[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] Blue are hey. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] So we do we are doing >> all right. Thank you. >> Um good afternoon everyone. Um thank you today. >> Wait a minute. Wait a minute. >> Feedback. You hear that feedback? >> Feedback. I hear it now everybody. Okay, Dris. Okay, Chris, I see you. >> Okay, I think we're we're set now, >> Amanda. Thank you so much. Okay, so I want this is the call to order and welcome. This Monday evening is a meeting for us to discuss the work that we've been doing in the committee setting. Um, and so I with that, I'd like to call this meeting to order. Let's begin to introduce ourselves to We'll start with our clerk, >> Ariel Smith, lead city clerk, >> Anthony Fox, interim city attorney. >> Renee Johnson, and I'm honored to represent the dynamic district 4. >> Oh, dynamic. Come on, dynamic. Um, Marjorie Molina, District 5. >> James Mitchell at large. >> Dimple at large. Biles, mayor. >> Marcus Jones, city manager. >> Malcolm Graham, District 2. Ed Driggs, District 7. >> Edwin Peacock, District 6. >> Lana Mayfield, council member at large. All right. Thank Thank you all for being >> Oh, I'm sorry. >> Hey y'all. >> Oh, Victoria Watlington at large. >> I think I've just seen Victoria on camera so long today. So, thank you. No, my apologies, Miss Watlin. Um, so we're going to um have we have had this opportunity, but I thought that we might go ahead and have an update from the city council workg group on appointments to the Metropolitan Public Transportation Authority. And I'm going to recognize the three members of that or I'll have the chair recognize the membership. >> Thank you, Mayor Council. Uh let let me recognize the three musketeers who who've been working uh feverishly on on this great assignment that the mayor gave us. Uh Mr. Ed Driggs, District 7, and the one and only council member Lana Mayfield at large. And so today, mayor and council, we gave a great presentation to the uh transportation plan development. Through that feedback, I think we have even made the process better based on some recommendations we've made. So, the work work group and we're going to start off with Ken Liz. Uh, we're going to let the interim city attorney go through his presentation and then I will go through the workg groupoup recommendations. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, Mayor. >> Usually, good afternoon, mayor, members of council. Uh, Liz is teeing up the presentation that will talk to you about the transit authority board of trustees appointment overview. Um first of all this um the composition of the board of trustees for the uh new authority should the referendum pass will have 27 members uh appointed by various the city the county uh six towns the state and state government leaders. Uh the city has 12 of those 27 members. However, the city's appointments are regulated by statute and the statute provides that three of those appointments are recommendations of two of the business alliance, one of the foundation for the Carolinas. There's also an appointment um that that the a requirement that one of the appointments uh appointees must have small business experience. And then the um the next uh condition that's imposed is one that was agreed to by the city and the county pursuant to a memorandum of understanding that was entered into the uh into by the parties a while back and under that agreement there was a commitment that one of the appointments for the city as well as one for the county will be an active catch user. The eligibility requirements that the clerk and I will review for all applications are those that are set out on the screen. One, uh any applicant must be a resident of Meckllinmberg County. Uh then two, um there it provides that no elected officials um no current elected officials may be appointed. This the statute in the act specifically provides that no uh no elected official sh uh may concurrently serve on the board of trustees of the new authority and um the new authority membership on that board will be a product of eventually identification but appointment and swearing in and that's not likely to occur until sometime in December before that final process will occur. the uh pay act does not speak to uh any pre prerequisites other than what I've mentioned previously as to the appointment process or any criteria. The other last one was that no lobbyist uh can serve uh or be a member of the authority or any family member of lobbyist. Now when you turn to experience and qualifications, the PAVE Act is specific as to um what um members uh to the of the board of trustee shall have by way of demonstrated experience or qualifications and it requires that they must have demonstrated experience or qualifications in the areas that are set out there on the screen. Those areas include law, finance, engineering, public transportation, urban planning, logistics government architecture or economic development. The act does not go into any definition of what uh what constitutes law, finance, engineering. And so that's going to be within the framework of this body to decide as they review the applications. With regards to experience and qualifications, the most um asked question has seemed in the discussion I've witnessed has been around public transportation and what constitutes demonstrate experience and qualifications in the area of public transportation. We can only as a court will do look to a definition of what public transportation is. And there's a definition uh on the screen that provides that public transportation is a system of trains, buses, etc. that is paid for or run by government. The act does define public transportation system and that definition is uh within the act and I'll just call your attention to to that definition. While it's fairly long, it does talk about, you know, things that may be expansive for your view of what public transportation is and things like high perceived vehicles, micro transit, car pools or vampoos program, special transportation services that often run by transit systems can certainly fall within that. again that that's the only direction that the act gives you u uh for the use of those terms. the application process. Uh your clerk uh has developed uh an application process which aligns with the application process that this body has used for boards and commissions. Um save the only exception is that that there have been some provisions added to the application process that are dictated by the pave act. things like allowing the applicant to to speak to their qualifications in one of the enumerated fields to speak to uh their demonstrated experience in one of the enumerated fields. Um the window for applications uh is open now and it closes on the 13th of October and then the council makes appointments um on or by November 24th of 2025. I'll yield back to the council member. Uh any questions for interim city attorney? If there are none list, can you then uh prepare the work group? uh recommendations and we can share that with council. >> Thank you, Liz. >> So, Liz, if you can go ahead and turn to the first slide if you don't mind. Just remind people how we got here. Mayor LZ appointed a work group and email on September 26. Uh she challenged her divine a process for council to approve appointments by November 8th. U she twisted my arm and asked me to be chair and I told I need my sidekicks council member Driggs and Mayfield and the work group. We reported to the TPD today and got a lot of feedback from the committee that I'm I'm I will share with you later on. So here's the framework for us. Applicants must reside in the Charlotte city limits. Stephanie Kelly, thank you so much. She's been notifying those applicants who only uh reside outside the city. They need to apply for the county city council. We have 12 appointees total. Uh we're recommending two mayor appointments and seven council appointments. One must have small business experience and one must be a active cats user perou. And then we have some partners who are joining us as part of the appointment process. The business alliance will have two and foundation of the Carolinas will have one. Council Graham, you brought up a good point to make sure we communicate with our partners and I have made calls and ask that both of them will make their appointments prior to council on November 10th. October 13th, as the interim city attorney mentioned, application closes and the city clerk will continue to coordinate with the county clerk to identify any applicants that apply for both city and county. More recommendation. The work group, we're very clear on what expertise and talent that we're looking for based on the payback. As you can see, law, finance engineering public transportation, urban planning, logistic government architect and economic development. Part of our conversation then were, and I give council member Mayfield a lot of credit. What would be our guiding principle? And one thing with seven appointees, we have seven districts rep. And so we would like district representation be part of our guiding principle. Definitely a transit rider and someone who use it. And more important, the skills. Council member Jurg reminded us that this authority is like setting up a corporation. So let's make sure we have the right skill sets to be to to manage uh an authority. Next slide. So October 16th we will share all the application that will be verified with the full council. And then here's the hard work and let me thank our work group in advance. October 20 through the 31st, we have allocated 52 hours to schedule interviews for applicants, 25 minutes per applicant with a 20 minute uh Q&A questions and a five minute for us to do the evaluation. We have reserved already room 278 and 280 here at the government center for the applica for the interviews to take place. Council member Johnson, you brought up a good point earlier today about transparency and so we going to set this up like a committee meeting. So it would be a virtual options for people to view the uh view the interview. We we want to show flexibility. We know some can meet between 8:00 to 5:00 but then we need to set up some evening hours. And so when you look at our schedule, we have two evening uh days per week. Uh October 20 24th then October 27th through the 31st. It is our goal then this work group will will provide recommendation to the full council on November 6th for you to have considerations. Then November 10th uh we will have nominee uh nomination our business meeting with a November 24th final vote. And at that particular time we should know the Charlotte Regional Business Alliance as well as the foundation for the Carolinas discussions any questions for the work group. Miss Asameir, >> go back to the previous slide. >> So would we before we vote, would we know who is appointed by the Alliance and Foundation? >> Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. >> And how about the mayor mayoral appointments? >> Uh yes. >> So we would know ahead of time. >> Ahead of time. And so we make to to and I give the committee credit because they said we want to make sure if there's gaps then that would help council make the right appointment. >> Right. Exactly. Would we know >> some board >> county commissions appointees or no? >> So they don't point uh point to December the 3rd. >> December the second. So we're going first. The county won't point to December the 2nd. >> Got it. Well, theirs is outside of the city. So >> exactly. >> Okay. And that's the point Council Member Mayfield brought up because and on your desk, council members, you have as of today 71 applicants >> have already submitted applications and we think that there'll be probably up to about 90 when all said and done by Monday. >> Oh, that's all I have. Thank you. >> All right, Miss Watlington. >> Great. Okay. I just had a um question about the business appointments process-wise. Are those appointments going to happen through our process or are they just going to be something that they handle external? >> Oh, I'm sorry. Which ones? >> The business appointments like before >> Oh, no. They will handle their own process. Business alliance and founders of Carolina. Yes, ma'am. >> We will know before we >> We would know before who they selected, but they have their own process. >> Okay. And I'm just curious, how is that recorded? How is that required? >> Because I mean I can reasonably understand how hours will be made and recorded via the public record and the counties and the legislators and the governors, but then for the private organizations, where does that like procedurally, where does that go? >> So, so I'm going to try to take a stab and Stephanie, you correct me. I think we we will receive those nominations and then she will have it for the record. Those that were received from the foundation from the business alliance. >> Did I get that correct? >> Yeah. Okay. >> All right. Thank you. >> Oh, I ate my weedies this morning. >> I'm sorry. I just want to understand. So, >> did I understand this correctly? So, everyone will apply to the city and then the alliance and the foundation will have their application packages. >> Yes. So, the alliance will have two appointees. Foundation Caroline will have one and they will have their own process separate from ours. >> Oh, so okay. So, our process >> just strictly for if you stay in districts one through seven. Garn >> just for clarification because I don't even know if I realized that. Um, so the alliance will actually appoint from this list. >> No, no, no, no, no, no. >> Oh, oh, okay. I thought so. That so this list is just us and then they have their own separate and apart. Okay. >> As well as the county and all of the other >> So, let me reiterate that. That's a good point. >> Yes. So, Foundation of Carolina would appoint one and the Charlotte Reigns will appoint two and they have their own process separate from ours. >> Okay. >> My my colleague Council Mitchell, >> thank you. Following up, Council Mitchell, and so that we're all on the same page, what we have recognized is that we may have individuals that have applied and shown interest through all the bodies, through the state, through the county, through us, through the alliance, through foundation. The reason since they have according to the payback these designated seats, that's why we're working with them to find out who their people are. So if those names pop up on ours, we know that they've already been identified. So along with the ones that we have highlighted here that are outside of the city Charlotte proper limits, that way we can make sure that we're looking at a clean sheet of individuals so that we don't make the mistake of identifying somebody that's already been identified in another space. And that was also part of the conversation in committee this morning regarding the mayor's appointments. We want to know so that we can one be very transparent as well as very intentional about who is going to be the voices that are representing the city of Charlotte. So even though they have their own process just like the state did and they just announced their people, we know that we shouldn't see those people's names pop up on our list. >> And let me add another note just and council member Johnson about this. I think it was an excellent point. Starting tomorrow at 4:00, all names that have applied will be on our website. And so are they there now? Oh. Oh, gone Stephanie. So they're there now. So, if you if you go to apply uh for this board and there's another button you can click, you can see all 71 names. So, going forward, it'll be updated every day at 4 p.m. >> Where can we find it? >> It's on uh Stephanie gave it to >> Stephanie tell. >> Go ahead, Stephanie. council, you can find the web the uh link that includes that PDF at the um where people go to apply for board. So if they go to city clerk apply for a board, there's a icon on there that says list of MPTA applicants and it's a PDF of current applicants. >> You going to repeat that? >> Stephanie, can you come up in the microphone? Yes. Thank you, Council Member Johnson. I'm I'm sorry. You can go to the city clerk's website where you go to find out information about applying for advisory boards and commissions and click on that link and there is a icon there, a button there that says a list of MPTA applicants. >> Thank you, Stephanie. Thank you, Council Johnson. Council Graham, >> thank you. Um um Council Member Mitchell, I want to thank the steering committee for the work they've done thus far. I I think it's good were a couple of questions. Um just for clarification and one is to the attorney. We talked earlier today uh in reference to the council having the ability to withdraw names once appointed for for whatever reason we want to uh take back a a recommendation um a nominee that serves on the board that we can and that hypothetically if the mayor made an appointment we wanted to call back a member for reasons we could does that also apply to the and the mayor will make the reappoint >> right Does that also apply to the alliance and the foundation in those three appointments? >> I I think the termination might apply but uh the ability to reappoint would still fall within them. I need to look at the act specific for the termination. I don't think it limits termination to any particular group. It just gives the council the ability to terminate because even though uh the process provides that all the names of those three parties come through the council but you must make you must follow their recommendation. That's fine and that's the only thing it provides. >> I just want to put that on record that we do have that ability. >> Uh but they will have to make a reappoint for for whatever reason for cause we we we decide that a particular member needs to be recalled. we can do that but that appointment body will make a subsequent reappoint to an individual and so thank you um and also I want to thank you Mr. chairman for moving so quickly in in reference to reaching out to some of the um other organizations have been making appointments. I think it's really really important that we kind of know their appointments so that we can fill gaps, right? And so I'm not sure have you talked to our good friend Governor Stein yet, but we we it would be nice to for him to do follow suit so we can kind of know uh how the table's being set so we can fill in those gaps as well. So, thank you very much for for moving on that um so quickly. Uh and then secondly, while we have 70 applications, I know you've already and we talked about this that we want quality over quantity, >> right? So 70 sounds good, but we need to make sure that those individuals really meet the test um for for service. Uh because it's going to be a lot of work the first year and a half, two years. It's going to be a lot of work. And so we need to make sure people understand that this is not a fluff board. It's going to be a working board for the first two years setting up the administration of this organization. So I love the numbers, but I hope that you and your committee will really scrub down to to separate the best from the rest. And I think the interviewing process will alleviate that and hopefully council members can come and be a part of that. >> That's right. um because we all have different criterias, different things are important to us in reference to selecting an individual member. So, I think the process makes sense. Thank you for your work and I look forward to supporting it. >> Thank you, Councilman Graham. >> Council member Graham, I just want if I can follow up with you. I found a specific language in the PAVE act as it relates to removal and it says each member of the board of the board of trustees may be removed with or without cause by the appointing authority. So since we are the appointing authority for the 12 members then we would have the ability to remove a member with or without cost >> and then that hypothetically echoes the foundation that we recall they would then reappoint a new member. then they will be appointed. >> Thank you, >> Miss Johnson. >> Thank you, Madame Mayor. Earlier, I thought that I heard you say that you all that the committee would do the interviewing and then you would present the top three candidates to full counsel. Is that what No. >> Okay. >> No, >> we have not settled on a number yet. No. Well, top X council are are are you are we suggesting that this committee will make the final recommendations or will at some point all of council members be able to ask those questions because that was one of the concerns that was shared earlier that we would want to be able to ask questions of candidates as well. >> So, so let me address the first part. Councilman John, I don't think we've came to a number how many we would recommend. I think we're going to be a recommendation slate. >> Okay. But still council has the ability like we do the normal process to vote for whoever they would like. But we we least wanted to let you all know we have vetted and this is a slate that we think would make a good authority. >> Okay. So in other processes the work group would make the recommendations for the slate and then the full council would interview the members of the slate. not the full council. The the work group will be doing the will be interviewing the candidates. Council's invited to attend the interview or the point you brought up earlier earlier if we want an option to view it virtually. >> Okay. I I I would I would want to if you all want to interview the slate and then maybe recommend recommend x number of people three to five people and then they come before full counsel I mean this process was defined by a small group of individuals not the council so is there room to tweak yes there's room to tweak the process >> okay >> so what what >> she can you can advocate for anyone on this list that you want to even If they say that's right that they got people not taking away your ability people on here or someone you see you can you can advocate for them. >> Exactly >> right. But that that's Thank you. But that wasn't my question >> or the process suggested. I think you all understand what I'm saying. I mean we've done it numerous times. We just did it uh we just followed the process for the city attorney. So if there were a work group and then once there are identified leaders or the top of the pack then when is full counsel going to have the opportunity to interview those individuals? >> Oh you want to I don't think and I look at the work group I don't think we factor in let's say for example seven names we bring back and you and then you want the entire council to interview just the seven we recommending. Oh, >> I don't even think we packed that in. >> So, James and Council Member Johnson, I want to make sure that I think I'm hearing you. and James Ed we did actually talk about this but just briefly in discussion as far as when that 52 hours that's been identified for the interviews that is the time because again we were trying to be respectful of people jobs family whatever for you to be a part of the interviewing process my expectation was that that is the opportunity for full counsel to be a part of the interview process to ask questions. I was not under the impression that we were going to bring you all back a slate. We've done the bulk by identifying here's the criteria that the payback identified. Here's the criteria that we've identified focusing on the city having the conversation and negotiating instead of three and six for us to be able to have seven and two because we really only had nine seats, not really 12. So, how do we be as representative as possible and having seven seats? Now's the time where based on whether it's the morning, the afternoon, or the evening or when someone can block out that whole day to be a part of all of them to actually do the interview process and score on your own because this is just a snapshot. Each of these applications and Stephanie correct me is seven pages. So 70 plus plus a resume. >> So 70 plus as of today, potentially 100, seven pages each. What are some of the criteria on the front end to help streamline this process? And then deciding as a body what attributes are we looking for and how do we try to identify for me gender parity, ethnicity par, age par, demographic parity as well as someone that not only has some of the skills but also as a bus rider. Not just for when you're coming up town for entertainment purposes. someone that actually utilizes it for your main form of transportation. So, I was thinking that here we presented the initial, but when it comes time for the actual interview process over that 52 hours that we've said we've committed to, mainly they've committed to 52 hours. That's when all of council gets to be a part and we do similar to what we recently did and do our own little scoring as far as hey is there someone that was a standout for you in district 4 based on the skill set the different districts because honestly that if we have if we agree with the type of who is our ideal representatives and the diversity of that ideal representative that would help to lead the conversation. But it I didn't think that there was an expectation that three of us was going to narrow down 70 to 100 people and bring back to y'all. Here's 20 that we think you should look at. Pick seven. We did our part with this presentation, but now is the next step is the actual interviewing, which again we've committed up to 52 hours. We're going to make sure all the times are available, but that's when full counsel gets to be a part of the interview process and we get to do the way we broke it down. We get to actually have discussion about the individual and do our own little scoring, >> right? >> If that helps. >> I I want to make sure Miss Mayfield is saying that any council member can come in to this process with having any kind of conversation that you want to have, a deeper conversation. if you just want to check off the boxes. So, I think that's really the date and time for the full council to begin >> over 52 hours. >> 52 hours, right? >> 52 hours. >> So, um I had Miss Dimple Meshmeira and then follow that Miss Watlington and then Miss Brown. I want to make sure that I'm clear as to what this working group is doing. So from what I understand that you are interviewing all the applicants that applied. Is that >> I mean I know that council members can attend if they want to but the working group is interviewing all applicants. Is that correct? Um, I think our original intention as we talked about it was that we would identify >> the people that we thought were most likely to end up being finalists. But any member of council who doesn't see a name they like on that list would then nominate someone else. Okay. I don't think we're going to interview every single person because there will be some who are obviously really not very competitive. >> But but nobody's going to be excluded that another member of council wants to put forward. Okay. So, you will all provide us a list and enough time >> and the times >> and enough time to make sure that we can add if we want to uh add an individual. >> So, and take a step further, Miss Amir, our goal, we're going to meet this week. So, our goal is to have that list ready by Friday and so council can see who is scheduled for interviews. >> Got it. And how long is the interview slot for per person? So, uh, 20 minutes for Q&A and then 5 minutes for us to do the evaluation. >> Totally 25. >> So, I wanted to follow up on something that council member Graham uh, brought up termination. So, can you go back to the slide where you got the city appointments 12 and then I think it was one of the first slides. >> Yeah. So, I just want to make sure I understood this correctly. So, let's say out of um h in a hypothetical scenario we have city has 12 appointments total if technically it's not 12 it's seven because well 7 + three by the mayor or two by the mayor so technically it's nine um so Mr. Fox you mentioned that so let's say if we want to recall one by business alliance for an example would would it go back to the business alliance or would it come to the city >> alliance >> well the removal provision is only a paragraph long in the act so it doesn't get into great specificity about removal. It just gives and confers upon the appointing authority the ability to remove. Um if you remove though then you go back to how do you appoint? The appointing is specific under the PAVE act in that the alliance has the ability through our process to recommend a person or individuals for appointment and the act provides that we must we must appoint those people as recommended by them. >> So it will go back to the appointment process. So, it'll go back to the >> alliance, >> right? >> Okay, Miss Watlington, >> thank you. Um, that helped answer my question. Just for reference, I see it under 907 C is where it says that that it goes back to the appointing authority charged with the responsibility for making such appointments pursuant to section 905. >> Um, so yeah, it'll go back to the >> alliance, but it sounds like we could end up in a d loop if we keep saying nope, nope, nope. But that's neither here nor there. Um, two things. >> Uh, as it relates to this interviewing process, the sense that I got and I just want to I know we we've talked about a few times, but I still feel like there's a couple of different versions floating around. I just want to make sure that every person who meets the basic requirements here, lives and has filled out the application to speak to their qualifications as outlined here, is entitled to an interview. That's not >> No. Uhuh. >> They said no. >> And so that for me is a little I struggle with that simply because >> So doc, let me see if we can meet you halfway. Our goal was try to and Councilman Graham touched on it. Try to go through all the applicants and try to pick out what we think is the quality of people who serve on authority. We will show that list to the whole council. M >> if you see someone on the list who you think should be added then you can send us an email and say I think John Doe needs to be added part of the interview process. >> And so we not taking away opportunities but the work group has agreed to kind of roll up our sleeve and kind of vet and make sure we have quality people moving forward. >> And so we will see all of the applications in their entire >> all seven pages and the resume. Yes, you would still see those on November the 10th. >> Okay. Okay. And then um thank you for that clarification. And then the only other thing that I wanted to lift up that because I think you captured um the items that were laid out in the committee this morning. Um the only other one is one that I brought up earlier I want to make sure that I raise. I just I have not seen it in here specifically legal authority to give our appointments to a mayor seat. And so if the if the group is good to move forward, I can support. But I just want to lift up that I would not be surprised if that was some challenge at some point simply because the spec the specificity within which these appointments were made down to the the business community. you have to make this appointment upon the recommendation of so and so. So to give appointments away to another body, I just think that we we maybe have a risk there. But and I've heard what the attorney said earlier today, but again, I think this is a little bit different than simply determining whether or not we're going to whittle down the list through a subgroup or not. So I just wanted to put that on the record. But I think um those are all of the >> that last part when you say giving it to another body. >> Yeah, sure. when we what I'm talking about is that the here I'll just pull it up that way it's directly from the and mayor I just for the minutes I just asked Dr. Wington to clarify her last points of giving it to another body. I want to make sure I'm understanding. Yeah. So down here in the appointments, so in 905, wait, hold on. Yeah. Yeah. 905 where it talks about the appointments and it says 12 members appointed by the governing body of the largest municipality in the county that created that authority, which would be the city council, who's the governing body of the largest municipality in the county, the city of Charlotte. At least three of these appointments must be made upon the recommendation of an entity that represents business interest in the county. So, we've already talked through that, but uh obviously the appointment itself is made by the raising of the council's hand based on a recommendation. At least one of the remaining nine appointments by the governing body must be an individual that has experience owning or operating a small business as identified or excuse me as defined in subdivision one of the subsection and then two members and then it goes into the general assembly. So what I'm talking about here is where it says 12 members appointed by the governing body with the business community even though they have the recommendation the actual appointment is made by the governing body. And so when I hear that we are saying that we want to allocate two seats to be appointed by another body i.e. the executive office the mayor that feels like a departure from what's here. And again, I I'm prepared to support, but I just am lifting up that this feels like a risk here. >> So, for clarification, and attorney Fox, you can help with this because in my interpretation is that because we are a council manager, form of government, the mayor is part of the council. So because previous the um our current board >> appointment process gives the mayor's office, whoever the mayor's is, the mayor is the mayor's office a third of the votes. So that's why it was three votes and us having six. But what we did was reach out and have a conversation with the mayor to say, "Okay, two instead of what traditionally has done been done with our board process of what she agreed to which gave us the ability to have seven seats instead of six seats." Thank you. >> So I would say to that to and I spoke to this a little bit this morning. The difference to me with that is that our other governing boards or our other boards and commissions either having the bylaws of a nonprofit that you'll have this seat or we ourselves are deciding what the composition of that board is. And so that to me is clearly within our authority to decide where those seats come from. Um, but it sits somewhere in a document. Even on boards like um the housing authority that have appointments from different bodies within their governing structure, it says where those appointments come from. And so that's totally fine. In this case, I'm saying if this is that document, I don't see it here. And as it relates to the mayor being a member of council, I think that the definitions in general statute 160 would indicate that those are two different offices. I think what >> but again like I said just a risk. Go ahead. I'm sorry. >> Yeah. What you're doing you're parceling out the actual action of this body. >> The action be it two from the mayor and nine uh and seven from the council will be the governing body's action that will be forwarded on as well as the three from the authority that will be the action of the governing body. it. I I I understand what you're what what you're looking at. You're looking at the power of the mayor versus the power of the council and you're looking at the the wrote language of this which talks about the governing body making appointments. But the go but the act also allows each of the appointing authorities to establish the appointing process consistent with what their practices are. The practice here has been from a traditional perspective to allow the mayor to have some appointments. The as I would see it though, the mayor if if this actually were to pass, the mayor would appoint two people. Those two people would be joined in with the the people appointed by this council and that would represent the action of the governing body going forward. So, similar to what's in here with the business group, would it be upon a recommendation that ultimately the like why wouldn't it follow the process the same way that because I see where you're coming from. I'm just offering a suggestion. Could it be then just like where it says at least three of these appointments made upon the recommendation of an entity that represents business interest. So, obviously the official act is us raising our hand based on their recommendation. But just for consistency sake, could we follow that same process? I I I think the action would be at at the point in November 24th when you would forward this on to the newly to the newly formed uh transit authority that that action would be as an act the city of Charlotte governing body appoints the following individuals and there would be 12 of those people. Three of which would have been the recommendation of the chamber. two, if this pass would be the recommendation of the mayor and the remainder would be the recommendation of the council. >> Okay. >> Okay. Miss Brown. >> Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Um, there's been a lot going on. So, for the record, I I'm don't support it at all. I'm a no. A big no. But I want to know um from all the information that I'm hearing from people reaching out to me >> and I I'll be advocating for no in November as well. But so the PAVE Act shows that you get two appointments. >> Okay. I'm asking cuz I'm >> I'm sorry. >> Yes. Uh I think and correct me city attorney 27 positions have to be appointed and we have 12 and if we don't appoint that 12 they still going to set up an >> Dr. Watlin is researching that for me since I just got out. >> They they still will set up an authority. >> Okay. All right. Got that. No problem. And so for you Miss Molina I see your name is number one on the list. I love you and I think you're amazing and all of that but this is a red flag for me. I'm just >> ask you to speak to it or >> No, I'm just making a statement. I'm just making for me it's a red flag. Um some people have some concerns about that and I would be less than the council representative for the people if I didn't ask. And so with that being said, they've said where's my other question at? Are you going to recuse yourself from the list or are you going to move forward with trying to be appointed? >> Oh, okay. >> That's a question for you. >> Oh, okay. So, first I I'd like to speak to why I'm on the list. I think that makes the most sense. Um, I'm currently the vice chair of transportation planning and development for the city of Charlotte and I have a few years of knowledge base that can be absolutely beneficial to this body that I mean I you know with the I have a day job so they they're not even paying money to do this. This is literally me on my own accord saying I have four years of knowledge base where I've actually contributed to this conversation in a leadership role and I'm willing to offer my time to translate on this body so that there could be continuity in that knowledge base. I could retire it and go home >> um and spend that time making good money and spending it with my children which I'm tempted to do based on how this conversation goes. Um but I so I have to recuse myself I believe um because of what would be considered a conflict. In other words, I can't vote on myself, right? So if if I'm one of the people who are selected by this body to move forward, then I would actually have to recuse myself, which actually I' I've been weighing since I you know because the reason why I'm at the top of the list is because I was the last person to apply. It actually they're in order by date. So that's why I'm at the top because I just applied on October 5th. Um, one of the things that is a challenge for me is even in order to contribute my knowledge base because of the overlap in time, I have to give up my right to vote, which is more important in some cases than it is for me to actually be on >> right to vote in November. >> Well, no, no, the right to actually vote on the actual candidates once they're decided by the steering committee. So the steering committee is going to bring us some suggestions and then we have a right to go and see those interviews if we choose when they go through the interview process. I can't even be a part of that because potentially I could actually be an interviewee. Um so not only would I it it's it's a risk for me because it actually I I risk losing my voice to offer my information. Um and I I risk being a part of the process. So, it's it's something that um again I I this isn't about I I don't need any more titles. I got all the titles I can take. I got a lot of education. I think we've done great work over the last two terms. I'm very proud of that work. But I can also contribute to this body because I actually currently sit in a leadership role and it'll be over on December the 1st. and the articles of incorporation for this body won't even happen until weeks later. So there's there's only about a week overlap from the time that the council will make this decision and the time that I will no longer be a council member. So it's about a week or two okay left. >> All right. So yeah, so this information is not for me. It's for constituents. >> No, I get it. I'm just asking the questions from the constituents. So your accolades, you know, that's fine. You are a phenomenal black woman. I don't I don't deny that. It has nothing to do with the questions that the constituents are asking me to ask and that's why I'm asking them. I asked one for the mayor. I asked one from you. I can understand why people would say no though. It's been a lot of chatter this morning. It seems like a lot of confusion at this dayish right now and so I can understand why people are are some people are saying no and me being one of them. >> Well, I don't think they said no because of me. I think they said no because Oh, I just want to make sure that >> that's not what I said. I said the confusion. >> Okay. I didn't say saying no because of you, Molina. I'm just saying I'm speaking and whether people like it or not. I'm going to do that in the way that I want to do it because this is my voice. I have one of the 11 around this day is >> until December the 1st. And so I'm going to exercise my right to the fullest. So that's that's all I have. >> All right. I think >> Well, she can speak and then Oh, actually, it probably be fitting for me to follow up. Sorry, I was gonna say if you could. >> So, um I I guess um you know, while we were talking about this, I want to make sure that I'm clear. Um I got the language. I spoke to Dr. Watlington today because there was some confusion in the language of what was actually said and it said that a council member cannot serve concurrently as they serve on this board. So there is no concurrent service um in me assuming this volunteer role um after being on council. Um like I said, it's it's it's one of those things where I I may even still walk away from this and and take my knowledge base home. Um it's it's it's a possibility. Um but I I do have um in both my public work and my private sector work um something that would be extremely valuable um from my years of work on the council and primarily of being vice chair of the actual transportation board for our city. So, um, but that is in no way meant to try to there's always these narratives that just, you know, try to twist things and turn them into things that they're not. This isn't something that you're getting paid for. There's no pay for this. This is literally I'm saying that hey we got this very important board and I understand it very intimately because I've been an intimate part a very close part of the conversations and I'm willing to continue that service. So um this is also a decision. It doesn't automatically qualify me. So, if that is, you know, the will of this council or even another entity, then I'm I'm willing to at this point, um, at this moment, unless that changes, be considered for that. Um, and I I'll leave that there. >> Thank you. >> Your accolades are amazing. Again, the question was not a personal attack. >> I understand, >> but I the narratives that you said, I would have to come back on you with that because >> I mean, it's not for you in particular. So don't take this as a shot. This is something that like you said, >> we had the conversation in committee this morning. Yes, ma'am. >> And there were other colleagues around the table that had very similar concerns, okay? Like what would it mean? You know, what did the language say? So you're not the only one. I don't want to feel or make you feel as though I'm singing, you know, singling you out. I think it's a valid concern because I am sitting here with you. But the reason why, you know, I could potentially be also a good candidate to participate in this is because I have been sitting here with you and I have been in leadership around the transportation conversation. And so being willing to translate that into this board um among other leaders, I think could be valuable for the city and the continuity of information in our city and the region. So that's why I put my name in the hat, of course. But again, this is a selection process. I would be, you know, and and I could apply for the county and not even have to go through this. And they actually would select after I'm off the council. So, it would even be much easier for me to say, "Hey, county, you know, do this." But I I think in all transparency, first, I wanted to make sure that you knew that I was willing to offer myself in this level of continuity because that's important. In the in the spirit of transparency, you know, I I probably may even consider the county, but I I don't know yet. But I think like I told Dr. Watlington, I think the strongest endorsement, it's like any job that you have, the strongest endorsement are the people that you've actually worked with. So to say that I've stood among other people in the application process and if I am these people earn a right to sit in that seat and I'm properly qualified and it's an endorsement of my colleagues and I think that's more powerful. >> Thank you for your full explanation. Thank you, >> Miss Esmeir. >> Yes, thank you. A couple of questions. So, for the working group, yes, ma'am. >> As part of your process, will you be making recommendations uh for the mayor as well as the council appointments? >> Not for the mayor appointments, just for the council appointments. >> So, you'll be making seven recommendations. >> Yes. >> Okay. and and council can just like any other board, council doesn't have to follow those recommendations. They can select whoever they like. Okay. Um so was there any conversation about recommendations for the mayoral sports to mayoral sports? >> No, there there was not. I you know I think we was trying to go by what's in the advisory handbook uh that the mayor has one-third appointments and we don't have any feedback with the mayor currently now. So we was trying to model that same behavior. >> Okay. And so this question is for Mr. Fox. um in anywhere in the PAVE Act, does it say anything about the authorities board and uh possible compensation or does it strictly say it's a volunteer role? >> It doesn't say volunteer and it gives the authority the I believe the ability at some point to set compensation if they choose to. There's nothing in the act that currently sets any compensation for any board members. >> Okay. So authority could choose to have a compensation. >> Yes, they could. >> Nothing prevents them from doing so. >> Right. >> Okay. I think that needs to be a factor. Okay. Into consideration as we're making appointments. Um well, that's all I have. I'm sure I'll have more questions. I'll come back to you, Mr. Attorney. That's all I have. Thank you. >> All right. Do you want to wrap is there's there is Does anyone else want to have comment? I mean, Mr. Mitchell, do you want to wrap this up? And Okay. So, so mayor and council here here's I would say um we on a fast track to participate that I think something is very important for our region and for our community and so uh no is this a perfect system is not but I do think it's a system that will work and it has the flexibility of getting a recommendation but also it doesn't take away your power to vote for someone you would like to be on authority and I say that to say so I hope that we can get everyone one to agree that we need to move forward uh with the process and so we can participate and make sure I 12 are part of the authority. >> So with that I do believe that I wondered if we should have a motion and a vote so that we can move forward I think from the discussions that we've had today so that we codify this um process. So, um, >> mayor, I'd like to enter a motion that we accept the workg group, uh, process recommendation to make our appointment to the MPTA. >> Second. >> We have a second for that. And I think we've had a lot of discussion, but if there is anyone that would like to have further discussion. >> All right, Miss Johnson. >> Thank you. So, uh, it's just maybe the news is different in district 4. I don't know. But we have a challenge, guys, with perception and with transparency. And I just think we should have worked overtime and double time um to make sure we that we were moving forward forward with a transparent process. And um like I said earlier, the work group wasn't a council directive that that came from the mayor's office. The fact that we're pulling two of our appointees for the mayor's office. Um the the fact that and with all you know with all due respect the gray area of a of a council member and the overlapping time member it's more of the same and people are tired. So I won't be supporting this process. Um yeah I won't be supporting the process. I again I don't think that we've listened to the community enough even for the the tax. So, I won't be supporting the process. Thank you. >> Understood. Thank you very much, Miss Mayfield. >> Thank you. I would just like to ask a clarifying question of council Johnson. Do you have a recommendation of something other? >> Something other than us receiving an email that there was a work group. Yes. >> So, that's why I'm asking for it right now. Do you have a recommendation of a process? because right now based on the mandate from the North Carolina General Assembly, we have a very short window that we have to make our appointments. So that's why I'm asking if you have a recommendation of what you would look like so that we can try to figure out how to move forward because one of the questions that I ask the interim city attorney is, okay, what if we don't get cuz we we thought about any potential scenarios. What if we don't get to the point of moving this conversation forward and we don't get to our 7 12 whatever that number is and we don't get to our appointments. What happens then? That triggers a whole lot of other things based on the fact that North Carolina General Assembly sent back to us something that was very different than what we asked for. >> So if there's a recommendation of a better way for this to be done, that's what I would love to hear. Well, I talked about before I think that there should be a very open process. I've mentioned that before. Uh vetting the qualified candidates, putting them in categories, and then you could pull from a lottery system, >> a random drawing. So that's part of and I hear the concern as far as why was three people chosen to at least come back and bring a proposal but the recommend but the idea of saying okay between the 52 hours that gives everyone the opportunity to interview I wish that there was a space for us to actually come together with here's our top five criteria that we're looking for but let's have a real conversation for our regular meetings and for majority of the meetings, multiple people run anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes late. We all went through experienced something earlier this year because someone just had a whole lot of time on their hands to actually look into our attendance records to show that there were a number of people that were out. So I and me and Mayor La go back and forth every day all day and mo at least two three times on Sunday. So when the idea of okay what are we going to do? So, we're just making a recommendation, right? Okay. The recommendation is supposed to come back to full counsel, but there's a reality that we must acknowledge that people don't come to the regular meetings on time. You don't come to the committee meetings. And I'm not saying you individually, collectively, we can't be in on time at the meetings now. So, this was in an effort to try to do a good thing. It was not done in my personal opinion like a rump. Everybody got an opinion. So, this was not done with any malice or any disrespect. It was, "Hey, will a couple of y'all get together and start this process so we can move it along?" Sure, I don't have a life, so why not? Let's go ahead and spend a number of hours, but the expectation really was that, okay, we're not we got to have space for our colleagues. So, we're saying we'll commit to these 52 hours. I'm going to rephrase that. they going to commit to 52 hours and that way we got to make sure that everyone's voice is at the table. But if we ask Council Member Driggs and Council Member Mitchell, I actually asked that question of okay, well, how do we actually try to streamline this if we going to have 70 to 100 people that apply? What are we looking for? That's a space for full counsel to come around. And I think that part didn't get expressed. So, if there's a different process where you think we can come together within the next 72 hours when this application closes on the 13th, that's what I would really like to hear because hell, I want to support it. If it's going to if you ain't like this process, give me another process cuz it can't just be I don't like this. >> Right. But even the three of you, >> she just saw it today. >> Yeah. And even the three of you, the council wasn't asked uh they weren't we didn't all receive calls if you want to participate on this workg group. So again, there's I talk about the machine and how things are done. And so this this is why people are are frust frustrated and non-rusting of the process. And when you talk about quality candidates, um I hope that there's going to be a fact base or some type of rubrics or some type of scoring before uh we allow, you know, certain council members to say these aren't quality because we know that there can be some level of bias, right? Yes. >> So we need to Yeah. So we want to make a very fact-based um decision I before we eliminate individuals also. I would think. >> So just for clarification, does that mean that what you're saying is you're willing to help create this rubric that you're recommending that we use? >> Sure. >> Because Or you can use we we have a whole HR department. I mean, we can use very objective factors. So what we don't want to see is the same. It it just seems pre-esigned on who's going to be on the committee. >> I definitely don't disagree with you, >> Cmber Johnson. >> That in a dream world, just for clarification, in the dream world, we would have had 11 appointments and that way everyone would have at least their one to speak to. the four at large basically. So the two at large were saying, you know what, we gonna get seven the seven districts. We'll try to reach out to have a conversation with you to see if there's someone in the district that we know or if we have any insight. But that's what the hope of after this initial, hey, can we move forward? Then we have that conversation. But at the end of the day, the great thing is the way this system is set up, it takes six votes. So either six are going to move it forward or not. But we got to have some type of process before the general assembly comes in and try to appoint all 11. >> We have a motion on the floor. >> And you got a second. >> And we have a second. Yes, ma'am. >> And that's and I understand there was a dialogue and I think there was a but I think that right now we have >> discussion on the motion. >> Discussion on the motion. >> Discussion. >> Oh, I know council member Mayfield asked for feedback on the process. I I don't think we discussed this part but what I would like the working group to do is help us with this person meets this criteria finance this person meets engineering this person meets architecture this person meets public transit experience versus giving us recommendations you tell us you're giving us the facts to m to council member Johnson's point what we need is an objective process factbased you give us the facts let the council make a decision so that there is no preconceived motion of oh here's the candidate that it's sort of been oh this person is going to get appointed I I think what we are looking for is facts so right now I have no idea from this from all of these people which one meets what like >> so I think if we can have that instead of recommendations that would be helpful so that no one will feel like that DAC was stacked against them or any candidate. >> So I don't I don't I don't know. >> Yeah. So I would like to make a substitute motion that uh provides the council expertise fact-based uh that will tell us whether that person meets some of one of these criterias, whether that person meets small business background or public transit experience. And then based on the facts, the council will make the ultimate decision. No recommendations provided because I think that will take that subjectivity out of this process to council member Johnson's point. >> Second. >> Okay, we have a substitute motion. >> Any further discussion on the substitute? Mr. Driggs, >> um I I understand what the concerns are. what you're suggesting defeats the purpose. We can spend very little time and do a tabulation on a spreadsheet and circulate it to you and say, "Okay, guys, it's up to you. What's intended here is that thoughtful people, your colleagues will look and we'll try to make a preliminary recommendation. You're going to get all the facts and then you're going to get a little comments from us, just a recommendation. The goal is to try and help people zero in on where the strongest prospects are. Uh it doesn't exclude anything. It doesn't limit your ability. But personally, I don't see why you're better off not hearing the not getting the benefit of uh the work, the hours and hours that we're going to spend. You can come to every single interview if you want 50 hours, book the time. But otherwise we will have done that and we will have come back and there's a diverse group among the three of us and we will come back and just say this person in our mind is a writer has the stature satisfies Mr. Graham's priorities and so on and then you can disagree with that. I don't see how you're better off not knowing that. >> Yeah. So here is I I think that's where the subjectivity is because we are trying to take the subjectivity out of this process right what might be strongest candidate for you may not be strongest candidate for council member Johnson what might be strongest candidate for Dr. Watlington may not be strongest candidate for me. So we are trying to make this process as transparent as objective uh as possible. So I personally feel if you give us the facts I believe we are capable of making a decision. We are elected by the people um and I think we should be the ones making the decision. I get it that you're going to give us the recommendations and then we get to decide but that's that's already three uh that's already stacked against us and I just feel that's that's not the process that's factbased or that's not objective process >> so no interviews right no interviews >> so >> how does that work >> so here I'm going to break it down because I'm right I was just thinking about what council member Johnson raised and this is something that came to line that is >> are are you wanting this to be exactly like just a business advisory committee where just we have a lot of applications. That one seems to be a really popular one. >> Okay. I I think she still has the floor. Mr. >> I'm just asking her a question. I'm trying to figure out her substitute motion is I'm just trying to figure out >> because I think what she's saying is she doesn't want any filter at all. You want all the applications to come straight through. >> No, this is what I'm asking. I would like the working group to give us the facts and then this council will make the decision. So right now we need the categories. Uh you guys I mean interviews you can continue with it because the full council can participate. You're not telling us not to participate. So I don't think that process is subjective because we can all participate. You give us the time and say here here are the times these are the candidates that are coming. you're welcome to come and listen to them, which is fine. What I'm saying, we're not taking that pro that step out of the process. All we are saying is do not make recommendations. Let council make their own decisions based on the facts based on the interviews everyone heard and listened to. >> So, um, what is the outcome of the interview process? I'm sorry. I just >> Mr. Driggs actually Miss Ashmeir had the floor. Mr. Drizz has the floor and then you have the floor. Miss Watt Luton >> a certain number of people will be involved in the interviews and what are they going to do? Write down what this is what they said. We can provide recordings of the interviews and then not uh not opine any further. So you can have a package that has all of the data which is 500 pages and you can have 50 hours worth of recordings each one of you and then you can decide. I just don't understand why it isn't clear that if a hundred people apply for this, there are going to be some people among those applicants who are not going to make it to the final seven. Let's be clear. And uh that's all I have to say. If that's what you want, it's easier for us. I'm fine. >> Yeah. No, I I understand, but I respectfully disagree. I personally think this process needs to be as objective, as factbased, as transparent as possible so that council makes a decision. uh without any recommendations because I I just personally think that what might be important to three of you may not be important to the others. They might think that strongest person might meet different criteria from different districts. I I uh so I think this keeps the process fact-based. >> Okay, Miss Watlington. >> Thank you. um for me this convers Thank you council member Ajara for um for putting this on the table. I support your motion because I think you're exactly right. Um this what we've gone through here and what we experienced in the transportation committee meeting this morning to me is an exact example of some of the things that council member Johnson's talking about. We don't need you to explain to us the process. We understand what your intent is. What we're very clearly telling you is we don't want your recommendation without the facts for us to make our own recommendation first. So to me that's very clear. I think regardless of whether we're all in the interviews or not, it makes sense. I mean sure you can probably drop that in chat GPT and say read these people's applications and slot them in one of these c these categories, right? That can come ahead of the interviews. Uh, but I think it is very important that we don't start filtering people out on the front end. I I just don't think that is that is a fair process and I don't think it's necessary at this point. So, I'll be supporting your substitute motion. >> So, I the substitute motion is on the floor. Do we have a second? >> We have a second as well from Dr. Watlington. >> All All in favor? Um, Mr. Graham, >> you have a comment. >> Yeah, I I do. I thank you, Madame Mayor. Um, and two things can be true, right? Um, it it is it is we need a process that filters through the applications. Council member Mitchell said earlier today that the committee will um divide up the applications by categories. He said that at the transportation committee. So we can know which applicant fits which category. That would be a benefit to the council. It also would be a benefit to the council if we give them the authority uh to interview. and I'm not a member of the working group, but I think this is so important that I'm going to make myself available to attend if not all at least 90% of the interviews because I think Mrs. And the reason why I'm doing that because I think Miss Asher is right. What may be important to council member Mitchell may not be important to me. And I even at the committee meeting this morning laid out what's important to me. >> Yeah. >> Right. As these these are three questions that needs to be asked to satisfy me appointing someone. So I think we can do that for sure and I think we can accommodate what council member Ashmeir and Wallington are suggesting and J um uh Johnson that maybe it's not seven recommendations maybe it's 12 maybe it's 14 right these are the set of um uh applicants that meets the basic requirements through our interview process where every council member has the opportunity to attend and ask their particular question to give the council at least a body of folks to choose from. Right? So it may not be seven, maybe 12, maybe 14, maybe 15 and then have the council as we do through our norm normal um application process choose from that list. >> Exactly. >> Right. And so I think we can blend, council member Drees and Mitchell um Mayfield, we can blend the two a little bit to get to where we want to go. Uh this is really really important guys and the legislation didn't do us any favor and I said this before because it imposes a I think an impossible deadline that a lot of this got to be done by the end of the year if it passes. It's just it's just a lot going on, but we got to do it right. And I think we have to be very thoughtful about how we do it. We have to be very strategic about how we do it. That's why I think Council Member Mitchell, we need to have everybody place their cards on the table >> so we can fill in gaps where they exist. uh and really give all our council members the the feeling more than a feeling uh that they are a part of the process and that we're not hiding anything or uh that this thing's already baked. >> Um >> so I I would hopefully that there's a a way that we can blend this. Um and I think the substitute motion may accomp accomplish that maybe Mr. Mitchell, Mr. I would hope that the um idea around how we use technology that we're going to have a process that I think it was all of the people on this list has they have the opportunity to be interviewed if they should come in and talk and discuss it and that maybe at this place is that it's something that we actually have council members have the ability to see it virtually or sign up for any part of this because I know it can be a lot of work to get in and out of every place. But I think that what you're saying is that everyone should have the opportunity to have this discussion and have it in a way I believe that it's 20 minutes and five minutes and then you have fair fairness among everybody on this set for doing that. So, >> so there's a motion there's there's a a motion there's a substitute motion motion on the floor and >> and council member Graham made a suggestions I wanted to ask a follow-up question for clarification. So, Council Member Graham I just want to understand so you would like recommendations from the committee. Is that what you're asking for? I I think the committee can give us recommendations. I think we have seven appointments. I think we can go more than seven recommendations, right? And then allow the council to filter through 15, 16, I'm just throwing out a number, right? Based on those interviews, those criterias. And again, if everyone thinks it's really important that they would lean in and attend the meetings, right? That's that's the work, right? That's what we all signed up to do, right? That's the >> Would that require a friendly amendment maybe to >> That's what I'm thinking. Like I'm trying to figure out how many >> help me out. I'm trying >> how many recommendations that you are looking for council member Gram because here I'm trying to figure out a difference here. So over here one side no recommendation here they want to give seven seven recommendations. I'm trying to figure out what what is it that you're looking for because ultimately it's going to take the majority to move this forward >> if I can. I don't I think the substitute will will need clarification because I was talking with the clerk and we're trying to understand what is the what is accomplished in the substitute. So I think it needs to have some some meat on it. is the substitute to adopt the recommendation of this the committee but for uh making recommendations and only providing objective criteria on the pool of candidates uh that are being presented I I don't know you just need to >> yeah I think you nailed it you nailed it u we are okay with what the committee is doing in terms of the interview process what we would like to do at least for me is no recommendations made to the council where council will make a decision on who they would like to appoint based on the facts that's been provided and the category that it each candidate meets. >> Okay, this is important work for this this board because it's I mean it's going to set the future of this authority. You might want to then allow the committee to put it in buckets, maybe most qualified, qualified or least qualified in terms of categories but not rankings and still allow you as a council to select from within that that that coupling of the candidates that you want to do. And obviously that will include how those candidates otherwise qualify and the areas that they qualify in. and you know whether it's this is a candidate for law these are five candidates from law I don't know you you need to figure out that structure >> I hear what you're saying so I think that's where we have to define what most qualified means versus least qualified versus in the middle to make sure that the a decision is factbased again and then it's objective versus we are getting recommendations based on Um so there there's a lot that need to be worked out still. I I just feel that um >> I don't want to say anything else. I'm good >> um Mr. >> I just say you will get all the data. Everybody will have all the data, right? You can read or not read the recommendations. They're not binding. No, >> the idea is simply to provide assistance in reducing a large number rather than have 11 people look at a 100 applications. That's all. >> So, the application deadline is 10:13, right? >> Monday. >> That's a week from today. >> Yes. >> You're asking us to really get down in the weeds and and work out some process. Can we defer this vote for another week and then we work out the bugs and a process and then we can vote on it next week? We can I don't know if we leave the substitute motion hanging or how this works. >> I think we have a substitute motion on >> you know we want to be somewhere in the middle but you're asking for details today that I think we're taking a lot of >> I think that the attorney was suggesting a process that was not necessarily detailed. It was just defining buckets and whatever. That's that's what I heard him say. But if the application process is not even um over until next Monday, we can't do anything before then. >> All right. That is correct. >> That's true. >> But I a point of clarification. I just wanted to make sure that I was clear. >> It sounded in my opinion that you two were attempting to try to come to a consensus. And I think based on what I heard and maybe it was interpretive that you landed somewhere close to the same thing. You said that there was, you know, an ability to bring forward more than just seven and it not just be solely, you know, a recommendation by the three members of, you know, um, the board and you are asking for transparency in, you know, how those, you know, recommendations are being qualified, right? And I I agree with Council Member Graham. I believe both things absolutely can be true at the same time and I don't think we put a stipulation on that number. There may be, you know, between now and next week 20 people, 30 people who are qualified and I think if that means in this 52-hour window where they're 20 minute increments where they're attempting to try to be and and then it's over a certain amount of time as well, then any one of us that are interested and available to this process can be a part of and it's going to be streamed online. So, it's going to be available online for the public consumption. It any council member can actually be in the room. >> Um, all of the names are already online and and I get it. I I live in the same world as you guys do. I understand the need for transparency and we are bleeding when it comes to transparency and operation. And so, any opportunity that we can get to allow our trustees to say, "Hey, we want you to know what's going on." So I'm your point is not lost on me and I'm struggling with how to make sure that what you're asking which is absolutely valid in my mind you know how do we achieve what you would like to do and even taking the friendly amendment suggestion from council member Graham and saying we could do both I believe we could do both and I I'd like to even make a a friendly ask to you that you summate that say look there's no amount right if if at the end of this process they come up with based on these qualifications that they're 30 members, right? That for what and I'm just being hypothetical but not putting a limit on what that looks like and we have criterion that we have to pay attention to. So I think you like I said make a valid point in suggesting criterion if they're going to make a suggestion to us. There's no limit on the amount. It's all available to us. Again, it's streamed online. any one of the council members that are, you know, available to go to these meetings can and then the council can from Is that something that sounds correct, Council Member Mitchell? Um, help me so that we can because in my mind and maybe I'm hearing it differently, but it sounds like the two of them are almost there. Well, >> I go ahead. >> And and and I'm not sure we're going to solve this around the table tonight. And and and I and I think >> Council Member Johnson makes a a good point that, you know, we got another week. >> Council member Mitchell, I know you put a lot of work into it and so I'm just asking maybe that >> we use this next week >> Yeah. >> to really refine what you're what you hear tonight, right? and accommodate some of that so that we can all be on the same fitting on next Monday. >> And I I think there's a way for me, you Dimple, um Victoria to come together and put something together that makes sense for everybody. >> Yeah. >> And and and it's not that. And I think fairness to the council, we're just hearing this tonight. And so if we can put some furniture polish on it to make sure that everyone's comfortable with it and use this week to kind of talk and and kind of, you know, negotiate with one another to a point where we're all satisfied, I think it'll be a a couple of days well worth spent. >> Yeah. >> So we have a I just wanted I I was just going to suggest that Council Member Graham, you read my mind. I really like the idea that Mr. Fox suggested where we come up with some criteria as most qualified, qualified, least qualified like buckets. Uh that will help that would be fact-based, objective and as transparent as possible without putting the subjectivity of recommendations into the process. Uh so if we if the working group can consider that uh and bring back uh recommend bring back the process next Monday that would be helpful. >> It sounds like there's some appetite for a deferral. You have two motions. >> That's what I was going to say. We have two motions. >> We have two motions on the floor. We need to withdraw. >> So we have to withdraw the motion. Withdraw a motion to put something on the floor. The maker of the motion was council member Ashira and Miss Walton. You agreed to withdraw and then you want you make a substitute motion to defer. So I will withdraw my motion substitute motion and we'll make a motion to defer this to next Monday where we can finalize the process next Monday based on feedback from my colleagues >> and that feedback would go to the group that's working on this. Okay. All right. Is everybody clear on that? >> Yeah. I just want to make sure that whatever the process is takes into consideration objectivity factbased as transparent as possible. So we're taking this objectivity out of this process from the committee. >> Okay. >> All right. That's all I have. We have >> a motion. >> You had a motion and a second. >> Second. All in favor, please raise your hands. Anyone opposed? All right, that passes. Okay. Um now let's go for a next item which is an um the housing trust fund recommendations. Oh Mr. Driggs doing >> okay. So we I didn't I thought I had the housing trust fund to come up next. So >> all right. So the >> Yes, there will be committee report out. >> Yes, >> we're going to have committee report out. So, let's we'll start with this council committee discussions. >> Yeah, >> you had two agenda items. You were going to do the housing trust fund, then go back to the report. >> That's what I Okay, don't confuse. >> Okay. Cuz that was supposed to be part of the >> housing trust fund recommendations. Who's leading that effort? >> Is it this one? >> Mayfield. >> What we housing trust fun? >> Miss Watlington. >> Housing trust. Miss Mayfield. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Um housing trust fund. >> Recommendations. your chair right now. >> Well, she just pointed to her vice chair. >> So, y'all y'all work it out. >> Y'all are going to be eagles for the rest of the night. >> Do I do it now? >> Do we do it now? >> Yes. >> Okay. Mr. Mitchell, >> housing and neighborhood services is speaking. You're supposed to be doing something. Um, Madame Mayor, am I to understand that we're going to cover the rest of the update later on? >> We're doing that now. Item, the housing trust fund recommendations. >> Fantastic. Okay. Um, due to a potential conflict of interest, I'm going to have to request recusal from this conversation and the subsequent vote on October 2. >> I'd like to make a motion we recuse council Dr. Wallin from this conversation. >> Second. >> All right. Thank you. There's a motion on the floor that she be excu accu accused. excuse. >> Um, so all in favor, please raise your hand. Anyone opposed? No. And so we'll let you walk outside. >> Thank you so much. >> Next time I say I'm sick. >> All right. So, Miss Mayfield. >> Okay. So, I guess there we go. >> Now, so thank you everyone. We are going to try to be very brief because we want to be respectful of time. So, I am turning this right over to our director, Miss Rebecca Hefner. >> Thank you. And good evening, mayor and members of council. I'm Rebecca Hefner, the director of housing and neighborhood services. I have with me this evening Warren Wooten, the assistant director for affordable housing. Uh, and I just want to also acknowledge in the room um quite a few of our affordable housing um development partners who are here tonight. Uh none of this work happens without them. uh they have been working hard to um bring us proposals that are responsive to your investment priorities and your affordable housing funding policy. Um so I'm glad glad so many of them were able to join us tonight. Um if any if anyone happens to go back and uh see any of the housing safety and community committee meeting, you will find that it is entirely possible for me to talk at double speed. Uh, I went through this very quickly in committee. Uh, and I'll I'll try to um to move move just as quickly uh but maybe not talk quite so fast. So, tonight we're going to uh review the staff recommendations for affordable housing development support requests that were received in response to the most recent housing trust fund request for proposals. Um this is the second funding cycle uh following the expansion of the housing bond and city council's adoption of the affordable housing funding policy. So previously in April uh we brought forward to you the first round of recommendations. In this round you received a total of eight proposals uh totaling just under $20 million in investment asks. Uh there are um proposals in here for multif family rental development, home ownership, and supportive housing. Uh on last Thursday on October the 2nd, there was a memo and report uh in your council packet summarizing the proposals received. Uh and um in addition, you will receive the full booklet. So we we refer to it as the HTF booklet. Um, but you'll get a spiralbound booklet with detailed information about every proposal that will come out to you um the week before uh council action. And then the vote is scheduled currently for October 27th. Um the recommended investments will be on the council business agenda um for consideration. As a reminder, uh, in in the most recent, uh, housing funding policy you adopted, uh, you were really focused not just on creating units and counting units, but on a set of goals, um, for affordable housing. And those goals are uh, economic mobility, neighborhood affordability, and residential stability. So, as staff evaluate proposals and as we work with our development partners to bring forward to you the best um proposals, we're really looking through this lens. We want residents to have access to safe quality and affordable housing, to have access to diverse housing options across many neighborhoods, and to have access to services uh that that um contribute to economic mobility. So, we're going to look at this a couple different ways. I know some of uh some of you like the visual version. U and so this is where where you are right now on the housing bond investment goals. So, as part of the funding policy, uh you allocated specific dollar amounts as goals for each investment category. That's represented here um across the bottom. rental housing production, home ownership, etc. Uh, and the dark green within there, it represents what has already been allocated to date. So, you'll see that in the first round, you allocated funds uh across rental housing production, home ownership, and rental housing preservation, and anti-displacement. But we'll talk a little bit about um how we're activating the rest of the bond as well. But I just want to make a note also. So the winter round which was um in the the April uh investments that you all voted on, that's the round that typically tax credit projects are brought forward for consideration because it's aligned with the state's tax credit schedule. Um and so within that 13.9 million in rental housing production um there were several um tax credit developments uh one you approved two 9% projects one of them was um with home funds one of them was with housing trust fund and that did receive tax credits from the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency. So that's moving forward. And then the 4% deals are in the queue for allocation of um 4% bond and tax credits in early 2026. Um so everything that you approved previously is moving forward. Just a couple of notes about the the different ways that staff are working to activate the $und00 million housing bond. Uh so in in in many years past the housing trust fund RFP was the primary way to activate the bond. Um but with so many different types of investments now that you all are making um there are actually many different ways to activate the bond depending on the investment category. So that may be uh the housing trust fund RFP. Um that may be we also have a a rolling RFP for home ownership. Uh we have different programs like the House Charlotte program, the small landlord retrofit program and HVAC pilot. Uh under housing rehab and emergency repair, for example, uh you'll see a um a request for proposal that's coming forward at at the also at the October 27th meeting for your consideration. And so there are a lot of different components to the bond and a lot of different ways to uh a activate your investments. So ju just to to to put it in context that the housing trust fund uh recommendations as part of the RFP are just one piece of the way that we work to activate uh those investments for you. And within that RFP, as a reminder, the housing trust fund provides gap financing for affordable housing developments. This fund is replenished on a bianial basis via bond referendum. Uh we also include our federal allocations within the housing development fund. Uh in this particular round, uh we're not recommending any awards with federal funds. It's all housing trust fund bond money, but you have seen those in the past. Um the uh proposals also are evaluated for alignment with the again the affordable housing funding policy and within that policy you all have identified five specific investment priorities. So we actually work with our partners to propose uh and and uh share in those proposals how they address your priorities. So that's priority populations, specifically home buyers, lower wage workers, households at risk for displacement, and vulnerable populations. We take a look at location priorities, working with our partners to incentivize locations where investment increases housing choice. Uh we're also looking for strong proposals around resident services. How are we able to link housing and services to really create those stronger outcomes to really meet the uh affordable housing funding policy goals? Uh we evaluate partnerships and leverage and then we look for innovation. The schedule the um just where we are today. We started with the request the release of the request for proposals in June. The proposal submission deadline was the end of July. We had a brief committee discussion uh earlier today. Uh and then tonight we're of course talking all together in full counsel and then city council approval is scheduled for October 27th. So there's a little bit more time in here than usual. U we want to make sure that you all have an opportunity to ask questions and get additional information uh if needed. But that vote is scheduled currently for October 27th. And just as a reminder, the next RFP cycle, I mean, we just start right up again. Um, so that that RFP will be released likely in November or early December. And you'll see those applications next April 2026. And as a reminder, those um in that winter round will include te the the tax credits again. So the uh summary of the development proposals that were received here you can see on the screen uh you had eight proposals total um three of those in the rental housing production category uh requesting just 9.86 or so million. You had three proposals in the home ownership category $3.8 8 million and two proposals in supportive housing totaling $6.25 million. Um overall you can see by category what type of funding is currently uh available in the bond. Um you have committed 31.389 and change to date. Um leaving 68.6 million available. The total funding request is just under 20 million. And um so so we don't leave anyone hanging, I'll I'll go straight to the point, which is that tonight staff are recommending approval of all eight of these proposals. So we're going to start with rental housing production. Um the rental housing production includes uh new multif family. Um it it it also includes mixed use and mixed income, missing middle production. Um, tonight you're going to see three proposals totaling 9.86 million in investment requests. Two of the developments have actually been previously funded and are seeking additional investment. U, but I'll share more details about those requests as we go along. The first the first development is Kendall Crossing. This is a 4% tax credit uh senior so age restricted affordable housing. um that's brought forward by the PACES Foundation. This is located in district three. You may recognize this. It was deferred in the first housing trust fund round in April. Uh one of one of the things about a highly competitive round like what you had in April was that um we had an opportunity to really uh fine-tune some of the proposals. So, the ones that were deferred um did some work to come back with even stronger proposals and and Kendall Crossing um did just that. They brought us back a uh proposal that's much better aligned with your investment priorities. Uh and so today staff are recommending this. Um I'll also note so this occurred in the last round, but one of the things that your staff does is work very hard to make sure that you're getting the best deal you can. Um, and so the original ask on this one was $6 million. Um, and your team has negotiated the ask down already, um, to just under $5 million. So, Kendall Crossing, um, if you can imagine this, it's near the interchange of Morris Chapel Road and I485. So, this is an area where you don't have a lot of affordable housing investment. um that the site has an overall location score of 21.5. It's a directly adjacent to a shopping center with a grocery store and a pharmacy. Um this particular site is not directly adjacent to a bus route. Uh it is in a planned micromobility zone. So if that that work proceeds um it will be in that zone, but it is not on a bus route. Um the PACES Foundation um they are a tax credit developer based in Georgia, but they've partnered locally with us previously. Um they developed the Legacy at Car Heights. That was a partnership with the West Charlotte Land Trust. Um they are in good standing. Uh one of the things that we do when we receive applications is check with our asset management team and make sure that our partners are in good standing and doing the things that they've committed to. Um, so we're excited to see them proposing another development here in Charlotte. I'll say they were very responsive to the feedback as it relates to your investment priorities. So, in terms of priority populations, uh, Kendall Crossing is serving seniors. They, you'll see on here, they're also capping their rents at 70% AMI um, out of their total 100 proposed units. Uh and then they have um come back with a with a great partnership um and resident services that they've proposed. So they are they're going to be partnering with roof above. Um they reserved 10 units within the community for roof above's link program. Um and the link program connects seniors um with safe, affordable, and sustainable housing. Um in particular, seniors who rely on disability or social security income. So some of the more vulnerable seniors who are on fixed incomes uh in and uh within Kendall Crossing, the resident services will be provided by roof above in will be tailored to the needs of seniors um including case management, benefit enrollment, and connection to health care and transportation resources. And so I I want to say we've heard from several of you and from community members um about some of the long-term affordability in tax credit developments for seniors. So I want to go ahead and address that. Um NCHFA and the tax credit program, we we refer to it as LITC for short. Um they're specifically designed to manage and moderate rent increases, but that doesn't mean that rents are capped. um housing doesn't have fixed expenses and so rent goes uh goes up but through the program um it the the the tax credit program and NCHFA and then through your deed restrictions the amount that rent increases goes up is managed and moderated each year. Um what what we know is that for particularly vulnerable seniors, especially those on fixed incomes, the best practice and the best strategy is exactly what's been proposed here. Um to work with programs that help pair rental subsidies with deeply affordable units. Um and just as a reminder, this is a really important partnership because your housing bond dollars cannot be used for rental subsidies. The affordable housing bond is a capital investment u bond and rental subsidies are not an eligible use. So these types of partnerships are are really important. Uh just a couple of other other notes about Kendall Crossing. Um they're they're working hard to um uh use efficient building systems that can help reduce utility burdens over time. Um and some of the things they have planned for the development um are a dog park, urban gardens, and then for to to accommodate some of the resident services and on-site health exam room. All right, so that's Kendall Crossing. Um the next two rental housing proposals are ones um that you have seen before um that are coming back in for additional investment and uh council you have been typically very conservative about additional investment. Um the the the exception being during the pandemic when you had ARPA dollars that you dedicated to projects that had uh large and unexpected funding gaps. Um so I'll walk you through why uh staff um are are excited about the continued investment in these two projects. Um the first is River District. This is uh proposed by Laurel Street Residential. Um of course you're familiar with the River District uh the um master planned community um mixeduse community that's underway by Crescent. Um so there there are nearly 5,000 residences planned. um out at the River District. Um the first model homes out there are coming online now. Um and and the River District is uh River District Apartments is a development that you originally proved in 2021. Um and and it was it was early. There was nothing out there. It was just a concept and you funded it early on purpose with the specific goal of ensuring that some of the first housing out in the river district would be affordable housing. And so with this additional support, uh Laurel Street expects that they would be able to close financing in November and actually start construction in December. Uh so um that they're they are just about ready. They have a funding gap now of $900,000. Um so primarily because a lot has changed since your initial approval in 2021. Um the this project was funded with that ARPA um investment um in 2023. An additional 2.3 million was deployed um to this project and to others to support developments that had funding gaps coming out of the pandemic. Um and River District has an additional gap now of $900,000. There's two pieces to this gap. Um 400,000 of that gap is a commitment from Lisk that they weren't quite able to meet the full commitment and then an additional $500,000 um overall funding gap. And I just want to note on all of the slides um and in the summary report that you received where we've indicated investment per unit that is that reflects the total investment. So previous investment plus what's currently asked um if applicable. So it's it's it does reflect the allin uh amount and in this case the all-in o overall city investment um with this addition would be 6.7 million um putting the cost at just over 70 thou $7,000 per unit. Um so you'll also note on here this is not a tax credit development. um you know, being in a in a in a brand new master plan community, the location is not eligible under um the North Carolina guidelines for tax credits. So, it does require that higher level of support. Um we we knew that going in. Um and I'll note also that as part of coming back in for additional funding, staff were able to work with Laurel Street to negotiate an increase in the affordability period. It was originally uh approved at 30 years and the Laurel Street has committed to a 99-year affordability period which as a reminder is the longest affordability allowed under North Carolina law. Another another piece of River District that I think is really important to note is that um they do have they have kept their commitment to three-bedroom units. So 16% of the units are are are threebedrooms and that's really important to serve families. Um and it's getting harder and harder. A lot of your new uh developments proposed have very few if any three-bedroom units. So Laurel Street has kept that commitment in here. Um so staff recommends approval of this to advance the previously funded development. um especially being so close to ability to close and it will ensure affordability out in the river district um as as originally intended by city council. The next one you'll have to cast your mind even further back because River District was approved in 2021. Weddington Road Apartments was originally approved in 2016. So another one, many of you have seen this one before. Uh the original ward in 2016 was a little over $3 million. Uh and the the Weddington Road Apartments um was actually delayed for quite some time by litigation. That litigation was eventually resolved. Um I'm sure that uh uh Dreamkey would be happy to share with you um some some of some of the challenges of those years. Um but I but I think you know what's what's important to note is that that that was resolved. They're trying to now advance this this um development. Uh and it is in um you know it it's consistent with the plans and the place types um for this area. So Weddington Road Apartments is is a 4% tax credit. Um and and you may recall this came in in the last round um the fir the first housing trust fund round earlier this year. Um staff recommended a deferral at that time. It came in at about $4.5 million of investment ask um which came to $90,000 per unit when you when you did the um kind of did the all-in math. Um so so we recommended deferral. we asked you for some time to work to work with the developer on options to lower the cost. Um so Dreamkey um was able to modify some of the financials. They've reduced the current ask to just under 4 million. Um one one way they've done that is also to um increase their sponsor loan uh which means that they're actually putting more of their own money into the development. um and and it is now at uh an ask of 84,000 um per unit. So, I want to just say yes, that is expensive. Um and and uh it it it would be one of the highest per unit investments you've made. Um but a couple of really important things to note about Weddington Road Apartments. So, this is located in District 7. There's no other affordable housing nearby. You'll note in the location summary um the diversity score is 10. That's 10 out of 10. Uh meaning this is going to be some of the only affordable housing uh in anywhere around. Um so if you're familiar with Weddington Road, um right now this is a vacant grassy lot. Um I was able to go by and confirm that Dream Key is taking good care of of it. It is nicely mowed. Looks lovely. Um, so it's across the street from Socrates Academy. It's just about a mile south of the new 485 interchange at Weddington. You know, nearby shopping at Weddington and McKe. Uh, there's a YMCA branch there. It's close by to Batty Park. Um, but uh, $84,000 a unit. Um, this site is not located within a qualified census tract. So, when you think about tax credits, um the a qualified census tract means that it qualifies for the basis boost in tax credits. And Warren was um helping me with this earlier and looked it up. It if you if you receive the basis boost, you get 30% higher um dollar amounts in tax credits. So, without that basis boost, it's a lot more expensive. But one of the challenges that you've all have noted in the past with the tax credits is that the way it's designed and the locations that receive that basis boost are often um lower income areas. So it's designed to incentivize putting more affordable housing uh in areas that already have more affordable housing. And so it it is this is what it costs to develop affordable housing outside of that qualified census tract. Um I I will also say a couple of things. Dreamkey has been very committed to this development. Um originally it was 72 units. They've brought it back in at 85. So they're they're they're putting additional units out there. And you see the unit mix. they have capped the uh incomes at 60% AMI. Um and of course including the 20% at 30% AMI. So this is a deeply affordable uh uh development in an area with very little affordable housing. Same as I mentioned with River District, they've kept their commitment to three-bedroom units. So um in this case, uh 19% of their units are three bedrooms. Um and uh so um uh the um sorry uh one one thing to note um because I know this came up last time. Um Dreamkey has not completed a new round of community engagement yet. We did extend the deadline for a community engagement meeting. That will be conducted prior to the vote and um we'll provide any substantial feedback to you. um at that time. But couns um we we do recommend staff recommends approval to advance this previously funded development. Um it it is um you have about 1.4 million I think it is already um in costs in this for the land acquisition. Um, but Dream Key has indicated that if we're unable to find a solution here, um, they're they're likely to not be able to use this site, you know, that funding would would eventually, um, if the if the land is sold, come back to the housing trust fund. Um, but this is really for you all um, to uh, discuss and probably wrestle with a little bit. um dispersion is part of your overall goal for affordable housing and this is what it costs to um to do so. All right, I'm going to shift gears. We're going to move into home ownership. And just uh as a as a reminder, the um 25 million overall committed to home ownership in the um in the current housing trust fund bond. We have three proposals for you tonight. Um the first again is is one you've seen before. So Avalina at New Town Homes. Um this is a Dreamkey Partners home ownership um development. It is part of part of your faith and housing initiative. It's been proposed in partnership with New Presbyterian Church at land on land they own. Um and this was approved just in um the last housing trust fund round in April. Um they're also seeking additional funds. You approved them at 2.43 million and they're asking for an additional 702,000. And um this is this is one that that arose based on kind of the timing that occurs with the way we we bring you housing trust fund recommendations. So when when uh the proposals come in to us, they have been through sketch plan review with planning um but not full planning review. Uh and so in this case um when Dreamkey went through full planning review, they identified some changes that needed to be made um in storm water mitigation and in sidewalk improvements. Um those those would have a material impact on the cost. Um, specifically, they needed to shift some of the storm water mitigation onto the site um and and would have would have lost some uh of the 54 units. So, they're requesting an additional 702,000 to keep the original 54 units as designed. Um, and and again, this is uh 54 units at uh 80% AMI. It's a uh all in the investment per unit is 58,000. So it's a little bit higher than average, but it's still feasible. You you do have u capacity in your home ownership investment category for it. Uh and again, this is a faith and housing partnership um that that uh you all supported um and so staff recommends approval of these additional funds as well. All right. So everything else is net new. Um so the starting with Ellington Town Homes. Um this is another Dream Key partners proposal. Um it's part of a master planned mixed income community in Greer Heights. Um that Dream Key is is proposing um actually constructing already some of it on land owned by Meckllinburgg County. Um you may recall from the last round um Wheatly Seniors which is a senior tax credit that uh Dreamkey proposed in the last housing trust fund round. Uh we you you deferred that um and Dreamkey has been working hard to make some changes to that proposal. Um it's looking like a really strong proposal and they plan to put it back in um for consideration in the next housing trust fund round. But that's also part of this um same master um plan development. So this is a site located in Greer Heights. Um so if you think about Greer Heights, it's actually on the back side of Randolph Hills Apartments. It's just down the street um from the CMPD Providence Division at um Wendover and Ellington. Um if you go out there, you'll see they're already moving dirt. Um so the infrastructure for the whole master plan community is already underway. Um they got that started with um with some city investment uh 1.3 million in CDBG that council awarded to Dream Key as part of the FY25 budget process. So that work is already underway. Again, this is county owned land. Uh the the county is going to convey approximately 3 and a half acres uh in fe simple for these for sale units. Um the rental units are intended to be a ground lease. Um this is 35 total units at um uh capped at 70% AMI. 30 years of affordability. Um one thing you'll note about Ellington is a very strong site score. There's bus access, shopping center, grocery store, credit union, medical facilities, um and and um good access to jobs. Um a very um active neighborhood change score. Um so think think about Greer Heights. Um over over 80% of the homes there, the single family homes are currently renter occupied. Folks in that community are facing a lot of displacement pressures. Uh Dreamkey has been working closely with Crossroads Community Development Corporation to create affordable home ownership opportunities both um scattered within Greer Heights and then also in this neighborhood. Um if you if you're looking for a home in Greer Heights now um your median sales price is going to be almost $500,000. Um so affordable home ownership is in is in great need there. In addition to the housing, the site plan includes um multi-purpose green space um an internal trail network uh and and greenway connection um and a playground. Uh so a um you know part of the part of the broader community um out there in that in that location. All right, your last home ownership proposal is Unity Oaks. Um this is a proposal from Habitat for Humanity of the Charlotte region. Um and this is actually a mixed income development. Um so 71 total town homes are proposed. This is also in the new area also district 4 and um uh actually not too far from from um Avaline at New. Uh this is um off Greer Road and WT Harris. So across from CPCC's KO campus, um also very near the Rey Creek Nature Preserve. Uh one one exciting thing about this is it's really bringing together um several organizations who are partnering to create affordable housing and to create it for uh sustainably for the long term. Um so this is Habitat for Humanity uh the Morancis Foundation and TR true homes and Habitat is seeking uh in uh housing trust fund um investment for 31 um of the 71 town homes um out in the mixed income development. Uh one one of the things you'll note about the habitat model is um they are they are able to serve down to 60% uh AMI through their program. So it's a little bit um uh divided up between 60% 70% and 80% and then of course there's 40 market rate units. But just note that all of the calculations here are only based on the affordable units. Um the Morancus Foundation um purchased this land as part of their land bank efforts uh and and um they'll donate it to habitat upon land development approval. Um and then in addition to the purchase and donation of the land, they're really designing this partnership in a way that ensures long-term affordability. So, it's not often that you see 99 years of affordability on a home ownership development. And so, this is how they've proposed for that to work. 99-year restriction um that that these would be owner occupied and that they would um be subsequent buyers would be at or below 80% AMI. Habitat maintains a right of first refuse, sorry, excuse me, a right of first purchase for 45 years. Uh, and they've designed the deed restrictions so that it includes a shared appreciation clause. So, the longer a homeowner stays there, the more um shared equity they will be able to um generate um from from that um the future sale. And I want to just note one other thing um about Habitat. You know, you're familiar with their with their model and the work that they do to get to get residents ready for home ownership. Um, but they've really been working recently to prioritize public sector employees and they have a program called Money Matters. That's a financial literacy course that they've been offering to employees um specifically at the Charlotte Douglas Airport and Charlotte Meckllinmberg schools. Um, so just one one other way that Habitat is is working to um support and and achieve your um housing priorities. All right, shifting gears. We're going to talk um about two proposals uh for supportive housing and shelter capacity. This category, as a reminder, um includes both single use and scattered site permanent supportive housing, transitional housing, and emergency shelter capacity. You have $9 million um allocated in your bond uh for this category. You have not received any proposals or made any investments yet in this category. Uh tonight I'll share with you two proposals that have come in seeking a total of 6.25 million in investment. The first proposal is the dream center campus. This is transitional housing that's been proposed by the Charlotte Meckllinburgg Dream Center which is a nonprofit. Uh this is located in district 2. Uh you can see in this uh rendering um the dream center actually um is is a multifphase development um on a 13 acre campus. Uh their plan is to create 32 transitional homes. So we have to do a little bit of math here. So each of those homes has um six bedrooms and six bathrooms. So in individual units um creating a total of 192 rooms. So that's the whole the whole plan. Um this is this proposal is just for phase one. We'll talk a little bit about that. But the development is a partnership between again the Dream Center which is a nonprofit um and True Homes that uh who's their development partner. This is a site located off of Freedom Drive um just north of the intersection of um Toddville and Freedom. Um there's there um it's surrounded primarily by um single family neighborhoods but also um there are several churches nearby. Um this this proposal is again for phase one and that includes um eight units. So, it's a again, it's not as easy to do all of the math and investment per unit, but here we're we're referencing it as unit or room because there are 48 total rooms in these eight homes. Um, in addition to the housing units, and you can see some of it here, the campus is intended to include a 20,000 square foot clubhouse um with with a a variety of services for the residents. Um in in addition some the future phases I think there's there's a three-year plan for this and future phases um include a playground u recreational facilities and additional um open green space. So uh one of one of the ways that this really meets your investment priorities is serving priority populations. So again, this is 48 48 rooms. Um, but it's transitional housing that's dedicated to um individuals and families experiencing homelessness. And that includes um chronic chronically homeless, unaccompanied young adults, displaced families, and individuals in re-entry. And one of the strengths of this proposal is the resident services and the partnerships that they that they have formed. So, they're intending to provide wraparound services including mental health and addiction recovery. Um, but there's also going to be a teaching kitchen, gardens and farms in a woodworking area. The goal is to teach um a variety of job and life skills. They're partnering with Charlotte Works to provide workforce development opportunities. They have some specific employment partners um including Noble Food and Pursuit Precision uh Plumbing and Interstate Electric. Um and they're also proposing daycare services on site and teleaalth services that will be available on site through a partnership with Atrium Health. Um and so the the um the other component of this is that True Homes um through their uh is is proposing to build these homes at cost. Um so just another way to uh keep this affordable. Um and so uh this is this is another one where the community dead engagement deadline has been extended. Um so we'll provide we'll provide um any substantial feedback that we get um prior again to your vote on um October 27th. And the um this is this is the last the last one I'll share. Um so we're home stretch here. Um the last proposal here is the um Meckllinmberg County hotel conversion. Um this is intended to be um non- congregate shelter and Meckllinburgg County uh has submitted this as a partnership opportunity to the city. So a couple of things to note. Um the you you all and the community have been talking about this actually for a couple of years. Um originally the Meckberg County Continuum of Care um identified an urgent need for non- congregate shelter. Um then they worked together to develop this conceptual plan for property acquisition and shelter operations. Um in 2024 this conceptual idea came forward um to the housing safety and community committee. Um at that time the committee reviewed the concept and uh asked asked for uh staff to come back when there was a more tangible plan um for both the site and the shelter operations and and there is that now. I would also note that in May of this year, so a couple of months ago, um Sean Heath provided an update to housing safety and community committee um on on this concept. Um at that time committee expressed support for a project funding request to be prevent presented to full counsel um once a specific site was identified um and a and a more specific cost was determined. So that that time is now. Um and the need really continues to be urgent. Um and the the the number of people so Meckllinburgg County has has what they call a one number. So the number of people who are engaged in the homelessness system is currently uh at 20 2586. Um so and and it's on the rise. This continues to be um an urgent need. And and when this was shared with you in in May, um there were a couple of key aspects. One, that there would be a city county collaboration to fund the acquisition and renovation of an existing building. Two, the private sector has committed to fund the first three years of operating costs for the shelter itself. Um, and three, a qualified and experienced service provider, um, would be selected through a national, um, search to operate the shelter. And so, um, this this is the proposal that is now before you. Um, Meckllinburgg County identified a site. um they have negotiated a purchase sale agreement and they're currently in the due diligence phase. This is located off of Banner Elk Drive um near Batty's Ford and Sunset. Um the ask here is for $4.25 million which is half of the capital cost. So the total project cost is 8 estimated at 8.5 million. um 5.5 million of that is for acquisition and the and three million is for rehabilitation. And we did have a question about this earlier in committee. So I want to share a couple of the things that are included in that renovation budget. So this is a hotel uh with 62 rooms and again just to clarify again the language is a little bit confusing when it comes to shelter and transitional housing. Um this this is 62 rooms and it's non- congregate shelter meaning it's serving residents in those individual rooms um and also offers an opportunity for families to stay together um within the shelter. But the renovation budget includes um items such as additional costs for safety and security, additional lighting, um the the renovation and in this case construction of some of the communal spaces like a kitchen and a cafeteria. Um rooms for counseling, rooms for on-site health care, space for staff. um some of the exterior improvements, cameras, lighting, um and and um access to the site. So, it it's um there is quite a bit involved in that renovation scope. Um so, again, Meckberg County would maintain ownership of the building. They would assume um the responsibility for ongoing property maintenance. The plan here is a 62 room non- congregate shelter. Um and and the key piece of this is that it is um on-site access to health and mental health services especially for individuals with severe and persistent mental illness. And so this uh this concept is directly connected to the conversations that you all have been having about public safety and quality of life. Uh, one of one of the important things about this proposal and uh it what we think of as missionritical, one of the reasons that um that staff supports this is that some of the shelter capacity would be reserved for direct referrals from the city and county's street outreach partners. And so we're often working through our street outreach partners um with uh unhoused individuals who um are um not always willing to go to a shelter. Um, but one of the things that we know from from talking with with them is that one of the primary factors that they um that they note is that they would be more likely to um go to shelter services if it were in a non- congregate setting. Uh, so we think this this is a proposal that meets um quite a few of of those needs. Um, I will note that the private fundraising for the shelter operations is underway. Um an RFI was put out earlier this year um just to see, you know, would would there be capacity from partners um experienced and qualified partners to do this? Would there be interest? Um and two responses were received. So the next step would be a um to solicit for a provider through a full request for proposal. So that's eight proposals. Um it did take a while, but I'm going to just say it was a lot quicker than the first round. We had a lot more proposals than that last time. Um so again, you know, two things. One is that it's not the tax credit round. So there are fewer proposals typically um in this round, but also there's a lot of uncertainty and there's uncertainty in the in the housing market. Our partners are facing uncertainty. Um we're facing uncertainty. So, it makes sense that there would be a um a smaller number of proposals. Um in in summary again, uh you have three proposals in for rental housing production, uh three proposals in for home ownership, and two for supportive housing and shelter capacity. And you can see here um the the cost per unit um comparing all of all of those proposals. Just as a reminder, um when you think about um the AMI, um breakdown and the rent and sales price ranges, um we want to make sure that that you can you can see what those actual rent ranges would be. Uh again, very difficult to find housing at uh at these rates um throughout Charlotte. Um and um just a note here again, three of these are coming back in for additional support. Um so that 226 of the units here are um are are representing um developments that you've funded previously. So just to take a look at where you are with your with your uh housing trust fund balance. Um again uh after the um earlier round of investments you have about 68.6 million out of the 100 million bond remaining. Um with with these eight developments totaling just under 20 million. Uh your if if these were approved um your housing trust fund ending balance would be about 48.6 million. So thinking about um where we are in the bond cycle, that's about half the bond remaining at about the midway point. This is just another way of looking at it um by investment category. And so one thing to think about is if these recommendations were approved, what would your next round look like? So it's important to take a look there. And in rental housing, you would have a little over $11 million remaining, which is close to the amount that you recommended for approval last time. uh you would have a little over 14 million in home ownership, 3.5 million in rental housing preservation, 2.75 in support of housing and shelter capacity. And then in the other categories looking across uh housing rehabilitation and emergency repair site acquisition, in the innovation fund, you're looking at 16.8 million um remaining. Again, if these recommendations were to be approved, and as a reminder, when we're talking about um the housing development fund, uh following council approval, there's also financial closings, design, and permitting. Um so, so many of the um developments can take quite some time after council approval to actually come online. Um, so just at that uh that reminder and that is your full presentation for tonight and I would be happy to answer questions and and uh also have Warren here to help help me with some of the more details that you may be interested to know. Thank you Rebecca and Madame Mayor. So unfortunately for our committee because of the conversations that we had today we only had about 10 minutes to actually go through. So this is the first time that even the committee members are seeing the full presentation, but I would start off with a good bit of the conversation. If we can go back on the slides, the county hotel conversion piece is go stop there. Thank you. Is a concern. We had a couple of more questions. One, let's just one, we love the idea of partnering with the county. the idea of cost per bed at 137,97 or the breakdown of the investment per bed of 68,548 for a space that's already a hotel and we didn't get at the in committee we didn't have the details of okay this is including security lighting communal space it was also a question regarding us splitting this cost down the middle as far as also what of our partners or in the corporate community are contributing to this that was a question a question I have asked previously in this market as we move forward when we come to multif family and then we can go back towards the end where we had the breakdown that we just reviewed so go one more go back on. Thank okay right there. So when we we in committee didn't image have a chance to go through all of this but let's just look at the reality of right now I have seniors at Roden Square Apartments. Those apartments are apartments that we help fund. It is a senior community. The federal government because those are lit deals. North Carolina Finance Housing Agency has an escalation clause in their paperwork. The federal government says 30% AMI, you can earn up to 26,000. I have a senior who who brings home $987 a month. You're not even bringing home 12,000 a year. Your 30% should be $291. her rent has gone up to $475 plus the outofstate company cuz it's some developer out of South Carolina that owns this building. You've now added a fee for processing. So that's an additional $7.95. You bring home $987. So if we're going to sit up here and tell the community 30% of AMI, but of what you're doing is the national numbers of up to 26, but we have residents who are not receiving additional subsidies, who are living only on the income that they bring in. And if their 30% is not what their rent is based on, because if we truly built diverse price point housing, then there will be a balance of 30, 50, 80 up to market rate. There's a problem because in a very short period of time, we are going to have a number of elders who are about to be homeless in our community because of our pricing model. mainly because of the limitations that we have in our pricing model based on LITC and others. Now, we have some proposals in here where they're coming back for additional funds. And I do want my fellow members of committee to be able to share their concerns regarding coming back because we've already given money. And in one or two cases, we may have already given money twice and now here's the third time. For me, of course, I'm going to say, "Yay! I'm finally happy the river District has finally happened. We put a lot of work into that on the front end. I'm going to have to check with the attorney's office cuz there was supposed to be a for sale component at work for at these price point as well. And it looks like what's coming out there right now is starting like 56 700 and up. Yet the challenges that came up is how can we do something different? Because 589 seems great unless you're that elder that's bringing home less than 1,000 a month and we're taking almost half of your monthly income which is leaving you very little to eat which you know people like to do on a regular basis and or get your medication and or possibly pay for transportation. So those are some of the challenges but I know my colleagues both council member Johnson as well as council member Ashmeir had concerns regarding the additional funding as well as others. So I definitely want to give council member Johnson and afterwards council member a moment to share because again this is the first time we got to see the full presentation but I do I'm going to backtrack. Thank you manager. Thank you manager. Thank you staff for bringing it to committee. We have to look at doing something very different than what we've been doing. >> It's it creates a lot of challenges and people don't community doesn't understand that. >> Thank you, Madame Mayor. Thank you. And she's absolutely right. I mean, we know this SSI amount, I think, is $900 a month. So, yeah, the 30% AMI, I don't know if the state will allow us to do something differently, but people are hurting. I mean, I I say that I don't know where people are supposed to live. I I say that all of the time. I met someone who was just placed in uh low-income housing and he had been on a wait list for 14 years. So, I I just don't know what uh what we're going to do if we're not bu building or really really increasing our inventory. I appreciate the opportunity to go to Boston because we learned that Boston had inclusionary zoning of up to 20%. So, imagine if 20% of all of this explosive growth was required to be affordable, we could really put a dent into the u the deficit. But um thank you for the presentation Rebecca. I wanted to know who is the provider or do we know yet of the dream center the provider that's going to be providing the supportive services? Has it has that provider been identified? >> Yes. So that is that is a um uh development in partnership with Noble Food and Pursuit. They'll be providing the Noble Food and Pursuit. It's Jim Noble's um nonprofit arm, >> the restaurant tier. Yeah. >> What are they doing? >> He's providing Well, >> if I might add. >> Yep. Please. >> Um the Dream Center is itself its own 501c3 nonprofit organization who does have staff that is currently providing um homeless services and case management to the population. So, so they will be providing some of their own services. >> So, the dream the dream center is a 501c3. Is that what you say? >> And they've been operating for a number of years here in in Charlotte. They actually uh used to, you know, be the the the arms behind King's Kitchen. So, the the staff that were working there, that was part of Dream Center's operation. Uh they do feeding programs and case management for currently homeless individuals. and they're currently operating in community space in the Thomasboro Hoskins neighborhood. So, this this proposal provides both the transitional housing but also the dedicated space um for those resident services. >> Hoskins Park Ministries, are they do you know? >> No. >> Okay, we can Okay. Um so, and then you mentioned Dream Key and a transitional housing project. Is that you? What what project was that? I thought there was another. >> No, the the dream dream center is the transitional housing development and that is the Charlotte Meckllinburgg Dream Center is the nonprofit. >> Okay. >> And they're also partnering out there with True Homes, but that's separate and distinct from the other proposals that have come in from Dream Key Partners. Um, Dream Key Partners is the developer of Weddington Road Apartments, uh, Ellington Town Homes, and Avaline at New I think. Did I get all the Dreamkeep developments? >> Okay. It was Meckllinburgg County that's going to be looking for a provider. >> Yes. So the so the non- congregate shelter uh and and again there's a a a commitment from the private sector to fund the first three years of shelter operations which are estimated to be between 9 and $10 million. Um so that private sector fundraising is um currently underway. uh when when um you when Meckchemberg County is able to acquire and renovate the building that they will have a a time estimate for when the shelter could become operational and and an RFP will be put out at that time. Previously, a request for information um was sent out to solicit both interest and make sure that the budget they had identified uh was appropriate. Okay. And we talked earlier about the cost, the total cost for this the shelter. You said eight. >> Yes. So 8.5 million is the total capital cost. Um that's $5.5 million acquisition cost um for the building and the and the site. Uh, and then a $3 million renovation budget um to convert um the currently 62 room hotel into non- congregate shelter including the upgrades to the rooms and then all of the other um components to operate uh a shelter. >> Okay. And of that 8.5 million, the city is going to um pay four >> the county has requested 4.2 25 million which is half of the capital cost >> and then you me I heard United Way earlier is United Way putting up any of the upfront capital. >> So so this was originally proposed as part of the home for all initiative and United Way was leading the private sector fundraising. >> Oh so this is the home for all project >> initially. Initially, it was part of that conversation and and that's why United Way has taken the lead to date on the private sector fundraising, but this is a Meckllinburgg County proposal. Okay. Um, I appreciate the home ownership as I said in district 4. I wanted to ask you, you said that Greer Heights the average price is $500,000. >> So, um, the the median sales price in that area is nearly $500,000 right now. >> Now, are those for new homes or has the market increased for existing homes to that point? >> That's the median price for all sales. >> So, let me ask you, do we have programs? because we know $500,000 is is gentrifying the neighborhood. Do we have anti-displacement dollars uh because that's that's what's happening when the taxes are increasing for those folks who've been there for a long time. What resources or what tools do we have from our toolbox? Mr. Jones, um for residents in in Greer Heights and other neighborhoods like this, >> I'm sorry, three things are going at one time. could what was the question? >> So we this is a great presentation for affordable housing but what's happening folks are being displaced because of you know gentrification. So what specifically she said Greer Heights was $500,000. What tools do we have for residents who who would be struggling because of the tax increase? >> Thank you Council Member Johnson. Um so many things that the city has are related to what the city can do and which is permissible by state law. So there are senior and disabled uh tax relief programs. There are some pilots that we've done over the past few years like the homes program, but we can give you a a list of what we have been doing and what's available based on what the state allows. >> Okay. And I know that's off subject today, but when you said Greer Heights $500,000, you know, folks are hurting. So, not just for me, if we make sure that residents know what services are available, um because again, we know that we have people um fixed incomes, um individuals who are not earning a lot of money, so minimum wage is still 725, and we just need to know what resources are available. In in that vein, Council Member Johnson, I would just highlight that the Meckmberg County Homes program is open that provides property tax relief to current homeowners. Uh and then um you we're also excited about things like the new uh ADU program that offers financing for homeowners u to build ADUs, which is uh an an interesting opportunity um for existing homeowners to uh be able to actually get additional income if they have um space available. So there are a lot of things actually that are built into your housing bond. um that that are anti-displacement initiatives. Uh it's just that when when we bring forward the um the proposals from the RFP, it's typically um new construction or or rental preservation. >> So, we always talk about we can't build our way build our way out of the housing crisis, but if we continue to do what we're doing, we're just we're never going to get out of it. I I don't know where people are supposed to live. And I say that all the time, you know, like we know our and I talked to council member Graham about this the other night. I mean, we know that there's a population of folks that live in motel and hotels and now those are being developed. So, is there an overlay where we're going to protect people? I mean, I I heard you say the 25 86 um individuals who are homeless, but that's not counting the ones who are living in their cars. And I mean, it's it's a it's a problem. So, um, yeah, I I think we should, if we can, we really need to talk about the and and we do, but the anti-displacement, if Greer Heights is $500,000 and we know that, what are we what are we doing? So, thank you. >> So, as again, we ran out of time. So personally from the committee conversations and discussions of which we definitely want to hear from council member Azmeir I personally have concerns about us. Okay, we're just going to present this committee without a lot of this conversation would have been able to be held in committee. And just for full transparency, the idea of reconentrated povert poverty is something that I never wanted. I never want us to see a development that just has 30 in it or even 30 and 50 there. We need the diversity because also that's going to make it a much more sustainable. But when we're talking about potential good partners and when we're looking at a business that has created habit in parts of our community, a business that has targeted specifically African-American businesses, and yes, I'm talking about Noble on Freedom Drive where when we did development and we identified our corridors of opportunity the only African-Americanowned business that was actually left and able to maintain on the Freedom Drive corridor when all of that development happened was run out because of this one businessman. >> Even though city wrote a contract that clearly identified some language. And now we fast forward a few years and you get to present something that is ultimately at the end of the day it's going to benefit you and your family. It's a business deal. But the most vulnerable are the people who will be living in this space. And if I'm already saying we're having challenges where we have elders and we have others in our community who honestly are in fear and don't share everything that's going on in their living conditions because of fear of truly being homeless. If we have multiple news articles, multiple complaints, and we know that this is a challenge, and we're comfortable then coming back and say, "Oh, but we're going to fund you to do this and have the most vulnerable be dependent on you. We're failing." Council memb conversations we had at the committee level. Um Rebecca gave an overview at the beginning of the committee meeting about home program. Uh we are in unprecedented times with government shutdown and some of our federal funding challenges. Our resources are limited and we need to be very thoughtful about how we allocate our additional housing trust resources because council member Johnson is right. Where are we going to keep people that need affordable housing if we start paying 70 and $80,000 per unit? Um, we need to be very careful about spending 70 $80,000 per unit when we build affordable housing. That means we're going to have less to build more affordable housing. Some of these proposals that I just see is 70,000 plus 80,000 plus per unit. and and the proposal that council member Mayfield raised where you get for $60,000 60 sorry $68,548 you get one bed. I mean it's just I you know we we need to understand that when we are out on uh in the communities people often ask about oh where where are this all this affordable housing where I don't see anything I'm applying I'm not able to get any housing because if we build more and more and housing prices per unit continues to rise that means we delivering less that means we are we are helping less families that means our dollar doesn't stretch as far so we need to go back and start having some really tough conversations some with some of these proposals uh I appreciate the work of our affordable housing developers because they have to work with limited amount of resources that they have but at the same time we are getting questions from residents where there is very limited amount of affordable housing uh and we need to address that. So I when I see a proposal where it's 70 $80,000 per unit and they have come to us not once but twice or maybe three times that is a concern and I think at some point staff you need to draw a hard line. We cannot go back to council. We approved once or twice. This cost per unit is way too high. And at the end of the day, we are evaluated, our performance is evaluated on number of units, number of families that we are able to support, uh number of children that we are able to support. So the lesser families that we support, lesser children that we support, we have nothing to show for. Uh I was a few weeks ago I was on a campaign trail and there I talked to a single mom her two children that go to CMS. She shared her experience. She had applied to eight different housing and she hasn't been able to get any housing opportunity. They are living in a motel with two children uh going to CMS. No stability whatsoever when it comes to housing. So if we continue to pay so much more per unit, we we are going to fail some of these residents that depend on us to produce more produce more housing. Uh it breaks my heart when I see young children uh that we are not able to support like their families we're not able to support. It's just it's it's heartbreaking, you know, when you see children that just living in cars >> and it's happening everywhere and then when people are getting >> Let me I'm sorry. When they're getting evicted, we're harming them because they're in places they can't afford. >> Uh I just wanted to follow through on one question. So I just want to make sure I understand this correctly. So on Dream Center campus uh is which nonprofit you mentioned? That's >> it's the Charlotte Meckllinburgg Dream Center. >> So that's Jim Noble. Is that the one? >> No, that's a separate nonprofit. >> So which which nonprofit was the one that council member M? So, dream dream center campus and and Warren feel free feel free to to answer again for me here. >> So, so Jim Nebles was one of the founding influences behind the Dream Center. >> He he's not the executive director. He's not on staff there. He's just a supporter of that organization. It's run by an executive director who has a staff that works with this population. >> Got and and Noble Food and Pursuit along with Precision Plumbing and Interstate Electric are some of the employment partners um that are part of the um campus. >> Okay. So, on slide number 21, you talked about United Way uh to answer Council Member Johnson's question that they were leading private sector fundraising. How much did they raise? So there there are not commitments um to date. They've been working closely with um the Charlotte Executive Leadership Council and the Foundation for the Carolinas. And I think there's a little bit of of um you know, the private sector is interested to see will there be a hotel? Um you know, h how how will these conversations go with the county acquisition um before firm commitments are made. Um but private sector partners have in indicated a interest in a willingness to um partner for those first three years of shelter operations. >> Okay. So there is no private sector dollars raised as of right now? >> Not no commitments yet to date. >> Okay. >> And I'm I'm going to look at Sean to just confirm. >> I think the way you characterize it is accurate. We were clear in May that that would be a necessary ingredient to unlock any city funding that is authorized by. >> Well, that's always the case, but I I mean, >> yeah, that we always are asked to put the seed money, which is fine, but if you're not getting any private sector commitment, I mean, we're paying $68,000 per bed. And you see some of these other housing even even housing opportunities that are 40,000 50,000 I just it's difficult for me to make sense of 68,000 per bed when there is no private sector match. >> So one one thing I just want to put in context is that one one of the things we do is you know line line all of the proposals up together. Um, and they're not necessarily apples to apples comparisons, right? There there are, you know, you you invest as a council in a wide range of housing types across the entire spectrum from supporting the unhoused, anti-displacement, all the way through to home ownership. And all of those activities cost different amounts and they cost different amounts in different places. Um, and so even even 84,000 is not outside of the realm of what you might invest in say down payment assistance or other types of programs. Um, and then when when you look at things like supportive housing uh and and shelter, oftentimes those activities can be more expensive. So, I I I acknowledge the um certainly the the concern that you're raising. I just want to note that they're not always apples to apples comparison. Um some of the projects might be more deeply affordable than others. Um so uh one of the things that staff does in evaluation um is look at you know the the investment per unit per year along with the affordability uh to to determine if it's kind of within the within the parameters and within the range of feasibility and also look at those you know evaluated against what's available in um in each category. So Rebecca, I understand it's not an apple to apple comparison because a lot depends on the location uh other financing whether that's litac whether that's other money when it's involved like when it's faith in housing we know that faith communities putting up land so that's why the cost per unit would go down I I get all that so I you know we used to look at leverage how much Are we leveraging other financing? I I don't see that on here like for this hotel conversion. It's great because we need to expand the capacity. But what is the other source other than the county? Uh because I remember when we did in middle of the pandemic when we had a deal with roof above the per bad cost was lot lot lower than this because there were other sources that were involved. So we need to look at it that way as well and we need to look at how are we leveraging other sources >> and the and the leverage is not on the slides today but it is evaluated and it's um included in your more detailed packet um in in that HDF booklet. So we'll make sure that you get all of that. >> So the manager would like to comment on this and then >> Okay. >> Okay. Thank you, mayor, members of council, and I'll try to do my um best um explanation of this um city county opportunity. So, as you know, your $und00 million in HDF, you set aside about $9 million for supportive housing and shelter capacity. So, whatever your projects are, there's a um there's an opportunity of $9 million for these types of projects. But, um Rebecca said it is true. Um based on the type of service level, um it's difficult to take one look at a cost per unit. What's interesting about this one, if we go back to a home for all um which had some bold concepts about um homelessness in 2025 and we're almost in 2026. Okay. So, this started back during the pandemic. Um you achieved one of the goals by getting your housing trust fund up to $100 million. Um, this non- congregate shelter is very different. And Sean, if I'm way off, let me know. Okay. Um, it's not designed to just have someone live there forever. This is designed so that it is um short-term giving opportunities for individuals to have um opportunities to maybe one at one point have home ownership home ownership. When this began, the concept was $7 million from the city, $7 million from the county, $9 million from the private sector. So the county went out and acquired a piece of property and it appears that the public sector contribution instead of being 14 million will be 8.5. The private sector in their fundraising needed to see something um before they would really go deeply into this. And again, this something is not exactly what we have seen here in Charlotte as it relates to a non- congregate shelter. Again, these are going to be when I started doing this decades ago, it was SRO's, single room occupancy, but let's not call it that either because the concept is people will be there over a shorter period of time to find other avenues for um getting to a better condition as it relates to housing. So, that's was I close Sean? >> So, I have a question. So you said 14 million. I had >> can I know Mr. Graham was next. >> We What is 14 million? I just want to make sure I understood. >> Yes. So again years ago this concept before anybody located a piece of property or a hotel to have a conversion. The concept was a belief that this may be $14 million to find it, purchase it, renovate it. But fortunately, it's a lot less because the county has found the property, purchased the property, and the upfit with everything that Rebecca said earlier instead of being $14 million appears to be 8.5 million. When we started off again in this journey, the three-year carry from the private sector um was 9 million. So the $9 million investment from the private sector and the $14 million investment from the public sector. Now the public sector's investment is closer to 8.5 million. >> So what's the private sector's investment? >> So again as we started off and it'll be whatever it takes to carry this for three years and the estimate early on was was 9 million. So I don't know what it will be but the commitment is to fund the operations for those first three years. >> I'm sorry. So first three years of operations that that's the county's funding. >> That would be the private sector. >> Private sector will fund the operations for first three years. Absolutely. >> So once we put in 4.2 and the other half is paid by the county, the operations will be paid by the private sector. Do we know what that amount is? >> Yeah, I get it. For three years. But what what is that amount for the three years? >> We don't know what the amount is for the three years. What was estimated this private sector's investment would be that $9 million, >> right? But we don't know ho how much the operations would cost for the first three years. >> Yeah. I I don't know if it would be 12. I don't know if it would be six, >> but that's the commitment private sector. One thing I'll offer is that the reason that a RFI was published earlier this year was to assess um the um to to to confirm the estimates that were made and uh based on the responses to the RFI um that that 9 million could potentially uh cover 3 years of operating. So we don't have an exact number but um the our partners have been have been thoughtful about making sure along the way uh that the original estimates are reasonable. >> All right, Miss Done. >> Mr. Graham. >> Thank you, Madam Mayor. I told Kim this was going to be a short meeting and we're we're still here. Um so um I want to thank the committee and the staff first for bringing this to us. Um I think affordable housing continues to be our top priority and the way the committee initially set this up with the $und00 million talking about production ownership and supportive housing was the right thing to do. I think Rebecca took the the words right out of my mouth, which is this is all things are different, right? Um different location, different housing spec, different costs. Um I support the river district um project that's up there, but it's the river district, so it's going to cost more, I suspect. But I really want to draw our attention to the supportive housing a shelter capacity. And a lot of this conversation with a homeful all started when we had people living in tents in uptown Charlotte, ratinfested tents in uptown Charlotte. when the city and the county and the private sector came together to produce the study, a home for all, where we said that we were going to make this our top priority uh to ensure uh that people had safe, clean housing who need it in an emergency situation. We are in an emergency situation for our community for this type of housing which is a different from your typical affordable housing, right? It's it's emergency housing. It's needed housing. When we try to and I use the word really really loosely, right? Run people from Betty's Fort Road. We got to run them to services. We got to run them to housing. We got to run them to resources. Our capacity space throughout the city is limited. This helps with that. And it comes with a cost that I think we got to pay. We got to be respectful of the taxpayer dollars that we're not overpaying, but it comes with a cost. And so I would hope that we would um respect that our corporate community uh when axe has come forward to support us. I mean years ago when the mayor asked them to match $50 million they did. They made a commitment to be a part of the home for all and said that they would work with the city and the county. I think they will. And so I think what's before us and I'll talk specifically to M County Hotel, then we'll talk about the other one later, right? Because I I hear you right. Um but this relationship with the county and for housing and wraparound services is something that we've been talking about doing for years. And I think we we got to go ahead and write the check to support people um who are living literally living on the street and need someplace temporary to go until we find a permanent solution. And this starts a really new dialogue with the county about how we can work together. And we've been saying that we wanted to do that for years as well. So I think that's a get really first step. I I support this. It's in district two. Um, the county is going to be the property manager. It's going to be maintained appropriately. Uh, and they're going to provide the type of service internally that I think our citizens need and deserve. So, I think this we should do this. The other one is very interesting as well. Uh, it's in district two. Um, I I asked the question to who was the developer? who's who's kind of doing the day-to-day um operations of this? And so, could you answer that question one more time for me? >> Hit it, Warren. >> So, this is a 501c3 nonprofit organization called the Dream Center. >> Okay. >> It's run by a professional staff that has case managers and they're they're already providing services to homeless men and women in our community. this would become a permanent campus for them where they' be able to provide uh supportive services from the site and also the buildout that you saw on the slide. >> So that's much >> part of that conversation. So full transparency we're going to say who it is and we're also going to say who that founding is and recognize the impact that you have had in community. So it is part of the noble foundation. >> Okay. Point takes >> for the minutes. Point point taken. Um, putting that aside for a second, not permanently right? But this is what we need because part of it is goes directly to the issue that we've been dealing with for the last four or five weeks, which is public safety. We we got to have a facility uh to to host and house individuals who need help and this provides that. Certainly, I'm willing to ask some tougher questions. Council member Mayfield, I hear you. Um, but in terms of the translational housing that that is needed in this community, the shelters that's needed in this community, how do we get people off the streets into safe, clean, affordable housing? This is different from affordable housing, but this is shelter housing to increase our capacity. It's needed. It's a public safety initiative. It's a housing initiative. Uh, and it's helping people. Council member Johnson, when you said sleeping in the cars, some of these people are sleeping in the cars and we get an opportunity to congregate them in that shelter and process them out to a long-term solution. And if we have to have people transition in the campus environment with wraparound service already there, um, I think it's the price worth paying. Thank you. >> So I wanted to just say that when we talk about this campus site, it's absolutely one of the most things and I think Miss Amir talked about children and their ways that we can do this that this community voted for the $100 million and they've never turned us down in terms of what we are trying to do and accomplish. And I think the campus idea, being able to actually have a safe place to live, have your kids be able to get off of a school bus or whatever in a certain place, we have got to um address the issues of homelessness. If we walk out of here tonight and you go a certain distance, people will be sleeping and they'll be looking for some place to be. And um I think it's time for us to really be serious about where what we're doing to help those folks and do other things as well. I mean we're we shouldn't be just one thing. We need to be supportive to a number of people that need this kind of assistance. So um I think that we were also asked by um Miss Molina. >> Thank you Madame Mayor. There's there's been a lot said around the deis and um I think there have been some great points. Um I the the one thing that I've said my entire time serving is that um I've I've always believed that government is an access organization. Um and we intend to inform outcomes and I think outcomes are based on a number of different things. If this is temporary shelter opportunity for three years where we have multiple stakeholders at because we need the whole community, right? My mind says we need the resources of Meckllinburgg County because the resources within Meckllinmberg County are they have different funding and they have a different funding mechanism to be able to do more than what we can um with you know um for mental health services for an example access to you know human services and and that type of funding. So I I think it's unique to have a conversation where we have now Meckllinburgg County at the table. Um I I get hit hard because of you know um uniquely uh because of relationships in the private sector but there is no such thing as affordable anything unless we bring the private sector to the table. They have to be stakeholders in every single conversation that we have. They have to be willing to provide the jobs to the residents that are continuing to come to our um our cities, our city, our region. Um they have to we hope that they because they don't have to. We hope that they remain willing to continue to partner with us in this endeavor because it's a problem that we all hold. I mean, crime ends up on all of our doorsteps. So we either get in on the front end or we're on the receiving end of what becomes crime as a result of people in need. Um so it is all of our challenge and I am always heartened when I see a diversity of stakeholders as a part of our solutions. And so um Meckllinmberg County as actually listed as a developer I think is a unique um even listing for Meckllinmberg County and our partners not and one of the things that I endeavored to do when I was initially elected was I looked at our budget as opposed to their budget and what they have as far as allocation is concerned and Meckllinburgg County actually this is a leap for them uh because the largest portion of their allocation is for educational purposes. Central Piedmont is one of their largest stakeholders. You know, CMS is one of their largest stakeholders and then their health and human services and then they do have economic development money and they're saying we want to bring that to bear in addition to this. So, like I said, that's one of many. I also want to make sure that um as a single mother, I've been a single mother for quite a few years with two children and um I that that can mean different things for different people. Um I remember when I first and this is a personal story when I first went through um the beginning of my my my story. I went to Meckllinburgg County and I had a bachelor's degree and I remember checking that I had a bachelor's degree in their application and I remember being told that wow that's not something we see often. Um, you know, as far as people who need resources. Um, and I remember the first time they tried to send me to classes, they sent me to a GED class and they told me I had to sit there and I remember thinking and I told the woman in the class, I went to like three of the classes for services and um I remember the lady telling me um well this is a part of what we do and I was like well ma'am I have a bachelor's degree and I'm a project manager and you know I you know I I got all of these things and there's a point to this. What I'm saying is is that we I don't like to make these decisions in a monolith because we meet humans at different intervals of their lives. And some humans need very temporary resources that get them right back on track. Something like this. Like a mother who is in a detriment, but maybe she's not, you know, completely low on her resources may need something temporary so that she can stabilize, right? or we have humans who are completely homeless. We have families in CMS that have absolutely nowhere to go. That is a completely and totally different signal for help, right? And so, um, I challenge because I I know that we have over 13,000 areas of need and I know that we don't have enough money. We our need outmatches our money. Um, and so I I'm always on the side of where we can help. I think we should. I I think we should stretch our dollar as far as our dollar will go and I think that we should take our dollars to be of assistance and and I think it'll be an incremental help. I don't I we're taking stabs at a at a really big >> issue, like a really huge issue. And so, um, I just think that, um, I I'm I'm afraid to make someone believe that we're affecting total outcomes with my language, right? When I speak in definition and I say definitively that this can be resolved, we don't have enough money to resolve the issue. And I think making sure that we set that expectation and tell people hund00 million dollars is a lot of money, but it is not enough money to even close to resolve the amount of need in our growing region. Right. So um speak >> I just >> I'm no go ahead continue. >> Okay. Um so I I just wanted to make sure that I I was clear in saying that um >> you know these are temporary resources. I think you know notwithstanding the amounts that may differ um based on location and a number of different other things. I like the idea of incremental resources. I like the idea that we're going to meet humans in different places along, you know, and and we'll have over other opportunities for permanent situations, but I think temporary situations are also important because there are people out there. I can speak from personal experience, right, who experience difficulties and and they're very resilient. Someone like me, I can't say single mother the same way that someone who don't have the education and experience that I have, right? So, I'm not even going to pretend that just because I say that that I embody their experience. Does that make sense? Um, it means something temporary and different for me as opposed to someone else. So, I think that's why I shared that portion of my story to say being completely um, you know, cognizant of the fact that we're going to meet humans at different places. Sometimes temporary sources are very very necessary. Um, and then maybe getting them from an outcome perspective, right? I I think the outcome is we we are we intending to see somebody through to where they have a different outcome or are we just saying, you know what, we put them in something. Yay. And that's kind of the the the way things are handled most of the time. It's like, oh, we pat ourselves on the back, something's done, you know, but that's not with the outcome in mind. So, I'll digress because I'm rambling, but I said all that to say that um the idea of transitional, the idea of temporary is a gap. It's a gap that not is not always, you know, recognized as a solution, but it's a part of a solution. I always said if you grow an inch, you've grown. It doesn't mean you haven't grown, right? If if I intend to grow, you know, a meter, I got to grow an inch first, right? And I got to, you know, give myself you know, a pat on the back if I make it an inch understanding that I intend to, you know, land at a meter, right? So, um, analogously, I like the idea of some temporary solutions that are a part of our portfolio of offerings. >> I do want to remind the council that um, we still have the committee discussion part of us and as well, we have a closed session that we have. >> Oh, well, that wasn't on. We ain't get that. That wasn't I ain't seen no memo about that. >> We didn't get to close this. >> We ain't get no memo about that. Seriously. >> But the other side, mayor, for this. Hopefully soon we will be able to present something cuz luckily we're having conversations with the county >> regarding us doing something to me turning this whole conversation around housing upside down and on its head and how we really can do some work together. I highlighted the Meckllinburgg County hotel conversion because that's where the energy and committee on the conversation was without having the full details. Yes, corporate community needs to be at the table because this is all hands on deck. That other piece I'm not touching there. I'm just going to say now there's no version of any alternative universe where I'm going to support putting our most vulnerable in any connection with something that long term can hurt you even more. I am not doing that yet. The county and the city are getting ready to start some very real conversations. But what we also need to think about and have clear understanding on is if we're supporting anything, whether we're trying to push for a home for all or whatever it is, if it is not going to accept families, meaning that mother and father and child, >> that mother with a son and a daughter because what we're doing currently are splitting. We're saying that the young men cannot go with their parent and their female sibling. You're not sending your child to a homeless shelter by themselves. It is unsafe. So you have couples that the women can only go here, men can go there. So if less is going some less we're going to clearly have the language identified where families get to stay together, get to be unified, get access to the services that they need. That is what I would consider supporting. Other than that, the millions that we have put into this, we can be doing it better between the city and county because we'll have more control when we pull some of those latex out of it. Okay, Mr. Jones. >> So, uh, thank you, Mayor, members of council. I guess it's slide nine. I really appreciate what, uh, council member Mayfield said earlier. Um, there had been some discussion last we went through these rounds that we didn't go to committee first, but having the committee have an opportunity to discuss this, I think, is extremely important. Um, we have a business meeting next week. So on the 13th if we need to bring this back again so that you don't have to not talk about it before the 27th. So I think this has created some flexibility for good discussions um and for count for the staff to be able to give you feedback on some of the questions. But again there's an opportunity for us to discuss this next week too. >> Okay. >> Okay. Does everyone feel comfortable that we will continue this discussion and the committee? I don't know if some people can >> three of us show up. We're good. >> All right. Thank you. All right. So, with that um let's go on to where we had our committee discussions and um ask anyone that would like to share additional information. Um and we'll start with Mr. Dregs. Excuse me. So, uh, it's late and therefore I'm going to take, uh, the other topic that we had in community day and compress it. Basically, following the, uh, deferral of the vote on the community area plans until November by 60 days. Um, the the committee discussed today where we are and how we want to proceed. Just wanted the council to know that the work is being done on that. The staff briefed us today on how we got to where we are. They went again over all the outreach that had been done. Uh they mentioned that we will receive packages with all the comments and with the staff reaction to all the comments. So you will see that and uh they did talk in particular about work engagement they've had with the Cherry and Steelberry acres neighborhoods. Uh those discussions will continue. And uh I would just like to say uh again we're keeping it brief tonight but uh in the next two weeks if you can bring forward any new any new input that you want to provide to the staff and if we can conclude our our council comment period in two weeks time so that they have time then to act on whatever they hear and to engage with whichever residents need to be discussed. um we will try to target that date that we established before this council uh dissolves uh in order to get those plans adopted. Uh I repeat again, these do not modify the UDEO. They're just an attempt and all of those different 14 areas to somewhat fine-tune the the plan and be responsive to concerns that we're hearing from people that the one-sizefits-all plan does not is not responsive for them. Um, so that's kind of where we are. I think for now I'll leave it at that. I'll mention our cons the members of our committee are uh myself, Miss uh Miss Molina, uh, Mr. Graham, Miss Johnson, and Miss Washington. So, that's what I have to say about that. >> All right, Mr. Graham. Oh, I'm sorry. You wanted a comment? I >> Yes, I do. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Jones. One of the things I'd like to see, when we had the webinars, they were very successful. We had really good attendance. I think that what I would like to see for the plans that affect or impact district 4, if we could do if we could have a webinar where I could be present, I think it would be great for for council members to participate in these webinars to hear uh what changes are proposed and to have the residents participate as well because the problem is not we didn't delay it simply to delay it. We want residents want to ensure that they're they're being heard and we gave an example of the Cherry neighborhood where individuals had been involved since the very beginning and those changes weren't being incorporated. And that's not the only neighborhood. So, what I would like to do, I'd like to hear from the residents with staff on the line so that I I would like to ensure that district 4 residents and and the three plans that uh encompass district 4 I I would like a webinar or some type of meeting. I think I think webinar is a great uh forum. It works with the uh presentation of the plans. We had over a hundred participants. So, I I think it's a good format and and um I think it's a good idea if the other council members could I mean it's up to you all, but participate and hear from the residents and then you would then you would know why we advocated to delay the vote. I I don't question that we did delay it, but I think the staff did explain to us today in some detail the amount of engagement they'd had with the with residents in Cherry and some pretty significant changes they made, which in their opinion uh were accepted as being responsive by the residents. If you think that was a misstatement, then um but that's what they told us. and they showed us how they had dialed back the intensity of the industrial type of development that was contemplated in in a fairly large area there. Uh so uh I I will just say again what what I'd like to ask colleagues all of us to do is just as as members of this body and and for the benefit of the staff just get whatever it is that you think needs to be resolved or needs to be done into them in the next two weeks and then uh if we have to by a council vote then we will tell them what they need to do. But I'm hoping that we can just sort of bring this process down. There has been an enormous amount of outreach and and that's one thing. Hundreds and hundreds of different efforts by the staff to connect and to hear thousand a thousand responses that came in and I think the suggestion that the staff hasn't done enough work to try to connect with the public is unfair to the staff. Frankly, the public has to do something on its own in order to engage. and they did in the case of Cherry and the staff talked to them >> but the numbers were but the numbers were over 2500 comments and only I I don't remember what the number was but very few of a small percentage >> you can see every single comment and you can decide if any of those comments deserved a different reaction from the one they got and in the next two weeks if you would please Mr. >> Jones forward I've expressed what I'd like to see for district 4. Thank you. >> Okay, that's it. >> Okay. Um, Mr. Graham. >> Thank you, Madame Mayor. Um, the jobs and economic development committee had a a really uh eventful meeting today and I want to try to go through a lot of information in a relatively short period of time given the time >> for his committee >> given given the time aotment that we have. Uh, the first major item on the uh agenda was the Bank of America stadium modernization ground lease update. Um, one, uh, as you know, the $650 million investment in Bank American Stadium that we approved a year ago, uh, over the last year, the city attorney's office, uh, the Panthers, our finance department have been working to dot eyes and cross tees on the agreement itself. uh they have finally come to a a a conclusion where all of the elements of the agreement that the council wanted has been signed off on by both the Panthers as well as our city attorney. Uh I really want to thank him uh attorney Fox and his staff um for the work they've done over the last year to get us to this point. The finance department has been heavily engaged in ensuring uh that financially that we are doing all the right things per the agreement. Everything that the council has asked for in the original agreement has been signed off by the Carolina Panthers, including the 27% minority women's development goal. Uh at today's meeting, um the president of the Panthers uh was in attend attendance with her staff, Christie Coleman, which identates a a willingness to partner with the city, be a part of what we're doing. In short, uh we are ready now uh to present the final um draft of that contract for council for their approvement approval so we can send it to the local government commission in Raleigh. uh beginning on September 13th and the 27. That's a two vote process that we have to vote. This is not the first time you've heard hearing this. We heard it about two weeks ago. And so we're ready now to to formalize the document so that we can prepare it, sending it on to Raleigh to begin to release in the funds to begin construction on the stadium itself. That's item number one. Item number two was uh uh executing a lease with cats for uh a lot um that uh the Panthers will need to stage construction. And so our second uh item was we discussed that uh which is again um this is not new news for the council. We've talked about this before. Uh we're bringing this forward for a formal vote uh for the council, but again this is really dotting eyes and crossing tees. Again, a lease agreement uh for the catch lots for the Panthers to stage construction related activities. And the third item, which is something I think was really good news, uh the Panthers announced uh again uh that they will be um um constructing a 4,400 seat capacity um performance venue uh on the north uh northwest side of the stadium on Graham Street. Uh it's approximately 2 acres. uh the council approve um the building of such a facility with the resoning that we approved in April in April of this year. It should be noted that there's no public funding for the construction or the operation no incremental land added to the ground lease for the stadium or the fieldhouse activation of the stadium and as concept shared with the council in 2024. So we did talk about this in general. Now, we're talking very specifically about what it is, a performance center, where it's located. Um, again, no council funding, no council lease arrangement for the land. They will use the existing parking that's in close proximity to the um facility itself. Uh again, multiacet local benefits, jobs, hospitality, tourism, supporting more tax revenue, supports uptown vibrancy, and fills a void in the local venue inventory. Now, that's a short explanation for a lot of work that we did um for the last year from the attorney's office. Uh again, we've heard this two weeks ago. You're hearing it again tonight. Uh, this was voted out of the council with a five out of the committee rather, I'm sorry, with a 50-0 vote in favor to move it on to the council for your consideration. >> Council member Graham, I think you stated September 17th and September >> September 13th and >> was it September? October. That's >> October. I'm sorry. >> Yeah, that's I was just wondering. You're absolutely right. October. Sep >> 17th and October 27th. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. O Yeah. Next week and then the 27th. uh for council the first to take their first initial vote and then the the last vote on the 27th. So I'll pause to see if any committee members want to chime in in reference to it. >> I just wanted to note that the team demonstrated the importance of the lease amendment by winning yesterday. >> I know. Wasn't that wasn't that kind of good? >> Yeah, that was it. >> I know they knew they were coming before council today. >> We don't know. We just try our best. Okay, Mr. Mitchell, anything? >> No. Any comments in reference to this? >> Yeah. All right. So, so that's the Panthers. >> I think we're in a good place with them. I mean, Christie, President Coleman, uh, and I have been talking frequently and they are really excited about what's h about to happen over there. And again, Mr. Fox uh, came in and provided a lot of energy in reference to the negotiations. So, I want to thank you personally for that. Uh second item was um uh we identified several funding requests that came before the the council. If I can find my notes uh in reference to the historic excelsious club. Uh the second item was for do greater as well as the uh Spangler market. Uh they both came to us seeking funding from our AO dollars and I just misplaced my notes. >> You want to see the slides? >> Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Thank you. um from our um ACRO dollars and the requested um uh funding that we again with a 50 vote um uh supported uh $1.5 million for uh restoration of the historic accessories club, $500,000 for the Statesville grocery store, uh the Spangler Market, uh and then another $750,000 for do greater Charlotte. Um this would um exhaust our alcohol dollars. Um but uh the council this committee recommended with a 50 vote uh that we move this along to council for consideration. As you know the historic access club for road rich in history, legacy and tradition. We're not investing in the club. We're investing in the revitalization of the historic Betty's foot road corridor along with the other investments we've already made on the corridor on the corner of Betty's foot road and Lasowl. This investment is on the Betty's foot road uh in Oakland and hopefully in 2026 there'll be an additional investment at the fivepoint near Johnson C. Smith University. The Statesville grocery store is a partnership. I should mention uh that the county as well will put in $1.5 million for the historic Excelsster Club. Uh the Statesville grocery store again addresses a food desert uh on that side of town. Uh it was presented to the council the committee today. The county also is a partner and I think the county is going to put in $1.5 million to support the grocery store. Our investment will be $500,000. Uh the committee heard a a presentation today uh from staff uh and again voted 50 to advance this to the council for more consideration. And then lastly, do greater uh was seeking a $750,000 uh investment to finance their construction project. They have a number of community partners already invested with them. Uh and as you know, they've already have one site. Uh this will be their uptown location. Uh and again this is was our second time hearing this particular presentation uh in reference to um um seeking our investment. So the committee advanced all three with a favorable um outcome. Again the historic excels club $ 1.5 million. County will match that as well with $1.5 million. The station grocery store $500,000 from the city. the county will put in $1.5 million and then do gridish um which is a $750,000 commitment that we sign off on and I'll pause to see if my committee members have any other questions. >> Mrs. Mayor, >> so how about the institute because that's on the slide. >> Yes. So we're going to we deferred that conversation. Uh that conversation more than likely will be picked up next year. This probably was our last ED committee meeting of the year and there's some there's some um we have to talk about that in reference to recent emails we receive from our federal authorities etc. We we just got to look at that with um clear eyes. >> Okay. And uh I know you mentioned ARPA funding source for all three but I see on slide number 13 you got PGO for so how much was it ARPA and how much was it from PGO for Acceliser Club and Spang Spangler's market and it could be part of the followup report just >> the manager take that. >> All right. So you had a little bit over $2 million left for ARPA and in the corridors there was a million dollars that were are associated with these types of projects these um P3 projects public private partnerships. So um you pull the half the million dollars from the corridors for these types of projects plus a little bit over two million would cover these three projects. So I'm sorry what I guess how much of it will come from PGO that that's what I'm asking >> 1 million. >> Okay. Okay. And the remaining is from ARPA. So we exhausted ARPA dollars. So there is nothing left for the >> there is another ask >> for whatever. Right. >> Okay. All right. No more. >> That's all I have. Okay. >> Okay. >> And the third item, Vice Chairman, you want to take that one? Uh I'm going to do it with my colleague. Uh this was a uh Molina and Mitchell amendment. Uh we went to Seattle what four years ago? >> It's been two three >> three years ago and we saw Ike make a presentation of kiosk and so council member Marina and I got excited. We came back. We said we need to do this and our corridors and our MSD. So it's no cost to the city. And I think council member Durriggs you asked a great question. What's the annual revenue we can expect? They like 972,000 about 17 million over a 20-year period of time. Um, city manager, thank you for being creative and calling the pilot. Uh, somebody like me want to roll out 120 to compete with Raleigh, but you say slow your roll. And so, thank you, Mr. Chair, for pushing this through. And I think this going to be great for our corridors and for our municipal service districts. >> So, I have a question. >> Good job. >> All right, Miss Ash. So, we get revenue from this with no cost. >> No cost. >> I hate to drag this out, but what is it? >> It's kiosk. >> Kiosk like this >> that they display um >> directions. >> It's even got an internet connection. >> Yeah. >> You could It's got It's It's got um advertisements. All of that. >> Yeah. There a lot of ads on here. I see. >> Right. I I guess when we have our formal vote on this, there'll be a lot more information for and a lot it'll be a lot slower presentation. I'm sorry. >> Hello. No cost. >> There there will be some sort of restrictions on certain content, right? >> Yeah, they control the content. >> Yeah, they restrictions. >> Exactly. >> Yes. We're not going to be doing that. Miss Mayfield, Miss Mayfield, did you have a comment or question? Well, yes. Thank you, Madame Mayor. So, for clarification, one, thank you committee chair, vice chair, and members for going through this. I think somewhere along the line, conversations start to blur. >> Mhm. So I do have sadness about the fact that once we do this what we have left in ARPA is completed yet at the same time I'm happy to hear that because I think county had already allocated all their ARPA a while ago. I wanted and which chairman you can have staff or someone follow up with me later. We started the conversation regarding do greater back in 2023. For whatever reason, we're now in 2025, but during that time, the new opportunity with Excelsier, because I believe I asked staff at your last meeting, there was some money that we put in with the last buyer. I think it was like 250,000 or so. Did we get that money back? >> Yes. M. So that 250 is going towards this 1.5 ask or we're saying this 1.5 ask is coming out of POGO and Arper. Where's that 250 that we originally put? Yeah, >> I I believe council member Mayfield that 250 came out of uh just the general fund and went back to the general fund last fiscal year, but I can give you an accounting of where where >> that would be helpful if we took that out of general fund for that conversation. Either way, if we got the money back, where is the money when we're looking at this? I'm hoping also, Mr. Manager, now that we have leadership in the economic development department that we don't find ourselves in this type of position again where conversations are started and there's not a clear trail and a timeline from your office down of expectations of moving things forward because now we have these three conversations and hearing about Spangler's market. That was the first time that I've heard anything about it for so for them to even be considered in this conversation when we've had these other two big pieces that have been out there for a number of years that we've been working with or working around on some level is a little bit challenging versus less support staff creating an actual process where there's a timeline of movement. And if there's challenges, then we know this is put to the side while they work on it so that we're not caught unaware or something new is brought to the table when we have an outstanding conversation that should have been identified and moved forward one way or another. But I am happy and excited that for those of us that had the chance to go to Boston and hear what some of the things that they're doing, knowing that we had some amazing opportunities right here on the ground to support to make transformational change. I am happy to hear that out of committee, it was unanimous to move it forward and I do look forward to all of us supporting the funding requests for not only do greater and the work that Mr. McNeely is doing, but also for the Excelsia and the corridor work that Mr. Kennedy is doing. >> Okay. >> And then lastly, uh, and quickly, uh, we did take out the referral that the mayor sent to us. Obviously, we were exhausted with time, but each um, committee member gave our perspective on how we need to lean in to the utilization of small businesses. uh especially in light of the email we received over the weekend. Uh and um our ED director indicated um that he is almost done with the small business report uh and I think we'll have further conversations about that moving forward. Thank you, >> Mr. Mitchell. >> Mayor, and I apologize to council uh because I want to ask Mr. Chair uh Councilman Drake a question. TPD. I remember the last time we had conversation about the area plan. Uh, one thing that I think was a sticky point for a lot of us were we had 2500 comments. Did you all have any kind of conversation about uh qualifying or the process of them going to the plan? I think there was discussion. We had a lot of comments only 14 made it to the plan. So did you all talk about justifying or process how a comment goes through the process to get to the area plan? Any of you guys know of staff? >> The the staff talked to us. It's 2500, right? So, they talked to us in broad terms >> uh about how they uh how they basically sorted the comments, right? Some of the comments were just observations, okay? >> And some of them were not really actionable because they were things like we've got to stop the growth in Charlotte entirely. and and then they had a shorter list of the ones that uh that they responded to by saying okay we have done this >> okay >> they made changes that affected I think about six or seven% of the land area of Charlotte uh actual modifications and uh the the key benefit of all of this is we now have uh we will have area plans for the entire city whereas right now uh some high percentage of the city only has 20 and 30 year old plans that were adopted Uh so uh I think the best thing is you will receive from the staff they're going to circulate electronically everything all the all the comments you can scan them look at them you can see the staff responses and as I said if if in the next two weeks we could get uh feedback from council to the extent that there is something that's been left out or requires further attention and the staff is also actively engaging not only in the uh in these two uh convers conversations but in other engagement with residents on uh specific issues that have been raised. >> Thank you, mayor. Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> I believe that ends our discussion. Two more committees. >> Two more committees. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Got to do housing and BGR. >> Housing has to be I thought they just did. >> So BG Yes. I thought >> so for housing we have three items. >> So we only did housing trust fund but how about the first item about the funding federal funding challenges >> as well as the quality of life. >> May I promise I can do that one in 3 minutes. >> I'm I'm with you. I'm still here. >> You ready for a housing report out of which we will gladly send the email out to everyone. Thankfully staff just gave us an update. We are actually looking better than was anticipated as far as the federal government. We actually they are talking about not funding home but that isn't going to hurt us as much based on where we are in the community. The other great opportunity in it is we actually received $283 million more than what was anticipated for some of our funds which is puts us in a really good position. We wanted to make sure that regardless of what happens financially in the government, we will be able to continue to help our community and our partners. So, we are taking that very seriously. Then the last piece is we had our quality of life update of which that one is our policy referral for community safety the partnerships that we have which is also we can make sure the staff sends that out to share with everyone but it is the sequential intercept model through Charlotte Meckenberg. So yet another partnership with the county. So, we are actually doing a lot more with the county today than in previous years, but it was really a great breakdown of the models going back to 2015 to where we are today and learning that it takes all of us at the end of the day. But, of course, Dr. Wington was really excited when she got to see the breakdown since, you know, her and Ed love numbers and charts. So, this right here is really a great way of looking at law enforcement, emergency services, initial detention, court hearings, jail and courts, even though there's challenges around eliminating cash bail re-entry and community corrections. Some of this actually ties right into some of the housing requests. We just need a little bit more clarification on it. Those were the recommendations regarding our policy referral. Nothing actually need to be referred out to come to committee. Everything was just basically a update and that is your condensed version of the report. >> Well, I I thought the police officers were really really helpful in the discussion and the captain that was on the end really did a good job. So, I just wanted to say that. >> Um, so now I think this is our last report. >> Yes. So, I'll >> before we go into close session. >> Okay. So, we had three items uh for our BGR committee. First, we got a report from internal audit. Uh, Miss Adams walked us through the audits that's being completed, uh, status of each audit and, uh, what's in plan as well as, um, we provided feedback to Miss Adams about, uh, what we what we have heard from constituents. Council member Johnson had sent this request over to me from district 4 residents about need for putting RFP out there for external auditors because we've been using um the same audit team for external audit for a while and that's just the standard business practice. So, we will be getting a follow-up report on that. And we also got um insight I mean several constituents are interested in uh providing sort of uh community input in our audit process. So, we discussed that to see what other cities are doing to uh to engage community in our internal audit process. So, there will be some discussion on that our follow-up report. Uh second item we had was um the quality of life referral and public safety issue which is really focuses on our uh what tools and legislative support that we need to strengthen our public safety because we know the conversation is not just about policing but it's about a trust accountability across all levels across the entire system. So, uh, DA, courts, mental health, and, uh, there were several items that were discussed, including supporting our law enforcement, uh, to be all of these items to be included in our legislative agenda or some sort of letter that will uh, we are uh, we discussed in uh, collaborating with our housing and safety committee. Uh but we know that um district attorney's office is getting 10 additional district attorneys. It's just a drop in the ocean. Uh we know to operate at full capacity, we will need at least 144 uh prosecutors to get to where we need to be. Uh we also talked about investment in mental health. uh we talked about strengthening qualification for magistrates to ensure that uh they have the training and qualification because they are the first line of defense for a lot of judicial decisions and we also talked about reestablishing local uh juvenile center. uh we know that uh we lost that facility during co uh so our youth are being transported away away away from the support system like family schools so that would also be part of our request so that state can invest in reopening a facility that provides wraparound services for a juvenile. Uh but in closing, it was just all about how we can work across um various other uh agencies, especially the general assembly, the county, the DA's office, our judicial system to put together a comprehensive package. So more to come on that but the committee asked staff to pull together a summit uh similar to the housing summit we had done a few years ago uh that will bring together all the parties all stakeholders that I mentioned and um and then the we will discuss uh a shared ecosystem of public safety. So more details to come on that. Um and we will share with full council. I and u councilwoman Watlington plan on um meeting next week to discuss what that looks like >> along with >> Yes. Um along with council member Graham. And last but not the least uh we had a policy referral on financial stewardship thanks to the mayor. So you know the committee worked on financial partner policy for at least as long as I remember. So we're trying to have adopt that process for all nonprofits. So whether you apply with through financial partners or other a departments there should be one policy across all departments. So staff is going to gather information. They are going to bring it to us for recommendations. So, more to come on that, but just stay on the lookout um for financial stewardship. That's all I have. >> Okay, Miss Miss Johnson, >> you mentioned 144 was the full staffing for the district attorney's office. >> How many do they have now? >> So, I'll tell you the number is I have it written down. >> So, currently they are operating at 84. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Mhm. Okay. So, that ends our committee meeting discussion. Um I'm now going to ask our um attorney >> Oh, so go ahead. So, I'm going to ask we're going to go into close session and I'm going to ask our attorney to um give us a >> Yes. Uh the if I can have a motion going into close session by the council pursuant to North Carolina General Journal statute 143-318186 to consider the qualifications competence performance character fitness and conditions of employment or conditions of initial employment of an individual public officer or employee or prospective public officer or employee. That's the motion. >> So move we have a motion and a second. All in favor please raise your hand. Anyone in opposition? Anyone in opposition? I don't see anyone in opposition. So, we will now um have those folks that [Music]