Board of Commissioners · Work Session · March 2, 2026

The consent agenda items and if you have questions raise your hand and we will follow up this morning or send the information to you in the email number. The first one is 260063. This is a memorandum of agreement between Durham County and the sedimentation control commission. The next one is 2600067. This is an approval of a budget ordinance amendment for cooperative extension to recognize $14,82061 in additional Smart Start funding for the welcome baby program. The next one is 260069. This is a budget ordinance amendment to recognize $50,396 in a four of for grant funding for the Office of Emergency Services, EMS division from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities, and Substance Abuse Services, and to authorize a county manager to sign and execute all contracts for approved uses associated with this grant program.

The next item is 260073. This is an approval of budget ordinance amendment number 58 recognizing a $240,000 grant from the North Carolina Division of Water and Resources to the Storm Water and Erosion Control Program for the Whispering Pines Mobile Home Park string restoration project. Yes, ma'am. I just had a comment. I just wanted to congratulate the staff because I I'm always amazed at our staff going after and receiving these grants. But basically, just want to say kudos to the storm water staff for getting three different grants. So that basically residents I think the total amount for the project was I I had it in my notes like $2.1 million and we've received over $1.7 million in grant funding. So 80% of this project will be paid for not by residents. So congratulations and thank you.

Okay. The next item is 2600075 is authorization for execution of inbridge gas North Carolina encroachment agreements. The next item is 2600076, approval of budget ordinance amendment 59 appropriating $100,000 of general fund fund balance for matching grant recipient contracts in the county's matching grant program. Yes. just a quick request related to this., we did get a report that was on our consent agenda from the Durham Open Space and Trails Commission and then but they did present actually to all of us sitting here. We are on the joint city county planning committee.

There is a request from DSTS that we look at increasing the amount of money that is eligible for this program. there were there was a lot more requests than could be met by the 100,000 and this is a very good investment as we can see that we have invested $2.1 million and received $6.2 million worth of value. So I hope we'll look at that in our upcoming budget increasing this. Thank you. We will follow up. We'll we'll definitely be looking at that, Commissioner. >> Yes.

>> The next item is 260077. It's a budget ordinance amendment for public health department to approve $576,219 and general fund fund balance appropriation to increase Durham County's contract with wellpath to provide comprehensive medical services for inmates in the Durham County Detention Center and residents of the Durham County Youth Home. Okay. So, this is quite an increase over half a million dollars. So, I do have a number of questions, some that we could hear about further, but I would like to well, first I'm wondering if we're going to do a new RFP for the contract for both the jail and the youth home.

>> That we just went through an RFP and Dr. Jenkins can comment further on that. Good morning, commissioners. Dr. Rod Jenkins, public health director. Madame manager is correct. as of last week, we just wrapped up the interviews for the RFP. as you well notice, a five-year contract. proud to say that a selectee has been selected and we are still in the process of finalizing everything with our procurement department. >> Happy to address any additional questions you have., so the biggest increase is the 300,000 for >> medications >> medications and I'm wondering if you could just give us some insight onto that and then any possible strategies moving forward on that.

>> Absolutely., medications come in a form of HIV meds and mental health meds. As we have a time or two before presented to this board we certainly have a an increasing situation in the jails relates to behavioral health. HIV care has always been prominent at the jail. As a direct result we have worked with a number of companies to try to see whether or not we could get reduced costs. we employ 340B pricing and most importantly we look for grants in order to help the freighos's costs.

You will also understand that effective December 1st with Ireina's law we have an influx of inmates coming to the jail because of this law and of course when they come in we are mandated to provide that care. So, those are some of the things that are really factoring into the two highest costs, which are medications and MAT2. >> Okay. And I know we don't have time for this now, but I think what would be helpful is for our board to dig into some of these issues and have some more information. one, if we could at a at a future work session to understand from the from you and the office of the sheriff what is the impact of the new law, how how is that actually playing out in our jail and the cost to residents and to understand that., the second thing would be we we talked about this a little bit when the DA came to us last year, but really understanding how long people are in the jail waiting trial and.

Understanding the benchmark with other counties because it's my understanding that our processing rate for getting, cases to trial is quite slow. in Durham County compared for example to Wake County. And again, we really need to try to understand what's happening because the longer people stay in our jail, it costs us money and we're taking care as we can see the medical costs and things. It's quite concerning. So that's the second part of that. And then related to the 200,000 I whatever I forgetund whatever the money was for the MAT program. I'm also wondering is that something that in the future could come out of the opioid settlement funding as a source of funding.

I'll I will start with that particular question. will evaluate that particular question. Unfortunately, the the opioid funding recurring dollars are not as large as we'd like and so we'll try to see if that is an option. we've we're in the process of evaluating proposals for opioid funding and we probably had about $3 million more of requests than we have available recurring. dollars. I will note that the North Carolina Association of Board of County Commissioners, y'all may be aware they're doing a study of jail health cost because this is an issue that impacts all counties and so and they're in the beginning stage of gathering data from counties across the state., I I'm hopeful we can glean from that as well some best practices and approaches on how to contain costs or do things differently. The points raised about the days and and the processing time. that that is a factor. So we definitely can come back with some of that data. Medical care costs are just rising. And so that's.

Part of it. the question to is what level of of care happens from one jurisdiction to next to the other. But we'll come back with more information and possibly at our April work session we can bring you more information by then we may have some decision on the contract for medical care as well. So that timing should work out. >> Okay. And then the last is when may perhaps the office of the sheriff reports about the mus what's the law >> arena's law arena's law that also I know was mentioned in this item that well path is implementing staged mat phase two >> but just trying to understand I would love to for us to get an update on what what is just what's happening with that. That would be great.

>> yes, if I could. >> Thank you for those remarks commissioner. And so consistent with those remarks, if we could Well, first let me say thank you director for your work with the mel path contract particularly in the detention center. >> Yes, sir. And so I know we'd had some conversations earlier in the year about, you know, leaving the director some of his responsibilities regarding the contract in the detention center and and putting those responsibilities back with with the sheriff. I'd like for us to continue that discussion run that the ground and put that responsibilities back where they belong. Also, as it relates to that, we had a discussion earlier in the year. We hadn't got around to it about the director's position in in the jail. And so I think that would be helpful in facilitating these responsibilities being shifted.

And so if we could add that to the agenda as well u so we can resolve that that that issue. I think that would be helpful. >> We certainly appreciate that Commissioner Valentine. And you know I I would love nothing more. You know that's a personal point of privilege to say that. But I will say since 1998 the public health department has been managing the contract and doing it with a smile. But we do feel as if with those additional assets that the sheriff has employed they will be in line to be able to really perform it. the RFP process I attended all of the interviews and it was kind quite clear to see that the sheriff's department has a renewed sense of spirit about managing this contract. So I certainly appreciate those considerations.

The next item is 2600078. This is a budget ordinance amendment to approve an additional $30,000 from the North Carolina opioid settlement fund to purchase additional nlloxxone units to reverse opioid overdoses in Durham County government. The next one is 27079 environmental affairs board 2025 annual report. The next item is 260081. That's budget ordinance amendment number 26 BCC 64. This is for public health to recognize $2,248 from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Public Health, State Office of Child Fatality Prevention to Improve Delivery of Services for Children and Families.

The next item is 260082. This is to approve a letter of submission to the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services outlining the aggregate percentage of percentage change of 0% to public health's charge master rate. The next item is 260083. This is to approve a service contract of $60,000 in county early childhood action plans funds for the North Carolina diaper bank to provide diapers and essential supplies.

I just wanted to lift up this along with there are several items on our agenda that are really key for some of the basic needs that we have in our community. I'm really thrilled to see this partnership with the diaper bank and knowing that this will support a 100,000 diapers. That's amazing. and other essential needs., we talked about this at the retreat that we're really going to have to look at how we can support our families in in this these difficult times. And I'm just really grateful. There's another item related to food security for the Durham Center for Senior Life. for the next item, but just I hope when we look at our budget also that looking at how can we in increase the funding for some of these things and I'm looking out at our awesome food security and early childhood coordinators and I was thinking as I was reading our agenda how we have invested in how we really did a good job investing in the refugee and immigrant coordinator, food security,.

And early childhood coordinator, and that we have the expertise and the system in place, that we really can do some very targeted grant funding. And so I'm really grateful to you all sitting here and that we have created that structure and that system in Durham County government. Excellent. The next item is 260085. This is to approve a budget ordinance amendment for cooperative extension services to appropriate 40,000 in general fund fund balance for the Durham County Food Security Program to support the food security work with the Durham Center for Senior Life.

The next one is 260088. This is to approve capital project amendment 26 CPA 19 and budget ordinance amendment 26 BCC61 appropriating $400,000 of debt service fund balance to the PGO fund to support the project build at shops of hope valley renovation project and to authorize the Execution of the construction manager at risk guaranteed maximum price contract with hope brothers construction for the renovation of the project bill facility not to exceed $1.7 million. The next item is 260089. This is to approve budget ordinance amendment 67. This is for cooperative extension appropriating 300 I'm sorry $30,000.

300 would be much better, but it's 30 and general fund fund balance for the Durham County Food Security Program. The next one is to 260090. This is an authorization of amendment to the design contract with HH architecture for design development and construction administrative services related to the office of emergency services fleet maintenance project in the amount of $24,000 for dollars for total revised contract of 63,000282. Two.

The next one is 2691. This is to authorize the county manager to increase the contingency by $41,025.39 cents for the construction manager at risk contract with Sammit Construction for the OES fleet maintenance to a not to exceed $3.1 million. The next one is 2600092. This is approve and extend it is to approve the execution of contract with Gregory Pool Equipment Company in the amount of $103,558.

For a generator for the Office of Emergency Services Fleet Maintenance Facility. The next one is 260104. It's an approval of a budget ordinance amendment for a cooperative extension services to recognize $475,000 in Golden Leaf Foundation funding for Durham County Farm Campus and the creation of one new farm manager FTE position. This deserves a big round of applause. This was a very robust process. I was involved. John Kever was involved and the foundation has a probably about almost seems like almost a year's process and how they go through it. So kudos to the cooperative extension team.

The next one is 2605. This to consideration and adoption of high performance building policy. And this one will actually show up at your April work session, but we're putting it as a placeholder as we talk about this a little bit later. The next one is 26106. This is approval of capital project budget amendment appropriating $584,085 of debt service fund to the PGO fund to support the 500 East Main Street downtown parking debt capital project as well as authorize an increase in the owner's contingency in the amount of $584 and $584,885 to execute any necess Necessary change orders for the deck development agreement with Zam Living for an amount not to exceed $34.5 million.

>> Okay, commissioners, this concludes our consent agenda. >>, Manager Hager, you missed 26103. Okay. Now, >>, page 19. >> Okay. Thank you.

My apologies. 26103 approval of in the interlocal agreement cooperation agreement for the division of of sales taxes between the county of Durham and the city of Durham for July 1, 2026 through July 30th, 2027. >> Okay. Okay. I also just wanted to recognize all the staff Tobin and your team and Perry, everyone who worked on the the new high performance building policy. Thank you. It's really exciting. Thank you so much for your work on this. >> Okay. Thank you, Manager Hagar. All of those are consent items that will go onto our our regular meeting next Monday. Right.

Okay. The next item on our agenda as we.

Move into discussion items is the commissioner comments on the annexation request outside the urban growth boundary for 4802 Cheek Road. Awesome.

Thank you. >> Good morning, Chair Dr. Lee. >> Morning, >>, Vice Chair Alum and honorable commissioners. My name is Andy Lester and I'm here this morning to present Z24 000033 482 Cheek Road. This proposal includes one parcel of land totaling 69.19 acres and located at 4802 Cheek Road. The existing zoning is residential rural. The applicant proposes to change this zoning to planned development residential 2.748 to allow up to 190 dwelling units with a mix of town houses, single family attached and single family detached houses.

As stated previously, the existing zoning is residential rural. The proposed zoning is planned development residential 2.748. The site is surrounded by residential rural and adjacent to an existing PDR district to the south. This aerial map shows the general location of the project. It is south of Cheek Road and adjacent to Holly Heights Drive. The property is currently designated rural and agricultural reserve and recreation and open space on the place type map and is outside the urban growth boundary of the comprehensive plan. The annexation outside the UGB is inconsistent with the comprehensive plan. If the proposed zoning is approved, staff recommend a change to the place type as next residential neighborhood.

If the proposal is approved, the comprehensive plan would be automatically amended to extend the urban growth boundary to incorporate the parcel. The other place type of recreation and open space would be retained. Within this textual development plan, the applicant has included a number of profers., some notable ones include 3% of the units to meet UDO affordability standards, a contribution to DPS, electric vehicle charging stations, minimum tree coverage of 25%, native species, and a contribution to the Redwood Volunteer Fire Department in the amount of $30,000.

Neighborhood meetings were held in accordance with the neighborhood meeting guidelines on September 4th, 2024 and January 15, 2026. An additional inerson meeting was held on January 29th, 2026. two comments have been submitted on the Duryzoning Explorer in relation to this case as of this morning and both are against the proposal. As stated previously, the proposal is inconsistent with the place type map of the Durham comprehensive plan. It is outside the urban growth boundary and is not consistent with the designation of rural and agricultural reserve.

The proposal is consistent with 25 of 30 policies of the comprehensive plan and on February 10th, 2026, the Durham Planning Commission recommended denial by a vote of 10 to zero. Regarding next steps, the commissioners may provide comments on the proposed annexation that will be incorporated into the staff report., those written comments should be given to us by March 9th, so they can be included., and this application is tentatively scheduled for the May 4th, 2026 city council meeting., thank you. Staff and the applicant are available for any questions.

>> Thank you. Thank you for that overview. Commissioners. So, thank you for the work of the planning department. I appreciate it. because it's hard, right? And so, thank you for for operating in that space. So, it seems like the recommendation recommendation that you're making to the city council. And so, just for the record, the county really didn't vote on these. And as hard as I push for us to try to do something about that, I seem to be, you know, beating my head against the wall. But to the extent that we're able to give feedback to our colleagues in the city, it sounds like the department doesn't support this project.

With respect to the policies that are required to make it one that would be feasible for them to consider. >> that's correct. Aaron Kane with the planning and development department. Staff doesn't generally make recommendations to the elected officials, but we do evaluate them against the policies and I think the big policy where we find this is not consistent is that is outside the growth boundary and it is not consistent with the place type map. >> Okay. And I think you're you're correct about that. Is so is there anything we we we can do on the front end of this process having been intimately involved in it as a planning commissioner previously to go back to the applicant to to sort of work out some of the inconsistencies here.

What I can say to that is that, you know, there's nothing that in local or state ordinances or laws that prevents us for that allows us to prevent an applicant for asking. You can always ask, you can always apply. >>, we did inform the applicant at many stages through this process that it would not be consistent with these policies., but they have chosen to move forward and and present their case as they have every right to do so., and that that's yeah, that's really the best answer I have for that. We did bring forth the idea of we did bring forth and let the joint city county planning committee know that it was possible to move the urban growth boundary through the evaluation assessment report process that we're currently in the process of. and staff recommended and the JCCPC agreed that we should not make any changes to the urban growth boundary at this time through that process, but the Board of County Commissioners or the City Council.

Are certainly able to make changes to it as they deem fit. Okay. >> Are there any other projects in the pipeline that are outside of the urban growth boundary? Only two applications have been presented so far outside the urban growth boundary since it was established in 2023. one was to actually annex in Orange County. So it did not come before this body. The other was off of Hamlin Road here in Durham County and both were denied unanimously by the City Council.

Well, I'll I end my remarks by saying that I have a lot of reservations about where we are with this particular project. And I'll my comments will reflect that. >> I'm just going to warn everyone I have lengthy comments and questions, so please bear with me. I'm really concerned about the staff report here. And I do not believe that you know there are certain policies that are included in the staff report and there are many policies that are not and I would like to understand so there are 30 policies that are included in this report.

What is the decision about which policies are included and which are not? So staff developed back in 2023 a list of policies that would be reviewed. They are in those policies are informed by whether or not the comprehensive plan identified them as what we call a D policy or a development related policy. It is not all of those development policies, but it is the a sizable majority of those policies, and that's what guided whether or not we should include them or not in our staff report.

Well, I guess what I'm proposing then is that we need to have re-evaluate that >> because when I read this report and I just read through the entire comprehensive plan again before this meeting and I can list how many policies are not included in the staff evaluation that directly relate to county priorities. ities and county investments and county plans. >> Okay. So, as we will be bringing the environmental and assessment report, I'm sorry, the evaluation and assessment report of the comprehensive plan to JCCPC in the near future. And as part of that, we as we presented last summer, we're looking at all the policies that are part of that review. So, as we bring that to JCCPC, I would ask that if you have specific policies that you want included, please bring that to staff at that time and we'll be we will absolutely have that conversation. We are open to those those requests. And I also there are and there are some key policies that I'll talk about in a.

Minute that I'm requesting be included in this report because this this project cannot be evaluated adequately without including some of these policies. This is a joint city county planning department. This is we have a joint plan and I will elaborate but this report needs to be amended to include evaluation of certain things. And you know, I want to remind everyone also that policy 14 says that we should be using quantitative and qualitative data around the impact of growth on our community. And you know, when we heard from residents about a lot of their concerns and we have, you know, a farmland preservation board, we have a Durham County open space and real estate department, we have a soil and water department. And we need to have a way that when there is development that is proposed to intrude into the rural agricultural area, the RA, there needs to be an equal process where we are hearing from Durham County staff about our investments and our priorities that can be negative. negatively.

Impacted by the intrusion into the rural area. And I don't see that reflected anywhere in this report. When I read this report, all I see is basically a review from city staff and that's not okay. And we we have an urban growth boundary. That is the underpinning foundation of our comprehensive land use plan and our place type map is to respect the urban growth boundary and all of the policies are around that whether it's you know infill development you know not extending infrastructure and having sprawl not having car dependent development not having development that doesn't have adequate put infrastructure on our roads. I could go on and on. Our this comprehensive plan is fantastic.

Rereading it just made me appreciate the work that our planning department had put into this report for years. And we need to and that our residents put into this and we need to really honor and uphold this plan. So and I I also believe that the devel development growth strategy policies around annexation it's not these policies are not all created equal that that policy is not the same as some as some of the other policies. That is a very important those are very important policies and we need to find a way of really lifting those up because they clearly state when extension and intrusion into the urban growth outside of the urban growth boundary takes place. And there's even a recommendation in one of the actions that the city action number eight on page 159 says that the city code should be amended to prohibit utilities extension outside of the urban growth boundary. That is how important these policies are.

So, you know, I I think when I have to think about what are the policies that I want to see reflected in this report, policy 120 says to protect the rural character of Durham. That's not in the report. Sorry,. That's my daughter trying to FaceTime me. Sorry. Policy number 141 says support local farmers, farmers markets, and community gardens to create jobs. But there's actually a policy policy number 85 should be included in the report on page 146 which says explicitly protect preserve and support farmland.

This project will actually take away farmland and it also has we've heard potential negative impacts on farmers literally who can't drive down drive their tractors down the roads., so you know, I will follow up in detail with an email because I don't want to take up too much time here, but there are policies that should be included in this report. And there's nothing again about EMS and the impact to county EMS. And I do not want this report to go forward until we hear from Durham County EMS and to double the number of units from 97 to 190. What is the number?

>> 190 >> 90. Okay. So almost basically doubling the number of units and not have any impact on for what it will mean for Durham County EMS. There's nothing in here about it. And related to the fire response, the Redwood Fire Department is right there. And there there will be an impact of doubling the number of units and people living there with the closest fire service being so far away. There should be some some reflection of that because with mutual aid they are going to have to respond and they are a small fire department and we are doubling the number of people who will have to be taken care of. So there there needs to be some acknowledgment of that. So, I'll I'll stop here and say that I am strongly opposed to this and that I want to see again a staff report that reflects the county input and the policies that are missing from this report that are related to county interests. Thank you.

I I would like to comment that I know planning staff and the EMF staff are working through a process going forward and so that you will see that in future requests. but to your point, all of the areas that you noted, we will coordinate crosswalk to make sure that going forward there's a way to capture those those comments in a more in a more direct way. >> Yeah, I appreciate that. And I don't know, my concern is this project and this report and I don't know if our board should even take a vote on this.

>> Sure. that because I literally want this report amended before this goes to the city council. Do we need to take a vote on that? >> No. >>, Commissioner Jacobs, this this item is not before you for a vote. It is before you as an opportunity to make comment and provide us written comments by next Monday that we can incorporate into the staff report that will go to city council. It's not before the county commissioners for a vote.

>> Right. I'm not it's not about my concern is the report. That's what I'm concerned about taking a vote on is about the poor the report the the quality and the content of the report. Again, we have a joint city county planning department and I am very frustrated. So, Commissioner Jacobs, we can discuss further. I do feel as though your the comments about the report we can send to the planning department. If there are areas that can be fleshed out with the review ahead of the 9th, I'm sure the planning department will do that. I know EMS will weigh in on their opinion about the project ahead of that and that can happen quickly.

We will proceed accordingly. >> Chair, I I don't think that the the the actual question was answered with respect to on the issue of whether or not the staff report going forward without things being addressed was actually addressed. So, I actually would be in favor of that if we did vote. so, I'm just curious what your your thoughts are on that. Sir, you're asking to vote on the staff to update the plan before we submit comments. >> I I think that's what the proposal was.

>> Not the plan, the report, the actual staff report. >> The staff report. >> The staff report. >> So, we can certainly look to address your comments in our staff report. Look at the policies that you see. We'll wait to hear. You said you were going to send additional comments. We'll wait to get those comments and incorporate them as best as we can in the staff report. I I we can do that without a vote. >> I don't know. I don't think we need a vote to give instruction like that.

>> Yeah. >> No, I don't think a vote is needed for them to amend the report. They can. Yeah, they can do that as long as we provide them the information for them to do so. but I don't think a vote would be necessary for them to do that. >> We've not completed the staff report yet. simply the main reason being we wanted to come here and be able to incorporate your comments into it. So it's not done and we can still amend.

>> Okay. And so I have a few questions but it's mainly around process just for understanding here. So you mentioned that the planning commission voted 10 to zero to deny it right. So help me to understand the the process on why it continues forward. Just from my understanding if the plan so we so the planning commission is appointed and we look to them to move things right and if they vote 10 to zero why would it continue to go forward?

>> Sure. Thank you for the question. Strictly speaking though the the final decisions for all resonings and annexations occur with the city council. So when it goes to the planning commission it's essentially an advisory board where ideally city council or any public body takes into account their decisions their rationale into the final decision. So in essence it's just an advisory board. Okay. No matter if it's a recommended denial 110, it still always moves forward so the city council can perform a final vote on it. And >> so everything that goes to the planning commission has to be fully voted on by the elected boards.

>> Correct. >> On the city on the city side and we in in cases like this, we provide commentary on what we feel as the county. Correct. >> That's correct. That was direction given to us in 2024 by the joint city county planning committee to bring any items requested for annexation outside the urban growth boundary to you to provide that comment to city council. >> Okay. Thank you.

Does does the urban growth boundary ever grow? Does it grow? because it it sounds as if it was put into place and there shouldn't be any growth associated with it period. And is that forever? No, not necessarily. That is at the direction of the City Council and the Board of County Commissioners. the urban growth boundary is a policy. It is not ordinance. It is something to guide the elected officials and the planning commission in their decisions as to whether or not to move forward with an annexation or a resoning and or a resoning. but it is it is movable at the elected officials discretion.

>> Has it moved? >> It has not since it was implemented in 2023. as I mentioned before, there were two previous requests to move it. They were both denied and this body at least in the one that was in Durham County also advised that it not be moved. when we discussed this briefly with the JCCPC this summer staff recommend recommended that we not have any staff initiated movements of it because it is so relatively recent and JCCPC concurred with that. >> Okay. Commissioner Jacobs.

>> Yeah. I just want to emphasize that I think it's policy 15 165 166 they have very very clear criteria under what circumstances consideration of moving the urban growth boundary would be considered very clear and this project does not meet those criteria. So it's it's criteria around whether there's some public health benefit or something that's been identified or there it's fulfilling some you know need that cannot be met some other way. So all of the criteria that is laid out it it does not meet that criteria.

>> Okay., so you know, I'll submit my comments and, you know, just for clarity, I don't necessarily support this particular project., there's a lot of concerns there and and so forth, but I think there needs to be I think there needs to be an expectation that it the urban growth boundary could move, right? because when we hear or we had a comment I can't remember which one said no more houses out here right but then we had another comment said we're not against it it's just it has to be in the in the format in which we do I think to set an expectation that the urban growth boundary will never ever grow is is is probably not the right message.

You know, I I I appreciate you saying there's very specific very specific criteria to move the urban growth boundary. But just for those who just for information, you know, policies, I I I agree with we have to do policies. We we have to do policies to guide things, but that there could be things in the future that change in which the urban growth boundary or other policies may need to be overridden. And we have to we can't say we can't grow. We we we can't say that. And so I just want to make sure that we set the expectation and we're we're communicating this correctly that because this policy was we're not communicating because this policy was done in 2023 or 2022 it can never be changed.

And I I just don't think that's the spirit of what governance is. We have to make decisions on what our current circumstances are as we grow as a community and a county itself. It it just it sits wrong with me when I hear things such as don't build in my area anymore. Don't we don't need new houses. I I just don't think that's I don't think that's the expectation we should be setting as a community, as a governing body.

And that's just kind of that's how I feel about that. And I know you want to say something, Commissioner Jacobs. Yeah, I think that's the beauty of our comprehensive plan and our place type map is that the policies that are in the comprehensive plan says yes, we need a lot of housing and we're going to grow densely and we're going to do infill and we're going to allow mixture of housing types and we're going to do it within the urban growth boundary. So, it doesn't say, our plan doesn't say we're not going to have more housing. It just says we are going to do it in accordance with what our community says they wanted which is to have walkable communities not you know relying on cars but transit you know we're going to we're you know our our plan does not say no more housing. It just says we are going to be putting housing in the place where it's going to be cost effective not extending you know utilities out where it's costly.

Or where we have to keep providing services and it costly. So, it's just that, you know, that's what people in our community said they wanted and that's what's in the plan and that's why we have the urban ground with boundary because we know that if you don't do that, you will have the kind of sprawl that we see >> and I I understand that. >> So, I'm just I just want to clarify. I I think that that's what the plan says.

And yes, you know, in 50 years when we've we've actually followed our plan and we've built out maybe we or 100 years we have to change the urban growth boundary. But or there is something that meets the criteria that does justify changing it. But this particular project doesn't meet those criteria. >> Yep. And I >> but so I hear you. >> As I said, I understand that. However, we have the same people who are fighting against these types of this type of growth who are fighting against density.

So, it is you're fighting on both sides of the candle. It is no growth and no density. You can't have it both ways. Something has to happen. One of one of the two has to happen. And so like we my point is for clarity and expectation that something has to happen, right? There's not going to be a no density. You can't build the like on one lot, put two houses, you know, these two little houses, and you can't get new land and clear the clear land to build new houses. You can't have it both ways. It doesn't work like that. And so like we have we have to be clear of what these expectations are and some that something has to move and you can't fight on both sides. You have to choose something.

That's my opinion, right? That that's just my opinion. So that's that's my point in this is saying we need to I think we as governing bodies have to set the expectation that something has to happen. this I don't I don't agree with this this annexation. I get that. But something has to happen. Okay. >> I just want to say well said. I 100% agree with you. That's the deal. That's the deal. That's the bar. That's the deal. If you want to see farmland protected, open space, water resources.

The flip side of it is then you have to support that we're going to have dense development within the urban growth boundary. So I 100% agree with you. Thank you. >> All right. any other comments? >> Yes, Commissioner Valentine. >> Chair Lee, thank you for your comments. I think growth is is inevitable inevitable, right? And you hear from our community in most instances about these projects that they're not against growth in our community. They're not against growth. I have been saying for a number of years that the pace of development in our community is outpacing our ability from a infrastructure perspective to keep pace.

And along with that, the environmental concerns that seem to go un unressed as a governing body, if we don't have those considerations in our calculus, none of those other things will matter for for the future. And by the future, I'm talking about the future that we're going to leave to our children. And so those are the sort of considerations that that I put into the calculus when I'm making the decision or providing remarks particularly on the issue. But I don't think with respect to a government a governing governing position that we're sending the wrong message. The message is is that you know we we support growth. We just want to do it the right way. We want to be smart about how we do it. And lastly, I don't ever want to be in a position where I feel uncomfortable about hearing from the public on these issues.

My constituents have a right to be heard and I'm here to listen. So, thank you. >> All right. Thank you. I want to check with Vice Chair Allam who is online if she had any comments. Nope. Nope. Okay. All right. So, we'll move on to the next item, which is the 2600034, the briefing and discussion on the creation of Mangum Fire Protection Service District. Okay. The board is requested to hear an update on the creation of the Magnum Fire District and Director Lockheart will share that information.

>> Good morning, commissioners, madame manager, madam attorney. Mark Lockheart, director of the office of emergency services with a briefing for you on the creation of the Mangum Fire Protection Service District. it's important to give you a little bit of context as far as what occurs in the county right now. Durham County is covered by seven fire departments. Bahama, Eno, Lebanon, Mariah, New Hope, Redwood, and the city of Durham Fire. The city of Durham Fire is funded through the city's budget. The Mariah Volunteer Fire and Rescue Department receives no funding from Durham County. The other agencies, Baha, Eno, Lebanon, New Hope, and Redwood, receive county funding and have their own tax rate that is set as part of the county's annual budget process.

This proposed new district is being created under North Carolina General Statute 153302, which establishes the requirements for a new service district. A staff report for the county board of Board of County Commissioners has been prepared. Notice has been served to property owners in the proposed district. A public hearing has been scheduled and it would take effect at the start of the next fiscal year if approved. The report for the board of county commissioners has been prepared by the office of emergency services in collaboration with tax administration, the county attorney's office, and city and county GIS. That report was submitted to the clerk of the board on Friday, February 6, 2026, and a copy has been included in the agenda item for today's meeting.

The findings of that report is that the proposed district is 3.55 square miles. It's located here in the far northeast corner of the county. there are 268 taxable parcels within that proposed district with a total appraised value of 64,119,329. The year- round population in the proposed district is estimated at approximately 500 people with no significant change on a seasonal basis. Fire protection is currently provided primarily by Mariah Volunteer Fire and Rescue from their station without receiving any funding from the county.

They cannot continue to do that due to increased operating costs and that was the genesis of this request we received from them last year. the behemoth fire fire and rescue department assists on calls in this district as well as other person county agencies are called in as well. The county does not have the capital equipment or personnel to provide fire protection service in this area to meet the established standards. The county only tax rate for the proposed district for FY26 is 50.5542 cents per $100 valuation. The FY26 tax rate for fire protection within the county. The departments previously mentioned ranges from 0484 to 0919.

This proposed district creates an equitable cost-effective solution for fire protection in this area., the proposed Mangum Fire Protection Service District meets the standard set forth in North Carolina General Statute. Potential property owner impacts. If we look at an average property tax value of $239,000 and apply the higher tax rate currently in effect of 0919 cents per $100 of assessed valuation, that's $219.64 annually or $18.30 30 cents monthly. This would preserve the ISO rating and prompt fire response for residents in that district.

The process for formulating or for approving the new service district. Again, the report for the board of Board of County Commissioners was reported by the prepared by the office of emergency services and filed on February 6th with the clerk to the board's office four weeks prior to the public hearing is required by statute. The notice of public hearing and anformational flyer were mailed to all property owners of record as of January 1st on Friday, February 6th. It was also posted at locations within the proposed district.

The notice of public hearing was published in the news observer on Monday, February 23rd, two weeks in advance of the public hearing. And that hearing is scheduled for next Monday, March 9th, during the regular session of the board of Board of County Commissioners. So again, the next step center for that public hearing on March 9th and then we would be working with the agencies involved to develop a recommended tax rate for the new district as part of our annual budget process.

And I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have. >> Okay. Thank you. Commissioners, Commissioner Jacobs. So just to clarify, so Mangum has had a volunteer fire department is that's who's been taking care of this area? >> No, ma'am. Mariah Volunteer Fire and Rescue. >> Are they in Person County? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Okay., and who services the area around them? Is it the Paha? Like who services like Rougemont and >> Yes, ma'am. They they are bordered on the south and the west by the Bahama fire department and then to the north and the east is person county.

>> Okay. >> I believe and also on the Granville I think on the east side. >> So this Mariah department are they also serving people on the other side on the Person County line? >> Yes, that is their their original district is in Pson County. They have been servicing this district. My understanding is now for 44 years. >> Wow. >> and apparently have never had tax revenue from the county. >> And are they going to be doing the same thing on the Person County side getting revenue?

>> They currently receive revenue from Pson County. >> Okay. >> For running the calls that they do in Pson County. >> Okay. Wow. So they've been getting tax revenue on the Pson County side but not on the Durham County side. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Okay., and in terms of the public hearings, have you what have you been hearing from residents about this? >> We have since the notices went out our office has received one phone call from a gentleman who was I think originally a little upset with this and said, "I don't understand why you just don't give money to Mariah to run these calls." And when I explained to him that that's exactly what the purpose of creating the service district was, he relented and said, "Okay, I can support that."

>> Okay. >> So, overall, one phone call by our office. I know there's been some discussion within the community itself, thinking that if this district is not created, nobody's going to run calls. I think we need to be very clear that Baha continues to run calls in this area with Mariah. it's just that Bahama gets tax revenue from the county. Mariah does not. >> Yeah. Okay. Thank you. >> Yes ma'am. >> What's this is sort of tangentially related but the relationship that we have with Wake County on the other side of the county Morrisville area. How how is that currently functioning?

>> That area of the county is primarily covered by the city of Durham fire. >> Okay. through the interlocal agreement we have going back to the formation of the Durham County Fire Rescue Service District. Okay. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Is that it? >> All right. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> We'll be seeing you on Monday.

All right. The next item on our agenda is the update on the capital improvement plan.

Do we need more seats?

We have an army. Commissioners. We will have a highlevel overview and update on our capital and improvement plan this morning. this will be an ongoing conversation. U Mr. Lane will start off with just sharing best practices on the CIP process and what that looks like and some key dates that we'll work through and there's lots of details you're typically used to seeing. We'll bring that back to you in future conversations. And then we'll transition to our engineering team to share details and highlevel information on the various items within our capital improvement plan.

Again, this is the first of many conversations and I thank everyone for sharing this morning. >> Thank you, manager Hager. good morning, commissioners. we're going to go through briefly here the overall setup of the capital improvement plan. Remember the capital improvement plan is normally a 10-year plan. We're still working through our FY24 through FY33 CIP. There's about eight years left. We're still in that time frame, but we're looking out ultimately to fiscal year 33 and trying our best with these nice folks over here to the right of me trying to assess the the current capital projects we have as well as future capital project preparation.

What are some main guiding points that we have around the capital improvement plan? Well, it's multi-year. We're in in eight years of the 10-year CIP, but it's it's largely to prioritize project cost need and and where they can be fit to manage ourselves finan and still stay financially stable and fiscally accountable. So that all of these are like puzzle pieces. When you say a project cost $und00 million, you can't do that tomorrow necessarily. Or you have 10 projects that cost $25 million each. they all have to be placed in terms of importance and need but also where we can fiscally afford to put them. So there's a strong emphasis on timing of the improvements and matching the available resources we have with those timing alternatives. We try to blend the ways we find the money to pay for these capital projects. A lot of projects we use PIGO money. PGO means just it's another term for cash, county cash. In fact, you just saw a couple of capital project amendments come to you.

Today where we're paying county cash for urgent needs when it's a smaller amount. If it's a big ticket item, 20 million, 50 million, we usually do a long-term debt instrument just like you would take a a a loan out for your house and pay over for 30 years. We tend to pay t take out long-term debt instruments for 20 years. It could be geo bonds, general obligation bonds that are approved by voters. could be lobbs, which is where you go to go to investors up in New York, but you don't have to go to the voters and you take out long-term loans to pay for long-term assets. While we call it mixed uses, you wouldn't necessarily take a 10-year loan out for something that's going to last 30 years.

You would take a 30-year loan out. On the other side of that, if we borrow money to pay for computer equipment, we wouldn't take a 30-year loan out for that because the equipment wouldn't last 30 years. So you take a loan out equivalent generally to the type of asset you're trying to build. But part of the CIP is mixing and matching. Where can we put county cash? Where do we put loans? When do we do a geo bond referendum? Other things we have to take into account are the are these improvements targeting and improving operating efficiencies and improve service delay. In fact, you'll see one of the projects we have out there in future renewable energy. That's a one way we take current assets and improve the life of them and efficiencies in that case. But you always have to pay cash. Even if one form or another, you're going to have to pay for improved efficiency. We separate operating and capital resources. We try to get for.

Each new capital project out in the CIP estimated operating cost. If we build an expanded size building, we've got to have general services support for that. There's a whole host of operating costs that come along with a lot of potential buildings that we do that are new. Not so much with renovations, but even renovations can force us to have increased operational costs. Ultimately, we have to figure out a debt affordability modeling. And I'll show you a brief a very simplified one page of that and we can come back later and talk about it forever. But we try to look out and say as we take on loans, as we take on debt, as we take on and build new capital assets, how are we going to pay for those things in the future? It's kind of like if you have one house and then you buy a vacation house and then you buy another house. We in the county tend to have about 20 to 30 houses at any given time, loans that we're paying.

On. And so as we in any given year, some of those loans may be going off. They may be fully paid, but we've just may taken on another loan. And we have to see not only for the upcoming fiscal year, but have to prep the board of Board of County Commissioners for how much it may cost to take on a loan next year or the third year. An example for the 22 GEO bonds. We have yet to issue the first issuance of those GO bonds. It's not a problem. This was planned. We know that there's been a couple years, but so we haven't really been paying the amateurization payment for that loan yet from those voter approved bonds. that's coming and we'll put pressure on the property tax rate for you all to decide in the next couple of years along with as what Perry and this crew is going to talk to you about a whole bunch of new projects that we'll have to end up paying for. So we use all of these.

Instruments, timing, debt instruments, how much we can afford to pay ultimately to guide how we create a CIP steps involved with capital P planning, facility needs assessment. You're going to sort of get a version of that with with the engineering group here, the project management group. Then we try to prioritize project sequencing sequencing in terms of what's most important, but also what we can afford. They sometimes compete against each other. The DPS school system would tell you and not rightly or wrongly they may need a billion dollars in capital equipment as they see it and they would love to have it tomorrow. That simply can't happen.

So you turn around and say what's their number one priorities and then how can we sequence that in a way that we can digest. We have to complete the detailed as we just talked about cash flow projections. How much money do we have coming in to afford to take on new debt to evaluate affordability? How much property tax rate increase are we willing to put on citizens to do all the things that we need to do? Just like the annual budget, there are almost infinite capital needs and a finite amount of a available funding and affordability that you as commissioners and citizens can take on.

Then we all that ultimately gets into an updated capital improvement plan. What are the next phases or what are the phases we're going through? There's phase one which is project request project prioritization. We are we have done some of that. we have a priority u project request excuse me from different departments including engineering. Engineering and project management has vetted some of them. Some of them are from outside agencies. DTCC has hopes and dreams. The museum of life and science has hopes and dreams.

The library system may have some project requests. We have a regional system that has multiple libraries out there that probably haven't been touched in 10 to 15 years. Part of it, perfect example of timing though is we have a brand new library director and we need to give her time to digest what the situation is for the libraries and then come back and work with project management to give a reasonable request for us. So that may come at a little later date, but that's part of project request and prioritization. Once I get all these projects in, much like a department requested annual budget, I try to do a cash flow, how much would it cost the county to meet the needs as requested?

Then we have phase three whereas we evaluate affordability. I turn around and walk to the manager's office and we generally include our financial adviser Doug Carter and Associates and go this is what's requested. This is what it's going to do affordabilitywise for the county. And we say it might need a tax rate increase of such and such amount. And the manager will go, I already know that's probably not feasible for any number of reasons. But we also double check that with our financial advisor to make sure it doesn't affect our AAA bond rating. There's only so much debt we could take on even if you were willing to raise the property tax rate 10 cents in one year for us to feel financially stable to the lenders up in New York City who ultimately buy our long-term debt. That's a different group of people that we have to meet their needs and assumptions as well as the local government commission in Raleigh. So we do all of that in phase three.

Ultimately phase four once we've tried to double check that through our financial advisor prioritization get all the projects in we think that are reasonable for the next eight years throughout out through 2033. We then present to you all a capital improvement plan hopefully to be adopted. Where are we right now? We're in the phase two and phase three highlights March and Jul March what we're doing right now through July of 2026. Continuing to add capital projects, updated capital project cost to the CIP.

You can see there. And then in March, we're going to assess the shovel readiness of capital projects. This is really important. The shovel readiness. You'll hear the manager say this over and over, but I cannot emphasize it enough. And I'll give you an example why. This is not judging DTCC and the museum or Durham Public Schools. We had a $530 some odd million dollar geo bond referendum in 22. How much money do you think we have spent four years later after that geo bond referendum? I don't expect you to answer that. It's less than half. So it's been three and a half years roughly since that was approved and money became available.

In fact, DTCC has spent $11 million of whatever their amount was 40, 50, $60 million. That is not to say they're wrong. It could be slow. But when we talk about shovel readiness, it is really important that when we put it in the CIP and a department says or particularly an outside agency says, "I'm ready for $50 million in 2027," that they're ready to spend on it. Because we have built into the affordability. We're telling taxpayers we may have to increase the tax rate 1 cent because we're paying for that that they're building on. And if they don't build it for two years, then everything gets kind of jammed up and we have some issues. All that being said, that should give you some consideration and pause and the manager will guide you through this about future geo bond reference. We need you can say you need a billion dollars DPS, but do you have the capability of spending that amount in any in in the time frame that has been estimated? Yes, ma'am.

>> No, I we had some some really great examples that we got right. based on some lessons learned when we didn't sequence as well. the two elementary schools that were included in this most recent referendum, the 2022 Massenberg, >> Murray Massenberg And I can't remember the other one right off top of my head. The strategy and how we did it as you know with with planning design work that's usually about 18 months and my engineers the that team are not in the air. Yes. So having your design work finished is crucial and very helpful when you're when we from where we sit because we're looking at cash flow. When do we need to borrow this money? So we're not doing it prematurely, so we don't run into arbitrage, etc.

That's why we do bank anticipation notes, bands, and with our financing. Keith talked about timing of actually paying for the bonds., we use short-term financing before we take out the actual bonds. And so for the shovel readiness, we cannot stress that enough because we have some worst case scenarios when we we did not plan as well. It happens, you know, county projects, any project, market changes, etc., or it's not been vetted well what you really want to do. And so, but that clock is ticking on how long you can spend that money. So from that perspective, we're pushing really hard with how ready is the project to move forward as we plan for is it going to be a PGO dollar, a LOBS dollar or a GEO dollar so that we can manage the the cash as seamlessly as as we as we should. The other factor with this particular planning process, with a lot of the changes that have happened with tariffs and other factors off the gate, anything that we did three.

Years ago is at least 20% higher. And I may be overstating for some, but we're concerned about the affordability piece. So, making sure that cash flow number is right is is important. So, I'll stop there. Yep. Thank you, manager Hager. I don't if you all were still all a little bit scarred. DPS and every one of us when we built was a northern high school and the cost of that project was projected at one amount and it ended up costing a different amount. Those inflation matters a lot when it comes to timing because if a project extends farther than we think at at the type of increases you're seeing every year, it can quickly be outside of what we all plan for in terms of long-term debt.

April 2026. And this is key here. If a general obligation bond is recommended for 26 26 and we have to do a market assessment or we're hoping to do a market assessment to gauge public support, there are options. We don't have to do a general obligation bond referendum in 2026. There are other long-term debt instruments such as lobs funding that we can do and that may be a better way to go for 2026 for a number of reasons that we can talk about at a later date. manager just hinted at one of them.

There's a lot of numbers here. What I want you to see is sort of the growth in that hill. These are stacked. If you look at the top part of that are the types of debt. The blue is existing debt and the green in that top graph going across timewise is new debt. What I want you to see is a rising amount of new debt as we take on more debt from the 22 geo bond referendum. As you hear about a number of key projects that the county is overseeing, animal shelter, different buildings of that nature, that's all new debt we're going to have to take on. You can see slowly what the existing debt is being spent down. That makes sense. Just like you're in your 20th year hopefully of a 30-year mortgage, you have spent down on existing debt, but you just happen to buy another house and so you got new debt. That's the green. That little thin line of pink is PGO money that we help.

Dash here and there. Although it's a sign significant sums to fill out how we make all this pay. Well, the next question logical question is how do we pay for it? And that's what you're looking at below. The gray area is property tax. The blue area is sales tax. We no longer we're slowly running out of occupancy tax for reasons we've already been discussed. And then whether we use some debt service related fund balance to do some things. What I want you to see, and I don't I'm sorry that there's a little clip there on the new message up top. If you see a growing amount of annual debt service payments, if you look in 2026, it's estimated at 131 million. But if you look in 2033, 2030, excuse me, you see that number go up $50 million to 188 and estimated debt service related or capital financing plan cost. So, how do we pay for that?

The two biggest areas we have to pay by board policy for capital financing is property tax and sales tax. And you have dedicated article 40 and 42 sales tax. And you had occupancy tax. We don't. And we have a few more revenue sources, but they pale in comparison just like in your annual budget to property tax and sales tax. Second column I just want to show you is because we're taking on more debt, it means that we're having to use property tax revenue more and more to pay for most of that debt. What's the subtext all of that is there are estimated property tax rate increases in the near future related to debt service.

So you have dual property tax rate considerations here. There's the annual budget, whatever is going to be needed to meet the needs of the 27 annual budget, the 28 annual budget, and 29. But you also have once you make some promises and you start building buildings, you have guaranteed property tax rate increases needed in a year or two or three from now to pay for the debt service that will come with the building of these buildings, the buildings of Durham Public Schools and DTCC. That is normal and natural, but we'll show you that in the future, depending on where this all falls out after we talk with our financial adviser. Just need you to be prepared for that. That as you think about property tax rate increases for the annual budget, just know out here in the back of your mind, there are property tax rate increases needed coming in the next couple of years for a capital improvement plan.

So, I it it's news. I want to know if it's good news, but it's news. Important reminders, a balanced and affordable CIP supports a number of different areas, political desires, reinforces our AAA, bond rating, and it hopefully limits property tax pressures on Durham County residents. And what we mean by that is again is that spacing out. What are the key projects that need to be done soon? What are the cost of those projects? and what projects can be moved out to not put tremendous pressure on the taxpayers in any one year. It's one thing to say we might need 1 cent in a property tax rate increase next year and 1 cent the year after that. It's another thing to say, hey citizens, we need 12 cents in one year because we wanted to start doing everything in the same time. Once a recommended CIP is finalized, it'll be vetted, as we talked about, by Doug Carter and Associates, our financial consultant, to keep an eye on our financial capability and stewardship.

That AAA bond rating is the gold standard. We've had it forever, but don't you cannot take that for granted, and we do not. And I think the manager is strongly stated her her desire to make sure that we stay fiscally responsible through all of these big ticket item purchases, which is basically what capital projects are and how we pay for that. once we the CIP passes passes that stringent financial vetting process, it'll be it'll come to you all for review and discussion. It should be noted that the loss of occasy tax revenue over the last three years with this year being this coming year being third and final year will be a loss of about $5 million a year that's already built into the CIP financial but there's a trade-off between that money going for to support future investment but it is a loss of a revenue support that we did have for the capital improvement plan. So key upcoming dates, March through July, we'll continue the evaluation of the CIP. March 10th, we'll.

Have an overview with the BOCC and Board of Education meeting. I think that's important because there needs to be agreement between your two boards, two bodies about what's coming in the future. And then in April 6, hopefully we'll have a a work session on the CIP financing update where you'll see lots more of those complicated charts I showed you with debt rising and the different types of financial ways we're going to pay for that. Are there any questions?

>> Commissioner Jacob, >> you can go ahead. >> Well, first of all, I'm not worried about anything. When I see you all sitting up here, I'm like, okay, we have this amazing team sitting here like, okay. So thank you so much., really important things to think about., so I'm wondering I just kind of had a lot of questions. I'm you know so thinking about the CIP are we are okay so you know one thing is will we get an update on all of the projects that were in the bond in 2022 and kind of where where those projects are and how they've been financed.

Thus far. That's amazing to hear that we've been doing it through lobs or through g pay as we go. How >> well? So it's a so what we do so we don't run into arbitrage is we and we save millions of dollars by doing this. So for instance we b the the the referendum was for $500 million. So we cash flow when are we going to need the dollars in increments and it is our practice to do bank anticipation notes to borrow the the dollars in smaller increments.

So we had bank anticipation notes for about for for three years worth of expense. We once we spend those dollars, we will then go out and take out the loan for that particular amount of those dollars. So that way you aren't borrowing for 20 years when you've not spent yet. We did a I will say this is probably the one of the best scenarios that we did it because we spent hundredsome million or will within a three million within a three-year period. There have been times and the reason I know George Quick when he was here years ago he moved us forward towards this strategy which is more of a private sector approach in doing it.

Durham County was the first in the state to do use this approach. Years ago, probably 2008, it took us about 10 years to spend $90 million and we almost ran into arbitrage and so this helps so that you don't run into arbitrage because you you're first borrowing on a shortterm period, but it saves you millions in interest. So, didn't mean to go into all of those details. And >> there's a couple of rules you have to live while with general obligation bonds. You have seven years I think to ultimately issue the dollars and spend it. But you also have once you issue the dollars which is we haven't issued you have a certain amount of time three or four years to actually spend the money or the LGC at the state gets a little frustrated with you. So we use basically what's a home equity line and interest only short-term she call it the bank anticipation notes. We pay interest only till we hit a certain amount actually.

Spent by DPS DTCC and the museum. Then we go back and we go to New York and sell bonds and pay off the short-term interestonly loan. That is what George Quick and the finance department and is unique about. It allows us not to be paying the full debt when we're not building anything for two years, right? And so it helps us space things out. We're going for that first issuance now. We use that a lot with both lobs and geo bonds where we issue the short-term debt, see the money get spent, then we go back and actually go to New York and issue the debt and pay off the short-term loan.

>> I appreciate the explanation. I think a lot of our community doesn't understand what a a what a bond referendum is and you know that that we're we're borrowing money, right, >> that we have to pay back. And what we've always said with our partner organizations is let us see the cash flow and then we're going to pressure test it. We're going to want to see the the actual built the design work all of that and then from there we will try our best to map how you get the dollars.

Folks say G bond referendums because it's familiar, but there are several different ways that we can make sure that we address the priority needs of the community and we've we've done that with all of our partner. >> And to answer your direct question, only geo bonds have been spent on those geo bond or 22 geo bond related projects for DPS. It's just ultimately it was bank anticipation notes but to be paid back with geo bonds. There's no other funding. PGO money. Yeah. Okay. So, anyway, but it would if we when we get an update to see where we are on all of those projects that were in that bond.

>>, and then because I know we said we're, oh, we're going to do our next bond 2026. But I, you know, I do think we have to think about that's going to mean a tax increase for people. And we know the what the environment is around that and so I think that is something to keep in mind and whether you know we can use some other strategies I think it's important to communicate to our partners at the school at the schools we're not saying we're going to neglect what you need are there other ways that are more cost effective and but frankly I think we also need to hear where the schools are at with their CIP because again circumstances have changed for them as well. which hopefully we'll talk about at the joint meeting when we see them losing significant enrollment. It really does necessitate the question of revisiting your CIP and also your your just your whole facilities plan around are there certain schools that need to be closed,.

Consolidated. That's what Chapel Hill High School is doing right now., and so I think, you know, conditions have changed and that really we have to make sure we're making the most coste effective pos decisions for everyone. And so their decisions impact our our CIP as well. I know you want to say something about that. No, I I was going to say the beauty of CIPs are they are living documents and we can adjust and plan as we move along and get more information. So the way the county has partnered with Durham Public Schools, Durham Tech, as well as doing our own projects has helped us overall move forward. also recognizing some of the challenges in the environment that we're in.

And the other question I want to ask is how much do we do other factors relate to the CIP? For one, you mentioned like the opport kind of the opportunity cost, return on investment, whether you do or don't do the investment. also how quickly something can be built. We have a number of items on our consent agenda that are kind of jaw-dropping in terms of the change in the cost from like the parking deck at 500 to what it's costing now. I mean just you know so just yeah so how quickly because obviously the faster something can get completed the cheaper it will be. and then also the other revenue sources like our staff have been amazing at getting grants other types of loans public private partnerships I see the private sector is there other opportunities for them to help with some of the CIP like especially around like RTP 3.0.

So those are just some of the things going through my mind is how do we also start looking at the CIP with some evaluating some of these factors. All of those comments that you made are factors that go into prioritization. Ability to afford has become more difficult for many reasons. labor costs are are driving up a lot of these projects because of availability of workforce. the supply chain issues, we talked about the tariffs, price cost is the biggest challenge.

But we do weigh that against what is the opportunity cost if we don't do one particular project versus the other. And that goes into how we evaluate all of that. And when we come back to the board, we'll make sure we have some dialogue about prioritization and just conversations about that and what goes into it ultimately with what staff brings forth is something that we can afford. But it's often the pressures that we're trying to address or community needs and and and support that's out there. For instance, our library branches are probably some of the most utilized county facilities that we have. And it's been a couple of decades since those branch new branches that since they're now new, they're older. since they've had any type of major renovation, repairs. And so there there are some areas that may have prioritization because of utilization.

Others such as recent projects related to EMS or other areas because it's a public safety perspective. We're trying to be responsive because of increase in population. So there are many different factors and we'll we'll come and and share those with you. U but to your point, it's almost like a reset button that we're setting to to reassess is this still the same priority as it was before. I look at the main library. It was on the CIP in the late 90s.

It finally was built in 2016. So, we we have others that we can point to as well. Limitations are often money, but but we also find ways to to move forward. So, I'll stop talking because I know we have quite a bit to go through. >> All right. Any other questions? >> All right. Now, we have a second part of this. The second part is Mr. Mans and he will walk through some of the capital projects and I'll let him transition.

>> Yep. So, good morning, commissioners. Perry Mans, deputy director for county engineering. We have the whole team with us here this morning. hopefully you're in for a treat. this is the group that makes the magic happen. so we actually have Yes, sir. We actually have a long list of projects that we'll go through and we have another slide in here somewhere that I'll sort of list those out and we can talk about specifically where things are. So, again, this is all of the counties projects that the project management team is working on., these are projects in all phases. I mean, everything from programming, preliminary activities to design development to some in construction, some in the warranty phase. And so, I'll let each team member introduce themselves when they speak. And so, we'll go ahead and get started. And first up the bat, we have, Sarah Martin.

>> Good morning. Let's start the magic. I'm Sarah Martin. I'm the public art coordinator. And I guess I'll start with what we are almost finished with, which is the big piece over at the new board of elections. This is hopefully to be installed by May. It is a 15 foot sculpture that will sit outside of the early voting lobby which sees a lot of action especially this time of year. You can go to the next slide. Okay, so these are some of the projects. So, I'm sure most of you guys know that the public art fund is 1% of the total CIP budget., these are the projects that we have put out an RFQ. The RFQ ended on Thursday night. We had 228 applications, which is a lot.

40 of those from North Carolina, and I feel confident that we can hire many North Carolina artists. the first project is project build. the second one is not a CIP project, but it will come out of the public art fund, which is a mural that the folks at Durham Center for Senior Life have wanted for years. the next is the sheriff's training facility. There's going to be one piece in the lobby and then there's going to be an outdoor feature. The next is the utility administrations building.

Again a 2D work inside in the lobby and then another outdoor feature. we have two collaborations with the city of Durham. The first being station 19 on Highway 54. there will be a mural and a large sculpture piece. And it didn't make it on that slide, but the last one is the emergency operations center which will be happening. Well, I'll let my buddy Joel here talk about that, but that's what's on the list for public art with the CIP. Any questions?

>> Yes. What what is our role with the Stagville project since we we have set aside quite a bit of money for that? And if you could I know that's kind of moving forward. If you could talk a little bit. We picked the artist team, which is very exciting. It is Stephen Hayes, who teaches at Duke University. He's an excellent artist, and Cheryl Roland, who was one of my old students, and he teaches at Chapel Hill. So, they have been selected. They were just told that they won, last week. I'm very excited. And Stagville committee, it was a unanimous decision. So, we're very excited about that.

That is awesome. I'll never forget what happened to his sculpture that he made actually when the Confederate monument was removed. He actually made an amazing sculpture that was unfortunately destroyed. >> But yeah, he's a very talented artist. We're very fortunate. Thank you so much for your role in that. >> Absolutely. Okay. I'm Brenda Hayesbrite. I'm a project manager and I also in my spare time manage public art. this is the the Lincoln Community Health Center parking lot. the parking lot is has been completed and the ongoing work is utility work across the street. Can you hear me?

Next at Lincoln also is a building modifications project., the building having been constructed in 1982, needs a lot of upgrades and they have begun this process with the help of Durham County funding and it's ongoing. The next project is >> I'm sorry, Brenda. I just want to raise the point that is something other than the the extension of the parking lot. Those are all things that are really supposed to be the responsibility of the Duke Health System. So I we need to be clear about that. We need to be compensated for those costs and reimbursed.

>> I know we need to get the work done. so that the center can function. But conversation Jason Carter and I have talked about a path forward and coming back to both the hospital board as well as the board of commissioners with a a strategy for covering repairs, renovations and assessment will happen on the facility to see what are all the costs needed for Lincoln and then outlining a step of what is county, what could the county support versus what Duke would support or Durham Regional.

We'll come back. Okay, the next project is the 803 East Pedigrew Street feasibility study. The original study was done by Andre Johnson in 2023 and the board decided to move for not to move forward with that project. So we are going to execute a new feasibility study to look at bringing the building up to current building code and then the board will have an opportunity to give engineering some direction on what to do with the facility. Questions. >> I have a question about that. I guess I'm wondering why would we move forward with that when we haven't done an assessment of what the possible use would be for the community for this building.

>> Yeah, we we are going to do that commissioners. what's very important here is that in April or May at the work session, we're going to come and do a presentation to you to discuss that project discuss the assessment and discuss the possibilities of what the build what we can do with the building. We certainly can have dialogue at that time around what you guys may be considering. So >> yeah, I mean my concern is that just going ahead with a facility. So, are you saying we're first going to have discussion before we do the feasibility >> right now? Right now, what we're doing is we're actually trying to determine what we can actually accomplish on the site and with the property and what it would cost just to to bring it up to code just so we can kind of get familiar with what some of the potentials may cost. And again, we'll we'll bring that information to you guys and sort of get your feedback and input as to what your.

Thoughts are around the future use of the facility. Okay. Is the thinking about whether it may be worth it to tear the building down rather to keep it? Is that part of what you're looking at? >> That will come out of the study as a potential option. But again, we want to hear from the board as to what you all would like to do with it. >> Okay. And this is very similar to assessments we've done with the our other buildings, gauging what does it cost to bring it up to code. And then the cost benefit of renovation, expansion of the footprint on the building versus as you asked as you suggested a building just remodeling it or or demolishing it rather and doing something totally different on the site. So, the intent is to have our best effort with what it costs to bring it up to code and and the other basic renovations.

>> Okay. I do I mean obviously you know this Perry that the renovation would depend on what the use is. So, that's the thing that I'm having trouble with because it depends on Yeah. how it's going to be used. >> Sure. But but bringing it up to code >> for some of the basics that they're that we're dealing with >> will be regardless of purpose >> is is a baseline there. >> All right. Yeah. >> So you're saying this study is just going to be very limited.

>> Absolutely. Yes, ma'am. >> Okay. >> Yep. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. Board of Elections. They are currently using the facility as we all know from early voting. During that time we have also restriped the parking lot and added parking stops. We've added a sound masking device in the office area. because the the 20 foot high Kroger shopping center building doesn't work well with office environment. So we working on that seems to be working out well. the next steps are to repair some parking lot lighting and to increase the lighting on the building letters. Durham County Board of Elections Any questions?

Okay. The next project also out at the shops of Hope Valley. we were re-roofing and we're doing HVAC replacement. we have just had our final walkth through for the roof re-roofing and HVAC. And now that we're working on punch list items for that. the other work that's going to happen in the rear of this shopping center, we're going to replace some exterior lighting to bring it up to code and we're also looking at restriping the remainder of the parking lot.

Our newest current project coming up is the Durham County Utilities Administration building. This building will be across the street from the existing wastewater treatment plant on Highway 55. We received bids on February 9th and then we are going to have a rebid on March on May 3rd. March 3rd, that's dates wrong., and then we'll be preparing a GMP package to bring back to the board later. We're looking at a 16-month construction duration and we are looking at reviewing some RFQS for CMT services and commissioning services and looking to make this another lead goal building.

And that project includes the main building and a warehouse facility as well. I'm Jim Ferris. I'm am the division manager for project management division. We had been working in this building in particular. You know, there was an issue a while back where we had to turn off all the access controls into the employee areas because this building was designed in a in a in an era that current fire safety codes do not match with. Therefore, we had to go in and do some design work to change the the layout enough to where we can meet the current fire exit codes. in addition we had another project where the security division of general services Isaac Alderman wanted to do a a slight real u a sorry she they wanted to do a a relocation of some of the control devices for the security system out of the hallways and into the wiring claw. deposits. We felt that we could combine these two projects into one larger project and create some economy of scale. However, it didn't.

Turn out that way. The the lowest bid was twice as much as our expectation. The highest bid was three times as much. So, we've been trying to understand why the disparity has occurred. And we at this point we believe that it's best to just separate the projects again, rebid them separately and and and just see where the fallout occurs. We're not quite sure if it's one or the two projects or both. So we're going to separate them at this point and we'll be rebidding that project shortly.

That will enable all the access controls back in to secure the employee areas in this building. And it will also add in the in the parking lot in the basement, it will add an exterior exit door that will allow you to get out of that parking lot in case there's some type of emergency. Currently, you cannot exit that parking lot without a great deal of trouble. So that'll be one of the improvements that we'll be making as far as these emergency egress plans.

The other projects that we've been working on lately actually we started back before CO in in 2019. EMS had identified three potential sites for for future EMS stations. One was a far east location. this was out Kemp Road area. The other was the MLK it was the public work operations center that is out owned by the city that is out on MLK Boulevard for another location. And then the third was at Duke West where we had a facility where we were housing a a u ambulance but it was too small for our use. So right now they have roving ambulance in that area. So we're looking for a station in that area and again we have talked with with the city about colllocating with the fire station in there as well as with the far east station. Right now the city in both those locations is reassessing their sighting for those two stations.

So we're really we're not we're not where we are waiting on them. We have station 19 in the works right now which is will take all our energy for the next year but we want to start designing or planning for the future stations that have been put off for three or four five years now. So that is an area that we'll be working working on as far as this future CIP plan comes up in the next couple of months. So, commissioners, clearly, you know, you know, reading the reading the tea leaves, clearly we need to do something out at the eastern area of Durham. Clearly, we've heard from Mark Lockhart earlier today about fire EMS service delivery and just some of the challenging that they're experiencing.

So, one of the things that we put on this slide was we desperately need to update the EMS long range space plan. One to align with what the city's doing and two just so our EMS service delivery model can be updated based on you know population projections, growth in Durham, just evolutions in EMS and how they how they do things. And so that's something that we're going to be bringing to you all shortly. So keep that in mind is that's that's very important. similar to that, we're also going to be doing an update to the to the library service delivery model and doing a study on the library as well. those in the past when we did the space needs analysis those two elements were sort of supplements to the larger space needs analysis and just on based on the way that the library and EMS operate it's best to sort of pull them out have someone that specializes in their service delivery and you know so they can be laser focused so.

They can sort of move forward with the visioning that they have for for service delivery. around EMS and the library. So, just wanted to make that point. >> Yeah. The next slide deals with the west point. >> Yeah. Just had a comment. This ties into the conversation this morning. Is you know exactly why our staff needs to be involved in these reports when there is a development like this that's in East Durham. This is the exact area they Patterson Road was even mentioned this morning. you know Cheek Road 98 this is all the area. So information from our staff about what the cost is going to be for us to increase our services that should be reflected in the planning department report because it's enormous amount of money for us to build a new EMS facility and to buy all the new trucks and to pay the staff. I mean, so you know, it's the capital costs and then the operational costs that that should be included in these reports and part of the evaluation.

That is taking place when the city council considers these resoning. So, this is the kind of thing that I think needs to be in exactly what you're talking about needs to be in that report. The the Duke West location. there is a intention to colllocate with the city in this particular location, but but we and the city are both looking for sites right now. There really isn't a a convenient site that is buildable that we have found at this point. So, we're continuing to look.

All right. So, commissioners, again, 300 and 500 East Main Street., clearly the new address for 300 is 115 North Queen Street., the construction activities are basically 98% complete. And we're calling it that because of there's still some minor work that needs to be done along the linear park that connects Maine to Liberty., you know, the affordable housing is basically 100% occupied., kudos to Law Street Residential for for making that happen., we had the ribbon cutting back in November., you know, we continue to work with Early Years, formerly CCSA, on updating the RFQ to get a highquality child care prek operator in that space.

We've been struggling due to I guess just some parameters and constraints that counties have to contend with around supporting those types of facilities., security is is top of mind for everyone in the 300 East Main Street or 115 North Queen Street development and we continue to meet with the team on a bi-weekly basis to discuss those and that team is made up of a myriad of stakeholders. We have folks from the Durham Housing Authority. We have urban ministries. We have social services, public health. We have just a bunch of folks that are on the call to sort of help us navigate some of the challenges that we've been experiencing you know in that development due to its adjacencies and what's what's around it. So 500 East Main Street clearly you know the deck has been occupied since August. 847 spaces. We continue to work with Maison, that's Zom Developments apartments, the market rate apartments on trying to hopefully one day fill the retail spaces that they've constructed along East Main Street.

And again, we're still working through some functionality issues. We need to get pay on foot machines installed, some additional ballers. We did some additional way finding and branding so folks can actually know that it is a county deck and they can park there and not across the street at the church when going to human services. That's been a challenge, but we continue to work through those issues. The 500 East Main Street affordable housing, that project is as you can see through the latest drone shot there, it's a lot of activities are happening there., building's over 20% complete. The biggest thing is that it's scheduled for completion in June of 2027.

So Dan, good morning. Dan Nosbush, project manager., first I have joint EMS and fire station 19. Sarah talked about this a little earlier with the public art. Currently this project is out for construction bids. That'll open next week. expect construction to start in April and wrap up the middle of next year. DSS main health hazard mitigation 220 East Main Street has been vacant for a very long time. we have a significant amount of contents still in the building that need to be removed and part of that removal is going to include asbests mitigation. U once the asbestous and contents are removed, this building will be decommissioned, no longer be fire alarm monitored and it will be secured.

The bid was advertised yesterday with an April 10th opening and the abatement will take 30 to 45 days to complete. Project build at Shops of Oo Valley. The GMP is on the agenda for next Monday. Construction should start in April and project build should be able to move into this 5,000 square foot space at Chops of Hope Valley in the end of September. >> I just had a question. could you tell us a little bit about what about the project build project and what I mean what's the renovation and what's going to happen there?

>> Certainly. it's 5,000 foot space. It's going to support 13 staff. There are two private offices, a 12 person conference room, a meeting space for about 28 people, and then the remainder of the staff will be in cubicles. OES fleet maintenance facility, office of emergency services fleet maintenance facility is currently at Stone Park Court. that facility is going to be demolished this year by the railroad. we are currently in construction for a new location at 1129 East Gear Street and the move will be taking place at the end of April.

The Junction Road Fleet Operations Center will be the permanent home for the fleet maintenance center for OES and then additional operations for general services to support county vehicles. this new Junction Road facility will take the place of two lease properties, the one on Gear Street and then additionally one at Presidential Park West. And it will also include a fueling station, an assault barn, and vehicle storage for the sheriff's department. >> While we move on, you had said something about the at the DSS building.

>> Yes, sir. >> With respect to I forget how you phrased it. Essentially, they're conducting their own fire alarm sort of fire guard. Yes, that's that's the term use. Yes. >> The building is currently monitored for has a fire alarm system. >> Mhm. >> there's been issues with false reports, false alarms going off in there and a trouble accessing the building because of all the contents in the building. That has to stay in place. Once the contents are removed, then that fire alarm can be disabled. So, who's who's actually doing the I guess sweeps of the building or things of that nature regarding those responsibilities?

>> So, the building is being monitored by general services. >> Okay. >>, commissioners, I some of this information is a little dated, but what's driving this project is the fire marshall's office had a a false alarm in that building. And when they came in, the previous fire marshal determined that the building was unsafe because or not unsafe, but at least hard to deal with something if something really happened. like Dan mentioned, you know, it has all of the building contents in there. So there's a lot of combustible material in the building that we need to get out. And so that's exactly what this project is. But first, we have to remove the asbestous that's in the floor tile and mastic. and then that will allow us to get in and remove those combustible contents. So that that's really what's driving this.

It's it's all being driven by something that the fire marshall's office has directed us to address. So >> and this isn't the only building in the county where that's the case. Is that right? >> Well, pretty much because every everything else we've sort of removed things as projects came online. What happened was we moved expeditiously in this one when we moved from DSS down to human services and those contents have been in DSS main. >> Okay. >> Since the move to human services by DSS.

>> Yes, sir. >> Can I just ask a followup? I mean, I can understand like things that may be attached to the floor or the ceiling, but like things things that are movable like furniture that's movable, we're not allowed to even remove those. >> The problem is the the way as best as is commissioner, it's considerable fryable material if it's disturbed. So, if we go in and have contractors or whomever kick up or just hit some hit the floor tile and mastic with that with a with a chair or whatever they're moving, that's going to cause an unsafe condition and that asbesus can get airborne. And so, we want to go in and as move rem get a asbestous abatement contractor on board to remove the asbestous and then remove the contents.

Ideally, we may get a contractor that does both. that can remove the asbestous floor tile and the contents, but we'll have to see when the bids come in. There are contractors that do both. >> And did we So, we put the bid out for both. >> Yes. Okay. >> Yes. >> Good morning. Christy Raleigh, senior real estate officer for the county. The project managers still let me hang out sometimes. The Justice Service Department's transition house is currently a single family home built in 1950 with lots of updates and renovations. It's no longer very functional for their purposes. So, some of you may recall we did a study to substantially update that house. It came in at over $3 billion., so the county determined that wasn't a feasible feasible way to proceed., since that time we have located a house, in East Durham owned by a local nonprofit. They had been using it as a transi for transitional housing. So, it's really ideally set up for what we need., they had an.

Appraisal, but the appraisal did not take into account restrictive covenants that are on the property from the city. So, we're in the process of getting that appraisal updated and then I think we intend to make an offer on the house. So, the animal shelter is very exciting. >> Can I ask a quick question? >> Yeah. >> So, the existing house, what will be our process to deal with that? be are we going to try to offer that to another nonprofit or I know sometimes when we have property that could be still used for affordable housing or something we work with people what what would be the process for that property >> so commissioners we I'm not sure if The Justice Services Department intends to continue to use that space. in our previous discussions, they talked about continuing to use that to support their programs, but we will get an update and find out whether that's still the case or if we need to.

>> That's good with me. I personally don't feel like every single thing we have has to be leadcertified. >> Yeah, absolutely. >> You know, I mean, let's just have common sense approaches to things and housing is so critical right now. So, if it's serving a purpose, that's great. >>, so the board moved voted to move forward with the animal shelter project several months ago because the original study we had for that facility was conducted in 2019, published in 2020. So, obviously preandemic information, it obviously needed to be updated., that has just happened. We literally received that Friday afternoon. so we'll have that information to share shortly and once we're able to go through the study and vet it, make sure it's what we need it to be, we will move forward and bring to y'all a proposal to begin design and construction on that project.

>> One thing of importance there, the current proposal has the design being completed in May June of 2027. So we wanted to make sure we highlighted that. So, >> yeah, the design phase because it's I think you all know this already, but I'll say it because I think it needs to be said a lot. That site at Junction Road is raw land, right? So, anything we build there is going to mean bringing utilities in. So, this is probably much more like a 4-year process than a two-year process because of all the horizontal work that needs to happen first. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean the timeline is very frustrating., two things. one is I just want to make sure that we involve all the necessary stakeholders you know animal services and the APS with the design but also I am concerned about another four years of use of the current facility and thinking I mean that's a cost too right when we have >> of you know the ma the needs to maintain the current facility has a cost as well. So, >> so commissioners, we we've heard you all loud and clear about this animal shelter project. we hope to possibly fasttrack the schedule some and I don't know if we have a slide up here or not to talk about the waterline extension that needs to happen up Junction Road to support those residences north that have the contaminated wells. that in itself is going to allow us to maybe do some early grading, some early site infrastructure to kind of give us a head start on this site for both animal shelter and the fleet maintenance.

Facility. So, we'll we'll clearly assess that and hopefully we can deliver at least the animal shelter a little faster than anticipated. So, yes, ma'am. To update the study, we worked very closely obviously with our design team and they have on board a specialist architectural organization who works across the country in animal facilities. So working with their national expertise and our local APS, that's sort of how we got the study updated. So I think for where we are in the process, we've got great information from our sort of key stakeholders and obviously we'll broaden that out as we move forward.

We can go to the next slide. Thanks., Santi Road Nature Preserve is the design work is underway., or well, master planning design work. So, what we're trying to end up with here is the the sort of map that you would see at the park, right? It shows where the trails are. It shows if or what facilities exist., this has taken a little bit longer than we anticipated, but for really good news, it turns out the streams on the ground did not start where the map had them starting. They start further down that, will allow us to, arrange any buildings or facilities on the site in a much better fashion., and that I think is going to work much better on the site. So, it it will likely mean we need to work with the city of Raleigh to update the conservation agreement for the property.

But it is our hope that that sort of legal updating the legal document can work in parallel with what we're doing actually on site so it won't slow the project down at all. Another thing that's come about just very recently is some work that Celeste has arranged with Preservation Durham. Celeste and her folks in open space have done an amazing job meeting the neighbors of the site and starting to hear the stories of the area and once that happened, Preservation Durham got pulled in and Preservation Durham now is going to be doing this oral history report so we can document the history of the land. And then Sarah got pulled in so we can figure out how to get that history sort of incorporated from an artistic perspective into the site. I'm sure she's going to figure that out.

The Orange Factory Road, County Farm and Nature Preserve., you all just heard Cooperative Extension got a big grant to start doing some work on the land. we will work with cooperative extension to coordinate our sort of traditional pre-planning or master planning design process with what the needs are dependent on their grant sort of timing or like policywise. That's our next step. So hopefully we'll be able to come back to y'all with more information about that pretty soon. >> Good morning commissioners. Joel Jones, project manager. Stanford Warren Library. we we opened or reopened to the public in 2024, December 2024, a little over a year ago. we're still in the warranty period, so we're we're finishing up a few items. the audio visual was completed in September, so they they now have AV components in their study rooms, in the meeting rooms, conference rooms.

The north stair tower work has been complete. you might recall when the the reopening was done. There was still a big canopy over the north stair tower portion. that has been buttoned up and we've had no signs of water leakage since that repair has been completed. And we are coordinating with Schneider Electric and General Services regarding the BAS controls within the building. So, that's an ongoing thing, but that should be resolved shortly., yeah, just tying those into the to their automated system.

Solid Waste Convenience Site Redwood CT Wilson was issued the contract for construction in the amount of 4.7 million. The the building highlights excuse me, the project highlights a new attendant building paved access. If you're familiar with the site currently, it's just gravel and sparsely lit area. we're going to have dedicated entrance and exit for service vehicles. Right now they're all intermixed and it causes a a hazard. New traffic pattern for improved efficiency and indoor plumbing. Again, if you're familiar with the site, there's nothing out there but a portagon. So, the the staff that works there, any of the the community members that come to to utilize the site, there's nowhere for them to use restroom facilities.

Next steps CT Wilson has begun the permitting process. Once once that is procured, Redwood will close down for approx approximately 10 to 12 months. while they do the construction, the renovation and we anticipate reopening in spring or summer of 2027. So, the sheriff's training facility., this one is right beside the Redwood convenience site., the highlight project highlights a revised revitalized qualifications range, including a lead capture system. So, all the lead that goes down range, they they capture it and are able to recycle that. we have secured vehicle impound storage whereas you know it's not up to par as it is now. the building itself is a 10,000 square foot instructional facility. It has classrooms and a multi-use training space. it also has equipment storage and locker rooms again with indoor plumbing.

Just like Redwood any any classes or or events that were held out there, the only thing that is available is Portage John. The building will also have rooftop solar panels for energy. And another key feature to the site is it is built on an aband not a closed landfill. So you know that's 90 acres that would otherwise be unusable. We're making use of it in a in a environ environmentally friendly way. Construction has started., we have moved Electra Road over., it was in the gas easement., so it is it is shifted over slightly to to stay with outside of those bounds. you can see in the photo that the BMS are complete.

They are framing the the instructional building. currently next steps we're going to continue building do the plumbing, mechanical and electrical roughins and we will have to update the furniture package. and we'll be coming back to you for approval of that furniture purchase for this project. target completion is January 2027. Okay. The EOC and backup 911 call centers. this is a new 38,000t facility. It's going to replace the existing building which was built in the 1950s. It is a joint project with the city of Durham that will incorporate the backup 911 call center. currently it's at the site it's just emergency management. The new site will have emergency management and 911 capabilities.

The existing facility will remain in operation while the new facility is being constructed constructed. That's another key feature there. so there is no lapse in a place no facility that that emergency management will not be be able to work out of. So currently where we are with that project is the design has been complete. We have received site plan approval. We are working on radio tower designs now that are associated with the 911 call center portion., we anticipate receiving bids in summer 26 with construction commencing in the fall of 26. And, if all goes according to schedule, we will be substantially complete in 2028.

There's a short breakdown of the cost sharing there., as I mentioned, it's a joint project with the city. That would be how the the cost break out on the interlocal agreement basis there the priorities. >> Good afternoon. my name is Haley Williamson the renewable energy project manager. so as you're aware in February of 2022 the board adopted the renewable energy plan. and we have been working to try to reach those goals. we the plan was to reach 80% renewable energy by 2030. and then 100% by 2050. so we have completed the facilities assessment in order to figure out a priority as Keith has stated to hit these targets in order to reach those goals. and we've been working that out and as Tobin will talk after this about that more in detail.

But the little projects that we have been working on to try to nibble at that. we have five the 500 deck we just completed 12 dual port chargers there which will allow for 24 vehicles to charge EV. we are in the inspection phase of that and we have to get some borers just to protect those chargers that we've installed., in addition, we are working to bring to you guys the first 12 phase for, our scope 2 of the facilities assessment, to get that funded to get that started.

We have been working with the IRA funds as those are coming to an end to try to complete and recoup any of the rebates we can from that., so the 2024 we did receive that recently., so we did get some interest from that. So, the 139 did include some interest and we were able to get 141,824 back., and the previous year we received the $62,55 to total a rebate of $24,330 that we're going to be using to try to offset some of those energy upgrades and potentially put solar on a building that to keep increasing that. we are also working to capture some more funds for the upcoming year for 2025s to include EV chargers, electric vehicles that were purchased and the solar that we installed on the board of elections.

So the next steps we're looking to go ahead and get scope two started and we're looking at a semar to help us with that to be able to design all of those different phases., and then we're working with all of our project managers to make sure they are, submitting any IRA eligible projects as those are coming to a close, and to continue to add, some of the things we've incorporated into the potential high performance building policy. So, >> all right. So, before I turn it over to questions, it's kind of funny that I talked about magic at the beginning of the presentation.

We had a slide in here that listed all of our projects that we were working on, all of the studies that we were working on, all of the pre-development processes that we were working on. And I did direct staff to shorten the presentation, but when you open up a book, you don't delete the table of content. So, we going to find out what happened to that slide, but it was very informative. And so, we'll turn it over to questions at this time. >> Commissioners, >>, yeah, thank you for your presentation today., very comprehensive. I just had one question about the, sheriff's training center. I know when we initially, gave the go-ahhead for that. There were some environmental concerns that were raised and at that time that the folks who were giving the presentation noted they would come back and tell us if something was going on there that that we should know about. So we hadn't heard anything. So I'm assuming that all is well but maybe you could give me.

An update in that regard. >> Yes sir. in this respect no news is good news. it is most of the earth work of the landfill has been completed. Nothing was unearthed or uncovered that we know of. you know that that penetrated the the cap that was put on the landfill when it was closed. so all that is intact. In fact there's more dirt on top of the the landfill cap than was previously before we even started the work. So in that case, we have bolstered the the landfill cap that was there to start with and and and improved what's there. So no issues with any kind of contaminants or anything that have been recognized to this point. Do you anticipate any environmental concerns around runoff from this site to local creeks, streams?

>> No. with the the silk fencing and whatnot that was installed on the site to start with that is capturing any kind of runoff that might happen during the construction process to get the the grass established. And as you saw in the photos, a lot of that grass is is already coming up and greening. So, I think we're in good shape there, but that sil silk fence will remain in place throughout construction. >> One of the things I'll add to that, Commissioner, is to eliminate a conflict of interest, the county cannot issue erosion control permits and monitor their own sites. So, this site is being monitored by the state.

>> And so, we actually have to we had to submit an erosion control plan to the state. It's on their file. They're doing the monitoring. And so we're we're in solid shape there. We haven't heard any inspection issues or anything around runoff or just sedimentation pollution. So we're in good shape there as far as the state's concern. >> Thank you. Yes, sir. >> Also mentioned that the building itself is built over solid ground, not not the previous landfill. >> Yes, that that's correct. The building is on undisturbed land. The range portion is is over the landfield.

>> Okay, Commissioner Jacobs. >> Well, I I will look forward to seeing that slide, Perry, because you guys have really reported on an enormous amount of works. Thank you so much. It's amazing the range of work that you all are doing from public art to, you know, Santi Road to housing. I mean, everything. It's really incredible. So, I really want to thank all of you. I I was recently was it Friday? I was on Ramser Street and wow to see the 500 East Main Street affordable housing project if you haven't seen it recently it's like wow it's enormous and huge and really exciting and I really also appreciate the safety team that you're have pulled together Perry to work on the issues around Queen Street hopefully when we get the day center pilot going. I hope that that will help.

And also I I imagine there are a lot of challenges with the reality of the 300 East Main Street building., you know, I think it's, you know, it's great to say we're going to do a it it is a I know we're calling it I think it's important we enter that is a mixed income building. It's affordable, but there it is a mixed income situation and knowing that people are coming together from a lot of different backgrounds and there are challenges with that. I appreciate that that's going to take a lot of time and effort. So I'm thanking you on in advance. It was really exciting the other day when I walked to our budget retreat and I saw a school bus pull up in front of the building. I was like, "Wow, this is so cool to think about kids living in that building and getting to live downtown with their families and live across from the library. I just was like, "Wow, that's amazing."

I wanted to ask if I know we have another item related to the all this amazing work around sustainability and I guess I'm I'm the liaison to the EAB. I know Tobin is also the staff, but I think it would be great at some point for us for you all to present on all the things that the county is doing to the AAB because we get a lot of emails from folks like please do a a solar bond and please do this and like we are doing that. So from to make sure the public knows that we are actually doing all of that stuff., and then lastly, I just also wonder, maybe we'll talk about this more later, but we having a way that we can evaluate properties like the old DSS building.

Just the carrying costs, you know, related to some of our properties that there may be higher better uses for them or, you know, that kind of thing. So, I'm glad that we're doing the a best asbestous removal is a first step for that, right? So, thank you. >> And I'd also say thank you. This is just the sheer amount of work that you all have going on. I've as I was listening to all the projects, I was thinking like like where are we capacitywise? I mean you I mean you all are you guys have so much going on. I mean like are y'all getting sleep at night? I mean >> you have weekends off. I mean what commissioner what's been helpful is as Christie mentioned you know she took on she was a project manager. She's now the senior real estate officer for the county. So she has sort of helped us continue to take on some of the projects i.e. the animal shelter, the Santi road, the orange factory campus.

We are trying to backfill her position to sort of help the team out. It's a it's a challenge. I I'll say that we you know that's why I mentioned that slide because there's so many things that we didn't talk about. you know, all of the pre-development processes for shops at Hope Valley, DSS Main at the old Lowe's former school site, the study for 911 consolidation, the two studies I mentioned for the library and EMS., this team takes on all of that.

And so, I could kind of go on for days talking about, you know, just what we're tasked with and how we perform, but, you know, Dan is leading the charge on getting that, OES fleet maintenance facility up and running by, April, to meet the demands of the railroad that told us you had to get out of that building. And everybody knows we have to have ambulance repair in the county. And so, it's just some of those things. We're always under the gun. We we always under fire but we continue to push forward and that's why I wanted to bring the entire team today.

You've met a lot of them contingent upon what information or what we brought forward but we wanted to bring everybody and show highlight and showcase all that we do and thank you. We certainly hope you appreciate it. >> Well, I surely appreciate y'all's work and I'm sure everyone up here appreciates your work. So, thank you all for this presentation., just get some sleep, you know, please. All right., so we have a couple other things on the agenda. However, I'm going to call for a break. Get our get some lunch. What? 20 minutes and we get back in here. Maybe y'all you guys good with that? All right. Because we've been going a while. Okay. All right. So, we're at recess right now.

Righty,.

We are back in session from a little bit of a break. Thank you all who are still with us., the next item on our agenda is the presentation on economic development and utilities infrastructure improvements. I'll turn it over to you. Turn turn it over. >> Thank you, chair, and good afternoon, commissioners. I'm Ree Jones, deputy county manager for Durham County. It's a pleasure to be here with you today to discuss the good work that's taking place with both our economic development department and on the capital side of our utilities division. many who are watching this presentation are probably asking why we've brought these two items together, these two teams together to talk to you this afternoon. At first glance, their missions seem quite different. So, how are they connected?

Well without proper planning and investment in infrastructure on the utility side, our efforts to meet the needs of our current and future residents and businesses would be negatively affected and Durham will no longer would no longer be as desirable of a place to invest in. Simply put, the positive redevelopment and job growth that we've experienced in recent decades would come to a halt without this muchneeded capital investment. The good news is is that our utilities division has been working closely with planning and economic development to prepare for our future needs and to put us in the best position possible to be competitive in recruiting new businesses and supporting the expansion of businesses that are already here in Durham. We'll begin our presentation with our economic development director, Andy Miracle, and Matt Filter, our economic development manager, followed by Jay Gibson, our director of engineering and environmental services, and Stephanie Brixie, our deputy director of engineering. Andy Matt, take it away.

Great. Thank you so much, DCM Jones, commissioners, manager. It is a pleasure to be here with y'all today., I think we notice a bit of a recurring theme as we talk about infrastructure and just how significant that is to our success as a county., as DCM Jones mentioned, not something we we typically talk about in this format, but is so critical to the work that we do., as part of our business recruitment work, when companies are considering Durham County and as interested as they are in the talent and availability of our workforce and speed to market, if we don't have the appropriate infrastructure capacity to meet the needs of these projects, we lose the ability to compete. So, it's absolutely critical. so today we're going to talk about some of the benefits of our work kind of beyond the the normal conversation where we talk about let's see here Monica if you could help us out with the next slide. Thank you.

So talk a bit a little bit about the success that we've had as part of the business recruitment expansion portfolio. Specifically focusing in on some of the infrastructure work in Treyburn, in RTP and a little bit in downtown as well and how we can maintain the success that we're having. you know, typically when we have this conversation, we're talking about announced jobs and announced jobs and announced investment. we have started doing some work with the tax office so we can speak more to the actuals that we're seeing on the property tax delta as well. So happy to start sharing some of that information with you as well. And so with that I'll hand it over to Matt Filter to take it from here.

>> Good morning folks., so I think what we're trying to do, on our side of the presentation is just talk a little bit about recruited company data a little bit of as a proxy about what does the county get back when we make economic development investments as a part of this program and just stressing the importance of the the need to continue to be competitive with our infrastructure so that we can continue this type of work. And so, you know, our business recruitment program currently supports 2.7 billion in projected private investment and 4,600 jobs in Durham County., we've received, that's projected so far, as of June 30th, 2024, we've received 2.1 billion of that. So, the vast majority of the money has come in., we're about 1,700 jobs or so. A lot of the projects, you know, the the capital investment happens first, then the hiring., so we're still a little bit behind on the jobs, but that's projected., about half of those, announced positions are entry- level positions. So those that require,.

Kind of just entry- level education, entry level experience. And I know that's really important for the work that you all do as a board and that we do as a county to make sure folks that are here have opportunities to get into those positions. And then the next figure this is these are actual numbers not projected but using data leading up until June 30th 2024 for every dollar that we've put in as a county in in a economic development incentive we've received back $670 and change in private taxable investment which I think is a really important and and significant ROI.

And so the figures I just showed you were of companies that are currently in the program in the sense that they have an active agreement with the county. They're receiving money. You know, we're evaluating their performance. But there are other companies that are here that have either phased out of the program, meaning they've completed their term, you know, in terms of the agreement, or perhaps they set very aggressive job numbers, weren't able to fully meet them, agreements were terminated, but they're still here. And so we wanted to take a look at the tax impact of recruited companies last year. And so these collective companies, many of which have active agreements with us, but not all of them do, but they're still here, paid collectively $19 million in taxes. And then last year, we're evaluating the submissions now, so we don't quite know the exact number we're going to pay, but it's it's it the maximum amount, assuming everyone did exactly what they said they were going to do, is 2.1 million. So, I mean,.

That's an ROI of almost 800% when you look at the amount of money we're sending out the door versus the amount of money that we are getting back. >> Excellent. And and so, as I mentioned before, we're we're starting to build out that that data set of actual data. Working with tax to to understand what that looks like so we can speak to the many benefits that these business recruitment projects bring is really a considerable advantage to the county in terms of the value to the tax base and beyond. And so that's what we wanted to speak to a little bit as well today. It's a relatively brief conversation, but we we did want to hit on some high points. so and when we think about the the benefit beyond the actual jobs and the actual investment the delta to the tax base one of the things that commissioners and the county has prided oursel on since we did our economic development policy revision in 2019 was the idea of community.

Partnerships right and how we can leverage our relationships with recruited companies to add a greater value. This is both benefit to the companies as well as to the Durham community as well. And so this slide represents a few of those social media assets that we we saw out there that our our partners put out. And so we wanted to share those with you and just tell a little bit of the story behind those posts., so the the first post is from our partners out at NCU Biotech Center and this is for an ambassador training program that they held out at Eli Lilly. And so first I would make note that Eli Liy is a recruited company, right? And so that is a direct result of of our partnership and our work in that space., the second is that we have a tremendous asset and partner in the NC biotechnology center.

Just what they're able to do in in terms of elevating our status in North Carolina in biioarma manufacturing and life sciences is tremendous. And so this was actually program that was facil facilitated through the build back better grant that they won., and so it allowed for programs like this which increase awareness and recruitment into life sciences and bioparmmer manufacturing. And I I'll just make a note to that grant was also used to fund programs locally like maiden Durham that increase awareness of this industry with our nonprofit partners and our community based organizations.

The next two slides there are u pilot or projects that our department has been piloting to increase our the expansiveness of our community partnerships. And so with the first one there you'll see us with some staff from career and teched as well as Hillside High School. And so this was the first program that we rolled out where we took a company and we took a high school to create a one-to-one relationship. And we thought this would be the best way to really kind of you know cut through the bureaucracy and and just have them embedded with each other where they can work directly.

This slide is is from a career panel that we had about 60 students come out to. And so really appreciative of of Eli Liy and and their you know willingness to partner with with DPS in the school system. And then the last slide here is another program that we've piloted as well. this is this took place at Grail which is another recruited company and the the point of this was to it was a higher education roundt and so what we did was we appointed liaison from Duke NC Central and Durham Tech to be our main points of contact. So when we're looking to disseminate information, bring folks together, we we have our go-to folks.

And so this really brought them all together to kind of learn more about Grail as well as what each school and the services they provide. So this last slide is a little bit more of the same on the right. in the top left I'll just point that is from the Bulls Academy life sciences day that we hosted here in January to just really se celebrate the success that Bulls has had and now over 200 graduates and 78 graduates connected to industry employment. just very very proud of the partnership and success that we've had there. And you know, you'll see in the the bottom left our partnership with Durham Public Schools Career and Tech Education as well, serving on the advisory board and participating in events like Accelerate and and so I think in some we're certainly ex consistently iterating and thinking about how we can improve our community partnerships and our particularly our support of Durham public schools.

And that concludes our presentation. If there are questions and comments, >> commissioners, >> I just have just one comment. And so I appreciate the the data. There are some in our community who say, "Valentine, we can't believe the incentives that y'all give away. You just give away too much to get businesses here. No tradeoff." Well, looks like $19 million in taxes come back to the county on an invested on an investment of 2.1 million. And so that is a success story worth touting and I'm going to carry the mantel. So I appreciate that and I appreciate the work that you do every day.

>> Thank you. >> All right. >> Thank you so much. Can I just add one? I don't mean to interrupt Commissioner. I think it's also important to know too that that money is going to be on the tax books essentially in perpetuity as long as the company is here too. So you know we are seeing that amount of revenue come in every year. It might change a little bit based on depreciation or appreciation but at some point you know our awards are only 5 to seven years of payment. So at some point that is going to stay on the books for these companies and we're paying them nothing you know and so the number and the ROI should only get higher as time progresses. I guess I would be remiss if I also didn't mention the 4,600 jobs that you bring to our community. Let's let's keep let's keep our foot on the pedal.

>> We need that on a t-shirt. >> Oh, absolutely. >> On our county commissioner t-shirts. We need that like on the back. >> Oh, yes. >> Commissioner Jacobs. >> Thank you., yeah. Could you go back to the slide also that has the the list of all the different companies on there that Yeah., yeah, I just want to thank you because look, we're sitting here and looking at also a very small team of people and I I also want I know you don't have everybody here from your department, Andy, but it's it's a small you're a small but mighty team just like the folks before us. And I just really appreciate the work that you all have been doing.

Especially since we kind of you know had you all taking the lead on this directly. You know as as Commissioner Valentine was saying this our incentive program is it is very deliberate. It is very intentional and we are not, you know, we are about creating economic growth and increasing our our tax dollars so that we have money to pay for all the services and things that people need and want in our community. But on the ecosystem side, we're we're trying to create a community where people can thrive, where we see our young people you know, who are born into poverty, you know, 15% of of families in Durham are still or children in Durham are still living in poverty. We want a pathway for them to have a different life.

And the most important way to do that is make sure that they are prepared for and connected to a sustaining a life sustaining job where that they can grow in and flourish and support a family. And we know that a lot of these jobs, you know, you mentioned a lot of them being entry level and having a living wage, but we know that a lot of these companies also have pathways for people to move up in the companies and get further training and education and make higher salaries. So this is just so important because it at the end of the day this is about transforming people's lives and I appreciate the work that you all are doing. I see it around building relationships because at the end of the day it is also about relationships and between the companies and Durham Public Schools and Durham Tech and RTP and everyone being connected and working together., so those relationships are important and also I want to lift up that's a lot about what.

Made in Durham and the Bulls Academy is around. It's around people developing their social networks. You know, there's a lot of evidence that social networks are what is so important for economic mobility. It's even tied to a recent Pew study about the importance of living in diverse buildings and diverse neighborhoods like our renegade for kids to see and meet other families that are living differently so they can see a different future for themselves. So I I really value all of this., one of my questions is I know we have the infrastructure piece about how do we pay for that to support the economic growth because these companies need water and they need sewer and they need electricity and they need land and things like that., but with some of the federal funding going away that has helped us so much.

And even like the apprenticeships funding for maiden Durham and the Bulls academy and we know we need to do more. What are what are some of the conversations now around how do we keep doing this important work? >> I mean I I think those are excellent questions. Thank you, Commissioner Jacobs., I think specifically speaking to Bulls, there are conversations currently taking place, about sustainable funding for the future of of the program after ARPA dollars, have sunseted. And so, that you that's both inclusive of philanthropic funding as well as, private funding strategies. And so, they are they are absolutely in process.

And and I think you know I hope with you know before too long we're able to share some more updates with the board related to that. >> Okay. So I I hope that the relationship building is will pay off and the fact that companies can see that they are being provided by a talented trained workforce which is which benefits them because we we are going to need that partnership with the private sector. to continue these important programs. my my other question is and this is more for you to come back with this information but I would really like to understand more about how the city can be a partner in all of this work.

You know, again, this is tied to again bigger issues around our youth and reviewing the comprehensive plan. It's amazing. This is all in the comprehensive plan. It's about h keeping our youth engaged and reducing violence and reducing poverty. And so we right now I believe our federal workforce development funding I believe goes to the city and goes to their office of economic and workforce development or the workforce development board. I'd like to understand that better and how the our federal dollars that are related to workforce development how they are being used.

Because I was on the workforce development board my first term. So that was a while ago. That's more than 10 years ago. But I think we we need to understand how our federal money that is county federal dollars is being is being used and is it being used in the best way possible and do we are there options for us to use that in different ways as we're looking at other frankly are other funding that is going away at the federal level. So I would I would like to understand that and again I hope that we can see better collaboration with the city on the type of economic development and job creation that we are leading on in this county. Thank you.

>> Thank you for that. And I I'll just add real quickly on a on a micro level because obviously some of these are larger issues. since Director Gunn has stepped in the position, he's been a tremendous asset in terms of helping us with conversations on the city side and departments over there and and really just kind of moving the ball forward. So, we've we're off to a good start in that capacity. >> Awesome. I'm really glad to hear that.

And just to the first kind of point about how do we pay for some of this stuff. I think part of what we're trying to say from a high level indirectly is you know you all are thinking about realignments or tax rates and all these different things about how you make a budget work. But you know one thing to think about is how do we grow the tax base right and reduce the reliance on residential property and and you know balance it a little bit more to commercial and industrial property. I think if you look at Orange County, our neighbor, you know, they have a pretty heavy reliance, right, on on residential and that comes at a cost. And so I think one thing we're trying to to show you here is just a small investment, you know, from the county. Maybe maybe it's a little more upfront than we'd like, but it pays off in the long term and can help us as we're navigating various budget challenges or opportunities in the future.

>> Great point. Thank you. And I guess I have one more question. is have there been discussion about another potential education to jobs pipeline? You know, we we talked about at the budget retreat. We've got our early educator pipeline with early years with the Bulls. We've got biotech, you know, life science with Duke. We have the health care jobs. Any you know I've heard discussion about skill trades that seems to be kind of getting a little stronger but have has there been discussion about another pipeline >> so originally when we were looking at how the ARPA funds would be used the original plan was to include a second industry pathway and so there was a tremendous amount of research that went into that and there's really a lot of factors that make life sciences bioharma manufacturing unique and and one of those being NC Biotech. And so we have this role that they play in in Bulls and this relationship and it's just trying to figure out all right well.

Who would play that role if we're looking at a different industry. so Maiden Durham did a lot of really good research around that space that I think you know if we do go in that direction would help inform that. but then clearly there are you know if we use the bull's model then there are a number of other variables like funding that would have to be accounted for. but that that information I think will be there to help inform if if that does move forward in the future.

>> All right. Well, thank you all very much. I want to echo Commissioner Valentine's comments saying, you know, I do hear about incentives. I hear that quite a bit. some people on the City Council, you know, have said different comments and so I really appreciate this data and arming us to be able to say, okay, yeah, we we get the idea some ideological differences in in incentives, but this is what governance is. It's a long-term view of what an incentive is. And now we have this information. Well, I mean, we've had it, but now we have a better we have a slide to say, "Hey, look, look at this, right?" And maybe that starts to turn the tide and saying, "Look, this is this is what we're doing. This is what we're contributing not only to Durham County, Durham City, you know.

So I really appreciate y'all's work on this." Thank you. and the chair chair, one of the other things not to to get that we don't lose want to lose sight on is that we're competing with places all over this country for these types of corporations, these types of businesses. And so that that's another arrow in our in our quiver that we can use when we're competing is that we have this incentive policy that's in place. And in addition to that, from our perspective, we don't pay a cent of this incentive until they reach certain thresholds, number of jobs, the amount of money. So it's not like we're in on the front end paying a lot of money upfront and then a company doesn't live up to what they said they're going to do. If they don't, we don't lose anything there. And so that's really important for folks to remember as well when we're having these discussions about incentives. But the competition is real. It's not only real around the.

Country, it's real in North Carolina as well. We've got a number of places throughout this state that we're competing with for these types of jobs and this type of investment as well. >> Thank you for that. Absolutely true. Thank you all very much. Okay, the next item on our agenda, deputy manager, I think you're still here. >> Well, we are. We're just going to turn it over to Stephanie and the other side, right? >> Yeah. We're just gonna switch sides.

I think Jay's online, so he's gonna start out. Maybe.

While we're waiting, I wanted to follow up what you said, Maurice, or Deputy Manager Jones. that we also a lot of these projects are JD dig projects where we are actually pulling in state dollars and state investment and we only have a minimal match. >> That's an important that is a critically important partnership that we have with the state. and they know that when they come to work with our folks, they're going to have professionals working with them not only in our team with our team but also with the chamber of commerce. and with our utilities department and others throughout the organization who will come to the table as part of these negotiations and discussions with these companies that come knocking on our door. And one of the other things I would I would add too is that we were talking about funding. One of the things that we're trying to impress upon folks at the state level, our representatives, they get it. They understand that. But we're trying to make connections beyond the.

Folks who represent us in the general assembly. so they understand that when we're bringing in these companies, it doesn't just affect Durham County, right? I mean, there many, many jobs that are being created, folks. Of course, a lot of those folks live in Durham County, but they live outside of Durham County. and the type of work that's taking place in all these different businesses has a positive impact not just on our region on our state but I would argue on the country and internationally as well with the type of work that they're doing especially with biotechnology. So we're trying to impress upon folks at the general assembly that yes it's important for locals local governments to invest in these types of things but it's also important for the state to invest in this type of work as well especially on the utility side.

Jay, just making sure you can hear us. >> Yes, ma'am, I can. Can everyone hear me reasonably? >> Yes, sir. >> Commissioners, good afternoon. We're we're glad to be here with you, and I think a couple of points. we have quite a number of slides. We often joke that engineering environmental services needs to be changed from EES to WIT, the WIT department, whatever it takes. Because we feel that's what we do to respond to the request you and the manager make of us on behalf of the community. I think you'll find we have plenty of data today. and we are going to cover we've got a number of slides for our utility infrastructure.

So we're going to sort of take a speed dating approach Stephanie and I will today to try and and get through this and certainly be glad to follow up on any other items or interest you may have related to that. if we could go ahead and put the slides up please. One of the one of the first points we want to make u as we look at this is a map of our service area and you can see RTP outlined in black there in the center. One of the key points here when we talk about data is while RTP is about 3.8% 8% of the county of Durham Countyy's land mass is over 35 almost 36% of the gross domestic product produced in the county. Billions of dollars a year. It's some 200s of 1% of the state's land mass yet 3 and a half 4% of the state's GDP.

So there's billions of dollars a year supported by basically a 17 to20 million a year budget utility. That's to use the term that that Matt used a while ago, quite an incredible ROI and you can see just a smattering of the hundreds of companies supported by this utility. Next slide, please. Commissioners, I heard me mention a moment ago of interest in a board of commissioners t-shirt. We'll be glad to license you with this graphic right here. We think it tells a wonderful story for a t-shirt. we we there's 55,000 jobs roughly in RTP right now.

All of this data came from some studies in 2024 that RTP RTF had commissioned. And some of the data we've covered the the tens of thousands of employees in very highquality jobs. Many of these are what we call forward-looking jobs, not legacy jobs that that may soon go away. So that is a very big plus. the economic impact on the county and on the state., next slide, please. Stephanie, would would you take here and and start briefing on the our system?

>> Sure. So, currently, this is a map of our collection system. We have a little over 110 miles of gravity sewer. We have 11 miles of force main. We have 13 lift stations currently. And around 2,300 manholes. So with a small team, we try to inspect all of this and do the maintenance. This slide just basically shows the age of our collection system. So the top part is actually showing the age of the gravity pipes and then the the bottom part is showing the lift stations and the age. And you can see that the majority of the system was built between the 80s and the 90s for the sewer pipe and also for the lift stations. And so what we're seeing here is that we are reaching the the lifespan of our current system of those that were built especially between the 80s and 90s.

Which is kind of leads into all the projects that we're facing. So, currently under construction, we have construction on the Page Park lift station. It's got $1.09 million of community funding that Congresswoman Fushi helped us with and the rest of that is being paid with the sewer utility fund and we are anticipating that it'll be completed in late summer of this year. Slater Road lift station. we are doing part of it is being paid with ARPA funding. So we got a little over 13 million in ARPA funding for this and the rest is coming out of the sewer utility fund. It originally started out that this project was estimated at $10 million and as you can see it is now around 21 million and that's just a change over the last few years. So very minimal time frame and we are expecting it to be completed at the end of this year.

Page Point lift station., luckily this is going to be a new lift station that's being built. It's replacing a current one., but it's going to be moved and expanded and this one's being paid for by the developer. DOT, we were going to have to move it a little bit just because of the widening of Highway 70, but we wouldn't have they would have just given us what the current lift station's worth and not what the expansion would be. And we couldn't move in a quick enough time frame for this developer. So, they're actually building it, paying for it, and then they will turn it over to the county.

>> I know, right? This right here, Perry's group actually touched on it earlier. It's the utility administration building., Perry's group is actually overseeing it because it's an actual county building. But it will be funded out of the seur utility fund and at right now it's around $27 million. So moving. So that's what's under construction. Now we'll move into what we're designing. So, we're under design right now with the Chin Page lift station. A couple years ago, it came in at around $20 million. We actually were approved from a a state reviving fund, a low interest loan at 19.1, but since that time, this lift station is now coming in at a budget of $40 million.

So, we have 959,000 from community funding. We do have the loan that we're approved for, but we're going to have to determine where the other $20 million needs to come from. This lift station is very important because the stirup iron basin is our largest basin. And we do have a stirup iron lift station there which currently is serving all but it's almost at capacity. So, if we do not move forward with the building this lift station, then we're going to be in a situation where we're going to have to stop development in that area.

The TWWWTP phase 4 upgrade is also another project in design., the last upgrade at the plant was around 2004 and that's when it was expanded to what you all saw last week when you were there. But all this infrastructure there is also aging and a lot of the like the UV system is completely obsolete at this point. So when we have to repair it, we have a hard time. So right now we do have the UV system is at 30% design.

That's our first priority of replacing that. And we did get a low interest loan from the state approved as well here for around $30 million. Since then as we're looking at the cost of things, it's escalated. So we won't be able to do as many projects as we hoped for. So we're prioritizing. So right now the priorities are listed there in the orange. So like I said, we're at 30% design for the UV system. We do have the bid documents for filter equipment. The send draft form hasn't went out yet. And then we've got to do something with our grit removal system.

So those are priorities to keep us in compliance and keep the system running. We recently did a Northeast Creek sewer modeling and we did that with Durham City for us. all of our basin is in Northeast Creek. so we did this joint jointly and we're waiting to get the final preliminary modeling results. We should have them soon and sometime in spring, which that's going to also let us know what additional work we need to have done. So, it's going to tell us where we may have sewer line that's at capacity. And if that's the case, then we're going to have to upgrade those, upsize those so we don't have sewer spills. So, we're going to get a lot of information here in the near future., there is one segment that's highlighted right there., and for example, just that highlighted segment of around 8,500 linear feet right now would cost us5 to$10 million to replace it.

>> Could you explain this a little bit?, who is providing what service where, like how are we servicing this area? Okay. So, everything that's within the 100% service area, all of that is county owned sewer lines and lift stations, and all of that flow comes to the Triangle wastewater treatment plant. The 80% service area is those collection lines are owned by the city, but all of the wastewater comes to the county's wastewater treatment plant for treatment. So the cost there is when the city does the billing to their customers, they keep 20% of it and that's to cover the maintenance of their line and then 80% comes to the county to cover the treatment cost.

>> Can we look at a reverse of the Snowhill project? The manager and I have, manager Ferguson and I have talked about Snow Hill and some other projects so recently. We'll come back. >> Yeah, Snow Hill is one that's a little out of out of side of what I can really answer to. >> We kind of oversaw the project. Vince did he kind of over oversaw that but since we don't treat their waste and we don't have any county don't own anything there.

Well, I will say with all seriousness, Manager Ferguson and I have talked about establishing sort of a concrete list of infrastructure type issues that both the county and city need to vet over the next several years., a great example, a different kind of infrastructure conversation that was discussed was how we looked at HSAC and our it's not that's not hard water sewer, but it's process. How do you do the work? What part should the city do? What should this county do? How is it integrated more seamlessly? So whether it's public safety or water, sewer, farming up, what's the list of areas we need to jointly vet and and a timeline so that we can come back to both governing bodies? Yeah. I mean, this is an opportunity to really try to get it right because because this is another situation that involves the city and the county being dependent on each other to provide >> the service that needs help.

That's a great characterization, Commissioner.

Okay, we'll go on to the next slide. We have annual collection system rehab., currently, when I do the budget, I put 1.5 million into that line item., currently that's not enough to kind of cover the issues we're seeing. So this is a picture here of one of the clay lines where we have found recently through some videoing of cracks that are happening in the pipe. So this is pipe replacement needs to happen here. and so we're finding that there's lots of areas where it's aging under sized or there's some kind of issue that we need to go in and repair.

And commissioners, one point of clarification on this slide. We do currently budget approximately 1.5 million for issues like this throughout the system. Obviously, that is not 5 million a year where we're looking at perhaps a higher level of need due to aging system, but where it says unfunded, that's we are currently funding at a 1.5 million a year level to help with situations just like this. Currently we have an outfile remediation and access improvements., we kind of put a bid out to look at some issues because we have found that there's places where we have manholes that are underwater or creeks have changed the direction they typically would have went in and now they're on top of sewer., and some of this has been due to development, and just the storm water issues that happen., some of it is due to beaver dams that build in the current creeks and flood the areas., we picked out four sites and we got some, you know, from a preliminary engineering report and then.

Some cost of what it would take to get into these and repair. We're also in these areas are working closely with Ryan Eve's group because typically with sewer trying to get grants there's not a lot of grants for sewer but there are a lot more grants for stream rehabilitation. So we're trying to look at it from that point to you know to actually rehabilitate the stream and put it back to where it should actually be and then that would protect our sewer. So, that's kind of the direction we're headed in in these areas.

Yes. >> So, to me, this is related to the discussion of Aaron Cheek Road. It just makes me wonder. How you know obviously this is not East Durham but something like this you know impacts to county infrastructure storm you know sewer infrastructure how is that is it evaluated when in the planning department process I I just under, you know, if we're hearing that manholes and pipes are being impacted by changes in storm water or impacted by Yeah. that is caused by development. I just I just wonder >> Jay, you can probably answer this a little bit better.

Commissioner Jacobs, that is a great question and I and it really it really deserves a broader discussion than probably we're prepared for today. Obviously as each of us knows as development occurs it does change runoff characteristics. We're seeing certain climate change things. So we are looking at how to harden and create a more resilient infrastructure in the face of some of those challenges. And then with the beavers, as Stephanie mentioned, you know, how do you mitigate those those natural forces? certainly we strive to coordinate with our planning colleagues. However, there's always room in every process for improvement. And I think that's some of of where your comments are is is how can we strengthen those processes to help make sure there's the most robust look, complete look at these type of issues possible.

And so that really is is necessarily a broader discussion perhaps than what we're here for today, but it is a point very well made nonetheless. >> Yeah. Yeah. So I would say to Deputy Manager Jones and and our county manager that, you know, this is the kind of thing that could be added to the checklist or should be added when an assessment is made for a development project, whether it's a resoning or not. For there to make sure that our storm water folks, our wastewater folks review the plans and just for any possible impacts that need to be addressed or mitigated >> in the review process.

>> We can certainly add that to the list for the discussion with the planning department. >> Okay. Thank you. >> so look into the future We know that we're going to have to do some additional lift station upgrades for the ones that weren't mentioned. So looking out at you know maybe 2028 focusing on Central Park and Page Road which will right now would be around 20 million. 2030 looking at Fairfield and Scott King which would and Lake Park which would be another 20 million and then 2035 looking at Davis Drive and Stirup Iron., we did put an asterct next to stirrup iron because we may need to consider rehabilitating it a little bit sooner.

Because stirup iron is our largest lift station. It's the one that's in the basin. It's our largest basin with the lift station in it., and there's also where it sits with flood plane and the way the forest mount forest main route is. We do have our Rouge Mott water system., and we do have, Wexford. And I know we've talked a little bit about Wexford in the past., but Wexford right now to do any upgrades, we're looking at around $20 million. We're currently working with a engineering firm that's drafting a preliminary engineering report for us right now to kind of give us some ideas of how we can make it better with different cost estimates and which way that should go. And that will be something as we move into that we'll be bringing that back to the board to kind of help decide the direction we go in there., and then Rougemont's still not very old, but we're going ahead and looking pretty far out that, you know,.

In 2040, 2050, we would need to do some work there. With the growth and the change that we're hear, and that's going to come with RTP 3.0, we're already looking ahead at kind of the expansions we may have to have at the plant and at the and through the collection system. So currently we're working with a firm to that's doing some different flow modeling studies that's going to help us determine kind of send a letter to the state requesting speculatively discharge limits because we need to first find out if NCDQ would even allow us to expand in the footprint we're in and if we couldn't discharge there then where would they allow us to discharge and that would determine the cost of our upgrade because you know there's a good chance right now when I look at say where Western had to run their line they had to run their discharge line past but Corn Dam in Lee County. So the further you have to run it the more expensive it.

Becomes. So those are things we're looking at and it would also help to tell us if there's some type of partnerships or something we need to be looking at as we're you know planning ahead. So fiscal impact, this is kind of taking all the things we just talked about and putting it in a chart. So we've got the in construction piece, the in design piece, and then look into the future. And it just kind of moves all those funds over to this one slide.

And then this is just a breakdown of the funding. So, as of right now, just based on the slides we went through and those costs, we're looking at, you know, there's 215 million of unfunded dollars there. And then Snow Hill, you mentioned Snow Hill, so we just did one slide on Snow Hill just to kind of, you know, put it in perspective there. That's my favorite topic. So in 2015, the preliminary engineering report estimated it would be about approximately 12.5 million for this lift station., and I'm sure around that time that was what the county had planned on funding. It ended up right now is at 36 million.

So I think it's near completion. Well, yeah, March 2026. Yep. We we are very near completion at long last. >> I think it's really important to just remind everyone though had Snow Hill not been done, we would not have been the solution for many of the crises that happened with CO. >> the companies out in Treyburn were able to meet demand because we were prepared. Manager Hager, your comments as always are right on point. This this project and the fact that it was coming facilitated both the Corning expansion which was crucial to injectable medicines, vials, vaccines as well as Merc's research, a worldrenowned leader in vaccines. And so that is what Snow Hill the Snow Hill lift station did was facilitate Corning coming and making hundreds of millions in investment. Even with the escalation in cost, the ROI on the investment here is still quite nice.

>> Okay, any questions, >> commissioners? Go ahead. So related to some of the projects that you mentioned towards the end that are clearly I'm just wondering and well the the Can you go back? Okay what? Keep going. Keep going. That one. Okay. So this one and then I'm wondering the side before it. no not that one but that one. Yeah. So this one and then the other one. The the other one you you explicitly said RTP 3.0. And I'm also wondering how much this is also related to the to kind of RTP expansion activities.

Do you see what are the opportunities for public private partnerships especially on the RTP 3.0 know, like we want to see the that be successful, but we're not, you know, obviously Durham County is not going to be able to provide all of the infrastructure improvements that are going to be needed for that. Have have there been discussions just kind of planning now for that kind of public private partnerships? There have been general discussions about how we could support each other and work together on funding opportunities here but nothing specific just yet.

>> Commissioner Jacobs, one other point that is is important here as well is the utility is is an enterprise fund. So it's funded by its rate structure. And in preparation for many of these projects, we commissioned through Rafelis who does rate studies and and helps with capital planning for many utilities across the US really and certainly in North Carolina. They've helped us with our storm water utility and we did a comprehensive rate study and completed it about a year ago now, a little over a year to help provide a financial framework. We've also been working at the manager's direction with our financial advisor Doug Carter and his team and our own financial folks CFO Wright and others looking at how we put everything together. thanks to to the board, we've long made incremental adjustments because that's what our customer base and RTP has indicated they prefer over large here and there adjustments. So we continue to make those incremental adjustments that allow us to generate more capital to help towards these needs while also remaining.

Very competitive in our rate structure to ensure we can continue to compete for these economic projects and this economic growth. So there's a lot of behindthe-scenes work going on here above and beyond just saying hey there's some very expensive things here. We're also saying, okay, how do we pay for those expensive things in a fiscally responsible manner? >> And Commissioner Jacobs, I would add that RTF is undergoing an infrastructure study right now. We've been working with them on that as well, and that will help us have an understanding of what the needs will be for 3PO the 3.0 down the road as well. So, that will help lead to further discussions about opportunities to partner together, I believe.

And and just one other point there, Manager Jones, Commissioner Jacobs, you may recall the slide Stephanie mentioned about speculative limits at the plant. That study is being driven in part by early estimates. And I need to stress that that that it they are very early estimates of what growth in RTP might be. But we have used that along with the zoning that was in the recently approved changes the board approved at planning's request and RTF's request and we've taken that data to synthesize what some early population projections might be as RTP shifts from a work predominantly work environment to a true live work play with you know tens of thousands of permanent residents if you will. And so we have used some of that early data to start making projections for how that might impact both our sewer lines collection system as well as plant capacity and that's helping drive that's part of where a few years ago we quietly initiated the speculative limit study and are looking forward to that data coming forth and.

Then the study that manager Jones mentioned would be used to further refine that that information and and those cost points. But a lot of this work we've been working on for a few years now. Recognizing these are long lead time items. They are costly items and these are not things that you just can get a permit for in a day or two days or a month. So lot of a lot of work going on here behind the scenes to try and keep it seamless for everyone involved.

>> Commissioner Valentine. >> Yes. Thank you. thank you for this presentation. this is important information. our our community largely probably didn't have that they probably don't know how important this information is. but you had talked about an individual developer who took on the cost associated with one of these lift stations. What was their incentive for doing that? >> good question commissioner. it was their own economic motive. Stephanie mentioned DOT had approached us where our existing lift station was. They needed to condemn that area to to do convert Highway 70 into more of a freeway type setting from Durham to the Brier Creek area in far western Wake County. and it appeared as though they would would be replacing that lift station for us, which is part of DOT's policy when they have to take a local government's infrastructure. we advised the developer of that that part of their project was in a basin that was very limited on capacity at this small lift station that here was our schedule for working with DOT. The.

Developer said, "We want to move more quickly." and we said, "Well, your choice is to either take this on or you can, you know, we've already got this other project underway." And they elected to proceed of their own valition. So, that was sort of how that came about. to to dive a little deeper, commissioner, on your question, a state legislative act a few years ago, almost 10 years ago now, I think it was House Bill 436, 20 circa 201617, somewhere in there, created what we now call the system development fee framework that took away a lot of a local government's ability to have capital recovery fees or different fees depending on the needs of that community's utility.

To help fund improvements and we were all left with you know and and I'll I'll refrain from editorializing here but the system development fee framework and it's not as easy to use at times as our were some of the prior arrangements but it is the tool we have and so you know that that for us is what we're working with in terms of a broader sense of what we can do and what we cannot do. But this one was one that was wholly voluntary by the developer due to their desire to proceed more rapidly than they felt we were going to proceed with DOT.

Thank you for that. I remain optimistic that with the development of research triangle park that more of our community partners will come forward similarly. So hopefully that will materialize. Thank you. Any other questions? All right. Thank you all very much. >> Thank you. >> Appreciate this presentation. Thank you.

>> Okay. And the last item before our close session today is 260093. Update on sustainability initiatives and progress towards greenhouse gas emissions reduction and renewable energy goals. >> Good afternoon. >> Good afternoon. >> I'm glad there is so much appreciation for small and mighty teams because we are a very small team in the sustainability office. My name is Tobin Freed. I'm the sustainability manager. We have Megan Pendell who is a sustainability specialist. she's not with us today. And then Haley, who's our renewable energy project manager, you heard from her earlier, she's technically in the project management division, but she works exclusively on our renewable energy goals, which is under me, so we kind of we work together all the time. Perry, did you have anything to say to begin? All right, let's just jump right in.

Everyone is is ready for this? Okay., next. Oh, I have the clicker. Great. Okay. These are the items that we're going to dis to share with you today. Some updates and then a few things that will be coming to you soon for your feedback, approval, guidance. Oh gosh. Thank you. No, I need this. That's my notes. All right. Just a little overview to make sure we're all on the same page. that we I'm going to talk a lot about greenhouse gases and climate change. And so just those are words people hear around, but just so people kind of really know what that's about. Earth has an atmosphere.

It has gases around it. Lots of different gases that make up our atmosphere. Energy comes from the sun. It heat hits the earth and some of it bounces back out into space, but some of it gets trapped by those gases and that's what regulates our weather on this planet, which in turn regulates our ocean currents and so many other things that make it possible for life to exist and thrive here on Earth. And with too many of those gases, it traps too much of that energy. And that's when these really important cycles get disregulated. And that's what causes a lot of a lot of problems. And these gases are things like carbon dioxide which are emitted when we burn any carbon based fuel like coal, gasoline, natural gas, burning trees, things like that, as well as methane, and and several other gases. But that's kind of the general idea. We know this is a global problem. we're not going to fix it here in Durham, but we also know.

That we need to be leaders and and part of the solution here, and that's why Durham County has been leading on this for quite a long time. So, just to show the impact, there was an assessment that was done gosh, eight years ago now on the impacts of climate change here in our region, the triangle region. And the top four which we see almost right now right is flooding which of course we saw with Shantel but also regularly when there's just these huge rainstorms that can come very suddenly. also drought which we've been sort of in a moderate drought for the last really couple years.

Wildfires, which the impact doesn't have to just be fires in our own forests, but fires that are in the mountains or even in California or Canada. We feel the impact of that with the smoke that comes and affects the air quality in our area. And then of course heat. we all were here last summer. It was really hot. And here we are in February. It was whatever 70s something degrees yesterday. So of course there are other impacts, but these are kind of the major ones. we are already seeing here in Durham and it's important for us to to address those. I know just in the previous conversation about the sewer system talking about resilience and the need to really be ready for these these events.

Okay. So, Durham adopted a greenhouse gas emissions reduction plan in 2007. We were the first community in North Carolina to adopt that. again showing that that leadership and that called for a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from our own operations by 2030 which in 2007 when it was adopted 2030 seemed far away and here it is around the corner. and then in 2022 as Haley mentioned earlier the county adopted a renewable energy plan which calls for transitioning our operations to clean renewable energy. 80% of that by 2030 and 100% by 2050 and so so we have been working on that as Haley mentioned earlier and and there's more work to be done.

So just it is a little confusing sometimes when we talk about greenhouse gas emissions and renewable energy. And just again to set the stage here these two circles are you know intertwined renewable energy such as solar, wind, hydro, geothermal energy sources that don't generate those gases and also can kind of continue onward like you don't use them up. You don't use up the sun when you have a solar panel. You don't use up the wind. unlike fossil fuel-based fuels, when you burn coal, the coal is is gone. but we certainly get greenhouse gas emissions from other things as well.

That's that outer circle. So our land use changes, chemical management, waste reduction, using non-renewable energy. There are others. I didn't put everything in there, but just wanted to kind of show how the renewable energy plan kind of sits within our greater greenhouse gas plan. So, we are making progress and you can see here we do have solar on several of our facilities. our our new youth home which is lead platinum our first lead platinum home or or facility has solar as well as geothermal and that's been performing very well for us so far. Our fire and EMS 17 and 18 are colllocated with the city. The city has very similar goals to ours. So when we do build facilities with them, it's great partnership because we all want the same thing. and then our board of elections which again you heard about earlier with the project management team that was our first facility where we put solar on an existing facility and that is doing great. If you look at this bar chart the.

That big yellow section on a fiscal year 26 is the board of elections. It just came into service partway through the very very end of fiscal year 25. So, we haven't even seen a full year of generation on that system and it's really it's really pretty great. It has already generated almost as much electricity as it's used in this fiscal year. So, yeah, really excited about that system. Yeah, it's a nice big flat sunny roof. and I didn't mention with the youth home, but that youth home did replace our old youth home. And even though it's larger, it's 40% more efficient per square foot than the old youth home. and Duke Green source advantage. I'm going to talk about that in a couple slides. we are doing energy efficiency upgrades all the time.

Our general services department does a great job with that. Switching out lights to LEDs. doing building automation, tuning up the HVAC, all the things that need to be done. and then we did use performance contracting which is a financial mechanism to get a lot of energy efficiency and water efficiency projects done at one time. and it's guaranteed that the utility savings from that will pay back what we borrowed for those projects. And that is now in its 12th year and doing very well.

As far as our fleet transition, we do have 10 electric vehicles in our fleet, which is about 1% of our fleet, and 59 hybrids, which is about 10%. We do have more room to go with our with our vehicles and I'll show kind of where we are with that in in our next slide here. So here we go. Here is showing where we where we really are. So the chart on the left, the graph on the left is showing our greenhouse gas emissions reductions.

And you can see we have made progress. It's gone down 18%., which is great, but but there's still room to to to grow in that area. And I'm glad to be able to show you in the next couple slides where that progress is going to happen. The graph on the right is showing our energy makeup right now. And you can see almost half of it, that orange piece is what we get from Duke Energy that is not renewable that they're generating through natural gas or coal. Could be nuclear. nuclear does not produce greenhouse gas emissions, but it's not considered renewable under our under our definition of that. and the small 2% grid electricity is what Duke is generating right now and selling to us. And then you can see our little that little chart I showed you with our bar chart of solar is adds up to.3%.

And then our fleet is a little over 20% and then natural gas is about a third. So we we have some but we have more room to go. So this shows us a different way of looking at it by type and you can see the change over time., and that fleet, which is the red on the bottom, is is the section that's growing. It's increased by 51% over this time period., but to also note that our fleet size has increased more than 50% in that time., the county services extend further. We're, you know, doing more out in the community and that has impacted that energy use. It's something we really do have to continue to work on. The wastewater section has gone down 27%.

Stephanie and her crew over there at the wastewater treatment plant are definitely doing a great job looking for ways to be more efficient with more efficient pumps and systems. also significantly though, we are treating a billion gallons less than we were in 2013. And so that does contribute to some of this and as hub at RTP expands, we would anticipate that those numbers will will probably go up again and we have to continue to be vigilant on that.

And then that big blue wedge at the top is buildings and those have decreased by 20 27% while our square footage has almost doubled in that amount of time. You think about the big buildings we've put online since 2017. the courthouse, health and human services, library is much bigger., so that's pretty significant. We measure our efficiency. That 42% is energy use per square foot. So if you look at how much electricity and natural gas is used on a per square foot basis that's increased over our entire portfolio by 42%. So almost almost half as energy using as we were back then. So lots of lots of progress on that. So there are some challenges towards meeting these goals and some of them are are technological whether the technology exists whether it's affordable whether it can be used as a retrofit into a building versus having to be built in straight away. so that's something we're constantly looking at is what technolog is coming out there. or what could we use, who else is using it,.

How does that work?, growing operations, which I've already mentioned., and then state law changes, which I will talk about in a couple more slides, but as has already been referenced earlier today, in lots of different ways. What happens at the state level impacts what happens at the county level., and that is true in this area as well. And then the same with federal changes. We've certainly seen some swings of the pendulum while we've been working on this since 2007 on how supportive the federal government is and what they do impacts us as well.

So what comes next? We're going to talk about a couple things. So I mentioned that green source advantage and this is a program that we are participating in that was established through state law several years ago and it's with Duke Energy. We have partnered with the city and the Durham Public Schools through this program to have a a utility scale 34.4 megawatt solar farm built on our behalf. And that will cover more or less maybe about 70% of the electricity that we use in our facilities. As I mentioned, we're sort of keep growing.

So that number may may change., but somewhere around there for us, we will be benefiting for 10.5 megawws of that electricity when it comes online in 2027, late calendar year 2027. And we have a contract to benefit for 20 years into the future with that and we could continue past that, but that's as long as the contract goes., and so we are not paying any upfront cost on this. None of that debt service that was discussed earlier. The way this program works is that the developer, they pay for all of it upfront and we pay for it over time on our energy bills, but we also get a credit from Duke Energy to offset what they are not having to produce. So, so we will so yeah, it'll be very exciting when that comes online.

The next topic I want to talk about, Haley had referenced earlier when she was talking with the project management group about the comprehensive facilities assessment. As she said, we've already completed the assessment and it covered 42 of our facilities. and and we have a report nice long report on what was what they found. the company HDR is who we contracted with and they looked for energy efficiency opportunities. They looked for renewable energy where we can put solar, where we can put battery storage, what the impact would be of that. Building electrification, remember that wedge that was like 27% that was natural gas is looking for ways to reduce that. It's very hard to purchase natural renewable natural gas. it doesn't actually meet the the definition that Durham adopted for renewable energy. And so we really need to just reduce the amount of natural gas we're using to be able to meet our goals. so so looking at switching over from natural gas to electrification, fleet electrification, as I mentioned.

With the showing the fleet, to have more electric vehicles, we have to have places to charge them. And so looking for where we can put electric vehicle charging that makes sense for where our our fleet is parking. looking at refrigerants, that's one of those greenhouse gases that I said there are others. and when they leak out, they can be have very significant greenhouse gas impacts. There's laws that are making refrigerants more stringent anyway. And so general services asked us to include this so that they can transition smoothly to the new refrigerants. And then all of this included a financial an analysis and incentive and grant programs.

Unfortunately, since this report was complete, several of the incentives and grant programs have been eliminated. And so, we're going to continue obviously to go after the ones we can go after, but we'll we won't necessarily be able to take advantage of all the ones that were identified in this report. So since then, as Haley had referenced earlier, we took all those 42 and then we as a team with general services, project management, is sustainability obviously and fleet. Well, fleet, yes, it's part of general services. Thank you. looked at which which ones of these are the ones we kind of want to start with because we can't do all of it all at once. And so we picked 12 of what we're calling our priority facilities. They're generally most of our larger facilities and also the ones that have a lot of potential.

And so you can see the facilities here. This facility that we're in now, there are some opportunities for greenhouse gas reductions and cost reductions. We're not looking at solar on this building. It has a beautiful historic terracotta roof and we're not going to try to put solar panels on that one., admin 2 across the street, opportunities also for energy efficiency. There is opportunity for solar over there., detention center, also opportunities for energy efficiency. Pretty good energy efficiency., as well as some some solar., courthouse, same thing.

And then the warehouse, which is over on Hillsboro Road, another one of those nice flat, sunny roofs. Really good opportunity for solar over there. Potentially 72% of their total energy use that's an all electric building could be covered by solar on that building and then looking at many of our libraries and other buildings east regional library all health and human services that judicial annex and main library our smaller regional libraries in particular have great opportunity for solar and they're such public buildings I think It's really would be a great for our community that's so supportive of this to see solar on those buildings. and mo many of them are due to have their roofs replaced in the next year or so.

That's the best time you want to put solar on is when you're replacing the roof. And this is our last part of this group is as I mentioned north regional, south regional and southwest as you can see also have really great opportunities for emissions reduction and solar on those buildings. So once we have green source advantage as well as those 12 recom those 12 facilities the recommendations implemented this is what we would look like. you can see the the line graph over on the right showing that we will meet our greenhouse gas goals three years early which is very exciting. and and really looking forward to celebrating that. and then you can see with our pie chart solar is now that big blue chunk the dark blue 36% plus 3.8% 8% of that green plus a little teeny light blue section there.

So, we're looking at 40.2% renewable energy by 20 well 2027 assuming we do the things that were recommended in the in the comprehensive facilities assessment. Still have that chunk of natural gas, still have the chunk of of fleet. Now the fleet might change obviously since then if we get more hybrids and more electric vehicles between now and then which we certainly will be working to do. I did mention that this facilities assessment was looking at beneficial electrification which would take that chunk of natural gas down there. We're not really right now recommending moving forward with most of those recommendations mostly because our electric it really unless your electricity that you're buying off the grid is also renewable.

You're sort of switching from a non-renewable to a non-renewable. However, as general services you know, as systems fail and they need to be replaced, we're always going to be looking at whether we can be transitioning away from that natural gas. Yes, >> that would be after we so the GSA solar will be coming on as I mentioned end of calendar year 2027. The speed at which we do the other things to bring on like that on-site solar, get it up to 3.8 and and shrink the entire pie by becoming more efficient will depend on when we have the the resources in order to do those recommendations. So part of that speed is up to you.

Okay. So, as I mentioned, we've already done phase one, which is doing the actual assessment. And the next step is phase two, which is the engineering and design, and that will cost approximately 2.4 million just for those 12 facilities., and then once we've done that, we'll have a better sense of the cost for construction. there was a $28 million estimation that the consultants put together for us when they did the the assessment. However, that's now over a year old and we all know costs of everything unfortunately have gone up. So that may be skewed a little bit, but that we'll have a better sense of that once we finish with design and engineering.

Okay. So those next steps then are to move forward with that phase two and then also to get some quick wins. So Haley had referenced earlier that there's some incentive funding that we've been getting back from the federal government for some of the solar we've already installed for our electric vehicles for that geothermal. And so we're looking at where is a facility maybe we could put some solar on that's ready for that or some other kind of quick wins that we could do and and and move ahead even faster.

So before I move on to the high performance building policy I will just stop for a moment and see if there's any questions before we move to our next section. >> All right. Oh, >> no. I was saying I don't think there are until we continue forward. >> I know everyone's like been a long day. Yes. >> Maybe you're going to talk about this later. The future of the green source advantage program. >> the future for the program overall has changed. So, as I mentioned, it was a Duke Energy, it is a Duke Energy program that was established through legislation and the utilities commission. And we got into that first wave which was kind of the best wave in my opinion. it has been changed since then and the the biggest change to to it is gets a little nerdy here but is who gets kind of the is called additionality. So, in my world of sustainability, when you're talking about greenhouse gas emissions and renewable energy, you want to see if.

If the actions I'm taking are actually increasing the amount of renewable energy or greenhouse gas emissions that would have happened otherwise. And in our case, we are the reason that that field, that solar field is being built. It is additional. It wouldn't be there if we hadn't bounded together and said, "Yes, we're going to guarantee for 20 years we're buying this electricity." Under the new system. It doesn't work quite that way. It means there's going to be a large more or less large very very very very large solar fields that are developed by Duke Energy and you can kind of buy a piece of it kind of like a time share sort of situation. and so there are some concerns about the additionality with the going forward with green source advantage but we're locked in. We're locked in to our system. So we we are great. there was a limit to what any entity could subscribe to or purchase.

It was tied to our energy use. So we wouldn't really necessarily have the opportunity to do another project anyway unless our energy use skyrockets. So so we're good with our system. There are some concerns. There's some excitement about the new program. It's definitely easier to access. it's less of a long-term commitment. So, I'm not going to say it's terrible, but it's not what we would want for meeting our goals. Okay, let's talk about our high performance building policy, which also was referenced earlier today. I feel like everything was teeing teeing this up for me, which is great., so in 2008, we adopted we being the county a high performance building policy. It's one page and it says that we'll build to lead gold standards minimize transportation related energy use which is mostly where you site property make sure it's on bike bike trails and and well it doesn't say make sure it says try to and near public transportation and also try to reuse previously developed land. And since that time we've been building lead.

Buildings we're now 14 I think we counted the other day. So, that's part of what we do now. It's a big part of what we do, as you know, because you've been seeing these projects come forward, how important that is., so, but 2008 was a long time ago. We're coming up on, 18 years here., and, it's time for an update. So, we being that same team that I mentioned earlier with general services and project management and, is&t, etc. Went through a process. It took us about gosh almost two years, one and a half years, something like that., and we studied heavily what other local governments are doing, particularly in North Carolina, but also throughout the country, and really modeled our proposed high performance building policy on what city of Charlotte's doing and what city of Durham is doing with some some changes to make it Durham's all its own.

So a lot of this I would say really almost all of it are things that the county is already doing already considering again as we're building to lead a lot of it follows what lead is requiring. so some of this is just codifying it and also making sure that the public understands what we're doing and and making sure we're constantly kind of pushing for the best. So it does still continue to call to building towards lead gold standards. It does have specifically says really try to maximize the energy related points you get through LEA lead.

I should back up. LEAD is leadership in energy and environmental design and it's through the US green building council and it's a rating system. And there's a score sheet and it has different sections in it and the things you do in your facility get you different points and then the number of points determine what level certification you are either certified silver, gold or platinum. So this picture here is a beautiful lighting daylighting in our courthouse. In I should say also the policy covers both construction of new facilities as well as renovations of existing facilities which of course we do quite a bit of. Excuse me.

Thank you. So ensuring efficiency, installing water sense fixtures which are water efficient energy star appliances, that electrification that I talked about really trying to get towards more electric facilities and refrigerants with zero ozone depletion or low global warming potential. Also looking at that electric vehicle charging station, there wasn't anything about that in 2008 when we wrote the policy because that was not that wasn't really a thing. but certainly it is now. So, it's certainly less expensive to include electric vehicle charging station infrastructure when you're doing a construction or a renovation than trying to go back in, dig through concrete, to lay conduit, things like that. So, we really wanted to make sure that that was included in this policy. And when we say a minimum percentage of parking spaces EV ready, what that means is, and we've done this actually with the 500 deck, Haley mentioned we just installed 12 dual port electro vehicle charging stations over there, but 20% of the spots I think in that deck are considered EV ready, which.

Just means the conduit's already there. The electrical capacity is ready for it. So, as there are more electric vehicles and more demand for those stations grow, it would be much less expensive for us to be able to just install new stations and not have to rewire everything in the in the whole deck. So, that's what we mean when we say EV ready. The same thing with choosing sites that reduce transportation related energy use and have good public transit. That's something we always are looking for. We also recognize we're at the mercy of the market. where is there a piece of land that's available to do the thing we need it to do or do we already own a piece of land and so we don't always have the ability to maximize that but certainly it's something we're always considering design and commissioning that's sort of at the back end how you design a facility and then once it's built commissioning is kind of going through and making sure all the systems are.

Working the way they're designed to work and that's a really important part of making sure you know it's one thing to write it down on paper, it's another thing to see it in real life. we already do this again, but it's just really codifying that. Duke Energy's energy assistance and design program is a free program that Duke Energy provides at the design stage to say, "Hey, if you change this around, you'll be more efficient or you use this kind of lighting instead of that kind of lighting." And by the way, there are Duke incentives for that to help us maximize the Duke energy incentive. So that's a a program that again we're already using bird friendly glass and glazing on windows that's a you know become more and more in the public trying to reduce the impact on birds especially migrating birds but all birds u when we have build especially taller buildings with a lot of glass and then obviously trying to reach our renewable energy goal that solar PV.

On rooftops whenever possible and if not possible at the moment that you're building or renov renovating that. Make it solar ready. Make sure the orientation is facing south. That again the electrical capacity is ready. Where you put the things on the roof, try not to put them, you know, where it's going to get in the way of solar panels, things like that. But I would say really for the most part, everything's getting solar on it kind of from the start now anyway, which is excellent. And operate, there's a section in here on operations and maintenance. Again, general services already does a great job with this, but just making sure that we're keeping up with all our HVAC systems and energy systems, that there's temperature controls, automation, so at night when no one's in the building, the HVAC system kind of powers down a little bit so that it's not just wasting energy, heating or cooling a building when people aren't there., and then purchasing sustainable sustainable project products.

Lighting, you know, LEDs have been around now for a long time. That wasn't actually a thing in 2008 when we wrote that first policy. It was very, very new., light timers, motion dete detectors, things like that. And then meeting Dark Sky International standards. That's in our our comprehensive plan, which again was referenced earlier today. and just trying to kind of mimic what is required by the comprehensive plan as well as what the city is working on. And then there are sections on employee behavior of, you know, some of it can be automated, some of it can be, you know, behind the scenes, but our employees who are in the buildings also have some impact on that energy use. And so making sure that people are trained, that there's signage, that's easy to use, things like that. and then we do have an environmentally preferred purchasing policy that's already calling for purchasing products with recycled content etc.

And then there is a section on reporting administration so that we can make sure everyone's being held accountable that there's transparency that we understand the impact of what we're doing and and can can start to measure. I know everyone loves to get data so we want to make sure we're measuring what the impact is. We already, as you can tell, measure our energy use every month at least, if not more often. we have a wonderful system through Impira to monitor and analyze our energy and water use and our solar generation as well.

So, I'm going to pause there before I move on to my third topic and see if there's any questions or comments. Commissioner Jacobs. >> Well, fantastic work. Thank you so much. And again of a very like little little engine that could you and your team the this policy which I think is it's amazing how comprehensive it is. I'm in thinking about how this ties into a lot of things we talked about today. I'm wondering for our deputy manager and county manager how this could be shared with companies even when we do econ you know our economic incentives policy actually has a section about whether companies are willing to build environmentally sustainable in an environmentally sustainable way and just how could we then share this with them as a part of that process and you know ask if they'd be willing to try to meet as many of these when they're if they're building a new building or or renovating it. So that was one thought >> that I had.

And then the list of the very long CIP list., Perry, I was wondering how many of those are going to either have solar panels or be solar ready. >>, as Tobin mentioned, pretty much most of our buildings have solar panels or are PV ready., I can't think of one that we have in design right now that doesn't have >> Okay, awesome. So yeah, >> and if I'm not mistaken, and I mean to interrupt, I know the board years ago sort of gave us some guidance, not formally, but that when we brought projects forward that that would be a value that we do.

>> Okay. >> Yeah. >> All right. Well, there's a there were a lot of buildings on there. >> Okay. >> and I will say in that pie chart didn't take into account the new buildings having solar on. So that part of on-site solar generation will actually be a bigger piece of the pie when the new facilities come on. I did not include that in the analysis. >> Okay. and then I know you're talking about the reporting part and just wondering and we had talked about this like at least could there be some some type of snapshot >> similar to what we're seeing here. Yeah.

>> you know annually and you know where it would be on like a web page or something like that. >> Definitely. >> Yeah. Okay. and last the issue about the bird friendly windows. Yesterday morning my husband and I got woken up to a bluebird just flying into our window over and over and over again. And and then it happened at our door, both south facing windows. So I took some blue painters tape and just put them across all the windows that it was flying into and it stopped.

So and then I did a little research. It turns out they can see their reflection and during the mating season they will mark their territory and so they think it's >> another bird. >> Another bird. But it just shows how important the glazing really. >> Yeah. So, >> yeah. Well, well, you did the right thing. I think the most economical way to address that is by putting some type of pattern or some blotches up on the windows. Yeah, there's some things you can do with the actual window glazing itself to prevent the reflectiveness or just something being clear that they think they can fly into.

Oh, it was amazing. >> Yeah. But when you see and people don't pay attention to stuff like that, but like at the library when you walk by, you'll see these little small blotches on the windows and that's bird deterrence. And so yeah, so >> absolutely. >> Wow. >> Great. >> I'll be looking for that. >> Yeah, me too. Go check that out. Okay, so our last topic of discussion today is the carbon plan integrated resource plan also known as the CPIRP and this is at the state level and it's related to that piece of the pie where Duke Energy is providing our electricity and it is required by the state. There was a law passed HB951 in 2021 that required Duke Energy to reduce its carbon emissions by 70% by 2030 and be carbon neutral by 2050. I will say we took that into account when we recreated when we created our renewable energy plan assuming that some 70% of what we were going to be purchasing from Duke Energy.

By 2030 would be renewable. And well I shouldn't say that carbon emissions reduction is not the same as renewable. So they do have a lot of nuclear in their fleet and that it doesn't count as renewable but it is carbon carbon-f free. So and then that also required Duke to create a carbon plan every two years. The integrated resource plan the carbon plan says how are you going to meet these goals? The integrated resource plan was already required by Duke every two years to show this is what we think energy demand is going to be what how much we need to generate and this is how we're going to do that. These are the resources we have the power plants we have the new transmission lines more efficient whatever. and so those two things kind of got combined together into the CPIP.

Last year, SB261 got passed by our state legislature and that took away that 2030 goal. And so, we have definitely seen a bit of, backpedaling on progress, at the state level towards renewable energy and carbon emissions reductions. and so there is a process, a public process through the utilities commission to get input on these plans and we're going through that right now. And so, we for the last couple, this is our third time going through this, have worked with other local governments in North Carolina to look at the carbon plan and how it impacts us meeting our goals and submit comments jointly on one letter from local governments. And so, we, we have that opportunity right now.

And there is a letter that will be coming to you. You should have already seen it in your email, but it will be officially I guess brought forward yeah to to have Durham County sign on to that letter. And what it says in that letter is that we would like to see greater transparency into the economic development load forecasting. So Duke Energy has said, "Wow, we really expect our load forecast, the amount of electricity we have to generate to go up very very exponentially in a very short amount of time." A lot of that's related to data centers, not exclusively, but data centers, but also economic development in general in the state, but it's very it it's not a transparent methodology and they're not sharing exactly how they're generating that. So one of our comments is we would like to see what's going into that and see how that you know lines up with other things that other analysis has shown. Also planning for affordable reliable and resilient energy systems by optimizing.

The existing grid and investing in the least risk generation. So going back to that climate change and resilience and making sure that what is being planned is not subject to higher fuel uses necessarily really looking at the whole cost of the asset over the lifetime that it exists. Creating cost-effective clean energy procurement for large customers like us. So like the green source advantage we were really lucky to get in on that first trunch but we need more options and we all need more options and not just us the large companies that care about this Google and Apple and those companies they want this too. So really looking at what other opportunities there are for to create those programs to fully value energy efficiency and those demand side resources. the the cheapest, cleanest kilowatt hour is the one you don't generate or use. And so really putting more into efficiency and demand side resources. So that would be on our very coldest night that we saw like a couple weeks ago, everyone's heat is on. The.

Demand was the highest we've ever seen. Or also in the summer when there's high heat. there are incentives, there are programs that in those peak times to get kind of shave that off a little bit. The peak times are when they bring on everything. That's when they're bringing on their coal plants or every old anything that's you know ever been around. They got to generate the electricity. That's the dirtiest kilowatt hours. So the least you the more you can shave off that demand, the peak demand, the cleaner it is. And then finally, protecting existing rateayers from disproportionate cost burden associated with new large loads.

Other states do this, but saying like if a whole bunch of, for example, large users, either data centers or anybody else, that that shouldn't then all of a sudden mean that all the rest of us should be paying disproportionate because they're coming in and and needing more. Some of the some of the things in the new carbon plan are that for example coal originally in the last carbon plan that all coal assets would be off-grid by 2035 and now they're saying well we're going to keep push that out to 2040 and kind of not looking at wind anymore. So there's definitely some different things in this carbon plan than there were for the one previous to that. Whoa., okay.

That is all I have on that., I am open to discussion and that is the last topic that I had. So, open to anything. >>, Commissioner Jacobs. >> Oh, >> you're already on. >> From before. Sorry., thank you so much for this sign on letter. It's really important., I assume so. Is this going to the utilities commission and to Duke Energy? >> It goes into to the utilities commission and it's part of it's available on the public record there.

>> Okay. So, we don't send this to Duke Energy directly >> generally not. >> Okay. >> They'll see it. They'll know. >> Okay., well, I think it's incredibly important and I think it's also important that our residents know about these issues because at the end of the day it affects them and what they are paying for in their energy bills and we we know right now this is just an additional cost that is really having a negative impact on people along with you know rising cost of food and you know rising housing costs and you know the the whole impact of data centers is is a huge national discussion. As a matter of fact, when we were in DC, the one of the people who was running for the upcoming vice president of the National Association of County Officials is from what Lowden County Virginia, which is right outside DC. And they have, I believe, a hundred data setters. 100 Dana centers, the most in the United States in their one county and the.

County commissioner there is he's become a expert on the impacts of data centers. and so this is you know is like he is running on this platform for for the leadership of NAO because there's so many issues that that counties and county residents really need to be educated about. But surely residents should not be footing the bill for these data centers that are going to benefit companies. They should be paying for it. And so it is very concerning what is happening in North Carolina related to this issue. So I really appreciate that you helping us make a strong statement on these issues. So, so this will be coming at an upcoming meeting, >> I believe. Well, I entered it into the system for Mon for Monday's meeting.

>> Okay. >> I didn't see it on the consent agenda, though. >> This the the letter. >> Yes. >> Yes. That is for the Monday meeting. And then the other item we're going to bring back in April. >> Okay. >> Okay. And is the letter our board or is it you sign it? >> The chair would sign it. the chair. Okay. >> And it's being signed, as I mentioned, by many other local governments. So, it'll be either their mayor or their county chair says or designate, I guess, if >> Okay.

>> need be. >> All right. Well, anything else that you think would be important for us to do, whether it's a resolution or you know, whatever you think is just let us know what would be impactful., and I'm wondering, would this be something that we would also share with the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners? >> We certainly could. >> Yeah, we can definitely share it with others once it's complete. Yes, >> I think that would be good., because this is again something that is going to be impacting people unless they are belong to a cooperative.

I will say I have a very different opinion of our cooperatives like Brunswick Electric is doing amazing innovative things. >>, so it's not everybody in the state. >> True. I will say most cooperatives still purchase the electricity that they sell to their customers from Duke Energy. So, they're still impacted from a carbon point of view by what Duke Energy is doing. And potentially from a cost point of view because if Duke Energy's costs go up that has to >> so it impacts them impact them.

>> They tend to be very progressive though in the things that they're doing. So >> and they could have for example their own efficiency incentives or solar incentives within their co-op, >> but they're still purchasing that electricity from Duke. All right. >> All right., that's everything. All right. Thank you very much for your time. I appreciate seeing this again. This was great. >> Thank you so much. All right. Next item on our agenda is close session. So, I'll accept a motion to go into close session for the reasons stated on the agenda.

Just just say so moved. Just say so move. >> So moved. >> Second. >> It's been moved and properly seconded. We go into close session for the reasons stated on the agenda. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. >> All oppose, please use the same sign. Passes unanimous. We are now in close session. Thank you.

All righty. We are >> back in close in open session. close. We met in close session. No action was taken. Instruct no action was taken. Okay. I'll accept a motion to adjurnn. >> So moved. >> Second. It's been moved and properly seconded we adjourn. All in favor say I. I all oppose. >> We are now ajourer. Thank you all very much. >> Thank you.