Board of Commissioners · Regular Meeting · January 5, 2026

Good morning everyone and welcome to our work session for the uh Durham Board of County Commissioners. Uh hope everyone had a wonderful holiday break. um well holiday season um and a wonderful [clears throat] new year. Welcome back.

I'm excited about 2026 getting started. I hope everyone else here is as well. I will start our meeting this morning with the public charge and I'll ask um Commissioner Burton, would you be open to reading a land acknowledgement after I finish? >> I do. >> All right. So the board of uh the board of commissioners ask its members and residents to conduct themselves in a respectful courteous manner both the board and fellow residents at any time should any member of the board or any resident fail to observe this public

charge. The chair will ask the offending person to leave the meeting until the individual regains personal control. Should the cur decorum fail to be restored, the chair chair will recess the meeting until such time a genuine commitment to the public. Charge is observed.

Commissioner Burton. >> Thank you, Chair Lee. Land acknowledgement. As we [clears throat] convene for the Durham County Commissioners meeting, it's crucial to recognize the painful truth of history.

We stand on the stolen ancestral lands of the Kataba, Eno, Okanichi, Shakori, and Tuscarora peoples whose deep connection to this land predates our arrival. We acknowledge with humility the unjust displacement and violence that occurred leading to the dispossession of indigenous peoples from their homelands. Their res their resilience in the face of such adversity

is a testament to their strength and spirit. May we humbly honor the ancestors and elders of these nations, both past and present, by committing ourselves to fostering understanding, healing, and justice for all who inhabit this land. Let us walk forward together with open hearts, acknowledging the past, and embracing a future guided by compassion, respect, and unity. >> Thank you, Commissioner Burton.

I appreciate it. All right. Um the first item since this is a work session, the first item on our agenda is citizens uh comments and we will start here. It looks like we have Okay, it looks like we have eight, but two are on an access bus.

If they should they arrive Oh, they they made it. Oh, okay. Miss Cheryl. Okay. And

did James Chavis make it? Did he make it yet? Not yet. Okay.

All right. Should I see him come in, I'll make sure we have some time for him to him to get his time. Okay. So, um, we'll call everyone up.

We'll have three minutes each since we have aotted 30 minutes for the public comment uh, citizens comments. Um, we have less than 10. So we'll have three minutes each. Okay.

So our first, second, and third will be and you you can line up here with Antonet uh Halls. >> Okay. Then we have Peter Uerman. >> Eerman.

Yes. And then um Mr. Zed. >> Yeah.

Okay. We'll have you three up first and then I'll call the next three. Okay, let you come up. You have three

minutes each. You can go ahead. Go ahead and over there. So, we'll have ant uh Antonet, Peter, and Rosik.

Mr. Rosik. >> And there is also a timer on that side of the podium. So you will be aware when the timer begins and ends.

>> Okay. >> So it's on right whenever. >> Hello. My name is Antonet Hos and I am a citizen here in Durham.

I've been paying taxes since September 25th, 1997. All right. So we are here with the community and the community has expressed a uh for lack of a better word no confidence lack of a better term no confidence for the department of social services and its director. And we are asking that the

director be removed from her position and that is due to uh community [clears throat] participation for over a year and no changes. As a matter of fact, we have um experienced uh discontent and and and being removed and uh and our reputations are being um salt soiled as a result of us requesting accountability. Now, I did make a copy of the report that we got from the Department of Social Services director's meeting. You should have a copy.

I want you to pay close attention to the actual expenditure page. And I do have them marked as like aster on the side about the concerns where they have no budgets and spending like 1,600 2,000 bonuses. No budget for the bonuses. Spending

$5,000 $6,000 for the bonuses. We need a forensic audit. We need a forensic audit on the Department of Social Services as you move to remove the director. That is the community's request and we will continue to go and get this information.

We will continue to compile it and we will be delivering it to you with the discontent of the citizens of Durham County. Period. And if you feel like this is basically we need to de u reconstruct restructure it needs to restructure the federal dollars are not going to be coming in you and they got our children all over the place all over the counties all the different states and you cannot manage children in Durham. How you managing children in Texas and Oklahoma and Colorado, New York? How you managing our children? What we had to do over the holidays was

console the [clears throat] parents. That's what we did over the holidays. Console the parents who have their children in custody and don't know where they are and have no outreach, no visitation. And so we we have lost our confidence in the Department of Social Services and its leader and we are needing a change.

We are demanding a change today. Thank you. >> Uh thank you very much. Uh, Miss Halls.

Thank you. >> Morning. >> Good morning. I'm new to this process.

I've spent most of my life at the top of the feeding chain of privilege. I'm a white cisgendered male and I've just become aware I've been a community resident. My name is Peter Eisman by the way. Been in this

community for 10 years and um I've been concerned about injustice most of my life. It's interesting that you opened up with happy holidays. We have families in this community who are under the oversight of the Department of Social Services that had less than a happy holiday, denied the opportunity to see their children, denied the opportunity to have structured or unstructured visits by repeated repeated denials of requests. I sat in the DSS meeting for the first time in my life the other day and the degree of humiliation that you require these parents to come before that board and beg to see their children

is disgusting. It's revolting. It's inconsionable that you cannot send an email from the director of that service to send an email to say, "Fix this Fix this. Let's get these parents together is ridiculous.

" It takes that long. If there's a workday, takes that long. If there's an emergency, we have to close the building. It takes that long to send an email out for people to respond.

But we cannot send an email out to request that these families whose children have been removed from their homes to have visitation. It's a policy that is supposed to be in place. That's just one thing, folks.

The Department of Social Services is here. The North Carolina Civil Rights Advisory Committee has put out a report and I I request that y'all read that. We're in trouble here in Durham and our kids are here in trouble. And I'm just beginning this fight with my friends in standing in solidarity and holding these people to accountability and to see that something has changed in this system.

Taking away black children from black families has been going on in this country for hundreds of years. This is just a legal way to do so. Thank you. >> Thank you, sir.

>> Y'all have a blessed day. >> Good morning, peace. My name is Rafi Zadei. I'm a resident of Durham, 807 South Duke Street. I'm here today to bring to light title 4, section E of the Social Security Act that governs all the

funding that comes to DDS from the state and the federal government. We had a case where a former Durham police corporal Ray Sean Taylor, a 10-year veteran of Durham Police Force, surfaced with cases brought against him by District Attorney Santana Deberg. charges of rape, sexual battery, sexual servitude, sexual assault, and kidnapping. He's scheduled for trial for case heard this week in Durham, North Carolina.

Because Teller was allegedly on duty and acting in his official capacity at the time of the alleged crimes, the state and federal bureau investigation had to intervene. Bear in mind that Mr. Tails was working for DDS as investigator

during that jump. He was going in and out of houses such as Foster parent, Cheryl Smith with these charges on his back. following cases in Durham District Family Court against these parents. If that's not a form of conspiracy, a lack of transparency, what is it? Damn, during the period of these charges, rape, sexual battery, assault, kidnapping, he was going into these homes with our children. The federal title 4E funding declares with an overview statement that these officers or investigators should be vetted with background checks and reach a certain moral turpitude

before they enter the homes of these foster parents. I'm here on the record today to let you know that we are planning on filing charges against both Durham Police Department and DDS. You should know as well as I do. You don't send a man into nobody's home who have these type of charges on his back.

Would you send them into your granddaughter's house, your child's house, sexual battery, rape, kidnapping, funnling children, dealing with our children out of the sight of parents, yet Maggie Claps, Web, Maggie Claps in the whole system, Patrice Andrews, Leo Williams, no one can con can can mention the contractual services that Mr. Taylor had with DDS. We want to know how many more Durham

police investigators are participating in this practice. >> Thank you so much. >> All righty. Our next uh three will be Victoria Peterson, Miss Peterson, um Wita Burns, and then um Amanda Wallace, Miss Miss Smith, you you'll be right after Amanda.

Good. All right. >> Uh Dr. Yes.

Before I start speaking, who's taking notes of the public concerns? [snorts] Or one of these folks over here taking any notes? >> I think I think we're all taking notes. >> Okay, great.

Thank you. I'm Mrs. Peterson, Victoria Peterson. I'm one of the political activists here in Durham.

But I also want to share something with you. Very rarely do I talk about this about my own personal life. I was in the

foster care system in this country. Our foster care system is just it's just ridiculous. The problem is and matter of fact I was taken away from my mother as a young baby. I never return back to my family.

19 20 years in the state that I was in those many years I lived in the foster care system. Most of those years my foster mother was very very abusive. And I can talk to you a little bit about why that is because in a foster care system years ago they would tell the parents do not attack do not uh attach yourself to the child. So I was and and sometimes I have a little joke.

If folks don't like how I act, I was the ward of the state for 18 and 19 years. So that's why you blame the state that I was in. I I was very concerned about and I'm

also in agreeance about asking the director of social service. She really does need to resign and I want to let the uh the county manager no uh also know that get the hearing report uh she did a trespassing on an individual. She was in court that day. I was shocked the different things that she made statements about being afraid of African-American people.

Why is this lady in charge of your social service and many of her clients and parents or persons of color? And yes, in this country, we do have a history of taking black children from their families and from their parents. It's a history. three or 400 and some years. This is nothing new that is being done in this country. The problem is is that if the parents are not involved

and and and and they don't stay involved with the government, then the government really does not know until you hear it from the parents and citizens that are concerned. Dr. Lee and Dr. Lee, I was also concerned about how much money this lady is making.

Uh I I I've heard two different two different dollar amounts. So I would like to get back to the county attorney to find out what is her salary. Tell me why. And I'm not trying to be prejudice or racist, but social service has a lot of African-Americans that have been working in the social service department for years.

Why is it that they had to go all the way to Florida to bring in a white female that has very little understanding of people of color and you know that on the statements that she has said. >> Thank you, Miss Peterson. >> Thank you so much. The next speaker is going to be Miss Burns.

Wita Burns. Good morning. >> Fine. >> Good morning.

So um I'm Ga's mother and he was stolen from me from Durham County Department of Social Services on May 28th of 2024 after I gave birth at the hospital. After I gave birth at the hospital, I'm sick and tired of the emotional abuse we go through as black parents at the hands of the family police. I'm facing a lot of grief and harm from this case that I'm going through. I have missed many milestones with my son and wasn't there

when he took his first steps when he said his first words. I've been supervised with my son for over a year and having to spend time in small rooms while being watched through a oneway mirror. I recently began getting more visitations, but the department didn't want me to get any more visitations anymore visits. They keep recommending that I only see my son supervised even though they have been supervising me for over a year.

How long do I have to prove myself worthy to be a mother of a child I gave birth to? At my last hearing on December 12th, Judge Nancy Gordon even said that I have been deprived of time with my son by the department. Another issue with visitation is the department says that they accommodate expanded visits on weekends and evenings, but this is not true. I've asked numerous times and have been

denied this request both email and in open court. As a parent impacted by this system, I'm requesting that the commissioners actually look into this issue and not just take the department's word that they are doing right by families. I'm standing here as a parent who has been done wrong by this system and my child is suffering as we speak. So, as we start off this new year, I ask you, what are we doing to bring families together instead of tearing families apart?

That's my question, but thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Miss Burns.

Uh, Miss Wallace. >> So, my name is Amanda Wallace. I'm the founder of Operation Stop CPS and I've been here many times and I'm here today to express my deep

concern for this board putting this this roles and responsibilities presentation on this agenda without reaching out to anyone other than the problem. If you truly wanted to understand what role this system or these actors are playing in your community, you would ask those directly impacted by the problem. But you won't do that. You're not doing that.

I sent an email last night asking to play a video that talks in the per like in the voice of those impacted that gives statistics that explains and it was it was you know produced here in Durham. Why can't you play that? I asked for those who have been impacted to have voice during this presentation. Don't just let the lies stand. Let those

who are impacted respond. What are you going to do about that? Because right now it looks like y'all working together. And I've been here, so I know you are.

Durham County Child Protective Services, Department of Social Services, and the Family Police, whatever you want to call it. Them people sitting over there in the corner, the board sitting behind them. I see you, Wendy. They are responsible.

for the kidnapping of children, disproportionately black children in this community and y'all are funding it. I know why you don't want to do anything different. " If you really wanted a solution, you would start by asking folks. And what folks who are impacted say is reparations.

We're there. Let's stop talking about it. Like Wita said, while

we talking, her child is suffering. Children are taken from their families for poverty, which is coded as neglect. And and so I want to do a spoiler alert because the department is going to come give their presentation and I want you to know that they're lying. They're lying and their data shows it right here.

This board they said it said a little known fact that children go with their family if reunification doesn't happen. It's adoption. Look, this was 14 children adopted out of this county in one month. Let's stop the lies.

Stop the lies. Oh, I still got time. So, listen. What are y'all going to do?

I know you're going to do the same thing. Funding them. >> Our next speaker, our next speaker today is going to be Miss Cheryl Smith.

Okay. Good morning. I'm here this morning to speak on the reunification and the lack of resources that are being given to my family. I'm entitled, according to my court order, I'm entitled to two visits a month.

I'm only receiving one. And I, as I addressed that at to the social worker, she continued to try to convince me I'm receiving two visits. And I only see my baby one Saturday out of the month. And that's the fourth Saturday.

I only received two visits a month when it first started July 1st and July 15th. After that, I didn't see my baby anymore until October. There hasn't been any therapy, family therapy, there haven't been anything. The phone calls, the virtuals, there's always an excuse.

I document everything so I could prove my case. I asked for more more visits and more time with my daughter. adopted daughter that has already been in your system. There's

nothing your director have not even met with me one time, but she continued to sign off on my on paperwork for me. I visit my daughters December the 27th. She had a good time. She was having a wonderful time.

Once she went after we ate, she went to go get ice cream. " Oh, Simone would not be coming on January 23rd. The court, the judge have to order unsupervised visits. So, I said, so I went back to the two visits a month that I don't receive.

She got upset and ended the the visit. I asked my baby. " When that time from that time, Melvin got off the phone with whoever she was talking with and came up to the line and I noticed she left all my baby stuff at the table for someone to take. So by the time I went to got my baby stuff and came back to where she was

waiting on her ice cream at check at Chick-fil-A had to convince my baby to tell me that she required she asked for one visit a month and then she started crying and that pissed me off. But I kept my cool. But this needs to stop. Just think of the effect the mental and abuse that you all are giving my what taking my baby through that has already been in this system.

And her therapist isn't worth 10 cent. She haven't offer she haven't said anything positive. She haven't offered anything any suggestion. My baby just suffered in the system and I'm not even ordered to do a thing.

So why is my baby still in this system and we haven't gotten any closer to reunification? There's no service, none. Fire this lady cuz I'mma hurt somebody with my baby. >> I appreciate it.

Okay. And I do see Mr. Chavis just coming in.

We'll let Mr. Chavis, come on in and have as a public comment. Let's use one of these. Yeah.

>> Good morning, Mr. Chavis. >> I'm glad you can you can make it here. Sure.

>> All right. Come on. Calm down. >> All right, Mr.

Tavis, you'll have uh three minutes for public comment. Good morning to y'all and happy new year to all of y'all. I hope this year in 2026 will be better than next than last year, especially for the reason why we are here. Durham County government have done our black children wrong with

Durm Social Service. This is not just a DM thing. This is a national thing. and to see what happens to our black children when you tell a mother to do the things that she's supposed to do to get her children's back and then you come and lie to her and not one of y'all has been asking any question about it.

Then you had to have the county manager sign off, the one we pay over $200,000 a year salary to sign off on some federal act of our fifth amendment rights about a person. What do they say about y'all Democrats up there? Y'all doing us worse than Trump in the White House. And you sit here and said it's okay for

one person to do us wrong. But we got to start calling y'all Democrats out. And we got to especially call out our county manager of being a black woman signing [snorts] off without coming out into community. I hope this year y'all will make her get out here in this community and talk to people, get to know us so that we can get to know her before she do something else like this.

Cuz it's a crying shame. All the picking and walking we did last year down there. Not one time did she come out. But when somebody white come and tell her to sign off on something, she took one-sided that show us miss is not being black. She being anti mammy like we always used to call them back in the day.

So I hope y'all get her straight to let her know that she's going to sit in that street. She got to be fair to all people, not just some people. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr.

Davis. That uh concludes everyone who has signed up for citizen comments. So, we'll move on to the next agenda item, which is our consent agenda. Manager Hager.

Good morning, commissioners. We have several items for your consideration. If you have questions, um these items will um go to the board meeting um next Monday for approval. And there were a few questions that were asked that have been followed up on ahead of today's discussion. The first item is 25592 budget ordinance amendment

um appropriating $65,000 of Lebanon Fire Tax District fund balance and increasing the distribution to Lebanon Fire Department for the purchase of a res response vehicle. The next one is 25650. This is to approve a capital project amendment appropriating $276,244 of debt service fund balance and transferring those funds to support the Lincoln Community Health Center parking lot expansion capital project as well as um increase in the owner's contingency the contract with WC Construction in the amount of $276,244 to execute any necessary change orders related to this extension. >> Um, thank you, Madam Manager. I just have a comment about this item as well

as item um 26-00001 also related to Lincoln. Um, I am the county's board's liaison to the board of directors for Lincoln Community Health Center. And I just want to state that um, these are both very important investments for us to help support at this time the expansion of the parking lot and also the HVAC system that desperately needs to be uh, replaced. But I just want to clarify, I know there have been ongoing discussions um especially related to the HVAC repairs that that is the responsibility of Duke Health System and um Duke Regional. Uh and I just want to make sure that we are I know we these are timesensitive and we need to move forward, but that we will be pursuing um

being reimbursed uh for the HVAC repairs. Um so I just Lincoln provides is the safety net health care provider for our community serves 10% of our residents. Um over 37,000 people are dependent on Lincoln Community Health Center for their care. We cannot afford to have the HVAC system fail for one day.

Um so um I'm appreciate our staff stepping up. Thank you, Perry, and everyone and Brenda who's helping to make all this happen. Um, but we do um we will be seeking the compensation that we deserve as well. Thank you.

>> Yeah, I just had a quick question. So, because I know this was discussed before myself, Dr. Lee and Commissioner Valentine got on the board. Is it like pushing the parking lot like in that front area of Lincoln where it's like a

kind of a there's a yard or I just wanted to get some logistical idea of what's happening. >> Perry Mans will give additional clarification. >> Good morning, commissioners and um Commissioner Burns, the answer to your question is yes. uh that area closest up to Favville Street, that parking lot has already been completed and it's in use.

I think we added an additional I think 42 spaces uh to that area, which clearly uh helps um the challenges that we've had with with parking uh down at the facility. And what this work uh is for is the um storm pipe installation across the street. We actually had to do some work down Lynwood Avenue and had some conflicts with um the gas line, water lines, and we also encountered some rock while doing that. And so this allows us to complete the project and get it closed up and uh get a certificate of completion. So yes, ma'am.

>> Thanks. That helps me have like an idea of what's happening. So I appreciate that. Thanks, >> Manager Hagar.

Did you I thought you were going to say something. >> No, I'm sorry. No, thank you, Perry, for for those comments. >> Okay, >> Mr.

Chair. >> Uh, yes, Commissioner Valentine. >> Uh, thank you, Chair. So, I support this uh expansion project, but I also want to go on record um consistent with some of the comments made by my colleague with respect to Duke's uh legacy responsibilities with regards to Lincoln Community Center. And so this issue um came to bear very early last uh last last year and it's my concern uh that uh consistent with the agreement that the responsibilities that Duke has here with regards to um the Lincoln Community Center which is very important to the African-American community um that they do their part. And so whatever we need to do with respect to

uh looking into this matter further and running it to ground, I think that that would be um consistent with what the community would want us to do. >> Um Commissioner Alone. >> Yes. Um I wanted to echo those sentiments and also ask Perry either if you have it today or if you could email it to us because I serve as the liaison for the Duke Regional Hospital Board and have brought it up in those meetings as well. about what is the responsibility of Duke Regional Hospital and there's dispute between Duke Regional Hospital, Lincoln Community Health about this original contract and us needing to get all three parties, the county, Lincoln Community Health, and Duke Regional Hospital's attorneys in a room to actually look at that contract that was signed. what was it in 1988 89 or something that that original contract was signed and so that we can have that clue have it clarified because it says that Duke Regional Hospital has to maintain or keep up the maintenance

of the existing facilities but um the question I had for Perry was do we know because this isn't to the HVAC but there was also other repairs that the county had to make I think to the elevator systems do we have a total amount that the county has paid for repairs that would be that are considered maintenance to the existing facilities that would or should be covered by Duke Regional Hospital. >> Commissioner, we can certainly get you that information. Um, just to be candid, you know, um, in prior years, Duke Regional did step up and make those repairs and they actually maintain the facility. Um, as I stated when we brought this item to you originally, the um, some things have changed with, of course, Duke's funding, and I hope I'm not talking too much, manager, but um, they've basically taken a different stance as a result of their financial situation. And so we will

provide that information to you. But um I will rely heavily on the legal department uh to make sure that we have the the accurate agreement and that we can get everybody at the table to have the conversation around maintenance and repair and responsibilities associated with that original agreement. So yes. >> Yeah.

Thank you Perry. And to your point, you know, you did didn't cross over the line. Uh we we are working with Duke. There have been some unique fiscal challenges um that they have um had to deal with in recent months with huge shifts of federal funding.

Um, as you know, when this happened in the summer, our desire was to make sure that we were responsive for seamless operations. And, um, we will over the next several, um, weeks pull together some the historical funding that the county's done, um, compared to those areas that were supported by Lincoln, by Duke. and staff

will have conversations and then um have conversations with um the Lincoln Health Board as well as looping in um um Durham Regional. Yes, >> that would be great if we could yeah get the amounts for like the HVAC, the elevator repairs, other maintenance repairs that the county has made. And also going back to the original agreement, the reason that Duke Regional Hospital is responsible for these is that essentially we have given them out of I think it was like $1 lease or whatever for that Duke Regional Hospital was Durham County Hospital. So that's our property and land that they're benefiting off of.

>> Okay. Um, Commissioner Jacobs. >> Yes. Um [clears throat] I just want to lift up some of the comments that my colleagues have said that um the what is what was in the original agreement is what needs to be uh

followed and second of all that um even related to any kind of financial concerns. Uh we know that Lincoln the Lincoln Community Health Center saves uh our entire health system money because it's focused on preventative care and uh because of the care that Lincoln provides the outstanding care [music] to keep people healthy. It keeps people from ending up in the ER and in Duke Hospital. So, um, Lincoln serves actually to save our health system money.

Um, so that should not be any concern. Thank you. >> Um, so I've heard the term original agreement a couple times just now. Has there been any subsequent agreements? Should we get that all together? >> No, it's one agreement that now that I think it's over the past two years, three years now that Duke Regional Hospital has just been saying that they interpret that original agreement

differently now. So maybe we need to have a discussion about that. >> Yeah. >> Yeah.

>> Yes. >> Okay. All right. Very good.

Any other comments from our commissioners? >> Okay, manager Hagar. >> All right. Yes.

The next item is 26. authorized exe execution of the public art agreement with visual or original customs for the design, fabrication, installation at the board of elections building located at 3825 South Roxboro Street, Durham. >> Did we get an update on whether I know I asked this in agenda prep about the is it a local artist? Do we know?

There's a question about the artist and Miss Bright, can you clarify that? The question was whether or not it was a local artist. I believe the gentleman is not from Dorm, but um

good morning. Um the artist is from Winston Salem and he applied to our uh cafe um uh application as as he applied to the cafe um document that we requested artists to to um submit to >> at least from North Carolina. Yes, that's good at least. Do we receive and not generally to this one, but in general, how do we do outreach when we put out art requests for other buildings and projects to like the N to the Durham Arts Center to like to get more applicants from local Durham artists?

>> Yes, we submit um the the advertisement um locally. Um the city of Durham works with us as well and we submit it locally. Um, and cafe is actually a

national outreach program, um, which a lot of local artists are aware of. And whenever we have, um, decab and pack meetings, we also, um, allow folks to know that it's out there. So, we we get a lot of interest. Um, and as a bit of information, the public art um for Durm County has just finished about 12 murals.

Um, and all but one of them was from North Carolina and lots from Durham. >> Really great. Thank you. >> All right.

You're welcome. >> Thank you, Brenda. The next one is 260001 and it's almost a continuing conversation from our previous one. 33

of debt service fund which will be transferred to the PO fund to support increases to the new Lincoln Community Health building modernization upgrades. The next one is 260002. This is standard non-reimburseable utility contract for the extension of the county sanitary sewer system. Okay, there's a question.

Yeah, I had a question. I was just curious as to where does the city sewer system begin and the county sewer system begin because I was thinking okay all these projects are going to be are they city just curious about that and our um deputy director will come as Stephanie Princeley to answer those questions. >> Morning commissioners. Um so we have a

It's a little um confusing about how the sewer service area is. So um everything that's inside of the city limits is city sewer. Um and then the county has a service areas mainly around research triangle park and some of the outskirts. So we have um what we consider in the county 100% customers and 80% customers.

So the 100% customers are all county owned sewer and it comes to the triangle wastewater treatment plant. Then we have 80% customers which discharge to a city sewer but comes to the triangle wastewater treatment plant for treatment. Um so all of this is kind of mapped out. Um, we have the service areas laid out in G in our GPS, our GIS systems and um, and we actually have

some areas where city and county sewer run side by side. So, it's really confusing and there's some areas where it may go from city to county back to city and then come back to county for treatment. So, um, basically we have to look at the maps and just kind of really see um, where those areas lie during all the development. Gotcha.

Thank It's more complex than I thought. Like I I was thinking, oh, the city starts here and then the county starts here, but they're all kind of convoluted. Okay. Yes, ma'am.

>> Thank you, >> Vice Chair Lum. >> Thank you, Chair Lee. And this may be a question for you or maybe it's for planning department Sarah Young. Just wondering with the sewer systems of most uh county residents who are outside of city limits besides RTP now um are on septic tanks. Do we know the environmental impacts of like how do they measure the environmental impacts of septic tanks? Is there like >> um most of anything with septic tanks go

through environmental health? Um and so you know the DEEQ's done a lot of studies over the years. There's I mean there are some impacts um but typically anytime there's an area where sewer runs close to it public sewer you know it's um residents are really requested to tile them. Um most we only have a few left in our service area that um don't have are actually on septic systems.

Um what we do have in the county that's mainly on septic systems now is in the northern area. Um but yeah, environmental health should be able to answer any impacts. >> I'll ask Thank you. >> Uh Commissioner Valentine.

>> Yes. Thank you, Chair. Uh this might be a strange question, but are these infrastructure contracts consistent with existing plans?

So these contracts, we've been using these utility contracts for several years, um, which were approved through our legal department. Um, and so what happens is we do these contracts, um, the developer will build the sewer and then because it either has to be like in a public rideway or it's a a part where other development could tie onto, it has to become public sewer. So that's when the county takes it on. Um, so they build it, they give it to us through these agreements, and then they're responsible for the maintenance for the first year, like if there's anything wrong with it, and then the county takes it over. I just wanted to highlight that because we often in our discussions, in our planning discussions, don't emphasize the importance of the infrastructure requirements that become the issue for the county. And so, uh, the reason for me asking that today is to let the

public know that when these projects come to fruition, usually the infrastructure needs are afterthought. And we need to be more conscientious about how we deal with the issue of infrastructure broadly in any of these projects that come to bear, particularly in light of uh the growth here in the county. So, thank you for for highlighting that. >> Yeah, absolutely.

because um as you know we have to look at can the existing sewer support the flow? Do we have the lift stations in place that can handle it? Um and also can our wastewater treatment plant handle it because once we reach a certain percentage you know through state regulation we're required to be under um construction. So there's a a lot of pieces we have to look at from a compliance standpoint.

Okay, >> thank you Stephanie. The next one is 260003. This is to award a contract to Taplan

Group for manhole and sewer line inspection services for the Durham County Utilities Division in the amount of $223,73. Okay, the next one is 26006. This is to approve and authorize the manager to execute four lease agreements for the county owned shops of Hope Valley Shopping Center pending approval from the county attorney's office. >> Commissioner.

>> Um yes. Um the question I had and it could have been in the contracts but I just didn't see it easily enough. What is the price per square footage for the spaces that we rent? >> Good morning. I'm David Fleer with the real estate team and uh the rate at that we're asking at Shops of Hope Valley is

$20 per square foot. One of the leases is with an existing tenant and it's a smaller space and so the lease rate is higher for that one. But our asking rate and the rate for three of the leases is $20 per square foot. >> Is that the rate that that's at the market rate?

>> It is the market rate. It's not a subsidized rate or anything. >> Thank you. >> Thank you.

>> Uh Commissioner Jacobs. >> Um well, I was really excited to see these leases um and to see some new businesses moving into the shopping center. I was over there recently to get my North Carolina Real ID. Um, [clears throat] by the way, if you go there at 8:00 in the morning, there's no wait.

Um, I was wondering who who is responsible for maintaining just the sidewalk and the parking lot. How does that work? The county has contracted with a team called Trademark Properties who does both the leasing and the

management of the uh shopping center and they're generally responsible for maintenance. Uh general services does do some maintenance of the area near the board of elections. >> Okay. Well, the board of elections looked great.

Um, [laughter] I did I did talk to the county manager about just especially outside of the DMV because that's where you get probably the most use. Um, just making sure that they >> focus in on leaves and trash and things like that. >> It's been a hightra area. Yes.

We've we've talked with Trademark about some more frequency of emptying the trash cans that get filled up there quickly. >> Yeah. >> And we will follow up again, of course. >> Thank you.

>> Thank you. The next one is 260009. This is to authorize a county manager to enter a tour contract with Brady Train Services doing business as Icon Boiler Inc. in

37 for the purposes of replacing two steam boilers at the Durham County Detention Center with funding being provided and the authority to approve any amendments or change orders to the contract as long as funding is available in the CIP programming for ongoing HVAC replacements and upgrades. All right, commissioners. This concludes our um listing of consent agenda items. We will place them on Monday's regular session.

And if questions emerge between now and then and of course at the meeting, we will work quickly to give you a response. >> Okay. Any further discussion on a consent agenda? The consent items. Okay. Our next item, well, we're moving into discussion items and our next item is we're going to have to um based on

something that was done previously. Um we're we'll need to suspend the rules um to vote since this is a work session. We generally don't do action items. Um to vote on this next item, suspend the rules to authorize the county manager to execute lease agreement for OES fleet management facility.

So, first we'll have to uh do a vote to suspend the rules. Then we will do a vote on this item. >> I move that we suspend the rules. Second.

>> It's been moved and properly second and that we suspend the rules to address this item. >> Uh any discussions on that. >> All in favor say I. >> I.

>> All oppose, please use the same sign. The rules have been suspended so that we can authorize um authorize this item. So the motion will be to authorize the county manager execute lease agreement for OES fleet management facility. >> So moved. >> Second. >> It's been moved and properly seconded that we approve this item in the

suspension of the rules. Any any discussion? All in favor say I. >> I.

I. >> All oppose please use the same sign. The motion passes unanimously. That concludes the um suspension of the rules just for that item. The next item on our agenda is a presentation information presentation on the child welfare welfare system roles and responsibilities.

Good morning, county commissioners and county manager. >> Good morning. Good morning. Happy New Year, >> Clap.

Thank you. Um, my name is Maggie Clap. I'm the director of the Department of Social Services in Durham County. Um and I'm here to present today on uh Durham County's roles and responsibilities um at DSS.

Um we're going to talk about our role um as DSS, the district court, and then um the board of county commissioners. I have here with me my deputy director, Bila Luima, uh my assistant director of finance, Margaret Faircloth, and my program manager over intake, Carol Tremble. And then this is our legal team. just sent to Jones and Patrick.

So the child welfare system the structure it's a state superupvised county administered system. So um the way that it works in um throughout the country is some countries are state administered. Um in North Carolina we are state supervised but county

administered which means um the state is the one that gives out the policies and the procedures um based on federal law and state law and we administer those policies and procedures. We also um fund um through getting state dollars and federal dollars. We then fund um the programs. Um so the oversight is at the state and federal level.

um our responsibility is to provide those service deliveries. The district court has the legal authority. We do not um at DSS. And then the board of county commissioners, your role within our system is to provide governance and funding and to make sure that we are um have the funding that we need.

So I want to talk a little bit about the role of Durham County DSS. Um so we do not go out and look for cases. Um we get calls into our intake line. We have a 24/7 hotline um that we have to man um weekends, holidays. It never stops. Um and we get calls in um that the biggest

calls that we get in the the biggest places that we get calls in is medical um from uh Duke Hospital or UNCC or any of the local hospitals around here, the school system, and then law enforcement and then family and community members. So for instance in November we got 1,600 and 1,069 calls into our abuse and intake in one month. That was in November of 2025. We accepted 651 of those.

So um not even um a little bit over half. Um and the way that we have to accept them is based on um state and federal policy. So there's um when we get a call, we do an assessment. We ask the reporter questions. Everyone in the state of North Carolina is a mandated reporter, but as I said, the majority of our calls come in from the medical system, school system, law enforcement, and then the rest is community and family members. And so when we receive a

call, we then go through the list um of abuse and neglect and dependency and look at that and assess. If we accept the call, we then do um a CPS assessment. CPS stands for Child Protective Services Assessment. So, we go out to the home, we meet with the family, we meet with uh what we call collaterals, which could be um neighbors, it could be other family members, it could be if the child is receiving behavioral health services, it could be the therapist, the school teacher um and other children in the home.

We then provide services um initially. So, those services might look like domestic violence services. They might look like substance abuse or mental health services. um we may assist them with um if they have housing issues, we could um refer them to housing programs that we have or other housing programs in the community.

Um it could look um like food and nutrition services. So we could refer them to SNAP. So we provide those services. Um if we feel at the time that we cannot

keep the children safe in the home, then we do work with our legal team um sitting right here, two of them. And there's two more, Ashley and uh Keith. Um and we work to with them to file a court petition. Um then if that if the judge accepts it and makes that ruling, we then implement any court orders that the judge gives.

So the judge is the one that gives the court orders. So those court orders could look like um ensuring that one of the parents has behavioral health services or goes to substance abuse or um works with domestic violence advocates. Um we do make recommendations but we do not have the legal authority to make legal decisions. So any type of visitation is court-ordered.

We cannot um we we have to comply with court orders. So we are not able to make up visitation. We can't change visitation. That has to come from the judge.

So the judge orders that if it's supervised or unsupervised. >> Any questions so far? >> Commissioner Burton? Yeah. I just missed

the part where you said 651 some it was a number you gave out. Yeah. >> Yes. So in November we had a,69 phone calls into our abuse hotline for one month.

Um we had to accept 651 of those. So we do not accept every one because we have to go through we have a new state system now. It's called pathnc. Um which um all the counties are in this system now for intake.

Eventually they're going to roll it out so that foster care, CPS, everyone's in it, but right now it is just intake and CPS. Um, and so there's um certain criteria that we have to look at when we get a call in and then we assess that and decide if it's something that we have to take um and investigate. >> Last question. And you're saying this is state and federal law that you have to go by?

>> Yes. >> In order to do this process. State and federal law. Okay.

Yes. Thank you. >> Yes. Anything you guys want question and it may sound like a silly question but

wondering so >> to Commissioner Burton's point. So state and federal law say there's calls that come in that DSS a county any county decided we don't want to they make their own judgment based off of like separate from federal and state law. What would then happen from state and federal authorities? Uh we would the state and federal authorities could come in um and we could get um an audit and if they found that um we were doing that a lot um and putting children in danger we could have them come in and take over the DSS >> and then if the state and feds took over then it would like no longer be a county function that it's then >> correct then it is >> run.

>> Yeah. It's well it would be state run not federal. Yeah. But yeah it would be state run.

That's happened in a few counties recently. So yes, we must comply with with that law. >> Oh yes, commissioner. >> Um in related to the process,

so with over you said 1,069 calls coming in and which month was this? >> November. >> Okay. November.

So just most recently, >> we're a month behind with our data. So >> Okay. Um and then only out of that over about 600, you said 651 were accepted. >> Yes.

So over 400 were not >> correct. >> Could you discuss a little bit more about the process for evaluating um and what is the um screening tool that you uh staff uses and is that tool something that is a state tool? Is it a federal tool? Um what is what does that look like?

>> I'll have Carol talk to that because that's her department. Happy to. Good morning. So [clears throat] with um and Maggie shared this with the shift from our previous tool which was lovingly referred to as the 1402. it was the the tool number. Um we've shifted to pathnc

which is a statewide um system and so the tool that we previously used is a little bit different. Um it is now more streamlined. Um and it helps essentially to determine like if you say this is physical abuse then the response time to physical abuse can only ever be immediate or 24 hours. It may never be a 72.

So it helps to streamline and be more consistent. The goal with um all 100 counties in North Carolina going into this system is consistency. Um the state found that there were some discrepancies in different counties with the way that folks were screening. So um we have seen that it has tended towards that way which has been wonderful.

We we are very very glad to see that. Um so as far as the actual tool itself, it's less um like it used to be a number of questions, right? So, it used to be about 14 pages. Um, and now it is more of a clickth through system. So, you answer a

certain question and then it'll take you to another one. Um, it still does rely on the intake social workers to be the ones to ask some follow-up questions to make sure and determine that they have the correct information needed in order to screen. And so um to speak to I think it was another point over here earlier the policy that we use is all based in statute right so the the statutes that we adhere to are things that the state has mandated for all of us in the entire state to to follow. So, um, what else is there?

Anything else that I missed in that I want to make sure. >> And this, so you said this screening process is done with the person that reported it is >> the abuse and neglect. Okay. >> Yes.

So, we do spend it would be usually 45 minutes to an hour, sometimes longer, um, with the person who's making the report so that we can make sure and gather as much information as possible, um, and be pretty comprehensive in and being able to answer all the information. >> Okay. And does the state also come in

and audit this process to make sure that we're actually following it? >> Yeah. Okay. >> Yes, they do.

>> Okay. Thank [clears throat] you. >> You're welcome. >> As it relates to the calls, um maybe not for right now, but is that is it are we able to do this aggregated data is like who who's actually calling?

Is it community versus schools versus hospitals? Do you all have that that information? So that's another um pro to pathnc actually is that previously we would have had to kind of do that by hand. Um but now the way that the system is designed you can determine who like what it gives different categories of a type of reporter.

Um and so in order to we we could we could break it down that way. Yes. Um that's new as of November. So we are still working on getting that data.

Um but we look forward to being able to do that more. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Okay.

Oh yes. >> Yes. Good morning. >> Good morning. [snorts] >> So you've sort of laid out the the

process. M maybe you can uh tell us from phone calls through assessment treatment and then court involvement. What does that look like from a timing perspective? How how long does that generally take?

>> So um state policy is to try to do that within 45 days um from the beginning of the phone call to the end of the investigation. Um some things um will hold that up which is um medical examiner reports and things like that. If the if it was physical abuse we have to get um an assessment done by the hospital. So that sometimes can take a little bit longer but the goal is within 45 days >> and in your your presentation it says that DSS makes recommendations but does not make legal decisions.

>> That is correct. And so once that legal decision is made, what is the time that our children in the county are spending in the system? What's that look like?

>> Unfortunately, I will be honest with you, I feel it is way too long. Um, and I've been, you know, very vocal about that. Um, unfortunately, that is not um something that we control. That is up to the court system.

um in ways that we can control, it's making sure that we're working with the family and providing timely services. Um but um it can be two two years or more sometimes. Um and that is very unfortunate. I have been um very transparent that the child welfare system in this country is broken.

That that's that's a fact. Um it is not just broken here. It is broken throughout the country. Um and so it is something that um I continue to work on.

I worked on it in Florida. We continue to work on it here to make sure that we are doing everything we can to fix the system and to address the challenges in Durham. But we are not the only ones who have a part in this. This is it takes a community to raise a child. It takes a community to

support a family. So when you have calls coming in, so when you have co right now we have a financial crisis in this country. So I'm just going to give you an example. Uh we had a parent who um you we have parents who are working three jobs and are taking their kids um with them um on Uber drives and things like that.

people call in and that that's not something necessarily that we're going to take, but people call in for that um because they feel that that's that's not safe. So, you have a lot of parents right now struggling and so we do need the community to help us. We can't provide all of the prevention services and the things needed. Our funding is very restricted.

That's why Margaret's here today as well to talk about that if there's any questions. There's we are very mandated with what we can do with our funding. we can't just give our funding to certain uh things. We have to it's very much in line with federal law. So, um yes, it

can take some time and it is unfortunate and I do I hope that our current court system gets better at that um with timeliness and our legal team can talk about that as well. It's very rare that the continuites in court are due to DSS. Correct. It's and they can shed light on that during their presentation, but it's very rare that it is us that is asking for a continuence.

>> All right. So, I'm going to put this out there. The disruptions, we're not going to have those. Okay.

The s the size, the comments while we're doing presentations, not going to happen. All right. I I'm not I'm not accepting comments. All right?

So, just if you're interrupting, we're going to go into recess and you're going to be removed. I already said I said that at the top of the meeting. Here we go. All right. Please continue. >> Thank you.

>> So, the role of the district court um and Patrick and just will talk more about this as well. Um again, we do not make the final legal decisions. That is the judge. Um we they determine abuse, neglect or dependency.

Um not us. um they decide the custody and placement. So again, anytime that we go to move a child with placement or custody that has to be um approved by the judge um issues binding with court orders um and the role of the district court is to ensure due process. So um the GL the guardian medit involved in this as well um as well as us and then the legal teams and the families.

Uh the role of the board of county commissioners in North Carolina um since it is a county administered system um that is to approve and allocate the budget. So every year you get our budget um ensure that we have adequate staffing and infrastructure. Um I have recclassed several positions since I've gotten here. Um I started in April 2023 and um

in that time we've added um a coaching and mentoring position. Um this is a new thing that we're doing where this person will go out in the field with our workers to make sure that we are complying in real time with policy um and to ensure that they have the support that they need in the field. Um we have created a fatherhood initiative because when I as I said that there are challenges in the system. One of the challenges we have found throughout the country is engagement of fathers.

Um and we need to do a better job of that. So we have created that initiative last year. Also due to the um co really um impacted the behavioral health system. And so unfortunately there's a long wait list which can add to what commissioner Valentine was stating is the time that a child is in care. If a parent is court-ordered by the judge to engage in services, substance abuse and mental health, unfortunately, a lot of times we're looking at several months of a wait list. So, when I first got here, I met with Rashana Parker, the director of

the Justice Resource Center, because she had said that her numbers for um treatment were down. And I asked if we would be able to use her services, it was free of charge, um they're already paid for, um to send parents to get those assessments. and she agreed we did anou and so we're able to send our families quickly quicker um than we can to outside agencies to get those assessments again they're court ordered so the judge will not move the case forward unless those are done so that was a partnership we did to try to navigate around these long wait lists um so we also created a parenting position a lot of times most judges are ordering parenting um programs for parents and again that can be a very long wait list um or it can be teleaalth which is not really the best way to do behavioral health services in my opinion. Um and so we have created that position internally so that we can help with that and again decrease the time that parents are waiting for services.

>> Oh yes. So I want to be clear about the role of the county commission. All right. And this is one of the reasons why um I asked for this presentation to fully understand our role because if we are being asked to solve a problem I want to know exactly what is our role in solving a problem.

>> So when you say governance and funding by us allocating the funding the local funding because you have federal and state funding that goes to DSS correct >> and having a DSS board. Is that state law that you have to have a DSS board or >> Yes. >> Okay. So, and then us having you your staff asking you questions, making things sure that things are flowing right.

So, I want to make that clear. >> Yes. >> That's what our role is as a commission. >> Yes, it is. It's not to um look at specific individual cases, but to look

at systemically. So, for instance, um I've talked to the county manager about this. Um with PATHNC, um a lot of counties are seeing increases in um their inhome services um inh home or foster care. So, when um we get a case, we either close it if we don't find any issues or we may refer the family to inhome services um or foster care.

And so those numbers um have increased a little bit. Each um area in the state is going into PATHNC at separate times. So there's been some counties that have been in PATNC longer than we have. We just got in in OC November.

So some of the counties that have been in previously have seen those numbers climb due to PATHNC um and the new policies put in place. So, I've let um the county manager know that if our in-home numbers continue to increase, we may need more staff. Um and so that is where your role would come in. I would come to you and ask for that because what you there's a

certain limit. Uh you can only have certain number of cases um in inhome and you never want inhome to have the the most cases. You want because they're very complicated cases. So, you want you know the families to get the best services that they can.

So those are things where I would come to that that's your role as the board of county commissioners but in individual cases it is it is not. Thank you. So how the roles work um again we assess risk um and deliver those services. Um we have to comply with the legal decisions such as visitation and and ensuring that the parents are receiving those services.

Um and making sure that um the barriers to those are reduced which is as I said why we created some of these different positions to help with that. Um and then the board of county commissioner ensures uh system capacity and compliance. So the key takeaways is that the child welfare outcomes depend on governance

and funding and system capacity. Um clearly we cannot do our job if we don't have the staff suffic if we're not staffed sufficiently to do that or if we do not have the funding um to provide that for the families. Um and the board of county commissioner decisions are essential to protecting our children and supporting families. Again, as I said, um this is a community effort.

This is not the sole responsibility of DSS. We're a mandated program. Um we have to exist legally. Um it's not something that we can um do away with.

Um and so we need everyone at the table to help us with this. And I do want to say since um coming into this position um in 2023, we have decreased kids in care by 35%. When I got here, we had 270 children in care. As of today, we have 176 children in care. Um we have also increased um our reunification by 36% since I've come in here in the

past. Uh it'll be three years in April. So again as I said child welfare it's a legal mandate. Um the outcomes depend on um the funding and the system design. Um we have recently um did some restructuring to ensure that we have laser focus on inhome services and um CPS investigations because of pathn. So we have split the department and we'll have two assistant directors who can um make sure that they are laser focused on those programs because those are our biggest programs is CPS investigations and inhome services and I think I've I've said this too um just you know the responsibilities is to ensure funding organizational structure um what is not the board of county commissioners responsibility is individual case decisions, directing

court outcomes or overriding judicial orders. And again, we operate under state and federal law. Um and um the district court has the the exclusive legal authority once a petition is filed. Um juvenile matters are confidential and so DSS is prohibited from discussing case- specific matters absent a court order for disclosure.

So, I'm not able to in public talk about a case. There are times we've had um closed board sess closed board meetings where if my board members um ask for specific details, I provide those. Um and again, um some of the risks that I, you know, I appreciate Commissioner Valentine, he's met with me and the district judge a few times, um because I do have concerns about the delays in the court proceedings. Um kids should not be out of care that long. they should reach permanency much quicker and that is something that we need to continue to work on as a county and as a state and

as a country um throughout the system. It is like I said this is a countrywide issue where kids are out of per are not in permanency um as quickly as they should be and then I put in the key statutory authorities for all of this. So effective oversight of what that looks like is to help us review and perform um reviewing performance and trend data. That's something that's another role Commissioner Burton for you all as board of county commissioners is to ensure that um we are trending in the right direction.

And if we're not, why is that? Um to support qualified leadership, invest in prevention and family support services. Again, the prevention services are key and we're limited to how much of that we can do with our funding. So, it does help if we can bring in more prevention um into this county to ensure that families don't get those calls. Like I said, the calls are coming in sometimes because people think a child should not be in

the car when mom's having to Uber, but unfortunately, mom does not have the ability to pay for daycare as [snorts] well as to make sure she has um food on the table and pays her rent. So anytime that we can increase prevention services in the county, it's vital to our families and that will decrease calls coming in and those are just the statutory. Any questions? wondering and I know that um there's probably federal and state guidelines around that, but wondering in those instances where it's you know a parent who is having to take their child to work or anything else similar to that where it's like it's not that the child is being put in any sort of dangerous situation.

It's just the circumstances that the heart team could play a role or be integrated into that system to provide support to the families. Yes, we do we do refer to those services and others and in in that case um we are seeing more calls like that come in but that is not a case that we would take. I

mean as long as a child is safe that is not something but it's just an idea of the kinds of calls that we get because families are hurting and we're seeing that. Um but we try to make sure that um you know we educate the public as long as a child is safe we do not then take that or accept that case. >> And is there any way and I know I'm sure this hasn't happened yet of like and since it is a 247 so obviously wouldn't be able to be 247 service but the way that heart is integrated into the 911 system of like if there is like during the hours that heart functions that there is a heart person who's part of this hotline number that can immediately be referred and like sent to this family so there's not a waiting period before that family's able to get any sort of like support. >> That is something I can discuss with heart.

Absolutely. If they have the capacity, um, we can definitely meet with them. I've Yeah, we meet with I meet with them regularly. So, I can definitely look into that.

Anything that you want to add? What I do want to [clears throat] add specifically um the state prohibit us from referring families in the stage of um when we're accepting or not accepting reports because of confidentiality and they have not given us the permission to send their information anywhere else. We cannot refer them in that process. Once we're involved of course we can do that but prior to that we're unable to do that.

So, but if like it's decided that okay, in these instances where it's like DSS is not going to take this case and so you decline it, you would you then be able to pass it on or no? Since you're not handling the case, you can't. >> We're not since we did not accept the report, we're no longer involved with that family at all. So, we don't have that permission to send or refer their send their information elsewhere.

I believe a while a couple of years ago, we used to reports that we would get screen outs. would send them to prevention and for them to link for services. However, the state came in and said, "No, that is that is going against family's rights and for us not to do

" >> And which department at the state would that be under of like I'm just thinking of like legislatively for us as like commissioners when we talk to our legislators about like the things the pri issues we have for lobbying for change. Uh good morning and um I just want to make sure that the the understanding is I may be the reporter >> reporting on Carol but Carol doesn't know I'm reporting on her. That's where the challenge is. >> Correct.

>> Because I then we cannot give out information on Carol at that point. >> Correct. >> Got it. What what often happens though in in a scenario as you mentioned if we're getting the phone call from law enforcement um it is it is permitted for us to say have you reached out to Hart right like we could ask those kinds of questions and the intake person on the phone on our end often times will say Hart's we we

love partnering with heart they are wonderful they are such a such a great resource for our community and so that is oftentimes one that we will kind of have that conversation and just say regardless of our outcome, is this something that you guys have considered um to kind of point them in that direction as well? So, >> okay, that's helpful. Yeah, because I'm asking more. So, like um because I'm glad that you guys obviously don't take those type of cases, but then wondering also like those are obviously still families that I we would want to support in one way or another.

So, how do we get resources and support to them without them entering into that system? >> Right. >> Yeah. >> Yes.

Um, the question I have, I'm looking at your will. Thank you for the what effective oversight looks like. Um, the question I have is what, and I hope this is a system level question. What are families being referred for in child protective services? Is it neglect

mostly? What is it? >> Yeah, great question. So um I wish I had the data in front of me to share but we do have that data.

Um so it is primarily neglect. There are abuse cases as well but it is primarily neglect. Um the types of neglect then are broken down a little bit more from there. Right?

So um there are there's physical neglect, there's um educational neglect, there's I mean there's a number of different kinds. Medical neglect. Um now now I'm going to come up with all of them. I'm going to try physical, educational, medical.

What else am I missing? That's true. Like, yeah, food insecurity, like that kind of um >> Yeah, that I think that would be primarily those are the biggest ones. Yeah, because understanding that at our level, making sure that we are providing these prevention services to make sure our families have what they need to make sure this doesn't happen, right? If

it's, you know, medical neglect, okay, is it an issue with affording medication, right? If it's educational neglect, figuring out ways how do we get our kids to school? All right. And they, you know, are successful.

If it's housing, if it's something like that, I think those are the things that one of the things that I'm learning in this role, I have to we have to focus on what we can focus on, right? Because if it's clear that this is a complex problem, it's very complex. You got the federal, you got the state, you have these laws, you have to follow them. And for us to combat this problem at that this level, we have to figure out what do we focus on?

What is our role and make sure we do it to the best of our ability, right? Because I believe everyone on this board wants families unified. What do we do to make sure that happens? Do we have conversations with the judicial system,

the judges, figuring out what are the issues, things like that? So that will help if if we know okay what is the levels of neglect and then we can figure it out at this level. So um and this is why I wanted this presentation. >> If a citizen comes to you with an issue >> please gather yourself I'm leaving. Don't you worry I'm leaving. Please you the board with an issue about DSS is a matter that should be recess and it is a threeprong situation.

session >> and so we can provide that broken down. Um we will send that to you all later today about um can we get that today? Okay. Um the other thing that we are seeing more of um increase um in the past year is we're seeing more parents come to us and ask us ask us to take their children um because of behavioral health most it is um conduct and behavioral health issues.

So we are seeing an increase in that um and that's where then that falls under dependency. So it can be neglect, abuse or dependency. Um and that is concerning to me. um we can't we can't fix the child and we we literally get asked that.

Um and we can't do that. We can send this child to services, but we are seeing an increase of that um I believe throughout the state, but definitely I've noticed our numbers with that in Durham County going up. >> Okay. Uh Commissioner Jacobs.

>> Thank you. Um well, first of all, I just want to thank all of you for being here. I know we haven't heard the second part of the presentation yet just on the court side and the um legal side but um I just [clears throat] first of all want to thank you Maggie for your leadership um I know from being on the DSS board for 12 years um that I had I want to recognize all the changes that you have been putting into place and to also thank all the staff because you're the ones who do the work. Um, but I have seen you invest in the staff and professional development.

I'm not sure if you mentioned that, but the >> No, I was Yeah, I was going to get to that, too. >> Um, maybe you could talk a little bit about that also. Um, things you mentioned some of them, but the ways that you are trying to address the systemic issues. Um, and I think the data that you shared with us shows the progress that's been made. if you could

um send us some of that that data around the changes around foster care and around the time to get people into services. Um and also the red um the change in um the data around um reunific reunification uh accepting um children into um services and also just all of the relevant data and the changes that we're seeing. But I am really concerned about systemic issues because of the what we're seeing with the federal government and the reduction in the safety net program. So what's really alarming is hearing you talk about parents coming and and saying take my children or you know look I've seen children on the side of the road with their parents who are uh who are you know begging um and you know that comes to mind you know home

families who are unhoused um so you know just wondering with reduction in SNAP Medicaid the inhome health uh the leap that program. And now we just heard that child care funding is federal. What's the status of the child care um subsidy program? Because that was frozen over the last week.

Um so, you know, again, there so much of this is related to poverty and economic issues and the stress on families. And so, um, to Commissioner Burton's point, I think we need to get ahead of this issue as best we can, um, because we are going to see if the safety net is food security, um, being threatened, then we're going to see see the people more calls coming in to you all. I I think it's really important to say that DSS

does not go out looking for these cases. people are calling DSS. >> Yes. >> And um >> so and and then that starts the whole process that we are required to follow by this by state and federal law. um related to could you talk a little bit more also about what is the definition of abuse and neglect and it would be great to get the data related to out of you know how many calls we get per month and then what is the percentage that actually goes ends up in the court system the numbers or the percentage because it is important to see that it is a very small percentage of that but also to understand what are the different categories of and what is the definition of abuse and neglect. Um and then related to prevention services, if you could talk a little bit more about [snorts] what we are providing and what

are the needs that you could see that you maybe we as a community could try to focus on and the board can take a role in trying to increase funding or bring PE partners together, community, nonprofits to help with the prevention and support services. Um, and then the last thing that really caught my attention was you talking about how the new path and C is actually leading to more cases and then again um actually more families coming into the system. Why why is that? And then I know there have been some very big cases.

Um there have been in the news certain counties that the state is coming in and taking over like Nash County possibly. I think there was another county like what what has happened in those counties that the state is coming in. >> Um I [clears throat] can't I it's uh Vance and uh Birdie I believe and they

did do Nash as well um in the past couple of years. I do not know why. I'm guessing uh that they found um issues with the way that they were adhering to policy um and practice, but um their reports haven't come out for those counties yet, but it would be because the county was not complying, for instance, um not accepting certain cases or accepting ones they shouldn't or not following policy um in ensuring that kids are safe. That would be when a state would come in.

But as far as the specific reasons for each county, I I don't know yet. What I can say for prevention services is again um we are seeing the behavioral health system um is being depleted. Um and we saw with Medicaid cuts um that the governor did um last year even though he reversed them, a lot of providers um shut their doors. Um and so that is a huge concern here because we the majority of our cases um do require the

judge does require um behavioral health services and so when we can't get our families into them that you know stops it it has the clock keep running and we can't do anything. We you know um the if the judge orders it it has to be done and we need to find those services um and so for children and um the parents. So that's one of our biggest issues I think um in the child welfare system period is behavioral health. Um COVID impacted it and now we continue to see that and if more close their doors, you're going to have your wait list be longer and longer. So anytime that you all could work with um community providers to increase behavioral health services in this county, that would be um very much appreciated, especially ones that do evidence-based um programming like homebuilders and things like that. And your other questions I want >> I just what is the definition of abuse and neglect?

>> I want to get it to you correctly. >> Commissioner Jacobs. Um >> you might be back. So, um, the definitions for abuse and neglect and dependency are located in chapter 7B 101, um, statute 7B 101.

Abuse is generally defined, and I I don't remember the entirety because there's about seven subsections, but abuse is if physical or serious emotional injury that has occurred to the child by other than accidental means um, for the most part. And then there's um you know certain sex offenses and um things like that are generally qualified under abuse. Neglect is a lack of proper care and supervision by a parent or caretaker. Uh improper discipline, an unsafe environment, abandonment, um as well as emotional neglect, educational neglect, um and medical neglect. Um I may be missing one or two

of them. Um, I always have the statute in front of me when I'm uh in front of the court, but I do not have it in front of me right now. But it is located chapter 7B uh section or statute number 101. Uh 1011 is abuse, 1015 is neglect, and I believe 1014 is dependency.

Um, but we'll make sure that you get that and we'll we'll send that your way. >> Thank you. And just related to what um Maggie just said about behavioral health, I think it would be great if we could get maybe get a followup on that, Joanne, maybe with having Alliance come and anyone else involved to give us uh a presentation on what are the current services and we're what is currently available for children and youth and families and what are the options. to what are possibilities for us to try to um provide more support. Thank you.

>> Okay, there's a second part of this, right? There's a >> Yes, >> there's another part. Let's move Let's move forward. >> Okay.

>> Good morning. Um my name is Patrick Cuchett. I'm a senior assistant county attorney. Um seated next to me is Justinta Jones, senior assistant county attorney.

And then other members of the child welfare team are uh Keith Robertson uh senior assistant county attorney and Ashley Edwards Davis who is an assistant county attorney. Um all four of us are assigned to child welfare cases um in Durham County. Um before we begin our presentation, we did want to go back um to Commissioner Valentine's question about the timelines. I wanted to clarify that a little bit more um and give a little bit more broader of a timeline. So when a case is accepted, when we receive a referral, um generally we initiate that within 72 hours, 24 hours if it's a potentially abuse and emergency situations have to be um addressed within two hours. After

they've been initiated, there's a 45day period where the assessment or investigation occurs. At the end of that 45 days, child protective services makes a determination. Sometimes that's extended if we're waiting on evaluations or um other information. That is where the child protective services decides whether or not the case has been substantiated for abuse or neglect or dependency or unsubstantiated.

Um and then at that time if it's unsubstantiated the case is closed and there's no further DSS involvement. If it is substantiated there are a couple routes. they can substantiate it and make referrals for services and they transition it to what is called inhome services. Now inhome services can last six months, seven months where the social workers are going to the home um at least once a month but generally every two weeks or so to work with the family.

They're referring them to services. They're referring them to the heart team. They're referring them to um SNAP services, um behavioral health

services, um any substance abuse services, housing um referrals. They the social worker team is then meeting with them regularly referring them to services. Um during that time there is no court involvement. Um this is mainly the department working with the family.

The children are either in the home or they may be with a family member um or a temporary safety provider. If you ever see the acronym TSP, that is a temporary safety provider which has been identified by the family and an agreement has been made that that the child or children will be placed with that family while those services are put in place. Now during that time the uh social workers are still evaluating you know the reasons why the children were referred for services and the family were referred to services um and evaluating safety concerns. Now, at any time during those periods, they may come and talk to us at the legal team to decide to go see the to potentially either file a petition to

bring us before the court or just get general legal advice. So, in extreme cases, we may end up filing a petition within, you know, 24 48 hours. Um if there's an emergency situation, you know, uh such as the children are being severely abused or uh if a child is left at the department or if there are no parents around, we may file, but we are mandated by the Family First Protension uh protect uh preventative services act to work with the family before we even remotely try and enter a court involvement unless there's some sort of circumstance that requires immediate court intervention. But DSS is required to work with the family.

Um, so gener there may be cases where DSS has been working with the family for seven, eight months before we even try and petition the court for any type of involvement. Um, but just on the on the flip side, we may get a referral and then within 24 hours we're filing a petition. Um, but as you

can see from the number of calls in November alone, we received over a thousand. There's only there's less than 150 children or there's 170 children in care. Sorry. There's 170 children in care.

That's not families, that's children. So you think a thousand calls is about average per month for DSS. So they're getting upwards of 10,000 calls a month. There's 174 children in care.

So I mean just from that math alone, it it is a lower amount of the court involvement. Um, not every case remotely even comes close to seeing a courtroom. Um, but I did want to expand on those timelines for you before we begin our presentation. >> Thank you, Patrick.

And good morning again. My name is Justinta Jones. And so, as we go through our um presentation today, we're going to start with three C's of A and D court, which is just some important concepts to remember as we go through this information. We'll also talk about the key players that are involved in um abuse, neglect,

dependency court. So you may hear me say A and D um to cut down on that time frame as well as the stages uh which Patrick has very eloquently um started that conversation of that summary. And then finally some little known facts about department of social services and department of social services invol involvement. So three C's of A and D court to consider are council for all the court makes the final decision and confidentiality as relates to council for all because um the possible removal of children from their biological or adoptive parents um affects constitutional rights.

Parents have the right to courtappointed counsel if they are unable to afford counsel for themselves. So similarly as they would in um criminal cases like felony cases or cases where they could be facing jail time, uh provisional appointment of courtappointed counsel will be provided. Upon the case coming into court, there

will be um paperwork filled out to determine whether or not the parent, guardian or custodian can afford their own attorney and if not that provisional counsel will remain appointed to the uh family member or relative. However, the um parties also have the right to wave counsel if they so choose or to hire independent counsel if they think they could be represented better by paying for their own counsel. Additionally, the juvenile has an attorney in most cases and we'll talk about that a little bit later. And of course, the Department of Social Services is also represented by attorneys.

Secondly, the court makes the final decision. There are sometimes where parents, guardians, all the parties in the case involving the juvenile's representative, the guardian at lightum may reach an agreement about certain facts and circumstances and a consent order can be entered if the judge accepts the findings within that consent order. However, if there is not an

agreement across the board from all parties, then the district court judge assigned to hear the case will make all decisions regarding that case after hearing evidence from all parties. Um, it is important also uh to note that the parties have the right to present evidence. That does not always mean that every party involved will choose to present their own evidence, but the judge will make their decision based on evidence that is heard or reviewed at each stage of the case. And finally, we do want to talk about confidentiality.

As Maggie and Bea stated previously, um the Department of Social Services is prohibited by federal and state law from disclosing case specific information absent a court order. That is often why sometimes relatives will call to follow up on cases and cannot receive information from the social worker. Um sometimes um the department of social services may not be able to obtain information because the parents have not

signed releases from service providers. But the department of social services specifically is prohibited from sharing information if they are not presented with a valid court order allowing disclosure of information to certain parties. This includes statements to nonparties in the case. This can also include statements to the media.

It can also include organizations or even like we are here our board of uh county commissioners if there are questions about a very fa specific case. That's why a lot of the information that Maggie's been able to provide today has been more high level rather getting down into the weeds because of confidentiality laws. And so we want to talk briefly about who the key parties in the A&D case are. So we have the parents, guardians, custodians, and caretakers. Of course, a parent would be someone who is the biological parent of a child. It could also be um what we would consider a puditive father who is a man who has held himself out to be the father of the

child. Um a man that the mother has mentioned may be the father of the child. Uh it could also be someone who's on the birth certificate or is not on the birth certificate. Uh this would also include adoptive parents if a report is received after an adoption is completed.

You additionally may have parties such as guardians or custodians who are not parents but may have rights to a child pursuant to a court order. And that is either through a guardianship order or through a custody order. And those things are just um determined by different statutes in North Carolina, custody versus guardianship. And finally, we also have caretakers who may be adults who reside in the home with the juvenile or adults who have a parental type uh level of responsibility for children who are not given that authority through a court order for guardianship custody or through an adoption decree. Then we also have, of course, the Department of

Social Services and its social workers. In any abuse, neglect, and dependency case that's filed in North Carolina, the Department of Social Services is always the petitioner. So, the burden is on the Department of Social Services to um prove their case. And so, normally you have the social worker who has been working with the family, who's been receiving evidence, who would be the party that the court looks at to provide information on behalf of the department.

You also have the juvenile. So in abuse and neglect cases, the juvenile will be represented. In dependency, it can be discretionary with the judge. However, when we talk about juveniles for A and D court, we are talking about juveniles who are under the age of 18 at the time that a petition is filed or at the time that a report is received.

Sometimes children age out of custody and it does not necessarily mean that the department stops having involvement with them. it just would um not be as it relates to a normal abuse, neglect, and dependency case. Additionally, we have the North

Carolina guardian elitum program because the juveniles are under the age of 18 that creates a type of legal incompetency requiring that the juvenile be represented. The juvenile pro the guardian at lightam program has juvenile attorney advocates who are assigned to represent the interest of the juvenile. It's important to note that in North Carolina a guardian light item volunteer is the one who normally meets with the child and they provide information and reports for two things. One to address the stated desires of the juvenile and two to also provide information as to what the guardian at lightam thinks is in the best interest of the juvenile.

In some states, if the stated interest of the juvenile conflicts with what the garden at lightenum volunteer sees to be the best interest of the juvenile, it splits off and you have two guardian at items that are assigned at that point. North Carolina is not one of those states. So, a lot of times in the garden

at lightm reports that are received by the court, there is a separate portion for what the juvenile has asked for specifically and then an explanation of what the volunteer is recommending. Sometimes it is the same and sometimes it is different. Also, as it relates to the juvenile in North Carolina, once the juvenile reaches the age of 12, they have the right to ask to participate in their proceedings um to speak to the judge, things of that nature. Children under the age of 12 can still participate in hearings, but it requires more involvement from the rest of the parties.

Finally, we do have our district court judge. Um, abuse, neglect, dependency court is in the exclusive jurisdiction of the district court. Um, cases if they are appealed go directly to the court of appeals. They do not go to superior court first.

So, the district court judge is the ultimate finder of fact in our cases. We do not have jury trials. So, the judge makes all decisions unless there is a consent

as we discussed in the beginning. Then you have the attorneys for the department of social services. Any parent, guardian, custodian or caretaker and then the attorney for the juvenile. We also have another type of guardian at lightum attorney that is known as a rule 17 guardian at lightum.

A rule 17 guardian at lightum is appointed uh generally under two circumstances. One is if you have a parent of a juvenile who is a juvenile themselves. So for example, if you have a 15-year-old mother of a small infant, the mother will have a rule 17 guardian at lidum to assist her in handling her case because she has not reached the age of adulthood. Also, parents can have a rule 17 guardian at lidum appointed for them to assist in litigation if the court after hearing evidence determines that they lack the capacity to be able to um

assist in their own litigation. So, it is not just because a parent may have been found to be incompetent. It's more about whether or not they have the understanding to be able to adequately direct their attorney to help them to try their cases. So in a case that a rule 17 guardian is appointed, the parent may have their courtappointed counsel and then the rule 17 guardian.

The courtappointed counsel will look to the rule 17 guardian for decisions to be made about how to try the case if that rule 17 guardian is appointed. And also in North Carolina, placement providers also have the ability to appear in court and they have the ability to provide evidence to the court. A placement provider can be a foster parent. It can also be a relative that has placement of the juveniles and it can also be someone that we refer to as non relative kin, which of course means you're not related by blood, marriage or adoption, but you do have some other relationship to this child.

that could be a favorite teacher, a coach, the parent of a friend who has agreed to have placement of the child while the case is going forward. Go ahead. >> Um [clears throat] so going back to um the attorneys for the parents as well, I did want to point out that they are appointed immediately upon the filing of the petition. So, when a petition is filed, um the clerk contacts in in Durham County, uh which is one of the few counties in the state, the public defender's office actually handles appointments, um for parents.

Most counties throughout the state, it is a private citizen of the bar, or private bar member normally of the people who practice in family law. In Durham County, there are two public defenders that are um the heads of appointing counsel and handle cases. Um that is a unique uh Durham County. I believe there's only a handful of counties in North Carolina where the public defenders off actually has state funding

for solely abuse, neglect, and dependency attorneys. Um and then along with those two parent defenders, there are members of the private bar that also handle appointed cases. um and they are notified um shortly after the filing of the petition which parent they'll be representing and they are present at the first hearing and they are appointed until the court decides or the parent decides that um appointment is no longer appropriate in Durham County. 95% of cases have courtappointed counsel.

Um and I think that's even a low estimate. I it probably it's probably closer to 97 to 98%. Um the ones that don't have court-appointed counsel have either hired their own attorneys or have waved their right to counsel and want to uh represent themselves. Um but the vast vast majority um have courtappointed counsel and it comes through the parent uh the parents uh the public defenders office. >> Thank you. And I would also like to appoint um point out as Patrick

mentioned that the courtappointed council comes once a petition is filed. So the parents do not have a right to courtappointed counsel before the court gets jurisdiction over the case through the filing of a petition. Now we'll go into the stages of an abuse neglect and dependency case starts with our initial report into investigation and case decision. then followed by um in home services conversation the petition and non-secure custody adjudication and disposition permanency planning and review hearings and then um in some cases termination parental rights and adoption. So for initial report as Maggie and as Patrick have um shared previously the department of social services receives a report that alleges that a juvenile has been abused or neglected or dependent. When the Department of Social Services receives that report, the um intake worker must determine whether or not the

information provided in the report meets the legal definition of abuse or neglect or dependency. They also must determine if the party associated in that case would meet the legal definition of a parent, a guardian, a custodian, or a caretaker. So that's two ways that a case could be um decided that we will not move forward on it because if what has been described, for example, the example that we have used this morning has been a parent has her children in the car as they are going on Uber Eats deliveries. If that does not meet the legal definition of neglect and there's no other information provided in that report that meets a legal definition of abuse, neglect or dependency, it will be screened out. Uh secondly, if it is determined that the person who has the children in the car is not a parent, guardian, custodian or caretaker, then that case would also be screened out and then there would be no

further involvement with the department of social services. However, if it is found that you have a parent, guardian, custodian or caretaker involved and it meets the definition of abuse, neglect or dependency, then at that point an investigation will begin under the circumstances that were described and the timelines that were described by Patrick of the 72 hours, 24 hours, 2 hours depending on what the allegation is. Um, as previously described, an investigation normally lasts approximately 45 days before the department goes into making ultimate case decisions about what will happen next. Those time frames can be extended if you are still awaiting reports, still awaiting information and under certain extenduating circumstances. During the time of the investigation, the children can either remain in the home of the parents or they can go into the temporary safety placements, the TSPs as Patrick mentioned. So during these cases, the children may be in the

home, they may be with grandma, they may be with a relative or in a friend's home while things are being figured out with the Department of Social Services. At this time, the child is not in foster care yet because there is no court in intervention. Then the case decisions that you have are either unsubstantiated where we find that there's nothing to be done here, case closes or it is substantiated and then there will be recommendations of services that need to be um done for the family and then we move into the uh possibility of the inhome services transfer. So during the inhome services portion which can last generally to six to seven months as Patrick stated outside of extenduating circumstances DSS works with the family to refer them to services to check in on other things to correct the issues that arose from the specific investigation. So if it is an issue where we think there's issues of substance abuse, you're making referrals

to services, making sure parents are receiving the treatment they receive. If the children need treatment or need other services, you're following the family to see if those things can be taken care of such that the case can be closed. During in-home services, the children can physically be literally in the parents home or guardian custodian caretaker or they can be in the temporary safety placement while the parties are working on their plans. Again, they are not in a foster home at this point because there has been no court intervention.

However, as Patrick stated, when you have emergency situations that require the children to be removed immediately, then you may have a case that did not go into inhome services prior to removal. Are there any questions? All right. Next, you get to the petition and non-secure custody. The petition is where the court case begins. At that point, once a petition is filed, we have

the social workers who have staffed the cases with the attorneys. The decision has been made to move forward on filing a petition. Social workers signed the petition. Um, attorneys are assigned to the parties upon the filing of the petition.

And at that time the department alleges that the juvenile has been abused, neglected or dependent and is in need of court and state intervention based on state law and the results of their investigative and inhome service um phases. Again there may not be an inhome service case if it was an emergency situation. Generally there are two things that can occur when a petition is filed. A petition can just be filed where the department is saying, "We need the court to come in and order parents to participate in these services and we just want to work with the family while everybody is still in the home and everybody still has custody of the children. The other option is that the department can seek nonsecure custody, which means that the department would request that legal and physical custody

be removed from the parent or guardian or custodian and placed either with the department with a child being placed with a relative, being placed in a licensed foster home if there's no relative or non-relative kin available, or with non-relative kin. The department can also request that the children be placed in the temporary custody of a relative that they are staying with. So there's two things. There is the placement of the child and then there's who has custody of the child while the child is placed outside of the home.

Sometimes DSS says please give us custody so we can work on things. And then other times they say please place that temporary custody directly with the relative or non-relative kin who has that child. Yes, ma'am. >> I'm wondering what happens in cases where if there's no family or relative or kin within the state or city or county. >> Sure. So um there is the interstate uh compact for the placement of children

which is a a contract that all 50 states in the country have signed um that the court is bound by and even DSS is bound by um which requires a state um so whichever state they live in has to go and perform a home study, send a report to North Carolina that is provided to the judge to evaluate and then only after the judge has evaluated that report can the child be placed in that in that home outside the state. That process um for children under the age of three, there's an expedited process which it should come back in 60 to 90 days. Um for children over the age of three, um it generally takes about 6 months. Um so that is one of the that is one of the barriers. Um but it's it's a barrier that's actually federally regulated by that compact. Um but we cannot even if we are do not have court involvement um DSS cannot enter into enter into an agreement for placement

outside of the state. Um so let's say we want to enter into a temporary safety provider agreement. We cannot do that without an ICPC uh with the the home study by the other state even if there is no court involvement. And so is it the a judge in that other state or the judge in this state?

>> It is the judge that oversees this case here in Durham. So the report uh we send uh an application packet to Raleigh. Raleigh then sends it to the capital of the other state. That state completes the assessment, sends it back to Raleigh, gives it back to us, and then we present it to our judge here and they make the approval or denial.

Following the filing of the petition, you have the adjudication and the disposition. This is a two-part process and they are technically two separate hearings. Um, but sometimes they take place um on the same day. So, the first part is the adjudication. The adjudication is when the court

determines whether or not the allegations in the department's petition are true. Uh during that time you can have a consent if all the parties agree on a certain set of facts to say yes there's sufficient information to determine that this child is abused or neglected or dependent. If not then the department of social services presents its evidence first. Then the parents, guardians, custodians, caretakers present their evidence and the guardian at lightum can present evidence.

um after receiving all the evidence from all the parties then the court makes the ultimate decision. If the court finds that the allegations made by DSS are not proven then the petition is dismissed and the case ends. If the court finds that the allegations have been proven and the child is abused or neglected or dependent then the case moves forward to that second phase which is disposition. At disposition, all of the parties put

on additional evidence to uh determine what services need to be put in place, what needs to happen for the children to return home or for a permanent plan to be addressed. Um so here the adjudication is only about the effects that occurred prior to DSS filing its petition. However, at disposition, then the court hears evidence about everything that may have happened in the case since the petition was filed. So for example, if an allegation is that a parent needed to engage in mental health services at the time of the filing of the petition, then and they did engage in those services, then all of the information about their engagement in services would take place and would be heard at the dispositional phase, but not necessarily at the adjudicational phase. After the court receives all of their information and evidence from the parties, the court decides what services

are necessary. And the court is generally supposed to put in services that are nearly tailored to the needs of the family. They're also supposed to determine what amount of visitation parents or guardians custodians receive with the juvenile. Um what that frequency looks like, what the duration of the visits looks like, and whether or not those visits are supervised unsupervised.

And they also determine whether or not placement outside of the home is now necessary or remains necessary if the children have already been removed. Normally about 90 days after the disposition hearing, um excuse me, normally 30 to 90 days after disposition, the court then moves to either permanency planning or review hearings. Um, permanency planning hearings occur when the juvenile has been removed from their home. And at that time, the court looks at what

permanent plans are appropriate for the juvenile. There's multiple permanent plans that could be in place. Reunification, custody to a relative or a caretaker, guardianship to a relative or caretaker, adoption, another permanent planned living arrangement, which is a plan for older juveniles who do not appear as though they may be able to reach permanency before they reach the age of 18. And that's something where we monitor their placement outside of the home until they reach the age of 18.

So generally um the department is supposed to work a plan of reunification with parents with a concurrent plan unless there are factors that determine that working a plan of reunification is not in the best interest of the children. So you normally see two plans being worked together at the same time. That could be reunification and guardianship, reunification and adoption, things of that nature. At those permanency plan and review hearings, the court listens to information about the juvenile

status, the parent status and compliance with services. Um whether prospective guardians or custodians have been located, um visitation, placement updates, other things that are deemed relative either by state and federal law or that the judge themselves determines are relative relevant to that case. In review hearings, those hearings occur when the juvenile remains in the custody of their parent, guardian, custodian, or caretaker. Um, so it's just a two two-way plan.

Um, and when we say custody, it doesn't necessarily mean that they are in the home of the parent. It may still be a TSP, but the parent retains legal custody. So, both types of hearings do um require status updates on the children as well as the parents. Um, and there are also times where everybody has the ability to present evidence. The placement providers can also present evidence on how the child is doing as well. >> Any questions about these types of

hearings? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Excuse me. Could you um and maybe this is maybe you want to wait till the end, but I'd be interested in understanding I know um there's been discussion about the how long it takes once things get to the court system.

So maybe providing us follow-up information on what different timelines look like in Durham County. Um and also um could you highlight whenever you think it's appropriate what you see as the issues or the barriers that make the timeline longer than it should be? And the reason I'm asking this again is you know what are where where can we try to help with whether it's funding or whatever um or just getting people together to work together. And I want to

again applaud Maggie and thank you um also uh Commissioner Valentine. I was also working on that when I was on the DSS board. But what um what are where are some pre pin pressure points, pain points, things and and I know there's this involves a lot of different parties, but um that we could look at trying to move the process more quickly. So, >> let's wait till the end for that.

We're already super we're already past time here. So, >> let's wait till the end to try to quickly summarize that maybe and then we'll move on. Sure. >> Yes, sir.

Thank you. >> Finally, we have termination parental I'm sorry, we have termination parental rights and and adoption. So in cases where adoption becomes a permanent plan, a petition can be filed to terminate the legal rights of the parents to the juvenile. Um at those hearings, all parties present evidence and then the

judge determines whether or not the parents parental rights should be terminated. If the rights are terminated, then the court will continue to hold post-termination of parental rights review hearings, generally every six months until either the adoption is finalized or another permanent plan is achieved for the juveniles. And then we just go into some little known facts about the Department of Social Services. First, um, as Maggie has mentioned, only a fraction of all reports received by DSS result in court intervention.

We've also seen that only a fraction of reports are even accepted for investigation by the Department of Social Services. Also, most substantiated cases are resolved during the inhome services phase without the need to file a petition and get the court involved. Finally, federal and state law requires DSS to prioritize relatives or non-relative kin for placement over foster parents when the

court finds that the relatives or non-relative kin are appropriate for placement. And finally, children are more likely to be placed in the custody and guardianship of relatives or non-relative kin than they are to be adopted by foster parents um if they are unable to return to the home they were removed from. >> Thank you. Thank you so much for the presentation.

Do we have any very very quick questions? We need to wrap it up. >> Yeah. Yeah.

Very quick. When you say a fraction, like can you give an exact number? >> Um >> because it's not clear like >> So I'm sure they can I'm sure that um they can follow up with the exact number um when you look into cases that we've actually accepted versus the amount of petitions that we file. um >> they they can send a follow-up email for that.

>> Yeah, that would be really helpful. Thank you. >> Absolutely. >> Um and then uh Commissioner Jacobs, just to briefly talk about your question. Um I would say the and I'll start with the

main issue for reunification and what types of services are really the biggest barrier. I would say in the majority of our cases, the biggest problem is suitable housing. Um, we have multiple cases where the parents have done every service, but they don't have a home. They've done substance abuse counseling, they've done mental health services, but they literally do not have a home.

Um, housing is one. Um, substance abuse services is another. Um, finding providers that are willing to um engage in cases uh for mental health. But the biggest one would be housing.

Second one would be the the the next two would be substance abuse and mental health providers both for the children and the parents because a lot of mental health providers have decided to stop taking Medicaid because they didn't want to be involved in our cases. They didn't want to be subpoenaed and have their records being presented to court and they got tired of coming to court. So, a lot of providers across the

state have decided they're just going to stop taking Medicaid so they don't have to worry about coming into our courtroom. Um, and then timelines. We're required to have our first permanency planning hearing within one year of the children coming into custody. Um, typically in Durham County, um, from what I've seen, I've been here, um, just over two and a half years, we're very close to that mark.

Um, the the reason why there's such a long delay, uh, honestly, is because there's such a wait for services. Um, you know, we're very rarely are we getting to the first permanency planning hearing and reunification's being taken off the table. Um, reunification is remaining on the table for a long time for services to be engaged in, for evaluations to be completed. Um, and that's a lot of the biggest delay that locating family versus um foster care. Um, a lot of times families aren't presented until we're getting ready to potentially close a case to a foster parent. We're then uh made informed that

a relative is available to take take a child in which case we then evaluate that relative which slows which uh lengthens the process as well. >> Okay. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

I apologize we didn't have any more time for questions. If you have any questions obviously you can reach out and uh send them. Thank you all very much for this presentation. Very informable, very um very informative and um and we really appreciate it.

Thank you. >> Thank you very much. All right. So our next item agenda item item on our agenda is the downtown Durham, Inc.

blueprint presentation. So we'll have that All right. Is your second warning, Miss W Miss Wallace? This is your second warning.

All right, Miss Wallace, please leave. We're moving on with our agenda. That's what you want to do.

Please, please gather your stuff out outside, please. Security, please escort her. Pick her stuff up and escort her outside, please. Okay.

All right. Thank you. Uh yeah, still good morning. So, good morning.

>> Good morning. Uh happy 2026. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday. Um my name is Nicole Thompson.

I'm the president and CEO of Downtown Durham Incorporated and I'm here to present our downtown Durham or the downtown Durham blueprint. Uh to give you an update, uh this was taken to the city um it was taken to the joint city and county planning department in October uh recommended for adoption by the council um as a small area plan. Um, and it was presented to council at a work session in November. Uh, and then public hearing and adoption by the council in December.

Uh, and I am now bringing it to you for information. Um, and happy to answer any questions. Uh, so here's the agenda. Um, public engagement, who we reached out to, how we did that, what we heard. um a review of previous plans because as I think we all know they um Durham is really really really doing a lot of planning um and

there are a lot of plans that are happening um so we did take a moment to kind of address those plans that impacted downtown and how they fed into the um overall blueprint um what downtown looks like today which is very different than what um downtown looked like precoid uh which is the reason for us doing this blueprint um our vision goals and strategies and then kind of a deep dive into the implementation. So, who do we reach? Pro approximately 3,000 people. Um, these are all the different ways that we reach out to people, one-on-one, um, interviews, stakeholder meetings, um, events where we brought people in, pop-up events throughout not just downtown, but a few that were outside of downtown.

not many, but a few that were outside of downtown. Um, we had our survey uh which received a lot of people um um a lot of responses. Um both of the the survey and

the introductory materials were bilingual. Um and we worked with our partners to push that out to the Latino community. Um but these are just some of the ways that we reached out to people to get um and just some examples because people love pictures. Um, so here are some pictures and proof that we actually did do some popups at the Latino Credit Union.

Uh, many times at the farmers market. Uh, we even went to NCCU for the Ink Mania to get some student input. Um, back to school block party. Um, so just just a number of ways.

We also hosted because we felt that we were not getting a lot of um, input from the African-American community. So, we hosted a special black voices of the future panel uh at Motorco um inviting people to come in and speak and to hear a little bit about downtown in the growth. So, these are a few pictures from that. Uh and then we as we were launching our findings, we held a downtown future fest um about a year ago. Um it was in mid to late January um at Pickleback and invited people in. Um,

we had about 300 people that attended. Um, and I call that out because it was also a snow day. Schools were closed. Uh, and we still had about 300 people.

Um, and we told folks that we would do daycare and people took us up on it and they brought kids, which was actually really good because a lot of the kids also provided some input. Uh, so a little bit about how we reached and this is what we heard. Uh, wayfinding, ways to engage that leads to action. How do we make sure that we honor downtown Durham's history and culture?

Um, how do we support our small minority womenowned businesses? Um, how do we make sure that downtown feels like a neighborhood and has diverse housing options? Um, safe streets, ability for people to move about downtown, whatever mode of transportation that might be, and how do we trans uh transform our public spaces um to be spaces that are inviting um well utilized and and add to the fabric that is downtown. This is what we heard. Um, pretty much, hey, the these are

things we want to see. Uh, we heard this and more, but just a just a sampling of of what we heard in in people's own words. Um, which led us to the found build the foundation of the blueprint. I should stop here and say that the blueprint we worked with um, Interfaith Studios out of Philadelphia.

They were they were the lead consultant. We did a um, RFP. We had I think 14 um might have been nine. It's been it's been about two and a half years.

Might have been nine that replied. Um we interviewed three and we had a committee that selected interface studios working with um as partners all together um which was the lead on the community engagement um and access which did which did the deep dive on the small business retail piece. uh Ningret Partners which looked at the economic development piece and then our local the local contact was Blackspace. Um so I should also mention that we could not

have done this without the support of the county um which provided quite a bit of assistance in the very beginning stages. We kind of kicked this off about three years ago with a a a quick kind of um immersion of what things do we need to address as we look at downtown as it comes out of COVID. uh you all provided the funding for that where we were able to bring in an advisory committee from um the International Downtown Association um fellow CEOs from other downtown organizations to come in and spend a day and a half in the city doing some very quick um touches of of downtown and and um what the feeling was. Uh but also the city provided some funding as well as a number of um um private sector partners. So should have mentioned that at the very beginning. But from all the public engagement that we got, we we decided and it was determined that we had three primary foundations um or priorities that laid the foundation of the blueprint and those were keep downtown safe and welcoming, keep Durham Durham which gets

to the cultural and the heritage that that is so important to Durham and ensure that downtown remains a vibrant and growthoriented place. So with those three things in mind, we then took a minute and we thought again there are a lot of plans that have been going on in Durham for the past 5 10 years. Um many of them touch downtown, come through downtown or adjacent to downtown and it would not have been appropriate and it would make no sense if we did not include those plans or at least make an attempt to try to include those plans. So timeline I can't remember but about midway through this process of the last two years we brought together representatives of all of these plans at the Carolina theater and we had a couple of hour kind of in-depth um work working group people sat around at tables they shared what their plans were how they they thought their plans would fit into the blueprint and then we continue to go back to those plans um to ensure that we were not forgetting and we were trying to align where it made sense with those plans. So this is a list of all of the

plans um that we continue to track. Many of them coming out of the city and the county. Um many of them around transportation and mobility. Um but this is just to show that our plan is not one that is being done in a vacuum.

Um nor is it a plan that we can do alone. But it's very important that we work collaboratively with the city, the county, and our partners. Um so what we're hearing about today, what is happening today, and many of us remember the amazing things that were happening precoid 2019. We were growing.

We had any number of commercial developments happening. Uh people were moving in. We had housing being developed. Um businesses were coming in.

All of that kind of stopped with um 2019 and or 2020 and the start of of COVID. And as we've come out the back end of that, we know that things are different in not just our downtown, but downtowns across the country. And these are the things that that we um heard and we are recognizing that are occurring in downtown Durham today. um cost of living um and the feel in downtown has changed. Um hybrid work has

va vastly um impacted our small businesses. We do not have the um day traffic um the weekend day traffic that we had prior to COVID and that is having significant challenges and issues for our small businesses. Um many of our downtown open spaces need a makeover. Um they're they're showing their age.

They're not very accommodating. They're not very welcoming. um they're not lit well, so people don't know that they exist, don't know that they're places that that they might be able to sit and enjoy. Um we are carved up by any number of one-way streets and roads.

Um and that makes for a very disjointed street experience. If you're walking, if you're scootering, um even if you're driving, how we can do something to improve that. Parking is an issue. Um wouldn't be here if I couldn't talk about parking.

Um so whenever I talk in front of a public body, I parking is something I always talk about. It remains a challenge for us in downtown. Um we don't have major downtown anchors um who are driving. We need more of those. We need more variety of those anchors and food establishments

and retail establishments. There are perceptions of safety concerns in the downtown area. Again, this is something that my colleagues across the country are hearing. Um safety concerns within the downtown area and how that is impacting visitors.

Um there is a perception that downtown isn't for everyone because of the cost. The cost of living, the cost of products, the cost of food, um the cost of parking. Um but despite these challenges, downtown Durham um continues to remain the unique, quirky, cool place. This is the place where you come to find what Durham is.

From all of that, we came up with seven goals. Um I will go through them very quickly. Um I believe that you were sent a link to the overall document that to review. Um but I'll go through these very quickly.

um rooted and ready is getting to the um culture that is Durham. What makes the culture? How do we make sure that we remain committed to what is so important to Durham's um Hispanic, Latino, and African-American and other communities within um Durham? Um five different ways to do that. Um celebrate Paris Street as a unique

destination, create a hub for the Latino community, create highquality destinations for families. We heard that time and time again that there really aren't places for people to go. There are no hubs, no museums for people to come and bring their kids to enjoy. Um, infuse the public realm with art and culture.

Again, trying to get people to enjoy the public areas. Um, and then streamlineing streamlining the permit process for events. And I will say that we're working very closely with Discover Durham on this because that streamlining lining of events goes beyond the the the downtown boundaries. Um, the next one was open for business.

How do we continue to cultivate and ensure that our small business community grows? We hear time and time and time and time again that people love that many of our downtown restaurants are locally owned um either from Durham, from North Carolina um or from the or from Durham, from the Triangle region or from North Carolina. Um so how do we continue to make sure that that exists and can and um we can grow on that? We have seven um

actions [snorts] uh develop an an integrated and centralized program of public safety um so that downtown businesses um have have access to that uh but also people visiting preserve affordable space um on the ground floor for our businesses. We do have a number of vacancies. So, how can we ensure that we can keep those spaces at a rate that allows for small businesses to come in and and activate them, provide technical assistance to downtown retailers? Um, develop strategic parking and loading loading management for businesses and customer use.

Downtown is very compact. We have very small roads. We have more and more businesses that are coming. They are bringing delivery trucks.

You have delivery truck or three. You have people trying to park. You have people trying to drive. How can we actually manage the curb a bit better? um appoint a dedicated coordinator to guide businesses and on budsmen for instance um um to help with permitting and operational challenges, expand the business hours and programming to capitalize downtown events. That is working closely with our businesses so

that they know the events that are coming up and perhaps alternate um their their business hours so that they take advantage of people in the downtown area and address gaps and need for increased variety of businesses through through strategic tenant recruitment. Welcome home. How do we make downtown feel like a neighborhood? Um where we have a variety of housing options um and amenities essential to those housing options.

Uh here are five of those. Um looking at publicly owned sites and how we can ensure that they are held for mixed income and mixed use development. Uh coordinate with supportive housing providers and advocate for the needs of the unhoused. Um and I I commented here that we are working with the city and the county.

um through the community solutions plan that is being designed. We're on the advisory committee for that. Um develop a microrant program for community-led implementation to ensure that that small businesses people feel like they are can they are part of the plan and can come forward with ideas on how to activate spaces. Um continue to

encourage our downtown residents to be involved and and build that sense of community. We have a number of folks that are living in apartments. Um how do we ensure that when they come this may be their first introduction to to Durham. How do we make sure that they fall in love with Durham and they fall in love with downtown?

Um, and that is through great intentional communication with with the residents and clearly set expectations for how key development sites should be designed. Um, this is not just city and county but also private sector. Uh, our fourth goal is uh walk and roll. How do we make sure that people move throughout the downtown area in a safe and efficient way?

um what is a master plan or a downtown plan or a blueprint about downtown if we don't discuss the two-way of the loop that has been in every master plan that we have brought before the city and the county. So why should this one be any differently? Um but we're going to work hard to make actually make sure that this is the last one where we bring that up. Um, so we're beginning to have those conversations about redesigning the loop, hopefully making it two-way, but if not, how do how do we make sure that the oneway does

not make it a barrier to cross from the center of downtown to the northern part of our downtown. Um, certainly looking at how we can make the connection between the center of downtown and the and the main library. That is a a dead zone. Um, if you have not walked it, I I offer that you walk it.

It is not one that anybody wants to. and and we have a gym that is just on the outside that that people drive to and and a way to connect that with the sea of parking lots and then the six lanes of of the loop. Um how can we repair that so that there is this flow between the library and downtown um strengthening multimmoal connections along key streets um and then strengthening connections along the main spine of of downtown uh Blackwell, Corkran and Foster. Many of these plans are ongoing. Um this is a picture of if we're looking at two-way in the loop, the challenge that will exist because we'll have to involve um not only NC DOT but also NC rail because we would be in the in the the the the uh rail easement.

Um so quite a few challenges to get that done but not impossible. uh common grounds. This is getting to the public spaces and how we ensure that they are connected and utilized and um bright and cheery and and encourage people to sit and enjoy. Um this is looking at the network between those spaces.

How do we make that um um an easier experience and one that is just naturally followed? Um looking at both of our big plazas in the downtown area that have not been redesigned in 20 years, if not more. Um, and that would be CCB Plaza and the convention center plaza. Um, how do we look at the unique alleys that we have in the downtown area and what can we do to make them creative places um, unique places that people want to walk through?

Um, and then positioning the YMCA as a downtown anchor. Um, and providing more shade. We heard that over and over in downtown. They're great places to sit, but it's really hot in July. I don't want to sit at CCB Plaza. Um you may notice that this year we were able to get a few umbrellas that we put up in

the chairs that we have put out at CCB Plaza. That is a very temporary fix. Um the umbrellas almost immediately start showing their wear and tear. Um so looking at a at a at a at a more um beneficial and effective way to provide shade not just at CCB Plaza but other places in downtown.

Um downtown works. This is getting on how do we make sure that downtown continues to rem remain an employment center um for the county. Uh I believe that we are one of four or five employment centers and how do we ensure that that that remains true for downtown. Um and this is looking at preserving our old funky downtown buildings for affordable office space.

Um for example, the building next door. Um but there there many others that that exist. Um how do we reten existing office space? um how do we convert into uh some of our spaces into lab space? Um that still is something that that has a bit of traction but are then then remaining very mindful that that things are always in flux. Um m much is

happening on the national level and how can we adjust and and accommodate other possible office needs in the downtown area and then keep event- driven economic development activities in downtown like the biscuit and bananas um like the block party things like that. How do we keep that in downtown to ensure that people are coming downtown? And then finally, the more you know, um, this is really getting at how do we communicate all that is going on, all that is happening in downtown, all the ways to be involved, all the great excitement that is happening in the downtown area. Um, and this is through better um u more intentional marketing about the safety that downtown is safe.

Um, that that it is a place to come and it is welcoming. Um, changing the narrative that downtown isn't for everyone. um highlighting the affordable opportunities that exist in downtown and then unifying um the downtown by pointing out and uplifting key assets in the downtown area rather than uh districts. For instance, Major the Bull, Carolina Theater, DPAC versus the

government district sitter, the downtown loop, the warehouse district. Um this is just a visual of of the seven um goals. Um pretty picture. We'll move on up a up.

I mean, it's pretty. You all can look at it. Um, and I I know we're short on time. One thing that we asked the uh consultants to do um is to really take a bit a bit of time and help us look at the implementation of this plan.

So that it's not just a plan that had pretty pictures and all these wonderful things like, oh yeah, that's great. Oh, but to really put together um how do we make these things happen? Um so they spent a bit of time working on an implementation matrix. This is what just one of the actions under one of our goals looks like. It is a document that is probably 30 pages um a spreadsheet. Uh we are working to um transfer it from an Excel spreadsheet into ASA so that it's actually in a program management um

easier to communicate with our partners. Um as I mentioned earlier, we cannot do this without the help and assistance of our partners at the city and the county um as well as private sector. Um one thing that we really thought about and that was brought to us by the consultants was how do we ensure that people can remain engaged but we don't burn them out. Um as I if I go back and look at uh celebrate Paris Street as a unique destination, that's a lot and as you can see there are a number of things under there.

um with a tactical action group. These would be small groups that people could join because they are interested in say public art along Paris Street. They could care less about how people move, how people park. That's not what they're interested in, but they are really, really anxious and really want to make sure that they have a say in what public art goes along Paris Street. They would join a tactical action group around that. and then someone else would come, other people who are interested in biking and pedestrian and shared roadways would come and join a tactical action group around that piece of this.

So, this is just an example um um of a way that we're going to try to encourage continue to encourage public engagement within the plan. Um celebrating the Paris street as a unique destination actually has three primary elements, physical improvements, small business opportunities and placemaking. Um and then from that it will be led by really led by us working with the planning department um and then with assistance by the tactical action group and then as you see here these are just an example of some of the partners to get this one um goal or or action under this goal um completed. Um so very thorough um um quite a bit of of coordination between a number of different people and organizations.

Um, if we go a bit deeper into the actual action under this strategy, I keep I'm confusing, so I'm sorry. This is a strategy celebrating Paris Street. An action under that is forming a tag for the overall vision. Um, I'm not going to go into a lot. I'm not going to read

this to you. You can go and look, but I just wanted to give you an example of of the detail that went into the implementation. So, within under every action, there are a number of tasks that we would be working on. these tasks could change.

And I should also say that the blueprint is written in a way that we can prioritize based on what is happening um so that that we can move and make sure that we are addressing where downtown is and ensuring that it's growing. Um so these these again are just some actions and the number of things that are under each action um the number of tasks that are under each action to get them completed and done. Um all of this is again just around one um strategy celebrating Paris Street as a unique destination. Um it goes on um but it really this is an area where it's focusing focusing on capitalizing the area for small businesses and and playing on the Black Wall Street uh that made Paris Street the the destination.

Um, and then how do how do we provide storytelling opportunities along Black Wall Street, up Paris Street? How do we incorporate that in whether it's a museum, whether it's markers, whether it's public art? Um, but how do we make sure that you can learn the history and the importance of of this um landmark um when you come and visit? So, some things are already happening.

So, I come to you to say yes, we we have um launched this blueprint, but we are well on our way to trying to implement some things. Um, we are already working on public art in downtown. Um, you all just approved an artist for public art. So, we're excited about what's happening from the city and the county, but we also know that there are a number of private sector um, property owners who have who who were looking at doing public art.

Um, open for business. Um, that was um, how do we make sure that our small businesses are supported? Uh, we have launched safety ambassadors. DDI has hired three safety ambassadors that are in the downtown area focused just on communicating with um um our businesses and our um visitors

and our residents when they don't when they feel um a a need to reach out for safety concerns. Um they will work closely or they're working closely with the police and with the heart team um to try to address matters that that may be occurring on the street. Um safety resource for downtown businesses. We've created a magnet so that businesses know who to call based on whatever the challenges that is facing them.

Um we are now working on a retail market analysis and strategy. Um how do we keep these small areas available for for small businesses? Uh the retail incubator. Um but then also how can we be a little bit more intentional about what retail we go after that makes sense for our downtown area.

So that retail market analysis we are working with a consultant trying to fine-tune the scope of work and hopefully we'll start that the end of January. Um the retail incubator market on market that is something that we are working on with our partners at self-help. Um it will launch this um this month. Um it is

located on Market Street and we have built out the space working with Paradigm um partners um to build out a space for three small entrepreneurs um from the Durham area. Uh Be Well, um whose owner is Brianna Young Rowan who will be doing plat plant-based body care products. Um Echko owned by Lisa Densen who will be doing jewelry, candles, and apparel from recycled and natural materials. and then blank space uh owned by Charlotte Sharita Snow uh which will be doing stationery and gift shop um items.

Um all three of these will be in the space. They will be a cohort that will be working with um Infinity Bridges um both as a cohort but individually to address any concerns about the growth of their bu their business. Um the hope is that they will stay there a year. We have learned through our 307 West Main small little pop-up space that's in front of our office that six 30 days, 60 days, 90 days is not enough time for a business

to understand what it takes to operate in a downtown location where parking is not free. Um people are moving about the downtown in in different ways than they may be in in a retail strip mall or um um shopping center. Um, so with with this year experience, our hope is that we'll be able to help them grow and relocate them someplace else in the downtown area. Uh, welcome home.

Uh, we, as I mentioned, we're um on the advisory committee for community solutions. Um, we are aware of the county's RFP for a day center. Um, and we're also revamping our it's your neighborhood resident council. Um, walk and roll.

There are any number of transportation plans um that both the city and the county are working on. um common ground. Um we worked with the city's innovation team and we just wrapped up in December a um int uh uh partnership with them and the design school at NC State where they looked at three paper streets in the downtown area and the students provided

ideas on how those paper streets could be reconfigured, re-imagined um and they are sharing that information with us. Um, but we're also working with the sports commission and the city on the reimagining of the historic Durham athletic park feasibility study. Um, as well as working with, uh, Aaron and her team for Durham Central Park and their revisioning. Um, finally, um, downtown works, we are going to launch a very small white paper study on what it would take to look at a commercial land trust um, in the in the city.

um how we might be able to do that, how it might look like a residential housing um land trust, but how it would be different. Um looking at possibly three other cities that are are providing similar um have have created a similar structure. Um and then we are continue to have our available properties database um to ensure that people know what's available in the downtown area. Um, and then working, as I said, with Discover Durham on the event driven opportunities, um,

and how we can make that process a bit easier and how we can be a bit more supportive of smallcale events, but also larger scale events um, interested in coming into Durham and downtown. And finally, the more you know, we'll continue to work on our marketing and promotion efforts. Um, that is all I have. So I am happy to answer any questions that you might have but certainly understand that time if time is too short and you don't have any question very quickly through that.

So I appreciate that but we um I mean we have time for a few questions here but I will say that >> oh I'm sorry to interrupt. Yeah, >> let me go back to the um market on market. I also want to mention that we are working with the Durham Arts Skill because there was a question about local artists. We are working with them and they will have a local artist their their work on the walls.

You all will be invited to that um opening um which hopefully will be later this month. Sorry about that. >> Oh, no problem. So, yeah, we'll have time for a few questions here, but I will say um the the map that was on

number 27 that you skipped really quickly, that's where I spent most of my time looking at this because it gave a bit a broad picture of everything. Um, so I would suggest, you know, taking some time to look at here because it's everything that you talked about, all the goals is they're great individually, but being able to see it as a master plan, how it all comes together really gives us a good view of that. So, I do appreciate this map here. I'll I'll open it for for questions.

Um, >> thank you, Chair Lee. Um, Nicole, this was a great presentation. um especially from someone who's lived in Durham for a very long time and just to see the you know downtown transform and I know we're going to continue to transform and so thank you for your leadership. Thank you for your team's leadership with this.

I had a question about office space because I you've talked about that a little bit. Are people still looking for office space in downtown Durham >> on occasion? Yes. Yes, we are still we are still seeing people who reach out who want um office space. Um, of course

the chamber leads uh large office um recruitment retention efforts uh but smaller uh we we typically will work and and try to identify uh if there is a large prospect that is coming into the downtown area the chamber will let Matt will let me know um that someone is interested and then if they um decide that it is going to be downtown then we'll come in under an NDA to to work with them to to sell downtown. And what feedback have you gotten about the the ambassadors? Because I really like the ambassadors and the little cars and things like that. >> We've gotten that kind of feedback.

Everyone loves loves the the the the shift to purple. Um so our color now is purple. Um they're e they're they're approachable. Um they are engaged.

Um everyone is appreciative of the work that they're doing. Um, we we've not heard any negative feedback. Um, of course, I think a a winning part of this

is that we also have the bull ride. Uh, everyone loves the bull ride. Um, loves that it's out and about. Uh, we have more demand than we have the ability to service.

Um, and we're trying to figure out how how do we bring on a second one, but that is also manpower um and hours and operations. So, so it's it's a complicated thing. Uh, but but it has been a true success. Well, that's great.

Thank you so much again for your leadership and your team. And if I have any more questions, I'll just get in touch with you because I know we're short on time. So, thank you, >> Commissioner Jacobs. And then we'll go.

>> Thank you, Nicole. Um, we did not actually get a copy of the blueprint report. >> Okay. Um, >> it was just sent.

>> Oh, okay. Great. Awesome. >> Is my magic working?

>> Okay, great. Um, let me just say first of all, yeah, I fully support everything that you've is in this report and everything that you all are trying to do. Um, I am curious why the Durham County Board

of Commissioners is not being asked to adopt this plan as well. And I would say that I think it is important that we do adopt the plan because we are a huge stakeholder in downtown Durham, evidenced by where we are sitting now, but also the investments that we have made in downtown. Um I would argue that we could we've made even more investments than the city. Um so is that part of what we are we going to be asked to also adopt the plan?

Be careful what you wish for, Wendy, because the city has a a dollar amount that they put in. What is the tax that the city gives to? >> Well, it's it's not just about funding. When you adopt a plan, it means that you also support what is actually being proposed in the plan. And obviously, a lot of what is being asked for here is the city's responsibility, but we are a joint city county planning department. Um and and we again, you know, we referenced the main library,

the renovation we did to the Bell administrative building. Um this building we've renovated. We've got a great property open for potential use next door. We've have ground floor retail that we've implemented.

300 East Main Street affordable housing. We own a lot of other properties in downtown. We own the Head Start property next to where the Y is going to be leaving. So, I just think it's important.

This is should be also adopted by the county to some just saying that we support it or I would be more than happy for you all to adopt what's in the plan. I will tell you that um moving through the city because it was considered kind of a small area, right? um in talking with the planning department um it was determined that that kind of adoption wasn't um because it wasn't in your geo it wasn't in the it wasn't more in the city's geographical realm right

>> than the county right but certainly we have come to the county in the past with our master plans and and have asked for approval >> now I I agree and and I think part the strategy is working part of the reason today was for some board dial dialogue to just get thoughts organically about the plan >> and um as we hear from the board, >> we can determine formally how do we embrace this? I think it's as you pointed out, Commissioner Jacobs and others have shared, it's it's a great blueprint as we plan as a community, which encompasses all of us, and the county has invested heavily >> to activate certain components of downtown to support this goal. So, it's a natural progression. We didn't formally say it, but >> um we can definitely put this on an agenda if we hear from other board members to want to codify it by

adopting. >> Yeah, I think it's really important and we we were full partners in the revitalization of downtown all of the hotel historic hotel uh reinvestment projects. Chesterfield, we have been partners. And now I would say, you know, the history museum, the future of that, the city and the county are ob obviously have to be partners on that.

And then the future discussions about the convention center as well. So I I think it's important that we are um that we adopt this plan. I wanted to ask who is going to take the lead on this? Um is it going to be DDI um where where you have a certain person who is just working on this and pushing it forward because obviously it's going to take a lot of stakeholders and partners, but it's still going to need somebody to be leading and championing

and kind of making it all happen. >> Uh yeah, it will be um Yes, ma'am. It'll be um DDI as the lead uh but working with with the planning department um to help with the coordination of the city departments. Uh but we we are the implementing group.

Uh the plan is to um with adequate funding bring on a person whose primary job would be ensuring that that we are moving forward. We're prioritizing correctly. We're engaging our our partners. we're bringing on as we identify new partners um because there is a lot that that would that goes into this but then also our work plan is now going to going to adjust to what what is in here as well.

So we we begin this month looking at our our individual work plans within DDI and how they adjust and and form to this blueprint. >> Okay, great. And I, you know, I think when I think about and and yes, I believe that we are at an inflection point with downtown and, you know, we've

been visiting other cities. We're just in Austin. We went to Indianapolis. We went to St.

Paul and um Minneapolis. And we know that it is we need to double down at this point for the future of downtown Durham. and this is where we get the most bang for our buck in terms of our tax revenue. Um, and that, you know, we're looking at, you know, residents, you know, workers, tourists are all factors here.

I have a question for in terms of Durham County staff. What what are our current requirements around working on in person and onsite now postco? It's it depends by the by department. Some departments um they have 100% on site.

Um others are um hybrid and it varies. It's uh by department. We did a

survey um not it's probably about six months ago and it was close to 65 70% were in person at least 3 to four days a week but again some areas are have higher frequencies than other. We also have the challenge that we have uh some departments that may not have a touchdown space for each individual and so those are other areas. So we have to rotate. Um so yeah that's another context.

>> So I I just think it's important that we are modeling what we want other employers to do. Um and so I don't know what the city's policies are, but I think it's important for us to be very conscious of that. I'm glad that we are at least up to that amount. And also we have a policy um that I applaud which allows staff to get out and walk around during the day. You will see county staff walking around

downtown. So I I don't know if the city has that as well, but I I think those are the kinds of things that are really important that we model what we want the private sector to do. Um and the other I just want to highlight, you know, you mentioned the Y property. Well, now we know the Y is relocating luckily downtown >> over to um in front of DPAC, but there there's going to be really key now opportunities related to that site, which is contiguous again to county property.

And so that's that's going to be something very time-sensitive that we we need to be thinking about right now. So, but thank you and um I look forward to the county be supporting this plan. >> Thank you, Commissioner Valentine. Did you have comments?

>> Vice Chair. Thank you, Miss Thompson. Thank you for your uh presentation here today. Three quick things. First, I'd like to associate Commissioner Valentine with uh the adoption of this plan as

presented by my colleague, Commissioner Wendy Jacobs. >> Thank you. However, that's just as a caveat. I'm not exactly sure that uh the convention center is something that uh I'm wrapping my arms around just yet.

Um but certainly uh whatever discussions are about that uh down the road, I'm open to having that discussion. Uh, second, you talked about labs and I didn't really understand it in the context of your presentation contextually like what what we were talking about, but what did come to mind was our local universities, colleges and universities and their potential um space here in downtown in the future. I didn't hear anything about that in in the presentation. So, I'm interested in what your thoughts might be.

And third, you talked about your work with Discover Dorm. Um, is is there other work with Discover Dorm that's going on that uh we could should potentially know about? >> Um, I'll go start with the second.

>> Yes. >> Um, we understand that there continues to remain an interest in small startup lab space. Um, so we're not talking about what um, RTP is is generating, but but you know, coming out of our universities and they're looking for a small space and they want to be close to an urban environment. So, we're still seeing a little bit of that happen.

Um, we are also aware that um, the um, venerable on Roxboro, I always have to make sure I get the name right, is converting one of its floors to accommodate small suite lab space. Um, and I think they have completed that and and that that is on the market. Uh, we know that Longfellow did something very similar with one of their two buildings in Durham ID. Um, not the the building where Google is located, but the building beside that. Um, and they have leased now all of their spaces to to smaller to medium-size lab space. Uh, so we we know

that there is still a an interest in that. Um, so that's what I meant by the ability to convert space. Um it is a it is not inexpensive to do that. Um but but we are aware that some of uh the property owners who have office space they are converting.

Um but we also know that class A very amenitized class A office space is doing well across the country. Um so what that might look like in in the downtown marketplace. Um the second question things that we're working on with Discover Durham. um understanding that they came out with their destination Durham plan uh we were about a year behind that and that was somewhat intentional um so that we didn't have two big plans um and that there wasn't the confusion given given the names and some of the work that we do so we came in behind that um as you know Discover Durham is looking at the entire county uh we don't we only look at the 3/4 of a square mile which you can kind of see on this map so We're

very focused on that area and just adjacent, but we are communicating with and a part of ADI advisory committees around events and festivals um because many of them want to be in the downtown area and we are aware of the challenges of closing roads um of the one-way streets um of parking um and just the movement of people um um and trying to get event managers to to understand and recognize that we have very unique assets that allow for a unique experience in the downtown area. We are also on the advisory committee around the convention center um which we are saying convention entertainment venue um and exploring what that might look like. Um as I said in in the presentation, we are very interested in keeping any kind of um eventdriven um economy in the downtown area. That brings people, it brings visitors who then leave and walk the downtown area. Um so we are a part of those conversations and what that might look

like. Um very much pushing a look at not just single site um um and this is no matter what the the property may be but that that single site actually could be catalytic to other things. So, for instance, the YMCA available property. Now, that could lead to quite an interesting development.

If you look at the YMCA property, the county property that is adjacent, what this Durham Central Park is planning with their green plan, um, and how they're really trying to expand and and build up that urban park, uh, and then just beyond to the, um, historic athletic park that is creating quite a bit of activity um that we haven't seen in the downtown area. And all of that is supported by a vehicular pedestrian spine which is Corkran Foster. I skipped one. Blackwell Corkran Foster um which was if you all remember part of the smart corridor. So it's kind of bringing that smart art corridor idea

back and connecting u a number of venues from DACA in the Bulls stadium all the way up to the old ball park. Um but then also there is the the bike pedestrian trail that that the city is working on. So we're a part of that conversation. Um so those are two big things that we are talking with but um I am on the Durham Next board.

Uh, and then I meet regularly, I was trying to remember, but you know, it's the first of the year, so I don't remember, but regularly with um the new executive director of Durham Next as we start launching our blueprint, how we coordinate with Durham Next, who takes the lead on what um um on things that are related to downtown. [snorts] And I don't remember your first. >> Oh, my first was just associating uh my name with the adoption of this place. Yes.

Yes. So, thank you. fully support that. >> Yes. >> Thank you so much, Nicole. I don't have any questions because I serve on TDI

board and just overall really appreciative of the work that your team does and it's a scrappy and mighty team. I look forward to my customized DDI Christmas hat next year at the parade. But thank you so much for your presentation. [laughter] >> Appreciate it.

Yeah, I just want to say thank you as well and for all of your efforts. I always tell the story back in 1993 when I was a student at NC State and had to work on a project of downtown facade enhancements and the visioning that's required to keep communities vibrant is ongoing. So, thank you for being a part of that solution as we look to the next um 20 plus years. Well, and thank you for serving on our steering committee for the last two years.

So, we do appreciate your input on on that committee. Um, and we'll be pulling that committee back together. So, >> thanks. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Appreciate your time.

>> Um, and so for the next item, so I know we have the transportation item. Uh, Chair Lee asked if we could take the quick lunch break now. uh 15 minutes for everyone to just grab their lunch, use the restrooms, and then we come back and have the transportation presentation and keep working through >> that works for everyone. So, we'll come back at 125. >> Yeah.

team and then feel free to get started. So we have uh 30 minutes for this presentation. So do you think like 20 minutes for slides, 10 minutes for questions would be appropriate? >> Yes.

Wonderful. We'll do our best. >> Thank you. >> All right.

Good afternoon, commissioners. Um, so today Durham County staff will be presenting an update on the development of the FY27 work program. Um, I'm Ellen Beckman, Durm County Transportation Director. Uh, Brandy Miner, the senior administrative officer and staff working group administrator.

Uh, Curtis Scarpagnado, U, Durham County Transportation Planner, and Steve Schllothberg from Go Triangle as the tax district administrator. And then we have uh two uh Triangle West TPO uh supporters in the audience, Doug Plchinsky and Colleen Mcu. Um so with that, I'll turn it over to Brandy. All right. Good morning.

In 2011, Durm County voters approved a halfsent sales tax to fund public transportation improvements that expand the quality of service within Durm County and provide greater regional connectivity to the rest of the triangle. The Durm County Transit Plan, which was updated and adopted in 2023, determines how these public transportation funds within Durm County will be managed and spent. The transit plan was approved by the Durm Board of County Commissioners, Go Triangle Board of Trustees, and the Triangle West Transportation Planning Organization in the spring of 2023. The work program is the annual budget for the transit plan and its primary goal is to advance the projects in the adopted plan.

It is developed in coordination with our transit partners over a period of about 10 months. As staff working group administrator, I am tasked with presenting the work program to the governing boards for approval. Approval of the work program is required by the county commissioners and the go

triangle board of trustees. The transit governance interlocal agreement which was also adopted in 2023 establishes the duties and responsibilities of the staff working group. The staff working group is a technical committee serving in an advisory role to three governing boards to the three governing boards. The staff working group primarily includes staff from Durham County, Go Triangle, City of Durham, and Triangle West.

We are tasked with coordinating the planning and implementation of the annual work program and the multi-year vision plan. There are four voting members, one from each organization, who collectively determine which items such as the work program and any related amendments should be advanced to the governing boards for approval. Approval of any item before the staff working group requires a minimum of three affirmative votes. While the per while the preferred approach is to achieve consensus before advancing items for board consideration, items may be referred to the governing

boards if consensus cannot be reached. This pie chart represents the funding priorities of the Durham transit plan. The work program generally maintains the priorities of the transit plan, but in the FY26 work program, there were some minor shifts. Most notably, the operations and maintenance category increased by 5% and the enhance and extend bus service category increased by 2%.

On this next slide, we have provided an overview of the FY26 work program budget, which is approximately $55 million. The halfsent sales tax, our primary revenue source, is projected at 44 million. 5 million. 5 million will be drawn from the fund balance to maintain a balanced budget. And on the expenditure side, the majority of the funding is allocated to

4 million respectively. It is important to note that some projects such as the Durham bus stop improvement program provide benefits to other agencies and are not exclusive to the project sponsor. Due to better than forecasted revenue growth since the adoption of the transit plan, additional revenues have been programmed to expand bus services more quickly and extensively increase funding for the maintenance facilities and support additional staffing needs. 5 million for F Street Bus operations maintenance facility and 10 million for BRT development. 6 million for fair support

8 8 million for service expansion. Okay. Now, we'll move forward and talk a little bit about the work program and a potential transit plan amendment. The annual work program process includes an updated revenue forecast.

Growth in our largest revenue source, which is the half cent sales tax, has slowed significantly. 1 million less than the original financial model projection. The tax district will provide a final revenue projection which will be published in the final recommended work program. As of November 2025, the fund balance in the DURM transit plan is approximately $26 million. After accounting for restricted reserves

and previously encumbered funds tied to adopted projects, the current excess liquidity is 110 million which is available to fund FY26 and future projects. On this slide, we will take a look at what we are calling our status quo scenario. 5% annual increase for operating projects and no changes to the currently adopted CIP. 2 million in FY35.

We are required to maintain at least $10 million in excess liquidity per our adopted financial policy. The DURM transit plan can fulfill all the current commitments in the CIP and the MYOP, but there is very little capacity for new requests this year. [snorts] If we were to adopt the status quo

2 million available to fund new projects. It is important to note that this model assumes debt based on a rail project and a debt and debt based on a BRT project would have a shorter useful life and reduce the liquidity. This slide represents the proposals that we have received from our partners. Um, as you can see for FY27, there are a number of different proposals. The items highlighted in pink represent funding requests that will potentially be evaluated as part of a transit plan amendment as funding in the as funding in the current plan has not been identified for these uh projects as proposed. 2 2 million annually for Go

Durham and Go Triangle fair free transit support. 3 million annually for Go Durham and Go Triangle transit operations. 279,000 for City of Durham staffing. 200,000 for the GoDm transit asset management database, which is a one-time expense, and 75,000 for Go Triangle staff cost share changes.

Durham County also submitted a $650,000 request to update the transit plan, which is required to be updated every four years per the ILA. We also submitted a one-time $50,000 request to develop a database to improve the work program development process. Given the influx of new funding requests, we currently do not have a sustainable financial model. The model is projected to enter a deficit in FY28, reaching a low point of negative 140 million in fiscal year 37. Since we are

required to maintain at least 10 million in excess liquidity, we would need to identify at least 150 million to have a viable model. So what funding do we have available? We have review reviewed the financial model, the MYOP and the CIP to determine what funding we have. Unencumbered and unreserved fund balance is already included in the model as well as any excess future forecasted revenues.

There is an opportunity to delay or cancel several future projects to free up funding. 2 million have been identified for potential delay or cancellation. We could also revise the quick and reliable regional connections placeholder which will be discussed later in the presentation. Any decision to delay or cancel a

project should be formally approved by the governing boards through a transit plan amendment. I'll now turn it over to Curtis. Thanks, Brandy. So, the quick and reliable regional transportation connections placeholder is part of the 2023 Durham transit plan.

It is the lower piece of that pie chart there, the 26%. And originally, this came out of Durham's potential commitment to commuter rail. In the 2017 Durham transit plan, we actually allocated 85% towards light rail or commuter rail. So that was already a big change going from 85% to 26% in the 2023 plan. And just as a point of comparison, the new Wake County transit plan has 45% of its funding going towards BRT and rail. Currently, the city is pursuing the central Durham BRT and the county is

leading the Durham County BRT vision plan which are going to identify the specific projects that will spend down this placeholder 26%. And we'll have better information on what those projects will be when the plan is adopted in about a year's time. So, one of the questions we have is should we keep this placeholder as is or should we consider adjusting things? Next slide.

Thank you. The Durham bus rapid transit vision plan is currently underway and will identify, evaluate, and prioritize six corridors for BRT level investment over the next 30 years. And one of the corridors will be the central Durham BRT. That is going to be a priority project in the plan. And we expect the plan to be adopted in fall 2026. And again, the placeholder quick and reliable regional transportation connections um will be allocated to specific

projects when this plan is adopted as a transit plan amendment. And just as a quick recap, BRT typically includes higher frequency service with fewer stops, enhanced vehicle and station amenities for passengers, traffic signal prioritization, and dedicated bus lanes where feasible. Next slide. And I'll hand it over to Ellen.

>> All right. Uh, thank you. Um, so I did notice there is a updated version of this presentation in the in the materials. So um it's a little bit different uh than what's shown here. But um in summary, just to conclude this presentation, you know, as described at the beginning of the presentation, you know, since the adoption of the 23 plan, uh the annual work program has been used to advance those projects, and we've had several years of better than forecasted uh revenue growth that allowed us to fund more projects, fund projects at a higher level, and advance projects to be implemented more quickly. Um unfortunately this year the sales tax

revenues are projected to decrease from the previous forecasts. Um the positive news um is that the status quo model is viable and we can continue to fulfill all of the current commitments in the work program and the future projects that are in the CIP and multi-year operating program. Um, however, you know, we've received many costly requests this year and the modeling shows these cannot be accommodated unless we choose to cancel, reduce or delay projects that are in the CIP and multi-year operating program. Uh, potent including potentially the placeholder that's there for bus rapid transit.

Um, so if the boards want us to consider this, um, modifying the CIP and MYOP in this way would require a transit plan amendment. Um and therefore it would require approval by the three transit plan governing boards. Um this is not something we've had to do uh since the adoption of the 23 plan. Um you know historically we've had funding available to add new projects each year. Um this

year we we do not. Um so we need guidance today uh from the boards on if there is a desire to consider a transit plan amendment and if so any guidelines or bounds for what should be considered. Um, you know, the requests are substantial and could represent a significant change from the adopted plan and could affect the BRT initiatives that are underway. Um, the request also includes some policy issues uh that we do want to also bring to to attention.

Um, the fair support requests are significant. Um, they weren't in the 23 plan. Uh, the requests have increased significantly from the original approvals and they have the potential to continue to increase. um you know the cost of operating bus systems is going up um and the transit operators are seeking a funding source for supporting the baseline service cost. So we we desire a long-term decision and making sure that we are establishing a sustainable budget for this. Um in

addition you know capital project costs are increasing um and they also may continue to increase. So within this, you know, we need to consider um any guidelines or policies around capital project increases. So here's our schedule. Um this schedule does not um include a transit plan amendment, but if so, we would need to adjust it.

Uh we have this update today. Um the update to the Go Triangle Board of Trustees is has been updated to January 14th. Um, and next month the staff working group will be voting to release the draft work program um for a 21-day public comment period. Uh, we will then seek public input.

Uh, we will present that to the board of commissioners and the go triangle board of trustees in March. Um, the staff working group then reconvenes and votes to recommend a final work program in April. And that final work program is approved by the board of commissioners in May and the Go Triangle Board of Trustees in June.

Uh so thank you for your attention today um on this. This concludes the presentation. Um the staff working group you know as mentioned is advisory to the boards and we'll be taking action next month. So we're seeking your input on any expectations for the work program and guidance to make sure that we are using this funding source to benefit the residents and businesses of Durham County.

Thank you. >> Thank you so much Ellen and team. And you guys hit it spot on the 20 minutes. So, good job.

Um, were there questions, comments from the board, starting with Commissioner Burton? >> Yes. Um, thank you. Thank you for this presentation. So, I just want to make sure I'm clear. 2 2 million annually for fair free, right?

That means we're we will have to not do one of the projects or all of the projects or bus rapid transit like because there's not enough money in the fund balance longterm. So, I just want to make sure I'm clear on that. Um, or is it all of these things or it's just one of these things? So there's there's infinite numbers of combinations of projects that we could fund, right?

2 million. It could be less than that, right? That is what was requested. Um I I will say that I believe that any of those substantial requests, we modeled them individually and essentially each of them breaks the model even on their own um let alone in combination. 2 million minimum fund balance. So, that's

really all we have. 2 million annual request each year that increases each year um exceeds that amount. >> And where are we with the bus rapid transit vision plan? Where are we now with that?

>> We are currently underway. We are just wrapping up the initial analysis of the corridors to narrow it down to a more consolidated list of corridors. I'd be happy to share that with you. I'm sure we'll be coming back to you all soon to present on that.

>> Thank you. I'm going to let my colleagues ask questions. I have to think a little bit more. >> Commissioner Jacobs, >> thank you um for this update. Um I I just want to say very clearly I do not support um changing our plan at all. Um what we have committed to over we

adopted a 20-year plan and um I am very very concerned about to me some red flags here. Um, you know, first of all, as as has been noted, we're seeing a a decline in the sales tax revenue. That that is something that we're seeing in general, right, with our sales tax revenue. So one thing is I even though we have been doing better than expected I'm wondering um does that even impact our current financial model um for this the because this the plan that we adopted goes till 2040 is that right so I'm wondering do we are we going to need to update our financial model based on this decline in sales tax revenue Yeah, >> great.

Uh, thank you for the question. Um, the reason partly why the status quo is at 14 million. Last year we were in

the 20 million is because we actually had to lower that amount. So that slide that Ellen showed that went from 45 million down to 44. That incorporates the decrease um into that revenue running throughout the model. So right now uh the current scenario nothing would need to be changed if we are doing that.

uh scenario because of the uh revenue uh decline the bottom line number is smaller. >> Okay. And I also want to note that we have given additional revenue to go triangle um since the adoption the passing the sales tax revenue referendum. Can you remind us Ellen what Durham County what revenue we have given to go triangle one of the um >> rental >> the rental tax uh yeah so um there's a vehicle rental tax that has been levied by go triangle for many years predating the transit plan um the original transit

plan did dedicate half of that money to the counties for programming in the transit plan um and so we for many for I don't a decade or so we've had incorporated that >> right >> um with the 23 interlocal agreement um we stated that the decision on the future of that would be a decision of the go triangle board and the go triangle board has decided to retain that funding >> right >> so that has been taken out of the model and is not included >> I I just want to note that because you know with go triangle saying that they need more money for their operation ations that we have given Go Triangle more revenue for for operations. Um, and you know, just because I've been sitting here for for a while, we told the residents of Durham when we passed this half cent sales tax that it was to support

specifically improved transit, but also specifically for large investments, regional transportation investments. and the fact that we've gone from 85% for regional and fast regional connections down to 26% in this plan and that if we actually moved forward with I think I saw that some of the quote unquote partners are asking us to reduce the 26% for quick and reliable regional connections is very disturbing and concerning to me when we were the majority of this funding is already going now to what we heard from the community to increase uh improve bus transportation improve more routes you know more reliable um transportation uh transit um I

absolutely will not support reducing the this 26% any further that is what is going that fund things like BRT or if we can do more passenger rail. Um, and what I'm really concerned is when you go to that, can you go back to that pie chart in the beginning? Um, where you show that between the 2023 transit plan, okay, this is a huge red flag to me. When we look at operations and maintenance, originally it was 5%, we've already doubled that to 10%.

And what has been reduced is the more routes going more places, which is what the community said they wanted. The community wants more bus service, better bus service. And so for the city of Durham to then come and ask us for I'm trying I'm flipping between the

slides here. 7 million for their operations and maintenance facilities. This money was not meant to be providing all the transportation services for the city of Durham. And if they have understand our financial model, um, which you have on one of the slides, they know how much money that we have every year.

And so it is concerning for me to have these types of requests from the city of Durham for the Fagetville quarter 22 million. I would like to know what is the city of Durham contributing to the Fagetville corridor. What are they providing for their own operations and maintenance facilities? And I I would really like to know um you know when you talk about policies, what are what are our policies around cost

share and for finding other funding sources because the city of Durham cannot look to us to fund their transportation services. That is not the purpose of the Durham County transit tax. And um again, I I will not support any change to our current plan. 2 million available that could be considered for additional funding.

2 $2 million. But going forward, we definitely need to have some understanding with our partners about what this funding is for. Um, and I'm I'm not going to give up on what what you say we can continue doing in

the plan. Um, which is investing in all of these different routes. >> Thank you, Commissioner J. >> Yeah, I'm going to stop, but I, as you can see, I'm very upset about this.

I want to make sure we give time to Commissioner Valentine to ask questions, too. >> I will stop. >> Madam Vice Chair, you you're too kind. >> Yes.

[laughter] >> Let me first say that I'm not in favor of any transit plan amendment, but what I am in favor of is our our current existing plan. Uh second, I support our current um BRT commitments and to the extent that they are part of our model and I believe they are um I'm in support of that. Thirdly, uh I've been looking at this since uh sometime in November, probably after Thanksgiving. Um, our partners know exactly what our financial situation is. And pigging back uh pigging back uh on what uh

Commissioner Jacobs discussed, where do they believe the money is coming from to support these additional projects? Like how do how do they view this whole situation? Can you give me some insight into that? I mean we do have many meetings, staff meetings where we've reviewed this um both staff working group meetings and then many um workg groupoup kind of meetings in between those meetings.

So um they have seen all of the modeling um you know we develop the CIP and myop every year we ask for updates and try to make sure that we're incorporating the latest cost. Um I um I'm sorry. What would the [laughter] question? >> No, I'm I'm just trying to figure out our partners like where do they think this money is coming from? Yeah, I mean I think that we have been fortunate for many years that revenues have come in stronger than expected and I think people kind of got used to that and and saw that there was an opening and we have been you know as we've stated um as

money has been available we have programmed it you know we we aren't just sitting on it we aren't just putting it in the bank in the fund balance you know we've tried to make sure that we can program new projects every year um so I I think that this year just represents a significant change in terms of the revenues compared to the last few years. >> Well, I merely asked you that question. I knew the answer, but I'm I think it's important that we get that information out uh to our our residents. 2 million.

>> And I yield. >> Wonderful. Thank you, Commissioner Valentine. Um, for me, I know we had our long discussion and I got to ask a lot of the questions that I really had there. For me, I also don't support changing it in any way that's been presented here. What I have brought up to the transit team as well as I've talked to my other colleagues on the commission is not a change of any reductions, but actually that we should

pursue another transit tax amendment on a ballot for these additional expenses that exist for the city. And I know that would require us going to the state legislature and getting approval, but I think that is something that we should be considering because I don't think we should be cutting. I think we need more. That's the reality and would like us to have a conversation about that and then maybe in the next joint city county about how do we get that process started of getting a ballot measure.

>> Yes, Commissioner Burton. Yeah, that's why I wanted to listen to my colleagues because I was very skittish about we we need to do BRT. Um, our residents really have been asking for that and so I was really reticent about okay us not doing that. So, I'm really glad that I heard from you all and I was thinking about the same thing about getting another transit tax on the ballot. I'm just wondering have I don't know Wendy, you probably know this. Have we reached our

limit? I don't know if there's a limit to an amount. I know Charlotte Meck Me Meckllinburgg County did one. So, yeah, we we can go we can um I mean there's been talk at the um Triangle West TPO.

I mean, we've got our director here um Doug Plazinski. Um we we certainly were waiting to see what would happen and in Charlotte Meckllinmberg um with their MO and and they were successful um in getting an additional um is it a half cent or 1 cent 1 cent um and it the way it it can also be used for roads so it's not just for transit it's actually also for road construction um and So yeah, there's definitely been conversation talking regionally with um Wake County as well, Campo about us. Um I think it's something we

would just we'd want to work together with our other MPOs on um working together on moving forward with that. Um but that our our MTP that we're working on now the 2055 um it it actually um the assumption is that we have additional the h that we have a 1% additional transit tax uh for funding things. So it assumes that we have that funding. Um, so yes, absolutely.

Um, I agree with what's been said that we need additional funding. Um, and I don't know if Ellen if you have any more comments about that or Doug if you want to comment on the pursuing additional transit tax funding referendum. And also while you're coming up Doug for the roads I know the Meckllinmberg their new one is like the legislature allowed

them to pass the tax but it's like majority of the projects have to be road. Does that allow for because obviously with BRT there is road construction involved with BRT that is that construction applicable to those road requirements that the state Go ahead Doug. >> There we go. Um yes, there is a ground swell of new thought and discussion around uh additional referendum for sales tax to improve transportation across uh the entire region. Um, I think Wake is very serious about moving forward on that referendum and I would suggest that it would be when they move forward, it would be ripe for Orange and Durham counties to also consider how that would uh fair it at the the ballot box. Um, and yes, the funds would be available uh because they're locally generated funds to really improve transportation.

However, we we can they are not limited by any sort of program assignment. It would be the language on the ballot that would stipulate it. >> I thought the Meckllinburgg one that when the legislature approved them doing it, there was some sort of language in there about majority of it had to be like for highways or roadways. >> Yes.

Exactly. They that we would put it in the language. Um, and there are many more than these three counties across the state that are looking for statewide enabling enabling legislation or uh locally advanced legislation to make this happen. >> And so if we did have that stipulation from the state for us of like it has to be roadways, but like us, we would have to expand and move and shift our roads to uh accommodate bus rapid transit. So that would be road Exactly. Now, of course, if we engage federal resources through their standard programming, a lot of those costs would

be eligible for federal reimbursement, at least at a 50-50 rate, >> right? And I can just add um you know even with the funding we have right now that 26% for quick and reliable regional connections um there there we are looking through the bus rapid transit vision plan at how we could coordinate with NC do on some of their upcoming projects you know such as on 15501 or 885 of how to incorporate bus facilities with those projects. So there to your point there is a relationship right that if we're going to um widen or improve a road there's that is the appropriate time to incorporate transit facilities it'll be most efficient to coordinate those two efforts. >> Commissioner Valentine. >> Yes. So my question is that there is a lot of movement uh on this enabling statute uh moving forward but the

reality is it took Meckllinburgg County 8 to 10 years to get this done. And so while we're having this discussion I just want to make sure that we're having it in the proper context unless you see a landscape for this to move on a fast track. Do you see that? >> I'm attempting to plug in more to what the landscape and appetite is at the legislature.

I know it's part of our work program upcoming in the fiscal year 27. We will we have been approved and will be engaging uh lobbying services outside of our um fed federally backed work program. And I anticipate at least at some point um clarifying that and being able to use those resources to advance interest at the legislature. Um we still have to work through the process, but I can also uh do a little checking and get back to the commission on uh what people think

the current appetite is going into the next session. >> Uh thank you for that response. Uh, I think that even information that we may have available sometimes is more more important for me to have that information get out to our residents. And so that's why I I asked that question that way.

Thank you so much. >> And I guess I to add to that, you know, I going to various conferences and hearing um some of the state legislators speak on transportation items or NC DOT staff. I will say that I do hear increasingly an interest in um pushing more of the cost to local funding sources, right, which I think you guys all experience in other fields here as well, right? And so the same thing seems to be applying at the state level to transportation is more of a how how can we fund more things locally. >> Yeah. And I I think that again looking at our um 2055 MTP which

we coordinate with Campo on is the vision of joining together you know the Chapel Hill BRT you know we're just kind of getting started in Durham and then Wake County's BRT. It is. That's why it is so important that we do not change our Durham County work plan and our Durham County transit plan because it is very shortsighted for us not to keep working on the regional transit connections. The projections about future job growth is that the majority of jobs will be in Wake County. And if we are not planning and working right now on making sure that Durham residents can get to jobs quickly, efficiently, conveniently in places like RTP and Wake County, then we are really doing a disservice for the future Dur residents of Durham.

>> I believe you going to provide further. Okay. Okay. Can there any other comments?

Okay. I just wanted to thank Ellen and the team and everyone for sharing today. It was important for us to uh remind the board of the framework. We don't improve this often and the complexities of them are tremendous and the budget challenge is unfortunately a familiar story that you're seeing across the board as we do our work. Um I know there are some points that were point um shared as far as timelines to share back with us. And Ellen, if you don't mind just flashing that back on the screen as a reminder to the board, there will be follow-up conversations um coming back to the board in a couple of months um after public input occurs.

But between now and then, I'm sure you will outline your thoughts beyond what you share today as far as prioritization as um Ellen and the team work with our counterparts to bring forth a balanced plan. >> Yeah, thank you. Uh yes, as shown, uh we'll be back in March with a draft work program and then back again for approval uh in late spring, May. I saw this earlier.

I presented u this earlier and uh it's going to be some tough uh we're in a tough situation here. So yeah, but that's what we're elected for is to make the tough decisions. Okay. All right.

Thank you all very much. I appreciate it. >> Yep. The next item on our agenda um is

um because this is a work in lunch, we can continue forward 26007 which is an ordinance for RV parking amendment. >> Morning commissioners or afternoon I guess it's afternoon now. Yeah. I'm Scott Whiteitman with the Planning and Development Department.

Um, this is a text amendment that will be on your January 26 meeting. It's a staff initiated request to amend the parking standards for recreational vehicles in residential districts. 3 in residential zoning districts. Recreational vehicles such as boats, campers, trailers, and utility trailers shall be stored off the street and shall be located to the rear of the primary structure. The intent of this regulation is to reduce visual clutter of large vehicles

and residential areas and to prevent parked vehicles from blocking sidewalks or streets. However, the provision can be severely limiting to many property owners since the driveways typically do not extend behind the rear of the primary structure and [snorts] many homes do not have sufficient space for RV storage in the rear yard. As currently drafted, the new UDO would remove this regulation, but in the meantime, numerous violations of this provision have been identified in the past several months. rather than citing multiple property owners uh for a violation that would no longer be applicable when the new UDEO is effective um if all goes well by July 1st of 2026. 3 that would allow RV parking on a driveway at least 25 ft from the public rideway. 3E have been stayed pending

the outcome of this UDO text amendment. Should TC2502 not be adopted, notices of violation will be enforced on any property that is not currently in compliance. Uh the planning commission heard this amendment at their December meeting and recommended approval unanimously. I'd be happy to answer any questions from the board.

Any questions for my colleagues? Because so just for clarification, so someone um currently now has an RV like in the front just the front of the house. uh the amendment would uh suggest or say that it needs to be 25 feet, you know, like away from the >> the rideway. >> So, currently, if you owned an RV, it would basically have to be parked in a

garage or behind your house. So, your driveway would have to extend all the way behind the house, right? >> So, this would allow it on the driveway as long as you park at least 25 ft away from the street. So you would need a longer driveway, but it would allow more flexibility into where someone could park an RV so they don't have to put it behind their structure.

>> So can you define define an RV? Is it So I know there's different types, right? There's some you pull is would that be an RV as well or >> It would be an RV. Yeah.

>> Drive as well. >> Trailers or ones that go I don't go on their own. Okay. >> Thank you.

>> Any Go ahead. Um, Commissioner Valentine. >> I just Yes. Thank you, Chair.

>> So, I have folks that have talked to me actually about this issue who have boats, which is covered under >> Yeah. boats. This would include boats. >> Yes. And so, they don't generally have

it in their parking space or on the street. And it's usually not there overnight. they come and they uh they park it on their on their property and then by the next morning it's gone. Um but they seem to run a foul of this particular rule.

What what do we do about that that class of people? Because I know quite a few people where this is the uh the situation. I'm just I'm just curious. >> So there there people who are currently um they have a boat and they're >> they currently have a boat. they they stage it somewhere else but when they're going to go out that they bring it to the house so the next morning they can just proceed >> to their activity and it seems to cause a lot of constrnation in several not only governmental entities but also the HOAs which is really the subject matter of of our conversation per se >> but what what do we do about the this class of the people let's see is there a

temp is there a time limit Yeah. So, there is no time limit or kind of time exemption. So, if you park your boat in your yard or [snorts] in the in front of your house for even a short amount of time, you would be in violation of this ordinance. Although, typically when we enforce we the remedy is to just move >> the vehicle.

So, that's a pretty easy thing to Okay, >> you already have a place to put it, but yet this provision would apply to that. And so if you don't feel it goes far enough to accommodate that situation, that'd be good some good feedback to have. >> Okay. >> Consider consider that feedback.

>> All right. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. >> So what what supersedes homeowner associations or this? Homeowners associations would be that's a private contract between the homeowner and [snorts] the organization that enforces their covenants.

>> Uh Boinsky, Planning and Development Department. I just wanted to appreciate the comment on the sort of the time frame. We would just want to recognize, you know, while we're discussing uh in enforcing on time frame like that, let's say we included a 24-hour provision or or whatever, you know, whatever you all decide, uh that's pretty difficult to enforce because then it becomes a bit of a a cat-and- mouse with our enforcement staff and uh the boat owner. So, um we can certainly uh accommodate language like that, but the enforceability would be difficult.

just really quickly. So going back to the um the rules that supersede homeowners association supersedes this. So this is essentially just for people who are not in a homeowners association like who do who don't have home homeowners associations. >> That's correct. Yeah. and not maybe not every homeowners association would regulate this, but um so it would be

any any area that does not have a homeowners association or where the homeowners association doesn't have regulations on RVs, this would allow that. If the homeowners association does have rules regarding RV parking, then those would still apply. >> Okay. Uh Commissioner Jacobs.

>> Yeah. I just want to emphasize the reason that we're doing this now is because in the new UDO, this is not something that is going to be regulated um the way it has in the past. So, it's really important to just understand, you know, the reason why the planning commission afforded this, the joint city county planning committee supported moving forward with the language change right now is because it's going to be proposed in the new UDO anyway. Um, and this is, you know, it's not something that we want our staff to be spending a lot of time on regulating right now when

when we're going to be changing this um in the future. So, and we're just adding the language that um again, it says um on a driveway or or being parked at least 25 ft from the public right away, it would be allowable. So anyway, I support moving forward with this and I I'm just Would this be on our consent agenda? Is that what or are we supposed to vote on this today?

>> This would require a public hearing. So you would public hearing. >> So this will be on your January 26th agenda. >> Okay, got it.

Okay, thank you. >> Okay, any other questions? >> All right, thank you very much. I have a feeling that you all will probably still stay for our next agenda item um which is the uh new UDO update.

Welcome. >> All right. Good afternoon, commissioners. Once again, Bod Brinsky, plan development department with me.

I've got Robin Schultz, principal planner, Lisa Miller, principal planner, and uh I brought the director, Sarah Young, as well. Uh we'll be um providing an update to you on the new unified development ordinance. So, just a little bit about the structure of the project. Um we've uh contracted with a technical consultant code studio who's worked on um the drafting of the language and the the code itself.

Uh we worked with uh Tuana Allen on equitable engagement who has worked with engagement ambassadors um and really have some focus targeted engagement with uh typically under or previously underrepresented communities. um planning staff, folks in front of you today and others uh have worked on project management itself uh certainly some of the text and broader engagement efforts. I'll also note that we've had

uh significant support from some of you as a part of the joint city county plan committee that has uh served as a bit of a steering committee for for this project. uh talk a little bit about the time frame. Um so fall of 24 um yes it's been going on uh a bit of time. Um so fall 24 uh we began releasing uh the parts of the ordinance the proposed ordinance that we called modules.

Um so for the first module included zoning districts, maps, uses uh in the spring of um 25 we did development standards which these are standards that apply across uh the jurisdiction. Uh fall or this past fall um we released subdivision standards and infrastructure requirements. Uh this also included environmental regulations. um moving

into 2026 and in the coming weeks and months um we will be releasing uh the full draft which will include all of the uh previously mentioned components and uh administrative sections. So, uh starting um today obviously we're updating uh you all uh with the um new ordinance. We will be uh presenting uh the same presentation to city council at their work session later this week. Um over the next month or two, we'll be engaging with the community uh and conducting outreach um regarding the sort of the process for adoption um for uh the new UDO and of course the potential resoning of the entire county. Um there is a special meeting with the plane commission scheduled for February 24th uh and public hearing. They will uh once again meet on the um

the item in on March 10th. Plan commission. Uh we've scheduled a joint public hearing between uh city council and you all county commissioners in April. Um and then the following month we will bring uh a complete version uh of the new ordinance uh to both bodies uh in May.

We're going to start the presentation off uh talking a bit about um sort of what the purpose of the new new code is. Um so the new UDO is will be the biggest tool in implementing the comprehensive plan. You'll hear us uh say that quite a bit um this afternoon and of course uh up all the way up until May as mentioned. Um so the the comprehensive plan which of course uh was adopted uh fall of 23 was a culmination of four years of engagement with uh community members and residents uh with uh very

deliberate engagement with u previously underrepresented populations and and those voices really went into uh a visionary document um about how we wanted to see uh Durham grow and how to handle that growth. Um, one thing to note is the comprehensive plan itself uh is not a regulatory document and so that is where the UDO comes in. Um, the UDO will be how we implement many of the policies and action items and themes uh throughout uh the comp plan itself. There's uh 30 action items that actually um reference uh revising the the UDO um and one of them specifically speaks to uh creating new districts that correspond with the place type map that was adopted as a part of the comprehensive plan. So the the place type map uh replaced our uh land use map. it was a little more comprehensive in terms of how we wanted to see um a

particular property uh grow or or maintain. You know, obviously we have a lot of existing um development. And so the UDO is is or the UDO's new zoning districts uh will correspond with the place type. So, uh, some of the project goals, um, specifically, uh, again, it correspond with, um, the adopted comprehensive plan, housing choice and affordability.

Um, so the code, the new code will allow for a mix of housing types, uh, throughout Durham. Um, it will encourage uh, the creation of more affordable housing. Uh it will uh provide regulations that will help facilitate uh transit oriented more pedestrian friendly development while we continue to preserve um our existing character in Durham. Uh increased open space requirements uh regulations that will help protect our existing tree canopy and promote uh additional canopy in the future. uh

promoting sustainable development as we continue to densify or allow more intense development uh in particular locations. Um and consistent with the growth management strategy in the conference plan uh concentrate growth inside the UGB while preserving uh more rural areas outside of the UGB. Uh essentially uh grow up and in um and not uh continuing to to grow out. Uh one um other uh really exciting aspect uh of the project for I think certainly staff but hopefully others uh the new UDO um we really worked with the consultant to ensure that the code is more uh usable u it is more accessible um this is done through uh the expansion of use of graphics and tables and charts um you you'll see an example later on a different slide uh but really just trying to make it um easy to use for for for all uh residents uh applicants um

staff you all decision makers. uh consolidating zoning districts. And so just having um you know our current code we have uh multiple zoning districts that essentially allow the same development. You know consolidating where we can um emphasizing the form of the development you know how it actually impacts the public space or adjoining properties and not necessarily uh looking at density number and then um making sure that the code itself uh has has little little discretion and is very predictable.

Um and so that uh when we adopt the code or when a development comes in um the community residents uh we all know what type of development to expect. [snorts] So uh the types of regulations that are in the unified development ordinance uh both existing and proposed. You know this these uh regulations include application types, application processes, the public notice requirements and processes. Uh which entities have particular authority um to

approve particular applications. Uh much of this um obviously is in line with uh state statutes. Um it also includes our enforcement um processes. So, uh, it includes the zoning map itself as well as the zoning districts and their standards.

Um, some things that the UDO itself does not regulate. Uh, it is not the building code which include includes accessibility code. Um, it is not minimum housing. Uh, there are other um codes that impact development such as storm water code that the UDO does not include.

They sort of work work in concert in conjunction. Um so that's just something to keep in mind. Uh you know though it is a very uh large dense document with a lot of rules and regulations there are many many others um that development also have to to meet. Um couple things UDO can cannot do some regulations that that we cannot impose. Uh we cannot um require

architectural design elements on uh any development using residential code. So uh between one and four units. Uh we also uh are not legally allowed to require affordable housing or have any regulations that um speak to the the the cost of of housing. Uh you will see in the ordinance that there are um some optional standards and some incentives that speak to to both of these uh requirements.

>> Hey Bo, um could you pull the the microphone closer? >> Sure. Yeah. Um, is this better?

>> Yeah. >> So, speaking to the types of rules and regulations that are in the UDO, uh, the lot size, building size and building placement. So, how large a building can be, where it can go on a particular property, and how large that property itself can uh be subdivided to be. uh

the exterior um windows and doors uh entry features uh other design elements. Again, this is only for non-residential or uh apartment buildings. Uh the use and density. So like what type what types of uses um and how many dwelling units are allowed on on the property.

And then of course site design. So the the location of parking, dimensions of parking, uh circulation access, uh solid solid waste location and screening requirements, uh open space, street coverage, other um site layout requirements. So, uh, as I said, in the fall of 24, we released the first module that this included the zoning districts, uh, a proposed zoning map, and, uh, a draft of the use table. And here's a list of of the new proposed zoning districts. Um, I get into detail

on a few of these more, but you'll see incorporating some mixeduse districts, RX and CX. uh residential RA uh RB RCRD um a suite of commercial districts. You'll see uh only one of these is actually um sort of a repeat carryover um with different standards and that's being commercial neighborhood uh and also commercial general. Um two new districts I'll just highlight or three um civic park and conservation. um conservation zoning district being uh completely new in that um very very low development expected in in that district and uh so so that's uh meeting some of the uh goals of the comprehensive plan in terms of um you know right now if that was the situation it would just be zoned another district and uh the regulations wouldn't necessarily align with how we expect the property to develop or or not develop. um park and civic uh both instances where um we'll

have a district that better aligns with how we expect the uh property to develop. >> So just keep in mind um the these district standards um are intended to align with the place type and in doing so uh they include the uh height intensity setback slot size essentially what does it look like? Um the use table, this is, you know, what uses are allowed to to be there. Um what activities uh can can go on.

And then the zoning map itself, uh this is, you know, where that district is mapped and and how uh those regulations would would impact it. So this is uh just an example when I talked about the code being simpler. Um this is uh the district standards for the RB uh zoning district uh residential suburban um which is substantially similar to the existing RS20. Uh you'll see all of the uh zoning

requirements here in terms of uh lot or uh massing and um placement of a building all just on these two pages. I've been telling folks when we uh go out um and engage with uh the community on this project that the uh currently if you had an RS20 property and you wanted to know your setbacks, I I would potentially have to look at uh three or four different spots in the current UDO to give the answers that are shown just right here. And so just from a usability standpoint, this is night and day better. Um the RB district again like I said is is uh very much a a bit of a translational district from the RS20.

So we've uh we had released the use table um in the fall of last year. We've we've since made some updates. Uh a lot of these updates were made um after engaging with uh community members, residents, various stakeholders, and I'll speak to a few of those now. Um,

one of those being, uh, we incorporated an allowance for neighborhood scale non-residential in the RD district. Um, one of the, uh, goals of the conference of plan is to, you know, and this touches a lot of a lot of other policies, but we, you know, we really want to see, uh, more walkable neighborhoods, which uh, we we get at that with the mixeduse districts, but in the RD, you know, in our established residential place type, we also want to make sure that we've got um, accessible non-residential, so folks don't have to get in a car and and drive um, to to get to all the places that they need. Well, uh we we know that there the availability of land um where commercial is viable or where a uh a land owner potentially wants to sell. Um we don't control that.

And so one of the strategies we want to open up the maximum number of opportunities for smallcale commercial. We want to make it um remove all barriers for that type of development. Um and and the closer to

the residential the better in the interest of uh walkability and transit access. And so we've uh included an allowance for uh small rotten non-residential in RD district with a minor special use permit approved by the board of adjustment. Um another change that we had made after engaging with community uh was increasing the allowance for agricultural uses. It's actually greater u with the new UDO than it is today.

Um, one change that we've made, and this has been something that we've we've had made some modifications with various text amendments over the last few years, but we've really uh recognized that uh quasi judicial decisions at times um aren't necessarily the most equitable uh process certainly for residents. And so, um, in situations for developments that are high impact, um, and I'll just use the example of a school, um, the development, uh, if it wasn't already zoned appropriately, um, would have to reszone to the civic zoning district. Um

this will fair out in a more equitable uh process approval process um where input from the community um can be heard in a an easier to navigate process rather than um the quasi judicial which tends to uh benefit um applicants based on uh the time frame. And then obviously one change with the use table um we had a lot of limit use standards that were tied to uh the tiers themselves. is uh the new zoning map doesn't include tiers. We don't include that sort of concentric model that we previously had.

So the the proposed zing districts um that we went over uh these are translated um directly from the play site map. Uh to the best of our ability, most of them line up. We'll talk a little bit more about uh where there's some variation, but you'll see that the established res residential place type uh includes the RB, the RD, and the RX3 districts. Our

transit opportunity areas, the areas along transit corridors, uh CX3, CX5, CX8, this is a commercial mixuse district, uh the neighborhood services. Um this is, you know, the small scale uh commercial we talked about and this was originally where we thought um it would be intended. CX365 in that commercial neighborhood district. So the um proposed zoning map has been available uh at engage Durham.

You'll see you'll see here we can pull up and look at uh any property and uh see what the current zoning is and the the uh proposed zoning. Um again it it lines up with the adopted play stack for for that property. Uh this is a tool that's been available uh for over a year. Um and I I'll talk more a little bit later at towards the end, but uh we've engaged with with folks uh both during our office hours and also uh received a lot of map uh feedback in in real time where

they could point to a specific property. And and this was really just in the interest of uh obtaining feedback from community members, ensuring that we've got um that we're doing our best to align the district with the place type. There we go. So now we'll uh move into a section where we'll talk a bit about uh how we're implementing the comprehensive plan through the UDO um project.

Uh we'll talk first about housing. um you know how will the UDO align with affordable housing goals and the urban growth boundary. Then we'll speak to transportation uh how the UDO supports uh vision zero and the 15-minute communities framework. Uh then we'll talk about uh environment uh how will the new UDO incentivize sustainable development and the protection of natural resources. And then uh following that we've got some uh isolated issues just to to daylight. So, in regards to housing, um there's uh

the the adopted comprehensive plan um you know has a lot of uh policies and action items and uh growth strategies that all directly speak to housing. So, in in the comp plan, um we talk about focusing development within the urban growth boundary um including more infill units within areas that have existing infrastructure. Uh we talk about a mix of housing types and densities in new neighborhoods along with supportive non-residential uses and pedestrian friendly design. I talked about the non-residential uses a bit already um in these uh existing neighborhoods and we'll talk a bit about uh encouraging a mix of housing types.

Uh the retrofit of aging and vacant shopping centers um changing them to mixeduse transit supported developments that also include housing. Uh currently many of them uh just include a whole lot of empty surface parking lots. Uh the incremental change of existing neighborhoods to incorporate a variety of housing options with the mix of units, heights, and densities. Uh really just the inclusion of new uses that provide accessibility to daily needs that fit in with the

scale of the neighborhood. Uh complaint also speaks to uh creating effective incentive structures for affordable housing uh for both new and infill development proposals. So uh now we'll speak to how the new UDO um tries to to get at those concepts. Uh focusing development within the UGB uh to utilize existing infrastructure protecting the wersheds rural areas.

Uh this is being done uh through the mapping um obviously by having our uh more rural zoning districts RA outside the UGB as well as the conservation. Um [clears throat] a primary mechanism though um RD residential district and the CX and RX M mixeduse districts. Um we will be providing height and density incentives for both compact and affordable units uh throughout these districts the RDCX and RX. Uh these mixeduse districts will focus density along existing high frequency transit

corridors. So the RA zoning district you'll see in the green um residential preserve. This is substantially similar to our uh current rural residential and you'll see as this outside the UGB um threeacre lot size uh you know rural uses agriculture uses single family um the RB residential suburban again this is similar to the RS20 you'll see that in the yellow >> I have a quick question what is the all the white on the map. I was looking at this last night.

Was wondering what is the white? >> Um, a lot of Go ahead. Um, so white is anything that essentially is not one of those four. But I will say that in the county a lot of that white is going to be conservation because a lot of that is going to be Army Corps land or um

surrounding the the watersheds. >> I I think it would be important to have something that explains what the white is on the key. Sure. >> Okay.

Thank you. Because some of there's white within the urban growth boundary and there's white outside of the urban growth boundary. >> Yep. Let me see.

RTP too. Um the RC uh manufactured home park district. Um certainly uh coming from a comprehensive plan uh encouraging the preservation of our existing uh mobile homes as that's uh a lot of our our a significant amount of naturally occurring affordable housing. Um so creating the RC district uh to help um preserve uh the housing type.

And then the we have the RD uh residential neighborhood. This is uh very similar to our current RU5 or RU52 zoning districts. Um this is much of the

established residential place type. Uh and you'll see um we had there was a item that had gone to the joint city county planning committee um where we talked about uh where they there was an increase of allowable density. Much of the increased allowable density is uh in the uh changes from RS20 to that RD. you'll see and you'll see in that the blue areas.

So, let's talk a bit about the RD district itself. Um, so what you see here, uh, option one is the base. Um, so these are the the standard requirements for the RD district. If someone comes into our uh customer service center and asks questions about their setbacks or uh what they can build on a particular RD lot, this would be the the sort of buy right option that they they could build in order to incentivize uh either smaller units or uh more affordable

units. Um there are two other standards that they could opt in. There's the option two compact where a an applicant or developer or homeowner could uh choose to develop the property and commit to smaller unit sizes and they then have a greater density that they can build. There would be no affordable or affordability requirement with this aspect.

However, the smaller units uh by nature of um sort of the cost per square foot of housing um these units would be uh more affordable than um the standard base unit uh just due to the the size requirements. This is modeled after our current um small house small lot provisions. Uh one distinction here is uh though you see an example with four lots on that one side street um there's a lot of flexibility uh as

you all know um our existing parcels aren't all gritted and with you know perfectly 75150 lots or 55150 lots and so uh the particular way that um those units could be constructed could vary. They could be it could be a multiplex or it could be um just two structures. So just keep that in mind as you as you look at this. Uh the other option um is the affordable option and this would be uh as it's currently um drafted uh it's proposed if 8% of the units are at 80% AMI or if 4% of the units are at 30% AMI or affordable uh to someone at 30% AMI then you can choose the standards in option three which are even more advantageous. Um this of course uh is you know by sort of allowing such density with the affordable units offered that the uh idea is to encourage the construction of affordable units. Um for background we currently have an

affordable housing density bonus and and different variations. um it has been seldom used uh and that is uh at a percentage of uh 15%. Um as I spoke to uh earlier the RD district um aligns with the RU R5 most closely. Um it has the compact option and small op option.

Um with so the expanding house or I'm sorry the small lot small house option um really is similar uh to what the RD2 would be the compact. Um the affordable option would uh be a significant more density but the trade-off there of course is is getting affordable units um that are provided by by the market um without without subsidy. Uh Durham's current zoning districts are mapped across a gradient uh concentric development. Um like like I spoke to

about the tiers earlier. Uh so the implementation of the RD district represents the largest potential increase in density. Uh really you'll see this in the darker blue sort of towards the boundary of the city limits. Um where you have the the stark difference from RS20 uh to the RD.

again that this is um consistent with uh the comprehensive plan as I spoke to earlier in terms of introducing different housing types, removing barriers uh for the construction of different housing types uh densifying within the um urban growth boundary and of course uh those options that will encourage either lowerc cost housing or affordable housing that's income restricted in in uh all areas of Durham. Oh, I have a quick question about that map. How [clears throat] did you all figure this something like this out? Like, did staff literally go through lot by lot? >> Um, I mean, h how did you come up with

because a lot of these overlays where you're trying to show the impact. Um, I I was I was looking again looking at them last night. I'm try I'm just trying to figure out how did you come up with this type of analysis? >> Yeah.

So for this one we know that the RD is roughly um I think it's eight units per acre thereabouts. Um and so this is really a gradient of density. Um this isn't a specific lot by lot analysis right because there are certain lots which could not build to that density due to you know environmental features and existing structure or what have you. So this is just in the sort of um sort of like best case scenario of like if you had a blank lot right now versus in the future, what would be the highest or greatest change rate? And so as Bose said, um the RD sort of matches pretty closely with what we see in the the urban tier already. And then as we start getting out when we have things like RS8, that zoning district, residential suburban 8, residential

suburban 10, right? then we start getting more change and we get more dense from those because those have a much lower um density per acre. So essentially what it is is just a map that's showing um a change in zoning um along a gradient. So right now uh it's generally like RU5, RS8, RS10, RS20, right?

Getting into that suburban style development and we're trying to sort of move [clears throat] away from that due to the the the direction from the conference plan. So, uh many parcels within the urban growth boundary and within the established residential place type are proposed to be RB instead of the RD. Uh this is due to their location outside of the city limits. Uh these parcels would require an annexation by the city to develop at the development intensity

associated with the RE district. Um so uh we're proposing that they um remain RB uh as that's consistent with with the established residential place type uh potentially and it's also consistent with uh how they would um developed today without access to water and sewer. uh many existing residential subdivisions uh may have private covenants um you know HOA [clears throat] rules that we talked about earlier this afternoon um that also might limit uh much of the um more intense development that the RD district would allow or the different housing types that the RD district would allow. Um we'll we'll just say that you know we certainly want to remove the barriers that we uh uh have control over.

Um and so um reducing or minimizing the the zoning barriers uh for providing the housing type that the comprehensive plan calls for is is the intent of the RD district. >> All right. Another question. So are you

so basically I think this is really important especially for the community. the parcels that you're highlighting in yellow, you are you saying that those most likely would need a resoning? >> Okay, >> that's correct. And I I think that's important because we've heard a we've heard misconceptions that there won't need to be resonings in the future and this clearly shows that there will continue to be resonings and where these projects have to come before the city council and the community will have input.

>> Thank you. And just one last thing to note on um sort of the RB district, you'll see that it doesn't include uh those incentive structures for the compact or affordable options. Um as we anticipate the RD district being where we'll see the mix of housing, um our RB is uh intended to be more suburban style development.

So, the new districts also include uh mixeduse districts, um which I think we're super excited about. Um doing much more than just replacing our our current mixed use district. Um the they're mapped to align with apartment townhouse, mixed residential, uh the downtown, and our transit opportunity area place types. Uh many of the these areas as I spoke to earlier are uh replacing low inensity commercial zoning districts um with a more intense commercial mixeduse district.

Um this will be to facilitate increased density disincentivize autocentric development uh along especially along existing transit corridors. Um similar to the RD district, there will be incentive structures for compact and affordable units. These mixed use districts include the the RX, CX, and IX. IX being um sort of an industrial mix um mapped mostly uh

thinking sort of um low impact industrial can mix with residential or some adaptive reuse of some existing um sites. Uh these these districts are more form more formbased in nature. uh regulating the number of units through height, not through a density count. Uh using design elements and lot coverage, you know, rather than just a x number per acre.

Um more pedestrian center design, so you know, prioritizing the way that pedestrians and and you know, the way that humans move through the site. Uh using a a build requirement along street frontage. Uh and um improving the pedestrian access standards. uh parking would not be allowed between the building and the street. Um requirements for uh or design requirements including active depth penetration uh entry requirements uh similar to um our form-based districts that we have in our current code uh which apply you know um downtown or night street or the uh recently adopted

um page Miami um would allow a mix of uses. So currently um the proposed tax doesn't require mandate particular uses but it does uh allow for a broad amount of them. Um really just trying to get uh more walkable neighborhoods, more transit friendly uh areas uh so folks can you know leave their home, leave their apartment and and access non-residential uses, the things that they need uh their their jobs. Um there is a requirement for ground flooror non-residentidential within the CX8 and CX20.

These of course are the most intense districts uh you know for example CX20 being uh the core of downtown um that that mirrors a similar requirement today. >> Before you you go to the next slide I just wanted to make a comment. Uh I tried to make it in real time just sort of >> kept kept moving that and that's fine. Um, but I just wanted to highlight my colleague had said under parcels that

are designated as RB that these parcels will require annexation to to to develop. That also means that if they're outside of the city limits, it's potentially county, not potentially, it's county. And so while they are decisions that go before the city council, they're not coming before this body. And I have talked to my colleagues about us taking back or potentially fighting to take back our equities in in this regard so that we can play a part in in those decisions.

And so I just wanted to highlight that for my colleagues. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, I had a question. So why so the city has the power to annex, correct?

So if there's a a parcel of of land that's in the county and they want to annex it into the city, they have that power, right? Yeah. That's where I think it

gets murky a little bit for me understanding that like how does the city if there's a piece of land that's in the county and it doesn't come before us like >> good afternoon Sarah Young with the planning and development department. So annexation obviously bringing a property into the corporate city limits of any city is a power only given to cities always been that way. Um what has changed over the years in terms of practice in Durham was that many decades ago now um developers would get their zoning through the county and then they would get water and sewer service from the city without being annexed. And so those cases, there were a lot of cases that came to the county and you know got their zoning um but then were

able to get served through the city. There were changes in state law, I think that happened in 2012, if I'm remembering correctly, um that changed uh the way that annexations work in the state of North Carolina. So that annexations, cities can only involuntarily annex through a referendum, which let's be realistic, no one's going to vote to be annexed in um into a city against their will. So, in essence, that change in state law made it so that it took away a city's ability to later annex properties um if for the purposes of of serving them they needed to, which had always been the city's thought when they would extend water sewer. Well, if we need to serve you, you know, in some future and we need to annex you to keep serving you, we could do that. when state law changed and they no longer had that as an option, the city changed their city code to only

allow annexation, I mean uh water sewer with annexation. So all that, you know, it's a series of kind of compounding things that happened at the same time that then changed and had ramifications on the land use side. Uh and which is why now everyone basically that uh you know wants to upzone has to get annexed into the city. You know what would help if that was like written out like >> I have that written out and I can send I can recirculate that.

>> That will be so helpful. Thank you so much Sarah. >> I would just like to say oh sorry am I? Yeah I think yeah what's important to note in that is that the when the city annexes I agree that like it would be nice for the county to have some input. I think I have me and Commissioner Valentine have talked about it that we have different ideas of what that input looks like. For me, I'm like functionally it would make more sense to

have a merged city county government. And I think that provides the opportunity for the county and county residents to have their voice and say in those annexation or not even annexation cases, it would just be cases. Um because then if we had a joint body, it was it would be made up of county electeds and city or county residents and city residents in one board um deciding development and uh resoning cases. So I hear you, Commissioner Valentine.

I'm on the other spectrum of that edge of yes, the county should have a voice in the sense of a merge government for just efficiency. I reserve comments for for later forum. >> Okay. Um continue please.

>> Thanks chair. Um so back to the the mixeduse districts uh the RX CX. um as

as I was saying uh substantially similar to um our existing formbbased code uh simplified I will say that um you know similar to the RB example I showed you earlier the standards themselves uh much more accessible um so I think it's a little bit easier to to know what type of development um is being is being permitted by the code and what to expect. So similar to RD uh the incentive structures are applied um here there couple couple differences. So you'll see um the uh RX3 58 those numbers correspond with the allowable base height. So RX3 um you're permitted to three stories of height, RX5, five stories of height, etc. Um, in the RX3, if you commit to 25% of your units being 450 square feet or smaller, uh, you get an additional two, uh, stories of height. Um, and you

can see going down the chart, um, incentivizing a a portion of those, um, apartments or condos to be smaller and and subsequently, um, more affordable. uh in regards to uh an incomerestricted um sort of capital A affordable uh bonus um if you provide 8% of the units at 60% AMI which is is uh different than the 80% in RD um then you uh you have unlimited height in these districts um and if you provide 4% at 30% AMI you have unlimited height in these districts and so again just encouraging um the the use of these affordable uh bonuses um in these districts where we already uh through the adopted place type map have uh as a community um agreed that we want to see uh more intense development, more walkable development uh and of course more more

housing to address the the housing need. So, uh, those are the, um, incentives for the the sort of the X districts. >> Just for my reference, the, um, we have two really tall buildings now, but, you know, like wherever they are, the one that just got finished and then the one here right in the middle. >> Mhm.

[clears throat] >> Would those be zoned as CX20? >> Yes, those are CX20. Okay. I just want just trying to put something with understanding here.

Okay. Thank you. >> Yep. Yeah. Mo most of the uh downtown area downtown tier um sort of the loop would be the CX20 and then CX8 for much of the the rest of our current downtown zoned. Um I also just wanted to add since some of us have the benefit of you know hearing this stuff multiple times um that the the idea or I think it's

important to talk about um the idea of the compact option what really informs this um code connect presented us with a lot of research around how to create naturally ly occurring affordable housing and how to um what the market shows is that when you have smaller units, they're more affordable. And this is a way to try to also increase supply. Um, again, this is from studying what's been happening in other cities around the United States that when you um when you build smaller and more, then you're going to again have present the option of having more affordable options for people. So, that's where that compact option is trying to get at.

So, I I just wanted and m maybe you could talk about that a little bit more. >> Yeah, Commissioner, I I will I'm glad you brought that up. um the uh consult

code studio of course did a lot of analysis looking at sort of the typical lot sizes and uh but what I will say is um there's a lot of communities looking at us you know in terms of expanding housing choice and sort of the successes um where the uh the number of units that have been created where you know you've got three or four dwelling units that are all um much lower than comparable market rate units in that neighborhood um being constructed in a place that either had uh no housing or maybe maybe one unit. And so, uh we really wanted to to carry carry that forward. Um recognizing it it's a a way for us though not to necessarily get the greatest quantity of units. I think we'll probably see that in the X districts. I think that's where we really see the density in those transit opportunity areas. Um, but it is a way for us to um have a a lower priced housing option in in these uh neighborhoods that uh typically is not being provided um by the market in any

other way. >> And I'll just add when I was in Portland um at the um transit and community conference um we toured neighborhoods a neighborhood in Portland. Were you with me on that B? Okay.

um where we saw this happening kind of the missing, you know, sometimes it's referred to also as missing middle, but also the idea that everyone should have the opportunity to live in desirable neighborhoods where there is already a lot of infrastructure, you know, parks or stores, walkable, you know, things like that. And this is also a way to um you know make make it equitable for people to be able to live in desirable places. Yeah, >> I really appreciate that.

I'll hand it over to Robin to speak on transportation and environment. >> Sorry, I took that while you were still talking. Um good afternoon y'all. Robin Schultz, planning and development department.

So B has covered of the big three, housing and I'll be covering transportation and the environment. Um speaking first on transportation, the the two sort of policy uh documents that we're really pulling from are obviously the comprehensive plan u but also the city's vision zero action plan uh which is the guide book for reducing any sort of traffic uh fatality to zero. Um and so directly [clears throat] within that vision zero action plan uh it calls for the UDO to have updated street crosssections and standards um that directly prioritize the safety of vulnerable uh road users. Um so those are folks who are walking, biking or using a mobility aid.

Um going back to the comprehensive plan um our guide book for everything uh it it certainly calls out the need for complete streets. So it aligns with the vision zero action plan in that way. Um some of those uh

complete street designs include things such as you know reducing vehicle uh travel lane widths uh in order to reduce speed um but also reduce the amount of time the pedestrians spend crossing those rights of way. Um you know trying to make sure that it's safe and comfortable for people who want to walk, bike, roll, reach transit, right? Like that that's a huge um delimiter is keeping folks uh from actually doing those things is making it easy and comfortable. um trying to make sure that they can do it if they so choose.

Um and then also, you know, making sure that we're increasing connectivity in our land use standards so that we're focusing more on the pedestrian experience, um you know, creating direct routes, reducing travel distances, uh and enhancing safety. So, when we're looking at the new UDO, um, we worked with, uh, Lauren Grove, who is the city's vision zero, uh, action coordinator, vision zero coordinator. I'm so sorry, Lauren, if you're watching this. Um, but essentially what we've done is create

uh, street sections for both neighborhoods and mixed use um, developments. Uh as part of the vision zero action plan uh there will be a street design manual which will be adopted sometime in 2027 or 2028 which will be comprehensive um and will have you know standards for all different types of streets. Um so as sort of a stop gap measure what we did was we worked with Lauren to come up with street sections um for the most commonly constructed rights of way. Uh and that's going to be for residential development, right?

So new neighborhoods, new apartments, things like that. So really focusing on both the neighborhood and the mixeduse street examples and drawing from both the comprehensive plan and the the NATO resolution which is the national association of city transportation officials. Um some of those features uh are going to be smaller lane widths you know ensuring that bicycle facilities are accounted for having wider planting merges for street trees um and making sure that the the standards for transit facilities are clear.

Um, additionally, some other things that we've done, um, we're retaining the street connectivity and block size standards that were recently passed. Um, we also have a new maximum block perimeter for sites which are 10 acres or greater outside of the UGB. Um, essentially what this is doing is trying to make sure that when folks are walking that they don't have to walk so far, right, to get places. Smaller blocks makes it easier for folks to get around um, and certainly decreases the need for vehicles.

Um, additionally, trying to, as B said, provide increased density and mixed use along those transit corridors, trying to keep people from having to be in a vehicle um if they don't if they don't need to, right? So, trying to really facilitate that 15minute community framework. Um, additionally, we worked um with Code Studio and Lauren to think about pedestrian friendly design uh especially in our development standards. So, really trying to reduce the overall amount of land that's dedicated to vehicles when we're uh having a new development. Right. So trying to put buildings closer to the street, right, so folks can um access

them directly from the sidewalk rather than walking through a parking lot. Um decreasing driveway widths, like once again um reducing the amount of time that pedestrians spend um in, you know, uh land that's dedicated towards vehicles. Um and as well as in uh introducing new types of required pedestrian access points uh for connectivity. Um so those are the sort of main uh goals that we sort of f uh focused around transportation.

Um sort of moving into the environment drawing from the comprehensive plan some of the the comprehensive plan says a lot about the environment but sort of picking out some of the major ones you know establishing 30% of Durham County as permanently conserved. Um retaining 55% tree canopy coverage within the city limits. um prioritize prioritizing preservation uh of existing trees where possible uh and native species of course um encouraging green infrastructure and innovative storm water management practices and specifically revising the

UDO to increase open space uh and our tree coverage standards. So when we were looking in uh in terms of writing the new UDO we really tried to focus right density within the new or sorry not within the new within the existing urban growth boundary right trying to make sure that we're getting towards that goal of 30% of the county being conserved. So trying to uh concentrate growth within the UGB uh additionally we created two new zoning districts that Bo mentioned earlier which would be the park and the conservation zoning districts. uh trying to further those strategic conservation and recreation planning goals.

Um we also retained existing standards for street trees, uh landscaping, masquerading and phase development. Um additionally, we did have we did add um Lake Creek to the high quality watershed standards within sedimentation erosion control, which does add a 20 acre grading limit to those as well. Um, we're also increasing the the species diversity requirements and native species incentives uh from the

existing UDO and we are also requiring the preservation of existing plant material whenever a landscape buffer is required. Um, right now it is only required in uh smaller instances. Um, I believe it's only when the the the buffer is 30 feet or greater. Um so we are saying that now anytime a landscape buffer is required if that plant material is there then it needs to stay.

Um some other uh items we are in terms of usability of the overall ordinance um we consolidated tree protection, tree coverage and open space. Um really trying to make it clear what to expect from a new development when they come through. Um so part of that also included expanding tree coverage. Um we have an existing neighborhood protection overlay, the Tuscaloosa Lakewood, uh which requires 7% tree coverage requ 7% tree coverage. Uh what we did was we took that and we've expanded it to all um RD parcels. Um which is a a huge

shift for us in terms of requiring tree coverage for infill. Um because as a reminder, tree coverage does not refer to landscaping. Uh tree coverage is uh conserved forest or replanted forest cover. Uh so doing that for infill parcels is is kind of a big deal.

Um we also removed conservation subdivisions from the ordinance and instead requiring that when those primary conservation areas exist on site that they be retained in any subdivision. Um and another thing that we've done is we've allowed for Pedmont prairies to count towards tree coverage requirements. Um, currently they would not count because they do not meet the 60% um, woody tree uh, composition um, because they're prairies, right? They're grass dominated.

Um, but they are an important part of our uh, ecological fabric. So, making sure that those can still count um, to make sure that they're protected um, is another thing that we've also added. Um we also expanded the list of elements

that we encounted towards open space standards uh including a new incentive for public art and public plazas and courtyards. Um that was directly from the comprehensive plan uh as well as from public engagement uh and a requirement for the preservation uh of natural and cultural resources. So taking some of the other things from conservation subdivisions uh and still including them in the ordinance. Um we've also established a sustainable development matrix uh which provides an array of options uh to hope hopefully help us identify more sustainably um some of the things that are in there going to be increased conservation measures.

So like increasing your riparian buffers etc. Um native landscaping, green storm water, community agriculture, building design, things that we keep hearing throughout engagement. Things that are also hard to require on their own. Um but when as part of a matrix as an option um give us a way or a pathway to uh see those as a development outcome, right? Um we also

have new standards for decreasing light trespass um especially when they're adjacent to natural areas. This has been something that we've heard a lot um from a variety of different stakeholders. So really trying to reduce the impact on wildlife especially aven populations um though also insects uh and uh direct uh action from the comprehensive plan. So as far as the riparian buffer section goes um as you all probably know a lot of this is uh from DEEQ or the department of environmental quality.

Um so we are retaining all of our existing uh riparian buffer protection standards and clarifying uh our jurisdictional review authority. Durham County sits um where we are both in the Jordan and the noose and those have different rules. Um so trying to rewrite this section and so that it's very clear who is doing what. Um because we have the review authority uh over the Jordan basin whereas the

state has it over the news basin. Um the state has also updated the news river basin standard. So we have up uh uh updated our UDO as well. Um additionally right now the lake Mickey little river district is divided into the A and B.

Um however B is further divided uh by what's called like the rural village designation which was part of the future land use map um which was uh um rendered defunct by the place type map. So we are doing the little uh sorry the Lake Mickey little river district C essentially following that same line that same designation um but instead making sure um not referencing the rural village designation since that no longer really exists. So just trying to make sure that we're not increasing the allowable impervious within uh that wershed protection overlay. Um but to be clear uh no impervious changes for any of the watershed protection overlays. Um, additionally, we worked with public

works and storm water. Um, though I guess that those departments are now called something else that I'm not going to try to remember right now. But essentially, uh, requires that, uh, steep slopes when they are reconstructed that the grade is actually much smaller. Um, trying to reduce downs slope erosion and further minimize grading and the removal of vegetation.

Um, and we're really grateful for them doing that work with us. Uh and so as part of this in module three, what we had our uh consultants do was um provide some examples, right? So it's really great to hear these things but actually see what a new neighborhood would look like, right? So this is a green field site um in this example, which is to say that it is previously undeveloped.

And so what you'll see on the left is going to be a plan view. Um you'll see new streets, lots, tree coverage, you'll see a stream in the back, uh as well as some storm water control measures. And on the right, um, you'll see some examples of what those actual structures could look like. So, you know, town homes in the

front with single family as well. Um, so in this example, you'll see mostly smaller single family. Um, this is the N2 street type or the second neighborhood street. It features both on street parking uh with alley loaded units uh as well as driveway access right there on the left.

Um you'll see that generally what we are not trying to do is have um two-way lanes and then uh on street parking on both sides, right? We're trying to keep the the lane with smaller, keep folks out of the ride of way wherever possible or decrease the right of way. So uh it should alternate. Um in this example, you'll see um two different street types. you'll see the neighborhood one uh which is sort of running north and neighborhood no excuse me neighborhood two running north neighborhood one along the south uh but more importantly you'll see that this is the RD2 or the compact option uh incorporated into the neighborhood so that's going to be the option with the smaller units so they were allowed this

density increase um so long as each one of these units was 1,200 f feet or smaller right so this is what it would look like to sort of uh to incorporate a cottage court style development within an existing neighborhood or as part of a neighborhood design. Um, so for this one, um, really wanted to focus on the RD3 or the affordable option, right? So, this is going to be it's going to have at least 8% of the units. So, in this one, I'm going to imagine it's probably eight units with one of those units being affordable um, incorporated within that neighborhood fabric.

And now I'm going to pass it over to Bo. So, uh just want to speak on a just a few issues. Um with the project itself, um one of them, uh just as we've said before, the new EDO is primary focused on implementing the comprehensive plan, right? Uh taking those adopted place types, uh and applying these new zoning districts to those place types so that we can have regulations that result in

the type of development that the community said that uh we wanted to see in each place type. Um this entails densification uh within the urban growth boundary. Um this uh also entails um based on some feedback that we had gotten from the JCCPC um you know implementing the comp plan uh through um through this through the resoning of uh of the county and city uh city's jurisdiction. Um, one sort of thing to note is that um, each uh, there's multiple zoning districts that may implement the vision of a particular um, place type.

There's multiple instances where that is the case. You'll see an example here on the slide. Um, you know, that there are multiple CX districts that would potentially be appropriate for a transit opportunity area place type. Um, so we've tried to take do our best and taking a look at each um, each property. Um that's why our engagement on the map is has been so helpful in terms of taking a taking a look and um

ensuring uh you know CX-5 is appropriate or CX8 um or CX3 CX20 right like some of the things we've already discussed um we we recognize that you know it's not a one district fits one place type uh in every instance um the same is true when we looked at uh in some instances with between RD and RX3 um when we start talking about allowing um mixed residential and and we'll continue to uh look for um feedback and direction um from you all moving forward um on on this particular issue. Uh another issue to highlight uh there was legislation passed uh a general assembly December of 2024 um this session law uh limited a local government's ability to or prohibited local government um from downzoning um a particular property. decreasing the density, reducing the number uh or types of permit uses or uh also creating any

non-conformance situations without authority from uh the said property owner. Um this impacted the project in a couple ways. One, uh the new development standards would um really only apply to new development, not not necessarily apply to um existing uh uses. Um it also means that we need to be careful uh while we are mapping these uh districts and um you know the example shown in the slide.

If you have a a parcel that's currently zoned commercial general in the urban tier they're allowed 55 ft in height um if we proposed uh CX3 on that parcel which I think would align with the place type or could could align with the place type um it would potentially be considered downing. So, um, we're spending a great deal of time trying to to navigate, um, that that particular legislation, but ensuring that, uh, we're not downzoning any any properties. Uh, Commissioner Jacobs was um, spot on

earlier uh, when she brought up uh, this particular issue. Um staff has also heard um sort of this misconception that the new EDO um would uh reduce public hearings or or change the the public hearing process. And so we just want to take a look at a couple things. um city city city council um their approval of annexations uh within the UGB those sort of yellow properties that we showed earlier um those would all go through um same process that they go today after the adoption of of the UDO um just showing you know the number of cases that are going before uh city council that include annexation you know it's it's roughly 50% of them or a little more than 50%. Um, so is a significant number of them. Uh, we also need to factor in uh that many times applicants are just choosing to uh change the zoning or place type based on their own uh merit.

Obviously, those would all go before public hearing in front of uh you all or city council as applicable. And then of course, as I mentioned earlier, uh new schools and places of worship, government facilities, all these would be required to reszone to to civic district. this would actually result in uh a higher number of or I won't say higher number resenting because I can't predict the future um but those are developments that currently today are not going before these public hearings in the same manner. So um it potentially would be an increase.

com. This also includes the map that was shown earlier. Um so any particular property could be uh reviewed and you could comment on the proposed zoning uh directly to us. Um I will also just just note while I've got

the time here with each module um we've uh held uh virtual meetings uh inerson meetings we've uh had maintained office hours that Robin Schultz has spent a whole lot of hours uh talking to community members um I I will just say just in front while we have the full body here um the engagement with the community uh has has been been vast uh we've spent uh countless hours in countless meetings with various stakeholders, commissions, boards, residents. Um they've been most productive sort of small group as this content is quite dense. Um as you can imagine an hour long into the presentation, right? Um and so uh we tried to reach out and and receive all the feedback uh any possible way that we could.

Also, as I think commissioner Jacob mentioned, uh code studio, our consultant has provided code connects. These are recordings of each um the entire document uh separated out. Uh and

they get much more in depth than we did today on the content itself. Uh with with opportunities of answering questions, these are all recorded and available online. Um and I encourage folks that are interested in uh this content to to maybe start there as it's um laid out in a fairly userfriendly fashion. At this time, I'll hear any questions or will hear any questions that y'all may have.

>> All righty. So, like I said, it's pretty dense information. A lot going on. Um, we have time for for a few questions.

Any one? I I have one just to start out here. So, um, we hear a lot about the density type, um, density bonuses and so forth. And, uh, I'm going back to page 10 here. Um, and it's it's just a graph, you know, the RD district and you say you see the

one house and you see four smaller ones and you see more something like an apartment complex or something like that. What what benefit would a builder have by doing option one versus number two? Here's here's the crux of my question here. You can go anywhere around here in Durham and you start to see on one lot you start to see these smaller houses like this, right?

I have a family of five. There's no way in any way you can have us stand up, lay down, stand side to side, that we can fit in a house like that to live. Um, and I hear at the JCCPC meetings, I hear a lot about, oh, we can do more density bonuses. We could do this, do this. But it feels like

families the size of mine will will will not be able to come down live down here, right? Because I mean a builder instead of building one house or they'll buy a house on a plot, tear it down, and they'll build four smaller houses. That seems more profitable or more lucrative to me to builders than one house, right? Um why would a builder keep one house when they could do this?

And what are the unintended consequences of only having smaller houses, you know, taking over these neighborhoods and things? What do we with this with encouraging this. It sounds like we're encouraging it. I'm

not sure that we are, but sounds like we're encouraging it. Even in the neighborhood layout that you had, you know, you had like a house and then you had like the smaller houses that kind of mixed in there. I I don't see why a builder would build use a property to build one house when they could build four. >> Sure.

Um, great question. Uh, a couple comments. Um, one one of the reasons why we would encourage it, of course, is housing more folks, using existing infrastructure, uh, more walkable environment. Um, there's plenty of the reasons that we talked about earlier or Commissioner Jacob spoke to in terms of different housing types at different price points in these existing neighborhoods.

Um, one response that I'll have because obviously I recognize, you know, larger homes, there's larger families, there's just people that want, you know, an office, right? Like people working from home. Uh, completely reasonable. We still have single family houses that are being built that are large and the that number is in the thousands like those are still being

constructed and also that's much of the existing area that we're proposing to be zoned RD and so um the expectation would that you would see some incremental uh opportunities because like you said it probably is profitable to build these four homes rather than uh build one. Um but we've seen you know the areas that you see a lot of these smaller homes, it's still relatively low in the grand scheme in terms what's housing the folks in Durham. We're still seeing a whole lot of single family. And so I can't speak to the the finances in terms of their choices, but I will say that I'm not necessarily concerned about us not getting enough single family uh like the option one base.

Um also recognizing that that's a great deal of the existing stock in these areas. >> Okay. And just and one other thing I'll add, I apologize, just the obviously some of these areas will will have um be existing homes where it's not financially viable based on the condition of the home, right? Like, you

know, you're looking at a a house that makes much more sense to preserve, >> right? Okay. I was just going to add that, you know, the the compact option we essentially have today as Bo alluded to. We have the small lot um small house option and we've seen that used in infill situations uh mostly, you know, uh our our large mass market housing developers that are going out to green field sites and building new neighborhoods that are, you know, two, three, four, five, 600 units.

They're not doing that. they're doing what the market demands, which is larger houses, right? So, to your point, Bo, I think that there is still a place for that. And this, while we're encouraging it, I think one of the reasons we're encouraging it is because we don't see very much of it at all.

If you look at our housing creation in totality, I hope that helps. >> It does. And one last thing I'll say is you mentioned um I don't remember what slide it was on now. It had a picture of a street and

how wide it would be. It had cars parked on one side and did you did you No, it was a different one than that. Um did Oh, it was slide number 18 is the the first one. Yeah.

Keep going down. That one right there. So, the driving the right of way that you're driving here, did you say that'll be that'll be wide enough for two car two? Okay.

[clears throat] Because I thought you said it wouldn't be and you know, driving a bus down those streets is difficult. You know, we have that between Duke and Greg. Going in there is is really tough if it's not enough. I just want to make sure that we're having that in consideration.

>> Yeah, that was considered. I think Robin was saying that didn't want on street parking and the two-way all together. I think that was the >> very good. Thank you.

>> Anyone else? >> Wendy? >> Um, well, first of all, I really just wanted to thank all of you who are sitting here. I mean, Sarah, you've been involved.

I mean, Lisa, you've been involved since for years going back to the comp comprehensive land use plan. Um, and now finally we're getting to this point. I I just want to congratulate all of you for this incredible achievement. This has been years and years of work that all of you have been involved with.

And you know, often times communities will hire outside firms to come in and do this work. And yes, we've had the benefit of, you know, code connect helping us, but it's really been our staff here who've been doing the bulk of the meeting with the community and doing the work. and the memo

that you provided us that's in our packet. It really hit me reading the memo because you can see it says for more information, see this meeting and watch this video and it really hits home just how much work this has been that has gone into this. And I just want to applaud you that we're at the moment where it's time to adopt it and put it into action. I also just want to affirm that what's happening is really monumental and transformative because what you all have done, what you all are doing is to putting into action what the community says it wants. This is all about making happen what the Durham people in Durham say said that they wanted when we did our comprehensive land use plan. And you know, you went over it today, but just the policies about creating more

housing types, more affordable housing, more ways for, you know, being more people centered, how people get around. um the environmental protections, everything. It is just I just sit here and I'm so excited because we are going to be a national model what we're doing here and I just want to thank you. I can't wait.

I know we have a very tight timeline. Get this implemented before the end of this year. And I want to highlight why it is so time-sensitive to look at what's happening right now with Northgate Mall. Because if we had our comp plan, I mean, if we had the UDO adopted now, we would be getting something better at that site than we are possibly going to get there.

Um, so this is all really exciting. I do have a question. Um

thinking about you know outside of the urban growth boundary because that is our purview really. Um could you talk about the related to the max the block the block perimeter and design around that because I was a little I just reading over I was a little confused. Um, of course we want to make sure that what happens there really makes sense for our residents. And I just want to because it said that it would not pertain to anything that was um outside [clears throat] of 10 acres or more. But I just want I'm a little concerned because there's plenty of sites at outside of the urban grounds boundary that are going to be less than 10 acres where it will not make sense. >> Clarification that it would not make sense to have block standards or that it would not make sense.

>> Yes. Because they're going to be parcels that you know they were just one family's property or something or it's a farm or whatever. So yeah, how how are we going? I just want to get more clarification on that.

>> Yeah. So, right now it's written so that they only apply when they are 10 acres or greater. So, smaller than 10 acres, they shouldn't. But, um for a farm or something like that, it also would not apply generally because um they are not generally like subdividing, right?

So, that that that existing farm would not need to uh subdivide and create a block to make sure that that would happen. However, if there were to be a new subdivision, um, then that would have to do it if it were 10 acres or greater. Um, >> so is it only for a subdivision? Like what happens when it's just like again one individual property owner with their it would not pertain.

Okay. No. All right. >> It wouldn't apply then.

>> Okay. That really helps. And then also for RA,

which is I think was most of the area right outside. So, I read we're going over this saying that the minimum lot size would be 3 acres. Well, there's plenty of land outside of the urban growth boundary that are less than 3 acre parcels. So, what what happens there?

>> Yeah, I mean the ordinance just like it does today, there's plenty of lots that were smaller than um what were enacted at the time. There'll be provisions for um the development for a non-forming lot that exists, but we just wouldn't allow a new lot smaller than three acres. >> Okay. So, this is again just going forward.

Okay. I just wanted to >> and there that that condition exists right now. There's plenty of lots as you said. >> Okay. 0. That's one of the big white spaces, you know, on the plan, which we

probably should really say, you know, this is, you know, the what is it the UC or >> whatever. But to make sure people understand that one of those big white spaces is RTP and there's going to be a potential for a lot of housing there. Um, which we we we don't really talk about. Um, so I just wanted I I wanted to lift that up and again the uh the sustainable environmental sustainable what is it?

Sustainable development all that matrix again I want to applaud you for the creativity you know again reflecting what the community wants and everything around environmental enhancements is just really exciting. So again, thank you so much, >> Commissioner Long. >> Yes. So when I'm looking at this, um, thank you all so much again for this presentation. One of the things that comes to my mind is I always think to the the Bright Leaf community out, not Bright Leaf downtown, the Bright Leaf

off of 70. Is that kind of what we're envisioning here of like that's a community if folks haven't driven to it. It's right next to my neighborhood where it's like you go there's single family homes but then there's also apartments in that and then there's also town homes all in one neighborhood and then they have like big sidewalks they have amenities all of that. >> Yeah.

Of like is that what we're hoping that this would this UDO would bring us more of those? >> Yeah. I I certainly haven't gone back and looked at their site plan and compared it to this code, but I there's definitely aspects to that development that we we would like to see moving forward. Namely, just the mix of housing types uh sort of integrating together so it's not, you know, a development of large single family by itself and isolating out uh other residents. Yeah, because I really love that model also just like of the different housing types, but also the walkability of it of like they have the I love big sidewalks where like you don't have to walk into

the grass to let somebody else pass or anything, but they also have like trailways into the wooded areas of the neighborhood and then they have like the shared gym space, pool, I think they have a pickle ball court that like everyone can come and use. And then there's it's right off of 70. We need some public transit out there though. We do need that.

But I do like that type of living because it just feels like so it's like its own little village of like everyone is just close to each other and builds a community. >> I like that. >> Okay. Very good.

All right. Thank you all very much for this presentation. It was it was very good. And I'll see you all on Wednesday.

Huh? that soon? >> Yeah. [laughter] >> All right. Next item on our agenda is update on the Durham County Homeless Day Shelter and Services Program RFP and

intent to award contract to Urban Ministries of Durham. Samantha Smith will give us an update on our homeless day shelter and services program RFP. This will be a short conversation. We just wanted to let the board know um overall where we are in the process and because you will see the contract a little bit later uh hopefully by the end of this month.

Timing wise, we wanted to honor the board's desire to have some overview. So, this may seem like a shorter presentation than normal, but again, it's just to remind you where we were in sort of quick next steps. So, Samantha, >> yeah, thank you, manager Hager. Um, is can everyone hear me?

Okay, do I need to move the microphone? Okay. Well, thank you again. Um, it's great to see you all and I hope you had lovely holiday seasons. Um, I'm Samantha Smith. I'm a

management analyst in the office of the county manager and I work on homelessness strategy and response. Um, and just wanted to add on to what uh, manager Hager was saying is that when the contract does come before you, it will include the full scope of services with a lot of a lot more details in it. Um, okay. So, before uh or I just wanted to give you an overview of where this presentation is going.

I'm going to give you um background on the recommendation for a day shelter. Uh then I'm going to talk about components of several requests for this day shelter before I move into sharing with you information about the county's RFP for the day shelter. Um and then I'll close by sharing information about the intended contract recipient. So, while there's been discussion in the community about the need for a a day shelter for years, uh certainly predating predating my time with Durham,

um I'm going to share about three requests that I feel catalyzed this RFP for a day shelter. Um so, in September of 2024, the joint city county schools housing initiative was formed. Uh many of you um attended the September 2025 final report event for that initiative. Um and when this initiative was formed, it included several subcommittees that were divided up by area median income bands as well as subpopuls within those AMI bands.

Um, Commissioner Jacobs and myself were both on the pre-housing shelter subcommittee of this initiative and that focused on those who were making from 0 to 30% of area median income um, who needed shelter prior to being connected to permanent or transitional housing. Um, and I talk about this subcommittee specifically because this subcommittee came out with a recommendation that included a day shelter um, for that population. And

these subcommittees were tasked with coming up with short, medium, and long-term recommendations for resource and process improvements. Um, and they brought together uh community stakeholders, nonprofit leaders, frontline workers, elected officials, and city and county staff to collaborate on these recommendations, which again, this subcommittees included the recommendation for a day shelter. Shortly after this initiative, the Joint City County Schools Housing Initiative was formed, uh the downtown business community gathered at the Armory, you might remember that, um along with law enforcement, nonprofit leaders, frontline workers, city and county staff, and the district attorney to discuss concerns and solutions about our unhoused neighbors downtown. Um, and you'll see in a second that many business leaders who attended this meeting signed a letter of support um, for an homeless services advisory committee recommendation that also included um, the recommendation for a

day shelter and I'm going to talk about that right now. So, the homeless services advisory committee is the HUDmandated governing board for Durham's homelessness continuum of care. We call that HSAC. um and they had the request for a day center in their FY uh fiscal year 2526 budget request to the city and county.

And as I mentioned um this was supported by many in the downtown business community. Now I'm going to talk a little bit about um the components of those requests. Um, and I'm sharing this to just to give you a preview of how the county incorporated this advocacy and community desire into their RFP. So, the joint city county schools housing initiative request um stated that the day shelter should include um, excuse me, lost my place very briefly.

The day shelter should uh be designed to test the effectiveness of a day shelter as an intervention for those experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity. Um and that it should also shelter neighbors from elements during the daytime hours. Um, additionally, they stated that it should provide a space for unhoused neighbors to navigate services like mail, getting identification documents, um, as well as provide an opportunity for homeless service providers to partner together. They also recommended that, uh, underutilized space be identified um, to use for the daytime shelter.

HSAC's uh recommendation for a day shelter was a little bit shorter, but it did state that the day shelter should include access to services like mail, laundry, toilets, and showers. Um, and as I said before, many in the business community supported this request. So, I shared that so you could see how um the community's feedback and these uh

providers and frontline workers feedback was incorporated into the county's RFP. Durham County's RFP had two main goals. One was to provide a low barrier place to shelter neighbors experiencing homelessness from the elements. And the second was to provide neighbors experiencing homelessness with connections to services that support exits from homelessness to stable housing.

Uh and that includes case management. So, the county's RFP stated that the day shelter and services should, in addition to providing shelter, provide unsheltered neighbors with the opportunity to complete activities essential to maintaining dignity, including laundry, personal hygiene, receiving and sending mail, access to charging stations, the internet, and other technology, and offer case management services. In addition to those services, the RFP mandated that the contractor provide connection to those services that will promote um stability and thus exits from

homelessness to stable housing. Examples of which are workforce development, assistance with gaining and accessing benefits and behavioral health programming. So, I'll wrap up um with our intent to award. This RFP received one response and that was from Urban Ministries of Durham.

We felt their proposal was quite responsive and so we intend to award Urban Ministries of Durham with a contract of $350,000 to provide the Day Shelter and Services Center. Urban Ministries's proposal leverages UMD's existing space that is right across from the library at 410 uh Liberty Street um to provide for more unsheltered neighbors. They intend to operate the day shelter within their community resource space that is in their main building kind of right behind the church and right across from our parking deck uh near social services.

And this is a space that's already known to many unsheltered neighbors in the community as a resource. Um it's colllocated with their clothing closet, with their food pantry, and um thus it's just already known to many neighbors in the community as a place where they can receive help. Their response also included partnerships with other homeless services providers for additional case management and resource navigation. And um the services UMD proposed in their response satisfy the RFP and they include access to showers, laundry, mail, computers, charging stations, and the internet.

Um access to UMC UMD's existing clothes clothing closet and food pantry. Connections with case management and resource navigation through UMD as well as other uh partnering service providers. Um, and then housing navigation might include documents, uh, or excuse me, resource navigation might include housing navigation, document support with ID, um, and benefits. It

might include referrals to health, behavioral health, and substance use treatment providers, and more. Um, these services also included mental health and substance use disorder supports, employment support, and workforce development, and outreach and engagement activities. We intend to bring the full contract that includes the scope of services to the board within the next uh four to six weeks, hopefully by the end of January. Um and I'm open to any questions you might have at this time.

>> Okay. Any questions from the commissioners? >> I just I just want to say I'm glad to see this happening. Um it's needed and I'm glad that Ministry is going to provide this service.

So, thank you so much for your presentation. Yes, ma'am. >> Okay, vice chair >> echo this and also just give Sam a shout out for representing the county so well on the housing task force which was months and months and months of work of

a lot of the folks who are on the housing task force had a very like city centric mindset and thoughts process. So to have the county represented so well, uh, which is really appreciative of your work there and also moving this to fruition because this has been something that we've been talking about for like nearly two years now and I know you've pushed it with a lot of sense of urgency that it would have probably been a lot longer um, if we didn't have you really all of the different partners to get this moving and through the process. and I know it's going to help a lot a lot a lot of people and it's going to be really life-saving services and programming that we're going to have uh through this expansion. So, thank you Sam.

>> Thank you. >> All right, Commissioner Jacobs. >> Thank you so much, Samantha. Samantha is a real leader [clears throat] on HSAC and al also um co-chairing our policy and planning committee. So she has really taken a strong leadership role at HSAC. Um so

this pilot is going to be really important. I want to remember this is a pilot and we really want it to be successful. Um, one of my questions is, um, I think first of all, I'm going to be very interested to see the scope of work. Um because I think we need to remember that the day center is hopefully going to help people who are already who are staying at urban ministries who we see now kind of on the street during the day but also many many people who have chosen not to go to the shelter and who are living unhoused in Durham and and there's a whole spectrum of people right some people who are living in their cars, living in the woods. And so, um, I think, yeah, I think it's it's going to be it's going to be challenging, but I think I'll be very interested in that in that scope of work because there's so many different

ways we need to help people. But also I'm just curious about has there any discussion around data collection for so that we can you know because this is only for a 12-month period 3 months to get going nine months of actually being operational. It's not that long and we want to be able to show that it hopefully is going to be successful and make the case not just for the county to fund this because I want to note when you gave the background which was fantastic that you know the business community has asked for this a lot of stakeholders and I think it's going to be important whatever comes next that we're able to bring show the outcomes and also So be able to be in a position to give people the opportunity to help fund whatever comes next. So I that was my qu one of my questions. >> Um yes, we that was something I was

doing while I was listening to some other great presentations today was continuing to correspond um with our you know selected contractor and with county staff on the measures we'll be collecting as part of the scope of work. Um, I'm also going to be working with the city to try to see how we can pair up the um main data source homeless management information system to track outcomes of those who do use the day shelter um service. >> Great. Thank you so much. And I I would also like to note that if you may recall um for some um for many of you, you were not board members at the time when the library was um constructed, we operated a day center with Nehemiah Christian Center. And so we do have um longitudinal data that was part of the framework when we did the RFP based on those lessons learned, experiences gained um and just the cost associated

as um sort of a benchmark. So we do have some data as well during that 2 three year period when we were in the construction phase to also serve as a benchmark. Um the unsheltered community landscape has changed so much in the last couple of years. Um so how we move forward as a community will require everyone's support.

>> But we appreciate the board supporting us when we came forth aggressively to say we wanted to move forward quickly back in the fall. So and thank you Samantha for your leadership and make it it come to fruition. >> Yeah. Yeah.

And just related to that, I think um making you know we're going to really need to work rely on our partners and the whole HSAC community to get the word out to people about the day center as well and how people can get to the day center. >> Yeah, absolutely. If I can add to that, um their proposal does include some um

engagement strategies that partner with our existing street outreach team that the city runs and as well as the um heart team that the city runs, including um I believe HART providing excuse me transportation to the day shelter for individuals who are interested that they encounter um who are unsheltered. So, but absolutely we will be um relying on partners to spread the word and I you know I think you can see that partnership is at the core of this RFP. It was required in the RFP that or successful applications would include memorandums of understanding between various providers because we can't do it alone. So >> all righty thank you so very much for your presentation and we look forward to updates on that.

All righty. And then the last item on our agenda today. >> So the last item, which is one of our most important items, is the Redwood Convenience Site renovation update. This

will be a short um presentation to give an overview of the project. And for some of the board members, you may not be as familiar with some of the backstory. So um we will have um M trio Chrissy and others Mike to Mike would check to share and I'll turn it over to them and again appreciate all their efforts with moving this project along. So, we're the last ones. And of course, our video our video is not up yet, but uh that's >> Let me say this. Um we started the redesign of the convenience sites in 2013.

So, it's time. Okay. The other thing I want to say about uh the convenience sites is that we have um a wonderful manager who has dedicated her time to be able to enhance these programs when you uh will hear as Christy will share with you um the fact that we do have a grant to help us out to restore this facility. She was the motivator and the one who actually wrote the grant and acquired the funding.

So, I'm going to turn it over to the real person who does the work. >> Oh, thanks. Um, and can I get that? >> Yeah, I [laughter] control this.

Go right ahead. [gasps] >> All right. Thank you. Um, all right. So, I'll just we'll have a quick overview of our presentation. and we'll go over what the Redwood

Convenience Site looks like today, a bit of analysis of our program and where we're hoping to go with that. So, our Durham County Solid Waste Department, we primarily serve the unincorporated residents of Durham County on the property tax bill. For those um properties that have homes outside of city limits, they're assessed a solid waste fee. So, I live in the city.

I don't pay I don't get assessed the solid waste fee. It just goes to those unincorporated areas. And with that fee, one of the things that we provide are the convenient sites. So we have three of those sites.

Up here we have a map of Durham. So you'll see the number one, that's our Parkwood site. It's on Highway 55 next to the wastewater treatment center. Um number three up at the top is our northern convenience site.

That's the one we just recently opened about three years ago, two years ago. And then the one we'll be talking about today is the Redwood site. That's the number two. That's over in East Durham. And so just to give you a little bit more contacts context, there's um

85, you can see where that is. So if you go up 85, go past the Walmart um get off on Redwood Road and um you'll come to our convenience site. It's off of Electra Road, which is a dirt road. At the end of that dirt road is the sheriff's training facility.

And we're up there at the beginning. And then this is just another image of it, an aerial photo, so you can see a little bit better of the footprint that we're taking up right now on that um on that Electra Road right off of Redwood. Okay, so some annual statistics about our site. We see about 52,000 customers per year.

And it's probably better to say visits from customers because of course people will come more than once in a year, but that averages to about a thousand visits through our site every single week. We get uh about 2,200 tons of MSW, that stands for municipal solid waste. So that's just your garbage and bulky items that people bring in. We get 350 tons of co-mingled recycling or

cans, bottles, paper, cardboard, and then 160 tons of yard waste. And we do collect other materials at the site. Fluorescent bulbs, lead acid batteries, that's like your car batteries, auto fluids, including motor oil, antifreeze, oil filters. We have cooking oil, textiles like clothes or old curtains, um scrap metal, and white goods.

So, all of those items are collected at our site, and it's [snorts] a little cramped. So, we did reach out to the community because we kn we know we know we needed a new site, but we wanted to hear from our community and see specifically what they were interested in and get their feedback. So, we held a community meeting in January of 23 at the East Regional Library. Uh we also had a community survey that we passed out at the convenience site.

So, people who came to the sites, we gave them they could either take a physical copy and bring it back or we had a QR code so they could go online. and then it's been um on our website that people can take the survey as well. So, a lot of the

common feedback that we received was that customers wanted a better yard waste area and I'll show a picture of that so you can see it's not very convenient um to have the roadways paved within the site. right now they're gravel and additional services such as e-waste or electronic waste collection, household hazardous waste collection, that's like paint, those sorts of things, chemicals. Um those were the primary things people brought up and we agree. So this is pictures from the convenience site now.

So this is where our site attendants, our county employees operate out of. It's a tiny little hut. Maybe one person can stand in there. That gets a little bit problematic when we have two employees on duty on days like today.

Only one person can get inside to warm up. Um there's no running water. We have a portage John for the restroom for the employees and for the customers. There's no computer or internet access. So they, you know, we either enter their time for

them or we have to bring a laptop and a hotspot and and all that stuff. So uh a little outdated. Um this is the So you can see here's the gravel surface. So this is kind of when you pull up to the site, you would go to the to the left and around um where that car is sort of pointing at us.

It's it's not uh marked. It's not paved. So you know, a lot of times people it can when it's busy, it can get a little um a little scary. [laughter] Crowd control is important.

Um, but when we have uh like a snow event and we have to scrape through the snow or there's been a lot of rain, we get a lot of potholes and that's a big complaint that we'll get. So once or twice a year we've got to regravel and and add more gravel and maintenance on that. Um, so this is when people are disposing of their waste. We have three dumpsters along a wall. So people pull up in one lane and start disposing. So if somebody at the front of the line has a lot of stuff, then everybody in the back of the line just has to wait for them to finish

or sometimes the attendants will ask them, you know, can you just pull around and you know, so [laughter] then they're just hopping in and out of their truck going around in circles trying to get their material dumped. Um the other picture is our yard waist. So you can see those stairs. So people take their yard waste bags or their limbs, they climb up the stairs, there's a little platform, and then they have to hoist it over to the side.

So, we we frequently get complaints about that one. Um, it's just also for the trash side of it, it's an inefficient way to collect the trash. So, those dumpsters on the left, they might hold two to four tons of trash. Um, when we went to the compaction at the northern site, we have these things called pre-crushers.

So, they can crush trash, they can crush a couch, you know, furniture. Um, those containers can hold up to 10 pounds. So, or 10 tons. So, so when we're hauling that, you know, it's it's one hall versus, you know, four or five halls from here. So, it's a lot more efficient

um in in what we're wanting to move to. So, no. >> So, I get to tell you the pretty stuff and Mike will answer all the questions. Um but through Smith Garner we have redesigned the site so that um one it will have paved roads for the citizens.

It'll have gravel roads for the uh trucks that pull containers and the containers will be below the um citizens reach so that they won't have to walk upstairs or overreach on any of the uh facilities. We've also expanded the services um so that um uh there will be compactors at the facilities and uh that will address the whole two tons versus 10 ton issue. >> Okay, >> there we go. So, we're giving you some

examples of this. This is this is not the site because it of of course it hasn't been built yet, but this is the northern convenience site and it will look very similar. It will have wayfinding sign so people will know where to go. It will have signage that tells them where the compactors are, where the garbage collected.

It will also have a two-story facility for our staff, which will have internet and they'll have a bathroom and they'll have running water. um and uh a decent place to actually function out of. [snorts] This is another example of um the the one in the middle is the compactor that we're talking about. So, they'll have walk up services and just be able to just dispose it right at your uh chest level. Uh the two-story building is what um has been de designed by Smith Garner and um placed on the facility. It will

also have a a shop where people can actually take goods that are decent to be reused and we call that our swap shop. And people can go to the swap shop. They can leave items that are working and operative in the swap shop and other people can come and actually acquire those goods at no cost to them. [snorts] So I'm going to leave the funding over to Chrissy because she was the one who built all of the funding resources.

>> All right. So, in 2023, we were awarded 18,000 through NC Diner's community waste reduction and recycling uh community waste reduction recycling grant um to install swap shops at the northern convenience site and the Redwood convenient site. So, we were I guess a little a little more ambitious with our time frame thinking that we would have both of them available. But um so the northern site has re has their

swap shop installed and it's operational and we're just kind of holding on to the um to the grant a little bit longer, but it will help contribute to the cost of the building of the swap shop at this site. 3 million through EPA's solid waste infrastructure for recycling grant. That's the Swiffer grant. 7 million. So, you know, looking into that difference, the inflation tariffs as well as a build America by America or

Baba requirements and that's part of the federal funding that we have that we have to meet the Baba requirements um has increased in the cost of steel, concrete, electrical, and the manufactured components beyond what we originally estimated. And then there's also been additional renovations that were required by NC DOT and city county planning for some of the site access storm water improvements in a driveway reconfiguration. So because of that then this project requires an additional 1,688,697 for the completion. And so that's what we're here for today is to um you know talk to you about that increase as well as the CT Wilson.

Um so our timeline moving forward in January of this month we hope to award that construction contract and receive the additional funding. In February we would issue a notice of notice to proceed to our general contractor. In March we'll work on those permits for construction and then begin

construction in April. Um during this time the site will be closed so residents would be diverted to either our Parkwood or Northern Convenience sites. We had hoped to have a different option for them but it's this is the safest option for everybody. And [snorts] then in February 27 we hope to reopen the Redwood site in all of its new beautiful glory.

All right. And so if you all have any questions. >> All righty. Any question?

Uh Commissioner Burton. >> Yeah. Thank you for this presentation. I went out there to look at the property maybe once I was sworn in because the sheriff's training facility was out there and I when I first saw it I was like this is not very nice right and so um getting ready for the meeting I went out there this past Sunday and I thought it was already construction out there but I guess they're constructing the um

sheriff's training facility. It's the same builder, CT Wilson. But yeah, I think, you know, this is something and I've been to the Northern Convenience Site and that's really nice, right? Um I think this is important that we do this.

You know, I'm you know, I want to [clears throat] hear from my colleagues, but you know, I think, you know, figuring out how where we can find the funds to fund this. Um I think that's important. I think it's important because, you know, Durham County is a growing county and I, in my opinion, think we should have highquality facilities for our people to work in. I think that's very important.

That doesn't make me feel too good that we just have this shack for one person and they got to go to a porta potty. I don't think that's very acceptable. So, um, I'm for that. I did have a question [clears throat] because I live in that part of Durham and um in the I live in the it's the way my neighborhood is.

It's in the city but it's all around county but I do see some people have the green GFL um trash um receptacles. So how they don't have to take their trash to the convenience site if they're in the county park? Do they pay extra for that? So, we do have a a bi-weekly recycling, curbside recycling program, and we contract with GFL for that service.

Some residents choose to have trash collected as well through them or somebody else, but that's a separate thing. So, they could hire a company to pick up their trash if they want, but all residents who pay that solid waste fee in their tax bill get a solid waste decal or sticker or permit in their tax bill. So, that's what they they can use that to go to the convenience sites. So whether they hire a private company to do their pick up their trash or not, if they have the decal, they can go to the the Redwood site and use that.

>> Gotcha. >> Or any of the sites. >> Gotcha. Thank you so much for your presentation. >> The other thing is if they live in the

city, they can also buy a decal um from from the tax office and they can use our services that way, but they have to pay the full freight. >> Commissioner Jacobs. I do remember the discussion of this [laughter] a long time ago. Um, thank you so much for your work on this, Chrissy, and for getting the grant funding, significant funding that you did.

Um, I also support this and I would I was really curious to hear about how the swap shop is going and how that works and I'm really glad to see I mean everything about this is wonderful. But um, also how that is working. Just full disclosure, I was at a convenience site over the holiday at at another county and my husband and I pulled two perfectly good bikes out of one of the

dumpsters. Um, so I hate to see things that other people can use um just go to waste like that. So would love to hear a little more about that. >> So it's been going well.

Um, we are keeping data. I don't have it with me, but um, as part of the grant, the attendants keep an eye on um, what's going in and what's going out. We do get, you know, it's um, you say one person's trash is somebody else's treasure. That is a little subjective because sometimes everybody would agree that it's trash.

So, we have to kind of keep an eye on like what goes in there. And the attendants get pretty good about understanding like what somebody else is going to pick up versus not. So, but um they'll leave items in there usually at least a week or so and and see how the the flow goes, but um you know, residents have been excited to use it and to to take things from it to drop things off. So, it's been well been going well so far.

>> Valentine. >> Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

So, Miss Chrissy, thank you so much for uh the work that you have put into this. uh that means a lot to to uh the county and our residents. You had mentioned that in order to use this facility if you don't happen to uh be in the county that you can buy a decal from the tax office now. Can you just drive up and use it or you have to absolutely positively have to have the decal?

Have to have the decal. Okay, good. All right. Thank you for that.

Um, also I agree with my my colleague uh, Commissioner Burton who said uh that she was interested in quality workspaces for those who are employed here with the county. I think that's very important as well. And so I agree with her in that regard. And uh, sounds like this project is way overdue. And so I'm hoping that uh, we can bring this [clears throat] to fruition. And so to the extent that uh my support is needed, I'm hoping that uh that

support helps. 6 million that we need. Um our intent was to bring this forward to you so that we'll be on your next agenda for approval. >> Thank you.

>> Yeah, the staff have identified dollars to support this in our um reserve funds. This is a sign of what we will see with other projects unfortunately. And so it the cumulative impact of that means we will have to change value engineer project scopes especially if we're funding all of them um or determine timing for projects etc. So we have close to a $2 billion capital project for the next 10 years and this these cycles happen and we'll just work through them. So, but I appreciate all that everyone has done in general

services and uh to help us keep moving things along, especially partnering with Central Pines and um to help us with the grant and um just tremendous effort. And I think Chrissy, this was probably one of the largest um grants that we've received of this nature and and at the time I believe was the largest that they awarded uh for that period, but I may be off on that. But anyway, bravo. Thanks so much.

>> All right. Thank you. No other comments. Thank you so much for your presentation.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, brings us to the end of our agenda today. So we are adjourned. But I want to bring up five more things. >> All right, [laughter] we're journ. >> All right, now we have agenda.