Board of Commissioners · Regular Meeting · September 3, 2024

Not a discussion item so residents don't even get to have input at that point and and we don't really have that information that much information the second thing that's been happening is that the Gracie from the planning department sends us the information after it's gone through the Planning Commission and says hey if you want to provide input by this date and then it will get included in the staff report well I'm going to fess up I've only given my written input one time I'd like to know how many times have all of you done it okay so that has been also really not effective okay because it's like another email in our hundreds of emails that we get so the issue is really about how do we actually give the residents concerns more weight and importance and how do we actually make this more of a real process where we're talking about this publicly and having a discussion as a board and getting information as a board and then for formalizing something.

So that our comments can actually get incorporated into the report that then goes to the City Council and we're also saying things on the record so actually we are trying the idea we were giving to the planning staff the mission of how do we actually improve the process I think what I'm hearing from residents is that numbers one and two they would still okay two there doesn't need to be if we do this we don't need number two anymore which is okay but it seems like they really value having a list still being part of the JCC PC agenda so I guess one of my requests would be to put that back on again so that you know we all are aware at the get-go you know as an informational item so that the whole public as well as JCC PC can be aware of what has been submitted but my second question is and this came up from talking to commissioner Carter okay this whole idea is that we.

Have now adopted all of us the city and the county our new comp comprehensive plan and our future Place type map which shows where the urban growth boundary is and so now what we're trying to assume is that if anything that gets brought forward outside the urban growth boundary we really need to hear about it because this is not following the plan but then there is another situation A Nuance here Sarah which is what about rezonings that are within the urban growth boundary that are also not being consistent with the comprehensive plan and with the adop with the future Play Type map because we still could get resoning now correct me but we still could get rezonings that are not consistent as well within the urban growth boundary am I correct so how how it seems like that should be also something somehow that is lifted up or I don't I want to hear your thoughts on that yeah that is something that is actually it is not uncommon we get.

Plenty of reasoning requests that are not consistent with the place type map in some cases they are also being annexed in other cases they're already within the city limits and not consistent under state law any zoning request that is not consistent with a community's future land use map or in our case a place type map if the governing body approves that resoning the place type map or the future land use map is automatically amended to match so that is state law so it it really falls to the the jurisdiction that it's under and their decision on the resoning so but okay with prop properties that are still in the unincorporated areas or or let's say that have been County land that are now within the urban growth boundary okay with the new new Urban growth boundary I guess what I'm what I'm saying is for those County for you know basically County residents or formerly like people who are okay I I guess I'm just wondering about those whether those cases should be still be.

Treated differently in terms of us knowing about them or because if we've all adopted this and it's and they're not going to be following what's in the future Place type map then that's another situation where the plan isn't being followed I does that make sense yeah can I make a I think it might be helpful if if we continue with the summary kind of case reports to The JCC PC to really call out the ones where there is a difference this situation that you're talking about and maybe make sure that we build in some time there for you all to discuss that at those meetings that might be a good way to kind of accomplish that that look within the the framework that already exists so instead of just being a quick like here's the report any questions which is typically what happens we could specifically go over the ones that are as you said in in in the county subject to being annexed but having a different place.

Type thank you commissioner Howton then commissioner C thank you madam chair I concur with both of my Commissioners here I'm I I keep reading this over and over again number three in the area where it says these presentations will be in informational only and will not be public not be public hearing is there so is this saying that whatever comments or recommendations that the Commissioners have their comments are not included in the presentation no what that is saying is that just to make sure that we stay on the right side of the law because you are not the body with jurisdiction the city would be in those cases we need to make sure that if anything is presented to you all a case it does not look and feel like a public hearing meaning you would not you know typically a public hearing staff makes a presentation the applicant makes kind of their pitch or presentation about their project and then you ask if there's anyone from the public that wants to speak and give.

Their two cents so that's the part that could not happen should not happen you the could still during your regular comment period make any comments and it could be related to that case or that item because it's on your agenda but we want to make sure that there is Clarity that the County Commissioners are not holding a public hearing on an item that's not in their jurisdiction however you would still be discussing and providing comments that would then be included in the agenda item that would go to the city that would be part of their public record and their public hearing okay but the the citizens would not be able to speak during that time they I'm going to defer to our attorney on that you are correct ma'am the way it was being proposed m is it's coming to you as an informational item as our at a work session as our others comments would be during public comment but there would not be the illusion that that was an actual public.

Hearing being held where this board was making controlling decisions so so the residents in the county have simply all of their rights have been taken away that they have no they cannot have any input in the decision that's being made is that what is that what was saying I would say that as discussed it would be coming to the board for information after it's been before the Planning Commission so you'd have the benefit of their input and of course the residents could speak at that so they can speak at the Planning Commission they just can't speak at the full at the full board here before count commiss board as designed they they can speak let's make it you know they can speak just a public comment not as part of an official public hearing we can hear from the public right and and I feel like that a really good way for us to get their input and to represent them by expressing our concerns back but it's just not an official public.

Here that's if I was if I lived in the county I'd say this sucks and I don't live in the county and i' say it sucks commissioner c I really appreciate hearing everybody's perspective on this because I'm not on the Joint City County plan committee and you know it is complicated nuanced and we have received really compelling and concerning emails from citizens who are displeased with these proposed changes but to me it really does taking everything into consideration it's I feel like I am under this new proposal I would have more opportunity as a commissioner to pay close attention to what the annexation request entailed and connect that very directly to concerns from the resident by virtue of the fact that after these cases have gone to the Planning Commission they're then going to come to us officially you know in a really formal way through a work session where I will be prepared whereas now we do receive you know the email from staff and I look at it and then like Wendy Jacobs.

Said it's like oh goodness okay I've got this I don't have to reply to this right now I'm going to do all these other ones I really need to to reply to and it's it's just never a situation where I feel like I'm fully informed enough to give any feedback to the City Council I feel like this will be an improvement because this will just formalize the this process in such a way that this is before me as a commissioner I'm responsible for knowing what this is all about now and learning about it and reading about it and being prepared to ask questions to staff when they come to our work session so to me this really increases the representation honestly of the of the County residents in the unincorporated areas who feel like they don't have representation I you know I hate that it feels like there's less for them I I I've heard their comments I've read all their emails and have really considered them carefully and think this seems better.

I I would say the part about planning staff will ensure that the City Council is aware of the board's discussion on the case by providing one of the following I definitely think the time stamp so that city council can go and and listen but I also think it would be better to have some sort of summary con consolidating the feedback from the Commissioners I wonder what others think about that just to be an additional point of support for the City Council to make sure they're you know just cluing in I guess to to what it is that the Board of County Commissioners are are thinking after having had the presentation at the work session yeah we're we're happy to provide similarly with what we do with the Planning Commission planning Commissioners provide us written comments and we include those verbatim as an attachment to the City Council good ide so if you all what I just I don't want to be I want to make sure that whatever comments are in are really your comments.

And I don't want to be in a position where staff is paraphrasing we get it wrong or whatever so our preference would be that you all provide us comments and we are more than happy to put them in there like I said we do that for Planning Commission already I think that's a really good suggestion I what do you all what do you all think about that actually I thought we were doing that so I'm glad that you clarified it okay thank you I hear you don't want to try to translate what we say I wouldn't want to either god well commissioner Carter I think one of the issues present is if they start to create that record are they now basically making the minutes if there's discrepancy with what the clerk writes and y'all approve there could be a problem yeah I'll also note ma'am you had talked about a formalized input you know in my capacity supporting planning I've been at these JCC PC meetings where this was discussed.

And the consensus that I picked up from our board members who are part of that was that trying to move into a process where this board could hear and collectively communicate and make a decision and provide input was one of the goals and it not just be about an individual commissioner or two or even all three but that the board saying okay we've got some thoughts on this to communicate to the City Council before they make that decision well I mean I suppose that if if it would somehow be more desirable to have well what is the body politic point of view on this case that you we couldn't vote but you know could right we couldn't vote I guess you're right okay never mind it's not about making a up down or anything on each and every one of these but to the extent it's outside the urban growth boundary or it represents a zoning change that's inconsistent if the body had concerns to share they would have that.

Mechanism if that makes sense yeah how would we have the mechanism this through this process yes ma'am MH got it yeah I think that's good enough yeah meaning good enough at getting what you and I were just talk what we were just talking yes so and overall I think it's good I think it's a good you know overall I I endorse this proposal I guess what I'm saying you in summary then we're moving number two the planning staff will no longer send the comments but Commissioners will be sending comments but planning staff won't be emailing us asking okay we are going to keep number one except that when the summary comes to I'm going kind of in order when the summary comes to JCC PC we will specifically highlight cases that annexation cases that might be within the urban growth boundary but have a different place type right to are inconsistent with the place type and we will seek specific you know dialogue about that at jcpc so we will get that.

There our clerk who is familiar with JCC PC can kind of summarize that as part of the minutes and that that could be a way to include that information U moving forward we'll have to I need to think about that but so we could capture that we would stop doing number two which is emailing for individual comments since that seems not effective and with number three which is having applicants present informational items on cases that are outside the urban growth boundary to you all at a work session I think there and you know we can do it a number of ways we we can and I don't want to be putting words in any on you know but we could work with the clerk for instance and make sure that whatever you know is summarized is what is put into the council minutes to make sure that the the rec the Integrity of the record is there you all could as part of this is something brand new.

You're going to be doing right so as part of your deliberations perhaps at the end of the conversation you know there's like a quick summary hey so these are our concerns you know right and could be something fairly easy that we could work with the clerk to jot down and make sure that we're consistent in how you know that is passed along to council so I think there's a little bit of and actually we do have we have our first case that was submitted that is outside the urban growth boundary so we're going to be testing this out you know within who knows how many months but I would I would suggest that that we likely try and work with the clerk for the purposes of making sure the Integrity of the record is consistent does that help yeah and I think maybe even providing to make it easier also for our clerk staff like if we just have like a document or a piece of paper that.

All of us just write our comments and we could just pass it on to the clerk in written format as well that that is how the Planning Commission used to do it in our pre-digital age is we would set pieces of paper and with the case number and the comments and they would just fill them in and hand them in at the end of the meeting and that would be compiled so I that would be good okay commissioner car Jacobs how do we make sure that we implement this before this new case moves forward oh there there'll be plenty of time it's not moving fast at all okay it's we have many many months don't worry okay thank you and I and cheram I really that's what I was going to suggest as a former fifth grade teacher like just a sheet of paper that that we can just cuz we won't do it afterwards and that we can jot down our comments right then and there and hand them in like we.

Do with when we vote for boards and commissions I don't want Monica and her team having to chase us down more than she already has to okay wonderful any more questions okay and I think we have a plan thank you Sarah thank you all so much. Okay yes I need to check where the JCC PC JC C PC members yall are going cuz I'm alternate so if you need me to go let me know before we leave today brings us to business recruitment program policy update with Andy miracle and Matt and DCM Jones.

Maybe all right good afternoon commissioner and to the de it is a pleasure to be here with you all today my name is Andy marle I'm the director of Economic Development and joining me is Matt felter who is the economic development manager today we are going to speak with you the first of two conversations about updates to the business recruitment policy so what we're going to talk about today we're going to run through background history and success of the program very briefly recommended Framing and approach to the policy update as well as part three which is recommended topics and principles for the policy update so at Durham County Economic Development the way we talk about the work that we do is we divide it up into three buckets we do Recruitment and Retention which we're going to talk about today we do small business work or small business ecosystem work as well as Workforce Development work and those last two components were added more recently I would say that Recruitment.

And Retention is really the Cornerstone of the work of Durham County Economic Development that's what we've been doing the longest but we are able to weave these programs together I would say for small business work we are able to accomplish mwb goals that we have as part of our business recruitment work and for Workforce Development when you think about the Bulls program that was born out of the success that we were having in life sciences recruitment right and so we needed a program to be able to help Durham residents compete for these jobs and so they're they're all three interrelated to some degree and so here we are doing the work site visits public hearings announcements events it takes many many forms and many shapes and so to to briefly just give a little work on what got us here year so really starting in 2019 we one of the first things was part of my work here in this position was to revisit the policy and look at how we we structured that.

And how we approached it and so not only did we look at making technical adjustments to the policy as well to really make sure that we were doing things in the most efficient manner but we're really looking to maximize the value that we can leverage through these Awards while also recognizing the the value of our local market right understanding that this is a very desired market for companies to be in and so using those things to really understanding how we could put the best product forward so the three guiding principles that we had that we did that work and will'll continue to uphold these principles as we move forward again how do we recruit companies that align with our strategic priorities and allow for Max maximizing Community Partnerships this was clearly one of the top interests of the board was to understand how we can maximize Community benefits Community Partnerships and and alignment with our strategic priorities but we also balance that out with making sure that we maintain legal parameters right.

Is is what we're doing within the the state constitution state law as well as most importantly maintaining our competitive Advantage right if we go too far in any One Direction with the things that we're asking for we understand that our County borders are very close right and so companies could hop right over to a neighboring County if they wanted to the last point I'll make is that this is where we partner with the greater DM Chamber of Commerce they are the front door through the business recruitment process and this is part of the work that we do the contracted work that we do with the chamber so there were a number of things that we built in to the policy as we move forward right and and so these are performance agreements first and foremost so if if companies do not perform they do not get paid it's it's very simple right and we also have Tools in there to make sure that if if certain things are maintained we have.

Provisions to protect those Awards and so not only do Awards pay for themselves but we actually have a 50% cap new tax revenue to govern that so basically for every dollar that goes out out $2 are coming in and that's $2 new dollars to the property tax base and that's part of that competitive advantage that we have of Durham being a very desirable Community Awards must maintain Community benefits again this a high priority of the board and then we have thresholds in there of $50 million minimum for capex if we go that route or 200 for jobs we have job standards as well as effectively a 10-year window to to see both the performance of the award as well as the maintenance period good morning so these are some of the great companies that we've recruited to Durham over the last several years you can see nearly two dozen companies there in life sciences manufacturing clean tech Transportation and I just thought it was important to see all of them in one.

Place it's not all of them but it's many of them it's our favorite picture I'm sorry it's our favorite picture that we're also proud as a department and and as a as a county that we put out this report earlier this year I know you all have seen it we did just want to include it in the presentation in case folks are watching at home or people in the audience are not familiar this is something most counties do not do we do it because we think it's important for people to understand the return on investment the success of the program transparency things of that nature it's available at deed.com you can also find it elsewhere as well but kind of just gives us a a portrait of of the status of the the program and some of the key facts and figures which I'll just call out here just for a few seconds this this is a program that supports almost $3 billion in in projected private investment here in the county 6,000.

Jobs for every dollar that y'all put in you you vote for we're seeing $633 back in taxable investment so you know that's a pretty good partnership I would I would say that's my new favorite slide all right just a few other things you know this this information will update annually but you know our most recent performance year that everything is complete on our company spent $72 million at mwbe businesses and the majority of that was was at U minority businesses which was interesting to to see you don't always see in construction our portfolio also did quite well the companies exceeded the amount of jobs they exceeded the amount of capex and one thing that I know that we're really proud of and and you all have been huge advocates for is just making sure that we're bringing companies that have a variety of entry-level positions so that people can grow at these companies come out of Durham Tech come out of central Duke wherever and start their career here and.

Grow I I do have a question cuz I'm looking really far it says versus 6 and what is it 49 jobs for so we're a th jobs over yeah for that particular year so you know there may be some years where that is lower some years where that is higher you know companies have usually seven years to make targets so maybe they they've technically achieved year four and year one because they got the foot on on on the gas but at this point in time yeah there will be some companies exactly that do overperform that number may go down a little bit as the you know CU they might have overperformed in year one which you know year two they would just meet if that makes sense but no you that's a great question and so I'm going to turn it back over to Andy who's just going to kind of talk through the framing and approach of why we're here today yeah absolutely so as we mentioned.

You know we did the major revision to the policy about five years ago and we've really learned a lot in that time we're really looking at the process over the next two months is just an opportunity to fine-tune the policy in the program we're we're very happy with where a lot of the things are but we have learned some good things in the process that we feel like that we can kind of clean up and and streamline the approach by and large we want to maintain where we are in terms of per principles and performance criteria we continue to Benchmark and look at other counties and the approach that they're doing as as well as there are some opportunities where we see that they're adopting some of the things that that we have initiated which is reaffirming and we've also continued to maintain contact with companies as well local Partners industry experts it's been really helpful and understanding what works and what we may need to think about reconsidering as.

Well lastly I'll say you know just in terms of context we are small office we have three and fdes in addition to Matt and myself we have sria fut trial as our coordinator as as well as Brandy Miner A administrative officer who we share with transportation and so our approach for today and for the next we're planning on coming back at the October work session so for today we really just kind of want run through at a high level and share some of the things that we're thinking about initiate the conversation start to get some feedback and then in process of the next couple weeks start the markup of the policy with the intent of coming back to the October work session for more detailed conversation and then hopefully be able to move forward with adoption of those changes all right so we have six recommended kind of topics and principles and I I appreciate that that Framing and I think where we're we're hoping is just kind of talk high.

Level here you know Matt why don't you guys look into this Andy why don't you look into this this direction is okay okay not necessarily like a line by line you know redlining or marking up but here are some of the things that we've heard from from you individually or collectively companies just things that we've seen as we've administered the agreements over the past few years so I think the first one is is pretty obvious but continue our work as leaders in community benefits agreements there are some things that you know we ask for that are not in in in the policy officially I think 25% mwbe is an important one an example you know would be to incorporate that you know officially into the policy right now it just says you know companies shall provide an mwbe goal I think one other thing we could potentially do is right now in the policy we have kind of a long list of of programs and suggested policies and ideas and things for.

Companies to consider keeping that but maybe pulling it out of the policy and having as kind of an appendix that we can kind of update in more real time as new programs and things come off and on names change you know Partnerships evolve you know we wouldn't no longer be asking those for but but we would try to just make it a little bit more of a living document so if you if there's something that's really interesting to the board or something you've read about or you know new partnership you heard about we could kind of just add it in real time and not have to constantly kind of amend the policy and we already do a version of this we do have a hand out that we give companies so this isn't a huge deviation second thing would be a just to simplify some of the language reorganize make it a little more user friendly a little easier to follow and administer third third thing would be to just re-review the legal framework.

Work with attorney Massie and his team to just make sure everything is is still acceptable under case law state law Constitution are there any new tools that have come on that we should be thinking about ex Etc we do have for example a$1 th000 an employee option in the policy we have not used that you know if it doesn't case law requires counties and cities to recoup their investment in a period of s years if we did this but didn't recoup it is that something we're able to do so just an example of making sure that we we've thought through all of the tools and and that they're on the up and up the fourth evaluate a tiered approach based on award size or project size we have a wide range of of projects and a wide range of awards right you know you all have approved a $50,000 award we all have approved a $5 million Award right and we currently treat those kind of all the same you know process.

Contracts Administration Etc and so do we want to kind of break those out into tiers in terms of how we calculate the award some of the annual reporting requirements Etc and just make it a little easier to administer and and allow you just greater. Guidance the fifth one so removing unintended impediments towards achieving the goals of the policy so sometimes right you know we have these goals of things that we want to achieve but sometimes you know first time going about it we kind of some sometimes get in our own way or you know we haven't thought through things that are are new or that that come up as a result of Co Etc so you know an example here is we could allow the policy to to allow professional employer organizations or peos this is when companies are kind of scaling up in the first couple years they don't have a lot of employees but they want to provide their employees health care so they essentially become co-employees of these organizations so.

That they're able to to obtain healthc care and other benefits you know in concert with kind of other companies and organizations so you know we want people to have healthare and so you know maybe we would allow something like that another example would be right now we require companies to essentially submit a roster of all their employees their title their salary and then what how that compares to a salary in the Durham Chapel Hill MSA for a position similar to that so the companies have to to look at the two lists compare them it requires a fair amount of analysis and so maybe a more simplified way to get at what we're really trying to achieve here is just saying is it above a living wage in Durham County I don't know what that number is is it 40,000 is it 60 70 I don't know but you know Wake County does an example of that Wake County does that excuse me I think it is a logical thing.

For us to consider would reduce staff time we spent a lot of time reviewing that with companies and you know just as kind of a humorous anecdote right like I I looked at one of the recent submissions from a company and there was someone who was a supervisor they earned $120,000 a year sounds great but the corresponding position you know at the at the the MSA level was 128,000 so it didn't count you know and so I think that we would want to count the right that's a that's a good wage it's a good job you know it clearly exceeds what it what it costs to live in in Durham but right now we don't you know count that type of position and just lastly for this section we require companies to exceed 80% of the job thresholds for each year in order to get paid if you don't meet 80% of capital investment if you don't meet 80% of your job figures you don't you don't get paid and so.

Maybe we allow for a little more flexibility here this has happened a fair amount with some of our companies kind of postco where they've really blown the doors off with capital investment which is great they far exceeded you know all the the the promises that they've made so that's more tax revenue for us for our programs and our services maybe some of the jobs just didn't manifest or maybe they're working remotely or maybe you know they're in the office just one day a week or something and so is there an opportunity to say well maybe it's it's a little lower for jobs you know there's a weighted opportunity if you do 120% capex could that weight against 70% of jobs Etc so just something to think about those are just numbers that we picked as as examples and just the last one considering a special Lane for transformative project that can't meet the 200 jobs or $50 million capex requirements so you know we've seen some projects lately you know publicly and.

Privately that are you know large you know kind of office type type jobs so there's not a lot of real property investment you know but they so not a lot of real property investment but they have a lot of jobs and so maybe they can't meet 50 million capex but there's 170 jobs for example is that something that we would want to consider I think it is but you know obviously would you know seek your your direction and so this is just an opportunity for us to create a special Lane for kind of special projects as they come through so I will stop there try to power through it because I'm sure yall are hungry tired all of the things associated with long meetings and take any questions you may have thank you so much Matt and Andy for all of your work for bringing all of this money into Durham for always seeking our feedback I had one question that comes off of our tour at Corning was that something that came up.

Was the government relations person was mentioning that there were several companies in that area that were looking to come together and make their own investment into Child Care for those companies and I know that's come up in our conversations about there being that child care issue whether it's an RTP TR bur of like could that be something that we incorporate like that we're not you know obviously not everyone's going to be able to build a child care facility in their new develop new buildings but something that they're willing to invest in for their Workforce or support in any way yeah absolutely so we we currently have child care as one of the items in the checklist that that you know that we say that we're looking to if if companies do offer that that's something we want certainly want to know so we can include that as part of our valuation so that's currently included with the information that we collect and that we you know in terms of articulating Durham.

County values right which is effectively what that list is and so we do currently capture that we are seeing that as probably the hardest space to get Traction in just because the costs are so high but as you mentioned there is a group of of Traer employers that are meeting and so we're going to continue to stay engaged with that just to understand you know how that conversation. Evolves start on this side commissioner Carter well thank you guys I think that this board has been very pleased so very pleased with your work over the years in enacting our Economic Development policy helping us to develop it in the first place and add all the community benefits putting out the report the annual report and then the numbers look so great so thank you so much for your excellent work I think all of the things that You' suggested that we should consider as policy revisions at a high level make sense the examples that you provided of each of of those please.

By all means do that and bring It Forward for consideration by us for changes does this policy have to be in the form of a resolution like is is is that the way our policies are are all of our policies just resolutions I was just surprised to see this you know as a resolution rather than I don't know more of traditional policy language but maybe it's just the way they all are and this is the one that I've had experience with as a commissioner I don't know not excuse me not all policies are adopted by the board or even presented to the board yeah but this one is somewhat different because you are defining how you will support and engage in economic incentives so it represents a significant policy decision that does need to be adopted by the board well I see adopting a policy absolutely but is it does it have to be written as a resolution that just seemed odd to me I don't know we had policies you I think I.

Don't know just I don't consider policy language to be resolution language necessarily but I'm I'm way off base here I'm sure it's just I just thought it was odd I think it's it's not you're telling me it it's not I accept that but I said a policy such as this that is being adopted by the board typically the board adopts resolutions specifying what you're deciding okay I mean all the recital in a resolution will not appear in the policy okay but that you are making findings because it's a legislative action here's how you are going to engage in economic incentives okay all right would there also be a policy manual where it would just have the policy written or it would also be in the it would be resolution let's talk about this later this is just a this is just a quirky thing I have in my own head sorry about that now in addition to all that driil that I was just saying I knew there was something.

Really important I wanted to ask you you may have to come back to me Madam chair it was really please come back to me may I have a few more minutes later after IA my thoughts thank you yeah I mean okay icept that how yeah thank you m so what Heidi's looking for her what it was she wanted to remember I just want to say thank you thank you for all the work thank you so much for all the corporations and the jobs that you created for our citizens and that has been one of the major issues for me is that Durham citizens get these jobs and you've been very diligent about my that happen and we appreciate it thank you thank you and just just to follow up from the question earlier we were able to confirm that 32% of Corning employees are Durham County residents great do that great wonderful thank you that reminds me of what my right this whole notion that we really want to recruit these great.

Businesses that are bringing wonderful job opportunities and you know how come we continue to do our best to ensure that Durham residents get those jobs is there a way either through this policy revision or aside from from it to get more information on who works for the company you know what what how many of where do they live you know what what's the diversity of the workforce even you know we we alsoo want as a sort of community value for our corporations we we hope that they value diversity of in the workforce it would just be nice to see some data on on that if you all think that's a reasonable or even legal thing for us to ask about I'm not saying it's tied to the incentive just just we'd like to know I don't know I know we can't you know I know we can't say you have to meet these T you know you have to meet these required targets for who you employ and.

You have no recourse about you have to hire dur County Employees but still could we see the data on who you do I wonder about that absolutely I think you know just as we've seen with the Corning example and understanding the significance as it relates to transportation and and the value in having that information we can we can certainly do that we can put the ask out yeah great and then I also think we should hit as hard as we can following up on n's comment about child care on familyfriendly policies that you have in your Workforce Durham County really has that as a high value in our own organization being sure we have policies that are supportive of families and so what are those you know if we could get more information from counties on our own companies how they plan to support their the ability of their Workforce to you know have have a family and and succeed with their families absolutely and we've we've tried to include that.

More particularly of late just in terms of understanding the full range of benefits that companies do offer including that with the materials yes you have and I appreciate that let's just keep doing it and figuring out how we can do it even more more of that thank you y all right gentlemen taking over for just a second while chair has to step away my question is one y'all know how excited I get you know most elected officials don't like to go to close session and one of the Beautiful Things is I think at times the public gets really worried when we go to close session if they can't look they don't understand the paragraph and you see us coming back there smiling because we know that we're about to work on something with jobs for anybody who's listening you know this is not a deess you a Democrat or Republican issue I think we joked about that at coring the other day for most people a lot of.

That goes out the the door when it becomes a jobs bill so I am happy to say that you know we work really well together with our partners at the state and federal level with our partners at the chamber also our Junior partner at the chamber who our the newest baby who is also in the audience but for me so two two things I I do want to concur with my colleagues about some of these family friendly policies we were at and I know you all said that you will be looking at other counties and jurisdictions to see you know what they do because there's some things that they' mimic that we've liked and one of my questions will be you know and I only have two you know what are some things that you are looking at outside of this that maybe you're like meinburg did this or Guilford did this or Randolph did this you know with Toyota got to see one of their presentations the other.

Day from Sean sugs and just how much they put back into the community and I know that these are not ours and I'm I'm always I don't want to get myself in trouble but I'm like how did what was the secret sauce for them to get it right as opposed for Google and vent fast who are now on these pauses and Toyotas Full Speed Ahead I think we all know what some of the issues are elections have consequences so people are on certain causes but I the NC impact actually did a study and sawed 36 different counties come into North Carolina every day to work and that's not counting the ones that come in Virginia so we do have people coming in here to work and I'm always like how do we get our folks in this County to work I was real happy at Corin when we saw everyday people working cuz that's what in these cleaning environments the same thing to be said for K power as far.

As some of the familyfriendly things I I want us to be also hopeful that we can look at the state the same way you know we were able to do our Crown act change and our regulatory change before the state did we were able to do our juneth I think before the state did maybe not before the feds did I did not know this until I was at the Women's Conference last week and a few of y'all were there keep me honest as of August 1st the governor has passed executive order and a new policy where if you miss Mis carry a baby you are giv paid time off like we did not have that until August 1st so you know as we're looking at other jurisdictions are we mimicking that as a as a county but also looking at our partners and say are these things that you have in place I know I've talked to both of you about this before but the same thing that my other.

Colleagues said about child care for the first time ever the Department of Commerce has hired a state child care liaz in Commerce so and and she's actually she used to be in Durham I'm looking at in the face and cannot than her Cole Samantha Co she actually used to work in D I think she interned at the city so she now has this job where her only function is to Liaison with private companies on how they can better position themselves to provide more more child care so the burden is not on parents and not on us what can we pull from that state partner be like okay you were in Arizona you were in Michigan what was the best practice so that we can because I don't think they've come out with a booklet or a list of recommendations yet and I personally don't feel like we should wait on it like you know it takes a month or a year to put out policies and recommendations and I don't want us to miss that.

Moment because I think some of y'all saw we were best for business two years in a row and then the third year we were number two and when you look at the score sheet A lot of it had to do with infrastructure but for the first time and I've said this before we got Democrats and Republicans who are saying we need to inv invest in child care cuz duh they realize that now you bringing in all these jobs and folks don't have child care so they're putting policy behind it money behind it I don't want us to miss that boat so as we're codifying our language I would like to see if we could codify that because if the general assembly is doing it and the state is and the and commerce is doing the governor's office is doing it I think we're in a better position as a county to do it because now whoever is looking in is like at all three levels this is something that's important to.

Them and if we want to do business here this is it but again for the question what are some things that you all see at other counties that you think that we should be doing I know you gave us this recommended list but are there some other things that you think might be too hard for us to Cy by November but might be nice for us to look at so I'll take a whack at it first so I actually think and and hopefully it's okay to say I think other people are looking to us on this to y'all not not not us but to y'all I think if you were to look at some of the policy updates in the state of North Carolina particular counties over the past few years you'd see them moving more in our Direction at least on Community benefits and Partnerships so I think there there's that which is which is really good I think on some of the things that you referen you know child.

Care you know daycare things of that nature that's that's really hard to do with an incentive because the incentive amount is not going to pay even if you look at our largest incentive that we've ever given probably wouldn't pay for a daycare right and so I think we see and I think you all do too to some degree the incentives as an opportunity to reward good behavior you know bring bring companies and and reward companies for for things they're already doing certainly suggesting and steering where we can if they're willing to to to work on that front but a lot of the companies we've brought recently have had I would say relatively family friendly policies and but I think what I would say is a lot of the companies do want to work on it and I think the incentive process allows us an opportunity to have an open door with these respective companies but you know a lot of them are not in the daycare business right.

There's a couple companies in in in the park that have their own kind of child care service but but that's pretty rare and so you know they may be experts in manufacturing they may be experts in you know research and development but you know the child care piece is a little bit hard for them to bite off for just themselves and so I think they that folks would welcome an opportunity to have a larger conversation with different businesses and proximities on child care whether or not Andy and I are are are the best person for that or able to do that I'm not sure but I'm certain that we could you know begin the conversation and make the right introductions and and continue to to stress its importance and and quick followup before I go to commissioner Jacobs I I won't say the two companies names you were with me for one of you know this company said you know oh yeah we did this in edcom county and we.

Did this in Rocky Mount and I said well do you all have a significant presence they like why did you do that it was like yes we have a factory there and the footprint is this and then I look at some of the other we we do have these things I'm trying to not say things that are actually in our community benefit statement that we work on I'm trying not to but I just feel like I'll look at another company and they are doing I'm use Toyota cuz that one was you know they've given $2 million back to like schools and nonprofits in Guilford County I cannot think off the top of my head any of our companies who have said you know in two years we've done $2 million here and I bring that up because I know we ask for things but I actually think that folks really do want to be good corporate citizens and I think as one of my colleag said doing budget we.

Are punching above our weight in Durham we really are and we are over taxing our our residents and we do have these great companies here that I personally feel like it would not be a burden to them to help out I almost said this other company's name we I think myself commissioner L and D were there for the ribbon cutting and it was right downtown and we said they said oh we love working in schools they had worked in six schools all the schools were in Orange County had not worked at one year and I just I couldn't understand like and the footprint was just here so how we could just be a little bit more intentional I know you guys are doing tracking but as we're seeing folks make these additional Investments I remember Fidelity goes they're good they do financial literacy in classrooms can't quantify that but qualitatively I like that but what are some of these other things that folks are doing to be good stewards that we are not capturing and.

What could we be getting them to do so that there could be a bit more of a cost share or burden share and I don't have to have the answer now but that's just I want to be really in intentional about. That yeah without saying too much I think we've talked a lot about that internally and and how to make make I'll just say do better make sure we have more time to get with these companies and make the right connections and facilitate the right relationships I I think it does go back to one of the previous slides is there's really just three of us and so just me really just me doing business recruitment you know Andy obviously as a supervisor and man and and director you know doing doing the work too but I think we're thinking about ways to to to better maximize that certainly we talk to the companies once or twice a year with their with their reporting requirements but how can we make sure.

That they they know the right people at the right places so that they can develop the relationships that can lead to those types of donations right they're not going to make a donation to some place that they don't have a relation ship with and so I do think there have been some companies in Durham I mean I think noo nordis had a had a big donation couple years ago or a year ago some of our other life sciences companies have done kind of nonmonetary Partnerships you know with Durham Tech and with Central as a result of our agreements but I think your point is well received and something we literally talk about probably at least every day I'll say the more specific level you know as it relates to bows you know we we have funding lined up for that through the end of 2025 and you know the conversations that we've had with all of our partners are that you know we're not going to be able to maintain that level local support and.

So you know we will have to transition into a philanthropic and a private model funding model after 2025 thank y'all and I know y'all are punching above your weight too commissioner Jacob thank you so much I'm really proud of the work that we've done in Durham County and I think that that slide that shows all the companies and really speaks to it the the teamwork that we have going on with the chamber as well I really I totally support your recommendations about developing a policy that's more flexible and that's really rightsizing you know what things based on really what is the different types of companies that we're seeing happening and I think also In This Moment looking at the chips act and you know the inflation reduction Act and the bipartisan infrastructure Bill we're we're we're we are benefiting directly from that and so we're we're seeing different types of companies that are coming to Durham internationally directly because of this so I think we have to we have to adapt as well to.

Take advantage and leverage the opportunities and especially also around things like headquarters I agree with what we've all been hearing how if you you know if you have to pick if we had to pick one maybe what are the most important Community benefits that and I don't know maybe maybe I guess one of the thoughts I had is would we be more effective if we really streamline our what we what our priorities are in terms of community benefits so you know the things that come to mind for me are obviously child care and you know family supportive policies and you know it may be that people can't afford to do an on-site child care center but can they partner with other companies can they provide a subsidy you know those are some of the things so like zeroing in on that and then also the work the education to jobs pipeline I think this is something that takes is so difficult and I know we kind of you know we we we talk about the.

Internships and apprenticeships and the job but like I would really like to know like what does it really take and like is there something and and hear from the companies too like I would you know maybe maybe this is an opportunity to even have a conversation with companies and like you also looking at the flexibility around meeting the goals us being more adaptable as well because we've had to go back and amend some of our things related to covid and things like that but like really understanding with companies like how's it going are you really able to connect with Central and Durham Tech and Duke and Durham Public Schools like what is it that we really what is it going to take to really create that pipeline so that we know that our residents really can be prepared for these jobs like I I would really like to understand that and the that's a great question and point something we think about a lot I mean I think for a lot of our companies.

There's kind of two buckets there's kind of the big folks you know who have I'm not going to name names but you know they have offices all over the world they have facilities all over the world they have people on staff trained and resourced to to do that type of work then you have some of the other companies that we work with which are big companies and the fact they're not like a mom and pop but you know they may be starting from scratch or from five to 10 people hoping to get to 200 over seven years you know they're just trying to get their patent approved or their clinical trial you know complete you know they don't quite know how to make connections or create programs pipeline Associated things with some of our local partners and so I think that's where Andy and I have really thought about you know trying to put some of our our focuses with some of these these these growing companies who may not have the resources or time.

Or expertise really kind of focusing on them supporting the other companies certainly but they just tend to have more infrastructure already in place right and you know the HR I mean a lot of this is right their HR departments or who their HR director is and I know also a lot of this comes down to relationships too being able to pick up the phone and you know call somebody and say hey I've got this many positions to fill you know how do I find people or even we want want Durham residents to go into those jobs and then I know we've kind of struggled with people like justice involved folks and so yeah and then I think the other thing I totally agree like the living wage issue like we don't want to what are things that are burdensome and aren't really important to get away from that and and in our current policy obviously it says $15 an hour so we we definitely need to we need to update.

That language I think to be something that we is it's not even a fixed number but it should be something that's even connected to what Durham Cy's doing because we can't expect companies to even do more than we're doing right so well you I don't know I I just I mean that's something to think about right certainly we can think about what that number is I envisioned it would kind of be a living number it would say you know the companies much exceed this amount published by Durham County this month you know every year and you know that allow it to evolve with inflation wave wage growth Etc you said a better than me a living a living number that doesn't happen very often so I'll right a living number for The Living wage and also I like your idea of doing something more in a a data I mean like a chart form and also even with our our our tracking system for annually reporting to the community and on our on the website.

That you're doing some of the other like the big picture of all these different benefits the jobs the tax revenue even that being all just in more of a data form that's easy for somebody like a snapshot that people could look at like you did on the these slides for us no problem yeah so but thank you thank you thank you can I just go back to one thing I wanted to just say thanks to Brian if he's still here in the greater Durham chamber I know Andy called it out but Brian and Matt and you know Jeff and Angelique and their staff have just been great partners and are really the front door for a lot of our our work so I just wanted to highlight them again and just say thanks for all the work they do with us all right thanks so much thanks thank you so much manager I want to are we going to do Aran next Aran next as opposed to tax okay no well you can dox.

Are you sure because I know okay okay if we could ladies and gentlemen I would like to have the folks from our tax administration office we will be getting a re praisal update come forward you all look so happy to be. Here and then I think that's it yeah cuz what's her name is next.

Welcome welcome and you all can go when you want to I see that the PowerPoint presentation is already up in the clicker still you live good afternoon Commissioners thank you for having us we been working hard and we're dying to share this information so thank you for having us and hopefully we will not bore you it was a wonderful lunch all right so we're basically here today just to make sure that we are keeping you all the breast of what's going on and what we're seeing in the market nothing we are sharing is going to be final numbers at this point but it is a reflection of what we're seeing and this is the data that's being collected that will formulate these final numbers all right so I just want to make sure that we're clear in regards to what you're actually seeing this first slide is a illustration of really the importance of doing reappraisals all right if you see the First Column is the final ratio and the.

Last column is the actual year of the appraisal so if you notice the further away from your re appraisal date the lower that number is in that First Column the final ratio all right if you see us towards the bottom of the First Column Durham County is at 61% that's very low but as you see the last re appraisal was 2019 so when you base it on how many years have have have have passed since our last re appraisal given the market we're in you see these types of numbers and if you notice I believe as Cumberland County above us is even lower they were two years prior in regards to their reappraisal fory County two years after us and not too much far not not too far from our number mecklinburg County I got highlighted over to the right and as you see they are 2023 rear appraisal and they're still above 90% weight County was this year and they are just below 100% the goal of course.

For reappraisal is to try to be as close to 100% as possible but it's to make sure that you are readjusting and getting away from these numbers you see that are further away from the reappraisal date 2019 this was Durham's market for Residential Properties roughly. $240,000 the market 2024 as of July 2024 to be exact you see the DraStic. Change so this is Durham County this is the city of Durham so this is the new market that we are dealing with and this is where these values are coming from that we are reviewing these sales we are in abundance we have a lot of data so these are real numbers and as you see the.

Difference the real property division decided to give you all a few examples of what they're seeing so they collected a few sales so you could actually see some of the things that they're coming across here we have a 2018 sale for $270,000 by 2024 Fe February 2024 that property sold for $440,000 63% increase they intentionally didn't pick the worst Properties or the best properties these are kind of middle of the road just so you can get a feel for what type of transactions are taking place here's another property South Durham area 2018 sale $325,000 here we are in 2024 February again $560,000 72%.

Increase Forest Hills 2018 sale and as you can see this isn't a typical Forest Hill property I guess how I say so it's pretty average normal type of sale so for $210,000 in 2018 2024 $441,000 it's 110% increase. And this is closer to home closer to where we are now Watts Hill Andale 2018 sale $300,000 and 2024 sale $710,000 it's 136% increase as you notice most of these sales are 2018 meaning they were a part of the sales that were used to create the 2019 values for the last re appraisal the sales you're looking at that are more current these 2024 sales will in turn help us create the values for these 20 this 2025 re.

Appraisal current market statistics for the Residential Properties and this is just an illustration to kind of show you where the data is coming from we have that middle column is the count so it's showing you it's 335 sales below 100,000 I would assume a lot of those sales are raw land just being in that price range a lot of them the median sales ratio to the left is again giving you a good idea in regards to where those sales are coming in and the percent of the sales in the far right column is just showing you how much of that making up the total in regards to what's being reviewed so out of all the the sales being reviewed that's the breakdown of what we're coming.

Across current statistics for the commercial it's the exact same thing it's just showing you giving you an idea of the types of properties that are being reviewed where those numbers are coming from and the amount of what's making up that data below 250,000 250,000 to 500,000 and so on the next few slides are commercial and I will make sure that give James Roberts the floor he's the commercial supervisor in the.

Office hello. There we go how's that all right so I want to reiterate what K said earlier on that this data is by no means final data this data that we're about to go through in these slides is actually from One Source we will go through a number of sources to build our models and value the property so please don't look at these numbers and think that this is where we are where we'll end up all right so I'm going to go through five of our main property types first being office you can see we have data from 2019 to today the the things that stick out are that we appear slightly healthier than the National Market we have a positive absorption rate currently and we have a vacancy rate of 9.4 which are both better than what's going on in the nation I would caution though that because this is single Source data that we have to be careful that it's not skewed and that's why we use some of.

These sources because it would be very easy to skew this data the the individuals that provide the data would have a motivation to not provide any data when their vacancy rate was really high and they if their vacancy rate was really low they'd want to tell potential purchasers that it was low so those two two can work together to show a better vacancy rate than there actually is the vacancy rate is probably going to stay pretty steady because we do have one very good thing going for us in the office market and that is we have not been building many Office Buildings so we don't have a large amount of square footage that's going to come on the market during a time when not many people want office space rent growth recently slowed to two 2% it's it has historically averaged about 4.4% across all five property types you will see that there is a similar Trend and that is is that sales have slowed down over the last few.

Years and that is directly related to high interest rates the the banks with commercial can actually require even larger down payments on top of the interest rate problems because they want developers to put more of their own money in to deter bankruptcies and things like that they do indicate the values have continued to decline but forecasters are showing that bot that office properties will probably bottom out in early 2025 where they are now they're about $10 to15 higher than the 2019 average per square foot.

The the value sales sales price. Yes I'm I'm just wondering if we have this presentation so I could see it on my computer instead of on this screen right here and if not I know we'll get it later and that's fine just I don't have it do am I the only one that doesn't have it I'm I'm just on the email with the agenda link okay thanks I'm sorry to interrupt it's.

Okay okay so the next group that we'll look at is retail retails at a very tight Market the demand is at actually at record levels for retail we have again below normal Sal sales volume but that's interest rate related the rents are up 4 and a half% over the past 12 months which is almost twice the national average and our sales price per square foot is nearly $50 higher than the 2019. Sales our multif family is not doing quite as well second quarter 2024 vacancy rate is at an all-time high at 11.6% delivery have deliveries have outpaced demand which has caused a slight decline in rental rates so there are positives and negatives the rental rates have gone down some which is better for those who who pay those rental rates but it will reduce the property value on the tax side absorption has been positive for through the last four quarters the class A and the downtown multif family are doing the best in the county the developed parcel I'm sorry developed.

Unit count so apartment units over the past year have been double of what we've historically developed so that's part of what's contributing to the higher vacancy is the number of apartments that are being built absorption expected to remain solid but with 6,600 units under construction demand's not going to keep up with that number so we're going to see continued increases in vacancy rates a little and reduction in rental rates we are build we're filling up with all of our new apartment correct Apartments being built right but one so are you saying what are the impacts though is to help keep down the actual rent correct yeah it should help apply downward pressure on the.

Rent right it it is your your mic yes the the asking rent growth 12 months what's that one two three four five six seven from the. Bottom excuse me did everybody get the email yeah Heidi I couldn't hear your question you have people who are hard of hearing on your board I promise it wasn't worth everyone hearing was mostly I just was trying to read the the slide but now I I have it right in front of me here so I'll be able to I'll be a better list listener now thank you okay so the value per unit is expected to Contin continue to decline into 25 but will still be higher than the 2019 values I believe that the differences around $40,000 a unit right now on average that's the difference between 2019 and and now.

All right so now we're going to talk about industrial we have had a strong new construction it is outpacing demand currently and vacancies are rising it will probably continue for the next few quarters the annual wal growth has slowed over the past two years and it's going to continue to slow as new projects are completed and the vacancy rate Rises sales volume is down again High interest rates demand is expected to remain positive but large number of the new construction projects means vacancy levels will continue to climb and currently the sales price per square foot average is $125 and it was $70 in 2019 per.

Foot I we look at Hospitality which is hotels and motels we have the highest revenue per available room and best occupancy in the state over the last 12 months growth is continue is is expected to continue and it has been bolstered by corporate travel I'm sorry that's by percentage correct you said Mo say the sentence again the the triangle has had the highest revenue per avail able room and lowest occupancy which is a percentage okay I was okay thank you I was about to say because it's more hotels in some of these count so it's by that's still great like I'm still there but yeah right in let's see 2024 we will see 5% increase in rooms due to completion of 13 new properties the sales slowed again because of higher interest rates the 2019 average sale per room was 125,000 and the current average per room is about.

130,000 and I that is it for the commercial.

Numbers good afternoon this is just a sort of a a timeline to let you know where we started and where we are presently of course we started in January of 23 we did our reappraisal plan and sent to do and they sent back to us and we did an internal sent back and said we were okay to go and so we did the started actually doing our fieldwork in the same month the internal reappraisal process began all right so we started there doing our fieldwork and as we're starting to do these things if you notice we have three little things up there in January well this the beginning so we start a lot of things at one time and so we started analyzing our sales all right so in analyzing those sales that leads us into February which analyzing those sales starts giving us an idea of what our land our land is selling for which you kind of saw in the other one of the other slides.

The L low values we had were those were mostly vacant land vacant lots and those were the things that sell under $100,000 it's just a lot you know so if we got lot selling for close to a 100 we're rising in values so then we started looking as we doing those U analyzing we start looking at land prices but we then we start looking at what our improved properties are so now we're starting to try to figure out what what these houses are selling for once they're built and and what when when the current resident decides to move on and what are they the old stuff selling for so we started doing that and we've gotten an idea at this point of what's the dollars per square foot in certain types of structures that's residential as well as commercial so we're starting to get an idea in April of this year what we're going to be doing which one is this one yes sir all right and then we continue on until.

We get into July of this year and now we're starting to work on constructing what is known as the schedule of values the the book that determines the numbers that we use and apply to different types of properties different type of structures that sit on those properties and the different type of uses of property and we start organizing that stuff and trying to find out breaking everything down into numbers and that's what goes into the schedule of values numbers and so we started on that and so now we're get starting to get into October which is when you all are going to come into play and you're going to adopt the schedule of value so we'll present that to you for you all to do your questioning the values or to allow the schedule to lay open for members of the community in the county to start looking at it and see if they see something that needs to be questioned or they want to question and and get back to us and we start.

Responding and and making sure that everyone understands the schedule of values and how those things went into it and so then we get into November and we start doing what we consider our final review we've got the schedule of values laying out for you all to analyze and to look at and to stress over and so then we go into November and in the final review we're actually going back over the things that we we've already reviewed all so you say well why would you need a final review well you can never review too much because the sales are changing constantly and we want to have our information to be as close to December 31 of 2024 as possible because if we don't continue to look over the the the properties that change hands we may not be at the most accurate value that we can if we just did it one time and say that's all we need to do we would be at maybe not a.

Good place but the more we do it the more we can get to being confident in what we're doing and to make sure that we think that our numbers are as good as we can get them with the information we have and so and then of course as we get through November you say well that was the final review no we will still be reviewing even into January because guess what happens in December people still buy houses or sell land and that thing in December so we need to look at that in January so we get into the beginning of the year in January through March is when we'll be doing those final final things and at some point in between late January early March we hope to send the change of value notices and I say these things as not being Inc concrete because we don't know we may be able to send them January and we may not be able to send them January but we know.

That will be sent before March so we know that some point in there we'll be getting those notices of change of value out to the public so that we can start hearing their thoughts and we can start getting appeals scheduled and so that we can start getting ready to do the thing that no one wants to do which is to hold these hearings and to hear these questions or to experience these complaints according to who it's coming from some will be questions most will be complaints so we'll get there and we'll be there in in in March and okay there you go all right so that was kind of a timeline and this is kind of a the schedule the C calendar schedule of the things that we want to do starting in in in October and that would be as I said earlier present the schedule of values to you all for you all to go over and look at question us get in general information and at some point maybe even specific information.

And then in October also we want to start advertising that the schedule of values are open for public inspection in our office people can come up if they choose and just take a look at it ask questions about it just get information out of it and see how it fits their life and their properties and their things and then of course in October we'll start he having the public hearing and that'll be it'll begin at first one doing a regularly scheduled meeting I'm pretty sure you have had those before and you're very excited about going into this game I can just feel it and so the in November in November the you should you all should then after it's laid out for a while and you should consider adopting the schedule and you all to go through and do your legal things that you have to do to make sure that it becomes the the information that is used to value the county and it has met you all expectations and hopefully the.

Expectations of the citizens of the county so we'll be getting excited at that point and so the first date for us to advertise that notice we plan for it to be November the 13th in the in the local paper and so then it'll be going around we we'll have it a number of times advertised but that'll be the beginning of it so that everybody will get to know that we are doing these things and that their time is ready to for them to examine this stuff and that they can come in and see it and if someone is going to appeal it from November to 13th you got to have 30 days for them to appeal it in so they've got to have that appeal in within those 30 days and hopefully no one appeal it and so then we go into December and the last date the schedule of values can be challenged so they're going to be looking at that and but we're going to have everything lined up so there.

Will be no challenges to it everything is going to be perfect so in mid-February we will create a file for the notices to change the values so hopefully we'll be getting that sent to our printer in in mid-February so that he can get those things printed out they can get them printed out and we'll be getting ready to send those notices out and everybody will be anticipating it so it'll be a big thing in the county and the last week of February we hope to mail those change of value notices so if we do and get them and and mailed it by the end of February then one week after that we'll have a stack of appeals so Wendy Jacobs that was a schedule of value not their individual values yeah that was the schedule of values so no one's going to appeal the schedule of value but they are going to appeal some individual houses and properties you know so so mid-February we'll send that notice of value change and last.

Week we'll mail it out to the public and then in March we'll open the appeal module so people can start going into our electronic appeal system and start putting in their information in their appeal and we'll start getting that stuff and we so that we will be able to start lining up and scheduling those appeals so hopefully that'll start in the beginning of March and everything will run smoothly with the software which it typically does so that won't be an issue and then we'll come into mid-march and we'll start holding some informal hearings and meetings not not hearings but meetings in the designated Library so those people can come in start talking about things that they may not know about start asking questions and we can start getting them lined up so that if they really have problems or issues with their properties we can get them set up for a a hearing and get it scheduled and they can get ready to meet to the meet before the Board of Equalization and.

Review which is the board you all appointed that handles those questions or issues with property values and then in April we will advertise for the Board of Equalization and review we get that we've got to advertise it three weeks and so we'll advertis it probably two weeks before the schedule of the first meeting and then we'll probably advertise the week of the following the first meeting so that everyone will have a chance to make sure that they get to see that advertisement and no one will miss miss that advertisement and then by May May the U we will the board of equal Equalization and review will convene and hopefully it will be adjourned by June the 16th now that does not mean that we'll probably be heard all of the issues but we'll be adjourning as a matter of people having the timelines haven't been met for people to set their appeals or get their appeals set in so we have now we have a little something from Horton she'd like to add.

To that those were all our slides but we've got some something for Kim to say to you all she want to give us a little bit of of information that only the best of us have she's going to tell us she's found a secret pot of money for us no no there was just a couple of items that I think we failed to including the slid on one of them is the public meetings that we're currently attend attending at the request of some of the citizens out in the community I think we have five scheduled to date and we've already done a couple so if there's any Community event or organization that you would like for us to go and speak to by all means please let K know and would' be happy to attend as the notices go out as Starin has stated it is very important to K and the rest of us in the office that we're there for the community so that they can understand the values that.

We've assigned to the property we're going to have mechan mechanisms in place to allow them to easily appeal their value not make it hard or cumbers on the taxpayers and then just show them how our values were arrived at and share that with them so the customer service part of it after all the work is done you know the customer service part of it is a big item for K and the rest of us in the office so we welcome that interaction with the.

Taxpayers thank you all so much we know this has been a lot especially with the new software implementation with the budget I know kiar had a lot of anxieties along with our budget staff about the budget we passed P and how it's going to impact our residents when they get their reevaluations next year but really thank you to all of the work and especially your field team that's out there every day driving around Durham and doing these valuations especially during these warmer months and when it gets to the colder months I guess all year round I'll bring you back to the board for questions commissioner Carter I'll start with you you know I like to formulate my questions but I'll try to jump right in I can go to commissioner Jacob go ahead oh Vice chair Burns okay I have a random I got a do dis appointment so I was trying to hold off for y'all one thank you so much for this timeline I did learn a lot I it's interesting.

Because I know people are watching and I hope that they do see it's not just us like this is what the market is driving and and thank you for showing so many different types of homes and houses to show that this is happening across the board and thank you for geographically showcasing that it is also happening across the county so this it's not germine to just to one group and I think even some of the numbers were surprising to us as we sit here the March 11th through the 25th where you're going to have these series of public meetings and I know this is far off that kind of 14-day time period do you can you imagine how many of those you might have so those were based on historically so the last three Re appraisals we kind of looked at the timelines that we offer these informational meeting and they were two weeks they were they were either in mid February or March but they were always following that mailing so.

You want to give time to the taxpayers to actually receive a mail review it get confused and need to sit down and talk to somebody so that's fair if if we determine or if we see a need for more there's always you know opportunity to increase the visits but we usually historically we've always done two days at each library to kind of make sure we're in each part of durh and available for taxpayers to come out the the past experience I've had the the issue is usually advertising we're there and we're usually there all day so we'll be I mean I've been in Stanford L Warren I've been in north Durham at the library near Northern High School the traffic was dependent upon who knew did we get the word out were they aware that we were going to be there on these days so some of them are very very very impactful and some of them we didn't get enough we didn't feel like we got enough traffic but U we'll try to do.

Our best to advertise but if depending on how many appeals we're seeing what types of thoughts we're thinking about in regards to the impact we might need to do more but two weeks is usually what what has been done in the past no that's helpful and quick follow up to that cuz I'm imagining I mean people who even got their tax bills this year you know not we a talking about that next year you know like well why is it this why is it not that and then the sticker shock of maybe next year I'm imagining in this public room you'll probably have some information that you want to present much like you did to us but there is that one person that wants a pound of Flesh and then there's the other person that doesn't necessarily want they just it is disc concerned like they're now very nervous I don't know how to pay will you all have a room set cuz the libraries are good for that like here's.

This big room and then here's this study room where maybe someone from your staff can be in that that person so that this room does not go off the rails and also so that person who's kind of nervous doesn't have to wait until the very end and say Hey sir can I see you to the side are we in a position to take them away right so so in the past oh I mean not take them away but give give them the Privacy that they I do not know if the Privacy was always available it depends on the library itself right some of them have are set up so they do have those types of spaces but in general it's usually an environment where it's like six six tables set up individually and a taxpayer has the ability to sit down with an appraiser and it's it's not private cuz it's not closed off okay but they are isolated enough where they should be able to have a conversation that.

Oneone there's usually a laptop set up so they can actually look at the property together go over whatever type of issues or concerns they might have these are not set up for actual appeals okay but they are set up for you to actually discuss the property so we we usually have a pretty individualized session with each taxpayer that comes in so they they have their ability to sit down with someone whether it's an appraiser a supervisor they they'll have one on-one time and last question is first come first serve as opposed to registered 3:15 I'mma sit here so people could potentially be waiting in line as a or the other option is to make an appointment and come to the office so so in the past we've had appointments okay okay depending on how things play out sometimes you can squeeze somebody into a a spot but normally we go by appointments okay if if it's done prior to them coming or if it's done at the door it's usually by appointment this.

I'm thinking more maybe public meeting was what was throwing me off because I'm thinking you are but no this that this gives me a much better visual I'm done I will leave it to my colleagues I do not envy you at all but those are good questions but yes they are individual sessions for each taxpayer commissioner Jacobs y thank you so much I the information about the timeline is really helpful it's a really detailed and very intense timeline I'm wondering how will this be shared publicly where where where will the timeline live it live like where yeah where will it live will it be on the tax office website or just What would I'm just thinking about how do we make share this information publicly historically we haven't but I don't I'm not opposed to showing a schedule of some sort yeah I think it would be helpful we will coordinate with Ki to determine the path forward as well as with our colleagues at the city they're they're.

Listening in yes and so I'm sure we we will confer to make okay things very clear to the public and do you have plans to that was on my list here was do you have plans to present this to the city. Council if you would like I think it would be a good idea yeah I really recommend that the the the information that don't want to get James that you presented was really interesting and I mean I really want to study this but I think that's also really important for all the City Council members to know as well and for the community again would the trends is that something that would is going to be publicly shared or available for people to see not in that format that you saw okay those because those are raw that's raw data some of that data is I won't say I mean it's it's real data so it's changing all the time yeah right but it's collected data that's not necessarily been sorted and analyzed to.

See the specifics of what's actually going to be finalized so giving raw data like that it's it's not a problem if people know what they're looking at if they don't know what they're looking at and they take that data and try to start formulating things that could get a little dangerous cuz it's including some Outcast some some extremes some some some highs some lows some medians some means so it's a lot of it's a lot of data to be reviewing and if it's just out there without proper explanations and guidance it could mislead cuz one of the things that comes to mind and again I haven't had time to study this is we've heard a lot from the community community that oh we're we're not properly assessing commercial properties and ironically what we're going to see is because of what's happening with the market right now with you know still recovering from covid from because of the High you know inflation and the and the high interest rates we're not.

Going to actually see those values go up very much right compared to the individual home sales I mean it looks to me very different when you're seeing the increase in the value from 2019 it's not that much compare when you're comparing it to the residential so there yes there are totally two separate things going on so yes to to compare residential to commercial without taking in a whole lot of factors would not be wise but with that being said commercial has been affected differently since 2019 than residential we have vacancies that is different from pre2 the last reappraisal but definitely the pandemic as we know we all take advantage of remote work remote work affects the private sector just as it affects us but they're paying taxes on those properties so if they build a property with the intentions of a certain type of rent certain types of sales certain types of things when they built that property as a commercial developer and now they're in a position where those those buildings are.

30% or 60% but they are not 100% being utilized right that's rent being lost those are projections that were because of a pandemic that turned out to be wrong so if if a building was built with a certain type of expectation we do sales we base things off sales and then they turn around and appeal it off of income that that's going to be a drastic difference in value and we we do utilize all three approaches to Value as appraisers we're doing all three so we look at sales we look at cost and we look at income so if your sale value was projected or expected to in a certain place but then your income value is in a different place because of vacancies because of remote work because of things that they did not see prior to building this commercial property that's going to affect their value their projected value was one thing but the realistic value that they're living in and they're dealing with right now is another thing.

So you don't see that with properties that people are buying to live in right these these properties are still selling for numbers we still aren't getting used to but it's a totally different thing when you compare a residential to commercial right and that's why I'm saying you know we've all heard from the community that you're undervaluing commercial and blah blah blah but I think that the irony is going to be that it we're not going to see is maybe what people are expecting in those areas because of because of what you just explained and that's going to right right and but on top of that we're going to follow the sales we're AR going to create anything so we're going to do what the sales show us right and we have to see where that takes us and most of the the concerns of the public are real and I understand but they are also based on a 2019 Market we are not in that market we have to look.

At the market we're in we don't base numbers off of Trends we have to BAS Bas them off what we really see we use trending methods we use a lot of things to kind of help us with the data that we're seeing but we're going to follow the market all right thank you you ready Mr Carter oh I did have one other thing sorry the the what the different terms that you're using that you were talking about James with I think it would be helpful I hate to say it but almost like a glossery or definition of those terms I I was trying to guess what some of them were but I I think if you could provide us with that that would be helpful we we don't know what James is saying and we we work those terms will be those terms will be defined in the schedule values there's an appendix I couldn't hear you Kim I'm sorry those terms are defined in the schedule values there's an appendex.

To okay there will an appendix that explains those okay yes ma'am okay that would be helpful and I noticed that what was missing Starin from your timeline was the adoption of the tax rate I know you don't have anything to do with that the tax office has nothing to do with the tax rate and and and I'm assuming so that you are going to be having the comps up there for people to see the online comps yes they will have that online by the time appeals or Star roll yes thank you I'm done thank thank you commissioner Carter then commissioner howon and I know I don't want to speed you guys up but just oh believe me we'll talk about that later I hope actually how long this meeting has been going and similar meetings how long they've been going for I just I really want to thank you guys I think that you all have as a superpower this ability to make our residents feel like you hear them and.

You care about their concerns I really have seen that in action from you already and we haven't even been through the reappraisal process yet and I I can't tell you how important I think that is and really want to thank you so much for that it really matters so if I don't say anything else that means anything today I want you to hear that it's just super important especially going into the reappraisal so so that sort of service to the consumer or or whatever just you're you're great at it and thank you one question I do have is related to this whole notion of Are We assessing our commercial properties fairly compared to the Residential Properties just still back to that is it a reasonable conclusion to draw though right now from the current market statistical data that you've given us if the mean if the if the median sales ratio for commercial properties is you know 53% and the same ratio for Residential Properties is 55% I mean they're both way off but they're.

Sort of off by about the same amount it does that is a logical conclusion that well they're sort of equitably appraised do you see what I'm saying that would be my assumption you would draw that conclusion too okay yes based off of what you what you've seen what I've seen I believe that the people the company that did the last rear appraisal did a good job could they have done a better job possibly could we comb through the data and find some things to pick at sure but I think overall we're talking about 126,000 Parcels I think they did a good job I won't sit here and say that it was perfect so I think Hudson Vaughn's article pointed out some great things I think he did a good job of research but I think we're going to do our best to learn from some of the things that he brought up the things that we can control within our office all of the things he brought up are not something.

That we can control some of that stuff is a role that's played after things leave the tax office and you're going into the Board of Equalization and review you're going to the property tax commission and that's just like going to any Court long money so but I think that what you've observed is a good point and I do believe that the last reappraisal was a pretty good reappraisal okay great and my really only other comment today about all this is that anything we can do to make the schedule of values as userfriendly as possible I was just looking at our the one that we currently have on online and boy it's I'd have to spend a lot of time you know trying to figure out how to use it and I think I could figure it out but it would really take effort and collaboration with others around me like can you help me with this you know that kind of thing so maybe it's not something that is very user friendly.

And maybe people don't use it but it seems like we would so anyway thanks for thanks for all the work that you're doing and that will you will be doing really appreciate it so I just want to say thank you I got a little distracted here with an emergency email I need to take care of but I know that you guys are working hard to make sure that our citizens understand what's happening and what's going to happen so I just thank you for being so diligent in trying to make sure that the citizens understand because that's the biggest thing whether we understand it or not the folks out there need to understand what's happening especially when they get those bills cuz they're not going to like you when they get those bills they don't like you now they'll like you even less then but but thank you you we got to tell the folks who ask us to fund more programs to go say thank you to the tax administration office for.

Collecting the money that funds these programs hey any other well there's only me and you left Heidi we're losing everyone one by one I'll pass it to thank you all so much again thank you for sticking around till the end with us I feel you Heidi on the long meetings I'm trying and I Claudia with arpa yes commissioner Lum I know we're we have like 3 minutes left or so and what I wanted to do was point to the board just the attachments that are in the document over the past several months we've been working to well for the one the Ila with the city of dorham for digital Equity we've been working on that I think probably John see feels like a year almost but but but the final version is in your documents to look at and highlights are in the PowerPoint for that the other two ilas for your review are related to the dorham public schools agreements that we did for Capital Improvement for the $6 million.

As well as the dollars to support prek which will occur throughout our support through title funded schools and so those three items are in your in your agenda we will also bring to the board a contract for review as it relates to the housing I'm sorry for the homeless support effort and so we will also bring that to the board on the 9th that was my best effort to go really fast amazing we and if you have questions just let us know we'll we'll do some additional followup as as well ahead of the meeting I just have one quick question will we also get information about the the RFP for the land trust yes the land trust you approved that Ila I think it was on the 12th John you can I'm sorry the contract was approved on the contract was approved on the 12th and that update let me see if I read the slide so the contract was approved on the 12th and John all 2 right yes so the.

Contract was approved at the August 12th work session we are in the signature process the manager I don't think got to sign it before she left but it's on her desk for when she gets back but the contract is dated back into early August following the the board meeting and the Durham Community Land trustees have already been able to utilize a portion of the funding to support the purchase of a multif family property the Anderson stre the Anderson Street departments right a portion of the $1.5 million approximately 200,000 of it went towards that purchase which we're very excited about because it's going to add I think it was 48 I don't have it in front of me I think 48 units of permanent affordable housing for multif family one to three bedroom units so that was we're we're happy to see immediate effects from that contract's approval by the board yeah that is incredible that really is and it's also really CL close to Lakewood it's walking distance to Lakewood Elementary.

School and they were also able to purchase a parcel of land adjacent to the Anderson Street Department with a portion of our fund so that they can develop new I think they were they're expecting to be able to do 48 additional units right there as well so that's it is yeah that's giving us a really we have to really celebrate that yes we do so we will be we're in the process Ella is is in our office is helping us with this we're reviewing as we shared in the past all of the performance information progress reports and trying to scale it down to a digestable document that we can share with the board to highlight all of our partner efforts and but we're most excited about this one I'll also forward some information on this particular one and response or an information request that we did and so as I share the other two items please let us know if you have questions yes ma'am is there so yeah I'm really.

Excited also about the land trust one and but certainly don't want to because of the lateness of the day and everything minimize how excited I also am about the new Murray massenberg Elementary School and the prek classes that are there even though I see there's been sort of a shift because of arpa compliance issues because of compliance and that was one of the things that we shared with the board we would have to determine how we would do it so we're funding title one overall for the system okay so but those dollars being freed up will allow them to then support Marie massenberg and John can can speak do we have something in the Ila I know we have something in the Ila about how the Murray massenberg preschool will meet the high standards of Durham prek right we still have that yes so that will be in the Ila I do want to highlight and emphasize that the language that's being presented thus far is a starting point.

We are going to add more specifics so not just around the expectations at Murray massenberg but also to be more specific about what spec types of expenditures at the title one schools are being supported as well so we're still working with DPS on the language what you are seeing is really just the starting point we are awaiting feedback on that particular Ila from DPS to try to advance the conversation around the language but there will be language in the Ila that not only commits DPS to providing those classrooms but also establishes some specific quality and and other expectations around the services themselves and we'll be working with I fully int have not send it over to Dr Chapelle yet but I'm going to seek her feedback our early childhood coordinator Mall who was here until recently she has been a part of the process and then we're going to be obviously incorporating feedback from DPS as well so that language will continue to evolve before you approve it.

Okay but we're just wanting to kind of share the Frameworks with where they are now so that you can see it's in progress that sounds good I you know I would be interested in just being sure that we fill all the seats and so if there's anything that we can build into funding connected to full full fully enrolled spots or you know I don't I'm just throwing that out there as a Poss thing to consider certainly explore that this is we have a lot more flexibility with when we're designing a Grandin agreement from scratch yeah so we can we can address any concerns that try to address any concerns that you or any of the other board members have through either of these agreements and we will endeavor to do so all right thank you so much okay so I'm just taking over from commission commiss chair Alam who had to leave for a a work call so we so the followup is going to be any questions that anyone has to please get.

Those to our acting manager C Hager and that we will take this up for approval at our meeting next Monday night correct okay thank you the the DPS ones will probably be later on and and the either in in September or early October okay the digital Equity one will be on Monday night jenal Equity okay and we will also bring forth the recommendation related to the homeless Services Services the intent to award to for the home for the arpa homeless Services RFP that we put out in June will'll be bringing our recommendation as to the organization to be funded for your approval next Monday okay great thank you all right so the last item on our agenda is review of county commissioner directives and and thank you Shannon I think you going you going to lose a COR in a minute we have a close session yeah we're about to we're about to end yeah we're going to end we're going to end in no with no closed session no close session.

Yeah well good afternoon I have sent you all the link to our board directors and so if you have any questions or updates I'm happy happy to manage those at this time thank you so much Shannon for sending those out and does anyone have any questions about any of the. Directives all right well seeing none then and thank you've done a great job I know Monica and Shannon of following up on those and getting us the information and thank you to the senior leadership team for getting their comments into us all yes thank you so much so with that I'd entertain a motion to adjourn move by commissioner Howton seconded by commissioner Carter all those in favor please say I I any.

Opposed and we are adjourned thank you.

Everyone e.