City Council · Regular Meeting · August 7, 2023

have our Pledge of Allegiance and councilwoman Freeman will lead us in that I think if you're able to stand and join us in the salute of the flag One Nation Under armored indivisible with liberty and justice for all right Madam clerk if you would call our road thank you madam mayor mayor O'Neal I am president Middleton here councilmember Javiera Caballero here councilmember Freeman president councilmember Halsey Hyman President councilmember Johnson here councilmember Williams I'm here thank you

hello again everybody this is our first of the month and I'll virtue for this month is compassion it's compassion so and this is our only ceremonial item and so as I finish up and walk back in order to expedite time I'm going to ask our mayor Pro tem to pick it up to lead us through the announcement portions after I finish reading okay all right here we go where is our daily lives our field with information regarding crime violence iniquity and disaster often often causing feelings of helplessness and whereas the many daily acts of extending patience and kindness that occur in our community are largely inconspicuous and unobtrusive and whereas by recognizing the need for extending Grace being patient and showing compassion all members of our community will be

made aware of the importance whereas the purpose of compassion month is to remember to be patient with others and that everyone is essential every life has value in our different paths give us various advantages and obstacles and whereas when we extend Grace and show compassion we consider those differences and we are prioritizing understanding breaking barriers and empowering one another and whereas by showing humility we are striving for a sense of belonging and creating a community that is welcoming inclusive kind and a safe place to live work and play and where is the city of Durham honors those who positively influence our community now therefore I Elaine ammonia mayor of this great city of Durham North Carolina

do hereby proclaim the month of August 2023 as compassion month in Durham and hereby urge all residents to practice showing compassion spreading kindness and respect generosity and consideration of others at all times witness my hand and the corporate seal of the city of Durham this is the seventh day of August 2023. [Applause] thanks to her honor for that wonderful Proclamation on compassion good evening colleagues good evening to everyone in the chamber all who are watching on whatever platform you'll be what you may be watching uh colleagues um welcome back our first council meeting official council meeting after our break um Monday night council meeting I want to with the mayor's permission and Direction go now to council uh announcements and I will first look to my left and yell tanning colleagues

councilmember Hyman good evening hi good evening thank you may Pro tem to my colleagues to our residents of Durham welcome um oh goodness am I speaking in the mic I'm forgetting right I just wanted to again welcome our residents but I also wanted our residents in Durham to keep uh Pastor Tim Moore of the greater Walltown United holy church in Durham in our in in your prayers on Saturday night his established the church went up in Flames I was able to go out myself um councilman woman Friedman and the mayor to just kind of give our condolences and just be there with the community I will say that I also want to do a special shout out to fire department and EMS I really saw firsthand what they what they do so again that particular Church also does they feed the Homeless and so they didn't let this stop them they said they're going to continue to feed the Homeless and they're going to do that within in the parking lot so I just wanted you to to kind of just lift them up and wanted to say that thank you

thank you for that council member colleagues to my left councilmember Johnson good evening thank you Mr Mayor Pro tem um thank you everyone it's great to be back with you all hope everyone had a great break and is uh refreshed and recharged and ready to continue our work together um I just have one request of my colleagues which is for an excused absence for our work session on September 7th I will be traveling to St Louis for the local progress conference and I need to arrive before that work session um so just requesting an excused absence for that day thank you thank you councilmember still looking to my left councilman Williams good evening thank you it's good to be back and it's good to see everyone there are a lot of back to school events going on so I wouldn't even start to uh try and announce them all but there is one that I think is really important for the hillside Community uh the new band director at Hillside High School is Jordan Jones uh Jordan was a drum major when I was assistant band director there

m on August 19th sting fling thank you councilmember her honor will have the last word so I'll look down to my right any colleagues councilmember Freeman good evening thank you I also did want to extend that uh great thanks for our fire department and our EMS and police just noting there was a lot of of Manpower and woman power at work out there that night and throughout the

night it was really unfortunate to see the church burnt as badly as it was I think that fire lasted about three hours and to all those folks in the neighborhood who were bearing that brunt for the evening I do want to say thank you and to and to build on to that just noting that reality Ministries actually held their first disability pride parade and had a great opportunity to reflect on a huge population of our community that has often been overlooked and it's it's really great to have the chance to sit back and and look at what is possible when you put together folks with Solutions and I am Overjoyed to say that this was the month that my sister passed last year and it has really been hard for my family it's it's definitely been incredibly different than I would have expected but I want to appreciate reality Ministries for creating that

space and giving me the opportunity to reflect lastly I did want to bring forward a consideration requests from the Durham committee on the Affairs of black people there was a request shared with each of us by email and by phone call around the scad proposal and so I'll I spoke with the mayor about it and asked if we could add that to our other items and so additional items and so I'll look for us to have a just a brief discussion to figure out whether or not it's something we could adhere to as far as uh postponing that scad proposal conversation for a little while thank you thank you councilmember and councilmember I will say I think um and City attorney can correct me from wrong since it is attached to a public hearing that the appropriate time for us to discuss any delay would be at the actual time it's scheduled uh rather than prior to that but I appreciate the uh it's noted and we will certainly uh take it up thank you councilmember Javiera Caballero good evening

sorry about that good evening everyone good to see you all good to be back in Chambers um I also need an excused absence for Thursday September 7th work session um so we'll be asking my colleagues to grant that I am also going to the conference the local progress conference um other than that uh August will be busy I know lots of us are getting kids ready to go to school this point of the year it's always time I always think it's um be real helpful if school it just already started uh so hang in their parents and caregivers were were uh at the end of our sermon Journey thank you councilmember I'll just uh simply associate myself with all the wonderful announcements my colleagues have made and that'll be it for me and I'll yield back to her honor thank you madam mayor thank you so much and just to follow up um on the requested uh councilwoman Freeman in terms of the uh request for discussion that item is on the work

session for Thursday and we can have that discussion at that time so without all those who are interested we will have consideration of The scad Proposal this Thursday at 1 pm I I only have a couple of announcements this summer was quite busy for all of us and like life goes we all had some sad times and some happy times I did have some City time to tour some other City departments and I just want to give them a shout out I had an opportunity to go buy General Services Under the direction of Gina probes and um just a shout out to Juliet black who got up in the book at church and went all the way up we had a grand time over there we have they had a food truck we just had a really good time in that space and those are really the first First Responders before the police officers can get out there before the firefighters can get out there a lot of these people are already out making a way for those folk to come through so I

g Pearson um school and when I tell you there are a Powerhouse I had a great time with Laura Khalil and her staff over there we'll be seeing more of her I believe this week at another meeting she'll be presenting some of the great work that they are doing and they are really doing an absolutely uh fabulous job I also want to give a shout out to Durham parks and Rick I had an opportunity to spend some hours with them with Mary and uh gosh I'm blinking on the other young lady's name that took me around to about two or three different areas here in Durham under the auspices of Durham Parks and Recreation so I just want you all to know Durham city that you have a lot of great city employees who you probably never run into but they are

doing an absolute wonderful job in this city and I can a test to the fact that they love this city and they are willing to work really hard for us so those will conclude my announcements I do want to just tell you in general that tonight we have at least two changes to our agenda we have some guests in here tonight from our JFK Towers which is a center a senior citizen home and you know on Monday nights because I don't want to get a whole lot of people kind of off track as to what we're doing but our seniors are here tonight and I've talked with my city council colleagues and we're going to move them up on the agenda so that they can be able to speak to us tonight about their concerns with JFK towers and then get home in a timely fashion so as soon as we're done with the consent agenda in our prior to items we will move right into hearing from our seniors this evening and we will also

move up one additional as requested by our city council which is a public hearing item number 21 which is the limited obligation bonds we will also take that up before we get to our actual public hearing items and that will conclude my announcements before we go into our priority items so I do want to entertain a motion to excuse both um councilwoman Johnson and councilwoman caballera from our September 7th meeting second okay it's been moved by councilwoman Jose Harmon seconded by councilman Williams all those in favor if we would just signed by saying I I all those opposed having the same right hearing none that motion carries and we will now move to our city manager for any consent items she may have good evening Madam mayor Mr Mayor Pro tem and members of the Durham city council the city manager's office has no priority items this evening thank you thank you so much we will now turn to

attorney Don O'Toole who was who is sitting in he is a a senior City attorney you all have seen him before but he's sitting in tonight for Attorney Kim Rayburn good evening mayor mayor Pro tem and council members sitting in for Kim rayberg this evening and the city attorney's office has no priority items thank you Antonio to always glad to have you with us and we now turn to our Clerk and see if she has any any items full priority consideration tonight thank you madam mayor the city clerk's office has no priority items this evening and welcome back everyone thank you so much we will now turn to our consent agenda the uh consent agenda consists of items that the council has previously considered in a work session all items on the consent agenda may be approved by a single vote of the council items may be removed from the consent agenda by a council member or a member of the public and those items will be considered separately at the end of the meeting

tonight I will now read the entire agenda beginning with the consent agenda all right we're actually starting with item number three which is the Durham affordable housing implementation committee appointment number four Durham affordable housing implementation committee mayor appointments item Five May and June 2023 be it reports number six 2024 city council meeting schedule number seven is the contract amendment number one for Durham Workforce Development board Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act NC Works career center operations and Eckert Youth Alternatives Inc item eight contract amendment number one for Durham Workforce Development board Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act adult and dislocated worker program with Eckert Youth Alternatives Inc item nine is the amendment to the contract with the fmrt

Group LLC for the provision of police Psychological Services for the city of Durham Police Department item number 10 we have one speaker from the public who has requested that this item be pooled that's contract for the water quality web portal repair and maintenance for the storm water quality program item 11 is the contract amendment number two to Professional Services contract SW 47d Marine road bike and pedestrian improvements number 12 Municipal agreement with the North Carolina Department of Transportation for bike facilities two tip number bl-0028 item 13 is the municipal agreement with the North Carolina Department of Transportation for neighborhood bike routes to tip number bl-0031 item 14 is the municipal agreement with the North Carolina Department of Transportation for Horton

Road pedestrian facilities tip number bl-0063 item 15 is Consulting contract with just cities Collective LLC for the development of a transportation Equity action plan we now will turn to our general business agenda to be read into the record of public hearings uh item 16 is the zoning map change brightleaf North 17 Consolidated annexation Fletcher Crossing item 18 zoning map change Fairhaven walk item 19 is the zoning map change 602 North Hoover Road item 20 the Consolidated annexations 631 and 633 Clayton Road item 21 is the limited obligation bond series 2023. now uh there has been just one poor item which is item number 10.

and so I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda uh with the exception of item 10. second right it's been moved by councilman Williams second about councilwoman Freeman all those in favor we'll just do this by a Voice vote unless you all have your clickers ready okay let's do it by the clickers let's roll all right Madam clerk if you open the vote we forgot about the Clickers all right if you close the row and Report out the consent agenda passes 7-0 all right thank you madam clerk i7 and the consent agenda is approved we will come back to item 10 prior to going into our regular hearings through I believe Mr James Chavis has pulled that item and he is also a senior so we'll be cognizant of that tonight otherwise he would be last I believe so now we'll turn to our

seniors who are here tonight to speak with us on JFK Towers um I will call five at a time you don't have to of course come to the mic until it's your time to speak but you will be given three minutes of peace first we will have Miss uh Miss Burris will be speaking first see Burris I have no name on the second one but they have a phone number a an address at 4900 North Roxboro Road number 420 the last four digits of their number is 4735 I would just need for you to put your name on your card all right the next person will be Mr Joshua Allen followed by Terrell Dungey and Felicia Kozar thank you

good evening mayor and city council I'm glad you picked this month for compassion because I'm gonna say this real quickly it's sad that as as council members that y'all have not learned yet to work in unity you cannot move this city until you learn to get along yourself with each other including supporting the mayor now I went to JFK I was so upset at what I saw what I heard I wish that when I got home that day I could have said Lord if I hadn't had enough money I would have scooped every resident up and JFK and put them somewhere now y'all sit here tonight like you got it going on but I'm gonna tell you one thing if you live long enough trouble gonna do this you need to stop acting like you're better than one another sewage stopped up trash stopped up elevators not

working I'm a senior citizen most of them have health issues when have you went out there and checked I went out there I was asked to come out there not because I'm running a political campaign because a lot of us don't show up until we run political campaigns and you want the organizations to endorse you and all that kind of foolishness that is irrelevant I want y'all to start caring about citizens people that put you in that's us you can you can pull all the organization you want to but at the end of the day it's us that vote you in period now I am sick and tired of of folk even walking over me and acting like I'm nothing until you want me to do something for you I am somebody and everybody here tonight is somebody now crime I Gotta Throw This into getting shot at last Tuesday I didn't hear from nobody but uh councilman

Freeman I talked to him and the mayor called me where was the rest of y'all and and I mean it's just pick up the phone you love the tents also Freeman text me are you okay I appreciate that because this is the third time in that last time I ran I'm gonna tell y'all something I thought about my father being Beat to Death almost as a child and we talk about gangs take that out of your mouth because gangs ain't the only ones doing the crime in here in this city these people need help let's start running your mouth stop running your mouth talking about help let's put some action to your words because talk is cheap I'm proactive and I know what I'm talking about you do some action you'll move mountains you came all mountains until you to action stop doing so much policies and procedures meetings get off your behind and come out here and see about us [Applause]

here good evening I'm Phyllis Bryant and I've lived at JFK towers for 12 years while undergoing care here at Duke during these years Millennia has shown poor management of JFK Towers poor oversight resulting in hazardous conditions for residents both elderly and disabled these conditions are Deployable as a property manager I've got to seen that in my adult pre-disability days I've seen how these conditions affect lives my best friend is the 79 year old tenant who was left without Pest Service for one month while dealing with bed bugs and heart conditions no one should allow their grandparents or relatives to live in such conditions yet every day on a Rollator she went downstairs to ask for help she did not receive it she moved out at her own expense and with great effort by her family to get her out of there she has lived there seven years

maintenance is poorly qualified to handle even the most simple of repairs such as a clogged drain or faucet installation mine was put in wrong hot to cold and cold to hot even I can do that elderly and disabled residents are currently without air conditioning in many units and dealing with sewage backups our trash chute is so infested with maggots that flies and gnats have taken up resonance in the hallways drug dealers use the east stairwell as a back and forth access to real drugs even with video evidence that I've provided nothing is being done now over two and a half years currently even with Renovations just today I witnessed carpeting being installed on a nasty unmopped floor with an active leak just a few feet away Millennia is good at giving excuses one after another and nothing is done please audit their records to ensure that basic building needs are being met while these Renovations are ongoing such items that you would consider basic security

Pest Control Trash Services trash chute cleaning and overall Waste Services air conditioning and plumbing as well as proper elevator service contract paid waiting a month for Pest Service or months for HVAC service or even one tenant waiting two years without heating and air is an atrocity please do research on how many tenants at properties across our great nation owned by Millennia Who currently tenants have unsafe and unsanitary living conditions please act and limit access to any future funding until every deficit is remedied thank you ma'am ma'am if you would you can just sign it right here Mr Allen Mr Joshua Allen good evening Mr Miss mayor how you doing

um we are like the young lady said that we have uh problems with the elevators and stuff like that and um the renovations when you get into a renovated apartment nothing's not working right in there um it's been a lot of you know trash I mean not trash um sewage from the toilets from the toilet and that that way uh the feces will come right back up and they do the same thing in the sink also so I bet you everybody's scared to drink the water that's why I have bought some water the other day so that way I won't be in the faucet you know it's contaminated contaminated water and stuff like that so the water is brown and stuff like that sometime and you know that's my you had to but especially when he cut the water off the water stays off for around like possibly all day so and like I said before and I'm not going to stop saying it they don't need

to do no renovation they need to go ahead and tell the pace down and Order enough to be to have to be rebuilt that's all I had to say thank you thank you so much Mr Dungey followed by Miss Cozart you just state your name once you get there Jewel you'll be ready to go in three minutes good evening Council my name is Terrell Dungey I'm a community organizer with American friends service North Carolina I've been working with the tenants of JFK towers and like many of folks I've heard about their conditions through the story that came out back in July that Ruth brought the news coverage to the type of neglect people we're living in actually my first visit to the building someone was being saved by the fire department because they were stuck in the elevator and again that's a regular occurrence in this building so over the last couple of weeks I've

been working with tenants uh with Ruth Phyllis and several others to make a list of the things that have gone wrong and the reasonable demands that they want to present to the city into HUD about some of these conditions to hold them accountable so I just want to read that uh that statement so we the tenets of the JFK towers are coming together to get elected officials in the Department of Housing and Urban Development to call for a full building inspection of JFK Towers to address the dangerous living conditions we struggle with day in and day out the property management company Millennia management company receives a 19 million housing bond to rehabilitate JFK Towers but the living conditions in this building have only gotten worse and more dangerous to those of us that call JFK our home many of our neighbors have made individual complaints about a host of things like lack of pest control and roach and for roaches and bed bugs

Plumbing Savages clogs hot water shutoffs with no real notice lack of security alarms on exit doors inoperable clogged trash shoots and subsequent pests cleanliness in public areas lack of adequate cleaning adequate clean laundry areas unrest months of uncaring management electrical issues invoices not paid in a timely manner to contractors unsafe unreliable accesses elevators property damage or loss due to faulty appliances plumbing and pest mold in homes and throughout the building these issues continue to be ignored by management so now neighbors have come together to hold Millennia accountable none of us deserve to live in unsafe unsaturated conditions just because we have limited options of safe and affordable housing in our neighborhood that's why the tenants of JFK towers made the following List of Demands again a getting a full body building inspection of JK Towers to identify work

needs to bring the building up to safety standards and non-renovated and renovated Apartments getting inspection on elevators to have all three repaired or replaced to ensure they meet safety standards having a fire code inspection to access to assess if fire alarm is old and renovated in unrenovated apartments including sound levels in the hallways using emergency repairs to address the issues in the building uh an audit of that 19 million dollars to see how it's being spent for these tenants as well as allowing residents to the table around who is hired to manage the building and who to maintain it in testing water and air quality um thank you so much Mr Dungey if you you're three minutes up but if you have that list please be sure and share it with us foreign [Applause] [Music]

thank you good evening my name is Felisa Cozart and I've lived at JFK towers for 11 and a half years I'd like to address the pest problem um they're gnats and flies they're now in the entire building in Resident Apartments hallways Lobby elevators laundry room common areas there are roaches and bed bugs they've all been contributed to and because of a lack of extermination and treatment of the entire buildings never been exterminated dumpsters overflowing with trash that have been allowed to sit for days and emptied and sweltering heat clogged in broken trash shoots where garbage has been allowed to sit and rest there for weeks where flies have been laying eggs and now um there were maggots and now they're flying all in the hallway you have to hurry up and close your door so you don't get as many gnats and flies in there is unsanitary unhealthy harmful

living conditions an environment there the floors from first floor to seventh floor were unswept on mopped floors dirty Windows allowed to be this way for months riding trash inside the building where trash is in place in the hallways in front of the elevators because the shoots were broken and were never repaired broken elevators that are temporarily patched up to work for a while and then they break down again residents won't have mobility issues site issues who use scooters and relators who walk with canes are left on not being able to leave their apartments or who are downstairs and not able to climb the stairway Wells to get to their Apartments but often people are trapped in the elevators they stop working with people on them and that also goes for our visitors and our guests that come EMS has often had to climb the stairwell to reach residents who dial 9-1-1 for medical emergencies when the elevators go out there are numerous needed repairs

that need to be done from Plumbing to leaking AC units mold windows with no screens tubs and sinks that are backed up just to name a few so we at JFK Towers who are here tonight are pushing to have Millennia housing Corporation held responsible and accountable for these ongoing problems that are never remediated they're never fixed and so we're constantly going through a vicious cycle of them over and over and over again so we're asking for help thank you [Applause] our next five speakers Shanta Vox Lee last name spelled m-o-a-v-e-n-z-a-d-e-h [Music] Sean Lee Shantae lovey

at 4900 let phone numbers 9884. okay last four digits Mr jonte Dunstan and Miss Andrea Hudson and then Miss Austin is the last group of speakers that I have hi my name is Shantae I'm here on behalf of well hello everyone I'm here on behalf of JFK when I read a post on Facebook it brought tears to my eyes how the seniors in my community are living the seniors are living in deplorable conditions we're backed up sewage in bathtubs mold and maintenance requests on getting fits and a slew of other things it really makes me scared of becoming an elderly if I don't have a high income um

just because someone live in an income-based property and reports the situation do we threaten to remove the person or just keep ignoring it because they because um they aren't living in um a big nice house or have a big income um we need to start showing empathy and realizing um how you would feel if that was your mother or father um this is real Sydney and um you know um this really like got me shaking and um y'all really need to do something about this this really does make any sense and um I just hope y'all do something thank you [Applause]

my name is Lee morvenzade um from Chapel Hill Madam mayor city council members and residents of Durham I have a dear friend who lives in JFK Towers and when I saw her reports on Facebook I was also shocked and outraged by the living conditions in the apartment building I went to visit her and a few of the other residents just to see what was going on and um the extreme state of of disrepair and neglect that our elderly neighbors are stuck with indicates a complete lack of compassion uh the residents are as you men heard from several of them are rightfully outraged as we all should be that uh living conditions like this are allowed to continue especially since several of them mentioned that up until

just recently it's been a lovely place to live and and they were were happy to be there not exactly sure what's going on and so I don't know where exactly the buck stops in terms of who's responsible for this building financially but I someone is clearly not doing their job and maybe maybe several someone's uh not doing their job um we do know that public money is being spent to help cover housing costs for the residents there and so every taxpayer should demand accountability for what's going on in that building um but beyond the clear financial mismanagement and and neglect that's happening in JFK Towers it is criminally inhumane to allow uh and and not immediately address the countless building code violations and health code violations that are rampant at JFK

towers and you've heard just a few of them mentioned here this evening um I mean but crumbling walls missing ceiling I mean it's unimaginable that we would allow human beings to live in a building in this state um these are our human family members and we all have a responsibility to see that Justice is done uh by and for them and yes I hope that everyone will do what whatever they can do and even what what you may not be able to do just show up and help because it's absolutely uh disgusting to allow human beings to live in the conditions they are stuck in thank you [Applause] I think it's lovey with the phone number of 9884 as their last digits at 4900 North Roxboro Street

yes yes sir your next followed by Mr Dunstan followed by Miss Hudson followed by Miss Alston if you just state your name Sir John lovely uh good evening mayor hello and and I'm glad that everybody's here to support us thank you for coming um I would like to say the word inhumane is a little light word to say I think is really horrific in a lot of situations and and you don't know until you dare to see it firsthand living there a lot of people that live in the building they they feel like when you have a mind frame of you have no power to really do anything you will be put in a situation where

you feel trapped so if y'all ever had that feeling and you and you have no no you feel like you're in four Wars but you're not but you your mind is trapped so your body is going to react that way not moving or seeing or doing anything you'll go for anything at the same time that you know that anything shouldn't be done to you by you paying your money to live comfortable anywhere that's if anybody on this panel was to live there under these conditions I guarantee you you would not put up with it longer than these residents as well as myself for eight years I've been quiet because you know when you have this this this this this dumb faith I'm gonna call it dumb faith that it's gonna get better and you

seeing a turn around with management like for eight years we had like five to six managers being fired for eight like the course of eight years and God knows how long before I got there you understand this is not about people who clean this is about people who have a right under the government under you guys and you'll hire Anarchy to be treated right and not be treated wrong so um you know who wants to live in a place where the trash is bagged up and you coming out your your resident paying your money and you smelling what you have no business smelling would you all like that to be happening in this in this building would y'all still operate under them conditions so look at it as in if you either one of you were living there how you would feel

if you were there or this building was in the same condition that building is so that's where the compassion should come out of all of y'all and this ain't got nothing to do with color it's got something to do with human beings and if you can't treat people like human beings and you want that for yourself something in this planet is shifting a devilish way and not the way of God so if everybody saying they love God why the hell would they allow a building to go down like that with people who are with God and have not a problem with how they're taking care of their responsibilities thank you feel the name being taken care of at the same time thank you Mr lovey we appreciate your comments tonight Mr Dunston

jonte Dunstan um getting his Merrell O'Neill Council getting into the residence of Durham and I deeply would like to apologize to the JFK residents that we have not stepped up that this city has not stepped up fast enough to help get you out of a situation having this city learned having a city already had enough embarrassment having you learned about McDougal Terrace what the situation is going on out there and now we have to see our Elders our seniors the pioneers of this community go through this atrocity do you know how to do the job or are you just sitting up here just looking at a job the question is is that I can speak on this because a friend of mine offered me a job last year I didn't want to take the job but he needed help with his company

and he said we need help I need somebody that's good to come in JD I need somebody that's going to be able to you know help out the employees but I didn't know it was delivering medical equipment first time dealing medical equipment and I didn't know that this job was going to take me into the residence it was going to take me into these facilities and JFK is not the only facility that needs to be checked upon now I may call myself a whistleblower then I'm gonna have the biggest will so I'm gonna be at the biggest beginning of the line but how dare y'all sit on this Council and y'all supposed to be I don't want to say it but a black majority City Council and we're allowing our residents to live like this situation now I'm not up here for no political I'm up here to talk based on what I've seen and I'm sorry you have people that wants to bring their parents to this community but after seeing JFK you got them scared to bring their parents into this community to take care of them

now the conditions that they're living in why is it that the animals at the animal shelter around the corner are living in better conditions they got attendance to take care of them but our residents don't have that same concierge service now if I wanted to stay at the Marriott around the corner and I'm talking to you Leo businessman the businessman if I'm going to stay at the Marriott and those rooms are two to three hundred dollars a night even a suite could run you with 500 a night and I stay there for a week and a half that bill is almost the equivalency of me standing in the week of their monthly rent now if I got a complaint about my room guess what they're going to say oh we apologize Mr Johnson for the inconvenience we're going to upgrade you we apologize Mr Johnson if this is not up to the standards we're going to transfer you to one of our ups greatest hotels because we want to keep your business why can't we treat them as the customers give them the service have checks and bounces but

to me it's a big contradiction to see people try to keep jobs at the jobs they haven't really been doing thank you sir we appreciate your comments this evening [Applause] Miss Hudson it's all about Miss Austin followed by Mr Woodard city council my name is Andrea Hudson everybody calls me muffin and um when I was sent the link this morning to this news article um I didn't cry I got mad as hell and I was like you know what both my parents are deceased both said to my grandparents are deceased but to see that this is how we have the elders in our community living pissed me off and the only thing that I could do was go rent a van to make sure that I can get folks here because their voices need to be heard it should have been heard a

long time ago when that organization that company got that 19 million dollars there should have been some accountability and where's the accountability for DHA for selling the building to take their name out of it and given 19 million to fix it but not making sure it got done and if DHA is responsible just as much as Molino is because they're the ones who sold the building that was already in deplorable conditions so whatever y'all need to do or can possibly do please make sure that you do it because folks are dying and getting sick in that building the first time I went in that building today was today and I was attacked by gnats in the hallway and the heat in the hallway was over 80 degrees this is the hallway so if they can't get on the elevators and they got to go through that stairwell they got to be in that hallway it is hot in there and these are elderly folks who already have medical conditions disabilities and

all of those things and this is how we have them living we have got to do something different and it needs to be done immediately we can't wait and see if someone's going to change something or if they're going to do something different something has to be done now the young lady who and I say young lady because I don't know her age but her tub was filled in the video she's in the hospital right now 99 years old and in the hospital right now because of the conditions that she's living in in a building that I'm sure Council and Mr Woodard are already aware of that there were problems in this building and all the other buildings that are in Durham that are owned or managed by Durham Housing Authority isn't that why we did a 95 million dollar housing bill is to make sure people didn't have to live in these type of conditions and nothing's changed so where's the money when you follow the money you'll see where the problem is coming from

follow the money Senator city council follow it find out what they did with that money because they definitely did not put it into that building like she said the carpet they put down there's paint on the floor and they're putting carpet down on top of paint and it ain't been swept I've seen it myself today and I was very upset now if y'all want y'all parents to live over there or something like that then y'all take your parents out in and bring and give my people something different good evening city council mayor protein and my family just want to take a moment well JFK Towers please stand

however I thank you all out of 177 Apartments and I have this young man coming from Charlotte once Greensboro once a week to help me organize out of 177 Apartments this is what we brought here tonight they're scared they ain't coming to no meeting they all want to talk to me they don't want to talk to him he didn't get me put up out of my home and I dare to say you ain't get me put out of my nice place because that's where they have to live

because there's nowhere else to go to pay the rent the way we pay our rent and the government subsidizes that I'm not going to you all like everybody else have tonight I'mma start out like this thank you for reading the proclamation of compassion I like that this is compassion month in every definition of the word compassion I heard y'all mentioning here tonight church burned down and nobody get burnt but y'all went over there to check it out and see if the bricks were okay your dirt the cross and everything else was in place Saturday JFK was on fire but guess what the alarms were turned off

by the time the residents on the third floor got down outside of the building no fire trucks they had to call on their phones to get the fire trucks down because the smoke was bellowing in the hallway compassion I stand Here by grace about Grace I want to give a shout out I want to give a shout out to JFK elevators they don't work and work when they want to I'm gonna give shout outs to the alarms got returned off I want to give a shout out to the smell to the next the Flies and the roaches the the the the wisdom thing Bed Books I'm also shout out water

I'm talking about water however you want to look at water it ain't good it's not good I get sixty four dollars in food stamps a month and it goes towards water I got too many other ailments to drink the water and find out I got another itch situation but let me in like this 12 seconds Injustice anywhere threatens Justice everywhere Dr Martin Luther King where's the compassion thank you thank you [Applause] Mr Woodard and then I believe we have one person um Miss Wagstaff on the internet yes sir state your name thank you madam mayor and members of the

council I want to recognize Jeanetta Austin for raising this issue when she contacted me I went out to JFK the mayor Pro Tim was there he had the good sense to wear a short sleeve light shirt I didn't and we were both sweating big time in there me a lot more than he was and I think we would agree we were appalled to the conditions that we saw that day you've heard about the bathtub the elevators three elevators for 177 units over 200 people living there that's an adequate number I understand but not when they're not working I subsequently returned and saw where the garbage was backing up because the garbage shoots had been locked not closed locked and the garbage was piling up residents were forced to take their garbage down the elevator through the lobby out to a dumpster now I don't know about y'all's garbage mine leaks sometimes and we were having leaking garbage going all through the

building we saw you heard about the mold but the mold had gotten so bad in one of the apartments and I've got the pictures to show you that the resident had mushrooms growing this big on her kitchen counter these are all things that happen the problem is that this is not a DHA building it is a privately owned building so therefore the accountability was a little tricky but we were able to work through and find some of the accountability for this building the I think they bottomed out though the Friday when one of the residents came home from a stay in the hospital and they could not the EMT could not take her up to her apartment because not one single elevator worked she had to be checked back into the hospital on that Monday I reached out to the Department of Labor Department of Insurance for inspections of the

elevators we found out that the elevators were inspected by the Department of Labor but we found out that the building had not had a contract for the service of its elevators since October didn't have a contract they were only calling on an emergency basis and the technician I spoke with said he didn't think the elevators had been inspected in over a year there has to be a policy change to be able to have these elevators inspected not by the Department of Labor they will do that regularly anyway but by elevator service technicians because every one of these was a part that was missing about a wheelie a wheel that could have been easily replaced so these folks could have had elevators they were without elevators the building is under construction you all may know this and you've heard reference to the money that has been given to that I'm out of time but the

state housing inspection agency has inspected it and will return and will not release the funds for further renovation until some of these matters have been taken care of so I just wanted to give you all that update [Applause] you know I think we have one more person who has raised their hand to speak on this issue tonight is that correct Madam clerk if you would unmute that person for three minutes and if you would state your name can you hear me yes we can uh good afternoon Madame mayor City Council Members um I am Jacqueline White staff um I live in Durham um I am I I really don't have many words to say about this other than this has been a long going situation that has been occurring in Durham

as it relates to our seniors and we're not just talking to any seniors we're talking about our seniors of low wealth and low means JFK has been experienced problems for a long time and I'm so happy that johnetta Austin is speaking up and the residents that are speaking up because I know it's hard on residents when they're under the thumb of the government and their housing is reliant on that to actually be brave enough to come out and stand up about these things so a lot of times they suffer in silence but I'm happy that these residents have come out tonight and I want to say this is what happens when our public housing sector starts to turn over their properties to private sector and say we wash our hands of this and that's what is happening here and it's JFK is not the only one that has had problems but

we hear these stories over and over again mold sewage backups elevators out alarm systems not working we hear it over and over again and these people come and pour their heart out and the unfortunate part this Council or whoever the council is they'll make these Grand speeches and probably speak tonight and do dissertations and whatnot but they're not going to do anything they're not going to do anything and going out there looking at the problem every week so that you can say I went there it's still not going to solve this problem and this problem has to be taken care it's a crime chain when residents temporary housing solution is Duke emergency room or the hospital that's their temporary housing inclusion to get out of these conditions that should not be happening the same way that they had to remove residents for carbon monoxide these residents should be moved into proper

settings yesterday where they can live comfortable until these problems are resolved and that 19 million dollars that y'all have given to them you have to have be accountable for it you have to find out where those dollars and take some of that money and move these residents into temporary housing if that means putting them in some of the best hotels in Durham it does not matter you have to take care of our citizen this should not be allowed like Mr Johnson said when the animal shelter has better housing than our most vulnerable population this city has a problem so I'm just saying think about what you're doing up there and I hope people don't sit up there and give big speeches tonight because the cameras are on and do nothing later thank you thank you so much [Applause] I'm going to turn now to our city manager who will give us some insight as

to where the city is in this process thank you madam mayor I'd like to ask Keith Chadwell to come up I asked him to prepare a summary response regarding the neighborhood Improvement Services housing code inspections process and a status of that this evening so I would ask that Keith be allowed to provide that update good evening Madam mayor Mr Mayor Pro tem and members of council um the city's Code Enforcement office launched a inspection process on this location on the 13th of July with two inspectors who had responded to a some specific complaints upon seeing the conditions these folks arranged for another four code enforcement officers to be dispatched and through the period

from the 13th through the 18th began to do much more comprehensive inspections and Analysis of the conditions in in in the facility um as of now uh that has resulted in the opening of 15 open and cases of violations to the minimum housing code of the city of Durham um and the process is not completed as of yet excuse me among the most common violations that were revealed in this action had to do with smoke detection and other life safety working devices um Plumbing fixtures in disrepair disrepair in conditions of uh along common areas and within certain specific units and inoperable air conditioning units there has been a

history as has been stated tonight of inoperable elevators and and other sanitary related kinds of things so what this means at this point the owners have been issued notices of violations in concert with this um from the date that they got that notification on July 19th they have 30 days to bring this into compliance within that dirty day period they can submit a plan for a definitive plan for completing those issues but if no accepted plan is submitted and it is not revealed and and the fork is not completed within that 30-day 30-day period um the code enforcement department will be in a position to issue a finding of fact and Order to be referred to the housing appeals board and through that board within another 30-day period if it's not completed at

that point additional legal actions can be taken at the at the behest of the housing appeal board so that's the City action at this point it is a legal process we'll be monitoring it straight throughout there will be additional monitorings and we'll also have some management from our Community Development Department as well um present with us this evening virtually is a representative of the owner of the owners of the of the uh building Mr Tom mignon magnonia is present with us and if Mr magnonia is President would like to be uh acknowledged at this time we'll we'll give space for him to do so sir Miss Maine Mr magnonia this is Elaine O'Neal mayor of the city of Durham sir we have um my colleagues on the council with us here this afternoon as well as a number

of um of our citizens who occupy your building in the house tonight so I would like for you to at this time I speak to them and to their concerns uh can you hear me okay yes we can great uh my name is Tom mignona I'm vice president of development for Millennia Housing Development um Alexandra Thompson who is our district manager on the operations side for the management company is also uh monitoring the zoo webinar however I'm not sure if she is unmuted or not I can certainly speak if you could speak up a little bit louder you were coming in great at the beginning but I think you have to get closer to your mic yes ma'am so if you can hear me okay uh we we hear these complaints loud and clear we're cooperating with this city on

um the neighborhood inspection services for the units that have not undergone the rehabilitation um Millennia acquired uh JFK Towers in December 2019 uh right before the covet outbreak from Global Ministries foundations we understood that that the building uh was in poor condition then um and we weren't able to close on our construction financing until July of 2022 whereupon we underwent and started a major Rehabilitation of all the units um spending approximately an estimated 64 000 per unit um construction is behind schedule um and I understand everyone's feeling the frustration of this and in part has to do with lack of coordinate with the residents who are living in the unread units while we are striving to complete the complete renovation of the units on

the upper floors um we have taken notes and understand the concerns of the residents and you know I if we feel horrible horrible about it uh I know that management while not maybe able to talk at this meeting today is listening and you know communication with the residents will be the first uh and foremost um item also I want to say we during these rehabs we check on the big five uh items um we want to make sure that the residents have air conditioning if a p-tac unit an old air conditioning unit and a non-rehab unit is not working then we get portable air conditioners uh to those residents especially at times this summer when when it's so hot if those air conditioning units the portable ones aren't working then we will get two up there we just have to stay in constant contact with the residents on that if the management company is disregarding

you know those requests from residents then you know we will do our own internal audit and find Property Management staff that will um the elevators we have a temporary immediate repair scope and change orders to the tune of 240 000 that we're working on to make those elevators more reliable available while we also work into our construction budget the necessary costs to make them permanently reliable uh we've heard loud and clear these concerns um and they weren't originally part of the scope but they are now as far as the water we're not familiar with for drinking water issues but we will look into that what is more important to us is uh doing a complete jetting of all the sewer and plumbing pipes unfortunately the sewer backup that

affected Miss Katie's unit which was the bathtub that was backed up it took us two days to resolve that and find a plumber who was capable of resolving that issue um I think uh when Senator Woodard was there along with the mayor Pro tem we actually were able to solve that problem while they were still on the premises and that is leading us to complete jetting of all sewer lines that came with this building the sewer lines of 40 years old were in the process of replacing where needed and making sure this doesn't happen anymore um pest control and Bug treatments I've been uh verified today with by management that our pest control company comes every other week to treat 30 units um they are treated uh those 30 Apartments but along with that they do Target and treatment as well we

will see if we need to make that every week we will do so and after what I've heard today I think that will be the case um the same with bed bugs when bed bugs are identified in units we have the pest company come out and verify that that and what treatment is needed and we work with the resident to secure their belongings and do the necessary preparations in their unit for a treatment to occur and then that bed bug company comes out and does it and then they'll come back and do it again as needed um you know more concerning was the trash in the trash shoots we have a cleaning company engaged to come they did a deep clean of the property I was pulled last week and that they're supposed to come every Monday Wednesday and Friday to maintain uh clean and sanitary conditions including the trash and trash shoots um concerning the trash shoots we have ordered and updated

um trash compactor to be brought to the property and installed we expect that to happen um in September um and in the meanwhile management will work with uh the maintenance text as well as the cleaning company to address uh the conditions that were out that that were described today um I did not witness those uh conditions when I was there uh two weeks ago however that doesn't mean they weren't there I did not inspect every trash chute myself um and again to give you an update uh construction is approximately three months behind schedule it had to do with some redesigns of ADA units which held up the turn of a complete floor that we could have occupied with non-ada residents we are working now we have those residents moved up to the sixth floor in new units um and we are working on the fifth floor again I can tell talk to you more about

the construction side of things and the timing associated with it however uh we will have comprehensive management meetings for on-site to not only address the concerns we heard today but to also make sure that our management staff work with the residents with empathy um that is absolutely needed when you're trying to live through a substantial rehab like the one we have at JFK I'm sorry Mr mcnon if and I'm sorry I'm just going to call you Mr M because I'm sort of butchering your name this is the mirror again as my colleagues and I have sit here sat here and watched the citizens reactions to the words that you have stated tonight they are looking in disbelief and uh seem to they have laughed on a number of

occasions at some of the things that you've stated that your company is doing and have done they are saying that this is in disbelief so I am wondering when the last time that first of all when your company uh has when have they been in Durham and actually taught to the citizens and really giving them an outline of what you all are planning to do and the reason why I asked that is is when it gets to the city council stage with a private organization who owns a building that's problematic and I think that we are now at the point where the city is looking to you all to do some things that will immediately address these concerns we've heard about a fire we've heard about that happened over the weekend we've heard about the bugs we've heard tonight now I'm not sure if you've

heard at all about all amount of problems that they have been dealing with over and over again that sounds like it started before your construction phase so can you and you I'm going to ask that you can give us some direction or some timelines as to how immediately some of these concerns are going uh to be addressed in terms of what you all are already or have not done these residents they're not believing that and they're indicating to us that that is not the current situation that they're dealing with mayor O'Neill I also have a Alexandra Thompson uh who I believe has raised her hand he's a part of the day-to-day operations and we rely on her um involvement very heavily if she can be acknowledged she might also be able

to provide you with some direct uh responses and timings yes please um Miss Miss Thompson um if you would unmute we should be able to hear you and you have the floor man are you able to hear me yes we can hear you okay um thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak so um Mr Monona is correct I am more Versed and involved in the day-to-day of JFK Towers under Regional property director with Millennia housing ma'am I'm going to ask you if you would just speak closer in your mic we're having a little bit of problems hearing you sorry about that yes ma'am if you could just stay close to it all right yes yes I am a native to North Carolina I live a couple of hours away from JFK

Towers but I am there quite frequently I have conversed with the majority of the residents I believe there were only five JFK residents but I have spoken to the majority of them in debt as well as others about their concerns so to speak to the conditions that they brought your attention both this evening and prior with Mr Woodard and the mayor Pro tem we have I feel Taken full accountability we have to speak to their concerns about the elevators JFK towers built in 1981 does have 177 units across seven stories we do have three elevators which are inspected annually that is a requirement it's not something that we can get around um so yes while in the middle of a substantial rehabilitation

it was noted and it was planned that these elevators would be renovated towards the end of the project and the main reason for that is because we knew that we were hiring moving companies to move the residents throughout the property as we were renovating each floor and due to just the wear and tear on the elevators we just thought it would be best to take on that project towards the end we have now met and decided that we may need to move this up sooner just due to some recent issues I will say that there has been an elevator contract um as long as we've had the property and continues to be one although we do have the option to revisit that and we have looked at switching companies to a more local based company that can respond quicker

when there are issues we have been under contract and currently remain under contract with Otis Elevator and that is who Services the elevator in the event of a true emergency the phones do dispatch the local fire department if there ever was to be an entrapment um and while there are three elevators I do know that one in particular has been down more frequently than the others I can only recall twice and I've been over JFK towers for a little over three years that the all three elevators have been down at the same time and most recently was the longest duration of time and that was about seven hours and I myself um two Saturdays ago on the day that this happened drove down to the property to just check on our residents number one and also to meet the elevator tech there to see what was going on and we were able to get those back up and running I was constantly walking floors

checking on residents um in regards to the trash I will say that very common in high rises like JFK we do have a trash chute and while you know again looking at the age of the property the trash chute is a little more narrow than maybe a newer property that was built in the last few years and as long as the residents use it as they should um and they don't throw large cardboard boxes or big bulky items down the trash chute it typically will not get clogged there have been some issues recently with the trash compactor that sits at the bottom of that trash chute to which we had to work with several vendors to get them out to evaluate the bends that sit underneath the Chute to collect the garbage to keep it from backing up and during that time we were able to secure a loaner but that did not arrive at the property until early last week I do know

that maintenance along with the new cleaning company that we've contracted have been working even myself and my team have gone in in the evenings and cleaned the trash chutes the lobbies there surrounding those trash sheets to help put push trash down we have signed a contract and have a new trash compactor on order once this problem this issue was raised and the estimated delivery time for that is about five weeks but in the meantime we are still the cleaning company is there three days a week and then of course our staff is there every day working to ensure that there's no clogged trash chutes on any floor pushing it down reminding residents that cardboard cannot be put down the trash chute it has to be broken down and taken down to the dumpster which is very common in buildings that use a trash chute um Pest Control at JFK Towers has been

an issue and um prior to us beginning Renovations we did have an issue with bed bugs and one of the main reasons for that was that when a resident would move out other residents would recycle the items Left Behind or thrown out to the trash and we you know it came down to a resident education and what you can and cannot bring back into the building so um with that being said we try to remind residents especially as residents are moving to the new renovated units not to bring belongings back inside the building that have been thrown out that they've been thrown out for a reason I did um we do have a contract with the local very reputable pest control company in the area they do come in the first and third Fridays of every month and as Tom Winona mentioned they are contracted to treat the common areas the office 30 residential units and then if anyone

calls during those two weeks that they're not there a week and a half we put them on a list and then they will treat if we have any Resident raise a concern um of bed bugs they would inspect and confirm whether or not there are bed bugs and if they are they then schedule the bed bug treatment and if the unit is occupied a resident they will provide a resident prep sheet of some things that the residents have to do to get ready one Mrs Thompson if you would suspend for a moment ma'am if you let me let me say good evening this is Mayor Pro tem Middleton her Honor's giving me permission uh and I appreciate you going down the list exhaustively uh to respond but I did want to in the interest of time uh bring a couple of things up first off Mr Magnolia good evening we've spoken before uh so this is not this is not our first opportunity to to speak we had a rather extensive conversation in your staff's office on property two things firstly I want to do I do want the staff to clarify the 19 million

dollar number that's being bandied about that we gave we didn't give 19 million dollars uh to them uh so it when the staff gets an opportunity I'd like you to break down where that 19 comes from the actual cash transfer how much of it is tax incentives how much of it is loaned so we didn't give 19 million uh to them just want to clarify that uh Mr McDonough Ms Thompson and I'm glad Senator Woodard is still here um I'm trying to reconcile our conversation that we had um when I visited the site and when I was there and the senator was there our our NIS staff were on site the same time it I you know I'll I'll just chalk it up to being quite fortuitous that the um repair to Mother's tub was done while we were there it wasn't because we were you were alerted that we were there but I'll just talk it up to Good Fortune that it just happened on the same day uh that officials were on on the premises um everything that's been said tonight and and I want you to help me with my

recollection Mr Magnolia when we spoke and the senator was present um everything that's been said tonight is not new uh these are the same type of things that we we said um when we had you on speakerphone in full disclosure I want to share with the people of the city what I said to you then um this it wasn't a gotcha visit um I didn't make it a media event and I committed that I wasn't going to make this a media event uh my belief was that we were communicating in good faith um I fully understand and I want the folk to understand that we know that when this building was acquired it was in very bad shape uh and that folk are literally living in the middle of of not only a rehab basically reconstruction we understand that but there are some things that need to be constantly maintained even through that process and I remember we spoke specifically about elevators and the senator is represented tonight that there was no service contract for the elevator but that calls

were being made on a need basis on on an emergency basis so one I'd like you to speak to that because my understanding is that that was something that was going to be taken care of I do recall also asking about out your your washers I think there was only one washer working for the entire building and the explanation was that well because we're getting ready to rehab rather than putting new ones now will defer until everything's done then we'll bring the washers in and I'm wondering if the elevators are in that same kind of category that you were just waiting until everything was done to get the elevators up to snuff but we have elderly people um there who are stuck getting upstairs and being able to navigate and go up to their apartments on very hot days bringing groceries in um so I'd like you to help me square and reconcile the conversation we had no media present it wasn't a got to visit but the conversation the senator and I had with you that day where we um the

Litany of things that were said tonight we talked about the same things then so so what's different uh what are you just learning tonight that you did not learn in the conversation with the senator and I and what are we going to do about the elevators thank you um are you able you're able to still hear me correct I'm sorry I just want to make sure you can still hear me yeah go if you pick up just a little louder okay so um correct we did have that conversation and um even met um Senator Woodard since then so we do have an elevator contract a five-year elevator contract that went into effect we renewed July 1st of 2022. so um what we're looking at is switching to a more local company so we do have the elevator contract they are servicing the elevator as they're supposed to annually and that coincides also with our annual

inspections which are occurring and they are not behind um however if there's ever an issue with the elevator um doors not closing opening things like that we do call an emergency number and they dispatch a technician so what is being done with the elevators is we've had them come back out and again look at the elevators and see hey did something get missed in the maintenance is there something that needs to be done we also had a another third party elevator comp somebody come and look at the elevators and tell us what their assessment is of what is wrong and what is needed and what's needed now and then what's needed at the time of remodeling the elevators and then with that information we are speaking with Otis who is our current elevator service provider and saying hey have these things been done um you know we're being told that regular service has occurred they have

regular service reports our annual inspections support that that annual maintenance is being done on the elevator but we agree that there have been some issues um well we're being told by both elevator companies is that these elevators take a lot of um I don't want to say wear and tear but they're people are hard on the elevators and you know the doors the rollers for example sometimes get banged up and scuffed up more than they would at a hotel or anywhere else so we are looking at having um more frequent maintenance on the elevators additionally they're in the elevator room on the roof they've determined that the room is getting overheated especially with the hot weather we've had so we have ordered a new HVAC system to be installed on the roof Miss Thompson I'm sorry again the interest we've got some folk here who

need to get home did you say you plan on having a more frequent maintenance on the elevators more frequent Inspections just so they can see if there's something else that needs to be done typically they're inspected and serviced and maintenanced once a year all right I'm gonna I'm gonna yield to the staff and back to her honor but my office will be following up with y'all there are some things that have been represented here tonight that I think weren't for the conversation so I'll follow up with you both um um in the next 48 hours and ma'am if you all would stay on the line our city manager we have a correction uh that we'd like to note for the record in terms of the code cases yes and so thank you madam mayor as a result of the report that the city received in our neighborhood Improvement Services Department in July and the cases that were open I believe Deputy city manager uh Keith Chadwell in his summary uh indicated there were 15 open cases but I wanted to provide a little bit more

detail on those it's actually 55 open cases that were a result of that those inspections of all of those apartments all apartments where residents allowed the inspectors access were actually inspected and that was in the whole building and that those inspections resulted in these 55 open cases and citations for as well as some citations for General Building and Safety you know violations so I did want the record to reflect that instead of the 15 that Keith mentioned it is 55 and I did want Keith to briefly address the funding that has been mentioned here for the record and I do humbly apologize for saying 15 when I fully intended as my notes reflect 55 cases 55 cases that that is correct in terms of the finances associated with

the building um I don't have before me tonight any configuration of the Acquisitions or any of the transactions where I can identify a number of 19 million dollars uh if you allow me to speak speculatively I think that may have been a number associated with the transaction that likely occurred when the initial transaction was made from the purchase from Global Ministries back in 19 subsequent to that uh as the company mentioned there were challenges associated with getting construction financing for the renovations another transaction was made to a restructured limited partnership that transaction the value of that transaction was 35 million three hundred fifty two thousand dollars in round numbers the the subsidy associated with that um the the project was awarded to the

5 million dollars so the remainder of the 35 million dollars was all from private sources including a 17 million dollar First Mortgage thank you so much thank you madam mayor thank you uh any other questions from members of council all right I'll start on with councilman Williams followed by councilwoman Jose Hyman um and then I look to my right thank you madam mayor we

in regards of the city being able to respond being able to respond it's a really long drawn out process um we'd like to I'm sure I can I'm sure others feel the same would like to respond immediately but government is what it is uh to the to the ownership of the company would you consider the building a place for folks to live right now um and and I that question is rooted in there seems to be you have folks living in the transition um we are it's like you you purchased the building and it wasn't ready for folks to move in yet but you move folks in or you allow them to stay in and I'm just wondering if you would consider it um a habitable place right now under your standards and I do notice you have about 200 and over 200 properties across the country so I'm wondering is this is also a

common practice elsewhere is Mr Tom McNugget uh call me Tom Tom um uh councilman when we when we acquired the property in nineteen we understood that it was going to undertake a lot of uh challenges uh and we were hoping to get a quick uh rehab moving forward covid-19 certainly didn't help with those plans however um Our intention was to have a very quick rehab uh 12 to 16 months and to get people into new units sooner uh than later and I believe that the process being drawn out and the process where covid-19 uh involved our inability to

you know maintain Unison get into units very easily during the time of quarantining did not help certainly we are endeavoring now to address the issues that were raised today by the residents and um my colleague or my property management district manager uh Alexander Thompson will address all these concerns and make sure that we can address those those items um now so by the way councilman someone raised the question about the 19 million dollars those were the taxes and bonds that were issued it's it's uh construction financing it's not a grant it's a loan it has to be repaid it's all part of the four percent tax credit um process that we work to raise the the equity and the debt in order to effectuate the substantial Rehabilitation to this property thank thank you um and I guess I'll

close with we we'd love to have a plan of action or whatever plan you have in place I'd love to see what that looks like um and thank you we have a couple more questions for you starting with a councilwoman Josie Hyman sir good evening I'm going to call you Mr Tom and again uh housing is a basic right and I want to see the plan in terms of being able to get our residents in a temporary situation because I've heard all of this we're doing this we're doing that we it's a long list and I actually had a headache what I'm saying to you is that I would like to see something immediately done where they are temporarily housed someplace else to be able to fix what you need to fix [Applause] right so we're not uh I think we have a

couple more comments on my left hand side any comments on this end councilwoman Freeman thank you I I just want to appreciate the residents being here tonight and sharing the situation just acknowledging it's not isolated and so I do want to make sure that we're we're looking at what staff is going to do to consider what it looks like to actually assess what elevators are within the city limits that have folks with disabilities and this concern could be Rose or it could be a risen arising in those areas as well I think this is a highlight and it is a situation that is occurring not in in like in a vacuum and so just making sure we're not waiting for another location to bring this forward I think these folks have plowed the way and we just need to make sure that we're we're covering that part of it I would like to also just add a word of appreciation to Senator Woodard and just acknowledging that you know you know the ropes and so it makes it a little bit

simpler to move through and I will say that it also makes it a big difference when a person not of color shows up for people of color in the community and I know that that it's not intentional but it does have an impact so I appreciate you showing up with your whiteness I I also want to appreciate mayor Pro tem for taking a lead and making sure that our staff is on top of it and getting the answers to the questions I think that there is there's a lot to this and this is just the beginning I don't think that this this is going to be I think to councilmember Hyman's point you know there has to be some temporary relief because it should not be the case where the hospital is where your temporary relief occurs and I think it's just been this is just this was two weeks ago that it that we it came forward in the conversation at work session and Miss uh Austin invited us as well and so in the two weeks if nothing has occurred to improve it

doesn't leave me um confident that anything will occur in the next two weeks and so I would like to figure out what that looks like and I'll leave it at that for now thank you foreign I'm going to ask our city manager has some other follow-up remarks as to where the city is heading next thank you madam mayor I was going to ask Mr Chadwell to come back up again to be a little more specific about when the um the clock starts ticking for the the major code violations that we've just discussed here when that we know it's in July but just so there's a better idea of that process you've already stated it but restating it after the conversation has has happened so the next date of incidents would be August 19th which is the 30th day from when the notifications were made between now and then I don't know this precise date but I do know that our NIS staff the code enforcement staff is scheduled

a follow-up meeting is in the process of scheduling follow-up meeting with the owners which I expect to occur within the next five to six days something like that that'll be an opportunity for an update the opportunity for uh to make a planned approach for what they're going to do in in the context of this kind of enforcement action as a part of the due diligence actions and these kinds of enforcements a property owner is given an opportunity to cure without additional um without additional enforcement and so that that process is imminent I'm going to turn to our attorney who's not in his head attorney Donald too the guy to kind of give some insights of what those particulars mean in terms of 30 days the enforcement process that day ends and then what is required of the uh Builder to to to bring itself in compliance and if there is a longer process after that to kind of give the perspective from the attorney's point of

view sure um Don O'Toole city attorney's office Sophia Hernandez in our office actually works on NIS with these kinds of complaints and why I was shaking my head is I was agreeing with uh DCM chat well about the kind of due process that that the city is required to give in circumstances like this um um all violations violations are issued and then the offending party is given time to come to compliance um I know two weeks has been Tran has transpired hopefully um Mr mignona is true to his word and um is going to give NIS a plan of action in order to bring the property into compliance but then if that doesn't happen NIS would um and I'm I'm not sure of the exact term but um they issue something it goes to the housing appeals board that then gets heard and um

certain action then gets taken after that process Council a question um thank you um councilor I made a representation tonight that I I would be reaching out I don't want to violate any due process and I don't want to make it seem like the city is giving any undue pressure and so would it be your advice to to wait until that that process is exhausted the time that they have to come into compliance with the violations is exhausted before I have any further conversations with representatives for millennium I I don't think so um mayor Pro tem um bottom line is NIS has apparently notified the owner that there are at least 55 violations out there um they are in the process now they should be in the process now of working on a plan to correct those issues if anyone wants to issue support or encouragement to them to correct these problems that's not a due process

violation I want to encourage them thank you thank you madam mayor thank you all right so ladies and gentlemen of JFK we um we are so glad that you have come down here of somebody's okay thank you good evening everyone I just had a couple questions for staff real quick um two questions that I have is are we also keeping residents updated with the NIS process so that you know when that 30 days is up they're also alerted so that I know everyone here is keeping real close tabs but I would just want that dialogue to continue with residence and is there going to be an opportunity for residents you know just to be fair I'm hearing more from residents of what's actually happening than what I'm hearing the owners saying is happening and so is there going to be an opportunity for residents to actually compare like I know that our NIS folks have said this is happening is there going to be another opportunity for them to

um weigh in because what I don't want is the owners saying oh yeah we fixed it and then we get residents we're like no actually they didn't fix it so what's the process around that yeah the the simplest response to that is that the process of remediating this these challenges uh must wind up in a place where the uh the uh offenses are remediated or ameliorated and it's part of that process that means that a condition that someone's lent that someone is living in that's atrocious has been cured so the process up to that must in fact include in within that Circle of communications those who are impacted by the violation thank you I appreciate that Miss Austin yes ma'am if you could go if you could come to the mic ma'am

Mr Tom just mentioned in this forum that when they acquired Millennia uh when Millennium acquired JFK Towers they had a 12 month plan to turn it around and then covet happened so if you were going to turn it around before covet in 12 months is isn't that same plan the plan that you should be working on now which has been over 12 months so if you could have done it then why haven't you done it now that's the only little question I have about what was said yes ma'am Mr Mr um Mr M did you hear that question yes ma'am all right if you had to

provide a response for me please yes ma'am uh when we wanted to do the 12-month construction process in 2019 uh we were planning on our plans and specs getting approved construction pricing to come in and be um the way it was forecasted um when we had to wait until 2022 for this to happen we had a 14-month construction schedule still very aggressive however um what has happened over the last four months of delays associated with design changes required by the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency which weren't uh shared with us until after we closed on that financing in July of 2022. um we had to then resubmit the Ada units um back to the city for review and

approval which also required changes to the sprinkler system this is all part of a design build rehab that we're going through unfortunately we have four months behind schedule we're on floor six right now when we should be on floor three um we have worked closely with the city we've expressed our concerns and we are constantly trying to make up time to complete this project and get folks in completed rehabilitated units that will address all the concerns identified by the NIS on their inspections but while our construction teams are moving forward with this Rehabilitation project and they are now on floor five doing their demo and commencing the rehabilitation and complete Rehabilitation of the units on four or five we will also be working with the operations team to come together with a plan to address the 55 issues that have been shared from the neighborhood Inspection Services with us not only on

the 19th but some of them have filtered in past that the 19th is not the firm day for all of them but we will be working on all of those and we invite mayor Pro tem Middleton to continue to stay on top of us uh we'd like to complete and refine our plans for addressing those 55 violations so that these units are in compliance it is our opinion that some of those units many of those units are habitable however those there are issues such as the pests and the flies that we have to step up with the pest control and we will Miss Thompson talked about our service contract with Otis and that we're working with the local elevator company as well to uh add another 250 000 of immediate repairs while we also are working into the scope additional costs to make sure they're permanent repairs we're working on that as well

uh to to address the comment that nothing has happened in the last two weeks I would say that is wrong it's not happening fast enough but we are working behind the scenes to address these issues to address Pest Control to address the new uh compactor that was needed um to Jet dry and get quotes to to Jet out all the water pipes um associated with the stacks um I think what we need to do is have better communication with the residents um to address these items so that they are informed and not necessarily satisfied but informed um deputy chief uh chat will can you tell me if the 30 days in uh 30 business days are they 30 calendar days 30 calendar days 30 calendar days so September 19th will be the first deadline I'm sorry no no August 19th august 19

completes the first 30 days yeah within the construct of the noted initial notification okay um at that point in time um should be submitted yes and if if that fails what happens the the item that the council was the counselor was referring to uh if that's not met in 30 days a finding a fact can be made and issued to the housing appeals board for additional legal actions to get compliance that does now trigger another 30-day period for something of finality to occur uh with respect to an opportunity for Curative after that um I'll just say more Draconian options are available to us now Mr M uh what is your stance at this point on your meeting that date we will provide a plan uh as we finalize our uh more specific time frame

to share with the city NIS as well as with mayorprotem but please note the ultimate goal is to substantially rehabilitate all units and relocate the population to the completed units so that we can get ourselves down to the first floor um I Believe Miss Austin is in a unit on the seventh floor that has been rehabbed and I'm hoping that she's finding that unit satisfactory um we we uh there we will move on from asking that question um huh uh you can tell from my response I have one last citizen that I'm going to allow her to ask a question and then we will ask mayor Pro tem if he would be willing and

has been stepping into this vein to give some oversight as to directions that he will be getting ready to take to in order to make sure that the city stays on top of these things and so I'll give him the opportunity to make some final closing remarks as to how he's going to enter into this vein to make sure that we're moving along yes ma'am I wanted to thank everyone for listening today but I was sitting here taking diligent notes and Alexander Thompson has admitted on the record that we're moving with elevators that are not properly maintained albeit decidedly more use when you're moving from one unit to the other you're taking boxes carts Etc you also have construction persons going up and down

for their activities for renovations why aren't you maintaining these elevators with more diligence than once a year you're now putting them into decidedly more use also as far as the trash shoots please use something other than Pine Saul and fabuloso because that's not a biological agent you're dealing with biological chemicals in that trash chute I've been there 12 years it's never been cleaned by a professional company that typically use gas masks to do so so I'd like some address with the cleanliness of the trash chute and please change your maintenance person not to mop the trash room and then turn around and mop the freight elevator oh that was quite loud let's put it that way and ask for Pest Control you have 170 plus units how about treat them all while you're moving people into renovating units they still could have bugs you're moving items around hallways up elevators there are bugs Please treat

them before you move someone in treat them when they move out use that as common sense bugs do not just stay with the person they stay in the apartment unless you use common sense to treat these matters but if you're putting your elevators in more service because you need construction people going through and you need people moving to accommodate your Innovations maintain them bring in people to look at their parts what's wearing out proactively not just once a year because they will break you're putting them under more demand and please use professional cleaners to clean the trash shoots that would take care of the gnats and the maggots I thank you all yes ma'am thank you uh Madam mayor um first off Madam I just I want to thank you for compassionate leadership in moving this item and making room for

this item uh tonight um not necessarily and I'm sure she'll forgive me for divulging this but her honor said to me in her her office you know we recognize that this would normally happen at a work session this type of of hearing uh but the mayor uh thought it important enough and and I don't think there's a person up here that disagrees with her that this was the time to do it and the place to do it so I want to thank her for compassionate our leadership very fitting tonight for making space for this absolutely yes just very quickly I want to thank uh in accordance with the mayor's um statements tonight the council has made it clear that um encouragement uh to Millennium is not in any way violating due process uh in this period so I want to let the mayor and the council know that that encouragement will be going on um I will be making contact with with Millennium and of course keeping the council apprised of every conversation everything that's said and every representation that is made I want to thank DCM Chadwell as well for his uh

comments I'll just end this way and then we'll go to our nine o'clock break with the mayor's permission um councilmember Hyman said something earlier and I've heard councilmember Johnson Echo this as well um that that housing a decent place for us to sleep a safe place for our kids to sleep and live is is a right it's a it shouldn't be a privilege it's a right I want us to lean into that and I heard uh councilmember Freeman also tonight say that that this is not an isolated incident there are there are a number of places that need this type of attention for those of you watching tonight I don't want you to feel that the council's kind of leaning in on just this one particular place and that we're oblivious uh to the thousands of our of our brothers of our residents uh brothers and sisters who live uh in these conditions so this is not JFK is here tonight but we know that there's work to be done in a number of places around the city and I I want to you to know that those who are watching tonight so I want to thank my colleagues for asking point on questions I want to

thank Senator Woodard again as well for his leaning in um on this issue and and for the comments that have come uh the questions and comments that have come from this day as uh tonight and to my uh to the staff as well did you have anything else to say did you approach the oh no sir all right with that said we'll be uh we'll stay in touch and we'll stay in touch there are a lot of people um that I love and care about at JFK from years back before I had this job and and um you need to know that you are heard uh tonight uh that we take this personally as a as a government and as a council and as a city um and we go forward with that said we're going to take a we'll be in recess for about 10 minutes till 9 11 and then we'll come back and continue with the business of the city with the marriage permission we're in recess [Applause] hi Alexandra

okay Rings five public hearings one is about brightly recording stopped

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here's some tips to ensure that your garbage and recycling gets picked up one your cart should be put out for collection before 6am on your collection day two your card should be at least three feet from all other objects such as mailboxes telephone poles fire hydrants trees and other carts three your card should be no more than three feet from the curb four no vehicles should be blocking your carts the mechanical arms on our trucks need direct access to your carts and cannot reach around vehicles find more information about garbage and recycling pickups go to this web address [Music] did you know the city of Durham has interpretation and translation services available the city adopted a language access plan to provide language services

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foreign all right everybody we're at the 9 11 hour and we're ready to start back I never used the gavel as a judge but here we go we didn't use that in North Carolina we

had a bailiff that was your autumn we had one item that I like to pull for from our consent agenda uh and I think that uh that item have been pulled by Mr James Chavis which was item 10. he did indicate to me while we were out on recess that he would like to withdraw that request to speak and um he will be sending some written correspondence uh to us so we don't have a need to hear that person now um well he'll so we will take a motion to go ahead and pass that we'll vote on that so I'll entertain a motion to approve uh item number 10. so move second all right it's been moved and properly it's been moved by a councilwoman Freeman seconded by

councilwoman Javier all those in favor if you sign by saying aye aye all those opposed have the same right hearing none that motion carries uh and we did have a quorum for that vote since some of our colleagues are still making it back from a brief recess we will turn once now once again sure a clerk that should be recorded as unanimous thank you thank you to turn on two oh there's Mr Chavis coming back in Mr Chavis I have just moved your agenda item and told them that you would not be speaking to us tonight and we have approved that item um okay and you and I did tell them that you'll be sending us some written correspondence as well okay all right thank you Mr Chavis all right we will now move to item number 21 at our city manager's request she's asking that the limited obligation

bonds series 2023 will be the next item to be heard so I will now turn to our staff great thank you very much Madam mayor mayor Pro Tim council members I am Tim Floyd Director of Finance the purpose of this public hearing is for a limited obligation bond series 2023 sale which is a financing for General Capital Improvement program CIP projects adopted by Council in Prior budget Cycles the public hearing is required by State Statute and all notifications have been made and are on file for review key points to be made the financing is not to exceed 138 million dollars the proposed financing will refund the series 2022 limited obligation bonds which were an interim facility approved by Council in June 2022 to fund General capital projects the proposed financing will also refinance the series 2013 a limited obligation bonds to achieve Debt Service cost savings we are working with

our financial advisors and bond Council to maximize efficiency and effectiveness of the process all data all debt activity duties of this type and size require State approval and we will be submitting an application to the local government Commission in the morning to complete this process we will be back before you on September 5th seeking an approving resolution and we anticipate closing on this debt on October 17th in addition to the public hearing other actions related to this financing and for your consideration tonight include adopting a resolution authorizing the negotiation of the financing contract authorizing the filing of an application with the local government commission authorizing the retention of Professionals for implementing the financing and authorizing the city manager or her designee to execute other Associated legal documents related to this agenda item I appreciate your consideration and welcome any questions you may have thank you so much you have heard the report from staff and I will now declare

this public hearing to be open and will first entertain questions and comments from the council seeing none I have no person signed up to speak either here in person on this item or on the internet I will ask our clerk to check and make sure all right is there anyone else in the audience who wishes to speak on this item let the record reflect that no one has requested to speak on this item and I now declare this public hearing to be closed and this matter is back before the council we have several items for our consideration to vote upon tonight in regards to this matter the first I will entertain a motion to adopt a resolution authorizing the negotiation of an amendment to an installment financing contract not to exceed 138 million dollars in other related items

is red all right that was moved by mayor Pro tem secondary by councilwoman Jose Harmon Madam clerk if you open the vote if you were close to vote and Report out passes seven to zero thank you the next motion that we will entertain is to authorize the filing of an application to the local government commission for the approval of the amendment so moved second that's been moved by our councilman Johnson seconded by councilwoman Freeman Madam clerk if you open the vote if you were close to vote and please report out motion passes 7-0 the third motion for our consideration is to authorize the retention of Professionals for implementing the

financing the movement councilwoman Johnson Second Amendment councilwoman Jose Harmon Madam clerk review open to vote if you would please close the vote and Report out the motion passes 7-0 thank you and the final motion for our consideration on this item is to authorize other actions as necessary to complete this transaction moved by councilwoman Johnson second to make by councilwoman Jose Hyman clerk if you open the vote if you would please close the vote and Report out the final motion passes 7-0 all right thank you we will now return to item number 16 which is a zoning map change for bright leaf North

4 acres and located at 548

S 70 Highway East the current zoning is commercial General with a development plan Falls Jordan District B the applicant proposes to change this designation to commercial uh neighborhood with a development plan Falls Jordan District b as well the applicant is proposing to rezone the properties to allow up to 90 townhouse units the properties are currently designated commercial on the future land use map the proposed commercial neighborhood with a development plan zoning is consistent with the designated future land use this request received a recommendation of approval from the Planning Commission on April 11 2023 by a vote of eight to one as a reminder two motions are required for this application the first motion is to approve the zoning ordinance the second motion is to approve the consistency statement thank you staff and the applicant are available for questions thank you Ms

Robert good to see you I'm going to officially declare this public hearing open but before we go to any comments from the applicant or the gallery I'm going to ask if any of my honorable colleagues have any questions or comments for the staff seeing none we will go now to the gallery Mr gauche representing the applicant I believe sir how much time do you anticipate needing for your presentation five minutes sure all right put seven minutes on the clock please Madam Clerk and uh good evening I will also greet the mayor who is not here but I assume we'll return at some point and mayor Pro tem Middleton members of the city council my name is Neil gauche I'm an attorney at the Morning Star Law Group at 700 West Main Street also with me tonight we have Laura Holloman and Ryan Acres both of whom are with Nick Adams and we have Donna Crowder and Ann Oakley with four star and dhic respectively or maybe I did it backwards but they are the Builder and developer for this project uh I want to thank staff for the presentation of this request and I'll

try not to be repetitive this particular piece of property is part of a larger previous rezoning I believe from around 2005. back then the idea was for a mixed-use area with residential office and Commercial that concept never has panned out here in fact most of the original rezoned area remained vacant only until recently the HIC has Acquired and is building out a dense residential Community east of the site they are building multi-family and they are also building rental Town Homes which they call Casitas the project is just east of this site within the original rezoned area on this project four stars acting as the development arm for dhic what we're proposing here are for sale town homes I wanted to paint that picture for you because in a vacuum this project looks like a standalone townhome project and technically that is what it is but it is part of a larger concept as I mentioned or as is mentioned in the

staff report the current zoning does not allow for any residential use here instead this area would have to be developed for office and Commercial what we are asking for here technically is a down zoning in that the proposed project would generate less traffic than development under the current zoning in our initial submittal for this rezoning case we tried to maintain a mixed-use approach the property is divided into a north and a South section by stream which you can see on the development plan we designated the area closest to 70 exclusively for non-residential uses unfortunately through the review process we learned probably the number one reason why the previous mixed-use concept never panned out here there is so much uncertainty as to what will happen with Highway 70. ncdot has two different plans for turning 70 into a super Street commonly referred to as the North and South options and our understanding is that

the city of Durham may also be advocating for 70 to instead become a Boulevard for years including up to today there has not been any resolution on which option would be implemented and nonetheless because of these various Transportation plans we were requested to reserve a 300 foot wide right-of-way along our Highway 70 Frontage 300 feet is pretty wide and it wiped out the whole non-residential area south of that stream in fact it goes into the Stream So the commercial component of our original submittal has been removed that actually turned out to be maybe something like a happy accident because the place type map designates this area for apartment and town home which this project this rezoning is consistent with the draft play site map for this area finally I just want to highlight the fact that this requested zoning map change received a strong recommendation of approval from the Planning Commission by a vote of eight to one I don't have to tell you all that that doesn't happen always but I think the various

conversations we've had with nearby neighbors the the fact that this is part of a larger effort by dhic to create housing here and the applicant's willingness to deal with the uncertainty of Highway 70 have worked together to bring you a very sensible project it results in less traffic less intense uses and better cohesion with the existing Community than the current zoning would allow or otherwise require our team is available to answer any questions you may have and we hope to have your support tonight thank you very much thank you Mr Ghosh you've got a little bit of time in reserve Madam clerk I don't have any cards for any speakers on this this is a public hearing is there anyone in the chamber or on our virtual platform that wishes to speak on this matter this is a public hearing all right seeing none and I've seen on um pardon me Mr Mayor Pro tem there is one hand raised in the virtual queue okay is that would that be Carolyn Arias

if you would make a hi can you hear me good evening can you hear me can you hear me yes hi yes I can can you wish to speak on this item yes please if that's all right absolutely we're glad you're with us you'll have three minutes thank you so much so I'll speak quickly I'm a resident of brightleaf at the park which is uh the community that um this uh area would would directly be next to and really right at our entrance just to intro our community we're about 1200 homes and probably one of the largest communities in Durham we've had a ton of change happening around us here in southeast Durham but we have lots of Pride here uh probably about six to eight different neighborhoods being developed right directly neighboring to our community but we get it Durham's a great place to live a lot of people want to be here and we just want to bring to the city's attention that our neighborhood is highly engaged on this topic we've reached out to the director

of the planning department met with them several times this year we've reached out to the developer and then also uh Neil gauche here as well the legal representative and I want to assure the city that everyone has been a lovely collaborate with so just wanted to note that but I also want to highlight that you know our neighborhood's interests here are really um you know outlined a lot in what the Planning Commission had recommended so I think that they voted you know 8-1 which you know I you know I think you know that's that's uh sort of um seems to be like a majority but I think that there are some fine details that I'd really highlight which include you know there there is an opportunity to do something more than just pop up another 90 homes um you know when a lot of us moved in here with an excuse uh being planned there that we had hoped that even if there was something small that there would be potential for you know a small uh you know retail I mean we know that

grocery store wouldn't fit in there but you know I think that there were some ideas um put in put in by the Planning Commission um also we just highlight that uncertainty is a word that just was brought up and I think with Highway 70 you know uncertainty and then also all of these neighborhoods being moved in directly at our entrance we already have a hard time getting out of the neighborhood uh probably the biggest complaint of people who moved to our neighborhood so just if we could ask for the for the city to really take careful look at you know how we get in and out of our neighborhood and making sure that you know it doesn't take 20 to 30 minutes just to get out we're also very conscious of the environmental impact so we'd love to see more details about the greenway that's planned we are in an Audubon Society neighborhood so also considering the impact to lick Creek which is the stream uh that they were just referring to and then lastly we are really appreciative of the commitments

to the city that were made you know uh you know donations to um you know the the schools Etc which obviously were very supportive of but we'd also love to just emphasize you know with all of these developments moving in close to us it would be wonderful especially considering you know I think that you just mentioned sort of like this bigger plan there's you know I think two to three large neighborhoods being built that's your time that's dude thank you so much for being with us that's your time we thank you for your comments okay Mr ghost did you want to respond to anything do you have a couple minutes yeah just quickly and I I recognize the name immediately uh someone I've spoken to personally three two or three times I think about this project um and that that's what I alluded that to uh earlier I think one of the successes of this project is the level of Engagement that's been done here as

far as um the fact that you know this project would be nicer with some sort of non-residential use we agree we pursued it we tried to um and uh ultimately the the plans for that which very sensible if you look at the property it's cut in two by this stream North and South the South Side being closest to highway 70. it's an obvious sight for for non-residential but we've been asked to remove that from this development plan on account of the need for right-of-way reservation that actually ate up that whole section which took away the the non-residential command I will also just state in our engagement the idea that the section where we are building the town homes would be used for residential was widely supported and and in fact the current zoning would require that area to be office and maybe some commercial which was not well liked by the community to begin with so I think what we ended up with is not 100 of what the neighborhood asked for because we

are not able to implement a non-residential component on account of the right-of-way reservation but where we're building Townhomes is exactly what the community said they thought would be a great idea in this location so you know I think it's a it's a good project and if we knew what was happening with 70 we could tell you a little bit more about what would happen at that corner but we can't at this moment Mr ghost thank you so much I'm now um entertain queries or comments from my colleagues councilmember Hyman thank you Mr so I think the contributions to the school and affordable housing fund is a plus um but can you just talk to me about is there and I just want Clarity because I was reading it and I've read a lot of the comments from the Planning Commission I know they voted for it but they also had some other comments on things that they wanted to hopefully have seen too but the affordable housing piece can you just um speak to that yes well I'm glad you brought that up uh so the Builder here dhic um they okay so recently they had a project denied in Sanford because the council

there felt their price point at under 300 000 was too low now that's in Sanford the the land prices in Durham are a little different uh but I will tell you that uh when we filed this however long ago we filed this they were aiming for a price point here at at in the low 300s and if I had to tell you today looks like these will be you know probably in the mid 300s at this point um because of you know just fluctuation in the market but what they are trying to do here is build I wouldn't call it affordable housing under Durham's definition but definitely entry-level housing here and they like I said they have a wider Community here where they've got multi-family rentals that's over on the east and then west of that but east of this site is rental town homes so you can think of it as kind of an opportunity to move into a nicer development and then on this this development which across the street from uh was that copper leaf that these would

be the for sale Townhomes I mean this is a whole program where they're trying to provide a low price point option for people so you know I obviously I've been at this Podium many times I know how the city of Durham talks about affordable housing this is not what we can call Affordable housing on the Udo but this is that's exactly what they're trying to build here is attainable housing you know and so the commitment to the monetary commitment to the affordable housing fund is a genuine commitment but I think more I mean I I think this is a better project than that in the sense that they're aiming for a very low price point here as low as as low as I've seen in Durham and and uh and I'm working with them hopefully to help bring more projects to Durham where we can get low price points in Durham we need that and I just have one more question because I think it was and just correct me the 21 000 to the school system right that's correct right so what was the um number that you calculated that in terms of the amount of students that would be I guess affected with you build sure

um and that was we pulled that directly from the staff report and I don't know it off top of my head but I've got the stuff for it so I can tell you it was just a big amount for the affordable housing fund and then I see the 21 000 for the schools so I was just wondering what was the number that you used to calculate the number of students that you use as your metrics to calculate that number looks like it was 42 students 42 students yeah that's what the staff report indicated would be the additional students created by this project thank you thank you thank you thank you council member colleagues anyone else council member Freeman yes ma'am I think I think it's it's probably really a good idea to share that dhic has been a good partner for the city of Durham on a number of affordable housing projects and I think that this is uh a good project coming forward as a town home covering like the missing middle conversation that's occurred in this community and so I think that's a little helpful around where I would be supportive of moving this forward

thank you councilman of course it's kind of hard to move me and once I've kind of looked at things and made up sort of kind of my mind but I think I'm going to move tonight in support thank you madam mayor College anyone else all right with that I will declare this public hearing close the matters now back before the council uh before we call uh for emotions I'm going to uh just query one more time and any colleagues have any questions for staff or comments about this case all right colleagues this matter requires two motions the first motion is to adopt an ordinance amending the unified development ordinance by taking property out of the commercial General with a development plan false last Jordan District B and the step and establishing the same as commercial neighborhood with a development plan fall slash Jordan District B some moved I was looking at the B I have a motion from councilmember Freeman in the second from council member Hyman

Madam clerk would you please open the vote would you please close the vote and Report out the motion pass is 7-0 thank you at this time I'll entertain the second motion to adopt a consistency statement as required by ncgs 160d-605 I was so moved uh I need a second second all right uh motion from councilmember Hyman II from councilmember Freeman since they both said at the same time uh Madam clerk would you please open the vote would you please close the voting report out and the second motion passes seven zero thank you very much item 16 is disposed I'll now yield back to her honor I will not be yielding back to your honor I'll be keeping the gavel Madam Clerk the next item before us is a public hearing item number 17 Consolidated annexation Fletcher Crossing and at this time we will

347 Falls Jordan District B this is to allow for the construction of up to 80 townhouses the request received a recommendation of denial from the

347 zoning is inconsistent with the designated future land use if the proposed zoning is approved staff recommends a change to the flum to designate the property as medium-high density residential as a reminder three emotions are required for this application the first is to adopt an ordinance annexing the property and entering into a utility extension agreement the second is to approve the zoning ordinance and the third is to approve a consistency statement thank you staff and the applicant are available for questions thank you so much for that report I'm going to declare this public hearing open before I go to the gallery or to the applicant I'm going to receive my honorable colleagues have any questions or comments for staff seeing them we'll hear from the representative for the applicant Mr Ghosh again how much time do you anticipate needing on this one sir five

minutes put five minutes on the clock please Madam Clerk uh and good evening again mayor Neil mayor Pro tem Middleton members of the city council I am Neil gauche an attorney at the Morning Star Law Group 700 West Main Street for this project we have Mr Zach Shipman with shipment engineering we also have Dan Moore's who is with the development group for this project and again thank you staff for the presentation this is a very modest sized piece of property at under 10 acres on the draft Place type map this property is designated for mixed residential neighborhood as is the area south of this property uh now in a mixed residential neighborhood designation the comp plan hopes to achieve a diversity of Housing and though this project only has Town Homes it is consistent nonetheless with the place type designation because the larger area within the that same designation is mostly built out already as single-family homes so this is the right housing type in the right location based

347 dwelling units per acre this is the type of development Durham will need going forward to meet the rising demand for housing in our ever-growing city this project received a four five four to five vote at the planning commissions it's pretty close there notably several who voted against the project indicated the lack of public transit infrastructure as an issue with this project as you all well know there is nothing that the private development Community can do to address that issue at this time the transit authority does not have plans for transit in this area and therefore will not accept Transit easements on new development even if we did proffer it so we don't disagree that the project would be improved the Republic Transit closer than about a mile away currently but there are no routes that go through this area now nor are there any plan to do so in the future

and that's just a fact aside from that this is a really great piece of property to develop in the sense that there are very limited environmentally sensitive features here if you've been to the property you would know that most of it is devoid of trees but there's actually a good swath of trees in the rear of the property and this project commits to saving a majority of the existing trees on the site in order to meet the tree cover requirements and that's you know instead of replanting I know many of you have heard from folks in the area that tree preservation is more desirable than is replanting and that's exactly what this project achieves there also are no streams on this property there are some existing wet ones but you can see on the development plan that those areas are being preserved and I did mention earlier that the project is under 10 acres so you know in the grand schemes this is a small project it would be one phase even under the proposed multi-phase development tax amendment that is being considered right now

um we have limited the impervious to no more than 60 percent and we are providing additional open space over what is required by the Udo so you know in my opinion this project really is hitting on a lot of things the city asked for our team is available to answer any questions you may have and we hope to have your support tonight thank you very much for your time Mr gross thank you very much I didn't receive any cards from staff for this but I do God bless you I do recognize two hands raise Madam clerk you're in agreement in the uh on our platform I see pan Pam Williams and Donna stainback if you would make Ms Williams hearable if you would good evening Ms Williams can you hear me yes I can can you hear me I can good evening and thank you for being with us you wish to speak on this topic see me that's why you raised your hand yes sir absolutely good to have you good to have you with us you have three minutes okay uh good evening to all welcome back opponent of moving Fletcher Crossing Williams I'm sorry could you get a little closer

to your microphone we really want to hear everything you say okay um I'm an opponent of moving Fletcher Crossing forward this is due to the existing narrow curvy roads less than 10 foot Lanes a dangerous road structure with no plans for improvement in the area that already was has burned traffic flow and congestion this stretch of road also does not have street lights it illuminates uh down this area the additional development although it's small will further hand or hamper the ability of the re stress infrastructure to function the traffic value is presented do not include the approved development under construction now when I talk about traffic fires what the latest count is um the increase in traffic on Mineral Springs in this area by about 4 000 due to Harlow development and Wesley development which couldn't uh increase the traffic on this road to 12 000

vehicles per day the Tia for the two developments in this area mentioned that heavy volumes are experienced on the major Street Mineral Springs the proposed 80 Townhomes would be approximately 600 additional vehicle trips per day no Tia was prepared and no cumulative impacts how will the quick quick overgrowth in this area affect the intersections farther from the area like Mineral Springs and Sharon and Pleasant Drive and 70 which is already functioning at a low level service um Singham family homes I feel like are more appropriate in this area with larger lot sizes they're in Parks connected sidewalks transit in this area as approved this is a change in the future land use plan with no regards how Durham is approaching the needs of the existing and future residents the the closest neighborhood is Harlow with a low density residential or four dwellings per acre and massive part of

this is the quality of life aspect in addition to the environmental impacts that these negatively impacted developments we already have uh people being flooded due to these developments that occurred and more water is rushing faster down the creek down holder Road already we are humans and not numbers and so sometimes the numbers don't truly reflect the conditions and we would like you to take the existing residents needs into account out um I do appreciate all who have come out to see what the situation and the development in southeast Durham has done and I invite anyone else who would like to come out and take a tour of Southeast Durham and the construction is here's some of the residents concerns uh to please give us a call give me a call Pam Andrews and we'll set up a uh a meeting with the residents thank you very much

thank you so much for being with us tonight next is Donna Steinbeck stainback can you hear me yes I can hear you good evening thank you so much for being with us you have three minutes good evening council members and mayor O'Neill and mayor Pro tem Middleton I'm Donna Steinbeck I live I'm a lifelong member of Durham County okay uh I'm on the opponent for this particular project because uh the design requirements and the environmental concerns the proposed proffers are Udo requirements adding a commitment for devil Rose silk fence to be used during construction is a Udo and adding a commitment for use of flocculents near the discharge points no commitment has been made to affordable housing and

the proper for the additional students is 37 additional students which should would due to the overcrowding in the schools should be at a thousand dollars per student um due to the existing flooding problems on hold a road the impervious soil percentage needs to be less than 60 percent and we request a hundred year storm plan due to this flooding concern and and it's hasn't been dealt with it's still occurring we reported on the several projects ago um minimum design con criteria is not dirt is not what Durham deserves the existing environment cannot continue with the minimum tree preservation I I heard speak about there was pre pre-preservation but it was not listed

8 opacity thank you thank you so much for being with us miss stainback I don't see any other hands raised Madam clerk Mr would you like to respond to some of the concerns from our residents yeah absolutely so um one of the concerns raised was about the narrow curvy roads in this area and I did just want to point out that this project will be dedicating 10 feet of additional right-of-way I think along both Mineral Springs and holder

so you know their this project would be actually widening the road in those locations so can can understand the sentiment raise however this project does address that um the I think a statement was made that single-family homes would be more appropriate here and the Harlow Point neighborhood was was referred to I actually represented the developer on the Harlow Point neighborhood and I'll just point out that some of the same people opposed that project as well aside from that the draft Place type map does indicate that there should be a mix of housing types in this location the only other housing type in that designation on the playside map that I'm aware of is single-family homes without if we built this out of single-family homes which current zoning would allow for I believe staff report indicates it could be built out for about 16 homes first of all that's not

enough housing on on a piece of property like this in my opinion and second of all you'd only have one housing type here you would not bring to fruition the vision of the place type map here um I think I can leave it at that for now and and look forward to answering any questions you all may have thank you thank you Mr gauche this is a public hearing is there anyone else that has not spoken yet on the platform or in the chamber that wishes to speak on this matter seeing none I'll now yield to my colleagues for questions or comments to the applicant or to the residence council member Javiera Caballero yes thank you really quickly um what's going to be the price point for these town homes uh these sounds will likely be in the in the uh mid to Upper 300s to maybe even to the low 400s okay if you were going to build

one of those 16 single-family homes what would the cost be to that I mean I know you don't have it but like right now that would be a fairly large lot oh they would definitely be large Lots I mean this is a 10 acre piece of property okay so we're okay yeah so maybe they'd be large Lots I mean I'm just trying to hesitate to put a price I don't know um but it would be more than 400 000. oh certainly yes certainly could we maybe get into the 800 000 range with that level of land that's what I've been seeing yeah okay that's accurate um so the buy right basically we could get 16 homes um I would say the staff report indicates that we haven't run that analysis ourselves but it would be allowed right so without a rezoning what we would get in the areas up to 16 homes and based on price points that we've been seeing in other communities um probably a 800 000 home I think

that's an accurate statement yes thank you um that's all thank you thank you councilmember councilmember Freeman yes ma'am thank you this question is for staff um I just want to know if currently there is a design feature or design process in place for a town home or a multi-unit single family homes like if there were a unit that were multi-family on a sub in a subdivision is there a process for that to happen today [Music] so if it wasn't just townhouses being built if it were like a eight unit you know Cottage is there a process for that today for your speaking specifically for the design of Townhouses [Music]

sorry hey thank you for the question Alexander Cahill planning department yes there are design requirements for anything other than single family homes uh their their minimum requirements um in North Carolina we can't regulate them for a single family but we can for anything else however in the rezoning process they are purely proffers and so just just going to give some context and just like broaden this conversation a little bit because it's not just this site if there were an actual intention around multi-family cottage style subdivisions being built even if it weren't 16 by right and you could actually do 144. you know within a site what would that what would that process look like for a developer that would be different than what we're doing now that would actually require some amendments to a unified development ordinance to create a buy right development that would allow that and

Council right correct okay I would I would love to see something I would love to have that conversation because I think what we tend to end up in is in this you know duality of whether we do townhouses or or buy right you know single-family homes but there's a missing conversation of whether or not we're actually coming up with the way in which we get both what we want because I think folks are in the community often like I don't want to just look at townhouses that look like big boxes they really want to see the continuation of their neighborhood character and if that neighborhood character Incorporated you know the same pitches same you know the A-line frame it would be very different as a cottage than it than than actual then setting it up as like four to eight town homes in a site and so I I offer that because if we're going to create the burden of traffic and the burden of environmental concerns there should be some Community

benefit that comes from the development of a project and I often vote and and and affirmative just in support to try and build more housing but it is really becoming increasingly concerned that there there's no there's no end in sight it's not really creating a a relief valve for the housing needs that we have and so the affordable housing piece is one you know whether they were doing an additional pad or two or three or four that's a proper that they would have to make there's no way I can push in on that but these cases that keep coming forward I'm going to lean in on our commissioner's comments and just realize like we don't have the infrastructure in place so why carry the burden like why put the burden on the residence why put the burden on the rest of the city to actually uh get the infrastructure up and running in the area where we have not planned to do so and so I I can't support it at this moment I can't say that it's a bad

project I wouldn't say that I wouldn't support it in a future but I do think that we do need to have a small area planning conversation around how to get a timeline around the because it's not just this swath of land it's the swaffel land that's right below it that will need to come online as well and when the development happens we want it to be something that's beneficial to the rest of the city so I thank you for that yes thank you council member colleagues council member caviar had a follow-up yeah this is actually for you Mr Cahill just out of curiosity and I'm maybe kind of lost in the cottage thing would we have to go through some regulatory you know once we get into some of these units we get into Commercial Code and so my question I guess would be once we get into some of these you know what I would love to see essentially we are no longer in the residential code and so then we have to do more fire Walling usually a sprinkler

system which then impacts the cost of housing but I just want to make sure I'm interpreting that correctly yeah that's a great Insight uh council member Javier we so this is something we've talked about as approaching as part of the Udo update and rewrite as you know director young is very passionate about the architectural piece too and the design piece and so one of the parts and elements of going through that process will be figuring out what is more appropriate for the building code what can be done within the building code and then what can be a design requirement within the Udo where is legally allowed so that will be part of that process as you know that contract's been approved and so it's hopefully be getting soon thank you I look forward to that and hopefully we will get some license for some creativity from the state thank you councilmember colleagues to my left councilmember uh Williams sure I um councilmember Freeman hit on a lot of points that I actually agree with just being able to be a bit more Innovative

um so I do look forward to that I think we we have some opportunities coming up where we can address that and I hope we will um it's a balancing act act um you know I I'm one of the leading representatives in the city on Transportation uh mayor Neil said go triangle council member copiero and I are at um the mpo and I I can I can tell you from personal experience transportation is just jacked up and and we are going to be in really big trouble uh and we're going to stay in trouble until we can get the way we do Transportation up to par with the speed of housing which I don't know how possible that's going to be anytime soon um so we we I keep thinking about holistic governing we we have this Demand on housing that we have this Demand on Transit and we have this you know the the impeding impacts on the environment

and all of it is happening at the same time and very little we can control you know so the only thing we can do is be intentional so when we do have an opportunity to have a little more flexibility or or be more intentional about how we're doing it I hope we take advantage of those those opportunities um specifically to you at what point of what threshold does the Tia um should be executed yeah and they'll judge is here as well but it's generally if it generates I believe it's 150 trips a TIA would be required okay thank you thank you councilmember College anyone else I just had a couple of comments this is and for students of the city council this this is probably a really interesting night um we just approved a project before this one in the highway 70 area that was approved by the Planning

Commission and my suspicion when you look at kind of the all of the impacts that we talk about would have been relevant the only difference is was dhic and dhic has a lot of Gravitas in our community no pushback about you know impacts or environmental impacts in the same area um it's not even affordable it and and I know we we can now we're on record calling three hundred thousand dollars missing middle so that price point we now and I've said time and time again to nccu graduates who are who are Partners who make 90 grand a piece which is with an nccu degree it's very doable 100 Grand a piece they're set not their first job but moving on you know their combined incomes that's the range for their second home for these two professionals who graduated from nccu um but pass with no no issue this second one right here very close vote on the Planning Commission um and it it's it's curious how some of

now those things come back in this particular case listening to some of the comments um from our residents as well tonight and pass and catch this um all of the environmental impacts and concerns go away if we build single-family houses with with Big Lots so all of the Litany of concerns are addressed if we just turn them into a big single family homes I I don't understand that um on the other hand you know the environmental if we just add a more affordable housing so so the affordable housing and when we have had projects that had affordable housing in it and by the way we've had plenty of developments that had both single family and town homes uh we routinely uh and there have been plenty of single-family Town single family in town home developments that have come before us that included affordable housing that included double fencing that including flocculents that you know folks still voting uh down we still

voted down so I'm I just wanted to catch that that these projects are very very similar it's curious also to read the Planning Commission comments the first one you know passed the second one was very close four to five um the lack of Transportation which is out of our purview and you know when our experts say you know well we do have the capacity I think it's important to remember that and I'm I'm a layperson in the stuff I I judge infrastructure by my comfort if I'm in a traffic jam or I'm waiting at a light too long to me that's an infrastructure problem when it's really I'm at the peak of the travel they that it doesn't mean that that road can't handle the cars and because I'm stuck at a traffic light does not mean that scientifically we are we don't have the infrastructure it just means that I'm frustrated I want to get to where I want to get to quickly but if our experts say we've got 20 more years on that road before we have to ratchet up again you know each individual

resident will have to have to uh come to their own conclusion about that but oftentimes we we um we conflate our comfort with with actual uh infrastructure issues as scientists would look at and professionals we'll look at infrastructure so I'm supporting this project like I supported the one before it uh uh in the same area it was a very close vote uh you know one excused absence devote could have gone another way and the Planning Commission comments but I'm reading the Planning Commission commenting and I'm seeing starting I try and develop patterns and kind of understand where folk are coming from but it's it's challenging to reconcile the first case and the second case uh in generally the same area all things considered and I I don't see how single-family homes make all of a sudden make uh um you know environmental or infrastructure concerns go away that's a values decision single family home large Lots does not

how does that dismiss all the other things you said it doesn't it's a value decision and and I would just you know as I close remind us that we we've done plenty of developments that have both single family and town homes and you know double silt fencing things that people have recommended and affordable housing that Focus still pushed back against um so I just want to just put that in clear relief because it was it was on clear relief tonight uh here at this meeting um well that's all I have to say and I'll be supporting this project colleagues anyone else Madame mayor I just I I would just say that people have a right to disagree and so people have to vote their conscience and I don't know if it's up for us to interpret how an individual thinks and justifies how they come to their votes um and so I just would push back and then to say that people may not see them as the same

because they are not the same they're too dark two totally different projects and so you can have two differing opinions as we've seen with the Planning Commission on both folks so I don't know that I put a lot of stock in trying to figure out why you all vote the way you do and I vote the way I do I'm accountable for my vote to decisions who elected me and I don't try to weigh in to what and how are you all are voting do we vote together on some things and we don't vote together on others that's called democracy that's how it lives absolutely Madam mayor thank you man and please accept my apologies if my comments seem to come off as suggesting that people don't have you know their opinions or their votes I've actually been cited for we've been publicly chatted for our votes on this day it's in other places many times as a demonstration of our values look at how they vote and and so that's actually happened but

I didn't I in no way wanted to suggest that people you know shouldn't vote the way they survive it's merely expressing my opinion on the matter with that I'm going to declare the public hearing close the matter is back before the council uh colleagues I'll query one more time if there are any questions or comments for the staff with that this man I'm sorry yes thank you for recognizing me uh mayor Hotel so I just want we wanted to make sure we clarified one point of information before y'all took your vote uh the phased grading and tree preservation Amendment will be coming to y'all on September 5th meeting and in that uh Udo Amendment it actually defines Mass grading as anything over four acres for residential so I just want to make sure you have that information I think Mr gauche thought it was 20 acres but it would be four acres thank you very much duly noted that's an important distinction all right colleague this requires two emotions motion number one is to adopt an ordinance an Annex in Fletcher crossing point of order point of order I just wanted to check in with Mr gush and

see if he wanted to address that tree preservation request that was made because I know he's he stated it was a 20 and staff just corrected and they said that it will be at four yes ma'am Mr ghost you want to respond yeah thank you I'll just maybe ask a question so the as I understand it in the in the draft tax amendment the largest phase before you have to do additional tree save is 35 Acres Mass grading still is at four acres as it is now as I understand it but the for a phase development this development at under 10 acres would still be one phase under the new Amendment is that that's correct so to trigger the tree preservation it'd be 35 which is what I was 20 and 35 acre threshold sorry if I misspoke earlier but that's what I was that's what I meant this is going to be one phase on the recurring Udo and under that Amendment it'll be one phase this project thank you for that uh both

347 false last Jordan District B City jurisdiction so moved second I hear a motion from councilmember Johnson in the second from

council member Javiera Caballero uh Madam clerk would you please open the vote please close the vote and Report out and again the motion passes four to three with mayor O'Neill and council members Freeman and Halsey Hyman voting no thank you and finally motion number three to adopt a consistent consistency statement as required by ncgs 160d-605 no move your motion from council member Williams in the second from councilmember Johnson Madam clerk would you please open the vote would you please close the vote and Report out the consistency statement passes 7-0 thank you very much this matters disposal I'll yield back ma'am thank you we turn back thank you mayor Pro Tim we turn now to item number 18 which is the zoning map change Fairhaven walk and this is a

445 Falls Jordan District B the applicant is proposing to rezone the properties to facilitate the construction of up to 192 multi-family dwelling units and 6 000 square feet of

445 zoning is inconsistent with the designated future land use if the proposed zoning is approved staff recommends a change to the flum to designate the property as high density residential this request received a recommendation of approval from Planning Commission on June 13 2023 by about a 12 to zero as a reminder two motions are required for this application the first motion is to approve the zoning ordinance and the second motion is to approve the consistency statement thank you thank you Miss Roper you have heard the report from staff and I am now going to declare this public hearing open first Saturday any questions for staff from members of the council all right all right we will now

445 to develop Fairhaven walk which is a 100 affordable

apartment community it will have a maximum of 192 units and is located in the Bragg Town neighborhood of Durham this gave us the opportunity to have meaningful engagement with the bragton Community Association and work with them to find out how best to fit this project how best this project could support their Community many of the commitments we've made stemmed from that engagement and I would like to mention too that Fairhaven walk was one of the four initial recipients of the Gap funding we've also been working with the Durham housing authority and Durham Head Start and after several Zoom calls emails and one in-person tour of bragtown we were able to come up with a list of items that we could help to address the needs of the community as Burke mentioned this is a hundred percent affordable and 30 percent of the units will be 30 percent Ami or lower we did have a commitment to the to 25 of 30 Ami but after talking with bragtown we were able to increase that to 30 percent 30 at 30 percent Ami and the remaining

units will be an average of 60 Ami and we're hoping that through some housing vouchers with DHA we can increase the profer of the 30 units we don't know that at that time we're working through that right now this project is also committing to a space for Head Start and early childhood education program the developer and director of Head Start have been in communication about an mou for this although it has not been finalized yet we're also committing to a covered bus shelter for the existing bus stop located along the northern Frontage of old Oxford Road and we are providing off-site sidewalk to fill in the Gap from our project down to the South and to the west to kind of fill in the corner which will help to facilitate in in addition to some crosswalks folks that live here and in the Brighton Community can walk to the Food Lion shopping center which is something that we knew is important to them and we wanted to commit to crosswalks pending approval by Dot and then you know in transportation but we're hoping that we can get those

crosswalks in and we did receive unanimous approval at Planning Commission and we hope to have your support tonight and myself and the rest of the team are here for any questions you may have and I'll have Justin come up and he'll say a few words about Commonwealth good evening Justin Mitchell with Commonwealth development I'm the development project manager for this um Commonwealth development as I think you've you've seen probably a number of times as we are a national developer of affordable housing um and uh we are looking to develop this site as a four percent tax credit uh project in which an application was submitted in 2022 um it's something that was unique about this project was a lot of times when we look to to bring new affordable housing

into a neighborhood we're met with considerable opposition we don't want to rentals in our neighborhood we don't want multi-family we don't want affordable housing those people you know those are the types of things that we hear and the response from the breakdown neighborhood was uh I guess a yimby plus it was yes we want you here and um we want as many of the 30 Ami units as possible um in recognition of Durham area rents uh in general are relatively high and if we utilized a standard unit mix for a lie Tech project it would price out a lot of the people who currently live in in the breakdown neighborhood and so um what we've done is looked at various Avenues in which how can we meet that goal of how many or the maximum number of 30 percent Ami households and as Pam stated if if the partnership

which is uh currently in discussion with with the Housing Authority comes to fruition it will be 34 of our units would be at 30 percent Ami level but the nice thing about that is that those units would all have vouchers and so while a typical family at a 30 30 Emi household would have to have about thirty thousand dollars in income for a family of four the voucher means that you could essentially have zero income because you pay 30 of your rent and the voucher would pay the difference so it really creates an opportunity for people who live in that neighborhood Who maybe have the greatest need to be able to afford and live in this development which is you know going to be a Green certified sustainable development with uh you know playground and different amenities two playgrounds because there's Child Care playground and um and our our site playground but one of the the great things about this process was Donna and Vanessa from the neighborhood invited myself and the lead developer and the

architect and Pam joined us to gave us a tour and then we we went out to eat and kind of had this roll up your sleeves a session of what can we do to make this be one of the the greatest contributors to the neighborhood and that's where she's like we need we need child care we need child care that's stable the residents are able to walk to that they feel it's an easy Avenue to get their kids there safe and uh and we need those 30 units and so that's where the that's how can we connect our site to the existing sidewalk their sidewalk by our site but it's splintered and there's trails and people are actively walking everywhere in that neighborhood and then to improve bus access my my uncle and I drove around the site neighborhood this evening before the meeting and I mean every bus stop had like two to five people I mean it's a it's a heavy youth Transit area and so to be able to improve that infrastructure as well a lot of things

have really come together to make this an exciting project so I think we're all smiling the councilwoman Freeman councilwoman we'll just go straight down the line I think all of us have just a happy thank you I I appreciate this presentation and it's almost like magical but it's so weird that I asked for development with a daycare center about a year ago or so and here it is I will say that this is the product of of uh bragtown folks you know really rolling their sleeves up and pushing you guys around it but I appreciate you coming into the community and trying to figure out what's most beneficial to us as residents who live here rather than the other way around trying to think about what other people want to come here and so that's very helpful I I did want to say that it's really useful to put it in in terms of

trails I've never thought about it that way but you know Trails because they're out of necessity is very different from the trails people use to kind of exercise or have daily activities and so figuring out what that kind of trails of necessity are in that area are important and so I really would like to see how that conversation moves forward and I'm not sure who I follow up with on it but I know that that Corridor they are those it's kind of like the the beaten paths that are in place if there's ways to use that that is incredible for this project and so just just appreciate it and say thank you I would say that this is this is the type of project that meets the burden of infrastructure like in the previous project though thank you thank you um said you're that'll make Council really happy and I

really couldn't see anything where there would be any um anything but joy so thank you for an excellent project thank you for working with the neighbors I'm glad that affordable housing I'm going to say it I said that this is this was possible because of Voters in 2019 passing an affordable housing Bond because that Gap financing came from the city so I think it's important to to see where that you know we often get asked as council members well where did that money go here's an example of what that where that money went um and it's important so um uh thank you and I will be very happily voting yes thank you colleagues I want to associate myself with everything my colleagues have said best 3 million I ever spent um only time I've ever spent three billion dollars um congratulations I think this is a wonderful project um four percent uh latex are grants are easier to get than the nine percent obviously but but still uh take some

some leaning in so we're very appreciative I um I did want to ask where where is your company headquartered Middleton Wisconsin where Middleton Wisconsin so just right outside of Madison Wisconsin it's a lovely Community I remember visiting Middleton Wisconsin some years ago working on a presidential campaign years ago in the previous form of life I think their their model now is a city a great neighbor City uh the city of great neighbors or something like that but but you know you just work there I worked there every other week I'm actually uh closer to Green Bay up in Oshkosh Wisconsin but well please tell all my cousins in Middleton Wisconsin I said Hello thank you look into my love all right looks like we're going to go down the road I'm just going to say thank you to my colleagues at that point I wasn't on city council but you had a vision so thank you thank you thank you that's all I have to say um yeah not that much to add this is a great project let's do it 50 more times

thank you I've said it's a balancing act holistic governing you're bouncing it out thank you you made us all happy tonight I know you reached out to me but there was really no need for me to answer once I read it for us to meet Durham thanks you bradtown thanks you it's going to be our unarmed shooter took care of this vote all right so let's get to it everybody we're going to close this public hearing unless there are some other people to be heard tonight they could talk alert all right so this public hearing is now closed and this matter is back before the council we have two motions for our consideration this evening the first is to adopt an ordinance amending the unified development ordinance by taking property out of the residential Suburban eight the residential Suburban 20 follow slash Jordan District B and establishing the

445 followed slash Jordan District B so moved second it's been moved by councilwoman Jose Harmon I heard councilman Williams speaking in the background too ozen Hammond and then councilwoman Freeman all right okay Madam clerk review open the vote if you will close the vote and Report out the motion passes 7-0 second motion is to adopt a consistency statement is required by ncgs160d-605 second uh motion was made by councilman Williams seconded by councilman the councilwoman Jose Harmon Madam clerk if you open the vote if you close the vote and Report out second motion passes 7-0 thank you so

much thank you all for tonight we now turn to item number 19. 217 acres and located at 602 North Hoover Road the current zoning is residential Suburban 20 Falls Jordan District B the applicant proposes to change this designation to Industrial light with the textual development plan Falls Jordan District B to allow for light industrial uses in the future the properties are currently designated

industrial on the future land use map the proposed IL zoning is consistent with the designated future land use this request received a recommendation of approval from Planning Commission on March 14 2023 by about a 13-0 as a reminder two motions are required for this application the first motion is to approve the zoning ordinance the second is motion is to approve the consistency statement thank you staff are available for questions thank you Miss Rowe Roper for that staff report I am now going to declare this public hearing open first are there any questions from staff room Council no okay councilwoman Freeman did just just um a thought that I feel like I should share and get it off my plate is there any connection between um I guess developer development cases like this that come forward in economic development in our Workforce and

Economic Development Department so I do not work directly with that department when these cases come in um I don't know if we I'm going to tap on Alexander Cahill again hey uh thank you councilmember Freeman uh so we do we do have some collaboration with office of economical Workforce Development outside the purview of zonings and annexations however um we don't collaborate in this space I'm not sure what the the legal realm is for that but I see attorney O'Toole is my king so oh I had no comment s i if it might be just helpful um Alexander if we could set up some time to have a conversation that if I could just ask you to help me with that that would be helpful yeah we can talk to director young and get that set up thank you

2 acre parcel currently Zone residential Suburban 20. we were seeking

to change it to industrial Light there was no Tia required for for this rezoning Planning Commission unanimously voted 13-0 in favor of this rezoning a gentleman spoke at Planning Commission and expressed concerns about some of the permitted uses in the new zoning designation we have manage this application to have a textual development plan restricting adult establishments and bars and nightclubs I actually spoke to that gentleman here earlier tonight and based on our conversation his concern seemed to be seemed to be eased and so I hope that adding those restrictions adjust any reservations you may have on this application thank you thank you sir are there any questions for all right mayor protein Mr Santiago if you would thank you I have a quick question I'm sorry the um what do you plan on doing what is going to go there do you know there is no plan at the moment um the property owner just got the land appraised he has no intentions for development developing

it but um he got it appraised at the appraiser suggested that it would be worth more as industrial and looking at the future language map they determined that was the best use anyways for it right just out of curiosity the list of prohibitions they're they're usually a little longer when they come before some but maybe there's some shorthand here so under adult establishment does that include internet cafes or gambling spots yes I email planning departments and they confirmed that those establishments are covered in that even breweries are covered in their bars for example so um yeah everybody just restricts those social uses so really if that were to be developed eventually um really the the biggest thing or the best use it seems to be at the moment would be a courthouse or a small office building thank you so much I appreciate you being here thank you madam mayor thank you mayor Pro tem any other questions

all right I will now declare the public hearing to be closed and this matters now back before our Council we have two motions for our consideration this evening the first motion is to adopt an ordinance amending the unified development ordinance by taking property out of the am I reading the right one let me make sure I am sorry thank you so no I'm sleeping sorry about taking property out of the residential Suburban Dash 20 fall slash Jordan District B and establishing the same as industrial Light with the textual development plan bald slash Jordan District B removed it's been moved by councilman Williams and seconded by councilwoman Jose Harmon Madam clerk if you open the vote if you close the vote and Report out

the motion passes 7-0 thank you the second motion for our consideration is to adopt a consistency statement as required by ncgs160d-605 second and moved by councilman Williams uh seconded by councilwoman Jose Harmon uh Madam clerk if you open the vote if you will close the vote and Report out the second motion passes 7-0 thank you so much mayor Pro tem I'm losing my voice I'll let you handle the last one for me yes ma'am of course um I'm assuming the gavel item number 20 is a Consolidated annexation 631 and 633 Clayton Road this is a public hearing we will now receive report from our staff Brooke Roper City County Planning Department a request for a utility extension agreement voluntary annexation and initial zoning map change has been

706 acres and located at 631 and 633 Clayton Road this annexation petition is for a contiguous expansion of the primary corporate limits the current zoning is residential Suburban 20 Falls Jordan District B the applicant proposes to change this designation to residential Suburban multi-family with the development plan Falls Jordan District B the applicant is proposing to Annex and rezone the property to facilitate the construction of up to 61 townhouses of which nine will be income restricted to households earning no more than 80 percent of the area median income the properties are currently designated low density residential on the future land use map the proposed rsmd zoning is inconsistent with the designated future land use if the proposed zoning is approved staff recommends a change to

T staff so that they're making sure that they're letting them know the concerns as opposed to us being in a flow through

really we do have dot staff we share the rezoning applications and annexations with DOT staff for comment so they do get to see and comment on each case and is there any way for that information to come like I guess a feedback loop so that the resident knows that they're going to follow up right I'm not quite sure on that point but that's definitely something that we can consider in the future thank you thank you councilmember anyone else all right then I have uh the attorney for the applicant identified as Adam Stallings counselor good evening how much time do you anticipate needing for your presentation uh five minutes I've been put five minutes on the clock please Madam clerk thank you hey a good good evening Madam mayor mayor Pro tem uh honorable council members my name is Adam Stallings I'm an attorney I'm Martin and Gifford at 301 North Main Street in Winston-Salem North Carolina I've known my client for a long time Peter ditto is the face of the applicant

5 Acres so it's relatively

small for what you will deal with but we think we can have an impact here that's good we've got some single family to the West we've got the Southern High School across the street and it seems like would be a great place for some students and their families to move in it would have been great you know when I was back in in high school and being transported from Cary all the way to Southeast Raleigh you know by bus that didn't make sense then but maybe maybe things are getting better um a couple other points you know just things that we've heard tonight you know we've committed to uh making sure that we would uh uphold you you all had done a lot to increase the erosion control standards um flocculents things like that to help keep the waterways clean uh we committed to that even though it's not part of the Udo yet we've also committed to ensuring that we can tie in with some other development that you all are doing and increasing accessibility through sidewalks one thing I wanted to note

you'll see in one of the proffers we made that we would try to get it so that we could go to across 629 Crawford which to the South we reached out to miss Wiggins she she did not want us to come on her property and build that so you'll see that that was one of the conditional profits we made and unfortunately at this point we've not been given permission in case anyone noticed that but in general we think this is exactly what this area needs and we we humbly asked for your support tonight and thank you for your time consideration thank you so much Mr Stallings you identified Mr Joseph as part of your team but he did fill out the court sir did you wish to speak only if you all have questions and we're happy to fill one out if you'd like us to very well thank you so much I don't have any cards from anyone wishing to speak and so I this is a public hearing does anyone in the gallery or on our virtual platform who wishes to be heard on this matter would you please you wish to be hired man thank you so much for being with us if you come to the podium and just give us your name you'll have three minutes and afterwards if I could trouble you to fill out a card

um afterwards thank you so much and thank you for being with us um good evening my name is Tanisha Wiggins I'm a co-owner at 629 Clayton Road um we've been long-time residents at 629 Clayton Road our parents established at home in the 70s and we've seen a lot of change of course in the area and we are we understand growth we understand that growth is going to happen we would just like to see it happen with respect to the residents that are currently there and there have been long-term residents there um we oppose the building of those Town Homes it just doesn't fit the neighborhood and that's the concern like I understand

growth I understand you know I think really under the rules of affordable housing to hear that you know staff has assisted with that and offered dangled that out there it's concerning as a long-term resident of Durham it's very concerning and I just wanted to be on record that I'm disappointed that's it thank you thank you and you are in record thank you so much for being with us tonight if you would see our Clerk and get the Elkhart thank you so much this is a public hearing is there anyone else in the chamber on our virtual platform who wishes to be heard on this matter this is a public hearing Madam clerk you see anyone on our sorry you're multitasking anyone on our platform seeing no one all right Mr Council strongs did you want to respond to anything you heard

just briefly thank you you know we certainly understand that not everyone's going to be a fan of of these developments but we do think that based on your your your outlook and your decisions to move forward in this way it fits with that plan and that vision and so while we understand that people don't want to see things change and I understand that better than a lot um you know this seems to be a good uh area where you could start to phase in to these changes you know you look at to the to the West you've got the single family homes but this does bring you know it's it's not a ruse there will be affordable housing and these will be more like the entry level uh you know things that we're talking about as opposed to the 800 000 single family homes that you know seem to be the the options these days when you go with the more traditional setup so again we really do thank staff for doing this and we think that it just fits the vision of this Council thank you thank you so much I'm going to now uh seek if any of my colleagues have any

questions or comments for the applicant or any of the residence council member Freeman yield to you thank you and I'm I may be missing something I'm just trying to figure out I guess what when you say that it's gonna kind of it could phase in is where their property is is there a buffer and is there like anyone have you been able to identify whether or not there'll be like a third story Second Story view into their house like how much detail have you been able to get to Great questions councilmember Freeman um no I mean there's a large buffer and you'll see that one of the profits is that we've gone beyond the minimum requirement you know we're going to try to save as many trees as we possibly can there if you look at the plans closely we got a greater opacity we do not know the exact size or elevation of these properties though we do feel like you know because it's the edge of that other development you know it's the perfect

place it's not right in the middle it's not surrounded by single family homes it's on the edge right up against the school across the street and like I said I think I may be missing something because I'm not seeing like a map with any like development envelope on it is there there's am I I'm sorry I'm asking staff if if there's something missing from our uh granicus file say well no the yeah apologies it looks like it's not on I legislate it was entered into onbase but that was a staff error yeah and I think that might be part of the issue is that this has not publicly been made available so I'm well it may be on the website I may be missing it but I think it would be helpful if folks could see exactly how the building envelope will sit on that piece of property because it's a small triangle and then if their

property's right there my main concern would be whether you're looking in my bedroom like if I happen to open a window am I looking at someone directly like they're they're just pieces of that that kind of matter and so I can appreciate the comments that were shared and I would hope that staff could get that and I'm certainly happy to have um Mr Joseph come up and speak to that hi I'm Michael Joseph with veteran Engineering Associates to your point I believe on that property line there's a 30-foot buffer and I I'm working for memory but I want to say it's 60 percent opacity right I believe that the that that Mrs Wiggins house is closer to the road and so there's there's they're they're not going to light up the proposed road that that's

development's proposing is sort of the middle of the site it's a shame you don't have the exhibit that's helpful I think um staff will get us that copy I don't feel comfortable voting on this I will tell you that I was just going to vote no but I just figured I didn't realize it was just missing yeah we can definitely provide you with the development plan attachment um I'm sorry for the oversight thank you councilman mistakes happen I'm not trying to like it's nothing anyone should be upset about it's just just missing yes ma'am we've been thank you councilmember colleagues anyone else questions or comments um I agree with the Planning Commission on this one I think it's a good project I'm going to vote for this one um I appreciate councilmember Freeman's um questions about line of sight and I will say I my neighbors if they leave

their blinds open I can look out my window and looking to there I've lived in plenty of Apartments where if you don't have your blinds closed you can you can see in um so I don't know well I appreciate the the uh bring it up I don't that's not really operational for me um I think it's a good project I'm going to be supporting it per the planning commission's uh good comments on us and good vote I think colleagues with that I'm going to declare this public hearing close the matter is back before the council I'll query Council uh one more time if you have any questions or comments for staff before we entertain these motions with that uh colleagues I'll entertain motion number one to adopt an ordinance annexing 631 and 633 Clayton Road into the city of Durham effective September 30th and to authorize the city manager city manager to enter into a utility extension agreement with winmore 208 LLC let's move I heard a motion from council member Williams in the second from councilmember Javiera Caballero Madam clerk would you please open the vote

foreign out the motion passes four to three with mayor O'Neill and council members Freeman and Halsey Hyman voting no thank you for motion number two I'll adopt uh I'll entertain a motion uh to adopt an ordinance amending the unified development ordinance by taking property out of the residential Suburban 20 RS 20 fall slash Jordan District Dash b f slash JB in establishing the same as residential Suburban multi-family with a development plan rsmd Falls Jordan District bfjb so move air motion from council member Williams into second from councilmember Johnson Madam clerk would you please open the vote please close the vote and Report out motion passes four to three with mayor O'Neal and council members Freeman and Halsey Hyman voting no thank you and

finally motion number three I'll entertain a motion to adopt a consistency statement as required by ncgs 160d-605. m on August the 7th Monday August 7 2023 here in City Hall Chambers but we'll see the Strong City