City Council · Regular Meeting · March 20, 2023

good evening good evening everyone welcome welcome to our city council meeting for this night Monday March 20th 2023 at 7 pm here in City Hall Plaza on our first floor in council chambers we have a lot of movement going on right now I think people are still signing up we have a fairly Full House tonight we have a fairly great agenda but I am going to ask folk as they're coming in uh if they would just pause for one second for a moment of silence meditation thank you all so much I now turn our attention to councilwoman Freeman who will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance thank you it's our practice to stand and

salute the flag if you'll join us thank you for all right at this time we will have our roll call Madam Clerk mayor O'Neal I am president mayor protem Middleton I'm here councilmember Caballero here councilmember Freeman president council member Halsey Hyman councilmember Hyman is here she went upstairs to grab something she'll be right back thank you councilmember Johnson here councilmember Williams present thank you all right at this time I'm going to recognize my colleagues to see if they have any announcements for this evening

I'll turn to my right first since we have a full house on that side and see if you don't have any announcements councilwoman Freeman thank you madam mayor I I just wanted to just take a moment and to acknowledge that our legislature has been moving forward with Medicaid expansion and I wanted to to send a big thank you to our legislators and and moving this forward and I also wanted to share that it was a little bit of a conundrum that it's been tied to the budget and so I think there's talk that it won't it wouldn't pass until the budget passed and then it wouldn't be implemented until January of 2020 well 2024 and I do want to encourage folks to reach out to our legislators and let them know that it'd probably be best to separate that out and move it a little bit forward faster so that was all thank you

oh I'm sorry and also I didn't want to send a congratulations to our newest Superior Court member Justice Reinhardt I didn't get to attend this the swearing-in this weekend there's too much going on but uh I do want to say congratulations thank you Echo those congratulations had a very nice event on yesterday I'll turn to see if there's anyone else who has any announcements on on my right hand side no man announcements Madame mayor just um it's good to see a pretty packed house this evening all right I'll turn to my left and see if we have any announcements on this end of the dice yes thank you madam mayor I um don't have much to say other than we have a new dermite in the house who just recently moved here uh she's our new general manager so and she's attending the meeting tonight so hi Karina welcome to Durham thank you welcome sorry I should clarify she's my new restaurant said I'm headed

to not the city general manager that was a little weird sorry all right any other announcements councilwoman thank you thank you madam mayor um nothing really to say tonight just wanted to welcome everybody who is here tonight we have an unusually packed house a number of public hearings on the agenda and look forward to hearing from all of you um this evening thanks councilwoman Jose Hyman hi good afternoon good evening good evening women's health for women's month but I just got a um an email prior to us having this meeting that I have been just want to share with my colleagues that I've been selected to be honored for the Timeless Unbound ceremony of women leadership to represent Durham County this is an award given by the lieutenant governor so I'm pretty honored and just wanted to share that with my colleagues

congratulations congratulations all right well we will now turn to our city manager to see if she has any priority items for this evening good good evening Madam mayor Mr Mayor Pro tem and members of the Durham city council I do have one priority item for you it's the information item agenda item number 17 Consolidated annexation Wesley Downs attachment F was updated with additional values thank you that is all I have for this evening all right and I will turn to our City attorney likewise good evening mayor O'Neill mayor Burton Middleton and members of the city council the city attorney's office has no priority items this evening thank you attorney Ray Berg and now turn to our city clerk good evening Madam mayor Mr Mayor Pro tem and City Council Members the city clerk's office has no agenda items or no priority items for today thank you

thank you the next order of business for the council this evening is the consent agenda the 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'm going to read through the entire agenda which would include our business agenda as well starting with our consent agenda item number one is the Durham cultural Advisory Board appointment item three skip two it's the housing appeals board appointment number four Durham record workers Rights Commission appointments number five Durham bicycle and pedestrian advisory commission appointment item six the approval of city council

minutes item seven is an ordinance to set filing fees for candidates to municipal office in the city of Durham number eight a resolution to authorized second opioid settlement and the supplemental agreement for additional funds item nine this American Rescue plan act Opera project Community rooted approaches to Public Health number 10 change order number nine to the construction manager at risk contract with skanska USA Building Inc for the Merit more park formula Hoover Road Park project item 11. it's a grant Administration agreement and Grant project ordinance for reintegration of ex-offenders First Step act initiative p-r-o-w-d Grant funds item 12 drainage structure access and stabilization sd-2023-01

item 13 the Professional Services contract award to heisen and Sawyer pce for facilities electrical study we will then turn to our general business agenda public hearings item number 16 is a public hearing on the fiscal year 2023-24 budget and FY 2024 the 2029 Capital Improvement plan CIP that will be led by mayor Pro Tem the Consolidated annexation number 17 Wesley Downs will be led by councilman Williams item number 18 Consolidated annexations Shady Grove assemblies will be led by councilman Williams item 19 the unified development ordinance text Amendment simplifying codes for affordable development that will be led by your mayor item 20. the development agreement novel University Hill will be made led by a councilwoman Freeman

item 21 will be a public hearing on an approval of the home American Rescue plan ARP allocation plan that will be led by councilwoman Johnson and item 22 FY 2023 2024 is an annual action plan needs public hearing and that will be led by councilwoman Johnson as well I'm now entertaining motion to improve our consent agenda so moved okay it's been moved by councilwoman Freeman and seconded by councilman Williams all those metal clerk have people open to vote if you were close to vote the motion passes unanimously thank you we will now turn to our

budgetarians I believe our public hearing and we will start with mayor Pro Tem thank you your honor good evening to you Ma'am to my honorable colleagues to everyone in the chamber and those watching at home or wherever you may be good to have you with us tonight our first uh General business agenda public hearing is item number 16 public hearing on the fiscal year 2020 2023 through 24 budget and FY 2024 through 2029 Capital Improvement plan CIP I'm going to yield to staff now for their report good evening sir good evening mayor mayor Pro tem members of council John allor director of budget and Management Services this is a public hearing to receive comments from the public on the development of the fiscal year 2023-24 budget and 24 through 29 Capital Improvement plan budget staff are here and available to listen to All comments this is indeed a really important milestone in our budget planning process

where we hear from our residents and our citizens before I officially open the public hearing when asked if any of my colleagues have any questions or comments for staff seeing none at this time I'm going to declare that this public hearing is officially open and we welcome all of our our neighbors and friends here tonight uh to hear them out on this important important matter before us I have several cards before me folk that signed up to speak on this matter I'm going to call the first five I'll ask if you would queue up uh in all right cards are growing queue up in the order that I call your name and you'll each have three minutes we'll start with Mr Kyle Barber Mr Paul Harvin Ms Allison Simpson thank you okay and uh lazarati's and Claire shell nut in French forgive me um for my initial instructions you'll each only have two minutes tonight

sometimes we do um amend time based upon the number of people we have and as you can imagine there's a great deal of interest in our budget so forgive me uh you'll have two minutes and I'll welcome Mr Barber if you feel just state your name for the record you have two minutes thank you for being with us tonight hello my name is Kyle Barber great to be here tonight I am 21 years old born and raised here in Durham um I I really love this city so much and because of that I also care about its safety and when we're talking about budgeting from uh for the coming year I really feel that we need to prioritize fully funding the heart program it's so important that we have a skilled unarmed and caring crisis response team in this city and uh for it to be able to operate 24 7

in all areas of the city this team's been able to handle so much so many mental health crises and things from handling suicide attempts to domestic disputes to welfare checks and also as a young black man living in this city I want to be able to have the option to call this service if I'm ever in a crisis to be able to have a place that I can call um because I think it can be scary um Coming face to face with the police and you worry if there's going to be fear of escalation that could cause they could cause unneeded harm and so being able to have this option is very important for a lot of black people like me in this city um and I I really hope that um that we can get this thing uh fully funded bring in more workers and and get this expanded and uh

do this together like I said I I love this city and um I have so much hope in this future and I think we can set a great example for the entire state of North Carolina um at that so thank you very much and let's get this done thank you so much for your comments for being with us tonight Paul Harvin good evening if you'll just state your name for the record you have two minutes thank you for being with us tonight thank you my name is Paul Harvin I'm a Durham resident I'm here to speak with council tonight about Road Safety in Durham uh in September of last year I was hit by a car on Main Street in downtown Durham and while I am very fortunate to be up here walking around and I'm very grateful to the bystanders First Responders and our local Health Care Professionals many of our fellow citizens are not so lucky um uh I'm speaking to you today to ask for the city to fund a full-time Vision zero

coordinator to lead an interdisciplinary team across Durham departments as well as with our counterparts in the county and in the state to help reduce Road deaths and serious injuries on our streets um also here to request that Council and the city fund the repair of sidewalks and bringing our crosswalks up to Ada standards as well as to add protection to our bus stops and our bike Lanes to protect our most vulnerable Road users and to continue efforts to improve our Transit sidewalk and bike system across the city so that all Road users can be safe thank you thank you Mr Harvin we're very grateful you're up and with us as well Allison Simpson good evening if you'll state your name for the record you'll have two minutes as well thank you for being with us hi my name is Allison Simpson

by a speeding car in front of myself and our young children we were riding home on the west Ellerbe Creek bike and pedestrian Trail at the crosswalk that connects the trail on Guess Road the car sped through the red light hitting my husband never attempting to slow down or avoid him and never stopping after he was hit the car kept going only to stop a couple miles away to rip my husband's bike out from under the car and discarded on the side of Gregson Road this has been beyond devastating for our family as well as our friends and Community we were doing what many families enjoyed about living in Durham we were enjoying time outside together and enjoying one of the many bike and pedestrian trails Matt was a brilliant kind and gentle and devoted dad recognizing that this is our permanent reality is heartbreaking I share all of this because I want to honor Matt's life and turn my pain into something productive I'm so grateful to the Durham city council for being one of the first cities to adopt a vision zero program

and recognizing November 20th 2022 is the world day of remembrance for road traffic victims in Durham these are very important steps that the city has taken and yet we need to do more Based on data from the NC DOT 2021 report there has not been a reduction in traffic fatalities and serious injury in Durham since the city adopted Vision zero today I ask that the Durham city council budget reflect a stronger commitment to the vision zero in order to make progress toward the goal of zero traffic fatalities and serious injury and adopt the bike Durham Vision zero Durham agenda this gender includes providing funding for a full-time dedicated Vision zero coordinator and it is imperative to hire this position as soon as possible it also includes providing funding for the repair of existing sidewalks bringing curb ramps up to Ada standards and converting existing bike Lanes on a personal note I would also want to advocate for the budget to increase funds to the newly created Durham

Community safety department which in turn provides funds to the county court system so that the District Attorney's office is able to include traffic violence in its priority to prosecute violent crime thank you Miss Simpson that's your time May Matt's memory be a blessing thank you good evening my name is Ann lazaritas I live in on Club Boulevard in Durham I will take the first several seconds of my time to acknowledge Allison's loss and and appreciate her courage for showing up and speaking on behalf of safety foreign in similar ways thank you for your many and extensive efforts on behalf of safety in Durham and for revisiting your commitment to eliminating traffic deaths allow me to speak specifically of my concerns for people who walked bus stops

and ride bikes routinely these groups of people are the ones Among Us who personally are doing exactly what needs to be done in the face of climate disruption either of necessity or by choice While most of us meet our transportation needs by driving and thereby consuming fossil fuels the people on their bicycles and on public transit are actually doing what many more of us need to be doing while so many are deterred by our concerns of heat or cold or rain or lack of time those who take public transportation or bike routinely somehow manage the potential discomforts and time requirements as one of the folks who rarely gets past the 101 excuses for not driving it strikes me as inappropriate to burden the very people who are keeping down their carbon footprint with needless risk when alternatively we could be demonstrating our appreciation by taking every opportunity to look out for the safety of bikers and pedestrians for this reason I encourage you to work

for slower traffic speeds and protected spaces for Ultra Street users by pursuing the vision zero agenda which will have us funding sidewalks curb Rams traffic directed bike lane Networks and a full-time coordinator to lead an inter-departmental interdisciplinary team that will identify prioritize and Implement measures to reduce traffic deaths and serious injuries thank you so much for being with us tonight Claire Shelton Claire shell nut good evening if you'll state your name for the record you'll have two minutes thank you for being with us my name is Claire Shelmet and I'm a resident of Durham I'm a local children's pastor and a student at Duke Divinity School I know that many of us in this room know what it is to grieve on October 7 2021 my precious little sister died she had struggled with mental health for many years before her death I know what it's like to call 9-1-1 on

behalf of someone you love when they're in the midst of one of the worst days of their life it's awful awful 11 months before she died I called 9-1-1 on behalf of my sister she was wrestled To The Ground by law enforcement officers when she needed access to support and resources she was met with violent Force I don't blame these officers they were not trained to deal with what they were facing they certainly were not trained the night before my sister died when they assured my parents that she was mentally stable and safe to be left alone she was not and she died these calls were made in the dead of night crises like these cannot be scheduled we must expand the funding for the heart program to provide for people at all times of day and in all zip codes to

have access to the support that they deserve Camille didn't have access to a program like heart think what a difference it might have made in her life please help provide access to Skilled care in our moments of greatest need thank you thank you so much for being with us our next set of cards Eric Lanfrey Eric Lanfrey John Talmadge Carolyn Frye Brooks Emmanuel and Olivia Lynn if you all will please line up good evening if you'll state your name for the record you'll have a few minutes thank you so much for being with us thank you my name is Eric lanfrey and I'm one of the co-chairs of bike Durham's advocacy committee on average a person walking or biking is killed or seriously injured and traffic crashes every 16 days here in Durham

and we know there are even more minor injuries and close calls that we all experience every day you've heard from a couple people already about some of the people who have been killed or seriously injured while walking or riding their bikes I also want to mention Tyson Gurley who was killed recently Crossing Alston Avenue uh Mike Posley a man in a wheelchair who was killed by the driver of uh I believe it was a dump truck Crossing Hillsboro Road uh Noah Goyette who recently hit a pothole on on Main Street because he was forced out of the bike lane by a driver who was parked in it luckily he survived but sustained many injuries these crashes and tragedies are often called accidents by the media but they are not accidents they are the result of a transportation system that prioritizes speed over safety and prioritizes people in cars and trucks over people walking biking and

using Transit Vision zero is a strategy aimed at eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries it assumes that human beings are fallible because we are and our transportation system needs to be designed to safeguard us against that fact Durham adopted a vision zero program in 2017 but has done little to actually implement it the city of Durham must do better and we are here to make sure that the city knows that we do not accept these deaths and injuries as a byproduct of our transportation system finally I also want to provide my support for the expansion of the heart program both both traffic fatalities and other types of tragedies that occur these are all part of community safety and health and we need to do more to support them thank you thank you so much Mr Landry don't tell me Mr Thomas if you'll state your name for the record you'll have two minutes thank you for being with us

I'm John Tallman's resident of Durham and executive director of bike Durham you've heard many of the points of what we're calling the vision zero Durham agenda that we're asking you to support in the coming Year's budget and Capital Improvements program I want you to know that in addition to those who are speaking here tonight we had about 50 of us join us for an event where we rode down from the intersection of Morgan Maine and Watts Street where Noah goyet was was injured when he couldn't stay in the bike lane recently we're also speaking on behalf of the 142 others that have signed the petition that we put out um just last week I wish that we could all be here in the chambers to show you how much support there is for what I know that you're deliberating which is how to fund a vision zero coordinator and how to fund

the sidewalk repairs the new sidewalks the protected bike Lanes the traffic calming um I also just want to take a moment to let you know that neighborhoods are reaching out to us and we have been partnering with neighborhoods around the traffic calming City staff has been Cooperative but also pointing out that they don't always have the budget to invest in what the neighborhoods are looking for in terms of traffic traffic calling measures so it's an important additional funding program that we're asking you to consider on an annual basis as we move forward finally I want to also support the continuation of Fair free Transit that I know was discussed at your retreat that's also an important measure for the community here and finally on a personal matter support the heart expansion thank you thank you so much Mr Thomas Carolyn Frye

thank you for being with us if you'll state your name you'll have a few minutes thank you for being with us thank you my name is Caroline Frye and I'm a resident of Durham I'm here to ask that the heart Crisis Care Program be included in the city's 2023-2024 budget and receive full funding about a year ago I encountered a man having a mental health emergency downtown because of the many murders of unarmed Americans by police across our country I was hesitant to call 9-1-1 if I had known about the heart program I would have been assured this skilled Mental Health Specialists could have responded to de-escalate the situation instead of armed police officers I'm proud to live in Durham and I'm very proud that this program exists now that we know it works I ask that you please expand it so that all Durham residents have access to Crisis Care 24 hours a day seven days a week thank you thank you so much for being with us Brooks Emmanuel good evening if you'll state your name you'll have two minutes good evening

Council I'm Brooks Emanuel I'm a Durham resident I'm also here to speak in support of full funding and expansion of the heart program 24 7 and to all zip codes and I'll just tell one quick anecdote that Echoes you know so many other so many things that people have already said about the fear of calling the police because of the fear that they will do more harm I recently had a friend who was in a housing situation with someone who was starting to show really troubling mental illness signs and was getting concerned for their themselves and it was it was not a situation that had escalated to a dangerous point at this that this point and they wanted to make sure that it did not they understandably did not want to call the police and so just want to point out the the safety issue that it creates for multiple people to to not have someone to call and the safety that you're creating to have these people to call because she reached out to me I happen to know

Folks at Durham Beyond policing I called zart Durham Beyond policing they sent the map of heart service area to me and we were able to determine she was in it but I just thought that imagine if she didn't have to go through that process imagine if everyone in the city had that option so that when they needed help and that they were around someone they need that needed help they could call all and handle both of those safety situations both her own safety while also protecting the safety of this other person who needed help I think it's I I come from Atlanta originally and it breaks my heart to see what's happening in Atlanta with police there now and I think Durham has already started to set a trend in the other direction with the heart what you've done with the heart program so far and I think it could set an incredible example for the rest of the country to fully fund it 24 7 and all zip codes thank you thank you so much Olivia Lynn as as Olivia comes to the podium and asks if Leia Whitehead Eric

Rubinstein Elliott Berger and Sam Hoffler with a lineup thank you for your patience in this Lane if you would give your name you'll have two minutes thank you good evening Council my name is Olivia Lynn and I'm a Durham city resident I'm here to advocate for fully funding the incredible accomplishment that is the heart program so that this vital service is available to Residents Citywide and 24 7. I'm speaking to you first and foremost as a community member I spent six months supporting a loved one through near constant thoughts of suicide she had no family support a reality for so many queer and trans people and no money for formal mental health care she had been traumatized by an involuntary hospitalization and she regularly begged me not to call the police so I spent six months terrified of what would happen to her and feeling incredibly alone

the weight of this caregiving led to my own Mental Health crisis if this happened today and we were in the right neighborhood at the right time I would have been able to call on heart for the kind of safe life-affirming support we both desperately needed but I'm also coming to you all as a future social worker entering the field with fewer resources than I need to be able to support my community and already on a fast track to burn out my experience was not unique especially among queer and trans young people who are so often the only support systems for each other I run a support group for high schoolers who have experienced sexual violence and for the last four weeks we've been building a toolbox for their healing Journey last week we talked about how to ask for help when their triggers become overwhelming tomorrow we'll be talking about how to say stay safe while they're caring for a friend who may be suicidal or self-injuring which all of them have experienced every single tool in their toolbox matters and I want to be able to tell them that they can call heart thank you

thank you so much for being with us Leia Whitehead thank you so much for being with the super state your name you'll have two minutes thanks hello all my name is Leo Whitehead and I'm a native North Carolinian and a long-term Durham resident calling for the council to fully fund the heart team 24 7 throughout all of Durham I've been working in the full-time and homelessness services for the last eight years for five years in Durham and I have delayed making life-saving decisions to ask for a wellness check for friends experiencing mental health crises because it would require police presence and would result in that person being arrested for a failure to appear in court I've been present for many uh interactions between police officers and houseless folks where police just did not have the skills needed to address that person's needs they didn't know what referrals to make they didn't know what to say they didn't know where to go and they definitely didn't have the capacity to follow up to

address the mental health and survival needs of folks whose struggles went far beyond that Mental Health crisis I first interacted with heart when their care navigation team brought a neighbor in for services at the community empowerment Fund in Durham it was a beautiful moment where dreams kind of became reality and that neighbor walked in and she was so proud to be rolling in with such a strong team she shared to anyone who would listen about how Hart was able to help her both in the moment of Crisis and Beyond and they didn't just come once they went back again and again until they were sure that she was going to have long-term support through us now I work as a housing case manager at the lgbtq center of Durham each day I'm reminded of how important the service is for everybody in Durham but especially for our queer and trans family who are facing unprecedented mental health challenges and need this compassionate empathetic response please

fully fund the heart team thank you so much thank you so much for being with us Eric Rubinstein good evening thank you for being with the state your name they'll have two minutes hello uh Eric Rubinstein I'm a resident of Durham [Music] um I bike to work every day my wife bikes to her work and my son bikes to school every day so biking and Transit infrastructure is very close to my heart in addition I am a business owner in town of one of the larger renewable energy firms here and my employees bike to work and our infrastructure I believe could be so much better and I believe that the vision zero program coordinator can help us achieve that future where I can have faith in my family and my co-workers Vikings work every day and being safe and and that safety pays a real dividend

for for this city and so I ask you to support the program coordinator and I also support the heart program thank you very much thank you Mr Rubinstein Mr Elliott Berger [Applause] Elliott sorry hey my name is Elliot Berger I am a co-owner of the Regulator Bookshop on 9th Street I'm Durham born and raised I also really hate speaking in public so I'm going to make this really brief I along with all the nightstand Merchants would like to support the fully funded heart program uh we have seen firsthand what it's like to call police on homeless folk and what happens afterwards and we would uh I would really support that program in this expansion thank you thank you so much Sam Hoffler and as our as our next speaker comes if you'll bear with me for just what I'm going to read the next cards I have a

card with no name on it but I'm gonna put your business industry read the address 1000 North Duke Street apartment nine if you sorry man if do me a favor stick your stick your name on it you can grab this stick your name one if it's back to me thanks AJ Williams Regina Mays and aureli Barrack Grodsky Sam Hoffler Hi how are you if you'll state your name you'll have two minutes thank you so much hi I'm Sam Hoffler and this is Max you want to say hi okay we were practicing that one thing and he couldn't couldn't do that um so I just want to say thanks for having me I am an anti-poverty advocate here in Durham that's what I dedicate my life to and um really focused on meeting people's basic needs and heart does that safety is a basic need and I'm going to keep it short and sweet and just say please fully fund the heart program 24 7.

thanks y'all thank you so much AJ Williams thank you so much for being with us if you start your name we have two minutes good to see you hey uh AJ Williams good to see you too um Durham resident 2112 Summit Street um I'm here uh to uh ask Council to fully support the heart program expand it to 24 7 Citywide obviously we'd love to see it in the county as well but I know that's not Charles area I'm speaking from a place number one um as a Survivor um as someone who's experienced mental illness who's saying families experience mental illness ranging from PTSD to schizophrenia to depression and someone who has also experienced self-harm um having to call 9-1-1 and have to make a decision and talk to the dispatcher and say please don't send the cops knowing that I'm a masculine of Center black male presenting person

is probably the scariest moment of my life knowing that I could die at the hands of law enforcement for misreading the situation and so I know how important this program is this is work that I've been doing with there and Beyond policing since 2019 when we showed up to city council to try to get our community community-led safety Wellness task force proposal approved and y'all did approve that or council members did at that time and so knowing that this is an opportunity for this work to go forward far City and all of our residents to have access to 24 7 care feels imperative and I know we've had many conversations with many of the council members on Council as well as the mayor this morning I know y'all support this program but I really want to know that we're on the same page by saying that it gets fully funded so that it's a robust operation that's available throughout the entire city um also want to say that I really appreciate um councilwoman Monique cozy Hyman for speaking today at our rally we

know you fully supported and I know you come from a social work background and again it's really imperative that this this care is available to all of our residents thank you thank you is Regina Mays [Applause] good evening thank you for being with us you feel state your name you'll have two minutes good evening Regina Mays Durham resident um I would like to speak in favor of expansion of the heart team but I would like to take a moment to make a request of what I hope that looks like you can accept calls 24 hours a day but if you do not have the staff that is there to support that 24-hour day call it does not help you can add to staff but if they are not properly trained that does not meet the need you can train them but if they do not have the Partnerships it still does not meet the need the call is just one step

what happens after matters someone can go out on a call address the matter talk to people and get them to a location but if that location is not funded to support that person and house them they are right back on the street and it's not just the homeless population I'm speaking as a mother of a son who was misdiagnosed for over eight years so I know the hardship directly how it attacks the family and not just the person people are quick to medicate I understand the whole conversation of Medicaid expansion and people think that will open certain doors but everybody will not qualified to be a Medicaid recipient what does that mean for that individual because the lack of help so I hope even if the suspension goes through that all those matters are considered because it is one thing to

say that we can make the call what matters is what happens after the call is made thank you thank you so much irelia Grodsky good evening thank you for being with us you feel state your name you'll have two minutes good evening my name is I am also a business owner Coco cinnamon we have three locations and I am here um also on behalf of supporting the hearts program and expansion of that currently we have the three locations that do not meet the district of the hearts program so we're not able to use that program for any needs that our staff needs in terms of safety concerns recently we have been dealing with a neighbor who is in need of Health Care and mental health care and we don't have access to being able to provide that for him and our team is starting to feel unsafe and we have been doing a lot of

work behind the scenes to create Community safety measures but I feel like we're exhausting all of our resources we have been in communication with some of the council members up here and with Ryan from the heart program and now he's doing everything that he can to support us but because he doesn't reach us the heart program doesn't reach us at any of our locations he's Limited in what he can do with the support so I'm just here to reiterate what everyone has been saying to expand the hearts program thank you for being with us Ansel do they even feel state your name you'll have two minutes thank you for being with us hi I'm Ansel Dao I live in Durham I'm here to ask for full funding for the heart program two years ago I had a neighbor who is in a moment of Mental Health crisis and I went to support and try to care for this neighbor I felt feel fearful for my neighbor's

safety and I felt feel fearful for the safety of his family in that moment I considered calling 9-1-1 [Music] but realized that I felt even more fearful of the Durham Police showing up because of their track record of arriving to these situations with guns and without the appropriate de-escalation skills I don't want other people to have to do that risk calculation when they're in these moments of crises and I want people to be able to call for help and know that the people who show up have the things they need to de-escalate and to resolve moments of conflict and crisis peacefully that's why I want full funding for the heart program to cover the whole city 24 7. thank you thank you so much our final card representing Mike bike Durham not applicable of 2205 Inglewood Avenue

that sound familiar 2205 Inglewood Avenue Durham are you not applicable you wanna you'll State your preferred name and you'll have two minutes thank you hello Council my name is Noah Goyette and I'm the person that was badly injured in the bike accident recently also a lifelong social worker the son of a police officer as well as the later stepson of a firefighter I've spent my life in social work so I'm actually here to support I feel like I'm in a room full of my people frankly um here it's a support the full funding of the heart program 24 7. Oliver Durham I didn't even know that was happening so I'm really pleased to know but I was primarily here to talk a little bit about the bike Durham but I really want to mention the have a heart I've worked all over the country in social work I've worked with juvenile offenders I've worked with people with mental health crises I've worked with people who have disabilities of various sorts and people

who are Elder adults who have to use various forms of assistance through State local Federal funding and I would love to see the kind of thing that I have done in my job be available on the phone to all citizens who are in crisis instead of having to use the police I don't want you to call the police to get a cat out of a tree and I don't want you to call the police if someone's having a really hard time on their front lawn that isn't what is required um I'm the kind of person and have been and actually some people in this room that know that you can call me when that happens in my neighborhood and I've been able to help and stand between emergency services and the police and make sure things were de-escalated because I was trained in that in the environments that I was in and the police thanked me and the emergency workers thanked me and people like me are willing to be paid a reasonable wage to do that work and I'd love to see that happen in Durham as far as the bike situation is concerned this actually sort of ties a little bit into both things we live in a city where we have these shared spaces the city is a

shared space and we need the spaces to be movable and easily and freely movable for everybody people on bikes wheelchairs Walkers people with or without legs sight hearing I want big body people and small body people to be able to move through all the spaces safely and I almost didn't make it the other day and Matthew didn't thank you thank you so much for being Within [Applause] Madam mayor colleagues that's all of the cars I have for folks that have signed up for this public hearing we want to thank all of you for coming out this is such a critically important part of this process we can't do this without this part from hearing from you and we do listen intently you should know all of you in here and all watching at home there will be another opportunity for our citizens and our residents to come and weigh in on your money and and how we should spend your money so thank you so much for taking the time to be with us tonight Madame mayor with your permission I'll bring this now back

before the council and if if my colleagues want to have any comments or if not I'm going to officially declare this public hearing close that disposes of matter number 16 and I will defer to councilmember Williams to take a bite of number 17. thank you thank you mayor Pro tem and uh thank you all for showing up tonight and just re reiterating your your uh Beyond advocacy for the things that are important to you um really take it to heart and we hear you we're listening to you and uh and appreciate you all right uh so we have item number 17 here uh consolidated annexation of Wesley downs we will invite staff up to give us a report I know how you feel you can take it off the mic Stan

I'll try and bend down see if that works mayor O'Neal mayor Pro 10 Middleton and honorable council members and all those in attendance my name is damir Powell with the planning department thank you for having me you want to hold on just a second just to okay I miss it a lot of the uh shifting to happen all right and it'll probably get a little loud in the hallway so we'll put somewhere on payroll for like three seconds to close the door and just put it on the tab all right thank you so much thank you councilman a request for a utility extension agreement voluntary annexation and initial zoning map change has been

166 to allow for the construction of up to 229 dwelling units consisting of a maximum of 115 single-family units and a

minimum of 100 townhouse units this request case c21 triple zero one two received a recommendation of denial from the Planning Commission on June 14 2022 with a vote of 11 to 0. 166 zoning is consistent with the designated future land use if the proposed zoning is approved there will be no change to the Future land use map designation of low to medium low to medium residential as a reminder three motions 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 improve the consistency statement thank you and staff and the applicant are available for any questions thank you so much staff for that report this is the public hearing so I will

consider it open at this time and we have the applicants here um how much time do you think you'll need okay we'll we'll allocate 15 minutes for each side all right now and before we move to you Mr Africa colleagues are there any questions for staff all right so good evening mayor O'Neill mayor Pro tem Middleton and members of the city council I am Neil gauche an attorney at the Morning Star Law Group I'm representing the applicant for this project which is Lennar Homes also with me are Laura Holloman and Nick Williamson from McAdams Ronald Stevenson from Raymond Kemp Charlie yokley and Stephen Dorn from Lennar yeah I think that covers it I want to thank Mr Powell for his presentation as was mentioned we are applying for a PDR

166 dwelling units per acre the total assemblage is a little more than 60 Acres and at full build out the project could be around 229 units we've committed to a minimum of 100 units being Town Homes but we do have a site plan that's in review for this project so we do have a little more clarity on what actually will be built here the site plan shows 124 townhomes and 102 single-family homes I know you all are familiar with Lennar they've been in front of you a few times recently they also probably have built the most new homes in Durham in the last five years they believe in our city and continue to invest here uh this case was filed more than two years ago so I'm going to ask for a little bit of Grace here because obviously the conversation around new development was very different two years ago than it is today there are certain aspects of this project which we cannot really change at this point but we do want to add some environmental

commitments which are consistent with the soil and erosion Control Ordinance that that this body passed recently technically because this site plan is already in review and was in review prior to the passage of that ordinance those those uh Provisions don't apply to the site plan but through our zoning we are making this project compliant you know in a sense with with that ordinance so we're adding a few commitments number one the site shall be designed to detain the peak flow rate for the 100 Year storm leaving the site as a whole number two a double row of silvins shall be placed along regulatory Watercourse buffers number three flocculans will be incorporated into the erosion control plan to reduce turbidity of runoff and number four we're increasing our temporary stormwater controls uh about 150 percent and designing them so that they dewater in a minimum of four days these commitments reflect Durham's

values which Lennar has taken to Heart in all of its recent projects and is happy to commit to here there are a couple of other changes as well there already is a commitment to provide five additional feet of asphalt for a bike lane my understanding is that ncdot has fallen out of favor with that commitment and instead prefers a 10-foot wide multi-use path so we've updated the condition to reflect that new preference and finally we're removing condition 10 which is related to recombining a certain portion of land with an adjacent Cemetery the issue with that condition is the need to recombine typically recombinations on not an issue but as we work through it with the seller and the church we found that the cemetery parcel actually is owned by a ton of heirs and so we don't know if we'd ever be able to coordinate with all of those areas to actually achieve the recombination so

Lennar is you know so we're removing that condition Lennar is obligated to give this property over to the church and so they will do that it just won't be through recombination and we've run these changes by sap already I'm happy to review them for you again if you please but aside from those changes the project already has some great commitments included this project provides a fair amount by way of infrastructure there's a traffic signal at the intersection of Mineral Springs and holder if it's warranted the project also commits to intersection improvements at holder and and Broach in addition to improvements at the site access point the project also will Reserve I believe it's 125 foot wide right of way for Northern Durham Parkway and provide a 125 foot wide easement for the planned Greenway through this area um but I would say by far the best commitments on this development plan are related to affordable housing both capital A affordable but also affordable

by Design aspects as well on the capital A affordable side the project commits to providing three percent of the final unit count which in this case or on this side plan equates to seven homes as affordable at the 80 Ami level for 30 years which is consistent with the udo's definition for affordable housing but there are other commitments as well which really help shape affordability here all the town homes are limited to no more than sixteen hundred square feet no interior townhome lot maybe more than 24 feet wide and all the town homes are surface part so there's no garages for the town homes just like the town home that I grew up here in Durham in in Parkwood it's a nice home to raise a family in because of where we are in the site plan uh we actually have got some much more recent data and projections on sales prices if the zoning is approved and weather permits these homes could start to be delivered in about 12 months

and that's not usually the case when we get to this stage of the zoning but because this case was filed more than two years ago um and Lennar is all in we've actually you know they've gone in on site plan they've done a lot more work um at this point than normally would be done and they believe they realistically can deliver the first town homes in this community in the 290s I was shocked when they told me that I cannot remember the last time I saw new construction in Durham uh starting with a two uh and folks that's this is well below the median uh sales price for town homes in Durham and definitely below the median sales price for homes in this ZIP code this is an important price point to hit and Lennar is finding a way to do it while still implementing many of Durham's other objectives I think I'll leave it right there 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 uh and you do have

Tom left who will revisit afterward um so I have some speakers here give me one second I just crossed my cards up here we go all right uh so thank you so I have five speakers here uh all our opponents sure let me uh correct that actually got my car sort of mixed up here I do have all right so I have uh two opponents and I have five proponents and I have one person online and so I will call the names of uh the proponents now

uh Mr James Chavis Pam Williams oh I'm sorry I'm sorry sorry about that yeah so I have um so we have for opponents uh Laura Holloman and um we just heard from the applicant nogosh door started okay all right so yeah so we have five opponents all right and we will do um we have the 15-minute segment for all parties on this side and just for just for reference uh Council procedures considering we have really long nights that allows us to do either three minutes two minutes or 15 minutes per side so Matt o'clock if you can put 15 minutes on the clock

one moment I don't know 15 minutes okay gotcha sounds good you have three minutes Mr Chase you can't you oh you're gonna cut me down from 15 to three I'm I'm cutting you down from 15 to three tonight I'm 15. you're gonna cut me down to three that shows how y'all work for our citizens okay yes sir Mr Chevy but I I understand this quite well all right thank you my name is James Chavis I'm 2813 Ash Street Apartment B I'm here to speak against this because guess what this is another gentrification that's going on here continuing to go in here and this residence as he's saying 80 percent 80 percent who can afford that don't make over a thousand dollars

a month to afford these condos and these homes that is not fair to the original City people here in Durham we are not getting anything all these developers are doing is coming here taking our money and leaving us dry and guess how they're doing it because the city council and the male approval if y'all don't prove it they can't do it if y'all really look into it they can't do it but I'm telling folks right now we as Citizens got to find a way to stop them from taking over and sending us away from here with nothing you highly you need the money but guess what what are you doing with the money so look at this why can't they drop it down to 60 to 50 for home ownership no they don't want that they want 80 above

now have you asked him that no because why they're not going to put that much loss in this project not only that look at the surrounding areas who's stand out there now they're gonna have to suffer because they are raising up their property value and somebody's been out there over 30 years now on fixed income can they keep their property up no because y'all going to raise the taxes they're kind of going to go out there and raise the taxes once you index into the city they're gonna have to pay City and County taxes who's fair is that that's their problem to y'all but to us that's our problem thank you [Applause] uh thank you very much uh the next person I have is uh Pam Williams and I'll go ahead and call the person after that I believe this is

8 opacity along the roadway so many of our roadways are being uh uh nothing but Hardscape we're seeing nothing but fences or nothing but houses when there was nothing but trees there before the infrastructure doesn't support this increase this development will increase traffic by over 2 000 vehicle trails per day that will increase the re congested narrow curvy

roadway where Mineral Springs uh traffic in 2019 was 13 000 between Mineral Springs and Pleasant Drive and Sharon Road was over 12 000 ADT in 2019. S 70. that's how congested it already is what is the hurry why do we have to build the houses that and all these houses that we're building the higher density and everything is vehicle dependent over 11 000 homes have been approved and Grading or billing is going on right now on eleven thousand in southeast Durham area Lick Creek and little Lick Creek there are over 4 500 dwellings pending approval for a total of fifteen thousand five hundred dwellings just in south and east Durham this massive growth has created gentrification and will add over a hundred and twenty four thousand Vehicles trips per day within the area

no fire truck or EMS will be able to get anywhere due to congestion and I have to agree with Mr Chavez and everything when that Webb came in although I live out in the county and although I may be 500 feet from Del Webb in one year my taxes doubled and I was a single mother at the time on well I worked for the state and didn't get too many raises but anyway so it does create and other people in the community or moving out of the community because of all the blasting and all the disruption that's going on and they are just frustrated and anxious and and they just have to they end up selling so anyway thank you thank you next up I have Tammy and I I will go ahead and call uh after you with Tammy our Donna Fairbank and Pam

Andrews I'm Tammy so I point out something different of why I I'm concerned about this development Grove Park Ari has a grant over a million dollars to improve their their stream restoration from the impact of their development this development is close to Grove Park there's already issues of erosion impacting uh current residents there when there's a heavy rain event so that is one of my concerns and and once we go down this path we can't go back I think we've done a great job of getting some amendments out there but I think we still don't understand if they will truly and support the environment and create the degradation that continues to happen and that is my

concern thank you thank you very much let's stand back state your name and address hello I'm Donna Steinbeck good evening City Council Members the environmental oh I live at 4825 Jimmy Rogers Road in Durham North Carolina I'm a lifelong resident of 69 years the environmental metrics are minimal in this particular presentation the um Soul the impervious soul is set to a Max of 70 percent the open space to 16 percent the tree preservation only 20 percent and we're pushing to get more tree preservation and they have a hundred foot perennial buffers for streams this is 61 Acres so this is only in one phase and while we're trying to get the phases down to

less than 50 acres and with 30 to 35 percent tree preservation um because of the change in the um topography they probably will be blasting and we know the damages that's doing to the whales and we're getting little recompense people have well damages and they can't get any help from the people that are responsible there should be a a proper that says that the developer would be responsible for any well damages during this construction because it's not happening on the other sites um the uh adherence to the like I said the tree preservation and the phasing needs to be in place for this particular project um we one of my classmates that I went to

school with as a farm and it gets flooded on a regular basis just Downstream from this area for development um the traffic is atrocious and I drive it and if you go in the morning you can plan on 6 to 10 cycle delays in some of the areas like on Mineral Springs to Sharon Road it and this the major outlets for this particular development are Sharon Road and um Mineral Springs so it is going to make things that are bad even worse if if it passes so I am an opponent for it thank you and Paramount Drews well you can state your name for the record good evening good evening everybody Pam Andrews 6108 Wake Forest Highway um I'm going to say this again what is the

rush I know it's been a couple years but out in our area we've been slammed why can't we wait for these two text amendments to get passed I unbelie humbly ask you because we're seeing every day the results of what's happening in our creeks one of the new objectives when we've studied the site plan I mean the new comprehensive plan thoroughly says protect neurons most sensitive natural areas including floodplains Wetlands wildlife habitats hillsides drinking water sources critical watersheds and natural heritage areas from the impact of development and as she mentioned there is Tim Ellis that lives at the bottom in between both ends of this small Road who gets flooded every time it rains we have pictures of his whole home this whole garden up to its front steps flooded Josh white with water and land Solutions on December the 6th 2021 submitted a presentation for Grove Park stream restoration project this project sits in between the developments proposed on each end of holder Road the restoration

project is finally underway I drove over there today to see it myself the cost of this project was one million three hundred and thirty thousand five hundred dollars with a hundred thousand of that money coming from grow Parks HOA to restore little Lick Creek the work being completed will hopefully not be in vain as these two developments one on each end of holder road now being underway with one coming again up for approval in just a short time each one of these developments will have even more impact in the loss of habitat and the Damage Done to our creeks in the Triassic Basin soil please stop this destructive behavior until New amendments are in place I know you guys have profit some of the erosion control amendments but the tree preservation amendment is not even close to being ready and that alone would restore and saves of our trees which is so important so we can prevent this tomato soup from budgeting our Creeks each development passed before you this occurs is an open invitation to continue to masquerade

unlimited amounts of traffic Basin soil we ask you to please wait for these amendments to be passed humbly thank you [Applause] thank you Miss Andrews and just want to make sure that we're not missing um we have Robin Bender online we don't see her available up here all right sounds good and we will um all right uh applicant would you like to respond to any of the comments thank you for the time I don't know a couple of items um so one of the things I think that was brought up a couple times was about the snec or soil and erosion control tax amendment in you know earlier I we

committed to those components on this rezoning and to be clear without those commitments on the zoning the site plan is already in review those those provisions of the Udo don't apply to this site plan and if we were to wait with respect to the uh tree preservation or mass grading tax amendment those also wouldn't apply to this site plan because it's already in review um an item was mentioned about the the 70 impervious uh the under the Udo there are two relevant numbers related to impervious in this Watershed if you're 24 or below you're considered low density and if you're above 24 up to 70 you're considered high density when we filed this case two years ago we knew we were going to be above 24 now that we have a site plan um we actually have much closer estimates on our impervious we're happy to drop that down to 45 percent

impervious uh on the as a commitment on the zoning we know we can hit that much lower than 70 still above 24. um with respect to the open space uh 16 open space was required is required by by Under the Udo on the zoning side again we have a site plan we commit we will commit we are committing to at least 25 open space on the site plan um with respect to tree save there's actually more than 20 tree save on the site plan however I would be I I'm not we're not going to commit to more of that part of the reason is uh some of the tree save area that's on the site plan is in the right-of-way reservation for Northern Durham Parkway if that gets built those trees will get taken out will be under whatever the percentage is shown on the uh on the site plan so we're leaving that commitment at 20 because there's necessary infrastructure that's going to come through this development but at 20

percent that is the Udo requirement that's what we're meeting Lennar has I think proven several times what their values are here and that they are they are willing to work uh in in Durham's Vision to make things happen this project is maybe the perfect example um as I mentioned we are so much closer to going vertical on this if this only were approved because of the how long it's taken and because of lennar's investment and belief in Durham they've continued to move along with the project uh despite not having the zoning in place and like I said if if this rezoning is approved they believe the site plan can be approved shortly thereafter permits pulled they could start construction and start going vertical with houses in probably about 12 months weather permitting and probably about 12 months and right now they believe they can deliver these Town Homes the first town homes in this community in the 290s I'm telling you that's that's the lowest number I've seen in five years at least for new

construction in Durham and that's because they're really making a match effort to make it happen thank you so much are there any other comments this is the public hearing any other comments all right at this time I would consider it a public hearing uh closed and back before the council colleagues I'm sorry I didn't see you madam Clark it's okay Mr um councilmember Williams there is a speaker online and they have their hand raised actually there are two now there's Larissa Seibel and Tina Motley Pearson would you like to hear them all right we'll consider the uh the public hearing close after we hear those comments okay now is this for number 18 or 17th we see our uh Tina Motley for 18. they both have their hands raised three minutes

um who do we have speaking first medical clerk Miss Seibel okay uh Miss saibel can you hear us yes can you hear me all right yes uh please state your name and that's for the record and you have three minutes great thank you very much my name is Larisa Seibel and I'm speaking on the budget uh we are asking okay I'm sorry to interrupt you uh this is item number 17 for Wesley Downs correct um I was signed up to speak on the budget I'd be happy to speak at the end of the meeting um understood the budget public hearing has been closed so we're specifically speaking on item number 17 Wesley Downs at this time yeah I'm on my way down to City Hall hopefully I'll get a chance to speak at

the last item on the agenda um the budget hearing was already close Okay so we're we're on number item number 17 so we'll see you when you get to City Hall all right uh and we have another person medical Tina Motley Pearson Tina can you hear us can you hear me I can hear you uh you have three minutes that your name and address for the record please okay great thank you so much my name is Tina Motley Pearson and I live at 2205 Olive Branch Road in Durham I am a former board member of cool water for North Carolina sorry about my dog I am an opponent of this project I I the density is too high for these highly erosive Triassic Basin soils and the blasting that goes along with it the blasting is a real issue you know I just

spoke with another Resident today that said the blasting near Sharon Road made his whale cave in and the blasting company said he couldn't prove their their blasting caused the collapse of his well even though it seems like a pretty strong coincidence so his family had to go with that water until they could drill another well and of course he had to pay for that the blasting company refused and this is not the first time I've heard a story like this in our area you know the residents don't really have time to fight this stuff continuously there are lots of people that don't even know what to do when they have damage from all this development people have jobs kids some are elderly he's speaking up for them a lot of people don't even know about all all the development that's in the works just because they aren't speaking at City Council meetings does it mean there aren't a lot of people distressed about all the negative impacts of development and Southeast Durham I just checked lennar's financial report

3 billion dollars in the first quarter of 2023 they can afford to be more environmentally conscientious the first priority of these large track builders is to maximize profits that's why it's up to city council to look out for the residents thank you to the city council members who understand our concerns that's all thank you thank you madam Clarke do we have any others all right we will consider this public hearing closed and back before the council actually there is another Gabriel yes all right

well mommy please you've tried to close it Adam Clark we're going to consider the public hearing closed at this time and bring it back before Council I have colleagues I just want to make sure it was asked a number of times before we closed the public hearing to make sure there's no speakers that wanted to speak it was asked a couple of times and attempted twice also I know that folks online may not have the ability to speak up so just be mindful I'm going to rely on the process that we have in place I'll bring this back before the council colleagues are there any comments

wow all right well I will entertain the motion let me on just read this out real quick uh we have comments from staff yes um before we motion to vote I just wanted to have the applicant confirm the profits that were made there were three prior to this meeting after the development plan was submitted and one additional profit for impervious surface correct there were the the one we're related to the soil erosion control or three related to soil erosion control there's one related to the multi-use path there's a removal of condition 10 and then we would commit to 45 impervious rather than 70. we also said we would commit to 25 open space thank you yep

yep what's up thank you so we will um our first motion is to adopt an ordinance annexing Wesley Downs into the city of Durham effective March 31st 2023 and to authorize the city manager to enter into a utility extension agreement with Lennar Carolinas LLC I moved second it's been moved in properly second matter clerk can you please open the vote can you please close to vote motion passes four to three with mayor O'Neill councilmember Freeman and council member Halsey highman the voting now thank you our second motion to adopt an ordinance amending the the United development ordinance by taking property out of the residential rural RR Falls Jordan District b f j b County

166 Falls Jordan District B fjb City jurisdiction it's been moved and seconded Madam clerk may you please open the vote in close to that place and the motion passes again four to three with mayor O'Neill council members Freeman and Halsey Hyman voting no thank you very much so now final motion here is motion number three to adopt a consistency statement as required by ncgs [Music] 160d-605 move to adopt consistency second it's been moved in probably a second uh Madam clerk can you please open the vote can you please close the vote

and the motion passes five to two with council members Freeman and Halsey Hyman um well actually it's six to one with Council oh I'm sorry it is um a 7-0 vote yep thank you so much all right we will continue on I'll be facilitating item number 18 tonight this is a Consolidated annexation of Shady Grove assemblage and we will hear from staff damir Powell planning department for the record I didn't State this prior to the previous case of Wesley downs but all planning items have been noticed in accordance with state and local laws and affidavits of these notices are available in the planning department thank you this item is Shady Grove assemblage a request for a utility extension agreement voluntary annexation and initial zoning map change has been received from Eden's land for six

632 to allow for the construction of up to 440 single-family detached and townhouse units this request kz210016 received a recommendation of approval from the Planning Commission on January 10 2023 with a vote of 923 the properties are currently designated low density residential on the future

632 zoning is inconsistent with the designated use shown on the future land use map if the proposed zoning is approved there will be a change to the Future land use map designation to low medium density residential as a reminder three motions 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 the consistency statement thank you and staff and the applicant are available for any questions thank you so much all right we will hear from the applicant in this case I'm sorry you've now heard that I'm so used to listening to you rather than facilitate it you've now heard the staff report uh Council colleagues are there any questions or comments for our staff question staff Airport

how would it impact the schedule if we would ask for a continuance in this case I would need to defer to Alexander camp uh thank you mayor Tim pro tem I might actually defer it on the applicant on that I'm not necessarily sure how it impacts them for us these are some of our last cases of 2021 so it would just mean they are with us longer but thank you very much thank you um council member Williams all right if there are no other questions for staff I will go ahead and open the public hearing up and we have our uh proponent here which I believe is the applicant you state your name and address for the record good evening uh Jared Edens with Eden's Investments I appreciate everyone's time to see you already interrupt you how much time do you think you'll need five or six minutes all right and Madam clerk can we confirm before we get started I

have three people registered here online and I have uh five cards up here I have six cards up here and I have three people online there we go there are two Joseph Curley's at the moment I see headed Joseph Curley okay and we have Tina Motley and David Johnson okay so they're all there all right so we're going to go with those registered speakers uh and and I believe just one of the Joseph curlies all right based on the opponents we're gonna give newspaper

so considering that we have a block of uh speakers here that are all uh in the same position we will allot two minutes per person which would give us 18 minutes so we'll do 18 minutes per side and just for the audience just because the agenda is so long tonight we're trying to better organize uh having some uh shaped time blocks to uh that be yours or 3am all right so you can put 18 minutes on Mr Edens don't feel like you have to take all 18. no sir it's up to you feeling too long-winded this evening so I appreciate your time appreciate the 18 minutes of time um Jared Eden's with Eden's Investments um thought staff to get a good job of summarizing the project and working with us over the past couple years we've got a 78 Acre Site near Brier Creek I think it's a really good location for what we have proposed I think it's got some really well-rounded proffers and some

things that we haven't seen on other applications we're proposing a Max of 440 units it's a mix of single family and town homes we're very heavy on the town homes if you look at the product breakdown to maximum I think of 120 single-family homes and up to 320 Town Homes there's several notable commitments things we try to incorporate up I've always looked at this project as it's the most easternmost parcel in Durham adjacent to Raleigh City Limits so I've always sort of seen it as like a Gateway kind of project into Durham you know similar to coming in 98 from Wake Forest or what have you so we try to do some things that were a little bit different to make it stand out the first thing we did we incorporated what I call a Parkway type of design it's a wider right-of-way I think it's a 70 foot right away we have proposed through the property um it has normal pavement widths but it's got I think 10 foot multi-purpose paths on on each side of the collector Road of the parkway that's committed to

um we also we've committed to a good product mix I think we have three or four different townhome products committed to we're also on that Parkway we're going to make sure because I wanted more of an urban feel when you come in there so we have the the product along the Parkways has to be a rear entry that's a zoning condition also so you'll have town homes and single family that are up on the street a significant affordable component and we've we've written it to cover it in a way where whether it's for sale or rental product which I don't see that happening but just in the in case it was we wanted a zoning condition that would give some affordability on the rental side as well so five percent of any rental unit of all the rental units will be affordable um five percent of the single family lots which would be six if we did 120 homes those are six completed padded lots that like we've done on similar projects they'll go to Habitat for Humanity and we've discussed Wounded Warriors internally maybe splitting those up but

that's part of our affordable proffer some other smaller things we've got some additional buffers on the perimeter of 50-foot buffers uh fencing that we placed on our side of the buffer so it gives our neighbors the appearance that their properties are 50 foot deeper than what they actually are I met with a lot of the neighbors walked the properties walked the the rear um Rosso I was made aware during the neighborhood meetings at Shady Grove Baptist Church was having some issues with well and septic and so as part of our utility extension agreement we've committed to extending water sewer North along Shady Grove Road to provide access for the church and if they choose to Annex in the future that probably frees up property for them both from the septic field and and fixes their issues other little things Mr Miss Hatcher you live on Carpenter Pond Road we made a commitment to for asymmetrical widening which is Shifting all the widening for the turn Lanes on our side of the road

to minimize any impacts to the neighbors on the other side of the road um and the most notable commitment I think is a five acre public park I mean it's the first project we've ever brought that it's spelled on a development plan we worked with Parks and Rec it's a five acre Park constructed by the developer dedicated to the city for ongoing maintenance it's not a simple Park it's got a significant sized Playfield again Parks and Rec said give us this use that use that use we did listen to some of the neighbors for their concerns on what uses will work best but this is a five-acre public park being dedicated as part of the project and I'm glad we could do that I've always said there's a hidden tax hidden local tax when you do development and the park system is one of those areas environmental there's no floodplain on the site 78 Acres basically dry no float plane we are doing 100 Year detention like we have always been doing I also

want to point out it's 72 of the 78 Acres flow South to the lower news they flow through Sycamore Creek and the Vincent and Crabtree Creek and that's Riley's water only six acres of the site out of the 78 are in our Watershed the yeah the Watershed um blasting and soil as I read the Geotech report recently um yeah Triassic soils they're there Clay is there but we did 17 different bores on the site and only one bore out of the 17 did we find highly clastic highly plastic clay which is what you avoid and those are areas where you have to work basically between November and as late as May every year you have to avoid grading during those times but we'll encounter that once out of 17 bores we also found no rock out of 17 bores the bores go a minimum of 15 foot deep there's no rock in any of the geotechnical report

um traffic we did a traffic study I know traffic's always a concern there's a long list of improvements on the cover page I do want to point out that the immediate roads and I'd always follow the staff reports numbers two of the roads have 1700 cars a day one of the roads have 3 700 cars a day all three roads have a capacity of twelve thousand seven hundred cars so we're three to four times minimum of what the existing capacities are Planning Commission approved their project nine to three I'd be glad to answer any questions and Reserve time for responses thank you thank you so much all right I have uh three online speakers and I have six cards here so I'll go ahead and call the folks that are in the house tonight um I have Rebecca Freeman Donna stanbag Pamela Andrews

good evening mayor O'Neill council members I'm Rebecca Freeman 1818 Southview Road lifelong resident of Southeast Durham this is a strong project design but falls short into areas the density is one of those areas the request is to jump two levels of allowable density will make this project dissimilar to Harrington Pines Hundley and Bennington across the street across Shady Grove Road the second issue is the traffic that will be greatly impacted by the intersection of Shady Grove and Leesville Road as well as which is one of the two routes to Brier Creek for services there's and the narrow rural roads without shoulders I along with one of the Planning Commission members are very familiar with that area we go to use that that route many times during the week and we both have the concerns about the backups that are currently happening in that in that particular area and also that 10 of the 14 neighbor

comments agree with this assessment I appreciate your time thank you uh next good evening Miss Donna staying back again at 4825 Jimmy barges Road my concerns I mailed out this afternoon to y'all regarding the Matrix and the issues that I see this first concern is that this is too large of an acreage to be Mass graded and with excessive runoff in the Triassic soil again we're trying to with amendments for 50 acre maximums and to have greater tree conservation um he one of the comments I heard was no Rock but I

a lot of times they do not know until they get in there if there's not going to be any blasting um the minimums have been provided for the um environmental metrics the 70 percent impervious soil is worst case the minimum of 13 acres for open space was provided a minimum of only 15 acres for the tree preservation it on the um minimums for the in the intermittent buffer was is what was stated um we need better than minimums and especially with the tree preservation that really needs to be foresight this large to be 30 to 35 percent that's what we're looking at and this is after much input from everybody

um that is this particular proposal has been going on for quite a while um there's a minimum provided for the perimeter buffer and there is way too much cumulative development in the area impacting the traffic now and for future and other infrastructure I too have gotten caught in that weight trying to cross into Leesville Road and it is terrible and I don't see how with the roads that they have that they can adjust for this larger development thank you thank you and just a reminder that all of each side has the same amount of time so as you're speaking you'll hear the indicator of three-minute intervals but um just know that that's are you giving three minutes or two two I'm sorry but you this thought has the opponents have 18 minutes just like the uh proponents okay Pamela Andrews 618 Wake Forest Highway

I visited a home today about half a mile down the street from where this is going to be where Dynamite blasting starts tomorrow she had me come out today here is another 78 acres to be developed before these two amendments can get passed why these new developments Annex before these amendments can be completed and passed will not be held to these new standards especially concerning the mass grading of maximum of 50 acres at a time and the Second Amendment at least we're trying to hold the developers to 50 acres of mass gradient at a time with the tree preservation of save at approximately 15 Acres none of these parameters will be imposed on these new developments and open invitation will be extended to Ravish the land and rip it apart which causes this tomato soup in our Creeks as we travel as it travels to Falls Lake Samantha Crop spoke with you last week this past week she was back in the creek she has been surveying Lick Creek for macroinvertebrates in four separate locations three have been heavily impacted by development where

sedimentation is clearly an ongoing problem and another reference sample was on Rocky Branch which leads to to LIT Creek the purpose of this macroinvertebrate study is to determine the health of the water body in healthy bodies of water macroinvertebrate populations are diverse and thriving and polluted bodies of water these populations are limited to pollution tolerant species what this shows is that sediment isn't just flowing in the water it's settling and choking out the life beneath it and as opposed to the reference sample sites where we could actually see rocks on the bottom of the creek even the macroinvertebrates are being harmed with just the smallness of the critters as our Creeks are filled with this sediment-rich tomato soup I continue to ask you for a comprehensive environmental study and a delay in permitting more homes in this area until our creeks and ecosystems are truly studied because they are suffering I thank you humbly Pam

thank you uh next we have um Pam Williams I didn't know which order to go in thank you good afternoon again my name is Pam Williams I live at 2130 Adventure Trail off Leesville Road I'm in this area quite a bit have family live on the other side of the Wake County Line down Leesville Road I in fact designed the Culvert on Leesville Road at Durham County Line and Wake County I am requesting that this project to be maintained at the low density the proposed density is higher than anything around this area all the roads are are tree lines single family homes pastures and farmlands in this area um rule a rule Phil is not having houses setting on the edge of the road like uh a lot of the developments are having at this time I'm requesting a 30-foot

perimeter buffer 08 capacity along the roadway on Carpenter Pond Olive Branch and Shady Grove they are all pretty much just have a little portion of carpenter Pond pretty much all trees and that's what the community and as the Udo States continuously is within the character of the existing surrounding you know also the 30-foot perimeter buffer and the 08 on these roads are in the tree preservation uh text Amendment so um you know I'm not asking for anything that we're not going to be asking for later uh I'm asking for this to conserve the scenic views from the public road rates and reduce the high density in The Hardscape in this area again this is the highest density and it will be creating around 3 and 700 vehicles per day again this area along Lick Creek and this and I'm also considering uh that

little portion that's right next to Brier Creek and everything there is over 11 000 homes approved in this area that use this road a lot of people from Wake Forest use Carpenter Pond Road to cut through to Leesville and to Brier Creek area to get to work to RTP and my question is will the park be in addition to the open space because the open space should be around eight acres and the five acre Park is at separate from the open space required thank you thank you so much next up Mr Freeman good evening all Thomas Freeman 1818 Southview Road Durham lifelong resident I'm the guy that usually stands up here and talks about lick Krieg how filthy it is how ruined it is but I'll give you a break tonight I'll talk about a process one of it isn't I'm doing this in air quotes the unintended Quant unintended

consequences of City annexation on nearby County taxes Miss Williams stated this earlier and I'll just pick up and move with it when Dale Williams began their project on Leesville Road our family had a farm there and a home uh we rented the home couldn't rent the home for enough money to pay the taxes so the unintended consequences citizens and I'm talking particularly to those elderly folks that live in the area of any of these annexations your unintended consequences is your taxes are going to double very likely you will have to sell because you can't afford to live to pay the taxes and live in the home that you own because of that unintended consequences thank you very much

[Applause] thank you Mr thank you Mr Freeman last card I have for in-house design James Davis thank you thank you once again for me to speak as you've been hearing from citizens that stayed closer than we do I remember Leesville Road when I was a child we used to take Leesville Road from Durham to go all the way to our church in Raleigh you can't do it no more Baptist growth Baptist Church with my family church that we used to take leave for the road to go all the way around there to baptist Grove we can't do it anymore even if you throw down seven and try to

go all the way down to Lynn Road it's very congested so I'm asking you city council members stop letting our highways and byways and streets and stuff be congested for developers to make the money and leave you heard what the developer prior to this mate in a quarter's time now who's making the profit the city of dime or who's causing the citizen of Durham to suffer is it you all that allowing them to put the burden on our backs and is that fair you know I'm going to say this and the Lord give me strength I'm keeping the count of y'all and I'm going out there in that street and I'm gonna tell them one two three

four two peoples is coming up this year Well three four and I'm gonna tell you how y'all are sending us to Hell by taxes because that's what you're doing you're forcing us out our home in our raising my taxes and you claim you want to help us you're not helping us you're hurting us thank you [Applause] thank you for your comments um I have three people online Madam clerk uh Tina Motley Pearson David Johnson and John Curley John Curley was actually first Joseph Joseph Curley sorry

are we ready hello all right Mr Mr Curley thank you for being with us are you are are you an opponent or a proponent no no I didn't intend to to speak I'm sorry I I registered that out of error so I I really have nothing to say I'm just listening thank you thank you for being with us no worries next person I have is Tina Motley Pearson we can miss uh Motley I did not have you down as an opponent or proponent could you state your name address in your position on this case I am in opposition to the Shady Grove assemblage again I feel like it is too

much impervious surface for the highly erasive drastic Basin soils um I feel like this is another example of a development site that will be masqueraded and potentially blasted um I heard what Mr Edens had to say about the blasting um and if they say there will be no blasting is it possible to get a committal on that um I do feel like Durham can be a better Steward of the land it can do more to protect our creeks and streams more impervious surface means more storm water and clearly the storm water Provisions aren't working I am looking forward to seeing improvements in the code to address erosion control you know we don't really know what the site plan will look like since site plans are a rarity these days but I would guess that it is more of what we have been getting since many of the developments are approved without details and other than the pointless neighborhood meetings your vote on

annexation is the only opportunity for citizen input I can't support any developments that continue the current trajectory of negative impacts to Southeast Durham thank you so much thank you Miss thank you Tina and the last person I have registered is David Johnson Mr Johnson can you hear us I can can you hear me we can you are free to speak uh after you state your name and address for the record thank you David Johnson 4123 Carpenter Pond Road Durham North Carolina as it was stated by Mr Edens this is the gateway to Durham and saying that the gateway to Durham is a two-lane road um you're speaking of bikes earlier that uh the dangers of them at all uh this is a huge area for biking and has anything

been put in place for bike Lanes or anything of this nature uh it is tremendous amount on the weekends with all this additional traffic it's going to be nothing but really bad uh I don't I've not heard anything addressing this at all you've heard the whole time this has been going on the past few months about the blasting I'm not sure if anything's in place as a permit has to be obtained to uh an inspection of each well or each house or is anyone in the city of Durham collecting these permits and going out and inspecting uh it will be time consuming it will be some money but you're dealing with people's personal property that they're having to pull money out of their pocket to pay for these things which is not right uh you've seen this going on for a while but haven't put anything in place uh to counteract all of this growth is always going to be around uh but planning it and we've quite

understanding tonight the uh this is the last vote because you are going to change some of the recommendations if you're going to change the recommendations you know there's an issue somewhere I don't see the urgency of this uh get things in place when it's time when everything's in place do what you need to do but uh once you vote for this it's on and it's no change there's no going back brother have a nice place than just a bunch of people on top of each other wishing that someone five years ago had a done what they needed to do I appreciate your time thank you for being with us that those are all of the uh registered speakers that I have uh online and in-house so at this time I would bring I will close the public hearing you bring it back before the city council colleagues are there any comments councilmember Freeman just a question regarding the public hearing is it the

council's now stance that we have to register before you speak because of the volume of people we have here tonight I did ask them to try to make some adjustments to accommodate everybody and so the first adjustment was made by men Pro tem until two minutes when we had a a plethora folk also councilman Williams has a plethora of folks so we tried to consolidate that to make sure that everybody could have an opportunity to be heard but what we are beginning to see is we see a trickle in as we're doing this so at some point we have to put a stop in this one and so that's when I asked him to stop it so that we can move on at the end of the meeting tonight we have some extra time I think you hear one person saying they were on the way we would try to again revisit it but I did want to try to get through as many people as we have here as possible thank you

any other comments it's it's before the council now question for the Builder applicant yep council member Jose Harmon hi good evening interaction and also I'm just questioning about the blasting is it going to be blasting not blasting thank you yes I'd like I may have mention we had I think four different neighborhood meetings throughout and and again I went I met with neighbors several times several trips out wrote letters I wrote letters to neighbors documenting what we talked about and agreed to and gave them sketches here's your fencing here's a 50-foot buffer which exceeds the perimeter buffer so I had a lot of Engagement with the neighbors I even met with City of Raleigh residents on the Eastern side of Shady Grove Road just to hear their concerns but you know City of Raleigh residence but um yeah so we had a lot of involvement um

as far as blasting goes I mean all I can go on as I'm an engineer by trade is is we hired you geotechnical engineer and then we do the report and they they look at preliminary sketches we have and they they make sure that they drill a test hole where the ponds are going to be because we know we're digging out of the ground to build the stormwater ponds or they put it where the roads are going to be because we need certain sub-service conditions for that and all I've found from the report is just out of those 17 holes that we drilled there was no rock found and there was no um Bedrock it's called bedrock at the at the bottom where the auger refused so that that's all I can go on doesn't say there's not right I'm not saying there's not rock I mean I was we developed a site on Herndon Road that the site south of it had no Rock our site it just rock cropped up and that happens but typically when you've got this much of a cross section with no Bedrock there may be what's called partially weathered rock at the surface but those are thin layers that are always ripped out with

equipment there's no blasting I mean developers are not looking to blast you know we're not we're not out there with firecrackers you know just we don't want to do that it's very expensive to blast so we we adjust our grading plans and do everything we can to avoid it because you can kill a project very easily with blasting so we try to avoid that thank you any other comments colleagues councilmember Freeman just a question to the applicant uh just asking following up will there be a will the park be in addition to the open space requirement and just I believe the way it's segregated out on the development plan because it's one of the last ones that will have the development plan but it's the city park is shown at the entrance to Shady Grove but the community itself will have to have its own open space and active open space independent of the park so let's say the Park's five acres and there's 73 Acres left for the community we'll have to provide that

minimum 16 open space with a certain amount of active there plus what's been done at the park because we're not taking we're not double dipping is the answer yeah thank you that was all any other comments all right I'll share just a few um you know I I listen and intentionally with all of the comments that are shared with us uh you know for or against and um we we want to fund programs that we know are working like heart and we want infrastructure and we want to fix sidewalks that we want to make sure we have protective bike Lanes but no one wants us to generate the revenue to get there and I hear a lot of hand clapping tonight what are you going to do about the two people that actually sometimes we actually bring experiences to this Council from conversations with each of you in

the community whether you're here tonight or out and about sometimes we bring experiences that we actually live every day so I want to know what are we going to do about the two people that actually work for me that are homeless what are we going to do about the people who are trying to have a roof over their head and I'm asking the folks that keep on speaking and have a roof over their head already I I I I just want to know and that's something I want to ask rhetorically and I want to make sure that we can start answering that question because we can clearly clearly be against something but I'm yet to hear what are we going to do about the people who are looking for a home and that is something that I'm really concerned about so those are my comments and others have had theirs and at this point I will call if there are no other Comics amongst my colleagues I will call for a motion on this this case

all right so at this time uh we have a motion to adopt an ordinance Annex annexing Shady Grove assemblage into the city of Durham effective March 31st 2023 and to authorize the city manager to enter into a utility extension agreement with Eden's Investments moved it's been moved and seconded councilmember Johnson and Caballero uh Madam clerk can you please open the vote can you please close the vote thank you the motion passes forward is three with mayor O'Neal council member Freeman and council member Halsey Hyman voting now thank you motion number two to adopt an ordinance of amending the Udo the United development ordinance by

taking property out of the residential rural RR Falls Jordan District B fjb and 860 airport overlays 860. 632 Falls Jordan District B fjb and 860 airport overlays 860 City jurisdiction second it's been moved by councilmember Johnson and seconded by mayor Pro tem Middleton Madam clerk will you please open the vote can you please close the vote the motion passes again four to three with mayor O'Neill and council member Freeman and Jose Hyman voting now thank you and finally motion number three to adopt a consistency statement

as required by North Carolina General statute 160d-605 which adopt consistency second it moved by bear Pro Tim Middleton and seconded by councilmember Johnson mayor Madam clerking please open the vote you please close the vote the motion passes six to one with council member Halsey Hyman voting no thank you thank you colleagues thank you to all my colleagues tonight as you all know we have to give our folk who working behind the scenes to make sure that everybody can be a part of this a break at nine o'clock we are past the nine o'clock hour I would ask that we come back in 10 minutes at nine 17. thank you all for your patience

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oh they're in the bath sure I don't know what number it was but he said I thought it was the last time laughs

[Music] all right I think we are now ready to resume the people's business this evening the next item on our agenda is item number 19. the unified development ordinance text Amendment simplifying codes for affordable development this public hearing is a zoning case and we will receive our staff report and then we will continue a conversation that we started last week good evening mayor mayor protonment member members of council I'm Sarah Young with the city County Planning Department this text Amendment case tc2201 simplifying codes for affordable development or scad as it is often referred to is a privately initiated text amendment that proposes to amend various provisions of the Udo in order to incentivize affordable housing and to

allow additional flexibility in citing and design predominantly targeted at developing infill housing and small-scale Commercial opportunities the applicant team is here to present their amendments tonight the Planning Commission recommended Denial on December 13th by a vote of six six in addition to their comments they unanimously supported a report from their subcommittee which has been included in your agenda materials this item has not yet been scheduled for consideration by the board of County Commissioners pending the outcome tonight a staff will schedule the appropriate next available date for their public hearing on these amendments a modification of the effective date may be required to maintain a unified ordinance as a reminder two motions are required for this item the first being a motion to amend the unified development ordinance and the second to approve the corresponding consistency statement and staff and the applicant are available for questions thank you Miss Young you have heard the

report from this from staff Miss Young and I'm now going to declare this public hearing open first I do have a couple of comments I'm glad to see everybody in the space tonight we have a fairly uh packed audience here tonight at the late hour and we have a lot of people on uh Zoom as well and we've gotten a lot of emails at least I have been checking mine from folks who are very interested in this matter which is very important to the city of Durham at last time that we had this conversation at our work session I had a a request of of counsel and we also had a discussion a kind of lengthy discussion I don't know that everybody was here but at that time my request was that we would have this particular a public hearing as a standalone hearing because we have have a lot of people who are interested and

at that time we even had some folk who were asking for a stated amount of time and as you can see with the cards that I have here tonight we have about 44 speakers in person here signed up tonight and we also had a number of speakers as I indicated early on on the internet the second part of my request though goes basically to the complexities and length and unprecedented nature of this request and our consideration and for the three of us who are newer on this Council there I understand that there have many they have been sitting with this information as I understand it for some of us not on the council but in the public for about a year is what I've been told and we have not at least the three newest of us have not been sitting with this information for one year and as I indicated to uh

Council last week on my third reading now of it it is a kind of technical document that does need to have a place for us to land and to kind of understand how this plays out in actuality to the best that we can figure so at that point I did ask staff if they would have time to accommodate that recommendation in helping us to understand how some of these very technical uh sort of uh amendments play out or they think will play out in the league in the real world and whether they would be able to do that if I remember correctly Miss Young indicated that she has been primarily the one that's been doing a lot of this lifting and will come back today with a date by which she thought she would be able to give to the council those additional information now

I I understand that from our attorney it is a majority vote as to whether we proceed tonight or not but I did want to give Miss Young the opportunity to say if she had been able to get a date I did think I do think that I saw an email earlier that said a date on May 1st but I don't want to speak for her I want her to tell us that date tonight thank you Mary as staff went back and looked and May 1st did seem like a viable date should the council wish to continue this that would give staff sufficient time to do that in-depth analysis that was requested and so that's what I would be asking for as the mayor is that date in order to make that accommodation but as I understand from our attorney that would require a majority vote of the council would that be correct attorney Ray bird thank you so that will be my request is to move this matter to

May 1st to accommodate that I like to make a motion that we move to the May first date second discussion yes you may yeah I uh I was one of the biggest things for me was just ensuring that this was not an up or down vote it is a lot of information and there are things in it that I like or things that I don't like but I did my homework and after that and that's the main thing that stands up for me I just being able to discuss through this I'm just a little concerned that we've been at this for a year and it seemed to be it seemed to be a little uh a little organized to to delay this uh tactically and I will go with whatever way the council determines to go tonight

um I am ready to hear it I want to be there's a lot of questions coming at me about this project I've read it I'm ready to ask the applicants questions I'm ready to hear the residents uh proposition forward or opposition and get to it but I I just I don't it's been delayed 30 what 90 days from Planning Commission uh and it's been a year so I would like to hear it I'd like to go forward but it's up to you all at the council Sure Mia pro team thank you madam mayor um I've I've lived with this for for some time now um reading it studying in as uh just the immediate past here of the jccpc so I'm prepared tonight to treat the matter and hear it however um it's it's I can't think of a compelling uh reason when the mayor and colleagues say that they need more time and if that time we'll

um serve a better informed decision then I'm hard-pressed to find a reason uh not to agree with that this isn't even about the substance of the substance of the issue if colleagues are asking for more time to better engage in the substance that would be a different matter if we just you know disagreed on substance and we were going to have a substantive debate but if if colleagues feel that they need more time to better Serve the People of this city by having more time to study and then jazzed I I can't find a compelling reason to to not go with that thank you councilwoman Caballero thank you I had a couple clarifying questions because at our work session discussion there were several different options presented um one of them which was the May first was because of that that's a council a standing council meeting and so I'm a bit confused because if we're saying we're only taking up this this item on that night I guess my staff my question of staff is is this the only public

hearing scheduled for May 1st okay because otherwise I would not want to postpone anywhere close to that I would want to have a special meeting and just hear it I don't feel like it's a fair thing to ask for that kind of delay any other discussions councilwoman Johnson thank you madam mayor I'm prepared to hear this tonight of course you know it seems like the majority of the council is would rather delay I'm wondering if we can schedule a special meeting in the next couple of weeks rather than waiting until May just to hear this item I believe that was one of the options that was available to us if folks are agreeable to that I yeah thank you thank you ma'am I I think um one to councilmember Johnson's question I wasn't certain if staff was going to identify a Time by which the whatever colleagues need to to

address their questions or or I thought there was going to be some type of work product or breaking down of the the um the mass of information and am I incorrect in that because if that if that date is at play that might inform when we need to have the meeting or not have the meeting yes mayor Pro tem thank you for that question my understanding from the work session discussion was that the request was to better understand what the actual regulations mean in terms of what the resulting difference would be from what we have today so a little more digestion and explanation as well as uh staff recommendation on on the the proposed changes so that is my recollection of what was requested at the work session that is likely going to take staff a couple of weeks probably at best to put together because it is pretty lengthy kind of a line by line analysis so I can't we can certainly aim for something but it is going to take a

little bit of time that's not something we can turn around immediately that's my thank you madamir councilwoman councilman Williams so that that sort of drives why I really look forward to hearing this because one I hate to impede this on staff and I think that you know with all due respect to the applicants you got a job to do this the community does not really understand what's happening here and this was a very complex document so I I don't I'm not trying to be rude but you guys are developers this you're in the industry it's your job to make sure that this is digestible so I Madam director I'll take that from you all uh that that's what you'll do but just I want to sit on the record that I'm not in favor of you guys carrying the load for any any developer no matter who it is but if that's what we'll do that's fine any further discussion Mia protein thank you madam I I will say I don't know if this is In fairness but

just to provide context the request was made to staff for the uh for the for the work for explaining so it was directed by Council again for me did this this matter turns on I think colleagues in good faith have said they want to digest more and I think it it serves the debate it makes for more robust and substantive debate I wouldn't dare ask somebody to force somebody to vote on something that they feel that they have not had adequate time to to digest not take that at face value uh my colleagues again I'm prepared to treat this matter tonight but you know what do you say when when your colleagues say they need more time to digest the material and I think it would be a better debate if they had that thank you I will I'm sorry Council woman copier here's what I would like because I've there there's various needs in on this dice I would like to figure out if we can hear it before May 1st I think that is unfair I think that the folks who

have been um doing the engagement around this this came to jccpc twice the documents have been out in the public for a long time there are several neighborhood groups that have had these things since last July so they've had an ample opportunity to review um I also understand that not all of my colleagues sit on jccpc so they haven't had the same opportunities that I have had and some of my other colleagues so I want a compromise I do not want my first I think it's unfair um and I also want to acknowledge that not everyone is in the same position as I am around their comfort with the document I understand it's unwieldy and very technical so that is what I'm proposing is a Compromise date well before May 1st I know mayor Pro tem is out of town April 17th through 24th and so I would also request that all seven of us are here thank you so I'll look back well councilman pregnant I was going to say once

discussion is I'll just waiting I think um Madam young was she chose the date of May 1st but I would look to her since we're actually asking her to speed things up at that point if that's doable I don't have a particular date in mind I don't know that any of us do we want to hear it as fast as as she can get that information that I requested and yes my my request Remains the Same I would like to be able to have the opportunity to dig a little bit deeper and I have not had a conversation with our planning staff directly on this I plan to do so I think that's a part of my due diligence is Mayor is to make sure that I understand what I am voting on and can put it in a context that I understand for myself and I I understand that that varies from person to person so I am still making the requests that I

made last week and that is the same request that I have asked our planning she came back with a date of May 1 for her to figure it out for her to feel comfortable but I will look to her again and see if there's a Compromise date per um councilwoman Caballeros request so I would suggest and we did we did talk about this and the direction we believed that we had gotten was to try and stick to a regular meeting date so my apologies but that's why we we looked at a regular meeting date we can certainly try and find a date where everyone will be present that is sooner that is not something that we can do right now on the Fly that requires Consulting calendar so my suggestion is to refer the matter back to the administration to staff we will then re-advertise it once we once we have a date and we will work behind the scenes with your admin teams to to find a date that works for you all and to find a

date that works for the applicant as well women here all right trying to get some technical advice on what we're moving I think councilman Freeman had try to offer emotion and councilman Muhammad seconded in order for us to have it referred back to council there has to be a withdrawal of that motion and then an agreement to refer back to council or you can vote it the motion up or down is what I am being told by Council you could vote you would like to have a vote on your

motion and your motion was if you restate it the motion was to move forward with the date that the director young suggested May 1st all right and there was a second Madam clerk if you open a vote if you close the vote the motion passes four to three with council members Caballero Johnson and Williams voting now so this matters now continue to May 1st the hearing so let me get it technically straight the hearing will remain open and it will be on May 1st

it has continued to May 1st I would ask also because we have a number of people there have been a couple of people who have requested longer periods of time I don't know that we can honor that what I would ask that you do if you're not comfortable with the three minutes that have we are normally allotting that you give us an idea of what you're requesting then we will approach that closer in to see how much time we actually need to set aside for this particular part of our meeting that day I cannot guarantee you that you will be given I think one person to one group X for an hour another group asked for an hour I do want to know what requests we have before we get to that time so that we can try to make some accommodations I will take it that all 43 people who are here tonight would still want to speak on that day as well as the seven or

eight that are on the internet as well but if there are others out there please as much as you can sign up in advance so we will make sure that we can accommodate to the best um the best that we can all those who wish to be heard we thank you all for being here tonight and for caring about this important issue your presence means a lot [Applause] all right now we will move to items uh 20. and 21. and 22 and we'll start with councilwoman Freeman will lead us through 20 and then councilwoman Johnson will take up the rear and lead us through the last two items on our agenda tonight councilwoman Freeman thank you madam mayor I'm going to allow the room to clear

it's going to allow the room to yeah and item 20 the development agreement for Noble University Hill I'm going to turn it over to staff all right good evening thank you thank you mayor O'Neal mayor pro-time Middleton honorable council members Alexander Cahill with the planning department we did receive a request for the city of Durham to enter into a statutory development agreement from Dan gultieri of Crescent communities this statutory development agreement is to allow for an increase in the allowed density on the project site in exchange for The Gap financing of 66 affordable units as part of an off-site project at Carver Street assemblage the applicant proposes to construct a maximum of 291 additional market rate units above the allowed density of 109 units for a total of 400 units on the

novel University Hill site the proposed benefits to the city include Gap financing for the 66 units of the Carver Street assemblage project the donation of eight undeveloped Parcels to Habitat for Humanity of Durham LLC fifty thousand dollar donation to go Durham go triangle for a new bus shelter and construction of new sidewalks that link the bus stop to the development itself the current zoning is commercial neighborhood and Commercial General the applicant intends to develop the property under the current zoning districts and the proposed properties are currently designated as Design District compact neighborhood pursuant to North Carolina General statute a municipality may enter into a development agreement with an entity for the development of property through the adoption of an ordinance by the governing body statutory development Agreements are intended to provide for Community benefits within developments that are difficult to accommodate within traditional zoning processes staff from the city attorney's office committee Development Department

transportation and planning have reviewed the proposal and offered several suggestions most all of which the applicant has incorporated into their draft development agreement this development agreement was heard by the Planning Commission on January 10 2023 the Planning Commission did recommend approval by a vote of twelve to zero since the planning commission's public hearing the applicant did revise the development agreement to ensure that the parcels that are being donated to Habitat for Humanity will be annexed into the city two motions are required for this application to be approved tonight the first is to adopt an ordinance approving the statutory development agreement the second is to approve a consistency statement staff and the applicant team are available to answer any questions tonight thank you staff and I do believe I have one card and no speakers online just checking with the clerk you should be one speaker online in support

a property owner named Rick Adams nearby property owner okay and just all right just checking with the developer Mr Patrick biker to see how much time you think you might need how do you feel about two minutes I feel wonderful about two minutes I like two minutes two minutes sounds good thank you all right good evening mayor O'Neal mayor Pro tem Middleton members of the city council my name is Patrick with Morningstar Law Group I live at 2614 Stewart Drive I'm here tonight representing Crescent Acquisitions out of Charlotte and Michael turberty and Dan gualtieri the development leaders at Crescent are here along with Ted heilbrin who is the principal with Kelly development company this agenda item pertains to what will be the second development agreement between private developers in the city of Durham it's been my professional privilege to work on both of them and I can assure the city council we've had strong Community engagement regarding the Redevelopment of this site we are considering tonight based on based in part on our community

engagement I wish to highlight that this proposal is intentional about boosting pedestrian and Transit infrastructure for this neighborhood since it is in the compact neighborhood tier next in regard to this development agreement this agenda item before you tonight will leverage the resources of crescent and deploy them in the most efficient means possible this development agreement will provide the missing gaps financing for 66 units in the Carver Street assemblage in bragtown that the Planning Commission and the city council unanimously approved back in first quarter of 2022 this will allow 66 nearly shovel ready units to move forward expeditiously it's no secret that Durham has several strong deserving affordable housing developments that would move forward but for needing full funding of the financing Gap that now inevitably exists between the amount provided by a four percent low income housing tax credit and what the high cost of construction is in 2023. this aforementioned financing Gap becomes even more pernicious when a project is not located in a qualified

5 Acres we're looking at this evening along Chapel Hill Boulevard I will wrap up and say that Crescent communities would like to redevelop this property put it back into productive use rather than have it remain a concrete slab and after discussing this development agreement for approximately one hour your Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval for all these reasons we respectfully ask for your approval tonight and our team will be happy to answer any questions thank you thank you Mr biker and did Mr Adams want to speak I don't know if his hand is raised if not just check in to see if there's anyone else that wanted to speak on this item before bring it back to council all right any questions comments Forum Council if not I'll entertain a motion to adopt an ordinance amending I'm sorry council member Mr Adams just raised his hand would you like to hear from him sure

Mr Adams Mr Adams sorry can you hear me now yes we can hear you okay thank you my name is Rick Adams and I am in favor of the noble University Hill development I live within two miles of the proposed uh project and I own a commercial building at the intersection of Shannon Road and University Drive which is within a half a mile of the project I am especially interested in high quality development in Durham and this development seems to usually meet those standards furthermore I'd like to commend the city council for its commitment to demand high quality development in Durham and I would like to urge the council to accept and

approve the noble Hill Noble University Hill development thank you very much thank you Mr Adams and if there isn't anyone else Madam Clerk and I will close the public hearing and bring it back to council just checking to see if there's any comments if not I'll entertain a motion oh sorry madam councilwoman Caballero yeah I just wanted to say this is a great project thanks for bringing it Forward um sometimes these are real easy to say yes to I agree motion to adopt an ordinance amending the unified development ordinance by taking property out of commercial neighborhoods CN and Commercial General CG and establishing the same commercial neighborhood CN and Commercial General CG with a statutory development agreement and adopting an ordinance approving a statutory development agreement with crescent Acquisitions LLC and KB Carver developer LLC and then Associated utility extension

agreement with crescent Acquisitions LLC and authorizing city manager to execute both the development agreement and the utilities extension agreement so moved second thank you moved by councilmember Williams second by councilman cavallaro Madam clerk if you open votes and close the vote the motion passes 7-0 thank you and a second motion to adopt the consistency stage statement as required by ncgs 160d-605. thank you councilmember Williams second by mayor Pro tem I'm sorry councilmember Johnson old habits die open a vote close the vote and the motion passes 7-0 thank you

thank you and I'll turn it over to councilmember Johnson thank you council member Freeman we will proceed with item number 21 public hearing on and approval of the home rescue plan ARP allocation plan and we are ready for our staff report good evening mayor O'Neal mayor Pro tem Middleton members of council and city manager Paige and all in attendance here in this presentation I'm Colin Davis I'm the manager of the homeless system team in the home and the Community Development Department the purpose of this public hearing is to receive citizen comments regarding the proposed home ARP allocation plan home ARP funds were appropriated in March 2021 by Congress to address the need for homelessness assistance and Supportive Services Congress appropriated 5 billion dollars

S Department of Housing and Urban Development one of the requirements is for a public hearing to be held in solicit comments on the allocation plan the draft of the home ARP allocation plan is available for public review and was posted on February 23rd and will close on March

25th 2023 on the Community Development Department's webpage located on the city of Durham website notice of this meeting was properly advertised in the herald sun and que pasa newspapers distributed via the Department's General that serve as well as posted on the Community Development Department's webpage and the City of Durham website the city council is being asked to approve the final draft of the home ARP allocation plan tonight to ensure the allocation is allocation plan is submitted to HUD by March 31st 2023. S Department of Housing and Community of Housing and Urban Development thank you thank you Mr Davis um our staff report and I

hearing open we have four people who are signed up to speak one here in the chambers and three online I'm going to give each person three minutes and we'll start with Miss Larissa Seibel welcome please state your name for the record and you have three minutes hello my name is Larisa Seibel and I'm going to speak very briefly um I as I understand it the These funds will be used to build affordable housing in the future I do want to encourage the city council whether it's These funds or other funds that are needed to help people keep their homes because there are thousands of people being evicted um in 2022 it was close to 6 000 people were being evicted in 1700 who were actually put out of their homes and so I hope that you will find funds in the upcoming budget to assist people

who are at risk of eviction and homelessness and I think one of the ways of doing this is uh through guaranteed income which is a payment every month that people can use to help fill a gap between their income and their housing their housing Pro as you know is going up much faster than people's wages and so I hope that you will consider a guaranteed income program and that builds I think on one of the programs that you've already done a guaranteed income program this one though is specifically for the lowest income residents of Durham who are paying more than 50 percent of their income and rent and there's at least 8 000 people who are in that situation already in Durham but this program would help at least 500 people

and we've reduced the costs as well from the original proposals so we'll keep you updated as we work on a program that we hope you will consider in the coming fiscal year and we appreciate all that you do for affordable housing and the people here in Durham thank you very much thank you Miss IBO um Madam clerk the folks who are signed up to speak online are Cameron Smith Marley's Leggett and James sparra are any of them in the queue Mr suara was here in the chamber but I believe he is online now okay we can um we can make him available thank you welcome Mr svara please state your name for the record and you have three minutes hello this is Jim savara 12 Susannah Drive uh from the Coalition for affordable housing and Transit I'm sorry I wasn't able to stay until the end of the meeting we proposed that the city and county use their Arbor funds to

75 million dollars should be shared between the city and the county 150 000 of these funds would support a non-profit capable of both administering the program and counseling recipients of the guaranteed income households would

receive financial counseling to improve their financial capabilities we are very pleased that the center for home ownership and Economic Development Corporation which worked effectively on the Durham emergency rental assistance program is interested in managing the program and Advising the recipients it is a HUD approved housing counseling agency we have already we have been informed by the Community Development Department that HUD regulations apply to the home ARP funds and HUD does not permit direct payments to individuals therefore we are asking the city council and the County Commission to use a portion of their General arpa funds to support this guaranteed income program to lift the heavy burden of rent on extremely low income tenant households who are at risk of eviction this is a group that receives a lot of attention but no direct benefits from the home or proposal we don't oppose the proposal

that they have made but we do ask the council to help stabilize rental conditions now for these households in great need by using the general arpa funds you will receive a an email with more detailed statement tomorrow thank you for your attention to this important issue thank you Mr savara Madam Clerk or the other speakers still available in the queue or is there anyone else who's would like to speak on item number 21. there are two additional individuals in the queue but none of them have their hands raised okay um I will then declare this public hearing closed and the matters back before the council any comments or questions from colleagues councilmember Freeman no you don't okay any comments or questions um great so I will um accept a motion to approve the draft

S House Department of Housing and Urban Development home investment Partnerships program home American Rescue plan ARP allocation plan project ordinance and the amount of four million three hundred and forty six thousand one hundred and fifty one dollars second moved by council member Williams seconded by council member Freeman Emmanuel clerk would you please open the vote please close the vote the motion passes 7-0 thank you madam clerk we will move on to item number 22 fiscal year

S Department of Housing and Urban Development HUD

notice that this meeting was properly advertised in the herald sun and k-posa newspapers distributed via the Department's General list serve as well as posted on the cart Department the Community Development Department web page and the City of Durham website as a recipient of cdbg Home ESG and hopwa funds the city is required to hold at least two public hearings prior to the submission of his annual action plan the first meeting must be held early in the developmental stage of the plan the department anticipates the second public hearing will be held in April or may or may of 2023. in addition the city is required to publish a copy of a draft annual action plan for citizen Commons for at least 30 days prior to its submission City's annual action plan must be submitted to HUD by May 15 2023 or as as applicable

on February 27 2023 HUD announces FY 2023 Community Planning and Development formula program allocations the city expects to receive 2 million 38 871 dollars in cdbg one million three hundred seventeen thousand thirty five dollars in home 182 000 5563 dollars in ESG and one million sixty six thousand three hundred twenty eight dollars in Hopper funds in closing a summary of comments from this public hearing and written comments received from citizens during the development of the annual action plan will be incorporated into the final 2023-2024 annual action plan thank you thank you so much we have received our staff report and I will now declare this

public hearing open first are there any questions by members of the council for our staff um seeing none we will move to public comment there is no one signed up to speak on this item either in the chambers or online is there anyone present who would like to be heard on this item seeing none I will declare this public hearing close the matters back before the council are there any comments or questions from colleagues before we move to a vote or actually there's no vote we're just doing a hearing yeah it's the common to say I wanted to welcome Miss Terry Porter homes I don't think I've seen you present before and so I just wanted to say thank you thank you any other comments from colleagues job well done thank you so much um that concludes item 22 and I will pass them thank you our colleagues for a very Lively and um

meeting tonight I thank you all for participating in the running of this meeting I've taken a lot of notes and I appreciate the opportunity to have to do so I tell um councilman Williams thank you for carrying the water tonight on those two matters um there's a lot of a lot of going back and forth that you had to do in order to make it even I want to commend you for handling that quite well and thank you for for everybody who's done pleasure thank you everything to make this meeting run smoothly tonight and we are now uh at the point of other matters are there any other matters to come before the council this evening seeing that there are none from anyone we will stand adjourned at 1004. on March the 20th of the day before spring but what city is strong

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