City Council · Regular Meeting · May 23, 2024

Closed session at the conclusion of the regular business today for attorney client consultation okay yeah so what we'll do we council member Freeman we could just make sure that we get you everything that's discussed in there mayor and as as well as mayor Pro 10 does that you need that to be today we do your honor because we have to enter into an agreement by May 1 so got this is our opportunity to brief the council and get final approval May correct June 1 sorry June 1st yes thank you got it okay sounds good I'll now entertain a motion did we do that before you we can do it now right mayor Williams you can entertain the motion to accept the priority item and agree to hold the close session and then I can read the motion language at the end of the meeting if you'd like okay which I think is what we've done the last couple times so you need a motion to agree to you're.

Pro all right I'll entertain a motion to receive the the attorney's priority item so moved second in favor please show by son by thank you all post great all right all right Madam Clerk thank you Mr Mayor the city clerk's office has no priority items today all right thank you thank you just a quick program note that I fa to mention earlier I do have speakers signed up for the budget item there I just want to note that there will be I believe it's June 3r is it June 3rd so we have a budget hearing on June 3rd but as many of you may have known by now I'm very very very consistent with our Pro procedures so if you signed up I will honor that today but I do want you to know that you'll just be heard on June 3 that is when we are actually having the pro the actual meeting for the budget specifically but if you've signed up I will honor that today.

Okay all right at this time I will go ahead and read the consent agenda item number one Duram Board of adjustments appointment number two Duram workers Rights Commission number three Duram Planning Commission number four mayor's Council for women number five citizens advisory committee number six Durham Sports commission appointment number seven request to amend the fiscal year 2023 24 budget and other Capital project ordinances number eight trip party agreement with the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency and the North Carolina Home Builders Association for the construction training partnership number nine Grant agreement with development Ventures Incorporated for the Diller Street Apartments number 10 Grant agreement with development Ventures Incorporated for forever home Durham hope help six I'm sorry H six preservation project pull that item you g to take that time for me okay number 11 Grant agreement with development Ventures Incorporated for f fat Poli Forest Hills Heights Forest Hills Heights Redevelopment number 12 2024 pull number 11 as well number 12 2024 General obligation Bond referendum I pull that one as.

Well number 13 insurance plan fiscal year 25 fiscal year 27 14 2024 North Carolina summer Fire camp program Grant project ordinance number 15 contract with mosca Design Incorporated for the corkran Street Garage banners restoration project like to pull that one as well 16 First Amendment contract to create public art for South L restoration project using CIP public art funds 17 American Rescue plan act arpa coronavirus State local fiscal Recovery Fund cslf frf funds sub awward agreement between city of Durham North Carolina and St Joseph's historic Foundation incorporated number 18 contract with Cornerstone on demand Incorporated for software to audit the employee performance evaluation program pull that one just note that there were no attachments that I saw there so I just had a question about that yeah okay number 19 American Rescue plan act bridging business opportunity and Equity project can I pull that one too number 20 agreement to fund made and Durham education to Career initiatives going to pull that item you 21 contract amendment number two for Durham Workforce.

Development board Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act NC Works career center operations with eer Youth Alternatives pull that one 22 interlocal agreement between the city of Durham Central Pines Regional Council and Durham re Durham County regarding cost sharing for the Roxboro rail trail master plan I don't want to pull it I'm just really excited to see that on the item on the agenda it's it's amazing 23 resolution accepting the 2024 Tennessee venue Services Grant from the United States Tennessee Association for the repair of Tennessee courts at Southern boundaries par don't want to pull that but El want to say big big shout out for that one too I think the whole city wants to pull that finally 24 resolution accepting the Grant from the United Tennessee United States Tennessee Association North Carolina for the repair of Tennessee courts at Southern boundaries Park number 25 resolution accepting the Build It Forward Grant from the United States Tennessee Association Southern for the repair of Tennessee courts at the southern boundaries Park and number 26 2024 first quarter.

Pre crime report number 27 update to div Vision zero resolution 28 construction of a new traffic signal 05- 0811 at us501 North Roxboro Street and monk Road 29 Amendment one to the Professional Services contract with kimley horn and Associates Incorporated for the West End Water and Sewer Rehabilitation project 30 Amendment to the service contract with Waterworks Services Incorporated for residential backflow prevention assembly testing and repair 31 Amendment to the service contract with Acme Services of Durham Incorporated for residential backflow prevention assembly testing and repair 32 Professional Services contract with critic en Engineering Group PC for the miscellaneous waterline replacement Phase 2 project 33 fiscal year 20232 24 third quarter financial report 34 downtown dor Municipal Service District annual report 35 summer camp Aquatics and teen programming presentation and discussion 36 Vision zero update presentation 37 public hearing for the city managers proposed fiscal year 20242 budget and fiscal year 25 2030 Capital Improvement plan CIP 38 proposed of D fire department permit and inspection fee increase for fiscal year.

2425 those are all our right all of our. Items with items 10 11 12 15 18 19 20 21 that's all the rest of presentation okay the exception of those items pulled and 37 sorry right okay also it item. Six I don't think that's. Correct right I'll start online first.

All right we'll start online with our.

Public comment which colleagues we will call this public comment I first person I have is jacqu Wagstaff Mr W step can you hear me I can welcome you have three minutes okay good afternoon just wanted to first want to let you know I signed up to speak on public comment under citizen matter and I also signed up to speak on an item about the bond referendum that is being proposed by this body but the citizen matter that I I'm here to comment on is in reference to the past weekend event that went off with a couple of hitches one of the issues that I have is that on May the 17th at 11 17 our mayor made several video postings one in reference while he was sitting on the plane on his way back the Durham and he referenced that he had spoken with the artist and that he she would be coming and then he made a a subsequently he made another Po and later and he said he spoke with somebody.

Else but what I'm referencing is that first comment and that video that you've taken down since but some of us still have a copy of it and one I think it's a shame that you kind of blame the the citizens of Durham that the way they handled this and the way they responded was they should have been more concerned about the crime in Durham we are concerned about the crime in Durham but we're also concerned about our public official who is the mayor making comments to lead the citizens to believe that he under he knew what he was talking about and he had this under control that didn't happen and we have the proof now the other part of this is that even though you made these comments you took all of these comments down and you made these comments and your official capacity as mayor which make those public records now I would like to which I'm going to do this afternoon request that those videos be put back in.

Place because that became a part of public record and when you remove those public records I believe that you violated the rules of this body you removed the public record you were comment or in your official capacity you weren't comment as Leo Williams private citizen you were commented in your official capacity as the mayor so I would like to know where are those public record comments that you posted on May the 17 at 11:17 I have the video but that's just me being diligent on keeping up with history but you took those down and I think they need to be replac so the public can have an accurate record even though y doing an investigation so that's my comment on that thank you Miss wxa next speaker Mr Langley just completely rent.

Free Mr Langley can you hear me yes can you hear me I can welcome you have three minutes good afternoon I would first like to just take a moment and pause due to the five black male juvenal that were had juvenile petitions filed against them yesterday for breaking into cars as well as the three juvenal that were injured and Drive by shootings last night one of which there were over 50 shell casing so I'm just going to ask.

For a moment of silence and I ask for that moment of silence because when we don't act that is representative of what we're doing for boys and young men of color in this community when gun violence occur I again am coming before this body urgently requesting now I'm down to $25,000 to support the Charles Hamilton Houston foundation and delivering essential career expiration and development programs for young for boys and young men of color in the city of dur this demographic as you all are well aware are disproportionately affected by low academic proficiency inadequate College and Career Readiness high levels of short and long-term suspension Dropout rates limited access to life sustaining careers and overwhelmingly represented in involvement in both gun violence and juvenile delinquency the best way to improve the plight and the outcomes of these students and these young men is to keep them from picking up a gun in the first place the way we do that is by tackling these disparities by offering skill focused mentorship academic enrichment and leadership.

Development your investment will enable us to expand our reach enhance our resources and build the necessary capacity for long-term programmatic sustainability your funding will not only change individual lives but also positively impact the broader Durham Community we deeply appreciate your consideration this request and are ready to provide further details I need one member of council just one of you all to make a motion for this $25,000 to be added to the budget thank you thank you Mr langle Miss CYO oh no I'm sorry one moment.

Adam CL could you provide me some clarification real quick.

Yeah I'm not going to do that to the public I am going to go ahead and this the only one that has let's see 35 has a citiz public person number 34 in 37. Okay all right I'm going to go ahead to item 34 and going to jump around a little bit today.

Welcome so if I don't want you to hear got it good to have you here welcome you have new technology for you so you know how to use that now I do I do ready here I want to hit the quick mute button now but I won't thank you so much my name is no name match Thompson I'm the president CEO of downtown Durham Incorporated and we are here to give you our annual update annual report for the municipal Service District I will let you know right now that we're going to run through very quickly the first few slides that provide a lot of the information about what we have accomplished to this point in the fiscal year I'm happy to answer any of the questions we will spend the bulk of our 20 minutes I think it said 15 but I don't know I don't remember so I'm gon go with 20 of our time reading a letter that I would like to have submitted into part of our our presentation are we ready.

Okay so very quickly great picture we're going to really just run through this is who we are this is what we do these are our goals slide this is the the district that we focus on the downtown Municipal Service District or business improvement district from ballpark to Ballpark Just sh East Campus to Golden Belt we also are are I'm very interested in what's happening ajacent to we did a survey for the bullpen as you know we were the in the organization working with the city parks and wreck to Institute a downtown Durham social District called the bullpen here are the responses that we got we can give you more information on that these are our accomplishments for fiscal year 2020 2024 this is up until the end of March so we have one more quarter so we can update this if you would like but as you can see we're involved clean and safe Poli Place keeping Durham Choice which is a collaboration with the city of Durham and Durham Housing Authority.

For the choice neighborhood project and then what we've been doing around Economic Development marketing Communications the downtown during blueprint which you might have heard about and stuff that we've been doing around advocacy and special projects interesting slide just so that we we are always asked what is the ethnic ethnicity of visitors coming into the downtown area this is a slide to show that right now we're at 5050 and of the 50% that are people of color you can see the breakout there this did not change from last year this information is gathered by Placer which is a technology that we use based on cell phone data and now I would like to read the letter I believe you all have a copy of that letter so if you would like to follow along dear Mayor Williams not major sorry dear mayor Williams mayor protim Middleton and members of the Durham city council I mean you were talking about being a drum major not so long ago so I.

You know it's a legitimate mistake I am no name match J Thompson president and CEO of downtown Durham Incorporated and I come before you to ask for your renewed partnership and support of downtown Durham at our state of downtown Durham event you have a copy of that report I reported on downtown's continued success increases in house housing units with a slight but encouraging uptick in new affordable housing units due to City County and Durham Housing Authority efforts an increase in merchants in downtown and more foot traffic into downtown I also Shar that we are carefully watching the lack of any commercial development but stress that we realize this is very possibly a short-term Trend and as we move forward we need to begin looking at an expanded definition of work and workers and how we accommodate this in a downtown environment I actually had that pled so so on the face of it it would appear that downtown is doing well and certainly compared to other downtowns of.

Our size we are doing better than most however there are serious challenges facing our downtown and its very authentic unique Vibe and those these challenges can only be solved with your intentional and specific attention you will recognize in the audience and I will have them stand today a number of downtown business owners employees and small Property Owners there are any more there are a number of others are outside in the lobby and are downstairs they could not make it into the room today I am reading this letter on their behalf I'm here today to speak on behalf of these important businesses it is because of these businesses that downtown is the amazing place that it is they have for the last 20 years poured their hearts and souls into creating a downtown that is diverse in its Workforce Cuisine atmosphere services and products also welcoming and vibrant without their efforts and creativity downtown Durham would not be the phenomenal space of collaboration and excitement unfortunately the very heartbeat of downtown is being.

Threatened first there was the gas explosion in 2019 which not only closed a part of downtown but took the valuable lives of two individuals then there was the global pandemic that damaged the local and National economy and that has made running a small restaurant bar store or personal service business in a downtown environment on unbelievably difficult many think that Co is over and things are back back better than ever and that appears to be true if you drive through downtown on a sunny warm Friday or Saturday evening but if you walk down any Street in downtown on a Monday afternoon or a Wednesday morning you will see a very different downtown from the downtown Durham of 2019 with remote work and hybrid work becoming the norm downtown lacks a very important customer customer base the off worker to include the city and county employee downtown no longer has the same level of energy and liveliness during the middle of the work week spaces that used to be crowded by 4M on a Sunday.

Afternoon are often empty people moving throughout downtown hided for a breakfast or lunch meeting are few and far between for this reason downtown Durham street level small business Community its very heart is facing a very dire future of course it's not just downtown Durham this is is happening across the region and across the country but Durham isn't like the rest of the triangle or the rest of the country where many other downtowns are filled with chains and National companies Durham's downtown is built on local street level businesses that don't have Corporate Offices or conglomeration or conglomerate cash flow we value these authentic cool homegrown businesses they give downtown its very heart but right now there is little blood flowing into and out of dur Durham's heart DDI has come before you today and has submitted this letter because you the city and the county are largely responsible for creating the downtown we all love local government policies investment in downtown and programs that supported small businesses created an environment where those businesses grew.

And flourished that environment is under threat today without a renewed commitment from our local leadership the downtown we all love and our so proud of will cease to exist the uniqueness the authenticity that has always been so important to Durham will die these people that just stood up will not be here there are many challenges facing downtown street level businesses but there are some challenges that these those businesses should should not have to face challenges that can be remedied by action from you and A Renewed partnership and commitment to downtown success here are three areas where positive City and County Action would have an immediate positive effect and show your ongoing partnership construction DDI is a proponent of good sustainable development we work with many of the developments that are occurring in downtown because we understand that a that to thrive a downtown must continue to grow and create new spaces and places so that it remains a true live work play environment however development sites that aren't regular inspected and.

Supervised by the city or county lead to conditions that are almost impossible for small businesses and residents as you see on the slide roads are blocked by equipment machinery and large trucks which means employees face challenges getting to work on time and daily deliverers can't get through sidewalks are impassible creating Ada violations and safety concerns for pedestrians to include customers and employees utilities are shut off without warning necessitating temporary business shutdowns construction debris and trash litter litter streets alleys and other properties creating a general feeling of disrepair and neglect our ambassador team does its best to stay on top of this construction Personnel common Deere what limited parking spaces exist arriving early and staying all day making it difficult for employees to find parking and pay paying customers to access small businesses all of this can drag on for weeks or even months longer than scheduled leading potential customers who have many many dining and shopping options in Durham and in the Triangle to go elsewhere the city and county can.

Partner with us to create policies and processes that address these concerns in the following ways mandate pre-development meetings that include city and county where appropriate Department Personnel DDI developers property owners and general contractors in addition we ask that these meetings be regularly scheduled throughout each development process for progress reports and space to and a space to address concerns and challenges we had this in the past we had this back in 2015 2016 expedite reviews and inspections in high density neighborhoods in order to limit the amount of time roads and streets are closed and let me highlight that high density neighborhoods this is something that could impact small businesses throughout Durham require detailed Road and sidewalk closure and utility shut off plans indicating when roads and our sidewalks will be closed when utilities will be shut off how adjacent impacted businesses property owners and residents will be notified of these closures and an anticipated schedule of when work will be completed unless there are documented extenuated circumstances like an act of God fees should be assessed.

When projects do not comply with written and approved plans as it stands stands now there is no incentive to limit activities that harm downtown small businesses ensure collaborative planning of public and private sector infrastructure improvements so that work requiring Road and sidewalk closures and anticipated utility shut offs are scheduled strategically to prevent unnecessary consecutive or multiple closures no name match I need to pause you for one moment audience members I want to be really consistent with how I manage the room so I've asked staff to leave the room so that we can open up more seats so staff if you're are not on the agenda at this time if you don't mind just stepping out to create space for audience members to have a seat this was not my intention no.

Worries I can read faster and we will now respectfully ask everyone who's standing to just grab a seat staff don't go. Home thank you all so much I I want to be consistent with our procedures and and keep an order in the room thank you all continue you may Hing downtown Merchants continue to face severe challenges related to parking in downtown to be clear this challenge is not about the number of parking spaces rather it is very much about the cost of parking and the impact it is having on downtown employees most specifically hourly employees of street level businesses since the city increased its rate in 2022 we have heard numerous complaints from business owners and their employees and even their customers currently downtown Durham has the highest hourly parking rate in the Triangle at $22.25 Cent an hour in parking decks and lots and $22.50 an hour for on street parking spaces in comparison downtown Raleigh charges a dollar for the first two hours and $2 an hour after that.

Index for a maximum of $14 on street parking is a150 for two hours oh and on street parking is a $150 for two hours currently Chapel Hill charges $150 for off street parking and $1.75 for on street parking this increases to $2 an hour between 10:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. During the week Carrie currently does not charge for parking in its downtown with remote hybrid work schedules the burden of this increase this increase rest squarely on the soldier on the shoulders of downtown's hourly Workforce these high hourly rates and high monthly rates at at $140 a month make it challenging for downtown street level businesses to retain existing St are hire new employees Durham does offer an evening Employee Program at $80 a month when compared to Raleigh and Chapel Hill both offer $20 monthly parking passes for evening employees and Raleigh since covid offers businesses with less than 49 employees up to 10 free monthly parking passes in select decks to help offset parking costs for their employees many downtown.

Merchants pay above a minimum wage and some are paying as high as 16 to 20 hours $16 to $20 an hour even yet even with these hourly wages downtown's Hospitality Workforce is overburdened with the high cost of parking and downtown Merchants challenges with parking don't end with the increased hourly rate existing and potential customers complain about parking due to the increase in the parking rate a lack of signage clearly identifying Park public parking options and the lack of upkeep and maintenance of parking decks and lots including a lack of signage inside the decks a lack of lighting and general feelings of deferred maintenance and upkeep to address these concerns we ask that the city partner with DDI in the following Solutions improv way finding to include directional signage to available parking options prominent parking signage on all available decks and lots clear signage identifying rates and directional signage and side decks to elevators and exit we understand that there is an E A wayf finding effort underway and in fact I received an email.

Today about this we ask that we remain in the loop on this so that we can notify and update downtown stakeholders and that this effort be expedited to address the concerns noted above two make a concerted effort to address ongoing maintenance issues within the within an adjacent to parking decks and lots to include proactively identifying security concerns due to lack of lighting either due to blown lights or a need to add additional lighting to dark areas regular trash and debris collection and general upkeep of common areas again we understand that the city is moving forward on improvements to City owned decks starting with Durham's Central Center Parking Deck we ask that this plan be expedited for all deck and that we remain involved in this conversation so we can notify our downtown stakeholders three create a Downtown parking program that provides discounted parking to hourly employees of any of downtown street level Merchants at a significantly reduced rate and that is easy to access and Implement DDI is committed to work with.

The city to identify and administer such a program four finalize the outdoor dining program so that businesses can take advantage of this unique opportunity to offer outdoor seating and parking spaces that are attractive and welcoming make the program a aordable to downtown businesses with an easy and quick review and renewal process and remove any unnecessary barriers to implementation not having a cohesive outdoor dining program is a continued missed opportunity to build on downtown Durham's vibrancy these outdoor spaces bring energy by having people interact within and along downtown sidewalks and streets again DDI is committed to work with the city to identify and administer a streamline and affordable outdoor dinning program small business support the number on the screen 82 that's the number of businesses that we have lost in downtown small Merchants that we have lost in downtown not all of them closed and shut down many of them have had to relocate due to these concerns that number 82 is what we have lost since Co years ago 2011 if not earlier the.

City was a strong partner in helping new locally owned businesses open and grow in downtown through Innovative and creative programs like the build Improvement Grant big and the retail and professional Services Grant the city helped to launch or stabilize a number of businesses in the downtown area these programs Focus not only on providing much needed support to small business owners but also work to improve The Pedestrian experience by enhancing visibility and the appearance of businesses through signage and facade improvements these efforts were a huge success supporting 41 small street level Merchants like Bullseye bicycle do venage exotique the federal motorco The Parlor pin hook toast and Westend Billiards and Wine Bar the overall impact of The Pedestrian experience can still be felt today it has been more than 10 years since these programs were made available to downtown during businesses and creating a business downtown is more expensive than ever DDI is aware of a number of small women or Min minority owned businesses that could have been helped by these programs given.

The unique challenges facing small street level businesses postco any assistance to build out space improve a facade or establish a through signages needed not only will it assist the business but it will also enhance The Pedestrian experience and encourages people to excuse me to wander and walk throughout downtown to address this concern we ask that the city once again offer the building Improvement Grant and the retail and Professional Services Grant to downtown businesses we ask that prior to launching these grants the city worked with DDI to evaluate the programs and revamp where necessary to ensure that these programs address current challenges are easy to access and apply for and have seamless Administration and oversight in this letter we've listed three urgent issues that will make a real difference for the small businesses that make up the heart of dur of downtown and of Durham there are many deeper thornier challenges that we need to tackle and together we will but we invite you to partner with us to take these first.

Steps before the community of small businesses is IR irreparably damaged the city and county together have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to create a downtown that is Neely Durham a downtown where 70% of the street level businesses were started right here in Durham where 32% of those businesses are minority owned and 40% are women-owned downtown success was founded on public private Partnerships Strategic investment and supportive policies created by Visionary public leaders that investment is worth too much downtown is worth too much to let it falter based on the mistaken belief that downtown is done a vibrant successful downtown that is the primary economic engine of a thriving city does not happen accidentally or on autopilot when the city and county were active Partners in building downtown we did great things you see on the slide three of those great projects all of those have created spaces for small locally owned businesses those three spaces have 15 small businesses located in their first floor many of them are supporting office small office tenants.

One of these actually has a business that started not in the letter so if you're looking forward to sign the letter started in biolabs NC loved downtown so much that it was able to find a space in the the Durham ID location we are asking you to partner with us again to sustain and grow this amazing investment our downtown is great but we welcome your partnership we need your partnership in making it so much better an inclusive economically and culturally vibrant downtown that values and supports diverse small businesses the investment you make is worth it the small businesses that make downtown so amazing are worth it downtown is worth it Oh I thought we had a blueprint okay we look forward to working with you in the coming year thank you so much for your time and thank you to the city staff that had to leave I do apologize not my intent at all sorry well thank you.

Thank you so colleagues I am not gonna talk much on this matter because everything she said I personally feel it every day I've lost employees myself because of some of these issues so I am not going to engage too much into this conversation but to my peers I hear you I live it with you every single day I get it so I'm going to let this conversation be facilitated by council member cabier y she wasn't expecting that by the way no I just got volen told people all right thank you council members Baker or cook any questions or don't have any questions but I just want to thank youall for listing these demands out really clearly I think this is a a really helpful starting point for us on a in a different way than the mayor I too have personally experienced this I was an hourly employee and I've been an hourly employee in several locally owned downtown businesses some of my former bosses are in the audience here with you.

Today and and so I have been personally affected by this and I I understand the challenges particularly around parking that was something that I dealt with quite often and I just want to thank you for this this letter and I think you've seen us all up here taking copious notes and I look forward to seeing what we can get started together so thank you so much for laying all that out very. Clearly yeah just a quick question how do you foresee the recommendations in this letter folding into the downtown master plan so our intentionally so I could turn it on and off again we are embarking on our downtown Durham blueprint these challenges can't wait for that that blueprint is looking at how downtown grows over the next 10 seven 14 years so it is a visioning process on on how we grow how we're intentional about that growth how we continue to provide ways to make sure that our our retail spaces are Equitable these things that we need.

To do now for these existing businesses so I think they start and we can build off but certainly we will be always looking through that that our our our blueprint how we can continue to have spaces that are ripe for entrepreneurs small businesses women owned businesses minority owned businesses thank you yeah I I certainly so some of these recommendations are require Investments direct investments in creating funds for small businesses some of these require certain kinds of programming and initiatives and investments in infrastructure signage reconstruction of our streets and maybe making things pedestrian oriented in the public realm and then also addressing our development regulations I mean you have the first item here is construction and so I think that there are there are some items here that are loow hanging fruit the thing about our zoning regulations is that we have them for free they're free and then they're low cost to implement and so we can get good bang for a buck and they're very well capitalized developers that are coming.

Into Durham and making a lot of profit which wasn't the case a couple decades ago if you came and and developed in durum and so I I think that there there's a major opportunity there certainly that we certainly we need to have some conversation discussion and think about how to improve the parking situation I like how in the letter you talk about how it's not necessarily that we don't have enough parking but that we need to think about how to make it more accessible and easier to find the small business support that comes down to money and and priorities there the development and construction standards so that's something that we can just bake into our regulations this is something that I've been frustrated with for a very long time particularly you know I think there are some very highly visible construction projects that are happening in downtown where the communication has not been honest by the developers that have had huge impacts on small businesses sometimes more in in more.

High-profile ways and and I think that's important for us to to not our development regulations we we can improve those by by improving the standards that developers construct their buildings by a lot of them are out of town developers anyway large corporate developers so making sure that they are providing more public goods both on site and negotiating better public goods offsite but we can't do that without intentional effort through through the the unified development ordinance widening the street trees W widening the sidewalks enhancing Street trees bearing the power lines we have trash bins that that span across the sidewalk in violation of of ADA because we aren't required them requiring them to allocate space for trash and other utilities and and all of this is is baked into our our regulations and and we can improve that very very easily and then the construction standards themselves and the process of construction just as the letter says has not apparently required them to provide frequent honest communication with adjacent small businesses with adjacent.

Building owners with the public and we need to bake that into our rules and our and our regulations again that can go into the UniFi development ordinance we are right now at the beginning of the Udo rewrite but it has been my desire and my intent to initiate the ud amendment process for a couple of targeted items beforehand and this is been one that I've been thinking about that that we could potentially tackle right away and that I would personally like to tackle right away either way it we need to make sure that it gets into the unified development ordinance and is part of the unified development ordinance for the downtown area and any other areas where where we're having those kinds of impacts so those are some of my initial thoughts but I really appreciate everyone coming out in this show of force here I think that there are some very real things we can do some of these are lower hanging fruits some of these are going to take a little more.

Time and so I I look forward to continue to have this conversation with with my colleagues and trying to move some of this some of these initiatives forward in a very intentional way so thank you for coming if if I could comment I do want to say that our our conversation around construction is very I I'm not I'm wanting this to be aligned with any kind of changes to the Udo this was not the place this is not where I was going with this letter much more wanting to just have the conversation in the dialogue and bring back a the pre-development meetings that Economic Development used to hold as a way to start having the conversation we do work closely with the planning department and we are aware of the Udo process I went to the public comment meeting that was held at the county building a few months ago that is a separate conversation I just want to acknowledge that this is how we can communicate and how DDI can assist the.

City in communicating what is going on we hear very very frequently those pictures that you saw that was because four or five businesses had called us over a course of a couple of days and we went and took pictures so if we can if we have that connection I imagine everyone in this room probably has my cell phone and if not knows how to get in touch with me if you if we can work with the city when we know something's going to be shut down we can get that information out to the businesses so it was more of a how can we work with you we really want to work with you we are not anti-development we we understand and we know from covid that a lot of the construction that happened in downtown brought people that visited these small businesses when everyone else was living out in the suburbs so we are walking a delicate balance yes but but we are supportive of and I work very closely.

With a number of the cranes that are coming out of the ground right now so so I I do understand we are sitting here speaking very much for the small businesses but I think the majority of the small businesses will also say that they want to see some development how that development is done how the businesses are notified of that development is is of the most importance right now without development these businesses can't survive I also want to say you do raise a good point about investment some of these things will require Investments and we know that they will not be implemented I am not asking anyone to upset or turn over City manager's budget that she just presented so I'm not asking I'm putting it out there let's have a conversation let's spend the next year talking about what that looks like so I I do want to be very clear that I am not coming in here asking for any Amendment to the city manager's budget but these are things.

That that we know worked in the past I believe there is someone who has signed up who will talk with talk about how it helped her in the past but but I do want to acknowledge that yes some of the things that we brought here do require some investment and I understand that that may not happen until fiscal year 2020 May 6 I think that's all thank you council members Freeman Orest do youall have any questions or.

Comments thank you for the presentation and the letter I think I sit in a unique position as I live across the street from downtown and what the work that I see DDI doing has been impactful what I will note though just B based on your comment the residents have also been making those same requests those water shut offs happen to them as well and so I do think it's tied to the Udo and I do think it's policy that needs to be implemented so that folks know in advance that's just kind of courtesy but I will just say that.

I'm not sure how to frame it in a way that's not you know offputting but our Economic Development department so to speak hasn't had the arms and legs it needed to do the things that it needed which is why DDI was put in place and so I what I'm what I'm drawing on is that this is really clear this is very clear and concise for the downtown business community and I appreciate that all of you are here to represent for that downtown business Community but this is not limited to downtown and so these requests are things that we need to be thinking about across the entire city and and many other districts that would not have this type of organization and so it always push pushes me back that when you're screaming you know for help because you know CO's not over that there are others who are also unable to screen for the same type of help and so we've got a lot of work to do around this and 2026 seems.

Like way too far off that's that's where I'm at that's all thank you I I will say that I think some of those Grant programs are offered outside of downtown I'm not 100% sure but but but but you you raised a very good point we are here speaking as an annual report to the municipal Service District which requires that that funding is put back into the municipal Service District but yes we we've heard these complaints from other other locations thank you councilman rist yeah thank you very much first of all thank you Miss Thompson for being here thank you dtown business owners for for being here as well I just want to say first of all Miss Thompson we are so lucky to have you in Durham I really appreciate the presentation and all the work you're doing for DDI and downtown businesses as you know well since we were connected way back when when we were when you were an intern and folks may not know this but I spent about a.

30-year career working for a dc-based NGO working in the field of Economic and Community Development so I know well from I work together with our with your as a partner agency the role that small businesses play in providing both an opportunity for for all kinds of people all kinds of genders ethnicities and backgrounds to start a business to build wealth and grow wealth it's also a way to build our economies from within so this small business sector both downtown as well as elsewhere in Durham is so critical to our economic Vitality so I want to thank you for the report for your advocacy of downtown Durham the city needs to be a better partner with you all I I agree I think what you've given us is a very actionable a very tactical set of recommendations and I would suggest that we send this right away to the city manager for her to review this with her staff and come back to us with recommendations but this is.

Important work that we need to do we need to be a better partner I thank you for raising these issues and I look forward to working together thank you thank you. Thank you I really appreciate everyone coming out today I think you've already raised some points you know when you're talking about grant money and things like that so I guess one thing is to your point there's some lwh hanging fruit I think specifically around parking and some of that and then with the conversation around the parking garages and things like that we're just going to have to look into our CIP and figure out what is a process that's fair right because within that my assumption is with these parking garages they're they're in in our CIP and I don't have that in front of me right now and so yes heard and also balancing as y'all are very well aware of the needs of the downtown community within the needs of the whole Community is is is going to be challenging and so.

Some of the things that are listed I think are going to be easier to solve and I think y'all are very well aware of that and some of this is going to be more challenging I think that just like every other partner please come to us in December that's when Council in November that is when council is pulling together their own items around budget requests so if this is a we're not going to I'm going to be real clear I'm not going to remember that y'all are asking for these Grant dollars to come back in six months like that's GNA we see so much information so my urging to y'all in this room is if these are things that you want and you need to be either refunded budget gets started to get to get submitted in December and January council members will submit their things January of 2025 for fiscal year 2026 and so if there are things that are bigger Financial dollars that are that are in.

This letter that is the opportunity I I will say the the piece around parking and then the outdoor dining I see those are things that we need to be able to fix more quickly I think the notification around construction I don't think that's Udo to your point no name match I think that is figuring out what was the process before why did we abandon in it what were the pain points there and can we bring it back and then the point around finding I mean I'm going to be really blunt I think the reason you put the picture of where you put is because that's the bad actor I can name many other projects downtown that I see that have cranes that are actually bigger projects and I'm not hearing from those small business owners around you know that it's impacting them in a negative way and so I think that the the stick is going to have to come out on some of those types of things and that's going.

To be our burden as a city when that comes out and being consistent and you know increasing fees if needed and I I'm happy to do that you know if there's a vote needed on that one I'll I'll you know Bad actors need to be penalized that's how it's done so I just one funny thing I'm pretty sure it's my kid on the front slide by the bulll so okay my kids are down here all the time and and to small business owners here you know most of my kids and their friends are employed by downtime businesses they are in the service industry especially for not on the bull just chilling that's good I didn't want to give him in trouble trouble I don't want plent pictures of him on the on the bull over the years so so yeah I know for just from personal experience you know even during covid you could send your kid downtown to get an ice cream with a mask on their face if you were close.

Enough and so I can say personally benefited many a time just from a mental health standpoint of sending children out into the world so thank you so much for the presentation I don't think that anyone else has any comment I will say can we maybe get a response from staff around a timeline I will also say that we are approaching the end of our fiscal year as many of you are well aware and so I am a little concerned about the timeline of our response because if there's things that involv Council action it's not going to get done likely before we go on break I very much understand that this this was many many many months of hearing and meeting with the businesses I am not expecting that anyone is going to make a motion to do anything today or before the end of the fiscal year and the intentionality of making sure what comes forward is the the process we would like to start I am not suggesting that this is the city alone.

Or the county alone or the private sector but as that last slide showed when we all come together and we are all representing those voices great things happen so I'm asking for a year City staff is is great we get along very well we have some some great allies within the City Council I'm not well within city council but also with City staff and County staff who do amazing things when I can call them up and say hey this is closed this road is closed what can you do someone's called because their delivery truck can't get through so I do want to acknowledge that that we are not coming in and saying you all are bad and you're not doing things but I am also raising up on that flag post that we've got some challenges and we've got businesses we have 260 small businesses that wanted to be heard and need that partnership we know it's there we know that that all of you all want to support them as best you can.

We ask that we work with you to to decide what and and work with you on on what those next steps are and how we put together that budget request for 2026 thank you so I'm just going to get a opportunity mayor Williams go ahead do you want me to just pass it back to you yeah I got it but you g ask for it's yeah I just wanted to give staff an opportunity to at least respond on on at least initial thinking around what we can expect as Council thank you thank you in the absence of the city manager that's something I'm going to want to consult with her but I'll pass the the request along to her when she has returned and I'll have make sure that she gets a response back to council can I just suggest to council that amongst ourselves can we and this is just my opinion that the parking and then the notification that that be something that can get solved Within by.

September like at least a a process or some kind of resolution on that obviously the things that have bigger Financial impact that that's different but I feel like that that's kind of process and internal versus I part I get is a little bit dicier but to me that's something that to demonstrate real responsiveness that we should be able to expect something back kind of late summer early fall thank you all right and I said I wasn't gonna talk much and I'm not but I will I am gonna say this this has nothing to do with out oftwn developers it has nothing to do with any of that this is what we can take care of right here so I want to appreciate your comments this is something where we can actually take action on and we have a small business fund I have created and the other person that helped create is right over there as well Mr Hurley we have it we need to activate it when.

It comes to the alert system to your point I think this is something that we can actually get done probably before then it's just a matter of communication so I I I want us to stay on topic and on Focus because this is a this is you it's getting to crisis mode and so I and I and this is one of those things where we we it's not going to be political it's it's it's just operations and I think that we can do that and and and I'm not going to let any other subject matter hijack this Focus this is on us as a as a governing body and and and all the other stuff done don't even belong in it so as as mayor and also a practitioner in the space in what we're talking about right now I want to make sure that we're honoring the value ad you know we all play our part from businesses to Residents we Everybody Plays their part and that's what make that's what make a city.

Successful and I think we need to really really keep that first in front of mine so that being said I do have some folks that have signed up Mr can I add one clarifying thing for staff yeah go ahead thank you and for staff when I talk about the parking I'm specifically talking about the employee parking that to me is the part and I I'm not seeing anyone I'm assuming count other council members are not in agreement that to me is is different than the fee structure and all because the that's a broader conversation but the employee parking in particular has been something that I have consistently heard as a council member it affects if we're going to have this vision of shared economic Prosperity we know that often these are I'm real clear on who's cooking most of my food and serving most of my food when I come to a downtown restaurant and these are the folks who are who are often on the the most on the margins.

Economically in our community and we can't sit there and say we support shared economic prosperity and then not do our part on trying to figure out a process as simple as figuring out where can our employees Park especially late at night and pro putting them on the other side of downtown walking through downtown late at night after they've closed out a bar or closed down a kitchen is not okay and that is on us to fix and it's been at least a year since I've been hearing the complaints if not longer thank you may one last comment to also just want to say like so the parking is clearly one we can act on sooner but I hope that we'll get from the city manager for all these items a sense of what the timeline is in all these things so we can do some earlier but we need to act and have a clear sense of what's the timeline for all the recommendations in the letter so thank.

You I think just to that point I would say that there are some like I said that are Beyond just downtown Durham that need to be incorporated in because I think folks are hurting and there are some pain points that we could probably help with so if there are areas I mean just being very honest Andre driver you know Ninth Street like there's there's space spaces where we know that our small business owners our local small business owners have been trying to keep their heads above water so that's thank you and then so no name match I'm gonna have a next up for you potentially because I know you have deep relationships in all kinds of pockets to council member Freeman's Point helping us navigate that side of it that's going to be my ask of DDI is y'all are really focused on downtown and that's your job but council member Freeman's correct and so that's where we're going to really rely on you thank you with than happy dor proper Incorporated Durham.

Incorporated thank you more gray hairs what are you trying to say I did this intentionally I just went I just thank you thank you so much thank you for your time thank you for listening if I can continue to speak for these businesses that are within the room and those who couldn't come because of the middle of the day meeting thank you for listening we do appreciate that and we look forward to working with you and the team and continuing to make this a great place thank you so much thank you.

So thank you so much we're gonna we're gonna move this on I have four speakers I am going to reduce it on down we have a long agenda so I'm going to reduce it to two minutes and I'm going to have everyone stand in Q if you will Brian I'm sorry Bruce Kenyan Laura Butler the work conflicts have to be speaking okay someone is speaking on behalf of Laura she had to go to work same Renee Bachelor and Kelly Carter welcome good good good thank you m you hear me all right my name is Bruce Ken I work downtown I'm here to speak on behalf of the parking and safety issue downtown because of the high rates and lack of safety we get less client less clientele downtown it's become a normalized conversation amongst a lot of people that I see behind me about how we don't see anybody because they tell us on a regular basis how the high rates for the parking and the harassment and.

Attacks that we get in a lot of the parking lots downtown deter them lack of clientele brings lack of profits for our business lack of for the business brings lack of wages for the employees I'm employees I'm not making any money employees pay anywhere between $150 and $400 a month to come to work and pay this affects us a lot if we're not making any money businesses aren't having any client so we're not making any money we're paying the con War for free am aware that we have parking passes I know they're somewhere between like 120 and 150 although it is an alternative I don't feel like it's sufficient because everyone has different realities everyone has different schedules to pay 150 and we're not utilizing it that much it doesn't it's not an endend all Beall the same thing I heard about the bus system is free I know that we can commute there it's an option I feel like it's sufficient but it's not a a end all.

Be all as far as just just what we can do let me see let me see let me see.

Basically I had some notes written down and I was listening to what everybody was saying and ultimately what I hear is what I'm going to ask was as far as our clientele I feel like rat should be lowered so that we can have more fruitful business and we can survive like I like what you said shared economic Prosperity I like that a lot I like that a lot lowering the rates for on the parking decks all across downtown increases our economic Prosperity it increases Pockets back in the employees which makes us happier as far as security goes I see a lot that sometimes when the machines aren't working in the back we have attendant we have attendant back there to collect money is this me yeah it's time to wake up oh I no don't say record U I see that yeah I don't know I don't know thank you thank you so.

Much all right BR 300,000 people just heard what you just said I've never done this before no worries no wor my name is Tiffany bashore I am with DDI I'm here to read a letter from one of our business owners who recently just left downtown I'm Laura Butler owner of Rock Paper Scissors Salon since 2009 we recently moved our business location out of downtown Durham and into the Rockwood neighborhood I have loved being part of downtown Durham's community and watching it blossom into a bustling City these last 14 years last year I made the hard decision to move for multiple reasons but a big reason being the parking for employees and our customers to start Park Durham raised hourly parking rates without very clear communication almost overnight every weekday hour by 80% this meant our living wage employees had to pay $25 a day or $140 a month to work an eight hour day my employees could not afford this extra payment which was well over some average monthly utility bills I attended many different.

Meetings where many good Solutions were discussed but never heard back from anyone every time second ly my business used to offer customers parking validation up to four hours we used to get a small discount on these rates and as a small business helping to get customers to come downtown after the recent spike in rates and how the garages operate I went down to being able to offer two hours of validating and still spent up to $20,000 a year for this expense no one was happy lastly Durham charges more per hour to park than any bigger cities local bigger cities our customers visit us from all over the triangle Beyond which is amazing the hassle of finding parking feeling safe enough to walk around downtown and then paying top dollar on top of that isn't worth it to most folks and we suffered I honestly believe that if the city of dorm executed some simple ideas for service industry employees to park and change some steep parameters for visitor parking my business wouldn't.

Have left and our customers would be more than happy to ignore some other downtown frustrations thank you so much thank you. Good afternoon Heather Wilson with DDI reading on behalf of Renee Bachelor property owner and business owner 7-Eleven r rsby Avenue I want to start by saying I am all for new development in our area I am especially looking forward to the influx of new residents and the many retail options that will be here in the Central Park District it obviously will increase my property value and hopefully with new customers increase my sales and visibility with that said there really needs to be oversight regarding the developers and the contractors I would like to share some of the issues that we have had to endure over the last three years which I feel could have been somewhat avoided had we had better oversight from the city utilities being turned off without any notice or barely any barely an hour's notice I have spent countless hours on the phone with Duke Energy.

Spectrum and even the water department asking why was not notified of planned outages in advance so that we can make proper adjustments to our businesses street closures with no notice no permits no work orders construction Crews stopping our deliveries from coming to our place of business that are essential for us to operate no beer vendor wants to come Park two blocks away and then have to carry 30 cases of beer to my bar I've had to pay extra fees for my weekly dumpster pickups because access to our dumpster was blocked during the scheduled pickup times my staff are not able to park in my driveway because again they are blocked from the blocked from coming down the street customers have stopped coming until after 6 p.m. leaving us virtually empty during our initial opening hours because the street is filled with debris heavy equipment and random closing which has made it impossible to find anywhere to park because all of the parking has been taken by construction workers I had.

To stop our lunch service because we never know from day to day if cars are going to be able to come down the street or tractor trailers back hose construction vehicles constantly block access to my driveway or blocking the front of my business and some even having the audacity to park in my driveway construction materials are being put on the sidewalk in front of my establishment and left to sit there all day until they feel like moving them thank you.

Hello welcome good afternoon mayor Williams mayor prot Middleton and council members my name is Kelly Cotter and I own and operate toast at 345 West Main Street and I'm a co-founder of Dashi at 4:15 East Chapel Hill Street both located in downtown Durham in August of 2007 my husband and I were approved for a small business facade Grant from the city for $2,250 to help give us give the building we were renovating a much needed facelift with signage an aing and a new transom total costs came to 7,300 so the grant really helped offset the cost of getting quality materials that are still in use today I truly believe these facade updates we made with the help of the Grant from the city helped us get noticed when we opened our doors for business in February of 2008 and helped to start give downtown a more welcoming appearance as most of you likely know it cost of thousands of dollars to upfit an old building in Downtown and bring it to.

Code even for a restaurant is smallest toast most of these funds came to us in the form of loans and very fortunately this grant in 2014 as we began the expensive process with another building for our second restaurant Dashi no such grants from the city were available to us there is real value to the city investing in small businesses and entrepreneurs through these grants both short-term and long we create jobs provide Revenue Vue to the city through taxes and give residents and visitors reasons to spend their money downtown it feels to us as though the city has turned its back on the very reasons people want to live work and play in downtown Durham entrepreneurs need to feel supported by the city they choose to open their businesses or they'll just choose another city we're asking you to reconsider adding these grants back in for downtown businesses thank you.

All right we are going to go back up to the pull items now those are all the speakers I have and I I want to appreciate everyone coming out today I fail to mention item number seven also colleagues have been pulled has been pulled it's been pulled by Resident number that would be online so I didn't mention that earlier so I just make for your notes all right I'm going to go back up the agenda and get us get us going all Madame Chief if you could inform staff come back in So item number seven was pulled by Lara cyel former council member Miss cyel can you hear me oh where oh hey I'm sorry oh you're online here.

Okay this is this is AI you know you're you're not really. Here well first I want to thank the city council for allowing us to speak unfortunately Angel Vic who is a dedicated volunteer at the courthouse assisting people in eviction had to leave and I wanted to follow up with the budget item that we're discussing that legal aid it is such an essential service for the people of durum to have a home is so essential to all of us and when legal aid gets involved they are able to resolve most of the issues and allow people to stay in their homes by working with the tenants and the landlords and most judgments are avoided 66% of them are avoided which is really important for people to be able to move forward and then on the preserved Tendencies and in the courthouse the actual services in the courthouse are so important when people come they oftentimes do not know how to go through the whole process of eviction and legal aid is there to guide them.

Through the through the court process and often times is able to negotiate with landlords and tenants to be able to help tenants landlords maintain the tenancy and which benefits everyone and as you know we have growing homelessness in in Durham and we really need to work to avoid these these judgments and legal aid has been able to do that about 85% of the time in in the courthouse so I beg you to please fund all of the legal aid attorneys if you ever wish to come and see what's going on at the courthouse please do there were 66 just today I've seen dockets of a 100 tenants being evicted and you know even with more legal aid attorneys it it would be difficult to reach all of them but legal aid does they're just Heroes I'm I'm so impressed with what they are able to do with the with the staff they have now but we certainly can't afford to cut their staff in half so I ask you.

To consider that for the coming year thank you thank you she knew to stop right before that's what a former council member knows how to do all right. Again did we get number nine sorry number nine that was yeah yeah he is just a resource oh resource person okay okay yeah that's it all right next item is number 10 council member cook I don't know who pulled it but I'mma it was okay all right I never know who I just assume I actually don't think that I even pulled the majority today so we see did I I did okay you did great not by many great so we have a time's up time's up are you looking for the resource person I was looking for Mr Johnson maybe somebody else is here oh Dar he is oh you should know you should know that that I'm gonna make you come to the m I I just have a couple questions on both 10 and 11 so I can kind of do them in.

Conjunction both of these projects sound great to me in reading through the the information that we were provided but they're all kind of in different stages and so I just wanted to clarify a couple of things so this first one is number 10 this is the forever home Durham hope six preservation project and my questions were so this is a this is a contract with DVI as is the next one which is for those of you listening in is the Durham housing authorities nonprofit arm nonprofit development Johnson director of the Community Development Department so just in short housing authorities Public House public housing agencies are not permitted to engage by law engage in development and so but they can form nonprofit organizations that are subsidiaries of the houseing authority and so one term that you you'll hear quite frequently development Ventures Incorporated DVI that's the arm of the the Durham Housing Authority that does their development most of our I would say most a lot of our work is with.

Through legally DVI right I just I know that I never know any of the acronyms and I this is a place where I do know the acronym so I don't want to speak them too quickly so my question about this first one is that will will DHA manage these properties moving forward do we know a long-term plan for who is actually going to be managing those properties so I'm going to have to my understanding that it's DHA but I think Eric prell is on the.

Line can you hear. Us I'm here I'm here thank you are you there we are we here Council M hi there so my question was I'm I'm looking at the item number 10 I know you're on a few of these today this is the forever home Durham hope 6 preservation project I was wondering if these properties are going to be managed by the Durham Housing Authority moving forward or if there were plans to contract with someone else or how that how that normally goes yeah I I know on the Dillard project they will be managed by a subsidiary of the code veler Royal Street and on the Hope six projects U that will be developed by possibly by the Community Builders which was dha's partner in constructing those complexes and this might actually be a question for you Mr Johnson but once these are kind of subcontracted out does the city maintain any input over any of that moving forward or is it once the extent of this contract is finished that.

Is the extent of our interest that's the extent of the arrangements other than basic monitoring if you remember the source of this fund is the affordable housing Bond and the 58 million and so that's designed to be Gap financing that they're programming not us and so they will we won't be participate in the management of it we're just we Gap financiers. And I'm going to move to the number 11 in case unless someone else has questions on 10 specifically no fore go ahead okay and then so for number 11 this is the F place and Forest Hills Heights this one.

Was okay well I I first of all I wanted to just read the goals because I thought that they were really good we've been talking about quite a lot of things similar to this I specifically I feel like I've been talking a lot about what affordability means and what it looks like in action and so I just wanted to read the goals and objectives this is from one of the exhibits I'm paraphrasing them but preserve and enhance affordable housing options integrate public housing residents into broader downtown populations create diverse and inclusive community improve neighborhoods connectivity accessibility and livability Foster economic growth job creation and Community well being I just wanted to point this out because I thought it was it was really well worded and these are goals that I think this whole council is is really inclined to Foster and me particularly have been talking about this quite a lot but I really really it puts a bad taste in my mouth when we talk about folks who need affordable housing options and we.

Put them in distinct places where it's like visually different than other places right and and I really like this project because I can tell that the effort was put in to integrate everybody equally my question is that there was no timeline included in exhibit a it kind of said that the contract was for 24 months but then in the actual contract there was no timeline listed and I was wondering if you could clarify how that works and what that means so we'll have to talk with them in terms of the timeline but this is predevelopment and so as well it's not unlimited at 18 to 24 months sounds like the U well is a appropriate time that's for pre-development this is not for the actual work because that has to be decided determined Community input and all those sorts of of things and the financing has to be put together right okay so this is sort of like we're going to be this the predevelopment is ongoing.

And then we're going to see how it goes so we're leaving ourselves flexibility that's correct this is research on the site you know zoning site planning soil testing those sorts of things as we get the site ready as they get the site ready and in advance it will be a major this will be a major Pro this will be major yeah I I'm really looking forward to this project and and I really that was the main reason why I wanted to pull it because I have a lot of Hope for it and I I wanted to appreciate y'all's work on it so thank you so much and I I do want to say one one thing I in terms of your comment about having facilities that look different one of our philosophies is that we do have a philosophy that our work and the affordable housing should not look different from other housing and you can't look at it and tell that oh that's affordable housing and so the late the.

Things we've been doing as of late have have reflected that and council member thank you I just just one question to Mr Johnson I appreciate Chelsea Cook pull it for item 10 and specifically it's just the Community Builders I've been having some trouble connecting with their staff around some of the community centers I want to make sure that there's a way to if there is a way to include in whatever the contract is some type of partnership or some type of interaction that includes parks and wreck for their community centers it's becoming increasingly bothersome that they're never open or available to Residents and I I've tried to reach out a number of times and I've not gotten any word back so I just want to make sure that that's on the front end of this I'm saying saying it because I'm also saying on the back side okay all right well we we'll talk what we'll do is follow up with the housing authority and Mr snail the director development who's arranging.

This coach and it's specifically the Community Builders the the calvary place the Franklin Villages the Main Street towns all of those locations and then I want to say there's a couple of other residents who've who who've made some comments at the partners against Crime conversations with pack one two and three I think Mr snail might be is on the line Mr s mayor Mo Anthony snail y Mr snail can you hear. Me we see him online okay yes Anthony there you go yes this is Anthony snow yes I I heard the comment and we are will be working with t the Community Builders to address those issues as part of this plan we do we are adding additional resources to the site as part of the budget process so we will have additional resources to work directly with our residents thank.

You all right you all good council member all right I am going to pause on pulled items and move us to the crime report I I'm about to lose another council member item 26 okay if you could I just want to address my pulled item oh yeah which one is it it is item 12 20 item 20 all right our Public Safety staff you all can get ready and it's just really brief honestly I just want to make sure that we don't lose sight I know that de under attack nationally and Statewide it's important that we keep the demographic information of those we serve especially when we're working in partnership with nonprofits like maiden Durham I do want to note to my colleagues this this is a nonprofit We have served or offered the same type of Grant to for over 10 years so it is a single out nonprofit organization that we are saying does really good work and that we want to continue to partner with.

And I just want to highlight that in the conversation the context with the summer camps that will get into this position to do the same thing for other organizations similarly but I I do want to make sure that all of the organizations we work with keeps or creates a way to measure the demographics of those they serve because they're missing I don't know what the ages are I don't know what the race is I don't know what the gender is and those are just Basics that could be covered and that's all that was all thank you yes sir say thank you for those comments counc member good questions there I also want to say we we see a lot of contracts at every work session I just want to highlight the scope of work here for this grant is is exemplary in terms of like what their objectives are what the benchmarks are so this is the kind of I think this is kind of work and partners we want to.

Work with that actually provide this kind of clarity on what they're intended do and how they're going to measure that so I want to thank made for. That thank you welcome and let's let's do it I'm sorry I was just a mayor and members of council I was just the resource person from Maiden Durham and I understand in event there was an actual question but oh that's it thank you thank you all right Madame Chief of police we will move to your presentation good afternoon mayor Williams and my Council so I am wanting to just deputy chief Melissa Bishop is going to be actually doing the presentation today and so over the next series of quarterly reports different members of my staff specifically my Deputy Chiefs will be providing those reports for you and the purpose is is that I am not the Durham Police Department there are so many more Amazing staff men and women women that make make the police department run and it's important to me that you are able.

To meet a few of them and because they are the ones that that make this department run the way it should so without further Ado I will introduce deputy chief Melissa bishop and she was I'm sorry I just wanted to before you introduced her just just a point of privilege in saying that I wanted to congratulate you on not just being the chief but also continuing your efforts to improve yourself and others in your department around the Advanced law enforcement certificate and I noticed there's a lot of folks so it looks like there's a lot of work happening behind the scenes to make sure the folks are continue to elevate their skill set so I just want to appreciate that thank you thank you thank you deputy chief Bishop is also an academy mate of mine so she will be retiring soon and so she is our deputy chief over our administrative services so that's our that's kind of the backbone of the police department so I'm going to bring.

Her up to present the quarterly report thank. You deputy chief you are retiring soon I am Haven done the official date yet but it's not accepted coming soon doesn't matter not accept it all right well good afternoon Mr maror Williams council members and Deputy city manager Ferguson as Chief mentioned I'm Melissa bishop and today I will be presenting the first quarter report this report covers our Department's five performance measures part one violent crime part one property crime clearance rates response times for property one calls and Staffing levels and I will also discuss some of the highlights for the first quarter our first slide is the part one violent crime for January through March violent crime which includes homicide rape robbery and aggravated assault increased by 3.7% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to 2023 this was driven primarily by an increase in robberies our homicide is down 53.9% during the first quarter of 2024 we had six reportable homicide offenses six criminal homicides one was domestic related zero negligent manslaughter and.

Zero Justified homicide year to dat we are currently at 18 forceable rate is down 20% during the first quarter of 2024 we had 40 forcible rape offenses 35% I'm sorry yeah 35% of the reported offenses occurred in Prior years our robberies are up 18% during the first quarter of 2024 we had 118 robbery offenses 76% of the robberies were from persons which shows an increase of 27% 49% of the robberies from persons had one or more Hispanic victims 24% of the robberies were commercial and that has been unchanged 86% of the commercial robberies involved retail businesses 59% of total robberies involved the use of a firearm also result resulting in three gunshot ones aggravated assault is up 5.5% during the first quarter of 2024 we had 287 aggravated assaults from 191 incidents 46% of the non-domestic incidents involved Firearms resulting in 28 gunshot wounds 30% of the incidents were domestic which is an increase in 23% next slide this slide shows the chart of violent crime during the first quarter.

Over a period of the last 10 years while crime is very able it is also seasonal with the first quarter running from January to March generally dominated by the winter month homicide which is the Blue Line were near the bottom of the range with six during the four quarter less than half of last year's total while rapes to Orange Line were down 20% from last year they were still noticeably up from earlier years this could still be a reporting effect influenced by our agency saki Grant and ass Associated efforts to encourage and support victims about one of every three rapes reported in 2024 occurred in Prior years of 2012 to 2023 robberies the green line have trended downward over the last few years with the three lowest totals occurring during the last four years about one of every robberies are commercial in nature with the remaining three fours being individual robberies reductions have occurred in both C categories Hispanic victims have been disproportionately impacted with 49% of the individual robberies in the.

First quarter having one or more such victims normally were around 39% aggravated assaults the purple line have remained relatively consistent over the last several years intimate partner domestic violence incidents were slightly more represented this year with 30% of the total normally we're at 28% in with Firearms were less slightly represented 46% versus 49% next slide our shooting incidents shooting incidents decreased by 34.1% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to 2023 the number of persons shot decreased by 16.7% most of the reduction was absorbed observed in the Fatal category there were 209 gun seized in 150 incidents in the first quarter of 2024 down 25.4% year over-year.

This graph takes a look at the trend for shootings over the last three years while we saw a spike in shooting incidents last year the number of persons shot has trended downward each year we do Post these shooting graphs on a weekly basis on our website to keep the community informed on the number of shooting incidents in persons shot next slide so now we'll move into property crime for part one property crime of January through March property crime which includes burglary larsy and motor vehicle theft increased by 15.6% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to 2023 this was driven primarily by the continued increase in motor vehicle thefts in lar from Motor Vehicles burglar showed a reduction of 3% during the first quarter of 2024 we had 35 burglary offenses 58% of the burglaries were to residential locations which is a reduction of 6% 13% of burglaries were to retail business locations which is an increase of 1% and 16% of burglaries to construction sites a significant increase from 2023.

Household Goods outpaced power and hand tools which significantly LED last year at a 2:1 ratio arys are up 12% during the first quarter of 2024 we had 1, 194 Lars offenses 40% of the Larsen were from Motor Vehicles which is an increase of 26% 72% of all stolen guns came from Motor Vehicles 25% of the vehicles with the gun stolen were unlocked 36% of larsy were related to shoplifting which is an increase of 14% tools were the most common type of property stolen our motor vehicle thefts had an increase of 53.2% 80% of the vehicles stolen not including attempts or Vehicles not registered have been recovered 18% of the vehicles stolen were left running unattended or had the keys left somewhere in the vehicle Kia were the most frequently stolen vehicle make totaling 91 followed by Hyundai's totaling 90 and then Hondas and Toyotas at 28 22% of the motor vehicle theft incidents were attempts heavily impacted these manufacturers this continues a national Trend that started in 2022 and.

Has increased in Durham around April of 2023 next SL this chart shows the property crimes during the first quarter over the last 10 years burglaries the Blue Line have trended significantly downward over the last 10 years with the three lowest totals occurring during the last three years while residential burglaries are slightly lower than average 58% of the total versus 61% and burglaries to businesses are down even more 133% versus 18% orgies to construction sites with appliances being targeted after installation were abnormally High during the first quarter household items were the most frequently stolen item which is usually LED easily by tools larsy the Orange Line have trended up over the last two years after being down for two years from its peak in 2020 during the first quarter of during the first quarter 40% of all larsy were from Motor Vehicles or involved parts accessories normally we're around 30% of all guns stolen this year 72% were from this category which is much higher than normal which is at.

52% in addition breaking the glass was the method of entry for 56% of the gun stolen from these Motor Vehicles more than four times the normal rate of 133% Motor Vehicle thefts the green line have significantly increased over the last two years while they are down 22% from the peak experienced during the second and third quarters of last year they are still up 53% over the first quarter of 2023 as noted before Kia and Hyundai continue to dominate the vehicles stolen which is a regional and National Trend attempts to steal these vehicles also contribute to Crime counts was constituted 22% of all motor vehicle theft offenses in the first quarter compared to 4% normally.

This is a chart of our part one clearance rates a clearance rate is calculated by dividing the number of offenses cleared in the period by the number of offenses reported for the same period it is not uncommon for an offense occurring in one period to be cleared in another period such as in a Cold Case homicide or sexual assault FBI clearance data for 2022 is based on the south region regardless of jurisdiction population data for 2023 is not available yet clearance rates for the first quarter of 2024 were higher than the normal dpd's clearance rates were higher than the normal FBI annual data for 2022 and aggravated assault and burglary and better than the dpd annual data for 2023 in all categories other than homicide and rape while the homicide clearance rate was lower than 2023 it is based based on a very small number of offenses six which can be very highly variable the rate clearance was significantly lower than dpd's annual data for 2023 and FBI 2022 for the south.

Region of the count of the country 87% of the violent crime cases cleared were via an arrest either by our agency or another agency serving our warrant 133% were exceptionally cleared meaning there was significant evidence to support an arrest but some element beyond the control of law enforcement prevented it from occurring valid exceptions include the victim is unwilling to cooperate the prosecution of the case is declined by the District Attorney's Office a juvenile offender not in custody and death of the offender 95% of the property crimes cleared were via arrest and 5% via an exception.

Our Priority One calls for service for January to March there were 2,153 Priority One calls for service in the first quarter of 2024 which was unchanged from 2023 our average response time was 6 minutes and 37 seconds which did not meet the target of 5 minutes and 48 seconds we answered 49% of these calls in less than 5 minutes which did not meet our Target of. 57% so Staffing at the end of the first quarter our sworn Staffing was at 75% at the end of March 2024 it is currently at 74% staffed 26% vacant we currently have 397 filled positions out of the 535 authorized positions this includes 29 recruits in some phase of training our non-sworn staffing was at 86% at the end of March 2024 non-sworn Staffing is currently the same as it was at the end of first quarter we had eight new officers graduate from our basic Law Enforcement Training also known as belet Academy number 58 in February we currently have 12 recruits going through Academy number.

59 we are working to recruit for Academy number 60 that will begin on August 26 there are currently nine recruits who have been confirmed for this Academy based on current projections recruiting unit is projecting a class size of approximately 20 in the first quarter we had 53 applicants which is around the same amount of applicants we had in the first quarter of last year the number of applicants in the first quarter last year were the highest that we have seen since 2018 during the first quarter of 2024 our recruiting unit initiated multiple marketing campaigns for recruitment which included the coffee shops and local business initiative through this initiative our recruiters met with local businesses and hung up recruiting flyers in these establishments we are also currently working to schedule a recruiting and information Symposium with the North Carolina Congress of Latino organizations the recruiting unit is also part of a docu signed pilot program for the city of Durham this program enables the applicants to submit their applications prior to testing to make.

The process move along smoother we're also researching some new software known as esoft to streamline the background phase we have also been approved for a cops 30x30 Grant to help with our female recruiting and we'll talk more about that on the next slide a 30 30 initiative we continue to build up our representation of female officers as we are a member of this initiative the 30x30 initiative is a coalition of police leaders researchers and professional organizations who have joined together to advance a representation of women in all ranks of policing across the United States the goal is to increase the representation of women in police recruits class 230 by 2030 at the end of the first quarter we had 70 sworn female officers out of 402 17.3% of the Duram police sworn officers are female which is above the national average of 12% currently we have 66 sworn female officers out of 397 which equals 16.6% of the Durham Police Officer sworn officers in the first quarter of 2024 we.

Had a total of 16 fale fale applicants apply to become swarm police officers that's the most female applicants we have seen since 2018 we had one female graduate in Academy 58 in February of this year and currently we have two females that are in our Academy 59 the reasons vary for why the females are applicants are not making it to the academy those reasons include failing the physical or written tests failing some of the background checks or they withdraw from the process these are also the same reasons why they're male counterparts don't make it through the academy too our recruiting unit Works year round to recruit more female officers recruiting recruiters make efforts to attend female college career Affairs such as the Meredith College in Raleigh in 2023 our public affairs unit featured a different female officer each month through the women in Blue video series to help boost interest among female applicants we have also been been approved as mentioned for the 30x30 grant funds from this grant are geared toward initiating more specific.

Recruitment for female officers we are currently working on holding two events one is a hiring event for female officers and the second is focused on retaining our current dpd female officers both events are tentatively scheduled for the fall of 2024 we are in the planning stages and more information will be provided in the future are U Visa requests by the quarter during the months of January through March 2024 the Duram Police Department received 83 U Visa requests 51 of the U visas were were approved and 32 were denied resulting in 61% of the results submitted this quarter were approved we currently do not have a backlog of UVA requests and we are processing requests as they come in.

And please make sure to follow us on social media platforms that is the end of the presentation thank you any questions thank you so much any questions before you leave I would just thank you for the presentation you did a great job and just say that I the one thing that's kind of always a sticking point for me is the vacancies and and just being mindful that we've got to figure out something but I'll definitely come back to it thank you thank.

You congratulations council member Freeman enjoy your day yep Saturday he's graduating I'm excited all right. Colleagues start and go down Council m m cook well I I will start forever it seems okay just I have a couple quick questions so one of them is that we were talking about response times the second of your statistics was the 49% answered in less than five minutes is that I thought that that was through the call center is that police specific so that's when they're dispatched so when the officer receives the call and they arrive on scene like they don't rece they receive the call from Communications on the radio Okay and then they actually make it on scene so the the first one was the response time that's what the one that I thought was for them making it on scene and then the second one was the calls answered unless than five minutes so the first so basically our average response time is 6 minutes and 37 seconds then we.

Break it down a little bit further for on Priority One calls we then have a second metric of 57% but we made it we answered 49% of those calls when we tried to answer 57% of okay thank you so that same statistics broken down okay I got a little bit confused with the wording and and didn't know okay and then my second thing is is briefly and and it's the same issue that council member Freeman just brought up that we're y'all are doing a great job in Recruitment and Retention I think specifically from those recruitment classes has been going up but we're still seeing quite a bit of vacancies to an extent that it would be hard to see that moving it close to 100% ever probably right I mean it's we don't we don't have like a we don't have a clear path to getting those vacancies filled but those vacancy numbers the the numbers of of people that we have space for that is set by state is that correct by.

Census that comes into play that the there what we have is 535 M and also yes they look at the population of the the city but it's not something that's set in by state however because that number would be a lot higher what we actually could you tell me then how like the other factors that set that 535 number there's different metrics that are put in and I'd have to get you the numbers of exactly the formulations for it but we've had studies done that look at the population of the city of Durham and work it that way great yes I was just going to add that there are a number of so so that's a completely local decision so all all local governments are completely independent in terms of being able to decide the level of Staffing that they have locally so our existing Staffing level would have been a culmination of decisions over the years to add Staffing based on analyses at the time and recommendations ultimately brought to.

The City Council to add staff there are a number of metrics that get used to sort of feed those recommendations but none none of those metrics are binding and and I wouldn't say that any one of them is used primarily over others I would say you know population crime crime rates response times are all important factors in in getting to a recommendation that gets brought to the city council do the vacancy rates over some period of time are those metrics that we use when we're thinking about or is that not previously been used as a metric I would well first of the manager to to speak to her philosophy but I would say that no primarily our staffing level is going to be driven our recommendations are going to be driven by workload and we're going to set that at the number of staff that we think would be necessary to achieve acceptable outcomes and then based on that that's the target we want to we.

Want to hit and if we are not able to hire that many people I think we are still going to maintain all of our efforts to to try and fill the those vacancies so that we're pegging the the number of FTE at the service demand okay yeah I mean it just seems to me and and I'm not you know I'm not trying to be any kind of way but I hear the the recruit numbers and then the numbers of folks who are making it through those recruit teams and I'm and I'm seeing the you know we we throw around like percentages but this is this is a large number of vacancies to fill and and we're not going to hit that unless we start having police sort of growing I don't I don't think we're going to hit that from what y'all are saying about the the numbers of folks coming through the recruit class and I want to say specifically that I do appreciate that Durham has really high.

Standards for our police officers I think that's a a great statement to the program that the chief has run and and I'm and I'm excited to see the diversity but I also am just being realistic about these numbers and and so it's just something I'm thinking about moving forward in terms of calculating that but I appreciate those answers thank you. There was a pretty massive increase in the motor vehicle theft obviously that's happening around the country can you just give us a little bit of insight as to why that's happening I mean we have there have been like Tik Tok has shown videos of how to steal vehicles and they are being shared and the you know the juveniles are watching it so it's kind of meeting so that would probably be a big a big we really think that's it's it's yeah it's a national Trend that that is social covered and the social media is picking up on it and then can you also just touch on the homicide and rape clearance.

Rates and why those are a little bit down in the first quarter why we might see that just according to those statistics so this one the biggest one was is because the first quarter for homicides we only had six so when and with the clearance rate just being a small I'm sorry with the number of being so small six and a clearance rate then it's just going to show a difference now for the rapes we spoke with investigators and we really could not pinpoint an exact reason as to why the numbers were lower some of the investigators did look at the cases and there was a little bit of a lack of cooperation from the victim there are services that the that we encourage for people to report so they can get those services and a police report is needed for that however that could be a possibility as to why that in order for them to get certain Services a police report is required but then they don't.

Want to participate any further in the investigation thank you yeah and I know that those are a challenge across the country as well yes what would it take to get closer even if we don't meet it but get closer to meeting our Target response times higher higher pay to increase our staffing because the there is a trend that the you know police officers are coming back there from 2020 it's starting to take a pick up however officers are looking for higher pay support from leadership and then my last question I was looking at the UVA graphic there's a large very large number of applications and you already touched on this a little bit it's also the largest number of of denials that we've seen at least since 2021 can you just tell me a little bit about what's behind that so I'm not sure what can answer on like why there was an increase I do know that a lot of times we have people that apply.

For a u Visa but they must be a direct victim of the crime so they may not have been the actual they may not they may have been a witness or an associate and so that since they weren't the victim of the crime we do not give them the U Visa we will refer them to the DA's office for that so that could be a possible and there's also Captain Packard is sharing with me that there was he handles to U visas that there was a lack of cooperation from when he follows up to see on the investigation because they also must cooperate with the investigation okay yeah the applicants the applicants must cooperate with the investigators if there's a lack of cooperation then we will not approve a u Visa thank you so.

Much thank you good afternoon deputy chief Bishop I have a couple you you said a statistic about property victims of the of Latino ethnicity and you gave the percentage and it was a lot higher so I just wanted to hear that again for the robberies was it I thought it was robberies Maybe was like 49% of robbery victims in quarter one were Latino but I just I wasn't sure if like right in comparison to what what was the I missed the normally 39% 39 can we so historically one of our worst periods is usually around the holidays and so this would have been post the holidays so just curious as to what any any thought or hypothesis as to maybe why we didn't see that number come down because usually we do see it it's it's a terrible cycle we all are aware of it I've spoken about it before so just curious if y'all had any thoughts around that some of the information that was was given was basically they are there is some.

Trends that they were looking at that investigators and they are kind of involving some juveniles okay so it's still kind under investigation and and looking at different things but there wasn't a driving force okay of it whereas like I think sometimes we know the time of year is often the driving force right so this is why I'm like well this doesn't make any sense to me like usually this is post holidays as we can see on the numbers in general our first quarter often tends to be one of our quietest quarters I'm not looking forward to our next quarter and so it just curious but that makes sense and then are we seeing an increase of and I'm seeing it some but I'm not seeing a huge increase are we seeing an increase of Latino perpetrators because historically they have been victims and not perpetrators and I'm just wondering especially around Latino youth if we're seeing an uptick if that's being tracked which to me then I mean what has.

Historically happened in other cities is as immigrant communities become more established you will see growing gang activity within that community and that is something that we haven't seen historically and Duram and so I just I'm always cognizant of if that trend is starting to shift I would have to follow with our investigations unit on that one to look but it would be something that we could track yeah if we could start I would appreciate if you all are seeing a trend within especially Youth and I would say under 25 perpetrators of crime and and their ethnicity and if it's if we're seeing an increase within Latino U populations because I certainly hear anecdotally right from from parents that are concerned about their kids getting involved in things that they don't want them to be involved in and so that's just a person interest of mine and then how are you all thinking so it doesn't really affect you because we we don't run the jail but with the recent potential enforcement you know.

By the state at the jail with the sheriff having to cooperate with ice how are we thinking we're going to handle that on the PD side to your point around people not wanting to report crimes with u visas domestic violence cases potentially rape cases when we tie immigration into that folks not necessarily wanting to participate or just in general trust within police officers eroding because we're bringing their immigration status in so I was just curious if if yall are having those conversations what is the potential strategy and again you don't have to answer that today but I would appreciate some kind of response as to what we're thinking as a police department yeah and the police department and the sheriff's department are always collaborating so those I'm sure I have I have not been part of that but that's not on my side of the the department but they have been working with the jails and we will continue to make sure those conversations continue yeah I just am very concerned around we've worked.

Really hard in Durham and your department you know the police department has worked really really hard to increase trust within our immigrant communities to report crimes and these kinds of bills really just erode that trust because no one's going to cooperate if they think somebody's immigration status is is in Jeopardy so so I just I need our police officers to really be Mindful and as always whatever youall need from engagement side happy to do it but we need folks to feel like they can as we see they are often our Latino neighbors and often immigrant neighbors are victims of crime at a higher level and that makes everybody less safe because if they're not going to report it then the community as a whole becomes less safe so really wanting to see what the that we're going to have a good robust response depending on what's happening at the state level around this law change and then finally I have one more question are y'all working like when.

You all are getting a UV sub petition you know this the city runs an immigrant legal def defense fund with Justice matters we fund that so what is the coordination between the police department and Justice matter and referring those folks because often you do need an immigration attorney to help you with that paperwork and so if we're having with folks who are you know U Visa recipients that they can then go and get those free legal services to get them on that path of of documentation right and we for our purposes they don't need an attorney to get the the first part of the U Visa The Next Step so you know we we always refer them to if if they need a referral however when they come to to us just to get the U Visa first step of the paperwork we do not require an attorney yeah I I know that I'm saying that then they then you have to go the next step is right if they need.

Assistance a lot of times we get them already from an attorney oh perfect so if they were that is something that we could refer them for okay so I guess my ask is also then ensuring that we have a a good and tight relationship with Justice matters which is the nonprofit that we fund specifically for that thank you those are all my questions Mr Mayor thank you council member rist thank you deputy chief Bishop for the presentation I just have one question following on my my colleague council Baker's questions about motor vehicle theft so I understand that this social media phenomenon that's sort of providing ways or sort of guides how to Steel cars is out there my question is sorry let me get back to the screen looking at are are clearance rates for motor vehicle thre thefts are much lower and it's a national phenomenon right but our clearance rates are much lower than the FBI rate so what's up with that a lot of ours is you know.

Deals with some of the staffing issues that we're faced with is just that the the case load that they have is is also a prime factor of it and cooperation from the victims okay thank you I just wanted to say one last thing I know that this council is is very committed and I think I hope our police office police officers are watching what's happening with pay and are seeing the the very substantive increases that will be hitting everyone's KN on wood budget goes smoothly everyone's paychecks in you know their first two paychecks in in July and that we responded to what we heard in the police department around anniversary hiring you know moving everyone to July versus anniversary hiring because of that confusion so this is just to our Police Department your council is hearing you loud and clear you all have been coming to us around the pay issue for a long time so yes council member cook I see I definitely agree with you around the vacancies but I am hoping.

That at least some of it maybe not all of it will get solved with with the large pay increases that our police officers will be seeing thank you very much thank you great Point yeah exactly she's looking at my notes that's why she said that anyway thank you thank you so much for the presentation obviously this report while if it's one person shot it's too many but this report is much easier to digest than what we have coming so I'm going to ask my questions about this report because I know what's coming okay all right so I I'd like to go a little deeper if you're looking at this at the high level that we have for.

Example shooting incidents we're at 147 this this this first quarter versus 223 last quarter 40 people shot five fatal 35 non fatal now I know that's going to change what I don't see here which I'd like to see is where these are happening the demographic of who's being shot and who's shooting and how many shots were fired do we have that information at all we we do have it oh okay sorry to interrupt Tes Andrews again so how we determine how many shots are actually fired is by the number of casings that we can that we collect because that's something we can put our hands on and say there was one point in time there was a bullet in this casing we thus far year to dat we've collected 1,500 a little over 1500 casings so we know whether it was a fatal or non-fatal shooting that that was the number of rounds collectively that we know had been fired that we actually collected a casing on last year was a it was.

It was a little bit higher last year just over 2000 50 maybe 2000 and some casings that were actually collected last year same same time so do we know how many calls I mean so this is I guess we'll be working with Duke health or yeah that's or yeah that's our Hospital in this area how many folks are of these nonfatal and sometimes fatal as we know based on our reports from the manager are are reporting to the emergency rooms without a corresponding 911 call do we know that information we can pull that information we have seen a lot more people driving themselves or have being driven to the emergency room because the EM obviously the emergency room will the Ed does notify us but we have seen more people being driven and dropped off so then traditionally do we know why folks are not calling 911 well I I can't say if they're not calling that someone isn't calling 911 I know in the sometimes in situations.

Where it's a drive and drop off it could be anything from not wanting us to find the actual location of where it happened and which we have in times been able to backtrack and it's always it's been different from what the witnesses or victim in the car has said we think that's purposeful or it's for them the fast Fest way to get to get that person to the Ed and getting them treated or the actual shooting occurred from car to car or from outside into the car but we are able to track whether whether these shooting incidents have corresponding calls or not correct yeah we can we can track that all right do we have a percentage of who's being shot and who's doing the shooting not generally is you know demographics I I can get you an exact percentage we can get a percentage of of perpetrators I think Mr she might.

Have so Mr she who's our analytical division manager he stated that the demographics are on the website so you can see the breakdown but we can't get that for you we just don't have it off the top of our heads right now okay I'm I'm going to just assume that it's majority young black men. Gotcha so I know that you all do some type of followup actually I've heard reviews from family members of individuals who've been shot and killed and individuals whove been shot and survived that the police follow up the the counseling is really good and and I think that we're going to get some resources around Survivor care I I hope we do because I'm I'm personally interested in a full apparatus of you know just Public Safety support and family support I think about all the trauma that you know the kids getting off the bus you know the the fact that kids can get off the bus and see shootings happening while they're just walking to their neighbor walking to.

Their door and they don't even Flinch it's just normal I I can't digest that it is it it is just it's sort of it yeah that we almost touched on it when I think council member cook earlier was talking about you know just because affordable housing or lower cost housing you shouldn't have to be just stuck in one area so I hope that we just totally demolish you know isolated you know I mean humans don't deserve to live in some of the properties they're living in in the city and I know that dha's plan moving forward is to have mixed income mixed use to ensure that you know access to nice amenities is is Equitable and equal in a sense but what reality we have right now is I'm asking these questions because I'm getting a lot of you know folks reaching out to me that I can't I can't respond to them I can't answer you know and I've been in a really good mood until I had to talk about this stuff.

You know and colleagues I got to say to us we did a really good job at figuring out why we couldn't keep shots spotter but we don't have a real response to it and neighborhoods are getting sprayed they're getting sprayed I mean people I and matter of fact let me put another question on the record we talked about it briefly but another data point I want to start saying in these presentation is the shelling you know I person per per site I believe there was with just recently 50 some shots in McDougall the week before I think it's like hundred and something or nearly aund 90 or whatever you know we we're gonna have to respond somehow someway and the office of Survivor care is something I hope we get but it damn sure can't be the only thing you know there are folks right now watching this video and they're they're constantly saying hey what are we going to do about it this is a customer.

Service issue you know and and I I I we have the model of how to actually activate as a community as well as a council and as I said recently I want to say this on the public record you know a ceasefire in Gaza and a ceasefire in Durham that's not a binary it's a both end but we shut City Hall down down for one and we're quiet here in Durham and personally I'm offended by that so we're going to have to have some serious conversations on who we're listening to how sensitive we want to be I grew up in these type neighborhoods I don't live in those neighborhoods now so I can't pretend to know the daily experience or live the experience of the folks that are living in the neighborhoods that are ding ing bullets constantly but I also refuse to let it be a normality recently I went to the bus station at the last work session we had when there was a shooting going on.

At the bus station while we were sitting in here when I left here I went over to the bus station because I wanted our bus drivers to know that hey I hear you I'm not afraid to come out here I want to let you know that we heard about it and and and and I'm here for you I also spoke to the police officer that was working off duty but also went to talk to the 20 young fellas that was sitting on the wall and I said get your bleep off the wall and get on a bus or go home somewhere I promise you I can make one call and there's going to be a lot of people coming down that street right there that's going to get you out of here and they dispersed and I told them you're not going to make our bus terminal a territory you're just not but that is what's happening and I Can Only Imagine The Strain and stress that you all have.

Being so short with your Staffing issue so I I'm excited about the pay that hopefully will come we pass the budget but I think it's going to take a lot more and I think what's invaluable when it comes to actually getting people to want to work for you or work in your organization is how you actually invest your support and we've done a good job at stating what's important to us and we've done a good job at being quiet when we have actual people that are living in these situations asking us and I'm talking about people who don't know how to sign up to come to the council meetings but they're asking us Facebook Messenger Instagram DM Tik Tok DM everywhere what are y'all going to do we need to do something about this crime that's the number one issue that I hear out in the community it was also corresponding consistently with the number one resident response on the resident survey so we need sidewalks we need we.

Need bike Lanes we need Street repair we need all of those things but we also have to we have to acknowledge the customer service issue almost crisis that we have on our hands when someone says how do y'all do a bond on Street sidewalks and Street safety and we're getting shot at and nothing is happening so colleagues I told some of you all I would bring I would I would mention this today and this and this is why because there are folks watching watching there folks that have a high expectation not even a high expectation they just have a normal resident expectation I don't want to get shot at and that's just from residance it's also from the young men that I sat on a panel with yesterday My Brother's Keeper My Brother's Keeper Summit and said you know when when the moderator said what is most important to you he's like yo bro I'm just tired of looking over my shoulder you don't know what direction the bullets coming from.

They just don't want to look over their shoulder that's it they should be able to say I don't know you know I just I don't know what college I want to go to or I don't know what job I want to get but you know I have these options no they just want to not have to look over their shoulder because of the bullets that are coming so of course it's personal because I'm a black and if you just simply anodically follow the news reports they all look like me so I hope that we can really really assess our priorities I really do because this is on us we can't we can't push this on anything else police officers Police Department thank you for doing your job thanks for doing it well because when you go to Wick Forest it doesn't feel like the they have all the lights on the every officer has an SUV and they pull up you just you if you just cross the lane.

Wrong you got to wait for us there's five vehicles coming at night in the middle of the night I've been pulled over three times in Wake Forest imagine my fear so thank you for not being that way and dorham but unfortunately you probably don't have time so I I just talking a lot but to the community members inste of watch it I hear you I feel you it is personal it's serious and I think this is the biggest crisis that we're dealing with right now and it's one of the main things if not actually it's the main thing we're not even responding to so those are my comments any other questions thank you thank.

You and I've jumped off all over the agenda and I have no idea where we are all right if you're doing pull items number 12 if you're doing.

Presentations that's number 12 okay M wack staff can you hear.

Me all right you have three minutes okay again excuse me for hesitating but you know I couldn't get on for a minute but I'm here to speak on this proposal to float this Bond referendum on the taxpayers I think it's insensitive to not understand that economically people are strapped you're proposing the manager is proposing a 3.5% tax increase for people that actually own property and actually pay taxes just because you're proposing this tax increas and our property taxes go up doesn't mean that our income is increasing doesn't mean that anything Financial is increasing so even though I heard the manager say $153 more we don't know who has $133 to put towards paying more taxes now with this Bond referendum this is not freey this is you going to the bank on the behalf of the Duram taxpayers and act and getting a 200 $200 million loan that has to be paid back by the taxpayers not to mention we should not be floating Bonds on general maintenance annual maintenance obligations that should be.

In the budget for general maintenance roads and Street and sidewalks are in the budget for annual maintenance funds that's money that's got to be there no matter what that's just like me understanding that every day I'm going to take a bath and I'm not going to call the mortgage company and say can I refinance the house because I'm gonna turn the water on so I need to re do a refinance to be able to take a bath every day this is what's happening and if the if the city and our elected officials and the staff would St shifting money around from the annual maintenance budget into these pet projects that a lot of these council members are H maybe we can take care of the projects that need to be taken care of now if you're floating a bond because there's some new capital expenditures maybe you're going to put some bells and whistles on the sidewalk a one- time deal then that's one thing but for general maintenance we have a budget for.

That a general maintenance budget where sidewalks and streets are included in that that is money that have to be in the budget every year we should not and when you let these obligations get fallen into disrepair like the Housing Authority does with public housing then it does cost more money to upkeep and get these things back on track but if we stop putting so much money shifting money around into these pet projects and I'll say it all day long participatory budgeting two million you don't what's going on with that money that's being appropriated out there because those people don't come back and get reports and I don't know if anybody's keeping up with what they do with those $50,000 grants and you got other projects that y'all are putting money into so put the money where it needs to be going and not keep overburdening these taxpayers in Duram because this is not right and this is not what taxpayers are paying for they're not paying they have to pay more.

Taxes for services that they already pay for so that we're totally against and y'all need to do more research on this before you float that bond out there on us thank you thank you Miss wag I'm taking over marij Williams stepped out I think the next pulled item is number 15 counc member question oh I'm so sorry Chelsea Cook go ahead great thank you all right how are you great I I actually just pulled this to highlight it again and and now that I've heard that comment I'm I'm glad that I did so I might get you to add some things but I was most just going to talk about this item this has been because we are increasing the property taxes or we've we have a budget that is hopefully maybe going to pass that increases the property taxes I wanted to talk about this separately just to make sure that there was no confusion that this Bond or these two will go by referendum in front of the voters they will have to.

Vote on these and they'll get to vote on each of them separately so they get to choose if they want to borrow this money in order to do the Parks and Recreation piece and they get to choose if they want to borrow this money to do streets and sidewalks I do want to ask and and maybe a w city manager will be the best person for this because of the possibility of this Bond the city is able to use our money that is in the CIP or in our budget for construction and other upkeep we've been able to move some money to projects this has freed up money to other projects could you talk a little bit about what projects we are might be able to see if this bond gets passed because we've been able to free up that that money just just a brief summary for us defer to our staff we've also got Christina Ren from the budget office either of them probably could could speak to that.

Tim Flora Finance director so yes so if we if we were to go with a bond referendum what it would do it would free up capacity for our CIP programming and so not necessarily free up much programming in the current cycle because that is fy2 so we have so for streets and sidewalk maintenance we we do have there there are those budgeted projects but we have other projects in the queue for outline years I I believe like a fire department some additional additional Transportation needs top of.

My to the mic to the mic yeah so yes as as director Ren was saying there will be a discussion at next week's Council work session on CIP which we we will be making a presentation on that very topic and we can provide you more information with then awesome yeah and and I look forward to that presentation and and we've seen the the proposed budget so we we know sort of where they fall I just wanted to sort of have that be out in the open again because this is again going to be it's going to be something that goes in front of the taxpayers so I want to make sure that everybody knows what they're voting on and understands the benefits what can you just tell us one more time why is advantageous to have this money upfront particularly for these two items for the parking Recreation development and for the sidewalk and streets why why a bond is the is a is something that staff has recommended to us sure so using.

General obligation debt Bond debt is the least costly way of financing any major Capital project the fact that the city has a AAA credit rating means that we will get the lowest interest rate possible on any debt that we issue to do that so most of our CIP is debt funded 90% of all of our CIP projects are funded by debt the least expensive debt that we can issue is General Obligations bonds and so and where we will be saying because of legal requirements and the TR and the what the average cost of a general obligation bond in the state I think right now is right around 5.45% because the city has a AAA credit rating we are anticipating an interest rate of somewhere more around like 3.6% awesome wellow thank you that is awesome it's it is it is really really awesome I mean it really is and and then so we had this on our last agenda item too and that was a notice period and now we are actually putting.

It in front of we are now approving it to go to the voters in this step or do we have another step left to go there's still another step so so our first was a approving a resolution that allows me to make application to the local government commission this is the resolution to move forward with a bond referendum and setting and if once that gets approved then we will also have another meeting where we'll actually and I think this also announces a public hearing then I think on June 16th we will actually be having a public hearing and so while we are waiting for the public hearing we are also now currently working on the application for the LGC and we will then again get you know approval from them to continue to move forward awesome great thank you for that and I know that we've talked about it a lot of times and we have a lot more presentations to go so I will be brief but we're talking about.

Investing in our community we're talking about listening to the concerns of our citizens yes safety is a big issue and these are things that are directly tied to safety and particularly the development of of the Parks and Recreation having a place for youth to go having a place for folks to congregate having things for them to do particularly over the summer when school is out this is this is going to be such a boon to our community again this is up to the taxpayers if they want it I'm excited for it to go out to a vote I'm hopeful that we'll be able to use our excellent credit rating to do these projects as cost effectively as possible so I really appreciate all the work that's gone into this from staff and just wanted to raise it again you'll hear me talk about it many many times but I just wanted to raise it again so that folks watching this meeting can hear why why I personally.

Think that this is a great great way to go so thank you so much that's all well more you talk about it before we have to stop talking about it the better so we never have to stop talking about it just staff our job for the next several months is to talk about it all the time okay good M no no no council's job is to sell this let me just keep talking yes keep talking and to talk to so I will be the folks especially R Lea on to bpac Dos EAB and the rack any council members who are Le aison there I will be bothering you a lot to make sure that those commissions and Boards really know what's what's up because they're they're going to be huge advocates in our community to to get these important amenities passed before the voters I had just a really quick question when y'all come next week with when we talk about CIP could you also provide us so I know that there's ex expanded.

Capacity it's imagining a world that I'm just gonna I'm so suspicious it's imagining a different world on November 5th for many reasons hopefully and so when y'all presented to us at our Retreats it was imagining the more constrained CIP and then what's been what's now is is is different so I would just like to see a side by side in one place so that I can see because I know some dollars moved around just so we can see what's moved where and how so that's just a request I have for our presentations next week I will ensure that we collaborate with the budget department and we get we show that for you thank you I second that comment thank you all right thank you item number 15 council member cook oh this is going to be so so brief I don't believe it okay I had one very specific question about this I just want to say that I thought these banners were so awesome I actually was next.

Door and my car was in the garage when they got destroyed and it was that was a a wild time but anyway my my one very specific question is I saw on here that that we have insurance as a City about when we do installations like this and I was just wondering if this was covered under that insurance and why are why not Etc will you turn your mic on hi good afternoon mayor members of council City man or not city manager but Deputy city manager of Ferguson I'm Rebecca Holmes with the general Services Department with the cultural and public art program unfortunately the insurance does not cover this specific case but we are looking at ways to ensure that our pieces in the public art collection are insured the limit is about3 to 5,000 so does it is it just it doesn't cover storms like what what was unfortunately the policy that we currently have does not cover this specific limit because of the cost of repair and replacement is.

About $100,000 the insurance only covers about $6,000 for public art okay and they and we cannot get it for that for a portion no we have to pay the entire thing yeah okay that was my only question thank you Ma all right all right next item I have is number 18 council member no can I make an announcement on that item this is the item that council member wrest pulled because u in I legisl there were no attachments by the item and he is correct we located those attachments they were elsewhere in the agenda beside a title they were in the packet and I'm told that as soon as this meeting is corrected they will it'll be corrected on the website will it also be corrected in I let all right the website is correct now we apologize for the error thank you are we all good to move on absolutely I'm glad we found them that undisclosed location yeah yeah top secret is that a 19 yes Sor all.

Right number 19 that is me yeah yeah so thank you Mr Dicky for being here so counc Baker and I have been having a conversation about the importance of employee ownership as a critical way to create solid jobs good jobs but also as you hear me say many times is a way to build wealth for employees right critical strategy so I just would love little clarification here on this item so as I understand there was an original proposal submitted by ewd for $3.5 million in arpa funds to help preserve traditionally underutilized businesses including encouraging employee ownership correct now we're being asked to authorize a sub precipitate agreement for $400,000 so so less than 3.5 I want to understand how that's different than 3.5 but this also doesn't include employee ownership and so I just want to be clear so so question about like 3.5 million and then this is like 400,000 so did we get the 3.5 million in ARA funds want to understand that but I also want to.

Understand if this grant is not for employee ownership Services where does that where does that work live at the city right now thank you mayor members of council Chris sticki from the office of Economic and Workforce Development Keith G talk to you for a second.

Good afternoon Keith Chadwell Deputy city manager me assist at Le certainly with the first part the reference to the three million $3.5 million comes from the first round of application the application process initial allocation of opportunities subsequent to the process that was given for the consideration of those requests the council and sitting at that time decided to cap awards for all applicants including City applicants that time at $1 million so the kinds of things we were going for for the 3.5 that included that variable something had to be prioritized since we're going for the the $1 million cap so the reest was to was from o to the city using ARA fund that's correct the city was an applicant just like many other external agents that wasn't uncommon during this process and so in the process of prioritization we had we came down to a million doll cap this request for approximately $400,000 is a portion of that $1 million award that was made to oewd in the general area of Business technical.

Assistance and in this case the focus with business on the Fairville quarter in concert with the action that Council took last Monday evening is to provide assistance for those businesses who are not don't have capacity just yet to deal with the financing that may come with with with some of the other awards for the kinds of improvements and and and in internal accountancy that they'll have or to get ready for the application process that'll go with it so is is to uplift their capacity in some instan provide some growth and all those kinds of things so the spec the specific you're talking about what sacrif IED in the process anding allocations I hope that helps and so and is there is there other efforts going on now at obw to support employ ownership or is that we're currently not are we not supporting I don't believe we have specific funding specific funding for it now we would we pursued a grant from a North Carolina state agency the name of it Escapes Me Right.

Now employee ownership yeah we weren't successful in that time we haven't abandoned the effort we just haven't funded it yet okay thank you that's something I think we want to return to obviously an important part of any Economic Development strategy is creating ways for employees to own their own companies and create good jobs and build wealthy that so I look forward to working with you on that in an attempt to completely to not completely ignore it in some instances when when we move into the coming fiscal year and perhaps subsequent ones when we look at the curricular basis the the base of curricular offerings in our technical assistance program and based on some specific kinds of things to to specific organizations that might be in a a position where they can receive that kind of technical assistance we're going to go from more large cohort to smaller cohort coachings where we may Identify some some some business organizations that might be a little bit more ready for it than just a general approach and.

That's just a prioritization based on resources at this time.

All right any other questions all right item 20 oh we did do that one.

21 21 yep I think that's me again yes thank you so clearly one of the city's priorities in creating shared economic Prosperity is creating a solid Workforce Development system right that's something we all share an interest in so since being elected to council I've been made aware of some concerns about how Durham is not effectively using our federal Workforce dollars oh no a lack of business engagement in the workforce board and concerns about the ratio of contractors to staff so there's been some concerns there so I know we're being asked to extend this contract to a provide contractor to implement the NC career work center operations that was covered by the original contract but I don't see a scope of services in this contract here it's a very short contract and I don't see a discussion of the goals of the contract being met so I just want to understand better the role of this contractor in providing Workforce Services at the NC career work center and how that relates to our larger.

Effort as part of the Workforce Development board well I'd have to look at the original contract in terms of the actual scope of services but this contract is basically to manage the NC Works career Center operations there and so there are services that are provided to our youth the youth that the adult and dislocated workers that's a separate programming operation that happens but the actual physical Center get operated by this contract and are there are there like are there goals of X number people to serve per year what those outcomes would be in terms of accessing jobs wages or what are what are our there all goals is is Russell Ingram he's yeah he's right here I'm on the head Russell Ingram Ingram he's a program coordinator for this he probably speak to that b okay because we that that was all we had was the amend Amendment of the contract there's no background in terms of what we're expecting to receive from this contract okay Russell welcome hi Russell Ingram with offic.

Of Economic and Workforce Development so essentially this is a a a routine contract as and the career center is we are getting those individuals to actually manage the contractor to manage the actual career center so previously before the state managed the career center and basically all this contract is for the management of the on Stop Career Center so with specific goals that's connected to this particular contract is just more so just uring that we are all inclusive ensuring that we are serving individuals at the career center making sure that all operations are going smoothly and being mindful that we are having all our partner agencies within the career center because again it is a One-Stop place for anybody who walks in and that is how it's ran throughout the state so this particular again this particular contract is for the management of the career center more of our goals are set on the action ual adult dislocated worker as well as the youth side that's where our goals and our performance measures are measured.

But this contract again is specifically in the management of the partners at the career center well I appreciate that I guess my my question would be in response to so if if the career center is operating smoothly as you're saying that that's that's the point of the contract like how do we how do you wall at o how does we as council members know that that's actually operating smoothly what are the sort of outcomes that we're expecting to receive so what we do is outcomes are measured through what we call Wagner piser so Wagner piser is a performance measure throughout the state of North Carolina anybody who comes in the coris or actually entered into that particular program called Wagner piser if you go in any cores throughout the state of North Carolina that's exactly what they're entered into this is the step prior to any individual wanting to be enrolled into the adult located worker or the youth program so with those particular wagn and positive results what they do.

Is the state in turns has different reports to where they may come in they may get resume build and they may just use actually the CRC which is the computer Resource Center things of that nature to see how many individuals are coming in cisa how many people are actually being seen by someone how many people are actually receiving services and going through the different partner agencies in that that aspect so that's how we get our overall performance numbers in a sense from the state so that that comes from the state I appreciate that and those are those reported back to the to the council at regular intervals when does the council see the results of those those activities in the career center so be it'd be great to have just some little little sort of visibility on how that's how that's so activities and how how successful that is yeah so to your point I think they're they this is really an administrative type of operation whereas the actual metrics.

Associated with the results are in the program contract but to address your question I know you're saying we're paying money what are we getting yeah so why don't you let us come back and give you exactly what we're getting for the for for the $100,000 it's $100,000 and you want to know what are the outcomes that expected for $100,000 it's not clear in this in the amendment right and also yeah then that that'll be really helpful but then also how that how that P that contractor how that relates to the larger work that we're doing in the workforce system right so how that how that contractor how they support the larger efforts all that would be great we'll work for a more coach at response absolutely appreciate it thank you thank you thank you all right still have three presentations let's get to those those are all my P items oh no yeah part item number 35 that's a presentation.

Yeah good afternoon mayor Williams other members of council my name is no clear match interim assistant director for Duram Parks and Recreation and me and my team today will be doing a presentation at the request of councilman Reese on care programs team programs and aquatics first up is Miss Daniel Hanks good afternoon my name is Danielle Haynes I am the recreation manager for school H care for the Parks and Recreation Department so thank you for having us the first part that I'm going to do is about our summer camps that we are going to be offering this summer they are scheduled to start June 17th and run through August 16th.

How how long have you been with the city I have been with the city for 12 years how did I not know that I don't know we went to college together the same 12 years wow okay y I know good all right Perfect all right so with our summer camps this year we are going to talk about our participants so we are expecting to offer 1,261 slots not to be confused with participants but opportunities available for people to be able to participate in summer camp the locations that we are going to offer is our Edison Johnson Recreation Center the IR homes Campus Hills facility wi Patterson Community Center wtown Park Recreation Center and WD Hill Recreation Center on this slide I'm going to skip to the bottom bullet where it talks about the sliding fee scale first because the structure will match with the second slide we offer a sliding fee scale for all of our school Age Care programs including summer camp but also after schools and Inter sessions where.

Families have the opportunity to apply and get discount for participating in programs so at the time of this presentation we had 126 families that had been approved for the siding fee scale that number has since increased just with those approvals taking place one of the things that I want to talk about is the implementation of new Staffing strategies for Camp structure Staffing is not a unfamiliar topic and is one of the struggles that we are currently having with our summer ke move to thank you so what we have seen over the past couple of years is a decline in Staffing which is affecting our ability to serve participants and so the staff came together to figure out what we can do to help and so through surveys through talking with our participants talking with parents we figured out that the normal lifestyle of the typical 7:30 to 6 wasn't hitting everyone and so we wanted to be able to offer more options more varieties to be able to address different Lifestyles and so what we.

Came up with is several Camp options which our first one is our halfday camp structure and so these are going to be camps that operate in the morning and then take a break and then in the afternoon and so these can cater to families who work from home and maybe they need care for their child in the morning but not necessarily in the afternoon or the opposite maybe they don't need care in the morning but they need something in the afternoon these camps also have very themed structures so typically when you think about summer camp you think oh send the kids to camp they're going to go swimming they're going to have field trips and a random kind of theme these themes are going to be very specific so things like cooking chemistry where they're going to learn about how to cook what does it take to measure how just how cooking Works we also have camps such as a Theater Camp so participants will have the opportunity to participate in.

Theater do a play and have performances so our halfday camps have a little bit more structured themes and hopefully with our half dayss we're able to serve more instead of just having a typical 7:30 to 6 being able to only serve the few our second type of Camp is a specialty Camp this is going to run from 9 to 9 to 4: and what this will do our first four weeks are specifically structured for stem Camp so for four weeks these participants will come day in and day out and they will learn everything there is to know about Steam and science technology engineering math and they will have a direct focus with that our traditional camps which are going to be held at Edison Johnson and Campus Hills will be from the 7:30 to 6 which is our typical Camp so we're still grasping the people who need that full day care so they will come they will swim they will have activities that'll be something they'll do all.

Day in our traditional and our specialty camps they will do field trips and then in all of our camps we have contractors and we've also tried to hire instructors to be able to help us with these very themed type of camps we are Parks and Recreation and we have some skill but if we can find someone in the community who has a passion for cooking or has a passion for theater we want to be able to bring them in and work with the kids and so that is a new structure that we have started to be able to better collaborate with some outside organizations and just general the general public want to talk about Staffing as I mentioned earlier so we have the capacity of participants however that is based on our staffing if we do not have the camp counselors to run Camp we're not able to do that we currently operate on a 1 to5 ratio which is one staff person to 15 participants which we have done and it has been.

Successful that's a good ratio thank you yep and and we pride oursel with that because with that ratio we're able to connect with participants able to build relationships with families and so as we are trying to figure out Staffing we have done a multitude of things to try to recruit so we have held our own job fair we are participating in community job fairs we have gone out to the libraries we have gone to local businesses we have gone all over Durham and even outside of Durham because we also understand that college students come home and so as they're returning home hopefully they're looking to work in summer camps and recruit so we don't just limit our recruitment to Durham we try to look everywhere am I missing no all right I'm going to to let Jackie who is my cooworker no name match talk about our Partnerships that we're incorporating within our summer camps good afternoon my name is Jackie Steckler and I am the recreation operation supervisor for our school H.

Care Unit so along with Danielle and myself we hope help oversee all of our summer camp sites and some of our Community Partnerships because I you know we think this is important to talk about because our our program does have high quality and part of having high quality and and the diversity is bringing things in for our kids that they've never seen before or things that they've never done before have gotten to experience before within our own city right so the Durham Police they come in and and work with our kids the water management and storm water and the K9 unit the sheriff's department the fire department so all of our own units within our or departments Within our city that have the opportunity to come in and teach stuff to our kids we we invite to come in and have a collaboration with and then there's also some County organizations and then you know just outside organizations so the Durham County Library comes in and does a lot with us the American dance.

Company and we have MC and we're currently you know there's a lot of others that we only had two slides so we couldn't put them all on the slide but there are a lot of other options and other organizations that we have come into our summer camp and ones that you know we've just started and we're we're looking at you know the nassa Museum of Art and Durham is one that you know we we tried to get something for this summer but they're they're looking to come into our after school programs so just a lot of different Community Partnerships that we offer we're going to pass it to death quick quick question while we're transitioning have we reached out to our school system like I'm sure you all have I'm asking that's all right yes the high school seniors we have a great relationship with the Community Education Department and so we are constantly in collaboration with working with them they help us with some of our training we are always talking about.

Some of our struggles with Staffing and can we help each other with any of that and so that is a relationship that we have to say that we have a a solution for our staffing no but we understand we understand that it's not just us right and and we talk about an industry that is having problems with Staffing so we are able to collaborate with them and other organizations to figure out if there's anything we can do got you I this is just a coincidence the seniors at the seniors at Trinity School Of Chapel Hill and Dorman Chapel Hill uhuh the seniors one of the seniors just literally emailed me and say Hey you know any opportunities for seniors to work this summer so I'm gonna do some putting in touch with yeah one of the things I think that no name match is going to talk about is we're looking at trying to incorporate a counselor and training type of program so that we can develop those youth into our regular counselors.

Creating a bridge which would be phenomenal aw one thing I do or two things I'm sorry that I do want to mention this year for us is going to be transitional because as you all may know Durham Public Schools has changed about four of the schools to year round from TR and so what we don't know yet is how that's going to impact our summer camp enrollment what we do know that it has impacted our staffing right and not only has it impacted our staffing but it's affected the lunches so Durham Public Schools typically provides free lunches for us that we've been able to have in our facilities but starting Mid July they're going to stop that program because they need all of their capacity at their schools because now they've increased the year round and so we have been on a hunt trying to figure out how we can still provide this most needed service as far as breakfast and lunch to our participants as this is.

New and so this year for us with trying this new camp structure and then also dealing with the lunches and going with more year round schools we're taking all the feedback to figure out what we can do so that next year we have a a clear path of all of these changes so question I know I have some larger questions but before I know we're going talk youth in a second just can you tell me just like just generally speaking what's the what is the advertised fee for these camps versus what most families pay given the sliding scale just a sense of that yeah so if somebody is not on a sliding fee scale the average pay per week is $132 if they are on the sliding fee scales those scales range from 10% all the way up and so if someone is on the 10% they're paying like $10 to13 per week for the end that is for our traditional camps that's for the 7:30 to.

6 if they are on the sliding fee scale and they are in the half day camp it is even less than that because it is less hours service hours that they're in I don't know the number but I we can get it that's good that's good and and how many what what share of families are on the like like how many pay the full Freight and how many are what what percentage are having are somewhere on the sliding scale so more than 50% of our families that we serve in school Age Care on the siding fee scale I would say it is more likely for us to see on siding Fe scale than not to see them on the siding fee scale thank you you're welcome yeah just also along with your counselors and training and recruiting from high schools for job employment in the summer lots of other organizations ask for volunteers over the summer so I know our Durham Arts Council most of our high schools require a volunteer percentage to graduate or.

Maybe they don't require it but they very much encourage yeah and so I know that Duram Arts Council definitely uses high school volunteers as Junior camp counselor so they have a paid person but then they have a second person there so that's another thank you yes that is something we really are excited about because it is that extra set of hands and they're closer to the kids age you know and so there is a relationship that they understand and just a continuous building like I said we have met several staff who have gone from Junior counselors or even Camp participants into staff and that makes us happy sounds good thank you good afternoon I'm no name match Ford I'm the recreation service manager overse WD Hill Weaver Street Durham Team Center and Citywide team programming thank you for having me today and as Danielle and Jackie has already talked about school age care we know the importance of having that continue of services by having team programming as well so we.

Have our team camps and our first team Camp I want to talk about is the Holton keran Resource Center which is called team connect we have 180 slots or participant slots that goes over nine weeks so we average 20 kids per week for nine weeks the the age for that that camp also was 13 18 as long as the 18y old is still in high school the price is 8775 per week but the sliding fee scale we got 75% of the kids who have applied so far on that sliding fee scale and they pay half that amount for the nine weeks so they pay roughly about $40 a week to attend this Camp coming up this coming summer our times that we go from 7:30 a.m. to 3 pm now some of you might wonder why don't we go to six o'clock well with teens it's a very fast pace and we try to memor what the school system does so also we don't have the behavioral issues.

When we notice that we don't bring that three to six Peri that 3 to six period in there 3 p p.m. to 6 PM there so basically what happens is that the kids are fast moving they inter they enjoy the camp and they're basically they're just basically moving from Station to Station and trips to trips and things like that life skills I want to just talk about some of the kind of the the programs that we do arts and crafts now arts and crafts you know sometimes sounds very Kitty 14 but when I talk about arts and crafts I'm talk about creating things like this where they have a journal where they actually take go to a wood a wood shop program and create these type of things I just want to just pass this around just in case for y'all to see them I think you just got me to enroll yeah yeah you have counsel Camp a question so so also we do the life Readiness.

Skills so one of the things that we always do with Team Camp is teaching them how to cook so it's cly we're always teaching them how to cook but secondly this year we're instituting a a a counseling training program so we're taking the kids for the first two weeks for the two first two or three weeks Alex first two weeks we're actually giving them job Readiness program telling them what to expect how to behave on a job what they need to dress like all those type of things that they have to do then for the rest of the weeks they're actually going to the school Age Care site and working with the youth so they can get counseling training and hopefully one day they will actually become counselors at our summer camps or whatever they decide they want to do but it's the ability to earn jobs and get a skill at this point in time we also think it's important for the kids to have a volunteer opportunities volunteer opportunities.

Basically shows kids that they need to give something back to their Community as well so we're talking about kids working volunteering at the diaper Bank we also got the food pantry that they G to be working at as well this as this this coming summer so we also got some new new things such as like teen talks we have a new staff person on who's going to be bringing her own flare to the to the teen camp at Holton the next summer program we have is called my Durham it's a program that we do during the academic year but we also have it during the summertime the thing about the summertime program is changes from 11:00 a.m. to 4 P p.m. we have a potential participant capacity of 450 kids 25 from the Durham teen center and 25 from the weave Street Recreation Center which is located in corn Wallace Community we go from again from June 17th to August 16th Monday through Friday from 11: a.m to 4 pm now we know.

The reason why we got it from 11:00 am. To 4 pm teams do not get up early in the summer they want to sleep late so we make sure that we are very attentive to where where they are so we can address those those needs that they have and or address the time that they can come activities interactive programs you probably saying what what do you mean by interactive programs well first of all you know we typically do the same Tri some of the same trips like Frankie or go bowling but this year we want to make sure that we give these kids some different OPP different looks so some of the things that we're doing this year is actually going horseback riding some of the things we're also doing are going canoeing but the big thing I'm working with the young Eagles we're trying to get we're doing fly free flying lessons for the kids so we hopefully they will be able to see what it takes to be an aviator.

And go into those fields later on but we want to expose kids and make sure that they're exposed to those opportunities one of the other things Al also with interactive programming one of the things as DPR celebrates their 100th Centennial one of the things that we're going to do is do a 100 we're going to do a hamburger eating contest a 100 hamburgers we're going to try to get 10 teenss which is 10 hamburgers a piece or 10 cheeseburgers a piece and we're going to have a a cheeseburger eating contest during that week of July 4th to mirror that hot dog eating contest in New York city so those are the things I'm talking about being interactive with the team now the next thing that we have is the DPR pal summer basketball league this is in conjunction with our partners from the police department we have a capacity of 72 kids to play so roughly is 12 six teams 12 players on each team the police department supplies.

The jerseys and they also Supply a team Parks and Recreation we Supply the referees as well as the the logistics of for the for the league it's free 13 to 16 we'll start practice on the end of June and we will start games pretty much that first week after July 4th we run to the first week in August great time we gonna be at Walltown recreation center and WD Hill Recreation Center do you have anything for me the mayor will come in on and play Hoops one of anybody else welcome okay all right we're go yeah let's do it all right we're coming to play Hoops one of these days sounds good look forward to having you I will come cheer yall on side I'll start stretching now though yeah I don't think council member cook or I will be playing but we can cheer good afternoon my name is deian brown I am the Recreation services manager and I oversee Aquatics so with this summer coming up.

We will have both our in our outdoor pools of Forest Hills and Hillside open they will open June 5th we are SCH to do that and excited we'll also have our indoor pools that will be open for the 14 hours that we're open 6:00 a.m. To 800m Edison Johnson Aquatic Center and IR homes Recreation Center we will be offering Recreation swim daily at both indoor and outdoor facilities as well as we have our spray grounds of no name match and Hillside that are going to be available from 8:00 a to 8:00 p.m. some changes that have happened are positive the Hillside spray ground which once was within the Hillside Pool area which was only able to operate whenever the pool was open has now been transformed and now it's available to be open 8 to 8:00 pm as well as it was on recirculating water which meant that staff had to treat it consistently making sure that they were there to you know intervene in any kinds of issues with water management of.

Of chemicals now is now on non- recirculating and available to the public which means it operates the same as all the rest of our spray grounds a big change as well is our outdoor pools will be open seven days a week this will be the first time since 2017 that we have been able to open our outdoor facilities daily which will be available from 100 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. our indoor pools as I stated as well during the week from 6:00 to 8 and our Saturday and Sunday operation from 8:30 to 5: as well as 1:00 to 5 on Sunday we'll offer lap swim water exercise recreational swim and we'll also have some special events with that we provide swim lessons we'll be projected to offer about 80% or 80 people on p participant sorry in our learn to swim program and the cost of that is normally $446 to $52 and that would be for eight classes this summer for our swim lesson program it will run in a.

Two- week segment so we'll have Monday through Thursday for two weeks that's just because with the summer having long extended classes aren't as beneficial people go on vacations there's a lot going on so we try to condense those down so that way we can get more lessons in but also being able to accommodate around the summer time frame and people's vacations and opportunities with our outdoor pools and being open seven days a week in our indoor pools we are grateful that our staffing capacity has increased we have really did a big push on getting lifeguards this season we had five lifeguard classes and we're able to certify 62 certified lifeguards and encouraged all of them to work for the city of Durham because we do a great job at providing that first opportunity lifeguard with a great environment to work in training as well as a good decent pay of $118.90 an hour so that's something that they are very much so encouraged to apply with us be a part of our.

Organization and learn as well so we hire at the age of 16 and we're excited to have a lot of our new incoming lifeguards last year we had one seasonal applicant this year we have at least 15 seasonal applicants that want to come at Le just for the summer if not anything to get that. Experience all right I need to renew my instructor's license for lifeguard too come on we have lifeguard instructor courses annually yeah I don't know if I have the breath anymore Mr council member Baker thank you all so much for those presentations and for all of the work that you're doing I think this is one one of the most important programs and one of the most important things that the city of DM does one of my questions for you all is where are we in terms of the number of applicants that we're the number of applications that we're receiving versus the number of slots that we have available and are we meeting the demand.

And how close are we to meeting the. Demand so I will say that this year we have seen an influx of applications just as we're coming out of the co error and people not really applying however we are not where we need to be and so what we are relying on is Staff who want to work additional hours so we typically book staff and shifts so they would work at 7:30 to 12:30 and so for us to be able to cover the camps we have the ability to work 40 hours and so it is a benefit to staff who want to work the additional hours and they don't have to go look for other jobs that they can rely on us to be able to get the extra hours but on a logistic side we would like to have two staff so that we have a backup if somebody calls out then we'd only be out four hours versus the whole day and so I would say Jackie you deal she deals with hiring.

The most I would say that we are about 80% of where we need to be but like I said we're not concerned about operating staff or not concerned about operating camps because we do have people who are available to work those dou shifts am I accurate yeah I think the the thing with the Staffing is we have the weight list right so like our our summer camps all of our summer camps have weight lists and in order for us to pull off those weight lists and to serve more kids in our community we have to have more staff to do that so that's where we you know especially us as moms ourselves like we need places for kids need places to go so that parents can work and you know so I think that's where our struggle is is being able to pull off the weight list our cams where they sit right now we can staff because we would never do that right we would never have camps and crazy numbers that we don't.

Have the staff for it's just you know being able to to increase our numbers in those camp locations how close are we in how many more people are applying than there are itions say say that question how many people are on the waight list oh so each site is a little different I can tell you I'm going to give you a factual number from Monday when I looked Edison Johnson had. 147 and the the biggest limitation is our ability to staff up correct I want to say one thing that I think we pride oursel on is our program is wanted right in the community and it's needed and we can tell that by our weight list numb so if there you know is a way for us to be able to get this additional Staffing we can then increase those numbers because it is needed it is something that families look forward to and we talk to families all the time who are disappointed because they're not.

Able to you know enroll so that is one of our challenges but also one of the things that we're working on and trying to figure out how we how we can get staff in and do you have insight into why there is that challenge right now and how we can help you it's an industry the child care industry has seen a change really with after Co I think there were more options presented for people to be able to work who things like college students they like the flexibility of being able to you know kind of float in and Float out and so that is what we have with talking to our staff and talking to people who typically would work school AG Care they want more flexibility they want the instant pay they want the things that just kind of doesn't come with that and or with our positions and so I think increase in Pay of always is going to be something that is enticing I think offering quality programming so that.

They know that they have support I think is a huge thing knowing when they come into the site they have supervisors who are going to listen they're able to contribute what we have found is it's not just about the pay but it's about how you feel in the job and so creating a culture and environment of where people want to be so there are a lot of private actors in this space as well nonprofits other organizations do we have any sense of is there anyone is there anywhere where there's this Clearing House where we can look at the entire ecosystem holistically and how Duram Parks Ander creation which provides probably more affordable you know programming than other private entities what percentage do we have in that market and are we be how can we outcompete them in terms of being able to hire and providing programming and also I'm just curious about demographics because we know during Public Schools the demographics are are shifting and a lot of families are sending their.

Children to Charter Schools and private schools are we seeing the same kind of thing when it comes to camps that was a lot of questions it was to go back to your first question about and let me just clarify your asking if there's some sort of like a network where we work with other outside agencies to talk about what we're all doing as far as participants and as far as Staffing do I have that correct yeah I guess the question is do we understand holistically how many slots there are for all of the different programs how much some programs cost versus what Durham what Durham Parks and Recreation programs cost do we understand holistically what are the opportunities for kids and teenagers to be able to occupy their time with summer camps each summer I don't we don't know W walk with Parks and Recreation but it's a great question we know anecdotally about who the other players are in the local area recently council member rist and I.

Became aware of a out School Time study I believe it Wake County that had started that Wake County Co-op extension is doing instead of yeah so I know council member R and I learned about that recently and was something that we had hoped to maybe we could tackle here in Durham so it would accomplish just what your question was to get an understanding whether it's public or private U providers and understand what are the needs you know how many youth between this age these ages don't have anything to do during the summer and then we can get a a sample of how many nonprofit how many public you know all those different organizations to give us that idea what to go for and then in terms of attracting more people I know the city like Danielle couldn't have said it better about our culture and environment and pay only other thing that we've started to explore if we could is you know explore the idea of of a signing bonus even just different uniqueness out.

There that we could help attract some people is that a study that I would be interested in us pursuing a study like that I mean as we understand like so Durham County cop extension could do the same study so so and I know cop extensions is on the county side but I think there's people there who are aware of the W County study so it's worth us talking maybe one of our joint City County meetings talking with the county manager about how do we how do we get this kind of study done it would also I mean Mr wall Cuts correct it would it would sort of address summer stuff but also address after school during the school year all that stuff you know and as May saying like what are we doing about some of this awful crime oring I this is one of the big ways we can respond this is a really powerful way so so thank you I just want to say as a former DPR summer camp parent which.

You did actually feel like you were doing the lottery as soon as the thing opened whatever it was February I don't even I will say I don't miss those days March yeah you're like up so we were it's excellent care for your kids in the summer and it is extremely just priced really really well and in comparison to some of our other camps in the area it can cost thousands and thousands of dollars as a as a parent of three we one time took a vacation unpaid because we figured out we were saving a lot of money by not paying for summer camps so so thank you all for it's a great presentation and then I am curious about that that kind of broader study I think having kids engaged for including employment right like these the teenagers I really appreciate that counselor and training I'm very happy when all my children turn 16 because I'm very much a Believer and go get a job y and hopefully when.

My youngest will be at when he turns 16 he's already planning on doing the life lifeguard class he's and it's the pay I'm always like those jobs are year round you can go work all year and they pay a lot better than everybody else does so so first of all Mr walcut and and staff deian Jackie Danielle all right no name match thank you so much for the presentation I also want to thank the council after I heard this presentation at the recreation advisory committee I was like oh my gosh we've been talking so much in the council about summer camps this is something we need to he so thank you all for giving the thumbs up to having this presentation here I think you know as we discuss all the stuff we talk about in city council grounding this discussion in data is really helpful and knowing that like our own Parks and Rec Department as you said providing top quality camps we also as it's been a long time ago but our kids.

Were also in DPR camps back in the day high quality like trained instructors right paid a living wage thinking about raos all this kind of stuff is really valuable and so as we're talking about potentially other funds for summer camps is worth noting that we've got a quality staff here with more resources they could also do a lot more so just to put that in the mix and think about that as we're thinking about this larger question of like summer camps and out of school time so thank you so much for the presentation thank you so much question that you may not have the answer to right now at full capacity every child paying and this is going to be hard to answer because of the sliding scale but let's say every child was paying the full amount we capacity do you know what that dollar figure would be for every Camp collectively I I I see your face tell you the numbers if you want to take out a.

Calculator we can calculate yeah because we do know the numbers of in ballark is fine yeah ballpark is fine and I'm asking that because I I think we have an opportunity well I I I dare not to speak ahead of talking to my colleagues about this you know but when we can when you see a number you can always see a potential investment so the next thing is what does it look like for dur have free camps we estimated at a little over 188,000 $18,000 if every participant was paying full pay I say this again so if every correct me if I got your question right so you wanted us to look at the camps that we're offering and if every single one of those participants that we have enrolled was paying full pay times nine yeah so it would be 18,000 a week yeah per week correct per week right so 162 something so 162,000 and that does not include teams it does not include team that would just.

Be the Youth Camp okay all right so what I'm getting yet is this may be something we look at in the future the city of Durham offers free camps to kids shouldn't be a barria to have our kids occupied which just if everything goes well with the budget you know we creating a summer camp fund that could help with this now I do you know it's I want to make sure that we're not you know almost like an honor System you know if you can pay pay you know but I just do not want any type of barrier to kids being you know having access to engagement we actually anecdote I mean there there's been a lot of studies saying that people are actually pretty honest around when they can pay and when they can't pay and we actually with our stiens have seen that on on our boards and commissions the folks who don't need a stien don't ask for the form so I will just say that there we we do have.

Some at least in the city of Durham evidence of folks not taking advantage of something that they could take advantage of if they wanted to well you're talking Municipal budgets I mean 100 this sounds I don't mean to sound like you know we're just balling but right Municipal governments you know 160,000 I see the budget person you can find I mean what my point is like that that's an easy budget line item I mean Budget reest I do have a budget request for next year that's why I'm asking this line of questioning so we we and just just one more comment Mr Mayor and and connected to what you're saying one of the challenges Danielle and and their team see is she mentioned earlier the majority of families that sign up for Camp do qualify for a fee reduction and a big chunk of them pay very little and what is interesting about that maybe 10 bucks a week what is interesting sometimes a challenge occurs where everyone has signed up for Camp they.

Paid 10 bucks for a week and then they're like well I'm not going to go this week because I'm going to do something else and not take my kids to Camp it's I'm only out $10 and that happens sometimes too or unfortunately and you know the quality and the standards that we have some folks will say well it's only 10 bucks how good could it be and so sometimes with a lower amount it has a a reverse effect of like well maybe the quality is not that great too so we'll continue to push and advertise and Market the not only the quality but the culture and the environment and what we're doing for children but that's just an interesting that we find sometimes yeah I get it and and that's why I you know if a kid that lives in this city wants to go to a summer camp and a parent wants their child to go they should be able to go and that's what I.

Want to make sure we have capacity to do I don't think this is really about I'm not trying to speak for someone's financial situation or their household but psychology plays a role in this as well you know you look at Walmart and Target carts are all over the place you look at Audi for 25 cents you're gon to take that cart back and get your quarterback so it's it's the psychology with it as well and I just wanted to make one comment I just wanted to remind and thinking of budgets and thing like things like that this isn't Break Even situation so when we talk about budgeting the money that we bring in for fees does not zero cost out the cost that it takes to have the program so I just wanted to throw that out the numbers that was my next question that there's a whole another City budgeted fund that helps to put on the camps but if we're talking about increasing and things like that that has to be taken.

Into consideration because those will go up if that goes up so I just wanted to right so so the reason why I asked if every kid was paying what that cost would be because I would then consider that supplemental to whatever it cost for the entire summer camp operation okay which I'm sure is way more you know so those are and we don't have to you know deliberate that today but I just want you to know my line of thinking on this and director re I I I see you watching over there I promise I'm not going to throw your budget out of whack this year but she's giving me that look okay thank you any other questions council Baker yes yeah just last question transportation of accessibility is transportation provided or so transportation is not provided from someone's home to a camp parents would have to parents or Guardians would have to figure out how to get their participants to a site however Transportation to field trips to swimming to other recreation centers.

For other activities that is all provided okay has that ever been a posed a barrier to it has moreful it hasn't been one because we offer a variety of sites throughout the city parents are able to figure out what works best for them and so we have had parents who have taken the bus to get their kids there we have had Parents even who have ubered because they want the summer camp and know that they want to be there so it hasn't been a a large topic or issue that we've seen okay thank you it it's rare that we are all so excited about a single thing and so I I feel like this is this is one of those things where you would have a very United Council to to support your efforts and awesome again I really appreciate your presentation and your work thank you one thing to just add for transportation and when we switch to after school we do provide after school transportation from the schools to our recreation.

Centers and then we and that is a partnership with their Public Schools as well because where they provide transportation to a site we kind of supplement and go in so we do have transportation throughout the year thank you any other questions Mr Mayor oh yeah are there's are I think some may are we accepting citizen comments now on this as well or on this item there was I do have one person.

Thank you for your patience it's good to see you again yeah I'm glad to hear y'all's excitement around Recreation for kids and Aquatics in particular my name is Lee bardley I'm here to speak about the swim for Charlie program as some of you know the swim for Charlie program teaches Durham public school students water safety skills we work particularly with second grade students and we focus particularly on schools that have high percentage of free and reduced lunch students over half of our students learn the most safety water most important water safety skills over the eight sessions that we work with them we're really excited to be able to provide this service for Durham I'd like to ask youall to keep three data points in mind as I talk about my concerns today number one drowning is second only to car accidents as the cause of accidental deaths for children ages 5 to 14 black and brown children are at a greater risk 6 4% of black children 45% of Latino children and 40%.

Of white children have little to no swimming ability and number three swim lessons reduce the likelihood of drowning by 88% despite the danger drowning poses and the efficacy of the swim for Charlie program we are currently unable to operate at our full capacity and reach some of the children who need us the most because we lack pool pool space in Durham we can't teach seven elementary schools in Durham in East Durham because Campus Hills the IR Holmes Recreation Center is not available to us the children these schools are exactly the children that our program is designed to support the DPR staff have told us that they cannot grant us access to both DPR pools because they do not have sufficient number of lifeguards and I've really appreciated the conversation around Staffing here I'm here to ask for your help in resolving this issue the swim for Charlie staff has met with the leadership of the aquatics program and offered a number of possible solutions to this issue including asking our.

Volunteer instructors who have LIF G guard certification from the American Red Cross to volunteer as guards or to join the DPR staff to work during the swim for Charlie program hours staff have rejected these options pursuing them would be a change for DPR and would require flexibility in my view resolving difficult problems sometimes requires flexibility unfortunately the very process that DPR uses to hire guards might be a barrier and I'm so glad that staff who are doing such a great job job are out there looking for people but I had the experience of applying to teach swimming with DPR this past fall before I knew about the swim for Charlie program and joined it as a volunteer my application was Deni declined I have a master's in social work I've worked with children for almost 40 years and have a water safety instructor certification from the Red Cross when I asked various staff people why this might be I was told that applications are often rejected if the applicant misses a.

Question the application I went back and counted I had answered I think it was 112 questions including where I went to high school I graduated in 1979 I was never alerted that I missed a question in the application process no one knows how many potential lifeguards or Swim instructors are dissuaded from applying by the length of this application and the tum of navigating the Antiquated system which I know y'all don't have time but I wish you could go on and have the experience that I had of applying I'm going to keep talking because I've been sitting here for almost four hours so we don't know how many applications have been rejected I would like to suggest that DPR use a shorter application give you a little bit more time but I want to be consistent thank you mayor I really appreciate it a Google form as an initial application could make this portal an actual portal I know that this is a nationwide problem I feel like your HR staff could.

Come up with a way to help your DPR staff meet the need that we all want want met children's lives are literally at stake thank you so much.

Right 33 there we go thank you item number 33.

Colleagues y' all need to take a a quick yeah sorry you're right there we so take take your time to get set up we're gonna take a quick break and we'll get back here at 5:00.

Pm you got it okay we'll know that for next time.

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G to get started very good mayor Williams council members Deputy city manager Ferguson I am Tim Floyd the finance director with with the FY 24 third quarter financial report this is a collaborative effort between the finance department and the budget Management Services Department and so at this time I would absolutely like to thank my colleague director rean for the work that she and her team have put in these quarterly updates as well as the staff the Min staff and the finance department who put who puts this information together this information is as of March 31st of 2024 so the end of Q3 we'll start with general fund which is this the city's main operating fund and so if I were to give the quick and dirty version of the financial update it would be we are inogate with budget but we are not anticipating any surpluses like we have seen in the previous three years the nice thing is with we can report that all departments are going to.

Come in under budget we are anticipating being under budget by 6.4 million most of that is attributable to Personnel savings a vacant position savings and as you see here we're looking to be under in Personnel Services by 6 point almost 6.4 $6.5 million a little bit over in our operating expenditures I think some of that was because higher than anticipate at elections cost but again under budget by 6.4 in total and moving into our revenues and so this is a summary of all of our revenues I did sort of want to point out and so revenues we're looking at coming in a little over a budget on revenues just $779,000 really the important thing I would like to illustrate here we have a budget variance of $7.2 million but the column I would like to point to your attention would be the projection through year end and if you go that is the net revenue less expenditures amount and you'll see that is a negative number what that illustrates is while we.

Have a positive budget variance and we always want to see a positive budget variance because we cannot go over budget in general what that 3.58 million represents is that we are using reserves or appropriated fund balance to balance our budget so we balance a budget with appropriated fund balance and so this year we are anticipating using $3.5 million of our reserves in order to meet budget now I also want to say this is the worst case scenario so when we do are doing our projections we fully know that by the end of the year that there will be lots of incumbrances lots of contracts that are not that are not going to be completed those are in that which would roll to the next year but for all intent purposes that is when you see that negative number in that column that is that is we are using Surplus revenues to do that but this is how we budgeted this is what we anticipated that there's just no surprises from that standpoint we start talking.

Individually about some of our bigger revenues we've got the property taxes and this just really sort of shows you although I will say I do have a number I just recognize that it's not 2011 that should be 2021 but as you go up there you'll see the slight increases that we see over property taxes again property taxes are coming in as expected those are our most predictable Revenue stream sales tax on the other hand is the bigger story so as you see sales tax continues to grow from 2021 all the way up to 24 we we're seeing really good increases 39 million all the way up to what we are as of through March 31st we've collected 50.4 million but sales tax isn't growing at what we were anticipating even though it's still growing and we were a little bit more ambitious in our budgeting for that so you'll see as a percent of budget it is a lower percent of budget and in the current year we are anticipating being under.

Budget on our sales tax by $749,000 as opposed to the prior year where we actually were over budget $10.7 million if we just wanted to look at some of our comparisons from the current year to the prior year for our IND of year projections these are the end ofe projections looking at those different revenue streams you'll see that overall we're anticipating our total revenues to be over by $779,000 like I said prior year we were over budget on revenues by $14.3 million again we talked about the the sales tax and then the the other Bitcoins no surprises there utility franchise taxes those numbers are just people are not using landlines as much anymore so those revenues are are certainly on the on the decline now we're going this is a chart to just sort of show you where I was comparing Revenue to revenue now we are actually comparing Revenue to expenditures and so this through the third quarter 2024 so that First Column is through the third quarter all.

Of the other years are actually for the end of the year it just shows again that we are trending right where we should be the only here I the only thing I would like to point out is when you look at 2023 2022 and 2021 one you see there are much more higher revenues than we had in expenditures and again we we we will not be anticipating that to be the case this year again we will we will be under budget it's just that we we are not expecting any surplus from a revenue standpoint to add to our reserves quickly because I know it's been a long day Enterprise funds we can go over them very quickly Water and Sewer we have a positive budget variance of $2 million we go to look at their revenues very tight budgeting in the Water Management Department they do a very good job there revenues are going to come over a little over $107,000 almost $108,000 with overall budget variance of $2 million most of their savings.

Are in the the Personnel Services category Transit fund again operating expenditures projected under budget by about $3.8 million with a total budget variance of $4.5 million this is somewhat funded by a tax rate and if you were to look at their revenues you'll see under the inter intergovernmental revenues line there's a a $1.3 million shortfall that is just because I think there was some County funding for a program that started midye so we don't have so so the offset of that would be some of the expenses as well but again an overall budget variance of $4.4 million but again if you would look at that one column the projection through year end you'll also see that again we are using fund balance reserves for for that again not a bad thing it it is planned in many cases many cases we work to right siize our fund balance and our our reserves and so this is this is not unusual I just want to to point that out Solid Waste to clear on that so.

You're saying that we budgeted we budgeted fund balance to as part of the budget for the year yes so how so so North Carolina you're required to have a balanced budget and so the way you balance that budget typically is you you will use if you have a higher fund balance than necessary you will use that fund balance appropriated fund balance to balance your budget and a lot of those it's for the It's usually the onetime cost we don't we usually don't use it for like recurring cost you usually use that fund balance for sort of onetime items in the budget we're on budget there we just we had planned to use right exactly yes all this all this is planned it's not something we should be we concerned about it just some years you you have you make a little bit more some years you make a little bit less so I think for solid waste again I think we're we're right on on schedule I think we've actually even seen some Revenue.

Increases in our operating revenues where we've seen a return of customers who previously have gone elsewhere now they're coming back when they because they've had issues with outside vendors contracted services and so so it's nice to see that that we're having that come back overall budget variance of $2.1 million so we're we're looking good there storm water just again storm water is a self-sufficient fund so it does not receive any tax money it is all based upon fees I think we've got we've had a be a boost in those fee revenues and you see they've got a pretty large overall budget variance of $6.1 million revenues have been good but again if you look at that one line even still we are still using reserves to balance that budget and that's because storm water has a lot of capital projects that we pay for as a payo project we don't we we are not debt funding those projects so there there's usually always a big transfer that goes for their capital projects the parking fund.

An anticipated over all variance of about $57,000 so again it's on a tight budget just the one thing with the parking fund we do from The Debt Service fund subsidize some of the debt service for the parking fund for the the parking garages so this is a fund that we have seen struggle over the last couple of years a lot of it due to the remote work and the use of the garages during the week are just not what it used to be and so where I will point out where I have pointed out before on that column of the projection to year end that $1.5 million there is no fund balance in the parking fund so that is for the most part a loan that we are carrying from other Enterprise funds and so that's carried on our books as a liability for our Enterprise funds so hopefully one day we'll we'll we'll see some recovery there and do we offset that with other Enterprise funds essentially we don't.

Have to so this is the only one that we have in that that's in that situation at this point but I mean we we offset that then with with with with surpluses and other Enterprise funds right yes yes yeah yeah yeah cumulatively our Enterprise funds are doing very well and so it's just it's a it's a financial it's a liability on the books for that particular fund ballpark just briefly we're doing very well with the ballpark right on budget DPAC of course we always talk about how well it's doing it continues to do well will not stay on those very long and then our County inspections funds have traditionally not ever mentioned that in one of our reports just again just wanted to reiterate it because it is one of our special Revenue funds that we have it's doing well it is supported by user fees permit fees and in this situation it's a shared relationship with the city and county because of the North Carolina building codes and the.

Building codes we have of the county in this regards they've had a pos positive budget variance of $1.4 million and in their regards we are very much anticipating a Sur Surplus for that fund that pretty much is it for my presentation just a reminder that this report is online we did add a new exhibit to this quarterly Finance report the general Services real estate division report which I think reports on leases that we are record that we are required to report on so just consolidating some of our report reporting requirements we thought this was a good report to incorporate that into so that will be included and just one thing I would also like to mention one thing we noticed today that in those exhibits we have 10 exhibits somehow exhibit nine did not get included so I will make sure that exhibit 9 does get included in I think that was a technical error basically my fault so we will make sure that that exhibit gets included and updated thank you so much.

Colleagues no questions great. All right item number 36 Vision zero update. Presentation it's great to see you great to have you. Here your phone.

So we haven't had a chance to meet yet but I'm going to come and get on your calendar okay so we can hang out talk about how I can support your work sounds.

Good I did watch a city life video interview.

Ready do we need to go full screen on it there we go hey hello mayor members of city council my name is Lauren Gro and I'm the city's Visions Euro coordinator and the transportation department I'm here today to present an update on the city's Vision zero commitment to end traffic dusts and serious injuries and ask for adoption of a new vision zero resolution in 2023 traffic crashes resulted in lives lost on roadways in Durham Carlos yessica David Deborah TSA Michael Daryl Robin Cheryl Monty Kelvin James sha Jackie Arthur alvado George Dean Bonito Melissa Donna Frankie Gabriella Miriam khil Elijah Hector David and Daryl these lives lost and the lives lost in traffic violence that may not have been reported are unacceptable and preventable tragedies the only acceptable number is zero in 2017 the city committed to Vision zero to eliminate traffic fatality and serious injuries and improve Mobility so that it is safe healthy and Equitable for all this commitment requires an organizational safety culture that integrates safety into its policies.

Plans and programs such as designing safe and acceptable streets for people of all ages and abilities targeting the leading causes of injury investing in underrepresented communities and prioritizing safety over other Transportation measures like congestion to achieve these objectives we structure Vision zero using Safe Systems approach the US Department of Transportation states that Vision zero is our goal and a safe system is how we get there safe systems recognizes that the human body can only sustain so much force before it is injured and that there are multiple components of our transportation system that impact risk of being in injured the Safe Systems pyramid created by public health engineer David Eder with a CDC that you see here helps Transportation professionals to frame their tra Traffic Safety approach much like that of a public health approach putting the most weight and resources into the solutions most likely to decrease risk and prevent injury at the population level investing in Solutions at the bottom of the pyramid have a population health impact while.

Solutions toward the top rely on individual effort so for example a focus on socioeconomic factors number one at the bottom of the pyramid may include policy that links affordable housing with public transportation land uses that create dents walkable neighborhoods and Street design standards that prioritize vulnerable Road users and slow vehicle speeds Citywide policy like this helps to decrease everyone's risk of being injured in a crash because we are limiting exposure to injury-causing factors like the force of a vehicle constructing new streets and retrofitting existing ones to include traffic calming measures that reduce vehicle speeds Implement physically protected space for people walking and biking and adding safe Crossings near bus stops are part of our built environment which is number two on the pyramid everyone moves through our roadways in a variety of ways and so when done at scale Citywide physical changes to improve Street safety and dignify the ways in which people move have a population level impact with highly protective effects we know that this works Alexandria Virginia achieved.

Zero traffic deaths in 2023 by focusing on a Safe Systems approach rooted in speed management policy and changes to the built environment like adding a connected network of bicycle facilities and sidewalks daylighting intersections so that drivers cannot park within Crossings and upgrading crosswalks moving up the pyramid relies more on individual effort to be effective latent safety measures like signals and Signal timing and active measures like stop signs can be very useful in injury prevention if implemented systematically but it does rely on road users to adhere to the signals and signs education measures like campaigns encouraging drivers to slow down rely the most on individual effort because we have to see hear and understand the message adhere to the message and the message has to be powerful enough to change Behavior over the long term this takes a lot of resources and has the least protective effect so recognizing traffic violence as a Public Health crisis necessitates a public health approach which focuses on preventing injury and controlling risk factors at the population level this.

Requires a shift in thinking no longer do we accept death and serious injury as inevitable outcomes of our transportation system humans make mistakes and when those mistakes lead to a crash the impact on the human body doesn't result in a fatality or Serious injury these principles are inherent in Safe Systems and vision zero policies and they need to be foundational in Durham's Traffic Safety approach so to deploy that approach we need to understand what is the problem in the last 10 years in Durham we have not seen a steady decrease in traffic dusts and serious injuries the graph displayed here shows that in fact we have a trend in the wrong direction with an increase in traffic dust and ser serous injuries serious injuries are the taller orange bars that you see and fatalities are the dark blue bars these data are reported crashes across all Road users in the last five years 19% of fatal crashes have involved pedestrians which is the most common type of fatal crash angle crashes like a T-bone crash.

Account for 18% and drivers running off the road account for 12% these top three crash types account for nearly 50% of fatal crashes in Durham identifying patterns like these help to determine priorities for safety improvements when we look spatially at fatal and serious injury crashes we see a few notable patterns in the last five years 80% of fatalities have occurred on surface streets so not highways like nc47 15501 I40 I85 and I 85 meaning a vast majority of fatal crashes are happening on roadways that intersect with other streets they have traffic signals and other form of traffic control and a mix of land uses fronting them so they are streets serving multiple functions fatal crashes are also happening disproportionately for example 16% of all crashes happen in areas with both majority low-income households and people of color yet 30% of fatal crashes occur here meaning when a crash happens in these communities it is more likely to be.

Fatal so since Durham's Vision zero commitment in 2017 there have been multiple efforts to improve Street safety listed here are those which closely align with vision zero some of which are currently underway and present significant opportunities to address the socioeconomic factors associated with st Safe Streets like the Udo update which is poised to standardize land use and transportation best practices the city CIP process creates opportunities for transformative investments in multimodal infrastructure and close coordination with Partners like ncdot ensure we're utilizing ongoing processes to leverage improvements to the built environment such as reconfiguring pavement markings during Street resurfacing efforts it takes dedicated resources to achieve Vision zero including staff like a vision zero coordinator and where some cities struggle to carve this out in their budget Durham found a way that the city council staff and the community work to create such a position is an achievement on its own and Durham is putting resources into built environment changes which decrease the risk of injury and improve safety.

For all Road users on the left is a pedestrian Refuge island with a pedestrian activated signal on Roxboro Street just south of KNX where there are bus stops serving Goram Route 4 pedestrian Refuge islands like these are proven safety counter measures even without the pedestrian activated signal pedestrian Refuge Islands reduce pedestrian crashes by 56% they self- enforce driver yielding and they can help the slow vehicle speeds by effectively narrowing the roadway on the right is Enterprise Street in the Southside neighborhood where a community-driven project to reduce vehicle speeds was a success redesigning and narrowing the roadway using simple treatments like paint post and speed cushions reduced speeds by 177% this project is also evidence of Durham's multidisiplinary coordination with fire departments testing fir Tru operations and God Durham testing bus operations prior to installation the city of Durham has the tools to improve Street safety and there is a need to develop an equitable systematic strategy to implement countermeasures at scale Citywide this starts with committing to a year at.

Which we we will end traffic deaths and serious injuries setting an achievement year creates accountability helps City staff establish benchmarks and communicates our commitment to the urgency of saving lives on our roadways we need a strategic action plan with metrics and refined goals a collaborative of multidisiplinary groups needs to be established to develop those goals and implement the action plan these groups will help to analyze data that will determine priority corridors answering the question which streets will we add address first in that plan there will be systematic approaches to proactively implement safety improvements so rather than relying on a responsive safety model we will develop datadriven procedures to proactively identify areas of safety concerns and work with the community to create and Implement improvements all of these needs require a culture of experimentation and Innovation to achieve zero we will need a willingness to try new ways of doing things to test out and pilot new safety features and evaluate Effectiveness if something isn't working it doesn't mean removal it means we readjust and.

Re-evaluate until we get it right and in my time at the city of Houston former Houston mayor acknowledge that wild traffic crashes increased Citywide as it happened across the nation during the pandemic crashes decreased by 26% on streets that were rebuilt since adopting Vision zero in 2019 stating I want you to think about that it means the places we fix we fix right so what's our timeline to get an action plan it is quick and we feel confident it's achievable because of the groundwork that's been laid by City staff since before I started in December 2023 so we've been working to evaluate crash data and patterns some of which I showed you and more is on the way we've also been meeting with departments and partners to talk about Vision zero effort and engage on challenges which doesn't necessarily end at any point but it may shift into more formal working groups we are working to revise the vision zero resolution which is part of the reason for this pre presentation and.

Plan to attend events and Community meetings that are already happening over the course of the summer we hope to hear from community members about their traffic safety concerns going into the fall we will start to develop themes and priorities based on what we heard as part of the vision zero action plan will identify key actions and Innovative methods and use data and proven safety counter measures to establish benchmarks for Success all all of this will be vetted by our partners both at the city and other agencies who are going to be key in implementation and by December we will have a final Vision zero action plan setting us up to move into 2025 with a strategy primed for implementation so to get there we ask that a new resol vision Z resolution item 27 on the agenda be approved which includes Target dates to reduce fatalities and serious injuries by 50% by 2035 and eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2045 as I mentioned setting Target dates help City staff to develop benchmarks.

Creates accountability and establishes our commitment to end traffic dust and serious injuries it will increase our eligibility to receive federal funding for vision zero available now through the Safe Streets and roads for all Grant opportunity a criteria to receive funds for implementation is that the entity has established through policy a Target date to achieve Vision zero and lastly this resolution is a reflection of the urgency that we've heard from the community saving lives ending traffic violence cannot wait so we greatly appreciate the council recognizing that this is the critical next step in Durham's effort to end traffic death and serious injuries thank.

You thank you so much colleagues thank you thank you so much Lauren I'm so glad that we have you on staff and the work that you are doing and embarking on here and I'm of course going to be supporting the resolution one of my questions is I I have have a few questions one is how important is Street and intersection design in in general and theoretically in Vision zero and Street safety yeah I think it's a crucial piece of achieving Vision zero so when I talked about that pyramid it was right at the bottom the built environment so when you're thinking about how we're designing our streets in intersections that's a key piece of addressing changes in the environment making sure that when we're designing streets and intersections we're thinking about the safety of our drivers slowing speeds down because we know speed is a major factor in all types of crashes and we're thinking about more vulnerable Road users like people walking and biking so any chance we can to shorten the.

Crossing distances physically protect people who are more likely to be injured in a crash that all comes down to Street design and can you talk a little bit about so we you know we hear a lot about hey can you make this speed limit sign 35 rather than 45 because obviously we want people driving 35 rather than 45 because if you get hit by a vehicle you're much more likely to die at 45 than you are at 35 can you talk a little bit about speed limit signs versus design speed of Roads yeah so there's a couple of components to that there is a research study out of Seattle that shows adding more speed limit signs even not lowering the speed limit but adding more you get slightly more adherent so a couple miles per hour which does make a difference and then there are studies that show you know changing the speed limit does not have a big impact it's really when it comes down to when you.

Change the design of the roadway and pair it with lowering speed limits that's when you really start to see slower speeds or more people adhering to that speed limit can you talk about what the design speed is conceptually like in North Carolina or just what is what is design what is the design speed speed is how we're designing the roadway is the intention that we want drivers to be going right so when we talk about the design speed that's that's what we mean so we really want to be thinking if we want to enforce a 25 mile per hour speed limit on our roadways we have to design it for that we can't expect that multiple Lanes of traffic will enforce a 25 M hour speed limit we might see people driving above that speed limit especially when there are fewer drivers on the roadway and people see it more as a highway with an opportunity to speed so I think that's what we mean when we talk about design speed is really.

Thinking about all of the components that come into play and to slower speeds and making sure we're designing our roadways to self- enforce that that's what that means so we wouldn't necessarily need police out to enforce it because the roadway itself is designed to enforce that speed what's a tangible example of reducing the speed through design I would say narrower Lanes there's a lot of research coming out now about just the simple reduction in the lane width itself has a big impact and then an actual reduction in the number of lanes on our roadways will also help to bring speeds down there are other traffic calming measures that's a transportation jargony term that I showed in a slide earlier that we did on Enterprise Street where we can use paint and post to effectively narrow the roadway and it and it brings speeds down other things like speed cushions and ways to really make sure that drivers are are forcing we forcing drivers to slow down there's a lot of measures.

That we can use in a toolbox to look at reducing speed Citywide thank you and so just to picture this in two different buckets there's restriping Redevelopment of existing streets that's sort of one bucket the other bucket is we are developers are constructing new streets every single day when they build new neighborhoods and so we have sort of guidelines or we should have guidelines for how we're could reconstructing and restriping and repaving streets can you speak a little bit about that bucket and where we are now on that sure so I'm new so caveat on if I don't know all of the the standards and and policies here yet but from my understanding we're able to make an impact through the Udo development as it comes along we have certain design standards for our roadway so that's one way we can get there I think making sure that the requirements that we do have are aligned with vision zero principles so really looking at the causes of injury like speed shortening.

You know narrowing the roadway thinking and considering our lane widths our standard curb to curb width those all of those components come into play when we're looking at standards and we need to be sure we're aligning our existing standard guidelines with vision zero and then there's other opportunities when it comes to retrofitting so when we are doing resurfacing projects looking at the pavement markings because we're going to go out there and restripe it anyway let's restripe it to a safer configuration that's where we can also take advantage of narrowing the lane widths shortening cross crossing distance and those are generally lower cost approaches to achieving the the same as it would if we were to outright construct a brand new Street and then to go over to this other bucket you touched on it just now a little bit when we re when we construct new streets we hold developers to standards to construct those streets would you say and maybe you haven't looked into I don't know would.

You say right now today that we are perhaps requiring excessive width to the streets that we are holding developers to at this time yeah I I don't know if I have enough information to make that assessment I'm personal opinion I'm always gonna say that we can be doing better in terms of still allowing people to all the ways that people move around and have traffic to flow and prioritize that safety piece so I think we need to have a bigger conversation about you know what that looks like for the city of Durham and and reassessing can we do even more than what's in the Udo can we have some sort of General guidelines for classific classifying streets in Durham and and thinking about how we can apply those Vision zero principles more broadly not just when it comes to development but any opportunity when we're doing storm water projects and having to tear up the roadway there is that also an opportunity to consider implementing safer safer Street configurations.

One one last thing I don't want to make this political at all trying to figure out the right way to to ask it on Monday we approved a resoning which I was very unhappy about the the result of that the comprehensive plan was calling for walkability in in an area with 200 200 Acres and we ended up approving a rezoning for you know single family I would call it sprawl put that put that aside we have remaining land out in the county which could be annexed and rezoned when we think about the a scenario where the comprehensive plan let's say in the remaining areas are is calling for walkability calling for mix of uses is calling for sort of elements that would enhance non autoc Centric forms of design do you think it would be detrimental if we envision that the rest of the land that remains in the county out there if we were to Annex rezone that purely for autoc Centric design from your professional.

Standpoint I don't want to put you in a tough political position that's a very leading question you know I'm I'm not gonna ask that question I think you know we I think you know where I'm going with that coming back to just one last question do you think there's an opportunity here with the unified development ordinance rewrite do you think that there would be a recommendation in the vision zero recommen guide or what what the plan action plan action plan to make sure that the that we get the best the Cadillac quality high quality standards for multimodal transportation Safe Transportation corridors and good cross-sections into the Udo through that Udo reite process do you think that that is potentially going to be a major recommendation opportunity coming out of the vision zero action plan yeah and I don't think we necessarily need to wait for the action plan to start making those recommendations now because I know the process is underway now and so I think you know getting ahead of and.

Thinking about what does that really look like what are other cities doing to integrate Vision zero principles and make them into standards when it comes to development even outside of development what are how are we standardizing this in our roadways so I think it is a tool I think it it's a an opportunity we need to take advantage of right now and not necessarily wait until the end of the year when the action plan comes out I agree thank you so much thank you for the line of questions.

I could tell if you were yeah go ahead hi thank you so much for that presentation and welcome to Durham thank you I just had a couple of quick questions I was wondering if you had any cities and I know you mentioned one earlier but cities that you look to for guidance and ones that maybe we could do some research on and and sort of familiarize oursel with yeah so there's a few that I looked at that are comparable in terms of size like square miles and population and I don't have that list in front of me but off the top of my head Salt Lake City is actually a city that I think is doing some good work with a similar like I mentioned population in square mile size there's also Alexandria even though the size is not as as big as Durham it's about 15 square miles it is in terms of density similar and so they're doing a lot of I think they have a similar approach U.

That Durham wants to head towards and I'm happy to provide other cities I just cannot rattle them off yeah that's totally F if you want to send us that later that would be awesome and then you have these timelines in here 10 years and 20 years how did you come up with those timelines is there a way to accelerate those timelines it's a really good question when we talk about urgency and then you see a date that's 10 and 20 years out might raise raise some alarm so I think of course there is a way for us to move up the timeline and we are going to be working every day to achieve zero we are also working in the reality of project delivery and how quickly we're able to get projects on the ground so we're really thinking about the city of Durham's current processes when we're when we're setting these Target dates what is realistic to address all of the corridors that we need to address where we're noting crashes but also.

Where we're maybe missing crash history but we know they're dangerous so there's a lot of processes involved that make this particular timeline what we felt would be achievable given the current project delivery processes here at this and when you're thinking about those processes I'm assuming you're working closely with the planning department are you an budget I assume as well trying to bring everybody in and connect this is this is something that impacts all of us right and so we we're really trying to bring in folks create some working groups to have those types of conversations of where where can we move project delivery along quicker what are the scenarios what what needs to change to make sure that things are getting on the ground faster so we can achieve zero sooner than 20 years I guess the thing that I'm thinking about is that of course there's costs involved and there's time and we know that it's restrictive and if we could revisit every street and fix it today we would.

Have already done that if we had the budget and the time to do it but we are looking at potentially a bond and some other things that might might accelerate at least on the money side some addressing of streets and and I think you mentioned it earlier but you said that there's opportunities when we're going in outfitting so potentially when we're laying sidewalks and doing other things we can be doing these some of these Road repairs and additives at the same time is that is that possibly going to speed things up have has that conversation happened did we did you have a conversation with CIP in terms of our strategy budgeting what does that look like I think since I can't say anything about the bond I think what we'll have to do is find funding mechanisms to add in where we're not able to with our CIP so I mentioned the safe streets and roads for all funding opportunity that is available now there's over three billion dollars.

Available until 2026 that we could be taking advantage of to supplement C IP to add on to existing projects where maybe we hadn't thought about this particular intersection that needs to be addressed or the set of signal timing that needs to happen so I do think that you know we're trying to be as holistic as possible when we take into consideration funding and how to fund all of this work and I think right now the time is now to to take advantage of the federal funding that's available for that yeah yeah I mean we've been talking a lot about that and and that was so that was actually perfect lead into my next question which was like what do we need to be doing in order to make sure that we are accessing all of those opportunities before yeah we don't know what those opportunities are yeah the resolution is the first step so that is there are nine criteria for implementation Grant through Safe Streets and roads for all.

All eight out of those nine are about the action plan so we're going to get eight of those tackled by the end of the year the one that we won't have is this target date and that is part of the criteria to be eligible for implementation and so we' trying to take this first critical step become eligible and then check off a lot of the boxes very important boxes as part of the action plan that we're developing okay thank you don't have any further questions thanks hi good to see you thank you for the presentation so I have a few questions first of all and this is going to come up at the m to so Bill judge was at this Transit Summit that we were at so as council member R this we were very excited that this was on the agenda because like fresh on our our minds we're like oh yeah I won't forget this it'sing go triangle oh I'm sorry that's okay I won't say anything about.

That so there was some really excellent presentations there were and those were all videoed and or taped or whatever so folks can hopefully go see them because I I there was one speaker that came and spoke about I guess two speakers one was about Hoboken and then there was another Summit and actually I I don't know if his divisions you're a coordinator from Charlotte but somebody came from Charlotte and so I think it'd be great for us to do a field trip to Charlotte because I know that they're doing pretty amazing things and we don't have to go very far so that's something that I think is always helpful a few years ago there was a group of folks who went to Charlotte around affordable housing so like there is a a tradition of of doing this here but I think one thing that I'm really kind of harping on and this isn't in particular for you but like as you starting to uncover pain points especially in our processes our delivery on projects has.

To improve and I and I think that as one of the nasons when we have federal dollars on the line that becomes critically important because we don't win more things we don't get more things we don't get those dollars if we're failing on our end on Project delivery and I say it's our end because it is a city thing we are expected to do something and we're not going to get that money and So within this action plan if you are starting to see where is it falling apart because I understand it's an intersection of many different departments that we need to know that as Council because we're the ones who at the end of the day sign the checks so that that's just the way we approve the contracts we approve the budget and if we don't know what we don't know we're never going to hit our goals so that's something that I as a council member because I've I've been on Council since 2018 and project delivery.

Yes it's construction I get that it's expensive but we also have to just do better so that's one thing that I'm in particularly interested in I think the other part is I'm I'm glad that you're here and I'm glad that you're from Houston because or at least we're there because if Houston can figure it out anyone can figure it out and that's a very car Centric space I think with the udio that is a huge opportunity and I know that we're moving that along and then I think the only other thing I feel like I had another thing it's about process and project delivery oh same thing when we passed our affordable housing Bond it was great but then we didn't actually have capacity in the department like we had to and we had to tell them to come to us and ask for that capacity we again we don't know what we don't know so as you're looking at this plan as we're looking about having aggressive targets.

Sometimes even if it's a shift in a department we also need to understand that as Council because we know then we can ask or then if if if a department presents something or like why are you asking for three more positions or where's them you know the funding that becomes critically important as well so I think that's my other as to you and to the transportation department don't be shy that's how we got you I mean we got you because there was advocacy in the community to get a vision zero coordinator so I think that's my other ask of of you and transportation department in general is please don't be shy for what you need as somebody who has heard for so many years what community is asking for it's in our survey every year for so long streets and sidewalks and people feeling safe while they're biking and walking and to council Baker's Point yes we want all of these things we want people to.

Be able to walk but a lot of that is is not developers it's on us to provide that infrastructure with public dollars thank you Mr gr great presentation as as my colleague council member cavier said we were so inspired yesterday for the last couple days by some of the some of the stuff we saw from around the country on Vision zero so it's so great that we're having this conversation I also want to recognize my colleague council member cavier I think you're the one that sponsored the the sort of like the budget item last year right to have a vision coordinator so thank you so much and thank you for drawing me into this work I know you've been leading on this you've allowed me to come in we're going have the vision zero conference like next week or something like that so glad to be a part of this work I just have a couple comments and questions so the first thing is I'll certainly support this resolution can you say more.

About the Safe Systems approach there's a lot of talk about that at the conference the last couple days and I understand our resolution from 2017 was really not a Safe Systems approach model right was more of a behavioral approach I don't know what you call that five E right the five so can you say more about this an important shift here I think I want everybody to know about so can you say more about this shift from the 5es to the Safe Systems approach sure yeah so 20 17 resolution which is a great resolution for its time at that time the five e and I try my best to recall them but it's education education enforcement engineering Equity evaluation and they kept adding ease emergency response and it just yeah and so it tended to Silo a lot of those components and so the Safe Systems is is trying to step away from that and I think y'all may have seen the wheel of Safe Systems that's out there and what I showed is the.

Pyramid which I think is a better refocusing of of the Safe Systems approach because it tells you where to put the most weight in that wheel it acknowledges safe road users and safe speeds it talks about vehicle technology but it's it's sort of equal parts across in that wheel and so the pyramid is acknowledging that there are certain comp components of our transportation system that we know have a greater impact on injury prevention and risk management and so we need to put the resources there at the bottom of that of that pyramid and so Safe Systems it's about acknowledging that my human body our human bodies can only take so much force before it's injured and in a traffic crash that Force tends to be from a vehicle and it tends to be a serious injury or deadly when there's increasing speed and vehicle size should be acknowledged here you know vehicles have gotten bigger that also impacts the force so it's really Safe Systems that's a Crux of it is just acknowledging the.

Human component that we can only handle so much on our roadways and we need to focus on the interventions that that prevent that you know prevent the injury from happening great thank you and and I think part of the cism approach I think as I recall from like from the presentation from Hoboken which again I don't know if you heard beginning of our meeting book and has had seven years of like no fatalities right it's a smaller Community it's different from dur but it's like it's what we can accomplish right part of the Safe Systems approach is also like a data driven piece right they talked a lot about the data so can you talk about and I know you've been doing some some crash analysis already can you say more about the demographics of the 28 people that died last year in Durham or the 121 in the last four years sure what do we know about their demographics because I think your slides sort of get another sort of like angle demographics.

But didn't say exactly like what are the demographics of people that are EI either seriously injured or died yeah so just really quickly on Hoboken the mayor of Hoboken spoke at a conference I went to recently in Miami the National Association of city transportation officials and he had a really great quote which is his belief is that streets should be Avenues of connection not Peril and so that sort of leadership has led to seven years in a row of of zero traffic deaths and I will say the data is a strong piece of not just Hoboken but I mentioned Alexandria a lot of cities where they've seen decreases despite the increase in in traffic crashes as kind of a function of the pandemic they focus on where the crash data suggests that it's higher there's a higher frequency of fatal and serious injury crashes on certain corridors there's an approach called a high injury network analysis which we are working on that we will have one for the city of.

Durham and it really is a focus on where the most fatal and serious injury crash is happening and the usual outcome of a high inury network analysis is there is a majority of traffic dusts and serious injuries happening on a very small percentage of streets in Houston it was 60% of traffic dust and serious injuries on 6% of streets so that really allows you to hone in on those 6% and say okay what is going on here how can we target our sources on these 6% right you're kind of starting with the worst first and then working working through that that list of roadways so I think when you're talking about using data crash history is one piece of it we don't want to necessarily rely on that we know there are a lot of crashes that go unreported or there are a lot of near misses and so that also is a piece of data we want to fold into a Safe Systems approach back question so can you tell.

Me now do you know demographics of those sorry yeah demographics I did look at really quickly some demographic Data before this meeting the exact percentage I want to double check but a majority of of traffic deaths and serious injuries are people of color and so that on the crash report is where we get that information so it's just an indication there and I will say most of that are black people that's the identification on the crash report that we're seeing so there's more work there to get an actual percentage but a quick look at that shows that it is disproportionately impacting people of color that's great then last question I'm looking at the the map you shared with the like where crashes happened and I I think I see like a spine here that looks to me like Roxboro Mangum Road right so can you tell me of the of the 387 serious injuries and fatalities in the last four years how many of those were on Roxboro and Mangum I didn't look.

At Roxboro and Mangum specifically but I I'm not and I'm not what portion you're talking about the portion north of 85 still learning my roadways here is where you're noting a lot more crashes south of that there are crashes happening I'm not sure of the exact number but the resurfacing effort that's being done in conjunction with ncdot should have that crash information and we are happy to pull that and when can you provide that I'd love to see that as soon as possible sure yeah we can email it to you and it's on our website I believe too looking at Bill back there but I think we have that information readily available it was presented at the community meeting that we had for Roxboro and Mangum we had some crash data for that portion of of roadway yeah if you were Mr judon that'd be great thank you council member yeah I just have one more question this actually may be a question for you Bill yesterday and this.

Is just I'm thinking about the Udo rewrite opportunity yesterday in one of our presentations they talked about Street systems it was like instead of lining it up the way it is it's to like land use do I don't do you remember that I tried to get a picture of the slide and I I didn't so I'm I'm gonna email the folks who put on the presentation and get it just because it was like oh this makes sense to me we're in this process of our udio rewrite they were talking about how Street design council Baker's point should be tied to land use and not the way like we have the collector Street system we have the you know thanks yeah I'm not sure I remember the exact slide you were referring to but I would say in general yeah there is a strong correlation I guess to Street design and land use particularly just like for example on street parking we have right now for new development we have minimum standards minimum Street widths so.

If the community is developed and on street parking is heavily utilized that can be a great factor in reducing speeds and reducing conflict points however if the roadway is designed to accommodate on street parking and then it's not utilized it becomes a wider road with higher speeds and more complaints and more more safety concerns thank you and I'll try and get that information just because it it is with the Udo rewrite I just thought it made a lot of sense all right thank you so much this is very helpful I there are so many lessons across the country that we can learn from and I'm just grateful for you doing this work I I think what this out of this entire conversation I think what's pequ my interest is the best the most practical way is to council Baker's point about just looking at our design standards you know because it it's just so complicated working with you know a state transportation department that doesn't always align with our.

Values I mean we I they make Urban centers feel like the problem child and we're just trying to save lives conceptually I really appreciate your approach and I and I think that you know I'm sitting here like gosh we need a vision zero coordinator in other areas too like I we just talked about crime like Jesus we need one day or two but just for just to make sure you know like your approach to this work it is so easily followed and it it makes it I have a little anxiety about you know I'm going to support the resolution but I have anxiety about setting dates and thinking about how big this is but at some point we do have to change our way of thinking you know so so I'm on board with that but thank you thank you thank you thank you for your time oh yeah go ahead yeah so we know that reducing the width of lanes and reducing the width of streets is a good thing and because this is.

My job having the convers the tough conversations often come with talking with solid waste and who drive these big trucks talking with the school system who drive school buses talking with the fire department who they want to have the width on all the streets to be able to do the cold desect Maneuvers and they all contribute their comments and say hey we need more width and so just wanted to lay that out there is those are tough conversations to have and we just kind of need to push we need to push those entities in in very delicate and careful ways do you have any input on that or any thoughts on that well I'll give major kudos to Transportation staff who before I was here coordinated with the fire department and with go Durham to test out some of those traffic calming features before fully implementing them and I showed that example on Enterprise Street in the Southside neighborhood and in the slide slideshow earlier that that really was a coordinated effort.

With other departments who use our roadways our roadways have a lot of functions we need to be serving all those functions safely so how can we do some demonstration do some Pilots with those departments have them bring out their fire trucks or or buses or come and see how this project works if we're talking about repurposing space repurposing a lane repurposing parking for different uses Let's test it out and invite folks out to see how it works look at the effectiveness and and we can see before and after data I think we need to decide what our values are as a city what are we really going to say this is success of a project is it the speed reduction is it businesses are happy with the foot traffic is it you know there's a lot of things that that we need to decide our values in order for us to think about what success means but I think it we have to first think about the ways that we can demonstrate.

Projects and bring people out to see to see it's how it works great thank you all right well thank you so much thank you all very much you can now go home and we're gonna be here for a little bit longer all right can you C motions not yet not yet yet and I did have speakers but I don't see them in here for 30 oh yeah well that's right and we don't need to because they're not here we don't need to address it right all right is that the last presentation yep all right so so Madam attorney you want to read that motion oh yeah so like so this resolution of Vis do we do that is that part it'll go the it just go yeah itent agenda Mr manager thank you mayor members of council a lot of good work today settling the agenda on consent items 1 through 32 and on GBA public hearings you'll have items 37 and 38 thank you motion right yeah I'll entertain a.

Motion to approve the Consin agenda so to settle the agenda second all right all in favor all oppos all right mam ma thank you Mr Mayor oh I'm sorry Madam Clerk sorry thank you Mr Mayor and city council I I have a brief report the Durham Board of adjustment appointment for the category of regular member the selection for nominations was Chad me Meadows and David S Morgan Durham workers Rights Commission for the category of regular member is Nina Martin Durham Planning Commission appointment Malcolm K Gregory and Council has chosen to re-advertise the second seat mayor's Council for women appointments for the at large category is Sarah J Cunningham and the category of w one is chronia spruel citizen advisory committee appointments Valen Alfred Leah n eer green sherard a Johnson Brian w angas and Shonda Wilson and the Durham Sports commission nomination is J Pratt and that's the end of my report thank you madam attorney thank you may Mr Mayor the mission that the city attorney's office needs from the council is a.

Motion to hold a closed session pursuant to North Carolina General statute 143 38183 for attorney client consultation concerning the handling of a settlement demand for a yet to be filed liability claim all right I say a motion so mov all right all in favor please sh by raising your hand thank you allst all right we are now recessed to we'll secure the room.