Nov 17, 2020 City Council on 2020-11-17 6:30 PM (AMENDED)

the city council meeting for November 17th. We have a quorum, so I will call this meeting to order at 631 again on November 17th, 2020. Let the and just for the record, Mayor Watts may attend a little later, but we're going to go ahead and get started. We have a few calls for the first item. Just as a reminder, we cannot ask questions, but we will be able to give statements and clarifications, etc. With that, we'll let staff get ready and we'll call the first item, which is a pledge of allegiance to the U.S. and Texas flag, and we'd ask those that are able to stand with us. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible. Thank you. That will take us to our item number two, and I'll call that. It is items for individual consideration. Item A, ID 20-2366. Receive a report, hold discussion, and give staff direction on the use of polling locations. And before I do that, I have one quick announcement. Item for those watching, item 2E, which is ID 20-1722, resolution of appreciation has been removed from the agenda, will be placed on a December agenda when Mayor Watts is present. So that's just a house cleaning item, so we'll go with the other items. And again, now that'll take us to item 2A, and Rosa is going to present that. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Hutzpeth. Let the presentation become online. I'll pull that up for you, Rosa, one second. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. My name is Rosa Rios, and I am your city secretary. I do want to first apologize that I could not be there in person, but I appreciate your patience. So I'm here to present the polling locations for the December 8, 2020 runoff election, and of course, the runoff election is for Place 6, Place 7, which is the Mayor's seat, and District 2. Next slide, please. To provide a little bit of background as far as polling locations for prior runoff elections, going back to 2017, District 3 was in runoff, and we did use the North Lakes Recreation Center. Now, here I am covering election day locations only, and there are always other participating jurisdictions, and District 3 does usually share with those other entities. But for that election, we did only use North Lakes Recreation Center. For 2018, the runoff was for Place 5, and we did use Daniel Recreation Center, which was located in District 4. The MLK Junior Recreation Center for District 1 and the North Branch Library was in District 2. There also, there were other participating jurisdictions, so sometimes the locations do get shared with them. And of course, for 2019, there was no runoff election. Next slide, please. For polling locations for November 3 here, just to kind of show a one-page snapshot, you can see how many early voting locations were. Now, this is only the list of Denton locations, and then, of course, also for election day. And in some instances, there was, you can see here for election day where I noted earlier that sometimes we do share locations with other entities. Next slide, please. For the polling locations for the runoff election, the early voting are going to be Denton Civic Center, the Denton County Elections Administration Building, which always serves as our main early voting location because we do have to designate one site as such. The North Branch Library, Robeson Ranch Clubhouse, South Branch Library, and the University of North Texas Gateway Center. And of course, for early voting, any voter can go to any early voting location. Now, this does show only those in Denton, and we did receive the other jurisdictions that are in the runoff, that are going to use the December 8 runoff election date. We did get their location, so those will be incorporated into our early voting locations, as well as the notice of election that we will be publishing twice. For the election day locations, we have the Denton Civic Center and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Recreation Center, which are located in District 1. For District 2, we do have the North Branch Library. For District 3, we have the North Lakes Recreation Center, Robeson Ranch Clubhouse, and the University of North Texas Gateway Center. And then for District 4, we do have the Denier Recreation Center and South Branch Library. I do want to note that there is, of course, right here showing only one location in District 2. However, registered voters in that location are going to be sharing other locations. And again, the election order that we publish will let voters know in each particular precinct what the other locations are that they're going to be. And the shared locations for that are going to be the North Branch Library, of course, the Denton Civic Center, the MLK Recreation Center, and the North Lakes Recreation Center. Next slide, please. So the Denton County, under the November 30 elections contract, Section 3 notes that the elections administrator shall select and arrange for use and payment for early voting and election day voting locations. And those terms do carry over to any runoff election that could take place. And the county opted to select city-owned facilities as they were easier to obtain approval. The exceptions were Robeson Ranch and, of course, later UNT Gateway Center. They did opt to not use any schools as they felt that it would make it easier because of the issue with school schedules and things like that. Next slide, please. So typically, the timeline for polling location selection is that Denton County is willing to hear city input, even though, again, under the terms of the contract, they pretty much do select the locations. There was a tight turnaround for the December 8, and so the Denton County elections had to prepare. They had to send out mail ballots in advance of the runoff election and, of course, have them returned by the voters that requested one. There was need to obtain approval from the locations to ensure that the locations were suitable. Also, they have to schedule testing both internally and then publicly. So the Denton County had set a deadline of November 13 to lock all of the locations necessary so that they could, you know, to address the mail-in ballots, again, in the testing requirement. However, they did go ahead and extend the deadline to November 16 to wait for us to hear whether UNT would allow us to use their gateway center, and, of course, that was granted early on Monday, November 16. Next slide, please. So Denton County, again, is willing to work jointly with the city and other participating entities to determine the general election locations. They have developed a list for future upcoming elections and what that early voting period will be, or proposed at least, and city staff will take the steps necessary to discuss the polling locations with council and seek input to provide to Denton County well in advance of any election taking place. And, of course, going forward, when the discussions take place for a general election, staff will also go ahead and kind of take a position to consider, like, that every possible seat on the city council could have a runoff election and then try to identify those runoff elections in advance. Next slide. And that is this presentation. Are there any questions? Okay. And this is -- and so before we go to questions, just a note, we don't have to vote on anything, so there's no action needed, but go ahead. So Councilmember Armitage and then Meltzer. Yeah, so two questions. The first is about District 2. Do voters in District 2 have the choice of any one of those three voting locations, or will District 2 voters be divided? So Denton County assigns the precincts. There are several precincts, obviously, in every district, and the county determines which precinct is going to vote at what location. That is something that's actually beyond our control. But, like I said, there are several locations that they will actually go vote, and they are notified as to where their voting location are, and there's several other features online where a person could check where they're going to go vote on election day. Got it. Okay. So in this case, the precincts will just be divided by precinct into those three different locations. Yes, and there's actually going to be four. There's actually four, although the location within the actual District 2 is just the North Branch Library. I understand. Okay, great. And then, and secondly, and this is a question that you had actually answered from me via email, but I wanted just to give you an opportunity just to mention publicly, I had asked why is there not a TWU location on that list, and you had explained the reason if you could mention that. Yes, so TWU had big concerns about the COVID situation, so they opted to not make it self-available either for the November 3rd election and either the end of runoff as well. Thank you. Okay, thank you, Councilmember Melter, and then Councilmember Briggs. Yeah, I was going to ask about District 2, so my question's been answered. Thank you. Councilmember Briggs. Thank you, Mayor Pritam. Yeah, I also asked about, or have a question about District 2. So is that the only district that is going to be divided into four separate polling locations or? No, ma'am. Actually, it happens within every, within every district. Okay, so like District 4 has the two, Denia and South Branch, so you're saying that people that live in District 4 will also go to other locations listed other than the two that are here? Yes, ma'am. Okay, and on one of the pictures I saw, it had zip codes out next to these locations. Yes. Is that going to be one of the ways that they divide it up? Because that might be easier for people to kind of glance down and see where they go. I don't believe that the Denton County elections looks at district, you know, I mean, the zip code when they're assigning precincts. However, we will be happy to put some information on our website that breaks it down not only by precinct, but also by location as well as zip code. That'll make it easier. Thank you. That would be very helpful and I did want to tell you that I appreciate the slide and about going forward, how to handle this next time and to think about runoff locations ahead of time. I appreciate that foresight. Thank you. Thank you. All right, any other questions for staff? Okay, we do have the callers whenever they're ready and we'll take those. Actually point of order, Mayor Pro Tem. Yes, sir. You said earlier that I don't know if there'll be a need. You said earlier that no questions could be asked, but these are posted items for individual consideration. So I would think that we could interact to whatever extent. Sure. Choose to. If I asked that in advance, but I may have misunderstood. So staff can correct me where I'm wrong. I'll take a stab. Staff didn't speak up. This item was it's the presentation that Rosa gave was more of a work session presentation. However, it was I see that it is listed as an individual consideration item, although there's no formal action being taken. The this the chair and this council can go forward and allow questions to be asked of the callers if you should wish to do since it has been published or I mean noticed as an individual consideration item if it chooses to do so. Okay. Not that I know that there will be a need, but you know, just wanted to. Yeah. And I'll just say we have people that are I'm just going to be I'm going to watch it closely. Just buyer beware to make sure we can we can be timely and considerate of those that are here to support those that are elected and get to the other items. So that being said, we want to make sure everyone's heard and have their questions answered. So we'll take the first call. And I'm flying a little blind. So someone will have to tell me when they're on. Hello, are you? Are you there? I am here. Great. If you could get you're on with the Denton City Council. And if you could please provide your name, address, and then you have four minutes to speak. Perfect. Wonderful. Thank you. My name is Bonnie Moore. I live at 2520 Broadway Drive in Trophy Club, which is in Denton County. And I am calling because I am actually the student engagement director for the Denton vote group, which is a nonpartisan group that educates and registers voters all through Denton County. And for the last four years, I have been specifically engaged in registering students at UNT, TWU, as well as Denton County high schools. And I've worked with all the different administrations to get into the various locations to really help students learn what it is to vote, how you register, how you learn about what's on the ballot, and specifically the importance of being a lifelong voter. And excuse me. And so when I heard that the gateway location was not going to be available for the runoff, I was very upset and concerned because I actually worked as a alternate judge in March for the primaries, and it was so phenomenally rewarding when students would come up to me and say, "Oh, you registered me to vote two years ago," or, you know, in the fall. This was obviously pre-pandemic, but it was very important that they followed through the whole cycle. They registered, they educated themselves, they showed up, they voted. I never ask what party. I don't. It's none of my business, nor is it my purpose to find out who they're voting for. I just want them to become mature, adult, engaged citizens. And part of my concern is if you eliminate the gateway location for the runoff, there are hundreds and thousands of students still living on campus that, specifically freshmen, that have no transportation, that will not be able to go to one of the other voting locations because they don't have access to it. They're certainly not going to jump in an Uber. They are basically told to stay on campus, you know, wear masks and take care of themselves and get through the school year. So to take away access to a safe, known environment and disenfranchise them is very concerning as someone that is very pro-voting for everyone. I know that we always consistently have a Robeson Ranch location, primarily because there are many older citizens that don't have access to transportation. They don't drive anymore. And I am all for it. I love that they have access to, you know, in their community, the ability to go vote there. I'm just asking that y'all consider to also give that same consideration and respect to younger voters that do not have access to transportation. And as a side note, I'm a mean green mom. My son is a sophomore and he has just moved to an apartment off campus, very close to it. He's fortunate in that he has a vehicle so that he could actually, you know, he can actually go vote at one of the other locations. But there's so many that I know personally from having worked on campus that do not have that same luxury. So I'm just hoping y'all will reconsider and make that gateway center available to anyone in Denton County for the runoff. Thank you. Okay. And I just want to, I can answer that question for you. It wasn't ever excluded. We just needed permission from UNT because it is, we just needed permission from UNT and that permission was granted. So never was excluded. We ask they granted permission. So that is a voting location for early voting and for day of voting. Can I ask you one more question? On that particular point, will this keep coming up every election cycle? Will we have to go back and re-discuss having a location on campus? Well, that I can't speak to future items. We will always have to speak to UNT. Yes. It's just not city property. I understand. Okay. So, but barring that, so it won't be like every time we have to rally around and have discussions of whether it's worth having an onsite location, assuming that the university would always give that permission. That is, yes, that is a council decision or in this instance, it's a county decision. But yes, those decisions have to be made for each election. Okay. Okay. Well, thank you. I mean, you gave me good news that I appreciate that. I'm happy to hear that. I don't even know how many students will still be on campus. I mean, I know they have the ability to go home after Thanksgiving and not every, all their classes will then become remote, but there, I know there's many that will still be there through December. So it's important. Yeah. Thank you. I surely thank you. Thank you. Let me see if there's any other questions for you. Are there any other questions? Great. Thank you very much. Have a great evening. Thank you so much. Bye-bye. Bye. Okay. And staff will bring up the next caller. [PAUSE] [PAUSE] Give us just a minute. [PAUSE] So I think we have a total of five callers. [PAUSE] And for those just joining us, we are on item, what is this, 2A, and we're taking callers on the presentation about the voting locations for the upcoming runoff elections. [PAUSE] I don't know if we need to go to break and let them queue them up or what do you think? Oh, here we go. Yeah. Hello. Hello. This is Mayor Pro Tem Gerard-Hudspeth. You're on with the Denton City Council. If you could please provide your name and address and then you have four minutes to speak. Do we need to? Hello? Yes. If you could give your name and address, please, and you'll have four minutes. Yes. Hi, Jennifer Lane. I'm at University of North Texas. Are you able to hear me? Yes. Okay. I'm going to turn the volume down here so that you can hear me. Yes. Okay. Yes. I'm in Denton, Denia neighborhood, 76205. And I'm calling because of long, much like the last caller, Bonnie Moore, I have been involved since 2013 in student voting. And it was described to me back then that there had been sort of inactivity. It was even described using the word suppression that could be measured in generations rather than in decades. Well, things have really turned around and the community at UNT wants to vote and the students want to vote. And there are about 800 to 2000 that will be living on campus throughout the break. There's also many, many adjacent precincts around and people have stepped up and about 1100 are now registered voters in the adjacent precincts around UNT. Plus during early voting, the whole county, any runoffs in any elections that are going on for December 8th would be able to vote at UNT. Anybody that's working there, studying there or teaching there, whether or not they live in Denton. But of course, all the members of the community there who do live in Denton would especially benefit from this poll because of the location. I'm very glad that you have it on the list. I hope that going forward, we won't have to debate it every time, at least from the city council. And I know that it's a question for UNT and they had to pass it through their COVID-19 advisors and determine the safety, which worked out really, really well in November. And of course, the numbers will be fewer this time, most likely just because of the nature of the election, but still more than perhaps usually happens in May. And I am very happy to see elections for the city council happening at this time of year. And I think that it's been wonderful that the turnout has been so much higher than it's been before. So I hope you guys will keep the poll there and advocate for yourselves there and go to student groups and faculty groups and staff groups and present your platforms and what you want to do in the city of Denton and in the surrounding area and your outreach to the county at large and everywhere that you might have influence and interaction. Any city like Denton, like Arlington, like Louisville and all of you interact and it's not, it's not as if there's walls around us, we influence community. So please do keep this poll and please use it and please do more to campaign and canvas the area. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions for the caller? All right. Thank you very much. Have a great evening. Bye bye. And the next caller. Okay. Hello. Is this Alejandro? Yes, Alejandro Galindo Juarez. Yes, sir. So you are on with the Denton City Council. My name is Gerard Hutzpeth, Mayor Pro Tem. If you could please, you've provided your name, but if you could repeat it again and then provide your address, you'll have four minutes. Okay. My name is Alejandro Galindo Juarez. I live at 2325 Northway, Denton, Texas 76207. First of all, I want to start off with congratulations to all the victorious and your respective races. Thank you to all the party members, including Mayor Watts, who is not on the call I see. Your public service to our city is a legacy worth of appreciation and good luck to all the members who are still campaigning. I'm a UNT student and much like the people calling before, I'm speaking for Gateway. I'm not breaking any, I hope I'm not breaking any ridiculous rules for speaking in support of UNT Gateway as I am a student at UNT. And yes, I'm aware of the update from yesterday, but why is this consistently issue? Our city loves to boost our pride in our universities, as we should, but there's still debate over the UNT Gateway being a poll location or not. That doesn't make sense to me. The city of Denton has seen a rising voter turnout for two years now. How about we help build that trend and not leave voters out, specifically students, faculty members as well. I just want those that have expressed their views and judgment in suppressing and yes, I mean suppressing university students, faculty and their spouses from voting at a public university. Y'all do not represent Denton Valley. UNT is Denton and it's about time our local elected officials started believing that. Sorry, it's a little harsh. That's the words I have for today. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions? Great. Thank you. Thank you for calling. Thank you. Yeah. Bye. Bye. Okay. And next call will be joined here shortly. Hello, Tiffany. Yes, sir. Hello. My name is Gerard Hutzpah from the Mayor Pro Tem and you're on with the Denton City Council. And if you could please give us your name and address and then you will have four minutes to speak. Yes, sir. I understand. My name is Tiffany Miller. Okay. Yeah, there was something in the background, but I think it's cleared up. Yeah, I don't know. That's not on my hand. My name is Tiffany Miller. I live at 6201 Highfield Park, Denton, Texas, 76210. I believe that's District 4 for reference. I am the graduate student council president at the University of North Texas, which may not mean anything to any of you, but basically that means that my grad student government represents roughly 7,000 students at UNT. Of those 7,000 students, approximately 94% are domestic students. About 6% are international students. Many of our grad students work and live in Denton. A great number of them live near campus and a significant portion of those that live near campus also do not have transportation. I wanted to reach out about this item because I do have a couple of questions, but also some comments that I thought y'all might need to hear for future reference for those of you that are either ongoing members of the council moving forward or if you look back in that direction again in the future. When we polled grad students at UNT back in April on what their biggest needs were surrounding especially COVID-19 and all of the interesting implications it's had for our students, the number one concern those polled indicated were financial stressors followed very quickly by job security and then health concerns. Our students, like I said, many of them that live near campus or live on campus lack transportation and they lack financial resources or they otherwise have significantly strapped financial resources. The average grad student in the United States makes $20,000 a year before taxes. That's not a lot. It's a tight budget. It's usually around $1,600 a month at most. I'm telling you all of this because this is information that I have that I get from our students. I get weekly emails from our students about how they're stressed, about how they're anxious. I've had to work around messages about colleagues that they have committing suicide in the middle of everything going on right now because of their financial stress, because of their anxiety, because of their depression, on top of work, on top of school. I think it's important moving forward. I understand Gateway is polling location that's been confirmed, but I want you to think about those things moving forward when this question undoubtedly comes up again in the future. I want to connect you with that information because I have it and I'm not necessarily sure that the council or that the mayor or the city manager hear these concerns from students, which is actually a great segue into my question, which is how are polling sites determined? And second question, what information do you all seek from the population to determine those polling sites? That is, how do you connect with our students to inform the decisions that you make? Got it. Do you have additional questions? I can take them all at once and then that way we can get you the right people to answer those or is it just this one question? No, it's two questions. How are polling sites determined? One and two, how do you all work to connect with our population? Because it's a weird population to work with. Got it. Okay. Well, thank you for the statistics and that information and advocacy you do first. And then Mr. City Manager, do you want to have someone answer it or? Yeah, sure. And I can take a stab at that. Typically with the municipal elections, we bring that and have a workshop each year with the council to talk about the polling places, your preferences. In the last year or two, we have added the UNT Gateway Center, tried to get a place close to UNT, as well as Ropes and Ranch. So as you heard our city secretary say early on in her presentation, we immediately go back to those polling places that you've approved through prior discussions and ask the county to honor those for consistency sake so people know where they're going. However, in some instances when the city doesn't control the polling sites, such as the one at UNT, the county and the city are both really at their mercy. They did find a way to make it work again this year, but as to the question, is it just something where we're going to have to go through this each year? With the city not controlling the polling site at UNT, there's no question the city is going to have to go back and ask the administration each year for their permission to use their property in that site. And it's something that we're happy to do. The council has been very clear in their direction that they wanted a polling site in that area, and we have communicated that to the county officials. So if it got shut down in some way, then the idea was to try to find a polling place in that same vicinity to try to accommodate the students. But staff's been given that direction, and it's just unfortunately for us, we don't have the ability to tell UNT how to use our facilities. We have to ask their permission at this point, and they've been very cooperative with us to try to accommodate us. So it's probably the best answer that any of us can give you. It is something that's going to have to be revisited each year. There's a municipal election, and we try to get our direction from council proactively so we know where to head. This has obviously been a strange year. UNT is facing a lot of issues as well as all of us, but they did find a way to make it work for us, so that's great. But it's not something with us not controlling that site that we can have a definitive yes every year without having to talk to them. Thank you. Okay, Councilmember Briggs. So thank you, caller, for the the information and all that you do to help the students. One of that, I think the city manager just answered one of your questions as far as the polling location. Regarding outreach with UNT students, generally the council members and other ways that we can reach out. I don't think that there's a set team that actually reaches out. It's just up to individual council members to connect with the students and advocate that way and let them know what the options are through meetings, social media, other ways like that. And if you have suggestions, I'm sure the city would be open to them on how to get that information out each time there are decisions to be made. Okay, Councilmember Armitage and Councilmember Meltzer. Just to add on to that and not to repeat what has already been said, you know, UNT falls in District 3 and so there will always be a District 3 representative. So I encourage people to reach in any district, you know, to reach out to, number one, reach out to all of council like you're doing right now because we all get to vote on it, but especially reach out in your district to your council member. And, you know, I think that most of us, I know I myself, as an at-large member, am asking around trying to get input, but the best input is the input that comes to us about polling locations unsolicited. So thank you for that. Okay, Councilmember Meltzer. Yeah, I just want to call to mind that there is a committee on community engagement that's been fairly dormant since March, but as I recall, we restarted a discussion about making a more formal relationship in terms of having perhaps somebody on staff regularly attend, like, you know, the student legislative bodies who are just somehow kind of crafting a more regular liaison. And I think when we, you know, get more back in the regular swing of things, we may well want to take that idea up again. I think it's a good one. Okay, thank you. Any other questions? Ms. Miller? That covers everything that I wanted to ask about the polling sites. I did want to make a suggestion to y'all just because this is something we're dealing with a lot on campus right now, but it would be really beneficial for your meetings, especially your virtual meetings, if you had either closed captioning or an interpreter. I know we have a large deaf and hard of hearing student body, and they often don't feel engaged. So I think that might help with some of the engagement you just spoke on. Great. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yes, thank you. Thank you so much. Have a good night. Bye. Bye. Thank you. Bye. Okay, we'll bring up the next caller. We have one one more caller. Hello, Charlotte? Yes. Hello, this is Gerard Hutsworth, Mayor Pro Tem, and you're on with the Denton City Council. If you could please provide your first and last name and address, and then you'll have four minutes to speak. Okay, thank you. Yes, my name is Charlotte Cook. I live at 418 Des Moines Street in Aubrey, Texas, 76227. And I am calling on behalf of UNT staff senate. I'm actually the UNT staff chair. And at this time, I'm speaking about regarding about the polling place at the Gateway Center at UNT. I'm hoping that you keep in consideration of having that as a location not only for our students, but also for serving over 2000 staff that works there and plus many more of the faculty as well, and also the vicinity of the area of Denton. So I'm just encouraging you to please do that. I have to admit we did use that place for the early voting and the regular election. And it was a very safe environment, and it worked very well for all of the residents of the Denton area. Okay, okay. Yeah, and I'll just let you know that it was confirmed as a location by UNT. Obviously, we had to ask for permission, and that permission was granted. It was never excluded by the city, just a matter of we had to go back and ask. And that permission was granted by UNT. And so we moved forward in both early voting and day of voting there. So, but I wanted to make sure you knew that. Okay, thank you so much. Great, thank you. Yes, bye. Okay, we don't have any other callers, any other notes for staff before we move to the next item. Okay, thank you. And thank you, Rosa. And then that will take us to our second item for individual consideration, which is ID 2017-18, consider adoption of ordinance and canvassing the returns and declaring the results of the regular municipal election to elect three council members in place, four or five, and mayor place seven. And then I'm going to call item C at the same time. There's only one presentation for both, which is ID 2017-19, consider adoption of ordinance, canvassing the returns and declaring the results of the special municipal election to elect two city council members to district one and two of the city council of the city of Denton. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. My name is Rosa Rios, and I am your city secretary, and we'll get the presentation ready. Again, this does apply to the two agenda items that Mayor Pro Tem Hutzpeth read into the record. So I'm going to be presenting the canvassing results of the November 3rd, 2020 general and special elections and the required ordering of a runoff election for December 8, 2020. Next slide, please. So in canvassing the general election held November 3rd, the election was ordered on February 4, 2020, and again, later amended two times, one due to the COVID situation and then the other based on some governor orders and changes to the early voting period. The purpose of that election was to elect members for city council, and it's actually places five, six, and seven for a full term. For place five, we had two candidates, and that was Deb Armenter, who's the incumbent, and Rick Barria. For place six, we had three candidates, Jim Mann, Paul Meltzer, being the incumbent, and Liam York. For place seven, for the mayor, we had three candidates, Kelly Briggs, who resigned from city council district two to run for the seat, and also Gerard Hudspeth, who also resigned from city council district one to run for the seat, and Michael Mitchell. Next slide, please. For the special election, that election also was ordered on February 4th, and like the general election, was amended two times again due to the COVID concerns, and then also for the extension of the early voting period. So the purpose of that was to elect member for city council districts one and two for the unexpired term, which expires in 2021. For district one, we had two candidates, Berdia Johnson and George Michael Ferry Jr. For district two, we had five candidates, Ronnie Anderson, Daniel Clanton, Connie Baker, Katie Irene Finley, and John Homan. Next slide. The unofficial general and special election results report will include the total number of votes received by each candidate in each precinct, as well as the sum of precinct totals tabulated per place district and candidate. And then the city council does need to accept the unofficial results in order to officiate the outcome and order the runoff as it becomes applicable. City charter article three does provide that the candidates receiving the majority of that do not receive the majority of the votes cast for each place, actually those that receive the majority shall be considered elected. And if no candidate receives the majority, then the council is required to call a runoff election. Next slide, please. For the general election place five, the candidate shows to have received 50 plus percent of votes cast. So no runoff election is required. For place six, no candidate received 50 percent plus of votes cast. Therefore, a runoff election is required. For place seven, the mayor seat, no candidate received 50 percent plus of votes cast. So runoff election is required. Next slide. You see here the cumulative results which show that for council place five that Armenter received 2,356 votes to her opponents, 1,692. Therefore, no runoff was required as she did receive the majority of votes cast. For place six, Jim Mann received 1,695 votes total with Paul Meltzer receiving 1,582 votes and their opponent receiving less than that. So the two, again, Jim Mann and Paul Meltzer are in the runoff once ordered. For city of Denton Mayor place seven, Kelly Briggs did receive -- excuse me. I'm not able to see the numbers. Hold on. 24,889 votes. And Gerard Hudspeth did receive the 21,396 votes with their opponent receiving less than that. And -- okay. Next slide. Here you see the precinct by precinct returns. And I'm basically just going to kind of just phase through those. They kind of recap the results you see here for place five. We move now to place six. And place seven. Thank you. And those reports are part of exhibit A that are on the corresponding ordinance. For the special election, district one, the candidate received 50% plus of votes cast. So no runoff election is required. For district two, no candidate received 50% of votes cast. Therefore, a runoff election is required. Next page. Here the cumulative results show that Berdia Johnson in district one, again, that is for the unexpired term, received 5,541 votes to her opponent who received 3,111 votes. For district two, again, for an expired term, Ronnie Anderson received 3,370 votes. And Connie Baker received 3,425 votes with the other opponents receiving less than that. Therefore, Ronnie Anderson and Connie Baker will go to runoff once ordered. Next slide. And here, again, you see the precinct by precinct reports. Thank you. So for the runoff election that -- >> Rosa, if you can hear us, I think you accidentally went on mute. >> I'm not saying the -- >> Oh, yeah, sorry, Rosa. We couldn't hear you for any seconds. I brought down the presentation. I'll bring it back up. >> Oh, thank you. So, again, for city council seats, place six for the full term, the candidates, again, once ordered will be Jim Mann and Paul Meltzer. For place seven, the mayor's seat. For a full term will be Kelly Briggs, Gerard Hudspeth. And for district two, for the unexpired term will be Ronnie Anderson and Connie Baker. Our city charter does not address how the order of names will be determined for a runoff election. Therefore, the Texas election code comes into play, and that provides that the order of candidates' names on the ballot for any resulting runoff election or election to resolve a tie vote shall be the relative order of names on the original election ballot. Therefore, what you see here is the way that the names were listed on the ballot, so there was no drawing required. Next page. The voting period here, you can see, is Monday through Wednesday, November 23rd through 25, all eight to five. We do have one Saturday voting, November 28th, eight to five. Monday, Wednesday, which is November 32, December 2, is eight to five. And Thursday, Friday, is December 3rd to 4th, will be 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. We are required to have two days where it provides for a 12-hour voting period during the early voting, so we are accomplishing that requirement. And, of course, Election Day is Tuesday, December 8th, from seven to seven. Next slide. The early voting locations are reiterated here that were part of the original presentation, so I won't detail those. Next page. And, of course, here are the Election Day locations. Again, these were covered during the early presentation. And just to note that for the election for the early voting, we did receive all of the early voting locations from Denton County today. And there are other participating jurisdictions in Salina, Capel, Frisco, Pilot Point, and the Colony, and those will be incorporated into the Denton locations, so the voters will actually have a few more locations that they can go to during early voting. Next slide. So the recommendations is to consider adoption of the two draft ordinances, number 20-171H, which will canvas the returns of the general election, and ordinance number 20-1719, which canvases the results of the special election held November 3rd, and as well as order corresponding runoffs. And I'll answer any questions you may have. One quick question, Rosa. Your calendar in the presentation excluded November 29th. That's a Sunday. Yes. Can you confirm? Yes, sir. Typically, so the county does set the runoff or the early voting date periods, and typically for a runoff election, we don't vote on Sunday. We did have Sunday voting in November, because that is the norm for a November election. But generally, during a May and a runoff election that typically will happen again, May into June, we do not do Sunday voting. Now, there is a process that if somebody wanted a Sunday, you know, voting day, then that process could be, there's a process that we could detail later, if that's something that you'll want to consider in the future. But the other, again, it involves so many participating jurisdictions that we have to coordinate with them as well. Okay. Questions for staff? Councilmember Armitter. Yes, thank you for asking about that, Mayor Pro Tem. I myself would like to see a discussion of Sunday voting in the future. So I'm putting a word in now for next year. If there's a runoff election, I think that we should always have voting on the weekends for any election. Okay, if you can follow that up with an email, just to make sure that we follow our process. And then any other questions? Councilmember Meltzer. Yeah, I'll just comment that we're using the expression full term loosely, given that we'll be six months into the next term. Yes, thank you. Okay. Any other questions for staff? Okay, I'll take a motion on item 2B. Councilmember Briggs. I will move approval. Okay. Councilmember Armitter. I'll second. Thank you. Any other discussion? Okay. Councilmember Briggs, I say you. Yes. Councilmember Armitter. Yes. Councilmember Meltzer. Aye. Councilmember Ryan. Aye. Councilmember Davis. Aye. And Mayor Pro Tem Hutsworth says an aye. That passes 7-0. I'll take a motion on item 2C, ID 20-1719. 6-0. Mayor Pro Tem. Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you. Creature of habit. Thank you. Okay. Councilmember Briggs. I'll move approval. Thank you. Councilmember Meltzer. Second. Thank you. And any discussion? Councilmember Briggs, I'll say you. Yes. Okay. And then Councilmember Meltzer. Aye. Councilmember Armitter. Yes. Councilmember Davis. Aye. And Councilmember Ryan. Aye. Thank you. And Mayor Pro Tem Hutsworth is an aye. That passes 6-0 as well. So both motions carry. And then now we'll move to item 2D, 2017-20, issue the following newly elected Councilmembers Certificate of Election, Statement of Office, and Oath of Office. And so I will now present, now issue the Certificate of Election first to Councilmember-elect Deb Armitter and congratulate her on behalf of her peers and Mayor Watts. And we're doing them one at a time or should I read the other one as well? Yes, sir. You can go ahead and read the one for Councilmember-elect Berdia Johnson. Perfect. And then I'd also like to now issue a Certificate of Election first now to Councilmember-elect Berdia Johnson and congratulate her on behalf of her new peers and Mayor Watts. And then we will take a, yes, very good. Let's give them a hand. That's great. Thank you. And we will take a quick 90-second break recess just so that everything can get situated, so that they can take their oaths, etc. And we'll come back, count down, and take care of that part. Thank you. And we are, welcome back to this meeting of the Denton City Council. It is 7 31 and we are now to the OATSA office, which is a continuation of item, let's get this right, 2DID 2017-20. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Councilmember-elect Armitter, if you could please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, state your name. I, Deb Armitter, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I have not directly, that I have not directly, or indirectly, or indirectly, paid, paid, offered, offered, promised to pay, promised to pay, contributed, contributed, or promised to contribute, or promised to contribute, any money or thing of value, any money or thing of value, or promised any public office or employment, or promised any public office or employment, or the giving or withholding, or the giving or withholding, of a vote at the election, of a vote at the election, at which I was elected, at which I was elected, so help me God. I, state your name. I, Deb Armitter, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will faithfully execute the duties, that I will faithfully execute the duties, of the City of Denton Councilmember Place 5, of the City of Denton Councilmember Place 5, of the State of Texas, of the State of Texas, and will, to the best of my ability, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend, preserve, protect, and defend, the Constitution and laws, the Constitution and laws, of the United States, of the United States, and of the State, and of the State, so help me God. I, state your name. I, Deb Armitter, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will faithfully execute the duties, that I will faithfully execute the duties, of the Office of Councilmember Place 5, of the Office of Councilmember Place 5, of the City of Denton Texas, of the City of Denton Texas, and will, to the best of my ability, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend, preserve, protect, and defend, the City Charter, the City Charter, Code of Ordinances, Code of Ordinances, and Resolution of the City, and Resolution of the City. Congratulations. Thank you. Ms. Johnson, if you could just come up, and you're more than welcome to bring your family. You can just have them stand behind you. You're going to raise your right hand, and you're going to repeat after me, okay? I, Boudia Johnson, I, Boudia Johnson, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I have not directly or indirectly, that I have not directly or indirectly, paid, offered, or promised to pay, paid, offered, or promised to pay, contributed, or promised to contribute, contributed, or promised to contribute, any money, or thing of value, any money, or thing of value, or promised any public office, or employment, or promised any public office, or employment, for the giving, or withholding, for the giving, or withholding, of a vote, of a vote, at the election at which I was elected, at the election at which I was elected, at the election for which I was elected, so help me God, so help me God. I, state your name, I, Boudia Johnson, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will faithfully execute the duties, that I will faithfully execute the duties, of the office of, of the office of, city of Denton, city of Denton, council member, council member, district one, district one, of the state of Texas, of the state of Texas, and will to the best of my ability, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend, preserve, protect, and defend, the constitutional laws, the constitutional laws, of the United States, of the United States, and of the state, and of the state, so help me God, so help me God. I, state your name, I, Boudia Johnson, do solemnly swear, do solemnly swear, that I will faithfully execute the duties, that I will faithfully execute the duties, of the office of, of the office of, council member, district two, pardon me, council member, district one, council member, district one, of the city of Denton, Texas, of the city of Denton, Texas, and will to the best of my ability, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend, preserve, protect, and defend, the city charter, the city charter, state of ordinances, code of ordinances, and resolutions of the city, and resolutions of this city. Congratulations. And now being 7 36 p.m., the meeting of the city council, the city of Denton, is hereby adjourned.