Dec 17, 2020 City Council on 2020-12-17 6:00 PM (Special Called Meeting)

good evening everyone it is 6 o'clock on December 17th 2020 and welcome to the Denton City Council holiday special we will begin with we do have a quorum established I'm calling the meeting to order now and beginning with our first item which is always is the pledge to the U.S. flag and the Texas flag please stand if you're able 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 our next item is the reading of a proclamation to councilmember Keely Briggs in appreciation for her service to the city of Denton as a city council member I will now read the proclamation and then give members of the council an opportunity to say anything that they'd like to proclamation and appreciation of Keely G. Briggs to all to all whom these presence shall come greetings whereas Keely G. Briggs has served on the city council of the city of Denton from 2015 to 2020 and whereas the city of Denton has been extremely fortunate in having enjoyed the dedicated and outstanding contributions of Keely Briggs in her efforts to make Denton a better city whereas Keely G. Briggs among her many contributions to the community has served as councilmember for district two and also served on the city council employee benefits committee committee on community engagement committee on the environment committee community justice council convention of visitor bureau advisory board the Dallas regional mobility committee coalition the Denton county homeless homelessness leadership team the development code review committee the economic development partnership board the ethics committee the Lake Ray Roberts planning and zoning commission the mobility committee the regional transportation council and the tax increment reinvestment zone number two board and whereas Keely G. Briggs has always served above and beyond in the efficient discharge of her duties in promoting the welfare and prosperity of this city and has earned the respect of her fellow council members colleagues and citizens of Denton and the loss of her services will be keenly felt now therefore I Chris Watts mayor of the city of Denton Texas that the sincere warm appreciation of Keely G. Briggs felt by the citizens and staff of the city of Denton be formally conveyed to her in a permanent manner by reading this proclamation into the official minutes of the city of Denton and forwarding to her a true copy thereof be it further resolved that the city of Denton on this the 17th day of December 2020 does hereby officially and sincerely extend its thanks to the honorable Keely G. Briggs for her successful career as council member in this city of Denton signed by Mayor Watts and y'all at home can't hear the muted applause coming from each council member at this time but I'll start with anyone any council member who would like to say something and then Keely will give you a chance at the at the end go ahead council member Armenter. Sure I just want to say thank you so much Keely I happen to live in District 2 and I knew you I met you for the first time when you were running I was at my kids school picking them up and you were just another mom at the school you introduced yourself and told me you were running for mayor and you did not seem like a politician at all you just seemed like a real member of the community who really cared and that is what you have continued to be even in politics and that's why apparently overcome by emotion D2 loves you. Thank you council member Armenter council member Melzer did I see your hand a moment ago you did I'm a little stunned with the unreality Keely you were very much an inspiration to me I'm involved in city government and your example is a tough one to live up to the energy and commitment and sort of true north of your convictions always present it's going to be tough making sure that we maintain that level of performance without you here I thank you so much for being an example to me and I'm sure to many others. Any other council member or anyone else like to say anything council member Johnson? I wanted to thank you for your service and that I pray that whatever your endeavors are in life that you will be a success. Anyone else then I'll add to that Keely before giving you a moment I want to sincerely thank you for your service I think Paul had the right of it you're irreplaceable on the council it's going to take a few of us to fill the gap you leave on the Denton City Council we know you're not going anywhere you're still a vital member of our community and I know we look forward to hearing from you in the future and seeing you in town you're very active before your service on council and we'll I'm sure we'll see you again and if you'd like to say anything okay we had somebody on the line who needed to mute and council member Briggs you have the floor okay I'm going to just read something really quick it has been a tremendous honor to represent the great people neighborhoods and businesses of district two here on our city council for almost six years I want to thank district two for the opportunity to serve them it has made me a better person and Mr. Baker wherever you are in there I wish you as our district's representative here on council I wish you well and I thank you for giving of yourself and stepping up to serve I've worked alongside 14 different council colleagues here in my time on City Council we saw eye to eye more often than people realize maybe even more than we realize when we didn't agree we just didn't agree we did we sought compromise where we could get it and each council member fought hard for our positions and the direction that we felt the city should go because that is what we are supposed to do on behalf of the people we serve thank you so much to our city staff and leadership you keep this city running and moving forward sorry your execution and daily service to our community keep didn't on a path of constant improvement and I thank you for your high standards and your professionalism I thought I got all of this out I really did okay to the people of Denton stay engaged this is your city participate in it help shape it serve it volunteer in our in our community serve on municipal boards ask representatives questions and share your ideas please talk to your neighbors more and make things happen the people on this dais do a better job representing you when you are engaged informed and participating in our local government and in our community I leave you with a very full heart thank you thank you all thank you councilmember breaks we'll move on to the next part of our agenda items for individual consideration I'm going to read both item captions and call both items then we'll have one presentation before we take up action on these items ID 20-1780 consider adoption of an ordinance canvassing the returns and declaring the results of the municipal election runoff to elect a city councilmember to place six and mayor to place seven held in the city of Denton on December 8 2020 and provide an effective date ID 20-1781 consider adoption of an ordinance canvassing the returns and declaring the results of the special election runoff to elect a city councilmember to district two held in the city of Denton on December 8 2020 and providing an effective date and with that I'll turn it over to the city secretary Rosa I think you're still muted. Thank you my name is Rosa Rios and I am your city secretary I am here to present the results of the December 8 2020 general and special runoff elections so the runoff election for the general places were was ordered on November 17th the purpose was to elect members for city council places six and seven that being mayor for the for the mayor all for full terms we had for place six we had two candidates and those were Jim Mann and Paul Meltzer who's our incumbent for place seven again for the mayor seat we did also have two candidates Kelly Briggs and Gerard Hudspeth the results of the runoff general for the special election were was for the purpose of electing city council members to district two for an unexpired term and we did also have two candidates Ronnie Anderson and Connie Baker so the unofficial general and special runoff election reports 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 and district and candidate the city council does need to accept the unofficial results results in order to officiate the outcome and per city charter the candidates receiving the majority of the votes cast for each place is are declared elected for the general runoff election place six candidate Paul Meltzer received 50% plus of votes cast and for place seven the mayor seat candidate Gerard Hudspeth received 50% of votes cast here you will see the cumulative results that show total votes received by each candidate and of course Paul Meltzer shows to have received 50% plus and Gerard Hudspeth again also receiving 50% plus the next proceeding pages will show the results by precinct and candidate as they were issued and received place six continues end of place six for place seven the mayor seat place seven continues and the end of place seven results for the December 8th special election district to candidate Connie Baker again received 50% of votes cast the cumulative results here show the total votes received by councilmember Connie Baker councilmember elect here you'll see again the results by precinct per candidate and so the recommendation is to consider adoption of the two draft ordinances that you've been presented ordinance number 21780 with the proposed numeration is to consider adoption of the ordinance canvassing the returns of the general election and ordinance number 21781 proposed numeration is to consider adoption of the ordinance canvassing the results of the special municipal election runoff and I'll take any questions you may have okay Rosa if you could take your screen down for us we can see the council members there we go thank you are there any questions for the city secretary on either one of these items and I'll note for the record that we had no callers and no online comment cards on these items if there aren't any questions could I have any action desired on ID 20-1780 that's the runoff for place six and place seven councilmember Briggs I move approval councilmember Briggs moves approval is there a second councilmember Armitter I second there's a motion by councilmember Briggs second by councilmember Armitter any discussion then we'll proceed with a vote councilmember Briggs how say you yeah councilmember Armitter yes councilmember Johnson councilmember Ryan aye councilmember Meltzer aye and the chair is an aye that motion carries and we'll move on to the next item ID 20-1781 do we have any desired action on that item councilmember Briggs I'll move approval councilmember Ryan I'll second councilmember Briggs has moved approval councilmember Ryan has seconded any discussion then we'll move forward with the vote councilmember Briggs how say you yes councilmember Ryan aye councilmember Johnson aye councilmember Armitter yes councilmember Meltzer aye and the chair is an aye the ayes have it both of those items are approved the results of those elections are approved and that will move us to item C ID 20-1714 and I'll start with we have a series of things to issue to each of the newly elected councilmembers and I'll start with the certificate of election and we'll start with councilmember elect councilmember Paul Meltzer I will read the certification and I believe it's also going to be displayed on your screen in the name and by the authority of the city of Denton this is to certify that a runoff election held on December 8th 2020 Paul Meltzer was duly elected councilmember place six signed by Mayor Watts and for Mayor elect Gerard Hutsmith in the name and by the authority of the city of Denton this is to certify that at a runoff election held on December 8th 2020 Gerard Hutsmith was duly elected mayor place seven and signed by Mayor Watts for councilmember elect Connie Baker this is to certify that at a runoff election held on December 8th 2020 Connie Baker was duly elected councilmember for district two to an unexpired turn signed by Mayor Watts now each of those councilmembers will receive a copy of that certificate suitable for framing and what's going to happen next is we're going to recess for about 90 seconds to allow each of those folks to go down to the council chambers or for Rosa to get set up in the council chambers after about 90 seconds then the city secretary will take the baton and will do statements of each officer and the oaths of office they'll each be sworn in and then when that's concluded we'll take about another 90 second recess and at that time Mayor Hutsmith will take the baton and chair the rest of the meeting so let's take that recess now everybody I am here to present the statement of officer and the appropriate oaths to councilmember elect Paul Meltzer we are doing this virtually councilmember Meltzer if you would please raise your right hand let's see if we can get it on camera here we go you will repeat after me aye please state your name aye Paul Meltzer do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I have not directly or indirectly that I have not directly or indirectly paid offered promised to pay paid offered 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 of a vote for the giving or withholding of a vote at the election at which I was elected at the election at which I was elected so help me God help me God please keep your hand raised repeat after me aye Paul Meltzer aye Paul Meltzer 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 councilmember place five city of Denton councilmember place six yes of the state of Texas of the state of Texas and will to the best of my ability will to the best of my ability preserve protect and defend preserve protect and defend the constitution and laws constitution and laws of the United States and of this state United States and of this state so help me God help me God one more aye state your name aye Paul Meltzer do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the duties I will faithfully execute the duties of the office of the office of councilmember place six councilmember place six of the city of Denton Texas 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 reserve protect and defend the city charter the city charter code of ordinances code of ordinances and resolutions of the city and resolutions of this city thank you and congratulations congratulations we're not going to continue with mayor elect Gerard Hutzpah you can please stand here and your family can stand behind you if you please raise your right hand and repeat after me aye please state your name aye Gerard Hutzpah do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I have not directly or indirectly that I have not directly or indirectly paid offered promise to pay paid offered or promise to pay contributed or promise to contribute contributed or promise to contribute any money or thing of value any money or thing of value or promised any public office or employment or promise any public office or employment for the giving or withholding of a vote for the giving or withholding of a vote at the election at which I was elected at the election of which I was elected so help me God so help me God I repeat your name I Gerard Hutzpah 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 mayor place seven city of Denton mayor place seven 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 and of the state of the United States and of this state so help me God so help me God I Gerard Hutzpah do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the duties that I will faithfully execute the duties of the office of mayor place seven of the office of mayor place seven of the city of Denton of the city of Denton 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 the code of ordinances and resolutions of the city and resolutions of the city thank you and congratulations if you will please step over here you'll find the documents thank you so thank you if you would please raise your right hand I say your name Connie Baker do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I have not directly or indirectly that I have not directly or none paid paid offered offered promised to pay promised to pay contributed contributed or promised to contribute promised to contribute any money any money or thing of value things of value or promised or promise any public office any public office or employment employment for the giving for the giving or withholding withholding of a vote a vote at the election election at which I was which I was elected elected so help me God so help me God we're going to continue I say your name Connie Baker do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will faithfully that I will faithfully execute the duties execute the duties of the office of office of city of denton city of denton council member council member district two district two of the state of texas state of texas and will and will to the best best of my ability my ability preserve preserve protect protect and defend defend the constitution constitution and laws laws of the united states united states and of this of this state state so help me god so help me god I Connie Baker do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will I will faithfully execute faithfully execute the duties duties of the office of office of council member council member district two district two of the city of denton city of denton texas texas and will will to the best best of my ability my ability preserve preserve protect protect and defend defend the city charter city charter code of ordinances code of orders and resolutions and resolutions of this city of this city congratulations thank you very much okay we're going to take about another 90 second recess to get reset and take over with mayor hudspeth all right welcome back to this meeting of the denton city council and again congratulations to the new members that were sworn in and again i'd like to join everyone in thanking council member briggs for her service to the city um it was well done and so with that the next item on the agenda is item id 2017 15 the election of mayor pro tem and to lay the ground rules for that i will just uh once i give the indication uh that the i'll say these words uh the nominations are now open then that'll allow people to use the electronic feature to raise your hand staff will place those in order uh and then before that council member melton you have a question uh yes uh i i'm going to move suspension of the rules uh which i'm happy to do at an appropriate time but before the proceedings get underway you you'll have to help me understand suspension of the rules in what way okay so uh having been through this this process twice it didn't make sense to me the first time and the second time i went through it it didn't make any more sense to me uh it's just uh a custom uh but it's within our power to set our own rules and uh it uh it just strikes me that this form of election is done entirely different from any election that anybody ever takes part in uh just this simple matter of it being dependent on who makes an electronic move first which is really you know quite a meaningless thing uh and what i what i'm proposing is that like every other election any of us has ever participated in uh we take nominations and then each member has the ability to vote for one of the candidates nominated now if the requirement is that we end up with greater than 50 uh for the you know the ultimate winner of the vote uh if that threshold isn't met then we would have a runoff as many of us present here have experienced so that that uh so i propose that we suspend the rules enough is enough with the silliness let's do it like a normal election well okay i take issue with some of that but that's not for me to go into right now uh mr city attorney what is the process for that um for the suspension of the rules to be considered you're muted erin sorry when when that has been made it there's usually it is a motion and the second and then it requires a simple majority of the council to suspend the rules okay thank you is there a second for council member melzer's motion one more time okay motion fails due to want for a second and we will proceed uh again uh just as a reminder i'll say nominations are now open and then if you would push the raise your hand button electrically electronically uh the staff will place those in in order of that was done so if you could please uh note that now the nominations are now open and i'm waiting on staff to got it so here it is in order so first is uh berdea johnson you're muted i would like to nominate jesse davis he did a good job so i think he could continue doing it okay thank you next in line is next in order that showed up here is council member armature yes so i agree that jesse davis did a great job and um but i want to nominate myself for this position okay okay are there any other nominations okay seeing none uh with no no others forthcoming the nomination process has closed does any member of the city denton city council wish to make any comments about their we've already kind of gone through that process any additional comments on the on council member davis or council member armature that have been proposed okay then uh with with no additional comments nominees will now be put no you're not on mute uh so with no additional comments nominees will now be put to a vote uh in order received as we have in the past so we'll take up council member um johnson's nomination of council member davis first if that fails uh then we would go to council member armatures nomination of herself so um council member uh johnson you made the motion how say you all right all right and then um uh let's just go in order council council member uh connie baker or and let me let me let me before i do that uh question uh for procedures do i need a second for this somebody help me no thank you just making sure okay so council member johnson was yes aye and then council member uh baker i vote uh for thank you davis thank you thank you uh council member davis aye thank you council member ryan aye council member armature nay thank you um and then uh council member melzer seeing the clear of fate i'm happy to join in approving council member davis aye thank you and and mayor hudspeth is aye as well the motion passes or pardon me the nominee uh passes six to one thank you everyone uh that will conclude item uh d of the uh items for individual consideration that will take us to section four citizen comments on consent agenda items and i have no calls for any of these items we did have have citizens comment on the consent agenda items using the virtual white card uh two people commented on item ac id 2519 there were two in support zero in opposition of that item so with that are there uh that takes us to the uh consent agenda item are there uh do any of the council members have questions about the consent agenda uh council member armature and then council member davis so i don't have a question about the consent agenda um but i was wondering if individual item j the very last item could be pulled up to right after uh we go over the consent agenda and vote on it since it is the item of seems to be the item of the greatest public interest uh voting on the the the coven ordinance at the end that the public wouldn't have to wait till the end of the meeting to get to that so i'm i'm happy to take them in in order just because that's what people are reviewed but i will open it up to the group is there um erin is that in my purview to have us take that up and either see if there's interest for that or how does that work to consider council member armatures proposal what what has been done in the past is the mayor has made the decision of whether or not to move that up based on the council member requesters uh uh justification or reasoning behind that uh however nothing prevents you it's not an actual written rule so nothing prevents you from proceeding the way you've proposed by putting it before the group and seeing how they how they feel about that certainly uh thank you very much for that insight uh is there is there a another person that would want to move that up and then we'll we'll see if there's four uh councilman melter yeah i support moving that up okay all right and so then the question would be are there are there two others that support moving that up uh so that we have a majority of the this body not seeing any action okay then we'll move forward as is are there any other questions about there are comments on the consent agenda before we move forward council member davis i'd like to ask to pull ac for a brief presentation that staff has prepared i don't think it's going to be especially controversial but it's a lot of good information uh going into that vote thank you okay any other questions comments on the consent agenda okay then we will move forward understanding the only thing we're pulling is ac um so let's i will take a motion on the consent agenda and so council member davis i move approval of the consent agenda uh with the exception of item ac council member ryan i'll second we have a motion and a second for the consent agenda item uh all but for ac council member davis houseiu aye uh council member ryan all right uh council member johnson aye council member baker you're still muted we'll come back council member baker council member melzer aye council member armater yes okay uh council member baker and while he's unmuting uh mayor hutspeth is a i as well uh there we go council member baker's right so that motion passes seven zero thank you that'll take us to items for individual consideration and we will take up uh item ac from the consent agenda item and is there there's a presentation staff has yes we have uh david gains and richard canoni um bear for this one thank you we're in the process of pulling it up now so uh good evening uh mayor council richard canoni deputy director of development services good evening what i'd like to do is just quickly go go over a couple slides give a little bit of background with respect to how this how this came about if you recall back in january 9th of 9 of 2019 we added a criteria for to include a fiscal impact analysis for a number of rezonings as well as annexations that we were receiving as part of the 2019 ddc update we then included a specific section uh to include that as a criteria when applications come in section 245 e9 shortly thereafter we did issue an rfp with the goal of creating sort of this independent fiscal analysis as we were starting to receive some of these we wanted to make sure we were looking at them equally and and across the board and there weren't different methodologies being used from a variety of different consultants related to the project so this is something that would be specific to the city have city city data and we can control that and provide that information both to planning and zoning commission as well as city council and so we issued that rfp we sent it to 531 prospective suppliers included with that were 22 denton firms the scope of work was developed i won't go i won't read everything in here but it just gives you an idea of the items that we were looking for both to look at how we can how we can continue to look at how uh how how development will further impact the city both in the short term and long term but making sure we look at that in a holistic view both from looking at our residential growth industrial growth as well as commercial retail growth looking at how transportation affects it property tax policies but then also looking at other sources and and with respect to how the city's growing and what improvements are are assisting and guiding or promoting development and that could be through disd new schools being built text dot installing or widening roadways as well as the cogs involvement in addition looking at that looking at all new developments that under under this microscope just to provide that that that option for for council as you're weighing weighing those those land use decisions in total we received um 13 responses to the rfp and then we conducted interviews with the top five the the firm that that was uh that we're recommending is a comm they had a pretty diverse uh a diverse project team they they have done this uh in other places one one thing that we did like is the fact that um they weren't using a a sort of canned model if you will um so while there will be a report and analysis with with their um study there will be a a um a model that will use an excel spreadsheet program that that would be linked um and one thing we wanted to make sure that that we as staff can uh modify that or update it each year um depending on depending on our our annual budget so we didn't have to go back out and and ask consultant or continue to spend fun funds to to update that model and then again keeping it making sure that it is specific to denton and then uh tying them to a a six month completion date wanted to provide a little bit a little bit more background because i i know if through through the through the last couple months uh it even came up last night at planning and zoning commission just really how this tool and and the purpose is and um when you really look at at zoning and land use regulations there's there's several objectives in addition to being fiscally prudent um and and it really is this fiscal impact analysis i want to make sure everyone both here and and and in in the public understand it's it's one of many factors to consider but it it really can't be just the only deciding factor there's a lot of other other considerations um and and again making sure that you have that balance looking at how this affects will have effect both citywide and not just only on that that one project because there might be other other items that tie to it and and there's there's a term i won't get too too far in the weeds on on planning theory but there's there's a term that that's often used is called fiscal zoning and there's there's multiple sides that that that agree or or don't or disagree with it and some think it's a great tool and others caution and and and that's all i want to do is is just throw throw a little caution as to um why it can't really be the the operative motive for for how we how we review these cases um one you you would it would lead to really what's called overzoning or or or sort of abandoning the the the old school of thought of of the legal premise of zoning which is which is health health safety welfare and and really focusing on highest and best use only and and that would be the guiding factor to really develop at the highest intensity that that could be developed and i don't think that that's that's that's the the the goal or or the policy that that's that's been said at least through our through our comprehensive plan but also caution that that it's not a tool used for exclusionary housing you know where a certain use could be excluded a perfect example of that would be a a non-profit housing provider while they're providing a a fantastic or or much needed housing in the community on paper running through the model it would generate almost very little if not any taxes at all and so i think i think it goes back again look looking at that balance and and how how we want to grow but it but it is just another tool that we have that council has in again in weighing your decisions and whether whether it makes sense as we continue to bring those bring those items forward and with that i i have nothing else to add other than staff recommends approval of the to enter into the contract with aecom thank you okay questions council member melzer yeah i'm going to go ahead and move approval but i want to comment that any kind of economic model or fiscal model is i would just caution is an aid to judgment but it's not like because it's done quantitatively it's you know the absolute truth it's a function of assumptions that go into it time frames that are selected there are always externalities things like environmental effects that may be difficult to quantify and you know would necessarily show up and you know in fiscal analysis so it's an age of judgment i think an important one and i do move approval thank you council member davis i'll second and say that council member melzer gave a very good summary of exactly how we should view this they can't it can't predict the future it just gives us good information to work from thank you okay we have a motion to second any other comments or questions for staff council member armature yeah i had a question to what extent is this a living document of sorts um you know how often could we can come back to this if i may um we would we would look at this annually and update it with the with the annual budget um but i think it also lends itself you know what's occurred over the last year obviously we had some changes with sales tax and so i it will be our model um we're we'll be able to adjust those those inputs um and in those those um various layers if you will of the spreadsheet to to model it based upon again based upon on denton and any any changes or um budget budget numbers that that would reflect okay you have is that you have follow-up questions that what you're okay go ahead yes and thank you for that that's good um another question i had was can you speak to the role of denton housing authority you know it to what extent uh are they considered a partner agency in this being a obviously they're not a uh a entity but they're here in denton and they serve us to what extent will partner with dha uh be involved in this in this plan the model is the model is simply a tool to assess new developments are being brought forward to you the the dent housing authority really doesn't have much of a role to play there if there was a project that they move forward that perhaps uh you know there was there was some incentives being requested to the city council we have asked them before to follow the process and bring it before the city council for a discussion but that's that um policy on whether or not to support tax credit projects to encourage affordable housing is a is an independent and different discussion from assessing new developments that are coming in new projects are coming in whether or not they're cost neutral or not two distinct processes and two distinct different intended uses okay thank you any other questions for staff okay we have a motion by council member paul melzer we have a second by mayor pro tem jesse davis um so no other questions we will take a vote paul how say you hi mayor pro tem davis i got to get used to that uh council member johnson hi and then uh council member baker yes thank you and uh council member armater yes and mayor hudspeth is a i as well it passes seven zero and so that'll take us to uh section seven items for individual consideration continued and so we'll take up uh item a id 20 2449 consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of denton tex is a homeroom municipality municipal corporation authorizing city manager or his designee to execute a contract with ray rig pacific company i'm sure i'm saying that wrong through the through the uh u.s community communities government purchasing alliance contract number zero two five four thank you mayor we're going to pull up the presentation just one moment okay good evening mayor members of city council my name is adrian hill i'm the solid waste operations manager uh we are hoping that the city council will approve a new contract with ray rig pacific company to provide residential carts in 2005 the city of didn't began using carts for collection three years later in 2008 the city of didn't sign a contract with ray rig pacific company to provide the refuse and recycling carts on october 1st 2019 ray rick started supplying the city of denton with carts for the new yard waste program that was implemented for the past 12 years ray rig has provided carts for the city of denton the core of the containers are made from 100% recycled material they are also located in dallas texas so this would cut down on freight cost as well as delivery time ray rig also provides a replacement warranty on the entire cart the solid waste department is seeking a five-year contract for three million eight hundred sixty two thousand dollars this contract will allow us to continue purchasing refuse recycle and yard waste carts that concludes my presentation if y'all have any questions for me i'll share the screen thank you adrian and while they're pulling down the presentation uh do we have any questions for staff okay not seeing any questions is there a motion okay councilman council member ryan i'm with approval okay is there a second councilor mayor pro tem davis i'll second okay uh council member ryan i say you aye mayor pro tem davis aye council member johnson aye council member melzer aye council member armature yes and mayor hutchpeth is an aye and then uh council member baker yes thank you that item passes seven zero and thank you have a great evening that'll take us to the next item item b id 2024-71 consider adoption of ordinance of the city of denton a texas homeroom municipal corporation authorized on a city manager or his designee to execute a c m a r guarantee maximum price amendment to the construction management at risk contract with those s brine uh inc a texas corporation good evening mayor scott gray director of airport facilities and real estate i'll pull the presentation thank you so there we go mayor and members of the council you see the presentation yes sir thank you well good evening i have the privilege to be before you this evening to uh present the public safety project amendment to the owner's c m r uh this evening um briefly go over a couple of slides just to bring the council up to speed some of the council members have seen some of these um previously in previous uh presentations over the last year or so um so the project scope um for this project includes the pd headquarters renovation which is the picture you see here on the left and the vintage boulevard pd substation and indoor firing range which are the two pictures on the right council remembers um we went through a number of presentations previously with various options for facade and and items to be added at the council's desire and those have all been included and i'll go over those in a few slides one thing i wanted to cover in a high altitude this evening is is the process being used which is the construction manager at risk process and this process um typically referred to as c m a r is a delivery method for construction and it and it's a commitment by our construction manager to deliver that project at a guaranteed maximum price which is the reason we're here this evening um to construct whatever it is that we had designed in accordance with our documents and specifications there's some advantages to this particular type of method and it's more collaborative construction process it certainly assists in the value engineering cost estimation and constructability review because there's coordination between the design team and the construction team during the process and i'll get into that as well this method also assists in accelerated construction schedules in some cases um it's again the design firm and the c m a r the construction manager do collaborate um and and help select the best value subcontractors to do the project um and it and it certainly provides us a cost certainty with a guaranteed maximum price and again at a very high altitude this is the process for the c m a r design firm is is selected first they do start they do start the design effort and they're contracted by the city subsequent to that selection and as they're going through design the city then selects the construction manager at risk and enters into a contract for pre-construction services that's when the two firms start to collaborate and again work out design details constructability issues things of that nature and that brings us basically where we're at today is the last box but the two boxes before that the c m r solicitation of subcontractors bid and the design firm c m a r and city's collaboration to term best value is what i will explain here in a moment and then certainly we're here for council's consideration for the amendment itself and just as a reminder of of who those folks are as i mentioned the design team is selected first that's brand stutter carol they are architect they are nationally recognized doing public safety projects thomas s burns or burns construction is our construction manager they have 90 years experience and then peak program value is our program management firm and they and our project control specialist this happens to be the same team that's currently finishing the development services building we're excited to bring that one to a close here over the next several weeks and start moving staff into that into that building and i think what's significant is both on time and on budget so now as i mentioned those those box four and box five on my previous slide is the c m a r subcontractor solicitation process and first as they were going through design and before it's actually bid each of the members of our team actually did a construction estimate that did not include the owner's contingency and i'll get in to that what that is in a moment but as you can see it ranges from about 41 million to 50 million dollars to do all of the construction and the alternates but did not include the owner's contingency we saw significant subcontractor participation in this project which was exciting and in many cases more than 10 trades firms bidding on each section so it was a very very well solicited and well submitted project the alternates that were included and we talked about this on occasion at the council meeting i think it was in may to include 100 foot firing range lanes ballistic upgrades which is part of that driver training pad for for the police department covid 19 upgrades that we'd like to put into the building sustainability options which we talked to council about as well wall protection and signage were the others what you see in the in the table there is the the bid amounts that we received this project was bid in basically two pieces the substation and firing range is one because it's on the same site and then the headquarters renovation which is obviously at the at the existing police headquarters the substation firing range bids were approximately 19.1 million the headquarters at 16.4 million and then there's the owner's contingency that i talked about a 5.9 and i'll get to that in a minute and then all of the alternatives that were listed there at 4.6 million for a total of 46 just over 46 million dollars what i'd like to point out here is if you take the contingency out you're approximately 40 million dollars which was actually below all of the estimates by our team members which was really contributes to the subcontractor participation and the best value created for the city the owner's contingency piece just briefly is inside the guaranteed maximum price that is controlled by the city for unexpected items that may come up during construction certainly with a renovation project those are more likely to take place including probably one of the biggest concerns that we'll be looking at as they get started is the slab inside that old building if it is sufficient to support the development that's proposed inside that building so that that money is controlled by the city and through our team and negotiated whether or not that the the need is there if not the money will start to return to the city as they reach different phases of construction certainly at about 30 percent increment so as the money isn't needed it's returned to the city the city can use it for its choice in this case it is bond funds in this particular slide is the project budget from the beginning so it includes not only what you see highlighted in yellow which is the item this evening but the previous contractual items approved by council to date over the last year year and a half design effort which is the bci contract the pre-construction efforts which is included in our professional services construction services to get us through the project itself and then other professional services such as materials testings and so forth that had to be done at the front end so that currently gets it at approximately 50.8 million dollars of under contractual obligation today assuming that the council will pass the amendment and then the pending items which gets us through the rest of the project the commissioning of the building testing of all the all the things in each of the buildings materials testing all the soft costs which is furnishings equipment it av security and fiber probably of most significance there is the fiber piece to get to the the new facility and then there's another contingency that's actually outside that guaranteed maximum price and that 3.3 million is basically the balance of the of the 2019 bond issuance that money is again is controlled specifically by the city that would be used for things that are outside of this construction project that may come up that that may be some additional funding that was not included in the contractor's scope of work our intent and hope is to provide that money back to the city and then it can be used for other bond related construction efforts the proposed schedule if approved this evening the notice to proceed will happen in january i believe it's the 15th of january at that time the construction team will start assembling their team and their construction trailers and begin work on this on these two significant sites and projects the the projects will be completed roughly in the january to march of 2022 time frame but be fully operational by june and there's a gap there for weather and and maybe some construction delays and issues there we're certainly hoping to be completed with all these projects before that june 30 deadline that i'd be happy to answer any questions to council mayhem okay thank you scott questions for staff council member armature yes can you take us on a little um time travel back to so we can trace exactly how the costs uh escalated and changed along the way a kind of a timeline um i'm not sure i follow the question exactly council member but the the time frame is is is the council may recall the 2019 bond issuance was back in november for voter approval which was 61.9 million dollars which was the budgets that's still being held today the construction i think you're asking about the differences between the numbers today that where we were again at that time the estimates were a little bit higher when we went into the bond issuance effort and then as they went through the construction effort and the and the best value and the bids that we got we got significant savings as you can tell not including the the the contingency there was nearly a 10 million dollar savings on what was expected which was which was great news um and and also and i forgot to mention um mr chris squadra from ppv is on the phone he is our he is our consultant for our projects and our cmar and and certainly can ask any answer any questions in detail about the process or or the budget so that so that first estimate was would you say was kind of a conservative estimate with some extra padding um and it turned out that thanks to this sorry i'm hearing some some strange feedback so that's correct as you as i mentioned in one of the slides is there was three separate estimates by our team members and they all look at it from a very very different perspective of design construction and then certainly ppv who is our our our cross control specialists in that range was from 41 to 50 and and the numbers came in actually 40 so it was conservative but i think really what we saw was a great market for the bids from the construction and again and when one more follow-up question to that um how long um does do those bids uh go for um that is uh you know if if um if construction got delayed say you know how long would those bids um be be retained at that exact dollar amount um well it is the it is the guaranteed maximum price we're contractually obligated from our our first um contract this is an amendment to the original contract to begin construction in in january and issue a notice to proceed so um our intent obviously is to move uh forward with these with these great pricing that we got with this project to get it kicked off as quickly as possible certainly if there's delays that could eat into our our contingency monies um if it's delayed because obviously um we would be delaying that that contractor from doing their project thank you and and mr city manager do you have something you wanted to add to that yeah i i don't like the um term padding in the budget i mean we went back through the with the bond committee and recalculated all the uh all the budgets numerous times based upon how fast the market was moving and we recently had had a project built in richardson and and then another one in granbury caused us to sit back and kind of rethink pricing so part of the reason we brought the uh we revised the budget and then brought this back as one package was trying to encourage as many subs as possible as scott is saying to participate that's really where we continue to see ourselves get hurt on some of these smaller vertical projects is they're just they weren't big enough and we didn't have enough subs on site to to really help the pricing so we went back and put a very different construction method in place trying to make sure that there was a enough volume here to you know to meet those budget numbers and and enough interest from the contractors to cap our outlay so um i don't like the word padding i think what what scott is telling you tonight is that we were within about three percent or so of our bid estimates all three bid estimates that actually came in three to four percent and that's pretty amazing on a on a project that's 50 million dollars so the process appears to be working we still have to get through and clear a couple contingency hurdles but given the current building the and all the unknowns of that building and it wasn't initially built for a place department i think all of you would probably know better than me uh the initial use of that building but they're not sure what they're going to find i think the one thing that we promised the council when we went through the bond process is that we were going to find construction methods to help us contain our costs better we were going and not going to reach construction pricing costs until we had 100 percent design so far we're off and running exactly as we had hoped okay thank you any other questions for staff councilmember melzer yeah oh i think i mentioned it in a previous meeting there was more business forms i'm sure they never anticipated the current use um uh i'd be happy to be sure to be wrong on this but generally everything we do we see things happen they don't expect in their contingencies you know that and we have to make adjustments on the upside you know raising expenditures but if it if it holds true and we do come in ahead uh what happens then is when you have a savings on a bond funded item like that we're do we just not raise that much funding or what what happens we'll have some options i think scott and the team have added in the uh the additions that we were hoping to get into the the project but weren't sure that we could afford and any unused dollar amounts is is going to most likely be recommended that we use that to prepay the bonds off the way that the bonds the way that the bond was sold was pretty specific about the the projects in each proposition so need to talk to david gaines and in our legal council to be sure but my guess is we'd probably use that to prepay some of the debt i see you want to count chickens before they hatch right thank you okay any other questions for staff okay i i'll take a motion council uh mayor pro tem davis i'll move approval council member ryan a second okay we have a motion and a second any other discussion okay mayor pro tem davis how say you aye council member ryan aye council member melzer aye council member baker aye council member johnson aye council member armater so i i will not go into any uh histrionics but i i do vote no to this thank you and then mayor hudspeth is an aye that passes six to one i'll call the next item which is c 20 24 72 consider adoption of ordinance of the city of denton texas home municipal corporation authorizing the city manager or his designee to execute a contract with axon enterprise inc good evening my name is chris summit i'm a lieutenant with the denton police department i appreciate your time tonight listening to our proposal i'll jump right in so the department is asking to upgrade to the officer safety plan seven plus through axon let's see how can i hide the camera pictures there we go all right so uh we're we're proposing upgrading our existing officer safety plan uh for both taser conducted energy weapons and the axon body cameras to utilize some improved technology that axon officers offers this program will also improve some efficiencies uh to help make the officers and the communities safer so our background information uh we're currently using an officer safety plan uh contract with axon it was designed to run through five years and it is scheduled to expire november 2022 uh this contract is complemented complemented by an unlimited cartridge plan contract that provides every sworn member with axon body worn camera a taser x2 and then cartridges for training and replacement after use the contract also provides all sworn members with unlimited tier licenses to evidence.com which is our cloud-based evidence storage platform for all of our digital evidence generated this excludes uh interview and recordings in our interview room currently and the current contract only provides an update to the body worn cameras it does not grant access to new taser conductive energy weapons or any of the new software suites that axon has coming online that will work in concert with their new products. So some of the benefits that we will see from this the we'd be upgrading the taser x2 to the taser 7 that will the current range for taser x2 the officer has to be about eight feet away to achieve effective probe placement to incapacitate the subject the taser 7 is going to reduce that to four feet we'll also have improved accuracy just from changes in how the the the probe's trail wires versus pull wires from the cartridge will have increased clothing penetration and a reduction of bounce-offs so that should make the uh the weapons more effective for us in the field we'll also have a rechargeable battery that we can dock it will upload firing data every time it's docked it will receive firmware updates this will be a big efficiency gain because right now we currently have to touch every single taser x2 to either download the firing data from the weapon or upload firmware we have 200 of those in service we'll also be getting a software suite called axon performance this prompts random supervisory review of video recordings through axon fleet which we have as our dashboard cameras in our car and through the body worn camera videos it maintains audit trails to ensure that the supervisory review has occurred and this will be a good component for us to achieve and maintain our status as a best practice organization that's one of the the requirements is a review of these videos by supervisors the one of the other features that will come available to us is axon aware plus our body cameras currently have active sim cards that allow for gps location the aware plus allows us to look on a map and see within about 100 feet where a camera is in record mode it's always possible that the camera could fall off the officer but we can at least get to where the camera is and it also allows approved personnel to live stream from an officer's body worn camera while it's recording this is you know a significant officer safety gain or oversight just as an aside if an officer activates their emergency button the approved personnel can log in and see real time what the officer is dealing with if it's just somebody yelling and screaming or if the officer is actually fighting with somebody that will help us direct resources accordingly another feature that we'll be bringing online is the axon redaction assistant our current method for redacting video to comply with open records request is a frame-by-frame advance to blur things like a face for a license plate or a computer screen the new software suite uses artificial intelligence to automatically redact faces or license plates or computer monitors so this should save staff hours in terms of redacting videos to comply with open record requests another feature that we're going to pick up is the axon signal sidearm this is a bluetooth attachment for gun holsters and basically pushes a bluetooth signal activating all body car all body and in-car cameras within range when an officer draws their weapon so you're basically taking the the decision and the muscle requirement from the officer to activate their camera in a critical incident you're taking that away as soon as the officer draws their weapon from the holster that camera is going to activate it's also going to trigger an alarm through the aware plus that can be monitored and dispatched that that a specific officer has drawn their weapon and allow dispatch to to get assistance and start monitoring that situation real time so definitely be a benefit to make sure that we don't have any human error mistakes and fail to capture evidence and critical incidents this is the budget product projection our fiscal year impact for our current fiscal year will be about thirty thousand dollars additional to what we've already paid in moving forward into fiscal year 21-22 will be at about six hundred and ten thousand dollars you can see the exact figures on the slide we're receiving a pro rate this year which is why our fiscal year payment this year is so low because of covid we wanted to minimize any actual impact in the current fiscal year we do have to make it up on the back end but we are receiving significant discounts from axon as well for re-upping sooner so in conclusion i'd like to ask you to consider adoption of an ordinance awarding a contract with axon for services and materials related to taser conductive energy weapons and our body-worn camera system for the police department in a five-year not to exceed amount of two million nine hundred and eighty one thousand dollars okay thank you and we'll take questions after the slide is pulled down sorry about that no problem perfect uh questions for sad council member melzer thank you i appreciate the increased accountability that the improvements in the in the body cameras represent i wonder if you could give us any context about the frequency of use of the you know of the class of non-lethal weapon and also any recent changes in use of force policy that might be reflected in some of the purchasing decisions that are being presented today sure so i pulled our our taser usage data so in 2019 we had 26 taser uses that can be a display a drive-stun where you don't actually fire the probes or firing the probes at an individual so we had 16 incidents in 2019 where we fired probes in an individual year to date in 2020 we've had 20 uses that include 11 instances where officers fired darts and individuals are we recently have updated our response resistance policies as well as our conductive energy weapon policy our policy was was robust prior to to these changes so there wasn't much substantive in the policy change what were the the general rule that we're looking at before an officer decides to deploy a taser where they're actually pulling the trigger shooting the darts at somebody is you're dealing with somebody that's trying to injure you actively trying to injure you or actively trying to injure somebody else that's the that's the litmus test for deploying the weapon does that answer your question yes it does if i can just ask a follow-up yes sir thank you was that in evidence in all the cases that were tracked that they were used in order to prevent injury to the officer or someone else yes the so each each use of force is individually reviewed to make sure it's in compliance with policy so i'm sure there were some that were were out of policy and the department took the appropriate corrective action there but the majority were within policy and appropriate uses so when it when it's used the patrol sergeant will review the use of force then the patrol lieutenant and it will go up the chain through the executive team any supervisory personnel has the authority to flag that use and recommend further investigation imagine the automatic triggering of the body camera with the activation of the device you know would give greater insight into whether there's any you know uses that are sort of on the bubble yes we we do currently have that functionality the taser x2 we do have the bluetooth compatible batteries to ensure that cameras are activated when the taser is activated so that's not new with this that's not new what will be new where will be when you draw your your lethal firearm that will also activate the body worn cameras thank you okay any other questions for staff okay councilmember armature oh yeah so if somebody's in a situation um where use to force is used against them and the camera is on um and they request the body camera footage does it automatically uh go to them get admitted to them um or a member of their family uh or what what is if you if you speak to the process uh and also the cost of obtaining the the the footage i mean not just seeing it but obtaining it speak to that sure uh if you want a copy of a body worn camera video you make an open records request in terms of and and then the city legal department makes the determination of what can and cannot be released in terms of cost of production i do not know what the cost of production is i can find out and get that information to you at a later date oh that's that's okay i didn't need to see cost of production um i just wanted to confirm that yeah they still have to fill out a public information request and then there sometimes is a cost for them attached to it which i believe is determined by the state i believe it's a state rule about a certain number of minutes it costs this much past that it costs that much um okay but i just wanted to confirm that that that was the case would also be the case uh is it is it with is it within uh the the jurisdiction of a police department uh or a city council uh to open it up uh so they automatically get the footage without having to pay for it that i don't know mayor she's going outside the scope of this item this item is a contract for the purchase of these this equipment it is not a an item to discuss procedures and of attaining uh uh city records city governmental records and so we've gone beyond the scope of the posting thank you yes uh so council member armature do you have any other questions regarding this contract okay thank you any other questions for staff okay i'll take a motion mayor pro tem davis i move approval of the item council member ryan i'll second okay uh we have a motion and a second in the other discussion uh mayor pro tem davis how say you aye council member ryan okay council member uh melzer the police have a very difficult job to do and i want to remind everyone that there is an advisory council uh that will review use occasions where force is used that has to report the results of which have to be reported out to council twice a year i vote aye thank you uh council member baker i vote yes thank you uh and then council member johnson aye council member armature no okay and uh mayor hudspeth is a aye that that passes six zero thank you uh officer summit and that will take us to uh i'll call the next item i which is item d id 20 2509 consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of denton texas home home rule municipal corporation authorizing the city manager or his designated execute a contract with texas meter and device company llc thank you mayor hudspeth council members chris lutrick did municipal electric have a short presentation here that hopefully explains why the electric department is here pitching a contract for the water department thank you so here to talk about the city of denton water reading services rfp 7484 again i'm chris lutrick executive manager of operations at the municipal electric some background on the topic we're going to discuss this evening is water meters so the city of denton provides water service to residents via municipal water utility currently the system has about 39 400 meters the meters that are currently in service are mechanical so they mechanically measure and track the water that flows through the meters to our customers these meters kind of are indicative of an old odometer so as the water goes through the the numbers just the dials keep moving up so to get this information into the billing department to issue a bill for our customers the meters must be manually read once a month by manually read i mean an individual must go to each each meter in the city open up the can read the numbers on the dial and enter that into a handheld device so a little background information of why i'm here prior to about 10 years ago the electric utility utilized the equivalent the electric equivalent of a mechanical meter so dme had to send somebody out every month to read the meter uh entered into the computer and at the same time they would read the water meters so about 10 years ago dme uh transitioned to an ami system that's an advanced meter infrastructure system where the meters basically are now smart and so instead of sending somebody out to read the electric meter they send that information to us every night so after that point when when dme no longer read the the electric meters we did continue to read the water meters so that's the answer why i'm why i'm here this evening so some information about the group that reads the water meters that is housed in the dme electric meter department a full a full complement of fte's would be seven that's seven meter technicians and i should say that as of today three of those are vacant these are the guys that actually drive out every day part their car walk four to eight miles actually looking looking at every meter and entering that in a handheld device uh this group is supported by a lead technician a meter billing coordinator and they're managed by the meter data and billing supervisor so once that information comes back in this is the group that verified the reads are valid if there's any any discrepancies or any high lows then it's taken care of by this group and then that information is forwarded on to customer service where they generate your monthly utility bill uh technicians on average read about 350 meters per day it's a tough job they're they're walking you know four to eight miles a day 100 degree heat 30 degree cold just a good group of guys uh total annual reads are approximately 475 000 and the operating expense for this service is paid for out of dme's meter operating budget and the water fund basically pays us back every year to the tune of about 940 000 a year looking to the future one of the items on your consent agenda tonight was the water department issuing a rfp for a feasibility study for ami amr system to see what that would look like for the city of denton just like our electric meters are are smart and we don't have to go read them manually uh the same tech technology exists for water meters so the uh the the study that was approved tonight they'll take a look at that and see what are the financial implications uh what technology is required how do we merge that with the electric system all of that will be looked at through that feasibility study so we've kind of seen this coming over the last year so one of the things we that that this does do the key benefit is it eliminates the need to manually read the water meters and another big benefit of that is is called meter to cache functionality the meter you know it does its job it sends a signal in to a billing system and the customers are are then issued a bill if it's determined that this technology is feasible for the city of denton the implement implementation of that infrastructure for the water department of course will take will take several years so that kind of left us in the transition period we've pretty much been there for about the last year taking a look at this because we do have a department that that's their job is to read these meters so currently uh this slide is off a little bit currently we have four fte's and dme who are still performing this function so over the last year um we've had some attrition we've had some of these of these gentlemen get jobs in other parts of the city we've actually started back filling their role with a contracted service to kind of see how that see how that would work out and that's worked out very well so again the contractors that this proposed in this contract role will be utilized to provide all the manual reads so basically we'll be replacing the fte's we have now with with a contracted service and this contracted service comes at a substantially lower cost to our rate payers uh to the tune of about three hundred sixty thousand dollars a year less than what it cost us using our our in-house uh our in-house staff a note dme is has now upgraded to a new field collection system in the old days these guys had to know where every meter was uh on their route so if someone's out sick or you bring in a new employee to get them up to speed took a couple of months because somebody had to walk around with them every day to show them where all the meters are so we uh we have a new field collection system it's smartphone based it has some great features they can take a picture of the of the read so if there's a dispute that that can be given to the customer but but the biggest uh the biggest uh tool in this this new field collection system is it geolocates the meters so as they go out they take the read they hit a button that the program actually stores the the latitude and longitude of that meter when they come back in and dump that data into the system that that that meter's location is now known so what that allows us to do is to generate a route hand it to anybody i could go do it i need to lose some weight so it's a good way to get some exercise they could hand me that handheld device and it would tell me where to go so basically what that allows us to do is to turn this process over to contractors who are not familiar with our routes and they'll be able to provide the same service that that our that our guys do so and a big part of this transition period is is to emphasize to you we're not eliminating these guys position we're eliminating their positions but we're working to find them other jobs within the utility we have two positions already that are in the budget they're approved but we need the contractors on board before we can open that up so we feel that the skill set for these positions suit well with these gentlemen so they'll have the opportunity to apply for those jobs some of them have applied for other positions in the city and kind of our our our ace in the hole is our contractor so we've met with the contractor and we said hey what if these guys want to continue reading meters in the city of denton so if they qualify or they meet the minimum requirements with the contractor that that's a place of a that they can continue their employment with the contractor and finally the contractor will continue to provide this service until another solution is in place which could be an ami amr system in the future so summary just the contracted reading services are proposed in the contract before you will allow a smooth transition for our dme staff to contractors and also to get those those those folks re repurposed in dme or within the city the service will provide the same level of the contractor will provide the same level of service that the rate payers are accustomed to at a discounted price again dme will continue to manage the contracted reading readers the support staff is in dme they also kind of moonlight and they help out on the on the electric side so it's a good fit for it to stay there and i just want to end with it the the existing staff will have the opportunity to migrate to other positions within the city or to possibly obtain employment with the contractor so with that i will answer any questions thank you and you pull down the presentation and i'll say chris i think you're rather svelte as is so no no extra walking needed why thank you sir questions for staff council member melzer so with regard to the city employees who are doing meter reading now who could trend who could migrate to other positions is that how we intend to handle it where where you know we'll go kind of like they know that this is getting phased out they'll go with the phase that they find opportunities or you know or is this uh more of a push is that you know and the reason i ask is that you give that option of well they could go to the contractor but we know that's do the same job with lower pay why would anyone do that right correct mr melzer so uh we've known this is coming so as part of um if i mean we all went through high school kind of how rumors go so dme is like a big high school so we thought it was fair to get ahead of that so about a year ago i set these guys down and said hey look here's what's coming we're going to look at ami technology for the water department most cities of our size have gone that direction that the meter reading days you know they have a long legacy at dme we have quite a few employees that have been here 30 years that's where they started hey guys we need to start thinking about some different career choices here because this meter reading service is going to go by the wayside much like the electric the electric meter reading service so we've started that um and we've already we set up some new positions already in dme knowing this was coming but yes the beauty of this is if this if this contract is approved tonight it gets rolled out we can bring those meter readers the contracted meter readers on as we need so as we open up those positions and they're filled by our internal staff you know we will migrate that as seamlessly as possible but there will be some time in the next budget year when we will say yeah this is the end date so we need to we need to find you a new home let me just uh you know clarify a little bit i see that there's no that that there's a true compelling need to find something else you know uh for these individuals to do when you switch over to the automated system which which is perfect makes perfect sense and you know it's just digit it's just the digital age coming to one last thing uh but between now and then the idea of saying well you know now we're going to replace with the contractor because they charge less that's not really driven by the technology that's saying contractor charges less which is kind of a different proposition uh and uh i guess that's what i'm really probing is are we trying to say move out so that we can use a lower lower price contractor or are we saying as these individuals move out if we're not at automation yet we'll fill in with contractors which of those two scenarios is more like what we're trying to do here councilmember melzer i would say we would be we would be in the middle so we want a smooth transition um for these for these individuals to find additional roles uh in in other departments but the the the without this if we didn't have this contractor solution in the middle we would have seven fte's up until the date that we flip the switch on the ami and then we have no need for those seven fte's so the contractor allows us the flexibility to to keep those gentlemen uh in in their current role for a for a unknown time and then allow them to look for other opportunities when the city as the city recovers from covid and and positions open up uh one gentleman just just found a new position uh last month by applying for that but i would say as as of today there's not a firm date but we will i think as you said gently nudge them in that direction that we need to to look for for alternate positions for these for these guys okay thank you any other questions for staff councilmember pardon me mayor pro tem davis whatever you choose to call me mayor that's fine um well just about anything uh chris thank you for the the presentation um i'm kind of on the record already is uh not quite dubious but not quite sold on smart meters uh the issues that they had in san diego california uh jackson mississippi some other notable places lots of different kind of issues but i do appreciate the timing of what you're bringing forward because i think that right you're right about that transition time that if we did go forward with the smart technology what do we do with those folks who are gainfully employed with us and what do we find for them um this makes it a little bit easier for me to look at that technology going forward knowing that we've made provision for our employees that the meters are not uh taking somebody's job they're kind of at the 11th hour so i appreciate the timing of this very much thank you great any other questions for staff okay i'll take a motion council member ryan move approval is there a second mayor pro tem davis i'll second thank you um there's been a motion and a second discussion great uh council member ryan how say you aye okay uh mayor pro tem davis aye council member paul melzer yeah i you know i just have to say i wasn't uh compelled by the transition plan as described i'm going to be a no thank you uh council member baker ah thank you uh then uh council member johnson um councilor rawmater yes and then uh mayor hutchpeth is an i that passes six to zero thanks chris thank you mayor next up we will take on uh item e id 20 24 51 consider adoption and ordinance of the city of denton texas home rule municipal corporation for approval of pre-qualified professional services services list and qualified social services list for allocation of funding of the emergency solutions grant cares act uh evening mayor and council danny shaw community services good evening i wanted to start off with just letting you know that i'll be presenting uh oh and not just e but all the way through i so this presentation will cover all of those items but i'll sit for questions as each item is covered by council so this is uh danny before you start the mayor will have to call the other items as well oh right now yes thank you i'll stop sharing great thank you um so then i will you said through i correct danny correct okay thank you so i'll also call item id 20 24 52 consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of denton texas home rule municipal home rule municipal corporation authorizing the city manager is designated to execute and services agreement with christian community action for allocation of funding from emergency solutions grant cares act and then i'll call item g id 20 24 53 consider adoption ordinance the city of denton and this is uh regarding services agreement with giving hope inc uh for allocations or from emergency solutions grants cares act and then item h which is id 20 24 54 consider adoption ordinance of city denton texas home room home rule municipal corporation authorizing city managers designated to execute a service agreement with grace like rain inc and lastly item i which is id 20 24 55 consider adoption of ordinance the city of denton texas texas home rule municipal corporation authorizing city managers designated to execute a service agreement with the salvation army for allocation of funding for the emergency solutions grant cares act thank you mayor thank you so the cares act awarded funding in a number of different areas and one of those was for the emergency solutions grant it awarded four billion dollars to be allocated through that funding source this is a grant that is specifically targeted for homelessness assistance including almost prevention and those folks who are experiencing literal homelessness in may the texas homeless network in conjunction in a partnership with the texas department of housing and community affairs released a competitive application process for the first round of that funding that was awarded to tdhca the city then went through the competitive application process on behalf of denton county in june and in october we were notified that we received the award of 1.4 to 5 million dollars in the esgcv round round one funds from tdhca excuse me got a little jealous there just as a an overview very quickly on the key dates of this grant we came back to council and asked for approval to apply for these funds in june and then did submit an application and a week later tdhca did give us a conditional letter of approval in september that allowed us to start the process and then we received our award letter on october 8th because there were requirements from tdhca that these that these services be procured we did go through an rfq process that we're reviewing today and then staff reviewed the qualifications of those vendors who were seeking to provide these services under this grant and then did make recommendations for the award allocation and that's where we're here today we are looking at a service agreement term for these funds from november 1 through july 31st this grant for this first round of funds does have to be expended by july 31st of 2021 within the esg grant there are certain services that are eligible street outreach which is outreach to where folks are experiencing their homelessness on the street or in in places where they are living unsheltered it also affords funding for emergency shelter services those services for the prevention of homelessness including eviction prevention and case management additional assistance for rapid rehousing which is to help folks who are experiencing literal homelessness identify housing and secure that housing through rental assistance and our security deposits it also does a two administrative function it helps support data entry into the homeless management information system both through licenses and staff to be able to make sure the data is inputted accurately and correctly and then there's a 10 administrative on these particular cares act funds that the city passes directly to the partners who are selected for this first item we are recommending these five agencies be qualified that's christian community action giving hope inc grace like rain the salvation army denton and the united way of denton county in order for these agencies to be qualified through the rfq process they had to score 80 percent or better and they submitted that application through our procurement services it's a quick overview of how the funding was originally reviewed and then how it ended up being awarded when we first submitted the grant application it was for the 1.4 to 5 million we did ask for approximately 80 000 in street outreach another 267 850 in emergency shelter and then we split almost evenly between prevention and rapid rehousing services and then additional funding to support the data entry and the admin the total request from the agencies once we did the rfq process was slightly higher at 1.6 million so if you look at the chart to the right this is how the funding is being allocated in the agreements that you'll approve and you're in the other items cca was is being recommended for 197 giving hope is being recommended for 277 616 grace like rain is being recommended for 292 993 and the salvation army is being recommended for 656 465 at the bottom you'll notice that we we did not include the united ways allocation united way did seek funding but at the time when we reviewed the budget request we asked them to forego funding at this time and then allow us to be able to allocate the funding to the agencies that are listed here we are leaving them on the qualified list however because we will be monitoring the expenditures on this grant and would like to have the ability to reallocate funding to other agencies in order to make sure the funds are expended in a timely manner if there are any delays in funding as you can see on the bottom row it also shows what their original request was so the majority of the agencies were able to receive an amount higher than what they requested with the exception of the salvation army where we did a slight reduction in in their rapid rehousing funding from their original request so we are ultimately we're able to make the budget balance for the 1.42 this is just a slide you'll see later in our conversation in g but just wanted to kind of give you an eviction prevention overview to show how the funds are being allocated for esg1 and how they are going to be leveraged with future funding and previous funding so with that i will stop sharing and then take any questions thank you questions for staff council member davis dani can you help me better understand what you said about the the united way that we're leaving them kind of on on standby as a qualified uh vendor for this program but um we're we're using these other organizations first with this particular round um can you tell us why that is and kind of some of the considerations that went into that right the united way is likely going to be a recipient of some other funds that are coming in the esg2 round which is a significantly higher amount of funding and then the the texas eviction eviction prevention program as well so we felt like they to be able to make the balancing the budget happen a little bit easier we asked them to forgo their funding at this point but it also gives us the opportunity should any of the other agencies have any difficulty expanding the funds that we can reallocate those to any of the agencies available including the united way since they did meet the qualifications as well yes sir thank you sorry uh i'm sorry todd did go ahead that's bad too danny's um explanation you might remember a month or so ago we uh supported a united ways application by advancing a half a million dollars with lewisville also they have about a million dollars on the estg2 grant so danny had kind of her and her staff had kind of lined all that up with gary henderson so the idea would be that we would support this first round united way would score high and support the second round would be able to bring both pots of money into the city so uh she's kind of downplaying it but she and danny and her staff coordinated this very well for our residents and she needs to be thanked for that mayor can ask a quick follow-up yes sir brownie so uh we know that united way has had a very heavily publicized program the applications have closed for that program folks may not be so familiar with these other organizations a lot of people are but maybe not everybody and then also connected with that timing so if somebody has a need and they've gone to the united way website if they're not accepting applications how are folks finding out about these organizations that we're helping fund and what is the uh what's the timing on this funding when are people going to be able to get help we uh just developed a promotional tool that we're going to be providing out to the community united way will help us refer the other agencies are already known in the community because folks even through the united way fund we're reaching out to those agencies directly for assistance so it should look relatively seamless for the clients who are seeking assistance and then our promotions will hopefully help as well as connect people to the assistance and information about those agencies and then your second question was related to uh timing when when funding is going to be available to the organization so they can make it available to applicants it's technically would be available as soon as you approve the contracts because we did uh back date those contracts in november 1 so any funds that they're even expending now could be reimbursed so immediately after you approve the contracts they will they will be available be able to assist people with their january rents great any other questions for staff councilmember armature yeah so first i want to commend staff for this putting all this together i know that you know the the first time uh y'all did this this was the first time ever uh we have been in this situation as with other cities um and i know that there were you know a lot of lessons learned by everybody um and uh you know about uh the way this works i'm wondering if um if you could speak to what you imagine uh will be the the turnaround uh for people who apply for relief to one of these agencies um will it be you know can they still expect like the one to two weeks uh roughly uh or is there yeah if you if you could speak to that and then i have another question with that well i think one of the ways in which we are absolutely benefiting is because of the united way and the crf funds that existed previously so these agencies have all been dealing with the same same clientele on the same things that are going to be happening with this under this grant so i think the practice of how it's going to be delivered in the processes are in place there probably will be some slight delays because there are a few more eligibility requirements on the esg grant that they may not have had to comply with which primarily relates to the documentation of their income so it really will be dependent on how quickly the clients themselves turn around information to the agencies so the agencies can get them qualified so that will be a new factor okay thank you and kind of following up all that on that um are there any uh you know plans in place for ways to uh ensure that during this period while people are applying for relief that they won't um be asked to to vacate uh their their their premises can we kind of protect that period of time while they're applying for relief i know that for instance for our utilities we can because that's a publicly owned utilities but for housing that's private between the landlord and the tenant so i was wondering if you could if you could speak to that no i'm gonna step in there staff can't speak to that that we we have an item to talk about that and and so i'll let sarah talk about that next but that's that's not a question for danny that's a question for the next our pardon me for item j staff will be able to speak to that process so did you have any other questions for for danny on these contracts yeah so somebody um who is uh an undocumented uh resident of denton you know who's working here who's paying their rent are they eligible uh for these funds this grant does not require documentation of their legal status okay excellent thank you all right any other questions for staff great uh then i will take a motion on item this first item is uh e councilmember mayor pro tem davis mayor if you'll permit me since you've called all the items i'll move approval of items e through i um unless uh there's some reason to do them separately got it we we all get there erin just that i'm not sure yes mayor awesome thank you so yes thank you uh mayor pro tem councilmember ryan and i will second items e through i thank you any other discussion on any items between those e through i great and i'll echo uh mister city manager's uh comments danny thank you very much you you continue to amaze and serve our community well so thank you for your your heart for our community and and the capacity what you do so thank you uh we so have motion second no other comments and so we will take them uh mayor pro tem davis how say you aye councilman ryan aye councilmember johnson aye councilmember baker aye councilmember melzer aye thank you councilmember armatuer yes okay and mayor hudson i that passes seven zero or they pass seven zero thank you um mister city manager i'll take your your guidance on jay so we should we just go straight through do you need to know should we take a break to get ready for that one it's going to be a little longer um i'll leave the breakup to you mayor and sarah keichler will be doing that presentation and and i would appreciate if we could let sarah get through the entire presentation she's got some wrap-up uh quest policy questions for you to administer and and kind of take council through at the last um in the very last slide so i think that'll probably work the best it's a it's a lot of there's a lot of information and it all sort of interrelates so i think we can answer questions at the end if you don't mind got it thank you for that and and so uh to my peers thoughts are we all okay to just press forward and and get through this last item great okay well uh obviously you need to break your you're free to do so but uh i will call the last item so this is item j i d 20 24 67 consider adoption of an ordinance city of denton texas home rule municipal corporation extending effective period of declared state of local disaster superseding and replacing the 10th order of council of the city of denton issued september 22nd 2020 approved by ordinance number 2018 45 good evening mayor city council sara kechler chief of staff so this item is for council to consider extension of the disaster declaration and the order so as you're aware since the first declaration of a local disaster in order in march a number of actions have been taken from council to extend and amend the declaration of the order with the last action being taken on september 22nd which is the current disaster declaration and order under which the city is operating and that is effective through december 31st so just as a reminder um the local orders cannot supersede or conflict with any state orders and then our just the kind of reminder of what the purpose of a local disaster declaration and order are the disaster declaration basically provides the ability for us to be eligible for state and federal disaster funding and then the order of council provides a number of different items but provides us the authority and the flexibility to change our operations services hours personnel as we respond to cobit 19 and the different waves that we're seeing as this pandemic continues to sustain over a period of time so the items that are in the order provide us that flexibility on december 1st staff brought forward a work session with city council in order to seek direction if council wanted to extend the local declaration and the order and we received a direction from council at that point to extend the order and declaration as is through march 31st we also received direction to memorialize the waiver of utilities and fees in the order itself and then we're also seeking just a small increase of the total spending authority to a total of three million that is an increase of 250 000 from the prior order and it's mostly related to the expense for hotels as an alternative emergency shelter for people experiencing homelessness so what staff has done is in your backup you'll see a draft ordinance and order that has been drafted from that direction that we received from you all on december 1st and reflects what you see here in the slide and so this is just kind of a review of the expenditures if you had any questions at the end finance director cassie ogden is here as well to answer any questions but i'm going to keep moving through the presentation um so since that time at december 1st work session um where we reviewed a list of requests from council members i think there's about 15 or 20 or so received where we um went through and presented some information and then mayor protem davis led a discussion to see if council was interested in including those items or having more discussion any of those items since that time council member armature has emailed a few additional requests to staff and she asked that her request be shared with the rest of council and we have done so including those in the backup to this item and then we've also listed them out here on the next slide so this is just a synopsis of the request that she had the full narrative is in your backup with some more details as well i'm going to go through just each one of these with some brief information and then i have a few more slides that provide more information and as city manager haileman stated the last slide will kind of be that direction slide on the items that staff needs direction on so the first request that council member armature had was a proposal for what she's calling a local emergency eviction prevention program or leap the first request would be from her to propose an outright ban on the issuance of any notices to vacate or uh alternatively if there's there's not interest in that from council if council would be interested in creating a new requirement and this would be something that would actually come before the notice to vacate and would be called a notice of proposed eviction and would give a minimum of 60 days for renters to cure non-payment we've provided just some brief information here and i have two slides following that will go over the eviction authority and process in the state of texas but in short the eviction process is governed by the state by chapter 24 of the texas property code local government does not regulate or set forward regulations for the eviction process furthermore uh recently the texas attorney general on august 7th put out an opinion that local officials cannot use the emergency management statue to change or alter or amend the uniform uniform statewide eviction eviction procedures in any way that would prohibit delay or restrict the issuance of a notice to vacate so the proposal from council member armature would be inconsistent with this texas attorney texas attorney general opinion and again i'll have a couple more slides just to kind of visually show what the eviction authority process is here in the state of texas her second request also kind of part of her leap proposal and calling it a part two would be for the city to establish an emergency rental property maintenance fund to cover the cost of maintenance for landlords and property managers this would be development of a new program and we do not have any current such program so we would need to identify funds in a budget and then we would need to go back as staff and kind of research and group together to determine what could be what could a potential program look like what would be the parameters for eligibility and so forth and that would probably take us at least a few weeks to get an initial work session to bring back to city council and it may also divert you know some of our community services staff right now from the many other services and initiatives that we we are working on the third request was that if we could if council could consider using general fund to help provide some interim rent relief i'll have some more information on slides 10 through 11 in terms of the eviction prevention assistance dollars available in the community some more information to talk through in the coming slides and then the last request was to ban utility shut-offs in the city of denton and this request was made previously by council member arm return the december first work session and at that time there was no council can set consensus to move forward however utility assistance does continue through interfaith and staff is actually going to be recommending an increase to interfaith for utility assistance and that will be one of the last slides we will talk through so moving on and i'm going i'm going through this kind of fast but um this is slideshow is kind of an overview of the eviction process in the state of texas and then the respective authority um so anything in regards to how um you know eviction starts um is governed by the texas property code of chapter 24 um which is the notice to vacate so generally speaking a landlord must provide at least three days notice to vacate to a tenant before an eviction suit can be filed um if that the tenant does not um remedy that uh the landlord can move forward with filing of an eviction suit and this process of the hearing of filing the suit and then the hearing takes place through the justice of the peace courts in texas and then it would continue through if there is a judgment for the opportunity to appeal and then lastly if there is a final judgment a writ of possession could be issued by a judge and then that would be passed along to the constable to execute that writ and remove the property so that involves both the justice of the peace courts and the constable and so it's all governed by these entities here in texas um there has been some questions around what travis county and the city of austin have done and so thought we'd try to lay this out a little bit visually um in terms of the many layers of orders that are in effect right now from the federal government to the state government to local governments in travis county um so really overarching um we have this nationwide eviction moratorium that was issued by the cdc and that has been in effect and will be in effect through december 31st so nationwide that is overarching everything um and there is some talk we'll get into in the next slide that potentially the house and senate leadership are coming to agreement on a bill which may extend that eviction moratorium but it's also a negotiation and talks but right now currently what you have in the state of texas is you have kind of the left hand side is the court's process and then the right hand side is really more the legislative bodies so the texas so first starting on the left hand side the texas supreme court issued emergency order 29 and that permits courts to modify or suspend eviction deadlines and procedures through february 1st of 2021 so the justices of the peace courts in travis county did exactly that of the authority that was permitted to them by the texas supreme court the justices of the peace courts in travis county issued a standing order that requires trials and evi and residential eviction cases to be automatically abated until december 31st so this is the standing order in travis county by the justices of peace courts there is no eviction cases moving forward and that may be a reason why you have not seen as many coming forward in travis county on the right hand side is in regards to the legislative side so again as i reviewed in previous slides the eviction process is governed by the texas property code and then the ag has also issued that opinion that local officials cannot use the texas emergency management statute to amend the statewide eviction procedures travis county and city of austin have taken some actions which would be contrary to that attorney general opinion of trying to amend or change those statewide eviction procedures what the travis county judge did really is consistent with what the nationwide eviction moratorium is right now so you still have that overlapping overarching federal order that applies same with same with the mayor of austin i believe and then moving down what is different in austin is the city council has created a requirement kind of an initiative a pre-step to the eviction process that a notice of proposed eviction must be given before a notice to to vacate again we think this would be contrary to the ag's opinion and attorney general or sorry attorney city attorney leal can also answer more questions at the end of this presentation so i want to move into next kind of addressing some questions we received about what eviction prevention dollars will be available in the community so danny had showed this slide previously and this is a little information that we have covered before but just want to run through it really quick the united way of denton county did have a program that took place over the last nine months that is coming to an end at the end of this month overall through those nine months over 6.5 million was spent to assist households with paying rent or utilities or mortgage in the city of denton for city of denton households just over 2.2 million was spent in those nine months this was a pretty broad and open program any income could apply the only requirement was that you had to show some loss of income due to covid so pretty broad program parameters from what you usually see in federal programs for housing assistance and that will look different in these next sources that are coming online so these three kind of rose and white will be the sources that are next coming online and actually the the first one here the esg cb1 is the contracts that you just approved so of that total grant amount of the 1.4 1.4 million that you approved over 398 000 is for eviction prevention assistance countywide so if we apply that to maybe just estimate what city of denton households will use of that it's about 131 000 again that will be immediately available however participants would have to income qualify and produce the documentation that the income qualify which will be for 50 area immediate income or below we then expect in the second source to come online in probably late january february and that's a total of 271 000 countywide or sorry for cities of denton and lewisville only denton and lewisville are cdbg recipients and therefore we are eligible for these funds so it would be 271 000 between denton and lewisville with denton receiving 149 000 and then lastly the bigger source that will come online for our community will be the esg cb2 and that's expected sometime in march and that's a total grant amount that thn has recommended for award to united way of denton county it will not be considered and approved by tdhca until january but it's an amount over 3.3 million with 2.5 million dedicated to eviction prevention assistance countywide again just trying to estimate what that means for city of denton alone and that's about 841 000 and so if we're looking kind of at some broad assumptions and trying to understand what could be a potential unmet need in denton for eviction prevention assistance we've tried to just roughly put this slide together there are a number of factors that could change or that could adjust this and there are a number of unknowns that could easily change this situation pretty quickly but what we did is we looked at the united way of denton county's usage for denton households and you can see it broken down by quarter and you can see how it increased over the quarters and that might be due to a few different reasons in regards to need and also in regards to promotion of the program so if you average through the entire program over the nine months you get to about 59 000 per week we're going to denton households if you averaged over the last eight weeks you know thinking that there was more demand over the last couple of months you get to about 105 000 per week so we tried to put that on a range of from low to high and project out using that per week basis out for 12 weeks for the first quarter of 2021 and you get to this estimated need here for denton households alone about 713 000 to 1.2 million what we've done is then adjusted it for eligibility taken 75 percent of that amount we know that some participants may not be eligible just due to their income and the new income qualifications and that they might not also be willing to produce that documentation and may be unable to do so so then you get to about a need of 534 000 to 946 000 we've applied the two sources and this is just again from january to march is this potential unmet need rank there's potential need range applying the two funding sources that we have it could be a potential gap again all unknown of 253 000 to 664 000 now this could change you know based upon a number of different unknowns one of the biggest is if the federal government will extend the eviction moratorium that is set to expire right now on december 31st and if congress will take any action to approve additional federal housing assistance and that would make its way down to state and local governments we did get some updated information this morning from our federal consultant that it looks like again who knows what will happen but it looks like the senate and house leadership are coming to agreement on a bill they're getting further along in their negotiations and discussions and the latest we've heard is that there might be a 900 billion dollar covid relief bill and that they're going to continue working on that probably through the weekend and early next week there might be some discussion or action on that if negotiations continue and things do not fall out what they're considering in those bill talks right now is that the eviction moratorium would be extended as well as there probably be i have to look back at the numbers here quickly i think it was over 25 billion dollars in potential rental assistance coming through that bill but again that's all still negotiations but just some of the latest we've heard of the house and senate leadership talks of the bill that they're trying to get agreement on also unknown is any potential state funding actions and timing the state has set up a program of its own through the courts which is called the texas eviction diversion program so that if someone tenant is being brought forward for an eviction case there may be funding available for them as well through this program right now pretty limited funding through the state for that program but things could change and additional funding could be allocated there from the state i think they're trying to understand how that program will work and then there also is some other current agency sources out there these are really starting to decrease but did want to acknowledge that there are some other funding sources that are out there that are usually there from year to year and then lastly we do not know how much the need or demand may adjust under some of these different tighter program guidelines than what we saw in the broad program parameters that were available through the united way of denton county's crf program so just wanted to kind of set that picture that there's a lot of moving pieces still especially not knowing what actions the federal government might take however just looking at a point in time if council wanted to close this potential gap that we've roughly forecasted for that quarter one until the esg cb2 dollars come online in march sometime there's a couple different options including there's a potential that city council could reallocate the cdbd cb dollars we have 685 000 left and we have that allocated for non-profit agency support and i'll talk about that in the next slide of what that may mean it's also possible you could we could adjust some guidelines to try to spread that over more households but to be honest it may not prevent eviction if we're not able to help the household with their entire amount of need and then lastly and there is the option that general fund dollars could be utilized so moving to the item that was just a suggestion or an option that could be for council we have 685 000 in the city cbg cb budget that is currently planned for non-profit agency support for various services and needs in the communities to support our low to moderate income households this is anything from food security to child care health care senior services you'll see an example of some agencies that have generally received support from the city for human services in the next slide this funding could be reallocated though from non-profit agency support to the eviction prevention housing assistance side that is an eligible use for these dollars in order to reallocate it we'd have to go through a substantial amendment that would have to be filed with hud we first have to do a five-day public hearing process so if we did that process in late december early january we could bring forward a substantial amendment to city council in january to approve that action and then a potential mo you with the united way of denton county to administer that cdbg cb funding for eviction prevention assistance they're really the only agency with the capacity i believe at this time to undertake that and then it would lead into the esg cb2 dollars and and you know not knowing a number of things that are going to take place in the next few weeks if additional federal funding would were to be authorized by congress or some additional assistance would come through council could reconsider the cbg cb reallocation in january even if we started to take the steps doesn't mean that that amendment would have to be approved or go through you would have that option at that time maybe once more more things are known however i just want to point out from staff's perspective if we did reallocate these these dollars to housing assistance it does mean that there would be less funding available for non-profit support and could impact some of the agencies in our community who are struggling at this time in their fundraising efforts you know especially as they've not been able to do in-person fundraising and a number of the events that they typically would do in a year for their next fiscal years and and many of the services they provide help house help households to stay housed as well even though it's not direct housing assistance it's providing services in a number of different areas and this is just to provide some perspective especially for new council members of what our our human services grant process is so we've taken right now the six hundred and eighty five thousand dollars added that to the amount that we have budgeted for the the next fiscal year for the human services grant total added those two together and that would be potentially one point one point one million dollars that the human services advisory committee could allocate out to non-profit agencies non-profit agencies must apply for these grants and give it it's quite a lengthy application in terms of what their services are what's the need that they're meeting in the community what are their performance measures and so forth the human services advisory committee reviews all of those and then makes recommendations to council in the spring of how those funding dollars would be awarded so this is what they would be normally doing in an annual year would be allocating five hundred and ten thousand what we have planned for is to take those cdb gcb dollars right now and and increase that amount so that there is a lot more available potentially for those non-profit agencies that are also struggling and needing additional assistance and then on the right here you'll see some of the organizations that have been funded so for this current fiscal year actually and these these contracts were awarded back in october the different categories from child care services also helping with emergency assistance for homelessness family resources food security health care and mental health and then other public services so helping a number of different needs in our community and then we just included this slide is kind of a wrap up i know this has been provided to council in the past through friday reports but this is our current fiscal year funding for social services kind of showing out the general fund our our federal funds that we continue to receive the cdb g and home and then the cares act funding and that we have also received so if you look down here at the bottom in in fiscal year in our current fiscal year 2021 over 10 million dollars is being allocated in some way and being spent towards social services in in the city of detton for the city of detton and i can answer any questions on that but i just wanted to include that information again just as a resource and then lastly utility assistance staff is continuing to monitor how much is is remaining in in utility assistance how quickly that is going through with interfaith there's still a lot of unknown factors that drive the assistance demand but in short what we're looking at right now and recommending is that there's an additional 125 000 allocated from the utility funds to utility assistance to interfaith and we think that would provide sufficient assistance until spring summer and then we can continue to monitor reassess in the spring and let council know if indeed that will be enough through the remainder of the fiscal year or if there's been such increased demand that we may make another recommendation for additional allocation to help with that utility assistance and help those residents in need so this is getting to the the last slide kind of wrapping all of that up in the in the different areas in which staff needs directions which includes direction on council member armatures requests we also need direction on the remaining 685 000 in the cdbg cd funds if we should remain programmed and plan as planned for the non-profit agency support or those should be reallocated to housing assistance eviction prevention assistance in the entire amount or maybe a partial amount reallocated to to that other purpose and then lastly really what this ic item is for is is consideration of the drafted declaration disaster declaration order to extend both through march 31st 2021 we did have those attached in your in your backup however we if council would like we can include in the order an additional 125 000 for utility assistance we can add that into the order so those are the items that we're seeking direction on and i can bring this down for discussion thank you sarah and uh so questions for staff council member melter and then council member armature so uh first i want to thank council member armature for ensuring that that we're focusing very forthrightly on the pickle that we're really facing in large part because of washington's inability to act in time but you know perhaps was the verge of that my preference would be to work within the powers that i'm confident that we have i think the core issue is interruption of income in a kind of hundred year event and if there are you know it's not generally speaking within the scope of a city government to be able to you know float a big section of our economy but if your grant money is large is available for the purpose of keeping you know keeping people housed and keeping our economy moving i'm not in favor of you know throwing a sort of an additional crowbar into to the local economy that all having been said if there's still a gap and i don't know for sure how big the gap will be or if in fact another tranche of federal money will arrive soon enough to make it smaller than feared which is i think is also within the realm of possibility but i am leading up to a question there is also the reserves which are absolutely you know do not break glass unless you know absolute emergency and i think a hundred year event that requires a federal response to basically float the economy until everyone's vaccinated kind of qualifies now and i i do think federal money will come in sooner than march but there's a but nobody knows for sure but my question is is there a relatively safe degree without screwing up our city's credit to which we could tap our reserves in this once in a hundred year moment i think i think the answer is there probably is a one-time contribution that can be you know used as gap financing the first month or two if you wanted to do that if this you know if this issue continues into quarter two three four you're no question just even if even if you put some significant program restraints on this such as the number of times someone to get access the the grants that sort of thing even limiting the amounts you're putting yourself in an absolute certain tax increase situation or service cut situation but from a one-time perspective we've already floated basically pulled out the five hundred thousand dollars to float to united ways so they can start cash rolling early and we'll eventually get that back in q2 you probably we've got another two hundred fifty thousand dollars built in there and i think if the council wanted to head this direction you've got about three hundred and fifty to four hundred thousand dollars that we know that is coming our way from federal funds if you wanted to use that flexibility there to at least prop up the program through january you could certainly do that so we can get some idea of you know what the need is and whether washington is going to be sending additional cares act through but i think you start getting up into that half a million dollar range up to 750 000 you start pulling down more than that you are absolutely setting yourself up for service increases or tax increases yeah i i mean i'm really addressing the narrowest possible i just appreciate the context to provide that's that's the direction i'd be interested in going in part because you know if we borrow from peter to pay paul in this in the with respect to the non-profits they're serving the same fragile social network that you know we're trying to address so i don't think that helps you know to go after that so if that's that's going to be so any other questions for staff not and i want to i want to preface this we have calls i want to get questions answered so really pointed questions please and then we'll go into discussion if there's traction to move forward but i don't want to i want to get questions for staff so councilman marmotor uh yeah i wanted to know if there are any callers for this i there are there are questions for staff okay um and my question is uh is it important to staff that uh the items be considered in the order in which they're presented on the direction slide or and if not um i would like to request uh that we first consider the uh funding allocation and reallocation items uh and the extension of the declaration of disaster first and then do the eviction uh measures that i proposed afterwards i think that's entirely up to the mayor how those questions are run through one thing though if if any sort of eviction anything would have to be part of the order yeah yeah we'll take it in in the order it's presented uh any other questions for staff councilmember davis okay so hopefully this is going to be pretty quick but assuming council doesn't want to file amendment with hud and and take from the the non-profits were already committed to uh to funding assuming we don't want to do that is there any other part of what uh toddy that you discussed with councilmember melzer um that we wouldn't know more about say at the beginning of january if we if those organizations that we just decided to fund tonight can actually be filing for reimbursement for some some they've already done that there's going to be money available through them for january rents for some subset of people would it if the conversation is about general fund or reserves or anything like that um that's kind of outside or more involved in this presentation um would it be better to have that conversation at the beginning of january will we know more at that point about what the senate leadership gets together on whether the cdc uh eviction uh i don't really call it a ban but their eviction mitigation stuff if that's um extended further i'm just asking if that's helpful to staff what and if that hud uh amendment process is the only like external process we really have to worry about getting rolling early yeah and i think the i think our advice to you would be is if this is something that you are really serious about then and to be getting the um those dollars rolling into the economy quickly you're you're just under four hundred thousand dollars that should take us the first couple weeks if you wanted to allocate and authorize for the emergency order uh you know a a couple hundred thousand dollars as a belt and suspenders i i really don't think we should be committing any more general fund money to this um after night until we know what is going to be happening with the transition in washington we have no idea um if you know how much additional dollars are going to be out there to be to plan to be played with to be put surfaced back into the economy to help our residents and you know i just think that we should be very cautious about kicking in any additional dollars if you wanted to give a little cushion you certainly could but i think this conversation is more appropriate probably the third week of january when we see the transition take place and we know if a new program or two is coming out and what those dollars are going in there this is way too early to be talking about moving general fund money into this program okay any other questions for staff great so we have uh so i'll read this uh for item 20 2467 for this item we have one person made comments using our online forum that person was in favor of the item the comment form was emailed to the entire city council and city secretary to be recorded additionally there are three three who have uh requested to speak on the phone on this item staff's currently loading up those phone lines and we will allow them to speak uh they will have four minutes okay uh and it is gabby are you on the line right here okay uh if you could give your name and address please for the record then you will have four minutes to speak um yeah my name is gabby pelton i am at 1800 okay thank you can just go yes please i'm sorry no no worries thank you denton city council members tax bystanders i'm here to warn you all of the perilous predicament of the unsung heroes of the coronavirus the small mom and pop landlord when i say small i mean small some of us don't even have to be fire for those of you not to know that's financially independent retire early a primary goal of the small board and every time a government body gets together to talk about saving tenants life from the streets i fear for the small landlord the we land lady the lilliputian real estate for fair see about nine months ago in denton it was business as usual if someone couldn't pay their rent whether biopsy or a runaway guacamole addiction the remedy was simple just kick them out let old poor winds all around it was beautiful then one day a virus came to our fine city and each week things got a little scary here pretty soon they had to shut down things because everyone was just so scared personally i never really got what the commotion was i've been staying home most of the time because i'm financially independent but by the time we realize most firees the damage was already done the shutdown and the scared customers put a lot of people out of work that meant people couldn't pay me the rent now for some big shot real estate developer with mayor money in their back pocket a down year might be but for the mom and pop landlords we don't have mayor money if we keep getting rent every month then we can stay afloat can't afford our extra houses we only bought them because we assumed everything was going to stay exactly as is forever wages would stay the same for laws would stay the same forever the threat of forceful removal from homes would stay the same forever like wall street in 2008 or will like creditors in the good old days of debtors prisons the entire family and justly placed on the morally inferior side of the equation the poor and that's exactly why i'm here today not to demand tax relief in exchange for tenant relief not to demand a solution to the mortgages i've already had in forbearance for months and for the foreseeable future not to ask you for any form of financial assistance based on my actual need demand that you do your one job as agents of the state manipulate class antagonisms in my monopoly on violence shake these miserable little unimpeded until you've drained parental savings charity treasury and food often then and only then can i pay back my sweet teeny tiny eight pound six ounce little baby bank who gave me the money to buy my extra houses if it ain't broke don't fix it if it is broke deduct it from the deposit bring back the glory days denton next again thank you okay thank you gabby just one second any questions for gabby uh councilmember armater yeah so was that for real or was that a satire okay and gabby are you still there are we okay got it so they must have left so the next caller is leah leah are you there yes i'm here okay great if you could turn down the the the meeting in the background that'll eliminate the echo awesome great and then if you could give your name first and last an address for the record you will have four minutes to speak with the denton and then you will be able to if you could give your name first and last an address for the record you will have four minutes to speak with the denton city council perfect thank you thank you and you can go start whenever you're ready oh okay so whenever i'm ready i'm sorry my name is leah i live at on less prairie street uh two three two zero uh i want to dress the last speaker because i think he did more harm for his cause than good in my opinion uh i'll try to speak fast because i'm only have four minutes i am a social work student at unt i currently work at an after-school care program uh on the 31st as we know the cdc moratorium will expire but the pandemic won't be over as of today denton has over 1600 active covid cases uh so beyond the health effects of the pandemic the economic effects are still weighing very heavily on us i personally lost my job to uh the care to pandemic due to a cares act paycheck protection program paycheck protection loan expiring so after tomorrow the after-school program i work at which is considered one of the most affordable in denton will be closing down this is obviously a nationwide issue in september according to the poll survey one out of every six americans are behind on rent uh the city of denton poverty rates are higher than those of texas or the u.s so this is also a denton specific program the census found that one in every five individuals in the city of denton are living at the poverty line in 2017 so pre-pandemic united way of denton found that 32 percent of denton residents could not sustain themselves for three months without income the pandemic has lasted 10 months so far so that doesn't look good for us as we just saw less than 200 units will be able to assisted be assisted prior to march i think that's a huge gap in needs and funds i think rental assistance is admirable that's what i want to go into that's my area of passion but during this dire time it will not be sufficient i don't think this is a good time to be bowing down to uh state bullies basically i think that it is your responsibility to take care of your constituents and denton is not so up to handle a mass wave of homelessness uh the mcinder king outreach center can only house shelter 47 people per night salvation army can only shelter 10 or 11 my god uh i think that keeping people housed is both more affordable and more humane than supporting people through homelessness and i think now is the time to ask this up okay that's all that's all i had to say okay so you still have two minutes if you want them but oh geez i spoke too fast didn't i no problem well then i'll see if there any questions for leah councilor envirometer yeah so i'm not sure if you were speaking specifically to this point but we're being asked tonight for among other things direction on uh cdbg funds you know whether or not uh to distribute them to uh some some non-profits that meet a number of uh basic local needs that was kind of pre-allocating earlier on in the pandemic or to reallocate some or all of them entirely to eviction relief do you have and apologies if i wasn't catching precisely what you were saying um you know when you were uh you know making your eloquent points but can do you have an opinion on that one way or another it's fine if you don't but i'm i'm curious because i wanted to make sure that i wasn't missing that if you did yes uh sorry i did a lot of my research before watching the presentation from city staff but in regards to moving that towards rental assistance or non-profits i'm honestly really torn uh that might be a little bit out of my depth as a citizen i obviously i'm going into social work i'm not for uh shutting down non-profits but i also think that rental assistance is important right now so i think i would say um i'm for letting that money continue to go to non-profits but uh it's definitely tough question thank you so much thank you thank you any other questions for leah okay leah thank you very much have a great evening thank you so much and we tried multiple times to reconnect with the third uh caller uh three to be exact and we were unable to do so so we will move forward uh into discussion and so what i'm going to do uh is ask once again any questions for staff before we consider uh each of these items and i i'll do my best to summarize where we are for the council to make sure we're on the same page councilman melton questions for staff i think i just want to see if uh we can crystallize some of the upshot of what i asked and what uh Mr. Davis asked if if we just looked at one month if you're taking uh your cue Mr. City Manager that maybe some of these broader questions should be addressed sometime in january if we just looked at what we anticipate for the for a month from today you know have we identified resources that cover you know the expected continuation of of eviction prevention and i don't know if everybody really understands if you've been watching for the last you know half hour you would understand we've been doing eviction prevention uh throughout and the question is continuing past the end of the uh the first tranche of federal money so if we look at just a month are we what's our need or do we have resources identified to cover that because a lot of what you've said i did talked about the first quarter yeah i think i think the first month um and we've gone back and forth with this with staff i think i think part of the issue that um sarah and her team are having is there was just such a wide disparity because there was some different rules with the care act and then it's going to be placed with the cdbg dollars and so i think our best estimates are we're probably to get through january we're probably one to two hundred thousand dollars short if the trending continues the way it did um you know that we saw it happen in the last quarter um you know and we we are not sure when we're going to see or hear back uh regarding the negotiations going on in washington it's a lot of optimism the last couple of days but we have no idea if we're going to see a package before after the transition takes place for instance and what other programs are are going to get finalized we're getting some optimistic information today um the problem with this and making a decision too soon is we can't be reimbursed and you know so once that money's spent you're kind of out and and i think our i think that our our sort of middle ground solution to this was to increase my spending authority uh about 250 thousand dollars if the council wanted to plug that gap and then give us the opportunity to see what happens with these additional spending packages in washington that's probably the most responsible direction or advice we could give you right now and if we do that if we increase your spending authority where are we tacitly taking from i mean uh you know i'm kind of tracking back to my point of saying now might be the time when you break glass it would be it would be the the city's general fund would be the only place that would really be defensible to to move that problem so we could certainly handle that if council wanted to do that um and then sort of revisit where we are towards the end of january so we'll be able to make harder decisions yeah okay thank you very much okay any other questions for staff okay so we will move forward and just to kind of summarize so we have two or three uh decision points on that last slide if you have that in front of you or um i'll reference it best i can uh i think that is i think the decision point is kind of exactly what count council member melzer and mayor pro tem davis have discussed it's are we moving uh on time based on the the dollars we have available uh and i think speaking uh just independently i think it we could probably get up and running say if we had to have an emergency meeting first of the year or it only takes a couple of weeks to give notice and then have the meeting and have that discussion at the first of the year as well if we had to do something quickly we're able to do that uh versus is now and and i think the reimbursement is is a big consideration for the for the council as well because it it saves uh our taxpayers or protects them uh from those dollars being you know using the federal dollars and also i'll point out uh that the state uh legislature convenes in january uh and we have rainy day funds of billions for the state level as well that that may uh come into play so it adds some clarity towards the first of the year it seems like um and i'll be interested to see how this weekend goes we've all been following the news closely uh in that regard as well so what i'm planning to do is just continue mayor pro tem's uh approach uh that y'all started last week if there's four uh to consider our item we'll take it up and vote on it uh if there's not four people that want to have that discussion further we will move on to the next decision point councilmember armature yeah uh so i i would rather um us each at least be able to state where we stand is that what we're going to be what you're allowing to happen or are we just going to do a kind of thumbs up or thumbs down because we've gotten a number of emails uh about the uh eviction uh prevention uh plan that works with this funding so even if i'm the only one i would at least like to be able to say some words about it uh out of respect to the people who have written to us certainly and i think you can do that in whatever platform you feel uh is best suited but for this uh in this context robert's rules uh dictate that discussion comes after uh first and a second and so in this instance uh continuing what you did before uh so it's a just a continuation i think staff was great to add this uh with with very limited notice i think that i'm i appreciate their diligence in responding to the citizens request and and need to take this up but at the same time i'm going to respect the the process that that mayor pro tem established in the absence of mayor watson and uh and continue that it's the same thing you did a week ago so i don't see any problems continuing with that process someone can correct correct me if i'm understanding that process wrong i was not here firsthand but i'll take direction as to uh i'll take correction if i'm interpreting what was done before incorrectly uh so mayor pro tem if you could tell me if i'm if i'm in error i i think you've described what we did last time around accurately um and we kind of had a similar discussion last time around that um you know council member armentor has uh her request almost verbatim is in the backup staff presented it uh out there on facebook all over the place there's been lots of discussion outside of of this meeting lots of backup provided okay thank you uh council member melzer you had your hand up yeah i objected last week or the last time you met and uh i object today to the sort of straight jacketing of discussion i think it's entirely appropriate for council members to express where they stand with more than just a yes or no and i don't disagree and no one's straight jacketing anything i that's your words and you're entitled to that but i'll disagree with you strongly you have every platform available to you to discuss that and to air out every thought you have uh in in a public format that that is absolutely available to every council member here and i respect your ability to do so but to then somehow say that it must be done in a particular format in a particular forum is disingenuous in my opinion and so we're going to respect the other council members here this this it takes four uh to move things forward we talked about that at the retreat that's been discussed readily and we agreed to that as a group and as a group we're going to move forward and follow those rules and so uh i look forward to the next retreat if there's four of us that want to change that rule then i look forward to that discussion but otherwise we're going to follow uh what we'd agreed upon we spent an entire weekend uh kind of having this conversation on how we're going to proceed and so i'm going to respect that time we spent uh council member armature uh yes if that's the case um then i want to explain why i am in favor of this first item well and i want to respond to giving some information that has been given by staff that i want to respond to you that i have not uh had a chance to respond and you will have a chance to do that but no i want to do this right now staff if i need to mute her how does that work there's a memo from the texas we're going to go to break so let's go to break and we'll fix this so uh we will take a five minute break i'm not council member armature i'm not going to have you talk over me i'm just not going to do it so you can respect the fact that i chaired a meeting or not okay that fixes it we'll move forward uh so council member melzer you had your hand up yeah just to you know respond to your characterization uh i participate well i'm gonna let me i thought we were taking a break just with the the process that you just described was for one minute pitches things to be considered on the agenda it's it's it's uh i think been a valuable tool for that purpose but it's not true that every single thing council does are uh our one minute pitches of things to add to work sessions that's what that was about so i just don't agree that that applies i mean it's your meeting to chair but you know i'm just uh telling the way i see it well and and i'll take your point i mean but you can either take it from the weekend that we have that conversation or you can take it from the conversation where richard hayes presented to the group on robert's rules of order and both i think would draw to come to the same conclusion we have to be diligent about speaking on things that the majority of this body want to move forward and not independent you have an opportunity to speak no question we're not we're not disagreeing there it's where we invest the time and again council mayor pro tem makes his point we you had this conversation last week so it's not the process is not new your your position is known and it was known last week and so i respect that but i have to respect the entire group and not make unilateral decisions council member armature yes uh ken paxton's opinions are just that their opinions they're non-binding they don't accept precedent thank you the city of austin passed its opportunity council member armature council member armature i'm going to ask you to respect the fact that i'm chairing a meeting and ask you to uh hold your comments when you meet me you are muting all the people well i'm asking you to hold your comments and i'm asking you to respect the fact that i chair this meeting if you don't like that i respect your disapproval but it is a fact thank you so we will take these one at a time um so the first decision in front of us is the local emergency eviction protection prevention uh program uh part one so i'll ask are there four people that want to have this conversation by show of hands one more time let the record reflect that only council member uh armature wanted to have that discussion uh so it dies for want of support uh then uh or for a consensus then let's go to leap part two establish an emergency rental property maintenance fund to cover the cost of the maintenance of the landlords and property managers by show of hands who wants to proceed to have that conversation i don't see any hands okay let the reflector lift the records reflect there were no hands uh that one uh reflecting interest in speaking on that item uh then the next direction point is on uh renaming the six hundred eighty five thousand dollars from the cdbg cv funds who is wanting to have that discussion regarding uh removing those funds are transferring those funds to um a different that that and so by by way of description that's the five-day notice that's the charities that staff had pointed out are in line to receive those so just to give clarity is there anyone that or who wants to uh have that discussion and take that item up let the record reflect that no one raised their hands lastly uh and i'll take some guidance from you sarah the the two hundred and fifty thousand dollar additional city manager authorization is that in this last um consideration or would that have to be amended if the body wants to do so that is not there currently that would have to be amended further what we're seeking direction on is what's not in the order um is 125,000 additional for utility assistance that is a recommendation from staff for council consideration to be added to the the order that was drafted for you all got it thank you so for the question before the body is uh who wants to have this conversation uh the the two decision points are one what sarah indicated direction for additional 125,000 for you utility assistance uh and then if there's any desire to discuss or add the 250,000 authority to the city manager so uh who would want to have that discussion are there are there so i'm so we have at least four that want to have that conversation thank you five uh and so we will let's let's have that conversation we'll take up the what's not listed first to make make sure i make it easy um thought i open up the discussion about the 250,000 authorization to the city manager council member ryan i believe that that 250 is in the order is it not it is in the order um just increasing the total spend um for projected um for the hotels uh so we'd actually have to add an additional 250 so it'd be three million and 250,000 total spending authority so that that is not accounted for currently in the order it would the 250 would be additional for the three million okay so it's it's two separate 250,000 okay thank you uh councilman ryan good question any other thoughts council member melton then council member davis i think the intention uh is clear at least you know to me that our goal is to provide some flexibility in a very short time frame uh so that we can see what other you know sources may be available how the picture looks different in a month i don't know if we need to if that's implicit we need to say anything like that within the order uh you sarah are are taught your thoughts i think the i think that the 250,000 the initial 250,000 dollars as sarah stated was to give us a flexibility for hotels any unforeseen issues out there if the council feels it's appropriate to provide some gap financing for the eviction prevention dollars until we find out until we can get the esg2 grant in place until we find out about congress's appropriations that that is really the decision point it's your call and whether you want to do that yeah i support that and my only question is what language needs to be uh if you know other than maybe just the dollar amount and purpose but um maybe the dollar amount itself implicitly addresses the time frame i think if you wanted to do that it would be to basically to amend that order from three million to 3.25 million and to be utilized in the same fashion as the esg1 grant terms to the other agencies that way we can keep uh keep that program going until we find out what's going on that sarah is that correct that's correct i think we would have to approach the united way of denton county see if they could help us administer that 250,000 with the same program parameters i think that would be the easiest way and the quickest way to get that program started and you know the other non-profits are kind of limited on capacity as well so we we'd want to bring in the united way i'd recommend that so i have one go ahead paul yeah i guess i'm just saying you know i i concur with that recommendation or uh uh and you know whatever language is needed to enshrine that uh you know i would support so so my one follow-up question is to your point mr city manager can we make that can this body make that authorization without actually utilizing the funds so it's there as a as needed only or if we allocate it in this way it has to be um activated i think we can i think you can you can increase the spending authority and use it as needed if we get additional dollars in uh prior to that then then we won't spend them so that's that would be the way that we would handle that okay yeah good that that's helpful because then it's not punitive but if for whatever reason if we can't as a body get together you have what you need to take care of the citizens that's right okay got it uh thank you uh so any other questions for com uh questions for staff on the additional 250 000 dollars uh council member i mean sorry mayor pro tem davis um todd this 250 that we're now 250 000 that we're now talking about is that essentially the same piece of general fund money that we would be taught that we were talking about you recommended taking this back up maybe the second or third week in in january and my my concern is you know when we first authorized spending and with our first declaration in order we knew at that time there may be some reimbursement headed our way there may not be and then as time has gone on as we've authorized additional spending we've seen good reports from staff on parts that have been reimbursed or are reimbursable or eligible or might be in a future tranche and all that kind of stuff um i'm wondering if this is the conversation that we ought to have after the first of the year when we have a little more direction um and and maybe even have some more funding already lined up i think i think that's fair um our intention would be to try to work with the non-profits and exhaust those t-rap and esg1 funds first and then supplement it with you know provide gap financing with the 250 so i may pretend that's a fine strategy and it's something we could put on the agenda you know either on the 12th or the 19th and have that discussion with you but i think that's fine i'm just we're really kind of hesitant to give you a number and ask that authority to go spend it right now it's not that the staff's opposed to doing this program we just haven't got any idea when we're going to have an announcement and then will this have been an unnecessary expense so it's six one half a dozen the other if you want to give us the flexibility to continue it barring no order from the feds that's fine if you want us to bring it back like on the 12th that's fine too so whatever you're more comfortable with got it yeah council member melzer uh mr city manager if we if we vote you the additional authority so that we have some insurance you know against things going pear-shaped you know beyond what we hope or what you don't fear um but uh if it turns out that we don't need to spend it you know are we stuck having authorized no no i think i think i think it goes with the direction that uh again we we work with the uh the agencies that are getting the grant funding they spend their dollars first see where we stand if the money is is needed and we don't have any direction from the federal government then we can certainly appropriate it if you want to stop that before that happens that's fine with us too well i i would support you voting the insurance and the flexibility and trusting staff to be judicious if we don't need it we don't use it okay yeah so let's let's uh so uh councilman ryan i believe i'm with the mayor pro tem on this one that i'd i'd rather see it if i understand what he's saying i'd rather see this wait until january i don't see anything major going on there is some funding currently available uh one of my worries is i think about another emergency declaration that we did that we authorized hundred thousand dollars and is we didn't spend that much we had council members saying oh there's still money left in that well this is this is not this is couch cushion money that we have to find this isn't budgeted money this is stuff we figure out where it's going to come from so i would prefer not to authorize anything unless it was absolutely necessary at this time let's see what happens there's so many different changes that can take place between now and then sure fair point um any other questions uh so erin help me understand well councilman roberter uh yeah so what about so people who need you know this relief in the interim um can you just kind of speak to what what will be involved in in in in waiting what what are the potential downsides of waiting so right now with the approval of the esg the esg cv1 contracts um we're gonna release a plier tomorrow that will help individuals identify agencies that they can go to um we should be uh giving hope um the salvation army and grace like rain um and they can immediately approach those agencies to ask for assistance with the dollars that each one of them may have for eviction prevention okay and uh and how will the message be sent to landlords to please don't uh evict people during this time or don't start the eviction process will there be an effort to educate to encourage people to allow the time to apply for relief to wait for it to come to apply for it i'm worried about the covid spread that will come from uh the displacement that that will happen in the interim so is there a plan for that well one we don't know if the eviction federal eviction morphing will be extended or not past december 31st at this time it may be it may not be um but once an individual or tenant is asking for assistance and if they are approved for assistance they can have that communication back to their landlord as well um the i can ask danny shaw to to chime in if she has any more information but that communication needs to take place before between the landlord and the tenant as well and they can produce some of the documentation to show hey i've been approved for assistance and the funding is coming um but but there's nothing stopping uh a landlord from um issuing a notice to vacate at that time that's not we will typically we pay the landlord directly as i understand it sarah and it's typically their call we have no standing um in that call that is just the jp court's call in terms of how those processes work so we have no standing to get involved in those issues but we can communicate to the landlord whether they're going to get approved and whether the the grant program will be uh those grant funds will be redirected to them okay and and i'm gonna so i think that's a great idea to communicate um since obviously my uh my proposal um you know to legislate that uh we didn't have the consensus but uh it would be great to be able to have a concerted effort to communicate to landlords to ask them to please wait while people apply for relief can can i get consensus on that no no that's not i think both the staff has said that we that is a landlord and a tenant conversation we're going to move forward you also said that we can communicate oh yes and and we will danny did you have something to add what form that communication is going to take because this is important sarah laid that out so you can say it again please yeah i'm going to ask uh danny shaw to to chime in who's a little bit more familiar with the logistics of how these payments are made right the the payments goes directly to the landlord once the client is approved for assistance and so the relationship between the communication between the client and the landlord is currently in that that civil relationship between those two entities so we we would just be communicating that these assistance funds are available and that do the outreach to the entire community which should catch landlords as well as those who are in need of assistance great thank you so go ahead um we can also work with the united way of denton county and kind of do an email blast out to the apartment associations to just let them know there's some continued programs available excellent thank you so then the so the decision point first and erin give me some direction uh so i want to have a decision point on the uh the 250 000 allocation and then take up the uh the the latter part it's all under one item so are proposed currently that that last consideration of a drafted declaration order and order so can i bifurcate those or is that a uh discussion all in one you can you can have the discussion separately it's just that when you vote remember this is one item on one individual consideration item so whatever you end up resolving moving forward to add to the order and declaration before you adopt it you know that that's the ultimate but if you want to bifurcate them right now you can do that as long as you come back and tell sarah and us what that motion is going to be and what it's going to look like it sounds like you're going to amend what we've what the staff has already drafted and this before you tonight yes sir thank you so so to have that conversation independent of each other so first it's uh the decision point and i just need to see if we have a consensus on uh the 250 uh thousand dollar additional um spend authority uh to councilmember ryan's point uh it gives authority that may may or may not be needed and and can tend to say there's budget available to uh the city manager's point we're going to spend only if needed so it would be idle unless needed and then would tap into it that's kind of the decision point is uh do you want to have it available um in advance or take that up uh after we know more and deal with it at that point and so i let's uh to make things simple and clear for those that would advocate or support uh the 250 thousand dollars additional uh be allocated and held or give the given to the uh given a spending authority to the city manager so who would support giving the city manager the 250 thousand dollar spending authority now indicate so by raise your hand so i can kind of see what a support is for that and i think i would do that as well so that's three uh so that one uh counts mayor pro tem yeah that was a that was a flip from the mayor pro tem i'm i'm uh i'm i'm in favor of doing that and the and the reason why i think is that um todd made it more clear how he and the staff will view those funds and that he's got direction from from the council on what to do with that money um and i think united way has made uh has made it clear in the past that they are ready and willing to do what they can in this in this crisis i think if that money becomes needed they can they can stand up that effort very very quickly okay great and then uh so the second part of that is is there anyone that would not be in support of the 125 thousand dollars uh utility assistance is so who would not be in support of the additional 125 thousand dollars in utility assistance so everyone supports that great so sarah in summary i i think uh what we're going and i guess aaron do we need to now vote on that or you're you're muted sorry vote on the additional items or or the entire item the entire item i i think that it if it would be preferable if you do call a recess so that sarah and and our legal uh catherine and tray can draft the language to put it before you so that you have it and then the motion that would then be made would be uh the motion as amended uh which which would include the additional items that you all have already uh it seems there's a consensus to add in this order that is right okay okay thank you great great point so just to summarize sarah before we go into the break and we'll take a uh how much how much time do you think you need sarah uh five ten minutes okay yes we'll take ten minute break uh but to summarize before that uh what's being proposed is supporting and adding the 125 000 dollar utility assistance and adding the 250 000 spending authority uh that is you know that would go to yeah yes to the to the city manager uh in in case of emergency we can't get back together or approve spending uh timely okay all good okay great so we will take it is now uh 9 32 p.m we will take a 10 minute break come back take up this one item and next would be concluding items so 9 32 we'll be back at uh 9 42 thank you okay and we are back it is this so this is december 17th it's 9 51 with the denton city council we're back from break with uh and everyone should have received an email with the red line document if you could take a moment take a look at that and uh are there any other questions for staff before we we vote on item j council member ryan yeah i've got a question looking through this the way that it reads because it should be that the total up to through date on this emergency declaration is 3.25 million but the way this reads it almost looks like it's during the period of this this order as opposed to throughout throughout since the the onset of the emergency declaration okay let's see i guess it's five h so let me just uh maybe share the screen really quickly if that's okay yes okay um so council member ryan is referencing this paragraph here um which says the city manager is authorized to extend to expend no more than three million two hundred fifty thousand dollars total including previously authorized funds that means from the previously authorized funds of the previous orders through the entire disaster declaration period okay yeah i guess it's just the way that i'm i'm reading the grammar on it it it may instead of previously authorized funds uh maybe previous um emergency declarations or including funds authorized in previous declarations um erin do you have thoughts or i mean i know it's on the fly so i think we can capture the spirit of it but tell me if if there's uh concern in doing it that way i'm going to defer to uh first assistant city attorney katherine clifton she's there drafting those amendments i don't have a copy of the red line in front of me to look at it closely is katherine on yes just one second while i switch chairs and allow her to come over hold on thank you and i apologize now that i've come over here i don't have it in front of me either but i think as i understand council member ryan's question it part of the issue was that it says during this period and that does it feel like that this period is too narrow for the amount of money yeah i mean it's it's to me it's reading like it could be interpreted that that 3.25 is for the period from now from when we authorized this until march 31st as opposed to from when it was first authorized on declaration one all the way through to today because the other thing about it is we've crossed over budget cycles as well so that becomes a you know just a concern of well what budget year was this in and you know is this from this year is this only this year if we change that language to say instead of during this period to say for the duration of the emergency beginning march 13th i believe that was our original the original mayor's order to date or through the march 31st right that would make more sense to me okay okay so do we need to is everyone okay with that is everyone tracking do we need to see that or is that everyone comfortable making that uh with that understanding that staff's going to make that amendment all right anyone okay great thank you thank you john uh so i i'll take any other discussion on uh well first let's let's get the formalities out of the way so is there a motion to approve item j as amended uh council member melzer i move approval uh council mayor pro tem davis i'll second thank you uh any other discussion great so we'll vote so uh council member melzer i'll say you i mayor pro tem davis i councilmember johnson i councilmember baker hi thank you uh councilmember armature yes councilmember ryan hi and uh mayor hutchpeth is i that passes seven zero thank you all for your work there uh that takes us to uh section eight concluding items um concluding items council member ryan then council member melzer yeah i just wanted to uh offer out some condolences and let some of the our predecessors know that they're in our thoughts and prayers former council member james king's father passed away uh this past week and taro king was also a former council member in the mid 70s and uh he was taro was a mentor to me he when i first came into the breakfast guanis he kind of took me under his wing and you know gave me advice on council from his days and uh he will be greatly missed and uh then uh former council member ronnie beastly her husband passed away this past week and you know i've worked with them on Beaujolais and several other items throughout the city throughout time and uh they're they're great people and just want to let them know that they're in our thoughts and prayers thank you councilmember melzer yeah just briefly uh obviously we stole some tough stuff to get through together look forward to doing it with this new council for those who celebrate happy eighth night of kronika and a joyous and peaceful christmas uh and i look forward to seeing you all and for everyone seeing us hopefully in a in a much better happier new year excellent well said thank you for that uh council member armator um yeah i just want to uh just extend my personal hope to any landlords who are listening please don't issue notices to vacate please wait uh for your tenants to apply for relief money that is coming it will be coming please we're all in this together and i hope that you will extend the maximum grace um and allow your tenants the time to apply for relief because time is really significant right now please allow them that time okay thank you uh and anyone else okay and so i want to point a couple of things for for uh my peers so uh please remember to submit your council committee preferences i think that's due uh the 22nd of this month uh and then a couple of things i want to touch on is one i want to thank denton fire department with rudolph one if you've not seen it that's a pretty neat thing they'll be uh parking at the convention center on friday and golden triangle mall on saturday but they drove through our neighborhood it's really neat seeing them in other neighborhoods so that's that's a great idea i want to encourage people to continue to shop locally uh and then i i just want to say i i um we're going to honor mayor watts later for those that were wondering about that so that'll come at a future date he wanted to kind of make sure uh this body was able to have this conversation and and kind of mindful of that and and putting us first to make sure there's no distraction so i appreciate him for for being considerate in that way uh and then i'm just happy to be here happy to to follow uh his in his footsteps big shoes across the board i mean mayor burrows we've had some great leadership perry mcneel some other folks uh jack miller so i i just appreciate the opportunity to be here and i'm going to close with with something i forgot when i was getting sworn in so i'm going to say uh hi mom so that's dr hutzpeth and and my pops uh look there'll be some interesting council meetings uh lord please let the zooms continue uh but no it's it's a blessing to be here uh and so i'm grateful uh and so thank you all very much and we will see you in a couple of weeks and and we'll do it all over again thank you all and i'll