Mar 22, 2016 City Council on 2016-03-22 3:00 PM

Good afternoon. I wanted to welcome everyone to this meeting of the Dent City Council on Tuesday, March the 22nd, 2010. It is 3.02 and we do have a quorum. Our first item on the agenda is citizen comments on consent agenda items and we do have two cards for consent agenda item 3B. Yeah, I just think that's just... The first speaker will be Michael Hennan. If you'll come on up to the mic and state your name and address and your time will begin and I believe is it three minutes? Three minutes? Yes. Thank you, Mayor. I am Michael Hennan. I live at 724 Thomas Street in Denton. I'm speaking on behalf of the Denton Drilling Awareness Group and I'm asking council with regard to the issue on your consent agenda, which is 3B, dealing with the Brattle Group's study of the DME proposal, that the Brattle Group be urged to consider a 30-year assessment of the DME energy plan, not just a 20-year span, which I understood the DME to be looking at. So we think the life of those plans is longer than 20 years and we'd like to have the study consider that longer period of time. Also we are interested in having the Brattle Group analyze the plan that's been proposed, which is a 70% renewable plan plus reliance on ERCOT, not just reliance on the Peker plants. I understand I've seen the contract that the city manager has proposed and I agree that it's vague enough maybe to include what I have suggested, but it's also not specifically stated in there, so I wanted to be sure that there's some citizen request that those factors be considered. And that's all I have. Okay. Thank you, Michael. Next speaker will be Ken Gold. If you'll come up, state your name and address and your time will begin. And this is on this agenda item, is it 3B? Yes. Yeah, okay. Yes. Thank you, Mayor, members of the council. My name is Ken Gold. I live at 2512 Natchez Trace here in Denton and I too am talking about consent agenda item 3B. I think this is something that is worthy of an open full discussion and presentation in a regular meeting of the council rather than a consent agenda. Many people work this time of day and aren't able to come to a work session and put their two cents in. And I think this is something that has been requested by many people in the public for a long time. I think that we need to, that they're entitled to a better discussion of the details of this agreement and what is going to be studied. And that's why I urge you to pull it off the consent agenda item 3B. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Ken. All right. Seeing no more cards, we'll go to agenda item number two, which is request for clarification of agenda items listed on today's agenda. Any requests for clarification? Seeing none. Okay. Let me just look at my notes right quick just to make sure because I did this last night and I could forget. My computer will come up. I'll come back to that if I have any. We'll go on to work session reports. Work session 3A, receive a report and hold discussion, give staff direction regarding the city's budgeting, rate setting and cost recovery processes for internal service funds and utility funds of the city. Thank you, Mayor. Our Director of Finance, Chuck Springer, will be handling this item. Thank you, Howard. I've got a very short presentation on this topic. That's it. Thanks. Really going over just kind of expanding what we touched on last time, some different types of funds that we budget, internal service funds and enterprise funds. These are really just the topics I'm going to cover in detail on these two types of funds. Let me kind of summarize here and then I'll go through how they receive funding as well as kind of their purposes on future slides. But we've got six internal service funds of the city, technology services, materials management which is our warehouse and purchasing, fleet management, the risk retention fund for our outside insurance and self insurance, the health insurance fund and the engineering services fund. So these budgets are kind of in accounting terms, we kind of double count them. In other words, we budget these funds and then there's cost of service transfers from operating funds to these funds. So they're set aside really so we can make sure that we recover all these costs but they're charged out to the operating funds and enterprise funds based on their service usage and I'll go over that in a minute. So the purpose of them is really to centralize these services and fully cost and recover these services from the funds that they're providing service to. In terms of descriptions of the six funds, technology services is really all of the city's computer, telephone, software, help desk support, GIS system and applications or software development. The materials management fund is our centralized purchasing function and warehouse services. The fleet management fund, we have centralized vehicle maintenance and it also is centralized fuel. The risk retention fund is the liability insurance coverage. Health insurance fund is for employee health benefits, also dental and life insurance coverage and the engineering services fund really has three components, the engineers, real estate services and public works inspection. In terms of how we charge the services out across the city for technology services and several of the funds have a couple different methods for different types of services. Some of it's based on the computers, number of computers and phones in your operation, help desk calls and software packages supported. For materials management, purchasing services are broken down based on the number of purchase orders issued for each area and then warehouse services are based on inventory purchases. Whatever is purchased out of the warehouse by the departments is charged to those departments. Fleet management is based on an hourly maintenance charge when the vehicles are brought in and fuel purchases is just based on the amount that's purchased in fuel. Risk retention is just based on the number of employees by fund, those costs are broken down, health insurance is a total annual cost allocated per employee for health insurance. Engineering services is based on services provided to internal customers. Oh yes, sorry, go ahead, yes. Chuck, so for an example on engineering services, is that only our internal cost or does that include the total number, does it include outsourced engineering as well? That's just our internal cost. If there's outsourced engineering, it's usually charged directly to the capital project or the department that's using it, but those are internal staffing costs and those other costs. And those are charged, I'm sorry. Real quick, I'm sorry Chuck, follow up on that one. It says internal and external customers? For public works inspection, some of that is charged to the outside projects, private projects that receive public works inspections, so that one is charged outside and inside some of the inspection they do as internal projects and outside. So the internal is more of a transfer of funds, whereas the external, they'll actually be writing a check that'll be coming in. Yeah, it's a revenue source that's partially outside. And on the fleet management fund, and I'd probably say this on all these, some of my questions don't really apply to them, but do we periodically go back and try to benchmark what we're charging based upon what is out in the marketplace? Like let's say fleet management fund, based on an hourly maintenance charge, of course it's pretty easy to ascertain to some degree what shops are charging for different types of work. When we're going through the budget process, we compare ourselves to, they usually do a survey of some outside services to make sure we're competitive with those. And we've been competitive or a little bit below. Now not 100% of their work is in-house. Some of the work that's really specialized, they go outside to do, but for all the internal work, we track our hourly maintenance charges and kind of compare it to the local charges of other shops. And that would be the same for like technology services fund, okay. We're trying to provide IT services and support for all these different components. We sort of have an idea if we were going to contract that out to somebody, this is what it would be. On some of them, probably the contract out would be most common on like a help desk. Okay. All right. Okay. So we kind of compare that. Okay. Thank you. Some of those I should mention for technology services is all of the software maintenance is kind of centralized there and then charged out to the departments. So that's a large portion of that cost. Kind of switching from the internal service funds, the other ones I want to go over are enterprise funds, which is kind of business activity type funds. And the large ones, electric, water, wastewater, and solid waste. Our airport fund is also an enterprise fund for accounting purposes. And really you're segregating these funds for which a fee is charged to users for goods and services. They also pay for the cost of service transfers to the internal service funds. And these definitions, one, two, three definitions is really from accounting rules. Is their debt back solely by fees and charges? Do they have legal requirements to cover cost or a policy decision to recover their cost? Council Member Hawkins. And on that airport fund, does that include some of the gas well royalties? Yes. Can you explain that then a little bit more? Well, when the, there was some land under the airport that was leased for gas wells, so those revenues, because the airport receives federal funding, they're required that those revenues based on any property owned by the airport goes directly back to the airport. So they receive all the lease and royalties for gas wells based on airport property. And that, we're looking to expire that operation in a couple years, that gas well royalty is going to go to another fund, am I understanding that? No, I think it's just declining in terms of the revenue source is somewhat declining. So we may have more difficulty having that as a self-supp orting fund sometime in the future as those funds decline. Thanks. And in terms of the goals for the enterprise fund of rates and self-sufficiency, you know, they're based on cost of service annually reviewed by the staff and we generally for the utilities do an outside review of all of their cost and rates on a five-year interval from an external consultant. We try to incrementally adjust rates to achieve our revenue targets so we don't have any kind of one-time spike or increase. We also try to make sure it's equitable across different classes that residential customers, commercial customers, all are kind of paying their fair share. We try to remain competitive for the utility rates. For electric, we compare to other cities as well as private and for water and wastewater rates we compare ourselves to other cities. And you know, just ensure that the funds are balanced and kind of have a long-term resiliency, maintaining prudent reserve levels. Just like the general fund, they have reserve levels that are set and adjusted from time to time to make sure they can handle downturns. The most recent year, if we have a wet summer, the water utility tends to suffer in terms of revenues and can have losses in some years. So we try to maintain a reserve to cover those down years. In terms of the budget process, the internal service funds really start first. When you think about all the other funds, the enterprise and the governmental funds, they're going to need to know what their internal service fund charges are as they begin developing their budget. So they really start in January and then look at their affordability and their cost and make adjustments as necessary. The enterprise funds also start a little earlier. One of the reasons is other than the airport, all of the utilities and solid waste go through the public utility board and have several meetings during the budget process to look at their budgets. So they begin a little bit early. They come to council at the same time. The airport fund follows the same process as governmental funds in terms of the budgeting process and then it's combined all together what comes to the city council at the beginning of August in terms of a proposed budget. With that, I've just kind of got another overview of what's coming next in terms of budget information over the next couple of months to the council beginning with the fire department presentation on April 4th. And we'll kind of go over the final funds that we budget on the 5th, the capital improvement budget and miscellaneous funds or special revenue funds. With that, I'll open it up to questions. >> Does this schedule seem to follow last year's schedule or are we trying to get a little bit ahead of it? >> Well in terms of the timing of the proposed budget will still be the same. We've tried to add a lot of additional information so that we've kind of gone over these different types of funds and then the major departments, we're trying to bring those to you before the proposed budget. So in terms of it's earlier that we're discussing the budget this year as well as there's additional sessions ahead of time in terms of the budget this year. But in terms of the timing of when the proposed budget comes to the city council, that's still the same. That's driven mainly by we don't get the final assessed valuation until late July. >> Okay. >> Mayor Pro Tem. >> Thank you. Now it seems that my memory serves that on April 26th was also going to be the time when we would talk about any kind of council concerns that we're supposed to be sending our information into the city manager and that we'll have a discussion on that on the 26th also. >> Yes. >> I don't see it on there but I -- >> I think it's really part of the strategic plan update and strategic outcomes really. What is the council's direction for the budget process so as much detail or generalized we think that's kind of appropriate for that discussion. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I guess to follow up on that because I know at the first presentation we did sort of an overview in this new process we're trying to develop that you -- that staff was wanting if there were some concerns that council had -- let's say for example the one I'll bring up as sort of an example. There's that one cent assumption of one cent O and M and that if there was something that we wanted to express to you now you'd rather hear the concerns now as far as if it's a rate or like last year there was something about raises and salaries and so you'd want to hear those kind of things on the front end at least be aware of them instead of -- okay. I just want to make sure and is this the time, this April 26th, is that when we would be talking about those kind of issues? >> I think we'll be talking about them but we'll take that kind of information at any of these meetings along the way. Any of those that are posted for budget discussions we can have those type of discussions. It's not just restricted to the 26th. I think George had put in his memo that he sent out to the council if he could have those back by the 26th so that could be discussed then but at any point along this time we're open to taking direction and feedback. >> Okay. All right. Great. Any other questions? Yes. Councilmember Rodin. >> I'll just comment that I like this kind of breaking it up into chunks. This presentation that you did today would normally be, as I recall, a part of a much larger presentation in which we'd be sitting here for a couple hours and gloss over enterprise funds or gloss over some of these. So this helps, I know for me, to write my mind around it and get us prepared for it prior to this summer. So thanks for that. And I guess on the enterprise funds, because I know I believe there was some information sent out on debt levels just recently as far as how much debt we had for general fund, tax fund and all that. And so on the enterprise funds, any debt associated with those funds, let's say electricity, water, sewer, whether they're GOs or COs. Based upon what you just presented, then those revenues from those systems are pledged to pay that debt. Is that correct? >> Correct. >> And then the only thing is if it's a CO, you have the pledge of the revenue, but yet there's this sort of underlying kind of catch all, I don't want to say liability, but recourse that is the tax rate or something. There's really an additional tax pledge that gives the debt a higher rating and lowers the interest cost because of the additional tax pledge combined with that revenue pledge. Where revenue bonds would strictly only have a pledge of the revenues of the system, typically didn't sold water, wastewater and electric together with the system pledge of all three. Revenue bonds only have a pledge of that revenue stream where COs have a pledge of that revenue stream plus a property tax pledge which is really kind of like a backup pledge. And what that does is they have a higher rating COs because of that additional revenue pledge and lower interest cost when we sell that debt. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> And Chuck, do you know, have we ever had a situation where the revenues didn't cover it and we had to dip into other revenue sources to be able to cover the debt? >> No. >> No. >> No. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Any other questions on this presentation? Thank you, Chuck. Appreciate that. Oh, go ahead. Yes. >> You're going to do -- you have another presentation, right? >> Oh, do you? >> Are you -- >> I wasn't going to do the next one. I think it's loaded. Was it the -- >> Which one am I missing? >> Well, there was another backup piece and I thought it was going to be -- >> Oh, oh, oh, yeah. There's a backup piece that gave some history. The mayor -- I don't have it in the presentation. The mayor had asked for a 10-year breakdown of property tax revenues and sales tax revenue as a percent of general fund revenues and that's attachment to within there. It's not really part of the presentation but it's additional information that was requested. >> Yes, go ahead. >> You know, we have on that schedule April 26th a discussion of a lot of those things and if the council would indulge me, I would like to talk a little bit about an initiative that I'm interested in the staff exploring but I don't want to waste any of the staff members' time in developing cost estimates for this if there's not really an interest in the part of council. So if you would indulge me, if that would be okay. >> And it's regarding this budget discussion. >> It's regarding this budget discussion. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And I think this is what you and I discussed. >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> So I don't know -- >> Do you know which one it is? >> It's up in the corner. >> Okay. >> All right. We'll do it here. And if you just -- I'll use the up and down keys to go backward and forward. >> This is scary, isn't it? >> I have a question. >> No, no question. By the way, it occurs to me that we need a clock on this wall so that the presenter here can see how long we're taking. Could y'all make that happen? >> That's a good idea. Okay. You just spent one minute talking about this. Let's get moving. >> When we had a discussion a while back about the IAOF cemetery and ordinance to make sure that it was clear that we were not discriminating against anyone that wanted to be buried there, I got thinking I need to go visit that place. And after all, according to some council members, I'll probably be using those facilities sooner than anybody else here. So I went. And I also went because a friend had said -- she's a storyt eller and she said we need to go there and do some exploration. There's a lot of history out there. And I realized that immediately when I got there when I saw that that cemetery was established in 1860. So there's a historical marker there with a lot of interesting information. I will not read it to you. But there's also a special historic Texas cemetery marker there. So we have some restrictions on what we do out there. It's just fascinating to see. And you can just look at these sets of tombstones and know, wow, that's a family. There's kids there along with an adult. There are some beautiful tombstones out there that ex quisite artwork that was carved. Several different places. Now some of the tombstones have been damaged because of wear and tear or vandals. There's tombstones that sell fascinating stories. And this is a tombstone that's over 100 years old. Tombstones -- there are a number that have this type of design with tree trunks and information on them. Here is a fascinating tombstone that -- look up closer and see the detail work. And it has a poem. Remember stranger as you pass by, as you are now so once was I. As I am now, you must be preparing life to follow me. So there's not only history here. There's poetry. For Lizzie Barnett, the death of a good woman is only the commencement of a higher life. It is like the morning star that rising never sets but melts away into the pure light of heaven. This is an interesting place to go visit. There are well-known people buried at this cemetery. Emily Fowler this week at the chamber banquet will be giving out the Otis Fowler award. There they are. Family plots of long established families. Lots of names in the cemetery that you'll recognize. In fact street names all around. It's an active cemetery. Folks visit regularly their loved ones. You can see here that somebody took a belt buckle and left it there on the gravestone. I understand that there are about 25 funerals a year, 25 burials a year at this and our other cemetery in town. But there are problems. There is a lot of damage that has happened to a lot of these gravestones. This one has just fallen over. This one will be falling over fairly soon. You'll see these others back in the background right here and right here. They have fallen over. And somebody reset them so that they would be more permanent. There's crypts that are literally crumbling, falling apart. And folks, we're the stewards. We are responsible for this. This is the city-owned cemetery. Nothing gets fixed here unless the council directs dollars to get this fixed. This is what a crypt is supposed to look like. But even this one has some damage and in a few years it's going to be moving towards the direction that that other crypt was in. Other tombstones that are near falling over. Here is the -- you can see this when you're driving down Carroll Boulevard, the little workshop building. I am sure that it's only by the grace of God or something that the city has not received a citation from community improvement services because that building is in need of improvement. So I decided to go over to the Oakwood cemetery. That's another city-owned cemetery and that is right next to Fredmore Park. I thought that it was a cemetery reserved for African Americans. But look at the date, 1857. This is an older cemetery. This was our first cemetery. It too has a historical marker. Fascinating information. First people buried there, 1857. A lady who was pregnant traveling through Denton gave birth . She died in childbirth. She's buried there. A couple of days later the child died. The baby is buried there. Fascinating information. It's also a historic Texas cemetery. Interesting tombstones there. Variety. I love this. Notice the wife's name. Tennessee. Tennessee. They also have family plots and they also have some problems with tombstones that are falling. Died 1875. Here's another above ground crypt that is worth repaired than those over at the IWF. Here's a tombstone that it was just sitting like that when I walked up to it. They can be repaired. Here's one that was broken and they put it in concrete to kind of preserve it. I don't know if that's the best way to preserve it but it seems better than it being lost. Here's another one that's preserved that way. Here's some that didn't get preserved at all. They're gone. I would assume that we have records that would show the people that are buried in those places but we have no idea. I guess what I'm trying to say is we have a responsibility as the citizens, as the stewards, as the owners of this cemetery. I don't think that there is anywhere near enough revenue from the money that we bring in on burials to cover the cost of the kinds of repairs. So what I'm asking is if there are enough council members interested to direct staff to come up with some estimates for us of ways, methods, whether it means that we add staff, whether it means that we have to do a contract or something like that in order to start working on this. I don't know that it can be a one-year process. I have no idea what the cost would be. But I don't want us to waste staff time in doing something like this unless there's enough interest on council because there's no point in having staff spend their time on something and then for us to just out and out reject it. I suspect the cost may be significant. So that's my little presentation. I'll come back and sit down for the discussion. >> Councilmember Hawkins. >> I'm interested in this, Dalton. I'm just curious if there's any restricted funds that somehow could be used for any of like the art type aspects or, you know, maybe it doesn't matter. >> Well, I think that would be something for staff to explore. I had asked Emerson Borle when I talked to him about this if they had checked to see if there were any statewide grants. And he said that there had been some investigation at one time. He did not know -- he didn't think that there were any available. But there might be a possibility of a friends organization forming that would help with some ongoing things, but I don't know. And that's something for staff to let us know about. >> Okay. >> Who's -- would this fall under parks or who's -- does this fall under parks? Okay. Any comments on -- I mean, I don't have a problem with exploring it to see what it is. I mean, you know, I certainly need some more information to know what kind of decision to make, but to say we're not going to -- I don't think we should do anything -- that's not really acceptable to me, but I'd like to certainly have some more information on it because these are historical landmarks within our city. And at one point, there was a drive to put a wrought iron fence around -- >> Well, there's actually some work going on in that regard . >> Okay. >> And the -- on the Oakwood Cemetery, part of it has no fence at all. >> Okay. Yeah. >> Part of it is fenced and it's a chain link fence. There's a chain link fence around the IAOF cemetery. Part of it has been damaged due to cars running into it. There had been some work done on -- and they have selected a design that has been approved by the Historic Landmark Commission for a replacement fence that would be more appropriate than that chain link fence. And they have a project or they have plans in place for slowly replacing that. >> Okay. >> All right. >> I thought I saw -- go ahead. Oh, no, I'm sorry. >> I was just going to add my voice to I am comfortable with staff looking into this. And I appreciate that presentation. That was a fun look into something that, you know, we tend psychologically to avoid more often than not for probably good reasons, but I think that's an important point to bring up. So thanks for doing that. >> Well, as that tombstone said, well, I'll be there. >> Exactly. >> All right. Good. Thank you. Any other comments? Oh, Kaylee, I'm sorry. Yes. >> I, too, am comfortable exploring it. And it looks like there possibly could be a grant from the Texas Historical Commission on preserving historic cemeteries that we could look into as well. So there might be some things out there for us. >> Great. All right. Fantastic. Yes. >> I would just say for staff as we're investigating, I definitely want to go take a look at what our options are, but maybe to break it into buckets , right? So there's fencing, there's grounds, and then there's restoration of headstones, which, you know, that's almost like an art. So maybe if what staff comes back with could be broken out into buckets, so maybe it's a phased kind of program, or at a minimum, we need to have good fences around these things. We need to keep the grounds well. And, but on restoration of statues or restoration of head stones, that's probably something we don't have the ability to do in-house, so maybe if they can come back with different estimates in buckets, so we can pick and choose. >> Yes. >> Dalton, your storyteller friend, are there actual tours that are given through there? >> Not that I know of. >> Not that you know of? I don't even know if that's allowed or not, so. >> Yeah, I don't think that it's where it can be locked at night, but I don't know for sure. I've not tried to go there at night. >> Yeah, I want to do a spring break with you next year. That sounds like you learned some stuff. >> I'm a blast in the cemetery. >> Okay, thank you. Any other questions or comments? Fantastic. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. I think that ended the presentation of the work session reports. We will now move into closed session. At 336, we will consider the following items. Consultation with attorneys under Texas Government Code section 551.071. Deliberations regarding real property under Texas Government Code section 551.072. Deliberations regarding certain public power utilities, competitive matters under Texas Government Code section 551.086. And if somebody could close those blinds, please. Sorry about that, Brandon. See you down there. >> Good evening. I wanted to welcome everyone to this meeting of the Denton City Council. It's Tuesday, March the 22nd, 2015, and it is 6.36 PM. If you would, stand with me if you're able to pledge allegiance to the US and the Texas flag. Thank you. >> 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 thee, Texas, one state under God, one indivisible. >> I'm going to come down for a proclamation. >> Well, thank you all for coming. Is this on? >> Hello? >> Hello. >> It's on. Yeah, this is a proclamation for Mental Health and Intell ectual Disability Awareness Day, and I wanted to give you all an opportunity to say a few words and introduce all that you have here. >> Hello. I'm Pam Gutierrez. I'm with Denton County MH MAR. I'm the executive director, and I'm so pleased to be here. Thank you all so much for your support of our center and for what we do. We're very proud of what we do, and we're so honored to be here tonight. And I'm going to let everybody introduce themselves. >> Thank you. I'm Mark Thompson of Goodwill Denton. >> I'm Larry West. I'm with Denton County MH MAR Center, and I represent the intellectual and developmental disabilities side of our services. I'm Claudette Fetty, and I am with the School of Occup ational Therapy, but we support the ABLE disabled group at the Denton Community Health Clinic. >> Fantastic. Well thank all of you for what you do in our community and the people that you help, because it's just critical with the population that you're working with. So thank you so much for your commitment and your sacrifice and your willingness to really help those who need help. So it's with honor that I read this proclamation. I've got to get bifocals, but I just refuse to do it. Proclamation by the mayor of the city of Denton, Texas. Greetings. Whereas the city of Denton recognizes the fundamental promise that all citizens living with a physical or mental disability should be treated with respect, dignity, and compassion. And whereas Americans with disabilities make up about almost one-fifth of our population, we are unemployed at a rate that is twice that of people without disabilities. And whereas in Denton County, approximately 77,136 people have been diagnosed with mental illness. In 2012, 10,433 Denton County children ages 0 to 15 were reported as having ADD or ADHD. 4,796 met the criteria for severe emotional disturbance. And whereas organizations such as Goodwill Industries, Dent on County MHMR, Denton Community Health Clinic, and Youth and Family Counseling are together to raise awareness and counsel and treat those affected by physical, developmental, and/or mental health disabilities. Groups such as Able Disabled, supported by the TWU School of Occupational Therapy, and the Denton Community Health Clinic are working to enable participation in meaningful roles and the opportunity to contribute meaningfully to their communities. And whereas groups such as Proussammers, Ark of Denton County, and ARK Self Advocates, Denton County Federation of Families, and NAMMI are bringing their deep understanding of the needs of people with physical, intellectual, or mental health challenges, and of best practices to reduce stigma and exclusion in our community. And whereas every resident in business in Denton can help address the issue in our community by being aware of these individuals, groups, and organizations and their work by practicing inclusion as business owners and potential employers and compassion as citizens. And today, nearly 30 years ago, President Ronald Reagan declared March as Developmental Disability Month. Let us honor this month by embracing our differences and working together to overcome the challenges. Now therefore, I, Chris Watts, Mayor of the City of Denton, Texas, do hereby declare and proclaim March 22, 2016, as Mental Health and Intellectual Disability Awareness Day in the City of Denton and urge all citizens to be aware of our citizens with physical and mental disabilities and to treat them with the dignity and respect they deserve. Thank you all so much. I want to just give you an opportunity to say a couple words if you'd like. Let's give them a hand. Because I know right now through the behavioral health leadership team and things such as that, the city is intricately involved with United Way and Denton County MHR and other organizations to really try to increase the opportunities for people that are in need. So just take a few moments if you would. Thank you for the opportunity. I think this is a wonderful, wonderful opportunity to reduce the stigma because it's so great in our community. And I think this gives us just a moment to reflect because we're very fortunate in our lives and we don't see a lot of the issues that many folks face. And unfortunately, we see it every day. And it's very sad. And it's something that, by the grace of God, that I'm very fortunate that I haven't had to face some of the things that our consumers do. So I hope we'll open our eyes and our hearts and really look at our community because this is our community. And if we can't help the people that we love, then what are we doing? So I'm very, very appreciative of this and of Mayor and of you all. So thank you so much. I appreciate it very much. Thank you. Thank you. And again, thank you all for your service to our community. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you all. Thank you. [Applause] We'll move on to our consent agenda or the consent agenda. Council Member Hawkins. Thank you, Mayor. I move approval of items A through C. Council Member Rodin. Second. We have a motion and a second for consent agenda items. Let's vote on the board, please. Motion carries 6-0. We'll now move on to our public hearings. Public hearing 4A, which is hold a public hearing to consider adoption of an ordinance of the City of Denton, Texas, approving the land use assumptions and capital improvement plan under which roadway impact fees may be imposed for designated service areas. And I will now open the public hearing. Thank you, Mayor. I'm going to call on PS Arora, our manager over wastewater department, for this staff presentation. Good evening, Mayor and members of the council. It really gives me a lot of pleasure today to be here and go through the first public hearing for the road impact fee adoption. So this is the first of the two mandated public hearings. The second will be in April. And you'll be setting a date for that today for April 26 as part of the ordinance. The first public hearing on the land use assumptions and capital improvement plan that forms the basis of the calculating the road impact fees. Prior to this public hearing, we have made presentations to the council in work session. We have made a presentation to the mobility committee, to the Dallas County developers alliance. We have provided information to Dallas builders association and then capital improvements advisory committee that was appointed by the council, but state law departments, which is all the planning and zoning commissioners. That's the CIAC. So we made two presentations to the CIAC for the LUA and the CIP. The CIAC comments to the council are attached as exhibit four. They have recommended approval or adoption of the land use assumptions and the CIP. I will turn this over to Jeff Whitaker. He's our project manager from Kimleyhorn to go over the LUA and the CIP. Jeff? >> Thank you, P.S. Good evening, mayor and council. Today we're going to give you a brief overview of land use assumptions and capital improvement plan. We presented this previously, so we're going to keep this relatively short, but there are questions. Please let us know and we can elaborate on that. One thing we wanted to give is a quick update to those watching and those in the audience of what impact fees are, just in case they haven't heard. It's governed by chapter 395 of the Texas local government code. That's our playbook. Everything we do in this is basically dictated by state law and we're following a guideline in state law, including these public hearings that we're having. The assumptions that you're documenting tonight are going to be what's used in the final report, which will present the results and the ordinance at the April 26th public hearing. The land use assumptions form the basics of the need for growth. So as people move in, more infrastructure is needed. So that's the concept behind the land use assumptions that we are looking at today. It's basically what we're looking at is in a 10-year window , how much growth are we anticipating in 10 years and how much infrastructure do we need to accommodate that growth in the next 10 years. One of the key indications of impact fees is the concept of service areas. It's dictated by guidance outlined in chapter 395. Basically roadway service areas are limited to six miles. For roadway facilities, they're required within the city limits, so we can't charge for roadway impact fees outside the city limits in the ETJ. The important concept is money collected in each service area has to be spent in each service area. In Denton, we developed five service areas. In defining the service area boundaries, we're looking at major boundaries like I-35 and some other roadways to define those boundaries. And a map of the five service areas are seen before you, with B being in between the 35Ws, A west of 35W. E is kind of the developed portion of Denton and DNC to the north. With the land use projections, they were fully coordinated with the planning department and the Denton comprehensive plan update. We used the future land use plan that was adopted as the Denton comprehensive plan. We also looked at some growth projections that they included in the Denton comprehensive plan to coordinate these growth projections. We also looked at historic counts just to see how our historic counts related to the growth that we're expecting in the next 10 years. Before you, there's a slide that shows the current future land use plan that we used to develop these assumptions. Just to let you know, during the last 10 years, just to give you some perspective, there are approximately 9,500 residential units and 12 million square feet of non-residential that was built in the city of Denton. So that gives you some basis from historical perspective of what we're going to show. This is a summation of what we're projecting in the next 10 years. Roughly 10,966 residential units and then 15 million square feet of non-residential. Basic service and retail, just a quick description of that. Basic is kind of your industrial. Service is your office and your government agencies. And retail is commercial. Moving on to the impact fee CIP. Once we have the land use assumptions, we develop an impact fee CIP. It's a 10 year plan. Going to briefly go through service area D. You've seen these calculations before. This is an example. We do this for all the service areas. Service area D, we had a roughly 180 million total capital improvement plan. One thing to note is in your packet, this is an updated table from what's in your packet, but it's 180 million. The slide is correct. We break that out until what's needed in the 10 years, what 's needed outside the 10 years and what's needed today on existing conditions. So the important number on this slide is 27.7 million. That's the 10 year growth need. This is a similar chart showing service area D. If you think of it as a pie chart, the 27.7 million is the need. 10.55 million is the cost to meet existing needs. That's the current traffic that's on the road. But then there's 142 million for the service area that's way beyond our planning and lendo. It's not going to be built. We're going to have future projects down the line. If you take that methodology and break it up into the five service areas, this is a summation of those. Like I mentioned earlier, the 10 year CIP cost is the important line for impact fee CIP. Service area D shows a 27.69 million. With that -- Quick question on that previous slide. On that last slide. Yeah, I'm sorry. Your existing deficiency cost, now what is that representing exactly? That represents the existing traffic that's on the roads that you're rebuilding. There's already roads out there. Traffic's already using them. So we're not charging for the existing demand on those roads that have to be rebuilt. Okay. So that number represents the reconstruction of the roads that are already existing? Correct. So we don't charge future development for those? No, I get that. I just -- when I'm looking at -- and that's what I'm trying to understand with that number is as far as -- like let's just take A. Okay. $7 million is what it would cost to reconstruct the roads that are currently existing to meet, I guess -- Design standards. Design standards. Okay. So then the 10 year CIP cost is that saying in 10 years we think you will need additional road improvements -- Correct. To handle additional capacity. That's not rebuilding the roads that are part of that existing -- this is new roads. New roads. To the tune of $136 million, $794,776. So I guess when I'm looking at that number, it's so much different than the $7 million. So that $7 million can't encompass all the roads within that subsection A. Or if it does, I mean -- Subsection A is an area where there's not many roads. So there's not many roads. And it's only the portion of the traffic that's on there. So you're saying that NA is where most of the growth is going to occur in 10 years? Correct. So the master plan communities, et cetera, in that area. I'll take any other questions. If not, I'll turn it back over to PS. Yeah, I'll see any other questions. Thank you. Thank you, Jeff. As I mentioned earlier, we had taken it to the capital improvement advisory committee. We had two work sessions, one on January 13 and February 4. The IAC recommended approval of the land use assumptions and CIP. You have the comments as Exhibit 4 in your backup that show the presentation and then their acceptance of the LUA and the CIP. So today the action would be we hold the first public hearing, which is on the land use assumptions and capital improvement plan. And then consider approval of the LUA and the CIP. And with that, we will stand for any questions. Second public hearing, as I mentioned, is on April 26. That will be for the ordinance as well as the impact fee amount that we need to charge. So we'll be discussing those at that time. We have a question. Councilmember Hawkins? Maybe not necessarily a question, but before we vote on this, I just wanted to thank you for all your hard work on this. It seems like we've been working on this since I've got on council a long time. And this at first was a difficult sell when it's called road impact fee. But this is definitely a way to make it simpler. Some of that money that would possibly expire and not being able to use will now be able to stay in that pot. And I just appreciate your hard work and the meetings that you had with the developers too. So thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Hawkins. Thank you. Any other questions for staff before we take public comment ? Seeing none. Thank you, PS. This is a public hearing. I don't believe we have any blue cards for this public. You don't have to turn in a blue card for this. Oh yeah, come on. Anybody wishing to speak, come on down and state your name and address and your time will begin. Good evening, Mayor. Council, my name is David Letty, I'm the Director of Government Affairs for the Dallas Builders Association. We represent a seven county region, including Denton County . And it would be our flagship city here in this area would be the city of Denton, which is why I'm here tonight to speak with you regarding our observations and concerns regarding the capital improvements plan and the land use assessment. First, let me state that as association deals with communities and home building and residential development, we understand the challenges municipalities face in trying to meet infrastructure needs. We understand the requirement, the obligation the residential development community has to meet a fair share of that development cost within reason . Let's start with the land use assessment in the LUA. We do have concerns regarding the projected growth listed in the land use assessment. For residential, there seems to be a 15% increase over the previous 10 years. Generally, when we see things, they're a little more closer to what the previous 10 years is when you see the projected increase for the next bunch. So we kind of notice that and we're wondering what valid ations can be given. I'm pretty sure staff probably has that information, how they can offer that for you. In the capital improvements plan, one thing we do notice is that the number of projects listed is an aggressive one. There is a lot there. There are infrastructure needs for the area, but we know it also bases on the growth, which we also have concerns on. Probably first and foremost, we might ask is what are the assurances that these projects would lead to construction within say five to 10 years? Granted, there is a 10-year obligation the city has to start the project for the refunded, but in Chapter 395 and you get into 025A, it mentions that there are other things that other options the property owners have, less time and under 10 years to ask for refunds for those. So it's always good to make sure these are roads that you can get on project going. There are updates required by state law for the city once you do this for your impact fees. So you want to avoid the process where you're just rolling over any roads and things like that. They've addressed the issue where you have the demand, where you have existing demand on it and then you have your new development demand. We feel that's important to address because there are areas like in Area A where you will have a road that cuts over, I think it's A17 and possibly A 9, A13, the projects on there, which will likely see good service use from the existing development that is to the southwest corner of that service area. With that in mind, there is always the question of are impact fees fair? Can they be regressive on a resident because keep in mind it's the homeowner who pays for these impact fees. It's rolled into the cost of the construction of their home and then that's, you know, amortized for your mortgage over usually a 30 year period. So that adds into that cost there with the day's tighter lending rules and things like that, those things to keep in mind as you set what rate you may have for any ensuing impact fee. Another concern we have is regarding the areas where you may have projected new development. Often it's typical practice for the city to request the developer build the adjoining road structure next to the development they're at. They usually are happy to do that even in areas where they institute impact fees. Now we understand the cities will usually offer a credit for that against impact fees in that area, but the reality is you may have a road that's listed for 100% in the CIP, but there is the, there does stand the possibility that percentages of that will actually be taken on by the builder and you have to keep in mind that your impact fees are calculated by numbers you see here in the land use assessment and the CIP. They're used as a basis of that, so it could be skewed there. So those are things to keep in mind as you move forward with your consideration of this. Just kind of think of any other major issues we often run into. We do notice some of the roads go near areas that are, could see heavy demand within your extraterritorial jurisdiction, so we also ask that they consider to make sure that any growth numbers estimated for 12 years is within the city corporation and not within those limits. We do have a question. That was your time. So I'm going to go ahead, Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mayor. You represent the Greater Dallas Builders Association? Dallas Builders Association. You used to be the homebuilders of Greater Dallas, yes. So Denton is not the only city that has gone to a roadway impact fee, is it? No, it's not. And there are some that have actually gone to the point where they've removed their impact fees when they've seen, okay, it may have a limit. There's always a delicate balance there. I'm always charged with addressing the pendulum of fairness , whether it be a local ordinance or a state ordinance or a state regulation or a federal agency rule or law is to look for that pendulum of fairness where government and the community and the business work well together. One of the reasons you have to be careful when you do the impact fees, we don't ever want to see one of our cities remove itself from the competitive nature of each other. We don't pick cities over one over another. I love all my cities. I'm from Denton County. I'll leave that out there, but I love all my cities. And if you go too far with an impact fee, if it's too high and there is a hint of where your development is kind of stymied in there and you see the growth slow down or it impacts the desire for developers or builders to come in there, that's a loss of generation of revenue and taxes that would come to the city through ad valorem, also job base and things like that. So it's a balance that we always look to. So is your position that this fee is too high? The fee that we've seen in previous projections, I'm not sure what the current one is. We've looked at this compared to other cities and it's very , very much in line with the percentage. Yeah, I always make sure to advise the cities to look at what the fee is actually going to be. Granted, the fee hasn't been calculated yet. By law, they still have to go to that. So I want to be on record that we haven't seen through the city that says they calculated the fee, just out of fairness to you guys. Okay, thank you. But those are the concerns we have. It's just kind of that balance we look for. We always do advise that if you're basing the fees, you do it commensurate with the actual services you're going to provide, which is why we're always interested in the CIP. We do have another question, Council Member Hawkins. Yeah, I think some of the things you brought up, we had the same concerns in the beginning of this conversation and one of them was our roads in some of the areas in Denton, they feel like they're piecemeal together. Like it's not a unified. So we're trying to figure out a way to remedy that. In other cities that do not have impact fees, how do they do that then? A lot of them have kind of built up and they decided they had a - they saw the - sometimes they see the funding that comes from it. Just the developing of the homes brings a significant amount of revenue to the area when you look over it long term. It's important to remember that the impact fees are not going to pay for these roads. They're usually a percentage and very seldom they actually pay for the whole road. So you're still going to look at a bond issue. So this is somewhat of a payment into the bond. So there's a lot of things to consider. I realize we're throwing a lot of information at you. I applaud the - applaud city staff for going through this. This is a tremendous amount of information. If you look at the CIP study itself, there are a lot of pages. It's a phone book of information that they have to go through. But that's why we always look for the balance. We see things in this CIP, for instance, where you get in a rural area where they say it might be 15 to 30 percent for a right of way construction, which seems - might be kind of high in that area, but they're also trying to judge demand too. We have another question. Council Member Johnson. David, thanks for coming out tonight. You said something earlier and I'm not sure I understand it . You said the 15 percent growth projection seems a bit aggressive versus the 10 that you would think would be normal. I think that's what you said earlier. Yeah, it's usually the - you usually base the next 10 years as reasonably close to the previous 10 years. And we just thought it was - it seemed somewhat higher. Now, if that's going to be the case, trust me, my guys would be ecstatic, but we also try to look at it realistically because we bear the explanation of the cost of the home. We have to sell these structures and we have to worry about the cost and what the market's going to afford. Housing affordability exists at all levels, really, not just your low income or your moderate incomes. There is a certain amount that an underwriter is willing to pay for structure and what people are willing to buy. So, but I want to get to the question part of it because I think it'll - I'm trying to understand. So, when you say that's aggressive, is your concern that because the 15 percent growth projection would cause us to have to go build more roads before it's time? That is possible. That is the concern. The reason we kind of look at it this way is - and consider it being gun shy, what have you. We're seeing a downturn in the housing industry in recent history, very recent history, and we haven't got back up to the numbers we saw before. I'm not sure how long it would take to get there, but that 's the challenge is that they're tasked with projecting out for 10 years. We're about six years into this recuperating and rebuilding cycle and we're seeing numbers come back, but that doesn't usually consistently sustain for out to 10 years. So there could be a slowdown. I remember, you know, recent history where we were excited about raising a ranch here and then there was a slowdown there. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? I'm seeing none. Thank you, David. Appreciate it. Good to see you. You bet. This is a public hearing. Anybody else wishing to speak, please come down and state your name and address and your time will begin. Anybody else wishing to speak? One more call. Anybody wanting to speak on this agenda item? I will now close the public hearing. I do have a couple of questions for staff or the consultant , whoever can best answer this. It goes back to Councilmember Johnson's question about the residential projection of 15 percent because if I understood correctly what the concern was, well, that would cause more roads to be built which would determine to some degree how much the cost was, which is then what you calculate the fee on. So if the projection, so first of all I understand if my function is correct. In other words, if you have, if that percentage was lowered from 15 and let's just for example purposes to 7 percent, then that means you have less roads, that means you have less cost. Does that translate into potentially less of an impact fee per transportation or mile equivalent or are those not related in any way? Well, it would not. So one thing, our consultant, WRT, their projections are actually more robust than what we are using. So we are using a lower number in terms of projecting out what will happen in the next 10 years compared to the comprehensive plan. And that's fine. I guess for me it still is the increase related somehow functionally to the price of an impact fee. It totally depends on the vehicle mile traveled and it's, if you have less number of people come in in the next 10 years and every five years as you remember, we have to come back and redo the study. So it's not that we are stuck with this for 10 years. Every five years we have to come back, redo the estimates and then redo the calculations. But the cost of a road construction to meet the demand that is needed, your cost is not going to change because you'll only build the roads which are based on what is happening in the community. So we have taken all of the roads that are to be built in any service area and we projected in 10 years this is the vehicle miles that will be traveled or the growth will be that much and then use that and that stuff will come in the next public hearing when we actually go through the process. So today only on the land use assumptions and on the CIP itself. So that's all the hearing is today for. And one other question and he had mentioned that if you collect an impact fee based upon your land use assumptions and your CIP project as we're looking at today, that if you don't build them, the roads or that in 10 years that those impact fees could be subject to refunding. Is that correct? The reality is that the amount of money that we collect and as you will see in the next public hearing and as you have seen in previous work session presentation, we are looking at barely 30% of the calculated maximum fee to be used for impact fee. So that money, 30%, will be very quickly used for any -- there are a number of projects to be done. There's a lot of need out there. So we start using that money, it will be used up. Okay. So the money is not tied to a specific project. It's saying in this service area this is how much money we have for an impact fee. These are the costs of the projects we're doing. And if it gets eaten up and it's only 30 or 40 or 50%, then that's it. Okay. I think that's where my question was. Councilmember Hawkins. Yeah. And one last question. The home builders, the one that will eventually pay for this impact fee, they do right now already, don't they, in a way? I mean, that developer is in charge of building that road in front of that development and that is passed along to the home -- Yes. Eventually it passes on to the homeowner because it gets built into the cost of the home that they're -- that's the last product that they're going to collect money on. Right. Thanks, PS. Yes, sir. Okay. Any other questions? First half? Seeing none. Thank you, Mayor. Well, I move approval of the ordinance found in Exhibit 5 of Item 4A. Councilmember Johnson. Second. We have a motion and a second. And to reiterate, this is not approving a specific fee. This is -- that will come at the next one. Yes. All right. We have a motion and a second for Agenda Item 4A. Let's vote on the board, please. Motion carries 6-0. We'll go on to 4B, a public hearing. Continue a public hearing. Consider adoption of an ordinance of the City of Denton, Texas, designating a certain area within the city limits of Denton as Westgate Business Park Investments. And this is a continuation of a public hearing. So the public hearing is open. Yes. I'd like to call on Amy Bissett, our Director of Development Services. To be handling this item. Thank you, Mayor and Councilmembers. What you're considering tonight is an ordinance that would establish a reinvestment zone for an incentive that is something that you've discussed before that we're just looking at an amendment of today. This is for Westgate Business Park Investments. And this is a rendering of the future development, which is three building business park, approximately 400,000 square feet of construction that's out in our industrial area on the west side of town. To give you a little bit of background, it is located on the southeast corner of University and Western. It is three, it will be ultimately three buildings compr ising a business park. It's about a $24 million capital investment. There's an existing building that was recently completed that Quality Industries is in the process of moving into. They are a Peterbilt supplier. In April of 2015, you approved a 10-year Chapter 380 grant incentive agreement. On this project, it is a variable incentive depending on the type of tenant that is recruited. It can range from 60 to 75%. It is estimated that over the life of the 10-year incentive , it would total approximately $1 million and that the net tax revenue or the net new benefit to the city over the same time frame would be approximately $500,000. Westgate Business Park Investments has requested to the city that we amend their existing agreement. They would like to apply for a tax abatement with Denton County. The county policy requires that a tax abatement agreement be in place with the city of Denton first before requesting a county abatement. In order for them to seek that abatement, they have made a request from us to convert their existing 380 agreement into a tax abatement agreement . In order to do that, we must first establish a reinvestment zone. Essentially what they are asking us to do is make a change to their existing incentive agreement with no change to their requirements, their threshold, or the things that we have asked them to do within their incentive agreement. Currently, they are under a 10-year Chapter 380 agreement. We are looking at a new scenario where year one would be the Chapter 380 agreement, which is commenced last April when we adopted the original agreement and then we would convert the remaining into a 9-year tax abatement. Tonight is the first step in that process, which is to hold a public hearing and consider designating the Westgate Business Park reinvestment zone in order to establish the zone's boundary boundaries. Then the next steps would be to consider, hopefully on April 5th, amending the existing Chapter 380 agreement and adopting the tax abatement agreement. With that, I will be happy to answer any questions. Councilmember Johnson. Thank you, Mayor. Amy, just for clarification, this is kind of a technicality thing we are doing, meaning the terms are the same, the incentive is the same, the potential dollars they can get is the same. That's correct. A Chapter 380 incentive agreement is essentially a rebate of property taxes. We collect those property taxes and then we cut them a check once a year based on the performance under their incentive agreement. An abatement, which is what we are looking at converting to , is just simply a discount off of the property taxes from the get-go. It's a wash for the city either way. It's the exact same incentive. It's just the way that the agreement is structured in order to facilitate the county's participation as well. So they still have to meet all the same hurdles. Yes, sir. That's correct. My other question is, so this is specifically related to property taxes, we're still going to get the business and personal property tax of any tenants that are in there, right? The business personal property was actually included as a part of the original Chapter 380 agreement and will be as well in the tax abatement agreement. But it's unchanged. It is unchanged. That is correct. And then we would still get the inventory revenue as well. And then if there's any sales tax generated by those tenants, we would get that, right? That's correct. Okay. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mayor. And to be absolutely clear, following up on Council Member Ruchansin's question, all of those performance objectives that we have in the 380 agreement will be moved to the other agreement? Yes. Okay. One question I have is when you talked about the project, there was potentially going to be three buildings. So I've got one on the ground. So this incentive package, just to refresh my memory because I've got a lot of stuff in there. So if they build another building, they're not coming back to ask for another incentive. It's covered under this umbrella. Is that correct? That is correct. It encompasses the entire development. Okay. All right. Thank you. Any other questions for staff? Thank you. All right. Thank you. And this is a public hearing. If you have a question to speak, come down and state your name and address and your time will begin. Zach Youngblood, 836 Hawes Drive, Copper Canyon. I'm kind of curious about the shift from the 380 agreement to the tax abatement given the city's current economic development policy, which states that a tax abatement cannot be used on a currently existing structure. Additionally, given that this is developed by a local business, I'm not quite sure what the entire benefit was to any of the tax abatement. That's all. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you. You bet. Public hearing. Councilmember Briggs, you want to hold your question until after the public hearing is closed or we'll go ahead and ask it now? After? Okay. No, it doesn't matter. I just wanted to make if you needed to ask it now. Okay. Yeah. All right. Go ahead and ask it. We'll go ahead and take care of it now. It couldn't be used on current structures and I just wanted to see what staff said. I'm unfamiliar with that. Go ahead. A response. Okay. I'm sorry, but that's okay. Yeah. That's correct, which is why we're taking a look at rather than just completely repealing the original 380 agreement and replacing it with the tax ab atement agreement. If we did that, then the building that was eligible under the 380 agreement would no longer be eligible under the tax abatement agreement. So when we come back and present these two agreements, we 'll show you how that's structured, but essentially we'll cover building one because it was approved before it was on the ground under the 380 agreement and then the tax abatement agreement will apply to the remaining buildings. Okay. Thanks. Okay. Good. Thank you. One more call. Public hearing. Anybody else wishing to speak? All right. Thank you. The public hearing is now closed. Council Member Johnson. Thank you, Mayor. I move approval of item 4B with the substitute ordinance that was provided to us prior to the meeting. All right. Council Member Hawkins. I second. We have a motion and a second for agenda item 4B. Let's vote on the board, please. Agenda item 4B carries 6-0. We'll go on now to agenda item 5A, which is items for individual consideration. Consider an option – excuse me. Consider adoption of an ordinance establishing public hearing dates and authorizing the city secretary to publish notice for April 5, 2016, and April 12 , 2016 for annexation of approximately 23.24 acres of property generally located on the west side of Gisling Road. Thank you, Mayor. Amy Vissot-Lohan on this item also. Thank you, Mayor and council members. I think this is probably the shortest slideshow I've ever pulled up for you. It consists of one slide and the introductory slide. Essentially what you're considering today is calling public hearing dates for a voluntary annexation. This is a proposed development that is on a parcel of land that was a part of our 2010 annexation program, but we have an existing non-annexation agreement with them that doesn't expire until 2020. In order for that non-annexation agreement to remain in place, the property is required to remain in ag or wildlife status and that no development is permitted. The new owner intends to develop an industrial park and they have filed a preliminary plat application which automatically triggers annexation. The property would be automatically annexed as RD5X, which is our default zoning, and then the property owner after the annexation is complete would come in and file a request for rezoning. Even though it's a voluntary annexation for the purposes of facilitating a development, we must follow all of the state laws as it relates to notifications and public hearings. So tonight's action would be to call the two public hearings, which would then take place on April 5th and April 12th. And then we would have the two reading of the annexation ordinance just as we have on the other annexation actions that we've taken in the past. And with that, I'll be happy to answer any questions. We have one speaker with a blue card, but are there any questions for staff before we take public testimony? Thank you. Thank you. We do have a card. Mr. Husbeth, if you'll come down and state your name and address, your time will begin on agenda item 5A. Council members, my name is Willie Husbeth. I live at 623 Newton. It's not clear where that's located. Can you help me with street names and the like? I don't see it up there. Am I missing that? Yeah, she's coming up. Yes. This is located near the quarter of University and Giesling Road, which is out on the east side of town off of University just past May Hill. It's just on the south side of University off of Giesling. You might point out where the flea market is. I don't know where the flea market is. You'll have to point it out. Right there. That it? There you go. Okay. All right. All right. Now, what is this? So where's University? Is that right? It is immediately north, right here. Right there. That's correct. All right. What is the street? This is Giesling Road that runs right here. What's the one to your left? Here? That one. Black Road. No, not south. To your left. That one. I don't know. I don't know what that is. This is Carpenter Street. That's right. That's right. I don't know. This is Copper Creek over here. That's not a street right where the red is. No, it's probably a fence line. Okay. Thank you, Amy. All right. Thank you. All right. Having noted blue cards, any other questions for staff? Council Member Hawkins? I move approval of Item 5A. Council -- Mayor Pro Tem Gregory? Second. We have a motion and a second for Item 5A. Let's vote on the board, please. Motion carries 6-0. We've now come to Item 6, which is concluding items. Council Members? Any concluding items? Council Member Johnson? So I have two. I was contacted by a citizen this week. As you guys all know, if you live on the south side of town , we're using tree mitigation funding. We're planting a lot of trees in South Lakes Park along the jogging path. One of the concerns -- while I think this is awesome -- one of the concerns was it's not a very well-lit path as it is, and there's quite a lot of people that walk out there at night. And this lady has some concerns about once all those trees are there, you know, might provide for a less safe environment for ladies that are walking at night, which would be an unintended consequence of creating shade during the day. So I'd like for us to investigate just the possibility of what we could do with the existing lighting, maybe brighten the existing lighting or add some lighting or something. I think we ought to take a look at that. Okay. Secondly is Denton lost a great man today. Paul Hendricks, a very dear friend of mine, is a guy that none of you all ever heard of, but I think a great example for all of us on what a servant is. He spent all of his waking hours either remodeling bathrooms for a living or mentoring kids. And he had a huge impact on my life as a father, and his kids lost their dad today, and he fought cancer the same way that he did everything, which was with a smile on his face, his chin up, and showing everybody that this life isn't what it's really all about. So Paul Hendricks, you'll be missed. Thank you. Councilmember Briggs. I will follow that with a congratulations to Councilmember Wasney for her granddaughter with some life to come in here. Sorry about your friend. You almost teared me up. And I also want to invite those to come out on Friday to a panel Friday, March 25th, which happens to be my birthday, at 6 o'clock to UNT Environmental Science Building Room 130 to come and listen to a panel discussing renewable energy future. Okay, thank you. Councilmember Roden. We had a great open data day project. The mayor kicked it off over there at UNT. I'd like to explore the possibility of creating an ad hoc committee temporarily to gather some of those experts along the lines kind of parallel to what we're doing with What Works City to get some input on their recommendations moving forward in terms of building out the proper infrastructure to continue that sort of movement long term. So perhaps maybe that's just a discussion with the mayor. The mayor could probably call a task force, but I know there's several staff members involved in that as well. So I'd like to kind of explore that possibility and perhaps get that kicked off this spring. Okay, great. Yeah, we'll look into that. I thought I saw someone else requesting to speak, but okay. Okay, anybody else? All right, seeing none, we will adjourn at 725. (upbeat music)