.
>> Good morning, everyone. I am John Baines. I'm the vice
chairman of the economic development
partnership board. And I'm glad to announce that we do have
a quorum. And we will call the work
session to order at 1103. And our first order of business
is EDP session 18-026. We will receive a
report and hold discussion regarding revisions to the city
's public improvement district guidelines,
better known as PITs. >> Good morning, Mr. Vice Chairman
and members of the board. I'm John Baines.
>> Good morning, Mr. Vice Chairman and members of the EDP
board. It's good to see you all this morning.
Everyone seems like they're in such a good mood. Beautiful
day. Everyone's happy to be together.
Talking about PITs again. Yay! Guess what? This will not be
the last time we will talk about PITs.
What I am going to do today is give you all an update based
on the feedback that we got from the
work session on PITs that we did with city council last
night. And we will just run through that.
And I am going to go quickly through these first slides
because this is going to be a review of
stuff that we've covered before for the most part. But if
anybody has any questions, feel free to
stop me, slow me down, and we'll get those taken care of.
So what we're going to go through quickly is an
overview of PITs as an economic development tool and their
use and done to date. We're going to talk about
how we've been before you with this before. We've been
before the council with this before. I'm going to
present some more specific options to mitigate the possible
risk associated with PITs and also to
maximize the benefits to the city when considering PIT
projects. And we're going to revisit some things
that we want to include in the draft PIT guidelines. So as
you are all aware, PITs are an ED tool that are
used to fund public improvements that benefit a
specifically defined area. And the way that PITs are
either funded on a pay as you go basis or the debt is
backed up with assessed fees for the property
owners within that defined area. They can be used for
commercial or residential development. And there are
some benefits of PITs to cities and developers. On the city
side, they can increase the quality of
development through better amenities. On the developer side
, tax exempt debt helps provide funding for
their public infrastructure and can reduce capital
requirements and increase the developer's rate of
return. You just heard me mention the two different types
of PITs. They can be done on a pay as you go basis
or a debt basis. And there are a couple different options
underneath those two categories. Does anybody
have any questions about this slide? As you're aware,
cities around the state do use PITs to encourage
development. And there's a short list of some of our
neighboring communities that have them in place
or have used them in the past. The specifics that surround
PIT usage in different communities do vary
according to what the city's policy goals are. So our goals
are not going to be the same as Argyle's or
Arlington's. And we will be using them for different
reasons. This is just a quick chart that we put
together about PITs that have issued or had bond sales
either last year or this year so far. The list of
the communities is over here on this side. The cost of
authorized improvements is included. The value to
lien ratio is included there. And we've had some discussion
about, you know, what would be an ideal value
to lien ratio from, you know, a policy standpoint. And most
of the folks who analyze and think about
PITs a lot fix that at a 3 to 1 value to lien ratio. But
you can see here that some communities do
choose to move forward with PITs either with no appraised
value, so without finding out what that number is,
or with a number that's below 3. And that, again, is
dependent on what the community feels comfortable doing.
We first approved PIT guidelines in 2007, and then we
amended them in 2014. We do have one established PITs,
Razor Ranch PIT number one. Reimbursement agreement for
phase one infrastructure of that PIT was approved
by the council in March of 2016. But since the service and
assessment plan and finance plan have not yet been
submitted, the PIT is not initiated. So no assessments have
been levied and no bonds have been issued.
Caroline, we have a question from the floor, please. On
that, do those expire? I mean, they do expire.
If full initiation isn't done within five years of the
establishment of the PIT, it does expire.
So within five years of 2016, that's when it was
established? No, it's within five years of 2014. Okay. Yes.
So coming up soon, relatively soon. And I'm sorry, May I?
Go ahead, please. And will that come back through,
or does it just automatically fall off? I mean, is there
some sort of formal action that has to be taken or?
I think it automatically falls off, but I'm going to ask
Brian for his opinion on that, too.
It's always tied up here at the podium. So the way this one
was done is the PIT was created by council action.
To create the PIT, the property owner would have to
petition us to dissolve the PIT.
There was a memorandum of understanding that the council
also approved with the developer where the council and the
developer agreed
that if there was no action, they would seek to dissolve
the PIT, but it doesn't happen automatically.
They would have to petition us to do that. Then the council
would have to approve that.
If they were not to do that, they would be really in
default of the MOU,
and then the city would probably not have any obligation to
proceed with the assessments or any kind of debt sale or
anything like that.
But it's not an automatic. It's really not related to the P
IT law. It was really more related to the MOU that we had on
that particular development.
So hopefully that makes sense. But it is 2019. It is
rapidly approaching.
We've had some contact with the developer for Razor Ranch
about potentially wanting us to do another reimbursement
agreement
for another set of improvements that have been done and
looking at having that discussion perhaps later this year
about their status of when they want to start the
assessment.
But it would fall under this same MOU?
Right. That's right. And there were, this was really, you
know, from our perspective,
we would prefer to have the service and assessment plan,
the financing plan, all those details on the front end in
the future,
so that you have all that laid out very clearly of what you
're going to do.
The MOU was an attempt to have a basic framework around
what the deal points would be.
But all that has not really been detailed with any specific
ity about what the assessment would be.
How much is it? What improvements is it going to pay for?
It was really kind of an attempt to help the development
get started and move forward with some of that
infrastructure.
That's a long-winded answer, but it's not automatic by any
stretch of the imagination.
Okay. Thank you.
So I always learn something from Brian when he comes up to
the microphone.
Some of the things that Brian mentioned with the service
and assessment plan, the finance plan not being submitted
on that PID,
as well as the concept of an MOU, we are addressing those
by changes to the PID policy by requiring those things up
front
and by requiring what's called a development agreement,
which is, you know, it's a little bit more serious of a
form of an MOU.
So we've learned some lessons in our proposing changes
going forward.
So we have done several work sessions on the topic with the
EDP board, with council,
and we have made revisions to the guidelines based on
feedback from the different bodies.
The last time that we were here before this group, the
council had directed us to exclude residential PIDs from
the guidelines.
And some in this group had some concerns about a blanket
exclusion of that and the fact that that might cause us to
miss out on opportunities for projects that we would like
to consider.
So last night I passed along that concern to council
members and some of them did share that concern.
And so one of the significant changes that came out of the
work session last night is that we will be adding back in
residential PIDs to the guidelines.
Along with these best practices that we are including in
the guidelines,
which include requirement of an independent assessment of a
PID projects service and assessment plan and finance plan
prior, as I just mentioned,
and requiring that development agreement that has a scope
that covers land development, infrastructure, vertical
improvements.
And there was a request from council to make sure that the
development requirements for vertical improvements or the
buildings, whether they're home or commercial buildings,
but primarily on the residential side that they exceed the
standards in the development code.
And so we're going to be including language to that effect
in the revisions of the guidelines.
And then as you've heard me say before, we're going to be
requiring developer reimbursement for the city's costs to
establish and administer the PID. And that's very common
with other communities to require that.
So here's a slide with a lot of words on it.
I skipped ahead a little bit, but residential PIDs back in
the guidelines.
So we're going to be expanding on the concept of demonstra
ble public benefit and how it can be determined.
Please note that you do not have a handout to that effect.
So ignore that that's up there. This is what happens when
we try to like make a presentation 12 hours after the last
thing happened, miss a few of the edits.
So rest assured that we are working on the demonstrable
public benefit definition and ways to determine whether it
's happening or not.
There was also some concern about notice to residential
purchasers of the fact that there would be a PID assessment
on the property.
And that did also come up last time we were talking in this
group about that.
So there are some steps that can be taken. Those are just a
couple of things we can do there under the bullet.
There are other things that can be done as well, and we
will make sure to address the fact that extra steps beyond
what's required under the Texas property code will be
necessary for notification in any PID.
And that will be again this development agreement is the
vehicle that we use to outline all of those very specific
to the project things that have to happen.
This checklist of development standards for residential
development again touched on that a little bit, but we're
going to we're going to ensure that the developer knows
that they will be required to exceed what's in the code.
But we're working with outside council to determine when
when and where is the appropriate place to put that initial
thoughts that it would go in the development agreement
versus in the policy.
So they'll be told it will be included in the development
agreement, but we won't have to have a policy that tries to
detail each and every aspect of what we would want the
development to look like so more on that later but we're
working on options.
Then the issue of an assessment cap was raised, and there
was some interesting discussion around, if you say this is
the assessment cap which currently it's at 40 cents per $
100 worth evaluation if you say that's what it is, isn't
everyone going to try to get their project up to that cap
amount,
and it's always going to be 40 cents it's not going to be
lower than that.
So one thing that we were looking at is maybe phrasing it
as there is an assessment of whether it's 40 cents or 30
cents per $100 valuation, putting that in there as kind of
a benchmark but then saying preference will be given to
lower assessments in the evaluation
project. So it's a way to to tag it to a number so that we
're not just saying preferences given to lower assessments
but what is lower mean lower than what. So there's a, there
's a number to tie it to.
We are looking at limit limiting the percentage of the cost
of eligible projects that can be reimbursed by a PID. So,
if theoretically you could reimburse 100% of the public
infrastructure costs via a PID, looking at limiting that to
50% just as an example of costs,
which would be a way to potentially take the assessment
lower, which is one of the goals there so options are on
the table we're thinking about this.
But for the reason of all of this came up last night, we
now know the direction that the council wants to take but
we still need a little bit more time to prepare the actual
edits to the guidelines.
Your agenda shows a request for a recommendation today.
And the question is, and, and the opinion of folks in the
city management office is that we're not ready to ask you
to do that today because we want to make sure that we
actually get the draft in front of you before we ask you to
recommend it.
So that will be your decision.
When that time comes around on the agenda and during the
regular meeting.
So if you're comfortable you don't feel ready doing that
today, don't feel obligated to, but that does mean we have
to talk about it one more time.
At least one more time.
So moving on some other things that we are going to include
in the revisions to the policy are some specific ways to do
that risk mitigation.
So we're going to be doing an application and application
fee of X amount we're starting with $25 but we're going to
be doing some benchmarking against what other communities
ask for.
And then that could be put an escrow and drawn down to
apply to the cost of the review and vetting of the project.
Caroline, did you say 25 or 25,000. I'm sorry 25,000. All
right, thank you.
$25 would get you not much.
Caroline.
How did that number come about? Is that kind of the minimum
of any costs that have been associated with?
In the world of PID policies that we have reviewed in the
course of all of this, we've seen application fees ranging
from $2,000 to $50 or $60,000.
I've spoken to our representatives at Hilltop Securities
that do some of these analysis projects and they say that $
25,000 is a reasonable amount to get started on an analysis
and to make sure that the person that you're talking to is
serious.
By putting up, I mean that's a significant amount of money.
They did say that it probably wouldn't cover the entire
cost of a review because you're going to want to have
financial folks, your legal outside counsel, bond counsel
review it.
But it's a number that is a differentiator between people
who have the resources and are serious enough to put up an
amount of money that's significant versus those who are
kind of fishing around, don't really have the financial
status to be able to do this or maybe just kind of seeing
what they can get the city to do.
So it's not science, but it's kind of taking a look at what
other communities are doing.
It sounds like it is below the minimum of what would be
eventually required for anyone to process it here in the
city.
I think that's a fair assessment of it. It's not intended
to be a catch-all, cover all of the cost amount, but it's a
place to start and kind of separate serious projects from
less than serious ones.
Good question.
We want to put a term limit on PIDs of any type, whether it
's debt or pay as you go, not to exceed 30 years. That's in
line with what's currently in our policy and that's in line
with other policies that we've seen from other communities.
Back to that value to lien ratio of three to one being
preferable.
So it's not a requirement. It's just preferable because
that was a concern I had after looking at some of the other
cities and where they are.
We do want to have some flexibility built in just like we
have with our incentive policy.
So this is why we have to come back with it because we don
't want to back ourselves into a corner by trying to do
something too fast.
One option is to consider only reimbursement bonds instead
of bonds that are issued before a project is started. So
that way you can say once the city officially accepts your
public infrastructure or once you've completed 75% of the
public infrastructure and it's 75% has been accepted, the
bonds will be sold.
So that's some way to tie it to completion of work and
actual benchmark in the process of the project. Then we are
looking at ways to express that there's a preference for
certain sizes of projects.
Again, you want it to be significant and so a benchmark
place to start, other communities have used it as
commercial projects that are above 100 acres will be given
preference. Residential projects that are above 300 acres
will be given projects.
Another way to approach it from the residential side would
be minimum number of lots of a minimum size would be given
preference. So we'll work on the specific language about
that.
Yes. What about for for minimum lots concerns me because if
people wanted to invent to develop live or work play
locations smaller lots, but they may be higher value.
And then also how to live workspace in it. Obviously give
you a smaller law. Right. And that's, that's a good point
and that goes back to building in the flexibility, like,
some of these things I think will be presented more like
these are these are things we will use to analyze your
project.
So we're going to use kind of a cafeteria option of choices
, so that if a unique project comes up that has an aspect
that makes it might not fit but it makes sense from a
different perspective of what's trying to help us achieve a
goal of density or higher quality
development that you know comes closer to covering its cost
of service or something like that. We want the council to
have the flexibility to be able to do that and not just
exclude things. So, good point.
I had a question alone that same line, Caroline.
Going from my memory I remember us having a conversation
about that, in general, we didn't want housing, unless it
brought something very unique to the table. Is that still
the, the nexus of the conversation, it is, and that's, that
's absolutely going to be addressed in the revisions
in terms of this is what demonstrable public benefit is,
and here's how we judge it.
We're housing to adhere to standards that are higher than
the minimum in the development code and that will be cod
ified in in a developer agreement which will be part of the
formation documents of the pit. So I think that's still
what everybody's opinion is, is that it's intended to
support higher quality
development, brings better amenities that has home prices
that cover its cost of service, those things that would
differentiate it from current projects current development
of residential.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
I think this is the end of my presentation.
So,
does anyone have any other questions.
Okay.
Thank you, Caroline. You're welcome.
Let's see.
The next order of business is EDP 18 025.
We'll have a discussion and give staff direction regarding
the second annual taking care of business and little D
workshop.
Let's see.
Please.
Christina Davis right.
How are you all doing today.
Great.
I did not prepare a PowerPoint presentation just to save
some time because I just want to give you a brief update on
the workshop that we'll be having so this is our second
year to participate in the national small business week.
The small business week started approximately in 1963 with
the president issuing a proclamation announcing that it was
small business week.
These small business administration each year participates
by providing support and training for small businesses
outside of what they normally would do and so as part of
the shop here on purpose program.
We were looking at ways to support small businesses and we
thought this would be a great opportunity. So reaching out
to some of our small businesses we asked them what kind of
things would you like to know more about.
We got back lots of information and we kind of narrowed
that down into four categories which are marketing how they
can protect their business ways they can strengthen their
business and to grow it and I know some of those kind of
sound the same but they are just a little bit different.
This year we have a great workshop. We have people from the
community and we also use staff so that we can provide this
workshop for free our small businesses so all small
businesses in Denton are encouraged to intend we work with
the chamber and by chamber members to attend as well.
And this year we have some great speakers we're going to be
working on social media and the forge maker space which is
a small business support center that's located at one of
our libraries of the North French Library.
We're talking about when distress when disaster strikes and
in light of some of the recent things that have happened on
the square with the fire and we found out a lot of our
businesses are not prepared in case of emergency.
We have we have Michael Petaluma who is our emergency
management coordinator who's going to speak and we have
someone from an insurance company who will be here to speak
and to help give our small businesses some direction and
some assistance and how to prepare in case the you know
something like a fire were to happen or even in the camp in
the chance of a natural disaster.
We're also going to talk about how they can strengthen
their business by leveraging the workforce training that's
available through the state also from SBA for developing
and and getting leverage funding and also how to use local
opportunities through stoke.
We've also talked to trainings lunch and learns and
workshops and so we want to help and help our small
businesses to leverage those activities to maximize their
strength in their business.
Then we also have a couple special things happening as far
as growing their business by creating a memorable customer
experience.
So, Shannon, and I'll hope I get her last name.
Manage.
Man.
How do you say it.
She'll be with us to speak and then also will be doing some
frontline training for staff.
So if you have a retail business and you want to help your
staff create a memorable customer experience, we have some
training for that as well.
So we've structured the workshop with the most popular
items in the morning to allow for businesses that open a
little bit later and we just encourage them to attend
either one seminar or the whole day seminar.
So we're really excited to be able to offer this to our
community.
Questions, please.
Sure.
Hi, I learned recently that I think it's the North Branch
Library has a small business support group.
They do have you all reached out to them.
Are they aware?
I mean, is there communication between?
Yes, we definitely work with them and we've also been
promoting.
They have a workshop coming up on the twenty first of this
month.
It's for with it's a women's business outreach.
And so they'll be opening up their forage workmaker space
for this event to do that.
So we do coordinate with them and actually Randy.
I'm sorry.
Yes, it's Randy Simmons will be here to talk about the for
age and just explain what they do, what they offer there,
the types of support groups that they have in those types
of things.
Forage.
The forage.
And that's the name of the support group.
That's the make that's the space, the makerspace.
So they call it the forage of RG makerspace.
And they did lots of other things besides small business,
but the small business workshop and what they do there is
part of it.
So good part of it.
So I wanted to add something to Councilmember Briggs
comment.
When my staff developed this TCB and the program for the
first time last year, that's when we really started
intentionally and actively collaborating with the folks at
the North Branch Library, because that is where the forages
housed.
The business library and the person who specializes in
business is housed there as well.
And so we have worked really hard on cross promoting.
They came in and were on the key support team when we did
the Stoke transition, their business librarian was.
And so we've really grown that partnership and made a
concerted effort to share information, cross promote
resources and make sure that we're doing good referrals
back and forth between what programs they offer and what
resources they can help people learn about and what we can
do for businesses in the economic development office.
So it's been great.
Yeah, awesome. Thanks. Nice. We refer a lot of people there
.
Yeah.
So Christina on on May the third. Yes, sir. And the
location again is it's here at City Hall here at City Hall
will be.
We'll have the workshop upstairs in the council chambers.
At what time it starts at 830 am registration starts today.
And on it goes until it goes until 430. Okay, thank you.
Yeah.
We do have a link for people to register and it's through
our Facebook page shop in Texas.
One more comment, please.
I know that we actually on this particular board have a
number of people who are small business owners in our
community. So I would like to ask those people to raise
their hands so that we can all recognize them small
businesses, one, two, three, four, five. Yeah.
So that's pretty impressive. We know that it is a big time
commitment for y'all to take time out of running those
businesses to be here. So thank you for what you do in our
community from a business standpoint and also from a
volunteer standpoint on this board and others.
So thank you very much.
Thank you for those kind words.
Any more questions of Christina before she concludes.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much.
There being no other items for the work session.
We will adjourn the work session at 1133 and a half about
that.
Now that we've completed that portion of the agenda.
Since this is my first time I'm reading my script so please
bear with me.
I'll call the regular meeting to order at 1134. And the
first order of business is to consider the minutes of the
March 23rd 2018 meeting, and I'll give everyone a chance to
review them briefly before we vote on them.
Thank you.
And once you're ready just say I'm ready.
Call the question.
We're ready. Okay, we're ready. Good deal.
I make a motion for approval.
We have a motion on the floor to approve the minutes as
presented.
Second, Bob aims and
any further discussion of the minutes.
There being none.
All in favor of approving minutes as presented signify by
saying aye.
All against same sign.
Any abstentions. Okay, the minutes are approved as
presented.
Let's see.
Okay, thank you.
The next item on the agenda is EDP 18 027, which is to
consider a recommendation to the city council regarding
approval of the revised public improvement district
guidelines.
But because that report is not fully completed, I would
entertain a recommendation to table this motion until
another meeting.
I move we table this agenda item to a later meeting to
allow for completed presentation to review.
We have a motion on the floor we have a second. Second.
We have a second. Any discussion.
Okay.
Okay, all in favor of the motion on the floor signify by
saying aye. Aye. Any abstentions.
Excuse me. Any.
Any nays, any nays.
No, there being no nays no abstentions the, the motion to
table this particular topic until another meeting date is
approved.
Staff reports.
18 024.
I don't think so.
I have, I have a, I have to leave it one but other than
that I think we should be done before then.
What do you think is that a huh.
Okay, let's have our staff. We love our staff so let's let
's hear from them.
Let's see.
City RFI summary.
I don't know if you can hear me.
Okay, sorry everybody in TV land who couldn't hear me,
which includes precisely two people,
one of whom I know.
And the other person is Mike's friend.
So just to recap, we received four inquiries, we responded
to two, two we did not respond
to.
Then we have a status update from a project 2020, which our
original response to that
project was submitted in October.
I believe that should say October 2017 to the Dallas
Regional Chamber, or maybe it's
2016.
But they, we were previously submitted on it.
They've come back again after a hiatus to begin looking
again, it's a beverage production
and distribution facility that's seeking around 15 acres
for the project.
Their expected capital investment is $48 million with 100
employees and an average wage of
$41,000.
We did provide the additional information that they were
looking for about the site.
And there was a site visit on March 26, and then the
prospect requested and staff provided
sale information on the West Park site.
So at this point, the land seller and the potential buyer
have been connected.
So we'll provide more updates on that as they become
available.
And then the, I'm sorry, did someone have a question?
So the two that we weren't able to meet the criteria, my
question, what type of buildings?
So obviously they're a little larger, but is it the kind of
the shell building that
they can build out?
Is that what they were seeking or?
It's actually existing buildings that we typically can't
respond to when they seek existing buildings
because we don't have them of the size that they need.
And then, you know, there are many different ways that
buildings can be finished out.
And those are real specific to the project.
But the basic issue with these is that we did not have a
250,000 square foot existing
building, nor did we have an 800,000 square foot existing
building of any kind to be able
to provide to them.
And help me orient me.
How big is that?
So Wynco distribution center on Western Boulevard is, it is
slightly under a million square
feet under roof.
So that would be humongous.
And one of them was wanting just about that much.
I don't know if 250,000 square feet, does anyone have a, is
Christina still in here?
Do you have an example of a 250,000 square foot existing
building here in town that you
could holler at me and I can repeat?
Okay.
So if you've seen Westgate also on Western Boulevard, their
building one is 170,000.
So it's still smaller than this.
But that's a, you know, it's an idea of the size.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
We have another question on the other side.
Why are we limiting this report to responses to just these
two sources versus all the sources?
We can expand the report because we do have quite a number
of leads that come directly
to us from other sources.
And we would be glad to add that in there.
When the report was originally requested, the request was
specifically for these.
So we track those in an in-house developed system.
So it's easy to generate the information.
And if you'd like to see it expanded, we'd be glad to do
that.
Well, I don't know if I speak for everyone on the board,
but I just if it's just as easy,
I don't mean to create new work, but it seems that it would
be interesting to know.
Christina would love to modify this report to include that
information.
I'd also like to, can I have the right month on the report
to do that for you next month?
Yes, she's going to step up her game next time.
I forgive you.
Any other questions on this first staff report?
And the next staff report that we have is the stand, the
monthly stand report.
And that, you know, the categories of content in that don't
change from month to month,
but the specific numbers do.
It's got a lot of great stuff in there.
I'm not going to talk through it because that would take a
long time.
But if anybody has any specific questions, please feel free
to ask.
Are there any things that we should really be aware of?
So you know, something that stands out?
Because we had the census information come out.
So Christina pointed out that the demographics have been
updated, which some of those are
only updated on an annual basis when the community survey
information comes out from the U.S.
Census Bureau.
So those will be updated this time.
I think Councilman Briggs has a question.
Yeah, just the -- Councilwoman Briggs, excuse me.
Poverty rate change due to off-campus population.
Can you describe that a little bit and the percentage is --
and is that percentage from
last year or from last month or the change or is that just
percentage change from the
-- it's under demographics.
Yeah, I guess 20.6% poverty rate seems high.
So -- Christina, can you speak to that because I'm frankly
not super familiar with it.
So maybe we can ask Christina to come up to the podium and
she can elaborate on it if
she's got more information.
And if we don't get that for you, we will email everybody
the answer when we can get
with Erica, who is our analyst.
So we'll see what Christina might know.
As she said, our analyst Erica Sullivan provides these
numbers.
The poverty rate change, it's supposed to calculate in the
percentage that the students
impact because there is such a lower rate and so that's why
it has the rate change.
This will be updated.
Those updates come out in May and we'll have a new update
then and maybe at that time we
can have her give a better definition or description as why
the information is provided in that
format.
So this changes dramatically semester by semester?
Yeah, due to the student population.
Okay.
Thank you.
Does that cover it or would you like more?
Yeah, it's just interesting.
I'm just kind of wondering how we apply that data and what
we use that for.
I believe her response was because the student population,
there's 50,000 of them average
per semester and because they have such a low income, it
brings the poverty rate.
It makes the poverty rate higher because there's so many of
them bringing it down.
So I think part of the reason that the information is
gathered and is relevant is because when
we are looking at or when especially retailers are
considering location decisions, they look
at things like the poverty rate and we feel like because of
our student population being
high, that's a different perspective on the number that you
see on paper.
And so we want to make sure that we have that information
and can convey it to them that
this is a subset of the population that affects that rate.
So in this case here, if you were to take out the student
population, our poverty rate
would be 13.9 instead of the 20.6.
That's just interesting because usually we use that student
population as a positive
impact on our community.
And so I mean especially when you're talking about shopping
and retail, because they do
spend money.
So it's just interesting to see it this way.
Yeah.
And so the percent change there is, I mean that's obviously
just the difference between
the poverty rate for all people and then the ones for
students.
And statistics are so fascinating in the way that they can
be used to support and enhance
different sides of an issue.
Because I think we definitely, I mean our students are
positive for our community.
Of course they are.
But if you just look at a straight number like overall
poverty rate based on how that's
calculated by the census, that could look like our
community is more impoverished than
it really is.
Right.
Yeah.
Okay.
So they come from their parents, right?
Yeah.
I have a question about that.
Because of that rate and even looking at the overall
poverty rate, that puts us at a pretty
large number, over 20%.
Are there other, does that open us up to different
financial capabilities for them, either federal
or state level to be able to?
It can.
And there's been some recent designation of opportunity
zones under the new tax act that
was enacted and we did have one of those designated which
opens up some opportunities for different
development programs.
So again, you weigh the balance of what you get with our
demographics.
So good question.
Any other questions on this particular report?
There being none, we'll go to the third report please.
There being none, right?
Any more questions on that particular?
No.
Okay.
All right.
Thank you.
Sorry.
The third report is the Chamber ED offices report.
I don't know if someone from the Chamber would like to
speak to that because there's a lot
of stuff on there.
Looks like good stuff, but I am not intimately acquainted
with it.
So let's just fly by dancing, right?
Do you have a copy of it?
No I don't.
Do you want a copy?
Meh.
I can fly pretty well.
Adam is actually at the MRO, America's Conference today,
this week actually.
So he's trying to sell it to a few thousand people in
Florida.
Team Texas, which is what we co-op with them to kind of
support their booth just to sell
it.
I will answer any questions that you have or I will take
them back and ask Adam about
them.
So if you have questions, don't hesitate to ask.
Go ahead, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, I was just going to add a couple of things to
this.
Thank you for filling in.
A couple of key points on this to kind of differentiate how
we go about our targeting
prospect.
Out of six offsite activities, four were specifically and
directly with professional consultants,
which allows us to actually go one on one and make a bit.
There tends to be a lot of emphasis on the trade show and
the expos and this kind of
thing.
But what you'll see the focus is predominantly over the
past few months has been going directly
to the folks who will bring the prospect.
And this is one of the key points that Karen and Adam do a
very good job with.
Could we also clarify on May 1st, is that a work session,
the City Council meeting you
asked us to move to?
Oh, yes.
So Chuck's asking about a work session that was requested
by council members to do a midyear
update on the economic development partnership.
So my office and the Chamber ED office will be doing an
update on where we are in our
program year and our work plan and yes, work session.
So one of the things, the last thing I was going to point
out is a new website in collaboration
with the city.
I don't know if you want to make an official launch on that
May 1 or if you need us to
do something with the partnership board separate or before
that.
But those are some, or Karen could you show your end now?
We spent the last four or five months reworking our website
, trying to make it a little bit
more user friendly.
I ask all of you to go on the website, take a look, tell us
what you think, what you don't
like, what you do like.
We're getting a lot of information or comments back about
this particular section or this
particular news article stating that Denton County is one
of the fastest growing or strongest
economic growth for the next five years.
So this is, I mean, just go through it, peruse it.
If you have any comments, don't hesitate to email Adam or I
or just hit the contact us
button and put it.
It's very easy to read.
I did have a look around and the information is kind of
spaced out nicely to where I found
it was easy to find and I felt very pertinent.
So I think it was a job very well done.
So it's really for Caroline as well.
And you are the, I just saw a tab for targeted industries
or do they match what we have on
council?
Absolutely.
Yes.
And we make sure that everything is congruent based on the
direction that we're receiving
and the information that we're distributing via the website
.
That looks good.
Have we heard any word from the big company that's reloc
ating to DFW potentially?
DFW is still in the running for that particular project,
which I'm going to guess that you're
talking about Amazon HQ2.
Yes.
So yeah, the region is still in the running.
So from, and this may be archaic, but last I heard that
they felt that the DFW area was
the better area for relocation.
I don't know if that information came from the company
themselves.
They've been pretty closed mouth, but there are a lot of
armchair quarterbacking on what's
the best region and which one isn't, but they've cut it
down to 20 at this point.
And I believe they've actually cut a few more out.
I had an article I read just about a week ago.
They cut two or three more out.
So 17 instead of 20.
So is that fake news or is it real news?
I read the actual article, so I don't know.
All right.
Thank you.
Question, want to comment?
Yes.
Just for my own personal, someone can email it to me or
something.
I would like to know kind of, if you can give me a scenario
if you've brought, when you
bring someone in town, Adam, or someone in town, kind of
what their kind of pathing is.
Hey, what's your kind of introduction to Denton, kind of
your staples?
Hey, we're going to stop here, here, here.
I understand it has specific requests, but if there's kind
of a, here's our normal haunts
that we take people to or a normal pathing, I'd love to
know what that is.
Just to be curious.
It varies greatly depending upon who it is.
If it's brokers, Adam has a set industrial tour that he
takes them to, which goes out
airport drive, up Western Boulevard, kind of circles back
through 380.
Just show them where West Park is, where things are moving
and grooving over on that side.
And sometimes they'll take them, if they're looking for
something different, they'll take
them to the east side over by Southwire in that area where
there's more industrial development
going on.
So it just greatly depends on what the particular broker,
consultant is looking for or the company
is looking for.
Okay.
And just FYI, I know Chuck didn't mention this, but we did
have a site visit on the
29th, I believe it was, with Project Exit, which is one of
the projects right over here.
I believe that came and met with the city.
Can I add something real quick about the site tours?
Karen's absolutely correct in that we allow the person who
's visiting to drive the way
we construct the tour based on how much time they have and
what their primary interests
are.
But of course, if we have the latitude to do so, we do take
them downtown because that
is one of the most unique parts of the community.
And something that we've also been doing is taking them
over around the transit oriented
development that's around the downtown transit center and
Stoke and the development that's
moving that way too, if we have the opportunity to do that,
if their time schedule permits
and they're interested.
And then if I may, so what is the, but what's the, are we
in a city of Denton Van?
I just don't know what the day in the life looks like.
You know what I'm saying?
So maybe in what, and also I add to that, UNT is selling
their nice little bus, that
giant bus they had.
So what is work?
So I have a suburban, so I usually take people in my
suburban because there's plenty of
room and it's comfortable.
And Adam has his truck that he takes him on in and an
expedition also.
We have used, we have used City of Denton buses.
The solid waste has that people mover van thing that I
think gets frequently used for
job interviews.
When we've done tours that are larger, more people than can
fit in a suburban or a truck,
we've used that in the past.
Just depends on what group it is and what we need.
Okay.
Thanks.
If you have any questions about the website, social media,
all those analytics are also
in there and then our financials on the back page for last
month.
Do remember that this is an unaudited, unreconciled
financial.
So it does change.
Thank you very much.
I feel enriched by the staff reports and I don't say that
facetiously.
I'm glad that we did take the time to go through them.
Let's see.
Do we have any concluding items that we need to address
before entertaining a motion?
Yes ma'am.
I have a couple of requests.
So I would like to see if we could, if this committee could
get an update on the TW Women
and Business grants.
I think they've had an application that went out for
entrepreneurs or small business.
Small business is owned by women and there were several 5,
000 grants and I know that
I shared it and sent it to several people and I haven't
heard an update on that and
I didn't know if they were going to do some sort of
presentation in the community on that
since it does directly affect our community.
Also if we could get a staff report or a presentation on an
amphitheater and how and where to best
locate that if we wanted one in Denton to best reflect
positive for the economic development
for our city.
Could you amplify on that request please?
Well I have had people ask me or say that they would like
to have some sort of outdoor
space for playing music or outdoor theater or something and
so I'm just curious if there
was a location in our city that if say council or if
somebody wanted to request one if there
was a specific area that the economic development or
chamber or anyone would recommend that
it go for the city.
I think my first step on that would be to check in with
other departments to see if
anybody's got anything like that any master plan documents
that are going on see what
information we might have already pulled together about
that just to run that first and then
we can come up with some suggestions.
And I'm not talking about the like the stage that's back
here.
Right yeah.
Okay just for clarification.
Something a little more avant-garde.
Yeah.
Just to clarify a little bit more do you mean some place
like where we would have food trucks
be able to circle around and then the economic development
impact would be you know having
mobile food or beverages being able to be sold in that
location.
Well if it was an amphitheater it would be it would stay in
one area so it would but
the food trucks well then also the businesses around would
be would build and benefit from
people coming into those shows or or what have you so that
's what I mean.
I do think that in the initial plans for razor ranch there
was an amphitheater included in
the town center section and so I will just quadruple verify
with the developer that that's
still part of the plans.
The most recent version that I've seen you know that's that
's for the third phase of
the development that that close-in town center section that
has green space in the middle
that was the original intention was to have an amphitheater
there so I can verify that
that's still the plan I think it is.
But that might be at least one pretty straightforward
answer to that question is that that would
be a great spot for one.
Yeah just arts and entertainment has been proven to be an
economic driver and that is
just another area that we don't have here that would be
great thank you.
Growing up in Houston we had a center called the Miller Out
door Theater that had drama
music and they built a hill right behind it so people could
actually sit on the hill if
they didn't sit in the seating they had seating and it was
covered but it was open you had
you know the amphitheater so it wasn't completely closed.
So and I think the seating on that was probably about a
thousand or two thousand so it was
large but of course the city of Houston and it was in the
arch district and so did you
have a seating in mind or sure sure you had something in
mind more than ten right.
Thank you any more items before we conclude today.
There being none I'll entertain a motion to adjourn the
meeting.
So moved.
Motion and second.
Any discussion.
All in favor signify by saying aye.
Any abstentions or nays.
Meeting is adjourned at twelve oh four.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you.