May 17, 2022 City Council on 2022-05-17 4:00 PM

And welcome to this meeting of the Denton City Council and it is Tuesday, May 17, 2022. It's 4 p.m. We do have a quorum. Call the work session to order. And the first thing on the agenda is citizen comments. We have two live, one that will come to us via Zoom. So I'll call the first here in the room. It's Priscilla. And I don't want to say your last name wrong. So Priscilla? Yes. And if you could come to the podium and give your name and address, you'll have four minutes. No, the podium. Yeah. Perfect. Thank you. Can everyone hear me? Try again. Hello? There we go. Okay. Priscilla, you already know I'm at 115 North Austin, Denton, Texas. Thank you. Great. Today I'm here to speak in support of the approval of the resolution endorsing Medicare for All Act of 2021 in Denton. I'm a recent graduate. I got my M.P.A. here at UNT. I've been here for about eight years now. I have seen what not having health care provided as a leading nation will do to people who are poor, people who are immigrants, undocumented refugees, but even the rest of us who don't have jobs or who during COVID-19 were let go. I've seen what it does to students who are in need of people with diseases and autoimmune diseases, especially during a global pandemic. I'm here to ask you to please support this resolution. And I thank you for your time. Thank you very much. And then also in the room is Karina. Is that right, Karina? Oh, yes, that may be an L. I'm sorry. Forgive me. Carla. Yes. Thought it was an I. Thank you very much for you. Please and thank you. Hello. Can you hear me? Yes. Thank you. Good afternoon, council members. My name is Carla Palmares and I'm speaking on consent agenda item twenty two dash ten fifty one. Today I'm asking that you vote to pass a citywide resolution in favor of Medicare for all. Along with this, I ask that you partner with residents to implement and fund programs that will serve the underprivileged who do not have access to affordable health care. Well, I'm currently no longer a resident of Denton. Between 2010 and 2014, I was a student at the University of North Texas. And while I was a student, I had the burden of working one to and at one brief point, three jobs, the cost of housing, the cost of pursuing education, where my top priorities is still the case for many people living in Denton today. Many people cannot afford health insurance or care. And many people have jobs that don't offer these benefits and are troubled with absurd out of pocket expenses. How can we expect the residents of Denton to live healthy and prosperous lives under these circumstances? It's now twenty twenty two. We've seen the horrific challenges of navigating a pandemic with a health care system that doesn't have a solid infrastructure. And when you look at what's changed since 2014 in terms of costs, there isn't much cost of tuition, housing, food, transportation and health care are on the rise and significantly impact families or individuals ability to juggle all of those things. People should not have to choose between seeing a doctor or paying their rent or seeing a doctor or putting food on the table. We can do something great by recognizing that health care is a human right and should be accessible to everyone, regardless of your income, race, gender, sexual orientation, undocumented status or anything else. We must pass this resolution to set the standard for cities in Texas and assure that people and health and safety are a priority. It's critical to show other elected officials higher up that they must pass larger legislation on the state and federal level so we can expand health care to all in the US so we can stop seeing people pay the cost with their lives when they're denied treatments because they cannot afford it or because the insurance will not cover it. We need to change course from being the most uninsured and underinsured in the US with over 5 million people who were without health care coverage at the height of the pandemic and I ask that every one of you seated on this council today to please endorse and vote yes on this resolution. Thank you. Thank you. And we have one caller, if staff can bring up the caller, please and thank you. Hi Mayor, the caller is no longer available. They didn't call into the Zoom meeting. Okay, very good. That takes us to the next section of our agenda, which is request for clarification of agenda items on this agenda from council. Councilmember McGuire? I have questions about consent agenda item P, the contract with Siddons Martin Emergency Group. Okay. We'll give staff a minute to get here for that. Item P. And this may be more of a question for MAC or someone in finance than it is for Chief Hedges. So my question is, you know, I know that the contract is with Siddons Martin, which is a Pierce dealer. And I also know that about a year ago, Pierce rolled out a pilot project in, I believe, Madison, Wisconsin, and also Portland, Oregon, to sort of get them the Volterra electric fire, fire trucks before they went to market. But they will be hitting the market in about a year. So I know that, you know, the bid was for very specific models with, you know, specific specs to city that will meet city requirements. My question is, do the terms of this contract, are they flexible enough to allow the fire department or council to revisit this plan maybe a year from now when the electric fire trucks from Pierce hit the market, and consider including that as part of this plan? >> So with all of our contracts, we have the option to revisit it any time. So we can absolutely do that. I think it depends on what the fire department needs. So I'll leave that up to Chief Hedges if he wants to speak to that. >> Good afternoon, Chief Hedges. Yes, you're absolutely right. We have actually been watching that research on electric vehicles rollout. The one caveat to that right now is it's new. So it's brand new. It's close to Oshkosh where it's constructed. When you start reading into it, these electric vehicles are good for two hours and you got to recharge them. So if you're in a very busy system, they actually have -- the one you're talking about actually has a diesel engine as a backup. So it's not pure electric. So we really kind of thought let this kind of mature over about three, four or five years. I was really curious about going electric, especially at the downtown central station. That was the old powerhouse. That just kind of makes sense as well. But we are looking at that as far as for future. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. I think I'm satisfied with that. >> Any other questions? Councilman Beck? >> Yeah, I have a question for about item O and consent, the uniform. >> Okay. Would staff get here for that? >> Yep. Go ahead. >> Laura Behrens, Assistant Director for Carement. >> Yeah. My question relates to sort of what I sent in the email and that is does it make sense for our field officers of all sorts? I know that the response in the email was -- so let me finish my question. Does it make sense to unify all our uniform purchases for our various field officers under one contract? I know in the response in the email that you sent that we have two or three vendors that we're using for our animal control officers. But considering that a lot of their gear, their uniforms, their service needs are similar to the police and fire, would it make sense to expand our contract and lump that in? >> Yeah, no, absolutely. And we do have another contract too where we have different like departments that are grouped together under that contract. For animal services, they are right now using three different vendors to get what their needs are in terms of uniform and also just standard, you know, work clothes and the associated equipment. GALS is one of them and they can use this contract. So they can definitely be a part of this contract. >> So this contract under O, they have the opportunity to purchase from -- >> Absolutely, yes. >> Okay. That's excellent. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> Councilmember Davis? >> I'd like to pull item X for a separate vote. >> Okay. Presentation or anything? >> Just a separate vote. >> Thank you. Councilmember Watts? >> Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, I would like to have at least some brief information on item X. I mean, read the backup on it, just trying to understand exactly what it is to accomplish, who it's to. I mean, it says legislation in general. Is that to just United States Congress? I mean, obviously the state of Texas does not receive all the Medicare that it could receive. So I mean, I think if we're going to have a resolution, it would be something that would be also more specific to the state where we can exert some influence on our state delegation to say, hey, how can we encourage you all to get more Medicaid, Medicare benefits for our citizens of our state? So I'm just needing a little background on -- other than it being symbolic, what is it -- what are we really hoping to accomplish with it? I mean -- >> This is actually subsequent to a councilmember two-minute pitch wherein they did pitch this specific language to come forward to council in a resolution of support for legislation to be passed at the federal level for Medicare for all. So staff is simply bringing this forward, that pitch to get support from a majority of council. So staff is bringing this forward subsequent to that direction from council from that two-minute pitch. >> So when I'm reading the resolution, they're the whereas's. So it does say we must urge the United States Congress or the Texas legislature, which I think it should be and the Texas legislature, to expand health insurance. So that's who this resolution is addressing. It's just saying we want to make sure and encourage you to have -- to vote for and to pass the Medicare for all Act of 2021, and we're also petitioning or resolving to send it to the state legislature to whoever, the governor or whoever, to say -- or is this just -- does this get sent to anybody or is it just -- is it just sort of on the books? >> So it's on the books, the way it's written. Now, staff could send it out just to make our delegation both at the federal and state level aware, and we would do that if it was passed. However, this specific resolution does not direct anything with regard to federal or state delegations, and it is not even specific to federal legislation. It just says legislation in general is what is supported and what is urged. >> Okay. Well, I've got to think about -- because, I mean, I certainly am in support in general, but I think if we're going to pass something like this, that it needs to have some either teeth to it or be addressed to someone or something that really indicates it, then it's just something we pass and it sits as an ordinance on municode that we're actually trying to influence whoever this is supposed to be addressed to to move forward in any way that they can to do that. So I just have to decide if this does that. >> Understood. >> Yep. Thank you. >> Okay. Any other questions? Then I'll note just for the record that consent agenda item E, which is 22885, the date reads May 26th, but for the record, that should be amended and has been amended to June 1. So if you can note that on your own copies or just kind of those watching to note that that should say June 1st instead of May 26th. Absent that, I don't see any other questions that would conclude that portion of the agenda. So only item X is pulled. And where did we land? Councilmember Watts, were your questions answered or would you like a brief presentation tonight? >> No, I think they were answered. I guess my only question is I made a comment about changing the or to an and because it says we must urge the United States Congress or the Texas legislature to expand health insurance coverage. I don't think we want either or. I think that needs to be an and to say we're asking both of them to do that. So I don't know how you approach that. I mean, if it's something that council got a vote on or something like that. But I think that would be more effective at least what we're trying to accomplish. And then I would propose that we put specifically in there some language to say that we will send this to our respective delegations, both federal and state, to directly. >> We can make those changes. >> I believe that could be made in the motion. >> Correct. It's going to be pulled for separate action anyway, so it can be made in the motion. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Takes us to our first work session item. Let me get there. ID 22936, receive report, hold discussion, give staff direction regarding the development of an updated municipal utility district mud policy for elevating mud, seeking consent from the city for development within the ETJ extraterritorial jurisdiction. >> Thank you, Mayor. Tina Fergens, deputy director of development services here at the City of Dunton. So good afternoon. It's my pleasure to be here before you to be presenting this item. I know we've been talking about this for a little bit of time now on being able to bring this forward. So this agenda item is related to updating the city's existing interim mud policy that was adopted back in 2020. And so this item is being brought forth as a result of past conversations with city council during 2021, as well as through direction provided by the recently adopted Denton 2040 comprehensive plan, which supports the update to the policy. There continues to be development pressure within our city's extraterritorial jurisdiction or ETJ for short so I don't trip on that. Therefore it is appropriate to review our policies from time to time to make sure that our policies are working for us and are in the best interest of the City of Dunton. As it specifically relates to this mud policy, this updated mud policy should provide clearer direction and expectations for muds that are wanting to form within and receive consent from the City of Dunton. So given the complexity of this topic and the various subtopics, if you will, surrounding it, I figured I'd help provide a presentation roadmap so that you know where I'm going this afternoon because this presentation is a little lengthier. But there are a variety of items that influence the formation of muds within the city's extraterritorial jurisdiction or ETJ. So what I'd like to do is provide some background information and in this information also mirrors what was included in the AIS and the backup materials as part of your agenda item. But we'll start with addressing background in specifically what is a municipal utility district? How are they formed? How many of them do we have within our ETJ? We'll also talk about our ETJ and our limitation of ability to regulate land uses within that area of the city. Then we'll move into why update the interim mud policy. Many times we start working on projects we need to think back to the why and why it's important and why it's in our best interest in this particular case to update this interim policy. That's a good segue then into our challenges with our current interim policy that we've learned since we've adopted it in 2020. And then we'll pause and shift our focus then into staff's recommended proposed draft mud policy purpose as well as the policy goals. And then we'll talk on next steps or address next steps and then conclude with discussion and direction related to this. So in this particular case, I'm actually asking you to begin with the end in mind. So at the end of this presentation, I'm going to ask you a series of questions and related to that. So I wanted to give you a sneak peek in advance so that you know what those questions are. And then I'd ask that as you're receiving this information this afternoon from me, that you take into consideration this from a policy perspective and apply the policy filter, if you will, associated with this. And really, the key thing is going to be how does the city influence better quality development within our ETJ? And like I said, I'm going to share with you a variety of pieces of information that influence the formulation of the muds within our ETJ. But again, at the end of the day, our goal is to have better quality development because we understand that, you know, our development standards set the priority and communicate this. This is our expectation for development within our community. But we know that with the muds, they're going to fall short of that because there's a reason why they're forming in our ETJ and they're not pursuing developing within land within our corporate limits. So our goal is staff is to how do we shore up the delta on that, if you will. So again, my questions to you at the end of the presentation are going to be, do you support the draft mud policy purpose that staff is recommending that we put forth, but then also the draft mud policy goals that we're recommending? And there are 12 that will present at the end of the presentation. And of course then, is there anything that you feel that we have missed as part of our effort related to this? So let's dive into some of that background information. So what is a mud or municipal utility district? Well, it is a special district that functions as an independent limited purpose political subdivision. It is independent from the city of Denton. So we do not regulate it. It does have the muds have their own regulatory body associated with them. They're typically a board that is elected by property owners within that district. The mud developments typically occur within the city's ETJ area. These can be single family residential developments. They can have multifamily uses associated with them. It's possible that they could have some commercial development. For the most part, I think primarily what we're seeing right now is primarily single family residential developments that are requesting consent from the city and occurring within our ETJ. Primary reason for why a mud forms is because they're not wanting to follow our land use and zoning regulations, right? So nor are they wanting to comply with any other regulations that may apply to them. They are also not interested in having to pay impact fees to the city. We do not collect impact fees within the ETJ unless with exception of water and sewer service and if we're assisting with providing that service. But also these developments, they do not want to have to annex into the city because again, they're not wanting to have to play by all of the rules that we would otherwise have in place for development happening within the city limits. Another reason why muds form is because it provides the developer an alternate way to be able to finance their infrastructure. So in this case, typically they're looking at a means of being able to finance their water, sewer, sewage and sanitary sewer, their drainage and their road facilities by issuing bonds to be able to be reimbursed for those costs. So the developer is up fronting the costs and associated with the construction of the infrastructure, but they're looking to get reimbursed associated with it. So the bonds offer that ability to be in reimbursed for those costs. Once those bonds are paid off, the muds can then annex into the city, but there would be presumably some sort of agreement that would take place before their annexation. But one of the key things is important to realize and what we would like to be able to communicate to you all this afternoon is being able to negotiate with a mud developer provides the city an opportunity to influence better quality development within our ETJ at the end of the day. And this not just from a technical standpoint in how things are constructed, but also take into consideration emergency services. When people are in their greatest need in calling 911, we want to make sure that there's adequate emergency services that are being able to provide or provide to the residents of these areas so that their needs can be met. Also, we're interested in being able to influence having better quality development because eventually at some point in time, if these developments do annex within the city, then we want to make sure that we know what we're receiving. And ideally, we want these developments to build to our standards so that when we do receive them into our city limits, then we have an idea as to what we're maintaining. But we really believe that our best opportunity to be able to influence the better quality development is to be able to get the developers at the table in a conversation with and steer them towards negotiating into a development agreement with the city. So one of the factors that influence as much as I mentioned earlier is that they're forming within our extraterritorial jurisdiction. And so that is our ETJ. And we've included a map here because many times a map says a thousand words. And when explaining ETJ, I think this is where the map is really, really important. So you have the area within our corporate limits that is shown there in green. So that's the areas that are within our city limits, the areas that we're able to regulate both land use and subdivision plotting. The ETJ is an area that extends beyond the city's jurisdiction lines or city limit lines and that allows the city eventually to be able to annex into or provide some limited services within that. The range is anywhere from a half a mile to five miles. It's based upon the number of inhabitants that are located within a city. So in the case of Denton, because our population exceeds a hundred thousand inhabitants within the community, our ETJ range is actually five miles out from our city limit boundaries. What's important to note within the ETJ, we have no land use authority. So uses can come and go, and the city has no ability to say yes or no to the type of uses that are occurring within the ETJ area. Now to add an interesting element that pertains specifically to Denton, we do have an interlocal cooperation agreement with Denton County. The state mandated that many years ago that cities enter into agreements with the county as it relates to the ETJ. So in our case for Denton, we have ETJ 1 and ETJ 2, or more technically referred to as division 1 and division 2. So ETJ 1 extends from our city limit line out three and a half miles. So that's the area that's in blue, showed it on this map. So within ETJ 1, so that blue shaded area, we have the ability to enforce our subdivision regulations and our platting regulations. So if somebody wants to divide a parcel of land, then they would submit a development or they would submit plats to the city. We will review that for compliance with our platting regulations and our subdivision regulations. Obviously what we're looking for is to ensure that properties have access to roads, but also access to utilities such as water and sewer. What's interesting to note or important to note about our ETJ 1 area is that the majority of our ETJ 1 area is located within our Certificate of Convenience and Necessity. So this is the area in which we're committed to providing water and sewer service associated with that. Also what's important to note is the city and the county, we do not enforce any building code regulations within the county, or excuse me, within this area, the ETJ. There may be some minimum building code requirements or minimum requirements associated from a state statute standpoint that the county might have to enforce, but in terms of the city of Denton enforcing any building codes and how structures are built, we do not have any purview in that area. So now then, beyond that three and a half mile line, so from three and a half mile boundary out to five miles, that's the ETJ 2 area. So that's the area that's kind of shown in that brownish yellow color, depending upon which monitor you're looking at. So within this area, the limitations become even less controlling, if you will, or least restrictive, however you want to look at it. So in this area, the county has platting authority. So we, the city of Denton, are not involved in the subdivision regulations of platts within that brownish colored area. The county reviews any land subdivision that occurs. They're enforcing their regulations, and again, they're looking to ensure that properties have access to roads and utilities. This area, what's important to note, is it's primarily not within the city of Denton CCN. And then again, the city and county, we do not enforce any building code regulations. But I want you to be able to see this visually and understand the differences between ETJ 1 and ETJ 2, because this, again, the city's ability to control development and regulate development within the ETJ is quite limiting. So let's talk about now, how is a mud created? So it can be created in one of two ways. So one of the first ways is through the creation by the Texas legislature with the passing of a bill. We have had one or two muds within Denton's ETJ form that way. One that comes to mind is La La Ranch when it was initially established. It was established through the legislature process. The other process that's available and in which developers seem to be pursuing more commonly is through the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, or TCEQ, following a petition and consent process that's provided for in the state water code. So for properties that are located in the city's ETJ to be included within a mud, city consent has to be requested prior to the creation of the mud as part of the TCEQ process. So TCEQ is telling the developer, hey, you need to go talk to the city and request their consent, right? So the consent application, in our opinion, provides the city with the greater potential to influence the mud development. Because again, we believe that's where we can begin to negotiating into having a development agreement for these muds. At the end of the day, consent is not required from the city. So if we say no, the developer can still pursue through TCEQ with the formulation of the mud. It may be a little bit longer, arduous process for them. And this is really where time and money become involved, right? Because if it's a longer process, then in all likelihood it's going to cost the developer more money to be able to go through that process, if you will. But it's important to note that regardless of whether or not we provide consent, this mud eventually can be formed within our ETJ. That is why, in our opinion, approval through TCEQ at least is the preferred application process because again, that's where we feel like we have more opportunity to influence the quality of development. If we can get the developer at the table and be discussing entering into a development agreement as part of a condition for the consent being provided, then we feel like there's the opportunity where we have the ability to be able to influence the development. It looks like you have a question. >> No, I just need to understand the process. So during the presentation of any link, do y'all save questions for the end? Okay. All right. Okay. Good deal. Thanks. >> No problem. Okay. You had that expression, so I just wanted to ask and extend that. >> I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so easily read. >> No, no. That's all right. So try to watch my audience. And I realize -- and keep in mind, the overview that I've provided you is a very high-level overview. There are also, you know, some additional nuances associated with it in that TCEQ process. But the whole purpose, though, for this presentation is just to help communicate to you, you know, the two processes that are available but recognizing at the end of the day, the developer does not have to have the consent from the city to be able to move forward with having the MUD created. So then our MUDs, if you will -- and I say our just because they're out in our ETJ, right? But the city has provided consent to four MUDs in the past, just more recently, 2020 and 2021. So those four are Astra, La La Ranch, the expansion, the first expansion associated with it, which is up in the northwest portion of the town -- or excuse me, northwest portion of our ETJ. If you can see my cursor in this area here. We also have Olex Meadows. And just recently, Matt, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe we did an amendment to their agreement earlier this year with respect to the fire service. But then also Stonehill Ranch received consent back in 2021. Right now, the city is currently working on negotiating a development agreement with Legends Ranch. That particular MUD, the city did not grant consent associated with that request. So hence why we're now negotiating an agreement so that we can ensure to get better quality development. It is within ETJ1 and has the potential to potentially be annexed within the city. So we're in that negotiation process. However, it's important to note that we also have eight additional MUDs that have expressed an intent to apply for consent from this city. And I have them all listed here. But you can see where they're mapping out. And majority of them, I would say, are kind of in this area here south of U.S. Highway 380. And so it's where it seems to us. Some of you that were on council last December may recall that we had a discussion regarding La La Ranch in their interest in providing expansion. We call this their expansion number two. So if that one looks familiar. But I just provide this just to share with you and illustrate. So one of the challenges in things we discussed internally is what do we want to be when we grow up? And I would say, well, we had that conversation when we adopted the comprehensive plan earlier this year. But we recognize that the MUDs have a potential influence on our land development patterns within our city's ETJ. So this leads me to why update the interim policy. So again, this policy, when it was originally adopted, it was adopted as a stopgap measure back in 2020. Because at that time, we had some MUD requests that had been submitted or consent requests had been applied for. And we did not have anything to evaluate the MUDs associated with it. So hence why we said it was a stopgap measure. The existing policy or interim policy, I should say, which was included as an attachment to your agenda materials. If you had a chance to peruse through that, you'll see it had eight policy statements and a series of technical requirements that were associated with those policies. Ideally, those technical requirements need to be separated from the policy itself. And there's no formal application process associated with it either. But what we have found is that over time that the current interim policy has proven difficult to implement. And I'll expand on that here a little more on my next slide. But one of the key things that what we have realized since the adoption of the interim policy is that the current policy does not incentivize or encourage. And I want to be careful here, not incentivize from a financial standpoint, but facilitate or encourage the developers to be able to pursue consent from the city. If the developer is not pursuing consent from the city, then we do not have a seat at the table to be able to influence the development from a land use infrastructure and services perspective. Ideally, we would want to encourage the developer to enter into a development agreement with the city, which then leads me into my next bullet point about if the development is going to occur in the ETJ and knowing that we have limited authority, as I just explained when we were talking about our ETJ, the city should want to encourage developers to enter into the development agreement. Because at the end of the day, we want better quality development. If we can't get development here at our standards, we're trying to shore that up so that we can get that development as close as possible to the level of quality of development that we're interested in having within the ETJ. Also, as I mentioned on the onset of this presentation, our Denton 2040 comprehensive plan provides policy level support and provides further direction as it relates to updating the policy. And we've included the action item here out of the comprehensive plan, which says to update the interim MUD policy criteria to encourage consistency with our land use criteria, adopted plans, adopted infrastructure standards and require review of any MUDs in the development review process. So if we're looking for a policy support provision, then that's where we have that. But lastly, what we do know is, again, we continue to have development pressures within our ETJ. I believe the last MUD on the list, Taper Ranch, was a request for consent that we've received just within the last 30 days. So knowing that we will continue to have development pressure within our ETJ, given the limited ability to require annexation in areas that are not subject to any non-annexation agreements, we find it's in our best interest to find ways to influence the development positively. So that leads me to then challenges with the current interim policy and what we've learned since we adopted it in 2020. So first of all, there are many technical requirements included in the policy that really should be part of a separate application process and we do not have an application process at this time for developers to submit. What we're finding also is that the current interim policy has been proven to be difficult to implement. For one, it is cumbersome for developers, but it's also cumbersome for staff to be able to administer and to be able to apply. Currently, as I mentioned, there's no formal application process associated with it. There's also a lack of information that is submitted to the city because at the end of the day, developers are not required to have to submit any documentation to us. We can request traffic impact analysis and other more technical information, detailed layouts of their proposed subdivision, how they're intending to develop it. But at the end of the day, they're not required to have to be able to submit that to us. So they just need to notify us that they are seeking consent from the city. The other thing is that we know that developers can also pursue formation through TCEQ without city consent, as I elaborated upon earlier. Another challenge that we find with our current interim policy is that it discourages developers from seeking consent from the city, thereby resulting in that developers are not entering into a negotiated development agreement with the city as it relates to infrastructure and services. It has the potential for emergency services implications. While the county assigns who will be providing the fire emergency services, if we are not assigned as the primary, then we know that we are assigned as backup and that we are going to be on the scene eventually. And what that translates then to is an increased cost to the city to be able to provide that service from an emergency services standpoint. Also we know that if developers are not seeking consent from the city, then there could be implications on the city should development pursue annexation in the future. If they pursue annexation and they're not built to our standards on the front end, then we don't know for certain what we may be getting. And so that's why we're interested in pushing them towards the negotiation and development agreement so we can influence them being built to our city standards. If the development is within ETJ, we have a little bit more of a say on how it's constructed in terms of our technical standard requirements. But if in ETJ2, then again, there's no influencing that unless they're at the table with us in a conversation about how we can influence better quality development. Also the other concern that we have is when these developments form within the ETJ, should they pursue annexation, and I mentioned we may not know exactly what we're getting is because we weren't involved in the construction process or the inspection process also, if you will. So we run the risk for increased costs to the city associated with the maintenance associated with that infrastructure. Also what we've learned since the adoption of the interim policy is ETJ1 and ETJ2, should those areas be treated the same? The current interim policy really treats them the same. And when they are not within our certificate of convenience and necessity where we're not obligated to provide water and sewer, that can influence whether or not we want to provide consent or not associated with the development. Also if they're not within DME's service area, that could influence our decision on how we address the MUDs from an ETJ1 versus ETJ2 perspective. Also we may find that some of them are located within overlapping ETJ areas. Knowing that our ETJ is very expansive, there are some smaller towns that populate amongst our ETJ area. And then also what we know is the likelihood of MUD development annexing within the city if located in ETJ1 may be different or more likely to occur at some point in the future. It might be many years from now, but developments within ETJ1 versus ETJ2, that annexation conversation comes into play in terms of who would be likely to annex within the city. So you'll see the bold statements here. So in working with our outside consultant in all the conversations that we've had internally amongst staff, we really feel like this comes down to how does the city influence better quality development within our ETJ in consent being pursued. Again, we believe that the goal is to get the developers at the table to negotiate into a development agreement so that we have the ability to better influence the quality of the development. So now let's shift back to then, you know, think about those questions that I asked you at the beginning of this presentation, because here's now where I'm going to start sharing a little more of the meat of this presentation with you as it relates to making amendments to the MUD policy moving forward. So the recommended policy purpose and goals that follow outline what the city would like to achieve with respect to MUDs through the policy update process. And I use the word update because this, because we are updating this policy, but what we really anticipate is that there's going to be a significant rewrite associated with this policy. And this kind of comes in also, and I know Council Member Beck, you had sent some questions this morning about the existing policy. That policy as it exists today, as I mentioned earlier, it's very cumbersome for us to be able to use. We anticipate, you know, there are some good nuggets of information that are in there that will likely be carried forward, but really we anticipate the documents can be formatted differently. Items that are more application requirements are going to be pulled out separately compared to the policy statement. So when I say update, don't think this is just a light touch. This is a significant rework of the policy, if you will. But as it relates to the policy purpose and goals, we've developed these collectively amongst staff. Our outside consultant we've used, or we've looked to see and researched information from other communities. At the end of the day, the intent is to keep the policy high level so that it can be flexible over time, but also given the fact that this policy is going to apply to an area that's very expansive when you think about our entire ETJ area. We believe that we would like to add clarity to the policy and the MUD review process. We'd also like to be able to influence development where possible, and we'd like to mitigate or avoid altogether any potential financial burdens on the city. So that's why we believe that MUDs should be encouraged to be in alignment with our city policy and technical requirements. And when I say technical requirements, it's more of our design standards and our technical manuals that we use when we're evaluating development projects. We want to promote fiscal sustainability so that there's no future financial burden on the residents of Denton. So again, this comes back into, if the city are to eventually annex any MUDs within our city limits so that we know what we're getting, we're concerned about any additional cost impacts associated with the city, but it's also taking consideration the emergency services provisions and costs that are absorbed by the city when we're having to respond. We also believe the purpose of the policy should establish a framework for discussions with the county for applications within the ETJ. We benefit from a good working relationship, at least at the staff level with the county staff there, but we feel like this policy could help them so that they know what our expectation is for development that's happening within the ETJ. Because at the end of the day, the land in the ETJ is what people refer to as the land out in the county, right? And then also we believe that the policy needs to establish a framework for development agreements if they are a condition of consent. And then lastly, we would like to establish a clear application process for the proposed MUDs. We propose that the application framework, if you will, will come forward to council at the same time we bring forth the updated policy. So when we bring this back to you later this summer or early fall, we will anticipate having two documents for you to review. One will be the policy itself that's been reworked, but the other would be then the application requirements or the framework associated with that as we be able to move forward. And we believe it's important to bring both of those items back to you because if we're able to move forward, at such point in time when we're able to move forward with adoption of this revised MUD policy, then we'll have the application framework already in place so we can start with the implementation immediately. So as it relates to the goals, so I'm going to walk you through there are 12 goals that have been identified associated with the policy and also included within your council deck or on the slides is a matrix summary. And so I'll eventually get to that. But what I want to do is really focus on these next three slides that outline the goals and explain why we believe they're important. And again, these are the areas where I'm asking you for your feedback and whether or not you believe these goals are correct for moving forward, or if there's something that needs to be modified, tweaked, or if we've missed the mark on something, let us know that as well. So the first one is to establish an equitable arrangement between the MUD and the city in order to influence development as possible. The key word in this phrase is an equitable arrangement. We realize that in order to encourage developers to be at the table entering into a conversation and negotiating with us on a development agreement, it does need to be an equitable arrangement. If we have all of the requirements stacked up really deep on the developer side, then in all likelihood at the end of the day, we know that they can basically skip over us and not get our consent and be able to go form through TCEQ. So again, if we can, you know, instead of those scales being tipped, if we can balance that a little bit more and make it more equitable, then we feel like we can have a better relationship moving forward to ensure better quality development. Also number two, we believe we need to establish clear guidelines with respect to the MUDs for the benefit of you all as decision makers, but also for staff and being able to evaluate and process them as well as for the MUDs so that they know what the expectation are. Again, this also parlay's into the ability for the county to also be able to understand what our expectations are for MUDs within the ETJ. Number three, we believe the MUDs should be developed in a manner generally consistent with the comprehensive plan. As you know, we spent quite a bit of time working on the Denton 2040 comprehensive plan, and so even though we have limited ability to regulate land development within the ETJ, if we have the ability to enter into the development agreement and partake in that negotiation, then we have the ability to identify key policies and provisions within the comprehensive plan that we can negotiate and use to be able to influence that development. Number four, we want to encourage alignment with the City of Denton's technical design standards, including but not limited to our road standards, our water and wastewater standards, especially if they're located within our CCUN, so that services can be provided to, but also then maintained for the MUD over time. We believe this is very important because eventually if these MUDs are to annex within the city, then at least we know that this development occurred in alignment with our technical design standards, so we eventually know what we're getting. Number five, we want to ensure that the MUD has adequate protective services, including fire, police, and ambulance services for the safety of the residents in the greater community. Again, as I mentioned earlier, when people are in need of stuff the most, when they're calling 911, we want to make sure that there is emergency services that are being provided and that effective and quality services are being met in that regard to be able to meet their need. Number six, we're interested in verifying the long-term fiscal sustainability of the MUD in order to protect the residents' investment and ensure that a financial burden is not placed on the residents of Denton. So again, this comes back to if we are, if these developments do eventually annex within our city limits and we're having to maintain the infrastructure associated with that, then we want to understand what we're receiving, but also from a long-term fiscal sustainability aspect, is we realize that residents who buy into these MUD developments themselves, they're making a significant financial investment in it as well. And so we want to make sure that the fiscal responsibility is there, that it is solidly set up from a financial perspective, because let's face it, if the development goes belly up, then they're gonna be contacting us and looking for us to be able to meet their needs and help offset any costs that they're having to absorb associated with that. Number seven, we want to encourage environmental stewardship of MUD lands and the provision of open space for the long-term sustainability of the city's ETJ and also for the enjoyment of the MUD residents. This also kind of goes back to our comprehensive plan. I know we had our preferred land preservation plan map that's included within that, but we see the value of open space associated with these developments and being incorporated. So if we have the ability to be able to influence good environmental stewardship of the properties that are located within the MUDs, regardless of what regulations that we may be looking to influence and be able to assert within these developments, that we're also trying to meet that goal of our community as provided for in the comprehensive plan. We also want to prepare for potential future annexation of a MUD located within ETJ1 to ensure that the recommendations of this policy are implemented to facilitate the technical and financial integration of the MUD into the city. So again, this just goes back to being able to better influence quality development within ETJ1 because we realize, if anything, those MUD developments within ETJ1 could be annexed into the city at some point in time in the future. May not be within the next three years, but if it's in 10 years and we're all sitting around here and having this conversation, we're wanting to ensure that hopefully we were able to influence better quality development. Number nine, for lands that are located within ETJ2, we want to ensure that the recommendations of the policy are implemented so that any possible negative side, offside impacts of the development are minimized and also that necessary services can be provided. And this goes back into as well as from the perspective of if the MUD development is forming within ETJ2, if they, for whatever reason, go belly up and they're not financially solvent, then we realize that that has a potential impact on our services being provided. But we're also concerned about what are the implications on the land surrounding it and how does that affect land development occurring in that area. Number 10, we're interested in establishing a framework for necessary communication regarding a MUD with Denton County to ensure necessary coordination between the city and the county takes place. And I already explained the significance of this item further and why we're recommending that be included. Number 11, we want to establish clear guidelines for the development agreement or for a development agreement between the MUD and the city. Should the city decide a development agreement is advantageous for us. And lastly, we added this one, should the city consider other alternative development financing tools instead of a MUD. We understand why developers are pursuing MUDs because of the ability to issue bonds and to be able to reimburse themselves. But there may be other development tools available from a financing standpoint that may be encouraged. Some of them are ones that we have not necessarily supported or advocated for here in the city of Denton or have provided that level of support. But nonetheless, we do recognize that those tools are out there and it may be appropriate that if it's development that we're interested in influencing that may be one of those tools or the more appropriate financing mechanism compared to the MUD tool. So with that, again, I'm not going to go through all these slides because it's just a complete summary of just what I've spent probably the last 10 minutes explaining, right? But we felt that this was helpful information for you all to see. So what we did in this matrix, we put the challenges on the left side that we've identified and then the goals that we'll be able to address those challenges. And we obviously truncated the statements associated with it, but wanted to provide that for your benefit so that you have that and also as our discussion occurs. So let's talk about next steps. So next steps is today we received direction from you on the purpose of the MUD policy and those 12 goals that I just laid out for you for your consideration. Again, interested in knowing, do you agree with our recommendations? Are there any adjustments that we need to make? Do you feel like we missed the mark completely on something that needs to be addressed? But ideally, we get that direction from you today and then we'll take that direction back and we'll start writing the actual updated policy and then also the application requirements and what we would anticipate that we would bring back both documents, the updated policy, but also the application framework and bring that back to council. In all likelihood, it would be late summer, early fall of this year and have that for your consideration. As we work through this, we may find from time to time we need to come back and touch base with you on certain items and I guess we'll beg for time on the work session agendas associated with that. But we know that this is a complex topic, right? And we want to make sure that we get this right because we want to set ourselves up for success and knowing that we have some limitations in our ability to be able to influence development within the ETJ. So now, back to those questions that I told you that was going to begin with the ends in mind. So the first question would be, do council concur with the mud policy purpose? And then secondly, do you concur with the mud policy goals that we've outlined? And then lastly, is there anything that you feel we have missed? So I'll leave it at that and I appreciate your time and attention. So thank you. Great. So thank you very much. And so I'll give people time to make their notes on questions, grab dinner. We do have a 630 meeting, so I want to be mindful of that. So you can grab food, bring it here. We'll start questions, but let's take 15 minutes or so to again process, make notes, grab a plate. So we'll be back 515 for questions and then we'll go to the and we'll get you the information. Thank you very much. 515. Welcome back to this meeting in Denton City Council. It is 515 and we are to the questions portion of our first work session. Questions for staff. Councilmember Davis. I very much appreciate the thought and consideration and staff experience that went into this framework that you've devised for us. I think it hits a lot of council priorities. It really takes the temperature of the council very well, I think, the things that are important to us, and I'm looking forward to the conversation about that. But I have kind of an overarching question. We are legislatively very over-barrel with these muds. You know, we're talking about kind of incentivizing developers to come to the table and to seek consent as opposed to just short-circuiting and go in the other route. And I'm wondering how onerous is that other process? So if we're kind of balancing what's going to bring them to the table and get them talking with us against their alternative, can we hear more about how that alternative works for them? Is it a longer timeline? Is it costing them more in engineering fees and that kind of stuff? Like, how onerous is that other process? And that helps us maybe frame how much we need to be willing to give on our side to bring them to the table. So I'll admit, I have not had to process a mud request through TCEQ and been through the other side of it or even from a staff's perspective. And so I'm going to look to MAC to maybe also provide some support on answering your question. My understanding at a high level is that if consent is not provided by the city, then there is a process in which the applicant has available to them through TCEQ that it's a longer process, somewhat more arduous process. MAC might be able to speak to that a little bit further, Scott, for that matter. And then also in terms of what is all required to be submitted to TCEQ, if that makes it more arduous for them, I don't know. From what I do know when talking with our consultant is that some of the documents that would be submitted to TCEQ would be items that we are interested in receiving as part of this discussion and negotiation for a development agreement. But beyond that, unfortunately, I can't provide you any greater insight. Yeah, and I'll go through it. I was giving them an opportunity to write down some notes. That's right. Thank you, Tina. The one benefit that they get from consent from the city is it really puts them on a short path through the TCEQ. It's a very quick process once they have the city consent to get that approval through TCEQ. If they don't and the city does not give consent, they have a longer process involved. That process allows the city potentially to go down and protest. They also have to come to the city before they can go file with the TCEQ and request that we provide water and sewer service. That takes another 120 days onto the process. So it's mostly time. It's going to be the primary delay in cost for them. They have to wait that 120 days after they request services from us. If we go to protest, potentially we get a challenge to say we don't think that it should be created because they don't need all those services. We already have those services there. We've talked with outside council on that and not a good history of success on that for cities making those arguments, but that's a viable argument that you can make potentially to at least slow that process further. After the TCEQ grants it, there's also an appeal which is to district court. So you could prolong the process longer through filing a lawsuit potentially even after the TCEQ makes their decision. So yeah, there might be additional standards. The TCEQ may ask them for additional requirements as far as how are they going to provide sewer and water service in absence of the city doing it. There's a higher standard that they may have to go through, and that's why they initially come to us. It makes it a lot easier if the city just gives consent. It doesn't make it impossible. It just adds some extra cost, not terribly extra cost, but it's going to be also just the delay in time is really what's going to be the big cost for them. If I could add to that, I think to your point, we don't have a lot of leverage, right? We don't have too many points of leverage. I think the time that it takes to go through that process is one. Public safety commitments is one. That takes a regional approach. That takes us working with other cities, working with county on a unified approach. That's a piece that we can have because we're going to have to have those agreements. I think a third piece that is up for consideration and really is that policy-level discussion, it was the last bullet point on Tina's list there that was referenced, is do we want to take other approaches as these folks come in, especially on the ETJ near the city limits? We're going to be coming back with TURs and PID policies and things like that. One example of that could be a mud that's coming in near city limits. Do we want to have a conversation with them of annexing in and giving them a PID to pay for their infrastructure? As at the beginning of that presentation, Tina went through the reasons why they would want to have a mud. Some of them are not have the same requirements on development, but a big piece of it obviously is paying for the infrastructure they're going to need. As a council, as a city, are we open to annexing a development in like this so that we have more control but letting them have that financing mechanism of a PID? We're going to have future conversations on PIDs down the road, but I think all those play together. We have limited leverage, but there are pieces that I think the policy can help us get to. >> Can I follow up, Mayor? >> Yes. >> Kind of a little extra direction on that last part that you -- I know this is a conversation we're going to continue to have at another time, but I'm extremely skeptical about any kind of additional public financing mechanism for residential development. What we're talking about is leverage. What we're talking about is the give and take of these negotiations and what gets us the quality streets and the quality pipes and the infrastructure that we need to see when we eventually annex them 20 or 30 years down the road because that's what happens. But just as we go into that, I don't know what the direction for the rest of council would be, but we would -- I think we would need to get something pretty outstanding in the bargain to enter into for these smaller, non-master planned projects. We really have to have something spectacular to do any kind of creative public financing. >> Okay. Anyone else? Councilmember Burke. >> I was just going to read it. I'm glad it turned on. I see there where you have encouragement to be in alignment with the city policy and technical requirements. What does that look like? Is this something that you're sitting down per group to discuss and they have it, you know, their own way of doing things? Or is this going to be like straight up line? Are we adding more to this policy to put some standards in there? How does that work? >> So what this would be is that if we have a mud that is wanting to form within our ETJ, that how they're going about their development, whether it's land use, if they're incorporating open space associated with it, how they're building their infrastructure, that that is in better alignment with any policies that we have adopted. And so -- but also more importantly, our technical requirements. When we say technical requirements, what we're talking about is all of our construction standards and our design manuals. So as you're well aware of, you know, when development happens here in the city of Denton, they submit civil engineering plans to us. And so there's a myriad of technical documents or standards, construction standards that we review the development against. And so with this, we're trying to get the muds to have infrastructure and development that is more in alignment with requirements that are in our Denton development code, but then also our construction standard documents that we review projects. So hopefully that helps address your question. >> And additionally, I think Scott McDonald, director of development services, the other piece would be the proximity to the city limits and the reality of whether that may be incorporated into the city at some point in time or whether it may not. So what is it that we may inherit, what may become future Denton residents, and then any opportunity that we have where it is the city nor the county have any ability to enforce building codes so all structures built within the county don't necessarily have to follow those same standards. So any time that we can incorporate any of those pieces and, yes, it would be dependent upon the location, the size, and what they're proposing to build and how they're proposing to build it. >> Thank you. And so what I was going towards was the standards. I appreciate you all looking at those standards and, you know, shoring them up to help with the encouragement of knowing that they have their own opportunities to kind of play it the way that they want it to. So the, you know, obvious good thing here is that now there's something to go directly to each and every time and then start working from there with each one of them based on if they're in one or two. Got it. Thank you. >> Anyone else? >> Thank you. So I'm really glad to see this focus on kind of finding the sweet spot where we're asking developers for as much as we can without scaring them off from the process of getting consent from the city. And two questions. Does pursuing consent from the city necessarily involve a developer agreement? >> No. Because they can pursue consent from us and then we can choose to grant it or not without the development agreement. The reason why we're advocating and supporting the development agreement is because we think there's significant benefit there to us, especially from the longer term. Because we're able to negotiate through that agreement that you will do X, Y, and Z and they're saying yes, we agree with doing X, Y, and Z. >> Thank you for that clarification. Yeah. So anything that we can do to encourage more developers to enter into those types of agreements, I'd love to see. I'm not super familiar with developer agreements. Can you give us maybe some examples of the types of provisions that might be included in that type of agreement? >> So provisions that could be included would be constructing roads, other infrastructure in accordance with whatever standards that we have in place. Because keep in mind we have otherwise they may not be. We could require them to comply with the international building code. Because again, if it's development out in the county, they're not necessarily having to comply to. So it could be that they agree to construct certain infrastructure and make improvements to certain roadways associated with it that otherwise they may not be required to do so. It could be the provision of paying impact fees or potentially park open space fees if that's an allowed option under the development agreement as it relates to MUDs. So it allows us to be able to lay out within that agreement, you know, the developer agrees to do X, Y, and Z. Development agreements also can include provisions in it that the city agrees to provide to. So, for example, if the agreement requires the developer to construct a fire station, then there may be a provision in there that says upon receipt of the fire station, the city agrees to have it operational to this level within a certain time frame. So it can go both ways. But it lays out, you know, whatever those items are. And then it's a contractual arrangement and it's agreed to by both parties. Okay. Thank you for that. And presumably the development agreement would come before council and be approved by council. Okay. Thank you for that as well. And as far as my direction, I definitely agree with the draft policy purposes and goals. Thank you. Okay. Mayor Patel. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I'm going to take where you've heard some of the conversation and just for the sake of argument, ask you to play devil's advocate all the way out to the other end, we've heard that, you know, getting nothing they're going to go through legislative or TCEQ. And so the real incentive seems like it's time delay equals money kind of argument. And so what if we, what are the, you know, I think it's clear what the upsides are, consistency with development policy and in future annexing. I mean, that's, that's really clear that it's going to just be consistent with Denton. So if we annex them, boom, it's just easier on us. The update costs are lower. But, but what if we decided as a matter of policy to have a, you know, hard border fringe, you know what, if you don't want to play with us, we don't want to play with you. You know, we're going to have a crud, a mud crust and that's kind of gross. But, but what if we say, okay, you know, if you want to play with us, then you have to come to the table with us. What is the, what is the disadvantage of, of, of, you know, having that more stiff arm policy for long run, because then we're not, we were saying, no, we're, we're not going to, there's not going to be any future long-term costs because we're not taking you. So how does that play out if we go all the way full devil's advocate on that? So to me, they have the ability to call our bluff, right? Because they can still go through the TCEQ or through the legislature and get formed at our, without our, without our consent. And to me, that's the key thing is that, you know, ideally we want them to come request consent so we can negotiate in that development agreement. But at the end of the day, they don't have to. And so they can still, they still have a process available to them to be able to still form without our, without us being able to significantly influence it in their formation. So to me it's, they can, you know, they can say, okay, city, we hear you, but, you know, they can turn their nose up at us and walk away and go form. But I mean, it's. And the reality is, is that they have the ability to build whatever size lot, whatever width, whatever, however it is they choose to make it look, feel, or act. And we'll just deal with whatever that fallout is of those residents still using our road, our roadway network, they may or may not have our water sewer. They'll use, utilize our, our emergency services one way or the other, whether or not it's a primary county or a primary, another municipality providing fire service and EMS, will still provide backup service, will still, will still be introduced as part of that. But it really would be that that fringe or that hard block, that mud crust, would ultimately then just in turn be that it'll be a community that would be on our periphery or our gateway and that's what it is. We'd have zero say. No, and I'm not really arguing for that, but we need to know what the context of sort of what the gain is beyond just making it easier, that's, that's clear. So I'll give you one example of, right now we spend an increasing amount of time doing some runs down to Crum and Sanger from our fire department. One day we took an engine out of service and it sat at the fire station in Sanger for a period of time, which reduces our ability to serve us. That's number one. Number two, the other cities surrounding us that may be drawing in a mud does not, they do not have the same standards we have for the development of a fire station or a police substation such as that. And I made it very clear when I had a meeting with our partners in other cities, I'm not willing to accept a Morton building fire station for the city of Denton. That is not our standard. And so we need to be in the driver's seat when it comes to this. So we can set those specific standards so that when and if they decide to annex in, in 20, 25 years, our police, our fire emergency services have the right stations and equipment and anything else that they're providing to the standards that we're used to, roads, because right now county doesn't do curb and gutter. So that we can make sure we're continuing that quality and not accepting things that are not going to work for the city of Denton. And that to me is the cusp of it. And, and so I had this conversation with Sanger, with Crum, with Ponder, with Justin and said, we have to figure this out. We're going to council, but we have to figure this out and we have to figure out what's the ETJ one and two or if we call it whatever we're going to call it, because at some point we're not going to be able to back you up if we continue with where we're headed and the growth in the city of Denton. But also, and I made it very clear and I don't, didn't mean to hurt anybody's feelings, our expectations and standards for building our facilities for our staff are higher than anyone else around us. And we do not want to lower the bar or even have a developer lower the bar so that we end up taking it and it's less than desirable. And if I go back to maybe the first part of the question is we have no say and they will build and, and MUDs are a, a very common tool that are being used throughout the state of Texas, not just here, but just the sheer number that we're seeing in the petitions for MUDs. It is that we want an opportunity to have a seat at the table just so we can have some influence. Bottom line, if we say no, then they'll just go through the legislative process and whatever time frame that takes and whatever money it costs them. They're going to still continue to do because, again, they're ending up with large tracts. Most of these, and I don't know that I can tell you the smallest MUD that we've seen, but I will tell you the vast majority of them are a thousand homes or more, each, each of the MUDs. So they're significant in the impact or the future impact to our community as a whole is, is very dramatic. So any influence we can have and anything that we can do is what we're, is what we're suggesting or recommending. So, so to unflip, to follow that up real quick, to unflip out of devil's advocate mode and back to questions about, you know, sort of more supportive. The, if you have, what typically for these kinds of MUDs, when, when we, when we do go to update them, part of the reason they're a MUD is, and didn't come to us and buy and try to get annexed in is it's cheaper. They're, they're passing on some cost to the developer or to the resident or wherever it's, they're saving money along the way. And at some point we have update costs to make them match. And I understand that the, the goal is to minimize that Delta, but at some level we have Delta. So like the county wants bar ditches and we want storm drains. And so what does it typically cost us to do that kind of update when we, when we pull in a MUD and make it an annex it is, I mean, I don't have a feel for the kinds of costs. Oh, I, that, that would be astronomical if we had to go in and put storm water and rebuild roadways. Will the county let them do storm drains in, in a, in a, if they come to the table with this? And that was the piece where she was, where she was going into our, our relationship with the county as we talked through this. And then again, in the developer's agreement, how it is that they're going to design in the county, quite honestly would prefer that any of those properties are annexed into the city. So part of those developer agreements would be that they would annex and we'd get that tax revenue at some point in time. And, but again, it's, it's going through the process. The county has very limited authority. And so they rely on us where it is that we can provide any enforcement of any rules or better the development. They're, they're fully supportive. So yes. Again, our advantage is their advantage. And the last, the last section of my question is, is, is to that sort of inter-local relationship. One of the things I didn't see a lot of language in the, in the operating policy was our relationship to other cities. Like, you know, I mean, you know, crumb is completely surrounded by our ETJ. Sanger is seven, eight surrounded, you know, the, all the surrounding communities. It seemed, I didn't see a lot in that draft policy that I know we're going to work on, but I did, that seemed like a whole of what is our, I think we covered language with the county and you just described some of that language with the county, but it seemed like we had, I mean, I know we want to be friendly neighbors, but to what extent does their, their ETJ policy and our ETJ, ETJ policy get into conflict? I mean, I know that's going to depend on their council versus our council and things like that, but maybe update me on, on how we're getting along with our border cities. And I, and I don't want to speak for, for Sarah, but I'm going to anyhow. So I think, I think the first step in what we're doing is, is really trying to craft a policy and this is for our ETJ. So any of our neighboring communities and their ETJs will have their own sets of, but I will say that our relationship with the county and as we go through this, and I think Sarah took kind of that first step of meeting with all of the fire services from the various communities that will continue to advance our relationships. We've met with some of our surrounding communities. We have just been so busy with really trying to get the foundation of our work done, which is a development code, the comprehensive plan, our criteria manuals, our specifications and standards that we've, we've not had the ability nor the staffing to be able to do truly the planning work of what you're suggesting. And I think some of those next phases may be what the path that Sarah started of going down that road. - That's exactly right. I think here's the thing, as I began to have meetings with the county and started talking with the mayor of Crum and others, I realized that we were not having conversations that are so important to have. This, we're all going to be grown and completely built out and we're all going to go, what happened? Who's doing what, when and where and how? What fire service are they using? It's, it's a mess. So I didn't just talk to the staff. I asked the mayor or their administrator to come to a meeting. We hosted here with our neighboring cities and talked to them about, we have got to coordinate everything from our trail system to our roadway systems to who is doing emergency services and what is your plans for emergency services. The county was at the table with us and helping. So now we've begun the discussions, but we said, we're going to our council first to talk about mud policies. And then we need to talk to you more about it because the county does their portion, we do our portion. And then we kind of picket each other with Crum and others when it comes to fire service and things. And we really need to establish some boundaries and say, who's going to do what? Because we are stepping on each other to be real frank with you. So the relationship is great, but we have to, we have to have these discussions. But before we go out of our realm of responsibility here, I need it from this council to tell me, what do you want in the way of a mud? Do you want an E.T.J., want an E.T.J. too, or do you want it to be just an E.T.J.? Do we want to draw some lines? Where do we want to extend our fire service? That's why we want to come back with a recommended updated policy for municipal utility districts so that when we sit down with our partners, we can then begin to have those discussions about the lines being drawn, the services we're going to provide, who's going to overlap, because we're already looking at Fire Station 11. Well, then to just close my section out, then my direction is to move ahead with staff recommendations. But I would, I would caution us to pay particular attention to our surrounding communities and get that nailed down. We will commit to that from at least development services. We certainly plan to. All right. Any other? Councilmember Watts? I know I'm looking at the clock and it says double zero, so I'll try to make it quick. Basically, this is just, I mean, these are great comments. I mean, Councilmember McGuire's question about consent and development agreements, I don't know why we would ever consent without it having to include a development agreement. So this is just basically a big negotiation. That's all it is. And it's going to be very difficult to craft policy if we don't have identified our interests, the mud developer's interests as we see them. What's their baton? What's their best alternative to a negotiated agreement? What are they going to have to go through? What are our reservation points? What are our non-negotiables? I mean, and I think that's what Mayor Pro Tem was talking about. I don't know so much of his devil's advocate. It's just like, hey, there comes a point where you get to know and you really can't get to yes until somebody gets to no. So I think for me, the policy directions are fine. I think it's the detail part because I don't think we're going to be able to craft a really fine tuned policy without actually having an understanding of the details of how do we negotiate with these people? What are our -- you know, what's our starting point? What's our reservation point? What's our aspiration point? What's our bargaining zone? And until we do that, these will be sort of kind of conceptual, high level, but I think what y'all are needing is to some degree direction of specific deal points that say this is where we'll go. We'll go no further. How many of the list that you put on there of the MUDs, are those all already created, the list that you put up there? >> No. So these are what we've put forth, what we're recommending to be the framework for developing the policy so that we can work on more of the meat and the more of the details to bring that back. So we will bring back to a document to you that's more fleshed out with more meat on the bones. >> You put a list of names of different MUDs. >> Oh, the MUDs, yes. >> Yeah, are those ones that are already established or are they being -- are they in the process? >> They're in the process. >> The eight -- they're in a variety of different probably status levels. I know some have requested consent. Some have -- >> The four -- >> Right, the four have. >> And the balance, not yet. >> Okay. So what you're saying is these down at the bottom haven't "requested consent." So can we grant consent and still incorporate things that you would want in a development agreement? Or do we need the development agreement to be inextricably linked with the consent request or the consent granting? >> To this point, we've usually required the development agreement when we gave consent. I think there was one that did not. It just had some conditions in the consent that spoke to what the council wanted. But the others were all involving development agreements as -- basically as attached to the consent for approval. >> Right. Okay. All right. Yeah. Those are some of my comments. And I mean, that's -- I'm sort of a little bit down on the ground while we're up here. But I think the policy -- I think the policy recommendations or the suggestions from staff are great. It's just we're going to have to incorporate really to make a decision those sort of technical kind of specific -- you know, what we will do and what we won't do. >> Right. And I think that's where 11 will help. >> Yeah. >> When we flush that out. >> Okay. Anyone else? Councilmember McGee. >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So this body was tasked with looking at the purpose and the goals. I'm a little unclear. I understand that the city has a little bit more say in ETJ1 rather than ETJ2. I'm a little unclear on the difference in the goals, though, between 1 and 2. >> Well, and so -- >> 8 and 9 here are the draft goals. >> So -- and these apply to the -- these apply to the entire ETJ area. There have been like 8 and 9 were a little more specific to ETJ1 and ETJ2. But if you're generally in agreement with the sentences or the statements that are on the screen, then we will use those to then further elaborate on what is more important for ETJ1 and ETJ2. So does that help address your question? >> Yeah, okay. All right. >> This is basically the bones of where we're starting point. And we'll come back and put more meat on the bones to be able to help address more of the specificity. Because on some of these items, we may find that there's a little more relevancy to the entire ETJ, or some of it may be more specific to ETJ1 or ETJ2. But we needed a starting point, a kickoff, if you will, with council to see are you generally in agreement what we've identified as what the goals of the policy should be. Because we did not want to spend a lot of time and effort on drafting the policy document for you all to tell us, no, we don't like that. Or you went the wrong direction. And so that's why we're having this conversation. So to help put more detail in it later. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Anyone else? Councilman Davis. >> Thank you, Mayor. I'll be brief. I want to add a couple of things just for us to be thinking about that I haven't heard mentioned. But first I'll also say to follow on to that, ETJ1 roughly coincides with our certificate of convenience and necessity, where if somebody wants utility services and will pay for the pipes, then we have -- it's our job, you know, legislatively we have to provide those services if we can come to an agreement about who's going to pay for it and how it's going to get there. ETJ2 is outside where we've got to run water and sewer if they're willing to pay for it. So it's just a very different dynamic to the negotiation into how we treat those two different parts of the ETJ. The two things I'd like us to kind of keep in mind are the cautionary tale of Providence Village and it's over on the other side of the green belt. It's not something necessarily was part of our planning process when they came up. But two things to notice about. I'm going to annoy some of my friends over either formerly from Providence Village or who live there now, the quality of a home in Providence Village is very different than the quality of a home in even the next mud over. And the quality of the roads in Providence Village very different than the quality of the roads in even the next mud over or certainly in one of the incorporated cities. But what happened in Providence Village is they ended up incorporating their mud. They -- the alderman or the board of the mud got together, they had a ballot initiative and they incorporated. So there's now the city or the town of Providence Village. And one of these big muds, if they get tired and not get in the water, I mean, think of it like the not quite so dire version of a green tree estates. If things are not good in that mud, they could go through the process and it's not as onerous as you might think for folks who are motivated to do that. So it really behooves us on a lot of levels to at least bring them to the table, to at least have the conversation because instead of a mud crust, we could end up with a Harris County satellite towns crust or an Austin satellite towns or Dallas satellite towns. And that just gets -- that makes the process that Sarah is talking about with public safety and roads and everything even more onerous. Now you've got all these different people at the table. The other thing to think about is that we as a council right now are -- we're not exactly anti-annexation, but it is not a priority for this council, it doesn't seem, to be aggressively annexing more territory into -- I said territory, that sounds like a risk game -- more land into the city. It's just as we do the math to balance the tax base versus the infrastructure, it's not something we're all that excited about. At previous times, other councils have been more aggressive about annexing. As we sit and set policy about what is going on in our ETJ, we may have in mind, well, gosh, we're not very interested in annexing these subdivisions, these low quality subdivisions that are going to pop up, and another council may see it differently. They may not -- they may see the math differently on infrastructure and repairing and maintaining all the lower quality stuff out there versus the tax base that's going to come from it. It's going to cost more than the tax base is going to pay for. We get that now, that's our view now, but it could be very different in 20 years. And we could be sitting there with very low quality developments annexed into the city, and the next thing you know, it's why don't I have sidewalks? Why don't I have curbs? Why are my streets cracking everywhere? Why are my water mains breaking all the time? And it's on our citizens to fix those things. So anything we can do to bring them to the table, anything within reason to bring them to the table, I think there's some really good reasons to do that. Okay. Anyone else? I'll pick up where you left off. I think what comes to mind is Castle Hills, right? They end up saving tax dollars and getting better service by getting annexed into Louisville due to the ancillary fees they had, but that was like a 10-year, 20-year in the making thing. So that was interesting to me, though, the cost and kind of what's required to make that a win coming into the city. So direction for staff for me, I think I like the overall, it's a little bit of everything. I like the overall plan, but I also pick up where Councilmember Watts left off from a detailed next steps perspective. For me, I think that's one kind of listing, like we did with the economic development plan, here's kind of where we can get comfortable with entertaining, or here's some deal points where it's just kind of let's jump off that conversation and also kind of maybe entice them. So maybe we're a little under our pain threshold, but say, for example, here's where we can trade off on land space. If you're willing to conserve this much land, we're willing to talk to you. And so at least someone knows going in, they can look at our, that's my hope is that they look at the document and they can make a decision early and often if they're willing to engage with us or not, or you know, kind of whatever we can demonstrate that we're willing to talk to them. Same thing with emergency services. I think we have an understanding because we've negotiated those things to the West. We have those rates. Let's share those in that document to say here's our, here's where we are. It's going to be modified, but here's where we are today. If you want us to cover it. And I really think we need something. I don't know the process very well, but there's, there needs to be some kind of documentation early because I think council member Davis is exactly right. And we, we see those people doing that. So it's, it's one developer and then it becomes 300 households, 200 households, and now they're banging on it. I think there needs to be something documented early at least to give a future council an opportunity to say, Hey, we talked to them about, we're not annexing if you do this. Right. And so whatever we can get that in the record, if we can publish that in the paper, if we can put that in their documents or whenever they have meetings, just regularly kind of submit to say, Hey, we're not annexing you and nor anyone. And so now they're, maybe they have problems selling their property. Maybe they have trouble getting interest, but if we communicate that early and often, I think that behooves future councils to beat back that, that gamesmanship. And then, so really that's the communication things. And then I'd like to see, and you may have already sent this, and if you did just tell me where to find it. Kind of a issues. I've heard of the issues with the county versus the city. Hey, I talked to the city. I talked to the county. They're kind of that limbo. I'd love to see kind of that, how this checks off some of those boxes. Like here's the complaints we've had scenarios and here's where that's addressed in this document. If you have that kind of lined out in some kind of spreadsheet, that'd be great. Or just kind of point me to it and I'll take a look at that. And then I'd like to understand, the annex process has changed, right? And so I know it's more cumbersome. And so if we can just get a refresher on that, because I know they almost have to be willing to come in. So just want to understand that better, because that'll help me kind of guide decisions. And then do we have kind of a standard base level? I know someone talked about it, but a kind of a base level of construction that is easier for us to bring up to our standards. For example, a bar ditch constructed this way makes it easier to go back to curb and gutter. Is there, is there kind of a base level requirement? I was going to say, we have to come back with that information and work with Becky's team on that. Yeah. I think just for me, that would be interesting to understand. If there's some level of, hey, if you get us just this close, we can then, you know, if we do have to annex you, we're halfway there, a quarter of the way there, it makes it function for us. And then in conjunction with that, I really would push, I'd really want this to be a deal point, the infrastructure inspection. I mean, if we can have some kind of negotiation that just pivots on that alone, right? So at least we have when 30 years from now, when someone's considering it, if we have well-documented, hey, they only dug this deep, they only packed it this well, you know, visibility in the future, we can say, hey, you know, you know, when those negotiations come, we know, you know, hey, this is a nightmare and it's going to cost you more. You know, so those. How to get those as built. Yeah. It's kind of like, just take the list of everything we found under Bonnie Bray and scripture and put that in there, coax cable, telephone line. Yeah. Yeah. Just use that as a list. So, okay. Thank you, sir. Yeah. Very good. Thank you very much. Great presentation. Thank you. Okay. That concludes a takes us to be, which is ID two, two, six, seven, nine. And this is going to be an overview. So I'd ask that we kind of look at, look at this, understand it's a, it's kind of point in time update, but not much to do here at this point. Just want to bring it back. And then also we have a six 30 start time. So want to be conscious of that. But really general update. If you have questions, concerns, obviously staff will take those, but there's nothing, there's no real action on this item. Just staff felt it important because of the priority to bring back an update as they work through it. And so this is just kind of an in between, um, point update. Good evening now, uh, presentation of transportation planning. Thank you. Mr. Mayor for that introduction. This is an update by the way. Thank you. I like it. Appreciate it. Um, this is an update of vision zero back and, um, late last year we had said that we would come back in front of council and present what we're doing with vision zero and what's happening before we directly jump into vision zero and want to touch base on the things and the activities that we're currently working on. One of the questions that we received, um, today, um, was related to, okay, if vision zero is going to take us this long, what are we doing in the interim? And I want to make sure that we are, we, um, show what we're doing in the interim and we're working on a lot of these things. Um, here's a list of things that we're working on. Citywide speed study. Uh, it's an ongoing thing. Uh, most likely by fall this year, we'll have all the data, all the information, start working on, um, how do we look at safer speeds on some of these streets? Uh, we are already, we've applied for two rounds of highway safety improvement program funds from text dot. We've received a lot of, uh, grant funding to fix some of the hotspots which have high density traffic collisions. We are trying to address them. We're, we're trying to improve them using text dot funds. So that's an ongoing, uh, process. Some, some of the intersections are already under construction, so we are moving forward. Um, we're doing a signal re-timing thing that is going to help, uh, improve, uh, some of the safety at the intersections. And last but not least, really critical item where, um, developers and, and our criteria manual that developers use is getting updated. We are actually implementing some of these, uh, uh, things like context sensitive design and safer speed design into the, in the, into our annual update for the criteria manual. Next slide. Uh, background on actual Vision Zero. It is, um, something that a priority was established in back a couple months ago in March. We went through the mobility plan update. You can see on the right side. Uh, here are the goals, um, objectives and strategies that we adopted as part of the mobility plan. Uh, the, most of the cities when they do Vision Zero, they have this step as part of that plan. So we're already a little bit ahead. We're already, um, you know, taking some of these steps to implement and move forward with the plan. We did take a phased approach in a couple of slides. I'll mention why we went to the, this phased approach. We are, uh, working on phase one right now, which is the assessment. Then we'll, uh, develop a Vision Zero plan and then finally, uh, we'll have the implementation and monitoring phase, uh, of that particular plan. So as I mentioned in, in the assessment phase, uh, we have initiated, we've had a consultant on board, um, who is helping us through the assessment phase. We recently had, um, a week ago, last Monday, we had a meeting with stakeholders, not just internal, but external stakeholders within the city. Uh, and we had a good attendance, about 30 people attended to understand and participate in Vision Zero. So just before I jumped directly into the update, um, um, for some of you that may not know what Vision Zero is, it's an idea that was started, uh, back in 1997, um, in Sweden and slowly it spread across the world. A lot of, a lot of cities in, in US are actually adopting this. Uh, it is a, from a ethical standpoint, there shouldn't be any, uh, debts or long-term injuries associated with traffic collision. That's the basic idea. We're moving from a traditional approach of, uh, traffic debts are inevitable to a Vision Zero approach where we can prevent them. And as you can see, it's an interdisciplinary, multilevel, uh, approach to address safety on the bottom. It is not just fixing our transportation infrastructure. There's a lot of layers to it where we have to address some of the behavioral issues, not with just the drivers, but the, all types of users, pedestrians, bicyclists. We have to address some policies and law and enforcement. We have to look at vehicle performance and safety features. And then last but not least, when an accident happens, we have to look at how, what kind of emergency medical care response, what was the triage, what was our, um, response to such an incident. So those are the different layers that we're looking at when we talk about Vision Zero. So why did we do the assessment? Um, the, the reason is we have a lot of cities in the U.S. We're trying to follow them. And as they move forward, they've adopted ordinances and they've adopted, uh, or prepared some of the plans. And what has happened is they've directly jumped into preparing the plan without understanding their weaknesses, without understanding what issues they have. They've directly adopted some of the Vision Zero stuff. What has happened since then? Because it's business as usual, a lot of cities are seeing, um, a increase or, uh, no decrease in, in traffic deaths, but most, a lot of them are seeing an increase in traffic deaths. So that's something that we looked at it and we said, we need to step back. We need to think about, have a better feeling and understanding before we jump into a document, before we jump into a plan, before we jump in an ordinance. It's easy to adopt some of these plans and ordinances, but is, are we ready? What stage, uh, stage are we and what level are we? And that's the assessment that we're doing. So what's entailed in the assessment? We are collaborating with internal city staff, uh, between all departments. A lot of departments are involved, as you've noticed, the different layers and a lot of external stakeholders. We have the county at the table. We have COG. We have, uh, partners, local partners, the two universities, Denton ISD. We have a lot of external, uh, stakeholders involved and we've, we've gotten them to the table. We're, um, asking them the questions. We're looking at what, what kind of opportunities do we have here and what kind of strengths we have here and how can we build upon that to get to that, uh, closer to that zero goal? And then, uh, last but not least, we're going to assess what challenges are preventing us from getting there. As a city, are we doing good on the policy side and not so good on, in certain other aspects? We're going to look at all of that and that will help us, uh, create a better Vision Zero document when we get into the plan phase. So this is, uh, phase two, which is the actual Vision Zero plan. It is an in-depth action plan and I'll get to an example in the next slide, show you quickly of what elements will be involved in the Vision Zero plan, but it's an action document and it pretty much revolves around the core elements. If you look at the core elements, the areas are leadership and commitment, which goes all the way from the elected officials down to staff level who's implementing that, um, safe roads and safe speeds. And I, as I alluded to, we are actually doing a portion of this already. We've started looking at some of these, uh, context-sensitive speeds and appropriate, uh, complete streets and so on and so forth. And then data, data-driven approach, transparency and accountability. One of the things that is key to this is understanding, uh, are we monitoring the stuff that we said we implemented? So if we're not monitoring, it's very difficult to do those data-driven, um, approaches. So that's one of the key components of the Vision Zero plan. Here's a quick example of how it would look. On the, uh, left we have an example that shows the list of items, the, uh, uh, the department, the lead department, the supporting department, what the goal is, what the objective is. On, on a right there is a different kind of, uh, way of looking at it. They also have a priority. They also have a timeline associated. So we are going to look at all the plans that are out there and then create the best fit for, for the city of Denver when we get into this phase two. And then last slide here, uh, next steps, where are we going? We are currently working on phase one. As I said, we're going to wrap that up towards the end of the year. And based on that assessment, we will start working on Vision Zero plan early next year, um, possibly getting to adoption in 2024. And then from 2024, once it's adopted, we'll start implementing and monitoring. I do want to leave with one last, uh, thought that this Vision Zero plan is currently not funded. We're trying to get it funded through the budget process. So I want to make sure that, um, you all are aware that it's coming through a budget process and getting that approved. So this timeline actually depends on that. And then the next step is that implementation phase. Uh, we definitely want to have some kind of support or, uh, some kind of backing to have that annual funding available to start implementing some of the pieces of the plan once it's adopted. With that, I will go to questions. Great questions for staff. Mayor Patu. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, so, so in, in regarding the, the timeline in a little bit, we talked about in the hall, can, um, can you let us know what steps of the parts that you're still doing right now, that you're implementing right now, that you're not going to stop, that, that we can keep going, that we'll not interfere with future Vision Zero planning, that you don't think will cause you to, you know, pull back and have to change to a radically different direction. Some of the steps that we're already taking are just common sense that all cities will do, that will no, no matter how our Vision Zero plan ends up, we'll still be doing those. Can you give us a feel for, because, uh, you know, as I said in the hall, the, the two-and-a-half-year timeline makes me blanch. Um, and I know that it's not a, it's not a nothing for two-and-a-half years, but, uh, you, maybe you could update us a little more about the kinds of things you think will, will be part of a future Vision Zero. So yes, so I do want to highlight, that's why I pulled up a couple of slides back. This centerpiece, which is, uh, designing our transportation infrastructure itself, we are really focused on complete streets. All our, uh, criteria manuals have been updated to include that. I think Nathan has done a fantastic job to pull in a lot of that complete street element into the criteria manual. Last year and this year, we're doing the same thing. Um, also context-sensitive designs and speeds. We are going through the speed study currently that will inform us and that will create the next level of how do we start implementing some of the improvements or changes that we want to see as far as these corridors are concerned, the speeds on these corridors. So yes, we are working on this core piece. There are other pieces that we're working on the side, so responsive hotspots planning, that is something, the heat map that you, uh, you probably are aware of that. Uh, we are looking at those hotspots and applying to TechStat to get some of those hotspots rectified. So those ongoing efforts will still continue. And as we create a plan, we'll continue documenting and pulling some of the information in there. I guess Nathan wants to add. Yeah. Uh, Nathan George, Capital Projects Engineering. Uh, so a couple observations that I, I want to share just because I'm working on the speed study and I think it's important to acknowledge that as we work through these processes, we identify new opportunities or new data and it starts to, to alter the way we approach projects. Uh, one of the takeaways that I've, uh, you know, we're in the data collection phase. I'm trying to get a lot of data so I can make informed decisions. And one of the point that you alluded to in your email questions this morning is about hotspot analysis. Like where are crashes occurring? Where are we seeing severe and fatal injuries? And how do we address that? One of the points that I identified going through that process was that we have some data collection issues. Uh, creating those maps is going to be a little bit challenging because we're not getting location data consistently in all of our police reporting. About 10% of our data is, is completely empty. So I can't create a map or identify the location of where that crash occurred. So that's, you know, working through this process and the reason that it takes time is we identify those shortcomings and maybe current practice. We have those conversations. How can we make process improvements? How can that, we improve the data as we're working through this process and we get there in, in, you know, two years, say it takes that long. We've hopefully closed some of those gaps and improved our processes as an outcome of this assessment and then developing the plan itself. So that's just one specific example I can point to that hopefully, you know, we're, we're actively having conversations with police. We're hopefully going to start working on getting more consistent data and making sure that we have a clear understanding of where some of these challenges occur because as engineers or as the folks who are, you know, we're trying to target our investments and our changes on the street, we need to understand where this crash has occurred. So we're going to the right location and that's currently a challenge. Thank you. Okay. Any other questions? Councillor McGuire? Just I guess a little bit of, of direction. First of all, I, I, I really appreciate that, that there's a focus on, on getting real results, not just throwing a policy out there and saying, okay, we passed a vision zero policy. The goal here is, is to actually decrease the number of deaths, not to just be able to say that we have it on paper. I appreciate that you're taking a multifaceted approach to this because of course it's a multifaceted issue. I do, I feel like, and, and please, you know, if, if you have thoughts on this, let me know, but I, I feel like roadway design is the area that we have the most control over and has the most potential to prevent fatal and serious collisions. So, I mean, you mentioned, you know, that, that we're really moving toward a more complete streets kind of philosophy and the transportation criteria manual has been updated to reflect that. Can you talk a little bit about other roadway design elements that can promote slower speeds, things like, you know, curb bump outs, narrow, narrower lanes? Are, are there conversations about those kinds of, including those kinds of things in the transportation criteria manual? Yeah. I mean, yes, we do have that. We have, we've gone down with the, with the lanes we've gone down from 12 feet wide to 11 feet in all our requirements. Yes, we are, I'll give you an example. We're working with a development, one of the parcels in Hunter Ranch and they have a roadway that is secondary arterial and we're working with them. How can we add elements that are landscape related, that are more of sidewalk or more of a bike path or something like that on the side as opposed to creating a fully wide street and having all four lanes of divided highway in the middle. The context is really important because they're bringing the context. They, they have an idea of how the retail or commercial and the multifamily is going to laid out and how that plays into the actual design of the roadway. So it's not just one element, it's the whole planning system that we have to plan it around. It's, if we're designing a roadway in the middle of nowhere, that doesn't provide any context that will be designed as a regular roadway that serves. But yes, there are other elements like a bump out or reducing crossing distance for pedestrians by providing that extra area like protected intersections and so on, so forth. Yes, we're working, looking at all of that. I think some of the elements are raised intersections that some of the developers are coming in with raised intersections, raised crosswalks and so on and so forth. Do you have anything? Yeah, from a capital projects engineering perspective we have a lot of street bond projects that are upcoming. We have worked in bump outs partly to improve ADA accessibility. The existing curb to curb in a lot of cases doesn't really work from an ADA perspective and then if we have an opportunity to construct a bulb out, that gives us a little bit more space to play with. So in some cases I've been able to make the pitch that that's the impetus to put in a curb bump out. But in other cases we have seen some opportunities where it's just a traffic calming opportunity or it might tee up a future improvement. So the Sedna neighborhood, there was an opportunity to do curb extensions and that tees up a potential future sidewalk project. So we were able to kind of form out the ultimate curb to curb if you will, like pushing the street out and narrowing the street, pushing the parking away from the curb and then that tees up a little bit of extra space that I can come back and fill in those curb extensions as a sidewalk project. So that's another way that we're looking at maybe incremental designing of the street to then come back and fill in the gaps in the sidewalk network. So we're kind of tackling it from both sides if you will as we're implementing these projects and trying to make sure that we're making those investments in a very wise way so they really start to not just rebuild the street but also address some of the safety and mobility goals that we've been talking about in the mobility plan update and every conversation we seem to have around safety before you guys. Great, thanks. Any other questions? Councilman Davis. Thank you Mayor, I'll be brief as possible. The first thing I'd ask for is some kind of regular reporting schedule. I know that there are milestones and there are things that you're going to naturally report out to us but we get the number one issue that we hear, probably the top two, homelessness and speed are the things that we hear about the most right now and being able to report back to our folks. We understand that your neighborhood has a speed issue, we can address that locally but we're looking at the whole thing overall. We're looking at traffic safety overall not just the speed that you see when somebody goes tearing down your street residentially but we need to be able to report with some regularity back to constituents that we're moving forward with this. And this is Denton, people are engaged, they know what Vision Zero is, they ask us specifically about Vision Zero and how are we doing on Vision Zero so being able to report I think in Miller it's a little bit about what Mayor Pro Tem is talking about that long lead time knowing that we are not just spinning our wheels and dreaming up a fun policy we're never going to use that we're actually making some progress so maybe monthly or quarterly reports whatever. That would be my ask is to have some sort of regular reporting schedule like for instance the city attorney's office is really good about updating us on stuff even when there's no update the update is there is no update but we remember that you'd like an update. Yeah we'll put Councilman Davis that's a very good point and I'll ask staff to go ahead and start putting something in at least every other month in the Friday report but also any other mechanism that we can maybe on DTV so we can share what we're doing and how we're doing it, what's the next update. It's a good suggestion thank you. And then my last two questions I'll give you both of them so you can answer both of them because they're a little bit tied together the first one is do we have any kind of rough sense of what the budget ask might be and if you want to say this is not the time because we're going to give you a number and you're not going to like it and we can't back it up yet then that's just fine if that's the answer we get it we're not in the budgeting we're not if it's not ready for us it's not ready for us so that's question number one is what is what is the budget ask because a lot of these are CIP kind of things a lot of these are things are going to have their own different process but a lot of these are not a lot of these are you know plastic bollards and striping and different things. Correct. So there's that question and tied to that can you can you help us understand you had some slides that got kind of got close but can you help us understand how this is more complex than simply lowering the speed limit by five miles per hour or putting up some different striping or some of those things because intuitively some of these things seem very very simple and very very easy to implement it's difficult to articulate for folks and it's difficult to understand myself sometimes how is this a whole big long process the whole thing that the dynamic the system might be a process but how does it take us going through a whole big long process when we already know that speed is the number one contributor to the frequency and severity of injury how come we can't just fix the speed we know that there are intersections in our city that have fatality accidents on a regular basis how can we not just fix that can can you help us understand how much is it going to cost really and or if we're not ready for that and how is it so complex. So both the answers are a little bit so the to answer your question the actual vision zero plan itself the doc creating the document is currently estimated approximately about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars so we are asking that through the budget process we will have to hire a consultant get the whole thing document and create the plan as far as those little smaller improvements yes they can range from a couple thousand dollars or five thousand dollars to add a speed bump or a couple bollards all the way to millions of dollars one of the projects that he's looking at is almost thirty thirty five million dollar improvements along a stretch of the roadway so it can range in different areas to answer your question I think yes there are low-hanging fruits that we can definitely focus on and start addressing them and I think Nathan is really doing a good job when we are going after capital projects he is addressing some of the low-hanging fruit and trying to include them it's not going to happen overnight so we need some time to start addressing the systematic issue is is at all levels it's it's a behavioral change people need to get used to me and you everyone needs to get used to from this point in the city from the center part to get to thirty five it's not it currently takes me twenty five minutes or twenty minutes it's going to take me forty minutes the minute I've changed the system that's a behavioral change that's it that is very difficult and slow it takes a long time for someone to understand hey I I yesterday I was able to get there or ten years ago I was getting there in five minutes today it's taking me thirty minutes and it's not the traffic they have made it so damn difficult that I can't get it so that those are the things so behavior is a really really important thing and perception I think a lot of time speeds are perceived a people a person sitting and I've done these experiments with a lot of people in my past life but people sitting in their porch looking at cars and literally looking at cars they're like yeah that person was driving 50 miles an hour I've had a gun a radar gun and sat down with them it was not more than 28 miles it was under speed limit so that's the perception is very difficult to change or change perception and then change behavior so those are the two important things that really play into the sense of everyone has their own way of interpreting and that's why I mean I ran into a lot of people that they they are they think they're traffic engineers because they drive but that's the that's why that there is an opinion by every single individual so that's why this process is really difficult we're attacking not just only from a policy or law enforcement or the actual built environment which is the transportation infrastructure we're also looking at how do we change behavioral changes that have been here for decades I mean even we probably grew up and you're 50 years old and you can it's hard to change any habits so that's why it's going to be a longer process to pull everything down and slow everything down but I hope I kind of sort of answered your question because putting in some little ballers and fixing someone's front yard is not the issue the the main accidents are happening at the spots that we know and we are trying and working with tech stop to get funding we are getting improvements done at those intersections but long term we really have to think about everything sure thank you that that does start to answer my question it's a question that's going to continue through the budgeting process and when that $250,000 ask comes along you know how I feel about consultants sometimes they're fantastic other times I'm like hire us a guy who does this and keep him and keep him finding the low hanging fruit every year and keep him writing the NT cog grant proposals and all that stuff instead of a consultant that draws us up a plan that we reference every so often when we think about it how about some more engineers I know you can't hire as many as you need but anyway it's just something to keep in mind okay any other questions quickly oh okay I'll just say this for those I mean there's some weren't here but for me it's really critical that as a body we communicate clearly right we can't have a director have to get up in front of us and say hey this is a safety issue for us to then say well we're focused on connectivity more than safety right I mean I think that messaging doesn't help anyone because then there's people watching that get the wrong message it versus the message is when it comes to because we told you and we stand by that safety is a priority so if it comes down to connectivity or safety we have to err on the side of safety with one voice versus well I really want connectivity in this instance because then that sets us back it sends the wrong message to the community it sends the wrong message and adds confusion the key is to continue to hammer home safety over all things because that's what we said and if we're going to stick to that let's stick to that if we're going to deviate from that and talk about connectivity being a priority in some instances let's talk about that but let's unify our messaging to make everyone's job easy because we aren't at the same had the same message for two years and every time we deviate based on project specific concerns and and entertain other things I think that's the challenge for me that inconsistency from the from the policymakers confuses the community and so I'm going to be big about that I'm going to point it out if I hear it again everyone can do what they want to do but I'm going to point out the inconsistencies when we prioritize a particular project a particular preference over safety just to say hey we talked about this is a priority if we have and it shouldn't take a director to stand in front of us it should take any subject matter expert you know to then say hey here's here's why we're making this decision so with that it is 625 we'll conclude the work session we'll be back in chambers in five minutes for our regular session thank you thank you. Welcome to this meeting of the Denton City Council it is now 630 and we do have a quorum so I call the meeting order today's Tuesday May 17 2022 and so this is our regular meeting and we will start with the first item on the agenda which is pledge to the United States and Texas flag please stand and join me if you're able. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. In honor of Texas flag I pledge allegiance to the Texas one state under God one and indivisible. Thank you for that that takes us to presentations from members of the public if we could review the procedures for addressing the City Council. The Denton City Council has adopted rules of procedure including a code of conduct that applies to the public as well as council members these rules were enacted to promote an orderly process and to preserve decorum speakers will have four minutes to give a scheduled report and four minutes to give an open mic report a bell will ring when time is expired if their marks are not concluded by that time the speaker will be asked to stop speaking if the speaker does not cease and a second request is made the mayor may request to have the speaker removed from the chamber speakers should not approach the dais if a speaker has materials for the council please notify the city secretary in advance for scheduled reports the council may initiate discussion or ask questions for non-scheduled open mic reports the council may listen however because no notice of the subject of the open mic report has been provided to the public in advance the Texas open meetings act prohibits discussion or decision by the council on non-scheduled items as a result the council may only proceed as follows on non-scheduled items proposed to place the item on a future agenda make a statement of factual policy or a recitation of existing policy speakers are asked to direct all remarks and questions to the council as a whole and not to any individual member please refrain from making abusive personal impertinent profane or slanderous remarks anyone who violates the council rules of procedure may be immediately removed from the chamber thank you in advance copies of the rules of procedure are available from the city secretary. Thank you and I will take that takes to a consent agenda I'll take a motion understanding that everything is intact but for item x councilmember McGuire okay mayor Pro Tem I second motion by councilor McGuire second by councilmember back any discussion seeing none let's vote on the screen. That passes seven zero call item x ID two two one zero five one consider approval resolution of the city of Denton endorsing the Medicaid for all act of twenty twenty one and declaring an effective date I don't know if there was a there wasn't a presentation there was a couple of modifications that were made there was mentioned in them work session and any so council member Watts did you have a question yeah oh I'm sorry yeah we have a speaker so let me do that so that we can all speak to that if need be so I'll call that that's and I don't want us mispronounce con is the last name is that right. If you could give your name and address you'll have four minutes if you'd be so kind. Okay dokey my name is camion Connor and I live at two one one two Preston place and Denton. I'm camion Connor and I use she her pronouns and I'm the executive director of the tech sequel access fun our entire mission at the tea fun is to help people pay for abortions in Texas when they can afford it we hear from people every day navigating health care they cannot afford due to a lack of insurance coverage we do this work not only for our clients who are mostly folks of color navigating many barriers to health care access but also do it to support clinics the medical providers assisting the clients with limited incomes many health care facilities have to find ways to recoup the money lost from providing care to people who are uninsured this should not be the responsibility of medical professionals who should be able to spend their time utilizing their expertise and providing medical care I'm a social worker who has worked in Denton for over 20 years during my time working at a title 10 clinic in Denton I worked with many uninsured or underinsured individuals who often paying out of pocket for their health care I saw people have to make the difficult choice to forego their much needed health care and delay life sustaining care all due to the inability to afford the cost I work with many people who were unable to afford their medications necessary for health maintenance and in some cases medications that would save their lives many low income folks communities of color and queer and trans folks have limited access to preventative care mental health care and reproductive health care Medicare for all would ensure the ability for everyone to access the health care that they need it is devastating to me that we are in the richest country in the world and people are dying because they can't afford health care due to the COVID-19 pandemic we have all seen firsthand the health and equity and access issues experienced by our community members over the last couple years this resolution is crucial for Denton City Council to approve local governments often provide frontline response for community members who fall into poverty due to medical debt related bankruptcies or experience deteriorating health or even die needlessly due to the lack of adequate health insurance Medicare for all would end the burden on local employers to provide health insurance and would free up entrepreneurs to pursue their business ideas without fear of risking the loss of their health insurance since everyone would be covered regardless of their employment status this would be huge for small nonprofits like the T fund and also local business owners didn't musicians and arts collaborative DMACC exists because the music and bar culture that we love and didn't does not support the health care of the creatives you all each one of you on council have the responsibility to ensure that the residents of didn't know that their city council understands that no matter your race income status the city of didn't believes that the residents of didn't deserve health care coverage and the ability to access essential health care I'm asking that you all support the adoption by the city of didn't have Medicare for all resolution. Thank you item X on the table for one moment. I have a couple of speakers and I want them to be able to be heard before we vote on that. So I'm going to set that for a second. I pick up the public presentations. There's a Mr. Max Fomar regarding Transperson Services and goes on. Max FOMAR. Okay. Seeing no movement. And then Mr. Dillenberg Mr. Dillenberg. Seeing no one. Okay. So we're back to X that concludes those that wanted to speak. So I did want to make sure everyone from the public had opportunity to speak if they wanted to. So any questions for staff. Councilman Watts. Yes. Thank you Mayor. It's sort of to add on some of my comments in the work session. I guess for me this is first of all the comments I'm hearing. We're not we're simply sending a resolution. There's nothing we can do regarding the the act that is attached to the resolution. Is that correct? That's not something the city can adopt. Mr. City Attorney. That's not something that. No, we're not adopting anything that would effectively require us to do anything other than this is a statement of the city a position of the city on Medicare for all. Okay. Because I wasn't part of this resolution, or the creation of this resolution. So there was not a work session on this resolution. Is that correct? Yes, there was a work session on was it was it a two minute pitch before is two minute pitch. But the two minute pitch my understanding is sometimes that's to request a work session for a particular item. Yes, you're correct. That went directly from two minute pitch to a resolution. Okay. So this is going to sound odd. And I think we've done it at least if I can remember historically, because I know I'm uncomfortable voting for it. And I'm uncomfortable voting against it. And I know that I think we've had historically that there's been ability to abstain if you do not have enough factual information in order to make an informed vote. I think I've seen that utilized not very often. But that's that's sort of where I am simply because I wasn't involved in any of the discussion. And there was no work session on which I've commented in the work session before, that I think if we're going to do this, I would like for it to have a little bit more meat and a little bit more vetting on what it is that we're actually we're asking for. So I guess I just need a little guidance on that. That's your prerogative Councilmember Watts if you feel like you can't vote on it, or if you would like to ask for this to go to a work session or would like something else to happen with it. That's certainly a motion you could make. Okay, if you want to abstain that's also within your authority. Okay, all right. Well, before I abstain, I would then just say, Hey, I would feel comfortable with asking for a motion to postpone to the next date certain, so that we can have a work session on it to discuss it. As far as the implications, you know, what are the needs in our community, not just pass this resolution, but also try to identify what can the city do, if anything, to assist with those other than just passing a resolution that is somewhat symbolic. So that would be my my first approach is to postpone it to get a little bit more information. So I would make that motion to postpone this item till the next council meeting, which is what is it June 7th? Yes. Okay, we have a motion to postpone. Is there a second, Mayor Pro Tem? Is that why you're okay. Thank you. Is there a motion postpones on the table? Is there a second? Councilmember Davis? I'm trying to push all the different buttons at once. I'll second the motion. Thank you. Motion postponed by to the next regularly scheduled meeting, which is June 7th by Councilmember Watts, seconded by Councilmember Davis discussion. Just to be clear, so we're clear on the record is a motion to postpone, but to come back as a work session on June 7th? Yes, absolutely. Yes, thank you for that clarification, City Attorney. Yes. Okay. Any other clarifications, questions? Councilmember Davis? Thank you, Mayor. Just to speak to the motion. I'm not I'm not supporting the motion because I suppose that there will be a necessarily a different result if this comes forward. But the way that I look at this issue, it is and I say this without disagreeing with the problem that has been described by some of the speakers and some of the folks that are emailing us, I disagree with the way that the city can address the solution in picking one of a myriad of different national policy ideas that are out there that has a particular national policy agenda behind it to a deeply complex issue. I don't think is the best way to go about it. An advocacy group has brought forth a resolution. We didn't write it, an advocacy group wrote it. It's something that's making the rounds to all these different municipal bodies. If we're going to take a position on an issue that is frankly not squarely in our wheelhouse might affect us like anything does, but not really in our wheelhouse, not something the city's going to going to really have anything to do with. Instead of sending our legislature a dead letter on an issue that they can't vote on, or an issue that they've said, this is how I'm not going to vote, then why not come up with what we can do locally. I know the city manager has has had some conversations about things we can do locally for our own house that need medical attention for our nonprofits that need support, all of those kind of things. I am much more interested in spending the city council's time talking about what we can do from where we're sitting than sending a dead letter to legislators who either aren't going to ever vote on the issue because of the Texas legislature, or have staked out a position that is very clearly not Medicare for all but a different solution to the problem. Okay, anyone else? Councilman Burke. Good evening. It's good to be here on this fine evening. I am in support of us making this resolution at this point because it sends a message that we are supported. And so when it's time for us to get in the nitty gritty of it all, then you all already know that we have your back. So whatever that takes to do these things, what they're proposing, you know, we can just do that at the time when it's time to get it done. And we won't have to read re-address the support level. You all ask us to support you right now, for you to feel secure that we're here for you. And I think that this is what we should do right now is to say yes, we hear you, we support you, and when it's time to do all of this, then we will do it at that time, you all will come back to us and we'll work through that. We have ample opportunities to go back and revisit things. But right now you need to feel secure and I think that that's what we should give you at this point. Thank you. Councilman Watts. Mayor, I'm going to withdraw my motion to postpone. Thank you. Councilmember McGee. Before you go, the withdrawal needs to be supported by the person that seconded it. So I need to check with Councilmember Davis if he. Councilmember Davis. Well, I'm not going to second a motion that's not there. So I'll withdraw my second as well. Thank you. Okay. All right. Councilmember McGuire. Thank you. So although Medicare for All might not seem at first glance like it's a municipal issue, the fact is that all the for-profit healthcare system places a huge burden on all patients, providers, and employers and negatively impacts nearly every person in our community including patients who can't afford the cost of insurance or medical care, doctors who must jump through hoops to get insurance companies to cover the treatments they prescribe, and consumers and taxpayers who must subsidize the inefficient private insurance plans paid for by both private and public employers. In the fiscal year 21-22 budget, the City of Denton is contributing $22,090,000 for employee health insurance, $1,233,000 for dental, and $139,000 for vision. That is in addition to employee contributions of approximately $3.5 million for health insurance, $1.2 million for dental, and $144,000 for vision. The resolution that was brought forward in a two-minute pitch was not for a conversation about potential solutions. It was for a resolution specifically supporting the Medicare for All Act of 2021. And I support this resolution because universal single-payer healthcare at the federal level is the only solution that's going to cut $23,462,000 from the City of Denton's annual budget for employee benefits, which would save local taxpayers money. So in light of all of this, I move approval of the resolution with the following amendments. I would like to amend the passage reading, "We must urge the United States Congress or the Texas Legislature," to read, "We must urge the United States Congress and the Texas Legislature." I would also like to amend to include a section four reading something to the effect of, "Upon its passage and approval, a copy of this resolution shall be furnished as soon as is practical to all federal and state legislators whose electorate includes residents of the City of Denton." I appreciate Councilor McGuire's motion and amendment because I was going to do something similar myself. I think Councilor Watts made some excellent points that we can push this a little harder. So I really appreciate that he brought that up in the work session. And you can see that Councilor McGuire and I were listening intently. And so I completely support that for the reasons that she said. But also, I want to remind us and the audience that we are saying, as Councilor Byrd said a second ago, we are supportive. Our lobbying and legislative missions, we encourage you to support these kinds of actions. We are in no way stepping outside of our authority to say, "We are going to implement Medicare for All in Denton." That's not what this is. This is saying, "Hey lobbyists, hey legislators, we support this." In the same way that we say, "We support various proclamations that come before us on a weekly basis." So we are saying that Denton says this kind of approach is very powerful. And it does not preclude us from then having the more in-depth discussion about the service gap needs and our local medical approaches and how we can make those better. As Councilor Watts mentioned, as Councilor McGuire mentioned, we can have that discussion. We can have an additional work session. But I think this says how important that the city of Denton says that it is important not to, through good money after bad, to take this kind of approach. Please listen to a city of 143,000. So I second this. - Councilor Watts? - I'm removed. Sorry. - Okay. Councilor Davis? - I forgot I removed it. - I'm not going to necessarily die on this Hill, but I think it's really clear just based on the comments that I've heard, exactly what we're doing is exactly what I talked about just a moment ago in the motion to postpone. We are signaling, we are sending a signal to a constituency that we have a particular viewpoint on a particular issue, that we're not going to move the needle on. We're going to make people feel, no offense to my colleagues, we're going to make people feel better about how we feel about an issue. And I do not, it may be within our authority to do that. I don't think that is a proper use of this body's time to make people feel like we're on the same page with them, to make people feel like we are validating a constituency. That's not what we're here to do. We're here to fill the potholes and pay the firefighters and pay the police, build parks, all that good stuff. So that's why I'm going to vote against this, not because I think our healthcare system doesn't need an overhaul, not because I don't think it's broken, not because I don't think we're spending money after money after money to try to fix it in ways that aren't working, but because we are spending our time on the council now signaling on an issue. And while we're there, while we're talking about the merits of it, and Councilmember McGuire brings up some useful statistics, I've been active in this space since the early 2000s. I've worked on this issue professionally when I worked in D.C. It is very easy to say single payer, universal, because it makes a lot of sense when you say it out loud. But then you stop and think about how much better those Cadillac plans are and that employers who want to be competitive will still have to offer competitive compensation packages, will still offer that employee-based healthcare. It's a system that's been in place since needing to hire workers after World War II. It's the fringe benefit system that's been in place for decades and generations and will take more than a resolution from the Denton City Council to unwind and reform. It will take more than a simple one-time legislative fix that does not have legs and will not pass with or without our support. So again, not a hill I'm going to die on, just something that I don't think we should spend our time on signaling to certain communities that they have our support and thanks so much for theirs. >> Councilmember McGee. >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Validating particular constituencies is exactly why I believe we are in this seat. This is important and it's simple. Time is money. I understand that. I, too, don't want to spend staff time on this resolution. That is why I would have voted against the previous measure to set for date certain in the future. I appreciate that this resolution has already been written and considered. This is something that has been adopted by cities all over the country and we know that this particular resolution is also coming to other cities in the Metroplex, not in the future, but in the very near future. We can take care of this tonight. It's very simple. So we don't have to spend time on this because this city has a lot of other things to do that I want to spend time and dollars on in terms of staff and work sessions. So therefore, quite simply, I will be supporting the resolution. I will also add that we know that every year a myriad of resolutions come to all sorts of legislative bodies, particularly one of my favorite ones in the Texas legislature every year, someone tries to author a bill that says the official breakfast taco, the official breakfast of Texas is a breakfast taco. This happens all the time. We can simply pass this tonight and be done with it because it is an affirmation of what we believe and what many of our community believe. It simply signals to our state and federal partners to start tracking legislation in this area and be on the lookout because we believe that this is what is good for America. It is not, it is not getting into the weeds because we have our federal partners to do that. And I believe tonight this is very simple, cut and dry. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Anyone else? Okay. Then we have a motion by Councilmember Guara, seconded by Councilmember Pritz and Beck. And any other discussion? Wait, you jumped the gun. Any other discussion? No. So here's where, if you can pause that for a second. So here's my explanation. I am passionate about the core responsibilities of the City of Denton. This is a new opportunity to hit the ground running for this council and focus on core priorities because people have also told us that we need to get our streets fixed. They also told us we need more police service. And so those are core responsibilities. But to this issue specifically, I take exception to the use of the word proclamations because that's not something that we vote on. I take exception to the use of this not addressing an issue. That's what the city, that's what the municipal, that's a great thing about serving at the city level. We can affect change. I would much rather sit here and talk about, and I looked it up. I've served on the board. It was a different name at the time, but Health Services of North Texas offers solutions right now to people that we can absolutely act on their services and provide services for this budget session. We don't need a letter to the federal government. We need to act locally and support our local nonprofits. We had a nonprofit collaborative meeting so that we don't have overlap, so that we can identify funds, identify needs, and work together as resources and that was very well attended and I appreciate staff putting that together. And then lastly, I'll say I work for a small business in town, a business incubator, and I just simply mentioned, hey, if anyone needs it, First Refuge has services. They have mental health services, they have dental services, they have medical services, they have counseling services, they have a food pantry ready to go tomorrow. Yet we'll stand here and send a letter to the federal government that nothing's going to come of it and so that's disappointing to me. So I'm going to vote against this for the mere reason that I want to focus this entire session, this entire year on getting things done in our local community and not on federal issues that are not going to produce the results we want in our community. I want to take care of our community. I want to hit the ground running and so I'm not going to support this because I think we should focus on the local nonprofits doing the work, supporting not only local nonprofits, but also benefiting our citizens straight away versus hoping the federal government acts on it. The City of Denton, the city municipal government is action-based and we can really make a difference and show the citizens that we're responding to local needs locally, expeditiously, and addressing the core issues of streets, fire, police, safety issues, that sort of thing, and we're missing that opportunity here. We're sending that we're going to continue talking about national issues, unfortunately. So that being said, let's vote on the screen. And that passes four to three. I want to go back again. I missed one. Struggling today. Is Amanda Thompson here? Amanda Thompson? Sorry about that. That's my mission. So you could give us your name and address and you have four minutes. My name is Amanda Thompson, is T-H-O-M-P-S-O-N. My address is 1308 Paco Trail. I am here today to discuss Texas Constitution Article 7 that says that every student has a right to a free and public education. I moved here last year. I've been coming to your meetings since October, just kind of getting a feel for the city. I was trying to get my son into your schools. It was like getting into a secret club, actually. I was not able to get him into your schools from November of 2021 until April of 2022. Somebody dropped a ball. Someone dropped a ball and all I'm asking is for this to never happen to another family again. I spoke to someone, I started speaking to different people in November. The schools were going through, Thanksgiving break was about to start and a championship was about to start. So I kind of gave some wiggle room with not getting response to emails and phone calls. I spoke to someone on December 16th. She told me, she said, "I'm going to send you a link. You can't come to the school for a tour. You can't come to register. I'm going to send you a link. I need you to fill out the registration. Someone's going to respond to you tomorrow." She said, "It won't be me." She said, "I'm leaving for a wedding." And this is where I think things got tricky. So I downloaded all the documents that requested. I got a confirmation email saying that everything was submitted. I never heard back from anybody. I let days go by because I really wanted him to start school in January when school started. I was sending emails. I was leaving voicemails. No one was responding. So when school started back the first week in January, the teachers went to school Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. So I'm telling my son, "They're going to call you. We're going to start school. We're excited. It's a new school." He was doing online learning the whole pandemic. So now he's getting a chance to be around kids. No one responded. So what I did was I registered him at a charter school in Corinth previously and he had gotten approved. I called them on a Tuesday. They told me he had a spot. I just needed to register him. He was registered by Thursday. He started going that Monday. So some time passed and we promised him that as long as he met the expectations, he could run track. Well, his school didn't have track. So I registered him into a private track club. I'm driving 45 minutes every day for track practice. I registered him in North Texas Chess Club because he plays chess. So now I'm coming out of pocket, spending things that he could have done free at the school. So in March, I called the school and I spoke to someone at the administration and I'm asking them about SAT prep classes. And she tells me, "Well, he can't participate because he's not enrolled." And I said, "Well, that's no fault of my own." And so she's listening to me. She's asking me to send her the emails. I sent her the emails. And she said, "I'm going to reach out to some people. Call me back if they don't call you back." So somebody called me. She said, "This is not how we do." And I said, "Yes, ma'am. This is how you've done." And so she asked me to forward her emails as well. And I did. And so she sent me an email. She apologized. A week later, I get an email saying that my registration had expired due to non-activity, not because of me. So on the 27th, I went to the school board meeting and on the 27th, I get an email from a lady at the administration and she's requesting that I register him on the 28th of April. My time is about to run out. This is longer than a four-minute conversation. Well, I just want to help me understand. So a question of clarification. Did you ever interact with, did the city do something? I want to get you to the right person. I went to the school board meeting and the principal emailed me and apologized because the ball was dropped. Someone made a mistake. That's all. Somebody made a mistake. On the 28th, I got an email requesting that I brought my son to the school. But when I called his school, they said, "Well, we can't pull him out now. They're doing finals. They're about to do finals at the end of the school year." So the school can't go back and fix what happened to me, but I am wanting a discussion. I want to know what protocols are to make sure this doesn't happen to another family. It's okay that somebody made a mistake, but don't silence me. Don't disrespect me. I'm very tenacious. I'm not going to give up. Number one, I'm my son's biggest advocate. Certainly. I appreciate that. I just want to make sure I understand if we need to connect you with the school board. I don't understand the city connection. At this point, I went to the ... Because I wanted the city to know what was ... The school district is in your city. Since I'm not going to be quiet about it, I've contacted the attorney general's office and they told me, "Your son's civil rights have been violated." I contacted the TEA. I contacted the federal department of education because I'm not going to be quiet only because I just wanted to have a conversation with the school board. I wanted somebody to sit with me, tell me this mistake was made, and this is what we're going to do to make sure it never happens again. But someone ... The people who've talked to me have been smug. They've cut me off. They've been disrespectful. Channel Fox News talked to the PR rep, and he told them, and I'm paraphrasing, "I don't know why you're wasting your time. No one's going to care. I care." Right. Not only for my son, but for every ... I've been an educator for years, so for her to say, "No one's going to care," if she doesn't care, she needs to resign. Sure. Because if you work anywhere in that administration building and you don't care, then why are you working for the children? That means you're not working for the children. That means you're just working a nine to five, and the moment she said, "Nobody's going to care," that was a personal opinion. Sure. That wasn't a professional opinion. She shouldn't have been at work that day. If wherever your staff's going to get with you and get your information, and they'll forward ... Again, it is a school board discussion, but they'll connect you with the right ... And I understand that. Yeah. I understand that, but I wanted the city to know, since the school district is in your city, this is what's happening, and this is what I fought. Now, we can't go back and change it, but we can make sure it doesn't happen to any other family. Certainly. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Okay. Mr. Dillenberg had called in and didn't ... And that wasn't communicated somehow, so I'm going to take that call, and then we're going to move on to the last ... Let me see. Hey, Mayor. Yes, if you can give your name and address, you'll have four minutes. Okay, great. My name is Steven Dillenberg, and my address is 1004 Abbots Lane. Mayor, can you point to the part in Article 1, Section 27 of our Constitution that says you all have the right as a home rule city to abridge people's rights to speak to you all in the context of you want to maintain decorum is what you said at the last meeting, so you make it to where it's only been four minutes. I've got issues, big issues, in our city, and I've been trying to come to you guys since November 16th, so can you point out the part in there that has allowed you guys to not only abridge this woman's talk right before me, which was very well done, and so I compliment her, and I relate to her because I've dealt with smugged people in public offices, so I want to know, just real quick before I continue, can you point out the part of the Constitution that says that you all can violate the Constitution? Can you point that out for us, sir? You have three minutes. So, no? So that's a no? Can we get that on the public record that you don't have a duty to uphold the Constitution then, because you've said on January 25th of this year that you do have a duty? So do you or don't you? It's a question, a direct question, and I'm asking for an answer. We're just going to sit here because you refused to answer questions? As a public servant, you don't have to answer anybody's questions, don't have to uphold the Constitution, don't have to answer anybody's questions. Article 1, section 29 of our Constitution says that you guys can't change any of that stuff. To prevent the transgression of the high powers herein delegated, we reserve this Bill of Rights and all of the following provisions to the people and exempt them out of the general powers of government. 8,200 people just elected you out of 143,000. 8,200. You don't speak for us. You guys just put up a 52 million dollar bridge to some good old boy contracting company. We don't need a 52 million dollar bridge. We need you guys to take accountability for the damages that were done to people of our community and these vaccines that you all pushed on us. And now doctors have been told by the AMA not to report any of these injuries. I'm getting tired of it. Have you guys told the community to try to get accurate numbers for these vaccine injuries yet? Because we know they're happening. We know it almost killed my mom and we've got you sitting here smug still, not answering questions from the public, not upholding the Constitution, making some dumb presentation that says we only get four minutes to talk and these are the reasons why an American asked someone's leave or the mayor can mute someone or the mayor can get five people in the order here tonight and then come back to somebody before and say, oh, well, it wasn't communicated to me. So I'm glad you didn't have your right to bridge tonight. Okay. You guys have a responsibility to us or you don't. So put it in the record, be a damn man, sir, and put it in the record and say we have a duty to defend the people of Benton or we don't. Say it. Which one is it, sir? Which one is it, mayor? Just radio silence. Right? I'm going to sit here in silence the rest of this until you answer. Which part of the Constitution says it's okay for you guys, for us to have judicial officers serving in executive and legislative roles? Where's that, Drain said, either. And that's your minutes. Thank you. And that takes us to the items for individual consideration. Item A is ID 22956, consider adoption of ordinance of the City of Denton, Texas, amending the fiscal year 2021-2022 budget and annual program of services of the City of Denton to allow for adjustment to capital improvement programs of $1,200,000 for expenses related to purchasing land for park development, declaring a public purpose, providing a servability clause and open meetings clause and an effective date. Good evening, mayor, city council members, Nick Vinson, assistant director of finance, my pleasure to be in front of you today to present this budget amendment. Let me just flip to the first slide. So really quick, just want to give you a little bit of history. This budget amendment will support a parkland acquisition that will be considered by council on the very next item, so item B under individual consideration. So we are looking to amend the fiscal year 2021-22 capital improvement budget for $1.2 million. This will increase appropriations from $670.9 million to $672.2. It is important to note that the parkland acquisition money was identified in the 2019 bond program. Go down. So this is a bond issuance table. We just use this to show the different phasing of the various projects that were approved by voters in 2019. Towards the bottom of this table, you can see the parkland acquisition. So voters did approve a total of $5 million. The adopted fiscal year 2021-22 budget included $2 million for parkland acquisitions. This will amend it to $3.2 million. And then that does conclude the presentation. If you have questions regarding the parkland acquisition, Gary is here. He can answer them or I'll do my best to address them. That's it. Okay. Got it. Then Councillor Watts. Sorry. New mics. Quick question. So this wasn't identified as a potential purchase during the original budget process, is that correct? So this opportunity came up? Let me just understand the context of the timing of all this. It is correct. So this purchase came up after the fiscal year 2021-22 budget was adopted. This was something that was discussed with council, I believe, at the last council meeting. Staff did receive direction to move forward with this purchase, this property. All right. Thank you. That answers my question. Thank you. Okay. Any other questions for staff? Okay. One moment. Okay. Councillor McGuire. I move approval. Mayor Pro Tem. I second. Okay. Motion by Councillor McGuire, second by Council Member Beck. Okay. Got it. Any other? So I have a motion, second. Any other discussion? Yeah. Okay. So item B, ID 22353, consider adoption of ordinance of the City of Benton authorizing the execution of a contract of sale between City of Benton Bay buyer and Walter F. Laney Jr. for purchase of 79.004 acres. Good afternoon, Mayor, Council, Madam City Manager. I'm Deanna Cody, Deputy Director of Development Services, Real Estate. In support of the Parks and Recreation Department's Masterplan, real estate staff has been engaged to assist with acquiring land for Denton's future park system. With the next few slides, we will discuss the latest property under consideration for park land. Here we see a broad overview of the 79 acre property that's described as the Laney Parcel, and it's located south of University and east of Trinity Road. In November of last year, real estate initiated discussions with the property owner Walter Laney Jr. and found that he was willing to sell his property to the city. At that point, city began conducting the assessments on the property and obtained an appraisal, which assessed a value of $2.3 million, just over 2.3 million. On the next couple of slides, we see a close-up aerial view and on-the-ground pictures of the pond that's located on the property. An additional attraction to this particular property is that it's located just under two miles from the city's undeveloped East Lake Park. As a recap on the property and an overview, the property is located south of University and east of Trinity Road. It's approximately 79 acres. There is a pond located on the property, and it promotes the park goal of accessibility and green space to current and future residents within the Denton regional area, eastern region area. The owner has agreed to the appraised value, and has already executed the city's contract at the total purchase price of $2,370,120. So because this property checks off so many boxes for the Parks and Recreation Department, the owner has agreed to and executed the city's purchase contract at the appraised amount. Staff does recommend approval of the item, and approval of this item this evening will authorize the city manager to execute the contract to purchase the property for the public purpose. If it's so approved, closing would be expected to transfer title to the city of the 79 acres within approximately 45 days. Gary Packin, the Parks Director is here and present if you have any questions regarding the programming plan for the property. And that concludes the presentation. >> Thank you. Councilmember Watts. And I'm glad you spoke about the programming, because we're purchasing this, looks like it's pretty rough. So what's the timeframe that we would expect, and is there sort of an estimated cost when it would become available for public use in the future? >> Gary Packin, Director of Parks and Recreation. Great question. What we've typically done with similar, with Mills, we've put in our CIP, future master planning for that property, which could be $100,000 for conceptual plans, CDs, eventual, you know, working with the public to generate ideas, questions, feedback, make sure that we're hearing their needs to the community, and then move towards construction documents and eventually identifying what that would cost and bidding that out in construction. So if this was purchased, we'd put it in our CIP for future master planning, and then future construction, to be determined. >> Okay. Because I know we bought about, what was it, 70 or 80 acres, it was by the, off of, off of by Sherman? >> It's off of Mills. >> Yes. >> Mills, yeah. >> And we did that, I think, a couple. >> Two Mills and McKinney. >> Yes. And we did that a couple, two or three years ago. >> Yep. >> And so the same process applied to that. So we're not really quite sure if it's five years, if it's four years, I mean. Similar to Southwest Park, that property was purchased in the early 2000s and we just finished its master planning last year, and now it's at a point where we're ready for CDs and construction with a future bond program. So we'll move forward with a master plan in the future, especially when more houses start to show up there, engage the community, identify exactly what we want to put in that park, move towards construction drawings, and then have that ready to go out and try to get grants from Texas Parks and Wildlife and/or a combination of bonds. Good. >> I guess, if I could, Madam City Manager, just get a list of similar pieces of property that are in this type of situation, this kind of context where, you know, how many do we have sort of land banked? >> Sure. >> And, you know, what is an estimated timeline for that? What is an estimated cost? Because, I mean, this is $2 million and we just had a budget amendment for 1.9 to purchase. What did we purchase for the 1.9? Just the last agenda item. Anyway. So, yeah, just get an idea of where we are on the timeframe because we'll have a lot of money tied up and, you know, the whole point is to really get it online for the citizens and help us understand a little bit more of that timeline. >> And I think, Councilmember, while that's what we should be doing, we'll share with you and the other councilmembers, the new councilmember, McGee, we have a PowerPoint presentation that Gary did about our potential acquisitions and some other things that I think would be very helpful. >> Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Thank you, Gary. >> Councilmember McGee. >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Packer and Ms. Cody, I want to applaud you. This is great. I love this. This is exactly what makes Denton special, that we can get out and enjoy this community and enjoy the natural nature that God has made. So I just want to say thank you for this. Really appreciate it. Well done. >> Councilmember Davis. >> Thank you, Mayor. A little bit of follow-on from what Councilmember Watts just asked about. Can you give us just in a synopsis version, what's different about parkland when we acquire something and it becomes parkland versus just regular land baking? You know, maybe that's going to be a pump station one day or maybe it's going to be a power plant one day. How does parkland get held and addressed by the city differently than just any other land that we might hold? Restrictions and that kind of stuff. >> Again, Gary Packer, Director of Parks and Recreation. So we're using park bond money to purchase this property. So it's specifically dedicated for park property. Once it's purchased for parkland, then it will be preserved as park space. We'd have to go through Chapter 26 to change that long-term use. If it was going to be used for something else in cooperation, we'd have to address that now with different funding sources and then identify that one where I guess we plow or split the property on how we want to identify, whether it's city land or parkland. >> Thank you. I appreciate that. That comes up in this context but also with other parcels as well from time to time. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Any other discussion? Questions? Seeing none. >> Just one quick follow-up. >> Councilmember Watts. >> Councilmember Davis. So this park bond money, can that also be used for the construction of the actual park amenities or does that come out of some other CIP budget? >> This funding is specifically for land acquisition. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Mayor Pro Tem. >> I'm really happy to move approval because I think we all know and recognize that Gary works really hard on this finding contiguous properties that help advance our preservation goals and our wildlife corridor goals that we've just put in our comprehensive plan. This is land that's, you know, perfect for the future canoe trails. It's on the lake where we don't have actually weirdly all that much lakefront property. And it's nearly contiguous with existing parks. It's nearly contiguous with our state park at the green belt. And, you know, this is just another in a long line of really smart choices that Gary's make. So I'm happy to move approval. >> Councilmember Watts. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion by Mayor Pro Tem, second by Councilmember Watts. Any discussion? Is that old, new? Okay. Got it. Okay. Let's vote on the screen. And that passes 7-0. Thank you all very much. I want to go back and note public hearings, that item, item S220002A, which was a public hearing, was postponed until -- oh, got to open it. Okay. So public hearing item S22002A, hold a public hearing and consider making a recommendation to city council regarding a request by Toronto Realty Inc. for a special use permit to allow for multi-family dwelling use on approximately 11.891 acres of land. So I'll open the public hearing and then I'll close the public hearing. Oh. I'll open the public hearing and continue it until June 7. That takes us to item C on the individual items for consideration, ID22983, consider adoption of ordinance of the city of Denton, a Texas home rule municipal corporation authorizing the city manager to execute a contract with Archer Western Construction LLC. Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is David Brown. I am the construction project manager for Denton Water Utilities. Today I'm pleased to bring to you for consideration Northwest Booster Pump Station. The city of Denton operates over 600 miles of distribution pipe, also have five pressure planes. The existing Northwest pressure plane is in that Northwest quadrant of the city. The Northwest's elevated storage tank is there at 288 and 35. Currently there's not a transmission main that actually connects to that pressure plane or the elevated storage tank. So basically what happens is water from Ray Roberts treatment plant there just south of the lake comes through, passes through the city and has to go through the city into McKenna and also the Roseland tank south of town. So what happens is basically McKenna tank has to pump to the Rony Road and the Northwest elevated storage tank. What this causes is an imbalance in the water system, meaning water age problems and also some operation pumping problems, meaning have to close some valves, close some tanks in order to pump up and get the pressure to get to the Northwest elevated storage tank. With that our water master plan identified a Northwest booster pump station would be a key component to the master plan with our distribution system. Also I'd like to say that this pump station will also be tied to a 36 inch transmission main that will directly go to the Northwest elevated storage tank to serve those customers up there and you know about the growth that's going on in that area. This will be the primary feed to that Northwest area. So what we did, we had a design with Kimley-Horn and basically what this is, is it is designed with growth in mind. We know growth is going on in that quadrant, that area. What this design is, is that it will be 18 million gallons per day at the beginning initial capacity and be able to upgrade it very easily in the future to go up to 28 mgd. So basically we'll be able to plan for the growth. And what this does, it's going to be able to serve the new dent and high in that area up there. It's going to ensure water quality standards are met and improve the service to community. So we would like to propose to enter in contract with Archer Western to build this Northwest booster pump station and it's located over at Riney Road for $15,458,300. We recommend that we enter in a contract with Archer Western. Thank you. Any questions? I'd be glad to ask. Thank you. Councilman Davis. Thank you, Mayor. Absolutely agree in the necessity staff's advice there is spot on. But I've been in the pipe galleries and the pump rooms and our existing facilities. I've been outside those pipe galleries and pump rooms and our existing facilities. What can I tell folks in that area about noise in the neighborhood? And what is the design of the building? And if we can get this later on, that's helpful too. But what does the design of the building include as far as noise mitigation? Have we looked at that? Obviously it's not right up on somebody's back doorstep, but there are quite a few houses there. And I'd hate for us to have to go back in when that first noise complaint comes in and now we've got to spend X number of dollars soundproofing the cinder block or whatever. So is noise can are noise considerations built into the current design? Yes, it has been considered and I can get you that information. Of course with this, we are building a nice fence around the whole area for containment and security as well. And it is set back off the road there. So there may be some, you know, we're considered noise also in construction as well. But I can get you that information. Have there been any, does the neighborhood know this is coming? Have there been any kind of neighborhood meetings and conversations about it? Yes, sir. We did have a public meeting to start off the proposal that we're going to go enter in design. And then we're also planning a public meeting before we start construction. Good deal. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yeah. Councilor Davis asked the bulk of my questions. I just want to follow on with the one and that is, do you have the the sonic profile, the noise levels, has that been measured? I believe so. I can certainly get that for you. We seem to be kind of dialing in on about the 75 DBA kind of number. We're hearing that pop up in a number of our committees and that seems to be the general sort of threshold we're using. So, you know, until you get us that number, do you think it's below that as the estimated plan? I don't know the exact number, but they are electric motors. So we're going to be a little quieter. So electric motors. All right. Thank you so much. This will be at Riney Road right there off of Nicosia next to UNT Discovery Park. So I'd like to give you that location. Councilmember McGee. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. You said this can be very easily upgraded to 28 million capacity. Yes. Ballpark it was that upgrade go cost us later. The upgrade on that would be, of course, it's dependent on construction costs, but the main cost is going to be in this project. The upgrade would be just adding pumps. So the infrastructure will be there. It's just an add of a pump. So I don't know the exact cost for pumps, but I can get you that number. Thank you. Appreciate that. Anyone else? Seeing none. Councilmember Watts. I move for approval of agenda item 5C. Councilmember Davis. I'll second the motion. Okay. We have a motion by Councilmember Watts, seconded by Councilmember Davis. Any other discussion? Seeing none. Let's vote on the screen. That passes 7-0. Thank you. That concludes our agenda this evening. Concluding items. Seeing none. I'll touch on a couple of things. So Wednesday I'll be here in chambers talking to Boys State. That's a group of high schoolers that go down and mirror the process, office holding process. So I'm excited to speak to them. Mayor Watts has done that a lot in the past. So looking forward to that. Then Boca Feliz is a restaurant there in Golden Triangle Mall. They've been fantastic in our community. So they're having a ribbon cutting on Thursday. Then also Thursday night is Twilight Tunes, which is important. So if you've not been on the square for Twilight Tunes, it's an amazing event. And the Boca Feliz thing is at 4 o'clock Golden Triangle Mall. I want to support them. Great local ownership and management. And then Saturday is a busy day if you're looking for stuff to do. So Saturday Freedom House Golf Tournament is going on. Main Street Historic Property Tours are going on. And you can look online for these times. And then I'm joining the mayor of Corinth and Lewisville. And we're having a mayor's bike ride and an event downtown at the at the transit station. So that's going to be a really neat event and pray for me that I won't pass out on a bike or something. And then there's a DHS farewell. So go Broncos. That is 10 ish or so. Look that up. But they're having an event there in high school. So if you've graduated from there, please make sure you go see that. And then wrapping up, there's Memorial Day. So please everyone be safe and make sure we look out for each other over Memorial Day. And then I have two birthdays within two days of each other. So my my 11 year old has canceled out my wife's birthday. So Alice's birthday is on the 27th, Diane on the 29th. But want to wish them a happy birthday and look forward to celebrating with them. It with that 736. Oh, Councilman Burke. Yes, I wanted to announce that I am going to hold my annual town hall meeting here in the chamber on next Tuesday at 630. So we'll have an opportunity to speak on some things that I've observed and and understood and some future future items that we may be interested in. Also, I wanted to acknowledge to a family that I am just dearly in love with and we have grown up together. Last Monday, there was a shooting just a few streets over. And I just wanted to ask you all to please pray for that family, that very delicate family and has affected everyone in the household. So we'll be putting that young lady to rest on next on this Sunday at St. Paul Church. There is a go find me for her service. But I've been deeply affected by this. I feel she's actually part of me. So I just want to pass that on and just you know, just allow a little bit of reflection there that we just have to make sure that we are just taking care of one another as best as we can. Thank you, sir, for allowing me that time. Councilmember McGee. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just want to give a special shout out to the police department. Yesterday, I was very blessed and fortunate to graduate from Citizens Police Academy. I want to encourage every single citizen and then to look up the didn't police department online and apply for didn't apply for dens police academy program. It was really great, fantastically put together. I want to thank the police chief for making that possible and in particular Officer Gina Whitson for shepherding us through. I want to thank all the officers who volunteered their time. They didn't have to do that. But they did that because they're passionate about their jobs. And they did such a great job helping us shepherd us to the all the different departments of the police department for about 12 weeks. It's every Monday night, starting at 630 is only about two hours. So I would encourage everyone to apply. Let's support our police department and you can do that through going through this program. And the importance is that you see it from the inside, a more inside view of what these fearless and brave men and women do every week. So I just want to encourage everybody to look up Citizens Police Academy. Great program. Thank you so much. And now at 738, we will conclude tonight's meeting. Thank you very much.