Sep 12, 2018 Economic Development Partnership Board on 2018-09-12 11:00 AM

Good morning, I'm Marty Rivers and today is Wednesday, September 12th and we're going to start the Economic Development Board Partnership Meeting . It's 1102 and we will start. First I want to introduce a couple of our new board members . We have Tony Clark with Independent Bank and Chris Davis with Peterbilt. Do you guys want to take a second to introduce yourself? Yeah, my name is Tony Clark. As Marty said, with Independent Bank we've lived in Denton since 1993 and very honored to be associated with this group of men and women. Look forward to serving with you guys and excited about the role here. Thank you. Yeah, I'm Chris Davis with Peterbilt Motors. I've been with the company 20 years. I've been relocated to Denton on three separate occasions. On this occasion I've been four years now. Feel really good about the city of Denton. We've been here, Peterbilt's been here 38 years, so we continue to be here a lot longer. But again, proud to be a member of this board and looking forward to the work. Thank you. We're excited to have you both on there. So thank you. All right, our first agenda item is EDP 18-048 to receive a report, hold discussion, and select a recipient for recognition at the 2018 Business Awards Breakfast. Good morning. Is this on? I have a long voice anyway. At our last monthly meeting, this award recognition was discussed with the current board, but we have new members, so if you don't mind, I'll just briefly reiterate that since 2008, the Economic Development Partnership Board has been recognizing a Denton business for its contributions to the economic growth and prosperity of the Denton community and with a focus on their public-private partnership investment in the city of Denton. And toward that end, you'll see in your packet the criteria against which the board wished to have information provided so that they could review it and determine a selection premised on the company's activity in Denton against those criteria. And at the last meeting, you were provided WNCO, Target, and ACMEBrick as large employers that you might want to consider, and TRCA, which is Technology Resource Center of America, as a small business. In the interim, Councilmember Briggs suggested embassy su ites and convention center. We've not previously considered a company that hasn't been fully open for a year, but there's no reason we can't. We just hadn't. So that information as it stands today is also provided for embassy suites. I think it was also discussed at the time last month that it's very difficult to take a look at smaller businesses. Originally, those had not been considered when this award was fought about that many years ago, but it's something that was expressed that there was an interest to maybe develop criteria for small business so that there might be two awards next year. But we still have TRCA in here that is a smaller business. They were considered for consideration this year as well. Just to reiterate, WNCO opened an 830,000 square foot distribution facility in 2017 serving stores in Texas and Oklahoma. I did want to mention that they are partnered with Work force Solutions in providing specialized training to employment to individuals with disabilities. And they've actually had some of those individuals be able to emancipate themselves, purchase cars and start living on their own due to those jobs. They also participate in a work program that was founded or begun in San Antonio called Quest that is very similar to the layered workforce development approach that is available here in Denton through our workforce training partners. And so they're and they're also involved in those efforts, but that's what Quest is. It's working toward a livable wage, developing the skill sets people need to become independent and able to contribute in their community. WNCO is a United Way member. They are a partner in the North Texas Food Bank, and they do fundraisers for any state accredited school that asks them. They'll participate in that. I believe I mentioned last time that there are shelfers and packers at WNCO that started with the company that are now millionaires when they retire because WNCO is an employee owned company and each employee working a part time to full time schedule is given $5,000 worth of stock. So the company's done very well and the employees have done well. Forbes has recognized them as one of their best private companies, I believe number 56. They're also recognized for successful growth and I, you know, $112 million worth of valuation and 150 employees. As you come across this grid, you see also that Target, this was a landmark facility for them. First robotics distribution facility and their CEOs and others came from many states to take a look at how this one operated because they have since then replicated it for distribution facilities in other states. They also are a chamber member. They partnered with University of North Texas and actually hired the technology students from that program to run their robotics distribution equipment that is, I think was the largest product that German company had made when they installed it . They're a United Way member. The first year they were open, they did eight times their campaign goal. They are in served debt and board leadership or were initially. North Texas Food Bank, our daily bread. As it goes on, Wilson Elementary School, they provide grants to schools in every community that Target has stores in. Target still was the first to give 5% of their before, I'm sorry, 3% of their before tax income to education and to communities. And so they do that still. The volunteers over a million hours annually. So being a part of the community in which they live is a big deal to them. They have eight or nine playgrounds now in North Texas that are put in areas where children don't have any place to play. And that is also in partnership with a company called Kabo om to provide that sort of thing. So dedicated corporate wide, not just in Denton. Again number 10, fast growing most innovative companies in 2013. Among the first to fully implement the automated picking as mentioned. $100 million evaluation this year and still at 150 employees. Acme Brick is an icon. Began its Denton operations many, many years ago. And it's renowned worldwide. It's a chamber member. They have contributed not in Denton to education but to UT Arlington where they have a brick masonry certification program that is exacted in Grand Pra irie and in their Houston facilities. Yes. Yes. Back on target. Okay, sorry. Under the environmental stewardship that was blank but it was my understanding that last just maybe several months ago that we approved a large solar installation for their building. Okay, I was I'm not aware of that. I thought that was Tetra Pak. Well, no, the Tetra Pak is the solar array. This was panels on their building. Okay. Because they applied for solar panels. Okay, and I was unaware of that. So thank you. Okay, please make note. Acme Brick, largest brick producer in the United States. Their innovation comes from the sorts of tiles and coatings and other building products that evidently they have a leading edge on those sorts of things within the construction and the building community. They did donate bricks that were put into a public art sculpture that ended up in the automotive museum in Michigan and evidently have donated bricks to several other installations. By the way, the public art installations that are here that are brick from Denton artist Carol Collins that are over at the police department and are also Acme Brick installations. 31.6 million valuation this year and 200 employees. So on those public artists that donated brick or just happens to be Acme Brick? It's not donated. It happens to be Acme. But I haven't talked to the artist to know whether they've discounted brick for them. It's specially manufactured to her specifications. So they I mean, it is kind of a consideration because it's small batches of special product for her. I know they donated brick for to help rehab the high school baseball stadium. 34 years ago, so I think there's probably some more smaller in things they've been doing. Okay. Any questions on Acme? Any more comments? Okay. Embassy Suites fully opened in January of this year. They are a chamber member. They're engaged in the Denton ISD culinary arts project. I know that they don't have interns happening yet, but they are engaged with that program with Denton ISD. And I know they've toured that facility and that there are still discussions happening between our current technology and folks and them as well. And that they are also, of course, looking to have UNT graduates in their hospitality management program and are engaged with UNT. For community relations and support, their HR director has just been nominated to the board for our daily bread. They are engaged in serve Denton. I believe they hosted their gala for serve Denton and they are the August of 2018 business partner of the month for serve Denton. They're United Way members. I believe they also hosted or helped to host an event for United Way. Their homeless initiatives and their United Way serve Dent on. All those are opportunities that are provided to their employees to be engaged in as community service projects. For Embassy Suites, they encourage their employees to also be involved in their community. And in fact, one of the events that the employees did do was they had a car wash and they collected money that they provided to Cumberland Children's Home to pay for back to school supply products. For innovation, if they are approved, they would be the first Embassy Suites to achieve LEED Gold certification. The LEED certification is definitely on the future end and kind of leading edge for hotels. This is -- there's a growing desire of people staying in accommodations to have them be environmentally sustainable. And so now Denton has that type of facility that meets those needs. Again, and I believe Councilmember Briggs, you mentioned a couple of other initiatives that Embassy Suites had as well. They have solar -- I'm sorry -- they have charging facilities for electric automobiles so they can charge for free. And for their environmental sustainability, if they've got 1,000 -- well, I've skipped ahead. I'm sorry. Let me go back. On the successful business practices, 70,000 square feet of convention space has allowed the City or the Convention and Visitors Bureau to successfully bid on a number of different conventions. Probably 90% of the conventions that they have booked at Embassy Suites could not have been booked were it not at a facility with that capacity. It expanded the City's ability to look at multi-day conventions that were previously 100 or fewer people now to be able to accommodate 500 people with the increased 318 rooms plus the additional suites and the 70,000 square feet of conference space. So it's vastly supported the stature of Denton's ability to compete in that market as a place for people to come and visit and have conventions. For innovation, again, their leading edge, I would have to say their environmental innovations. They have green events. You can have a green wedding with recycled products provided. Again, they have -- if you're up on the top floor, they have 1,000 solar panels to the side. Actually, I thought it was more than that. I thought it was a few more than that, but it's just about a field of solar panels. And there is a recycling focus. They even look at things like wood chipping, the pallets that things were delivered on and recycling it into landscaping cover at their site. So they're always looking for ways to engage to be environmental stewards in the community. Currently they're valued at $74.5 million in total valuation. However, I can't give you a definite amount there. That amount is under AARB review and presently they have 170 employees. And then for small to medium-sized employers, TRCA is a veteran-owned company that was founded here in 1991. Originally, they were rehabbing used telephone systems out of hospitals and schools. And then they became folks that were doing data system implementation. They do or monitor the point of sale systems for very large companies for actually O'Reilly's, for PF Chang's, Dick's Sporting Goods, Fort Knox, some Homeland Security, a hospital. There's a wide gamut of what they do and they are one of the largest folks that are doing the logistics, cabling, and carrier and technology integr ators in the United States. They're located on Virginia Circle that if you are taking the overpass on 380, you may not see them because they are, the facility is down by the railroad tracks. A lot of folks say, "Wow, where's that company?" But they are here and they are additionally, again, Chamber members. The company has a valuation of $3.4 million and but they do have approximately $53 million in sales and upwards. 58 employees, they are engaged, I skipped over this, but they are engaged with North Central Texas College's Tech Hire Program. This is a Department of Labor grant that North Central Texas College got to help pay for internships for companies and transitioning folks through high need jobs with school money and then with money to the company to help pay for that student's internship at that company and provide them work experience and hopefully the company is hiring them and having an opportunity to have folks coming to their door that they have the chance to help develop into that job. So they have been involved in that. They have 24/7 technicians that are 58 people here, but they are contracted nationally with a couple more thousand folks that are independent contractors so that they can be on site fairly immediately. So as you look through the Denton businesses, you could have nominated anybody on here and there would have been a brag sheet and we are very, very fortunate to have the number of companies that we do have here that are all excellent. I think it's part of what makes us a unique and engaged community. So if there are no further questions. Yes, John? This is a Chamber Award. No, this is an Economic Development Partnership Board Award . This is who you as a board are recognizing. Okay. Uh-huh. That makes a difference there. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Can you remind us of who the couple of past winners were? Yes. I want to look at the second or at your agenda information sheet. I think it's page number three for you. In 2008 was Peterbilt Motors, then Business Air, then Philip Baker and the Razor Company, U.S. Aviation Group, Mayday Manufacturing, which is now ES CO, Medical City Denton, TetraPak, Flowers, Safran, which is Labinal, and last year it was Victor Technologies, ESAB. Thank you. So that's, that's. And you'll notice again that those have been large taxpayers and that this has been where this award has been centered in the past and it has not really acknowledged smaller businesses. So that provides an opportunity should you want to do that in the future as well. And here too, because TRCA is smaller. Well, the WENCO target and embassy suites, the contingent center are all in one way or another recipients of incentives through this board. So that's kind of a nice thing to see and probably a really good example of companies that brought in that have given back to the community, which is a big focus of mine. So any other questions or comments or would anybody like to nominate one of the companies? I'd like to nominate Target, I mean any of these would be very wonderful. But for me personally, the community relations support, the partnership with UNT, just again, it's just kind of unique. You know, they're also awarded for their innovation. And a big part to me too is the employee volunteering, that they have a volunteer goal of however many hours annually. To me it is a true partnership award. So not only have they partnered with this board in the past , just to show that they are partnering not only with our universities, our other businesses, but also our nonprofits. And I think they're all vital. Again, it's not that I'm opposed to any of the others. I've got nothing bad to say whatsoever. They're all outstanding candidates as you said. But thus far in looking at the totality of the criteria, I put Target forward. Keely? I'll second. All right, we have a motion and a second. For Target, any further discussion? Second. All right, all those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed? Target it is. It wasn't easy. Well the nice thing is they've been here since 2013 and the other ones are new, so I imagine they'll pop back up on the list and have an opportunity down the road as well. Thanks for compiling that list and information and gathering that. That makes our job a lot easier. You've put a lot of effort into that, Michelle. So thank you. Marty, I do have a question. At the breakfast, will the other nominees be at least acknowledged or will they be considered acknowledged or are we only going to pay homage to the one? We've not done that previously in that sometimes that is, depending on the organization, they're unhappy that they are not selected. So we've not traditionally done that. Of course, we're all watching this on television right now, so they all know. Well and we've had, you know, and I know the Chamber probably experiences that from some of its awards as well because, you know, everybody wants to be recognized and again, certainly all of these businesses are, we're fortunate to have them and they all can be recognized for their contribution. Which is kind of the fodder to my thought that at least you let people know that they were under consideration. I mean to me that gives some, there's some benefit to that. I mean even if I don't win the award, hey gang, you were really considered very inattentive. My only thought is that there's not a clear cut selection process for those that are ultimately compiled in the information package that we have. So as far as future years and vetting who we want to once again show who was, so with that, is that what you're saying, the ultimate group that were presented by the staff? A simple statement at the breakfast. Okay and so. That there were other companies that were under consideration and we'd like to at least acknowledge them for their high levels of service and commitment to the community. Okay. Should we then have this be a numerical grading situation? I like having it vague and because things pop up and we can 't calculate the number of, you know, the value of a thousand solar panels versus different, I mean different things. Like I like how we're doing it now and I don't know that I care if we acknowledge or don't acknowledge so I'm open to whatever anybody else wants to do. So Michelle and I were discussing this. I think we're going to explore the possibility of a ranking system similar to what's done for the downtown reinvestment grants and we'll present the option to y'all for the future. So I'm glad you brought that up Jill. Just as we go through examining our processes for pretty much everything that we do, that will be something that will come before you in the future and it will be up to y'all to decide if you prefer to keep it the same way or move towards something different. And I have no comment on whether we should acknowledge the other companies or not. So I think we're going to probably need to get a consensus from the board if we want to do that. Chuck, do you have a? Well, thank you. John did point out, asked, had the confusion about is this a chamber award. We do an award that is based on the small end and we totally bought into the philosophy several years ago that you just talked about and it backf ired. There were a lot of hurt feelings. So I would encourage you to, I know where you're going, totally agree with it, but there's a lot of harm shared quarterbacks Monday morning, second guessing that goes on and it's actually naming names and especially if you're putting, publishing the criteria, it gets awkward. And in our case did more harm than good. I second that exact. I've seen this within the last 30 days where people didn't show up for an event because they were nominated and then they didn't win. So then they got angry. As opposed to the whole. Let me just give you a recent experience. I was nominated to be the chairman of the state society of CPAs, 27,000 members. So I was one of four that was under consideration. I did not win. My feelings were hurt for a few days and then I realized, man, goodness, what an honor to be. And so my job now as a good citizen is to support the one that won, said congratulations and don't be a sour apple because you never know you may get another chance. But anyway, that was just my experience. So I was appreciative of being offered the opportunity. Didn't win. And actually I didn't win two years in a row. So you know, so I was really hurt the second time, but you know, I got over it. But once again, the record, John, is our program and our membership luncheon this Friday. So I have to be nice to you. Anyway, I'm done. So I just wanted to offer that. Thank you for the feedback. I don't care either way. Why don't we just leave it like it is. We can acknowledge that we have so many, many people to recognize. And again, they're probably watching on television, John. So they're going to know they're nominated. Good discussion. Thank you for everybody's input. Appreciate that. All right. Our next agenda item is a DDP 18 to 049 or staff reports. It looks like I'm gonna have some time to get to talk about all those. So who wants to go first? I can go first. I have a couple of items that are not included in your backup packet. And then I'd be glad to take questions about anything that is in there. For those of you that are not aware, the City Council approved the renewal of the Chamber's economic development contract with the city last night. Vote of six to zero on that. So we're happy to be moving forward with another agreement and to be working together again for another year. My staff is finishing in the last month of this fiscal year our business retention and expansion push. Business retention and expansion, as some of y'all are familiar, this is when we intentionally make appointments to go out and visit companies that are already here to either establish or to maintain relationships with them, help them solve any issues that they've had come up and make sure that they know that we're here to assist them. And these visits, what starts with one visit can often turn into two or three follow-up visits and hours worth of staff time to actually address the issues that have come up during the visits. So it is a time-intensive effort, very worth the time that it takes. But I just want to make sure that everyone is aware that we will push hard on that through the end of the year and plan to continue with our implementation of that next year as well. Yesterday, we received news that we're going to have a second site visit in mid-October from an aviation research and development company that's seeking about a 150-acre site at the Denton Enterprise Airport. So we're pleased to be having them back again for a second visit and I will update y'all on that as more information becomes available. So those were the main things that I wanted to share and again, I'm glad to answer questions if anybody has any about the reports that are in the backup . I had a couple of questions on the Green Gloves project that we didn't have, it was not a target industry. What was the industry? Are we allowed to say that? Marty, I'm going to have to follow up with you on that one. We get so many of these that come through that sometimes I can't remember exactly which one is which, to be honest with you. So I can follow up with the group and send an email out on that. On both of you guys have reports on project MODIS and one says we have a site visit, one says that we don't have the requirements for 1,000 acres, I guess, available. So where are we at on that still? That's one that we both participated in the site visit. It came in as a Ditten Dallas Regional Chamberlain, it came in through I think a state lead, there weren't responses but then somebody from Cole Ranch did respond. It's the only 1,000 acre site that we have in Ditten and if you're unfamiliar with that location it's down 35W, undeveloped property, it's just kind of way out there. So we did show it, it's the first time in four and a half years that I've been here that we showed that site. It's the first time we've had a company wanting an area that large. Yeah and if I could just add to that, the issue with the site is that we did not know that Cole Ranch was submitting their own site for commercial property because it has a PID request for residential development, for 3,000 acres of residential development so neither Adam nor I were aware that they were putting their site forward for commercial. So their broker did that for them and then Adam heard from the Fort Worth Chamber that they were coming up here to show the site so frankly it was a little bit of a surprise to us but Adam and somebody from my staff did participate in that visit so but that happened, you know, we didn't respond directly to the RFP because we didn't think we had a 1,000 acre site. When their broker contacted the Fort Worth Chamber saying that Ditten was one of the sites they wanted to look at, the final sites in Texas, you know, they at least wanted us to put our best foot forward and have somebody from the city, somebody from the Chamber and their broker just represent us the best we could but they ultimately just about a week ago deselected our site so. And that's on the following page, the update about MODIS. Oh, good. Does anybody else have any questions? All right. I also have a packet in your backup, the last five or six pages. You can see all of our social media and website stats and all that stuff in the packet. I won't go over those. I'm going to go over mainly the marketing, upcoming marketing trips and previous month's marketing trips and then the products that we're working and things like that. We are in our last month of the fiscal year starting now. Our fiscal year for those of you who are new starts October 1. So like Caroline said, our budget was approved last night so our funds will get replenished, our public sector funds will get replenished starting October 1 and then we raise private investment as well. So right now, close to the end of the fiscal year, we had nine new projects last month, so total of 53 for the fiscal year with a few weeks left to go. Out of those nine, Project MODIS was one of those so you guys know that one's taken off the list. I won't touch on all of these for you but a few of them that we are definitely in the final running for, Project Sagebrush AM is one of the ones that I want to highlight. It's one that we were selected along with the City of Dallas proper so we're not competing with all of DFW. It's the City of Denton Limits and City of Dallas in competition for a large advanced manufacturing project plus headquarters. They want to put the headquarters in Dallas and the manufacturer here obviously we're fighting for both. That's how we like to do things but we're still in the running so we are in the final process of working with a broker out of Toronto, a broker out of Dallas, out of LA and out of Atlanta so they're all with the same company but kind of coordinating this project's visits. So I don't know how many, if we're competing with another state or not but we are down to just those two locations within our state. Project Axelrod is one that we are working 200,000 square feet. We showed them a 20 acre site. They haven't been in for a visit yet. We showed this to them electronically so there is interest. That one that we called McRail, that's just the name that we made up for it, 40 to 65 acres on rail. We're down to really one developed rail site in Denton left right now that hasn't been accounted for. We think we might have a project that might go in that location but as a backup we do have this company that's looking at that site as well. Project Falcon is a new one and that's a big one that we put in a lot of work on in the last three weeks. It's a brokerage firm out of Dallas. C.B. Richard Ellis is working it and they're looking to put in 1 .2 to 1.7 million square foot project and we are one of their finalist site selection options. We submitted two different sites. It's very tough to find the site that they wanted because of the depth that they need, 165 feet back off of Western Boulevard and just how we worked that project for them but we are in the finalist, one of the finalist locations right now so I'll keep you all posted on all these projects. A couple of other projects that I know I've mentioned a few times in the past, the past few months that we're still, I think we're 95% going to close on these. Project Conrad, it's a roofing materials company based out of St. Louis. They have 20 or so locations across the U.S. They're going to put a 20 to 30,000 square foot building here right there next to Anderson Merchandising on an eight acre site and from what I understand that one is pretty much closed. I think they're just, they're waiting, you know, the razor company owns that property so I think they're just waiting on final sign off on that. Project Crown is one that we've been working on for about a year. They manufacture forklifts. We're going to put them in the leftover space that's remaining, the additional 20,000 square feet that's at building one at Westgate Business Park. Once building number three is built at Westgate Business Park, they would then move all of that production into that larger building. So that's two that we're working on. Along with all good success, we have had a couple of, or I 'm sorry, one recent one that we were working on that we were one of the five finalist sites for that they did to shoot us down recently and they were looking at an airport site as well which we don't have anybody right there on the west side of the airport so that 's a great, developable site of 150 acres. So it's great to hear that you all are getting close on that one project as well. This one, the reasons they shut us down, this was an aerospace aviation project looking to pay $43 an hour, 200 jobs. So I mean it was a great project. Like I said, we made it to the five finalist sites in the country so we put in a lot of work on it, we made it a long way. The reasons that they gave us were that the, in determining these finalist sites, our utilities were at the end of the day were not at to the site. They were close to it, they didn't run right into the site so it was going to take a little bit of leg work on that whereas a couple of other sites weren't going to take that long. Too long of a taxiway, once again that's one of the reasons they gave us so we'll... Too long of a taxiway? Too short of a taxiway. I apologize, yeah sorry. Only use the car you need. Take off before you get to the end. Yeah, I apologize. Thanks for catching me on that. Caroline, the aviation expert, thank you. Where's Bob? When Bob was here we got him. And then fire service capabilities were not readily available to the site. So the three that they selected as the finalist, the fire service was actually, they had them on this all the time. We need to get a fire station at the airport, just putting that out there into the universe for... That's what held us back on that one. Once again we went a long ways on that so we just keep working on future projects for that site as well. Oh, I'm sorry. Oh no, just about the fire station at the airport. Now I'm in total agreement and council has, that has come back within our view recently and I've heard from the outside that there are funds that would help us build those because it is needed and so it's not completely too far away. It's on the radar. Good, that's good. Good here. Any other questions on projects before I get into just brief marketing activity? Okay, marketing activity for the last month we went to the, and I think I reported on this on this last month, but we went to the Southern Economic Development Conference. It's a non-profit membership organization. They serve 17 states across the US. They host conferences that consist of site location consultants, construction and architecture firms who work projects, site selection projects as well, foreign direct investment consultants and then other economic developers. That's one that we've always done. It's always a very beneficial conference for us and I think I had already reported on that last month because it fell at the beginning of the month right before this meeting. We also just hosted, or we did a booth in Dallas at the Net car Conference which is North Texas Commercial Association of Realtors. That's basically all the Dallas, Fort Worth site selection brokers, consultants, people that work projects looking all across the Metroplex. We have a booth there with the Ditten backdrop and so we're kind of there marketing ourselves. We came back with 34 contacts from that that we're following up with. 34 that either were new contacts or that had expressed some interest in doing something up here at some point. Marketing activities. IAMC is next week. That's the, I've presented this to you all several times, International Asset Management Council. This one has some site selection brokers but it's mainly comprised of larger companies that have their own in-house site selection teams. For instance, we located Penske Trucks from this conference . They put a small satellite operation here in Denton. They have PepsiCo, Frito-A, it's all their site selection team from all these big companies that are representing themselves at this thing. So we go and market Denton to them trying to gauge interest . And then IEDC annual conference is coming up at the end of the month. That's the International Economic Development Council. That's something that Caroline might do as well. I go to all those as well. It's economic developers. They have speakers and we kind of keep surprised at what's going on in the country in terms of economic development, what other states are doing, what other cities are doing. So we can make sure we maintain our competitive state here. Adam, do you mind if I just want to mention that the theme for this year's IEDC conference and it's being held in Atlanta. But the theme is inclusive economic development, which is something that Atlanta is known for. So it's a little bit of a different perspective than we've seen at other conferences. And I am planning on going to cover all those sessions together. Okay. Or split them up. Yeah, that sounds great. Can I ask what that means? It means making sure that you're creating opportunities for people at all different kinds of socioeconomic levels and providing workforce development in a manner that's inclusive, transportation options, childcare options, you know, just looking at all aspects of things that people need to have to be able to work and support themselves and be contributors to a community's economy. It's also picking the bus route out to the... It's getting the bus route out there. Yeah, it's making sure that those things are provided for people who want jobs. And then something else we're participating in here in two weeks that is something new that we have not typically done before. And I think you kind of received an email from me. I've been talking with the Richardson EDC and they basically contacted us about doing something that's called the SME Support Japan delegation here to the DFW Metroplex. So they're basically spearheading everything. The Fort Worth Chamber is getting involved, Dallas Chamber, and they want Denton to be involved and have maybe three or four of our manufacturing companies there to help us represent Denton. But then they're also bringing in 25 companies from Japan with a representative with interest in doing business in Texas in the DFW region. So obviously we're going to support ourselves here and that 's a two-day event on the 24th and 25th. So I'm gonna go and represent us. We have one-on-one meetings with each one of these 25 Japanese companies. You... I don't know if any of you have ever done any business with Japan, but it's a big relationship building process. Sometimes it might take five years, but you gotta start and just keep working on them and keep our name out there. And there's... I think there's only six communities across the Metroplex participating in it. So I'll keep you all apprised of how that goes. But we do want to get at least two to three companies from Denton to go with us and maybe Peer Built or Mayday Manufacturing and any companies that might want to do business with Japanese companies. How long is the trip? It's actually... It's not a trip. It's gonna be here and it's... They're having one day in Arlington and one day over in Richardson. It's two days, the 24th and 25th. It's here rather than... It is here. So there will be no travel calls. We need to check the... Go with you. It was in Japan. Yeah. That might make a difference if you have companies go with us. That's all I have. Any questions? Concerns? All right. Thank you for the update, Caroline and Adam. That's a great job. We appreciate all the information. All that stuff's in your packet every month. There's a lot of information. This is a great place to get your information. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. We're gonna be working on it. I have a son at the Blues Festival. John kicked me off the stage because it was too long. You guys did great. And it was also, he booked us at 7.30 in the morning on Wednesday. I'm not sure the festival started. So please join us for a weekend of fun and entertainment. That's great. Jill? Just a couple of things. First, I just want to give a shout out to both Adam and Caroline. I heard at least tremendously positive feedback from a presentation that they gave jointly to the Chamber's Business Networking Luncheon, the dual economic development overview between what the city does in conjunction with the Chamber. But I heard from more than a couple of people how excellent both of you were. So I'd like to say thank you for your time and coming out and helping people know what is going on and what the city and the Chamber are doing. Secondly, I would like to thank our chair, Marty Rivers, who came to Celebrity Bartender Night at Queenie's. I was the bartender. But he represented all of you really well. But I will take donations to the Minerva Scholarship at Texas Women's University if you would like. Thank you. I was already there. Shut up. I think with that, we're adjourned. Thanks to you for being here today. Appreciate it. Thank you.