Apr 01, 2019 City Council on 2019-04-01 11:30 AM

Welcome, everybody, to this meeting of the Denton City Council on Monday, April the 1st, 2019. And so we will now stand adjourned. I'm sorry, it's April Fool's. I'm sorry. It's April Fool's. Sorry. I just noticed that. Monday, April the 1st, 2019. We do have a quorum. I'll call this meeting to order, and Council Member Hussbeth will be joining us here shortly. We'll go on through our Work Session Item Reports, which are Work Session 1A. Move report, hold discussion, give staff direction regarding the general fund FY 2018-19 revised budget, the preliminary 2019-20 proposed budget, and five-year financial forecast. So we're entering that time of the year. We're right in the mix, Mayor. We are. So Mayor, City Council, Tony Puente, Chief Financial Officer. Thank you for having me today. As you know, we generally don't start this process, really, until, like, the June timeframe, but just because of some of the things that we're seeing in the local economy, things that are impacting our general fund forecast, we wanted to come to you as quickly as we could, kind of give you an update, let you know kind of where we are, solicit your feedback as well as we continue to go through the budget process. Just want to note really quick that departments are currently in the process of putting their budgets together, submitting budgets to the budget office, so there's still a lot of things that are going to impact the ultimately proposed budget that would come back to you right after the 1st of August, but this is really kind of a precursor to that process, and before I get started, I wanted to just kind of give you a little bit of a recap, and I don't have this information up here, so I'm going to just verbally kind of walk you through that. So really going back to '17-'18, I just wanted to remind the council that through that process, which really took a big change in how we budget here at the City of Denton, we changed the focus of the general fund to more of an effective tax rate focus. That particular year, we decreased the overall tax rate by four and a half cents, in addition, we also eliminated a number of positions in the general fund, last count at that point, it was a little bit over 22 positions that had been eliminated. In the water fund and the wastewater fund, there was no rate increases, you're aware that over the subsequent previous years, we had seen a number of increases. We kind of reset those budgets as well, and so there was no rate increases. For the electric fund, there was also no base rate increases, although we did reduce the ECA rate at that time that resulted in about a 1% decrease in rates for the electric fund. And then for solid waste, if you recall, at mid-year in '17-'18, we came back to you after a number of operational decisions and changes that had occurred in that fund, and we actually reduced residential solid waste rates by 12%. So that's kind of a recap of where we were in '17-'18. For '18-'19, we continued much of that effort going into the '18-'19 budget. We did reduce the overall tax rate by another one and three quarters pennies, and then ultimately the council did increase the tax rate above the city-calculated rate by one cent. If you recall, most of that went to debt service. The council approved the issuance of about $30 million of COs that that money went to support. We also had a refocusing of many positions, and we added a total of seven positions in the public, excuse me, in the police department. We also added three positions associated with Fire Station 8. That's really three of the nine that were in the overall plan. And then we also added three positions in dispatch. For water and wastewater, for water there was no rate change in '18-'19. We actually did do a 5% reduction in rates for wastewater for '18-'19. For solid waste, certainly the 12% reduction that we did mid-year, the previous year carried forward. There was no further reductions beyond that at that time, but again, it was a carryover. And then finally for the electric fund for '18-'19, again, no changes in base rates, but we did suspend the TCRF, which is the transmission recovery factor, that actually resulted in about 3.5% decrease in rates. So I just want to give you a recap of where we've been and some of the efforts that we've undertaken here at the City over the last couple of years. Going into this presentation, a few things that I'll point out. The emphasis here in resetting or recalibrating this budget is one, to continue to maintain the O&M rate at the effective rate, maintain the current level of services in the City, and then finally to maintain a competitive compensation plan for employees so that we can continue to recruit and retain our workforce. So some of the things that I want to cover with you today is certainly go through the property tax rate history, self-tax history, talk with you a little bit about the assumptions that are going into this particular preliminary forecast, along with some budget balancing strategies, and then finally go through the budget calendar and respond to any questions that you may have. So as I've included in your backup, overall the tax rate has continued to decrease. As I mentioned earlier, if you go back to really 2015, where our tax rate had hit an ultimate high of 68 cents, we subsequently made reductions in '16, '17, and '18. That resulted in almost a 7-cent decrease in the overall rate. The majority of that rate really occurred on the operations side, as you can see here. On the debt rate side, we've maintained about a 21-cent tax rate to support the outstanding debt, plus the additional debt that we've issued at the end of '18. Yes, sir. Tony, real quick. If this is the only slide we're going to see moving forward, no problem, but if we're going to see this history again, it would be nice if we had another column beside, and you don't have to go back to 2008, maybe so, just what the assessed values did correspondingly, or unless you have that. Do you have that? I have it here. I don't have it in the presentation, but I will say that really going back to 2015, our overall assessed valuation increased about 8.5 percent, stayed about the same for '16, in '17, went up to double digits, 13.5 percent, and in '18, we saw right about 9.7 percent increased Navy value. I will tell you that it wasn't too long ago, right around the recession, that we actually saw a flattening to really a decrease of assessed valuations, but again, that was really associated with the Great Recession and the impacts in the housing market. We saw a lot of foreclosures during that time that really suppressed the assessed valuation. As a matter of fact, it was almost the same type of trend that we saw at that time over in sales tax as well. Right. Okay. All right. Thank you. Appreciate that. Yes? If you think we've got room for one more column beyond that, I would suggest median tax bill. Are we actually raising people's taxes or lowering their taxes or not? The rate is a very manipulable factor, right, but ultimately people need to know, you know, did we raise taxes or lower them? Correct. Well, and Council Member, you did pose a question over the weekend. So our average home value for the 2018 tax year was about $233,000. You know, the impact of a 4-cent, and it's really something we'll cover in the next presentation, but a 4-cent tax rate increase would be at about $100 per year. So that equates to, you know, to about $12 per month, right around that figure. So just for the backward look, though, right, during the period we say, oh, well, you know, we kept the tax rate flat, right, the tax bill is going up every year. So certainly the average home value continues to appreciate. Yeah, well, but ultimately those are just inputs to figuring out how much we charge people for taxes. And then during the years when it was declining, we were keeping the tax bill about the same. So you know, that's just a different way to look at it. I think we can certainly do that. We just take the average house, I guess, price of a house those years and do that. I think the other thing that's important to maybe expand on your point is the city's percentage of the overall tax bill itself on an annual basis. I know people see these tax increases, and we had the same discussion last year, if you remember, with, you know, that huge referendum passing, and people automatically assume that the city's raising its taxes. So probably the way we're presenting this needs to be a little bit more holistic. We can add those couple slides and get all of your points in place. Yeah, we can add the whole overlapping debt. Yeah, we can do that. The other thing too that I'll point out, just as a reminder, the 2014 BOM program did include language that there could be up to a three cent tax rate increase. That happened when overall tax rate was at 68 cents. I will tell you that that increase did not materialize. We've not done that increase, as you can see, kind of by our trend. And again, that was really attributable to higher AV value growth, but at the same time, the market for our debt issuances, the interest rates actually came down a little bit, and so some of those things could obviously mitigate those increases. So the next slide that I want to talk with you about briefly is just our self-tax history, kind of where we've been and where we are today. So last year, these averages are really the averages that we were looking at last year as we were looking at revising our estimate at that time. And so we felt really comfortable that based on the three-year and the five-year average, that a 7% increase was likely a reasonable. So that's where we estimated where we would end up in '17-'18. Obviously that did not materialize. Subsequent to that, we also had an increase of 5% for the '18-'19 budget. I know that I've mentioned this to you anecdotally, but our '17-'18 actual budget came in really at about 4% above the prior year. We did see about a billion dollars less in revenue over the last two months of last year's fiscal year that really impacted where we ended up in the estimate. So with that reduced actual for '17-'18, what we have to make up now is really 8%. We need to be at 8% to really be able to meet our budgetary estimates. And based on current trends, through the latest allocation for January sales, we're certainly not seeing that type of trend. And so that's really what necessitated us having to go back and recalibrate that estimate. So our current estimate for '18-'19 that's included in this forecast is actually a 1% decrease to where we ended up in '17-'18. Again, we still have about six more months to go in sales tax, but we feel comfortable that we've recalibrated where we think we're going to end up the year. And so they have used that as a lowered basis for the entire forecast going forward. So that represents about a $3.5 million decrease in projected revenue for '17-'18. And then, of course, as I mentioned, the recalibrated or lowered base, then we are projecting a 5% increase on top of that for every year of the forecast. Tony, question. Why are we using the '17-'18 budget as sort of a -- sounds like we're using it as a benchmark and we're trying to compare that this budget needs to at least represent what that one was and then what are the factors that are -- is it just because it was the last one before two years ago or something? Well, I think part of that -- and I'm sure that's the most accurate data that we have, but certainly just looking at that month-to-month trend and where we're tracking compared to last year's actuals by month kind of gives us that comfort level. So right now we're tracking pretty flat to where we were last year. And I will just add that we do get monthly reports on our major sales tax payers. So it's not just extrapolating based on last year's basis. We're getting real-time information on our largest sales tax generators so we can see what's going on with them as well. So there's a little bit more concrete estimates in terms of what they're doing and why we were able so quickly to identify the one industry that really took a dip in our sales tax projections. Well, as I mentioned earlier, if you go back to kind of the first set of data that we have here, really during this period between '18 and '10 was really during the recessionary time and so, again, sales tax did take a hit at that time. What I will mention to you is that even though we did see a negative increase for 2008, 2009, I think compared to some of our surrounding cities and their metroplex, we kind of weathered that storm a little bit better. Part of it had to do with not just an increased number of retail outlets available here in the city to our residents, but if you recall during that time, gasoline prices were really spiking up and so people were having to make a decision whether or not they will shop south of the lake as we call it or stay in debt and we believe that really the higher increase in gas prices really kept people here locally that really kind of helped at least keep us pretty stable as far as our sales tax was concerned. Again, I don't have a lot to back that up and that's just my own personal theory of where sales tax ended up that year. >> I don't know if we have records going back way, way back, but I imagine we do. Was the change in sales tax during that recession markedly different than what we have seen in other recessions? >> I think for the most part, yes, Councilmember. Certainly this recession was a little bit deeper than some of the other recessions that we've had, certainly was very comparable to, you know, to what you may be familiar with, with the Great Recession, with the Great Depression, certainly not to that degree, but certainly not as, a little bit more drastic than the normal business cycle type of recessions that we see every five to ten years. >> Yeah, and what would be a more typical recessionary impact, like 2001 maybe, or I don't know if that, or we can certainly. 1989 I think was a recession. >> We can certainly go back and take a look at that. I would just point out that for every 1% decrease in our assumption here, you're looking at about $380,000 of less than projected revenue to the city. >> Thanks. >> Councilmember Briggs. >> On the sales tax, is there a way to tell or even possible, because we did have some businesses that weren't in incentivized locations, but then moved from their non-incentivized location to an incentivized location, say like Tuesday morning, PetSmart or Petco, whichever one. In their previous locations, they didn't have any kind of incentive, but now they do. Is there a way to tell what impact that has had on our overall sales tax? So now we have IHOP that wasn't in a location, but now is in Razor, which is an incentivized location. >> I would say that there is some level of impact. Unfortunately, the sales tax data that we get for IHOP, well, we get that information, and we've had it for some time on how much they're remitting to the city month by month. The actual rebate that's generated from those increased sales tax isn't netted from what IHOP gives us. It actually is given in aggregate to whoever the developer party is that gets that. And so we can give you a high level net sales tax for the city, where we net out from gross revenues all those incentive agreements to let you know kind of an idea of what the impact might be. But certainly, there is some cannibalization, if you will, of sales tax that has occurred. To what degree, we'd have to study that a little bit more. >> Just to follow up on that, I would like to, as we discuss our incentive policies, to try to do things to prohibit that in the future, say, you know, or exempt those properties from that incentive if they weren't in on one before. Because as they do move out to these developments, which are large, and they leave other parts of the city, then I just -- I don't think that that's a fair thing to do. You can certainly take a look at that. >> Thank you. >> So the next couple of slides I want to cover before we get into kind of the forecast itself, just kind of walk you through some of the assumptions that we've made in developing this forecast. So the overall assessed value growth for all years of forecast is projected at 4%. Within that, there is new value growth that we've projected, as well as 4%. Again, that new value growth represents about 2.5% of the overall A/V value growth, or about $300 million of new value that we've seen. Again, certainly if there's a slowdown in the economy, we could see that, you know, come down, but historically, that's kind of what we've seen. That equates to about $1 million in new revenue that comes into the city from new value growth. What we've assumed here is the effective O&M rate for all years of that forecast. And then finally, within property taxes, of course, we have the frozen value. That frozen value represents about $1.2 billion in value, but since that is frozen, there's about $7 million in frozen taxes that are coming to the city. We've assumed that that would grow at about 2%. So just wanted to point those things out. So on the property tax side, for the O&M tax rate, we've projected the effective rate. And so that effective rate continues to come down, and the only credit that's coming into the general fund is the new value revenue, or the revenue associated with new value. As such, one of the things that I did want to point out is that, and I'll cover that a little bit further, we have pulled out all assumed supplemental funding from the forecast every year of the forecast. And so any supplemental funding at this point that would be added to the operations side would likely require an increase above the effective O&M or maintenance operation rate. The overall tax rate for this plan, and again, we'll discuss this a little bit further in the next presentation on the bond program, we're assuming to maintain that tax rate at the current tax rate of 62 cents for all four years. However, there could be up to a 4 cent tax rate increase, and that really comes in play in 2001 at a 1% increase, 2002 at a 1%, and in 2 cents in the 2003 fiscal year. Those are the assumptions that have gone into the debt service tax rate. The sales tax, as I've already covered, we've projected a decrease for the current year of 1% over what we received in '17-'18, as I mentioned. That's about $3.5 million of reduced revenues in this one particular year. Yes, sir. To try to put this in a term that I can more readily understand, I mean, I understand that. So if I remember correctly, the current budget, 2018-'19, when we were at this time last year, the forecast was for a 5% increase in sales tax, I believe. Yes, over the revised estimate for the prior year, that was also revised up to 7%. Yes, so 5%, because I know that in the assumptions, it used to be 3% based upon the prior year's revised estimate. So we moved it to 5% based upon the chart, and that's where sort of this happened, because we had some decrease in that from some of our sales taxpayers. And so put it in terms of, so do we know how much the sales tax grew? Okay, it didn't go to 5%, but how much did it grow from the prior years? Was it 4%? Yes. 3.5%, so it's 4%. 4% right here, Mayor, over the '16-'17. So then we're projecting in our forecast for the budget, if we're using the 2000, you're using the 2017-'18, or you're going to use that? Yes. Okay. So we're reducing the current year estimate to $37.9 million, so it's a 1% decrease from the 2017-'18 actual, and then it's 5% going forward on this revised estimate. Okay. So you're saying that 5%, that from, and where I'm getting confused is because we're jumping back two years to use that as a base, quite honestly. So from, when you get to the, when you know what the actual 2018-'19, that's the estimated is that $38 million, right? And you're saying you're, so the forecast is being projected that we're going to have sales tax increases of 5% above that level there, the $38 million, is that right? That's correct. So then help me understand, because we did that last year, we did 5%, and it didn't hit 5%. And that's sort of, I mean, I think we're going to have to pull it out of the general fund, a couple million bucks, or that's what you're going to go over, I think, from the fund balance, because we have to make that deficit up somewhere. For next year, yes, sir. Yeah. So why are we doing 5% instead of, because I know we had been doing 3 or 3.5% pretty conservatively over these forecasted years. We bumped it up to 5% last year. Help me understand the reason for that. David Gaines, assistant director of finance. So I get, when we look at it this way, and you see the negative 1% and then a 5% increase, it looks a little off. But what that's coming from is, as we looked at that, the sectors and the confidential report, the actual taxpayers that are paying less this year, we've really taken those out, got them back to a new baseline this year in the estimate. We take those out, we're seeing close to a 5% increase on all other taxpayers. So by getting us with this new estimate, we're coming to a new baseline, and we feel comfortable projecting 5% over that new baseline in future years. And I will say, just to add a little bit, not only do we get these monthly reports, we can go through and see specific taxpayers, industries, that sort of thing. Our finance team went out and actually met with the larger taxpayer last year, who basically felt like their sales that they were currently undergoing were going to continue forward. That didn't happen. So they've been out there, first Chuck, then Tony, over the last two years because we were so concerned about the trending we were seeing. And the problem with that, and the reason that we have those discussions, is the minute that you budget a lower amount, and you come in $3, $4 million higher, then you automatically get into an issue or a discussion that you should have lowered the property taxes more. And so there's a lot of points of data and information that we go through when making these estimates. But the other thing you've got to remember is you've got a number of larger taxpayers coming online, as well as what they're saying. Several of these entities are starting to fire up and will be underway before the time we hit the next budget year as well, in addition to the trending they're saying. I'll get with you offline on that so I can understand more clearly because I'm looking at this and the actual for 2017-18 was less than the estimated. It was $39 million and then it went to $38.270. The proposed for 2018-19, which is the year I'm talking about, which we went 5% above, what our estimated was back then, which means we were already in the hole basing it on the estimate instead of on the actual. So that sort of made those actual differences higher as well. Again, Mayor, just to go back to 2017-18, when we craft this estimate, the majority of the decrease occurred in the last two months of that fiscal year. So again, at that point that we created this estimate, there was really no indication that that was going to happen. Because you get it a couple months later. Yes, sir. Because when you're talking about the end of that year is October of 2018. It's like September and October, August, September and October of 2018. So September we don't get until November, as an example. Right. Okay. What I don't want to do is run into the same situation. So I understand what I'm hearing you say is, before I think we just took a straight, we're just going to do 3% above, and you're saying you're doing now a little bit more analysis of the actuals and who's paying to give you a little bit more accurate forecast. Yes. And so that will keep us from running into the situation again. You hope so. And the issue is when we see unusual trending, we're going out and talking to these folks saying, you know, has there been a spike? Did you just get to have a big order come through or is this something you think is your new normal? So yeah, I mean, with sales tax, that's really the only approach you can take when you have one, we're still reliant on I think probably our top 10 or 12 sales tax generators are probably, what, 60, 70% of the overall sales tax. So I mean, it's not that difficult. We need to continue diversifying before it makes it that much more difficult to predict. Well, and as I mentioned too, Mayor, we'll continue to look at the sales tax every month. Our hope and what we're seeing today is that that will continue to flatten and really kind of track more in line with what we received in the prior year, kind of just based on some of these kind of industry adjustments that we're seeing. So the one area that seemed to take the big hit, is that forecasted to stay at the level after the big hit or is there an analysis that it may sort of return back to historical levels? I think it's unlikely that it would return. Okay. So we're taking that out of the equation. Yeah. Okay. Great. Without naming taxpayers, you mentioned that, City Manager, Mr. City Manager, that some new taxpaying entities are coming on. What sectors are we talking about? Generally retail. In fact, I think almost every sector, there's retail that we're predicting that should have a pretty marked impact. And Council Member Hutsby requested that information, so we're working on that. We're going to give you kind of the new entrance into Denton, but I think it'll also be fair to show you who's no longer in Denton as well, because there's really kind of a netting that occurs there. Okay. Thanks. Okay. So sales tax, the other thing too that I wanted to point out in this forecast is that last year as well, what we've done this year is we've included the three FTEs, four Fire Station 8 in 1920, and then the final three FTEs in the 2021 fiscal year. Again, there's a total of nine firefighters that are going to go into Fire Station 8 staffing. One of the things that I do want to point out is that there is an intention, our intention is to reapply for another safer grant. The current safer grant that we have covered six FTEs, about a million dollars over a three year period. That's really a staggered, so it's, you get 75% of the salaries in the first two years and then it decreases to 35% in the final year for a full million dollars. We're pretty confident, we're certainly, our intention is to apply for that grant. That has not been included in here. If that were to happen and we were to get that grant, the one stipulation would be that we would have to hire all those positions in fiscal year '19-'20. So we'll have to readjust the budget, but I did want to let the council know that our intent is to reapply for that grant. So going to the next slide, this really gets into, you know, how, what we've done to try to rebalance our general fund forecast and budget. So some of the items that we've included, as I mentioned up here, you know, we've taken about 5.3 million dollars in the '18-'19, and the way we've done that is we've increased our salary savings assumption from 2 million to 2.8 million, so it's initial 800,000 salary savings. That's really, the managed vacancy program is something that we've always done at the City of Denton, but we've actually taken a harder look at those FTEs, when they come vacant, and how quickly those positions are refilled or not refilled at all. So that's something that we're going to continue and continue to address going forward. We estimate, again, that we can generate an additional 800,000 salary savings. This plan also recaptures 2.1 million dollars that was previously used to cash fund small transportation projects, if you recall at the end of '16-'17, the general fund budget or the general fund balance increased by a little bit over 3 million dollars. We came back in '17-'18, and we made a couple of proposals to the council. One of those included cash funding some of those small transportation projects. Some of those projects have still not, are still underway, they're in design, and so as such, what we're proposing to do is to bring back that 2.1 million dollars in cash funding that we previously did, utilize some of our roadway impact reserves that we have for those projects to the tune of about a million dollars, and then issue about a million dollars in COs to fund those particular transportation projects that were previously approved by the council. So in addition, we're proposing to eliminate another cash funding that we did in fiscal year '18-'19 of $678,000 for the Mayhill project. Yes, sir. Excuse me, Tony. I just want to understand the previous item a little better. 2.1 million? Yeah, the part that's where it's drawing on, I forget what, reserve? Roadway impact. Yes, sir. Yeah, why do we have a reserve there? What was it originally intended for, or did we not spend something we intended to? No, I think in all of the capital project impact fee reserves, there has been quite a bit of time spent, including parks, there's been quite a bit of time spent the last year or two building models where we can track all of the impact fees, where they're eligible to be spent, that sort of thing. So we've got streets, water, waste water, parks, all set up now to where we can actually go back through projects that have been approved in the plans, match them up to the funding, and those projects should be funded out of impact fees first before there's any additional COs. That had not previously been done because our tracking mechanisms weren't very good. I think all of our directors have been working with our GIS folks and have got that very finely tuned now, so you're seeing a lot of recommendation, and we're also applying the same methodology to the 9/15/16 funds as well in parks, so it's just a matter of once we get that money in here, if they're eligible to offset capital projects, that goes first, then our COs or tax dollars come next. So it kind of should have done this in the past. Should have been done, and it's just a matter of getting organized. Okay. Helpful. Thank you. All right, so the next item that I have up here, well, let me finish the 678. So we had proposed a cash fund, a portion of the improvements at the 651 Mayhill. This is where we're going to co-locate our warehouse and our transportation facility as well, and so as a result of some of the changes that we've made in the solid waste fund, we had some additional COs there that can be used on this project, and so rather than use 678,000 in cash from the general fund, we're going to go ahead and use, or proposing to use excess COs in the solid waste fund to complete that project. The other thing that we've done is we've worked with our economic development department. We have early projections that we do of where we think our incentive agreements are going to be and what expenses we're going to make, and we've gone back, we've put a little bit of pencil to paper, and we think that there's about $500,000 of money that we will not need for some of those incentives, and so we feel comfortable reducing that estimate by $500,000. Again, those agreements will continue to be in place, but we've just readjusted that budget for the current year. And some recurring items that I'll point out is, if you recall, we had previously cash funded a portion of our vehicle replacements to the tune of about $600,000 that was in the plan every year. We've taken that out. We've continued to do some work in our fleet area to right size our fleet. We've been able to reduce the amount of vehicles that are going to be replaced. Again, that effort has not impacted public safety through that effort as well. If you recall, there was a fire, air, and light truck, and so we've re-prioritized some of the funding for some vehicles, and we were able to free up some funds to be able to do that. That particular truck, if you recall, that was a supplemental request in the last fiscal year, and so just wanted to report that to you that we were able to fund that, and that was actually, I believe, already on order. So the next item is franchise fees. If you recall, we've been dedicating two sources, really, as it relates to franchise fees. All the growth in franchise fees overall to the city now go to the Street Improvement Fund, and that's been going on since fiscal year '11-'12. In fiscal year '16-'17, we proposed a 10-year plan to completely remove all franchise fees out of the general fund, $622,000 every year, and so part of this proposal that we would postpone that for three years, as part of our balancing strategy, that fund does have about $1.6 million in reserve, and so we'll continue to reanalyze that Street Improvement Fund, and if needed, we believe that there's enough fund balance there to cover it for at least the next three years. And so that's how we arrived at this particular plan. In the third year of the plan, let me go to the plan real quick, and I'll show you. So by fiscal year '11-'12, we'll pick up that transfer again of $622,000 going out, but for fiscal year '18-'19, '19-'20, and 2021, we would not transfer that additional $622,000 to the Street Improvement Fund. That's part of, again, part of our balancing strategy here. - Council Member Briggs had a question. - And we did that to make sure that there was enough money to continue maintenance, street maintenance, and other things for our infrastructure, because that was the number one issue for Council and our residents. So by doing this, we're not eliminating any projects or any maintenance or anything. This is just something that we're putting on hold. Can you speak to that a little bit? And I do know that there's some issues or legislation going on with franchise fees now. And does this have something to do with that as a hold, or is this something separate? - It's keeping the service level the same and simply drawing down reserves the next two or three years to get us back to a balanced budget. It was important for us, knowing that some of the issues that Council's gonna face in the next few months, that we put you in the same, if not an improved, position heading into the '19-'20 budget discussions, because the budget's starting to get so lean now, there's no question we can use the effective rate as a, basically, I guess the bottom line, which it is, in terms of the services we're gonna deliver. However, most of the policy discussions we're gonna be talking to you about, capital projects-wise, public safety, is going to require some thought process to, and most likely an incremental addition to that. So this won't affect our ability to keep up with things. It's a drawdown in the street improvement fund balance, and so it shouldn't have a measurable impact at all, or a noticeable impact at all, on our street maintenance abilities. - So the potential changes to the cable franchise fees is certainly something that we're aware of. I think that the legislation certainly has some challenges in completely doing away with those franchise fees, but could those franchise fees be less than what we're getting today, potentially? That has happened in the past. So we'll continue to look at that legislation. - Yeah, and I think their approach is, if we see some of these restrictions on the city's budget in terms of this revenue stream, property tax caps, whatever, it's going to start changing the way we bring budget proposals to you, which is part of the reason you'll be seeing the potential two propositions this year, is we're already anticipating that the city council's flexibility is going to start getting restricted this year, as well. - Thanks, Mayor Mouser. - Yeah, sorry to keep making you break it down to basics, but it sounds like a good thing that we had this 1.6 million in reserves. Why do we have reserves there in the street improvement fund? I mean, do we generally carry a balance? - I'll let Tony answer, because that was my same question. - Well, I mean, I certainly think that one of the requests the city manager has made of us is to do some more analysis, but what I will tell you is that that fund balance has grown, and so, I mean, I think we can all deduce that probably some of that maintenance either hasn't been done or hasn't been needed. There's a number of things that we need to look, but the intention in that fund was never to grow that fund balance. That fund balance started back in '11, '12 at about $200,000. We put some seed money in that fund balance, and it's grown, and so we think there's, again, some things that we need to do in that department to reconfigure how we're doing street maintenance and give us some time to draw that down. - This is almost the definition of couch money. - I'm not going to give Council Member Hudspeth the satisfaction, but yeah, so, thanks. - So, my observation of this slide is, and I'm probably going to have to see it in the next slide, is there's a lot of moving money around because it seems like that the upcoming budget's going to be very tight and that we're having to try to find ways to meet some of those shortfalls without necessarily raising taxes, so, because I remember this cash funding of vehicle replacements, that was something that was advocated for, and maybe it's the person who was advocating for it is really no longer with us, but, Mr. Langley, but, so is this a change in policy? Is this cash funding, this moving that or eliminating that, is this a change in policy or is this a temporary kind of solution to try to help shore up what we see to be a fairly decent-sized hole in the available revenue for this upcoming budget? - I think some cash funding of your vehicle replacements is, it's best practice, there's no doubt. I think this also corresponds with the fact that we've been going through right-sizing the size of the fleet, so we had a cash funding policy based upon needs that are more than we currently have today, so, and we're going to continue challenging the department heads to make sure that we're not replacing vehicles too early just because it's a due date. Does that really mean that we need to replace it? We're starting to ask different questions of them and they're being very good about putting up vehicles that don't, they don't need any longer, different ways of doing business. So what you're seeing here is just continued business process, questioning, the staff continue to get more sophisticated and organized. Council Member Meltzer's question on the impact fee is an example of that. Fresh Vacancy Program is fairly simple, we just basically continue to ask questions, do we need positions refilled, can we hold off, delay for several months until we can get our financial house in order and confidence there, and so these are easy levers for us to push while we're still continuing to question how we're doing business. Economic Development Incentives, again, assume that a whole different level of performance is going to be done out of those development services agreements, those of economic development agreements that didn't materialize, so we're constantly going through recalculating our budget, recalculating what do we need to do business every day. The one thing we didn't want to touch on up here right now since we're a couple months away from having a policy discussion with you is going to be the red light camera money for instance if that goes away and so we just didn't want to get into that with you, but again the whole goal was we're not just satisfied with how the budget is, we're continuing to challenge the directors with how can we do business smarter, how can we redirect dollars into people and services and not necessarily vehicles that aren't moving and those sorts of questions, but the goal when we started this was to get you back, which I'll show you on the next slide here, to the same or an improved position so you were not starting out in 1920 in a panic situation with the legislature continuing to try to take away your flexibility, so we wanted to be sure this is our plan, our recommendation, if you didn't like something that we've done you can let us know, but we thought this was the best plan at this point in time moving forward, we've still got six months left in the fiscal year and we're watching Austin closely, but we've been able to improve our financial position moving forward and at least give you the ability to have policy discussions in a position where you're not in crisis and that's what we owe you right now. I will tell you Mayor that we issue about $3 million in five-year COs every year for vehicle replacements, the $600,000 is really an immaterial amount to what we're already issuing anyways. Oh no, that's not a criticism, that's not a criticism, it's a shift and that's okay, it's certainly okay as a policy discussion, but I just wanted to address it. I would say long term it's not a policy shift we would like to make, I think it's something right now we feel like we need to do in order to put you on an even footing going forward. Sure, okay. Now on the economic development incentives of $500,000 in projected savings, because those incentives are based upon revenue we're receiving, a percentage of revenue we're receiving, so is that a net number or is that a gross number, in other words, has that been taken off the revenue side as well, because if we're saving and not having to pay out half a million dollars, that means we're not getting a certain amount of revenue in either. It was really more a product of we had a higher anticipated budget there than we really needed. That was really netted off of whatever increase we felt we had on the revenue side, it was really netted off so there was really no impact. Okay, all right, and on the managed vacancy program, that's always been something that's been very interesting to me, it's sort of like, so if there comes a point where we don't need some of these positions, are we dropping them off or are we still keeping them in this managed vacancy program to sort of, I don't want to say keep the number up, but if we find we don't need them, are they removed from this quote unquote managed vacancy program? Well, I'll answer your question in a lot of different ways. I don't know, I think that's the first time I've heard that kind of precursor. It's a big organization and you figure people are always retiring, leaving, changing, I mean we've got industries right now in the city, construction related, it's a revolving door between us, Jago, Peterbilt, so you're always going to have those types of vacancies there and the savings associated with it. The reason I gave you the answer I did is there's clearly areas in the city, I feel like the most diplomatic way to put it is just getting our priorities straight. I mean, you know, we've really downsized the management team significantly and tried to expand control in order, there's areas in the organization such as public safety, we've probably outside of the budget process moved a dozen to two dozen positions into police and dispatch over the last couple years and we're still several, probably two or three dozen short from where the chief would like to be and so it just really gets down to can they fill the positions, do we have the minimum savings, are our priorities really right sides right now and if we can do business different and we need two or three more officers right now and we can bake it in there and still work within the effective rate the next year, why aren't we doing that? And so that's kind of been the approach we've taken. It's easier to come to you and ask for your 10 officers rather than 25, you know, if we're able to reprioritize throughout the course of the year. Okay. Thank you. Oh, Councilman Briggs. A question about impact fees, was that on there? Yes. The roadway impact fees. Yeah. So is there a risk, a time limit that those need to be used after they're collected and does that have anything to do with us needing to use them? No, no, not really. It's really about what's available for us to utilize within those zones and what projects of the small transportation projects are in those zones and so you are restricted to utilize that money within those zones that we have. For some reason I thought it was within 10 years or something. Those are almost exact, like if you have to build a sidewalk for your project, you can either pay money in to a fund that has to be used within a certain amount of time or you build the sidewalk and I'm not sure what those are called exactions, I'm not sure. I just wanted to comment to make sure that those are things we're following up on and that we're actually... So there is a set of pot of money or I guess there's some pots of money that were set aside when developers came in and it predates the impact fees. Those funds do have a timeframe associated with them and when that timeframe passes then the development can request a refund on those funds if they haven't been utilized and we're constantly combing through those to see where those are. That predates the impact fees. The impact fees are a totally different story. Okay, I think I may be thinking of the money we were talking about that was in the past. Okay, thank you. I just want to kind of build on Council Member Briggs' question, I mean one of the things I've asked Todd and his staff to do is go back through and take a look at the roadway impact fees again because the cost of the road program is escalating so fast. These impact fees are probably three or four years old by now, so if you just think about what we're seeing with our bids on the roads going up 10, 20% a year in terms of the cost of construction, are those impact fees right size and proportional to what we're seeing actually having to spend money out there right now? So we'll be bringing that discussion back to Council here shortly and some of the known projects and then we're going to combine that along with the mobility plan, the thoroughfare plan as well, to make sure that we're capturing enough dollars from development to help put the infrastructure in place for our residents. Thank you, Mayor. Well, I just want to say, Brian's not the only one that advocated for the cash funding and vehicles. I've been a big advocate of that and for this exact reason, it's you don't use the credit card when you can use the debit card and so when you do end up in a crunch like this, you've got a place that you can adjust your budget accordingly. Okay, hopefully everybody can see that up here. So this is our current forecast. Again, as I mentioned, I'll just put that out there again. We'll continue to revise this as we go forward. Also we have a number of things that could impact it. I mean, Councilmember Briggs brings up a good one on the cable franchises and a number of other legislative things that could happen here in the next few weeks. And certainly on the expense side, we have a number of things that could impact that as well. Departments are currently working on their supplementals and so one of the things that I wanted to point out just really quickly with you or to you is on the fund balance percentage, I just wanted to remind the Council that our target, our fund balance target is 20% to 25% and so we believe that this plan puts us kind of in a pretty good footing over the next four years. Certainly in these out years, again, what's going to happen in year four, year five is certainly something that we'll continue to look at. But again, we feel comfortable that we're well within that policy level. The other thing too that I'll point out is I mentioned to you that this forecast currently assumes no supplementals being added to this budget. Again, we've added about $750,000 in supplementals every year with 250,000 in one times. Certainly we can make the argument that that 750,000 is somewhat unrealistic. But again, we just want to make sure we pointed that out to the Council as we continue to look at supplementals and where we're going to land with those. We could very well have to look at an O&M tax rate increase or some other type of reduction in expenses. So we'll continue to formulate that going forward. I did want to point out that here in transfers, you see that transfers increased from 17 million to 19 million. This is where we recaptured that $2.1 million in one time funding that we did in the prior year. And then also I'll point out that franchise fees in fiscal year 2021 and 22, we restart the $622,000 shift out of the general fund over back into the street improvement fund. Excuse me, right here. >> So what I'm understanding on this is now based upon the last slide, this makes a little more sense to me. >> Yes, sir. >> So the current estimate 2018-19 has incorporated in that column many of the things you just mentioned. Which if we didn't have that, if that wasn't there, if those adjustments weren't there, that- >> The 14,000 would be 3.5 million roughly. >> Say it one more time. >> This $14,000 change in fund balance would go up to about 3.5 million negative. >> Yeah, at least. I mean, if you're changing 2.1 plus 800. >> By year three, you were down to 12 or 13% fund balance. So we just couldn't put you in that position. >> So that's what the moving around has made to make the current budget more whole. Because of the big decrease in sales tax, we would have been drawing down the fund balance. >> That's correct. >> $3.5 million, $4 million. >> Yes, sir. >> Okay, all right, okay, sir, all right, thank you. >> Yes. >> Can you just speak briefly to the question of transfers? I know that could be a whole presentation on its own, but just because it's something that I get questions about, not regarding today's presentation specifically, but just the public, stuff the public wants to know. What happens when money gets transferred internally? So, if you could just speak kind of briefly to, where do you see, say for the 2018, 2019, and 2020, where do you anticipate? Where have most transfers come from and to you in the past? Where do you anticipate that going in the future? I know some of what the answer is, but just what would be your sense of a nutshell summary of that, average member of the public? >> So these transfers that are transfers into the general fund, they come in as revenues, are really charges for services that the general fund provides to internal service and utility funds. So a component of human resources that's being provided to Electric Electric then reimburses the general fund because all the HR expenses are in the general fund. Same thing with legal and accounting and a number of other core services that are included in the general fund and paid for out of the general fund, but are attributable to those other funds. And so those are what these transfers really kind of are made up of. And unless we see an expansion to those core services in the general fund, likely those would continue to remain relatively flat, so. >> And just for follow up, so would you say that utilities transfers constitute the bulk of it? >> Yes, I would say that, yes, ma'am. >> Thanks. >> So the other couple of items that I wanted to point out, again, as I mentioned earlier, for fiscal year 19-20 and this 92 million dollars in personal services, we've included the three firefighters for Fire Station 8 and an additional three in fiscal year 2021. And depending on where we land with the safer grant application, we may need to make that adjustment and move all six to 19-20. >> Tony, real quick, I know that on our utilities we have and I think it's, I know it's on electric, but I don't know about wastewater and it's always. We have that rate of return. I know they pay a franchise tax and that comes in under franchise fees, I presume. >> And then there's also that rate of return figure, what revenue line is that? >> It's in the transfers as well. >> It's in the, and do you know what that amount is about, isn't it about four or five million or something like that? >> That's about six million. >> That's what I thought, it's about six. >> 8.4. >> Okay, and that's, how do I put it? That's hard cash, that's, whereas transfers are almost like an accounting kind of, because utilities are charging for their personnel. And we're charging them for the core services that we provide to them. And so that part of the transfers is kind of a, I don't know how else to say it, but it's just sort of an accounting kind of approach. >> And we can break that out, Mayor, for the next time that we come to you, that way it's easy for you to see. >> Okay, all right, fantastic. >> Yes, sir, you bet. >> So a couple of other items that I wanted to point out, again, for fixed assets. Again, we did see this fixed asset decrease and this is where, again, we've elected not to do the $600,000 for vehicle replacements and the 600 plus thousand for the Mayhill project. That's really kind of where that shows up. Again, and just finally, I wanted to again remind the council that this plan, at least currently, keeps us within that policy, a target of 20 to 25% for the general fund, fund balance. So I'll be happy to answer any other questions that you may have on this forecast. >> Yes, Councilmember Hudson. >> Not so much forecast specific, but future looking. Assuming a downturn comes at some point, and assuming construction slows, what have you seen, or what do you suggest ways to kind of seize that opportunity, right? So we've seen it uptick so much. If it comes down, I want to try to take advantage of that opportunity to get projects in the ground. As people have staffed up and up and up, now all of a sudden, and you see it some, or you hear some in the retail market currently. And so as that, is there a way to hold projects or kind of look at that and then pounce on it? I just don't know, given the way our budget flows, if there's a way to do that, but I'm curious. >> Certainly, I mean, some of those projects every year as we're going through and looking at what we're going to issue by way of debt. Certainly we're cognizant of where we think our revenues are going to be in the future to be able to support that debt. If we feel that there's going to be a downturn, then likely what we'll do is we'll postpone the issuance of some of that debt, which would probably be kind of one of the triggers that we can look at, because again, you want to make sure that you have the revenue to support that debt. Because once you've issued it, you have to generate the debt, and if the value hasn't grown, then likely what you're looking at is a continued increase in the tax rate to be able to generate that debt. So that's only one area. The other area that I'll point out is this forecast assumes a 4% annual AV growth, which we think is pretty conservative. I think it's what we've traditionally forecasted. Even though we've seen double digit growth in AV value over the last couple of years, I just remind the council that that increase in value, the effect is that it's decreasing the effective rate over the course of this plan. So that the only revenue that's coming into the plan is really associated with new value growth. That new value growth, about $300 million a year, is increasing about 4%. We think that's still a pretty realistic number, but certainly if we see a slowdown, that's usually where it's gonna first hit and we'll hopefully be able to see it through some of our permitting activity that we're looking at on a monthly basis. But I think right now we're pretty confident that that will continue to grow, at least in the foreseeable future. But if it doesn't happen, then we'll be back to you talking to you about other opportunities for us to rebalance the budget further. >> And then Mr. City Manager, I think you're listening to the conversation about holding positions appeals to me. Because I almost see that as if, and I don't know your approach, but I could see value in almost a utility type position that then is able to ebb and flow and fill those needs or kind of as if it's automation, if it's outsourcing, whatever kind of kicks in. We've had six months experience with this person in this department to get a feel for them and then transition them over to another area, that sort of thing. So I really do kind of just listen to that conversation today, I find that appealing. And then lastly, if I may, if I could borrow Todd, I want to get an estimated time on the underpass at Brinker, because that's going to trigger four, five, six new growth spots that I think will go pretty quick. >> So I'm just trying to understand where your question is coming from. >> So I understand the underpass, once that's completed. >> Yes, sir. >> Then those lots in front of Bucky's are going to develop. That's my understanding that they're holding off on those. >> More than likely. >> Yeah, and so I want to understand the timing of that because I think that will be appealing to those that would want to build. I think they would want to build quickly. And I don't know if it's one year quickly, but I think it'll affect some of this. >> To be perfectly honest, that schedule remains fluid. I think the current estimate is? >> It's May, June time frame when they'll punch through with temp signals. >> And of course, weather is not our friend this time of year, and that's what's been holding off a bunch of the work they're trying today. >> Thank you. Did you have a question, Mayor Pro Tem? No, no, no. >> No, I was just going to ask May or June of which year. >> So Tony, if I could just to understand, when you talk about the assumption of 4% in AV growth, I think what I heard you just say is that under the property tax category, that we're assuming the effective rate on existing properties. In other words, so it's only the new growth. So I think somewhere in our assumptions, we probably also ought to clarify that. If we're saying we're going to receive 4% new growth, because you're saying that's what's accounting for the increase of the property taxes over those four or five years is the new growth coming in. Instead of AV growth of the whole general assess base is what I'm, is that correct? >> There's actually three numbers, if you will, Mayor, within that number. So there is the revenue that you received in the prior year that stayed flat, and then you have the revenue associated with new value that is growing at 4%, 300 million, 4% a year. And then you have the third number, which is that $7 million associated with frozen properties, and that's growing at 2% per year. So we can certainly break that out for you, so you can clearly see that. But again, the 4% in value from existing properties is going to lower that effective rate. Does that make sense? >> Yes, it does, it just, yes. >> There's only so much room I can put in this, but we can certainly separate it out. >> Yeah, just blow it up to about two or three slides. >> We'll go two pages, though, yeah, I'm just kidding. All right, go, yep. >> Councilmember Meltzer. >> First of all, I just want to acknowledge what these guys are doing is really hard. It's much easier to come to us and talk about, what do we do with all this extra money? It doesn't happen that often, and it's a lot of creativity that you've drawn on. I'm just going to say this. I think you're probably already doing this, but you could probably infer from my comments. I think you'd be prudent to expect that at some point in the next five years, there's maybe not the great recession, but a typical recession. We've gone 10 years since the last one, and I've correctly predicted five of the last three recessions. You know, I don't know, you never know when it's going to happen. But developing maybe just some policy choices, you know, when it comes. Obviously, I'm sure you're preparing to do that. >> Councilmember Duff. >> Well, I kind of think that there is a possibility in those out years that that Hunter coal ranch can have a huge impact. You know, it depends on whether that thing goes forward and it happens. But, you know, we're talking about a great deal of property taxes that would be coming in once that thing gets rolling. But we can revise at that point. >> Yeah, we've not factored any of that into this forecast at this point. >> Okay, any other questions for this slide? All right. >> So again, as I mentioned to you, this won't be the last time that we're here in front of you. Our plan is to come back to you on April 23rd. You know, as most of you have already met David, David will have the honor of coming back on the 23rd and giving you an update. I told him that I would not do that to him this first time around, deliver, you know, some cautionary information. But certainly, he and I are working together on this forecast with the rest of the city management team. But again, this is just a calendar going forward. Some previews in the June timeframe, we'll be coming back to talk with you a little bit about the utility budgets. Actually, in April, May timeframe, we'll be presenting preliminary forecast to the PUB and then coming back to the council and talking to you about all of those utility budgets, including customer service. June 11th, we'll have another opportunity to talk about the forecast with you and really initiate the, you know, the annual presentation from departments. We have been working with our departments on the presentation and try to make those a little bit speedier this time around for you. Certainly, if there's questions, you know, that's certainly the council's prerogative to ask. And, you know, so then on July 16th, we'll have yet again another opportunity to continue having a conversation with you. We'll have additional sales tax information, property tax information. If there's things that we're having to look at differently, we'll certainly update you on those. And then on August 1st will be the first budget workshop. The charter and state law does require that we provide to the council a proposed budget by July 31st. I'll remind you that July 25th is when we normally get our certified value. And so there's a very short time window that we get that number. We look at what the overall impact is, make any necessary adjustments or changes to recommendations, and then prepare that proposed budget to the council for August 1st. And then ultimately, we currently have September 17th as the day targeted to adopt the budget. And again, just as has already been alluded to, there's a number of legislative potential actions out there that could continue to have impacts on us from everything from revenue caps to appraisal caps to lowering of the rollback tax rate. And so there's a number of things out there that could still impact this budget that we'll be briefing you as we go along here. But again, plenty of opportunities if the council certainly as we go through doesn't have any questions about where we are with the forecast. And again, we'll have that on the agenda from here on out. >> Okay, any other questions, comments? Fantastic. Yes, Councilmember Montero. >> I just wanted to say thank you. Just adding to what was said previously, really appreciate all the work that you've done to answer so many questions and concerns ahead of time. And to see how proactive you and your department is being on these issues is really, really reassuring. So thanks. >> Thank you. >> Any others? Okay, thank you. >> All right, our next agenda item is agenda item 1B. Receive a report to hold discussion and provide staff direction regarding future capital needs within the city being proposed by staff for a possible bond program and election for November 2019. >> All right, Mayor, city council, again, Tony Buent, the chief financial officer. I have the honor to kind of walk through the first few slides. I will point out that this slide deck is 62 slides long. There are a lot of pictures, so kind of bear with us. >> Should we just take a break right now instead of? >> I could probably use one, so. >> Okay, let's take a break. >> Yeah, let's take a break. Welcome everybody back to this meeting of the Denton City Council on Monday, April the 1st, 2019. It is 1252 PM. We're down to our work session report 1B. Receive a report to hold discussion and provide staff direction regarding future capital needs within the city being proposed by staff for possible bond elections. So Mayor, city council, Tony Buent, the chief financial officer. Before I kind of start this, I want to first of all thank our PCO staff for this nice slide deck that they put together for us. And also really, it's been a team effort in this whole presentation. Our PCO staff really kind of helped kind of put it all together and kind of coordinate things, and so we really appreciate it with them. And also all our departments in public safety and transportation engineering, all those areas contributed to this as well. So I wanted to thank them, it's really been a team effort. Really over the last two years, as you're aware, we've been going back and combing through our entire CIP program. Not just in general government, but also in our utilities. We've been filling a lot of gaps in our 2005 bond program projects that were out there. And certainly working closely with our committee, our bond oversight committee on the 2012 and 2014 bond programs. As you know, many of those projects have come to you and we've asked for additional CEOs in some cases. We've asked for reallocation of some of those geo bonds to complete some projects. And so that's really been a culmination of kind of where we've been to date. And so kind of the first couple slides, we're going to walk through kind of some of the programs that we've had in the past and the status of those. Certainly, if you have any questions, please stop me at any point. So today we're going to talk about, give you a status on the 2005, 2012, and 2014 bond programs. Present to you some needs and some proposed projects related to public safety, roadway and infrastructure. Many of these projects are projects that we've previously discussed with the council at one time or another, so they should not be new projects to you. But certainly Mario will be coming up here and talking with you about the public safety facilities. And Todd Estes and Preetam will come up here and talk with you about the roadway infrastructure. I'll then come back up and talk with you a little bit about the financial impacts and then the proposed bond propositions and the bond committee. And then really next steps, trying to get the council's direction on where we go from here. So first of all, just as a reminder, in 2005 there was a bond program, total was $42.4 million. That bond program at that time contemplated up to a four cent tax rate increase. Based on the information that we've gathered, it didn't seem like that tax increase went into effect during those years. But that bond proposition was really three propositions. $4 million related to public building improvements that included the senior center construction improvements as you're aware of. And then also improvements to the South Branch Public Library. $27.7 million was related to various transportation projects. That was proposition two, and in proposition three was $10.7 million related to park system improvements. So as of December 31st, I can tell you that all the bonds associated with that bond program have been issued. And many of those projects have been completed. We do have some projects that are still underway. The two that kind of come to mind are Highway 377, widening and FM 1830. Those projects have now been state funded. And so those projects are underway. As we speak, there was some city contribution to those projects. The bonds that were associated with those projects were reallocated to the Bonnie Bray project. As the council may recall, we did come to council with that proposal. So this just shows you some of the pictures of some of the projects that were completed and associated with the 2005 bond program. Certainly, we have the cemetery fencing projects at both cemeteries, as you know, the Oakwood Cemetery Fencing Project is completed. The I00F, about 50% is completed, but the other 50% is underway, and council recently gave approval for that. Wayfinding signs, of course you've seen those throughout the city, made a number of park improvements related to trails. And then also some improvements out at the Clear Creek Heritage Center, just to name a few. In 2012, there was also a bond program. That bond program was a streets only bond program, and with the caveat that we had about 400,000 of that associated with public art. We'll talk with you a little bit further down the slide deck on public art. About $20 million was associated with the street reconstruction program. I will tell you that at the end of last year, the council did approve the issues about 2.5 million in CEOs that went to address and complete many of those projects from the 2012 bond program. To date, all the bonds associated with that bond program have been issued. This lists some of the projects that have been completed and associated with that particular bond program. I don't know if the council has any questions about any specific projects, but certainly you've had them in your backup. In 2014, there was a bond program. That particular year, that bond program was $98.1 million. I will note that this bond program also included public art within three other propositions. So in proposition one, the amount was $61.7 million associated with various street improvements. Not just street reconstruction, but there was a number of roadway projects associated with that bond program. Proposition two was related to public safety facilities. The two major items there was fire station four and fire station threes. That was $16.5 million, we had a couple of other projects associated with that proposition. Proposition three was 8.5 million related to drainage. We have come in front of the council to talk with you about completing some of those projects, such as the Hinkle Road drainage project. I think it's called the Magnolia project, is included in that, that's underway. Also, the PEC-4 project is also included then, along with a number of other downtown drainage projects. Proposition four was related to the park system improvements, $11.4 million. Projects included in that, included the Bela soccer project, the tennis project that is soon going to be underway. And a number of other trail and park improvements, playground replacements, and such. >> Tony, you said that that has a public art component. Was it a percentage of each portion of those amounts? >> Yes, at that particular time, there was a revamping of the public art policy. Where that particular policy only applied to vertical construction. And so anywhere that there's vertical construction, 2% of that project. For example, in the streets proposition, the only project that was there was the new traffic facility. So 2% of that project was used to calculate that public art component. There was also 2% for public safety facilities and 2% for some of the park improvement projects. But only on vertical construction. >> So then that money goes into, I guess just wondering how that money is getting spent and so forth and so on. So just maybe some type of email or staff report about how much is in there, who's got the jurisdiction over it. What projects, just sort of a summary of that, because combine that with the last one, which was 400,000. I think that's maybe close to a million bucks, just in those two bonds. >> So it was 400,000 in 2012, it was a little bit over 500,000 in the 2014 bond program. And Mayor, the public art committee is the one that oversees much of that spending. >> But is that presented in our budget discussions or how do we know how that's going? >> Yes, that's included in our CIP component of the budget. >> Okay, all right, okay. >> So this is just a recap of street segments that have been completed associated with the street reconstruction component of the 2014 bond program. I will point out you'll see a uptick in 2017 and going forward. Much of this has been just a refocusing of those efforts. There's been a number of projects now that have been bundled together to try to get them out the door. We've completed about 222 street segments in that program. There's another 181 street segments that are still to be completed. I will remind the council that at the end of 18, we also issued an additional approximately $7 million in COs to get this entire program fully funded with the goal to get these completed by the end of 2020. That program also included a number of traffic signal and sidewalk improvements, and I mentioned earlier, public art as well. So this is just another graphic illustration of how much work has been done over the last couple of years from the 2012 and 14. 2012 being the kind of off-yellow, orangey color, and then the blue is, excuse me, have those backwards. 2014 is the yellowish color, and then the blue is the 2012. So for the street improvement projects, to date we've issued a little bit over $61 million. We still have, excuse me, $48 million. We still have $13 million to issue. That'll come over the next two years. As I mentioned before, or as I also mentioned to you, for the current year, we've also included a reimbursement ordinance that the council previously approved in anticipation of issuing those bonds later this summer. So this is a list of some of the projects, some of the street improvement projects that have been completed on the reconstruction side. Public safety, as you know, Fire Station 4 has been completed. Fire Station 3 is due to come back to the council, I think, relatively soon for award of that construction contract. We've also issued some additional appointees, some additional COs for that particular project to have it complete. The fire burn tower was originally not part of the bond program, but we did utilize some funding along with some CO funding to get that project completed. And the police lobby renovation, part of that project has been completed. And again, that was a component of public art. I will remind the council that a project within the public safety proposition associated with the improvements or really reconstruction of the area for our criminal investigative bureau and also our dispatch has been postponed. Related to the discussion we'll have with you later on the new public safety facilities. And so those have been placed on hold in lieu of utilizing those funds for that new project. So all bonds associated with public safety have been issued to date. So this is just a visual representation of some of the projects that have been completed as part of this bond program. Stormwater drainage and flood control improvements. Eagle drainage project has been completed. PEC four phases one and two are underway, as I understand. >> You want to repeat what he said? >> So award of that contract is actually imminent to come to the council. >> Which one is the Eagle Drive segment from Carroll to Elm? Which one of those projects is this associated with? >> So the Eagle Drive drainage project, that's the segment of Eagle right now between Carroll and Elm that's torn up. That's the last piece of drainage that flooded that Carroll intersection at Eagle and that 2007 flood. So this was one of those last segments that needed to be put in place so that it doesn't happen again. >> Is that part of the Eagle Drive drainage projects or is this just something totally separate from any of all this? >> It's part of the Eagle Drive drainage projects, but it was phase two of that. >> Okay. >> Second part. >> Yeah, good. >> Councilmember Riggs? >> Just on that Eagle Drive, and this may not be, I'm just wondering, because I recall that that was supposed to be done in March. >> Yes. >> And so March is over, I'm just wondering. The communications with the public, the drainage boxes were anticipated to be done in March. And with the business owners, we've been talking to them about May to allow traffic back on it. The weather has pushed us back, they're finishing up the lids on the boxes. They should have that complete, hopefully by the midpoint of this month's where roadway construction will start. We still think that by late June, early July at the latest, that job will be complete and they'll have all lanes back open. >> Thank you. >> So, just like with public safety, all the bonds associated with this proposition have been issued. Park system improvements, a couple of the projects that I'll highlight for you. Certainly are the wave pool and concession improvements, those have been completed as well. The one that was pretty high on the citizens' radar was the spray ground that that project has been completed. The Vela project, as you know, is underway, and so that project is now fully funded. And then a number of playground replacements at the parks that are noted here have been completed. So to date, we've issued, so about $9.9 million and the remaining funds associated with this proposition will be issued over the next two years. There's just some pictures of some of these projects. Again, this is Ariel Vela again. There's probably a lot more of that project's already been completed if you've had a chance to drive by there recently. And just a picture of some of the playground improvements or replacements that have gone on at various parks. So just a quick review, so total of three bond programs over the last number of years, 2005, 12, and 14, that totaled almost $161 million. Again, we see those as investments in the community. Most of the projects from 2012 are substantially complete, and many of the projects in the 2014 bond program are certainly underway. And the goal is to have all those completed by 2021. So again, many of these improvements included streets, drainage, public safety, flood control, and such. And so improvements touch all areas and residents of the community. That's certainly something that distinguished these bond programs a little bit different than what we're proposing today. Again, with the exception of 2012, that was really associated with just streets only, but again, throughout the community. In 2014, just as a reminder, the voters did approve of this bond package. And that bond package did contemplate a tax rate increase of up to three cents to date that has not occurred. And as a reminder, the 2005 also included up to a four cent tax rate increase. >> That's very great. >> Is there a time limit on applying that? You said it has not occurred, so is that something that's still open that we could go back and do? Or is there a, okay, we haven't done it by ten years, you can't go back and do it without? >> No, ma'am, I think that's really tied to when you issue the bonds and whether or not you're going to need that additional appropriation. What does go stale, I will mention to you, is that if you wait too long to issue the bonds, I think it's three years beyond the time frame of the bond program. The AG's office is hesitant to approve the issuance of those bonds. And so again, that's really the only caveat there, so. >> So now I'm going to turn this over to Mario. He'll come up here and walk you through the public safety facilities, and then after him will be Todd Estes. >> Good afternoon, Mayor, members of the council, Mario Canazaro, Assistant City Manager. As Tony mentioned, these next few slides are two propositions that we want to bring to your attention and your consideration. The first one being public safety facilities, the second one, proposition number two, roadway and infrastructure. The areas I'm going to be covering is on the public safety side. So the facilities that we want to discuss today are basically four facilities, three of those that reside in the police department and the other one for the fire department. If you recall back in February, you all had your Monday luncheon, your noon luncheon there at the police station and you all did a walking tour of the facilities to see the conditions of the police station. During that presentation, the consultant presented to you a number of options for you all to consider. One of those was renovating the existing City Hall East facility at a right at $27 million, which included updated technology, improving the workflow of the facility, adding some additional spaces for the growth that has already occurred and will be occurring at the police department. Improve locker facilities because they don't have any, and as I mentioned, just some additional parking. In addition to that, knowing that growth is coming to the police department and as the community continues to expand in other parts of the region, the other recommendation that was made was potentially to build a new substation, which would be located over off of Vintage next to fire station number seven. And that was estimated to be right under $11.5 million. So all told, those two facilities were being recommended. You all said to proceed with doing some design work so that we can go ahead and begin doing some of the initial planning for this so that we can potentially bring something to you all for your consideration for a November bond program. And this is kind of where we are at this point. So around $37 million for those two facilities that are being recommended. This piece, though, has not been presented to you. This is something that's new, and this is to potentially add an indoor gun range for the police department. Currently, the police department operates a facility outdoors off the airport road. We have some situations where as part of the shooting, there has been rounds found outside of the site. As development continues to encroach around the outdoor facility, it is becoming more problematic, not only just because of noise, but just safety concerns. And so one of the options that we would like to bring towards your attention is the potential of adding this component to a bond program for November is adding a 15 lane, 50 yard indoor gun range for the police department for their training. >> Mario, it said on there part of the new could be connected to new PD substation, but that cost is not in that 15 million. >> Correct, sir. >> So you're saying the shooting range. >> It could be in addition to the 11.4. >> How wide are those lanes typically? Do you know with the shooting range lanes, how wide those lanes, you said you got 15 lanes of 50 yards each, 150 feet long. >> I'm going to have to rely on our assistant police chief on those technical details. I don't know exactly the width of those lanes. >> Yeah, well, I'm just trying to get an idea of just the size of the building, actually. >> We have yet to do any kind of design work. >> Okay, so this is very preliminary. >> Absolutely. >> Okay, gotcha. >> These are very high level planning estimates. >> Okay. >> And the intention would be that if you can connect it to the new substation, you just keep building until add as much as you can with that amount of money. >> Okay, okay. >> Because you would think that based on the fact that if it's just purely for Denton PD, there shouldn't be the need for additional parking because it would just be for the officers and employees that are already, that are working there or as they come and go from the other police department. >> Okay, all right, thank you. >> And then last facility that wanted to bring to your attention is Fire Station Number 8. Back in, I believe in a few weeks ago, the council awarded a contract to Kirkpatrick Design Architects for the design of our newest fire station, Fire Station Number 8. They're in the midst of that design work now and should be completed. >> Yes, I'm sorry, go ahead. >> [INAUDIBLE] >> I don't think on the fire station itself you need to, and we have not recommended to approve the architect yet. So is your concern that they helped us with preliminary planning? >> My concern was that the name was mentioned. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> I just wasn't prepared. >> If you feel more comfortable doing that, I think that's fine. The idea was just to get the concept out, but if you feel more comfortable doing that, my suggestion was go ahead. >> I'll just go to the restroom. >> Okay. >> My apologies. >> No, that's all right. That's cool. >> So these are still basic numbers, cuz that's about $550 to $600 a foot based upon 8500 square feet. >> Well, this also includes a piece of fire apparatus that would be included that was part of the package. >> All got you. >> And I'll show you a summary. >> Got you, okay. >> Of all the expenses. >> Includes an engine? >> Yes, sir. >> Okay. >> It's fire apparatus, furniture fixtures, you know. So it's the full meal deal on that station. >> Okay. >> So the design firm is in the process of doing their design. They should be finished up, I believe in May, June of this year. So if again, if we were to bring this project forward, we would need the funds for the construction of it as well. >> So to give you kind of a breakdown of cost, these are the elements of the total of all the costs associated with these projects with the four that I just covered. All in total, $58.6 million. Of that $58.6, you all had set aside about $4 million for design work and property acquisition for City Hall East for the police station remodel. And you've also set aside, as Mr. Puente mentioned, as part of a CEO issuance last year, about half a million dollars for design on the fire station. So all total, in the next slide, you'll see that delta of what's been allocated so far in funding and what would be needed for the bond package. So just under, so about a difference of $4.5 million between what was put on the previous slide to the current slide. >> Council Member Hussband. >> I have a question for Chief, if I could, on the indoor gun range. Thank you, sir. Afternoon. So question. The, all the other training facilities are here at City Hall East, as far as new recruits. Is that right, kind of all the rest of the training is done here, for the most part? >> Yes, sir, with the exception of the range. >> Yes, sir. So I just would like to hear, I don't know if there's a way that, is there a gun range indoor that is sound proof? Is that a real thing? >> As far as being completely sound proof, I'm not certain about that. >> Okay. >> But it would be, I mean, the indoor range would do a lot to keep the sound down. >> Are you talking about from the, in other words, you can't hear it from the outside? >> Yes, sir. >> Okay. >> Because here's the core question for you. I just want to hear from you, while I have you, the advantages, disadvantages, convenience, inconvenience of the range being separate from where all the other training's done. I get it that you can load up and go over there, but the fact of the matter is, we still got to go over there versus if there's a number that's comparable, that puts everybody where you just walk, you know? >> Are you talking about maybe taking the existing facility and turning that into an indoor range, in other words, City Hall East, using that? >> Or some level of acquisition in that neighborhood that allows us to walk across the street, walk. I mean, I don't, that's just a- >> Well, my opinion on that is that it's possible that if you had the land to do it, you could build it, and it would probably, again, I don't have a ton of experience with indoor ranges because I've spent my entire career shooting outdoors. I'd have to actually go visit some facilities to give you a more intelligent answer on that. But it's going to be severely, the sound will be severely mitigated, as compared to even a baffled range or an open range. >> Well, let me ask you this, just on the functionality of it then. So compare and contrast the value of it being next door to being near the new potential station or that. So what is the kind of your thought on those two? >> Well, my thought is if you have a substation going in out there, you're going to have a lot of your resources out there also. And there's also been some discussion about potentially moving training to that substation area. So there's a lot of things on the table when it comes to that. But getting to, I think I understand what you're trying to say here, it would be very convenient to have it all sort of one stop shopping there, you know, if you could get away with it. So, but yes, if you're putting in a substation though, you're going to have a lot of resources out there also. And potentially half of your resources, depending on the growth and the stuff that's taking place out there. >> Okay, got it, help me, thank you. >> Thank you. >> So with that, again, as I mentioned, the previous slide was 58.6 million, you know, with all the projects. And then the delta is just those projects that I have already have some associated funding with. So what would be requested is that what would be on the ballot was $54.11 million for public safety facilities. >> Yes, Councilmember. >> Would, I guess I'm asking whoever, would now be a good time to weigh in on these? Would it be best to wait until the very end of the presentation and we can kind of address the big picture of the public safety plus the roads? I'm up for either, I just want to be curious. >> When you say weigh in, you mean talk about whether you support it or don't support it or what do you mean? >> Yeah, yeah, whatever kind of. >> I just say, as it comes up in the presentation, if you have some comments, I'd just feel free to go ahead and make them. >> Okay, okay, well, so sure. So as far as my personal take on these public safety fund proposals, great with all of them and see their need for all of them except the indoor gun range. For me, that's looking at the cost to me since there's already a place for that training to happen. And again, I understand, I understand why that's wanted, I understand the advantages. But that's the one that I am not okay with. I don't quite see why we need to do this in the near future, especially with all these other things coming. >> Well, I'll try to answer that a little bit. We're going to have to do something with the gun range. They're finding bullet casings outside of the range right now, so they've already had to go back and restrict what can be shot there. It's taken away significant flexibility in that area, it's starting to get surrounded with development. So one way or another, we're either going to have to enclose it or move it. And I think to me, it's a pure risk management issue. And for the officers to maintain their certifications and sharpness with the weapons, they're going to need a place like this to train, that is one number though. I think it's probably the one that we aren't as comfortable with. If there's a way to reduce that number as we get our architects moving on the police department areas, that would be the one that we would try to hone down a little bit more. But it's really not an option of whether we need it. It's really more of an option of where do we put it. >> Yeah, so just to clarify, I mean, I'm all for making whatever kinds of improvements, either improvements to the existing range, moving it, something like that, but yeah, it's more the $15 million for an indoor 15 line range. Yeah. >> You have a comment? Go ahead. >> Are there options to have, and would it cost less, to have something similar to what they currently have, but in a different location? Maybe where the city already owns land, but it's not around encroaching development, if there is such a place. >> We could certainly go down that path. Our thought was it probably made some sense putting it next to more of our training facilities. But if we wanted to really manage the cost, cut the cost significantly, and keep it outside. Yeah, we'd probably have to go out and buy property further outside, away from the development. But that would be an option. >> Yeah, well, obviously we wouldn't have a number in your, I'd be interested to know what that would cost, obviously. Don't expect it to know right now. >> Yep. >> Just for clarification on, when you say that they're finding gun casings outside of the, cuz I know you got your lead and you got your shell casing that the gun expels as it's shot. So is it the round itself, the lead round? >> Yes. >> Okay, all right. >> How in the world do they find a lead round? Is it just people find it in the course of, yeah, I'm just curious just to understand. Does somebody find it in a car or a house or, well, I mean, if we're saying that it's going outside the boundary, somebody's bound to have found it. I'm just curious how that was. >> Well, sir, there's been two instances that we know of. >> Okay. >> The first one happened probably in the spring of last year. >> Okay. >> And it ended up over at the Winco food, which is directly north of the range. And in that particular case, there was a couple of rounds. And then we had some found in late fall, maybe early winter in the Winco Foods parking lot. We're not certain, we have those rounds, we looked at them, they looked a little bit old. We're not certain exactly when those things actually flew, or even flew from our range. But based on that, we took some serious steps for safety. In fact, our range was open at one point as far as people going out there, but that is completely shut down. You can't be out there without a firearms instructor. There's a lot of things there. But yeah, it was Winco Foods. >> What's the distance from, I mean, Winco is sort of on the north side of that development. And I think the, how far is the range down, I don't know if it's down south. >> I looked at this about four months ago, so I'm going to have to try to just based on memory. I think it was, I think it was less than 1,000 yards. Yes, but these were definitely pistol rounds. >> Okay. >> But we checked on this and for sure, for sure, our pistol rounds would have had the ability to reach that. >> Yeah, yeah. >> They would have had the ability to reach that. >> Okay, all right. >> So, could have happened. >> All right, thank you very much, appreciate it. Thank you. Yes. >> Before you go, sorry. Yeah, about how often does an officer go to a firing range? >> It depends on the officer, but historically, when there was free access to the range, it was all dependent upon the motivation of the officer as far as self-initiative. Now, several times a year, probably anywhere from two to four times a year, you'll be mandated to go to the range and do training and qualification. But that was one of the beautiful things about the Denton Range, the way we had it is you could go out there as many times as you wanted to. And I've done that a lot over my career, but now you have to set up an appointment with the firearms instructor. And so we have open range days, but that's all voluntary. >> But you might, would it be sort of out of the ordinary to go once a month, something like that? >> That would be out of the ordinary for the average officer, yes. >> Councilmember Briggs, do you have a question for the chief? Okay, thank you, appreciate it. >> Sorry, I missed it. So what I think I'm understanding is that it's $15 million and there's 15 lanes, so it's about a million dollars a lane, pretty much? >> Sure, yes, ma'am. >> Okay, is it possible to, does it have to be for police use only, or is there a way to allow, I guess if it was attached to the substation it would need to be, but to make up for some of the cost, could you have certain citizens, because we don't have an indoor, we don't have a gun range in Denton. I'm just, is that, would there be legal or insurance issues? >> Well, and let's make sure that this is staff bringing this presentation to sort of give us a heads up. I mean, we're going to have a whole different conversation as these numbers come back with this feedback. So I don't know if I want to, I mean, we can keep talking about it, but I think we're getting down to a level of detail that we're going to have a lot more opportunity to explore. So I think that could be one of them, is can we create some alternative revenue from that, like we've thought about doing with our fire safety training, at least at one point, I don't know if we're doing that now, but. So, I mean, I'm not trying to cut the debate off, I'm just, I mean, this is a high elevation, yes, go ahead. >> I was under the impression that we were saying yes or no to these at this point, but we're not. >> No, this is just the initial. >> Okay. >> We definitely want to get your feedback, if there's anything here that is a definite no, we want to know it. And so, yeah, we'll be back refining all these numbers as we continue to get under design and get those numbers better. The gun range is the one that we're least comfortable with right now, because it wasn't part of the initial program. But we just felt like if we're going back out looking at trying to do these other projects, it made sense to try to put it with the substation and cut the cost down as much as possible. If we had not looked at the possibility of moving it out into a less crowded area again, we can certainly do that and come back with a couple of options. >> Okay, Council Member Hussbett and Council Member Dock. >> Yeah, so I'll just, my three cents, no, I don't want to move it more remote, because then you're right next to the $1 billion potential developed. I mean, remote has left. It's just, development's going that way. So you would just, then you're going to get up into neighborhoods. It's just, I think that just causes problems later. So that's why I'm not for that. I think the chief's point is very salient that if we're going to, and I would advocate for continuing to grow our presence there at that substation, then that makes sense and answers my concern about some synergies and access, that sort of thing. And so for me, I think forward looking there at that substation, and then just kind of whittling down the number to make sure. And I absolutely like the flexibility of it. If we get to a point where crunching numbers and we say, hey, well, let's start with half that. Let's start with, based on those costs, once we dig into those. I think that's great, too, to have those options, because I don't know. And I think there's probably, I don't know how many I can get lined up there, but anything's better or comparable in that new environment. So I'm okay with that. The other things I'm okay with, the only thing I would throw out that's not there that is top of my mind, that if you saw traction there, I'd love to see it. And that's enhancements here at City Hall. I mean, I understand that's heartburn for some people. But for me, succinctly, I think there's value in making this place more disability accessible. For those that are comfortable with it being the way it is, haven't had to lift someone up in that electronic thing or get them into the building or watch people struggle to get down the stairs. And so if there's a way, and I think the citizens would support that. So to make it disability more accessible, whatever those kind of staff sees as those high line items, I think that goes in line with this and it's something I could support. >> Okay, Council Member Johnson. >> I'll use a few less words, but I totally agree on the indoor gun range. We need to put it there right in the same place with the substation. It makes a lot of sense to me. And I think that's something that's important for the police department. And we need to go first class. >> Yeah, I mean, I'm okay with just trying to figure out what the numbers are. It's gonna be hard pressed to convince me how a gun range costs a million dollars a lane. Those things aren't more than ten feet wide. I mean, I've been to those before and you've got your target that goes down. So that's, I know you have special ventilation, you have lead line walls and all those kind of things, but that's a lot of money. But we don't know the numbers, this is all preliminary. So we certainly have our options if that's the case. Council Member Armitage. >> Can I have another question? I'd just be interested to know, the answer to you is just maybe look into if it would be reasonable to partner with the county. And if they'd be open to, if there's physical room for some sort of partnership since they already have. >> I don't know, I've never been to their facility, but I've just looked it up to see if they have a facility. They do have something, I figure it can't hurt to ask. >> Okay, because we've been to Texas and TWA because they have to train them. >> And I believe we are in those conversations now with some of those outside entities to see if there's any interest in those partnerships. Absolutely. >> Yep, all right, fantastic, okay. >> Anything else? >> So it sounds like a green light in the sense of further exploration. The biggest sort of variable is the indoor gun range and that'll be just as cost. >> Right. >> Become a little bit more solid. >> Thank you. I'll turn it over to Titus. >> Good afternoon, Mayor, Council. I'm gonna give just a brief overview of what we're projecting for the upcoming bond program. Should Council go forward with it? And then Pre-Tam's gonna dive into a couple of the projects that have really risen to the top. So one of our key focus, as we've been going through our previous bond programs, is not only looking at what have we committed to in the past and how do we make those projects whole. That it's also how do we start accounting for where development's coming in the very near future, where it's coming today. What's the long term transportation needs for the city to get people in and around our community in effectively and safe manners. Congestion is becoming a real issue in town. We want to make sure that we try to plan ahead instead of doing the homework that should have been done 30 years ago, trying to overcome those hurdles now. We want to go ahead and take care of the current issues and then move past them, think 30, 40 years ahead of time. Get some of these roadways in that have a dire need to be in place, but also plan for where the development's coming in the near future. And then how do we complete those projects again that have additional phases that need to be built upon or committed on previous bond programs. So some of the high growth areas in the city of Denton right now. You've got to the south where we have a lot of infill residential subdivisions going in. There's quite a bit of commercial and industrial going in on the west side of town near the airport. And then up north, again, more residential homes and residential living coming in on the north side of town. All of those areas have traditionally been served by much smaller transportation facilities. We've not taken the time to put those in place to where we could grow to them in the past. And that's where we're headed now is we're playing a little bit of catch up here, but we're still catching at a good time where we could get there before full build out and those areas really arrive. So just to give you a preview of some of the things that are going on currently within area one, this is that area to the south of town. You have a lot of subdivisions in and around the area. What you see in green, those are projects that have already been approved. So they're either under construction now or they were recently approved through development services or by PNZ or council to move forward. What you see in orange are projects that are currently under review or going through the permitting process. This doesn't account for some of the projects that we're currently having meetings with, bringing in more and more development in the area. Some of those areas in and along the Hickory Creek area, the Ryan Road, moving out west. It continues to move towards 35W and south. >> Could you give me some references on, okay, there's a railroad track there. >> The railroad tracks, you've got 35E here to the north. There's Ryan Road. >> Okay, all right, okay, that's helpful, thank you. >> Okay. So area two, this is the area to the north of town, so it's kind of on the northeast quadrant. You've got loop 288 here and you've got Sherman Road, FM 428 that runs to the northwest. And just long term, the outer loop will actually come through on the north side up in the Milam area. So you've got quite a bit of residential subdivision, residential development coming in on the north side of town. You can see several of these are in progress. There are more that we have had multiple meetings with that will be in fill in the same area. And then area three out to the west of town, where you have a lot of industrial development going on, a lot of commercial. You can see quite a bit that's in progress, so to give you an idea, this is where that wind co-site sits right now. So here's Jim Crystal Road, US Cold Storage that recently came in. Apartment complexes that are under construction right now. Next to I-35, and then you've got a couple of proposed back buildings coming in on this side, as well as multiple conversations for the remainder of this area that have already come to the development services team about future projects. >> Todd, while you have this map up, since we talked about the location of the gun's range, could you show approximately if it's on this map where it would be? >> It's actually, well, the current gun range is right here. >> Okay, all right, thank you. >> You've got Airport Road right there, FM 1515, and there it is. >> Okay. >> So several of the projects we identified are some projects that we have talked about here recently, like Hickory Creek Road. We're talking to multiple outside agencies for funding partnerships, and then also bringing together a total package for transportation under this bond proposition for these future needs. And we arrived at these costs by just going through an analysis of each of these projects and saying what would the ultimate build out of these projects be from a design standpoint, from acquisitions right away, total construction costs, building in some contingency, because right now this is very high level. We have not engaged in full-fledged design, so we don't know what that full cost would be. And then also building in contract incentives and disincentives for the construction piece. If the contractor motivated, we typically end up spending less on a project when we put those pieces at play for the contractor. And then I'm going to hand this off to Preetam to start running through some of these projects. >> Good afternoon, Preetam Deshmukh, traffic engineer for the city. I'll briefly go over every project, really high level, what's entailed within the project, starting with Ryan Road. It is a two-mile stretch of Ryan Road between FM 2181, which is Teasley on the east side, goes all the way to a country club or FM 1830. And we're planning on widening it from a two-lane undivided to a four-lane divided facility. We're looking at everything that has to do with utilities, everything that has to do with drainage, and there are creek crossings in between as well. The total cost of the project is $43.4 million. And the city cost, I think Todd can get to that a little bit later and explain what we're contemplating at this time. But it's a very high level. And this is a typical cross section that we're planning on this particular segment. Next is Hickory Creek. This is a big picture of how big this project is, starting at FM 2499, going all the way to I-35W. It is approximately a little under six miles of roadway. A lot of it in this area that we're designing is currently in the floodplain. So what these colors mean is the yellow, we are currently under design. This particular project will go to construction now, fall this year. The green is currently under construction. We're working on the utilities relocation at this point. The blue is currently under design. We're doing a full design. Council recently approved that particular contract, move forward with HDR. And then the rest of it, the red, we're also aligning a 30% schematic. We want to make sure that we have the line in place when some of these developments go in construction or come for review. We have the opportunity or the ability to reserve right of way. So I want to make sure, as well as we want to make sure that funding wise, when we're approaching some of these other entities, we have that alignment and the environmental clearance that we need. Total cost. >> I'm sorry, go ahead. >> Total cost of the project is 160 million dollars. And as I mentioned, we'll talk about the city funding. >> Council Member Briggs had a question. >> So the images we're seeing down here on the bottom for the bicycle lanes, is this what we would call a complete streets? >> This is a typical cross-section, but we are considering all modes of transportation, correct? So we are taking into account, as far as our master thoroughfare plan and mobility plan, all modes of transportation. So yes, complete streets. >> Thanks. >> Robinson Road, I'm sorry, go ahead. >> No, actually finish, sorry, moving on to Robinson Road. Well then, in that case, going back to Hickory Creek. >> Yeah, if you could speak to the parts of Hickory Creek where vehicles have lost control. And those parts that the city is in charge of that belong to the city. If you could speak to kind of specifically what is planning on happening in those parts as far as safety measures. because I know there was, at first I had been under the impression that there was going to be some sort of physical barrier at the most dangerous places. But then there was an issue about where there was one area where service people needed access. >> So the city and the county went and put roughly a half a mile of guardrail along the entire stretch from where the most dangerous curve actually is. All the way back to 1830 where there's a very sharp drop off from the roadway. There is a gate for service personnel to go in and do some maintenance in that area. There's a gate there that has been constructed to close that and then can be put back in place. Those were all there. That gate for the service and operations folks is not in the curved section. It's actually on one of the straighter sections. So it's an area that has had less of an issue with some kind of accident occurring. We've also placed LED signs on the side of the road. So as you drive down the road, when headlights hit the first sign, the remainder of those signs then start to flash to direct you in the correct pathway. We've done everything we can to make it as visible as possible. And then I know there are continued looking, we're working with the county to continue to make that a safer stretch of roadway in the short term. While we come to the design process and then ultimate construction with this road where we just go straight. Take the curves out of it and go over the floodplain. >> Excellent, great, and I would just encourage that as we move forward with Hickory Creek. If there is money that ends up being allotted for these improvements. If it turns out that there's something that has already been done that could use some tweaks or improvements that I for one would not be against applying this. If there is money that we end up allotting for that road in general. If some of it be used to add on to safety measures that have been recently instituted there. >> I believe genuinely by putting in the guard rail. If you've driven it and you've seen how closely spaced the bollards are, the posts that hold it together. It's about as safe as you can make it the way it is. We are working with the county to repave that segment. Whether it does get just a little bit, has a lot more traction to the tires as they go newer pavement. But it's really what can be done is done with that roadway. And then as we go forward we're moving as fast and aggressively as possible to design this roadway and get the construction on the ultimate solution as quick as we can. >> Thank you so much, thanks a lot. >> So the next one, I almost jumped on this. Robinson Road, this is a really small stretch. It's less than a mile, it's 0.7 miles between just west of 2499 and Teasley. It's currently a two lane facility, it kind of narrows down where it hits Teasley. And this is a prime location for congestion at this, especially in the morning peak hours. So this is a critical piece that we definitely want to upgrade to a four lane divided facility. And the current price, or the price for doing that is $12.3 million. And the cross section will look something like that. >> Tim? >> Yes. >> Back on this one, it's less than a mile, it's $12 million. >> Correct. >> And so when you look at some of the other, what's the main cost driver? I mean, what is included in these costs? That just, it seems like an awful lot of money for, so it's got to be something else in there that- >> So as the manager pointed out earlier, we're refining these costs as we go. Some of the biggest issues we have right now, a road like Robinson, the unknowns are much smaller because there is so much less to really worry about. The road is where it is, we're going to add next to it. The right of way has very limited impact because we just have one or two stretches where we need anything. Utilities are good where they are. It's really something we can just go build as opposed to something like Hickory Creek Road, which has a history of roadway alignment issues. It has right of way issues. It has floodplain issues. It has utility issues. >> My point is this seems high for this project. I mean, compared to the other ones. >> Sure, and some of that comes to- >> Yeah, there's a breakdown of cost. If you go further slides, then you'll see there's a higher cost for contingency and inflation in there, inbuilt, depending on when we go to construction. As we move forward fast, we can really reduce those costs. >> All right, cool, thanks, yep. >> So just a comment. In addition to moving forward, and I realize it's just the beginning of our discussions, so in addition to questions about the pricing that have been mentioned, I would need to hear, before making a final decision in July or whenever, I would need to hear from people who live in the area, and I know that when this comes up for a vote for the whole bond, anybody can come out. But I would like to know kind of what options could we kind of squeeze into that timeline for either neighborhood meetings, or maybe kind of breaking it into public hearings. Something where we could, at least for me, I would need to approach each of these road issues, especially the ones that I know less about, like Robinson. What the express needs of the community are, and I can see looking at the map how, because there's residential surrounded by commercial, and you've got these, and you all have been so helpful in showing me the big picture of how you've got these little islands of communities and not enough connecting roads. But anyway, I would love to see that kind of worked into the calendar on this, on these road items. >> I will tell you that with the exception of Bonnie Bray phases five through seven, which we've talked to you about a little bit, and that's taking us all the way just north of the loop, tying in State Road with I-35, as well as Jim Crystal, which we talked about recently. These projects are purely driven on citizen input and complaints and congestion. So that's how these, we were asked to put together a list of these projects where we are getting the most input, we will have no problem pulling the public out here. I mean, we've got wait times in every one of these areas that we're not talking, we're talking minutes and minutes of congestion every day. And people are complaining to us about these particular roadways. Hickory Creek may be a little different because we're trying to tie in to 35W to get the federal funding, and we're already seeing subdivisions in discussion and being platted right in the pathway of where we need a right-of-way. But with Hickory Creek, Ryan Road, Robinson, FM 28, that is exactly where we're getting these projects are coming from, just citizen concerns and complaints. >> Just to kind of follow up on that, and I understand completely that that's how these projects are prioritized, so I guess what I mean is more in terms of getting to know what community members think about the proposal of widening and kind of getting to watch if they have concerns. For instance, in the case of Bonnie Bray, when meetings were held about Bonnie Bray, I didn't see anybody who lived there who said, there's nothing wrong with Bonnie Bray as it is now. Everybody had issues, but people had all kinds of questions and were wary about things. Some of that got worked out, kind of having a community discussion about proposed solutions, that helps me, and again- >> If the council wants to move forward with these projects, we have no problem at all going out and kind of educating the public. We can't advocate, but we can certainly educate that here are some proposed solutions that are being brought forward to the council, here's why, and getting their feedback early, I see no problem doing that at all. >> Wonderful, wonderful, thanks. [BLANK_AUDIO] >> Continuing to the next one, Jim Crystal, this is on the western side of the city within the industrial area. And primarily, this is a connection that forms between I-35 and Western. It is one of the focal areas, because this is an interchange with the interstate. As you all know, that 380 at 35 is already congested. This will be next, and this road connection needs to be improved. We're widening that one mile stretch from a two-lane to a four-lane, total cost of 16.8 million, and then we'll talk a little bit later. I think Todd can explain what we're talking about when we talk about city costs. Bonnie Bray, as Todd alluded to, is phase five through seven. Phase five is this smaller section between Scripture and US 380. Phase six is 380 of university all the way to 77. And then phase seven is this pink area between 77 and the loop. And this project completes our tie-in from all the way phases to the bottom of the city or south of the city to the north along this entire stretch of Bonnie Bray. It connects connections between state routes, which is US 380, US 77, and loop 288. The total cost of these three phases, five, six, and seven, is $111.5 million. The street is gonna be widened to a four-lane divided street. It will also help with the new high school being placed along this particular segment between Scripture and US 77. Sherman is, I think this is the last of the transportation projects. It's a two-mile stretch starting at the creek and going south all the way to the loop. We're planning on widening it from a two-lane undivided to a six-lane divided facility. And currently, this is a textile facility, completely managed by textile. So TechStat is looking at options and feasibilities of what needs to happen here. But we are making sure that we're on them. We're making sure that we tell them that development is coming. So this is the right time to move forward and at least get a schematic in place so that they can start reserving the right-of-way. Total cost, $44 million for a two-mile stretch. The street rehab program, we're requesting a total of $15 million over a three-year period, $5 million for each year. This is purely for rehabbing, rehabilitation, or reconstruction of street segments that are in bad shape. They have lower OCIs. And we're planning on looking at 70 to 80 total segments with approximately 25 lane miles. And this time, what we're doing differently as compared to the previous time is we're going to look at neighborhoods as a whole, not necessarily specific smaller segments in the neighborhood, but we're going to look at neighborhoods as whole and look at improving them as single units. That way, we get in and out of the neighborhood and we're done and not playing with different pieces. So that's slightly different. That's the way it's planned. Total cost, $15 million for the rehab. And last but not least, sidewalks. We're requesting a total of $10 million over the next five years, $2 million per year. It's to design and install sidewalks every year. So what's planned here is we've already designed sidewalks for 2019. We're currently under design. So we're requesting money to go construct them the following year. And we'll repeat the same type of pattern. We'll start designing in the previous year and then start implementing the following. So that's why this cost is set up this way. >> So there's a section on our website where you can go and you can request sidewalk either repairs or installation or issues. Was that, I know that we heard our city manager talk about, that's how our street projects come up. But is that how our sidewalk projects also come up? >> So two things that we're looking at, one is the maintenance option. And yes, if there is a disrepair, definitely they're identified and then fixed through the maintenance and operations component. But if they're missing sidewalk, which is the gaps of sidewalks, previously that's how the list of sidewalks were developed. Once we get the request, what we do is look at a big picture citywide and prioritize the sidewalk based on is it really close to the, close to a school? Is it really close to a school? >> That dog gets computer turned off. >> [LAUGH] >> [INAUDIBLE] >> [LAUGH] >> So we prioritize those and then those are put on the list. And yes, they get picked up for these design and construction. >> And just a reminder on the sidewalks. I remember, I think it was Councilmember Begarry when she was here, she mentioned that it might be a good thing if we had a budget for sidewalks. I mean, we have a bike and ped individual and then we have all of these requests for sidewalks. And there's not a specific designated funding, I don't think. And so we may want to talk about that, or I would like to talk about that in the budget. I know we just had a whole presentation on us being, not having enough money to do anything. But just if we could, because there is going to be maintenance requirements with these as well. Just like the streets. And so if there's funding there, I believe will help in the future. >> Okay. >> [INAUDIBLE] >> So first you answered one of my questions, which was going to be, to what extent are you considering proximity to schools? That was the very first thing you mentioned. So hooray. I want to say to second what Councilmember Briggs just said. Something I wasn't planning on saying, but I agree having a budget for sidewalks because that's just going to be like roads, it's going to be an ongoing need. So my remaining comment was more of a comment than a question. It's just that I would like to see kind of the issue of sidewalks specifically with this map presented at some point to the Committee on Disabilities. Because I know sidewalks are a big issue for ADA accessibility. And it'd be really good for them to kind of look at this map from an ADA point of view and to make suggestions about what specifically are the issues with these particular areas. Maybe to suggest some other additional sidewalks that are especially problematic for people with disabilities. And I would like to, as you know, I've been really concerned about the broken up sidewalks. I know you all have too and done a lot of work and trying to work with Textodd on all that at Geyer, in front of Geyer. And that's another thing I would love to see us budget for where if they're not going to operate according to our timeline, which prioritizes the safety of the kids who live there and are walking the sidewalks, if we need to spend more money to get that done, that would be something good to have reserves for. >> All right, how do we get home stretch? >> So just to give you a brief overview here of the projects that we have listed and how we came up with the costs and what they entail. So you've got an element for design. At this point, it is a high level estimate. It is based on the construction cost of the overall project and then built in a contingency. So that we have an idea of those hurdles we're not aware of right now. We do take into account some of those issues from a funding perspective, how we're going to get there. You've got inflation built in, construction inflation. So again, we're at about 1% per month compounded. It's still what we're seeing in the Metroplex area for a lot of these projects. It's not going to decrease unless there is some major recession that comes along. Tech Stop's going to be in our neck of the woods for a very long time. For the next ten years at a minimum, with all the I-35 improvements, 380 improvements, the Luke 288 improvements, there's a lot of work they're going to be doing. So I don't see a decrease in this construction inflation in the short term horizon. So the time frame we're talking about for these projects, I think it's very much a reality. So the quicker we can get to the project, the more we can minimize those ongoing costs. Staff time, we've also tried to give you a picture of what we anticipate staff time to be based on the timeline of the project. And then again, incentives and disincentives. Those incentives and disincentives would be for the contractor. It's that carrot that we would handle out there or hang out there so that we keep the contractor onsite, motivated to move the project as quickly as possible. You see a total project cost here on the very bottom right, it's $413 million worth of capital projects. Part of what we have been working very hard and continue to work hard to do is to find other sources of revenue to help us fill the gap between what we're asking for and the vast majority of the costs of these projects. A lot of these are regional connection projects, so that brings in council of governments, that brings in the state, that brings in federal funding. County, even the school district to some extent, depending on where we are. So we're anticipating that the city share of this would be approximately $137 million. We're looking to make up that gap with those other sources of funding. We are actively engaged in talking to those different entities. I know we have talked to TxDOT. That's where one of these roads came and we left it on this list was FM 428. A lot of the interest that the state had once we started talking to them was, well, that might just need to be our project. That's great to know that they would take that on long term and look at it as their project and not one of our projects. Working together to make that happen. So quite a few of these projects, when you see committed funding, they're projects that we have already started work on, such as Hickory Creek. First couple of really phases now, instead of what was in the 2014 bond contemplated as just we're going to Hickory Creek from a limited section. This is that regional connection piece. How do we get the residents of our community to where they want to go and back? So we have a portion in that and these are the other certain amounts of money that we're working with other entities. It doesn't mean they're committed to these. These are just the amounts we're anticipating. We're working with them to get a better picture of. So currently, what we've built into the pricing that we've given you so far is this construction schedule for delivery of these projects. This would be start to finish and it is fairly aggressive. The shortest project you see on here is 25 months. That one obviously is not going to be realistic unless tax that kicks it off tomorrow. But some of the things we can do in the short term are those intersection improvements at that intersection loop 288 and FM 428. Those are still on the horizon for us. These other projects, we feel these are fairly realistic as long as we're committed to those dollars right up front. Yes, just back to that one intersection improvement, the loop and 428. You said that still on the horizon. Yes, we have signals. And I'm just I'm just curious about funding for that to make sure that that is covered. Yes, so funding for that is covered through our small transportation projects. OK, thank you. Any other questions for this portion of the presentation? Yes, that's just a couple of comments. So if you go back to the. Yes. Mr. Manager, I would sell you on sidewalks being rebranded as pedestrians or pedestrian. Some kind of way where you loop that in, because I think I think expanding that kind of vocabulary and options, I think, is key. I think also looking just based on the conversations I've had when you're talking about those complete streets, if you have pretend a way to carve out so it's this many miles, so that one is less than this many miles. But also if you if you broke that out in bicycle lane miles as a kind of run parallel with that to highlight the emphasis of that, I think that also kind of goes a long way for those that would be interested in those type projects. And then lastly, I would just personally prioritize Bonnie Bray because of the high school going in and just making sure we're well in advance. And then ahead of that project and kind of highlighting that I drove Hickory Creek just this past weekend. I feel good about it. I saw the barricades of solar signs. That's outstanding. So really, really great work there between the city and county at all. So I appreciate that work. But that's kind of my of those absolutely get it. But Bonnie Bray folks at the top, because we're going to that D day is coming with a lot of traffic there. And there's there's a lot of questions to be kind of hashed out through that sort of thing. So absolutely. All right. So a couple of things. One, I agree, it's a good idea to think about potential for bike lanes. Both when we think about sidewalks as in pedestrian and bike, but also streets as in car and bike. I know you guys are doing that already, but I wanted to mention that. And at some point, and I imagine everyone is going to want to see, maybe not, but want to see some kind of itemized list breakdown of the cost for each of these projects. I realize it's projection, and this is good for at this point in the discussion. But ultimately, in kind of making a decision, I mean, I see the need for all of this. So yes to all of this, but in terms of being able to explain to people, my constituents, why does it cost this much? I'd like to have something to really show them, even knowing that it is just projection. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> Some of this, I guess, we're about to get into. But I have an overall, let's say unresolved feeling about what the total level of indebtedness is that we should be doing. Given our scenario, you don't want to pull your horns in too much, because this affects the local economy too. We're putting money out there. And you also don't want to get overextended, because when you take on the debt service, you have to pay, right? So it takes away your flexibility. And I would hate to see in a, if we did have a kind of slowdown, dipping further into reserves, losing bond rating and so on. So I wonder about the total level. I don't question that all these things are good. I think there's probably many more good things we could put on a list of things that are good. I question whether we ought to prioritize a little bit and maybe end up with a, well first of all, package tailored to a size that is maybe comparable to what we know we can financially carry. And maybe a little more balanced in terms of safety first. Then maybe quality of life investments that also make us attractive to new employers. Maybe things that would drive or facilitate economic activity. So I mean, just to give a couple of examples. Well safety, I'm sure you could point to many of these. We didn't talk about lighting today, we've talked about it in the past. And we've got some serious needs for lighting for safety. Things that would facilitate economic activity. To be perfectly honest, I didn't catch whether the PEC4 project is fully funded in this or if it's funded otherwise. But that could drive economic activity. >> And PEC4 one and two is already fully funded? >> Yeah, yes. >> It's the remaining piece that is not fully funded for construction. >> And is it in these? >> No. >> Yeah, so I'd probably put that up there because that could unleash some economic activity that might help us if things were otherwise softer. >> I'll address that, we had a couple second tier projects. That was one of them primarily because we think there needs to be a discussion with the council and the TURS board about what's really appropriate for the city to take on versus the TURS. Should each pitch in, should the TURS is what's going to benefit more than the city's budget at that point. So it's a great, it's a good discussion, it is on our second tier list here. And I think what we needed to do is just kind of let you know where our head was today. I think you make a good point with the lighting, that is a very good point. And we're working on what does a lighting CIP look like right now. But as these numbers continue to get refined, we can certainly answer those questions a little bit. We may just need to get into at least conceptual 30% drawings on some of these in order to hone that inflationary number and the contingency numbers, and there could be enough dollars in there to fund some of these other things. But it's a good point, especially with the lighting. >> I'll tee up another one, we'll see if I'm on a roll with you if you think that's a good point too. But in a maybe more modest balanced package, open space acquisitions. >> Don't hurt your record, Paul. >> I'm just kidding, I'm just- >> All right, I just said it, you don't have to respond. >> Well, and let me, I guess I'd take a little bit of exception to how it was initially teed up. These were, we definitely are viewing these as quality of life congestion mitigation type issues. I think the one that we struggle with a little bit was Jim Crystal. So we definitely need to get a plan in place because at some point the way that that park out there is developing, that four lane roadway is going to have to be put in as soon as the next dealer or two comes in. And the thing that we wanted to communicate to council is we're trying to get outside funding lined up for all of these particular projects. Every one of them is affecting, depending on where you live, you think it's an urgent project or not. And we did not get necessarily into the quality, the open space acquisition, the lighting, I'd really like to have better plans put in place, especially for the lighting. Preetam is making progress on a sidewalk master plan, so we've at least got some thought process behind these things. But the program started getting so large to begin with. We wanted to have the discussion with you knowing that in three, four years we're probably looking at another potential tranche of dollars if we can clean these out. >> But I think your points in particular with sizing the budget, that's an important question. And I think Councilmember Briggs brought up a good question, too, in terms of the sidewalks. We've had this discussion internally. Should we move the levy and just simply incorporate that into the base budget rather than fighting against $25 and $30 million projects? It's a good question. I think something you need to debate here over the summer, what your comfort level is. We want to always be worried about hanging out, waiting for the next bond package. Or do we want to just basically say, we're going to put a revenue stream in place like we have done with streets to fund this consistently. But wanted to give you something to respond to. I'll let you know that unless there's any major objections to where we're going, the community meetings are fine. We can certainly take a look at lighting if four or five of you want us to do that. But this is kind of what we thought are the most pressing needs right now. This is where we're getting the most complaints, especially when zoning cases are coming in. And in Hickory Creek's process, it's a little bit of an opportunity to defray over $100 million of that project by having federal funds kicked in, which helps all of our residents long term. And we've just got example after example, we've had development swallowing up local streets. And then we're trying to figure out how much to condemn and whether to condemn to deal with congestion. So we're trying to think a little bit further ahead for you and give you those options. >> Well, and let's be clear about this. This is just sort of bond kind of package briefing. Bond package being there's a citizens committee that is put together that decides what actual projects would be included in a bond program. And then the citizens get to vote on what level as recommended by the bond committee and council on what that is. So, I mean, I understand what you're saying about the budget aspect of it, but the public's going to be able to weigh in on that. Like we did in I think it was 2012 was where we had the three cent or was it 14, three cent. The part of that bond package was we could go up to three cents to help fund that. So I think that all will be considered as we get further down the line and begin to hone in on the details. So, okay. Yep, now we're in the homestretch. >> Some errors they say back into the fray, right? >> I guess, I don't know. >> Yeah. >> Okay, so Tony Point, the chief financial officer is kind of taking us on a homestretch here just to walk through some additional details. Again, just to reiterate, we're looking at, and this is a potential bond program for 2019. That would mean that this would be presented to the voters in November of 2019. Two propositions are what we're discussing today. Public safety facilities, a little bit over $54 million. Roadways and infrastructure, 136, almost 137 million. So a total of $190.81 million would be what could potentially be on that proposition. So just want to talk with you a little bit about the development of this bond program. Certainly over the last year or so, we've had a number of conversations with the council dating back to August of 2018. Certainly on the 4th of February, we had an extensive conversation with you regarding at least a portion of the public safety facilities. So staff is outlining here some elements of a potential bond program for 2019 for your consideration. And a follow up work session will take place on April 16 to just continue to seek direction from the council. >> I think this is an important point to make is today, we view today as just simply kind of giving you an idea of what the thought process was, what's out there, what we think are important things. But we wanted to make sure we had a couple of weeks to sort of get your comments, let things sit before we came back to you again and continue the discussion. So no attempt to do anything other than introduce this to you today. We want you to be able to think about it now that we've been able to provide some context. >> So this is a timeline, if the council were to choose to proceed with a bond election in November. Really the critical timeline is between August 7th and August 19th, the council would have to call that election that is set by state law. And so really that's the time frame in which that would need to be done. Certainly there would be a number of processes before that time, as the mayors alluded to, potential formation of a citizens committee. And I'll have some more information for you regarding that particular process and kind of what we've done in the last two elections. >> You have it in this presentation? >> Yes sir. >> Okay, because I was going to say that. That doesn't look like enough time to get all that in place, but go ahead. >> Correct. >> So basically, Mayor, this is what you're alluding to. So option one would be to informing, considering the formation of a bond committee. Again, these are possibilities, option one would be to use the existing bond oversight committee. That's currently made up of five members. That committee was formed, was really the chair and the sub-chairs of the bond oversight committee from 2014. That 2014 bond committee was comprised of 50, it was a 50 member citizen committee. And just for some context, the 2012 citizens committee was about 25 members. Again, that was a much narrowly focused, bond election was for streets only. If I recall correctly, the 2005 citizens committee was about 50 members as well. So again, here what we would throw out as an option for you would be to add an additional member per council member to the existing bond oversight committee for a total of 12 potential members. Just again, as an example, we would certainly have to reach out to the 2014 bond committee members to see if they would be interested on, I will let you know that I did share this presentation with those members today. >> So I want to make sure I understood what you just said. >> Yes, sir. >> Because when I see use existing bond committee and add one person per appointment of each council member, the bond committee was 50 members and the bond oversight committee is the one that's the five members. So you're saying that under option one, the bond committee would only be the 12 people, which is the five plus one additional for the seven? >> Correct, that would be covered here under option one. >> Okay, all right. >> So certainly option two would be to formulate and establish a brand new bond committee to be determined size and scope by the city council. Again, just as a reminder, 2014, that was comprised of 50 members. It was seven per council member plus the chair, if I recall correctly, was appointed by the mayor. So for either option staff will work through the bond review committee and develop a city wide public education campaign. Just so you know, staff is limited, city is limited to the information that can be supplied regarding public education. We got to make sure that we're not advocating for in favor or opposed to that. So I just wanted to reiterate that and let you know that the staff is aware of that. >> Next member, I'm trying to ask a question. >> Yeah, so if you could go back to that slide. So question about the bond committee, when people are appointed to bond committee, what are they told about what their term limit is? What's the rule on term limits for that, for a bond committee? >> Yeah, generally the council will set the scope for that committee and also an extinguishing or dissolution of that committee. Generally that coincides with the council's call for the actual bond election. And so then that committee is dissolved, and in general the council will then come back and pass an ordinance or resolution setting a bond oversight committee that's made up of some members of that committee. To which staff can continue to kind of work with them on keeping track of the projects associated with that bond program. >> Okay, and so the existing bond committee, what were they told was the point of dissolution? Or they weren't given? >> So generally, the bond oversight committee, which is what exists today, generally we do not dissolve that until all the projects are substantially completed. >> Okay, got it, got it. And correct me if I'm wrong, but so it sounds like kind of what you're saying is that number two, option two, could be done in such a way that every council person could, if people who are presently on council who have appointed somebody to that committee, they could just say, well, I keep my person in there, right? And then the new people would, those who were not on council at that time, would be putting somebody new in versus, so the option one would expand the committee while keeping existing people, option two presumably could also keep all the existing, could presumably keep all the existing people except those who were, and maybe even those would be reappointed to, am I understanding that correctly, the way that's framed? >> Yes, ma'am. >> Okay. >> I think the main thing is it's a far more targeted couple of propositions than in the past where we're kind of looking at citywide. We envision that will probably need to happen in a few years, but you've got some acute road and safe public safety needs, so it wasn't really the mindset that we needed to set up another 50 person committee. It's just, we're just giving you things to respond to. There's probably a hybrid in there somewhere that Paul's already thought of. So yeah, but it's always easier to look at something, you know what, I just tweaked this. >> And just as a reminder, the 2012 committee that was kind of narrowly focused on streets only was only comprised of 25 members. >> Okay, yeah, just for me personally, I'm for whatever would enable my colleagues to have the opportunity to keep the person who they've appointed on, if they've appointed somebody, and it enables new people to appoint. >> I'm the only one. >> Really? >> I don't even know if I was on there when they appointed this bond committee, I was elected in 2000. >> Wow. >> I think you were. >> Wow. >> It was in May or June. >> Well, yeah, I can go with either option. Either way, we're going to be deciding, we're just going to be deciding, do you want to keep somebody who's existing on? >> So these would be points for you to kind of provide some input to us in a couple weeks. Again, we don't want to put you on the spot. We know there's different ways of organizing it. We just wanted you to kind of think it through. >> Thanks. >> So the next item that I wanted to talk with you a little bit about is the public art policy. So we do have a public art policy that was revised in 2013, and I know there's a lot of language up here. But basically, I wanted to mention to you that certainly the council has the option whether or not to include public art as part of the funding. So that's really kind of question, or option number one. Option number two is if the council chooses to include public art, it really will only be applicable to vertical construction based on the revisions in 2013. And then if the council chooses that, then it would be whether or not, what the range would be, 2 to 4%. And just for some context, 2% of really just the public safety only components, which is where the vertical construction would be, would be about a million dollars. A 4% would be a little bit over $2 million that would be designated for public safety. Those public art projects are necessarily tied to those specific public safety projects that are in the bond program. Those public art pieces could be included in any public safety related facility across the city. And then finally, the other item would be whether or not to have that public art component as a standalone proposition or to embed it within the applicable proposition. In 2012 and in 2014, public art was included within the propositions. They were not treated as standalone propositions. So again, just giving you some history on that. >> Yeah, is there a definitional requirement that public art always refers to sculpture or can it be understood to include things that support performing arts as well? Like performance space at the Hall West or outdoor performance spaces, how vertical does the construction have to be? >> I don't think the vertical is referring to the actual art. I think it's referring to the project itself. Like for the public facility training, it's instead of being land or roads, it's an actual structure that's going up and it's 2% or 4% or whatever it is of that. But that's a good question though because there are some parameters around what is defined as public art in the sense that applies to this. >> Correct, and generally again, that particular decision or decision making, the council has chosen to give the public art committee kind of that decision making process. Certainly if there's contracts or other expenses associated with those particular pieces, those do come back to the council for ultimate approval. Again, as I mentioned, with the current proposal, you'll be looking at $1 million to $2 million would only be related to public safety. But again, it wouldn't be tied to the specific facilities that are outlined here, it would be really any public safety facility that's out there, fire and police. >> That's why I think it's important to get sort of an update before we come back on this as far as what has the money been used for from the other bond programs via the public art committee. >> Okay, and we have that, Mayor. So before I get into the financial information for you, just wanted to again cover a little bit about the education and outreach. Certainly our city staff through our PCO office would work with whatever bond committee to make sure that we get enough information out there to the public so that they're aware of the various projects that are being included within each proposition. Normally we produce a booklet or a brochure that goes out to just factual information. We also generally will hold a number of town hall public meetings in concert with the citizens committee. Staff will be there present to discuss any other projects that are being outlined and answer any citizen questions, as well as making sure that there's speakers available at the various civic clubs and business organizations. And would have you really just a community wide information and education and outreach process. >> Let's move on, Chair. >> Yeah, just to speak to that point about the education aspect. When the time comes for that, and I realize we've even established whether there's going to be a bond election this year or next year or whatever, but I think it's important that even though in a flier, informational flier, you can only get so much information, you need to really condense it. But I think it's important that on the website there be as much detail for those people who really do want detail to avoid what I've seen with past bond elections where people vote for something. And then they find out what they voted on is there's some element in it that they didn't anticipate because that detail wasn't provided. And then they have a feeling of bond voter buyer's remorse. So everything we can do, again, you don't want to overwhelm people by shoving information in their face, but just having it there and searchable for those who want it. >> And past practices, council member, we've had a dedicated web page where any information that's going to the bond committee is published. We also put minutes of the meetings, all the detailed information on the projects. We certainly abide by all the open records requirements and public meeting requirements for those. And so we publish agendas, and we also have had a citizen submission portal for ideas and questions that they may have. And so again, I would envision that that would likely continue and potentially be expanded. We have a whole new group of individuals here that have some great ideas on how we can get information out to the public, including social media and things like that that maybe we haven't done in the past. So as the finance department began to kind of look at these various projects and timing and what the impact would be. I just want to outline for you that this is the schedule that we looked at based on timing needs and forecasting for construction. And so this is really, again, how we've outlined the actual bond sales within our debt forecast. And so beginning in fiscal year 1920, so this would be the actual fiscal year in which the bond election occurs. The bond election would occur in November of 2019. Likely in December, just like we did with the previous bond program, we would come to you with a reimbursement ordinance, get those projects going. And then we would issue the first trunche or the first block of bonds that summer of 2020. And currently we're looking at about $23 million in that first fiscal year. And ratchets up to $91 million the following year, $56 million and then $20 million. Again, one of the things that's a little bit different in this bond program, unlike some of the other ones that we've had, is generally the others have been spread out over a five to six year time window. But just the nature of some of these projects and when the full funding needs to be available for construction, primarily, this really kind of stated this kind of compressed schedule. So we would be looking at a four year bond program versus kind of the five and six year bond program as well. So that really is kind of driving some of the fiscal impact, if you will, in forecasting the revenues that's going to be needed to support this type of debt issuance. So, and we had shared this a little bit before in my previous presentation. So just as a reminder, where our total debt is, excuse me, our total tax rate is currently for 18, 19 is 62 cents. The proposal that you have here to support this bond program would be to maintain that tax rate. Certainly what's happening as part of our adoption of the effective tax rate on the O&M side, there's a shifting that's occurring in which we're shifting cents from the O&M side to the debt side. Over that five year window, it's about six cents that's being transferred over to the debt side to continue to support this. On top of that, there's an additional four cents that would be needed above kind of the current overall tax rate, potentially, to support this program. What I've outlined for you here in this box is some of the assumptions that have gone into that debt forecast. Very similar to the O&M side, 4% assessed value growth. We are projecting that these would be 20 year term bonds. Certainly some of these roadway projects could lend themselves to the 30 year term scenario. But again, currently since our policy is to issue 20 year bonds, that's kind of what we stuck with. Interest rate is projected about 4.5%. That is for the life of this issuance or for the four years of this issuance. I can tell you that current preliminary interest rates for the upcoming bond program that we're looking at, or CO issuance, we're looking at about 3.5%. And potentially, that will continue to come down. Again, that's just an impact of the sliding economic environment that we're in currently. Again, there's a little bit of a give and take when it comes to economic downturns. Certainly a good time to borrow money, but there might not be an opportunity to generate the revenue. But $4 million, we currently have a fund balance in that debt service fund, about $5.5 million. This proposal includes a drawdown over that period of $4 million, maintaining about a million dollars in reserve and talking with our financial advisors. That's really kind of where we want to be, no less than a million dollars. So we've kind of kept that forecast, that target in mind, based on the advice of our financial advisors. This program would also continue to include the issuance of CEOs, total $5 million for vehicle replacements. And also for our facility improvement projects that we normally do on an annual basis. And then finally, this includes about a $1.1 million in annual debt retirement. So along with the fact that we're layering additional debt, there's also debt that's coming off of the books. We did have a question that came in, I'll just kind of put this out there. So we have currently, on just general government debt, that's tax supported debt, about $25 million of annual debt service. And so this particular bond program would increase that by year four to about $30 million in annual debt service. And so again, I think it's well within kind of the window that we've had our general government debt. I'll kind of stop there if you have any questions. >> Councilmember Hussman, do you have a question? >> No, sir, I was going to take the city manager up on the time to mull it over and then follow up. >> Okay, all right, yeah, go ahead. Sorry, you just looked at me like you had a question, I'm sorry, no, that's fine. >> No, I do, I just- >> Okay, no problem, yeah, go ahead. >> I haven't refined them to a few enough words for now. >> No, you're good. >> So again, just to reiterate, we're looking at a $190 million bond election in November 2019 that would anticipate up to a four cent tax rate increase. And then again, as a result of conversations with council in 2018 and certainly in February of this past year, this year, this has generated some of these projects. So some of the options for the council to consider is certainly option one would be to hold an election in 2019 for public safety transportation projects that would anticipate tax rate increase up to four cents. As we continue to have conversations with you, the amount of the bond program and those projects could certainly fluctuate. And then option two would be to not issue, to not have that bond program. And in response to a question that came through as well, if we didn't do this bond program and we didn't want to impact the tax rate, what kind of bond program would we be looking at? The answer to that is we'd be looking at delaying the bond election to November of 2020. You'd likely be looking at about a $100 million bond program at that time. That would require us to issue those bonds in $20 million increments over a five year period. Again, part of the challenge with that is that that doesn't necessarily align well when construction dollars would be needed. Would be a first challenge and then two, as some of these projects are delayed, certainly on the transportation projects, then you're going to see continued inflationary pressures that would actually drive the cost of some of those projects. Requiring you to have either delay more projects or down the road having to issue more bonds than you would currently. >> That's my barometer. >> So that, you said $100 million projection, that's estimating for the increased construction costs? >> No, ma'am. >> Okay, that's without that. >> No, the $100 million would basically eliminate the four cent tax rate increase. >> Got it. >> Correct. >> But again, that's almost half of the bond program that is the projects that are being proposed here today. >> Well, and I think one important thing is depending on what the legislation does, because I think in the proposed bill, COs were to be included in your O&M as it currently sits. At least, and that would be, that's going to change everything. So, I think a lot of this is going to depend on the final legislation coming out if it affects this because so yeah. That's just, I throw that out there because that could rearrange this whole thing, yep. >> Correct. >> Yep. >> So finally, just next steps for you, this should be the last slide. Staff will continue to work or come back to you on a work session on April 16 to just continue to have conversations with you, seek direction. If the direction is to hold an election in 2014, then certainly we can proceed with that. We'll certainly have to get your feedback regarding the structure of the bond committee. Also, feedback regarding public art and certainly all the projects. So with that, that concludes the presentation, and certainly I'm available to ask questions and staff as well. >> That's my monitor. So I would like to just, going forward, if this can be done in time for the 16th, to see some sort of estimate on what it would take cost to include, if we were to consider including City Hall West funding as part of this bond package. I'm just curious to know. And secondly, and for me, most importantly, I wanted to mention that City of Austin, last year they passed Proposition A, which was a bond where voters in City of Austin voted on a bond package for housing and housing assistance is a big bond package. And so considering that we at our retreat settled on making homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring as a major goal, I would love to see this at least considered by my colleagues for this year and next year and to see something from staff as to what it would take to do that. Because we know that the need is great. >> Any questions, comments? Okay. All right, I believe that we don't have any concluding items on this work session. So, Council Member Reed. >> That the Committee on the Environment is next for anyone who wants to stick around. >> What time did that start? >> It started at 2. >> Yeah, thank you. We will then stand adjourned.