All right, good afternoon.
This is the February 25th, 2026 meeting of the Sustainability Framework Advisory Committee
at 1 p.m. in the City Council Session Room.
Our first item today is to consider approval of the December 12th, 2025 minutes.
Do we have any discussion or motions on the acceptance of December's minutes?
I won't appear, but I will motion to approve.
We have a motion to approve by Ms. Peripter, the second, Dr. Meyer.
All in favor of approval?
Aye.
Everybody?
Approves.
Our next item is to receive a report, hold a discussion, and give staff direction on
the adoption of the Sustainability Framework Advisory Committee 2026 meeting schedule.
I don't think we have a presentation for this.
You have the schedule in your backup.
Yeah.
If you want to just review that and if anybody has any conflicts that they already know about
that we want to make folks aware of, we can do that.
It's a monthly meeting, fourth Wednesday at 1 p.m. in this room generally.
So for me, Wednesday 1 p.m. is fine, except that in summer usually I leave end of May
and come back at the end of June, so it looks like I'm going to miss those two meetings.
Okay.
I'll have to miss the one in March, but the rest of them are okay.
Unless something unforeseen comes up, I'm good for all of them.
Do we need to move to adopt the schedule or do we need to modify anything?
Do we need to vote on the schedule?
We need to vote on the schedule.
Okay.
Is everyone good for the proposed meeting schedule?
I move to adopt the meeting schedule.
To adopt it?
Yeah.
Am I second?
All right.
Do we have a second?
Second?
Do we have a second?
Okay.
All in favor of adopting the schedule?
Aye.
All opposed?
No.
Okay.
So we now have a new schedule.
Our next item is to receive a report and hold a discussion regarding fiscal year 2025-2026,
quarter one, incentive programs, activity, and updates.
All right.
Catherine Hornet, sustainability manager, just to have a brief update on some of our
framework fund incentives for the first quarter of the fiscal year.
I'm going to compare where we are in first quarter to the previous year total results
and then look at that Q1.
I have a little bit of an update since we're almost two months into Q2 and then discuss
some future considerations and next steps.
So just a reminder, we have the annual funding of $150,000 for EVs, $100,000 for e-bikes,
and $50,000 for lawn equipment last fiscal year.
EV and e-bike stayed within the funding amount and the lawn equipment went over.
We pulled a little bit from the EV and e-bike to help cover that because those weren't fully
spent.
And those were all about six months' worth of fully active program, so about half a year,
maybe a little bit more, to get to those percentages.
So at the end of Q1, EVs were trending quite a bit lower than last year.
The incentives have played out.
We saw a little bit of an uptick in rebates right at the end of the fiscal year, right
before those incentives ran out.
So I was a little bit concerned going into the end of the first quarter with only 17
applications for EVs.
We're up to 35 now.
So we've had more than doubling that amount in the last two months.
So that's good news.
It is.
Thinking back at e-bikes, we've spent about another $10,000.
So that kind of keeps us on track for the fiscal year and going into ending quarter
two.
Electric blood equipment, we know that's going to pick up.
Folks are already getting ready for spring and starting good purchase equipment.
So we'll see more uptick there soon.
So I just wanted to give you a little bit of an update on that, just what we were looking
like.
And then some future considerations, if we have extra money in the EV program, seen a
few different models for low income e-bike that we want to see if we might be able to
replicate here.
Either a voucher or a step up rebate for low income.
I've talked to several cities who are self-certifying income, not using a third party nearby income.
So that was a barrier that we were afraid to have to deal with kind of.
It was not something that we have the time to take on in our office.
So we want to explore that option and then also talk to some folks down south of us who
are looking to provide vouchers for low income.
So there may be some opportunities there as well.
So I wanted to get some feedback on considering those two options and then just any additional
feedback that you might have about the incentive program, if you've heard anything from the
community.
Of course we'll continue to monitor and report the program results and then review those
future considerations with the city departments that we need to talk with to see if that's
feasible.
Is there a complication to doing vouchers, some of which you have to go verify that they
spend it on the right thing?
There are some different models.
Dallas has worked something out with some of their vendors that have multiple stores where
they have a barcode basically that is tied to that program.
So the stores are just then billing the city of Dallas at the end of it.
So there's some ways that Dallas is making it work.
I just need to see if that's something that we can do here.
You said Dallas' voucher program was for the law and code, right?
That's what they're exploring right now.
It's not in place yet.
I did have a question over the e-bike program and the 10K update.
That's about 20 applicants by average that it went up by since the end of Q1?
Before e-bike?
No, it's more than that.
Okay, excellent.
I did hope we could discuss that voucher program and how maybe we want to preliminarily tailor
what I'm assuming a pilot program might look like for us.
I'm sorry, I'm having a really hard time hearing you.
I'm sorry, I never speak up well enough.
I know there was some discussion about when we last brought this up about if we modify
the base level of the rebate or the percentage that we're covering for the low-income program.
For me, if we were able to offer some form of upfront voucher,
that satisfies the same concern for me that the low-income program is interested in or looking at.
So if, say, for example, city of Dallas is able to work with specific vendors,
in our case for the bike program, maybe it's -- I don't know how it would work with digital vendors,
but we do obviously have a number, six or seven bike shops around town that maybe a similar program developed.
But the upfront of the rebate, at the end of the day, you know, if I'm instead getting the rebate back
and I only spent out of pocket, you know, and I'm getting an average of $500 back,
and our voucher program means at the end of the day I'm only spending maybe $500 as our average rebate,
I think that's a fair and balanced program.
And I know there was consideration about, you know, having to take a low-income program to legal.
In my mind, it seems maybe smoother to work through a voucher system than trying to identify --
or, you know, are we having now retreating people who are utilizing this program in two separate categories,
two separate types of voucher programs or rebate programs?
It might reduce it a little better if we just look at a voucher for people who qualify.
And I understand that takes a lot of work on the backend for you guys,
but I think for me consolidating that down into one program through an upfront voucher payment
makes the most sense to try to satisfy that concern about --
we've had lots of discussion around the cost of e-bikes and the different model and price points that, to me,
get there through some sort of up-fronting of the rebate value for people who qualify.
Are there other city programs that are doing the income verification already?
In Denton, Community Development.
Has the city ever had a rental program?
I know at some point they had rental bikes in town.
Is that -- am I remembering correctly?
There was a third party that had bikes that were paid for use.
There's been validity to having a rental e-bike program.
I was in Washington a while back, and they have what they call a scooter program, I think, that is basically e-bikes.
Would that be something that could be feasible in the future?
I don't know that the city would be able to stand that up.
It would probably be a third party.
That's what I see in most of the cities that I travel to.
It's one or two third party vendors that provide that service.
The city would have to be involved with that on some level,
and I'm not sure who all we would need to breath into that.
We could ask.
Is there any licensing progress or process with the city where a person buys a e-bike,
since it can be, I assume, ridden on the streets?
Not that I'm aware of, no.
So there's no registration with the city then?
Not that I'm aware of.
Okay, yeah, I was just curious.
There might be.
I definitely would want to look into the upfront voucher program.
I think that would be a really good thing.
Any other comments, questions?
No? Thank you.
Let's see.
Our next item is to receive a report and hold a discussion regarding a summary of sustainability,
education, outreach, and social media metrics for fiscal year 2024-2025.
And Karen Berner's going to start this one off,
and we've got a couple of new faces for you to meet today.
Great.
Hi, everybody.
I'm Karen Berner, sustainability engagement specialist,
and we're just going to do a quick recap of last fiscal year's education
and outreach from our department.
What we're going to go focus on is the background of sustainability education,
recycling education, dense sustainable schools, sustainability education,
outreach and events, social media, and upcoming outreach and events,
and then questions and comments.
For a very short background, sustainability education was launched in 2007
with Denton ISD field trips out to Clear Creek Natural Heritage Center,
and it has evolved and expanded over the last 19 years.
We are not over the field trips to Clear Creek anymore,
but everything we do is based off of that start.
And then Denton Sustainable Schools was established in 2004
with the full program relaunch in the fall of 2022,
and recycling education was expanded to what it is today in January of 2021.
We're going to go over just a little bit of our education outreach,
what we do, and kind of a summary of each program,
and to start that off, I'm going to bring up Florrie.
Hey Karen, my name is Florrie Garcia.
I am the engagement coordinator,
and I mainly focus on residential and multi-family recycling education.
One of my top priorities is to find different ways to reduce contamination
within the city while also promoting and bringing awareness to landfills diversion.
And a few ways to go about that is by providing prep recycling facility tours.
These are open to the public, and they're able to come and view the bigger picture
of what happens to the recyclables after they're collected from the curb.
And yes, we do recycle. Their items do get recycled.
We also provide recycling classes, presentations, and over the past year,
we have also updated signage throughout city of Denver buildings.
We have a lot of employees that may not live in the city,
so these are a quick reminder on how to recycle and what you should be recycling
and what should be going in the trash throughout the city of Denver buildings.
For outreach, I attend quite a few apartment events,
so this can look like a residential appreciation week,
a Christmas party, or just a kickoff for summer or spring.
I am able to have a tabling event where I can provide more recycling information
and also provide these reusable bags that have a handle at the bottom.
That way they're able to dump their recyclables directly into the container
versus using a plastic bag, as plastic bags continue to be a number one contaminant in our recycling program.
We also get information from the solid waste and recycling team.
Whenever we have a few apartments that are receiving a lot of contamination and recycling,
I am able to work directly with the property managers and provide them recycling information,
the tote bags, and also I try to make it as easy as possible for them.
I type up an email, a template that they can go ahead and send via email plus to the residents.
For campus collaborations, we work together with UNT, TLEU,
and this can look like providing them educational materials based on their grant guidelines.
So for UNT, maybe having it green and a lot of items that are mainly seen at college campuses,
and the same for TLEU, Maroon, and The Owl.
We also hold our annual Texas Recycle the Day event.
So this is an event where community members are able to come and drop off their unwanted items,
and we are able to dispose of them properly through either home care or book collection.
We also invite Donate to Impact, where they're able to take some of items like toys and small household items.
And we also invite the Cedar Waste Textiles Initiative from UNT.
They're able to collect the clothing and take it back to UNT so that clothing can be reused at their campus.
With our marketing strategy, we have a few ads around the city of Denton.
We do targeted advertising through Den River Chronicle.
So we get more information from our solid waste team.
They let us know where the areas of high contamination are within the city.
So through these ads, we're able to target those areas so that can look like while they're browsing on the web
or they're playing a game, they're able to see that message or that quick video that does not let them go forward
until they at least watch a few seconds of it.
So we take advantage of that so that when they're able to get our educational message as well.
We have a Carpetizing ad and Golden Triangle Mall ad. These are pretty similar.
The Carpetizing ad, you can see the picture on there.
They have a unique QR code where we're able to get more information about how many times it was scanned,
the location that it was scanned, and just overall know that there's people who want a little more on how to recycle it.
With UNT Athletics, we have a halftime video ad.
This gets played during the football games and the basketball games.
So we try to be a little relatable to the college students so that way they're able to see it's fun
and hopefully they're able to grasp the message.
So tailored towards UNT students but also community members who attend those high attendance events.
The same with North Texas Daily. This is in collaboration with ISD.
So this can look like getting a few students from different ISD schools and mascots coming together for that video.
And we are able to play it during the online broadcasting of the football games
throughout the entire football season at Denton ISD.
With Spanish Radio, it's something very similar as well, but we wanted to target the Spanish-speaking population
so that way they're also receiving the message in their language and targeting the morning commute
and afterward commute where they're listening the most to the radio.
We have similar ads through newsletters and magazines as well.
And as for future initiatives, we do plan to keep some of these strategies forward.
And also we are wanting to work closer with TWA U. So we are going to have our message tailored to TWA U students
through their digital billboard ads on campus.
So that way they're able to see the message as well and students as well as the teachers, professors.
And right here I have the overall recycling contamination rate.
So this is just to give you an idea of how that rate has looked over the past three fiscal years.
So the green line represents year 2022-23, orange year 2023-24, and the blue this past fiscal year.
So we have seen the trend over the years that we like that trend where it's going.
It's definitely decreasing from the beginning.
The highest that we saw over the past three fiscal years were at 50%.
And in the previous last year, we saw a record low of 8%.
And of course these numbers fluctuate.
But in collaboration with Solid Waste and Recycling team, we are working together to keep this number as slow as possible.
And I'm going to pass it over to Heather, she'll be able to tell you more about our done sustainable schools work.
Could I ask a question on your subject?
That's great.
Do you have any idea of what percentage of apartment buildings are in the recycling program?
So they are required to have a diversion plan in place.
Yes, so whether that's having containers at the property or them having the information where they can take their recyclables to be dropped off at two locations here in the city.
So they are required to have a plan.
Oh, that's great. Thank you.
I have a few questions too.
Since I'm at TWU, I would like you very, very much, and I think I stated this in previous meetings,
that you really need to increase the collaboration with TWU, maybe at the level that you have it with UNT.
We have a sustainability committee and they will be absolutely happy to work with you.
And I'm thinking you have the video that you show at UNT, we have basketball.
And you can show that video in our arena as well.
Yes, yes.
And this is a mystery to us.
There is a clothing container on campus.
And we cannot figure out if it's a collaboration with you or with whom.
And I think they plan to put more than one.
The problem that we had this winter is that apparently they were overflown, nobody came to pick them up.
And we had people, homeless people, unfortunately, coming to campus and digging those clothes out
and picking up what they want and throw them away.
So I really want you to collaborate with our sustainability committee.
I can give you some names, all right?
And I can get your contact and give it to them.
And let's do a good job on our campuses.
Yeah, and just to add to that, the first part of your question, we have made contact with the sustainability committee.
So Karen was able to attend one of the meetings.
We did have clothing during the move-out time replaced UNT's bins to collect clothing at UNT.
At the 2WU, but they took it back to UNT.
But our goal would be to do something similar at 2WU where they keep the textiles
and they have like a clothing store within their own students.
So definitely, I would love to learn more and collaborate with them.
Okay, thank you.
You're welcome.
And we can touch base about the container.
I think I know the vendor, so we can touch base that for you.
Okay.
Hello, my name is Heather Hinton-Lucker.
I'm the school engagement coordinator for the Sustainable Schools Program.
So the team kept the program working strong October 24 through May of 2025.
Whenever I joined, I was able to learn more about the program
and continue the community and school engagement efforts for the program.
So for the '24-'25 school year, we had a total of nine schools enrolled in the program.
Seven from Denton ISD, two from private schools.
The resources that we provide through the program include sustainability education.
And what that looks like is presentations on trash and recycling and conservation,
STEM nights, we participate in their fall festivals, career days,
their walk-and-roll to school day, and summer camps as well.
And then we also provide the opportunities for schools to participate
in two of our challenges that we have.
And so we have our recycling audit challenge,
and then we have our sustainable activity challenge.
And what that looks like is that we have the recycling audit challenge
is where the students go and they do an audit of the recycling carts
on their campus or dumpster.
So for example, you see the students here at Hodge Elementary in the picture,
and they're doing audits and they're auditing for contamination
in the recycling carts in the hallway.
It's easy for them to get to. It's fun.
It's usually an after-school program or an after-school club
who participates in that.
And then at our high schools, it's usually a student council
or an environmentally-based club that does audits
of the recycling dumpsters at their school.
It's right outside the cafeteria usually, and it's easy for them to get to as well.
And then what they do is they submit a form online on the DSS website,
and they submit their contamination, what they saw.
And so last year we had a 20-30 audit submitted.
And so that was nice.
We have some schools that are more active on the recycling audits.
And then we have our sustainable activity challenges
that the schools can participate in as well.
And what that looks like is it's students who are engaging in lessons
that are focused on alternative energy, water conservation, resource management,
any kind of activity that's connected to sustainability.
And it's the same as the recycling audits.
They submit those challenges on the DSS website.
And there's a form to be filled out, and they submit those.
And we had 13 of those submitted last year.
And so how it works is that the school who submits the most challenges
receives an environmentally-based prize at the end of the year.
And what that looks like is, for example, the more popular prizes are gardening supplies,
raised garden beds, or STEM kits.
And then all the schools who are participating in the Sustainable Schools Program
have access to our STEM kits to check out.
So they can check out a STEM kit, borrow it, and then we pick it up and they bring it back.
And we have over 15 STEM kits available.
And those STEM kits are focused on solar, wind energy, circuits, coping, watershed, and landfill kits.
And you can see the landfill kit in the photograph with the green shirt.
And so you can see where we're at Explorium at one of their summer camps
doing a demo of the landfill kit.
And then we also provide tours of the prior recycling facility, the home chemical collections,
dino dirt, water production, and water reclamation.
So just providing opportunities not just for the schools, but for the communities or scouts
to come and participate and learn more about sustainability in the city.
And so then so for this current school year, the 25-26 school year,
we actually have 11 NYSD schools enrolled and one private school enrolled.
And so far it's been a great year and I look forward to coming back to report back on that.
And next we have Karen Warner again to talk about sustainability.
Can I ask you a question?
Yes.
How does a school get into the program?
Yeah, so you go to the Sustainable Schools website and there's an enrollment form.
They submit that and then I reach out to them and I coordinate our first meeting
just to see how they want to participate.
I think we talked about this before, but I think there's something like 40 schools in DISD.
My question would be what initiatives could be discussed and possibly used to bolster that number?
Yeah, it seems like they all should be involved in it.
And if there are barriers that need to be overcome, how we can overcome them?
Because I think the program could and should definitely expand.
Yeah, I agree and that's something that I want to look into for this upcoming school year,
for the 26-27 school year.
Thank you. Anybody else? Yes.
Yeah, I have the same question, but I have an idea.
So at TW we have a STEM program and we go to schools, to DISD schools,
and we do different activities, sustainability activities,
and it would be good to advertise this when we go to those schools,
to advertise the fact that they can sign up for the sustainability.
Yeah, I think that's a good point.
And actually I've worked along with Elaina Pressley this past year.
She's a professor at TW, with the sustainability science.
So she is working with Newton-Razor with their STEM club.
And so I'm going to be collaborating with her with their STEM club.
And I think UNT has also some programs.
So my idea is if we collaborate and if we spread the word together,
we are more successful in getting more schools to sign up.
And that's something that Elaina and I have spoken about,
with just kind of collaborating and combining resources.
And I can do that with other groups, like with UNT,
and maybe even this upcoming year, reaching out directly to who's in charge of STEM clubs,
because it's just about reaching out to the right person at the school.
I just had a question.
I know we typically approach this program on a school-to-school basis
because of their capacity and their capacity to work with them.
On a district level, what does those conversations look like?
Do you speak with the science program coordinator or curriculum coordinators
about scaling yourself up to be able to infuse some of these lessons
in their traditional curriculums?
So I did reach out to the science curriculum coordinator
at the beginning of this whole year, and she shared my information.
So that was helpful.
We're able to get a couple new schools engaged in the program.
And so I'm going to see what I can do to maybe strengthen that relationship
a little bit more now that I've had more experience in the program,
and I'm just starting to build my rapport with them.
That's encouraging.
The schools that are participating, is it pretty evenly distributed
amongst elementary and middle school and high school, or is it more...
It's mostly elementary schools.
I have two high schools, and I don't have any middle schools participating yet.
And I would like to, and I have reached out to our middle schools,
but I'm going to have to take the summer to think about what my approach is going to be
and try to see how I can meet them better at providing the kind of resources that they need.
From my experience, going directly to the schools is better than talking to the ISD.
It is, yes.
Yes, and I took the opportunity over the summer just to go do their dumpster audits.
I did take time to introduce myself, walk in as long as there was somebody here
to introduce myself to, and like you say, being in person is definitely helpful.
Great job. Thank you very much.
Hello again. Karen Berner, sustainability engagement specialist.
In addition to recycling, we cover a whole lot of sustainability topics like
water and energy conservation, wildlife and native planting, air quality,
transportation and local food, and we do this through classes and requested presentations.
We also do a lot of outreach events, and these are typically where we set up a table
and have a little bit of information on everything out so that we can meet the community.
We have pop-up events where we set up a table just at a rec center or a library
or somewhere in the community and just catch people as they're going through their daily lives
to try to get those new eyes on our outreach material.
We have university collaborations, so we do a lot of tabling at UNT events,
and then our new fostering relationship with the sustainability committee at TWU,
and then we also go to community events such as Arts and Autos we were at last year
on Electric Avenue, just reaching out to more people.
Some highlights from this past year.
There was a Texwana presentation about the recycling market strategy and campus collaborations.
Our Dentons Sustainable Schools was awarded the TCEQ Texas Environmental Excellence Award
and was recognized by STAR with a 2024 Excellence in Environmental Awareness Education,
and in 2025 was when we officially got our Bird City, Texas designation.
So the social media pages for the City of Denton Sustainability as well as Solid Waste and Recycling
is run through us, and we try to use it to increase awareness
and give a little more information to our followers.
And I just have a couple of examples up here for what we use it for.
So this is the sustainability page.
We like to give out useful information like this first one we talk about bird migration
and what people can do to help birds as they migrate,
and this also helps us with our certifications like Bird City, Texas.
In the middle there is an advertisement for our free fan giveaway in the summer,
which we try to do to reduce energy costs so people can keep their ACs at a higher temperature
and use a fan to cool off instead.
So we use that to make people aware that we're doing this giveaway
and how they can access their free fan.
And then also try to inform people.
We do have on our website the Air Quality Index flag,
and people will see it on the news or hear it on the radio,
but some people don't know what the colors mean.
So we're trying to do posts like this to give people more context to what they hear around.
And in the caption we explain to more about what each color means and why they're significant.
A couple other on the sustainability page.
We do a lot of water conservation as well.
So we talk about native ground covers,
basically switching the water heavy turf lawns for drought resistant ground covers.
We also use it to promote our classes.
This one is our Get Site to Site Like a Deadlight class.
It tells you where and when it is and then a brief description of what it's going to be.
So this is learning about Denton's alternative transportation options
so people can be encouraged and confident to use it on their daily commute.
And then we also recognize national or worldwide days or weeks that are sustainability events.
So this was Fix a Leak Week.
We made a post that was like, "Do a leak check for 10 minutes. Help with water conservation."
On our recycling social media pages, we do a lot of information.
So like this first one, community event, arts and autos.
We knew we were going to have the clear streams there
and we wanted to make sure people were using them and using them appropriately.
So we posted about it on the social media pages.
We do service delays.
We do planned delays like Barton Luther King Jr. Day,
but also emergency delays like with the weather we just had.
And then also just general information like using reusable water bottles instead of the single-use ones.
And now we'll run into a year-end breakdown.
These are just a couple metrics from the past fiscal year.
Our total attendance across all our education outreach events was 13,950.
You can see a large amount of that was from our tabling events,
catching the community as they're out and doing events and at the universities.
Our next biggest are the presentation.
These are our sit-down classes where residents come in to learn about a specific topic
that either our staff or an expert presenter comes in and teaches.
And then our third biggest there was activities.
These are hands-on events that residents can attend.
So examples would be like World Migratory Bird Day
or our DIY rainwater harvesting class where they make their own rain barrels.
And to put it in a little bit of context,
this is a nearly 30% increase from the fiscal year before where the attendance was 10,748.
And we try to make sure our classes are spread out throughout Denton
so that people who might have time or travel restrictions can still attend at least some of the classes.
So you can see the size of the bubble here is attendance, orange is sustainability,
purple is recycling, and blue is Denton Sustainable Schools.
So we try to spread out throughout Denton as much as possible
to just get in front of as many people as possible.
Some of our upcoming events.
On March 5th we have the turf lawn alternative.
On March 18th container gardening.
March 28th seed starting.
April 4th get site to site like a Dentonite.
May 6th sprinkler spruce up.
May 9th is World Migratory Bird Day.
May 21st is creating a backyard prairie.
That's all I got, if you have any questions or comments.
Anybody? Yes.
So Karen, you need to put on upcoming events a table at the Texas Wildflower Day.
Yes, we did that last year, we'd love to do it again.
That's April 24th, I'll send you a message.
Yes, thank you.
I have a question about the meeting.
So I don't quite grasp what you do with this.
So you have meetings, four meetings you had.
So those are meetings that you as an office participate
or is that a meeting with a community?
Those are most of the time meetings either with schools.
So when Heather goes out and meets just like one science teacher
or the principal of the school will label that as a meeting.
Or if Floria goes out and meets with the multi-family complex,
like one or two people from there, we label that as meetings as well.
Oh, and I forgot to ask when Texas Recycling Day is?
It's in November and it's usually the second Saturday?
The second week of November.
Typically it's the 15th of November, so that's Saturday around that day.
That's good to know. Yeah, thank you.
I had a question about the Lights Out program.
And the idea being to turn off non-essential.
Is there any way that the auto dealers out on 35 could at least dim their lights?
We have had several comments about that.
And with Lights Out it's kind of a slow progress
working towards the whole community involving themselves in it.
So right now we're really hitting residential hard.
We already have municipal electric dimming residential lights
during peak migration seasons.
And what we're pushing forward, especially with our green business program,
that's just redamping up, that's a part of it.
It's listed on our action items for them.
So it's a slow process, but we're working on it.
Great, thank you.
What sort of engagement do you guys usually do
if an HOA approaches you or do you target HOAs for some of your engagement programs?
I'm thinking specifically your sprinkler or some of your landscaping programs
that would be really appropriate for that kind of audience.
Yeah, we have reached out to HOAs in the past to limited success.
And a lot of community members come up and say that they wish they could do this,
but their HOA doesn't allow it.
And we'll say give us their information or give my information to them.
And generally we find it hard to get in front of those people,
but it's something we are always open to.
There, people definitely can request a presentation,
and we will keep trying as much as we can for that.
But right now there's no targeted advertisement for that.
On the social media, this is going to make me feel old,
but are people able to see those announcements even if they don't follow the page?
I mean, do they get promoted?
Sometimes, so there's a little bit of -- if we -- we can pay to advertise,
and it will reach more people, however much we pay is however much it will get put in front of people.
If we don't pay, there are a handful of people that don't follow that might --
it might pop up as a suggested, but generally it's the people who follow us who will see that.
Any other questions, comments?
Thank you very much.
So we're up to staff reports now.
Yes, you have a few memos in your backup that I can answer questions on most likely.
We have the waterways incentive program,
just a little bit of the results of that mid-January time frame.
The TARP buyback program has been paused briefly for some redamps, some lessons learned from the pilot,
and should relaunch again here in March.
I don't know if anyone noticed that we had some sustainability incentives advertising
with the most recent city newsletter that was emailed out,
so we've seen some uptick there, and also the Denton, you know, newsletter.
And then we have the memo from Caitlin.
She couldn't be here today.
We were getting an Air North Texas partner award, so she's a cog doing that.
We'll show that off next time.
She included the emissions reductions estimates for rate sets for last fiscal year,
very similar to how it was presented for the prior year.
If you have any questions about that, you can bring more information back,
or I can try to answer them now.
I have a question about this third buyback rebate.
It looks like you've had 125 applications and only 14 were eligible,
so that's a lot of work for you to go through 125 applications.
And these are going to the water department.
We don't necessarily see that original application.
A lot of times, from what I can kind of see on the back end, it was more of an inquiry,
like how would I do that, and then maybe they decided not to.
A lot of folks never even followed up to schedule the first meeting.
So that's one of the revamps that we're working on,
trying to only get folks who are really going to complete it coming in
and doing the inquiries and the pre-inspections.
I appreciate that she included a list of reasons why those applications were rejected.
I think it's helpful to frame how we tailor those programs.
But then maybe in the table you should make another column with just inquiries or questions.
Which one are you talking about?
Waterwise.
I'll make that suggestion.
The information on the emissions reductions is certainly good.
Thank you.
And then we have the memo from our senior engineer, Mike Linder,
about the flood risk planning, just some background about what goes on over on their side.
And then lastly we have the matrix.
Any comments on the flood risk planning?
Anybody have any material for the matrix or discussion of the matrix?
I have one, and it was in relation to the waterwise memo.
And I understand we're looking at some revamps on that program.
I think you're saying maybe on the March timeline for the revamp,
having that come back to us for where we're shifting,
and if we need to look at tuning up that program again,
or how the success is being implemented maybe after a month or two of testing out how that revamp works,
that would be really nice to hear from them again.
And just to be clear, the water department is just going to relaunch the program.
It's not going to come back here for additional feedback there.
Oh, okay.
Then I suppose I am asking if there are modifications,
was that what your reference was in the memo,
that they were looking at revamping the program or fine tuning?
Fine tuning.
Okay.
Lesson learned.
Right.
I guess that was my effort there,
was I'd like to hear from them again about what their lessons learned on their implementation,
if we could see that in the late summer after a couple months of publication.
I think I propose for DME to come back and clarify some things that were not quite clear to us at their presentation,
and I don't see it here anymore.
I can look back through the metrics.
I was going to make that point too.
It seems that the metrics that we got.
You raised some issue, I raised some issue.
We consolidated them in one presentation.
The December 2025 matrix is much fuller.
Well, a lot of stuff was removed in the January 2026,
and one of which was what you were just talking about.
That was one of my questions is what was the justification or reason for paring down the matrix
and removing some items that really haven't even been discussed yet.
And this is from December.
My memory is that there was a memo that addressed those items that were removed from the matrix.
It may have been that DME will come back in the future, but DME was not clear.
Yeah, there was.
Right now the report.
Yes, it was in that memo, and I believe that was at the December meeting.
I'm not sure if it touched on our raised issues.
Right.
We can check on that.
Also, Dr. Meyer, Mayor, sorry, had asked for an update on the wildlife corridor survey
in reference to how the survey relates to ecosystem protection.
And I don't think that was that addressed.
That was a very nice report.
Okay.
Yeah.
All right.
That makes sense.
I have one other thing for the matrix.
Given our problem with having a full board, full committee, I would request a presentation.
Well, first of all, I went through city charter and the handbook for committees and all that,
and I couldn't find the answer to my question.
So that's why I'm asking that the city secretary explain to us the procedure
for having applicants to our committee voted on and placed on the committee,
where the link is broken, because we have two people who have applied, as you know,
and who are ready to roll, but it's crickets, basically.
Nobody seems to have an answer as to why these people have not been presented to council
for voting on joining the committee.
And in light of the staff report about the Sustainability Framework Advisory Committee
and the January 16th Friday staff report, I think it's very crucial that we get this worked out
so it's not a problem that continues either with this committee
or any other citizen-populated committees.
So with that in mind, I would ask that the city secretary come in and explain to us
if there is a problem, what is it, and what we can do about it
so that these appointments can be expedited rather than forgotten, it seems.
Okay? Any observations about that?
It would be nice not to barely make quorum every time.
Yeah, exactly. So that's my two cents.
Okay.
Anybody else have anything for the matrix?
Well, I guess that means we need a request for a motion to adjourn.
Second?
All in favor of adjourning?
Meeting adjourned. Thank you.