All right, good morning. My name is Marty Rivers, Chair of the Economic Development
Partnership Board. It is 1106 a.m. on June 24th and we do have a quorum so I'll go ahead
and call the meeting to order. Before we get to our items of consideration, I want to make
sure we introduce Mark McClellan with UNT. He's one of our newest board members. This
is his first meeting. Welcome, Mark. Glad to have you on board.
Thank you, Marty. Happy to be here. My wife and I moved here a few months back before
the world changed with COVID, but we're happy to be here and excited to be joining you.
Great. Well, welcome to the board. This is a perfect time to get started with our new
process. All right. Our first item that we need to consider is approval from the minutes
of our February 12th, 2020 meeting. Can you do a roll call real quick just for the record?
All right. Let's do a roll call. How do you want me to do that?
You want me to call it? I have it in front of me. Okay. Marty Rivers?
Here. John Baines?
Here. Keely Briggs?
Present. Tony Clark?
Present. Chris Davis?
Right here. Jesse Davis?
Here. Bob Eames?
Here. Steve Edgar?
Here. Jill Jester?
Here. Jimmy Mejia?
Here. Jason Tomlinson?
Here. And then Mark McClellan?
Here. Erica Pangburn?
Here. Todd Hallman?
Here. And Jamie Wilson?
Here. Okay. We're good.
Did you get everybody?
I got everybody.
Okay. All right. Need to consider minutes from February 12th, 2020. Any comments,
questions, or I would entertain a motion?
Tony Clark's on move.
John Baines, second.
We have a motion from Tony Clark and a second from John Baines.
Any discussion about the minutes?
All right.
Do I need to go around everybody and ask if they approve?
Yes.
All right. I'm going to go around to my screen here and start with John Baines.
Bob Eames?
Approve.
Keely Briggs?
Uh, yes. Approve.
Chris Davis?
Approved.
Tony Clark?
Approve.
Mark, you weren't here for that meeting, so Jason Tomlinson?
Approve.
Jill Jester?
Aye.
Did you hear me?
I could not.
Okay. Aye.
You're saying aye?
Yes.
I can hear Jill.
Wait. I thought you were saying aye and had some comments.
Sorry.
Steve Edgar?
I have never heard that Jill Jester couldn't be heard before, so that's...
Approve.
Jimmy Mejia?
Hello. How are you?
I need to... we're just... we're voting on the minutes.
I approve.
All right.
Yeah. Sorry. Just connected right now, so I didn't know where we were at.
I couldn't have had a little bit of hard time connecting.
All right. We're good to go. I think we had a unanimous approval there, so we will move forward.
All right. What we've been waiting for is to receive a report, hold discussion,
give staff direction regarding the comprehensive economic development.
Strategic plan being completed by TIP strategies, including, but not limited to,
community economic development goals and vision, business attraction, retention,
and expansion programs and strategies, marketing and outreach, business support,
education, labor, and workforce development, community advantages and disadvantages,
incentives and related policies, development districts, and general economic development
strategies, policies, tools, and related matters. So we'll turn it over to Tom and get the report.
Thank you.
Before we get started, I just want to let everyone know that despite all of the chaos and changes we
have seen in the world over the past few months, Tom and Jacqueline have continued to work on the
strategic plan to the extent possible and have been in constant communication with our office
and even helped us with some pivoting that we needed to do in March and April and early May
with the ongoing COVID pandemic. So we're very appreciative to the hard work that they do,
and we're so thankful that they're able to join us remotely. I believe Jacqueline's somewhere in
the Metroplex and Tom is still in Austin. So we're happy that they're here and able to join us.
And I'm going to turn it over to Tom and we're going to figure out this technology stuff as we go.
Thank you guys very much. I was especially interested in Mark from UNT and your background
because you said you just moved here, but I noticed that you're somewhere up north right now
because I know that background is real.
That is real. It's from Utah. And I was running down a path on a snowmobile path.
That's how I feel when I stopped for that photo. But I moved here from Oregon. I was in Portland.
And so anyways, thanks, Tom.
All right. Hey, you bet. You bet. That's actually been one of my favorite things for Zoom is just
the backgrounds. And then in a couple of calls with Jessica, she's been nice enough to share her
family with us, her dog and her cat, and just about every call that we've had. So very much
Erica, you too. So thank you guys very much. And I appreciate Jessica pointing out that
we had to pivot. The work that we were asked to do was really a three to five year economic
development strategy. And so we were pretty far along that path with you guys. I think we had met
back in February and laid out where we thought there were a lot of opportunities and you guys
seemed pretty excited about them. And then I think we were scheduled to come back in March and that's
when our first trip was canceled. So we're thankful to be able to meet with you guys virtually today.
But as we go through this, I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time on the project recap. I have
more slides than I need today. But I think backing up just a little bit and talking about the current
context and some of the things that we're all concerned about right now from an economic
standpoint, we'll do that. And then we'll give a quick plan overview. And then you guys may have
been looking for target industries. We've got kind of a new name, strategic growth areas that
kind of replaced the path on target industries. And I'll talk about that here in a minute. And
we'll talk about strategy and then a couple of recommendations around how you guys can organize
yourself going forward to do a little streamlining. So with that, let's go ahead and go to the next
slide, Erica. So from a project recap, the goals haven't changed. An assessment, looking at targets
and tools, we're going to do all of that. I would look at item number six, creating an actionable
work plan that guides the next three to five years. I think we've done a good job of that
in this draft. But if you'll notice, if you had a chance to read the plan itself,
we did a big pivot. The first strategy is all about recovery. And so it's worth pausing for
a moment because we're in a totally different place than we were 90, 120 days ago.
But we felt like we needed to make a choice in how we went forward in this plan. Did we
make the plan just about recovery or did we go ahead and address the longer-term positioning
of Denton within the Metroplex? And so we've done both. We've put together a pretty detailed
recovery strategy. And as Jessica mentioned earlier, during this period of time, there's been a lot of
back and forth between our staff and yours to help identify best practices and loan programs and
microloans. And how do you get this stuff out? How do you distribute it? And I feel like the city and
the chamber and the county have all been working really hard in Denton to make sure that the
existing businesses are supported. And we were happy to be able to support that over the last 90
days. So thank you guys very much for the opportunity to help. So next slide, Erica.
We were at the end of the opportunity phase. We're about to do an opportunities workshop,
2.4. That's where we were when we stopped. And so instead of waiting 90 days and coming back and
starting over, we went ahead and continued working and worked on a first draft of the plan. So what
you have is what we've worked on over the last 90 days with input from the staff. So next slide.
I don't think there's really a need to go through this. These were the groups that we had met with
back in January and February. And then since then, we've also had some additional phone calls
meeting with the number in the community. So we've done a lot of homework was done
to get to the point where we are right now. Next slide.
And just a quick reminder, at our last meeting with you guys, we went through
a SWOT, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. And we categorized items based on
whether this was something really local or was this a state issue? Was this a national
issue or a global issue? And go to the next slide. And you guys know well your assets,
the universities, community college, the fact that you have your own electric utility, an airport.
You have a greedy little downtown that's had an entertainment and kind of art scene that was
burgeoning. You've got entrepreneurial interests in the community. And much of that is still with
you. This pandemic, this changing economic conditions, you still have all of these assets.
And so I think you guys are still in great shape. You have the West Park industrial area. You have
an amazing anchor in Peterbilt. You've got US cold storage. You've got the interstate.
So from an economic development standpoint, you guys are still in the path of growth.
The question before us is really at what rate is that growth going to recover? Is this 18 months
from now? Is this 36 months from now? And I'm not pretending to be a DFW area economist. You guys,
I'm sure, especially on the bank side and others, real estate side, you probably know
what's being said right now in the DFW area in terms of recovery. Go to the next slide.
Some of the challenges being a university community that's got a pretty good demand
on housing, the low end housing, it's really, it's all taken up. It's difficult to find housing.
That may change. Right now, I have a daughter who is a senior at the University of Texas,
and I just resigned an apartment lease for her. But I'm sitting here thinking, what's going to
happen to the university? And you guys, how many of your students are going to return in the fall?
What decisions? There's a lot that's still up in the air over the next 60 days.
So, there's still some uncertainty there that may impact your housing market.
And, you know, like I said, this is all stuff we went over back in February,
and not a lot of it, I think, has changed. Let's go to the next slide, Erica.
So, opportunities for you guys. Obviously, leveraging the higher education assets that
you have, telling the Denton story better, taking advantage of Peterbilt being, you know,
an anchor there and the logistics hub that you guys are. All of that still makes sense,
although I'm happy to hear from you guys as we get through this,
if you feel like anything has really, really changed dramatically. Next slide.
So, I will point out on the threat slide, you know, and this was before
the pandemic really hit us, we did have that up in the far right-hand corner as a sort of global
threat. Unfortunately, you know, we had no idea at that time what the significance of that was
going to be. It is changing, you know, supply chains, and, you know, not mentioned on there
that really we had no idea is the current social unrest that's been happening across the country,
and then we're going into a presidential election, a national election, that I think there's probably
going to be some additional disruption that occurs between now and then. So, uncertainty
still ahead of us. I think you guys are following the cases from COVID and, you know, what that means
in terms of being able to go back into an arena. I follow NBA right now and just, you know, excited
that there might be, you know, a continuation of that season, but right now there's discussions
about whether that's even going to happen because of the concern from the players
about going to do that. So, there's still a lot up in the air. So, and I'm not, you know, this wasn't
meant to be, you know, a bad news call. I'm just acknowledging the situation that we're all in,
really, before we talk about the plan. So, next slide. So, you know, we did the plan back in 2002
for Denton, undiscovered college town, really the business park was just fledgling,
economic development was a new thing for the city, and now in 2020, you know, the city was
experiencing growth out of the Metroplex, thriving downtown, business park that's kind of known
throughout DFW as a next destination, especially for logistics and distribution, creation of
different tools, and you guys have found yourself with better connections to the DFW, including the
commuter train that takes you into DART, but Chris, I think it was you who pointed out that
each morning when you went for a run, you saw four or five people on that commuter train.
Every day. Every day. Every day, yeah. So, it wasn't obviously being utilized, but and right now,
you know, the rush to get back on a bus or your rush to, you know, get back on public transportation
has been questioned across the country right now. So, what the trends are remain to be seen. So,
next slide. So, the current context, I'm going to riff a little bit on just some of the points
that I just made. You know, the questions for us are, you know, how long is this going to last and,
you know, what does this mean for us? What's going to happen to certain sectors of the economy? I'll
talk about here in a minute, you know, what regions of the U.S. are going to be hurt disproportionately.
Jacqueline and I are working for the city of Detroit right now and talk about a community
that can't catch a break. You know, this is a community that was just undergoing an amazing
renaissance in their downtown and really on the upswing and then COVID hits large African-American
population that's been hit disproportionately. It's really tough up there. One of the other things
that was pointed out in one of my meetings this week was that part of what we're experiencing
from a consumer demand standpoint right now is being propped up by the stimulus checks
that many received, the unemployment checks that are still in the pockets of many. I have a son
who is unemployed right now, who's receiving larger checks from unemployment than he was
actually getting paid. And so, you know, at what point does that run out and how does that impact
the economy? And then the last question is one of the things that we're seeing across the country is
that the impact of COVID has been disproportionately toward those that are of low income. It's just,
it's been a real challenge for folks in certain categories. So, next slide.
And I am going to stop here in a moment and give you guys a chance to react to some of this. But
so, you know, what we've seen in this first wave of impact, places that were dependent on tourism,
places that had, you know, heavily dependent on air travel have been impacted, leisure and hospitality.
When I talked to Charlie and Erica with the chamber, I talked to, you know, Erica and Jessica
with the city, just, you know, what does this mean for hotel occupancy in the community?
Charlie, I think you pointed out when you were at the hotel last, there was, it was you and maybe
a half dozen other people at the hotel. Yeah. And so, you know, some of the things that we all know
and we're seeing, the industries that were most exposed, restaurants, retail, auto parts, air and
ground travel, one of the things that's being pointed out right now is that we will likely
we will likely experience a second wave as those companies that are serving many of the other
industries are going to start seeing professional services and finance and real estate begin to
experience some cutbacks. So, I think that's yet to hit us. Most of what's hit us so far has been
in the low end, low end occupations and not on the high end side. But we're going to probably start
seeing a little more of that. Next slide. And so, we anticipate, you know, restructuring and supply
chains as businesses look to potentially reshore remote work. You know, we're all beneficiaries of
being able to do our work remotely. And so, a question that a lot of people are asking right
now is that as a company, if you've got, you know, 90% of your employees working from home right now
and it's working out, you know, do you need that office space when you start reintegrating, you
know, employees back in telemedicine, online retail sales, broadband, demand for IT, these are all
things that were sectors that we're seeing growth in. So, I'm going to, I think I've got one more
slide I don't want to talk about before a pause. And we're working with a number of communities
right now that are focused on how do they support communities within their city that have typically
not participated in sort of the upside of economic growth. And it was interesting, we followed some
numbers that black and Latinx-owned businesses just as a result of the CARES Act did not receive
proportionate distribution from that. And a lot of that has to do, there are a lot of small and
medium-sized businesses that operate informally. You know, they're actually cash businesses,
and so they're not eligible. So, let's go to the next slide.
And so, before I go into this, I want to pause just for a minute. And is there anything that you
guys from your experience in Denton right now, or Denton County, or in the DFW area
is different than some of the trends that I talked about? And I know you guys haven't
had a chance to chat much with each other, so I would be happy if you've got a comment on
something that struck you in the data that I've shared, or the thoughts that I've shared,
or you're experiencing anything different with the university, or with your manufacturing,
Chris, from Peterbilt, or the banking industry. Is there anything that surprised you?
If you'd like to respond, raise your hand. I see Mr. Baines raising his hand. Go ahead, John.
I promise not to be too long. I did want to talk a little bit about a report from the Texas
Association of African American Changers of Commerce. Can everyone hear me okay?
Okay. Yes, if everyone could just make sure that they're muted, because sometimes we get
feedback when someone starts speaking. If you're on a little bit of a delay, we hear them through
your microphone as well. So, just make sure you're muted if you're not speaking. Thanks.
There was a lot of discontent with the PPP program in that a number of the small, mom-and-pop African
American-owned businesses did not get PPP loans. They had difficulty processing the information,
and there was kind of a consensus that a lot of the way the loans were structured were difficult
for some African American and Latino businesses. A number of my clients received the PPP loan.
I received the PPP loan, and it's greatly benefited us, and I'm really concerned as to what's going to
happen when that money runs out, and if we can't get some more stimulus, I'm very concerned as to
what's going to happen to the, I would say the, I won't call it the underbelly, but the lesser
financed sector of our community. If there's really some strain there, I'll stop and pass it to Tom.
Yeah, thank you, John. That's something that we're seeing kind of across the country right
now. It's not just limited to Texas. Small businesses that don't have the same relationships
with their banks that other businesses have in their track record and just the complexity
of having to go through it, so definitely, and that's a big issue, so.
Kaylee has a comment or question. I was just wondering, Mr. Baines,
if you can say that or share that study with us so that we can look at it.
That's all my comment was. Did you want it today or should I forward it to you as the city or to you
as the individual? I think just to Jessica would be okay. Yes, you can send it to me and I'll
distribute. Thank you so much, and one last comment. The forgiveness program, they can't
figure out what to do. I mean, you know, we got a report from one of the banks that says we don't
know what to do. The SBA is not giving us adequate information, and so there's some backlog there
that when the money was given out, there was a certain expectation, but they changed the rules
as they went along, and here we are two months later with a different set of rules than when
we first started. So it's a very complicated kind of a situation. Thank you.
Any other comments or reactions to any of the trends or any of the information?
Yes, Chris, did you have your hand up? So Marty, you need to acknowledge them, I guess.
I lost Chris. Yeah, I officially acknowledge that's good. Yeah, I think many of the things
you hit on, I mean, being a manufacturer, a couple things, I mean, deploying as many
employees to work from home was an initial challenge. You know, we moved over a thousand
to working from home, and, you know, those are the kind of discussions we're having. You know,
do we really need to bring everyone back, you know, if they're being successful in their
current off-site locations, you know, how we interact with customers?
You know, we haven't had, we haven't allowed any visitors here on-site since we restarted
production last month, and we don't really have any plans to allow that, and, you know,
we're a site that had 6,000 visitors a year that would come through, customers and what have you.
Just the financial impact, you know, for us, you know, being kind of a large business is,
I mean, it's an expense. You know, we spent millions of dollars to get the facility ready
to reopen. There's protocols that we have in place that, you know, many businesses
frankly won't be able to afford to do. You know, we've got building, temperature screening buildings
now on-site, and we use a lot of infrared technology to monitor people that come into
the facility, so I think there's a lot of things that are going to change. I think it will create
some new industries along the way, but at least for us, you know, we're just happy to kind of get
get the thing restarted and kind of see where we go, so.
That's Kaylee. Go ahead, Kaylee. Okay, thank you. Yeah, just from a city perspective,
as we're looking at budgets and everyone knows sales tax and things are way down as we're
looking at different budgets in the city, which is a concern. Just watching the trends, the grocery
stores, the lows of home depots, those types of things have been increasing, but the main concern
is the colleges and the impact to our local community if they don't return to normal, because
that impacts, like you said, the housing and then the small businesses, and so that's
just a concern for me as well as a council member. I don't think we realize, or we've said, but I
don't think we realize the impact the community, the college students have until they're not here.
And then also another concern is just empty retail space, you know, with the work from home.
It's just a concern for that as well, just the empty buildings sitting.
Go ahead. Is it Mark or Tony? Tony's, go ahead, Tony.
There we go, I'm sorry. Yeah, I just wanted to give you, and I'm sure Marty can share
similar information from his bank on the, to address John's comments on PPP.
You know, we did, in our footprint, we did almost 800 million across Texas and Colorado.
Denton County did about $60 million in PPP loans. We had about 98% approval rating or submission.
So I think not to throw the big banks under the bus, but I think a lot of challenges
that were seen by a lot of small businesses, minority businesses, just off the whole gamut,
really kind of were a direct result of those relations with larger banks.
Our average loan size was about 158,000. We are a preferred SBA lender, so we've got a pretty
sophisticated SBA program. We are, you know, in constant contact with them on the forgiveness
component. And as John mentioned, it changes daily. Obviously, there's been some modifications to it,
which have helped, you know, extending the repayment program, modifying the percentages
of what the customer can use for forgiveness, went from, I think, 75%, 80% salary to 60%.
So all those things have been good, but I think we're still really concerned and interested about
when we get the final information and how our customers can submit those, you know, those final
packages for forgiveness. And I'm hoping that what we're seeing from the banking industry
as a whole is more pressure on Congress to simplify that process. I think the first
document that came out was five pages. One of our customers, if we wanted to today,
could not submit that for forgiveness because there's not an avenue for it yet. So once again,
hoping that as we go down the road the next few days and weeks that most of the, hopefully,
the banking industry as a whole can pressure Congress so that there is a lot more simpler
process, especially for the smaller business, the smaller ones that are, say, under $250,000 or
whatever the number is. But that's kind of what we're seeing from our end. And I'm sure Marty and
his bank have similar observations, but just an FYI. >> Couldn't have said it better myself.
Let's keep moving forward, Tom. >> Okay. Mark, did you have one thing? Sorry, I saw Mark put
his hand up. I didn't know what you wanted. >> Just real quick, since Kaylee raised the
question about the universities, we will start our first students back onto campus
for second session summer, which is right after the 4th of July. Our expectation through the end
of summer and into fall is a reduced student presence, but still a large student presence.
We will shift all very large courses online and we'll shift smaller courses into those large spaces
to create socially distanced teaching opportunities. Our expectation is come Thanksgiving.
We will be pushing all those students to encourage them to go home and to stay home for an extended
winter break in order to create space to be very frank for them to catch their flu or COVID or
whatever and deal with that in a home environment. We think that would be safer for everyone.
And then, of course, bring them back for spring and into somewhat of a normalized spring. That's on
the teaching side with the students. So you can expect that engine to start running certainly
come July, August, although at a significantly reduced rate. On the research side,
we are in a stage two research operations now, which means we're in what we call fully socially
distanced research. Many of our laboratories are up and running. We probably have one of the most
aggressive growth in research proposals going out the door that we've ever seen. And our expectation
is that's going to lead to more success in research grants and more spending on research
as we start to go into next year. Of course, that's my job is to build that part of our world
in a big way. And we've got a lot of moving pieces to try and make that work.
So not quite all doom and gloom. It will be a different year for us. Until there's a vaccine,
we simply will be holding reins as much as we can to create distance and space
to try to minimize infection. All right, Erica, I'm good to go if you want to go back to the slide.
So let's go ahead and go to the next slide.
So this was our thinking prior to COVID, is that as we thought about this plan,
we really wanted to help you guys modernize your approach in the way you thought about economic
development. And that going beyond the marketing to a company, finding a site for a company,
and locating that company and offering incentives to that company, is that being the total sum
of what constitutes economic development. We thought it made sense to take more advantage
of some of the other significant assets you have in the community, such as the universities,
the downtown, the fledgling entrepreneurship strategies that were going on. And so we still
hold to that, but I'll talk a little bit more about that in a moment. And item number three,
we point out while many assets of this plan or many of the recommendations in this plan
don't make sense in the next 12 months as you recover. But we're going to lay them out over
a three to five year period. And one of the things that will help the city with is delivering an
implementation plan after this that will be the document by which we lay out the timelines for
when all of this would be implemented and who would be responsible for it and how it would go
forward. And that's something that would be developed by you guys and the city to determine
the best way to implement these things. Go ahead and go to the next slide.
The guiding principles that we're working off of, core resiliency over the next 12 months,
you need to take care of your existing employers and hang on to what you have, make sure that you
are solid. I mean, that's you've got major employers that are on this board and others
that they serve that you need to do everything that you can to make sure that they remain solid.
But you have to believe that you have to keep looking toward the future. That's why we've
designed the plan in the way we did. We do feel like in the U.S. of the metros that should
recover more quickly, we think the DFW area is at the top. You're in one of the strongest
economies in the country in the state of Texas. And yeah, we're getting hit kind of hard right
now because of oil and gas. But for the most part, you know, we have one of the most diversified
economies and we think it will recover. We do think that there is now room, this was our thinking in
advance of COVID, that based on the residents in your community, there are populations that
need additional help and that they should be rolled into your economic development strategy.
Your entrepreneurial spirit goes without saying. I mean, I think that's long been part of your
community. And the fact that you've been, you know, an arts and a music community, also including
that in the way you think about the community's future. Next slide. So three primary goals. The
first one is accelerating recovery. And had we not gone into this crisis, this would not have been,
you know, the first goal. The fostering growth and managing growth would have been the first goal.
But we have pushed that back because you really have to focus on the recovery right now. There's
so many moving parts. You need to work as a team to make sure that you're supporting your existing
businesses. It doesn't mean that you're not out, you know, working with companies. I talked to
Erica and Jessica and to Charlie about, you know, there are companies that are still looking right
now, you know, at the DFW area, and you have to be able to respond to them in a professional
and organized way. You have to keep your act together. We're not saying that you're not
recruiting companies. You are. You'll continue to do that. But it's going to be a little more
responsive than it is, you know, proactive and looking for them. And then the last goal
really is around strengthening community inclusion. In this case, we really mean, you know,
workforce as part of what you do. And then your small minority of businesses,
as John mentioned earlier, that's a group that's really strong in your community,
but is also very vulnerable in your community. And so you have to pay attention to that.
And it's really, it's bringing, it's thinking about not just what's traditional economic
development, but thinking about some of the things that fall into our community development
as being part of what you as the Economic Development Partnership pay attention to.
Next slide. So I mentioned earlier that we're shifting a little bit from a traditional approach.
On the right hand side, these have been Denton's existing targets, you know, supply chain,
logistics, advanced manufacturing, aviation, renewable energy, IT, R&D. These will all still
remain as part of the mix. It's just we're not leading with these companies as the way we talk
about where your growth opportunities are. And so we've, we talk in terms of strategic growth areas
instead of target industries, and we have four of them. And so the next slide will point those out,
and then I'll go into a little more detail. But our approach for strategic growth areas,
and I apologize, this looks like a slide made by a consultant. And it was. And it's really
the way we think about strategic growth areas. How are you leveraging your anchor institutions?
How are you, you know, calling upon capital within the DFW area to support? What are the,
you know, who are the key and emerging players within that sector? But I'm not going to spend
a lot of time on this. I'd like to go directly to the next slide and talk about what we're calling
your growth areas. And one of them we call connectivity. And that is, you know, that's
your manufacturing, that's your transportation, that's your logistics, the fact that you are at
the intersection of 35 West and East, taking advantage of that and building out that you
have an industrial park to support that, you know, that's a key growth area. On the right,
you guys have been a, you know, from a green technology standpoint, you've got a utility that
takes that seriously. There are other opportunities for you to take advantage of that. I think you
guys are on your way to being 100% renewable for your power, for the city. This is something that
you should continue to tout and think of as an economic development opportunity. The creativity
component is based on the entrepreneurship that you guys have supported in the past.
I think that's going to require you, you know, thinking about the existing companies that you
have. And then the place, the box that we're calling competitiveness is really where
the Hillwood development that's coming up, I-35 from Fort Worth, you guys will now be
in a much more competitive position as it relates to office and to things that you
haven't been able to pursue in the past. So there was a lot of talk in the, when we were doing
interviews about, you know, what does it mean for us to compete with a Frisco? This is where you
compete with a Frisco. You know, this is where class A office can go. So we think that's very
solid. So the next slide. So the strategies, as I mentioned before, accelerating recovery,
many of the things that are on this slide, the city and the chamber are well on their way. You
know, it's already underway. This isn't, this is capturing a lot of things that have happened over
the 90 days and some of the things that were even going on before that. So creating, you know, a
group that brings everyone together and is responsive. You guys have already done that.
You've done your surveys to, you know, reach out to the businesses to understand that.
You know, everybody right now is supporting businesses virtually. You guys have had a strong
relationship with the workforce, with the community college, with the university. I think that something
is a little bit new is thinking a little more inclusively from an economic recovery standpoint.
And that's where I think where John was talking about the African American chamber, Hispanic
chamber and other groups in your community. I think you've done an okay job at that in the past,
but I think there's room for improvement there. And so we think that's something you should hit on.
So to the next slide. So the fostering growth areas, as I mentioned before, the connectivity,
creativity, sustainability and competitiveness. A lot of your time right now is going to be spent
over on the connectivity side because that's where you're holding on to your existing businesses and
attracting new investment. As Chris was pointing out from Peterbilt, you know, he's rethinking how
he's going to, you know, use his workforce, whether it's remote or not, and just making sure that if
you guys have opportunities to support that, you want to be able to do that. And as I mentioned,
the ability for you guys to work with the prospects that are active, you know, that needs to be made,
that's a priority. And the other three strategies, I don't think it makes sense for us to go through
in detail, but we had laid out on the far right, the competitiveness side, a plan for how you,
you know, basically leverage the Coal and Hunter Ranch development. And Jessica, I think you had
pointed out that that's still, you know, in other words, that hasn't necessarily been put on hold,
maybe some of the timing will change. I don't know if you have anything to add to that.
Didn't mean to put you on the spot, but. No, I don't know that any of the timing has changed,
but it's original timing. You know, we're not expecting houses on the ground next year. There's
a lot of infrastructure work that has to happen. And so we expect that to continue. It may be a
while before we're able to leverage the impact. So our discussion with Tom and Jacqueline has been
that we want to start doing the groundwork now to prepare for year three, four, five out from now
when those developments become reality. And what can we do now to position ourselves for that
instead of waiting until year five and trying to play catch up? Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for putting
on the spot, but I feel like that from a long-term standpoint and many of the conversations we had
about, you know, how does, how does Denton offer up a higher end housing product so that the
hospitals are able to attract the doctors that they need that represents the best opportunity there.
If you're wanting to compete with a Frisco on Fintech or bringing in professional office space,
that represents the opportunity for that. It's the best opportunity around, you know, class A
office space. And as Jessica pointed out in the short term, it's, it's not like you're going to
go out and recruit, you know, back office right now. That's just, that just doesn't make sense.
You support those developments and you maintain relationships with the brokers and the developers
that are working on that. And as, as Charlie and I had talked before, Charlie Dromgoole, the,
the DFW market for the most part is driven by the real estate community and the development
community and making sure that the city and its partners maintain those relationships right now
is more important than you guys sending somebody off on a trade show, you know, or sending you out
on a recruitment mention. Never mind that you can't really do that right now, but even in the next
six to 12 months, those types of activities really don't make sense. Most of your activities need to
be done virtually kind of upgrading the look and feel of what you're presenting, but also just
maintaining the relationships with the brokers and developers in the DFW area, because that's where,
that's where most of these deals are done. We had, you know, we had a good meeting with your,
your local brokers back in February and they, they really emphasized that too. They said that,
you know, that's, that's where, you know, economic development happens in the DFW area
is through, through that community. And, you know, we have really solid ideas around the creativity
growth area and sustainability growth area, but much of that is, you know,
is going to have to be pushed back in terms of your investments in those areas. As you go
through recovery, that's going to be the priority. And then the last strap or last goal, go ahead,
Erica. Next slide. There we go. So the number one or one of the biggest issues prior to the pandemic
was workforce, you know, finding the skill sets that you needed. And we think that represented
an opportunity for Denton to coordinate with the community college, the university, the school
district, and the advanced tech center with the school district. The current conditions in the
short term are a little different, but we think that that's something we're going to have to come
back to. Housing affordability, you might see that ease up a little bit in the short term. We're not
sure how that's going to play out, but prior to this, that needed to be, you know, a priority.
And then a growing your own talent initiative, being able to find ways to keep some of your
university graduates and others in the area represented a great talent pool for the area.
So this is essentially our workforce and inclusion strategy. So let's go ahead to the next,
may go ahead and work through this, Marty, and then we'll open it up for questions again
after I go through the rest of this, if you guys are okay with that. But within the plan itself,
you guys, you know, if you've had a chance to read it, you see now it's laid out, you know,
there's a strategy, there's an action item, and then the details. And what I mentioned earlier,
we will, with the staff, actually put all this into a timeline for when you would do it,
who would be responsible for it, how you would measure your success and whether you're meeting
that. That would be a next phase after this plan is adopted. So I think the final section, go ahead,
Erica. So one of the attempts that we made here for the, how we think about you as an economic
development partnership board was that there would remain a working group that was primarily the
staff of those who would be responsible for the day-to-day carrying out of economic development
in the community, and that the board would move to a quarterly meeting so that you guys aren't
meeting, you know, every month to go through the same things that the staff would be responsible
for, and they would report back to you guys, which you would work on a quarterly basis.
Go ahead to the next slide. And so the meeting cadence for you guys would go to quarterly,
and that you would focus primarily on the goals, and that over time, we're recommending that your
board remain the same size, but that as terms came to an end, you guys would consider making sure that
you had someone from the municipal electric, and that there was somebody representing the
entrepreneurship community, somebody representing workforce, somebody representing community
development, and somebody representing marketing and/or tourism. And I think you guys cover many
of these bases. We just felt like it made sense as you went forward to be more explicit about how you
made sure that the plan, your board aligned with the plan. And I think there's one more slide here,
maybe a couple more. So this recommendation seems a little bit
suited for the future now, because right now you're trying to figure out where the
monies are going to come from. But many of the communities that you're competing with have
economic development sort of cash. They've got cash in the bank because they've got sales tax,
and you guys don't have that. In one of our previous meetings, we talked about that.
And we felt like if you were going to be competitive on certain projects, that you needed to have your
own fund, and that fund would be partially funded through the city, partially funded through a
campaign that you and the Chamber would go through and raise funds, but also figuring out how to have
the electric utility participate in that. And right now we feel like this may not be feasible
in the short term, but as you guys move forward, we would strongly consider that you create,
we called it a Denton Catalyst Fund. There are many communities that call it an Opportunity Fund.
There's an Opportunity Austin and Opportunity Houston. Each of the groups that realize that
if they're going to be competitive and position themselves, they're going to need to be able to
raise some funds to take economic development more seriously. And we've got more details on this
in the document itself. So I think I've got another slide there for next steps, discussion.
If you don't mind, is there a slide after that, after the next one going to keep going? Yeah,
so I'm going to talk about next steps, and then we'll come back into discussion, if that's okay.
That way you guys will know what's going to happen. So our goal today is to receive any feedback from
you. If you've got other feedback over the next couple of days, and Jessica, feel free to weigh in
here. But feel free to share that. There will be a public opportunity for comment on the draft plan
once we receive feedback from you guys and incorporate those changes. It would, and Jessica,
if you wanted to explain how you're planning to do that. Sure, so we are pretty limited in our
ability to have public meetings, but we certainly want to make sure that the community has the
opportunity to participate in this process. So we have worked with our public affairs department
here in the city, and we're going to actually do an online public forum process. So we're going to,
I think Jacqueline has volunteered to record the video, she's laughing at me, but we're going to
record a brief video overview presentation so that members of the community can watch it when
they're available to watch it online. We'll also have the plan posted online. It's a big document,
but for anyone who wants to read it, and then we'll have a comment form, and we'll allow members of
the community, and we'll make sure to market it and get it out to different groups in the community,
and groups that we wish we would have been able to meet with them in person, but unfortunately,
you know, we're in 2020, but we're going to make the best of the situation, and we really want that
comment so that after the EDP has a chance to provide their comments, we'll have the community
comments, and then we can present all of the comments to the city council and say here's what
we've heard, and here's what we think really will best serve our community.
All right, I'm going to kick things off with a couple of my own questions, and then
as you guys raise your hands, I'll try to identify you and call on you as well. So Jessica,
what do we think the time frame for all those meetings are in getting something back to city
council? So we have a tentative timeline, so again, we are as flexible as we need to be given the
environment that we're in. So our goal is to finish the presentation with EDP today. We also
have this scheduled for your July 8th meeting. Our goal would be sometime between I think July 1st,
July 2nd, is that we would have the video recorded with the overview, and we'll get that published
for public comments, and we'll keep that posted till mid-July. EDP will meet again on July 8th.
We'll have all of that opportunity then between now and then to get your comments.
We'll get the public comments through about July 14th or 15th, and then we're in a perfect world
scheduled to go to city council at their first meeting in July, which I believe is July 21st.
If for some reason we hit a hiccup in the process, we'll be flexible and we'll figure it out because
that's what we do now. So that's sort of our timeline and process. Okay. One of my
comments I guess on the partners working group, which is staff that would work together daily
and have monthly meetings, would it make sense to have maybe the chair or vice chair of the EDP board
be in attendance or meet with those folks? I guess I kind of like the idea of having a non-chamber,
non-city person involved in those conversations and just kind of being there as you go back to
the board meetings, just to have a kind of an outsider involved in that. So no need to comment
on that one way or the other, just a suggestion I had. I guess I'll open it up for comments or
questions. Kaylee? Yeah, chair, I feel the same way that you do about having someone else sitting
at the meetings. It's been very helpful, especially if you come back and there's questions,
it's easier for someone that's been there to answer. Just a comment. One, there was a slide
about affordable housing and just though you know that we're working on that and we know that it's
extremely important to have the housing stock in our community, especially now during the time where
funds are low and people are not working as much. But I did also take note of the other opposite end
where we need larger housing that are high quality for those who want to come in and have that option
as well. So that's a job for council to make sure that every aspect of that is within our city.
The only thing that I saw that was a little concerning, although I do know that we need
funds for economic development, having DME there, I'm not sure how that will correlate with our
charter because there's pretty strict rules there. And so just to make sure that that's looked into
before anything's brought to the board or council to make sure that that's acceptable is just my
request. All right, Mr. Baines.
Mr. Chairman, the only thing I was, I do appreciate all the comments that have been given thus far.
The one comment I did want to get a little interaction on was when speaking about
the need for this board to meet quarterly or to have a quarterly interaction.
You know, you and I have been on this board for a while. It seems as though
the things that have come up require more of a monthly attention rather than quarterly. So
I'd kind of like to hear a little dialogue on how transitioning to a quarterly interaction
would give us both the time and the ability to address issues that are of importance.
Tom, was that something you want to visit about?
Oh, sure. Sure. I wasn't sure whether it was,
John was asking for a dialogue about how others thought or wanted our sort of
thoughts on the rationale. But for us, in no way were we recommending that the board be
sort of taken out of important conversations. It was more a matter of, and it may be that,
you know, for the recovery period, you guys want to keep meeting, you know, monthly for sure. But
at some point, depending on how you've staffed this up, if you've created a team that you have
confidence in, that they would be able to report back to you guys, you know, maybe they're sending
you a report on a monthly basis, but that the need for you guys to have to meet every month
to go over the details that you would sort of enlist the staff or trust the staff
to be able to take care of that in the interim. And then you guys, you know, you might have to
pull yourselves together on an ad hoc basis to cover a specific project if a need was being made.
But we were also just being sensitive to the number of boards and committees that the city
currently has. And for us, it was more of a streamlining and modernizing
than it was a statement about, you know, how often you guys ought to meet.
Hey, Chris.
Thanks, Tom. A lot of information there for sure. However, in the kind of the next steps,
you talk about, you know, finalizing the plan. So did we just see a plan or did we see a PowerPoint?
Because I saw a PowerPoint presentation. Yeah, you saw a PowerPoint and the plan
is in the document. Okay, that's what I'm asking. So is there a document that we're going to see a
draft of that has the details of what the plan specifically talks about and actionable items
that we're supposed to go do? The board received it as part of the agenda packet
that I distributed. The actual plan was attached to that.
Well, I didn't, I didn't see that. So. Okay, we'll resend that.
Okay, that'd be good.
And Chris, just to your point, what the plan is missing right now is what we call the implementation
metrics. And so it will actually, you know, the plan will have the strategies and the actions.
So you'll be able to read that. And if you feel like, yeah, that they're on the right track, then
when this gets approved, then we would create a, we would put that into a sort of a work plan
that would identify the time frame to when things would be done and who would,
who would take the leads on them. Okay.
Yeah, Tom Hayes, Tony Clark, just kind of a comment or question. I appreciate your
political correctness when it comes to questions about our revenue challenges.
But, you know, I've been in Denton for 27 years. We've gone through these,
these things numerous times. We've all been involved in them.
At the end of the day, and I look on, I look on page 49 of the plan that was sent out,
which was, you know, it was eye-opening. I think the first time I saw it,
which showed all of the communities around us that circle us, East, East, West, North and South,
that have some type of economic development funding mechanism that, that gives them the
ability to be competitive when going out and soliciting and trying to implement a plan like
this. I would be curious to ask and really get your, your, your, if you could be really honest
with us, does this plan have any chance at all of being implemented with the almost embarrassing
amount of funding opportunities we have today as a city when it comes to economic development?
We've had those discussions with you before early on in our meetings.
And one thing that I was a little disappointed about is that that you didn't go into that as
much as I thought we would get into of how we are at a disadvantage from a competitive standpoint,
because of all the communities around us and their resources that they have available to them,
whether it's Frisco or Lewisville or wherever. But honestly, without additional funding,
without a true commitment to whatever funding mechanism or resources that we need, what's,
what's really the chance of this plan really bringing or having the effect on our community
that we all would like for it to have? I appreciate the candid question, Tony,
because honestly, I think I would answer it in that in order for you guys to remain competitive,
you have to make an investment in economic development. And it's not just in the creating
a fund. It's also in the resources that go just into the day to day. I mean, you could have a
full-time person, maybe two people just working with Hillwood on the Coal and Hunter project.
I mean, that you think about the return on your investment over time, if that's what you did,
you know, and that alone, you know, you could, you could, you could have a full-time person just
working with the universities to help leverage that. You could have a full-time person on
entrepreneurship. You can have a full-time person just doing, you know, working projects that are
going to West Park. And that's what the other communities have that have the economic development
sales tax. And so I appreciate you calling me out on that question, because it's, it's, I think if,
if I had been delivering this before the, before the pandemic, I would have been a lot bolder.
And so I apologize for not being more bold because yeah, you guys in the long-term have the assets,
I mean, that are enviable, you know, you still have land, you have major interstate universities,
you've got, you know, the, the Hillwood that's and others that are coming up at 35. I mean,
you guys are in the path of kind of the next wave of growth for the DFW area. It's just that right
now there's so much uncertainty. I didn't feel quite so confident, you know, in leading with that.
But if, if over the next six months, I feel like that's why we left it in there. You know,
we didn't take it out. We didn't take any of the long-term strategies out in the way we were
thinking about sort of modernizing economic development for Denton. But you're right.
Well, one other, just one other quick comment. I would love to hear your reaction to this as well.
In light of this whole pandemic issue, obviously we're all reading about, you know, potential,
you know, transformation really of our, of our society in our country. And, you know, from the,
the New York cities or LA's or Dallas or Houston, wherever you want to call into,
you know, moving more out to the communities like them. And it seemed like to me that, that obviously
there's an opportunity here. I may not be here today, but in the coming months or years that
we probably have, you know, as much of an opportunity to solicit and bring in great
businesses that we've ever had before. And in light of this pandemic and COVID, it seemed like
we would want to have the attitude of maybe even doubling down on being prepared for those
opportunities that we know are going to happen. And I would, I would be interested in your comments
or thoughts. Just once again, we're early into this, but you're hearing it from all over the
parts of the country. Yeah. So there's, there's a kind of two, two parts to your comment or question.
One is the, the trend that we, we may see, we may anticipate is that the density is going to become
less attractive in some, in some cases because of the, just the sort of the fear factor
and riding up a, you know, an elevator 30 stories to your condo. And so I think you're going to see
people want to be either in, you know, more suburban communities or even some rural communities.
And you guys represent sort of the, the best of three different worlds. One, you have a downtown
that represents the vibe of a city, but it's not a urban downtown. It's more of a sort of a ex-urban
type downtown. Number two, you, you still have access to the DFW area. You know, you're still
part of it, but you just have a different product. Number three, you still, you still have rural,
you know, the rural feel, you look on the West side of town, go Northwest, you know, there's a
lot of property that can be developed to bring in those who might not want to live in the density.
So I feel like you're right. The doubling down question, I think that's, you know, that, that
really has to come from you guys. And because we've thrown it out there that in order for you to be
aggressive, you're going to need funds and you're going to need the staffing to do all the things
that have been laid out. It's just a matter of the timing for when you want to do it.
So, I mean, I'm excited about the question, if there's a willingness there, you know.
Thanks for your comments. That's all I have. Appreciate that.
Okay. Chris, you raised your hand.
A couple of things. One, I did find where I was sent the plants. I've since printed that out.
So, but to Tony's point, you know, we talked about this six months ago, when you guys were first
starting to go down this journey of, you know, handing out 10 and $15,000 checks is, it's fine
for a, you know, a small restaurant maybe or something like that, but not for the kind of
economic scale and development that I think you're talking about. So, does the plan contain,
because it's obvious I haven't seen you yet, does it contain like based on your,
you know, dentin size, like a recommended amount of what that fund ought to look like for,
for dentin size and aspirations based on the recommendations that you put in this plan?
Tom, can you mute and unmute again and see we weren't able to hear you?
And I knew it was going to happen sooner or later. Sorry, guys. And I've been doing this
quite a bit. I guess to your point, Chris, the, no, we did not include a specific budget,
but I'd be happy to help think about that because we know what the budgets are for
a lot of competitors, and we'd be happy to weigh in there.
Thank you. Because, you know, you can kind of put an exclamation point on, you know, what's the kind
of at the end of the day, what are we really talking about here? Right? Because I'm pretty
sure I know what the number is. And I think some people would be pretty surprised to know that.
Okay. All right. Well, send me a text on the side and then I'll say that number for you.
Okay. I think Jill had her hand up and then followed by John Baines. Go ahead, Jill.
Well, I personally, the whole group and what's been brought to the table,
this overview has been, it's very helpful to give us a big picture of what we want
dent in economic growth to look like. I agree that I do look forward to once we can kind of agree
on these broad areas and ideas that we do get also your expertise on the nuts and bolts as far as
what types of budgets, minimum, maximum, what is typical for certain areas or certain positions,
you know, what kind of return on the investments we can guesstimate as we
do try to make sure that our city is committed to intentional economic development,
that we don't just leave it to, hey, we're a great place and people will just know about us
because of our awesomeness, that we don't want leftovers. We want to be very intentional about
what we bring into our community and how we grow our community. And so, you know, that we do need
this investment on the front end. And anyways, I think it's a great first blush. But I also look
forward to some of the more details and bringing in you guys as the experts without a dog and a
fight to talk to our elected officials as well as the public about, hey, this is how this area of
commerce works and this is what we need to do to make sure that we have choices in our community.
We can make deliberate choices. A couple of comments. I'll be fast. I also want to echo the
idea of including the economic development partnership chair and/or vice chair into the
nuts and bolts group, the working group. I think that if we do go with this organization working
or this board coming in every quarter, I also understand John Bain's concern that that might
then be a conduit for communications to give background to come from, you know, our perspective,
the business person on the grounds perspective as far as when we think it would be helpful to be
brought in more often than quarterly. So I think that that might be a good kind of compromise or
in between to maybe address that. Jill, you're cutting in and out.
Really important and really good. We heard your first point. I think we started losing you on the
second point. So we heard the comment about the working group, but it was when you moved on that.
If you wouldn't mind, Tom, speaking to I'm on page 48 of the total package and it's page 36
of the economic development strategic plan. And I'm looking specifically if you could -- and this
is just, you know, a side note to help me understand. I understand they work for someone
from NCTC, but can you talk a little bit about -- because a lot of people will need to have dual
roles. If we're going to keep this organization board the same size and still have the types of
representation, we won't have these additional areas that we want to be intentional about representing.
Can you talk to me about who -- what type of position you're thinking of when you say
that we want someone on the board to also be someone in workforce development? I mean, is that
something that someone who is representing one of the universities, is that considered
workforce development? Is it something more specific? Same thing with community development.
Is that, you know, some of the board members that are very active and nonprofits in the community
being someone that's considered in community development. I just -- as I read this, I tried
to start thinking of people I know or positions I know of that could be included. And so maybe
in marketing and tourism, are we talking about a hotel owner or I don't really know who else?
So just kind of if you would flesh that out about what type of person that is so we can kind of
figure out where we're going. Yeah, and honestly, Jill, the categories that we put, we haven't put
the details to them because part of that will be up to you guys because we do know that workforce
is important and obviously there are people who divide the world into oh, you're in education and
you're in workforce and you're in workforce if you're doing something that's much more technical
in nature and giving somebody a skill versus a more academic, you know, science-based, whatever
that field is. And for us, a lot of times it gets blurred. You know, there can be a workforce
development person at the community college or at the university that, you know, came out of a background
with -- that's K-12 and ran the Career Technical Education Center. So you -- it may just depend on
the individual that you find. You want to find people that understand that there's more -- that
workforce matters, you know, in the community and understands whether it's a Peterbilt or it's, you
know, a retailer or kind of skill sets that they're looking for. And you -- chances are there are
people who sit on workforce boards, who sit on, you know, community college groups that may already
be on your board and fit that category. We just wanted to call, you know, special attention to
them because they were pieces in the plan that we thought were important. And I do think the tourism
question -- I think the tourism question, especially a few months ago, was important because
we feel like many times tourism gets pushed out into a separate category and people in economic
development don't acknowledge it. But many times that's some of your best marketing. People are
coming to your community, they're coming to the embassy suites to attend a conference, and we
don't think of that as economic development. You know, we think, yeah, it's, you know, heads in beds
and hotel/motel tax, but, you know, you guys with the chamber and others understand it. You know,
you understand that when somebody's visiting your community, that could be a business owner that,
you know, the impression that you make is important. So don't have a lot more details
from right now, but as you get -- as you go down this path, we're happy to weigh in and provide
more details. Thank you. And one question, can you or maybe Jessica talk about how we are going to
-- do we keep -- will we continue to go through it and develop a plan? Is this something that we need
to be doing via email? Do we hold on to it until the next meeting? And I'm curious as to how the
public comments are going to be disseminated, how is that going to be presented?
May I ask? Sure. I lost some of you, but I think I heard what the question was. So in terms of the
board providing comments to me, you can send them to me prior to the next meeting or you can save
them. That's up to you. If you send them to me ahead of time or send them to Tom and Jacqueline,
we'll just kind of combine them and get them to Tom and Jacqueline if there's something that they,
especially if it's something that needs researched or clarification on or a question that's not sort
of a face value question, give us time to get a response or do the research that we need.
In terms of the public comments, we will move this forward like we do with all of our sort of
major policy decisions is that we're taking the EDP comments and recommendations with the draft
plan and the separate public comments to council and ultimately it's council's decision to adopt
or change the plan. So we're combining all of your comments, public comments, staff comments,
and delivering those to council when we make that presentation. And is that something that's public
that we can access as far as just my interest in the public comments? Yes, we'll have a summary
report. I don't know if anyone watched the parklet presentation at the city council last night but
what we did was we summarized the comments that we received back and said here's kind of the
categories that we received comments and we provided a full report of those comments of
this is what people said or adjustments that we made.
John, I think you were next.
Lost John for a second, I think.
So let me on our ED comments, if we have any comments outside of this meeting,
we need to email Jessica separately, not as a group. We don't want any group conversations
about anything. We can't do that but if you have questions, comments,
send those directly to Jessica and she can include those in our next meeting.
We're going to continue on having this discussion on July 8th. Is it my understanding that
the city council will just take our comments and then they'll just discuss it or are we going to
see a revised version and make a recommendation that city council adopt this
as a board or it sounds like maybe that's not the case?
So we would do it the same way we kind of handle any of our major policy decisions is that we
have the sort of accepted draft and I've heard some comments I think that we can make those
adjustments like adding the vice chair in the chair to the working group, maybe adding additional
details in some areas for clarification. But if the EDP has any policy related big picture
beyond kind of the plan itself and saying hey we need to add another step or we need to add
another goal that's something we would take alongside the draft to council and say here's
the feedback that we got from EDP. That'd be no different like when we take an incentive
application forward where we say EDP approved it these are the recommendations that they made
based on that if that makes sense okay. John did you have a question and comments?
Yes I did I hope I can be very concise when we're talking about raising money Tom and
Jacqueline I wonder if you could tell us a little bit if the opportunity zone that was
promulgated by President Trump in the 87 tax plan if that would allow for a public private
collaboration that could bring in a large partner to collaborate with the city in carrying out some
major economic development opportunities so we're not trying to raise all the money ourselves.
I have no experience with the opportunity zone but I've heard that it's very lucrative
and provides a lot of tax benefit so I didn't know if he had any experience in
using that vehicle as a drawing card for large endeavors.
Tom you're on mute. Sorry about that yeah I mean I'm familiar with the opportunity zones
as a as a tool for bringing in investment to specific projects within that zone you know so
there are funds that are being created where monies are flowing into that fund and then that fund
can be used to support a specific sort of parcel or real estate development within that fund.
I'm not aware John and maybe somebody else knows better than I do of the fund being created and
then the entire city being marketed or it being used for other areas of the community
it's I think targeted geographically to where your zone is and so but we'd be happy to explore that
because it's something we're interested in and kind of looking at how others are using that
creatively to be able to bring in outside money so we'll definitely take a look at that for you.
And the reason I mentioned that is because
I'm just an outsider I don't have an insider view I don't think we can go and just ask people to
put a bunch of money in a pot without some political backlash but if we had a collaboration
it might be a little easier and so I'd heard that this opportunity zone that was created in 19
excuse me in 20 in 2017 tax act has a lot of things associated with it so
it was just an idea that was trying to get some complete back on thank you.
No you bet my understanding John is that it's mostly geared towards specific projects
and so if you've got a project that you know it's a redevelopment project
that it's a good mechanism to be able to bring funds into that project.
Anybody else have any questions or comments Jesse go ahead.
Thanks Marty I wanted to do a couple things first to comment and throw a vote behind what Tony
and Chris were talking about earlier with the fund I think if after the comment period is when
we're going to put in some metrics and some measurables I think it's time to get real
aggressive with that fund and I know what you're Tom I totally understand your position when
we're looking at a time of maybe prolonged recovery maybe faster we don't know yet
some of those funding sources are dependent on that recovery but others aren't you know
the things rolling back onto the tax rolls incentives expiring those are the things that
operate by the by the agreements or by the law so we I think we can be a little bit more bold in
the way that we talk about that fund because I may be new to the conversation myself but I
know it's a conversation that's been going on for some time and you know all the plans in the world
are wonderful but unless we have something pretty I think pretty bold and aggressive in this plan
and some some concrete measurables you know it goes in the stack with all the other plans
and we the next time we have a big pot of money which is never in city government then we start
talking about how to spend it and maybe we talk about economic development fund but if the purpose
of this plan is to really put us on the best footing to come out of this recovery then I think
what what did Chris say doubling down or was that Tony I think that's exactly what we do I think we
we stayed a very clear you know the council when it adopts this plan is going to make some policy
choices and I think we we set it up for the council to make a policy choice that is that doesn't leave
any room for doubt that we're serious about implementing a catalyst fund how much it needs
to be if it's a lofty goal then let it be a lofty goal but let it be a realistic one so from where
I'm sitting that's what I'd like to see among the the measurables and goals. Thanks.
I would love to see us tie something maybe maybe if we come back July 8th we can talk about what
Keely brought up the legalities of tying something to DME but historically the utilities have been
the primary fundraisers of economic development and I some of you guys are new I've actually
brought this up years ago it would be nice if we could peg our budget to some very small percentage
of the DME budget or income or something like that so that if we're doing our job
in theory we're bringing in more revenue and that fund gets bigger and so we you know we live and
die on how that's working so it'd be nice to see if we can work that out at the end of the day it
all gets down to money and I know that the city's got some challenges ahead so any any other comments
about about the plan I guess if you had a chance to go through that maybe shoot off an email to
Jessica with some comments or questions and we can pick that back up our next meeting just in
a few weeks anyway so we can have some more conversation about it anything else that we
need to cover with regard to the report? Before we move off that I just want to make sure that
we kind of understand I've gotten notes on everyone's comments we'll make adjustments in
the plan based on most of these we may need to come back and have a little bit more robust discussion
in some areas but I think that's kind of what we'll do and then if there are additional comments
we get we won't make any adjustments based on singular feedback we get from anyone we'll bring
those back at the next meeting so that the board can discuss those and that will be our game plan
going forward. All right we've got a few minutes left with our next item is staff reports you want
to just give us some highlights Jessica and I'd also like to give Charlie a chance to weigh in.
Sure we included a new report for the board and we've shifted a little bit of our internal
reporting and to give a little bit more opportunities to show what we're doing and
give an update on the more comprehensive look on economic development instead of focusing on sort of
a narrow area but really all of the areas that we're working in an economic development that
sometimes don't come before the board and so you have our second and partial third quarter report
we obviously didn't have a full second quarter report for our fiscal year we were in the midst
of responding to COVID and if you actually go to the last page of our departmental report
you'll see a brief summary of the activities that we did it doesn't look very brief but I promise
you it is brief our office handled hundreds of calls throughout March and April helping businesses
navigate COVID and so we did hit pause on some normal operations and move to that and I just
can't thank the board enough many of you received personal phone calls from me as I was trying to
work through questions and issues in your areas of expertise so we're willing to jump on zoom
calls with me and then I also just want to say a big thank you to the city's economic development
team because we were in the office one day and we're home the next and our lives were turned upside
down and so we can't say enough and thank them for the adjustments that they made and then one
last announcement that I'll make is that Michelle Cunningham our wonderful business development
officer retired on March 19th and so we are in the process of posting that position and seeking
a new business development officer for economic development team but I hope Michelle's not watching
but I bet she is and we just want to send her all of the love and let her know that she's greatly
missed even though we've only been without her for two days now so Michelle is watching her
retirement is not going very well she's watching this knowing Michelle she's watching
Charlie
here we go all right yes we've it's been a an interesting time working from home we've been back
here in the office for about a month now and it's been it's been a busy time last month we
your report I think I gave you a report that we submitted like four or five
RFI's last month and we've already done five in the month of June and have another one due
Friday and another one due Monday so we're seeing we're seeing a lot of activity
and you know and plus I got a call yesterday from a company in Pennsylvania that's looking to build a
a large distribution facility and we're going to be working with him over the next few months to
to help him gather the information he needs yeah it's going to be a busy time we've got
right now a million two hundred and sixty three thousand square feet of
industrial property either on the ground or under construction right now with another
two hundred and fifty thousand that's in the planning stages and so we're going to we're going
to see some activity in the near future or in the future there's there's also a lot of competition
because Fort Worth North Fort Worth has about 12 million square feet either on the ground or
under construction and about half of that is already it's being built for a particular company
so we're going to see we're going to see some movement in in that arena over the next
over the next year or so just because of having facilities on the ground and
it's been it's been fun but it's been also also very busy
but be glad to answer any questions that anybody might have
Jessica you want to talk about the future agenda matrix sure let me switch over to that
so our next meeting on July 8th we will again reconvene on the strategic plan that will be the
focus of our meeting and then we're actually going to pretend like it's March all over again and the
meeting that got cancelled we're going to pick back some of the items that we had planned on
being on the march agenda so we had two incentive applications that we'll be bringing forward in
July as long as the applicants are prepared to move forward we're still talking with them to make
sure that they're comfortable with that as well as we will talk about a revised fair council awards
breakfast idea i'm hoping my light bulb will go off of how we'll be able to do that remotely
in the near future so i'll expect an update on that at our next meeting great all right anybody
have any questions for jessica or charlie before we if not then i think we're we're done for the day
we're done all right i'm keely go ahead
i was just saying bye after a 13 hour meeting last night i'm already just
zoomed out well uh if you have comments or questions about the plan please email jessica
otherwise it's really nice to see everybody there's a few faces i hadn't seen in a while so
it always puts a big smile on my face thank you for showing up today appreciate everybody's
commitment and we'll talk to you soon we're adjourned thanks everybody