Planning & Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

All righty. Thank you everybody for your patience. We have started to reream. Our tech team will make sure everything is proper and right on our YouTube page in just a moment. So, we are good to start. Thank you, Katie. For anyone watching out in the world, we had a little technical glitch, so we paused and now we are resuming. And I think um was that the end of that slide or on to the next?

Yes, Katie. Go ahead. Next slide. Great. So, our last topic in this area is um to really highlight some of the work that we're doing in partnership with the Urban Land Institute. And so Urban Land Institute will be on site um at the end of July. Really the purpose of this project is to continue to build out the city's strategic plan for economic recovery by incorporating the advice of national experts. um Urban Land Institute. These advisory panel services have often come to communities that have experienced natural disasters and provided some immediate aid in developing strategic framework for really addressing um the things that happen as a result of of the disaster and how they can move forward in a holistic manner. So next slide we can talk specifically about the framework that we've asked the ULI advisory panel to focus on and really it has a lot to do with our local economy because we recognize that that is something specific to the city's experience of the storm is is how it did really have an impact on our local economy. So here's a quick highlight of the scope. Um first really focusing on that industry resilience and diversification. Again, you can see that link with council's priority of really having um that strategy to accelerate recovery, you know, build that resilience in Asheville's tourism and hospitality sectors while simultaneously exploring how economic diversity can add towards resilience and preparation against future disruptions. That second piece is really connected to our work in ABI and our economic mobility and really connected how connecting to how we can prioritize the revitalization of underresourced areas to promote that economic advancement for low to moderate income individuals. Um third, this is really looking at the city's role as it

pertains to land use. So examining policies, regulations, incentives that can drive more resilient private development in flood hazard areas while considering design for storm and landslide impacts, but also balancing that economic activity with also that flood plane function. So really excited about that work to help us inform um overall land use. And then last, looking at public investment, infrastructure parks, really examining crucial public investments for flood resilience in our riverfront commercial districts, storm water infrastructure, and really exploring innovative ways to rebuild our French Broad Riverfront parks. Um, so we're excited about the work that ULI is going to do with us. Again, really helping us to round out um our planning and our our framework for strategic recovery. And if you'll go on to the next slide, Katie, I I wanted to share how the public can get involved with this work that's being done. So on Monday, July 28th, 5 to 7:30, there is a meet and greet planned um in the front of Harris Cherokee Center, and that's for all members of the public who are interested in attending. Um and that work will ensue um for the remainder of the week with a public presentation given on Friday, August 1st at 9:30 a.m. Um that now will be the panel presenting some opportunities for the city to explore for economic recovery. It will also be live streamed. So we really want to make sure that this information is out there in the public. And then later on there will be key touch points with this committee on how we digest and prioritize the work um as a result of of what ULI has has shared with us. So excited about that Steph I think back to you.

Thanks Nikki. I just wanted to highlight something about the meet and greet for um these council members and the public. Um it's only an hour and a half but we are packing a lot into it. And of course, as always, we're going to make sure that people um have uh beverages and some uh light refreshments. Those are actually being provided um by the Urban Land Institute. So, we want to thank um them for that. But more importantly, when you come to this event, um, we are going to have a what we heard wall so that everybody can take a look at the summarized analysis of the input that I mentioned earlier that we've received from Asheville recovers.org that we've seen in these surveys, what we heard in these business associations. We're going to have that up by theme areas. We want people to be able to take a look at that and if there's something that we're missing, they'll have an opportunity to add to that board. The second thing is that um we're coming up on the one-year anniversary and we know that a lot of people have started thinking about that time and there's been a lot of discussion in the community about being thankful for different people uh for places that were available for different resources that um were around at that time. So we want to highlight um the community's discussion around this. So, we are going to have um a card where we're asking people to contribute um or we have a table where we're asking people to contribute to a community thank you card. And so, we're asking people to think in advance about what they were grateful for in the days and weeks immediately after the storm. And we're going to make those thank yous very public to so that anybody um has access to them afterwards. and will

allow for additions as we get closer to that one-year anniversary. The last thing is that we are going to um make sure that there's uh for for those less inclined to try to bump into a conversation. I mean, this is a meet and greet after all. We're going to have a real organized way of people to have fun with some of the 10 panelists. And that is that we are going to have a speed dating setup. So when folks uh show up, they can sign up for a slot with a panelist of their choice and they'll get about three minutes to either give them a tell something that they think that panelist needs to know about Asheville that they might not have heard before or they can do an ask and say um hey I have a question for you panelist and it can be any kind of question um at all. Um, so we're reminding folks that it's a public event and we're really appreciative of people coming out that evening. Let's go to the next slide. So as we we wrap up here, one of the things that we wanted to mention is that while we're highlighting today that we're you know there are four areas of council's economy or economic recovery priority that um we're we're putting or attaching uh different strateies strategies to as a framework that all of this is interconnected. all of our work is really um going to make a big difference uh to economic recovery. And so while this committee um the um peed or EPED uh environment planning and economic development is going to be hearing a a lot about our real focused economic recovery work that sometimes we're going to bring you things that are going to be in other committees as well. And we kind

of pulled out here some um other priority areas that council had laid out like infrastructure and the environment, people and housing and how some of those goals that you laid out really are goals that are important to economic recovery too. So I'll just highlight one and that is housing. We're all aware that housing is a critical part of our um talent um attraction and retention and just making it affordable to people that live here at different levels um is a really important piece. So being able to look at the policy tools and partnerships that we have and continue working on implementation of affordable housing plan that's a critical component of our economic recovery. slide. So coming up um we are going to be hosting that ULI advisory panel at the end of this month as noted. Then we'll be working with the EPED council committee to integrate those recommendations into an overall economic recovery strategy. that it won't be our final strategy because we have more more work and it will be involving and and and living but that's the next two months August and September. So we're also as part of our focus on providing access uh to the resources that people need going to be building out that CDBGDR um economic revitalization programs especially starting with that small business support program. So that looks like uh a lot of focus groups that are happening right now. They're starting right now in partnership with folks at go local um and the chamber of commerce

to better understand like was there something that we missed before when funds were allocated? What are the common areas that people are like having pain points around like why are they not qualifying for funds? has people have like unmet needs changed at all? We're working on that at at the same time as finishing our program guidelines and we'll be coming back to you in August and September to report out on progress and get the feedback we need so that we can operationalize this and start getting money out the door. At the same time, we're going to be working on those um placebased opportunities. Uh we know we're going to be hearing from Hayden today. We're going to be hearing from others in August. The River Arts District is having their sharet um to look at the strategies that they want to adopt for the next year as a community. Some of those may invol may involve like city assistance or support. So staff's here to help uh work with you on what the priorities might be and evaluate some policy changes if needed. And then as Nikki um noted earlier, a big part of this is just continuing to bring in partners that can illuminate the other corners and show what else is happening. So that 5x5 economic recovery plan and um Clark Duncan coming in next month, I think it's next month, two months from now. Yep. Two months from now. Um is an example of that slide. So, we're back to our um uh key takeaways, and we just wanted to stress that we do have a good work plan um framework that is informed by uh council's four priorities, and we're also using all of the input that we've heard, our own innovations uh within the city administratively, what we can do,

and what we've learned from other communities uh to try to continue working on those short-term strategies. And we are really looking forward to this moment, this pivotal moment where we can take the ULI information, take the 5x5 information and continue updating that into more of a strategic work plan. We've got a lot of I think you know we've got a lot of discussions with you all moving forward. Nikki, I other um staff are here. We're really interested to hear your feedback on um what you've seen as far as what we've worked on already and um any especially about our process moving forward, some of our next steps if those sound good to you or if there's something else you might need to be seeing. Thank you very much. Thanks y'all. This is really um there's nothing like putting a bunch of work together so folks can hover over the big picture of what's happening. And it's really incredible as we think that every staff and community member who's contributed to all this work was also recovering from living in this disaster. It's really um a tremendous amount of work, a lot of very thoughtful quick response work as well as laying the groundwork for bigger conversations. So very grateful to see all the work. Um I know later in the agenda we're going to hear about some additional placebased ideas that might be more community-led. So I think that as we you know sort through um what the immediate work looked like, what ongoing work looks like, what long range work looks like, um collaborating with partners to really fill in any gaps is going to be exciting. I see a question from Councilwoman Rooney. Yeah, I'll echo the thanks um and

gratitude for staff that are getting this body of work moving um and covering so much ground. Um one question maybe a bucket of questions um is where to send people when a gap is identified. Like I'm imagining if there's a business who's like, "We still need small business recovery funds. Where do we go? What do we look to?" I can point to our partners that we're currently working with with small businesses like Mountain Biz Works, right? Um but for entrepreneurs, uh let's say small business operators who are like, "Hey, I'm seeing the push cart idea, but I'm still waiting on the food truck idea." Um should I be pointing them to the temporary activation team? because we had a really excellent memo from March 2023 from staff about how we allow permanent but not temporary and it's still bubbling up as a downtown activation tool. Um, but I'm not sure where to send people and that seemed like a place. Okay, I'm not sure there's one answer to this, but this is a really great question and I would say what it illuminates is that there are still there are there's still so much information and communication is a really key part of us being able to serve our community. Um, so it I think it depends and I think that using the TAP program and reaching out for those temporary activations is exactly what we want people to be doing. So it might it's new. Everything might not fit into that bucket. I can't guarantee that they won't get passed to another staffer, but I can guarantee that they will get passed to a staffer who cares and and who tries to address

some of this. Um, now if people just have general comments where like I would like to see, meaning like they want to contribute to a vision, that's where I think we want them to go through like asheville recovers.org and our public input processes and really provide that as comment so it can be recorded. This is this is key because sometimes what happens is when we have conversations with people like you know after the Builtmore Village Merchants Association meeting those things are not really recorded. They're important to us but they're um they're not codified and we want to start being really meticulous with the way we codify like our public engagement.

And then I'll just share that for for general business inquiries. I think Marcus is such a great connection point to opportunities, you know, joining his list serve. He can be a great connection point for businesses as well. So, I'll I'll put in a plug um to reach out to Marcus Kirkman within the city's business inclusion office.

That was really helpful. Thank you. Um so, another area that I'm thinking of because I was just in the long-term recovery group construction um team meeting this morning and we have multiple meetings this week. Um, one of the concerns is about connecting local workers into recovery jobs and training while so many local construction workers are approaching retirement um, in the next 5 to 10 years through our recovery. So, um, where are we looping in community partners? Land of Sky, Just Economics, EDC, advocacy member groups like Air, MODA, WABA, Heart of West Asheville, and then our education training groups like ABTE, the IBEW, electrical workers apprenticeship, Operation Gateway. Is that all kind of funneling through Marcus? Are we sending folks to partners or is this another area where we need to point people to the Asheville Recovers website?

That is not a website thing. Um again this might be a more um an answer that requires a lot of nuance and um different um approaches but I will say generally that it's important I think to know that the city participates in a weekly business service provider res like business response group and so um all of not every single one of those but all of the major agencies that you just noted we get together on a weekly basis this to share like exactly what is happening. I'm applying for this grant. I just released a survey and I got this information back. We're trying to start an initiative where we hook workers up with recovery jobs. City, how can you help? And we kind of go over opportunities in that manner. And from that kind of core or hub, it can get farmed out to James Shelton who's working on the workforce development program guidelines for CDBGDR or Marcus who might be working on getting people certified. But that's the and we um at least two of us from the city participate in that group usually every um every week. And I think maybe even more importantly is this is exactly the kind of emerging initiatives like workforce development that we'll be reporting out to you about and getting more input from you guys about in the coming months like in the coming quarters.

Thank you. That's really helpful. Um it does seem like to put a tail on that um some sort of presentation or getting on a future agenda item thrive and the long-term recovery groups just so we can see where our recovery plans are synchronized and it may be an opportunity to um see where some gaps are. I would certainly support that. Got it.

Thanks everybody. All right, let's keep moving. We have several additional topics that'll have a lot of discussion. It's essential for us to get this baseline of all of the existing work to understand the context of what's happening and also where we're going. So, thanks so much staff. All right, we're going to move on to um item number three, which is activating Asheville downtown. We've asked um the executive director of the Asheville Asheville Downtown Association to come and share some ideas that have been bubbling up in the community around really supporting and activating downtown as we're still looking at, you know, 4.6% unemployment and not even a year into recovery. Just really curious to hear what what more support for downtown could look like. I'll pass it to you, Hayden. Thank you for joining us. Thank you, Councilwoman, and thank you for the opportunity to be here and share just a few thoughts around um you know, how we could work with staff to really empower our downtown neighborhoods to activate um for their their own streets. Um so, I'll go to the next slide. This is a beautiful photo of our community concert um which drew, you know, around 10,000 people to downtown. Very strategic on that one that we had it on a Thursday night. um leading into a weekend that historically has been incredibly slow for downtown after Memorial Day and really hopes to bring locals to downtown and get to experience um the Grammy award-winning State Canyon Rangers. So to continue that momentum, you know, we talk often about how downtown Asheville is the economic and cultural heart of our region. And while it wasn't physically impacted in many ways um by Hurricane Helen, the aftermath of the economic impact has been great on our downtown businesses. And when we think about some um folks

who have been missed along the way, I think downtown businesses are included in that because a lot of times they're not eligible to apply for grants that have um for businesses that were physically impacted or they might not meet a minimum or maximum employee count. And so I think it's really important that we continue to support those downtown businesses. And we have a unique opportunity in this moment to remove some bar barriers um and create pathways for this momentum of downtown businesses, the businesses of Wall Street, South Slope businesses to have some more frequent and low lift activations by by removing some of those barriers. And our goal is to keep people downtown um longer to have them support local business and of course have a more vibrant and welcoming environment. Go to the next slide. It has some pretty interesting information. This comes from our technology pedestrian tracking technology um Placer AI. And um this shows us in um the time period between June 9th and July 6th uh kind of the number of folks who were coming downtown. This is our daytime visitor traffic. So uh we see about 14,000 people in downtown on a given day. And you can see the bottom line, the kind of turquoise color there is the 2,000 residents that we have in downtown. And then the middle group, the blue group is um over 5,000 inbound commuters. We would consider these folks locals. They're people who live in and around um Asheville, Bunkham County, and they come to downtown usually Monday through Friday from 9:00 to 5:00. You can kind of see that here um in in where it kind of bursts out for the locals. You know, we have a fantastic partner in the tourism development authority. We

have, you can see already 8,000 out ofmarket visitors that come to downtown, but we could really call it a success if we could get that middle line, that blue line to grow a little bit. And I think that kind of contributes to um diversification. You know, a lot of our downtown businesses have served tourists or visitors for a long time, but being able to appeal to locals, tweak business models to get locals downtown and stay downtown would really be a success, I believe. Um, so we can go to the next slide. One item that has come up a lot in conversation over the last year is um a social district. And I know that staff um city staff had come to some council members to chat a little bit about what a social district could look like. I don't know that we um had really gone into depth about all of the different opportunities for a social district. And I think many people can agree on kind of one form of this. And this is a social district that would be activated via festivals and events. So, I'm going to tell you a little bit how it works right now and then how there could really be some upside on creating social districts that are activated for festivals and events. So, right now I'm going to take the Independence Day block party which is a partnership between the downtown association and the city of Asheville as an example. It happened on July 4th down on the south slope Cox Banks and Buckston. So, right now, in order to be able for our guests of the Independence Day block party to enjoy or consume alcohol on the street, um a nonprofit such as the downtown association has to pull an ABC permit. That ABC permit goes through, you know, the ABC commission. It goes through uh Asheville Police Department and it also comes to city council where city council has to take

an action to temporarily suspend the ordinance that prohibits drinking alcohol in the street. After that, the nonprofits such as ourselves have to purchase alcohol from a distributor. This is for beer. So, we have to go to Empire Budweiser. We can't go directly to the breweries. and um we have to purchase the alcohol. Our volunteers are required to sell the alcohol and all the proceeds must come back to the downtown association. In addition to that lift, um the catch is that the alcohol purchased through the permit cannot be consumed on a restaurant or brewery property. And guests who purchase any alcohol on the restaurant or brewery property cannot come on to Cox Avenue, you know, from Bears Barbecue onto Cox Avenue and consume consume the drink that they um purchase there. So, we're talking about two separate liquor licenses and they cannot cross over. This is obviously very confusing for guests of our events. you know, they are don't understand why they can't buy a beer at Bears and bring it out to our event. But it also undercuts revenue for downtown businesses. So now the downtown association sets up a bar outside of a brickandmortar um business and we sell the alcohol and we keep the revenue from that. Um the revenue, you know, for many years has served us in being able to create more downtown events downtown after five. And so it's not a complete loss, but there are other ways that we can continue to fund this these events um other than selling the alcohol. So looking at what could be done to maybe make that process a little bit easier, we can go to the next slide and take a look at um an opportunity for a social district pilot. No, Katie. We can go to the next slide.

Awesome. So the way it would work in order for us to be able to remove that barrier of the downtown association or any nonprofit who are who's supporting these events from having to sell the alcohol in front of a brickandmortar business during a permitted festival and event is to create a social district. So what would have to happen is city council would establish the social district. They would essentially establish a map similar to let's call it the UDO. I don't want to scare anybody, but it it kind of is that way that once you establish the social district and you determine the footprint of it, it remains. It exists there. However, the second part of that is city council would have to adopt an ordinance that would govern how and when the district is operating. So, even though that map exists, it still would require a city council directive on when um when people can take part in the social district. So for instance, in the case of permitted festivals and events, we would say the South Slope Social District is activated on Saturday, July 4th, 2026 from 5:00 p.m. to 900 p.m. So during those times, people could purchase alcohol from Bears, from Twin, from Wickedweed, and come out and watch the doc dogs. They can go shopping at our local markets. They can, you know, enjoy watching their kids in the kids zone. and the downtown association wouldn't have to set up a bar. Um, so the activation from the downtown association's perspective, we believe that city council should activate social districts at minimum during permitted events and festivals. This could look very similar to the process that we do now. We go through the office of special events. We check a box that says we'd like to activate the social district because not all event producers would want to do that. John someone would take that to city council and you guys could approve it similar to how you lift the

ordinance. You would essentially um enact the ordinance to be able to um activate the social district. And then we also believe that, you know, some of these downtown neighborhoods have done the research and they do have plans in place to activate their social dist districts more often. And if that's something that council wants to take a look at or city staff wants to take a look at, we encourage you to hear them out. They've done a lot of the outreach. They've gotten the community input and there might be a case for activating the social district more often. However, today we're only talking about festivals and events. I think um let's Oh, I I have the slides pulled up too. I think that's my last slide on um Oh, no. I have a couple more. So, um we can go to the next one. We have a couple case studies of events that really would have benefited from having social districts in their area. The first is the Tripani Holy Celebration. This was a firsttime event from Tripani and it took place goodness um in March of 2025 after the hurricane. One of the very first outdoor public events to return after um Helen and I don't I think they expected around 500 people to come and we assisted them in shutting down the street. You know, we had to do the same alcohol permit, us purchase the alcohol, that type of thing. And they had over 2,000 people attend this event and it was very popular and definitely a community-led um program there on Banks Avenue. Had we had a social district in place instead of the downtown association going through the process of purchasing the alcohol point ABC permit and retaining the revenue from that Chipani could have done it themselves. Kataba Banks Avenue and we wouldn't have had to have an out we could have an outdoor bar but it wouldn't have been required in order for people to enjoy consuming alcohol in

between um the businesses. The next I already mentioned is the July 4th block party. I'll know that there were nearly 15,000 people on the South Slope this July 4th and so many of our businesses reported their best day in business since Helen, best day in business ever or best day in business since last July 4th um on this last day. So, it really is an economic recovery tool for a district that's not bouncing back as quickly as other parts of downtown. The last is the Grove Art Tracade treelighting that was on Paige Avenue in November of last year. Again, post Helen um event. And Grove Arcade and Page Avenue are uniquely positioned because we have Restaurant Row along the Grove Arcade on Page Avenue. Last year we had Cultivated Cocktails. Unfortunately, they're no longer located there, but there are a lot of opportunities for folks to be able to grab a cocktail, grab a drink, and then enjoy the marketplace, enjoy the, you know, Asheville Ballet and Santa Claus and everything else that's going on on Page Avenue and could really have benefited from the social district at that time. The next slide has um some potential locations. I've already mentioned a few. We would be looking at locations that already have existing restaurants, bars that could participate. Also looking at areas that might have some retail that would benefit. Um so on the south slope looking at coxs from south of Hilliard down to um southside or I'm sorry down to uh south of Buckton and then also Banks and Buckton. And we have had conversations with the Asheville Police Department and they've given some feedback on, you know, why not to include Hilliard, why why to end things um where we are. And it has a lot to do with pedestrian safety. You know, one big thing to note is that when you activate during festivals and events, the streets are closed to cars, to

vehicle traffic, so you're not as concerned about somebody being hit by a car, you know, while they're walking across the street. Um the other is Wall Street. Um in in response to Hurricane Helen and to really draw people down to Wall Street, the merchants of downtown and the Wall Street businesses um did a fantastic job in putting together Miracle on Wall Street which was four Sundays in December. And um at that time we had you know Laughing Seed, there's um the Marketplace. There's a lot of different businesses that sell alcohol along with great retail and marketplace vendors where we could have activated a social district and that could have been increased revenue for these businesses. And then of course Paige Avenue um has a great mix of bars, restaurants and retailers that could benefit um from the social district. You know, Hemingways has an interest in doing a Cuban festival. Um of course the Grove Arcade Tree Lighting. So there are a lot of events that would really um benefit from this. I think there might be one more. Let's see. Um, actually, we can go back um to potential locations. I wanted to stop and see if anyone had any questions about social districts, social districts activated for festivals and events and kind of the thought behind that.

Thanks, Aiden. Um, I I know that several of us have had conversation about social districts and um I appreciate you kind of narrowing it into a specific set of ideas for us to really think through and mle through because I think you know when I first heard of the idea it kind of felt like citywide booze everywhere 24 hours a day and in talking with you and hearing what you're saying I don't think that's how it's done in most places and I think your suggestion of having it at a minimum piloted but also just more targeted and specific. It's thoughtful. Um and and I like the idea. I like the idea especially um as we discussed in the first part of this call hearing about the immediate things that city staff rolled out the long-term planning we're doing. This could be something that we pursue this fall so that as we're rounding a year anniversary going into our biggest season as well as our winter season, this might be something to really activate and bring bring people downtown. Um I have some questions for staff of, you know, if we wanted to really dig into this and I don't know what my peers on this committee think. I would want to understand if there would be anticipated um costs for city the city to do this or staff time and maybe I don't know if you have any thoughts as the CD lead and and we don't need those answers now either. The other thing is kind of what would the legal's opinion be? Like I think that your process laid out here makes sense, but um maybe legal would draft some ordinance language for us to look at or just kind of what this would be changing some laws. So how would we do that? And if staff could give us some guidance. So if this is a topic that others on council want to continue discussing, those would be some questions I would have that maybe staff could help with.

Um have governor, did you want to jump in too?

Uh, not so much with more questions, just more support. Um, similarly, when I first heard about this and when it was brought to me, you know, like just either by staff as conversational, I wasn't in support because I thought that it was this citywide thing and that, like you said, Maggie, folks would just be kind of all all the time able to walk around downtown with open alcohol. I really appreciate the events approach and I want to be clear that that's that version I wholeheartedly support because I was on the ADA a long time. I've been I've helped manage these events over the decades. And it is interesting like Hayden in her job she's running a nonprofit to organize businesses and create a vital you know vibrant district but in reality she's slinging beer and she doesn't sling beer. it's not it's not in her toolbox. Meanwhile, the restaurants around these events can't do what they do, which is sell that alcohol. So, it's it's just seems like once it was I was enlightened to this other format, it makes so much sense to me. So, I'm hopeful that um council will kind of look at this. If it has to be a pilot, that's fine. The locations are great. I I guess my only question is, so the South Slope one is a fairly large location. I mean, is that indicative of like a big event on those three streets or we're just saying this is the district and the street might be by the Barksdale or the event might be by the Barksdale. You know, a little clarity around there. But, um, otherwise, I'm just really supportive and Hayden, thanks while I have your attention for bringing this to us and being like, you know, he isn't enough to offer it to us again after we were like, we don't understand. But, um, thank you. And if you could talk to like the size and the why the house slope is so big, that would be helpful. I would say these are event the south slope kind of permit is where we tend to have events. This this was the footprint for um Independence Day and then we've

also produced events there on um Banks Avenue like I said for Chaani. Um so that was kind of the reasoning behind such a large event. But I would recommend that um if you like for instance I anticipate that the Chaipani Devali celebration coming in October will only be on banks. So I would say if we activate a social district you would activate it on that event permit um for that event footprint. So doing it this large for um for um I'm sorry, Independence Day would help because you'd be able to activate the whole um Independence Day permit, but you could also break it down. you know, Bears is doing um a weenie walk coming up soon and that's going to be on Cox and um you know, there's talk of you know, potentially moving an Oktoberfest to Cox Avenue that would likely take over that whole street, but we we would want to make sure we have the social district prior to doing that as well. So, there's just opportunity there, but I would say keep it to the event permit um for

Thanks, Councilwoman Rooney. Um, thank you for this presentation. This is the first time I think we've seen publicly facing um, the three, the package of three that have been talked about. Um, in general, I love the idea of closing down streets like we have with the open streets campaign and finding ways for people to use our public right away for more than cars. Um, but I did have a question. In addition to appreciating um, chairperson's question about costs, um, there's still questions about liability. Um, how has the Asheville Food and Beverage United um, engagement looked? Um, and for residents, what does it look like to not only engage the residential neighbor in this these neighborhoods, but also um, adjacent neighborhoods like Eastn Valley Street, Southside, Mford? We know that when we have events downtown that folks park near downtown and they walk in um and so they'll walk be walking back to their cars with lots of things like um the trash that they are taking back to their car. So I think those are some of the questions that I'm hearing um and whether or not we have the staff capacity to do that engagement or not.

Thanks for the question. So yeah, go for it. Any council any other comments? And I'll just or go ahead. I'll I'll go to last when you're done with questions. And I only had one more. Go ahead. Y I'm just wondering if in all this context we're about to speak to you, could we talk to timing like how quickly this could be done?

Yeah. I guess what I was what I was going to offer from staff's perspective is I'm kind of taking notes is can't answer these right now, but yes, we can we can bring back a rough cost that it would be to the city. There's some cost, but I don't I don't know that it's excessive in any way, but we need to look at that. Um, don't want to put Janice on the spot, but yes, let's let our legal team take a look at this because I I do we do need to work through the concept of turning events on and off. So that probably needs some more scrutiny, Janice, unless you're ready to answer that, but I think we could probably come back with that. Then I think Councilman Ron, you raised an important question and this is I think what we would need direction from council on is what is the expectation around engagement and I think engagement would come to your question, Councilman Turner. I think that has a lot of impact on timing of this, whatever the expectations are for engagement. So I think we would ask just for a little more direction on our role potentially in any kind of engagement.

I'll say um I think Kim I think you're bringing up really good audiences and Hayden I'm not sure if you've already had conversation with some of those target audiences or not. Um but I think there are times when we expect staff to do all the engagement that when we're motivated we could be doing this as well. I I will say that October is our busiest time and I don't have an appetite for the long engagement that we sometimes have with other things, especially if we're piloting this out in a recovery year after a disaster. So, I have a real appetite to test this because it might not like I think a pilot would be very appropriate and would allow us to kind of beta test through a pilot period when it matters the most to our workers who are trying to stay employed in our businesses and then um use that, you know, extension of the pilot as a more thorough time if we're hearing concern. Um so that's kind of where where I could that that's my appetite. I would say I haven't done a lot of engagement with some of those groups, but I would love if you will give me an opportunity to share um an email that we received from a downtown business after Fourth of July. Um sorry, here we go. So, as she's doing that, I I definitely think I'm not saying don't do any. I'm just saying um a six-month process would be too long. I I would love to see if we could have some of these answers to the questions both Councilwoman and myself issued at our next peed meeting and then see what kind of conversations can happen between now and then.

So, I have a message from a a downtown business owner. Looking at the previous past Fridays, sales on July 4th increased by $277%. Tim tips increased by 300%. Hourly pay for employees increased from $28 an hour to $41 an hour. In direct dollars, sub typically we have two employees working on Friday. For July 4th, we had three. Averaging with the two employees, they typically make $171 on a Friday night. On July 4th, all three made more than twice as much at $355 per shift. Um, looking from last year on July 4th, uh, their numbers were up 83%. As we talked about, allowing business tents, and they're referring to kind of more of the social district on the street, would have been even better. I sold about $250 on my patio. Had I been able to place it in my garage, I would have done 15 to $2,000 more. So, I think this is a really good example of someone who had a a great experience, but would have been able to do even more had they been able to to sell to the street.

Thanks, Kim.

As um as someone who has had to work within permitted areas, those those places where you would sell alcohol would actually have to be permitted and allowed. But it is curious to me that the these benefits are without a social district. So we're not looking at the cost of having cups and trash cans to put them in specifically for the social district event. Um, and so it's there are multiple variables that I'm hearing are really positive from not having a social district, including the liability, having to bring in extra staffing, um, ABC enforcement, having to bring in outside staffing like they did for Belshare. It sounds like a positive to not have it if we're working from what that example is. [Music]

Thanks. And I know that we have several other ideas in your deck and we have two other pretty meaty topics. So I'm wondering if that is the um inquiries that we have from council and that staff might be able to work with um on on kind of addressing some of those questions between now and our next meeting. We we can definitely do that. Um, I know we need to move on, but I just wanted to give Janice, were you going to say anything or do you want to do that through the followup or

I I was just going to quickly say that um there is a lot of there are a lot of examples out there. I have no idea how long of a process this takes. I I think most places that have adopted them are doing this broader social district as you are all saying you would not be in favor of. So, um, but I think Hayden's presentation probably laid it out more clearly. I'm looking quickly on other websites. Charlotte has it. It appears that you need to adopt an ordinance generally and then you have to have a plan and then you do a casebycase social district with an application. So looking at that made it seem like okay it might take a little longer than we think but at the same time with the process that uh Hayden laid out it if we can kind of follow the special events process and it's really the the heart of it is adopting this um the ordinance itself that that might not take as long but and I know planning staff has already reached out to legal and Brad and has tried to sort of trying to see how this could be done in a way that's a little different than the general social district uh that others are adopting. Thanks. That's helpful.

And Janice, would you say I mean I believe this to be true that this is really state regulations that are disallowing us from our already existing special permit process to allow a vendor to carry alcohol off their address. Right. Right.

Primarily comes out of the um alcohol and beverage section of the statute. So section 18, not our usual 168 and our 168 that says we can create social districts is two lines. It says cities can create social districts pursuant to 18 which has all the regulations though which is as Aiden was explaining is you know those ones we do every time there's a special event that that's following that uh that 18 um article 18 of the statute. So have to take a look at that. I think you have to adopt some of the statemandated statutes when you do it and then you have your own plans like are you going to allow plastic cups and different things. So,

okay. Well, thanks. Y All right, let's go on to some of the other ideas.

We do already pay for the cups. We already pay for the trash cans and everything like that on the street. So, that would not change in this case. Um, okay, next slide. just kind of talking about open streets um to accompany this discussion but also to kind of stand on their own. So um when I speak about open streets, I'm actually talking about closing streets to vehicles to open them to pedestrians or people um not in a vehicle. Um, open streets can transform streets into pedestrian friendly zones, only zones for festivals, celebrations, shopping, dining, and recreation. It encourages walking, exploration, spontaneous spending. And of course, supports small business by increasing foot traffic and folks dwell time so they're not getting in their car, going in parking, going to one shop, getting back in their car, and leaving. We'll go to the next slide. um why pedestrian streets or open streets matter. Um pedestrian first environments are proven to drive retail activity and our downtown neighborhoods and business districts are eager to activate their own streets. We saw that after the hurricane with um with Miracle on Wall Street. We saw that during the Grove Arcade um treelighting and also during the Chaani event. And there's a lot of there's a lot of momentum there. all of our downtown businesses or most of our downtown businesses are very engaged right now and I think we need to capitalize on their involvement and engagement, but a lot of times cost can be prohibitive for that regular programming. We'll go to the next slide. Just as an example, um just thinking about the streets that are in downtown that do not have metered parking, which is typically what costs us the most when we close down a street is buying out those parking meters. Thinking about Banks Avenue for the Holy Celebration or

Miracle on Wall Street. So on Banks Avenue, it cost us about $800 just to pull the permits and shut down the street for that Holy Celebration. And that's a pretty big risk if you think only 500 people are going to come and the businesses can't even sell their own alcohol. They can. They just can't come out onto the street. So then looking at Miracle on Wall Street, which didn't have any alcohol sales, it was mostly just a popup market um for the folks and businesses there on Wall, it cost about $1,800 for four Sundays to shut down Wall Street. And we were very fortunate that Arts AVL gave um us a grant to cover these costs. Um but it's still quite expensive for that group of businesses. On top of that, of course, the event producers have to pay offduty APD officers if there's alcohol involved or a certain threshold of people. Um and then also the rental costs of barricades and signage to meet the city requirements. So that's a little bit about the um how much it costs just to create an open street environment. We can go to the next slide. So, our ask is to take a look at utilizing DR funds or grant program that could subsidize fees for these open streets events, the ones that meet our community and economic development goals. Um the city in partnership with Arts AVL does have a grant program for um covering the cost of some fees related to open streets or just public events in general, but it is on a um kind of yearly or an annual grant basis. And so sometimes when businesses are trying to be very flexible or respond to the needs or have a festival kind of oneoff, um they don't fall into that grant cycle. So, being able to be a little bit more responsive to when things just kind of pop up. Um, of course, and this potentially could cover the cost of police and rental of

barricades and things like that. Um, of course, prioritizing open streets that also activate the social districts and support brick and mortar businesses um would be a priority, but there's also some other corridors that don't have kind of the restaurant and bar scene that the other three locations did. And I would put Eagle Market and those streets on the block into that um category. So that could be an opportunity. You know, the block has a First Friday event. It could be an opportunity for them to actually be able to shut down Eagle Street and have folks walk in the street, enjoy going between business to business on on those first Friday evenings. We can go to the next slide. I'll also just kind of um chat a little bit about a parking voucher program. Parking comes up a lot as a barrier for folks coming into downtown and trying to visit our downtown businesses. And I know there's a lot going on in parking services right now. There's not a lot of fee waiverss that can be offered, but we'd encourage you all to take a look at um a voucher program. Something like um having a threshold where customers who spend $25 or more in a downtown business could get a voucher for parking in a local deck. Um, it could be a paper voucher that the businesses distribute or potentially a QR code that works with the technology. And this, of course, encourages spending at local shops and restaurants and removes one of the greatest barriers for what folks say is a barrier to visiting downtown businesses. Um, and whatever it looks like should be simple for parking services or businesses to implement um, and easy for the public to understand. And a part of that would be kind of a campaign. So on the next slide, we just talk about kind of a cohesive campaign um around letting people know about a parking voucher program. And we can go

to the next slide. Um and you know what it might look like to encourage locals or um folks who live near downtown to come into downtown. This could also look like changing the way that we charge for on street parking. Right now, Sundays are free, but you could see in kind of our little makeup of who's coming downtown that it's mostly tourists that come downtown on the weekends and our locals are mostly during the week. So, potentially looking at charging on Sundays, but then doing the free day uh during the week. um and do this in conjunction with like a local stay campaign encouraging locals to come downtown because they get free parking on Tuesdays and maybe we could work with the local businesses or go local to offer an expanded discount on those nights or um you know just activate on those nights to really show locals how special their downtown is. Um, I think we would see an increase in revenue on on street parking on Sundays because it is so busy during that time. Um, locals would have a clear and predictable reason to come downtown midweek and it would tie into larger campaigns like redefund the weekend campaign and things like that that our partner organizations have going on. I think that's the end for me. I'm happy to ask or answer any questions. Oh, look at that beautiful photo. I'd love to see people dancing in the streets, people being excited to come downtown and have that turn into some really direct revenue for our downtown businesses.

Thanks, Hayden. I I really appreciate the creative thinking that centers locals in these strategies you're proposing. Um, I think Councilwoman Rooney mentioned earlier just the support for open streets that that's kind of a She's frozen. She's

great faces, too. I'm just going to chime in real quick to say um you know I've lived through so many attempts of open street events in downtown Asheville, Wall Street and so on. And I just think this is such a great time to try it and experiment, mix it up. I mean people have been calling for it. There have been upsetness around which businesses can participate. You know, it's just we just got to do something. You know, we've had some lackluster attempts. It could be better. It could be greater. I I really support us trying things and letting the ABA with all their new energy just go for it. Um, whatever that looks like. I appreciate all this um zest for improvement, Hayden. I really do. And I think it could be great to have a regular program where it's like a regular schedule of open street events.

And it doesn't always have to go through us. I'm really hoping that removing some of these barriers would actually potentially remove the downtown association from the process where folks could go direct to John Filman and the Office of Special Events and be empowered to activate their own streets. I love that it does look like we lost Maggie. I'll just jump in for a second. Um, any other questions or comments about this particular item or questions for staff? Okay. Um, do you have another item? More slides? Okay. I think we'll probably get Maggie back soon. Can you hear me yet? Yep. We just kind of talking.

I appreciate you. Um, I I was able to hear what you were saying and I echo it. My question is what is the cost? If this is like $50,000 over the next year, that's a really different way for me to think about it than if it's $5 million. I don't think it's going to be $5 million, but I'd really like to understand for immediate what type of

we might lose her again. Um, but I think I share a similar sentiment like is this a budget amendment item? Are there funds in this? Does this mean council needs to like figure out where to find money? What does this look like? out of

I think real quick to jump in um there is there is a cost and and I think staff particularly transportation staff would like some time to assess this and come back and we can include that as part of our followup next month. Um I will note that my strong recommendation to council is rather than waving fees you'll need you'll need to budget for these amounts. this will be a cost to the city, but I'll also note that there are other partners that perhaps can share in this cost as well. So again, there's programmatic things we want to have a chance to look at, but then from purely a budgeting standpoint, I do believe you'd have to consider grants or budgeting money to cover these costs.

And Ben, don't you think I mean, we just implemented a lot of these increases in the fees and stuff in the last few years. I remember um it was just before Hayden came on I believe because I remember the previous director really advocating for it not to happen. A group of these Yeah. And Ashley's on today, our transportation director, she she's listening. So I think just giving that staff a little bit of time to come back to you is what we would ask for. That would be great. Kim?

Yeah. I know we're asking for more information for our next PED meeting. And I'll just reiterate that um what I what I don't want to see happen is it comes to council and then there's this big um constituency group that comes in with the questions that we failed to ask. And so, um what I still have concerns around is the needs of our residents. Um because I'm hearing a lot from businesses, but I haven't heard a lot from residents yet. And it doesn't mean that we won't. Um, but are we asking staff to do that or are we asking our partner organization to do that? Because it needs to be done regardless before we can bring this forward. Otherwise, we'll hear it eventually. Um, and I don't want us to be surprised.

I'm definitely committed to going and talking with Darn. Um, I don't know, maybe we can kind of talk about doing some of that outreach amongst ourselves. Are there groups that you would want to go talk with, Kim? I have been talking with neighbor orgs and I'm happy to point them in a direction. Um, but I'm not hearing a lot of broad support for open streets or for social district

for social district. Kim, I wonder how much that is kind of related to what I was understanding about the event and even like I believe what I was reading in the paper summarizing it was also like kind of a little misleading or maybe it wasn't the event strategy wasn't mentioned. I don't know but everyone I encountered thought it was that including myself. So I wonder if there's some more educational things we can do. I I'm going to just like hopefully value everyone's time by being really explicit. remember when we had the um redesigning Cox Avenue Street conversation and folks back to us later and said, "Well, you didn't ask me."

I don't want to end up in that same situation where we ask a partner organization to do all the outreach and then folks are like, "Well, I got skipped." Um, so this is why I was under the impression that we didn't have enough council support for to take up staff time in this effort. So, it put us in a quandry of like, well, if we if we rely entirely on the partner or um we can alleviate some staff time and what I'm hearing from my colleagues today is we could take on some of that advocacy. Um so, how do we intend to carry that forward together? Is the final destination our next PED meeting? I that's my that would be my priority so that we could have the opportunity of this starting to be in place as soon as possible.

Thanks. It helps to have that understanding.

Yeah. Yeah. I think I think your point is good, Kim. I think there's always this balance. I do think inevitably someone will always say, "I didn't see the flyer. I didn't see the meeting." But that doesn't mean that we can't. We know the consistent stakeholder groups who do engage and making sure that they aren't um caught blindsided by going too fast is important. All right, thank you Hayden for joining us. Um and um oh one other question on this downtown activation that made me think um on some information Kim that you had passed along about food trucks. Um there was a memo from 2023. It'd be great to hear from staff if there like an update to that memo if there's anything to update on kind of performance or any changes. There might not be but if there's been any additional work since then I'd love to know. Um, and then also on the push carts, I know um that was mentioned in the earlier presentation, but I'd love to see some update on like the performance of those programs. How many different um businesses or entities are using them? How many of the push cart slots are filled if filled, if you will, because I think that those two methods I keep hearing you bring to the table, Kim, and I I think they're really they're part of this activation picture. So, it' be nice to just hear a little bit about that as as we move this conversation into next month.

I appreciate that. I think um one of the things to consider around the food trucks, that's a variable that changed in the last time we looked at food trucks, is that more of our downtown businesses have shortened their evening service hours. And the explicit ask I'm hearing from the food truck operators is um late evening, early morning, weekend hours. So, a pilot essentially from like 1000 p.m. to 2 am um where we already closed down um the street for festivals near the former location of the monument. So, the keep the party going hours. Cool. Neat. All right, let's keep rolling. We've had very lengthy but also I think substantial and important conversations so far in our meeting, especially given our economic times after Helen and we still have two more topics. So, take it away. transportation to talk about item number four, which is micromobility policy refresher.

Thanks. So, we are here to talk about this item. This is a refresher. Y'all saw this last September before the storm. And so, I'm going to pass the mic to Haley and Jessica to talk through uh the micromobility policy, which we are planning to bring to council next month.

This is a refresher, so I'm going to try and go through this as quickly as possible. Um, but stop me if you have questions. Um, so in October of 2023, council passed a resolution with the college patent complete shoots project that asked us to look at preparing ordinance amendments to permit the use of all modes of personal transportation within bike lanes. And as part of those efforts, we've also looked at um permitting modes in other locations like in our streets and on greenways and on sidewalks. Um these recommendations will help legitimize these forms of transportation, decriminalize their use, and move forward council of accessibility, affordability, and transportation safety. There are five different proposed ordinance change sections looking at definitions, uses, penalties, and the section specifically on our e scooters and e scooter share programs. Um these changes as I as I mentioned were development developed through looking at industry best practices, community feedback including outreach with the active transportation committee, MMTC, the downtown commission, the riverfront commission and this committee and then also through very thorough legal analysis. I think that's the most important thing to remember as we get into what the actual outcomes of these proposed ordinance changes are that there if there are any like weird nuances, it's most likely due to some limitations of of um state law and the definition of different transportation modes within state law.

Um quickly what what is microobility? It's any lightweight, low-speed, self-propelled or humanpowered device. So, an electric device or like a push scooter designed for transporting a human being operating the device. The definition that we lay out in our proposed ordinance changes include further detail about what's humanpowered and what's self-propelled. And then separately bicycles and electric well ebikes are um considered microobility but have are are not under those umbrellas of humanpowered or electric vehicles because of how they're um defined in state law. This definition does not include electric or humanpowered wheelchairs and that is because in state law wheelchairs are already defined as pedestrians which means where those pedestrians can be or not be is already laid out in state law and we don't have the regulatory authority to um define that otherwise. Golf carts and mopeds are also not considered microobility. And then the kind of interesting term in state law, electric personal assisted mobility devices, which really comes down to segways and hoverboards are also not micromobility. This is taking all of those words I just said and putting it into a visual. So, we're talking about bikes and ebikes. We're talking about self-propelled or electric devices and then human power devices like scooters, roller skates, push push scooters. So, our current conditions for

micromobility today um currently in the city scooters and e- scooters are completely banned. That means both the scooter operating companies and also if you have your own e scooter, you are not allowed to ride them in our city streets today. Um, humanpowered microobility devices like skateboards and roller skates are banned on sidewalks within business districts. They are allowed outside of business districts and on all streets including bike lanes. And there's no guidance on the other various microobility devices that are out there. Um, and then bikes and ebikes are already allowed on all streets, bike lanes, greenways, and sidewalks.

Wait, pause. So, the bikes can go on sidewalks legally. Yes, because of state state law. Yep. I did not know that. Okay, but no skateboards on sidewalk, just bicycles.

Okay. Um, for the time I'm going to actually skip this slide because the next slide captures all of this. Um, but this is a graphic that tries attempts to boil down all these nuances and just make it really clear where can you ride your device in the city? Um and the anything that is shown in red is showing that it's would be updated or new um from our current conditions today with the passing of these ordinance changes. So on bike lanes uh this sorry after these ordinance changes would be adopted on all microobility devices would be allowed in bike lanes. Um, on sidewalks, like you just pointed out, Sage, bikes and ebikes are already allowed today, but the changes would result in humanpowered micromobility being allowed on all sidewalks, including those in business districts. um self-propelled microobility, so e scooters, e skateboards, and one wheels would not be allowed on sidewalks. And that is due to how they are defined within state law, which is they're defined as vehicles and vehicles cannot be on sidewalks unless stated otherwise. um greenways, we would make it clear in our language that all microobility devices can be on greenways. And then for local streets over 30 miles per hour, um bikes and ebikes are currently

allowed and we would also permit self-propelled microobility to be on those streets. Whereas for local streets under 30 miles per hour, all microobility devices would be allowed. And a caveat, if you go into our actual language, it's in the drafted ordinance. Um, we say local streets under 30 mph and also any neighborhood streets where the speed limit is not posted because um this the default speed limit when it's unposted is 35 miles per hour, but we feel like neighborhood streets are an appropriate place for humanpowered microobility. So, I'm going to pause here and see if there's any clarifying questions or um comments on this slide before I move forward.

My only comment is that's a little bit crazy. I know. If we want Well, yeah. There are some opportunities for state legislative. You know, that's just the the rules are just crazy to see all the different modalities with their different rules here and there. It's just, you know, what if we did cars that way, big cars here and little cars there.

Also, technology is changing all the time. I saw I had to look it up. I saw my first Moto Compacto. Uh, it's a square white thin disc with a seat and handlebars and wheels on it. like we're we're gonna have a hard time keeping up with um the rules when the technology changes.

Yeah, we specifically tried to draft our definition so that we don't have to go in and add a new device every single time there is these yeah new innovations. And so instead we we decide like what constitutes these different devices. And this is just a cleaned up version of that previous graphic and what we'll um likely use in communicating um the changes to the public and put on our website. So dismount zone dismount zones are kind of the tool to help us regulate the sidewalk riding if if issues present themselves with microobility devices. So, they're designated areas where people can get on where people are asked to get off of their devices and walk them on the sidewalk and they're indicated through signage or markings. This sign on the right is our preferred signage if we do choose to implement any dismount zones. Um, sidewalks with high volumes of pedestrian traffic and narrow sidewalks are likely good candidates for dismount zones in order to reduce conflicts between microobility users and pedestrians. And we are not recommending or proposing any designated dismount zones at this time, but we recommend monitoring activity and listening to public feedback after ordinance changes are implementing implemented and seeing if any are needed in the future. We do however have a map of the places we want to like pay particular attention

to to see if there are issues arising. So in the downtown business district and Haywood Road in West Asheville are areas we have in mind. This slide is just to give you an idea of next steps and how we plan on communicating all these nuances to the public if this moves forward. Um, our next step would be to go to council for adoption of these proposed ordinances in August or September. And we have already drafted a new service web page for micromobility that would show like where to ride graphics, safe writing graphics, and have an FAQ for people. We would work with our Cape team on press releases and social media posts. coordinate closely with APD to make sure they're aware of all the changes and continue to monitor to see if we want to implement dismount zones. All right, I'm proud of myself. So, I did that pretty quickly, but these are our again our key takeaway.

I have a question. Oh, go ahead. That should

Thank you, Haley. You should be proud of yourself. This is good work. Um, so the one question I had lingering is, um, you mentioned verbally that our neighbors who use wheelchairs are counted among pedestrian population and have those same um, rights and responsibilities. Um, but it doesn't say it anywhere on the slides for microability and where to ride. So, I'm not sure if we're going to be using those visuals themselves, but if so, if there's a way to add that in somewhere so that people can see themselves and where their um rights are on how to use our streets, I think that would help to cover all of our bases.

Thanks for the comment. Um, we hadn't the way that the website is drafted right now, we have under our FAQs where can we have we answered that question of where wheelchairs can ride and the reason we don't have it on the graphic is because they're not considered microobility. Um, you think that that serves the purpose that you're speaking to? you.

I would just imagine the conversation has been going on for a few years now that our um ADA accessibility advocates would imagine needing to see something here. Um even if it is in the bottom right hand corner, um wheelchair users and pedestrians share the same um rights in our public rightway or something like that. Um there's probably some specific language from maybe from our gap plan that we could include. Um so it's not because it's included in micromobility, but it's part of the ecosystem of transportation. [Music]

Okay, we'll think about how to best represent that. Thanks. Um any other questions or comments? If not, I'd entertain a motion. I'm ready to read it with enthusiasm. Um, I move to recommend to council to adopt a resolution to repeal sections 191, 196, 197, 1914, and replace with the language represented in the accompanying staff report. I'll second. All right, I have a first and a second. I will do a roll call vote. Councilwoman Rooney, I. Councilwoman Turner, I.

And myself, I. uh that moves on towards council. Thank you so much. Um it's funny we're getting there's like before times and this is definitely a before times policy conversation but it's still relevant and as uh Kim mentioned micromobility is more and more a way of life for more and more people and so I appreciate that we put the time in to um set the future we want for this type of user. All right, we have uh two other items. One is the PD peed work planning and I think that's going to be Ben. Um a question for council women. Um off our coun our agenda, excuse me, our calendar invites technically till 3:30, but often we kind of go by the 3:00 hour. What's folks timeline on needing to shift gears out of this meeting? Do we have seven minutes or is there maybe another five or 10 that um we could take together after?

I'm fine. I can continue. Okay. Hopefully we aren't going all hours of the day and I know there's a lot of staff just helpful. So, thanks Ben. Why don't you tee us up?

Yep. I'm going to move pretty quickly through this. Um just first want to thank Haley and Ashley and transportation for for getting that uh ordinance to you. They have been working on this for a long time and it is definitely a pre-time Selene and just just want to thank them for sticking with it. So I'm sure they're excited to get this off their plate hopefully at the next council meeting. So Katie, next slide. We're going to talk about your work plan a little bit and this is not a completed product. It's an iterative process. Uh councilwoman, I hope you'll engage some throughout this today because again this is your work plan for the year. real quickly. Uh what we have tried to do with our work planning and and hopefully you are as well is trying to align staff and your work with the four recovery priority priority areas that you established at your retreat. Um a lot of this is going to be based on that. Um another thing that we've we've talked about is trying to make sure that your scope as a council committee um is aligned and informed by these annual recovery priorities. So again, we're going to kind of frame it in that manner. That doesn't mean we won't do things that aren't recovery related or other things matter, you know, so there there will be other types of um projects and things that we'll discuss on this agenda. And then uh finally, we're not there yet, but as we move towards restarting advisory boards, your work plan also is a is a great opportunity for you hopefully to engage those advisory boards and give them assignments that they can work on and then bring recommendations back to you. So again, this should be the gateway to how you really take advantage of the skill sets that exist on the advisory boards in our community. Next slide. So, you know your four recovery priority areas. I won't read those to you. Uh, next slide. And I'm going to go through some of the entry slides pretty quickly because you're familiar with this.

Again, we've created four revised or new council committees that align with those recovery priorities. And this is kind of how we're set up for FLAW 26, which we are now in. Next slide. Uh, you these are your goal statements. So when you establish an economy um priority area, council also developed these four goal statements. Want to thank Steph and Nick Nikki earlier to today they went through all this in pretty great detail. So you've had a chance to see some of the work that's happening to advance your goal statements around the economy. Next slide. But what's really kind of unique about your committee is that you have some other areas or some other goal statements from other priority areas that I think connect to you. So clearly you're going to be doing a lot of work within the economy priority area, but you are also going to have other touch points. And so one is in our infrastructure and environment priority area. Um, we do have goal statements that relate to the concept of not only is our rebuild going to happen, but we're going to do it in a way that's more resilience resilient and even if that takes a little bit longer, we're going to try to get this right as we rebuild this damage infrastructure. So I see a role for PED in that also kind of the the idea of as we as we do generally rebuild and think about our infrastructure and environment just recognizing the importance of the environment and that and maintaining sustainability throughout. Again that's another touch point for this committee. And then finally, one of the one of the key uh action items or goal statements for the people priority is the concept of neighborhood resilience hubs and neighborhood level preparedness. Again, because environment is part of your scope, that's another item that will come to PED for your consideration. So, you guys are actually of all the committees, you probably touch the most

priority areas. So, you're going to have a very diverse and at times complex FY26 work plan, I believe. Next slide. This is your scope. I'm not going to read this to you. We've been through this at your last meeting, but again, you're touching on land use and transportation. Comprehensive planning goals. Economic development is really key for this fiscal year. Next slide. Then your scope also includes, you know, kind of the concept of business development and expansion. that that can include things like workforce development. And then finally, kind of the environmental piece that's moved to this committee, which is supporting our municipal climate action plan goals. And then this the idea of kind of these neighborhoodled resilience efforts that I think we're going to spend a lot of time on this year. Next slide. So we can kind of start to look at so this is this is your this is how kind of the council priorities. So these are your four priority areas. economy, housing, people, infrastructure, and environment. And as you're aware of, and we talked about this at the retreat we had with Fountain Works, one of the things that we did is we began a discussion of kind of the staff's organizational work plan project. So these are kind of the key areas that your staff will really be working on in FY26. And again you can see economy clearly is within you know alignment of this committee but as I discussed on the previous slide you can see some other areas and other council recovery priority areas that also touch this committee and these are kind of highlevel buckets. So for example I'll take riverfront revitalization you know they're parts of that they're there projects that happen within that. So we're going to rebuild the French Broad park system. We're going to look at Wreck Park. Those are things that are going to happen. Those are projects that are kind of under the umbrella of riverfront revitalizations. Much of that infrastructure rebuild will probably go to policy, finance, and infrastructure

committee. But another part of riverfront revitalization is how do we manage the the rebuild? What what do land use patterns look like? Um you know, what what is you know, flood control and and and resilience matters look like? there's a lot of policy um focus that's going to happen under re riverfront revitalization and that's the part that would come to ped for your direction and guidance. So we got to tease this out more but I think this this just gives you the higher level framework of how the staff work starts to align with your priority areas and subsequently with your council committee structure. Any questions on this? Is this making sense so far? Okay, I'm g keep going. Next slide. So the work plan uh next slide. So again the way the way we kind of look at your task is you know we just covered the six kind of organizational work plan areas that staff's working on those clearly will come to you. You know as we begin another another example as we begin to talk about our DR funds and what economic revital revitalization looks like through the DR program. This is the committee where those discussions will happen. So you'll see a lot of that, but we're going to show you some of that on the work plan for the first quarter. But I also want to be, you know, we just had an update from transportation. There's still just the normal nuts and bolts of city government that you still have to work on. So we kind of call this core services, but you'll continue to see things that come to you that are really more within the the realm of what we do as a city government. Whether it's micromobility, whether it's an update from DSD on construction trends, you'll still have that kind of information that comes to you along with your recovery priorities. Ne any questions on that or maybe next slide.

So, this is a really good example. We've gotten to the end of July, so we've we've we've done those items. Uh, one thing that we did today is we actually now have new items to add to your August agenda because we're bringing back social districts and some of the fee waivers. So, we've got a third item now we'll have scheduled for August. But, this is just kind of a look at quarter one for this committee. I think this is really going to fill up and I don't have a quarter two, three, and four yet, but I'm going to show you a slide we can talk about. But again, you can see next month along with what you add is we're going to start talking about what DR looks like. So I know one of the things that's critical for the community is you know kind of the idea of business support. So CED will be back in front of you in August to begin and again be clear we don't even have the DR funds in place yet but we know we need to start thinking about what that looks like when we do have access to those funds and also going to talk about some of the recovery specific economic recovery strategies we can begin to pursue. And again, you look at September, you we be we starting to see maybe bringing in the EEDC and what our partners look like. Um heard Land of Sky today, so we can talk about maybe how we have Land of Sky better integrated. But you start to see probably tea up things for this committee.

If you can go to the next slide and we can stop for a question, Councilman. Go ahead, Councilman.

Well, I I do have a question. I guess this is the slide that I was waiting for. Um so after an a very illuminating conversation as the new member of peed um I met with uh Ben and Jade and provided a like a two sheet on my takeaways from that that I presented to the members or sent to the members of this committee but also to our other council members including the mayor. Um and I we had identified 24 potential data sets around the six departments of planning and urban design, transportation, sustainability, community and economic development, development services and decre. And for me, it seemed like the one where we could really level up our use of data and the existing staff time and analysis while syncing up with our recovery goals would be this jobs pipeline. And Sage, I know that you're familiar with like the housing units pipeline is what how I imagined it would work is you kind of like can see what's coming on deck and get regular updates. Um, it could include new jobs in our community, our tax incentives to bring new jobs to our community, um, where we use tax incentive or land to grow existing local jobs, um, our own data as a major employer in the region. Um, it's it seemed to me a place where we could really start to tell the story and keep track of the good work we're doing, maintaining what makes Asheville really unique. Um but also because jobs are how people are going to be able to afford housing. Um so that's the one thing that I think we could really level up on. Um and then the second one is when I looked at this list in advance, I was reminded that this is a lot of work. We have a lot of planning work happening. Um it's going to take a lot of staff time, but we also have our advisory board. So I know we're going to have our 3x3 meetings with the council this week. Um,

but I'm really hopeful and eager that we'll find a way to engage our advisory boards like the urban forestry commission, like the neighborhood advisory committee, um, riverfront development, etc. to help us do this work.

Thanks, Kim. Yeah, I I think to the point of using data, something I did on the public safety committee was institute quarterly updates from public safety for data tracking, and we're we're planning to do that for this committee as well. I love the framing of the jobs pipeline that you introduced. I think that's really strong. Um, and as you mentioned, HCB gets housing updates. I was asking that we could have that data come through this committee as well for our context. Um, and then I think there's some other categories too, like quality of life, um, repairs for recovery, but also the development pipeline. And so, um, I think we weren't able staff wasn't able to kind of get that first rendition in this July meeting. And I don't remember if we're targeting in August or September, but hopefully we'll start that quarterly cycle soon. I think maybe September so that we can get on that quarterly track and really appreciate your contribution to the jobs pipeline idea.

Sage, yeah, just more comments on the jobs pipeline idea. Um, do we have does the chamber do anything like that? Like I've seen something but could be dialed in more. Right. And um and even when I saw it, I remember thinking like how do we get this data? But um I love the idea. I I don't know that we can take it on. I feel like we're so overwhelmed, but um our staff are. But I wonder if some kind of relationship with the chamber and improved process on past effort could be done.

Yeah. And I've just reached out to both um the chamber, the EDC and Land of Sky Regional Council and said, "Hey, we want to start having quarterly data updates." Like what you got next time um Land of Sky is provides the unemployment information. That's another metric I'm tracking. And so I'd love that to come through here. So hoping that staff and these other agencies can put their heads together and say what data is happening already that we can pull together an indicator picture. So like you're saying, it's not a new project. It's not a new research project, but what what picture can we see from our own data capture and our partner capture? And what those other organizations may or may not have is where our policies and land use and incentives have resulted in how many jobs like for example living wage jobs if we want to pull that in from our economic development or community development. I'm also thinking about the number of grants that we hopefully are going to see pass through our CDBGDR and if we're the holder of data then how do we release it quickly and effect effectively for our partners. Thanks.

This is my last slide, so I'm gonna add one or two more things. And those are great points and council only, we appreciate the um kind of the brainstorm and the data. And I still see a lot of our department directors and departments are still on the call and they they all have that they all have seen that and we are we just we're going to give you that data. We just got to come up with the sequencing through the course of the year. I know Nikki Reed and Rachel Taylor. Right now, we're kind of working on the the thought of like a job jobs data and pipeline and how we coordinate with the EDC and partners. So, that is at your direction well underway. So, we're excited to kind of bring some of that back um to help provide a framework for decision- making. Last thing I'll say on this, this isn't all the things that probably need to be done. There's a lot. The list is very long. Um, I tried to highlight a few things here that I feel pretty confident that we're going to have to or need to take on this coming fiscal year. It is a lot of work and probably a good opportunity for me to say this fills our plates pretty well. Doesn't mean we can't do other things, but just be mindful of doing other things sometimes. Um, you may impact this. I think part of that is is trying to find ways to use partners to help with some of this work we want to accomplish. Um the highlighting is important and this is this is for a future meeting but what I tried to do is I I highlighted four items. These are items to me that pretty clearly would have a connection to an advisory board format. So I would I would offer these as examples is I would think when we start this process of updating the comp plan in UDO that pretty clearly is a task that you could assign to an advisory board to kind of work with staff on that. I think the UFC is obviously where you would want to assign the urban forestry master plan work. You know, maybe maybe sack could line up with some of the resilience hub work. So, I think this is just a good example. We've got a lot of work on this slide

and I think you as a committee have a great opportunity to really kind of assign your advisory boards to play a a policy type role or maybe an engagement type role in some of this work. And I think if we can really figure this out, we could have a framework in place where council staff and your advisory board function are kind of working together to accomplish some of these important tasks. That's really all I have and I'll any other questions or conversation we would welcome.

Thanks Ben. I think that's a really good point. I mean, I know that we're still working through if we introduce task forces that allow us to get out of our current board and commission silos and have more integrated collaborative community input at the bigger topic levels of economy, housing, etc. Um, but I know like looking at that list, I think planning, zoning, ECC is a perfect partner to really provide the technical skills on helping us scope the comp plan and UDO update. I would love to see them really engage there. And then I think these other ones, you know, depending on if we do these four super committees or task forces, they would be made up of different folks. And I agree, I think that we're going to need a lot of community leadership for those areas. So looking forward to that. All right. Any other thoughts on this before I go to public comment of which we do have one caller? All right. Katie, has that caller been patient and still in the line?

Yes. Just one moment, please. Will I get them queued up? Caller ending in 520. Your line is now open and you have three minutes.

Hi there. Um, this is Rachel Cohen with Sunrise Movement. You're probably pretty used to hearing my voice by now on these meetings. So, hello everyone. Good to see you. Um, it's been quite a marathon of a meeting, but I will just quickly say, um, I appreciate all the work that is going on as always. Between the last meeting and this one, we've seen another round of climate disasters across the country, including flash flooding here in North Carolina, highlighting once again the devastation of the climate emergency that we are in. Um, and I know you are all deeply concerned about this. I've seen and appreciated, you know, your appearances at community events related to climate, your statements on social media. It's all been very encouraging. Um, and yet I I come to these meetings and it's as if the climate emergency is not a thing and it's just very confusing and startling and baffling frankly. So, I wanted to just suggest a couple of things that you all brought up that could really benefit from that lens and I hope to see them in the future and perhaps we can talk more about them offline another time. Um, for example, when we talk about economic recovery and I see a lot of talk about economic resilience, I'm still not hearing a lot of conversation about how our economy and our workforce needs to change if we're going to switch to 100% renewable energy in the next couple of decades. So when I hear about all these really important and great initiatives that are going on, I want to see more and Sunrise wants to see more about developing our workforce for green jobs. How are we making sure our workforce is prepared for the jobs of the future? Is that

built into our planning? When I look at the ULI scope, um I see so little focus on climate change mitigation, which should be a critical component of this works. I see a little bit of discussion of adaptation and resilience and that's very important. But guys, we can't just throw up our hands and say, "Well, climate change is happening, so we just have to make sure, you know, we have a little bit of infrastructure to be resilient." No, we have to fight climate change as well. Um, I would also like to say that in your work plan, whenever I see the CDBGDR stuff mentioned, it is almost always related to economic recovery, and that is great. But those funds can also be used for climate change mitigation and sustainability initiatives. And I don't see robust conversation about that. I would like to particularly bring up that with the recent um federal budget reconciliation bill, a lot of the incentives for building things like renewable energy are going out by the end of this year. If we do not build things like micro grids ASAP now, it's going to be much more expensive for us in the future than it will be if we start this year. So, time is now up.

Thank you so much for joining. I know that um if you have any more, feel free to email because I always really appreciate collaborating, hear your thoughts. All right. Um thank you everybody for a big long meeting. I think this is an indicator of how long we can have this update. Just shows the multiplier of how hard staff is working and how much work is being done. And I appreciate it. So, thanks everybody. We will talk next month.