Town Council - Regular Meeting

Guys? Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the May 6 meeting of the Chapel Hill Town Council. We are pleased to have you join us. This evening, we have two items on our agenda for discussion or action.

And I will note for everyone that in a response to a suggestion from staff, we have flipped the two items. As a result, our first item will be a public hearing regarding a drainage easement closure at 1301 Fordham Boulevard, which is expected to be relatively short. And our second item is the presentation of the f y twenty twenty six twenty seven manager's recommended budget. To get us started, we have proclamations. So council members will be bringing the AAPI proclamation to our next meeting.

And this evening, we're pleased to announce National Police Week and Peace Officers Memorial Day. For that announcement, we invite our guardians of the hill to join council member Nawler up front. That means all y'all back there. All y'all. All y'all.

I'm about to be the most well guarded man in all of Orange County for about five seconds. Thanks for being here tonight, everybody. Appreciate it.

If you all wanna call come all behind here and then you'll be on TV.

For Good evening, everyone. Tonight, we recognize National Police Week observed May tenth through sixteenth and honor the dedication of the Chapel Hill Police Department. We also pause to remember the officers nationwide who have lost their lives in the line of duty and express our gratitude to the families who support those who serve. Our officers and professional staff serve with integrity, compassion, and a deep commitment to safeguarding the rights and well-being of everyone in our community. So tonight, in making this proclamation, we invite everyone to join us in honoring and supporting our law enforcement personnel for their continued service to Chapel Hill. Thank you very much.

Council members, if we can take a group picture.

Like like each other. Come on.

Yeah. Folks on this end are gonna have to scooch in a little bit more.

Thank you all for joining us tonight and, of course, for your unwavering dedication and bravery on behalf of Chapel Hill. We're grateful for all you do. Before we move on, we also want to share that May third to ninth is Professional Municipal Clerks Week and invite town clerk Brittany Hunt and members of her team up for a round of applause and thanks. Our clerks, their work keeps our local government transparent, accessible, and accountable, ensuring public records are maintained, meetings are run smoothly, and residents stay informed and engaged. As one of the oldest public positions, the office of the municipal clerk is foundational to the continuity of local government, providing the structure and institutional knowledge that helps our community function effectively day in,

day out. So thank you both very much. And please say thank you to

the rest of the team. We are postponing Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, but I believe it's coming to our next meeting, and we are excited to do that. Up next, we have announcements. Tonight, I have just a couple of quick reminders for everyone. First, it's small business week in here in Chapel Hill.

Our small businesses are really important to our town. They create jobs. They strengthen our community, and they help Chapel Hill feel and be special. To help them thrive, we encourage everyone as you plan weekend activities, getting out and about to show show some love to your favorite local businesses or to try out a new one. Also, May is bike month in Chapel Hill, and there are many, many fun activities coming up.

This Friday, May 8, we'll be hosting a bike themed movie and campfire treats at the community center. Then May eleventh to the seventeenth is bike to work week in Chapel Hill, and we'll be hosting Roll Fest on Saturday, May 16. So please check out the town calendar for all the fun stuff coming up. Finally, council meet again next Wednesday, May 13 at 6PM in the library for a budget work session. It's budget season. And please mark your calendars for Wednesday, May 20 when we'll hold a public hearing on the budget. Council members, council member Rivers, I know has something to share, so I'll start there.

Alright. I ask your patience. I actually wrote it down. I usually don't write things down, but I didn't wanna ramble. At council meeting last week, we discussed the possible reduction of council size and the lengthening of the mayor's term. It is clear from the comments received during the meeting that a diverse set of constituents do not agree with

those

propositions. I am grateful to the people that came out to share their insightful concerns for their for their continued leadership in the community. I was in support of those changes and continue to find potential merit in them. However, I am not making this statement to litigate or debate the proposed changes. I am making this statement in response to something else that happened last week that caused me to revisit why I initially supported these changes.

We found out that our son's fifth grade trip to Washington DC was canceled. This trip is an annual tradition that many students eagerly anticipate. The trip was canceled because of significantly rising cost. Unfortunately, significantly rising cost is an apt description of many facets of everyday life. Grocery bills, filling up your car at the gas station, utilities, rent or mortgage payments, significantly rising costs are a defining feature of 2026.

These are uniquely hard times. People are at capacity in a country that has set fire to the social safety net. The cancellation of the trip to DC is a stark reminder that the people of Chapel Hill are not immune to this pain. In many ways, Chapel Hill is more vulnerable than other parts of the country. These rising costs are falling on a community that was significantly impacted by those funding cuts and layoffs in 2025.

People in Chapel Hill are hurting right now. The current federal government, at best, is a failure and more often than not taking actions that actively harm our quality of life. The state government is not not much better and potentially worse than its inability to pass a budget. The county is seeking to reduce funding to our town. The people of Chapel Hill are facing unprecedented difficulties, and no one is coming to help.

We have to rely on each other. We on town council need to be more agile in our response to long standing issues, such as restoring our aging infrastructure and preparing for a changing climate. We also have to be better prepared for unforeseen challenges on the horizon. Responsive and effective government is key to facing an uncertain future. In coordination with local leaders and the people of Chapel Hill, we must continue to seek ways ways to make Chapel Hill government more responsive and efficient.

The times are too difficult, economic conditions are too precarious, and people are struggling too hard to simply stay in town for us to accept business as usual. In closing, what makes Chapel Hill special are the values that we hold dear, diversity, inclusivity, inclusivity, and kindness. I advocate for a more responsive and effective government to ensure that we can continue to uphold these values in trying times. Thank you for your time and patience.

Thank you. Well said. Council members, anyone else? Okay. Next up, we invite members of the public to comment on items not listed on the printed agenda. Do we have well, then I'm gonna not give instructions. We don't have anybody. K. K. That brings us to our consent agenda. And do we need to is it amended consent?

No.

No? The contract was already on. Got it. Just wanna make sure we get it. Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda?

So moved.

Moved by mayor Pro Tem Berry, seconded by council member Sharp. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say nay. Motion is unanimous.

Okay. And as noted, we're doing our last item first. So item number six is a public hearing on drainage easement closure at 1301 Fordham Boulevard. And welcome, mister Garris. Oh, here we go with the table. You and John Richardson with your table shenanigans.

Patience, counsel.

Try being in a picture.

Hello, council members. My name is Rob Garris, and I'm an engineer in the town's public works department. We've received a request from a member of our community to close an existing public drainage easement located at 1301 Fordham Boulevard. It's the intersection of Fordham and Ephesus Church Road. This presentation will take approximately five minutes and maybe followed by a public hearing and potentially public comment. For the new council members, this is a routine process. Public Works coordinates maybe two to three of these a year with council. Some years more, some years less, but relatively routine and short. Tonight staff are recommending that council open and close a public hearing. And if council so chooses, take action on this request.

Your decision should be based on whether the closing of this public asset would be detrimental to the public interest or the the property rights of any individual. This is per North Carolina general statute 160 a dash two ninety nine. Basically, what this statute explains is is it lays out a process for the town to close public rights of way. We're following this as well as this a public arrangement, not necessarily right of way, but still a public asset. The main points of this are to to hold a public hearing.

We have to advertise it for four weeks ahead of time and post signs of the right of way. Barring any comments from the public hearing, the subdivision will close right of way then split amongst the funding property owners if we decide to relinquish interest in it. Any recording costs would be borne by the property owners receiving land. So where exactly are we looking at? This is, let's say, corner of Ephesus Church Road and Fordham Boulevard.

Currently the site of the newly constructed Atlas Blue Hill Apartments, if you're familiar with that. It's across from Trader Joe's and the food line over there. The town originally acquired the Strange Easement a little bit over ten years ago in 2015. It was just part of draining the Ephesus Church Roadway into a drainage ditch along Fordham Boulevard. Part of the new development there, the Atlas Blue Hill Apartments I mentioned before, that pipe was demolished.

There's no longer any assets within that right of way. I think this this went before council in in 2021. And they said they they're wrapping construction now. The town has no apparent need for the strange easement. We've talked to NCDOT. They don't have a need for the strange easement. And Owasa does not have any infrastructure within this easement. And then like I said before, we've advertised this to the public and have not received any objections to this closure. As far as financial impact to the town, there really isn't any any property transferring transfer and recording costs would be by the people receiving land. As I said at the start of this presentation, town staff are recommending the council open and close the public hearing.

And if council so chooses to take action on this request, your decision should be based on whether the closing will be detrimental to the public interest or the property rights of any individual. That's all I have. Any questions?

Councilmember Sharp. Hi.

Thanks. I'm sorry. I'm sure that this should be open and shut because it sounds like we don't have any pipes there anymore and that we aren't draining anything anywhere there anymore. But I drove down Fordham Boulevard in the middle of Chantal last night. Oh, not last not last night. Thank goodness. Not last night. Last summer. And it was a lake right there. And so I just would really like to have a little more because I wasn't on council when the easement was acquired.

And I wasn't on council when the building was approved in 2021. So if I could just have a little more historical knowledge of how drainage is being Yeah. Absolutely. Solved over there and just in the in the in the environment that we're in, giving up the ability to drain anything anywhere feels like a bad idea. So and I'm sure it's not, but I would just love a little more information.

No. And and that's fair. And and and hindsight, Prashiv had a a plan of the development on the slideshow because the the the building is over where the pipe was. Basically, if you can see on the screen, guess, sorry, the bottom photo, the big black outline is based on the property line that existed prior to development. As of now the building basically sits right along that property line. So the entire area of the easement is occupied by a building at this point.

So essentially the we acquired the easement when the property was, why did we

Oh, sorry. Yeah. Yeah. It was back in 2014 or 2015. It was part it was part of the drainage system for Ephesus Church Road. Fordham Boulevard has a a channel that goes along it. That's now piped underneath that keeps going. It'll be north. This 15 inch concrete pipe used to connect into that channel.

Uh-huh.

Now it goes across Ephesus Church Road and joins up with the flow downstream.

Okay. Okay.

Sorry. Last said in in hindsight, put a I should put a plan of development in this.

I'm I guess I'm just I'm assuming then that whatever drainage situation the property owners have put in place instead is adequate. Yes.

Mayor Pro Temburi.

Thank you. I appreciate my colleagues' questions because that leads me to ask why was this property owner allowed to develop when we had an easement there?

It was the curb line of access Church Road was reworked through the development process. I'm not sure what their reasoning for that was. I was on staff at that time. But part of the approved plans were to vacate the easement. So they had accounted for it when these were submitted back in 2021.

So the town staff had already indicated that the plan was to vacate at that time the easement? Yes. Okay. And was council notified of that?

I don't know. Okay.

I'm still curious because I didn't understand the response that you gave to council member Sharp about where I two was caught right there at that intersection. And, thankfully, there's that brand new wide sidewalk that my little Prius made it up onto to get past the water that was pooling right there. So can you explain to us again where that water is being channeled? And I understand it wasn't being channeled. Mhmm. It hadn't been channeled for some time, but I am curious where it's been.

Could you and within the intersection, where where was the the puddle? It's or the

front end?

I was on the side of oh, no. I'm sorry. Ephesus. I was on Elliot's side. So not there Okay. At another section.

Fordham and and Elliot. I was on the Ephesus side of Fordham, and it was all along that apartment building. It was, like, a it was a lake. It was, right like, up to the road in

the Or along Fordham Boulevard? Like, you driving on Fordham Boulevard? Or were you driving?

And yeah.

Yeah. So that that that area should, theory, be all handled by the DOT's roadside ditch, roadside swale.

Sorry? You

spoke about the drainage ditch that this instead of being the drainage being handled by the pipe that was in this easement is now is now draining into that ditch. Correct?

No. No. So so the pipe was for drainage from Ephesus Church Road.

Okay. And that's not now being channeled onto Fordham.

It shouldn't be. Okay. No. They're they're catching a sunset.

Sorry. I don't mean to No. No. No. No. No. No.

It's it's Right. Just

and I'm grateful that you asked me for further clarification because I was thinking of the wrong intersection. So thank you for that.

I'm Just a reminder too. I mean, in a thousand year storm, the area is gonna be wet. Correct? I mean, there's gonna be water because the no system is designed to handle a thousand year storm. And so I under I appreciate and agree with the questions about managing our stormwater, but I do think we can't expect this or the replacement to handle that kind of water either. So but I think I'm hearing an interest that maybe when we talk about stormwater again that we can understand kind of the the flow and generally how the area is being remediated. I think that would be really helpful just as education for us at some point.

Yeah. No. Always always on the talk on storm water with you all.

You're a good sport. Council, do I have a motion to open the public hearing?

Moved. Second.

Moved by council member Ryan, seconded by council member Nallert. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say nay. Motion is unanimous. Any other questions, council? Do we have oh, council member Ryan? Well, we have to ask her if the public wants to speak. Are there members of the public wishing to speak? Well, cool.

Motion on the floor. Oh, we have to close the public hearing first. Second. Moved by council member Miller Fucci, seconded by council member McCullough. All those in favor, please say aye.

Council member e. Who am I? Mayor Pro Temp Berry would like to make a comment since we're in that section. Thank you for this. Anytime while we may have just faced a thousand year storm, we in this community are very sensitive to storm water. Right? We're very sensitive to rainfall here. And I think it's only our due diligence to ask questions to make sure that we understand. And while I may have been confused about the intersection, I'm not confused about my interest in understanding this before I approve. I just wanna make that clear. And thank you for explaining.

Absolutely. Yeah. No. Anytime. Okay.

Motion on the floor. All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay. Motion is unanimous.

Okay.

Thank you all. Wait. Did we do both? We approved r two. Correct? Okay. We didn't?

No. I think we closed the public hearing.

We closed the public hearing. Second. Moved by listen. I'm going need a lot of hand holding. Moved by council member Ryan, seconded by Mayor Pro Tem Barry. All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay. Motion is unanimous. Alright. Our final item is item number seven, a presentation of the f y twenty six twenty seven manager's recommended budget. And I believe our town manager, Ted Voorhees, is here to walk us through the manager's recommended budget.

Good evening, mayor and council. Before I get started with the budget presentation, I want to thank our budget team, two of whom are represented here tonight, Amy Olin, our BMS director. Really appreciate your attention to this process. It's one of the most important processes you do. Matt Brinkley leading the budget as his full time job.

Thanks so much for that. I know Sally assisted you as well. Appreciate all her work. I also want to thank the communications team for assisting with putting a lot of things together, some of which you'll be seeing, some of which will be shared with staff, and then some of which will be shared with the community. So we plan to share some of the information that you've got tonight out with the public, and then invite them to our public hearing, work sessions, and then track any questions that we're answering for counsel.

So that engagement will be going out very shortly. We'll also be sending something to staff tomorrow that gives them what they want to know about the budget. So couldn't do that without them. I also want to thank our department heads and their support teams for getting everything in on time to be able to work through this process. That's really critical.

And then Lauren and Mary Jane for helping me work through my first budget with the town of Chapel Hill. And so with that, I'm going to start the presentation. Good evening Mayor and Council. Tonight I am pleased to present my recommended fiscal year twenty six-twenty seven budget. While I have the honor of presenting this budget, it represents the work of many hands across the organization.

Departmental leadership carefully reviewed costs, looked for savings, considered needs and reflected on your priorities. They worked closely with my office and our business management and communications teams to develop the information I'm sharing tonight. I'm incredibly proud of the work the Town team has done with this budget to align our financial plans with your strategic priorities, while sustaining high quality services and reinforcing long term fiscal stability. Before I walk you through how we built this budget, I want to share the bottom line up front. I'm pleased to share that I'm not recommending a tax increase.

This budget holds the property tax rate at $0.50 per $100 evaluation. The total recommended budget is $169,700,000 That's a 3.4% increase over last fiscal year. The general fund makes up nearly $100,000,000 of that total with our four enterprise funds, the debt fund, CIP fund and other annually budgeted funds making up the remaining 69,700,000. Now I'll walk you through how our recommended budget comes together. We begin each year by reviewing major revenue sources.

Like any local government, property taxes are our main source of revenue and how we fund our everyday core services from fire and police to sanitation and parks. For fiscal twenty twenty seven, we expect a 6.9% increase in property tax revenue, which means an additional $3,500,000 for the general fund and a million dollars across the debt service and transit funds. This expected increase is based on data from Orange County that shows that as a result of a much smaller number of property tax appeals, property values and therefore property tax revenues will exceed earlier projections. Sales tax revenues are also growing with current collections coming in at about 5% higher than expected. We project an additional 3% increase in the next fiscal year.

As the revenue picture comes into focus, we consider how we can best steward those dollars to serve our community. For fiscal year twenty twenty seven, we are recommending strategic investments across four areas: Advancing Council's strategic priorities, competitive compensation for our talented workforce, funding and strengthening our core services, and continuing our progress toward long term fiscal sustainability. At your retreat in January, you identified four strategic priorities: complete community, environmental resiliency, housing, and Organizational and Fiscal Sustainability. In addition to guiding your work for the next two years, these goals also guided the development of this budget. Complete Community is a bold vision for our community's future that advances thoughtful growth, multimodal connectivity and vibrant vital neighborhoods.

This budget supports our staff in bringing your vision to life. It funds our continued work on the Lumo rewrite and it also enables new initiatives to engage builders, developers and investors who are aligned with our vision. And we're funding a study to look for economic development opportunities along our bus rapid transit route. This budget also supports your vision for everywhere to everywhere greenways. As you know, we are in the midst of a feasibility study and I believe our town team can make progress toward your vision while that study is still ongoing.

I've started conversations with our business management and public works teams about how next year we can leverage anticipated excess fund balance and our public works staff to build some smaller scale quick wins greenways projects that will advance this important priority. I look forward to sharing more about this with you in the fall. Our community knows that we are committed to the environment because you've made environmental resiliency one of our ongoing strategic goals. In fiscal year twenty seven, we'll update our climate action plan and continue to green our fleet, solarize our facilities, and mitigate the impacts of climate change. We'll also continue to implement our stormwater master plan through new and continuing programs based on our recent conversations with you.

Because of your focus, our staff and our partners, we're making real progress on our housing goals. This budget continues council's direction to dedicate nearly 3¢ of the tax rate to affordable housing, supporting the creation and preservation of homes for low and moderate income households. With this budget, we'll also continue our efforts with community partners to address homelessness and our work to reposition our public housing program. Your goals for operational and fiscal sustainability are seen throughout this recommended budget. We know that sustaining high performing operations means investing in people and equipment and it means using data to inform decision making and resource allocation.

We also know that your ongoing commitment to our five year budget strategy is helping us get closer to a sustainable level of funding for the people, programs, and services that our community values. Our employees are our greatest asset and they face real challenges from everyday stress and long term burnout to the rising cost of living and struggles with work life balance. Their skills are also in demand for other Triangle local governments who offer competitive pay and benefits. This budget invests in our employees in the following ways: A 4% of market pay increase, which helps us retain our excellent talent, promotes operational stability and reduces costs associated with high turnover. It funds mandatory increases in the state retirement contributions and a 10% increase in medical insurance costs.

That's due to broader trends in the insurance market, including higher claims experience and industry wide price adjustments. This budget also includes three new positions to ensure staffing keeps pace with service demands. Those positions are a fleet technician, a library experiences assistant and a destination coordinator for our economic development team. When we talk about our core services, we talk about everything from police and public works to planning and parks and recreation. And we talk about all of the town functions that support those services: procurement, contracts, fleet, human resources, technology and more.

As with your household budget, our organizational budget is facing rising costs across the board. It costs more to provide all of our services, whether that's filling up our police cars with gas or renewing the software we use to check out library books. And our staff is always looking for ways to keep costs down while maintaining excellent service. Here are just a few examples of that in action. Our communications and engagement team saved $12,000 by leveraging staff interpreters rather than outside vendors.

This has also led to better connections and increased trust with our under engaged residents. Our police department saved the town $17,000 by conducting driving records checks in house rather than through an outside contractor. In addition to cost savings, this has also improved the turnaround time. Our parks and recreation team is saving over $18,000 annually by revamping the duties of aquatic specialists so that they both lifeguard and lead programs rather than relying on temporary staff and outside contractors. There are many more stories of cost saving and efficiency from departments.

And across all departments, costs continue to rise at an unprecedented rate. Here are a few examples of the inflationary increases we're experiencing for the everyday services our community members expect and enjoy. Our recreation staff shares that in 2022 the cost of a basketball was $59 Just four years later, that same basketball cost $99. The c o two our aquatics team uses to regulate pH levels in our swimming pools has doubled in costs since 2022. In the last two years, public works uniform rental costs have increased by 15%.

In the last four years, the road salt that public works needs for de icing roads has increased by 38%. While we always have inflationary increases for software, we are also facing a very sharp increase in hardware costs. Compared to last year's order, costs have increased by 32% and vendors are warning us that prices could potentially double by this fall. These increased costs are happening across every single department, program and service we offer. That's why in addition to asking our staff to continue their good work to save money and increase efficiency, I am recommending an additional $544,000 to address these rising operational costs and ensure the ongoing excellence of our everyday services.

Some of our core services and infrastructure are addressed in your five year budget strategy, which aims to address backlogs across multiple town operations. Here's how this budget continues our path to long term operational and fiscal sustainability. Our community expects well maintained buildings and streets, but years of deferred maintenance remains a significant challenge. This budget invests an additional $250,000 annually in facility needs such as HVAC improvements, roof replacements and small repairs. It invests another $250,000 annually in street resurfacing covering an additional two to three streets.

Our aging vehicle fleet requires ongoing investment to both address inflationary repair costs and make good on our commitment to electrification. This budget expands the replacement program by funding six additional vehicles beyond the 17 already planned. Fire capital needs remain steep. Increasing annual funding from $500,000 to $1,000,000 moves us closer to addressing essential equipment needs, vehicle replacements, facility designs for stations three and four, and safety tools that protect all our residents and firefighters. Our five year budget outlook continues to guide our path to long term operational and fiscal sustainability.

And while we can't account for every unknown or eventuality, I'm confident that the good work we continue to do together is creating a more solid fiscal footing for us. We have four enterprise funds that are separate from our general fund. For fiscal year twenty seven, two of those funds are decreasing while two are increasing. The transit fund decreases slightly due to changes in interest income, federal grants and shifting Route 420 back to operation by GoTriangle. The parking fund decreases by 1% and is balanced with the transfer from the debt service fund.

A parking study started this summer will guide long term sustainability. Public housing increases 4% to meet rising operational costs and storm water increases 23% including a recommended fee adjustment to fund system mapping and critical infrastructure work that are required by our permit. In summary, this recommended budget strengthens our financial foundation, advances community priorities, and ensures Chapel Hill remains resilient, well run, and ready for the future. I believe that it reflects our values and advances our mission of learning, serving and working together to build a community where everyone thrives. As we move through the fiscal year twenty twenty seven budget process, we welcome your questions and feedback.

Thank you, mayor and council. This consider us kicked off for moving the ball into your court. I guess that's a mixed metaphor of basketball and football. But we're looking forward to meeting with you over the next few days to take deeper dives into your interest areas and get your questions. And then on the thirteenth, a week from today, we'll have a chance to really work through those questions and make sure everybody's on the same page.

Fortunately, with no tax increase and a promising revenue picture, we're able to offer a budget that we think meets your needs without having to go through cuts and other scenarios that usually make these processes a little harder to get through smoothly. So I'm blessed by inheriting some good work from the current fiscal year and look forward to working with you as we go forward. And at this point, I'd be happy to answer any questions about that.

Okay. Council questions. And just a reminder that we're gonna do briefings, and then we'll have a work session, I think, and then a public hearing. So if we can just keep our questions somewhat big picture, and then we can dive in as we go through the process. I saw council member Rivers followed by council member McMahon followed by council member Ryan.

I really like the video. Can we get a copy of that?

Yes. We will be sharing it out to you. Okay. Yep.

And it's okay to show the public? Because I think it'd

It is. That'll be part of our public engagement too. We'll post that up and send it out, send links out on our socials.

Council member McMahon?

Yeah. Thank you. That was initially shocking to see the video with you right here. But I was watching. I was like, this has it it has value beyond this meeting.

So I appreciate that. Staying high level, there's been a lot of information, perhaps misinformation about the county funding the library. If there's a way we could get some information out quickly to the community on facts from our side, that would be helpful because I know there's different numbers going around. So that's one particular issue that I would hope we could address maybe before the work session or in some way so that people have actual information on how that might impact our budget, maybe work with the county to make sure that information is accurate. I think I think we're looking for a source of accurate information on that.

So I believe that would be helpful. From what I'm seeing online and hearing from the community, that also raises a concern or request for me, maybe from other council members or not. But it would be helpful to have a public engagement session outside of the work session and the public hearing primarily because of concerns about county budgets, concerns about school budgets. I have many people that struggle to figure out what's the appropriate question to bring to us versus another body. And my concern would be that if it waits to the public hearing, we would have people coming with questions that might not actually pertain to our budget.

And with the three minute allotment, there may not be sufficient time to help people understand how their issue is important but not something we can deal with. And I would hate to be in a position of telling someone, thanks for coming out, but we can't help you. So if there was a way to have some sort of guided conversation where public members could come ask these questions, I would also hate for them to come and be embarrassed to be asking a question that is public about their understanding of this. If we could find a way to invite people in in a casual environment where they could ask those questions, I think it would be helpful. So those are my two comments.

Could you share the engagement plan?

I can react to that just briefly. We do have options for counsel to consider on the issue of library funding and the reduction proposed by the county. That will be going out to you shortly as part of your agenda for next week. It has what we believe to be the factual numbers. And so we can talk about how that information might be shared more broadly.

And we'll have to think about exactly how to set up any kind of a meeting. We might speak with the friends because I think they've picked up the mantle on this. And perhaps as a way we can work with them to set something up for folks to talk.

If I real quick, I meant for the meeting with the public would be for the overall budget, not the issue with the library in Thank

you.

Councilmember Ryan? Yeah, I'd like

to pick up on the engagement issue. I know that we're doing the process a little bit differently this year where you're having us meet in small groups so we can ask questions and do a lot of our fact finding. And I'm fine with that. The only issue I have is that those are not open to

the public.

So a lot of the in-depth discussion we'll be having won't be available to our community. So I would really like to make sure that we have a time when they can come in, they can see this presentation, they can hear from the budget director, and they have a chance to ask questions as well and then provide feedback that then would come back to us as we talk either before the work session or certainly before the public hearing. I think that would be really useful. And it could be an hour or two at the library one night. It doesn't have to be super elaborate. But I think, again, given our change in procedure this year, I'd really like to make sure that the public has that kind of engagement opportunity.

Mayor Pro Temburi.

This is going be a comment because they all seem to be comments. So I'm just going to follow suit. I would ask us to be mindful of having our staff to address other bodies' fiscal decisions. And so how it impacts us directly, the library, yes, But the school funding, I would question that.

I don't think that's what he was asking for, but I'll let council member make I

thought I

heard school come from here.

Yeah, because there's different bodies that have different funding stuff going on, And no one's really clear who does what. So we might have people coming here that have issues about that are better directed to the school board or better directed to the county. And it would be helpful, in my opinion, for that to happen in a more informal environment outside of the public hearing. I could be wrong.

Okay. So that makes me very curious and concerned about our staff taking on the responsibility of educating the public about health. And I'm happy to hear from others, but I don't want to set our staff up to have to answer for those.

Council Member McCullough followed by Council Member Rivers. Yeah.

I like the idea of doing that. And maybe it's in a town talk letter even,

or

not the you know, the newsletter. But having seen enough especially with the planning board having seen enough people come and say, why aren't you doing this? Or I want you to do this for me. And it's like, that's out of our purview, and there's nothing I can do about it. When that happens, they're wasting their time, and they're wasting our time. And if we can help circumvent that by giving them that instruction ahead of time, then it might help.

Council member Rivers followed by council member Sharp.

I'm good. Councilperson McCullough covered my response.

Okay. Council member Sharp followed by council member Miller Freeshee.

I think I've just the other benefit that I can see in in council member McMahon's proposal is that it gives an opportunity for you know, in the public hearing, people come and comment to us, but then we aren't able to respond. And so the idea that they could come to us and say, why aren't you doing this about the schools? And we have the opportunity to say because we aren't school board. I think it would be us responding more than this staff less, but also just the opportunity for a back and forth, which they can always, you know, email us and, you know, but I I I think a conversation, I think, could be helpful.

Council member Miller Fucci followed by Mayor Pro Temburi.

I guess I do I have a question. Mayor Drew, could you please share with me, with us, from your experience, what kind of community engagement around budget you have seen to be very helpful and productive?

Well, thank you for that question, councilmember. It's really quite varied depending on community tradition and size and scale and location and complexity. I've seen localities that will have sort of pre budget development community input sessions, workshops, maybe some explanation of how the budget works and then some of the kind of exercises you might expect at something like that where people do dot voting on priorities. Or maybe they do a little gamification where folks are given a budget and work in teams to use monopoly money and show how they might do things. And then the staff would collect that type of information from those sessions and then provide it as feedback to the governing body at some point during the process.

So that's an example. Other places, your next door neighbor has a thing they call coffees with counsel that they do before the budget is released. And they typically go to four three or four neighborhoods and then they have one in Spanish, that becomes kind of a a mix of updates on community specific issues in that part of town along with a budget type briefing that sort of gives some broad outlines of where things are headed with the budget and and get some feedback from speakers that might stand up to say, let's emphasize this or deemphasize that. So I've seen communities do Facebook town hall on the budget. So folks will sort of they'll do a kind of a livestream, maybe kick off with a ten minute briefing on what the environment looks like for the for the budget making and then and then take questions.

You know, all of them are sort of have their own pros and cons. And, you know, we can tailor whatever makes sense for our community that that might meet our need.

So do you think staff can come back with some ideas to present to us that meet the interest that you're hearing from counsel?

We're already planning to share out an engagement plan. Whether it involves a meeting, I don't think that's in the draft as we've got it. But we can take your feedback tonight and see what you might be able to come up with.

Great. Thank you so much, and I'm happy to hear that you all already have a plan. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Mayor Pro Tembary followed by council member Rivers.

Thank you. One of the topics in here, and I know we're gonna have an opportunity to meet in smaller groups, but I want you to know that I am curious about the street. And there's always been a section that I've always asked about. So I'll be asking about that part of town again and what the plan is for there. And also how we are determining which how we're prioritizing the streets as we address them.

Let's see. And back to what I was saying. I wanna make sure that if we have a session and its engagement, then that means that we are, rather than just making a statement of what we address and what we don't, then that implies that there will be discussion and those who will be negotiating for us to do more. And I've certainly had the conversations and long phone calls. I've not gone to the meetings to talk about it because it's not our place to talk about school board and the decisions that they make.

So I just would like for us to tread carefully when we talk about others' budget responsibilities. Thank you.

Councilmember Rivers?

Yeah. Again, thank you, and thank you for taking engagement so seriously. Is it possible that the town can add on to existing events? So I'm thinking, like, for example, the Chinese school already meets. So, like, if there's

a chance to show this video at the Chinese school, that would

be a chance to reach out to our audience. Because I think there's a lot of people who care about the budget, especially after last year's tax increase. So I think it's top of mind. So but also people are busy. And, like, we can have great meetings to set out, but, like, it's kinda hard to break people's routines. That doesn't mean they don't care if they don't show up. It's, like, is there a way we can add yeah. Just add on to existing events. I know that's more work, but I think it's worth it considering all the questions from last year's budget and how people

are feeling fiscally this year.

I agree. I guess my budget specific questions, I have not finished reading the budget yet. So I will be ready by Friday. But in the meantime, first of all, do we have members of the public wishing to speak? Okay.

I guess my general feedback would be that I do really think it's important to do engagement. I always like the idea of tagging on to something that's already happening because I do think people, even in less overwhelming and hectic times, I think people just have a hard time coming to the library to talk about the budget as much as they might actually really want to. I also think I would like us to find a way where we do kind of have our way of doing engagement. I think this would be a great year to start trying to figure that out because I think think we really want to be transparent. We really wanna have that feedback loop back to the council so that we can be not having to go everywhere and be everywhere.

But I guess I would also say that if there are places where it would be easier or more appropriate for me or another elected to be there to answer certain things, I would absolutely be happy to do that. But I also know there are times where that's less helpful or that there are times when it might be more effective to just have staff handling that. And so I think I'm open to whatever ideas you all have, the ways you've seen it work before. But I would really like us to, no matter what kind of year it is, to have to engage our public in some reasonable ways that I think also go meet people where they are. Any other thoughts, comments?

I really like the video. I was also very confused at first because you were sitting here. But then you did start talking again after the video. So I was thankful for that, that we weren't trying to talk to the video. So that was great. But I think it's a great comms tool. And I think the community will appreciate something that's engaging on a topic that is not always the most visually exciting. Even though, Amy, even though, Amy, you are you do a great job. And it is the most important thing we do. But I think people forget, and they want to engage on other things until they realize this is a really important town function. Councilmember Nallert?

Yeah. I'll be very brief. I mean, I find the budget exciting and stimulating every year, so excited to get into it. I just wanted to say to whoever edited the video that when Ted said, we're looking for savings and you did the pan across Franklin Street, I saw that. That was clever. I liked it. That's all.

Okay. Mayor Pro Tem Berry. Thank

you for the video. Thank you to the comms team who put that together. And I think it's great that you were here, but I really love seeing that and that the public will be able to look at it. I appreciated the written information that was on there. And I was kicking myself because I looked down to take notes. I appreciate seeing the words as well as hearing them. So that was really good. I appreciated seeing different scenes around town, some that I have not seen. So I'm going to really look closely at it so I can go visit those places. But I think this is it's exceptional for what we've been doing, and I think it's a great step to communicating with the public.

And I do want to say that I do share my colleagues' desire to engage more with the public. I liked what the mayor was saying of, if we can be helpful, let us know. If it's more helpful for

us

to be not there than there, let us know. But I second that. And I do support how we have been working you all have been working hard to help us communicate the message. And I think that was a really great example.

Okay. The budget has been kicked off.

Thank you. We're not gonna fumble it. We're gonna get it across the goal line.

Okay, all right. Sports ball. Uh-huh, yeah.

Yeah. That's right.

Okay. Do we have a closed session? We do. Okay. You're ready. So Mayor Pro Tem.

Motion to go into closed session under general statute g s one four three dash three one eight dot one one a six.

All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed, please say nay. Motion is unanimous. And Do we need a second? Meeting is What am I

postponed or what are we? What do I say? Suspended?

No. Just everybody across the board.