City Council - Regular Meeting

would like to call to order the Thursday, March 12th, 2026 Concord City Council meeting. Uh, welcome to everybody that's here. If you would please stand and join me for the pledge of allegiance followed by a moment of silence. I

aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Okay, council. Uh, we have one, two, three, four, five sets of minutes to be approved. And I think you have all had copies of those. I have not been made aware of any changes that need to be made. Do I hear a motion to approve the minutes as presented?

Move to approve. Mayor, I'll second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. And we start out with presentations. And we've got a couple proclamations. And I'm going to come down to read those. And if we could ask the members of lambda, epsilon, omega to come up and join me for that. Thank you. Okay, thank you. It's great to have such a such a large group here and I love the colors. Okay, this is a proclamation from the office of the mayor. Whereas Alph Al Alphacappa Alpha Sorarity Incorporated, an international service organization was founded in 1908 on the campus of Howard University in Washington DC. and is the oldest Greek letter organization established by African-American college educated women. And whereas on Sunday, March 12th, 1978, the Lamba Upsilon Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sarority Incorporated was chartered by Dr. Mabber Mabel Parker Mlan. five newly initiated members and 20 other dedicated members residing in the Concord area who were committed to the

AKA mission of service to all mankind. And whereas the 25 visionary chartering members Joyce Lines, Gloria Boston, Carolyn Connor, Elaine King, Vivian Wilson, Carolyn Powell, Martha Lipkcom, Ola Stranger, Dorothy Bost, Patricia Woods, Emma Witherspoon, Johnny Hunt, Betty Batty, Ethel Aaron, Terrence Torrance, Terry Stafford, Mabel Mlan, Elaine Jordan, Johnny Tilman, Priscilla Green, Karen Jones, Yvon Pettis, Harriet Tyler, Bernice Moore, and Vivian Shreves set a foundation for impactful service and community leadership. And whereas Lamba Upsilon Omega has upheld a legacy of supporting education through the annual awarding of scholarships to local high school students, financial contributions to historically black colleges and universities, and significant support to Barb Scotia College in Concord. And whereas the chapter's philanthropy has extended to organizations across the city of Concord and Cabaris County along with communitydriven initiatives such as voter registration, clothing and food drives providing weekend and holiday meals for children and families and health focused events like family health and wellness events. Pink goes red for heart health, mental

health awareness forums, and the Susan G. Kleman walk for the cure. And whereas Lamba Upsilon Omega continues to enrich Concord and Cabaris County through its steadfast dedication to community service, education, fundraising, mentoring, and leadership training. sewing seeds of pos of purpose and positively impacting countless lives. Now therefore, I Stephen M. Morris, mayor of the city of Concord, North Carolina, on behalf of the city council, do hereby proclaim March 12th, 2026 in the city of Concord as Lamba Upsilon Omega Day. I call upon all citizens to recognize and celebrate the contributions of lambda, epsilon, omega to our community and to honor the enduring legacy of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sarity Incorporated. Congratulations.

Yes. Do you have some words you would like to say? Alpha Kappa Alpha Sority Incorporated, Lambda Oops. Our sincere gratitude to Mayor Morris and the city council for the recognition of of our day and lambda Omega day. Um it's been four decades um that we have been in service to Concord and Cabaris County through programming that focus on service, sisterhood, and scholarships. We actually have today is actually our charter day and um it's been 48 years in Cabaris County and we actually have a charter member here with us. So through our legacy and our membership impact, we will continue to stay in service to all mankind.

Thank you. Thank you very much. I also want you to make note of the fact that I wore a pink tie so we would so we would match. That's what you call luck. Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to have all of you here with us. Thank you. Yes. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you.

Mhm. Okay, next up we have a proclamation u an additional proclamation which I will read as follows. Whereas women of every race, class, and ethnic background have made historic contributions to the growth and strength of our nation in countless recorded and unrecorded ways. Whereas this year's theme is leading the change. Women shaping a sustainable future. This theme honors the women who have and are re-imagining and rebuilding systems to ensure long-term sustainability, environmental, economic, educational, social. And whereas women have played and continue to play economic, cultural, and social roles in every sphere of the life of the nation by constituting a significant portion of the labor force working inside and outside of the home and of the volunteer labor force. And whereas women of every race, class, and ethnic background served as early leaders in the forefront of every major progressive social change movement and have served our country courageously in the military. Whereas women have been leaders not only in securing their own rights of suffrage and equal opportunity, but also in the abolitionist movement, the emancipation movement, the industrial labor movement, the civil rights movement and other movements, especially the peace

movement, which create a more fair and just society for all. Now, therefore, I, Stephen M. Morris Mayor and the city council of the city of Concord, North Carolina, do hereby proclaim the month of March, 2026 as Women's History Month in the city of Concord and urge all citizens to observe this month with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities. So, let's give a round of applause for all the women. Yes, sir.

Okay, good point. Thank you for pointing that out. Okay. Now, it is my honor uh to make a presentation to Durk Vander Least. If you would come forward, Durk. Um and tonight we're awarding Durk with the North Carolina Governor Certificate of Appre appreciation. This is granted to recognize the efforts of individual members of the community, organizations or businesses who have contributed outstanding service in North Carolina. Mr. Dirk Vanderly has been the aviation director for the city of Concord since August of 2017, and the impact he has had on the aviation department has been exemplary. His leadership has guided the airport through unprecedented growth precoid through the tumultuous time through COVID and now postcoid recovery and growth. his mantras, we are ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen, which I think he credits to Ritz Carlton and first impression, last impression, have been ingrained in all aviation co-workers to provide all airport users, whether tenants, general aviation customers, or commercial passengers, the best service and best airport possible. During his tenure with the airport, the commercial airline service has expanded from one airline to two airlines serving 10 destinations with the new airline opening a base at

the airport and total passenger traffic increasing 51% in 2025 over 2024. ISBA, International Standard for Business Aircraft Handling was implemented and stage three was achieved, making the airport one of the first municipally airports in the nation to earn this highest certification. Multiple airport projects have been completed to rehab and strengthen all pavement areas of the airside as well as the general aviation parking lots in addition to kicking us off on the design of a new corporate hanger to be built in the next year which is the first one to be built by the airport in nearly 20 years just just to name a few. Mr. Vanderly has been active in the community as a member of the Cabaris Rotary Club, an active volunteer for Meals on Wheels, and has served on the board of the aviation academy of the at the West Cabaris High School, as well as serving on the board of the North Carolina Airports Association. Now, we got a little bit more. In addition to mentoring candidates for their final interview to earn their accredited airport executive credential through the American Association of Airport Executives, Mr. Vanderly has been a huge proponent of our co-workers personal professional development and often encourages everyone to participate

in conferences, seminars and to earn various airport management credentials. In 2023, he himself became an accredited airport executive. This mentorship and encouragement has enabled aviation co-workers to advance into new opportunities within the department as well as the city. And it is my honor to congratulate you and present you with this award which I will read from the state of North Carolina. Josh Stein, Governor, presents this certificate of appreciation to Durk B. Vanderly in recognition of dedication and outstanding service to the great state of North Carolina. Congratulations. And we certainly would like to offer you the opportunity to say a few words if you'd like.

Certainly. Um, first of all, I'd like to uh introduce you to uh my uh partner for life and vanise. We've been married 43 and 3/4 years. And then I also have in the back son number two, Alex, who came in from Arkansas. And then we have our grandson and son and daughter-in-law. Should be on the ground here in about an hour from uh Niceville, Florida. So we really appreciate that for an uh it's been a journey. Uh really has been. Started this in 1981 real quickly where I was a recipient of a Charles E. enhance scholarship for airport management. And lo and behold, um the Lord had it in his mind that I would start airport management in 1985. And so that journey continues uh through Huntsville, Alabama, Jackson, Mississippi, where I retired in 2014. And thanks to uh deputy chief uh deputy uh city manager Mel Hamilton decided to take a chance on me. Uh with that, obviously I want to thank personally the city council, uh you mayor, uh city attorney, it's been a ride, obviously our city manager, uh and then first and foremost all to our city city assistant city managers, ACMs, I'll call ACM1 right there, Marcela, but also to department heads. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Has been an enjoyable ride. I will miss you all. Um the twists and turns that we have entered and gone through uh has been a remarkable opportunity for me as a citizen of Concord. I really appreciate all the services that this city has offered and for this airport. We have reached the milestones. We will continue to grow. We will be asking for more money. Uh

hopefully we'll get more grant money. Um the future is here and it's been a wonderful place to live. If we had family here in North Carolina, we would stay in North Carolina. Thank you again. Great. Thank you. And I'm sure council would like an opportunity to shake your hand. Yes.

Hold on a second. Lindsay's out there.

Yes. Thank you. I did want did not want to put Durk on the spot by asking if his other son was not here because of a flight delay. But uh thank you. Okay, we move now toformational items and we are very honored tonight to have a presentation from Andrew Stiffle with the state auditor's office. Um, Andrew, if I might say a few things about him, uh, is a native of Concord, a graduate of Cox Mill High School, uh, has worked in various capacities helping the city of Concord, uh, through his service in Senator Paul Newton's office and various other places. And we're delighted to have you here tonight.

Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. And you took half of my speech, but that'll be okay. Um, well, good evening, Concord City Council. As the mayor said, my name is Andrew Stiffle. I am the Charlotte Regional Field Manager for the North Carolina Office of the State Auditor. First and foremost, I want to allow you for or thank you for allowing me to take the time to join you tonight and just share a little bit about myself and what our office actually does. So, uh, as the mayor mentioned, I was born and raised here in Concord, raised through the public school system. My mom worked in Cabaris County schools for over 20 years, graduate of Coxmill High School, and upon graduating went to Raleigh, worked as a legislative assistant in both the Senate and the House, as the mayor mentioned, with Senator Paul Newton at the time, and then finished up uh with Representative Grant Campbell here in Cabaris County, and then started with the auditor's office in July of 2025 and moved back here to home. So when Auditor Bolick took over in January of 2025, we wanted to have a communityoriented aspect to the office being a statewide agency. We wanted to have a statewide presence. So we started a field team. I was the first member of that team here in Charlotte. Now we have members in Asheville, Greensboro, Wilmington as well as our Raleigh office as a whole. So I wanted to briefly share about our six audit divisions and what they do. So we have financial, investigative, performance, rapid response, Dave and information systems. So our financial team performs what you might think of a government audit. So universities, community colleges, state agencies, simple financial audit just to make sure that their budgets are up to date and fairly presenting their numbers to the taxpayers of this state. Our investigative division is led by a career prosecutor and her team investigates reports of fraud and waste to the state auditor's tip line. So we get tips across the state from constituents of what might be fraud, what might be waste, what might be abuse

of spending. We investigate those tips to the fullest extent and if those tips produce some sort of criminal activity, we would refer that over to the proper law enforcement agencies and they'll handle it from there. Our performance team helps improve government efficiency. They perform financial audits, but also provide what I like to call a blueprint. So, our biggest example was the DMV audit that we released back in July of 2025. While we all knew the DMV had some issues, we wanted to provide them with a blueprint on how to fix those issues. That's what our performance team does. Our rapid response team is described by its name. A typical financial audit can take anywhere from six to up to 18 months. Our rapid response team can put out a digestible, readable report within two to three months. That keeps us on topic. It keeps us in the loop as well as providing updates to the constituents in whatever area it might be relevant to so that they know what is going on. Our newest division is the Dave division, which is the division of accountability, value, and efficiency. This was passed by the legislature back in 2025 uh July of 2025. Their job is to handle state vacancies and ensure that these positions are being filled and if they're not being filled, kind of find out why they're not being filled and where that light salary money, that lapse salary money may be going. And lastly is our information system division. Self-explanatory. They handle IT audits across the state. Make sure that all of our state agencies are up to date with IT security code and etc. Just to make sure there's no mitigation factors there as well as handle our own IT needs. Apart from our audit teams, we have our executive and administrative teams, which is your typical kind of state agency functions, scheduling, constituent services, communications, HR, business, legal, um, and then external relations, which is the branch I fall under. Last, I'd like to share a little bit about state auditor Dave Bolick. Dave

Bolick is the 21st elected state auditor here in North Carolina. Born just up the road in Lincolnington. Went to Chapel Hill for his undergraduate and master's degree and then went to Campbell Law School. After graduating from Campbell, went down to Fagatville where he worked as an ADA for about four years and then transitioned into private law. Served on the UNC Chapel Hill Board of Trustees for a handful of years and then was elected state auditor back in 2024. Came into office in January of 2025. Apart from being of course the executive head of OSA, serves on the council of state with the governor and all other statewide elected officials and the local government commission which is headed up by the treasurer. And one thing that we want to do is live up to this role of accountability. If we're going to hold other agencies accountable, we want to be accountable ourselves. So one thing that the auditor has done is back in September of last year launched our own internal dashboard. So you can go to our website and see exactly how we spend our own money because we want to make sure that we are accountable to the taxpayers just like we are asking everyone across this state to be. And the last thing I do want to share, I jumped ahead of the gun there, but the last thing I want to share is just some of the things that we did in 2025 and what we are working on now and how we can work together from a local government perspective with a state agency. So last year we were able to produce a lot of substantial reports. The biggest ones I would say were monitoring all of the Helen spun spending that's going on, making sure that's up to date. Um, we had a, like I mentioned, performance audit of the DMV as well as the Winston Salem for Foresight County schools. Um, oversight over Medicaid spending and screening gaps by the Department of Health and Human Services, a rapid response report of the Charlotte area transportation system known as CATS, and just this week, a comprehensive report into the city of Rocky Mount and their spending. As we look forward into this year, we will continue to monitor the new Meckllinburgg Transportation Authority, which might kind of roll over into Concord and Cabaris counties, as well as

some other counties in the area. Uh we're planning to release a extensive and comprehensive report on the North Carolina Education Lottery. Long story short, the education lottery system has taken in more revenue, yet cut back that revenue that they are giving to the school systems. So, we're going to release a substantial report on that as to what's going on and as to why. And as always, we will continue to receive and review tips from our constituents across the state with our tip line. What OSA does is broad in scope, but it is simple in mission. We are here to make the government more accountable and more efficient for all North Carolinians. If you or any of your constituents here in Concord ever run into any issues with the state government, we are here to assist you. And even if our office can't handle it, we are happy to put you in touch with the proper people to get you the assistance that you deserve. Now, if there's anything that I can do, I am here living in Concord as a resident of this great city, working in Charlotte, but here in Concord. Um, so please don't hesitate to reach out anytime. If there's anything that I can do for you, if our office can do anything for you, if there's anything from the state government that we can do for you, please reach out to me. I did just run out of business cards, but the mayor does have my information. Please feel free to share with anybody here that needs it. Um, but I'm happy to answer any questions that I can to the best of my ability, but again, want to thank you for your time tonight and allowing me to speak before you.

Thank you very much. Any questions for Andrew? I I think the only question I can think of is um we certainly appreciate what you do and what the state auditor's office does, but I wonder if if you call people on the phone and say, "I'm from the state auditor's office and I'm coming to see you." How many people are happy?

I would say 90% of the people think that I'm there to audit them. I am not an auditor. I have a polyside degree. I Please don't ask me to do math. Um so I've had to explain that I am here purely in a community relations and constituent services role. I'm here to serve you and help you any way that we can. Um and a lot of people even even when we do audit them, they are um responsible. They communicate well with us. and 90% of the people we deal with, they work well with us because I think a lot of people want to do well by their constituents, which is a good thing to see across the state. So, yeah. And and and I'm sure that that is true. And I think I asked that question in the spirit of uh when you think of audit, you think of the IRS.

Yes, sir. I'm not the feds. Thank you. We appreciate you coming and appreciate what what you and and Auditor Bo are are doing for the state of North Carolina. Yes, sir. Thank you all very much. Appreciate you. Okay. All right. Next up, we have a progress update on the Church Street Carter plan, and I'll call on the city manager. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So, ask Kaylee Kate and our design manager out of the design manager out of the planning department to come forward and provide this update to council this evening.

Good evening, mayor, members of council, Mr. Payne, Miss Colchinsky, and Miss Jenkins. Um, I'm going to give you an update as we mentioned on the Church Street corridor plan, kind of just progress as we move forward. So, I will do a brief project overview and then get more into the community engagement, mostly what we heard in November um through December from the from our community input and then we'll talk potential recommendations and what we're looking at to get feedback from next and then next steps in the plan. So always wanting to tie back to the strategic plan and these elements that really are our goal of the corridor study. Um you know especially communication partnership with the community talking about unique places and destinations and then the economic opportunities. So as a brief overview we're looking at the Church Street corridor from Highway 29 toward downtown. So the 2030 land use plan did mention to end the plan at Corbin Avenue. The area highlighted in yellow is overlapping with our downtown master plan which was previously adopted in 2021. So for that portion that's mostly in downtown of Church Street, we will defer to that master plan. Um so we're really focusing more on the other areas. Uh we did split it into three areas, area A, B, and C, which I'll kind of show a little bit more in a few slides. briefly want to mention that staff actually went out a couple weeks ago and did a walk or maybe just a week ago and did a walk audit of area A. So, planning buildings and grounds and transportation actually physically went out there, broke off into small groups and walked the corridor to really take a look on the ground of what was going on. Um, this is kind of a new way for gathering in uh data for us and I think it was really successful. So, we're going to do the same for B and C, but we haven't yet. So this was area A where we were walking and the purple line is where you're seeing um where sidewalk isn't consistent but throughout the rest of

the corridor there are sidewalks. So the um distinct area A or the distinctive part of area A is this is where we have the median and two lanes on either side of the landscaped median. And then when you get into area B, you see one lane on either side with um a turning lane throughout the center. And then area C as you get closer to downtown is just that one lane on either side. So the cross-section in each of these sections is a little bit different and the sort of the nature of the the area is different. Briefly talk about zoning districts and future land use. So um that commercial corridor is consistent until you get into center city surrounded by residential and then the future land use you see commercial from 29 to about Oakwood Cemetery and then it moves into mixeduse activity center toward downtown. Looking at our schedule, um we've got started on this last year, kind of going through a lot of data collection, mapping, analysis into that community-led vision and that first community meeting in November with an online survey presenting to you guys just to kind of give you an update of where we are and before we go back to the community with what we've heard and trying to move forward toward that final plan. So, talking about the open house, we had it um along the corridor as we usually try to do for these plans. So, it was at the Nook. It was on November 19th for about two hours and we feel like we had a really good attendance at that meeting. Um, there was also a virtual survey component that was open so anyone that couldn't attend could still provide input. Couple photos. We had poster boards up. We had the same questions at the community meeting as what we had on the survey so that we could combine the two. So, we had 41 attendees um as far as our signins go, but I do think that we probably had more more that were there. It was an open house. people kind of came and went. Um it's just possible that they didn't sign in. And then we did have 178 participants. I'm not going to read through all the numbers, but this comes from our public input

engagement portal. Um but with the 1,872 responses, those were like the physical responses to questions. There was a lot of information to go through. I'll try and summarize quickly. One of the questions we asked is what should what was the relationship to the study area? Um, so looking at, you know, living in the area or nearby, visiting, and then traveling through as being kind of your top three with the lowest one being transit. And this was a select all that apply. So the numbers you're seeing at the bottoms are the ind individual um responses to those different questions. We had an overarching what would what if you could change one thing about Church Street, what would it be and why? I will say most people had more than one thing within their comments on this question. Um but trying to summarize, you know, wanting looking for a safer, more walkable and bike friendly street, improving the look and feel. Um fair amount of comments kind of shifting away from that autooriented use, traffic flow improvements as well as infrastructure improvements, um creating a vibrant kind of people first extension of our downtown and then strengthening safety identity and long-term vision. So this is again the perception the the feedback that we're getting from the public. We anticipated that safety might be um something people were concerned with. So we did have a number of questions around safety and this is a bit of an overview. So looking at walking, biking, driving, shopping and dining and then daytime versus nighttime. And this was a sliding scale from unsafe to safe. Um unsafe being on the left and safest being on the right. So you're seeing driving, shopping, dining, and daytime were kind of the ones that received the more towards the safe side. and then walking, biking, and nighttime being less. So, so without going into too much of the detail, but just hitting on what people were saying, you know, different safety concerns and talking a lot with on the sidewalks about the closeness to fastmoving vehicles, people not paying attention, the drivers not paying attention, those kinds of things. But we also saw a lot

of comments that were what people wanted to see. So that suggestion of slower uh traffic, wider sidewalks, more crosswalks, better lighting, all of these are things we were also hearing from stakeholders. Um so you'll see these kind of repeated throughout, which is a good thing. It means people are kind of all agreeing on on what they'd like to see. Biking, I think Church Street is one of our corridors that has probably the most bike lanes, but they aren't consistent throughout. So people, you know, mostly focused on that. um concerned with drivers not paying attention, but again that desire for more of a connected protected bike lane that maybe connects to the greenways and a larger um loop system. Driving uh received more toward the safe side. Um basically mostly manageable, people feel safe, but there is beating aggressive driving and some confusing intersection designs, shopping and dining. People mentioned how um they'd like to see more. They felt like there were maybe fewer shops and restaurants, but they'd love to see more on the corridor. That they generally feel safe during the day, maybe less so at night. Um again, poor lighting is coming up and a desire for more vibrant vibrancy. Then during the daytime, when this was the one that received the most, I guess, safe feeling. Um, but then still talking about like sidewalks and and maybe issues with some of the fastmoving vehicles and then nighttime people in general are just saying kind of they might avoid the area. There's not as much to go and visit during night um kind of thing. We also did a visual preference survey. So there were a number of images and kind of things. What do you want to see more of through the corridor? These percentages are out of 100% but you could vote for as many as you wanted. And so these are the ones that received the most. So looking at pedestrian infrastructure, additional landscaping came up. Um midblock crossings which people did have specific areas they want to see those. Uh holiday decorations and then public art from the signal boxes,

the murals and the bus infrastructure. Those all received about that 7%. Kind of wanted to sum up the the survey with any other thoughts to share. Again, we're hearing a lot of the same things. A strong perception that the corridor has a lot of potential, but right now kind of feels rund down. um those look and feel improvements, interest in lo more locally owned businesses, kind of an extension of our downtown, and then um need for maybe better maintenance, preserving the character and history, which is also something we hear about downtown Concord. And then the safety and social secure, sorry, social concerns remaining a priority. So from that, we're moving toward what can we recommend for the corridor. I will say this is all preliminary. Um, this is where we're still gathering feedback from the community to make sure we're on the right path, but looking at our guiding principles of strengthening community connection and identity, promoting vibrant, thoughtful development, and enhancing safety and accessibility. some ideas that we'll have to run through a filter of what's feasible, how much would it cost and kind of talk to some of the other departments about and of course NC do about you know what can we do what what makes sense and go back to the public and ask but these are some ideas under each of these principles. So, we've got community plaza, um, pocket parks, events and programming, storytelling, historical markers, and public art and murals. Um, for promote vibrant, thoughtful development, looking at facade and street improvements, which I will say just as a resident that lives not far from here, you already see some developers making improvements through the corridor. So building upon that, mixeduse development incentives, corridor branding, wayfinding potential, and then maybe pop-up shops or activation of some of the vacant spaces and then enhanced safety and accessibility. That's where you're going to see your pedestrian improvements potentially looking into if bike lanes could be protected or traffic calming measures. Um improving lighting and

visibility and then accessible public spaces. So, next we will um continue kind of refining those recommendations, having those conversations with some of the internal departments, but and prepare for our spring community meeting where we'll have more of those discussions and then we'll work on drafting the plan throughout this summer. And I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. Questions for Kaylee? Sure. What's the speed limit? Is it 35? 35. Okay. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. We appreciate that report and that work.

Okay, next up we have a parks and recreation bond update. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So Jay, our deputy director in parks recreation is going to come up and give this month's update to council.

Okay. Good evening, mayor, members of council, Miss Kochinsky, Mr. Payne, uh, and Miss Jenkins. Happy to give the March update for our park bonds. And as we have in the past, just giving you a quick update on the financial slide. The only difference from last month is in investment earnings that we had an increase of $87,483 for our completed bond projects. Uh so far we have the Academy Gibson MC McInness Aquatic Center in Dorton Park. Um and as you can imagine with our warmer weather coming up the next few months, we continue to see more park visitation. I pulled our numbers for Dorton Park for February. We had over 13,300 people visit Dorton Park alone for February. So we continue to track that monthly all of our parks, all of our greenways. So just wanted to share that as Dorton Park was one of the first projects that we completed. For our current projects under construction, we'll start with Marvin Caldwell Park. Uh some changes that we've seen from last month is we continued to see work on the amphitheater including the slab and the stairs. uh continuing working on sidewalks and curbing throughout the park, including our baseball fence posts that were installed, which you see on the uh top right picture that shows the framing for the baseball field. Over the next 30 days, we'll see more curbing. The ground level for the basketball courts will be installed, more sidewalks, as well as the base level uh for additional servicing that's going to go in for other amenities. And we're still on pace for scheduled uh opening for the summer. We've received a lot of calls actually this week alone, but targeting summer is still on pace for that and looking forward to getting that opened for the splash pad specifically since I know a lot of people are asking about that. For our next project for Jim Ramser Park, construction continues. Uh we did complete the water tap installation this week. We did that with in conjunction with spring breaks and school was out of session. And then we continue to see storm drains storm drain installation as well as grading continues and we're on pace for summer of 2027 for opening for this park. for Academy Gibson Athletic Fields. Uh you'll see a lot of changes this month for that. We did start the turf installation last week. So the top bottom was our aerial shot of them the

first day they started laying the turf and then they continued more turf work the next few days and you'll start seeing some of the lines go down. As I was pulling out of the uh parking lot this evening, they're actually putting down the logo right now for the center field which looks great. Uh it wasn't done yet so I didn't get a picture of it and I had to get the slides ready but we'll have that ready for you to see next month. Uh, also shown here on the top left is our dugouts and storage continues to be uh, completed with the roofing being done and we're anticipating October for the completion of this project. For our next project, uh, one change to this slide is we were hoping to get the bids out and I wasn't sure if it was going to happen, but the actual bid did go out live today. So, David Phillips is currently actually open for bid and the date for closure is April 23rd. So, pending submitts for that project, we'll have more updates for you on May on what comes back for that project. So, open to bid right now. That's really exciting. Looking forward for that one. And once we see those bids, like I said, we'll have updates in May and then hopefully get a contract underway after 30 days. And then a couple other projects that are in design, no major updates for the skate park, pump track, sculpture garden. We're waiting on final estimates from the consultant for this one. Hoping to bid um later this summer. As well as popular tent trailhead park. No major updates for this. We're working with Duke Energy. They have some plans that we're reviewing right now. And then as we see updates, this is an internal project that we're working and we'll have updates for that um hopefully later this winter. For Hartzell Park, uh only change that we've seen is the bathroom was updated and open for use, which we mentioned last month as well, which people have enjoyed because now that we have the bathroom open, we opened the shelter rentals back up. So that side of the park is getting more use with that bathroom and shelter open. And we're hoping to bid this in the summer so that we would have the the fields back open at Academy Gibson and then we would close these fields down since that project would go under construction. And then for Wilson Street, uh only main update is our internal team that's working on this project. We met earlier this week to start planning out the playground and the outdoor classroom. So

as we see updates on this, we'll bring them to you. And then we did have some trees that were removed earlier in February and planning to continue to work on this internally and give you updates. Uh, no updates for WW Flow Park or for the Academy Recreation Center and there has been no changes to our general timeline, but I'll be happy to answer any questions. Any questions, council? Thank you very much for that report.

Okay, we move now to people requesting to be heard. Um, I'll read our guidelines for this part of the meeting. This portion of our meeting is our time to recognize persons requesting to be heard and provides an opportunity for anyone wishing to address the city council to do so. Each person will receive three minutes to address the council. This is a time of listening for the council. The subject will be noted and if it requires action or a request, the city manager will note as such and provide steps for any required response or afteraction. And I think all of you have left your contact information with the city clerk so that we can get back in touch with you. And the first person signed up to speak is Zach Ducey. I hope I pronounced that correctly.

You did. Yes, sir. Okay.

You did. Yes, indeed. Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Zach Ducey. Address 2701 Gilead Lane, Waxaw, North Carolina. Hope everybody is doing well this evening. Um, make sure I have my clicker going in the right direction. Back back. Perfect. Um, I'm here this evening to introduce myself. I'm the VP of land acquisition for Shea Holmes um Carolina division based in Charlotte. Um also here I'd like to introduce um a sketch plan that we recently submitted for a new proposed future subdivision um along George L Parkway with the working name of Bootsme Residential. Um the name will be changed but we are on the March 24th council agenda for sewer allocation and we'd certainly appreciate your consideration to allocate sewer um for our project. going through the slideshow briefly uh quickly. Sheay Homes, we are a private family-led home builder. Um our parent company, the JFHA Corporation, was founded in 1881 as a plumbing and heavy construction company on the West Coast. Some of their notable projects they were involved in were the construction of the Hoover Dam and the Golden Gate Bridge. Uh in the 1970s, they started a home building company, Shea Homes. Uh you can see on the bottom, we've been around locally for a number of years and and building high quality homes in the Carolinas. and we'd love to continue doing so. Um, let's see. We pride ourselves on the quality and design of our homes. Um, right now we have five active selling communities across the Charlotte market. Our average price point for these communities is $800,000 and up. Um, I'd really encourage you all in in your free time to maybe go on the website and poke around. Would almost even encourage you to go visit a community or two. We have um a couple active again in Huntersville, North Carolina. Um, candidly, we're we're we're proud of the quality and design uh of the homes and communities that we build. And these

slides hopefully um can give you an idea of who we are, what we build. Um we do feel as though the Bootsme residential site is um a great opportunity to provide the city and the community executive level housing. Um and candidly, we're excited for the opportunity to be able to provide that to the city of Concord. Um, quickly as mentioned, we submitted a sketch plan. On the left, you can see the general location of the site. Um, on the right is a map taken from the George L Parkway future land use plan. Um, which does depict as residential. I'm running out of time here, so I'm going to jump right to the site plan. Uh, we're intending to process it by right under existing zoning RM2, I believe, which allows up to four units an acre. I believe our plan shows 1.47 units per acre. Larger lots, candidly, that fits more in line with what we do as a builder. Um, homes projected to range from 2400 to 3,800 square ft. Again, price points going to be well within and above of that $800,000 price range. Candidly, we build really great homes, really thoughtful communities. We'd love to do it in Concord.

Thank you. Thank you. Okay, our next speaker is Stephen Ty.

Good evening. Uh, Steven Ty, uh, 126 Arlington Avenue Southeast in Concord. Um, Mr. Mayor, council members, Mr. Payne, Miss Golshinsky, Miss Jenkins. I'm here tonight to speak to you about an application that's coming before you at this month's sewer allocation meeting. It's for the former it's for the 1620 Union Street South location, better known to most as the former Gianis location. Um, we've secured a tenant that currently operates a restaurant, a successful restaurant in Kramerton, North Carolina, and he has signed on to take over this location as well. Um he's going to be drawing on his steakhouse roots though for this concept. Um spoiler alert and um operate breakfast and lunch and dinner. Breakfast and lunch will be more of a casual concept and then he's going to pivot to a steakhouse and a topus concept in the evenings for dinner. Um, I do believe that this will be a continued strong catalyst for our downtown and a draw and um, hopefully we can get your approval for the application. Um, and if you have any questions, just reach out to me and either myself or Eddie the the operator will be happy to answer them.

Thank you. Thank you. Okay, next is Katie Bradley. Hi, welcome.

Hi, thank you. Surprise. I'm also here to talk about sewer allocation. Um, I'm Katie Bradley. I'm the engineer at Timmans Group representing the property owner for the pop proposed popular hub development. We're requesting sewer allocation for 7,000 gallons per day for a um commercial and restaurant use. So, this site currently has an existing house on it, an existing barn that the property owner would like to transform into a gathering space with a cafe and a restaurant and revitalize those existing buildings into a place for local community to come to gather. He hopes to have outdoor seating, potentially a play area, just a place for people who live nearby the site to come and meet and hopefully eat. Um there is an existing sewer line on site and water runs right along the site in front of um the proposed development so it's easy access for the development to come online. We are planning to annex and reszone the property. Um it's not currently in the city of Concord, but there we have a surveyor working on preparing the annexation map and we should be submitting that shortly. Um, so we are excited about this proposal and we're hoping that when you meet in a couple weeks for sewer allocation, you would grant sewer for this project.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you. And on our next speaker, um, under the topic, you have put Vulcan and that is Suzanne Todd. And so you have the option to speak now or if you want to speak during the public hearing regarding Vulcan, which whichever is your preference for the public hearing. Okay. Great. Okay. And that that does conclude all the persons that we have signed up to speak. And so next on the agenda is public hearings. Um, and first one is to conduct a public hearing for case Z22-25 and consider adopting an ordinance amending the official zoning map for plus or minus 142.4 4 acres located at 7201 Trail Road, 7205 Trail Road, and 508 Cessna Road from Countryside Residential to I1 Light Industrial to I2 General Industrial and to amend the 2030 future land use plan to modify the future land use designation of the parcel from suburban urban neighborhood to industrial employment. And does staff have anything to add to that before we open the public hearing? Okay, at this time we will open the public hearing and invite those that have signed up to the podium to speak. And first up is Suzanne Todd. Good evening, Mayor Morris. Council Suzanne Todd, 1065 East Morehead Street

in Charlotte, North Carolina. Um, we're simply here really to answer any questions that you might have. As you may know, uh, the planning commission did unanimously recommend approval of the reszoning of these properties. There are four parcels from I1 in countryside residential which was a Cabaris County zoning um to I2 and that would necessitate a change of your land use plan. Um 128 of the 143 acres is already uh industrial employment place type. So it' simply be the 13 and a half acres from the that were recently annexed from Cabaris County. So uh we would appreciate your uh approval of this and happy to answer any questions you might have. I do have uh Denise Howlet with Vulcan with me as well.

Okay. Thank you council. Any questions for Miss Todd? All right. Thank you very much. Okay. And we do not have anyone else signed to speak on this public hearing. Is there anybody that may have failed to fill out a card? Uh if not, we will close the public hearing and council, you see the uh recommendation and we do vote on this tonight, right? Yes. Go ahead.

Yes. So you see on the screen in front of you the uh recommended statement of consistency. The um one that is labeled supporting approval was approved unanous unanimously by the planning and zoning commission. The if you're leaning towards denial of the request then you would adopt the one that says supporting denial.

Yes sir. I was going to make a recommendation. Mayor, I move that we adopt the supporting approval for the statement of consistency. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Uh, is there any discussion? Okay, all in favor, please say I. All oppose? No. That motion passes. Thank you. So, we do have two more steps on on this one. Um, the next step would be to approve or deny the zoning map amendment. Make a motion that we approve the zoning map amendment as presented. I'll second that.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I. All oppose? No. That motion passes. And then the final step is to approve or deny the land use plan amendment. Mayor, I'll vote to make a motion to approve the land use map amendment as stated. Thank you. I'll second that. All right, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes and we move to the next item. Uh item number two, conduct a public hearing and consider adopting a resolution of intent in the matter of closing the rightway near the intersection of Buridge Road Northeast and Old Salsbury Concord Road. So I will open the public hearing. Uh we do not have anyone signed up to speak for or against this item. If there's anybody that would like to come forward, please do so now.

Welcome. Hello. Didn't know I needed to sign up. Sorry. You're good.

Jeff Eisenhower, 6425 Mount Olive Bro, Concord. Uh I'm the owner of Rocks Properties. Uh and Rox Properties owns 10 acres behind the food line and branch view shopping center and on the other side Buridge Road. Uh the intent uh is for this 10 acres to become a church development uh in conjunction with Grace uh Global Methodist Church. Um, Grace Global Methodist Church has purchased the AG South building there along Old Salsbury Road and all this property is contiguous. Um, so we're asking to close these easements that were made many years ago by an owner I think in the 50s that had an idea you might develop it and then never did.

Any questions? Okay. Any questions for Mr. Eisenhower? All right. Thank you. Okay. Is there anyone else that wishes to speak on this item? If not, we will close the public hearing. Do we do we going to do both of these together? No, they're separate. They're separate. So, do we have the same steps?

Yeah. Okay, council. And so, you see the the recommendation uh on your agenda. So, at this time, I would entertain a motion to adopt a resolution for the closing of the rightway near the intersection of Buridge Road Northeast and Old Salsbury Concord Road. Motion to adopt. Okay, we have a motion. Do I hear a second? I'll second. Okay, we have a second. Is there any discussion? Okay, all in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes and we move to the next which is item number three. This is to conduct a public hearing and consider adopting a resolution of intent in the matter of closing the rightway north of the intersection of Buridge Road Northeast and Old Salsbury Concord Road. And I will open the public hearing. Uh we do not have anybody signed up to speak. I think Mr. Eisenhower mentioned this is the second part of of the item that that he discussed. Uh is there anybody else that would wish to speak on this matter? Okay, seeing no one, we will close the public hearing. Uh council, um I would entertain a motion to adopt a resolution of intent in the matter of closing the rightway north of the intersection of Buridge Road Northeast and Old Salsbury Concord Road as has been described.

Motion to adopt. I'll second that. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say I. I.

All oppose, no. That motion passes. Thank you. Okay. Next up, we have a consideration of authorizing the city manager to execute change order number one on the North Apron roadway project at Concord Pageant Regional Airport. Uh we talked about this at the work session on Tuesday. Uh are there any additional questions or does staff have anything to add? Okay. In that event, I would entertain a motion to authorize the city manager to execute the change order number one for $298,425 and to approve the budget amendment which is attached.

Move to approve. Mayor second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No, that motion passes. Uh, next up is consider awarding a bid and authorize the city manager to execute a contract with Williams Electric for the construction of a new 100 kilovolt kilovolt transmission line down Rockill Church Road. Uh, we heard from Caleb on this item on Tuesday also. Uh, are there any additional questions? Uh hearing none, um I would entertain a motion to award a bid in the amount of $3 million 9,021 and to authorize the city manager to execute a contract with Williams Electric for the construction of a new 100 kilovolt transmission line down Rockill Church Road. I'll make that motion, sir, that we execute that contract with Williams Electric.

Okay, I'll second that. We have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh item number three, consider authorizing the city manager to negotiate and execute a contract with by Onomic Services Incorporated to line 19,974 linear feet of sewer lines and the rehabilitation of 53 manholes. Uh, I think we all enjoyed the video that was shared with us after the description on Tuesday showing how that process works. Does anybody have any additional questions? Uh, if not, then I would entertain a motion to authorize the city manager to negotiate and execute a contract with Bionomic Services Incorporated in the amount of 8 44,36.73 for the rehabilitation of 19,974 linear feet of sewer lines and 53 manholes.

I'll make that motion, mayor. Second motion. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh, next up is to consider adopting changes to city code uh, chapter 62, water and wastewater utilities. Uh, once again, we had extensive discussion about this on Tuesday. Does anyone have any questions? Um, hearing none, uh, I would entertain a motion to adopt changes to the city code, chapter 62, water and wastewater utilities. Mayor, we have

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose, no. That motion passes. Uh, next up is item number five. Consider adopting an ordinance ordering the demolition of the structure located at 141 Himmlock Drive Southwest. Uh, pin number 5620-96-2330 owned by the Hazel M. Murray Estate and Eliza Love. Uh once again, we talked about this on Tuesday. Uh Valerie provided us with some history on the uh on the the property and Chief Hughes gave an explanation as well. Uh does anybody have additional questions? Okay. Hearing none, I would entertain a motion to adopt an ordinance ordering the demolition of the structure located at 141 Himmlock Drive Southwest in Concord, North Carolina.

So move, mayor. I'll second that, sir. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I. I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh item number six, consider approving the demolition of 372 and 374 Lincoln Street Southwest. uh Mary Carr uh talked to us about this on Tuesday night um and explained quite a bit as to the steps that we've had to go through with the insurance company with HUD and various other regulations and finally uh have the opportunity to to correct this situation. Does anyone have any comments or questions? Okay. Hearing none, then I would entertain a motion to approve the demolition of 372 and 374 Lincoln Street Southwest.

So move, mayor. I'll second that. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Uh, all in favor, please say I. I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh item number seven, consider authorizing the city manager to execute an amendment to the on call traffic signal equipment and associated construction maintenance contract for the construction of a traffic signal at the intersection of Brutin Smith Boulevard and John Q. New Hammonds Drive Northwest and approve the attached budget ordinance to appropriate funds from developer contribution funds. As we talked about on Tuesday, uh this is being funded by the developer and it is a pass through uh to the to the city to to administer that. Does anyone have any additional question?

Okay. In that event, I would entertain a motion to authorize the city manager to execute an amendment to the on call traffic signal equipment and associated construction maintenance contract in the amount of $494,222.80 for the construction of a traffic signal at the intersection of Brutin Smith Boulevard and John Q. New Hammonds Drive Northwest and to approve the attached budget ordinance to appropriate funds from developer contribution funds. Mayor, we'll move for approval on that.

Okay. All righty. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh, next up is item number eight. Consider adopting a resolution concerning the approval of the execution and delivery of an installment financing contract with Atlantic Union Public Finance Incorporated in order to obtain funds to pay the cost of the acquisition of various fire trucks and related equipment and the granting of a security interest and allowing the officers of the city to execute the installment. ment financing contract and to take other actions to implement the financing. And we heard from Lesie Reer about this on Tuesday. Does anyone have any questions? Okay. Hearing none, I would entertain a motion to adopt a resolution concerning the approval of the execution and delivery of an installment financing contract with Atlantic Union Public Finance Incorporated in order to obtain funds to pay the cost of the acquisition of various fire trucks and related equipment and the granting of a security interest and allowing the officers of the city to execute the installment financing contract. back and take other actions to implement financing approval.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I.

All oppose? No. That motion passes. Uh, next up is item number nine. uh consider allocating sewer 5,000 gallons per day to custom ingredients incorporated doing business as custom flavors. Uh once again, we talked about this on Tuesday night uh in regard to the circumstances surrounding this sewer allocation which was part of a economic development grant that uh we had not finalized the rules on which in the next item on our agenda corrects the that situation. Uh is there any discussion or questions?

Mr. Mayor, if I may, just from a clarification standpoint, uh, since this is something council has not done in the past, wasn't covered under the current sewer allocation policy, uh, in the motion, I would ask that council, uh, state whether this is coming from the economic development bucket or the non-residential bucket. I know that non-residential does replenish the economic development just from a procedure standpoint so that staff knows to track it if it's coming from there and then being simply replenished. Yeah, Valerie and I talked about this too. I think it should come from the economic development bucket and she agrees since the next item we're going to tighten this up, right?

Um, so are you ready for that motion? I'm happy to make if you I'd like to make the motion that we approve the allocation and that come from the economic development u bucket and the sewer. Great. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there further discussion hearing? None. All in favor, please say I.

All oppose, no. That motion passes. Uh, the next item is considering a revision to the sewer allocation process, which clears up the matter that we just discussed. Does anybody have any questions or comments on that item? Uh, not I do, mayor. Yes, ma'am. I don't really think it's clarification. I think it's an expansion. Is that fair to say, Valerie, that like it wasn't in the policy? And so now, I mean, as you can see, the red line, it's an addition to the policy that gives us clarity. Yes.

I just I feel like that's a little bit of a semantic, but I just want to be clear on that because you know how I'm about making sure this policy is tight. So, thank you for your work on that. I appreciate it. Speak to this situation and now it does. Okay. Councilwoman Hubard, are you making that in the form of a motion? I will. I'll make a motion to adopt the addition to the sewer allocation policy. Excellent. And I'll second that, please.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. All oppose, please say no. That motion passes unanimously. Uh, next up is item 11, consider adopting changes made to the mayor and city council operating principles document. Uh, once again, uh, we went over this extensively. I think it's up on the screen uh, on on Tuesday night as well. Uh many of these are grammatical um changes and capitalization etc. Does anybody have any questions or discussions uh on this item? Okay. Hearing none, I would entertain a motion to adopt the changes presented to the mayor and city council operating principles with an effective date of March 12th, 2026.

I'll make that motion, mayor. Okay. Thank you. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I.

All oppose, please say no. That motion passes. Uh, next up is item 12, consider adopting changes made to the rules and time limitations for public hearings document. Uh, once again, I think that's up on the screen. We discussed that quite a bit on Tuesday. Uh, are there any questions or comments? Okay. Hearing none, I would entertain a motion to adopt the changes as presented to the rules and time limitation for public hearings with an effective date of March 12th, 2026.

Move for approval. Mayor, I'll second.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Is there discussion? Okay. All in favor, please say I. All oppose. No. That motion passes. Uh, next up is uh we had a presentation of the rules of procedure uh document on Tuesday. Um, and this is one that after presentation we don't vote on tonight. we vote on next month because the rules um say that a 30-day period must elapse before council can adopt any changes. Uh so it will come back to us in April. Does anybody have any comments to make on that or discussion? Okay. All righty. Next up is our consent agenda. Uh these consist of routine items that have all been previously presented. Uh no one has made me aware of any uh issues with any of these items. So do I hear a motion to adopt the consent agenda as presented?

So moved. Mayor second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I. All opposed? No. That motion passes. And we now move to matters not on the agenda. And do we have a report from We Build tonight. And I Yes, we do.

Good evening. Evening everyone.

Good evening. Uh, Mayor Morris, city council members, Mr. Payne, Miss Kolinsky, I hope I'm saying that right. Kinsky. Okay. And Miss uh, Diesson. Okay. My name is Chonce Rankin. Um, I am the asset resident manager with We Build Concord. Uh, Dr. Graham and we build um, are being honored by the Queen uh, Q city metro this evening and he is in attendance. So, I will provide the following report. Fair housing month comes early. We build Concord has launched the fair housing month comes early campaign for Lincoln Street town homes and other um properties within uh for other properties through the end of April. We build in local and state partners may provide stackable down payment assistance up to 182,500 the largest avail the largest available to our residents. With lower interest rates and increase down payment assistance, qualified buyers can purchase homes uh with household incomes as low as 35,000 per year. This is the lowest income threshold in our history. Um after our realtor event last week, we had 38 applicants. As of Monday, we have uh applying for the 13 homes that we have available uh with the Lincoln Street Town Homes Malvin Street uh project. Um, next month we build Bill Concord will issue a request for proposal for the four single family homes at our 366 mile orange um site. The sanctuary which is Kur Street Baptist Church. This project will be completed by May and we will um we will begin our pre-leasasing in April. A ribbon cutting ceremony is scheduled for late May or early June. We will keep the council and committee posted. Corbin Street Cottages, we are final finalizing the site plan drafted

over the next weeks. Repositioning project. We are signed uh we have signed a new committed letter uh for the city um housing authorities authority reposition project. All the um projects are scheduled for the next fiscal year. Um, if you have any questions, I'm here to answer them. If I don't know them, I'll write them down and I'll get back to you. Right. Any questions? I just want and and I I know you're filling in for Dr. Graham. So, um, and I can reach out to him as well, but I'm just not clear on what was said about the repositioning project.

Um, yeah, we we signed a new um commitment letter for the city of um the city housing authority. um they're doing a reposition um project and so we signed so we can have um land built okay during that. All right, I'll follow. Thank you. I I can get back to you and ask more details about it, but thank you. Okay, any other questions? All right, thank you. Okay, and I think we have a report from the public art commission tonight. Welcome. Thank you.

Good evening, everybody. Uh, let me make sure I know how this thing works. Okay. Um, I'm here to present the public art commission's annual work plan for the upcoming fiscal year. Uh so this work plan summarizes all our projects past, present and future. And as a note, all the projects come from the public art master plan which the council approved in March of 2023. Uh but first a quick review of the commission's overall vision. The commission works towards strengthening Concord's identity and by adding beauty throughout the city and also strives where possible to feature local artists and community voices in all projects in a transparent way. Here's a quick summary of our completed projects. The Les Myers Park mural was completed about a year ago. It's uh a beautiful mural and if I would encourage anybody that hasn't seen it to go by. It's really a great piece of mural art. Uh the second thing is the public art map that was done about a finished about a year ago. It's on the city's website on the address shown there. And then finally, the streetscape art show is ongoing with four sculptures and a mural along Union Street. Uh we also have a few more currently ongoing projects. First one being the streetscape show. Uh we decided last year to rotate the sculptures every other year instead of every year uh to reduce the annual

average cost and the workload uh to produce the show. So this current year is an off year. So, normally it would require no funds. However, uh we did need to allocate $5,000 this year to extend the contracts from the for the initial sculptures from one year to two years. Second ongoing project is wrapping a transit bus with art. uh call for artist has been released and we have had 12 submissions so far for that artwork. Uh a selection committee is being formed right now and our goal is to complete this project still in this current fiscal year. The third ongoing project uh installs art on traffic signal boxes around town. The box locations are being identified across the city. A call for artists and an art selection panel are currently being formed and our goal again for this project is to get it completed before the end of this fiscal year. And the final ongoing project is the mural assistant grant program. It's for local artists and property owners. The application and guideline documents have been published and promoted by the city and outside sources. So far, however, we have not had any applications submitted. So, no more funding will be allocated to this project until it gains some kind of traction with uh artists andor property owners. And here's a uh financial summary by project showing the funds allocated and

spent as of today. Uh the first five lines show completed projects and the dollars allocated and spent. And so the and then over and under budget and we were pretty close on those. So I'm pretty happy about that. The next two lines are for the mural assistance grants uh where money has been allocated but of course since we don't have any submissions no money has been spent. And finally the last two lines are for the projects that we hope to complete this current fiscal year. And so that's a summary of the completed and ongoing projects. And now here are the projects we're proposing for the next fiscal year which would be fiscal year 20 27. First project is to of course continue the streetscape show. Uh this would replace the current sculptures with a new round of sculptures and add two new locations uh near downtown for two more additional sculptures. Uh this proposal requests uh $17.5,000 which would pay for two-year loans for all the sculptures and any contingency expenses. And I'll note also that uh this project therefore with that would not need any additional funding in the following fiscal year which would be 28. Second project is a permanent mural somewhere uh in the city. We've looked possibly into some place in Dorton Park,

but that's to be determined. And uh this project would follow the process, excuse me, uh that we followed in Les Meers Park for that mural. And we're requesting $10,000 for this project, which is the same cost that we um spent on the Les Meers Park mural. And then the final proposed proposal uh begins a multi-year process for a large gateway mural on the George Lyles overpass uh that bridge where it overpasses Highway uh 29. And in the little picture, you can see kind of the the space there. Uh for this we're requesting $2,500 as seed funding to begin the project. Uh this would cover any possible initial expenses such as printing costs, application fees, possibly hiring advisors, etc. that sort of uh funding. Uh we realize this is a large project which would likely require outside funding uh which would need to be raised at some point in the future. And that brings us to the total requested funding for the upcoming three projects in fiscal year 2027. uh which would be the $30,000. And finally, here are two long-term aspirational projects that we kind of have our eye on for sometime in the future. Uh first one is a permanent installation,

excuse me, at uh Ramser Park. Uh this would align with the park's intended uses but would be installed no later no earlier than fiscal year 28 after the park is completed. And the second project aspirational project would be a wall-mounted art piece to serve as a gateway in the airport terminal. There's no timeline at this point for this project and we realize outside funding would probably be required to complete this project also. And uh that's our annual work plan submitted for your approval. And if there's any questions or comments, I'd be happy to answer them.

Yes, sir. I just want to thank lots of hard work, lots of effort in this. Thank you very much for that. Thank you. Um I can't believe it was three years ago. Yeah.

Anyway, um simply to encourage you in our conversations to continue to look for other ways of funding this other than just the city. And I know that you're very nice. Thank you. We have, like you said, uh begun the conversation in how to raise other money, possible grants and and uh that sort of thing. It's very preliminary, but uh it's on the radar. It has to start somewhere.

Yeah. has to start somewhere. Some of these take take real money, so uh have to figure out how to find it. Okay, any other questions or comments for Dole? Well, thank you for what you do and thank you for that report. Yeah, thank you very much. Thanks.

Okay, we move now to general comments by councel. Uh does anyone have anything they would like to share tonight? Uh hearing none, I do not think we have need of a closed session uh tonight. So at this time, I would entertain a motion to adjurnn. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please say I. All oppose, no. We stand adjourned. Thank you.