City Council - Regular Meeting

Good. .

Right on the website.

No, he's not online.

Let me call him. I wish I was on social media.

Here. Oh, that's all right. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Can you, do you need a link or something?

So yeah, sometimes your phone gets you better audio. We found that. I got your, you're not Amy, are you? Or Abby? Okay, there you are right there.

I'm going to enable your camera.

And I'm going to turn on your volume.

Enable your mic. You want to give us a sound check? You should be able to unmute yourself now.

Okay, let me... I'm going to ask you to unmute. Okay, just hear me out.

Oh, that's much better. Okay, keep talking.

I think you're a little better.

I could also, we could just put you on my phone. That might be easier. The audio's probably a little better on my phone. I'll just point the microphone. But something's going on with your... That's pretty good. Can you hear me better?

Okay, I put it on automatically to adjust. Yeah, I think that might actually work. Yeah, that might work a little better.

Yeah, keep doing what you're doing. I think we hear him a little better.

Yeah, sounds fine.

Okay, perfect. Yeah, let's leave it that way. Okay, we'll leave it this way then.

Thank you. Thank you.

I don't know. I tried to be nice to you. This was valid. Can you just monitor it?

We ask them to put their hands up.

Yeah, I was not there.

Yeah, yeah. No, I wasn't. No, I wasn't. Oh, there we go. Okay, do me a favor and monitor that. Let me know if something's breaking. This is just another argument for the budget.

It's just piecemeal. I think we finally got to the point where... Yeah, we're good. For now, at least. Cross your fingers.

Yeah, we started.

You're good.

Yeah, you're good.

It's 7 o'clock. I would like to call the August 6th DeSoto City Council meeting to order. Let's start with a roll call plea. Patterson.

Here.

Savo. Here. Lane. Here. McCracken. Bradley. Here. Mr. Mayor, Council Member McCracken is absent.

Okay.

Thank you.

I would invite you all to please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

So, Brandon, I think we'll start tonight with a special presentation. I'm going to turn it over to you.

For a good evening, Mayor and Council. As some of you may know, we've had an intern all summer, Dominic, who's helped us on numerous projects. I think I speak for all the City Hall employees here that we're very impressed with the work he's done. helping us with streamway setbacks for the park board and planning commission. He's assisted Patrick in doing some research and ordinances and done a lot of work with myself on the community center steering committee and Brad with the BZA. So as Dominic has been kind of in our office learning, he had expressed his love for the Waverly Water Tower. So unbeknownst to him, I had sent a text message to our public works staff, particularly Martin and Jimmy, and asked them to snag a couple pieces of it for a thank you gift for Dominic. So I don't think Dominic knows this is coming. Maybe he snuck a peek of it today. But I'm going to wheel this around and show everybody what we're given as a token. You do not have to take this home right now. We'll wheel it to you. Let's borrow the cards. So Mayor, I just wanted to just take a minute and say, I know all city staff have been very impressed with Dominic over the last three months and we wish him the best. And like I said, we'll help you carry that thing to your car because it's very heavy. But I'll turn it back over to you, Mayor.

All right, thank you. Thank you, Dominic. Appreciate you this summer. All right. I'm going to let Brandon get resituated before I move on. Thank you. Our next item tonight is our consent agenda. Tonight on the consent agenda we have item A, approve the minutes from the July 16th city council meeting. Item B, approve payment number 1024. Item C, approve temporary use parade and noise permits for DeSoto days 2026. Item D, approve on-call agreement with Boyd-Herald for lift station maintenance. Item E, accept easements and right-of-way for Lexington Center. And item F, accept easements and right-of-way for carriage houses number 16. Is there any item anyone would wish to remove from the consent agenda? If not, can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda?

I move to approve the consent agenda as written.

Second.

All right. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion of the motion? Roll call, please. Lane?

Yes.

Bradley?

Yes.

Patterson?

Yes.

Sabo? Yes. Mayor Walker on items 1C, 1E, and 1F? Yes. Motion carries.

All right, item two is call to public. Members of the public are welcome to use this time to comment about any matter relating to city business that was not on tonight's agenda. The items discussed under call to public may or may not be acted on by the council during this meeting. There's a four minute time limit. If you wish to address the council, please stand and wait to be recognized. When you reach the podium, please state your name and address. For those participating online, Raise your hand. All right. Anyone wish to address the council under call to public?

I'm Jennifer Sharp. I'm a resident of DeSoto, Kansas. I'm here tonight because the DeSoto Chamber of Commerce and Economic Development Council, EDC, is funded through sort of a blended model and I want to ask a few things of our council. This is from their website and I quote, the EDC, a separate entity from the city, functions as a part of DeSoto Chamber and is supported by both private and public funds. I am here to formally request that the city council launch an immediate and independent investigation into the city's financial contract with DeSoto Chamber of Commerce and EDC. Our taxpayer dollars are being funneled into a private entity that is actively lobbying the state legislature for Senate Bill 51 and data centers, projects that face overwhelming opposition. Overwhelming opposition, okay? Overwhelming. from the actual residents funding them. I want to ask this council a few specific questions. First of all, did any of you sign an NDA for digital realty? I didn't expect an answer. How much of our public tax money went toward funding the chamber's lobbying efforts and written testimonies?

Sorry, I'm really nervous.

Who initiated this process and who approved the support for Senate Bill 51 on March 4th, 2025 by Tim Holverson and who approved the letter of opposition from Tim Holverson against House Bill 2483 on February 10th, 2026. What about the bill, I'm sorry, what about the letter in January 2025? Who gave authority to Tim Holverson to act in such a manner on behalf of DeSoto people while there is such extreme opposition? What specific oversight metrics does the city use to ensure the chamber represents the voters and not just private developers? Last, will this council commit to auditing or pausing the chamber's public service contract until a full investigation is completed? We expect our elected officials, because you work for us, to use our tax dollars to represent us, not to fund private lobbyists working against us. Thank you.

Anyone else under call to public?

I brought a notebook today because there's so much information. And I hope I can get through it all. OK. Sarah Vandercreek, resident of DeSoto. Jennifer and I should have talked. I should have gone first. Do you know that you can look up the testimonies of the state of Kansas? All of those documents are online and we found quite a few things. Some of it was pretty surprising. Let's talk about the Kansas 2025 legislative season. That was a big year for changes in DeSoto. House Bill 2169 was a bill introduced that year. That bill was about military veteran license plate documentation originally. It was passed the House with a 118 to 1 vote. They sent it to the Senate committee and it passed the committee and it was moving on to get approved. Here's where the political magic starts to happen. There was another bill, House Bill 2134, that was a bill about pesticide remediation, specifically in regards to sunflower ammunition plant. Sunflower Redevelopment wanted to hurry the process of cleaning up the land. They were, and as I quote, frustrated by KSDE's arbitrary and capricious regulation of historic pesticides in the soil and groundwater at the property, end quote. That sounds bad. I mean, we want the land to be as clean as we can get it, right? And our town is counting on the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to monitor these new developers. And I think that's what I heard, is they're going to be part of our process. Anyway, back to my story. Why is it important? Well, House Bill 2134 was dead. It wasn't being acted on. But back to that political magic, House Bill 2169 had already passed and was on its way back to the Senate and it was sent back to committee after being approved. It was gutted and rewritten and the language from House Bill 2134 was moved to the other House Bill. Sometime ask me about that Senate Bill 51, Senate Bill 98 thing that happened too because that was also important. So sunflower redevelopment got their changes. They talked about how much it would cost them to remediate the land and how it would slow down the progress. Sometime you can ask me also, how much did they pay? And better yet, maybe you should ask Digital Realty how much they paid for the acres that they just bought. So let's get back to this. So we keep being told, that, oh, and remember, the final bill that's gonna come from not having to do those pesticide remediations is eventually gonna fall on all the taxpayers. So why do we keep being told that as long as the developers own their land and they follow the laws and the ordinances, that we can't stop them? Well, we had a chance to stop bills and laws like this being, that impact our community and support certain development. An organization such as the Chamber of Commerce wrote letters in behalf of this law and Senate Bill 51 and then again Senate Bill 98. They get paid $190,000 a year and we don't even know for sure what they get paid for. They are out there writing letters on our behalf and every community in the state of Kansas should be furious with the city of DeSoto and its so-called leaders because we helped bring data centers to Kansas. DeSoto did not, we should have talked about this as a community. We should have had a chance to say something. Instead, people hide behind NDAs and the Chamber of Commerce. Now we're going to be asked to give them another TIF, another company, another TIF. And I'm gonna ask you, at what cost? I keep asking that, at what cost? I ask you, look at the strategic plan from 2024 and think about the values that are listed on it. I can get you a copy if you need to see it. But when is our city gonna start figuring out what choices we do have? Ask yourself, leaders, Why have you sold our legacy? Why have you stolen the legacy of Mr. Gabriel and the property that he had? We're asking you to stop putting developers over our community, quit giving away so much for so little, and update our ordinance at a very minimum. Thank you.

Good evening, council members and Mayor Walker. My name is Chad Osterman, and I live at 31726 West 83rd Court. But not for much longer, because due in part to this data center issue, I'm packing my bags, I'm selling my house, and I'm leaving DeSoto. This is my third time coming before you, and even though I'm leaving, I'm still fighting for this community because I've grown to love it. And tonight, I want to talk about something that we cannot see, cannot easily stop, and have not adequately studied. That is low frequency and infrasonic vibration traveling through the ground and directly into our homes from these data centers. Communities in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Virginia have already reported nausea, sleep disruption, and anxiety up to two miles away from data centers. And that's on ordinary soil. Here's the kicker, we have something different. DeSoto sits directly on shallow, farly limestone bedrock. Data centers produce something called Rayleigh waves, and those waves travel outward along the ground in a shallow path, which is exactly where our bedrock sits. When continuous vibration pumps into shallow limestone, and that limestone carries vibration much farther than soil, it can actually act like a giant tuning fork. carrying that energy directly into our homes. And we're not just talking about one hyperscale facility, we're talking about two. Rock can carry vibration roughly three times farther than soil. So if we apply that difference to the documented two mile radius, then a reasonable extrapolation puts the potential radius at roughly four and a half to six miles radius. That's literally all of DeSoto, by the way, and probably all of Eudora as well, and all of the surrounding communities. Our high school is only two miles away, and that's not even considering pets and wildlife. Nobody has built two hyperscale data centers on shallow bedrock beside a residential community before. We're actually being asked to become an experiment with very strong extrapolated math suggesting it probably will not turn out well. So yes, I'm asking for a moratorium. And now let's talk about the money. We're being sold nearly $500 million in projected revenue, but that depends on a 25-year timeline and a full build-out, which hasn't even been approved yet. And even at the full build out, that's roughly $20 million a year or $100 million over five years. But here's where it gets interesting, because data center hardware only really lasts about three to six years before it becomes obsolete. And not to mention, we're also facing an AI tech bubble that could force an economy crash and the data center boom and force many of these facilities to close, like ours. So if the AI bubble bursts, or if we only get phase one of this development, my estimate puts five-year revenue at only $49 to $98 million, which is a far cry from what we were promised, if this is about the money. And that's before you factor in two separate tax breaks lasting 10 to 20 years. SB 98 and others. One on sales tax, one on property tax, which extends far beyond the useful life of data centers and further cutting into the revenue that we actually receive. None of that revenue actually matters if nobody wants to live here, guys. I'm not. If property values fall and nobody wants to buy your house, that's not economic development, folks. That's a trap. We could end up with two obsolete data centers and a ghost town surrounding them. So yeah, maybe impose that moratorium, please. Once we build it, we do not get to unbuild it. Thank you.

Anyone else under call to public?

Mayor and council, my name's Dave Anderson. I live at 9152 Shorewood Drive. I guess this is a black and white deal here. I'm here to tell you that I think you're doing a terrific job. And why would I say that and under what circumstances? Judgment, would I do that? Well, this happens to be a sound block that was given to me by Daryl Zimmerman. I don't know how many, lots of people know who Daryl is, some don't. And this is what I used as mayor. And on here is kind of interesting. There are three things that are written. He wanted me and the council to have openness, equality, and accountability. So one kind of humorous thing was, this is 25 years ago, so we're facing kind of the same thing. It never goes away. The citizens have different opinions. But as I read this, I thought, well, what the heck does openness mean? By the way, it's misspelled. I just noticed that. As according to the dictionary, you need to be accessible on all sides, being open. Well, there's certainly a vocal minority here. And I think 7,500 people, there's also a silent majority. But you never hear from those people. So those things that you do as a council person, you need to be open for all sides. And look, I'm not on Facebook. My wife and kids will not let me be on Facebook. And they call it social media, which I kind of find interesting. because it's rather antisocial from what my kids and my wife tell me. Equality, the second one, was a state of being equal. That goes to the vocal minority and the silent majority. Not all the voices are here and never do they show up. So it's important I met Joe on the campaign trail, I've known Rhonda for a long time, the mayor I've known, and Danny. I met Danny at church when we first moved to Kansas in 1981. And you guys are all in the community. So remember those people that don't come all the time because perhaps they don't have an opinion like this. Accountability is the last one. And accountability is an obligation or a willingness to accept responsibility for your actions. Well, when you are elected, if you look at this room, you step up one above all of us. That's a power and a privilege that we as elected people have granted you. It comes with awesome responsibility, sometimes a really big burden, because you have to listen and care for 7,500 people today. I only had to care for half of that. But it's important that you get out, and you are, all of you are. That's why I want to commend, and Zach, you're not here. I hope you can hear this. You are doing a good job. I want to tell you that. It's a difficult one, but you are doing a good job, and I just want to say thank you.

Not seeing anybody else, so I will move on in our agenda. We do not have any old business, so I'll go to item 4A. Consider task order number 13 with HGR for design of well number 12.

Mayor, council members, thank you. So this task order is for HGR to complete design of replacement of well 12. 1212 is on the north side of the Kansas River. I've been in production for many years. It's on the side of the Kansas River where we have a good aquifer and good production of waters. We're right now working on 711. We should have those online here end of August, first part of September. And this would just add to that to... increase our capacity closer to 8 million gallons a day to match the capacity of our water treatment plant. So tonight would ask that you all approve the task order with HDR in the amount of $216,680 and authorize the city administrator to execute. All right. Questions for Joe? And this is the one where we had a federal grant on the water treatment plant, but because we had to start construction before the grant was awarded, we couldn't use the grant. We were able to transfer that grant to the Well 12. So it's about $940,000 that will go toward the construction of that. So offset almost 80% of that cost.

Questions? We're ready for a motion.

I'll make a motion that we approve task order 13 with HDR in the amount of $216,608 and authorize the city administrator to execute.

Do you have a second? Second.

All right. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Roll call, please. Bradley.

Bradley. Yes. Sabo? Yes. Patterson?

Yes.

Lane? Yes. Motion carries.

All right. Thank you, Joe. You can stay there. Consider task order number 10 with GBA to update the stormwater pollution prevention plan for the wastewater treatment plant.

So with the construction of the new wastewater treatment plant, we received a new permit limits and requirements from KDHE. Part of that permit requirement was required us to develop a SWPPP for that site. And so we had to develop a SWPPP before, I think it was July of last year. So we knew it was still under construction, but we had to be in compliance with KDET. We knew that at the end of construction, we'd have to come back and update that to include all the facilities and the drainage and all the grading. So tonight I'm asking for a task order with GBA in the amount of $14,500 for them to complete. the SWPPP, given the fact that we are done with construction of the wastewater treatment plant, so we'd be in compliance with KDAT. Okay.

Any questions for Joe on this side?

Joe, I'm just curious. I think it mentioned there's potential financial penalties that the city could face if it's not completed.

Well, I mean, they would probably, they could fine us. They could send us some nasty letters. But, yeah, we're required to be in compliance through the National Permit Discharge System. So, yeah, I mean, I've never gone far enough where we've gotten letters or, yeah. So we want to be in compliance. Probably what they've done to you is making your life harder as far as you continue to update your permits and have new compliances for us.

Any other questions? Ready for a motion?

I'll make a motion to approve Task Order 10 with George Butler Associates in the amount of $14,500 authorized city administrator to execute.

I'll second that.

All right, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Roll call, please.

Lane? Yes. Patterson?

Yes.

Sabo? Yes. Bradley? Yes. Motion carries.

All right. Item 4C, receive initial presentation from Digital Risk. This is an initial presentation regarding an economic incentive request for a proposed data center campus near 99th and Lexington in the Astra Enterprise Park. And this discussion's informational only tonight, so it's not an incentive agreement that's being presented or asked for approval. It's just the initial presentation by the applicant like we've done on other projects in the past. Patrick, anything you want to add? No. Then I will turn it over to...

Good evening Mayor, Council, City staff. Thank you for your time thoughtful consideration and continued engagement throughout this process. We appreciate the opportunity to work with the City of DeSoto and value the constructive conversations and discussions that we've had to date with this body and with the community itself. We're really grateful for your consideration to move forward with the TIF discussions. I believe that this represents an important step toward advancing a project that we believe can deliver long-term economic benefits to the community. As we've stated many times before, we're committed to working collaboratively with city leadership, city staff and the entire community as we progress through the next phase of this process. And we also look forward to continuing to continue progressing this project, which is located in an existing TIF district, which I believe has been in place since 2022. Astra Enterprise Park. Thank you again for your time, consideration and partnership this evening. We appreciate your support and look forward to the opportunities ahead. I'll now turn it over to my colleague Matt Schultes who will lead us through a little bit more details about the TIF and the TIF district. Okay. Thank you.

Hi, good evening, everyone. Thanks, Matt. My name's Matt Schultes, and I'm also with Digital Realty. I'm the director of our site selection, large scale development and leasing team. Great to meet everyone. As our company surveyed a number of different options around the country, the DeSoto Astor Park presented so many green lights and check boxes that it became quite apparent that the site was far and away our top choice for new development. Astra already had the proper zoning and would allow digital to develop our data centers using a specific customer design or build from one of our more standard designs. The size of the site, the existing infrastructure, and the improvements that digital intends to make in and around the DeSoto area using the existing TIF program were three key factors that made this site a unanimous yes for digital realty. Being able to bring infrastructure improvements forward with the ability of the TIP program was something that we were very excited about, allowing DeSoto residents to enjoy the benefit of these improvements from the very beginning of the project with no impact to current tax rates while increase the overall tax revenue for the city. I'd now like to introduce Bob Johnson with SRL, who can provide a history of the TIF program and provide a background on the city's structured, the way the city structured the TIF with DeSoto's long-term development in mind. Thank you, Bob.

Mayor and council, thank you for having me here tonight. Bob Johnson representing Sunflower Redevelopment or SRL. A lot of what I'm going to have to say you already know, but I think it is helpful and instructive to kind of walk through a short and succinct history of the TIF district here, short and succinct history of how we, the city, and SRL collectively brought this site back from contamination, brought this site back from underutilization to something far and beyond at least what I had dreamed. I'm sure there are some here on the dais and some within SRL who had a vision as grand as what has unfolded, but it's hard to envision what has unfolded given its significance and given its impact to the community in such a positive way. I've been involved since the inception of the TIF district, as have others in this room, and really I want to say on behalf of SRL how gratified we are, extremely impressed and truly just The fact that this worked out the way it did, the system that we even put in place, Patrick was heavily involved, to create a framework that has borne fruit many times over and worked as intended for the tremendous impact of both the public and private sectors is unparalleled in my very deep and vast experience. I haven't seen a community embrace put in place a framework like this, and see it come to the fruition that it actually has here. So before I get to that history, before I walk through what happened in the last five or six years, a basic explanation of TIFF I think might be instructive. I know all of you are aware of how it works, but I think to set the stage, it would be helpful. Tax increment financing is a tool by which municipalities incentivize redevelopment in statutorily eligible areas. There are very strict guidelines, very strict parameters under which you can create a TIF district and under which you can implement tax increment financing within a TIF district. One of those bases to create ineligible areas is the establishment of a blighted area. Very strict test, which is met in this case by the history that everyone knows at Sunflower Army Ammunition Plant. That is the contamination left through the decades of activities at the site throughout the 9,000 acres of the park. This contamination qualified Astra as an eligible area that enabled the 9,000 acre site to be established as a TIF district and frankly again long and deep experience with this statute and in implementation throughout the state of Kansas and this is the poster child for tax increment financing. If anything ever was utilization of this tool within the state. It is Astra Enterprise Park and the former Sunflower Army ammunition plant. You had a property that was vast in its size, extremely underutilized and producing negligible to none economic benefit for the community after the closure of the ammunition plant and you had this contamination which was a condition that has taken hundreds of millions of dollars to rectify and frankly would not be in the state it's in without tax increment financing. Again, bread and butter what this tool was created for in the first place. Once a TIF district is established, The geographical boundaries of the district are set and the base assessed value of the TIF district is established. The key mechanics for how TIF works is that once a specific project or projects move forward, the property tax increment generated only by those new and incentivized projects is used to reimburse certain statutorily eligible costs necessitated by that new development, namely site remediation, acquisition, preparation, and infrastructure costs. Again, very strict parameters in the statute as to how TIF funds can be used, very strict parameters as to how that increment can be captured. And I think it bears repeating. Matt mentioned it. Mention it again that it is only those property taxes created by the new project that can be used to reimburse costs necessitated by that project. These are not tax dollars generated anywhere else within the city. They are not new taxes on the citizenry of the city. This is entirely a tool that is generated by new development and incentivizes new development without which there wouldn't be the new development. So it is a very well-designed tool. It has worked extremely well throughout the history of its inception, which is decades old in the state of Kansas, and has produced some wonderful projects across our state, has led to immense economic development in our state, and has already proven to do so in DeSoto and is now going to do so again. TIF is implemented in two phases. First is the establishment of the district that I mentioned previously, and then it's the adoption of project plans. Once a specific project moves forward, a project plan is considered by this body for adoption to implement that specific project. Now the project plan includes the details of that specific project. Again, implementing a strict regimen and parameters around what can be developed, what is being incentivized. It's not open-ended. It is defined and it is tailored to the specific project. That project plan also enumerates the increment, the amount that can be captured, the amount that can be used to reimburse or pay for statutorily eligible costs, and it enumerates what those costs are. This governing body will have a project plan come before it at a later hearing, and you will have that decision to make. There will be very specific details as to what that package looks like, what is being asked to be reimbursed, and exactly which project you're incentivizing. Again, there is, to use the former mayor's word, openness and transparency throughout this entire process, and that's designed by statute. Certainly, you implement that by the policy of this body, but it is also absolutely dictated by the law and will come before this body in clarity in a document that will be publicly available through a public hearing to establish exactly the parameters around what the TIF ask is in this case. Now, going back to the historical contamination of Astro Enterprise Park and the lack of infrastructure needed for redevelopment of the park, I think it's easy to forget in the last few years exactly the fact that we had no infrastructure there, essentially. We had a water treatment plant, which has since been expanded, all in relation to the Panasonic project. already come to fruition that vast amounts of new infrastructure have been implemented. But 2021, there was nothing to be able to be used by redevelopment within the entire 9,000 acres. And the city was incredibly prescient in 2021 to put this framework in place that would lead to new tax revenues, already has. lead to new jobs, already has, new infrastructure and redevelopment in the city. All of those things in that short period of time have come true in spades. In 2021, the city and the SRL put in place and executed a pre-development agreement which established this framework through which the Astra Enterprise Park would be annexed into the city and through which the TIF district would be established that would facilitate the remediation of the historical blighted conditions and attract redevelopment to the park. Redevelopment to the park had been a monumentally difficult undertaking and massive underutilized opportunity for the city until that development agreement, pre-development agreement was put in place. We called it a pre-development agreement, Patrick may remember, because we knew or hoped that the system we collectively put in place would work and attract development to the city and did it ever. We would have future development agreements, which have been negotiated. Panasonic is the example, obviously. Through the framework, Astra was annexed into the city limits and the TIF district was then established in 2022. And as we all know, that set the table for Panasonic, the most significant economic development project in the state of Kansas' history. would not have happened if it was essential in Panasonic coming to the site, essential in the site being remediated, essential in incentivizing Panasonic to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in public infrastructure that otherwise would not have happened. without tax increment financing, which benefits the entirety of the community, not just the Panasonic project, not just digital realty, the entirety of the community. I already mentioned the expansion of the water treatment plant, which serves the entirety of the city of DeSoto. Just one example, roads, water, sewer, all implemented through tax increment financing, paid for initially by Panasonic, reimbursed through tax increment financing, otherwise would not have happened without this tool. Now the framework has proven invaluable again to unlocking this incredible opportunity for the city of DeSoto in the case of attracting truly a remarkable community partner and truly the most experienced developer worldwide in digital realty in the data center space. This is the most responsible actor you could find in this space. They are transparent. Their track record speaks for itself. They can speak for themselves. But again, without tax increment financing, that doesn't happen. So really, in conclusion and summary here, the TIF district has done exactly what was intended to do in the first place, which is to remediate the historically contaminated property, to implement truly incredible amounts of infrastructure in an incredibly short period of time. Again, shocking to me, maybe not to some of those who envisioned it otherwise, but In 15 plus years of doing these sorts of projects, I have not seen anything come together this quickly to impact a community this immensely in such a short period of time, all through TIF financing and to attract the world-class development like Panasonic and Digital Realty, again, by setting the table as you did in 2021 and 2022 with the pre-development agreement in TIF district. I'm happy to stay and answer any questions if you'd like. I'm sure Digital Realty can come back up and answer any questions if you'd like them to do so. Otherwise, I will sit down, and I appreciate your time and appreciate you having me here tonight. Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions from counsel? Matt, did you have something to add? Nope.

Just wanted to say that this concludes our presentation, and any questions you guys might have, we're ready and prepared to answer.

Questions from counsel?

I have problems with a mic. I was just curious as far as any performance benchmarks, milestones, accountability, those types of things that will be set, any examples of what that might be?

From a project planning standpoint? Yeah, I mean, I think we've already, you know, prepared our initial grading permit. And we look forward to starting that grading as soon as possible. to prepare us for the site in general. But as far as in the background, yes, we've gone through quite a number of site plan iterations and marketing the site for our users. In terms of, I would say, project milestones, right now it would be the site plan approval based on our design, and that would probably be the first step.

Are you going to get just... Like community? What are you asking about?

Yeah, just far as... Investment levels or... Yeah, like those kinds of things.

Okay, I think... So I think that was in the applications. Like their initial phase is a $4 billion investment, I believe, four plus. I think the employee count was in there as well, somewhere around 200 employees in the ERETA. Or Matt, stop me if what I'm saying.

Well, what I was just going to say is, as we've been pointing out, we are at the very beginning of the process. This is the gateway. I think all those benchmarks and very specific information will be worked out in the development agreement and in the TIF agreement document and in the TIF plan that we will be presenting soon. So it's, I think all the things that you're looking for are forthcoming.

And I guess the other question I know that everybody is wanting to know is a timeframe on when your end user would be announced on who that might be?

As soon as we are able to. We are in negotiations, and unfortunately, since we are both public companies, we have to follow rules as to how we can do that. But when we are able to announce it, you would be the second group of people to find out.

Thanks.

All right. Anything, Zach, anything from your side?

Okay.

Thank you, gentlemen. So, you know, to summarize, this was our initial presentation, and so we'll continue reviewing the request, and any agreement that might come out of that then will come back to us for consideration, public hearing that would set the TIF levels and all that at some point in the future. All right. Item D. Discuss amending city code to provide for additional environmental oversight of large-scale industrial projects.

Yes, Council. I include in the packet a memo and also a proposed draft ordinance. And essentially, in a nutshell, what the amendment to the city code would provide would be additional oversight by the city when it comes to large industrial projects and those are defined as any development in the commercial industrial manufacturing that exceeds 100 total acres or utilizes chemicals that are subject to the Federal Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act, which there's a whole list of those. Or is the project projected to consume more than 50,000 gallons of water on an average day? So important to note, though, that essentially this oversight, you know, main oversight of these projects is KDHE. And in the memo, I listed out all of the permits that are required for these projects. So there is quite a bit of oversight by KDHE already. I don't know that the general public or even the city is plugged into all that permitting, but there is quite a bit of diligence by KDHE on these projects. So because KDHE has the authority to enforce the federal environmental laws, the city were not able to enforce those. So if this ordinance were to be adopted, it would simply allow this or provide for the city to review these projects and if necessary communicate you know noted deficiencies to KDHE since they ultimately are the enforcers so this would just be an added sort of you know someone else keeping an eye on on environmental health concerns that might be presented so In my memo, I did query some policy questions. Essentially, is the oversight needed? Is it legal? And as I indicated in the memo, it is legal if we're careful about engaging in this. Because like I said, the city is not authorized to enforce these federal environmental laws, so we have to be careful about not having city employees go beyond simply having a look at whether the permits are being adhered to, that type of thing. I really didn't anticipate that we would take action on the ordinance at tonight's meeting. We do have the ordinance here, but really just provide it as a discussion item. Obviously, there hasn't been any engagement with our large industrial projects in the city, so that's probably something we may want to do.

All right. Then we'll start a discussion. Zach, since perhaps you initiated this process, maybe you would want to start the discussion?

Sure, thank you, Mayor. Can you hear me okay?

Yes, thank you.

Okay. Yeah, I appreciate it. I feel like this is good progress. The new Article 7, it does reflect good progress. It recognizes high-impact developments, structured review framework, appeal process. and a little bit of a nod to it, the environmental health compliance officer type role. And it incorporates a lot of the concepts, damper triggers, the third party reviewers, destruction phase monitoring. I think there are still some gaps that figure this in what the original intent was. I'm not saying that 15 acres is the right trigger, but I think 100 acres is probably a little too big because that could miss a lot of budgets. Also, the income-based triggers, the conditional use permit-based triggers were removed for some reason. I understand some of the rationale behind the move in the escrow. Another good place to get around that. Also, there is a car valve for Astrid in there, which I think this is intended. The other thing is that Okay, so I'll say the things that I think we should do. We're making compromising triggers, whatever the agents threshold, the Google Cup, ensure meaningful coverage of large industrial logistics projects. I think we should introduce a limited estimate model for external peer review and construction monitoring with explicit provisions for time limit balances, administration fees, and interest treatment. Also, I would like to codify the Department of Health compliance officer position and support duties in Article 7, time, funding, development, and industrial permit duties. I'd like to replace the Asker Carvel with a coordination clause that respects rig rig jurisdiction while preserving local oversight for non-rig rig issues. I'd also like to clarify that while the city will not list federal environmental statutes, And we'll enforce local approval conditions and help code using our own software and perfect violation tools. So I think there's ways to address the things that we've moved, not totally removing them.

But I do think that it's a great start.

We're making, I think, progress, significant progress towards getting to where I think, in my opinion, we should be. And how to get there, I think we're getting there. Yes, that's my third comment.

Okay, thank you. On the diaspora, Joe, Rhonda, Danny, any comments, Dan, tonight? No. I would agree with Patrick. I'm sorry, Rhonda, did you want to say? I didn't want to. You were looking for your button.

I know. I was just curious because this is a lot of information to look up as far as the KDHD and EPA. How much of this role is duplication of what they are already doing? Is this position more of a liaison you think to that? Zach, you might be able to answer that too.

It would duplicate for sure. It would essentially be Sorry, Zach. It's a little difficult to hear. I mean, you're loud enough, but there were... So I was just going to suggest maybe when you're back in town, you know, maybe Mike and I and yourself can sit down and sort of kind of go over, maybe, you know, fine-tune this. But... Zach is right. For example, noise regulations, that's a city regulation. Also, in the same chapter we're amending, the city has ability to rectify health nuisances. That's usually like contamination. But yes, as far as... Most of this stuff is dictated by the federal environmental laws. And we just do not have the authority to be enforcing those. And by trying to do that, we do put ourselves in a situation of legal liability. So that's why I said we need to be real careful and cautious, because it is something that we're You know, this ordinance I think does, you know, carefully put us in the role of being a communicator to KDHE. So for example, if our city staff noted, you know, something that wasn't compliant, you know, we could just call KDHE and let them know about it. So it would, you know, that really would be the nut of it is communicating You know, and I don't know what KDHE staffing is or, you know, how often they're on site or how, you know, often they're monitoring. Maybe there is a gap there that needs to be filled. I just don't know enough about, you know, how they operate to know if there really is a need for that. So, sorry, Zach, I kind of talked over you.

You know, you thought that, I mean, maybe a little bit before the year. Was there, were there any other issues to conducting this as a, As a work group before a council meeting, just because we've already started the public conversation, I don't want to now go behind not in a public conversation necessarily. If there's no opposition to doing it in sort of a work group prior to the next council meeting, that sort of format.

I mean, that could certainly be possible. We can just have it as another discussion. Obviously, we're not going to take action on it tonight, which I'm certain we're not ready to do. It will be another discussion item for an upcoming meeting. So I think Patrick's just thinking that... I had the same problem. You're plenty loud, but the sound quality through my little speaker here is not letting my ears quite pick everything out that you're saying. So it would benefit from the face-to-face conversation for sure.

Agreed. Thank you.

Anything we need to add to this tonight, I'd say we'll bring this follow-up when everybody gets back from vacations. Well, I'm not saying you're on vacation, Zach. I know you're working, but Patrick's going on vacation next week. And then we'll get it back on the agenda at the August 20th meeting. Is this conversation going to be done even during that meeting? It could be, or I think we'll just save it for later. All right. Thank you. Executive session, we do not have any, so we will move on to our advisory reports. I'm going to start with you, Brandon, as Assistant City Administrator sitting in his seat. City administrator tonight.

I just have one quick thing. I wanted to just get a pulse check from the council. As of Monday, we have about $1,700 left in the property tax relief line item. It is in the general fund. That's going to be, looking at our average award, it's about $400. It's only going to give us about four more awards. So I just wanted to kind of get a head nod if you guys are comfortable with us expanding that program and overspending that $25,000. It's in the general fund, so there's no legal reason why we couldn't, but I just wanted to let you know we're getting close to that point.

And how many will, I mean, obviously you have more applications than you think will.

Yeah, our program doesn't end until December. Our phase two, which opens up to anyone under the age of 65.

Okay, all right.

Yeah, that means that qualifications, yeah.

Are we comfortable going over the, a lot of, we allocated $25,000 toward that for this year. Yeah. Okay.

No need to have a formal motion or anything, just a head nod.

I don't have a problem going over it.

Can you share how many residents we've been able to benefit through the program this year?

64 so far.

Yeah, and I should mention, Edgar's taken over a lot of the day-to-day stuff. Yeah, 64 is what we've received. It was an average of about 375 is the average award we're giving out. So only a couple more if we actually, if they all come in about the average amount.

Any cases you've got to review yet?

I haven't seen those. How many do we have in there?

So out of those 64 applications, three of them, so 62, 63, that's the only ones for me.

So we could be at our limit or be within a few hundred dollars.

But with the program extending all the way to December's potential that you could get some more applications in that you don't have.

Yeah, and I did, to kind of expand on, I did look to see if maybe we just got more applications earlier. We are seeing different people apply this year. So I would assume that there's a need for more than the $25,000. Okay.

And then I had a question as far as the communication. I know it's been out on social media. Yeah. How else are, you know, a lot of people aren't on social media. So how are, how's everyone, you know, we don't have, for those who remember, a Dorothy Nally that can give everybody everything that's going on with everybody type of thing. So how do they get, how's everybody get that information?

So we have, we have quite a few, we have open houses that we do in the spring. And then we do put things in the utility building. that comes out once a month. So there's, I think every other month or so, Whitney puts that in there. And then there, if you come to pay your water bill, there's a little application sitting there for you. And then we do have a very active group of people that are, I call them kind of our ambassadors, that they let their friends know. There's a pickleball group that came during the first open house, came from pickleball right to the workshop. So if there's any other opportunities you'd like us to pursue, we're happy to do that.

Thank you.

Yep. I didn't hear any, I didn't see any nods. No. So we'll keep going. Keep going.

All right. Thank you. That's all I have today.

All right. To the attorney. Nothing for me. All right. City planner not here. City engineer.

Uh, the only update is if you haven't been out west and south of interview way, evening star road is now open to traffic.

Okay. Evening star road is now open to traffic.

Okay.

Council comments. Danny, anything for the group tonight?

Nothing tonight, Mayor. Thank you.

Zach, I'm going to let you go so I don't forget you.

Nothing really. I really appreciate the work that's been done on these ordinance proposals and the input from everyone. I look forward to getting these further down the road and the ordinance council meeting if we can. That's really all I have for tonight. All right. Thank you.

Thank you, Zach. Rhonda.

Thanks again for everyone that's been coming. I think it's great to see a good-sized average crowd out there. I do have a couple things. One, I was able to attend the comprehensive plan meeting along with Danny, first time being involved in that. And it's going to be a very lengthy process. It was great. The diversity of the group, I think, is going to be very helpful. And that's a year-long project. So it was great. It's the first time I'd been really a part of that. And so there's just a great group of folks, I think, that are in there to do that. So I just wanted to pass that along. And then I know there's just still a lot of unknowns, I know, when it's coming to the growth of our town. So... I just wanted to express just still some concern with attracting residents, as well as strategic development growth. We want to make sure that people want to move to DeSoto. Sometimes there could be things that they're thinking, this is the reason why I don't want to come to DeSoto. It might be the growth. But I just want to make sure between the city, the chamber, the UDC, the residents, that we all try to get on the same page on what we're wanting. and then get to a point where we can provide incentives to growth that we want to see, versus just giving incentives to everyone. So I think, and being part of that comprehensive plan meeting, I'm very excited, anyway, to be a part of that, because I think that's where some of that can be stemmed from. So with that said, I have two items that I would like to maybe be discussed at the next meeting, and I am going to read what I wrote. But I think maybe we should consider moving hyperscale data centers or data centers in general to M2 zoning based on their large users of resources. And though I know it's light industrial, I think based on the usage, that is heavy usage. So I think it should be moved into... the heavy industrial zones. And again, going to the planning meeting made me think of some of that. But anyway, I would like to bring that up or have that discussion next time and get feedback from folks. And then the other is maybe consider putting a pause on any economic incentive for any future data center applicants for maybe 18 months, two years, or at least until we have enough time. that has occurred to observe and review any effects or impacts that the city and its residents might have. Not still saying good, bad, and different, but I think it's just still an unknown. And I think for any future applicants or anything moving forward in that specific area, and I know you guys are sitting here, but for that moving forward, I think we've got to come to a pause in that area. There's other industry I know looking at coming to DeSoto So I don't think that we need to just hold out for one industry. So that's it for me.

All right. Thank you.

Joe? Just a couple of things. I think before our next meeting, first day of school starts on the 18th or 19th. I just want to Give a huge shout out to all our teachers and educators that pour so much into our students every year. Wanted to say something to Councilwoman McCracken, but she decided to skip out. She's taking her daughter to college. Well, I'm doing that on Saturday. I choose to do it on the weekend. Uh, yes. Alabama is quite a ways. I'll give her a break.

Yeah.

Um, but yeah, huge shout out to all our teachers, uh, educators, uh, you know, at all levels. Um, this Saturday morning, downtown DeSoto, we'll have a car cruise in, um, bring out, uh, your shiny machines, uh, Or just come look at them. Or, yes, yes, come tool around. And I think they're expecting up to 150, maybe 200 cars this Saturday. So it's going to be pretty big. And then last but not least, I think a little bit of good news on the Grotta sewer development. I'm not sure that anything official has been signed, but it appears that an agreement has been now reached with all parties, and there will be no need for any action by the city with eminent domain. And I was given permission by the developer to say that. But that's all I have.

Thank you. All right. Thank you, Joe. So you took one of my I was gonna remind people to come to the car show Saturday morning appreciate that Yeah car cruise in for me. It's just a show because I have nothing to cruise in I'm just one of the guys that comes and looks at him But the other thing I wanted to mention was we will be we're working with our fireworks supplier walled fireworks to schedule a test to try and coordinate maybe some fireworks that we could share during DeSoto Day. So we're trying to get that scheduled so if you see a random firework or hear of a random firework from Riverfest Park that is not with any other event, that's what that is. We're gonna see what the visibility is from downtown when we shoot them off down at the park. Because we don't want to drive people to the park. We want people to experience DeSoto Days, but we want them to be able to see the fireworks. That's what that will be sometime in the next week or two. We'll get that test shot from Wall. So just want to get a heads up out on that. And I think that's all I have tonight.

Will we be communicating the tests out so there's not multiple, what was that loud voice? I don't think so.

Let me get my leftovers out.

A test of the local alert system on the social media site. I don't have anything else tonight. I'll move to adjourn.

Second.

All right, we have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed? We're adjourned.

Thank you.