City Commission - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the City of Delray Beach workshop this 03/09/2026. If the clerk could please call the roll. Mister Parker Here.

Commissioner Cassell? Here. Deputy vice mayor Burns? Here. Mayor Carney? Here. We

have a quorum? No. That would not for a workshop. We are I do think there's a it's a banter that we do. First part of this agenda is public comment. So any members of the public wishing to speak on the of the what we're gonna be discussing here at the workshop, you each will have three minutes to come to the lectern, give your name and ZIP code, and public comment is open. Seeing seeing none, we move right along. Great. There's a policy considerations regarding not for profit funding. Mister Moore? Oh, no. We're gonna turn it over to you, mister Orris.

Actually, I'm gonna turn it over to to Janai who's gonna talk to you again about our established grant policy.

Great. Because that's one of the questions that I I wanted to make sure that what is our current policy?

Great. Afternoon, everyone. I'm tonight going to education and external opportunities manager. Here to present our considerations regarding grant policies and procedures. So the purpose of my overview really is to give an organizational overview regarding who we currently fund in the city of Delray Beach.

That will include their programming and their level of service. We'll also review the city's internal grants policy, was adopted in 2025, in relation to our current grant processes for our nonprofits. And finally, we'll open up with a brief discussion regarding the future processes for grant opportunities pending the city commission's review. Some background, the city manager's office currently oversees funding for seven Delray Beach nonprofit agencies. And that includes Achievement Center for Children and Families, Boys and Girls Club of Delray Beach, Spady Cultural Heritage Museum, Delray Beach Public Library, the Delray Beach Historical Society, Sandaway Discovery Center, and Arts Garage.

The funding for each nonprofit involves programming much more of an overview, but educational programming, historical preservation, and or services. Currently, each grant is awarded on an annual basis. And it's through a continuation continuous grant process, which means that we do not formally accept applications or provide a solicitation process through request requests for proposals. And the reason why we're having this conversation is because our funding agreements for each nonprofit expires on 09/30/2026. So we want to encourage discussion amongst the city commission regarding how will we continue how we will continue to offer funding for our nonprofits and other agencies.

Can I jump in just a second?

So the the public library's current agreement does not expire, but it does not contain an amount. It it basically alludes to as the commission allocates each budget year.

We do have a current grant process in place. And as I mentioned previously, there is no formal solicitation or application process. So currently, the grants are awarded on an ongoing or continuous basis to maintain services within our partner agencies. Previously, agreements were awarded for five year terms, but in 2026, the city transitioned to annual agreements to foster more agency within the city commission. Currently our internal grants policy and so in 2025 the city adopted an internal grants policy to offer guidance for future grant opportunities and within this policy the city establish es guidelines for proposals, selection of candidates, funding reimbursement, reporting, and auditing processes for grantees.

So while we don't formally go through this process, we do have an internal grants policy that outlines what this process will look like if we choose to go to a competitive grant process in the future. The policy also outlines the procedure for using notices of funding opportunities and requests for proposals depending on the services that the city is trying to seek. And it also defines application requirements and qualifications for proposals. Now this policy does not currently apply to the following grants. That includes Community Block Grant, our SHIP or State Housing Initiative Partnership Grant, Urban Development Action Grant, which all three are currently housed in the Neighborhood and Community Services Department, as well as the aforementioned yearly recurring city grants.

Within the current grant policy, there are applicant requirements and qualifications. So currently we are seeking to fund within that internal grants policy active and valid nonprofits with five zero one(three) status. The nonprofits should have been or agencies, I'm sorry should have been in operation for at least two years and have provided services for at least two years in Palm Beach County must demonstrate accountability through submission of acceptable financial documents as requested by the notice of funding. They also must clearly identify how their service or program addresses goals related to the notice of funding. And new applicants cannot currently or within the last year be in receipt of any funding.

Now if the city chooses to move forward to a competitive grant process, process, the following actions must be considered. So there are different phases. I've broken them down into phases. Phase one would be internal planning and grant design. So the city commission will decide programs to fund that addresses a community need.

So that could be, for example, advancement of small businesses, housing, arts and culture, education, neighborhood improvement, etcetera. And the city commission will be asked to decide the grant size and the grant period. Phase two would be the development of a notice of funding or an RFP. So the city will develop this proposal depending on the program priorities and will outline the purpose and funding details based on the City Commission's key priority areas, the scope of the grant, eligibility requirements, and the application process. And so once this is fleshed out, we'll move to phase three, which will be the solicitation and outreach portion.

And here the city will then advertise the funding opportunity to eligible applicants. Of course, this will be interdepartmental. We'll work with the finance department purchasing procurement in order to foster this solicitation or create the solicitation process. Moving to phase four, this will be the proposal submission and review. And here the city will develop an evaluation committee to review and score transition to phase five which is the award monitoring closeout where the city will award the grant and follow the proper monitoring and closeout procedures.

Current process, we do not currently Well, sorry. Grants are awarded by individual departments. We don't currently have a single department that oversees all grants. So the initiating department, city department, such as like Neighborhood and Community Services, They're responsible for preparing and submitting the programming and activities in relation to the agencies, statistical reports, progress reports, and the status reports. And then we work with the finance and purchasing department, and they are currently the department that oversees the monitoring of the grant agreements and the reporting aspects, as well as providing technical assistance to the initiating departments regarding what is necessary for the closeout procedures.

And they also prepare the financial reports or assist in preparing the financial reports the reimbursement requests drawdown requests and forwarding the grant balances And that concludes our current process for our grant.

Once the next presentation gets up it's it's actually a presentation representation of the spreadsheet you got that shows autographs. Please let me know. I I really don't think we need to go through this page by page unless you have a need to do that. What I really wanna do is kinda jump to what the possibilities are for the future. More than happy to go through this if that's what you want, but in try to be a little quick with our time.

I don't think we need to go through that. And and that spreadsheet, the first page is the grants we're generally talking about now, those that the city commission grants. Second page are generally funded either by UDAG or CDBG. And third page are grants that come from the law enforcement trust fund and go through the police department. So it's gonna again, I have all that information here, but it's basically just a presentation of that spreadsheet with all the amounts.

Can also tell you there's one sell on that's from the tops of that spreadsheet that does have an incorrect statement. Additional city funding formerly from the CRAA guide for the Spady Cultural Heritage Museum. We could kinda fix this, Darcy, if I could get your hand. It's actually it's a 109,000, not a 106,000. So let me get through this real quick again.

Your last few slides. Yes. Unless there's any objection up here, I'm gonna have him go straight into the thing rather than go through the spreadsheet, which we are.

That's fine.

We don't anything.

If any of you wanna talk about spreadsheet after the meeting at any time, I'm more than welcome I'm more than happy to do so. There's really three potential funding options that that are presented for your consideration. The city commission is not obligated to any of these. You can choose whatever you'd like to choose at this point, but it's important to note also that these would not apply to some of those past grants. CDBG, UDAG, you know, they come with their own strings attached, we follow the regulations from the funder that gives us the funding for that.

Option one is continue with funding agreements. They would be on an annual basis. The city attorney has told us that you all cannot bind future commissions, so they would all be single annual year allocations. We can do them in an amount as we've been doing it and basically don't change anything and continue on that way. Or option two, fully competitive grants.

You decide an amount. Maybe you take the amount we use this year and you decide we're gonna use that amount and ask everybody to apply for it. We can certainly put on put together a request for those proposals that has any particular theme that you want in any given year. You know, maybe you want to make sure that these are for out of school programs for whoever may do it. The Historic Society does a summer program. Sandaway does a summer program. So many of them would be eligible still to do that. Or whatever theme you want to do that promotes whatever is of importance to commission and the city as a whole. We can certainly do that, put together that process. A couple of of grants here would utilize the basics of the city's existing grant policy.

We would follow what Janai just told you. We would have some specifics. We would probably have some sort of a review scoring criteria put in place. Is is it more important that this is an organization that's been in the city for twenty years rather than two years? Is it more important that there's someone who occupies a lease on our property? I do, let you know one of things about having, financial support to those organizations is they are also stewards of our property. We don't have to constantly go back to those properties because they're vacant. They let us know when things are going on. They do have some responsibilities to maintain interiors of those properties.

So yes, sir. So just one quick question. So in this scenario, would these potentially be multiyear agreements? So the these are annual like the previous option. It it renews, renews, renews every year. This one could be multiple years?

And I would say no because the the city attorney has repeatedly told us, you cannot bind a future commission. Now Okay. And and I asked Lynn if if I'm stating correctly, but you could do a fixed amount and have it to be spent over a period of time, but not an an annual allocation over that time.

As long as there's an ability to terminate Okay. For convenience or for whatever basis, I think you can do multiyear. A lot of the concern was, creating a presumption that the money would be the same every year Yeah. If we did a multiyear agreement. And I think this commission and prior commissions wanted to have that understanding laid out publicly so that everybody understood each year there were no guarantees or promises for the future years.

Continue.

And I would ask you also to remember that

Can I ask, sorry, one more question? Does that scenario create problems for the nonprofit in that their funding isn't guaranteed further out? Are they still able to manage the longevity of their business even though, you know, it's an annual funding re

I'm not a nonprofit, but I can tell you my discussions with some of our nonprofits is they're concerned about that. Okay. If you yank away a $100,000 from a nonprofit, that's a significant

amount Understood. Yeah.

One of things is if we go to a competitive process of this type, it's going to take the nonprofits more time to submit and to pull together all the information and submit an application. It'll take staff a significant amount of time to review those and move those forward appropriately. I can tell you the CRA a guide, I know it was very difficult for the CRA, very difficult for nonprofits. Interestingly enough, they put together a competitive process and ended up funding the same nonprofits for the same amount almost every year even though it was a significant amount of time for them and a lot of paperwork for the nonprofits to review as well as significant amount of time for the committee that reviewed them. What we can do through this also though is we can decide specific performance standards that you want met or require that they give us very specific performance standards.

Our current agreements don't have the best of performing standards. They're very general, more kind of aligned to do what you do rather than a specific item of make sure you do this, whatever this may be. Alright. One of the things in our current agreements, the ongoing funding agreements is the nonprofits have to provide us a certain amount of financial information when they first get the agreement. And then each year, they've gotta provide us with a could sell a statement of their finances and some other information.

That I would anticipate if we were doing an open competitive grant, we would ask for certain things upfront so that we can make sure that they are stable and have the financial wherewithal. And then the new agreement that the city attorney's office put together for Arts Garage is great. It has submittal of receipts at the end of the year. So we know the money went to what it was supposed to go to. That agreement's in your backup.

You can review that. I would anticipate that would be the type of agreement we would have in the future. So we get financial information upfront that says you you have the wherewithal to do this, and then we get receipts say showing how we our money was spent. Now third option is some combination thereof. As commissioner Marckardt said, you may have a concern about withdrawing so much funding from some of these nonprofits.

So we can set aside a certain amount of money for those nonprofits that have it now, maybe free up others for competitive grants, maybe you want to wean them off this amount over a period of time. Whatever you feel might work, whatever the nonprofits tell you might work for them that you can agree to, those are the sort of things we can still go through all the same grant process. We can do an RFP. We can do any any of those options. So it gives you a little bit of leeway to not say, okay.

Nonprofits get money now. We're not getting anything, period. Or you can do that and go to a competitive process process and and maybe we give them extra points if they got if they have current funding. There's all different ways we can structure that. It really depends on how the commission would like to do that and what your goals are with the nonprofits. That's all I have there.

I appreciate both of you and the presentation. I'm I'm gonna just ask ask a couple quick questions because I've gone through all the materials several times. And I'm not gonna include the UDAG, the block grant stuff. Those are pass throughs. I'm not even sure why we they're on your screen because we don't really not no way we can affect those with the law enforcement grant. So mean but that's fine.

Mayor, I I would tell you, I wanted to let you know who's getting them because there is one entity that gets from all of them. So I wanna lay out all the money they're getting out of the city so you're aware.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm aware of that. That's fine. Have we thought about categorizing our, you know, funding for not for profits in these certain you know, what the the service that they do. For example, the library historic, those actually provide a service to the city. Alright? So they they provide a service. So they're kind of different than Sandaway House or any one of these I mean, so do we have should should our policy include, you know, just really separating things into what service they provide? Because you you as you articulated, you know, this person asked an afternoon program.

I'm seeing people having a hard time hearing you. Oh, why? Your microphone's kinda far away. Sorry. Never signaling.

That that's not very often people say that, actually. So that's that's I I'm I'm happy to do that. Thank you. No. You're welcome. Thank you. Well, our our chairs got shifted because of the other meetings. So it it It's a bit off. So is there any thought given to kinda categorizing the not for profits into types of service that they provide and or and or whether or not they are really doing the service for the city. I mean, said about if they're running the building, how important that is. And obviously, that is. But for example, but the library and historic are different than some of the other not for profits. I'm not saying any less any more important, but different. So do we do do we have any thought about how to create

We we certainly could do that. And however it is you might want to divvy these up, I don't know if you wanna give me specifics. We can sit down and come up with a proposal to

get to

I'm I'm I'm to lines or the example I used, educate out of school education, you know, if you wanted to that's been an an issue this commission I know has has been involved in. And maybe we wanna give nonprofits based on they run a summer program or an after school program. We can we can put together pots like that.

Because there's because some cities in this how they break it break them up into, you know, their service or use. They do do we have a policy in in terms of whether it's just a per capita type of thing? Or do we do we do we look at what the what their revenues are in terms of before we give them a grant? I mean, do we do anything? Is there any like, they want some of the not for profits or some of the events, they say, we're gonna give you up to $8,000 or 10% or whatever, you know, whatever is smaller or whatever the number Do we do that for with the not for profits as well?

Our current policy does not is is more general than that. It just kinda dictates the process. That sort of thing would come a little bit more into play in what we put into any request for proposal for these, the specific things you want from them.

Because most most municipalities seem to have gravitated towards creating some kind of a rule whether or not it's gonna be a percentage of their, of of of their operating cost or, you know, or just some per capita number. So we don't have a policy, and that's why I think whatever policy we we adopt, and I don't care which it is, we should have a policy that kinda spells that out. Because I don't even know how we do as a city. I mean, have our our not for profits are great. So, I mean, I'm if if people have certainly said this before, for the little town of, you know, 16 square miles, we we generate for our not for profits is fabulous.

Do we know where we are in the scheme of things in other municipalities? Are we lower than other municipalities? Are we higher than other municipalities in terms of the percentage of our funding that goes to not for profits?

We have not done a review of that. I I can tell you just anecdotally in my experience is there are cities that give nothing. There are cities that have more formalized program and give a lot of money. It depends on where their budgets are. I lived in excuse me. I work for one city where they gave $10,000 every year to a a nonprofit that assisted the blind, and that was it. And nobody knows why that happened. It was just always given for twenty years. They kept giving it.

Mister mayor, the South Florida throughout Florida marketplace supports a variety of approaches there straight annual allocations there's competitive processes every year a lot of the options that were outlined here for today's presentation takes under consideration in terms of what happens in the marketplace so the same it's across

the Whether we we've looked at whether we because we make we there are some cities, I think, which probably percentage wise give more money than we do. So

In some cases, that's true.

And and so I'm really trying to not that I'm trying to make my not for profits competitive, but I do think that there's they have to be competitive. So in terms of

I I can also tell you in my personal experience, there aren't a lot of cities that have quite so much leased space to nonprofits. We do have a fair amount of that. With the exception of the library, the spaces we lease to these folks who are getting money is all historic properties.

Okay. And one other question, Luke, because I was a little confused by the by the by the graph. We talked about the 460 what the CRA had had in their presentation. They talked about $463,500 and saying that was one half. Where are we in terms of because we know the CRA is moving out of that. So I guess I'm trying to figure out what's the total number we're talking about in terms of

The CRA has moved completely out of it. This year,

we took over

all of

that funding. So what is the what is the total number we're talking about?

I'll tell you because I added broadly broadly, estimated. Estimated. Because first of all, you have to take the library out of this calculation altogether, in my opinion. They shouldn't even I know it's here for but this isn't something that's optional. This is something that's going to be ongoing. And then I would also say for consideration of the number, the visitor center, Mae Vollin, Pioneer Boys, and the Chamber of Commerce, that's just lease agreements. We're not funding them with money. So I'm taking that out of the equation, as well as the Community Land Trust Christian Reading. And then the Urban League is small. The Legal Aid I didn't know we were doing for Mulagro, but that's through the UDAG, I'm happy to see that.

It's about 1,900,000.0 estimated at about 1,900,000.0 for what we're doing right now, not including the library. And I just did that fast in my head, so don't really

check them. But then my follow-up question would be, have analyzed we the value of the benefit? Because if some of these are just leases, which is fine, I'm not objecting, do we know what do we

I think put the lease numbers in there. That's what I'm saying. So when you look at the visitor center, their total estimate support from the city is 31. I have that in my in the beginning, if you include the lease stuff, you get to 2,230,000.00. But realistically value

of the benefit because if if I'm renting something for

Correct.

$10 a month and it's worth a $100 a month, then I'm getting a $90 benefit.

Right. But I really was more looking at for the sake of the discussion of these options, I think we first have to start talking about who we're actually funding with money before and then we can talk about because these are very separate things and bunching them all together to get a number is great, but they're not at all similar in how we're funding them.

I do think do which is what I'm saying. That's why I I talk about categorizations and Right. Because there's a lot that we don't in developing this policy, it's gonna it's a it's a major undertaking and and I and I'm I'm I'm concerned that

I do think we should continue on. Oh, may I have the floor?

Yeah. You have it. But go ahead.

I know. I'm sorry. I do think we should well, I was answering your question and because the math is on the page. But I think when we have people in our buildings, that we should be wanting to support them. And agree with you. They provide a service. The Historical Society, Spady Sandaway is providing. I mean, the arts garage is providing. They're all providing a service.

Well, service to the city. I I I historic because they are actually our they they hold the city's archives, a library because it's the library. You could also probably include Spady because it does include, you know, the historical aspects to to the to to the Northwest Southwest neighbors. But other than those three, I don't know which ones I mean, they're all valuable.

I'm not

They're all valuable. So I when the city are to different date. Right. But I

think service for the city or for the for not in the city. Well,

I think they're all doing a service for the city. And even if you go to look at people that like the Boys and Girls Club, they're doing a service for our city.

It's it's what they're providing a service for people that are beneficiaries in the city, but it's not they're not it's not it's we're already

know what you're saying, but in we are also saying we need to work on help how do we improve the quality of education? What we've determined from six different conversations is the quality of education, the way that we do that is by subsidizing programming after school. So, I mean, I do think we have to sort of say, is our budget, how much of our budget do we want to allocate to non profits and then where do we want to put it? And I do agree that I do really feel like the funding at some amount to what we're already giving to the people in our buildings is should be ongoing. And then the question is, what do we do beyond that for individuals?

I understand you're asking what are other cities doing, but I don't even like comparing ourselves to other cities When things are happening in Boynton, let's not compare ourselves anymore Boynton in some respects. I I know. I I never actually

I never actually compare ourselves to Boynton.

Right. I mean, I love it. So I don't know who we'd compare ourselves to. I think we just have to determine what do we find valuable.

Agreed. But that's I'm just trying to understand because I'm I'm trying to really create a policy that's I'm not looking to take things away. Understand, I'm trying to figure out a way to create a a policy that is predictable and doing the

the Okay. So if we're not looking to take things away, so what we're gonna then, Jeremy, we agree we're staying where we are right now and going

I mean, I mean, I love the competitive aspect, but I don't know that we're ready to do that. I mean, my my if I had to force an inclination on myself, I would say, look, I think this year we just do what we were doing, but truly get in place the policy that's going to be because I think we're going to need every one of these entities is going to need a transition period to learn how to make that application to do that application.

And so that begets the biggest problem we have because if we are going year to year, then you can't. And you're sitting here currently but maybe we all might not be here again. How do you project that out into the future? That's the problem.

So you're either That's my conundrum because I think that we do need a policy. I could work with option three. I work work with any of these options if we had if I had a better understanding about what is our total number we're trying to do, what are we trying to achieve, what is it? Well, that's thing. We don't we as a city, we're spending taxpayer dollars without understanding what our priorities are with the spending of those taxpayer dollars.

That's where

Because you you mentioned education. I'm very keen on education. So when we talk about directing dollars, we have to establish where what priorities we have for the spending of those dollars. And and that's not what we we we have not really done that.

Right. And I would argue almost all of these, the Achievement Center's education, arts garages education, are doing programs for kids, historical societies education. Obviously, library we're not talking about, but education. Sandaway House, definitely education. Spady, education. I mean, really, these all fall under that, and maybe not the education you're thinking of where you're thinking about. No.

Well, I'm, you know, I'm not positive what we could do with this, I mean, in the NGO, with the after school programs. I'm not positive whether, I mean, whether we should look more closely at the at the not for profits who do these after school programs.

Like Roots and Wings and more of the law ground.

Actually, we have so many good ones.

The problem is if you go to a combination, when you go to the second option, it sounds like it's more cumbersome potentially in terms of reporting. Can you go back to option two slide?

Really, it's only the first year.

Most most It seems like none of these are optional.

What are you thinking?

I'm thinking I would love to see a competitive, process. However, you know, we we we retain these because of the service that they provide. So, you know, my thing is, what do we want? Like, where do we wanna go? What do we wanna support? And if it's what we have, then we continue what we're doing. I mean, I hate to see, we we get pigeonholed to what we have and and other organizations are not able to come in and and apply for these grants. But it seems like we have the ones that we want if if that's what we want.

I think that was an interesting statistic. The c d the CRA went too competitive, and they ended up doing exactly the same thing, which is probably what Pretty

much. Yeah.

I'm not suggesting that isn't what what happened here either.

Right. You know?

I mean

And, mayor, there there are certain like, one of the reasons I I I wanted to make sure I I said this is, for instance, Achievement Center with their grant for Pine Grove and Village Academy. That's actually a three three part thing that we're entered into an agreement with them and the school board because the school board's providing the school space. So that agreement expires this year. So we've got a by the way, despite what it actually says in the document that it was 2025, we've confirmed it's actually 2026 that expires. But that comes up.

If we wanna go with it, we gotta start working on that agreement now for next year. So so that's important to know. You've got the library. We know what the situation with the library is. We give them a lot of money to prevent the county from coming in and charging our residents much more Right. Than what the library costs our residents now through what we give them. And then you've got the historic society, which also $50,000 of what we give them provides a city archivist.

Which is critically important.

Yeah. So That's what

I'm saying.

We do have these things in place as well.

If I may, mayor, the here's the problem. If you we we're going into the budgeting process, and every time we get there, it's cut, cut, cut. If you're expanding this program, be prepared to be laying out more money. If we stay where we're at, we know where we are. If you open it up to competitive, I feel that I like that we give grants to organizations that are utilizing our property. Now, you could argue some people say, hey, you're already giving them the property. But we're also helping them to be successful in the property. And I think we argue that every one of those is important.

Agree with you. I I I want to understand better the value of benefit. We've we've not and you stated this, we have not really looked at the deliverables at all. I mean, we haven't really done any performance requirement, and I I think that that should be part of when you do spending taxpayer dollars, there is some kind of measured measured performance standard that we we said, we are looking for you to do this, and you showed us that you did that. I do understand that when you're doing your receipts and things like that, you have a better control over that. And I think that was that's

a You're looking for an ROI, return on investment. That is what you're looking for. Mean, it's pretty basic. You're spending x and you want y.

No, I just want to make sure that they do

So, but we were getting that in the form of when we were doing the AGUIDE funding, were getting those types of reports. And now we're trying to figure out how we move forward with the grants Because that's derive idea some kind of

worked very well.

Well, was talking to one of our agencies and there was talk about benevolent grants, do have reporting requirements, something we had in the past. I'm not super familiar with that paperwork. I don't you know, listen. I think it's totally appropriate if you're giving a grant to understand the value that it provided the residents, but I think we can all agree that with any one of these organizations we're funding, the benefit is there. We just can't specifically articulate what it is.

Right? I think what you need to to figure out, because we're going into the budget, how much money you, this commission, we are willing to allocate. Allocate because that dictates where we're going if we're going status quo then we're not opening it up to competitive grants because there is no additional funding if we're going to fund what we currently have and then we're going to expand and give more have more money out there then you maybe want to go look at organizations that are doing educational things since we've all said we that's what we we would like to focus on how to improve the quality of our children's education but at the end of the day and every one of these meetings I start and end the same. It all relies on money. And if we're gonna sit here at budget time and be screaming, cut, cut, cut, we don't have the money, then there's no point in having this conversation and bringing all these people here.

I I agree. I look. I I that's part of what I said was we need to determine how much we wanna allocate to the not for profits. Right. That's the number.

Okay. So then

figure out how we're gonna spread it out among the various, you know, not for profits, whether we do it through competitive, whether we do it through the Right. Negotiated, whether we do it

So perhaps we conclude by asking staff to categorize these various expenses. Okay? So the the the the category of what is the total value of the programming, right? And I think that's about or any of the money and I included the total last column in that you know 1,900,000.0. But the organizations that are doing programming, I think we need to know how much money that totals because that's where you're going. I mean, I'm assuming we're I'm trying to understand why we're here today. And I'm assuming we're looking to go forward the way that we've been going, but you just need a better understanding of the numbers.

I need to understand. Well, I I the answer is yes. I mean, I'm not looking to get I'm not we do we there are so many holes in our policy. So what I I want my Is

there a policy?

Well, there is

a policy. It was talked about in the first part of the presentation. Yes, ma'am. There was there was policy. There was no policy.

But it's it's it's we need to the whole thing was we need to create some special in however we do it. And because just right now, the policy is they apply, we say it, and they get the money. That's great. However, we got to measure what the values of the benefits are. We have to measure and, again, I'm not talk trying to talk taking anything away. And I I like I've I've I've already taken the library and and the and the historic put them over here and spady over here, and now I'm dealing with everybody else. So I need

to Okay. Let's go through a list of who you're dealing with. If we let's get this make this productive. We take the library off the table. Let's go through the list.

I'm just saying, they're not off the table. They're still coming to get money from us.

No. No. We're not discussing them, meaning you're you wanna fund them at that same level because you feel you you put them in a particular category of benefiting the residents. So let's make our list. Spady. Okay. We take off the table. So we continue to fund Spady at exactly 261,497, which is inclusive of the grant money, which is 155,000. And then the maintenance, the fair market

That's not that's not what I'm saying, commissioner Kassad.

Okay. What are

you saying? I'm I'm saying, we're trying to develop a policy here. I'm not gonna I'm not plucking out numbers now.

Well, let's just pluck out organizations.

I'm just saying we see I wanted to see the different organizations categorized in terms of different stuff. I'm not talking about because the funding aspect and funding request is gonna come

They can't categorize it. We have to. If you're saying that you feel that Spady provides something, mister Oris is not in a position to tell us what we feel provides something, That's our job. So we should at least try and conclude the meeting categorizing them some way so that we can get to the next step. Because where this all leads to is putting a dollar amount in our budget

I'm agreeing

with with to have this. We it. Can't get there until we lay it out.

Well, we need to we need to figure out what our as as as commission as as commissioner Burns also said, you know, what our we where are our priorities?

You know? Right. That's what we're here to talk about.

Priorities first. And also, is there a performance measure in the policy?

We don't have it. We we don't

have a performance measure.

We don't really know what we're gonna

be So the policy needs to we need to insert a performance measure in in the policy.

Well, if I may, mayor? Sure. I think one of the things we need to do is make sure that the the performance standard if you look at the agreement that we put together for Arts Garage Right. It lends itself to tell us what you're gonna do with our money.

Yeah. Right.

And then we can make sure there are performance standards within that. So at the end of the year, when they report to us, they could say, okay. Here's all the receipts for everything we did. Here's what it funded. And they can give us specific if it's out of school programs, how many students were participating, participating, how long they lasted, how many times they that may be. And then we can have a report at the end of the year with their submittal that says, here's what we did. They do something like that now, but the standards are so general. They're really not specific.

But you've articulated exactly what what what commissioner Burns

was saying. I mean, it there it's very easy to create a rubric that goes across the board Right. For what we want once we determine what we want. What what do we want to serve? Right. A a rubric is very easy to to that'll go across the board. That'll serve all of the organizations that I see on you.

And you all can categorize what it is you may wanna do and then say, hey, nonprofit. Tell us what you're gonna do. Before we put together the agreement, you give us the standards that that you think we should be measuring by, and then we can review them and and say they're sufficient, they're not sufficient. You should move the the tab here a little bit, whatever the case may be. And did they meet them? What did they meet? How often? And we have all those that information.

That's that would be something that should be that was that's the kind of stuff I'm talking about when I talk about these things that other places have in their policies. And I'm not trying to say whether we're gonna give this I

get what you're saying, but right now we don't we we sort of have that historically through the a guide programming. If we could go back and look at those documents and we can see

I think the a guide is a great is is is I I I thought I

But I'm back to the beginning, which is how do we move to the next level here if we do not figure out what it is we're trying to accomplish. Ahead.

Mr. Mayor, may I?

You Yes, you No.

I was just saying you have to establish your goals of what what what do we want out of it first before you can move anywhere.

Right. Exactly. We we

we obviously have nonprofits that we are satisfied with what they provide to the city. So now we just gotta create something that hits that.

Right. Miss Amir, if I may One second. I'd to offer a suggestion based on the input having been provided by everybody. We're not in position to offer a drastic change in terms of current process and practice at this particular point in time a huge clarification offered this afternoon is the fact that agreements have to exist on an annual basis given commission opportunity to prioritize what the goals and objectives are in terms of his partnership with nonprofit organizations in the community number one number two we will soon embark on the initial phases of the fiscal year twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven proposed budget process first meeting anticipated in April we'll discuss aggregately what the next steps are associated with getting to the best place possible in this regard there was also mention of a annual goal setting session resuming that opportunity I'm anticipating that to take place sometime in the month of May in which we can make this a particular focus in this regard however I do wish to publicly state that we support the merits for performance measurements indicators to be incorporated in terms of annual reporting there are some noted footnotes or good examples as to what that looks like in different organizations you talk about arts garage that particular format and that's probably a step appropriate to get us to where we need to be so that we can achieve in that regard so for that reason ladies and gentlemen I'd like to suggest that we continue as noted and also as we embark on the proposed budget process I'm conscious of revenue expenditures and frankly at this juncture, it's not advisable that we expand the financial footprint above and beyond what's being made available to nonprofit organizations.

And in preparation in this regard, my thoughts are in relationship to what's being made available because I think that is reasonable, plausible, and thus a realistic consideration. So we work with what's being made available in this regard and as we engage in the annual goal setting session you'll have an opportunity to prioritize what it is that you wish to accomplish so that we can continue a productive relationship with the nonprofit organizations in this community so those are my suggestions and

could I ask for clarification you said I like to continue as noted. Could you be more clear with me what what are we continuing right now? Right now, the people sitting here are anticipating the same level of funding

That's what I mean.

Coming forth in the next fiscal year budget.

I mentioned that early on, but I followed it up as noted. I stated as noted later because I specifically mentioned the current I

just want to make sure we're all clear on

That is what

I when we walk out the door,

what I we're wasn't looking to I mean, there's gonna be a transition period. So but I'm not I wasn't looking to I I'm just trying to develop a good policy.

Listen. I think great policies we should be developing policies throughout the entire city. I just I think when we have these meetings, it's not exactly clear what we're doing. We we may make our nonprofits concerned.

With your assistance, commissioner, I was able to clarify for you

Thank you.

What I specifically had in mind. And I think that's reasonable because I will be the first to offer as we prepare for 2026, 2027.

This could have been done administratively without fanfare though. This this changing the policies in the how we, you know receive back information with respect to what is being done it's a great conversation

it's a good conversation I think it was healthy because there are policy implications that do involve the commission as it relates to funding considerations in that regard But again

leave tonight. We expect everybody to receive the same level of funding in the next year's fiscal budget and that's the what we've agreed on here?

That is the

We should let my colleagues answer that.

I I I I I this is not the funding meeting. I mean, need to understand better

We're moving into our budget. We've asked for him to do it way earlier than usual, so we need he should have some sense of what money he's allocating in the budget. It's don't get me wrong. We can it can maneuver around, but the whole the whole idea behind all these grants is how are we funding them? What are we funding? And we're having this workshop. Let's start with how do we move forward? Money.

Miss Amir? My recommendation in Could you terms of allow money

my colleagues for a consensus, miss mister Moore

on this coming to that, ma'am.

Thank you.

Justice just, ma'am. In the context seeking appropriate consensus where which was the next step it comes with the recommended proviso that the funding levels for the anticipated coming fiscal year will remain as is because I do foresee that being the case there may be some direction otherwise as we get down the path of the proposed budget process but where we stand at this particular juncture we can comfortably commit to that effect and again we outline other specifics as we approach the goal setting session for the coming fiscal year which is anticipated in May but the budget process begins in April so with that I therefore seek consensus clarifying question

Sir? Does that mean we are not going to be seeking other partners?

Yes, sir.

It'll just be the the group that we have is the group that we have.

For the time being. K. Which is kind

of what I said. I just I'm happy to go this year. Renew the go you know, get up this year and put in place something that's gonna really be

Okay. But mister Market, you you asked a question and said okay to the answer, but are you saying okay to that level of funding for the I like us to start having very clearly documented consensus on the record Because often what I find is that we have a conversation up here and I leave feeling it's gone in one direction and then it's not at all clear. So I would like very clear consensus on on the budgeting as we currently stand with the nonprofits. Is that

Are are you asking are we committing now to the budget number?

I'm asking, are we assuming we're committing now to we don't know what the budget is going by the end of We We know these these numbers. We know what these numbers are right here.

Right. But we don't know what all our other numbers are. Well, we

have to provide some direction to staff.

Need some direction. So I'm assuming

I don't think you're asking for a vote. I think you're asking for

I'm just asking

Based on this discussion, is that direction?

And that I I think that don't go in a direction.

I would say, yeah. My my I would be yes on that. Thank you.

You know, subject to what we do with the budget. I mean,

I of course. Yeah. So

which is kind of what I said when I was just ready to move.

I just think that oh, I'll just wait. Which one?

That's fine. Okay.

Okay. So I just think that it's too close to the budget process to change anything in terms of the amount of funding. So I'm I'm all for keeping things the way they are with this 1,900,000.0, I guess, until we create this this policy with goals and objectives and performance measures and all that's that's needed for this.

So yeah. With that consensus

all of that to say yes.

Yes, ma'am. So with that consensus, ladies and gentlemen, policy details and related considerations will engage in the month of May when we assemble the annual goal session. We'll make that a focus in that regard because I think that's appropriate and productive. Nevertheless, I think I know where to go in terms of the financial administration angle. So thank you.

Thank you.

Great.

Any other comments by anybody? Work workshop is adjourned. Thank you.