City Council - Regular Meeting

City Council meeting to order. First thing we'll do is the invocation. Chief Alan Shipley will come up and lead us in that. And then we'll do the Pledge of Allegiance with former Chief Tim Ward.

Let's pray. Father in heaven, Lord, we thank you for this day, dear God. Lord, we thank you for this time of year. Watch over us, dear God, and guide and direct us with this counsel, Lord. Help them make the decisions they need to make, dear God. We ask your guidance. We ask these things in your name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, the first thing I'd like to do is to say, Steve Starnes, can you come up here for just a second? How are you going to find, no. I just want to say thank you. You've been leading our schools for the last few years and have worked very diligently at it, and we haven't always agreed on everything, but we've been able to talk, and I hope that we can always do that. So I want to say thank you. I hope that we can always do that. So I want to say thank you for your help and your guidance, and also good luck to you on your next steps. And please, everyone, let's join in giving him a hand. Would you like to say anything? Or are you afraid you might have to come up later?

advocate for the students and the staff. Any of us can do it at the end of the day.

That's exactly right. So thank you again.

Thank you.

Okay, the next item will be the gift for kids. We're going to let Christina read that for us.

All right. I'll do this without trying to have to scroll it. Okay. Whereas Gifts for Kids Christmas in July is a cherished annual event that brings joy and happiness to children throughout our community, supported each year by the generous citizens of Greenville and Greene County. Whereas Gifts for Kids itself has served local children and families for more than 30 years, beginning as a grassroots effort in 1995 to ensure every child received Christmas gifts and growing into a trusted community-rooted nonprofit organization located exclusively in Greene County, and whereas this event seeks to provide for children of qualifying at-risk families in our communities through the collection and distribution of new and gently used toys, school-appropriate jeans and warm apparel, and Whereas all benefits, monies, and donations from Christmas in July fundraising activities directly support Gifts for Kids, enabling the organization to help even more children this year and ensuring that every child may experience the joy of receiving a gift. And whereas we urge all citizens of Greene County to make a difference and pass it forward by sharing their financial blessings and volunteering their time and talents throughout 2026, in support of Gifts for Kids, spreading love and kindness to those who need it most. And whereas citizens are encouraged to drop off new and gently used toys, school-appropriate jeans, and warm apparel at the Gifts for Kids drop-off site located on West Irish Street, adjoining the Forward Air corporate facility. And now, therefore, Kevin C. Morrison, Mayor of Greene County, Tennessee, and C. Calvin Doty, Mayor of Greenville, Tennessee, by the authority vested in them and in... We proclaim Gifts for Kids Christmas in July month, and we hereby encourage our fellow citizens, businesses, churches, and community organizations to participate in the various activities that are planned.

Thank you. And this year, we've had to cut back on some of the gifts we gave to some of the non-profits this year, and this is a great... activity that we've got going on here in Greenville and Greene County. So, I hope you will help support that. So, thank you, Christina. Also, on July 8th, there's going to be a reading of the Direct Declaration of Independence in front of the Greene County Courthouse. What time is that?

The event starts at 5.30. The reading will start promptly at 6 p.m. because this is a nationwide effort where anyone who wants to get together and read the Declaration is going to do it at that same time, 6 p.m. Eastern or whatever that happens to be for their time. So it's going to be – there's going to be some choir singing. There's going to be – Apple pie, hot dogs from John Price. So it's very all American. So we hope everybody will come. We have some special things planned for that evening. So hope everybody can come.

I hope you'll come and join us. We also, this is a great time of the year, although we've had a lot of folks graduate from high school and college and moving on to their next steps. The proms, I live on Main Street, and I've seen people going up and down the street, taking pictures and enjoying their time out. We had Memorial Day, which I hope we all remembered how important that is to all of us. And it's a great time of the year. I hope everybody is ready and got their plans for summer vacation and have a good time if you take some time. Also, did everyone know that yesterday was the 230th birthday on the state of Tennessee? Yes, I did. No, I didn't. Well, it was. And so in honor of that, I just wanted to bring that up to everyone. It's also kind of interesting. How long has Greenville been around? 243 years so you know we were the part of um state franklin when it was started and so greenville is older than the state which is kind of interesting and then tusculum i think is older than the state also and then the next thing is i'd like to kind of talk about what's going on to be going to coming up soon. It's the 250th anniversary, but we'll be having a celebration on July 4th downtown. And, uh, we've got a lot of, a lot of activities going on and I hope that everyone will keep their eyes open and take advantage of the opportunities that you have around the town. It'll be, um, Fun stuff. It'll be interesting stuff. You can learn history. You can listen to music. Cool stuff going on. The Greene County Heritage Trust website has all the information on there, and I hope you'll take a look. I've had a couple people ask me about the banners that we have downtown and if you could buy them. If you have an interest in one, let the Heritage Trust know because they're going to order some before the end of the year. And I've had a couple people ask me about it. So I was in my office the other day and I looked down and I saw where I had written or signed my ethics agreement. And after that, I started kind of reflecting about what we do here as an elected official and also as our town. So just very quickly, at a time when public confidence in government is being challenged across our nation, it is important to remember that ethical government begins with individual responsibility. Tennessee's Ethnic Laws and the Town of Greenville Ethnic Policy provide guidance for elected officials, appointed board members, employees, and department directors. They require annual certifications, disclosures of conflict of interest, and adherence to standards designed to ensure decisions are made in the best public interest. However, ethics is not simply about policies or compliance. It's about personal accountability. And accountability requires education. I didn't always do the education that I needed to do in some of the decisions that I made, and I'm ashamed. But I am trying to do better. No one should assume they already know everything there is to know about ethnic laws or conflict of interest requirements. Ongoing training helps ensure that officials and employees recognize potential issues before they become problems and understand the proper steps to take when questions arise. Every public official is responsible for understanding the law, recognizing potential conflicts, and exercising sound judgment. Every year it's getting more and more difficult to keep up with these laws as quickly as they're changing. Department directors have an additional responsibility to provide guidance to their employees, encourage questions, and ensure their teams receive appropriate ethics training. Employees should never hesitate to seek direction from their supervisors or department heads when faced with an ethical concern. No vote, committee recommendation, directive, or group decision removes an individual's responsibility for his or hers actions. Each of us remains accountable for the decisions we make and the advice we provide. The citizens of Greenville expect honesty, transparency, and integrity from those who serve. They expect us to put the public interest ahead of personal, political, or financial interest. Meeting that expectation requires both individual commitment and continual learning. Our ethics policy provides the framework, training provides the knowledge, and individual responsibility provides the accountability. Together, they help protect the public trust and ensure that Greenville's government remains worthy of the confidence of the people we serve. Thank you. Okay, next is our public comments. John, can you pick that up over there? I think there's one person on it. Yeah, thank you. Mary Louise Watts, please. Mrs. Mary Louise Watts. Can you speak, can you pull the microphone down just a little bit?

Good evening to each and every one of you. My complaint is here today, I don't know if I have to email somebody or not, but I have called your phone and the mailbox is full. I called Tim Teague and left a voicemail, no return. So... What I'm complaining today is I have lived, will be 59 year on Royal Street. And I want to, I'm 81 year old now, and I still drive, but I have got pictures on my phone that when you come at the, off to view at the end of Royal Street to view down Halsey Street, you can't see because Matt, The fellow, Matt, has got so many bushes that he can't... This is my view when I'm stopped at the stop sign. The bushes is growed out. And there's a lot of people. There's some more on there too of a view of a tree that's grown up on the right side where that block house is. It's overgrown. And there's nobody can do nothing. I've called the police department. I've complained to Scott Key. I've called and talked to the girl four or five times. And they tell me they can't go on private property. Well, Roundup can. If they don't have the machine to do it, Roundup does a good job. And my neighbor, he about got hit out there. And if anybody's here that's not a big tall guy, and I sat on a pillow, I cannot see that way. And I came down here and signed a paper with Paige, and she got a hold of Matt. He's kind of crippled, but he works, and he's stubborn as a mule. And he says he's not gonna cut them bushes. Well, if I wouldn't get sued, I know what I'd do with him. Roundup does a good job. But he would sue you, and I can't do that. And first, I'm not able, but I'd see that I could. But anyway, the house, the lot is growed up with trees and stuff that they, the girls in rehab, that somebody's paying the taxes, But it's grown up so bad, I would just like for you to drive by on Halsey Street, and it's where you turn into Royal Street. All the bushes is there, and all that grown up house of the block house. At one time it was gonna be sold, but somebody keeps paying the taxes on it. It's a disgrace. and yes i i i can't do much but i do get out and do a little bit and keep my flowers and i want to ask you how many feet do is the city allowed on each side of the street is it eight foot on each side i think we'll need to have a look at that i don't know It used to be. Now, I've got flower pots on the city where my chain link fence is. It's back on our property. But my flower pots is on the city. I keep them painted. We keep the banks out there. My son hired somebody to mow the banks. And if somebody's going to have to do something, either they're going to have to do some roundup or somebody's going to have to... I think... The distance is like from eight foot from one side to the other one. These bushes are set on the city. If you're not able to maintain them, they need to come down, and these not. And I'm aggravated, and if I could, I'd hire somebody, but he says he ain't going to trim them. So somebody's got to do something up there. They got to use some spray over on that where I can see up to the right where the speed bump is. And when you come off Bohannon, come down that little alley, you do a little raise, and here's these bushes. And I am so aggravated. I'm a Christian. But sometimes the devil makes my tongue and little devil's sword. And I'm just tired of it. And I don't know how to get a hold of you all. I don't do email.

Okay.

But... Whenever I leave a message, I like to have my... It returns. And if you ever get up by there to come... And also the stop sign over on Bohannon, it's sitting over at the light pole. And I've nearly got hit. My son's nearly got hit. There needs to be a stop here because people don't stop coming over at Hill. My friend got hit. So...

Thank you. One other thing. Can you tell us what your claim to fame is?

My claim to fame?

Uh-huh.

I'm the first woman alderman of this town in 1985.

Let's give her a hand.

Charlie Worley and Arnold Hunter and Charlie Moore and Mayor Love.

And you kept them all in line, didn't you?

There you go. I had Alan Fritz here and got 911 in. Everybody raised cane, but that's all right. But you sure want to support your 911 no matter what, because if you ever take a tour of that place, you can see that the money that they charge, they need it.

Thank you.

All right, I think that's all that's on the public comments. So unfinished business is consideration to approve the minutes from the regularly scheduled meeting held on May 19th, 2026. We got those out last Friday. Do I hear a motion to approve?

Motion to approve.

Second. Any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All those against, like sign. Motion carries. Item 6.2 is a public hearing and consideration of an ordinance on second and final reading. to rezone 1202 Tuscaloosa Boulevard from R1 low-density residential to RB4 arterial business. Hello, Justin.

Good afternoon, City Council. So yes, this is the second and final reading to rezone the property on 1202 Tuscaloosa Boulevard. That's currently being used as a office, business office site and will remain as such. And this rezoning will bring this property into compliance.

Motion to approve. guess it's a public hearing so I'm sorry is there anyone here that would like to speak about this okay you knew my motion to approve we have a motion is there a second is there any further discussion all those in favor say aye all those against like sign final reading of a text Amendment to the Greenville Zoning Ordinance to define an authorized neighborhood gathering venue as a use in the B1 district in places of amusement and assembly as a use in the B2 district.

Thank you. So this is the second and final reading for the ordinance text amendment. And as you'll notice in the agenda packet for the draft ordinance, I worked with Ron Woods where due to the comments for the first reading on the bed and breakfast, we removed that section. So there's no Bed and breakfast home or in change. So this is strictly now just the small event venue gathering for the neighborhood gathering venue and the place of amusement and assembly change from before to be to as a use. So nothing has changed since the first reading except the removal of bed and breakfast. And I think we talked about addressing that at a later point. So I will go back to the planning commission and report that the bed and breakfast use and definition has been removed from the ordinance draft. Okay.

Does this address what the folks want to do up on Dowdy Avenue?

Yes. Yeah, the small neighborhood event venue, this will address what they want to do.

Again, this is a public hearing. Is there anybody that would like to speak to this? Is there? Okay. Do I hear a motion to approve? Motion to approve.

Second.

Motion and a second. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those against, like sign. Motion carries. Thank you. Thank you. Item 6.4 is consideration of appointments to fill one vacancy for an unexpired term and one for a full five-year term on the Greenville Municipal Airport Authority. Can you take it on down? Yes. Please. That part. This was brought in last meeting and I think we had asked for this to be re-reviewed and My understanding is they just said that this is what they wanted to do, and we're going to keep moving forward. I think that we should break this up into two different agenda items. One would be to renew Jimmy Collins as a member, and the second would be to add John Curran.

What's his name?

I'm sorry?

Curran. Curran.

Okay. So, are there any ideas, questions?

Yeah, why are we breaking it up into two separate agenda items?

Because it is two different situations. One is a renewal and one is a new member.

Okay. We'll need a motion for that to add it to the agenda because it was just one item.

Well, and if we need to, then we can hold this until the next meeting, but I feel strongly.

I think we can add one coming up. It's broke down. It's just determining who's that one for the unexpired and who's the one for the five-year.

Okay. All right. Can I have a motion to approve this into two different motions? so moved is there a second second all those in favor say aye aye those against like son motion carries so the first one will be the um will be the renewal of jimmy collins do i hear a motion to approve so there's a motion and a second Any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Those against, like sign. Motion carries. The second item will be to select John Curran as the new member to fill the place of Sherry Hensler, unexpired term. Thank you. from Cherry Hensley. So do I hear a motion? Is there a second?

Second.

All those in favor, second. She asked if there was an interview conducted. I think in the last meeting we asked for them to be talk to Mr. Kern. And I'm glad to say this is the first time I've had the opportunity to meet him. And so thank you for coming in today.

I was waiting for the opportunity for discussion before I shared comments, but it looked like Councilmember Ward was about to say something, so I just... We've got a motion and a second.

No, motion and second. Okay, motion and second. Any discussion?

I just, I still have some concerns regarding... There was a request made by this board... from a council member to go back and interview people, and that wasn't done. I've got some serious reservations about that. I also would like to reiterate from our last meeting that when it comes to these boards and appointments, it is this council's obligation to make those decisions we can take recommendations just as we take recommendations from kathy and laura and department heads but we don't always we don't always go with that recommendation we have discussion sometimes we do sometimes we don't i I believe that there were other qualified candidates that I have concerns that did not receive a fair opportunity to be considered. I believe there were nine total applicants. Three individuals were omitted. from my understanding arbitrarily before they were even presented to the Port Authority to be scored. I have concerns with that. Also in reviewing the applicants, my recommendation would still be based off of my review to still recommend Mr. Jack Miller. for the position. I feel like he meets, his qualifications meet a high priority that the airport needs as it applies to finances. And he has a background in financial management along with his experience in aviation. I feel like there's a value add there that has been completely overlooked and that worries me. So that's my biggest concern. And I will add one other piece of this. As in between our last city council meeting and this meeting, another applicant who... did not receive the recommendation from the airport authority, had reached out to me to share their concerns of regarding the process as an applicant. And due to the perceived convolutedness, convoluted nature of that process, they had decided just to completely remove themselves from the process entirely. And that's not what we want. with these boards and appointments, that's not fair. This isn't personal, this isn't personal for anybody. Sometimes there are qualified people that we need to give an opportunity to step into these positions. And I just want to make sure that everybody has a fair opportunity and chance at these boards and positions. And I'm not convinced that this process was fair. And those are my thoughts. I mean, a motion and a second have been made. So, I mean, at this point we can take a vote. But if there's any other comments from fellow council members, I would be willing to entertain a conversation regarding this.

Anybody else?

I wasn't here at the last meeting, but it's my understanding that Council Member Ward made the motion to send it back. I guess, are you satisfied with any feedback you had?

So the airport authority is the group of people we've empowered to deal with the airport at this point. So we don't do it all the time. Until this board decides to do away with that power, I think we should follow their recommendations when it comes to who they want on their board. If this board decides in the future that they want to do away with the airport board, there is a process to do that. And that could be done. We're not at that point. So until we are, I'm going to follow the recommendations of the board on who they want.

And I understand where you're coming from. And in an ideal situation where there weren't some serious... potential perceived conflicts of interest and respect issues, I would 100% agree with you. I'm all for taking the recommendations from our boards when it comes to making decisions. But in this particular instance, when there are applicants that weren't given a fair shot to even be considered for a recommendation, that's my concern, Councilmember Ward.

Duly noted.

Any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Those against, like, sign. No. Motion carries. Thanks. All right. We're going to try to do the consent agenda items again. There are four items on the consent, and unless anybody has any questions, Concerns about them or questions about them, I ask for approval of the consent items.

So moved. Approved. Second.

Motion and second. Is there any further discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. All right. New business. Consideration to approve a resolution authorizing the application of $350,000 of available proceeds of general obligation bonds of the town of Greenville for other capital projects.

Good afternoon. When we approved this budget for fiscal year 26, there was a, we had about $450,000, $460,000 of bond proceeds remaining from the Depot Street project. And in this budget, we have added the audible signals at Main and Depot. We have the stain purchase for the concrete stain will come out of that money as approved. And those are the two biggest ones we've had out of that. So together, that's about $100,000.

There's an audible church in Main, Depot in Main. Okay.

summer in summer yes yes yes yes so um and those were approved by the board that's right so as we approach this new budget um in the current budget we did have 300 000 of those monies allocated for that pedestrian walkway on Depot Street. And it is my understanding that that project has stalled for the time being. So in conversation with the comptroller's office and our bond council and our auditors, we need to do something with that money as quickly as possible. So after that conversation, and especially with our bond council, They have, this resolution was prepared by Jeff Odom, who is one of our bond council members, came back and said since the original bond issue was for Depot Street to be able to spend those proceeds on another capital project, not equipment, but a project, We need to get the resolution to apply those bond proceeds to something new. And so City Council has already voted $95,000 of those monies to go toward the tennis complex renovations, which leaves about $255,000. And that $255,000, the very first project we have ready to proceed with construction as of July the 5th, are the turn lanes at Roof Taylor Road on Highway 11E. That project is a go. We've accepted bids. We've got a bid award come to you soon with notice to proceed, like I said, around July 5th. With that said, those are my recommendations. Those are my recommendations to bond counsel that would spend down the remainder of these proceeds in FY26, or 27, I'm sorry. That was a mouthful.

Yes, it was. Does anyone have any questions about this?

Bottom line, $255,000 for the turn lane project.

Yes, ma'am. That's about a $500,000 project. So the remaining $255,000 would go there, and the city council's already voted and approved for $95,000 to go toward our contribution toward the tennis complex renovations.

Okay. We have a recommendation from Ms. Young. Okay.

Laura, 255,000 is left in the bond proceeds. So we're way off from even thinking about doing the walkway on Depot Street.

That's the way I understand it.

Well, I mean, that's where we were.

Right, yes.

When Mr. Wright did the presentation to us.

Yes.

And no physical way it can be built right now anyway.

That's what I understand.

And we have to use this or lose that money? Or are we in fault of the whole bond issue?

We're not in fault of the whole bond issue. We could potentially have an audit finding for not spending that money down in a timely manner. Understanding we've tried. So I don't think that would be an issue if we didn't move forward with this. But the question from bond counsel and the comptroller was, if you have something that you can allocate the money towards, please do. And go ahead and spend it. That issue was done in 2021. And typically your bond proceeds, the cap is anywhere from three to five years to complete the project and spend the proceeds. And now we're going into your fiscal year, the sixth year. So we really do need to spend down those monies. Thank you.

And we have $500,000 planned to do that work out there, so the $255,000 will not be spent out of our fund balance.

It'll still be there. Yes.

Okay.

Make a motion we approve.

Is there a second?

Second.

Is there any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All those against, like son.

Thank you so much.

Good job. Thank you. Item 8.2, consideration to approve an ordinance on first reading to amend the fiscal year 2026 budget.

Okay, this is actually just to do, this is my annual cleanup. We usually do one mid-year, and then we do one this time of year that lines up with our next year's budget, just to kind of clean up and go in and look at real numbers where we think we're going to finish up the end of this fiscal year on revenues and expenditures. In the general fund, we're actually going to reduce our total revenue by about $50,000.00. and you can see the categories in there for those that are adjusted and then in our operating budget with the biggest drop being we re-budgeted some capital items for next year um so those reductions in operating and capital are add up to be about 1.1 million and then the rest of the budget ordinance in front of you if you have questions specifically or just our other funds that we have state street aid landfill solid waste, the capital projects, the library, the reduction on the library was we had amended the budget and parked $30,000 for their roof. It's obviously going to be more than that and not be done by the end of the fiscal year, so that's removed. And then Miss Life always, as required by the comptroller, provides me their budget amendments, and those are in culmination on the last page, on page 81. of the budget amendment. Are there any questions or anything? It's a lot of numbers on a page, but this literally is just cleaning up our books, trying to get as close as we can on our budget for this year.

Okay, we have a recommendation. Do I hear a motion? I have a motion. Is there a second?

Second.

Is there any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Those against, like sign. Motion carries.

Okay, thank you. And second reading will be on the 16th at the next meeting.

Thank you, sir. Ma'am.

It's been a long day.

Been a long month. What do you think? All right. Item 8.3 is consideration to approve an ordinance on first reading to adopt the fiscal year 2027 budget and establish the property tax rate effective July 1, 2026. And very quickly, I want to thank Laura for leading the charge on this. I know that she's been working diligently very, very diligently, along with Kathy, to put this budget together. And it's not been easy.

No, it's not. It's been a tough year.

And we'll talk some more after you get through. But thank you.

Okay. You're welcome. So I'm gonna go through the presentation and if you've got questions, if you don't mind, just for the sake of time, respect for your time and our audience's time, if you'll hold your questions to the end, just kind of mark your page and we'll get to them and I'll try to answer them to the best of my ability. So this really on first reading, I consider it our draft ordinance because we can change things up to second reading and approval. So we do have a balanced budget with about 1.8 in our fund balance drawdown that is strictly capital. There's a rebudget of about a million in there for next year, and you just approved to reallocate those bond proceeds to those two projects which are also in our capital budget for next year, included in the budget for next year. Where we ended our discussion at the last budget work session was a property tax increase of four pennies, takes our tax rate to 1.7471. which generates about $260,000 in revenue, and one penny of our property tax right now is about $65,000. I've got $35,000 of new property tax revenue for our commercial properties. That was a conversation with Mr. C. And then we've got about $307,000 in natural property tax growth, just new properties added to the tax roll. On the expenditure side, our largest change this year and where the four pennies are coming from is the maintenance of effort for the schools, the additional money we have to meet that test, which we've talked about before. We have our next step in our pay plan. This includes benefits for our employees. $40,000 for the new George Clinton facility, 15,000 for the pay plan update, and then around 210,000 new debt. That's the GEA debt and the airport debt. What's not included in here? We don't have a cost of living for our employees, we have unfunded two positions and no new positions, we have no major technology upgrades and equipment, and there is no funding for the nonprofit agencies. This is the typical chart that you see in this presentation. Our taxes, property tax, sales tax, that's local and state, make up 77% of all of our revenue in the general fund. Our revenue growth for this year, budget to budget, is $800,000, or 2.4%. So this graph is our property tax. You heard Ms. Light talk about it in the school budget, same on our side. You really want that to be a really nice, clean, upward to your right line, and it's not, it has some hiccups. The 23-24 was that big jump, was our reassessment year and the property tax increase. The growth over our five years averages about 2%. Our next reassessment year is in 2028, which will hit the 2029 budget. I put this slide up here. We get a lot of questions in our office on how to calculate your property tax revenue. The math is basically the same, different percentages are applied. So if you have a home and it is valued by the property assessor at $350,000, our property tax rates are calculated on 25% of residential, then it's per $100. So you take the 87.5, divide it by 100, multiply it by our tax rate, and that's how much property tax is collected on a residential property of that value. The same is applied to commercial. This actually is where I got the $35,000 added to the property tax revenue for this upcoming year. There are five commercial properties with a total value of $5 million, and altogether they generate just at $35,000 new money to our property tax revenue. There's that pretty green line that goes straight up to your right. That's our local option sales tax. There's a 2.5% average year to year. Budget to budget, we've got a 3.5% increase built in this next year. That's the graph you saw that one on the last financial statements. That's an average of about 3% growth forecasted in the years out based on our growth in the years prior. Same thing for state sales tax. Average over five years is right between 2.5% and 2.25%. Again, that's the forecast you saw on our financial statements at the last meeting with an average of 2% each year in the future year's growth. So where does the money go? Our largest expenditures are public safety, police and fire combined are 26%. And then our schools are 17% when it's broken down by department in this particular way. With the exception of capital contributions, our total expenses for the year are a million dollars more. Of that, operating only, that was without capital contributions and personnel, is $790,500, which is a 3% increase. And then Mr. Teague, Council Member Teague, had asked me to apply the same forecasting. So I have two methods. I'll let Excel do it, and then I'll do it and see how close I am. And so there's a 3.75% average growth moving forward from 2027 to 2032 based on our history. In this budget, we're at 3%. I think it's also important to note that the April cost of living the CPI index was 3.8. So we don't have any surprises at that point. This is a breakdown of our debt issue that we have now. The schools contribute $371,500. The town portion is down at the bottom that gets us to our principal and interest payments of $3.25 million. And then you can see how those are broken out. Our balance that we have in principal of the $17 million is 26% of our debt capacity. On this slide here, I do this every year. It's just the math, and the next slide actually has the graph. You can see we're going to add that $1 million down to our bottom line. Most of that is capital for this year, and then we're going to turn around and take it back out. So our bottom line, our fund balance policy, we changed that down to 20%. We're going to be about 22.5% if we do everything we say we're going to do on the capital side next year. And this is the graphic of that. So capital equipments and projects, that's kind of the big one because we take that out of our unassigned fund balance. Equipment totals, 356. Capital projects is just under 1.9%. Here's a list of all of the capital equipment. You will notice between equipment and projects, we don't have anything much over a half a million. And usually we have multi-million dollar items in equipment. But our departments, along with their operating budgets, and because of our fund balance, as close as we are on our fund balance policy, have agreed to this is what they need. We'll go back and look mid-year to see if we need to make any adjustments or anything. But for right now, this is what they've told me that they need and they can live with. And then these are our capital projects. You'll see the very first one. That's the 255 that you just approved, those bond proceeds, and then the 245 left. There's a traffic signal at Irwin Highway and 11E, the sidewalk grant. The pocket park is the remaining expenses that we have for the dig grant. And then Hardin Park as well. There's the sports, the tennis courts. And then we've got parks and money in there for stormwater improvements. And I've been told we do have one we probably need to look at this year as well. Here's hotel motel tax. I will say that I have, at the request of Mayor, contacted Jan Murkoff and Jeff Taylor. Mr. Taylor has moved $20,000 of his regular general fund appropriation over to Hotel Motel Tax. Jan's moved $4,200 of hers over to Hotel Motel Tax. So we're still within what we think our revenue's gonna be next year. None of the rest of those have changed. And then you can see what our bottom line is on hotel motel tax on the reserve. And I'll quickly go through other town funds. This is State Street Aid. The most important part is in 26 in the column, the box on the left, you just approved at the last meeting for Mr. Keith to purchase a street sweeper out of that fund. And then next year, there will be contracted paving in the expenses, and we always put some in there for equipment, whether that's a traffic signal or whatever kind of small items of equipment he needs, still have an ending cash of about 435, 436 that he can pull from if he has time and has room to do more paving in-house. This is municipal solid waste. The box on the left is the revenue and the expenses for this FY27 budget. And then you will see that he has in his budget part of that general fund transfer is a $300,000 transfer from our fund balance over to purchase a solid waste truck. And you can see on the right hand at the bottom that that comes out of his cash. And so the solid waste fund should end up with about $750,000, $760,000. in their cash balance and we maintain that cash balance so when they have to buy toters or any kind of waste containers things like that we've got the money here without putting an extra burden on the general fund this is the demolition landfill again box on the left is 27 revenue and expenses they have a surplus which they usually do then on the right hand side we've got the cash balance at the bottom after purchasing some equipment I think Tony expects he's already looking into some equipment that would come off of that cash balance and possibly amend his budget. For FY27, in the event we have to haul, we have to buy some trucks and trailers to haul some of our waste until we can get the extra space at the landfill. Okay, I flew through that because that's a lot of numbers on paper. So what questions do you have for me on anything that we've talked about in next year's budget?

A step increase. How much is that to our people approximately?

It's about two and a half. The next step on average is two and a half for each employee.

Okay. And then you talked about some of your forecast for our funds, taxes. Three and a half percent. Is that?

So I've vetted all the taxes four ways from Sunday. Ellen and I have worked together and looked at local taxes. We have our state revenues come from a really bright guy named Brad Harris. He's one of the very brilliant tenured finance consultants at MTAS. And he puts out something for every single municipality every year. All of our state revenues are budgeted per capita. And that's what the comptroller expects. So if I vary from those, and I have in the past, I didn't this year. But if I vary from those based on what we've collected and historically, then I just have to prove that to the comptroller. But this year he was spot on. I think we're okay on those.

And just to comment, I really appreciate you forecasting out into the future because we've got to look at both sides and put a plan together. So thank you, step by step.

You're welcome, step by step. Other questions that I can answer for you? Yes, sir.

Yeah, could you go back to the PowerPoint for capital projects real quick? Capital equipment and projects.

Do you want the equipment and the projects or just projects?

Yeah, I'm trying to align what you have in our packet here, section four, to your slide deck. I'm trying to find where you've got stormwater improvements.

Stormwater improvements are going to be in the budget ordinance. There's a separate capital fund. And so there is a line item in that for stormwater improvements. That's going to come out of our fund balance. next year. Now, I can tell you, and if Andy needs to answer questions about stormwater, he's done a really good job, and Scott both trying to work on this. We need a placeholder here because I'm sure we have things that we know are going to happen if we have a large rain event or things like that. That's a start for us, and he is also evaluating commercial

stormwater agreements and things like that so that when we have revenue coming in from stormwater fees we can also offset other things that we need to do well that was going to be my question is are there specific projects that would make up that two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and then my follow-up for that would be would it be possible for this year to defer that until You know, we get a new city manager hired. I know that was one of the concerns that Mayor Doty brought up at our last meeting addressing stormwater, a lot of the other issues around town related to that. I wonder for this year, could we defer that? and wait for the city manager to get in here to really do like a comprehensive assessment of sorts. Because if, again, I'm not the finance guru you are, but that's 250,000. If we didn't have that this year, would that eliminate the 4 cent increase?

Okay, I'll answer your question. First of all, no, it would not. That comes out of fund balance. The 250 that we're talking about? The 250 comes out of fund balance, yes. It's not an operating expense.

Okay.

And I do recommend that you leave it in there. If we had an event where we did have an emergency, we had a break, we had something we had to fix like we had on North Main Street a couple of times, we need to have a budgeted way to pay for those in advance without having to come back to city council and amend the budget. Oh my goodness, we've got an issue. We know we've got issues. There's potential issues out there that we may need to address. If we don't spend it, it just doesn't come out of our fund balance. To your point... In this budget as a whole, there are things that I think really need to wait until we get a city manager, and the stormwater project is probably one of them. Back to that point, in addition to that, I have had conversations with Andy and Scott both for their departments about mid-year adjustments for some things that would be needed in there. Did I answer your question?

You did. Okay, thank you.

Anybody else?

One event like North Main Street would take care of that. It would. And we have them all over town. I've got a couple of questions. Sure. If you don't care, Laura. The nonprofits, again, they weren't in this budget at all.

They are not in this budget proposal, not as of today. Okay.

And how much did we – I didn't even see the request.

I think there were close to $90,000 in requests on those on average. That's typically what we have. We had a few extras this year, and they asked for more. The savings from last year is about $82,500. From what we funded last year? From what we funded in the current year, yes.

And Main Street Greenville – Were they not in the request last year for a non-profit?

Yeah, they were. And Main Street is getting the $42,000, the same as she got last year. She simply moved 10% of that over to be funded in hotel motel tax, which reduces her general fund appropriation by that amount.

Can we not fund Main Street out of the hotel motel tax? Yes.

You can. I will ask Jan if she wants to address that. Her board approved for her to move the 10% over.

Well, I'm talking the 100%.

The 100%? Yeah.

But let's wait on that.

Okay, that's fine.

Let me read what I've got here.

I'm sorry.

It's tough when you can't read your own writing. The effort of maintenance at schools, $250,000, it's going to be reoccurring every year.

It is reoccurring every year moving forward.

Explain that one more time just so I get it in my head.

Can I ask Ms. Leip, Mr. Drennan, or Mr. Starnes to express that plea?

They're all just going to jump up and run straight up here.

Dr. Drennan's like, I'm not even here yet. Already being put on the spot.

I could explain it. I think she can explain it better.

We'll see. Okay, so maintenance of effort is essentially you look, I'm simplifying, you look at last year's local revenue versus this year's local revenue. So budgeted local revenue versus revenue in the current budget. And when I say local revenue, that means all local taxes. So what the county commission sets in our county taxes counts toward our maintenance of effort.

Your allocation counts toward our maintenance of effort.

So money from local revenue sources, that's what the Tennessee Department of Education considers local revenue sources. Current budget versus proposed budget, is it equal or more? And that's the maintenance of effort test that the comptroller has us perform and that we have to pass to be able to get both of our budgets approved by the comptroller.

But we're getting less percent of that money now from the county?

Is that correct? The tax rate has been reallocated some so that less is split between the two school districts. And so when that does happen, then that does affect our maintenance of effort.

What sum percent? Do you know offhand? What percent is that, that we've lost in the last five years?

Well, it used to be, if I'm remembering correctly off the top of my head, it used to be around 44%, and now it's around 23%. So it's about half. So we've been cutting half almost. Yeah, and that's off the top of my head, but I think that's correct. It was 77 pennies at one point, and now it's 23-some-odd pennies.

Dr. Drennan and myself and the county are going to get together and talk about the allocation that they're making. Part of it's due to the fact that they're getting smaller every year, losing a couple hundred students each year. Thank you. Thank you. Does that help? Pam?

It does. What year did the county go up on the city residence taxes? Do you remember?

It was the same year we did, 2023.

And they just went up on the city residence taxes?

No, they went up on city and county. No. Before that. Before that?

They went up. Before that. It's not the 20, that's 23, 22, 23.

That might have been right before I came in 2019, 18 or 19, I believe. I think that's about right.

Has it been that long ago? No.

pocket part yes so we still owe the $25,000 yes or no no that's not in the 27 budget no we have paid that if Kathy correct me we have that right we have paid that so this is the additional part with the $50,000 dig grant these this is the additional part the rails and

We'll get that back through the district. So we'll get to that agreement next. But the town has already put up, you had budgeted $175,000 for this year. And Andy, I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, we ended up spending $171,000, some odd dollars for that, $171,000. So the town has already put up their match to help in our portion to the dig grant for the $50,000 that Jan has.

I think so.

Okay. Is the $40,000 for George Clinton, is that just to keep the lights on?

It's to keep the lights on, and we've got money in there for maintenance cleaning bugs, those kind of things. Other questions?

I don't really have a question, but I sort of have. Something I want to say about this. Sure. Thanks for all the hard work. It's tough. When I came back on this board in 2022, I was surprised from when I left in 2009 how much money was floating around. And then when I thought about it, realized it was stimulus money. It was COVID money. Then it was infrastructure money. And most of that's been put to good use. I mean, we have been able to do some things that we wouldn't otherwise have been able to do, but that also comes with a cost and it never lasts, particularly in a regressive tax structure, which is what we have in the city and state. Um, You've done a good job of paring things back, but I still think before you raise taxes, you really need to take a close look at how you tighten your budget. And I, you know... You might say, well, where, Jenny? Well, I don't know, you know, that I rely on you to say those things. But I know things just from my experience. I've experienced nine percent cuts in operating. I've seen things closed. And, you know, you don't want people laid off. And last time we voted for a tax increase. It was in support of our employees. I'm all for that. I'm all for public education. But sometimes things like us having to come up with this local maintenance of effort, it looks like somebody trying to force consolidation almost. I mean, it's a little baffling. So at this point, I just want to say that I'm going to,

vote against this on first reading um hope that you know there's some i can get so that i can support it by second reading and uh i just wanted to explain that sure so let me i've came prepared in case somebody wanted to know wanted to know um as part of the cuts we mentioned at the last work session i don't know if you were here jenny um We have cut just shy of half a million dollars back already out of our budget. So we've unfunded a position, the GIS Planner position. Not taken it away, we've unfunded that one. We've unfunded the Assistant Public Works Director. We have gone back in everybody's budget and cut back, for example, police department cut back almost $37,000. um we've done as much as we can and i've gone back in every even today i've gone back in everybody's line item and without cutting sir and i can stand here and say without cutting services or slowing something down i just don't think we have the revenue to make it up i've looked at our sales tax I've looked at all those things, I've looked at both sides of it for months. Cuz I first realized we were gonna have an issue when Ellen and I started just talking about revenue growth back in probably February. And understanding that a big part of that is the COVID money is gone. All the infrastructure money, all of it. I mean, it's all spent personally and professionally. All those, the majority of those allocations have to already be spent or closed out by December of this year. And a lot of people already have. and so those are kind of gone in addition to that we rely heavily on grant funding here and a lot of the federal grants have been paired back as well that translates down to the state grants that have been paired back as well so um i'll be glad to go back and take a look at it again um The school system and I both, our staff here, not just me, our staff, everybody, have gone back and looked to try to see what we could do when we realized we had this $246,000 maintenance of effort issue in front of us. And so they've cut and we've cut, and their budget was balanced without that. Our budget is just balanced without that. And to balance our budget to accommodate that is the four pennies. So I'm a taxpayer, too, and I can appreciate very much where you're coming from. I don't want to do it. I don't like to do it. I just don't know where else to go.

Well, that being said, if we were looked at, solid waste charge may i ask mr keith a question sure how many trash cans do we have out in the city do you know off the top of your head are close come on it's a test we pick up well i can tell you on average that over the four days that we pick up two trucks we're probably i'm sorry we're probably running about seven to eight hundred cans a truck

So say 1,500 a day, four days. Four days. Yeah.

And that gets everybody in the city, I guess.

That's residential. That would not include... So 6,000 cans. 6,000 plus probably, yeah, in that neighborhood. And that's increasing. We're already down. We ordered just in two years, the order of 640 toters that we did is almost depleted. So they're going out at a rate of... you know, six to 12 a day in some cases. So it's on the uptick.

It is, but I was thinking about putting a fee on cans or just kicking that around my mind, but that would be a large fee.

If we're picking up 6,000 cans, is that pretty close?

1,500? Yeah, 6,000. they're paying initially for the toter but and then if they replace right right and i think that's one of our services that you get for paying city taxes it's almost like doubling up but but i know a lot of cities that do that and sort of try to spread it out even if you're leasing a place or somewhere and they don't provide a trash can at least that gets it and another way is a city well tax that would have to be looked at but and I'm really not sure I've called Lori Bryant's office to find out how many cars in her city, but she said, just, you know, take an average of two cars, 70,000 people or whatever, and then put it into our city. I don't know if you can do that or not. I don't, a lot of people have one car, two cars, three cars, but that spreads it out to everybody.

Cars, a wheel tax.

And I don't know if it can actually be done, but the, little bit of research i've done it can be see i think the county commission has to prove it and lori bryant's office has to prove that she collects it for us but i think there's around seven seven eight thousand cars in greenville that's tagged in greenville so i'd make it up pretty quick with just a small wheel tax but here we go again where does that end So we just put it on the backs of the property owners again. I mean, Laura, please tell me about the step increase. This is the last year of step. No, it's not.

This gets us to midpoint.

Oh, just the midpoint.

Just the midpoint of the salary range. And we've got in the budget the money for the consultant to go back and look and make sure we're on track. So this would get us to, yeah, everybody to step six. That actually midpoint market value of their job. Not everybody, but the majority.

Does the budget include any COLA for this year? No, sir, it does not. So here we go again. If you get a step increase, you're not going to get your 3% cost of living.

That's correct. Now, I have talked with Kathy, and that's priority number one for a midyear adjustment if we can.

Yeah, we've got to keep our employees, period.

And that's the importance, too, of doing that update to the pay plan, because we do need to see what's the next step, 7 through 10, 7 through 12 is going to look like, so that we have some direction for the future, because this, like she said, it only gets you to potentially market average, and this was done in 2019, 18, 19 is when it was started. And of course, we know that another reason for the update to the pay plan is to address some well-known compression issues that we have too.

I was just thinking out loud.

Thank you. That's fine. There are no bad ideas and no bad questions.

just quickly i've been talking with andy and scott about our storm water we're behind our roads i think we it's going to take us 40 years to redo our roads at the at the rate we're going that's we're not putting more money out for that and you said this isn't the year but what is the year And what do we see coming that's going to make a big difference? And so Tim and I, I think you both said that we kicked it down the road for a lot of years. And it's hard. And I'm proud of what our people are doing. And I don't want to pay more, but I also don't want to lose services. And so... I appreciate what you've done. I also applaud Ms. Kidwell for her suggestion on trying to find some ways. And I hope all of you will go and talk with Laura about where we are and what you might be able to add.

Well, stormwater is a new issue. It's not a new problem. It's a new issue for us that we have to address or it's going to go away. It's going to bury us. Roads, we'll never catch up. I mean, we're 40 years behind on paving roads, or it takes 40 years. They're 15-year average. You'll never catch up. It's perpetual. I mean, we'll always be paving roads, and I hope that people understand that that's just... We'll get there sooner or later, but it's... We have a list, right, Mr. Keith? I mean, it's... And we'll get there, but... And state aid's not enough to pave every one of them, so...

Well, and I also want to applaud Scott for changing the rates for the roll-offs. We hadn't made a decision or hadn't made a change in that since 2010. And I'm not sure we're where we need to be, but we're getting closer. And then Tim's idea or Mr. Teague's idea is about the starting to call it charge for pickup of trash. That's a big, big deal. It's a great opportunity that people have. So I think we're going to have to look at all of our fees, our building fees. I know Bert's looking at some things, and it's not going to make everything – it's not going to fix everything, but every little bit helps. And also, one thing that I got to – had the opportunity to go to a seminar, and I There have been $250,000 grants for stormwater, and if we could get that, that would take care of it here. So anyway, is there any further questions?

I was just talking about the trash cans because I know a lot of cities don't pick it up as something they do for a taxpayer. Correct. And if we didn't do that, it's not a $300,000 truck every year. at four or five years what whatever the lifespan of them and plus i guess the employees that run the routes and it's a big savings picking up trash and i hope people understand what it costs the city to do that um not saying that i want to do that i'm just saying it's another way if you don't put it on property owners you got to put it on somebody somehow so As far as I know, it's always been on the property owner's back.

This isn't a question. And at the risk of making a long meeting even longer, having sat on this side of the podium going through budgets for the last three years and having been on that side of the podium for about eight years before that and dealing with Laura and her staff, they make every effort. to save this town money and still be as progressive making changes, getting towards the places we need to get, uh, as possible. Um, they do a phenomenal job of pinching pennies. Nobody likes tax increase, me included. Um, the price of things goes up. That's the bottom line. And this year we're saddled with $250,000 of unexpected debt that there is nothing we can do about except eat it. Um, Nobody's happy about it. But that's the fact of the matter. Laura, thank you and your staff for the work that you put in on this. Kathy, thank you. It has not been easy. And it never is. But this year's been worse than normal. But it's been a bigger challenge. I won't say worse. It's been a bigger challenge. So thank you all.

We're going to let Ms. Markoff tell us. Yes. Why don't we move 100% of your budget?

We don't do 100% tourism. And that's the only thing hotel, motel tax can go to is solely tourism. So that would require that everything that Main Street does is tourism related from top to bottom.

Well, other places are, I mean, other Entities of the city are funded with hotel-motel tax that are not 100%, correct?

I can't speak for another city.

No, no, no. Ours. Oh. The city of Greenville. Let's see who gets hotel-motel taxes.

Partnership and us.

Impact.

Impact. Park and Rec. And it's all related to tourism projects.

Oh, what they spend it on. Yes. Okay. Yeah.

We're required.

Correct. To fill out a report to show. All those. What you're basing, moving that to.

Right. Based on, based on the definition by the state and what their requirement is. So that's how it, that's how the tourism gets funded. You're welcome.

Yep. Thank you. Thank you for working on it and moving what you did.

Yeah. It's appreciated. You're welcome. Hey, we're, we're here to do what we can and. And I'll be partners together. So thank you.

Laura, I'll piggyback on what Councilmember Ward said. Thank you and your team and to Kathy as well. I know she's been in there crunching numbers and sharpening pencils as well. It's not easy. We want to provide the best service that we absolutely can, and to do that, it costs money. It costs money. I brought this up to you individually, and I brought it up to Kathy individually. I'm... I really think that there is an opportunity to continue just looking at the budget to see if we can identify any areas of administrative bloat. It's coming through it even further. One example I would like us to maybe look at is, We obviously support marketing, invest in the partnership for marketing using hotel, motel tax dollars and things of that nature. We have marketing efforts ourself at the town. I'd like to see, are we duplicating efforts? Are there opportunities to maybe realign priorities with that? That's just one example when I say go back through and try to look for just opportunities to maybe reduce that administrative bloat. Because it just takes eyes, continue looking through. But thank you and your team for what you all have proposed at this point.

Any changes, specific changes you wanna make on first reading for second reading?

Does this budget keep in the city manager's salary?

Yes, it does.

Okay, if there aren't any specific changes that you want, my recommendation is to pass it with the four penny property tax increase today. Kathy and I and department heads will go back and look again and see what we can do. I'm not optimistic, but we'll look for sure. We've combed and combed and combed, but we will definitely look for sure. So anyway, that's my ask. My recommendation is to pass it on first reading. We can come back with any changes or anything on second reading, and you can approve it with those changes or additional changes or recommendations that you made on second reading. Next reading will be public hearing as well on the 16th.

So we have a recommendation. Do I hear a motion?

Yes. And we can always come back on the second reading.

Yes. And change anything. You can change any. Or back up on anything. Yes, sir, you can.

I'll make a motion.

And Mayor, may I request a roll call vote for this item?

Sure.

Please.

So we have a motion. Is there a second?

Second.

Is there any further discussion? All those in, sorry to trip you up. Sorry to trip you up.

Council Member Hensley.

Motion to approve, yes, I support.

Council Member Tidd. Yes. Council Member Ward. Yes. Council Member Kidwell.

No.

Okay, three to one, motion carries. Again, let's give Laura and Kathy a hand for all the work and our directors. Thank you. Thank you. I guess, are you still gonna stay up here? Item 8.4 is consider- No, that's me. That's you. It's consideration to approve a resolute- Take a break. Yes, she does. Consideration to approve a resolution to amend policy on public participation in meetings.

So back in 2023, the city council adopted a public comment policy. And at that point in time, this came down from the state and our policy. Since 2023 is to we have a sign in sheet, as well as all of our public meetings where folks can come and sign up and speak to a published agenda item, but that policy was recently changed at the state level, and now the verbiage is to allow. comments on any matter germane to the jurisdiction of the Town of Greenville, including comments related to specific items that are published in the agenda, but also to general matters not otherwise appearing on the agenda. The city council still has the jurisdiction and the authority to set time limits. So our time limits are the same at three minutes, and the cap on that is 20. So that is regardless if you are here to speak to an item related to an agenda item or just a general matter. And so the public comment policy sign-in sheet is a little different this go-around period. So there is always asked for you to state your name and your address, and then you can check the box if you are here to speak to a published agenda item or if you're here to speak to a general comment, just like Ms. Watts did today. We do ask if you're here to speak to an agenda item, you list what that agenda item is on the sign-in sheet, and if you're here to speak to a general topic item. you can just kind of give a synopsis of what that will be. But other than, everything is pretty much the same as far as the time limits. We've never thus far since 2023 have went past the 20-minute limit for three minutes each. So we'll try this out and see if that's conducive. But just to make everyone aware, the comment policy has changed to allow items of general nature or specific agenda items.

Okay, so we've had a consideration to approve a resolution and I think you're making a recommendation.

Yes.

So do I hear a motion to approve? Is there a second?

Is there any further discussion? Just one thing. I'm okay with the resolution. I do have, what gives me pause is putting the limit of 20 minutes total. Obviously, we have, you know, Laura's our timekeeper down there and makes sure that, you know, the three minutes per individual is upheld. I just wonder if we're sending a message of limiting individuals the opportunity because if you're, As the old saying goes, the last hog to the trough. You don't want to miss your time. You might have something incredibly important to share. And it just so happens you might be the last person and you're beyond the 20 minutes, yeah. So that's just my concern. I'm okay with everything else. Just would it be possible just to remove that limit? We've never gone over that anyway. I just don't want to send a message that we don't want to hear what people have to say.

Not to disagree, but to disagree, we need a cap of something. Maybe 20 is too little, and like you said, we've never gone past it, but we need to cap it somewhere just because, just a case.

You need a limit. I mean, they could line up out the road. If we went 21 with it, it'd be seven people. We're here listening. They can do it other than a meeting. 30 minutes. Change it to 30.

One thing I would suggest possibly is if it's 21 minutes, then that would be seven people. So instead of 6.23 or whatever, 6.6, so.

My only other, sorry, I didn't know you were still talking, Mary, I apologize.

I'm great at rounding, so we're good.

My only concern just building on this is, as we well know, that we have a three minute policy now, but some folks, go over that three minutes because they're in the middle of a very passionate description, explanation, whatever. I just don't want us to get into a quagmire of, well, that person got three and a half minutes. Now I only get my three minutes, and now the 20-minute limit is gone.

She's going to keep me in line from this point forward.

Beep.

Okay, so we have a motion and a second. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Those against, like, sign. Motion carries. Item 8.5 is consideration to approve an agreement with Main Street Greenville for the purpose of adding improvements to the Eagles Rest Pocket Park.

We did approve that on 20 minutes, right? Without any changes. We approved that without any changes. Okay. 20. 20.

And I can start with this. I actually... Talk all you want. I'll let you fill in the gaps. So this was presented to you all, the resolution for Jan to apply for this grant back in 2024. And so we had a resolution where you all approved this 25% local match with her $50,000 that she could allocate. The DIG grant, the Downtown Improvement Grant, I believe it was a total of 300,000 that helps businesses downtown with facade. But she was able to allocate $50,000 for public improvements downtown. and so this was um an area that the main street board decided this would be a good spot since obviously main street uh held it for 25 years held it for 25 years and so you had already approved this this agreement is just part of the grant documentation after talking with lance lowry with first tennessee development district today this is just um things that they need even though you all had approved it a long time ago And like I mentioned earlier, you all had approved and budgeted $175,000 for the Eagles Rest Pocket Park. And as I mentioned, Andy has been keeping track of that, and I think we've spent around $171,000 at this point. So the only other thing left in the pocket park is an archway that's going in that says Eagles Rest Park. along with a railing in the back and potentially a water station and the town will be receiving something else and maybe something else here we see how far the money goes and the town we've already covered our part our local match part and so what will happen we need to pay for this up front but then jan will yeah jan will get the money um sent to her and then she will turn around and give that over to the town. So just add to it if I missed something.

No, I think you covered it all. This is more a formality to keep us tight and in shape with the state and where the funding's coming from. So we're happy that we were able to allocate some money to public space.

It looks good.

It does. It's looking good.

And is it up today?

No, I don't think so. The last I saw, they were making some adjustments. They had some elevation changes and a few other things. So we'll keep going. We've got some other tricks up our sleeve. You mean the sidewalks are not flat? No, and you know what else is there? Is all the foundation from the front of the former stores. Ah, I got you. And that's what we got into, so it's a little funny.

When that property was bought, all it was was a facade. The facade, yeah. Actually, the parking authority bought that, and then a donor.

And Main Street.

Miss McNeese was in it. Yeah, we contributed to it, too. Nancy McNeese was on, actually, the parking board at that time.

She was.

And... Anyway, that donor said, why don't you give it to lease the parking places? And for y'all who don't remember, There was about seven, eight cars that parked in there. Yeah, three.

We had three.

Back when Crowfoot Alley was Crowfoot Alley. And Main Street received the money from those parking places, that's how it started. And I think the parking authority tore the facade down. There was only an arch facade left.

Yeah, we actually, Patty Bradford ended up with it, and she kept it for years. And then we kept it in the hope that we might be able to use the metal maybe as a water feature when the... You're talking about the facade. Connector area happened, but it wasn't usable enough, so it's gone by the wayside.

I've forgotten that. Yeah. Took that.

Yeah, that's true.

When they tore it down. Yeah. But it's come a long way. It looks good.

It has. It has. We're masters, all of us, together as partners. We're masters of taking things and giving it new life.

Can you explain or share why it's called the Easter, shoot, Eagle's Rest Park?

Yes, I can. John Boyes, Dr. Boyes and Lucy's son, one of their sons, was interested in doing an Eagle Scout project. And Jim Snyder was here at the town at the time and was very heavy into scouting. And so they approached us and said, hey, this is an idea, what do you think? So it was John's responsibility to do everything on the project. to man it, to get the donations, to have the excavating done along with his friends and some other scouts. And so we moved the fence back about 30 feet and put in what we've known as the pocket park. So Eagle has two meanings. We're a presidential town. It's on our town logo. It's widely revered with the county, and it was an Eagle Scout project. Hence the name, Eagle's Rest.

Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. All right. Do I hear a motion to approve? So moved. Is there a second? Was there two of you down there? Yeah. Okay. Any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those against, like sign. Motion carries. Item 8.6. Thank you. Thank you. Consideration to purchase ballistic vests and carriers for the Greenville Police Department. Hey there. How are you, Ms. Gass? Good, thank you. Good, good.

Okay, so this is part of our yearly grant program. We're requesting purchase for seven vests. It's a federal grant with a 50% match. Are you modeling one? Yes. And the carriers. I'll make a motion we approve. Second.

Second.

Any further discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those against, like, sign. Motion carries. Appreciate you. Do we have a motion to adjourn? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

You wanted to stay, didn't you? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Those against, like.