City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you. That's not public comment.

Thank you.

Thank you. Oh, great.

good evening and welcome to the city of hampton mayor and city council regular session for june the ninth twenty twenty six at six thirty p m held here in the council chamber at city hall seventeen east main street south hampton georgia three zero two two eight at this time i will call the meeting to order where we will have invocation by council member meets as council member army as pastor Herman Mason, his mother passed, and we're asking that everybody will lift him up in prayer in the Southside Christian Fellowship Church.

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we come before you with grateful hearts. We're very thankful that we enjoy so many liberties as American citizens. We're grateful for those that we commemorated just a short while ago that gave the last full measure of devotion, that we might enjoy these liberties. And we're thankful that the next time we come together in a regular meeting, our nation will be 250 years old. We're thankful that you've allowed this nation to exist this long. It's not been perfect. It's not been easy. Lord, we're going to celebrate Juneteenth coming up on June the 19th. a great moment in our nation's history, and we ask that you would help us all to remember the past so that we might have a brighter and better future. Give us, I pray, wisdom, discernment, discretion as we meet. Help us to do everything decently and in order, and may you be pleased with the events tonight. In Jesus' name, amen.

Moving on to agenda item two, presentation and approval of city council agenda. Agenda item two, a regular session meeting agenda for June the 9th, 2026. Council member Meeks, can I get a motion to approve the agenda as published? Yes, ma'am. Council member Meeks approved the agenda for June the 9th as published. Can I get a second? Second. I have a second by council member Chaney. All in favor? All opposed? I have a 6-0. moving on to agenda item 3 presentation and approval of City Council minutes special call meeting minutes January the 28th 2026 Councilmember Mitchell can I get a motion to approve or to deny I have a motion by Councilmember Mitchell to approve do I have a second I have a second by Councilmember Meeks to approve the January 28th 2026 any discussion from the council any discussion from the public all in favor I have a 6-0. Agenda item 3B, the work session minutes April 14th, 2026. Council Member Chaney, can I get a motion to approve or to deny?

I make a motion to approve.

I have a motion by Council Member Chaney to approve. Can I get a second? Second. Second by Council Member Mitchell. All in favor? All opposed? I have a 4-2. Can I, presentation and approval for, I mean, regular meeting minutes for April the 14th, 2026. Council Member White-Williams, can I get a motion to approve or to deny? So moved. I have a motion to approve by Council Member White-Williams. Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Council Member Meeks. All in favor? I have a 6-0. The retreat minutes for April the 17th through the 19th of 2026. Councilmember Mitchell, can I get a motion to approve?

So move.

I have a motion by Councilmember Mitchell to approve. Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councilmember Chaney. Any discussion from the council? Any discussion from the public? All in favor? All opposed?

I'm abstaining. I wasn't there.

Okay. So I have a fourth with two abstentions for reason of being absent. Special call meeting minutes for May the 7th, 2026. Council member Meeks. May the 7th.

With. With.

Councilmember Meeks for approval for the May 7, 2026. Do I have a second? Second. Councilmember White-Williams. Discussion from the council. Discussion from the public. All in favor? All opposed? Councilmember Brooks. I have a 6-0. Moving on to agenda item 3F. The regular meeting minutes for May the 12th, 2026. Council Member Meeks, can I get a motion to approve?

Madam Mayor, I approve the minutes for May the 12th, 2026 with the exception of that line one seven seven be amended to reflect that council member Mitchell was made chair of the admin and finance committee not myself okay I have a motion on the floor by council member Meeks with the amendment to line item one one seven to amend the name one seven seven to amend

the minutes to reflect that the name should reflect Councilmember Mitchell. Do I have a second?

A second.

I have a second by Councilmember Chaney. Discussion from the Council. Discussion from the public. All in favor? I have a 6-0. agenda item for acknowledgement of guest proclamations and flag for a recognition so tonight we're going to skip agenda item a as our finance director is not here we would like for him to be here when we actually uh present the capper award so we will move to agenda item 4b presentation by lisa dahuda of casa the court appointed special advocate

Did I say it wrong?

Ms. Lisa, if you'll come forward. She's with CASA, the Court Appointed Special Advocates Group, and she just wanted to share what they're doing here in Henry County.

Thank you for this time. CASA is pretty new to Henry County. We're the 159th county of 159 counties in Georgia to adopt the program. But it's been around since 1977. So it's a program where we advocate for children in foster care. We do that through the juvenile court system. So it is a very stringent process. We take volunteers from the community. We're volunteer-based. So we take anyone who's interested and has a heart for children. to visit with the children, to do all the things to ensure that their best interests are served. And we report to the judge and to the court so that they understand what's best for the child so that when they're making decisions on whether a child should go home, whether they should go with family members, or whether they should be adopted by a perfect stranger, that they've made that based on the best interest. information set forth for them to decide so i do have a video that i'd like to share with you guys um it is it does it's comprised of our board chair and a couple of our volunteers that's the one can we do the other one there were two on there Okay, it's fine. So this is one that was developed by National CASA. So every CASA program is an affiliate of the state in which they're in, but then we all roll up to National CASA. So this is a video that they developed. So if you want to go ahead and share that.

There are over 400,000 children in foster care in the United States, and most have experienced abuse or neglect. A third of them will be homeless 18 months after aging out of care. And they typically experience multiple school changes, from elementary school to high school, with nearly half dropping out of school entirely. But you can rewrite that story. Children and youth with CASA and GAL volunteers are more likely to find safe, permanent homes, more likely to succeed in school, and most importantly, experience significantly higher levels of hope. Change a child's story. Become a CASA or GAL volunteer today because children in foster care need someone fighting for their best interests. You'll be provided with all the training and support you need to perform your advocacy role. You'll spend time with a child in foster care, learning about their lives, their hopes, their dreams. You'll be a consistent presence who cares, listens, and stands by them. Someone who speaks for them when they can't speak for themselves. You'll meet with the people in their lives, parents, foster parents, family members, teachers, doctors, neighbors, social workers attorneys and therapists to ensure the child's needs are being met and because the judge needs to know the child to assess the situation you'll share what you've learned with the court so the judge can make the most informed decisions and the child's voice can be heard your advocacy will help the child heal and thrive Just a few hours a week can have a lifetime of impact.

Thank you.

So why am I here?

I'm here because I want you to understand that we have probably 90 to 100 children in foster care in Henry County, which is surprisingly low for the size of the county. We're not sure and we're digging into why is that superficially low or is that realistically what it is? We need volunteers to help these children. They're our children. They're from our community. All of the children that we serve come from Henry County. They may be placed in other counties, but they are from this county. So whether you birth them or not, they're still our children. And so what we are wanting to do is partner, and I feel bad because I'm turned to all of you, but what we really want to do is partner with our community to serve these children. making sure that they feel seen that they feel heard that their needs are understood and met and we can't do it without the help of everyone so i'm going around from every to every city explaining who we are and what we do in hopes of raising awareness raising support whether you can serve as a volunteer or whether you choose to just serve as an ambassador Whether you choose to donate, whatever it is that you can do, we need you. So that is it. Does anyone have any questions for me? How did we find you? I have some brochures, but we are at henricasa.org. That's our website. There is a link for you to volunteer if you'd like, or you can just call us. You can reach out and email, and I'll be happy to answer any questions. It is a one-person show right now, so I'm it. So I will answer your calls. Yes, ma'am.

What is the process? Is there some sort of background check, like what happens?

Yes, so because we're dealing with children, we do vet every volunteer very carefully. We have two steps of fingerprinting. We do it with our local police department, and then we do one with the Georgia Application Processing System. which is geared towards working directly with children. So it's more stringent. And then we have a training program that is a national curriculum. And then there's court observations. Once all of that's done, people are appointed to their case and they begin to work their case.

Thank you, Ms. Lisa. You're welcome. Moving on to agenda item 4C, the branding presentation by Jason... or meet a design club and jazz firm. Hello, how are you doing?

I'm great. Thanks for having me. It's so nice to meet you all and be here. Thanks, Errol, for the invitation. I'm here to just simply introduce me and my firm, which is called Proper. Me and my business partner have a brand identity studio based in Atlanta. And as we've gotten to know more about the city of Hampton and some of the recent brand efforts that have gone on there's been an invitation to come and share a little bit about our process and our way of thinking of brand philosophy so I've got a few slides that I can talk through but the idea here is that if you want to This is the best way to do it. Great. Awesome. So by way of introduction, Design Club Jazz Firm is a simple, silly way that we talk about ourselves to just make it understood that we're a boutique, relationship-oriented outfit, that we're here to make it feel like jazz when you're working with us, meaning that it's completely collaborative and expert-driven results. but also that it feels very effortless, it feels very inevitable, it feels very intuitive. So the power of brand is not simply saying that we need a logo that we slap on top of things, but brand is more about the identity of a place or an organization or a company. So instead of thinking about it as a logo, we think about it as what's the essence or the value that a city or a company or an organization provides. And so some of these slides are a little off, but I'll talk through the idea that if we have a brand, then we're able to, if we understand what that brand wants to be, the essence of the city or the organization, then we can reflect that through our logo. So the outcome or the expression of our brand starts in meaningfully defined understanding of what the city And so a powerful brand will allow for civic pride, will allow for a clear economic engine to happen. There's proof that clear identities will help capture more local spending. So if there's reason to gather and be championing a certain story or brand narrative, then it increases the economic viability of a city. So brand answers these kinds of questions before it ever creates a logo. Who are we? Why are we unique? Why should somebody care about coming to live here, set up a business here versus other places in Henry County or other towns around Atlanta? Who are our audiences and why should they care? So the citizens that live here, the students that go to school here, the visitors that want to come and experience our town, the business community. So we're much more than just creating a pretty logo. We're more about what's the story that needs to be captured. there's efficiencies that are created with a good brand so instead of solving for all of these unique parts of a city like the public works or the parks and rec or police and fire so a good brand is going to enable us to solve and determine how to actually effectively create each of those entities and a brand is multiple parts make up a brand so that the toolkit that we have at our disposal is not just a logo but also colors and fonts and photography so that we have a kit of parts to help efficiently drive the next touch point that needs to be created or designed so like the banners on a streetscape or the signage in the community or the website. So each of those things aren't recreating the wheel, but rather driven by our identity, our visual identity. And so I've already spoken to most of this and it's a little off, so sorry about that. And I think one of the things I wanted to mention is where cities or organizations can go wrong. So a lot of times a organization will just want to do the graphic design exercise of creating a logo, but it doesn't have that brand story or strategy to back it up. A lot of times there's Disparate design expression. So each department creates their own logo or each entity creates its own logo rather than a cohesive set a lot of times Design is created by a vast committee vote rather than a handful of chosen committee team experts and input from the greater community to inform the good work that needs to be done and then The typical way that we think about going about getting to the story that we need to use, the brand strategy that we need to use, is to really embed ourselves in the community. So from a process standpoint, we do take input from the community. We do come and visit the community. We do think about focus groups and stakeholder interviews to make sure that all voices are represented. and that the story that we want to create is true and represented. So the typical range for brand projects, if you're doing brand strategy and identity and thinking about gateway signage and murals and wayfinding and all the things that you need, there's a range of scope of 50 000 to 125 000 depending on how deep and how wide you're going to go in each of those areas and so based on the depth and breadth of the work the timeline can range from 30 weeks to 40 weeks, depending on how deep and wide we go in any of those areas. So in short, the way we think about a brand is it's not going to be a layer that put on top of the city to make the city great but this town is already great and we're polishing what's great about it and bringing it to the surface to tell that story so Hampton has a really strong statistics fundamentals about average income earning and home ownership and there's so much of a community pride that's already here so what we want to do is draw that out and be able to express that through a brand system so happy to answer any questions or follow-up conversations about process and timing and things of that nature if it's something that's of interest thank you so much jason any questions from the council um is there a website that we can see some of your work yes that you've previously done Yes. So our URL is proper P. R. O. P. R. A. T. L. Dot com.

Any other questions from the council?

Any discussion from the public?

I do have a question thank you for your presentation the purpose of you presenting to us tonight is that for us to make a decision about his company or is it just presentation presentation okay all right that's all ahead thank you thank you very much

All right. Moving on to agenda item five, which is public comments. Michelle?

Thank you for being here. Public comment is now open to residents of the city of Hampton, to those who own businesses physically located within the city, and to those who are directly impacted by a matter on tonight's agenda. Speakers may address any item on the agenda or any matter over which this governing body we ask that each speaker maintain a civil demeanor and refrain from personal attacks toward members of the governing body. Under section 246-8, all council members are required to conduct themselves in a professional and respectful manner. All remarks must be directed to the mayor and not to an individual council member, staff member, Council members may not speak until they are recognized by the mayor and all comments must address the motion currently under discussion. The mayor is responsible for enforcing the rules of this forum. If a council member believes a rule has been broken, a point of order may be raised and a second is not required. The mayor may rule on the point or allow the council to debate the issue and decide by majority vote. Public comments are limited to three minutes per speaker. When you approach the podium, Please state your name for the record. We appreciate your participation in local government and your commitment. Okay, so first we have Miss Debbie Palmer.

Good evening, Miss Debbie.

Well, you kind of knocked the wind out of me about Dr. Mason. Dr. Mason, that's who my grandson Mason's named after. She was a professor at Mercer. So it's kind of throwing me off a little bit. But I've been thinking about some of how this council is operating. We don't need this. If you want to keep on keeping something going, do your letter of resignation. Let me tell you something. We, the taxpayer, pay you. you work for us I don't think we're getting our money's worth we're not getting anything done up here at the city and while you're blaming somebody one person breaking the law you breaking the law too I just want to give you something

Thank you.

I came to a meeting up here special call meeting where there was a question about a vehicle and it was testified that some of you went to the police chief's house this was on the minutes I don't know how you got his address I you know if you if he didn't give it to you then you got it either through your work which is an ethics violation or from another phase I work in the school and I have parents to say call me and I said well give me your number you can get it off there no I can't that's ethics you it was stated that The person drove by the house, come back up by the house and was looking. You didn't do it one time, you did it twice. That's stalking. I have been stalked before. I know the stalking law. That's a violation. That's illegal. When you do it, you're wrong. And if you can't work and get along and do something for this city, then you need to remove yourself. We won't be mad at you. We're proud that you put your name on the ballot to run. But I am mad and I don't like it. that you don't want to work together and get something going for this city. The teen council needs to be squashed this year. None of you have the concerns and the needs. And I wouldn't want my child to be up and under y'all for how you do. You're not teaching them anything. You're teaching them how to fuss and fight. They get that out there at school. They understand that. But then, one more thing I want to bring up. A person said, I want to fire the police chief. I want to fire you all. Can I do it? I'm going to the Capitol next week, and I'm going to meet with somebody. I'm going to find out, are you going to get it together? So you need to tell the city, the citizens, we pay your salary. Get up and walk out. and save your reputation other than where the citizens are going to come after you. Somebody's got to take the high road.

Thank you, Ms. Palmer. Thank you. Excuse me. Excuse me. No, no clapping.

I'm going to have to leave because I'm going to go and see about this place.

Yes. Next person on the agenda on the list of them.

Good evening, mayor and council. Good evening. These questions are for the mayor. We had an ethics complaint, and you had to leave. I was made to come to the ethics complaint, but you was allowed to leave. To my understanding, you left to be with Willie Turner at your clubhouse to watch the meeting. So I'm going to ask you the questions that I wanted to ask you the night of the exit committee. Did you receive the initial complaint involving the city manager before notifying the council? Did you involve human resources before initiating action? Why was human resources excluded? Did the council approve a suspension on April 14, 2025? were restrictions imposed regarding city property and the city equipment? Did the council authorize one day exception for the vehicle? Did you later allow the city manager to retain the vehicle? Did you inform the council of that decision? Did you obtain additional council approval before doing so? Do you acknowledge the council members that it was a bad judgment call? Was council members told the vehicle was secured in the city limits? Was that information accurate? Did you, Mayor Torpen, instruct Chief Turner on how to respond if council members asked about the vehicle's location? was a disciplinary action form created continuously with the council's action? Why was Human Resources not maintaining the disciplinary record? Why did the city initially report no responsive documentation existed? Can you produce the original executed disciplinary document today?

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Cleveland. Next.

The next person is Ms. Lisa Mason.

Good evening Mayor, Council Members. My name on record is Lisa May and I'm the owner of 1181 Warm Spring Court in Hampton. I have been a homeowner since January 9th of 2009. I have been in the state of Georgia for almost 20 years and have lived at that house going on 18 years. If you do not have not known, Mayor, of the incident that happened on the evening of Sunday, May 24th, I suggest that you contact the police chief and or Detective Mulder. The house across the street from me was shot up with AK-47s and had over 30 shots of gunfire. My neighbor across the street, Miranda Baxter, was on a cruise. there were gunshots that ricocheted off of the car and went through her garage, went through her husband's car and into her living room. I was here in the city of Hampton when there were no other houses in my development. I watched the housing market plummet and I have invested every single penny that I have could have to improve not only my property but my neighbors. I'm here to put it, the only reason I haven't gone to channel two news is because I wanted to give the council the benefit of making sure that it is on record that this activity happened and it's not gonna be tolerated. There have been too many homes in not only this cobblestone region but in the city of Hampton that have been taken over by rental properties and project management companies and it has to end. Not one single person better knock on my door asking for their vote if this is not rectified before the next election season this is not tolerated that I look out my office window and I see people with ankle monitors now of course people have the entitlement to have a second chance but this house this rental property has been a problem since the people moved in and we are tired of it we're tired of it I established the bus routes for my son to go to school. I've been the only person in, I'm one of the oldest homeowners when there were no homes. And I expect, I know cases aren't solved overnight, but what I am asking, and I'm thankful for the chief for additional law enforcement surveillance in the neighborhood before this incident and after this incident, but something has to be done with the amount of rental homes in the city of Hampton. Thank you. Thank you.

Next we have Ms. Esma Oliver. Next we have Ms. Sheila. I don't know, I can't even write the last name.

It started with a C. Is that me, Clark?

Yes, ma'am.

Hello, Mayor, council members. My name is Sheila Clark, 100 South Hampton Road. I'm proud of you. What bothers some of us here in the city of Hampton is the chaos. It's not abnormal to have chaos amongst workers. Get behind the door, close the door, hash it out. But when you come out of that room and those doors open and you are here to represent, it should be a level of cohesiveness and teamwork. And that's not what we're seeing. We need your help. We need it. Please come together. Don't make it personal.

thank you thank you no no no next we have Everett Hooper the next person we have is Everett Hooper Mr Hooper yes hello everyone councilman council members well what I got to say is doesn't seem to be as heavy as all that but it's my concern So it's just a simple matter of down on my street, Revere Way, when the lights go out, we're always the last one that the lights come back on, and I can never get anybody that can help me with the situation. We need somebody that we can call and talk to about that situation. So I just really would like for y'all to come up with a way that somebody that would be responsive You know, I'll give an example. I've been living in Hampton for quite some time. I lived in Clayton County, Hampton, before I moved here in 2009. I've been over there since 2009. So in Clayton County, Hampton, we're at Central Georgia EMC. When the lights go out, you call them. They can tell you almost to the second when they're going to put those lights back on. And I just need to know sometimes. They've been off eleven hours before. That's all I got.

I need you to give your full name and your address. Everett Hooper, 928 Revere Way. All right, so what I'm going to have you speak with Chief Turner and Mr. Alton West on the back. We need to definitely get you some contact numbers that you're able to reach someone because we definitely do not want your power to be out that long. Yes. Okay. Please, thank you. Yes.

Thank you. Is it Ms. Lisa? Yes. Can you give me the date that this incident occurred again? She said May the 24th. May 24th.

Into the morning of Monday, the next day.

And what subdivision are you in? Cobblestone Ridge.

And the house in question is 1153 Cobblestone Ridge Road. Okay.

thank you that was the last person for public comments all right thank you guys so very much for sharing your concerns we want to make sure that we take care of everything that we when she came to the special call meeting she would be allowed to speak and forgot to put her name on the list

Good evening, Madam Mayor.

Good evening, Council. I wanted to just comment on the gas station ordinance. It was my understanding when I spoke about it in the hearing a few weeks ago, I thought that one of the main concerns for doing the moratorium was oversaturation, just too many gas stations, a concern around that. And so I thought that the new ordinance would address that a little bit more. It looks like the new ordinance has a requirement now for conditional use So anytime a new gas station is proposed, it will need to come before council, which is awesome. That's a great step, I think, in the right direction. What I'm concerned about is that the limit is still one mile between each gas station, and there's a loophole. So if you have a gas station... I'm not sure if it's clear that if it's on the opposite side of the road, if it doesn't count, you know what I mean? Like if you go one mile and it's just across the road, I don't think it it's one side. So you could have two gas stations within a mile of each other if it's just on the other side of the road. So I think that's a loophole. I also think there's another loophole where it's if it's a ten acre retail site you can add one there and my concern is we're as a town at this point of 9 300 some odd citizens and we have about 14 gas stations within about a mile of the city limits from what i could tell And that's, if we were to go by the national average of how many gas stations you need per kind of population, it's around 2,000. So one gas station per 2,000 people. So if we bump up our population to 10,000 people, we should probably have around five. So why do we have 14? And my concern is, you know, living right across from a gas station, I'm very familiar with, you know, the fumes that you get. These are establishments that are a necessary need for our communities. There's no question. However, do they really bring much to our communities in the way of, you know, community activity, people getting together, doing things? It's a necessary need for our society. But, you know, I mean, let's be honest, going forward, we're going through this gas crisis. The future of electric vehicles is rapidly approaching. I mean, how many gas stations do we really want to use up all our real estate to house? And so I personally would really like to see, rather than put the onus on the citizens to come comment every time we have another gas station, we got to come here and fight it, you know, if we don't want it. I would love to see a policy and an ordinance that truly puts the onus, if someone really believes Hampton needs another gas station, it should be on them to present a market study. So we make a requirement that they have to present a market study justifying the need for a gas station. okay well and and I think we should increase it to two miles yeah and there's a few other recommendations that I'll email you but that way we can trust that the ordinance will respect our needs thank you all right that's the closing of our public comments no

No, we're going to close public comments. Appointments, agenda item 6A, consideration and action to approve resolution 202639, Council Development Authority appointment. We have Council Member Brooks is appointing Serena Daniels and Council Member Mitchell is appointing Eugene Hope. Can I get a motion to approve resolution? Council Member Mitchell, can I get a motion to approve resolution 202639? So moved. I have a motion by Council Member Mitchell. Do I have a second?

Second.

I have a second by Councilmember Chaney to approve Resolution 2026-39. I believe both of the candidates are in the audience this evening. Ms. Daniels, can you raise your hand, stand? Yes, come on, stand up, yes. Is Mr. Holt, Mr. Holt not here?

Okay, all right.

So I have a motion on the floor. Is there any discussion from the council? Any discussion from the public? All in favor?

Madam Mayor, I don't have a discussion, but I would just like to extend my gratitude and thanks to you, Ms. Daniel, for your willingness to serve the city. Thank you.

Thank you. All in favor? I got a motion. All opposed? I have a 6-0. Moving on to agenda item 6B, consideration and action on resolution 2026-40 to appointment of members of the Hampton Historic Preservation. Council Member Cheney is appointing Ms. Kim Lunn back to our historic preservation. Ms. Cheney, can I get a motion to approve resolution 2026-40?

Yes, I make a motion to approve 2026-40.

Can I get a second? Second. I have a second by council member Meeks. Any discussion from the council?

Just a comment. I'll appoint my one next month.

You'll appoint? Okay.

Next month.

All right. Any discussion from the public? All in favor? I have a 6-0. Agenda item 6C, consideration and action to approve resolution 2026-44, the Downtown Development Authority. Councilmember Chaney appoints it is Mr. Clyde King. Councilmember Mitchell appointment is Gloria Holt. My self-appointment is Ms. Kim Boatman, and for the council representation is Councilmember Errol Mitchell. I need a motion, Mr. Mitchell, to approve Resolution 2026-44. So moved. I have a motion to approve Resolution 2026-44 by Councilmember Mitchell. Do I have a second?

Second. Madam Mayor, I make a motion to have a second. Okay. Okay. I'd like to make a motion that we discuss the appointment of Council Member Mitchell as the Council Liaison.

Okay. So I have a motion on the floor to approve Resolution 2026-44 by Council Member Mitchell and a second by Council Member Meeks. Discussion from the Council. Yes.

So according to the Georgia law, Michelle, can you open up that? presentation and it's the photo that says dda madam mayor i have a question once okay can you scroll down so in the highlighted section this is according to Georgia law the term of a director who's also a member of the governing body of a municipal corporation shall end when such director is no longer a member of the governing body of the governing body of the municipal corporation If at the end of any term of office, any director, a successor to such director has not been elected, the director whose term of office has expired shall continue to hold office until a successor is elected. I had a conversation with the city attorney regarding the highlighted section. So according to this, because I have been the council liaison for the DDA, And also I was appointed to the DDA before I became a council member. According to this, I cannot be removed from the DDA because I'm still a part of the governing body. So I don't know if Mr. Mitchell's appointment as the DDA, the council liaison for the DDA,

is legal because we cannot have two members of council serve on one board council member brooks yes i'm looking here where council member cheney and mitchell both um i'm just wondering how does this work we we have a dda we have a chairperson of the dda who actually When will I know it's time to make an appointment? I just need to be educated on how that works.

Everybody was notified on these appointments. Everyone that was supposed to appoint someone was notified that they had an appointment to make on these boards. You are saying you didn't get that notification?

I don't recall getting it.

Neither did I. I'm not saying you're not. I've never been able to.

I still have one.

What do you mean I'm not? I've never been able to appoint anybody. Hold on.

Hold on. Hold on. Okay.

Hold on.

I think I got my clarification. According to Clerk Michelle, I still have the opportunity to make an appointment to the DDA. That's all I need to know.

I'd like to know because this is my third year on the council and I haven't ever been able to appoint somebody.

Council Member DeShane.

Go ahead. I said, this is my third year on council and I've never been able to make an appointment to this board. So I'm just wondering when I get to make an appointment to this board. as well as I think the last time when you appointed Council Member Mitchell and Council Member Cheney to the committee, Council Member White-Williams asked you when myself or Council Member Brooks would get the opportunity to serve on our board and you said the next time. But the next time I've come and once again Council Member Mitchell is serving on that board but obviously miss council member white williams is still serving so i'm just wondering when do i get a chance since this is my third year so um council members that are currently in office and that have two years have their people sitting on the board already

everybody goes through an up and down vote names are turned in it's not specific to a council member council members just turn in their names and it goes through an up and down vote so the individuals that just like we were just talking about council member Brooks she will have an opportunity to submit a name because she is new on the council this year so everybody's terms runs with a particular council member okay so it was four of us that got reelect or got elected this time so there was four appointment four people that came on for that we will be coming off and or they were reappointed so council member DeShane's person has been on the council since she has been on the council how they got on it was through an up and down vote right here in this council chamber can you tell or the who was my person well not your person what what I mean is the the seat that would run with your seat concurrent with your seat because we go through an up and down vote now um yes go ahead Councilmember White-Williams so when I was appointed to the DDA I came on in 2023

And the whole board was appointed that night. So Councilwoman Duchenne wasn't on council. So the old council appointed the seven members to the DEA that night. She has not appointed anyone unless somehow she took one of the former council members appointee.

I was going to say that's not, that's not accurate. because every time there is an empty seat, the main street director would come to us and say we have an empty seat. council would be notified that there is an empty seat do you know anybody that would like to serve send their names in tell us about it we're going to put them up for a vote to serve in that seat so that is how we would continue to restore our boards and do our boards any other discussion about this resolution 2026-44 yes because when i did try to appoint miss jeannie twice

during that time uh you she was not voted in right exactly because because she was never allowed to be voted on so i have never been able to put a name of a person to be considered so i have never had a representation for my any time the names come in we put them in

as they come in we put them in we vote on them like they come in it's simple as they come in that's how we vote on them once we get full we are full we have the representation needed that is the reason Miss Chaney did not get an up or down vote she was never voted on because we were full at that point in time so

any other discussion yes i would like for us to go back and discuss what was actually in our packet provided by the clerk the information that i just read and i'll read it again the term of a director who's also a member of the governing body of a municipal corporation shall end when such director is no longer a member of the governing body of the municipal corporation So to move forward with the vote, to put Mr. Mitchell in this, as the council rep would be invalid.

Council Member White-Williams, your term is up. It has been up. I am still a part of the governing body. Were you appointed?

Madam Mayor.

Yes.

If I may. Yes. The term of a director who is also a member of the governing body of a municipal corporation shall end when such a director is no longer a member of the governing body of the municipal corporation. I believe this. And I'm not an attorney, but I believe this refers to if that person leaves office, they're no longer on the DDA.

Exactly. And because I still have all of this year and next year.

311G in the charter says all board members serve at will and may be removed at any time by vote of four members of the city council unless otherwise provided by law. And I think that's ambiguous. And I can understand your point.

So I have Attorney Washington. Can you chime in here? Because this is state law. This is not a state law supersedes charter.

It's ambiguous.

It's my understanding of both your ordinance and the state law that What you say is correct, that the city council appointed director on the DBA holds an office until they are no longer in office. So they don't fall into the same category as other directors where they have a four-year term.

Attorney Washington, is this your legal opinion or is this just your opinion?

It's my legal opinion. Okay.

Can you tell me if Council Member White-Williams was never appointed as the liaison between the council according to the downtown development authorities, bylaws and charter, does this still apply to her? She was appointed prior to, before she was on the council, not as the council's liaison.

You appointed me as the council's liaison. You told me that when I ran... Charlie Varner and I were both on the DDA. We both ran for council. I won. Willie Turner was the council liaison. He never came to a DDA meeting. You told me, and it could be in the minutes, that I would remain as the council liaison once I was sworn in as a council member.

And she said that in January of 2024 when she was making the board appointments, she said that you were an appointee but since you are the council now that you would be the council representative since you were on the board so the council wishes to change their representation

that represents all attorney councilmember Mitchell that is who we we would like to appoint to the downtown development authority attorney Washington motion on excuse me I have a motion on the floor by councilmember member Mitchell and a second by councilmember Meeks is there any discussion from the public all in favor you had a discussion how do you have this okay

And I don't know if it's time, but I didn't want y'all to skip over it. Yes.

So I'm going to read this. My name is Joey Lewis. I'm the owner of Makers on Main in downtown Hampton. So good evening. And this is not about removing her. So should I wait until you guys get to the other appointments? Or can I? So I'll read it now. Okay. Good evening. I'm asking for clarification regarding the Downtown Development Authority appointments. Under Georgia law, OCGA 36427, DDA boards are required to include members who have a direct economic interest in the downtown development area, such as business owners, property owners, or individuals actively engaged in downtown redevelopment. The law also requires that the board maintain representation of those downtown stakeholders, no less than four. Right now, we don't have any stakeholders on the DDA. With that in mind, I have several direct questions. First, are the individuals being appointed actual downtown stakeholders as defined by Georgia law, meaning do they own property or operate a business within the downtown development area? Second, were qualified downtown stakeholders, specifically business owners and property owners in the downtown district, identified and considered during this appointment process? Third, what specific criteria were used to determine that these appointments meet the statutory requirement of having an economic interest in downtown redevelopment? If downtown stakeholders were identified but not selected, what was the reason they were excluded? And finally, If individuals with direct downtown investment were not approached or considered, how does the city ensure compliance with OCGA 36427 in making these appointments? I'm asking for clear clarification on how these appointments meet the legal requirements set by the state of Georgia for downtown development authority boards. I brought this to you guys' attention November 2024. Thank you, Joy.

Attorney Washington.

Yes. I'm sorry.

Did you hear one of our residents, Mr. Joey Lewis? Did you write down her questions and so that we can make sure that we get her the answers that she needs?

Sure. I heard her questions. Yes.

Do you have a response at this time?

Well, no, I need to look at it to see exactly who's on your board. I'm not familiar with the members of your board or whether or not they satisfy the necessary requirements. I need to take a look at that and give you an informed decision.

All right. Thank you. I have a motion on the floor by Council Member Mitchell and a second by Council Member Meeks to approve Resolution 202644. All in favor?

Can I say that maybe we should table this till next month so he can give his opinion from reviewing who's on the board and what Ms. Joey said?

Maybe table the last section. Go ahead with the other two appointees and table the last section.

Well, the other two appointees, she had asked about if those appointees have any business interest or whatever. So maybe we should table the whole thing until the attorney can really provide a.

Council Member Mitchell, do you want to rescind your motion?

I made a motion to resend my motion.

All right. I resend the motion. I need a motion to postpone Resolution 2026-44, the Downtown Development Authority of Point C. I make the motion. Second. I have a motion by Councilmember DeShane and a second by Councilmember White-Williams. All in favor to postpone to our July meeting? I have a 6. Councilmember Brooks, you raise your hand. Yes. I have a 6-0. Moving on to our youth council update. Do we have any youth council update? Seeing none, we'll move on to our city manager's update.

good evening mayor and council members citizens and staff members I appreciate the opportunity to provide a brief update on the key city operations and priorities first off we'll start with personnel operations and I would like to mention that sadly we are losing Tiffany Dobbins I'm going to ask you to stand up Tiffany so I can thoroughly embarrass you to a private firm as such we appreciate all that she's done for the city but we are actively interviewing this week for planner one positions and citywide we have very few openings and we're operationally sound in the policy and governance category a council directed resolution has been prepared to modernize our procurement policy which is last updated in 2014 and this will be presented for the council consideration this evening In the near term, we're working on presenting and finalizing the water rate study and an ordinance to adjust the water and sewer base rates and a review of our agreement with the Henry County Police Department. In the legal field, we've received a service on a civil matter filed in Henry County Superior Court that has been forwarded to the attorneys for review. Economic development infrastructure, the staff continues to manage multiple projects associated with infrastructure needs such as water, stormwater, and reuse. Updates on agreements, easements, and related incentives will be brought forward as they progress. One item coming before you tonight will be resolution 2026-41 related to an IGA with Spalding County Water Authority in the near term. An MOU for the Hampton Development Authority's consideration will be brought forward shortly. I also anticipate plan approvals for the master water meters at the Henderson Farm project once review has been made. Upcoming, we have numerous bid postings for pending issues under the updated procurement framework, recompetition of select professional service contracts under the updated procurement framework, and a continued focus on budget preparation and millage floss two discussions with Henry County. Our focus stays on strong governance, transparency, and efficient service delivery for the citizens of Hampton. And now each department head will present an update for you. HR Director Atwater is out at training, so we'll catch up with her next month. And we'll begin with Chief Turner.

One second, Mr. Baker. Oh, yes, ma'am. Yes. Council, have any questions? Do you?

I do have a question about our bond, the stormwater and sewer $4 million bond. Yes, ma'am. How are we paying? I know we've made or have we made the first payment? And where are those funds coming from?

Yes, ma'am. Those payments have been made. I would need to confer with the finance director to find out where he's pulling those from.

okay um so the assistant director he's not aware rj um rj is still here while he comes in okay any other questions i i do i have yes ma'am rj behind you okay i'm sorry i didn't hear the question the question was in regards to our bond for the stormwater um infrastructure

we have been making payments we would like to know where are you making those payments from what accounts you know where are we paying it out of there's a utility sinking fund that i know of and then there's a revenue account as well it's got its own separate account but that's all i know so far utility what kind of account It's a utilities bond account.

Oh, OK. And?

Mr. Forsyth would know more than I would.

OK. Utility bond account. Thank you. Thank you.

I also have a couple of questions. I think I spoke with you on Friday in regards to the signage. You said that we were waiting on the procurement policy to get approved. Yes, ma'am.

That's part of the, for the upcoming, we have numerous bid postings that are available once we get the procurement policy squared away to go up and be posted.

Is there a reason why it can't go up underneath this procurement policy that we're currently working under?

Well, I hesitate with the opinion from the attorneys that we need to update it I feel more comfortable with all these going out after under the new policy So what if we don't pass the new policy Well, I guess that's a different discussion.

Exactly. So that's what I'm saying. The procurement policy is holding up us progressing and doing what we need to do in regards to putting out our bids.

Yes, ma'am.

I'm trying to figure out why are we not operating up under the policy that we've been operating under?

after the discussions that we had at the council retreat and previous discussions and the concerns from the attorneys as the out of compliance with a number of different areas in the procurement policy decided to be prudent to wait until hopefully we have passage of that this evening okay

Mayor Toccoli, I have a question. We approved the fund, the fundings for the signage. So we didn't move forward with it after we approved the funding?

I don't believe, I'm not familiar with the approval of funding for the signage.

Yes, we did give you, we did approve funding just for signage. We originally wanted to take it out of SPLOSH, but we went to Fund Balance instead.

I believe that we weren't secure I didn't have any bids per se on that one so you approved an overarching funding not to exceed a certain amount but I don't have bids to proceed with that so there is there's you're correct there's funding on that but I don't have any bids to apply to that funding or if that's going to need to be adjusted and the reason we don't have any bids is because we don't want to go by the procurement policy that's currently in place that's the hesitation right now yes ma'am okay can you tell me there has been a

not a stop work order, but there's been a delay in the park. I know that we didn't make payment. Can you tell me why it wasn't payment made on time for that? And why did they stop? Is that the reason?

For the totality of the payment?

whatever the last payment was that they didn't get paid on time and i know they stopped the work stopped because i went by there every single day and nobody was showing up and trying to figure out why uh yes the payment has the final check has been issued to them and they picked it up last friday last friday yes ma'am all right so they should be back on site getting it completed and done yes ma'am is there a reason why they had not been paid

It was just going through the procurement policy to make sure where the payments were going to come from because there was a split payment from two separate funds and Mr. Forsyth worked that out and presented a check and that was Friday.

How long is that taking? How long was it before they submitted their invoice? How long was it before we paid them?

I would say a couple weeks somewhere in that ball field. I'd have to check to make sure.

All right. That's all the questions that I have. Any other questions from the council?

um do we have a bid for a new finance advisor was that bid closed this is one of the bids yeah there were several bids around that were closed pulled based on a recommendation from the attorney several of those bids were pulled out and they're ready they're the same frameworks ready as if we get approval on this tonight they'll be posted tomorrow hold on the the the financial advisor was already posted bidded on I have bids closed on May the first and why didn't we get a all of the ones that put in their proposal that was based on we had those closed out and they're assembled but based on recommendation that's where we held off on that and I don't remember the exact close date on those from the from the legal

What was the recommendation from legal?

Why was we not part of this process that we've had questions on and everything from April on was where the professional services portion of the procurement policy as well as construction portion of the I understand that but I'm trying to figure out what does that have to do with the bids that we have that has been closed and you have

and is ready to be awarded and for us to approve that award why didn't that come back before we can proceed if you would choose to but the recommendation was ought to rebid those things rebid them yes ma'am all right moving on any questions more questions from the council how many bids did we receive do you recall I believe at least two perhaps three

OK. And you can't disclose their names, the company's names?

I probably could. I can share those with you.

OK. OK. But you can't share it tonight?

I don't have the bids in front of me. I know one of the companies that I don't want to integrate any of the other two by not mentioning those also.

OK. OK. All right. Thank you.

We're going to have our police update now?

Yes, ma'am. All right. Good evening Madam Mayor and Council. Police update for the month of June. Next slide. chief that's cute um the response time remaining y'all know we have a five minute goal and i have slowly tasked lieutenant arnold and captain brownlee with us being under four minutes they continue to to hit that mark at three minutes and 28 seconds um a testament that's really to them not just to them but to our entire staff that they that is um a point of contention and something we're very proud of and i know i've shared in the past but the national average is over 10 minutes so from the time you first call a police officer to the time he gets there it's important when you need them so three minutes 28 seconds was outstanding the month of june we had 827 contacts um that's everything from calls dispatch to to anything that generated a case number um that could be a citation it could be a report a call for service out of that we did have three complaints One thing that, if you can go to the next slide, I think it's important to be transparent about that. We started, I think in October, started putting the complaints. There's a lot of months we have zero. There's some months we have, you know, some, I think this is the first time since we've been doing it, we've had one sustained. But I think it's important to be transparent, not to just the mayor and council, but to the community that we're going to make mistakes. Our officers are not going to be perfect. They're going to make mistakes. While we can't get up and tell you the exact thing, I know that's something the city manager and I work with when we have one sustained, whether that is, you know, whether it's done informally through the disciplinary process or if it's done formally and they require other things, that's something that's important that we're honest about each month. So we'll continue to do that. Hopefully we won't have any sustained ones, but when we do, we'll take appropriate action. Next slide. I do want to cover this right here just as a public notice. We had over the last weekend several vehicles that were, I'm going to say broken into, but it's more rummaged through. One of the best things you can do is lock your vehicle. We notice that most of the time when people hit an individual neighborhood or an area, they go around and just check car doors. If you leave anything of value laying out, that's usually what's taking. We ask that you secure all firearms outside the vehicle. When you go into your home, take the firearm with you. Continue to report suspicious activity if you notice any. Last but certainly not least, I want to introduce you to our newest officer.

Come on up, Officer Williams.

Officer Jairus Williams has over 20 years of law enforcement experience in both the military and the civilian sectors. He's served in leadership and operational roles in corrections as a patrol sergeant with the city of Griffin. He's worked in investigations and... His background includes personnel management and criminal investigations, policy enforcement, and crisis responses, community engagement. I think a lot of the decisions that this mayor and council have made over the last two years have allowed us, when we have an opening, to pick the best of the best. I give you Officer Williams.

Welcome.

Thank you so very much, Officer Williams.

Question for the chief.

So, yes. I just want to kind of go back to Ms. Lisa's comment and public comments. I was not made aware of the incident. So I don't want you to think council does not know and we don't care about what's happening. There are some things that I believe the police department can share with us and things they cannot. So just know that I'm sorry that that happened to you and your neighbor. and I hope no one was injured or involved you know injured during that time but we do care and when these things happen I would like for us to know we're not going to go out and investigate them ourselves but I think going forward whenever we have situations like this the council should be made aware so that other citizens like Ms. Lisa is not informing us on the guidance

yes ma'am and our our policy is has been with under the previous city manager and with the city manager i notify i notify the city manager and provide case updates as they happen that is a case i i can't comment on because we're in the midst of the investigation i think may the 25th was the date of it i know miss lisa spoke to detective motor yesterday i believe um i believe we're being very responsive to her concerns and we'll continue to do so um the the investigation itself why i can't comment on it we are it's certainly at the front of our our patrol activities and our investigations and i'll work with mr baker to to ensure that we're keeping the council apprised of the and that's that's something with mr baker that we certainly have daily conversations over the weekends most of the time and this was one of Don't want to talk about that individual case, but there's certain things as they rise to the level that you guys are notified, but that'll be something that I worked through with Mr. Baker and you guys worked through him as well. Yes, ma'am.

Council Member DeHaan.

I know last year you spoke about creating some sort of a public safety or committee. Would you think that coming out of something like this, that is something you should pursue? I know that previously on council, they used to have like a safety committee.

And I think it's a great idea. We had started the process of talking about it. And then in January, there was a some committees that came out that was was going to be coming forward. And that was one of them. That's why I didn't want to step on any toes of you know take any initiative since the the governing body had had said that that's something they wanted to institute but it's certainly something we would welcome and i'm you know you at you guys's direction mr baker can kind of help us assemble it and but i think it's a great idea so um i have um two things yes ma'am um

You're really good at sending an update to the city manager. I did not get a CC and or a forward email on this incident that was presented to us on the 24th or 25th. I'm sure because it's overnight, but the next day we should have been notified that we had a shooting of that magnitude. so in the future I would like for the city manager once he is notified that you would notify me so I can let the council know or you can do us all on an email change just to let not not to tell us any other details or anything but to notify us of there was a shooting in our community that's that's important that we know that and that's how it's been so I don't know where the laughs went also you in your presentation you said we had one sustained complaint you could not go into detail with it however I would like for you to as working with Mister Baker and in his update We need to be aware of what that issue is with that officer. It is the governing body's responsibility to make sure that, along with yours and yours, to make sure that our citizens are safe and that our officers are doing their due diligence and are doing what they're supposed to do. So I think that an update needs to definitely be given to us in regards to that. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. I have our public works director Mr Lewis King good evening mayor council and citizens of Hampton

Okay, so as many of you may have already seen, the splash pad is open. It's going, man, every time I drive out here, a bunch of people out there, so they're definitely enjoying it. It looks like we're going to have a hot summer, so it should stay full. This is just some of the projects we're working on right now up on Emory Street. They had, man, an issue with the storm drain over there. Bamboo everywhere. That bottom picture on the left there, you couldn't even see that house before we got in there and started taking it out. So we're just about finished with that, and then we're going to be moving on to some other things. McBear Park is coming along. We're still on schedule to finish by the end of the month. I know you mentioned something about driving by and they haven't been doing work. It's because of the rain that we recently had, and they're getting ready to put the acrylic down on the pickleball court as well as the upper basketball court. So as soon as that's all dried up, they'll begin on that. They have to put the basketball goals up and some nets, and that's pretty much it. We'll be done. And for the month of May, we completed 95 work orders, had 306 miles of road swept. The sweeper's been down for some maintenance issues. We just got that fixed. We had some type of electrical shortage. We couldn't find it. So the folks came in, took care of that. They had to put a hydraulic pump on the broom, and it's back in order. And this is a retention pond over, excuse me, detention pond, off of target that we have to maintain. So we took care of that. 21 citizen contacts for the month. That's it in a nutshell. Any questions?

Any questions from the council? I have one question. If you can go back to Mr. King's first photo on Emory Street, is this a private residence? it's well residents on both sides yes ma'am but that is it do we have a public easement there to clear out that drainage yes because i've been i've been told that we don't have an easement that this is private property that that i was told where is the easement um where is it at right right there where we're at no no no i'm saying where is the documentation for the easement how do we know we're not on private property

I was told we're not, but I'll buy. Did I discuss that with you, Ms. Wanda? Do you remember? No, Emory Street. Okay. I don't recall now, but...

I believe Emory Street is private property. If I'm not mistaken, this is the location that... The city has been doing favors to the homeowner to clearing out this drainage. I'm trying to find out, do we have a permanent easement to clean this out? No, it's not on steel.

It's off of Main Street.

So I'm curious to know, before we go into, because it's obvious private property, cleaning out these storm drains, Who's pulling the documentation that says we're supposed to be on this property?

Well, ma'am, all of those drains along that street, they drain into that, and then that subdivision behind there, there's a huge storm drain. All of the drains off of that street fall into that.

I understand. I understand. I know how Emory Street is. Okay. This has not been clean for years for the fact that I was told that this was private property. So now we are cleaning it again and I want to know where's the documentation that says this is our easement that we're supposed to be maintaining it. You should pull the plaque, you should find the easement and you should know that we're supposed to be on the property. This is how it works now. Isn't it? This is how it works. I thought this was okay. Well, all right. So if somebody could get council the documentation on Emory Street, what is the address? 1515 Emory Street. If you can get documentation, thank you. That this is our drainage that we are responsible for and we should be clean cleaning out and maintaining because we definitely want to do it. We don't want to stop every other year. We trying to figure out which one is which. We want to know. So just get the council the documentation and that way we'll know. Everybody be in the loop.

All right.

That's all the questions that I have for public works director. Thank you, Mr. King. Thank you. Moving on to our utilities director, Mr. Alton West.

Mayor, council, how's everybody doing this afternoon? Doing wonderful. Oh, that is not mine.

There's a click up there.

Oh, stupid me? All right. It's not easy.

I'm going to go away. My bad. I'm going to help you. Nope. Nope.

Ah, that's much better. All right. What we have here, I would like to point out from the upper right, left-hand corner, that is a woodlawn tank. So we just recently had that resurfaced and painted in preparation for the need for the days ahead. Electric division, there are 73 work orders total. We had five power outages, one of which Mr. Everett, he expressed his concerns. I'm going to send the guys out there to see what they can do about that tomorrow. Install approximately 250 feet of underground triplex wire to provide electrical service to new homes. Install three new bypass switches in East Main and Highway 20. install three bypass switches and three new trip saver switches at West King Road and Rosenwald Drive. They were replaced because they were just outdated, old, crumbling. Coordinated with Georgia Power and Central Georgia EMC to transfer all electrical load from the Woodlawn substation to the McDonough substation. So maintenance work could be performed at the Woodlawn substation. The wastewater treatment plant, we had a total of 95 work orders repaired and calibrated caustic pump. Clarifier two, drain and clean. I think we're currently waiting on the clarifier one repaired and back operational. Water division had a total of 164 work orders. possibly eight, nine leaks repaired, one leak currently on our system and our water loss is hovering around there between 30 and 31 percent unfortunately but we're working on that. Anybody have any questions or concerns? This again is about the Woodlawn tank. It was in bad shape. you look at the two pictures on the left so the reason partially because it took so long because we're waiting on someone qualified and capable to get the job done as you can see the previous contractor I mean they didn't do a good job at all but we're past that now and that's it if I got a question any questions from the council

So for the last couple of months you've been giving us a report and we've been at 31% in water losses. Yes ma'am. I would like to know what are we doing? What are we implementing? What are we putting in place in order to curtail the 31%? Get that number down.

We're implementing as we're at the retreat, the meters, that whole system. We're losing, we have a lot of old meters. It's roughly 25, 2600. And most of that loss can be attributed to that. Now, there's some that we can't see, obviously. When we do, we fix them. But the primary cause of that is just the faulty old meters. Over time, they just degrade and they get less and less. That's why people complain when they get a new meter that the bill goes up. That's why.

So we are actively installing new meters now?

Yes ma'am once we have currently we get them periodically obviously we have budgetary concerns to consider but we get them and install them a lot of times it's at customer request or we find one faulty out in the field you know but again looking forward to next budget we'd like to get a lot more and do a lot more.

Have we identified all of the leaks?

Not with meters. I mean, it wouldn't necessarily be a leak. So again, like I said, it just read less and less over time. The apparatus inside of me just degrades. So but usually when we see something we get, we try to get it fixed. You know, when I first got here almost a year ago, it was stuff leaking everywhere. Now we try to address it within days as opposed to weeks and months. Yes, ma'am.

New meters, would they still have a percentage of leak? May I? New meters, would they still have a percentage of leak?

No. I mean, it's negligible. Like I said, the leak is inside the actual meter. So you wouldn't see any water. It's just over time, you know, the apparatus that measures the water going through, it just wears down. So you get more water going by that's not metered as opposed to a new meter and metering as it should, if that makes any sense.

So how many meters do you think we would have to replace to kind of bring that number down from the 31 to bring it down?

We're looking at about 2,500. Now, that's not including the ones through the new developments because all those will have to have new meters as well. So and looking at the days ahead, who knows? I mean, that number is going to grow exponentially, which is a good thing for the city.

How do you know how old the current meters are?

uh they run the gamut maybe 5 10 20 we found some 30 40 years old just some of the older neighborhoods uh the apartments right here um behind the city hall that meter took some doing i think that they was like 40 years old wow yes and we don't know how much we were losing on that because it wasn't really you know it's since been replaced but that's just the kind of things we're up against but you know we're addressing those issues as they as we come across them

So I have a better understanding. And so we're not necessarily having a leak. We have no loss.

It's the losses due to, you know, just mechanical loss.

I thought we were looking for a leak. All right. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Moving on to our community development update. Ms. Wanda.

good evening mayor council get my eyeballs on so for the month of May we've had nine business license that we've issued nine building permits one zoning application submitted we have currently fourteen development projects underway we had a new grant award which is a G dot local LRA local road assistance monies that we had to apply for working with the city manager and the focus of the council. We had made application for that to pave downtown East Main Street. Grants underway, our continued GIC program. We've had a lot of activity with LIHTC investors. We have one particular investor that wants to do a tour for the team. And we got another recent email even this evening for a well-qualified LIHTC developer. So that's exciting. And LIHTC stands for Low Income Housing Tax Credits, which are entities that allow affordable workforce housing in partnership with tax abatements and that kind of thing. LMIG is consistently underway. Our Land Water Conservation Fund grant for the Rosenwald Park is stalled right now because we're waiting on being able to put it out to bid for design, but we'll be able to do that quickly. Sounds like in GDOT, Overpass, Last meeting, you guys authorized execution of the contract. The following day, we got an email from PON saying they were changing their project manager. Per GDOT procurement policy, that change has to be vetted out to ensure that the person that was identified originally, this person on their team ended up leaving Pond and taking work somewhere else. They have to replace them with equal or better staff. And that has to be vetted out with GDOT, which it was, as well as with our selection committee, which it was. And their proposed project manager is accepted and we will be working towards the contract and getting it settled so that we can send it to the attorney for final review the great news about our congressional direct spending is that they actually have the process in hand it is highly I don't know what else to say, time commitment. For me, as all the things that we do in my department, you actually now, we have to apply for another grant process in the EP, I think it's EPID. And it's just the process and how these guys are going to manage this grant. We've been awarded it, but it's paperwork, paperwork. And same thing with the overpass. So there's a lot of paperwork with these federal grants, but we're on top of it and we'll continue to give you updates on that. Wanted to give you just a brief oversight from the month of May. We had 50 records created. This is from GovWell, our account. You can do different types of analysis. We have had the average process of these applications and permits were three days, which is fantastic. Tiffany's done amazing. We've generated a little over $8,100 in revenues from these permits. And we've had 100 inspections. And this is just in our system. Safe Built does all of our inspections for our big industrial buildings. And so they have probably three times that much that we're working through. These are current projects. I wanted just to highlight for the Speedway Technology Park, that had to go back through DRI. The GRETA NOD, which stands for Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, notice of decision was issued. Also, I had pending when I made this slide, but we got an email today saying that they're the review is final so i'll be sending that to you guys so you can see what arc's final review was on that particular project 709 Manassas Street, they are very close to having the CO issued for the gas station. They've done a fabulous job. I don't know if you've been over there, but they paved Manassas Street as part of their development, which is required that y'all have in the code that requires any kind of development. If the road is subpar, they have to fix it. That's kudos on y'all and the code and the way that things come out. I'll have pictures next month so y'all can see the code that you have adopted and put forth what a difference that makes on the final product. There are no ice machines out there. There are no gas things hanging out there. It's very clean. It's a very pretty site. I wanted to share this area. At the time I got it, Henry County's tax assessor didn't have this much detail. But we got this from the engineer from Equinex. This is Equinex. That's below the white building. The big white building is Target. site Parkway comes in has a cul-de-sac and then there's going to be another private road that goes to the west but this particular site you can see the long narrow buildings for equinox those total four buildings will total maybe eight hundred and something thousand square feet as opposed to target is 1.4 million square feet the overall DRI is was approved for 5.4 million square feet, so you're substantially lower in that action and what you've done with that. This right here in the red is a substation that is Georgia, it's not Georgia Power, it's Georgia Transmission, uh it's their substation they permit it yeah and and they're building it the power from this substation going to equinex is all underground so there's nothing aerial you can see the line that goes across horizontally where the trees are cut that's their existing line that they tie into to build this substation for the power they will have lines going to the south And you can't see it, but there's a large expanse of floodplain that buffers this whole thing. The closest resident to this property is over 1,000 feet. And then this area right here in green, This area is going to be reforested. So the area that is shown now developed, it is what they call the lay down area where they stage activities. But in their land disturbance permit, this was required by your code that you enforce to be replanted. And so much of the forest is going to be brought back. And that's my update. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to hopefully answer them. COMMISSIONER DIXON Comments from the council?

Tiffany is gone she did okay well I would like to know what kind of anticipation of time lapse or increase in like the permits that Tiffany was responsible for how long do you think that we're going to possibly go to so when I get a phone call and they ask me well what's taking us so long you know I want to

they think five days is long so yeah yes ma'am I appreciate the question because obviously now there's one Mr Baker is already started to work and it will continue to work help alleviate some of the extracurricular activities that I have assumed that weren't necessarily my daily responsibilities and and not adding anything new per se. We're trying to work that out so that the building permitting and just plan review period takes takes time and we have great you know alton is helpful on reviewing the plans for the water sewer which has been amazing because we haven't had that in the past so that means the world to me to have our own water department looking at our infrastructure so that's key our civil engineers and the guys that we have currently women under procurement or under our current design professional services they will continue to do plan review safe built is amazing they're always there to to help and to to lift anything so that's a long answer to say I will work with GovWell, because GovWell has AI capability as well. We haven't engaged it as much because, quite honestly, I didn't want to pay any more extra money and try to facilitate, you know, we have a very specific process we want to make sure things are done right and sometimes when you put things out there you know ai is what ai is because they they still are they steal our knowledge right they steal our process and it's not that we don't want to share it but um we're at the point now that like i said you saw all the things that were done in one month And that's just one thing that Tiffany does. She had done GIC and other responsibilities in the department. So we are able to do more than we had ever in the past because we have GovWell in the system. But I'm not going to lie. It's going to take me a minute to get up, even though I designed the system, I'm going to have a minute to get up to the skill set Tiffany has on it. So I will commit to doing whatever I need to make sure that our residents and our customers are taken care of and i will continue to talk with mr baker if i feel like i'm drowning that somebody can help me so it's not rocket science Thank you, Miss one. What's that? We have interviews. That's fantastic. We have about eight interviews. That's right. Tomorrow and the next day. So very, very excited. There's folks with GIS capabilities. And one of the things when you guys are talking about stormwater easements and things like that, GIS is amazing in the ability to allow public works at the tablets to pull up where the plat is, where the easement is. And also geographically, we have triples that we can go out and stake when we when we have the flexibility to not be narrowed down and have a survey come out and stake it. So hopefully one of these candidates would be able to be hired and can provide both planning and GIS. Not the level that we had before, because that was an analyst, but certainly to help us do day-to-day mapping. All right. OK. Thank you, Ms. Wanda.

Moving on to our IC department update. Miss Michelle Arthur.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. I would get up here and tell a joke, but I'm not going to do that because everybody seem a little stuffy tonight. But I'm just going to go through. Tell a joke. Tell a joke?

So we can get understanding.

I'll tell you a dirty joke. A white horse fell in the mud. There you go. So we're going to start this off. I know that joke.

And a black horse came out. Look at you.

Already. OK. So I don't like to be stuffy, so I'm not. But I only got three slides, so we're just going to go through these and call it a day or call it a night. This is for the month of May. I had 45 tickets opened. I resolved all 45 because I'm awesome. I like to do my job. That's the correct answer. That's 100% resolution rate. I'm trying to keep it that way. I don't like tickets in my queue. For your tech tip for today, we're going to talk about Wi-Fi versus Ethernet.

And I'm not going to be long, because Michelle threatened me.

Wi-Fi, we use Wi-Fi on most things, like your mobile devices, your phones, your laptops, your iPads. I don't do Android, so I'm just going to say Apple stuff. What you may not know is that Wi-Fi can be a little bit unstable if you're in your basement or if you're by a microwave or if you're by something else. You're always wondering why my bars are not there. It's because Wi-Fi can't travel through certain things, especially if you live in an older home and you have a certain kind of brick.

I thought you were going to talk long. I got to explain something.

Y'all learn it. Okay, there we are. We're trying to learn some things here. This is not just for the staff. I want to make sure your residents are also knowing what's going on in their home if I can help it.

You're welcome.

So the other thing is Ethernet. Everything in this building more than likely is under Ethernet. That means it's hardwired, it's connected by a cable. That's how you get the most effective internet into your systems is through a wire. You can't do that per se with your mobile devices, but if you have a laptop at home and you're near your modem, you can use an Ethernet and you'll get faster internet. And you don't have to worry about it cutting out on you and cutting it out unless you didn't pay your bill. And that's a different story. A little bit of information. If you want to sound smart, the next time somebody asks you about Wi-Fi, you can tell them it stands for Wireless Fidelity. And a lot of people don't know that. They just think it's four letters. It's not. It actually stands for something. If you guys have any questions, you can probably try to catch me after this or maybe tomorrow. That's all I got.

Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Mitchell.

Questions. It's very simple. What is the status about the large display sign?

About the?

Large display sign.

That's the same thing that you guys were discussing about signage. And I have to wait until we figure that out. It's going to come along with that. I promise once I know, you'll know. Next month, we're going to talk about this one more time. Hopefully, I'll have the answer for you then.

Any other council's comment? Thank you for free. All right, say Main Street work. We're gonna ask Toba if she will come forth and give us our Main Street update.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Council. I am told by the Main Street director for the city of Hampton. And I'm gonna talk about the monthly report Main Street report. May community engagement, we did Eats and Beats, Cinco de Mayo, National Day of Prayer, Mental Health Walk with Councilwoman Melissa, and Hampton Day and Memorial Day. All of those events were in the month of May. We brought residents and visitors downtown to have more visibility in the community. Eaton Beach celebrated Hispanic culture, featured live entertainment, like we always do, encourage community participation. The Main Street impact was that we brought residents and visitors downtown, increased visibility for local businesses, celebrated cultural diversity because it was a Cinco de Mayo theme, and it strengthened community engagement. National Day of Prayer, we had the National Day of Prayer over at the train depot and it brought together faith leaders, churches and residents, promoted unity in the community. We provided an opportunity for reflection and unity while utilizing public spaces to bring the community together. mental health walk that we we did sponsor it was sponsored by councilwoman melissa brooke we support brooks we supported that it promoted health mental health awareness and wellness encouraged healthy lifestyle and community support the main street impact was we supported the community wellness initiative and also encourage healthy lifestyles and connected residents to resources and support Hampton Day, we celebrated Hampton Day as well as Memorial Day back to back. We celebrated community pride, Hampton's heritage, encouraged resident engagement, Memorial Day ceremony, we honored the fallen service members, and we partnered with American Legion post-330. We got some cool pictures there. That's from Memorial Day. Okay, we preserve Hampton Street impact, Main Street impact. We preserve community traditions, strengthen civic pride, and create opportunities for residents to celebrate and honor Hampton's history. upcoming events we have the juneteenth event friday june 19th from 12 to 6 30 downtown hampton we will start our rail and roots project june saturday i'm sorry saturday june 27th 2026 from 9 a.m to 1 p.m and that is in partnership with our volunteer board The Hearts of Hampton. The Hearts of Hampton. Also, we'll have Independence Day celebration, 4th of July, which is gonna be a big event hosted over at McBrayer Park from 5.30 to 10 p.m. Main Street Impact, we support business growth, celebrate new investments, and help showcase Hampton as a destination for residents, visitors, and entrepreneurs. The last thing I have to share is a community partner spotlight recognizing outstanding service Following the Yellow Pollen Festival, Main Street received a letter, an email from a vendor recognizing Public Works employee Dajon Little for going above and beyond to assist the events with event setup and logistics. Dajon went over and beyond to help me, she said. He literally took over the task and bagged my trailer into the vendor spot with ease. The vendor also noted that Dajon returned at the end of the event to ensure that they could move could safely exit their space. Successful events require teamwork. Main Street is grateful for the dedication of Dajon, even though he wears a lot of hats right now, so he's not there helping us as much. We appreciate his dedication, and also the entire Public Works Department, whose support helps create positive experiences for everyone. Thank you. Any questions for Tova?

Tova, I have a question. Juneteenth. Yes. What are we doing for Juneteenth?

Well, we're having a small little market downtown, an artist market with a few vendors. We're going to celebrate with a lot of the business owners. that will be doing events as well, specifically Makers on Main will be celebrating her two year anniversary. So we're gonna do a lot of different events with her and the other business members downtown.

Give me the time, one more time.

The time is from 12 p.m. to 6.30, so it'll be little things going on, like we'll have an art show over at the depot. We'll have different demonstrations of perfumes testing or oil testing, just little things like that, so it's nothing big, but at 6.19, we would do a say-lie moment, which is a moment of silence where you pause and think about you know, the things that African Americans have contributed. And also we're doing a walk, a history walk of downtown Hampton that will have placemakers in place and an immersive experience with that. So we're working on that part now.

Okay, I have another question then. The things that you're saying, I'm going to assume they have a time slot that you're going to be doing those specific things. They're not going to be going on all day. No, no. Okay, so are we going to get a schedule as to what's going on at what time? Like if I want to participate just in this right here. I already have a schedule.

I just need to print it. I can send it to you. All right, send it to me.

Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you. Okay, thank you. All right, moving on to unfinished business. Action item 9A. Can I make a motion that we take a quick recess so I can go to the restroom? I need a recess for a break. Yes, I have a motion by Councilmember White-Williams and a second by Councilmember Duchesne to take a recess just for a few minutes. I'll be back at 5 o'clock.

I motion that she wait. 2030.

All in favor? 2030. We got a long night.

Yeah.

Good evening. I need everybody to take their seats and be quiet. I need a motion to come out of recess. So moved. Second. I have a motion by Councilmember White-Williams to come out of recess and a second by Councilmember Meeks. All in favor? I have a 6-0. Moving on to agenda item 9A, consideration and action to approve the second read of ordinance 2026-10 to amend chapter 2 administration article 7 code of ethics section 2-307 ethics committee of the city of Hampton code of ordinance. This item is is a proposed amendment to the city of ethics committee provision to clarify committee composition and the strength and independence, the ordinance expressly prohibits member of the governing body from serving on the at this committee and maintain existing a point man authority and for people flying where where the amendment is intended to promote transparency avoid potential conflict of interest and reinforce public conflict in the city. City's Ethic Process. This is sponsored by Council Member White-Williams. I need a motion to, we actually moved this item over to the Administrative and Finance Committee. I need a motion to move Ordinance Number 2026-10 on the Secondary over to the Administrative and Finance Committee.

I made a motion.

I have a motion by Councilmember Mitchell. Do I have a second?

Second.

Second by Councilmember Meeks to move Ordinance 20-2016 over to the Administrative and Finance Committee for review.

Madam Mayor.

Yes. Discussion? Yes. Discussion from the Council.

Councilmember Brooks. Okay. What does that mean when you say you're going to move it over to the Finance Committee, Administration and Finance Committee? Will they bring back a recommendation for the board to

yes so this ordinance as drafted will be reviewed and looked at any recommendations out of this ordinance or any changes that the board may think needs to be needs to happen will come out of that committee and a determination will come back to the council for everything that they reviewed under this ordinance and you guys will make the decision to find a decision on whether or not

really understand what is the role and function of a council member if we don't get to make decisions on this, that we just roll everything over to administration and finance? We don't?

So this first read was sent over to the administrative and finance committee for them to review the ordinance. That's where it went originally last month. And so this is just the second read of the same thing since they were going to review it anyway. So they're going to review the entire ethics, not just this particular section, but the entire ethics section of the charter. And therefore, you will be able to get a better update and a better feel after they give all the recommendations.

I have a question. I have a question. Council Member Brooks, you finished?

Yeah. Yeah. Council Member DeShane?

Yeah. Has this committee created some sort of like their bylaws and like what is their scope, their purpose? Is there a bylaws for them? Have they created anything to say that?

Committees do not have bylaws. Committees is appointed by the mayor. They are to review anything that is sent over by council to that particular committee and that is what we're doing.

Is there a timeline for the committee to update the council? There is not a timeline.

Madam Mayor. Yes. There is a Admin and Finance Committee meeting Friday at 3.30. And that's what they're, those meetings have to be advertised. Yeah. And they are open to the public. That's right. And the council needs to avoid a forum. But they can, what they do is bring the information into the meeting, review it, and make a recommendation to the council. And they can provide whatever, you know, we've got the ordinance and the suggestion here already.

So council needs to avoid quorum, so that means all of council can't be there to hear it. But this is something that's going to come back to the council, but they can't be there to...

hear it there's been a long time for me and I do believe and maybe the attorney can clarify if there is a quorum they have to remain silent they that is for the committee to discuss is what I'm also I'm trying to understand so when these ordinances are given to us

why can't we make whatever adjustments that we want to after reading them when we come to a council meeting i'm just i guess i don't i i mean i'm just like i thought that's what we were like our jobs it seems like it's circumventing so so we can't we could make a decision on ordinance number 2026-10 it was a suggestion that we sent it over to committee for further review um

By all means, if you want to vote on this up or down, Mr. Mitchell, do you want to make a motion to approve or to deny ordinance number 2026-10?

I make a motion to deny as it stands right now.

All right. I have a motion on the floor by Council Member Mitchell to deny Ordinance Number 2026-10.

Mayor, just so that I'm clear, because we had Mr. Mitchell, I mean, yeah, Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Meese. Oh, yes.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Mr. Mitchell, will you rescind your first motion?

I make a motion to rescind.

All right. I have a recent of Mr. Mitchell, Mr. Mitchell first motion to move this over to committee. Now I need the motion to approve or deny Mr. Mitchell. Mr. Mitchell.

I make a motion to deny based on the fact I need to improve it and the council refused to make me improve it and make it better.

Okay. Do I have a second?

A second.

I have a second by council member Chaney. Any further discussion from council?

Yes. So looking at the meeting minutes for the ordinance, it passed unanimously 6-0. I don't see anything in the meeting minutes that said we were going to transfer it over to the admin.

Okay. So we're actually voting on it now.

Okay, but you said at the last meeting we voted to have it referred to the admin.

I thought this was the one that went to the admin.

At the last meeting it was ordinance 20-26-07. 07, okay.

My mistake. So this one had not been referred over to the admin. So we have a motion on the floor by Council Member Mitchell and a second by Council Member Chaney to deny ordinance number 20-26-10. All in favor of denial? all opposed I have a 6 I may have a 3 3 is Melissa you did the now you know you wanted it no I won't yes I'm in favor for all right you know it's a 3 3 tie out I will break the tie to deny we have a 4 3 moving on to our consent agenda saying that there is none for the consent agenda guys I actually need an executive session at this time can I get a motion to go into an executive session I have a motion by council member Meeks do I have a second second second by council member Chaney to move into executive session for the purpose of personnel or litigation and personnel all in favor all opposed are you opposed no I'm in favor I have a 3-3 we're going to move into executive session with a I break the tie with a 4-3 we're adjourned to executive session I need a motion to come out of executive session. Have a motion by council member Meeks to come out of executive session. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Councilmember Chaney. All in favor?

Aye.

All opposed? I have a 6-0. I need a motion to terminate the contract of Mattie Cardy Ashby. Will one of our councilmembers give us that motion?

Madam Mayor, I make the motion that we deny the termination of Denmark, Ashby, and Matricardi.

I second. I have a motion on the floor by Councilmember White-Williams to deny the removal of Matricardi, Ashby, and Denmark. And a second by Councilmember Duchesne. All in favor? No discussion. Discussion.

Why can't we discuss?

Discussion. Did not. No. All in favor to deny? Discussion. all in favor so all in favor to deny I have a three all opposed three I need a motion to remove Denmark Ashby Maticardi as the attorney for the city of Hampton Another councilor going to?

I make a motion that we speak with them and maybe have a different representative.

I have a motion by Councilmember DeShane. Do I have a second? Second. Second. By White-Williams to discuss any issues that we have with Maticardi, Denmark, and Ashby. All in favor? All opposed? I have a 3-3. I mean, I break the tie of 4. Council Member Chaney, can I get a motion to remove Denmark Ashby and Matt McCarty as our attorney?

I make a motion to remove Denmark Ashby and Carter Marty as our attorney.

Second.

I have a second by Council Member Meeks. All in favor? All opposed? I have a 3-3. I break the tie that we remove Denmark, Ashby, and Maticardi. 3-4. Moving on to new business. Consideration and action to approve resolution 2645 on the Rosenwald project to include the city purchase of 16 Rosenwald Drive for the purpose of a cultural arts museum sponsored by myself. If I can get the clicker. Thank you very much. Good evening, everyone. This evening I would like to present to the citizens of Hampton what could be in the historic Rosenwald District. This district has long been neglected by the city of Hampton, but we have come to a point where we wish to preserve the legacy of this important area in the city of Hampton's history. Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington embarked on an ambitious mission to educate students that had long been forgotten and lacked the necessary resources to fully implement educational opportunities. As an outcome of this partnership, schools around the country was established to educate people of color, and the city of Hampton, Georgia was a part of that mission. History must be preserved, honored, and highlighted to pay homage to a people, place, culture that has helped shape the city of Hampton. Hampton Rosenwald School was built in the late 1920s and early 30s with the help of the Rosenwald School Foundation and the people in the communities that contributed their money and their skills to erect this facility. In 2006, the Hampton Rosenwald School was demolished. and a national treasure was lost forever. Today I ask the board to pay homage to this legacy by investing in a property that sits directly across from the Rosenwald school site. The property is currently available for sale. It is right for the time. The council doesn't realize that 16 Rosenwald Drive was commissioned and built by two former students of the Hampton Rosenwald School Mr. and Mrs. Richard and Sulu Sloan wouldn't that be a way to honor the legacy of a Hampton resident for Hampton Rosenwald School and the students their teachers their principals and their staff to be to put the Rosenwald Cultural Arts and History Museum into their home that was built by former students. The city of Hampton goal is to revitalize this area and bring attention and attract development. However, how do we do this? Tourism. Tourism is an economic driver in any city, giving people places to go, gather, linger and take pictures, play and learn, This will help to spur interest in the Rosenwald district. Revitalization only happens when areas come alive as a live, work, play, and learn community. This center can boast and boost all of those outcomes. If the City of Hampton makes this investment, maybe we can attract private entities to develop out the much-needed Rose and Main project and create an interest in a partnership for our LIHTC projects in this area. This property site is on the trails plan. If you can imagine people from across 20 walking across our new overhead pedestrian bridge downtown, from downtown down the multi-use trail to find themselves at this work wonderful park and cultural arts museum location at this time I want to show you what this site could be You're looking currently at the location of a Garden Day Light off trail where we currently have nothing but a gazebo sitting in the Rosenwald District that is being underutilized. It does not have any activities. If we create something of this magnitude in this area, it is going to revitalize that area in its totality. It is going to spur growth, and it's going to make sure that people come within the borders and boundaries of our city. This monument would allow people to come take pictures and enjoy the history and the culture of that community. This is a daylight picture of it and this is what it would look like at night lit up. This is a wonderful opportunity for us to embrace this area. As we all know, the Rosenwald District has not been adequately invested in. It is always the last community for us to even think about. We finally got to a board that has started to look at that area based on staff and all the work that they've done out in the community to even do a new LCI study that focused directly around that corridor. This is the place to start to bring in new business, new industry, new homes, new investments. This is what the layout of that house that I would love for you guys to consider to actually buy. That house is, like I said, was actually built by Mr. Richard and Sulu Sloan. They went to the Hampton Rosenwald School. What you see here is the exhibit hall. Coming in, you will get an opportunity to be welcomed and greeted, we're hoping, by someone from the Historic Preservation. And they would be able to sit there, greet you, and take you on a tour of this Cultural Arts and History Museum. This is the exhibit hall of the Museum and History Gallery. It tells the story of Mr. Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington, where the beginnings start on the development of all of these schools across the Southeast so that they can educate African American students so that they too could have an opportunity to prosper. This would be the gallery. In this, this would be an exhibit hall. This exhibit hall would allow for you to have an interchangeable exhibit each and every, I would say usually about every six months you could change out the statues to exhibit art in this exhibit hall, but this is where it would be featured. After that, you will have a year round exhibit that you would paint a story and tell the story of the Rosenwald School along with other history throughout our city. This is the interactive kiosk area and learning center that allows the story. The city of Hampton commissioned several years ago stories from the Rosenwald students and those stories was told and recorded and they would run on the kiosk and we're hoping that we would be able to get more and more stories from those students and teachers and let them tell us about their experience at the Rosenwald. But the interaction section and the educational section would allow for you to actually learn. There's many people that do not even know about Rosenwald and the Rosenwald School and its projects and how it came in and really provided a service to an underserved population during the 1920s and 30s. And then this is your art education studio. So many things can happen in this studio as it is a teaching room, but you can have all types of classes in this studio. From art making, I think Councilmember Brooks, she makes jewelry. I know she does. She made me a beautiful piece. She makes jewelry. You can always have a cultural arts teaching room. And it will allow our children in this area, in the most underserved area, an opportunity to have somewhere to go every single day of summer months and breaks. Right now, they have nowhere to go. There's absolutely nothing for our children to do. Not just in that district, in our city. We have to go to work. We don't have time to do anything else. We've got to go to work. This is a wonderful opportunity for us to begin that work. That is the end of my presentation. I am asking that council would consider resolution 202645 on the Rosenwald project to include the city to purchase the 16 Rosenwald Drive for the purpose of a history and cultural arts center. Can I get a motion to approve or to deny?

Madam Mayor, I make a motion that we deny this purchase. We just talked about this. granted it was the URA board but I think our sentiments on the way I voted still doesn't change board member Mitchell stated that he had concerns that there was not enough parking the property is I don't even know if it's 2000 square feet. I think that while we could benefit from something like this, I don't think having it in that house is the best place. So I make the motion to deny. I second.

have a motion by council member white williams to deny and second by council member deschain to deny resolution 2026-45 any further discussion from the council yes yeah so um is this a budgeted item that we're buying this property and putting this museum like is that in our budget so we have um 266 thousand dollars in splash funding uh for splash five, I believe, and we have some match money in Splash Six for Rosenwald Park. understand that the URA decided that they did not want to fund this even though I feel like that it really would follow up on the URA because URA is a revitalization agency it's supposed to revitalize areas but they denied this particular location as well so other than that we would have to get it out of fund balance is that a budget amendment it would require a budget amendment

my question is with all the technology that you've shown in your presentation who's going to pay for that because even though we could purchase the house for whatever we're going to offer we still have to put money into this project to turn it into the interactive center and I understand that know there's not a lot for our kids to do right it's the splash pad it's the park or one park however i just i just think if we are going to invest any money into doing something like this and we truly want to pay respect to the rosenwald um the history of rosenwald and the sloans i think you said that was their name um Why not do something a little bit more grandiose? I think this is definitely, while the gesture is good, I think we have an opportunity to really give it more than what's being presented here. My other concern is that you have residential homes right next to this. So now you're gonna have, if this goes through, now you're gonna have those people that live next door impacted by strangers, cars, you know, infringing upon and maybe encroaching upon their property. I do believe that If we wanted to pay homage to Rosenwald when we did the new park, we should have thought about it then. I think you're trying to pull at the heartstrings of people. In the URA meeting, you... I am. And that's fine, but it turned into almost a race thing. It was race baiting. And I think that... This should not go forward, not here. There are other places within Hampton that we can do something a little bit more grandiose and make it really, really nice.

Okay. So I will tell everybody, I made this presentation to the council and the URA meeting. I was pulling on the heartstrings. of each council members to value the residents of the rosenwald district an underserved that's always forgotten it's always the last one the gesture or the comment that council member white williams made then was this was not the place to start i don't know why rosenwald in that district is always the last place to get started on we never want to get started there we want to get started somewhere else but With that being said, everybody that is here, and there's several people that have left, that is in favor of the Rosenwald, for us purchasing 16 Rosenwald Drive. Please stand up, because I want to just show the people that are here, that these individuals live in that community, right across the street from it, right next door to it. They live in this community. I'm not I'm not the only one yes this is a passionate thing for me my mother my grandmother went to the Rosenwald school so yes it's very personal for me to preserve the history of this district and the people that have served this community for every year that it has been in existence we've been here so It is a pulling on the heart. I am pulling on the heart and I am asking passionately. But your residents are asking as well. They want you to pay respect to the Rosenwald District by purchasing this house and turning it into a cultural arts and history museum to preserve their history. So I have I'm asking for a motion to. Well, I have a motion on the floor by council member.

Madam Mayor. Oh, I'm sorry. Council member question.

we're talking about making this purchase what about the zoning and uh the parking like certain things have to have certain amount of parking uh have our uh zoning administrator had a chance to look at this so we we have miss wanda and i have looked extensively at this area there's another little sliver of property that we also would consider or had on the table to purchase as well as a part of the park plan This sits on our trail. This gives people opportunity to come off the trail, go to the monument, then walk over to the house to see the exhibit hall, learn about the culture of this. So all of those things have been thought about. You guys are saying that, oh, we don't have enough parking. It's not big enough. We're talking about the history of a district, of an area. You can't move Rosenwald. Rosenwald is where it's at. You can't put Rosenwald stuff somewhere else. You got to put it on Rosenwald. This is an opportunity to do that. That's all I'm saying to this council.

And I don't think when we had the discussion, anybody was saying they didn't want to pay homage. They just were saying that this property wasn't adequate enough size to give you what it is that you were looking for. Mr. Mitchell said that we could probably look for another lot that was a larger lot to purchase that would be able to house it. Nobody's saying that they don't want to.

So that would be an even larger cost. It's going to be an even larger cost.

And I had said that we already own 16 acres that we could probably put it on.

i don't think the council will is going to ever be to put uh cultural arts and history museum for rosenwald on that 16 acres so uh this i i i don't want the public to be um to be fooled because this presentation was given to us at the ura board meeting That meeting was the first time we saw this. The mayor, the mayor never shared with council or with the board her intentions of doing this to that property. All we know is that When I came to the meeting, it was for us to discuss the purchase of the building, not what the use of the building would ultimately be. So when we got to the URA meeting, this was shared with us. And as I stated before, while I would love to pay homage and respect to Rosenwald, I think that particular property, and who's to say nothing won't come up available on Rosenwald in the future? but to buy that property which is not it's not even 2 000 square feet it's smaller than this building so how much can you fit in that building with everything that you know i know what we see in these photos won't be there but actually how much can you fit in that building if we're going to do it If we're going to do it for Rosenwald, let's give them something they truly deserve if you really want to do something for them. I can't say what I want to say because I'm in a council meeting, but if you're going to give it anything give it a hundred percent i i just think that that building is too small if the history of rosenwald is so is that extensive and that great why can't we just give it our best and i don't think that that particular property is our best

so i will say that site plan came directly from the henry county tax assessors office it is the site plan for that house what is fit is what you're seeing the measurements would fit in that location so um i I respectfully disagree with Councilmember White-Williams that it would not work. But I do have a motion on the floor by Councilmember White-Williams and a second by Councilmember Duchesne to state.

One other question. Is there any way that we could ever think about I guess, expanding the park, East Hampton Park, to maybe put like a community center there that would have things for the, you know, and add the cultural art to that. Maybe I mean, we're going to spend money, just really spend the money and get something really nice. You already got a nice park there. Maybe add

a building you cannot do it because of the the grant that was given so much of it has to say you can't put a closed structure on it you can put an amphitheater on it you can put something open on it but you can't put a closed structure on the east hampton community park location so i have a question um you said that we uh and maybe i misheard you

there was a grant given for Rosenwald? No, for East Hampton. No, this was before she just said that. Earlier. Did we, was there any grant money given for Rosenwald?

No, I was saying that Rosenwald Foundation gave a grant. How much? That was in the 20s and 30s to build the school originally. Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, no. We have a contribution from Georgia Power of $19,000 right now sitting for the Rosenwald project. So it's not that we don't have funding and we have money in the bank to be able to do this. I have a motion on the floor by Councilmember White Williams and a second by Councilmember DeShane to deny Resolution 2026-45. All in favor? Are you going to ask the president? Oh, I'm sorry. Public. I'm sorry. Public. Ms.

the public you give you my address again no okay one thing that I have found in all of my advocacy work for the last twenty five or thirty years it and I'm and I'm all for preserving history and let history be apart but when you go and you give in you the citizens are paying for it everybody and you're making the decision how we're going to spend our money is not right. You need to invest and it needs to come from some private entities and let them come up and joint be at a joint process and get these people to invest in with us so they can come into our city. If we have private funds coming in and there's a lot of builders, there's a lot of companies, and the grants, that's where your team council can come up with grants and get them in on the groundwork for the community and to save and find the history of a community and who you can spotlight and what areas to spotlight. I think as a, member of the community. I'd like to see somebody go out, some of the residents go out and find private funding and do a match. I mean, that's just where I come from. If they're out working on it, then they're going to be invested in it, other than just saying, hey, I want it over here. Oh, I'll go over here. Well, I'm tired of it today. If you go and you put your money and your hard work in it, then you're going to respect it, and you're going to have more to do with it. I'm just saying, you be a part and raise the money. Let the people in the community that want it raise some money and do matching funds. Thank you.

Did I see someone else? Ms. Lyon?

Hello, Mayor, Council, Ms. Cheney. I'm Kim Lund, and I am, I don't know if I should say it right now, I'm the chair of, current chair of the Hampton Historic Preservation, and everybody up there I think pretty much knows that I have an absolute heart for Rosenwald, you know that. I've been a part with the Arts Council, working to raise funds with them. I've been doing Rosenwald before Rosenwald was even a thing, so it definitely is very important to me. But I will say that on behalf of, well, I'm gonna say on behalf of myself, We have gone to several conferences in places that took us on tours, the last one being Wisconsin. And we went out there and we went to places, you know, people are saying, oh, over in Rosenwald area. It is. It's hard to imagine that some things would be over there because we all know Rosenwald has been underserved. However, Purchasing a house with limited parking is not the best option, in my opinion. Some of the things that we've seen when we were in Wisconsin was a walking art park that could be highlighted. It's waterproof. I have information on it. I think maybe I even shared it at one of our historic preservation council meetings. But I think there's some other things that we can look at and grow into a cultural center because I think it would be amazing and I think it would bring people here. But I think that starting huge and then trying to figure out where the money is coming from. Right now, everybody's tight, you know, and so maybe if we started with something just a little bit smaller, looked at some grants, looked at some funding, and frankly, let's look at Equinix. Let's look at these data centers. I work with Fayette County and a lot of the people in their historical society. Their entire cemetery just got a giant... influx of money from their data center they get volunteers from their data center to come over and help clean and help redo the tombstone they make them pay for what they're coming in and doing and maybe that might be a way for us to reach out and to try to bridge some of that negativity that we have which we all know it most definitely is there so maybe if in a way of trying to find some funding but also starting a little bit smaller i love the idea it's beautiful it definitely would bring people there but if we start small be happy to share those pictures with you of the art park out in wisconsin and then there was another one i don't remember which one it was, but you just walk along and it's in there and it tells the story and it has an opportunity in some parts to be changed so that it's not always the same thing. They had it at their bus area. They had it around some of their underserved areas. and you i mean you i went walking i went there at seven o'clock in the morning by myself in a city that i didn't even know i didn't feel unsafe but i wanted to make sure that i got to see it so i just while i agree with you and i think it was beautiful the renderings are fantastic i see both sides but i think if we start a little bit smaller and grow um i think that might be the best way to do it but whatever you know you have our support

And Kim, I also told and I also took that walk in Wisconsin, and it was something that we should consider. It was an open park. And as you're walking through the park, there's history on the walls. There's murals, there's plaques that tells you the story of Greenwood.

And so something like that was the one in Tulsa is the one. Yeah, I didn't get to be told.

So we did it in the Greenwood district. So it's it's not something that that we cannot do. Um, I think it would be even more of a cost savings if we're trying to, if we're going to have these trails that the mayor is speaking about, why not have this information on the outside?

That's a possibility. Like I said, I love the idea. The renderings are beautiful, but I just sometimes think starting a little bit smaller and growing into something bigger, but that's just what I wanted to share.

I'm going to say that after our URA meeting, I did have a conversation with Jeff in regards to maybe we could have, where the park is, maybe rename the pathways names from the Rosenwald School to pay homage, put out some of the interactive that are waterproof. And as we expand on our trails, kind of put the things through the trails. But I just don't feel that this building is.

Yes. I'm Melvinia Merrimel. I'm at 17 Rosenwald Lane. Yeah, it's very personal to me. I was not born here, but I bought here. I purchased a townhome at 17 Rosenwald Lane. It's right across the street on Rosenwald Drive. So if you're going to look at and recognize something, if you've got the culture there, why move it? Our clubhouse for our community is where the original school was. And the surrounding community is where everything else was for Rosenwald School. So yes, it is personal. It makes common sense. You start small, and you expand. You can do it a different way. For example, Montgomery, Alabama, the legacy. They've got three sections. And they've got it set up. You start one. You go to the other part. They've got charter bus to take you to. Phase two, you finish it, and now they've opened the third phase. And it's all right there in the area, right there together. So you have to start somewhere. Why not start there? And we can expand. You got some area from King, on the other side of King, and Rosewater going to Maine. What's happening there? But you have to start somewhere. And Hampton is not huge, it's small. So everything else is small. I was going back. So it's one of my areas. I was looking back at some of the information we had. We had one, you got the Hampton History Center.

It's in a small building because Hampton is small.

Then I went further and I looked where I had, where in temporary 2026. We had the big digital world affair on the through the, sponsored by the Hampton Historic Preservation Commission. And it was proud to select, celebrate, and show the rich cultural legacy that was woven into the city. So if you've got these things, and where was it? Rosenwald School, established 1932. Mrs. Jink's Rosenwald class, 1954. And these beautiful pictures they had that I'm finding that they're still on the floor in the closet somewhere. So if you've got stuff already and you're not using it, why not start small with it and you grow into the bigger? But there's enough space. And you're talking about parking. Oh, my goodness, come on. You don't have to parallel park. You can have 45-degree angle parks. And from that house to where that park is now, all you do is split it, and you've got 45-degree angles on one side and 45-degree angles on the other.

Okay.

It's not time. Watch it. Thank you. So all I'm saying is, it is a great idea. And we're excited. The residents at Heritage Place, we're excited about it. And then I've talked to people at East King, West King, Daniel, George. Thank you, Ms. Melvina.

Thank you. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Can I have somebody else?

I just want to say that I've actually donated money to the county on the county level for the Walter Wall and the one we did at DigiWorld and we did one at Fairview. But I just want to say this, I don't think we should go through with this because if we want to invest, we need to invest in Daniel Street first. Do some kind of ordinance to put on the home owners or the homeowners to make them upgrade their properties, because those are dilapidated. And you can't really, I don't think anybody would want to go there and live. But you have to upgrade those properties so we can have somewhere decent for our citizens to live. And you talk about the kids, I guarantee you not one child will go in that place. We should have put, in that park, we should have put basketball goals or something over there for them because we know they have to walk across the street to come to these basketball goals over here. So we should have put something over there for them. But I do not think you should go through with this for this property. Again, start small. Kim had a great idea. Put it in a park along the trailways and walk around it. I've been to the Montgomery. I know what you're talking about down there. Put it in a park. But please do not vote for this.

So I just want to say that Hampton has made a huge investment in our Coley Park. They've made a huge investment in our McBrayer Park. They've made a huge investment in our East Hampton Community Park. Only part we have not made an investment in is the Rosenwald Park. So I have a motion on the floor by Council Member White-Williams and a second by Council Member Duchesne to deny Resolution 2026-45. All in favor?

All opposed?

Abstaining. I have one abstention.

I wasn't here at that meeting.

Sherri, you have to give calls. Oh, I wasn't at the URA meeting. OK. All right. Moving on to agenda item 11b, discussion on citywide implementation of AI in all departments that is unified and integrated for planning, budgeting, predictability, and efficient operation. This is sponsored by Councilmember Mitchell. Council, who are you going to make presentation? Okay.

Good evening again, Mayor and Council. Good evening. It's late. It's past my bedtime. So... Any mistakes, you know, charts in my heart. Good evening. We're gonna talk about one of everybody's favorite thing, AI. A lot of people don't know a lot about it. If you don't know more than ChatGPT, then this is the talking points for you. As the IT person, that department, everything here, I think I'm the best spokesperson to tell you about the things that we are currently using, the things that we should be using, and the things that we need to start with first in implementing AI throughout Hampton. AI, truthfully, is already working throughout this building. I use it a lot. A lot of my server things, how I look at devices, how I look at my servers every day. Every single software is trying to implement AI in some form or fashion. A lot of our different departments, they use ChatGPT, the free version, and as long as they get permission, they're free to use it to enhance their emails, to enhance their documents, to do a lot of things to help them work, quote unquote, easier and faster. Our police department, they use flock safety for their license plate readers. They use their Axon body cameras. All these things implement AI, things that we need for safety. Our police department is actually utilizing AI very effectively for our city. The city manager's office, public works, and of course IT, we all use ChatGPT. Our finance department in some cases, customer service, they may use it for emails and small things like that. The clerk's office just implemented software for minutes. I'm sure she's going to need this after this meeting. But it actually takes voice recording. She can even take the YouTube video, pop it into this program, and it instantly promotes those minutes. And she goes back and she doctors them to make sure that the words are said by the person that said. And it makes her job a lot easier. It's the reason why you got all those minutes in the beginning of this program.

Excuse me. I need y'all to be quiet, please.

Oh. So currently those are the things that we are using. I'm gonna start talking about the things that we should or could be using. One of the main things I wanna start talking about, well, let's start with the police department. The police department can also utilize and is going to be utilizing more and more AI for safety concerns. Axon is becoming like one of the biggest police department um software companies out there i'm looking into buying their stock because wow um it's getting huge and they are implementing ai to make things like dashboards so where cities can communicate with each other with just a push of the button um one of the biggest things we talked about today I've heard is the water meter reading system and we talked about water loss I've been saying this since I got here that one of our poor software that we have is that meter reading system it's slow it's ancient and like Alton West said they even found meters that are 40 years old so if they found meters that are 40 years old where does that put our software Things like that you can't implement AI with. You can't make their job faster. You can't make their job efficient because AI doesn't fit. 40 years ago, there was no AI. There was no internet, so there's that. Other things that we can be using, we are already using Civic Plus for our clerk. Our records management system, that's one of the things that I've heard that we can use to help us record anything and everything. Documentation is always important. Our records for our minutes, our records for our IT department, anything where you can use documentation, AI is out there to help us record those. For our website, if we're using chat bots to answer citizen questions that is an easy very easy fix we're actually already looking into things like that i'm sorry that you're hot we turned it down i guess we gotta turn down some more um those are things that we can easily and effectively implement right now to help the citizens do things. In our Main Street department, Tova is running that department by herself right now and sometimes answering the phone. Her phone rings constantly all day, every day. I know it because my office is right by hers. And she's always on the phone, and that doesn't count for the people that's coming in and asking her questions. There's an AI receptionist out there that can actually record phone calls, do reservations for her, tell what's on her calendar, put those things back on her calendar without her having to do anything, which also minimizes her workflow. AI is not here to replace anyone. When I'm saying these things, I'm saying this as a tool to use with the staff that we have and any future staff that we may have. You can't, it's not going to automatically have robots in here doing things for you. That's not what we want. I'm a big fan of terminator. I'm not trying to die by robots, but what it does is it partners with us to help us run the city a whole lot better. It also helps our residents to where we're actually doing things faster for them. They got problems. They got things they want us to solve. AI is one of those tools that we could use. Another thing for Public Works, other than the water meter reading, is City Rover. I don't know if anyone's ever heard of that. I actually just heard of that just last week. but it actually you stick this device on a utility vehicle that goes around town like a trash truck or our sweeper or something and it actually combs the streets for you while it's working and looks for things like potholes so before a citizen can even say hey there's a pothole in my neighborhood city rover already finds that for you and it actually puts this in a system and it can also create a ticket for public works so public works knows hey there's a pothole before you even get a call from any human person Sorry, got a lot of notes. I got a 19-page document, but I'm not doing the whole thing. Sorry. I'm just going through these things. So those are some of the future projects that we could be looking at, should be looking at, that is actually helping us. One of the things that me as the IT department is trying to do is what do we do first? Because you can't just say, oh, I want this software, and I want to just put that out there. You can't do that. Or you could, but that wouldn't be the safe thing to do. One of the first things is, A, getting rid of some of this old software that we have. I'm working on that as of right now. I've been working on that since I got here and trying to make sure that we have the software that's out there that can fit us. The second thing, which is I think the most important other than that, is to have a governance policy. The state of Georgia has its own guiding principles that it goes for for AI. I've also taken the training class and got certified for generative AI so that I am the number one person that's above everybody else. I like to be ahead of the game and ahead of the curve so that if you have questions, got a fan clip, if you have questions, I should be the one that can answer it, or if I don't have the answers, I can do it later. Your governance gives you security. It makes sure that we're going by law. It makes sure that we're going by the state and making sure that we're doing everything ethically as well to make sure that our citizens and our city staff is doing things that we should be doing by law. and also make sure that nothing is creeping into my systems to make my job harder and that we're not doing things that are safe because we are working with data, we're working with things that can get out there, and just using things like ChatGPT, CLOD, GROC, any of those things, copilot, those things can be dangerous if not properly trained, which is the next thing that we're talking about because the next point would be training city staff. I myself have been taking these classes because as a way to kind of cut costs, you want to take your IT department and have these classes with your staff, have these classes with your council so that they are well aware of what's going on within our city. That is so important because we don't have a whole lot of training. You get thrown into something and you're just automatically supposed to know what you're supposed to be doing. That's not what we're trying to do here. We're trying to do things the correct way because that would be the best point. Bring things in right. Sorry, it's a lot. So what I have right now, just to give you a rollout as the last thing, is implementation. Implementation, the first phase would be maybe one to two months. It'll be something critical, adopting a governance policy, launching training, establishing an IT SOP. We have a personnel policy, but we do not have a policy that is just strictly for IT and its devices. Phase two, two to three months, deploying a citizen-facing AI chat bot, something that's easily thrown out there, something that's for us and also for the citizens that may cut down on some of the workload. Three to six months, implementing things like something official. Instead of just chat GPT here and there, let's make something that is staff-wide, like Copilot, which is Microsoft, it's in our Microsoft tools, and it's a cost of 20 extra dollars per person per license. The next thing would be making sure that we're looking at grants because you don't want to just throw money at something. I'm not asking for a whole lot of money. What I want to do is I want to see if there's grants out there because they are smart cities, AI-managed cities. They want to give you money for these things, and we want to make sure that we're looking for those things so that the city is not spending a lot of money. That's where I'm at.

all right so you have a plan and that you're going to bring back before us within the next couple of months in regards to some resolutions or in for implementation of a document that is what do you call it a governance policy governance file already have an example made up I can actually send it to you in your email okay send it to us in our email so we can start reviewing it and and we will see about getting that approved because that is going to be the policy that we're going to be following following for our ai implementation is that correct yes ma'am all right got a plan thank you very much for sharing yeah man i'm doing any any any council excuse me miss palmer is this section six cost summary your recommendation it is that's that uh presentation that you got there in the pink and all that that's me

yeah can it be implemented if we approve this tonight again the first thing that i want to do is do the governance policy i don't want to implement anything without the governance policy part first thank you very much you're welcome sir any other questions from the council i want to thank you very much for your presentation i mean we spoke before and so have we madam mayor we spoke about this before as well

It's very important. I don't see any council disagree with it, so I make my short speech. It's very needed. If you look right now, it reduced, it's a helpful technology employer to reduce tasks, finance department. About a month ago, in a retreat, where the finance department was, couldn't get information that needed fast enough. I don't want department, like, take three weeks to get a result. I need, like, three minutes or three hours. And that's what AI can do for us. You know, as you mentioned, we're not trying to reduce staff, we're trying to make the workload easier, each one. I'm very strictly, I'm very passionate about training employees, educate them to be better, and get them certified. If they feel like they need to go to a different job, get better pay, they have the tools to do so. It's not going anywhere. If anyone think that they're going to go by tomorrow, next two years and be gone, it is here to stay for a long time. And it's getting more in-depth. So I rest my case here and we'll go forward.

All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the discussion, Michelle. Moving on to agenda item 11C, consideration and action to approve repairing the roof At the wastewater treatment building, the office lab area at the cost of $4,500. Additionally, the garage slash warehouse area is $4,500. Mr. Mr. King.

That's right.

Mr. King.

Yes, ma'am.

Tell us about this.

When I first started, Keenan brought it to my attention. The worst part is in the warehouse area because it's literally... one section about this large works practically right in that side to build in town. We have a heavy rain again throughout the office areas. There's lots of roof leaks throughout the building. It's a newer roof, so the cost of repairs minimum compared to maybe doing something like this.

So it's two $4,500 one on one building, one on the other side. Okay. Any questions from the council?

I want to thank you for bringing it up. About a month or two ago, I took a tour, and I saw you. I met you there as well. And I didn't see the other building. So I'm very happy that you brought it to our attention. My delay if not brought it up earlier. But I'm very thankful for that.

Where would the funds come from?

We would have to do a budget amendment, sir.

Budget amendment. Probably fund balance. Yes, sir.

All right. We don't have a resolution or anything for this. So I need a motion to approve repaying the roofs at the wastewater treatment building, the office lab area at a cost of $4,500, as well as the garage warehouse area for another $4,500.

Madam Mayor, I move we make these repairs for a total cost of $9,000.

I have a motion on the floor by Council Member Meeks to make the repairs at a cost of $9,000. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Council Member Chaney. Any further discussion from the council? Yeah, I need to make a amendment to the motion. OK. you need to add to to the um see the money should be taken from fund balance specify where it comes from the budget amendment all right so fund balance is where the money is going to come from um i have a motion to i have a motion to amend the um motion to include money coming from fund balance by councilmember mitchell Do I have a second to amend the motion?

Second to amend the motion.

I have a second by Councilmember Cheney to amend the motion. All in favor of amending the motion? All opposed? 6-0. So we're voting on amending the motion. The motion is now we will do the repairs of the roof for a total of $9,000 and the money will come out of fund balance. All in favor? I have a 6-0. Moving on to agenda item 11D, consideration and recommendation by Mayor and Council on the first reordnance 2026-11 proposed amendments to Appendix A, Article 2, Definition, Article 4, Use Provision, Article 5, Residential District, Article 6, Business District, and Article 7, Mixed Use District. I need a motion to approve or to deny. I make a motion. We approve. I have a motion by Councilmember DeShane to approve. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Councilmember Meeks. any any discussion from the council yeah yes miss wanda could you come up please are we able to add maybe any sort of language because i don't think we kind of

or do we need to put any sort of language in it in regards to the gas stations not having any also capability of doing like a charging station for cars at the same time, on the same premise? Do we need to add something?

We can add that. I don't believe we've addressed it in the current draft. This is the first read, so we certainly can add if that's something we want to make sure that There's no charging stations. We can do that in the use provisions.

Are we also able to maybe extend it from one mile to two miles? Would that make up, would it make sense or would it?

So that's the pleasure of the mayor and council as far as the distance between, but certainly that can also be updated and it can be brought back before you guys for the final read for you to have those. If that's the direction and mayor and council would like those updates, I certainly can do that. and those that mileage is whether it's across the street or just down on one side right right it's clarifies in the ordinance now that it can't be across the street except for if it's a 10 acre one but if um you want to to include to be sure that i understand you want two mile minimum whether it's across the street or on the same side. And is that also the distance you want between standalone gas stations and gas stations that are part of a larger development? You still want two miles regardless? OK.

so i need i need to ask a question in regards to that miss wanda so if we were to get a program um program with the gas pump with it uh out on 20. with the gas station that's coming online or coming to be developed that's already been approved would we be able to get we would not be able to get a program with a gas station not with the two mile requirement what about with the code

So where's this gas station coming up? Isn't it by Liberty Square?

We have a gas station that's under at Hampton Locust Grove Road and State Route 20.

All right, you can bring it back before the council. They can approve it if they choose to. So I have a motion on the floor to approve Ordinance 2026-11 by Councilmember DeShane and the second by Councilmember Meeks. The first read. All in favor? I'm sorry, public, public, public. I'm sorry.

Correct me if I'm wrong, Wanda. Anybody can apply for a code variance. I think it's $300 if you want to make a petition to do a code variance.

Variances are pertaining to development regulations. If we choose to adopt the two miles, then it would be a text amendment that you would request, which negates the fact of you updating your ordinance.

I guess the way I was thinking about it was the way it's written now, it's still going to allow gas stations to apply and come in, and then we have to fight every single one. If we make it clear in our ordinance what we want for our town, which is we don't need any more gas stations, then I think a special case where you have a Kroger and they come with special priced gas, then the city can decide if we want to approve that, and they could apply for a text variance at that point, maybe where we say we're... specific vendors are allowed, or I don't know, or in this one case, we allow it, I don't know. But I just feel like if we write the code the way it's written now, we still have gas stations every mile, and they can potentially be on both sides of the street if it's a 10-acre site of retail, Kroger or otherwise, and we still have just the potential for more gas stations if it is within a mile. and that's the thing it's like we don't need any more gas stations I think for our community's development at this stage and by leaving that door open I mean they're going to keep coming and wanting to buy this land because it's it's you know they get the first chance to get the best plot and choose and they'll put one on every corner if they can So I think it's up to us to really take a clear stance that we don't need any more gas stations unless we decide that, yes, in this case, this is going to be very beneficial for the community to get access to a preferential rate of gas. But really, I don't see us needing more gas stations and so I think we can be very clear in our ordinance the recommendations I made I mean or you know yeah adding a market study requirement so they have to say we think your town needs another gas station for these reasons and they provide the study, we don't pay for it, they have to submit that as part of their application, and increasing it to two miles, and not allowing it on the opposite side, as well as removing the large-scale retail exception, because that doesn't say if it's Kroger or Costco, it's any retail, so that could be Ross, and retail, I mean, you could put a data center and add a little store inside of it, call it retail, and now you have another gas station opportunity, you know i mean the gas stations they want to keep coming so that's how i see it i think we need to take a strong stance as a city to um protect our uh development in that way thank you thank you thank you kendra kendra i have a motion on the floor to approve ordinance number we have another one okay i'm sorry

Yes well I'm for the gas stations you know I think that we can close up some of the older ones with the new ones coming in we can because there there's some that's going to be wanting to close because imminent no bains coming to some places and they'll be taking it because they're going to be offered more money and they're going to take it and go but yes when you have the races out here that's taxes coming in to us because that's in our city any activity over here we we need to be getting the money off the gas as much as we can so I'm for the gas stations

Seeing nobody else is, all right. I have a motion on the floor by council member DeShane and a second by council member Meeks to approve ordinance number 202611. All in favor? All opposed? 6-0. All right, moving on to agenda item 11. e consideration and recommendation by the mayor council on the first read of ordinance 2026 12 regarding property owning owners dion smith variance request for the property located at 118 rolling metals court at hampton georgia 30228 variance number is 20 20 26 0005 partial id number is 021 e 01022000 It is zone R2, single family resident. The property owner is requesting relief from the required rear yard setback as specified in Article 5, Section 5-3. The properties on R2 to accommodate a swimming pool and associate hardscape. I need a motion to approve or to deny.

Madam Mayor, I move that we approve Ordinance 202612.

I have a motion to approve by council member Meeks and a second by council member Mitchell. Discussion from the council?

Yes. I don't think we should because or what happens with the piping and all the, you know what I mean? You could never know what happens in the sense that the one resident is saying what will spill over into their yard. I mean, if in the winter a pipe breaks underneath what app, you know what I'm saying? There's just, so much potential like that you can't um you can't really foresee what could happen and you can't control it as well as in the packet i didn't really see if they're an hoa are they in bridgeport no if they're an hoa community and if they had gotten any kind of approval from their hoa are they an hoa community miss wanda

They are not. I don't think so. Is that heritage? It is. Heritage, yes.

All right.

Any further discussion from the council?

I do have. I would like to know, Ms. Wanda, the applicant, Mr. Smith, that's requesting the variance, Is he meeting all, I mean, I know he's requesting the bearers because he's not meeting. The development regs. Right. And the property owner that's behind him voiced his opinion. I would have to agree that we should not approve this because really and truly it should not be approved. up to us exactly what that should look like but if there's a a law or a criteria that the requester, the applicant is not meeting, then I just don't think we should approve it because you kind of set a precedent when you do that.

Sure. And staff doesn't make recommendations per se on variances. That's totally, you know, left up to council. Variances are allowances in code because not every lot, not every situation is typical. So the law, the code allows opportunities for property owners that may be encumbered on situations that are very specific to their particular, you know, lot or whatever they're trying to do. And it can be residential or commercial or it could go across any type of land use. So the question is, This particular lot, it is impaired in the sense that it is not deep. The way the subdivision was platted, it was a shallow lot and very wide. So the rear yard setback that you have to build your house in, the rear yard setback is 40 feet, and it literally is almost in their patio area. So beyond that, you can't build a pool. But our code allows for the construction of accessory buildings right up to the property line pretty much. And so there's a question. that you guys might need to contemplate in the future where some jurisdictions if the pool is not in some way attached to the decking attached with the house that it's deemed an accessory structure where it's built out in the middle of the yard and it's allowed to encroach in that rear yard setback. Our code is very specific for swimming pools. It actually was the first time I read it, and I was actually surprised that it had that requirement. I don't think it's unreasonable for anyone to ask for a variance if it's specific and it's not repeatable in a sense that it's unique to that property. However, whether or not you feel that this substantiates a unique request somewhere he couldn't put the pool on the side yard or do something else, that's for you guys to speak with the applicant and try to understand where he got to where he is and why he's asking you guys to consider changing that just for this particular lot.

Is Mr. Smith still here? He is.

How big is that lot?

Do you know? So it's R2. I think that it is our R2 standard is 25,000 square feet. So it's pretty wide.

And then for the neighbors that oppose looking at the the diagram that we saw at the 530 meeting. Are they the house? Is their house? You need to come closer.

which house is there so is it this one it is is this one where the check mark is okay okay and then we didn't hear anything from the neighbor there's there's nothing encroaching on a neighbor right here a letter in your package that shows support from both of those homeowners okay um And Bridge Mill is a little bit uphill, just so you know, related to water and overflow. It's at a higher elevation, so it wouldn't impact it in that way. I think that some of the concern of overflow was the noise that they were concerned about possible.

So I was going to ask for the neighbor that's opposing succumb to the program. good evening so I know you stated at the 5 30 public hearing that you were opposing the approval of this variance because of noise and what happens when you know people are outside right now

do you hear like if they are having any type of event at their house okay or can you hear the noise i hear the noise but i the gentleman have left so i don't want to be speaking on it right now but i want to talk about else you gonna put your pool closer to my backyard and leave far away from your backyard Why you going to put, the law says 40 feet on the property line.

So you do understand that 40 feet from his property line goes to his house. So he doesn't have any backyard to put a- That's not my problem. But I just want to make sure you understand that.

I pay tax on my property. I'm a law-abiding citizen. So why should I suffer? Because there's going to be some spirits from that pool. I wouldn't put a pool and wouldn't have a party. It don't make no sense. Yeah, they older people, but they going to have a party. That party going to come over to my backyard. And we're going to see, when I call the police, if they're going to come there in three minutes to get these people out of my backyard. So that's the only problem I have with the pool, is that it's going to affect me. It's not going to affect the guy that's putting the pool in his backyard, because he's going to enjoy it. But I'm going to get that spillage, them long hours when they 12 o'clock at night, they still in the pool. They playing music. I'm trying to go to sleep. I already hear the music.

I already hear the music.

We have a noise ordinance. I guess I'm looking at the diagram and I see the check mark. Because it's not indicated on here where your property line ends, and Ms. Wanda, maybe that is somewhere that I can see it.

That's what I mentioned in the beginning. didn't identify all he did was pull this up off i don't know where he pulled it off right but he just pulled it up off her out but it didn't show my prop it didn't show the proper line see this this tells me that he's trying to put this on my property line when i look at it that's all they're telling me that this it's on my property this is on my property line just a little bit on my property you telling me It is greenery. It's the trees behind, but no. To me, it looks like it's on my property line. He want some of my property.

So Ms. Wanda, has he, has the applicant, I'm pretty sure he had to have a survey done to know his, where his property boundaries, correct? Is that part of the application process?

Yes, ma'am. Do you have the clicker?

I do.

I have the clicker. Sorry. So, yes, ma'am. It is for... And he has... He has... engaged in had this design. I wanted to show this particular exhibit where the number says the 149. That's your property line. And that's where he has this applicant that's not here anymore. He has a fence along that. And then there's, you know, maybe 150 200 feet of, you know, tree trees.

He's his property. Yes.

And so the red is where the 40 foot building setback is. So his his house is correctly built. It just doesn't afford any area to build a pool. Now the pool is below the yellow, which is roughly 21 feet from the property line. The squares above it are little pad areas with gravel and stuff like that impervious that he was gonna, you know, but I don't know what chairs or something like that. I would note that he would be allowed because it would still be in the side yard, he could put it to the side. But I just want to be clear, as we all are, that will make no difference on the noise. So if he puts it here or he moves it to the side yard where he wouldn't need a variance, if there's noise that reaches and becomes a nuisance, then that can be dealt with on code enforcement. However, he's in a different subdivision that has an HOA. This one doesn't. The neighbors in this gentleman's subdivision have written letters in support of the variance request he's behind it and this applicant wanted to be a good neighbor so he reached out to just let him know and and to get him here and so i don't know if this helps as far as you locate where things are but so if he was to put it in the side yard is it still behind his fence Yeah, he would have to have a fence just see the area where that big green tree is up to the right. If that pulls 50 down, and most likely would have to take that tree down. If you go in the backyard, it would just be the decking itself if you see the square that's in the backyard just adjacent to the house if you just imagine sliding that line over and the pool being over there in that side yard and then the decking and everything could go around it it could fit

All right. Thank you. Any further questions from Council? Any discussion? More discussion from the public? I have a motion on the floor to approve resolution, I mean ordinance 2026-12 by Councilmember Meeks and a second by Councilmember Mitchell. All in favor? All opposed? I have a motion on the floor by council. I thought she made a motion to deny. No, no. No, no. I just said I would have denied it, but they made their motion. Council Member Meeks made a motion to approve. Council Member Mitchell may second the motion. All in favor of Ordinance 2026-12, raise your right hand. All opposed? I have a 3-3. yes um i break this high in favor of ordinance 2026 12 that is the first read moving on to agenda item 11 f consideration and approval of first route re ordinance 2026 13 amending article 7 code of ethics of chapter 2 administration of the city of hampton code of ordinance sponsored by council member white williams um i need a motion to approve or to deny

Madam Mayor, I would like to move that this be tabled until after the Admin and Finance Committee meeting, that it be moved to Admin and Finance Committee, because they're already hearing one thing about ethics, and they'll have the whole kit and caboodle to discuss and to make a recommendation.

I have a motion on the floor to table ordinance number twenty just not the table to refer to the administrative and finance committee ordinance number twenty twenty six thirteen by council member Meeks do I have a second a second a motion I have a second by council member Chaney discussion from the council all in favor I mean discussion from the public all in favor all opposed I have a 3-3. I break the tie that we move it to administrative and finance committee. So it's a 4-3. Moving on to agenda item G, discussion on and review of existing plans to renovate City of Hampton City Hall due to space configuration and current maintenance issue. This is sponsored by Councilmember Mitchell. Councilmember Mitchell, who is coming to make presentation for you?

I'll go find

you know we're talking about the city hall renovation

renovation of City Hall due to space configuration and current maintenance what we were trying to find out we were I know months ago we were presented with entire redo of City Hall I believe that is what we also have currently in our package, the entire redo of City Hall.

You have, so starting in 2017, back in precision planning, you have that documentation just to document how long this has been in discussion. Some of the improvements were made. They have a cost estimate in there that was similar as far as $100,000 to do something different to the roof. And then staff, based on just... things that were happening in City Hall. I did a lot of interior layouts for the city manager at the time we consider they were all mixed and said, we're going to hire these architects TSW was engaged, and they did a fabulous layout. They had three concepts. He picked it wasn't just me and city manager was several included finance department which was mostly impacted by their current conditions city for just a lot of input came up with that one layout that tsw did however that's where it's all it kind of did this nice pretty picture we have this layout and now what i understand or what we feel is that the most impaired staff currently is the customer service and this wing over here. So the city manager asked me to do a layout again of what that might look like if we were to what I did on the layout that if you can find it in your pictures, I moved the offices to outside wall so we could read the figure and they can have windows and some actual space for offices punched into the area that is not used right now with a safe where the safes are and doing a window wall in between in between the rooms so you can have daylight coming in and and just reconfigured where the window was. Mr. Keyes looked at it briefly. Mr. Baker has we haven't gone any further, but it was conceptual just to show we could create some more space there and do it just minimally improved, along with any improvements that we need based on doors, roofs, I sat in a meeting today with Georgia DOT on Title six and ADA requirements that was alarming. When you think about I know that Miss Atwater has always done and kept up with different things on our ADA as far as how we disseminate information. But based on g dots requirements, we're going to have to do a citywide analysis on our ADA compliance with access to our buildings. And there's just a lot of stuff that we as a city as we grow, when we were under 50, when we were under 50 employees, we didn't have to get over 50 employees to fix it up. So the importance of City Hall for employees, how their care for as a work environment as well as how we come in and out of the building. The door Mr. King has talked a lot about with me. I'm sure the city manager. So that's kind of, you know, we just need direction as far as because TSW, if it so pleases the council, TSW has done the work in AutoCAD, right? Or whatever Revit program they use. So they've done all the hard work as far as getting all the dimensions and understanding. They crawled up in our roof. They know. So if we wanted to move forward and get TSW just to take my rudimentary layout and get a real architect to look at how feasible that is and how cost efficiently We could do that in related to outlets, computer, any of the ideas to do it as cost effectively as possible. But we don't need to be running around in here pushing walls down without a real plan. An architect can give that to us and give us a cost estimate so we could actually, understand before we put it out to bid what the bid should be coming in and looking like number wise so that you know is effective

One of the main reasons why I request this item, but not the whole package, what I see right here, it's only for the finance department area, because if you work in finance, you see possible mold in the ceiling, and that's very dangerous for the employees. And I'm a big supporter of supporting employees as much as I can. And the working condition needs to be improved in those areas so they can be more effective. So I am requesting the council to take a deeper look of repairing the finance department area because that's where the money at. All the money comes in that area there, so we've got to maintain that area as well.

My department brings in quite a bit. Yeah. I understand.

So we have to make sure the employee is safe. And if we don't fix those issues and those moles, employee gets sick and there's more liability to the city and staff as well.

Okay, I have a question because I'm looking through our package. I see that we have some pricing for roofs, some for doors, things of that nature. In my mind, the first thing we need to take care of is the roof. We need to stop this water from coming in. I'm assuming it's coming in through the roof.

I agree. Yes, ma'am. When I first started here, they brought that to my attention about finance. The rain was literally coming down the wall in the drive-thru window. So we went up and did a patch. It stopped it, but, you know, unfortunately, water's going to find... the least resistance so it just moved down the hallway and now the break area is running down the wall anytime there's a hard rain so what you got to do is look up and there's water leaks everywhere so so the first thing we need is a roof yes ma'am and the this package that you have in here for a roof on this building is 119 000 is that what you're right i went out and uh i acquired a few quotes i mean i still need to get one more but

But I see is from the same company that you're going to do the roof over at Public Works.

Well, they're they're one of the companies that came in and looked at not just these two buildings, but pretty much all of our groups. And I have I looked at another company and I'm going to try to source one more. But I didn't want to get too far ahead and continue to do all that. You know, we didn't have the support to do it.

Well, I think like the we The building got to quit leaking. This is, to me, a no-brainer. That the building got to quit leaking. If that is the case, we need to... repair the roof first before we start demolition in here because I think we should figure out the overall plan first

of how are we going to move forward with what was presented to us months ago with the renovation of city hall before we start replacing a roof we did it on 24 main and that building will be coming down for demolition That was $115,000 gone to waste. So before we start, I'm not saying we don't need to replace the roof. We do. But I think we also need to make a decision on what we're going to do with this building. and if the design calls for or allows for us to do the roof first we need to do it first because i don't think we need to start tearing off the roof and now we're going to start moving hvac systems on the roof it all has to make it all has to make sense So I think we need to figure out that piece first and if we can do the roof once we figure out the overall plans, then the roof will be the first thing we tackle.

So I think the recommendation from Council Member Mitchell was for us to tackle inside was just this finance side. So these plans that we have is for the totality of this building. So we need to go back to the drawing board and get what we want to repair or want to fix over here. Am I right? Is that what you're saying? So, um, I think that's probably the starting point. But didn't did I hear something about buckets?

We have buckets up in the attic that we have to empty every time after the heavy rain. We've got sheet metal diverting water. I mean, we've got some structural issues with some of the beams up there. Mayor Tarpley.

We don't have a whole lot of time to make a decision. Yes, Council Member Mitchell.

I'm recommending to the council that Anything to decide, but make sure we help the employees like fix those issues, that main issues are the roof that are required to get done for the safety of the employees. But if they don't wish to do anything further, it's fine. At least they start something to make sure the employee is safe.

Well, that's what I was going to say. If we do the roof, it stops the water from leaking in the building. Yes, ma'am. Then the council needs to decide on if you're going to renovate inside of buildings.

what I think also we need I think we should have the was the roof professionally patched or did do we have the first time it was okay and the leak came out and we went up and did it it wasn't professional patch no we did it the best we could but again it's not just there that's the worst part but every room in here has got roof leaks

right can I say something I I'm not an engineer but I feel that the age of this building it has more issues than you know than we are aware you know I'm just from a personal standpoint at our school we had to shut our school down because of the route was leaking there was mold you know we they had to go through a lot of different things so if the roof is leaking and there's mold and mildew there's a lot of issues in this building so you know we need to look at a lot of the whole picture we need to look at a lot of different things and safety and health and safety and so not just looking at that roof but there's probably a lot of other issues in the walls and floors. Yeah.

The doors from 1985. Yeah. In the short time I've been here, we had to Fix them in-house two times. So my theory is that one day we might not be able to. And you're going to come up here and there's going to be a big piece of plywood out there. And you're going to have to come in the other door.

So that is why I think, as council, we need to move swiftly on moving forward with the entire renovation project. First thing we need to do, if there's mold, we need to take care of that issue. We can't have employees come to work I wouldn't want to live in a moldy condition, so I know they don't want to come to work. It's a working one. So I think there's a couple things here. One, the health and safety of our employees and the citizens that come in and out of this building all day. Two, I think we need to patch the roof. not a full replacement but just try to patch it and then while that is happening council can make the decision on moving forward with the renovation i just don't want us to spend 120 000 only for us to renovate and the architects like well you got to do the roof all over because now your mechanicals need to be moved so

that's just my my take on it there's probably a lot of issues electrical and you know it's the domino effect I mean I'm not an engineer like I said but I know there's some issues and you know to invest a lot of money in here and and we may have to eventually move out of the building. So there's some things we need to discuss and look at.

Okay. So we're going to try to just fix the drive-thru area for now? Is that what? Yes.

Just a discussion. If the council wishes, and I'm the only person, everyone have their own seat. If that is the stage that the council wishes to do to make sure that employees are safe, I'm fine with it. But we can't stall on it and let the employees, maybe in the hospital or something like that, affect them.

it would help because you know I know we're talking we don't have any really hard numbers right and so what we might do is take the drawing the full reno that TSW did I think it works really great in the aesthetics if everybody likes it we can at least take it until ask them to give us preliminary cost estimates. So you guys will have at least an idea of what you're talking about on reno and because even if you move somewhere else, you can resell the building if it's functional, and it works. At least you have a jumping off point to say, you're looking at, you know, a million dollars, or you're looking at $10 million, or to give some type of idea for you guys to make a decision on how much money, you know, you want to afford for this renovation, because you have money in the budget for City Hall renovation still.

Can I ask a question? Mr. King, when you got the estimates for the roof, the roof, did they tell you about moving HVAC or anything like that, that they were going to have to, that they were going to need to? Did they say any of that?

No, no. The only way I could see, I mean, for the most part, the AC, we did some work on it. It's working fairly well. And even if you, in my opinion, even if you did replace the roof and whatever reason we had to go to the larger system, it wouldn't be that much of an impact on the room to do that.

So I think I want to make sure your question to Mr. King I want to make sure I was there's no confusion I'm not questioning whether the HVAC system needs to be moved now if we did a replacement my concern is when we do renovate the building the design is going to change so the HVAC could be here now but when we do the the new design that HVAC could be on this side so I think of course they're not going to have to move it move the HVAC to do what they need to do now if we go with them for replacement but we need to keep in mind this building once it's renovated it's going to be a totally different layout so the last thing we want to do is put a whole new roof

this building that's not going to fit it's not going to work with the design of the building and to your point this the roof that's on it now has an internal internal gutter you don't have gutters on the outside it's It's internal, that's why they have these issues with the drainage. So one of the concepts that Precision had was a pitch roof, right, that gave more attic room so that the utility work, whatever, could be accommodated. TSWs is still, it looks like a flat roof, but it's still pitched the way that they were talking to us about the configuration. So to your point, if HVAC needs to move right now, the problem is, at least what the architect said, and I know there's a challenge with space, there's, you know, there's not a lot of space a clear, clear story between where the ceiling is in the in the roof, just the way the building was designed. So, again, it might be to get a swag on how much the plan is if y'all like that but also say what is our temporary measure to put some type of cover over the roof now that we have that is cost effective it keeps the water off but it's not permanent like a tent a big blue tarp it's not an easy like fix and it's certainly not a quick fix but we did the city we had a remediation on mold because actually michelle is in the city clerk's office had a lot of mold there and we actually had to evacuate and tent that area to kill the spores and all that stuff and that was done um who's here was it a year ago yeah maybe 18 months or something like that and then we had some mold here that they remediated but they said it wasn't airborne and it was treatable with surface cleaning that kind of thing so it wasn't Um, and it was by, uh, an outfit that that's what they did.

So, um, and I've even had reports from people in the restroom sitting on the toilet and it's waterfall on the head. So that's the truth. Okay.

So it sounds like the council has a decision to make in regards to, um, what type of renovation we are going to be doing within a city hall within the city hall. how we wanted to be configured put it out for a sway to get some numbers on that inside because we know we don't have to have an entire roof replacement that's a that's a no brainer we we know that so is that what we're talking about doing everybody yes yes um yes i'll give you the portion over there she was going it'll be all of it yeah

they'll give us a good design for all of it but we need to make sure that if we just want to do one section of this building we need to have that I think our packets contain three different renderings yes and one rendering is just bumping out of here in the drop through and the other ones are extensive it is a good idea to have that so we can decide it

what approach that we can take if we're going to make an investment or whatever needs to take place.

All right. No further discussion on that agenda item. Moving on to agenda item 11H. Consideration action to approve resolution 2026 to approve a 50-year intergovernmental agreement with the Spalding County Water Authority for the assumed responsibility for all future relocation as needed of the 20-inch water main installed within the Georgia Department of Transportation right away along Highway 1941 from Mayland Road to North

Henry or north to Henry Spaulding County line yes madam mayor admittedly that will be finalized tomorrow when we meet with Spaulding County and Cedar Griffin but it is as it reads I mean I don't foresee anything happening in nineteen forty one in that time frame i mean it has it for years uh but we would be responsible for moving it if indeed the d.o.t uh deemed it necessary to do so or if they had any expansion in 1941 in that area it's about a thousand fifty two feet off a man down to that to the line all right i need a motion to approve resolution twenty

approve or deny resolution 2026-41.

Mayor, I made a motion to approve. Second.

I have a motion by Councilmember Mitchell and a second by Councilmember Meeks to approve resolution 2026-41. 41 discussion from the council. Yes. Yes.

So is this something that equinex is going to be respond when it says we're responsible?

We are responsible for the city. So this would be the city because this is going to be our asset once it's going to belong to us. Once it's transferred, it'll belong to us.

The only thing that would be smaller county property would be the actual meter obviously because that'll be that meter come from spotting line spot inside of the lounge but yeah that will be our asset.

Any other questions from the council? Any discussion from the public? All in favor? All opposed? I have a 6-0 moving on to agenda item 11 I consideration and action to approve resolution 2042 oh so I believe this item needs to come off the agenda yes ma'am it does we don't qualify for that one unfortunately okay so we will not hear this resolution today as it's been stated we don't qualify for this particular grant moving on to agenda item 11j consideration and action on the adoption of resolution 2026-43 regarding the property owners jmb25 llc request to dedicate property for public use to the city of Hampton portion of partial number 040-0105-0000 consisting of 0.366 acres, Hampton, Georgia, 30228. Ms. Wanda.

We want to qualify the acreage on this particular item is actually 0.287. That was an update when we got the actual survey. This is property that is part of the gas station site, six acres. It consists of a stream and stream buffers. It's really undevelopable, but it's in a location that would provide the city, if we need it in the future, access to our new sanitary sewer line that's in gdot right-of-way it also is at a low part that city manager and myself in the city the mayor have been talking about possibly taking one of our lift stations offline and converting it to gravity and it would have for possible gravity line down this draw and that could connect and for future sewer so it's a public dedication of land for future use However, at this point in time, it's not an urgency on our part to accept it. The attorney at the time had sent something to me and indicated that they would recommend, instead of us doing it as a quick claim deed, that we do it as a a different, I can't remember the language, form of transfer as far as the legalese of the property. So if the city council, the applicant, the property owner If you guys are not interested in the property, they won't go forward and do what they need to do on the title search and all this stuff and expend the money if it's not something you're interested in. If you are, they'll go ahead and move forward with the initial recommendations that the attorney made that they wanted you guys to have for it to be a better legal transfer of property.

All right so this this I don't actually want to improve our system we're going to be able to take a possibly or possibly take off a pump station and have gravity flow in that area, is that correct?

It is set up because of where it is topographically. If we did a gravity line that eventually went under 20 and served the other side of Henderson Farms, there's greater possibility of use for that than it just sitting to be not used at all. And so their multi-use trail, just to show the whole picture. They are required to install a multi-use trail on their property that's a long state route 20 that runs parallel to 20. That's part of our trails plan. It came to that part, but they were not able to, just based on state law, to put the pathway over the creek it would have to been some kind of bridge crossing if the city moved forward and and had the property and the city wanted to do something there's more allowances for city improvements in stream buffers and things like that than private development so the trail system could also run along the sewer easement and and tie back into one of our senior center our senior um communities yes so there's potential um there's um just like when we the city um took property from the pendleys over off of state route 20 at um east king on that side where the roundabout is there's a corner there that jim chapman didn't want The Penleys donated it to us. Even for the future, if we wanted to have one of our gateway signage there, then we could have it. And so it's a similar kind of little piece of property that is not of value to anybody, but it might be great value to us.

I did a motion to approve.

What's it in our rhythm? From my understanding. If I go out Hampton Locust Grove Road to 20, this property is on my right, the former Ablett property that has been. OK, gotcha.

Thank you. I need a motion to approve or to deny resolution 202643.

I make a motion to approve item number resolution 202643. Second.

I have a motion to approve by Councilmember Cheney and a second by Councilmember Meeks to approve resolution 202643. Any further discussion from the council?

Yeah. So the variance, well, it's the variance. I don't have my whole packet. It's not a variance.

This isn't a variance. This is just a property transfer resolution. No variance.

They're giving us a quarter acre.

Dedicate. Any comments from the public? All in favor? I have a 6-0. Moving on to agenda item 11K, consideration and action to approve resolution 26, 46 to launch an investigation into the Seth Dillons and malfeasance of Councilmember Pamela Deshaies sponsored by the Mayor. This resolution of the Mayor and City Council of the City of Hampton, Georgia authorizing an investigation pursuant to Section 2.15 of the City of Hampton Charter into alleged conflict of interest, ethical violations, improper participation in city business, Seth Dillons, improper use of office, procurement, irregularity, coercion, and malfeasance in office. authorizing the initiation of ethics proceeding pursuant to the Article 7 of the City of Hampton Code of Ordinance, directing the evaluation and pursuant of appropriate civil remedies reserving the right to evaluate whether the alleged conduct constitute a violation of the council member's oath of office and related matters, authorizing city officials to implement this resolution for other lawful purposes. Whereas the city of Hampton, Georgia is a municipal corporation duly organized and existing under the state of Georgia, and whereas the duly elected governing authority of the city is the mayor and city council there of and whereas the city of the mayor and the city council of the city of Hampton have a fiduciary obligation to protect the public trust, ensure compliance with the city charter, code of ordinance and laws of the state of Georgia and safeguard the property expenditures of public funds, the proper expenditures of public funds. And whereas section 2-6116 obligates the mayor and chief executive officer and general superintendent of the affairs of the city to see that the laws and ordinance are enforced and cause any officer to be prosecuted for neglect or violation of duties or immoral conduct. And whereas section 2-2.15 of the city charter authorized the mayor and city council upon adoption of an authorized resolution to make inquiries and investigations into the affairs of the city and the conduct of any department officer agency officer employee and officer of the city and whereas section 2.14 of the city charter established standards governing conflict of interest disclosure of financial interest participation in matters involving financial interest and malfeasance in our office and whereas Article 2, Division 8 of the Code of Ordinance establish ethical obligation applicable to public service including prohibition against using public office for private gain, conflict of interest, coercion, improper participation in matters involving financial interest and failure to disclose and whereas information has been presented to the mayor alleging that council member Pamela Deschain a city elected official may have owned operated managed control or possessed a financial interest in a private business that received compensation in the amount of $225 on 4-3 of 2026 and $365 on 9-8 of 2020 I mean $225 on 4-3 of 2026 and $365 on 9-8 of 2023 from the city of Hampton. And whereas allegations have been made that such officials recommended, directed, encouraged, influenced, or otherwise participated in the election and use of said business by the city of Hampton, and whereas allegations have been made that such transaction may have occurred without disclosure of financial interest as required by the city charter and code of ordinance, And whereas allegations have been made that city funds may have been expended without compliance, without applicable contracting, purchasing, authorization, disclosure, ethics, procurement, and administrative requirement. And whereas the Mayor and the City Council found that A fraud investigation is necessary to determine the truth of such allegations and protect the integrity of the municipal government. And whereas if substantial and submission of payment for services not properly disclosed by Constitution violation of the state of Georgia includes self-dealing, embezzlement, breach of oath, and malfeasance in office. And whereas the mayor and the city council finds that the alleged conduct is sustained if sustained may also constitute a violation of article 7 code of ethics of the city of Hampton code of ordinance including without limitation section 2-292 which prohibits using public office for private gain section 2-219 which prohibits financial interest interest that conflicts with the public service responsibility section 2-298 which prohibits public service from using his or her position in ways to coerce or give the appearance of coercion coercing a city employee an appointed official of the city or a contract employee to provide any benefits to him or her or to per person with his or her immediate family section dash 30304 members of the city council shall disclose the nature of any interest or benefit he or she has at the time such matter is presented to the city council for discussion or for action such disclosure shall be recorded into the minutes of the meeting and become public part of the public record. Following any disclosure made pursuant to this code of ethics, the members shall not participate in the ex parte communication with other members regarding the matter at hand and other applicable provisions of the city code of ethics and whereas the mayor and the council further finds that the alleged conduct is sustained if sustained may be inconsistent with the oath of office taken by the council member Pamela DeShane and with the fiduciary responsibility owed to the city of the to the citizens of the City of Hampton. And whereas the Mayor and City Council desire to protect the integrity of public funds, preserve public confidence in municipal government, and ensure that all appropriate criminal, civil, administrative, and ethical remedies are considered and pursued as warranted by the facts and applicable laws, And whereas the mayor and council acknowledge that no final determination has been made regarding whether any crime, civil, or ethical violation has occurred and that any person accused of wrongdoing is entitled to all procedural protection and due process afforded by law. Now, therefore, it is resolved that the mayor and the city council of the city of Hampton as follows. that there will be a scope of the investigation the investigation shall include but not limited to determining whether any person engaged in conduct constituting a conflict of interest failed to disclose a direct or indirect financial interest as required by the city charter or code of ordinance participated in influence recommended directed negotiated authorized or otherwise facilitating any trans actions in which that person had a financial interest use public office for private gain, engaged in self-dealings or conduct creating the appearance of self-dealing, improperly influenced, directed, pressured, or attempt to coerce any city employee, department head, appointed official, contract employee, city manager, other representative of the city, violated section 2.14 of the city charter, violated any provision of the city ethics code, violation of purchasing, procurement, contracting, bidding, authorization, accounting, financial control, or expenditure requirement, violated section 2-3 of the city charter concerning interference with administration concealed a financial interest or violation of conflict of interest provision of the city charter engaged in constituting malfeasance in office caused the city to enter into any transaction or arrangement that may be boardable under the city charter records to be reviewed all relevant invoices paid payment records, purchase order, contract, travel authorization, financial records, email, communication, ethics disclosure, council maintenance, city manager's record, procurement records, and other documents relevant to this investigation. Demands for reimbursement and recovery. The city manager in coordination with the finance department is hereby directed to issue a written demand to the council member, Pamela Deshares, requesting reimbursement to the city of Hampton in an aggregate amount of $225 for purchases on 9-9 and $365 on purchases on 9-9. purchase order 0, 9, 0, 5, 8, 7, 6, the other together with any additional amount determined to be all within five business days following receipt of such demand in the event reimbursement is not made within the period specified here and or it if additional public funds are determined to have been improperly obtained the city manager is cost cost in consultation with the city attorney share pursue all available civil remedies including without limitation actions for restitution I just enrichment money head and receive conversion and other claims authorized by the state of Georgia. Ethics complaints pursuant to section 2-307 and 2-309 and 2-310 of the city code of ordinance and the city council hereby encourages and authorize any members of the council or any citizen of the city to file a written complaint with the city clerk alleging such violation of the city code of ethics as may be supported by the facts and applicable laws upon receipt of any such complaint The city clerk shall process the complaint in accordance with Section 309. In evaluation of additional remedies, the city attorney is directed to evaluate whether the alleged conduct is substantial, constitutes a violation of the council member's oath of office, or otherwise warrant additional proceedings authorized by georgia law and advised by the city council quarterly preserving the records for the city manager the finance director the city clerk and all other officers and employees of the city are hereby directed to preserve all documents electronic records email financial record reimbursement form and materials related to the matter no final adjudication nothing in this resolution shall be construed as a final finding or adjudication that Councilmember Duchesne committee any crime, civil, or ethical violation. This resolution is intended solely to authorize referral and investigation, recovery of public funds, and the evaluation and pursuant of the law, authorizing the implementation by the mayor city manager, city clerk, city attorney, and all other appropriate city officials are hereby authorized and directed to do such further action and execute such a document as may be necessary or desirable to carry out the intent of purpose. Public record, the city clerk shall maintain the resolution in the office Official public records of the city and shall incorporate it into official minutes of the city council meeting at which it is adopted. Repeals also all resolutions or parts of resolution in conflict with this resolution are hereby repealed to the extent of such conflict. Affected today's date if we were to approve resolution 2646. I place this item on the agenda after finding out that we had some council members that had been doing some business deals with the city of Hampton and we definitely know that we are not able to do any type of business without full disclosure in a city council meeting and I was not aware that I saw the check that I believe Mr. Baker signed in April to approve a flower arrangements for his breakfast dinner or breakfast gathering from when he was welcomed in along with another receipt for mr shane and so this is just to launch the investigation to gather all information to see if this is actually uh a self-dealing and a malfeasance in office can i get a motion to approve resolution 2646 i make a motion that we deny All right, I have a motion by Council Member DeShane. Second. And second by Council Member White-Williams that we deny 2646. Any discussion from the Council? Yes.

Yes. In the motion you've read, and this, I know mine is coming up next, but in the motion you've read that, I'm sorry, the resolution, page two, 6th to 6th, whereas it states section 2-304. Let me back up. Yes, section 2-304. The member of the city council shall disclose the nature of any interest or benefit he or she has at the time such matter is presented to the city council for discussion or action. We never had, this never came up for a vote for the council. There was no consideration in action. Councilwoman Duchenne was not originally even supposed to help with flowers. This was something that occurred at the last minute. So I'm not sure how this could even stand on its face when the resolution clearly states that she should have disclosed this if this came to council. It never came before council at all. So to recommend this for an investigation to me is a moot point because what was there to disclose? If you look at the meeting minutes, I do believe at the council meeting, I said that we were going to have, this was the February meeting, We were going to have a welcome reception breakfast for Mr. Baker. There was no vote taken. There was no consideration in action. As a matter of fact, I think I said it in our positive happenings. So to try to bring forward this resolution when there was never the opportunity for Ms. Duchenne to disclose that she was the owner. i mean even in that council meeting she didn't know at the time that she was going to be asked to help with flowers for that day so i don't i don't see how this resolution can go forward um if it did come to a vote and she did not disclose or recuse herself from a vote yes but that clearly did not happen here i have something to say so

Do you have checks or purchase orders that were made to me, Pamela Duchene personally, that I am self-dealing, like the show that I'm self-dealing? Do you have any sort of audio tape saying that I coerced anybody?

So that's what an investigation will bring forth.

So you're just bringing this, you're just saying this. It was presented. You're just saying this without knowing there's coercion. You're just saying there's coercion.

No. The information that I gather, it does have a check for your business.

Yeah, it has a check for my business.

That's right.

So, Ms. Toba, could you come forward, please? And also, while Toba's coming, You're trying to have her investigated for $365 payment. She wasn't even on council in September 2023. Exactly.

So this whole thing should be even thrown out.

I mean, to me, that is... But you have in the resolution two checks. One from 2023. To me, that is reaching. Any judge would throw that out because... You're trying to punish her from something she did as a private citizen slash business owner.

And if that's the case, are you going to punish every single business owner who's done business with the city? Because I was a private citizen in 2023. weren't we camping in 2020, in September? But anyways, Ms. Tova. Why does Hummingbird Flowers, why did they present a invoice?

Because the original, Ms. Atwater was in charge of the welcome reception. Ms. Atwater wasn't here, she was out of town. So she asked me to help with the event. I got Michelle's card and went to Sam's Club to get flowers, but they only had a few. So I bought the ones they had, but it was not enough to create the arrangements for the table. At that time when we got back, it was on a Sunday night. Nothing was open, nothing was available. So the welcome reception was going to be that next morning. So I called Councilwoman DeShane and asked her if she would be willing to help pull some stuff together and if she would be willing to help make the arrangements. She said, yes, I'll do it. I said, well, I have to leave. She said, well, I'll do some tonight. You can meet me in the morning and I'll help you finish setting up. That morning I got there, she had did most of the flowers. I think maybe we had to do a couple more. She brought more flowers because we did not have enough. It was only a little bit of flowers that we had. So she was there, she put the flower arrangements together, 12, 13 to be exact, and they were really big flowers arrangements. So she put them together and we put them on the tables. I asked her because I had already asked other business owners downtown to do something for the Expo welcome breakfast.

Who were the other business owners that contributed to the reception?

Michelle with rutabagas and I'm more away with the wake and drip okay so you had three three downtown businesses that contributed towards a city of Hampton event to be clear did any the pundish councilman pundish come to you about purchasing flora summer no I went to her you went to her

Did I coerce you? Did I tell you, threaten you, that if you don't use flowers for me, I'm going to do something to maybe have your job jeopardized?

Absolutely not.

You came to me.

Right.

On a Sunday.

I did.

On a day that I was closed. And let me say this as well. This was Sunday, February 15th, the day after the busiest day in my shop, Valentine's Day, when she called me. And I was tired. But because of the city and doing something for the city that she needed help, I said, okay, I would come and help her on that day. And on Monday when I'm closed. Come and help her. Does the city have a policy to support local businesses?

As a main street community, we are supposed to use businesses in the community, preferably downtown, because they actually... request us to do that so we can work on economic development, which is the economic development part of the city, so they want us to use businesses. It's a part of the Main Street motto for us to use businesses. It's in the vitality part, so we're helping to stimulate the economy and help to grow the business even more or help with the businesses that are in our local communities.

Clerk Michelle, every year that I have to sign my affidavit, do you see that I list hummingbird flowers on my application when I do it? Could you pull it up, actually, and tell, do you have it to pull it up?

No, I would have to go in and get, I would have to go get one of your affidavits or something.

Because I can't believe that this is the first that the city of Hampton knows that I'm the owner of Hummingbird Flowers, that they're coming to me and asking me to provide a service and a product for them.

Thank you for that permission. I would ask a question. Normally, any elected official that will introduce your responsibility have to be put on a system if you have business. What concerns me, for me, when I look at this, if you did approach her, then you violate the policy. To me, you should say you did not.

No, I did not. Also, I want to say that the mayor is asking me to pay back money from the city ordering product from my small business, to me, makes this, like, she's putting the city in a position where, what is it out to do, scam its small businesses? Like, I mean, you're asking for payment back on two? Invoices where they, one, I think had a purchase order from Rashida for it. You got the product, and this is three years ago when I wasn't even on council, but you're asking for me to pay the money back in five days. So what about the product? Are you able to get the product back as a city? Are you able to give my time back that I spent making those arrangements back to me? If I give back money, are you able to give back my stuff? Does the city have a policy or an ordinance or a charter, anything that says that the city should not do business with its small businesses on Main Street? Is there something in the charter when you are coming to run for an elected official that it says if you own a small business in the city, you can't? Because if you're doing business with the city, then you're gonna be held liable for malfeasance and self-dealing? I'm asking since you brought it, I'm asking you.

so our charter and our ordinance clearly tells you you can do business as a small business in downtown all you want to you just can't do it sitting on the council no when you when you become a council member where does that say that you become a council member you have to fully disclose when you are doing business with the city of hansen show me show me where that says that you You have a business. You have a business and you are an employee of the City of Hampton. You used to get flowers and bring them for free all of the time. Didn't Councilmember DeShane, when you asked her about making these flowers, tell you what the cost of it was gonna be?

She told me it would be a cost because I was approaching her on Sunday night after Valentine's so she would have to pull some stuff together and that she's normally not there on Mondays.

I get it. Did she tell you what the cost was?

She told me it would be a cost.

She told you it was going to be a cost. And you continue to proceed with getting the flowers from her because you felt like she was a Main Street business.

Well, because I got everything from Main Street businesses, from the food to the coffee and everything. And during the reception, I let everyone know that it was Main Street businesses that I used to do all of the things for the reception.

She did say how many

bird flowers and at that time at that time Councilmember Deshaid didn't say that she was the person that was providing the flowers she said hummingbirds everybody knows hummingbird flowers is Councilmember Deshaid and she said it on the dais she talked about how busy her Valentine's season was so are we saying are we saying that if you are a business owner here in the city of Hampton that it's all right for us to not disclose to the city that you're doing business with the city.

How did I not disclose? I fill out a form saying every year that Hummingbird Flowers is owned by me. Yes. So how, how, how, how would she have disclosed it to the council?

It's supposed to come to the council.

So isn't that something under your purview that as the director, you have a budget that you, that's you had to come back. Did you have to bring that to council to get a vote on it?

No, I didn't, but I'm the coordinator and. at the time the very next day I spoke with Miss Grace and she said that just make sure you get because I needed to know how to do it and she said just make sure you get your invoice and when you get your invoice do your check refund and turn it in so how to do what how to pay you know like how do I pay you and other vendors already right

So why did you need to find out from Ms. Grace how to do her?

Because I had already talked about using the other people. I was using her at the last minute.

I get it, but is the process not the same?

For businesses, it is. But I want it to be clear for me.

so for a business it is and it was in hummingbirds the invoice i took it straight to finance so so can i ask the mayor a question because you're saying she should have disclosed at the last minute you wanted us to have a council meeting I mean, who was she going to disclose it to?

I actually just wanted her to not do business with the city.

Oh, is that what you're trying to do? You're trying to prevent hummingbird flowers from doing business with the city?

Could a council member not do business in the city without the council?

Could you show me that in writing, that it says that, please? Show it to me.

Give it to me. That's what the investigation will show.

No, but if you have it up for investigation, how are they going to show it if it's not in the charter already? That's what the investigation will show. Are we going to change the charter before the investigation? I mean, to me, it doesn't make sense. Disclosure, if that is the key word.

To me, this just sounds like it's retaliatory and she's just trying to put a blemish on my name because she's not sure if I'm running for my seat again next year and she wants to already come up. Mr. Devlin, you were on City Council and you own a business downtown Main Street. Did the city ever use your business? You did cops day.

Did Mr. Cleveland come to the police department for services? Or did the police department go to Mr. Cleveland for cops day?