Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Me, workshop number four. We're glad that you were all here, those joining us in council chambers as well as those joining us on our YouTube channel this evening. As a reminder, all of these meetings are on YouTube, so you can tune back through and watch 133. We do have the presentation at our May meeting, and then we'll be presenting again in June and voting on the budget in June. So with that, I will turn it over to Rob.

Thank you, mayor. Good evening, council. And I'll reiterate, pleasure to present the final budget workshop. The next meeting will be the public hearing. So we'll present at the council meeting in that public hearing forum where we'll have public comments. You'll see final manager's recommended budget. Then we'll sit on that, take those comments back after the May meeting and adopt in June. However, tonight we will see several things, if I can get this to work.

Lee broke it.

It worked a minute ago.

Okay. First we're going see the results of our council exercise that we did looking at all of the projects and programs that we put before you between the last budget meeting and tonight we'll talk about those consensus items which ones we still don't have a strong consensus on and discuss those in tonight's meeting hopefully to get really a final say on those is that something we we push till our next retreat and go through that in the next budget process or is it something that that we want to really pursue in this budget. We'll have our financial models basically what does the financial model look like right now and I would say our budget is 99.9% done from a financial standpoint. There's some nuance that we can can still adjust in there but we're very confident in our financial models go through our budget season graphics look at the fee schedule that we're proposing make sure that everyone is good with that and then finally the wrap up for this evening that will just be open discussion anything that wasn't covered before we get into the final MRB I will say at the end of this evening you know we'll we'll be full bore ahead on presenting the manager's recommended budget so we're not going to really leave here, at least staff doesn't plan to leave here without having consensus one way or the other on the handful of things that we have so we will make sure in that wrap up area that we all understand the path forward.

From a process standpoint you can kind of see the hours that we've put into this so far a ton of hours that you don't see on here right these are the these are the open to the public hours that we've had here in this room where we're presenting all this information. However, all of our department heads have spent weeks on analyzing their budget, coming up with proposals, refining them based on the feedback as well as the whole thing that you all have done. I see everybody has their budget binder with them. You know, that's a lot. That's not covered in this, right?

So, at the end of this, we're open to the public. We're engaging with the public for for twenty to twenty five hours. However, I would say, you know, when we look at man hours from a staff standpoint, we have four to five hundred hours just in producing this, as well as the hours you're spending at home, spending on the phone, sending in emails. So, really take a lot of pride in all the effort that we put into it and really proud of the product that we have for you tonight. Today is kind of that council budget exercise results what it's not is a final budget we do have you know a great recommendation for you but we can change it tonight we can change it in May we can change it right up until June, we don't like to get to that point and we really want to understand what we have from this room this evening that way when we put this out to the public there are changes that are reasonable to make if we don't adopt a budget in June, we're not like the federal government where we can kind of kick the can July 1.

We just don't operate so I don't like to get to a scenario where we're giving ourselves, you know, a week or so. I've seen several communities in this County do that where they've got to pass a budget maybe June 30 on a special meeting on a three, four, four, three vote that's that's not the type of position we want to put you guys in and so we try to make sure that we're spending plenty of time getting these results and making sure that we have a good consensus moving forward. I'm going to have Lee go over the next section which will be the counsel exercise parts but before he goes over you know the results of all of that I want to remind everybody how the buckets we break this into when we analyze it. So a strong denial and we have we have eight elect ives in here. If only one or two folks are in support of something, we just put that into a we'll look at that later bucket, right?

If six of our eight electives are like, no, I'm for that, it's not really worth the time. We'll put that on budget retreat you know future workshops and try to try to vet those a little bit better. When we get into that three to five, one way or the other, even if we have four people on this board that say yes, I want to do that and three that don't, we still bring that back to the board because we think that's a coin flip, Somebody might feel really strongly, maybe one of those that that are supporting it don't have enough information or vice versa. So that moderate approval is really what we look at discussing tonight in here. And then the significant approvals, six or seven members are for something.

We again put that right into the budget and we say that that's a strong consensus that everybody wants to go do that. It's already funded in this budget. We can talk about significant approvals and strong denials or the moderates. But from a staff standpoint, we're just really trying to focus on getting those you know three four five middle grounds and making sure we know what we're doing they're moving forward but everything that's significant approval is funded everything that's been a strong denial is not in the budget and if we're gonna make any changes to that tonight's the night to do it Lee do you want to take it from there and go over the rest?

Hey, rough one thing that might be helpful. I don't know if we have anybody here from Casey's staff but when we get to that point, it would be nice to see a summary. No tax increase for major projects funded. Just some headlines that we could carry out because you know I don't know if the public is going go through this but

we're already working on it.

Good deal.

Yes sir.

Okay so thank you everyone for having me tonight I'm going go through these try to go through them at a decent clip I know all of you spent a lot of time in the extreme detail so none of this is anything that was not on your exercise so it should be familiar to everybody but there are a few things I wanted to point out as we go through so we're just not flipping through slides too fast. The first one here is the revenues this is where we ask everyone what do you want to do with the property tax rate, the solid waste fee that we currently charge and then we always have that license plate fee a lot of our area municipalities and then those neighbors do charge that fee we haven't traditionally but we have that out there just see if y'all are ever interested what you see here is it was a unanimous agreement that we stay with the tax rate as it is at $0.41 and then we keep the solid waste fee at $10 as it currently is so no changes were made by anyone here for those two and that is how the budget is all built around.

And that was unanimous, so we were happy to see that that we had very clear consensus, no tax increase, no changes to fees, stand pat, we all know the issue we've talked about the state legislature where, you know, there is some unknowns there. That's always that's something we can adjust to. But, you know, certainly no increases is something we committed to three years ago and going through the four year reval process. And it looks like the board was all in consensus on that.

So next, we'll go into the operations. Here, you'll see these are some specific ones we pulled out for you to consider. Again, going into this, all of these items were in the budget that we presented to you. So all of these, you can see, either strong or unanimous approval. So all of these were in the budget and will stay in the budget.

I did want to just point out, as you can see, most of these were unanimous approval on both sides. You have all the council votes on the left, and then we include the mayor and council on the right side. You'll see there's about five of these that have some strong approval. So again, five-two overwhelmingly approved. But just to kind of point out again, so we have some of these items here, the athletic special recognition, the data trust pilot, town center small area plan.

And then you'll see the benches at Harris Depot and additional cultural events. All those had a couple of dissents, but overall, again, very positive all moving forward. Personnel these, again, this was a very light year on purpose that we didn't put a lot before you relating to this. And so these two items, both small dollar amounts, both were unanimously approved by everyone. Capital, we got a couple slides here.

There was a lot of capital. As everyone knows, we have a lot of stuff going on. Again, this one, as much as the other ones that you saw in the operations, most all of these are either strong or unanimous approval all the way down until you get to the sidewalk program. So I wanted just to make sure that that was understood that currently, 100,000 is in the budget that was presented to you. There was a unanimous approval there to keep that $100,000 in place for the sidewalk program.

We gave two options, moving it up to $50,000 increments over the course of a five year upgrade there. And both of those had unanimous denial. So for the ADA sidewalk program, we're keeping it at the $100,000 You go down below. This is our first one where we need to get some consensus here. So this is the annual greenway program. Currently, as has been in the budget for a while, is a $250,000 annually that we have in there. That was unanimously approved. So it's in the budget. It stays in the budget. Just like with the sidewalk program, gave $250,000 options there.

The $3.50, which would have been $100,000 more than we currently budget, had strong denial. So we're off of that one. But the one here that we have moderate denial, that's a three to vote on council and then three to five with the mayor and council. That brings it up to $300,000 so an additional $50,000 for Greenway. And that would be planned to have each year over the next five years. So question would be that we put out to the floor, is there any discussion that we wanna have as of right now? It's in denial, but it's in that moderate area. So it was up for discussion if anybody wants to talk about it.

I mean, was personally, I was in favor of it to increase just because of all the positive responses that we're getting from the residents. I mean, I rarely do we do very much that gets a lot of accolades and, you know, from people just actually being on it to using them on a regular basis, we've had folks come and compliment us on it. We even have a special group outside of the town that has formed that's so excited about what we have. So, I mean, I to me, it just seemed like it was a no brainer to continue to grow it as opposed to limiting it.

Yeah, I think

I wanted to look at it slightly differently. Like if you think about it option two, you have three people that voted for option two and two people voted for option three. So, option three would en encompass option two, right? Yeah. So, those two people want at least 300,000 but they actually want even more. They want three fifty. So, you actually have five people technically for the 300.

Is that how you calculated that Brian?

The two that went three fifty are also counted as one in the 300 as well if you want three fifty then you want 300 as well is how I set this up.

Three people

was not willing to go up to three fifty but they're the same people.

They are the same people. Okay but those people should not then be counted in the unanimous approval they should be if there's three people there there should be the two fifty should be three four I mean four three

right well I looked at it as if you said yes to the three fifty then you are obviously okay with the two fifty as well so that was an automatic yes at any lesser amount if

That's you went with the higher a good point taken. Way I kind of interpreted it was I think think honestly the entire room is fine with $3.50 if we know what we're spending it on. I think the folks that were held back were like I'm good with the $2.50, I would be good with $3.50 if you can give me some more, what does that get us? So I think we can get there over the next year and say okay what would we do with another 50 or another 100 there I think we're all intuitively going yes greenways are good let's do more of that what does that really mean what am I giving up for it? So that that was kind of how I read it just looking at all the feedback from all the forms and and trying to kind of try and give it up.

I that's exactly right. Yeah. Mhmm. I also wanna point out that you know with this exercise we're trying to make it so that we don't go into deficit. So you know let's say I want this and this and this but then you know like I may have said no on something, but I know everybody else is gonna say yes, hopefully, and that will pass. Like the slide before, somebody said no on 8,000 for benches. I mean, they probably only said no because of the they're trying to make the numbers work and to say yes on something else so.

Are you

manipulating Brian's system, is that what you're telling I me know exactly. We all did the same thing.

Would have to I think you summed it up right because I didn't have enough intel to know what's the extra 54 is shovel ready or you just got to go out and find something to spend it on but if you have $300,000 worth of greenway that can be fueled and take flight in the next year like yeah sign me up but I didn't understand enough about it to know and then the second thing is there any grant money anything that goes along with this are we doubling our money if we're funding 300 is this 100 or is this all all us. Us? Yeah,

this is this is all us and it's mostly for that opportunity money. Right? We we we fund individual large projects in and of themselves. And then we are also spending $2.50 on things that come up throughout the year. Hey, can we connect these two sections?

Maybe we got a request. Maybe, you know, there's there's a development going in and and they get to a point where they've, you know, finished 80% of it and there might be a connector in between too. So we tend to do this couple it with other projects and this is really our creative Greenway money. Again backed why I kind of interpreted it that way, I think it's less defined but it is there's almost never matching funds with this we do get transportation greenway funds but that's usually with a defined project it's a multi year project. This is every year and and we put it to kind of the best projects that we can find.

How much did we spend last year? How much we actually spend?

It's a great question. I do not know.

$1.01 60 something like that. Yeah. And then we're probably 2 to $2.20 this year. Yeah. Okay.

So maybe should we leave it up to, let's say, if there is a good project or there is a good opportunity to use, like, a certain moment and connect certain streets or something like if you can still bring it up to us even if it goes over the whatever the allocated Yeah.

Yeah. We're happy to bring budget amendment if we have a project that that we feel strongly about. And also, you know, not to terrify everybody in the room, but we start doing this again from a staff standpoint in September. And and so we start building out justifications and and we'll be starting to take a look again in September on what would we do based on last year's budget process if we had another 50, if we had 100, what are the things that we have queued up, we're not doing now that that would accelerate. So I think we have a couple of opportunities to leave that at the two fifty and then bring those to you on a case by case.

Another question, when we have programs like that, like this or ADA or any other programs and there's a set number, do we kind of build in adjustment for inflation over time, especially if it's a construction, like if it was ten years ago, if it was February, I mean, shouldn't be that now. So, do we have some sort of, like, mechanism to increase that every year or no?

We have not historically done that with these couple. We've kind of set those hundred and two fifty and left them for a number of years, and then maybe in a process like this, it would jump 50,000 at one time, but but we have not indexed those typically.

Because I feel like, you know, we should probably think of that as well, especially when we know prices are going up so much.

I think Brian's one of his answers earlier was, you know, last year it was 150, 01/1980. I don't remember what you said. And then this year it's like $2.20. Next year, we're probably going to max out the $2.50. And when once you run up against that wall, that's when you kind of get into that scenario where we come back to the budget and we're okay. For years we've been building this program up, now it's at its max. Do we we start to allow some of its purchasing power to erode because of the inflationary pressures or do we index it up once at 50 and grow into that that next, you know, bucket of money. So, that's typically how we do these buckets projects they're a whole different animal.

So I'm hearing that everybody we're still on board with the two fifty but I think everybody has an appetite if there's something ready that you could come with a budget amendment and we would evaluate it.

Yep and we still get our benches. Okay

this is the second page of the capital here there's no consensus issues to talk about here but I did want to point out a few of these programs because there are a few more of the more high profile items that we have you'll see here the wayfinding signs phase two was unanimously approved. The Stallings Road roundabout artwork and landscaping that actually the RFP has gone out and so this will work out well in tandem when we get that we'll be able to get something turned around to you

pretty

quickly. We've got the Highway 49 and Roberta Road mitigation, the design piece of that. So that will have a strong approval on it. Harrisburg Common and streetscape here in front of Town Hall and along Main Street. This was a case where we had 700 requests up to 2,000,000 and that had a strong approval there.

Can we stop here for a second?

Yes, sir.

I mean, I was one of the nose on it because to me that seemed like it was a pie in the sky. We really didn't even other than we saw it in our retreat. Like, how can I go sign off on this amount of money? I don't know what I'm signing off.

Yeah. I mean, we have to go through

the same line. Like, I've talked to Rob about it at length.

Like

I'm willing to

say no to the whole budget on that.

Yeah. It it would have to go through design, but, you know, we we already have 700 now. And I think when we went through our retreat talking about what could we add to it when we talked about the historic features of it, The historic train or, you know, adding the the water features and really creating that downtown gathering place. You know, if this would have come back two to five or two to six in the opposite way, I'd agree with you. But I mean, did give handouts there.

We we gave, you know, concepts. I have more than I have. We can we can flip to them. But I think one of the one of the biggest drivers of this without a doubt when we went through our retreats and through the whole budget process, the number one priority on on this when we went through retreat when we had a budget workshops was investment in town and creating revitalization downtown and having, you know, foot traffic here and moving events here and really making sure that Main Street represents kind of for lack of a better term, just a gathering place, A center of town, I think councilman Fall had mentioned, you know, when you take a picture in Harrisburg, you want everyone that sees that picture to say, that's Harrisburg. And so this was that attempt to to increase above that.

Megan we can we can flip a bunch of slides

and we've had no in-depth conversation other than hey you like this that's great and then you know I would like to have at least some kind of consultation of is this going to cause future delays or further issues or I mean, one of the things that we learned when the bonds came forward several years ago for the parks was nobody wanted to write a blank check and while I see a design here, I'm very challenged by the idea of could be, maybe, we don't know. Let's explore. And for me to write that check to you and say, hey, sure, I'm on board. I'm not. I mean, I haven't seen enough on the paper.

I haven't seen enough research done even know that the numbers are even close.

I did not realize that this was it had already 700,000 and it was an increase to and I'm just looking at what my response was and I think I left it as yes but now that I'm seeing the details on it I'd like to say no on that as well could we

introduce understand blank check is scary. The idea that this would require approval, you know, more rigorous than just

I mean, honestly Chris, I don't know. Were you in favor of closing the road and putting all the grass down? What's flex? I couldn't tell you and and if you came to me as a resident and go, hey, what's this for? I couldn't tell you.

Yeah, I get that. I get 1,300,000.

I'm sorry. I can't I can't

prove that. I I I'm conceptually on board with the idea but the details need to be worked out before you just sign off on.

That's every $2,000,000

budget. Yeah.

There's not a single project in here that we're asking for money on. Yeah. That has full design.

Yeah. Think what that provides I'm I'm I'm on board. We need to do something. What the something is need some rigor.

I've seen more failed attempts for town center without lack of direction and we need more than just us to go do this. We need another partner and every single time we brought in a partner we've gotten close, they've walked away and there's a reason they walk away and it's not us. I know we have the capacity if we had a partner come in on this and work with us, we could get there. We we could find the money but to approve it now and and now we're going solo and hoping for the best.

Requires any participation.

I'm not asking for participant. What I'm saying is the effort that we're putting into this needs to be echoed by another partner coming in to do other things besides just this.

My opinion on this is that if you had no other partners, this in and of itself is an exceptional project for the town that we already utilize this area. Our our farmers market, our art walk, our trick or treat are all in this area. Not to mention the programming that parks has been asked in the parks master plan and that we've heard a bunch times through this comp plan process of what can we do downtown friday nights and saturday nights? Can we have singers songwriters? Can we can we have a gathering place down here?

We've had folks approach us with the the social district and the different events and tying the businesses up here at Roberta and moving everything downtown. So we don't, don't get me wrong, we don't have to do anything in

our center. You.

But for twenty five years and and I've been here 10 of those with Iran where I've seen the same thing. We're waiting for somebody to come in and do something. Maybe we'll partner with them. Maybe we won't. So, when it was the four acres across the street here that got right up to the finish line, then we pulled the rug.

Tony Zhang project right up to the finish line, we pulled the rug. We had the town center overlay right up to the finish line that doesn't go through. I don't know that this detracts from anything that that's going to come in. I also don't think it relies on anything that can come in. I do think it drives foot traffic.

I think it creates a gathering Harrisburg in general, our downtown is our park system. When we talk tonight and you know, the past four years time and time again, people are Harrisburg Park. They're on our greenways. They that that's where our folks want to gather. So, creating a park place for them to gather in your central business district similar to what Kannapolis has done with West 6th I think.

It's the name of the street but there's more lineal Concord has gone and redone their their downtown. We're in the fortunate position where we don't have to put a bunch of our businesses out of business in order to create this now. If we wait until everything's built up and we come back and say, well, now we're gonna make Main Street walkable and available for nightlife. I think you missed the opportunity. We can certainly put it off. That's that's not the point I'm making. I just think this does not tie to anything. This is something we can do on our own if we

want to. And so Ron, I've asked quite a few of those same questions the other day about where does our ownership of this property stop because that drove my decision for some of the same reasons. I'm not so worried about closing the road permanently and then when I talked to Rob about it that link like I think that that is pretty way to slow traffic in the area as well. So that part doesn't bother me. I I am and I don't know that I really agree with the examples of when we close the roads because that's temporary.

It's a couple hours on a Saturday or whatever. I mean the concern I still have the concern about what does it look like do we need to do something yes I don't want to be late to the game so it's just right in that line of

where we are on that.

And to be transparent we're in the planning phase of this now it's a matter of how far do we plan in the upcoming year. The council still has to approve renderings, you still have to approve an engineering contract, you still have to improve a construction contract. So there's plenty of opportunity to participate. These renderings exist only because I was frustrated with the renderings we've gotten so far.

So what's the 2,000,000 for?

I created these myself.

But what's the 2,000,000 for?

For what you see here a center courtyard. What you'll see kind on the edges there are swings like we have at Veterans Park, knee walls and retaining walls because we do want to have just some natural bench area for for folks to to sit. I think if you look at at these, the string lighting, the lamps, the natural vegetation that we have out there that's more like natural to North Carolina so that we could, you know, have our placards and and call out different plants. Obviously, you see the gazebo there that could serve as a stage or an entertainment area and a locomotive like you see at, is that Freedom Park? You can kind of see way back here on the other side and this really just becomes an area where the overhead none of this has to stay how it is like we have this logo and this water feature that can turn on and off.

This is inspired by Bergdell. They have a plaza that has water bubblers and fountains, but when they do concerts, just turn it off and you can just sit out there. So again, this this is imagination. This is the way we get there is just come up with a rendering. If that rendering says, hey, that's worth, you know, some some further investigation. How much can we realistically spend out here? The $2,000,000 came from doctor Banks and I's conversation at the retreat. We said, is this realistic? I said, yes, within two years and under 2,000,000, but you're gonna have to put some money towards it to have that type of momentum to move forward with it. These things things do take some some momentum.

So, I guess I got a question just for clarification because I think we need to do something, alright? For our downtown area. So, the 2,000,000, what will the 2,000,000 get us like what does that look like you know is that the rendering is that a redo of the renderings that you did like is that like you know getting you know

2,000,000 is like construction and everything that's what that's what we have in here.

I mean, that will for me, I think that, you know, our community wants that and to see some kind of movement, right, is is needed. Like, I don't know if it looks like this, right? But if we have someone who specializes in this and can do something really nice, I think it will add value to to what we already offer it for our account, you know? And so I just wanna be clear, like it's not just we're not spending $2,000,000 still imagining, right, like in this hypothetical it has to be something that's real.

This is the rough site overlay that our staff has come up with, we spent a lot of time, we have every department working on this project because we do think significant to look at all of these features. So, you know, where that gazebo is at, where that water feature is at, where the shade structures are at, where the swings are at, knee wall, know, Jim Spina came up with the arch. I don't remember when the train first came up,

but

it, you know, that was something it was like, wow, you know, we we constantly talk about our heritage and our history and our lack thereof. But I really don't think there is a lack thereof here. It's just telling our story hasn't been done for a long time. Harrisburg has been here in name and in incorporation for fifty two years. But as a as Harris Depot and as a significant historical area, it's been here for two fifty three hundred years and was one of our first rail stops on westward expansion.

So, you know, leaning into that, I do think it's significant in telling that story and when we go back and look at some of our archives there, there is significant stories to tell. So, that has been one of our focus that's been pushed on staff is that, we want to define who we are. We want to make sure that we have art and culture and those things. So the Farm Mill, the historic farm Mill project, this and adding to our other parks have all been thought about in that way. I I know what you're saying, Councilman Smith, because I've been here the same time where some of these projects just go and

Let me finish that. Mhmm. Because I certainly didn't come a little bit. I've got time on my side on this one. Veterans Park, free piece of land, that's development. Let's turn into Veterans Park. Dollars 7 and 50,000, we'll get it done. Grew to like 1.2. Then guess what? What we just did?

We refurbished it because we found that it was done differently than what it should have been done. We're we start on this and we're gonna go down the same path we have yet to build a project consistently through first phase that works. We always have to go back. We always have to expand. We always have to do more.

I don't I would want if if this is something that we would pursue, I want more understanding of what it is. I mean, you're telling me, you showed us those slides in the retreat and I'm like a train I never heard of a consensus of everybody was on board I didn't know we were taking a vote I took it away as oh this is something we could shoot for or discuss at a later date. When this showed up on the budget, I mean and I clearly wrote in my notes, if this is what I think it is, count me out and and I still say, if this is what I think it is, count me out because we've not done enough work on our end as a council to fully bring this back to the residents and be 110% in and go, we know better than you on this. I don't think.

Is there an intermediate step that that you think is?

I think there needs

to be more discussion and you know, feedback from the residents as well. You're getting ready to make a huge commitment to an area. I mean, you this community here has been very vocal throughout the years. I don't know where they are today, how vocal they are. They may take it and enjoy it but then again, they may come back and go, you know what? This is too much we're you know I don't know what they're gonna say.

I would be surprised if they didn't like a park.

So I appreciate where you're coming from because I mean I feel like you're listening to mine and Rob's conversation about this but in hearing you say those things it makes me think about two things our parks plan was very clear that people want more parks and also want to see something happen in town center. And let me be clear, I was a very strong note to this. But as I have talked to Rob through this and just listening and talking through it more tonight, I'm kinda leaning in a teeny bit. But I wonder if this is an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone and understand that your concerns are absolutely valid that things have not been done well historically. We are very confident in the staff that we have here for everything else and I don't know if these are the I doubt these are the same people that were here.

It doesn't even have anything to do with the staff but government works the lowest bid.

Right. Right. No, hear you on that and and I don't think but even with that considered the projects that have come forth, I don't think of the shoddy projects. So, I think that if they if there is an intermediate step step and I'm not a 100% what that looks like I think that we would miss an opportunity to try and give it a go.

Rob I think original 6 or 700,000 was allocated only because we got that free ARPA money, we had to use it and we said okay, there was this project up in the clouds that we were thinking about, Lee, I think you mentioned that like you wanted to do something around town center for a while. So, that's how that original money was allocated. I don't know if any of us envisioned that we're just going to like spend so much money on that. And then as far as people, you know, using it and enjoying it, to me, it seems like so much money for a small space that's I don't know it's just very hard to swallow.

I mean and I think that there's also so again everybody's clear I said no to this but now I'm like thinking it through if we do this then does that drive an opportunity to help Ryan when we're trying to drive the economic development? You don't know.

Guess I know that they're gonna throw money on it that's what doesn't make sense.

That's why I said I would I'd be a buyer if we this was our part in having another partner there if this is what we were going to do and they were going to do bring in this building and that building and develop this and develop that 110 I'm in because I've seen every presentation but to do this and we hope that it turns into something better.

Maybe we need to push this to next budget and for now like get Ryan's input get those folks around here input like what people want to see instead of like us trying to, like, just come up with something and just rush to pass it through. Like, can we just move it out of this budget and put it to the next years for now and kind of wrap our brains around what it's gonna be?

I can do anything that you all tell me to. Six out of the 80 has said let's move forward with it. I'm I'm I'm I'm

going no.

So Right.

Yeah. She was a no. Flipped back. So now

it's still it's still six.

So are you flipping yes

to your son?

I don't know. Let's circle

back. I don't know where I am right now.

So Even at five three, like, we just need a clear direction. You know, from a staff standpoint, hear invest in Town Center, do some things that that bring people down here. Let's have more events down here. Let's do all that. Ryan is in every single meeting that we went through, we've talked about the opportunities here with the 1st Floor Of Novant being vacant, the different businesses that would want to locate in there next to this, you know, we've we've had lots of different economic from a staff standpoint, we've we have vetted it. What the top end number is, we've got to bid it to to your point. This could be a million dollars. I don't it's not going go over 2. That's our that's our top cap. We still have several steps to get there.

If we're not comfortable going to those next steps, then we're not comfortable. But, you know, we're giving our best effort to bring you guys things to say, is this something that you're comfortable with? Up until this point, the only way we've been able to describe it to you is with words. I've walked it with a few people. I thought this conversation might happen at this meeting. So I'm like, let me get something visual so we can at least understand what we're talking about. And then if, you know, if the council doesn't wanna do it, we don't we don't go any further. Again, tonight's approval doesn't say, hey. We're gonna also approve all the contracts along the way. If the community doesn't like this or people in this room aren't comfortable with it, don't do it.

There's enough dialogue to say that not everybody's on the same page. It wasn't I mean, LT made her comment. Latricia, you've made your comment. I've made mine and we all seem to have something here or there, but we don't have everything. And and I think for me, it just felt like I was committed to something that I didn't really understand that I was committed to. Just based on, oh, do you like that? Yeah. You're on board. No. I'm not on board.

I wanna have more discussions. I wanna understand what is there ramifications? I mean, I think we just need to have more discussions around this and see where everybody really truly sits on.

Is your concern more about the road being closed?

My concern is the whole project in general. Okay. I I mean, we have too many residents today that go line by line through budgets and go, what the heck? Why'd you get on board with this? I can't tell em why I got on board because I didn't get on board because I'm not a fan of it. I'm not a seller of it. And I I for the life of me can't give them a reason that we should be supporting them.

Mhmm.

Other than oh it sounds great. We've got a roundabout up there we really need to focus on and whatever money we're gonna need I'd rather see us get all that stuff taken care of let's come back and take care of our own once we get all that worked out because could be that we would need this road. I don't know. Mhmm. And the road really has no bearing to me one way or the other.

It's more of this town center has sat for far too long. I get it but we need another player in the situation because we clearly can't buy the land. We've tried that and it went from 12,000,000 to 13,000,000 to crazy numbers. My ask is, let's take some, let's take a step back and let's walk through a little bit more and have some real heavy discussions on what's in, what's not in, what ramifications does this cause, How how long are we looking at for the roundabout? All those pieces.

Roundabout's a funded separate project.

I understand it's funded in a separate but we have yet to work through it from a perspective of what does it do to our traffic. Is this gonna be needed? I don't know.

Are you

always telling residents to avoid 49, right? We tell them to go down Harris through Harrisburg Estate to whatever you hold Harrisburg to to avoid going down 49 to avoid all traffic. This is one of your major major arteries of folks cutting through. You know, they're coming from over there to go to McDonald's, to going to Aldi's, going to whatever. I mean, I had the same conversation with my daughter. She's like, don't close the road and I was like, the road is the least concern. I said, because you've got whatever that is, Physicians Boulevard in front. You can go that way.

Yeah. There's plenty of other

streets. How would you?

Mike, did you want to say something?

I just, I mean for me I voted no on this because I wasn't at a retreat but I didn't have I

think I was I was ready to approve

the 700 to go through this actually 1.3. Is this something we think we're going to be able to do in the next year? Or is this something we could go ahead with the 700,000? Do the pre work that we're talking about to get more information on what this is actually going to cost us come back next year budget meeting and say this is what we're this is what we're looking at for that for the information that you're looking for. Is this something we can budget for next next year and that that increase? That's that was the reason for my note.

And and so that the answer is yeah, we can we can do those in in steps. The the only reason that we have the the the larger number here is that we've gotten the feedback in the previous years that, you know, don't don't give me partial numbers. Right? Tell me what you think this is gonna be because we don't wanna come back in with a second phase or third phase. So, you know, let me know if this is gonna be a $5,000,000 project.

Don't just tell me the engineering is gonna be 500,000. And then we do 500 and then we come back another year and say, well, we need another 4 and a half, Mike, because you already spent the 5. So the short answer is I think you can move forward with a design on a bigger project with the money that's already allocated. I just don't I don't wanna get in a situation with you all where we've designed something that's not fundable. Not to say you have to fund it now, but I think you need transparency on

it

that, like, if if 700 is our kind of top line number, it's not this. Right? We're doing a different style of project at that number than something something you see here. 700, we're gonna we're gonna do some sidewalks. We're gonna put street lights up. We're gonna we're going to do the the minimal. There's not a train, the water feature, those types of things. But if we want to go with a more Harrisburg style park where, you know, people coming to Harrisburg, they know what they expect. I think this is is more in tune with that branding. But yeah, we can we can certainly do it in steps and we would do it in steps like that regardless.

I don't think we could construct this in a year. Right? And we're not going to be going to construction in the spring of next year.

And I think when when I removed that out, that money went to capital reserves.

I think on on mine. So, I think

that money was still put back for if we have these discussions next year if we come back and have some plans and have it drawn up or we had to do we can approve the the documents for research we can do that in a 700,000 that that was my

partner that was

comes in play.

I'm going hold my breath on the partnerships but but yeah, we can certainly that that can certainly be a method if the if the full board wants to go that route, we can go that route. We can pause it completely. We can move forward with the whole thing. It's this is really just a board decision. We're capable of doing all of those things.

I I think what I'm hearing is we want more information. I get that. I don't know if we regret Veterans Park as much as we regret not getting it right the first time and learning from that mistake. But I think if anybody looks back, even though we had to refurbish it, I was so proud of Veterans Park. I didn't have to live through all the history of doing it.

No, I mean, I and please understand my words were I regretted it. It was it was a free part. It was a free piece of land donated by the developer. We were like you know we had talked about having veterans back here why not have it there but a lot of things went wrong and it was people were like oh well we got to have it opened by veterans everybody looked at timelines and everything else so now we're rushing and then we're doing poor work along the way plus we're taking the lowest bidder and again the people that were involved are no longer here so I'm not you know, contaminating any of our staff. I'm just saying that we don't have the best history and and if you go back to Rob makes the comment that we had the developer want to build phase one but he wouldn't commit to phase two and I forget that was after what's his name's plan?

This was the Kannapolis builder. We were going to do something, you know, we wanted to get them to commit to something in town center, some type of artwork or whatever and this is what I'm talking about when you have a partnership and they're coming in to do their stuff these are the things that we can offer them we're going to do to enhance their product and their work as opposed to we're just going to go for it and hope somebody else comes in so.

But but how long have we been waiting on a partner?

The same amount of time. Well that's my point right

so it's like I don't but but what

I'm The issue is greater than just the partner.

No but I'm just asking.

The issue is the landowner plays games and the landowner refuses to negotiate. We've seen it three times over that he changes the deal even the the deal where the town was going to loan the developer money he changed the interest rates and he changed the agreement two days before the deals go through.

So Ron, do you think that

this could potentially attract people to town center but you're worried about what the landowner's going to

do? No. Well there's a time and a place for it and right now is not the time nor the place. I think if you had a developer in the wings that was looking to come in and do whatever else and we were talking about this it would be the time and be the place right now I mean we could have six more minekeys stuck here we don't know it's whatever the landowner decides he wants to

do So this is just for the additional 1.3. And

what about businesses perspective on closing this road completely? The more I think about it, it seems that it would be nice to have that open and only close it periodically for events.

The businesses we've talked to love this idea. This gives their patrons because they're all different types of businesses. They give them something to do other than just come to their business. Right? So if you're coming down to Rocky River Coffee, right now, you can sit at Rocky River Coffee. With this, you can then walk down here with your ice cream or your coffee and read a book on a swing under a tree near a water fountain and enjoy.

But are people prepared to pay 2,000,000 for it? That's what we're gonna do. Because I feel like we're gonna be

Only you guys can answer

that question.

Well, what what what was

I don't remember our comp on the comprehensive plan, what did people say about this? Let's go back to the data. What did this they they wanted? I don't remember right on.

Think so.

Yeah. The woman devil

is in the details.

Oh, yeah, it is.

People said they wanted Greenways and everybody voted against increasing the budget that that number was there ten years ago. So, we're obviously not listening exactly.

No, because of last year, we spent what? $2,100, what did you say?

$1.60.

$1.60. And this is what? What was that? 300?

300. Yeah.

2 yeah. So, I mean, the money's there. So, I don't see that. I don't think that's an issue but what I'm saying is that we always talk about the data and and what the people want, right? What they've said, they've said they want it. This is our effort in doing that, right? Just like the parks, just like, you know, increasing what we do for fourth of July and all the other things like we don't want to listen to them over here, but not over here. Like, and I personally don't think people want to wait until a partner comes before we do something because then we'll just be waiting for maybe an infinite amount of time. So then we, wait, wait. So then do we not address, like do we not, like, it's kind of like, and I get it.

And to Ron's point, I don't want us to waste money doing things twice what the saying says measure once cut twice or something like that once. Measure twice cut once. So like we don't want to waste money because they're really going to be met right so we just got to make sure we work out the details and get it right but I think when it becomes right and it's something like this, people are going to enjoy it. You know, yeah, are we going to be inconvenienced? Probably.

But I think it will be a nice thing and it will tell the community, we heard you and we are working towards doing what we said that you wanted and so yeah.

My take on it, this may be a great thing but I feel like there's a recession coming. There's going to be a drop. So, you know, like Farm ington, they planned it ten, fifteen years ago and then, the drop happened and now, it's finally starting to come back around. We may be planning this and doing this but then, there maybe there won't even be any mining coming in. There was not going to be much development. We don't know. So, I don't know if I'm prepared to allocate this much to this when we have a lot of other needs.

Can I have one thing and and I like, look, I'm I'm in favor of this? I I don't know if you could spend $2,000,000 if you're like, spend it on it in a fiscal year, so that takes care of some of that. But maybe a public workshop where people came in and we said, here are three designs, what do you think, get on board, I like this, I don't like that. It was funny when I was coming in here tonight, there were kids out there playing in an open field, and they were just, you know, I think I use that analogy, don't build the sidewalks until you see for the paths are worn down. They're telling us they want to play right outside of this town center. There's nothing out there now, a gazebo.

Yeah. There's kids

up there playing. I know which field you're talking about, Rucker. Well, we don't own that land. So, if someone comes in, they can build something and you think you want no kids kicking balls around here?

But doesn't it have to look just like this this was brought in this was rock right we're get someone you know no no I'm just saying yeah this is gonna be something a little bit more sophisticated then

and I looked at the looked at the map

I feel like everybody liked it until I drew this

This looks beautiful, but I looked at the map and this space is smaller than the Veterans Park. So it's like, it's a that's a small space. Like, I I don't think there's gonna be as much of

a use of it for the light. I'm looking

through this lens of if we all woke up fifteen years from now and we look back and say, boy, I wish we'd never done that. I can't imagine a scenario unless it was a road thing or an Indian burial ground or a radioactive field or so, I can't imagine we would say, I wish we hadn't done that.

Yeah but all you do is blocking the road and spending money you can do that next year the year after the year after it's not like somebody will sell the road from under you.

Yeah but we haven't and this is us and this is our moment.

So what does 700 get us right now? Is that we already that's already in the

So I think we have I think we have three options and, you know, we've we've had what I think now sounds like a a five to three with five wanting to pursue this three not. I think we have three options. We have the 700 and we can just, you know, do street lights, plant some more trees, kinda do the best we can up and down, leave the road open, and talk about this at some other time or just never do it. We also can just move ahead with, say, let's allocate up to 2,000,000, go into design, start doing some things, and and we, for the most part, like this, but we'd like to see the public come in and comment on it, or we'd like to give you some suggestions. I think that the third option somewhere in between those is to say, let's use the 700 pursuing a concept like this and come back for the additional amount once we have a concept we're we're all on board with.

So I really think you you either abandon this type of concept and just stick with what we have. You go full boards acts like this or that middle ground that you know, Councilman Devin is going mention. Can we just start the design, start the public engagement and then see what type of money we have, and then we can make a decision. Hey, do we wanna go more or less? Whatever. Maybe it's more specific. Maybe this comes in at

1,000,000,

and everybody feels a lot better. Maybe it prices out much higher, and you don't.

I like the third option and I'm bullish on this because if this were New York City, this would be our Central Park and people would come get their wedding picture out here, take a picture of their dog and say this was Harrisburg and this is where, you know, I got my ice cream and proposed to my girlfriend and you know, all of that. We there there's no place to go. I mean, we're getting there Farmville and other places but, it gives us character and it's lasting. And if you take $2,000,000 it sounds like a lot of money. But if the life of this park is one hundred years, that's $2,000

a year.

I pay $2,000 a year for this for the last time.

This space is so small. There's going to be so many people there. Nobody's going to come take pictures there because there's gonna

be I don't know. I took my daughter's wedding pictures in Concord because they have a little garden that's a heck of a lot smaller than this, and I drove over there.

Yeah. But Concord is huge, and they have a lots and lots of parks, and they're empty. Have you seen like it's going to look like, you know, like the playground in Harrisburg Park like there's going to be people there all the time which is

not necessarily a bad thing.

If we if we if we do more of them though, we hope to get them spread out. Right? So, if we if we do Historic Farm Mill, if we do this, if we keep adding to to Farm Mill Park, if we do a Southern park, and then we, you know, continue to to do the improvements we've done to Harrisburg Park. The hope is that all the new people that move here aren't overcrowding the existing facilities. I I think it is hard to to look at something from a conceptual, even if it's just me drawing it, and say, yes, I'm I'm fully on board with that. I just think it's that we're in that, you know, we're in that twilight zone of a project where it's like we either

Invest in it.

We you know, what we design next, we really need to know how much effort we can go in. There's no sense designing something if we wanna spend 500,000 versus 5,000,000. Those are completely different instructions that we would give the engineering firms.

And, Rob, can you revisit what your third option again was?

Yeah. So the the first two were just don't do it or go full board. The third was pursue this concept but not settle on that on that 2,000,000. So go ahead and say let's spend the 700 on engineering with this concept concept in in mind, mind, but we're gonna get feedback from the council and the community.

Mhmm. Yeah.

And Okay. Before we set a dollar amount.

Now, the only irony about all of this, and I'll hear councilman Smith on this, we're gonna make unreasonable landlords land more valuable next door whether he likes it or not. It will be a magnet. I'm telling you. But it might not take for two years or three years or five years. It's like, oh, I wanna be next to that park. So 12,000,000 is about 20,000,000.

Well it's not we've recognized we're not the buyer. When he went over 12 you know we're not a player in that space so it could lure that partner in I get that but you know for me it was twelve years 12 budgets one I didn't support so I'm eleven and one I'll go twelve and two on this I'll hold my vote this year on this one if we leave it where it is today.

If we were to do it

with a third option I'd be willing to switch to a yeah for this one.

What does everyone think of the third option? I'm a yeah.

I'm a yeah. I'm a yes. We need to evaluate, reevaluate whether we want to close the road or not but that in front of people and have them waiting on that. So that's part of thought

that was part of

is that

Part of the study.

Yeah. That's part of this part

of the Third of document. Yeah.

So we would present them, I'm assuming, some designs, but some designs would have to have a road open so that people

would I don't think there's a design that has a road. We can do it now with the road open with what we have. I I I really think you always council always reserves the right to say we've heard from the public. We did this with Parallel Road when we talked about one way streets and the public came out and said, don't like that. And we said, fine, we won't do the project.

Council always reserves the right to say we're not gonna do a project up until we do the project. But I don't I mean, it's an exercise in futility saying do we want the road open or not? If you either do or you don't, I I think that's that's up to this board. And we've talked about it ad nauseam about whether or not we blow open side streets in order to get people up and down roads. But honestly, if we're gonna have anything on Main Street, whether the roads open fully or not, that's gonna be a slow road.

You're gonna be going 15 miles an hour through here if we're gonna have people walking on the sides of the streets and dining and crossing the streets. We get multiple complaints now. You guys get these complaints up at Fincher Church and Percent where people are almost getting hit because cars cut through here and they try to go too fast and they don't feel like the lighting is out. But truth is there's just a lot of people out enjoying themselves at that intersection and that pedestrians and cut throughs don't mix.

I mean, I would love to see something like this at the train station to be honest as opposed to right here. But, you know,

don't think I'm

from there.

I don't think you can.

I don't I

don't think this this doesn't prohibit you from doing other parks throughout town. I think the point of this is, do you want something in your town center or not? And if we don't, that's easy. You just don't. If we do, then we gotta decide what does that look like? And I think your point is fair. Like you're not willing to to put a number at this point. You don't know if it's 2,000,000. You're out. You're not a blank check. That's a that's a fair assessment. But the the idea of, you know, are there are they mutually exclusive with other parks or should the road be open or should it not? I think that's something that Yeah. But it's just a view decision.

Money is finite. You know? We can build another park. What about something like that? It'd be nice next to wherever our future library will be located?

And the hope is that it'll

be here. Would hope Right? Would hope to

have If that's the case, then we can I

would hope to have an

adjacent in conjunction with

And so that was maybe that's the missing piece for you because that was it for me? I know that the hope has always been well, not always, as of late, been to bring the library here.

Yeah. When we've been negotiating with the county on Mhmm. Town Center Library relocation for a few years. They've had some hiccups that have taken them away from the negotiating table, but, that remains our our position.

I just want say great job on the drawing.

Thank you, Mike.

Yeah, they're not. This

is this is this would attract people to town. I mean I think we're looking at economic development. I think it would be it would be something I went to a little place in Houston and they had not really similar but they had businesses all around the field kind of in the middle and there were people out there kids playing soccer it was a turf but it was it was it was a nice area in between the businesses I Is this something we think we can get done next year?

I mean, that's what I was looking at

was this is the twenty seventh budget.

We we we have money now. So, we're kind of at a pause thinking do we do we go forward or not? If this is approved as a concept in this budget, our next step would basically take consultants that we've already hired, give them this concept and say, design it, get me some pricing, let's start taking this back, you know, through the through the ship. So, yeah, we can move as quickly as we want to on it. But we have to have consensus on it.

Right? And if if there are problem areas with it, let's workshop that and and figure it out. We certainly don't wanna do anything that the board or the community doesn't want to do. I think our plans that we've looked at with the comp plan and the parks master plan, all the elements in here are reflected in there. They didn't say, I want it between town hall and no Those aren't that specific. But all of the elements that we see in here are pulled straight from our plans and and reflected. So I know the community supports having these types of things. Is it here? Does it fit the board's vision and all that? That's up to you all but we can get it done quick if we want to get done quick.

Mike to your point and Ryan you weren't here so I don't feel a dart on this Veterans Park. Wonderful park. We were going to have a restaurant sitting next door. You have a restaurant that would overflow. They would come into the park. Great space. Kids could play while they're on the wait blah blah. We got Panda Express and Chase Bank. So, while you're waiting on your deposit, go hang out at Veterans Park. While you're waiting on your Chinese, go hang out at Veterans Park and and that's some of the stuff where I'm at in all of this is don't get me wrong.

A reasonable concept, we can certainly go there. I didn't feel like there was enough conversation and I've seen other things in town go sideways and goodness gracious, I don't know that I'll see people walking out of Panda Express going to Veterans Park or stroll around. I

have no retort for any of those things. I think some people in this room have heard me talk talk to some of our developers within the past few weeks and say, almost identical language to what you just said in another location.

But I

think that's different.

It's something more it feels more memorial. But

it was sold to us just like we are here now. The same way. It's gonna be great. We're gonna have a restaurant. We're gonna have this. We're gonna have that. Fast forward. We got Panda Express. I I have no bones with Panda Express. I have no bones with Chase. But what I'm saying is.

It's the medical.

It started out amazing.

In front of us. The smell.

But you know what? I'm thinking as you were talking like when I go to not to like your spotlight Burtville but I am. Like when you go there, they have that open space. They have the shops. You walk. You can spend a day there. You know what I mean? And if it like, imagine if we can do that here. Like we can leave our dollars here and we can and then when because when people start coming out, the businesses are gonna come. It may not be overnight but at least it gives some momentum even in Farmington, even bringing Dario there is bringing more stuff over there.

Chick fil A is probably upset but it's, you know, it's bringing some it just a it's a different energy, you know, and I haven't been here as as much as as long as some of you all, but it feels different, right? And it feels like we're going in the right direction because there are folks who come from New York and and different places, California, you know, like, do y'all have to offer? This is a start in in my opinion in in in that direction and hopefully, it'll bring the momentum and the businesses and the partners to that space. You know, and so, I just think I just think and it and it also answers the question the or the survey that the the the folks said that they wanted, right? And but again, measure twice, cut once, okay?

We want to make sure we get it right. We don't want to spend any unnecessary money doing this again and I I I I envision people going to these places, bubbles or whatever and then hanging out at the park right here in our community.

Yeah. I think it's leaving it better than we found it. Yeah. I mean, it's. Yeah. It's a cool project but I don't know if the five three is enough for you guys.

No you are. Anybody? We moved to 6 2.

Well I think we have one.

Oh because she shifted I'm sorry

I'm sorry.

But to to councilman Thevenin's position of, hey, pursue the design. Let's wait on a construction number. You know, as a as a third option, is there anybody anybody dead set against that? I know.

Listen, I think

councilman Patel's is I like there's a lot more that she'd like.

Councilman Smith on board somehow. What would it take to get you? Because I your your wisdom is ringing in my ears. Let's not make a mistake and I don't want to make a mistake. Like I said

there's only been one budget that I said no to and I have written with everybody all the way through the last ten years except for that one. And this one when I saw that I was like no this is absolute dead deal to me

so

and it's because we as a council haven't done our due diligence we basing it simply on that's a great photo great concept that doesn't constitute I get

it I get it I

think it hits the survey though I mean I feel like

that's what so did as Paltine said so did the greenways and we pooh poohed on those.

Well we

didn't I don't think We haven't

really been allocating a lot of resources we haven't really there hasn't been really big push from like the council onto the employees to push those further, you know. This just seems like, I thought 700,000 was going to cover, you know, beautifying this area. But if you are gonna use all of 700,000 just to do like the the design work?

No. Understand it will

be that way.

My my thought you're going to use part of that for the design fees you're still going to have some my thought was I don't want to go ahead and put in the budget the extra 1.3 for something that we don't have

any we don't know I mean it

could be $5,000,000 to do I'm probably not

but we

just we don't know and that was my my push back on it was I wasn't sure I I didn't have enough and I put that on exercise. I just didn't have enough to know, I mean, how how can I justify another one? Three? We don't even know what that looks like. If we're just doing the budget for this year, that's to me that's that's what we're this is the 2027 budget right and it's what are we looking at I

mean are we going to go

ahead and allocate $2,000,000 for this

Yeah.

And and Chris, you know, and and for those who weren't here for the the bond though. The reason the park bond failed was because it was presented. We wanted X amount of money and there was no list what we were doing, how we were doing, anything else and everybody came back and said, I'll be damned. I am not writing you a blank shot. Yeah, that's fair. And here again, I can't explain it. I, all I can say, oh, it's a concept. We're gonna explore 2,000,000. Maybe that gets it. It might be 6,000,000. It might be half 1,000,000. I don't know and I don't feel comfortable answering those questions when presenting a resident.

So, if we had the 700 as is, which we have the 700 to do the exploratory, you could always come back and say, well, turns out it's 1.9, we've done a survey, everybody's good, counseled you on board, we can say yes or no, up or down, you come back and say it's 5,000,000, we all say, no, you know, that's gonna be a no for us, it's harder than we thought. There's utility lines or something we didn't anticipate. But I don't like the idea of another year going by and another year But going then work on

the 700 that you've already got.

We've got the 700 but I I think what Rob has done is say, it's not 700. If you keep on this path, it's going to be up to 2,000,000. So, that's sort of full disclosure. It's not a government plan that keeps on giving. It's like 2,000,000 could probably get it done.

You know, we're we're at a fork in the road on the on the concept. You know, are

we

closing the road and doing a signature downtown, know, Harrisburg Common or are we beautifying the exterior edges and calling it a day? It's not 700, you know, generally rule of thumb 10 to 15% per design fee. So you would expect a $2,000,000 project to have, you know, 200 to 300 in complete design. So, yeah, we have that in the 700, but we don't wanna go and spend $200 on a concept that everybody so when we send it out to you, it'd be like, oh, that's a terrible idea.

So if we leave the 700 in and we come back and it's 2,000,000 and we've done customer surveys and we're on board with it. I mean, is that reasonable

to leave

the 700 in, keep knowing that we've got an aiming price of 2,000,000 for whatever design that we do the company, the customer survey. We bring the citizens in, we do renderings, we show them concepts, and then we could say.

It's a very reasonable. I think that's what counts with evidence suggestion

was. Yeah.

But I'm not sure if it's an all or nothing proposition with the with the road being open or project in general pursuing it. And I think that's where we're that's where we're at right now is are are we gonna are we even comfortable spending any money on design and renderings and and public involvement because

think we need to.

That's what our

people have

asked for. I

think we're doing a disservice by not looking into that.

Obviously.

I'm still for three because to that point and I don't know that I mean I'm kind of torn on the survey but because I feel like we do a ton of those.

We know we got a lot of data what people want.

Still looking forward with that I

mean I think that this is just this is getting us more information being informed on what happened we're to vote on this.

We would still have an open house kind of like we've done before. That's what I'm not I

think the most impact you know somebody might not drive over from Camelot to see this but somebody back here may weigh in and they may be less positive or something I don't know but I think we and if 12 people show up alright you were heard we send out a survey. So

that's what I envisioned yes

we didn't just have a concept drawing We actually put money towards getting the research done. How does somebody design that? I mean, he did it pro bono. I mean, that was that was part of the process.

Yeah. I think, wasn't it?

Yeah. But concepts are, you know, public involvement summary is part of that process for that project. That's that was further along than

this is

and we're just in the infancy of this. We're either gonna do public involvement with something like this or we're just gonna do the edges. We've we've never really went and said, hey, are we on board with something like this? The the first time we talked about this was in the retreat, of whether or not now I've talked about with select folks on what if we closed it and what if we, you know, had an open field out here. But as a group, that's the first time where we're able to get any anything from our consultant to

you

to look at and say, you know, what if we put something here, put something there. So, yeah, I think that is normally part of the process. We're just we're early on

on this one.

I'll be honest, when I first looked at that, I thought it was back here. Mhmm. Yeah.

That's what

I thought. It's because the gazebo was right there

and we still have

So I think I'm hearing you need to have seat.

I I think it's fine, and it closing the road may be fine, but let's just not kid ourselves. This is a small little area. Like, let's say, Veterans Park, there's, like, three families, and then it looks comfortable. But, you know, you're going to have a bunch of people come in, and it's just too small to be any sort of meaningful park. It's just going to be a small, little, pretty area. So let's not, like, over blow it and spend too much money on it.

Alright. Well, we're ahead of schedule. Plenty of time tonight. So we can I'm just kidding. We're we're we're on page four of 36. So we're gonna go ahead and back up Gideon.

A few.

And Oh, try.

And that wasn't another one of the items that was.

No, we were here. It's we didn't even get to the to the strong denial one here. This is the one that I just wanna bring this to your attention. Strong denial, so we we didn't fund it. However, I think this is one that is our fault, and I think the criticism that Councilman Smith gave us on that one better pointed on this one because we really haven't talked about emergency generator for this building in any deep capacity.

It's just kind of one off. This isn't one of those kind of fun, you know, flashy capital projects that we're always, you know, doing renderings and talking about. This is more of a issue with town hall where as we've had these emergency events, as we get larger and larger staff with more and more people at town hall, we can't operate through like the ice storm that we had. Guess it was a couple months ago mid January when we had Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, we're were down for without electric there for several days. When we have that situation, there are some folks that can work remote, but we just need to either be okay with closing operations when we have hurricanes or ice storms or things like that or we're gonna have to have backup power at this building. I think, you know, we've we've had we're continuing to go through and and look at costs on on this. We'll do that, and we'll come back to you at some point with a fine number, and you're more than welcome to say no then. I just want everybody to have

I was actually on board

with that. Yeah. I just want everybody to have two eyes.

Back to the good graces. Drinking game.

I just want everybody to have clear eyes on what that that is. When when the power goes out, we just we're we're just gonna send

folks home until

we have a generator. There's no real way for us. We can what's that?

Thousand dollars buys a lot of candles.

That's true. It just it doesn't run one drive, and that's the that's the difficulty we have. So we do send a a handful of folks over to John's building at Public Works where we have generators. So we can keep continuity of operations going, but it's a skeleton crew. And so if we really wanna have full operations, which our customers do expect, I mean, they call in and the phones are dead because there's no power to them and everything is voice over IP now. So, you know, as long as we're okay with that scenario, that's fine. We'll get better numbers on this. It's not in the budget, and I'm not gonna waste any more time on it. And I'm gonna let Lee get back to

Trust me.

Yeah. He said, I told him. Remember you guys said Lee does quicker meetings?

Well, to be fair, Lee wasn't talking.

He got you there.

Alright so this part gets into the what we call the word cloud and just as a point of reference to anybody that 's here that's not familiar with it, these work clouds are just a culmination of a bunch of different projects that have come in from surveys, from talking internally, from residents. It's just kind of a, truly is a work cloud where we've thrown all this stuff there. None of this is in the budget. So this is purely putting it out. We do this every year.

Put it out to counsel and just get some feedback to see if there's any of these projects that have moved up into the level of wanting to take them on. You'll see there most there was no on this page, there was none that rose to level of any type of consensus to do any of them. But I did just want to point out, you'll see there's five here that had low interest. So a little interest going into it. We have the fire station, one in admin preliminary design, a community space or the community center space, the historic train, the let's see, the outdoor activities and the basketball let's see, is the basketball court?

Yeah, basketball courts. And then we have down here towards the bottom, this open green space natural area. So again, nothing rose to a level of moving it into the list, but wanted to point those out. Another page of these, a couple of things here. Again, we had no areas of consensus to move forward until we get down on the bottom. We'll talk about that here in just a second. Business incentives. Pain, gum, I did it again. I'll get a hang of one of these studies. That's all.

I had it for years. The business incentives and the site ready EDC had one vote of interest. And then we have the start to tree canopy down at the bottom. At the very bottom, though, you'll see the one area that we got a four-three under council, four-four with mayor and council vote was to increase the facade grant funding to 100,000. Again, this is 50,000 is what we've historically had in this account.

And that 50,000 is actually in the budget. So this is just bringing up the question, do we want to bring it up to 100,000? Right now, pretty much this program is if any of the businesses that qualify want to come in and ask us to start that process, we will do it. But we don't physically go out and put a big effort into going to these businesses and putting it out to them. This would be part of that to take a more active role in working on the facade areas around town. So any discussion that we want have on that?

Scared to ask? Scared to ask.

I think

it is.

I'm in support of this. When we saw, I think the easiest example is with the Moorhead sign. That just made it look so much better. I mean it fits like Everything. It looks like Harrisburg. And I think increasing the dollar amount helps to update some of our older buildings in our community. And we're, you know, aesthetics are important to our community. We we see that on everything that we put out. So, I think that, I mean, increasing the dollar amount just makes sense.

It's a pretty rigorous application process. Right. That they have to get through to even get

It is. It has a high impact because it generally incentivizes folks that can't really get there without the grant. Right? They want to spend some, but they may have half. So, you know, we've traditionally under spent on this. And I think my interpretation when I read these was 50 seems to be plenty because we're not really spending 50 over time. I would say with the addition of our EDC team, we're getting a lot more interest because they're out there, you know, knocking doors, beating the streets. So they they're letting people know that these things exist and making suggestions. Hey. I noticed your, you know, your side's really run down.

We have a program if you're interested. And so I think we'll spend, you know, the whole 100 if we go that route. But we haven't talked about that program a lot. And so the the $4.03, you know, really made sense to me. Four four makes sense. But I also think it's a high impact, low cost addition to to some of the private property that we can't really affect without their buy in. We can we can build $2,000,000 parks all day long, but we can't we can't go on a private property and and fix their signs.

I voted in favor of it. I think it helps, you know, those businesses that we have that, like, to your point that can't get there themselves. And, hey, I didn't know about this until the last presentation of my email. And I think word-of-mouth is a snowball effect is real. And I think that the money is, even if we don't use the money, it's there. Right? And I think when people hear about it, they're going to probably want to ask even if it's a rigorous application I think that now they know it exists, right, and it's something and I think it'll be more in alignment with what we're asking our new businesses to have, right, so they won't look like the Sore thumb? The sore thumb?

Yeah, you know I what mean?

It'll just bring everyone. It'll you know bring everyone up to kind of see what what we're expecting now in Harrisburg.

So. I mean and there's going to be some interest in it too on the recent social media post about this program too.

Killians Plaza is the first example.

Thank you. I can't think of the name.

They you know, some still see it differently but it it's much improved than what it was. I mean, ideally, I would love to see the the shop center across the street from Killian Plaza. Take advantage of it or the car wash but I don't think the car wash is going to do anything other than what the car wash.

But you know,

for some these businesses that are just day to day trying to survive, they're not spending $10,000 a month sign improvement because they

don't have it.

But to pony that up and think, okay, that could draw more people in, I think it's a great way to support our small businesses.

Yeah. I think the Morehead sign was a great example of it. Does anyone feel strongly that that we're in those no's or, you know, we the staff was gonna recommend we we move forward with this unless there's, you know, some strong opinions on do we is this an absolute no go? We just we're good with the 50.

Alright. Once we allocate a 100,000, what happens to it at the end of the year if we don't spend it?

This one's a little unique because we have a capital reserve fund just for economic development purposes. So if it's not spent here, it just remains in that fund for this purpose.

So next year, we could go over? Mhmm. Okay.

If you allocate it.

And this fund has about If

you allocate it. Right.

I think we have, like, 400,000 in in this fund right now.

Was Wow.

That was my next question.

Might because it's been building for years and

years. Yeah.

Mhmm.

I wonder if I was actually yes on it but I'm wondering if we can can we keep it at 50 but have like okay from the council like if somebody does come in and they want to do something and we run out of the budget that we just do budget

because we have

400 in it. Yeah.

Yeah. I'm fine with that.

Can actually be okay with that.

Yeah. That would be a great thing if you said, oh man, we're at $4.25. We're about to run out of money. We need more. Yeah.

I mean, that fund is just like in lieu of, right? Right. They operate the same way we just stick it in there and tell them self

perpetuating okay we'll do

that okay

And the last slide I have here, these were the open ended priorities, and so if you remember, we got to the bottom of your exercise and we just left it open to ask, is there anything that you can think of that you might not have seen otherwise in the exercise that you would like to entertain that none of you have seen all of the these weren't put together for y'all to see so this is the first time y'all are seeing it. We have on the right hand side there, you'll see the status checks. All those mean that those projects that were put down there are currently in some form of discussion. We just talked about the facade program, so we know what we're doing there. Historic train, we've had those discussions.

The dog park, that's an area that we're currently working on so we hope to have something to bring back to you all soon on that in this current budget. Additional money for the greenways we already had that discussion earlier in what you all decided and the new sports program just wanted to remind everybody that, we are going to be having lacrosse camps this summer. So that will be the first time we've introduced that. We feel like that's the way to begin moving into that process to gauge interest, start getting people to know what it's all about. We have adult kickball that is already going in this summer and is moving forward with that.

And then we're also partnering with the Y to get volleyball started. So they started volleyball, this fall. We're working with them. So eventually we'll take that program over. At this point though, we're letting them kind of use that to get it started. So we are working on those. Now what this amount is would be a much more in-depth, pointed attack to it, but just kind of leave it open here if there's any of these that anybody, that put these down would like to speak for that we haven't talked about already.

I'll speak for a couple of these. One was a discretionary fund for the mayor council beyond the athletic funding. I'm glad the discretionary funds were in there when we sent the team. I have no idea what that would be or what could come up but it just seemed very easy when we said do we have $20.00 to send somebody somewhere? And the answer was, oh, sure, we've got a fund.

No idea whether we'd spend that or not or what that would be, but a year is a long time and anything could come up. So, I put that one in there just to give us some flexibility. The second one was the grant research application. I'm not sure we're getting all the juice out of all the grants and we have somebody, you know, on a contract basis or something who's looking them up and funding themselves and saying, just I spent a million dollars for you if you fill out this grant form and it's we got the thing from Duke Power and, you know, there there's all kinds of grants out there. I'm not sure we're taking full advantage of those.

So, I'm advocating that we put something in there to make it somebody's job, somebody's responsibility with an ROI that says, you spend $75,000 with me and I'll find you $2,000,000 in grants. If I don't, you can fire me. And then the last one on here was this Robinson Church extension. I can't tell you how many times I come up to that road and people put their turn signal on like, yeah, you've lived here a long time because that road used to go through. I feel you, man.

It's crazy that that road is closed. I don't know if we go over it under it but I know it's multi year project. I have no idea what it is, how much we would fund, but it's ridiculous that that road is closed. So, don't know what the funding is, but that was certainly less than you guys asked for, but I think we need to do something on that.

And that one, to be clear, is Robinson Church to Harris Depot.

Right. Right. And by the way, still put my turret signal on. Get to that time.

I think we allocated some money for it to research the above or below Yeah.

Wonder what the results of that is.

Yeah. So we'll be able to report the that stage of it within this budget. I think what this was to say, hey. Whatever those results are, it sounds like Councilman Falls is willing to put some engineering dollars to it to get it more shovel ready. And so I think that's what he was advocating for there

Yep.

After the planning stage.

Yeah. But it was less than I think you guys there was some big number in there. Well, something, you know, what can we spend?

Yeah. I think we we estimated that at, a $26,000,000

Yeah. Exactly.

Thing upfront. Like I said, they're still working through those final engineering planning level estimates, but it won't be cheap.

We have to buy, like, the businesses and the houses there?

No. So there are there are no total takes in our preliminary estimate, but I I also think there's some where we left it off, they they did basically earthen fill. So, you know, instead of doing, like, retaining walls, like, think of three as you're going into Kannapolis, and they've got that retaining wall on on it. It's, like, 60 foot in the air. Right?

They did that to save that house that that was up there because it was a historic home. The preliminary estimates that came through just have, you know, two to one slope or so that really take that goes into people's front yards and impacts them. That's not really going to be viable if we go through there. We're gonna wanna tighten that up and have more tight retaining walls so that you don't have to take any businesses or houses. You wouldn't even with the fill, but you you would impact them more than you'd be comfortable with by filling their whole front yard.

How it would work. You've got Corey Wilmon on that corner. Right? His his driveway is right up against the train tracks. Yeah. And then he's got a business in the back, Acme, welding or whatever that is.

Yeah. We'll have to show you the the planning level.

But also the impact of Harris Harris Depot Park. Yeah. I mean, do you get in? Yeah.

Yeah. Access room. I mean, it it's driveways that just move. So, like, take Harris Park Harris Depot Park, for example. You know, we've got the grass parking lot right after the retention basin there that we paved half of it. Now, you would just move the driveway up about 70 feet and come in before the road either goes over or under depending on which one you pick. So instead of going all the way up and taking a 90 in, you're you're just gonna 90 in and then work your way into the park. So it's not as impactful as I thought it would be. I thought I thought it would be much more unrealistic. The cost is gonna be the part that we're we're the town of Harrisburg is never gonna pay for that project.

It's gonna be a federal government grant that pays for that, or it just sits on the shelf waiting for, you know, some type of public works funding to come out of Washington. So I think the cost is gonna be pretty the design, I think, is actually more doable than than I envisioned it would be when we started it. Were there any other on this list that anybody wanted to kind of explain or advocate for? I think the reason we we have this slide is just one to say those open ended items that we're doing, hey, we're working on those. Don't worry about it.

The other is nobody else except for the the elected official that put this on their form has ever seen it. So we didn't wanna be kind of a gatekeep to that and say, hey. Look. If if one of you has an idea, maybe everybody else likes that idea, at least get it on your radar. If they're small dollar items like the discretionary funds, those are things that we can easily make in this budget. If if it's something we want to add to a future retreat and and talk about future budgets, that's fine too. But just wanted to have it out there for full transparency.

The dog park came up several years ago, Harrisburg I guess whatever that is today that's being built.

Is it village?

Yeah, Ayersburg Village. So, they they put in an upward but they clearly put in a sign that says. Residence. Get them. And they're very strong about it. They they also believe that the greenway is theirs too but I I think the town has probably explained to them that that's not just their property. And we're friendly to the size that we several folks have asked, when are we getting one? I'm like, I don't know if makes sense but do we have the space and where would it be?

Yeah, and we're working on some options for existing spaces that we have to put, you know, more more temporary dog parks like, you know, it wouldn't be insignificant. It'd be a nice park like we do here, but something that doesn't take years to design and have, you know, all the things. Like, we we need water and parking and fences and

I don't think dogs are very objective objective when it comes to what they like and what they don't like.

Dog has never turned his nose up to a fenced area with other dogs in it.

They don't complain if you put a flower there or make them walk around sideways sideways or or whatever. Whatever. Complain

Alright.

So, I've got some pretty quick slides here. So, we'll go over the financial models and some of the budget season graphics. This financial model and all all three of them that we'll look at tonight are almost identical to what we've seen all throughout budget season. We did not have any sort of significant change in our projected revenues. We did get an updated number on property taxes from the county and our real property value went down by 50,000 and our motor vehicles went up by 50,000.

So you see no change in the budget as a result of that. And then we did incorporate some of the very small items that we've talked about tonight. We'll pull out the 1,300,000 that was added in for Harrisburg Common, so that will just improve the bottom line here. But this model does look almost identical to the one that we saw on April 9. So here is a graphical representation of the model and I think this might be a better way to share the results of the model over time, versus looking at at all the numbers on the screen there.

So on the left side is the y axis for the capital reserve fund ending balance, in blue there. So you can see that we're starting north of 20,000,000 as we enter fiscal year 2027, and then we have sort of a spin down of that savings account, in the first year representing all the authorized projects that we have ongoing right now, assuming that those are spent down. And then you see our cumulative capital that's funded across this model as we progress through the ten years. And so you can see that the capital reserve fund balance incorporating all of the about a 100,000,000 in capital improvement projects, all the expansions of programs and staff and and all sorts of estimated growth that the town has produces a model that's that's very successful. It stays positive the entire time, and we accomplished nearly 70,000,000 in, capital that's paid for with cash.

And so that doesn't include, but it is represented here, about 30,000,000 in capital that's, financed as well. So we are accomplishing a lot across this ten year model, and it and it remains healthy the entire time. And that's, you know, what what we see here and and how much capital is involved in this model is the reason that we're so nimble when something pops up that we can take advantage of or that we can respond to. It's because all we have to do is shift, capital here. You know, we can move capital back.

We can have savings on it. We can, outperform in operations to make up some ground. So this is kind of an illustration of how nimble we are and, and how good the outlook is for the next ten years. For the water and sewer fund, same story here. This is almost the exact model that you saw about a month ago. And so here's what that looks like. Starting at 8,000,000, it does dip down in 2032 to just below 1,000,000 and then recovers. Bless you. And so that tells you that we don't have a structural operational problem. We just have a spin down of, of our capital reserve balance, and then that recovers as well.

And then same story here on the stormwater fund. You can see it dipping down as we spend about 3,000,000 on spot improvement projects over the first couple years of the model. And then we don't have anything planned out in the future. As you see that capital level off. And so then over the next four or five years, the storm water fund starts to build back up capacity for those types of projects again.

Now any questions on the financial models? Alright. Also have budget graphics. These are literally the same as you saw on April 9 because we haven't had changes to the departments. So just to refresh everyone's memory of the dollar bill graphic showing you how the departments represent a typical dollar paid in property taxes.

And then our breakdown of the general fund expenditures by function. So public safety still makes up right around 50% of our general fund budget. Parks and rec at just under a fifth, and then environmental protection and streets combined are about another fifth, and then all the remaining, supporting departments and engineering and planning and economic development make up about 16 or 17% there combined. And I'll pass it back to Lee for the peace schedule. Sure.

Okay. So I'll run through these much like what Brian just went through. You're going to see here. We went over at a higher level last budget workshop. Just want to kind of go through a little more detail. First thing, everything you see on this screen is fee schedules that have no increases. So they'll stay the same as they are today. Go through a couple of these here. Utility account fees and charges, those are all going to stay the same. The one change is actually reduction with the security deposit removed, and you'll see that here in a moment.

Fire plan reviews and inspections all stay the same as well as the plan review fees and inspections so no changes to any of those there's no changes to our resident athletic registration fees we will talk about the non resident here in just a second but no change to our resident fees and no changes to the facility rental rates so all those stay the same. Now we'll get into a few of these slides that show the changes. Go through these here you can see that credit card convenience fee, I think we talked about that last time as well, that increased 0.5%, again just trying to keep up with the cost of those credit card fees so that the users are covering that cost. Our water and sewer rates as we had mentioned also went to the 5% increase due to the increase that we're having to pay for increased rates since we're reselling them. System development fees also 5% increase.

Those are the fees to developers that pay for the development. You'll see the account delinquency fee. The $100 is still there, but what is changed in this presentation is that the one time a year the first time can be automatically waived per year. And this really is aimed to try to help those people that just for whatever reason that's not something that ever normally happens, but something happened and they missed it for a month. So every twelve months you'll have opportunity to have that waived if that's the case if you're one of the people that chronically are getting cut off that fee after that will continue to build as it does today Utility account setup fees, the deposit was eliminated.

I think we had mentioned that as well and then the account setup fee has been increased by $5 So ultimately what that means is whenever someone comes in to create a new service for the town, they used to pay $75 to the town now they pay $35 and that'll be it. Parks and recreation fee changes again these are only non resident fees you can see that for most all the regular sports is a $10 increase the Pewy sports is $5 the big changes are going to be down at the bottom with Pop Warner you'll see $25 increase for cheer and then $50 for Pop Warner football.

And I did get questions about, you know, cheer and Pop Warner on based on our last meeting. Are we transitioning? Is there a plan in place? Are we continuing that indefinitely? So I did want to open it up as if there's any conversation for that. We have everything proposed here for the for the upcoming year as this just is business as usual. But there has been requests for, hey, what's our is there a transition ever? And if so, how quickly is that? So I'll open open it up for that if anybody has anything.

I mean, I've been very vocal about I'm very supportive of Pop Warner football. I would like to see them transition and stand on their own like other Pop Warner's. I'm not saying that immediate cut, but like a a transition over a couple of years. Yeah.

Any other thoughts on that? I know, you know, Jim and I have talked about this and we we had some discussion at budget three about just what does that look like if the if the organization doesn't wanna do it.

I mean, I I think some

of it came up because there were local events that were pricey. And when I walked away from that, I'm like, it was always pricey. You guys weren't in Orlando when it was pricey. Right? Just because it was local, it touched you. It touched Jennifer. It anybody else in this room. Touched me. But it was nothing within our control. It was always that way.

I mean, if you even go out to the website and search, there's a, I think, 90 page PDF that all these teams are given that explain from the very beginning the cost involved. And so it's unfortunate that Pop Warner charges what they do, but that's not within our capacity control. The downside is is what are these kids gonna do? I mean, there's nothing feeding our middle school. There's nothing feeding our high school.

You would hope that the middle school will feed the high school, but sometimes kids get discouraged between the two and you still have that relationship. And then if you ever go out to the high school football games, you see those coaches that mentored these kids throughout the years. I mean relationships you'll be amazed at how strong they've gotten over the years. I would always advocate for just from I see the benefits. I think, you know, the other side of it, Council Member Banks, you talk about, you know, basketball courts.

Where would these kids be if they didn't have somewhere else to go? And I'm still asking, you know, I'd like to see more of the basketball courts because the only two that I know of besides at the Y behind Harrisburg Elementary. You know, if we're not providing opportunity for the kids then sooner or later they're going to find other things to get themselves involved in and whether you think it's part of what Harrisburg is at the minimum I'd like to see us invest in our kids whatever it is that we're giving them opportunity to do something.

I could be wrong but I think a lot of this discussion came up last time because we were looking at what population this is serving and it was a lot of out of Harrisburg residents. I think that was an overwhelming it was not Harrisburg residents.

That was certainly part

of was a major part of

our discussion that's part of that doesn't necessarily that yes that's a thing that I'm concerned about and also I want to see it be successful but to your point Pop Warner has its own rules that we have no control over and I don't know that our community really does really understand that and I'd pop Warner's rules are what they are. We we're we just have to deal with it. That's not.

There's not a city league.

I just. A county

league that we can invest in to give them an alternative and that's why Pop Warner has always been there. It's like we don't participate in the little little league world series because that's a whole that's similar to Pop Warner. Uh-huh. It's run by a different organization. Uh-huh. The town's always chose not to participate in that. In this, there there's really no other competitive for these kids.

So, I mean, I I I my struggle with it is we are their fundraising source. We are their like if we looking if we look at other Pop Warner teams around us, they're doing the work. They're doing the thing. They're not backed by a municipality. I think that we should strongly encourage Harrisburg Cowboys to stand on their own two feet. Again, not saying like, oh, yeah, next year that's it. No. It used to be I'm I'm a huge proponent of of, hey, let's figure out how to make this a healthy healthy transition because we I don't I mean, I have a vested interest. I don't want to see them fall. I don't want that at all.

So we figure out what's the best way to make sure that we're leaving them in a good spot. So if that's it, hey, watch us do it. You do it. We're here. Is it help the following year? And then, you know, year three, like, it's yours. I mean, that's just a tentative. That's just a spitball idea. I do think though that there should be a transition.

Well, they do, they do their own funding. I mean, they don't rely. That's why they're a 501

C three or whatever that special number is

and I know those kids throughout the year are always looking to raise money and do raise money quite a bit so there is a benefit from the fields and infrastructure and signing them up and so.

And I would still be in support of, hey, yes, that'd be our partnership, use our fields, take the equipment. That's just what makes sense to me. Yes, I'm the only one that feels that way and that's okay too.

So I may asked me a clarifying question about the fees and whether or not the program costs are covered by the registration fees, which they are. So I clarified that. And I also clarified just that I think some of the feedback that I've gotten from the parts department and some of several of the council members is not necessarily the cost as much as how it operates. Does it it operate consistent with our vision, mission, values, goals, like our other kind of recreation programs versus it's just a very competitive league, which is why they have recruiting, which is why 75% are not Harrisburg residents. And how long does that go before it breaks?

We've seen some tension between what, you know, the five zero one c three board wants to do and what we will allow them to do because we have, you know, different restrictions, even as much as, you know, their practice schedules and things like that. So, you know, those were the things I I was clarifying over here and passing those

over.

And Rob,

I think it's important too. Like, yes, we wanna we do wanna feed into our high schools. Mean, anybody who's had a private conversation with me knows that I think that athletics are number one job prevention program I stand firmly on that given that these students are not ours they're not going feed into Hickory Ridge or middle or high school anyway.

I I don't I can't say it's fact or it's not fact I was just told Saturday apparently one of the teams are considered to be like top five in the country right now. Mhmm.

Yeah. So.

Where do they live? You know I mean that's and they are I mean that I've heard that same thing but I think it's important to consider the impact to our staff what that looks like and just again figuring out what that transition looks like over the next couple of years.

But I don't think it's any harm in figuring out a transition plan. It's not immediate. No. I mean it gives us time to kind still work collaboratively. It gives us, it's not saying that we don't want it. We end up getting there huge benefits of it, right? But I think there is some benefits of having the, of preparing them for success on their own.

I'm confused though if you don't want it then why would you transition? Either you want it or you don't. There's not, I mean, you wouldn't transition just to say, we want you but you're over here. I mean, that's part of the transition. I guess, I'm not understanding that.

Well, well, I'm I'm I'm talking about the, I mean, the money spent, right? So, I I mean, I think I'm I'm saying I think Pop Warner is a good thing. Just don't know if we as a as a town should be paying for

it. Not

for the program cost and and again with the folks that have I've talked to about it, both staff and elected. It's more about who's in the driver's seat and who's in the copilot seat. Right now, we drive, they copilot.

Do we?

And that's theoretically. But there's there's there's there's always an argument over who's got the stick. Right? So, you know, at what point do you switch those? I don't think there's I I have not heard anyone, staff included, say, like, they run it and we're out. I think it's more we're the support group. We provide fields. We provide assistance. We do all of that. They're running it as a true prop Warner, collecting the fees, selecting the players, doing and there's probably a transition period that would have to happen there.

And it probably takes a couple of years to to really transition into a successful five zero one c three led program versus a municipally led program.

I'm just curious. The reason maybe, you know, maybe I don't know, are other pop Warner because in Florida, they're not like this. Not run by our town they run independently on their own.

Well let's start there we can't compare

any I kind of athletics to

know

I'm just saying so I'm like so how common is it to have it structured this way?

From what I understand is no.

We're we're the only

in our

in our league, we're the only municipally funded.

Okay. Okay. So, that means that we can do a different way.