Board of Mayor & Aldermen - Regular Meeting

Please stand. Good evening. Welcome to the board of mayor and alderman meeting for the city of Hendersonville, Tennessee. This is February 24th, 2026. We are right at 7 pm. We're going to begin our meeting as we typically do and that's with a prayer and the pledge. And uh providing our prayer tonight is the Reverend Dr. Otis Clayton, Senior. He is the chaplain for the Summit County chapter of the Military Officers Association of America and he's also retired Army Major and retired chaplain with the US Army. Um Dr. Clayton, we very much appreciate what you do for our community and uh it's good to have you back. We're praying especially tonight for men's of the 278 and women of the 278 and other unheard prayers that was not vocalized. Let us pray our brother my brothers and sisters. Eternal and gracious God, we come before you tonight with heart full of gratitude for the blessings of life, for the gift of community and for the privilege of public service. Thank you personally for the opportunity to stand in this hollow place as a resident of Hendersonville as a military veteran who has worn the uniform of this great nation as a chaplain who has prayed with soldiers in times of peace and conflict and as an author who believes in the power words to inspire to offer this prayer on the behalf of this great city. We thank you, dear God, for Hendersonville, a city of growth, promise, and shared vision. We thank you for its youth, its schools, its businesses, its houses of worship, and for every family that calls this place home. Tonight, dear God, we lift before

you, Mayor Jamie Clarity, the alderman, and all who have been entrusted with the responsibility of leadership. Grant them the wisdom to govern this with fairness, insight to make decisions that serve the common good and the moral courage to do so what is right when the path is difficult. Help them to lead not for personal recognition but for the well-being of every citizen. And Lord, as we observe Black History Month, we pause to remember the faith and sacrifice and perseverance of African-Americans who have contributed and have shaped this nation and this community like this one. May the time of reflection move us toward deeper unity, greater understanding, and renewed commitment to justice, equity, and mutual respect. Dear gracious God, as one who served in armed forces this country, I also ask a special blessing upon every veteran, their families, and active duty service members in this community, upon the first responders, and upon all who stand daily in the front lines of service for safety and for freedom of others. Bless the citizens of Hendersonville, young and old, lifelong residents and newly arrived. May this city continues to be a place where opportunity is real, where diversity is respected, where voices are heard, and where every person is treated with dignity. As this meeting proceeds, let every discussion be guided by wisdom, every decision be marked by integrity, and every action be directed toward the welfare of the whole community. May there be a spirit of cooperation and a commitment to truth and a shared vision that lifts this city even greater heights. We offer this prayer in the majest mighty name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the lamb of God who came and took away all the sins of the world. We pray. Let us all say amen. Amen.

Amen. Dr. Clayton, thank you. Um you've raised the bar on opening prayers. That's for sure. And again, that's the Reverend Dr. Otis Clayton, Senior. He's is the chaplain for the summer county chapter of the military officers association of America. He is retired Army major and retired Army chaplain. Again, we appreciate what you do for our community and for our country. So, please join me in the pledge.

I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all. We entertain a motion that we accept the agenda that was provided to you in your packets. We have a motion from Alderman Goodwin and a second from Alderman Dixon. Alman Robertson.

Yes. Uh mayor, I I would like to uh make an amendment to add to the brief committee reports. A report from me on the uh Country Hills Golf Course. Kind of an update uh on the storm damage there and the results. So I I may I move we have a second from Alderman Sassy. Alman Robertson Alman Sassy, how do you feel about putting that in reports as number three? Yes. Okay, sounds good. Okay. All those in favor, please say I. Those opposed, please say no. Okay.

So, we're going to add golf commission report is number three under brief committee reports. Any other discussion? Any other motions? So the packet is pro provided to you. We have made one addition to that and that is a golf commission report under brief committee reports number three. All those in fa in favor of approving the agenda as amended please say I.

Those opposed please say no. That passes unanimously. Thank you all. Um next we have a couple presentations. I think Larry Phillips is going to do that. Maybe Larkin. I'm not sure who else is going to be with you. Um Larry, I'm gonna let you take the show away. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate that. Good evening to all of you, alderman and Mr. Mayor. On behalf of the Hendersonville Holiday Fest, we thank you for allowing us a few moments to recognize the 2025 Holly Jolly Christmas Parade winners in the 2025 Cindy Lhoo Essay Contest. Of course, we are doing this a little later because we all got snowed out in January. So, thank you for letting us be here again. First, I want to extend sincere appreciation to all of the Holiday Fest supporters and sponsors for their continued investment in this community. We appreciate everything that they do for us. And a special thank you to our Christmas parade sponsor, EXS Group, whose partnership helps make the parade possible each year. I'm pleased to begin with our 2025 Holly Jolly Christmas Parade winners and the parade entries were judged on overall creativity, theme execution, visual impact, community spirit, and presentation on parade night. At this time, we invite our parade parade winners to come forward. as I read your names to receive your plaques. And then uh we've already taken the photo so we don't have to do that. In third place is Stone Creek Memory Care. I'm not sure if they have a representative here tonight so but thank you Stone Creek. In second place was second place was Isaiah 117 House.

There you go. Thank you very much. And the first place overall winner is the Hendersonville Animal Hospital. Thank you very much. And on to our Cindy Lhoo essay winners. The annual competition invites third graders from across county to reflect on what Christmas means to them. Essays are judged on originality, check clarity of thought, creativity, and how well they capture the spirit of the season. We are also incredibly grateful to the third grade teachers throughout our community who continue to make this a tradition within the classrooms each year. Your encouragement and leadership makes this program possible. This year, all three of our winning essays just happen to come from the students at William Burus Elementary. At this time, we invite our essay winners to please come forward as I read your names to receive their certificates and take them home with big smiles. So, our third place winner is Alice Landry, who couldn't be with us tonight, but we want to certainly recognize her. In second place is Bella Head. Thank you. And in first place is Carla Gonzalez DeLeon Torres. Thank you. These students remind us that beyond the lights and festivities, the true heart of Christmas is kindness, generosity, and hope. Congratulations to all of tonight's honores and thank you Bulma for your continued support of Holiday Fest and the traditions that strengthen our community each year.

Thank you Larry. Thank you.

Appreciate y'all putting that together with the parade and the contest. Uh we have no public hearings. Um next is uh approval of the minutes. You provided the minutes in your packet from our February 10th, 2026 meeting. I need a motion, please. We have a motion from Alderman Goodwin, a second from alderman, somebody down there, Alderman Burgdorf. Any discussion? All those in favor of approving the minutes as they were provided to you, please say I. Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Thank you. Next, we have citizen comments. We have one person signed up. Here are the rules for citizen comments. Speakers must identify themselves by name and address. Public comment should be limited to five minutes per person, which time is not transferable to other speakers. All comments are to be directed to the presiding officer. That's me. Not to alderman, city staff, or other members of the public. Comments must address issues, not individuals or personalities. Personal attacks shall not be tolerated. Comments may support or oppose particular issues or measures, but the motives of those with differing views shall not be questioned or attacked. Malicious comments will not be allowed. Speeches for or against particular candidates running for public office shall not be allowed. Uh, Mr. Brand, Henry Brand, who was here a couple weeks ago, of help a white drive. Let me keep it for a second.

This is an Um, first I want to be clear. I don't want to be that gadf fly that shows up at every meeting railing against a certain cause. But just had just a little bit more to say from what I had to say before. To begin with, I don't think you'll ever hear have ever heard yourself describe the way I'm about to describe you. I sat there last week and I was enchanted. Okay, this has come from someone whose image of government is what I see in the mainstream media. Bunch of Christian Gorg gowns and Armani suits and pretentious clownishness and all that crap. You vote. You're normal. I mean, I'm I'm not trying to damn you with faint praise. I'm just saying, you know, you dress normally, you speak normal. It's this is America, okay? I mean, what can I say? And I'm not buttering it up because one of my main points here is going to be there's not a whole lot you folks can directly do about what I'm talking about. I know that. I see that now. But the problem with NES and their incompetent, they're unwieldiness. I don't think they're evil. Okay. I think they just they're over well. They're unwieldy. They're too big. And sending a repres asking Nashville to allow us to send a representative represent please. Okay. I know they've got a uh lobbying presence is just like a big steamroller. It'll run right over us. But then the thing is this is mostly a state and to some extent federal issue, but you folks have influence. I can get in contact with my state legislator or something. Yeah. Okay. You do. I don't know that much, but you have more impact than I do. And you're not alone. There's Leverne, Brentwood, Smyrna, Sunre County like and the like that are already going into the state legislature and approaching them to make laws that a law or something that would allow us to choose who we get our electric service from. And to underscore this is a real

problem. It's serious. It's not a Democrat versus Republican, left, right, blue, red, ma, rhino, I don't care, however you want to spin it. It's right versus wrong. One of the big complaints I hear is people, well, you people are soft. You're spoiled. You just can't get some electricity. You don't know what to do. Well, you tell that to the 94 year old who's wrapped up in blankets breathing 10 degree air. Yeah. Back then, they didn't have it. You know what they did? They died. Okay. Probably I would say a good bulk of the people that are in our world right now are here because of electricity and a few other improvements that have made life better. And when you have a restaurant owner who's sitting there in Hendersonville with their food stocks totally destroyed while over here by uh Cumberland Electric that this counterpart parts doing just fine. Thank you. That's a real issue. It's it's economics. It's human survival, human dignity. So I'm asking is whatever tricks you can pull out of your hat, you know, rabbit's hat, please contact these people. Do something. I'll do the same. But I think you have your influence. You're not alone. city go and county governments around this this area of greater middle Tennessee are doing the same. So please that's all

Mr. Bren. Thank you.

I turned off the wrong microphone. Here we go. Next item we have is uh ordinance and resolutions. And the first item we have under that group is second reading of ordinance 2026-02. This an ordinance amending budget ordinance 2025-09 to reflect mid-year adjustments to the city's 2026 fiscal year budget.

We have a motion from Alderman Sassy and a second from Alderman Garza. One of the first things I need to do is I need to turn this over to um uh to Tamara. Oh, shoot. Um oh, there we go. Okay, you're there for Okay. Uh she needs to explain um and we might need to call Jason, too. She needs to explain uh the need for an amendment. I sent that out to you. Unfortunately, I just sent it out today. I would hope to get it out to you yesterday. That's entirely my fault. And I'm going to give you a hard copy of what Tamara's going to talk about.

So, the amendment, I tried to make it easy so everybody could see what we're talking about. It's these last um four lines on here are the additions. And then on line three, there's a correction of a clerical error. Um on there. Um these last four lines, there's a couple of things going on. one um the cost for the pay study came in substantially less than what was anticipated. So there's about a $90,000 savings um from that. Thank you, Jason. Um and with that um it has identified um and it was actually brought up previously that our phone system that is um currently used citywide is beyond its useful life and we can't do any repairs. So, if our phone system were to go down, it would be down. So, um the thought was to take some of that savings from the pay study, move it into a different project to be able to allow for the replacement of the city's phone systems. So, that would transfer 80,000 of that 90. And then one of the HVACs that um services the annex building for PD has gone down. It is so old they can't get replacement parts for it. the cost is around right around $20,000 for that. So shifting 10 the other 10,000 from the pay study into there plus PD does have some savings in their building maintenance line of about 10,000 that they can transfer down to cover the cost for that Hback replacement.

Tamara is the best way to handle this to take what we just handed out and substitute it for what's on page um well it's exhibit B. Yeah, I would say replace exhibit the existing exhibit B with this version and then everything would be as it needs to be. Okay, we'll do that in a second. Alderman Sassy. Yeah, thank you, Mayor. Um Tamara, did we do some did we upgrade our phones just in the last budget cycle? Okay. No, I thought we had something in there about phones as well. No. Okay. I don't think so. There there was some video um equipment but there yeah there was no phones. Okay. Thank you.

Appreciate that. Tam um I'm going to entertain a motion that we take what Tamron handed us and substitute it for exhibit B.

We have a motion from Alderman Dixon, a second from Alderman Sassy. Any discussion on that? Alderman Robertson. Did uh staff look at possibly on the uh work at the uh the the uh police department and the uh of putting that in uh the PIP account instead of in the operating budget to increase our balance in the operating budget. I I think that that that could be covered in the PIP or am I wrong on that? It's public safety. It's a public safety expenditure. So,

yeah, it it could be. Okay. Um I that's I have no other questions on the amendment. Okay. Al Robertson, you're the only one who has the light on right now. So, okay. So, we'll do this amendment and then I'll see if you want to continue. Okay. Um that's what we're voting on right here is the amendment. All those in favor, please say I. Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Now, we're back on the main motion. Uh, Alderman Collins,

I have a couple of questions. Just some clarification. Um, the first one is under general HR meals and incidentals, a $3,000 expense for public safety recognition event. Can you tell me about that event?

You want to talk about that, Jesse? I'll let Jesse address that question. About two years ago, we did um an event where we brought PD and fire together and we provided lunch and said, "Hey, just bring your families and we're going to have a a food truck out and just enjoy some time together." Well, if you're on shift or you're not on shift, we wanted to do that again this year. We don't have availability of budget to do that. So, we were asking for a little bit of money to be able to do that for police and fire this year. That sounds wonderful. I'd like to be invited. It sounds fun. Yes, ma'am.

Um um my other question is under parks. We have two different Did you ask for a page number? I I don't know what page if you if you have a the sheet in front of you um has numbers off to the far left hand side. If you tell me the number 19. Okay. um page 19 and oh so under it's the second little section okay contributions for parks and sponsors and contributions and donations.

I am very curious to know who has donated to us because I would love to thank them. Um, at least one of them has asked to remain anonymous and that's I respect that. Yeah, the the big one has has requested to remain anonymous, but I can I can give you the names of the others. They're not listed on here. I don't remember them off the top of my head, but I would love to have an opportunity to thank them. And we do when we receive donations, we actually out of the finance office send a um donation letter to them thanking them for their contribution and then they have that so that they can use it for tax purposes as well. Thank you so much for doing that. Uh, that's all I have.

Alman Collins, thank you for that note. I'm sorry to interrupt you. I want to make sure the cat didn't get out of the bag. Oh, I we've had anonymous donations before and that's very reasonable. Thank you, Alman Collins. Alman Burgdorf. Thank you, mayor. Appreciate it. And, uh, just a point of clarification, where was that donation? Was just up here under line six. Uh, lines four and line six.

Lines four and line six. Okay, great. Thank you. Um the question in particular is about u the use of the tree bank fund and I see the prior year refunds under refund to tree bank uh refund of tree bank funds to grace place but the use of funds you're requesting additional 31,000 uh do we have an idea what that was for? It was for additional um tree planting throughout the city throughout the city. wasn't any one particular location or anything like that. I think I I don't remember exactly how many locations, but they've they've had um purchase orders to plant trees in about 10 or 12 different locations throughout the city. Okay. All right. Thank you. You're welcome.

Alderman Brodor. Thank you, Alman Robertson.

Thank you. Uh and I talked to Tamara today, so hopefully I'm not going to spring anything on you. Uh but I do have some some questions and some concerns. Uh if you'll look at uh let's see page three that was in the uh in the packet uh under nonoperating budget capital and special projects. I'll give you a minute to get to there. It's on page 22 in our notebook. And I guess what I'm my overarching question is I'm trying to get a good accurate picture of our finances.

And uh so I'm going to ask some questions that can help me get there. So certainly you you you see uh page 22 the the nonoperating budget capital and special projects. what what what is included in in those line items in the the non-operating capital and special projects? Those are all of our construction projects. There's um like the pay study, things that don't happen year-over-year, routine purchases um are included in there. So, our salary and benefits, our operating costs for our departments, the replacement vehicles that we do routinely are not, but everything else is included in those. And is that also uh construction projects? Yes. including,

you know, that that maybe we haven't had to pay for yet, but that is encumbered. Yes. Okay. Um I I if you if you look at the numbers, it's growing in the deficit. The deficit is growing, Tamara. Uh from an a general accounting principle, should we be concerned about that?

I think it's something to keep your eye on. Um, we want to make sure that our unassigned fund balance stays at an adequate level. Um, the positive is that with these projects, we can they're one-time expenses, so we can choose to fund more or less of them um from one year to the next, you know, not authorizing new projects potentially. Um, but it's definitely something to be um aware of and and and watch. You know, looking at this um there's only about $800,000 of unassigned fund balance that could be used before we drop below the minimum recommendated recommended amount. And that's shown at the bottom.

Yes. In the yellow, I believe. Or maybe No, that's my highlight. That's your That's Yeah, it's at it's at the bottom of that um chart. So the nonoperating budget and capital and special projects, would that capture the PIP money? No, this this is this chart here is only the general fund. PIP is um accounted for separately. And what's our projections at midterms on the PIP of what it's going to look like? Yeah, our projections at the um for midyear for PIP is that it the revenues are coming in about 150 to 200,000 over what was budgeted for the year. For the year projected Yes. about 200,000.

Yes, sir. Okay. And hotel motel about the same thing. Are they a little over? And I I apologize. I'm sure finance has asked these questions. No, that's I wasn't there. Um, hotel motel is coming in maybe 25 to 30,000 um over um budget uh on pay on line 11 on the the amended document that we approved tonight. Exhibit B number 11. This is $2 million for the storm that we project that we're going to submit to I guess FEMA.

It says that it came from the rainy day fund. Is that reflected on this uh page 22 anywhere? It is about that expenditure. Yeah, it's listed um in that second section, the nonoperating budget. Um the second line down on the right hand column. Yeah, it's it shows a use of reserves. Reserves. So Yeah, it's that middle. It's the middle section on the chart. It's and it you can see it on the column to the right hand side. It shows the use of reserves.

So So I would assume then since it's listed there that uh all of our re all of our reserves and I think we have three reserve funds, right? Correct. Yes. Rainy day, uh public safety, and infrastructure. Yes, sir. And so are all of those three uh balances listed in the non-operating? No, sir. Only the um amount of the reserves that were requested to be used for this amendment are shown on there. Okay, that's okay. I just wanted to make and uh all of that's coming from the rainy day and we had $2 million in there, I'm sure.

Yeah, there was $2.4 4 million um in the rainy day reserve and that will be replenished once if and when the federal government gets it to us. Yes. Okay. Um, so you did tell me that uh the bottom line is that uh is that we're about uh $800,000 uh over what the comproller requires us to the bottom line. Correct. Yes. About $800,000. So it's it's it's tighter than it's ever been in recent history. Yes. On that. So

recent being four years. Yeah. Since I've been here. Yeah. So that's something else that we'll need to look at too as far as as that shrinks even further. Okay. Um, let me see if that's all.

Okay, that's all, mayor. Thank you.

Real quick comment on that is I appreciate you making making those points, Alderman Robertson. uh six let me think eight and nine years ago uh we had such a low fund balance that uh we couldn't spend on paving uh in August, September, October, November because we just didn't have enough money in in our bank accounts. Uh now all we had money coming in in November, December, January and February and that's we can do paving. we had to put off all uh capital expenses and capital purchases uh the first half of the fiscal year because our our budget was our our fund balance is so low. Fortunately with with Jesse and Tamara um you see the shape that we're in now. So it makes a big big difference. Alderman Sassy,

thank you. Yeah, I really appreciate those questions as well. Um, just one note on the on number 11, Tamara. How long will it take for FEMA to reimburse that? U, I anticipate towards the end of fiscal year 2028, we will likely receive FEMA funds. So, it usually takes about two years. Great. Yeah, I wanted to make that clarification. Yeah. put it in um perspective, they for the tornado and for the flood, the tornado that happened in December of 2020 three and the flood that happened in May of 2024, they just obligated those funds. So, yeah, we're in 2026. So, it takes about two years. Wow. Yeah.

So, we look forward to that and we may have another uh another disaster. Well, I don't want to say that. Don't say that. You said the you said the dword alderin ward. Uh we may have another claim to them of some sort later on. So um but uh one other point here number 28 this is just a typographical uh error. Uh another one that I noticed uh number 28 uh it looks like we did not carry that 75,000 over um to the adjusted budget amount. Okay. Tam, does that have impact on the bottom line?

It does not have impact on the bottom line. Yeah, just typographical. Is that something we can just correct as a clerical error? Good catch. Yes. Do I need to make an amendment? No, I didn't think so. Thank you, Lance. Alman, Alman, that's all. Thanks. Uh, Alderman Evans,

thank you. Uh, a couple of clarification questions. Uh, thank you for um, Alderman Robertson for bringing those um, those thoughts. Uh, but um, two things. One, is it a requirement of the state or is it a recommendation of the state as far as what our recommended fund? It's a recommended fund balance, is it not? It is a recommended fund balance. However, last year our smaller funds that did not have that, they told us that we needed to update our fund balance policy and we needed to make progress towards getting there for those other funds. Um, but it's

they they we could potentially have our budget either only conditionally approved or not approved if we don't meet certain certain recommendations.

I was just looking for a clarification there. It's not, it's highly recommended that they want us to have a certain fund balance, but it's not required. And so, while I'm probably as fiscally conservative as as anybody up here, I would say, um, we just have to be careful with that and that it's not a requirement and that we're looking at sometimes you have to spend money, you know, and one one thing I I'm glad that Alderman Sassy brought this up too. While the $2 million is using some of the reserves, the rainy day reserves, and that's why we're at the point where it's $800,000, a little bit over. If we didn't have to use that $2 million, that would be 2.8 million higher than the the the recommended, but that's why we have that there. That's why we have those savings there. and us keeping in mind that that will be enor re reimbursed albeit a little bit later than we would like but it's going to be reimbursed. So I just wanted to bring that up. Thank you Alderman Evans. Thank you.

Any other discussion? Any other motions? We've made one amendment and that was replacing this sheet that Tamara handed out uh as exhibit B. All those in favor of approving second reading ordinance 2026-02 as amended, please say I. Those opposed, please say no.

Thank you. That passes unanimously. Thank you, Tamara. Thank you, Jason. Uh thank you, Jesse. Next, we're on to resolution 2026-03. This is a resolution to discontinue a period of temporary employment for employees of a political subdivision participating in Tennessee consolidated retirement system in accordance with state law pursuant to Tennessee code annotated title 8 chapter 34 through 37. We have a motion from Alderman Garden and a second from Alderman Goodwin. All those in favor of resolution 2026-03, please say I.

Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Thank you all. Next, we have first reading ordinance 2026-01. This is an ordinance amending the Hennisville Municipal Code repealing and replacing title 4 municipal personnel, amending section 2-101, appointing members to various boards and commissions, and to adopt a revised addition of the personnel rules and regulations. We have a motion. We have a motion from Alderman Garza and a second from Alderman Robertson. Alderman Evans, go ahead.

I just wanted to throw this out before we start. I don't know what the process is going to be of us going through this, but I just like to throw out that maybe we just take it section at a time because I'm sure that there are some questions from a lot of people and rather than going from here and there and whatever's brought up, I'd like to take it methodically and go through each section if we could. And if there's no questions on say section one, we move on to section two if that's okay. Um I think that's reasonable. So thank you. Yes. I'm looking here.

So Alderman Evans, I'm looking at sections sort of as chapters. Does that make sense? Okay. Um Okay. So Alderman Goodwood, you were already planning to speak. Do you want me to start calling sections or you want to speak now?

We might get there. So, let's um uh Okay, so we're looking at page 27 and this is chapter one. Anybody on chapter one? Okay, page 28, chapter 2. Okay. Alderman Goodwin

and chapter two on page 29, the middle section D. Do I need to read what it is or do I just Do you want me just to say what I would like changed where it says fix and establish? Yes. Okay, go ahead. Do I need to read it? Uh or somehow explain it.

Do I would like to change that? I would like I don't like that one person makes that decision. I would like the department heads to be a part of establishing the number for their department, their individual departments. So I would like that to be changed. I think it needs to be a collaborative effort between the COO and the department heads and then let Bulma decide the funding. So up at the first paragraph it says the city administrator shall have the basic responsibility for the personnel program as set forth in this chapter. The city administrator specifically shall

and go down to D. Okay. And what's the wording you're proposing on D? Uh I suggest certainly after consultation with department heads fix and establish. So put a prepositional clause in front. Fix and establish. And where are you saying put it at the first of the sentence? D starts with the word after consultation. Oh after. Okay. So do you Okay, that would be fine. Hold on one sec. Sure. Go ahead.

Can you tell me uh I think I found it just now, but are we on page uh 30? Is that correct? 29. 29. 29. 30 has a couple deep paragraphs as well. We're on 29 about twothirds of the way down the page. Thank you. I got you. Okay. Thank you. Alman Robertson, can you give me a wording after consultation right here? department heads with department heads and then comma um fix and establish. Is that okay? That that'll be fine.

Okay. Okay. Thank you very much. Okay. So, Alderman Goodwin, is that your motion? Yes. Okay. Alderman Robertson, a second. Yes, sir. Okay. So if you look on page 29 about twothirds of the way down the page you see paragraph D. Paragraph D will begin with after consultation with department heads, then fix and establish and continue what was what's already uh typed there. Is that accurate? Alderman Goodwin, Alman Robertson. Okay. Um any discussion on that specific proposal? I've got a couple lights uh illuminated here. Alman Sassy, Alman Skidmore, Alman on that specific item. Yes. Go ahead, Alman Sassy.

Thank you. So, I just want to clarify. So, the the administrator as it's as it's mentioned here would consult with this new wording, they would consult with the department heads to create the plan for the that create the staffing plan for that department. Is that correct? Go. Take that one. Okay. So the department head wouldn't determine the staffing themselves. They would determine it. They would give feedback to the city administrator and the city administrator. They both would collaborate and bring it to so that we could vote on budgetary.

Okay. Thank you. But I want the department heads to have have some involvement have involvement in that. Great. Thank you. Alderman Sassy. Thank you. Alman Good. Anything else? No. Okay. Anybody need an explanation of that change? Any sort of clarification? All those in favor of that amendment, please say I. Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Alman Goodwin. Um, anything else in chapter That's chapter two, isn't it? Anything else in chapter two?

Yes. Go ahead. Number on page 30 number E. We have at the top. Okay. Will that be done using the pay study? Uh Jason, is that that's probably best for you to answer that one? He says yes. Okay. Or were you saying you're the best to answer that? Yeah, that makes more sense.

Okay. So, let me restate the question so I understand. on number E where it says prepare and recommend to the city administrator a pay plan for all city employees for the governing body that would be the method to do that would be through the pay study when we're making changes okay good anything else on that okay Dixon go ahead thank you um Jason not all positions are in that pay study correct so this pay study includes all of our positions oh we did that's right we did vote on that thank you very much Dixon Thank you, Alberg.

Thank you, Mayor. Appreciate it. Jason, just for clarity and uh for point of information for our citizenry, what role does HR have in in this? Can you explain what the HR role is to the administrator and to the city? Sure. So, the my role as the administrative services director or the HR director Yes. uh serves to oversee the pay study, all the compliance and operations, making sure everything is um done consistently, fairly, and equitable amongst all employees. Okay. And you take that seriously. Absolutely. Okay. Good. Thank you very much. That's what I wanted to hear. Appreciate it. Alman Bergdorf, thank you. Um Alderman Goodwin, anything else in chapter 2?

Okay. Does anybody else have anything else in chapter 2? Okay, good. Alderman Garten, I'm sorry. It's Oh, Alman. Oh, I'm okay. Okay. Uh, chapter three. I'm sorry, Alman Collins. I um Wait a minute. Chapter Okay. Section I didn't organize my notes in that fashion, so I'm struggling here a minute. But um section 4 203 number two

page 31. Page 31. Um this is kind of a question for Lance or for everybody. Um when we say that they are not codified as part of this code and shall remain separately contained, they may be amended by resolution. Correct. The rules. I'm saying yes. Um midway down the page where it says number two. Okay. Um I why was that decision made for it not to require an ordinance to amend this?

We had um some of the personnel rules that were codified, some were not. uh those that were in both uh tended to show some inconsistencies and I imagine that a lot of the personnel rules and regulations were codified before we had a separate set of personnel rules. So, um it it uh to um prevent duplicity and inconsistencies, uh it just uh it's more efficient and legally safer, I think, to uh have them just uh in one document.

Okay. I I don't think I understand this because in my mind this is just does it require a resolution to make an amendment or does it require an ordinance? But you're saying they wouldn't be in the same document. It wouldn't be both codified in the Hendersonville Municipal Code and also in our personal rules and regulations, which a lot of our personnel rules and regulations were, some were not, some were um that were in both were inconsistent. So it I believe as I mentioned that the reason that they were codified to begin with was the fact that uh we didn't have a set of personnel rules and regulations.

Okay. I um I I'm not offering an amendment but I am going to give that some thought because sometimes I feel like when we have resolutions for personnel rules and it's one reading we don't maybe slow down enough to really understand what we're doing. and it might be part of the reason that they got a little not the best over time. Um, so I'm just going to give that some thought, but is there is there a way to accomplish both things to require an ordinance to make amendments and

yes, you could establish a rule that uh any amendments to the personnel rules would have to be by ordinance. Should should we add that to this section? Uh it it would be nice to maybe consult with uh Jason and Jesse and maybe bring a separate ordinance on that just so that there's some things in there that uh wouldn't require an ordinance uh too much overwork it if you will. I mean there may be some things that doesn't need such an ordinance.

Yeah. I Okay, I need to give that some thought. I don't want to make it overly cumbersome and just have red tape everywhere, but at the same time, I want to make sure that any amendments to this are really deliberate. So, um, should we get Jason's thought? Yeah, I was going to ask Mr. Gallow.

Sure. So, this mirrors what other agencies do as well. But what we're running into in some cases, and I understand your point about taking our time and moving slow. Um, some of the issues though that I saw when I we were updating this, is that laws that had been in place in Tennessee for almost a decade had never been adopted. What I don't want to do is put a legislative process in place to say that we're going to adopt the new laws that Tennessee has passed and it's going to take six weeks. So that's part of the thought here is from a compliance standpoint and keeping the city in the right standing, sometimes those laws require us to move a little bit faster.

Thank you. That I'm going to give all of this some thought. Alman Collins, anything else on chapter two? I I think I might have, but I didn't organize my notes in that fashion. We're going to go to Alman Sassy. Thank you. Okay. Alderman Sassy. Thank you. Uh Jason, so if you you mentioned the resolution, just following up on that inquiry by Alderman Collins, if there's a price tag attached to a change that we make, that would still require an ordinance, right? If it's 10,000, I think it is, right? You're amending the budget at that point. Yeah. And so, yes, that would require. Thank you,

Alman Sassy. Thank you, Alman Collins, if we need to come back after we finish all the chapters. I mean, that's that's fine. We're not we're not married to that. Okay. Uh we're moving on to chapter three. That starts on page 31. Moves on to page uh oh, chapter 3 has one word to it. Uh reserve. Yeah. Let's move on to chapter four, which is the top of page 32. I'd like to any any conversation, discussion, or proposed changes to chapter 4. Okay. Okay. Alderman Dixon. Oh, hold on. Sorry. Here we go. I'm circling back. Okay.

Wanted to use that term. Is there I'm sorry. Is there a reason why chapter 3 is reserved? It might be important to us. class. Um, sure. So, the reason we put it as reserved is when all of this was rewritten, chapters two and three were combined. If I went through and um eliminated chapter 3, then chapters four and five would have to be completely remembered. Got it. Got it. So, save a little administrative work. Got it. Say no more. Thank you. Thank Thank you, Alman Dixon. So uh we are looking now at chapter 4 which is on page 30ome.

Thank you. 32. Any discussion, suggestions, amendments, motions. Chapter 5 begins on page 44. And chapter five is the last chapter in there. Um, we have exhibit A. Uh, we just have exhibit A, I believe. So, it starts on page 48. Anybody see anything that they want me to back up to or any questions for Jason or Lance?

Ottoman College, do you need me to pause or are we good? Yes. On Okay.

pages together and got them all out of order at this point. You guys good? I made a motion, right?

Okay. I have uh gotten my pages out of order and I'm not even sure what I'm talking about at this point, but um I think it's section 4202. Chapter 4. Yes, chapter 4 202. 29. Okay. Well, that's chapter two. I know I am going backwards. I'm sorry. Page page 29.

Yes. I'm sorry, guys, but I wasn't organized in that fashion and I'm still not sure that I'm totally got myself together. But um where we say that employees on um chapter 4202C, okay,

um appoint, remove, suspend and discipline all employees of the city subject to the policies as set forth in this chapter and so on and so on. I have a little bit of a concern about what if there are things that because somewhere in here I read some language about uh the COO using discretion. Um, and I think that's appropriate, but I kind of feel like there's an overarching theme, and I can't point to exactly where it is because I got my pages out of order, but um there's kind of an overarching theme that the COO has quite a bit of discretion and um final decision making for staffing and firing and disciplining. And um I'm not necessarily thinking that that's wrong, but I would like to hear thoughts from everybody and have a discussion about whether we are if we were more involved in that as a board. If things like firing a department head required board involvement, is that too much in the day-to-day or if we don't, is that neglecting our oversight responsibilities?

I'll weigh in. Okay. Thank you.

Uh I It's been said many times that policies are written because of one bad actor. That's right. Among many. uh and I wish we didn't need personnel rules and regulations. Uh but almost from the day that this former government was uh voted in by referendum, uh there are immediately problems uh with with some personnel issues. And so that's why we have to have personnel rules and regulations. Um obviously I wish we didn't have to. Um and uh it has ever since 1986 and that referendum uh there have there have that there have been um questions about who uh who supervises the the personnel under this form of government. It's it's very clear that the mayor is the COO. It's very very clear. Uh part of the reason we have this form of government is because it wasn't as clear under the previous charter. Um occasionally we'll have committee meetings and the committee will uh will ask me to do ask me to do something, ask staff to do something. And I just gently remind them that the staff works for me. Now they uh uh they they under our charter they they are supervised by the mayor through the department heads through their supervisors. Um now the board has a tremendous amount of authority when it comes to setting the budget. Tremendous amount of authority. Um the uh the problem that we've run into more uh recent I'll say I'll say five six years ago was I remember department head telling me that he doesn't work for the mayor he works for seven alderman whichever seven he can find at any time that will support him. That creates big big problems. Uh that's part of the reason that we are making some of these changes. Uh, our COO works directly under the mayor, which makes sense. Um, and the COO has

has um I mean has greater expertise in the day-to-day operations, especially since the COO supervises the uh the HR director. uh very much what probably 60 to 70% of my time was spent on before he had the CEO were were personnel concerns and personnel issues. Doesn't give me doesn't give the mayor a lot of time to spend on long range planning and long range strategy. Uh fortunately that that has changed and as we have rules and regulations and have standards and have consistency, we have fewer we have fewer issues um that are that have not been answered before from personnel. Um but that consistency is huge. Uh it is incredibly inconsistent to allow personnel to choose their supervisors especially when their supervisors can change. Uh I have these rules and regulations and I have to stick to them. You tell me what

can you say that again? So that what I said it's a very inconsistent when an employee can choose their supervisors and their supervisors are seven people that could change that could change on any week. What I mean by that was the person who told me this a couple years ago um they uh knew that sometimes that person would be able to satisfy seven alderman doing one thing but seven different aldermen doing another thing. Yeah. So I get my concern is not frankly that the mayor would have that authority. My concern is that a staff member that we even though we appoint that person is not elected. Okay. And so

I was just about to get there. Okay. Thank you. Um without the CEO, we used to have department heads that handled a lot of those situations. So those people weren't elected um because but they were essentially carrying out the responsibilities of the mayor. Now we have those responsibilities carried out by the department head and the co. I don't see it as much different. It is one more layer, but honestly, it uh it allows the I think allows the board a little bit I think it gives the board a little bit more accountability on that position because instead of 10 department heads, it's now one person that if you are if you are unhappy with that, he gives a report and he uh he needs to answer to you. Maybe I answered that.

Uh I don't I'm not offering an amendment to be clear. These are just things that I have thought about from um kind of a philosophical point of view as to balancing where the control and power should and should not be. And I would really hope that other aldermen would weigh in on this because I would appreciate a conversation on it and um insight. It might help me find clarity and feel more comfortable with the overarching what I see as an overarching theme here. Thank you.

Okay. Alderman Bor. Thank you, Alman Collins.

Thank you, Alderman Collins. Thank you, Mayor. Appreciate it. Um I do um agree uh that well, let's just be honest with you. Every organization needs someone to take the fall. Every organization needs someone to where the buck stops here. Uh whether that be any one of us or the mayor in this particular instance. Um and that is good operations. You need to have that. Um the old saying is if you designed a horse by committee, you turn out with a giraffe. So we need clean, clearcut lines. And I think this goes a little goes to the direction what we're trying to get to as a smooth uh wellrun organization with these rules and regulations in place. They appear to be close to uh state requirements, right, Jason? Yes. Okay. Close or spot on? What are we at?

The goal is spot on. Spot. Okay, good. I'm looking for that. So but I I you know we every organization needs that person in the seat uh to take the responsibility. Uh so I think we're headed in the right direction but doesn't mean that this when we go through here the next few weeks, years, days, we can't change anything. I believe we still have the ability to come back and do so. Correct. Am I correct? Okay, good. So um I appreciate you bringing this forward to us, Jason. and uh uh letting us have this conversation. Thank you very much. Thank you, Alderman. Alderman Evans,

I appreciate what Alderman Collins has has shared and and I understand where she's coming from, but um I'm looking at it from from both sides, from being in the corporate world, both forprofit and nonprofit. um you have to kind of draw the line somewhere as far as well, you have these rules and regulations and someone has to be accountable for those things. The thing that makes it odd um different in in this situation is the way we're we're governed and we're set up. The fact that you have a mayor, then you have a COO under that, and then you have the department heads under that. So, I'm going to I'm going to say this, but then I'm going to back up. I understand that the fact that you you want to be careful with one position or one person having too much of the authority, power, whatever you want to call it. Uh but also that's part of our responsibility in making sure that we hire the right person to put in in that position. And I I think we probably all would agree that we, you know, I I think Jesse, the COO, I'll say, is um is well qualified um has good intentions. Uh has not given us any indication that there is um that there would be problems with that. But I think that's also what we need to do as a government governing body that we need to watch over that and that if there is anything that happens that maybe we just we don't agree, we don't follow or whatever, then we have those conversations. Someone has to be the the the person. You can't have all of these things that uh that go on. But I understand your your concern, Alderman Collins, with um kind of the buck stopping with one person on all these things if that helps.

Alderman Evans, thank you. Alman Robertson, I'll take a shot at it, too.

I try. We'll see. Uh would it would it help Alderman Collins if we made a change in that sentence as follows? appoint or remove, suspend, discipline for cause uh all employees. So, so you put in there for cause that that that puts a standard that that someone just can't lay off employees, but they have to have a a cause. uh and and uh you know I kind of it it's kind of like I hate to use the example of the federal government but for when the when the when the president makes appointments to cabinet which would be similar to our department heads uh they have to go in front of the senate and get confirmation. We do the same thing. So when a department head is recommended by the mayor and COO, they bring that to our recommendation to act upon it. So we have we have the first blush authority right there.

But the but Congress does not have any jurisdiction over the president dismissing employees. Uh they can have hearings on it. they can have oversight hearings. So, I just wonder would would that help you if we put in four calls? Um, let's should we go to um Mr. Ray first? Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. Always defer to general. I'll come back to you. Thank you.

Well, it it says uh subject to the policies and we've already got policies on what that what what those powers can and can't be. So I would be careful in tinkering with this when we already have something in place that uh that um regulates that. Also this board when it adopted uh the ordinance uh establishing the chief of operations, it delineated what the chief of operations could and couldn't do. So, um, we can't really, in my opinion, change a lot of things of what the chief of operations can and can't do in this if we don't do it in that ordinance. It's my opinion. No offense. Thank Thank you, Al Robertson. Any other discussion on the ordinance in general? All those in favor of first reading ordinance tooth. Um, Alderman Good, would you have something? Oh, there we go. Alman, good. Go ahead.

So, wait, did we just quit doing the chapters? We quit doing the chapters. Did you finish the chapters? Well, I have something to bring up. Go ahead. I would like to discuss the e pay and I have a solution I would like to propose. Page 116. Okay. Oh, was it Are we not there now? We're We're doing the We're doing the regulations and the

Okay, page 116. I've spent many, many, many hours looking at this, going over it, trying to come up with a solution, um, trying to figure out what we could do because I think for probably the past 25 years, it has not been consistent. Um, and I appreciate Jason and Jesse trying to come up with a solution. I We need a solution. Um, but I don't like the solution that you came up with. Nothing personal, but I don't like it. I'm sorry. And the reason that I don't like it is in the proposal it goes to moving someone to the next step when they start if they have the degree or two steps or three steps depending on your degree that you have. I'm not for that because when you hit step 17, you no longer are receiving the benefits from your e pay. Um, after sitting through hours of discussing eay, I think we need to simplify it and I think we need to look at our employees and do what's best by all the employees. And the way that I would like to amend it to simplify it, your rate of pay includes everything. Um, I'll use fire for example. If you're a firefighter and you're on the dive team, you get extra money, the different categories, the hazmat, different

things. All that's on your rate of pay. What I would like to do going forward with the new budget, I would like to have your rate of pay in one column, your e pay in another column. If you have your associates, you get the two and a half%. If you get promoted, you get your rate of pay. You keep your two and a half%. If you have your bachelors, you have your rate of pay and the 5% and it goes with you all the way through. You can still have requirements to have degrees for the job position, but taking it away, adding it back, it's too cumbersome. I would like to simplify it. Have the two columns. It stays with you through your career and leave it at that. And that would be my amendment. Okay. Um, can we come? So, Jason prepared something to help Jesse and me and a couple other folks understand this. Um, and it might help explain your amendment as well. So, Jason, do you can you show what you put together and then we'll come back to you, Alman Goodwin, to ask you where you would insert that. So, go ahead, Jason.

Are you talking about the slide deck? I am. Yeah.

Okay. All right. So, this was just prepared to give you an overview of what education pay or e-ay looks like. Um, how it's applied today, how the new policy would do it as well. Uh, so just to be clear, e-ay is education pay that's provided to employees whose education currently exceeds the maximum or the minimum requirement of their position. The job requires a high school diploma and they have an associates or bachelor's or masters. That's the highest level that we'll recognize. Then they have one of three possible levels. E1, two, or three. So if somebody, for example, high school diploma is required, they have a mast's, you would end up with an E3. Each education level or E level is at 2 and a half%. So at an E3, that would be 7 and a half%. It's just some basics before we get too deep in the weeds here. So here's an example of our current policy on applying EPA. I just gave you a salary table and a grade just as an example. The job requires a high school diploma and the employee is on grade 15 step five. So under the current policy that employee uh would get an E1 designation. They have one step educationally above the minimum requirement. They have an associates degree. A high school diploma is required. So they take their base pay at step five and add an E1 designation at 2 and a half%. Down below I've done the math for you. So step five plus that 2 and a half% gives you 321788. Under the proposed policy, what we're looking at is that if an employer receives the associates degree, they move up one step. So just as simple as that, there's no question on do we recalculate um they've gotten the degree, they move up one step. So the comparison here on the different

steps is if they have excuse me if they have an E1 designation currently they get two and a half% under the proposed they move to step six. You'll notice as we go up further in the percentage there's just a nominal difference as far as pennies and that has to do with the rounding between each of the steps. So, um, when it's all said and done here, that what we're looking at, um, is just trying to keep it clean and consistent for all employees with promotions. This is where it can get a little tricky. So, it's where it has gotten a little tricky.

It's what has gotten the city in a lot of confusion. Um, so here's the example. A vacant position requires an associates degree and it's a grade 18. So I take a current employee. Now this is as it stands today and these would be the grandfathered employees that are listed in the policy um as it's being proposed. So the job only requires a high school diploma but they have a bachelor's degree. So they're getting an education level two. So currently then they're at grade 14 step 12 with an E2 designation. So in order to come up with what their promotion rate is, we have to first come up with their combined rate. Their combined rate is their hourly rate plus the additional 5% that they get from the education pay. Those two totals together give you that combined rate of 372969. Sorry for the small text. Got hard to fit this in. What we're doing then is calculating the promotion rate. So we're let me back up just a second. that very bottom number, the combined rate, we're taking that and then multiplying that by 7 and a half. That gives us the promotion rate. So the promotion rate there is $40 and 00942. That's the promotion rate. Now what we're trying to do is find the step that gives a 7.5% increase. Looking on the salary table, it actually is step nine. But what we're doing with that is we're saying that's the end goal. So a combination of your education play pay plus your base rate gives you your combined rate. So what it ends up being instead of step 9 is step eight with an E1 designation under this current policy. Just kind of

recap 41870 is what we established as the goal. the seven and a half percent. The employee in the example has education in excess of the requirement by one level, so they receive an E1. They had E2, they keep an E1. And the promotion rate for the employees new position is grade 18, step 8 plus E1. Under the proposed change, here's what we're looking at. Same position, same qualifications, but the employee is hired after this whole thing has been rolled up. uh the employee is currently in a position same position grade 14 but because they had the bachelor's degree after the policy was enacted they are already at step 14 they're not at a step 12 plus E2 they're at step 14 and so when we figure out a promotion we just take their base rate multiply it by 7 and a half% and what we come up with is step nine but then there's no question of did you take away a step did you you know exchange anything. It's just math. It's the number times 7 and a half%. Which is really what we're trying to do is keep it simple. So 41870 is what proposes the new 7 and a half. Um I just want to end on some maybe potential options or I can pause on this mayor. It's up to you.

Okay. All you have a question about this. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah. So I can back up if you need. Yeah, if you wouldn't mind, let's back it up. That table right there is fine. Okay, so before the promotion, if they had an E2, yes, technically an E2, even though it's baked in to their base rate, right?

And they then get their seven and a half%, but now they're only one step in the education, right? Because it requires an associate and they have a bachelor's. How does that does that does that add into it even more or are they just so they're still going to get paid basically with that E2 in place? The goal is still like in this case, let me back up to the other example. I think it's a better one. The goal is still to get to step nine because step nine is the total amount, but now it's a combination of their education pay plus their promotion. Now let's we're getting to the same. We're getting to the same number. We're just eliminating the E1, E2, E3 now. Right. But a grandfather

does seem to be simplifying it. Yes. And a grandfathered employee would be able to keep it. So if they currently have it and their position allows for it, we're not taking it away. Okay. My is my issue that I have with Alman say anything else? Yeah. One more thing. If could a an existing grandfathered employer employee, sorry, move to this new methodology? They could. That's all I was curious. Okay. Alderman Goodwin, go ahead.

My issue that I have with that is when they get to step 17, they are maxed out and I want to create an environment where employees want to stay 30 years. If you're maxed out at 17, they're losing 13 years of getting a higher pay. If we have a separate column, may cost a little more in the beginning. They'll get their 2 and 12% merit and then get their e pay on top of that. And I think that's the cleanest, fairest way to do it. I think we need to take our employees and incentivize them to be long and I think this way I did the math. So with the new way um let me see here the lifetime differences. uh would be on the new way a step step 14 30 years. It's a difference that they would have made over the 30 years if I'm looking at all I've got notes going everywhere. It's about $101,000 that they would lose lose out on over that time. And I I just can't go with the way that you're proposing. So that 30-year employee, is that assuming that they stay in the same position they started at for all 30 years?

Yes. Okay. Um so Jason, we sort of prepared a little bit for how many people do we have that are that are at So step 17. At step 17, you no longer um receive a merit increase. That's the highest you can be at. How many people do we have that that's the case? Total at step 17, there's 23 people total as of today. Okay. How many of those we anticipate will be retiring? Oh, that I don't have. Okay. Okay. I can I can tell you out of the 23, 10 of them don't even have e pay. So, only 13 people at that level have e pay. Okay. Good. I sort of interrupt you. Go ahead.

I would like to encourage people to have the education pay. And I I'd really like to quit taking it, adding it, taking it, adding it. Um, that's why I want a separate column and then the e pay is done on top of their rate of pay and that's what I'm proposing. So, where would that separate column go? Well, you have their their pay, let's say their pay is a dollar, their rate of pay is a dollar after their add-ins are on. And then if they have a bachelor then you do that rate of pay at 5% of the rate of pay and just they keep it and it keeps moving up.

So on page 116 is probably the best. Yeah. 116. How what what would we need? What are you proposing that we change? I'm proposing that you don't do a that you don't come in and get a step up or move to the next step. I'm proposing that you come in like you normally would, you get your rate of pay. And if you have a bachelor's after your rate of pay is figured out, it's 5%. And then if you move up to step two, you figure out your rate of pay. Put your 5% on that for however long they're here.

So, how do we put that? How do we write that in the ordinance? Lance, can you help me write that? Can I? I I wouldn't want to just half-hazardly put something down. That would totally get us in trouble because we would miss something like that. Yes, but we'll see. Well, for next reading, I will Can we write an ordinance between now and the next reading? Yeah, we can. Yeah, definitely. We can come up with a good Okay, good. Anything else? That's all. Okay. Thank you. Uh, Alderman Burgdorf, you uh Yes, sir. Thank you. Um, thank you, Alderman Goodman. Good one. I appreciate um your concerns and I do see what you're talking about. uh that how do we the question is how do we

maintain long um longevity in an employee a longtime lifetime employee I understand that and I'm just trying to wonder um I'm sure you guys have thought about this so the the livelihood as as Alderman Goodwin has said ends at step 17 the level of pro promotions end at step 17 is there anything else um that would be is there another mechanism is another vehicle that we could incorporate uh something to promote longevity for these 13 23 23 23 employees. There's 23 employees.

What came to my mind is we could add more steps. However, just a couple years ago, we reduced the number of steps. Well, yeah, we did. Um Okay, that's that was a that's my best thought out loud question. So, thank you. That's my best thought out loud answer. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Alderman Collins, I have a question for Alderman Goodwin.

Um, in your scenario, does the does the 2 and a half% or 5% or 7 and a half% take into account whether or not the job requires them to have that degree? Yes. If you come in and it requires it, then you don't get it. But let's leave it and quit taking it, adding it, taking it. Just make it clear.

If you come in and you have a bachelor's degree and it doesn't require that, but then you get promoted and it does require a bachelor's degree, you continue to get the two and a half%. Yes. I need to give that some thought. And um Mr. Gallow, could you email us the documents that you went through? Sure. It's just for review. I would be happy to. I I'd appreciate that. Be more happy to send it out. Thank you, Alderman Collins. Thank you, Alman. Good. Jason, you said that you paused for questions. Is this the end of the presentation?

Uh mostly. I mean, there's a few potential proposals that I had. Alman Evans or you want what do you want to do? Um for me we don't need to look at these potential options. Number one, I wanted to say that I think maybe I'm missing something, but I think we're making this too complicated. Number one, I don't think we need to add any more steps. So let's let's take that off the table and don't even mention that.

So I have mentioned it. Okay. Um, but I understand where Alderman Goodwin's coming from and the fact that just leave the the pay as it is with the steps and everything. Why can't this just be a separate thing? Um, you know, of you know, you have a person, this is what where they are in the step um of of everything. That's their pay. But if they have the E1 or E2 or whatever designation it is, you just add that to it. However, I do want to uh think more about what Alderman Collins said about the fact that when a person is promoted and that is required, I think we do have to look at that. I get what what Alderman uh Goodwin is saying about that, not taking it away. But if a person is that's kind of inherent and included uh within the the promotion if you will with somebody getting paid that if it's a requirement that they have to have a bachelor's or a master's then they shouldn't be getting the promotion that requires that uh plus uh the designation that they've been receiving all along. So I I do have a concern there. But again, I want to try and keep this as simple as possible. And I think that we're convoluting some of this by thinking about, oh, well, you know, we want to get to that. I I get what you're doing with the math and all that, but I think it's too complicated. It's too convoluted. Let's just keep it simple. These are the steps. Add the 2% 2 and a half% the 5% 7 half% whatever it is, and then go on from there.

Alman Evans. Thank you, Alman Dixon.

Uh, thank you, Mayor. Um it it might behoove us to schedule a town hall maybe or just on this because this is this is a little bit beyond our ordinance tonight. Um but I will say this coming from the corporate world myself for uh almost 40 years. Um, I I I I think it is is it as it should be as simple as you're promoted to this level, you get an eay bonus, and I'll call it a bonus instead of an add-on. And when you either go to the next level or you get promoted, your bonus stays with you because you earned it. And that's how I look at it. Um, and I just think it needs to be much more simpler than saying, "Well, they're going to the next level. That job requires a bachelor's degree. They already have one. So, we're going to take that 2% 2 and a half% away from them." I say they earned it in the last job. Let that 2% carry with them in the next job at the base pay that they're currently at. That's how I look at it.

Thank you, Dixon. Alan Collins. Um, Jason, the base pay In the case that somebody gets promoted, the new job description, the base pay includes it's higher in part because there's more responsibility or different responsibility, different skill sets, but also because the requirements are higher, including education. So, is it kind of like you're getting paid for it twice? It could be seen as double dipping. Absolutely. certain jobs required.

If you hired into that position instead of getting promoted into it, you would not al Alderman Goodwin, maybe this is where I need to have the clarification. If you're hired, in your scenario, if you're hired into a position, that requires a master's degree, do you get the percentage as well as the No, you don't. You're hired in at a much higher level. promoted into it, you still get it

instead of taking it away every time you know people promote the that just quit taking it, moving it, taking it. Tonight's really hard for me. I don't I am not finding a lot of clarity on many of these issues. And um I would like I know we already deferred this once, but I would like to have um to not have an amendment tonight and have some time to really digest these ideas and think through them. I'm fine not doing an amendment tonight on it. We'll have a second reading. I can get with Lance and I can think more if I'm going to

do the do the deduction, but I just do want to find a solution that is simple, straightforward, and benefits our employees. I would like a separate column after their rate of pay is determined with their e pay added on and move. It's to me it's just much simpler. It's Thank you.

Okay. So, good you're going to work with Lance to put an amendment together. Uh let me say something real quick is and Jesse, I think you probably need to help us out a little bit. Um uh just keep in mind we're not trying to harm anybody. All we're trying to do is trying to get consistency. That's that's the objective here. Uh because what we've had has has been vague and inconsistent to to the point of creating inconsistencies and exceptions that other people want to join in on. Um and so probably the only inconsistency we have is that is we've been very inconsistent. Um, and so hopefully we we can get over that. And keep and keep in mind, too, this is not to save the city money. Um, there's no reason to believe that there's going to be savings in this. Um, not at all. Um, let's go to Alderman Burgdorf.

Oh, I'm sorry, Jesse. Um, you might want to address something a second ago or

Yeah. Okay. I'm not going to really express my opinion on this, but what I will say is that Jason and I have dealt with this time and time again. So, like Mr. Revan said it's complicated and all the math up there is complicated. Unfortunately, the way that we have to factor our current eay system is with all that math up there. We have to get this big spreadsheet out and we have to do it that way. Otherwise, we calculate it incorrectly. And I'm not kidding you. I've sat with department heads, multiple department heads and Jason, and we've all come up with a different way that we calculate the e pay. And people have been doing it like that in their department for years. And so we need a very systematic way that we can do that. Right now we do have a spreadsheet that we use in HR where we test everything that goes through with the current system. What that means though is that HR has to manually go in on every promotion and manually check these things. And they could miss one a year, they could miss two a year, and four years down the road, oops, we missed an employee three years ago, we missed two employees two years ago. And so I wish it was simple, but we have to do it the way that we have on the spreadsheet because our policy says we don't want employees to get less than a 7 and a half% increase. And if and if and to Miss Dixon's point, it's easy if you keep a bonus on there. But then what happens is if an employee got a job and they didn't previously were in a lower ranking job, like if they hired in and it required a bachelor and they never had the option to get a bonus earlier, then they're going to work alongside someone who got the bonus because they started at a lower position. So they're going to work the same position and one gets a bonus and one doesn't. And so there are so many issues with how you can do it. Um what we basically did in this policy is a proposal. This was the

an idea that we came up with. So we're not saying that the board has to do this

is we said how do we eliminate the confusion? How do we keep it consistent for all employees and how do we not harm to the best of our ability all the existing employees who have eay? And the idea was we grandfather everyone in who has it. For the next couple of years while we are here, I think we will be able to be consistent with these e-ays. New employees coming in, bumping up a step. It is hard to make a mistake. Much harder to make a mistake. Um there was an issue raised. Now we shared all this with department heads for probably the last eight months and we didn't really have this issue come up until the last couple weeks. And I should have thought about this and I didn't, but there are current employees right now who are about to finish an associates or bachelor's degree. So, they were counting on getting an E1 or an E2 and they're almost done with their degrees. Uh, if I could roll back in time, I would have adopted a grandfathered extension in here to say, "Hey, if you're currently an existing employee, we're going to give you a certain amount of time to finish your degree." And that would I think at least alleviate some of the concerns with folks who are about to get their degrees. But there's there's issues with any way that you do it. And we kind of keep it on a column to the side right now. That's what we do. We have your base pay and then we kind of keep your e pay to the side. Uh, and but if you roll to a position that requires that level of education that you've been getting a bonus for, um, it rolls off because that position has the the pay built into it that's required of that position. So, you know, as you bump up through the ranks, you start to get 80, 90, 100, $110,000 jobs. Well, they're they pay more because they require the education. So, there's a lot of different ways you could do it. It's just hard to have a systematic way where no one's harmed. It's perfect for everyone. We are absolutely open to

ideas about it. This was what we came up with again to grandfather employees that are currently in the system and then roll a new system on for new employees. That's more consistent. That's much more clearer than what I said. Appreciate that, Jesse. Thank you, Alderman Brodor. Thank you. Um Jason, Jesse, either one of you please. The only the one question I've got is we just recently had a pay study and I think we discussed this a minute ago. Was any of this was did the pay study we uh solicited give us any insight on how to do this? Have we seen this type of pay study anywhere else? So I actually go anywhere else. They're in the middle of the pay study right now. So I called the consultant and spoke with her.

Okay. And they do all of Tennessee. Okay. So they're not middle or east or west. They're all of Tennessee. Okay. And I asked her, I said, "What's the consistent thing that you have seen?" and all the, you know, municipalities that report data, all the cities that turn it in, what do you see? And borrowing from what the mayor said, it's consistently inconsistent across the board. Across the board, nobody does it the same. Nobody offers the same structure. And she said there are agencies who don't offer anything at all. And so she said those who do offer it, none of them do it the same. So no insight from the basement. None whatsoever. Is that why we got it so cheap?

Is that why we got the discount? Right. No, I was hoping. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Alderman Burgdorf. Thank you. Alderman Goodwin.

I just want to apologize if I came across as being critical. I'm not critical. I I think we have not had consistencies and I have toyed with ideas and looked at it and to me that made the most sense. Um, I mean, I'm not good at math, but that was the simplest way for me to do it as an extra column on the the rate of pay. And I will consider, you know, if we have to take it away to get it done that way when you move up, then I'll see how I feel about that. But I wasn't trying to be critical, but I think we need to make it simple. I think it's been so inconsistent over the years and way before y'all came. I mean, I think that's been going on each time you got a new person in. So, I'm not being critical of that, but I'm trying to offer a solution that I think will benefit everybody. And

so, thank you. That's a good one. Alderman Collins. Um, do we reimburse for 100% of their tuition, books, whatever if it's specific to the position? Yes. So if it's not specific to the position, no. So there are departments, police and fire are probably the ones who use it the most. Well, those employees will go back for an advanced degree. The city pays for that and that allows them to get a promotion. That allows them to get the promotion and it also allows them to get the

I'm definitely not saying that we shouldn't do that. Don't take this the wrong way, but we are paying for somebody to earn the degree that gets them the promotion which has the degree baked into it. Thank you. Okay. Thank you all cons. Any other discussion? So, Lance available work with anybody who has some uh some proposed changes. This is just first reading. Uh, all those in favor of first read orders 2026-01, please say I.

Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Thank you'all. Now we're on to brief committee reports. The first one comes from our public works chairman. That is Chairman Skidmore.

Yes. Thank you, Mayor. Um, we had our meeting tonight at 5:00 p.m. and it lasted about an hour and a half. So, what I'm going to do tonight, if that's okay, I'm going to highlight the uh public works committee report that actually affects the citizenry of the city of Hendersonville. Um, I think that's more important than us to do the the uh I guess the in work or the house work that we that we consistently do every month. But I think it's more important uh that we really address to what's been going you know what affects the city as a whole instead of just here at city hall. So by saying that tonight uh we looked at two readings of resol we had a a full plate um a resolution 2026 which is which is coming here u at our next meeting uh 202602 a resolution to apply for local parks grant um for various projects within the city parks. So, you'll be getting that at at our next packet. Um, the next one is another resolution uh by 20267, which is a resolution for the mayor to execute agreement for inline hockey supply vending machine, which I think is pretty cool. you know, you we're uh instead of having like food vending machines, this is like having things that you might forget or something that deals directly with the inline hockey. Um I, you know, I I'm just trying to think. I don't know because I'm I'm not really a big fan of inline hockey, but I enjoy watching the kids, you know, get out there and play,

but it's their, you know, their equipment. uh they might forget it and sometimes I remember when I play I played basketball I was playing basketball many years ago and um I forgot my tennis shoes to play basketball

and so I was just heartbroken. So I can I can identify what those kids do. Uh, fortunately my mom was there and she had my extra pair in the in the u in the old chvel if you can believe that that we had and uh so I was very grateful for mama for doing that. So um it happens and moms can't think of everything I can tell you because they got a whole load on their plate. So, with this vending machine, it'll be in it'll be in Volunteer Park at Airhead and uh and I'm real excited about bringing that to the uh table here at uh um city hall. Um then we had uh our trash collection update and uh it's in it's in we're in doing pretty good shape. Uh we just need to continue to monitor it. um you know the threshold has not been enough for the uh for enough misses for us for us to you know uh institute our contract that says they've got to pay they got to pay us. But we've been really good. We've been very fortunate especially with the weather with our um with our trash um pickup. We did have a a a discussion of the traffic calming discussion, which I know every alderman on this board, including the mayor, um has had that question answered in in parts of the neighborhoods uh here in our city of Hendersonville. And I'm here to tell you that uh we're doing a uh we're coming uh and trying to get a new a a new program dealing with with that. Now, we're not

ready yet, but we're very close to bring it to the board of mayor and alderman to explain it and and also to explain it to the uh citizens of Hendersonville. But I'm real real proud of that. um the Saunders Ferry boardwalk crossing, you know, where the boards are there. So when you're driving uh down Saundersh Ferry Road um you can't really see the the water and actually that's one of the most beautiful places if because I can remember I know everybody can remember that um so I'm not talking about the 80s and you know um it's kind of you know it's hidden now and we're look we were looking into the um uh replacing everything with, you know, what like the little wires that go across like you see in a lot of state parks. And so we had a, you know, many months ago we had a uh a bid put out or um Sarah Lock who was there did some research on it. It was about $260,000 or so. Well, we did it again just to see what it would be and now um it's 300,000 for what for what the they're what they're asking for. So, we've got to put that on the back burner for right now. But I don't want the people of that peninsula of Walton Ferry and Saunders Ferry think that we're just dismissing it. We're still going to continue to look for avenues that will be better so you'll be able to see um the waterway, but it's got to be safe, you know, safety first. We got to make sure it's it you have the safety there. Um want to tell you a little bit which I'm really excited about is the light synchronization project with the in the

city of Hendersonville. As you all well know as this whole board is very excited about that. Um we we got uh back in February 6th, we got the notice to proceed on that project. And so our um we're going to advertise our bids u around March or the first couple weeks of March. Um so I'm real excited for that to be happening here in Hendersonville. Um also I do want to say one thing about and we did discuss this too. Um this is about um our storm uh debris removal and um I'm really excited. I'm very proud of public works for doing what they've done and the road crew um and the track the and the the pickup crew that picks up our debris. Um it's about 64,000 uh since the last time I reported that we've had about 64,000 um debris at at of all everyone in Hendersonville u have been picked up. Um I'm just trying to talk about what's the easiest way to say this. I guess the best way is just tell you what it is, the truth on it. Um, we're probably going to be it's going to be before we're back on schedule in the city of Hendersonville mid-March. Um, but they have been working tremendous, tremendously work hard. In fact, they did they have had to today over 280

uh hours in overtime. So, we're this city the the city um here is working for the citizenry and I'm real proud of that because that that's exceptional work and they are working desperately and long hours to try to get the debris up. But I want everybody to remember and this is key that rain and tornado season could be coming very soon. And so when if you think that the trees are or are the debris that you get out of your yard and put it up and you know you get mad like I do and say, "I wonder where they are. I wonder where they are." Uh go to the website and look because they're working to to to the best that they can do. And I'm just so proud of that. Um, the final thing I want to say is, um, a lot of people through social media and phone calls to my house and and emails and things like that. And I know all the the alderman have had these uh calls, too. I mean, I'm sure of it because I'm just looking at the the past and it never fails. But I do want the people of the Hendersonville to know that the potholes are being filled, but they're not being filled by the city of Hendersonville if it's on where the state of Tennessee owns that road. Like for example, Main Street. We we don't fill those holes. the Tennessee Department of Transportation and the road division fills those holes. Now, we go into like um uh Old Shackle Island Road and fill those holes up or uh we go

into just your normal streets, Allen Drive. I'm just and I'm just tossing these names out uh just because I want to let you those are city roads. um Riviera Drive. That's that's real close to us in Ward One. But but every street that the city is being dedicated to that is a that is a city street. I want to let you know they're working real hard to get those um potholes filled. Um it's the cold weather that has an issue with it. Um a lot of people don't know it. It needs I like as as chairman of public works and many years I've been in there, I like the fact that when the temperature rises, you know, they're they're working a little harder because it's going to it's going to stay more impacted in the in the pothole the asphalt is. Um, I always like uh when when we have our streets, you know, every alderman gets a street list of what we have done and what we're and what the city is choosing to do or re uh to uh repave um that street. I always and and this is just a matter of, you know, my opinion, but I really like to see um our roads uh and I represent along with Mark Burgdorf here, Ward One. And so when I obviously when I look, I always look to see, you know, like every alderman, we all look to see what our streets are. Um, but I like to see ours done in the spring and I really love to see it done in the summer because um I'm at to the belief that our streets last longer when when it's a lot hotter outside for the asphalt to take

to the to the roads. So, so we are working on that. But I know there's been a lot of people, like I said, and I'll close with this, that has been uh, you know, somewhat critical through social media, but just just hang in there with us. We're doing we're doing excellent work. City staff's doing wonderful. Um, best I've seen in a long time, and I'm very proud of them. And just have faith in us. Um, we're we're we're getting it all done. But our tree limb service is is the is a key. Um, you know, I'm I'm really worried about when it when the rain comes and the uh and the wind comes that it's going to do. Um, not like the major damage that we had this this last ice storm, but I just want everybody to remember we've got that that is coming and they're doing real good. So, uh, mid-March is when we're we're going to be ready. We're going to back on track and, uh, and we'll continue to look at the website and it will tell you when the trees are being picked up in your respective ward. Mayor, that's it. Thank you.

Thank you, Chairman. Mr. Goodmore. Um, Alderman Dixon, you're the liazison to the Lakes Shore Committee. I appreciate you all you offering to provide a report. Go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor. Um, as you all remember, uh, we voted, um, I think it was in 2004 to, um, 2024, excuse me, to, uh, form a Lakeshore committee. Um, and so in, uh, 2025, in May, about nine months ago, we held our first meeting. Um we have uh nine members and uh our chairman is Angela Holmes. Uh and our vice chair is Jeremy Hatcher. Um our staff liaison was Stephen Winsen Reed but since Stephen has been uh promoted congratulations Stephen. We now have uh Tater Mills Frank or uh as our uh liaison from the city. Um, we have created a website and on on and you can see it in front of you. Um, and on that website we list the mission statement that we've voted on and we also have our work plan that you can go out and peruse at your convenience. Um, two of the items on that work plan I want to just give you an update on um, just in nine months what uh, the committee has done. One of the uh biggest items that the team felt very important um to the community is to create a digital resource guide for city residents about the lake. Um uh lots of information. So over the last nine months they've had many no one came in with all the answers. I don't think there's any one person in the state of Tennessee that has all the answers. So, uh they did a lot of um asking folks to come and and the core of

engineers and different people officers and uh the uh fire chief came and did a presentation for them and um just trying to gather what they feel like might need to go in this digital resource guide. Um it is about 75% complete. Uh it's in draft. Uh we will need a legal review for this when it goes live on the website and we would need our um information officer Casey to help us uh uh launch this on our website. Um the next item is that uh on the the the um work plan is hosting meetings with uh property owners and the core of engineers in partnership with our mayor because um before this uh committee was formed, there were two uh meetings that the mayor has had over the last three or four years um where he invited citizens to come here and uh me members of the core of engineers could act they could ask questions. Um last um well I'll say February 9th the the Monday after the Super Bowl uh we had a third meeting that was al that was sponsored by the mayor but um the lake lakeshore committee was involved. Um, we had members of the core of engineer and the Cumberland wa water management here. Um, because it was the Sunday after the Super Bowl, we were very surprised. Uh, I think the mayor and I talked about if we have 20 people, that's a success. We had um I stopped counting at around 65 and many many more people came in and I think we have between 80 and 85 people

here. Um and every seat was full and we had people standing. It was a great great meeting. The thing that did impress our team is that it was all positive communication and feedback from those who attended. Um and there was so much information that was offered by the resources we asked to come and speak. And I would ask all the aldermen and those watching if you're interested, we did video this and it is out on YouTube um on our YouTube channel. Um and more to come. I would really like to get Angela as our chairman here to give a overall presentation uh sometime later this year. But I I did want to prov give everyone um that update. Thank you so much,

Alderman Dixon. Thank you. Uh, Alderman Robertson, uh, you also asked, I appreciate this, to provide an update, um, as liaison of the golf course commission. And I'd like to ask Director Gilly if he could come and help me with this presentation. Uh, you know, one of the things that I did when I was appointed to the golf commission. I noticed that uh, they really didn't have a leazison uh, department with the golf course. It was the finance committee. And you know, uh, so one of the first things I did was h pass a resolution

for the parks department to be the leazison. And boy, what a blessing that has been. Uh, the parks department does a great job in helping the management company. Uh, but as you can expect, we've had a lot of problems with the snowstorm. Um, and so just a brief report and then I'm gonna ask Director Gilly to say a few words. due to the substantial tree damage. There's a lot of trees as you can expect on the golf course. It was partially clo either closed or partially closed for 23 days starting uh January the 24th and uh management company estimates that they lost approximately $40,000 during that time. Now thankfully the golf commission and the management company with the parks d department they have really managed the money well. Uh demand for the golf course is up. Uh it started going up in COVID and so uh the good report is uh the bad report is they lost $40,000. But the good news is that they had enough reserves to cover that. So, they're not going to need to come to the come to the uh to Bulma asking for uh a supplement, a help on that. They're going to be able to to absorb that within their uh reserves that they have. Uh and that's the good news. Uh uh the next challenge and uh I want to the the management company wanted to especially thank the staff and the the third party contractor that has helped remove a lot of trees from the golf course. Uh and now there's a lot of stump removal and repair of golf paths. So, Director Gilly, would you please add anything that you think need to maybe what the parks department has done with the golf management company to make it work?

Um, thank you. Um, thank you to this board for supporting the golf course. We are one of few municipallyowned golf courses in the country that make money. Uh, you can call around to Gallatin, Springfield, Metro, Nashville. Even though COVID has bmed golf, they don't necessarily turn a profit. So, these folks have done a great job. They being the management group, our parks maintenance staff, public works, working together on all that. I can assure you when I sat where Alderman Dixon now sits uh eight or nine years ago and I was in the role as a liaison as Alderman Robertson is now. If we'd have had this storm then we would be coming up here with an emergency amendment for the budget to ask you to help the golf course make payroll not just keep it open just make payroll. So those folks have done a great job. Uh the on call tree company has been fantastic. So, that's been a a contract well done by the city. What I will say about that contract also that people may not realize is they have come in and Stephen or Jesse, correct me if I'm wrong, they have hired local people too to work with them as monitors and working buckets and other things. So, that's been good to have local people that care about the city also working with people from out of state. Um they have touched I I I know they never and I personally never want to see another tree with ice on it ever again. Um man, what a mess. And um they worked really hard and the biggest thing was we didn't want to open it until it was pretty safe to open it for liability reasons. So they got they got nine holes back open. They've gotten 18 open now. In the meantime, that allowed us to finish a major renovation to the restrooms out there. I know uh Alderman Collins and her women's group that meets out there in the clubhouse appreciate

the restroom renovation uh that we worked on. So, it has been a complete team effort. Like the golf course is a good example of what has gone on citywide during this. Um if if you didn't know better, you wouldn't have known we had a tra a disaster, right? like except for when we were without power for a week or two in some cases, but um they've done a tremendous job of cleaning up. They they will be able to meet payroll. They will be able to still have money in the bank to to do things with and probably even maybe do a project or two outside of that. Not saying that's going to be the case every year, but for this year, we have saved up enough money to do that. It was a record year in rounds played last last calendar year and uh we hope that we'll get back to normal business soon. So if anybody has any but that that I probably didn't answer all

No, you did. But I want to to ask you uh the golf commission has spent a lot of money on the golf course. I mean by my estimates it's in the hundreds of thousands of dollars within the last two to three years. The the the golf it's kind of it's the city spending the city's money. And when you get down to it, we've, you know, the money that the golf course collects is city dollars and then the golf commission helps guide the staff in spending that money on the golf course. So, between buying a a new irrigation pump and all the improvements that we've done and and maintenance items, it's well over $300 to $400,000 that has been spent by the revenues from the golf course.

That's what I that the city has not had to fund. So that's that that just doesn't happen, man. I get I mean I've actually been asked to speak at a conference about how you make money on a municipal golf course and I declined because I I really just what I want to tell them is look, we're just well situated in between two really expensive country clubs with a lot of people moving in here. That's what's really happening. So um not everybody can do that.

Yeah. I I've never uh seen the the the response to the storm at the golf course and with the city. Uh I'll echo what uh Chairman Skidmore said. I've never seen such coordination and team work in dealing with the natural disaster. Our staff worked as a team. Um they were dedicated, they were responsive, and uh we we just can't say enough of uh expressing our appreciation uh to all of the staff for what they did and and especially at the golf course since I'm on the commission. So, thank you, Director Gilly.

Yes, sir. Unfortunately, we're we've had a lot of practice working together on disaster, so we we're ready for a little break for a year, hopefully. Thank you all. Hold on. Uh, uh, Alman Evans, you have a question for Alman Robertson. No, no, I have something I want to share with all some Sure. I'm good. Yes, you're good. Thank you. Thank you, Andy.

Thank you, mayor, but I wanted to to speak before um uh Mr. Einroth came up and spoke, but this goes back to the uh personnel rules and regulations. Um, so it's it's my fault, but um I think that we've um first of all, I want to appreciate I appreciate uh Jesse and Jason and the staff working on on those over the last few months that they have year or whatever. But um I feel like in our haste tonight, we went too quick and I I did wasn't following what you were doing and we we went too quick in in approving the first reading. I'm not saying we go back, but um that's the reason I asked for us to go section at a time. And I appreciate that, you know, Alderman Goodwin jumped into the epay. That's fine. But there were other questions I had. So I want us to be prepared when we come back for the second reading that I have a lot of questions and I think some other people do too. And let's not quickly jump into all those in favor kind of thing because we we did that when we had the workshop. Those of us on Bulma really only got to speak maybe or ask questions maybe 20 to 30 minutes at the most for a document that's you know 200 pages long. We we listen to um uh the folks that have helped us write this and that was fine to have them share and and all that stuff, but we've we've not been given the opportunity to ask the questions properly. I've worked with Jason and Jesse to ask a lot of questions, but I still have more and I wanted to do them tonight in a forum. And so I'd just like next time when we meet to talk about this in the second reading that I would like for us to go through. And when I say chapter by chapter, I'm talking about the HR numbers. So Jesse, if you if if I'm speaking the wrong language here, it's the policy HR. I want to take

those a chapter HR at a time so that it gives us all the opportunity to ask the questions and not rush through this going forward, please. Thank you, Alman Evans. Thank you. Uh Jesse, B report.

Yeah, thank you Andy. That was a good report on the golf course. Um Jason, if you can pull up the social media that Casey and Natasha put together. This is a little clip that uh public works asked us to play during um public works committee, but we weren't able to. So, we're just going to go ahead and play it for you. Now, this is out on social media. Can we get the audio? Maybe that's me up here. That's That's what I want.

On Sunday, January 25th, Hendersonville residents woke to an icy mess and the sounds of popping trees and branches. Winter storm Fern had brought widespread tree damage across the city. City crews were dispatched immediately, clearing more than 65 calls for trees in the roadway over a 24-hour period. As a part of our emergency preparedness plan, the city has a contract crew called Looks Great Services on standby to help with storm damage during a state of emergency. Prior to the storm, public works alerted this team that we may need them. And as a result, they were prepared and had trucks in the city ready to support within days of the storm hitting. Due to the large collection volumes, Looks Great brought in nine limb trucks to support our existing limb collection crews. These trucks have been divided up in zones across the city and are collectively working to pick up the debris as quickly as possible. Residents can place all their limbs and branches at the street for collection by these crews. They will be making several passes on each street to get everything collected. Once trucks have a full load, crews take the limbs to our city limb and vegetation landfill off Forest Retreat Road. They are unloaded and eventually ground into mulch and hauled off. These crews are averaging a little over a 100 loads of debris a day, and I've collected over 50,000 cubic yards of debris since starting. We encourage everyone to get their tree limbs to the curb as soon as possible to ensure a timely collection. We anticipate our contract crews will be here to help with collection until mid-March. Working together, we can get the city back to normal as quickly as possible.

Yeah, thank you Casey and Natasha for putting that together. I think it was 50,000 cubic yards when we did the video and as Chairman Skidmore said, we're up to 64,000 cubic yards already. So, uh, we're nearing a million and a half dollars already for the cleanup that we have, um, through third party. So, good thing we have our rainy day reserve. Uh, again, we're going to submit for reimbursement on that. But, uh, there's been almost 2,000 loads of debris that have been taken out to the limb landfill. And you saw that kind of pulverizer that was shooting out all the chips. And then those chips have to get hauled down to Nashville. So, it is a production out at the site just to manage the space out there. There's quite a production. Uh I'm not going to go through the Bulma report static since last meeting. Um I will just highlight the email that the mayor sent out about the Boring Company just so everyone is clear on that. We did already submit an application for the Boring Company. We were able to meet with them about a week ago and they told us, "Oh, by the way, we have a contest for a free mile of tunnel and the application's due in three days." So, we went ahead and put the application in, but that the estimated value of a mile of tunnel uh that we could use for undergrounding utility lines is, you know, in the neighborhood of 10 to 12 million. So, that will be wild if we can actually get something like that. But planning did a great job in in getting that submitted. Uh so, that is uh in the boring companies kind of queue. Hopefully, that is awarded to the city. Uh the last thing I want you guys to do is just remember to mark your calendars for tomorrow. We have both a uh Bulma budget workshop that starts at 6:00 pm in here. And then following that up, we are going to have a Bulma and parks board meeting to go over the parks master plan. Uh so we're going to talk about the master plan. We'll do a SWAT analysis. Andy, uh

Mayor Clary, and Kimley Horn will be here kind of leading that. That's going to start at 7:00. So 6:00 and 7 o'clock, we'll have some uh some food here right before our six o'clock meeting. So if you don't have time to grab dinner, we'll have something here for you guys. And that concludes my report. All good morning. Do you have a question for Jesse? Oh, here we go. Now you're good. Yeah. I just wanted to say to Casey and Tasha, thank you guys uh for that. But after viewing that, I had post-traumatic stress disorder when I saw that video. So, I'm not really sure whether I want to thank you or not because it was rough. Thank you, mayor.

Appreciate that, Robert. So, next we have uh executive session, which can include only the board and our city attorney. Uh we do have one other item on the agenda before we adjourn. Um I'd like to give you a prediction. I'll say somewhere between five and 20 minutes. Okay. Thank you, Jason.

Ready, Alderman Ward. We have a motion to adjourn from Alderman Ward and a second from Alderman Collins. All those in favor, please say I. Those opposed, please say no. That passes unanimously. Thank you all. Y'all have a good night. Appreciate your work tonight. Thank you, Jason. Thank you, G.