Town Council - Regular Meeting

Would everybody rise for the Pledge of Allegiance?

Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

If you'll all remain standing for a moment of silence. May be seated. Tell you a little bit about an upcoming event. We don't have events. And before the next meeting, we just have one and it is a big one. It is a rock the trail, September the 12th, which is this Saturday. Uh, crossing past park from four to nine celebrate Indian trail. with the evening with live music, local food, and community spirit, from great tunes to hometown pride. It's gonna be a great night, and Taylor Swift's gonna be here on Saturday.

What's so funny?

Oh, not really Taylor Swift. It's a, what do you call it? What do you call that?

Tribute band.

There you go. But listen, it's going to be fun anyway. So I know lots of young ladies and maybe men too that are really excited about this. And I always like to say Taylor Swift's coming because I know you know better.

So anyway.

Okay. So those are all the events that I know of. So with that, let's go to, uh, mayor council, uh, member introductions. And let's start with, with Adam.

This Tom, our town manager, Adam McLam town manager, Marcus McIntyre, Tom Kong.

So Todd Barber town council, Melanie Cox, town attorney, David Cohn, mayor, Crystal Buchholic council, Tom Ambergy, councilman, Clarence also works junior councilman.

Very good. Thank you. Uh, does anybody have any additions or deletions?

I have, uh, I have a deletion.

Okay.

Uh, make a motion to remove item four B quarterly financial review from the agenda.

Okay. I'm sorry, Marcus. I didn't hear you.

Uh, make a motion to remove item four B as in boy.

Okay. Four B I got you. All right. All right. Got you thing. Okay. Any others?

No, sir. That's the only one.

If that's it, can I get a motion to for the amended agenda?

So I make a motion to approve the amend the agenda as amended.

All in favor. Unanimous. Okay. That brings us to new business. It's copper top and table here. Well, there you are. Hey, how you doing? Hey, good to see you. I see people. You've already been there, huh? Because you like it. Are you Jackson? Right. Yes. Yes. You do. I step up. Come on up. Come on up.

Yesenia as well. She's our promotions manager.

This is this is our new business.

Yeah, we're brand new. We're an Indian trail right over next to Sun Valley. So but I'll just happen to You been there? It was good? I got two thumbs, three thumbs up then. That's awesome.

I've been there too, man.

Twice. That's four thumbs up. All right. We're on a good start. So yeah, we got a thumbs up over there too. Thank you, Abigail Ball. Awesome. Awesome. Well, I'll just kind of hop right into it. We're a brand new restaurant. We just touched down. We serve new American food and we do stuff like Jack Daniels. salmon chicken parmesan wings fish and chips all that kind of stuff and we have two big focuses we want to remain family-friendly but we really want to just show people a good time we are a little bit of a bar as well but we want to do that responsibly and make sure everyone does awesome so we're working on a catering menu right now and we'll have it up and running in like two weeks and then we do live music and then we have really competitive drink specials so we run wine Wednesday which is half off wine or tap Tuesday it's like $5 for anything on tap. So yeah, we're super excited to work with y'all and I'll let her say a little bit, but thank you.

Hello. Ooh, this is a little tall. Sorry. I'm Yesenia. So as Jackson mentioned, I am the promotions manager at copper top and table. I'll echo everything he said. But aside from a restaurant, we not only want to just be a restaurant where people come sit and down, sit to eat. We want to be a space for the community. If you need local events hosted, would like to be that space we'd like to be the space to help local organizations and we want to really be involved in the community so you'll see us hopefully everywhere going forward because we do want to meet everybody and be involved so we're looking forward to this and happy to be here and happy to meet you all thank you and let me tell it's it's and for anybody that wants to know it used to be where east coast wings used to be so that that would

Someone said we had better wings.

I didn't eat there.

It's an upgrade.

Yes. I love that. Thank you. They're no longer here. Yeah, it really needed to be an upgrade. I never ate there.

I've been there twice. It's a nice place to eat. Yeah.

Very good. Does anybody have any questions? If not, no, this way.

Oh, okay.

We have something for you.

Yeah, yeah. If you guys invite us back, we'll bring samples. That's his favorite. All right. We like samples. All right. You know, if you invite me back, I'll bring a menu and samples and maybe some other stuff. We'll see.

When's our next meeting?

No drink samples. Sorry. You can bring samples on the 26th.

We'll get you guys something to eat.

Oh, yeah, I should.

All right. That brings us up to CDBG and residential services guide Jason May, Union County representative. Come on up. Thank you, Mayor.

a little bit more hungry now, and I didn't bring samples either. However, I did bring my partner in crime, Monica Culbreth, and as I go through some of our public service provisions, she's gonna be handing out some information about those services for you. As the mayor mentioned, my name is Jason May. I'm the Director of Budget and Grants Management for Union County. And it's my privilege this evening to be able to kind of walk you through some of the public service programs that we offer in Union County as a part of our community development block grant funding. So I'm going to jump right in. First one that we have is Habitat Home Repair. This is a program that we've been working on for at least the past six to seven months. Colberth has been working very diligently on this. What we have is we have basically a home repair program for owner occupants within the county. It's focused much more on roof replacements, HVAC, health safety items. If your house is green and you want it blue, unfortunately we're not your people. But if you've got an HVAC that's going out and you're hot, or if it's cold this winter, we can help on that. So we're looking for non-cosmetic repairs, typically in that $5,000 to $10,000 range. Some comes can be higher, depending upon the complexity of the job. And again, it's based upon AMI, or area median income.

And we'll get to that in just a second and talk a little bit more about that.

The second program is with community shelter services. Again, they provide shelter and housing assistance for Union County residents. They provide emergency shelter, rapid rehousing and housing again services. Again, this is for financial transition, for essential furnishings, things of that nature. It's always cheaper to be able to keep those that are at a threat of becoming unhoused, keep them housed, as opposed to having them go into the next one, which is diversion and prevention, keeping those vulnerable families housed during financial crisis. I wanted to mention the last bullet point. We estimate that there's around 619 people that are experiencing homelessness in Union County, and one of our key identified gaps is that we're only providing services in the Monroe area, and we recognize that that's not the only area that we have unhoused in the county. We're working very diligently to begin to provide services outside of the Monroe area. Common Heart Services, again, the food security and empowerment. I started my career a number of years ago, which we won't talk about, but one of my first jobs was working as a social worker working under, trying to break generational poverty. So one of the programs that they have is doing economic empowerment. They also do food pantries as well for those that are experiencing food shortcomings. Council on Aging is one of our recipients. We work with them to provide free in-home aid services. It helps older adults be able to stay in their homes, complete those essential activities, essential living, support seniors in remaining safely and independently in their home. And I can tell you from past research in a previous position that being able to allow seniors to age in home is always cheaper and it's better for everybody involved than to have to go to a skilled nursing facility. So those are the four big programs that we have for public service. Again, we can only spend about 15% of the total funds that we receive on public service in the county. So these dollars don't go as far as what we would want them to go in that situation. But how do residents qualify? So first they have to be a resident. They must be a current resident of either Indian Trail or one of the other participating municipalities within Union County. They have to meet the housing limits, which will be on the next slide for you. This is where the benefit of being in the Charlotte Mecklenburg Municipal Statistical Area helps us. We're in a rather affluent area, and so that raises some of the levels for what is considered low to moderate income individuals in our area. And then there has to be a demonstrated need. Again, for those house repairs, we have to be able to see the HVAC system is no longer working, the roof is causing leaks. There are critical health, life, and safety issues that are at play in the situation. And then lastly for you is the income limits. We brought this up because I want to make sure that everybody sees that we have three different areas. And this comes from the HUD and the census data. And this is area median income. And so this is based upon this area, not New York City or a small community in the eastern part of the state. And if you look at that, if you're a single individual that brings in annually less than $65,750, you can qualify for that home repair program. If you're a family of four and you bring home less than $93,900, you can qualify for that program. So don't just judge. It has to be extremely low-income individuals to be able to qualify for this program. you can have more moderate income and still qualify for the program. Again, looking for those owner occupants, especially for the home repair program to be a part of. And with that, I try to keep this as short and sweet to the point as I can. Any questions that we have for us this evening, any information that we might be able to bring back in the future?

Thank you very much for being here, first of all, and for the work that you guys are doing. What sort of efforts does the county undertake to let initial residents or the participating municipalities and Union County residents as a whole, what sort of education is being put out there or being performed to allow people who may be eligible to be able to partake in getting some of this assistance? And as a follow-up to that, how can we in Nintrail help get the word out about some of these programs that some of our residents may be able to be qualified for?

and make sure I get the question correct. What we're doing is we're using social media to be able to communicate that. We're using our website. We also have a group, Thrive Union, in the area that we're actively part of. So we're working through those. And then also word of mouth. Again, when we work with those four groups that we're working with, and we've worked with several others within the area, we rely on word of mouth on assistance and being able to recognize the needs in one area and being able to provide the referrals for assistance in others. As far as what you're able to do, again, we've given some of this information out. We'd love for you to be able to promote that either on social media or to be able to have us come back and be able to provide some updated information when we go through this process again next year. I believe that we are working with the town to do a Facebook Live at this moment and trying to work through that to try to get that information out there. We're working those channels to be able to try to get that information out.

Appreciate that. Thank you.

Thank you.

Can you tell us what CDBG stands for?

Yes, sir. It's the Community Development Block Grant Program.

Block Grant Program. Yes, sir.

And this is a HUD program, housing and urban development. It's federal funds that we receive based upon the number of low to moderate income individuals that we have in the county. Yes, Clarence.

So mine is more of a statement, kind of bring this full circle. So I actually I know Monica from Thrive, and that's where I think we we had Keith come here and present every chance I get to go to the Thrive meeting where you have a lot of nonprofits that are presenting what's going on. So I went to Monica. I knew the taxes were coming out and I hear you in the trail. I hear people say they're having hard times. So I was wondering what can I do that would, you know, the people that are having hard times, if they need help. So I did, I reached, you know, Monica and I made that connection. Um, and thank you for giving the presentation, but, uh, I just want people of Indian trail know that, you know, I heard you, um, seeing what we can do for you and everybody that's out here under my voice social media whatever if you know someone in need please spread the word um and then also I can't say I can invite people to thrive but you know thrive is a meeting where I think it's the third Tuesday uh of the month and that's where there are a lot of other non-profits and where I met Monica and so many other people so if you know people out there that are in need and again you know our tax bills are out people are looking at that but if you need need if you have a need or know someone in need i ask you to please refer them and get them in this program so thank you mr mayor

I have a couple questions. Sorry. You get your funding from HUD, right? Yes, sir. Housing and Urban Development, right? Yes, sir. Is it possible for you to tell us what your budget is? And if it is, if you are able to, have you ever run out of funds during a particular time that you've received that funding? I think you mentioned the approximate sort of Transaction is about 5,000 thereabouts. You can sometimes go higher than that depending on the nature of the repair that needs to be performed. But I don't know if you can share that information.

I don't have the total funds in front of me, but I would prefer to be able to get that exact number and be able to provide that for you. I can tell you that there are rules and guidelines as far as the community development block grant funding is concerned. So we only can provide 15% of our total funding towards public service. When we get our funding right off the top, there's a part that goes towards the administration of the program and a part that goes to the public service. To my knowledge at this point, I don't think that we've ever run out of those program of those fundings. But again, we're in local government budgeting, so we're trying to if I get $100,000, I've allocated $100,000. There may have been instances where some of our public service folks were not able to fully expend all of those dollars and they're carried forward to the next year. So quite as a matter of fact, the opposite. I don't think we've run out of funds, at least to my awareness. More often, what we're trying to do at this point is to be able to get the funds out the door, and sometimes we've had to carry year-over-year savings.

So you're able to move it to the next year? Yes, sir. You don't use it or lose it? No, sir.

No, sir. Okay. Good. That's good to know.

Thank you.

Todd?

Oh, yeah. Could you send us a list of, like, each contact for each organization of who we would give? Like, I've got Monica Benson here, I assume, with council on agent, we would tell them to call you. But if one of the other organizations, if we, you know, just get a little list or something, if you send it to us, then when citizens ask us, send them to the right direction. If that's, if that's okay.

Yes, sir. We can pull that together and get that over for you as soon as possible.

Thank you, Jason. If you want to send that list and then the other number to me, I'll make sure it gets out to council. Thank you.

Jason, thank you for coming. And thank you. Thank you all for what you do, Monica and all of you for for your hard work and what you do. And we're happy you came today. Fantastic. Thank you for the opportunity. All right. That brings us up to public comments. I'm gonna read public comments tonight. Each speaker has three minutes to speak. Mayor and council, please elect one speaker for groups whenever possible regarding the message. Comments and questions may be directed to individual council members. If a member desires to respond to comments or question, he or she may do so during council feedback to public comments. Speakers remain respectful with reasonable standards of civility. comments will only be allowed by individuals attending the meeting in person written comments will not be read any grievances regarding staff should be communicated to the town manager not aired in the forum meeting facilitator may discontinue and or disallow the speaker to continue if rules are violated all Documents provided will become town property and will be available to the public. Meetings are recorded and broadcast on the internet along with citizens' comments. So first speaker tonight, Alisa Sawalsky. Did I get that last name pretty good? Yes. I'm proud of myself. I like that.

So I'm Melissa Zawelski. I'm here from Bent Creek subdivision. And our big concern is all of the new fiber lines that are going in and all the destruction that is happening within our neighborhood. Again, today we had another gas line break. We've had multiple people in our neighborhood with four or five days without internet that work from home. That's unacceptable. These companies come in and destroy our property. and don't repair it the way it should be. And we have made calls to right now we're dealing with AT&T's installing their fiber right now. So we've called AT&T, we've called NC DOT to complain. We've had multiple calls to the water company for water line breaks, the gas company for gas line breaks. And we are just trying to this is the third time in two years that we've had new fiber installed in our neighborhood. We have one more coming. We understand Google is next. So after they get all this and we get our yards repaired, they're going to come through and tear it all up again. And this is going to start all over. And we are just frustrated with what's going on with the placement of things. People are having big boxes put right in their front yard center front yard. That stuff is not acceptable and we are wondering what can be done to help our community and the other communities because we're not the only community suffering. But we're trying to figure out what we can do to prevent this from happening again since It's just ongoing. For the past two years it's just been ongoing. And so anything that you guys could do to help would be appreciated because right now NC DOT has told one of the people in our neighborhood that at least half of our neighborhood has already called them about this install. that's going on and we only have 263 homes so if half the people have called already that's a lot of phone calls on what's happening so anything you can do to help us would be appreciated um i don't know who approves what i don't know i don't know any of that kind of stuff so i don't know where it stands but if you could help us we'd be appreciated thank you lisa what we're going to do is we don't allow comments now but when everybody's done

Then we'll, we'll come back and I've asked the town manager to, to give an explanation too. So that way don't go anywhere.

Thank you.

Thank you. Kevin Marsh. Excuse me, is it? Oh, it's Kevin and Dominique Marsh. I'm sorry.

Thank you. Good evening. We are Dominique and Kevin Marsh, and we are your neighbors that had multiple vehicles run through our fencing yard at Hayes and Old Charlotte at Hayes Road and Old Charlotte Highway from 2019 through August of this year. We've had five vehicles go through our fence, of which four were due to drivers running the stop sign on Hayes Road. In addition to those, we've had several accidents happen at the entrance of our neighborhood, as well as cars running off the road into the ditch beside my home. The most recent accident occurred two weeks ago, of which the sheriff deputy openly admitted that he had just pulled the driver over on 74 and advised him to go straight home, which is when he found him five minutes later sitting through our fence. In 2022, I spoke to four different members of the DOT regarding my concerns. And the first solution was the sign that advised a stop sign was ahead. Another accident occurred. I then asked for a guard rail, which I was advised that it would be too dangerous, which for me, that meant the safety of my family is less important than those who choose not to drive safely. I then asked for a flashing stop sign and rumble strips. And that is when the sign was added that states to go left and right. which was ran through two weeks ago. I understand that there are future plans in place to fix the overall traffic problem. However, we need something now that can reduce this reoccurring problem that affects my family and neighbors. These accidents have not only kept me from having events at my home due to the fear of another accident occurring, but it's also caused me personally to have PTSD Anytime I hear large trucks hit the bumps on the road or when I hear screeching tires, I often jump up out of my sleep and run to my windows to ensure that there hasn't been another accident in my yard. My ask today is that we not wait until someone dies to make this intersection a priority. Thank you.

Thank you. Brad? Brad Tatum, correct? Yes, sir.

Come on up. Hi, I wanted to address a similar issue to the fiber damage. Is that okay? I'm gonna cover the same type of ground. Thank you. My name is Brad Tatum and I live at 1025 Enderberry in Bent Creek. It's a neighborhood off of Indian Trail Fairview near Hemby Bridge Elementary School. And I've been a resident there for 24 years. For the last three years, as earlier stated, our neighborhood has been the target for fiber optic utility upgrades. In 2024, it was ripple fiber. And then last year in 2025, it was kinetic fiber. And this year, what's going on right now is AT&T Fiber. All three have caused damage to our personal properties. In 2024, after Ripple Fiber completed its work, I know I personally had to pay to have the damage repaired out of my own pocket. Last year, Kinetic brought heavy equipment onto my property and began operating outside of the DOT right of way. I called the DOT and the representative came out while they were on property, measured and showed me that Kinetic was operating outside of the easement, but Kinetic still continued working until the project was finished, so it's almost like, you know, what's the point? It's now been a year since Kinetic damaged my property, and the yard's still not repaired. I was able to find a contact at Kinetic, and they agreed to fix the damage, but to date, no one has made the repairs. Today as I speak, AT&T Fiber's installing their infrastructure. Since starting roughly two weeks ago, I know my neighbors have had their internet cable lines severed. Their power lines have been severed. They've lost power. Water lines have been severed. Flooding driveways. There's one neighbor whose entire part of their driveway has to be dug up and relayed because of the water damage. And what was really heartbreaking was some of this was in that 100 degree temperature. So there's people online complaining that they have no power, no water, no internet, and it's 100 degrees outside. Today, as mentioned earlier, a gas line was cut on Macon Drive. I'm not sure how they hit a gas line. That's a pretty known utility. But the biggest problem, kind of why I wanted to talk was, that no one communicates directly with us when the utilities or the property are damaged. We feel kind of helpless because we don't know who to contact or how to get our properties restored. The current, Companies not digging small holes, they're using small excavators, and by all reports, most of the workers do not even work for AT&T. They're subcontractors, and when neighbors ask for credentials or proof of insurance, they're unable to provide anything. At best, they say they'll have a supervisor contact us, but nobody ever contacts us. Homeowners in Bent Creek, we understand the need to upgrade utility infrastructure. It's the 21st century, right? We all want to get fiber. But what we don't understand is why these companies are allowed to damage the property without directly communicating with the homeowners. And what we're asking you to consider is enforcement of legislation and local requirements that protect homeowners from utility contractors and subcontractors who cause property damage or interrupt essential services. These companies should be required to provide direct phone numbers for resolving install installation related damage, not just general service numbers, um, to call centers. I'm sorry.

I wanted you to get it all. So anyway, we're going to have some answers for you in just a minute. So thank you for, uh, or I hope we do anyway. Thank you. Thank you for coming up. And I've asked Adam to, um, to, uh, to go through and kind of give all of you a heads up on this whole process. And we've we've started now a we've got a point here in town hall, a person that you can call, but I'm gonna turn it over to Adam and Adam.

Well, I'll start, but I'm going to look at Todd back there on the back row and tell him to help me when I mess up. So, um, so we hear you, we hear fiber is a bane and everybody's existence, but I'm going to start with giving you the news that you don't want to hear first, and then we'll go forward from there. So by North Carolina general statute, we are not allowed to tell them they cannot come in and install fiber if they are within the right of way. So I know that is frustrating to hear, but I see heads nodding that you agree, and you know that, but it is frustrating to hear. The town has put steps into place, and that's Todd Hunsinger, our director of engineering, a couple of meetings ago did a presentation on that right-of-way process and what we require from a town street standpoint. So a couple of y'all have mentioned Bent Creek, and as you know, that's an NCDOT street subdivision. But if it's on a town street, they have several steps they have to follow to come to be able to install that fiber. They have to come to us with just the thought that they want to do it. Then they go from there to providing more levels of detail. And as they walk through that process, they do get that encroachment agreement eventually. but that does not give them, and I'm looking at Todd hoping he'll shake his head as soon as I go off script, but that does not give them their full authorization to go out and do construction yet. They get that after their encroachment agreement, so what would happen is that's when they would put those door hangers up in between their encroachment agreement and when they get authorization to construct. they would put those door hangers up they would also put up signs at the front of the neighborhood that said who was responsible somebody said while ago like just a contact information of who i can call if i have an issue that's what is on that signage that they should be putting up if you're on in town streets then as the mayor did mention a while ago we do have an employee todd can i say his name out loud i mean is is he the contact for that or is it just the engineering department in general OK, so on our staff, we have a staff member. Gabriel is our kind of fiber person. He does all the reviews for the encouragement agreements and then does a lot of the inspections as work is going on. And then we do have another engineer that does helps with all that work as well. um so as that process is going on as things happen things do get hit i mean it happens it's construction um gabriel and todd's team go out and do those investigations they work with the contractor to make sure things are restored was in a meeting earlier today with the mayor about fiber in another neighborhood The level of restored work is not the level of restored work of what our yards are today. I mean, I live in the town as well. As long as grass is planted back, that is considered restored work. It's not back to the level. So there are steps in the process. Let's back up and talk about NCDOT streets. Gabriel Todd's team, all of them, they do go out. We do meet with NCDOT with the contractors and different things. As soon as we know about the issues, um, I did, we did get an email last week from Bent Creek about a couple of things that was sent to DOT to give them a chance to see if they could meet with the contractor and then we'll follow up and we'll walk through that process with them to make sure that they do, uh, have some of those fixes come online. Those are a lot of words.

Thank you, and I don't know if Todd, is that summing it up pretty good?

Yes.

Okay. Well, and listen, we all live here, and they've busted up my water line a couple of times, and that man right there came and helped, Marcus came over and helped me figure out what was wrong with it.

Didn't even charge him. Okay.

So the frustrating thing about the whole thing is, like Adam said, is there'll be another one coming, and there'll be another one coming, and they'll come tear the yard up. And it's aggravating. I can tell you this. I have called a state senator. I've called a state... representative and I'll continue and I would suggest that you do the same because it's not our decision if you call the state representatives then maybe when they have to answer those those telephones one of the representatives or one of the people that I called said they actually I talked to their assistant and they said that they hadn't heard anything about it and They don't live around here, I can tell you that, because there's a lot going on with it. So pick up the phone and call them too, and it's not, we'll do everything we can. I know Adam will tell you, I spent a lot of my time and I find it very important to go to your homes. I was in Bent Creek and spoke with, I think, Chuck and was out there watching him do work. I've been to several homes. That's what I do. So call me if you need me. A month or so ago, somebody had cut a water line in a fiber and they called during the meeting. And of course I didn't get home to like 10 o'clock and it was too late to call them back. It was a resident and he informed me that he didn't have water. and that they were coming to spend the night with us in my house. That's the truth. And I hollered at my wife. I said, honey, we got company coming tonight. And she goes, who is it? And of course, I was kind of half kidding, because it was too late anyway. But they did get their water restored during the meeting. But anyway, we're aware of it, and it affects all of us. And I don't like it. It would make sense if they would dig a trench and say, hey, y'all got two months to fill it up. Come in and everybody do it. And it would seem like it would save them millions of dollars. But that makes sense. So maybe that's why they don't do it. Marcus?

Yeah, so I emphasize, I feel your pain, cuz I've been through it. Where the power goes out on my wife when she's working at home on a Friday, there's no internet till the next day. And I have three guys who wanna play games and they're all screaming because that's the end of the world. So I do that. We've had two come through our neighborhood where I live, and I think there's about two more who have to come. So that leads me to a question for our attorney. We cannot legally stop them because it is considered to be a public utility and therefore they can install the lines in the public right of way, correct? Correct. providing that they meet all the requirements from a town standpoint and so on. But what we've seen happen is that the residents have complained, rightfully so, because one, the yards are torn up, they've invested money and stuff into their yard. It's the pride, right? You own a home in America, you're prideful about that. Can we prevent them from going to another neighborhood unless they repair the things that are that needs repair in the neighborhood that they either were in or they're still in. For instance, in this case, AT&T. AT&T was in my neighborhood I think about last week. They were there last week and now they're in Bend Creek. With Ripple Fiber, I felt I had a good experience with them they seemed better compared to when they started. But AT&T from the start, and I think they started with our neighborhood first, but it's been terrible. So can we prevent AT&T? Can we put a stop order on what they're doing? I mean, like, there has to be some sort of recourse that we can prevent them from going to another neighborhood, because in Ontario, essentially, that's our community, right? There's a lot of different neighborhoods. Can we prevent them legally from doing that?

i wish we could however the statute states that a city shall issue a written decision to approve or deny an application for a permit or encroachment to conduct activities in the town's right-of-way with broadband within 30 days of submission if a decision is not issued the application is deemed approved that is straight from 168-296.1

If we deny it, what's their recourse? They got to go to court or something or come back to us?

It's deemed approved. I mean, they can do it and we can't.

If we deny it, if we say no.

Yeah, if we do not, we can deny it. We have to act on it. I don't know if we have the, it's not, the law is not clear if we have the ability to deny it based on failure to repair in other communities. I don't want to go too far into conversations Todd Hunsinger and I have had about this, but it's something that we're definitely exploring. The problem is we have the federal legislation, right, and then the state statutes, and we only have the power that the state gives us to do. the only things we can do is require an applicant to promptly repair damage caused by the applicant but that's only on our property if there's damage on private property we're not part of that right because it's not our property um and require that they execute an affidavit evident of financial responsibility or that they have insurance But the statute is very clear that a city may not impose additional conditions or requirements on an applicant beyond those listed in this subsection. So the legislation really, really ties our hands, unfortunately, on what we can do. So we've tried to be creative and think of other things. You know, might we end up in court one day over this? I don't know.

So I think the mayor mentioned that he's spoken to our representatives. Mr. Manager, what's the names of our representatives? It escapes me at the moment.

Senator Todd Johnson, Representative Dean Arp, Representative Willis, Daniel Willis, David Willis.

So these are the, sorry, I knew the names, but these are the people that you need to reach out to because from what the attorney is saying is that We're limited in terms of some of the enforcements we can put on that, unfortunately. And we all live in a town, so we're affected by this too as well. But I do, I feel your pain. I mean, and it's really, really frustrating. First of all, I have ripple fiber. I am not going to change to AT&T or Kinetic or Huawei or Google. I'm not jumping around.

I don't know how many fiber lines we can have in one yard.

I don't know where they're going to fit it. But that being said, um, as the mayor mentioned, he's going to explore some of the other options in talking to the representatives. I'd encourage you to, to get, to get them involved as well. I think no action is taken unless the phone start ringing. So that's probably one of the other things that we can do, bring pressure to be on them. And hopefully we can try and get something some way because I, it, I bear with you. I really do. Okay. Todd.

Yeah, I would reach out if you got an HOA or whatever in your neighborhood, I'd give them the town Gabriel's number. And, uh, like one of y'all mentioned is my right of ways. I have state roads, so I've had the same problem and we contact the gas company. We contacted those. So I would tell people to contact those people off also, because like if they hit something and the line hadn't been drawn and they dig where they weren't supposed to, if it was me as individual, people on natural gas or Duke power would find me, they'd make me pay for the repair. So I think that's where you have to contact and tell people to contact the people where they busted the line or whatever. Cause we had that with when we got, like, I've got ripple fiber, also ripple fiber. We reached out to them and they actually reached out to AT&T going, you know, you, you, you cut our lines and like my wife works in home sometimes too. And, uh, that's, you know, it's aggravating and, you know, like you said, it's not fair and whatever, but I, if you work in HOA or something or whatever, I would try and get that list out who you contacted Piedmont, who you contact for your utilities. you know, and, and he contacted the town and I think he made a good point of listen, you know, reach out to the state reps and, you know, cause what, from what the town attorney said, it's clear, we need some sort of teeth in the law to give us a responsibility to help the citizens get the repairs made. Uh, it's, you know, it's just like in my yard right now, I got a spot where grass don't grow where they dug. So, That and that, like you said, that you pay for stuff. Well, that winds up coming up to my cost. So, you know, and for some reason, I'm really not good at making grass grow, but that's OK.

So anyway, but so I take it this is a sandalwood community right here to address your situation. To let you know that, and I have talked to the Marsh family, this situation we've been looking at for a while. It's not just something that recently we've been looking at. If you go back and look at other meetings, we've actually talked about some resolution to this. And item number 10 tonight, the sound engineer is going to speak on it, so I ask you all to hang around. Also, if you had something to say but you're a little shy, didn't want to get up here and speak, I'm gonna hang around after the meeting. I am the CRTPO rep, and I can talk to you about it a little more as well. So, you know, and I can relate to you. Where I live, the road is thin, and people run off the road, and we had somebody run off the road, hit our vehicle, had somebody run off the road, hit the backside of my house. So every time I hear somebody run off the road, you know, you know, I'm waiting to see what's going to happen. Do they overcorrect or do they get back on the road? So I feel your pain there, but please hang around till the presentation. And like I said, if you have something to say after the meeting, I'll hang around and talk to you. Okay. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. Thanks for everybody speaking. Thanks for counsel. And Kevin and Dominique, we're going to get to your later. Or we could do it. No sense in doing it now. We'll do it when we get her up to it. So that moves us over to the consent agenda. Can I get a motion for the consent agenda?

Law enforcement, he's not here, right?

No, I texted him.

Number six line.

They're not here, so I just skipped it.

So we just skip it or just move it.

Just skip it for now. Just skip it.

Make a motion to approve the consent agenda.

All in favor? Unanimous. See this way, Andy's not going to get mad at me for calling him out. I just tried to make believe it wasn't, didn't win there. So anyway, all right, so this, we don't have any public hearings. This brings the old business. Uh, Mr. McLam, FY 2731 CIP discussion.

So tonight, from the CIP discussion standpoint, I just wanted to open the floor back up to council, see if you've had a chance to look at any of the information that we talked about at the last meeting, if you need any more information. or what our direction would be at this point would be to bring back the CIP at the next council meeting for adoption for the FY 27 through 31 CIP. Again, remembering that does not mean that the projects are moving forward. What it means is that we have a plan to move those projects forward.

I don't have any objection with bringing them back for adoption. What I'd like to see is a little more breakout of the funding mechanisms available, particularly when we looked at the projects that we were trying to get funded. If we could list each one and see how the funds would be appropriated. whether it's from the five and a half cents or the debt service or whatever monies we have there and also what other instruments um that we could use like i think we mentioned um installment loan or something to that what are the um that instruments we could use by going to market And I don't know if we have the ability to, we don't know where rates are right now, right? The economy's wearing flux, there's an election coming and some other factors. But if there's some sort of projection we could use in terms of a rate, what the rate is now, if the rate goes up, what a quarter basis point or half a basis point in the future or goes down in the next six months, what that would probably do. I know it's prime plus whatever, but if we could get some information on that, just some, I don't know if your model can do that, but that would probably help us a little bit understanding the need for two of the big projects that I, the rest of the council can speak for themselves, but I would really like to look at is the second phase of Indian Trail Road and also the public works facility. I think those are the two that are top on my list. Hope that helps. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, sir. I guess in looking at this, you know, to me, one of the number one priorities would be Indian Trail Road phase two, but We don't have a approved final design. So what I'm looking at is once we have a concept designed, then we got a better idea of what the cost will be. So that's kind of looking like more information on that. And the same with the public works facility. We had consultants come in. and we got a facility that included solid waste. Well, we're not doing solid waste. So I'm kind of wondering if we're looking at a $21 million building, what what is that based on? Do we have a better concept and of design? And do we have something more concrete that we could go? Well, we could build this in thirds or, you know, this is the administration part. This is where we're parking the vehicles. So I'm kind of looking at a more concrete estimate of what things are gonna cost or what we're looking at to actually do before we say, hey, okay, well, let's go out and borrow $14 million. And then if we're gonna borrow $14 million to build a public works facility, and I kind of piggyback on what he said is, what type of year? Is that a 15, 20-year loan? At what rate and how much interest are we gonna wind up paying versus principal Is that going to be worth, or do we want to stick that type of debt and cost onto the residents of in a long-term basis? I think we're still paying on the town hall. And so I don't know how much interest we paid on that over the years, but just kind of that is, you know, if I'm looking at increasing our debt service, then I want to know a little bit more in the terms of financials of what it's really going to cost in the long run or in the short term. or do we want to take what money we got and stick with that? I think we've got like 3 million available in the debt service. And I think there's 4 million for community center. I think we've got 7 million set aside for public works facility, and there's less than 1 million for any trail road. You can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's where we're at. So I'm kind of looking at, you know, we may want to move some money around from one project to another. So, I mean, we had a strong credit rating, so we're actually in a good position of being able to bounce around some different ideas, and I appreciate you doing that. But that's kind of what I'm looking at. I'm looking at just a little bit more concrete stuff. Does that make sense? Yes, sir.

Any other questions? Any more? Good. Okay. So... Chestnut Square Park Access Road. Mr. Hunsinger, you want to come up and?

Mayor, Council, we advertised this project a couple months ago, went through the bidding process, and we ended up getting about, I think it was around seven to eight bids, so had a good turnout. I had four that was pretty competitive and four that was way, way high, so a little all over the place. But I actually had a local company end up being the lowest responsible bidder. Their name is Littman Excavation and Construction with a low bid of $977,900. I will tell you this, that $970,000 is $100,000 over. That's the reason why we need to update the ordinance. But that's basically the 10% contingency in our bid. So actually, the subtotal for their price is actually what we... had in our ordinance, so it actually came in pretty well. I actually had an estimate about a million, so they were actually a little bit lower than ours, which is good. But just so you know, that's kind of the difference, and why we need that extra hundred is actually for just contingency that we may not use, which... But anyway, I would request council to award this project, Chestnut Square Park Access Drive improvements to Littman Excavation Construction at a bid of $977,900. And I'll be happy to answer any questions.

Any questions?

What's the duration of the project? When do we expect? Six months. Six months.

Yeah, I believe what's going to happen is obviously around February and stuff, you can't pave that around that time. So we gave them an extra, actually we gave them an extra, I think we got seven months. So my, uh, my anticipation is as long as we don't get, uh, you know, monsoon in the winter time would be to hopefully be paving that road in the March frame time.

Uh, just kind of a general question is, Shady Bluff is open all the time, and I got this question, and you probably answered it, and I just don't remember. That's okay. Is this road going to be open 24 hours, or are we planning on closing it during the park hours?

Well, I think there's still a discussion to be had. We've talked around keeping it private, and it's going to have gates on it temporarily right when it opens, so we are going to gate it. initially, but we could choose to keep it open 24-7 or not. So I think that's just something we're going to talk about and eventually make a decision on while the project's being moved forward.

And at what point do we close Shady Bluff? Is there a frame on that?

Yeah, we would close Shady Bluff when we start the Chestnut Square Park Phase 3 project, which that will take about six months to design. So hopefully next year we'll probably close it probably in the summertime next year.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

No, sir.

Did nobody? Okay. All right. Um, I make a motion to make a motion. Yeah. Yeah.

I'll make a motion to approve awarding the chestnut square park access road improvement project to Littman excavation and construction incorporated as the lowest and most responsible bidder in the amount of $977,900 as presented all in favor. Now I'll make another motion to approve the amended chestnut square park access road ordinance number zero nine five as presented.

All right. All in favor.

Unanimous. The last one. I'll make a motion to approve the budget amendment for chestnut square park phase two as presented.

All in favor? Unanimous. Thank you, Todd. All right, thank you. Brings us to C, Old Monroe Road. A million dollars. We still owe, DOT says we still owe them a million, and we do. Of the $5 million that we promised them many years ago and actually stopped paying them because they didn't start the road. So it's been a long process over the years. I heard from NCDOT several months ago and they asked for the million dollars and I gave them a hard time about it. And they said point blank, you give us the million dollars. We don't we will not start the road. And the road is a when is it starting clearance? Exactly. Or when is the new start date? Let date January 20, 27 January. So that's our that's our our That's that's what we've got. So we either pay the million dollars or and they start hopefully in January. And Marcus, I gave you that their number. Did you ever call?

I did.

You did. Yeah. Did he give you that same day?

Yeah, he did.

OK. All right. So, Todd, your question.

Um, we have a written agreement on this, correct? And if we don't pay the million dollars, we violate the agreement. Is that correct?

I would assume that the agreement has been on for a long time and the million dollars is budgeted.

Yes.

Okay. All right. Well, then I'd say.

I'll make a motion. Go ahead. Thank you. I'll make a motion to award the remaining $1 million in regards to our the town's contribution to Old Monroe Road construction to North Carolina and CDOT.

All in favor. Unanimous. Thank you, gentlemen. All right. Brings us to new business in CDOT partnership for Old Monroe and Hayes Road. Who's going to speak on this? Clarence, you going to speak on this or Todd?

Just to make a comment about the last agenda item. Technically, the way the agreement works is DOT has to submit in writing. They have to actually request that money. So I don't know if y'all still want to do that, but I'm just letting you know that's technically what the agreement says.

I will say this, and I did not say this earlier. When we got the call, I was with Adam when I got the call, that they weren't going to start date. NCOD DOT has done some things for us because they did not start the road when they were supposed to. They've done a lot of patchwork on Wesley Chapel Road. They've done some things to help us out.

uh because they realize they've done us wrong over the years so i just wanted to get that clear yeah that's a good point i'll reach out to dot and have felix submit that request just so that we're following the ordinance it's coming okay okay all right so um

We're gonna get a little bit of background where we're at, where we started at, and where we're at, and then go from there. So this project was part of the 2025 Union County Curriculum Intersection Programs selection process. Again, we had worked with Union County since 2016, had several intersections, and we've kind of been going down the list, and so this was just times for this intersection to be looked at. So the consultant presented two alternatives and when we presented that to council and then basically the citizens and the citizen survey selected alternative two and the council decided to select it as well. And basically, citizens selected alternative two because it's less confusing with safer turns. It was one of the comments, seems easier to navigate for vehicles and pedestrians. And it's in, obviously, recent years, the four incidents with the house and its fence being hit. So the alternative two was basically to realign Hays Road to make this basically a symmetrical four-lane intersection. And so if you zoom in, Hays Road is up here north for the folks behind me. And so we would take Hays Road, realign it, basically encroach into the Duke Energy property, realign it to Faircroft, and then basically... It's hard to see, but you would add left turn lane on both sides of Monroe and then an additional right turn lane on Omer Road for Hayes into the Sandalwood subdivision. And then you would add additional right turn lanes off of Hayes and off of Faircroft onto Omer Road. Now, you'll see a little bit of realignment that's happening. Again, this is conceptual. Until you get a design going, it's going to change a little bit. So it is removing some road and realigning it. So it is a little bit of a realignment on Faircroft as well, but just not as bad as Hays Road. And then, of course, you'll have signals. You have two mast arms, and that's kind of how they'll be configured out there in the field. And based on all, basically any kind of transportation improvement project, you are required to have pedestrian improvements. So that's why you see sidewalks on both sides of Ulmer Road as well. So this is how I presented to council the future costs at the time. So this is based on CRTPO's funding spreadsheet. When you go after federal dollars, either through the STIP or through the fall call of projects, you basically have to go through this formula, which is you get a, and this is consultants' numbers from about a year and a half to two years ago. So you get a base cost, and then you have engineering and CEI. So again, just to reiterate what all this is for council, engineering is your design funding, so that's 25% of the base cost. CEI is your construction inspection. Again, you have to have somebody out there. You have a third-party inspector out there at all times to document everything for the auditors in the future. So that's a 20% assumed cost off the base cost. And then you have right-of-way utility, which there will be some relocations involved with that that the consultant looked at in purchasing of right-of-way. And then the CRTPO puts an escalator of 40%. And that's because these projects, if you decide to go out there for federal funds, it's going to take a long time for this process to go through with design, right, and all that. So they think in years, in multiple years, until it actually gets built. So that's why you see two different costs. You see an actual cost of 2026 of $5.6 million. then you have a 2031 three percent inflation cost of six point five so that's what was in the council at the time and again it wasn't to move forward the project at the time you were just selecting an alternative and you were given these calls to say okay this is what you would cost if you decide to move forward this project in the future All right, and then just so we're clear, there's a 10% fee DOT has on these projects that wasn't included in these numbers, and that's just because they have to administer and be the mediator between the feds and us, so they have to review the plans, do a lot of admin, so stuff like that. And that 10% is usually not always paid out. It's just a cushion for them. Now, so we wanted to look at this intersection a little bit more and talk to some folks about possibly grabbing additional funding if we wanted to not go through the federal process of getting money, but actually try to tackle this project sooner rather than later. So DOT has two funding sources that they can look at transportation improvements and want two of those, and this has got to do with crash and travel time. So spot safety is basically crashes. So the way that program works, They get about $9 to $12 million a year in that funding. Again, this is statewide, so $9 to $12 don't go a long way. But each project has a limit of $400,000. So you can get the $400,000 or you can get less. It's just I don't know how that criteria works as far as how they figure out if you can get the max or not. But like I said, the purpose is to reduce traffic, crashes. So that's what the spot safety funding source is. Spot mobility is more about travel time, like you've got long queues at the intersection, like you're waiting forever. Now we realize these folks on Faircroft wait a long time to get out on Omer Road. And that max funding, that's a 20 million a year statewide with a max of 750K. And again, Based on their criteria, they do the analysis and everything. So we went ahead and asked them to go ahead and start doing that for this intersection just to see if we could get some type of funding. So they're actually doing that right now, and the hope is to get some of those numbers back to us by the end of this month. And again, that doesn't guarantee we can get it. It's just guaranteeing that that's possible, the money that will be available for this particular project. Again, they still have to weigh it with other projects around the state. And then Union County, under the Curriculum Extension Program, does have an annual, it's usually around $300,000, but this year it's only $237,000 max that they can go after projects. Obviously, it's through this program, these intersections that they would fund, give you funding for. Well, that max is $237,000 this year. And we found out that there is one competing project if we decide to move forward, which is out of Marvin. But we've been told that they're not sure if that's happening. And so they're hoping they'll find that out as well by the end of the month. So again, hope to have more answers to y'all as far as available funding, but let's just say we could get the funding. Let's just go by that scenario. We get the max, we get the full 237 from Union County, we get all four 750. So if you do that, and say you wanna tackle this thing right now, Well, here's estimated cost. We took down some of the escalators in those previous spreadsheet, and we figured 3.686 to build it now. Well, and again, that's getting the designer on board, that's getting the CEI out there to inspect it. That's a base call for construction and right-of-way utility. So you get DOTs, both fundings, you max out both funding, and you get the Union County, but you get no funding out of CR2PO, again, because we're not going after money. We go after money, it's going to lag more. Then you could possibly complete this project, design, right-of-way, acquisition, everything, by 2029, 2030 at $2.3 million, if you get all that max funding from those other two agencies. So just keep that in mind for a second. All right, say you do go after, you just decided, okay, we're just going to go after fall call projects this fall call. We're going to put an application in, we're going to see if we can get it, and we do an 8-20 split. Same deal. Well, you've got to go back and use that big number that, because of all these inflation and everything in future years, all that's put in a spreadsheet is calculated, so it's around $6.5 million. So if you do that, the difference would be a 20% match would be $1 million. But you're not getting that project done to 2034, 2035, if you go that route. All right, so the other thing that we could hopefully benefit this project is a development happening in that area. so you've got the third phase of what was harkey creek subdivision which is at the backs right beside sandalwood right now in the county that is county parcel but the phase three is actually in the indian trail and this is the layout it's called it's going to be called oak haven it's not going to be called harkey creek um again right now not sure if they're going to move for a project but it does have approved plans and they have approved tia they have and they have impacts that intersection So the intersection is right here in this image that we're talking about. So those impacts is they've gotta build a left turn lane into Faircroft Way. So if you look at the picture on your screen, you can see the dark area on both sides of the road, that is a widening. They have to do widening out there to get that left turn lane in. And so you're talking about a half a million dollars worth of work right there. Now, if we go after the project now, We probably get that money from that developer and include it in the cost. But if we don't go after it now, because this project would take so long to build based on the federal funding, we have to get them to build that now because if they start building development, they're going to need the left turn lane. We can't just wait for it. So again, it takes 500,000 off the 2.3. You're down to 1.8, but that would be, you know, 1.8 of town money that you'd had to spend. Do you want to start it now? And I'll be happy to answer any questions.

Todd, you're saying, uh, you're giving that number, but then all the pieces of the puzzle has to fall. Yeah, exactly. Just right.

Absolutely. Just right. And that's what I'm saying. I mean, it's nothing y'all need to make a decision now, but I just wanted to give y'all all the information. That way when we find out these numbers at the end of the month, we can come back to y'all and say, do you really want to go after this? And it's going to have to be a quick thing because we've got to jump on his application here thing because we've got to have it in.

by the end of october well the way it's explained i mean it it it's pretty obvious which way we should do it i mean which way you're going to save the most money and if you say you're going to save the most money and get it done quicker all in the same project correct it's possible because again you can't

when these projects linger for several years, stuff, things are gonna happen, you know, money's, you know, cost is gonna go up. Again, they put escalators on here, but you never know. So, I mean, you're saving a little bit of money, yes, actually waiting and trying to get the federal dollars if you can get the 80-20 split, but again, don't know that until you go through the application process. So, again, you just have to weigh the difference between the million dollars and the 1.8 if we can get all that funding.

Can I throw one thing? Sure. Sorry. One thing while y'all are deliberating and thinking through this that would be helpful for... us is if you are thinking about moving forward with this, you'll ask a question while ago about the model that you've we've shown you all. Now, if you are thinking about moving forward on it, we need to know that so that we can if this project is not in the model, we will need to run it through the model to see how it lays out with with those folks. And it's not in the model.

It is not in the model. It is not in the model. Correct. OK, Marcus.

Two questions. First, can we pursue both tracks? Can we go to submit to the DOT call for projects and still go on a self-fund process?

Yes, you can. It's just, it's, you know, obviously when you go get the application, you get accepted. You don't want to say, oh, well, we backed out. But we may have to do that if you want to go that route. Yes.

But, I mean, if we backed out, it's because we don't need the money because we're building it. We're not backing out saying we don't want to do it again. That's different. No, I get it. Right. I mean, like if it costs us nothing extra, I would say we could pursue that. The second question is, did I see correctly that it would you expect it were in 2026? You expect to be done in 2029? I would say 2029, 2030.

I mean, it's really, it's really corny how long the right away would take to do. I mean, again, you're not only dealing with a couple of parcels, but that stuff can drag. But, and obviously the homeowners that are going to be impacted by this road would have to be, you know, willing to move forward.

But you anticipate 2029 as a completion?

happy i mean yeah design wise it shouldn't take six months is on road uh... and uh... you know if you could turn out around and we're going on i don't have any lead times when i don't have them The only thing I don't know about is will we be getting funding for these things or do we have to go and DOT have to bless every review and how long that takes? I don't really know how to answer that. Thank you.

But it would definitely be done faster if it didn't go through the CRTPO process.

Correct. Because you've got two-year escalators. You've got to wait on the money. You may get design money in one year, but then you're not getting your right-of-way money in for two years. And even if you've got your design done in less than two years, you've still got to wait because funding has to be available in that current year.

Tom?

Yeah. the resolution, you know, they're going to put in a left hand, left hand turn lane and then a right hand turn lane going into Sandalwood for that project behind Sandalwood. Right.

No, just the left turn lane into Faircroft.

The developer was responsible for that? Yeah, just, yeah. There's no right hand turn going off? No. Now, will that resolve the issue for these folks, for instance? I don't see a traffic light in there. No. I don't see any bumps in the road to slow people down. So it really is nothing going to change for that house right there on the corner.

yeah yeah i think the q and on the y y lines are still going to be a problem right so the we need to go a different route then definitely then because we're not resolving anything by going with the developers part if you will well and another thing you know we mean we're going to need to come back to y'all and discuss is you know we brought our attention about going after another intersection at the fall call you know if you want to jump on this and you know adam runs the model financially it may make sense to back off the other intersection until this year if we want to do this one so just keep that in mind as well as we keep talking about this clearance

so with the what's going on with the recension of i-77 i don't think it's a good idea to ask for something with ncdot and then say no we're going to change your mind it's not not speaking for ncdot but i don't think that's just grounds that we want to um

Yeah, well, we have to have a pre-application meeting with them. I mean, we could kind of talk all that out and see what their feelings are since we're, you know, in a kind of a, maybe I wouldn't say a weird situation, but again, we're talking about another intersection as well. So maybe we just kind of have those conversations and maybe it won't be as bad.

Is there a, sorry, Mr. Mayor, I have a question. Is there an emergency contingent fund that with CRT, PONC, DOT that we could possibly, some money under the couch somewhere that they've been holding off, plus that 70 million they're gonna get back from Charlotte and all these other guys that we could. I'm trying to figure out how do we shake the cushions to get some money.

No?

Well, yeah.

Well, again, you're going to get, you're technically going to get $2.5 million back from them once Olden Road's done, but that's going to be a while. But that's just to put on another project. That's not like money in your pocket. But you do get some money back out of that deal. But you won't see that during another six years.

So when you all say add it to the model, does that mean we would potentially need a budget amendment for this year and then look at budgeting some for next year?

no so the model the so we have that new financial model that we got that we modeled all those capital projects through so we would run it through that model yes if council decided to fund this project or the next one we're going to talk about yes it would be a budget amendment to add money to the budget to fund the project in this year if you were going to do it this year if you're going to do it in next year you would approve it with next year's budget so are you looking tonight for us to say add it to the model tonight, all I was looking for was some head nods and it feels like everybody wants to kind of see how it progresses forward. So I feel comfortable running it through the model and let's see what happens. Okay. And then Todd, on your end, as we get information back from NCDOT and from union county, um, we'll bring that forward either at the LA it'll probably be the first meeting in October, October, Trina.

Are we good?

Yeah. And my next my more questions.

Okay. Can you put your thinking cap on and maybe talk to this couple? I don't know if there's any resolution or anything we could do now because they're kind of looking relief now is what I got. So, right. I mean, just I don't know if you want to reach out to them. You know, I'm sure you'd have more ideas than I would. So.

Yeah, I mean, just to kind of spitball, one idea is she mentioned something about some flashing lights or something. Yeah, well, I would say if you wanted to put something out there where people are coming down Hayes Road to stop, maybe put some kind of, I mean, we'll think about something, but something that lights up that can kind of just caution people, maybe wake them up. Okay. yeah i don't know street street likewise there's there's a street light out there right there's no street lighter maybe i'll need to talk adam we need to talk about getting a street light out there that'll help too so maybe a combination of things that we could probably get done sooner rather than later we could look into that yeah that's an ncdot i mean all three all three roads are yes even even faircroft

You think they could put some sort of guardrail out there, or has that ever been thought of?

Yeah, I don't know if it's something with them about liability or not. I don't know. I don't know why they made the comment to her about that.

I will ask. There's no harm in asking, right? No, there's no harm in asking. I'll ask DOT if maybe a guardrail. I know that probably would make you feel somewhat better, I would hope. But I will ask.

David, even a stop ahead painted on the asphalt coming towards Monroe Road off of Hayes Road. Right. So people know it's there.

We'll talk about several different things.

So we're still going to pursue fixing the road with. Right. But in the interim, we're looking at some measures that you will talk to DOT on what's permissible and what's not.

Yeah, yeah, because even if they don't want to do it, and if y'all, you know, we come back, y'all want to do it, I mean, we can do an encroachment. They probably would allow it just because we would maintain it if it got knocked down.

We're giving them a million dollars tonight. Well, yeah, that's true.

But yeah, we'll think about it and come up with something. Appreciate it. No, not a problem.

Thank you, Todd. All right, I'll leave you up here because you've got the next item also. Okay. About our partnership with Stallings.

Yes. Unfortunately, this has been a few months, so I'm going to try to refresh your memory. I came to you all around the month of April. I say around. It was in the month of April. About a partnership with Stallings on a pedestrian project. So actually, we came up with actually two areas. So, you know, they reached out to us. And so there's two areas. It was like it was Chestnut Lane. Okay. Chestnut Lane and Matthews, Matthews-Innitro Road. We're talking about, you know, you know, building, you know, connecting some of these sidewalks that have the gaps, right? So they came back. um so they went back to their council and i think in june is it june was it june they said adam and so uh talked to him about again matthew's kind of off the table so they concentrated on chestnut lane um so they kind of convinced council based on our conversations about you know trying to go after you know again again federal money it takes a long time blah blah they actually convinced their council to want to build it now and do a 50% partnership with Indian Trail, if we so choose to. So again, the Chestnut Lane would be, the connection project would be from Weddington-Matthews, that's that roundabout at the end of Weddington-Matthews, up to Potter Road, and basically we're connecting gaps and then constructing that boardwalk across West Fort 12 Mile. Remember, we'd have to have the boardwalk because the bridge is actually rated fairly well there. based on DOT's conversations about it. It's probably been about a year or so ago. So they're not going to rebuild that culver anytime soon. So we can't stick a sidewalk out there. So we're going to have to go the boardwalk route if you want to do it now. So this image I showed you in April basically should be the project area in red. Again, it's Chestnut Lane. Everybody knows Chestnut from the roundabout back to Potter Road. And then, so we estimated, and again, these are conceptual estimates. Nothing concrete, and we're never gonna have a concrete number until we do a design, if we so choose to move forward with it. But we're figuring a million, a million and a half dollars to build that sidewalk project. And based on the numbers, they came about pretty close for what we would have to pay on our portions and what Stallings had to pay. It was around a 51 to 49 split, so I just made it 50%. So that's $775,000 apiece if you wanted to do it again now. So again, rough estimates. That number's going to change, but that would be what we would start off with if you wanted to move forward with it. So... You could ask me any questions. You could wait and we could come back to you later. Or you could decide to move forward with it. But again, we move forward with it. We would have to get an interlocal agreement with Stalins and then start advertising for RFQ for design. And I'd be happy to answer any questions.

So go back real quick. So what are we deciding tonight? Go back to that last one. Okay, so you can't really get a... Well, this is what you need.

I mean, you're basically... I'm asking you if you want to spend $7,000 or $75,000 to build a pension project.

Go back if you want to do that last one. Okay. But what I was going to say is you got the council approval or denial. You don't really want that tonight. Because you got to go work with, because work, let me finish. Work with Stallings Interlogical Agreement. You have to do that first, correct?

No, because I'm not going to move forward with an agreement. I don't know for sure y'all want to spend the money. So y'all have to figure out if you want to spend that money or not.

So if council wants to move forward with the project, we would then go work on an agreement. We would get that and bring that back for approval.

Okay, I was just looking at it the opposite way. I would have thought you would have done it the other way, but that's okay.

All right, that's fine.

Yeah, because Stallings already said they're willing to pay the $775,000.

But Stallings only wants to do it if... we want to fund it outside of CRT POS process. They don't want to wait for CRT.

Right. They want to build now.

So no additional funding, but this is a second time y'all have heard of this, but it's the first time y'all have heard it as a request for funding. You know, the last time it was a request for information, If you want to hold, if you want to just tell us, yes, we want to continue to move forward with it.

We can at least let Stallings know that you're so by saying a council approval is moving forward with it. Is that what you're saying?

Correct. Correct. If you prove it or not, you're going to move forward.

So what I'm going to ask, does council want to approve this? Can I ask? I'll go down the line. Does council want to approve this to do to do this?

Do you want to do it?

Do you want to do it?

Do you want to do it? Do you want to do it? Do you want to do it? Okay, now go ahead.

How long would the CRTTO process take and how much potential funding will we get through that process?

Hard to say because protection projects, you could get the 80-20 split, you could have to fork out up to 50%. It's based on competitiveness, and we really won't know that until we do an application. But you're talking about a two-year kick, so the money wouldn't be available if we get selected this year, the money wouldn't be available until 2020. I think it's 2029. And then you go 2029, 2031, 2033. So you wouldn't be able to start a project until 2033. And then that's probably a six-month, nine-month project. Yeah, so you'd be done 2034.

So to answer your question, I don't want to spend $775,000 right now. Okay.

Stallings will only do the project, as you said, if it's self-funded, not through NCDOT. That's how they want to do it, yes. All right, question. Can we fund this this year? We can?

We wouldn't fund it this year.

This year's budget.

When we fund this project, we would go back, tonight you would say let's work with Stallings on funding this project. When we got an interlocal agreement ready, when we got all that ready, probably, honestly, it would be funded in next year's budget and we would just roll it into next year's budget. Okay. We would not do a fund balance appropriation tonight or next meeting. It would be once the interlocal agreement was ready that all that would happen.

So I think you got four nods.

So let me just make a motion and put that on paper.

Okay. Well, there's not a motion on here, but go ahead.

Well, I'll make one up. I make a motion to enter into a partnership SORRY, MAKE A MOTION TO APPROVE FUNDING OF THIS PROJECT IN THE FUTURE AND THE TOWN TO ENTER INTO A LOCAL, INTERLOCAL AGREEMENT FOR THE STALLINGS AND INDIAN TRAIL PEDESTRIAN PROJECT WITH INDIAN TRAIL CONTRIBUTING AN APPROXIMATE NUMBER OF $775,000. ALL IN FAVOR? UNANIMOUS. ALL RIGHT.

Thank you all.

Thank you. All right. That brings us up to the manager's update.

Uh, just a couple of very quick things. Um, manager's report was sent out and posted last week on the town's website. Um, earlier this evening, we, uh, pulled the hold off on the quarterly financial, um, funding update. We're gonna bring that back at the next meeting. The main reason for that tonight was we don't quite have all of our revenues in yet. We still have a few that are lagging. We're waiting to get those and once we have those, we'll be able to have better numbers for council on what last year's budget finalized at. ALSO AT THE NEXT MEETING WE'RE GOING TO DO AN OVERALL CIP UPDATE OF ACTIVE PROJECTS SO THOSE ARE THOSE PROJECTS THAT ARE ACTIVE RIGHT NOW SO THAT'S LIKE YOUR INDIAN TRAIL ROAD PHASE ONE, YOUR CHESTNUT SQUARE PARK PHASE THREE, ALL THOSE PROJECTS. WE'RE GOING TO GIVE YOU ALL AN UPDATE ON THAT. And then just a very quick team update from the town team side. We've had quite a few like things that have gone on lately. We've had a couple of birthdays. We've had Trina's had two big I would call two big life events. So I just want to say to everybody on our team that's had different things that have happened. Congratulations. And we're lucky to have you.

Thank you. Is the kick.

But there's no cake tonight.

I thought you were going to say Trina had two big two birthdays. Fast. Okay. That brings us to council comments.

Council member Barber.

Congratulations to Mr. Miss Wiggins. God bless your marriage. Thank you. Congratulations to every ball on being named 2026 woman of influence by the county chamber. I take it that happens in October officially. Anyway, Attagirl Abbey, well deserved. Indian Trail Presbyterian Church is having a homecoming and dinner on the ground Sunday, September 13th at 11 a.m. It's a good opportunity to see their newly remodeled sanctuary. Sun Valley High School FFA is hosting a Patriots and Protectors Appreciation Breakfast. This is September 10th from 8 to 10 a.m. at Sun Valley High School Spartan Center. All first responders and military members are welcome. You can go to the Sun Valley FFA Facebook page to RSVP if you want to go. The VFW is hosting a classic car show Saturday, September 19th. They have a great car show. It's a great event. Valley Church of Indian Trail will start in the men's group ministry. They're meeting Saturday, September 19th, 9 to 11 a.m. All men are welcome. Freedom Community Church is having a community Bible study. They're starting. Contact the church for more information. Thanks for everybody coming. Have a blessed evening. Thank you.

Council Member McIntyre.

I'll keep mine short tonight. A few months ago, we opened that road over there, Chestnut. I said I'm going to talk about it every meeting, and this is not going to be an exception. To everybody who's here tonight, thank you very much, and everybody have a blessed evening.

Council Member Oserbrooks.

All right. Congratulations, Trina. Congratulations to Abby. Union County High School football is going on. I ask everyone go out and support your local high schools. I hear that Parkwood High School won two in a row there. Of course, Captain Mullis isn't here. He's and Trina Parkwood graduates. But unfortunately, they lost the Sun Valley the other night. So I'm a Sun Valley graduate. Let's see. Sandalwood neighborhood. Thank you for coming out. Thank you for organizing. Thank you for coming out to see what your government looks like. We have these meetings every second and fourth Tuesday, so please come back. You'll find out so much more or check out the town's website. There's so much more information. Again, as I said, I plan to hang around after the meeting. Be happy to talk to you if you have any other questions. and let's see last thing just a personal thing going through a lot of things in life and a friend of mine actually used to work here jim water which um i was talking to him and he gave me a verse in proverbs and in reading proverbs i would say it's just my personal thing if you going through something in life that would be a good place to find some answers so with that said y'all have a good evening and thank you for coming out councilmember ambergy

congratulations Serena I didn't know there was a you've been together how many years 17 40 but we didn't know they were engaged but congratulations and Abby she's just setting the world on fire we had a commissioner out of Cabarrus County compliment her on her due diligence I mean she just worked expedient work she did on helping them with something with the funeral home. But anyways, Abby's a ball of fire, and we appreciate you. And also, I just want to tell the Sandalwood community, we hear you, and we're trying, you guys. It's hard. Everything in government with doing roads, I've been wanting Indian Trail Road done for five years now, and I was hearing there was going to be orange barrels from day one.

i hadn't seen them yet but hey bear with us we're trying i promise you um and i'll shut up and i'll just say jesus loves you god bless everyone have a great evening councilmember behalik the best and worst thing about being last is everything's already been said pretty much so yes congratulations everyone um i look forward to doing the leadership summit tomorrow with some of the council members as well as some of the staff and i just appreciate everybody being here and hope you'll come again

Mayor Cohn. Thank you, everybody, for coming tonight. Congratulations, Trina. I didn't even know you had the big day, so I don't know what the congratulations are. And Abby, congratulations to you. And tonight, I have a today's note. It's never stop being a good person. No matter how bad someone treats you or how things or what they say about you, their words and actions reflect who they are, not who you are. So just keep that in mind. Don't let anybody get you down. Just keep moving on. And thanks again for being here. And those magic words. Can I get a motion to close? No, I can't. Wait, wait. Don't tell me. I can't close. I can't close because we have a closed session. So we get to stay a little longer tonight. So I move. Got it right here in a closed session under NCGS one four three dash three one eight eleven eight five to establish instruct the staff or agent concerning the negotiations of the price in terms of a contract concerning the acquisition of real property located at zero seven oh four eight oh one nine B. Can I get a motion to go in closed session?

I'll make a motion to go in a closed session.

All in favor. Now, OK.

I'll make a motion to close closed session.

Can I get a motion to come out of closed session, please?

I'll make a motion to come out of closed session.

All in favor? Unanimous. Can I get a motion to close?

A motion to close, please.

Unanimous. Get a motion to adjourn.

A motion to adjourn.