City Council - Regular Meeting

Ms. Berry with a second. All in favor? Okay. We're going into a very special moment now. And, Council, we need Mr. Davalk to have something to say.

Mayor, I'd like to make a motion to dedicate the Kannapolis Middle School campus athletic field as Rogers Field. Thank you.

All in favor? I second. You get a second. Mr. Payne, all in favor? Thank you very much. All right, we're going to come down. If the family wants to come up, Mr. Melton's going to read something very special.

All right. Scott, do you want to hold this? So before we get started here as the family's coming down, I was just sharing with the family earlier that I had the opportunity to work with Scott some years ago. He helped us with right of ways and everything else. It was so amazing to be able to work with someone, obviously, that can come out, have a cup of coffee with someone that's out, negotiate a property, and without any conflict. So you're talking about a special moment. This is special for me for sure, but just thinking about this family and the years and time that I've had an opportunity to be able to work with Rick and others and this facility that the school sits on, a lot of history there. Meredith, I know you know what my wife and others, that were there teaching at the school system, my mom before, but this is special to be able to do this for you guys. So let me read a little dedication here for this. This is a resolution dedicating the Kannapolis Middle School athletic field adjacent to Oakwood Avenue in honor of the Rogers family. Whereas the land in which Kannapolis Middle School campus sixth grade building athletic field sits located adjacent to Oakwood Avenue has been a part of the Rogers family since the mid-1900s and has served as a city park. And whereas the Rogers family has farmed and cared for this land for generations until the early 2000 when the property that became the site of the Kannapolis Middle School campus was sold to Kannapolis City Schools. And whereas the Rogers family has a long standing and distinguished history of service to Kannapolis City Schools and the students and families of the Kannapolis community. And whereas Delinda Rogers served as a mathematics teacher in Kannapolis City Schools for 32 years and also served for many years as a cheerleading advisor positively impacting generations of students, both in the classroom, instruction, and extracurricular activities, whereas Scott Rogers has been employed with Kannapolis City Schools since 1991, having taught science and currently serving as the Director of Operations while also dedicating many years to Kannapolis student athletes as a coach of varsity football, softball, as well as middle school football and baseball. Whereas other members of the Rogers family have demonstrated a similar commitment in education and public service, including Jan Rogers Johnson, who retired from Cabarrus County Schools, her daughter Meredith Johnson Spry, who retired from canapa city schools and additional members of the rogers family who have served and currently serve the canapa city school including hope johnson being travis rogers elizabeth rogers grouchy rogers carolyn rogers mckenzie rogers caleb spry and rachel spry and whereas the naming excuse me, whereas naming the athletic field in honor of the Rogers family would acknowledge the family's historic connection to the land and decades of service to the school system, providing a lasting tribute to the family whose contributed or contributions have strengthened community. Now therefore be it resolved the City Council of Kannapolis North Carolina hereby dedicates and renames the athletic field at Kannapolis Middle School campus as Rogers Field in recognition of the Rogers family long-standing connection to the property and extraordinary history of service to Kannapolis City Schools and the greater community. Thank you all.

Thank you.

I know, I know.

I'll see you tomorrow. These babies are beautiful. Oh my gosh.

How about smiling a bit, will you?

Those babies are precious.

Congratulations. Hey, buddy. Hi. Congratulations. Hey, man. Hi. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Hi. Hi. Congratulations.

Good seeing you.

Congratulations.

Good seeing you.

You think you'd ever say that? Congratulations. Yes, sir.

Appreciate everything. Congratulations. Thank you so much.

Yes, ma'am.

Congratulations. Thank you.

Yes, very much. Very well deserved.

Good singing. Thank you for all your support. Thank you for all your support. Thank you, sir. Hey, Janet.

Good seeing you, ma'am. Good seeing you. I always think about Mr. Evers when I see you. Good seeing you, sir. Hey, buddy. Hey, John. How are you, sir? Good seeing you. Good seeing you. Yeah. Hello, young lady. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Return? Yes, sir. Yeah. Thank you. Congratulations. Good job, brother. Hey, man. How are you doing? Hey, brother. How are you, sir? Good seeing you. Well, I don't guess we are.

We don't need a recess. Let's just let them go.

Hope Waisley. Hey, was it good?

Good job.

Awesome.

Wow.

He didn't want any attention on him. All right. At this time, we will go ahead and move on to our speakers from the floor. Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

So the first speaker I have, if you will come to the podium, you will have four minutes to speak. You'll see lights at the podium, timer at the front. Four minutes. At the one minute mark, the light will turn yellow. At the end of your four minutes, you'll hear a buzzer. And the first card I have is Terry Stowers.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. My name is Terry Stowers, and I've been a resident of Kannapolis for more than 25 years. I'm also a member of the Friends of Kannapolis Parks, which operates under the umbrella of Partners for Parks, a 501c3 nonprofit organization. I'm here tonight because I believe it's important to remember how we arrived at this point and the commitment this city has already made to the future of parks and recreation in Kannapolis. In 2023, the city engaged a consultant to develop a comprehensive park and recreation master plan. Public participation was an important part of the process. Through community survey, stakeholder interviews, and community workshops, Kannapolis residents had the opportunity to tell the city what they wanted and needed from their park system. That public input identified several priorities including the preservation of open space and natural areas, greenways for walking and biking, drive-in movie opportunities, and a greater public access to city lakes. The master plan also identified the need for three new neighborhood parks and three new community parks to adequately serve our current population. On March 25, 2024, the Mayor and the City Council formally adopted the City of Kannapolis 2024-2034 Park and Recreation Master Plan as a guiding public document for the implementation and development of a robust and coordinated system of parks, recreation facilities, programs, and services for the residents of Kannapolis. That action was significant. By adopting the plan, the city acknowledged that the recreation needs expressed by our citizens and established a vision for addressing those needs over the next decade. Then on June 22nd of this year, this city council unanimously voted to place a general obligation bond on the November 3rd ballot. to help fund projects identified in the Parks and Recreation Master Plan. I'm here tonight to respectfully remind the Council of those actions, and more importantly, of the public process that led to them. The citizens participated, they completed surveys, they attended meetings, they shared their priorities. The city listened, developed a plan based on the input, And council formally adopted the plan. Now voters will have the opportunity to decide whether to provide the funding necessary to move forward with those projects. As we approach November 3rd, I respectfully ask each of you to support city employees in their efforts to inform and educate the public about the bond referendum to the fullest extent permitted by North Carolina law and the applicable guidance from the State Treasurer. Our citizens deserve clear, accurate, and accessible information about what is being proposed. What projects the bonds would fund, the financial implications of the bond, and what these investments could mean for the future of Kannapolis. The referendum is ultimately a decision for the voters, but an informed decision requires an informed community. You have already taken important steps by listening to the public, adopting the master plan, and placing the bond before the voters. I ask you now to continue that commitment by ensuring our residents have the information they need to make an educated decision on November 3rd. Thank you for your service to our community and for your continued commitment to the future of Kannapolis.

Thank you.

Next card I have is for Zach Irwin.

Good evening, Zach Irwin of Kannapolis, North Carolina. Today you will be considering the public hearing and public comments policy and amendments to it. I want to bring your attention to the amendment that you are proposing. so that the public can be informed of it as well and gosh it would be very helpful to be able to use a power point to do this we used to be able to do that as part of the speakers from the floor now we can't i would respectfully ask you to reconsider that at some point but nonetheless here we go uh... if you look at section d of the public hearings public comments policy part three where it reads, unless otherwise provided by this policy, a speaker card must be completed and provided to the city clerk prior to the start of a public hearing or public comment period. And then bullet points one and two say, speakers will not be allowed to sign up to speak after the start of the public comment period. Number two, prior to the end of a public hearing, the presiding officer will ask whether there are any individuals wishing to address city council on the topic of the public hearing. My plea and advice to you is that you will reconsider this change to the policy because, as I mentioned last time I spoke here, there are several people who come in with the intent to speak who don't know the policy, who are not informed of the policy ahead of time, And so they don't know that you have to submit a card ahead of time. Unless you plan to do a very good job of explaining in detail every single meeting that they need to turn in their card before the public speaking period starts, then I suggest you remove this suggested amendment to the policy because people come and they hear people speak and then they feel so emboldened to speak themselves. And so you should allow them to continue to sign up throughout the speakers from the floor process. Also, point two, prior to the end of a public hearing, the presiding officer will ask whether there are any individuals wishing to address. Please make sure that you clarify to where that's only a public hearing. or whether it also applies to speakers from the floor. I ask that you will take these into consideration, and I thank you. I thank you for putting it on the business agenda today to be spoken in public. That is very meaningful. It's transparent. And then for added transparency, again, I would suggest allowing for PowerPoint presentation to be part of speakers from the floor so that the people at home with possible hearing impairments are able to see what is being discussed in city council meetings. Thank you for your time and for your consideration.

Thank you, John.

Next card is Cindy Griggs.

Good evening, council members, and to all those that are here this evening. I'm going to speak very briefly. I don't need to add any more to, I think, what Terry said about the upcoming parks bond. But I just would like to advocate just so much for our continued expansion of our parks and recreation program. Tonight was a very special thing that just happened with the family that was here with the dedication of the park. And that kind of thing we have seen just means so much to our families and the people that have been here for a long time. But we need to remember that our city is growing. Whether we like it or don't like it, our city is growing. And the fact that we have not added on to a lot of our parks for quite some time, is something that we really need to think about long and hard, because everybody is loving Kannapolis, just like we have for many, many, many years. We tout ourselves as a city of health and wellness. Right now, coming up later on the agenda, is information about our youth sports program. There are members on the city council that have long been advocates I've known you, Doug, for as long as I've lived here, for 31-plus years. We have served together in many capacities on different parks and sports programs over the years. And for our community, for our children and our community to continue in the health and wellness programs that we serve, We tout everywhere. We have banners talking about this. We need to continue to develop our parks programs, our health and wellness programs, our greenways. It has so much more to do with not just physical health, but mental health. And that's a huge issue these days. So please take a long, hard look. We're not going to stop growing. We're not. Everybody is liking it here, and they're moving here. And we have a lot of things to address that way. But one of the things is the reason why people move here. And they move here because they enjoy all of the wonderful things we have to do here in Kannapolis that have to do with our park system, our green space systems, and our sports. Our youth sports program has just gone out the roof. We desperately need more of those fields and more of those things. So please keep that in mind. And we ask the people that are here tonight to keep that in mind when they get ready to take a look at the bond that's coming up very soon. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for giving us the time to speak tonight about these various issues. And I just can't congratulate the Rogers family enough. I've known most of them since I've been here. They've been part of our family too. And thank you, council. for presenting them with those honors.

Allison Palladino.

Good evening, Mayor, members of city council, and city staff. My name's Allison Palladino. I'm president and CEO of the Cabarrus Regional Chamber of Commerce. I'm here tonight with an exciting invitation for U.S. city leadership and the local Kannapolis business community. On Tuesday, September 2nd at 6 p.m., we're hosting a Kannapolis Connections kickoff party at the Kannapolis Cannonballers game. This event is completely free for local Kannapolis businesses to attend, and we hope that city leadership will attend with us as well. A massive thank you to the Kannapolis Cannonballers for hosting us for this special evening at the ballpark. This party is celebrating the official launch of Kannapolis Connections this fall, a brand new monthly morning networking group created specifically for our local business community to connect, collaborate, and grow. All Kannapolis businesses are invited to start attending the Morning Connections upon our launch this fall. And if a business isn't a chamber member yet, they're invited to attend as our guests through the end of 2026 to experience the group firsthand. This initiative builds on an incredible foundation. Right now, approximately 100 Kannapolis businesses are active chamber members, and 40% of those have been with us for 10 years or more. These businesses are driving local growth, creating jobs, and shaping the future of Kannapolis. To claim a spot for the September 2nd kickoff party, to get ticket details or learn more about the Morning Network Working Group or Chamber Membership, businesses are invited to contact us at the Cabarrus Regional Chamber of Commerce at 704-782-4000. Thank you, city leadership, for your continuous support of our business community, and we look forward to seeing everyone for the kickoff party on September 2nd.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, Mayor, last card is Violet Elaine Mitchell.

Okay, I'm Valerie Delaine Mitchell, address 415 Linden Street, located right off of Southland, Texas Road. And I know that y'all have heard me speak about the sidewalk project ever since 2012, but I'm not going to even get on that tonight. I want to say, when I was up here at the last meeting, I talked about what a bad shape Linden Street is in, the cul-de-sac that I live in. And I got a little song for y'all. Okay. Michael Dodge came out that Saturday. I said, you working on a Saturday? He said, yeah. So he came out and he assessed everything that was going on and he assured me that they was going to get on it. And sure enough, I got a call today and they're going to start on scraping the shoulders and everything tomorrow. The other thing I'd like to say, congratulations to the Rogers family. I know them all. I used to work with them and everything. They're a great family. And the last thing that I have is... I had the opportunity to meet with the governor of North Carolina, Governor Josh Stein. I handed him a handwritten letter of issues and concerns that I had and of the citizens of North Carolina. He was pleasantly surprised, and he knows who Violet Mitchell is now. So anyway. He was really impressed with the issues. I wrote everything down in a letter form. And I gave him a key chain in the shape of North Carolina. And he really appreciated it. And that's all, folks. That's all.

Thank you, Ms. Mitchell. That's it? Okay. Thank you. All right, council, we have a consent agenda. We need a motion to adopt that.

So moved.

Mr. Payne. Mr. Jackson with a second. All in favor? Okay. We're moving on to the business agenda now. I think Ms. Gordon. Always good to see you.

Good to see you as well. Thank you so much. So this evening I'm presenting the 26-27 CDBG non-profit grant recommendations. So HUD allows entitlement cities to budget up to 15% of our annual allocations for public services that benefit low-moderate income residents. Our total CDBG allocation for 26-27 is $400,067, and $58,000 has been allocated for public services. I would like to thank our Community Improvement Commission for their time in reviewing the applications, and a few of them are here this evening. So the eligible activities that are or can be awarded for the CDBG grant would be for employment services, crime prevention and public safety, childcare, health services, substance abuse services, fair housing counseling, education programs, energy conservation, services for senior citizens, services for the homeless persons, welfare services, down payment assistance, and recreational services. So applications were solicited, and we received 24 completed applications, totaling $192,500 in funding requests. Those applications included applications from the Academic Learning Center, AYA House, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Bethel Baptist Church, Cabarrus Health Alliance, Cabarrus Rowan Community Health, which is now known as Access Point, Central North Carolina Council Scouting America, Christias Incorporated submitted two applications, Classroom Central, Conflict Resolution, Cooperative Christian Ministries, El Príncipe Español, Faith Fellowship Church, Families First, Lock and Key, McKnight Child Development Center, PEAK NextGen, Rowan Cabarrus YMCA, Rowan Helping Ministries, The Studio, The Sudo Institute, Valor Haven Foundation, and Vision for Life of Kannapolis. The Community Improvement Commission is recommending funding 18 organizations. As we reviewed the applications, the focus for this year was on projects addressing housing, behavior, health, and education. Organizations can request up to $5,000 for sustaining projects. While most organizations requested the maximum amount, the CIC chose to fund more organizations with smaller grants amounts than to provide the organization with all that they requested because we have such limited funding. These projects should be focused on services, not building and infrastructure. When we look at the applications, we consider the organization's track record, we look at their budgets, we look at how funds are being leveraged. We also invited four organizations to come and provide additional presentations and to answer questions. Those organizations were the Suda Institute, El Príncipe Español, Lock and Key, and Conflict Resolution. I also want to emphasize that these grants are reimbursable grants, and each organization must submit receipts and documentation showing how the monies have been expended before they are reimbursed. So the funding recommendations include the Academic Learning Center, $3,000. Their funds will be used to support before and after school tutoring programs for Kannapolis City Schools. AYA House, $3,000. Funds will be used to support transitional housing program. Big Brothers Big Sisters, $3,000. Funds will be used to support the mentoring program with the focus on mental health strategies. Bethel Baptist Church Ministries, $2,500. And that's funds to support crisis assistance programs with rent, utilities, and housing for the underserved. Cabarrus Health Alliance, $4,000 comprehensive dental services to Title I Kannapolis City Schools. Classroom Central, $3,000. That's a mobile free store program to provide school supplies for Kannapolis City School teachers. Conflict Resolution, $4,000. Funds to support their teen court and truancy program. CCM, $4,000. funds to support individuals in crisis. They help to pay utilities and to help prevent evictions. El Príncipe Español, 2,500, funds to support families, empowerment program for the Latino families. Faith Fellowship, 2,000, funds to support programs for the unhoused, such as transportation, food, and bus passes. Family First, 4,000, funds to support the home-based child care programs. Lock and Key, 2,500, funds to support families impacted by incarceration. Peak Next Gen, 3,000, funds to support out-of-school tutoring program. Roy and Cabarrus YMCA, 2,500, funds to support their positive youth development after school and summer camp program. Rowan Healthy Ministries, 4,000 funds for crisis assistance for utilities, rent, and their clothing pantry. The Studio, 3,000 funds to support project uplift emergency assistance for the unhoused. The Suda Institute, 4,000 funds for physician-led care coordination for the Sun Project, serving pregnant and postpartum individuals with substance use disorders. Vision for Life, 4,000, funds to be used for mentoring, tutoring program for the youth, along with the parenting component. So tonight, the motion is, or we're asking this motion to approve these recommendations. Number two, you can revise the public service allocations amount as you see fit. Or three, do not approve the recommendations. The city is not required to fund any non-profit with community development block grant funds.

All right. Does anyone have any questions or concerns on this? Ms. Hatchell?

No. Okay. Sherry, I just wanted to publicly thank you. I know I sent you quite a few emails asking about the different things, and I do want to thank the CIC board for the work that you put into it. I think the hardest part about this list is we have so many great nonprofits in our area that really support our city. I know it was not easy for you guys on this decision, and I thank you for the questions that I had and explaining what their decisions were. So thank you to that team that you have that worked on this. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Appreciate you asking.

Okay, we need a motion here. Ms. Dixon, is there a second?

Second.

Mr. Davenport, all in favor, if you will. Are we good? Thank you.

Thank you.

Our old friend, Mr. Smith.

Thank you, Mayor, Members of the Council. We have two annexations for you tonight. Voluntary annexations we need to hold a public hearing for, and believe it or not, both of them are located very nearby each other, even though they're not the same applicants. The first one we have on your agenda tonight is a voluntary annexation at 115 Kidd Street. This is made on behalf of the petitioner, Bell Parazine Christian Center II. It does consist of one parcel, just over an acre. It is a contiguous annexation. It's located in the city's present ETJ, which will be dissolved soon, and our future growth area as well. And the proposed use there is a daycare center. So this kind of gives you an idea of the proximity on Moose Road near where Kidd Street is, west of China Grove Road there, and their survey map. So with that, we need to hold a hearing. I'll be glad to answer any questions you have before or after the hearing, Mayor.

Are there any questions with this item here? Okay, I'm going to open the public hearing. If you want to speak on this topic and this topic only, please come now. Okay, we're going to close it. Council, we need a motion here on this ordinance to extend the corporate limits.

I'll make that motion, Mayor.

Mr. Jackson?

Second.

Mr. Dayball, all in favor? All right, thank you.

Second one we have tonight, Mayor, is voluntary annexation for also on Kid Street. I'm sorry, there's a typo there. Andrew Matthews made this request. It is one parcel. It's just below a quarter of an acre, contiguous annexation, located in the ETJ in the future growth area. It is proposed to be residential as well. Same location, Kid Street, just on the opposite side of the street as the previous one. This one's on the west side, whereas the previous was on the east side there. There's your survey and of course we need to hold a hearing on that as well.

Any questions on this item? All right. We need a motion to approve this. I'm sorry. No way.

There's a question right here.

Any questions before I go to the public hearing? Okay. I'm going to open the public hearing. If you want to speak on this topic and this topic only, please come up. Okay, we're going to close this one. Okay, another situation. Council, we need a motion to do this, and Ms. Dixon's got that. Is there a second? Ms. Berry? Okay, all in favor? Good. All right, we've done that. Thank you. We'll go on to this policy amendment, and before I open this up for comments, I will say a few things about this, and I think some of this goes back to how long you've been coming to these meetings, but there was a time, and I know Joe Hatley's out there, and he'll remember this, and Phil Goodman, one of this council met once a month at 4.30, and so during that time, we didn't have public comment, if my memory's correct, and Several of us asked that the meetings be moved both to 6 o'clock so we could have more attendance from the public because it was more convenient. In conjunction with that, I think somewhere in all of that activity, I asked that the speakers be granted four minutes instead of three. And the council went along with that. So we extended our opportunity to speak by, what's that, 30%? Something of that nature. So I don't know of any, and I've talked to Mr. Kelly about this, I don't know of any other municipality that's offering that much time. We do, we offer four minutes. And then, beyond that, I think Mr. Dayball and Ms. Hatch will push the fact that we do it in both meetings. So we've taken it, we've actually expanded the opportunity greatly from what it was, let's say, two years ago. If you want to look at it from that perspective. We're just trying to develop more structure to this. And I think it's a valid move, in my opinion. So does anyone have any comments on this? Mr. Dayball.

Thank you, Mayor. The one thing that Mr. Irwin brought up, just wanted to clarify that we will have signage posted outside, I assume, at the table. instructing people that here's the new policy, here's what you have to do in order to get signed up to speak. We need to make that perfectly clear. It's a very good point. And I assume that you will, as you open the meeting, you will address that same topic right out of the gate even as soon as we open the meeting. I mean, essentially.

As soon as we adopt the agenda, I intend to make that comment.

Okay. And... The other thing that I would say about our current process, Ms. Skaggs needs some help over there to ensure that that button gets pushed on the countdown. Because, you know, it's not fair that somebody's standing there watching the clock moving, and that puts you under a different amount of pressure than... if the clock's not moving. And she can only do so much at one time trying to take minutes and type and hit buttons. So I think we need to get somebody to sit up there to help her through that process, another staff member, to make it fair to everybody that is taking the time out to come speak. Also, it was brought up to me that the date on the policy that's in the agenda says this policy is amended the 10th day of August. That was when we had it on the consent agenda. So that needs to be corrected when the motion is made to pass this policy, if that's the will of the council.

It needs to go to the first meeting in September now, I would think. Is that being right, Mr. Kelly?

The policy will be affected tonight. Tonight? Yes.

It will be put into play at the next meeting. That's correct.

Right. Okay.

But, I mean, we need to make the change. Yeah, we'll make that change on the document before the mayor signs it.

Okay. That's correct. It will reflect it was adopted tonight, not the 10th. Okay. Yes. That's all I have, Mayor.

Anyone else? Ms. Hatchell.

Yeah, I just wanted to take a minute to thank Mr. Kelly for his work on that and taking in our input with the different parts of it. I also want to point out that we will no longer ask for street addresses when people come, especially since our meetings are streamlined or put out there in the public. The purpose of public comment is for transparency for us, not necessarily for those who want to speak. So I just want to make sure that's put out there. Like you said, Mr. Mayor, other local government bodies make you sign up the day before. You have to sign up different times. You don't get to speak twice a month. So all those things are very true. So thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else? All right. Having said that, then we need a motion here. Ms. Hatchell? Second. Mr. Jackson? All in favor? Thank you. And we're back to now Carter Mozingo, Gary Mills.

Can somebody turn those bright lights down? Yeah. Somebody put under a spotlight.

They wanted you all to be seen. I don't know how that thing got turned on. Thank you, Mayor and Council, for allowing us to do this presentation tonight. Mayor Wilson had asked us a couple months ago to do a presentation on our youth sports, the success of our youth sports program. I said, well, let's wait until our registration for fall flag football occurs so that we can include those numbers in. And so we've prepared a an exciting conversation for you guys' presentation tonight. So I hope you'll be enthralled by the information that we provide to you. But Carter Mozingo, our athletic coordinator, is here. Jordan Fuller, our assistant athletic coordinator, is also here. But he's got some really cool information to share on our very successful program. And when we get done, we'll be open for questions.

Carter?

Thanks, Gary. Thank you, Mayor and Council Members. I'm excited to give this presentation. I've been a part of the athletics program here in Kannapolis since almost the very beginning. I was not here for the very first basketball season, but since then I've been a part of the team in a part-time and now full-time capacity. I am biased but I do think it's a great program that we have and it's been great to see the growth. To see those kids that started in our first program that are now getting to that middle school and high school age and see them go on to start working with their school teams and everything has been great. So to get started, we'll look at the numbers for our participation since we started in 2020. So in fiscal year 2020, we only had basketball, and that's that 332 members that we had in that first program. Since then, we have seen growth across our total numbers every year. Those numbers are starting to level out a little bit now that we've captured a lot of those people that are planning to play sports with us. But we still continue to see a lot of growth across different age groups and different sports. So looking at it by sport, as you can see down at the bottom, in fiscal year 20, that was just basketball. And then in fiscal year 21, we were able to add soccer and flag football. And in the following year, in 2022, we also added baseball and softball. So again, in this, you can see how our sports are continuing to grow, and some of our soccer and basketball have started to kind of level out a little bit, but our baseball, softball, and flag football numbers are continuing to grow, which is great to see. And even within those soccer and basketball programs, as we'll see later, we still have age groups that are continuing to grow, especially in our girl programs. Those numbers are continuing to grow by a good bit. So we'll move on to our facility usage for the fiscal year of 26. Flag football is our first program for the fiscal year. We utilize Seyfried Park and Barry Lentz Park. At Seyfried Park, we had 532 hours of games and practices, and at Barry Lentz, we had 140 hours of games and practices. Barry Lentz is utilized for our 5-6 age groups, and then 7-8 through 13-15 are being used at Seyfried Park. And on Saturdays, we have games running from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. every Saturday. So that's a great program that we have going on there. And then if we look at the numbers by the age groups over the last three years, you can see how those numbers continue to grow. The younger age groups, they can go up and down a little bit, but we can see the retention as the ages progress. We see our 5-6 continue to go into our 7-8s and our 7-8s into our 9-10 and so on. As they continue to grow until they get to that school age where they're playing with their school teams or if they're electing to do other sports. That's why you see a little bit of a dip in those older age groups. But we still continue to see that retention that a lot of these kids are staying with our programs year after year. That takes us to our basketball league. In fiscal year 26, we had over 1,000 hours of games and practices spread across the Kannapolis City Schools that we utilize for our games, which is Kannapolis Middle School 6th grade gym, Forest Park, Shady Brook, and GW Carver. And we do have a great relationship with the Kannapolis City Schools. We would not be able to put on these programs without their facilities. It's been fantastic. I know Scott Rogers and his family were here earlier. Me and Scott are constantly talking about what we can do to better clean their gyms and everything to make sure that we are being very respectful of their space so that they continue to allow us to be in those schools. And we help them out. We've been able to update some of their facilities, enhancing some of their goals, and we'd love to continue to look at ways that we can enhance their facilities. We also utilize Royal Oaks for our 3-4 instructional program, which is outside of the Kannapolis City Schools system. And for basketball, we have a couple more bars on this graph because once we hit the 7-8 age group, it breaks up into boys leagues and girls leagues. Our 3-4 and 5-6 are still co-ed. But like I said earlier, I think the biggest thing you can note is how the girls leagues have continued to grow, even up through the older age groups. And I think that's just because our program is continuing to excel and be better than it was the year before. And even across all of our leagues, boys and girls, we see that retention as the older age groups continue to grow and the kids have continued to enjoy those programs. That brings us to soccer, which is held in the spring. We utilize Safer Park and Barry Lentz Park for this as well. We had 788 hours of games and practices at Safer Park and 164 at Barry Lentz. Again, Barry Lentz is used for our 5-6 program and then our 3-4 instructional league and then our 7-8 through 13-15. use the Safer Park facilities. Our 3-4 program utilizes the outfields of our softball fields there until about noon, and that's when it transitions over to be a baseball field after that. On Saturdays in the spring, we're usually here from about 9 a.m. to about 9 p.m., utilizing that main Safer rectangle because we've got games going on all day. To break that down into the age groups, again, all of our soccer programs are co-ed. So we can continue to see that retention as the older age groups progress. They're continuing to stay in our program, which is great. We love seeing those older kids staying out and staying active. Move on to our... Baseball, softball is our other sport that we have in the spring. We have three parks that we utilize for baseball and softball at Safer Park, Barry Lentz Park, and Baker's Creek, where we had over 867 hours of games and practices. And again, those games will run from about 9 a.m. to about 8 p.m. on Saturday. So we've got a very long day of baseball as well. And it's the same thing as the retention that we've continued to have. And baseball and softball have continued to grow across pretty much every age group, especially our softball program, as we've continued to utilize what we feel is good facilities. And we also partner with Concord and Odell and those older age groups and in our softball leagues to help build out a good program so we can have plenty of teams and plenty of good competition. Next, we have our resident and non-resident numbers for all of our sports. Across our sports as a whole, we have about 77% resident participation. The biggest non-resident participation that we have is that flag football program. We believe that is mostly because we are the only organization the only place in the area that provides flag football. Most other places do not do a flag football program. They may do a fall soccer program. And then the rest of our programs are about 20% non-resident. This next slide is one of our most important. That's our volunteer coaches. After our facilities, it's the most important thing that we have in our program. In fiscal year 26, we had a total of 253 teams that were covered by volunteer head coaches. And that does not include the additional assistant coaches that many teams have. This totaled over 4,700 hours of volunteer time between games and practices. And that's just the time they spend on the field. That does not include the time that they spend before games and before practices coming up with plans, planning out their roster, communicating with their team, and just learning the kids and everything. Over those 4,700 hours, we have calculated that's about $117,000 of savings that we've been able to have because we're using volunteer coaches as opposed to part-time staff. Next, our sponsorship. In fiscal year 26, we had 20 youth sponsors that equated to about $4,000 in monetary donations, equipment, and services. That number is not quite where we would like it to be, so going into fiscal year 27, we've revamped our sponsorship program. We believe that gives us greater versatility to allow what we believe can be limitless growth for our sponsorships. We want to help the community and business owners to give them more chances to give back to their community, more avenues. So we have that QR code for anyone that you can look up our new sponsorship brochure and just kind of breaks down the different avenues that they can take as a youth sponsor. And finally, we have our youth athletics healthy contact hours. And the healthy contact hours is a part of that Discover a Healthy Life brand that the city has. And this is hours that are tracked, meaning time away from screens. Sorry. Time away from screens, time spent being active, time spent with other kids their age, and time spent help building those social skills that are important for kids as they grow up. To break down a little bit of our healthy contact hours, for flag football, each participant had 18 healthy contact hours. Those were 10 hours of practice, eight hours of games. So across our 455 participants that we had in fiscal year 26, that was 8,190 total hours. And that final column is the total hours that each program has had of healthy contact hours since its beginning. So for flag football, that was over 33,000 hours. For basketball, it was over 61,000 hours. For soccer, that's over 66,000 hours. Baseball, almost 40,000. And softball, almost 15,000. So as a total, since the very beginning in 2020, we have provided the youth of the community an avenue to get out, be active, and spend time with their peers over 215,000 hours. And that's all that I have in the presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions that you have about our youth athletics.

Okay. Are you tired?

Do what?

I said, are you tired? Not quite. You feel like you've been up in a few hours in yourself. Yeah, right. Any questions for this young man?

Make a comment. Go ahead. Carter, just thank you for what you've done. I mean, this is a big lift for the community. and as well as Mr. Mills for his support of this project. But I also want to give a shout-out to Coach Wilson, who we're famously known as. You know, I remember sitting here on this dais several years ago, and we were arguing about the need for this, and you were adamant that this city needed support. a youth sports program like this. And some of our other members at the time, they didn't feel that it was a big priority. But you pressed on and won everybody over. And everybody eventually got on board and supported the creation of this. And this is major for the community. So I wanted to give you a shout-out especially for that. So thank you for your leadership, and thank you for y'all implementing this vision and helping. On average, it looks like about 2,500 to 3,000 kids a year. And I'm sure there's kids you said that repeat each year. But if you add up all the years, that's 12,579 kids. slots, I guess, that have been filled year over year in sports here. Thank you for what you do. Anyone else? Ms. Hatchell.

Thank you for your presentation. I kind of noticed too with your numbers that we've kind of leveled off. Are we running into any problems like with a wait list or anything with some of these sports? Or we've been able to maintain it?

So not yet. We are pretty much at capacity with our soccer program, our basketball program, and our baseball softball program. So the leveling off has been OK because we're right there at that capacity. We have not had to turn anyone away as of now. But if we continue to grow, there may be that time. But as of now, we have not.

I know you mentioned the sponsorship is what you guys are promoting. Do you guys have a current goal for that? If there was a business that would hear it tonight, what are some ways that they could do that?

Our goal right now is to grow more than we were last year. Like I said, we've revamped it and we're seeing how those changes are going to benefit the program. We're willing to continue to change as the years progress, but We want to have more like 20 sponsors per season as opposed to for a full year. We want to get as many people sponsored as possible so that we can benefit the kids as much as possible.

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Barron, go ahead, please.

Okay, Carter, I would like to know who these youth athletic coaches are. I mean, no, I don't get to the games, but I would like them recognized somehow, whether it's in the newsletter, if it's on the website, if they're invited to a council meeting. That's a lot of sacrifice and a lot of time they spend. And somehow or another, they deserve more recognition. As the fall's starting, maybe they're finished up spring and summer. Somehow or another, I'd just like to know more about them and them to get better recognition.

Yep, that's an excellent suggestion. We'd love to do something like that. We do provide them with a plaque with a picture of the kids and everything that were on their team, but that's a very good suggestion to recognize them even further in the community.

Even if we had a big dinner for them, something that we're saying, hey, we couldn't do this without you.

Thank you. Good idea. Anyone else? Harold, do you have something? You know, they let me coach in this in the beginning, and I got so many technical fouls that Gary told me I had to go on. All right. Okay. So thank you very much. Thank you. Great. All right. Now we have... We're going to have, where are we now? We're on the wrong page. Counselor, Mr. Melton, I'm sorry.

Mayor, I don't have any additional items tonight.

All right, City Council. Mr. Daywalt. I just want to give a shout-out to the fire department for their work over the weekend locating the elderly man that went missing. And I understand that our fire department is who found him. And there were people all over the area looking for this gentleman who's got dementia. And they found him in a field and safely returned him home. So that's a huge thing for our department to do. I accomplished that. And I just want to say hi to my twins, Ava and Aubrey, who are four months old, but they're watching this meeting in deep commitment. So I'm sure they've learned a lot through this hour-long meeting. Thank you, Mayor. Do you have something? Ms. Dixon? No. Okay.

Anyone else?

Mr. Davon? I believe it's time for you. All right. Mayor, I'll make a motion to close the session pursuant to North Carolina General Statute 143-318.11a3 to consult with an attorney in order to preserve the attorney-client privilege and General Statute 143.318.11a5 for discussing the negotiating position regarding the acquisition of real property.

Second. Second. Ms. Dixon, all in favor? Okay. Our meeting is adjourned. Thank you for coming.