Finance, Governance and Public Safety Committee - Regular Meeting

Well,

he you know, he's here, now we've lost I'm so yeah. Rogers to

You can get started now. I appreciate Madam Chair waiting on me.

Of course. Good morning. We did have a quorum, but I was morning, everyone. Welcome to the Tuesday, February 24 meeting of the Finance Governance and Public Safety Committee. My name is Andrea Boo. I'm chair of the committee. Did I will ask my committee members to introduce themselves starting to my left.

West Rogers, 2nd District. Chris Panarea, 4th District.

Darryl Curls, 5th District at large.

And we have one guest.

Malcolm Duncan, 6th District.

The microphone's working. They seem awfully soft. Can you hear us in the audience? Okay.

Hello. I don't think it's working.

I think the microphones are working, but these

Oh, so we don't hear ourselves. The staff will introduce themselves.

Our Rye, city clerk's office.

Tammy Queen, city manager's office.

William Choi, interim director of finance.

Sam Miller, assistant city attorney.

All right. We have a couple of holds for today. Item 260222 will be held. We will hold that for one week. I do believe we're going to have a presentation and business session on Thursday about that.

Item 260,224 regarding the violence prevention fund will be held for a week and $2.06 $0.00 $6.05 regarding, the legal expense fund will be held, for one week as well. Those last two items, we are referring to them as budget budget adjacent items. So, we will kind of, hold those off with the, the budget items. We are going to begin at the top of our agenda, and Howard is going to read several of our budget items. There will be a presentation.

I before the presentation, I will read a script, and then we will have a presentation from our budget item our budget ordinances, but those items will be held. Howard.

02/2005, adopting the annual budget of the city for the fiscal year twenty six twenty twenty seven, estimating the revenues for the fiscal year appropriating for the purposes stated, the thumb set forth in the budget, directing the director of finance to make the necessary entries upon the city's records to show the appropriations and allocations provided for authorizing interfund loans and electing to establish a budget adoption deadline pursuant to section eight zero five I of the city charter two six zero two zero two six zero two zero six, setting the rates for the trafficway maintenance tax, the park and boulevards maintenance tax, and the boulevards and parkways front foot assessment at $0 for fiscal year twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven in accordance with section 68 dash five eight two of the code of ordinances two six zero two zero seven levying Avalorum taxes for fiscal year twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven for the general revenue health, general debt, and interest, and museum special revenue funds on all property in Kansas City subject to taxation on June 01/01/2026, providing for the extension of such levies by the director of finance recognizing this ordinance is having an accelerated effective date and authorizing the collection by the director of finance 02/2008.

Amending chapter 78 code of ordinances entitled water by repealing section 78 dash six, seventy eight dash eight, seventy eight dash ten, and seventy eight dash 28, and acting in lieu thereof, new sections of like number and subject matter that adjust charges for water services and establishing an effective date. 02/2009, amending chapter 60, code of ordinances entitled sewers and sewage disposal by repealing section 60 dash two and sixty dash three and enacting the lieu thereof new sections of like number and subject matter that adjust charges for sewer service and establishing an effective date. 02/2010, establishing fund number 3527, the general obligation series 2027 a question one bond fund in the records of Kansas City, Missouri, estimating and appropriating $37,370,000 from the unappropriated fund balance of the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a question one bond fund establishing fund number 3627, the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a question two bond fund in the records of the city of Kansas City, Missouri, and estimating appropriating $2,329,000,603 from the fund balance of the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a question two bond fund estimate establishing fund number 3727. The general obligation series twenty twenty seven a question three bond fund in the records of Kansas City, Missouri estimating and appropriating $1,010,000 from the unappropriated fund balance of the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a question three bond fund declaring the intent of the city to reimburse itself from outburden proceeds for the for certain expenditures authorizing the director of finance to close project accounts and establishing the effective date of this ordinance.

02/2011 establishing fund number 3827, the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a q one twenty two bond fund in the records of the city of Kansas City, Missouri estimating and appropriating $47,500,000 from the unappropriated fund balance of the general obligation series twenty twenty seven a q one twenty two bond fund establishing fund number three nine two seven, the taxable general obligation series twenty twenty seven BQ 22 bond fund in the records of the city of Kansas City, Missouri, estimating and appropriating $12,500,000 from the unappropriated fund balance of the taxable general obligation series twenty twenty seven q two bond fund, declaring the intent of the city to reimburse itself from the bond proceeds for certain expenditures, authorizing director of finance to close project accounts in establishing the effective date of this ordinance.

Thank you, Howard. Today's meeting of the finance governance and public safety committee shall act as the public hearing for the city of Kansas City's proposed ad valorem property tax rates pursuant to section 67.11 of the revised statutes of Missouri. The clerk has just read ordinance 260,207. The purpose of this hearing is to allow members of the public to make suggestions and to express their opinions on the city's proposed ad valorem property tax rates. There are speaker cards located at the front of the room.

The city clerk will call individuals to speak in the order that the cards are received. You should speak at the microphone, which is located in the center of the room by the rail. Anyone who wishes to speak but is not signed up should do so now. Okay. Now we will have the staff presentation on all of the budget ordinances.

I do want to say I'm going to adlib to the script I have because at least this year I remembered to read the script. Last night we had our first budget hearing. We will have two more budget hearings, one next Monday and the following Saturday. While this meeting today is for the public budget or for the public hearing on the tax rates, those two public budget meetings are for the public hearings for our budget. So as we move forward, we will not necessarily take public testimony on the ordinances.

So I just wanted to make have provide clarification because I think last year we did have people showing up at the the committee expecting to provide testimony. The public budget meetings on the Saturdays and Mondays is the the form by which that we provide or take testimony for the public budget hearing. I just wanted to mention that. Thank you, Brenton.

Thank you. Good morning, Chair Boo, members of the Finance Committee. My name is Brenton Cerelli. I'm the Deputy Director of Finance. And I have with me Teresa Danielson, our budget manager for the budget division. We're here to present on several ordinances relating to the implementation of the fiscal year twenty seven budget.

Could you speak a little closer? Maybe it's, I don't know, it's our speakers, but we're having trouble.

Can you

hear me better now?

Too much better.

Not, yeah. Matter of fact, we have someone from communications work on it while

Yes, we maybe receive the can find somebody to come down because it's not projecting up here. I don't know if you all are able to hear in the audience.

I think

it's our speakers, but

I can try and talk louder if this helps.

That's a little better, yes.

When the mics start working, I'll tone it back down.

Okay. Perfect.

Okay.

Perfect.

So there's Sets our property tax levy. Getting into those annual rate setting ordinances.

There you

go. There we go.

Twenty six thousand and twenty six is sets parks related taxes to zero. This is required following the passage of the half sales tax authorized by voters in 2012 for the purpose of providing the maintenance and operations of local parks, parkways and boulevards and community centers. This follows a resolution passed by the Board of Parks and Recreation Commissioners in January recommending the city council set these rates at $0 for the parks and boulevard maintenance tax and boulevard and parkways front foot assessment. Twenty six thousand and twenty seven sets the levy rates for the general revenue, health, general debt and interest and museum special revenue funds. This is a preliminary estimate to support property tax revenue generation in the fiscal year 'twenty seven submitted budget.

A final levy will be set in September following the final assessed values for the four counties where Kansas City lies. It will include a proposed recruitment to account for revenue losses in fiscal year 'twenty six resulting from Jackson County assessment changes. 02/61000 and 02/61100 establish the water and sewer rates in the submitted budget. The water department will be presenting next week regarding those changes as well. Getting into the geobond appropriation ordinances, 02/60211 support the GEO Bond Plan previously approved reflecting the annual update to five year financial plans in the citywide business plan.

That was passed on 10/23/2025. Detailed information regarding those projects is in the capital and debt section of the budget document. Getting into the annual budget ordinance itself. Overall, the total budget is $2,500,000,000 That includes $1,700,000 from governmental activities and eight seventy eight million dollars of business type activities, including water and aviation funds, governmental activities totaling special revenue, general fund, debt service and capital funds. I do want to reiterate that while the forecast for the general fund estimated an operating deficit of $100,000,000 the fiscal year 'twenty seven submitted budget closes that by about $45,000,000 and there still is an operating deficit of about $55,000,000 With that operating deficit, the estimated ending balance for the general fund is $218,500,000 approximately $7,000,000 above the 25% fund balance target of $211,000,000 in fiscal year twenty twenty seven.

If trends of revenue and expenditures continue as originally forecast, we would estimate the fund balance target to drop below the reserve target in fiscal year twenty twenty eight and ultimately go below zero in 2030 and 2031. As part of the submitted process, budget and future budgets, the city will continue to evaluate and identify potential revenue sources, identify additional potential reductions as part of fiscal year 'twenty seven-'twenty eight budget, continue to utilize and evaluate how priority based budgeting is implemented within the city to allow for strategic reductions and resource alignment as part of this budget and future budgets and ultimately continue to meet the fund balance target of the city as we move forward with future budgets. As part of the amendment process, there are two kind of amendment processes within the city budget. First is Amendment A. This is more technical amendments identified by the budget process to address corrections needed before the budget is adopted.

Amendment B reflects policy driven amendments presented by the mayor or council members. We ask that these be e mailed to the city manager, finance director, budget officer, chair of the finance committee prior to the city council adopted deadline of 03/12/2026. As previously mentioned, there are three public budget hearings. The first was last night at Ruskin High School. We have one more on March 2 at Guadalupe Center on Monday, March 2 and then the last one on Saturday, March 7 at Winnebago High School. And that concludes the presentation.

Great. Thank you. We will be hearing parts of this tomorrow probably at our first department budget meeting. And we'll have opportunity to discuss as we move forward

in

finance committee meetings. We will hold these budget items each week and should more information arise with respect to amendments or additional information, we can discuss that. But if you have questions now, certainly be willing to entertain those. If you have specific questions on the budget that arise or you have outside of the department budget meetings, I would certainly encourage you to meet with the finance team. So are there any questions with respect to the overview of the various budget ordinances.

Councilman Brea. Looked at the a been a while. I know. So I looked at your name tag so I wouldn't call you Councilman Kearls.

A very quick question, and this is in reference to Slide 13. So this year's work is addressing our structural imbalance. It seems like we're kind of doing it by half this year and then going to continue to work on it next year. And so if we take up the other half of this imbalance next year and reduce that $100,000,000 what is the revised balance in target reserves and the longer term trajectory look like from 'twenty nine to 2030 to 2031? If we were

to reduce the remaining $50,000,000 In next year's It would improve. I think ultimately, part of the problem is still that we estimate just the rate of expenditures to continue to grow. So it's a constant evaluation of how we those rate of expenditures will continue to grow at a faster rate than the revenues that the city collects as part of our long term forecast. And I think that's part of just looking at those long term trends as we get closer to those years in the future, reevaluating forecast assumptions. But it is going to be a regular evaluation of just the priorities as a city, what we want to continue to offer versus the resources available.

It's probably about all that we can provide at this point. I mean, obviously, we can only hope that revenue grows more than what we expect. We're assuming slowing growth rates right now, but expenditures we know are growing much faster than that. So it's just trying to hope that revenues come up, but making further cuts in the future to try to get them to be more in balance with one another.

It doesn't feel like a permanent solution this year. What I'm trying to understand is the extent to which we have more hard decisions to make next year and the extent to which that gets us in a healthier position long term.

Right. And I think there are some permanent items in the budget, you know, cuts in the budget that will help. But yeah, we continue, what are we, 70% personnel across the board? Personnel costs are high.

And I just want to speak to one thing that I think was implicit in your question, which was we dealt with half of it this year, and we're dealing with half of it next year. And I'm not sure that that was the assumption that was embedded in the budget. I think it was more of a reevaluation of what the revenue was or is, and then the looking at the cuts that were asked of the departments. And so it came out to be about half of what was projected back in August. So I don't know that it necessarily was we had 100,000,000 projected in August, and we're dealing with half of it now and half of it next year.

I think it just and somebody that actually knows more than I do

comment on that.

I think there's really three driving factors that go into this. It's the revenues, as mentioned, the reductions made by the departments, then also the driving expenditure increases we needed as a city based off of priorities discussed in here previously. So pension was driving expense cost in when we discussed the forecast in the fall, continues to be investments in public safety continue to be a driving cost driver in the fiscal year 'twenty seven budget, and that is what's reflected in that ultimate operating deficit.

Do you have any Councilman Carls?

Thank you, Madam Chair. So I just want to try to see about putting this in context. Priority based budgeting, I could be wrong or off base with this, but when we went to priority based budgeting, my thoughts or understanding was that that was going to prove or help us see some savings. It doesn't seem like we are anticipating any of that based on priority based budgeting. Am I incorrect on that?

I would argue that we saw some significant savings in this budget through our evaluation of every program and the expenses that were ultimately delivered in the fiscal year 'twenty seven budget, we just had additional costs that needed to be funded as well. So the fact that we were able to bring this deficit not only lower than what was originally forecast but lower than last year's submitted budget while also making key investments in public safety is really a reflection of the work done by departments, the budget office staff and the city managers reviewing the budget before it was submitted to city council. So I think the budget reflected through those reductions is a reflection of the work, especially that programmatic evaluation through priority based budgeting.

But going forward, it doesn't sound like we are anticipating too much savings. The

budget process is a revisiting of expenditures on an annual basis based off of the resources available. What you see here in fiscal year 'twenty eight is still an estimate. And when we get to next fall and January 2027 and we submit your 'twenty eight budget, we'll be talking about all these same factors, the review of revenues, programs, investments in the city, just like we are this year. So it is what you see in fiscal year 'twenty eight is purely an estimate, and we will continue to need to evaluate how we spend money as a city as every budget process going forward as we have in the past.

I've got some other questions, but I'll save those until we have a meeting. I'd like to get a meeting set.

Councilman Duncan.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I know that we're not the only city in The United States that, has pensions and a fire department and a police department. Is is what we're seeing a trend among other municipalities of our size?

I don't know that we've studied their rate of pension growth. It's something that we are going to look at much more carefully over this next probably six months or so. We have some thoughts about perhaps how to get ahead of the issues with our pension. Certainly we can't just start renegotiating pension benefits because those are the subject collective bargaining agreements, so it's not like we can just change things wholesale just by bringing an ordinance to all of you to do so. And that's not necessarily what we're suggesting, just trying to figure out how can we slow the rate of growth.

Everybody's had assumption changes over time, all pension plans in terms of what's your assumed rate of return that you think you're going to get. Not that long ago, we were all thinking we would all get 8% to 8.5%, and that's not been happening. And so actuaries are requiring us to ratchet those numbers down, which increases our unfunded liability, which increases the amount we have to contribute. So there are just a ton of moving parts with a pension plan, and we want to just stop and kind of take stock in all of them, each of them in turn, and try to figure out, okay, what lever can we try to change to change the trajectory of this. But it's when costs for personnel go up, then costs for pension go up.

It's they just go hand in hand.

Thank you.

Alright. Are there any other questions? Bless you, Les. Alright. I think I need to go back to my script.

Great. We're good.

I'm good.

As soon as everyone who wishes to sign the cards have done so, would the clerk please call the speakers if anyone has signed up. Are there any speakers?

Appears

to This provide

would conclude the public testimony on the city's ad valorem property tax rates. Each of the items let's see. 260,205 through 260,211 will be held on the docket until next week. We'll continue to hold those from week to week. All right. Howard, you can read 260,214 and 02/15 together as well.

02/60214, authorizing the collection of the annual special assessment imposed by the Westport Special Business District for fiscal year twenty seven approving of the uses of the revenues produced there from estimating and appropriating revenue in the amount of $40,000 in the Westport Special Business fund, reestimating and reappropriating the remaining uncollected revenues and unexpended and unencumbered appropriations for the year twenty twenty six-twenty twenty seven fiscal year, designating requisitioning authority and recognizing this ordinance as having an accelerated effective date. 02/60215, consenting to the right of front foot assessment, special assessment to be levied by the Union Hills Special Business District, consenting to the proposed uses of the revenues produced there from, estimating and appropriating revenue in the amount of $65,000 in the Union Hills Special Business District Fund, re estimating and re appropriating the remaining uncollected revenue and unexpended and unencumbered appropriations to the twenty twenty six twenty twenty seven fiscal year designating requisitioning authority and recognizing this ordinance is having an accelerated effective date.

Good morning chair boo and members of the finance committee. My name is lakesha johnson financial manager of the revenue division and I have here britton civili the deputy director of finance department. The finance department comes before you to discuss the annual renewal ordinance for the appropriation of funds for the West Port and Union Hill Special Business Districts. Ordinance 260,214 renews West Port Special Business District which was established in August 1987 These collected revenues are used for ensuring maintaining and operating the pedestrian light fixtures and brick entry monuments within the district and the voters of the district approved a special assessment ceiling of $2.5 per front footage of the right of way. However the west court s p d did resign in December 2022.

The city does desire to oversee continued assessments and collections for fiscal year twenty seven at their previously established rate of $2.5 estimates and appropriates expected collections of $40,000 for this fiscal year and the city will continue to use those funds for the maintenance of the light fixtures and brick entry monuments. This also allows certain accounts to roll forward to complete the collection and pass through processes. And then we will move on to the Union Hill. Which similar to West Port the district was established in December 1990. The district board annually establishes a rate of front foot assessment for the properties within that district and the city facilitates the billing and collection of those assessments.

The collective revenues are used for ensuring maintaining and operating the pedestrian light fixtures as well and the brick entry monuments within that district. This ordinance 260,215 consents to the 2026 board approved assessment rate of $3.5 per front foot and will be used for the purposes of that district. This also estimates and appropriates expected collections of $65,000 and accounts collected will be remitted to the district this summer. This also allows certain accounts to roll forward to complete the collection and pass through process Because annual billings typically go out March 1 we are asking for an advanced due process on this ordinance for both witnesses.

VICE Great. I do have one question for you and And one question for I think I asked this last year, I can't remember the answer. Do these two special benefit districts have a termination date, or are they impart to it? Do we know?

I'm not aware of an expiration date.

So they just continue forever?

I'm not sure on Union Hill. For Westport,

I know that it was

a voter approved levy that was indefinite, it's a rate ceiling that is imposed on a yearly basis. I'm not aware of any expiration date

on that one.

My other question for you, Sam, was could we put these on the consent agenda, do you think?

If you desire, yeah.

Okay. Are there any questions? These are, I know, something that have come before us by six years. It's just an annual thing we do. Any questions? Is there any public testimony for ordinance numbers two six zero, two one four, or two one five?

There was no testimony submitted for either ordinance.

I would entertain a motion.

Madam chair. And if there's no objection, I'll take them up in the same motion.

That's fine.

Madam chair, I move that ordinance numbers two hundred sixty thousand two hundred fourteen and two hundred fifteen be reported out of committee with recommendation of advance to pass and placement on the consent agenda. Second.

Moved and seconded that ordinance numbers two hundred sixty thousand two hundred fourteen and and fifteen be reported out of committee with the recommendation of advance and do pass and be placed on the consent agenda. All those in favor please say aye. Any opposed? The motion passes. We'll hear them on Thursday.

260,218 approving the '25 Campbell PIEA general development plan on approximately 2.32 acres, as more particularly described as Exhibit A, a TAF tier two, and declaring said area to be an undeveloped industrial area and in need of development and rehabilitation pursuant to the planned industrial expansion law and authorizing tax abatement. Good morning.

Good morning. Doctor.

Good morning. Name is David McCruby. I'm the executive director of the PIEA, and we are here to attempt to satisfy a Chapter 100 statute at which we're trying to find a not a blight study in this instance, but it's a what's it called? Forgot.

Undeveloped industrial area.

Sorry, I'm having a undeveloped industrial area. Thank you very much. Our goal is to satisfy that requirement. To my left is the proponent for this plan. His name is Kelly Robby, and to my far left is Jim Potter, who is our consultant in the matter. This is necessary to make the area within the boundaries of the plan eligible for PIA's incentives. So if I may introduce Jim to present our undeveloped industrial area.

Great. Thank you, David. Madam Chair, members of the committee, Jim Potter, development initiatives, 3965 W. A. 3rd Street, Prairie Village. This is a new proposed PIA planning area, the 25 Campbell. It was heard before the PIA board last November, unanimously approved. Was heard before the city planning commission in January, again unanimously approved. Today we're asking for your consideration. This area is located in the Hospital Hill area.

It's bound by 25th on the North, Campbell on the East, 26th on the South and an alleyway on the West. It is located in an area that's having a significant amount of investment presently. Just to the north across 25th Street is the new UMKC Innovation Building. I believe the budget on that is 145,000,000 So there's a lot of investment going in and around this area. The planning area is about 2.3 acres.

There's two owners. The majority of the site is vacant and has been so for a while. We have three parcels. Parcels 1 And 2 are currently owned by the city. Parcel 3 is privately owned. Parcels 1 And 2 have been vacant since 2004. These two parcels had former automotive service related buildings on-site, and those have been demolished. Again, I said the majority of the site is vacant, about 68%. The commercial building on the south is a viable multi tenant building. There's no plans at this moment for that structure.

Existing zoning is M15. In discussions with city staff, they have indicated we don't need to rezone that for this particular project. Design guidelines are through the greater downtown area plan and standard PIA benefits are expected. So the proposed project here contemplates the redevelopment of all the vacant parcels and the construction of mixed income residential units. 144 new units.

These are oriented towards Hospital Hill employees and students. 29 of the units will be oriented towards households earning less than 60% of the area median income. And collectively, all of the 144 units are their average rent is less than 80% of the area median income. Total development budget is a little over $34,000,000 and we anticipate approximately 64 construction jobs with an annual construction payroll of 4,100,000.0 Upon completion and when placed in service, we anticipate four full time jobs to be resulting from this project. There is some difficulty in cost of construction.

The site has been vacant for over twenty one years. We do have significant environmental issues relating to Parcels one and two, and we do have inadequate subsurface soils, which are leading to higher development costs. When those two parcels were or when those two buildings were demoed in 2004, all the demolition debris was pushed into the basements. We have confirmed that via two methods. One was actual soil borings across the site, which discovered gravel, concrete, brick fragments, just demolition debris in general.

And that spanned an area of anywhere from three feet deep to 10 feet deep across the site. And then we also confirmed that through city staff, who was in charge of the project at the time. They actually demoed everything into the basements. So, as part of approving a PIA plan, we have to have a finding, either that the area is blighted, insanitary, or undeveloped industrial area. And in this case, we are looking at the undeveloped industrial area finding.

It basically evolves around land uses not being used economically or conditions which retard the economic or social growth. This is effectively a two part test. You have to find one of these initial factors present, and that leads to the second part, which is these causations. We did note that factor one was present, which led to both of the causes. And we'll go into that a little bit more in-depth here.

Again, we have vacancy, underutilization. There is some discussion as to whether the city has owned this back into the mid-90s. We haven't verified that, but we do know it's been owned since 2004, and that's when they demolished those buildings. We do have some significant environmental issues, which will go into that. And then as I previously mentioned, the inadequate subsurface conditions.

The environmental and the subsurface conditions all add cost to this project. That's all going to have to be remediated and all those materials are going to have to be properly disposed of. And so that just adds added cost to this project. So this is an image looking south, 25th Street's in the foreground, Campbell's on the left hand side. You can kind of see the topography of the site.

The multifamily or multi tenant office building is in the background. And then this is looking south from Campbell along or from 25th Street along the alleyway. And you can note the topography here. I'm going come back to that here shortly. And then just some general improvements that haven't been maintained across that site.

And you can see in the background, you can see the construction materials for the UMKC innovative building. So, this is the alleyway looking south. So, environmentally, you know, we've been in the economic development, community development business for twenty five plus years, and this is probably one of the most investigated and assessed sites that we've come across. Even since 1995, we have assessments and analysis and all kinds of different reporting mechanisms that have been undertaken here. Basically, this analysis has included soil sampling, groundwater sampling, monitor well installation.

And through all that analysis, it's been noted that Parcels one and Parcels two are impacted both the soil and the groundwater. Those are impacted through by lead, polycyclic, aromatic hydrocarbons, petroleum hydrocarbons and heavy metals. Now all of those are considered to be cancer causing chemicals at the threshold levels. And there is an 18 inches blanket soil blanket overlay. And if you refer back to that photo that I was referring to previously, there's been 18 inches of clean fill deposited across the entire site to kind of differentiate that from the dirty fill.

Now, in between those two have been placed a orange construction barrier. I think you've seen those plastic orange fencing. That's across the entire site. To alert somebody who's digging or drilling or whatever on this site that something is below this. There's a land use restriction on place.

The city put a land restriction on this site. However, the proposed redevelopment allows for multifamily, so we're okay there. This is an image of just some soil sampling and monitoring well locations. The image on the left, you can see the former footprints of those two buildings, which were demolished. And we counted 23 different monitoring well or soil boring locations across the site.

Considering it's 68,000 square feet, that's a boring or well every 3,000 square feet, which is pretty comprehensive. The image on the right shows the groundwater contour map and as well as some additional monitoring wells. So that leads us to the second part of our test, and this is basically an economic argument. The site has been vacant, underutilized since 2004. Has been generating 0 tax dollars to the city, to local taxing jurisdictions.

Presently, we have a proposed project that will come in $34,000,000 plus budget. We have job growth. We have full time job growth. We have new e tax. We have new e tax on residents and new utility taxes. And Part two is largely the same argument. You know, it's just an economic argument. We have zero impact now. And once completion of this project, that benefit to the taxing jurisdictions should be pretty significant. Again, to summarize, we did note that the initial factor was present and that followed by the two causes.

It is our opinion that this area does qualify by the statutory definition as an undeveloped industrial area, and I'd be happy to answer any questions. Mr. Rabbi is here to answer any questions specifically regarding the development, and I'll turn it over to you.

All right. Just one second. So the environmental condition that currently exists and the land use restrictions, I understand that what our job is today is to create the

Plan area.

The plan area. Will part of the construction plan be to remediate any existing conditions that are on there, or is your statement that the multifamily use is a permitted use that will not require any remediation of the existing conditions?

The proposed project will remediate both the demolition debris and, for the most part, the environmental issues. You know, you're putting foundation packages, so you're going to have to go down a certain depth. I don't know a multifamily use is permitted through the land use restriction, but I'm not sure if that answers your question.

Madam Chair, my name is Kelly Rabbie. I live at 416 West 62nd Street, Kansas City, Missouri. Madam Chair and committee, for our financing, we'll have to mitigate any environmental issues there. So our plan is to completely mitigate the soil. And we're going to have to dig out for footings and a partial parking deck. So we're going be digging the soil anyway. So we're going have to remove it and remediate it accordingly.

Right. Councilman Raya?

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think there's a lot of interest in this area between UMKC University Health and the potential of this becoming a fully functioning health sciences district. I think that's a vision worth everyone who owns property in this area working to achieve. I know the chancellor, UMKC, has a very specific vision of how we could work together to create a health sciences district. So I don't have any questions, just commentary that I would ask that you all are in contact with them and understand what that vision is and that we are all kind of working in the same direction. Everything I've seen here, just from what I understand about that vision, seems consistent, but I think the ongoing conversation would be a good idea.

Yes. That's a great point. We actually met with the health science district's leadership, I believe, last August. That included all the CEOs, the new CEO from Children's Mercy and UMKC and their marketing HR people. And although we didn't get a written letter of support, they basically unanimously supported our project because we're not in their district, we're not in their way of future expansion. The other parcels the city owns, they have their own opinions on, but this one they were very supportive because we're on the perimeter. We provide much needed housing for employee recruitment retention. So we have met with them. We've met with a long fellow neighborhood association a times as well, and they're in support. So we've tried to cover all our bases.

Again, as Jim mentioned, I believe this will be one of the first or second, somebody can correct me here, projects that meets the city's policy for affordable housing, running at 20%, 60% AMI with an average of 80%. So in addition to the environmental issues and just the construction costs, the reason we're here for a tax abatement, sales tax exemption, again, is to make sure we can keep these rents at an affordable level that many people can afford at the 60 to 80% workforce AMI levels. Understood. You.

Are there any other questions?

Madam Chair? Yes. We'd kindly ask for an advancement and do pass, if possible. Okay.

Is there any public testimony on Ordinance No. 260,218?

There was no testimony submitted for this ordinance.

I think it's a great project.

And I

always love seeing PAA projects and economic development projects come to the finance committee. Thanks for coming here instead of MPD.

Not

that you all had much of a choice, but I would entertain a motion with advance.

I move that ordinance number two sixty-21a be reported out of committee with the recommendation of advance and do pass.

Second. And seconded that ordinance number two sixty-21a be reported out of committee with the recommendation of advance and do pass. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? The motion passes. Are heard on here say. You. Howard, before you read the next one because I am going to recuse myself, I also wanted to say something about our finance department staff. Last week I had the opportunity to set in on two bond rating calls.

Want to give a shout out specifically to Kimberly Carter who led those calls. But she led it with a table full of individuals from our finance department, and they did a phenomenal job. I just want to say the policies and the ordinances that we pass in this committee have a profound impact on our bond ratings. One of the agencies mentioned the SURF plus TIF policy ordinance that we just recently passed and how important that was. And so I just want to say thank you to entire finance team, many of whom are sitting here in the audience today and over here.

They did a phenomenal job, and I just want to say thank you. So with that, I'm going to yield my chairmanship to councilman Raya.

Thank you, madam chair. What? Can you please call the next ordinance?

Two six zero zero nine four. Approving the second amendment to the general development plan for the Southwest Boulevard redevelopment area to amend the estimated completion time to fifteen years from passage of this ordinance and affirming the findings of the city council made when approving the plan.

Morning. Good morning. Chair Committee, again, my name is David McCruby. I'm the executive director for the PIEA. We are here to extend the life of a PIEA plan that was created in 2004 by the gentleman to my left, Lucky Brooks.

In 2004, the city council placed an expiration date, if you will, in the plan of twenty years. Nothing happens fast, it seems, in the real estate development world in Kansas City, and this is no exception, a little bit happened within the plan area, but I think the main event is yet to come, and the gentleman to my left, Bucky, will discuss that. Our goal here today is to get an extension of the plan for fifteen years and to start development on this wonderful site.

Real quick, before we move forward, do you have a presentation to be put on screen? Okay, got Thank you. I think we have a copy of that as well.

Good morning, and thank you for having us here. I'm Bucky Brooks. I'm with Copacan Brooks, 1111 Main Street, Suite 3100, Kansas City, Missouri. Happy to be here. I'm reminded of the very first project I brought before the council in 1986, working with then Councilman Emmanuel Cleaver.

Thank you for considering the extension of the Southwest Boulevard planning area. As David mentioned, this has been something that' been planned for a long time. We, our company, came in and acquired this in 2019 and we' so excited about these development sites within the Planning District but then found out they' been dormant for decades because of extraordinary and costly development challenges. We' gone to work on those over the years and we' done a little bit there. We have and I'll refer you to our presentation here.

We have two really spectacular infill prime development sites. The first is Cambridge Crest, if you look at can I there

you go?

Cambridge Crest, which is 40 acres of gross development area, and then next to that and below it is Imperial Crossing, which is six acres. And they're very different. They're next to each other, but they're very different because Cambridge Crest has spectacular sweeping panoramic views of the skyline, everything from Downtown Kansas to the North, sweeping over the downtown skyline, the crossroads, Midtown, and all the way south to KU Med. And it sits high with sweeping views. The Imperial Crossing Site next to it is actually about 60 or 70 feet below it in elevation and underneath the I-thirty 5 Overpass.

And the extraordinary well, let me flip through the presentation here for a second. You can get a sense of the Cambridge Crest view I just described on that slide the next slide, I think.

There

you go. And that site has an abandoned old limestone cold storage mine underneath it. And that's what's really prevented that from being developed over all this time. And what we've done is we've studied that and had it engineered, and where it might have been prohibitive to develop it before, we've now found new methods to take care of that site, or at least part of it, with less expensive and speedier remedy there. So it's getting closer to developable, we think.

On the Imperial Crossing site, we demolished the imperial brewery, unfortunately. Wanted to save it, but had to go. It was in extreme disrepair. Something bad was going to happen there. So we took care of that. So that's closer to development as well. If you go to the next yes, and that shows the Cambridge Crest the be irregular shape are the pillars where that's been mined out. We do not have a project in mind for this. We're marketing it. We have some interest.

It seems like the interest that we get in this site, people want to live up there. I've included a couple of concepts for apartment development that could occur in your book, and then we have some build to suit office and industrial concepts that we planned, but nothing imminent right now. On the Imperial Crossing site, the last two slides we have here, those buildings are gone in the picture. And the site on the last slide shows a concept that.

Do

And

And circumstances that have changed to with the to new technology and the mining for the foundation of the underground of the site. Could you briefly describe how that has changed circumstances and why that makes you optimistic that a project here cannot move forward?

Doctor. Yes. When we first encountered the site, we thought that you could not develop that hole on top of the on the top here unless you remediated the mine. At that time, that involved at least $8,000,000 and eight years to do that in a fly ash type technique, similar to what happened at Briocleft. It took fifteen years to take an old quarry and fix that.

Since then, because we went out and engineered it, we found that you can go to a concrete grout column method, which is significantly less expensive but still millions of dollars and can be accomplished in about a year. The other thing, the big light bulb do to that. Make sure

to to to

that

brewery great building, though, and I was sad to see that I know. Me too. I used to own a business down there, and just driving by, there's something kind of majestic about it, but I understand.

Excuse me, if I may. I don't want to belabor this any longer. By the way, I'm Doug Stone with Lewis Rice. I represent the property owner. Just a little typo in the ordinance. I don't think it rises to a committee sub. It's just typographical at the end of a third recital, which has an open paren, parentheses, which is within the planning area or needs to be within the planning area. It should be a close parentheses after planning area. Just a typo. That's all.

Thank you. I will turn to our city attorney to advise on how to handle this. I'll just say we can make that as a scrivener's change.

There's no substitute needed for

the ordinance. Great. No substitute needed. Okay.

Great.

Thank you. Thank you.

If there's no other comments, I would just say I did have an opportunity about a year and a half ago to go tour this site. I would suggest guys go take a look at it as well. I think it has some unique opportunities in that it is a large swath of land. It offers great views of downtown, West bottoms of Midtown. Know Councilman Rogers will appreciate this, that it is right on the state line. So the hope would be that any commercial activity or business opportunities would attract revenue from the Kansas side, which I think is always a good thing. That's why I'm supportive of moving forward with this. If there's no further comment from the committee, do we have any public testimony?

There's no public testimony submitted for this ordinance.

Right. Ask for a motion.

Mr. Chair, I move that committee numb committee ordinance number two six zero zero nine four be advanced that of committee, advance and do pass. Second.

The motion has been

I should

figure out the script.

The motion has been made and

Seconded.

Seconded. All in favor. All in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion passes. If there's no further business to come before the committee, we are adjourned.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much.