Economic Development Board - Regular Meeting

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good afternoon i'd like to welcome everyone to the september 14th economic development board meeting um first of all we'll consider the minutes b1 consider approval of the minutes monday august 17th 2026 regular economic development board meeting any comments on the minutes not take a motion to We don't do persons to be heard at UDB Dealey. Well, we can. Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak who's not already slated to speak? Seeing none, we'll move on. So we do have our applicant here and members of our board. C1, you have a couple of old business items, and then we'll have an administrative comments update. C1 is to consider a City of Keller facade improvement grant request for 128 Bates Street. And I think all these items are related, right? Well, last meeting, I know this is a carryover. Do you want to consider them one by one? We've already heard some of this.

Yes, so if you want, I can kick it off, and I'm gonna try to remind y'all as we go which item goes with what.

Yeah, that's great. Thanks, Anna.

Perfect. All right, so tonight we'll be presenting three separate requests associated with the same property owners. You will consider a vote on each item separately. However, to help you and the public understand the full scope of the project, we'll be presenting three requests together. As we move through the presentation, I will try to remind y'all at the end as well. Okay, here is an aerial view. Do y'all need me to get the lights or is that good?

I'll do the lights. I would turn the lights on.

Yeah, I got it. All right, so here is an aerial view of both properties. The properties remain separate but are under the same ownership and are both planned to be parts. of the new Keller Depot development, which is owned by the applicant, the Hive and Holden Co LLC. You'll hear more about the overall Keller Depot concept throughout staff's presentation, as well as during the applicant's presentation. As a reminder, the overall request includes two separate Facade Improvement Grant applications, one for each property, as well as a Chapter 3 incentive request. And then this slide shows the current condition of the properties as they were acquired by the new property owners. And this slide shows you the conceptual vision for the three proposed phases of the Keller Depot development. Phase one includes the redevelopment of both properties before you tonight. Bates Street, the applicant is anticipating a January 2027 opening with a potential candy shop tenant at 136 Bates Street, which is the one on the left. Sorry, I'm like, is it my right or my left? The applicant anticipates opening a coffee shop in the summer of 2027.

Can you say that one more time? So on the yellow building?

Yellow building has a strong interest from a candy shop. And that would be anticipated to open in January. And then the other one, the goal is to have a coffee shop. And there's been a lot of interest as well.

And what was the anticipated, did you say?

Summer of 2027.

Okay. Great.

So it's not the applicants that will own the coffee shop or the candy shop?

Correct. It's the property owners. Okay, so I split it into two. I'm going to go through it because this is a lot to digest. So the applicant is requesting the following. Item C1 is a request to approve a facade improvement grant providing up to $10,000 in reimbursement for eligible improvements at 128 Bates Street, which is the Yellow House. Item C2, same request, at 136 Bates Street, which is the station, the White House. And then item C3 is a request to approve an economic development program incentive agreement for the construction, maintenance, and operation of publicly accessible restrooms at 128 Bates Street, which is the yellow house, and you can see the restrooms, the photo right there to the left. And then for 136 Bates Street, to support a grease trap reimbursement to support a future food and beverage tenant, so the coffee user. So here we split it so you can kind of see what are the requests for 136 and 128. As part of the Chapter 380 request, the applicant is investing approximately $125,000 in the redevelopment of both properties as part of Phase 1. Looking beyond Phase 2, the applicant anticipates a total investment of approximately $250,000 across the current and future phases of the Keller Depot, in addition to the cost of acquiring the properties, which they acquired in early July. So across all three incentive requests, the applicant is requesting a total reimbursement of $81,740, $20,000 of that being Facade Improvement Grants, and the rest will be the Chapter 3.

It was 250 total renovation, or was it 150 plus 250?

It's a total of 250 anticipated total investment.

What's the timeline on the total of 250 being completed?

I think it depends, right?

Yeah, it depends on when we get permitted, but fully we're anticipating by summer of next year. Including phase three? For all phases, yeah, there's three phases. Okay.

So what would the anticipated construction timeline be or the remodel timeline? Because you can't, to your point, you can't predict exactly what permitting goes through and things like that. But what's your general?

Yeah, so that initial phase one is going to be the buildings. And then we plan to lease them up. That is three months. So yeah, depending on when we start. That's why our initial anticipation is January 2027. Okay. Because we're hoping to...

Okay, thanks Here is the cost breakdown provided by the applicant for the proposed facade improvements at 128 8th Street You also received this in your packet Yeah, it's the official one from the contractor, so it's the next document, those documents right there.

Those are the indexes. This is much simplified, much better explained than this.

Thank you. Sure.

Let me know when you're ready.

So, you know, does this show like the...

is that all in or is that like how much of that is the facade improvement grant the 23820 it's my understanding this is just this is just their investment into the facade so it goes their investment goes beyond that but this is what they listed for what their Like what they're doing for the facade itself.

So is it $10,000, Ashley, to help offset the $23,820? Or are you basically spending $33,000?

No, the $23,820 is the total facade investment for $128,000. Okay. And so the $10,000.

Would offset, so then you'd be above 50%, which is great. Like $12,000 is some change. This is the same thing here, it looks like.

Yeah.

Okay. Okay.

These are only the eligible improvements.

And those, like, the renderings that we saw, I mean, I'm assuming that's pretty consistent with your vision for, like, what the paint would look like and some of these things. Yes, yeah. Okay.

Yeah, and none of this is including in, like, the bathroom or anything like that. Sure. It's strictly facade.

Yeah, makes sense.

Okay, and now we're going into the ROI for the Chapter 380. So we're moving into the publicly accessible bathrooms and the grease trap, the reimbursement. So should both of those, the grease trap and the bathroom, reimbursements be approved by the city council tomorrow night, the city's projected to break even in year seven, assuming the two businesses generate a combined total of $650,000. in annual revenue, and also based on post-construction property values provided by the applicant.

We generated, go ahead.

Can you say that again? Because it doesn't make sense to me. Okay. Yes.

And then these are the numbers. This might help y'all looking at how we landed at this. So these numbers were provided by the applicant and used to determine the potential ROI to the city.

So we're talking about $6,500 a year in taxes?

what kind of product it is.

So with the assumptions, like the projections, the financial projections, did you put together, excuse me, put that together, Anna?

Yes, with the help and assistance of our CFO.

Okay, so these are the city's numbers.

Okay, so for the three, you said year seven? for the, both for the 380, though, was more, it was 42 plus 19? 61?

Yeah, so 61,740. Okay. Just to be clear, the

Estimated revenue. Is that what the city's CFO provided or the analysis of?

It's what was the, the revenue was provided by the applicant and estimate of the two businesses.

And they were based on like industry benchmarks? No, I was going to ask that. It's like nine years to break even. It's 61, 740 divided by 6,500. It's about nine and a half years to break even. Yeah, it's the 1%, but I know we ran these with our CFO last week.

Yeah, so it's... TERS and the property tax, the ad valorem, on top of her estimated sales tax. So it's not just the $6,500. Okay.

I don't know what TERS is.

So TERS is the tax increment reinvestment zone that the city adopted back in 2020, 2021 as a way of funding mostly infrastructure projects kind of along the 377 corridor. So there's a portion of the improved, the additional property tax revenue that will go into that separate fund, and the rest will go into the general fund for the city.

So, yeah, to Sarah's point, the whole purpose of it is, it's like some people call it TIF, which is, you know, it's a way to draw a geographic boundary, and then the additional values go back into a fund that we reinvested. as a city of basically saying, hey, we have a vision for the 377

is all...

Appreciation in the property generates more property taxes. Half of that will go to the general fund, half of it goes to the turners. That stays in OTK, but we're still estimating in

You could technically, for the purposes of this slide, you could combine ad valorem tax and TERS number two. Simply for the, they're going into two different buckets. For the purposes of this slide, it's all property tax revenue.

Okay. Yeah, I just wanted to know where the additional revenue into the city was coming from, property tax. Right. Slide. Do you know, Ashley?

Yeah, currently it's about $7,000.

I don't know what percentage of that goes to... Do you know what it's taxed at, though, from the calendar? $128,000 is $108,000, and $136,000 is $284,000. Oh, okay, $108,000, all right. And $284,000, all right.

And then with the allocated purchase price, that gives an increase in potential taxable value. So they're basing that $30,000 a year on that difference, the difference between what the county says it's worth and what they're paying for it. And that could be two years from now, though. Yeah. We don't know what the number will be. But it will continue. Yeah. I agree that it will go up. We just don't know what.

And to clarify, you said that was just industry standard. It's not directly from the vendor.

given the peculiarities, yeah, some adjustments have been made. Do you have any access to that kind of data for OTK or surrounding areas?

No, I mean, those are private numbers. I've never run that type of business, and we're just leasing these, so I can tell you the candy shop had numbers. They were at about 350, and that was not the industry benchmark that I came across, so I kind of stayed a little bit more conservative. in terms of our numbers, but there's another comparable business in Roanoke, bigger footprint, and they do a significant amount, but. Yeah, they do. Yeah, and so it's really, I mean, this is a small, this is a pretty small footprint, so I wanted to be conservative, and just keeping in mind when they are able to open, we're anticipating, you know, let's say it's January 2027, I would love to get them open right before the holiday, but, you know, the area is what the area is currently while we're trying to incubate, get things going. So I wanted to be conservative in that number, so I came down with it.

Yeah, it makes sense. And the numbers seem pretty fair. Just from our standpoint and the numbers that we get to see, I would say those are pretty spot on.

And I didn't account for phase three. And I'll do a presentation as well, so you kind of get the full scope of what we're trying to develop. But there's also other anticipated revenue. These were just based off of the buildings.

All right, so the Keller Depot concept includes two additional phases to be programmed and developed in the future. Phase two, the Keller Depot platform focuses on activation of the space during phase one. The applicant will provide additional details on the space during her presentation. Phase three, the Depot marketplace is envisioned to include small local retailers and community gathering space. Phase 3 is not included in the incentive request before you tonight. However, the applicant has indicated that the incentive being considered tonight would make the likelihood of being able to move forward with Phase 3 possible. Say that again?

It's more realistic to get to Phase 3 if they get approved.

If they get the incentive. If they get an incentive for this, they can get to Phase 3. And then the Keller Depot incentive requests meet the following incentive policies. The policy goals of section one, the general eligibility meets high priority businesses, experiential retail that is family friendly and will attract visitors to Keller to enjoy unique experience. And you have that document as well. And as part of their request, the applicant has proposed to invest first, commit to long-term public access, and activate the project before reimbursement becomes available. The applicant will share her vision with you next. But before her presentation, I'd like to remind you that you'll be voting on each of the three items individually. the facade improvement grant for 128 Bates Street, the facade improvement grant for 136 Bates Street, and the Chapter 380 Economic Development Program incentive for the reimbursement of publicly accessible restrooms at 128 Bates Street and a commercial grease trap at 136 Bates Street. So the Keller Economic Development Board has the following options when considering an incentive request. Recommend approval as presented. Recommend approval with changes and or conditions. Recommend denial. And if you don't have any more questions for me, the applicant will get her presentation next.

Yeah. Any questions for your staff? So I wasn't here last month. I went back and watched the meeting today. So has the 380 always been combined? Or was that originally split and then joined? Was it two separate, on one application, bathrooms on another?

Yeah, it was always. No, no, no. I understand. It's one line item. We have it as a combined. One application. Yes, one.

Okay.

Yes. Okay. Sorry, it took me a minute. That's okay.

That's it. Yeah, good question. Any other questions before we hear the applicant's presentation? No? Okay. See this presentation first. Mr. Hernandez, the floor is yours.

I'm going to switch it over to you.

Thanks for being here.

Thanks for having me, everyone. All right. Some of this is going to maybe sound a little bit more repetitive, but I just want to kind of move it for you.

I mean, whatever works for you.

I can do it.

If she just points the, that should work pretty much. Oh, it's this? Yeah. There you go.

Alright, if you, okay. So as she stated, obviously, so this property is located on Bates Street. So it's the only commercial property on this street, which is deemed as Festival Street. And the ultimate goal is to create a destination. So the concept of the Keller Depot itself is really a destination space. The buildings are two, like she said, two separate properties, two separate entities, and they will be leased as separate as well and remain as two separate plats. The reason why we came up with the concept, the Keller Depot, we wanted to lean into the history of these properties. On the left was the previous train museum. The last train master of Keller lived in this house. On the right is the- The last train master? The last train master for Keller, yeah.

All right, I'm going to go around at the end. I love history.

Oh, it's pretty cool history. Well, the Keller History Museum actually has some great documentation, and his daughter is still alive. She's almost 90, the Scudders. And so I actually do have his records from when he retired. He was only 38, I believe. And he, or I'm sorry, he passed. He passed very young. But his daughter is still alive, and actually she's coming back to visit the property. She lives in Oklahoma, and so we've been in touch with her, and she is thrilled about this project. Yeah, so it's been really special. And the house on the right. So far we've been able to date these back to about 1928 is as far back as I've been able to go. Specifically the one on the right has always been that size. It's about 700 square feet. It's a nugget. And the one on the left, the original rectangle of that property we believe to be the original. And then it's evolved over the years in different ways. so yeah so that's kind of the concept and that's okay I'm gonna have to remember my presentation fully because I'll get ahead of myself so so yeah 1881 the town was called Athol it was a unique thing I had to discover trying to find plats for this because you couldn't find them it wasn't under the city of Keller was under Athol so that's when Old Town Keller was platted so there's just been incredible history for us with this property and we've been in great partnership with the City of Keller, the Keller History Museum. So as I stated, this is Festival Street, so there's been significant investment from the city, investing just on Bates Street alone, 5.08 million just on the street. And then in the area right now, we have Elm Street under construction. It's a pretty long street, and there's some really great things happening. You can see some of the brick, but it's kind of leaning into that kind of nostalgic, walkable, you know, vision and we want to kind of, our goal is to lean into that as well. And so the properties here is an aerial view. You can see this is again on Bates Street and across the street we're directly across from the Bates Street Park. And again, this is the only commercial property on the street, these two properties. And it's a pretty large yard space in the back. As far as private capital, both myself and Jamie here, We purchased the property outright back in July and we anticipate $250,000 in additional cash infusion investment and see where it goes if we're able to continue on to that phase three, then it potentially could be even more. One of the unique things just learning about Keller over the years and how it's evolved. One thing I love is that we always ask the community about what they want to see. And what was really unique is I came across a survey back in 2018 that was specifically about Old Town Keller and what residents wanted. 91% wanted restaurants to bring visitors to Old Town. The number one thing was dining choices among their desired amenities. 82% want more entertainment and special events and 58% want more interactive and play features. And here we are eight years later. The survey on the right is for just the, it wasn't specific to OTK, it was just as a city. So 55% are for incentives for quality businesses and sit-down restaurants. And 38% rated attracting and retaining unique businesses, poor or very poor, as far as where we're at today. And then 20% rated destination business districts poor or very poor.

For the sake of this, they disapprove. 58% is a landslide.

You're right. People are asking.

Actually, I remember, correct me if I'm wrong, but the incentives for new restaurants and sit-down businesses were actually at the top of the list for... If you're going to spend our tax dollars on things, then that would be at the top of the list. Top-ranked choice.

Of all. And this is that survey that the city did.

But they're not a restaurant that's going in. It's a coffee shop and a candy store.

And yes, and experiential was also, I believe, it was on the list as well. So we just named the restaurant. But with that said, I mean, part of what we're requesting is a grease trap. And we are hoping for a tenant to be able to diversify their offerings. They will be offering food of some kind. But without a grease trap, they're very limited. The coffee shop?

Yes. They're not limited. There's so much good equipment out there nowadays that they don't need a grease trap with the turbo chef option. to provide a better source and better quality food than a grease trap. And a grease trap opens up opportunities for rodent infestation, all the other stuff that goes with it in that area. And I think the grease trap is, the maintenance of it is going to be a problem also. But I just, a 1,500 square foot facility with a grease trap, in my opinion, with all the restaurants I've worked with, doesn't make sense.

That was a different opinion the last time.

We can get to the, like...

Yeah, so the thing with this property, here's Kathy Jackson. I love stories and he loved history. So Kathy Jackson, at the end of the day, at first I was like, we're trailblazers. We're going to do something unique and different with this property. And really, Kathy Jackson was the trailblazer. She had loved history. She was one of the founding people for Old Town Keller Foundation. She was the owner of these properties. prior to us purchasing, she unfortunately passed away. But her legacy continues, that's why the yellow house we're naming it the Jackson Cottage. She has done a significant amount for the history in Keller, but also the city has recognized her when she passed away. And actually, this image was from that recognition. But she was no stranger to coming into city council. And she had a big part in advocating for the old buildings to not only be preserved, but even moved. There were some historical buildings that was moved from, I believe, the Color History Museum, the Jarvis House, was where the Chopp House was. And she advocated to get that moved. And so her goal was to preserve these, and our goal is to make them viable for the economy. So two separate historic properties, three distinct experiences, one destination, the Jackson House Family Retail was her former bookstore. We are 100% anticipating we do already have a tenant. ready to come in for this station house. We have five LOIs, letter of intents and interest. Three out of the five are requesting a grease top. So that's when we realized that is something that's important in the negotiation process. It is not something that we will be able to provide without the incentive. And as stated by the potential tenants, it is to diversify their food offerings based on their experience, one of which currently has a coffee shop in another town that's very successful and has seen that from experience. So with that said, the Depot Grounds, which is events and pop-ups, we actually are kicking off our pop-ups September 25th. So come on out because we want to get the community involved early on and start activating the area. We'll be doing those once a month and those will be pop-up vendors and then as we said they'll be the other areas that we plan to hopefully get to with phase three so to the anyway yeah and I think for us our ultimate goal is to redevelop the property to we're getting it to a standard shell and then that potential tenant that we have coming in would be taking it further from there so it really just depends on which one we're able we go with as far as moving forward but I can probably give you an idea of some of the things that we've received yeah yeah I mean it's tricky to define that when you don't know who the tenant's actually going to be but even if it's just like hey you know part of the vision would be coffee and

like breakfast or lunch, if it's more of a bistro type vision that you're going for, because you do, as the owner, have a little bit of, obviously you have your hands on

Yeah, I would say, I mean, we've received as simple as, you know, coffee and grab and go. Um, and that those were the ones that didn't necessarily request, um, having a grease trap. And then the other ones, um, we've seen as far as wanting to have later open hours and there's a coffee shop named George's. Um, I believe in Carrollton that was referenced and they actually have like even a couple of things on tap and wine. So I let them know there's a whole process to go down if they want to do that But that's you know Those are the some of the ideas being kind of thrown our way to evolve that coffee to a night option Based on the future vision of the property. Thanks So I'm going back to these three So phase three is kind of like our permanent footprint that is is the dream of this fully coming together with these more so permanent Sheeshed is like the best way I can describe it. More permanent units, but they're a smaller footprint, about 10 by 10, 10 by 12. And this is for vendors that basically, the pop-up vendors that are ready to get into that next phase, but maybe not be ready for a full brick and mortar. It would be a great incubator opportunity for those businesses to transition on the in-between. And we've had a great level of interest for the idea of this, but this is the potential phase three that we hope to get to, but it's not a guarantee as of right now.

Is that to scale?

We did have someone go and map it out and do it to scale, and we can fit up to seven units between two properties. And that's what's keeping in mind, like the variances. Wherever the property line is, I know we have to be five feet from that. And then we've already been advised from the city of Keller that each unit has to be at minimum 10 feet.

There's a little chain link fence in the back. Is that the property line to the house in back? Mm-hmm. Okay.

And this is an incubator at our expense. Yeah. For Keller to grow its brick and mortar as well.

Yeah. So again, going back to the request, one destination, three separate decisions, 128 bates. We broke it up a little bit different than how Anna presented it. Basically, the way I understood it is the facade grants were separate. And so each individual property, $10,000 for each one. As she had shown, we're spending about anywhere from $21,000 to $22,000 and some change depending on the property. And then the Chapter 380 total is at $61,000 with those two items, with the restrooms and the crease interceptor. So here's where I break that down a little bit more. Or actually, we kind of went over, was it, yeah, this is the facade grant. So I wanted to note just, this is kind of unique. I know what we're asking for. The facade grant, not so much. I feel like these are kind of standard. It clearly is going to get a facelift and look beautiful when it's done. But truly, our goal is we're preserving a 1920s cottage. We don't want to bulldoze it. Realistically, it probably would cost us the same at this point to bulldoze and build it new with what it will cost us to preserve this. But I really feel passionate to preserve history. And so that's kind of one aspect. We're going to be preserving two historical buildings for Keller. Same thing with the station house. I kind of gave you a couple different angles to kind of see and understand. One of the questions last time was about the pathways in between. There's kind of a visual there where you can see all that grass separate from the sidewalk. And that's where a lot of that break and that pathway is going to be. One, connecting the current ramps and those kind of things to the sidewalk, but also connecting the properties so that way there's just easy ways to walk through and for people to come through if you have a wheelchair. Let's see, for the Chapter 380, So again, this is a unique ask that we're going for. And the public return, I personally won't equate it to the numbers that y'all broke out. I really equate it to a public value and request that has been a regular, consistent request in this area since Bates has been completed. It's very difficult to host an event on that street with no bathrooms. There are no accessible bathrooms anywhere on that street besides if you can walk across the back way, you can get to Hush. and interrupt someone there to go and use the bathroom, but it's difficult and that's kind of one reason why we came up with this concept to be a public benefit. The secondary piece to that, we did our own polls and surveys on our Facebook pages. One of the biggest things as being Texas's family friendly city, mothers, what's that?

Most. Most. Most.

Let's show people.

Let's stand behind that. My 8-year-old was like, Dad, how do you know it's Texas' most family-friendly city? Did you make it up? And I replied, I said, well, yes and no. I said, it's part of our commitment to the city. Most family-friendly cities.

So being most family-friendly city, we wanted to keep that in mind. And actually, moms were the ones that probably commented the most on this question. They wanted a changing table in these bathrooms. They wanted privacy to be able to go in with their child and then also to breastfeed. So that was really cool to see. have that interaction and see that request. But that was one of the public benefits that I just wanted to note. Separately from that, it is a benefit to our property. For phase three, and this is why for phase three to fully get to its full vision, the truth of the matter is having additional bathrooms on the property is going to allow us to have more occupancy on our land. We only have one bathroom in each individual unit, and they both have a smaller footprint. And we do know at least one of which doesn't necessarily want to offer public access to their bathroom, which is understandable. So we may even, although we might get tenants, we may run into where it still might be difficult to not have enough bathrooms on that street available. Well, we're doing a full addition, so there's new bathrooms going in.

Not the new ones, the ones in the buildings already.

Yes, we're getting additions, and in the additions, the bathrooms will be relocated and they will be unisex, one unisex, 88 bathroom.

But these tenants shouldn't bear the expense related to public gatherings.

Yeah, and that's kind of the concern.

Did you find a place for this bathroom now?

Yeah, so I will kind of talk about that, I think, here. I did grease. Is there another page? So as far as that, that's actually one of our own stipulations. Since we've had that discussion, there is the property line. So we would absolutely have to replat, and we're willing to make that investment to do so. I just, there's no feasible reason to replat without, if we're not going to.

Is there a reason that can't, what are you doing with the little red building in front?

So that will get moved over, but that is a... Could there not be a bathroom? No, that is a historic ticket booth that has been donated by the History Museum, so we are preserving that, yeah.

It's like a trolley.

It's not... Yeah, it's not a...

It's got four walls and everything.

You can build anything. It steps up into it.

Yeah, it's a historic ticket booth, and it's actually... It's been donated by the Keller History Museum to stay on property because it was a part of the property for...

Man, you stepped in that one.

No, I just saw it sitting there. That's a good question. I'm just thankful because I'm even willing to step in. You weren't here before, but we have a property line issue. Yes, sir.

Yeah, and so part of our, there are stipulations to all of these things. So one of which, the grease trap itself is based on us actually securing a tenant. that we know is signing a lease and the reimbursement will not come into play unless we sign a lease for a tenant that does need that grease trap. And so we're committed to, you know, to agree to that, to not install if we don't have that tenant with a sign lease that needs that.

When you talked about, you know, potential to do more stuff, more business, more foods, whatever, I mean, how does that equate to more business? Is that a 10% increase? Because it It's $1,000 a year. If it raises it 20% in volume, which would be a big number for food, then that's about $1,000. So that's 15 years to break even.

And the SEC freeze check gives you more options for different food.

I will say this, the vendors that are looking to partner with us, they're looking to stay long term, right? So they're looking to grow their business and pivot as they need to to continue to be successful in the city of Keller.

And actually, that's a good point. So majority of the LOIs that have come in, there has been such great interest that the minimum request has been a five year lease with up to three five year options. And people want to make a pretty significant investment into even bringing the Esfoli to life. Like I said, we have an array of choices to look at, three of which are requesting that grease trap to diversify. They're wanting to survive and thrive.

You can get more bread for that, though, right?

We could. I would say for the long term, yes. But initially, our rate is standard to what we're asking, with or without the grease trap, to be fair. Because right now, we're already in negotiations and conversations. And so not necessarily negotiations, I'm sorry, conversations. And we've already stated what our price per square foot is. I don't feel like it's appropriate for me to ask for this incentive, get the incentive, and then increase my price per square foot. So we've already presented a price per square foot, and we anticipate.

How is the foundations of both buildings? Are they still strong, good?

They are pyramid beam. However, there are additions going on both properties. And they will be a slab foundation for the additions. And the additions are just shy of 400 square feet. They're small.

And the upcoming events that you have, are you providing public restroom in any way? So I kind of, you know, yeah, that's a unique one.

I know. Well, I will say I have looked into the cost of that and it's more than what we're charging for our vendors. But I will say this. I do own a property right behind this property. I've actually installed a gate. So we plan to give little tours of our property pre-construction and that gate and access to my other building will be available with the bathroom.

Again, increasing her expenses.

Well, yeah, but that's what we're doing. And it's a Friday night, and we are not booking anything else at our building so we can have a bathroom available because that is the number one concern that people ask.

So that's good, at least that people will have that opportunity. And then lastly, you said you had the survey. Was it shared probably with non-Facebook users in any form or fashion?

No, it was just on Facebook.

Maybe down the road you might find a means of collecting it. non-Facebook users and the ideas might be helpful.

Yeah, I would definitely think that would be great. I think the City of Color maybe proposing that survey would be awesome. I'm limited to my reach on Facebook.

Yeah. Nate, did you have anything? Yeah, I was curious on the total project investment. I think you've shown a couple different figures up and that could really have an impact on how the city council views it, how the public views it as we look at the amount of private dollars versus public dollars. To me, I think the project is awesome. I think this is gonna be something that's really gonna benefit the city. For me, it just kinda comes down to you know, this idea of what should private dollars go for and what should public dollars go for, and how do we create this virtuous cycle of where public incentives are used to stimulate that economic engine, that business, and help give you guys what you need, you know, but we can't really function like a bank, and we shouldn't be doing things that private capital markets should be doing, you know, with public dollars. So that to me is like where the tension kind of comes in. So the... The facade's pretty straightforward. I think that's, it really just kind of comes down to the, actually the grease trap's pretty straightforward too. There's precedence for grease trap as being part of infrastructure, so that one doesn't really bother me as much. The bathroom one though, that's where it gets.

When does Keller anticipate installing public bathrooms for an area that they want to activate?

pay for it because the ask that you're asking for, when it looks at the total investment of $250,000 and you're asking for about $82,000 total with all of it, you're looking at 25% or 26% of the renovations and the facade, which is all renovation. that. Do you think the whole thing should be...

Specifically for the bathrooms?

No, for the whole ask. Because, like I said, we all have different opinions on the grease traps. I'm not a fan of that part of it. One, because of the equipment available, but also because get back in rent so whether you do or not decide to that again those are financial decisions up to you the bathrooms I see a value in that you know helping with some of the facade stuff that fits underneath the terms of the city rules and stuff some help on that I I'm okay with some of those things it's you know the grease trap I'm not part of the bathroom I am and so how recommendation as to if and if so how much and so i just was curious from your standpoint because you've sat in on these things yeah um what what do you think based on the payback periods and what this the city might recoup and and and everything is a what do you think is a fair number i mean yeah if you came out of here and you got one number and you said versus okay that's reasonable that's fair what Where do you think that is?

I think as to how I described earlier, I'm fairly conservative when it comes to certain things. If anything, I'm like, I don't think that's even going to be fully enough. But we're willing to actually make that additional investment if anywhere that we're short. But with that said, looking into even replatting, replatting is about $6,000 to $7,000. All of the brick and the pathway and the landscaping, we also would have to move that. that historic ticket booth, we'd have to move that, so there'll be costs associated with that. All of the brick and pathways and landscaping and the gates and locks, that's not, it's not included in this bathroom quote or in the facade grant.

Yeah, you know, some of those are developer expected costs, okay? Like, you know, I own a business here, I own a property, and through my 15 years, I never asked for anything, and I could have, because most of it I just looked at as a thing. I don't mind helping and recognizing to fund the redevelopment, and how much do you think should be yours? I mean, if you think it should be the whole 81,000, then say so, if not, whatever.

I would like to separate the facade grant specifically from the 380, because I feel like, as you stated, the facade grant is pretty straightforward. We are significantly improving the facade. well over the ask. Thinking about the Chapter 380 in full transparency, that is new territory. I think not only for me, but even talking through staff, we went through a couple different things that we thought might be potential items, and we kind of narrowed it down to these two specific items because of the public benefit and the concerns that's already been faced on that street. And to the benefit of the city to activate the street further, we want to see festivals happening on that street. We wanted to live up to that name. And so with that said, and I also think the uniqueness of these bathrooms, even when future bathrooms come, which they are eventually slated when that happens, still think this is an added benefit in addition to those bathrooms because of that privacy because of what we've gotten on feedback from from parents and so I think it would still be a great alternative option and we hope that events are happening on that street all the time I know my tenants are certainly hoping for that too but in the meantime we're willing to go the mile and start activating it and doing those events ourselves

Was the park going to happen? When is that?

I think they're currently sitting in the 2028 CIP. It's always at the discretion of the council.

Because the street's not going to probably get super big, with the exception of destination events that you might have for a couple of years anyway, because of Elm Street.

you know, the $80,000 number and some change is you support the city funding at that level.

Yeah.

Okay. So that answers your question directly. Um, cause I understand where you're going and it kind of gets to Nate's question, which is like, what's the right balance and what's the tension. So I was going to, or even the concept. So when we evaluate it, can we pull up the slide that looks at basically the performance piece of it? Year seven, I think there's recovery. Because in my mind, this is again to Nate's point and also your point, David, the real recovery for the taxpayer happens in year nine and a half. Because in my mind, I add in the 20,000 for the facade. Which point well made about that there's a lot of precedent the total ROI eventually. Now, my question was if the numbers don't, is it a performance-based 380?

It's not.

That was one of my next questions was when you expected that. It's not what we did for hops, correct?

Right.

They normally are performance-based, right?

Yes, traditionally they are. But they're also going to the tenant, not to the landowner. Right. The tenant has the tie. Hobbs happens to be both. But, like, with the, I don't know who was here, but we did a 380 for the pizza restaurant and brewery. They needed some additional infrastructure. They were the tenant, and part of that discussion We're going to base our repayment on this tenant, whether they're going to successfully run the business here or not. But the infrastructure is still there. So at least here we have the property owner asking, and we have a tie to the property owner and can tie those costs back.

And then there's also, I don't have the contract right in front of me, but the way that we've written the language,

Let's pause for a second. Anna's talking.

So the reimbursement would not happen, and we had it outlined in the drafted contract that until the bathroom is open to the public, they don't get the reimbursement. until we have an executed lease for a tenant and there's a couple stipulations they wouldn't get the reimbursement for the grease truck so there are stipulations protecting the city and you know the fair amount before when they get their reimbursement because we can't measure it based on performance because they are not the tenants but it can't be that Yeah, what's difficult is at this moment we don't have actual projections.

And keep in mind, I would just say too, Elm Street is under construction, right? So with that happening, we are going to actively commit to just activating this street in a way that we shouldn't have to wait. We shouldn't have to wait to do all these beautiful things for our city, our community. Despite that, but a lot of people would have reservations with coming in and starting a business when there's nowhere for people to park, nowhere for people to see light at the end of the tunnel. And we're willing to do that, and we've put our money up to show that.

And just to that point, I mean, that is the risk that we took. I mean, making this investment to begin with. We put up a substantial amount of cash investment already. And we simply want to develop it. We could have literally just gotten these properties and just took care of these buildings, leased them up, and called it a day. we not only have an alignment in the vision for OTK, but we're willing to take the risk as well and cast a vision too and create a destination for this street.

And that's part of my question or concern is how much of your success to get this off the ground is dependent on how much money comes here. Originally, when I came in, I wanted to build a million and a half dollar building for an auto repair shop. Port a cachet, valet service, the city said no. They said if you want an auto repair shop, you gotta buy an existing one that sits here. And so I had to go that route. So I didn't get to do it the way I wanted to do it. I didn't go to the city for help, and that's fine, that was my decision. But I had to make that successful. What do you mean on this money to make these projects come to fruition? No.

I think what she said.

the beginning, like when I joined, uh, join you guys, um, to be honest with you, from my council perspective, and we try to tell us to all our boards and commissions, like how we, how, how folks vote is like is important, but really the conversation and the fact finding is honestly, what's the most helpful piece of it. So when we're going to the vote as a, as a board and as a team, it's not necessarily like there's a lot of room for agree to disagree. Jamie or any applicant they go through, we're going to ask questions that maybe they don't have the most on-point answer to. So I threw out a question about what a potential tenant could look like, and you came up with a better answer than I would have on the fly. But that was kind of me trying to say, hey, FYI, this is something to think of. So I don't know if that's been said to you guys yet. Was that kind of the operating assumption previously? Is that how we've operated as a management?

place to be able to vote correctly?

To ask questions, to get answers to... Yeah, and what I'm saying is, like, honestly, the questions that are asked and the information we glean is literally the most helpful thing for council. It's not so much, you know, how we vote. That's important, but it's almost like a secondary factor. It's, you know, the question that David's asking is, you know, some of them you know any applicant should be able to answer but it's kind of a it's a recommendation it's also prep for the applicant and those are things that you know in all fairness y'all should be ready to do so but I'm also like highly compartmentalized and so when we're going around the room like let's allow one person to ask their question and then let's allow for an answer so that way myself included I don't accidentally stomp on it so your question was sir oh well no I was just asking you know about

a little bit about how they're approaching the financial side of this and the renovations and everything, because the renovation ask in total for all of it is, depending on how you look at it, is somewhere between 25 and 30% of the total cost of renovation. So you're basically saying... That's asking the city to pay for 25% of your renovation. And that's a big number to me.

Yeah, so the near question was, if I recall, are you guys ready to move forward if, like in the event of a denial...

the amount that you get here.

So in regards and in full transparency, the Chapter 380, that ask is strictly incentive. If we do not get approved for it, it is not something we're moving forward on. We, as I stated, as much as you all see the $250,000 of additional investment, that doesn't include the potential Phase 3 with those units. It also, again, full stop transparency, we acquired this property and we were cash buyers. And so with that said, we've made a significant investment to acquire the property, and we have a budget as to what we can do to move forward. We didn't anticipate a grease trap request. I thought that's what tenants did in their build-out, to be fully transparent. And some requested it and some did not. I saw actually and spent some time with a gentleman that used to own a restaurant here, right here at F&G, and he also served on this board, and spent some significant time talking to him about his opinion on that and what options are available and grease shops can run the gamut from, you know, like literally there's like portable type ones and then they can go upwards of like $40,000 if you get really like, we don't need that. But these were based on discussions of other restaurant tours that I had conversations with and then plumbers, and my contractor. And so this is kind of where we landed with that. But again, I have five LOIs. I'm seeing what I'm able to do, and that will help me go back to those conversations with those LOIs. So yes, that is a clear incentive for us. Separately, the bathrooms, same thing. I believe that if we don't have additional bathrooms on this property, I tried to find a way to find a balance between the public benefit that we could offer because the street needs bathrooms, period. Two, we want to create space for moms that is even when the bathrooms do come, this is a great alternative. And so, fantastic. So that's the public benefit. Separately, it is an incentive for us because phase three with up to seven units in the backyard and anticipating additional occupancy load on that land, those buildings will not go past, like hit the number we need to hit for that. Yeah, exactly. So technically, we wouldn't be in compliance to have more people on the property itself without the benefits. Yeah, we would need to either invest in bathrooms or we couldn't do phase three in its entirety, really.

Can I ask a general question towards Anna and Ross? You know, because we did hops, and that was, what, a four-year, five-year? Five-year. Five-year. Is that our normal? We try to look at our payback or our break-even as five years or so?

It really depends on the business, but ideally, yeah.

That's how we did it.

I would say traditionally, sales tax reimbursement, not just in Miller, but across the region, is anywhere between three to five to ten years. So again, it really depends on the business. There's just a lot of specifics for each business.

So to speak to that, in a typical incentive with that type of reimbursement with that business, they're increasing revenue as well for their own business. The bathroom doesn't increase, it increases occupancy load for us. But it also.

Which would increase revenue.

Well, yes, for the phase three, because yes. So yeah, I guess in that instance. It will increase revenue for the city because we'll have those smaller footprint, those smaller units.

And on our property. You guys are the tenants.

Yes, so it's a win all the way around, but the public benefit, to be honest, in my mind, just thinking how Ashley thinks, because when they came to me with all these numbers, I did my best to give benchmarks and those things, but I never looked at it from that perspective. I looked at it strictly as a value to the street, to activate the street, to create an opportunity and incentive for more people to come to the street and have their own events. I don't... Jamie and I hope to invest in more properties. We don't necessarily want to be hosting festivals on the street, and that's why our long-term vision are these units that it can sustain its own ecosystem, is the dream, truly. And then the street itself is activated by third party coming in and wanting to be a part of that experience. Does that make sense? So that's why the bathroom, to me, is a unique, I know it's a unique ask, but I also am not tying it to dollars for the city as much as the public benefit to .

That's why I'm . Mostly for you, but it does help the city, at least for now, because by the time Elm Street's done, the other bathrooms may be.

That's my question.

Do we have a date?

2028.

2028.

This question is for staff. How often do we have events in Old Town, Carolina? Can we say how many times a month or specific time of the year, maybe during holidays, during summer?

or maybe others maybe they have like a jazz night or something like that so maybe two in one question so the city and maybe others so we already have a couple of different private events mostly private events some public events but the goal of Festival Street which is Bay Street which properties are is to host a lot more events in the future so once the Elm Street project is comes to fruition. This is why the city has invested so much money into Old Town, because the goal is to have a lot of festivals, and then also for private entities to be able to host events as well. So that's the goal.

I can give that answer to five. Five is the answer. Five. Five in its entirety. That is what I believe was last year when I was based on what I knew on the calendar that I do for Kickmate.

The Arts Festival.

Yeah, so the Public Arts does theirs. The Old Town Color Merchant Association, they did, they normally do it on the east side, and they brought it over, I'm sorry, west side. And then they brought it over to the east side once or twice. And this year they did it twice. They did a spring, and then they're going to be doing a winter. their holiday one, I think they're doing their holiday one again on Bates. There's a date night that the city of Keller does. They have one coming up on October, we have October 6th, they have October 3rd. We're doing National Night Out on October 6th. We are committing to once a month hosting. Yeah, we want to increase the, we want to activate the space.

potential jobs, like even part-time jobs, what would there be to staff this place? Maybe in each of the phases, that might be something that would have helped to boost the public benefit.

Yeah, it all depends. I can tell you by the cottage, the small business that's coming in, they actually are a local family. Same thing with the LOIs that we're looking at. These are all local families, if not in Keller and surrounding towns. immediate to our right or left and so these are all local families so I anticipate that staff wise I'm not sure the size of staff for the cottage for the candy store it might be one or two but for the coffee shop some of them are anticipating a full team it just depends on which one we go with to be honest one of which is proposing a potential bakery. There's a lot of ideas being thrown right now, but we really don't know until we get to this next phase, to be honest.

There'll probably be more than one person in each. Oh, 100%.

Yeah. And we're also very committed. All of our people that were, our GC is from Keller. A lot of the vendors that we're working with, even in the development, are from Keller. We have a pretty good network of Keller local businesses that are involved in this project.

Steve, did you have any questions you were holding back?

Yeah, what does that mean?

Do you want to clarify? I mean, we asked a lot of questions, and your post said they asked questions that didn't make sense.

And it bothered me because... About me serving and that I resigned?

Yeah, that's what it was about. Criticizing the board members about asking all sorts of questions that you say confuse people. We asked every business counselor all sorts of questions, and that's why I held back tonight.

I have served on this board for four and a half years. I'm very aware of the questions that get asked at this table. The questions that were asked when I was here the last time was in regards to my validity to even ask for the things that I was asking for. And so I clarified that I resigned.

I asked you several questions about property lines, bathrooms, and I'm not saying that you attacked me or anything. It doesn't matter. I don't care about that stuff. That was the whole thing about the map.

There was nothing wrong with it. And I came back with a solution for that. There was nothing wrong with your questions. I didn't have an issue with the questions being asked of me. I know.

You just said that we only asked questions regarding certain things.

So I'm just saying we asked other questions. Honestly, blame the city manager for just walking in. Aaron and I have had a really long day. He got back. We spent six to eight hours a day together. I'm just kidding about you walking in. He's pulling a shift and a half. Social media is a nightmare for me on a daily basis. comments on social media, I would encourage anyone, myself included, keep them, you know, above board and let's just attack it that way and let's get back to the policy. I do have some questions on that. I mean, if you have, like, so you spoke to your piece, this is my perspective, you spoke to your piece, you spoke to your piece and replied, I'd like to just move on if we're okay with that.

And I guess I want to say that should... of us learn and kind of you know maybe other things that we probably have never thought about so please don't let that hold you back in any way in asking any questions because I'm learning you know as everybody asking their questions so please don't let that hold

I always use the joke, if y'all decide to set sail and move to Tahiti and sell the land and things are going great, how can we be assured from a city perspective and a resident perspective that they continue to be public? Because I think it's really cool, right? Jamie, I think you kind of made the point like, hey, this is something that doesn't exist. So I see the value add. I'm getting caught up on procedurally, how does that work?

but that's a great question yeah that what we discussed within that was um i think what was being proposed was a 10-year commitment of making them accessible um i i mean as long as we we own the property we're we're fine to go even beyond that but i think it was that 10-year it stays with the property um that contract i guess is how it would be put together um but we do plan on um like it will be have its own separate gate it will have its own separate pathway too and it will have um

to the 380? It is.

And there's some language in the 380 if for whatever reason they were to sell and the intention is that they would sell to if they were to sell to someone that they would then take ownership of the operation of the publicly accessible restrooms and if they don't agree to that then there would be a percentage reimbursement they would have to reimburse the city for the amount of years. Let's say that They own it for seven and then there's three years left when it changes ownership. Then out of the reimbursement from the city to them, the 40 something thousand, much more delicate language in the 380. Basically, we would get reimbursed for the amount of time. So we have it pretty well outlined in the 380 to have that safety net and I know that the applicant has given me all kinds of their commitment of when they would operate it, that's all in the 380. The cleaning, the maintenance, all the aspects of what we would expect

out the private folk ncd folks maintain it yes yes so if there's like a you know knuckleheaded eight-year-old that runs in the bathroom and creates a mess for some reason um shouldn't pick on him he's a really good kid um but you know knuckleheaded yeah that's not a public responsibility yeah not a public responsibility and it will be

Anybody can call.

Yeah, we talked about putting signage. So we'll have signage that says the hours that it will be accessible. So the locks that we're looking into potentially doing is it'll be on a timer. So they'll be able to unlock or it'll automatically unlock. from, I believe we're looking at the hours of like eight to 10, not necessarily the same park hours per se, but like from eight to 10, there would be signage that there's public restrooms visible from the street. And then the locks would automatically unlock and lock at certain times. We would maintain, you know,

If there was a festival that went to like midnight, would you guys be able to change the time to watch that open up for everybody?

Yeah, and honestly, I think our tenants may want to even potentially participate and stay open later. I don't know necessarily the coffee shop, but maybe the candy shop or even with phase three. We plan to put really beautiful gathering space all throughout the property. where they're able to sit and hang out. And so, I mean, we want people to come and gather and stay. So if there's an event happening late, then we're willing to potentially open up our hours longer.

Okay, because in essence, it's basically, and I'm not trying to diminish anything, but...

It goes back to the 380 contract. For the bathroom, what kind of mechanisms are there to, let's say, you're going to maintain the rest of the bathroom. If that's not happening, or it's not happening to an adequately acceptable level, is there any mechanism in 380 to address that?

There's a language over and off following through on either side.

Or sometimes it's not usable because it's filthy or something.

Yeah, that is all outlined in there.

Okay. Justin, did you have one? I have one.

Yeah, so you did mention the private-public partnership, you know, in the bathroom, and, you know, that was a good way to put that together. And you did mention that we don't have anything like that, you know, here. Do we have a precedent, maybe, in a neighboring city, in Texas, or anywhere across the nation that we have something like this that you know of?

I don't have a, like a pure city, like to see someone else has done something similar.

Exactly, like a private public partnership, bathrooms, something like that?

Yes, so we have like public private partnerships.

But specifically the bathroom one.

Yeah, probably, honestly, I've never seen anything like it, but probably pretty hard to find. I think it is a very unique, like at the high level, it's not, you know, you know this, it's But have you ran across anything about staff or the applicant where it's been like an apples-to-apples, you know, public-private partnerships for bathrooms?

I think most cities that we've investigated, they built it in such a way that this didn't have to be a thing, right? And so we're...

Especially with Bates having already a park on the street, most instances there's, you know, something available nearby already so in this and even in even multiple businesses and like restaurants and things of that nature and so like right now we there's not there's not that in this area so as far as something comparable to kind of the stage of where things are or where they might go To be honest, I didn't fully do that research. It was quite a bit I put together.

I would have even thought to answer that question.

That's a great question. But other cities built their downtowns differently. And they probably were very methodical in how they built up accessibility.

right now, so in a couple years, they'll have facilities. Elm Street will be there, so you'll have more density of people.

I'm going to just say this, too. She's so much more well-spoken than me. But the expense to maintain a bathroom that you didn't build or you didn't pay for is astronomical. And there is no guaranteed return on our investment other than we know that this is a benefit to this city. This is a benefit to activating Bates Street, which is not going to be entirely to our benefit, by the way. This is to the benefit of the city of Keller, too. In the grand scheme, it is not because there's other businesses, other streets that y'all intend to activate eventually.

Yeah, it will, but again, kind of just going back to that. Now, I am not going to be the one to tell you that this was a slam-dunk application coming in asking you guys for bathrooms. I'm a creative, out-of-the-box kind of thinker. I see a problem, I always want to find a solution. And for me, there was, to me, the way I understand the incentive program, while it is a unique ask, I believe that it is, for us, I know it to be an incentive, yes. We will have benefit to it for the long term. If we don't do the bathrooms, we don't get to phase three. We don't get that benefit. So I think that's what she's kind of alluding to. But separately from that, we just know that additional benefit to the street because of right now they're not being bathrooms. But we wanted to also be thoughtful to say we don't just want to add bathrooms to Bates and say, because in two years, it's going to have bathrooms, right? And I'm sure that's probably the initial thought. Yeah. We'll still need them for the property, so it does incentivize for us to continue to develop more. But it also diversifies the options for families in Texas as well as families around the city.

Yeah.

to do phase three?

There's an absolute chance, and the city can probably speak to that. In my experience of bathrooms, which is the hill I seem to die on in all ways, but I will tell you I have an event venue behind this property, and we are hinged to our occupancy load based on bathrooms.

But I guess that's my question is, so you're asking the city to offset the money for the bathroom so you can get to phase three?

which will grow . I understand the argument.

It's a good question, though. So is that the incentive to, without the bathrooms?

Without the bathrooms, we can't That is, yes. And then on the flip side, we're just showcasing the public benefit to it. Because I can't tie it to tax dollars, like in the financial way that we're used to seeing, instead the public benefit is bathroom zombies to activate the street.

I do have one. So you guys, I'm sure, have spent a lot of time over there in the last couple months after buying the property. How often do you see families or anybody utilizing the park?

Never. And it is because there's no backwards. And we know why. Yeah, yeah. They've told us.

Well, but it's also, again, as I was saying, it's unique time. It's time and density. But I bet there's still time.

No, it's mothers saying, I can't bring my kid here because they will need to pee. And there's nowhere for them to pee.

Because right now, with all the redevelopment going on, there's not a natural flow of traffic to give density to any of the streets over there in the way it's going to be in a couple of years. street gets done, there will be more flow-through traffic on dates.

What kind of bathrooms is the city going to build in two years?

Just out of curiosity. So my point in asking the question was, the city invested into a space that's unusable many days after. No, it's being unused. Well, again, we'll see that tomorrow.

No, no, no. Because look, if you look at it, and I drove there, and I just sat there, and I just said, why is this here? First, it just looks straight into the church. And I thought, well, okay, we've got the parking lot that's going to go down next to the church. So the flow of traffic will be people to walk through there. Once Elm Street's done, right now, it's like a dead end. There's no ingress, egress of any fashion. There's no... Why do we wait until 2028 to put a park and bathrooms? You're asking the wrong person.

I blame the previous mayor. Yeah, the previous city manager, the previous mayor, the previous community development. I understand.

My counter is we're placing a guarantee on a capital improvement two years from now that may not materialize.

ultimately if it's in the CIP it's up to the council's discretion so Justin's correct I mean that there's no the bathrooms have been and it's been it's been a few years they did some preliminary design showing how that could work and how it could be situated next to the park ultimately council decided not to move forward with that back component of the project but There's nothing currently under design. I can't tell you, hey, we'll turn dirt on this day to construct those bathrooms.

Do we know why the council did not move forward at that point?

Do we know? To be honest with you, here's the answer. All right. I'm getting cheeky. It's getting late. My understanding is like one member of that seven-member team is, a lot of us, we're trying to synchronize with the opening of Elm Street. Is that reasonable, Steph? I would agree. You would agree, Aaron? All right. So it's not do we want to do bathrooms or not. We're going to do bathrooms. That's the current intent. Now, to Justin's point, will that truly ever, and Sarah's point, will that materialize? Well, that requires a vote. But every indication I have at my disposal right now is that the city intends to move forward with bathrooms. Isn't it, how many, like, I think Jamie asked with the applicant, how many, do we remember the concept rendering? It was literally like a year and a half ago, or two years that it was. Was it like two stalls, four stalls? I can't recall.

I thought it was four per, I mean, it was a full... And just a park.

And that's consistent with what we've done in other areas of town as well. So does that answer the question about the city's intent on bathrooms? That's the best I got, so hopefully it does.

It does. Thank you. And I think at the time it was a, we recognized Elm was going to be under construction. The costs were running high for Bates at that time, and so this was just a cost saving. We can move it. Hey, let's just delay this because we really can't utilize it anyways until we get to 28. I do want to just have the fun of it. we are about to adopt the 27 budget, so we're talking about in two years, it's kind of a year of change. 28 starts October of 27.

So maybe down the road y'all could build two instead of four.

The other thing too, I know it sounds like, I said I'm getting cheeky when we're talking about bathrooms, that's awesome. Think about that for a second, that's a good pun.

we do care about the the experience or whatever but it was more about the fiscal impact and so you know that could whatever it's worth um it's at the will of the council but it could help offset a little bit depending on how it works there was another application that came through here it never came to fruition but um it was deemed as the potential and anchor business an example for otk um and unfortunately it didn't come into fruition but And correct me if I'm wrong, but if I recall, it was about $180,000, I think, was the incentive request with infrastructure. And they were the tenant making that request with a very short-term lease. And their entire investment was just shy of either $400,000 or over it for what they were doing for their renovation.

Do you remember what year that was?

it's the property on Elm Street that was going to be the pizza brewery. So just earlier this board sat in on discussions and decisions for that and unfortunately that property didn't come to fruition and it was due to infrastructure. The reality is these buildings in this area, this entire area is going to be a unique thing. I think with every person wanting to come in to develop, I think we are going to set the standard in preserving and keeping that small town feel and really leaning into this being a destination district. I really truly believe we will be an anchor property to showcase what can be done and not just cast the vision, but be the vision for other people converting these old homes. And so in that instance, it's a good example that unfortunately that they didn't come to fruition due to infrastructure issues. whatever they may be, but their request was pretty substantial, double what we're asking, and their investment was as a tenant, not as an owner of the building, and they had a short-term lease, and their investment, I believe, was about 400 or so thousand for their build-out, and that's what we were equating that off of, which was more than 40% of, you know, their ask was about more than 40% of what their investment was. And so, just to, I mean, give a comparative look.

And I feel like this is in the same vein. This is a step in the direction of where we want this area to go. I don't disagree.

But I guess my concern to that is I've never had a developer, and all the companies I've worked with, the developer development of the property

The property's outright, so cash flow shouldn't be the biggest issue here. And we have had that happen with the basketball thing in KYA where they kept coming back.

There are obstacles that are beyond our control, which is that Elm was under construction. So that's an obstacle beyond our control, and yet we still chose to invest our money in this city. because we believe in this vision.

And it's amazing.

I mean, the alternative to not getting to phase three is to doing pop-up shops in the way that we're doing actually right now, starting in two weeks, and we just have those people on the street and not necessarily in our backyard in the same way. I mean, that's kind of the alternative, and that's phase two. So, I mean, with that said...

I'm sorry, I thought you were finished. I didn't mean to cut you off. No, you're good. Go ahead. Okay, so is the incentive tied to the phasing?

No.

Okay, just making sure.

Well, yes and no.

No, let me ask a better question, a more specific question anyway. If the request is awarded, does that require the applicant to go beyond phase two to phase

Well, and the incentive is only for Phase 1.

So that's my question. So the incentive, if the recommendation is to, and then the eventual vote were to be to award the incentive, the applicant's not required to go to Phase 3? The bathrooms have to be built in order to get the...

The reimbursing. Right, yeah. But Phase 3 is not required.

in the contract. It's not tied into it.

Good discussion. Good questions. We spent about an hour and a half on it. Do you all have anything else you want to cover?

I think we're still struggling with what should be in the agreement, like the structure, and we really didn't spend a whole lot of time on the how and the reimbursement structure, and I feel like that could be another very lengthy discussion, and it's kind of where, I apologize if things were unclear in me leading the meeting last time, but that's really kind of what I was trying to get at is that I don't know if we're gonna be able to get this thing through in one shot. Maybe the council can get it through,

Thank you. base it on a five-year or seven-year payback, that's not going to work because they need the money up front to build the bathrooms, correct?

That's a question for them. No, so we actually will be fronting the money to then get reimbursed after it's completed and we meet all parameters.

It wouldn't work for you if the incentive was... Like you're doing with ops? Yeah, so like over time, as opposed to getting a reimbursement when it's open to the public, over time, like over five years. Is that something that you guys can do or not? I think that's the question.

I think part of it's based on the amount.

Yeah, and as always, we will take your recommendation to the city council tomorrow night, and we will state that, and it will just depend on what the council decides.

My number for all of it was $26,000. $9,100 for the facade improvements, just slightly more and less than 50-50 on each one. And then $16,900 for the 380. I'm not...

Yeah, but I guess, okay, you said $9,100 because it's $10,000 maximum. Yeah, yeah, so I was paying $100 for both. And we typically give $10. That was $47.25 on one and $43.75 on the other.

Okay, so it's about 3% of the bathroom. So if it was lesser, you're saying for that entire amount to be lesser than... Yeah, I've got my own personal view on our facade grants and stuff, and I won't get into that. That's a

Let's focus on the 61-740, the actual 380, because that's where we have some kind of a typical type request there.

And that's where I was 16-9 to open the bathrooms. I'm not a believer in the grease trap thing, one, from necessarily a need standpoint, but also

So I'll frame it like this. We could recommend the full amount. We could do partial or none, right? There's anywhere between zero and the full amount that we can recommend to the city council. So just so we can move through the discussion, can we give feedback that way before we jump into the dollars and cents? So not picking on anyone, but you've got to pick on the numbers guy. What do you think, Justin?

To clarify, you want to talk just about the 380? No, I'll talk about the options. Zero, zero, zero. Well, I'm in favor of... Helping or not helping? Yeah, I mean, the facade grants, I think, are a given. They're doing what the rules state. And so I think I'm a yes on both of the two of those, and I'm a yes on the bathrooms. I'm a question mark on the grease trap.

Okay, good feedback.

Kingsley? Similar.

Full funding for the bathroom and both facade grants, and actually full funding for the grease trap as well.

grease trap and the facades of the bathroom I'm a little bit partial just because I feel like from it for a contracting and just it's just another thing for the city to have to manage and it would be best if the city didn't have to manage it if that was separate but the grease trap I feel like that's got long-term value in terms of driving tax revenue if you get whoever gets in there but I also agree with folks that have been in that business and you know maybe there's a better way to do that but it's not up to me but I think there is long-term value to the city for that. Even if these get wiped off and you put something back there, that grease trap would still be there and could generate value.

Yeah, yeah, great, good feedback. So question mark on the bathroom, and you question mark on the grease traps. You got all this in it? All right, good, because it's only scrambled eggs tonight for brains, which is not much better than normal. I'm sorry, I told you. Hold on.

Full for both facade grants and partial for both grease and bathroom.

Okay. And the facades, I just am not a believer in giving full grants for those because those are leveraged things and some of those are things that are either not necessary to make it look more beautiful or they're Yeah, like I said, I was about 9,100 on the facades and 16,900 on the bathrooms.

David, and for the grease trap, remind me what you said for the

So, four months, like, how much is it again, Anna?

81. 81. 81. 740. Hang on, let me get back to that number. 81.

I understand facade grants, we only have limited funds for those, typically. Yeah, so I'm actually... I want to leverage those, because...

So it depends on how many requests it is.

Yeah. So for some improvement grants, currently we have it budgeted at $35,000.

Nothing like the total economic development budget instead of fund. Like, what's the total amount?

It's like $225,000. Yeah, $225,000 plus the $35,000 plus the... Next year we dropped it to $125,000.

Does this fall into this year with the fiscal year ending in October? Like where would this fall? You would be FY27.

But I also want to remind you all that we're going to be looking at a new proposal for an application next month. So we might be kind of looking at different line items. Instead of having like this is the facade and this is the incentive, it's going to be capital.

But also the facade, it was meant to be for existing businesses unless there are in the politics.

But isn't this more in the spirit of what the development of... I said yes to it. No, I'm just... I think that means bathroom. That's what I'm saying.

You're talking about 20, even in this case. Yeah, I mean...

People have come through here and invested $11,000 and gotten $10,000 in new paint that we repainted a building when we repainted it four years ago. So there's levels to this, and ultimately this is to improve the properties and maintain 100-year-old buildings in Old Town. Right.

I mean, this is one of the things that makes Scholar great is there's a lot of passion in this room and then in our community. And, I mean, frankly, I love it in a lot of ways. The meetings run longer than they probably do in other communities. Staff is working a little later than, you know, in other communities, and we appreciate that. I'm kind of where a hybrid of everything. Philosophically, I'm kind of where Kingsley's at. A lot of it's because the applicant is... committed to Keller. A lot of our macro level concerns are really based on out of state landlords that just don't have any interest. They write it off as a depreciation, a depreciated asset. So I like that component. I am concerned, though, or concerned it's a little more negative than I mean it. I am curious, very curious, about how we bring accountability, to your point, to the bathroom discussion, because it's the whole Tahiti thing, right? It's like if y'all set sail to Tahiti, we've got to anticipate that scenario. So I would like to see if there's ways to further strengthen the Chapter 380 to where... you know, if there was some sort of the bathrooms were funded and then ceased to exist, I would be looking for before City Council tomorrow, myself included. So, you know, philosophically, I'm where you're at, Kingsley. I think we were the two that were, and a lot of it for me is, total dollar amount, $81,740. If we can do a good job addressing the point you raised, Nate, There's some cost recovery there and but. You know, so I'll be in support of recommending. You know, all this feedback to city council for review tomorrow night. I think there's a lot of great discussion and feedback, but. To your point about making sure that we can help. Continue helping applicants. I think it's a great point. We do have limited tax dollars. If we see a dynamite presentation. and we don't have the funds, then that's what we have some fund balance for. We reduce the total amount. Frankly, our economic development dollars aren't maxed out every year, are they? Not currently. Yeah, and most of the time we don't reach that full amount. So part of it is trying to recalibrate to historical norms and trends, as I understand it, and also trying to be as lean as we can. So anyway, I hope that rationale helps.

I think we should take action on each individual. It will also, I think, help package that up to council tomorrow night for each.

I heard unanimous. No, there was a little bit of dissent. So C1, consider a facade improvement grant request for 128 Bates Street. So the facade improvement grant for 128 Bates All in favor of motion to approve? And then second by Kingsley. All right. All in favor of C1? Yes. All right. You can always make a motion to amend. I've done that a time or two, and it's always interesting. Well, I would make a motion to amend. Okay. So the full amount, what's your motion to amend? Amend it to 9,100. To 9,100.

Yes, and we're only voting on 128. Oh, okay.

Can you put up the slide that shows each individual item they're voting on?

and then to 4725 for 1.28 base.

Okay. So just procedurally, something about me, I'll second a motion just because I think voting and having that discussion is a good thing. So I'll go ahead and second your motion so we can take a vote. If you vote in, how much was it? 4725. 4725. Procedurally, if the amendment fails, then we would consider the full amount. Make sense? Okay, all right. So I'll personally second it, but I'm not gonna be in support of it, because I support the full amount. So if you're in favor of the amendment, say aye. Or raise your hand. Okay, see the amendment fails. It was a good point, good discussion to raise. Go to the original motion made by Justin, Mr. Sadler. So all those in favor of the full amount requested for the facade improvement Perfect, good work. C2, consider a City of Keller Fatah improvement grant request for 136 Bay Street. So.

Motion to approve.

Motion to approve by Mr. Sadler. Second on the game. Same motion, same second. Any further discussion? All right, those in favor, raise your hand. All right, any opposed? Noted. For what it's worth, when I first came to city council, I struggled with facade improvement grant greatly. I don't know who can attest to that, but I actually like, anyway, story for another day. So I always appreciate the discussion for and against. C3, consider a chapter 380 economic development incentive request for the Hive and holding collective LLC. I know that was where there was a lot of split opinions. Does anyone have a motion for consensus on that item?

So there are two items, right? There's the toilets and the grease.

Well, yeah, but it's one application, so we have to vote on the application.

We can just do a money amount, or is it, because it's not by, it doesn't have to be by line item. If we approve it, she can decide how to split it up, or does it have to be after the grease traps? I think we can give a total amount.

Yeah, because I could always rewrite it. I can edit the document that has the amounts. I can edit the 3E.

I guess my question went back to whatever we give, are we giving it on completion or are we going to tier it like we've done some of the other ones?

Well, I think we're going to come tomorrow to City Council with some options because currently we have it as completion.

based on completion, but some of the feedback should, I would assume, be...

It should be like a turn, like stepped in.

Yeah, certainly feedback that council can consider.

Yeah. What percentage is that?

That's 25. Is that 25%? Of the 61. Of the 61. Yeah, that's about 25%. For me, it was. That was you. That's you. Okay, I'll make a motion for 51,990, which is 100% of the bathrooms and 50% of the grease trap. I'm sorry, Justin, can you repeat? I was still typing.

51,990 is the bathrooms and 50% of the grease trap.

I like it. I was walking to sleep. I'm waking up. So we'll consider, can we say 25%? Yeah, that's fine. Okay, all right. And what's the total ask? Again, just on the 380. 61,740.

Okay, so YALS is 25%, 1% is YALS.

25% would be $15,435.

in this proposal on this one. You mentioned that they wanted to clean that up.

Yeah, I think you can just stipulate if you're in support of it, for example, you could say the motion can be X percentage with the condition that the applicant complete construction, which is already in there, and then award it on a certain You could probably keep it more general and say on a performance basis, measure over time, right? What language are y'all would take in the city council? Comfortable with, I mean.

Well, I think we need to kind of look at it. We need to know, too, if this impacts y'all, if this is something that you would consider the over time versus needing it at completion before we kind of take it through. Because if it doesn't work,

Yeah, it's kind of wasting our time.

Yeah, I mean, I would say, like, just budget-wise, because of the cost of Phase 3 to come to full fruition, it's not a cost we anticipated to have to do. So it will limit how many potential micro-units we'd be able to do in the back. So we're anticipating at full, its entirety is seven units, up to seven units. And so if, say, for example, it's, reimbursement over time or whatever that looks like, then it will limit us to have cash available to do additional units. So does that make sense? Because as far as like our full budget for what we can do in the back, if we have to hold that cost longer to not get reimbursed, then the cost going into the back will just take more time.

Okay, so you are comfortable over time.

Is that, so like, instead of full reimbursement at commission, it's like over a period of each year, there's a percentage that comes back each year kind of deal? Right. Yeah, I guess it would limit what we could do in the back, but yeah.

Or maybe how fast?

Essentially, yeah, how fast. Because we already kind of have an idea of what those potential costs would look like and how we're funding that, but we like the bathroom would, it kind of goes in tandem. So if you delay reimbursing us for what we have to do in the backyard, it's more cash that's out.

Does that make sense? Yeah, you're not getting all the cash back as soon as you need it.

To then go do it to the next ones. Right, right. Yeah, we're tying up cash. We're tying up cash so we can .

Just to clarify, though, when we talk about the phased payment, is that for the full amount, meaning 61, 740, or for 85% or 25%? Well, that's what I was saying earlier.

The smaller the amount, the quicker the pay

Again, we're also absorbing annual costs to then maintain it.

So that has to be... And something to consider when you vote for the amount is if it doesn't work for them, they can say no and then they don't build the bathrooms. So we need to take that into consideration when you vote tonight.

Sure. Yeah. Yeah, it's just a recommendation. I mean, it's a recommending vote, so... the bad guys are me and city council. There's a motion for funding 30% of the requested Chapter 380. Okay, good starting point. Let's consider the motion. I'll also second that one for time's sake. 380 request for the Hyven Holding Collective LLC at 85%. Raise your hand. Okay. I'll raise my hand for that one. I think that's a good amount. Those opposed? All right. So that fails. Now we're at Dr. Fay's 50%. Is that right? That's correct. All right. So we have the motion to fund the 380 request at 50%. For the Hyven Holding Company Collective 380 request, favor of 50% raise your hand okay for and then those opposed all right so the 50% is adopted for three and then I think the recommendation remains for us to try to tighten up the in either percentage I think we're there's unanimous agreement that unless I don't speak for any anyone individual but unanimous agreement that we work on language to further strengthen the 384

Yeah, my plan is, Mayor, to have a slide tomorrow where I maybe do like a comparison between the current language that has the completion dates, the estimated dates, and then the overtime. But again, it just kind of depends on if... You might be asked tomorrow, you will be asked tomorrow if that works for you or not.

On the, yeah.

Can I suggest... If we're doing 50%, can we give them all at whatever stipulated time that you have, everything? Well, it's up to the city council tomorrow. Yes. It's normally not. No. Oh, okay. Yeah.

Yeah.

Just the council.

Yeah, so that's an option to consider.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean.

I mean, because it's not the full amount.

Yeah. Normally there's a performance feature. Yeah. To make sure that we get our break even .

And just so I understand and just kind of like I think sharing my perspective hearing this, When we came in with the cost that we did, we also knew that we were already going to have to incur additional costs that we have gotten quotes on. which will require even more investment to have these bathrooms. So to decrease it to 50%, I can tell you in full transparency, we won't move forward with the bathrooms. And that's okay if that's what the answer is. I would just rather just be transparent to say with the cost that it will for us to replat to move the ticket booth to do the additional brick, the landscaping, the additional things outside of what we have got included on just the core of building these bathrooms, blueprints, in addition to what we're already doing. We are making additional investment on top of that $42,000. And so that roughly ranges anywhere from $25,000 to $30,000, depending on where we land with our brick and all of that. So to decrease it down to 50%, I would just say we wouldn't probably

grease feets and well or do I could be all for bathroom contingent even so if they only do the bathrooms they still qualify for $30,000 reimbursement that's what I think we discussed is it was an amount okay but not contingent on that if it's not the full amount they can't do it right and because i i kind of know in the sense that of all what we've discussed it's a great idea revitalizing old town keller and all m street will be ready till 2028 and you know and all of that i think it gives them that time if it's you know at least for them to move forward with everything that everybody has shared and the way they, you know, see the whole thing. I think, yeah, she's in Keller. It's revitalizing Old Town Keller. And if we do do the 50%, it's basically putting our support, which seals that private-public partnership. And if there's an option and it's possible to use all the money for a bathroom, then so be that, if it's possible.

The language of the 380 will ultimately be determined on what lands out of all of this tomorrow, plus the council's own questions. We will have to design it, and I think you were going to ask because you know that Justin knows the process well. When something is tied to reimbursement for something very specific, you have to show those exact receipts. And so we will have to maneuver through that and make sure that the 380 is pretty well outlined with what's expected.

In the sense, to throw our support, you know, to support the vision, because it does fit into the city vision. And also, to be fair to the fact that we know facade brands are for existing businesses, and so this is more like a, what we say, a precedence or whatever that we're saying. Well, it's captured. It's not out of the norm. Well, I think he had mentioned that typically it's for existing businesses, right? Typically, but not exclusively. Is that correct?

There is a use case for that Elm project. That came in and $10,000 was allocated for a demolition of a building to build that larger building that is on Elm Street. So there has been exceptions made in the past in that sense for new developments.

I literally thought you were done. No, you're fine. I was done. You're good. So just for the purpose of tonight, we've gotten staff the feedback that they'll need to fully prep for tomorrow's city council meeting, and that's our mission here. And honestly, I think 50% is a very accurate representation of kind of where everyone was at in the room. Y'all had kind of a – it's like picking out your favorite flavor of ice cream, right? Different – Shades of gray, I guess, is another way to say it. But I think it's pretty accurate representation. We could recall the vote and re-vote if you want to. But to be honest with you, I mean, it went opposite of the way I voted, right? But I do believe, just for transparency's sake, it went the way that consensus, where consensus is at from this body. I would just make a note for council that You know, we considered it like fully. There's a lot of passion. I think there is support in the room. Everyone spoke in support of some component of the project and the vision. And, you know, that's where the recommendation landed. And then Anna, Sarah, Aaron, Melanie, is there anything else you guys need from us in terms of this project?

I don't think so. I will say, and I will communicate to the city council tomorrow that 50% means you will likely not go forward with it. And then I'm sure that they will ask you some questions on that. So I will make sure that the recommendation is communicated with the caveat that if that's what they also vote on, then they will not be able to move forward with the Chapter 380.

Would it be helpful, Ross? And I'm just thinking, I'm equating this to the facade grant. So with the facade grant circumstance, so it's $10,000 as a threshold, right? But oftentimes we like to see, we no longer meet, but applicants showcase the full amount of what they're investing, even though it's over the 10,000 threshold. So in that instance, we showcase 22,000. and all the things that we're doing, which is more than 50%. In this instance with the 380, because it was such kind of a unique thing that we were navigating, the additional costs were not factored in. We were just trying to get to a reasonable number that we were proposing and being conservative in that, but also knowing these other variables that came up was the replat and these various things like we would have to move and so on and so forth. That was not initially like, thought of in this number. And so because of those additional costs, that's why I'm saying otherwise had I known that when we presented the application, we would have increased and maybe included those costs so you could see the entirety like, hey, this is what it's fully going to cost us to actually make these bathrooms happen. And from there, if you said 50% of that, then that would look a little bit different. But we already came in at our bottom number and didn't factor in those additional costs to also make this happen. So for that reason, that's the only reason why I'm saying the 50%, it's going to be far less than what we anticipated on the cost.

Because we were just giving you guys our conservative, just the... Again, you're asking for the city to pay for something like that. No, she was asking... She's asking if it is helpful information for city council.

And so to bring the number up. To see the scope. No, to see the scope.

Yeah, to see the scope. Just like with the facade grant, those additional numbers to include, and you can attest to this when you apply for your facade grant, he strictly kept to showcasing what was up to $10,000. But I know you made a significant investment beyond that, but didn't think to showcase all those various pieces.

let's go back to the purpose of these discussions right they're messier than what we get at City Council and they're messier by design because we want to get all this out on the table so that way when it comes to City Council so I would answer yeah it doesn't it does push up the number I'm not going to speak yeah it's important context but to be honest y'all I think you've done a really great job thorough job considering the application I think the recommendation speaks in support and also raises a lot of good valid genuine points and as long as Anna Sarah Melanie y'all have what you need to bring it to council I mean we've done our job and I would go ahead and give counsel a heads up that if they want to, you know, further prep, because the timeline is a little different, right? We're meeting today and then meeting tomorrow. Aaron, if you could help just making sure folks know that the video is on. Maybe it'll entice them to know that I said a lot of embarrassing things as usual. Probably not. But we've done our job and commend all of you on that. And thanks for working through also the applicant. A lot of passion here. So thanks for working with us and going through the process.

Something at the very end after the update that I would... Yeah, did you...

So, I mean, we can adjourn. I'm fine with that. Do we have an economic development update?

We do. You're welcome to take it. It's coming around. And I can give it to you really fast if you want, or I can... Thank you.

Okay, go ahead. All right.

I will do my best. So for the month of August, we have the number five is actually incorrect, because I've updated it since I gave it to the city council. It's actually 15 business CEOs, Concentric Electric of Texas Inc., Longhorn Public Adjusters, Raven Mood Collective, FX Media TV, LLC, Red Pepper, which opened today, Chinese food. Please go support them on Killer Parkway. It's 1411 Killer Parkway. So over by... Like Firehouse Subs and... Yes.

They have a nice lunch special, too. I may or may not be a sucker for food of that nature.

Yes, same, same. Okay, and then North Main Medical Office, 78 COs so far have been issued through August. And the building permits currently under review are in process. McAllister's is going through the process. Chalk and Steel, they are also working on getting it opened. This one's exciting as far as incentivized projects flexed. A 7,500 square foot youth sports concept has signed a lease with an announcement expected soon.

Oh, they signed?

Mm-hmm. That's great. Yes. Additional prospects include an MMA training school, a flying showroom, a plumbing company. So it's coming out to be, looking out to be a good combination of businesses. Where's that at? Off of Bear Creek Parkway in Chisholm. right next to Penguin Patch. Okay.

Oh, that big building that's right there. Yeah. Nice.

Yes. So we continue to have monthly check-ins with our real estate team and also at the direction of city council during the executive session last month, we have gathered quotes to appraise the city-owned property right next to Flax at 785 Chisholm Trail. And BLEX ownership has expressed interest in purchasing it. It's not a huge piece of land, but they're interested in acquiring it. A few other updates that you kept track this summer, we had some conversations with Regency Centers. who operate Kellertown Center. We just hired a muralist to develop concepts for the wall behind what used to be the former Petco across the street from Soho. And so they're gonna be bringing some concepts to the city council, hopefully before the end of the year, to start activating that space.

So they're gonna paint a mural on it?

They're gonna paint a mural.

Wow. Can we just give credit to his kids

conversations.

Yes, and then I want to make sure you all know that the Keller Citizen Awards are happening on Thursday, October 22nd at 6 p.m. at the Bowdoin. Steve's ineligible, right?

Everyone else is eligible. There will be an award for Business of the Year, so we're excited for that.

And please buy your tickets, $25 apiece, and you'll get a really good meal.

Yep.

You had a bound meal, getting a good meal. So make sure to buy your tickets, formal attire, and I'll just let you all read everything else. Awesome. Okay.

Any questions on the outfit? No, but can I add something? my time on economic development, and it's been amazing. It's been fun for me. I hope I've added value to it, and I hope people appreciate what I've done and not be mad at me all the time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.

I appreciate it. We learned so much from you. Appreciate it. We learned so much from you in these meetings. I say I've learned so much from you in these meetings.

He's like, say it again.

I can't say it again.

If you guys have questions, stuff comes up, I'm glad to answer.

Thanks for everything you've contributed. And if there's a way we can recognize you, we will do it.