Kemah Community Development Corporation - Regular Meeting

Item number three, proclamations. There's none. Item number four, board member comment, Sean. Megan?

Well, Cesar and I had a meeting yesterday with See My Legacy, which is a platform that does, for lack of a better service, crowdfunding. But you can do we think it would be really good for the adopted tree program over at 57 acre park because they could we could map out the trees for one. They would be able to see them. They would be able to go online, pay for them there if they wanted to. And it also you can set up guided tours so we could do tours around walking we could do a walking tour for the nature conservation area, Galveston Bay.

I think it would be useful for those. As we mentioned, you know, the farmers market as well. You can use it to have vendors sign up and track your vendors, do vendor management through that. So we are looking into that. And we did also meet with the National Fitness Campaign about possibly putting in a fitness studio in 57 acre park or in linear park. So we're still looking into those options, seeing what funding grants are available.

We'll take it. You. Dustin?

I don't have anything to follow that up. Well done. Welcome to the board. Nice job. These guys have a water problem. It only impacted the entire city. It's almost as if there was chances to find solutions to all these problems recently, but here we are. Hopefully, water board gets their act together and gets it fixed. We'll see. Cost of cost of lighthouses from the city a lot of sales tax. So hopefully, they get their act together. Whatever we can do to help them, we're gonna have to push them along because I don't know if they're gonna

be able

to figure it out on their own. Thanks for your

help. Number four, president's comments. I don't know if anybody saw my post, but March was second best sales tax month in the history of chemo. So kudos to that. I know today was not good news, but there is some good news out there.

I think there was a question posed on Facebook as to when when the other one was, and I'd like for Ron to go back and research it. It was December '23, but I think that's when we hired HDL and they found two or three taxpayers that had been paying sales tax, but it was not assigned to us. And we got two lump sums, I believe, that month caused us to have an extremely high number, but it was because of corrections from the comptroller. So if you get a chance, no rush, but I'd like to I I think it was last year. I think it was like Might have been February from Well, mean, I'm having December sales.

Oh, okay. I

think it was three. Substantially, there was some smaller ones, but I think there was three, but I don't if we got them all in the same month. But, but we did get a chunk of change from the HDL folks when they got done with their audit and submitted the results to us. And people were paying sales taxes, but paying it to the right agency. So, we got popped on one month too where we lost, like, 65,000, I believe, or somebody was paying Kyma and was not supposed to be paying Kyma. So it goes both directions. Mhmm. So but if we get a chance, I'd like to just validate that information, then I can get out some factual information. I just wouldn't sure. That's all I got for president's comments. Item number six, city administrative report. Caesar?

Thank you. Just wanted to take a moment and highlight the two reports that we have, the Bayheb report that Bayheb asked us to put out for the six month synopsis. But I want to take a moment and go over the regional travel impact report for the Bay Area. I just wanted to say that although we are small and still comparable to some of the other cities, I wanted reflect on where we are. The numbers keep showing, where our economic impact, where it is and how much of an effect it has through the area.

But specifically to the regional impact as how we compare to other cities in the Bay Area. We are one of the lowest, although we do have more rooms than one of the other cities that's reflected. We still have a much lower number in the Bay Area. So things could be deceiving when it comes to that. So I wanted to highlight the fact that it does play a large role in what we do, but that the numbers are dwindling. The other pages do show where our overnight leakages. This is made possible by the placer.ai software that we have. It shows you what folks are spending and the fact that we're down 3.9% year over year on what that visitor spending is. And then the average amount of monthly visitors. Folks are coming to stay.

They're staying a little bit longer, those that do. But nonetheless, it's still a little bit lower. And surprising to us, a lot of our visitors are coming from that Dallas Fort Worth area and then the second highest is Austin, San Antonio and Baymont round out our top five is where people are visiting from. But this information is pretty information for us to have to know where our leakage is going, what type of leakage we're actually getting. Obviously, as we know, we don't have enough hotels to accommodate. So, they are leaving through hotels and also through restaurant usage. Internal leakage is the same. A lot of retail leakage, obviously, going to other neighboring cities, as well as general retail and restaurant leakage. But, that concludes those two reports. But, I want to take moment and highlight that just because of the importance of what it is.

I know some of us up here, we do know the importance of what tourism provides to the city and through the form of a sales tax that keeps our property tax where it is now.

Then another thing is, I know Cesar and I have been working on it and I thought it got handled in 2023. When I got back from my trip this last time, was walking in front of Kyma Oaks picking up trash and I figured out would that be the North Side Of 518 across from Kyma Oaks. We had submitted one for repairs back in '23. It was never done. For whatever reason I haven't walked that part of it's not really Keno, it's Galveston County.

But we reengaged and pursued forward trying to get those issues resolved. There's also electrical box. The top is completely missing so there's like a five foot hole. I got a hold of Darryl out fell at the county and they were supposed to come out and resolve that issue as well. So for anybody who might be listening from that's Galveston County, know, but those sidewalks are being addressed on that side. So and then the one right here behind Walmart is also being addressed that I think ber. Actually crushed it when they were doing the one forty six repairs but. Still a little bit of research but that is being addressed so we are working on some sidewalk. Problems. The center point.

Okay.

Item eight, consent agenda. Approval of minutes from the April and eight b, updating signers on the Texas First Bank account for KCDC. Do I have a motion?

So moved.

Do I have a second?

I second.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Item nine, considering possible action to create and release an RFP for virtual assistance services. Dustin, you wanna take this one or you want me? You can take it. Alright. We've been looking at since Patty has left, maybe there might be a better way or a cheaper way for us to accomplish some of the goals that KCDC is trying to initiate.

There's a new Facebook page called Chemo Fun that I created and kinda been playing with just on my own. I've gotten quite a bit of response off of it, actually a lot more than I anticipated. I don't think we do a very good job of marketing, and I think we have a lot of smaller stand alone businesses that struggle in marketing outside of their business. I think they could help us in that way. And then also, the other main area we think they could help us is probably writing 80 to 90 of these grants that Cesar keeps working on and has been very successful at.

Not that they overwrite a 100% of them, but do the lion's share of the work and then let Cesar and his staff polish them up and finish them up and for some middle. But pulling all this documentation can be very tedious, and there's just a buttload of stuff. I mean, there's this. I've seen some of them. It's crazy, the amount of information that's required. So that's the two things. I know Dustin and I have talked to a company that I'm familiar with because I have folks that have used this company. So kind of a baseline price just from that company. Know we gotta put it up for bid, but, I mean, it's around $1,500 a month all in. And that's somebody that's gonna be well educated, and we get to decide who's gonna be that person so we could figure out who's gonna best work in those two arenas.

Is there anything I'm missing in Dustin? I know we talked about a couple of things too, some smaller stuff. But that was a lion's share of what we were trying to accomplish with this person. Like I say, we have the budget already for it, so that's not an issue. We can do it on trial basis.

If it doesn't work out, we can either change virtual assistance or we can move on forward and hire somebody directly. But directly is gonna cost us anywhere from 44 to 62, somewhere in that range at the baseline, where this one probably gonna get a college educated person for $18,000 a year. All benefits, everything included. So We're gonna sit down and go over all the local business that I think need help. And maybe even with our site,

and maybe it'll allow us to help them with their own sites.

If they'll give us access to them, we'll let that person go into their own sites. I think we'd have, I don't think we'd have any liability. We'd have to check that out. But our sites for sure, because I don't have time to do it. I mean, we need to be doing it. If you look at the people that are successful, in my opinion, in this town, they're very good at social media.

Well, that was my question. Is that include social media and things like that? Yes.

That's where I'm gonna focus on, and then we're gonna back into the grant part of it because somebody that's gonna be good in marketing is probably not gonna be good in grants. So that's gonna be something we're gonna have to teach them.

So that's that's teachable.

No. That's what

I'm saying.

That's a teachable function where marketing, you gotta have some pizzazz and understand what we're trying to accomplish. So I really think I mean, it's it's gonna be a pilot deal for me. I mean, I think I think it's got a lot of pizzazz to it because, I mean, in dealing with virtual assistant that we've been dealing with for the last couple of months, I mean, she follows up very well. She's very well spoken. The company we've been talking to puts, you know, a 100 through class, only, like, 20 of them make it through class that they actually put in in the field for what they use.

I know that the city is looking at it on the PIR side as well because, again, so many PIR's in the city that we're gonna have to address that issue. So we've been looking at that might be an alternative for the city. So not to say this one person might not be able do all of it. I don't know. That's the part. I mean, I don't know how much time it's gonna take effectively. But the other thing we can do is list properties. If we wanna really get into this, we can have a a website for KCDC and have all the available products properties. The right. Have all the brokers, have all the contact numbers, have the lease numbers, have everything readily available so when somebody does get ahold of us, I'm not spending two hours on the phone trying to track down the information for somebody. We can just go to a website and actually have some accurate information because right now we do not. So Yeah.

And and and and we do have the the the spots posted now that are available. But it's been able to keep up to date with those when they change and then also to respond to folks and and and quick follow-up. So much so that the company that that we did an actual just demo to kinda just get a feel for it. I found out later the person that did the entire demo and person been following up with us is a virtual assistant. So it was it was neat to kinda see that perspective and to see that kinda you know, I I just started inquiring. I was like, hey, know, you seem to know this very well. How long have you been doing this? I like, well, I'm actually the company's virtual assistant that does this. And so it was it was interesting to see that.

We had one that was virtual also. It was indescribable. No. What?

Sometimes better. I mean, there was some some some good stuff that

I mean, it's just

it should.

True. The times the time change is a little different, and there'll be some hurdles we gotta overcome a little bit. But we'll figure those out. That's what I'm saying. I mean, and if it doesn't work out, I mean, I know before we had a financial assistant, I guess, at one point, it was double that money. So I think we'll get a lot more bang out of our buck for this position in my opinion. I mean, I'm that's just one company. We gotta go out for bid. There's three or four companies out there. We've got a they they provided us the list of the companies to right I get

able to anything we can do to be more efficient is definitely welcome. There is some area for improvement. We're in the process of obtaining our five zero one(three). So, that will open us up to a whole new world of possible grants and sponsorships. We talked about a sponsorship package for the parks. We talked about who's going to drive and who's going to feed these softwares that we have. So there's a lot of moving parts that we'd like to look into more and learn more and do more, but we know that we don't have the capacity to increase our staff accordingly. So this could be an efficient trial that we could do and then just see how it goes.

So I guess I'm looking for a motion. It's just an RFP, so we'll have to come back with more information.

Make a motion to create and release an RFP for virtual assistant services for Casey Neeson. I'll second.

I have a first and a second. All those in favor? Aye. Alright. Go on executive session at 06:21.

Call the meeting back to order at 06:50 to do And And

do

agreement with Fish that. And Ships pending changes that we that the attorney is going to make to some of the recitals. And, again, this is a proposed order to go out or excuse me, a proposed agreement to go out, not an official agreement at this time until it is signed by both parties.

Do I have a second? Second. All those in favor?

Aye. Okay.

11 b, consider a proposal action regarding deliberation of rural property. We don't have any action tonight. Motion to adjourn.

So moved. Second. Second.

All in favor? Aye.

Aye. Six fifty three.