City Council - Regular Meeting

I will go ahead and call to order our December 11th, 2025 city council meeting for the city of Long View. Always excited to have a full chamber. Thank you guys all for being here. I know we're excited to have you. Uh tonight, District 1 Councilman Derek Connley is attending virtually. So, just a reminder to council that we will uh vote by raise of hand and make sure and wait for Derek if he wants to say something. Uh the first thing we will do is our invocation and pledge. Our prayer will be led by fellowship Christian athlete from Spring Hill, Kaylee Landu, and pledge will be led by FCA leader Brock Norris. If you two would join us up at the podium, and if everyone else would please rise. If you would please bow your head and close your eyes. Uh dear heavenly father, thank you that we're able to come today. Uh I just want to thank you for all that you've done for us. Lord, thank you for allowing us to arrive here safely. I pray that your holy spirit would just fill this room and thank you for all your blessings and all your goodness. And thank you for sending your son to die on the cross. and it's your name we pray. Amen.

Amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you guys very much. Great job. Uh, next on our agenda is citizen comment. I have two speaker cards. Uh, Miss Margie Laterski, I will start with you. Uh, we have changed the citizen comment rules. If you'll just tell us your name.

Margie Lurski. Can you hear me? Okay. Yes, ma'am. Right here. Okay. I think so. In 1993, my husband and I moved our family here to Long View, Texas. [clears throat] And in from Washington, DC. And in DC, I was diagnosed with a muscle disorder. In 1994, a gentleman ran the red light at Schoffner in Fairmont as I was crossing the loop and rolled my car over and in the ER room. That doctor knew about my muscle disorder and said, "You're going to be hurting a really, really long time unless you get your doctor to prescribe physical therapy for you at Good Shepard on Judson Road. There was a pool there. That's when I discovered how well that pool was for my body. I to this day I can still walk. There's many people with this disorder who cannot walk because they don't have an opportunity like I do. That pool is the number one pool in this community for me, for seniors. And there's a lot that can go on at that pool from 9 months old all the way to seniors. Both my daughters took mama and me classes at nine months old because when they were ready to walk, I didn't have to worry about them at grandma's [clears throat] house falling into the pool. That they were able to float long enough to stay afloat until hopefully somebody rescued them if that were to happen. Um, I when I go to Paul and Martin Jones, I like the deep water because I can do jumping jacks, I can walk, I can run, and I can bicycle in the deep water. I don't have to touch the bottom of the floor. When I go to healthy living, there's a reason I don't care for that pool. the the lanes pool goes down too declines too fast in the first lane.

When I'm standing up, I can only stand up for so long before my shins hurt. Then I have to turn before my calves hurt and then I have to get out. In the smaller pool, it's not large enough for classes. I miss all our classes. We had five classes at Paul and Martin Jones before CO and we hadn't had really any classes since. Um, the other thing in the smaller pool at at Healthy Living, there's only a 5-ft area by 5 foot where I can bicycle. I like going up and down the lanes when I bicycle. Sorry for my pause.

Yeah. All right. Thank you for your help. Thank you, Margie. Uh, Miss Barbara McDaniel, you are next. And again, you just need to tell us your name, not your address anymore. Barbara McDaniel. And I'm also here about Paula Martin Jones. Hoping that you'll okay repairing it because that is the only affordable pool in Long View and I really need it. And it it's a great pool. And by doing water aerobics, it keeps me out of nursing homes and out of hospitals. And I hope to make it to 100 with when it's fixed. And the only other thing is I hope better management. We have not had water aerobics since co and there was no reason not to have it. And also no there's no teaching swimming lessons. I would love to see preschool lessons and mama and me lessons and lesson and more lap swimming and everything. And so I hope you approve it and get it fixed. Thank you.

Thank you, Miss McDaniel. I do not have any more speaker cards. Is there anyone that would like to speak during citizen comment and then fill out a card? If not, we will go on ahead and move to our presentation items. Presentation A is presentation of a proclamation recognizing today, December 11th, 2025, as Spring Hill Panthers Volleyball Day here in the city of Long View. that will be presented by District 5 Councilman Jodie Barry Hill.

And if the girls with Spring Hill volleyball team and their coach would come on up, I'd appreciate it at this time. Woohoo. [applause] And while they're coming up here, it's an honor for me to recognize these girls because I'm telling you, a lot of people do not understand what goes into making champions and making a team that makes it to the state tournament to start with. It's a arguous process that starts in early August, but I'm telling you, there's no offseason for these girls. I know they're probably involved all of them involved in club helping to train younger girls who are going to be coming up along the ranks and I'm telling you the hours that you all have put into it. It great recognition for what you all done. Uh I just want to congratulate you and coach do you want to say anything about them before I read this?

Uh sure. Uh thank you city of Long View. Um we will say that it was our our inspiration speak uh speech by our mayor. Um um mayor came and talked to the girls and uh um I had a team dinner and so we'll say say that was that was it, right?

Um uh these girls work really hard. I'm I'm super proud of them. They represented the city really well. Um uh they they don't get frustrated. They keep a even keel. They work hard um non-stop and uh they represented their school and this community really well all the way to the state uh state tournament. Um first time in school history again um great group of kids um uh I believe in invested in people and these are really great people

and I want to say to all the parents that are out there all those times that you'd get up early in the morning and drop them off where they were able to drive thank you because this is what you helped create. Uh I'll read this now. Spring Hill Panthers volleyball day two December 11th 2025. Whereas the Spring Hill Panthers volleyball had a record of 40 and seven. And whereas the team had a tremendous run through the 2025 UIL Texas volleyball state championships making it all the way to the state semifinals. And whereas the team ended the regular season as regional champions. And now therefore, as representative for the mayor of the city of Long View, Texas, do hereby proclaim the day of December 11th, 2025 is Spring Hill Panther Volleyball Day in the city of Long View. Give it up for these girls. [applause] And if uh and all the parents, boys are still here from the FCA, all you girls right there because I know you played across from them on the court scrimmaging, come on up. Take pictures with them.

Say, Jody, come on up. Jody, you need to buy the girls some new jeans. Okay. Hey, Nil deals are not happening in the high school rank. Yeah, I think they just bring everybody.

Oh, I want a picture. Congratulations. Congratulations.

You need to think about that. What do I need to think about? Buying those new jeans. [laughter] We'll give them just a minute. [snorts]

Thank you guys for being here. Uh we will move on to presentation B, presentation of recommendations from our housing task force with Miss Shiva Marshall. Thank you so much for being here and for chairing that task force. I appreciate you very much. All right. Good evening, mayor, council members, Mr. McY. I want to start off by thanking

Maybe turn the mic. Put it up. There you go. You're a little taller than our last. Okay. Is that better? I can hear you. All right. Yeah. So, I want to start off by thanking uh you, mayor, for your confidence in me uh chairing this committee. It has been um a very good experience thus far. Um we have um really enjoyed getting these great minds together to come up with some solutions for our community. So early in the summer, uh, Mayor Shahara, she called, she had issued a co a call to service, uh, inviting residents to lend their expertise and, uh, perspective to shape Long View's future in housing. Out of that call, we had roughly about 25 citizens that volunteered and um, they stepped forward to serve on this housing task force. They represent uh, several industries. We have builders, we have investors, service um social service agencies, nonprofit leaders, and neighborhood advocates that just basically care deeply about the housing situation in the city. Their particular or their participation underscores one truth that we know, you've heard this time and time again, housing is truly the foundation of all the success of all of our families. It shapes the safety of our neighborhoods, the stability of our families, the economic success of our communities. And when families cannot find stable and affordable housing uh that will fit their income, it creates pressure on our school system, our employers, our local services, and our overall growth of our community. So for these reasons, uh the mayor charged this committee with four core responsibilities. Um to recommend ways to create additional affordable housing units, identify transitional and group

housing strategies, develop an affordable housing guide and resource list, and finally to support participation in the city's housing study. To begin this work, we dedicated an entire meeting defining affordability for Long View. And we used a lot of these statistics to come up with that definition for Long View. Uh the median household income in the city ranges from 62,000 to 65,000, which results after taxes about $57,000. And using this standard benchmark, the housing uh should cost no more than 30% of a family's income. Uh an affordable monthly housing payment uh with those numbers would be around $1,4242$25. However, the median new home prices in Long View topple around $300,000, which is far beyond what most working families are able to afford in our community. Um, with this context in mind, we established three com subcommittees within this committee so that each subcommittee could really dive into all of the core responsibilities that the mayor taxed us with. Uh, the three subcommittees are shelter and transitional housing, rental housing, and home ownership and new construction. So the shelter and and let me say this um to start off these are the top three recommendations for each subcommittee. Okay. Um to start off with the shelter and transitional housing. This committee examined our existing shelter system and the barriers individuals face when trying to access um m and maintain

stable housing. So, if you see here, Long View is very, very fortunate than a lot of other cities in East Texas because we do have a great landscape of agencies that support transitional housing, and our unhoused individuals. Uh they are Highway 80, House of Hope, Salvation Army, East Texas Women's Center, and House of Disciples. But despite these efforts, we still face several challenges which include and you've heard this previously mental health and uh substance use that maintains or to or remains to be one of the major barriers of stability in our community and it's not just unique to Long View. This is a national issue. Also, many individuals are not connected with consistent case management. Um there are other individuals that will avoid shelters because of lack of support for pet accommodations and overall our transitional housing capacity is just limited. It it's very limited. So our top three recommendations from the shel for shelter and transitional housing include creating an unbudsman program to help individuals our vulnerable indiv vulnerable individuals manage rental obligations and this will hopefully help prevent homelessness and evictions from the start. So, if you have someone that is responsible or who can be responsible for helping individual identified individuals um pay their rent or pay their utilities and make sure that they're getting the case management that they need concerning whatever their whether it be substance abuse or mental illness, this will hopefully help us on the front end so that we're not having to count them at the point in time count. Okay. Um,

number two, explore mechanisms for mandated mental health evaluations when appropriate. Um, so individuals can be connected to the uh, I'm sorry, to the essential services. And then number three, to strengthen our partnerships that already exist with housing uh, trans transitional uh, programs to create a handoff of pathways to enhance the coordination with our behavioral providers. and that's going to be GLOW Post um special health resources and community healthcare. And one way that we can create this seamless uh process is through coordinated entry. I'm sure you've you've heard that several times. Uh our next subcommittee was our rental housing subcommittee and they concentrated strategies that would not only expand our rental housing here locally, but to also protect the supply that we currently have. Uh it included examining zoning barriers, reviewing incentive programs, and identifying opportunities to maintain the re and rehab our aging housing stock because we did find out that we do have an aging housing stock here locally. Uh the group also emphasized the importance of strengthening relationships with landlords. that was probably one of the top uh issues and ensuring that landlords and tenants have the information and tools that they need to support um better relationships between between tenants and landlords. So, the top three recommendations for rental assistances, I'm sorry, for rental housing is first um to emphasize a stronger public engagement and better

data. We don't have a lot of local data concerning our rentals uh our rental properties here in Long View. Uh this includes publishing a comprehensive rental resource guide for both law for I'm sorry for both landlords and participants or landlords and tenants. I've got my housing hat on. I apologize. um hosting quarterly landlord roundtables to pro to improve communication and education because we found that there are a lot of landlords they have a property they put it on the market somebody's in it but they don't really they're not really educated on what it takes to be a landlord. There are also several programs in our community that currently exist that help a lot of our citizens with, you know, rental payments um if they need to be connected to other resources, but our landlords are just not educated on that. And there's not a central place where landlords can go and click to find, okay, how can I help my tenant? It's very expensive for landlords to have this cycle of tenants. You get one tenant out, you have to do a make ready, you get another tenant. So, this helps the landlords as well. Okay, I'm sorry. Let me go back. Uh, the third recommendation is a review of current ordinances and policies um that may identify some reforms that are needed to increase our rental supply. This includes expanding zoning and uh to allow more multif family and mixeduse housing to simplify approvals for small infield projects uh for duplexes, triplexes, forplexes, and

accessory dwelling units, also uh known as ADUs. uh permitting adapted adaptive reuse of underutilized commercial property and spaces and implementing a tiered um inspection system for landlords to um basically when we're talking about getting data that we don't have for rental properties. coming up with a program that will allow landlords to list their or list their their properties with the city to say, "Hey, I have this rental property. This is how much the rental property is." Give all of the details, square footage, and things of that nature. and we could come up with an incentive so that landlords would want to this would help us one to understand how many rental properties we have at any given time. We can do this now with the subsidy program but we want to be able to do this. We only have 1,200 vouchers. We know that. So we want to have some type of database for all citizens to know okay these are rental properties that we have. these are landlords. That also kind of helps us to establish better relationships with these landlords. And we could um create a inspection system to where we're going out, we're inspecting these units. if these units routinely pass the inspection, um there's some type of incentive there, whether it be um you know, tax uh incentive or that's something that the committee is willing to continue to develop, but we are looking to have some type of database so that we can keep track of the rental units in the city. Okay. Okay. And our last subcommittee is new construction and home ownership. This

committee focused on increasing access to attainable homeownership which is very very essential to our tax base and the economic mobility of citizens in Long View. While Long View continues to grow, the supply of entrylevel housing is decreasing exponentially. um it's it's definitely not keeping pace with the needs of working families, young professionals, and first-time home buyers. So, in looking at um some of the market challenges we have here, we see that the current market analysis shows that Long View basically needs about 320 homes over the next five years. And those homes need to be within the affordable range. But as we talked as I as I stated before right now we're looking at 300,000. So how do we decrease the number I mean how do we decrease the cost of these houses to increase the opportunity for families to be home buyers? Well, one of that is looking at or one of those ways are looking at barriers in zoning um inventory costs for developers and permitting. So, our first recommendation for this subcommittee is to expand and rename a program that we already have, which is the slip program. Um, we're looking or we are recommending to rename this program the Safe and Livable Incentive Program. And this would make the the program available citywide, not just for new construction homes, but for existing homes as well. Okay. Um expanding this program is going to offer benefits such

as permit fee reductions, um partial tax abatements, and a fasttrack permitting uh process to help lower the costs for developers. One of the things we we do have a few developers on our task force and one of the things that they continue to say is it cost us money when we can't get our permits. It's costing us money. And so it's not a dig at at at any city department. It's just a matter of sitting down to see, okay, is there any wiggle room in the current processes that we have that could help developers um get their permits so that they can get these projects completed in a shorter period of time. Secondly, we're proposing to modernize zoning to unlock more land for attainable housing. And this would include again um legalizing like the duplexes, triplexes and forplexes and cottage courts. And this is something that is actually uh talked about in the housing study. uh when we had our first housing study open house uh I was really taken aback because a lot of the citizens there are very interested in different types of housing more non-traditional housing than what we have had here in the city before. So that that was that was pretty interesting. And then uh lastly, the final recommendation is establishing voluntary inclusionary incentives. And that's more so um with the slip program. We're really thinking that there's some things that we can do to enhance the slip program to make it more aware, make the public more aware of it. There's a lot of confusion with that program. Um I in the housing department I get emails and calls all the time you know wanting to know okay who do I go to what are the qualifications

and how do we make the most of this program. So I think if we take or we think if we take that program that we already have and just see okay what are the possibilities with this program that would be very helpful for the new construction of the city of Long View. Okay, our housing study engagement um Dietrich Johnson and I we talk with M matrix what about every 3 weeks or so. They are extremely excited. Um to date we have 578 community surveys that have been submitted 48 stakeholder questionnaires and 58 employer questionnaires. And a couple of meetings ago when they gave us uh other another set of numbers and I was thinking okay well gosh we've got to get those numbers up. They said oh no this is the best of any city that we have worked with your size. So I want to thank the community uh the city of Long View as a whole for pushing us forward in this and I think we can even do better. So we're going to continue to push for engagement with this housing study going forward. So, our next steps, we are going to be providing uh council members with a detailed report that's going to include a full analysis with case studies of other cities that have been very successful and a lot of the recommendations that we're bringing for you today. And uh lastly, Matrix is on track to present to you in May to give you the final results of the housing study. And before I close, I would like to uh ask any of the task members that are here, I know there are a few that are here, if they would stand. [applause] I think we had a few more in the

overflow, but this task force has worked very hard to get us to where we are right now. We understand that, you know, this is this is the we're in it for the long game and um we are open to any questions that council may have. We are looking forward to continue to move forward with whatever marching orders that council gives us.

Thank you. Any questions, comments, or discussion for Shiva? No, I just like to say thank y'all for the time and effort that y'all put into this. Um the only uh question I have is like on the unbudsman program. I know um we use the umbus with the state and it's like a advocate to kind of prevent things from happening and help move things along. So, how would it work with that? Is this just a volunteer person or

Yes. So, we're looking at pulling because we didn't even get to talk about funding. I'm glad you guys did ask us that because we're we're coming back to the table to to come back with some funding issues but or solutions. But it would definitely be another call to citizens to say, "Okay, hey, who's willing to volunteer to be a part of this this this committee and there would be of course a ton of training because there's a lot of training that that goes on and we want those volunteers to be uh educated in what it is that they're doing because they would be helping definitely some of our most vulnerable citizens.

Would that be maybe where they would be repay?" Okay, that's what I figured you were. Yes. Interesting. Yep. And then the other thing I definitely agree with the expansion of the slip program because I think that'll help out a lot because especially with existing homes. I think a lot of people have a lot of problems with trying to even get permits and remoding those homes and they will definitely be willing to accept people and it be affordable housing.

Absolutely. Good deal. Yeah. Thank you. I've really enjoyed listening to the data you guys prepared and all of those ideas. That was definitely creative ideas that I'm excited about. Did you add something? No, I was just going to say echo on the expand the slip program. I remember somebody in Ray's district was like arbitrarily just right outside the line and they're building affordable homes and it's like can you just

like I'm right there. I just the line was drawn just here and it's just that kind of thing. And so um I don't know the downside as far as other practical reasons for that but I think that's an interesting thing to look into as well. Uh plus again appreciate all the work the task force did um on this. definitely helps, guides us and gives us that uh information that we needed. Thank you.

Good. Yes. Thank you so much. Appreciate you and the task force. Uh next item on our agenda is discussion item A, discussion regarding the city's market pay plan and potential survey cities, Mr. Matt Wely, who is here with us in person. Welcome, Matt. Thank you for being here.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of council. Oh, sorry. Staff, go ahead. Go ahead, Derek. Mayor Shark, I'm sorry. I need to step away for a minute. Sounds good. We'll see you in a minute. All right. Thank you. Very good. Good evening. Yeah, appreciate the opportunity to visit with you in person. Uh picking up from a November 13th council discussion and some further input and conversations that we've had a chance to have uh driven by your feedback. I've got some updates uh to share. Any other discussion or any other questions that I'll either answer, artfully dodge, go do more research on, [laughter] you know, certainly let us know. Uh couple of quick reminders on both the methodology as well as the intended timeline. Certainly arriving here both in November now and I think hopefully no later than the January uh discussion to get final approval on survey cities. So getting some direction and comfort level from you all really kind of creates this green light. We'll be going out then and on your behalf collecting salary plans, job descriptions, organization charts and really building out a custom salary survey database. The entire intent is to establish the going rate for each of your jobs um representative of local, regional or maybe like situated comparison and competitor cities. Um talking through that data then in the spring to bring forth recommendations to any updates as necessary. Uh revisiting perhaps compensation policy or philosophy. So the numbers that we're going to generate I would say in part are just that they're numbers. We don't want to back you into a corner. We'll definitely facilitate some conversations around where you want to be, you know, in the world. So, answering the two biggies, how are we doing compared to those we're competing with? And then ultimately, where do we want to land that will allow us to recruit and retain staff. Some of the feedback that we heard uh after the November meeting kind of helped frame up um the next slide that's coming, which is probably the little bit more overwhelming eye exam that that's coming. But ultimately, you know, the the major frame up here is what cities have jobs like ours, right?

And I'm very intentional that I say it that way because my mission is to compare jobs, right? It is very easy, I think, to get wrapped up in comparing cities. Uh there are some nuances that I want to honor so that if we do need to normalize the data for differences such as cost of living, cost of housing, differences in median income, median home price, we can go further on uh and look at things like general fund size, staff size. Ultimately, I think the top bullet point wins on this slide, and that is cities of our like population that also have like services. that gives me a fighting chance at surveying as many of your jobs as possible to honor just that first ask and that is what is the going rate for our city job descriptions and our city classifications. So obviously that extends to public safety, civilian, you've got a lot of services including utilities, library, you have in-house attorney, you have some housing positions, you have sanitation, you know, all of those things are not jobs that we see at every city that we have a chance to work with. And so we won't get data for all of your jobs, but I really want to kind of have a fighting chance. There's a few that are going to be a little bit lighter on data points and I just know that kind of going in because not everybody has sanitation, for example, not everybody, you know, has housing. So not to say that we can't get some data, but ultimately the other feedback that we had broadly was a sensitivity to competition amongst our competition. Right? I think historically looking at cities maybe five to six up and five to six down on population led us to include probably no less than three four metroplex cities uh depending on where you go around the metroplex there's a lot of pressure on those cities to compete and so um I don't know that I would really fuzzy up the numbers just yet but I want to throw that on the wall

and come back to it from the standpoint of if we need to normalize the data there will be some noise associated with differences in cost of living. Um the abundance or absence of competition. Set another way kind of are we a regional city with a lot of um open space on on in every direction or are we a city right in the middle of 50 other cities? Right? So when I look at population there's some interesting cities that pop up because some are right in the middle of the the metroplex. They have a lot of neighbors and a lot of pressure on them. The chart that you'll be familiar with, we added a little bit more detail on the right just so that the font got smaller. Um, what I split this up to was really a population sort. Those on the top set there in black are agencies that I don't want to say, hey, they're in, but I feel like they're in, right? I didn't get any feedback or concern about the population or the other attributes. So, Tyler, Witchah Falls, St. Angelo, Baytown, Temple, Brian, Mansfield, Missouri City, North Richland Hills, Tex Arcana. Now, couple of outliers in either direction for population. Um, Tyler's a regional player certainly. Uh, Tex Arcana on the other end of the spectrum as far as population goes, regional player. And in between there is predominantly five up and five down on population. in the blue. These are agencies that were mentioned in the council member feedback that came to us over the last couple of weeks. So, we dug in and did some research. Um, I'll say while I'm on that topic that I kind of like San Marcus and Victoria. Um, Conroe touts itself as the fastest growing city in the United States. So, we have that, you know, to consider. New Bron Falls has a lot of um, I would say outside tourism dollars coming in. So their revenue streams look

a little bit different. The general fund, you know, not terribly dissimilar at all, sitting at 110 million general fund. They've got about 150 more employees. Um certainly, you know, as I get into the minutia on the right, which again is a little bit more comparing cities than it is comparing jobs. There's some differences here in median home price. You know, median household income. distance to major metro is another kind of driver that gets us to the the top list there in the black font. And then original ones that we had um down below that based on council feedback we would say are okay to remove lander for growth. Uh flower mound and rowlet also expressed certainly you know median home price some of the other you know income statistics cost of living um indirectly maybe cost of wages you know come out as a little bit of an outlier. And so this chart really reflects, you know, in black. I didn't hear too much back about like, ooh, absolutely yes or absolutely no. And heard some good feedback like absolutely yes. So I feel pretty good about the cities that are up top. And then out of the blue pondering, you know, one or two of those when I look at, you know, the data and I haven't looked at any specific numbers, but a San Marcus kind of an interesting one. U they've got most of the services in common. Victoria also most of the services in common they're going to be a little bit smaller. So a couple of other things to keep in mind you know our preference as a third party would be to over survey for a moment right what I mean by that and I would I would love to say we have 10 cities I think we're going to end up with more than that but I would like to reserve the right to come back if we survey 14 cities and tell you out of these 14 cities who has most jobs in common. Okay, before I get stuck maybe on the dollars and cents of who pays way more or who pays way less,

a good comparator in my world is do they have a lot of our jobs in common? So know that you won't quite wear out our welcome, but my preference would be to survey and come back to you and say, "Hey, we tried and we're going to leave Tex Arcana in there even though they only had 80 of our 200 jobs." Or we might leave a Victoria in there even if they only had 100 of our 200 jobs. But there could be a few others. So, I want to, you know, kind of stamp this in a couple of directions. We've got, sure, this one-time clash of symbols may be coming in the spring of where are we at, you know, kind of thing, but bigger than that, broader than that, can we establish this body's comfort level so that staff has direction anytime in the future. The last time the survey was done was about 2022, 2023 results. So, we're kind of on that three to five, five to sevenyear arc. I would love for you all to not have to to wrestle with this every single time. However, you know, let's use this as an opportunity to bring you data, right? Just to kind of arm you to get to a comfort level and make some decisions driven around the data. My fine print at the bottom, we would include local private sector. So, equipment operators, mechanics, laborers, accounting clerks, administrative support. Those are positions that have a high portability on a local level between the public and the private sector. Okay. So, I want to at least acknowledge what's going on locally where possible to bring in not just maybe cities from afar, but also local private business from up close. There are plenty of nuances between pay and benefits. I don't have benefits in my scope, but I am interested in bringing forth some of that pay data for you. And then ultimately if we need to normalize the data, let's normalize the data, right? I want to bring forth probably non-fuzzy numbers. Yeah. For a moment and then allow to react, right?

And establish kind of that baseline of where do we want to be in this mix of 10, 12, 14 cities. Can we monitor them in their off years because they're doing colas, they're doing merits, they're doing step increases on a regular basis. So we take advantage of the data. We reestablish our market position and then we talk about those non-servey years for maintenance, salary, administration and upkeep where we kind of partner with your staff on a little bit more quieter, you know, kind of upkeep type of thing. So, the direction that we need again, you know, any initial reactions like, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe you forgot." Or, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe you had that one on there." I definitely need those. If there's any additional research that I or my staff can do um to, you know, get to that kind of January council meeting, I'll go back to the specific list of cities so we can talk about that. But, you know, the clock isn't quite ticking yet, right? I need the direction u to establish those survey agencies. Um the great commission then lets me go get, you know, some data and bring that to you in the spring. Uh we'll still, you know, be in plenty good shape for your budget discussions. Uh, but that probably pushes me into kind of an Aprilish, April, May. So, uh, I'll pause there for a moment. This is the overwhelming slide. Um, any questions, comments, feedback that I might be able to either take back and do some more research or potentially answer for you this evening.

Go for it. I just want to say, Matt, thank you for meeting with us as well in regards to some of the for the peer cities and stuff like that. Um, ultimately I think that the updated list improves consistency and gives a better review of like the different peers that we want to look at. Um, and so and I think that like you mentioned it was the uh over survey. I think that's a great um method to go to in case we need to remove a you know a couple or so like that. It's better to have the data and not need it than don't have the data and need it. So I appreciate that. So overall, I I feel very comfortable with the list and we can keep our eyes on New Bronals and Conro like you mentioned. So thank you.

Okay. So you're comfortable with the 10 and black and the four and blue is what we're saying. Y Okay. How's everybody else? That's hard to say. I I got to echo what John said. I was able to sit in and you explained a lot of stuff why it's important for us to go with kind of be that mid-range city and go with five that's above us and five that's below because I really had a lot of questions with that. you know, when you talk about some of these cities and then when you got done, the way you explained it, especially the ones that are sitting there in blue, uh it made a whole lot more sense to me and I like that. Uh I think you did a great job explain it and I can't wait to begin seeing what you bring us uh going forward.

Very good. Without a doubt, it was good. Great. Um I definitely agree. Um I like the um the ones that you're considering adding or whatever. really especially San Marcus, Victoria or whatever and definitely removing the ones in red. So definitely agree with that. Very good. Thank you for that.

Anybody else? Otherwise, we're considering this blessed or till next time. We'll see you next time. [laughter] Everybody else good. Okay, I think we're good. Thank you, Matt. Very good. Appreciate you very much. Have a great Christmas. Thank you. We will move on to we still presentation. Nope. discussion discussion item B presentation of proposed one-time expenditure projects Mr. for Rand McY

and and thank you so much. First off, I want to say I'm I'm really excited actually this has been a long journey for us to get here to be able to talk about these one times and and council knows that from time to time in years past, I've recommended as part of the budget proposal one-time purchases here and there for fire trucks, which you guys have done a great job with that. Uh uh don't have to have that conversation again, which I'm really super excited about. uh and there it was visionary. But the other things we've not done those some of these items have actually been in the proposed budget originally for as long as three years ago and we've had a rough couple of cycles in budget. It's been tough. We've we've really had to keep drag budgets across the finish line and we've been unable to do these things and we've foregone one-time expenditures in the interest of keeping our pay competitive and and moving forward with the same tax rate. Y'all have done a fantastic job. So here recently the move to the 15% which is just is just such a long-term vision that you that council had the had the wherewithal to do that as well as the fire apparatus pay plan. I know I sound like a broken record but that was visionary for the long-term sustainability of the city and you guys need to celebrate that. So without anything else coming back into the fund, just with what we have based on what council has authorized thus far, there remains $3.6 million in the unallocated reserves. This is based on estimates from last year when we first started using the numbers. That's why they haven't moved. We're not done with the audit. Uh from time to time, we add money back in from year to year, which I anticipate we'll do, but until we get done with the audit, we won't know that. So, uh, I want to, uh, thank number one, I want to thank staff

time that's gone into preparing this. And Maryanne and I have had lots of conversations about what we think. These are the things we really think rise to the level of council's priorities. And quite frankly, what I consider organizational priorities. And hopefully those will align with what you believe are the things to do. Thank you each of you for taking time out of your busy weeks. I think I got squeezed in on a FaceTime call because trying to give make time with people, but every one of you came in, devoted time, went over the projects, toured some of the facility areas, and I can't thank you enough for the time that you've given me. So, a lot of this is old hat to each of you, but I'm going to introduce each project and the budgeted estimate, which this is my uh this is my Angela moment in the slide. This is the the asterisk with the numbers. We didn't go too far down the road in vetting these numbers. They're they're budgeted estimates. I it what I will tell you is I anticipate we'll beat them all, but I don't want to come in here with a number that's low and give you false aspirations for where we're going to land at the end of the projects. So, I'll talk through each one. The first one is a fuel station. This is a a supplemental, I think is the best way to say it, a supplemental fuel supply. So right now the city has a large fleet. They have nearly 500 vehicles in rolling stock. And so that means things with wheels. Not all of them have engine, but most of them do. And so when you have that many vehicles, everyone goes to the gas station and buys fuel and knows that you pay more for fuel if you have a car that doesn't get as good a gas mileage. We have lots of equipment in public works that doesn't get good gas mileage. It's the nature of the equipment that we put to do the jobs that we perform. And and having a fuel station, we we have a fuel

card right now that we can go to any station and we get a we get a better deal on fuel because of negotiated rates for these fuel cards, whether it be through enterprise fuel cards or whether it be through negotiated fuel contracts by different purchasing cooperatives. So, we do save some money from what we pay at the pump uh on in our personal vehicles. But what a fuel station would allow us to do is is enter into the wholesale market where what you do is you can get fuel at wholesale and maintain the station and make that return or that savings, whatever your investment is, you can make that back. right now roughly depending on the vehicles we think three to five years by the number of vehicles but by the savings in gas volume alone with a million dollar investment we believe we would recoup that $1 million investment in a gas station or a fueling station in no less than five years. So, it's a great thing. And then when you think about the fiscal constraints that we've had on our economy, on our budgets, not only would we recover what we're putting into this, we would we would get annual savings from here on out for that fuel, which would help us keep providing the services that we're providing at a reasonable rate

of 200 to 250 then, right? Yes. It's about $200,000 a year savings on the on the low side and and upwards of 340 or somewhere around there. It just depends on how it hits. You have to understand not all of the vehicles are going to be able to use that, right? Because people that are trying to do building inspections or uh policemen that are surveying the beat and working areas and fire stations, you don't want fire stations driving all over to one location in town. So, we're still going to be dependent on our fuel cards. But if we place this one strategically where the worst gas mileage vehicles are, which is public works, we're going to get our return out of those folks because we'll be able to we'll be right by the station and it'll improve our efficiency out in the field. So that's our first project. The second project is city hall renovations. So this is a crucial update needed at city hall. So the two areas that we're talking about remodeling are with the information services group and the finance group. So everybody knows city hall was built and you may not know this but I every city hall was built in 1976 nearly 50 years ago and we have a variety of smallcale renovations that we've done from time to time. There have been a few in our wing. There have been a few here and there. There have been very small things that have happened, but the last major investment was mostly uh just convenience, updated carpet, paint, new seings. We've just not remodeled the spaces much. We have put people and shifted people in move cubicles around through city hall for some time. So, most of them were just cosmetic. However, I want you to think about since that time, since the early 2000s, the city's business and collective reliance on technology to serve our citizens has

grown immensely. The world looks different than it looked two decades ago. And when you think about that, information services group originally had four to six people. We have 20 information services folks, over 20. And so we've shifted people around to try and make do and get biggest footprint, but we've they don't have adequate space. So the the picture in fact you're seeing is of a cubicle that is shared by two people. And when more than two people are working on something and you've got three trying to figure out what's going on because technology is is is very difficult to troubleshoot. They just they're crammed for space and and it has an effect on morale and these folks in information services, the folks in finance, those are extremely important positions that keep the backbone of the city running. And we have the retention we've got to work on. We're recruiting well. We're keeping the people that have been here for a while, but that two to sevenyear period when people come to work for us here and they have to share a cubicle for three years, it does it is difficult to be to keep your morale up. Secondly, the space that information services uses was originally designed and that's actually where my first office was in the in the city over 25 years ago was in a small office because it was where all the engineers were. All the engineering techs were outside and there was plan tables for the contractors and the building official and the engineers to lay out plans and work collectively. That's not the kind of environment and the kind of work that happens in the finance division. Finance division needs to be concentrating on payroll or I'm sorry on bills on on opening up purchase orders, vendor payments, auditing and that space requires some individualized space. So

those of you that have toured that and gone through that space, you they've put up cubicles that are as tall as walls because that's the workspace they needed. And so this money, this $700,000 budget would allow us to flip those two spec spaces and lay out better working spaces for both of those groups that are more suited suit suited towards the work they do. The next project that I want to bring forward is one that city council's aware of. You see the picture of the new pool liner that was put in with the annual operations and maintenance budget that was proposed a year before last, I believe. And once we actually did the liner, got the liner installed, the under drains failed. The under drains, at the time of this, these numbers that I prepared in mid November, we did not have the bids for the under drain replacement and decking replacement. Those bids are here. It's $417,000. And you've heard two of our citizens here tonight talk about just this project. So, I know y'all are familiar with that one. So, I won't belver that anymore. The next one is development services renovation. There this is also an issue and it goes back to when we purchased this building. We purchased the Texas Workforce Commission building in 2007 and at the time of the remodel like every other decision that we make. We did the best we could with the funds we had available. So that was nearly 20 years ago. It served us pretty well but it's pretty worn. And one of the things that we did was we chose to place the carpeting over existing flooring tile that contained asbests, which that is not a problem. It was not airborne. There was no problems with it. But when we made that choice to place carpet on top of it, that meant you can't replace the carpet again. It was a one-time thing that you can do because when you start to pull and replace a

carpet tile or this worn path that you've been seen, you pull you you open the danger of the asbestous becoming airborne. So basically, it's lived its useful outlived its its life because of the traffic. So when you think about the development services group, the people where people come into that group to invest in Long View, they come to say, "Hey, this is great. we're we're here to build new single family homes that we need. What happens is they see that that's the investment. That's the first impression they get with us. So the development services department from the initial reaction is thought they're asking what are we walking into? It has made it back to me that customers have actually said, "When are y'all going to get something done about the carpet?" This was actually proposed in the budget three years ago. It was had to be removed to get it across the finish line. So this is a real thing that needs to be done. It's the first step because you can't do any efficiency remodelings. You can't touch anything until the as until the asbestous has been remediated. So we're going to try some different flooring that is not does not wear like this in the appropriate spaces because you have to remember contractors are coming in. They have booths. They're in the construction field. That's what they do for a living. It's just not the right kind of flooring for the application at at 410. So that is $300,000. I do believe that'll still come in below that because we do have some spaces now that the municipal annex is opened up that we can do temporary housing of some offices to better accomplish this and hopefully reduce that cost in the long run. The next is a community attitude survey for $125,000. And uh this is to to quote someone that I talked to about this. They said I way said, "What's a community attitude

survey?" And I said, "Well, Laura Hill told me it needed to be in here." So I put it in there. But uh actually one of the things about this is that when we apply for grants throughout the community or for opportunities for our community, we need something that's statistically valid, that's representative of each area in our community as well as each council district that's up toate to gauge public opinion about the programs that we're applying for grants for. We're still using great data from 2015, but the 2015 comprehensive plan data now we're competing with people with for grants with 10-year-old data and other people have grants that are more competitive their applications because they have more real time data. the returns on that. I'm sure Laura can tell you about the returns on the grant program, but this is a small investment for the long-term rewards that we're getting out of the grants that we apply for. And last but not least is the Long View Animal Care and Adoption Center. Uh it's there's a repetitive team theme if you think about this. It's been 10 or 20 years on every one of these items before we're talking about them. It's been about 10 years since we've had the animal digtor. And so what I want to talk about that the digtor at this is at the end of its life. Uh the the nature of a digesttor and the process is a very costic environment. There are lots of chemicals involved in that. They are just they are very messy machines as far as environments and it is at the end of life. and and the reason that this one-time purchase is something that needs to be done, I'm going to go back to the morale and retention. So, when I've lost animals in

the past on my own, and there's nothing harder about about disposing of the animal that I've lost, that's that's a terrible thing, and I wouldn't wish it on anybody. But the flip side is they do that. Unfortunately, they have to do that because the dogs that can't be adopted out or for whatever reason need to be put down. And that is destructful to their morale. It is taxing on those employees. And if you don't think it takes someone special to work at the animal shelter, spend a day there. This is part of the retention investment we need to make by replacing a piece of equipment that has at the end of life. So, in summary, the these items come up to about $2.7 million in aggregate. Um, the thought process, Mayor, I appreciate you letting me bring these forward to council for discussion because these are things I have talked about for some time and she has known about them because I have not let her forget about them. These are things that need to be done and I would certainly appreciate council's consideration of these moving further. And that concludes my presentation.

Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Questions, comments, discussion? Go ahead, Miss Mark. So, on the um the fuel station, so is it just going to be for public works? No, it will be accessible for everyone, but the returns are based on about 75% anywhere between 50 and 75% of the fleet using that for a period of three years.

And so, it'll be like regular gas and diesel. Yes. Yes, ma'am. And then I will say this about the parl palibarton um uh swim pool. Um for me, I think that we really need to think about what that it accommodates everyone from youth to the elderly. And I think it's really important that we understand that we have a community that really depends on that pool. And it wasn't the the because when we went back to people talking about, well, it wasn't that used that often. Well, it wasn't used that often is because of it was always something wrong. And we're to the point now that we're neglecting a certain population in this community and we owe it to them to continue what we've always offered them. This is this is part of their quality of life. This is what they depend on and I would hate to see it go to waste with all the money that we've already put into this project to say, "Okay, no, we're not going to do it." It wouldn't make sense to me. And that's what I have to say about that. And then on the survey, my question on that is is how is this survey going to be done? I would really like to it for it to be well thought out so that it can be diverse because oftent times we have the same people doing the same survey and we really don't get a great what the feel of the whole city is because you have the same people participating in those surveys. So, I would if we're going to invest um what how what's the price on that? $125,000 on a survey. I would really like to see the plan on how it's going to be brought about.

Yeah, it's a good comment. I fill out all the surveys. Yes. Go ahead, Laura. What would you like to add on that? Okay. Uh if you decide to approve this, then we would do an RFP. We would want the council to be involved in scoping out the project. Um the last one we did we did um we take every department and ask about how the community feels about them. We also ask about their priorities for the community. We um challenge the consultant to guarantee a minimum of for example 125 responses per council district. So there's parity uh there's no bias um but you will be involved from A to Z in the entire process. So we are asking the questions you want answers to for budgeting purposes prioritization. Uh of course I have my little angle. I want data for grants. But um you know it's hard I can say the 2015 survey thanks to the depth and scope of that process that was for example responsible for the city of Long View getting our cultural district in the first goaround because we had excellent community data. It wasn't staff saying it was right. It's what the public wanted and that's what many funders want to know is what do your citizens want and are you doing what they prioritize?

Would it be possible or feasible to do just door knocking with it? Because I understand the com like when we put it out it's an online survey so it's only people that are doing online surveys. Could we do something more engaging like meetings in certain areas or knocking on doors? If you recall what we did in 2015, we had that massive meeting at the Belchure Center. Mhm.

Uh so it includes public meetings, it includes mailouts. Uh there will be an opportunity for online surveys. It will that's why it's so expensive. We want feedback. There's a mail out. There will be because we have to guarantee that each of your districts is equitably represented.

Yeah. I was trying to think about how we go to them as opposed to them coming to us, which would be public meeting or online survey. But how do we go to them? That is up to the consultant. Okay. I can tell you for example, Mosquite and San Antonio do these every other year. They use them for budgeting. Their councils do.

So, um they have the the protocols to guarantee we are getting what we want and what we need to help us move forward equitably and listening to the majority of our citizens. a good representative sample because we have lots of people that don't even know who to call but they may want more swimming pools. So, okay.

Okay. You good, Mr. Alen? Okay, Miss Hill. Yes, sir. On the survey, it's it's titled an attitude survey. Does that mean Do you like your city council or you don't like them or you like I mean what what do you mean by attitude survey?

It's more about do you like sanitation being one day a week? Uh do you think um the environmental health department inspects restaurants enough things like that?

So it's about the city offices or is it the city services? Oh, it's about the city services. City services. And what do you envision for the city? Do you want more parks? Do you want fewer parks? Uh should we build a branch library? Um

well now the excuse me the um previously was it when we had it out at Belure that time? That was is that been about was that 10 years back or when was that? Yes sir. We actually started in 2013. We had a lot of public input there. Is it are we going to try to do the same thing or will this all just be through correspondence?

Yes, sir. We will we will have public meetings. But will we have the big meeting like we had out at Belure or I mean that that seemed to me is very We could do it at Mob. We could do it at your house. Whatever. Don't think I have room. But um in other words, I I Yes. I felt very positive what we had out there. We had a good feedback. Mod Cobb would be an excellent place to have it

where where the where you try to u get the general public to oh mercy. You try to get the general public to come out and express their opinions. Uh I'm oldfashioned. I kind of like the face to face and attitude of the people u standing around and talking to each other and then looking at what other people post and saying well you know I hadn't thought about that or I would like to see more of that. you know, when when you do a a pre-planned survey, uh it's kind of the person doing the survey makes up the questions where if you've got a group of people all at one place like Mod Cobb for one evening, then then you I think you can have more of a general conversation with the people.

We need both. We want the people who are willing to drive and express their opinions in a public forum. And then we want to hear from the people who don't think it's worth their time, but they still live here and pay taxes. And we need to hear from them, too, about what their priorities are

on these survey questions. Will there be a area where they can write additional comments and that we will we're not just going to have them check the boxes and we'll feed it in a computer? Absolutely. there. So there will be additional comments such as that on the

if you will go back ha and read the comprehensive plan in totality you can see all the comments we we captured we received previously yes sir okay yes

one other not not with Laura not with Laura anything else for Laura yeah I mean I just want to say on Cindy's point is like we should call it community satisfaction survey. No, we will call it whatever you want. I'm so happy. I appreciate your time, Laura. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Allen, do you have one more thing? Yes. On the public works on the gas on the gas and diesel. Uh I previously talked to I previously talked to Rand about this. Rin, how many vehicles do we normally house at that facility uh at night? public works is about 200 of the 493 vehicles.

Okay? So, there's about 200 and and the benefit would be uh they don't have to go someplace else to fuel up. In other words, they can fuel up when they get back that night. Anytime you're running a truck in operation, it's always better to fuel at night and that way in the morning you go ahead and do what you need to do.

Ready to roll in the morning? Yes, sir. Now, uh we will have gas and diesel I'm sure these sir. Yeah. And these will be at the public works facility. I call it the garage, right? Within that within very close proximity was the intent. We had a originally we had a layout that uh was just talked about. So this isn't but it's it's shown here. There was an existing gas station that was a natural gas station at the at the corner.

Yes. Uh we we there may have been some real estate movement on that. We're not really sure and we didn't want to start poking around without having the discussion with council, but the thought process was adjacent to the facility and that was the original one. Now, we may be able to actually construct something cheaper. We may be able to do it differently, but that's that was what the original concept was because we knew it was abandoned because of the uh the natural gas fueling that has virtually vanished.

All right. But other vehicles that are not housed there, let's just say the police department, they will not be required, will they, to go out and No, sir. They would not be required. So, like I said, it was it's a supplemental contract what we have in existence. So if we're if you estimate that 75% of our fleet uses it, which you know some people may be able to do that, it comes to about $338,000 a year. But at a minimum, if it were just public works, our estimates are about $200,000 a year in savings. So somewhere between those numbers, depending on how well we can train people to use that that facility. Well, we know that we can buy the fuel buying it direct uh cheaper than we can through a a station where we have to

Yes, sir. Substantially cheaper. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. Good. On the fuel, will we send out RFPs on those the purchases? We we typically when we purchase real property, if we if

the fuel the fuel Yes, we would do bids for fuel. Okay. Yes, sir. Interesting. Yep. Is it on fuel? Good. So, um, on the fuel station. So, is it going to be on the on city property or not? That's what that's to be determined. This was original. The original concept was what I had shown, which was right off city property where the existing pump station was.

That was where our initial one, this red circled area, which is just adjacent and southeast of it. So that's this original estimate included like a an assumed purchase price of that, but we still have some work to do on that. So the area that's on here we don't own. No, that that area.

So we have to purchase property, right? And and if we if we had to move to purchase property, we would have to bring that back to council for approval. There may be room on the existing lots. We just haven't vetted it beyond that beyond this initial concept.

Got it. I think I got on on the fuel. Well, I mean, I just think that's uh one, it's a great location and opportunity if we can do that. And then just this the return on that. You know, you're looking at worst case scenario 20% return on that money that we spent on the saving the taxpayers and that's a great return. So, I'm definitely interested on the fuel side.

You No, I I echo what you're saying about the uh the fuel, but Josh, we're going to do everything we can. I I tell you what, when I walk through IT services, first off, I'm impressed with what they've done and the awards that they've received and the areas that they support. But soon as I walked out of there and I spent some time with Josh about, hey, how do you hire people? Went through that process, I left his office and I come to RAW and I said something's got to be done because that picture that he's showing there, that's outdated. There's two people sitting in those cubicles and there's several of them and uh that's not right. If John Newstead come in and hadn't took a bath for a week, I'd hate to be sitting in that cubicle. [laughter] Not that you would do that, John. But I'm telling you, he does such a good job and he's got all his people that get on the bus and or get in the boat and they row in the right direction, but they do need the space. And that was one of my first things. And I'm I'm telling you, I'm beyond that. I stopped by to see Michael and I don't know. I think he's slipped out of here. But, uh, you know, I'm big on first impressions and I've worked in situations where, man, there was nothing I could do because of the facility wasn't mine, but you're looking at the flooring and all and I'm like, when parents and people come in, especially when I was in the medical field, golly, you're taking care of people and the flooring looks like this, uh, you're talking about building and that's what it looks like. That's that's disheartening. And uh I firmly believe in first impressions. I've learned that from my wife. I try and do my best. Trace, forgive me, cuz sometimes I'm just who I am. But uh these are things that definitely need to be done. And I can't wait to see what you come back with some final things. And I know there was talking about possibly some changes over at development services. And I' I'd love to see that. Uh because that was one of my concerns. you go in and do carpet and then you sit there and want

to change some walls or do different things like that. I don't want to sit there and spend money after money. I want to make sure we can do the project at the right time. Okay. I have a question. Okay. So currently with the uh the remodeling of um information services and finance what is the square footage of information services area currently and what is the square footage of finance?

So the square footage of in the numbers I don't I have the percentage difference it's roughly the information services areas roughly 10% to 20% larger. The problem with the way that square footage measures is not in the size of the space, but in the layout of the space that you're able to create inside that footprint. So, one of the interesting things about the finance space is that you can create two different walkways parallel and a U shape around the entire office and get more people in that business in that area because it is a large square. The information services group is two squares disjointed connectedly with one long hallway and you can't fit as many workstations in that space as you can in the open space in in finance.

I met with Mr. McY and we discussed these and this was the only area where I had questions and it wasn't questions whether or not they deserve better working space because we all agree that they do. Um but you mentioned earlier in your presentation that information services has grown tremendously over the last 1015 years. Correct. Yes sir. the projection of the next 5 to 10 years that growth and then this move in this remodeling will it accommodate that and then also to you know and I and I don't want to throw any kind of strong you know monkey wrench into the project

but you know information services as we all know it works on an island of their own for the most part and them housed here directly on campus here as opposed to not a remote location but another location so that we do have the space to continue to grow. So I'm assuming growth is going to continue to happen for everyone. Would you assume? I I'm not sure that's I think the effect of technology and the changes that are happening so rapidly in technology that I I don't know if Josh could even predict how many people it's going to require whether it's going to go down because the effect of of things that we're doing with programs and learning programs that we used to do with multiple staff members has changed. So, we've gone from uh Josh, you correct me if I'm wrong, but we've gone from having a whole bunch of computers locally and a backbone locally to having virtual machines that are housed with within the cloud. And so while we've been able to to shrink the technological footprint like the room that we have technology in is uh dwarfs the amount of technology that we have in there. But all of the backup power generation, all of the main lines coming into the city all come from this hub. And so there becomes some real logistical problems with removing the technicians from where what the things are that break. Right.

And so um so you're saying then indication of the last 5 to 10 years of growth is no example of what the next 5 to 10 years of growth would look like. No sir, it is not. And part of that was due to when the information services department was created, several functions were being done by different departments that were consolidated to get more return as a collective issue. So

yes sir, thank you for answering my question. Yes sir. Excellent. Any other comments, questions? Can I go to the list and I'll kind of just hit different ones on it if you don't mind. the list of all list of all this. So, um the city hall renovations the main concern and I talked about was like that we can relocate, you know, and then but there's nowhere really else for us to put it because they need to stay near the server. Is that correct?

Yes, sir. And so looking at different options, maybe moving them to where development services were, looking at other places that we can maybe house them, but it doesn't have that ability. And then finance needs to be here as well. So both of those are not an option to do. Um so I think that you're working with what you can the best that we can. Um, I wish there was a little bit more room and more efficiency gains that we can get from it, but ultimately right now, as Jod's mentioned, I mean, they're on top of each other. And so um so I understand that the uh Polymart and Jones pool that's something that it's a unique service that we provide that fits a certain uh group of people that really require either well it's learning from learning how to swim or using it for as they mentioned uh for water aerobics. And so really we don't have an option within the city that they can accommodate that. Um with Stamper pool going to be more towards recreational. Um it's not going to meet their needs. Plus you're going to need something year round that they can accommodate. And speaking with u some people about the use of like using the institute um it's not adequate to what their needs and Pauly Martin Jones really does fit that. Um I did have a question on the how much did we spend for the liner?

80,000. Okay. So, in the liner that we have right now, even with the issues that we had, that's still suitable. Yes. Okay. Um, the development services renovations, you know, I feel we need to do a lot more. Um, I really, you know, I've mentioned this to Raleigh many times. I don't really care for the location of it, but for what we need to do and what we have the ability to do. Um, I understand that. I really think they need that building. if we're going to retain it and and do more with it, we really need to do something more than what it is. Even, you know, throwing down flooring is not going to make it uh presentable to those that are wanting to invest in the community that we serve and providing the level of service, customer service that we want. Um, but if we can do the flooring in a in a effective way to where any additional renovations going forward, we're not just sinking money into something that we're just going to end up tearing up in the first place, right? And I understand asbesus abatement is going to ultimately improve the ability to do that in the future as as it is. Um and then the animal shelter digesttor the um you know that's something I like you mentioned I couldn't imagine having to do that um with the with so I appreciate the work and stuff they do there. My question on that is, is there a way that we can make this like a a fundraiser opportunity or somewhere some way for a community to come in on board with this or is this something that really just needs to be provided through uh the city funds um for this? I mean, this is something I feel like I know I would contribute to it um if that was the case. That would be something that I would personally wanted that would give and I feel like maybe that's something the community would be willing to give. Um, so just throwing that idea out there if that's something that we could do.

Mo most of the donations that we sub solicit for the Long View Animal Care and Adoption Center, and I'm sure the mayor and others in here could speak much more elaborately, but the people are pouring the donations in to avoid us having to use this. Mhm.

And so at the end of the day, the tough things are the things like this that people don't want to say this was sponsored by us because it's not it's hard to feel good about that because there's nothing good about that particular piece of equipment. And so my opinion and and just the opinion of doing the work, this is ultimately something that should be programmed in through the city's maintenance and operations as a part of its continued maintenance and operations and and capital costs. Again, this is something that has been in the budget for two years that we have eliminated, but it it's just I believe that's it's a harder ask of that. you understand it from a different perspective and I appreciate that but I do think that's a harder ask of of individual donors.

Yeah, I would agree with that and I would say from the uh Long View Pause 501c3 perspective, we had two major capital expenditures this year. One for half of the acco that they funded, but then also the transportation ban, they spent 60,000 on that. Um so they would not be in a position to have additional funds. It would have to be like a go out to the community. So I would agree with Rollin on that one.

Awesome. I appreciate that perspective on it and that's all I have on the items that we have. Okay. Yeah. So, the overall concept um thank you Randin and staff for putting all that together um was as Rand originally mentioned this would be what did you say budget estimate?

Yes. Not exact. Right. So, if council seems on board and is not uh a hard no, absolutely not going to consider that. I think then our direction would be let's get those hard numbers so next time when we have that we have all the details. We have everything that we need to actually vote on those items. Okay.

Is that okay with everybody? Get the hard numbers, right? Yes. Yes. So, one thing I'd like to offer when we typically when we do CIPs, we've done estimates, we've gotten a budgeted amount that you guys were okay with us not going over there, going over that amount. But that allows us to get started on those projects with the architectural or the whatever those things are, the engineering work. And then when it comes time to bid, we make sure the bids fall within that budgeted estimate. So we'll do a little bit more digging on these numbers to try and get them to where we think they're as close as possible. But that's typically what we do when we approve a a CIP. So we would that the thought process I had was just that we would amend our CIP to include these one-time expenditures with a budget knowing that I can only do leg work. We can only hire engineers and things to do the leg work. And then when it comes to the actual award of the work, you guys would have the final say or not.

Okay. Is that okay with everybody? Yep. One other comment and it's it's just on the fuel station. Uh it's it's kind of a a plus and minus as far as location. I would like to see it on city- owned property. If we're on property that we whether we buy it, I would be a little concerned if we have to lease the property because so we will actually own the property.

Yes. You guys made it extremely clear that we don't need to lease any more buildings. Well, I agree because the liability and stuff down the road. No, we need to own the property. Yes, sir. Where we can take care of it where we won't have problems down the road. Yes, sir. All right. I know Paul Martin Jones we have the bid for already. So that will just be a vote come next meeting to award that bid and move on. But the others, do you feel like

our next meeting would be an appropriate time for staff to have enough time to do that work and vote on those things? Yes, ma'am. Okay. Okay. That'll be the plan. Sounds good. Thank you guys very much. Uh moving on to the consent agenda. We are going to pull item C and vote on that uh separately. Are there any other items that council would like to pull off, discuss, or have questions on? Go ahead.

B B and Mr. Allen. U item E. Okay. Uh let's start with B, Miss Laura Heel.

Okay. Was that Was that you, John? Yes. Okay. Laura, I know we applied for this already and we approved as council for the for that. I did want to just if you could tell us what this does, what this grant's for. Uh we received uh an approved grant from the Federal Railroad Administration that will do a atgrade crossing elimination and safety study on 33 areas of town. And once we get this study done, at that point we would have the information, the data to move forth if there were grants for actual construction, quiet zones, that type of thing. But we need the study first. So tonight we're asking for uh the grant match from the fund balance.

Okay. So it does uh you said so it's quiet zones and then the crossing guard. It it will depend on the study. I'm not going to predict what the stud is going to show, but this is step one to future improvements at these 33 locations throughout our community. Okay, I appreciate you. Thank you very much.

Independent study for the last [laughter] I've done all the study. So, absolutely be great if we could approve it. Yeah, thank you. When will we know um what actually they're studying? Do you know? Um I can get that to you. Um we're waiting to start. So, uh, we have a preliminary list, but we'll get it to you, um, before the next meeting.

Let's have a lot of railroads with a lot of complaints of trains. So, I want to see exactly what they're studying. One of one of the things when we laid out the list of projects because this is actually something that he had brought up years back and we did an inventory. Excuse me.

Yes, you [laughter] that that that we did an inventory and we looked at density. where there are large numbers of people surrounding crossings and highlighted. So, we thought that's the best way, right, to benefit the most people that are around these crossings in neighborhoods, right? Because a lot of times these neighborhoods, like if they're spurs over in in certain areas of town, trains remain on the tracks, but they're not the railroad and they don't even have crossing arms. And so it's very disturbing if if you go around those areas and you think there's nothing to guard safeguard. There's no lights, there's no there's just the black and white X signs and that's it. And so the thought process was uh is to actually help people in those areas that maybe maybe they make less than the median income, maybe they're disturbed, maybe the kids don't get the proper amount of sleep due to the noise from the tracks. It's all of those things to improve better outcomes for our community in general.

Good. On these uh on the railroad crossings, uh I guess my first question is, do we actually own these railroad crossings or are they owned by the railroad that utilizes them? And whose responsibility is it to keep these crossings in reasonable condition?

Just the railroads. That's what I was scared of. Do we have much leverage if we want if we have if we see one that needs to be improved? Probably none. But um this is the first step. That's why it's the Federal Railroad Administration. It's not the city of Long View.

Okay. So, we're complying with all of their requirements. It's the way we work through them with the railroad. Okay. So, thank you, Laura. Uh item E is a resolution casting the city of Long View votes for the election of the Greg County Appraisal District Board of Directors and that would be for the individual that we previously nominated. Do you have

Yes. I just wanted to on our limited agenda here. It doesn't list that individual. Would you please tell us who that individual is and then uh when the election will be and such as that? Oh, I don't know about the election, but uh we nominated Dan Sury, who is a local attorney, serves on the Long View Arts Board, and is very invested in our downtown, has previously served as a weekend municipal judge for us. Um, and I believe we have 750 7

900 900. Yes. Thank you. 950 votes. And when does the election happen? I don't know the answer to that one. We they're they're required to be turned in tomorrow at both appraisal districts. So that's why they're on this agenda. Yes. Okay. Yeah. But all the votes have to be turned in tomorrow to the appraisal district tomorrow.

Yes. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Any other items on the consent agenda that we'd like to discuss or pull off? If not, I need a motion to approve the consent agenda having withdrawn item C for separate consideration. I move to approve. Thank you. And a second. Second. All in favor, please say I.

Oh, I'm sorry. And raise your hand with Derek. Sorry. Okay. Any opposed? Consent agenda is approved and we will move on to consider item C. Come back up, Laura. Consider a resolution that authorizes the city to apply for and accept a five-year grant in an amount not to exceed 6 million for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission projects for assistance in transition from homelessness a path grant program. Miss Laura Hill.

Yes, ma'am. And uh we have updated this to where we're asking for permission to apply for not to accept at this point. Uh this grant came about as a result of at your last council meeting you received a report from the coordination task force primarily asking about having housing navigation and HMIS and things like that. This is the only grant we could find that would help us start to accomplish some of those goals. It is very competitive. Um, we did share the, uh, draft application with you earlier today and I'd be happy to answer any questions.

I have just one and then I think you got lots, but has the city ever applied for this before? No, ma'am. Okay. All right. And I think we got a number of questions. Who wants to go first? Well, I guess I'll go first. Um my main concern with it was um like we already kind of fixed that because I I want to know the plan the actual plan as to how we'll accomplish this when getting this grant.

Uh if it was approved and if you decided to accept it uh we would be working with the housing department. Uh we've already worked extensively with Dietrich Johnson and Shiva Marshall to create the application based on their expertise with the housing side. Uh we would create and hire five people to work under housing to work on the housing navigation working with landlord recruitment and education. So they would handle the housing piece. The other part of this with the substance abuse and mental health initiatives would be funneled through our glow basically the internal one within the city with our post officers, our community health paramedics and then uh working with community health corps who is our region's uh mental health authority with those teams. You've heard presentations on that. So it's once again growing our collaborative to meet these various needs. The housing part is currently a hole in in all of the services we do case work on. So, this would help us fill in that hole.

And so, on the housing part, is it correct that it's it's just going to do a one-time rental assistance or is it going to be continual? It's just one-time rental assistance. It's to help get you into housing with casework, finding all the other resources. Uh, it's not the voucher, excuse me, the voucher program through HUD. This is a different model to help people get into housing that may have difficulties. Uh, it it does allow for uh security deposits and like one-time rental assistance, but it's more about the casework to help you find housing, obtain housing, uh not be evicted if you're about to lose housing for some reason. And it's helping us help you. It's almost like the OMBbudsman program in a way that the housing task force mentioned earlier. So, I guess my concern with that is because you're dealing with someone with mental illness, you're going to give them a one-time rental assistance and then within that 30 months that they're in that apartment, we're supposed to be able to find them housing and get them permanent housing because what happens after that 30 days when the rental when that one month that y'all have gave them rental assistance goes away.

We're working with them on all of their other uh non-medical drivers of health. uh you know it's it this is not I guess the best way I can describe this particular grant we have to comply with all of the SAMA regulations too. Mhm.

So, it's it's a unique model that um we want to try to bring to Long View and if it's if they approve our application, we will work through it. If they like the model we put into our description. So, um

and I and I definitely understand that and I want y'all to apply for the application. But I do I do think that we need a deeper look at it before we say, "Hey, let's accept a grant to see what steps and how many people y'all have and how is um community healthcare because they struggle with that program and their rental assistance is continuum and you have these clients out here that you have to have those care coordinators going out and I see on there that y'all did say that y'all were going to hire a care coordinator, but they they have to stay in contact with these members." So what happens is they're overworked and this is with community healthcore and this is what they go through. So I want to see how we as a city how we're going to come into that. So I would definitely like a more ind depth of what y'all are going to do and how it's going to be accomplished.

Yes ma'am. Do you know when we would find out if we were awarded and then how long we'd have to accept it? Like what is that time frame? If if we are selected we'll know in May and then it would go into effect September 1. Would we have a time frame where we'd need to accept it? Like we'd have time to have a work session and talk about what it would mean citywide. Okay,

perfect. I know there more questions. I know, you know, you look you look at it, you know, initially come across about $6 million, which is a little over $4 million, which 30% either cash or incind from the city, you know, we're talking about a million8, that's a lot of money. Uh, and we said we'd do that through in kind, through some of the people that we already have employed in positions, whether they're post officers or whatever, working with that. Yes.

My one of my questions for the people that already serve and work for us, are we adding more to them and not giving them anything uh salary wise to go for it or is it going to be part of their job? And the other part that I had question about is in that $4 million, I think 70% of that was allocated for salaries, which only left about $900,000 that would actually be distributed towards people. Uh which you break it out over five years, you're you're less than $200,000 a year that you're working, but you're talking about uh between the people that would hire the people that work with us in the city, you got about seven people working on, you know, less than $175,000 a year. um $175 to $200,000 a year that you're going to distribute. So, that's kind of some of my questions and that's why I like the the word that we said we want to apply for it. Kind of see how it comes back, see how this affects everything. And I do like the part that hey, once we get people in the program, they've got to enroll in it that we've got to turn our data in on a regular basis. But if we're not right, we owe this money back. And that's the part that I want to make sure we're right on because I'll be honest with you, I've had more phone calls about this piece of uh literature here than I have anything since I got on the council in May. And so I know it's a I know what we're trying to do in the city with homelessness. It's a it's a it's a big topic for us, but when you're talking about a, you know, a lot of salaries and where do we get to when we're at five years? Is another grant come up? Is it available? Are we just dropping it and we've kind of lost things? Because I don't want to lose traction. I just want to make sure we're going in the right direction and we're continuing forward. But most of all, I want to make sure the people that we've got employed now that

we're not adding more to them and not they're not receiving payment for it. I just want to make sure they're able to continue to do their job. Um, okay. And it may not have been a question. It may have been more of a statement. I'm sorry, Laura. I uh first comment, uh, the amount, the 900,000 allocated for housing assistance, that was the max allowed by the grant. So that's the most we could do with. So there's that answered. Uh on the employee matching fund part, it's uh there may be a little bit, but it's mainly putting information into your report you already do. It would be another data point to answer because you're turning I'll say if you're a post officer and you're recognizing somebody needs housing. Yes, we're using part of your salary, but you're funneling them over to this case worker that we hired through the grant. So, you're making the contact. That's the workload. Right now, they don't have anybody to send them to.

Okay. So I I am very aware that we do not want to overburden or add anything to our existing staff. Uh they are already doing a lot but we can use those what they're already doing as match because they're already in that field.

Right. Okay. Um as for another grant in five years, I can tell you we're constantly writing grants and looking for additional grants, but I cannot predict the future. Right. Thank you. I think Mr. Alan had a question. Yes. Um on the um I'm more or I am interested this time the direct cash involvement. You mentioned that with this program we can make one original maybe a deposit in one month's rent. Is there any money that would be available, discretionary money that we could spend maybe for medical doctor's opinions or for other outside opinions that uh where we would have to pay uh for uh is there I guess what I'm trying to say is there a pool of money that we can discretionary spend at our choice?

Uh not through this grant now. uh possibly some other funding we have access to but not through not through there's no uh liquid money that we have a choice over where we want to spend it in this grant then or there is no sir oh no this these are federal funds administered by the state no there is no

in other words we don't have a there's no extra pool that we can spend for medical or whatever no sir okay thank you you did could you answer some questions that I had sent sent you in an email. And one of the things people to understand this funding would not pay for treatment, rehabilitation or jail diversion. That function would be uh continue to be managed through the globe community health partners that we have.

Yes. Yes, that was what I was talking about. Okay. Yes. Yep. Go. So, um I'm I'm trying to understand how this is going to go because so you have a person with a serious mental illness. That's who qualifies for this specific grant, right? or substance abuse. Yeah. Or substance abuse. And they usually are hand in hand. Um so what who is the person that decides that serious mental illness or substance? Who decides that?

That is through community health core because they're the state's mental health authority for our region. And that's why we have the contract with we entered into anou with them that y'all approved I think last meeting uh for us to hire uh and embed to um community health professionals. So that's our entry point into that system.

Okay. And so are any of them going to go to the ones like say a person that gets picked up with the EDW and they're at Greg County Jail. Are any of them going to go to the jail and evaluate these people for this program? There is already somebody from community health core within the jail and we work with them in different ways. I we're a plate of spaghetti actually but u

yeah I mean because that's what it sounds like and it seems like so will y'all be paying these funds to community healthcare? Like is it going back and forth? No. So we're in a partnership with community health court. Community Health Court is already in the jail. Community Health Court, we're going to go to community health court to to recognize these members and they're just going to refer them to

GLOW. The community health corps that is in the jail is is between community health corps and Grey County Sheriff's Department. So, but we they're always always available. Just so you know, they're not always available to assist. That's up to the sheriff. Okay. Um, I do know that Glow is working with the sheriff's department as possible for them to tell us when somebody is being released if they need to if they need Glow so we can intervene.

The reason why I'm asking those questions because in reading this grant and looking over it and reading it online on on the website, it specifically states that people coming out of jail. So I'm trying to see how are we catching them if we're depending solely on community healthcore, solely on Greg County Jail that I know for a fact that there are members in there that there are citizens in there that are in jail with mental health issues that they never get to see community health court. So that's what I'm saying and that's a part of this specific grant. That's where if we got the grant, we would sit down with the sheriff's department and really formalize that process. Right now, it's very informal,

but we do get calls from the jail that so- and so is getting out. You may want to come enroll them as a glow patient or they're already a glow patient and we're getting them on the way out, you know. So, it's all about communication and networking. It's a constant process. for us to try to help this part of our community.

Okay. And that's why I guess the more comp comprehensive look at how we're going to do this. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. Go ahead. On that with that coordination program, I can't call y'all the acronym that you use. Would that help and assist in that process? The what's that?

Pack. No, the coordination one where everybody interprets the data so everybody can Oh, HMIS. HMIS. Would HMIS assist in that maybe that process of coordinating that? Would that be It would and and this grant would help pay for those licenses for all the other agencies. So, that's part of it.

All right. If we received it. Thank you. Good. Yeah. Thank you, Laura. I would like to just say I am very grateful for you and your work. I think um this is a new and exciting idea and I think we're all very excited about it. We're not going to solve a problem that we haven't been able to solve yet without new ideas that we haven't thought of yet or talked about yet or bring to the council yet. and I love the collaboration here to make sure that we're going to do a quality job, that it's something that the city should be stepping into, but I love that you are out there finding those opportunities for us so that we can have those conversations. Um, so I think what we're planning to do tonight is um approve. So you're saying if we approve it as presented, it would be to apply for but not accept.

And so that would be okay. Yes. Um Okay. Oh, the other thing that I did want to make sure if we were awarded and we did come back to talk about it, I would love to hear directly from the employees that would be impacted because I have found sometimes that employees that have other opportunities to serve with something they're compassionate about would actually be energized by it as opposed to feeling like it was going to be too much for them. So, if we could include that if we did the work session, just would they be excited about being able to offer additional services for something they are already passionate about or would it be a drain? Because I think that's a lot of our concern. we're all talking about recruitment and retention and we don't want to overburden people, but I would maybe think that they may even be excited about the additional services that could be provided. Um, so that was my only comment on that. And then I think we need a motion to approve that agenda item as revised.

Motion to approve. Mr. R, do you want me to read the statement or that? I don't think we have to. I think she submitted it the that way. So just whatever Robert says. Okay. Yes. I have a motion and a second. All in favor, please say I and raise your hand with Derek. I.

Any opposed? Item is approved. Thank you so much, Miss Laurhill. Uh, moving on to zoning item A. Public hearing will be held to consider application Z2522 filed by city of Long View to reszone some blocks in the Heights. Miss Angela Choy.

Thank you, uh, mayor, members of council, and Mr. McI. Uh staff is requesting a reszone of the property shown here on the zoning map uh located on the south side of Park Drive uh east of Dillia or west of Dillia uh Drive from Light Industrial shown here in the gray to single family for zoning district. Uh currently there are several single family homes located on this property. Uh currently in the UDC, single family homes are not allowed in light industrial zoning district. Therefore, these properties are considered non-conforming. In order to correct this issue, staff is requesting to reszone these properties to bring them into compliance. Uh staff along along with the planning and zoning commission recommends approval of this request. I'd be happy to answer any questions at this time.

Thank you. This item does require a public hearing that I will open at this time. I do not have any speaker cards. Are there any comments, questions, or uh discussion for Miss Troy? If not, I will close the public hearing and ask for a motion. Move to approve and a second.

Second. All in favor, please indicate with raise of hand. Okay, that item. Any oppose? No. Item is approved. Thank you so much, Miss Troy. Uh action item A, consider an ordinance accepting a private street known as Talwood Drive located east of Leisure Lane and north of Eden Drive. uh in response to a request filed by the Talwood neighborhood, Mr. John Newstead, District 4 council person.

Yes. Uh so I'd like to speak to some of the uh valid concerns that I've had come up about this um accepting the private road. And so the first concern that I received uh is really the one of the concerns is the road does not meet the current public road standards. Um so to kind of address that um my thoughts like the neighborhood was built 50 years ago. It is a single entrance and exit uh with roughly 20 homes that use the streets. It is also a curb and gutter street already as well and it's a in a higher standard than a large portion of our street inventory today. So given that this road has worked for this neighborhood and their needs for five decades and is built above the level of many city streets, u I feel it's more than adequate for the neighborhood and their use. Another concern received was the accepting the road will strain an already overburdened street repair program. I know there's many streets out there that um people need to be get repaired and so that's definitely something that we want to make sure that we are not affecting and so uh this road again as mentioned is in better than average condition and with this low traffic count and any future repairs would fall at the very bottom of a priority list. This will not take resources away from streets that truly need attention. Um, and I've expressed this to the HOA many times about that is if this was to happen that they would be very low on that list. Third concern is the accepting a private road u encouraging others to ask the city to take over the streets. Uh the factors I've outlined in this is what makes this situation unique. On top of that, this requires a petition process that requires a 100% of the homeowners to agree to uh turning the city the street over to the city. And in this regards,

it took this neighborhood six to seven years of very strong diligence to to even get to this point to get that 100%. So, it's a very high barrier um on that. Also, as far as uh this is an exception and as far as I'm concerned and I will not be entertaining or encouraging anybody else to pursue this in district 4 and so uh I would not yeah any future requests in district 4 would I would not be u in favor of um so to close this this road is in my district and I've spent time with the residents uh numerous times over the past few years uh regarding this and reviewed the details closely. And so based on everything that I've seen, I believe I believe accepting this road is the right call for the neighborhood. Uh and any concerns about this should be directed to me as their representative. And that's

and and I want to add that I had the opportunity to go out and spend time with John uh with uh president of the homeowner association. go through the street and I know there was an area talked about a tree route and I'm telling you it's one area and it's very minimal and they had addressed it some time back and I was very cautious about you don't want to open up Pandora's box. Uh I don't feel that's the case. This is a low traffic area with one entrance and one exit. Um and I don't see where we would be hurt by accepting this piece of property. The road's in uh great shape. They've m maintained it. In fact, there hasn't been any maintenance on it because it hasn't needed it. Uh so I just I just want to echo what John was saying there.

Thank you. Go ahead, Mr. City. Uh yes, after quite a bit of thorough discussion and and thought on this, I think the points that uh Mr. Newad brought up are very relevant and at this time I would be in favor of accepting this city, this private drive as a city street.

Thank you. I appreciate the discussion and everybody's with that consent. I'll move to approve. I have a motion. Do I have a second? A second. All in favor, please indicate with raise of hand. Any opposed? Item is approved unanimously. Thank you so much. And thank you to our Tealwood folks, Miss Carla Hale, who I know has been working on that for seven years. So, appreciate you guys and your diligence. Merry Christmas. Uh action item B uh consider a resolution authorizing an economic development incentive agreement between the city and Flanders CR Intermediate Inc. under our chapter 380 Texas Local Government Code. Miss Heather Malone, I told Heather when we started that I was sorry. We always saved her for last. So I tell you what, next time if you want to do the prayer and pledge, you can go first.

Oh, thank you. [laughter] Go ahead. Well, Mayor, council, Mr. McY, thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak before you today. Um, Flanders is recognized as one of our legacy industries, which is a target for Long View economic development. Um, as part of our strategic plan and with intention, LEO supports our legacy industries by encouraging diversification and expansion through new investments and new job creation. The Flanders project includes a capital investment of over a million dollars and they will use those capital funds to install a new equipment line that diversifies their product and service offerings. They will also create 50 additional jobs and retain 58 jobs at their location here in Long View. their jobs do pay above the county average wage significantly, which is what um was a positive measure in this um impact study. With this incentive, we project a return back to the community with less than two and a half years. So, it's a good project. Um it's it's good for the community. It's good for the existing industries. And with that, on behalf of Long View Economic Development Corporation, its president, CEO, and the board of directors, we recommend approval for this 380 agreement.

Thank you. Any questions, comments, or discussion for Miss Malone? Go ahead, John. I just want to say, Heather, I appreciate League Co. doing focusing on our existing businesses and not just about recruitment, but retention that we've been talking about, even all that stuff. So, I definitely appreciate I know that y'all been working on this deal for a while and so I appreciate your diligence on it and to do uh to do this for us. So, thank you.

Very exciting. And thank you to Flanders for investing more in our community. Absolutely grateful for that. Okay. Uh do I have a motion? I have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate with raise of hand. Item uh is unanimously approved. Thank you so much. Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas. uh items of community interest. Uh we'll start with Mr. Connley. Thank you guys for the allow me to be uh represent you virtually and I just want to say item of community interest. Merry Christmas and happy new year to all.

Perfect. Miss Moore. Yes. Um we would like to invite everyone to the Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration. It will be January 15th through the 19th. information and parade registration is coming soon. You can always go to longview.govmlk for any other questions regarding the event.

That's all I have. Okay, Mr. Wayne. Yes, I actually have some things tonight. Um, as everyone know, we took on an initiative uh maybe a couple of years ago with um um with celebratory gunfire. And I'd like to thank our city staff for adopting this and promoting this. Um the numbers that we had last 4th of July, I believe, showed a drastic decline in celebratory gunfire. And so heading into the new year, we have a new promotion. I can't believe they're at broaden gym and basketball without me involved, but Officer Brown's there and and some other people will join this. So, let's see it. Here we go. What are you doing?

Testing gravity. Testing gravity. Still works. [laughter] What goes up must come down. Your bullet, your responsibility. Look at that.

That's so good. So, thank you guys for that. Thank you PD for promoting this. It's It's very important. Um, and I'd like for everyone to continue to stay safe and to watch uh celebratory gunfire. Um, last, Long View Transit and RNK Distributors, Inc. is offering a free and safe ride home from 8:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m. on December 31st. And that's New Year's Eve. And that's another opportunity for everyone to continue to be safe. There's no need to drive, call, and get a ride. I just made that up. That was pretty good, too. [laughter]

Thank you, ma'am. Thank you, Mr. New Tib. Yes, ma'am. We had the My family and I had the privilege of riding in one of Long Beach Fire Department's antique fire trucks. And I just want to uh well interesting fact about this the truck and I they mentioned it Sean actually talked about it at the live stream but this truck this antique truck they had the Shrin they gave it to Shriners and then Shriners ended up giving back to us but their Shriner trucks that they have are based they actually built on this exact truck not just this model but that truck in uh there. So I thought that was pretty unique. Um and also I want to say to thank you to Chief Parker and his wife for uh being our chauffeers on that. They did a great job. No al everybody was safe. And I want to thank city staff that take tremendous amount of energy and coordination to put this together. And even the next day I was downtown and our uh cleanup crew that we have was down there picking up everything to make sure that Long View stays uh very presentable to to the public. And uh so just all in all wonderful parade uh and I appreciate everything even with the reschedule. I mean there's a lot to it. So thank you very much.

Lots of fun, Mr. Fair Hill. All right. First off, want to thank all the Spring Hill parents and the girls for coming out tonight in recognition of uh Spring Hill Volleyball Day. Uh like I said earlier, the work that goes into it, the hours that these kids put in, not just during the season, but even to get to this point is huge. Uh and they're they're to be commended. Uh losing at the state tournament, it's going to happen. Uh but I'm telling you, the pride that you can take away and the accomplishments that you you you did getting there, uh you're to be commended. So, uh congratulations to them and their coaches and parents. Um, next Spring Hills uh, Junior High, they took second place in the region in one act play. They did Alice in Wonderland. And anybody who you may not know about one act play, but you have so long to set up your scene. You get out and perform it and you've got to be off and there's a lot that can go wrong and you've got to ad liib. So, congratulation to those uh, future dramas dramatist or actors there. U, but appreciate what they did. Boy, I'm that redneck [laughter] come right out of me, didn't it? So, but you you know me. Uh want to say something before I say that. I wanted to echo John. I don't know. I'm sitting behind you, so I'm always echoing, [laughter] I guess. But, uh the Christmas parade, like I said, there was a lot to go in with changing the dates and people getting there, but I'm telling you, everybody that I saw there was enjoying it. I never heard anything negative. Uh, thank you to the Ambbucks and everybody who worked to put it on, clean it up afterwards. It was a great event. But, uh, Christmas party over at Green Street Recreation. So, this is going to be Tuesday the 16th from 12 to 2. Uh, you guys be sure and come out. Um, Santa Claus Barry Hill or Coach Barry Hill or me, whoever you want to

call me. U, I'm gonna I'm gonna show up and visit with you all earnest. I owe you a Domino's game. So, I'll be there. I expect to see you. And that's it. Mr. Allen. Yes. Uh on speaking of the city parks on the Christmas uh celebration, if you haven't had an opportunity, the arboritum, which is on Cotton Street directly west of here, I guess you'd say on Cotton Street directly west. uh right before you get to Mod Cobb have a wonderful Christmas lighting display and they will have a future activi I mean a feature feature activities on Friday and Saturday uh with even Santa Claus and different activities for children but u if you're looking for something that's really nice for the weekend uh that's a wonderful place to go wonderful lighting facility also I want to say this is the time of the year which we have a Christmas celebration. And what I'm trying to say is be responsible and don't get out there and cause injury to yourself or somebody else. Be careful of what you do. And if you have a problem with alcohol, designate somebody to drive and don't try to do it yourself. Thank you.

Yep. Anything from you? Great. I have just a couple of announcements. Uh Christmas sanitation schedule, trash and yard waste collection on Thursday. will move one day to Friday. Recycling will be collected on that Friday. Uh holiday closing, city offices will be closed Thursday, December 25th, Friday, December 26th, and Thursday, January 1st. As mentioned previously, please have a wonderful holiday filled with love and wonderful things. And be safe. We love you guys. And we'll see you in January. Now we will uh adjourn to an executive session under personnel matters Texas Government Code section 551074 to consider, discuss, and deliberate our annual performance evaluation for our municipal court judge Terry Jackson. We will not reconvene after executive session. You guys are free to go home. Thank you for being with us.