Finance & Administration Council Committee - Regular Meeting

Alright. Good afternoon, everybody. It's 04:00. I'll go ahead and call today's meeting to order. Please record your attendance by pushing the appropriate button.

Next up is approval of minutes from the Finance and Administration Committee meeting on 02/10/2026.

Move to approve unless there's a noted change.

Second.

Motion is second to approve the minutes. Any questions or comments on the minutes as presented? If not, please record record your vote on whether or not to approve. We'll move into new business. First up is resolution twenty six twenty one.

A resolution to accept the bid authorizing the purchase of two vans for the transit department, whereas the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas, its Jonesboro Economical Transit operations, has an ongoing need to maintain and improve safe, reliable, and ADA compliant transportation services for the public, and whereas staff has located vehicles to replace current vehicles that need replacing our current fleet, and whereas the city has identified the need to purchase two low floor ADA bands to support transit and mobility services, and whereas a quote has been received from Creative Bus Sales for two BraunAbility Lone Star ADA bands, and whereas the quoted vehicle is available for purchase through the state of Oklahoma contract number SW0797MFY2026, which qualifies as cooperativesstate bid procurement method permitted under applicable purchasing laws and policies for $156,933 each, dollars 3,866 total, and whereas this purchase is supported by the following FDA cost match, 85% federal and 50% local, whereas sufficient funds have been identified and are available for this purchase in the appropriate budget or grant accounts. Now therefore be it resolved by city council of the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas that number one, the city of Jonesboro hereby approves the purchase of two BraunAbility Lone Star ADA vans from creative bus sales utilizing the reciprocal bid from the state of Oklahoma contract number SW797MFY2026 in accordance with the submitted quote dated 02/12/2026.

Number two, mayor Harold Copenhagen, city clerk April Leggett are hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesboro to execute all documents necessary to effectuate this purchase.

Move to forward to full council. Second.

Motion seconded to forward to

full council. Any questions from council or the committee?

Have a question.

Doctor. Coleman. This

might have already been asked, but I guess since I don't remember, you know, when you get old, you don't remember certain things. Do we have spare vans or spare buses?

That's one of reasons why we're looking at this similar to the bus purchases that we made. We actually operate eight vehicles for paratransit service every day. One of the vehicles that we are currently operating which this will allow us to replace that plus have an additional for spare. That vehicle has actually been two vehicles put together to make one functioning vehicle. This is just us trying to get our stock back up to a useful life benchmark and be able to have those spare vehicles for rotation, keep from running so many miles on each vehicle and allow us to do the standard services that are necessary.

How many more routes are we planning to have? I know we were rebuilding routes after COVID when routes were reduced, but what's the ultimate goal as far as how many lines?

Ultimately for the paratransit we will use as you know what it depends on what our service dictates. Our service every day depends on the schedule as far as who needs trips. We utilize that based upon how busy we are. Like I said on average we usually operate seven or eight vehicles or seven or eight routes per day for paratransit. Our bus routes we've been operating on four routes here recently. We will hopefully by the end of the month be at our full five route service plus the two A state service routes for a total of seven routes on fixed route.

Is there any plan to and I know it's been mentioned at MPO meetings, Mayor Brooklyn about maybe extending our routes close to Brooklyn or up to Brooklyn area. Has that, is that being considered?

There's always consideration, just a matter of looking at the feasibility of something like that, talking with the various agencies that would be involved in that, trying to work out deals and concessions on that.

It would certainly be good for people that live in the Brooklyn area to come to medical appointments here I'm sure.

Anything else from the committee? Anything else from staff? Yeah,

the cost share is listed on there just as a reminder, the $85.15. I've been trying to make sure that we do a better job of highlighting that for our vehicles. That $85.15 is for any ADA vehicle that we have. That 15% is what the city has to have matching portion so.

Alright. Thank you. Anything else from staff? Anything anything from the public? Please, Lee, you may wanna please state your name and address for the record.

Patty Lack, 4108 Forest Hill Road. Lee, just how many buses do we have altogether? Or you can include these two if you want to.

I've got to do the math. So we have five trolleys and we have two trolley routes. We have currently seven buses and we're operating four fixed route. We have seven paratransit vehicles and we're operating an average of eight paratransit routes a day.

Anything else from the public? If not, please record your vote on whether or not to forward resolution 26,021 to full council. Resolution 26,022 is a municipal lane. I'll read this by title only. Resolution by the city council of the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to place municipal lien on property located at 233 South Fisher, Partial 01 Dash 144181 Dash 44700 owned by Michael Kevin Kelly in the amount of $9,754.56

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion seconded forward to full council. Any questions or comments regarding this item?

Mr. Chairman, is there any reason this one is so much more? Seems like it's a lot. Almost 10,000.

I was torn with it in my mind trying to make sure we had the correct address, but the name does register a bail. That was a demolition. So we actually removed the structure of a citizen who had passed and there were no associated relatives.

Got it. Thank you. Anything else from the committee? Anything else from staff or the public in attendance? If not, please cast your vote on whether or to forward resolution 26,022 to full council.

Resolution 26,023, a resolution authorizing the city of Jonesboro enter into a sixty month service lease contract for 12 coffee machines, whereas the various coffee machines owned by the city of Jonesboro need replacement due to lack due to age and lack of available repair and operating components, whereas the city of Dunford wishes to enter into a service agreement with Forest Office Machines for 12 copiers, and whereas upon completion of the service lease, the city will have an option to purchase the machines at fair market value in accordance with city purchase and guidelines. Whereas funds to support the leasing agreement are included in department subsections of the FY 2026 budget. Whereas the proposal for the coffee machines is attached here too, therefore be resolved by the city council of the city of Jonesboro that section one, the city of Jonesboro agrees to the terms outlined in the forest office machine service lease proposal for copy machines. Section two, mayor Harold Copenhagen and city clerk April Leggett are hereby authorized by the city council for the City of Jonesboro to execute all documents necessary to pass away the agreement.

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion to say before the full council, any questions or comments from the committee? Anything from staff or the public in attendance?

Patty Black, 4108 Forest Hill Road. Is it because we're doing 12 because all 12 need to be I mean, they're all not working correctly? And the second question is, is that the maintenance on it, does the forest company who's we're buying them from do they do maintenance free or do they charge for them?

Yeah, there we do have, I won't say all 12 are not operational, but there are a number of them that are non operational. And as we looked at whether or not to outright purchase, which we have done in the past or to lease, we opted for the lease option at this particular point in time. As with most items electronically these days, there's a pretty good chef life of when an item is obsolete. And so what we're finding is the lease gives us a better option of keeping our stock current. Currently, even if we purchase a machine, we have to get a service agreement with the copier supplier.

And so we're paying for that maintenance already as a part of our copier agreement. And so this just allows us to lease and continue those maintenance agreements that are there to replace obsolete equipment and equipment that doesn't work. Jim, can I

ask one question? Just a follow-up to what Tony was saying. So do I know sometimes you have an agreement where you can print as much as you want at least for a certain amount. Do we have that similar?

I can't I don't I'm

not sure on this one. I know there are, I'm fairly certain that there is a charge for copiers as a part of the maintenance agreement anyway. So the maintenance agreement is predicated on how much you use the machine and so we tally copies each month as a part of the maintenance agreement. So yes.

Anything else from the committee? And I will say to this point, we do something like this similar on the banking level is that it also ends up encompassing your toner cost as well, which is a significant amount.

Anything else from the committee, staff, public in attendance? If not, please cast your vote on whether or to forward resolution 26,023 to full council. Resolution 26,024, a resolution by the City Council to accept an offer to settle existing liens in dual litigation efforts between the City of Jonesborough and Laurel Park LLC, whereas Laurel Park LLC representatives have made an offer to settle a lien established by Jonesborough City Council Resolution 20 five-one 106 for demolition costs of the structure located at or near 100 West Washington Avenue, commonly known as Citizens Bank, whereas a settlement offer of $110,000 has been presented for consideration and whereas upon acceptance of the offer, a certification of funds received has been completed, the city and certification of funds received has been completed, the city of Jonesboro would terminate lien claims by the city on partial zero one dash 144, 183 dash 40 2300. Now therefore be resolved by the City Council of the City of Jonesboro that section one, the City Of Jonesboro, Arkansas hereby authorizes a settlement of the lien established by resolution twenty five one zero six in exchange for payment of $110,000 by Laurel Park LLC. Section two, upon certification of funds received by the city, the city of Jonesboro will remove current lien claims held by the city on partial zero one dash 144, 183 dash forty two three hundred.

Section three, the mayor and city clerk are hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to execute all documents necessary to effectuate the proposed settlement.

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion seconded to move to

full council. Any questions or comments from the committee?

I comment or I guess a question to Carol first. First. How much do we have so far in legal fees on this?

I don't have an exact number. I think it's around 13,000, somewhere in there.

So if we take 110 and we've got to subtract 13,000, so we're going be under 100,000 for a release of a lien. Best case scenario if we say no to this, if we don't pass this, what's the best case scenario beyond that?

Continue litigation.

Again, what could happen from that? I know obviously we're gonna

Every time you ask me to predict what a court's gonna do and I can't do that.

You mean, I mean, what's

What I've been told and what I've said repeatedly is that the appraised value of the land is approximately 300,000 give or take a smidge and that our legal counsel believes that we would be limited to that top dollar amount in our recovery because what would happen is if we are successful in pursuing the lien and we get to a foreclosure then you're gonna sell it you know on the house steps just like you would anything else that you foreclose on, and it just depends on what whoever bids at that courthouse sale bids up to as far as what you recover. And then from that amount, you're gonna deduct the legal expenses that it took you to get there.

I guess I'll say this, Mr. Chairman, I think 110 is too low for us to take. And like I said, we don't have 13,000 that comes out. To be less than 100,000 I don't think is a good deal and I don't think we should accept this offer. That's just again my opinion.

Ms. Duncan, since you have your crystal ball out.

Right. And I can predict all

Yeah, let me ask the question this way. Okay. When, I know, like, earliest things have been happening, know, like, when is this set to go to trial?

It's not yet. Do

you have any anticipation on the date that it would go to trial?

I don't. So right now we filed an answer and we filed, I believe, a motion. To have as I I think I told y'all that we had filed a motion to remove city council that had been served separately from that. They filed an answer to that motion that has not been ruled on by the court yet to my knowledge. So the next step on our side if we continue litigation would be to file our counterclaim and our, foreclosure, which would be more legal documents that we would file. And then at some point, I would assume the court would first rule on the motion to remove city council as parties and leave just the city of Jonesboro as the primary defendant. And then and then it would go from there, and it would get on the circuit court calendar.

Oh, because where I was going is I saw I read in the paper today that there a court date was recently set for a case and the court date was in 2028.

Kinda depends on what case. I think they moved

can't remember what court it was.

Right. I do think that they moved quicker on these types of things. We didn't have to wait that long to get our first court date on Ice House, for example. I do think that they give a little bit more priority to something like a lien. So I don't think it would be that bad. But, you know, once you get into circuit court and you have your your hearing there, you would you have to assume that if we're successful, there would be an appeal just like there was an ice house. And then we go up to the court of appeals. That's where we had been in limbo for quite some time on Ice House and just got a ruling. And you know how long ago. I don't even remember when we filed that foreclosure, but it's been some time ago.

Do you have a guesstimate on what you think our legal fees would be on this case? And does the recent ice house ruling, in your opinion, impact this case any?

I don't think it impacts this case any. No. I mean, I think the rules are still the same as far as how you pursue a lien. I don't know that it impacts this case. I just know how long it took to get us there, and we still haven't really gotten to the sale point. We're waiting to get an order in with the circuit court to pursue, you know, a sale of Lots 5 And 6 Of ice House.

And I believe too that this isn't the first offer that they made. This is I guess second time

Second or third. The council.

I think offered 50 the first

time. 55 the second time and then somewhere in the middle. 70? 75? Somewhere in there. I don't know exactly. Somewhere in this mid range to where we ended up.

Anything else from staff or the committee? I guess one point I want

to make also understand we would incur legal fees but he would also incur legal fees. So I mean, he would have he would be just as incur I would think, incur to settle beyond 110 if he's got to continue to fork out money as well. And so that's why, again, I think the 110 is not enough. But at the same time, and I guess another question, we're not responsible for his legal fees, correct?

Not right now. I mean, if we were unsuccessful in court, it's always up to the court whether we would responsible for any of his legal fees. I don't I don't know the answer to that today.

Has it I mean, I'm saying has it has

it As of right now

past that that has happened where

Yeah.

These foreclosures don't happen very often like this. This is an ice house is the only other one I've ever experienced where we foreclosed on a lien this big. So and we were successful in that one in circuit court, so we weren't there wasn't a question of should we be responsible for any other legal fees. Now would we? I don't I don't know. I would have to research what the case law says on that or what the potential liability there is. So I don't I don't know the answer to that. I know when you're unsuccessful in court, in most cases, there's always the possibility that you get ordered to pay some of the other side's legal fees. I just don't know if the law's the same on this. I would have to do that research.

You could. I'd like to know, but at the same time, like I said, he's gonna incur legal fees as well. I think it would encourage him to, if we say no, that they would encourage him to come back to the table.

And again, as we expressed to counsel before, you know, it's 100% up to you guys Mhmm. What y'all accept or don't accept as far as the settlement. I think that, you know, when the mayor and I had a discussion about it, we both agreed there was no point bringing anything under 6 figures to you guys to even review and determine. And we knew that, you know, that wasn't gonna be anything that y'all would accept. But anything above 6 figures, we agreed to bring to you guys for you to for your consideration and vote. So that's why we're here.

Anything else from staff? Anything from public in attendance? If not, please cast your vote on whether or not to forward resolution

council.

Resolution twenty six zero twenty five. Resolution expressing the willingness of the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to authorize the grants and community development department to apply for the federal transit FY twenty twenty five forty nine USC section 5,339 formula grants for the Jonesboro Economic Transportation System, whereas the Arkansas Department of Transportation is the FDA designated recipient of the 49 USC section 5,339 and the City of Jonesboro, Arkansas, a direct recipient of this grant through RDOT, and whereas the City Of Jonesboro was allocated $120,446 and 5,339 funding per JET in fiscal years 2025 and whereas JET requests $120,446 in 05/1939 funding with up to a 20% local match for capital projects and whereas $5,003.39 funds are available during its allocated fiscal year plus three additional years and must be applied for and obligated or the funds will be returned. Now therefore be it resolved by the City Council for the City of Jonesboro, Arkansas, the section one, the Jonesboro City Council supports application submissions to FDA for the FY twenty twenty five secondtion fifty three thirty nine formula grants. Section two, the mayor or the mayor's designee are hereby authorized by the City Council for the City of Jonesboro, Arkansas all necessary documents to factuate the grant applications.

Section three, the grants and community development department is hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to submit all necessary documents for this federal aid program. Section four, the merit or the marriage designee are hereby authorized and directed to execute all appropriate agreements and contracts regarding any future award of the FY twenty twenty five secondtion five thousand three hundred thirty nine formula grants.

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion seconded for full council. Any questions or comments regarding this resolution? Anything from staff or the public in attendance?

Patty 4108 On this one in the one resolution following this is that when you add both of them up, it's like, know, a little over $1,500,000 and you just said that it goes into capital projects. Does that go into the capital projects for the jet bus system or does it go into a capital project for the whole city?

Just jets.

And then what would that be used for specifically?

So first off, this is the standard formula that we use, the five three hundred and seven and five thousand three hundred thirty nine funding is what we use every year. That's what this is for. But this funding is what we use for our departmental for capital purchases in order to make these purchases of vehicles, buses, things like that that are needed for the operation of our service.

Any other questions or comments regarding resolution 26,025? If not, please record your vote on whether or not to forward a full council. Alright, resolution twenty six zero twenty six. A resolution expressing the willingness of the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to authorize the grants and community development department to apply for the Federal Transit Administration FY twenty twenty five forty nine USC section fifty three zero seven formula grants, excuse me, for the Jonesboro Economic Transportation System, whereas the Arkansas Department of Transportation is the FDA designated recipient of the 49 USC section fifty three zero seven urbanized area formula grant, and the city of Jonesboro is a direct recipient of this grant through RDOT, and whereas section fifty three zero seven funds are available during its allocated fiscal year plus five additional years and must be applied for and obligated for spending or the funds will be returned, and whereas the FDA has apportioned $1,489,359 in Section 5,307 formula funding to the City of Jonesboro and whereas JET requests $1,489,359 in Section 5,307 formula funding with $819,150 local match for operating assistance and capital projects. So there you can see that operating assistance federal 595,743, local 595,744, capital projects 893,615, local $223,406 Now therefore be it resolved by city council for the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas, section one, the Johnsonville City Council pages its full support for the submission of the applications for FY twenty twenty five secondtion five thousand three hundred seven urbanized area formula grants to USDOT FDA.

Section Section two, the mayor or the mayor's designated hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to execute all necessary documents to effectuate the grant applications. Section three, the grants and community development departments hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesboro, Arkansas to submit all necessary documents for this federal aid program. Section four, the mayor or the mayor's exitee are hereby authorized and directed to execute all appropriate agreements and contracts necessary regarding any future award of the FY twenty twenty five secondtion fifty three zero seven grant application.

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion taken forward to full council. Any questions or comments regarding resolution twenty six zero twenty six?

I just wanted to ask if, where it says capital projects, that can be used for shelters and sidewalks, two bus stops? So

the 5,307 funds and the 5,003 and 39 funds are different types of funding. The 5,307 also encompasses our operational budget, but there is also some allocation in there for capital purchases. Now those could be, I mean, literally anything from your paper and ink pens all the way up to a vehicle if that's what's needed. That is just for use for the service in order to be able to do whatever our service needs that that these funds are the funds that we've utilized for purchases of vehicles, purchases of shelters, upgrading of equipment, different things like that. Now the shelter project that we have that's ongoing right now that was a specific grant that stood alone apart from these.

Does that answer your question?

Yeah.

You. Anything else from the committee? Anything from staff or the public in attendance? If not, please record your vote on whether or to forward resolution 20 six-twenty six to full council. Resolution twenty six zero twenty seven a resolution to the to the city of Johnson for Arkansas to accept the low bid and issue a purchase order to Wilkins Electric LLC for the Huntington Avenue lighting project.

Whereas the city of Johnson for desires to accept the low bid and issue a purchase order for the Huntington Avenue Lighting Project, whereas the low bidder and the firm selected for the project is Wilkins Electric LLC, whereas the funding for the execution of the purchase order shall come from the 2026 capital improvement budget and compensation shall be paid in accordance with terms of bid number twenty twenty six-two, now therefore be it resolved by the City Of Jonesboro, Arkansas. Sounds stuff was left out of there. One, that the city of Jonesboro shall accept the low bid and issue a purchase order to Wilkins Electric LLC for the Huntington Avenue lighting project. Section two, funding for the execution of the purchase order shall come from the '26 capital improvement budget and compensation shall be paid in accordance with the terms of bid number 2602. Section three, the mayor and the city clerk are hereby authorized by the city council for the city Of Jonesboro to direct the purchasingfinance specialist to initiate purchase order for this project.

Move forward to full council. Second.

I motion second to forward to full council. Any questions or comments regarding this resolution? Anything from staff or the public in attendance?

Patty Lack, 4108 Forest Hill Road. I think Craig, can you just kinda, the bid was $100,000 The two other bids were a $100,000 more. Is that because maybe the people didn't want the project? Why would that be a big difference between that? It was just kind of odd to see. Would you know? Or they just think that they're really good at their job?

Have no idea why the other contractors bid so high other than they weren't familiar enough with the project to give a competitive bid. Wilkins Electric did the Crest Street project. He knows what he's getting into and I don't have any concerns about his bid.

Anything else from the committee or staff or public? If not, please cast your vote on whether or not to forward resolution 26,027 to full council. Last item under new business, resolution 20 six-twenty eight. Resolution authorizing the city of Jonesboro to enter into a contract to lease office space for the E-nine eleven administrative staff and amend the FY 2026 budget, whereas following the closure of the non reinforced portion of the Justice Complex, E911 administrative and training staff have been temporarily housed in open office space in multiple areas of City Hall, and whereas nine eleven administrative staff seek a longer term office arrangement that allows for more efficient communication, training needs, and general usage space, and whereas new staffing has been hired and office spaces currently occupied by nine eleven administration are now needed by other department staff, and whereas it has been determined that it is more cost effective to rent a temporary space rather than repair the damaged complex building until the new nine eleven center is completed. Whereas research has been performed and the space proposed has been identified as the best option in regard to pricing, layout and location.

Whereas the unit is located at 624 South Main and includes approximately 1,700 square feet. That includes office space, a conference room for training, private restrooms and a break room area. Whereas the proposed initial lease term is six months with the ability for the city to renew under the same terms at a rate of $2,300 per month. Whereas in order to support the lease payments, moving costs and miscellaneous expenses associated, an FY 2026 budget amendment of $25,000 is requested, be resolved by the City Council of the City of Jonesboro, Arkansas that section one, the City Council approves the lease contract attached to this resolution with Continental Limited Partnership. Section two, the city council hereby approves a 25,000 amendment of the E nine eleven FY 2026 budget.

Section three, the mayor Harold Copenhagen, city clerk April Leggett are hereby authorized by the city council for the city of Jonesborough to execute all documents necessary to effectuate the agreement.

Move forward to full council. Second.

Motion second to forward to full council. Any questions or comments from the committee?

Chairman? Mr. I

did have one. I noticed the lease amount that was necessarily here and I'm good with that dollar amount. I think it's fair for the area and for the square footage. Is this including any kind of furniture, fixtures and equipment or do we already have that inventory?

We already have some of that inventory because some of that's over in the old office spaces and we do have some miscellaneous furniture. There's also already some budget line items that they have that would cover some of the ins and outs and that's kind of why the exact lease amount isn't the budget amendment because there will be some miscellaneous expenses that are involved in this process.

Good deal. Thank you, sir.

I have one, Mr. Chairman. Why was the lease only for six months? Do we expect to be out of there in six months or?

Well, as we are, the lease can auto renew. That's part of the language in it. But as we're also exploring the possibility of some sort of temporary police complex, you don't wanna leave that option open in case whatever complexes could be rented in case there was space housed in that that would work as well. So just want to leave options open on that.

Anything else from the committee? Anything else from staff? Anything else from the public in attendance?

Patty Lack, 4108 Forest Hill Road. So Brian, are you saying is that the reason why we're doing this? To just to let them have more room right now? Because where it says, we're the Justice Complex, we're not going to they're not in a dam if they were in a damaged damaged part of that building, we'd probably have them moved out already. So I'm not understanding, maybe I'm getting this.

So for clarification, this is for the administrative staff of nine eleven, not the nine eleven call takers. The nine eleven call takers are in their reinforced fortified part of the old Justice Complex. The administrative staff was located adjacent but outside and then the unreinforced part of the Justice Complex. One of the Justice Complex closed down Carol, nine eleven staff, police staff and district court and associated services all had to move out of that building. The estimated repair cost of that was at a minimum 100 to $150,000 and probably climbing higher than that.

And even then there was still no guarantee that it was gonna be safe. So this is obviously the cheaper option. And right now the nine eleven administrative staff, they're in the grants office. They are in part of engineering. And they're using a conference space for training here. One, that's not efficient. Two, we have hired additional staff to fill those once what were empty offices. And they are working out of temporary alert spaces, is obviously not efficient for them either. So this is the most economical and viable route that has been researched and found to help give them a more centralized communication ability, better training opportunities and better efficiency for not just the nine eleven department, but the grants department and engineering department as well.

Anything else from the public? If not, please record your vote on whether or not to forward resolution 20 six-twenty eight to full council. That was the last item under new business. I'm not aware of any pending items. Does anybody on the committee have any other business for us today? If not, we'll move into public comments. This is where the public can comment about something that was not already discussed on today's agenda.

Patty Lack, 4108 Forest Hill Road. There's two things that I need to say. Yesterday, I emailed Bryant concerning how emails are given to

all

of you when a citizen writes you. It came he told me that whenever a citizen writes alderman@jonesboroughar.gov is that I assumed that it went to just you guys. Brian told me that it goes to the administration, that goes to the mayor, and the administration staff. Kinda disappointing because if I wanted to message Brian or I wanted to message the mayor, I would have copied him. And I think people have assumed, and you know when you assume, is that you guys were the ones seeing it.

I don't think it's right. I don't think it's fair. And I was told that if I or any other citizen wants to get in touch with you, that we have to address you separately. I think it's something that has to change because people know that. And when I look back at things that I have come up here and other people have come up here is that I always thought how did they get prepared for what was coming.

I don't think it's fair to the citizens because when I address you guys, that's who the email should go to. And I think it really needs a change. I don't know how long it's been going on, but I really think it's fair to the citizens that I messaged you guys and not Carol or the mayor or Brian or Tony?

I I can answer that, Patty. It's been going on since 2004 since mayor Brodell and since April's predecessor and my predecessor. Like, it's been that way from day one because it's a listserv type situation. It's not. I get that the naming is unfortunate and we're working on a change to that. We don't know exactly what it's gonna be named at this point but there's gonna be it's it'll be separated. You can email city@jonesboroughar.gov and get the same people you would have originally gotten under Alderman and then we'll have a separate address that will be city council direct or something like that where it'll go straight to them.

Okay.

But it was my guess has done that originally because mayor Bardell probably didn't have a computer and that he used on a daily basis. So therefore, he had it going to his staff. I know Philip Crego, who was my predecessor, did not have a computer. And so I think at that time, it went to our office, our legal secretary in the offices who got those emails. So I really think it was just set up that way in the beginning and it just stayed that way through all four mayors that I've that I've worked for.

Anytime that you're sending something just for public information, anytime that you're sending something to a group like that, you can always click on the name Alderman or council comments or whatever it is that's a group type email address. If it says city clerk's office, can click on city clerk's office and it'll give you a drop down list and it'll tell you everybody that that email is going to just for future reference for people that are emailing and not not sure who it's going to. But I think it was for efficiency in the beginning. If somebody was complaining about a flooding straight, the mayor's office knew about it immediately and could go handle it. I do understand the confusion, but I I don't think that when when it was set up under Brodell and Craigo and, you know, Donna, I think that it was done originally because some of those people were not super computer literate, if they were computer literate at all and therefore they had their staff added to it so that they had a way to get knowledge of the emails if that makes sense.

Well I certainly understand it Carol.

Right.

But the point that

I get the confusion. I was just explaining the history.

And I certainly understand it but there is a reason why I email all my city council people versus emailing the administration part of it. And I think people don't really appreciate that, and I think they don't know it. And I think the same thing goes back to the MACPC having a pre meeting. You know, it was a couple years ago that I finally realized that there was a pre meeting before the meeting and really necessarily is that they should be holding that meeting here in the council room to just be transparent, you know. And what happens at that pre meeting is that there's usually two or three of the commissioners that are there that come here and they approve something and there's very little conversations but up in that room there there is and I think that should be handled here but I think that it's just I I I'm upset about it and I think people will be also too knowing that when I email all of you guys is that I think that it's only going to you and I always copy April to make a record of it but I hope it changes because it's just not fair to the citizens.

Citizens. So So thank thank you. You.

Anything else from the public? If not, the next item is adjournment. So moved. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? We stand adjourned.