City Council - Regular Meeting

It is 5 p.m. on July 28, 2026. I'll call the special meeting, city council meeting to order. Let the record show that all council members are present. I will now ask Ms. Council Member Bass to open us up in prayer.

If we can bow our heads for prayer. Lord. Bless our deliberations today. Bless us with wisdom to make wise decisions for our city. And help us remember that as you love us, love for one another is what you expect of us. In Jesus' name, amen.

OK, so I need a. Well, let me thank you, Council Member Bass for the prayer and Mayor Pro Tem for the presentation. Council, I need a motion to approve the agenda. Council Member Brown moved to approve the agenda. Second. It was second by Council Member Bass. Any discussion? All in favor, signify by saying yes. All opposed, no. Motion carries seven to zero. It's now time for citizen comments. Citizens will have three minutes to speak with one minute time allotted for the City Council to respond with a statement or explanation without engaging in dialogue. Madam City Attorney, please call the first name.

Dr. Sue Neesey-Croft.

Good evening, ma'am.

I'm already at 255, and I haven't started talking yet.

There you go.

Good evening, Mayor and members of the City Council. I'm standing before you tonight to address the language that has been finalized for the November ballot regarding Proposition F, Grounds for Recall. As a voter and a citizen of Kalina, I am deeply concerned about what will happen to our community voice if our neighbors vote yes on this proposition. Right now, our city charter protects a fundamental democratic right, the right of the people to recall on elected officials based on poor performance, policy betrayal, or general dissatisfaction. It is a system built on pure voter accountability. But Proposition F completely shifts that balance of power away from the citizens and directly into the hands of the council. By forcing a petitioner to sign a sworn affidavit alleging strict legal definitions like incompetent official, misconduct, or malfeasance just to start a petition, this amendment creates an immediate legal and costly barrier for everyday residents. If this passes, what happens when a city member, when a council member votes for an unpopular tax hike, pushes through unwanted zoning, or simply stops responding to their constituents? Under the new law, citizens will be completely blocked from taking action. As long as a politician's bad choices are technically legal, the voters are silenced and forced to wait years until the next election. Furthermore, forcing regular citizens to sign legal affidavits exposes them to personal litigation, defamation threats, and institutional bullying from well-funded political campaigns. It turns a grassroot democratic tool into a legal battlefield that only the wealthy can afford to navigate. Gathering thousands of valid voter signatures is already a mass difficult hurdle that stops frivolous recalls from happening. We do not need legal red tape to protect politicians from people who elected them. Tonight, I want to get the ball rolling on this critical conversation. I want my neighbors to see this proposition for what it really is, an incumbent protection plan that dilutes our voices and blocks our ability to effectively communicate our dissatisfaction with the council. I will be voting no on this Proposition F in November, and I urge my fellow citizens and the 494, I repeat, the 494, to do the same to keep the power where it belongs, with the people. The 494 thanks you. And may I have an additional minute? Council.

Can I see your hands, please? Yes, ma'am.

And another thing I wanted to say, this is kind of free willy right here. I feel that y'all need a raise. Y'all have been functioning on this amount of money that you get for I don't know how long. And I'm quite sure Debbie Nash can tell how long y'all have been functioning on this fee. I feel that all the crap that you all deal with and looking at the other cities that have councils at our size. Unfortunately, I couldn't bring that up when it was time to bring it up. They're being paid substantially more than what you all getting paid for doing more than what you all. pretty much a bargain for you. You haven't been on the job three months yet, and it's like you're doing two jobs, two full-time jobs, 80-hour weeks. So that's what I got to say.

Thank you. Madam City Attorney.

No other persons are signed up for citizen comments.

All right. We will move Madam Secretary. Discussion item.

Discussion item number one, DS-26-070, discuss ballot language for proposed city charter amendments.

Good afternoon, sir.

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, Council Members. So tonight, as you know, we've been working a long time since February getting to this point. So tonight I do have all eight ballot measures drafted up, the proposed ballot, the language that would go on the ballot. I'm just going to run through all eight with them, run through all eight. And if Council has any questions, call me.

Thank you. Okay.

The first is Proposition A. This is moving the regular city elections to November. The ballot language is to amend the charter of the city of Killeen to move regular elections for mayor and all council members to the November uniform election date during odd numbered years. And to make certain other grammatical and technical changes related thereto. Proposition B. This involves the repealing of the resign to run provision. Amend the charter of the city of Killeen to repeal the requirement that a member of the city council resign and vacate his or her position upon filing to run for a different office on the city council. And then that final part there is going to be on every proposition there, so I'm just going to skip over that. Proposition C, this is for the filling of the vacancies on the city council. Amend the charter of the City of Killeen to require that any vacancy on the City Council shall be filled by majority vote of the remaining members of the City Council and allowing for a special election to fill the vacancy should a quorum of the City Council no longer exist. Proposition D, this is for the initiative and referendum petition timeline. Amend the charter of the city of Killeen to change the number of days in which the city secretary must certify a petition for initiative or referendum and in which a petitioner may amend a deficient petition from 10 days to 30 days. Proposition E, this is also for the adoption of initiatives. Amend the charter of the city of Killeen to prohibit the city council from adopting any initiated ordinance that is inconsistent with state law or from submitting such an ordinance to the electors. Proposition F, this is the grounds for recall. Amend the charter of the city of Killeen to require that a petitioner allege incompetence, official misconduct, or malfeasance in office in an affidavit seeking the recall of an elected official. Proposition G, this is for the recall petition requirement. This is to amend the charter of the city of Killeen to change the number of days in which the city secretary must provide petition blanks in response to a submitted recall affidavit from one day to five days. And the final last but not least, uh, proposition eight, this is recall a district council member amend the charter of the city of Killeen to require that a person filing a recall affidavit for a district council member live within the district in which the council member represents. Okay, so that concludes all of them. I actually don't need a motion tonight unless there's any changes that are required. The next step is I will take any of these approved language, put them in an ordinance, and bring them back next week for adoption by council.

Council, is there any questions or comments? Council Member Brown?

So just because it says that it's requesting that we give direction, I make a motion to accept the ballot language as presented.

Okay, it's a motion by Council Member Brown. Is there a second? Okay. Is there a second? Who's second? Council Member Bass? Are we in discussion? Is there any discussion? Council Member Kimball?

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. In reference to Proposition F and reference to the citizen's comment also, when it comes to definitions of incompetence, official misconduct, or malfeasance, what definition are we going to go by? Is there going to be any sub- any assistance on what those definitions may mean if someone wants to file?

No, so we wouldn't define them in the charter. It would just be whatever legal definitions are. It would be on the burden of whoever's filing the affidavit to prove up that it meets that.

And I know we probably had a lot of discussion on this. Who decides what is incompetence?

So there won't actually be a determination made on that. So our office or the city secretary's office would just make it and look at the allegations that are asserted in the petition or in the affidavit at face value as opposed to whether or not they are making the allegations of incompetence, malfeasance. Whether or not the validity of the statements or anything like that, we would not make that determination of whether or not whatever they've done actually amounts to malfeasance. It's just not whether or not they've met the requirement of asserting those grounds.

So the petitioner will be required to give examples? They can. Okay. I mean, we're into new territory here, and we had a comment on it, the only comment on it today, Very, very good comments, I would add. It's just that there's some very, without guidance, this could be, and I know we had our discussion, but I know without any supplemental guidance on the definitions, it could be wide open. At least that's my opinion. That's all I have.

Council Member Bass.

So what I like about this language is that if, for example, it's me being recalled, hopefully not, it gives me the ability to challenge the recall and say, OK, please show me how I'm incompetent. And hopefully we can have that conversation before the recall was initiated. Please show me how I'm incompetent and give me a chance to become more competent. We can have a conversation about that. If it's official misconduct, then again, what conduct have I done that is officially improper? And if it's malfeasance, then what have I done to offend you or to do something illegal? or improper or unethical. I think it just gives the basis for a really good conversation, hopefully before the recall is initiated, but certainly during the recall. I think it just kind of frames the conversation. Thank you.

Council Member Nashke.

Thank you Mr. Mayor and Council. One of the unique things about this proposal is that it gives a lot of room for the Fowler to decide what they perceive as the three factors. Each person perceive things different and basically if they find even one regardless of how a person feel on the council they have the right to file that recall on anyone. So I think it gives the filer that's doing the recall more flexibility when they file on what they may perceive or also what other residents that will sign that petition. But I would hope that In any petition, the ones that have been done on me, they do give, I'm not saying in the future, but in the past, there were examples of what they perceive a person should be recalled, but I would never challenge it because it's an issue. me as a councilwoman, I wouldn't challenge it because it's a person perception. And if that's how they feel, they feel that way. And it's left up to the other residents that may agree or disagree. Agree mean they will sign it or disagree mean they're not going to sign the petition to push it forward or it would die. But I would never try to defend something that an individual perceived it to be. You have a conversation. Yeah, that's great. But They have that right to file a petition on us, and I'm just I've been there, done it, and I can see it from both perspectives. Thank you.

OK. Any other discussion? OK. Madam City Attorney, could you repeat the motion, please?

The motion on the floor is to accept the ballot language as presented.

Thank you. All in favors, please push yes. All opposed, no. Motion carries, seven to zero. Thank you, sir. Appreciate it. Okay, Madam Secretary.

Public hearing item 2, PH-26-021, hold a public hearing to receive citizen comments on the draft program year 2026 to 2027 annual action plan proposed programs of activities and consider an ordinance authorizing the 2026-2027 annual action plan describing the final use of funds and the application for and the allocation of community development block grants, CDBG.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Got a clicker? Are you going to control the clicker?

I thought it was open.

Oh, you got a new one. Yes. All right. Good afternoon. As an entitlement community each year, the city of Killeen is awarded funding from HUD, for its CDBG and home grants. And in 2021, the city was the recipient of a one-time award of home art. And those funds are to adjust the need for homelessness assistance and supportive services. CDBG activities must benefit a low and moderate income person, aid in the prevention or elimination of slum and blight, or respond to natural disasters. Home activities must be used for affordable housing initiatives, development and or redevelopment of units for tenants and owners or rental assistance. Home ARP activities must benefit one of the four qualified populations, homelessness, at risk of homelessness, someone who's dealing with domestic violence, human trafficking, sexual assault, etc. Other populations where providing supportive services or assistance to prevent homelessness would serve those at greatest risk of housing instabilities. And all of these categories include veterans and families that include a veteran that meet one of the criteria and are eligible to receive home ARP assistance. So our grant cycle timeline, we started with public community planning meetings in February. This year we did three meetings. One was a hybrid and this process on the public facing side is approximately six months from start to finish. The CD grant staff actually start in December planning the planning calendar so things can run smoothly. Community input and survey, the city must seek input from the community including holding public hearings and then submit the consolidated plan and one year action plan to HUD for approval. This year we're just submitting a one year action plan because our five year consolidated plan was submitted last year. Community planning meetings and public surveys are intended to gather citizen input on community needs. We do have an advisory committee, the CDAC, Community Development Advisory Committee. Some are here today. They convene to review, evaluate, and recommend funding awards for proposed activities. And listed is some of the things that they review when they are looking at those proposals. So the CDBG entitlement for program year 2026, which is also fiscal year 2027, and I'll be saying fiscal year 2027 for the remainder of this presentation, was $1,437,398. And we had $66,637.94 in reprogrammed funds. Those were funds that were unexpended in the previous year. And we have those back to reprogram them and put them to use. So the total that we have for each category is listed here and also with a percentage. So our housing, public facilities, code enforcement, other is approximately $1 million and $946,000. And then we have our admin, $287,000, and public service, $215,609. While public services is an allowable use, it is not required by HUD that any entitlement community provides public services funding. But if you do, the maximum that you can provide is 15%, and it does not carry over from one year to the next. So these are our public services funding requests. And we have Bring Everyone in the Zone, Communities and Schools, Families in Crisis, Greater Killeen Clinic. There's a project description, the amount requested, and the amount of the CDAC recommendation. And I'll just pause to allow some time to take a look at those. Additional public service funding requests include Hill Country Meals on Wheels, KPD Homeless Outreach Team, and KPD Community Engagement Unit. What you will see on this slide is that we have a column for staff recommendation. After the CDAC recommendations were made, KPD Community Engagement Unit actually declined the recommendation that they received because they could cover this funding out of their own budget. And because CDAC had already convened, and it is within our citizens participation plan, city staff through city manager can make a recommendation. So instead of reconvening CDAC, that $5,000 still stays with the KPD community engagement unit, but it goes directly towards the homeless outreach team. So that is the only staff recommendation you will see here. Continuing on to our final public service funding request, we have Seventh Day Adventist Church and Richard Allen Community Development Corporation with their requests and then the CDAC recommendations. The Code Enforcement Forward Commitment, so each Not each year, but code enforcement has come and requested funding in three-year increments. And what you see is two different years here. One was under Ordinance 24-029. The other was under Ordinance 25-038. So we're in year three of three for one code enforcement position, for one code enforcement position, and then year two of three for the other. And that's that total there. So our housing public facilities, clearance and demolition. We have the city of Killeen Community Development where we requested $75,000 for a sewer line blockage program for low income owner occupied homes. Parks and Recreation requested for three parks, Richard Allen Community Corp, Development Services and the Killeen Fire Department for a total of $874,500. CD admin, that is for program planning and administrative costs. And that is the allowable amount there, $287,479.60. Then our home program, our FY27 allocation is $585,207.77. 75% towards affordable housing activities. 15%, now this one is required, different from the public service. This is required to be set aside for this pot of money. And then the maximum allowed for admin is 10%. And that totals that $585,000. So we had these applicants come forth with proposals, Centex Arc, Killeen Community Development, Families in Crisis, and Richard Allen Community Development Corporation, and the CDAC recommendations are in the last column. And again, CHOTO, we didn't receive any applicants because we don't have any qualified CHOTOs in the City of Killeen at this time. And we have our admin, which is 10% of the total allotment there. Next is the American Home ARP plan. Again, this is money that was in FY21. One-time spend, these are the categories and the amounts that are there. We had syntax arc and families in crisis apply syntax for transitional housing units and families in crisis for tenants based rental assistance. CDAC recommendations are at the last column, $700,000 and $400,000 respectfully. The citizen comment period was open from June 22nd up until today. Comments were accepted online in writing, including at an email, communitydevelopment at kalinetexas.gov. A copy of the draft plan was made available at five different locations and online. And our next steps, that is, if this is approved tonight, we will submit a plan to HUD for their review and approval. And then October 1, we will execute our agreements for fiscal year 27. So alternatives, do not accept the 2627 grant funds and return the funding to HUD or basically we wouldn't enter into an agreement with them for this funding. Reject CDAC funding recommendations as presented or reject the CDAC funding recommendations as presented. Staff recommends City Council approval ordinance adopting the 2026 annual action plan describing use of funds for CDBG home and home ARP, excluding the CDBG public service request from Killeen Police Department in the amount of $5,000 and adding said amount to the public service request for the KPD reunification program. And with that, not only am I available for questions, we do have some of the applicants that are here. We have some of the city departments here to answer questions as well.

Council Member Bass.

For some of us who are new or people who might be new to this process, can you just briefly explain to us the Community Development Advisory Committee, kind of who makes it up and how long they serve and what the scope of their duties are? I think they've done a fantastic job with this. I've looked at these slides over and over because it's so much money. and so many different community partners. But I think they've done an amazing job. Can you kind of tell us kind of what the committee is?

So CDAC members are appointed by council. They serve in staggered two-year terms. So every two years, someone, they either reapply or they vacate or they could term out of that seat. The committee is allowed in the committee the city council is allowed to reappoint as they wish, but it's regular citizens who are interested in this, in this service. And we pretty much meet with them maybe once a year. If we have a substantial amendment, we can meet two to three times a year. But this year when we updated the community, uh, I'm sorry, the citizens, uh, participation plan, we did add that they would come to our community planning meetings at least one. because they are to act as surrogates as well to go out to the community, talk to them about what the city is planning to do with this money, bring that back to the panel, and also have it there as something they can refer to when they're doing their evaluations to determine who or what program they want to provide funding to.

Well, I can tell a lot of work went into this, and I think it's very meticulous work, and I appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you. Council Member Brown.

Good evening, Ms. McNair. Good afternoon. With the request for a seven-day advent and a mobile shower facility, how would the utilities on that work, how would they connect to water and electricity? Would it be on private properties? and then where would they be determining the locations that that would go to? May I ask them to come up to provide that?

Because am I allowed to? Please. Thank you.

Maybe come up.

So we have Moreland Harris from Seventh Day Adventists, and I want him to answer, but I do know that they come with tanks that they sometimes pre-fill with water as well and have the heaters, but it's his program. He should be able to tell you.

Good evening, sir. Thank you. Good evening. Thank you for that. That's a good question. We have already made arrangements with particular establishments to use water as a resource from their community or from their from their particular business. And we're looking forward to just making it happen. Our particular focus is just serving individuals and let's just say the homeless population in particular areas where they gather. And so we have already discussed with other businesses within the community to use their water source.

So I have two other questions for you then, sir. One, where would you be disposing of the wastewater? How does that get disposed of in this type of setup?

We were informed that we could dispose of the gray water because we will not be using any black water. in that particular sense, only with showers. And that will be disposed of in the places where they have already established that in that particular area.

So it would be dumped onto the private property, wherever it is that you're utilizing?

Yes, within the area of that business or that establishment.

Okay. And then when you're talking about particular areas, what areas would those be in?

For example, we were informed that we could use in the same way that RVs get rid of their particular waterways in areas such as that.

I mean, as far as where you will be servicing the individuals that would be utilizing the showers. So would it be primarily North Killeen? Would you be venturing out into other areas of the city where we have gatherings of the in-house? Yes.

Being that this is a mobile shower trailer, we will be traveling everywhere around the city of Killeen.

Okay. Thank you so much.

You're welcome.

And then for Ms. McNair, sorry. I'm going to move on to the next item, which is how many requests for sewer line blockage assistance on private side and owner occupied? Did we get any here?

We haven't received any at Community Development. Those will probably be sent over to Public Works to see what's going on there. But we looked at this as a program based on previous citizen comments to see what we can do to pilot this and see if there actually is a need. So it's pretty much a pilot program. We did contact... public works and sewers to see how we would go about this, what the cost would be to develop this program. So we talked to Mesquite, Texas, we talked to Detroit, Michigan, Houston, Texas, to provide some guidelines to see what it is that we need to do in Killeen. So we're just going to, since this is private property, we're going to see what eligible homeowners are interested in this and see how it works out, which is why we started with $75,000.

And I ask that because I do know we have a legitimate issue that affects about 1,300 homeowners, primarily in the target area for our CDBG funds, and that would be the galvanized water lines. And so I would love to know, and I apologize, I did not have a chance to contact you about this last week during the week. But I'd love to know what the potential would be to take that $75,000 and instead put it towards galvanized water line replacement.

Well, typically best practices for the purpose of planning for an annual action plan, you start this process early in the year because you want to make sure that whatever you plan on and whatever proposals you get, that come October 1, you can actually start that programming. So we have not done any work to actually launch a galvanized plumbing program, but it is – Something that we can look into for a future program year. The decision is ultimately up to the council. I just wanted to note that it's pretty much the planning process is what gets you here. And if there is money to be shifted, usually councils shift that towards the proposals that they have in front of them. Because it still has to go to HUD to get their approval that the planning process was fair and it was transparent versus a program that had no consideration by the public. The public hasn't gotten a chance to comment on a galvanized plumbing removal program to this point, up until maybe a couple of weeks ago when a letter some people received came out. But, again, the decision is up to the legislative body what they want to do, but it is not best practices to decide what to do with the money. At the moment, you're going to be making that vote. You know what I'm saying?

Thank you. I understand what you're saying. Thank you. Okay. And I'll wait until after a public hearing to discuss the rest of it. Okay.

Council Member Kendricks.

My question was actually for the gentleman that was up here. Mr. Harris? Sir, what I just wanted to know, basically with your mobile shower, To a sense, we want to be ready, not trying to get ready. That's right. And we're prepared for anything that happened, and it just doesn't have to be toward homeless. We could have someone in a resident that gets in a fire along with a duplex or apartment complex. That's basically what that is. We're going to stay ready so we don't have to be ready.

Yes. Yes, sir. Initially, our vision was more of serving the, well, I guess if you're talking about the homeless population, that individuals can become homeless every day. And so we are available for any emergency. So, yes. in order to stay ready, we must be ready. Yes, sir. That's the only question I have.

Okay. Thank you. Yes, sir. Sir, before you leave, I want...

My apologies.

Oh, no problem. So, sir, first I want to commend you. That is an excellent idea as the church getting involved with the community connection. More churches and more organizations should step in line with this project and do greater things for the community because it takes a village for our city to continue to grow. But I commend you on that. But here's my question. Can anyone reach out to you if there was a situation to your church, sir, and something happened and we want to utilize your mobile showers, like for 5 to 15 people, you know, situations like that?

Yes, ma'am. Well, we exist to serve our community.

Yes, I love that. Thank you. Thank you for that. You're welcome. All right. My next question for Ms. Tiffany. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Mr. Mayor, may I have a question for her? Yes, ma'am. OK, thank you. So my question is, I had asked you over the phone in reference to galvanized pipelines about, I understood that you have to have a proposal. That's the best practice in order to move forward because you want to be fair. Do we have any way, and I told Ms. Heather, I spoke to her a long, lengthy time in reference to this. Do we have any way for residents to have that information to know how to do that proposal? Is it something that you just write a letter? Or how does that process work for them? Because that is a major concern, not only from her, I heard from others, and I know Mayor Pro Tem is really involved with that from my understanding, just trying to help with resources. And I think Councilwoman Brown said, in accounts for making it a priority for our representatives in Austin.

So, no, an individual wouldn't write a proposal like that. It would probably be a service provider, but more a city department, so whether it's Public Works that writes the proposal or Community Development that writes the proposal, the interested household would apply for the program so they can be income qualified, but an individual wouldn't apply and write a proposal for themselves and maybe the people on their block, it would make most sense that it would be the city or a partner organization.

Yes, ma'am. So in order for it to get that moving for next year, it has to be some kind of, and Mr. Cagle, you can jump in. I don't even know we have funds for next year, but I'm just trying to see. It would have to be a motion of direction or something for next year, or since you already know about it, would that be something?

I didn't get a motion of direction for the sewer line repair. Once we are made aware of something, we do pay attention. We do see what it is we can do, how we can Set up a program, scale it for Colleen. Who would be interested? Who are our target recipients of the grant money? So, no, I don't need a motion of direction for that. It's something that I've already talked to the CD Grants Manager about next year, should the feds fund this program next year.

Yes, ma'am. Thank you for all you do. Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

Okay. Any more questions for Ms. McNair? Council Member Kimball.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Ms. McNair, great job on the work that you and your staff did. As I look through the different proposals, and I know what this community has done for the unhoused population, we do a lot. And a lot needs to be done, and there's a lot of work that still needs to be done. But one of the things that concerns me is that, you know, when we look at our seniors in our community, there seems always to be a shift when it comes to them. And then I see that we ask for them, we reduce the money for the Meals on Wheels program. Is there any way, again, with something the council can think about, I know KPD has the $5,000 request that you moved over to them. Is there any way that we can somehow supplement or move those funds back so we can get the Meals on Wheels program to the original ask of the $34,000.

You absolutely can. Okay. And the slide before, the city council could accept, reject, or modify, then accept. So you absolutely can move that public, and that's in the public services category, as long as you don't exceed the 215-609.

Yeah, that was my next thing, but we're going to throw your numbers off if we move that back.

If you move it, we will adjust accordingly. and the numbers will pan out at the end.

Okay, thank you. And my next concern is, again, a lot of discussion on the galvanized pipe issue, a little research. I think there's a huge grant coming available from TCEQ, but I don't think we have time to get it in. I think it's due like this week or next week. But that being said, can we apply for it? If we did go move forward next week and the funds were available for TCEQ next year, being that it's a state program, could we still apply for that? Or is this only federal dollars that could apply for it?

No, we could apply for whatever we're eligible entity to apply for. So I'm just writing that down because the HUD does have lead programs. My hometown, we actually had a very hardy lead safe program, and they just received last month $7 million for lead removal. We need to have the staff capacity for grant writing, and if we don't have staff capacity, we either need to, I'm not even going to suggest it, but we some way have to have a person that gets a paycheck from the city to write grants because that's the most difficult part is the grants are out there a lot of the times, but if you don't have staff capacity, most municipalities are hiring a grant writer or they contract with a grant writer. because it takes that much time to pull things together.

And we can put that in the grant for that specific grant writer for the program, right?

No, you want to have the grant writer to write the grant so you can get the money.

Okay, I see what you're saying. So my last...

I'm sorry, but you can partially fund staff to administer the grant and have that listed as one of the uses, but the grant writer would come before...

And my last, and maybe we can't get it done this year, but maybe for next year, as we identify the 1,200 or 1,300 homes that are affected by the galvanized pipes, one of the quick mitigation things that we could do are filters. So I don't know if we can, I have no idea what filters cost. I mean, obviously we have to identify the homes that are affected, but I think as we move forward, one of the first things we have to do is identify the homes, and then if we can quickly mitigate with effective filters, I think that would be something I would want to look at moving forward. I think Columbus did that, Columbus or Detroit. They had a hardy filtering program as they moved to mitigate the pipes.

Right. And they also have lead safe ordinances. And I'm not sure if Colleen has a lead safe ordinance, but it gets really into the weeds of rental registry, tenant protection laws for your municipality. But all of those things can be done. And considering we're talking about private homeowners, they would have to be willing participants. We would also want to make sure that If we're saying 16 homes that they all actually have some type of galvanized plumbing in or lead in there, and then what specific population are we wanting to protect? So it's a – I'm only saying this because I don't want to do a deep dive in my resume, but the Lead Safe Program that we had in Toledo, it wasn't just a notion that you get into. It was something that was worked on for years before we got to that point. But – We could see which private owners are interested in having some assistance from the city and what that will cost, but I'm not sure what a filter will cost. And if some of these homes are of a certain age, if a filter would even be an option for them, and they probably would just need the entire plumbing system mitigated.

Again, thank you. I know even in real estate, if your home was built before 1978, you have to, there's a note, a notice that has to go out. So I, I, I vision something like that, that if you, you know, so at least for a notification purpose that the person know who's going to move into the house, rent it by whatever the case that, that you will be affected by galvanized pipes and you can make your, your decision to live there, you know, moving forward. So thank you for your work on that. I think the council is where I think we're all in agreement on this. I look forward to working with you as we move forward.

Thank you very much. Mayor, it looks like Ms. Ramirez wanted to add to the conversation. Is she permitted to come up? Yes. Our Public Works Executive Director?

Yes. Okay. Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. I just wanted to provide a little bit of clarification. We have as a city been passing out filters to those who received the first round of notices last November. And so that letter last November did go with the city of Killeen letterhead, as well as the city of Killeen envelope. Um, and we will be doing the same again, this coming December, both to the landowners and tenants, should they be different? Um, there are some laws, federal and state that, that do differ as far as who you do notify. One of the things that came up since our last meeting in my discussion with Ms. McNair is taking those 1,300 approximately known galvanized service lines and overlapping them with the CDBG areas. because they must be in those particular areas to qualify for her grants. And then some of the TCEQ grants that we are aware of, some of them are for public system improvements and not necessarily on the private homeowner side. And so we are monitoring those and developing that overall program for the future.

Thank you, ma'am. One question, what's the cost of the filters? What's the cost of the filters?

The cost of the filters, to be specific, I do not know. They were already in stock when I went through the list, but we can follow up with you on that.

Thank you very much. Thank you, ma'am.

Council Member Kendricks. I'm sorry, Council Member Brown.

My question. I heard the question being asked, the $5,000 that the police department found within somewhere else to move the money. So they voluntarily did that. They could have just left it where it was.

Yes.

So to me, I don't feel like they should lose their funding when they're putting it somewhere else, and it should be taken from them when they was already granted the funding. I'm just saying this, my recommendations, basically. I'm saying it for the council, too, and that's just... I'm sitting here thinking about it, that they voluntarily moved it from one area to find the money somewhere else. So it shouldn't be a fault of theirs because they was able to move the money around. That's what I'm saying to the council. So I believe they should be able to keep that money. Thank you.

Council Member Brown.

Now my question is for Ms. Ramirez. So I'd asked Ms. McNair earlier, but how many requests for sewer line blockage assistance on the private side and owner-occupied do we get annually?

So I would have to go back and look up that specific number. Being new to my position, I don't have the history yet.

Okay, and under the plan, either one of you, who would be responsible for clearing those blockages then? Would it be city staff actually goes out and then we're reimbursing staff hours for it, or would we contract with a plumbing company or multiple plumbing companies?

It would be engaging with multiple plumbing companies to have them go out, clear the work, and the city would pay on behalf of the qualified homeowner. Okay. Just making sure we have got that out there. Yes. All right. Thank you. You're welcome.

May I approach him?

Thank you, sir. Regarding the... the grant program. So we talked about having an employee possibly for a grant that you'd need to have a writer, but we also tossed around the idea of hiring a grant writing firm. Will you be able to give us the pros and cons of each, an employee versus an actual firm

I can, and I would say that this is just opinion. This is not me speaking out like I've done the research today, but I do know that the costs are more controlled when you have a staff member on board. You know that you're going to pay them whatever X amount of dollars is per year. versus a contract, you do have some control, but you may only contract with them for X amount of dollars for one grant, or X amount of dollars for three grants. And then they could have something in their agreement that if you are awarded a grant, then they are entitled to a bonus or some kind, or they get X amount of dollars from the admin portion of the grant that they got awarded to you. And I only speak from the experience of what it was when having to be a part of writing grants. It was stressful, time consuming, and sometimes we just didn't make the deadline because we still had to do our regular nine to fives with a grant writer, again, saying this is opinion, this is based on my experience. Once the grant writer was brought into the organization I was previously at, the grant writer, number one, did the research to find the grants. If we came across the grant, we would run it to the grant writer. They would put together what we needed. Then they would go and sit down with different department heads to ask for their contribution. And it was really a more streamlined process because you would be signed Section A, you got Section B, and we would make it work and put it together and see those monies come in that way. But it was more ours versus we worked with the firm, and they're using us just to build up a professional resume. Some firms are good. I've worked with firms to write grants, and they're in and out. There's really no... true passion, like they don't stay around and say, we got this for you. They oftentimes, sometimes I would say, look for the city to bring the grants to them versus them bringing the grants to the city. But someone else may have an experience different than mine working with a firm, so I don't want to make my experience sound universal.

Sure, but it's valuable information because you have used them before, so I do appreciate that. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Council Member Nashke.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. I just have a quick question about the $5,000. Okay. So the KPD Community Engagement Unit had $10,000.

That they requested, yes.

Right. And they gave back $5,000.

CDAC recommended $5,000, and they declined the $5,000.

I'm sorry, they was giving them 5,000 more. Correct. Okay. No, no, no.

So they, if I could go back to the slide. So, yeah, in the middle column, you see the CDAC recommendation, but the first column is what each applicant requested, then what CDAC recommended, and at the end of the slides for each section, we show that it equals the amount that was allocated for that percentage. So, yes, they asked for 10,000, CDAC recommended 5,000, and then they said that they would rescind their request.

Yes, ma'am. Mr. Mayor, can I ask Chief Lopez a question, please?

You may, ma'am.

Thank you. Hey, sir. How are you doing?

I'm fine, ma'am. How are you doing?

Good. So they rejected the 5,000. You know about them rejecting the 5,000. Yes, ma'am.

Could you explain in more detail?

Because me and Mr. Bass was talking. We really don't. We clearly don't understand that one.

The real reason why we gave them the 5,000 is because the fire department needed 5,000 for their fire tower. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Oh, wait a minute.

Wait a minute. I saw Chief back there waving the flag. Like, we're going to take it. We're going to take it.

No, the real reason is that we reallocated those monies to help out our, what's Ron's position? The social worker. The social worker position. They had a better use of that money and they could allocate and use that money for more people than we could reach.

That is so needed. Thank you for giving clarity on that. That is so needed, and it needs to stay where it's at, definitely, because the councils have always asked, especially she's not here, former councilwoman called us one of her things, social worker. So thank you for clarifying that. That is so important. Thank you.

And it was actually Chief Lopez himself that rescinded the funding.

That's clear, and I thank Councilman Kendrick for pointing that out, just the clarity of where the money is going. Thank you both. Thank you, Chief.

Okay, any other questions from the council? Thank you, ma'am.

All right.

Okay. Okay, my apologies. Council Member Kimball, you had another question? Okay, we will move on. Public hearing is now open.

Victoria Ginsberg.

Good evening, ma'am.

Good evening. Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Victoria Ginsberg. One of the grants that is proposed is for the CDIC-ARC program for the homeless community. I was one of those homeless community. I have, because of the program that is syntax, I was able to be no longer homeless in my program. What are the program that they are proposing for Colleen and for the homeless community and the amount of people that it would be able to service and provide help for, including veterans, single families, mothers that have been on the run, abuse victims, and all of those in that perspective. I hope that you'll approve that grant. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. Madam City Attorney?

Leslie Gross?

Lester.

Lester, I apologize.

Hello. Good evening, sir. Okay, I'm also, I mean, just the thought of this is just very exciting and life saving. I know what Centex did for me. I was in Killeen. And before I was in Kalina, I was in Alaska for a long time. It's a big difference with resources and stuff like that. So when I got to Centex, Centex was lifesaving for me in so many ways. Being out here, coming from Alaska, being out here on the streets, not having the resources and just things like that, it's very scary. This is a place for me to come and heal. get to build up my self-esteem, just build so many things. And I'm just so thankful for it. And I just think that more people need to have these opportunities. That's what I have to say. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Madam City Attorney?

No further persons signed up for this item.

Okay.

Public hearing is now closed. Madam Secretary.

Will there be a vote on the motion?

This is an action item. Okay.

Excuse me? Okay. I apologize, Mayor.

Are we going to number three, Ph.D.?

No, this is an action item to consider the ordinance.

This is an action item?

Yes. Okay.

Well, then I'll entertain a motion. I do not. Council Member Kimball?

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I move that we modify... presentations for the Killeen PD homeless outreach team to their CDAC recommended amount of $96,109.70 and take that balance of $5,000 and move it to the Hill County Meals on Wheels program and add $5,000 to their recommended amount, which would be $35,000. Okay, is there a second?

Mayor Pro Tem. I second that. Is there any discussion?

Mayor, if I can get clarification, is that motion to approve everything with that modification or just to modify and then go back and discuss everything else?

No, to approve everything with that modification. Okay. I'm sorry.

Council Member Brown, we open for discussion.

I'm supportive of the request to move that funding back over to the Hill Country Meals on Wheels program. My concern is the amount of money putting into building 16 tiny homes, and I appreciate the people who came to speak about it and let us know how transformative Centex Arc has been for them. But that limits us to only having 16 individuals or maybe couples that we can help at any one given time if it's 16 tiny homes, which at this point in time are not even authorized within the city limits to be built. My concern is approving money for something that by ordinance in zoning we don't allow. Yep. Do you, I think you understand where I'm going, right?

Did you want?

Yeah, if I could please. I think Mr. Neer kind of understands where I'm going with this.

Right. They're not tiny homes. Okay. This iteration is actually duplexes. So they may be single room and or Bobby and Mark. I believe that they even have some one or two bedroom, and this is phase one. In phase one, the cost also includes the infrastructure. So that infrastructure of making sure that we can get utilities to that site is included in this cost. So phase one is... potentially going to be more, and I say potentially because I can't predict future costs of a Phase 2, but Phase 1 is 16 units. Phase 2 would be another 16, but Phase 1 definitely includes infrastructure as well.

So 16 units would be 32 dwellings?

No, no, you go ahead.

Councilman, Councilwoman, the proposed project has a minimum, a maximum of 32 units on the property. As many of you have been in building and construction before, the ground that's there is not usable to any construction company that wants to make money because it has a large floodplain. And it takes about 700,000 to 800,000 just to get the ground right. Anybody who wants to use that land for anything will still incur that cost. The intent is that we put the minimum of 8 to 16 units on the ground. As we're doing this project and garnering more support, every dollar that we get puts additional units on the ground. And they will not be the tiny homes that you're used to hearing and seeing. They are not the ones in Waco. They are also not the ones in Austin. These are permanent duplexes that will actually be HUD qualified to be Section 8 properties immediately upon design. So 50% brick. party board, energy efficient units, and HVAC systems. Nothing that a tiny home, per se, would have. I don't like wasting money, and I don't like seeing government waste money, so these are enduring units that will be there permanently.

And would the money that is going into this cover the loaner?

I'm sorry, I didn't hear.

So would the money that is being proposed cover the loan? So the letter of MAP revision, since it is a flood zone, the ground would have to be built up. FEMA would have to do a letter of MAP revision in order to utilize that full property.

We've already had it replatted. I can't remember the month, but development services already came before council. We've already had it replatted. I believe it was around the time we were preparing for the homeless shelter there, and they're not building in that flood plain. So it's all designed ready to go outside of the flood plain.

Our entire proposal is actually, we've unofficially been blessed with Contero to give us some . The 20% flood plain is not going to be used for anything except for when I get free money to put a playground and a basketball court.

Okay, thank you.

And some of you have seen the designs. They're really nice plans, really, really, really nice. It would really benefit Council Member Bass.

My questions are for you, sir. So I received my brief from you and your team. You kept talking about 32 units. But correct me if I'm wrong. When I asked this question, how many units will $1,280,276 build, I believe you said eight units. Is that correct?

So, yes, the total funds that we will receive with the CBDG home and home art will put eight units on the ground. The intent is already to get enough funding to put eight more units on the ground, so basically the city is getting eight units for free, and that's the minimum. I already have commitments that I can't tell you about that will cover the additional units.

When it comes to the government, I don't believe we'll get anything for free, but I will grant you that.

It's not government funding, I'll tell you that.

All right, so, but... So CDAC recommends 700,000.

So how many units are we going to get? So there's two pots of money, I believe, if you look on your budget proposed. Those two combined will still put the eight units on the ground. And how many people can those eight units service? The maximum number of people in those units, because you're using individual and families, is going to be approximately 12.

12. And so that was my other question to you. For $1 million, we're getting eight units. At that time, you told me 15. I never said 15.

It's only in two, sir. Okay.

So we get, okay, maybe I'm not remembering right. Thank you. Yes, sir. So for $1 million, we get eight units, and we serve 12 people. who theoretically, based on our conversation, would come from that population around the homeless center that would be eligible for your services and would be willing to go through that. Is that correct?

If you just do clean numbers and it was coming out clean, yes. But that's not how it works. The minimum would be you would times that by two. So that would be 24 people serviced within the first 12 months. And that does not include the additional funding that we're committed to getting for the additional units.

And then what y'all reminded me was the units would remain, and then people would go through those units.

Correct.

Yeah.

So they use the unit. It kind of is managed as a rental-type approach, but the intent is that it's a transitional iteration. Average six months is the stay, and then they move into the community because, again, the ultimate goal is to always make them be productive members of society.

And how sure, understanding the federal government can change on a dime, what happens if we don't get any money in the future? What happens to those eight units?

Again, if those eight units cannot be used under the grant funds, they can be converted over to permanent rental units. They're already going to be Section 8 qualified, which is an easy minimum. Again, housing vouchers, we're never going to get rid of Section 8. It's like telling us that we're going to have a perfect society. It will never happen. So those units will always be able to be rented if needed in the future. Thank you, sir.

Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, sir. This is a good program, I believe, because we've just dealt with a situation where we've identified and previous councils have also identified that we have a need for the ultra low income housing. And so with this also being a transitional opportunity as well as HUD certified, I think that's a good blend. It does make sense that it will serve a need for a population that is currently underserved in our area. I just have a question for Ms. McNair, actually, regarding this, because previous councils, we've been working on this for quite some time, and we approved these funds. I think this kind of sounds familiar to me, like, with regards to planning you talked about before. So if we've already worked on this, we're now at the design phase, we know how many units potentially if this goes through. What is our timeline? What does that look like? And what does that mean for planning for people that might need to actually utilize these services? What's the turnaround time for you as a grant provider? And then what's the turnaround time for you as a developer potentially for this project, if it's approved?

So with home funds, home art funds, the same rules will apply for development. So they would have, once we sign the agreement, they would have... 12 to 18 months to develop, we can extend that if that is necessary for their construction phase. Bobby will know more about his construction timeline and where he would phase out should he be awarded these funds now because there are some soft costs in the development that he would need to cover with that. With the home art portion that is being recommended for this particular project, those funds must be expended by 2030. So if we run an 18-month construction timeline, that will get us about late 2028, and you don't necessarily, it's similar to the ARPA money, where you had a certain amount of time you had to expend those funds. You want to commit it and expend it because if you don't use them, you lose them. And the Home ARP funds were really once-in-a-lifetime funds, just like ARP UP. And it really allowed a lot of cities to address homelessness and provide some type of housing structure that they could then later on support with the continued Section 8 or HOME TBRA, tenant-based rental assistance, they could still support the funding through those resources instead of coming back to the city or getting to a point where they don't have the operating money for it. So they are all designed to be rental, similar to Laredo. They use their home art money to do a small community village for people that were transitioning out of homelessness. So this is something that you're seeing nationwide, and it's actually the best and fastest use for getting that home ARP done and getting it expended.

Thank you.

And with those specific populations, you are kind of forced to do these types of projects, which, like I said, they actually just make the most sense. It's very specific about who can benefit from the home ARP funds.

Okay.

Yeah, thank you. Council Member Williams. Oh, he's the second part of my question. Yeah, another question. My apologies. Yes, sir. Thank you.

So as far as from, I'll just call myself a builder perspective. The longest, and this is my second project in five years. The last one was 5.5 acres. And usually the delay is the city. Permitting, planning, inspections, and things like that. With the amount of units and the size of this lot, we could have it up and running and on the ground after the permitting and everything is approved and plats in 12 months or less. So it still aligns with the timeline that Ms. McNair is speaking about.

Thank you.

Okay, Council Member Williams. Yes, how you doing, sir? We spoke earlier and we went over some of the that I want to ask you as far as the facility. And I worked at something similar when I worked at Hackberry Prison in Gatesfield. To me, it reminds me of a residential program or a residential area that you guys are having. My question to you is what kind of programs do you all have for these when they come in there to your program? What kind of program that you have in the programs?

So the majority of our programs are considered in the category of supportive services, generally speaking. We are a licensed substance use treatment program. That's how we operate. The beds which city of Killeen and the council has approved multiple years. We offer such treatment. We also offer peer support services. We also offer religious peer support if it's requested. We are non-denominational, so we try and respect the rights of everyone. We also offer individual group counseling as well as an ultimate goal of housing placement. So regardless of whether or not the service is provided by us, we obtain those services under our case management wraparound services. If you're familiar with SSVF or Veterans Affairs, it's kind of like a combination of that and the current one that we also run, which is a grant per diem, again, the transitional housing component and then the permanent housing placement.

Okay. My next one is what's the process of admittance? Um, what kind of referrals or whatever do we have to get and what the ages are? Uh, is it every age adult? Is it kids? What the ages are and what's the process for admittance?

So all our programs are a combination. Obviously, the primary has to be 18 to whatever age, probably longer than I'm ever going to live on this planet. But we've had people as old as 84 as our entry. Assessments will come. This is a city of clean focus project. So we use the hot team. We have a strong relationship with them. We can actually do a triage and assessment of an individual wanting services and willing to accept them probably in about 20 minutes. Because we have that relationship, they kind of pre-qualify people and give them the guidance and then we do the other information. We also do families, which is almost not seen anymore because you don't necessarily get paid for a family, but we don't care. And that can also include same sex couples. It doesn't matter to us. We want to be able to provide the service to the people that need it most, and removing those barriers helps us do that by doing individuals, adults, family members, and things like that. As an example, right now we have four children under 10 running around in our campus. We had seven last month.

Do you all have any psychiatrists on board?

We do not have psychiatrists on board. We utilize community partners. So very specifically for mental health because we want to segregate suds in mental health. We utilize central county services for those resources. We do have some professionals that do pro bono work, but we want to make sure that we're working with community partners who are already providing those services. I'm a military guy. We're not trying to reinvent the wheel. We want to make sure that if there's folks out there doing work, we want to make sure that they can do the work and work with us to help the community.

My last question would be, it's important for them to live a productive life once they finish with the program. What process do you have for them after they leave the program?

So we have an ongoing feedback loop. Several council members had asked about that. We have what's called an alumni program, not funded at all. It's very specific that Centex focuses because in recovery of anything, whether it's mental health, homelessness, or substance use, that you have a strong support system. And that does not necessarily need to be your organic family, so we give them a Centex family. We actually talk to them and track them from the day they graduate. until they tell us to stop calling or talking to them. So that way, if somebody is struggling or somebody needs some help or just some guidance in life, that they have somebody they can ask. And if we don't know, we will call somebody for them.

Thank you. I think it's awesome. Thank you. Council Member Brown.

We keep using and mixing terms here, so I want to make sure I'm very clear on this. Number of units versus number of people helped by their duplexes. So when I hear a duplex in a unit, that would mean two dwellings. So I want to specifically ask how many dwellings would this be? Is it eight actual living spaces or is it eight buildings with... the duplex, so two dwellings each?

So they're duplexes, one ones on each. We have one set of duplex that's a single, one set that's an ADA, one set that's a family. So there'll be a minimum of those put on the ground immediately to ensure that we have appropriate number for the mix of people. We don't want to segregate or abstain people from being able to receive services. So we always include family units. We always include people with disabilities. Because you just don't realize how many are out there until you start offering a service.

So we're talking about 1.1 million or 1.2, however many million, is going to build four buildings.

Four duplexes, and then on top of that, we will be contributing four more right away. Your 12 comes up on initial people because you're including children. Most of the families that come in, come in with a minimum of two kids with us, average two to four. We can change any of it to any composition. We've already done a second iteration, and I'll send you the packet. We've already done a second iteration of design, and that design is based on the limit of the funding as well as the timeline. In order to do that, all we had to do was adjust the size of the unit. These units are actually bigger than any tiny home you have ever seen across the country, and I've seen about two dozen. I've also been to two dozen units, which I just don't like because, again, they don't make them enduring. It's like It's like giving a mobile home but assuming it's going to last 50 years and they're only made the last 12. These are enduring. They will be able to fit these folks in there and all we have to do is adjust square footage to actually accommodate to put more units on the ground. So this second iteration actually put more units for the exact same price.

What is the average square footage?

Right now, for the 1-1 standard, it's 368 square feet. And we're also talking about this is not just living space. This is actually a small kitchen, private bathroom, living room, and an eating area, and a porch in front because we kind of force integration of habitation.

So the other question, and I think this is my last question. I know of an eight-plex in North Killeen that's for sale fairly newly renovated for $300,000. That could fit eight families right away. So why build new duplexes when we have properties like that that are available that are much more cost-effective and we don't have to put infrastructure in because the infrastructure is pre-existing?

So I've done home repairs on some of those A-plexes before. Most of them will not meet habitability standards in many cases, specifically fire suppression. Many of them don't have fire safety. The reason that we don't have A-plexes, and that was our initial design, was that fire suppression would have cost you three times more than the units themselves. So the duplexes allow an accommodation to ensure not just safety, but also affordability in the process of putting them on the ground. If you go and rehab, you're stuck with what you have from that. You don't know what you have until it really is there. And 90% of the time when I've done home repairs and I've done about $32 million in home repair programs, most of them are other people's problems that were never foreseen before.

Excuse me, Bobby.

I'm sorry. And I'd like to add that the reason why you see most cities that are doing this type of transitional housing with supportive services wrapped around, doing it with new construction where, the units are all together is because they can cultivate an environment that is I don't want to use the term control, but it is specifically to provide the support for the people that are going through this transition, getting back to a new sense of normalcy in their lives. So when you have scattered sites, that's the term that I use, scattered sites. People are here, they're everywhere in between. Someone, if they are closely knit together, and even in an eightplex, you want to be able to have your folks together. So someone notices that Ms. Gonzalez is not coming out of her apartment. She hasn't been out in three days. We need to go check on her. Or if it was a single-family home, because you could say, well, why not do single-family home? People can get lost in that kind of space. And some temptations that lie in certain regular neighborhoods and the accessibility of certain things is just too strong for where they are in their recovery. So they build and cultivate these type of communities to have that insulation that one needs to be able to. to go back into society and whatever that new normal is going to be for them.

So that kind of leads me to one more question then. As far as speaking about that, is it going to be something where there is a CENTEX ARC staff member there 24 hours? Are they going to be there during certain hours checking in? Essentially, is there going to be supervision of these individuals or are we truly putting them in Go be independent in a somewhat controlled environment where we at least know where you are.

So it's a little easier on the project pictures, which, again, I'll send you. But generally, we use the same concept that we do at Centex Ark and Temple. Much like a military installation, everything is self-enclosed. It's kind of like a scuba bubble where you can't get in or you can't get out, except for this is not going to have those kind of things. It is going to be like a regular housing community except for there will be perimeter walls for safety and security. We will have 24-hour resident monitors. I don't like calling them security because they do a lot more. They also provide transportation, but they're there 24 hours a day for safety and security of the clients. Staff as well as anybody and riffraff in the area the design and the composition of our structures Leans towards ensuring that the things that miss Tiffany talked about are kept out in the same design instruction We encourage you to come visit our Center in Temple it uses the same design concept where we're ensuring that that bubble is well kept and tight to ensure that they don't have any that they don't have any distractions from the community. It's not going to be a housing development where neighbors and visitors can just come in and out as they please. It's still going to be a treatment program, a supportive program, and a residency program. The housing is just a different style than what you're used to thinking in that model.

Thank you.

Council Member Bass.

Ms. McNair, Councilman Kimball and I attended your department briefing. Yes. And I was very impressed with your entire staff. And I was also very impressed with your many years of experience working with the government on these complex projects. So it sounds to me today like you believe, as our city's director in this area, that this is a wise expenditure of these funds. Is that correct?

I do, and in February I was given a motion of direction to have this conversation to see what we could do. It was a two-part motion of direction. First part was to engage with families in crisis about an expansion of their homeless services. As we know, that June they did not get any funding, so there was no need to talk about an expansion from that point. The other part was to engage with Centex. to develop a transitional housing site and program, and that's exactly what we have done. We have had conversations over those several months as far as what this would look like, how do we make it work, I asked Bobby, where did you get this from? He's like, oh, this is Arizona, New Mexico. He has some experience. Everything that I would throw at him, he would just lolly back. He had a response that I found to be satisfactory and something that I could compare it to to make sure that it would work here in Killeen. And so we're going to do something. We've talked a lot since I've been here, and We have to do something. I'm glad that this council is engaged in the way that it is. I appreciate every question that has come because it either allows me the opportunity to share the information that I have or it gets me into a space where I go gather additional information to make sure that what we're doing is the right thing for this city and the right thing for the people that need this type of housing.

Well, I think, like I said, I'm very impressed with the CDEX work and 100% trust you based on your experience. So I'm good. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Wilson. Not Ms. Wilson. She's on my mind. Ms. Tiffany McNair, as Council Member Bass, thank you. This is my concern. I'm glad you pointed out it was a motion of direction from this council. And this is a project we have been working on for so long. The unhoused population is a part of our community, period. The resources are tight. And if we can save the least of them, I like the concept of a community neighborhood. And we all know how that works. This is not anything new to society. This is reality. It is happening everywhere. Well, we take what we have and we make the use of it. And the council really talked a lot for the last two, three, four, maybe five or six years about the homeless population. This is not a campaign slogan. These are actual people that need a helping hand. And I like the two speakers we have, and I like what you said, Ms. McNair. Anyone in this room is subject to be homeless. It takes one incident. The funding and what you're doing, and sir, thank you too, this is needed. And you have to start somewhere.

Period.

Period. My other concern goes back to our community outreach. Another motion of direction from the council for years, the social work part. And I know there is a motion on the floor for Meals on Wheels, and my heart do see that as a need also because there are more needs than we have money. And I don't know how this is going to work before you come back. And I know Mr. Cagle is going to probably say something to me, or Ms. Tangeland. But if we could find $5,000 somewhere, because both of them are a need, a social worker. Because if this is the population that we saw a need, the council, that we needed a social worker. And we always say police are not, throughout the years, they're not programmed, they're not designed to do social work business. That's how the social worker came apart, the outreach, to ensure that not only I like your program, all the programs you have in place, and I've seen this before over and over, When we bring you in, I love your drug treatment center. I love your counselors. I love all your programs because we want you to be a better person when you leave. So we're helping the unsheltered population. We do need social workers to help them, to be a part of that team. And that's what the outreach program is. It's the different entities brought together. That was the purpose, I thought, to bring different entities as a neighborhood, a community, that if you need this, we have this. You have everything. And that's what our programs need to be, the whole person, the holistic, viewable person. It's not always financial. Mm-hmm. It could be a crisis you went through, losing a child, losing a spouse. We need that. So I don't know how that's going to work, but if we can find the money to support both, I'm for it. But if I had to make a choice, I am still for a social worker for our outreach unit. That's what the council directive was in the future, I mean the past. For our police department, I hope we can continue that. Thank you.

Council Member Williams.

I like the fact, it's like Councilwoman Nass said, that this is like a team. It's a family, and it's community-based. I love that. Could we have the other two gentlemen to come up as well, who's part of the group? Could they come up too, part of your team, who was there today for the meeting?

Was that Mark Baker? Yes. That's one of their board members. Mark Baker is the Executive Director of Syntax Art.

I just want them to come up and introduce themselves as well. I know the other one. I know this one here. I don't remember the name, but I do remember your face. And so I just want them to come up and introduce themselves too as being part of this program, which is awesome.

It's my pleasure to be here today in front of you, council. My name is Mark Baker. I'm the executive director at Syntex ARC in Temple. And we're very excited about this program, very excited about the work that's being done. And we look forward to doing great things in partnership with the city. So thank you for this opportunity.

It's also a pleasure to come before you all today. My name is Randy Young. I have 20 years history. with Syntex ARC as operations manager and director. I'm now retired. I can tell you in those 20 years, we've never been about making money. We've been about helping people, and that is our goal, and we will continue that. We have a 50-year history of being in business. We're solid financially, and we look forward to doing what we can to continue to help the homeless. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Something that they didn't mention and I just I found quite impressive working with syntax arc in my time here at the city of Colleen is we fund them with our opioid settlement funds and it's it is limited to six months and they have to get additional permission from the city. But what I have seen is when the money runs out from us, they don't kick out that individual. They keep them there. They find the money. They find a resource. They find a sponsor. They see it through. And if I had any doubts that they would not see this through, I would not have brought this to you. I would have said this is DOA. Sorry, let's keep looking. But the commitment that they have That wasn't even asked of them. I have emails and text messages from Bobby. I've run out of money, and I know you have to go back to council, but I found a way. And that's what I expect with this project. It's whatever needs to happen, whatever comes up, that they will find a way. So I appreciate your time on this particular subject. Thank you.

Council Member Kendricks.

Yes, and I want to speak about those gentlemen. And I honestly do believe when you say you're putting your heart into it, if you wasn't, it would be DOA. I really believe that. And I want to commend the ARC. And the reason why I want to commend Art when he was just talking about funding, they don't come back and ask. They find a way to make it happen. And they continue the mission even when they are slacking. They find a way to make it happen. And that is music to my ears that we can depend on. a partner like that that's gonna make sure everything is happening the way that they say it's gonna happen. And the other thing that I wanna commend them, He was prepared and I know we talked and he said he's a retired first sergeant. He's like myself, was wounded in combat, but he was prepared for every question that was thrown at him. He was prepared for the answers and his answers were precise. They was like, I already knew what you was going to ask me, so now what? I'm prepared, and I'm prepared to take hold of this mission for the city and drive the city forward. And like you say, we may start now with just 12 units, but the way this arc is and with that leadership, I say soon we'll probably be at 48 units before we know it because they are mission-driven. Thank you.

Mayor Potem.

Thank you. And you actually answered my next question, so thank you for making that statement because that's extremely important. I support all the comments that have been made previously. But when it comes to this project, from what I've gathered and from what I've learned during my conversations with the gentlemen that are a part of it is it answers a lot of our questions. My all calls to our community was for our community to come out and get out of our silos and operate together. So we're not duplicating services and to be able to prevent that from happening, but also provide a need for the people that need it. We've also said that we needed ultra low income housing. Clearly, we just had an issue that now we have an opportunity to resolve that or at least start the conversation open the door and create new opportunities for ultra low income housing, HUD housing, transitional housing to support that need. And that is huge. The only concern I have now at this point, or just you can clarify for me, is I just want to make sure that it sounds like they're meeting all of those check marks for us, which is wonderful. And I just want to ensure that when they have people that they're serving in Killeen, those folks are going to be in Killeen first. Is that how that works? Like that's the population is Killeen first.

Absolutely. And that's, um, we write that into our agreements that is, this is for citizens of Killeen who are experiencing hardships when it comes to housing or lack of housing, substance use disorder, mental health issues that are, causing them not to have stabilized housing. This is very much only Killeen. I know there's a site in Temple serves all of Bell County, which is how the homeless outreach team are able to refer people there. But again, even with our opioid money, our opioid money is Killeen first, and it is through our homeless outreach team making sure that those are the people that are getting that help that is being covered and financed by this city.

And I know that they've been doing this for quite some time in Temple, and they're basically duplicating this here, replicating this here in- Colleen, if there are organizations that aren't currently partnered with them, but they are in our area and they want to partner, or they're open to accepting new opportunities with local partnerships, is that correct?

Yes. Yeah, if Bobby could partner with all of you, he would. But he is very much open to bringing any and everyone to the table that is interested in supporting the mission, is interested in changing lives.

One of the things, and this is the last thing I have for council that set this apart for me was, There's a gentleman that does the alumni program. I thought that that was fabulous. That's where you continue, Mr. Baker, to do the outreach. I thought that was a wonderful component of this. So for me, Council Member Nash at King had mentioned, these people are not just They're actually walking the walk, and I have been saying that for five years. And so this is exciting for me to know that we're actually able to now not just talk about filling a void and providing a service, but now we have an opportunity to give this to our citizens. So thank you, that's it.

Council Member Kimball.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to make sure I speak on my motion, and I think Ms. Williams seconded or forwarded it. You know, my, my motion was, you know, that we covered the, the program director for the meals on wheels program. And if that money's not allocated, I mean, that's, that salary is going to come from somewhere and it's probably going to come from the program. Uh, so that's 4,000 or $5,000 less that the meals on wheels program could have to actually deliver meals, but because they have to pay that salary. So again, I just, and I know the social worker program. This is important. I was a police chief. I trust me. I know it's important, but as we look at our seniors, I spent a lot of time at the seniors. Uh, there's a lot of issues that's going on with our seniors and to keep pulling from them. I think it's not fair. I think that we, that we, if we can do anything to enhance the program by doing this, by bringing up, uh, their, their amount request, excuse me, go to the record, increase their recommendation now for the, the, For the social worker, the CDAC recommendation for the police department was $96,109. Okay, I get that. Staff recommended 101, 109. The only thing I'm asking is to bring them to the CDAC recommended amount and then use that balance from the staff recommendation over to the Meals on Wheels program to bring that up to 35,000. So again, I know we got... You know, we use the motion to talk about all of the programs, but I just don't want the seniors to get lost in this mix. Again, I'm hoping the council would like to bring up the pay for that full program manager salary for the Meals on Wheels program.

Thank you. Okay. If there is no other discussion... Madam City Attorney, would you please repeat the motion that was made some time ago?

Yes, the motion I have is to approve the ordinance with the modification moving $5,000 from the KPD Homeless Outreach Team program cost to Hill Country Meals on Wheels program.

Ms. Clements, could I say something really quickly about that motion? I just want to be clear that we're talking about modifying the CDAC recommendation because on the last slide, the staff recommendation was to put that $5,000 towards the... Homeless Outreach Reunification, I just wanna make sure that we are modifying this, basically rejecting the staff's recommendation and then modifying the CDAC recommendation.

That's what I understood. The ordinance as it is in the, the ordinance as was included has the 101-109-70 number. And so I believe that the motion would reduce that back to the CDAC recommendation 96-109-70, add that $5,000 then to the Hill Country Meals on Wheels for $35,000 total.

Okay, thank you, because that's good. I just want to make sure that the motion was as I understood it, but I have a staff member who's like, no, no, no, check the, thank you all.

Okay. Before we vote, Council Member Kendricks.

I have one question. How many requests actually got the amount that they wanted? I think there wasn't anyone that got the amount that they requested. They got amounts very close to that. Am I not correct?

Yeah. I'm sorry. Yes. When it came to our public services proposals, no one received their full or CDAC did not make a full funding recommendation for anyone.

OK, so council, as we sit here, and I just heard what was just said, we just talked about, hey, do we go with what CDAC talked about? We talked about a committee and everything. And now we got it. It wasn't recommended. But we want to change their recommendation, which there was no staff recommendations with the exception of moving that money to the outreach team. I find it hard if you're not gonna look at everybody who didn't receive what they wanted. And I think everything was done in such a manner to where we could get everyone as close as possible to what they was requesting. And I think we should honor that. And Council Member Nash-King, alluded to trying to find that $5,000 elsewhere. I think that's the way that we should go because we don't need to say one is more important than the other or anybody's more important than recommendations were made, and I think we should stick with that recommendation.

Council Member Nashking.

Thank you. I just want some clarity from Mrs. McNair. So you recommended $10,000 for the homeless outreach, correct?

No.

Okay.

We recommended the staff recommendation once the 5,000 requests was rescinded by KPD. We just looked at what we had in front of us and what we believe the intent, and we spoke to the CDAC chair about the staff recommendation about leaving that money with the KPD Community Engagement Unit to support its homeless outreach team, and it was the $5,000. Okay.

Yes, ma'am. So what I'm trying to ask you, I guess my question is, before you rescinded it, how much was the claim outreach getting?

$5,000. That was the CDAC recommendation, $5,000.

But they wanted to use it for something else. Is that?

CDAC or KPD?

KPD.

No, KPD did not ask for the money to be used anywhere. I don't believe in that email you asked for it to go anywhere else. You just rescinded the proposal.

Yes. Okay. And my follow up on what I asked before, and we have to, we'll vote on it next, next time we meet or when we vote today, this is it.

Vote today. This is it. Um, the vice chair of CDAC is here.

I believe another CDAC member is still here.

Oh, we have Ms. Dix here as well. Um, And like I said, we did contact Mr. Frederick, the chair, to let him know so he can inform his committee. And we didn't get any objections to the staff recommendation that was communicated back to us for that $5,000.

Yes, ma'am. So here are my questions. And I don't even know if I can do this or not. So if I'm wrong, Ms. Clements, correct me. Because we haven't completely voted on the budget. And I'm really big on social workers for our unpopulated workers. and as a senior citizen that use the senior center, and I do understand from a widow perspective how cost effective it is to have someone to make sure that food is delivered. So I am not against that at all. But when we get into our budget, and Mr. Cagle, I guess this question is to you. Could we just find both of them? We just have to find the $5,000 somewhere else. And I'm going to ask that when he come up here to present on that because both of them are significant. But I agree. One is no more better than the other because we're still talking about people's lives. They love the hood. So that's important to me, but okay. Thank you very much. Madam City Attorney.

I was just going to add, if we went to slide 10, I could make notes on here to show everybody what this motion would do if there still needs some clarification.

Thank you, ma'am.

Slide 10. Right. OK. So this amount down here is the amount that was withdrawn. The request was withdrawn. And then this was the recommendation of staff. But the motion would bring it back to this amount here. And then that $5,000 would be added here. So that's, I don't know if that's, so.

Right, so this column would just be gone. That staff recommendation would be gone.

So you'd have 35,000 with Hill Country Meals on Wheels, 96,109.70 with the KPD Homeless Outreach Team Program, and then the last column would be zeroed out.

And I would like to note, when Chief Lopez came up, he actually did pull up the email that he sent and wrote, I would like to withdraw our application and, if possible, reallocate the $5,000 to the document retention initiative. So I was mistaken. He did ask that that $5,000 be put towards the social worker for the document retention. And I do apologize for that error.

Thank you on that. It's not like he didn't ask for the money. He just wanted to use this somewhere else. Okay. City attorneys?

Thank you. She has support?

That's all. I just wanted to try to clarify. I'm not sure if my chicken scratch on this has done that, but this, I believe, is what the intent of the motion is. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Did no other... Council Member Nesking? Okay, you're off now. Your name was there. Okay. All right. Okay. Everybody's off now. Okay. All right. Let's take it to the vote. All in favor signify by yes. All opposed, no.

No.

Okay. The motion passed five to one. Okay.

If we can, before you, it seems there's a question on why Mayor Pro Tem shows abstention.

Council member Nash King isn't, it's not. She was saying. You've seen OK, so there's two things OK. OK, you've seen OK alright, so the motion pass this from. Bob. 212 abstaining Mayor Pro Tem abstaining and. On what I'm saying. Okay, I'm saying here that you abstain.

That is not correct.

So we're showing five in favor of yes, one no, and Council Member Nash-King is the only one that abstained.

And that's not correct?

It's not matching what's on the screen, but that is what we show on the deliberator.

Could you repeat that, please?

Absolutely, I have a five to one vote with one abstaining being Councilmember Debbie Nash King.

OK, so the motion pass. OK. Thank you, thank you. Appreciate it. Miss McNair for which I'll do and syntax. Thank you for what y'all do. Y'all do great work and you've been doing that for many, many years. And. Okay. Moving on. Madam Secretary?

Yes, sir. Public hearing item 3, PH-26-022. Hold a public hearing on the proposed fiscal year 2027 annual budget and set the date to consider adoption of the fiscal year 2027 annual budget.

Excuse me, Mr. Cagle, my apologies, but can we just take a few minutes break, please? We'll take a five to ten minute break. Okay, we're back out of recess, and we can continue. Good evening, Mr. Cagle.

Mayor, I'm sorry, are you ready for me to start?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

We are ready, sir.

All right. So let me start here and give you some information. So we're here July 28. And we should have already posted the agenda for the August 4 meeting. But we haven't done it yet. We'll probably get it done. middle of the morning, something like that. We still had not received the final numbers for the certified tax roll. We received them Saturday. We found some incorrect numbers, sent them back, and we've been going back and forth ever since then to get the tax cap calculation to get everything done, and I got that at 459 today. And there's some significant changes, so we've got quite a bit to talk about tonight. But we'll have a public hearing tonight, and then on August 4th, the action that you need to take is just to set the date to hold the public hearing. That's all you've got to do on August 4th. But tonight, we'll probably want some sort of direction about where to go with that. So first of all, just to remind everybody, our general fund, and that's the real issue. Most of our other funds, we've dealt with the issues and they're in pretty good shape. General fund, not so much. Where the money comes from, you can see 72% here on the graph on the left is sales tax and property tax. And so those are our two major revenues. And you can see that property tax doesn't cover police and fire. And property tax and sales tax together cover a little more than police and fire. But another way to look at this is not just where the money goes to the departments. Seventy-five percent of those departments, the money goes to pay for personnel. So when you want to reduce the budget very quickly, if you're talking about any meaningful size, very quickly you're talking about personnel. At this point, I want to take just a minute to give a little background. I know a lot of you already know some of this, and I've said pieces of it now and then over the past six and a half years, but historically, the Killeen local government is very poor. And the reason for that is our economy is a service-based economy, and primarily the property tax is funded by residential, and the majority of that residential is starter homes. So for, I'd say, the past 75 years, that's been an issue, and it's made things difficult to fund and be competitive in the marketplace for employees to fund local government. So Over that time, many things have been tried. One of the things was we're just gonna shift a bunch of expenses over to water and sewer and solid waste and things got really complicated and then a budget was presented and somebody decided $8 million was missing and we had a big audit that said no, money was not missing. But your system is so complicated, almost no one can follow it. And we had done so many things and moved money back and forth to places it shouldn't have been that nobody could keep up with it. We've dealt with all that, we've straightened it out. By and large, not 100%, but 90 something percent probably. And then so the other thing was tried, well, we're just not going to maintain our streets. and the street budget was cut significantly, and the quality of streets started declining, and then winter storm Yuri hit, and we know what happened. We've done a pretty good job of addressing that now with the street maintenance fund, and we can, for the most part, stay on top of all of our collectors and thoroughfares, as you've seen the numbers in the past, not residential streets. And then the city said, well, we're just not going to give pay increases. So we went three or four years without giving pay increases. And lo and behold, turnover went through the roof. We couldn't keep people. Turnover costs more than keeping people. And we found, just for example, in municipal court, municipal court clerks are very important. And if they make a mistake, they can send the wrong person to jail. But they were leaving us to go over to Bucky's to make barbecue sandwiches because they can make a lot more money. And so then we said, well, we're going to make all of our vehicles last a lot longer. Well, that actually costs you more money as well. And then we found out we had firefighters going out on engines that were older than they were. They were breaking down all the time. And we were borrowing equipment from much smaller cities. We've gone round and round and tried a whole lot of things to deal with this. And then after COVID came along, we actually started making some improvements. Let me come back to this slide. I want to get to this one, and then I'll go back. But you can see we had a pretty steady tax rate at 74.28 cents for quite a long time. And then after COVID hit, we had a lot of sales tax started increasing much better than it had in the past. Property values started going up. So we started reducing the tax rate. Inappropriately so. Looking back on it now, I don't know. But at the time, I think it was the appropriate thing to do. But then things started changing dramatically for us with the veterans exemption. And I'm once more going to say, Never heard any council member, any staff member oppose a veteran's exemption. The state of Texas gave an exemption the state of Texas should pay for it. And it's easy for the state to give exemptions because the state of Texas doesn't levy a property tax. They don't feel this. In all of those years when we were reducing the tax rate, state sales tax rate didn't go down even though there was tremendous increase in inflation. It didn't happen. I'm going to go back in a minute, but I want you to focus on this number just a minute. That's the latest from the 27 tax roll. $18.7 million that we should be reimbursed from the state. That's 18 cents on the tax rate. Right now it's about one penny on the tax rate generates about a million dollars. That's 18 cents. That's beyond significant and my proposal was just to add back two pennies of that 18 that we're losing. But things get worse now. Let me go back, well, let me do this. As I said, this is a blank slide because we didn't have numbers to put here because we weren't able to do it in time getting it at 4.59. But what we did get was some numbers that I will tell you about, and I want you to maybe write this down. So let me go to – sorry, this is kind of confused because it's – We didn't have all the information that we wanted. So look at 26 there. Our current tax rate is right here, .7014. Now that we have the tax cap information, the no new revenue rate, it's not shown on this slide, but the no new revenue rate is .7048. The proposed rate was this 72.15. And then now we have the voter approval rate, which if you go over the voter approval rate, it triggers an automatic election. And the voter approval rate is 0.7302. Now that you have those tax numbers, let me go back and start with the current rate. Well, I'm going to back up again a minute and show you a couple of other numbers. So I mentioned there was a big change from the preliminary tax roll to the certified. One thing they left out was or it appears they left it out, was Texas House Bill 9, which exempts the first $125,000 of business personal property. And so once again, the state doesn't levy a property tax, but they do issue lots of exemptions. Not saying there's anything wrong with this exemption, but it does cost us. And so in the preliminary tax roll, that number was $10.6 million. When we received the certified tax roll, it was 185.9 million. So that's an additional reduction of 175.2 million in value. It comes out to about another 1.2 million in reduced revenue. So these are some other numbers you can write down. If we adopt the current rate of .7014, just keep the tax rate the same, we've got a 3.2 million deficit that we need to address. If we adopt the no new revenue rate of .7048, we have a 2.88 million deficit to cure. If we go with the proposed rate of 0.7215, we have a 1.2 million deficit to cure. And then if we went all the way to the voter approval rate of 0.7302, we would still have a $350,000 deficit. And I'm sorry, I don't have a slide on this. As I said, I got it at 459. So when we went back to the preliminary ad valorem, there's a couple of things we need to look at even from that one, is that our market value only increased .27%. And when you come down to the adjusted taxable value, it was down .01%, essentially flat. And so with the proposed tax rate increase of two pennies, the levy actually came up to a 4.24% increase. Yeah. Now, I've already gone over this and told you the significance of the number, but when you think back to that other graph I showed you, the tax rate, when it started going down, we weren't losing near as much money and we were getting more reimbursement. Now the losses are significantly more and the reimbursements are significantly less. Another way to look at it, this is just restating it, every year we go in the hole because the annual increase in DV exemptions here, now this year 253 million. The only positive I'll say is the growth rate appears to be dropping. It's still growing, but the rate of growth over here has slowed down. But you compare that to all the new construction in the city, and since 2020 it's been less. every year. We've already gone over this and this. Now, I want to spend just a moment on the total budget summary. Now, this is all funds, but to make sure you understand the expenses of $316 million versus revenues of $285 million. That sounds a little scary. It's not that bad because essentially $19 million is bond money. That's one time. The revenue is already there, so you spend it in future years, and that's fine. Same thing with the street maintenance fund. That's cash. We get cash. We do maintenance during the year, but we also save some for the big projects, and then we spend a big chunk of it. So the majority of that, that's fine, no problem. Same thing with other special revenues, that's cash. We're just spending down some fund balance, no big deal. The other two, I would say, just a little more concerning. Things we've done to balance the budget, we're using up fund balance in the internal service funds and the debt service fund. Not so much to fund ongoing or say personnel expenses, but still taking up a number of one-time expenses and that money won't be there next year. So while the budget that was proposed is solid, it still has some issues. Now, when we talked about this, I'm going to back up before. When we talked about this at the last meeting, he said, come back with the cuts to get the roughly $2 million at the time we needed to balance the budget, and said, bring all the vacant positions. I will show you, I've got two slides here with positions listed. FTE means full-time equivalent because there's a part-time position in there on the next page, I believe. And then the days that position has been vacant and that sometimes there's multiple, that's from the most recent vacancy. So you can see the positions here that are vacant. ACM, an accountant, municipal court, a number in police, fire, animal control, code enforcement, some parks and recreation, public works, engineering, and community development, the general fund portion, that's the library. So when you add all of these up, excuse me, oh. I don't have it on here, but it's about $2.1 million, I believe, when it was salary, all of the benefits, cutting all of these positions, all the full-time equivalent positions. I forget exactly how many there are now. It comes out to about $2.4 million. And so if we're going to go down this road and eliminate all of these, I would also suggest that you go into your governing standards and take out these overhires. You've given us the ability to go overhire police officers and firefighters, and that's because – well – This is the first time since I've been here six and a half years we've ever been able to even do that. And the reason you would even consider that is because, let's say you've got all your positions full in police and you've got five more good candidates. You take them because before they're on the street, you've probably lost five people to retirement, leaving, changing their mind about being a police officer. It's a pretty good policy, but we're at a point now with these cuts I don't know that we could afford it. Then I also wanted to tell you a little bit to put in here. We look back at our citizen survey at what our residents told us was important. And it's kind of sad that kind of matches up where a lot of these personnel cuts are going. Put in a couple of slides here. So I hate bringing you a problem without a solution, but I got the problem at 4.59. I had a solution. You may not have agreed with it, and I understand that. I had a solution before we got that final tax roll today. Now it's a little more difficult. We do have the public hearing that I just want you to know today that we're going to have in a few minutes. It's been questioned in the past whether we noticed it. Here's the notice, and it was in the Clean Daily Herald July 12th. So the only thing... that you need to do after the public hearing is just set the date for another public hearing on September 1st. That's the minimum requirement of things that we have to do today. Unfortunately, I dumped a lot of info on you there at once, and it was a little disjointed, but I think I got all the information out. And yes, that's 31 and a half positions in the general fund for $2.4 million. And I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. Good evening, Mr. Kagan.

Yes, ma'am.

How are you?

I was better before 459.

I like that sense of humor. So I just want some clarity, please. You said something about shortage or deficit or something. Was $3 million in what, Mr. Cagle?

Sure. Let me go back to that one slide. It's a little helpful, not completely helpful. Yes, sir. But... If we adopt the current tax rate of .7014, we have 3.2 million in expenses to cut. If we were to adopt the no new revenue rate, which that number's not on this slide, that no new revenue rate is .7048, so you can see just slightly above the current rate.

I'm sorry, could you repeat that one more time?

.7048. Okay. barely above the current rate, we've got to cut 2.88 million. The proposed rate here of 72.15, if we adopt that rate, we still have to cut 1.2 million. And then another number that you don't have on this slide that we didn't have is the voter approval rate, which if you go over that, there's an automatic election. That voter approval rate is 0.7302. And we still have 350,000 to cut at that point.

Yes, sir. So the voter approval rate is what the residents of Killeen voted on. Okay.

No, ma'am. There's a complex formula that the state has come up with, and they amend it every year, and it gets more complicated every year. But you feed in all the information from the certified tax roll, And it kicks out some numbers. One of them is called the voter approval rate because it means if you go over that, it requires voter approval. It requires an election. That's why it's called the voter approval rate. And that number is the .7302, which I would say you can take that as your maximum.

Right.

Because I think the only way you go about going over the voter approval rate you have to be prepared well ahead of this time with lots of explanation to the voters or you're probably not going to get a positive vote um so um i would say in in my opinion that's definitely your cap okay that was important because the positions that uh

that we saw to make up the deficit. And I don't even think that makes up for that if it was $3 million. That's why I asked you, if you only came up with $2 million and you gave us at the .7014, $3.2 million that we need to find funding for, to me, there's a one point some million that's still out there somewhere. Did I read that wrong?

No. The reason I started with the current rate, because there was some discussion at the last meeting about keep the tax rate the same. So now that we've got new numbers, keeping the tax rate the same is even more challenging. It's another million or so challenging than when we were talking a week ago.

Right, so my concern with all of that, our civilians is our greatest access asset that we have. We already know in some areas that we need more personnel. We already know that, that's a given. And my concern is that if we cut the civilians positions, that we're going to overwork the people that we already have working. And then we talk about how expensive it is for turnover rate. Then we're doing a cycle of life, something we just pulled ourself out of. And if we do this, go against our civilians in that manner, we starting back that cycle. And one of the things I've heard over and over again, we all support our first responders. that takes up the majority of our budget and that's why the over hire people could get sick or accident because the job that they do is so in some cases a dangerous situation so things do happen and we all know that the public want our first responders that's a given so that's an area I know we cannot cut the animal shelter and we talk about our animals we know we need a manager to go there our code enforcement Yeah, I hear that so much. And not only that, I read it through emails to residents concerned about code enforcement. Any area we saw today, in my opinion, being on here since 2017, is something that we was in dire need of. And I think if cutting any of those positions, we are wasting our time and a cycle of life. repeating the same mistake we had years ago, and we just got out of it, and now we're requesting. I don't even know if they're going to vote for it, to do the same thing to get us back where we started. So those are my concerns. Thank you.

Yes, ma'am. Council Member Kimball.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, Mr. Cagle. Good evening. So let's just talk from the proposed rate, you know, And that's a $1.2 million deficit coming from the proposed rate. For the average homeowner, what does that look like for them?

And that is what's frustrating. We should have been able to have those numbers for you tonight to show you. I think going to the proposed rate, Judith, are you looking that up? I'm thinking it was somewhere around $30. Let me say between $30 and $40.

$20 and $30.

No, I think between $30 and $40, if I recall right. Finance is going to give me a number here pretty quickly.

So if we go for $40, that gets us to the proposed rate, and that still puts us at a $1.2 million deficit. Yes, sir. Okay. So go proposed rate, once still hang out the 1.2, and the only way to, at least in my opinion, Chuck Kimball, there's three ways to get there, through personnel, through services, and through fleet. And, you know, I'm not in, obviously I'm not in on the budget discussions, but if you had to grade our current fleet, or if we had to take, I don't know, a, you know, come out of a cycle for maybe one or two years. I mean, what would that put this operationally? Excluding public safety. Oh, excluding public safety? Say if we did all the other fleet, excluding public safety, what does that look?

Give me one moment to understand what I was just given. Okay, so I was very wrong. It's probably double that, isn't it?

Pretty close. That's what I thought. I thought it was double.

The median value homestead property in 26 was $233,428. In 27, it's up $6,244 to $239,672. So there's an increase. $85, $90. Yes, sir. You add two pennies to that, and you're at an annual property tax increase of $91.97. Okay. I thought it was a little higher than that.

So if we take public safety out of the fleet rotation, out of this cycle, are we good operationally? If you just eliminate it all? No, no, no. If we don't do any scheduled increases to the fleet.

Oh, well, in the general fund, there are no additional fleet. Okay. It's only replacement. It's all replacement. That's the only thing we have in there. So what we'd be talking about is the things that are scheduled to be replaced. pushing them out. Yes. And there would be, remember, you've got a pretty good chunk in water and sewer that doesn't impact this. Then you take out public safety. You're down to some part of public works that's in general fund and parks is going to be the main two. It's not going to be a lot big. It would be some, but not a lot.

So if we go, Mr. Mayor, if I could just a little more time, I appreciate it. Okay. So if we take public safety, I mean, excuse me, we take everybody out of the rotation of the replacement cycle for one or two years, and we say if we go with half of the vacant positions. I'm just trying to get as close as $2 million. And then we look at some of our services. having discussion with other council members, we may have to look at what we do as far as providing some of our events and things like that. And I'll let other council members speak to that. That really affects their districts. But, you know, trying to trickle up to this 2.1, I mean, the fleet and the safety are probably the two. I mean, the fleet and the services are, excuse me, fleet and personnel are probably the two. We're probably 80% that's going to have to come from. I can't see any way around it.

You know, I left out one thing when I was talking about things the city's tried in the past. There was also a time when the city said, well, let's just, we're not going to have libraries anymore. That didn't go over too well. No. I'm not recommending it. I'm just saying that came up. Yeah. And appropriately, it did not fly. But when you start looking at, okay, what services can we just eliminate? There's really not, I mean, obviously it depends on your point of view.

but we don't offer a whole lot a big variety or a high level of service my last question mr mayor so if we we um if we take the fleet out i mean take the fleet take them out of replacement cycle and then come back with an appropriate amount of personnel this still holds true for the cola raises for the employees time is up sir yes sir so far yes sir and that's three percent and i would not we don't fall behind as much at that level. At least with me, I would not want to touch those. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Council Member Brown.

If I'm understanding this correctly, then in order for us to get to the proposed revenue, we would have to go above the voter approval rate.

To meet the proposed budget, yes, you would.

Do you have an idea of what that rate would be?

Well, it would be about another third of a penny, something like that.

So about 73.32 approximate.

Okay.

And I in no way think that we should try to do that. Yes. And so for everybody who, it's a lot of terminology when it comes to tax rates and how it works, but if we were to go to voter, exceed the voter approval rate, go to a rollback election, which is what it's called when we actually go out there, have you vote on it, If the citizens were to vote that down and that failed, then we have no choice but to go back to the no new revenue rate, correct?

It's either the current or the no new revenue. I can't recall off the top of my head, but it's a much, much, much lower rate. Yes, it's a big risk that you would be taking.

If I remember correctly, we go back to no new revenue because in most cases, even going to the current rate would constitute a tax increase on the levy unless we have an odd year like this.

Right, and it is. In this case, the current rate... Is below – well, no, that actually makes sense. The current rate that we have right now is below the no new revenue rate.

So we would have to go back to – either way, we'd then have to go back and find about $3 million, give or take.

That's about right.

This one I don't expect you to have an answer to right at the moment. But I'd love to know what the approximate rate would be to get to the proposed revenue minus the $2 million that we were talking about before. Does that make sense?

So what we were thinking about coming in here was cutting $2.1 million. And if we were to cut that 2.1 million, I think we're about 1.1 million short.

So we would be looking at somewhere between the 70.48 and the 72.15. So about 71 and some portion of a cent to get to where we thought we were going to be talking about getting to today.

Correct.

so somewhere around 71 cents if sometime before now and between now and the fourth if we can come up with that number i think oh we'll we can come up with it exactly that would be appreciated um so a couple of things i i do uh agree with councilman kimball um Some of those events that we have, they're luxury items. They can get kind of pricey. I think cutting some of that expense would not be a bad thing. So when we're looking for places to cut, I would be supportive of looking in that direction. I would say deprioritizing building new parks of more than 10 acres for the time being, because not only is that the addition of the expense to build those parks, but then that's the park maintenance and the potential of needing additional staff for that maintenance. And then in the responses to the questions, I see a lot of the salary increase we have, I thought it would be mostly from overtime and stuff, but I see we have a lot of it that's coming from mid-year reclassifications. So the full-time equivalency for each department is remaining the same, but we're seeing in some departments $70,000, $80,000 in salary increases because they had reclassifications mid-year. Well, I can't propose that we go back and we tell those employees, let's take that away from you now because it's affecting next year's budget. When we do our financial governance standards, I would love to see us add something about maybe not doing those mid-year. If we're going to do reclasses, either have them done during the budget or during a budget amendment period because it's going to affect our next year regardless. May I have one more minute, please?

Yes.

Thank you. So I apologize. That was a lot in there. I don't want to cut anything in public safety. I know how crucial that is. But I think that we have some places where we can go back and revisit. trying to cut out some of this overtime to the best of our ability. I don't really want to get rid of the over hire program because then we get ourselves stuck in a situation where if we have turnover, now we're short in those departments. So it's not like when we had two city secretaries leave us where we could pull an administrative assistant from a different department to fill in there. We can't just pull somebody from parks to go be a police officer for the day. We can't pull somebody from streets to go be a firefighter for the day. So I think that that's something that we really need to think about being in there and with the limitation of knowing, hey, I'll ask you my question around that. I'm sorry.

Mayor Pro Temp.

Thank you so I share the sentiment of that has already been mentioned, but I have a couple of questions. So, when we're looking at planning for this. $2 million search that we were going through. I am not a fan of cutting personnel. And so, of course, reducing raises for a period of time would be ideal. And absolutely no cuts to COLA, I think, would be my recommendation as it relates to personnel. We have some places that we were able to potentially reduce from. Fleet was one of those that came on my radar as well. So having that... I think is also critical. So fleet, I identified 3.3 million I believe is what's held in that fund. I did have a question regarding the allocation for the animal shelter. That 1.6 that's held, is that something that's held, that's set to the side, that's something that if we decide that we don't want to do, because there's conversation about us maybe not building, selling that building, whatever, it's not a requirement by the state, that 1.6 could be freed from that, is that correct? Would that be a correct statement? It could be. If we decided that we don't want one at all, we're going to work with MOU somewhere else or whatever, but that 1.6 could be freed from there, is that correct?

It could be, but you have to be very careful taking a one-time revenue and using it to cover... annual expenses. Understood. Because then your deficit next year will be double.

Understood. And it's only if we want to replace it, right? So if we decided that we no longer want that particular, I'm not saying it's this one, but if we did not want to replace that fund or that particular subject, then that goes away.

Yes. And what I'm saying, then you would have that $1.6 million, but my concern is you should not try to use that to pay for salaries for people. Understood. Okay.

Understood. And then there was conversation about, from constituents who recommended reduction in downtown events. You know, I looked at that. It was only about $126,000 as it related to downtown events. However, there were questions regarding downtown that particular function as it related to to downtown and um i know that ideally the conversations in the beginning before this even was finalized was that the citizens community would take over and take over some of these projects and take over some of these events and so i don't see a big cost savings in the overall events meaning if we took some away like motown downtown for example is about eleven thousand dollars Christmas is $9,700. However, my understanding is that there would be huge cost savings as it related to overtime, which was also mentioned by several council members, and other costs associated with putting these on, and then also payroll personnel, things like that. Would that be a true statement?

That police and fire is the majority of the cost for those events.

Yes, sir. Okay. And so that there would be cost savings. And then if I'm not interested in personal cuts. I just want to be out there. However, if for some reason there was a downsizing of that particular department or that section that handles those events, would it be possible for those employees to be reallocated to a different department within the city and maintain their current rate?

It's possible.

It is possible. Okay. All right. I know that we have a very tough decision to make when it comes to services, supplies, personnel. And so none of these are going to be easy conversations to have. Also, with regards to the HOP, I believe I just want to confirm that we're at $650,000 on the HOP. Is that correct?

I believe that is correct.

Okay. So I'm showing $650,000 on the HOP. And then we talked about... Okay, so then also with regards to exemptions, I would be curious to know from our staff, as we've done this before, the last time we had a pretty tough budget, not as tough as this, but we had a tough situation. I was really curious to hear from our staff. as far as any suggested cuts that they would recommend, 2%, 2.5 in this case, any recommendations that they would have on services and supplies. I think that it would be important for us to hear from them as it related to that before, you know, as we're considering all of our options here. The only concern I would have is I would want to exempt IT, and of course we've already talked about our emergency services, but I would want to exempt IT from that. And the reason is because IT to me is just as important as our emergency services, especially in today's information age. So I would not want to do any cuts in that particular department, but I would be curious from our department heads at a 2% to 2.5% reduction. I'd like to hear their feedback. So that's just my proposal to council, please. Thank you.

Council Member Brown.

So where I was trying to get around to at the end, what do we project having at the year-end excess for this year, and how much of that is not already allocated?

We haven't allocated anything from this year. It will be significantly smaller than we've had since I've been here. One of the things, sales tax has significantly slowed down, and We have most of our positions filled, which in the past we had big surpluses. Sales tax was far exceeding our projections, and we had lots of vacant positions.

Do you have an approximation for us of what we can expect?

Not right now. It would be...

We can just get it before the 4th. That would be great. We can give it a shot, yes. I agree that maybe it's time for us to revisit the HOP funding. We requested information from them back when we had our first community partner presentation in May, and we still haven't received any of that information from them. So you may be able to compare where we're at on that. I also think we need to cut all of the training and travel for board members. My understanding is that's only within planning and zoning right now. But I think looking at this, we are clearly in a situation where every couple thousand dollars we can save is going to matter. So that would be a recommendation for that one. We have some departments that have grown exponentially that are not public safety related. And I don't think we have any one department that's not important. Otherwise we wouldn't have them at all. But I see areas like communications and I know we're asking them to do more and more. But maybe it's time for the council to tone down expectations and meet what staff is able to do on a more limited amount. Because I remember first time around on council, we were running communications with three FTEs. We're up to seven FTEs now. And that's only been four years. So we're adding, on average, about one person per year to that department. And is that an area where we can afford to lose staff?

Well, that's a tough question. Compared to a police officer, it becomes a pretty easy answer. But those increases were more or less council directed. That was a different council, different people setting up here now. I just want you to know it didn't just happen.

Right.

Yeah.

I agree with that. We're in a situation where we have to make tough choices now. We can't raise the tax rate up enough to get to even what was proposed in this, so we have to find money to save that. So I would start looking at those areas and now that we know kind of a better window of what we have to be looking for, we can help with that. And I'm happy to email those ones to you. We were talking about the downtown events, shifting more of that expense to seeing can we get more community partners? Is it possible to get a listing, an idea of how much we're truly paying per event?

Absolutely. But once again, the vast majority of the cost is going to be public safety.

Right, and that's what I'd like to see because if we have to cut some of those events, those are not essential to the community. I think we have maybe a position over in that department that is not essential at this point. If we're going to cut down on events, then we probably don't need an event director. So there's another potential salary savings. I know we have a main street director. If we're only doing one or two city coordinated events a year, then she can probably handle that one or two events a year. I am looking pragmatically at this area. What is essential and what is not absolutely nothing personal to our communications department. I do think you all are doing a great job, but we're really having to figure out, do we cut services to our citizens? Do we cut back on public safety? Do we try to get the voters to go out and approve a rate that exceeds a legal requirement, which I do not foresee passing? Do we have to start increasing fees and rates even more to try to cover it, which I don't think is really feasible at this point in time? So I think we're getting kind of limited on our options there.

Yeah, and just to add to that, when you look at this, there's a reason I brought this slide up. When you talk about fees, Fines and fees together are about 3% of the general fund revenue. So you can cut more than half of that on probably fines make up more than half of that. You start dealing with some pretty small numbers very quickly. I'm not saying every number is important. But there can be some gain there, not a lot.

And at this point, I'm going to put a call out to the council to pick up and do more of our lobbying because we can cut $100,000 a year right there. And my time is up. Thank you.

Yes. Okay. Mr. Cagle, let me ask you this question.

Yes, sir.

What? I certainly would like to see what you see. If we have to cut some things, what are you seeing?

Sure. A couple of comments. I think you are, but you need to be thinking long game here, not just one year at a time, because you all are all going to be sitting here in the same spot next year. And my guess is the problem is going to be worse. So one thing to keep in mind there, I get the sensitivity on the tax rate, but this may be your last opportunity because There's a high probability there'll be even more restrictions passed when the legislature meets if not eliminating the ability to raise the tax. There's lots of stuff out there that has gained traction the past couple of years. As we know, you never know until it's over what's going to happen. You can look great all the way to the last day and something bad happens or vice versa. I'm just saying that is a threat that's out there. on the horizon. And the reason I'm saying it's a threat is I'm going to go back to the same chart and say, if it weren't for this issue, we wouldn't be having these problems. And every year or every other year, we get our hopes up and then they're dashed at the end. So I don't know what, it would be nice if we knew. It'd be easy to balance this budget if you knew there was some help coming at the end of the next session. I don't know, don't know what to say about that. But back to the mayor's question, I would say, I would just ask in my opinion, I would stick with my original record recommendation of the 72.15 and I can immediately, uh, see, you know, I could probably come up with half a million out of this list. Not that I want to do any of them or recommend any of them, but understanding the position I can come up with with about half a million off of this list. Um, and then. We've got a week to dig into it and see, come up with what the least worst options are.

So you're saying that you come back with... Yeah, it's hard for me getting slammed with this at 4.59.

Give you some time. Yeah, I was coming in prepared to defend the proposal that we had. We didn't expect there was going to be a bomb dropped on us like this. So there's a lot of things that are going to have to be done. As I said, looking at the long game and not knowing what odds there are of any help on the horizon.

Thank you, sir.

In fact, last time, it hurt us. We lost revenue. Thank you. It's a tough spot.

Council Member Bass.

So I have three statements.

For the residents of District 3, I will not vote to raise property taxes. For the city council and city manager, I want to go on record to say that I am in favor of terminating our contract with the Schluter Group, And I am in favor of terminating funding for the Clean Economic Development Corporation. And my third statement is, for whatever cuts we do make, I think the city council's making great recommendations. But for me personally, I will look to the city manager for his recommendation, bottom line, for any cuts we do have to make, because he's the most qualified, in my opinion. But I appreciate that we're able to give him input. Thank you.

DAVID BURRAGE. Council Member Kimball.

KEN KIMBALL. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I, um, and I do appreciate Mr. Cagle. I know him. We've worked together. We've, it's not the first time he and I have been down this, this road, right. Um, but as a, as a council member, And I think all of you have heard me say this, that it's a job that I take seriously, that's oversight. Because we get the calls, we get the comments of why we did what we did. And Mr. Cagle is going to go off into retirement, there'll be another city managers there. And we still have to provide oversight on why we did what we did, why we voted the way we voted, why we gave direction. Me, I'm not going to get into the minutia of individual people and positions. That's not my job. He has highly qualified department heads to get there. Again, I look back what Mayor Pro Tem said, looking at realistically. We sat here and we talked about having cut or reductions in our community partners. And they were held at a certain level. I think when I look at KEDC, they need to be held at a certain level. They had to ask. I don't think we could make that, but I think there's some compromise where they come in at a performance-based metrics based on how they do it. We've had that discussion before with KEDC, and I know that when you're out trying to develop, you plant seeds now that may not bloom for a year or two, but we're in a really, really tough spot right now because at the rate at which the – The DV exemption was going, I mean, it may be, we only may get 5% next year. We'll get like 7.5, 7.4 now. If that goes, I mean, the city being a really bad spot if that drops down below 4%. I mean, it's- It could. Yeah, I mean, because the builders are not going to stop building. And I think Mr. Cagle, I'm surprised he don't have his rooftop map here, because he had a previous budget. But when you build a development and you look at all the rooftops and when what, 40% of the people don't pay taxes when you build houses. But the same people get police, they get service, they get everything else, but they're not contributing to the role. So we just have to be careful. and make decisions, I think when I look at KEDC, I'm not against them, but I think they have to be, there's a level at which they should be maintained. I hope you get a chance to look at that, Mr. Cagle. Again, we're looking at the long game. And even for our departments, our department heads, you know, I appreciate everything that you do, but can you work with a 2% or 2.5% reduction in your current budget? whether the department head, whether it comes in supplies, whether it comes in your travel and training, whatever that is, I think it's fair that everybody, Mr. Cagle, looks at where we can hold the line at to prevent those increases. Thank you.

Council Member Brown, this is your third time.

I'm going to request, make a motion to suspend the rules for this discussion. Yeah, for the number of times that we can speak.

Okay, motion was made. Is there a second? Is there a second? May I approach him? Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying yes. Those opposed, no. All in favor signify by raising your hand. All those in favor? Okay. All those opposed? Motion carries four to three.

Okay. I did have comments, Mayor. I want to point out that we still have at least two community partners that we have zero funding for in this budget. And I think it's going to be very important that we, as we're going through this, we find a way to put them into the budget and fund them. So FIC requested money. I do not support giving them their ask of $350,000. That would be highly irresponsible given all of this. But especially with what we have going on with Gray Street, with those concerns, with the fact that we are not going to be building a new shelter, I do still support funding them at the $63,908, which is the operating budget for the Killeen homeless shelter. And then IBCC has requested, I think, 187,000 in that range. Again, we don't have the money to give them that, but I do believe we need to fund them at least at the same 50,000 we gave them this year. We can't do a one-year funding for a business solution or a business resource center. we still need to support those small businesses because that is still revenue that comes back to us in the long term. So as we go through this, I would request we find a way to fit at least those two community partners into the budget at those reduced request numbers. which I understand is not an easy ask. So then as we're talking about this, Mr. Cagle, what does it look like if we choose to defund positions rather than eliminating them?

It's just semantics. It's gone. I mean, if you're talking public safety and you're talking civil service positions, It's a little different. The position's still there. There's a lot of legalities there. But you still then, if you want to fill the position, you got to come up with the money. So it's, like I said, it's almost just semantics.

So would you recommend, rather than defunding or eliminating, so I wouldn't recommend eliminating all of the vacant positions. There are things on there, though, that we have never been able to fill. I know it would be great to have an internal street engineer. How feasible is that coming up?

You mean the position that was labeled traffic engineer?

Oh, yes, that one. Sorry.

We added a lot of money to that in this budget. We still can't hire anybody. I mean, that's one of the ones that I would – I don't like it, but that's one of the ones I'd recommend.

And then would you recommend we go back to one ACM for the time being?

You almost have to to get to the numbers that you're talking about.

So that's almost $400,000 just in the salary there plus the benefits. So that should bring us significantly closer into positions and help to start eliminating that stress without taking any of the absolute critical positions out of the city, correct?

Yeah, I wouldn't recommend any police officers, but the – traffic engineer, these positions in public works. When we added those, we weren't able to fill them, and then we changed street maintenance dramatically with the increase in the street maintenance fee. We're just doing things differently. probably those as well so you know that's almost 400 000 there and then if you did the city manager these numbers are with all benefits so okay yeah you're over 500 well over almost 700 there

And then probably the custodian over at Rosa Hereford Center.

Sure.

I mean, at least for this fiscal year, I don't think it's going to do us much good, if we're being realistic. Agreed. OK. I just need time to think now. Thank you.

Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. First, this is a tough day, right? This is a tough conversation. But I just, I also want to say this for the record, because I really appreciate the fact that you were very forthcoming regarding that this day would come, especially if we weren't able to figure out how to get the funding for our tax exemption and how that was going to hurt us in the long run, and that we were going to realistically have to look at where we are now, which is services, supplies, personnel, and how we're going to figure out how to balance this situation. budget. So it's no surprise I just don't like that we're here today, unfortunately. But there were talks about Reducing like for example, we have a hundred thousand dollar contract I believe hundred thousand dollar for the Schluter group that was mentioned earlier. Is that correct? That is correct now I'm not sure do we have are the penalties involved with that if we were to break that 30-day notice So the problem that I have though with regards to what these lobbying firms do for us versus What we're able to do for ourselves. I think that at this particular moment the idea that we've had that has been tossed around is many times about hiring somebody internal could be very costly and it's not something obviously that we're in a position to do at this point, but to have no one and representing the voice of the citizens could also present a challenge as well. And so that to me is concerning in this particular moment. When you look at transparency.us or USA, I think it's Temple that got $166,000 to $389,000 in contracts that they're paying for their lobbying firms. I know we're not Temple, but I just don't think that this right now is the time to have that particular conversation, especially with what's about to happen potentially in our 90th legislative session. We need all the help we can get. mr cagle when i was looking for um we talked about services and supplies like i was not able to really to your point earlier find a whole lot of spaces to cut in that would that be a true statement as well when it comes to services and supplies

Yes, ma'am, that's true. So the general fund, I think it's about $137 million. And then so you go over to where the money goes or what the money pays for, this one. And supplies are 4.3% of that, of $137 million. If you just had no – that's unrealistic, but I mean we're going to have to look at every single – thing. It's just, there's no silver bullet anywhere.

Okay. So I understand we're going to need some time and I understand this is the bomb that was dropped on us just recently, but I'm, I'm going to, um, I would like to make a motion after everyone has had a chance to speak regarding my request for staff, if that's what's needed. Um, no.

Okay. One moment. Thank you. Council member Kendricks. I'm sorry. Continue. My apologies. Continue.

Thank you. I did not hear you. I said that's OK. Would it be appropriate, Mr. Cagle, to make a motion for that, regarding my request for staff to have some input on this? The department heads regarding the 2% to 2.5% cuts, excluding IT. Do we need a motion of direction for that? Or is that something that you can take back? I mean, I'm not sure.

Are you saying you want them to come tell you what they think the impact of that is?

Do they have any recommendations for cuts for their departments?

Well, I don't think anybody's going to come up here and say, recommend cut my supply budget.

You don't think it's important? I'm just asking. You don't think it's important to have staff input on this major reductions that we are going to have to make? Yes, absolutely.

But I misunderstood you. I thought you were asking them to come up and start offering. Absolutely not. No, sir.

I would just like their input or something that they know that they don't need. We're talking about services and supplies, and if they've got a request and it's holding up 16 desks and they know they don't need them, for example, well then I would like to know that so we can make a more informed decision, that's all. Thank you, sir.

Council Member McKenzie.

I have a few questions. With your experience when you talked about a high turnover rate, does a high turnover rate actually equal more money being spent as far as overtime and then those employees and everything?

It costs you more. Um, overtime is only one aspect of it. Um, then just the training. I mean, what's a police officer? You get him hired to go six months. Same, same, uh, long time on firefighters, paramedics as well. And then you lose them in a year. You start over. You spend a ton of money. So there's a lot of different places where you lose money with high turnover.

And the other question someone brought up, and I don't think it's fair to any new council member We've already cut the funding once for training for council members and I don't think it's fair to any of the new council members not to be able to receive that training if we want our council members to become more knowledgeable because the laws change every year and I've seen that just myself and we have three that haven't been on the council before I feel they should still be able to get that training if we want them to be knowledgeable in order to do their job as council members. Then the next thing. It was talked about the community partners. Yes, I understand the importance of the community partners, but in the same sentence, we talked about giving the community partners or finding a way to give them money, but like I said, in the same sentence, you talk about cutting somebody's job and sending them home in the same sentence. To me, that's How can I say it? A crossover ain't nothing but a double cross. I don't feel right in reference to that. Say you're going to cut one thing and then come back. And we talk about we don't want to make those hard decisions and those cuts. And all cuts, it's a tough decision. I don't want to see no cuts. But just looking at things, it may happen. I'm not in favor of it. And the last thing I want to just say to everybody, all citizens, all council members, um, we got to get uncomfortable to get comfortable. And, and I think when we got all of those funds from, um, COVID, we got a little too comfortable and now is, is coming back. And it's, it's a, it's a sad day that we're going to get to that point. Um, Man, this is, it's just, it's hard because like we talk about even We just said it, at any time, anybody could be homeless. And we're talking about cutting jobs. That falls right into that. And it's heartening to me. And I know we've got to try to figure this out. You're much smarter than me, along with the finance people. And I'm pretty sure you'll do your best. I'm done.

Sorry, just one thing, if you don't mind. Just so everybody understands on the COVID money, we never use federal dollars for any ongoing expenses, but I did refer to COVID earlier saying that our sales tax really took off and property values went up even though we reduced the rate because of that. But that's, I agree with y'all on that part of it, but I don't want anybody to think that this is because we were using federal money to pay for parks, maintenance workers or police officers or anything. No, we used it for one time expenses.

Council Member Nashke.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. So far, I've listened to Council expectations of what they assume or think a budget should be, and I see three in the same direction. With that being said... My whole concern is this, Mr. Cagle. As we know, you need a motion, you need four votes to really move forward. I'm assuming, I'm just trying to get clarity. I'm assuming that you're going to take what everybody is saying and go back and give different scenarios. I would hope so. If we're going to forecast as any leader would do, Even in our budget at home, knowing we've got to repay a bill regardless of what that bill is, we just don't save money just for that one month hoping that next month don't show up because it will show up. So I'm hoping, and this is just Debbie's opinion, I'm not speaking for anybody else, and I hope no one repeat after me what I'm saying. This is my opinion on this because I want you to assume that I talk to anybody. When you forecast, would you, and I'm not speaking for the whole council, and I'm not telling you how to do your job. I would hope that there would be different scenarios. I'm not big on cutting personnel. I'm not big in changing the quality of life for our residents for downtown events. just for a quick, okay, we made the budget fit, but the reality of it is part of our comprehensive plan 24, the quality of life. Couldn't any services go against our comprehensive plan? It goes also against the survey. I don't know if people had the opportunity to read that survey that the residents have taken and the things that they want to see. And what I'm hearing are all things that goes against that wheel. And this is Debbie's opinion. And if we're going to cut funds, and I said this last year, all of our training, other than three council members going to the one in San Antonio and Round Rock that all council members have to go through, Everyone should go to those training. But if we really are serious about the budget, first, we shouldn't add anything else to our budget. If we're so serious about cutting it, but we're finding ways to bring other stuff, it just don't pass the common sense test to me. And the other thing, if council really serious about this budget and people giving up their job, well, we can give up our travel. Everybody here other than the three people already went to the first training. That's basically with all you're going to get. Anything else is just something that you choose to do. And plus, TML have a lot of training online. And I just think charity starts at home. Before we try to cut any kind of position, Before we take away the quality of life from residents, can I have one more minute? Yes. Before we cut the quality of life of residents, which is in our comprehensive plan and also in our survey, taking events and stuff for them to get out of their homes, socialize, enjoy themselves, we do stuff we want to cut. But then we bring on things that we want to support, but what we support does not cover the need of all of our residents. It may cover one population or one group, but it's not good for everyone that's into that. Our entertainment that we put downtown meets the needs of all of our residents. And we cannot expect our first responders to take away their time from their family, All of them that I have seen out there, they really love that. They bring their families out to these events, and it's a family affair. They don't seem to me in my sense 2017, but we really got into it in 2021, that they really seem to really be upset or angry about supporting a community event. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council.

Council Member Brown.

Mr. Cagle, what is the plus minus of shifting some of our employees to part-time instead of full-time? And would it help us saving money?

I mean, obviously a lot of them are off the table, police and firefighters. I don't. First of all, you might as well just cut the position. If you tell somebody it's a full-time employee, hey, you're going to be part-time, they're most likely going to leave because they need full-time employment. I don't see a lot there. What the city of Dallas has been doing right now, because they have a deficit in their current budget, they are furloughing people, saying you're only going to work four days this week. And I think they'll see some of that, too, that people think, okay, I need to go find a full-time job. That's more of an emergency thing, but I'm just using it as an example. I know that's going on right now at the City of Dallas.

Also, what's the plus or minus? So if I remember looking through the line item, accordingly, we still have a budget this year for the Rosa Herford Center for operation.

In this current budget, yeah, that's probably where some of the year-end savings would come from.

And we have it in a proposed 27 budget?

Yes.

So how much could we save if we take that out of the budget for the year? Knowing that once we do finish the center, we're still going to have to find the money to staff it.

I'll check on it. There'll be some money there.

So I think that might be some low hanging fruit for this year. And then we're going to have to be cognizant of the fact that it's going to be a year long process for everybody to look at where can we find the savings for next year. But if we can get that low hanging fruit for right now, I think that would be a really good start. Do you know offhand what the budget is for the Rosa Hereford Center for FY27?

Not off the top of my head. It's not a big number, but it is money. And I think in regards to what Ms. Nash-King was saying, I've been trying to formulate a plan here, and it would be silly, I think, to try to do 20 or 30 different little motions and directions.

Right.

So if there's some target – Tax rate, that would be worthy if there can be some agreement on what the target tax rate would be. That gives me something to work on. Failing that, I'll just bring levels of cuts.

Did you have to ask that question while I had the floor?

Sorry about that.

That's okay. So I think personally one of the target rates that I would look at would be around that 73-ish cents. That brings us to what we thought we were going to be talking about when we walked in here tonight.

Let me make sure I understand what you're saying. The 73-cent rate?

It's not any of the numbers you gave us. I remember earlier I asked you, okay, what would the rate be between – What we have now, the proposed revenue minus the $2 million, what would that rate be for us?

Yeah, that's going to be below 73.

Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, that was at about 70.

I can probably, at 73, I can give you a proposal to balance it right now.

Yeah, and I apologize. That was back in between that 70 and the 72, right?

Yeah, I think what you're saying is it's going to be somewhere between .7048 and .7215, somewhere between those two numbers.

Yeah, so something in that range that would bring us back to where the proposed revenue was in the original proposed budget minus the $2 million that we thought we were going to be cutting tonight.

I understand. We'll have to do those calculations.

And I just say that because it goes back to Councilman Bass's proposal from two weeks ago when we were talking about the budget and the rates. So that's why I came up with that number. Otherwise, I guess I'll just send you a bunch of emails throughout the week.

Okay.

Councilman Bass. Yes.

Regarding the Schluter Group, we pay them $100,000 a year. We pay, by the month, on the first of the month, we pay the Schluter Group each month $8,333.33. A legislative session in Texas lasts five months, from January to May, every two years. The 89th Texas legislature adjourned June 2025. The 90th Texas legislature will convene in January 2026. So I ask us to ask ourselves two questions. What has the Schluter Group been doing for Killeen since June 2025? when each month they have received $8,333.33? My personal answer is nothing. And my second question is, is $100,000 a good price for the city of Killeen for five months of work during the legislative session? Thank you.

I would just respond to that and say while they only officially meet every two years, work is going on every day. If you're not putting legislation up and working on it right now, January and February is generally way too late. Building those relationships, making the contacts, staying in touch, telling them what the issues are, that goes on year round.

And I 100% agree with you, Mr. Cagle. My issue is this is $100,000. That's a lot of money. I know we're talking about $3 million, but still it's $100,000. And I'm just expressing my personal opinion that there's other ways to do this, and we can save $100,000 by terminating this contract. Thank you.

Council Member Kimball.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. From my standpoint, Mr. Cagle, I think the proposed rate of 7215, I think that's, if I heard you correctly, that puts us at a $1.2 million. Yes, sir. All right. So 7215 at $1.2 million, I think that's, in my opinion, I think that's a good starting point. I think everything else is fine. Because even if you go up to the no new rate, I mean, that's a $2.8 million, 2.88, I think that's what you said. So at the proposed rate of 7215, I think that's the rate I would like to see most, you know, I would like to see most of the work done at. And just for the record, When we started talking about cutting positions, my proposal was to talk about unfilled positions, not people sitting in seats.

Yes, sir. And just to make sure all those presented tonight were unfilled.

I don't know what everybody else, there was a lot of conversation, a lot of accusations thrown around, but my position was for those. for unfilled seats. And if we talk about the Schluter Group just come up again, as our positions, when we show up every Tuesday, our pay isn't just when we're sitting in the seats. There's work being done when we're not here. I'm pretty confident that the Schluter Group is doing work when they're not in session also. So I would just caution us before we end that contract with the Schluter Group. There's a lot of relationships that have been built over the years, a lot of work that's been done. Again, you plant seeds now for things to sprout in the future. So I am not in support of cutting the Schluter Group. Somebody has to do the work, and surely if we ask you to do a staff member to do it, it's going to cost a little bit more than $100,000 if you have a staff member to do what the Schluter Group does constantly. I mean, just going back to Austin, building the relationships, doing all those things, that's a lot of work. I think we tried that at one point with a staff member, and I think it was a lot of work. So again, just so we're clear, My position is for seats that are unfilled positions and coming from the 2.15 proposed rate.

Council Member Nash-King.

Thank you, Mr. Cagle. Mayor, Mr. Cagle, do you need any direction, a motion of direction on this item? Oh, you understand from each perspective.

Well, there's going to have to be, and maybe it's too soon tonight probably. Okay, next. Because, like I said, when you brought up your issue, I was thinking about how to make this, and so at some point you all are going to have to vote on something, but I'll bring some tiers of cuts from the least worst to the worst where the tax rate falls in there, and that's sort of the plan I've been formulating while I'm standing here.

Okay. And my concern, I think I've always been clear, even ever since I've been on here, how I feel about personnel. It's all about forecasting for the future. It's not about today. Whether the position is field or not field. Our community is constantly growing, especially when it comes to things that we know in our survey, things that we know that we voted on for the 2040 Comprehensive Plan. We may not need to position just, I don't even know if we wouldn't have it out there on HR perspective. I don't think they would waste their time posting something if there was not a need. And I know from my perspective only, and I hope, I talked to Mr. Cagle about it, you gotta forecast for the future. What's today is not, and I heard it a lot tonight, what's today, whether it's good or bad, we cannot forecast our future. And if those positions have to go, and I agree with Council Member Bass, and I think Council Member Kendrick said it somewhat, and I heard Mayor Solomon speak on it. That's probably who stated this. Mr. Cager, you have always done a great job from the time you came on board. Our budget was not the best budget. We were not in the best financial shape. And I understand my colleagues and what they believe to be true, and they understand what I believe to be true. But I entrust you that the decisions that you make will not only just be for some for today, but you also take a consideration, people like me, and I know her, Councilman Beck, I'm really concerned about our future. I don't want us to set standards that we cannot provide the best customer service by cutting everything we have, and then the people we do have feel like they're being overworked and they leave. We had a lot of complaints about that, a lot of complaints. That's why the council came back, not this one, and added some positions, especially in code enforcement. We continue to get complaints about code enforcement. I know one council member, God knows I know he does it, He does it, and that's Councilmember Kendrick. He will wear you out. That ain't even my district, but he'll call me and say, hey, they say they know you. Call them and fix it. And I have to talk to the resident. And call enforcement's a big thing. That's why we had the litter team. See, these are all the things the people wanted at that time. That's why our personnel is stacked the way it is. And now we're coming back and say, well, those people, they still live here, hopefully, that we don't want to get rid of it. But I really want you, from my perspective, and I heard other council members and the mayor, please forecast for our future. And I don't want to pin everything on tax exemptions. I really don't. Because we already know that's going to be there. We already expect, can I have one more minute to finish? Thank you. We already know with tax exemption the next year, if things don't change soon, it's going to be worse and worse and worse. Those are my forecasts, my future. But I also have positive that we're going to bring in some revenue. Some kind of way, if our sales tax is going to go back up or I don't know about our home tax. I don't really know about that. But I'm just hoping, can you tell me, can you, no, you probably can't. I was going to ask you to try to forecast that. But whatever you bring before us, in my opinion, I would hope that, and I'm telling you how to do your job, it's sustainable, especially for services that we provide, that the services are not cut. the quality of life, whatever that might be. And if it's entertainment, you feel cut, whatever decisions you make, I support. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council.

Okay, if there's no other discussion, thank you, Mr. Cagle.

And just on a couple of things, I'll tell you, I've been a broken record saying that is not sustainable. And I don't know what else to say about it, but it's not. So, yes, we got a lot of work to do, and we're going to get on it, and we'll have something for you in a week.

Thank you, sir, for your hard work, and I believe you'll come up. We'll be okay. Thank you, Mr. Cagle. Thank you so much for that. Okay. Uh, uh, now we are going to hold a public hearing and the public hearing is open. Madam City Attorney.

Patsy Bracey.

She's not, she's

I don't have anybody else signed up for the public hearing.

Okay, there's no one else. Public hearing is closed. Okay. Council, we need a motion to set the date of September 1st, 2026 at 5 p.m. at the Clean City Council Chambers to consider adoption of the budget. Council member Brown so moved Council member bass I second the motion The second by council member bass. Is there any discussion? There is no discussion all in favor signify by yes all opposed no Motion carries 7-0 Next, I'll need a motion to adjourn. Council Member Kendricks? Is there a second? Council Member Brown?

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Motion carries. Meeting is adjourned.

Is anybody missing this?