City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to all. This Picosen City Council work session is called to order. Tonight we'll have discussion of both a conditional zoning request and a comprehensive plan amendment request submitted by Bob W. Moses representing the Fountains of Picosen and Albert S. White III. Uh, we have with us our director of community development, Mr. Wy Horton, and our director of planning, Miss Laura Noose, and they have a presentation for us. So, while Laura, take it away. Thank you.

I'm going to step up here tonight just because I'm a little bit closer and I can point out a few things. Uh, as mayor pointed out, this is a conditional resoning and a comprehensive plan amendment for Bob Moses and Albert Sydney White. And this will be uh four parcels uh total is what we're looking at for the resoning as well as the comprehensive plan amendment. And this is where they're located. If you look at the stars, that's the four properties that we're talking about. Uh got the two over here that uh as you'll see in the next slide are pretty heavily wooded. Uh this is uh more glass I'll guess. And there's Ariel right there. You can see the EDA pond. A lot of references made of west of EDA pond and east of EDA Pond. uh east. This is where he wants to put the town homes. Uh 38 of them and 28 uh duplex units down in this area. Now, there's a lot of pass ships around here and I was looking at this and instead of reading this to you, maybe I can do it show you better on this map here. Um this was phase one and phase two that was reszoned village commercial back in May of 2012. Uh there was also a comprehensive plan amendment to uh put that into village commercial use as designated on comprehensive future land use map comprehensive plan future land use map. Uh there was a later resoning in 2016. Oh, well, I guess I should say it was also a conditionally used permit up here

to allow uh second floor residential over commercial. In other words, two floors of residential and one floor of commercial. Um had a resoning here in 2016. As you can see, the latest plans were for a 2:1 mixture of residential to commercial over that entire phase 3 area and the phase 4 area. All of these have expired now. All these condition use permits have expired. Um, some of y'all that were here then may remember that Mr. Moses did come for an extension of his conditional use permit on phase two, but that ran out in September 2021. So, it's been out for quite some time. Um, but at it if if he had developed this according to uh what he was thinking at the time, we would have had 52 residential units over 62,600 square ft. uh and we would have had 36,000 35,000 sorry 600 square ft of commercial space. This is slightly less than a 2:1 ratio and a little bit less than 2/3 of the entire development. But nevertheless, that's what we would have had. As I said, those are all expired. Uh even if he was going to restart today on something like that, he'd be starting from scratch. Okay, the overall site I guess you guessed the gist of this has not been developed according to how Moses had envisioned when he first started out. Uh most recent utilization of the front parcels were the town homes and I'll get to those in a minute are going to be has been as a lay down yard. Uh Mr. Moses is

of the opinion that the residential units will go better and that he will have an easier time getting bank funding for those residential units. Uh but there's no there's no getting around the fact that this is an entirely new plan for the area. There's no more consideration of the commercial. Uh it will be um R3 uh which will be town homes and uh and duplexes and and absolutely no commercial at all. Okay. So let's get to Bob Moses's proposal. U by the way he is not here tonight. He will be here on the 23rd and his transportation impact analysis principal writer uh Mr. and Michael Bradley will be here on 23rd as well. Okay, so this is the front. Uh he's got his he's got his units. He's got an access a new access coming off of Wolf Creek Boulevard about a 24 foot wide access with 25 ft radi which would be somewhere there. the circulation is also going to have some access to this area uh along this area of of Alpha of Alpha Street as well. So, you know, theoretically you could come in here and you could go out that way or vice versa. Now, of course, you know, he's he's stated I kind of borrowed this from Mr. Moses um but he is stating that he will be in compliance with R3 site plan of course will make sure of that. These are some architectural renderings that Mr. Moses used to white submitted

along with his application and uh the applicant has proper that the development will be in accord with these construction drawings. This is for the town homes now. Oh, I just lost my place. Ah, hit the wrong button. Okay, so that's the front obviously. That's the rear. And this is sort of it's a it's a drawing of how it will look from the street basically. Uh and that is a first floor and second floor mockup. This is in your staff board as well, but I just want to cover it not only for the for the uh the council and the staff but for those who might be watching at home. Okay. the back part of the parcel, the heavily weighted part uh part of the parcel. He's looking at 14 twotory, two family dwellings, uh 28 total units. He's proposing them to be accessed off this 24 foot curb and gutter road. We've uh looked at this and the site plan is going to call for that to be a public road. Mr. Moses has been informed of this. Uh, and it looks to me, not that I'm a traffic engineer, but it looks like to me this road may have to go back there in order to give a straighter access into the development. Um, and of course, this down here is just phase one of his building. That was that's the one that worked. Although he does have a hard time getting commercial uses in there. Yes.

Did you say it was to be a public road? This will be the public road. Yes, sir. He's not showing that on this concept plan, but that's what we're Mr. Point.

And again, he submitted some conceptual drawings here of the uh town homes and what they'll look like. As you can see, they're definitely two residences, twotory. Uh, I did it again. Okay, this is the rear of the uh duplexes. And this is sort of a mockup of how they look uh from the front on the top and from the rear on the bottom. And that's a mockup of the room layout inside the uh the duplex as well. comprehensive plan submissions. Part of this is a comprehensive plan amendment. I think I can boil this all down by saying if the council does vote to approve the R3 that it would make sense to go ahead and redesate the whole area to uh high density residential as it's characterized in our zoning ordinance. Keep in mind that R3 is our highest density residential. uh that would keep the zoning ordinance in comprehensive plan and alignment. If this is denied then the proposed amendment uh we would recommend that you you just keep it village commercial the way it is now. Uh the entrance as I stated earlier he is going to have a new entrance off with creek road uh to access the 38 town homes. There is going to be that secondary uh avenue off of Alpha Street. Uh the second access for the 28 duplexes, as I stated earlier, that would have to be a public road. Right now, he's showing a very curved road, 24 u 24 ft with curving gutter. Uh the reason I say may have to come forward is

I don't know if this turn radius is going to be sufficient to meet public street standards, but we Yes. Before you go to the next slide, can you back up to the slide before I have a question about that? Sure, I can.

The last comment at the bottom of it, can you explain that? Well, if the Arbory resoning, conditional reszoning is denied by the city council on the 23rd, then it really doesn't make sense to redesate the whole area R3 because one of the things that we're trying to do, or as I understand it anyway, is to try to keep the zoning ordinance in the comprehensive plan in alignment. So, if you don't approve the R3, it stays village commercial. So you might as well designate the phys commercial wind comp plan that'll be in the line. Did I explain that right or

continue with you with your slide? I need that. Okay, we we can get back to that. When we're done with

uh the submitted traffic analysis, I'll use the anacronym TIA. uh includes the 66 units. There was one recommendation made on it. I believe I enclosed the executive summary in in the report, but the applicant has well construction of a full movement driveway with one ingress lane and one egress lane off with Creek Road. He is showing that in his plan. Uh and uh and we did note that there's a stop sign added there too to at at the corner of uh what will be the new creek road access. The level of service categories are in the A and B range on a scale of A through F. Two instance of C flow will be offset by adhering to the uh recommendation of the traffic impact analysis. uh A and B range basically stable flow you're not impeded by other people on the road so additional steps there's a fair amount of additional steps in order to carry out the proposal it will be necessary to mitigate boundary lines uh the uh the uh the town houses and town and the duplexes is will be uh fee simple real estate need uh the applicant has provided for it that's one thing it didn't come from 15t easement over tax pin uh it's it's a tax pin but the uh the building on it and that's just basically to allow walking between two sections of this development site plan is also required and must be approved along with meeting all city

land use provisions before any construction activities occur. This includes all building permits, all all all requirements wrapped up in the world. The planning commission did vote 42 to recommend denial of this request. Both requests actually the reasonzoning request and the comprehensive plan amendment request. So they voted 4 to2 against uh against both of them. Uh the following four items have been proper by the applicant and you'll beg my indulgence. I will read those in. Uh the units will be age restricted to 55 and over. The applicant shall grant a future 20 foot wide easily in the area shown on the presentation by Robert Moses which is considered the alpha street extension corridor. Now of course I've already said we'll need a public road in there too. So this is this is on top of that. Nothing that he's proper overrides any site plan requirements. Uh the applicant will provide a connector easement. That's that 15 ft easement that goes um partly over the uh the phase one property uh to connect the properties on the west side of the EDA pond to the properties on the east side. Uh the overall layout including all constructed buildings shall be in compliance with the proposed layout and architectural renderings submitted as part of the development. and I went over those a little bit while ago, but those are the buildings and the layouts that that you saw earlier. So, we will be in compliance with that. And with that, I'll take any questions you might have.

Yes, sir. Uh Wally, on your uh additional step slide about three back, I think. Okay. First sentence says they will be zoned real estate. What are they now? Well, right now they don't exist at all. Say that again. Right now they don't exist at all. But what we've done in the case of the village village park is we we've done the the the pond, whatever it's called. Um that still be under possession of the city.

The the pond? Yeah, it'll still be an EDA pond. And that's one of the things Mr. Moses will have to demonstrate as part of his overall site plan is that he does have enough excuse capacity to uh to treat the impervious area. So the city will be required to maintain it in anything.

Well, the EDA has a separate agreement with Mr. Moses right now. And one of the things that we will do as he moves forward with his uh site plan is to verify that the EDA is uh for lack of a better term okay with the uh with with the development which by the way will probably be a little bit less than the development he had that's all expiring. But I was just curious as to who's going to mow the area andor knock down weeds and do they have access to get there?

Well, the EDA has access to get into the pond, but uh Bob Moses will have to, you know, to do his sight in in order that it effectively drains into it and you know that works essentially. Yeah. Molly, could you help me with I have a Picosen land use 101 question for you.

So, thank you. So, I know that if a parcel is zoned commercial by nature, including village commercial, um or let's flip that. If a if a parcel is zoned residential, you cannot do a conditional use permit for something commercial in nature. You have to do a reszoning, right? Because we Well, that's in the past. We we've used condenser use permits to solve a lot of problems. But I agree with you, it'd be better to go reserve.

So for residential, so I didn't think we could get cups for commercial nature or a significant cup for on a residential. Well, no, we cannot we cannot. And and yeah, and then through that's what that's one reason we're going to reszone. And then if we flip it, if you have a commercial property, including village commercial, can you do a cup for something in nature? Well, you might be able to do a cup, but we're trying to think of of how a bank might look at this. I mean a resilient is permanent and a use permit can be revoked at any time.

Yeah. For any number of transgressions. So once this is zoned residential then that's that's all she wrote until it's residential. Okay. Thank you.

Do do we have a drawing showing its location relative to the commercial properties nearest? Yeah, I can I can go back to the top and and kind of show you. I'm sorry to do this. It's probably a better way to do it, but I'm not always the most, but uh these four properties here would go to U R3. These properties here would stay village uh commercial. This property would stay village commercial. This would stay general commercial and these would all stay B2.

So the the the area designated by the two long parallel vertical stars back up to commercial property. Well, that's actually R3 property down there. That's the villas. But there there I think I mean that that's business right there. Um it seems to be shade differently but I believe that is business commercial as well.

Yep. Now originally you said prior to 2012 that whole area was considered general commercial GC all this area this area in here in here was uh general commercial. Yes. This area was actually still B2 back here. That be changed that slightly by making a village commercial. In other to allow businesses to exist but residential space above them as was in the very first building that was built. Right. Correct.

And now we're talking about screw that. Whoever said it was commercial to begin with and then modified to be village commercial didn't know what they were talking about and didn't have that vision for any kind of commercial thing in the main corridor that is for commercial existence in the city.

Well, I think I can answer that by saying that when when Mr. Moses began this process. He intended for it to be a mixed use development and that's why he needed to go to village commercial because that's a zoning district that that allows that and and the city council uh approved several conditional use permits that that instead of a one one he can go to a 2:1 uh ratio of residents to commercial. would have been three to one if they but if if

question is we're wiping out as Angie was kind of saying we're wiping out commercial at all if we reszone this oh those four properties yes they would be residential they'd be uh town homes and duplexes I don't really have a problem with those two parcels on the left side west side because they're backing up against legacy Well, here's the aerial right

against the uh two EDA properties, two legacy properties which aren't being developed or planned anyway and the so-called gun range. I don't have a problem really with that being residential. I kind of have a problem with taking the part that's right off Creek Road and changing that around to make it purely residential. Is there any discussion in all this stuff? Because I heard that and I'm about to say at the planning commission meeting. I'm glad they brought it up. Nasty word affordable housing. I don't remember affordable housing coming up.

Chaz mentioned it and he kind of dismissed it because it was laughable at times, but just wanted to see if there was any talk of it because we're talking about 55 and above. Wow. I saw what the prices happened 20 years ago when they put in the villas. You know, they were selling for 200 when they started. By the time they're done, they 300. Now they're in the upper 300s. Any other questions or comments for Wally?

Thank you, Wally. Appreciate the presentation.

I suggest we take a six minute break. Yes. Okay. With that, we will adjourn work session and we'll take a 6-minute break.

Good evening and welcome to all. This Picosen City Council meeting is called to order. Item B on the agenda is the invocation and pledge of allegiance which will be led by Councilwoman Jeanie Hoverbert.

Rise. Let us pray. Almighty God, we ask your blessing on this council and the work before us this Grant us clear minds, steady judgment, and a sincere desire to seek the good of our whole community. Guide our discussions as we hear about the work of our community college. And as we consider matters affecting our schools and the stewardship of the resources entrusted to us in this season where the days are growing longer and the weather reminds us of constant change, help us remain faithful in service, patient in listening, and united in purpose. All this we ask in your name. Amen. Amen. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Jeanie. Item C on our agenda is a special presentation. Tonight her presentation is related to the Virginia Peninsula Community College and we are pleased and honored to have with us tonight Dr. Carrie Ragno. Uh Dr. Ragno is the vice president of academic affairs. We have Mr. Seth Fiser. Mr. Fischer is the director of advising. And we have Miss Tracy Wright. She is the director of campus and community initiatives for the historic triangle campus. So, welcome. Uh, thank you so much for coming. Uh, looking forward to your presentation and, uh, we're all quite familiar with Virginia Peninsula Community College and the impact that that's had on on the area and the region. Uh, and and beyond that, going back to the 1960s, I know both my daughters took classes there. my brother graduated from there and I know numerous council members and and staff members have also benefited of what the college has to offer. So, thank you again and the floor is yours.

Well, I want to first say thank you'all so much for having us. I'm super excited you took up part of my job that of introducing everybody. So, thank you. You made my life easier. Um so, just want to thank you all so much for allowing us to come um and to provide these updates. Super exciting. Um we got to always love when those positive updates coming too. Um so just wanted to get started um with our first positive. Um so we did have um some decrease in a little time. Um but we are super excited. The past two years we have seen an increase in enrollment and we're shooting for that third one coming up. Um what's super exciting is we're seeing not just first-time freshmen coming, we're also seeing returning students as well. Um and we're also seeing students that are working um and doing have families as well. So super exciting with that and continuing to have that growth that you're seeing there from the 2023, 2024 and 2025. So super excited about that. And then what y'all are the most interested about is Kosen. Um so we have a 3% um student ratio at our school from Kosen. That equals about 272 students. Um what's super exciting is we're actually visiting schools now. Um which we have actually seen an uptick of students that are more likely to come talk to us understanding what community college has to offer. So we have different initiatives that we've been really putting into effect to help students to understand what their best options are to help them take that next step in education. One is our fasttrack. That's the one that we actually have at our school. Um, but we also have another one where we actually go to the schools like I was saying and we're actually able to help meet with the seniors to be able to take that next step and actually have them talk to an adviser and also enrollment specialist to make sure they know what's going on and that financial aid to make sure they know that budget as well. Um, we also have where we've been connecting with um, students that have stopped out um, due to family reasons or different things that have happened and helping them finish that degree that they so hardly worked on to make sure that they're taking that next step to complete that degree. Um, and

then we do have our college navigators and recruiters that are always going to the schools. Um, super excited that they'll be coming and doing more with the students um, to be able to help them understand their next steps. And then also we have our student in orientation. Um super excited. They'll talk a little bit more about it, but we opened up our theater. Um so our theater opened up. Um and that was actually where we had our first new student orientation this um fall. So that was really exciting to be able to see students back in our theater for that. So like to talk turn it over to Dr. Rio.

Thank you Seth. Good evening everybody. Thank you again so much for having us. I am Carrie Reno. the vice president for academic affairs um and happy to talk to you a little bit about um our nonredit workforce student programs and then our dual enrollment programs both of which also serve picosen population. So one of the ways we serve workforce students is through a program called fast forward. Has anyone heard of that before? There is legislation supporting that program and as you can see by the bar chart our uh demand for that program has far exceeded the funding for that program. It's been very successful over many years. Um so that is essentially a workforce credential grant. Um and it gives financial assistance covering 2thirds of the students tuition for short-term programs. So, it's aimed at getting students into um a program that will prepare them for a workforce related credential um or license and then back into the workforce either to upskill or serve in new high demand positions for them. Um residents pay then only onethird of that cost upfront. So, it's a great deal for students. Um so we've seen growth since 2016 by 127% and it is growing 20% yearoveryear which is huge growth. Um it has exceeded its annual allocation for four years. We were able to cover that at the college last year. We are no longer able to cover that. So there was a legislative ask. So fingers crossed that will proceed through accordingly and we will get some additional funding. Um otherwise we will unfortunately have significantly less financial assistance for those fastforward programs. Um those

non-academic programs include a variety um of different workforce trades including allied healthc care, HVAC, information technology and of course welding which is a big one in our area with ship building. Um and again the short term is anywhere from two weeks to six months for those students to get the skills that they need or get um and get thirdparty industry credentials. As you can see by this chart, our enrollment is tracking based on some areas where we have had some significant investment in the recent years. We anticipated growth in Newport News and then um in Williamsburg, James City County. They are number one and number three largest users of fastforward funding. Picosen is an opportunity area for us. We would love to serve more of the Picosen population. We currently have 11 students taking part in fastforward programming. We are also going to add additional programs that may interest your population. U we are looking to add structural fitting um construction trades, hospitality and behavioral health technician which is a very quickly growing field um meeting our local behavioral health needs. So, let's talk about a little of a dual enrollment. One of my favorite topics. Um, this is something my staff and I spend a lot of time on with our partners at Picosen High School as well. Um, as you can see, dual enrollment is no different than our regular enrollment. It has been up ticking upward in the last few years. Um, showing our headcount growth and our full-time equivalent growth. Um 2021 is the last benchmark where we're seeing major

growth since that date. We anticipate more growth over the next several years. And this past year, Picosen High School has partnered with us for the College Now program where students will be able to graduate with an associates in social sciences. And every high school in the state is now required to offer a uniform certificate of general studies which is essentially the first year 30 credits of um a degree um general education courses and uh within that a passport which is about half a year or 16 credits of transfer education. Each of the courses contained in that uniform certificate of general studies and passport um will transfer to any public institution. It is the exact same curriculum at every single public institution 2-year or four-year in the state of Virginia. So, we worked very hard on that and I'm excited to be able to present that to your high school students. Here is our locality information for dual enrollment and this is just showing you the enrollment of all high school students starting in 2021 and then now in 2425 and you will see that in 202122 Pakosen had about 6.4% of that pie of overall dual enrollment um students and then now we're looking at about 4.6 And here's another way to look at the numbers. Um, the student enrollment has stain stayed pretty steady between 117 and 122 over those last several years. Um, and again, we're looking forward to serving more students upcoming with the additional programs that have been added in your city. So let's talk about retaining and making

sure students complete. So enrollment is very important but not if our students are not retained so that they can complete and get what they need out of our programming at Virginia Peninsula Community College. Um more points of pride here on this slide. Our falltofall retention rates are up. Our degrees and certificates awarded are up. And again, those short-term fastforward programs that I mentioned earlier um are way up as well. So, retaining and graduating those students is the main way that we strengthen the local workforce and make sure those folks can contribute well to our economy. One of the ways we focus on student retention and completion um is through initiatives like uh tutoring, intrusive advising, student engagement activities. We have a strong athletics program um that is growing. We also invest quite a bit in faculty professional development to make sure that students are always receiving current relevant curriculum that is centered on the needs of our um workforce here on the peninsula. We have wellness initiatives on the campus. We also have a bridge program for students who would like to go on and transfer to our four-year institutions. We don't want our students at VPCC to simply transfer. We want to know what our four-year institutions are going to do for VPCC students. So, we have scholarship funding. We have priority enrollment and housing funding for local institutions. Um, we have a variety of other initiatives such as receiving advising, library services, access to sports at the receiving four-year institution even while those students are still our students. to make sure that that transition is seamless and those students can really achieve what they would like to. Um, and finally, we also have career readiness initiatives. So, for those students who want to know what can I do with this degree or certificate or a short-term training

program, we use a tool called Litecast to help students explore different careers, think about what they might be interested in, and what might be the best investment for their time and money.

Thank you. Well, good afternoon again. I have the opportunity to talk about another important part because I know you all are kind enough to contribute some funds to help us provide these wonderful educational opportunities to the students. So, you want to know what's the return on your investment. And I'm happy to tell you that Chev um which is a state organization did a study about the mobility and comparing students who attend a community college versus those who attend four-year institutions. And you can see there on the screen that there's a nice difference in terms of the students that come and study at an institution in Virginia, whether it's a two-year institution like Virginia Peninsula or if it's a four-year institution like all of our amazing four-year partners of CN you and William and Mary, any of those. Um, the students that go to a 4-year institution, only 47% of them stay and reside and work in the state of Virginia, the Commonwealth, once they graduate, compared to 78% of students who attend a community college. So, you're more likely to have students that will stay and work in the communities in which they're studying. But the other important part to you is what are they doing? Are they getting jobs? You know, that's really why a lot of people are going to get this education is to better prepare them for economic mobility through a better position and career. And you can see there what's happening. Um 72.4 of our students um will transfer our college um students transfer graduates are employed within 18 months. 80.9 almost 81% are of our career and technical

graduates are employed within 18 months as well. And then 77.7% of our short-term fast uh forward completers are employed within 6 months. So it's really important um that they're putting their BPCC credential to work for them. But we're not just sitting around resting on our laurels. We've been busy uh making some things happen on campus because we know our students coming to us are expecting certain things, amenities and spaces that they can study and um learn in and gather and build friendships. So, we've been working on renovating some of our student spaces. Some of you might recall that in 2021 our roof collapsed on our theater. Thankfully, it was right during the time of CO and boats were not there. So, that was a huge blessing. Um, it took a while for us to rebuild it, but we're very grateful that in January of this year, we were able to hold our grand reopening. And so, it's beautiful. Has anyone been there yet? Yay. Bring the rest of them on over. Uh, we have a couple of plays coming up, so we invite you to come over this semester. um that fast. Our theater students are pulling themselves together. They've been waiting for this moment. And have any of you been over to Newport News to our center for excellence in early childhood development? Oh, y'all got to get over there. It's a beautiful space. Um it's a collaborative space between the city of Newport News, the PE childhood development center, and our institution. So students are being trained on one side of the building in early childhood education and then they can walk right down the hall and around the corner going through of course the safety and security measures and do their practicums at the peak childhood development center and the city of

Newport News helped fund provide the funding for the building and all those things the utilities. It's really a beautiful space. Um, and we've heard from other of our localities that we should have talks about trying to do something similar other places. Um, in March, if you haven't already received a an invite, you will receive one to come over to Newport News where we're opening up a new trade center that will focus in um maritime industries. Um, again, meeting the needs of the area there. And then um we have a new academic building that I know Dr. Rano is just too excited about. Um that's up for um development. So all of that is going on. What are our students saying? For me, I'm a student affairs person back from back in the day. And so that's really always important to me and where I get my charge is talking with our students. I feel like I work for the students. That's who I'm there for. And so our students are telling us things. Uh we survey them on the regular. And so um you can see some of the comments on the screen. I'll read just a couple of them. I'm grateful to BPCC for respecting my longterm enrollment, being patient with me, constantly reenrolling. The college has been very accommodating through all of my changes and my growth. And then lastly, looking back, I truly appreciate how helpful and understanding everyone at the college has been. They have shown that they care about students, not just academically, but personally as well. Because of their support, I've been able to stay focused, make informed choices, and feel confident in my path. I'm grateful for the positive experience, and proud to be

a part of this college community. So, we're letting the students speak for the work that we do day in and day out. Um, we believe and know that we have an outstanding product. It's so good that all the four-year institutions in our area as well as beyond um are coming to our campuses on the regular to recruit our students and some trying to snatch them away before they get their associates degrees. So, we're proud of what we do. Um, we thank you all for your support and we thank you again for the opportunity to be here. My colleagues and I are happy to entertain questions if there's time or if that would be appropriate.

Yes, ma'am. It would be appropriate and we do have time. Council members, go ahead. Gee, me first. Okay. Thanks. Mr. You mentioned that have people that are recruiting students. Are they out in schools like on a weekly basis?

Yes. Um, so we have Jamal Davis, um, who is actually our recruiter, so he's been going to different schools almost every day. Um, so he actually travels to different schools every day. He does talk to them, um, talk to the students as he goes in. Um, and then we have navigators in those, um, ones we visit. So we actually reached out to all of our schools and we said, "Hey, we'd love to come visit and do those um, inschool visits." And that's actually where um, we'll actually be going and coming to the schools and do that. So yes, we actually have it two kind of twofold where we have it where we add one person that comes around and visits, but then we also have a team that comes and does that one-stop shop. That relatively new computer.

It is. Um so Jamal I think has only been with us for I think this is the second year. So yes, it is a newer um thing. We did have a little bit and then co kind of screwed up some different things. Um but we have been bringing back and making sure that we're getting back into the high schools and also middle schools. We actually have middle schools and high schools that do visit us as well. I know that back in 2005 to 2010 they had two people that did that and the enrollment at that time went way up and then they did away with it and then it leveled off and then sank like a rock. So, it's a good thing. Yes. And we're super excited. Jamal does a fantastic job as well as the one-stop shop when we go around to help as well. Thank you.

Hi. Thank you. Um I used to teach at VPCC when it was previous uh Thomas Nelson come back.

Um so I'm looking at the two pie charts. The first one on dual enrollment by locality and then the other one on the fast forward enrollment. Um I'm curious I think it would be helpful to the communities and I know you don't have those numbers off the cuff but when we're looking at 4.6% 6% because Picosen is a smaller community and both questions are geared to this. It would be lovely to see what percentage of our student high school population um is involved in that program and I think that that might be more telling for us compared to these much larger school systems. Yes, that's a great metric. I'll make a note.

Okay. And then the other piece on the slide two slides before that one um for the workforce fast forward enrollment 2425 um those 11 students you had mentioned funding being a challenge uh in the future and that you've already put the ask out. Yes. Because of those population differences in the communities. What type or have you considered protective measures because you're going to end up making some hard decisions on who can participate and get that funding

who can't what type you know when we see 11 I don't know what that criteria is that allowed those students to be was there criteria where they were declined because we already are well bel you know having to fund be more than we've been given right we you um and And what happens if they cut that funding? How do we protect Picosum?

That's an outstanding question and you're right. I am not sure exactly what happens. I know that we covered the funding um for the year that was mentioned here. Um and for this year there was a pause. I want to speak to Todd Estus is my counterpart who would be able to answer this best for you. So, I'm going to get with him and and reply back to you all a little bit later, but if I recall what he shared, there was a pause in funding going through the summer of 2025 and then we were able to start again. So, what that did to specific groups or populations, I'm not sure that I will have to ask him because that's very important. Absolutely.

Because you could snuff out two of those communities without even blinking.

Yeah. Yeah, that makes good sense. Thank you for the question. And one thing I did want to touch upon that um we are finding different funings from different places as well. Um I was actually sorry make sure everybody can hear me. Um one of the things that we've actually just were working on financial aid director and myself and Todd Essis who is head of our workforce. We actually have a grant that we actually be able to we were actually able to use to help more students um for that. So even there was pause we were able to still help students with that aspect because we had that grant that we were able to get the students. So we have been really trying to figure out how can we use grants that we have to help students in any way we can. Um making sure that it's not just credit side but also nonredit what you're seeing up here. So that has been one of the things even though we did have some times where we were like okay we have to cover something we were finding different ways to be able to do that as well. So just wanted to make sure we pointed that out. And I did want to mention that I did have one in dual enrollment, one in um uh associate program and one in workforce development in my family. So we we like it there.

I love it. Go Gators. That's go right there. Yes. And I noticed y'all have some green. So thank you. Do you think that the uh that most four-year colleges offer online courses now? Has that had any effect on your enrollment or have you thought of that?

That's a great question. So about 50% of all of our offerings are online on the credit side on my side of the house, not for not for um workforce. We do have a lot of competition for online teaching and learning. that space is becoming pretty saturated. Almost every institution, if not every institution, 2-year or fouryear, is absolutely finding their way into that online market. Um, a few years ago, looking at it as a pretty good cash cow. Now that we have saturation, I'm not sure how well that's working for those institutions that were really wanting to um to find a way to some additional um funding sources through there. But we do have competition and that's one of the reasons why we work so hard to not only market our programs but make sure that our faculty are top tier and able to teach uh very well in both in person and online.

Used to I knew a lot of students that would come home for the summer and take courses at uh still at your place. Yes. And now they it seems to me they tend to take an online course from their four-year school. They will sometimes, but we do have many, many, many students that we call them visiting students that come home for the summer and they'll either come in person or online particularly to make up general education credits. A quick question. Um, have you done any measurement of the uh level of learning on online versus in-person classroom? Uh, differences there? I would suspect there probably is, but I'm

You're asking about learning success, successful completion of those programs. That is something we are held accountable for. We must make sure that students have an equal experience whether they're attending in a classroom or online. That's why we invest so heavily in tutoring and other supports for students and that faculty uh engagement and training. Um, so if we do notice in an individual course or a program overall that we're not seeing the metrics that we need to see for success or there is a difference between online and face toface, then we're able to address that immediately and make sure that we make the shift needed.

I have a question. Um, I was looking online at your programs. I'd mentioned a little bit earlier. Um, and Picosen does have the college now program. It's a new program looking there. There were also some um partner municipalities that had I think it was early college and what's the difference between college now versus early college. So early college is available to everybody. It's a program that exists if schools would like to participate and it's simply that students are um who are qualified for dual enrollment. they are high school students who um are eligible to take college courses as defined by um our metrics for admission can come to the campus and take courses that may not actually give them credit both in their high school class and their college course. So some of those students are coming to us and taking things like psychology or sociology or advanced math or things that aren't available um in the high school. So that's early college program. Um, and college now is the special program that we worked on and launched in the fall of this year where students are taking as many classes as possible in their home high school dual enrollment, meaning as many courses as we could find. Um, what I call crosswalk. They give credit for high school and credit for college in one course. And then any additional courses that don't do that, um, Picosen will bus over or students will drive over and take on campus or online. You're welcome. Any other questions?

Dr. Rana, Mr. Fiser, and Miss Wright, thank you so much for being with us. Uh y'all obviously have a servants mentality. Uh we admire that. Uh we have that in common with y'all as well. Uh we appreciate and admire your positivity and your enthusiasm. presence tonight has certainly added value to our meeting. Thank you again for being here. Thank you all again for having us. We appreciate it.

That concludes our special presentation tonight. We'll move on to item D on our agenda, which is the audience for visitors. At this time, we will open the floor for public comment related to the city other than a public hearing, which we'll talk about in just a little while. Yes, sir. If I could um ask Mr. Failen to come forward and introduce you to Paul Failen. He is our new city engineer.

I told you I was going to introduce you, but I didn't tell you. You might have to stand up and speak because I wanted you to come. Everybody um Paul Failen uh coming from the federal side. I was the facilities management division director at shipyard graduated university. Um and William and college William Mary for my NBA. Um and I look forward to doing lots of work for y'all. Excuse me. Did I get your name is Bob Failen? Paul. Paul. Okay. Paul. Uh, welcome. Thank Southern Illinois, Illinois. Carbonddale.

Yes, Carbonale. I guess the correct one. Hey, Paul. Thanks. Congratulations on your uh on your new job. Appreciate your interest in the city of Picosen. Professionals like you are are not all that easy to come by. And uh if you wouldn't mind share a little bit about your military experience and and your construction experience overseas.

Yes. Yes. So uh I'm also retired lieutenant commander. Uh started off enlisted as a Navy nuclear machinistmate. Um after my first enlistment that's when I went and got my degree. Uh the war started in Afghanistan and I uh went into the reserves as got my commission for as a CC officer. That's civil engineering core CBS. I'm sure you're all familiar with CBS. Um spent a year and seven months in Afghanistan, another six months in the Middle East, and then another six months in Europe. Really can't count that as a deployment, but they technically do call it a deployment. Yeah. Um did a lot of construction overseas uh you know forward operating bases mostly you know contingency type stuff. Uh over when I did do the uh deployment in the Middle East I was deployed with Jac um did a lot of development of their forward operating bases. I was in uh I was in Jordan. And I had guy I had a unit with me. I had guys in Syria, Jordan, Kuwait, and Iraq at the time. Uh it was it was really interesting time. Um got to see Petra while I was there. That was And uh any other questions?

Did you have something else? No. Okay. Normally yes. All right. Thank you very much. Oh, thank you again for sharing that with us and very interested and uh certainly highly qualified. Thank you. Welcome. Do we have any other public comment tonight? Okay. Well, thank you. We will close the floor and we'll move on to item E, which is approval of the minutes of the regular session from February 23rd, 2026. Do we have a motion and a second? So move, Mr. Mayor.

Second. Thank you. Questions, comments? Christie, call for vote, please. Councilwoman Hover. I. Councilman Southpaw, I. Councilman Freeman, I. Councilwoman EMTT, I. Vice Mayor Bunting I. Councilman F. Hi I. Mayor Hut I. Mr. Mayor. The motion carried by a vote of seven to zero. Thank you Christie. Do we have a motion in a second to approve the minutes from the budget retreat from February 24th, 2026? So move, Mr. Mayor. Second. Thank you. Questions or comments? Christie. Councilman South Hall. I. Councilman Freeman. I. Councilman. I. Vice Mayor Bunting. Hi. Councilman Fi. Hi, Councilman. Hi, Mayor.

Hu. Hi, Mr. Mayor. The motion carried by a vote of seven.

Thank you, Christie. All right, moving on to item F, which is a public hearing related to an ordinance authorizing the issuance of not to exceed $3 million general obligation school bond of the city of Picosen. Uh the public hearing is now open and we will have uh Tanya O'Connell, our assistant city manager, uh to give us a presentation on this topic. Tanya, the floor is yours. And I will add that there is no council action required tonight at at the council meeting on March 23rd, 2026. Davenport and Company, the city's financial advisor will present the results of the financing proposals received at that time. Tanya,

perfect. Mayor, vice mayor, city manager, council members. Tonight is the formality. We have to hold the public hearing. Um, just open the hearing. Of course, if there's any audience that wish to speak for it or against it, they can do so. Other than that, we'll bring back the proposals on the March 23rd. Davenport will pres present the results for y'all to officially vote on which mechanism and institution we do go forward with. I have a question. Um in the packet um where it talks about and you introduced it this way it says um ordinance authorizing the issuance not to exceed 3 million. Next page it says authorizing the issuance of up to 5.8 million. Correct. I'll

hop in there. So, we have two things going on in the current issuance. We have an issuance for up to 3 million for the high school roof replacement and then last year we did an issuance for the HVAC. So, we are looking to refinance that debt as well. Okay. So, currently we have a 4.27 interest rate on that debt. We're trying to see if the market can better that. Is that city advisor um financial advisor going to talk about both of these? Absolutely. And we'll also have bond council here as well, S Anderson that'll be here as far as the ordinance. Any other concerns you have?

Any other questions or comments for Tanya? Tanya, thank you very much. Uh do we have any anybody present tonight that would like to speak to us about this topic? Very well. We will close the floor and with that close the public hearing and we'll move on to item G, new business. So we have one topic tonight. This is an ordinance making additional appropriations for fiscal year 26 for capital project fund. And we have Tanya back with us again. So, thank you, Tanya.

Absolutely. So, tonight I'm coming to you with a request to have additional funding for the trim around fire station 2. When we did that functional capacity evaluation to determine the roof was bad, that did not include the trim around fire station 2, says Keith Webb, who is our part-time construction manager, was with the uh contractor to determine that we really should replace that trim as well for efficiency purposes. So tonight I come to you with a request of 32,743 to fund both the roof and the trim work around fire station 2 as well as giving me permission to have the city manager to sign that contract because now with both those project it exceeds his authority and we did have the funding available in the capital project fund.

Any questions or comments for Tanya? Thank you Tanya. No. Thank you. Uh do we have a motion and a second for approval? Mr. Mayor, I propose an ordinance making additional appropriations for fiscal year 2026 for capital project fund. Second. Thank you, Christie. Councilman Thy. I. Vice Mayor Bunting. I. Councilwoman EMTT. I. Councilman Freeman. Council Councilman South. I. Councilwoman. Hi. Mayor Hooks. Hi. Mr. Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of seven to zero.

Thank you, Christie. All right, we will move on to item H, comments of the city manager, Randy. Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Only one item tonight, and this just to reiterate a point Mr. Horton made earlier. For those that may have watched uh at home, the work session pertaining to the upcoming uh resoning uh by Bob Moses and uh Mr. White, um that will be subject of a public hearing at our next meeting. So, if you've got some thoughts you'd like to share about it, uh you'll have an opportunity to do so at our next meeting. Thank you. Uh thank you, Randy. Uh item I, council directives, uh start with Mr. Freeman tonight. I have nothing to additional.

Thank you, Angie.

I have two things. The first is coming up this Saturday, the 14th, is the Kuanas Boating and Fishing Flea Market and Nautical Art Show. That is going to be held at the Picosen High School from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Um, admission is $5 $5 for speaker if you want to go see the speakers and then 12 and under is free. and the speakers that they have lined up this year. We have Sunny Ensley, Stan Simmerman, Aaron Holmes, and Craig Freeman. They fill the rooms um with their knowledge and uh come on out and there's always good deals. If you want clean out your garage and get a table, we would welcome that as well. Um, and then second thing that I just wanted to mention because um, it's a it's a tool that I utilize every single day. Uh, and I know that Bud well, I suspect that Bud will say that we should be more involved in our municipal government and our state government or at least know what's going on. And one tool that I really really appreciate um the Virginia VPAB, the Virginia P or the Virginia Public Access Project has uh which is a nonpartisan nonprofit um that just has puts out information, websites, visuals, all that pertaining to um local politics, local governments, state governments. um they have a daily newsletter called VA news and basically they just it's an aggregation of all the original news reporting from around the state. So you get things from Cardinal News, Virginia Mercury, Richmond Times Dispatch, a bunch of newspapers, all original reporting. um and they send it

right to your email every single day. And it is so um insightful to read what's going on, not just in the legislative session, but also what's going on in the Martinsville City Council or wherever. And um you just start reading it and before you know it, you'll be a policy wonk and just keep learning more about about your state government. So, uh, it's VA News and go sign up. It's free and, uh, it's a it's a really good resource. Get more information from Okay, that's all I have to say. Hey, thank you, Angie. Jeanie,

thank you. And I would also like to be a policy wonk, so could you just send me the direct link? Absolutely.

Thank you. I actually have a few things. Um, first I want to thank uh begin by thanking our presenters tonight from VPCC uh Carrie, Seth, Tracy uh for taking the time to share with us that state of the college update. Uh you know the partnership that we have is is dear and close and um I was heartened by the information and uh and the response to our questions. I think that's great. It just shows uh continued partnership there. Um, I also want to take a moment to thank our city staff um for the work y'all are doing to continue um or during this budget. It's not an easy time. You know, Picosen faces some unique challenges and year after year you guys manage those challenges with creativity, discipline and and of course Picosen first, right? um you not only keep our heads above water but held high as we have that phrase punching above our weight and um that's that's absolutely um awe inspiring. I I think that you guys um you're you're fantastic. Um I wrote this down earlier today and I said, "Huh, apparently you can fast and still gain muscle. Who knew, right? We don't have anything coming in, right? But yet you guys are still doing amazing things what you do have. Um I do want to remind everyone to get out and do your civic duty. Um the vote on the to vote on the proposed constitutional amendment, but please read up on it and understand what you're actually voting on before you vote. Um because the wording may or may not make sense to you. So please read up before you get there. proposed constitutional amendments tend to um uh be complex. So, please understand what you're choosing yes or no to. Um and we want you to make

your voices heard and share with our representatives what you think. Finally, I'd like to share a quick community announcement. Picosen High School's Try M, which is their music honor society, uh is hosting its first jazz gala this Wednesday evening. You hear that, bud? It's Wednesday evening. Jazz Gala. Um, and it's from 6:00 to 7:30. It's their pizza, not pizza, it's their spaghetti dinner show. Um, and so, and Triam is not just chorus. Triam is all the music. So, you'll have people from, uh, the jazz band, people from the concert band, uh, and then the different organizations that do music there. So, that'll be at the high school. No. Yeah, at the high school. It is $20 at the door. Um, and it sounds like a great way to support our students and enjoy a great evening on hump day.

The date on that again is Wednesday the 11th. Say that to Bud because we have kids who were triumph people. Mhm. And that's all I've got. Thank you, Jeanie.

Keith. Yes. First thing is on Thursday morning is the Picosa Mobile Food Pantry. Um, it starts at 10 o'clock, goes to noon, but if you're going to come and volunteer, I'll be there hopefully by about 8:30. This will be the first pantry we had since the closure of the parish food pantry. There might be some additional people there. We hope we can accommodate as many as possible. Um, although I tend to leave it to the school board to congratulate the students that for the success that they've had, uh, two things stand out over the last couple weeks. uh that I think is worthy of note. Uh we do we do see it. We do know what's going on. We tend to leave it to the school board um was the uh postal high school wrestling team taking state championship last month. Um followed just a couple weeks ago, maybe a week and a half ago by the academic challenge team also taking state championship, which is quite a lot to say for uh a small town city uh like us. So congratulations to those students and the the coaches and everybody else that gets them prepared for away for all those. Thank you,

Keith. Thank you, Malho. You sure?

Yes, sir. Positive. Well, first off, I'd like to thank everyone who came here tonight to pay attention to the city government and everyone at home who's listening. I hope there's a lot of them out there doing that tonight. Um, it's no secret that Picosen is my favorite city. I've said that about every meeting. And the state of Virginia is my favorite state. And I've done some traveling around the United States really beautiful places, okay? But none of them I'd rather live in than the state of Virginia. We have four ones we don't like when it gets really cold. Okay. Okay. And and we don't like it when it gets really hot. But we do have places either have hot or cold. Okay. And u Virginia is a nice place to live. is and the city of Posian is the best place in Virginia to live. U I do tend to get political. I hate politicians. Yeah. And I am one and I hate that part. But I am a politician and I don't like it. And too frequently the citizens do not pay attention. Frequently they don't pay attention to their state and federal governments. And when we elect politicians from the state up to the federal level, u we expect them to represent the people. Too often the both political parties are more about politics than they are working the people's business. That's occurring in Virginia right now. We having a early election and it's going to be over what 45 days, something like that. But um they want to jerrymander the state of Virginia for this one election. Okay, because another state did something. Okay, it's one party versus another. And I do not belong to a political party. I vote for the people and what they say they're going to do and I whether or not I believe that they're honest. Right.

Changing the election in the state of Virginia because another state may have done something that's not right isn't the right thing to do. That's not what either party should be doing for the the state of Virginia.

We need to keep Virginia fair. Okay, both parties have jurymandered. Okay, this is pure spite, political spite. Okay, and too often I've seen one party vote against another party either way because it wasn't that party's bill. It's not supposed to work. They're supposed to do the people's business. We do the people's business. This is the best working city council in the state of Virginia. and we care about our people. We don't get paid thousands of dollars, okay? Most most many times it cost us money to come here and do this. And sometimes it's not fun. Okay? But I'm asking everybody who may be listening to tell your friends, okay? We don't need to change our elections and make them unfair because another state may have done something make it unfair because I can't tell you whether other state made it unfair or not. I don't pay attention to the state of Texas or any other pay attention to Virginia. I'll vote here. And so I ask you to uh consider that in the upcoming election. I ask everybody who's hearing my voice to pay attention and vote. And the state of Virginia is right now doing some other things that might cost the citizens of this city and Newport News, Williamsburg, and the rest of the cities also, but I'm not concerned about them as much as I am the city of Picotenua. That's uh a House Bill 1263 and a Senate Bill 378. which will change Virginia from being a right to work state. I believe in giving any small business the opportunities to do work for a city government or a state government or a federal government. Okay, the opportunity to do that. Not require that they can't do it because they're a small business and don't belong to a union. Want to join a union? Fine. Okay. If you don't want to belong to a union, don't join. But every business guy needs to have the opportunity to compete.

If if we if all the citizens of Virginia are required to compete only with union contractors, it will cost us all a bunch of money. We're already fighting as hard as we can to keep our taxes low. And as hard as we're fighting, if anybody had paid attention or attended our last works work session on the upcoming budget, we're having to consider things service that we might have to cut. And and and if we do, it might be good for some people, especially younger people. Hey, well, we don't maybe we don't need to pick up trash. Well, it's great if you're 15 15 to 30 years old, okay? But if you're 55 to 80 years old, okay, having to pick up your own trash might not be a nice thing to do. So, we're doing our best to keep our taxes low. And even that, we may yet have to raise taxes. If the state does this, we will raise them even more. Not because we want to, because the state's going to require us to. Everybody pay attention to your city government, especially your state government right now and the federal government. a little stool. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. South Hall. Deb, I don't have anything tonight, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.

Okay. Well, you're welcome. Uh, I have a few things to comment on and uh thank uh the special election on April 21st. That was on my lip. So, thank you for taking care of that. And I I would like to add just a a brief comment to that. Uh you can go to our our city website uh to the voter registration uh Tammy and and Tara. Uh they do a good job of posting information related to voting. Thank you to Jen Canela and Allison Croll for helping us with it. And welcome back to Mr. Moore. Uh hope you and Ms. Moore enjoyed your vacation.

Very good. many of them. Well, nice nice to have y'all back with us. Pay the price for my 200 and some emails I'm working on. Patience and perseverance.

Uh, thank you to Mr. Keith Webb uh for helping us out with our construction projects and for noticing things like the additional work at station 2 that needed to be done. Uh thank you to council members for your uh engaging and insightful questions and comments uh especially when we have presenters here and and to our staff as well. So thank you all for that. I'd like to comment on our 16th annual community group meeting which was held on February 26 and I understand that that was the brainchild of Mr. Dave Callus, uh, our former director of economic development at parks and wreck. Uh, I mean, sadly Dave passed away a little over a year ago, but just wanted to to recognize him tonight for his contributions and ask that we all keep his his memory alive. Um, this year's event was hosted by our community recreation department and our Picosen Public Library. So, thank you to to to staff and both of those departments. This year, we had about 62 attendees representing about 30 community organizations within the city. So, pause for just a minute. Think about that. 30 community organizations within this small city. That's pretty impressive. I don't know if all of them were there, but uh that's a lot. And they do a lot of great things. This year the theme was to encourage uh collaboration and and networking. And I know at the tables where I was seated, it just reinforced how much of that goes on in the city. Uh how much people work together uh for the common goal of

serving the greater good uh as we do on council. I know the staff does as well. It's just a common theme within the city. also like to recognize and thank uh our library director, Miss Jessica Hartley. Uh this new format was her idea and I I think it was very wellreceived. So, thank you all to your contributions. And on another note that's also related to that and I mentioned this in my comments that night, but the night of the community group meeting, that was the third night that week that staff had worked all day and came back in the evening to support a city event. uh we had the council meeting on Monday, we had a budget retreat on Tuesday and Thursday night they were back again supporting it. So that just again demonstrates through their actions, their dedication and the effort that they put forth uh to to serve the city which in includes all of us. And it further reinforces the responsibility that this council has to take care of employees as best we can to demonstrate daily the effort that they put forth to take care of of of the city. So just just keep that in mind please as we move in deeper in into the budget season. That concludes my comments,

Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir. I'm sorry I left out one. Welcome, Mr. Paul Failen, the new city engineer on my sheet. I didn't I got so wound up in politics. Oh, I hate politicians. I I left it out. Welcome, sir. Glad to have you here. Thank you, Mr. S. Mr. Freeman. I was just going to comment. You were talking about the community meeting. Uh, Councilman Fi ran one of the groups. Yes, sir. That was at the table. You're very good. And it's just that collaboration. The only unpaid leader of one of the groups, I might add. I don't think I was getting paid extra to be there. Other duties as assigned.

The comments are well received. And and if I could capitalize just a little bit, the the positivity that that we share in the throughout the community, it's it speaks volumes and it it helps to attract uh people of the caliber of of Mr. Failen that want to come be a part of it. So it it's contagious. So Mr. Failen, he's just, you know, another example. He's living proof uh that it is contagious and people want to be part of something like this. I know it certainly it's one of my many motivations uh to serve is cuz I who I get to work with and uh for that I'm I'm forever grateful. So thank thank you all. So, are there any other comments from council members? Okay. Well, I'll ask for a motion to adjurnn, please.

So move. Second. Thank you, Christie. Councilman Freeman, I. Councilwoman EMTT, I. Councilman Southhaul, I. Councilman Fi, I. Councilwoman Hubard, I. Vice Mayor Bunting, I. Mayor Hawk, I. Mr. Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of seven to zero. Thank you, Christie. We are adjourned.