City Council - Regular Meeting

It's good to see everyone this morning. Welcome to our pre-meeting. Ladies and gentlemen, we're now in the hands of our capable city clerk. Excuse me, we're in meeting. We are now in the hands of Ms. Lisa Carroll.

This is the pre-meeting of the Mobile City Council Tuesday, September the 15th. We have approval of minutes from September 8th.

Any issues, anyone? Okay.

Appeals, we have requests for waive the noise ordinance on September the 19th. on Pallister Place West, October 17th on Adams Street, October 10th on Venetia Road, and September 26th on Downtowner Boulevard.

Any issues? For District 1, can we move to 9 p.m.?

Same thing on District 5.

Anyone else? Okay.

Public hearing, today is the public hearing to declare the structures at 1550 Stewart Avenue, also formerly known as 1551 Forest Street, 1318 Hercules Street, 913 Texas Street, 858 McQuillan Street, and 1109 Bay Avenue public nuisances and ordering them demolished. Public hearing to consider the application of Granbury Executive Transport for a certificate of public convenience and necessity to operate a shuttle, sedan, and limousine service. Presentation of petitions and other communications to the council. Lonnie Robinson. Questions about why the city is not cutting overgrown ditch.

Mr. President, did he say where this ditch is?

It's behind this house. Yeah.

No, he said that he is sorry. He's filed a complaint with 311 back in April with no response.

I have to Laurie looking it out.

So she's looking it up this summer, the summer Dale drive lane. Yeah.

Sunny. It's where Sunnyvale. Is that you?

No, it's it's you. Oh, there's a work order in progress behind that.

Jaden Bloodworth, collaboration proposal for Hydration Drive in Mobile.

What is Hydration Drive? I'm just curious. What is Hydration Drive? Oh, is this giving out water?

Health resource note here. Yeah. Electrolyte packets, cooling towels. Oh, okay.

All right.

Estella Trotter, Mobile Housing Board, years of failing to enforce and follow finance reports to the federal government, including special application center, malpractices of HUD, demolition, relocation, and replacement of residence and housing development buildings. Ordinances held over 64, 037, 038, 039, 040, 041, 042, and 43 are considering proposed rezoning property located at 320 and 330 Western Drive. Proposed rezoner property located at 255 Church Street.

Mr. President?

Yes, Madam.

On that particular one, I'm requesting that we do a holdover for one week. I've asked legal to work with admin to get some questions answered. One in particular, I've had several, one developer and several residents to reach out, and it's regarding the fact that if we move to that T6 zoning, it would be the only building there that would be a T6, and the concern is that it would unravel the other areas impacted, basically. And if we want to go ahead and just do a full amendment, then that's what we would do. But we just need some more questions regarding the fact, why would we allow just this one isolated incident of T6? Okay.

Any issues, anyone?

Considered a proposed rezoner property located at 2665 Government Boulevard and 604 and 610 Mandrell Street. Proposed rezoning of property located at 2694 Government Boulevard and 2750, 2754 and 2756 Brookley Avenue. Proposed rezoning of property located at 4460 Dolphin Island Parkway. Considering a proposed rezoning of property located at 4213-4221 Spring Valley Drive South. and considering the proposed rezoning of property located at the northwest corner of Bear Fork Road and Moffett Road. Resolutions held over 08958. Approve purchase order to MCCI for annual renewal of laser fish document management software.

Mr. President?

Yes, Madam.

On that item, I just want to thank Admin for sharing with us the agreement. And the agreement addresses some of the issues we were concerned with in terms of data privacy, how we are handling PPI information or personal information along with data security. So thanks for sharing this information.

Okay. 01966, authorized agreement with Wesley Fontaine to provide racket stringer services. 01967, authorized agreement with the Board of School Commissioners of Mobile County for four community safety team prevention positions. 08972, Approved purchase order to Gray Bar Electric Company for traffic signal and pedestrian signal light poles. 08974, approved purchase order to Burwell Material Handling for forklifts. 08975, approved purchase order to Camo Manufacturing for floor cleaning equipment. 09978, allocate funds from fiscal year 26-27 CDBG census tract restricted capital funds to the Taylor Landing affordable housing development.

Mr. President.

Mr.

I do have an amendment that I offered last week and it's on file with the clerk's office. I'll be offering just cleaning up some language.

Okay. Mr. Penn.

Mr. President, we're working on, I want to add to that amendment, a lot of confusion kind of been going on regarding if this is capital or is it federal. I just want to add language to it in that resolution, know that this is not coming from the federal funds. My attorney is working on that, and I have entire council members and administration before the council meeting. But it just would be saying that it's not coming from the federal funds.

Will this be an amendment? That's what I was going to ask.

Can we tag along for five minutes?

Included in that one amendment? Okay.

All right. Thank you. 09979, consider adoption of the 2026-2027 General Fund and Capital Improvement Fund budgets.

We need to hold this one. Mr. Chairman, what do you think? Can we hold it two weeks, one week? What's the deadline? We're not going to make that.

Well, since we've got a finance committee meeting today.

Let's just push one week and see if we can get that after our meeting today.

One week.

All right, Madam Clerk. 31980, authorize the mayor to apply, accept, and receive a grant from the Federal Transit Administration for five new trolley-style buses. 25981, authorized limited temporary and non-exclusive access easement permits for Mobile River Bridge project. Ordinance is being introduced, 83044, an ordinance approving de-annexation of certain described land and redefining proposed reduced corporate limits.

Mr. President. Ms. Reynolds. I want to go back to the trolleys. I was looking through our contract with VIA on sort of the funding plan. I couldn't find in there where we're saying we must spend so much per year on capital expenditure. Is that in there? Oh, Mr. Woods. Good morning.

Good morning. So that is not part of the contractual obligation. That's the federal obligation for taking federal funds.

I don't understand what that means. There's a federal obligation that they must or we must spend a certain amount of capital money?

It's not necessarily capital you have to match, but because it is a separate entity, what we end up doing is we expand the capital. We can't pay people who are not our employees, right? But we ultimately end up, because remember, the city owns all of the infrastructure. Correct. And so that's how we make our payment a contribution to meet the federal guidelines. So that's what we do. It's twofold. One, I hate to revisit this one, but one, we have the pension that we deal with, which you and I agree on. And then two, there's this capital contribution to make sure that we are getting the federal funds because we don't own... the actual transit group. Some cities do. That's how we make our contribution to make sure we're being a good federal partner.

All right.

I don't understand that. You're right about it not being there. It's not a contractual obligation for us.

I see that we have a cap fixed rate amount that we will contribute at $8 million. That's what we're contractually obligated to spend.

That is right.

$8 million. And as far as capital goes, what you're saying is there is no obligation in that same contract.

Correct.

But you're saying there is some other obligation that's created by some federal statute or federal something or another?

When you take federal money, you have to make a certain amount. You have to make a certain contribution, yes.

And what is that?

It's based on percentages. It's always based on percentages. I could give you the numbers, but I can't give them to you right now.

I want to understand that, especially for the budget discussion later on today. But the reason I bring it up is the $320,000 match towards this federal grant, which I hope that we're going to get, I would expect we're going to get. Could that $320,000 serve that purpose of our capital outlay?

Typically, no. Typically, no, but we can look at that.

these five trolley buses. I think this is a start, Mr. Mayor. I think that's kind of where it should stop for now. Let's try five out. Let's see how this goes. And then we can... explore the idea further. And this is just my opinion later. Let's see how the five work, put them in the strategic areas instead of going after more in this next budget or, you know, more before we know the outcome of what we're going to get in return, because the goal is to increase ridership and to bring up the capital, because if we got budget money budgeted in our upcoming budget for expanding trolleys to, I don't know what the number would be. I don't know what the goal is, if it's 10 or if it's 20 or whatever, uh, If the goal is to increase ridership, maybe that capital money could be spent in some other way to prop up, you know, the system to try to increase ridership rather than go just head first all in into the trolleys without really knowing that that's going to get us across the finish line. So I just want to make that point that these five, I think so. You know, we're going to try it out. But beyond that, I think we need to see some results before we, you know, go head first in and just making a huge assumption that it's going to produce.

Mr. President, I have a follow up question regarding that. So the new trolley style buses, are they similar to I saw some, you know, transit is a transit wave. It was like a little bus. And but yet it was small and it was a part of our

um there we go um i think i know which bus you're talking about it's kind of a it's like a ford front body and there's kind of the larger taller i call them church buses is kind of what they look like to me they are those you know those are smaller and that's something that we used in the moda program. And I believe we may have had one other one, maybe a few more in the paratransit side of things. The trolleys will be very different from those. You know, have you seen the the one that we have thus far, the one trolley that we have online with second line?

Yes, I saw one parked outside last week sometime. But the size of it was similar to the size of the one I'm referring to, just the size.

If we're talking about the same, what I will refer to as a church bus for these proceedings, the trolley has a good bit more capacity. They do have the same paratransit capacity. ramps, lifts to allow for wheelchairs and other people with physical disabilities to be able to enter into the vehicle. They're a good bit roomier. I don't want to quote a number for occupancy. Is Jacob in here? I'm not sure the exact occupancy for the church buses, but I know that the trolleys are a good bit larger. I want to say at least six to eight more passengers that they can fit. cost-wise, you'd be surprised at how similar those vehicles are priced. Again, with the trolleys, some of it is gut. I am working to some degree with gut when it comes to trolleys, but I think that gut feeling on the rideability, the attractiveness of trolleys versus buses, is born out in the market. When you look at hometown trolleys, which is one of the primary, if not the only primary manufacturer of trolleys in the US, but it's the group that we're partnering with. In the last several years, they've gone from trolleys being about 5% of their ridership to 40% of their sales. 5% of their sales to now 40%. There was a recent article, and I can find it and share it with you, but it's out of Kansas City. Kansas City has gone to trolleys and have now beaten ridership for every other system in the country. They are, frankly, doing far better than anyone could have imagined. I think per vehicle ridership in Kansas City on their trolleys that are much like ours beats San Francisco. uh, beats every other system in the country. So it's not just gut. Um, and in the end we have these large buses that, again, I don't believe fit the character of our city fit the, you know, frankly, the size restrictions of our lanes and our roads, uh, you know, purely impossible to turn onto some of our more narrow roadways and Midtown specifically in downtown. Um, you know, the, I think there is certainly data to back up this move of getting rid of these large, oversized buses in favor of more nimble trolleys that generally fit nearly the same amount of passengers, albeit slightly closer together. If you're riding two on a bench, you might be a little closer than you would be on a bus sitting right next to someone. But getting cozy with your neighbor is not the worst thing on earth, so I think that could be a good thing. I also don't think that many of our buses are riding around anywhere near capacity. I would say most are not riding around anywhere near capacity. I think these trolleys are going to serve our citizens better, I think. And in the end, if you want a route that has dedicated trolleys, these six would generally allow us to have one dedicated route that is purely trolleys. It really wouldn't allow us to put them all over the city. We need to, I think... We need to go all in when it comes to trolleys. I know I am. I would love to invite Councilman Reynolds on a ride. We can go cruise in the trolley, see how you like it. Yeah, we actually have functional windows in these trolleys versus the buses, which don't.

I don't know what the secret sauce in Kansas City is. I mean, is it just trolleys or is it something else? I can just tell you this. I'm not going to jump on a trolley. If I got to wait out in the rain to catch the thing or if I got to sit out there in a blistering 115 degree heat index to catch it. And I think most citizens probably see it that way as well. I don't care if it's pink or yellow or it's a trolley. I don't care. They're not going to go out there and suffer on the side of the road to catch the thing, you know, or to an inconvenient location. We're doing these wholesale changes with routing and trying to make it more convenient. And that could be part of the secret sauce as well. I mean, I'm not trying to poo-poo your idea of trolleys in general. I'm saying we're spending a lot of money on public transportation, right? And we committed to a cap of $8 million by way of contract. And it looks like we're exceeding that amount, substantially exceeding, by way of capital expenditure. And if there's a way, and I agree with you about the big buses. They're empty everywhere. They don't fit the streets. They don't make a whole lot of sense. We probably went after them some years ago because of some federal dollars that were offered to get them. And they need to be unwound, no doubt about it. But they need to be unwelmed at a sustainable, reasonable rate, in my opinion, rather than going wholesale replacement. While we still have other capital needs for this transit system, in my opinion, for at least the residents in my district, I think would have to overcome in order to get on that bus, trolley, vehicle, car, whatever it is.

And I realize that I began on the campaign trail talking about trolleys versus other things in the midst of an ongoing negotiation uh you know with wave and ultimately the transfer and contracting with via and i wasn't a part of any of that um you know i think i understand that um you know when you look at the eight million that generally the city is committed to spending its own money on you've also this year we've got a 4.5 million dollar award from the federal uh transportation um authority and you know so that equals to 12.5 total um of that 4.5 i believe mr woods was referencing some of that needs to go to capital um and it's it's around to my knowledge it's around four uh ten percent so it's a little over four hundred thousand uh jacob knows these numbers and percentages much better than i do and he should probably be talking about it But in the end, every dollar that goes into the system feeds the system. Every fare that goes into the system feeds the system. And my hope is that with trolleys, with really changing the vibe and the culture of our transportation system, we are going to see additional ridership and choice ridership. I think microtransit may play an even larger role in the fixed routes. um, vehicle, even the trolley. I think the micro transit system has a chance to do that. Uh, and ultimately we'll do that. Um, in the end, we're still going to be stuck with a lot of buses. Nobody's riding. If we don't make a change, those buses are big, large, inexpensive. Um, I think that with, you know, these dollars that we're talking about today with the 1.36 and a 320,000 match, I believe, um, When we're trying to activate a workforce for the up that we have, if we don't provide the workforce, we don't continue to develop economically. If at any point we fail to deliver the workforce that these companies need, we fail as a city. We fail to continue to grow. We fail to attract new businesses. When you look back at that chamber study from two years ago, Over 30% of our workforce was not at work simply because they lacked transportation. That was the one barrier. It wasn't education. It wasn't criminal record. It wasn't any of those issues. It was they didn't have a ride. And if we're gonna add five to 6,000 jobs over the next five years, we gotta have those people. And if we have 30% of our workforce sitting at home simply because they don't have a regular ride to get to work on time when needed, if we solve that problem, we're solving multiple problems. so you know i think the trolleys are worthy of investment i don't do it just because i'm obsessed even though i am i'm obsessed because i think it will work and i think the proof is in the pudding when you look at kansas city when you look at hometown trolleys and the increase in their sales this is a this is a movement to this style of vehicle that you can see at different places in the in the country And again, these trolleys, you know, Mobile used to be a trolley town. We had the loop because we had trolleys, you know, that we have areas of our city still named for our public transit system and it hadn't existed in 70 years. I think bringing some of that back could certainly help, you know, as we look at opportunities at the airport that it's going to bring. You know, you've got a large swath of people that I think would hop off a plane and onto a trolley without a second thought. They're not likely to do that if it's a big bus sitting out in front of the airport. They will if it's a trolley. And I think we need to take all of those moving pieces into account. And, you know, I would ask the council to consider the investment in trolleys to be an investment, not in just our transportation network's future, but the future of our city.

Mr. Mayor, you make great points. Chamber of Commerce, I'm not saying those are not valid. They are. But I think we've resolved a lot of that transportation issue by partnering with VIA that taking or tackling this problem by getting a new operator in here. They're rearranging everything. The microtransits are going to be operating. The routes are going to be optimized. The software is going to be used. The rebranding, all of that stuff ties into that getting the people to the job. I'm just simply saying that the trolleys are an idea and we are acting on that idea and by getting this federal money to pursue it, I think it would be wise prudent of us to see the the changes that we've all adopted in the system to see what sort of results they produce and use these Federal monies to go down the road of trolleys and then make a decision at some later date and time on the efficacy of the trolley. Is that the secret sauce? And if so, it is. It's not like it's lost on us and we never can go down that road again. I don't wanna go all in and spend a lot of money. I mean, it's frankly a lot of money, it really is. And there are areas in the budget that I think probably should get more money. And we're foregoing that opportunity by doing some of this. for a federal grant that I support, I'm in favor of. So we'll vote it today and I'll be voting in favor of it. I just wanted to sort of tee that up as we have the discussion in our finance committee this afternoon and as we approach approval for the budget.

And I appreciate that and I appreciate your support of this, pursuing this grant. I don't think it would be fair, the one point I would make, I don't think it would be fair to judge the efficacy of trolleys based on six. Six is not even replacing a fifth of our fleet of buses. You couldn't utilize them to the degree I think they need to be utilized, especially in the older portions of our town with narrower roads, lower hanging trees, all the things that I think fit a trolley much better than a bus. And so I'm certainly willing to take this bite by bite and have those discussions, but I'm asking you not to limit your judgment upon trolleys by six, which would maybe be a route and a half. Uh, I think, I think we would need to go a little further beyond that before we pause and take stock.

Mr. President, just to follow up, um, on councilman Reynolds point, the church buses that came about because we needed something smaller, right? So is there a way for us to consider like what has, you know, what has happened with ridership since we have the smaller buses, you know, whenever they came on board and use that data to see how that's impacting it. And just, um, And a follow up to that, and that would allow us to also look at other barriers like you talked about, you know, in terms of the weather, making sure that the conditions are in place so that we can ensure that they will take advantage of the public transportation. I ask that because I agree with Councilman Reynolds. Yes, I'm definitely in support of this, but it would be great if we could see the data that shows once we brought on the smaller buses, what impact did that have on ridership? More importantly, as we start thinking about the budget, what are we going to do to address the other barriers to public transportation in terms of the conditions that they must weather when they're waiting on public transportation.

We certainly have, I completely agree about the need for shelters and better bus stops and not waiting out in the sun or rain for an hour. And so our focuses are on frequency, increasing frequency of fixed routes so that hour is not a reality, hopefully eventually on any of our routes, but with the new updated system, it won't be the reality on many of our routes. The capital needs are not just trolleys. The capital needs are vehicles for microtransit. They are new bus stops with better signage and replacing existing signage and creating a better world around not just trolleys, but buses and microtransit and everything that we use. So we're happy to have that discussion. I don't know if there is data specifically addressing ridership on the smaller vehicles versus others. I would offer skepticism to believe that they had a measurable impact. I also don't think they're trolleys. And I think you don't have to look very far. Kansas City is not too close. But yeah. You don't have to look too far if you've ever visited San Francisco or Kansas City to see the people lined up to ride on trolleys. I haven't seen a line to ride on any one of our buses in the history of their existence.

Thank you. Mr. Woods. Mr. Mayor, just real quick before you sit down and sorry you sat down already. I know we were kind of waiting on the rewrap and saw the trolley last week. I know it's been in a parade. It's still on target to try to get everything rewrapped like you originally intended.

Yeah, the wrapping, it has been probably a week since I've checked that schedule. I just got a text last night from Joe with a suburban wrapped for microtransit that looks pretty sleek, pretty cool. I would have to get back to you on the wrapping schedule for all the existing buses. I'm not sure, but to my knowledge, we are still on track for the end of this month.

All right, Madam Clerk.

Consent resolutions being introduced, 48, 982 through 4986 are declaring the structures public nuisances and ordering them demolished. 58, 987 and 988 are authorized removal of will use groups 1681 and 1683. 6989 through 991 are approved and award a special bonus to the Parks and Recreation Employee of the Month, Firefighter of the Month, and Officer of the Month. Resolutions being introduced, 01992, authorized agreement with Mirth Artists for construction of Mardi Gras float, $55,725. 08993, approved purchase order, to vc3 inc for annual renewal of think guard network cyber security and disaster recovery software services 125 540 08994 approved purchase order to prime professional concrete pumping and finishing for storm drains vegetation and debris removal $23,200, $08,995 approved purchase order to Long Lewis Ford of the Shoals Ford Bronco SUV, $32,189.50. 08996, approved purchase order to truck equipment sales for three Ford pickup trucks with utility bodies, $180,171. 21997, authorized contract with Kimley Horn and Associates, City of Mobile arterial management project for congestion management, $300,000. 21 998 authorized contract with acon technical services for city of mobile material oh material management project congestion management 300 000. mr president yeah mr runnels um i'm not familiar with this uh arterial management project can maybe jennifer can you help me

Jennifer, you sometimes use technical terms that are above my head. We can do it sort of in layman's terms.

That's the R-COP program where we have consultants that help us with the .

So we've divided the city into two.

We give half the signal to AATON and half to Kendall-Morris. And then they supply . OK. How is that funded?

You need to come up to the mic. Yeah. Thank you.

It's funded through the NPO, so this is federal funds.

Okay, federal funds. And these are just operational dollars for them to go in and adjust as necessary?

Yeah, it's constant. It's also observation. So when y'all call and say, hey, we got a little problem over here, they will actually pull up and watch the signal, and then they'll make adjustments to it remotely kind of thing. So this is part of that RTOC program. Okay.

Yeah.

I want to follow up. First of all, thank you all for sharing this and also giving us the exact locations of where it's going to take place. But I noticed that it said you stated that they give us in person quarterly performance evaluations. And so did we get those last year also?

Yeah, they give us quarterly reports, so it says, like, kind of gives us what travel time is on the corridors, what arrival on red is, you know, so it gives us kind of some of that to see how the function of the signals are working.

And so, like, if there's an area, like, in one of our districts that you have concerns about, you're getting it from these reports?

Not necessarily concerns, but when we have concerns, we approach them about actually helping us make changes to the signal timings to kind of make the efficiency better. So it's like a constant tweaking is what we're doing to keep the signals operating at their top function.

And I'm interested because I saw Water Street and Government Street as an area that they will be looking at. So recently, have we received anything on that from the previous year?

We'd be getting them at the end of the year in December. Yeah.

All right. Thank you.

All right, Madam Clerk.

37999 consider application of grandbury executive transport for certificate of public convenience necessity to operate a shuttle sedan and limousine service 45 1000 resolution to reaffirm previously accepted streets located in public low rent housing project alabama 2-5 60-1001, authorized settlement agreement and release of claims. Announcements.

Mr. President.

Mr. Reynolds.

I want to say thank you to the mayor for making the decision to delay the opening of the arena. I think it was just a wise business move. It seems that we likely could have made it happen at some great expense. And I think the decision was made soon enough to allow these organizations the opportunity to pivot and still modify their budgets or they're operating as a Mardi Gras organization. So I want to say thank you for making that decision sooner rather than later.

Well, Mr. Reynolds, you lost your bet.

We all got to eat a little crow from time to time, but that's fine.

Councilwoman Inger.

Mr. President, I want to first start off by thanking Public Safety for sharing with us last week some of the things that they're doing in the community. And Madam Vice Chair shared at that time, we really need to communicate more of that information. Recently, there was a shooting in the same area again. I think it was Rickaby area this weekend. And I've had several residents to reach out to me And they're hurting. And the bottom line is they want to feel heard and feel safe. And I know that you all are doing everything that you can. But if there is any way that we could have some open communication with them, you know, just about the fact that we know that we hear, you know, we hear them, we know that they're hurting, maybe in a form of a community safety meeting. And at that point, share with them specifically some of the things that we're doing, because I know that When you're hurting like that and you continue to realize that it's consistent in your neighborhood, you're alarmed. And so that's just my request. If there's some way we can figure out maybe a community safety meeting, share with them the current action plans, it would be greatly appreciated.

I think all those things are good ideas. The victim of the shooting, the initial shooting that happened on Rick and V, I went out within 12 hours to visit with her at the hospital. Went back out to the hospital a second time because she's had reoccurring visits due to her injuries. Giving her my personal cell number. and I've visited her at home with Chief Jackson. To say that we are exhausted of trying to get the community to talk, we can't get tired of it. However, it is very difficult to apprehend the appropriate people absent of the community working with us. So our hope is to get the community to talk to us, but I also understand that there is a fear factor in the community. So all those things taken into consideration, we are being very meticulous in making sure that we get this right. It is unfortunate, it is sad, it is horrifying that this same neighborhood has encountered a second incident. And that Ms. Coley, wonderful lady, has again, is subject to hearing gunshots outside of our home. Thankfully, no one was injured. However, the goal again is to make sure that we get this right. And getting the community to talk to us is paramount. So to your point, Councilman Ingram, I think it's a great idea to have a community forum to talk to the community. I've talked to some of the community. But at this point, we're still trying to make sure that we identify the appropriate people and apprehend the appropriate people. So until that point, we continue to be very meticulous, but very intentional in our efforts to apprehend the correct people.

And thank you for that, Mr. Graves. Again, I know that you all are employing all those strategies and resources you have, but back to the request for the community safety meeting, really just giving them an opportunity to know that we hear them and understanding that you still work in the case. So if that's an option, I would like to partner with you in trying to make that happen.

We can definitely work on that. We will not say no to any ideas. So hopefully we can get together with the mayor's administration and come up with a strategy to address that. But I'm more than happy to do that. Thank you, sir. You're welcome.

So I guess, Curtis, that when you all have that meeting and when the residents come, you all need to just stress to them that they need to talk to the rest of the residents in the area and the neighbors to talk. Because to me, what I'm hearing is that that's what y'all are looking for is people in the neighborhoods to really talk. to tell you all exactly what they see, what they heard, et cetera. Am I correct?

That's absolutely correct. And it goes back to the fact that there is a fear factor. How can they not? So it does take time. It takes time for them to be encouraged, to have the confidence. to share with law enforcement what they know. These incidents are happening in the wee hours of the night, early morning hours. So there are people who are not awake. There are people who are not out and about that see the things that we need people to see and talk to us about. But people talk. So the hope is that those who hear things share those things with us. And we're trying to come up with additional strategies to address how we may be able to get others who have not shared with law enforcement thus far to come out and actually share with us.

I know a long time ago there used to be a number where residents can call that they would not be identified. And I believe that's Crime Stoppers.

Unfortunately, Crime Stoppers still advertise, but they do not pay out. They're not actually functioning in this area. But what we're looking at now is trying to figure out a way that we can set up a reward system. for anyone who shares information with us. So we're working on that now. And like I said, there are things that law enforcement can't share publicly. Of course, everybody knows that. But I also understand the frustration of the community when they don't see results in a way in which they expect them. OK. Vice President.

Curtis, while you're still there, I just want to thank you and Chief Jackson for your quick response to emails that I started getting last Friday and then over the weekend about the intersection at Tuthill and Spring Hill. There has been another accident recently. neighbors are concerned. And it's an intersection we've been working on for a long time, trying to figure it out. And I know that you've got traffic control out there as often as you can, but they can't be there 24-7. So we have looked at some other options. We do have a blinking red light right there at the intersection itself. But I'm thinking that we need to try to be more creative in trying to grab these motorists' attention to at least say, there's a red light ahead, you better be slowing down. before you get to the intersection. I don't know if it's the digital sign, some sort of blinking something, whatever we need to do.

We are actually in communication with traffic engineering, talking to Nick, with PD. The goal is for us to collaborate and to figure out a strategy to address what we've already addressed, what we continue to address. It's hard to stop bad behavior, bad actors. It's hard to be somewhere 24-7. Almost impossible. That's why cameras are important. But I will tell you, ultimately, the goal is to figure out how do we become more creative in getting that problem solved. But to your point, yes, people are very frustrated, as they should be. And we are frustrated as well because it's not without us trying. So we continue to try and hope that we come up with a solution that will stop bad actors from speeding through Spring Hill and Tide Hill.

Well, I appreciate you reaching out directly to a lot of those folks who contacted us. I know they really appreciate hearing directly from you and not just me.

Well, it's important that we do talk to them. So thank you. I appreciate that.

Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Commander Graves. I had a question. I know in the past we had this system where if a homeowner had cameras, they can connect with the police.

We still have that, yes. That is something that the community homeowners who elect to do that, then we are more than happy to oblige and to allow that. access for our feed so that we can actually see what's going on or be able to pull basically whatever video footage needs to be pulled if it's connected to an incident in our community.

The reason why I'm sharing it, I think we're in a situation, I was saddened to hear about what took place at close to Rickaby Park. And of course, in all our districts, we have challenges. And I think maybe we all have to be a part and share the same message. So, you know, maybe in our newsletters, we can kind of also let people know that they have, you know, some people probably might not heard about Operation Shield. So if there's any information that you'd like for us to share as well, And anything that even if it's in other people district, I would love to support any initiative to help stop this gun violence. And so anything that, if it's verbiage, is anything that I need to share on my end, please let me know. I want to be there to support you all. I think it's great to show unification in this process. So just sharing the information that we can put in our newsletters or even at our community meetings or any time where we go into different organizations and speak with people.

just let me know this is what i would like for you to do and others to do uh safe passage uh this is something again that we're encouraging the community to participate in uh council members if they want to participate uh the goal again is to not saturate someone with a responsibility that oftentimes they expect law enforcement or public safety to manage. However, public safety cannot do it alone. Communities have to actually buy into a strategy, safer communities, safe passage, speaks to some of the concerns that we're talking about now. I mean, Rickaby, for example. I mean, we don't know who's responsible, but it's not without thinking that there are young people involved. Uh, so we're trying to figure out how do we actually reduce hyper vigilance in our community? Uh, and one of those strategies is safe passage. Uh, so, uh, this is a holistic approach, and this is a strategy that will not fix itself overnight. But what will not work is the absence of the community participating Councilman anger.

I just want to remind everyone the public. that September 22nd, we do have a public safety committee meeting so that, again, we are listening and we are trying to come up with, you know, comprehensive solutions for this. So thank you.

You're welcome. Anyone else? All right. Vice President.

Okay. Thank you. Let's look at resolutions that we might waive the rules on, starting with 01992 under resolutions being introduced. So that one, as well as 994, 995, and 998. Any others? Oh, I'm sorry. That is a 5,000, a little over the 50,000. Yeah. So you don't want to do with, okay. All right. All right. Just those three, two. Yeah, two. Okay.

That's it. Mr. Woods.

Just a reminder, we have a finance committee meeting at 1 o'clock, and the goal is to have a two-hour finance committee meeting. And I appreciate everybody remitting their questions. Thank you to the Finance Department for submitting those answers back to us. And between now and then, I encourage everybody to take a look at the questions and the answers that we received regarding the budget. But we'll see everybody at 1 o'clock when it comes to the Finance Committee.

And Vice President?

Councilwoman Ingram mentioned the Public Safety Committee meeting next week. She has submitted some questions. If anybody else has questions that they would like to have covered, concerns, questions, whatever, please get them submitted so that Commander Graves and the rest of the folks can be prepared with answers. Just let us know ahead of time. Thank you.

Anything else from this council? Anything from the administration? All right. We'll see each other downstairs at 1030. Thank you.