Community Development Block Grant (cdbg) Commission - Regular Meeting

So if we could call the meeting to order, it's 12.06. Wow. Okay.

Sorry to interrupt people who are chatting.

We can do that afterwards maybe. But welcome to the July 20th Redevelopment Committee meeting. And we have a question. And Lauren, would you call the roll?

Sure. Real quick. Dr. Anthony, can you hear okay?

Yes, I can. Thank you. Perfect.

Thank you.

Okay, Glazer.

Not here. Dr. Anthony.

No problem.

Erickson.

Here.

Lieberman.

Here.

Stauder. Here. Deschamps. Here. Westman-Chin. Here. Stauffer.

Here.

Christensen. Here. Hershlub. Here. Engelberger.

Here.

Davis. Present. And Levin.

All right. We have a quorum, thank you for that. All right, so first order of business is, can we have a motion for the minutes from May 18th? Motion approved. Okay, second. Great, all in favor?

Aye.

That passes, thank you. Action items, that'll be under section C. And then I was, Would want to ask the committee 1st of all welcome here. We had, we had to cancel the last meeting. So it's nice to see everyone since May was the last time we met. And we do have some members of the public here and if the committee is okay with it, if we could move public comment, which is under G, if we could move that up to right now, I would like to have that. Go ahead. So unless any objections to that, otherwise, who do we have here, Lauren, from the public?

Sure. Terry Giannetti.

Thank you.

Great.

Do you want to come up here?

Yeah.

And is it five minutes? Yeah. So you have five minutes. And then we'll have questions after that. Do you have something to pass on?

I do. So thank you for all your efforts i know i i'm actually just going to read a statement so i'm terry genetti i'm the executive director of the midwest horse fair and last time i was in this room was during our fair so and um so i just wanted a chance to make a statement on behalf of midwest horse fair that for those of you who don't know is owned and presented by wisconsin horse council one of our directors is here but So just to kind of, because I think this will be in the public record.

Yes. Right? Yes. We can add this.

So I'll go ahead and just read it, but you all can read along.

And you're going to say something else too, right?

Yeah.

Okay. Go ahead. Well, we'll stick around five.

And while I don't know if there's any questions.

Yes, we have time for questions.

All right. So for more than four decades, the Midwest Horse Fair, the largest three-day horse fair in the United States, didn't know that, has maintained a longstanding partnership with the Alliant Energy Center, serving as one of the facility's most successful and recognizable annual events. This enduring relationship reflects the fair's commitment to Dane County and the City of Madison, as well as the value that the Alliant Energy Center provides as a premier venue capable of hosting a large-scale equine event. Focused on education exhibition, Midwest Horse Fair, owned and presented by Wisconsin Horse Council, has become a destination event that draws an estimated 60,000 attendees, 400 exhibitors, 800-plus horses, 40-plus clinicians, and horse enthusiasts from throughout the Midwest and the United States, generating an estimated $15 million economic impact annually for Dane County and the City of Madison. While the Midwest Horse Fair supports thoughtful improvements and long-term investment in the Alliant Energy Center campus, The proposed renovations that may eliminate the use of the Coliseum for some or all of the Midwest Horse Fair events will have a great impact on our event and the attendee experience. The Coliseum, in particular, is the cornerstone arena of the Midwest Horse Fair and plays a critical role in the event's success. Its large seating capacity, jumbotron, and sound system allows thousands of spectators to comfortably attend the fair's premier attractions, including breed demonstrations, exciting evening performances, and educational clinics in an atmosphere that cannot be replicated in the smaller arenas. The Coliseum's ability to accommodate large audiences not only supports strong ticket sales and event revenues, but also enhances the overall visitor experience, encouraging repeat attendance and strengthening the fair's reputation as one of the nation's premier equine events, as recognized by recent nominations for Western Horseman's 2026 Event of the Year. and in 2025, the nomination for Wisconsin Governor's Award for Outdoor Industry Destination of the Year. The Coliseum has also afforded Midwest Forest Fair the opportunity to be the only Wisconsin PRCA rodeo to be live-streamed nationally to the Cowboy Channel Plus that was viewed almost 1,900 hours in 2026. Overall, maintaining and enhancing the Coliseum is essential to preserving the Midwest Forest Fair's economic impact and attendance growth. Ample and accessible parking is also essential to the success of the Midwest Horse Fair and the unique operational demands of an event that attracts 60,000 plus attendees, exhibitors, volunteers, vendors, and participants over three days. Unlike many entertainment events, the Midwest Horse Fair relies not only on visitor parking, but also on significant space for horse trailers, livestock, transport, exhibitor vehicles, equipment staging, and support operations. Convenient on-site parking is a key factor in the overall attendance experience and directly influences participation, attendance levels, traffic flow, and safety. There are concerns that proposed mixed-use development enhancements could reduce available parking capacity, limit operational flexibility, or create competing demands for parking during major events. Any reduction in parking inventory or accessibility could negatively impact exhibitors and attendees, increase congestion, create logistical challenges for trailer and livestock movements, and diminish the fair's ability to maintain its current scale and economic impact. As planning moves forward, it is critical that sufficient parking resources be preserved and protected to ensure the Midwest Horse Fair and other large-scale events can continue to thrive at the Alliant Energy Center for years to come. As discussions regarding future development and enhancements at the Alliant Energy Center continue, it is important to recognize the Midwest Horse Fair as a proven long-term economic driver and community partner, protecting the infrastructure, facilities, parking, and operational capabilities necessary for the fair success will help ensure that this valuable event continues to contribute to the financial health of the Align Energy Center and the broader economic vitality of Dane County and the City of Madison for generations to come. Did anyone have questions for me?

Did you want to say anything else on top of this?

I mean, just that you would consider it, you know, that for the record, the value of our event to Align Energy Center, to Dane County, To Madison, I know, you know, it's a perfect venue for us kind of as it is. I know we're looking at ways to redevelop it, but just that, you know, we want to maintain our long-term partnership and have it kind of be said that the importance of the Coliseum and the current structure or facility very much like it and also parking.

So. Okay, go ahead, questions. Alder Noah. Sorry, Lieberman. Lauren, could you give a copy down here?

Thank you. You mentioned here the use of parking both for sort of the horse trailers, the vendors' exhibits, and then also for attendees, what percent of the onsite parking right now is used by participants, whether that be like the horse trailers or the exhibitors, and what percent of the parking here is used by attendees when you hold the fair? Because I think that... moving off-site for attendees would be a little easier than moving off-site for the actual horses and folks. So I'm just trying to get a sense of how you're using the parking for a given fair right now.

Yeah, I'm kind of looking at Carolyn because she helps us manage it, but I would say it's probably 20% of our trailers. Maybe a little bit more, 80% attendees.

Okay.

Would you agree with that, Kevin?

Yeah, I mean, we do some trailers, we do some outdoor exhibits as well, and then parking. Now, important to note that with the redevelopment plan and the way the parking is reimagined, we do have, it is net neutral, right? So while we were taking away some surface lots, we are adding additional parking. Terry and I had a great conversation last week. I hope you don't mind me bringing it up. But as she mentioned in her letter, there's 60,000 people come to this, 25,000 people come on Saturday alone. We have to do a better job of managing the parking on that day to make sure everybody does have a great experience when they get here. So one of the things we're looking at doing is creating a mechanism where people would reserve their parking in advance so that if they know they have a parking stall here, they come here. If they know they don't, they go to a remote location. And we think that will do two things. One, it will enhance their experience, but two, it will limit the amount of disruption we the event impacts on the surrounding roadways where people, they all come here first, and then they realize that we're so out of parking, so they got to go somewhere else. And so letting them know in advance where they're going to park, they would go directly there. And so I think that would impact. And we want to see the horse bear continue to grow. And we also recognize that we are limited in the amount of space we can provide. So we do have to do a better job of getting people to go to these remote locations.

Part of that net neutral is... with the addition of a potential ramp, though, right? And a ramp, I imagine, is not usable for that 20%. Yeah.

No, but the general public, yes.

Yes, but the general. That's why I wanted to make sure that I had sort of the estimate on that.

Can I also add, I think for agriculture events in particular, and we're going to be speaking on a term, a lot of your attendees are going to have those larger vehicles than maybe your general like four-door Honda Civic, right? So I would say that's an important thing to keep in mind that while it would be very difficult to park a truck and trailer in a parking ramp, I would encourage as we consider parking ramps that they perhaps be a little taller. I don't know what the dimensions are, all that kind of stuff, but to accommodate those kind of vehicles. And I think communicating on that will be important. So those audiences know that you've it's been taken into consideration and welcome to still be attending event.

Great. Any other questions? No.

Great.

Thank you very much for being here. Appreciate your comments always.

Yeah, keep us posted.

Yeah, that's exciting.

Okay, so then we're going back into the regular order here. We don't have any presentations, right?

Okay, great.

Under E, okay, reports to committee. So chair's report, that's me. I have the neighborhood issue I wanted to mention, but the first thing I wanted to say was, We got a letter from a resident on the east side of Madison about the Ring Road. So everyone saw that, I assume. That's something we've talked about for a while. It's been a concern of mine. So we're talking about it. The concern has been the size and how it's configured. So I want to mention that quick. And the second thing was I always try to attend events here. And on Saturday, I got a great tour of the Dane County Fair. And I thought it was incredible. I think I especially like the children's petting zoo. But anyway. It was, I don't know, the whole thing was terrific. And my biggest plug for it or thing I saw with it was the amount of diversity in terms of attendees. So you've had every representation from the community. So I was really happy to see that. And I just think that underscores that we have events here that I think a lot of people don't know about. So it was great overall. And then the final thing I wanted to mention was we're always talking to neighborhoods, I feel like, or trying to and we did have a great meeting with the Capitol View neighborhood and Alder Lieberman was there and we covered a large range of issues shall we say and I won't go into the history of it but there is a lot of history there dating back I would say to the 90s in terms of when this site became kind of what it is now and some of those decisions have had negative impacts on the neighbors And we talked about those. We also talked about current things. And I think it was really beneficial. I thought Kevin addressed all the issues really well. And it just is suggestions that you get from outside sometimes, folks looking in. I thought it was really valuable and worthwhile. What did you think?

Yeah, I thought it was great. We did take some of their suggestions and we are planting. I signed the purchase order the other day. So we are going to plant some additional plants. Not trees, but more plants. So it'll be a little color back there. Because that tree height, I think, is good. But we will fill in. Back behind that ring. Yeah. So make it look a little nicer back there.

So the issue is one of them was that the neighbors like the trees, foliage that kind of blocks, you know, the view a little bit. So they like that. The other issue is, you know, this Lickburg Park and what the status of that is. And, you know, they would like to have a playground equipment. So that's something that's been on my radar from day one. Um, so we talked about that. We talked about the ring road again, and just other general impacts, which I think are always on the neighborhood, which I think are always good for a facility facility like this to hear from folks around, you know, regarding noise, regarding, um, just how things are run, et cetera, et cetera. So I think we got some really good feedback from that. So I thought it was really valuable meeting and, um, Yeah, so I think we learned some things. I think they were happy to feel that they've been heard, but some of these things have built up over decades. And we just talked about what we're doing proactively, especially stormwater management. So that's been a big issue for them. So that's what that is. All right, the next thing, E2 Director's Report.

Kevin. Yeah, and I'll just, one follow-up, since you mentioned the fair, Chuck, that... We had a bit of good news last week during the fair. We actually had a cow give birth. I believe it was the first time, at least since I heard about that, that one of our visitors gave birth. And it was interesting because the owner was not aware that their cow was pregnant. It was beef.

Oh, sorry.

They didn't know it was pressure. How does that get scored? You know, you get a two for one on the...

It's an interesting thing.

Okay, well... That was a highlight of it.

Again, it was a curse.

Again, it was a great event overall.

And I think having a day with a respite from the smoke and whatnot was really positive. But yeah, it was great overall. So sorry, go ahead.

So on to the update on the exhibition hall approval process. So we are moving the design through the various city approval agencies. We had our first meeting last week with the Urban Design Commission. Larry Strang, or Larry Barton from Strang was kind of the lead. I thought he did a great job of explaining the project and answering the questions of the commissioners. We got a lot of positive comments from the commissioners. They liked the architecture. They liked the different types of materials that we're using. They also liked The landscape, the one thing that they did want us to do was to incorporate more planting materials native to southern Wisconsin. And so our landscape architects are working on that. And they did vote unanimously to approve the design so we don't have to go back, which was nice. It's really positive. And so our next step with the exhibition hall is the Urban Design Commission on July 27th. So that'll be a week from today. Didn't they vote on something last week? Oh, I'm sorry. Sorry. But last week, the urban design. The urban design commission. Yeah, I'm sorry. I got this in there.

Urban design. The plan commission is next, is Monday night. And last Wednesday was the urban design commission, right? And that passed. I was going to send that out to everyone. I don't want to interrupt you already, but we have a lot of things to cover today. And we also have the destination district meeting here at 1.30. So we need to keep on track because of that. I was going to mention that earlier. So sorry. Go ahead.

Okay, so that was the update. The other update I'll have is that we have selected the contractor to demolish the Ferris Center, and that starts the process through county board approval tomorrow night. And that's the work is slated to start August 24th and be completed by the time World Dairy Expo. Now that's public works. Yep, so the first step is public works tomorrow night.

but Supervisor Engelberger's committee. Yep. Yep. Great.

So that will, that should be gone fairly soon.

So, and I did, so the next item on the agenda, were there any questions on any of the exhibition hall updates? Okay. I did want to give an update on agricultural events because they're in the last, since we met last, I've had three conversations with three different groups. about this notion that we were no longer going to be hosting agricultural events out here. And I just want to kind of put that to bed and let people know that that is not the case, that it is our intention to continue to grow our base of agricultural events. We have a rich history here at the Alliant Energy Center to dating back to when it was Dane County Expo Center and before that as the county fairgrounds. in hosting that, and it's really part of our history as a county, and it's part of our culture as a county, so we want to continue to grow on that. Right now, we host 18 different agricultural events, and as you can see on this slide, most of them use both P1 and P2, and just for reference, P1 is the first building we call Pavilion 1. It was about 50,000 square feet, and P2 is about 200,000 square feet. And so you can see most of these events utilize both of them. And so they are significant in the impact they have, not only on this campus, but on the community, because most of these events are multiple days. And while we do have some people that camp here for their events, we do also have most of these people to stay in local hotels. And so our objective is to take this 18 event load and double it. There are significant holes in our calendar. specifically in May and August, where we can fill in some of these weeks and really grow it. Many of the planned improvements are intended to support large ag events. The ring road is designed to improve ingress and egress, The latest capital improvement to this campus was the investment in 2013 of P1 and P2. These two facilities, if you saw any of the news covers last week regarding the Dane County Fair, many in the ag community believe that these two facilities are some of the best in the country. We want to continue to take advantage of that situation and ensure that we get additional people to come here. Increasing the number of events we do is key to allowing us, affording us the opportunity to build a new ag arena, which we think will complement that industry significantly. If we have a dedicated space for livestock shows or shows, we think that will help us attract new events. And really the only way to do that is to get more events. So it's kind of a, We've got to do both at the same time. Again, we mentioned this before, but there's net zero reduction of on-campus parking with this mixed-use development. We believe that the addition of the mixed-use development and the food portion of it will certainly be seen as an asset to these events as they're here. Most of these people, when they are here, their animals are here 24-7. A lot of them are here 24-7. So having additional food opportunities will be a benefit to them, as well as the outdoor exhibit plaza. and the experience storytelling on campus. So I just want to reiterate that this is part of our long-term growth, is the ag industry, and that we will continue to build on it. So happy to answer any questions that people might have.

Thank you.

The new ag arena, would that be basically... Um, to also provide the capability or what was mentioned for sort of potentially the, uh, I don't know how they describe them, sort of the highlight kind of events where they need to, you know, Motron and so forth. Yeah. As mentioned about the horse spirit.

Yeah, absolutely. So it would be a space, and Terry and I talked before, what is it, the one in Kentucky, the Kentucky Ag Expo?

It's the Alltech Arena. Alltech Arena.

So there are similar facilities around the country where you have a show ring that can double as an event space as well. So that's kind of what on our master plan is called the Equestrian Center. We would rather call it something more holistic like an ag arena so that it could be viewed as being utilized for both horses and cows. What would the human capacity of that be? Probably in the 5,000 range.

And with that, how your sort of highlight shows that you have in the Coliseum right now, and what is the sort of human attendance that those draw?

We saw 7,600 seats a night. That shows. And 2025, we closed it down to 7,600 during the day on Saturday. So, you know, if 5,000 is, if it's 5,000 and it has a full arena and a jungle tournament and all of that, yeah, but it also doesn't exist today. Yeah.

So, thank you for the question.

Okay, you're done. And then when I was here Saturday, I mentioned that, is this building one or which one's which? This is one, this is two. So I imagine it would be outside of two. And we talked about that and that I got an enthusiastic response that it would be, if it was positioned there, it'd be more convenient than having to go over to the Coliseum. So anyway, keep going. Yeah, please.

Just a quick question. that Ag Arena has always been part of the master plan. I didn't think it was that big. I thought it was more like 2,000 seats. Has this been reconsidered or I'm just, that's what my memory had. Am I misremembering that? Has it always been 5,000 seats? I thought it was smaller.

I think it's been fluid, isn't it? Yeah.

Fluid, okay.

It's been a square. I was wondering what the size would be. So that's interesting to hear it. Can I? Yes.

I would just... I do wonder, I think the ag arena, I'm a full supporter of that. I wonder if there is a need, especially in light of the goal to double the number of ag events for that perhaps to happen more quickly than maybe it is anticipated at the current time, right? I mean, we, you know, heard the points made by Terry and just at 18, if you could have more space, you know, that's just another nice feature to be able to offer. And if it's kind of a third in line or something like that, right? I think it's an important priority to be able to offer to other ag events.

Yeah, I agree with you. And I think that there are some opportunities there for some private donation to help, right? And so I think the other thing is if we can identify, they may not happen overnight. They may be like conventions where we're booking things several years out. If we can have some sense of what potential opportunities are from an event standpoint, it would help.

And thinking of it, it always was like in that part of the campus?

Yeah, it's basically right behind us here, adjacent to P2. But then we'd have to have the parking study and all that taken care of, right? The traffic plan has been worked with that piece in there.

Right. But the plan we're doing for parking, we'd have that established. So we'd know where parking would go. Okay. Great. Any other questions for Kevin about this?

All right. And the last thing I had on mine was many of you probably saw the news a few weeks ago that the, uh, Coliseum Bar site has some new life to it, and we are very excited about that and what that can mean. Range Hill partners are here. They'll be talking at the destination district meeting, but they are planning a seven-story, 190-unit apartment building on the site. And then they would also have a ground floor for commercial space. So I think adding that to our neighborhood will certainly improve the neighborhood. And I look forward to working with them as they advance their plans. And we're excited that this is moving forward. Are they going to talk about it more?

Okay. So how many units is it? 190. Okay. I thought I heard more, but okay. And the Wonder Bar would go entirely.

Everything, yeah, would go away and would build on that. And as we envision our mixed use across the street, I think that would be a nice complement for that corner of the space.

Okay. And I should know this, but I'm looking over at the city folks. Is this through the process already? I've seen it.

It's making its way. Yeah.

It's still going through, though.

Yeah. It's not 100% proof. No, no.

All right, great. No, they had a neighborhood meeting last part of June. I've been hearing about that. Mostly positive.

Yeah, excited about it.

If you want me to start forwarding all the Save the Wonder Bar emails to you, I can. No, thank you. Thanks, but no thanks.

That's all I had.

All right. Okay, so work plan calendar.

So as per usual, always good when there's a lot of pieces, moving parts, we want to just give everybody a refresher. very briefly of the multiple things that are going on that many of which you heard started to be described. But the Coliseum, as you all know, is still under negotiations and looking forward to moving that forward in the near future. The X-Hall design, going through its process, funding strategy being developed and worked on by the county. the mixed use development, which we are going to definitely be spending a bit of time on today. The plan is to submit a reasoning for those sites yet in September, as well as the condensed master plan. So we'll be discussing that with the ability to then work over the course of the fall On an actual RFP that could go out to the developing community at the end of the year. So we'd be with the county and. This committee to frame that up. Traffic and stormwater. The master planning is still continuing. They're working on the finalizing the next couple months. They're kind of more detailed engineering analysis and traffic impact analysis. So they'll be coming back to this group again. To share the results of some of that work and been discussing with city staff county and others along the way so that's continuing to go and we do see another. kind of annual newsletter going out in the fall so that just kind of highlight some of the many activities that are currently going on on the different tracks that we've discussed for. So we wanted to follow up, we had. Really good conversations back in April and May on the mixed use a variety of questions and comments and thoughts came out of that discussion. So we wanted to kind of refresh and also kind of advance some of that Input into where we are today as a precursor to some of our discussions. So we've talked about the components in April and May. We talked about the RFI responses. We've reached out to the development community. We talked about from the trends that led us to the 2018 master plan in the convening and district space. And we also kind of discussed what the potential components would be and how residential could be a component and was a component and is a major piece of the 2018 plan in the mixed use area. And how does that, how is that compatible with the overarching district and campus advancement. So as a follow-up, there was a lot of questions. Well, what happens in other places? Why is residential development often important to creating these kind of mixed-use districts? So I mean, first off, there's a variety of things. And many of you are fully aware, and several brought these points up. So we're just going to codify them. When you're creating a mixed-use entertainment-related serving district on the campus, it provides additional housing on the campus in certain areas, would provide more steady activity that helps those businesses that might be there continue to sustain when there aren't major events going on. This density that could happen on these sites typically creates more property value and generates more tax base within those project areas because it's development intensity and that tax base then can be utilized depending upon the will of the city and the project plan to be driven into certain improvements in the area potentially, also the revenue generated. by the county by leasing that land. Also could be driven into some of the major improvements that we have slated going forward. When you, you know, we've always struggled with the amount of transit service and we want to continue to evolve that as this entire corridor and the south side of Madison grows. And as there's more, if there was more development intensity on a portion of the campus that just having more bodies in this corridor would support better connections to other parts of the community and also better connections to all our hotels in the downtown that would provide more that access from a placemaking standpoint, you know, it just creates that cohesive desirable neighborhood where people want to be and gather. And I think it's clear from an event energy perspective that vibrancy helps make the customers who are coming here more connected, they may stay longer, they enjoy all the activities that are happening in one portion of the campus and have immediate access to serve their needs. So all of those reasons are very typical of what you would find in why residential ends up being as an integral component of mixed use districts. Here on the campus, what do we see? Many of those are, we think, can be leveraged. So activating besides the event days, the year-round activity, revenue streams that we talked about to support the X-Hall expansion in particular. We think, you know, because of the needs of that particular area that would support structured parking in a different way that could be integrated into the project. all the things that I already mentioned about feasibility, and it helps drive those on-campus related public improvements. When there's that kind of activity, some of the things that we've all talked about in the public, we've certainly heard about how can this campus be better connected? It feels a bit like an island boat. That also is very supportive to make those things happen so it's better connected to the surrounding area in the neighborhoods in the downtown. And that's kind of the essence of this slide, which is really saying you know we've had a lot of these public input sessions we've had a lot of discussion about as this area and this corridor is transforming. But that hub. Out here, if there was a mixed use kind of district here would it would provide that walkable activity of both to the to the campus, but also the entire corridor. And better connections and integration with the adjacent neighborhood so we see it at the end of the day, it creates a stronger relationship between the campus. The existing residents because it's serving people and you know it starts to be a place that people are coming to more regularly, as well as the visitors. So we wanted to just touch a little bit on the ground so and how we're thinking about this from a standpoint of the mixed use areas, as you can see. This is the areas kind of in purple are up against the john Nolan drive quarter, so you have the area in the lower that's the. Like 13 acre mixed use area up against rim rock tan john Nolan and then there's the one purple site south of olin drive on avenue. that is on campus. The rest is to the north of Olin Avenue that is slated for longer-term residential and mixed-use development. But we see this entire corridor kind of continuing to evolve in that.

Can you just highlight the part on Olin? Almost there. Anyway, this is the portion I wanted to highlight that. Oh, yes. Right. That is what we're talking about. And everything else. Everything else is off. I just wanted to point that out. Sorry. Yep. Great.

So, I mean, there's a variety of bullet points here. The thing I think I would I would focus on is whoops, is if this. advances per the master plan. We really see this kind of linear corridor that happens along in outside of the ponds between pond and John Nolan Drive as this kind of conduit where you're creating energy and a bike. There's no, there's no pedestrian network there. There's no nothing there now. So making that linear connection that kind of binds all of those things together and creates a great public space, maybe a boardwalk along the edge of the pond, public art, bike trail, pedestrian paths that connect those two areas and really focus that energy along the roadway corridor. Because we know that when we look at the broader campus, We're really thinking about this 200 acres, all the things that Kevin just described, the importance of really celebrating and promoting and accommodating these larger scale ag events takes up you know, the vast majority. So 200 acres dedicated to go all in on these major egg shows and the investments that were making to do that. And ensuring, as was heard today, which I think was thankful to hear it once again, related to the surface parking needs and the large vehicles and the trailer parking in which the city were excited to have them dedicate This area has fairgrounds used, which allows us to have more flexibility for tents, for large vehicle parking, because we can't function if we don't have that potential, as well as the ring road accommodating and getting more vehicles in quickly. So it doesn't queue up on the belt line as much. It doesn't impact the neighborhood streets as much by getting people in and to their parking areas as quickly as possible. The mixed use area that we're talking about is just that 13 acres on the right and a few acres. So a total of 15 acres off to the edge where the rest of the campus really focuses on those core

made main event uses. So just wanted to make sure that people were kind of clear that there isn't the intent because I think there was some confusion.

I heard people wondering, well, are we talking about residential over here or here? No, I think if there's, if there is residential, it's going to be in these mixed use districts snuggled up against the major roadway corridors. Really quick, can you, what are the red versus the purple buildings in there? Oh, good question. Commercial-oriented hotels-related uses and some of the things that are off-site are also highlighted as, you know, whether the hotel or office space or retail uses.

Thank you. Are those current active sites or are you seeing those as redevelopment possibilities?

I'm sorry, which was the first part?

Currently, current existing buildings, things that are happening now, are some of those more redevelopment possibilities?

That's a good question. And I would say we did not distinguish between those. So most of the red buildings on the outside of the campus are existing. The purple ones up on the north of Olin Avenue, the area that we described before up here, are really just saying proposed. Most of those are office uses. We're just saying there's going to likely be, based upon the city's plan, some development intensity in there over time. And then on campus, that's basically following the master plan.

one down to the lower part would be the Ferris Center. That's correct. That's a good point.

That red building that's being shown there is the combination of hotel and parking structure that could develop there basically up in between the Spark and the X Hall.

To the right is the Spark. Go ahead, Brewer.

In light of today's conversation, I think moving forward, it would be good to see a potential site of the arena on this planet's top. Is there a bear?

It's the green.

It's the green right next to that. The P2.

It's the green south side of the P2 bear.

Oh, there. Great.

And then that's what I was told on Saturday, that that would be so convenient to have it right there. And I heard all the wonderful things about P2 nationally, how it stands out, the ventilation, especially in this last week when we had this awful weather. So anyway, that's the location then. And just, does that answer your question?

It does. And I'll make one more observation. Thank you for doing this. And I think Really visualizing exactly where, and again, proposed, not accepted, but the possibility of there being a TIF generating residential corridor. That's how I'm thinking about it. What it's displacing is space that isn't typically utilized for a lot of events. That area is almost never utilized except for some of the largest of the events. And that connecting space that you're showing, again, I would say as a 27-year resident of this neighborhood who runs past it four times a week, I mean, you never see activity. I mean, almost never. So that's really interesting to see that. So thanks for sharing.

The other thing I wanted to point out, though, too, is just to the south of the Coliseum, that's where the arena building is now, and I assume that it's not on there. That's correct. So that's removed, and that's that old Plaza area as well, and I talked about that on Saturday, and folks I was with thought that sounded great, you know, so another positive thing.

And I like the linking of the two residential areas. You like the what? The linking of the two residential areas, Pipe Bath or Valdez Bath or whatever it is, but positive.

Yeah, I think it'll really change how that...

I was thinking there were two isolated communities, and I think that linkage is very important.

And I think it keeps that energy along the corridor versus feeling like that's... permeating through the entire campus. You know what I mean? So I think through design, we can really accommodate that.

We also wanted to revisit the RFI and when this went out, the request for information, it was clearly specific to the mixed use areas. So when that RFI was posted for developer reviewing and response, it included that map that we had with the two yellow areas identifying the mixed use areas. And we've shared this summary before, but there is one new piece of information on this slide in terms of the specific responders that did submit. So we wanted to share this just to bring some credibility to the responses that we received. We felt that seven responses was a good number of responses given that there are no specific benefits to responding to the RFI. It didn't win you a spot to be able to respond to the RFP, for example. So we felt that seven was a good number of responses. And of those that did submit, really good credibility and qualifications, a range of built projects in this mixed-use space. And then also within them, specifically a breadth of geography, so local and national projects, and then a breadth of specialization. So that responder number one, Card and Associates, does specifically advertise their specialization in sports facilities, specifically those coupled with mixed-use entertainment districts. A variety of different residential developers with a mix of specializations, so market-rate housing, affordable, even a little bit of senior housing. They have MSP having a specialization in that, though that's not the only thing that they do. and mixed use infill urban development. So Alexander Company having a lot of that. And then the one on the bottom, number seven, Vulcan Associates is a national residential market analysis firm. So really focused on the financial feasibility components of housing. So we wanted to bring this forward just to review again and to add that piece of information that had not been shared previously. A reminder of their responses. Unanimously, all of them felt that a higher density multifamily was essential to the goals of what was expressed in the RFI and the master plan, which was activating the campus as a year round destination. And that this housing component would make the entertainment restaurant and public spaces sort of key complimentary sort of synergistic uses together. All of them identified that the activated Coliseum would be critical to success of the mixed use areas. They felt that the Olin Avenue site was important. We called out that as a question specifically, and that there might be a good phased approach. So not necessarily coming in with all 15 acres at once, but maybe starting with Olin Avenue to test the market and maybe some of that market rate housing would come first. And then as various campus improvements were implemented in phases, that piece in front of the Coliseum could see multiple phases within itself. I believe we shared some general financial information as well in the past and wanted to bring this back to the front. Some of Rob's slides pointed out that this mixed use area is a key revenue driver and helps with the other improvements on site that help support those ag events or help implement the X Hall expansion. And so what we see here are three different scales, just estimates for planning purposes and to help with that order of magnitude. So lower density, medium, and higher, and what that would translate to in terms of land use amounts, assessed value, and land lease revenue. If you just look at the medium density column, that is generally what's been supported through the RFI, through the existing 2018 master plan. So we had multifamily total quantity of units, 520 on just those areas. Maybe 120 of those fit on the Olin Ave site and then 400 approximately in front of the Coliseum. That could be combined with one or two hotels on the mixed use site, four to five restaurants, some entertainment, retail, commercial, and office space using assessed values that are supported by the city's TIF in our own projections. That would be approximately 156 million in assessed value. And then on either end of that, that's decreased significantly without the multifamily component in the lower density scenario. And then of course increases as the number of units increase on the right in the higher density. That's the tax value that would support a TIF deal and sort of drive that taxable value in the mixed use areas. And then there's this benefit to the county as the county would continue to own the land, Um, and control the development that occurs here, there would be a land lease situation like there is on the campus today. Um, and use some estimations for residential and the commercial space to come up with these ranges highlighting that it's a range. We don't even have these accelerated annually per year. They're all rounded. So just a flat number, uh, order of magnitude, roughly a million dollars per year. in land lease revenue to the county to support the financial feasibility of other improvements. We've talked about TIF policy considerations in the past as well. And we know that the city does have their adopted TIF policy that guides the sort of deals that might happen. And we know that there are some ineligible expenses such as market rate housing where luxury housing is not something that has been supported with TIF. a sports facility, for example, hotel, non-taxable projects because there is not that tax generation component like the Coliseum or the X-Hall. Anything that's really just a private site improvement that a regular development would be responsible for implementing would not be eligible. But there are a list here on the left of potentially eligible expenses. And we've talked through these in the past, really things that have a public benefit. So some of that public infrastructure, say sewer infrastructure upgrades or improved access, whether that's a signalized intersection at the John Nolan Drive access or on Rusk Avenue, these critical bike connections, bike and ped path connections, maybe activated public space improvements if those have some generation and value to the public. Everything is looked through the lens of that gap assistance. So if there is a financial gap that exists in order to meet these goals, those are areas where the city TIF could be used. And the key principle that we described back in the April meeting is that the the significant value needs to be generated in order to fund an agreement. And looking at that last slide, we know that a significant amount of the value is coming from the housing. It doesn't require that this project have housing and neither does the zoning, which we'll talk about, but it does drive that value, which can help support the TIF arrangement.

So maybe just kind of wrapping that conversation up, we wanted to... because there was a lot of questions that we received. But I think in general, you know, it's interesting. This conversation is a great one and it will continue, you know, through the fall related to these uses. I mean, we're working in the context of, you know, Dane County is historically one of the number one or two ag counties in the state of Wisconsin. So ag is part of our DNA. It is part of our culture. We're also the fastest growing metro area. So we live all the time with this tension. And I think there is a way to balance those things on this campus. And I think when we're talking about the housing as a component, it's what's in the master plan. We talked about the activation, financial impacts. It's on the edge of the campus. We're not integrating it into the core. And we've heard from the community and the professionals that they believe it's market feasible and there is interest. Wanted to just summarize where the conversation has been to date and that this is all just consistent with the 20 new master plan. We don't have to make any decision as to whether housing is part of the campus today. But we do need to talk and work through the updated condensed master plan and the the zoning submittal, which we hope to do in September. So just wanted to provide that context. Any comments, questions?

Oh, sorry. I was going to say, are there questions on what Rob and Sonia were presenting?

Go ahead. This was really helpful. I think some of the concerns that we heard in the last meeting, hopefully this alleviates those because I think People were envisioning apartments in the middle of campus. And so showing where it's going to be at and reviewing kind of the responses, the financial impacts. There was nothing of surprise there because it was in the master plan all along, but I think it still just took time. took folks by surprise. So I think that this was really helpful to kind of lay it out where it is and why it's necessary if we're truly going to move forward with redoing this campus. So thank you for all of that info.

Any other questions? Any other questions, anybody?

Oh, sorry. Just a quick comment, Johnny. appreciated this information and some of it we've gotten. Chuck and I met previously with Kevin and Rob. So, I mean, this is all very helpful information. I just wanna underscore when it gets time to talking about an RFP, make sure we're distinguishing what we're reacting on today is just about moving forward with a rezone that needs to happen regardless of whether or not we decide to accommodate housing in a portion of the campus um but that when it gets to the rfp stage that um that we develop some really clear guidelines and expectations in laying out the RFP for respondents to be fully aware that, you know, big priority is that we're protecting, enhancing the use of this campus, especially for the larger related events. that we hope to maintain and grow.

Thank you. When we get to the RFP stage, because we didn't elicit this in the RFI and there was no need to, that when we look at the residential, we look at it with themes connected to this campus, two of which keep emerging are agriculture and sports. And there are ways, and the developers so far have just taught housing. You can do housing that has a theme like urban agriculture, that has community gardens, that would have green buildings, that would have totally self-sufficient energy, et cetera. I'm hoping for something a little more creative than just housing when it comes here. And you can have two communities. The one closer to John Nolan could be the sports community. You could have facilities related to sports. You could have a jogging track and a parkour that connects the two. You could do things that make these so that the housing isn't just housing, that it relates to the history and the uses of the site. So that, again, that's out there at the RFP stage. Great. That's a great suggestion.

Anything else? And then also looped in all this is our commitment to sustainability. So I'm not going to let that get lost in the shuffle of things. So coming back to that as well. All right.

Oh, go ahead.

Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off.

So the agenda does include potential action by this committee today. It doesn't need action, but we'll talk through that schedule and the options. But the action that would be requested would be This committee's approval of a condensed master plan, which was included in the packet, 20 or so page PDF, and then submittal of that master plan and the mixed use rezoning request for just those two mixed use areas to the city of Madison. Quick refresher on why we are doing this master plan. We have the 2018 one. Why do we need to be talking about this again? The city of Madison has their comprehensive plan. And this area, of course, came into the city of Madison relatively recently after being in the township. And in order to rezone any areas, the comprehensive plan requires that the city adopt a master plan. So rather than the city adopting the county's 2018 very voluminous plan, copy, they requested that we summarize and condense that into something much more manageable that will just give the city an understanding of how these pieces work together and allow them to review that before considering the rezoning application. So that's exactly what this condensed version is. It's not meant to be something different. It is a summary with some updates of what's happened since the 2018 plan was adopted.

And that's what I sent out last week. Correct. So if you saw that, I hope you could review that before this meeting.

Sorry, go ahead. So the condensed master plan covers the entire area, just like the 2018. And then the rezoning application only affects those yellow areas. The rest of the campus would stay in its existing city of Madison zoning district, PNR. And that also, by the way, is very flexible to accommodate ongoing zoning. Coliseum, Ex Hall, and events that happen on campus. There was some discussion already today just how the RFP fits in. So a reminder, we did the RFI in Q1 of this year, continuing on the path to this, facilitating select entitlements by the county, those entitlements being the master plan and the rezoning, and that these would be in place to help set the stage for a more successful RFP, that could be developed and released in Q4 or into 2027. The outcome of these two entitlements is that it enables mixed use and it creates more predictable conditions for the RFP, but it does not require housing to occur. So I have information on the RMX zoning district, for example, it allows housing, it allows a very flexible mix of uses. It does require a two-story minimum, but it does not say you must have housing. So that's what these entitlements would do. And then through the RFP, the outcome of that would be the county gets to control those development details, such as asking for a range of quantity of housing units or other types of themes, or how the parking is to be arranged, how it's phased, and those would be established in the RFP and development agreements. So because we are asking for action, potential action on this, we wanted to actually walk through the document so that you all together can review what's in it. And I'm just going to switch slides to be able to do that. Been working with the city to get feedback on what this document should include. They've consistently, like I said, asked for the 20 to 25 page version. And so a lot of the content in here is high level and takes from the 2018 plan. Sort of some introductory pages with an executive summary. It reaffirms the vision of the 2018 plan and summarizes the key land use, transportation facility improvements, grabbed the vision statement from the 2018 plan in that blue box, just saying that it's a key regional asset. It's a dynamic convening campus. It seamlessly integrates campus with the vibrant destination district, drives tax-based growth, all those sorts of things.

On the executive summary, I would love to see in that first sentence sports and events added because it's not represented, although it's represented throughout. well represented throughout the rest of the summary.

Thanks for that. These are graphics from the existing 2018 plan, just capturing those big ideas about improved traffic circulation with the ring road, better linkages, bike pad and green, and enhancing the heart of the campus. In terms of implementation status, this talks about This was a 2018 plan, and there have been some minor adjustments and updates. One of those minor adjustments, just for example, the Ag Arena Equestrian Center shifted a little bit south. It was always on the plan, but it moved south of that main entry drive just to accommodate better overall campus movements. There's some mention in here about fairgrounds use, which is a really critical piece of being able to have tents and fairgrounds uses on surface parking lots. a summary of public engagement. This has been a long process, so everything that went into developing the 2018 master plan, but also acknowledging that there's been consistent engagement since then and highlighting some of those key engagement themes. These couple of pages go through the overall master plan, highlighting the function of each of the facilities, and then there's some high-level mention of what the potential changes are on the campus for each of them. And if walking through Coliseum, X-Hall Arena, Willow Island, mixed use areas, the land use, yeah.

Sorry, this is a little baby tiny thing. Go ahead. But under Veterans Memorial Coliseum, the sentence that starts with an RFP for the renovation of the Coliseum was let in late 2020. That just reads funny to me. Maybe just sent out in late 2025 and negotiations are currently underway.

Something else, yeah. Accepted.

accepted in the RFP. Yeah. Yeah. Accepted in for county board approval. I'm just saying this to prove to you that I've read it.

Someone does read my notes.

Yes. A couple of pages on the land use framework. The narrative here describes how all of these pieces work together. The intent is to not, of course, change the success of operations and, you know, making sure that if there is a mixed use development that, um, the campus events continue seamlessly. Two pages on stormwater. So this first page summarizes existing conditions and key objectives. And then as overall master planning has continued with the master planning team and the engineers, what are the proposed improvements? The goal is to address historic flooding and concerns around those things. And there are a couple of bullet points on planned improvements. It's not finished design, so it doesn't get to that level of detail because this is not intended to be used by the city as a regulatory permitting document. It just highlights what the different components are. So same theme here in the transportation pages. The parking strategy describes how things function overall today. And then the parking principles would be to ensure that there are not a net loss of parking and that phasing is considered as these improvements are implemented. This page is on connections, which encourages that consistent looking at the destination district and how the various pieces can work together. Campus experience overlay page discusses the placemaking components of the overall campus. And there is some mention on phasing. So it's very generalized. because again, this is not a regulatory document, but if we were to break it down into two overall phases, orange being phase one, you can see there's a lot that could potentially be included in there. And just pointing out one example, if the Coliseum is moving forward and it has a brand new plaza in front of it, that's a public space and an outdoor exhibition plaza for Ag events, then maybe the Ag arena is advanced within that same phase two. We don't know how all of these pieces will fit together, but the Coliseum is clearly, has some discussions underway, the next hall, and those orange areas could theoretically be part of phase one with purple in phase two. So I just wanted to walk through that as I'm going back, doing other questions.

Go ahead, Pam.

The page 16 with the bicycle and pedestrian connectivity. I guess I don't know county process. So we received a comment from a constituent that has a concern about the ring road and having the multiple lanes. And so I'm wondering... Does the county send a response? I think this is a really good summary of the connectivity and you have all of those red dots that don't exist today that will make it safer. So just wondering, do we share that kind of information or respond back when you get comments like that?

I respond back that that has been a priority of mine since we've talked about a ring road because I'm one of the folks here who's always concerned about crossing Rimrock Road and crossing John Nolan as a pedestrian. So that's always been a concern of mine and Kevin's aware that Rob's aware of that, how that configuration would be. We also heard some concerns from that neighborhood meeting that I referenced about where it would go, you know, and like something that I would never think of would be like light, say it's at night and it's being used, where did the lights go? You know, that would impact surrounding areas. So if the concern is, do we take that in? Yes, we do.

I think that narrative is great to share with them, but I think this would be great to share with that constituent as well, if there's an opportunity to do so.

Yeah. Excellent. Okay. Any other questions? Or go ahead. Chair Miles.

Adjacent information, I guess, adjacent thought here to this, and that is whenever I'd like to see us continue to create a vision for and desire for community, land bridge, talking about connectivity. So, especially since there's a key person in the city that's resistant.

Pardon? I didn't hear what you said there.

That we will continue building the vision and build up an expectation for the development of a land bridge when we're talking about land bridge over John Doe. Okay.

Can I expand on that?

Wait, are you done?

Well, yeah, just yeah, I think we all take value in that and more we can take advantage of every opportunity to put that out there as part of the the vision for connecting the campus to neighborhoods, surrounding parks, natural resources, that we do that every chance we get.

And just to kind of... Second that one.

Second that.

All in favor. Wait a minute.

That was it. So in one of the maps, I don't know which one it was, you had your school... And I was thinking that, oh, I wish it's that what it was, because we all know what it is. So Supervisor Engelberger, what were you gonna say?

I just wanted to expand on the, not only over the John Nolan bridge, but I think there should be something at the ring road inside the campus, bikes through, it doesn't even have to be a bridge. It can just be like a tunnel. for bikes and then it's a bridge, but it's not really a structured bridge. It could just be dirt piled up to the tunnel. It'd be like a low elevation. It'd be like maybe 10 feet to accommodate the bikes and the pedestrians and under the road, as opposed to crossing roads and all that kind of stuff.

All right, the other thing with the land bridge too, we say bridge, but what I'm thinking is something like at Millennial Park in Chicago, something that'd be more interesting. It's not just a bridge that goes over, got grass and whatnot. It's kind of like a sculpture. Somebody told me it was art. Did you have your hand up?

Yeah, under phasing on page 19. I'm wondering if we wanted to call out like between, after exhibition hall, but at the Coliseum, moving from what we heard today, the arena and up as a specific project and the clearing up of the space where it currently sits. Because I think it is, for a couple of reasons now, if the Coliseum is gonna be down for some point of time, when it's renovated to keep the shows, I think the arena might wanna be accelerated. So just pulling that out as a specific phase.

So where would the land bridge go?

A land bridge? Where would it go?

There's a proposal evidence there.

Yeah. One of those images had like a purple arrow. What is that little squiggle arrow thing that represents?

Yeah, essentially just south of the intersection between Olin Avenue and John Nolan Drive because that would be one logical place because then you can cross the tracks and the roadway in one succinct location. and connect the capital trail by path to correct you can't test directly not on yeah and conceptually it's connecting our biggest convening asset in the region with our biggest public stretch of waterfront in the city you know and the major park so two public assets owned by different connected together so that they can really.

Dr. Anthony, did that answer your question?

Yeah. Yeah. I love that idea and would like to know more about it. I know Minnesota does quite extensive, you know, land bridges where they do full developments on land bridges, but I'm just interested to hear more about that. I think it would be a great idea.

Okay. Okay, I think it's something that's definitely for the future, but we wanted it to be on maps now to talk about it. All right, what else did you have?

So this is the last slide really just to summarize the potential schedule here. If the committee was ready to take action, it would reaffirm the 2018 master plan. It would not commit to any specific level of housing, but it would allow some housing to be proposed in a rezoning situation. when the collective parties get to that point. Highlighting July 20th today, potential action, and then the rest are dates in the city's submittal schedule that we would need to meet. A formal submittal date would be September 8th, and that would allow us to be on the November meetings from the UDC Planned Commission and Council. I do also have in there August 17th as the next ABCRC meeting, where if there were ANY CHANGES OR FEEDBACK OR QUESTIONS, WE COULD CONTINUE THE DISCUSSION IN THAT SCHEDULE. SO, AGAIN, JUST REMINDER OF THE POTENTIAL ACTION THERE.

CHAIR MILES. CAN WE GO BACK TO THAT SPOT, PLEASE? SO FOR REZONE, WHAT ROLE DOES THE UDC PLAY IN THAT?

GOOD QUESTION. The rezone is usually just plan commission and council, and there's a public hearing notice and a public hearing associated with that plan commission meeting. The UDC in parentheses was recommended as a potential meeting for the master plan, just to have any feedback from them on how these pieces work together or design feedback on the master plan overall.

Sorry, what did they vote on last week? XFAL. Okay, great. So the exhibition hall was voted on by the UDC last Wednesday. This would be something different. Does that make sense?

Yeah.

Could they become an advocate for the land bridge? All right. All right. So we all look at the schedule and so it is one 23. And so we all get it that, um, what if we were to act on this today? So this is item 5A. Does anybody have any other, I don't know, concerns or questions about anything? Otherwise, I'll entertain a motion. So motion.

Move it forward. Second.

Second. Okay. Is there discussion on that? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone? If not, all in favor? Aye. All opposed? That carries. Okay. Next thing. So that was 5A. And then next thing is just future meeting items and dates. Our next meeting is going to be, it's up here too, August 17th at noon here, as far as I know. Yes. So, okay. Public comment. We did that. We moved that up. Thank you for that again. That was great. Anything else allowed by law? If not, I'll have a motion to adjourn. Oh, okay. Great. All right. Okay. That carries. Thank you very much. It's 124.