Board of Commissioners - Regular Meeting

I got it. I did get it.

I did get it. I just don't understand it.

Hey, good evening. And I welcome everybody here to the 1 September, 2026 Board of Commissioners work session. I call the work session to order. We have several presentations tonight. And our first presentation by Mr. Brad West. We're on our Go West. I mean, I'm sorry. Go West, young man.

Yeah.

Go Wake Forest Fair Collection Update and Consideration of a Service Expansion Proposal. That's a mouthful.

Thank you, Commissioners. Yes, so this is an update on our fare collection for Go Wake Forest micro-transition system. You may recall that we implemented this back in February of this year. So you asked us to come back and report on how that was going. Just as a quick refresher, we launched this service back in October of 2024 with three vans and a spare. And then we quickly, almost instantly, realized that we were going to be over capacity with that fleet size. And so after a couple of iterations of service expansions, we ended up with our current fleet size of eight vans and two spares, giving us a fleet of 10 vehicles total. And even then, we were still hitting demand issues, ridership capacity issues. So instead of coming back yet again for another round of, hey, can you give us some additional funding, we thought we'd try a different strategy with a new demand management strategy with fare collection. And so the hope was that by charging fares, we would sort of stabilize that ridership demand to a sustainable level, and then also generate enough revenue to reinvest back into the system. And so we were joined by Tyler Amin and Mike Longi. with VIA, our transit partner, who are going to talk through how fare collection is going, the impact that it's had on our system, the revenues we've generated every month approximately, our reduced fare program that you all also approved last year, how that's going, and the stats on that. And then finally, what we can do with our revenues that we're generating every month in terms of possible service expansion. So I will turn it over to Via.

Hello, and great to see everyone. I'm Mike, this is Tyler. And we're just so excited to be here today, because I think what you'll see in this presentation is actually a model that I'm bringing to other partners in other agencies and other municipalities, just because it's been that successful, both in terms of the impact on quality of service as well as the impact on the county's bottom line. So as VIA, we operate with a bunch of different partners in North Carolina, both for software, Remix, which is a planning software, as well as for operations, like with Wake Forest. So really excited just to see the impact of these changes since February and look to the future. Since we started in October 2024, we're just this close to 200,000 total rides. And I think one way of thinking about that is that each ride represents a critical trip that someone needed to make for shopping, medical, or employment opportunities. And so as we're coming up on the third year of this partnership, we're really excited just to see how this has really grown over the years and what it could look like next year. In terms of the impact, one way of thinking about it is what it's replacing. So when we think of the previous shuttle loop that was around, the Wake Forest loop, since changing to this micro transit service, we've had over six times more boardings per hour. In other words, for every hour of service that's on the road, six times the number of people are actually using that service. So that's really, to us, an indication that it's in demand, that it's helping people to get where they need to go. In terms of the county's bottom line, the other thing to consider is that it's 74% more cost effective in terms of how much it's paying for each trip. So both in terms of the impact that it's having in Wake Forest as well as in terms of the actual impact for this entity, I think we're really excited just to see how the service has grown and really the impact of this fair change.

I wanted to expand a little bit on that impact when we look at the coverage area.

I'm going to ask. I'm sorry to interrupt you. Yeah, pull the mic over closer. So there you go. You hear me? We good?

Great.

Thank you.

Awesome. So yeah, I just wanted to speak of the coverage that we have replaced, essentially. So when you think of the Wake Forest loop, the fixed bus service that Go Wake Forest has replaced, we're actually covering 4.5 times the population. We're covering about three times as many jobs in that area. I think 4.5 more seniors 65 and up. About four times as many population with disabilities. And then the region in general covers a lot more SNAP in public housing buildings. And this is all US census data that we pull into our Remix software platform. So you all might recognize this map well. So we're able to pinpoint where a lot of our drop-offs and pickups are. So whether that be for education, for public housing, for people going to get to work or going to get essential needs at Walmart, this is really a way that people can get what they need on a daily basis. We did a survey in June of this year and found that 50% of riders have a household income below $40,000. 32% of riders use it to go to work. And 28% of riders are 65 plus. So this really is a service that is getting to the people who need it the most in this community. Speaking of those people, here are a few of our lovely writers who we got quotes from actually just last month. So you can read them for yourself. But things like, I wouldn't be able to stay in my apartment if it wasn't for Go Wake Forest. The middle quote, which is personally my favorite, can I marry Go Wake Forest because me and my mom love the service so much. And Go Wake Forest has been saving my life for over a year now. I love you guys. So we've heard again and again from our drivers and from our field managers that writers really, really do appreciate the service. Like Brad touched on already, I won't linger too much here, but due to really increasing demand and the limited supply that we had, we were seeing a lot of unmet demand going up. So fare implementation was a way to kind of bring that demand down and normalize it over time. As you can see here, it's a distance-tiered fare system, so it goes up with mileage. I think this graph is probably the most important. So essentially what you're seeing here in each bar graph is the amount of requests that come in in each month on the app. The green is a request that comes in, and when you hit find a ride, you're able to get a ride. The gray portion is no rides are available. So if you can see, before February, we had a pretty high unmet demand. But once fairs were implemented, we have 98. Right now, we're at 90. But we've just been seeing really amazing met demand rates since fairs were implemented, which obviously makes for much happier riders. Just another way to see the impact here, again, met demand went from an average of 73% to 94% with fare increase. ETAs went from 24 minutes to 16 minutes, which is amazing. And then fare revenue went from essentially zero to providing the town of Wake Forest with $20,000 a month. We are recommending going forward, along with Brad, that we keep an eye on met demand and really try to keep it at that 90% threshold. We think anything falling below that would warrant more board review. But we don't expect it to fall below that. The town of Wake Forest did a great job with a reduced fare program. They marketed it on their website. They have a eligibility form that essentially you can go through to get 50% off each tiered reduced fare. And as you can see on the right-hand side here, this has been super successful. Our field manager on the ground keeps track of all of this. We've had 250 people actually apply and been granted eligibility for this program, which is great, which really means that people who need this service can get it.

Great. So with the success of this fair change, there is a lot of good news. First is that improved quality of service. And then the second is the fact that the town of Wake Forest is now getting $20,000 a month directly from the fairs that people are eager and willing to provide for the trips that they're taking. So what that means is that there's roughly $220,000, $240,000 annually that's available that could be reinvested into the program. So through talking with Brad, one option that we've come up with is to provide Sunday service. So a budget neutral method would just be starting at just the fares collected in that annual amount, provide that additional revenue to provide service on Sundays. And really, that would just provide that much more impact to the community and the residents, being able to take more trips, being able to do more of their shopping on Sundays, access to employment and opportunities. So I think that's what we're suggesting that the town starts with. Because essentially, this is budget neutral, no additional investment. And in our conversations, one thing that we were thinking of is that you could actually start here and then three, six, 12 months later actually assess through the data how much demand is picking up. So for instance, if six or 12 months from now, that's actually perfect for what we need for Sundays, then Keep it exactly as is. But then down the line, we've modeled these two different options for what it could look like with more driver hours transiting to better quality of service on Sundays. So the second would be an additional investment of $140,000. And as you can see, it would just mean more drivers, more hours on the road, more rides provided to residents. So in short, we would recommend starting there at a budget neutral option, where we reinvest the fares that we're collecting that we didn't have six months ago, put that into the service to share more rides on Sundays, starting there. And then secondly, in terms of a North Star moving forward, What we've talked about is focusing on this quality of service metric of 90% met demand. In other words, every time that someone takes out their app they're trying to get somewhere, nine out of 10 times they should be able to get a proposal to get to where they need to go. So we'll pause there. We'd love any questions. And we're excited to chat more.

Questions?

Actually have a couple questions. So first of all, thank you. I do think this has been an amazing service in Wake Forest and clearly Needed and meeting and I'm happy to see how it's meeting those needs So thank you for showing us all that data. I really appreciate it. I did have a couple questions about Um, because I've received some feedback about the vans not being clean, like, and I've received it on more than one occasion in various settings. So, um, I know you said you did a survey of the riders. Is that something that they get to do every time they ride your van? They get sent a survey, like, do they get like, how, how was your ride? You know, when I go anywhere, I get a survey five minutes later. How was your experience? Do we, do we do that with this?

They are able to review their ride after. So we have constant reviews coming in. I could go check a review from today, and there would be reviews from today. I believe surveys are only once in a while. So the last survey I believe we did in Wake Forest was that June 2026 survey. We can do them at any point, but they're not getting them daily.

And so when they're rating the ride, is it just a star, like one star to five stars type thing?

I believe so, but we can check on that.

It's a star, and it's a comment. So a lot of them are- So they are able to leave a comment? Yes. OK. All right.

That's good to know. Have there been any reviews that are backing up what I'm hearing?

I would have to go into Wake Forest specifically, but there are, I mean, that is not uncommon that you would get some reviews that are negative, of course, depending on the service. Yeah, I'd have to check with Wake Forest about the cleanliness of the van specifically.

And you have said there is a field manager, so there is someone. Are they for Wake Forest alone, or are they for...

How does that work? The field manager in Wake Forest covers Gastonia, Wake Forest, and Wilson.

Does he or she ever come and ride our vans?

Yes, they have weekly quotas that they have to do.

So they have to weekly ride. OK, that's good. And are they accessible to people the drivers, like can they be reached via cell phone? If the driver needs to reach a manager, are they able to do that? Is that number publicly accessible to the drivers? If the driver needs to reach a manager? Yes. Absolutely, yes. We have a service that they can message through. They can message through? How does that work? Explain that to me. Do you know the name of the app?

I don't know the name of it, but it's essentially kind of like a Slack, but for this specific service that they can always reach the driver at.

the manager, the field manager at. OK. And are drivers allowed to use phones when they're driving?

Typically, no. I think one thing that we're really investing a lot of time and energy into is safety dashboards and automatic tracking of drivers. Because ultimately, we want a person's safety score through all these metrics like, are they distracted? Are they eating? Are they drinking? Are they on their phone? That totals up to a score. And then the safest drivers are the first ones who can pick their shifts. So we're really trying to align incentives to make sure that safe driving actually translates to the things that drivers care about.

OK. All right. I think those were the primary questions. that it would be very important to me to know that the vans are being regularly cleaned. We pay the maintenance cost on these vans. Do we pay it, or is it part of the program? Remind me how that works.

I believe it's part of just the overall rate.

So Brad, it's involved in the rate that they pay? How does that work?

We don't get charged extra for cleanings and it's routine. I think they've increased recently actually The previous case manager that was working with our system because I was made aware of some cleanliness issues as you can imagine so sent those off to be a they've increased the rate of cleanliness or routine cleaning so That was fairly recently. So we'll check in on how that's progressing. Okay, great should be included in the

OK, yeah, because I want to make sure if these are our vans, that they're really well-maintained and clean for our residents.

And I think just as a barometer of how we think about customer experience, The overall ride rating on average is either 4.9 or 5. But typically when we talk about it, we talk about what's the rate of five star ratings. And typically that's in the high 90s. So we really want to set the bar high because we care that riders not just get to where they go, but they should have a good experience both with the vehicle, but also with the drivers that they're interacting with.

Okay, great. Thank you so much. And I appreciate you sharing, like I said, all of this data surrounding the revenue and the possibility of riders being able to use it on Sundays. Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

Yeah, so I guess a couple of follow-ups on the cleanliness. I'm going to go back to where you said, you know, as far as the comments, you could look up, you know, things from today. Does that track along with, like, the time of day the ride was, like, the exact time that that ride was? Or is it just, like, a daily log of...

We can track any individual rider. We have rider IDs, ride IDs. So we can track what time of day it was.

Right, because I think that information would be great to find out when those comments are coming in, but specifically, you know, in relation to when the van was last cleaned, you know, my thought is if my kids go to a playground, right, and they track in grass and those kind of things at noon, let's say, you know, it might be dirty at 5. So to kind of understand where that's coming from, because, I mean, again, throughout a day, my personal car gets dirty with the kids in and out. So just to, again, the more information I think we have about the timing and how that aligns with, with the cleaning, that would be awesome. Yeah.

We can certainly pull that data.

Perfect. Thank you very much.

I've got a comment. Go ahead, Dan.

So I have utilized Go Wake Forest a couple times myself. I've actually expressed to the town staff some of the experiences that I've had, kind of what Commissioner Cross was talking about in regards to cleanliness. So I'm not going to continue talking about that. But talking about the survey, my experience where I work and stuff, surveys really do help us get a better understanding of the success, right, and also talking about some of the topics that, you know, Commissioner Sawinski and Cross have already talked about. So I really would encourage that we have something not just a one-off, but more consistent. So that way, again, going back to the data you provided us, it gives us more data to understand the experiences that the citizens are having utilizing this service. So thank you.

And just one final thought. Did the drivers get surveyed as well about their experiences driving?

I believe so. I haven't looked into that. I started a month ago, so I'm getting caught up on a lot, to be very honest. But I think we have the power to do any kind of survey. We use Get Input. It's a great system.

Because I think that would be valuable information as well, what their experience is driving and where they maybe think there could be improvements or something's going great. So I would love to hear that as well.

And I think in addition to that qualitative data, I think one thing that we could do on our end is look at some of the quantitative data on the back end. So not just what have drivers said in a survey in June or this year, but what's our overall retention rate of drivers from year to year? Or I think that kind of thing. Or even another stat that we really love is how many rides is each rider taking per month? Because that really shows both how engaged are they, but also how they're folding it into their everyday routines and comfortable and active using the service. So that's definitely something we could provide after this presentation.

Great. Thank you.

Any other questions? Thank you. Let's make sure I've got this understanding. Our ask for tonight, Brad, is for... consent from the board, proposal and consent from the board for these proposed next two steps, number one and number two. Is that correct? Correct. Thank you. Any other discussions?

I guess I have a question regarding VIA, but kind of tangential to this. So if we want to dispose of, I guess, that question first, then I guess, Brad, I got a couple of questions specifically for you on that. However you'd like to proceed, Mayor.

I think you should go ahead and... OK. Fantastic.

The one thing I had seen in there, obviously, was the bus loop, right, and how we did that. We're coming up on elections again. I know there was a big positive to the bus loop was that we had to stop down at the Northern Wake Regional Center. Now that that early voting site has been switched to Joyner Park, and obviously we don't have the bus loop, have we had any discussions on providing potentially fare-free rides to go vote? whether during early voting or on election day?

DAVID SANGER- We have, yeah. We have the ability to do what they call a geofence around that site. And we could have a temporary fence up for free rides for voting, early voting.

DAVID SANGER- OK. I'd like to see us pursue that. I guess I'll just throw that out. I would love to see us pursue that for anyone going to vote, that we find a way to make those fare free. OK.

Any other questions? Comments, sir? That was a great comment. That's absolutely great. I mean, it's not part of this proposal, but I think it's something that, you know, if you could just give us a quick update on that so that we make sure that it's meeting that for our voters. I believe that's consent from the board for that also.

Yeah. Yeah, we've already been working on that. Emmalyn actually has been working on that with VSO. Well underway.

Perfect.

Okay, thank you. Do I have a motion for the proposed next steps?

Do we need a motion or just consensus to move forward?

Consent. I think it's just consent. Make sure I'm right there with Ms. Evelyn. Just all we need is consent to go forward. Or do we have to make a motion?

We'll need to move it to the next voting meeting and put it on the agenda for that, both items.

Okay, so unless there's any negative Then we have consent that we're going to move this to our next to the September 15th board for approval Is that correct? Am I saying that right Kip? Yes. Okay. Thank you, sir Thank you very much Our next presentation is of the Wake Forest Comprehensive Transportation Plan, 2026 amendments. And oh, Mr. West is already here.

DAVID WESSELMAN. I'm back, yeah. Double header. OK. So yes, this is the latest Comprehensive Transportation Plan, CTP amendments. I say latest because we've done some in the past. It's been a while. But the last update we've had was back in 2021. So we have lots of different studies and analyses we want to incorporate that we've done since then into the plan. A lot of the items you're going to see tonight I would call sort of housekeeping items, existing conditions, updates, things like that. Nothing too seismic. It's really more of a Band-Aid until we do a more comprehensive transportation plan update in the next couple of years. So just as a refresher for the audience and those who are interested on what the CTP actually is, or Comprehensive Transportation Plan, CTP for short, it's a long-range vision of how we see our transportation infrastructure built out in the next 10 to 20 years, not just roadways, but all modes of transportation in this community. It helps our town. funding and how to prioritize different transportation projects, especially when it comes to the CIP. It provides clarity to property owners and developers. Any time there's a proposed development, that property owner or developer is responsible for building out the transportation infrastructure directly in front of their development. So this plan helps guide them on what they're responsible for building or payment in lieu if we don't want them to build. And finally, projects that are in our CTP Eventually make their way up to the Metropolitan transportation plan which makes them eligible for federal funding. So if you ever have a major project That we can't compensate for or pay for with our town funds, which there are a lot of them We want to go for different grant funds lap spot. Whatever it is. It needs to be in that Metropolitan transportation plan the first step is to get it in the So it behooves us to put even some pie-in-the-sky ideas in the CTP just to make sure maybe one day it's not so pie-in-the-sky and it becomes more of a reality. So that's just a little background on that. Like I mentioned earlier, the last CTP update occurred in 2021. Our initial goal when we adopted this, or when the board adopted this plan in 2019, was to update this every year. So clearly we've fallen a little bit behind on that. So we have a number of different items that we want to incorporate in the plan that have been done since that last update. But like I said, we're going to do a more comprehensive major overhaul of this plan in the next two or three years. So I'll get right into the, so there's 85 amendments. I'm not going to touch on every single one of those amendments for your sanity. I'm just going to go over the highlights, the more juicy stuff, but of course I can answer questions about any of them. So we'll start with Greenways. So really our main focus with the Greenway updates were just getting existing conditions data updated. We of course had the Dunn Creek Greenway extension bill recently. We also had feedback from NCDOT a while ago, years ago, and then reiterated again through multiple different project reviews. that they no longer want to see any kind of greenway, proposed greenway or proposed multi-use path in the right way of the NC98 bypass, Dr. Calvin Jones bypass. So the main reasoning is that they're trying to make it a true bypass with higher speeds, very few intersections, and they don't like having bike ped infrastructure really close to the road right away, so they're fine with it just being.

You know a foot or two outside of the right-of-way officially and so that's what we're gonna start reflecting here in our plan And I guess just real quick could just clarify that for me kind of Barney style so We will do a multi-use We will continue with that plan, but it will be moved 10 feet, 5 feet, just outside.

So an example visually that I'm sure you all pass by a lot, the Grove 98 development in front of Torchy's and Whataburger, there's a multi-use path you can probably see. So that's, and there's like a controlled access fence like right in front. So just on the back side of that, we are allowed, that's where the right-of-way line is, and that's where we're allowed to put those pathways. So it's still possible. It's just they don't want it technically in their right-of-way. And you probably wouldn't be able to notice it, the difference, but we had to scoot it a little bit out of the right-of-way line there.

Thank you.

And so in terms of our prioritization of greenways, again, we're not trying to reinvent this plan. We're just trying to make surgical updates here and there. So one big, again, piece of infrastructure that was completed was the Dunn Creek Greenway extension, and so three and four. And so next on deck is the Smith Creek Greenway 2 and 3, going from around Heritage High School down to the Neuse River. So this is a very important connection because essentially it's the missing link of connectivity to get Wake Forest and Roseville into the regional Greenway system. So you could take your bike, or you can walk if you're feeling really adventurous, from the top of Wake Forest all the way down to Clayton, over to downtown Raleigh, to the American Tobacco Trail, Cary. You're connected. So it really is an important link to make. So that's our primary focus in terms of the high-level focus. Our overall strategy, aside from that, is to really create a central spine of the Greenway network in Wake Forest, so the north-south spine, mainly Smith Creek and Dunn Creek. And then after that's complete, start branching out to the larger population centers that may have some isolated greenway segments, but are sort of disconnected from the rest of the network. So out towards Austin Creek and Rosedale in that area. So getting them connected. And then there's some connections around downtown that we'd like to make. And again, a lot of these are already sort of prioritized this way in the original plan. But we just wanted to kind of shift everything up a bit and emphasize the centralized sort of trunk of this network. There's also some spurs that come off the main trunk of the Greenway over to different neighborhoods like Homestead Heritage. There's a spur that we'd like to see built in the near future. And obviously, I mentioned Rosedale and Austin Creek. So we just want to get those. And then you'll see Richland Creek kind of off in the west. A lot of that we envision as being built as part of private development. It may not look exactly like that alignment that's shown, but that's one of our last large swaths of kind of undeveloped land where a possible ligand mill extension would go. So we'd see some development happening there that could potentially build out that section and keep in mind There's your it looks like there's a bunch of gaps but multi-use paths would fill a lot of these gaps, which is another slide I'll show you guys in a second.

I Have a question for you The wake first forest was a reservoir is so it looks like it's been prioritized as low is that going to be are the greenways around that going to be part of a When we update the reservoir and the dam, is that going to fall into that to connect there?

Yeah, so those are, I think, currently soft trails is what they call them. The feedback, and I know there's some debate whether to pave them or keep them soft trails or whatever, but the feedback we've received through our multiple different planning processes over the years is that they want that connected to the regional system as a primary amenity for the town and to open up access. Right now, it's a little isolated without the Greenway connection there, so... And that would also fall in line with our kind of north-south spine strategy of getting that central Greenway Highway complete. So multi-use paths. So these are, for those of you who don't know, basically glorified sidewalks where you can have both cyclists and pedestrians in the same pathway, usually about 8 to 10 feet wide. So some of the big changes we see in this update, so you all approved a ligand mill extension sort of concept design, alignment. a few months ago, so we wanted to have the corresponding multi-use path infrastructure to go along with that shown here in the plan to match that alignment. We also have some sort of side roads that connect into it, like holding mainly over here where the one and two box is, and Durham Road, making sure that we have the proper alignment for those multi-use paths. And then the big one, you may remember the South Main Street study that we did in 2024, I believe it was, that sort of reinvented that corridor and made it a more walkable, bikeable, pedestrian-friendly type environment. And so we saw some multi-use paths proposed there, along with parallel parking, so it's kind of reinventing that corridor. And eventually, if we could figure it out, we could take it all the way down to Wakefield. Right now the only connection to Wakefield would be from Durham Road, kind of coming from the top there. But it would be great to work with the Capitol Boulevard project and get something going there as well. But, of course, that is city of Raleigh territory outside of our jurisdiction. But it would be a great connection, though, in our opinion. I mentioned a second ago, with the S Line project, as you know, Elm Avenue is going to be closed off as an at-grade crossing as part of the S Line project. So the whole S Line project is trying to eliminate all the at-grade crossings. So the new sort of downtown entryway coming from South Main is going to be holding. We don't have a specific design of how that's going to look, but we know that there's going to be some type of, at least the current design, is some type of underpass under the railroad tracks. And so while they're in there, we are asking NCDOT to add some multi-use path infrastructure in that underpass, either on both sides or at least on one side, to get folks from the western side of town to downtown and then eventually the regional greenway system. So that's why you're seeing that kind of holding avenue strip there, the number four and five. And that would eventually link into, so you've got the Tyler Run neighborhood, it goes into Grove 98, so you've got a lot of folks living there that will be connected. And then, of course, one day when we open up that last swath of land where the MacCrimmon, or not MacCrimmon, Ligon Mill Road extension is, we could potentially see a lot of new residents living there that would want to be connected to the Greenway system as well using that multi-use path route. If you echo or something. Well, this is going to be interesting. So Elm Avenue. So I mentioned again, it's closing but the the plan from DOT At least as of today is to do some type of bike ped connection to the elementary school Wake Forest Elementary School We know a lot of folks walk and bike to school or parents take their kids. I see them every morning Take the kids to school there. So we want to maintain that pedestrian connection. So to accommodate that we're envisioning and to also implement one of the recommendations from the downtown plan is is to put some multi-use paths on Elm going towards Town Hall and the fire station. Um, one area, uh, that, um, was not addressed in the South Main Street corridor study, um, was the area of South Main, north of the bypass up until the historic National Register District near Holding. So it kind of cut off from, um, Capitol Boulevard up to Lidl near NC 98, but then you have, we didn't really address that additional section. So, uh, we're showing a continuation of multi-use paths, at least on one side, of the road, potentially the west side, to get you right up to holding where that underpass is coming out of the tunnel. So don't have a lot of design detail on that again. This is still preliminary, but that's the thinking there, connecting folks into the southern half of town. And then we just had to tweak the Durham Road multi-use pass. There's some historic sensitivity or Structures and fences and rock walls that we're trying to avoid over there and some funky terrain stuff happening on that that route so we kind of had to tweak that a little bit and We're of course going to have to study that again in our next update But we want to at least have it in there as a placeholder. I OK, moving on to transit. So as you heard earlier, we completely reinvented our transit system since the last update. So we wanted to reflect that in our plan. And we also had some tweaks to our Wake Forest to Raleigh Express bus route that we wanted to reflect as well. be just a morning service, an evening service, commuter service essentially to downtown Raleigh and it dropped folks off at the Moore Square bus station in downtown Raleigh with a stop in between at Triangle Town Center. So now it takes folks to the new Union Station bus terminal, so right next to the train station downtown Raleigh, not the Moore Square station. And that's during the commuting hours, so early in the morning and then in the evening. But in the middle of the day, it switches over to hourly service, goes down South Main Street from downtown all the way to Triangle Town Center. So we wanted to make sure we reflected that. Rulesville has also implemented a microtransit system, which crosses over into our town boundaries. So we wanted to just show folks that there's some overlap there. And let's see. Oh, and of course, the downtown mobility hub slash Amtrak station. We wanted to make sure that that was properly identified in the plan. OK, roadway highlights. So we've updated all of our labels or classifications for roads. So instead of going from local street to major collector, all that stuff, we're just doing a tiered system. And we're calling everything a thoroughfare. So as you may recall, our enabling legislation to charge transportation impact fees requires everything to be only specifies that thoroughfares are what the legislation is talking about. So everything has been clarified as a thoroughfare in the CTP, just to make sure we're above board on that. And so we removed the unique names for everything and just gave it kind of a Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3, basically based on capacity. We have a couple of one-off pieces of infrastructure, like the bypass. We don't foresee another bypass being built going through town or another Capitol Boulevard. So we gave those unique names still, but still labeled them as thoroughfares. Another big change, and this is directly related to feedback we've received from the public over the years and multiple different studies and planning processes, is they don't feel safe using the painted bike lanes that we have around town, the unprotected painted bike lanes. So instead of proposing more of those, we're switching just to full multi-use paths outside of the street, not competing with cars. And I don't blame, you know, a lot of these cars are going 45, 55 miles an hour, and it's a little dangerous, you know, riding your bike right next to that. So our policy shift is proposing to just go with multi-use pass wherever we can. Uh, again, back to the South main street corridor study, we had two cross sections recommended, uh, in that study. Uh, we had the section, uh, the two lane section. So there's, it looks like four lanes, but those are parallel parking on the edge, uh, two lane section from, uh, Rogers road up to Lidl, uh, NC 98, uh, bypass. And then the four lane section, um, from Rogers road down to, uh, us one. So just wanted to make sure we, uh, took the recommendations from that study you all proved and put it into the plan. Okay, we're getting close to the end here. So the roadway highlights. So as I mentioned earlier, a big new alignment for a ligand mill extension needed to be reflected in this plan, so we got that. We had some tweaks, and there continue to be tweaks to the US-1 service roads for Capitol Boulevard. I know we saw some tweaks done recently for the US-1 interchange at Burlington Mill Road. That's continuing to be fiddled with. So this is the latest that we have as of today, but this is all subject to change. And of course, when we do the full update, we'll have hopefully a finalized, ready to go design for that corridor. We had a backage road parallel to Star Road. This is the very southern end of town, kind of in the industrial area of town, right after you cross the Neuse River around Burlington Mill, going up to South Main Street. There was this backage road. It didn't serve any properties uniquely, because that star road didn't already serve. So we weren't really sure what the justification for it was. So we worked with a transportation planning firm, WSP, to do an analysis to see if removing that from the plan would have any impact on the overall traffic grid. It had zero impact. So we didn't feel like it was necessary to require property owners and developers to build this piece of infrastructure if it doesn't serve any real purpose. we are recommending that be removed. Let's see here. We had to what they formally called collectors shown In the plan Lowe's Avenue foul Kate they've been downgraded to tier one thoroughfares what we used to call local roads Just because of the amount of traffic in the capacity There was a interchange or there was a service road shown at the southeast quadrant of 98 and us1 That is not shown in the DOT plans for US-1. So we, in order to match that, also there's some terrain issues and access issues where it's not really feasible. So we removed those to match what DOT is actually showing the public. And then finally, so back in 2018, so the timing was kind of aligning when this was being drafted. So it missed the update. NCDOT, in conjunction with CAMPO, did a study on the 98 corridor and how they envisioned this corridor to be built out. So they're basically looking at this whole corridor as a four lane parkway. with very few stops. And if they do have kind of an interchange or intersection, it's like super streets. And if you have a greenway, they'd prefer tunnels. And obviously, we talked about the bike path infrastructure outside of the right-of-way. So we never actually fully incorporated that recommendation into the plan. So we just want to reflect that, basically continuing that same boulevard, parkway type feel all the way towards rulesville. Uh, and we're also getting a lot of, uh, development out there as well. So we can make sure that we focus our capacity efforts there.

I have a question about that. So the fire stations out that way.

Yes.

So how does that.

impact that there is there the space there to I mean I'm trying to that area is fairly narrow through there yeah so we we don't have any specific plan it's more of like in the future generally speaking four-lane cross-section don't have the the minutiae on access quite yet because they it doesn't mean so the way they do boulevards parkways It doesn't mean no access. It just means very limited. It's not like a limited access for you where you have zero access at all. So I don't know specifically how that's going to look. It's more of like teeing it up for a more robust, nuanced design. But I can, that's a good question.

I'm watching them do all this construction over there and changing pipes. I mean, it's been a... whole thing. And then I'm like, what? We're going to make this possibly four lanes? And they're saying they have to stop adding lights if they want to do that. They just keep putting more lights on that road. Okay.

Just real quick, just to piggyback on that comment. So this is In order to complete this, we don't have a timeline. We don't have nothing on it. So we will be done with that part. But then they're going to have to come back because we've made those changes and take all that in consideration. Because I think that's what you asked for. OK. Thank you.

So here's our most controversial slide, the prioritization roadway. Everybody has their own opinion on what this should look like. So again, we're not trying to reinvent this outside of the main planning effort here. These are just tweaks. A lot of this revolves around the new ligand mill extension. Obviously, that design being approved, or at least the concept design of that being approved by you all recently. The Rogers Road project, the widening and bridge. That's going to release a fire hose of traffic onto South Main. That creates more capacity issues for South Main. We did the study recently in 2024 since the last update. So a lot of the focus has kind of shifted to that area. The S line has also created a tight timeline for some of these projects to get off the ground. Holding Avenue, finishing Ligon. Those great separations there. That is the reasoning primarily for the tweaks that we made. Now, in general, and this is 2019 before I was here at the town, but my understanding, in general, the prioritization for these was developed using And you'll see some of this in Chapter 6, the roadways, the crash data, the capacity data, traffic count data, and also some of the Chapter 2 stuff, the future growth areas where they're expecting new development. And then, of course, this was then proposed to a steering committee back then who then had, I think they met four different times to fine-tune that. And that was what you see in the current plan was the result. And so this tweaks it a little bit to get it in line with priorities that we're seeing on the ground now, with S-Line being right on the horizon, making sure that we focus our attention to those. Now, obviously, Rogers Road is mostly a DOT project there. We have some betterments on it, but it's DOT-driven. And I should say, a lot of these major roads are DOT-controlled, but it's good to have these in the plan in case we want to partner with them on future projects.

So we do take into account crash data when prioritizing.

Now, my big caveat with that is this was crash data from back then when this original. So again, we haven't completely redone this by any means. So the big comprehensive overhaul will be in the next two to three years when we have brand new crash data. We have brand-new capacity data, traffic counts. We've had, obviously, a lot of development happen since, you know, 20... So this was approved in 2019, but I'm sure a lot of that data, 2017-2018 range, is what we were using back then. So it will be very interesting to see all that new data, and we'll be able to make a data-informed decision on some of this prioritization.

So there's flexibility. There's flexibility. Where we currently are, and then in, what, two, three years, when we're looking at the whole thing again, these things could be totally... Completely different. Okay, thank you.

So, yeah, I wouldn't get too married to this map. This is really, again, just a temporary measure until we go into the full update.

But a rather contentious map.

Yeah, it's still contentious. I'll admit that.

Okay.

And so just to let you know, this was presented at the Planning Board meeting August 11th, and the unanimously approved or recommended approval of those amendments is also brought to the Parks and Recreation Cultural Resources Advisory Board August 24th and the Historic Preservation Commission on August 25th. And we have a public hearing scheduled for the 15th.

Do we have any other questions for Mr. West? Question for you. You talked often about, obviously, development and the transportation infrastructure. One thing I've actually been thinking about a little bit lately is we talk about capacity and the build-outs of those things. So I guess here's a question. I'm not sure if you have the answer. But if we approve a development that will make those CTP upgrades, right? And I'm thinking specifically about Stadium and Jenkins and Capital, right? On the southwest side, there was a development that was supposed to install you know rcis at that intersection shortly after there was a development on the northeast side of that intersection that was approved but when that northeast side builds it i guess are we still counting that intersection improvement from the other development as in the pipeline does that make sense i kind of i'm trying to I mean, ultimately, let me put it this way. If the first development never gets built, the intersection never gets improved, But the other development never has to do those roadway improvements because they're already accounted for.

Yeah, and so we're very limited by the state statutes on how much we can claw from a developer in terms of improvements around the site. So we can absolutely ask for improvements directly related to their site. If there is a light directly touching their site, my understanding, and engineering can jump in if I'm wrong on this, we can improve that. If there's an intersection, we can improve that. but to a reasonable nexus to the impact that they're actually creating. You don't want to be the last person in, and then you get the burden of building all that infrastructure from other developers who've had to do no infrastructure a long time ago or whatever. So in general, if I'm not answering your question, I can obviously make a note and get back to you on it. But in general, that is our strategy, is to ensure that everyone's kind of pitching in the rational nexus between what their impact is and the cost of the infrastructure.

No, and that definitely makes some sense. You know, again, it's where, you know, I think we all hear very often as far as traffic and development and that the infrastructure doesn't keep up with the development. But it's just, again, that intersection in and of itself, I specifically remember the massive amount of intersection improvements that were coming from the first development that may never materialize even though the other developments. So you still have that coming in without what we were planning on. So that's, again, I guess where I am on that. Just want to make sure I'm understanding all of it correctly.

I think you are. And I will say, and I'm in agreement, a lot of the transportation infrastructure we see built out that's in the plan is done by private development, which is something a lot of folks maybe don't realize. And so obviously, there's some massive public sector investments, US1 being a great example of that. But a lot of the piecemeal stuff that goes under the radar is done by private development.

Awesome. Thank you.

Any other questions?

I got one more. Sorry. Just came up to me. So just explain to me, obviously, 2021 is the last time we did the CTP fully. Just curious why we're waiting another three years. I mean, what's the process? If you could just explain that to me.

I don't have a great answer for you. I was not involved in that. Rollout I was itching to do them. And so yeah, I'm very happy we get to finally bring those Those items into the into the plan.

Okay. Thanks bad. Appreciate it.

Yep If there's any other questions and we'll see you on the 15th for the public hearing great.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir Our next presentation is event recommendations for 2027 and beyond by Miss Jennifer Herbert

All right, good evening, Mayor and Commissioners. I'm before you tonight to make some recommendations for events in 2027 and beyond. So the first event that I want to talk about would be a new signature holiday event. As we currently celebrate, we have our Wake Forest Cares holiday kickoff that takes place on the third Saturday in November. And we have our lighting of Wake Forest that takes place on our first Friday in December. The Wake Forest Cares holiday kickoff is a town event. The lighting of Wake Forest is a Wake Forest Downtown Incorporated nonprofit board event. We would like to propose combining both of those events. Part of that would be to be held annually on the Saturday before Thanksgiving with the current setup of having five. Sometimes November has five Saturdays, so that date is not always consistent, whether it's the third Saturday or the fourth Saturday. So by establishing that it is the Saturday before Thanksgiving, it provides for more consistency. Core elements that we would retain with this combined event would be the community performance stage. That is something that we brought in year two of the Wake Forest Cares holiday kickoff and has been very well received with our community groups and community organizations. We also have a choral stage that we have at the lighting. So we would be able to incorporate both choral groups and community dance performances and other performances. We would also, again, continue to keep our interactive experiences, our holiday themed entertainment. And then the finale of the event would be the lighting of the tree. And the current setup with the lighting of the tree being its own separate event and occurring at approximately 620 PM, we've noticed through the years that we're losing attendance after the tree is lit. The lighting of the tree is, I think, a very prized and valued holiday tradition for many in our community. So we're not taking that away. We're just wanting to move it to be combined with a bigger and better event that can be more memorable for our residents and visitors. I think combining the event would also allow us the opportunity to explore new event components. Right now, there are some constraints with the CARES initiatives. That is something, too, that the new event would not contain the CARES initiatives component. That is something that the CARES initiatives were kind of born during COVID. We would still be happy to kick off the season of giving, promote that internally through the town, as well as have a frame signage at the event. But instead of dedicating dedicated space at the event to the six town initiatives, having to have those initiatives tent staffed all day, we would remove that component from the event. I think, too, it's important to note that I talk about elevating the experience, growing community participation. When I say reduce weather risk, weather is obviously, I feel like I'm an expert in weather some days because all of my events have the joy of being outside. But events on a December evening do present some challenges. two or three years we have faced cooler than abnormal temperatures and again that's probably also why we're seeing kind of an exodus of after the tree is lit because it when it's in the teens or you're having winter precipitation outside it doesn't well it can be warm and fuzzy in one moment it's also nobody wants to stay out there very long so by moving the event up to November historically we're not seeing snow or that cold temperature in North Carolina. The last few years, we've actually been pretty blessed with mild weather at the holiday kickoff event. So hoping that then, and then by ending the event by 6.30, people could go about and enjoy the rest of their evening. I think it's also important to note that by moving the event up and having this consistent timeline established, it really kicks off our holiday season for our residents, but also for our downtown businesses. In my role as the downtown director, I think it's important that we're constantly promoting local, supporting our local businesses, encouraging people to shop our local businesses, and I think this event its current state even as the cares it is one event that overall we have received overwhelmingly positive feedback at and I think a part of that is because it is structured in a way that people can shop and support our businesses and so it's important for us to continue that make sure that we're still promoting those businesses figure out even more creative ways to tie the businesses in whether that's through incentive promotions through WFD through downtown dollar giveaways or scavenger hunts or Again, more interactive experiences at the event that really encourage people to shop local. Also, by doing that, it kind of creates a timeline of three consecutive weekends of supporting locals. So you have that holiday kickoff. Then you would have Plaid Friday and Small Business Saturday, which are after Thanksgiving. And then the Holiday Open House, which is usually held that first Saturday in December. So again, that's kind of just kicking off that season. I think for a lot of retail, if any of you have been in a big box store lately, I'm sure not only are you seeing Halloween, you're already seeing Christmas and holiday stuff. So I think for our merchants, that's one thing, too, that we've heard through the years. By December, not to say people aren't shopping, but they've done probably the bulk of some of their holiday shopping already. I think also with our holiday decor, in our current state right now, we're setting up our holiday banners, our snowflake lights. We're setting up some of our holiday decor for the Wake Forest kickoff event, but we're not setting up our tree. We're not setting up the sleigh at the plaza, the ornament. And so I think by having all of our holiday decor go out together in advance of the event will also bring a reason for people to come back to downtown. When my office used to be in Town Hall on the second floor, I could sit there and I would see people regularly in the evening coming to Town Hall just to take pictures by the tree, just to visit the decor and the plaza. So again, I think it's just another reason to encourage people to come downtown, get out and about, and walk while the weather is suitable. This new event, as I mentioned, would be presented by Wake Forest Downtown. So it allows existing resources to be focused into one enhanced event. My department is essentially planning and facilitating both events in their current state. So it's no change to my department in that regard of facilitating and managing the event. It also creates a more efficient and sustainable event model. One of the challenges that we're kind of faced with right now is we're essentially booking a stage for both events. We're booking either snow or entertainment for both events. And so sometimes, because the events right now are two weeks, maybe three weeks apart, We're trying to be conscientious of, wow, we just had the candy cane still walker. We need something different at this event. And sometimes there's just not a whole lot out there. And so it really allows us to be more strategic and, again, provide a bigger, better overall event versus trying to kind of divide and conquer between two events. I think also with, again, I talked about the duplicated production. Wake Forest Downtown, because they're a tree nonprofit, has their own sponsorship program. They do sell their sponsorships on an annual basis. So this will also allow them to take a greater financial ownership in the event as well and to then For them, they're right now selling annual sponsorships with the understanding that sponsors get that benefit of the lighting of Wake Forest and then our Forest Fest event. So if we were to take that away from them, that would significantly decrease their sponsorships. And then again, I just think it strengthens the partnership between WFD and the town. So that's all I have specific to CARES. I didn't know if anybody in the new holiday event, if anybody had any questions or if you want to hold your questions to the end. I want to make sure everyone has an opportunity.

Yeah, if anyone has any questions on this, so that way it's fresh.

I got a really quick question. So looking at potentially doing it the Saturday, I'm sorry, what was it, the Saturday?

The Saturday before Thanksgiving, yes.

So did we have a time frame that you were considering offering? Because we don't want to be conflicting with other, like Raleigh or whoever else.

Correct, yes.

I mean, listen, we're better than any other town. Don't get me wrong, we want citizens to come to ours, but we also have to be realistic.

So we are looking at the current event right now. This event has kind of evolved through the years under the CARES model, but we're currently doing the event 12 to 4, so we would look at 2 to 6.30 with a goal of lighting the tree at 6. That way it's not like the tree's lit and everybody's packing up, but then that way the tree could be lit at 6 o'clock, according to... Historical data, it looks like the sun sets around 510. So it ensures that sun goes down, that we can get that holiday fill when the tree is lit, that you're not still outside with daylight. And so then, again, the event would end at 630. So right now, it's four hours. So we would just be extending the event 30 minutes to ensure that we can incorporate all of that.

Thank you. Anyone else? OK. Thank you.

I'm going to move to the next one. This is probably the easiest one. This is the Wake Forest Independence Day celebration. This is a Parks and Rec event. But since I was already up here on two other events, it made sense just to throw this under my presentation. So this is just advocating that we change the start time of the July 3rd fireworks event. So that event currently starts at 530, I think, Entertainment starting at 6 or 6 30. So we're just asking that we delay the gates opening until 7 p.m With entertainment beginning at 7 30 no change to the actual fireworks. This is really and largely due to heat I think just again For the patrons coming, they may not realize that, but staff who is out there getting set up, manning the parking lots, getting ready. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of shade out there on a high school stadium football field or in the surrounding fields, and then when you're on the pavement in the parking lot. So this just really helps eliminate some of those heat-related issues that staff and patrons are experiencing. Also, just kind of a side note, the Children's Walking Parade, while it is organized by an outside entity, the Wake Forest Community Partners, kind of going forward, we'd like to establish a pattern that when July 4th falls on a Sunday, instead of having that event held in the afternoon, again, because the heat of the day, that that event would just be held on the Saturday Morning of the fireworks so that again no conflicts because that event is ten to one none of the times would change It would just move that event to that Saturday morning so that it's not conflicting with any other Maybe religious conflicts on Sunday Yeah, that impact is just like specifically next year On the Sunday, so it would be the children's play would be on the third and then our fireworks that night, correct? Any questions with this And then moving forward to Friday Night on White. So as many of you are aware, Friday Night on White started as a quality of life event in 2016. This is our 11th year of Friday Night on White. Unfortunately, we did obviously not get to do it in 2020 due to COVID, and we got to host one in 2021 when the state of emergency was lifted and we were allowed to resume activities. We were allowed to get the September one in. Think that the event obviously was started to just help provide that exposure to downtown Give people a reason to get out and about make sure that downtown kind of remain the center of our community It's obviously grown into a beloved community event Because it's grown into a beloved community event. It also requires significant operational requirements and staff demands So pre-COVID, we had one footprint. Because of Festival Street and streetscape improvements during COVID or in 2019, we had to expand the footprint on South White down to include the Depot lot and go down to Waite Avenue. Post-COVID, we decided that we needed that extra space at that point because before we were cramming all the food trucks, all the dessert trucks onto Owen and Infidelity and with sponsors, just because the event was growing, because average attendance was growing, we needed that additional space. To date, we currently have 70 town employees working this event. And so over half of that is public safety, with obviously police department making up the majority of our personnel working this event. We also have seven departments that are working this event, from fire department, police department, facilities, public works, streets and then or excuse me facilities public works downtown development and communications and that's just really the day of obviously there's still people kind of Within town hall or behind the scenes like finance that are helping with processes of Friday night on white as well but those are the staff members that are out on the street for that event and I think with six events, there's just recurring demands on staff. So it's not as simple as, well, I would love to tell you that Frye Nanowide is a well-oiled machine. And I take pride in that from the planning and behind-the-scenes work that goes into that event. It is very time consuming. And so having six events. literally, especially when they're four weeks apart, which they generally are. So you're wrapping up. You're spending that first week after an event wrapping up the previous event. Then you're right into making sure everything's in order for the next event, whether it's sending reminder emails, whether it's our facilities department unloading equipment used, reloading the trailer to get ready for the next event. So it's not just staff working the event the day of. Staff is out there. Usually first street closure starts at 1 o'clock. So staff is out there pretty much a good 10 to 12 hours, depending on the respective department. I think it's also important to note that a lot of staff working this event are already working their regular job before they even come to this event. So when I say that, our public works, our electric department, our facilities department, those staff members come in anywhere between maybe as early as 5.30 to 7 AM in the morning. They're working their normal eight-hour shift, and then they're coming to Friday Night on White. And so a lot of them, because of the nature of their jobs, they've already been outside all day, similar with maybe police and fire as well. So again, just each event requires a significant staff time before, during, and after the event. I think also for impacts, it's important to note, I think with our downtown businesses, when this event started, I think it was universally seen as positive for our downtown community. We still have 17 businesses within or adjacent to the footprint that remain open during the event who take advantage of that increased visibility and foot traffic. But we do have eight retail businesses and two food and beverage businesses that close early or do not remain open. I think our business mix has just evolved over time, as well as I think just our downtown environment has also evolved. I think our downtown is more vibrant than it was in 2016. We have more nightlife. We have more activity going on. And so unfortunately, as a result, Friday Night in Hawaii is not universally seen as beneficial by all of our downtown business community. Unfortunately, too, I think our street closures, which are required for events set up to take place in a safe manner, not only for staff, but also vendors and outside patrons, those street closures also have an impact on our downtown businesses, especially our service businesses, because they're either having to alter their hours or adjust their hours to accommodate. I share all that because I also want you to be aware that staff is continuously debriefing, reevaluating, and making necessary changes. I think with this event, we probably spend more time analyzing. I don't know. I fully understand that maybe the average person attending the event may never pick up on some of these minute changes that are made. But we're constantly listening from feedback from merchants, from sponsors, from patrons, and saying, okay, this came in. Is that something? Let's look at that. Is that something we have the ability to change? I know one of those suggestions has been footprint. Unfortunately, in its current state and with the logistical considerations and public safety considerations and thinking about egress and ingress for emergency vehicles, that is something that we don't feel like our current footprint can change in its current state. I think that that's something that if we were ever looking at a footprint change, that would probably be a completely different event. Because I think this event has grown. We know this event is attracting kind of an average of 8,500 to 9,000 people each month. And so I think looking at that and knowing that it has that many people trying to condense that crowd into a smaller footprint is not realistic. I think also with, you know, we talked a lot about heat. This unfortunately has been one of probably the hottest summers on record in my time with the town. But these summer events are increasing employee exposure to extreme heat. I think we're 99, 97, 95, and I've already looked at next week and it's 92, which we're not normally in the 90s in September. And so having that heat again for the patrons attending the event who are coming at five or six that might be fine But for staff who are out there working on black asphalt There's not a lot we are fortunate with downtown that we can run in buildings and get some a little bit of relief but it's still I think there's a lot of strain on staff in terms of recovery, thinking about when you work this event, it's not as simple as you go home and the next day you're your normal self and can go out and do things. You really do have to listen to your body and be aware of the constraints of the heat. Also, adverse weather conditions, extreme heat creates pop-up thunderstorms. And so again, I'd like to pride ourselves that we've really tried to perfect that weather plan by going on weather delays and utilizing that as needed. But it's still a challenge when it happens. And then also, I think, because of our July 3rd fireworks event, we have a lot of staff that are cross-departmentally working both events. And so obviously, police, fire, public works, a lot of those staff members' communications are working both events. So it's not just one large event. That's pretty much the two largest events the town does, basically within a week of each other. So our recommendation from staff, and this is obviously I'm presenting, but I want to let you know that that's also consulting the other department heads and having input from other departments that work this event, is that reducing the number of Friday Night on White. So going from six events to three with right now we're April through September, looking at April through June. Part of that decision or recommendation for us is that Looking at to have it consistent. I think right that is one thing that we've been able to establish with this event Is that everyone knows it's the second Friday of the month? I love when I see somebody ask that question on Facebook and the public weighs in we don't even have to weigh in because the public knows so I think that keeping some consistency I Worry that if it was disjointed. I know that You know looking at okay. Well, should it be you? Two here, one here. I think it becomes disjointed not only for the public, but also for staff for consistency purposes. Also, I think right now we have those recurring staffing pressures. So this would reduce some of those recurring demands. By not doing it in July and August, we could also avoid those hottest summer months. And then from the downtown perspective, I think that, again, I don't know that we would make every business owner or every downtown business happy. But I think that knowing that that's three less major street closures would be hopefully considered a win for our downtown business community, because it would be fewer disruptions. Some of these recommendations, obviously, our outcomes are just to, again, align event frequency with available staff capacity, reduce our cumulative workload and scheduling pressures across departments. I think it's important to remember, too, when we're working the event, we're not able then to answer emails, respond to our normal job duties. And it's not as simple, while my department, we're exempt employees. We're not getting overtime. We're eligible to flex our time. And while that's great in theory, in reality, it's not always happening, because to flex your time means that you're going to take time off within that time period. And unfortunately, if you already have meetings scheduled, then for lack of a better word, you're sometimes just losing that time. Reduce public safety, street closure demands, and then just, again, reduce the frequency of impacts on businesses affected by the event. Just make sure I cover all my notes here.

Yeah, I'd like to start, please. All right, so I did write down some thoughts, and I wanted to make sure that I got all my thoughts out, so this is a little unusual for me. I just, as we've had, you know, behind the door meetings kind of getting prepped about this so i had a lot of time to think about it i'm really not supportive of cutting friday night of white i do believe staff when they tell us that there are capacity issues so i think we need to make some choices elsewhere as you all know i did ask for some of our event information with attendances and all that some of the events that town is putting on um i think could be reworked uh and done better um i'd like to keep all six friday night on white dates um the combining the two holiday events i think is a great idea uh one of the events that was not mentioned that the town does is planning 101 Every year our attendance has gotten less and less. I think it's a really great thing that we do offer But I would like to look at seeing if we can consolidate that I mean it goes over what four weeks I think or something like that, right? And you know several nights so have it where there's less staff at that just maybe make it one Saturday or something and look at doing even some of our smaller family events like the dances and stuff that we have going on um the the dances the family dances that we do require a lot of staff um from based off of what i was seeing in their 50 60 people showing up so ultimately i'd like to identify events that have the highest staff burden relative to the number of people that they're serving those are the ones that i'd want to look at next um and before we eliminate award-winning successful event programming i'd like to know whether or not uh temporary or contract event staffing could solve part of the capacity problem as well so ultimately what i want to look at doing is that we preserve friday night on white as is and then look at the other events that are burdening staff Um, also when it talk, when we talk about that, we're going to rework Friday night on white. I mean, we have talked about that. We're going to do a, after the season, uh, analysis of it. And I think that just saying, all right, throwing our hands in the air and saying, you know, well, we can't do this. We can't do that. That's, that's not what I want to hear. Um, ideally what I'd like to see is solutions and, um, Doing less, to me, of an award-winning program that we got going on is not a win for me. I remember when we proposed the Holiday Cares event. That event was proposed as it was because, as I was told, other towns are envious of us and what we do with Friday Night on White. And by having it where we take that now and do less of it doesn't make sense to me. Also, as we all know, I mean, there's been a blow up about it. And I've had comment after comment after comment of people coming up to me telling me how much they do enjoy Friday Night on White and how much they enjoy it feels like a community here. And that that is what brings people uh they feel like they can still feel like that they can come out and have that small town feel and the community feel from that event so i just think that we need to do a better job of looking at you know other things and i think there are solutions there if we want to find them um but that lat you know i'm on board with the first two the last one i am not

Thank you, sir. Any other comments?

Questions? I guess I'm going to ask a question to Commissioner Wright there. Again, I think, number one, I'm on board with you on the first two. I think absolutely those are phenomenal ideas, and I applaud that.

When you talk about looking at events and the staff burden for the people that are served, Are you talking about strictly number of staff needed for attendance, or are you talking staff hours? Because 70 staff over, I mean, we close down White Street at 2, and they don't go home until 1 in some cases. I mean, you're talking 700 staff hours per event on that versus, you know, you may have 10 staff serving, like you said, 50 people for three hours. So I want to make sure. I'm always a fan of more information, so I'm happy to receive that information. I just want to make sure we're looking at the right things and not just looking at a purely 70 staff for 15,000 people should be kept and 10 staff for 50 people shouldn't.

I think the best way to kind of figure it out is let's look at how many staff per how many people are being served. you know, if, cause I mean, obviously with 15,000 people come in, uh, you know, 70 people is not that expensive on, on when you're looking at staff hours per 15. Right. But if we need 10 staff and it's 50 people showing up, uh, that's a pretty great expense. Right. I mean, it, it, and so I think weighing it with a weighted measure like that, where we're comparing apples to apples on events, uh, Also, there again, like I said, I think maybe we should look at bringing in, if staff is really at this capacity, look at bringing in outside help to be able to do some of the things that staff is having to do out here. And one of the other things I meant to mention also that I didn't write down is I'd like to take a look and see if some of our partners for these events that we partner with, if they can bear the brunt of it more. I mean, we charge – going back to Friday Night on the White, we charge sponsorships for these. So if it's a cost thing, we're – I've just recently went through all these numbers, and besides the overtime and everything that goes with this, Friday Night in White basically pays for itself in the sponsorships. And if we have to look at maybe increasing the sponsorships because we have to bring in outside help to be able to man those hours, then let's look at that. I don't want to just go in here and just start doing less. without some serious hardcore consideration and asking some tough questions on this. And hopefully I answered your question. I went on a tangent again. Sorry.

Yeah, no, for sure. And again, I think what it boils down to is this. You know, again, we had some meetings and some information on this before. When we're talking about staff burden and we're talking about staff safety and we're talking about the heat and we're talking about a lot of those things, I tend to believe the people that are doing the job month in and month out. Whenever I host Friday Night on White, I show up at 4 o'clock. I get to be on TV for a little bit. Then I get dinner. Then I get to be on stage for a little bit. And then I'm free to go. That's not what it is for the staff. So I can't even pretend to understand what they go through. So I tend to believe them. And I don't think this decision was reached lightly. But with all that being said, I'm willing to hear your side of all of this. I just want to make sure that we're looking at pertinent information and we're actually looking at the right metrics. So like I said, I'm more on the side of, I think, what Ms. Herbert's proposing, but absolutely willing to look at information and have my mind changed. That's all I'm putting out there.

One thing I want to mention because you were mentioning looking at these these different Events like looking at that list that we were sent of all the different events. I think one thing I'm not really a fan of reducing Some of these other events because maybe they don't have the largest draw because I think that they meet different needs in the community I think Friday night on white meets one need and I think some of these dances For families meet another need and I think planning 101 meets another need so I don't want to just base it off of Well, this isn't quite as well as attended. Maybe not but there there are options for different Parts of the community, it meets different needs. Not everybody would love to go to Friday Night on White, right? But some people would love to go to the family dance. So I think it just meets different needs. So I'm not sure comparing them for me is necessarily the strongest argument, at least for me.

So what I was saying is not get rid of the dances. I'm saying there was like a mom-daughter dance. There's a father-daughter dance or something like that. Why not just have a family dance in general, right? And we can still do the dances. We can have these things. Combine them, you have less staff hours, right? I'm not saying get rid of them. That's not what I'm saying. Granted, I was trying not to talk for 30 minutes. Yeah.

I do think for me, staff capacity and the safety of our staff is a huge, it is the heaviest weight for me when I'm weighing, when I'm looking at these events. This is the thing I weigh the heaviest because we aren't the ones out there doing the job, one. And I think that, and I've expressed this to you when we were having a conversation, July and August are brutal months, and we already have the fireworks event in July. And August is just brutally hot every year here. It's just terrible. I told you I felt like I would love to see something in September like this. If we did do something in September that involved music and things like that, it would just be a standalone event. Singular event it would not be a Friday night on white it have to be something else And so I don't I think making some changes now does not eliminate Making changes again in the future I think it just meet it maybe is where we need to be right now And then we reevaluate and we say hey, you know, what what did that look like this year? So it's not a to me that this is not a permanent decision. It's a decision based in the needs of our staff and with this becoming such a large event.

Another thing I'd like to bring up as we, again, look at these comparisons, I'd love to see which events we have advanced sign-ups for, because I know a lot of the dances, the father-daughter dance and the mother-son dance, a lot of these things, we have capacity limits where Friday night on White, we don't turn people away at the door. again it's it's understanding the context of all of these things in in what that is so again i'm happy to look at the information just leave it that sir okay i'm gonna jump in here really quick okay um adam so you're talking about potentially like outside help right i mean when i think of that i think that's a

you know, it's an idea, obviously, but how would we be able to, you know, direct those individuals, you know, in saying, okay, hey, we need you to do X, Y, Z, right, because you're going to have to be training them, you know, nothing against the, I mean, the staff already knows kind of like, you know, you were saying earlier, you're kind of a well-oiled machine, now you bring outdoor, you know, outside help, you know, how does that, you know, impact in regards, and I know that there are probably establishments that do this. But again, that also potentially could increase the cost, my assumption.

Well, there again, the cost is it pays for itself other than our overtime. So one, if we're not having staff do overtime, and overtime's expensive. I mean, it's time and a half, right? Like, or double, I don't know what, what is it, Kip?

It's time and a half.

Yeah, so there's a large pot of money, right, that if staff ain't doing it, we can hire event security stuff like that that there are those groups that exist they're even production groups that you can hire so and then we have sponsorships on top of that that if we need to look at increasing the sponsorship cost or something like that I don't know what that threshold is for businesses that they're just gonna say I'm not gonna sponsor that but I think At least we explored this option of some outside help where it's not our staff that we're taxing. Like I said, I'm sympathetic to that argument, but there is a solution there if we want a solution. And it might even be a cost-saving measure if I haven't ran the numbers. There again, I found out about this a week ago.

I mean, we're in the same boat, right? Sorry, I apologize. So another point that I just wanted to make, and I had it down here and I don't see it. You know what? It'll come back to me.

I knew I was going to get my question time. Jennifer, have we ever looked into hiring outside help?

Thank you. I wanted to weigh in on that. So we actually do hire outside help. So in addition to our 70 employees, we actually have 10 to 12 elite staffing members that do come and assist us every month. So that's something that they have been with us pretty much at least in my 10 years of running this event and being involved with this event. I do think that there are some logistical considerations. But I know that within our police department, when you're having outside help, if you're wanting them, there's basic tiers or different tiers. And so I think that that's something that you have to keep in mind of that. we'll say you get what you pay for. And so our staffing, thankfully, we've been able to have some consistent staffing. They really are just an extra set of eyes and ears. While they are phenomenal people, they are helpful in some regard, but they really, kind of to your point, it is that training them. I think, honestly, even I know this year alone, because of some Staff health issues we've had to ask for volunteers from other departments that may not traditionally work an outside event And so we've had members of planning members of organizational performance members of HR that have come out to work the event with us again They've done a phenomenal job, but it's still taking time to train that person teach them what they have to do So I think it's just it goes back to that staff consistency I will share too that we have I'm a department of three, and I will say when I hire, all my employees know you have to set these six days aside. Can it be an inconvenience at times? It can. However, they know that up front. Obviously, a larger department like police, there are departments that I will say are being voluntold that they have to work this event, which again, they are employees. That's part of their job. But I think I will say that when I first came into the director role, we definitely had a little bit of a culture issue with some of our departments because they didn't like being voluntold. And so I worked really hard to kind of organize the process and make sure everyone was clear on what those expectations were that were expected of those various departments, build a relationship with those departments to make sure that they felt appreciated. Because as I tell them, when we do win an award or do something good. That's not me. That's not Bill Crabtree. That is our public works guys. That is our police officers. It's everybody. And I want them to know that. And so I think that that piece, though, that's all taken internal effort. And we do, I mean, again, we're blessed that we have a good group of people who want to work it. However, every single month, We fill out our EAP. We put in those employees. And before the event comes, I always am getting an email from various departments, hey, this person can't work. This person can't work. And so those are just some of the logistical challenges that then it's like, OK, we have to replace that person because now each of these 14 or 15 people have a specific duty at the event. So again, not to say, to your point, it could always be explored, but again, we are using elite staffing already, and I think that there's just some logistical considerations of exactly what they would do, because they're not going to have a badge into our facilities department to get equipment. They're not going to be able to drive our truck to unload. So there's some liability issues and other concerns as well.

So, I mean, in regards to that, before my time in... This town, I helped another town close to here run their RIB Festival. And this is when the RIB Festival was doing 7,500 to 10,000 people. And they were a town that is not even a third of this size. One of the things that they did was they actually opened it up for volunteers from the community to do help. Like, and it's not, I'm not saying doing event staffing, like doing security work. I'm talking about people coming out afterwards and they got a free t-shirt to clean up trash. You know, I did it myself. That's how I knew about it. That's how I got started. So there again, I think there are solutions here. If the staff capacity is the issue, we can figure it out. There are ways around it. I don't want to keep being a dead horse.

I'm trying to find the words. Y'all are very tactful colleagues. I strongly disagree with you on this topic. There are two things that stand out to me. One is our employees. The second is our business owners. I can't remember how many months ago it was that we had that firestorm on Facebook from our business owners. And... There were responses made. There were things that were thrown out there. And we were accused, as I recall, of not listening to our business owners. And I've had business owners stop me in my place of peacefulness and talk to me for a half hour about Friday Night on White and how much it affects his business and how little business he gets. So and then we did have a conversation amongst us in varying combinations that did not violate open public laws about having a meeting, talking to the downtown business owners, and getting some feedback. But this is coming up now. And I think it's appropriate for the conversation. I think, one, the proposal addresses what our business owners have been complaining about. Because they are right. I mean, there is absolutely no question that our business owners in downtown are affected six times a year by the closure of that street for Friday Night on White alone. We cannot debate that. And they do lose business. And so to me, this proposal starts to weigh that in, and it listens to that feedback. And then the other segment of this is our employees, who cannot go on Facebook. and rant and rave in a way that is appropriate like the business owners did. So when we hear this from our staff, I think we absolutely have to listen to it. Because if you're out there, you see it. And I shared in our private session when we first received this presentation that My eye-opener about how much our town staff puts into our events was Friday Night on White and just walking down as I was running for commissioner. And once I became a commissioner, I was like, holy cow. All of a sudden, the people you didn't see in the background, you see in the background because now you're more connected to them. This is real, man. And I hear what you're saying about all those other programs. But that's hogwash. If we look at taking Planning 101 off the books, that is- That's not what I said.

It isn't what I said.

You said evaluate it.

I said condense it. It's four weeks long, man. That's what I said. There are ways to condense it. So don't put words in my mouth.

I can put another words in your mouth if you want that you did say. And we are not eliminating Friday Night on White.

I said we're cutting it. It's what we're doing. We're going from six to three.

Again, I'm trying to be tactful and respectful, but I strongly disagree with you on this topic. I think to send staff to look at and reevaluate all these programs for that purpose, the way out against Friday Night on White is absolutely ridiculous. Do we have any other comments or questions? I'm sorry. And I want to apologize. I don't want to get so passionate about this, but we are at a point where I think certain things, we have to listen and we have to balance out. And we are leaders on this day, and leading is a thing about influencing others for a common goal. And so part of what we are, our job is not to get into this stuff and nitpick and tell them how to do it on a day-to-day basis. We're to look at the high level and the policy part of this. And so when our staff comes back to us and reports things to us on things like, we have to listen. We're not supposed to get into the nitty gritty of it.

Just a thought. We do have other events that begin in September. It's not like we're cutting things out, right? I mean, I'm just looking at our sheet right here, and we have the concerts in September that start.

Right, through Parks and Rec, correct.

So it's not that we're, this proposal doesn't stop our other events. We're continuing with that. The other side, and this is just my personal thought, I do agree that July is a hard month on the staff. Because if we look at next year, we have the 3rd of July fireworks. And then the following Friday, we have Friday night on white. So if it was me, if someone asked... been what he thought it would be like. July is a great month for us to take a hiatus for a month because we got the Fourth of July. That's just my personal opinion, and I've shared that with many of you. just want to make sure that on the record everybody understands and that we do we have not this proposal number three does not stop anything else and the requirements on our staff is still very high that's there and and an outstanding job so what I would ask the board right now is I believe number one and two if we're gonna we have consent on one and two the first the first briefings But then I'm going to ask you guys to, for number three, if there's any proposals or consent for number three, just a motion from you. And that's what we're asking for tonight. Is that right, ma'am? Yes.

We're just seeking consensus from the board.

That's right. Yes. So for number one and two, is there any, we have consensus to go forward with proposal number one and two?

For me, yes.

So we have consensus on number one and two. Now the question I bring back up is consensus to go forward with number three and or do we have a proposal that, and the other one is we can, and this is going to sound like I'm taking a coward's way out, we table it for 30 days in order to review certain data and then because we don't need a decision right or consensus to go forward with that right now. Yes or no, ma'am.

No, it's the pleasure of the board. I will just ask you to keep in mind that traditionally after September ends, we are starting planning because sponsorship packets have to be released. All of those. So obviously I want to give you all as long as possible, but at the same time.

Thank you very much for bringing that up because what we decide tonight is going to impact immediately and I have asked this with mr. Crabtree about you know our sponsors that are out there and so forth that we have to talk within you of course but so that's very important so we can't delay this but so much at least to go forward with this so just one of that information for the board to understand that sir so just I understand when did the packets go out for sponsorships

I'm going to look at bill for clarification. I believe that they go out in late December or early January. But I think just also for communications department, they need to know collectively all the events on the calendar for the year to then figure out what, because they're selling, their sponsorships are sold event specific. So looking at what do you add, what do you remove, and then, again, looking at overall revenue and where you need to make adjustments or can you make adjustments.

And there is something silly. Has our annual calendar? I mean that's a silly thing but so many members of our town really truly depend upon that calendar so So anyway, I throw that out there sounds silly for me to say that but that that's an important point I'm sorry to cut you off there

Have you gotten any feedback from the business community downtown on the proposals to change?

I have not. We wanted to make sure that y'all were aware of the proposal. I mean, again, as I normally, we always are seeking merchant feedback. That survey goes out every month. I will say, after the social media from, I believe, June, I did see an increase in some of that feedback. And again, I think in general, the number one feedback is just the street closures and the impact on the businesses. And so there are some things, I mean, I think anybody who interacts with me regularly will hear, like we're just at a point, I think we're a society this way. You're never going to make everyone happy. But we really try, in my role, I really try to explain what are the benefits of the event. But I also am very honest with business owners that it may not benefit every, you know, some of them more retail specific. Food and beverage, generally, it is going to benefit. It's not going to always benefit. But just kind of as Commissioner Cross was saying, just like every event doesn't benefit every citizen, same thing with our business community.

Can I ask, I'm sorry, is there someone else?

I was just going to say along those lines, I know we have general consensus on the first two items, but I think could we ask that that survey kind of goes out on all three items. I guess here's my question. If we decide on this October 6th, is that enough time to get things up, or are we cutting it too close at our work session on October 6th?

I will say, so Wake Forest Downtown does send their sponsorship packet out in October. So if we're looking at the combination of the 2027 events, because we do sell ours on an annual basis, not on an event-specific basis.

Gotcha. So I guess what I'm asking, again, I'm still on board with the first two. If we're going to get feedback, might as well get feedback on all of them. That'd be great. You know, kind of reserve the right to do that. But as much as I am, you know, again, with staff on the Friday night on white stuff, you know, I... I would love to give Commissioner Wright the opportunity to plead his case with a little more time. Maybe if that's in two weeks with information coming forward, that would be fine by me. Again, I'd love to give you that opportunity to have a little more time with it, to bring it to us with a lot less of the, well, if we do this, it could. Show me the numbers. Let's talk about the numbers. Let's really figure that out and see if it's feasible. Because I mean, if we're talking $50,000, Well, now you're having to ask business owners to spend an additional $50,000 or the taxpayers of Wake Forest to spend an extra $50,000. So there's some things there. But I am more than willing to give you, again, that couple of weeks if we want to bring this back at our next meeting to make that decision.

I also think that may it kind of it also meets the need of there is a public hearing at the next and if people have opinions on this public hearings are when they can express those. public comment sorry wrong word I always mix those two public comment there is there is always that option at the next meeting so people can give if they if we're not saying it's specific to this I'm just saying there's always public comment at our second meeting and people can give it feedback at that time so I would be okay with waiting two weeks I don't think waiting the month is necessary

okay so so I'm hearing help me out here yes so I am hearing that we table this for two weeks to have this at our work session on the 15th and I mean our board meeting on the 15th and that we have it opened a public comment that's there in case anybody what does want to comment on it and then it becomes a Kip, help me out here. Would it become a legislative action that we would do on the 15th? Probably just administration. Administrative action? Okay. And that way it gives you time, Ms. Jennifer, to answer the commissioner's questions with data. And it also provides you and communications enough time in order to meet your deadlines that come out. Does that sound, did I capture that for everybody?

I think so.

Yeah, I'm sure. Sir, does that capture it for you? Yes, sir. And Kip just correct me if I'm wrong and that's what then that's what with with your consent. That's what we'll do We'll move that forward that way but one into the lesser is additional comments We have given consent for those for you to begin to plan those two number one to two. Is that correct? To the left of my right, okay Thank you. Do we answer you did we help? I know we did Maybe that's not the right word ask if we help but were we clear on that? I

Yes, thank you. Thank you, ma'am.

OK, our next discussion is the monthly financial reports and discussion of July financial summaries. Do we have anything that you want to present, ma'am? Any questions? Ooh, OK. Thank you. We'll go on to the next one is review of the draft agenda for upcoming regular meeting. Besides that addition, I'm not going to try to repeat what I just said. And I know Miss Evelyn and Kip will capture that. Just real quick, going through this, we have presentations on the PANDAS PANS Awareness Proclamation. Proclamation recognizing Constitution Week, National Hispanic Heritage Month, National Senior Center Month. And thank you for everybody that went there today. That was great. I appreciate it. Resolution to support arts, our education, and the Rosemary, and I apologize if I don't say it right, Pimentel on her retirement from the town of Wake Forest. And of course, recognizing October 26 as Community Planning Month. We'll have a public hearing. I'm sorry, public comment. Public hearing on the contiguous annexation submitted by property owners, town of Wake Forest, located at 0 Devon Square Boulevard, being Wake County, PIN 1841281942, being approximately 8.25 acres. a public hearing on the Wake Forest Comprehensive Transportation Plan, 2026 amendments, and a public hearing to receive input on capital needs for inclusion in the five-year capital improvement plan update for FY2027 and 2032. Our consent agenda has approval of a resolution to schedule a public hearing and certify the sufficiency for a petition requesting contiguous annexation submitted by property owners, South Forest LLC, located at 4925 Unicon Drive, being Wake County, Penn. 1739, 517399, being approximately 16.38 acres. A legislative item of consideration of age-friendly community strategic plan. Planning items, a consideration of a contiguous annexation submitted by property owners located at 0 Devon Square Boulevard. and consideration of the Wake Forest Comprehensive Transportation Plan 2026 with amendments. And the final item that we have there is the August tax report. Do we have any comments or additions? Go ahead. Yes, ma'am.

A couple of items. One are the two items for Go Wake Forest that Brad discussed tonight, adding both those on there. And then the other one is an update and discussion on the holding subdivision in Franklin Street, South Franklin Street.

Thank you, sir. OK, we're going to go down to any other business. I don't believe so. And let's go down to commissioner reports. And before we start that, Ms. Evelyn, anything for the group, please?

Nothing tonight, Mayor. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. Mr. Kipp, anything for our group? No, sir. Nothing tonight. Thank you, sir. Commissioner Wright.

Thank you. I did attend last Monday the tech board meeting. We had a really great discussion on potential AI uses in the town. There was a lot of really solid discussion around what opportunities we do have. for instance there's like a chat bot that maybe some of our most important questions that people ask the town all the time it could you know have a little chat bot that answers all that for them crunching traffic data, stuff like that, any type of 311 reports, how to make sure that they're reducing redundancies and overlapping C-Click fix item agendas and stuff like that. So it was a really solid discussion. I think they're going to probably end up doing some great projects uh to bring to us hopefully through these discussions uh for approval um and i'll have more to report on that as it happens um other than that uh i think that's all i got thank you thank you sir commissioner cross okay so um

So first of all, I wanted to thank the board for I wasn't here at the last meeting But I did want to thank the board for their work at with the age-friendly committee and and getting that Established and actually and having in Welton as well as our consultant.

I really you know, I've been talking about this for a

months with y'all. So I really appreciate that that went through. I was very, very excited to watch that meeting and see that. Anne is a great asset to us, as well as many of the other experts on that committee. So thank you to the board for that. Secondly, so for me, I did a coffee with the commissioner. That went well. Commissioner Hupp joined me for that. So we had some good discussion. did the food security summit I was on the protein procurement group so that was exciting I love protein we did the sustainability open house I stopped by that that was really well attended you know we're having a little bit of issue with the air conditioning over there but nevertheless it was very well attended so had the public art advisory board meeting, and we did some prep for our community celebration of the arts, which is Saturday, September 12th from 10 to 2. There's a lot of really neat art things going on that day. There's going to be a slime station and all sorts of fun events for families, so I really do hope that people will stop by sometime during that two hour window a four hour window and then i also attended the uh the touch a truck event which was also really well attended and um i got to see our giant drone that we have which was really neat and then i got to see the weather beast so i've never seen inside the weather beast so that was a lot of fun um and then i went to this afternoon to the kickoff event for senior month for this which is this month so um yeah been a very busy seven days but thank you

Thank you, ma'am. Commissioner Slowinski.

Thank you, Mayor. Just a couple of events coming up I want to make the citizens aware of. We've got Good Neighbor Day coming up on September 19th. Had the Human Relations Council meeting to do final prep for that. So that is on the 19th from 1 to 4 at Joyner Park. And then the following week on the 26th from 1 to 4 at the Renaissance Center Is the fourth annual mental wellness fair? One thing I think I forgot to mention two weeks ago. There's a bit of a difference in the format for anyone who's been there And Lisa just wave at me if I'm wrong But we're gonna have dedicated time for the vendor advocates and the resources As well as just dedicated time for the panels and the discussions and those kind of things. So it'll be a little more Time sensitive, I guess, is the best way to put it. We'll only have the resources available at certain times so that we can focus on presentations and those things. So take a look at the schedule and make sure you're able to be there for the information you want to get. But that is it for me, Mayor.

Thank you, sir. Commissioner Hupp?

So I can assure you that Commissioner Cross and I are not like stalking each other because we are going to a lot of events. So pretty much where she was at, I was at at some point or another, other than some of the events. But that being said, I appreciate, I continue to learn a lot. I had a... opportunity to attend the summit, but I also went to the mobile market that is provided twice a month. I highly encourage you to go and check that out if you haven't. And just a big plug for the Parks and Rec Cultural Resources, they have an unplugged event this coming Sunday, September 6th, starting at 5 p.m. The goal is to get off your phones, get off your iPads, and actually socialize and have some fun game opportunities. And then also on the 13th is the other concerts in the park at Joyner Park. So continue. If you see me out there, stop me, say hello, and other than that, thank you.

Thank you, sir. Mayor Pro Temp.

No report, Mayor.

Thank you, sir. I just got a couple. Well, it's probably going to be long, but I got a couple comments. One, Lisa, I will tell you, Ms. Hayes, what I witnessed last Wednesday was so uplifting for the food summit. And I'm going to thank all the commissioners. for being there. I'm going to list names here, so I want to make sure that they all know. But Drew, Mike, Ross, Steven, Teresa, Kristen, for them organizing the food summit and then putting it together. I heard so many people say this is one of the first times that they went someplace, and it wasn't about egos. It was about doing some work. And it was so uplifting just to watch. You know, the Renaissance staff and the town staff that all helped. And I want to really thank all our representatives, elected officials that were there that night, Representative Mike Sheetzel, Senator Hasim Fatmi. The fact that they were there and they stayed with us throughout, that was absolutely phenomenal. uh... rollsville commissioners april sneed and and michael paul and of course our own town commissioners uh... faith cross key shackle for danny up i i just can't tell you every a r people came up to me and said that the fact that you were there and you had skin in the game and and someone said something about well i'm not quite sure what i'm doing and they said but you're listening you're active listening and that was so important to so many people who who uh... who helped take care of uh... all of us. So Lisa, please tell everybody, thank you so much. And thank you for your leadership with this organization. It is just absolutely excellent. This Friday night, September 11, Friday Night on White, we're going to do a couple of things just a little bit different. Because before we welcome liquid pleasure to the stage, and any time you can throw something at me, Bill, if I say this wrong, we're going to have a tribute to remember the 25th anniversary of 9-11. Now, we're going to have the Wake Forest Fire Department's honor guard, chief, I know they're going to do an outstanding job. We're going to have the flag flying from the ladder truck. We may even convince Commissioner Slowinski to climb all the way up there a little bit, but we don't have to.

That's OK.

But you know what's really, really important for that night? We have some local artists that are going to perform that night for us. And Angela DiApolo and Mr. Will Holtz are going to perform America the Beautiful. And many of you have seen them perform. at our farmer's market. They perform there often. So that's going to be very good. And we have the opportunity for a national recording artist from here in Wake Forest, Maya Warren. She's going to sing the national anthem for us. And we're just honored that she's free. And Bill, thank you so much, and Jennifer, for helping coordinate that. It is absolutely wonderful. So I'll tell you, it'll be a special night for all of us. And it is our last Friday night on White for the season, so we're looking for everybody to be there. And finally, I just want to close, again, with thanking everybody for all the hard work that you do and what you do to represent our town and especially our town staff. And as you go off this weekend, it's a long weekend. We are closed on Monday except for, you know, Wake Forest Finest and Wake Forest Fire Department who are going to keep us safe, and they'll be on watch for us. But please have a safe and happy Labor Day. So unless there's anybody has anything to add, then I will close the 1st of September 2026 board work session. Thank you so much. Be safe.