Board of Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Lee Grady leads us in prayer and we'll follow that with the Pledge of Allegiance.

Almighty God, we give thanks for this nation and this county and for all who have answered the call to serve our citizens. As we mark the recent anniversary of our country's founding, renew in us a grateful appreciation for the freedoms we enjoy and the duties they entail. Grant our commissioners wisdom, humility, and steadfast hearts as they seek the common good. Bless them, their families, and all who serve this county, and continue to watch over this nation and this county with your gracious hand. Amen.

Amen. I pledge allegiance. Commissioners, you have the agenda for today in front of you. Are there any changes or additions or deletions? And if not, I would entertain a motion to approve it. I move that we approve the agenda as written. Second. I have a motion and a second. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Mason? Yes. Commissioner Mitchell? Yes. Commissioner Howard? Yes. Vice Chairman Jones? Yes. Chairman Bucher?

Yes. The first item on our agenda today is the consent agenda. There are three items on there. The minutes of the July regular session, July 6th, tax releases and refunds, and under health, additional WIC funding budget amendment. Roll call, or do I have a motion to approve that? Motion to approve the consent agenda. And a second? Second. And please call the roll.

Commissioner Mason? Yes. Commissioner Mitchell? Yes. Commissioner Howard? Yes. Vice Chairman Jones? Yes. Chairman Bucher?

Yes. Item number two is the Board of Elections. New interactive polling site map, Susan Williams and Greg Carroll.

Good morning all. I'm Greg Carroll, I'm the new Deputy Director of Elections. When I first started with elections, it was right in the middle of primaries, and we got a call from one of the citizens saying, hey, I live in Greenbrier, where do our people vote? I want to put it on our Facebook. And I said, well, it kind of depends on where you live. Susan had mentioned that the state has a site where you could put in your name, and it will tell you where your voting site is. Unfortunately, you have to put your name in exactly as it's in the voter rolls, or it doesn't work. So I figured we could do better. So I got together with Bryce, who is our GIS genius, and his team. And we came up with this GIS map. What this does is it shows you the entire county. In peak, you will see the, well, and here too, you'll see all of the municipalities. So New Bern and Vanceboro and Havelock. There are green stars, which you'll see some of these, which over here. These are voting locations. It's all 21 voting locations. Robbie, if you could throw on the precincts, that would be a lovely thing. So we have in here, we have a layers. And precincts will now turn on every one of the precincts so you can see what area you're in. So the woman in Greenbrier, she could look and say, hey, you know, we're in H.J. McDonald. The nice thing about this is that we now have the New Bern wards, we have the congressional districts. Robbie, if you want to turn this one off and throw on the commission of districts. So this will show you what districts you're actually in. For those who want more immediate information, Up in the top, in the search bar up here, we have, you can type in your address. So Rob, you can throw in anything, one, two, three. You start getting a list of every address that's within the county that starts with or includes one, two, three. If we click on, say, Hilda Drive, that will give you your exact house location. Now if you're not sure because you're just seeing a dot in a blob, up in the layers, If you click on Imagery, well, you should be able to tell, hey, that's my house. I know where I live. If you go back to the search, something that you'll see within the box over here, sorry for the laser-pointing eye, you have your voting site, you have your precincts, you have your wards, you have your Senate district, your Commissioner district, all that information's in one place. If you're new to the area, like I am, if you click on the Route button, It'll show you how to get to your voting site. So it'll give you an exact map of from where you are to where you have to be. This map includes early voting sites, which I think are in purple. It has the election day sites, which are in green. And it has the two offices that are both election day and early voting. They are in gold. This should make it easy for anybody to get general information or the exact information they need. And we have sent this to the state. The state election board thought it was rather functional, rather useful. They liked it. We presented it to Jack. He liked it a lot too. And we're hoping you will also. That's it for me. Any questions?

Comments, questions? I have a question. Do you search by address or by your name?

By your address.

Okay. So you don't have to have the exact way you're registered in them.

Any others?

That's great. Thank you. Appreciate it. You're quite welcome. Thank you. That's very good. Now tell us who you are, where you came from, and we haven't met you before.

My name is Greg Carroll. I am retired recently from the federal government. I worked at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. I was bored. I wanted to go back to work, and I wanted to get back to service. And Susan was in need of somebody, and I said, sure, I'll take it. So here I am.

Very good. Where'd you come from, geographically?

Geographically, originally Long Island, New York, and then moved to Maryland, worked in D.C., and then we moved down here about three, four years ago.

Well, welcome. Thank you.

Long Island. Long Island.

Yeah, we got that.

I figured that out when I heard Long Island. Yeah. Well, welcome, and thank you for that. That's good. We appreciate it. Thank you. Susan? Number two, airport, federal aviation administration grants, Andy Shorter. Andrew? Good morning.

Good morning. Thank you for taking a little bit of your time this morning. Two grants, both from the FAA, slightly different programs. I won't go into explaining the... story details of each, but just tell you what the two grants are for. The initial one is basically a planning design grant for, or I should say design, because planning means something different than FAA, for $828,509. And if you look at the picture up on the screen, these are the two areas that we're talking about. So in yellow highlighted in this oval here is our main, what we call parallel taxiway that leads to the main runway. That's coming up on its surface life limit, so we're going to have to repave it. Actually, you have to design in order to repave it. So we'll be doing the design on that. And then, of course, Williams Road out here. Last time I was up here, we talked about a design grant to do the design for the safety area, but this will be the design for the actual road. When we did the environmental, we got up to about a 30% on the design. So we just need to get it over the finish line and finish on that design. So that's the first one for $828,509 airport improvement program grant. And then this is a little bit more of a close up on the taxiway. So you can see it gets a little bit more involved. the chart on the bottom you can see where the 828 509 comes from so about 321 509 the federal money for the design of the taxi lane and then 507 000 for the design of the williams road realignment you can see that the total of the williams road realignment design is a lot more but we have another bucket of money, so to speak, on that one from some of the state money. So that's how that splits out. Good thing about this, the FAA's got buy-in on the design of that road now, so as we continue to move forward to ultimately extend the runway, that it's kind of in their programming now that we're doing that. And then this is what that road design looks like. This is basically a chart from our environmental design plan from the NCDOT. So of course Williams Road is where it runs right now through here. This is Scotts Creek. And then we'll go around it parallel to the railroad tracks here and then catch back right here where Williams Road will have used to run this way. Actually putting a bridge in here for Scotts Creek. So that's a little bit of the pricey part of the program. But funny enough, at least when they did the design estimates during the environmental, it was cheaper to put a bridge there than in Culver, which surprised me. But that's how that came out. So the next one is for $1,345,745. That is an airport improvement grant, AIG. Again, slightly different bucket of money. For that one, we will look at this area here, which is now our corporate aerospace development area. A little bit different picture of it. So we've cleared this. We've leased this 55 acres in these four phases. So basically, we're talking about working the phase one and two area, the connecting taxi lane, and then a large apron. large concrete apron, about 18 inches thick of concrete for a medium size aircraft. If you look on here on that note, if you can see it, that aircraft silhouette there or plan view, that's a 737. So that gives you a little bit of size estimate of the size of that area. That apron is about 3.05 acres of 18 inches of concrete. So The money breaking down here, you can see where the $1,345,745 comes from. And we also have other money in this. This was another previous federal AIG grant of $1.8 million. And then so far we say local match and other funds. Again, we have state funding to do that.

For those of us who do not have pilot size and for our citizens, could you read those numbers, please?

Yes.

Because I can't read them. 1.4 million is fine. It's just I need. Yes.

I can't see that part.

Perfect. That'll do it. Thank you. That's great.

Okay. Oh, there you go. There we go. Good job, Rowan. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I could shuffle my papers. So again, that's just how this grant breaks down. That entire area, once the clearing, putting the road in, the sewer, the water, we're up to about 15.7 million invested in that area. Again, to have the 55 acres already leased and Jeff and his team working on helping the lessee, lessor, lessee. I always mess that up. fine companies to go in there. Again, we think great in economic development, aerospace jobs, average annual salary is about $75,000 a year, which exceeds what the normal average salary is. So we're looking forward to them starting to do vertical construction very soon. They had a meeting last week. to select companies to do a design build on the first hangar that's gonna go out there. We think it's gonna be about 60,000 square foot hangar. Could be 30, could be 60, but those are large hangars, much larger than anything we have on the airport right now. So we're excited about that, and we're continuing to do our part for it, which is build the apron, build the taxi lane, kind of setting the table so that they can get in there and start doing aerospace business. So ahead so two separate grants of those two different values 828 509 and 1 million three hundred forty five thousand seven hundred forty five dollars Are there any other questions?

This is separate from the tower that's going on much later, right?

Yes, so that's You know, I have this other crazy chart that Commissioner Jones is familiar with with we have basically 15 open projects across the top and then about 20 different funding streams down the side. So we're truly patting our head and rubbing our stomach at the same time getting all this done. But we feel it's a good effort for the airport. Again, if you're not moving forward, you're moving backwards in aviation for sure. Thank you.

Any other questions? I do have one, and that is the Williams Road reroute. Are we waiting on moving forward on that for this grant, or are we still in process? Where are we on that?

So this grant is for the design of that road to go from 30% to 100%, and then also the bidding for it. So the FAA is very particular about how things they want the environmental done, Completed then they want the design bid done completed. So about this time next year should be coming to you To accept another grant to then start the construction for both the runway safety area and the road realignment So we're looking a year from now and then probably another year to do it So we're looking roughly two years to get this project that piece of this project. Yes, sir. Okay, which you know in Road construction time that's like hyper speed

OK, any other questions? Chairman, I make a motion that we accept and authorize the chairman of staff to sign necessary documentation to accept the two FFA grants. Second.

I have a motion and a second. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Mason. Yes. Commissioner Mitchell. Yes. Commissioner Howard. Yes. Vice Chairman Jones. Yes. Chairman Bucher.

Yes. All right. Thank you. Ms. Leslie Young is going to talk to us this morning on item number four about taxes.

Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you for having me this morning. I'm here in compliance with North Carolina General Statute 105373 that says that this time of year I'm to present to you the annual settlement. You have the statement before you in your packet, and if you will look more than halfway down, you'll see net levy. The net levy that we received fiscal year 25, tax year 25 was $60,837,618.67. Another notable item there that you need to want to draw your attention to is our percentage collected. Collection rate for tax year 25 was 99.28%. And I'm pleased to inform you that that is consistent with the years that I've been serving as tax administrator. At this time, unless there are any questions, Chairman, I'm ready to proceed. I request to proceed to the next item.

Before you do that, 99.28 sounds like a pretty strong number.

It is, sir. Thank you. It is tied for the third highest collection rate since 2002. Real proud of that. Good job on that. Thank you.

Okay, go ahead.

Okay, the next item is letter B in compliance with North Carolina General Statute 105-321, letter B. It is to come before the board and ask for the charge for the 2026 levy. And note that we are on schedule for the 2026 tax notices to mail next Thursday, July 30th.

Okay. Do I have a motion to charge the Craven County tax collector? I'm sorry.

Mr. Chairman, I don't want to get ahead of ourselves here. So going back to item A, which is the 25 tax settlement, you do need to vote to accept that settlement prior to charging for 2026.

A motion to accept the settlement of the 2025 tax levy. So moved. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay, we've done that. Now we need to charge the Craven County tax collector with a tax collection of the 2026 tax levy. Do I hear a motion to do that?

So moved.

Second. Motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Thank you, sir. You've got your task approved. Now let's have another good year.

Yes, sir. Thank you.

Thank you. Item number five, Mr. Mark Seymour, Recreation and Parks.

Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you for having me here today. Craven County has received funding in FY26 for two projects that are still under construction. The first project is the construction of the 176-acre nature park on property acquired from the Coastal Land Trust. In fiscal year 2026, work began on the park. Parking lots have been cleared, utilities hooked up, and restrooms have been installed. The dock, footbridge, kayak launch, signs, and shelter are currently being constructed. Department is requesting a rollover capital funding into fiscal year 2027 to continue work on the park, which is planned for completion in the fall of 2027. Funds to be rolled over include shelter construction, $34,000. Half of that is already for the materials. Dock construction, $31,000. Trail work, $88,000. Site work, $164,400. Second project is for safety netting for the West Craven Park baseball and softball fields. Polls have been ordered, however, the netting and construction have not yet started. The funds to be rolled over for this project total $20,000. Completion for this project is planned for August of 2027. The board will be requested to approve an attached budget amendment in the amount of $337,400 to be rolled over into FY27 for the Craven County Nature Park and West Craven safety netting projects.

Okay, any questions for Mr. Seymour? If not, I need a motion to approve this budget amendment. Motion to approve. Second. I have a motion and a second to approve the budget amendment for 337-400. Madam Clerk, would you please call the roll?

Commissioner Mason? Yes. Commissioner Mitchell? Yes. Commissioner Howard? Yes. Vice Chairman Jones? Yes. Chairman Bucher?

Yes. Okay.

Next item. So this is another grant project, one we were successful on back in 2020. So in June of 2026, Craven County Recreation and Parks was notified that its pre-application for the North Carolina Public Beach and Coastal Waterfront Access Grant was successful. Craven County previously received this grant in 2020 to support repairs to the dock at Creekside Park. This grant will assist with repairs to the 2,000-foot dock at Latham-Whitehurst Nature Park. If awarded, it will cover 75% of the repair cost, with the remaining 25% to be funded by Craven County. The Recreation Department is also pursuing additional grant opportunities to support this project. A required part of this process is approval of the application by the Craven County Board of Commissioners. The application is provided in your packet, I believe. The final submission is due July 31st and award notifications are expected in September or October of 2026. The Recreation Department is requesting that the Board review and approve the North Carolina Public Beach and Coastal Waterfront Access Grant application.

Okay, any questions? Mr. Chairman, so as far as the match for the county, $102,500, so you are seeking, I see in here, assistance from another grant for that. Correct. We haven't been awarded that.

We actually have been. That was part of the pre-application. Since then, we have been awarded from the Bank Foundation.

Okay, so all we've got is $62,500. Yes. Okay. Good.

Yeah, it's an exciting project. One question is, do you monitor how many people use the park on a monthly basis or so? We do have access to that. I can certainly get that to you.

Okay. Any others? Motion to approve. So moved. Second. Got a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? This is a roll call right now. I don't think we need a roll call, do we?

No, you're good.

Okay. You got it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, item number six, carts, Deanna Trouble and Abby McClay.

Good morning.

Good morning.

The Craven County Metropolitan Planning Organization officially expanded to include the entirety of Craven County as of July 1st of this year. Originally, the organization was formed as the New Bern Area MPO in 2013, with the towns of Bridgeton, Trentwoods, Riverbend, New Bern, and some unincorporated portions of Craven County. As a result of the expansion, the lead planning agency transitioned from the city of New Bern to Craven County. The lead planning agency hosts staff to the MPO within the Transportation Department and are tasked with serving both the Transportation Advisory Committee and the Technical Coordinating Committee. By housing the MPO within Craven County's Transportation Department, the county will work to improve transportation in a unified manner, focusing on long-term growth, municipal-county collaboration, and community needs. The MPO and CARTS have worked together for years, and this transition will strengthen the capacities of both organizations in planning for the future of transportation. And with that, it's my pleasure to introduce our new MPO coordinator, Ms. Abby McClay.

Thank you, Deanne.

Good morning, Ms. Deanne. Good morning.

I'm Abby McClay. I'm with the Craven County MPO, and I'm here just to provide an overview of what the MPO can do for Craven County. Next slide. So an MPO or Metropolitan Planning Organization is federally mandated for areas over 50,000 to assist with transportation planning for urban communities. This means regional and multimodal transportation coordination, anything from airports to highway to sidewalks, bike lanes, rail, anything that has to do with transportation, we can assist with that. We serve to be a local representation for your local concerns and aim to be the first resource for finding a solution. The MPO can develop long-range plans, source project funding, conduct public outreach, fund project studies, and do scenario planning for anything that has to do with transportation, but we cannot do design or construction of transportation. With this, the transportation department is now under, with carts, so the MPO and carts are working together under one transportation department. Previously it was really just carts that served as the transportation department, but now the MPO is a subunit of that. And we are assisting with carts operations planning and improving their system operations and aiming to be a centralized location for transportation information, such as addressing questions about potholes or street repaving schedules things of that nature. The goals of the MPO moving forward are to address transportation concerns with an effective solution. plan for future development within all of Craven County, secure funding for more transportation projects within our area, advocate for regional needs, and collaborate with local and state leaders as best we can. And I've provided my contact information on the next slide. It has updated since the transition. So if you need anything, those are the best ways to contact me moving forward. And I'm here to answer any questions. I'm not asking anything of you today.

Questions for Abby. Sounds like a plan. Thank you.

Yeah, all right. So the next item is our 28 unified grain application requesting a public hearing. Each year, NCDOT Integrated Mobility Division announces public transportation funding opportunities through the Unified Grant Application, or the UGA, process which is designed to simplify, streamline, and monetize the process of applying for multiple state-administered transit funds. CARTS relies on these grants to assist with the cost of operating public transit services. CARTS is requesting a public hearing to be held for the purpose of receiving public comments regarding CARTS' application to NCDOT for the FY28, 5311, 5310, 5339 and applicable state funding or combination thereof. Grant information will be available for review on the CARTS website and at the CARTS office. Staff is requesting a public hearing be set for September 8th of 2026 Board of Commissioners meeting to hear public comment.

Okay, any questions?

I'd like to make a motion that we set a public hearing for the 8th of September.

Second. A motion and a second to set the public hearing for September 8th. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Ayes have it. Thank you.

Thank you.

Number C.

Back in October of 2025, staff presented findings for the Microtransit Feasibility Analysis Report with the recommendation to modify the fixed routes and implement a same-day service request. So as you might recall that we started off this process evaluating microtransit, and for those who might not be familiar with that term, it's similar to a Lyft or Uber platform, but as a shared ride service. So the desire when we entered into this analysis was to continue to be self-sustaining as much as possible, to look at potentially reducing our operating costs, and more importantly, to improve the rider's experience, and that includes decreasing the headway, which is the amount of time it takes you to ride the entire system in one loop, and also to identify some new stops. When we presented our findings at that time, we presented the options of reducing our fixed route system and then also trying to look at offering same day service. So currently we have three routes and they're all color coded based on your destinations and where the stops. And as you can see from the maps, there is a lot of duplicity with these stops. And so there are times we have buses that are literally right behind each other at the same stop. And so part of what we're looking for is offering a more enhanced service. Click it one more time. So what we're doing with this proposed change is we're going to be reducing our fixed route stops from three to two. And from us doing that, we're having one transfer point at DSS. So what's going to happen is both buses are going to start at DSS, and they're going to operate and start at opposite directions. And then they're going to take one hour to get back to DSS, and that'll take another hour to do the opposite side. So you'll get on at one of the stops. The drivers will help the passengers as they aboard if they need to get off at DSS to get on the other bus. So that way they're not having to travel for two hours on the bus. We were able to keep the majority of stops. We did look at stops that were either underutilized and that allowed us to remove those stops. But we did keep the majority of stops that we have. We feel that this change is going to be beneficial for our riders and that it allows justice that we have an enhanced provider service we also are reducing the headway and we're hoping that it'll be more utilized and getting them faster to where they need to go so this is our proposed change for the fixed route Then the next one was our on-demand plus. The on-demand plus was looking at trying to offer kind of a blend of the microtransit concept. So we're still keeping the fixed route system, but again, we're going to use the cost savings from that third route. We're going to reappropriate those resources to the same day service. So this would allow someone to make requests during our non-peak hours, which are technically around from 10 to 2, just in the New Bern area. So they would call the office if we're able to respond. It would be a $5 fare that was approved with this current fee schedule. But it would, again, just here in the commercial areas, Target, Walmart, downtown, et cetera. We're not going over the bridge over in James City at this time. And so this would be a pilot program that staff would continue to monitor. We'll see what the usage is and we can report updates in our monthly report.

Okay. We need to... She's got one more.

So today I'm requesting a public hearing. Policy requires a public hearing for major changes in routes or fare increases. We are requesting a public hearing be set for September 8th. These potential route changes will be posted on the CART's website, social media, at our office, and inside our vehicles. And comments can be submitted either by phone or by email.

Okay, so if anyone knows anyone who, anyone listening, uh knows anyone who uses carts and wants to know more about that they should be here and they can ask questions at that public hearing yes or they can call our office they can call cart's office and uh they'll give them the information yeah do i have a question or comment down here commissioner that's a question about the on-demand service it said five dollar fare and that would be anywhere within the county no sir it's where it's the service is only going to be provided within the commercial corridor um so it's easier for us to respond

Um, and then if that is successful, we can look at expanding it, but yes, it's just within the New Bern area.

Just a different area.

Yes.

Your overall usage. Is it being flat? You've seen an increase decrease on overall what you got now.

Um, so overall I would say that, um, it's pretty steady. Um, and we're hoping that with these changes that the ridership will increase on the fixed route demand response continues to grow. And so that is a lot to do with staff looking at efficiencies and making small changes to routes. We're always looking at underutilized areas and we continue to explore those.

Okay, any others? Go ahead.

To clarify, this means if I call at 10 o'clock Tuesday morning and say, I need a ride to, I have a, I've sprained my knee, I need to get to the orthopod. Can you get me there at 1 o'clock?

So the answer would be ideally yes.

If it's in Uber, yes.

And as long as we have the availability of the buses, then yes.

$5 is a whole lot cheaper than Uber.

Are there a large number of your customers that are Americans with Disabilities Act?

Yes. Because we offer not only the fixed route but also the demand response, then yes, a large majority of those meeting the definition of ADA are on our demand response.

And they would be responsive to the on-call? Yes.

Okay.

Any others? I'd like to make a comment, sir, if you don't mind. I'm the chair of the NPO, and I have been working with the NPO for 10 years now. saying that we needed to be more responsive, more flexible, and more cost-conscious, more bang for the buck, if you will. I am really excited to see we've expanded to a county level MPO, if you will, and to start seeing pilot programs like this to see what the citizens want, how we can best serve them as economically as possible with it. So I'm really excited. Thank you. I know there's tweaking that's going to be going forward. I know I'll be out of office by then. But I'm really excited to see something that will be a lot more responsive.

Thank you.

Sounds like if everything goes according to plan, the passengers, the public, they get an improvement here and we save some money.

Potentially, yes.

Yeah. So if everything goes according to plan, that's a win-win.

Yes, sir.

Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the public hearing? Motion to approve the public hearing. Second. Motion to second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Item D.

CARTS continues to receive requests to provide trips to Greenville for medical and life necessity trips. To explore providing this service, CARTS applied for the NCDOT IMD FY27 concept grant. The purpose of this state-funded grant is to increase collaboration among transit systems to expand services for underserved populations. CART submitted the Greenville Express project. This project would start by offering trips to Greenville three days a week with the opportunity to increase to five days a week. CART will coordinate with surrounding transit systems, OUTS, which is Onslow County, and CCATCH, which is Carteret County, by offering trips to a greater audience and improving mobility where potentially generating additional revenue. Typically, this grant requires a 50% local match. However, this year's grant is 100% state funded. Funding in the amount of $400,000 has been approved, which includes $274,000 for operating expenses and $125,500 for a bus replacement. Fares will be collected to maximize grant funding. Staff is requesting to change the fee for Greenville passenger fare from $5 per one-way ride to $20 per one-way ride. This fare is comparable with other transit systems providing similar long-distance service. To proceed, the board is being requested to accept the FY27 concept grant, approve the related budget amendment and fee change. Additionally, a memorandum of understanding between Craven, Onslow, and Carteret counties will need to be developed and executed by all parties.

Okay, questions?

yes great great opportunity for the county not against it and i commend you and staff for um finding this grant uh but does it commit us with using the 125 500 for bus replacement does it commit us to have to continue on after this one year yes sir do we have to return that funding no sir um Is there a possibility of getting an additional grant come the next fiscal year?

Possibly. Right now, this grant is typically with that UGA grant that I mentioned earlier. Right now it's on pause. The powers that be at NCDOT are evaluating a couple of things. One, should you be able to buy replacement vehicles in future grant applications? And two, should it have a match or should it continue being 100% state funded? So until we know those answers, that grant for future years is not available. But this is a great opportunity for us to explore if the board is interested.

Other questions?

Sorry. So just for just for pickup for the Greenville Express. So if they they'll be picked up at the hub, they have to meet at the hub and go to Greenville or they be picked up at their homes. How does that work?

It's going to be a little bit of both. So we are actually building off of the Downeast Express. For those of you who might not be familiar with that, the Downeast Express starts in Carteret County and they pick up people and they stop every day at Chick-fil-A here at the mall. and then pick people up and take them to the Raleigh-Durham area. And so we're going to be building off of that. So as they bring people from their area to the New Bern Mall, we will be picking up people from the New Bern Mall. But depending on where you live, we might be picking you up on the way as we head out of town, or we have other drivers that will be picking them up to drop them off at the mall. So those are some details that will vary depending on who's riding for the day.

Lawson's a good location, good idea.

So is this again a pilot program, see what the response is, see what the need is, see what the citizen interest is, so that it's not just an issue of will funding be available in future years, but also if it doesn't get used, then...

Yes, ma'am. We continually get responses and requests to go to Greenville. And unfortunately, we're not able to provide those trips right now. So this is a great pilot program for us to get the additional data to see if this is something we want to continue to operate.

I have one question, and that is, I like this. I think this is great. Everybody's kind of coming together and then heading out. How are we going to make the public aware of how this is going to work? What's the plan?

Great idea. So what we're doing, a couple of things. We have already started working, identifying a list of medical facilities that we need to... basically advertise in Greenville. We're also going to be going up to Greenville and distributing flyers. We'll have it on social media, our website. We'll also be going to offices down here. We've already had conversations with our local DSSs. So the word's already getting out when they started hearing that we were applying for the grant. So I think that it will naturally start building the ridership.

I like the idea of going to the offices and letting them know so they can let their customers or patients know. Yes, sir. Sounds good. Anything else? Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the grant and the budget amendment in the amount of $400,000? So moved. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Grant. Grant. Yeah. We do? Okay, let's do a roll call.

Commissioner Mason? Yes. Commissioner Mitchell? Yes. Commissioner Howard? Yes. Vice Chairman Jones? Yes. Chairman Bucher?

Yes. Okay. Go get it. Department matters facilities renewal of North Carolina Department of Adult Correction Division of Super Community Supervision leases with Craven County. Mr. Gene Hodges. Sir Hodges. Good morning, board.

Good morning. Per North Carolina General Statute 15 dash 209. A counties are required to provide suitable office space for the North Carolina Department of Adult Correction. Division of Community Supervision commonly referred to as adult probation offices. There are three spaces in Craven County facilities that have been historically leased to the state for providing probation services. These spaces that have been utilized in the last few years include 7,148 square feet in 403 George Street, the St. Luke's building, 344 square feet in the 300 Miller Boulevard building in Havelock, and a 64 square feet office in 302 Broad Street, the Courthouse Annex building. The current leases are expiring and the state has provided Craven County with draft leases that will provide these spaces from September 1, 2026 through August 31, 2029. As required by the attached general statute, these are $1 leases for the term of the lease. The board has requested to approve these leases and authorized staff to execute all necessary agreements to renew these leases for the three-year term and copies of the three draft lease renewals were provided in the attachments.

Okay, questions for Mr. Hodges? Move to approve. Second. Have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. Thank you, board. I wonder if we ever get that dollar, do we? item number eight finance proposed limited obligation bond financing request for public hearing and adoption of the preliminary resolution mr. every great good morning mr. chairman and commissioners I'm standing in for your finance director this morning and as the agenda narrative indicates this is a preliminary approval

and call for a public hearing for the county's proposed limited obligation bonds, series 2026A and 2026B, in an aggregate principal amount not to exceed $25 million. These bonds are proposed to finance a number of county projects which are itemized both in the notice of public hearing and your agenda narrative, the way it's working, the county will be reimbursed for funds expended for some of these projects and for funds to be expended. So it'll basically help replenish the county's fund balance and coffers going forward. I do want to note for the commissioners and for the general public, there is no anticipated property tax increase based upon this bond issuance. The next step in the process is to adopt the preliminary resolution. It makes some necessary statutory findings. It authorizes the filing of an application with the local government commission in Raleigh for the bonds and it also essentially hires your financing team. The other thing the resolution does is it establishes the public hearing date and time, which is proposed for August 3rd, 6 p.m. here. And finally, for your information, the financing schedule was in the agenda packet. There are numerous steps between now and closing, but we anticipate closing to occur in mid to late September of this year.

Okay. Sounds like a good deal. Hearing no questions, do I have a motion? Motion to approve. Do I hear a second? Second. Okay. This does not require a roll call. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Very good. Thank you. Appointments. We have a number of pending appointments. They are community child protection team, Craven Aging Planning Board, ABC Board, Clean Sweep, Crime Prevention Council, and Recreation Advisory Council. Those are under pending. Under current, first one we have is Craven County Planning Board. Mr. William Trawick seeks reappointment. Do I hear a motion?

I'll nominate Mr. William Trawick.

Okay, Mr. Trawick has been nominated. Are there any other nominations? Hearing none, he will be appointed by acclamation. Second one is the Fire Tax Commissioner's Board. Sue Arthur seeks reappointment. This is Township 6 fire.

I'll go ahead and nominate her.

Okay.

Are there any other nominations?

Hearing none, Ms. Arthur will be reappointed. The third one, New Bern Board of Adjustment. I don't have a name there yet. We're still waiting to find somebody. Mr. County Manager, I went through that list. I don't know anybody in there that I would recommend. Where are we on that?

I think everybody's sort of in the same boat as you just described. I will point out inside the Board of Adjustment, I guess bylaws at the City of New Bern. There is a time clock that begins ticking for you. If at some point, I believe it's 90 days, you don't make an appointment, the City of New Bern has the option to make that appointment for you. We have ran into this issue consistently because of the small area that this covers. At this point, I would just continue to look at it. Obviously, there's one name. I've talked with Commissioner Smith. She's not here today. I'm not sure if she had conversations with at least one name who I believe has served in this sort of similar capacity before. I'll continue to follow up with her if you like, and we'll keep trying.

Okay. We'll move along then. Under upcoming, we have the Emergency Services Advisory Council. There looks like four names on there. And then the Fire Tax Commissioner's Board. So keep those in mind for the future. Item number 10 would be the County Attorney's Report.

Good morning again. I have two items for the board's consideration this morning. The first involves county-owned surplus real estate acquired through the tax foreclosure process. The property is located on Church Road. It's got a parcel ID number of 6054029. The initial purchase price offer was $10,000. We took it through the upset bid process. There were no upset bids, so 10,000 is your last and highest bidder. The tax value on the property is $35,700 and the original past due taxes and cost of foreclosure Together, we're $2,420.30. I would ask that the board consider approving this transaction so we can close it and get the property back on the tax rolls.

Move to approve. Okay, we have a motion to approve. We have a second. Second.

uh let's do a roll call on this one please commissioner mason yes commissioner mitchell yes commissioner howard yes vice chairman jones yes chairman yes item b termination of trillium lease uh yes sir this is uh a lease between the county and trillium which actually dates back to the mid 80s when trillium was known as the new center And the property is located on the campus of the Carolina East Medical Center. Just for your reference, if you're standing in Neuse Boulevard in front of the cancer center, this property is all the way in the back left corner of the campus. It's a brick building that was last leased to Port Human Services, but it's actually been vacant for some years. Trillium came to us and said, we don't need the lease. We'd like to terminate it. We said, OK. There's one simple document in the agenda packet that memorializes that. And once that lease is terminated, the property basically becomes subject to the lease between the county and the hospital for the overall hospital campus. It basically just reverts back to that lease, if you will. That's the lease that we negotiated back in 2024. So I'm glad to entertain any questions on this. The concept is pretty straightforward, but the history is a little convoluted, I guess I would say. But if the board would consider approving these two documents and authorizing the chairman, your manager, and other county representatives to execute and deliver the necessary documents. Okay, questions? Do they intend to demolish the building? We don't know for certain what the hospital may do with it.

I can answer that question. Yes. They do intend to demolish it. serving on the hospital board, I would only say the hospital, I think, is excited about the health system. We call it the hospital. It's Craven East. They're excited about this, I think, because it fits into their future plans of some changes they'd like to make. Do I have a motion? Motion to approve. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion passes. That concludes my report. Thank you. Mr. Veit, county manager's report.

Morning, Mr. Chairman, commissioners. Thank you for the opportunity this morning. I've got quite a bit of stuff I just want to cover, a lot of information only. I was able to attend last Thursday the Purple Heart Monument rededication out here in the plaza between the courthouse and the county admin building. I think it's appropriate to provide some thank yous to two gentlemen in particular that made it happen, and that's Chip Shagnon and Lenny Lazara, both with Downey's Chapter 639 of the Military Order of the Purple Heart. We've been working with them at least going back a year to make sure that event was memorable. I know there was participation by commissioners and families. I thought it was remarkable. I did also note, and I shared this with Gene last week, I got to see Team Craven really working together out there, and a thank you to our rec team, our facilities and maintenance team, our solid waste team, our carts team, sheriff's office, and our public information team to make that happen on a very, very hot day, by the way, if you were there. It was remarkably hot. Again, just thanks to all involved. I thought it was a great event. I know Shane took some photographs. Hopefully he'll be able to share those soon. Also today is Steve Bennett, who you see sitting in the audience. It's his last county commissioner meeting as our information technology director. Steve started in March of 2020. And the very first conversation Steve and I got to have wasn't, hey, welcome to Craven County. It's we got a lot of technology we got to buy real quick because that was the very beginning of COVID about two days later. So Steve and I enjoyed that time together and his six years here with Craven County. He's really done a lot to modernize our IT infrastructure. He's been part of a huge fiber project, probably replaced every piece of technology we have, got us on a five-year schedule for laptop and computer replacement, and generally provided leadership of that department that was commendable. I've enjoyed working with Steve. I'm going to miss him a lot. Steve, best wishes to you. You always have a home here in Craven County. All right. For information purposes only, tonight, or today, you approved three public hearings. This is going to become a little bit more complicated. We have learned since our last commissioner meeting that the Sun Journal is only intending to provide print for two days now, which will be Tuesday and Saturday. To meet the 10-day requirement, we have to publish on a Thursday. So they're no longer going to have a print version on Thursday. It'll be electronic only. in guessing that you would adopt those public hearings and talking with the chairman we went ahead and put the notice in last week so we could be in tomorrow's sun journal to make sure we meet the 10-day requirement i don't know that ari and i have come up with an answer yet on that we're still talking and abigail but we want to make you aware of that the chairman and i do have to continue probably having those conversations until we figure it out We err on the side of caution by going ahead and running it. The worst thing that could happen is you didn't adopt the public hearing and we just got to run something in the paper on Saturday saying, hey, no public hearing, it's been canceled. But as the newspaper circulation continues to decrease, we're going to run into challenges like this all around. It's probably a legislative discussion that needs to happen at some point. We're obviously in the thick of that, but probably next year. So it's required at this point that be in a print edition of general circulation in the county 10 days prior to the actual public hearing day.

Could it be there is another print edition that goes around the county. Can it be in another print edition?

Mr. Vice Chair, it could be.

I do not believe there are any other publications that currently meet the statutory requirements.

It's not a paid publication. And it doesn't really have a distribution other than Where they put it. Yeah, where they put it.

Right. That's right. And, you know, the compass may meet the requirements in Pamlico County, but I don't believe it to have enough circulation in Craven County to meet those requirements. Although we can certainly check on that.

And the reason I ask Pamlico County is advertising. That's where they share theirs.

There's no accommodation for an electronic edition for the same publication. Not at this point. No.

And part of the legislature needs to change it so that electronic would be approved.

So that's correct. The legislative solution is a local bill that allows us to either do electronic publication with the news or electronic publication via your website, which we already do the website as just a normal practice anyway. it would just be the dominant one. And of course we want a wide net. I mean, as you heard the public hearings today, there's real value in people coming and speaking about the carts programs, just using that as an example that use the service. I mean, you need that feedback. So this is going to be more challenging moving forward.

Okay. Thank you.

And just because I talked to her, I got a text from her yesterday, just a reminder, Commissioner Hunt is at the National NACO Conference. She is attending that on behalf of the Board of Commissioners. She was already attending a Veterans Committee meeting and other committees related to taxation and other issues that are prominent in county government at the moment. So she sends her well wishes from New Orleans.

Okay.

That's all I have, sir, unless you've got questions for me.

Questions for the county manager.

Thank you.

You're all set. Commissioner's report. Mr. Mason, I'll start with you.

All right. Well, I attended the Tourist Development Agency meeting last week, and we are coming out of the woods from a down point. The May set a record for hotel occupancy, so we did very good on that. And June's looking pretty good. And we're forecasting that July is even better. And I'd also like to echo the thanks to the from the military order. The Purple Heart 6 39 chips at home, resting quietly after all his hard work. And he's very pleased with the response, both from the convention center and the support for the the ceremony out in front here. So that's all I've got.

Okay, thank you, Mr Howard.

I did get the opportunity to attend the Linda McMahon Secretary of Education New Bern High School graduate ECU graduate with Commissioner Mitchell last week which was I also went to the Purple Heart Gala with our group here to honor our Purple Heart veterans, one of which was my grandfather, Opus Evans, and a Bronze Star recipient also. So that was kind of neat to see all those gentlemen and ladies and gentlemen participating in that and getting that honor. It was an honor for the county to have that too. And we do have a Havelock Library board meeting this Wednesday at 1130 a.m. That's it.

Mitchell.

Yes, Mr. Chair, thank you very much. Yeah, to echo the comments for the military order of the Purple Heart, I flew out from New Bern Airport on Friday morning with a number of the Purple Heart veterans. This was a wonderful chapter in their lives. Thank you to this community for doing something so meaningful. And it's also a feather in our cap that we were selected for the national convention. So Team Craven at the county here and the commissioners really stepped up and it showed and it was appreciated.

A couple of comments.

Last Wednesday, I went to the North Carolina National Guard headquarters, which is also the state EOC facility, Emergency Operations Center. Anything I say now is for future boards, but I will make the comment that I would strongly advise that you commissioners or some commissioners Make that visit up there to see what the state's emergency facilities are. It's manned 24-7. We are connected very well with it with Stanley White, but it's also something that elected officials need to understand and understand how it operates. It was extraordinarily useful. I knew a little bit because I'm a veteran, but I wish I had known this 10 years ago. It's worth the trip. The other comment is from Allies for Cherry Point. We are moving to what I will call Act 3 with a new structure moving forward that will be seeking more funding from defense contractors and local businesses that benefit from the military facilities in this area. As part of that, and this was the vote last week, I'm sorry, two weeks ago, the government officials that serve in appointed roles on the board will now be in an ex officio role. So we will be in an advisory capacity, not in a voting capacity. The benefit of this is it will allow the government personnel who are serving on the board to advocate for ACT because we will not be voting with it, if that makes any sense with it. So we will be able to do a better, whoever replaces me will be able to do a better job in the future of relaying what is going on with Allies for Cherry Point to the members of this commission and other ones going forward. Makes sense. So I think it will be very, very helpful.

I would add that Commissioner Mitchell's father was one of the people honored as a recipient. He was, obviously he's deceased, but he was one of the honorees having received the Purple Heart. Thank you. Thank you.

And I don't have anything else.

Okay. Last chair. Two items, Mr. Chairman. County manager, county attorney, and myself attended a Krasama meeting last week, and they are actively building this new sale. Tons and tons of material being hauled in right now. This morning on the way here, I probably got behind seven, eight dump trucks coming out of there. So it's on schedule, but a big project for our landfill for the three counties. And last thing is this past Saturday had the opportunity with Sheriff Hughes and some others to celebrate with the town of Dover 125 years. and it was a great occasion and I commend the town of Dover for pulling together and having a hometown celebration.

Very good. Thank you. I have nothing to add. Item number 13 would be a closed session after short recess. We'll go into closed session pursuant to NCGS 143-318.11a6 to address personnel matters.

I'll make a motion. I'll make a motion. We're going to close session.

Second. Motion and second. All in favor? Aye. And motion passes.