City Council - Regular Meeting

We have your attention, please. We have your attention, please.

It is now 530 and I will call our September 1st, 2026

work session meeting to order. And we do have two presentations, and we will begin with Dr. Valerie Thomas with create it with a purpose. She want to enlighten us on what she does and her organization.

Well, everyone, thank you so much. to President George Allen and to all of our city council women and men and our Mayor Eddie Smith, thank you for this opportunity to come and talk to you about Create With Purpose. We are an organization that was founded in 2022 in the fall, and then we started to become a 501, we became a 501 in February of that next year. nonprofit, and what this nonprofit does is it's located in East Alabama, but we help with the surrounding areas. One of our signature things that we do is that we want to help single moms who are struggling, who find themselves in a situation where they are trying but to help walk along beside them to help them get their college education. And this is their choice. We're not encouraging them to go to school. They have made the decision that they want to go back to school. So we pick them up and walk along with them. And what that looks like for them is scholarships, of course, but we also mentorship. It's like a mentorship. So when you feel like giving up, we won't allow you to give up. So we've created a mentor mentoring community for them. The other piece to that is that they have to have enrichment classes every single month. So we meet every month and those enrichment classes look like we will have them to come in and we will do finance financial literacy with them to help them manage their money. We also have people to come in and help them manage their stress. Because we all know, well, if we'd never been a single parent, it might be hard to imagine that. But I was that single parent. And no matter how much of a great mom I was, there were times when I was stressed to the max. And so I wanted to walk along beside them in those stressful moments to say, don't give up. Because you can be the greatest mom, but that one last thing that breaks the straw, you can literally pick up a kid when you really haven't even had a chance to think about it. So we walk along beside them. They meet every month. And here's what I didn't know. I thought about it when I started it. I wanted to have 10 mamas to start out this program. But as I started to think about the 10 mamas, when I started admitting them, then the children came along. And then I started thinking, well, what am I going to do with 20 babies? Because we also support their children as well. Every single month that they come to those meetings, they are allowed to bring their babies with them. And we feed them. And like I said, community leaders come in and just kind of walk them through, talk them through some things. We've seen lots of tears. We've had mental health moments where they were allowed to just share. We wanted to do relationships with them. Because no matter how good you are and where you get started, one wrong relationship derails your entire plan. And so we want them to think about even the relationship. And that doesn't necessarily mean a male figure. That could be any relationship that enters your life that's not a good relationship. And so we kind of move our way through that. Our whole goal is just to empower them. And what we have found, though, because we've graduated two out already. Yay, we're so excited. One of them actually gone on to get a master's degree in social work. But what we have found is that they don't want to stop coming. So even though they've graduated out because this has become a community to them, they keep coming back. And so I'm thinking, well, what am I going to do? I'm still admitting moms, but then I have moms that won't go away because it's a community. And they have learned to love each other and just kind of walk their way through things. So when they come in on those Saturdays, we feed everybody together and then we separate the moms and the babies and we take care of the babies. So moms can have that moment to do whatever it is that they're learning for the day. That financial literacy look like helping them figure out how they're going to buy their first home. how they can do a saving to get the things that they want in life. Because here's the beauty or the reality of it. If you've been used to making $7 or $8 an hour, and nobody makes that anymore, I'm just kind of using that. But if you've been used to doing that, and then you graduate and you get a job, and now they pay you $90,000 a year, you tend to think, I've got more than I can do with, and you tend to squander or waste that because you've been poor for so long that when finally somebody gives you something, you just start this spending spree. And we didn't want them to do that. We have a board member, a seven board member, and we all volunteer. We all volunteer our time. We all sow inside of that to make sure that our moms are okay with that and everything. The other piece to this is that we have teens that we've been working with too. We're trying to get them early before they get to the point of teen girls, before they get to the point of, and some of them are already there, but we walk along beside them to try and help mentor them to help them dream bigger. So it's not necessarily that they all have to go to college, but we want to help you dream, help you see life in a very different way, no matter which background that you've come from. And then we decided that we were going to also pivot on that. And we were going to pick up our junior and senior teen moms. so that we can now, your life is not over. You still have an opportunity. And it becomes a pipeline to say, hey, I want to do something different in college. And so this takes up quite a bit of our time to be able to do that, but we have learned to, I mean, we really love it. My babies are glad to see, I always tell everybody, I'm not a kid's person, you know, but my babies, when I see them coming, We give them the summers off so if they want to travel, they want to do something else with their life. But when I see my babies come back, they are like running. And I'm running and hugging all of them. And they're like little. We have the youngest that started with us that was two. He is now four. And so we go from they have to have a child, at least one child under the age of 12. We figured at the age of 12, you're really kind of able to babysit yourself, like literally. So we kind of walk through our moms. And like I said, we give them scholarships. We do their meals. We also give them gas money every single time that they come. We want to make sure that you have no barrier as to why you can't get here. We want you to come and be able to enjoy. The other piece to this is that the moms don't know it, though. But we have an emergency and a crisis fund. Let's just say their lights get turned off. We want to make sure that. And this was born out of when, I don't know if you all remember, when SNAP went down. I fed some of my mamas because bylaws said that they, you know, we didn't have it in the bylaws that we would actually feed them. So secretly I fed them. I made sure that they were okay. And I will say this, that all of our moms work. They're not required to work, but they all work by choice. They all have jobs and they all drop a child off at a daycare. They're not old enough to go to school. So they have that burden on them to figure out how we're going to pay for daycare, how we're going to get the monthly bills paid. And heaven forbid, if just one thing goes wrong and then we lose it all. I'm just going to tell you that this is my heart, because I have walked in my house with my three babies and turned on a light switch, and that light switch did not come on. And it's on a Friday afternoon. Who turns your lights off on a Friday? If I had money to pay it on a Friday, I would have paid it. So when they turn off the lights, you got to pay extra. So we have a crisis fund for that. We want to make sure that they're all fed, that they all have, even if we have to, hopefully we never have to have anybody that's homeless, that we were able to actually help them, even for a hotel for a short while, a place until we can get them into a new place. So we kind of work through that. Like I said, they don't know that. And then when they're ready to graduate, that semester before they graduate, we have what we call walking into your purpose. So we have trained and certified HR people that give up their time, that train them on interviewing skills, how to make their resume looks good for what they want, how to dress appropriately, And then the final piece is how to keep your job when you get it. These are the things that we would not do when we got on the job. So we're very grateful for that. And so education and outreach is what we do. So education, obviously, is on our mom and our young girls. But outreach, every single year, we partner with Shop with a Cop because we feel like our community needs things, too. And so all the girls that are in that program, we supply at least six months, sometimes nine months worth of hygiene products for them and their families. We try and take in consideration that maybe we have this girl, but maybe there's a sister someplace or maybe there's another family or mom. So every winter when they bring that out, we start working on that too to make sure that they have a piece. So we always want to give back. That came out of us. I was doing, we were doing Operation Christmas Child where we were sending it and then I realized I've got people right here in my own community of the city of Opelika that could use a bar of soap. And so I turned it to say, hey, let's partner with, I talked to Alison Duke and I said, hey, we would love to partner and this is where we'll start. So every year we work with that. I will say that people give very generously to help us do that. We don't do that on our own as far as the board members, they help us a lot with that. So we always wanna give back. I wanna just, I gave you like a little snippet of why this organization matters, matters to us because here's the beauty. I know that when I earned my college degree And I'm a registered nurse. So I earned that college degree and I started as an associate degree. And I went from associates to bachelor's to master's to doctoral. And I will say that out of my three girls that I will raise, all of them are educationally prepared, at least master's or doctoral levels just by their choice. And I feel like that they took that role because they saw mom if that makes sense to you so i want to i want to and every college is not for everybody i tell them that but i really want to give our mom something to look forward to and to be able to help them again this is their choice to want to go to school we're not encouraging anybody to do that but once we do that we interview them they have to come with a letter of reference to be admitted into the program and a need survey to make sure that you are in a poverty level that you actually need the funds. So we're not just giving to every single mom. And so with that being said, this is my baby and I have a wonderful board. They are amazing. We all work so tirelessly. And we kind of really just started to enjoy this. And we would love for it to just spread out. I've gone to daycares, churches. I mean, I've gone any place that I could find where there may be a single mom to say, please apply. We admit just once a year though. But if there's some extenuating circumstances, I may be willing to bend that rule and just admit, you know, again. But thank you all so much for your time and allowing me to be able to tell you something about what I love that's literally right here in your Opelika community. Any questions at all?

I just want to tell you thank you for the work that you do. It's a pleasure to know that so many of you are actually doing the work in the community. And for us to be able to support you, although it's not nearly enough for all that you do, but for us to be able to support you to make your mission a little easier, that's what I think we're all here for. So thank you.

Thank you all.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. And we also have Jalen Bloodworth, the president of Project Pulmonary, and he will talk to us about hydration drive.

Good afternoon. Hey, just real quick, I wanted to take a minute and introduce Jaden and the program that he's bringing to us and kind of how we found each other. One of the things that's truly inspiring about working in Opelika is the amount of time and effort we put into developing our young people to go into the workforce. I think we do that as well as anyone. And I thought this was a great opportunity to put somebody on display who was doing something with the efforts that we put into people. I'd like to take a moment to recognize Jaden Bloodworth. He's a senior at Enterprise High School and a president of All the Same, a youth-led nonprofit organization dedicated to giving back to communities across our state. Jaden also serves as chief of governmental affairs for Project Pulmonary, an organization funded on raising awareness of the health risk firefighters face throughout their careers. Over the summer, these young people launched an initiative called the Hydration Tour. They traveled to communities across Alabama and provided water, sports drinks, electrolyte packets, cooling towels, and other hydration supplies to first responders. To date, they have donated more than 10,000 hydration items. Tonight, they've chosen to make their next stop Opelika and the Opelika Fire Department. Obviously, we appreciate the supplies. Our firefighters work in some extremely hot and physically demanding conditions, particularly in our Alabama summers like we're dealing with right now. But I think there's something even more important to recognize tonight. Jane's a high school student, right? This is a time in their life when they could be spending their time doing 100 other things, but he's chosen to serve others. He's identified a need. He's organized himself. He's traveled across the state, raised resources, and personally delivered these resources to the first responders. That says a great deal about his character, his family, and the kind of young leaders that he's becoming. As fire chief, I can tell you that as firefighters, police officers, whatever, we don't seek out this kind of recognition, but it is uniquely appreciated by the fact that we've got such young leaders taking on an initiative like this and recognizing the work of our personnel. So with all that said, I wanted to introduce Jaden Bloodworth and let you tell him a little bit about his program.

All right, can everyone hear me? OK. Thank you for allowing me to speak in front of you all. It's an honor to meet all of you. And thank you for letting me come to your beautiful city. It's a lot of traffic, but I did enjoy it. It's very beautiful. Like he said, my name is Jaden Bloodworth, and I'm the founder and president of a statewide nonprofit organization called All the Same Alabama. We were founded back in January, and we're dedicated to promoting health and educational equality for students across our state. But over this past summer, we've really been focusing on our first responders, making sure that they get the hydration items that they need so that they can continue to serve the people of your community. All the same, Alabama, we have volunteers in Opelika and all throughout the state. So that's kind of why they recommended us to come to your city. And I'm so glad, again, like I mentioned, it's very beautiful and your people are very kind and our volunteers help us out so much. And the reason that I kind of started this organization is because someone believed in me and they put enough trust in me to start this chapter of All the Same. And I know that there are a lot of students in our state that have the passion to advocate and do things like this, but they just don't have the platform So I just want for all of us in Alabama to be that platform for them to convey their passion, to be support to the people that support our community, because we are so thankful for the work that you all do every day. Because without it, we really would not be here. So again, I wanted to thank you all for this opportunity. And I hope to work with you all in the future in making sure that not only the first responders, but the people inside of your city are taken care of. So thank you so much. Thank you.

We're going to leave with Jaden now and do a social media presentation at the station. But again, I just want to thank him for his time and efforts and congratulate him on just a wonderful initiative. Did you say you're a high school student?

Yes, sir. What grade? I'm a senior. OK. At Enterprise. At Enterprise.

We've got a little hiccup. He's thinking about going to that wrong school in Tuscaloosa. But other than that, he's not interested in joining the fire department right now. I'm already trying to.

Mayor, do you or any one of your administration have any updates for us?

Mr. President, I just wanted to say that in the... Mayor, will you turn your mic? I'm just testing you. That in the consent agenda, I am making a recommendation for reappointment to the Historic Preservation Commission, Mr. Rush Denson and Ms. Linda Lyons, and those will be in the consent agenda.

Okay.

Thank you. That's all I have. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. Council members, do you have any concerns on any item on our tonight's agenda that someone here may be able to enlighten you on? Mr. Jones, is there anything else to come before us in this meeting?

I don't have anything.

Okay. If not, we will end our work session and start our regular meeting at 6 o'clock p.m. Thank you very much.

The only way the message is going to get delivered is, well, we didn't know that there was any agreement to go any further. The agreement that was entered into has been de-met. Now, if they want to sit down and negotiate another agreement for the next five years, or at least for the three years that I can guarantee, we'll put it right back in there. Or we'll do a special resolution.

Have your attention, please.

It is now 6 o'clock, and I will call our September 1st, 2026 Opelika City Council meeting to order. Call the roll, Mr. Jones.

Mr. Holmes. Here. Mr. Watley. Here.

Mr. Beams. Here. Mr. Routt. Here. Mr. Allen. Here. And tonight, for our invocation, we're pleased to have Tim Kirkenick from the Christ Our Redeemer Seminary for our invocation. And our pleasure of allegiance will be led by Banks Grantham and Eliza Tapley from Southview Primary School. Let us all stand.

Join me in prayer. Father in heaven, we come before you this evening thanking you for your goodness to us and praising you for who you are. Thank you for this Opelika community. We are blessed, God, in so many ways, and we praise you as the giver of all good blessings. We pray for our community leaders, our city council, as well as our mayor. Give them wisdom that comes from above. Help them to lead well and from a heart of integrity. Bless them and all of our city employees too. We pray for our police officers, firefighters, first responders, health care workers. Protect them as they serve us. We pray for our teachers, administrators, staff, and students in our community. give our children safe places to learn and help our students to grow in all areas of life. We pray for your blessing on local businesses, both employers and employees alike. Pray for our churches and area ministries. May they love and serve you and others well. We pray for the strengthening and flourishing of families in our community. We remember those who are struggling. Move us towards compassion so that the vulnerable may find help and hope. May tonight's meeting be conducted with fairness and respect May the decisions made here this evening, God, strengthen our city and please and honor you. We ask all of these things in the name of Jesus. Amen. Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America into the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

And at this time, we'll have the adoption of the agenda. Are there any items that need to be added to or removed from the presented agenda? Having none, is there a motion to approve the agenda as presented?

So moved.

Second. Any discussion? Having none, call the roll, Mr. Jones.

Ms. Holmes. Aye. Swallow. Aye.

Smith. Aye. Rapp. Aye. Stroud. Aye. All voted aye to adopt the agenda. Okay. Next, we'll have approval of the minutes. Councilmember McGinn, you've received a copy of the minutes from our last regular meeting on August 18th, 2026. Are there any correction, additions, or deletions? If not, I will entertain a motion and a second to accept the minutes as presented. So moved.

Second.

Thank you.

Mayor Cummins. Yes, Mr. President. I would like to put up for nomination for reappointment to the Historic Preservation Commission, Mr. Rush Denson and Ms. Linda Lanz. Okay.

I think we have that in our consent agenda. Thank you very much, Mayor. Yes, sir. Public hearing. We have four public hearings. One which is one that's included would be would be a due process hearing as well are and Will you present the.

Yep. This president first public hearing is a revocation of a business license at 501 Geneva street suite three and four.

Okay. Okay. That's just as an opening statement. Tonight's hearing is an important step in the city consideration on whether to revoke the business license of the business located at 501 Geneva street suites three and four. The purpose of this proceeding is not to prejudge the matter or to announce a decision before the evidence has fully been considered. Rather, it is to ensure that the business owner is afforded a fair and meaningful opportunity to be heard before the city take any action against that business license. The city council will consider the evidence and testimony presented during the hearing, along with the applicable provisions of the City Ordinance Number 020-22 and other governance laws. The business owner will have an opportunity to respond to the allegations on grounds identified by the City, present relevant evidence, and address the Council regarding the proposed revocation. The Council objective is to ensure that the matter is considered fairly, Transparently and consistently with the due process rights of both parties. And as a reminder to the council, you have the right to question witnesses at the conclusion of their testimony and doing the presentation of a witness for clarification purposes. At the conclusion of the due process here, you have the right to publicly discuss this revocation prior to voting. With that said, I declare this Process here for this matter open and I'll ask the city representative to come to the podium to my left and presented case. And the business owner would have that same right.

City Council, Mr Mayor. This also is an ongoing investigation. Uh, so the charges have already been bound over to a grand jury. And it's possibly pending a criminal trial, so there'll be parts of the case I won't be able to talk about. But here's a basic rundown of the case. My name is Marty Paulson, and I'm the captain of investigations. If He didn't already know that. If you do know me, I apologize. On June 22nd, the agents from the ABC board notified Opelika Narcotics of complaints in reference to top shelf alternatives at 510 Geneva Street, Suite 3 and 4 in Opelika, Alabama, in reference to selling flowering bud and like pre-rolled cigarettes, which is in violation of the state of Alabama hemp laws. Over a period of days, OPD narcotics and an undercover SBI agent into the store on five separate occasions. Each time making a purchase of the flowering bud. Three purchases were made from Kayla Haddon and two purchases were made from Bradley Haddon. OPD narcotics then obtained a search warrant for top shelf alternatives and executed the warrant on July 1st, 2026. Many things were recovered, but drug wise, the drug items that were covered were seven large clear glass jars containing suspected hemp buds. There was a scale, tongs, empty baggies and THC slushy mix. At that time, Kayla Haddon was charged four counts of sale or possession of unlawful hemp products. Bradley Haddon was also charged with three counts of sale or possession of unlawful hemp products, all of which are Class C felonies. Narcotics detectives transported the drug evidence to the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences for testing. And on July 17th, lab reports were obtained from the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences, which showed that all the suspected hemp was in fact marijuana. which is a schedule one controlled substance. All five of the previous drug buys were also marijuana. The marijuana recovered from the store weighed in excess of 2.2 pounds, but was less than 100. On July 21st, based on the weight of the marijuana recovered from the store and the fact that all the buys were also marijuana, Bradley Haddon was arrested for drug trafficking. marijuana and two counts of unlawful distribution of controlled substance. Kayla Haddon was arrested for drug trafficking in marijuana and three counts of distribution of controlled substance. Drug trafficking is a Class A felony. And distribution of controlled substance is a Class B felony. So a Class A felony of drugs also requires a three year minimum mandatory sentence. But based on the previous facts, showing that Bradley and Kayla Hatton are trafficking and distributing illegal controlled substances out of their business, Top Shelf Alternatives LLC. They're conducting business in violation of Alabama state law in such a manner as to constitute a public nuisance. The Obelika Police Department believes their business license should be revoked.

Thank you. Any questions? Thank you very much. business owner.

My wife, Kayla. Um, so per our attorney, obviously I can't say a whole lot because anything I say here can be used against me later on. Um, you know, I spoke to mayor Smith, um, and a few of the council members last week, You know, before this hearing starts, I would just like to voluntarily give up our business license at 510 Geneva Street in hopes of being able to move on with our lives and our next businesses. My main thing right now is, you know, this whole thing has essentially bankrupted everything. We are possibly losing everything. Obviously, you know, there's a lot of allegations out there right now. Unfortunately, we haven't had due process get through hearing yet to find that out. I'm just asking, can I voluntarily get you guys to vote if I voluntarily give up my business license because the business is now closed as of yesterday? that would allow us to continue to be business owners in the community in a different aspect without the 36 month ban coming on top of that. Because I really, really enjoy being a small business owner. I really enjoy the community here and I really want to just move on as much as I can and focus on taking care of my family, my children, keeping our house, stuff like that. I know it takes a long time to get through these hearings and everything else, and so I'm just asking if I voluntarily give up this business license, would you guys vote to accept that in lieu of revoking it, therefore not allowing me to have another business license in the city for three years? That's it, thank you.

They can ask him questions. Yeah, any questions? I'm sorry. And one will ask us any questions.

If you come. I have a question for you, Mr. President. Bradley and Kayla are both constituents of Ward five, and I've had numerous residents of Ward five who have called me and asked about being able to speak, whether on either side of this, would this be the opportunity for them to talk?

Now the fact that he's given up his license voluntarily, I feel like that should end this particular hearing in itself. Now, if you want to, as I said, attorney wants to elaborate on that, he can.

Yeah, I think I can actually, um, first of all, once he is chosen and offered to not contest, basically similar to no contest, there wouldn't be any reason to hear anything further because the decision would be made. However, the ordinance that covers the revocation and suspension of business licenses also has a provision wherein once a license, and I'm actually reading from it now, it's in Chapter 14, available online for anybody who wants to look. Once a license or the privilege to obtain or renew a license has been suspended or revoked, The person who was the subject of the suspension or the revocation or any entity in which such person is an owner, partner, et cetera, et cetera, must obtain city council approval of all future license applications prior to the issuance of any new city business license. So there is, unless he chose to appeal an adverse decision of the council after hearing, full hearing, there is a method by which Um, he has to come back to council to get a license if this license winds up winds up being revoked. Um, so there's a method that can do that and it would depend on obviously the circumstances and the facts and same kind of thing. Um, except in that case, he would be the presenter. and the city would present anything, of course, behind that, kind of like he would be.

And that's forever, not just the 36 months, because obviously I don't understand a lot of that.

Yeah, and I'm just reading it to you verbatim. This is exactly what it says. Without reference to the 36 months, it's supposed to last for 36 months, but that particular provision is in direct conflict with this one. So this one says when it's been suspended or revoked, meaning gone, of course, The person who has a license, you've always got to come back in order to try and get another one. Um, so that's, that's the way I read it. That's because that's what it says.

Okay.

Hope that answered the question.

And that's for any business, right? Not just in that particular.

It applies equally to all as do most laws.

Understanding the process, Mr. President, I respect that. There are people who have came here tonight not knowing that this was going to happen. However, they have taken time out of their day to come up here. Some of them brought their children and their family because this is a process. This is in the evening. So to be respectful of them being here, would this be the opportunity that they would still be able to hear, to be heard by their government on the public record?

Now, if it's, and with verification from our said attorney, to me, this is over. Now, if they have a desire to maybe speak at one of our public. Can you do that? I mean, they can do that, but they cannot in reference to this case.

So understand, Mr. President, Then we would if that's if this is a closed case, then we have no decision to be made. But the decision to be made is we're still revoking this business license for 36 months, correct? And that business license.

It depends on how we vote.

Right. So these people that have came here tonight would like to speak on either side of whether they think that we should take away their business license for 36 months. And I think they should be heard.

Mr. President, I have a question too. Pardon me? I have another question after he finishes.

Let's see if we can clarify this.

Once the decision has been made, it would render anything else moot? Nothing left to discuss.

I think maybe, Todd, are you asking if, is it just the business owner and the city that presents during this time, right? Of course. Or do they have witnesses?

In the statement, we said that they do have witnesses, but it has to be whether they are supporting what he's done, his business, or whether they are supporting what we're doing in the replication of his license. It cannot be character witnesses. It can it can be nothing of the sort.

Must be evidence based.

Yeah.

Right.

I understand that, Mr. President, but these people may be that. We just don't know. So and this is about the revocation. It's not about anything outside of that.

But if he if he decided to give up the license, I was asking.

That's that's what I was asking. Could I do that in lieu of going through this here? Right. Would you all give me that opportunity?

And if not, then obviously. Well, you would have to reapply for whatever license that you choose to to seek. Yes, sir. But for this hearing. It is closed.

Mr. President, I'm just going to be try to be as clear as I can possibly be.

Can I? Can I?

Yes, sir.

OK, so Ordinance 32-23. This is about the order of meetings, OK, under public hearings. This is what it lists. Public hearings shall be deemed to include only those hearings specifically noticed and required to be conducted by the council, by state statute or otherwise. for the purposes of providing opportunities for the public to comment. Now, this does not specifically talk about due process hearings, but it says public hearings shall be opened upon the declaration of the presiding officer that the council was at the time of public hearing. Each speaker may address the council for three minutes. Procedures and rules of decorum are stated. I will say in here, and I haven't found it exactly yet, and I will in just a second, Mr. Rauch, It says that speakers addressing the council during a public hearing shall limit their comments to the subject matter of the public hearing. Okay. Speakers addressing the council during agenda related public comments portion shall limit their comments to specific items on the meeting agenda. No comment shall be allowed on a matter that was the matter of a public hearing scheduled for the same meeting. So. even if they were to get up during the agenda related items comments, because this is on the agenda for revocation, they cannot address a public hearing that was already the subject matter in the same meeting. That's what the ordinance says. Also, it says speakers addressing the council during the meeting shall not be allowed to blah, blah, blah. But I skipped down, hold on. The, uh, Speakers addressing the council during the second roster of public comments at the conclusion of the meeting shall limit their comments to matters pertaining to city business or issues which the city council would have authority to act upon if brought forth as an agenda item. Comments are limited to matters that are within the city's control or jurisdiction. No comment shall be allowed on a matter that was a previous item of the meeting agenda. So even at second roster of comments. So if they are not If the president of the council says this public hearing is closed, even the people that are here to speak on it can't speak during agenda related comments because it's a public hearing that's already been addressed by ordinance and they can't speak during second roster comments on an agenda related item that has already been passed by the council.

May I ask the city clerk a question, Mr. President? Sure. So I have had calls from people that are here tonight that have expressed interest in speaking on the revocation of their business license for 36 months. With that being in that public hearing and talking specifically about that and having no other opportunity to talk about it to their elected officials on the public record, would they not be able to talk about it during that public hearing?

Not during this meeting. I mean, the public hearing is for the cities. This is a due process hearing. So that means it's for the city's witnesses, the city's presenter or representative and its witnesses and the business owners, presenter and its witnesses. That's all the people that can speak during this due process hearing.

Are those people coming as witnesses? Or they're just speaking to.

If they are a witness, I will say that a witness in this proceeding must have related evidence as to why he should or shouldn't keep his license. It can't just be a character witness.

Mr. President, can I ask you a question?

Let him finish if you want. So and we will try to clear up.

I'd like to ask a question when you get to the end of this.

OK, we will. The business owner's character is not in question. What is in question is. Are you going to present evidence as to why he should or should not keep his license?

And now, based on what he's done, he's willingly given up, which in our city attorney also agree that anything else is my new. I mean, it's me. It doesn't matter. Now, if he had presented a case, then, of course, he could have had his witnesses. But he chose not to present a case. He ready to give is giving them up. So that ends it. And at this time, we will consider that matter closed and we will move on to the next. Yeah. Unless you want to allow someone to ask him questions. I mean, we asked him. I asked that and no one had a question.

And if the public hearing is closed, then the city council does have an opportunity to discuss it. Among ourselves. Right.

Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Question. I do have a question. To him? Yes.

Yes, ma'am. So upon giving up your license. Yes, ma'am. You're giving them up in an effort to stop you from not having.

Right.

The ability to have the ability to have license throughout.

Yes, ma'am. That's that's essentially I'm willingly giving up this business license. So you guys don't revoke it. It's just over with and done. We go our separate ways and I can move on into the next part of whatever. And that's what I was seeking just because, you know, me and my wife are both on this LLC. If we were to open another business, say it was a restaurant. would either have to come through the council, and I feel like... would would impact that further down the line um and so that's why i would like to voluntarily give the business license up put this behind us the city goes its way i go my way and not be held for that 36 months of not being able to get a license without coming back through city council because of certain council members um i guess feelings towards me personally

And I think what we're dealing with is that typically individuals that come before it and when they concede, it's just to say, yes, we'll accept the 36 months. Right. But what you're doing is trying to kind of getting in front of it to stop it and not and avoid that piece. So I guess we'll discuss that. That. Yeah, it just seems like I don't know, I think we still have to deal with the fact of what we were going to do and why we're here instead of us stopping it in advance and avoiding what we have to have the initial conversation about.

Mr. President, may I ask a question? Of course. Okay. So do we vote one way or the other? How does this play out? Do we accept this and we don't?

We accept what he's done, but it's still on the agenda for us to vote.

That we still vote. Okay. I want to make sure I understand that.

So with no other comments, we declare this public hearing closed. And now if the member of the council want to discuss this among ourselves before we vote, then you have that opportunity at this time.

I think, Mr. President, I think this sets a bad precedence if we choose to not revoke this license because the reasons why we're sitting here tonight in a place where we're at a place of doing a revocation of this business is not because of anything we did. It's because of what's been done in this business and the evidence that's been brought forth by the police. And so, you know, I think that the course of least regret would be to continue with this revocation. And then if this case goes to a court and it's decided that nothing was done, then if the business owner comes back and, and wants to seek a license, at least we have the stop gap in place where we get to decide whether this business owner should have a business again in our great city. If we do not revoke the license at this point, then and let's just say it goes the other way the case goes to court we have uh they're convicted of these uh these felonies then we've got someone who could reapply for a business license that's that is a convicted felon and we've lost the ability to have some control over it so in in my mind um i i i didn't I didn't make any of this up. This drug test is from a lab. None of this was created by us. So I just think that the course of least regret is to continue with the revocation because of the evidence that's been put before us. And it gives us a little bit of a safety mechanism to have in place.

my time over and I can answer questions.

Any other discussion? Okay, I declare this discussion closed as well. Mr. Jones, second public hearing.

Mr. President, public hearing number two is for weed abatement assessment at 403 W.E.

Morton Avenue. I declare this public hearing open. Anyone wants to speak for or against this item, please come to the podium to my left. State your name and address. And remember, you have three minutes to speak. Having none, I declare this public hearing closed. Third public hearing is for a weed abatement assessment at 510 India Road. I declare this public hearing open. Anyone wants to speak far against this item, please come to the podium to my left and state your name and address. And remember, you have three minutes to speak. Having none, I declare this public hearing closed.

Fourth and final public hearing is to amend the text of the zoning ordinance for regulation of hemp stores in Opelika.

I declare this public hearing open. Anyone wants to speak for against this item, please come to the podium to my left and state your name and address. And remember, you have three minutes to speak. Having none, I declare this public hearing closed. Agenda related public comments, Mr. Jones.

Okay, if you would like to speak to Mayor or Council about anything that's on tonight's agenda, please come to the podium to my left. If you have not, please sign in the sign-in sheet with your contact information. If you do speak, please state your name and your address, and please keep it at three minutes or less. Thanks.

Move right along. Next item is the adoption of the consent agenda. Does any council member wish to remove any item from the consent agenda and address it as part of our regular agenda? Having none, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented? So moved.

Second.

There is no discussion.

I know we did that last time, but Mr. Allen and I were looking at the ordinance. It's not debatable on the consent agenda vote.

Just for your knowledge. All right.

Call the roll, Mr. Jones. Ms. Holmes.

Aye.

Ms. Whatley.

Aye.

Mr. Beings. Aye. Mr. Raut. Aye. Mr. Allen. Aye. All voted aye to approve the consent agenda.

Resolutions, Mr. Treece.

Thank you, Mr. President. Good evening, everyone. First resolution is to approve the revocation of the business license at 501 Geneva Street, Suites 3 and 4.

Is there a motion for approval?

So moved.

We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Having none, call the roll, Mr. Jones. Ms. Holmes.

Aye. Ms. Watley. Aye. Mr. Beams. Aye. Mr. Raut. Aye. Mr. Allen.

Aye.

All voted aye.

Resolution number two is for a weed abatement assessment at 401 W.E.

Morton Avenue. Is there a motion for approval? So moved. I have a motion and a second. Is there any? Second.

Okay.

Any discussion? Having none, call the roll, Mr. Jones.

Ms. Holmes. Aye. Ms. Whatley. Aye. Mr. Beans.

Aye. Mr. Routt. Aye. Mr. Allen. Aye. All voted aye. Thank you.

Ordinances, Mr. Treece.

We got one more. We got one more, I'm sorry.

Resolution number three is for a weed abatement assessment at 510 India Road.

Is there a motion for approval? So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

Any discussion? Having none, call the roll, Mr. Jones. So moved.

Aye. Ms. Whatley? Aye. Mr. Bean?

Aye.

Mr. Rauch?

Aye. Mr. Allen? Aye.

All voted aye.

Now, ordinance, Mr. Treece. Ordinance number one and the only ordinance tonight is an ordinance to amend the text of the zoning ordinance regarding the regulation of hemp stores in Opelika. This is for first reading.

I would like to ask a member of the council to introduce this ordinance for first reading.

My pleasure.

Thank you very much. Second, roster of public comments, Mr. Jones. If you'd like to speak to the mayor and council about anything else, please call the party to my list.

Please sign the signing sheet.

Contact info. If you do speak, please state your name and your address. Please keep the three minutes for lists. Say that five times fast. I mean, you can speak about, you know, you can't speak about that business particularly because we already like the license revocation. So because we already addressed it in the public hearing.

Good evening. My name is Justin Foster. I live at 728 McDonald Drive in the city. you thank you for for being here and thank you for your service to the city's mayor council uh i'm coming to talk about waverly woods that project that's going on right directly behind my house it is frightening just how ramshackle it's running there's dust everywhere cars houses covering that fine red dust that everybody's calling in complaining about But my biggest concern is the explosive blasting that's going on back behind it. I have called the city, the city building department, the city engineering department, the battalion chief for the fire department. I've called just about everybody I think I could. I called Lee twice, three times, three times. about this, trying to get information, trying to get a blasting schedule, trying to get how much they're blasting, how much they're using back there, what safety techniques they're going to use, if they're airing a siren, if they're following the regulations, if they're even licensed. I don't even know who the developer is. Nobody can tell me who the developer is back there. I know the blasting company is WR Walden because it's pasted on the side of the drill. That blasting is within 250 feet of my back porch. within 200 feet of my shed, I have had a survey crew come out. Now, that's required by law. But do you think that they would send that out if it wasn't required by law? No, they wouldn't. I don't know when they're going to set it off. I have two kids under five. I've got a four-year-old almost and a six-month-old. And I've got a wife who doesn't want them around when they blast because I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know if it's going to destroy my shed. I don't know if it's going to break my foundation. Damage my house? That house is a substantial investment. And I can't get a single iota of information about what they're doing. Nobody seems to know. The city engineer treated it like a complaint call. Wouldn't even let me speak at first. I introduced myself. I told him where I live. And that was it. He was like, oh, you're the fifth one. Okay, the fifth one what? I said I was just calling for information. I was calling to find out when. So what will it be? Is the city going to be transparent about whether they have permits, what they're doing, how they're blasting? You can contact me. I've left my number with the city building department, the city engineer, the fire chief, everybody. Call me. Call me anytime. That's it.

Good evening. My name's Maddie Clark. I live at 706 Orchard Avenue. We're going to have to bring this thing down. I'm here to ask about last year, I think before you became mayor, it was a talk about putting a walking trail over there at Covington Recreation Center. I haven't heard anything about that. Are y'all thinking about doing that? Is that in the ocean? We're going to get the walking trail over there at Covington, which would be very nice to have us over there. So if somebody would contact me and let me know if we're going to have that. The second thing, the city came and took down the sign that says not to put trash there, but they said it was going to come and put a better sign because my neighbor was having a fit. They haven't come put that sign up yet, but I'm not complaining about that until I come to the next city council meeting. If they hadn't put it back then, I'm going to complain about that then. But the grass over there on running off of that trailer lot, they've stopped cutting it. So I'm going to need somebody to cut that grass. Thank you very much.

My name is Bill Cantrell. I live at 709 McDonald Drive in Opelika. And I'm here to talk about the development that's going on behind McDonald Drive as well. I can't begin to tell you how upset all of us are over there at what's going on. The dust. of every single tree on probably 50 acres of land over there is incredible, especially when the wind blows. I live probably 300 yards from him down the other way. And our house, our cars, it gets covered in dust. We never got any notice that there was going to be blasting. Last week, I was sitting in the living room and all of a sudden they blasted. I had no idea that they were going to do it. It shook my house and I'm that far away from there. I can't imagine what they're going through and the people that are really affected by this. We've got babies in the neighborhood. One of my questions is who is responsible for telling the developer that he needs to have water trucks out there watering down that dust so it doesn't stir up. Those houses are covered. Those back porches and their furniture and their outdoor electronics are just, it's amazing. I don't know if any of y'all been out there and looked at it, but it's disgusting. It is. I can't, I can't believe that they've allowed this to go on that long and they've got so much more site prep to do. It's unbelievable. Uh, the other question I have is what time Are they allowed to start work? And what time are they supposed to stop? We have an Auburn policeman that lives right up the road right next to you. And he said that he gets up, he hears them out there at four or five in the morning working on their equipment. We left at 20 minutes till six to come over here. They're still working. They'll work till 6.30, 7 o'clock at night. And they start working at 6, 6.30. I mean, that's ridiculous. We just need some answers. Well, I'm not going to go into that, but if there's going to be 117 houses put in that space back there, that's usually two cars per house. That's 230-something cars that's going to be coming in and out of that one access out of that subdivision. And they have cleared all the way up to all their property lines. There is not a tree left out there, even on people's property lines. And it's disgusting what's happening out there. I can't believe that y'all even approved them to let them have this subdivision. It's disgusting.

Please sign in the sign-in sheet so I have your contact info, so if they want to get in touch with you, they can, okay? Please? Okay. Is this for him speaking?

Yeah, so the five council sign, we made one for the mayor, too.

Okay. The mayor already

That's a hard time saying. Sorry.

I like this. Uh-oh.

Hold on. Sorry. I'm sorry.

Go ahead. My name is Robert Smith, and I live at 465 Windsor Drive in Opelika. I've got two comments. The first one, I'm 100% disabled veteran, and I'm really appalled that there's no enforcement of handicapped parking anywhere in the city. And when you need a handicapped spot, you need a handicapped spot, not to see some youngster jumping out of their car and running in the public. And that's it. Second item, City Church of Opelika subdivided their land solely involved the tree line that is a required landscape buffer. The legal description of the parcel sold to Julian Batten Perez and his daughter is Unit 1, B.C. Church and Condominium Association, Plat 67, Lying on Lot 1, City Church Subdivision, Plat 49-39, Section 11, T19NR26E. Big mouthful. The fact that the parcels are all part of the City Church condominium plat is a zoning loophole. Like the buffer that runs with the land, not the owner. I have required landscape buffer on my property and that does not go away when I sell. The parcel being a condominium plat gave Mr. Perez easements to the existing utilities. Mr. Perez gets to use the church's property to build a driveway. and not use the required buffer. In December, Mr Perez workers were cutting down trees in the buffer and stated he was taking out trees to put in a driveway. Around the same time, the church built a large building without a water mitigation plan. We alerted Matt Mosley to the tree removal, and the worker continued to cut down trees in the buffer with a huge building, and it created an extreme watershed problem for four or five houses, mine included. My neighbor Jack filed a formal complaint with the city's storm management, which went ignored. In April, we met with Mr. Whatley or Ms. Whatley after he cut down an entire buffer behind the house and she facilitated a meeting with city officials on June 12th, 2026. They all said the buffer was required and they would handle it. He was still cutting down trees as of yesterday. The drainage issue is severe and costly to all of us at Windsor Drive as well as totaling construction. It's not been resolved. A tremendous amount of water and mud floods into our yards and several properties from the storm sewer and my front street gutter every time it rains. Putting a 400-foot driveway where a natural buffer used to be will devastate our properties with water. Mr. Perez has done all of this without a plan, a permit, a water mitigation plan, or City Council planning approval. City Church is currently in violation of their required buffer, and I believe it's a deed restriction like mine as well as a zoning requirement. Yesterday, Jack met with Matt Mosley, and he agreed to issue a stop work order. Now it's time to hold the church and Mr. Perez accountable. The buffer needs to be restored, and I'm asking the city to close the church parking lot until they can restore the buffer and get back into compliance and produce a plan to mitigate our water issues. Thank you. There's two maps. One shows the very thin strip of land. They're trying to put a road all the way to the back and that is 25 to 30 feet wide. And if you have a 25 foot required buffer, there's no room for a road. We suggested earlier that it be an easement on the church's property instead of taking out our required buffer. And the last page, it shows what it used to look like two years ago. And it's most of those trees where it says home, that's my house. Most of those trees are now gone.

OK. Good evening, Mayor, council members. I'm Gina Cantrell. I live at 709 McDonald Drive. And I'm here on behalf of myself and several households affected by the excavation occurring directly behind our neighborhood for the Waverly Woods project. The ongoing site prep has produced significant red clay dust storms.

for weeks.

Heavy equipment continuously moves dirt, creating airborne particles that settle on homes, vehicles, air conditioning units, and outdoor electronics. This is not a minor inconvenience. It is an environmental and public health concern. Residents with respiratory conditions cannot safely go outside and families with newborns and school-aged children are increasingly worried about the health and the effect of this dust. No one is taking responsibility for this. There are no dust control measures in place. I have videos and pictures to prove this point of these dust storms being in the air. It is standard practice when excavating large tracts of land to wet the surface before operating heavy earth-moving equipment. This basic dust control measure is not being used at this site. The lack of mitigation has allowed this problem to escalate to a level that threatens both public health and property. Additionally, the unannounced blasting at this site is causing strong vibrations in our homes and many concerns. Families closest to the blasting zone are worried about structural damage, such as maybe pipe breaking, or foundation cracks. We're not opposing the development. We're just asking for immediate enforcement of responsible excavation practices. We need dust control measures in place now. We need oversight of blasting activities. And we need communication so residents are not left guessing. about what is happening in their own backyards. This situation is urgent, and it is affecting families every single day. We respectfully ask the council to intervene and protect the well-being of the citizens of Boca Leyva.

The character trait word of the month is dedication, a self-sacrificing devotion and loyalty. And with that being said, I will now entertain a motion to adjourn.

So moved.

Second. Call the roll, Mr. Jones. So moved. Aye. Mr. Watley. Aye. Mr. Bean. Aye. Mr. Rell. Aye. Mr. Allen. Aye. Meeting's adjourned.