City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to all. This Pocosna City Council work session is called to order. Tonight's topic is a refresher training on the Freedom of Information Act, otherwise known as FOIA, and the Conflict of Interest Act, otherwise known as COIA.

City Attorney, Mr. Wayne Moore.

But before I turn the floor over to him, I'd like to extend a special welcome to Mr. Steve Geisinger. Steve is the Vice Chair of our Planning Commission and also running unopposed to a seat on City Council in the Central Precinct. And his term will take effect on January 1st of 2027. Steve, thank you for coming out tonight. Glad to have you with us. And with that being said, I'll turn the floor over to Mr. Moore.

So we can make this a very simple presentation. I've given each of you the current edition from VML of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, the Virginia Conflict of Interest Act, and the Virginia Public Records Act. Read that, and you'll know everything you need to know about how to comply. Basically, all I'm going to do is get a couple of the high spots. I'm not an expert on this. I will tell you, like most people, when a question comes up about this, you go back to the book that I've given you. Because what started out to be a very simple concept has gotten to be very complex. The simple complex is public business is carried out in a public way. So you're dealing with the public. It's supposed to be an open meeting. It's supposed to be all of the rules that we follow to hold a public meeting. And when it's not a public meeting, there's a whole series of fairly detailed exceptions that you must fall under in order to go into closed session. start on, I just go through my notes in no particular order. The purpose of the act is to ensure that there's a public meeting. The public's business is carried on in an open forum with discussions and votes so that the public can know what's going on. One of the recent new things is this requirement that there be periodic training for the city council as well as some of the staff. And the city appoints a official to be in charge of the FOIA request, and that person also helps with keeping the staff up to date on what's going on. So the general rules deal with, number one, the meeting and what you have to do to have a meeting. You have to have notice of a meeting. We give notice. And you can give notice in a newspaper. You give notice on our web page so that the public knows when the city council is going to meet. And we have an agenda so that the public will know exactly what is going to be brought up and what's going to be discussed at that meeting. One of the things that we run into from time to time is you give the notice, the date of a meeting, the time, the location, and that type of thing. But if that meeting is carried over, if it's continued to another date, And we must give the public notice of the same by sort of the same kind of notice that we did before. You can't just carry over the meeting till tomorrow morning and the public doesn't know what's going on. So you have to keep the public informed. And the basic foundation is that all meetings are public meetings and the rules of what constitutes a public meeting ought to be liberally construed so that it is a public meeting. In other words, if you're looking at an exception, you construe the exception on a very narrow basis rather than a very broad basis. One of the questions that comes up about a public meeting is, What is a meeting? What constitutes a public meeting? And I'm just going to read you this explanation. It says, this is on page four, what is a meeting? The city and town council meetings, county board meetings, Many meetings of a public body are certainly meetings regarded by the act. Like the definition of a public body, the definition of a meeting is broadly construed under the section, under the code statement. It is intended to capture any meetings where public business is transacted or discussed, not just transacted, but all discussed. Please note that the definition was amended last year. A council work session is also a meeting, as is any other informal assemblage of as many as three members of a public body, if or for quorum. And it says that where public business is discussed. So if three of you get together at Pocos and Donna, and you want to have a cup of coffee, have breakfast, talk about your city business, that's public meeting. You have to give notice of it, and you have to let the public know that you are meeting to discuss public business. That means you can't have breakfast and have coffee. You just can't discuss and deal with public business in that informal way. It says, a gathering of council members does not create a meeting if public business is not discussed or carried out, and the gathering was not called for the purpose of doing public business. So the definition of meeting includes a gathering of three or more members of a public body to discuss public business. It can be a social gathering. But if you're going to discuss public business, then you're going to be subject to FOIA. So it's a pretty broad definition of what constitutes a public beating. The other part is, if three members of a council meet on their own to discuss or act on government business, that creates a council meeting for the purpose of FOIA. And even if it's not considered a meeting under local rules. So that goes back to having coffee together and discussing anything to do with the business. Then we have to give notice. The notice must state the date, the time, and location of the meeting. It must be posted at least three days before the date of the meeting is to take place. Then you can have special emergency meetings. which don't have to have the three-day notice. But if you recall, when we've had those special meetings, we go back and we ratify. In a public way, we ratify what was done in that special meeting and make it part of the city records for the purpose of the public knowing what we did on an emergency basis. And it comes up like a hurricane type of thing. There are rules about electronic meetings. That was close. You cannot have a totally electronic meeting. If city council adopts rules dealing with public meetings, then one of the members can participate in a public meeting. by remote electronic means. But it can't be that the whole meeting is conducted electronically. It has to be public meeting, public place, with the public knowing what's going on.

Did that change since COVID?

It has been generally. I know before COVID, you couldn't. As a result of COVID, they put in some special exceptions for that. And I believe we have adopted the ordinances in order to permit a member to be present for a meeting. That code section has expired. The total meeting part no longer exists. That was a special exception. It says public bodies may hold meetings where one or more members participate by electronic means as long as a quorum of members are present at the public meeting. So it has to be a quorum present. Undervoting. So it says that all members, all votes must be publicly made. In other words, you can't go into closed session and have a vote and then come back out and announce we had a vote. You can, in a closed session, have a straw vote. In other words, the mayor can vote. poll each one of you and ask you your position on whatever the subject matter is. But you can't take the official vote until you come back in, reconvene from the closed session, and actually have the formal vote. Because the straw vote is not a formal vote. Then we deal with the closed session. When you can have a closed session, under what circumstances? So there are primarily eight matters that can generally be discussed in closed session. And I'm not going to try to go through the details of each one. But personnel matters can be discussed in closed session. Real property acquisition or disposition, because if you discuss all of the The contract terms and all of the things that are being considered in a public way, you could very well damage the city's ability to negotiate and complete a contract, either to sell or buy real estate. So that's one of the exceptions that you can go into closed session for. Then the privacy of an individual that comes up because of public business, you can have that in closed session. Some of you will remember, I know Bud will, and so will Carrie, that when we put in the sewer system, we had a number of people who qualified to have the cost waived because of their financial condition. And we were allowed to consider that in a closed session. It was personal information that the public didn't need to know about. And it was personal and private information to the citizen who was coming before us at that point in time. So those kinds of things are satisfactory for a closed session. The prospective location of a new business or the expansion or a new business coming into the community. That can be discussed in closed session. Consultation with legal counsel pertaining to actual or probable litigation. You can discuss with your attorney. You don't have to discuss in public the position that you're going to take on some type of legal controversy or some type of legal question that would come up. So you can go into closed session to consult with an attorney. Issues regarding tourism, you can go into closed session for that. And award of a public contract involving the expenditure of public funds. I don't ever remember us having to worry about that exception, but some cities, they make certain concessions and certain benefits to a new business or business coming in, and then They get some financial incentive to do that, and those kinds of things can be discussed. There are a couple of attorney general opinions that have caused some difficulty. says that in an opinion issued December 16, 1998, Attorney General opined that a council may not hold a closed meeting to discuss employees who are not directly employed by the council. So you understand there's only three people that are directly responsible to you, myself, the clerk, and the manager. So that opinion would say that you can't do that. I will say that most of the government attorneys that I know and who represent cities take the position that you can discuss those issues because The manager is making the decision, but the manager has a right to know what your position is about those decisions. And so it has been, I would say, the custom in every place I know of that you can discuss those personnel matters in a closed session. And the general rule is because an attorney general's opinion is only an opinion. It is not the law. It's not a court decision dealing with for you. And then all these various exceptions have rather lengthy subparts to them, which, again, I don't want to go through each one of those with you. But, for example, under real property, it says for the acquisition of land for public purpose or disposition of publicly held land, but only if discussing the matter in open session could harm the council's bargaining position. So you don't have a right to go in closed session just because you're dealing with real estate. There has to be that there's some aspect of it that would affect the bargaining position of the city council and deciding how they should resolve the situation. Again, new businesses coming in. It's a fine line between what you discuss in public and what you don't want to give away your bargaining position. And you don't necessarily want to give away the perspective businesses positioned because they may be dealing with several localities and they also may not want it to be all public business. They won't deal with you unless you're willing to discuss these kinds of things in a closed session. If the public official or the official of the business makes a public statement about the business coming to the locality, then all bets are off. Now it's public. If somebody from the city or somebody from the prospective business announces, oh, we're looking at coming to Pocosin and do this, that, and the other, now it's no longer subject to a closed session. It has to be dealt with all in public. The legal aspect of it, as we talked about, is actual litigation, if you are actually involved in litigation. But also, if there is a threat of litigation or a probability of litigation, you have a right to get legal advice so you know how you should proceed, how you should answer questions, how you should, if you get, you know, you get asked questions about it during public session or if you get the newspaper decides to answer some questions, you need to know that there is a way to know the correct process that you go through so that you don't endanger the city's position on some potential legal matter the and then if there is a specific legal matter that requires you to ask your attorney about. It's not possible litigation or something that could likely happen, but there is a specific legal issue the counsel is facing. You can certainly have a closed session to consult with the attorney in order to get the proper course of action for you to take. Some of the other things that create problems and lawyers love emails, text messages, all the kind of things that you do is a knee-jerk reaction without thinking what you're saying or thinking what it means or what somebody else gets to read that and what they think. If you are discussing public business It doesn't matter whether it's on your private cell phone, your computer, or whatever device that you use and you discuss public business, it can be subject to discovery and FOIA. So I would urge all of you that you should have a device that you conduct your public business on. You should not be conducting any discussions about public business on a private device. Because it's not going to be private if you do. And it's going to be subject to disclosure. And I will say, and I think all of you know this, when you're sitting at home in front of the computer or texting on your cell phone, It's an unguarded moment. And you may say something that really you didn't mean it the way it came out. And you may go back later on and retract it or make an apology or whatever. But it's going to be taken out of context. And it's going to be used against you if you're involved in any type of litigation or public dispute. So just remember that the emails and the text messages if you're transacting to public business, the ownership of the device does not matter. It's public business being discussed.

Wayne, can I have one point? Absolutely. Another thing to remember is that You receive a lot of email and things like that. It's not just your communication. It's communication to you as well. So if you have a friend or a constituent that likes to use otherwise private thinking kind of language, you need to really say to them in the future, please remember that all your correspondence are potentially subject to public disclosure. I saw that in another locality, someone, a citizen, used language and said things that he really didn't appreciate when they were published on the front page of the paper, but when he chose to engage the elected official, that became fair game there. So if you have folks that do that, you may just want to gently remind them that there may be a broader audience someday.

So that's fine. In the materials I gave you, there is an extensive list of the exemptions. And all I've done is just touch the fact that there's an exemption. But I haven't made any effort to go into the details because it's almost always factual based. If a question comes up, whether or not you're entitled to a closed session, you meet one of the exemptions, it really needs to be looked at and just make sure that you comfortably fit within the exceptions that the law permits. And as I said when I first started out, this started out to be a very simple law. You conduct a public business in a public way. And all of these exceptions and exemptions have developed over a long period of time because That just didn't work. I mean, some business is not to be conducted that way. All I can tell you is, when I have the question, I almost always pull this book out and go looking and reading the exceptions to make sure that I'm up on top of what's going on and what the most recent local exceptions are and what I know is permitted. And you know that with FOIA, then the public is able to come to the city and say they want copies of certain items, certain documents. The city is obligated to produce those. And if you have them on your device, the city is obligated to come to you and say, you've got to produce them. Well, you may not like it, but you're going to have to produce those items in order to satisfy the city's obligations.

I have a question about that, Wayne. Most all of us, I think, use our personal computers to read the email. If somebody sends us a note or something, we receive it in the city's mail from the city's the city's mail. And any response that we make, it goes back to the city's mail. And neither the receiving of the information nor the response to that information resides in my computer. It resides only in the city's email account. Now, does the fact that I received it and sent back a message about it to the city's email system, does that make my computer

I think it does, yes. And I think that the answer to producing it is that the city preserves those items within the city system. You have an obligation to preserve city business in your devices that you use.

I only preserve city information on the city's web page. I cannot take my computer and find any of the information that I've received or sent on my computer because it's all in the city's email.

If it's not on your computer, you can't produce it. But that doesn't mean that you don't have obligation to preserve your records.

Well, I mean, I'm preserving it, but I'm preserving it in the city system.

As long as that will meet the definition of preserving it, which I don't know the answer to that, it's preserved. But I know that the law says that you, as a council member, a public official, have an obligation to preserve the public business. And we'll talk with that.

But if I preserve it in the city system, is that considered preserving?

I don't know the answer to that. If you ask me for an off-the-cuff answer, I would say no. But it's just an off-the-cuff answer.

I would have to copy everything the city sent me and keep a copy of it? You have to preserve it.

You can preserve it electronically.

Can I jump in? Sure. If you send an email, a copy of it lives on our server. That is absolutely correct. If you delete the email, then we begin to have potential issues. What would happen typically if we get a FOIA request, which we do periodically, and they're looking for your email, we would look first for you to go through your system and search it. Because you have access to your account, we don't. We can work around that, but by good practice, we don't go into other people's emails except

If I was asked to show my response to a particular thing, I would have to go to the city system to get it. Yes, sir. My personal opinion is that I've saved it in the city system. I do not have it in my computer. I've got to come to the city to get it.

I would agree with that.

It's under your control. As long as it's under your control, then you can retrieve it.

But I'm retrieving it from the city system.

You don't have to keep it on a thumb drive in your system, but you have to have it under your control where you can get to it and show me what you've done.

Then my mailbox is my preservation place. Yes, sir. Okay.

My question is, this is governance, but governance then leads to perhaps a policy that tells us how this city... that need so that every time we don't have , we have one. And we have to go over, OK, how are we doing this? How do you want it to come to you? And so on. If it was make PDFs of your emails, save them with the name and the date of the subject line, whoever the person is, and send it into the clerk for storage, is that what we need to develop a policy so that when FOIA requests come, we don't have to keep reinventing the wheel. And by policy, I don't mean policy. I mean direction.

City's not going to be keeping what's on your cell phone or what's on those other personal devices, only what's on your email from the computer. Right.

Right. You know, part of that procedure is don't conduct city business on your cell phone. Don't, if someone writes you a message on your Gmail, direct them to send it to your city account. Go from there.

I mean, I think we could put together a basic document that might be helpful.

Formalized to death. But I think having that standard, and then we feel what we need to do.

Yeah, I understand what you're saying. I would also note that while I think Wayne's given extremely good advice, but AN UCTO CITY BUSINESS CAN ALSO BE SOCIAL MEDIA. SO IF YOU ACCESS SOCIAL MEDIA ON YOUR PHONE, AND ANY OF THAT DISCUSSION RELATES TO CITY BUSINESS, THAT IS POTENTIALLY DISCOVERABLE AS WELL. IT WILL GET HARDER AND HARDER AND HARDER TO BUILD THOSE KINDS OF .

THE OTHER ASPECT OF THIS WAS THE CONFLICT OF INTEREST ACT. And the Conflict of Interest Act is not complicated. If you have a financial interest, you have to disclose it. You can't vote. And then you have to file your annual disclosure form. As councilman, each year you have to file a disclosure form of your financial condition on the forms provided by the Commonwealth. The last thing is when you leave city council and this is bud the records that you have you've accumulated those records are supposed to be served and turned over to the city so if you have files paperwork things that you have preserved as part of the job of being acidic And when you are no longer a city councilman, you're supposed to turn those papers over to the city so they can be preserved by Virginia State Library for people to see what wonderful votes you made.

Well, in that case, to make that very clear, because Carrie and I are both in the same situation, when I leave city council, then do I make my...

city email public to the city because it's all there can i speak to that way absolutely we'll continue to maintain an email archive you don't i think what wayne's talking about is handwritten notes copies of reference documents i do not keep any handwritten notes the only information i have is in the city system

If you have those records in your files, you need to turn those over to the city when you leave city council. That's the only other thing I would point out. All the years that I've been the city attorney, a lot of them, and we've had this discussion before, so the city charter, that says that you have a duty to vote. And we've had this discussion. It's been the policy of our council for as long as I can remember. And if you didn't attend the meeting, you abstained from the minutes. That is not a reason not to vote. In other words, the only reason you don't vote is because you have a conflict of interest. That means you have a financial interest in the subject matter. I know what the policy has been, but in complying strictly with the authorization from the state of Virginia to be a city in our charter, it says there's a duty to vote, and it can only be excluded by the council. In other words, if you're not going to vote, you have to disclose why you're not going to vote. Council gets to agree whether or not they're going to accept you not voting on the transaction. That's what the city charter says.

Okay, so if we did not attend the meeting and we do not know what was said, if I say, hey, I didn't attend the meeting and I don't know what was said and whether this is correct or not, so I'm not going to vote, that beats the rule?

As long as the council accepts it. Okay, go ahead.

But with the recording nowadays, that's really kind of superseded technology. You can look at the film.

What happens most often is the council member abstains, but they don't give a reason. So that reason may be a perfectly acceptable one. providing the reason is important and if I could add one thing to COIA council members know this but members of the public may not as the BMLs were kept you abreast of the legislative changes to the last General Assembly one of the changes pertaining to COIA IS THAT BEGINNING IN 2028, THE FORMS THAT WE ALL PUT TOGETHER, THAT INCLUDES ME, AND ARE ALWAYS AVAILABLE IN THE CLERK'S OFFICE WILL NOW ALSO BE MADE AVAILABLE IN THE MASTER STATEWIDE ELECTRONIC DATABASE FOR ALL ELECTED OFFICIALS AND ALL PERSONS WHO ARE SUBJECT TO ELECTED CRIMES BEGINNING IN JANUARY OF 2028.

That's all I had. My idea was to just refresh your memory, bring you up to date on what the requirements are so that you can protect yourself. You can certainly read further if you're concerned about any particular exception. The book, the email does a very good job. And it's a very good, concise summary of all the exceptions and all the requirements.

Randy, do we have a memory limit email?

Not to the best of my knowledge. It can always be expanded.

I tend to leave all emails because of FOIA things, but there are ones like phishing and invitations to go to things in South Dakota that I tend to delete.

Wayne may give you a different answer, but the answer I would give you is if If in common sense it pertains to public business, retain it. If it's advertising circular from Bass Pro, you do not. Unless we were actively working on a Bass Pro, you know, something like that. So Trojan. spam, ridiculous things that have nothing to do with City of Pocosna or City Business, you can get rid of those. If you have a question before you do it, we'll be glad to look at it. But if it pertains to City Business, retain it.

Thank you, Mr. Moore. Well done. Any other questions or comments for Mr. Moore? I did have two items I wanted to emphasize. I think with the availability of our audiovisual and the fact that meetings are recorded, I think it's reasonable that all council members make an effort to review the meetings so we can vote on the approval of the minutes without having to go into explanations and approval, things like that. And I remember back in 2011 when I had my first four-year training, Dr. Jennifer Parrish put great emphasis on the fact that even if three or more of us are gathered together and we're not discussing city business, we want to guard against the perception that we may be important to do that as well so need to keep that in mind.

Also, part of this is that emails, like if I send an email to Angie, Angie sends one to Carrie, that's not considered a meeting because it's not instantaneous. It's like a group phone call, which would be emails aren't.

We have a right to poll each other and discuss between each other. But you can't get together, the three of you, and we're going to decide how we're going to, you know.

I don't know what they call it now, but instant messaging and other things.

So there were localities that got themselves in trouble 20 years ago because they were essentially doing it in real time as opposed to doing an email. I send it to you, she thinks about it for 15 minutes and she gets her response.

That's different than a live conversation with three or four people.

Who is our FOIA representative?

Tanya serves as the local government's officer. Christy is the assistant. The only exception to that rule is for the police department. Police chief acts as the officer of the fire department. and the deputy chief does as well. Because there are certain things that they would have access to that we wouldn't normally have access to or even need to have access to. And they have the training to know what is publicly disposable and what's not.

Particularly with the police, where if you're in the middle of an investigation, how much you disclose to the public until the investigation is complete and you've gotten all acts together, it could ruin an investigation if you gave out certain information partly through the process. So the police particularly have some pretty touchy subjects when it comes to FOIA.

I remember from the VML training, having taken this before, was that if someone makes a Freedom of Information request, They don't have to say that's a freedom of information request. They can just basically ask the question and we treat it as such.

If they ask for information and they didn't say it was a freedom of information request, I would be inclined to respond and say I need to know the details of this request, what's the purpose, what you're looking for, what authority, you know, by what authority are you looking for. I would just assume that was a four-year if it didn't say it was a four-year request. I mean, I know that's a pretty liberal when people request information. We don't just turn them down, but I want a little bit of guidance on what they're looking for and what basis they're coming forward with.

I would agree with Wayne. I mean, he gets through it generally. So if somebody asks for something specific, we provide it as if it was a FOIA request. But I just want to indulge me for one minute. Someone asked a question. FOIA is for existing documents. It doesn't require the government to create documents, to summarize documents, or synthesize documents. So a question is not a FOIA request. A FOIA request is a specific request for documents, which can be electronic, but they don't have to be paper. But for existing documents.

Anything else from council members? Mr. Moore, Randy, thank you all very much. We'll adjourn the work session and take a very brief intermission so we can rearrange the council chambers. And we'll call the regular session meeting in just a few minutes. Thank you. Good evening and welcome to all. This Pocosin City Council regular session meeting is called to order. And I'd like to give a special shout out to our Assistant City Manager, Ms. Tanya O'Connell. She and her family are vacationing this week, and she couldn't be here tonight for that reason, so she's enjoying some well-deserved family time. So we miss you, Tanya, and knowing you like I do, I'm confident you're probably watching the meeting right now. So we look forward to seeing you again at the next meeting. Moving on to Item B on our agenda is the Invocation and Pledge of Allegiance, which will be led tonight by Councilwoman Dr. Jeannie Hubbard. Jeannie?

Please rise. Precious God, we give thanks tonight for the community we are privileged to serve, and especially for the men and women whose daily work keeps our city strong, safe, and cared for. Their dedication is often not shown in grand gestures, but in their steady service day after day. Grant us wisdom in our decisions, gratitude for those who serve alongside us, and a shared good of this community and all who call it home. Amen. to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you, Jeannie. Moving on to item C, we have a special presentation related to our new GIS system. from Civic Vanguard. And Randy is going to share some information with us related to that.

Mayor, I think Stephanie is going to come out and present this, I would say, as she's getting ready. We will be posting this video on our website. So if folks would like to reference it in the future, it'll be there for them.

Excellent. Thank you. Good evening, honorable mayor, vice mayor, members of city council. It's so nice to see you all here in this pouring rain. I'm not here to make a presentation myself tonight. I'm just introducing a short video outlining some of the new features being rolled out this summer by Civic Vanguard, our GIS provider. The video was produced for us by Jamie Christensen, the founder, CEO, and president of Civic Vanguard. So without further ado,

Hi, my name is Jamie Christensen, and I'm the founder of the city of Canberra. And we're the city's GI Center. And I'm excited to share with you tonight the city's new, popular web mapping for web editing. When you go to the site, you'll reach for some of the great pages, kind of a page that you can read to in terms of editions. And if it's your first time coming to the site, you get a quick tour of where you get a sense of where you can search for data, where you can run an advanced search, see research history, even search by voice. And now, a new capability, you can switch modes in the site where you can look at the data on the map, on a chatbot, or you can make self-selection. And finally, you can always click on the Help button at any time to ask questions or browse all of those. So, if I want to, I can just go to my search bar and start to type in an address. And it will bring back that information. So I'll find the 123 block of personality. And you can see how they can write summary information in the parcel. They can write history. with the ownership history, the assessment information, the proven data. And then, if I want, I can click on any of the data tasks here. So, for instance, I can see my elevation information for the property. I can create an exploded map. I can look at the data in EagleView and see if it's going to leak through it, or if it's going to switch to whatever it would be. And this just lets me get to lots of information. So, for instance, I can look at Google Maps and see this, and Google Maps as well. So, in any property, we just have a lot of information that's available. My export is complete, and this gives me a full property card export. So this is all the data in one PDF, including a map of that property. So this gives folks one-stop shopping for data from the city just by simply typing in an address and a name. As I mentioned, you can also use the map itself to navigate. So if I want to, I can just navigate out on the map, I can click on a JSON parcel that will bring up data for those parcels, and I can switch nodes. So right now, I'm in the map mode, but I can switch to the chat mode. And again, in my chat mode, I can ask questions. So in this case, I can say, well, show me the parcel sold last week for 500K, for more than half the apron size. And that question that I ask then is put into our chat box, and the result is correct. I can look at this here in the chat, I can also see this data on my map, and see the individual records. And then finally, I have this ability to look at the data in my table view. So this is like a spreadsheet view of the data that's available. I can read over my data, I can sort it, I can also export it out to a CSV if I want to. There are many, many capabilities in the map here, and there's lots of, if we go back to our map tools, there's lots of capabilities here. So for instance, I can see my base map, so I can say I'm going to look at my data, and then 2002, there I go. So this gives me the ability to look back in time and see what the data looked like in our previous year. But I can also swipe between my data. So here I am swiping between 2002 data and my data in 2025, so I can see how things have changed in the city by just using my swipe tool. There's so many tools that are available, and not enough time tonight to show them all to you, but I'm really excited to make this new capability part of what the city its stakeholders, and its citizens. In terms of next steps for us, Camaro will be making a link available on the existing site where folks can go and preview their capability. They can provide feedback and can collect that information so that within two to three weeks, we'll make the site available for general consumption. The old site will still remain available for a couple of weeks after that, but by the middle of September, we expect that some capability will be available for everyone in the city. And we're excited to bring this to you at no additional cost as part of our existing services for the city. As always, my team is available and excited to cover this process for the city, prepared to answer any questions, and really appreciate your opportunity to speak. Thanks so much, and have a great week.

Thank you all. I think the most exciting feature of this when I saw Jamie's presentation or when he made it to me, the demonstration, was the swiping tool because I could actually see the progression of the city over just the period of time that I've been here and in many, many years past. I think our earliest aerial photography though is probably around 2002. You've got to not swipe any further back than that. Other than that, if you have any questions, please give my office a call, email me, or, of course, reach right out to Jamie. And with your questions, comments, criticisms, requests, necessities, because we want to make it the absolute best GIS system in the region. Thank you all.

Stephanie, thank you for your contributions to the presentation. And for all those that may not know, Ms. Stephanie Love is our city assessor. I'm very thankful to have her here in Pocosa working with us. So thanks again, Stephanie, for being here. Any questions or comments from council members?

I just like the fact you don't have to write in all capital letters anymore.

That's true.

Thank you, Keith. the other questions or comments from council members okay then we'll move on to item D which is the audience for this this time we will open the floor for public comment related to the city and I have one speaker card from mr. Kent awesome welcome Kent good to see you Doing good, thanks. And for all those that may not be aware, Kent is a retired Pocosin firefighter after 30 years, I believe. Yes, sir. Very good. Kent and I went to school together, played football together growing up. So got a pretty long history. So welcome. We're here to listen. Thank you. Glad to have you with us.

Yes, sir. My name again is Kent Lawson. I live at 117 Browns Neck Road, down at the left across from the railway. I was asked to come talk to speak to y'all tonight by my good friend, Mr. Hudson, the mayor. And he used the term the other night at the work session called geographic sustainability. And I think that says a lot for what I'm going to talk about tonight. It's not going to be a long presentation. Oh, I'm sorry. It will be a little bit better information on what I'm trying to get through to y'all. When I moved down to Browns Neck Road, 1986, 40 years ago, We didn't have the tide like we do now across our roads. You had several times a year where the tide would go across the road, and that was it. And everybody managed to get around it, and it was okay. Fast forward to Isabel, 2003, catastrophic storm, eight feet up to Chesapeake Bay in the city of Bocosa. I was working at the fire station. We were slammed with calls, trying to do our best in a bad situation, and luckily nobody got seriously hurt. And we obtained our objectives to get everybody and their property secure and everything went by. Three things that happened with Isabel that I noticed from this community. It brought the community closer together because everybody pitched in and helped the other one. Everybody's garage got cleaned out because most of the stuff got flooded. And the houses were raised, which was a good thing. There were programs and incentives to get the houses raised and everything. went well. The only thing that didn't happen was the roads didn't raise like the houses did. So now, with the way assessments and the way the crowds of people are coming in and coasting, you can't blame them because it's a great place. We have million dollar homes that you can't get to because of the tides across the road. So I talked to the city mayor, and I learned that the city was going to do a scheduled maintenance of Browns Neck Road coming up soon. So I said, now's the time to sail my pitch on getting the road raised. Time is everything. Everybody knows it. So he was a good old chap. I went down to his house, talked to him. He said, hey, I'll jump in the truck, follow you down there. Sat on the side of the road for about 45 minutes, had a great conversation. talked about what needed to be done, how I would do it if I was the one running the project, and he said, I'll get back with you. Now we looked at three areas. One of them was Browns Neck Road and West Sandy Point Drive. The next area was Browns Neck Road and Phillips Road. And then on down Phillips, Browns Neck Road to where my lane starts. And I said, what I would suggest, since we're paving it, is go ahead and add an additional layer up on top of the new stuff that you're putting down to give us several more inches of elevation. Now, you might not think that's much, but to us in a low spot, in a geographic sustainability area, it's a big deal. because no one likes to go through the tide. It's full-strength seawater. We live on the lower Chesapeake Bay, and everything that the seawater comes in contact to is corrosive and will destroy, just like the undercarriage of your truck or your car. So we looked at it. He said, I'll tell you what. First thing he does, he says, I want you to come and talk to city council and present just what you've told me and let them understand why you're here and give you a better idea of what I'm trying to accomplish. So he said, I'm going to get back with you. Now, I'll give him credit. He's one of the first people that I addressed this on numerous council and mayors before about this issue, and they said, hey, I'll get with you, and that was it. So he did his due diligence. He went and he called me and says, hey, I've got a meeting with the city manager, the engineering department, the public works director, and we're going to have a powwow and see what we can do to give you some cost on what it would do to see what you want to have done. He got back in a timely manner and said, hey, this is the cost of what we're going to do. He said, it's going to be additional $200,000 to upgrade the roads that you talked about, because we also have to raise the manhole covers with additional heights to get the roads up. Now, if you've driven down Browns Neck Road past Phillips Road, the road is sinking, and the manhole covers are three or four inches above the surface of the road. The mayor saw this. He said, hey, that's almost like a safety issue on that. When y'all reschedule, resurface the road, they're going to take the old stuff out, grind it out, and then they'll take and put new down up to where it is now. To do what I wanted to do, an additional layer would be extension of the manhole covers to get up enough height. I said, well, shoot. That ain't going to work. So he got back and says, hey, it's going to be $200,000. We don't have the money. I knew that was going to happen. Several times in my career, we have pitch sales to do things and projects, and money is the driven factor in any kind of locality. That's why I yell up here tonight to vote on every issue that comes across your desk. So I got riding around, I was saying, what can I say to these folks tonight to give a better understanding of what I'm trying to present. So I got riding around just Browns Neck, and there's 67 homes in one business that are affected when the tidal waters come across the road. Now, when I say tidal waters, I'm not saying a hurricane's coming, a tropical depression's coming. I'm just saying a full moon, a spring tide, a king tide winds out to northeast for two or three days. You have tidal water coming across the road. Nobody wants to drive through it. We have to. but we'd rather not to, okay? So that's what we're dealing with. Sea level's on the rise, there's nothing we can do about it. So what do we do? You can't wait any longer to not address it, because I'm up here talking to you about it tonight. Everybody I've talked to, yeah, we need to do something about it, but there's plenty of people that could be behind me now saying the same thing I'm telling you. So my thing to y'all is you need to establish some type of a geographic sustainability fund and put money in it in ear market for just these roads that are low. Now, Browns Neck's not the lowest, I mean, not one of the lowest spots. You got Messick Road, you got Ridge Road, you got the Pocosin Avenue. North Lawson Road and Browns Neck Road are in a competition to be the lowest spots in North America, and they're doing a pretty good job of maintaining that record because they're one of the two lowest spots in Pocosin. So if we can just, Take care of the home crowd. Everybody's planning for the future. I've listened to the planning commission, the economic development people. Everybody's interested to see what's going to happen across on Victor Boulevard. That's fine and dandy. But you can't forget the home crowd. You've got to take care of the people that have been here all their lives. and address this need. It's verified, it's warranted, it needs to be addressed, and you need to make sure it happens. Now, how you do it, you need money. Whether y'all raise the taxes, whether y'all go and borrow the money, I don't, to be honest with you, I don't care how you do it, but you gotta make it happen because we all like to get home when the tide's up and be in a great place called the coast. Thank you for your time.

Appreciate you being with us and sharing your comments.

I've moved on near Brownsnake Road, 86 also. Yes, sir. And every time you get a really good rain or wind, he says it's exactly correct.

There is no doubt. Yes, sir. No doubt. Do we have any other speakers tonight? Okay, we will close the floor for public comment, and we'll move on to item E, approval of the minutes of the work session of July 13th, 2026. Do we have a motion and a second?

Mr. Mayor, I move we approve the work session by 13th of 2026. Thank you.

Any questions or comments? Christy, call for a vote, please.

Councilman Southall?

Aye.

Councilman Freeman?

Aye.

Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Councilman Fye? Aye. Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Mayor Hooks?

Aye.

Mr. Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of 7-0.

Thank you, Christy. Do we have a motion and a second to approve the minutes of the regular session of July 13, 2026?

Mr. Mayor, I propose we approve the work session of July 13, 2026.

Regular session, you said.

Regular session, I'm sorry.

Second.

Thank you. Any questions or comments? Christy?

Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Councilman Fye?

Aye.

Councilman Southall?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Councilman Freeman? Aye. Mayor Hooks?

Aye.

Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of seven to zero.

Thank you, Christy. Moving on to item F. This is a public hearing. related to a resolution authorizing the city manager to execute an amendment to the lease with American Tower for the cell tower located at the Public Works compound, which is tax map parcel 19-01-00-0210. And at this time, we will open the public hearing. City Manager Randy Wheeler is going to share some information with us related to this topic. We'll have an opportunity for council members to make comments, ask questions, and then we will open the floor for public comment.

Randy? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The item before you is a simple modification, and what I mean by that is the modification itself can be explained in one paragraph. This pertains to the tower that we have at the public works yard. It is currently under lease through 2038. The company that manages the tower and its lease with us, American Tower, has requested that we entertain a change to the lease. I would tell you that we hear from them annually usually about this. What they have been doing is each year they go through the leases that they have that have peculiar or extra to market terms. And they make the rounds, seeing if anybody is willing to make a modification. The issue there is that the cell towers are consolidating, the carriers are consolidating, and this is just one reason that we get on their radar screen and i believe it's the only reason we get a little bit more than fifty thousand dollars per year in annual rent it's essentially divided into two pieces the basic ground rent which is what we're talking about in the change and then we get a percentage of the lease revenue when they lease it to additional users on the tower so So for the base rent, the way the current lease is structured is every five years, the base rent resets by 20%. What they're asking you to consider is to replace the once every five-year change of 20% to an annual change of 2%. This would be more in line with what is typical in the market and would get us off that yearly refresh list. I can't guarantee that they will stay through 2038, but I do believe that it is more likely that they will if we can agree to this modification. You certainly do not need to agree to this modification, but it is here for your consideration.

Thank you, Randy. Questions or comments from council members?

This tower isn't related to the other two towers in town.

It's just always one of them.

You said that you do not agree with it, or you do?

I didn't hear you well. I'm sorry. What I said is you certainly don't need to approve it. It's not an earth-shattering thing. I do think it's a good idea. This $50,000-plus worth of revenue stream, it may not seem like a lot, but every $50,000 is important to a community of our size, as Mr. Lawson just attested to.

Randy and I have talked about this quite a bit, and it looks like a no-brainer to me. So it's something that I intend to support.

It's a recurring requirement. We've done it for years. Yes, sir.

I have a question, Randy. And I don't know if you can answer this question, but maybe you can connect me with someone who can answer it. I am. I just need to know things. They have three tenants on the tower. They've got the City of Newport News. Pocosin and T-Mobile. And Pocosin is for our 911, or for the York County 911 call center. Do we know how many tenants those towers can typically hold? And that would be their business, right?

I do not know the answer to the first question. And the second one is yes, ma'am, you're correct. I can certainly find that answer for you, but I can't. I'm not a tower engineer, not anywhere close.

I didn't know if you knew. I'm curious just because, you know, City of Newport News is kind of an outlier in my mind when we talk to our county in Hampton. and I was wondering why they don't. Obviously you can't answer that question either, because there's no reason to expect you could. Those are some things I'm just curious in, and what type of efforts do they make to make these towers attractive to other communities that border us that could be interested in it, because we do share in the revenue that is generated by having tenants, and it just sounds like three is a few. Like, no one's trying real hard.

I do not know the answer to that question. I will endeavor to find it out for you.

Anything else from council members?

All right.

Very well. At this time, we will open the floor for public comment, since this is a public... Seeing none, we will... for a vote after which we will close a public hearing. Do we have a motion and a second?

Mr. Mayor, I propose a resolution authorizing the city manager to execute an amendment to the lease with American Tower for Cell Tower located at Public Works Compound, tax mail partial 19-01-00-0210. Second.

Thank you. Christy?

Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Councilman Fai?

Aye.

Councilman Southall? Aye. Councilman Freeman?

Aye.

Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Mayor Hux?

Aye.

Mr. Mayor, the motion is carried by a vote of seven to zero.

Thank you, Christy. At this time, the public hearing is closed, and we will move on to item G, new business. We have two topics. The first topic is a resolution of the Council of the City of Pocosin, Virginia, directing the public notice be given of the Council's intention to approve a lease agreement for 17 Park Street and receive bids for said lease. And Randy has some comments for us related to this.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of council. This is a tad awkward, so I'm going to explain it. And what makes it awkward is there are specific Code of Virginia sections that deal with disposition of public property. And you'll recall from past instances, the first official step is you all authorize a public hearing. and part of that you also uh... make public that you're going to be receiving steel beds that also applies to leases of an extended period this is under let's say three years are within my authority but beyond that only council can take us there and it requires the same process because it's a long-term interest in a piece of public property so you'll recall from your last meeting the folks from the big the league baseball came here and made a presentation to you in order to formally consider that This resolution is here. It would, if approved, begin the process that would create a public hearing on September the 14th. Between this day and that day, up to 4.30 on that day, any party wishing to make a bid for the lease can do so by sealed bid by handing it to the city clerk. On the evening of the 14th, at your meeting, the city clerk will open the sealed public bids, read them for the public's benefit and for yours, and immediately following that, we will have a public hearing to afford public input on that. Additionally, in rezonings and things like that, we have standard notice provisions. We don't have a standard notice provision in this case, but we will be sending letters this week to all the adjacent properties, including the schools, but all those properties that sort of back up. to either the fence line of the baseball complex or share a fence line with the back side of the football complex. So we'll make sure that everybody is aware of the public hearing coming up in case they've got anything they want to share. And just a reminder to council, the public bids come in. They're open. They're read. They have a public hearing. You are not required to move forward at that point. It's not one of those. uh the the highest bidder wins the the process it's not that at all you get to decide what what if any additional use on that property you have previously shared with you is a draft lease prepared by mr. Moore if you have questions about that I'm sure he can answer them but this is to provide an example to the public so they can see what we're talking about here so that it's not It's not a mystery. It's articulated right here. So with that, I'll stop talking, and I'll be glad to answer questions. And if you have at least questions, again, Mr. Moore, I'll be your best person on that.

Thank you, Randy.

Mr. Freeman? Just to be clear, and for folks that may not remember, last council meeting has been a whole month. This is for the little league to put a batting cage on a ball field, is that correct?

It is a building inside which they will use it at times as a batting cage, but also a pitching cage and just a training facility. Just wanted to remind everybody that that was. And likely storage as well. Thank you.

Got some questions about 20. Is there a similar lease agreement for other field facilities at that location? No, sir. So when they mentioned that they have four buildings down there currently, they're not leasing anything?

The agreement that we have with Little League on the concession stand is different than this because we own the building. was a condition of our participation the requirement was once they received the occupancy that it would transfer to us it was not a long-term lease we have an MOU with them the other buildings and maybe those are storage buildings right we don't have a specific agreement I don't know Okay. Because we have not required that for the sheds that the Little League organizations have used throughout the city on our property. We could if that's the council's direction.

In most cases, correct me if I'm wrong, the storage buildings like that are usually portable to where this building that will house a batting cage and possibly storage would be more permanent with a concrete floor. Yes.

Well, it was down there. The one that they were talking about was falling apart. It looks pretty permanent until the next big wind comes by, which may have just been about an hour ago. But I'm just curious as to how this one's different than those. So if somebody else makes a bid, they're basically having to make a bid to build an enclosed practice facility?

The issue at hand is to the potential use of that piece of property, they could abuse some other idea, what they wanted to do in terms of lease of that property.

Because this lease doesn't really specify any position on the property. It says it's 17 Parks Street.

That is correct. If the... council moves forward with the little leak proposal, they have already told you where they're going to put it and what it's going to look like. If you were to, after your September 14th process, say that's what you want to do, then Mr. Moore and I would work to include all the specific attachments. We took The original draft lease was crafted to show you what a Little League lease might look like. But taking it to the public and not wanting to say that the Little League had an unfair advantage to the point that no one else should bid, we made it more generic. A final lease will be very specific as to what they've offered and where they've offered it, and they'll be constrained to that.

This thing talks about an enclosed practice facility to support youth baseball and softball activities. And like we just mentioned, they also mentioned storage. Is storage considered an activity? Throwing it out there.

If they're putting something on your property as an activity for it, I'm concerned.

Talk about unreasonable interferes with her neighbor's properties or city facilities, including excessive noise, odors, vibration, lighter traffic. Who decides that?

We're going to decide it once you get to a final lease.

I understand that, but it has implications on what comes next.

If you want to propose something to be in a lease as a councilman, you have every right to do that.

I'm not asking for that. I'm just asking who would make that decision. You've had experience with this. I haven't. Please help me.

Who's going to make the decision is the city. I'm just advising as an attorney I drafted the language that I thought would protect the city's interest if the city Feels that there's some other item to be included then they have a right to do it This this is just a working document Does the building require a sprinkler system Safety wise I wouldn't think so maybe but I'm not I'm not your building official

We haven't even seen the building plans yet, so it's difficult to answer specific questions about theoretical building.

I understand. Theoretical building doesn't necessarily have to blend aesthetically with other buildings that are on the property.

It does not. However... Should City Council wish, following your September 14th process, to require them to, and this is not the right word, proffer specific elevations, they can do that. You can do that. If Council wishes to insert an ARB, Architectural Review Board requirement, you can do that as well. And those are not necessarily mutually exclusive. This is a straw man to begin. So to the extent that the lease provisions need to be fine-tuned, following receipt of the bid might be the best time to do that.

Okay. Just trying to put a little padding on the straw man. Any questions?

Just to verify, when it comes time, after we receive the bids and all that, the council can say, hey, 40 years, 30 years, 20 years, and with renewal options and lay all of that out.

Yes, ma'am. Should council give direction to the city attorney and I, we will incorporate all of that direction in the lease.

I do think that it's... a good thought experiment that after we get through the 14th to have that kind of conversation, potentially even in a work session to discuss those types of ideas. Many values were raised.

There could be something I'm missing, but I just don't have a problem with a little league organization putting a bat and cage on a little league field. That's just my opinion. Thank you.

Any other questions or comments from council members? Randy, thank you very much for that.

Yeah, just a clarification. Apparently, we want to make certain that we're not leasing a piece of property without considering anyone else who might want to lease that same property. And so we're just covering our basis and all right. If one leases property, it may be up to lease and wouldn't And anybody who applies for that lease, their bids for that lease will be held at public auction. And then the city manager, Wayne, will just select the best one and lease it. Is that correct?

No, sir. Most of it, just a couple of word differences. The bids will be presented publicly and subject to public hearing. Only the council can decide if it wants us to, Wayne and I, to work together to finalize the lease. Wayne and I will not be in a position to decide which of your several bidders you should move forward with.

Okay, so we will open the bids and read them aloud here before we vote on it.

Yes, sir. Immediately prior to the public hearing to give the public an opportunity to speak to it as well.

I'm good with that.

Thank you. Anything else from council members? Randy, thank you for that detailed explanation, and Mr. Moore, thank you for putting together that 27-page draft lease agreement. I went through it, and as to be expected, it's written in legalese, and take somebody with some professional legal experience and education to fully understand it, and that's why we rely on professionals like Mr. Moore and Randy and staff. So thank you all for that.

Thank you, Mr. Moore. Do we have a motion and a second?

Mr. Mayor, I propose a resolution of the Council of the City of Pocos in Virginia directing that public notice be given of the Council's intention to approve a lease agreement for 17 Park Street and receive bids for said lease.

Second. Thank you. Christy?

Councilman Freeman?

Aye.

Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Councilman Southall?

Aye.

Councilman Fye? Aye. Hi. Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Mayor Hooks? Aye. Mr. Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of 7-0.

Thank you, Christy. Moving on to topic number two under new business. This is an ordinance making additional appropriations for fiscal year 2027 for various funds, one-time retention bonus pay. before Randy has some information to share with us after which time I intend to make a motion and provided we get a second we'll have an opportunity for for council members to ask questions or make comments Randy

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of council, and each of you. We've had at least one opportunity to speak about this. What this is before you is a request by the mayor to move forward for your consideration a one-time retention bonus for city employees in the amount of $1,500 for full-time employees, full-time permanent employees. and $750 for permanent part-time employees. And our permanent part-time employees are almost exclusively in the library, plus one that we have in the police department. Should you approve it, we would move forward to cut those checks in September, September the 8th. And there are a couple of minor caveats to that which are suggested, the first of which is that as this is carryover funding from the previous year that we would, one, you would need to have finished here with us, meaning been an employee on the day that the fiscal year closed, which is 30th. additionally I think maybe they said the 26 I'm not give me I'm confusing two things second to second of all that the employee is still with us on the day that we give it which would be as written September the 8th and that that person is not in their two-week notice period we had that once before and in the in the year that we did it and in the absence of clarity on that point You know, we had a difficult decision to make, but we learned the lesson from that and have built that into this. As the mayor reflected, the vast majority of the expense is in the general fund. The solid waste fund has enough to cover and ensure their own fiscal impacts. So we're asking you to consider the appropriation to –

two hundred and twelve thousand dollars for the purpose of the one-time retention bonus had to answer any more questions but I think I've hit everything I always have a question hi Randy can you explain for the folks back home who don't know how Recurring income is used for salary increases, and bonus income can come from, and we are at the end of a fiscal year, and this money was not there, but it is now there. You understand what I'm trying to get to? Yes, ma'am. Why all of a sudden do you all have some cash? Because they care.

Well, if I miss one of the components, please redirect me back to it. But each year, we try real hard, as you know, to make sure that we do not overspend our budget. And during my entire time here, we never have, as an aggregate. We finish the fiscal year on June 30th, and we spend the next 45 days in an accrual period. So we're still in it. And as you know, the carryover and mid-year items typically come to you all in December, occasionally January, depending on the timing of the audit. So we finished the year in good position. We certainly have this amount of money would no way impair our finances. But the difference between, think of it this way, if you were to give $100,000 worth of pay raises, not adjusting for inflation, over 10 years that would cost you a million dollars. So you better have the money in your ongoing revenue to pay for it year after year after year. A retention bonus is a withdraw from your savings account and you only make it once so if you made a hundred thousand dollar decision in one year it would cost you only one hundred thousand dollars as opposed to that same so we have occasionally at times done things with one time money meaning that savings account non-recurring money to do retention bonuses at all

I think so. Thank you. But it raised one more question. You said we are ending our accrual period.

Yes, ma'am.

What is an accrual period?

Okay. I'm not our accountant.

30 words or less.

I can do it in 30 words or less. So our fiscal year generally ends at, well, it does end June 30. We have certain revenues that were due to us prior to that date that sometimes take a while to get here. Sales tax is an example of that. Sales tax we earned from the month of June we might not collect from the Commonwealth of Virginia until the second week in August. So there are certain revenues and in some cases certain expenditures, things that we have paid for that in the last fiscal year that have arrived pretty close to the line, depending on the nature of the expenditure, it may be moved backwards by our auditors and think that that really should be an FY26 expense. Or if it's de minimis or there's significant time that elapsed since it was ordered and received, it may be this year. So we've got about 45 days where we're finalizing all of that, and schools are in the same place. We have a pretty good estimate at this point, but it won't be final until the auditors complete their work, typically in October, heading towards a November presentation to council and a no later than first week report to the state Auditor Republic accounts.

I think it's confusing for a lot of folks back home because we tend to think of our dollars as being calendar year and if you're military, Our government, from that standpoint, it's always like, what is it, September 30th, new contracts come out October 1. But we have school budgets and we have continuing resolutions and all these things. June 30th is our big date.

That's correct.

And that's why this window is where this window is.

Yes, ma'am.

Done.

Thank you, Jeannie. Any other questions or comments on this topic? I have some comments, but I'm going to save those until after we get a motion and a second Since there are no other questions or comments at this time from council members I Move the council pass an ordinance making additional appropriations for fiscal year 2027 for various funds one time retention bonus pay.

Second.

Thank you all very much for the resounding seconds. So I'll make my comments at this time. We're pleased tonight to have several city employees here with us. We appreciate your presence and I'll speak directly to y'all. and also those watching from home. Please know that it is understood that bonuses do not substitute for increases in compensation. And it's also understood that we're not where we need to be when it comes to our level of employee compensation. We are thankful for the 5% pay increase that we're able to do this year. And we look forward to see what next year has in store for us. We are equally thankful to be in a position to provide these bonuses because this expression of appreciation is something that we're able to do at this time. With that, I'll ask Christy to call for a vote.

Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Councilman Southall? Aye. Councilman Freeman? Aye. Councilman Emmett? Aye. Vice Mayor Bunty? Aye. Councilman Fye? Aye. Mayor Hooks? Aye. Mr. Mayor, the motion carries by a vote of 7-0.

Thank you, Christy, and I appreciate the support from council members on this. And again, thanks to our employees for being here. So that concludes our new business. We'll move on to item H, comments of the city manager. Nothing this evening, sir. Thank you, Randy. Item I, council directives. Mr. Green?

I don't have anything tonight. It appears to me from what people are telling me that things are going relatively well, and citizens pretty well appreciate what the city does for them. Thank you. Angie?

I have two things tonight. The first is Kiwanis last Tuesday we had our new teacher breakfast welcoming teachers to a district. This year we had 15. We only had 15 new teachers. Eight of whom, I believe it was eight, are from Pocosin, graduates. So we welcome the new teachers and just reminding everybody to be safe out there when school starts. Watch for the school buses and the kids at the bus stops. And the second thing I have is our commissioner of the revenue, Thomas Canilla, is participating along with other regional commissioners of the revenue for the commissioners in Cairns Food Drive. And that is to benefit the Virginia Peninsula Food Bank. It's going to run all month of August till the 31st and he has two convenient drop off locations. One is in the lobby of City Hall by the fountain and the second one is actually by the self checkout lines at the food line. So my daughter and I were there this evening and we stopped and collected some items. went to the self-checkout, and I checked them out, and she just put them right in the box. So it's very convenient. I encourage every one of us council members, public, to join in on that. It's for a good cause. And we'll show how Pocosin can the generosity of our community to give to the food bank. I know it's a hard time for a lot of people out there, so it's a good thing to contribute to.

Thank you, Angie. Mr. Freeman? Let me say one more thing. The police department had a police night out and had a weather problem, but it turned out eventually that they had a fairly good crowd. Chief got to go in a dunk tank, et cetera. So I think everyone that was there had a good time.

Thank you, Mr. Freeman. Keith?

Yes. piggybacking on what Angie said, thanks to the commission of the revenue, because as was unfortunately foretold by a phone call with the food bank, food is a little less than they would appreciate having. We are going to have our mobile food pantry distribution this Thursday at Emmy's, and we're promised to get food, but not as much as we got in previous months, which is a bad thing. Hopefully the commissioners are... We'll help boister that a little bit down at the food bank. And also, a notice put out by the Virginia Peninsula Food Bank partner agency newsletter just last week was a kind of congratulatory announcement to Emmaus Baptist Church, their shine pantry there. We hear that the Pocosa mobile food distribution on the second Thursday at lunch registered. Neighbors may request a home delivery or late pickup by calling the church office Monday through Wednesday. That would be like right now. Requests are provided to the registration team for entry into our pantry track system, and the volunteers make deliveries in teams of two. The neighbor must be home to receive the delivery. The program typically provides four to five home deliveries and approximately two late pickups, which they also offer the people that cannot make it by noon, primarily assist neighbors experiencing the transportation, medical, work, or scheduling barriers. Basically right now it's offered only local in the Pocosin community, but Hope, with other volunteers, to extend into the 23693 area code, which is right over next door. Kudos to the Immunist Baptist Church of Cheyenne Pantry on that.

Thank you, Keith. Thank you. Debbie? Debbie?

We have had quite the storm while we have been here in this meeting. And I know several text messages have come in, you know, where maybe there's some damage here. I think maybe the city is without power, not sure about that. But just wanted to reach out to everyone in the area that has been touched by the storm, be it, you know, here in Bocosin and all the surrounding areas, just prayers that everyone is safe.

Thank you, Debbie. Jeannie?

Almost forgot that. I'll drive here, City Hall, on Thursday between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. for those that are able to give. Sorry, I forgot that.

That's okay. Thanks again, Keith.

I have a few things. First, I want to say that I love seeing back home. Welcome, Tara. Hey. Two, seeing band members active in our community. Hey, Kent. Good to see you. And which reminds me that I'm seeing online on socials the teachers and coaches are starting back up. That's where Thomas has been tonight. The show choir is showing there. some of their preview, that sort of thing. And that just reminds me that, guys, these kids are working really, really hard to do more than just academics. And whenever you support them, go out and see the art shows. Go out and see what they're doing. volunteer to help with the robotics or any of those different groups that don't always get the same headline as our wonderful football team. Go to the games. Make that your family outing on Friday night. That's what this small town is about. And finally, I want to mention that, you know, I'm really thankful for a council that reads the small print. You guys read and you think, and I'm continuing... continue to be amazed at how you guys make me think outside my own box of the way i think and i'm also grateful for our council and city staff because i've learned things like the impacts of what a simple referendum that sounds like a great idea and the impact it has on a local community and and to look behind the looks like a great idea to think about is it really a good idea uh... these are important things that i didn't know i needed to learn and being part of this process has really helped me i think become a better member of this community And I really encourage all y'all to watch these sessions when you're not able to be here in person, to ask your questions, to read the notices that are posted on the notification boards for Planning Commission, BZA, Economic Development, all these different groups. You'll learn about what makes this town run. It's so much more complicated than I had any idea. And I'm grateful that I've had this opportunity. And I know that the learning doesn't stop. It just continues.

That's all I have to say. Thank you, Jeannie.

Mr. Sallow? Excuse me for the ask, because I always run my mouth. I have a few comments to make. I'd like to thank everyone who came out here tonight to pay attention to the city government. And I'd like to thank everyone at home who pays attention to the city government. I think that's very important. Everyone here has heard me say many times, this is my favorite city. I love the coast, and it's home. It's the best city in the United States. I was going to say Virginia, but it tops the rest of them. And I work with a good group of council members. Everybody gets along together. And even if we disagree, we agree to disagree and we go on about our business. And I think we do that very well. Matter of fact, I know we do that very well. And as we work together, I'm convinced that not only we know that we're doing a good job because we try hard, It's evident that most of the city knows that because we're not flooded with people every week, every meeting, like, complaining about what we did. And you also heard me say that I do not do social media, okay, for very good reason. And I was a little disappointed this past week in that Someone posted on social media, not that I read it because I didn't, but my wife pays attention, and she truly hates it when somebody says something negative about us because she knows better. But someone that I know personally, okay, who knows me, and several of the other council members came up with a very negative comment, and it was based on, And she's sure of that. And it's their opinion of that, none of which is true. And it generated a bunch of conversation of the few people who engage in social media. And I'm glad that most of the city is pleased with what we do. I'm reading a book right now. It's called Tuesdays with Maury. And in that book, Maury is a college professor, and he's talking to a student. And he says something like, if you're engaged in a culture and it doesn't make you feel good, don't buy the culture. And so if you're reading your social media, and there's negative things being said and supposed negative things, and it doesn't really make you feel good, don't buy it. Visit Jessica and get a book. Read a good book. And while you come to see Jessica to get a good book, visit city council and find out what's really going on. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Southall. Thanks, as always, for our IT support. Tonight we have with us Ms. Jen Cannella and Ms. Allison Kroll. So thank you, ladies. We do appreciate that. And I would like to remind Mr. Moore how much we appreciate the refresher training on COIL and FOIA that we got during the work session. So that concludes my comments. And we'll move on to item J, which is a closed session. pursuant to Section 2.2-3711A1 of the Code of Virginia from 1950 as amended to discuss personnel matters. Do we have a motion and a second? So moved, Mr. Mayor.

Second.

Thank you. Christy, call for vote, please.

Councilman Southall?

Aye.

Councilman Freeman?

Aye.

Councilwoman Hubbard?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Councilman Fye?

Aye.

Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Mayor Hux?

Aye.

Mayor, the motion carried by a vote of 7-0.

Thank you. We're going to close session. We'll move on to item K, which is reconvenement and certification of the closed session. Do we have a motion and a second? So moved. Second. Thank you. Questions or comments? Christy?

Councilwoman Emmett? Aye. Councilwoman Hubbard? Aye. Councilman Fye? Aye. Councilman Zappala? Aye. Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Councilman Freeman? Aye. Mayor Huggs? Aye. Mr. Mayor, the motion carried by the vote 7-0.

Thank you, Christy. We're out of closed session. It's been certified, and we'll move on to Item L, Adjournment. Do we have a motion and a second? So moved.

Second.

Thank you. Christy?

Councilman Fyfe? Aye. Vice Mayor Bunting? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.