City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, welcome. It is 5:00 on Tuesday, excuse me, Tuesday, February 17th, 2026. This is a regular meeting of the city council of the city of Cape Girardeau. Thank you all for being here tonight. As always, we will begin with our invocation and pledge of allegiance. Tonight's invocation is by the Reverend Geneva Allen Patterson of St. James AME here in Cape Girardeau. If you all would please join us in rise. As we begin, just want us to all be in memory and in prayer for Pastor Phil Roop. Uh, he was scheduled to do the first prayer of this year at city council. On January the 5th, he has transitioned. So, please be in prayer for that family. And the family of Bethel Assembly of God on Perryville Road right here in Cape. Thank you. We can bow our heads. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word that declares in Galatians 3 and 28. There is neither Jew nor Gentile. Neither slave nor free. Nor is there male and female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus. Lord, on this drove, what we call Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras day. Day before Lent starts. As we look to the homegoing of a pastor. Who has prayed in these city council meetings, Pastor Phil. The pastor of Bethel Assembly of God in Cape. Also, the Reverend Jesse Jackson. Keep hope alive activist, dear Lord. This Tuesday after President's Day. And as we also continue to celebrate Black History Month. Lord, all of us give thanks.

During this month, we recognize the statue of Soldier James Ivers that sits on this very property. Honoring the more than 200 enslaved men. Who enlisted in the Union Army here. This statue was erected as part of Cape Girardeau's initiative. To honor Cape's African-American history. So that citizens like our city manager, our councilwoman, myself, others past and those who are to come. So that all of us would have a seat at the table. So, God of justice. God of righteousness. Be with our mayor, our city manager, our councilpersons. And we as citizens as we navigate this meeting. The plans being to your glory, dear Lord. As we cover the redevelopment of the Sears Grand building. The annual audit. And other agenda items. Let our voices not be silenced. But heard for the sake of our beloved Cape Girardeau community. We thank you for the dedicated employees. Have a lot of them here tonight. And for who all who thought it not robbery to come to this city council meeting. So that we would be a part of the governmental process. This we pray in Jesus' name. And we all said, "Amen." Pledge allegiance 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, Reverend.

All right, we will begin tonight with a study session on the redevelopment of the Sears Grand building and its surrounding area. I will ask uh our uh development and uh Deputy City Manager Trevor Poley to come up and introduce the the discussion. Thank you, Mayor. Council, Dr. Haskins. Also present with us is Drury Drury Corporation Michael and his associates. Uh, after I speak about this, if you have detailed questions, they're here to answer those for you. Sears Grand closed in 2019 along with two dozen other Sears stores throughout the country. This is a large anchor building that has remained predominantly vacant alongside from limited season use of small portions of the building. It's been a vacant building since 2019. The Drury Development Corporation is now committed to redeveloping this long vacant property. This represents a substantial private investment to the community. And a rare opportunity to reposition a highly visible anchor site within one of the Cape Girardeau key commercial corridors. As you all aware very well aware, it's seen by a lot of people driving up and down the interstate, the old Sears Grand building. The redevelop project includes the old Sears Grand site. This building is approximately 142 square feet of development space, which includes partial demolition, complete renovation to convert the property from a single commercial use to a multi-tenant commercial use constructed. Uh, the construction phase should last anywhere from 12 to 14 months. Also includes the inline stores, exterior renovation including demolition, removal, replacement sidewalks, asphalt overlay, restriping of parking lots, repair, painting, building facade, install brick, LED lighting. Major renovation of the area. There are two legal parcels of this

redevelopment totaling 20.25 acres. Any incentive asked of the city is leverage substantially private capital, mitigate redevelopment risk assessments. With an aging big box structure. To ensure this project delivers long-term public benefit. The city does not provide incentives lightly. Incentives for this project are commonly used for redevelopment projects of this size in the area and throughout the state. The incentive asked for project is a uh Chapter 353. Uh They're also going to establish a CID. [clears throat]

Plus a sales tax exemption on construction materials. Estimated value of all the incentives is 11 million. Benefits to the city. Approximately 330,000 annually in new sales tax. To new tenants, approximately 13 million in sales tax revenue from all the tenants, existing and new. Turning the long-term Sears Grand site into multi-tenant commercial use creating jobs within the city. Additional personal property tax within the first 10 years. Benefit to other taxing districts, significant [snorts] sales tax. And additional property tax in the first 10 years. The process that we're going to request is publication CID hearing on the 19th and 26th this month. Publication of 353 hearing notifica- uh February 19th. Mailings of the 353 on February 20th. CID and the 353 public hearing will be the next council meeting on March 2nd. Consideration of the CID and 353 ordinances on March 2nd and March 16th. Consider chapter 100 ordinances March 16th and April 6th. This is a long-term project coming to the city of Cape. A lot of people have expressed a lot of interest in this blighted building that has sat there for since 2019 vacant. Like I said, if you have a lot of detailed questions about the development, Michael and Associates are here to answer those. I can answer some of the questions for you if you wish. Well, and and would you all like to talk a little bit more about the specifics of the project and If you have anything. Thank you. Uh, good evening. Thank you for your time. My name is Mike Prem. I'm with Trade Development Corporation. And appreciate the introduction from Mr. Polley on the project. As he stated, we actually purchased the Sears Grand building. We purchased it in

November of 2023 with the goal of redeveloping the site. Having owned the owning the adjacent inline retail that's immediately south of and connected to the Target Center. We felt that we had certainly an interest in making sure that the property was redeveloped redeveloped and used for something better than its current deteriorating state. The building itself is is massive. It as Mr. Polley said, it's over 150,000 square feet. And the dimensions are approximately 350 by 360 feet. So, it's it's very square. And it's very deep, which makes it very challenging to convert to other retail uses. So, over the past 2 years or so, we've been working with potential tenants to figure out, you know, kind of who would go where, who who would be interested in in in the the Cape market, who would be interested in different positions within the building, and how how do we need to kind of redesign or reconfigure portions of the building to to meet their needs. So, one of the things that that is part of our plan is to remove about 30,000 square feet in the southeast corner of the building to create dedicated dock access for each of the retail tenants. We broken up the the the storefront to where the the north elevation, the main entrance to the former Sears, that would be divided up to about four tenant spaces. And then we would convert the former auto sale auto center to another tenant space. And then kind of that rear entrance where they where Sears used to have, I think it was maybe like a layaway center or a customer pickup area. That would be that would be an additional

tenant space. So, as also with part of the project, one of our goals is to make make sure that it's it's kind of a cohesive development with the existing Cape West Plaza. So, part of the proposal is is to reimagine the exterior of that center, paint architectural treatments that would be in line with what we would expect to see at the Sears. So, one thing that I would note is we did share a rendering which is up on the screen that shows potential architectural treatment for the Sears. It is not exact. What we expect is that when we sit down with tenants, a lot of them have their own trade dress, their own kind of color schemes that they want to incorporate. But this hopefully gives kind of an idea as to kind of the modernization, if you will, that we'd we'd like to to to push with the redevelopment. Okay, thank you. I do want to point out we don't have an agreement to discuss tonight. That'll happen at the next council meeting. So, I do appreciate you guys coming and sharing some general things. I just had a quick question. So, regarding the chapter 353 incentive, that does require a blight designation and that's been that's been determined. Is that right?

Yes, ma'am. We we worked with with a third-party consultant to make sure that we the the properties met the criteria for the blight designation. Um, and that study is presented with the application packet to the city.

Yeah. That'll be coming. Okay. Well, council, You touched on a bit second there, Mr. Prem. You're in communications with some vendors. I'm sure you've renovate and construct based upon their requests or demands or whatever. Are those pretty yes and pretty commitment pretty solid commitments from some of the vendors? We we feel that there's a level of commitment that with the incentives, we will be able to move forward and start start spending money on the on the project now. We don't have any signed leases to date, but with with this kind of development, it's it's kind of a chicken or the egg situation where the tenants aren't going to sign a lease until they know that there's a project. And then we don't know that there's a project until we have enough tenant interest to confirm that we have the co-tenancy that that that tenants are going to require because no one wants to be the only one in the center. And then again, there there we feel that there is a need for incentives to be able to justify the redevelopment here. So, so again, with the amount of work that we've we've done with the last over the last year or so in discussing it with potential tenants, and studying how we can break up the building, we do feel that we have a project to to put forward here. And and hopefully within short duration have have signed commitments to from from tenants. I think it's also fantastic that that you're working with with the mall project to complement somewhat complement one another. Is that Is that what you said? Well, the the the what we were working to complement is really the the the existing inline retail on on the Target anchor center. We want to make sure that that kind of west end of Cape from Target down to the Sears looks like it's one

intentional development rather than just kind of a a Target and then some you know, a TJ Maxx and a Buckle and a Sonic and and an old Sears building. So, we want to make sure that that's kind of a consistent theme at least. And what we control is from the Target. Target owns their own parcel. We own everything from the south of the Target now to the Sears. Thanks for the question. So, yes, sir. Thank you. Fantastic. Okay. Mr. Polley, can you come up for a second? Let's talk through the an example of one of the incentives. And and from often often times I get questions about the CID. And so, it's I try to explain it to people, but but I think it's best if we we create sort of a an example. And let's say um, I'm Kenny's wholesale. Okay? And Kenny's wholesale store wants to lease some space inside the Sears building. So, I enter into a lease. I put my shingle up. I go inside the business and I obviously I decorate the place with my merchandise. So, how the CID works is simply this, right? So, if citizen B walks in, makes a purchase, they will pay for the purchase. And then what? At that time, at the CID will impose a 1% sales tax on that on those items. So, that 1% of the said shirt would then go back to the developers to help with the cost of the redevelopment of the area. That's just one part of the incentive. But that's the CID that is is CID board. It is imposed by the

developers. The city does not receive it. We don't impose it. It's by the developers. We have several of those here in town already. We have several CID districts. You have one downtown. You have Town Plaza. You have Rural King. You have a lot of different CID districts already established here in the city of Cape. We have I think a total of seven. This would be another CID where it imposes a tax on themselves. So, it helps with redevelopment. It's 1% of your It's a 1% tax. Is what it is. And it's on top of the retail sales tax. Yes, it is. It's on top of it. This doesn't go on forever. Whenever the amount is met that they assess themselves, that's taken off. So, it doesn't go forever. And then you have the the chapter 100. That's just your sales tax on the construction items. So, so for example, if Kenny's wholesale went in and these guys wanted to essentially redevelop the property, we're talking about a a one-time sales tax exemption for the building materials only, correct? Yes, sir. Their estimated private in private money on this is 23 million. And the estimated chapter 100 is $227,500. Very low amount for a very large redevelopment project the city of Cape. Uh, the chapter 100 is used in a lot of different places. We've used it here in town on other developments. It's used throughout the state, throughout other places to incentivize on some of this. It's just this It's just the tax on the building material only one time. It doesn't continue. It's a very low amount compared to what the city of Cape is

going to have at the end of this development. So, essentially the council will be potentially allowing the developers to place a 1% tax. We're going back to the CID on essentially themselves and they will apply that to their tenants, correct? Yes, sir. And that money that's collected would be used exclusively for the project costs, the reimbursable project costs? On that particular project, yes, sir. On that project. So, we have an estimated 23 million with the CID obligation max principal amount of 27.5. Is that including bond interest amount or The whole project What they're saying the estimated value of incentives is 11 million. And they're putting in private money close to 23 as this project moves. Oh, yes. Yeah, I'm I'm sorry. So, the 27 We we did share kind of a range. We think that the minimum the minimum total project cost borne by us excluding any tenant build-outs that they would pay for would be about $23 million. However, depending on how many tenant spaces it could it could increase to 27 or so million dollars. So, as far as the level of commitment, we didn't want to over promise and say that we're going to spend $27 million if there was a possibility that might only be 23. Um, so that there there was just kind of a clarification there. But, the total amount for the CID in the Sorry, go ahead.

Oh, I'm sorry. And then as it as it relates to your question about the SID eligible uh items for the items that are eligible for SID reimbursement, um, that is approximately $11.5 million, which is really the cap. So, as soon as the SID So, the the the way that we're proposing to structure this is that the SID board, which will would will have two representatives from the city of Cape on it, um, that'll collect the taxing revenues and then it will make sure that the developer um, spent the money pursuant to the the SID regulations and then they will distribute those proceeds from the tax collection to the developer to reim- to pay for those reimbursable costs. And then once the once that amount hits that $11.5 million, then it will as Mr. Poley said, it will just dissolve. Okay. So, that's the So, the the chapter 353 tax payment and CID, that's that 11.5. And then it says the CID will terminate at the earlier of 27 years after the CID is created or payment of CID obligations in the principal amount of 27.5 plus all city application fees, permit fees, and other fees incurred in connection with the project. Yes, sir. Yeah, the the the 11.5 is the net present value of of of that that amount. Got you. So. Thank you. Thank you. Well, and I'll just point out too and we'll talk about this I'm sure much more in 2 weeks when we have the the actual agreement in place, but this is not a TIF. We were we were discussing that earlier, which is an abatement on sales tax. This is we're looking at the chapter

353, which is a property tax abatement, which which has a much smaller impact on on the city. And I always like to point out too, it's not where it's not where the city is taking a pile of cash that we have in some closet and giving it to a developer. This is tax abatement is is money that you earn through the the you know, the the new project and then put it back into the project. Exactly. That I was just going to say that I think an important is that 100% of what's currently collected will go continue to go. It's every incremental increase above what the current collection is is what will go towards your reimbursement. Did I state Did I state that all correctly, Mr. Poley? Yes. Yes, ma'am. Yeah, the the the the the sales tax revenues that that would would otherwise be generated and eligible or distributed to the city will the city still gets 100% of that. [clears throat] The CID tax, the 1% is in addition to to whatever the city's tax rate is at at that time. Um, excuse me. Okay. Any other questions? I'm just going to toss this out there really fast. You know, um, thank you for taking a swing at fixing our big fading blue block problem. Uh, anybody that's driven up and down Highway 55, anybody that's been on Siemers Drive has noticed the 150,000 square foot, you know, elephant in the room of a fading blue block. Um, and so thank you for taking a whack at this. Thank you for looking at this as a consideration. It wasn't that long ago we were in this room debating another eyesore property whenever we had our our mall redevelopment conversations. And those conversations have gone really well. Uh, the city investing in the future of all of its retail and our and our infrastructure like this retail infrastructure really does uh take foresight and it takes incentive and it takes uh somebody sticking their neck out there and actually looking at this from a different lens. So, thank you for bringing this forward.

Well, we also thank you. We appreciate the res- the res- how receptive the city has been to to this idea and when we first sat down with with Mayor Kinder and Dr. Haskin and Mr. Poley, it was it was very clear to us that we we wanted to find We had a shared goal of finding a tool that didn't impact any of those city revenues. And fortunately, we were able to to structure this this what we proposed [clears throat] here with the 353 and the CID. And I guess, you know, my one final note is that, you know, more than 75% of of our proposed incentive really comes from that CID. So, so really, you know, we we we hope that, you know, folks recognize that that it isn't really taking anything away from the city. The it it, you know, once we get these, you know, retailers in and generating sales tax income, it's it's really nothing but upside to the city. Um, so hopefully that that's, you know, something that we can share. So. Well, I've had people stopping me all weekend asking, you know, what's coming in? When's it going to open? So, there's a lot of excitement for sure. And I ditto to everything Dan said. He said it better than I could have said it, but yeah, we we appreciate our developers with with good good ideas investing. So. Well, thank you again.

Thank you. All right. Anything else for Mr. Poley? Okay. Thank you. [clears throat]

Much more on that in the following meetings. Next, we have a presentation we of the annual audit report for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 2025. Ms. Mills. Good evening. So, this evening we are going to present the audit results for our fiscal year ending June 30, 2025. I'm pleased to tell you that we had a clean audit. No issues or problems with the audit. The report's been filed with the state's auditor's office and I'm going to ask Jeff Stroder here with Beeson K Rowan Stroder to come up and discuss with you or answer any questions you might have regarding that audit. Thank you all. Uh, another year, another audit is complete. So, I'm happy to report to you how the audit went this year. I'll The very first report that we have has to do with your financial statements. And I'll get this sentence right and I promise not to read any more out of this report to you. But, I want to get this sentence right. It starts out by explaining that our opinion is that the financial statements of the governmental activities, the business type activities, each major fund, and the aggregate remaining information are presented fairly in all material respects the financial position and changes in financial position and cash flows of the city's funds in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America. That sentence is what makes it an unmodified opinion or a clean opinion. That's the opinion you want on your financial statements. Uh, the first report on your financial statements is quite lengthy. It goes into a lot of detail about what the city's responsibilities are for the financial

statements, what my responsibilities are as the auditor. Uh, it's a fascinating read. We'll skip that for now. Um, it it also explains uh, in that report that in that document that you have that we generally just call the audit report, there is a lot of extra information in there. There's what's a report called the required a management's discussion and analysis. That's written by management. It's more of a plain English version of what happened in the city with the finances during the last year. There's a lot of detailed information in this document about the the pension plans. Um my report explains that those particular pieces of information are not covered by the audit opinion, you know, the pension information that's all prepared by the plan administrators. The management's discussion analysis that's prepared by the city. We don't actually put an opinion on those those pieces, but we have been through those pieces and if we had seen anything that looked out of place or inappropriate, that's something that we would have worked out with the city before it went in here. It also explains though that there is a lot more information in this document that is also not part of your basic financial statements, but that we have extended our testing procedures to the other information and that we do extend our opinion to the other information as well and we believe it is also fairly stated in all material respects in relation to the financial statements as a whole. So, that's the first report on your financial statements. We have a second report that we issue whenever we conduct an audit in accordance with government auditing standards. And that report uh requires us to address the city's internal controls that are in place over handling financial transactions and also uh our testing that we performed on your

compliance with various laws and regulations, contracts, grant agreements, a lot of information that we've been testing there. So, that report, um like I said, starts out talking about the internal controls. Now, we don't actually issue an opinion on your internal controls like we do the financial statements, but to conduct the audit we have to understand how the internal controls are designed, whether they're designed appropriately or not, and whether they're actually working the way they were intended to. So, we we perform tests on that and if we would find something that we would consider to be a deficiency, this is where we would report that. And the report explains that we found no deficiencies in the internal control structures to be reported. So, the second part of that report, like I said, has to do with compliance and we're testing compliance with a lot of things when we're doing this the financial statement audit. You know, we're looking at um are are you bidding on jobs when you're supposed to bid? Uh we're looking at uh um you know, do are are your deposits adequately secured, insured with FDIC or other pledges? Uh and we're looking at did did the expenditures out of a particular fund, were they the right expenditures for that fund or were they inappropriate, you know? So, what we found and what we reported was that we found no instances of non-compliance with any of the tests that we performed.

[cough]

So, [clears throat] that leaves us with a third report. The third report is required basically for the federal government and it's required whenever your federal expenditures are greater than $750,000. Thankfully, this is the last time for that threshold. Next year it goes up to a little bit, but you're probably still going to be there. Um the during the year that we were auditing your federal expenditures were just a little over $3.5 million. Now, we're required to test at least 20% of those federal expenditures as a major program. We were able to get the coverage with the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds, the ARPA grant. [clears throat] The expenditures from that program were a little over $980,000 during the fiscal year. So, that was our major program. Now, the federal government gives us a list of here's what we want you to test on this program. Uh they were things like allowable costs. Did you spend the money on what you were supposed to spend it on? Did you not spend it on things you weren't supposed to spend it on? Did you um make the payments in the right time period, you know, the the the ARPA money is starting to run out and they wanted to make sure that funds were obligated uh before the deadlines. Um other things we're testing is uh procurement suspension and debarment type issues. Uh the were the vendors that you hired to perform services, were they allowable vendors for the federal government? And of course reporting, there's always reporting red tape requirements. So, for all of our tests on those issues, we found no instances of non-compliance with any of the grant requirements and that's what we reported. The they also require us to not only report did you comply with the requirements, but did you have intentional mechanisms or internal controls in place over each one of

those. So, what we did was we found out what's the most important control that you have in each one of these areas and we tested it. And we found no deficiencies in the internal controls in place over the handling the federal grant monies. So, we have three reports unmodified opinion, no deficiencies, no instances of non-compliance. So, um you know, I normally don't spend a lot of time going over your financial statements themselves. I know you're familiar with them and I could stand here all night and and barely make a dent in it. Uh but I know you're aware of that. Um you know, uh one of the only things I would I would caution you just based on some of my conversations with other cities that I've been working with in last year is uh a lot of times people go to that very first financial statement. I believe it's on page 11 of your document. They they just want to see that that big balance sheet for the whole state city and and and we're doing great. Um you know, I just wanted to be sure and point out the government financial statements don't look and work exactly like for-profit business financial statements, so you want to be careful with that. Uh there's a section there called um net assets and that's where everybody wants to go and think, "Wow, we've got all of this money now. How are we going to spend it?" Uh but I just want to make sure you're aware that there's not a big checking account sitting there with that much money uh and it's it's available for you to spend, you know, a lot of that net position uh is made up of your assets. And that's one of the first things I always point out that the accounting rules say we're going to call these things assets, but uh you know, that includes all of your streets, uh all of your sidewalks, all of your water systems. Um you can call that an asset if you want. You can't borrow against it. The only thing you can do is fix it when it breaks. So, you know, that that to me is almost more of a liability than an

asset, but that is a huge chunk of what your your net position is. It's going to be tied up in streets and sidewalks and and water lines buried in the ground. Um you've also got um a lot of restricted funds. Uh these those don't show up in the very first sets of financial statements, but if you go back into around page 72, that other information I was talking about that we applied procedures to, that's where it gets a lot more specific into the the particular funds and those monies that come in for a particular reason and can only be spent on that particular reason um for for what we promised uh to do with that. So, that makes up a lot of your um your equity. So, I think whenever you you boil down through that net position, I believe the amount of equity that you have, for lack of a better term, is in the neighborhood of or about 10, 11% uh of what that total net position is that's available to be spent at the at the city's discretion. So, like I said, it's uh it's something a lot of people don't talk about government financial statements and I thought since we had a minute, maybe I would just kind of point that out to you. So, I hope that uh would be useful information. So, I tried to make it a quick. I hopefully it wasn't too bad. I know you've got a lot to do tonight, but uh I'll just finish up if anybody has any questions about the audit report itself or maybe about what we did while we were here or what we found or how we went about it, I'd be glad to try to answer those. I I did I did have a question. Did as part of the audit, did you look at economic factors in the next year's budget? Was that page page 10? That's part of the information that I was explaining that is um uh pulled out from our opinion. Um that's part of that management's discussion and analysis. So, there's really what we're focusing on is

historical data uh for our audit and the procedures that we applied were to the historical financial statements. Uh that information that you're talking about is required by governmental accounting principles to be included with the audit report, but it's not something that we can actually apply procedures to because it's prospective information. But what we do though is is we look at uh historical factors and historical numbers and we look to see that that it's at least reasonable. Uh if if it had that information been something that we felt like just doesn't make sense, that's something we would have advised management to maybe make some revisions. Uh so, uh we felt that the information's reasonable even though it we did not apply audit procedures to that. Um Mr. Schroeder, you're just a master of understatement and um so, this is a really good report. Is that is that can we say that?

Yes, ma'am. Okay. Yes, this [laughter] is this is as clean of a report as you can get.

Okay, there you go. Yes, I I thought that's what I was we were hearing and um really I mean to to to hear that there's you found no instances of um in [clears throat] in various uh Right. We felt that the controls in place over how we accumulate information to be able to put it into place were appropriately designed and they were functioning as they were intended and we also on all of the compliance test that we performed we found no instances of non-compliance. Okay. And you mentioned those those controls. Um I wonder I maybe maybe Ms. Mills or Dr. Haskins you might be better at just explaining that a little bit of how the city what those are or maybe you can Mr. Strowd.

Well, um the controls that we're looking at are all sorts of things about um you know, for us one of the main and most effective internal controls you can have in place is segregation of duties. So uh um we believe that you don't want one person to have the ability to handle cash, physically handle or have custody of the cash. You don't want that person to also have the ability to record the transactions into the finan- into the the general ledger the the the financial uh software. Um likewise you don't want that person to be able to have oversight uh such as um you know, monitoring the bank reconciliations or something like that. You want to have multiple people involved. So that that would be an an example of an internal control. Um you know, another internal control could be as simple as having uh pre-numbered receipt slips that we fill out whenever we collect money coming in or an internal control may be requiring more than one person to sign off on an expenditure uh before the actual disbursement is is made. So Yeah. there there's um various controls over the different cycles [snorts] I call them cycles. You've got the the handling of cash. You've got uh revenues coming in to the city. You've got disbursements going out. You've got payroll. I look at those as different cycles. So we're looking at different types of internal controls based on whatever type cycle it is we're talking about. So um that this is part where it kind of starts to get boring I think but uh uh but but those are the things that we're looking at.

Yeah. Well, [clears throat] I mean we all read in the paper about some city somewhere you [snorts] know, where something's gone horribly awry and so it's just very very reassuring especially for us. We we're charged with the oversight of the you know, the whole thing and so here this is this is really I think one of the most important days we have on our city council is to get this audit report and hear that uh everything's being done very very well and there's a lot of good um controls checks and balances the procedures are are really good. I'm a little biased but I tend to agree and I think that the internal control area is one of the most important. I mean you can never guarantee that something bad won't happen but you can definitely minimize the risk and having the proper internal controls definitely can minimize the risk. Yeah. I just like to add Mr. Strowd to thank you, sir. This is the second time I've got to see your work. Uh and it's exceptional. Um how long did it take you all to complete the audit? I think that's important that people know. That's a good question. I think this year we had a little over 300 hours of um uh people hours involved in in the audit itself. We we started with our first procedures um right around uh June 30th where we were out at uh um various places where the city has inventory and we were double counting um you know, how how many feet of pipe do we have that's going to be used in water systems. I mean we're we're we're we're checking things like that so that we can see how does that flow into your financial statements and then we really start um heavily around October. Correct. Uh about the middle of October I believe is when we we started. We had I believe three auditors that were here for about 2 weeks and then as soon as they got done with

the field work here going through documents and talking to a lot of people uh that we I'm sorry about that. We bother a lot of your employees while we're working on our audit. Um we uh then when we get back to the office it's time to prepare the report and as you can see it's quite a document and uh a lot of hours go into uh the preparation of that document and uh then the the draft is sent over to the city for review. That's when the city adds the management's discussion and analysis part that the that they prepare and then it comes back to our office. We put everything together again and and uh uh that's how we get to our our completed document. Yeah, such a deep dive that you do and the fact that there was no exceptions or discrepancies I think that's that speaks volumes to the department heads, the city leadership uh Ms. Mills I mean what you all do um and also there's a term used uh used military quite a bit. It's called bluff. It's the bottom line up first. And cuz that's if you're briefing a senior officer that's all they want to hear is the bottom line up first. They don't care about getting into the weeds of a 100-page report and I turned to the financial analysis cuz that's what I wanted to see the bluff and it says at the end of the fiscal year the city is able to report positive balances in all three categories of net position of the government and and that I know should give gives us great peace of mind that we're doing things right and it should give the citizens the same peace of mind. And and if anybody wants to look at this basically 100-page audit it will be posted on the city's website. So dig in if anybody wants to find out a little bit deeper cuz it's there. It'll put you to sleep but it's

it's there. I'm afraid so. It's uh it can be a little on the boring side but and you know, you're my second city council to visit with today and unfortunately I had to tell the last city council that uh over half of the funds that they had did not get a clean opinion on their financial statements. So that was a that was a tough meeting. So you know, we're we don't just go out and and hand out rosy pictures. Sometimes we have to have the tough conversations but thankfully we didn't have to have that conversation here tonight. Can I just ask one more really it's it's uh related to what Mr. Cantrell was just talking about. Um where it talks about uh the financial statement statements and the the net positions that you say that the net position is an important measure of the city's overall financial health and the city's net position increased um 26.6 million. Um can you just just give us a sense of what that what that means? Um growth in in assets or

It it means well, the net position is just a mathematical calculation. The difference between all of your assets and all of your liabilities. Yeah. That's what the net position would be. So um throughout the year through a combination of whether your assets are going up or down or your liabilities are going up and down at the same time the the difference had changed by that amount. Um the difference of what's left of the assets after all liabilities are satisfied. [clears throat]

So but kind of like what I was talking about earlier to be careful about is those assets numbers are not just pots of money sitting around. They're they're not just checking accounts that we can just start writing checks out of. It includes things like your your streets and your sidewalks and your water systems. Well, and even um So we we do have reserves that we we have to maintain and that's part of the Right.

asset, right? Right. That would be part of the assets as well. Any investments that the city has. A lot of those like you said the reserves are required by bond ordinances to where you're required to have money set aside just in case something were to happen to the system you would still be able to make your bond payments. So but that does figure into the net position like you were talking about whether whether or not you have any discretion of how to use it or not. Okay. Um well, thank you very much for all the work. Um I can't imagine how you do any of it but I'm glad people like you exist. [laughter]

Um and our community is because we you know, we need a good uh report card every every year. Um these are if you I guess if anyone wants a physical copy you can get one but they are posted online. Every one of our annual audits along with our budgets is posted online. I don't know if this one is posted online yet but it is. It will be very shortly. Um uh Dr. Haskins I I want to thank you, the whole finance department and really across all of our departments. Um there's obviously a lot of a lot of good work and very um good scrutiny going on with all of our dollars so and all of our assets. So that's that's very encouraging and one of the best things I think we can hear all year. So thank you. Thank you, Mr. Strowd. Thank you all very much. Thank you, Lisa. And your team? Yeah.

[snorts]

Woo. Okay, uh Council, any communications or reports? All right, moving on then. We have some items for discussion. Is there anyone in the audience who wishes to appear as an advisory board applicant? If so, you can come to the podium. Seeing none. All right, we'll move on to the Planning Zoning Commission report. Mr. Martin. Good evening everybody. Mayor, Dr. Askins, Council. Uh short and sweet for you guys today. Um one rezoning request, 803 Independence Street rezoning. Um it was a request to rezone property from C-1 general commercial to R-4 medium density multi-family residential. Um motion to approve with a 7-0 um with with seven in favor and zero in opposition it passed. Questions? All right, next um subdivision plats. We had three of those. Um Laurencius Larkspur subdivision record plat. Um plat divides a duplex into two new lots. Um there was a motion for a recommendation for approval um subject to staff's comments being successfully addressed, which passed in a 7-0 favor. Questions? Next is Kues Corner subdivision record plat. Plat combines two partial lots to create one new lot. Um this is uh Independence and I want to say Themis area. Uh anyways, motion to recommend approval with a vote of seven in favor and zero in opposition. And last but not least, uh Broadway on the Hill subdivision record plat. Plat reset resubdivides two lots to create two new lots. Motion to recommendation motion to recommend approval passed with a vote of seven in favor and zero in opposition. That's all I got. Any questions?

Okay, so thanks so much for being here.

Thank you. Have a good Okay. All right, we will now move into regular session beginning with this call to order and uh the roll call vote. Is Davis. Mr. Bliss. Here. Mr. Kuntze. Here. Mr. Johnson. Here. Mayor Kinder. Here. Mr. Presson. Here. Ms. Randall. Here. [snorts] Mr. Thomas. Here. All right, thank you. Council, we have an agenda before us. Is there a motion to adopt the agenda? So moved. Second. Any discussion? All in favor of the agenda as presented, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That agenda is adopted. No public hearings tonight. We do have a consent agenda. Mr. Young, would you please read that? Bill 2610, an ordinance authorizing the mayor to execute a memorandum of understanding with Cape Girardeau County, City of Jackson, and Southeast Missouri State University regarding a joint emergency operations center. Bill 2610, an ordinance authorizing the mayor to execute a memorandum of understanding with Cape Girardeau County, City of Jackson, and Southeast Missouri State University regarding a joint emergency operations center. Bill 2611, an ordinance vacating the city's interest in a portion of Frederick Street right-of-way in the City of Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Bill 2611, an ordinance vacating the city's interest in a portion of Frederick Street right-of-way in the City of Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Bill 2613, a resolution authorizing the city manager to execute an agreement with Corporate Flight Management Inc. to provide air carrier service at Cape Girardeau Regional Airport. All right, Council, we have a consent agenda before us. Is there a motion to approve? So moved. Second. Any further discussion? All in favor then of the consent agenda, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That agenda carries. Thank you. Nothing removed tonight from the consent agenda. We have one new ordinance. Um as always, our staff member will discuss it and then uh anyone in the audience has their opportunity to uh make a comment. Um the only item we have is Bill 2614, an ordinance accepting a permanent utility easement from CNL Quality Construction LLC for Lot 24 of Rock Garden subdivision in the City of Cape

Girardeau, Missouri. This is the first reading. Mr. Pulley. Again, thank you, Mayor, Council, Dr. Askin. This ordinance is to accept an easement for a tenant sanitary sewer line. During During construction of the sanitary sewer line, the sewer line was moved a little south of the original easement due to rock in where they were placing it. This will clean up the easement and the easement was donated by the property owner. Uh the location of this is this is off LaSalle Avenue. Okay. Is there anyone in the audience who wishes to make a comment? All right, seeing none then, Council, is there a motion to approve Bill 2614? So moved. Second. All right, further discussion? All right, hearing none, all in favor of Bill 2614, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Pulley. Thank you. Um we had one person register to speak on uh an item not on tonight's agenda. As always, um citizens are able to do that until uh a few days before the meeting. Um also, just um as a reminder, um speakers have uh up to 3 minutes to speak. Um there will be um no no direct back and forth discussion with the Council. This is just a time for uh citizens to make their concerns known. So, that person tonight is Lauren Jones. Uh good evening. I'm just going to give you an update since my recent appointment to the

[clears throat]

uh River Campuses Board of Managers. So, thank you very much for appointing me to that board. I approach that responsibility with deep commitment because the River Campus was created as a partnership between the community and the university for artistic enrichment and regional events. It would not exist had the city not raised the initial funding in 1998. Since 2019, when the touring series was discontinued, the River Campus has been less accessible increasingly to our broader community. However, meaningful progress is underway. Since my interim appointment in September, I've met [clears throat] with Dr. Brad Hodson, the new president of SEMO, Dr. Andrew Moore, who's on the Board of Governors, and more than 20 local arts, school, and event organizations. Under Dr. Hodson's leadership, we have now have four to six annual one-week blocks that are now being designated specifically for non-university events. When staffing was citing it as a as a barrier, he released funds to hire a new productions manager and that has already been accomplished. And there is already a new commitment on the university side to reinstating the touring series. Building on that progress, I will propose targeted updates to the most current River Campus Policies and Procedures Manual, practical low no-cost refinements with high operational impact that Dr. Hodson and I are aligned on. That those are clarifying governance uh boundaries so city and university appointments can remain distinct. Activating a 500-seat uh configure configuration to bridge the gap between the 190 and the 950-seat theaters. Extending the university's April 1 exclusivity deadline so they have more time to plan. Modernizing rental structures with transparent daily and weekly tiers. Publishing student labor rate caps noting that $45 an hour was charged for a student electrician exceeding the IATSE local 6 union rate of approximately $30 to $41 for the same for a professional. Longer term, we're looking at possibly

reviving the Summer Arts Festival, which previously drew approximately 3 to 3,500 attendees. This would further strengthen our university and community alignment. Now, to explain a little bit why these are a matter. I have spoken with John Rust about bringing SEMO Ball back to the Bedell. Rust Communications is an academic partner with SEMO. Yet, SEMO Ball, which hosts 56 area high schools and approximately 1,000 attendees, is now held at LaCroix. We were told that their team prefers LaCroix because it is easier to work with, more welcoming, and more cost-effective. That feedback is not isolated. Organizations uh LaCroix over the River Campus. There's also been only one non-university production in the Bedell during 2024 and 2025. When that company's request for available non-conflicting March 2026 dates was denied, it had to cancel its production. Including free performances for approximately 1,500 Jackson and and Cape third and fourth grade students as the offered dates were either in the summer or a week where the company had already indicated they were not available to perform. These are lost engagements and missed recruitment opportunities. I believe working together, we can rebuild this confidence thoughtfully and responsibly and reestablish the River Campus to be accessible, collaborative, and vibrant public-private partnership it was always meant to be. So, thank you for the opportunity to serve. I'm honored to represent our community's interests and I'm always available for any comments, concerns, and questions. Thank you so much. Appreciate the time. Yep. All right. And uh with that, is there a motion to adjourn? So moved. Second. Any discussion? All in favor of adjournment, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? We are adjourned. Thank you all for being here. Do we need to turn any of this in?