City Council - Special Meeting

I'm a breakfast.

Okay. Good morning everyone. Good morning.

It is now 9:01. on Monday the 9th in form of council. I hereby call this special meeting to order. I'd also like to well I'd like to start off with not only recommend or recognizing our council, our city manager, our attorney, our assistant city managers here with us today. I'd also like to recognize representative de Ar and thank y'all for coming today. It's a blessing to have you here. also like to recognize that uh Representative Brody wasn't able to make it. He had to cancel. Um but we also have here because we're talking about in our legislative meeting two other candidates, House Seat 55 candidate, Reverend John Kirkpatrick and House Seat 55 candidate and Union current commissioner Clancy Balkam. I just saw him walk in. Yes. So, thank you all for being here today as we start this great discussion for our city and is a blessing for us to be here today. You know, it's just a beautiful weather and really get this conversation started. With that, I would like to turn it over to our city manager, Mark Watson.

Thank you, mayor, and good morning, everyone. Uh, we have all of our department heads here this morning. So, uh, and this is a this is an open discussion, um, of city council's legis legislative agenda. Um, and the purpose of the the meeting really is to provide everyone with an update of, uh, what's been accomplished over the last year uh, and what we have to look forward uh, to in the future. um at your if you're seated at the table at your place, you you will see uh this little handout that has the legislative agenda items on it. Uh and then we'll have some other handouts we'll be referring to uh during the presentation. But to start with, what we would like to do is give you an update on the legislative items that um have been I'll I'll call have been completed or in substantial um uh process right now. Um these are items that we have requested assistance with uh from the general assembly and um that our our delegation has been uh very involved in supporting the city of Monroe with and and the first one that we would like to start with uh is an update on the water uh the Corey water source. Um and you have a a handout, a big color handout here that kind of u gives you an idea of where it's located and whatnot. We'll be referring to that in just a moment. Um and and [clears throat] I will ask uh Jay Bo and Rob Miller to come up here uh

and and provide you with the the detail of the the quarry project. But uh the One thing that I would like to point out uh to start with is that in the month of December uh after a a very long process and with the help of our uh city attorney Richard Long um and [clears throat] uh and the and the folks at I guess in the governor's office with the department of administration. Is that is that the correct term term? Yeah, department of administration. We finally got the deed signed. So the deed was the deed was approved signed by the governor and recorded here in Union County in the month of December. So the city of Monroe uh now owns the 82 acre parcel uh that includes the the large quarry and the small quarry. Um and as you will see on the map here in a minute, uh this property u is contiguous to properties that the city owns all the way from the golf course and Lake Flea all the way down u the uh Richardson Creek uh to the quarry. Uh so we we have uh u ownership of uh the the land that that runs down the creek. Um and that becomes real important in this in this process that we'll talk about here in just a minute. The quarry, why was the quarry necessary? [snorts] The quarry is the site uh of some uh very large water sources. And these these water sources are unlike the

um watershed lakes that the city of Monroe owns and operates for its public water supply. Um you're familiar with those lakes there. Lake Monroe. Lake Monroe feeds into Lake Lee. Lake Lee H is uh connected to the water system through a a large pipe uh near the dam that pumps water over to Lake Twitty. And then at Lake 20, we have our our water plant that produces the the drinking water for the city of Monroe. So all of these lakes are interconnected. Um the the quarry itself um is not a watershed lake. It is fed by an underground spring or aquafer. Um it is estimated that there's over 120 million gallons of water in the large uh quarry and an estimated 30 to 40 million in the small query. uh that becomes uh very important in times of drought. And uh I would be remiss if I did not mention that uh the city of Monroe and and our immediate region in the the I'll just say the core of Union County uh north up through uh Unionville, Fair View and into Cabaris County is still under a severe drought condition uh at this time. Not the entire county is not under the severe drought condition. Uh but the US weather service has us under a severe drought condition and that does impact our watershed lakes. Uh we are

under stage one of water conservation. Uh which means that we've asked folks to voluntarily just be uh aware of how they're using water and not to waste water. U but we're in we're in good shape right now. um hoping that uh our conditions will improve uh as long as we get some much needed rain, but the quaries will very soon start playing an intricral part in our water supply. And I'm not going to steal Jay's thunder, but I'm going to invite Jay Bo up right now and uh Rob Miller to tell you how how the Corey actually integrates uh into to the public water supply for the city of Monroe. And Jay Jay's our our deputy general manager over uh uh utilities. So we have uh this past year we've integrated the management of all of our utilities uh water uh electric and gas uh under one management team headed by Mr. Rob Miller's our general manager and Jay's our deputy general manager and Jay I'm going to turn that over to you tell folks how the how the how important is

thank you Mr. Watson and good morning everyone thank you for allowing me to some time to speak about the quarry as Mr. Watson stated the quarry plays a plays a integral part in our water supply now especially under these drought conditions and just to remind everyone I know that we've received some rainfall over the past weekend but uh we had not received more than an inch and a half of rainfall between mid August 2025 all the way to the end of January. So with that being said, Lake Monroe, Lake Lee, Lake Twitty were drawn down significantly as we continue to provide drinking water to our community. So going into now the spring and into the summer months, this quarry having it piped into our water supply is going to be very important, not just from the volume of water supply, but also water quality. And I I'll get into that in a second, but each of you should have this picture in front of you, which is just a high level overview of how we're planning to pipe the quarry to Lake Lee. [clears throat] So we're going to have two pumps at the quarry intake. Uh, one is going to be a primary, one is going to be a primary backup. They're both 12-inch pumps. Uh, there's roughly 6,500 linear feet of 12 inch uh, highdensity polyethylene pipe that will connect the quarry to Lake Lee. And as Mr. Watson stated earlier, the city of Monroe owns all of the property in Fee Simple between the Corey and Lake Lee, which is significant. So there there are not any easements, there's not any rightway acquisition. We own all that property between the two reservoirs. So, going down to the south, we do have a crossing here at US Highway 74. Uh, this is where Monroe has the driving range as well as the back nine of the Monroe Country Club. That crossing circled in yellow is over the pedestrian bridge that crosses over uh Richardson Creek to the driving range and the back nine.

We continue to go south uh to Highway 601 where we have another crossing and we've identified that as a as a potential pedestrian impact area, but we have actually found a way to direct this pipeline under a covert in Richardson Creek where there's a bridge crossing for the uh for the golf carts that go from the main country club building to the back nine and then it's going to be coming up the dam side of Lake Lee and discharging through what we call a cascade water system into Lake Lee. What that cascade water system is is it actually airates the water that is discharging into Lake Lee which is going to get any potential contaminants out of it that is indicative of surface water. But I want to talk about water quality for just a second here too. Given that the Corey is a springfed water system and it doesn't have that storm water runoff, it's a high quality water and we have reports documenting that this is a high quality surface water reservoir as well. Going into the summer months, one thing that Monroe has had to look out for in previous years is is high temperatures which creates algae growth, uh, which is largely susceptible to Lake Monroe and Lake Lee, especially Lake Lee, given that it's a shallow water reservoir. So, pumping this quarry water into Lake Lee as it's drawn down so significantly over the past several months is going to allow high quality water to remain in our system even at a lower level that it currently is in. if that makes sense.

So even if we do see Lake Lee at full pond right now due to some recent rainfall, we plan on drawing that down to pump from Lake into Lake Twitty and then refilling that back in with Corey water which again will be a high quality water. How many feet down?

Currently Lake Monroe is approximately 9 ft down from normal pond. P and Lake Lee is at full pond and and Lake Twitty is approximately 5 and a half ft down from Full Pond. Lake Lee fills very quickly even with just an inch of rain that we we experienced recently. It filled all the way back up from about 5T down. It's a widespread shallow reservoir, so it fills very quickly. But again, we are continuing to pump three million gallons a day out of Lake Lee into Lake Twitty. So we're expecting the water levels of Lake to be very volatile over the next couple of months. We're producing how how much drinking water a day? Approximately 6 and a half million gallons of water a day. Capacity is

the plant is permitted at approximately 11 million gallons per day. So we're nowhere close to our maximum capacity for producing water.

No sir. No sir. Uh one other water supply that we take from is the Kitaba the Union County water supply through the Kataba at the airport interconnect. We take approximately 1.99 million gallons a day. That's to stay under our IBT restrictions. Uh so we are using that to supplement our water supply at the moment so that we don't continue to draw down on Monroe's water supply. But we are still continuing to treat approximately six and a half million gallons of water a day from the Monroe water supply. Any questions? Lake Monroe, you said 9 ft down. Yes, sir. And then Lake TW is 5T down.

Yes, sir. Okay. How's that flow?

Sure. So, Lake Monroe, there's a dam system with an outfall pipe. We can open up that valve from Lake Monroe. It flows into Little Richardson Creek. approximately thousand feet into Lake Lee. So it flows naturally through a dam system. And then we have the pumping system at the Lake Lee dam which pumps roughly 3 million gallons of water a day from Lake Lee through a piping system to Lake Twitty. Lake Twitty is fed by the Stewart's Creek. Uh and then Lake Twitty spills into after the dam into Richard Creek. So we plans to pump

at this time. No. Uh reason being there Monroe doesn't have any right away into Lake Monroe that would be feasible to pump water from any other water source that we have such as the quarry into Lake Monroe. But we have valved off Lake Monroe so that with any future rainfall, it will continue to build as Lake Lee is receiving Corey water and pumping out from Lake to Lake Twitty, if that makes sense. Recently with the rain,

it's it's been marginal, but we have seen it rise uh with the recent rainfalls, which we've we've received about an inch and a half roughly over the past month, we've seen it raise about a foot, give or take. uh it with some evaporation rate it has receded a little bit but it's not near at the rate that it was in the late summer that we had. Okay. Okay. Thanks J.

Very good. Thank you. So, I appreciate Jay giving us that overview and uh Representative Arf, you you can clearly uh understand the importance of the quarry and how it it really is intricral into the public uh uh water supply for Monroe and and I can't express to you enough uh the gratitude and thanks that we all have for the part that that you played along with your colleagues uh in transferring this property to the city. Uh it is not only a significant uh water supply, very unique water supply uh in terms of water supplies across the state, um but the the recreation potential uh we're already uh I see uh Councilman uh smiling back here uh because uh we we've discussed a river walk, you know, that that that goes from the the golf course along the property that we already own and and then maybe, you know, circles the the the Corey property. And and I will tell you, I've had the opportunity to walk that property several times now. And um if you didn't know better, you would you would think you were in the mountains of North Carolina. It is just a phenomenal piece of property and uh it will it will definitely be uh used to the public benefit uh here in Monroe. Thank you again. Well, that's a good vision um for on y'all's part and a lot of people y'all we work a long time on that and uh and the wheels of government turns slow sometimes, but we get there sometimes.

So, it's a it's a good uh it's good to have this one done. So, for sure. Well, we we certainly do appreciate it and appreciate all the the the help uh the the folks up in Raleigh that uh are in those administrative offices, some of which I've never heard of before [laughter] that that are the cogs that make all this happen. So, that that was uh that was a a unique experience. Uh next, we would like to turn our attention to the uh Charlotte Monroe Executive Airport. Um and you recall um going back u probably three years ago uh there was uh plans being made uh at that time uh to uh site uh a air traffic control tower uh at at the airport but ve in the very preliminary stages. Um and and it has taken every bit of three years to go through a process with the uh the FAA um to select uh a number of sites, have those sites studied uh and then have the FAA uh agree on on a primary site that works for them uh and and primarily is uh Uh um it it well the the tower the tower itself uh is is meant to improve the safety at our airport and and um so the u the input of the FAA uh was was important. Uh that that was a process. That was a process. [clears throat]

The general assembly uh of North Carolina um a awarded the city of Monroe $6 million toward the the development and the construction of that tower. Um that is um uh part of the funding that's needed uh to complete that project. Um the the federal government through the FAA uh has recently announced the uh opening of several grants um that we have uh already applied for. Um we felt like we well the the objective was to be ahead of the curve when the when the grant opportunities came and the grant opportunities have come. Um and uh it it's it's real exciting uh to have learned this past week um that the FAA uh is looking favorably upon our project. Um they have asked us to be ready to go to bid in September. Um and if we are able to well they [laughter] we we have requested 11.5 million

work.

We've requested 11.5 million and as they the this grant is specific to airports with contract air traffic control towers. Um so what they they want is they they have this money that they are getting ready to to u uh award uh across the country to these airports and they want to know that we're going to be ready to go to bid in September. Um we have uh we've met with our consultants, our engineers, we're confident that we're going to be able to make those deadlines. uh will get that information to the FAA and and they uh have indicated uh that they are um um ready and willing to u grant that 11.5 million. So

yeah, we're really ready and willing to accept it as well. Uh [clears throat] there there's a the air traffic control tower. Um the the way the North Carolina is a um a block grant state. So all of the federal monies passed through the division of aviation in in Raleigh. Um they have been they have played an intricral part in in this as well. and they actually do a lot of the planning of how Monroe integrates into the airspace between Charlotte Concord uh and Monroe. Um and because of that that integration in the proximity uh of these towers and and these airport locations um the FAA is also considering adding to this project um a u radar system um that will when it's fully implemented will give the FAA a three-dimensional view of all the air case between Charlotte, Concord, and Monroe. Uh, which is very unique. Uh, it's the same system that, if you recall, uh, just this past week, uh, was in the news again where there was the the the tragedy up at Reagan airport with the helicopter and the, uh, with the passenger airliner. Um and this particular 3D uh radar system was being recommended for that airspace and has not been implemented. Uh so that is the kind of benefit that that kind of equipment will bring to this. Now that's that's all being paid for by the the federal

government. Um contract control tower. Um [clears throat] the the FAA will operate this. There will be no expense to the city of Monroe in terms of personnel to operate it. Uh that's all done through the the FAA. Uh the city of Monroe's responsibility will be to maintain the facility uh provide the electricity and the gas and the water and those types of things. But uh other than that, all the expenses are the federal government's expenses. There's a couple of other So, that's the $6 million. There's a couple of other uh projects out there that I'll just mention briefly. One that we're currently in that is starting um it's actually the the project started last week is the replacement of a wildlife fencing uh along the uh eastern side of the the airport. Uh this would be the boundary between the the ATI property and the the airport. Um we're improving that fence. Um uh it will be higher. It will be underpinned. Um and you know it's a it's a very busy commercial area, industrial area, but it is full of wildlife uh more so than than folks think. We have wild turkey, we have foxes, we have coyotes, we have deer, we have geese, we have hawks, we I mean it is amazing uh the amount of wildlife that's out there and uh they travel through the current fence pretty much unimpeded at this point, but that needs to be uh corrected. Uh as part of that pro project also, we're adding a security

fence um on the western side. Uh this would be along um uh airport road, airport extension I believe actually. Um but uh it is um meant to improve the safety and security uh of the facility itself. Uh lastly, let me just mention um I think it was about six months ago, we had a visit by um the secretary of uh transportation, the deputy secretaries of transportation, um all of the the the folks at the division of aviation. and they brought quite a quite a contingent to the Monroe airport and gave us an opportunity to brief them uh on the facility and on our the the impacts that our increased usages uh flights into Monroe are having. As part of that uh discussion, it was mentioned u that the division of aviation has taken on a project um uh to start to develop um electric powered flight in North Carolina. Well, uh they actually have installed these uh so so there are uh currently across the eastern United States. We saw a map the other day and there's there's probably about 35 or 40 airports that have charging stations specifically for uh uh planes that are electric powered. The only one in North Carolina is in Raleigh.

Um the division of aviation uh is interested in developing um Monroe as the second airport that has the capability of doing the the electric charging or the electric flight. Um that would if you think about it would connect uh Raleigh with a direct flight to Monroe and back and forth. Uh the second part of that though is the the last mile flight and this would be the the vertical takeoff uh uh aircraft that could take off from Monroe um and deliver passengers to Valentine downtown Charlotte or anywhere else in the the metroana region. Um we have this would be if if it comes to fruition this would be a very easy uh thing for us to accomplish. We already have the electric service necessary uh to supply that at the airport. Um and um there continue to be conversations uh with the division of aviation about that as as early as or as late as last week actually. was all about that. Charlotte to Raleigh and [laughter]

Yeah. Yeah. So, um, look forward to that maybe someday in the future, but, uh, it it's being discussed and and talked about right now. Lisa, am I leaving anything out? Did the accident the other day, is that going to hamper anything regarding our FAA approval or does it move it up or was there any any

that that uh that plane flew in from um uh Wilmington um and there was it uh I understand I don't think this is official information so this is just my understanding that there was a pretty strong crosswind. There was some really really strong winds that day and the cross wind caught the wing and sent the plane off the the runway.

You don't think it's going to impact any of the grants or anything? Maybe tell them it's need to speed it up. Well, it you know safety is is primary and you know perhaps if there had been a an air traffic control tower and if there had been this 3D radar modeling and and all that kind of a thing um they the the plane may have been redirected but I don't I don't know that for a fact but anyway the $6 million is going a long way. There's a lot of activity out there. Um and it because of that preunding, the federal government is looking at Monroe Charlotte or Charlotte Monroe Executive Airport in a favorable light for the additional funding. So, we appreciate uh all the support there. Lastly, uh fire department. I'm going to ask uh Chief Ron Fowler to come up. the the fire department uh you know uh representatives of our fire department have visited with the general assembly uh several times over the the the past few years and made y'all aware of some of the the needs that uh they have particularly to support not only uh the fire efforts within the city but regionally. Uh, and y'all have been uh very gracious uh to provide about $250,000 in funding uh for the different uh projects that have been requested by the fire department. And I don't know anyone better uh and more capable of talking about the fire department than the fire chief. So, I'm going to turn it over to to Ron Fowler and let him tell you how he's spending your money.

Thank you, Mr. Manager. I um I sure a lot of people better qualified to tell you about this than I am, but I am uh I am very u experienced at spending money. So, I'm I'm happy to happy to do that. So, good morning, Mayor and Council, Representative Art and Mrs. Art. So, certainly good to see each one of you. I do want to say thank you for the uh for the grant that uh that you were able to uh to make happen, you and and your colleagues. So, thank you for that. Um, we did receive $250,000. There was 95,000 that was allocated for hazardous materials response. Um, 80,000 that was allocated for water rescue and then 75,000 for for training upgrades. Let me give you just a quick um kind of a quick highle overview of the department of kind of put some of this in in context. Um, of course, Monroe's a a municipal department. We're actually the only municipal department in Union County and uh we're a we're a full service department. We provide horse fire protection, structure and any kind of wildland, airport fire protection, um emergency medical, first responder, uh we do hazmat technician response, technical rescue, various different types of technical rescue. We enforce the state fire code, which gets me in trouble from time to time, but anyway, we we enforce the state fire code and uh we do fire and life safety education for the public. Um we're about we're atund and actually 109 personnel. We have u six fire stations and uh we've got a very very close relationship with all the county departments. We work very closely with them. There are 17 departments that make up Union County and we do a lot of mutual aid with them. We have mutual aid

contracts with each one of them and uh they come into the city and help us a lot and we go into the county and help them a lot. I do want to recognize we have two of our chief officers with us today, Deputy Chief Travis Stigall and Deputy Chief Brian Kinley. and um they're certainly here to um assist us to answer any questions that uh that you may have that that I may not know the answer to. Um so let's talk about first the uh the hazmat uh funding again was $95,000. Actually the majority of that 91,000 was spent on a single device. It's it's in the hand out there. It's called a it's a thread ID. Um this particular brand is a Red Wave and it is a very a very high techch um instrument that will detect and identify hazardous chemicals. You know, one of the first things you want to do when you go to a hazardous materials incident is is know what you're dealing with so that we know how to better protect the public. We know better how to contain it. We know how to better protect our firefighters. Um and that device was just over $91,000. Now, it's really like a almost like a mobile lab. It'll detect, as you see there, over 23,000 chemicals. Uh not just base chemicals, but um mixtures of those chemicals. Um it'd be kind of like having Caleb with us on the on on the scene, you know, that he could he could he could uh he could help with that. But uh anyway, so that that's certainly a certainly a big benefit to us. Now, we do we do operate a technician level hazmat team. Uh it's the only technician team in the county. We do have a an agreement interlocal agreement with Union County. Uh we provide the hazmat

service countywide. And we actually there actually only about I think the last time I checked there were about 22 technician level teams in the state. Seven of those are provided by the state. One's based in Charlotte, but if you go east from us from us, the the next technician level team going east is payable. So we respond a lot in into Anson [clears throat] County, you know, to assist them. And uh so again, that that benefits not just the city of Monroe or not just Union County, but on on beyond beyond Union County. I do want to talk next about the uh the water rescue and uh it's on the last page of the they hand out. We also through and again this is another partnership with Union County uh that we operate a this is a type two water rescue team. Uh we are type with the state and a deployable asset with the state. Uh we have been on um a few deployments. We actually deployed two teams to western North Carolina when when Helen hit. And u so what we did with the $80,000 we have we have basically added an additional setup just like the one you see in the photograph there. It's basically an additional double stack trailer, two additional boats. So what that does um we have 36 team members in the department that are that have the water rescue certification. So what this does so so with this this is three of these double stack trailers that we have. So what it does, it allows us to actually deploy two teams if needed to somewhere else in the state and still would be able to keep one trailer, one resource here. So with those 36 personnel, we could deploy two 12 person teams, still

have a 12 person team here and still have the resource resources here to protect Monroe and Union County. And again, we um we provide this service countywide through that through that agreement with the uh with the county as well. This unit, actually, one thing I didn't mention about the hazmat unit. Um we purchased that as soon as we got the money. Um and it's been in service for about a year, year and a half now. We actually have it out in the lobby. So, if you'd like to see it or you have anything you'd like identified, we'll be glad to Well, I'll call one of the gentlemen on the hazmat team, let him come over and show me how to operate it. But anyway, we [laughter] can we can figure that out. But we do have that here if you'd like to see that. This piece of water rescue equipment is actually supposed to be delivered today or the trailer and the double stack uh boats. We uh we got a we got an update Friday and it's it's due to be delivered today. We've been waiting to u order that because we wanted to be compatible with the other state teams because when you go on these deployments um you know if we of course obviously these teams are operating in some some very u very hazardous atmospheres and you know if you if you damage a boat, damage a motor, if we if we're using the same equipment that the other teams are, then we're able to interchange and that type of thing. But anyway, that should be here. That should be here and in service.

Delayed because of the rain. Been delayed because of the rain. That's right.

The last one I want to talk about the training grounds improvements and um which all of these are very much needed, very special to us, but the training ground improvements are um I I won't say more special, but very special. Um so we built this training grounds in 1999. And again, it's a partnership with Union County and that's that training ground serves Monroe and all the the county volunteer fire department. One thing we've never had there is a classroom which was something that we that we needed and and had the desire to do for, you know, for several years. Um, so what this funding did is allowed us to do that. Uh and again through u partnership with Union County with the school system, we were able to get two um um surplus mobile units. We had those move down. We set them up. Um we got one of them that's um we're using as a classroom. As you can we've actually got a recruit class going on now. There's a there's a photograph there with the that's the nine recruits that we have in class. Now, what this does, it allows us to um have the classroom portion there at the training grounds and go literally go right outside, you know, to the tower and and then do the the practical activity activities where in the past we've been, you know, we have them up at one of our other fire stations and have the classroom there and then have to travel to to the to the training grounds for the practical part. And not just us, but the volunteer partners as well. So, Unionville is doing a class and you know they're doing the classroom part at their station and then coming here just just makes it much more um much more efficient efficient on them. Uh so we put we put two level units in. One of them we've converted into a classroom

and it's it's in operation. The other one um the other thing we do not have at that facility are uh shower facilities and you know firefighters go in there and they're doing training, particularly live burn training. We do have a this is through a partnership with South Pedmont. We have uh burn facilities there. They can do burns. You know, one of the things we that we found out over the past few years is the cancer risk to firefighters from the carcinogens that they pick up in firefighting. So, what this second unit will do is we'll have shower facilities in it so that when they go in, they burns. They can come out instead of, you know, coming back to one of our stations or going back to their volunteer departments. They can actually, of course, have a change of clothes. They can shower there and clean up and, you know, get those carcinogens and and hazardous products off their body. So, so those are the the key things um that we've been able to use this funding for. I will say, you know, a lot of this stuff all ties in together. Um, we we did we did receive our ISO class one a little over a year ago and all that ties in with just water supply as well. The water supply is that's a big part of the fire insurance rating. And uh, of course, all this ties in and all benefits all certainly certainly benefits the city. The other thing uh, you always have to put the Thank you. So, thank you for the 250,000 uh with the property that y'all have been so gracious to um donate to the city. We do have plans to put a driving pad down at that at that training grounds. Um that's another thing that countywide

there's really no there's really no place to do fire apparatus driver training using the the state's program because you had to have a large area And we can't just we can't just go and say, "Hey, can we use a a mall parking lot?" You know, the asphalt won't hold up to that that heavy truck traffic. So, our plan is to put a concrete driving pan. We'll extend it across um for a road where it goes in there. So, we've got a got a perfect place to do that. So, thank you for that for that donation of that property as well. I'll be glad to answer any questions that anyone may have. First of all, let me tell you, thank you. You guys uh it's all fun and games till the disaster hits. And uh everybody's got to be ready to go and you guys are incredible legacy. Thank you to the men and women who serve and really, you know, the whole city. It's you guys got a lot of good stuff going on. So, thank you for for allowing us to contribute to that. Thank you. And one of the thing that's poignant is uh to the general assembly of course and my colleagues up there is how susceptible we are and how quickly things change when the disaster hits and and the network we rely on to have these inter agency agreements and send teams to help is critically important. So I think that's a great uh great vision for sure that

we're happy. Thank you sir. Thank you. Ron, you did spend all the money. Yes, we have spent all the money. We have spent We have We have spent all the money. Yes, sir. First of all, great job using the $250,000 with Fidelity. I think the thing that you use it on is very neat in our county and definitely in our city. I do have a question regarding um the threat ID. How many people in the area have that? And what is the radius of the people that you serve? I think you mentioned I want to get some clarification. How many people in your area in our area has one and the are the people that we serve with ours here. So, that's the only one in in Union County. Okay. The um the state response team in Charlotte has one.

Okay. Um now going east again, there wouldn't be another team until So, so we we're basically responsible for all of Union County. Now, we do go across county lines, you know, upon request. So if we get any kind of mutual aid request answering county or others and we would we would certainly go there as well. Okay. The other thing that benefits and I didn't mention it also benefits our law enforcement friends that it also identifies narcotics

and um and actually that piece of equipment is so high-tech sophisticated that that it's actually admissible in court. you know just uses the same technology that the state lab uses for for that but it also you know from our perspective identifies other hazardous hazardous chemicals that kind of things you might be able

Thank you sir. Thank you both. [laughter] Well, so so those are the those are the items that have been on council's legislative agenda uh now for several years that uh general assembly has been so gracious to uh assist with and and I appreciate uh t having the opportunity to take a few minutes and just recap uh you know what actually how those resources were put in place and what we're doing with those that not only benefit um the residents of the city of Monroe but residents in the county and really beyond. So, it's a it's a all of these resources are um shared resources at the end of the day. So, at this time u we'd like to absolutely five minute mayor wants to take five minute break. All in favor say okay very good minute

Oh, here you go. [laughter] as every as everybody uh gathers back around the table, uh the the second part of what we want to share this morning are the items that remain on city council's legislative agenda. And I'd like to call uh Assistant City Manager Lisa Hollowwell up uh to go through these items. Thank you, Manager Watson, Mayor Burns, and Mayor Pro Tim Anthony, and council members, Representative Ar, Manager Arp. So, I get the pleasure of going over the legislative agenda with you, and I'm going to do it fairly quickly because I know you don't have a whole lot of time. This is basically we had a bianial legislative agenda. So, it's basically the same items that we had last year, but with a couple of changes to it. Um, so if you look at this, it's laid out U with our policies at the top and funding at the bottom. And I'll start to with just going over the funding priorities. The first item on here is the POW bill. And you know, Representative Ar, this is very, very important to cities all across the state, not just the city of Monroe. But last year on the legislative agenda, we'd asked for a 20% increase if you were to have passed a budget. And we understand that that might be something you consider this uh legislative session on having a budget. So, we would be asking for a 10% increase on that program. It's currently at 186 million dollars and those funds go out to over 500 municipalities. Um the city of Monroe heavily utilizes these funds and and the the city has made it a priority for repaving contract resurfacing over the past year and um now has a plan of putting a little over $20 million over four years into the

paving program. And those funds, it's a combination of the PAL bill funds, um the $30 additional vehicle registration tax that goes into this program. Um and then also the the the council put additional general fund dollars in there. So we're looking at six million each year, well this year and also next year for about 20 miles of paving. So we're not just looking at um the state to provide that. The city has made a concerted effort. It's a priority and the council has put the money to it. Winchester redevelopment is the item also on there. We're requesting 2.5 million and that's to support the redevelopment activities out there. And representative ar manager, if you haven't been out there in a while, it is a lot of changes are going on. We have a building that's being renovated to house the fire department HQ as well as um some supply and in an inventory depot for them. commercials will be out there. So, we've got quite a presence and a lot of great changes, but this would be funding for um heritage walking trail, some uh assistance with some private and public um development out there, the greenway connections, and and also um if you were to have some directed funds available, we would ask that you look at that project. The Charlotte Monroe Executive Airport, you heard that

is available. Is it broken out like we've got some of the park and wrecks grants through that program and then also sometimes the vitalization redevelopment stuff and they're in different pots all around.

Yes sir. I've got a breakout of some of these things and I'm happy to provide it to you. Um the next one the Charlotte Monro Executive Airport and you heard manager Watson talk about all of these activities that are going on out there. Um, we had on our list 8.5 million. That's to help rehab some of the hangers that we have out there, meet some of the matches that we have for upcoming federal funds and just basically some upgrades. Lots of things going on at the airport. We can certainly still use those funds. No longer on this list. We had last year the city hall replacement and that would have been a lot of money for the city and the council the mayor council sent direction that they really wanted the city to utilize the current buildings that we have and um since that time we've went out and taken back the fieldhouse that is um located adjacent to the Monroe Middle School Monroe High School Sunset Park. Um so we've taken that over and renovated that and that houses the Department of Property Management, which was a new department created a couple years ago to help preserve the life of these buildings and ultimately reduce, you know, money to taxpayers for premature replacement buildings. That one um the Ellen Fitzgerald building, that part of that building had been leased to a nonprofit. The other part wasn't being used, so we renovated that. Engineering, some of engineering is there, and then ultimately all of engineering will be [snorts] in that building. Um and then at Winchester, mentioned that one, the downtown building. Um, when you get an opportunity over the next few weeks, stop in there. It is beautiful. That houses our economic development department as well as our downtown office. So, that's no longer on the list because we're utilizing the resources that we have. And then, um, another thing that's no longer on the list is the wastewater treatment plant expansion. We'd had that on the list for a few years, but thanks to the, um,

combining of of of our management and and new leadership over with water resources and electric and gas. Uh we they've taken a look at what our needs are and the current capacity that we have. So now that's going to be pushed out to around 2032. So we're very happy about that and um that'll give us some time to um amass a bit more in the fund balance so that when we actually have to finance that project, it will be less the policy. So, those are those are our money items and what's not on our list. And our policy priorities, um, the water basin criteria, we've had that on for a couple of years and we just ask that you take a look at amending the general statute 143 to revise that criteria so that any kind of interbased

all the bills been filed, right? Yes, I do follow those on opposite ends. Yes, sir. Exactly. polar opposites what you want. Well, we we understand that, but it is on our list. Nothing's passed though.

Yes, sir. [laughter] Yes, sir. We understand. The other one is related to the down zoning, the session law 202457. That was one of your disaster relief bills and that provision got in there. Thank you so much for sponsoring House Bill 170. Um and we would just ask that you continue to work on the behalf of the city to try to get us removed from that requirement of um having consent from all the affected and and neighboring property owners for any kind of down uh the PAL bill allocation. So I mentioned the money piece of it and the provision piece of it which is still in effect because it was the continuing resolution from the last budget.

Yes sir. So keeping those municipalities that are over 400,000 in population outside of the formula, Monroe benefits from that and all of those well all every other municipality also benefits from except those two. And then also not allowing the Department of Transportation to cut that program in the event of an emergency. Um that is a an important provision that needs to stay in place. So when they have an emergency, they cannot reduce that program since that would go out to the But both of those, if you were to pass a bill, a budget bill, those provisions need to be in place. Otherwise, it would be a cut to Monroe.

Um, okay. And then the county tier ranking system, we were requesting a a review and potential modification for the economically distressed. Um, House Bill 649 was introduced that would direct UNCC to do that study. That's their collaboratory. And that passed the house. So, thank you very much. But now it's got to either be picked up and put in into the budget or moved along in the Senate. Oh yeah.

Yeah. It ain't going to go. I mean the whole world's based on these tier systems and you have winners and losers and been trying to create a different system but so far we haven't been able to get and it's not and it cuts across. I mean it's It's it's a different divide up in Raleigh on the thing because it's the tier system is the 80 of the hundred and they change all the time. So, it's always who loses on this thing.

Well, I I don't know. I mean, it's just we haven't gotten compromised to move it forward. It is pretty complicated because it's tied into everything, right? A lot of funding goes out based on [clears throat]

the emergency medical services. Um, we had that on the list to look at the continuity of local and services around the state and the quality of that. There were some bills that were introduced last year, but nothing that really looked at that um continuity of care and the quality and whether or not um um that those services are provided equally around the state and um some additional regulation to help improve that quality. So, that is still on our list. The another item that was recently added was um the the council talked about the local fiscal authority. We know that the House has had a select committee on on looking at property taxes and we recognize that there is a need to to stabilize that around the state and the the council had um sent a message that they really would like to have decisions related to property taxes be made at the local level.

Certainly around the state a lot of debt gets issued based upon that ability to generate tax in the future. This doesn't necessarily apply to us of course because we are well within our thresholds of of debt and so forth, but we would just ask to be at the table. So, if you start moving forward and and try to get some legislation together, we would just ask to be involved with that so that we can help shape and craft that um for y'all. And manager Watson, I think that completes a really quick overview of the legislative agenda. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor.

Questions? I would just say this that we [clears throat] we just had a primary election and speaking with probably hundreds of citizens of Monroe. The two things are listed on here that that came up the most were roads and planning. I mean, it was basically development, but they're talking about planning. And people see their purchasing a home and living in Monroe is an investment. And those two things are the most uh they're the face of their investment when they can drive and when they they don't have houses built right on top of them. So I would just say that too. So I appreciate your efforts on those. [clears throat] [cough]

Okay. Well, that concludes our meeting. I'm very grateful to have everybody here who are representative and really the boss. So thank you for coming. Appreciate you. Thank you for bringing him. Thank you for bringing him. We we really do appreciate you guys and everything that you do for our county. Um, but with that being said, do I hear a motion to adjurnn? I have a motion. Second. All those in favor? Thank you guys. God bless you. Thank you. [clears throat]