City Council - workshop

Everybody ready? Sure. All right.

We'll call this meeting to order. This is our City Council work session meeting. Today is Tuesday, June 30th at 7 p.m. here in City Hall, City Council Chambers. And our first item is unfinished business, economic development. We have a staff summary of public feedback and outcome areas.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Attached in your packet is a summary of the public feedback we received, as well as some clustering of some after-action items. So we won't go through those in detail tonight, but Director Yeager will provide a brief overview, and then we will turn it over to Council for further discussion.

Thank you, City Manager. Good evening, everybody. Good to see you and thanks for participating in the session just before this. Hopefully we've got some good ideas rolling in people's heads and maybe some new ways to do this going forward in terms of presenting the material and making it more available to the public. So really appreciate your attention. So again, in your packet this evening is a brief summary of findings from the city council regarding the workshop that was held in May for economic development. And while council's initial discussion in April touched on a variety of topic areas, there appears to be some consensus on implementing incentives that retain and attract new businesses to our community, as well as help people mitigate the costs associated with facade rehabilitation and adaptive reuse projects. Additionally, there was interest in learning more about establishing business improvement districts in the community. And if those districts were established in the future, participants indicated that they'd like to see funds utilized to enhance connections between the riverfront and downtown, as well as create more opportunities for enhanced public gathering spaces. Going forward, administration will work to finalize and present development incentive programs that are within our current budget constraints. and work with area stakeholders to look at developing design guidelines standards for the downtown area. Staff is also working to finalize an RFP that will enable the city to hire a planning consultant to help us update the saldo, subdivision and land development ordinance, as well as overhaul the city zoning code to be consistent with the vision and goals set forth in the comprehensive master plan update adopted by council in 2023. ITEMS STAFF WILL CONTINUE TO INVESTIGATE AND SEEK INPUT ON FROM COUNCIL INCLUDE THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE BUSINESS DISTRICTS OR BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT DISTRICTS, FUNDING SOURCES FOR DEVELOPMENT INCENTIVES SUCH AS THE FACADE REHAB PROGRAM, AND COORDINATION OF SERVICES PROVIDED BY THE WEST VIRGINIA DOH AND OTHER LOCAL UTILITY PROVIDERS. AND THE ADMINISTRATION IS HAPPY TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS OR TAKE ANY OTHER FEEDBACK AT THIS TIME. ANY QUESTIONS FOR RICKY?

THANK YOU, RICKY. We've for some time been working on a set of incentives, business incentives that have been vetted through Main Street, Morgantown and city council and staff. When can we expect to see, and I think they have broad support for consideration from council. When can we expect that those will move forward through potential policy adoption?

Sure. That is an item that we would classify on our more of our near term based on these discussions, based on presentation before that we would like to get those finalized and bring those forward to council. So we would classify those as a short term action. I wouldn't say that they will be ready for your July 7th meeting or anything of that nature to commit to that timeframe. we feel like we have sufficient support feedback that we will be able to bring a product forward to you all for consideration of moving forward in the process.

Okay. Thank you.

Further questions or discussion? If not, we'll move on to item B, council discussion and prioritization for policy review as it relates to economic development. if any discussion on these topics.

There's a lot here.

I think these are a lot of the things we're talking about are kind of long-term and while it's certainly worth beginning to, I mean, we're not going to implement a business improvement district at our next regular meeting or anything like that. These are things that now that we know how public feels and we've given a little bit of council input, I'd like to give staff a bit of time to develop a couple of these to bring back to us for consideration and further development. Um, These are complicated concepts for the most part. But with Mark, you and I were on that economic vitality business. I don't even know what it was. We did it so long ago. I don't even remember what it was called now, but we, we developed those with staff and with main street and they were vetted through members of the business community and council. And yes, I would like to see those moving more quickly because I feel like we've done due diligence on those things.

A long time coming. Right, Ricky. With respect to the business improvement district, I've been toying with a number of different concepts and would appreciate and have appreciated, have been sharing those with city manager and city attorney and you know, happy to talk about those with anyone else. And they're just conceptual at this point. So I think, you know, once they've gotten more, I think, review or potentially, you know, beyond a conceptual idea, then I think that those could be as well. Ricky and I haven't sat down and talked about those. I'd like to do that. But yeah, certainly have a lot of ideas about that. I think raising standards was one of the areas that we talked about and I think we're well on our way there. Appreciate the focus from staff and all of Public Works has been and public safety has been quite visible. And so there's clearly been a concerted effort there as well as council, you know, just rolling up our sleeves and digging in and making things look better. generally better. So I'd like to see that continue because as we discussed during this workshop session, I mean, I think it's for us to set the standards that Morgantown's a place worth caring about.

Certainly. Any further discussion on this topic?

Yes. So we have, have we done an overall downtown plan after the last tenure plan?

I think there was, there was, that was in the cards, but hasn't been, that was, you know, this is kind of,

part of what could help inform, because we have a nice, we have something nice for the part of the downtown toward Deckers Creek. And then we have a nice tenure plan. Seems like parts of this are the basis for a really great downtown plan. And it wouldn't have to be, super fancy but it could help prioritize these things to what, like, I still would like to see some sort of a plan for how people, a city navigation plan or a sign program or not the signs that go up on buildings but the signs that help people route find. uh i think that would help whatever we can do to help pull together like our historic assets i like seeing that on here that we design standards so that we we pull together our historic assets we pull together our natural assets and our trails and our those kinds of amenities and we kind of pull it together in a way that invites people to use our, use our business improvement districts. Just, it would be, I don't know, I think that when staff is asking for prioritization, I think that's important, but I'm not sure we're gonna do it like right here, right now. I don't know what kind of a committee structure we, anticipate where we, like this shows by the green dots, but I think I'm one of the only ones that put green dots down. So we don't know where council necessarily prioritizes these items and we don't know necessarily where staff prioritizes these items. Somehow we could use something to let staff know what we think and what they think and how we determine what things happen in what order. I don't know what ideas my fellow, yes.

If I may. have some discussion that we would like to bring back before council at your next meeting, July 7th, a proposed amendment to the workshop schedule, which shifts around some topics and adds in a prioritization exercise at this point. We've had several workshops. I think there have been some great ideas that have come through them, but using one of those workshop sessions to discuss priorities. we would recommend dedicating a workshop period to doing just that. So that's what we would bring forward to recommend to you at your next meeting.

Is there a way to look at staff prioritization as well? Like have staff do a parallel something and then do some kind of a comparison? I don't know how we can get, I would like to know,

what staff thinks as well sure absolutely and i do envision this to be a multi-step process as we are essentially re-looking at our strategic plan which leads into our budgeting because i think along with priorities we also have to consider feasibility because some of these will help us dictate what goes into our budget for next year right so i think this is the time to have some of these discussions and that includes staff discussion as well as council priorities

And there are some simple things like some towns just have, and I know that there's talk about working with other groups and what they're doing with theirs and that's good too. But I just was looking and I can send to council examples but in Asheville, North Carolina, they just had like a few simple directional signs, like where the heck is our downtown? Where's the wharf district? Like there used to be one of the sample signs from a previous sign program. Now it's just blank that showed where the wharf district was and where parking was. But if we just had a few, because so much of our population comes in, either they're new and working at the hospital, they're new and going to school every year, there's a large population of people coming in new, new people working here for the first time, new people driving through here and making deliveries. There's just so many new people that come through here, but just to know where basic, and this is an economic development issue. If people can't find your, downtown for instance, how do they spend their money there? How do they park and walk and go there if they're not sure exactly where it is? And that goes for other business districts around town. It would be good to let people know where they are. But yes, I would like to see that. Cause it's hard to do that kind of with us on the fly.

A couple of other things that I'll, just highlight for awareness and to share some gratitude is that we've had associated with economic development, we've had a number of city manager and I had a number of different meetings, various meetings with some local business owners and have just kind of listening for things that we can, you know, can do better and kind of help, you know, us foster growth from an economic development standpoint. And I think those have been very productive. And as well as we, Lise and I, attended along with Damian Davis and and uh oh my gosh drew canis and so uh attended uh a meeting with uh a meeting with a number of property owners to talk about um you know kind of that workflow and and how we could kind of streamline things and reduce friction there. And I think that was very productive and well received. And I just, appreciate staff's willingness to engage in those dialogues and that relationship building and just because you know when we come from a place of understanding and willingness to listen then you know we get a lot further so and finally the other thing I want to mention is just on the airport and I know we're highly anticipating some good news out of Washington associated with some potential federal funding. Look forward to that and everybody keep their fingers very, very, very crossed. So that's all I have.

We tag team a little bit. The other thing is, when we're listening to individuals, but also there have been groups, like at one point, some business owners and, whoa.

Might be up there. Yeah, it's that one.

That's wild. So there are parts of Morgantown that sometimes feel, that provide for our tax base but could use some meetings with, and that would be, I think that there used to be a group in Saverton that would meet with city manager. I know in Evansdale there's quite a few business owners. I know in the Sunnyside area at one point they asked if they could join Main Street, but that would be kind of like pretty stretched pretty thin. But it would be interesting to see what we could do with some meetings with maybe not. Maybe not all of the business owners in Evansdale, but some groups. to see what could be done to be helpful.

As part of this document, say that staff is seeking further guidance from council on if we'd like to further explore the concept of a business improvement district. Do we have any objections to staff doing that? I know I'm enthusiastically for that, but just if there's any other opinions.

That'd be great. I called in another area that, of course, doesn't meet the requirements. So I would be for doing that. But it is too bad that it's just limited to certain types of areas. But that's how it goes.

How limited? How so?

Are we discussing the Opportunity Zone? I apologize. Oh, okay. Opportunity Zone. I'm sorry. So based on the census tract.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I understand the limitations associated with the opportunity. Business Improvement District.

They're two different things, right? Yeah.

Those are two different things, correct. No, Business Improvement District could be anywhere. Yes. And the Opportunity Zones are limited. And I asked about the wharf being an Opportunity Zone. Correct. And it cannot because of the census tract. Pardon me.

No, thank you, Jenny. It's a good thought. Well, you know, we just need a kick.

We just need a kick in a few places. More than one.

But yeah, just to be clear for staff, I think we're all in support of exploring that option for sure. Okay. Okay.

I still think a centerpiece of this would be a downtown and wharf district plan.

Interconnectivity sort of plan?

No, for a plan. The last time we had a comprehensive plan, we did a downtown plan, and downtown includes the wharf by definition. We did it the year before we did our comprehensive plan. So this time... We haven't quite done it yet and it's after we did. So it's been like a number of years. And the last plan had a whole bunch of little tiny areas that were supposed to be kind of focused that didn't really work out very well.

Maybe they'd worked out a little bit. Was downtown a small study area or a focus area in this comprehensive plan as well? Yeah.

But I mean, the last downtown plan had little tiny focus areas They had areas that were supposed to be kind of cohesive, and they didn't really work out, I didn't feel like. So I was looking forward to whatever a new plan would be and heavy on the prioritization so that we could look at it as an area and really focus on it and prioritize. And that would be... connectivity between those two areas would be really important also because that's part of, you know, when you want to have the amphitheater have an effect on the downtown and you want to have the downtown have an effect on the rail trail, you know, and you have people going back and forth, like that connection between Pleasant Street and toward the amphitheater is really important Like there's certain areas that we could really focus on and prioritize.

It's like you're leading into the next tonight's topic. Connectivity.

But connectivity promotes economic development because if people can't get from here to there, they're not going to be spending their money.

100%.

Well, and a lot of this economic development overlaps with the enhanced amenities in the public input session that we just had with... like outdoor dining areas with lighting and trail connections, green space, pocket park, playground recreation. So I'm interested to see what the summary of the public input from tonight is because I mean,

we all know these are the kinds of things we want particularly in our downtown and neighborhoods so it all overlaps yeah it's nice to see validation and themes emerge you know so it's a good thing right we feel like we've beat that horse yes we have right then we'll move on to our public portion which will be subject to the rules established by council and adopted by resolution I'd go over the rules, but I don't think Ricky's going to talk. All right, we'll close the public portion, move on to new business, enhanced interconnectivity. Council discussion on key topics for exploration related to enhanced interconnectivity. To kind of kick us off, I don't think anybody submitted anything specific they want to talk about policy-wise. the uh city city staff and kind of talked about items for discussion would be like rail trails pedestrian scale lighting enhanced crosswalk and sidewalk networks and pedestrian friendly gathering spaces so who'd ever like to uh kick us off for this topic

I had specifically asked for an update on the status of the pedestrian bridge that was in the plan for near Essie's and for work It's supposed to happen nearby on the rail trail that is slipping. Do we have information on those items?

Oh, we do. That is why Megan is here with us tonight. We will provide a brief update on those items.

Yeah, thank you guys for having me. It's nice to see those that I don't get to see often in other meetings. So the Greenwall Pedestrian Bridge, down there by Essie's, to kind of connect an area where that new pump track's going in across Deckers Creek. So we are under submittal review. We are in revise and resubmit of the structural calculations for the bridge itself. Green River Group was awarded the contract. They are estimated to be on site kind of towards the end of July right now to do the concrete abutments and some of the site prep. Once we approve the bridge submittal, it's about, 10 weeks-ish lead timeline, so we're looking about sometime in September to get the bridge set there, which should tie in nicely with the pump track being done and kind of alleviate some construction concerns with the congestiveness down there in the valley crossing area. So that's in progress and working well. We actually have a progress meeting, I believe, next week on that project. And then, Danielle, I believe you were referring to the slip behind the public safety building?

Yeah, down below the public safety building.

I know there's some concerns there with the drain pipes from the parking garage itself. So early last week, MUB completed dye testing of all the pipes and drains to kind of see what goes where, where it comes from and leads to. So I did talk to Rick Whistler of Parking Authority, and they are working with GAI to kind of figure out the next steps now that we know where everything originates from where everything goes is everything connected still. So that is in progress. There's really no definitive timeline at this point, but steps are being taken to kind of figure out, can't fix a slip without addressing the drainage issues.

Is there any plan for safety in that area? The fences. I don't know that it's moving, but the ground has definitely washed away and there's a big drop off and the safety barriers are never where they're supposed to be.

I'm not sure that offhand that wasn't in any discussions that came up with Rick, but I could follow up with Greg or Ella and see what's being taken, what steps being taken there. But I know like Bopark does check on the trail on a regular basis and parking authority has been going down there. I'm sure people are putting eyes on it. I just don't really have a...

There were orange caution saw horse type things, but they've long since ended up in the creek and not where they're supposed to be. So now there's just a drop off that's... I found that. I'm not sure about that one.

And just for clarification, because my neighborhood's going to ask, the bridge we're talking about is not the Domino's. No. That is the Essie's Ice Cream Shop. not first floor for any of my neighbors that might be watching this is the one that we recently redid the CDBG plan and it's part of is all part of like that lower Greenmont revitalization plan so I know that like the bridges a lot of neighbors have been mixing up that particular bridge with because we had done that study about the Don Knotts that's why I just wanted to make sure anyone watching

It's down over the rail trail.

It's not about to be set in the first ward.

Correct. It'll be down on the rail trail by hopefully by the end of September. We'll do another lovely something for it like we did for the Covent Creek Bridge that I think came out pretty well.

Thank you. Thank you for your clarification.

So, question. Can you hear me, Megan? Yeah. Yeah. i'm like i didn't catch which are you talking about the bridge that goes over donna's or the one on brockway the one down across by the ice cream shop and the um that bad turn on brockway it will go over from the ice cream shop to the valley crossing with that garage that got demoed was with the new pump tracks going in okay sorry about that i couldn't hear you're good

So I have other questions, but you were not prepped. And so I can try, I can make, well, we could just make a list and we could have another, you can try if you would like, but feel free to say. That's something that we can assemble information for and maybe other people in the room also might know something. Um, so I am curious about the bridge to the first ward and where we are for that. Leave that as tied up with the MMPO.

I'd have to get more information.

So there's like planning going on as far as my understanding. And we're not too, as far as I know, we're not to any other stage. but that seems like a pretty high priority. I was over to get ice cream in the first ward. And I know that people will love to go to Essie's for ice cream on that bridge, but I think we need another bridge. We need another bridge to ice cream. And maybe we were talking about what Morgantown could feature for a tour. Cleveland has donuts. We could have, we could have an ice cream tour.

There's a group doing a bicycle ice cream crawl.

Well, good. I'll send it to you. I've been doing it without even knowing. Um, yeah, so that one more information needed. Yeah. Just, and then. So then for connectivity, I just have some specifics that I'd like to see what we can do for them in the future. And this is one I know Danielle is also anxious about, or is wanting to see is a way to cross seven from the neighborhoods over toward Marilla park and dominion post. So crossing seven,

and Decker's Creek Avenue Boulevard, whatever that is. You're talking about the road that runs behind. From Jerome Park, yes.

Forest Mineral across Route 7 to, yeah.

Yeah, Jerome Park.

We participated in a couple of city folks. Drew, Gatlin, Jamie, myself, I don't remember. The DOH was just in Morgantown last week doing a vulnerable road user event. input kind of gathering or background gathering session, I guess maybe. And that was one of the intersections that we discussed. They made it clear that their consultants were only interested and offering recommendations for solutions to these intersections that would involve paint and signage, no like earthwork or any kind of thing like that.

If people would like to provide paint and signage to help people get across that location near Marilla park, across seven, That would be great. It would, but I just, I just think that has been on the list for so long. The bridge to first ward has been on the bridge has been on the list. Um, the bridge to first ward from across from the hotel near the dam to the unopened right away that, that bridge, that these are all like safety. connectivity, access, ways that whole neighborhoods can get to whole other areas that include commerce, recreation, connectivity, other places. So those two. There have been plans that Um, I believe engineering would know about, but it may not be high on anyone's list at this point, but, um, the seventh word to the trail, um, near star city. So be right on the edge of our city limits in the seventh ward and, and going down that hill to the trail. Uh, that would be a key. I'm just trying to think of what the upper level. things that would make a big difference to a neighborhood, any kind of connections to Deckers Creek Trail. And so I appreciate this bridge that we're talking about today as a huge, makes a huge difference. And there's the green bridge further down, but if you have a bridge there and then a bridge up further, then people can circulate and it just makes our city flow much better. And then I have one that I'm interested in, but I also hear constantly from neighbors. University Avenue, there's a crossing at Junior that the city helped put in, and I would like, on State Right-of-Way, I'd like to see a cross University Avenue at Rotary. There used to be a crosswalk, and when the road got paved, they paved right over the crosswalk, Um, they do H refuse to paint a new crosswalk, but, uh, it's when people walk in the neighborhood, they like to walk across there. And that happens. I talked to somebody that lives up on the hillside, and then I have neighbors that live more on the flat and we would like to be able to visit each other. And it's really hard when you don't have a crosswalk because people look at you and they look like, well, what are you doing in the roadway? It's like, I'm crossing the street. And it just isn't when people have kids and strollers and dogs. It just isn't pleasant without a crosswalk. And I think the mark of a great city and a great community and a great set of communities is having crosswalks. And I know that they have the same problems in Star City. And we've thought about going out in the night with rollers and just putting them in. Because like they said, paint's cheap. And so if they're willing to put some paint down, It would help these vulnerable road users if we did it. So I appreciate the other half of what I wanted to say is that I appreciate the intersections that have happened, the cooperation we have had with the DOH, like the Blinky Lights near the CAC across Patterson has been a game changer for people wanting to go see a show at the CAC or people that are wanting to park on the city side, whether we like it or not. And it just makes our city function to be able to cross these major roadways and get people to where they want to go. Another huge success was a collaboration between the county and the university and the city of Morgantown on a whole bunch of crossings on University Avenue in the campus area. So in... The area in Evansdale, there's one. Near Pizza Al's, there's one. Near the Loop, there's one near the Arts and Sciences building. Those were all collaborations kind of one year at a time. Actually, there's two in Evansdale. But the bottom line is that when we focus on specific intersections, prioritize our intersections, just like when we're prioritizing a sidewalk network and just do a few a year or putting in the curb cuts, if we can do connectivity where it really matters to people, makes a big difference.

I wanted to say thank you in terms of connectivity and crosswalks for the Don Knotts Boulevard. There was a crosswalk there that has lights finally over top of it and it was always really scary for the kids walking in the morning because they couldn't see them. And then as a very, I'm going to be very brief with my jumping off point, I really like the blinking lights. if there's any way to get some sort of flashing light on that crosswalk, because it is a high use area for the kids when they walk to school in the morning at the cemetery on bond knots, just to, especially when it's really foggy, just to be able to bring attention. That would be, it would make me feel better.

Yeah, that would be high priority.

That's all I got.

On the topic of crosswalks, my ward would love to see a couple of crosswalks on Route 7 from South Park, Greenmont, and then lower Greenmont down towards Essie's, especially where there's a concentration of a pump track, a bridge, a park, I mean, green space. By the bakery? By the bakery? Yeah, down by the Essie's.

No, no.

And then one up by the bakery.

Because part of the connectivity, when you have a bridge at one place and you have a bridge at another place, but then you don't have a crosswalk up into the neighborhood, it makes no sense. I had that written down, but I didn't mention it.

Exactly. I mean, I think those are two very logical, very high priority areas. along with agree with everything that you said about the areas that you pointed out, too. The other thing that I'm particularly interested in is dusting off the pedestrian and bike plan that's probably the wrong formal name for it but but everyone knows what I'm talking about and I'd love love to see us pull that up dust that off and take that as input into the overall connectivity prioritization

Megan, can I ask you a question? Yeah. Is there anything that maybe we, that you all are working on that we might not know about that you think is really beneficial to our community that we can spread the word on.

In regards to like connectivity?

Yeah, connectivity and access.

Oh my gosh, obviously all this stuff, current and the future plans for the lower Greenmont area. I think that's really gonna make that kind of tie into what Councilor Downs was saying about some of the concerns there in the Essie shop. I know a lot of that stuff's still under design, but a lot of that stuff's been taking a concern as we build that green space and that kind of clean up that area as a whole. I think a lot of that's gonna come together. And that I mean, we're always kind of continuing to approve the ADA ramps as we do the paving projects every year, kind of look at each neighborhood and update that as we go. It's a good point that some of you guys bring up about tying into some of the crosswalk stuff. And as a city department, we do go back and put in like the thermoplastic ones. But, you know, some of the other the light ones do not always get the afterthought that they do in the budgeting cycle for the paving plan. That'd be the big thing. And then obviously, you know what my department does with all the trying to clean up some of the sidewalks, the overhanging branches for not only bike, stroller, wheelchair access in some of the sidewalks, but also so people don't hit vehicles on trees and whatnot. I think there's a lot of behind-the-scenes day-to-day maintenance that goes unnoticed in regards to that. But we're always trying to make it better as a whole for everybody. I don't know if anybody has been out to see the new I'm going to call it the Richwood wall there by Mario's fishbowl, but kind of cleaned up that area. So hopefully you guys are driving Richwood, please pay attention to old center block garages are gone. Just kind of a nice, not necessarily connectivity thing, but just kind of an improvement to the Woodburn area.

Makes it safer for people walking on that. It does. The center block is not going to fall on you anymore. I think that kind of,

welcomingness is part of kind of what we were talking about today. Because a business wanting to come there that sees that we've taken care of areas like that. people that want to buy property here and people that want to stay here. It makes a huge difference when you do something like that.

Doesn't look abandoned.

Bragging my crew for a moment, but then, you know, like today and tomorrow, we're kind of focusing a lot, like the welcome areas, like the welcome to Morgantown signs to try and spruce up the area for the great 4th of July festivities we have planned here. So hopefully that's look like you said, more welcoming and inviting.

I appreciate all the work that you all do, especially, with the position you all are in where you're also trying to have to work with the projects that are going on by the state department and the projects going on by the university and trying to build your own schedule while also being able to adapt to what they're doing speaks to your character and the care that you put into our city. I really appreciate it.

I really appreciate those comments. It means a lot.

I think that there was a lot of connectivity done a year or two ago because we allocated funds toward it. And I think that those were not funds that necessarily were continuing funds, but they were maybe one time increase in funds that allowed a bunch of those projects to happen. And so as we move forward, as we look for more resources, toward roadways and sidewalks and connectivity and the whole package. I think we should keep in mind a few projects of that type every year so that we can keep moving forward in this area when we're budgeting.

You're absolutely right. We've done a lot in the last couple of years. I'm struggling on the spot with the stuff upcoming other than the ADA upgrades and some of the mega stuff more welcoming. Yeah. Sure. Come to me soon as I leave tonight.

But I do think I think when we talked about the paving plan and in concept in general, especially the ADA ramps and we talk about the roads that were being selected and some roads have more of those items that need to be addressed, which makes the project more complex and more costly. So as we're trying to formulate that paving plan every year, we know that there are some roads that we're going to have to start to tackle where maybe the amount of roads doesn't look like we're doing it as much. Obviously, we know the funds don't go as far anyways as they don't escalate, but some of that is a product of some of the ADA work that we need to do on those roads as well.

Yeah, some roads cost a lot more to pay than others. Some are a lot more shaped than others. And some of them were avoided earlier on when we were trying to just get roads started. So then now you have the more expensive roads. Some of them are left.

Yes, what we have left are some harder ones to tackle.

Some neighborhoods had asked about if they got together to get a contractor to... pave their sidewalks together so that they would have a lower, pay a lower amount of money. And I was wondering if you had a list of, not a preferred contractor, but a list of contractors that you all use that we could... We can't make an official anything.

We can certainly look into that administratively and see what we can do to help out those neighborhoods.

Yeah. I mean, there's definitely five or six more than qualified contractors in the area that would thrive on those smaller community level projects.

Yes, and not ratified by anyone, just contractors that exist in the world for people that don't normally do this type of thing but are interested in being community-minded and doing some purchasing together so that a contractor could make a little bit more money and a neighborhood could have better sidewalks. And that feeds into this whole looking better and connectivity.

I would fully defer that right over to Ryan, but I do know there's quite a few contractors in town that would love projects like that.

So if the Contractors Association had a side of whatever, it would be nice to encourage that with neighborhoods.

One last connectivity thing that just comes to mind to me and I think is probably pretty obvious but it's very, very, very important is WVU and the connectivity between campus and our communities is critically important and something that merits us and deliberately engaging with them on, the better that connectivity is, the better we, the better it is for all of us, right? I mean, town and gown is mutually important and something that we should lean into even more. So I'd love to see us undertake some kind of discussion with WVU specifically focused on connectivity and opportunities associated with it. I mean, I know on the on the MMPO, we're working on a number of things like Grumbine Island and I mean, there are things like that, but I think there's like low hanging fruit type stuff that we could, you know, like I, speaking of crosswalks, I've always thought I'd love to see up at the top of High Street where on High and Willie, I'd love to see a golden blue crosswalks around that and a flying WV in the middle of that intersection. you know, in thermoplastic. I think that would be super cool. I mean, little things like that that are just like, you know, just inspire pride. So anyway, just food for thought.

Louise?

Yeah, I have a question. Just maybe off a subject. North High Street, Megan, do you know if that's going all the way down to Willie? Yeah, Willie Street.

I believe it's going to stop near the East Prospect intersection because there's discussions there from how to make improvements to that intersection as well.

Okay. So it's not, they're not going to do clear down?

Don't quote me on that. I'll have to look up the, but I do know, I believe it was down at East Prospect cause I know there was a lot of discussions about how to improve that intersection there.

I think it's definitely being looked at and considered. It's just whether or not we do the full intersection improvement and carry it down to Willie.

The main goal of that was to get all those bricks up out of the road and the brick sub-base kind of ends in that vicinity.

Just curious, are there bricks underneath where the chemistry building is and the sorority and the church and all that in the parking lot? On Prospect?

Are you saying on Prospect there? Like, are they in their steam line work right now? Oh, okay.

Yeah, I was talking about from Prospect Street down to Willie Street.

I'm not sure.

I believe that's just asphalt.

I think they've been removed.

Yeah, that's just asphalt, Councillor Michael. But any section of roadway, we typically have, if it's fully asphalt or a combination or asphalt over concrete or asphalt over brick. So we typically have what the section of each of those roadways is. So we can look up and confirm. But I do believe that is all asphalt there.

Yeah, because I believe the bricks stop above that intersection.

Thank you guys.

I wanted to quickly jump back to Mark mentioning the painted crosswalks because they at first blush might not seem like a big deal and seem kind of frou-frou and unnecessary, but it is low-hanging fruit. It does inspire pride. It does improve connectivity and there are even some studies that show that it slows down traffic, so therefore improves safety. So I just wanted to highlight that and include all of those benefits to what is a relatively low lift in the public works world, considering. Wanted to mention that. I also wanted to highlight lighting, particularly because it was mentioned in enhanced amenities A lot of folks put green stickers there. Solar powered lights have been mentioned a couple of times, so I'd be interested in looking into that. As far, I know Jenny covered wayfinding signage a lot. I did want to highlight sort of an economic development driven sign that I saw in Pittsburgh. That's here for everyone that's here. That's what it looks like. What does it say? It's a blank minute walk to kayak rental. And so I thought it would be, I, I, that's a perfect thing for Morgantown. I think since we've got our main street, we've got the waterfront, we've got spruce street, you know, it's a blank minute walk to blank ice cream.

Kayak rental too. Kayak rental as well.

I like the stage. Um, and even coming the other direction as well from rail trail up. Um, I thought that was pretty cool, wanted to mention that. And then the last thing I wanted to ask about, and honestly I have some research to do myself, but I am interested in digital connectivity options. I'm not sure what that would look like for Morgantown. I'm not sure what that would look like for a city of our scale, if it's a website component, if it's an app, if it's GIS. But I would be interested in exploring what other cities of our size are doing digitally as far as connectivity goes. Because I know when I go to a new city, that's one of the first things I do is pull up my phone and try to find the cool things to do. So just wanted to mention that because that hadn't been I think that's all I have.

The digital presence, it would be interesting, I think sometimes we don't look at our own city, right, because we pull them out when we go to other cities, so it would be interesting to look at what our current digital presence looks like on different kinds of trail apps or city apps to see what's currently there and then see if we could enhance what's currently there and then see what other cities do for having something that was more robust and designed.

Or even a hub of what already exists, sort of a one-stop shop. And let's see, something you said. What people are already doing. It'll come back to me.

With the university collaboration, there's three good ways to connect Evansdale campus to the main campus and all of them have had difficulties over the years and so one of them is they used to encourage us to be able to bicycle up the boulevard on the side and at one point there was an agreement that we have that be a bike route and also presumably pedestrians do go up there pedestrians would go up there. And then at one point the DOH backed off. At one point the university backed off because they wanted the hillside covered, how there's some netting there, some metal there, and also they did something at the top to cover up the stones. So there still are some stones that come down, but it isn't so many that you couldn't have a way that people could bike up and down the boulevard there. It is fast and reasonable and so anyway, it would be nice to have that conversation come back up, particularly whenever the DOH gets around to actually, The shoulder got paved there strangely one year like in patches and so they kind of ruined the shoulder by repaving it and then they did strips up and down the boulevard so now it's like completely kind of weird but at some point it will get paved and it would be really nice if we had everything in place that there be a way to bicycle up the side and if people are uncomfortable with the speed of the cars there then we could put some sort of separation, but it's very reasonable to have a way up there and it can be all on one side, it can be on two sides, like whatever people deem the most safe, but it's an important connection and people use it anyway. And then there's a campus connector that's at the end of Grant that goes up by the President's House and there have been grants there have been attempts with our attorney to get more properties in there that would connect that area there's just a few little pinch points and then there's big swaths of publicly owned area and i think recently it was kind of attempted and then kind of shut down again, but we need to keep, when we're talking to the university, we need to keep that conversation open. They just redid the lighthouse at the top. There was talk about having a platform in there where people could look out, like you could have your Boy Scout troop go up there and hang out on the platform and then continue up. And then you get a great view at the top. And then there's another route that I don't know where, I don't know who has it on their plan, but it would start at the Seneca Center and it would have to cross, I think, two ravines and go to the top of the Arboretum and it would kind of parallel on the river side of the PRT. And it would be not right along the boulevard not as steep as the route up to the President's House. It would, because now you can go up the service road in the Arboretum, but it's like straight up, it's really hard. And for everyone's sake, it would be nice to have just a normal kind of grade that could go from, it's not all the way to the Seneca Center, but somewhere parallel to the PRT up from the Seneca Center and to the top and there are written routes of that that I know people in engineering have. So anyway, I just think if we can pick some priorities and then always have some waiting and if we had a budget for some of it and just did a few every year, that would be a huge improvement.

I was going to say when it came to connectivity, although my topic might be a little different, I'm more so interested in, I wanted to kind of ask about the status of burying our power lines. So I don't know if that goes along with this, but.

Pull it out. It's great.

That was all. I was just curious about how that conversation went. I don't.

Information, sorry. I've never heard of that one before, honestly, so I'll have to find out.

I have mentioned that in our MonPower discussions. And they said, well, we'll continue to look at those opportunities. Their initial reaction has been, well, sometimes we're seeing with burying the power lines, our response rate has actually declined when there is an issue to be able to identify where the issue is. So we'll continue to push that conversation, because I think the alternative argument is do you have fewer power outages because you don't have any weather affected areas. So that continues to be on the discussion point every time we sit with them.

Our neighborhoods? Actually, I'll wait until we're done. That way he doesn't have to continue to stand there.

I'll wait. But it's good to bring up those topics so we're prepared for the next time.

Thank you guys for having me tonight. Thank you. Thank you.

So with the power lines, can residents contact Mom Power to have them buried? Is that a thing?

They probably could contact them. I'm not sure if Mom Power would agree to pay for that just because a resident has contacted them, but I'm sure they could express interest in having.

Okay. I wasn't sure if like, maybe like we were talking about with neighborhoods and roads, if neighborhood associations came together to try to find a way to make the request.

Many people will dig their own trenches and run their own conduit and then ask the utility provider to run it through there. My experience on a utility working for a utility, they were always happy to do that. However,

How deep do you have to dig? Six feet?

I think so.

Six feet.

Sure. There's a publicly available document that shows you. Standard, yeah. Yeah, standard that shows you how far you need to be from other utilities, how deep you have to go for each different utility. Sure.

What other utilities are in the area that you have to be mindful? Is there water sewer in the area? Oh, wow.

Yeah. I forget what the design doc is, but you can see it. Anybody can access it. There's a lot of contractors I used to work with that would just literally go to Comcast's tech center and pick up cable. We would give it to them for free, and they'd run it themselves all the time.

All right.

Thank you.

See? Information we didn't know we had.

I think on the topic of digital connectivity, I think our website could use a little work in terms of especially our visitors page. If you look at our website, it's like residents and visitors. Maybe if it was built out as its own tab, but also the visitors page, I'm just looking at it now, it's kind of like, it's not great. I feel like it could be updated a lot of ways. We could probably have events on here, especially since you could probably hook this in with the CVB pretty easily so that it's always updated with the CVB's events that are on there. And then if we could have like QR codes around town that it's connected to our signage, maybe wayfinding that says like scan this and you can see what's going on. That would be cool.

Or if we had like a second website specifically for visitors, like MGW, that way people will know our airport code as well. It serves a double purpose.

Yeah, something different would be good too. Yeah, I think so. The other thing I would look for opportunities, encourage the city to look for opportunities for fixed Wi-Fi throughout our downtown and hopefully Wharf District and other places where people can access free Wi-Fi. I know the county, as part of their broadband plan, had proposals for these sorts of things. Well, the county mostly focused on, honestly, if I'm giving my opinion, what they should have been focused on, which is building up rural broadband in the western end of the county, which I think is a good priority for them. I don't know what else, what other money they might have available or if there's a way to partner there with a public-private partnership for, you know, public Wi-Fi throughout the downtown presented by a breeze line or something would probably play pretty well. But, you know, there's a lot of cities, I think Cumberland is one of them, that offers free Wi-Fi throughout their downtown. I think it would be a really cool amenity for people to have. I think it's a safety thing nowadays, too, if people lose phone service, they get a Wi-Fi call.

Doesn't the University ‑‑ Wheeze, maybe you can answer this question. Does the university have Wi-Fi all over campus available?

Yes.

Yes. In terms of relationship. It's everywhere. Just being able, like even outside, is that a thing?

Yeah. Yeah, you sign in as a guest. And then there's a code. But I'm not sure so much about somebody like sitting, let's say, at the law school. Actually, no, I take that back. They do do that. They set up there at the law school to pick up. And you don't have to type in a code up there. I actually see a lot of people parked up there across from there using access to the site there.

So it's just a matter of expanding that kind of program.

Or even people working in the parks. It's a great place to work off-site and stuff like that. So I think it would be a really cool thing to have in our city.

Good for wayfinding, too.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For a lot of people. So if you don't have self-service, you have something when you scan the QR code.

In airports, when you scan into their Wi-Fi, they take you automatically to the website. So it would be a great way to just kind of force people right into our website.

Employees have a job. Employees, like if you're an employee there, you can get code in that way. You don't have to constantly hit your guests wherever you are there. So it'll just automatically keep you online. All right.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Uh, we have listed pedestrian friendly gathering spaces. I think we certainly need, uh, a lot more respites within town, uh, throughout the city in general, uh, closer to downtown is great, but I think also within, the city and next to the trail, maybe more built up spaces where we find opportunity, where people can sit and rest. And I think to that end, I would like to see us when we're building those places to sit and rest, that they be constructed in such a way that they are not hostile to people sleeping or have it lying down on them. And again, to that end, I would ask if there would be support from at least two other members of council. We have a resolution written up to stop the installation of any further hostile architecture in the city. Uh, this wouldn't be a directive to remove what we already have. We understand how costly that would be. We'd love to see that happen, uh, at some point, but, uh, I would like to see that on our next council agenda. If I had support from two other counselors at this time. So send that out.

Absolutely. I haven't seen it.

Yeah.

So would that be, um, some architecture is hostile to skateboarding. Because it can destroy the item itself. So I don't consider, even though I love skateboarding and I support having appropriate places for skateboarding, but I think sometimes some items that are for the preservation of the of the infrastructure itself maybe would be okay.

But... Yeah, those little things that go in there. This wouldn't affect that anyway.

Otherwise, we have not done much with spikes or any kind of some of the hostile that I've seen other places.

Like the center bench, the center...

So the center bench is specifically the thing that is irritating to you.

That's one of the things that we've done quite a bit. I think we just did recently.

That was a recycle, I mean, or it was a recycle bench, but whatever, or a green lot. It wasn't a brand new one, but it was still. Right, right, right. But to your point about places to sit, you know, that is, people love that bench over in Greenmont. Again, I thank you again for the staff for making that happen because I see people sitting on it every day.

I would like to see benches everywhere, as many as we can muster. And if people are concerned about who's sitting on a bench, we need more benches. Right.

I agree with you. Absolutely.

Our downtown has had the most interesting flow of put in all the benches. Or we got like an Association of Retired Persons grant. We put in a whole bunch of benches. And then slowly people go, well, that bench is irritating. Let's get rid of that. Oh, I don't think that one should be there. Let's get rid of that one. Oh, I had a complaint here. And so they go away. So we kind of go on a cycle. So it's probably time to have more benches again. And also the same thing with bike racks. Some of the bike racks, I think, got removed that were on the parking meters. And I don't care whether they're on the parking meters or whether they're separate or where they are. But like when I go to the Blue Moose on my bicycle, I would just really like to park it at a bike rack of some kind. And instead I'm parking it on like a lamp post and I'm wondering if I'm nicking it and it's not in the right place. And it seems smart in a town that has a downtown adjacent trail that we have bike racks all over the place so that people come to the downtown and they park their bike at a bike rack instead of oddly somewhere else. And I'd like to start with one in front of Blue Moose because there's a new strip of dirt that hasn't quite found its home. I don't know if it's going to get planted or what's going to happen there. But it sure would be great to have a bike rack there.

Brian, you obviously have my support, but I also just want to highlight that it's, you know, when we think about hostile architecture, we're often our minds immediately go to the homeless population. But I also just want to acknowledge that it negatively impacts mothers with kids, people with kids, larger bodied people, handicapped people.

Elderly.

Elderly, yeah.

People who don't like to shop, who want to wait outside and not go in.

Exactly, exactly. It's hard for me to imagine a reality in which more benches is a bad thing. More benches that accommodate more people.

It's obviously a good thing. Generally in favor of seeing something like that move forward.

Just to follow up on that, when we have the hostile architecture, could we write something that was in support of street architecture and increasing the amount of places to sit and then have a second part that's together so that we're we're wanting there to be more seating and then secondarily, we don't want it to be hostile.

Yeah. I think Brian is sending the resolution as we speak. So then we can tinker together.

The part where we have more architecture in the downtown, more street furniture. Um, I would love to see like a setup, um, chess and checkerboard with two social constructs that encourage people to come. Or benches that face each other so that when there's a group they can talk to each other. Or benches that are in a corner so that people can

I love that. I also mentioned to Ricky at the public input session there was an image of an architecturally interesting bench slash swing. And so this feels also a little bit like the painted crosswalks, that if we're installing more benches, why not be more communal? Why not be more social? Why not be more artistic and visually appealing? And we have an awful lot of artists in the city who would probably love to help us with that.

If I may just, I do believe we would probably take on to your point, handle those as parallel paths. I do believe that policy decision on how our architecture is built, whether, you know, avoiding any perceived hostile architecture would be different from the policy decision from a budget standpoint of hey, we want to put more funding towards this. We would like to see that increase. That would be more direction. I don't know if that would go into an ordinance, because there may not be a point of a policy decision for an ever-expanding effort. But I think hearing that direction would go into how we develop our budget and items. I just don't know if more of that architecture would be necessarily in the ordinance, the law that we put forward. Right.

We could have a separate one.

I think you could do a resolution to say council would like to see more of this as a resolution, just not necessarily an ordinance as a policy.

Yeah, because you sure see large chess boards, Just small ones with places to sit. I'm terrible at chess, so this is not okay. But I have family members that play chess. But any kind of something or something that changes, you know, the kind of games that change from week to week, but it would be nice. The other thing is when we're looking on collaboration is working with the county on programming the courthouse square more, like, We used to have some noon concerts and other kinds of things that just made the downtown feel more friendly during the business day and encourage people to buy their lunch and come in, which I used to work for the county and I used to go and get my lunch and go to the Wednesday concerts. That was wonderful.

And I did want to clarify the agenda for the July 7th meeting has been set. So I wanted to make sure when we're talking about the upcoming meeting, we would be looking towards the end of July meeting to consider that.

Yes, I understand the agenda has been set. It's already been posted. Right. We could amend it. which is what I would be requesting right now.

I haven't read it yet. I mean, you guys can certainly put it on, but I can't say yes or no to something that I haven't seen yet.

Why don't we have everyone see it and then put it on after that.

Like I said, what I'm asking for is if I have two other members of council that want to see it on an agenda. If we don't, then that's fine. I think it would be great. This stands as a resolution anyway, Jenny. I think it would be great if we could add into the resolution a whereas, just that we would support, you know, further seating throughout the city, stuff like that.

So did you send it?

Yeah. Did you get it? Yeah.

Yeah. And I have seen it. We've worked a little bit on this together. I'm happy to, I'm happy to support it.

You got your number?

Yeah.

Okay. Good. I'll read it. You did send it around.

I've seen it. Oh, I sent it around before?

Didn't you?

Yeah, I thought so, but I wasn't sure.

No, I think I've seen it before. I'm not sure the context.

I'm not sure.

I can't remember if somebody showed it to me or if I got it in the box.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, I think it would be fine, especially if we wanted just a MedNet first day with, Ryan, if you could write up an amendment that just had some bench stuff in it that Jenny's asking for here, I think it'd be great. Okay.

Yeah, I would just want to make sure that... It was very specific so that it didn't include the little things for the... Skateboarders, yeah. I love the skateboarders. I just don't like the damage.

Well, I don't think anybody's... A lot of those little caps and stuff that go on, I think, save that, especially the wax, save that concrete quite a bit. Sorry, what were you saying? Take it off.

I was saying something that's going to make everyone mad. I'm concerned about the precedent we're setting that now not only are we amending an agenda, but we're asking for an amendment to the resolution that we're putting on the agenda when like that's asking a lot of staff at the last minute when it's a holiday week, but.

Well, I would support this in the long run, but I am not supporting it right now because I don't want to rush anything.

just haven't seen i can't say yeah i'm not saying yes or no i haven't i haven't i searched i didn't see that it had been sent around before um i just i don't understand why two weeks makes a huge difference so that we can all look at it and see about amending it i don't think it makes a huge difference i just think that sometimes uh we're extremely deliberative in our process and

that you know in i think in this case it's it's something that we can deliberate i think a lot of times we need to get more comfortable about deliberating things in here in these public meetings and having opinions about them in here rather than us like having to spend all this time kind of trying to decide how we feel about it before a meeting comes up

I have no problem sharing my opinion. I have never had a problem sharing my opinion. I'm just concerned in the time because the agenda's already been posted and now we're asking for amendments to it to be posted tomorrow.

Yeah. I mean, it is, just to be frank, it's not my fault that the agenda got posted early.

It's not early. We have holidays this week.

Well, tomorrow's kind of our date. Right. So while we're having a, uh, a deliberative meeting to decide our agendas. Right. So I understand. I understand what you're saying. I do.

We normally post on Thursday. You're right.

Yeah.

But Thursday's a holiday.

Yeah.

So, but, uh, but you were in the agenda meeting yesterday. You could have said it then. I know.

I didn't think of that.

But also I think that, again, like, to highlight, you were just saying this, you know, I was at an agenda meeting, but I think that we should decide what goes on these, what happens at these public meetings in public. That's all. That's part of it.

When you aren't someone who is at the agenda meeting then you don't necessarily know when it gets posted. So that's what happens to me nowadays and it didn't used to happen to me because I was in the agenda meeting. So it just is part of the thing that there's always going to be people that have something they want to add and we just want to not inconvenience staff too much because they already did the whole process earlier. Sure. further discussion I guess the lighting I think it is a good idea sometimes to add some lighting potentially if it could be solar then it we might not have to pay the power company for some of the pedestrian scale lighting if that's allowed. But anyway, some of these crosswalks that we're suggesting are in places that could use a little bit of lighting for pedestrians. So we should, when we're doing this, look at lighting as a important safety measure. Do we have, maybe this is a question for Megan.

Do we have better options for solar batteries? When we were in the Vulnerable Road User meeting, Drew was talking about a lot of the rapid flashing lights being solar powered and them always being broken because of the solar battery.

I think I'll just need some research, to be honest. I'm not quite sure what all options out there for better solar lighting are. The speed wagon has been set up on Richwood and

I think two out of three days when I would drive by it, there would be a little battery thing.

Okay. I think it's very location dependent.

Good.

Yeah, they're very location dependent on how well they work and how much time they get. You know, the whole concept of solar. We have some pedestrian skill. Well, we have at least one pedestrian skill light that is solar powered in the pocket park outside of 430 spruce and and that is a solar powered light and i know when we first did we had to um change where the how the more the where the anode was that is turning light on and off but otherwise it works and is solar-powered every day. But in an area that's heavily forested and treed and has a lot more shade than it, it becomes a little bit more difficult to get enough juice to hold continuously.

I have solar panels on my house. I know all about these cloudy days. Not this week. It's been great.

I had a question about, uh, there was a trail proposed. I know you're already sitting there, but there was a trail proposed for, uh, behind Eastern Avenue into the trail that way that goes over that went over the, uh, yeah, there we go. Where are we at with that? Just grant funding stuff.

Uh, right now the floodplain of that is very large, even though the stream looks very small.

You can jump over the stream. Yeah. And how long would the bridge have to be?

Have you jumped over it?

I think it's like 50 feet or more, which is, it was a pretty significant bridge. It's not 50 feet.

It is not 50 feet. But the floodplain is.

The floodplain is 50 feet. You could definitely hop over the stream. So as far as funding, it just, so we have a tentative design. There's just not actually.

money for construction.

It just hasn't been budgeted. So do people make bridges that are porous but in the floodplain that you just don't cross when the water rises? I know you don't want to block. It's anything coming down in the deluge. Yeah.

I just typically more about the concern that bridges would collect debris. Um, like the subterranean bridge sometimes does, and then it kind of builds that up. And so part of that issue is as that builds up, it essentially creates a dam and then further causes additional flooding behind it. So it's. Sometimes it's more that you design the bridge if it is going to have those heavy rains to basically break apart and it gets destroyed. It's a sacrificial bridge.

So how do we save up for this bridge? Because it would be really great for school kids that want to walk to school and people that want to walk down to the trail.

We can look at that whenever we are developing our budget for the upcoming fiscal year and the CIP. That council will be heavily involved.

Cool.

Have we covered it?

I think so. Do we have a motion?

Are we moving to go into executive session?

Sure.

All right, well, why don't we move into executive session for discussion of matters protected by attorney-client privilege. It is anticipated that the items will be discussed in executive session as permitted by West Virginia Code 6-9A4B12 and pursuant to West Virginia State Code Section 6-9A4B2A to discuss personnel matters for boards and commissions.

Second. So, all right.