Board of Aldermen - Regular Meeting

Thank you.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you all for coming. Um, I'll do the call to order. Um, if we could start with the invocation, Laura, please rise.

Bless this town and may it remain a beautiful and friendly place to live. We pray that this board makes fair and informed decisions this morning. We also pray that our police officers, firefighters, and members of our armed services here and around the world remain safe as they risk so much for our security. We also pray that our town be spared the ravages of hurricanes and other natural disasters, and that everyone associated with the town remain safe and secure. Amen.

Please stay standing for the Pledge of Allegiance, Connie. Okay, can I have a motion to approve the agenda? Do I hear a motion to approve the agenda?

Motion to approve the agenda.

Do I hear a second? Second. Discussion?

In the sake of time. I guess we can't move. I was one of recommending moving the appointment of the board member up in the agenda, but I guess it's already at the top of the agenda and can't go any higher. Is that the way I see it? Okay. I withdraw my discussion.

All right. All in favor? Aye. All right. Larry, just... No, man, you have really done a great job for us, Larry. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Mayor.

Bring the runners home. That's going to be hard to follow. But as the mayor was just outlining, I expect this to be my last report as North Topsail Beach's interim town manager. I've enjoyed the time serving this community, the mayor, the board, working with staff in the service of the community. I mean that from the bottom of my heart, top of my heart, sincerely. The 130 days have passed rather quickly, and it's not quite over yet. I look forward to the next phase of this tenure, assisting in the transitioning functions with Stephanie, our incoming town manager, upon her arrival on the 1st. That said, we've begun a soft transition upon the board's date of announcement last month. God, it feels like it was ages ago. of her selection. We've been sharing email threads on programs, projects, activities, and at her option, inclusion in some personnel interviews that are coming up. And so for today's manager's report, I'm offering some highlights from my written manager's report, which has been separately transmitted to you. I'll highlight a couple of items, one involving beach safety, and the other several policy initiatives. First, beach access crossover. I've received a report from Alderman Laura over the weekend regarding the condition of a beach access crossover. For safety reasons, BA18 has been closed. The condition of the structure has compelled our Public Works Superintendent, Chris, at his initiative, I would emphasize, to schedule an assessment of all our crossovers to determine their structural soundness. For example, the pilings, treads, risers, handrails, landings. Their findings may warrant closure of multiple crossovers until repairs can be performed internally or more likely externally through contracted offenders. We'll update the board as the assessment progresses. But in summary, what I would expect us to be doing is public works will assess the structures, determine the complexity of repairs, assess whether internal or external personnel will be needed to complete those repairs, collect quotes for contracting purposes, and refer or report quotes for repairs to the board for the request to award contracts if needed. And so that's going to be ongoing over the next week, two, three, four weeks.

Just a real quick one on that, Larry. We've got, what's the park we were just talking about yesterday? That's got the launch.

Oh, Rodney Knowles?

Rodney Knowles. Well, he'd be looking at, I'm assuming he'll be, it's not just the beach crossovers. On the sound side, we've got a couple. I mean, I was there the other day. It looked fine. But maybe after the beach crossovers, if he can make sure he looks at kind of some of the things. I know we've got the new one up by you, Mark. That should be okay, right? but I know that there's, you know, we do have some of that stuff, and I think that we did a lot of repairs at Peters Park. I think it would just be a follow-up, but I think the big thing is the beach access, from what I've seen. Any other comments?

What beach access was that? 18. 18?

Yes.

All right, and will we be putting it out on either our social media or online?

If we haven't, we certainly will.

Thank you.

All right. There are a couple of policy initiatives that have been deferred and or extended out of respect for the incoming manager for the purpose of providing an opportunity to involve her in those initiatives, in particular a traffic calming policy, parking ordinance, finance staff augmentation and vacancy reconciliation, and the RFP process involving the proposed compensation study. So first on the traffic calming policy, As I mentioned, it's been deferred from this meeting to allow involving the incoming manager. The draft policy has been circulated among staff and was forwarded to our town attorney team for review on or about July 10th, after which the decision authority is being refined and the policy will be rerouted to Stephanie and our town attorney team before June. being presented at her discretion to you all for review. Parking ordinance, if you all probably recall, it was introduced at your July meeting and referred to the parking committee. We met as a group last week. Refinements were made, and the draft will be retransmitted to our town attorney team and our incoming manager for their collective consideration and evaluation.

And then I mentioned to Connie before that meeting my concern about contractor parking, because I'm seeing them basically on the road, if not on the road, in the right-of-way and everything else, and multiple vehicles and those type of things. I've seen people swerving around them. And so when we talked about that, Connie, and you can address it if you want, I mean, if you've got eight cars there, you can park six of them someplace else and pay to park and then bring your people over there. And I'm not talking about dropping off materials, but they sit there all day long and... I just know people have had an issue with trying to get around them, especially in the 45 zone. So I think it's something we ought to at least take a look at. I'm not trying to punish contractors, but I saw two the other day where the tires were actually on the road all day long.

That topic got a lot of conversation on it, and we looked at how to mitigate that, balancing both. issues, you know, and I think we got a reasonable solution.

I just wanted, I know Connie and I talked about it, I just had concerns because I just see, it just seems like it's getting worse and worse and not better, so thank you.

Third, comprehensive compensation study. Our RFP was published on July 14th. It's been listed on our webpage. advertised in the News and Observer and distributed directly to six firms. So I feel good that the word is out. It's basically the punchline on that. The following timeline was set forth in the RFP. The proposals are due August 21st. We'll conduct optional firm interviews in early September, and I would expect... that recommendation referral to the board would occur at your October meeting and hopefully the project would be able to be kicked off mid-October. So again, that's really going to spin all around Stephanie's comfort level and so forth. We look to integrate her in the process. Thank you. And lastly, a staff augmentation proposal for finance. I offered the board a proposal to augment the finance staff through GWI tax and accounting. The policy and program initiative is being deferred to the incoming manager for her consideration. But the temporary augmentation of the finance division is recommended to mitigate a number of challenges. The loss of capacity, which occurred upon departure of our previous finance director. Um, finance processes, finance, uh, financial processes have not been fully integrated. Uh, finance was in the midst of a train up employing new procedures that hadn't been fully integrated, embraced or enforced. And then a recognition of heightened workload that is being shouldered by, instead of, uh, uh, by two, instead of three persons, uh, both having, uh, you know, somewhat new experiences in North Carolina, general statutes and so forth. So I just leave that with elevating that to the board's collective awareness. We're looking at ways to mitigate that, not only from a temporary augmentation standpoint, but also how to approach filling the vacancies.

Just a quick comment on that. I think that that's great and Again, it feels like we're putting a lot on the incoming town manager But I remember during her interviewing on her on her resume and everything She actually worked in the finance department at one of her jobs So so I I think that's great. She'll be able to give a lot of advice to our current one

And that concludes my report.

If I may ask there, have we put out an announcement yet for those vacancies?

Not as yet. There's been light conversation, if you will, with Stephanie. and an interest to continue the conversation. Okay, thank you.

Yeah, I think the issue, and it's a good point, Kip, I think the issue is going to be do you want to restructure one of those positions? Because if you just hire back in, she's already stepped into one role, and so the question is what level of expertise do you need? So I think that if I was Stephanie, I would just say, let me organize that department, which I think is your point. So make sure that we're clear when we go out. And also for the residents to know that they hear GWI.

I'm holding my power. I just want to make sure that we're emphasizing that we are moving forward and there are reasons why GDI is brought in to help make sure we're doing the right thing and all the right steps. So I just want to emphasize that GWI has not been brought in.

There was the recommendation to do that, but this, that what I, anything I've said today is, is not a decision. Thank you for the clarification. Or a contract execution.

I think the Newtown manager will have a lot to say as to how finance departments should be structured with her expertise and then can look at the job descriptions and and come up with the position she thinks are needed and then present that back to the board.

I've never heard this board say that we don't want good financial work and everything else. And I think we spent a lot of money over the years getting where we are. And I think the sensitivity that Connie was talking about is I think that Debra Mack did a great job on the FEMA stuff under a fixed contract. No hourly billings, one shop, done. And I think that worked out very well, and we got, what, $13, $14 million back. That was great. But as you know, there was a lot of upset, a lot leading up to that. So anyway, thank you, Larry. Sure. All right, so let's go to open forum. Lexi?

Yes, so we have multiple sign-ups today. Up front, we have Doug Winters.

Good morning. My name is Doug Winters, and I've applied for the open Board of Aldermen seat. Thanks for giving me this opportunity to speak with you guys this morning. I appreciate your time and consideration for the appointment. I'm seeking the position because I think that North Topsail Beach deserves leaders who are committed and thoughtful decision makers, financial responsibility, and serving the interests of the entire community. I'd be honored to be one of the leaders. For 35 years, I worked at AT&T in a variety of leadership and project management roles, including federal, state, and local and government customers. I managed military, federal, government contracts, as well as state and local. I did even implement and upgrade, was in charge of the enhanced 911 communication services throughout the state, so got a lot of background in those areas. These assignments require managing complex contracts, overseeing budgets, coordinating with multiple government agencies, solving difficult... operational challenges and ensuring projects were complete, successful, and responsible. Throughout my career, success depended on listening carefully, building consensus, paying close attention to detail, and making decisions from balanced, competing priorities while also protecting the interests of the customer and the taxpayers. My wife Erin and I made a very intentional decision when we chose North Topsail Beach to build our forever home in 2024. We weren't simply looking for another place to live, we were looking for a community where we wanted to invest our future and we found it here. We fell in love with North Topsail Beach, its peaceful atmosphere, its welcoming residential community, its beautiful beaches, and its great boating lifestyle. Those qualities make this town unique and are worth protecting. As homeowners and residents, we all have a personal stake in ensuring North Topsail Beach continues to thrive while preserving the character that attracts so many of us here in the first place. Understand the decision made by the board of all of them in fact ever residents ever business and ever property owner where their issue is infrastructure public safety storm resilience responsible development or managing the town's finances each decision deserves capital analysis and long-term perspective If selected, I will approach every issue with open mind. I won't come with predetermined answers or personal agendas. I listen to the residents, ask thoughtful questions, study the facts, and collaborate with my fellow board members to make decisions that strengthen our town today while protecting the future. Throughout my career, I've learned that trust is earned through preparation, transparency, honesty, and following through on commitments. Those same principles will guide my every decision as an alderman. I don't view the appointment as a title. I view it as an opportunity to give back to the community that Aaron and I have chosen to call home. If you place your confidence in me, I will work hard every day to earn it. I will be prepared, I will be accessible, and I'll always strive to make decisions that reflect the best entrance in the entire North Topsail Beach community. I hope you give me the opportunity not just to live in North Topsail Beach, but to serve it. It would be both an honor and a privilege to earn the trust and serve as a member of the North Topsail Beach Town Board of Aldermen. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you.

Up next, we have Jason Starr.

Good job. Good morning. My name is Jason Stare. Some of you know me. I am on the BISAC committee from Mr. Larry, talk me into that. I am also the most recent appointed chair of the Board of Adjustment. Again, we got into that. 303 Lanterna Lane, so I'm over on this end of the island. Larry's my friend, my neighbor, and there won't be another Larry. But in his honor, in my history, my experience, I've offered that to you guys in any civic manner necessary. And should I be appointed or not, I am at your call. For any assistance, I can help provide any guidance for building any plans going forward. So just with that, in Larry's honor, my experience, I put myself on the application. Thanks for your consideration.

Thank you for doing that. We all miss him.

Up next, Joe Peterson.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Joe Peterson, and a little bit about me. I am from Maryland originally. I came to North Carolina to play some very mediocre football and lacrosse in college. Fell in love with the state. went to law school at Campbell University and I got a job offer for Jacksonville at a law school. And I was like, Jacksonville? I'm not really sure I want to live there. They said, well, North Topsail's right there. And I got to fulfill my lifelong dream of living at the beach. And so I moved here 10 years ago, living in a tiny little triplex on Sandpiper Drive. Soon after that, moved to Bayview. I was very lucky that in 2019, I was able to buy my first house at the age of 28. And I was very proud of that. And I've lived there ever since, made improvements to it. And I love to brag to my friends that I'm a three-minute walk to the beach when they have to drive 45 minutes just to get to work. In the last year, I've felt a call to public service. Uh, I've been attending, uh, the Oslo County Republican meetings where I was fortunate enough to meet commissioner Bennett among several other, uh, representatives, including Carson Smith, who is our candidate for state represent, uh, state Congress. as well as Mike Lozaro, who's our state senator, Michael Watley, who is our Republican candidate for U.S. Senate right now. And so that's not to say that I'm trying to push a Republican agenda here or anything. It's really just that I feel called to public service. My best friend and business partner of the last nine years, Jonathan Naylor, he was recently appointed to be a district court judge, and I've seen sort of the change in him that he feels that he approaches life when he feels he's a public servant, and that means something. I meant to bring it up with me, but there's a book on the history of Topsail Island. And I reread the chapter on North Topsail last night because I wanted to refresh my memory. And one of the problems that I noticed back 20 years ago was overdevelopment. And that's a problem that I think faces us today right now. Because another thing that seems to follow with the overdevelopment was Bertha and Fran hitting us. When you combine overdevelopment with catastrophic events such as a hurricane, which we pray every year that we're not going to face, but inevitably at some point we're going to, we face these huge problems that set our town back several years. And so if appointed to the Board of Aldermen, I would take it seriously as a sense of public duty for the town and the city and the beach that I love and that I want to protect. And I don't have a lot of history with town planning or contracts like some of the other candidates do. And honestly, I'm a little nervous right now. I'm more nervous talking in front of y'all than I am a superior court judge, a jury, or a district court judge. Because public service means that much to me, and that's how much the position would mean to me. Thank you for your consideration. And by the way, Mr. Malcolm, I apologize for not seeing your email. I would have loved to get to know you sooner.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Suzanne, I believe Van is the last name. Suzanne?

Did I get your last name correct?

Van. Van, okay. And I am not running for Alderman. I didn't know I was going to be in the lineup.

Just to be clear, you're not walking for Alderman either.

No, but I shall contact him whenever I need something. I appreciate the board giving us this opportunity to voice our concerns or interest.

Can you list your name and address for the record, please?

Suzanne Van from 1921 New River Inlet Road. I have an appreciation for the talk about the vehicle, because that was one of my talking points, about vehicles on the road. I've seen multiple near crashes, especially if it's around a curve, of people going around stopped vehicles, construction workers, not one foot in the road, but three or four foot in the road, near a bridge, and it is bad, and it's getting worse due to the construction, and as he said, the development that's been happening the past two years especially. But one of those other points, and I'm with you, I don't want to detract from someone making money, doing their job, but the safety of the FedEx trucks stopped in the middle of the highway. They just stopped. And they go walking up the stairs to somebody's home or condo or whatever, and then they get back in the truck with their FedEx trucks stopped in the middle of the highway. So, yeah, I know they're time sensitive, but we do need some road rules. That's just only happened in the last year or two, so I don't know what can be done. And, of course, my other one that I have been speaking on for months and years is crosswalks at these beach accesses. I know that the data shows that no one has been killed, praise the Lord, at one of these crosswalks, but it's not because of near misses. And I'm just concerned with babies, strollers, people, you know, walking across the, and I know Onslow is part of it and North Top's part of it, but sometimes we need to get together on this. So I would really appreciate your support in contacting Onslow County Beach Access at my marker 20. It is awful. It really is. And some of the other ones that has a parking area across the road from the beach access. Something needs to be done there. It's just terrible. And to bring that down is these skateboards, these electric skateboards. They are riding in the middle of the highway. I'm talking about 8-year-olds, 10-year-olds. I know it's a parent's responsibility, but there's no parent around. When they're riding two on one the other day for two or three days, going up and down the highway on the wrong side of the highway, and they went around that curve at mile marker 20 on the wrong side of the highway. And I just prayed that no car was coming when they were there. So we need some rules and regulations and someone or something to enforce, okay, we can't do that. We just need help in the safety. of children and everybody. So I appreciate you.

Thank you very much.

Up next, we have Susan Meyer.

Hi Susan Meyer to 2 to 4 new River inlet road unit one 38 I'm also not running so and might be short and sweet I was just wondering if there was any possibility that we could put a camera or cameras up on our bridge. like they have in surf city. It would be nice for the residents to be able to look and say, Oh, well, I'm not going to the store right now, or it looks like a good shot. I'm going to go. So that's just a thought. Thank you for your consideration.

I don't want to respond to people, but believe it or not, we're actually looking at that right now.

Great, great minds.

It wasn't my idea, but yes.

Thank you.

Lastly, we have Keith Wilkerson.

Good morning, everybody.

Most of you know me. Keith Wilkerson, 149 Segal Lane. I just wanted to say that I agree with the two people that spoke about the crosswalks and the parking and the construction going around. They're right, it's a big problem. I want to congratulate the board on making a good decision in making Andy Page the new chief. I think it was fiscally responsible, also saved a bunch of money to come to the same conclusion that he was the best candidate. And I wanted to thank, just go on record as saying, I appreciate their work. A couple weeks ago, I got a phone call. My wife got a phone call that started screaming at me, get out of the gym. We got our babies choking. It was my granddaughter was choking. She was a couple blocks down. We ran down there and we called 911. Those guys were right on top of us. And they did a great job, and they cleared up, and she's fine. But I just wanted to say that we're lucky to have a small town like this, to have such a good fire department and police department. I speak from experience. We're very lucky. And I hope we all appreciate it. Okay?

Thanks very much. Thanks for your comments. All right. That's not another job you're looking for, Doug, is it?

Can we go ahead and read it? All right. Chad, if you could stand up and join me up here at the podium, please. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Chad Simpson. He's our senior public works technician. I'm just going to read this off. That way everybody understands what we're here for, recognize you for today. In recognition of your professionalism, dedication, technical competence, and continued commitment to the Town of North Topsail Beach, I do hereby appoint Chad Simpson to Senior Public Works Technician. This promotion reflects the Town's confidence in your performance, judgment, and reliability, and carries with it increased authority, responsibility, and accountability within the Public Works Department. In this role, you're expected to lead by example and uphold the highest standards of safety, workmanship and professionalism. You'll be responsible for guiding daily operations, mentoring and developing fellow employees and ensuring that all assigned work is completed efficiently, correctly and with integrity. You're entrusted with safeguarding town resources and setting the standard for performance and conduct within the team. This appointment recognizes that leadership is earned through action. You're expected to exercise your authority with fairness, professionalism, and sound judgment, and to continue earning the trust placed in you by both your supervisors and your peers. Effective this date, you're formally appointed to senior public works technician for the town of North Topsail Beach. Accept this promotion with pride and humility, and remain committed to serving the residents and visitors of North Topsail Beach with excellence.

Congratulations and thank you.

So the next one is kind of an interesting one that I'm going to do just a quick introduction, then I'm going to turn it over to the pro tem person here. You can step up. So as Laura and I were talking about before, this issue about COBRA and some other stuff, I've been talking about ad nauseum for a long time. and who will talk here in a minute, has been working with the Topsail Island Shoreland Protection Group for a while. And we'll talk about a change that you'll get into, a change in the focus as to what we were doing with some of the Cobra stuff. And in those discussions, and this is the hard part about it is, Larry was intimately involved with Ann. They were in constant contact all the time. He was husbanding this to put it, you know, and I know that you have really stepped up on this one because it was a huge gap to form. And I was talking to Jason about this. The irony about Larry was a simple one. He lived on the Sound, but he loved the beach. And once he bought onto the beach, And I think I know I and the people here want to support Larry's legacy on this. And anyway, so as part of that, we had a general discussion about that. And Kip, I remember years ago we were talking about if we had to put more money after it to increase the chance of getting some stuff done, we ought to be looking at moving in a different direction. And so this is kind of a first look from that. And Connie's going to talk about what Ann is doing and what she's done for the town so far. But it was my feeling, and I think, and your feeling, and I think the board's feeling that we ought to be doing a little bit more in Washington and other places to further some of the things we've got going on. Because for this town, the Cobra issue is a multi-million dollar issue. For homeowners that are in a Cobra zone, the cost of flood insurance is 10 times the cost of people outside of it. It's a very expensive type of thing to get done. With that, I'm just going to turn it over to Connie. This is her presentation. So she stepped into the big shoes, Larry's big shoes. So pro temp?

after larry passed i went up to uh... dc to meet with the lobbyists than the firm and i'm actually where it was supposed to be uh... with us and he was going to do all the talking and all the work and i was supposed to keep a mouth shut and i take notes that quickly changed and when i went up uh... to their offices and met and and the other lobbyists up there i was blown away by Actually everything they had done for the shoreline protection commission and that we're continuing to do and what they've been doing for our town There's a lot of things that go on behind the scenes and especially when it comes to Cobra as these as the mayor said It's so important not only to the individual homeowners but also for the whole town for projects that we're trying to get done that maybe need some federal funding and And as it evolved into that, Ann has actually worked hard to move us even further towards those goals than we've ever been in the past.

In a different path.

Yeah, in a whole different path. And not only that, but I learned that, and actually she came down and met with me and the mayor, that when we opened that up, there's so much more that she could do for us, but being hooked into the Shoreline Protection Commission, that's great for all that stuff, but there is some things that really could be done for us just individually that we could have done. Like the mayor's fund of saying, when we're with the Shoreline Protection Commission, we get a piece of the pie. We want our own pie. And that's where we'd like to bring Ann in.

She's the bakery.

And I think her presentation, she can speak to what she would like to have done and do for us. And I think it's just, my vote is, it's fantastic.

Thank you very much. Can I hire you all to do my PR?

We'll trade.

Thank you very much for that introduction. And I won't talk too much because I will cry if I talk too much about Larry. But absolutely adored working with Larry. That morning, Monday morning at 6 a.m., I got that email. It was a really, really bad day. And he was an exceptional person and one of those people that would call your phone, my work phone. I called my bat phone. I'd see it. I'm like, oh, thank goodness. It's not somebody else. And I have a voicemail saved I listen to from him often. I actually listened to it before I came here today, but a special person. And Connie did come fill in for him, and she did absolutely fantastic advocating and going through the points with all of the representatives and agencies we met with. So we've got a star there. I have Jeremiah, my colleague, is on Teams, and I will introduce him in just a second. Where's the clicker? I'm used to having to do that. Yeah. So I'm with the Ferguson Group, TFG. We do advocacy for local governments, municipalities, you know, all of the needs, all the things that we've talked about on the agenda today are things we specialize and do things in. And I am me. I've been a little... political nerd watching Meet the Press since I was five, and so that's what you turn into. Jeremiah, we can't see you, but you can introduce yourself.

Okay, can you guys hear me?

Yes.

Perfect. Okay. Jeremiah Van Auken, principal with the Ferguson Group. I've been with the company for three years now, and I've been in the federal advocacy space since 2021, always working on behalf of local governments, special municipal districts, water districts, that kind of thing. These projects that you've been talking about are really, really the bread and butter of what DFG does and the lobbyists here do. Currently, I'm working on behalf of several rural and agricultural counties in California and the Central Valley. Eastern Sierra Mountains, water districts throughout the West, as well as the transportation district, Hampton Roads Transit, the second largest transit organization in Virginia. Prior to lobbying, I spent two years on the Senate Appropriations Committee on their defense subcommittee. So very, very familiar with the appropriations process that uh is in theory supposed to happen every single year and uh i think uh connie said it best um right now you are getting a piece of the pie but you want to actually add the pie and be the pie you want to be in dc and you want to be treated uh just as everyone else is, and not just be a component of another organization. You want to be at that table. You want to be meeting with the legislators. You want to make sure that your priorities are heard in the context that you want them to be heard, and not in the greater context that you have all previously engaged in. So I'll throw it back to Ann, and I'm following her lead today.

Thanks, J. My. They asked me when I was coming to who I wanted on, then I picked Jeremiah, and that's going to become, his expertise is going to come clear for this. Yeah, I guess we have to revert. You spoke too soon. We can find money to replace this. So all of the one-stop shop, all of this boils down pretty simply. I already work with you through TISPC on a narrow scope of issues. FEMA, the COBRA issue, those types of things. But the one thing you are... leaving on the table is the access to the federal funds, paying for things, and also just the dedicated service of my focus, 100% on you, for the issues you have now and the issues we don't know we have yet. Leaving the money on the table is just a lot out there. Because we already do a lot of the work with TISPC, that stuff doesn't change. And those are issues that affect all beach communities broadly. But there's ones you have specifically, specifically funding needs. And so this is an add-on to that stuff. This is like the shiny coin of stuff because this is the funding. This is the big dollar signs. This is the great stuff. Next. So what we do and what I would do is we meet with, I meet with your new town manager that's coming in. And then I meet with the department heads, not just the mayor, although I'll meet with you and the board anytime you would like. But go... Talk directly to all of those and develop a federal agenda. So this is making a plan. So instead of going, you know, on defense for stuff, you've got a plan going forward and you're on offense and you're looking at things that are coming down the road to happen. Funding things that you're going to need in a couple years and creating a plan of how to get those things funded. When we go through those priorities, then that's where I get to get creative and Jeremiah, creative too. We get on these calls and then just brainstorm. There's some stuff that's real simple as far as we need a new fire station, you go to appropriations. There's other stuff you have to get a little bit more creative about and finding the money. We work to find that money, fully tailored service to your individual needs as a town of what you need. Next.

Hey, Ann, can I jump in really, really quick on that just to provide a concrete example? So one of the communities that I work with in the eastern Sierras in California, Mono County, California, Throughout this five-step process that Anne was describing, particularly the meetings with department heads and board members, we make a point to come to you, to have these meetings with you in person. And that has a really big impact on the way we approach our project requests. and how we frame project narratives. For example, when I was out in Mono County two years ago, we met with one of the board members in the historic Commission Chamber office building. This office building is in a relatively small town. It does not have the greatest power. This is an area of California that is subject to a lot of significant weather disruption expected. So we were in this building where only maybe a third of the facility was actually to ensure that appropriate power was being used. And that meant it was very cold. It was the middle of November. We were there up in the mountains and it was probably 45 degrees in this office building. And we were talking with the board member and he was like, yeah, we have to do this because we don't have reliable generator systems in this town to, to, ensure that power is available here at businesses, at places of community significance. So we worked closely with the board and with the county administrator to submit a earmark request that was then forwarded to the Appropriations Committee by the senators and received $900,000. And now the county is actually able to purchase a suite of backup generators to install across the county at these community facilities to ensure there is reliable electricity, running water, heat, air conditioning during wildfire or severe winter storms. And that's something that we would not have even thought of as a project had we not gone to the county and met with these board members and staff in person. So we think that's really important and it does yield really, really great results because we have a better idea of what your needs are.

You have the benefit of being a beach community, so I'll come here any time you want, no problem. Our expertise really, I like to say, boils it down to, I do two things. I find you money, and I save you money. The finding money is easy, and I've got some good specific examples in a second of some other stuff. But those are easy because you're going to be able to see dollars and cents of the federal money. You've got to pay taxes for now. That money might as well come back to you and your constituents for projects that you need to get funded. With the side of the saving you money, The Cobra issue is a great example. Now, when those maps and pictures were taken, the town wasn't incorporated. But while other people who were incorporated were looking, oh, no, this is a mistake. There are developments here. There was nobody to tell anybody that, hey, that map is wrong. That's an example of the saving money type of things. I'm making sure that down the road somebody's not overlooking you or creating something that is going to cost all of this money to both the town to try to get it corrected and the people who are missing out with flood insurance. The saving money is a little bit harder to quantify sometimes because sometimes you can't put a dollar amount on, but that's actually even more critical and has a greater return than just the finding money part, but it's harder. Policy development, so it's the thinking of you have a problem at the federal level, finding a solution. That would be like the COBRA issue, where when I got in and solved this issue and saw how long it had been going on, I said, well, this doesn't make sense. This isn't working. We need to find a different solution. Met with some staffers and on the back of a cocktail napkin had a no bad ideas and a brainstorm of every wild idea. And I actually would call and tell Larry these. And he goes, well, do I need to? I was like, wait just a bit. Let's see if one of these wild ideas actually works before we go tell people we tried this. But that's an example of thinking outside the box for a solution. And that's the real fun stuff to do. Environmental infrastructure through the Corps, Section 219. We do a lot of those projects. There's lots of Army Corps projects that you can get authorizations and money for. I do it all the time for different beach communities. WIFIA. We literally wrote WIFIA. WIFIA is the Water Finance and Innovation Act. It's a financing program for water infrastructure. Roger Gwynn, our CEO, literally wrote the legislation on that, and it's one of the most successful water programs in the country. Creative engagement within DAA. We'll talk about this more in a second, and this is where Jeremiah is really going to be very helpful. National Defense Authorization Act. You are very close to Camp Lejeune. There are lots of things that you can do being close to a military base. I work with Oceanside, California, who is right next to Camp Pendleton. I do all kinds of projects with them and get funding through different military programs for that. Because the bases want the communities around them to be successful and be good for the families that live around there. They use some of your infrastructure. They want to help. So there's lots of different programs you can utilize. And then the annual appropriations, which is submitting to your representatives and senators, project requests, and getting funding for those.

In your memory, have we ever done that? Have we ever put forth, I'm not aware of ever doing an appropriations request. Susan, right? I don't think we ever have, have we? Sorry, go ahead.

Appropriation season is a time of year I lose my hair. March. This, I added this picture, this was me with Chairman Snyder. Policy development. We were changing policy on the floor before we went in to speak with... Director Nesvik at Fish and Wildlife, making changes on the fly based on meetings we'd heard earlier that day and information. And so that's being able to be flexible and new ideas and use information to get the result you want. Sometimes we'll have you just on the floor making last-minute changes. Connie, this would have been you in this one.

Just to hop in once again, on the front, all of these issue areas here, when there are things that you find that are impacting you at the federal level, we can engage and try to make sure that your, we can engage your congressional delegation and make sure you are heard and your experience is On the policy development front, this is really important. When there are grant programs, federal grant programs that you're pursuing, where 95% of your background and project criteria are met, but there's 5% that absolutely prevents you from applying for this program. We can work with your congressional delegation to have the Congress change the guidelines of that grant program so that those 5%, those preclusions are eliminated and you're able to take advantage of this grant program or any grant program in the future. On the National Defense Authorization Act front, that's a bill that is put forward by Congress every single year. They've successfully passed an authorizing bill for the Department of Defense every year for the past roughly 60 years. That bill essentially guides the Department of Defense how much money they will spend on any specific program, what their priorities will be for the next fiscal year. So how I recently engaged with this bill on behalf of Hampton Roads Transit. Hampton HRT is located in Hampton, Virginia, which is actually where Norfolk Naval Station is. transit and that's the largest naval base in the world HRT has a bus line several bus lines actually on the military base that they operate and they want to expand that service to additional locations on base but in order to have that funded they need to have an authorization from the Congress to allow the Navy to spend money on it, which they don't currently have. So that's something that we're working with HRT right now. Their congressional delegation has been very supportive of this. And it is currently a provision that is similar to what we have requested is included in the House's version of the NDAA, and we're hoping to have it included in whatever that final legislative package looks like. But this is one of those things when it's an annual bill, it's much easier to incrementally make an impact. This is one thing that I think is going to be very helpful. These annual bills, NDAA appropriations, just being able to pick pieces as they come and as they are needed in this phased incremental approach.

You can go to the next slide. So based off what I went through about two years' worth of all-German meeting minutes and then also knowing what I already know about you through working through TSPC, went through, found just priorities and things of funding that I do other places that are relevant to you and kind of broke them down into the beach renourishment, shoreline protection, dredging kind of category. there which with Holden Beach not only did have I gotten over two years 2.7 million to fund their dredging of Lockwood Folly we actually before that had to make sure that and argue the case for against a different beach town of why the dredge materials we should get or should be able to place the dredge materials. So it was setting up, one, the policy problem and then finding funding solutions after that. With Oceanside, with Camp Pendleton, it's a constant dredging and finding money and making sure that we're thinking ahead because we know that, you know, you're going to need to keep dredging. You're going to need to keep funding dredging and beach restoration. Emergency services, fire station funding. This is, with Oceanside, this is an interesting one because with it being close to Pembleton, we did the Defense Community Infrastructure Pilot Program, DSIP, to fund a fire station that was next to the base. Those are the types of programs you are able to make a case for and find money for based on your location next to the Camp Lejeune. I worked with Wilkes County and this year Senator Tillis submitted $4 million for a fire station for us. City of Durham for storm water drainage. We have, TFG has gotten 20 million in regional water supply infrastructure improvements. With Cape Fear, this is an example of the environmental infrastructure, Army Corps of Engineers Environmental Infrastructure Program part I mentioned. And this is getting money for water transmission main, water transmission main extensions through the EI programs. Transportation and public safety. Like Jeremiah just mentioned with Hampton Roads transit system and going through the NDAA. We've done police department upgrades, tech upgrades for equipment. There's all kinds of programs for within policing, public safety. Emergency operation centers through different FEMA programs. That's big. on an island during hurricane season. So those are all like I had when I went through I had a page of five of these and narrowed them down to more specific places and winds that are relevant to you. And North Topsail Beach is very unique and it kind of sits in the middle of all kinds of different programs and funding that at the federal level you have access to through like being Barrier Island, FEMA, Coastal, being next to a military base. And you're extremely fortunate because Congressman slash Dr. Murphy does appropriations. With Wilkes County, Virginia Fox does not. So we only get one bite of that apple and that's submitting to Senator Tillis. You get to submit to whichever senator will replace Tillis. And also, Bud is going to be earmarking next year, so I hear. And already, he does only earmarks for defense reasons. So you're eligible for some of those different things there. Next. Communicate. It's not one of those you'll never see me ever again, but I will work with the Newtown manager that will set up whatever works best as far as I meet with some people biweekly, monthly, go through priorities, updates, hear what issues are happening, but I'm also always available via phone. I like to come to these at least once a year. Uh, so that you can see me directly and ask me questions. Um, when any reason at all, you need to go to an issue comes up, you want to go to DC and meet with the people. We set up those meetings. We get you the meetings with the people making the decisions. Uh, the fish and wildlife with director Nesvik and the coverage you isn't is one. We get you in the room with people to hear you. Uh, next. TFG sends out these weekly, a weekly legislative update that gives you a rundown of everything happening. I usually will go through and flag for anybody who's like, oh, this actually is pertinent to you. Let me know if you want us to do anything about this or engage your delegation on it. The grants update, every week you get a list of every grant that comes out. We usually like to send these directly to your police chief, fire chief, and they can send back to me, oh, this looks interesting. Are we eligible? And I can do a deep dive and tell you, actually, yes, that fits neatly into what we can apply and get grant money for. Next. And then the big special reports, big things that happen, a new administration. There's going to be one after midterms in January, the new Congress. We always do a new report on what to look for in the next two years of this new Congress, what the priorities are going to be. Because your priorities, one priority that wasn't a priority in that last Congress might all of a sudden have an opening in that new Congress. Uh, which is good. And then, uh, like right now I just worked on, uh, a special brief on, uh, like data centers, uh, word, uh, uh, 2026, uh, and send those to you, um, to have all the information next. All of that boils down to, again, find your money, save your money, make sure that everybody in DC is listening to you. It's not that they don't care, it's just everybody's competing for a really small amount of attention. And if you're not reminding them that you are here and you have needs and why those needs are important, it's very easy to get overlooked. Somebody else is getting the money.

Why don't we go at Laura? We'll start with you.

I'm on the Camp Lejeune committee. And so one of the things that we're looking at in communities around the base is threat reduction, threat mitigation, sleeper cell kind of activity, and looking at community safety and preventing any other threats that could affect the base. So certainly if there is funding around that to have our police chief get more equipment, get more funding, or encourage that relationship with the base and see what we can do in collaboration with the county and the base as far as threat mitigation to the base, to our own towns, that is some funding I would like us to look at.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Mark?

My biggest point is, and we can go back to where we debated before this last election, is utilizing the base as a way of trying to help us eliminate COBRA as well. I mean, you look at Sneeds Ferry and Jacksonville, that's where almost all our military have a home. VA benefits are not allowed in COBRA zones. And everybody that lives in a cul-de-sac in the community and you have a police officer that lives on the cul-de-sac, that's a huge help when there's police cars sitting in a cul-de-sac. Same thing if you have some military personnel that are here or there and scattered among the community. It's really and truly an asset because those people will be lookouts and guards for our community. So I'd love to see things like that be pushed through. Sorry, Kip?

I echo, obviously, what Laura said as far as preparedness and mitigation of threats to our military bases, having lived in Arlington, being right next to Fort Myer, Joint Base Myer, Henderson Hall, and obviously D.C. But obviously, my work with the Topsail Island Shoreline Protection Commission, I've gotten to see the work that you all have done. I've gotten the emails from the chairman of the commission, and I like what you all do and can provide for the town. So I look forward to seeing how we can build on that relationship. And I thank you for coming today. It's nice to see you in person.

Yeah, not just a little picture.

Connie? Connie?

I echo what my fellow board members say. The big issues in our town, of course, are the beach, public safety, and the environment. And while we have a lot of big ideas, we don't have a lot of big funding. And so to have somebody working for us to help secure some of that funding, that would mean a whole lot to the community. And to the town, to the taxpayers, anything we can do to save money and to get money. We're we're really looking forward to that.

Laura wanted one thing.

The other thing I wanted to talk about water is a huge issue. You all work in the West. You know, water is a huge issue, but it is a huge issue on the island, too, for different. And when you mentioned infrastructure projects, you know, certainly the idea has been tossed around about, you know, a water tower on the island, additional pressure. water pressure we keep getting development off the island you know the pipes only keep so much pressure for so long i mean our infrastructure is aging and having grants to help us with that infrastructure we're working with the utilities and the county and the base you know around infrastructure issues and hardening our infrastructure would certainly be something we'd be interested in

Just a quick notice that you put the Army Corps up there, and obviously we've got a lot of stuff going on with the Army Corps right now, so you have a pretty good relationship with them, don't you?

Yes, and the people at TISPC would know, we have my two favorite people to work with, Earl Stockdale, who is the former Chief Counsel for the Army Corps of Engineers, and Brad, who was with the Assistant Secretary of the Army engineering and those two are, as Connie's been in meetings, they are an absolute dream team. They, I love watching them work because Brad will ask a technical question about something and the Corps will sometimes give an answer back and that is what tees up Earl. to then recite the statute and pretty much, both of them know more, I've never had anybody actually working at the Corps that knows more than those two know how it works, who to go to, and that's.

So I was gonna say, and I wanted to see if we've got a consensus. You have a contractual proposal for us that is, how much a month?

It is $6,000 a month.

$6,000 a month we would sign up for. You won't take that on a contingency basis, huh? I'm being funny. We've got a lawyer there. He understood what I was saying. And again, I would like to see if there's a consensus on this. I think that to try something different, I think, Mark, you made that point again, and we've talked about this for a while, And actually the whole thing with the pie started with Royce and Tim Foster at the Commission We have no presence up there right now except going up with the group And I know the other towns do other things we had a meeting Royce with Tim and you about kind of doing more at the local level and doing those things as well and I fully support this, so what I'd like to see is consensus, trying to move forward to try to do something with them. That's one. Then a second question is, do we have to do an RFP for something like this or not? You're talking about $72,000 a year. It's a month. A month? Is that the way it works? Or we sign a contract for you for the year, right?

A year, yes.

All right. You know... I would ask for, I mean, obviously I think we got to try something different than we've done before.

Um, yeah, I think this is something certainly that the new town manager can bring back to the board for approval since it's above the $40,000 limit for the town manager to sign off of.

Right. Okay. And that's my question. My, but my question is if the consensus here is to try to move forward with something like that, then we need to understand whether we've got to do a budget adjustment. and those type of things. And so either if it's dead on arrival that nobody wants to pursue this, then let's not pursue it. If it's not, then I agree with you. This has got to go to Stephanie. But I don't want to wait three months to get something done because we didn't take the first step in understanding what we've got to do. Because I believe we're going to have to do a budget adjustment, correct?

I would think so. Right.

And I don't know if we have to do an RFP at this level. I know that it's outside the town manager. So if the consensus is to move forward to try to do something along these lines, Mark?

I'm all for it. I've been here for over 11 years, and things just have been the same old, same old. It's time to do something.

Okay. You've dealt with them through TISPC, too.

And that's why I think I've seen a lot of the work, a lot of the messaging that's come through at least. And, yes, I would like to see it implemented or to see what it could do for our town. And you know what? If after one year we don't find value in it, the citizens don't find value in it, by all means we could – No offense, terminate the contract after a year. But I think it's looking at what we get as a return from that as well. So, you know, like you said, $6,000 a month doesn't sound like a whole lot. But, you know, when you do compile it into 12 months and you get the 70 plus thousand, I think that causes some stir. But, again, I have no problem with moving forward with trying to work out some sort of agreement. Okay. Connie?

As we move forward, we are going to be working more and more on our strategic plan. And I think that having this be incorporated into it, maybe even helping us a little bit so we know some of the things. Like I said, beach, public safety, environment, those are big things. But because we've never had a presence at the federal level, we don't know what's out there. So I'm very much for this.

And just on that point, what you said is the guidance. Because we may be doing things we don't know. We don't know where the pitfalls are. We don't know where the walls are and the obstructions. And somebody can help guide us through so that we save money, not wasting time.

We don't even know what's out there. I mean, that's the big thing for me is it's And look, as you know, I'd like to focus on the money side of this type of thing. It's been my experience having hired lobbyists before. We're getting piggybacked on TISPC with this thing. If this was a standalone, we'd be charged a lot more than this to be baking our bread or baking our pie. Laura?

So in our strategic plan, implementing actions, funding options, 1.56, I think it lays out some of what we've been addressing and certainly we can add this strategy to that. And again, I think it I'm hearing it's the consensus of the board to move forward with looking into a contract. And I think this would be a great thing for the town manager to bring back to us at our next meeting.

with a proposed contract um for board approval okay and you'd be willing to work with her with stephanie on this and lex yeah do that kind of stuff because we're going to have that trend well the transition is you don't want her stephanie has made it clear that she is willing to get educated on things before she walks in on september the first okay and i think that we have got um a session legislative session coming up um and on behalf of the town, whether we're successful in the path that you've taken us on, um, at least to Mark's point, it's not the same path we've been doing for 10 years. Um, and when I talked to, uh, when I went to Murphy's fundraiser, uh, Royce was there, I mentioned to that, and he likes this path as well. Um, because it's always been my concern that whenever you have a standalone bill, you're a target. If you can tack it onto something else or to quote Nancy Pelosi, You'll know what's in the bill when we pass it. So I think we wanna move forward, Larry.

Uh, just a, a brief comment, uh, uh, uh, Alderman Kips made a, uh, uh, observation. I mean, a one year, you know, cut bait, go fish. I would suggest, uh, giving it two to three years to, cuz it's, it's gonna take a, a more than a hot second to, to build, uh, the legislative agenda, the plan, and then to work it. And then to, you know, if there's a, a change in legislation is, is, uh, Her counterpart mentioned, you know, there's a possibility for grants and so on and so forth. And that doesn't happen overnight.

And that's why I agree with Laura's point, you being the interim town manager and having been town manager, get the town manager to bring it back to the board as far as the reference in a year or two years or three years.

But I think maybe I'm oversimplifying what Kip said is I look at this right now as we're dating. And you can date for a couple years. I think you're going to work hard. I think that you have done a good job with TISPC. So with that, let's move forward.

The good news is I'm also not starting from zero because I've worked with your delegation through TI. They know who I am and they know you already. Now it's just introducing them to the idea of like, hey, we're at the table now looking, we have these projects, we have these things we need to get funded.

And we'll give you a North Top, so have it when you're up there too.

And that's the thing is we don't have one project, so we've got five or six projects that you're going to be working on five or six different things at once for that same amount of money instead of one and done. Thanks, Ann.

Thank you so much. All right, we're up to, speaking of water, the town's good friend. who is actually right now going to speak on behalf of on wasa as the on wasa chairman and for everybody that does royce is also a county commissioner so royce thank you for coming thank you mayor and um

Mayor Pro Tem and Alderman, I appreciate the time we have. I think you planned this. Did you plan this this way? I'm thinking, because everything we're talking about today is talking about the base and water and sewer access. Yeah, we probably need to have a conversation afterwards. um i have some slides i i know we're here to talk about the letter but i want to give you a brief update and on what's happening on wasa before we get into the letter if that's okay mayor um i'm gonna see if this thing i thought you had it fixed for me and There we go. Okay. So Onwassa is your community partner for water and sewer. Onslow Water and Sewer Authority. We're made up of the member towns who are in Onslow County, and you can see you know what they are. Onwasa's Board of Directors is made up of appointees from the member towns in Anza County, and your Mayor, Rick, is our Secretary-Treasurer, doing a fine job for Onwasa. The quick numbers for Onwasa last year, We are capable of producing over 2.4 billion gallons of water a year, and we actually pumped 3.8 billion gallons of water. We're capable of treating 2.2 billion gallons of effluent, and we actually treated a little over 1 million. I call attention to those top four numbers to say that We have treatment capacity. A lot of times our issues are not the capacity to treat, but how do we get the effluent from where it is to where it needs to be? And we'll talk about that a little bit in the letter in a few minutes. I'll show you what our treatment, what our water sewer areas are. You're in the Dixon area. And you're treated, your effluent is treated by Holly Ridge and Summer House Treatment Plants and Topsil Treatment Plant. I've got some pictures of the of the work that's going on right now and don't ask me what all these are because I'm not an engineer and I don't know but the Summer house plant. We're currently in the process of more than doubling the treatment capacity and these are some of the pictures of the current construction that is in the process and This one is the top cell treatment plant. And we're in the process of building transmission lines to bring sewage into that plant, and we're doubling the capacity there. some of the pictures and the expansion that's going on there right now you know what there's a slide that i missed that i wanted to talk about let's see if i can get back to it real quick yeah i got too fast Oh, yeah, that's the one. This is our water meters. You talked a little bit about how fast you're growing, and we are growing in this south end of the county. And this is a slide that shows you where the growth is. And if you see, there's a whole lot of it down here on your end. And I would say that just... We have just completed a project and installed automatic reed meters across the island. Now all of your meters are automatic reed meters. That means that those meters transmit your water usage to our facility in Jacksonville, and we're able to monitor water pressure. So if we see a water pressure issue on the island, we can respond to it immediately. If we have leaks, then that shows up in the pressure and the usage that the meters provide for us directly. And that definitely saves our ratepayers money because we don't have to drive a truck out here to the island to read your meters. We can now do it all sitting at a desk in Jacksonville.

The other thing that's important about that is, for example, I get a call now that says, your usage is higher than it was last month. Be aware of it, because you could have a leak inside your house. And with the automated meters, they've got real-time information about your usage.

Absolutely. We're able to monitor and they set parameters so that if you're, like you said, if your usage is more than what it typically would be, then you can get an alert so you know that there may be something that you need to take a look at.

And just real quick, the residents that are viewing this and listening, to your point, they'll check their house and they can't find anything with the backflow meters and everything else. The backflows will dump and the sand being in the soil, the water goes right in. So you guys need to check your backflow preventers just because there's a green cover over it and you never have to touch it. You need to inspect it. I mean, they get inspected yearly, but I know we went six months dumping water until we actually had to go out there and pull that cover.

Yep. Thank you. This is contact information for Onwassa. We're always interested in your feedback and you certainly have my contact information. I gave it all to you this morning. You can call me anytime and I'll be happy to talk to you about Onwassa or Onslow County for that matter. Any Onslow County issues and that is our website. can you have a we have an app you can use or you can do it on your computer and That is all of my slides and I'll move on to the letter. That's okay. Are there any other questions? So on WASA Board of Directors, y'all have this letter. I'm sorry, did you have some? The Board of Directors has approved the draft of this letter, and y'all have it. And it's basically an ask for more cooperation with the Marine Corps Base. For years, we have had an agreement with the Marine Corps Base that would allow us to pump effluent to their French Creek treatment plant, They have over the years reduced the amount of availability that they're willing to provide on Wausau. And that has resulted in us having concerns about having treatment capacity in the future. You can see from the slides that we have treatment capacity right now, but we're looking 10, 20 years down the road. So we're concerned about having treatment capacity in Onslow County. in the future. So you may be familiar with our Highway 24 project. We built a pipeline from Swansboro to Piney Green to transfer effluent from that side of the county to Piney Green to the French Creek treatment plant. Spent over $30 million on that pipeline just to have the Marine Corps cut our usage availability in half. which is very challenging for Onwassa. So in this letter, we're asking the Marine Corps to either give us the capacity back that they had promised us at French Creek, or to help us fund a new treatment plant on that end of the county, and or to allow us to pump effluent from top sale to French Creek, which is a project that they had approved years ago, and we actually engineered to the tune of about $200,000. And then when we got ready to contract and build it, they yanked it out from under us. and told us that we couldn't do it. So those are the three asks. And the Ongwassa Board of Directors has already approved this letter. We're going to transmit it to the commanding general at the Marine Corps base. And what we're asking for is that all of our entities, all of our towns, sign on to the letter because we think that having a unified approach to the base will be better for all of us, for ONWASA, than to, you know, hodgepodge, not have everybody all in. That being said, I'm not going to read the letter to you. You've all got it in your packet. So what we're asking for today is that this board agree that the mayor can sign this letter on behalf of North Topsail Beach.

And this is not a surprise to the Marine Corps. They know it's coming. For your conversation, you might want to understand this is not going to be a sledgehammer sent to them.

Right. We have had conversations with the Marine Corps. As a matter of fact, it was Tim McCurry from the Marine Corps who actually recommended that we add the third ask to our letter, which is the French Creek connection from the North Topsail plant. He said, you know, if you don't ask for it, you don't get it. So that was the third option that we actually just recently added to the letter. So we want to take this letter. We want everybody to be in on it. We want to take it to the local Marine Corps base. And we have some connections up into D.C. And we want to try to get this thing done. get something working on this. This is something we've been working on for years. This original agreement was signed with the Marine Corps, I think it was 2014 or something in that neighborhood. So it's not anything that's new. But we can't let it fall off the burner because we need the capacity. And a connection between Topsail Beach and French Creek adds capacity down here on your end of the county too. Thank you.

So do we need a motion, ma'am?

Do we need a motion for me to sign it? Is that what we need, Lex? Or is it consensus to a motion? Laura?

I make a motion that we authorize the mayor to sign the letter.

A second. Any other discussion?

Okay.

All in favor? Aye. Would you do me one favor? Step back two steps. Now step back up.

Step back up. Okay.

This is on behalf of the town, and this is to Onslow County. In their budget this year, they have appropriated $250,000 to us on the tourism grant, more than we've ever gotten before. And so I think on behalf of the board and everybody else and we are getting that into them tomorrow because we've got the grant application All set. So thank you very much. And then Kip. Do you want to hit the 20? Do you want to talk about the 20? Since you're in Ocean City

So we changed hats. You're changing hats.

Now you're on the Onslaught. Now you're a commissioner. I got you.

Yeah, I mean, I'll speak later about the Jazz Festival, but clearly the Jazz Festival is a beneficiary to some of the grants from Onslaught County. And being the largest event that we host here in the town, highlighting the culture, highlighting the historic nature of our community and our town, I think... like the mayor said we have to thank you very much um i know carla uh the who runs the the jazz festival was nearly brought to tears when she's heard that there's more support there and more support coming and um for people that haven't attended the jazz festival i encourage you fourth of july weekend to come obviously the the commissioners um are welcome to to come and partake in Work with me. We'll coordinate getting you in next year if you haven't been in the past, but it's a great event. This year was phenomenal. I'll speak on it in a little bit, but thank you very much for the support.

Royce, thanks again. I know you've been a big supporter of the town. Thank you very much.

While we go, here's Commissioner Hannon. Real quick, I was going to say this during the Alderman report, but while you're here, I want to say thank you and to let the residents know, that he attends every county meeting that he's physically able to. He's at the jumbo meetings. By the way, with the jumbo meetings, we've been pushing these crosswalks. I know I've been in office six or seven months now. But, yes, the crosswalks are a big concern with the town, with the county. Unfortunately, the speed of government is not very fast. When I sent these jumbo meetings, some of the heads that want a certain project pushed, they're like, well, this has been eight years and six years and five years. So the important thing is we've got the crosswalks on the radar, and we're pushing for it. And gentlemen like Royce and other commissioners do pay attention to all the small details that we think are insignificant. So thank you for your time and effort.

Thanks again, Royce. Thank you so much. I appreciate you all.

Appreciate it.

All right. Moving on to the consent agenda with our normal protocol, which is we can approve the consent agenda and then ask specific questions. Do we hear a motion to approve the consent agenda?

Motion to approve.

Second. Any discussion? Okay. Remember, we can ask – I've got questions I'm going to ask, so. All in favor?

Aye.

Yeah, we're going to do it during – we'll have a discussion now. Right now. Could I call up the fire chief, please? So for those of you that don't know, the fire chief is actually an amateur comedian. And so if you haven't followed the Facebook posts, the author for the Facebook post is standing in front of us right now, correct?

Well, yes, myself and AI, we do it together.

So in recognition of what you've been doing,

No, it's Christmas around here.

It's Christmas.

Wee-woo squad. So you don't know, what sound does a fire truck make to you? Wee-woo, wee-woo. I'm telling you, Colleen's talked about it.

She talked to people on the beach, and one individual said, I have my cup of coffee, and then I've got to look and see what... He's been Elmer Fudd. He's been Batman. Batman, the Joker. The Joker.

Making our rounds on characters.

And he does it in a public safety type. If you haven't read it, it's about public safety. He warns people about the tides. He warns people about those kind of stuff. Good job, man. Thank you. I really enjoyed what you were saying. All right. So, Mark, we'll start with you. You got any questions?

Yeah, first of all, that is a very entertaining way to help educate the public, and that's one of the first and most effective things I've seen in a few years here. During election time and everything else, numbers can be presented in a way if you present them correctly to determine your point. My question is, I wanted to speak to find out exactly how many residential homes are in North Topsail Beach. I don't see Deb or Brady.

We can have that provided to you.

I can have Brady downstairs if you'd like.

Now, that's okay, but what I want to just get the point across is long before I ran for election, we had the contractor trucks and everything else. The FedEx trucks have gotten worse lately, but I've heard 90 to 95% built out. Well, if you've got 100 homes, you only have 5 or 10 more to build. But if you've got 10,000 homes, that means you've still got another 1,000 to 2,000 homes to build. so i would love to know what those numbers are and i would love to make sure that the residents and citizens pay attention not to have the wool pulled over your eyes just because somebody sits up here and says we're not even 95 built out so it's no big deal it is a big deal and we need to know the numbers and you know what's our future are we over developing um It's good to see that Royce brings that up with planning for the future because wastewater equipment is very, very, very expensive. And if something breaks, you're in a bind if you don't have redundancy and duplicate equipment.

And just real quick, and then we'll move on to Kip. I think that the telling us that we are built out at the 99, and Joanne and I used to have this discussion. I fundamentally disagree with that. And if you went to the to our debates, I fundamentally disagree with that because what you're gonna see is they're gonna buy the 800 square foot beach house on the water, tear it down, and we're gonna have a 12 bedroom, 14 bath house there. To say that there's land available is not the same as saying that the building is stuffed because I've heard this today, and actually I've talked to a couple of people, including somebody on the planning board, not my wife, about trying to figure out some of this stuff, public safety and infrastructure and everything else, because what you get into with this kind of stuff is it's a completely different customer for Onwassa. It's a completely different type of thing going forward. So it's something that we need to look at and also take a look at what we can and can't do without infringing on somebody's property rights. Right.

I want to make it brief because I want to get to the next agenda item quickly. But to our public safety professionals in the back of the room, thank you again for your leadership, for the water rescues that have occurred, for the working with increased volume and everything. I appreciate the hard work that our men and women are doing on behalf of the board and the town. Thank you.

I'm gonna piggyback on that and thank you so much for all the help you gave during the sea turtle release. The sea turtle release is one of those things that just is such a positive light for the town. And our public safety officers, our police were right out there, our firefighters were out there. And Public Works, I didn't forget about you. But I'll talk about that later too.

make a comment to Mark's comment I think one of the things with the county and that we have to look at which puts pressure on our police and firefighters and everybody else is starting to look at how we call these larger structures because you know whether they're boutique hotels they are not primary residences And so I think with the county looking at planning and zoning and looking at what we call a hotel, what we call primary residence, and looking at can you take an 800 square foot place and put 12 bedrooms on it, you're now creating a commercial establishment. So Mark, I think that's one of those things that puts pressure on water, it puts pressure on the development, it puts pressure on parking, and I think it's something we have to look at going forward because going from a primary residence to what I call a small boutique hotel certainly puts more pressure on our firefighters and our police.

As well as following that historic value of Ocean City. They were basically one story bungalows, two bedroom, one bath, and that history is going away too.

I mean, we're trying to preserve what the island is without taking people's property rights. All right, moving on to continuing business. On this one, I know we're going to have a little bit of a discussion, but we're going to start with council walking us through. basically the statutory requirements and stuff. This is about filling the board of Alderman.

Thank you, mayor. Um, I will be brief, but, uh, vacancies on the board are governed by the town's code of ordinances, section two dash 16. which essentially then points you to General Statute 168-63. And 168-63 provides limited information, but it requires a couple things. Number one, that you fill the vacancy. And number two, until the next regularly scheduled municipal election. under general statute section 143-318 11 subsection 6 the appointment process must be an open session so the statutes do not however speak about a process by which the town must adhere to appoint a person to fill a board vacancy and that lack of statutory instruction provides the board with flexibility in its selection of an appointment process. So having said that, the default process that the board typically uses is the modified, is the motion and vote method of appointment. So today, my understanding is that the board's gonna follow a modified motion and vote method. Essentially, a board member will move to appoint a specific candidate, the motion will be seconded, and the board will vote. Voting will be done alphabetically and by roll call. uh... one of the advantages of this modified processes is that it still allows the mayor to break a tie uh... under one sixty eight dash sixty nine uh... that's important obviously because i think the goal of everyone here is to have a fair yet expeditious appointment process uh... and finally or next to finally the successful appointment of a candidate requires a simple majority so the board must continue to vote until a candidate receives a simple majority. And just a reminder, as everyone knows, you've got a legal requirement to vote. So if you're here and you decide to abstain under the statute, that counts as an affirmative vote. So now I'll turn it back over to the mayor. Thank you.

I've got to start off Before we speak one is I'd like to thank each of the applicants for the willingness to serve the community for those of you have been here for a while and I See that Susan's left you'll remember the time where we couldn't get people to apply for the planning board We couldn't get people on board of adjustments we've got a lot of very capable candidates on this and so I want to thank everybody for showing their willingness. And also keep in mind that we are 14 months, actually, as of last week, a year from now, if you wanted to run for office next year, you're going to have to let everybody know by that time. So this is the, I'm going to call it a stub type of thing. This is replacing. Larry was elected to a four-year term. This is not a four-year term. This is just until the next election, which will be next fall. So we're talking about a very short period of time. Running for or accepting an appointment to public office takes time, commitment, and a genuine desire to give back. We're grateful that so many individuals applied for consideration. Chip talked about this. North Carolina general statutes provide flexibility in the manner that town may use for filling a vacancy on the elected board. By the way, the reason we're doing a lot more this this way is, for those of you who are not here, Anecdotally, the way that I got appointed to the Board of Aldermen years ago was they had a meeting, they appointed somebody, somebody said they didn't do it properly, they did a revote at the next meeting, one of the people changed their votes, and that's how I got in. I was voted out, I didn't get the vote the first time. I'm seeing someone in the back, don't laugh at me, because you know that's what happened. Okay, because my wife and I were sitting there thinking we were not going to be part of this stuff, and then all of a sudden, and it was Dick Peters who changed his vote. And so we want to make sure that we do it the right way and that everybody is considered, because we've got candidates that, we've got four people that are currently serving on boards. I think that's wonderful. So anyway, we're grateful that so many individuals applied. North Carolina statutes provide flexibility as he talked about setting an application period to think about this from May 13th through June 21st. We provided invest interested residents with ample time to submit an application for consideration. Interestingly enough, and outside the script is, and Lexi can correct me if I'm wrong, right after Larry passed away, we actually had applications even before this period, because I think I asked you at one of the meetings, if we have an application, does it still count even before we post it? And the answer was yes, but we asked people to reapply. So we've had people wanting to fill this slot since Larry passed away in March. Fair?

Yes.

All right. on june 22nd all the applications along with additional documents submitted by the applicants were compiled and made available to each member of the board of aldermen for review so everybody's application we've had since june 21st so if my math is right that's nine And 31, that's 40, and today's the fifth, so 45 days we've had those, we've had the opportunity to review all the submitted materials and speak with applicants if they wish. The board has approximately 45 days, had approximately 45 days to review the applications. Today the board has the opportunity to appoint a new board member to fill the Board of Aldermen seat, Larry's seat. That will serve until the next regularly scheduled municipal election. To keep the appointment process organized, I'm offering a set of temporary rules of procedure to conduct the appointment process. This was put together by our town clerk and by council. I'll summarize them and then I've asked our clerk to distribute them to the board for reference. Everybody has them. Our town attorney, Chip Payson, has also offered his legal guidance. One. We will proceed with motions in the order of board member seniority, beginning with the longest serving member of the board, Mayor Pro Templo. If two or more board members have the same length of service, the opportunity to make a motion will be determined alphabetically by last name. Once a motion is made and seconded, the board will vote on the applicant. If the motion receives a majority vote of the board, that applicant will be appointed to fill the vacant Board of Aldermen seat. The mayor will vote only as a tiebreaker in the case of two yays and two nays. And as Chip pointed out, if you abstain, that counts as a yay. You can't choose not to vote. We're required, correct Chip, we're required to vote. If the motion does not receive a majority vote, we'll simply move to the next board member in the established order, which would be Laura, okay, and repeat the process until an applicant receives the majority vote needed for appointment. If by some manner of votes an applicant does not receive a majority, the board may table this matter for reconsideration. Before proceeding with the vote, I would like to note that Teresa Hardy, and I talked to Stephen about this as well, because Stephen wants to stay on the sexy board, right? He's on BISAC. And as we talked about, we've got to move it forward for Larry, right? Absolutely. All right. uh... have withdrawn their applications and no longer be considered the board will consider with the consideration remaining applicants anything else you want to add chip may i ask one question so the first person

makes a nomination. Yes. If that doesn't pass, it goes to the second person. The second person, can they nominate the same person that the first person did again? I just wanted to make sure that...

I've been trying to... We spent an hour and a half on this thing because I had so many questions to make sure we didn't screw up.

Just want to make people that aren't eliminated.

Right, and also keep in mind this doesn't... Voting for Mark is not voting against somebody else, right? And I think that's the key because I think we've got... I was very pleased by the number of applicants and the quality of the applicants that we've had.

Mr. Mayor, if I could also comment. I agree. I concur that we had eight great candidates, and I would be happy to serve with any of you eight that put in your submission. I just learned about the process yesterday. I'm not overly keen on it. The mayor and I had a discussion on it. I'm not going to hold it up. But if I vote no against any of the candidates today, it's not because I don't want you. It may be because I saw another candidate that I would prefer or has my support as my number one um but with that being said i did meet with everybody and i uh except for um mr peterson and i apologize we didn't get a chance to meet up but i do appreciate you i appreciate you putting in and speaking during the public comments so with that um Thank you.

Yeah, but you know, it's, it's sorry. What?

Just, uh, I heard a term that I just would emphasize, uh, members who are, are, have the opportunity to make a motion. Uh, please use the word appoint, not nominate. Yes, it could, you know, it could cause some confusion and entertain a whole nether iteration of process.

This is part of the hours that we spend on the phone with council because Again, I can see you can't laugh about this because you know that this happened before, right? And it was like, we really don't want to have to do this over and over again. So with that, Mayor Pro Tem.

Mr. Mayor, I would like to make a motion to appoint Fred Fontana as on to the Board of Aldermen until the next election.

Do I hear a second?

Second.

It's to you to vote.

Okay.

Thank you.

All right.

We're going to go in alphabetical order for the roll call. So I'm starting first. That'll be Alderman Barefoot. How do you vote? Aye. Aye. Okay. Next, Alderman Malcolm.

Nay.

Okay. Alderman Olszewski.

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Plettle. Aye. All right. So that is three ayes and one nay. That is a majority vote.

You're done.

Congratulations, Craig. Thank you. We appreciate everybody. The other thing I would add is we're not going to swear you in until September, OK? Did you use your three minutes? We have comments at the end.

While he's making his way, I want to reiterate what Kip said, there was nobody that was not qualified. This was a very difficult decision. Everybody, I would feel honored to serve with anyone. I did nominate Fred because, number one, I knew that in the last election, He had such a great amount of votes. He only lost to Laura by two votes, so I knew that he had community support. Also, with the strategic plan that we have coming up, as well as our responsibilities and duties, he already knows them. I felt he could hit the ground running.

Seriously? Are you going to be here for 10 minutes? Cause we can do the comments at the end.

I really, I, you got to catch up. I thank you very much. I look forward to serving on the board again and, uh, being, uh, active and helping door tops, the beach grow and continue to be a wonderful, place to live and to visit. I do have a plane to catch, and so that's why I will be leaving right now. But thank you again for your support.

And by the way, just so we're clear, my wife did not support you for Alderman. No, she didn't. And you know why? Because he's chairman of the planning board, and my wife is on the planning board and doesn't want him to leave.

Do we have to advertise for a new planning board?

I asked her that yesterday.

Yes, I will advertise. Anything that Mr. Fontana was a part of, we'll advertise accordingly. So that's why you don't see the planning board or the board of adjustments on. This agenda, that, and a couple other reasons, but it'll be next month.

All right, so TISPC? Yes. Do I hear a motion to appoint an applicant to the TISPC? I'd move to appoint Bruce Benson. No, we have to have a motion just to open it up, and then we'll... Do we do it the same way, Chip?

Do we do it now, or do we do it after we've sworn Fred in? Yeah.

MR. No. We're not going to – we won't – this is just to point – they won't get sworn in until this – well, until she's – Why don't you tell us? This is TISPC.

We are stepping away from our Board of Aldermen appointment. Mr. Fontana will take his oath of office at our next regularly scheduled meeting. We will now be transitioning to our TISPC appointment.

Which is new business.

Which is under new business. Today you have two applications in front of you, one for Ms. Coltrane and one for Mr. Benson. The board has had time to review the applications, speak with the applicants if they wish, and so staff have requested the board have a motion to appoint a member to the top. Same process?

Yes, correct. I just want to make sure, Kip, I agree with you, but let's go ahead and do that. Go ahead. You made a motion to appoint. We're not doing it by seniority this time?

No, you can make a motion to appoint a member to the TISPC.

No, but actually he's right. She can pass if you want, and then are you guys going to pass to Kip so you can make a motion?

That goes to Laura. Go ahead, Kip. Go ahead, Kip. Laura's passing it to me. Then I would make a motion to appoint Mike Benson to the Topsail Island Shoreline Protection Commission. So not his brother Bruce?

Okay. Do I hear a second? And Chip, if we do this wrong, please stop us again. I asked both of those if I do something wrong to interrupt me. So do I hear a second? Okay. Same process.

Is there any, you can discuss for this one if you'd like, but.

Yeah. Any discussion? Just real quick. I've, Bruce, not Bruce, see I keep doing that. Mike has gone to the meetings, has served on the top protection commission in the past. I spoke with him at the last meeting, and he expressed an interest, and I wanted to make sure that the application was in, which is why I emailed you. I didn't remember it coming from last month, but I appreciate you sending it. But again, nothing taking away from the other candidate, but we appreciate the interest, and by all means, remain active in the town's business.

Okay.

Any other... Well, that... Yes, if there's no more discussion, it's all in favor.

I can't vote. All in favor? Aye. Thank you.

Any opposed? All right.

Just real quick with Deborah. She was on BISAC and the original type of thing, so she does have a lot of knowledge. I think you've got two candidates that clearly could operate on that. And as you said, demonstrating the time and going to the meetings and paying attention and stuff makes a big thing. All right, moving on.

Next is also me. All right. So the current contracted receptionist position is proposed to be converted to a full time staff member. Here at Town Hall, this would be an administrative assistant position. A budget amendment to add funds is not necessary. Funds were budgeted for the contracted position. And if the recommendation is approved, a line item transfer would be approved by the town manager for any remaining funds to cover that position. Over time, the responsibilities of this contracted position

has increased and it makes more sense to Create a position here for the town rather than continue to contract it out And just a quick comment as I understand this what we're what we're doing is we are creating that as a full-time position That doesn't mean we're hiring somebody because we got Stephanie coming on in three weeks correct so it gives it would give her the authority without having to come back to the board to make it a full-time position and

so right right now recommending let's make it full let's make it a permanent position so we can fill it go ahead yes so the motion today that we are asking the board to consider is um amending the full-time employee number um to include the administrative assistant position

Do I hear a motion? Are we prepared to post a job description and post an ad for this prior to Stephanie coming on, or when will this job be posted?

So when the job will be posted is something that we have not finalized. There is a job description available for the public to access as well. It is tied into this agenda packet.

Okay, thank you.

All right, do I hear a motion to approve? Make a motion to amend the full-time equivalency position to establish administrative assistant position grade nine. Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

All right, next. This looks like a vehicle. It needs to come up. So PW is public works. Hit the button.

Yeah, we don't have a wee-woo squad or anything cool.

I've got to come up with something. Hey, I love that shirt, man. I do. I like that shirt. I'm a little jealous.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. This is a specific request for purchasing of two vehicle assets for the Public Works Department. These items were budgeted for this fiscal year, and the vehicle procurement would be within the state contract through dealership and rally. Um, so my, my ultimate request is, uh, approval to use the funds that were budgeted under that state contract for this purchase. Uh, the intent being one vehicle replacing, uh, F one 50 F two 50 fleet truck and the other being the, uh, larger dump dump bed landscaping vehicle that we need to replace. Um, that is obsolete.

Um, let's do a motion. We can have a discussion motion to approve.

Motion to approve.

Second. Okay. Discussion, please. Any discussion?

I'm good with it.

Over to you. All in favor? Aye. Opposed?

Spend your budget.

Spend your budget. Another thing to point out, though, is something that you talked about. The way that we buy these vehicles is not – it doesn't drive onto a lot and buy this kind of stuff. It goes through purchasing – state purchasing group, correct? Yes, sir. Thank you.

Yes, sir. The next item is fixed asset disposal is permission from the board to – characterize the two obsolescent vehicles as obsolescent or excess and post those. The intent would be to post them on GovDeals for sale through that website.

I'll make a motion to do that.

Do I hear a second? Second. Any discussion? All in favor?

Aye.

All right. Thank you. Is it okay to now address you as Chief?

If you'd like to, absolutely. All right, Chief. Good afternoon. I'm doing the same thing he's doing, but I do want to say I want a shirt, Mayor. All right.

Mine has to be blue. Just be careful.

I can't wear anything red. Just be careful what you're asking for. All right. But you'll get one. Don't worry. I hear the fire chief chirping in my ear back there. What's that?

It's a sense of humor, isn't it?

There, yeah, okay. Okay, whoa, whoa. Okay, okay, shots fired. I got it.

Hang on a second. Just a matter of schedule, all right? I understand for the first time we're having a coffee with the Chiefs.

We are, yes.

So I'm assuming if you get a shirt before the coffee with the Chiefs that both of the Chiefs will be wearing the shirt at the coffee with the Chiefs. I don't want a shirt anymore.

I believe so. The chief would have to be in uniform.

Yeah, unfortunately our policy said dictates that I must wear a uniform Details on this purchase yes ma'am so these are two uh trucks that were budgeted for um some background on vehicles we used to and i mean six eight years ago we used to shoot for a 50 50 split of patrol cars and suvs because that was what was available to us they don't make cars anymore At least in the police sector, they make little tiny cars, but they're not good for police work. So our options then become SUVs and trucks. And SUVs are sort of on fair weather days, you can take them on the beach. Outside of that, you cannot. So trucks are our options. There are two companies that are building, I guess all three of them, the major three companies are building special purpose police vehicles, police trucks specifically, and that's what we're looking at. We are changing the color because the problem in the past has been that we can't get the charcoal color. So you go to a dealer lot that does state contract, they have white and black. And then if you say, well, I want charcoal, they kind of look around, you know, and say, well, I think we might have one in the back somewhere. And so that was always a sticking point.

So we're going to go to white vehicles.

Is it the intention to have them partially marked?

They will all be marked, yes. So oh, I'm sorry.

That's okay. So we had these two budgeted. We did. Yes, ma'am All right, and we also have the vehicles that go up and down the beach, right? And how many of those do we have right now? We have two of those right now Okay, and so do we have anything in this budget to increase that number?

We did not know ma'am.

Okay Here a motion to approve make a motion to approve the purchase of two police vehicles under state contract NC2510-Alpha.

Do I hear a second? Second. Any further discussion? All right. All in favor? Aye. All right. Thank you all. Thanks, Chief.

I did not have any sign-ups for the second public comment.

Okay. Then let's move on to the attorney's report. Nothing to report today, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Okay. We got this backwards because I go at the end. Let's start. Mark?

First and foremost, I'd love to thank the citizens for coming out and supporting this meeting. Trying to get more people involved is a great thing. I'd like to say thank you to Lars. He came in and did a great job as an interim. I greatly appreciate you. I look forward to you passing the baton to the new manager. Stay in touch. I'd like to say thanks to Royce Bent for coming out and giving us an update on Wausau. A lot of people know what it takes to run water plants and wastewater plants, and it is not very easy, a very expensive trade to be in. It's great to know that they're working with the military base as well. I want to reiterate the fact that It was heartwarming to see roughly eight or nine candidates for this appointment of the alderman position. Unfortunately, only one could fill the seat. It'll only be a year and a half. I hope that I see every one of these names on the ballot next election and more. I'd love to see 15 to 20 people on the ballot would be fine with me. The more people get involved, the better.

By the way, you're spoken by somebody that's not up next year. Sorry, Mark. I had a little levity there.

It's all good. But with that being said, safety concerns... I'm pushing for the crosswalks as hard as I can through Jumpo. It's good that Royce was here to hear Suzanne speak, that know that it's not just coming from us for a wish list. It is a concern of the citizens and that we serve the citizens and he serves the citizens and he understands that it's a hot topic. Again, I think we've been pushing this. I know I've been pushing crosswalks since I got here back in 15. So anyway, we're still pushing safety. A lot of this has got to be educational. I must have seen the same people Suzanne saw, two seven-year-olds, a little boy and a girl on a little electric scooter that, my God, no helmets, no knee pads, no nothing. I mean, I grew up in that time, but they were running 30 miles an hour in a 35 zone, and their mom and dad were a quarter mile to half mile behind them walking. So that was scary, again. For all of us year-round residents, roughly about another month of chaos, maybe a little bit more, but Labor Day will be here before you know it. It will slow down a little bit, but we've still got another month of mayhem, so we'll have our island back shortly. The building, or excuse me, Beach Access 18, Lexi, whenever you do that, let's make sure we don't mention anything about fleas because people are going to go nuts.

I'll put it in big red font.

Yeah, and make sure that we don't mention anything about fleas. And whoever lives close to Building Access 18, go ahead and tell your renters that it's going to be closed. I don't know if we have an ETA for that, but two weeks from now when somebody rolls in and the access is closed, it's going to explode. Other than that, I wish everybody a great day, and thank you for being here.

I'm going to piggyback real quick and then go into a quick prepared thing. Larry, thank you again for your service over these past couple of months as well. It has been noticed by the board. It's been noticed by the staff. I hope it's been noticed by our citizens as well. On the vote today for Alderman, my vote was not against Fred. Obviously, I like Fred a lot. I had a great conversation with Fred, so my vote was not against Fred. But like I said, we had a lot of great candidates, as everybody has said, and I really do appreciate everybody that put in for it. and gave me the time to sit down and have coffee, ice cream, and have those discussions. It was very important for me to have those discussions. And I hope, like I said, in those conversations that we had, that you will continue your service to the town. I would like to recognize the tremendous success of the 2026 Ocean City Jazz Festival, as noted by my shirt. This year's festival brought nationally recognized musicians, outstanding performances, and an incredible atmosphere that showcased the very best of North Topsail Beach. The crowds were fantastic, the energy was contagious, and it was wonderful to see residents and visitors alike enjoying everything our community has to offer. Thank you to the festival organizers, to the volunteers, to the town staff, the fire department, without help setting up and break down, and to all those that helped make this event such a success. I'm already looking forward to next year's festival. Now I'm going to take some of Connie's thunder. She thought I was going to take all of it, but I'm not.

I'm sorry, if you're going to talk about the turtles, you have to start it the way that Connie does. No, she does it. That's her line. You're going to let her do it? All right.

On July 24th, I was walking our rescue dog Clifford out on the beach, checking one of the nests just north of Seaview Pier, and I stopped to check a turtle nest that wasn't expected to hatch for another two days. As luck would have it, the hatchlings had other plans. There were clear signs of movement beneath the sand, so I quickly sent a text message to the Topsail Island Turtle Project team, and within minutes, they said 10, and I think they made it there in like five, but the team started to show up, the volunteers, and together we witnessed one of nature's most incredible moments, and in the end, 143 of 150 hatchlings safely made their journey to the Atlantic Ocean. So hopefully many years from now, one of those hatchlings will return to North Topsail Beach to continue the remarkable cycle of life. Experiences like this, they don't happen without dedicated volunteers. The Topsail Island Turtle Project protects nesting turtles, educates thousands of visitors every year, and gives families the unforgettable opportunity to witness those magical moments. and ensuring the turtles have the greatest chance of survival. If you ever consider volunteering, I encourage you to reach out and become involved. They are always looking for additional helping hands. Connie can provide much more information on that as well. To discuss that, Again, thank you to those that applied. It speaks volumes about your commitment to North Topsail Beach, and whether you're appointed today or not, I sincerely hope that you remain engaged with our boards, committees, volunteer organizations, and future opportunities. An active and engaged citizenry is what makes our community strong, and I look forward to working with many of you. As I mentioned as well, Wednesday, August 12th, between 8.30 and 10.30 a.m. here at Town Hall is the Coffee with the Chiefs. I want to see a dad joke off between the two of you because I've seen that online a couple of times between police chiefs and fire chiefs. Don't steal their jokes. I want original jokes. But I plan to be in attendance, and it's an excellent opportunity to meet with our public safety chiefs to ask questions, discuss concerns, discuss firsthand with them their visions and priorities for public safety on the island. I encourage everyone to keep an eye on the town calendar, also for the Turtle Talk summer series that are continuing here and other community events. Thank you for everybody that has attended today. As always, my virtual door is open. If you're a homeowner association, civic organization, neighborhood group, would like me to attend a meeting, answer any questions, or simply listening to your ideas and concerns, I'd be happy to do so. So please don't hesitate to reach out. And again, it goes to all of our candidates that have applied as well. Before I close, remind everybody that hurricane season is still very much underway, and historically the months of August, September, and October are when we see the greatest tropical activity. So now is the time to review your family's emergency plans, check your disaster supply kits, know your evacuation plans, and stay informed through trusted sources like the National Hurricane Center. Oslo County's emergency services and the town of North Topsail Beach. A little preparation today can be a tremendous difference should a storm threaten our community. Thank you again, everybody, and have a wonderful month.

I want to thank Larry for his work for the town. I want to thank our public servants. Summer is always a trying time for us to maintain and to keep the craziness at bay. So, but thank you for your service. We really appreciated it. Your level of professionalism. I've really appreciated the detail in your documentation and the reports, much, much, much improved. Thank you. And we wish you good luck on whatever your next rescue to a town is. And enjoy partial retirement. I don't want people to forget, and taking off with Kip, that we had a big hurricane in 2018. And we seem to forget and newcomers seem to forget. They didn't live it. They weren't here. They don't have an idea of what it's like in hurricane season or when an event happens. And so if you don't have your reentry permit to get back on the island, you need to get one. If we need to offer another public event again about hurricane preparedness, I still think maybe that should be something on the agenda. But when I say to people the island looked like a war zone for about 18 months, They have no idea what I'm saying because they don't remember 35 foot piles of debris. So do get, go to fema.gov, get your go bags ready, understand that money machines go down and that you better have some cash. Don't let your car get to empty, you know, keep your gas tank full going through hurricane season. Hopefully we won't have anything this year. But the last thing you want to be is unprepared if we get a bad storm as it comes through. So FEMA.gov is a great, great wealth of information for preparedness. I look forward to working with an advocate for us in DC Our strategic plan needs to be something we pick up and run with in the next few months. We met on that, worked on it, and we need to keep those efforts going. And working with someone where we can pull in some federal initiatives into our strategic plan will be a great thing. Just so you know, down at the historic building, In old Topsail Beach, you know, you got pirate bingo tomorrow night. But that also helps keep the history of Topsail going at the assembly building and keeps the historical record of the island. And so any proceeds from the bingo goes to that. And that's all I've got, Mayor. Okay. Pro Tem.

All right, I'll try not to repeat too much of what everybody else has said, but I will start with the turtles. I do need you to remember that this is not a competition. However, if it was, there are 143 turtle nests on Topsail Island right now. North Topsail Beach has 89 of them. Sir City has twenty and Topsail Beach has thirty-four. Speaking of which, we had a turtle release right here at the town at Jeffrey's and it was phenomenal. The estimate was eighteen hundred people attended and watched the turtles go out. there was so much help from the town staff, in particular from the police and the fire. They had their guys out there with such a large crowd at one point, people just being over exuberant and trying to crowd. And I asked Chief Page first, I said, can we have a couple people just in their uniforms just stand down there? Got them down there, so many. Asked Chad also, can we get a few of your people? Yep, they all stood out there, and suddenly the crowd was very, very cooperative. And the town staff, everybody was phenomenal. It was just a really great one. And again, it's not a competition. However, I do think that it is better than the ones in Surf City or Topsail Beach. We have adequate parking. And our town staff is amazing. uh... also it is one of those things these turtle releases that just it's such a positive light on our town as are the turtle talks on tuesdays that'll run through the end of august uh... at at through the end of august we will also still have the volunteers out there every morning before seven o'clock checking to see if there's any new turtle nests that'll end at the end of august but we will continue to have people monitoring the hatchings at night, because we still have the nest hatching. So please, if you're oceanfront, keep your front lights off. Or replace them with the amber lights, which we do happen to sell here at the town hall. As far as the candidates, like I said earlier, it was a tough decision. Everybody brought something to the table. And I would greatly encourage everyone that applied to look into running, it'll be a short, what did you say, 14 months?

Well, you've got to sign up by July, whatever, like 15th or, yeah, 27th of next year.

Yeah, it's a short time, and so just to get your figuring it out, I... I encourage you to come to the meetings, ask questions, see how the whole process is, see what's going on. It'll help you be a stronger candidate for the election times. Larry, you have been phenomenal. You came in here just to kind of keep the boat steady. However, you did more than just that. You really, really helped lead this town, just not in an interim fashion, but in... In a town manager fashion, we really thank you for that. Yeah. We do have coffee with the Chiefs coming up, which is going to be great. Apparently there's going to be, I don't know, what was it going to be? Feats of strength.

Chief of the beet donuts.

Chief of the beet donuts. Yeah, there's going to be all sorts of things. Labor Day is coming up, so we're going to have another big hurrah, and then we should slow down a little bit. And that's it. I hope everybody has a...

Perfect. And again, I was frankly, and I know we were just laughing about that again, overwhelmed by the number of people that were willing to step up Um, and you know, and four of you were already on boards, which is stepping up and doing those types of things, because we've had a real gap in the past with getting people to sign up. We've had, as you know, we've had people on both boards because we couldn't get anybody. We couldn't get alternates. We couldn't get anything else. Um, and like I said, I think that, you know, no offense to, uh, to who was just appointed, but it's going to be a really hard thing to replace Larry. Um, Larry lived it. I mean, he was on the phone to me every single day. Um, he loves this town. He loved this town. He committed himself to it. Um, really appreciate the people that stepped up. Um, we got to keep BISAC going, buddy. We got to make sure that, uh, this, that his legacy continues. So we get this beach project done. Um, like I said, overwhelmed with the response we had on this. Remember, we still have some planning board openings, um, which we'll be doing, uh, probably at the next meeting. And I hope that everybody will come in September because that's going to be Stephanie's first day. She's actually going to come in. One of the suggestions we had from somebody to my left here, which was a very good suggestion, is, get her briefed on the beach stuff before she steps here on September 1st. So Chris has agreed to come meet with her and brief her on all that kind of stuff. And did we file the shallow draft stuff? I know that I've signed everything. So we have now filed for $34 or $43 million.

He is filing today for $33 million.

for $33 million for the shallow draft fund. So that's moving forward as well. And I've also been talking to Lazara and some other people and where I think Anne can help us on a lot of this stuff. I think, you know, Mark, you were talking about this as well. I don't even know what to ask for. And what she talked about at length is meeting with the staff and meeting with people here and part of the strategic plan. What do we want? There's so much money up in Washington. And like I said, all they can say is no. And one more thanks to Onslaught County for the support that they're showing us. I think you told me, is it Connie? Every week now they've got an event going on at their beach accesses, which they've never done before. They've put money into the beach again. The $250,000 is very, very welcome for us out of the tourism dollars, and that's not the only money they're putting into us. So with that... We're going to go into closed session, so could I have a motion to go into closed session?

I make a motion to go into closed session.

Do I hear a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. I don't think it's going to be a long session. And that would be.

I make a motion to come out of closed session.

Second. No action was taken in closed session. Do I hear a motion to adjourn?

Motion to adjourn.

Do I hear a second?

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Thank you all.