Town Council - Regular Meeting

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like to call the December 4th uh meeting of the Oakidge Town Council to order. Our first item is the invocation. We have the pleasure of Randy Collins leading us in the invocation. Please stand as you're able. What a great night we have tonight. And uh if you will bow your head for the invocation. Heavenly Father, we come before you tonight grateful for the gift of this town we call home. Thank you for Oakidge, for its families, its schools, its churches and parks, and for all who make this community special. We thank you for step forward to serve. Tonight, we lift up our newly elected council member, Lindseay Clark, and our returning council member, Anne Snyder. We ask that you bless them with wisdom, patience, and courage as we begin and continue their service. We also pray for every member of this town council, for our mayor, our staff, and all who support the work they do. Fill this room with spirit of unity, respect, and shared purposes. Help these leader leaders to listen well, to work together, and to make decisions that honor you and bless the people of Oakidge. We ask that you watch over our community, our families, our future. May Oakidge be known as the place of kindness, wisdom, and hope. In your holy name and together we say, amen.

Amen. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. First item is to approve the agenda. Is there a motion to approve or amend the agenda? I move that we approve the agenda with the elimination of item six, the annual financial report since it's not ready tonight. Is there a second? Any discussion? All those in favor say I.

I. Those opposed eyes have it. Next is the approval of the minutes of November 6th regular and closed and also November 24th regular special call and closed session. Is there a motion? So moved. Is there a second? Second. Is there any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Opposed. The eyes have it.

Uh I believe we don't have a report from the sheriff, but we do have the crime statistics in the back. You're welcome to take a look at that. What's that? Oh, resolutions. Yes, sorry. As always, someone has to keep me straight. Uh, resolution proclamation announcements. Uh, we have a resolution uh proclamation honoring the the life and service of Jerry uh Cook. Proclamation. Whereas Jerry M. Cook was born October 10th, 1935. And whereas in 1974, Mr. Cook purchased 130 acres of farmland in Oakidge, which included three corners of the intersection of NC 150 and 68. And whereas after building a home and settling his family here, and believing residents deserved an opportunity to make their own decisions, he participated in the town of Oakidge's incorporation efforts, which were approved in 1998. And whereas Jerry Cook was elected to the town council in Oakidge's first election in 1999, and he served until 2003. And whereas Mr. Cook eventually developed much of what is now commercial property in Oakidge, including the Village Store, Oakidge Commons, and Oakidge Marketplace. And whereas these commercial areas have supplied many of the services needed and desired by the citizens of Northwest Guilford County. And whereas during his long and productive life, he demonstrated dedication to others in countless ways, including membership of Oakidge Presbyterian Church and in the Northwest Guilford Kuanas Club. And whereas the town council of the town of Oakidge, North Carolina, know notes with deep regret the loss of Jerry Mcook and wishes to acknowledge and express appreciation to his family for his life of dedicated service to his community. Now therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me as mayor of the town of Oakidge, North Carolina, I do hereby deem it an honor to extend this proclamation of recognition to the family of Jerry Cook and offer that the town s serious condolences for their loss. In witness whereforth I have set my hand and cause the seal of the town

of Oakidge to be affixed this fourth day of December 2025. Uh before I give the proclamation to uh Phyllis, would any of the members of council like to add anything, Mr. Harton?

Just that Jerry was a recent friend but a a good friend which was really an extension for a long friendship that he had with my wife's uncle Bob. Um, Uncle Bob was one of the old Oakidge people who was probably the one of the first that realized that Jerry had a vision for this town that was quite different at the time and uh and Uncle Bob supported him and they became very good friends from that standpoint. Also, um Jerry was probably the first person to speak to me years ago about joining council uh and uh reciprocating. I made sure that next to my wife, he was the first to know that I was running two years ago.

Mer. Yeah, I haven't seen Jerry recently, but I've thought about him often when I especially when I met with his son Philillip and when I was first running for council before I I spoke to him a couple times and he was always um fun, a little salty, a little direct, but he was the first person a little similar to what you're saying. He was the first person to support my candidacy with a donation and he was very encouraging when I ran the first time in 2017. And I will always remember him as being so deeply connected with this community. And I remember talking to him when we celebrated we organized the celebration for the 20th anniversary. And it's just it's remarkable to talk to someone who has had such an impact on our community and I will never forget him. Thank you

Mr. Stone. Um a terrific gentleman. Uh gentleman being the key word. Um I first met first met Mr. Cook um next door at the fire station because that was the town hall too and that's where we had our town council meetings and planning and zoning meetings and so yeah to say somebody's been here from the beginning. Mr. Cook had been here from the beginning. We owe him a lot. Mr. Gon,

I just want to thank you for building the ABC store in the comments. So that's all I got to say. Um, as Mr. Stone, I met Mr. Cook the first time at the fire department firehouse because that's where he held town hall meetings the first. Uh, I always appreciated his directness. I don't believe you ever really had to uh wonder where he stood. Uh, he was very forthright about where he stood on something. Um, one of the most rememberable things he mentioned was is if you wanted to stop development out here, get your checkbook out. And I think that was very appropriate. He said, you know, development is important out here. And we benefited greatly from his vision. Um, when I first moved here, it was a good 30 minute drive to go to a full-size grocery store. We now have a full-size grocery store. Uh, as some of you know, I bake as a hobby. So if I forget an ingredient, it's really nice to be able to run down and get that ingredient in about 10 minutes. So he's made a tremendous impact on this town. Uh and his mark will last a long time after his passing. Uh with that, I'd like to present this to Phyllis, his wife. Uh Uh, Philip and D and I really appreciate this and we thank you.

We appreciate you. Take care. Thank you. Am I correct, town clerk, to move on to the sheriff's report? Thank you. Uh I don't we don't have a report from the sheriff's department, but it is in the back in written form if you'd like to take a look at the statistics. I believe we do have the Oakidge Fire Department here though for a report. Yes, sir. Just step right up and the floor is yours. We got the head guy.

Yeah. Hello everyone. If you don't know, I'm Chief Ken Gibson. Nice to be here. So, I want to start by uh say we did have a structure fire on Foxhound Drive Wednesday before the Thanksgiving. Um the family will be out of their home for some time, but the home can be repaired. We had two minor injuries. Stokesdale did send one to the hospital. So, and with the help of Stokesdale, Kernersville, and Summerfield, the fire was brought under control rather quickly. So, that being said, we had a total of 88 calls for the month of November. Every month EMS calls trump the uh the numbers. It was 42. And part of that's due to staffing of Guilford County EMS. They're short like everyone else. So we usually respond on calls that normally we don't get dispatched to. We had five hazardous materials calls and seven false alarm. 28 other calls which would be determined as service calls, whether someone locked out, animal rescues, etc. and 187.5 training hours for the month of November. Um, usually there's a safety tip. What I did, I printed it out. It's at the back. It's goes with the theme of December far as safety. So, if you could please grab

one of those. And also with the possible inclement weather tomorrow, I'd like to say everybody please drive safely if you have to get out. So, um, does anyone have any questions about any concerns or anything far as the fire department or open burning? We get a lot of calls on open burning. So, all right, that's all. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you, Chief. Thank you, Chief. We have recognition outgoing council, Mr. Mayor Prommy, you asked to have lead on that.

Yes, sir. Um would like to uh present uh to the town of Oakidge and to uh Mayor Kinnaman the following proclamation. Whereas the town council of the town of Oakidge, North Carolina, wishes to acknowledge and express sincere appreciation to Jim Kinnaman for his years of dedicated service to the citizens of Oakidge as a member of the Oakidge Town Council. And whereas Jim Kinnman has put forth substantial effort towards improving the quality of life for the citizens of the town of Oakidge, seeking to make the community a better place. And whereas it is fitting to show appreciation one when one has rendered such valuable service. Now ver there therefore by v virtue of the authority vested in us as the town council members of the town of Oakidge, North Carolina, we do hereby acknowledge Jim Kinnaman as a loyal and faithful public servant and express our deep gratitude to him for his leadership and dedicated service to the Oakidge community as a member of the town council from December 2007 to December 2011, from December 2013 to December 2017 and December December 2021 to December 2025 and as mayor from December 2023 to December 2025. Be it further resolved that a copy of this proclamation be recorded in the permanent minutes of the town of Oakidge and a copy thereof duly executed by the town council and presented to Jim Kinnaman. In witness thereof, we have set our hands and caused the seal of the town of Oakidge to be affixed this fourth day of December, 2025. It is with our appreciation that we present you with this.

Thank you. Appreciate that. Mr. Mayor, I believe that at this point it is fitting that the town council be allowed an opportunity to uh make comments. Uh Mr. Harton,

just briefly I've been working with Jim for the past two years. I think initially we didn't necessarily see eye to eye on on things, but uh over that time he and I learned to work together uh on several big projects that impacted the town in a positive way. So Jim, I appreciate uh that that work that we did together and your guidance along the way. Thanks, Miss Snder.

Yes. Thank you, Jim. And I'm sorry I came between the handshake and almost knocked you both down. Um, I am very grateful to have worked with you. And when I think about some of the things that you've made a big difference on in this community. I really think about trails and sidewalks, connectivity and safety. I think you've made a huge impact and I want to thank you especially for that. Thank you. It's been a privilege and an honor. Thank you, Mr. Pson. Well, that was a nice two years. I'm sorry it's over with. It was fun. I enjoyed getting to know you very well. having a few glasses of wine together and uh hope to see you around. Thank you.

Um in agreement and in disagreement, um Jim was always focused on what he believed to be right for the town of Oakidge, whether again in disagreement or in agreement. It's hard to argue with somebody that is focused singularly on the town. Um, and your service is much appreciated. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, would you like to say a few words?

Yes. Yes. Thank you. Um, just take a few minutes. Uh, thank you, my fellow council members. I appreciate the opportunity for those for these final remarks. It has been a profound honor and a true privilege to serve this town alongside each of you. And to the citizens of Oakidge, thank you for placing your trust in me. As I conclude my time on this council, I wanted to share a few reflections. If you will permit me to brag just a little bit, I'd like to reflect on what we've accomplished during my term and even before. During my time on council, we stopped big box stores, added sensible restrictions on cell towers, added Wi-Fi to the park, live stream council meetings, delivered a solid start to our water system, added two parks, built an amazing network of trails, and achieved a tree city designation. I am particularly proud of our work on walkability. As as M. Schneider pointed out, I remember when we first started adding sidewalks. Some humorously called them the Kinnaman sidewalks because frankly they didn't really connect to much. They were a start, but they didn't go anywhere. But look at them today. They are used frequently. In some sense, they were one of our most successful additions to our town. It's an interesting journey. Oakidge was very walkable before all the growth. My neighbor talks about being able to ride her horse for miles, and children rode their bicycles everywhere. That connectivity is what made Oakidge a tight community which led to our incorporation. As our town grew and changed, we inadvertently became less walkable. But together, we've been working hard to change that back. We have added sidewalks and trails. And I'm so excited that some of these new trails are just beyond the sidewalks, creating a true network. With just a few more connections, people on the east side of town could easily and safely walk to our shopping areas and our wonderful parks. So, I implore you, my friends and colleagues, continue to make those connections because a connected town is

a safe town, a stable town, and a resilient town. I'm also incredibly proud of the clarity and transparency we have established in our support for youth sports. As I reflect on my service, one of the clearest lessons that has been in public policy, perception can often be as powerful as reality. I'm particularly proud of the work we did to bridge that gap with the new rebate program. For years, the town has deeply valued our partnership with the youth association. However, the financial support we provided was often hidden in the waiverss or complex stipens. It was support, but it was invisible support. We changed that to make sure the town's contribution was undeniable and transparent. A campaign email this fall provided the clearest validation for why that change was so necessary. He claimed this was the first time physical money was coming back to the youth association. While that statement was technically mistaken, valuable support has always flowed from the towns to the association. It highlighted exactly why the old system failed. People couldn't see the support. The new rebate program simplifies everything and makes the town commitment concrete. Here is the reality of what we built. The value of our highquality fields is established by the initial payment of fields. The town then immediately returns support in the form of a rebate which is $70 per Oakidge resident per sport. And crucially, because this is now designated as real physical money, the youth association has the full freedom to do anything they wish with these funds. That makes staken campaign email actually confirmed that our policy was the right one. By moving to this rebate model, we have secured clarity for the town, ensured OA receives flexible, tangible funds, and proven that Oakidge puts his money where his heart is, supporting our youth athletes. But beyond policies and spreadsheets, we must never lose sight of what we makes this place truly

wonderful. Oakidge is not just another zip code or a suburb on a map. It is a community with a soul. There is a piece here that is hard to find elsewhere. It's in the open spaces we have fought to preserve. the historic roots we honor and the way our neighbors still look out for one another. It is a place where rural character isn't just a slogan, it's a way of life that we cherish. Whether it's the quiet beauty of our parks at sunrise or the bustle of community events, there is a warmth here that makes all the hard work worth it. We are stewards of a very special place. Of course, serving on this council isn't always easy. We've tackled complex issues, managed growth, and navigated disagreements. But through it all, I believe we have always shared a deep and abiding love for the town. We've worked to find that difficult balance between welcoming new neighbors and preserving the character that makes Oakidge so special. Continue to work to make Oakidge a town for all and fight the calls to close the door behind you. I'm proud of the work that we've done to listen to our citizens and find the path forward. We all like to say the town runs on our volunteers. Please ensure that remains true. They contribute council hours only due to their love of Oakidge. Before making any policy changes, please talk to each of the committees to get their input. They may not agree with what you end up doing, but at least they have felt they have felt heard. During my time on council, I've been blessed with an amazing staff that was always there with honest and reason support. They humored me with all my ideas. Some worked out and some didn't, but they always gave them full consideration. With them, so much has been possible. Make sure you continue to make take good care of them. I also want to express my deepest gratitude to my wife, Carol. Public service is commitment that the whole town makes, not just the elected official. Carol, thank you for your unwaving support, your patient during the long meeting nights, and for being my partner in this journey. I truly could not have done

this without you. I am not stepping away from this community. I leave this post incredibly optimistic about Oakidge's future. We have a dedicated town staff, passionate citizens, and a council that I know will continue to serve with integrity. I look forward to my new role as a private citizen, though I promise to be an engaged one. I'll be I'll be cheering you on. And as always, please donate blood if you're able. Thank you all of you for everything. It's been an in honor of a lifetime. Thank you so much. Okay. Uh, my name is Stuart Albbright. I'm the Guilford County uh, Spirit Court Judge, and it's a pleasure to be with you here again in Oakidge. I've come from time to time. Uh, it's a good thing, always a good thing for the judge to come see you than for you to come see the judge. So, it's always pleasure to

be out in Oakidge. And I started off doing this back in the fire department. So, it is a much uh nicer uh town hall. So, in any event, if you'll please raise your right hand and answer my questions. Do you and Katherine Snider solemnly and sincerely swear that you will support the Constitution and laws of the United States? I do. And do you and Katherine Snyder solemnly and sincerely swear that you will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the state of North Carolina and to the constitutional powers and authorities which are or may be established for the government thereof?

I do. And do you solemnly and sincerely swear that you will endeavor to support, maintain, and defend the Constitution and laws of said state not inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States to the best of your knowledge and ability? I do. And do you and Katherine Snyder solemnly and sincerely swear that you will faithfully discharge the duties of your office as town council member for the town of Oakidge? So help you, God. I do. Congratulations.

Thank you. Now, I'm John Hamilton. I'm a councilman here in Guilford County in the town of Somerfield. Uh, it's a great honor today to be able to give you the minister to you the oath of office. And if you're ready, I'll have you go ahead and raise your right hand and take your oath. All right. Lindseay Clark, do you solemnly swear that you will support the Constitution and laws of the United States?

I do. That you will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the state of North Carolina? I do. And to the constitutional powers and authorities which are or may be established for the government thereof. I do. and that you will endeavor to support, maintain, and defend the Constitution and laws of said state, not inconsistent with the Constitution of the United States to the best of your knowledge and ability, and that you will faithfully discharge the duties of your office as town council member for the town of Oakidge. So, help you God. I do.

All right. Well, congratulations. You are now officially official Lindseay Clark, uh, the Oakidge Town Council. council. I will now now take nominations for the office of mayor. Uh, madame town clerk, I nominate uh, Councilman Jim Harton as mayor.

Thank you. Are there any other nominations? Okay, we have one nomination for Jim Harton. All in favor say I. I. Opposed. Congratulations, Mr. Harton. You're now the mayor. Before you switch seats, I'll take um nominations for Mayor Pro Tim. I make a motion that Mike Greon be Mayor Pro Tim. Thank you. Are there any other nominations? Okay, we have one nomination for Mike Griezon, Mayor Pro Tim. All in favor, please say I.

I. Any opposed? Congratulations, Mr. Greon. going this way. It'll take me a while. Is this book? This is

Oh, hi. Hi.

Literally swapping chairs. to sit here. Lot of stuff to shift around. Oh, this one's my It must be Jim's.

We got to get settled in here about to do Congratulations. Alrighty. I'd like to thank the uh my fellow councilmen for their nomination and support. Um I apologize. There's a lot of stuff to do tonight, a lot of paper that goes with it. So, uh, the next item on our agenda is a public hearing, a reszoning case, uh, RZ2504 from, uh, zoning AG to RS40. The property is located at 7856 Alorn Road on the north side of Alorn Road approximately one quarter mile east of the intersection of Alorn and North Carolina Highway 68 North being in Oakidge Township. It is a Guilford County tax parcel 162804. It's approximately 25.4 4 acres and is located in the Jordan Lake wershed and is owned by Diana C. Yates. Um

Sean, are you going to introduce this uh this this public hearing reszoning case?

You got a good start on the first part of it. I I hate to uh start a new a brand new council off with uh a reasonzoning and a special use permit, but that's just the way the cards fell this time. But we do have a reasonzoning case RZ25-04. Um it is on uh Alhorn Road as uh Mayor Harton said. Uh the zoning districts surrounding this property are to the north is zoned AG and just to the northeast there's property zoned RS40 residential. Uh other to the southeast and west of this it is also all zoned agricultural. The RS40 district is what we consider our base zone. It is requires that a minimum of a 40,000 square foot lot or as many people refer to it as a oneacre lot. Uh that is not a part this zoning is not a well or this property is not part of any overlay districts. It is a part of the Jordan Lake watershed and the Greensboro WS3 wershed as well. The site does include flood planes along the northern border of the property along what is known as Beaver Creek. Public water is not available nor is public sewer. All lots proposed that would be if this lot is if this property is reszoned and developed all lots would be served by uh individual well landscape requirements per article 9 division 4 landscape and tree protection requirements apply to this site. Off- streetet parking regulations there are none. Uh tree preservation areas will be determined during the

subdivision approval process. Alorn Road is considered an existing collector street. Any new streets within this development, if it is approved, would be classified as existing collector as well. Uh any new roads in the this development will also have to be built to NC DOT standards. Sidewalks uh are not required for this development and a traffic impact study is not required by the town. However, NC DOT at their own purview may require one and as to address our land use plan with this it does meet objective 1.2 two, which recommends RS40 zoning for development on tracks outside of the town core with marginal environmental, agricultural, historic, or community open space value. And also within our comprehensive pedestrian transportation plan, the town of Oakidge existing proposed facilities map from the pedestrian plan does show a proposed trail following along the Beaver Creek and a proposed proposed pave shoulder along Alorn road. And if um just uh I had a clerical error that I call originally referred to this as Rita Creek, but it's actually Beaver Creek. So if you want to correct that in your reports that you have staff recommendation, the proposed request is consistent with the recommendations of the Oakidge future land use plan and staff recommend approval of the resoning application. This case was heard this past Tuesday. The planning and zoning board and also within your uh staff report is the written recommendation addressing comprehensive land use planning

consistency and other appropriate matters. The planning and zoning board recommended approval of to town council the application for resoning. The pro proposal is consistent with the adopted land use plan. It is also reasonable and in the public interest. This uh motion was made by uh Ron Simpson. It was seconded by Brad Wentz and then was approved by vote of six to zero in favor of this motion. And that completes my staff report. Mr. Mayor,

thank you. Are are there any questions by council? Okay.

Can you tell me again where the creek is on which which which side of the parcel? It's to the very north. Okay. Thank you. It's uh if since many of you since uh it belongs to our former council me along the border of our former council members uh property Doug. Thank you. Appreciate that. Okay. So, no further questions from council. Okay. Is there a motion uh consistent with the recommendation from the planning and zoning board to approve this? We need to do the public hearing. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I'm sorry.

We need to open the public hearing.

Forgive me. First time. Hang on. Covered that up. Okay. So, yeah, I'm sorry. Uh we'll go into a public hear public hearing at this time. Um we'll allow uh 20 minutes uh for those that are pro uh for this u for this uh zoning case to be approved. And uh followed that by 20 minutes for anybody that's uh wants to rebut. And um we'll ask that individuals uh try to condense that speak try to condense their their uh comments to three minutes. First stating who you are and where you live in Oakidge. Uh and we will we will start that way and finish that way. Afterwards, if there's additional time, we will have five minutes of of of on the pro side, five minutes on the rebuttal side if if needed. So, uh we'll start with the those that are uh for this zoning case as as stated, presented by by Mr. Taylor. Yes, sir.

Good evening. My name is Craig Fleming. My address is 4196 Mindenhal Oaks Parkway in High Point. Um, I'm here representing Ferguson Lane LLC. That that LLC is a partnership between myself and Brian Disney who is here who signed the application and his brother Mark Disney. Uh, Brian and Mark are longtime residents of Oakidge. They grew up here. Um so and we've done a lot of work with her family in the past. Um so um thank you Sean did a great job with the presentation. Um I'll just um maybe make a few extra points about um how why we believe this is an appropriate land use. Um there are two um can't see them now, but there are two other two additional uh parcels of land that are very near this parcel that are direct directly due east. Uh there you go. Thank you. You can see the two subdivisions that are directly due east of this parcel. Um the reason we believe that this is an appropriate use is because it's very similar zoning to those tracks. Uh it's a similar size. I think Beaver Creek is about 23 acres. Subject property is about 25 acres. Um in the Beaver Creek community, it's zoned RS40. Um and the density in that neighborhood is about 1.4 acres per lot. Um so relatively large lots consistent with an RS40 zoning. Uh the Crutchfield property is just a little souththeast of there. Um that Crutchfield Farm is about 38 acres. It's also an RS40 zoned property. Um the density there is about 1.2 acres

per lot. So again, seems to be consistent zoning. Um I think Sean mentioned that Beaver Creek does run along the north property line here. Um Beaver Creek will have um a stream buffer on it. It's also also has a 100-year flood plane that's adjacent to it. So, we would be conscious in developing the property to avoid those. Um, we have had a a a private um soil scientist do a wetland evaluation on the remainder of the property and there there are no other jurisdictional wetlands on the property outside the flood plane. Um, we've also talked to NC DOT. U preliminarily they have indicated that they would not require a traffic impact study. Town doesn't require one. However, any kind of development, driveway, roadway that gets built will be subject to NC DO's review and approval and uh compliance with all their safety regulations and all of that should it be reszoned. Um, that's really about it. Uh, any, you know, if if this property were reszoned and, uh, we were to come back with a subdivision plan, that subdivision plan, in addition to being, uh, required to be in compliance with all of the town ordinances. It's also going to have to comply with state NC DOT ordinances, Guilford County Health Department ordinances, erosion control, state ordinances and regulations. So, um, we're aware of all that. We are we have a fair amount of experience with developing property around Guilford County. Um, and we feel like because of the surrounding property and the nature of this property that RS40 is an

appropriate land used. So, we would appreciate your support on that. Be glad to ask answer any questions that you have. Just a quick one for me for orientation more or less at the center bottom. Uh, I just confirm that's the historic AI church. Mike, you might be able to help me. Yes. No, but I mean I'm just trying to Oh, yeah. That's that's that's where the historic AI church is. So I I now pretty much know where you're talking about. Yeah. Intersection 68. Okay. Right. Okay.

Is there anyone else? Does anyone else wish to speak in support of this project? Is there that being the case? We'll stop there. Is there anyone that wants to speak against this uh reasoning uh case? Oh, yes. Yes, ma'am. Good evening. My name is Terry Morpainer and I live at 7875 Alorn Road and I have lived there since 1978. Um, I just want to say how grateful I am for the land use work that all of you have done to preserve the integrity of Oakidge as a community. And I also want to say that I'm confident that the developers bring that same good intent um to the proposal that they're making. However, tonight I want to speak as a resident, a long-term resident of Oakidge and a neighbor to the proposed development on Alhorn Road. And I want to raise two primary concerns. The first concern has to do with traffic on Alorn Road. In the 47 years that I have lived there, I have seen multiple accidents occur on Alorn, resulting in cars in ditches, resulting in my mailbox being knocked down many, many times, resulting in fences being damaged, and resulting in cars landing in Ready Fork Creek. I'm concerned about the impact of adding

17 to 21 more households whose access to their homes would be directly off of Alorn Road and it would be just after or before the curve on Alorn depending upon which way you're traveling. And if you're coming from Rei Creek there is almost what I would certainly consider a blind curve. I can't tell you how many times I've come around that curve and almost hit a deer in the road. Now, I know that DOT is primarily tasked with assessing uh traffic issues, but I think it would be entirely appropriate for you as the town council who cares about safety in our community to call for a study of the impact that additional traffic would have on this stretch of Alorn Road and what might be done to assure safety there. Perhaps a turn lane might be required in the development or perhaps dropping the speed limit from the current 45 miles per hour to 35 miles per hour. Secondly, those of us who live in that neighborhood on Alhorn Road depend on private wells and private septic tanks and we get our water from the aquifer that flows below us. There have been reports this summer that there are communities in northwestern Guilford County where wells have gone dry. So the second request that I would hope that you as a council would take up would be to make a call for a water impact study that assesses the impact of 21 more wells and 21 more septic tanks in that particular area of Alhorn Road. Perhaps these concerns will be addressed

eventually with a submission of a site plan for the proposed development. Or perhaps, and this is for you to consider and you to decide as a council, these concerns warrant a delay on the zoning request so that some of the questions can be answered in advance. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else that would like to speak in rebuttal? Yeah, speak against opposition. Thanks, counselor.

So, I'm I'm done saying before for it or against, but I know our community uh Randy Collins 4514 People's Road, which connects Alhorn. Um, one thing I don't think unless you live on People's Road that connects Alhorn, realize at this time if you come at 5:00 PM and you're coming from 73 to Oakidge where people would that the right turn, everybody tries to get off on there, what's happening, the traffic from Oakidge is being backed up up to people's road and what I can see is I fought to get the speed limit reduced years ago to 35. that has not help helped any at all. So what's happening currently is when that traffic starts backing up, everyone's shooting down People's Road trying to get to the stoplight on Alhorn in 68 to get in front of the traffic. So, I think with the addition of the extra houses without a study, it'd be interesting to see how much more traffic on people's with our kids, you know, on bikes and stuff there trying to skirt 68's traffic to go around, how how dangerous that could be to not only People's Road, but Alhorn as well. Um, I know I got a granddaughter goes to elementary school here and if anyone's ever done parent pickup or grandparent pickup, you realize how crowded our schools are. And I'm not sure I know it doesn't follow your jurisdiction, but the the county uh as far as checking on the school population, what that would add, you know, even though it's, you know, 20 houses, one usually 1.5 students from a house usually come to that community to go to school, but some type of study for that as well. But just the impact we would see from on people's

picking up additional road pick additional traffic, excessive speed uh may be harmful to our community there. But that's all. Just want to recognize that.

Thank you, Mr. Collins. Is there anybody else that would like to weigh in the back? Hi. Uh, my name is Don Harter. I live on Bison Drive just to the right of where you're talking about. Uh, I've lived there 14 years and in those 14 years I've seen Beaver Creek probably widen 6 to 8 10 feet wider than it used to be. Dozens and dozens of trees have and washed into the creek. It floods usually every couple years. That whole drainage area back there floods. It comes up probably within a few yards of my back lawn. Um so I'm very concerned with additional runoff into the creek. Uh I'm sure development up on Stafford Road has also contributed to water coming down in the creek, but it does flood every couple years and the hard rainstorms. And like I said, that creek has widened tremendously in 14 years I've been here. And it floods. It doesn't It's not only flooding. You couldn't walk back there. You get washed away uh in the flat lands down there. So, um that's my concern. I'm not so much concerned with the, you know, development. I'm prodevelopment, but I'm concerned my house gets flooded. So, thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else? We ask for additional positives. Okay. And then we ask to Okay.

Hi, Andy Michaels, 8216 Hunting Cog Road. Not really for against, but I think the point is is that we probably all have driven on that road, Alorn. That is a curve. And the idea that a entrance way or two are going to be right on that curve is a safety issue that, you know, she brought up that I think is a valid one that maybe you do need extra turn lanes or something in order to make that happen. I don't know what that would involve, but I think it's a an excellent point and I would agree with that. That that is a concern for safety for our area. Thank you. Would anyone like to speak in rebuttal to those comments?

Name and address again or it would be helpful.

Craig Fleming, 4196 Menden Hall Oaks Parkway and High Point. Um, primary concern is traffic. Uh we do share that concern with everyone here. We do not want to do anything that would create an unsafe situation. We we do recognize there probably already is some issues with site distance there. Um there is a process. We've had a conversation with DOT about it and we've talked about uh certain criteria that would need to be met, certain locations. if we were to put a road in the ti tied into DOT. We have to get a driveway permit from DOT in order to do this. So, um there's certain regulations there's putting it in the right spot and it may justify a turn lane. We just don't know yet. Um but but we we share the concerns. DOT is very specific about their criteria. So, so we're going to let them lead the charge as to how that happens. Um, we'd love to see the speed limit reduced. That that would be great, I think, for everybody. I'm not sure how that process works, though. I'm not sure how to get DOT to do that. What we've seen in the past is it just takes a whole lot of accidents to get them to change something. So, but um so there that's the traffic issue. um concerns about runoff um runoff pros and cons when you're weighing an agricultural use versus a residential use. Um you know, some agricultural uses have high intensity chemical spread, things like that. Um some residential uses have lots of fertilizers involved. So maybe there's tradeoffs. Not sure one is particularly

worse than the other, but we're kind of talking about a land use issue here. Um, the other thing to consider is in a in a residential type of development, it is very very highly regulated. I mean, the town has a whole bunch of ordinances, the county, the state, federal government, there's lots of regulation in in building housing. Um there's really not nearly as much regulation in the farming business. Um rightly so. Farmers need the flexibility to grow and produce and and all of that. So, it's rightly so, but um Mike can consider if if you're concerned with pollutants and runoff and things like that that housing might be um a more an easier um easier on the environment. Um that's really all I'll be glad to answer any other questions that you have. We

would anyone else in the back? Sir, you want to come forward again? I can't answer questions. I want to know what they're doing for water remediation. Are there going to be retention ponds built on this property? Oh, okay. Don Harter, go ahead. Um, I just want to know if there's going to be retention ponds or any type of remediation for water runoff.

I I think in this time we can't answer those kinds of questions. Any other comments and rebuttal to Okay. So, we've um we have a issues any any further questions from council? We need to close the public hearing.

Okay. Okay. Uh, I'm I'm getting some coaching from the more experienced uh lady to my right. We need to have a motion to close the public hearing. You can disclose. Oh, okay. She said I can just close it. Okay. Now, do we have any further questions? No questions.

Um, I'll ask Sean the question about water retention ponds in case you know or the applicant can answer. Usually for this type of development per our uh storm water uh ordinances that type of device is not put in at the as part of the finished part of the development. Usually those devices are temporary storm water devices are put in when development development is occurring. Um and those are all have to be designed and approved and reviewed by uh storm water engineers that design it and then also our own contracted storm water engineers that are going to review and approve those programs. And with this uh being part um there's additional standards since this is a part of the Jordan Lake WHED and the Guilford County Greensboro GSW3 wersheds. Additional standards also apply to this that are more restrictive.

Thank you. Any other questions, Mr. Stone? Yeah. Um so, uh Mr. Fleming. Um, you made the the statement that, uh, you'll have to apply for and receive a driveway permit. You meant street connection, right? This isn't going to be a private driveway. Refers to a street connection as a driveway. A driveway is just a connection to a public road, whether it's a street or or an individual driveway. But this will be a public road if Yes. any road that would be constructed there is public.

Thank you, Sean. Um, I've received u multiple calls about this. Um, and I'll give my summary later, but um when we uh approved the um development of the Beaver Creek subdivision uh and specifically Bison Lane, um one of the issues was that um on Beaver Creek um there is a buffalo pit. Um has is there any consideration or comments about that?

Um a couple um if Michael bringing back the map I can show you where that actually is the parcel that is in. If you're uh familiar with the sub small subdivisions that's to the right of this property. Um there's a large um parcel right there just above that to the what would be kind of the northeast of that. Um that is when the Beaver Creek subdivision was developed that was dedicated as open space and that parcel was dedicated to the town of Oakidge. uh it contains flood zones and also the uh buffalo pit as part of that uh what is known as the historic buffalo pit um is within that parcel.

So it's not on this main not on the parcel we're considering tonight. It is not on the parcel we're considering tonight. So that is parcel what is it? 162788. Uh my optometrist would be impressed if these glasses work. was impressed. Yeah. Thank you.

Better like this. Better like this. Better like this. Okay. All right. Um Thank you. Um so that resolves that. Um flood plane. Um there was uh comments raised tonight and also that I've heard. Um part of this uh property is within a flood plane. that's going to reduce the total number. I understand in a reasonzoning, and I think most people do, is that there's 25 acres, so they'll ask for 25 lots. That doesn't mean there's going to be 25 lots because the flood planes and development and the streets and everything else. Is that correct, Mr. Fleming and Mr. Disney? Right. So, I understand why we we picked the number that we do uh for this. All of this uh will be fleshed out during the subdivision plan. Correct.

That's correct. So, right now we're just dealing with the straight up AG to RS40. That is correct. And that's what I wanted to clarify for everybody. Thank you, Mr. Clark. Any um yes, a question of clarification. So, mentioning the the connection to the main road, would the DOT assess if the turn lane was needed at that point? Sorry. Would the DOT assess if a turn lane was needed at that point when they're doing the the permit? Okay.

Any other questions? I have no further questions. So, we can invite a motion. At this point, we I invite a motion to either approve or deny this uh this reszoning case uh RZ2504 from AG to RS40. Do I have a motion?

Okay. Uh I move that we approve proposed zoning amendment AG to RS40 uh based on the following. The proposed zoning amendment is consistent with the adopted comprehensive plan of the town of Oakidge. The planning board has presented council with its written statement that the proposed amendment is consistent with the comprehensive plan and the council concurs and adopts the planning board's finding of consistency by reference. and the proposed zoning amendment is reasonable. The council considers it reasonable because the report of town staff finds the proposed zoning amendment to be reasonable and is adopted by reference. The council further finds that the proposed zoning amendment is reasonable because it uh it meets our ordinances as proposed and the proposed zoning amendment is in the public interest because the report of the town staff finds it to be in the public interest and is adopted by reference and I'm using language that is prepared for us in advance. So I apologize for that. I will also elaborate after the motion is complete. Is there a second? Second.

Uh, I'll elaborate now on why I support this. Um, I agree that we have some safety and traffic hotspots in Oakidge that we need to continue addressing. We tried to do this on Haw River Road. We need to look at those reports, see how that um the uh traffic um the speed limit sign is working where it shows you know your speed now. um and see if that would be appropriate. I would fully support and we've done this before as in Mr. Collins's neighborhood and in others where we've lowered the speed limit and if the town is an advocate for that and the neighborhood is advocates for it, we can we know we can get it done. Um I do agree that this is a tricky road. I think this isn't the trickiest spot. The trickiest spot is that Crutchfield Farms or Beaver Farms entrance. My life passes before my eyes every time I turn in there. I think this is on a broader part of the curve. I am confident that NC DOT can find the right way to do this. Um the right placement of the entrance to the new neighborhood the water. Um I I forgot to ask one question of Sean. When you do individual wells, do they do draw down tests or is it that just for a community well?

Um for what would be publicly knowledge would be for a community well would become okay. But as far as the private individual wells,

no. Okay. Um water is typically a problem from what we know from past regional water system water studies in Oakidge. Water is typically a problem just getting to it. It's there. We have a lot of water under Oakidge. The the problem is that sometimes it's difficult to get to the rock through it, but that's a challenge for the developer and I'm sure they've they've done this before. Um runoff, I believe it's very important for neighbors like Mr. um Carter. Is that right? um to watch out for runoff problems during construction because that's when the sometimes problems happen and when you see problems you can call Sean here and uh at town hall or you can call the de the the builder and developer but that's something important to watch and this is a very wet area so um I would hope that would be under tight control given all of the storm water regulations that Do we have Thank you.

Okay. We have a motion. We have the motion and the second. And the second. So then he can speak. You want to speak as a second? No. Okay. Mr. Grayson, you don't No comments. No comment. Okay. Well, if we have a motion in the May comment. Yes, sir. M.

Thank you. Um so RS40 uh by definition is the lowest density that we have in Oakidge. Obviously agriculture is what it is, but uh when we're talking about um protecting uh property rights uh for the reasonable use and development of an individual's property, RS40 is as as low as we go. We don't have an RS80 or anything else. So, uh, when you consider from a standpoint of somebody that owns a large parcel of land, whether it's 25 acres or 250 acres, the going to RS40 is going to have the least impact on the property, on the land, on the area, um, of all the zoning uh, opportunities that there are in Oakidge. Um if we believe in property rights then you know people have a reasonable expectation to be able to use their property to develop it um to um as they see fit within the ordinances and this fits within the ordinance and that way uh that's the reason I'll be supporting this

Mr. Clark. Um yes, I just wanted to add that uh as has been stated earlier, seems like a lot of the concerns will be addressed by the uh DOT permit as well as the subdivision approval process. So, you know, as far as having houses, the proximity to the flood plane, dealing with that, the tree conservation, um addressing that as well as the DOT assessing any turnly need. I think that will help some of the issues raised. Uh like Mr. Stone said, as far as reszoning, um that's a different issue. So,

okay. No further comments. So, we have a a motion and a second. Um, I would would um all in favor of the motion I I I any motion carries. Thank you. Congratulations.

Congratulations. Okay, the next item on our agenda is a evidentiary hearing. Um, before we get to that, and I have a little bit of extra help here because this is a more complicated issue. Um, so before we open the evidentiary hearing, evidentiary hearing for special use permit case SUP uh 251, a request for an event center in the RS40 zoning district. I'd like to offer a few comments to help the public in this council clearly understand the nature of tonight's proceedings. This hearing follows a quasi judicial process, which means that the council must base its decisions solely on competent, relevant, and substantial evidence. This includes written materials submitted by the applicant and available on the town's website, sworn testimony from the applicant or their representatives, sworn testimony from others who can offer relevant facts. As part of this process, council must identify factual findings known as findings of fact and then determine whether the application meets the town's requirements for event centers under section 30-1048 of the town ordinances as well as the general conditions for special use

permits under section 30-302. These standards exist to ensure that any special use permit is compatible with the surrounding area which in this case is an RS40 residential district. Council cannot base its decision on our personal opinion or the opinions of those who speak tonight. We are limited to factual evidence that is competent, re relevant, and substantial and that directly addresses our ordinance requirements. The testimony council may consider is also limited. Council may hear from the applicant and witnesses for the applicant, including expert witnesses. Town staff, members of the public who can show standing, meaning that they will suffer special damages or provide relevant facts and witnesses for such persons withstanding, including expert witnesses. other witnesses who can present competent material and substantial evidence that is not repetitive and is allowed by the board. All testimony must be taken under oath and is legally binding. Because of these restrictions, we may not be able to hear from any from everyone who wishes to speak. Even so, the process is impartial and fully open to the public. If you do speak, whether in support or in opposition, please focus solely on facts and ordinance standards, not personal preferences. Council may only consider evidence tied directly to the relevant sections of our ordinance ordinances. After testimony concludes, council will

have an opportunity to ask questions and deliberate. At the conclusion of deliberation, council may approve, approve with conditions, deny, or continue the hearing to a date certain. Disclosures. Before beginning consideration of special use permit 25-01, I need to ask council a few required disclosure questions. Number one would be for conflict of interest because the parties in this case are entitled to an impartial hearing. A council member may not participate if they have a fixed opinion on the outcome, have a financial interest in the outcome, have a family, a close family, business, or other relation with the applicant or an affected person. Does any council member have a conflict or believe they should recuse themselves? Miss Clark?

No. Mr. Stone? No. Mr. Greon? No. Miss Schneider? No. And I don't either. Okay. Ex. The second is exparte communication. Please disclose any experte communication regarding this case. meaning any communication outside this hearing, including site visits, conversations with the applicant, staff, or members of the public. Do any council members have expert communications to disclose? Mr. Greon, no. Miss Snyder,

I've had extensive conversations about the process with staff and when asked by members of the public, I have focused only on what the process is and said I can't comment on the case. Likewise for me, Miss Clark. Um, yes, I spoke to Mr. Taylor about the existence of certain ordinances, not the uh, you know, details or how they pertain to the case. Mr. Stone uh visited the property and have had conversations with staff. Based on these disclosure, does any member of council wish to object to another council member's participation?

No. No. Mr. Stone, I do I do not either. No sir. Okay. At this time we will turn to the staff for presentation of the application. Yes sir.

And before staff's presentation actually before the case begins. Um, I'm required by under my ethical duties to the state of North Carolina and state bar to uh advise you as follows. uh pursuant to uh the 2007 formal ethics opinion three which was based in turn on uh the authorized practice advisory opinion 2006-1 concerning unauthorized practice of law at quasi judicial hearings. I'm just going to one of the things for me to do is read you this paragraph from the 2007 formal ethics opinion. Uh, in authorized practice advisory opinion 2006-1 appearances at quasi judicial hearings on zoning and land use, the authorized practice committee of the North Carolina State Bar was asked whether it is the unauthorized practice of law for an individual who is not an active member of the state bar to appear in a representative capacity for a party in a quasi judicial hearing before a planning board, board of adjustment or other body of local government. In the opinion, the authorized practice committee observed that a hearing on an application for a special use per permit or for a variance under zoning ordinances is quasojudicial in nature, noting among other things that evidence is formally presented. Witnesses are sworn, testify, and cross-examined. The body has the authority to issue subpoenas. A record is created and preserved. The decision must be based upon the evidence presented and include findings of fact. and the decision is reviewable by an appellet court based solely upon the record of the proceeding. The committee also observed that the law is clear that an appearance on behalf of another person, firm or corporation in a representative capacity for the presentation of evidence through others, cross-examination of witnesses, and

argument on the law is the practice of law. The opinion concludes therefore that appearance in a representative capacity at such quasi judicial proceedings is limited to active members of the state bar. Now having said that the opinion goes on to address the specific case as in the situation of myself an attorney advising the board as to what happens when it appears that a party an applicant in a quasi judicial proceeding appears to be represented by a non-awyer which is the case this evening. As soon as such a lawyer determines that a non-awyer is appearing in a representative capacity for a petitioner, such a lawyer must inform the city council of the holding and authorized practice advisory opinion 2006-1 and advise the council on the legal implications of the opinion. If the council decides to proceed with the hearing despite the advice of uh such lawyer lawyer the lawyer may continue to provide advice to the members of the council on any matter that arises during the remainder of the hearing. So I have alerted you to the advisory opinion and what the gist of that opinion is the both opinions leave it and I'm so advising you in the discretion of the board to either require under such circumstances that an applicant and in here you have an applicant for a corporation an LLC which by law in the courts of North Carolina has to have a lawyer. Uh this is broader than that and talks about any representative representation as an advocate for other parties. Uh but the opinions make it very clear acknowledging uh the situation municipalities and

particularly smaller municipalities relying on the presentation of evidence for these types of proceedings uh by uh lay persons or by professionals uh on their own without a lawyer. uh that that is a reality in North Carolina and uh in short and it is my advice to this board that it is in the discretion of the board to require a an applicant in such circumstances to have a lawyer or not and to effectively wave that requirement for this board's purposes believing it can hear the facts uh based on presentation without a lawyer and having discharged my duty I leave to the board to make that decision.

Okay. Thank you. Do we need a motion on that or do we just choose to act on it or not? I'm an attorney. I would prefer that being on the record. I I would like to make a motion that based on the fact that there is not a perceived risk as I understand it to the town uh that it is the choice of the applicant not to have an attorney present that I am uh okay with that. That isn't a good motion, but I I'm fine with it.

Is there a second? Evidently not.

Could we possibly uh I guess alter the motion slightly um saying that we would allow them to proceed as long as the representative doesn't argue the rule of law or you know act as a lawyer but simply is the one to present the statement of facts um as the consultant for the applicant. uh because I think that the job of the applicant and the applicant's representative is to advocate for themselves. I I don't think I could change that motion. Uh and I would also remind the the mayor that he also can second a motion. Anyone can at this day can second a motion. Um, but it it seems important to me that I I don't see Well, I guess I'll ask you this question. Is there a risk to the town that you perceive?

You're asking me, uh, Miss Clark, Councilwoman Clark,

I don't know necessarily based on risk. Uh, more so just based on, as Mr. Thomas described the legal standards. I think just having that clarification in there that while we are allowing them to proceed to represent the applicant or you know the applicant to represent themselves as well that we're making the distinction that that is not them acting as a lawyer um in a sense but more so stating the facts of the case in support of the applicant's application. I'm not sure I followed that. But I would also point out that this is not although it's called quasi judicial, the word quasi is very important, it is not fully judicial. So I don't I think the idea that we have to have lawyers everywhere is is problematic for me. I think that peop that I I worked as chair I served as chair on the historic preservation commission for seven or eight years and that's all quasi judicial procedures and typically the applicants did not have a lawyer and they were advocating for uh legal ability to get a certificate of appropriateness under under a quasi judicial process and Mr. Greco has been involved in many of those and I think is very capable of uh navigating that.

Were they a corporate entity as well? Some of them were. Yes.

I have a question. If uh if the applicant were here with a law a lawyer um and would not most of the questions be relevant to the issues surrounding the site and would he not just refer them to Mr. recuper and I think the distinction Miss Clark's making is between simply presenting factual matters which Mr. Rico is, as we all know, quite competent to do and others uh uh I believe at least one member of the LLC might be here as well, but to present facts versus uh cross-examining witnesses, arguing legal points. Uh, in other words, basically presenting facts and leaving it with this board to make a decision on the application and the and the findings without hearing legal argument as to those. I mean, I think that's a valid distinction.

It's um, listening to this, it's a my opinion is this is our first fora into a special use permit. Um, we don't do quasi judicial processes that often. This one has a lot of arms and legs on it. Um, I don't have um any question that Mr. Grio can answer uh questions as he's in the business. Um but um the statement that if an individual or corporate is permitted to simply introduce themselves to the governing body uh and to defer to any non- lawyer, I'm just I don't feel the love on that. I would much rather and I would prefer that um that we that we expect a high bar on our ordinances and and the consideration of um I would I would feel much more comfortable if the applicant was here with their attorney. It's my opinion.

I agree with that. I guess I I I point to what our attorney just said that the the an attorney for the applicant would probably not have very deep knowledge of the proposed operations of the site or the how the site is to be built out and I would not see a lot of use in that for my purposes. What I want to hear about is the operations of the proposed facility and hear and ask questions about the site and I believe that the representative of the LLC who's here and Mr. Grio can answer those probably to all of our satisfaction. And if we set a precedent that everyone coming before this board for this council for a special use permit has to have an attorney. That just kind of unnerves me. So I'm not in favor of that.

Yeah. I guess to clarify, that's why I wanted to make the distinction that if the applicant is choosing to wave their right to a lawyer, I feel like we could make the distinction that they are therefore waving their right to have their representative argue as a lawyer like the examples that Mr. Thomas provided. Um, but more so their representative would present the statements of facts and not necessarily cross-examine or the other uh roles. However, they might want to rebut and that could be considered by some to be cross. I mean, they've got to be able to respond to things they hear. So, it worries me. I don't want to I don't also want to be I mean, Mr. Thomas, is there an easy way for this council or for you to make that distinction? I'm not sure I could make that distinction.

Well, again, the um u this involves a corporate applicant first of all. So the law of North Carolina is a corporation cannot go into court to anybody except a licensed attorney. It's unable to do so. Uh in quasi judicial is a court uh proceeding under North Carolina but right it's got but it's not a court.

It's but it's not court. It's a little looser but nonetheless uh you have uh legal requirements because you have to adjudicate facts. You have to find facts. The use the underlying use has already been legislated. That's done. But the use cannot be allowed for this without a special permit because the code the development ordinance says so. And you can only do that based on facts and factf finding is what courts do. That's what courts do and then they base a decision on those. Uh so you've got a corporate applicant, but let's say you have a non-corporate applicant, an individual. Uh there again, um it could be an unauthorized practice if somebody else is speaking for that individual. But if the individual shows up and says, "That's me. It's my application and I'm going to let these other people talk about the facts." Um that's that's their call. uh uh getting into cross-examination and that type of specific legal uh work as Miss Clark was indicating that implicates practice of law. If you're just presenting as uh you were saying, Mr. Schneider, about just presenting a position without cross-examining somebody else. Uh again, that's why I think the opinions have give K boards the latitude to effectively wave uh requiring an attorney and letting it come forward just on a straight up presentation. So once again, unfortunately, it goes back into the board to decide Do you believe that we can make a distinction as m as councilwoman Clark is indicating? I'm not sure I heard that

probably. Yes. in in that uh simply to keep the u presentation to a an individual's factual presentation and not engage in examining witnesses as such or presenting experts or calling witnesses and asking them questions. Again, the opinions um anticipate the situation where surveyors or architects or others will come into the hearing and simply talk about the application and sit down and answer any questions the board has. That appears to be uh an acknowledge reality and and and acceptable as far as the opinions go.

Well, then I withdraw my motion, which died for want of a second, and uh open the

Well, I was I wasn't quite done. uh following the procedures that were provided. Um essentially it's the staff presentation, the applicant testimony, other uh testimony from other partner parties withstanding, other witnesses, then questions from council to that group. And then there's the responses, rebuttals for parties withstanding. And I guess that's where I have concern or or bewilderment because at that point it seems like there is some kind of crossexamination uh or not. And I'm that's as much a statement as a more of a question really.

And I'm sorry I don't mean for this to get into some kind of hyper technical discussion. It wouldn't be a cross-examination if you're not actually asking a witness in a Q&A setting. just to step back up and further present is not what's being talked about here. It's not so a pure rebuttal of a point would not be it would not be cross-examination. Okay. That's why it's in your discussion.

Well, that that being the case, then then I would second uh Councilman Schneider's uh motion. Um because I I think the the issues that are here for us is to find out specifically about this particular special use permit and to get the evidence because we're in an evidentiary hearing and I I would I would that situation to at least be able to get that information before council. uh this I would second the original proposal and and appreciate the clarification from other councilmen that uh and women that have occurred. So I would second uh Miss Dyer's original proposal.

Well, I will say she withdrew that motion. Um but I began withdrawing it. So but I I see that you wanted to So let me Should I make a fresh motion or would you like to do it? Yeah, I would just I would like there to be clarification um of the basis of why we are allowing it to proceed and the reasoning behind that. Um so I could say sure. I'd like to make a motion to allow the applicant to be heard uh with their chosen representative with the understanding that the representative would not be practicing law would stick to the statement of facts and rebuttals as needed.

Second. Okay, we have a motion. Do you have a any input on that? Yeah. Oh, with the understanding would not engage practical meaning not engage in cross-examination and legal argument. Correct. Yes. Would not engage in cross-examination and legal argument. I'm all for putting postponing it personally. Um I think Okay. Well, we have a motion and a second. So, we need to deal with that first. Well, no, we can have discussion. Yeah. Okay. I want to make sure we do the right thing. I'm going to Okay. I'm not going to vote for it tonight. I I want a lawyer present with

I would feel I would feel most comfortable, as I stated earlier, I would feel most comfortable if there was an attorney present. I get it there. you know, the conversations and what we're talking about may not be as in the weeds and technical, but again, this is our first fora into the special use permit, and what we do tonight is going to set precedent. Uh whether we want it to or not, it's going to set precedent. It's going to be something that the next applicant for the next special use permit will look at and say, "Well, if they did it this way, then I can do it that way." Or I I would much prefer I agree with Mr. Greon that it would be I think simpler and I think it would be cleaner if uh we were to stick with having an attorney present.

Okay. Any further comments? Uh do do you have any further comments? It was your motion. You know, I am honestly torn. Um I almost wish we could speak with the applicant perhaps, but so I guess Mr. stone in Greon. You are you have the opinion just based on the legal requirement in a court that they would have a lawyer present being a corporate entity.

That that's correct and that based on that that the town would be best served by having uh an attorney present during this type of proceeding. We're just talking about postponing for uh till the next meeting um so that we get everything lined up because it's not going to go away. No, it's going to go away for 30 days.

I just want to make a point that it is not required. It's required that we're okay with it one way or the other. Okay. So, it's not required that they have an attorney. I do think that the best precedent that we can set is by being sensible uh taking a common sense approach to the findings of fact that I think can be provided by the applicant and the consultant and I think uh the frankly having done quasi judicial procedures before where in some cases um there were legal differences the presence of an attorney on the other side might make us look bad. I mean, I don't think it helps us. And I'm concerned with helping this town and this council move forward. And I don't see another attorney on the side of the applicant who might say, "Well, you didn't do the findings of fact correctly," or something like that. I don't see that. Of course, we're all recorded. It doesn't matter, but I don't see that as adding anything to our discussions. Um, I'd like to move forward on this case.

Okay. So, we have a motion and and a second. Um, I will So, it's been proposed to move forward. Um, by council, I would say all in favor I I All opposed? No. Nay. All right. motion uh is denied.

Mayor, I'd make a motion that we postpone consideration until the February meeting uh at which time um through clarification with um our attorney and the applicant that uh they would be prepared to present their case with their attorney present. May I ask why February is chosen? I'm sorry. This is December, isn't it? Hey, merry Christmas everybody. Thank you. Um, February. Somebody's saying February is good. I said February. Happy accident. Somebody has heartburn about it. Then make a friendly motion. I'll

Okay, I'll second that. Okay. Is the motion to continue to the meeting in February? Yes, sir. And that's a date certain. Can we give that date certain? uh February 5th. Okay. So, motion's been made, seconded. All All in favor? I did. So, all in favor of the U postponement to February, say I. I. I. I. All right. Thank you.

And I'd like to apologize for people who came out tonight. I hope you'll come back again in February. And especially, of course, the applicant and attorney and Mr. Grio. Thank you.

So that continues. Um, continuing with the agenda, we have uh public comments and community organizational reports. We'll let we'll take uh two minutes here to let people depart so we can have a more orderly meeting. Okay, we're we're at public comments and community organization reports. Please keep your comments to three minutes or less in consideration of others who may also wish to speak. Uh state your name and where you live.

Good evening. My name is Melissa Wilson. Excuse me. Mayor, may I suggest you wait for everyone to leave the meeting because I I can't elementary. Okay. I thought I had but but they're still talking. Okay, you alighty. Almost. Almost. The door is closed. Okay, you may proceed.

Good evening. My name is Melissa Wilson, assistant principal at Oakidge Elementary School, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to share a few updates from our school community. First, I want to highlight the success of our recent service project, Operation Sweet Success. Um, thanks to the generosity of our students and families, we collected 300 pounds of unwanted Halloween candy. Our student council officers and representatives along with our ASES students spent time sorting, packaging, and preparing the donations. The candy was delivered to Salisbury for distribution to troops. The first shipment goes out tomorrow with the remaining candy being sent to service members deployed around the world. We are incredibly proud of our students and their heart for service. We are also excited for this weekend's light up the night festivities. Our Oakidge Elementary jump team and chorus will be performing and they could not be more eager to represent our school and be part of such a special community tradition. Earlier today, we communicated with families and council members about the water testing results at Oakidge Elementary. Guilford County Schools is participating in a voluntary water testing program with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality. Through that testing, we learned of elevated PFAS levels in our wellwater supply. As soon as we were notified, we began taking responsible steps to ensure the safety of our students and staff. GCS has placed Leblau water stations throughout our building, and these supports will remain in place as we work with state partners to determine a safe long-term solution. We also appreciate

Mayor McKinnon's response and we elevated his communication directly to our superintendent. Another positive update is the launch of our new transportation hub at the town park this week. We have had an excellent turnout from families. Members of our administration team and GCS transportation have been on site each day and everything is running smoothly. We truly appreciate the town's partnership and willingness to support this initiative. It is making a meaningful difference for our families. And finally, as we move into the holiday season, we want to wish all of you the happiest of holidays and share our gratitude for your ongoing support of Oakidge Elementary. We value our partnership with the town. We look forward to continuing that collaboration in the new year. Thank you for your time and all you do.

Thank you. Any questions or comments? I'm so glad the parking hub is working well. It's been I mean we're on day four, but it's been a really nice incentive and it's making a difference in the car rider line. So right now it has reduced the number of vehicles around 50 which is significant. when our car rider line in the morning um we average between 400 and 450 cars

and a lot of this I just want to say give a public thank you to Brock Dunigan our our park superintendent for his openness to trying this out and I think it's working well from staff's point of view also. So, I'm thrilled and and our hope is is that um as it continues to be successful that more families will join in and maybe we can have more than one bus come through that location.

Before you before you leave, u just tomorrow I'll be meeting with Mr. Bruce and the chairman of our water advisory committee, Mr. Um Spencer Sullivan. Um and I think one of the actions that will come next week when we have a water committee is to meeting is to have someone come and speak with you because if you got here before dark, you'll notice there's a water tower going up.

Yes, sir. And over the next two years, there should be uh water lines coming up from the county line from Winston Salem, Foresight County right in front of the school and then coming back down Lynville Road and hopefully continuing on to the to the Commons. So, uh I know that I know that there there would we would like to have a besides a letter a dialogue. Oh, absolutely. and uh because we think we have the solution. Uh it will take time, but I think we have the solution that can possibly deal with your issue. Just let us know and we'll get that on our calendar. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Take care. Thank you very much. Is your hand Is your finger up or your hand up, George? Well, come on. Come on up. Don't be shy. Good evening. Uh, Mr. Mayor and Mayor Pro Tim and members of this council. I tell you, I want to just say, Mayor Harton, I'm so proud that you are. Oh,

you know, I'm glad you asked that question. I'm George Mlen. I live at 2806 Oak Ridge Road, Oakidge, North Carolina. Mayor Harton, I just want to say I'm proud that you're my mayor of this great town. I'm want to congratulate Councilwoman Anne Snyder on her reelection. Lindseay Clark on yours and we have a lot of work to do. We have, you know, gosh, we got a water tower being built in the back. We got a water line getting ready to lay. And I mean progress is being made in our town. We also have a community center which is had a tour recently. I understand pretty successful and having been in there myself, I believe it's worth every penny that's been spent and will do great work for our town. Once again, as always, I'm proud to be a citizen of this city and I look forward to the y'all being my council members. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. McClenn.

Thank you. Any anyone else from the public that wants Oh, sorry. Sorry. There we go. Sorry.

My name's John Blust. I'm at 5630 David Christian Place in Greensboro, um, North Carolina. And, uh, I do represent Oakidge in the North Carolina House. And I haven't been here since earlier in the summer. As some of y'all know, I had a back problem, an accident, and um was laid up a disc. And for 11 days before they operated, it uh went into the nerve and all the way down my left leg.

And my left leg got so weak, I I could could barely stand. And the pain was excruciating. And um so I laid there 11 days. I was unable to really do anything and would dread having to stand up to even go to the bathroom. Um but as I lay there, I had time to think. I couldn't do anything else. But I recalled something I once heard motivational expert Zigg Ziggler say. On a clear day, you can only see the stars from the bottom of a deep pit. And sometimes, just when things around you look the darkest, that's when God might be about to show you some of the most amazing revelations. And I just came to realize one how quickly I gone downhill. How how all the things I had, especially health is just it's just a blessing. It's nothing that I really did. It was I've just been blessed with so much. And once you lose your health, that becomes everything else goes to the side. Um and and um I I've just become way more now that the pain's gone. The leg's still not nearly back normal. But uh I just recognize how one I saw how small how truly small I really am. Um about how and I used to think I was pretty tough. uh US Army Airborne 82nd and I was in I could barely take the pain but uh I'm so much more thankful for every little thing now and big things and realize how

blessed I am and one of the it's it's a blessing and a privilege to get to represent um the people of Oakidge and and I I think um it's a great community. It's a great place with great people and I just want to tell you I with the new is a new council I just wish you godspeed. I do hope for wisdom on your part. It's tremendous responsibility. I've even seen tonight two almost innocuous things on the agenda. How much detail and how many hard considerations there are in in the things that come before you. and I I thank you for your willingness to serve and I hope I can be of assistance to you going forward. So, thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Thank you for your service, John. Okay. Any other public comments or community community organization reports? Okay. Shall we go to the town manager reports? Mr. Bruce. Thank you, uh, Mayor Hartin and councel. Uh, the first item I have tonight is consider the approval of the reappoint of John Browning as the parks and recreation board liaison to uh, the tree committee. So move. Second. Been a motion and a second. All in favor? I I

uh secondly to consider approval of resolution R202508 to add Peberly Drive and Peberly Court to the North Carolina State Maintenance System. Do we have a motion? Uh so moved. Second. We have a motion and a second. All in favor? I I

I. Uh thirdly, um and uh this is a topic that's been in front of the council several times over the last few months. This is the final step to allow us to uh advertise electronically on the Guilford County website. We've had discussion of a text amendment and a discussion of authorizing moving forward with the text amendment. So this is really housekeeping uh to approve a resolution R202509 to allow for electronic legal advertising on the Guilford County website. I move to approve the resolution as described. Second. There's been a motion and a second. All in favor?

A question. Thank you for Mr. So on this resolution, uh, I've had some folks call me. Um, this is going to be on our website. So, will there be a link from our website to the county website? How how is this going to play out? It's not on our website. It's on the county website. I'm sorry. The advertising is on the Guilford County website, right? But is there a link to the Guilford County website if somebody wanted to look for an advertisement? It is also on our website. Okay. Those things are always posted on our website as well. Okay. So, the legal advertising is going to be at the Guilford County. Yes.

And as a courtesy to the general public, it's also on ours. Yes, sir. Excellent. Okay. Thank you. Answer your question. Yep. Okay. Uh any other questions? So we have a motion, a second. All in favor? I I

um and I have one other uh item under any other business. Uh yesterday um I circulated an email with council about a proposed um um uh CA to the uh contract for the waterline contract uh with park construction. Um, I was informed by our engineer um earlier this week that the pipe specifications that were originally specified um that NC DOT has uh requested um an additional uh specification to that pipe to um um allow for uh added PSI. Um and this is above and beyond what our system requires, but unfortunately it is a requirement of NC DOT for any water line installed in their rightway. Um I've had extensive conversations with our operator Envirink uh with our um um engineer at the Wooten Company, also with our water advisory committee chair, Mr. Sullivan, and with the council liaison, uh Mr. Harton. Um we have all uh agreed with a recommendation to move forward with a amendment to the contract uh to switch the pipe specification to um the um and I'm sorry I don't have I'm not as organized as I should have been to the um uh 12-in PVC SDR21 pipe. A total change order of $55,789.50. And just as a reminder, we do have a contingency of $220,000 on this project. Um so, uh this does take up 25% of our contingency, but it is an absolutely needed change and I'm asking for the council's support.

Um just to add to that again, um Mr. Bruce and Mr. Sullivan and I will be discussing tomorrow, but um it's surprising that our engineer and the department North Carolina um did not catch this in the submissions. Um but it's better that we found out now as opposed to finding out once pipe was going in or has been placed. So timing uh and the situation is difficult, but uh from a timing standpoint, we found it. We found it at the appropriate time and and uh hopefully we'll we won't have any others.

Okay. So uh I move to approve the proposed contract amendment of $55,789 uh as described by the town manager. Second. Second, Mr. Grayson. Second.

Second. And I just want to thank uh Mr. Bruce and Mr. Harton and Mr. Sullivan for their swift work on this. No one likes surprises, but the assessment that was presented uh even in more detail than Mr. Bruce has just given is thorough and the resulting recommendation is reasonable. And I would just say that I think I trust Wooten more than I trust the state, but we do need to make sure that everybody's on the same page. their their guidance, Wooten's guidance so far has been absolutely excellent. So, this has my full support. Okay. Any other comments? Okay. We have a motion and a second. All in favor? I I

Okay. Any other business, Mr. Bruce? That's all. Thank you. Okay. So, we're at the moment that some of us have always waited for with which uh is Mr. Anders and his monthly financial update. I'm just deeply disappointed that a technical hearing attracted hordes and and here you are.

I thought that maybe it was they were coming to hear me and it just happens that way. You get used to it after a while. I hope you all are well. Uh everyone should have got a copy of the financial reports by email. Um on uh the financials, if you'll go to the balance sheet, we're still maintaining a strong position. Um a little over almost 2.1 million in liquid assets. Uh liabilities of uh 60,000 and uh 2.033 033 million in fund balance. Uh as normal strong position um behind that you've got the monthly financials. Um with the revenues, the expenses fund by fund. Um you will see an overall a negative flow for the month. We had to move monies around uh for funding to the uh water tank while we're waiting for the grants to come in. Uh we had a uh grant check over $600,000 came in two days ago and that has been deposited. So this was anticipated that we would be covering cash flow uh because there is a a lag with the grants. Although I will say that um this uh funding grant process that they've got um is actually much faster than most anything we've seen in the past from the state of North Carolina. So um all in all everything's working fairly well. Um back on schedule uh three is assets and depreciation. Schedule four is the loan on Heritage Farm Park. And then uh schedule five is on the water enterprise fund. So all of that's in there. Um for

the month we had a AC a wire transfer remitting property taxes of 36,699 motor vehicle tax of 11611. A total received was 48,310. Uh these were all collections in the county as of November 30th. Uh monthly we received sales tax, property tax as is normal. Interest for November, solid waste disposal tax came in this quarter. Uh again, HPC and veterans honor green donations, town council, I mean, excuse me, town special events revenues, park revenues, and the water enterprise fund income, uh which was tap fees and user fees. Um investments at the depository banks, we are monitoring those. We're still looking for uh good rates. and uh Waterline Capital Project Fund. The checking account checks are here, so everything's ready to go. Uh we did move $1,000 in to open that account, and we've got everything on standby, ready to go into action. Uh annual audit is still underway. Uh they will have it filed with the state before the end of the month. Presentation will be at the January meeting. Um the uh a couple of other things in some late breaking. I got the u uh dashboard from the county report today. They call it the dashboard. They send out uh tax collection data for uh the each fire district and persuade it to the information sharing agreement between the town and the fire department. Um it's very good actually. Uh it looks like sales tax revenue so far this year for Oakidge Fire District, which encompasses the town, is at 55% of the year already. And so we're running about 10% or 5% of the 50. We're running ahead on sales tax collection, which is actually quite good. Um the other item that is good is that uh motor vehicle

taxes are still uh running stronger than any projection that I've seen or had on any work that I've done. Um I don't know who's buying all the new cars. Um but we've had a large uptick in motor vehicle tax. I think it's I think there's still going to be some residual effect from the fact that there had been some miscodings in the past um with at the county level, but that is been extremely strong. Our property tax collection has been extremely strong. We are expecting large collections coming in in January at the end of the due date period for the property tax. Um and everything's tracking uh countywide on the on the dashboard. Everything is tracking in that manner. So uh we should have a large bump next month. Uh but overall everything is uh flowing well um in the support area. We've done you know quite a bit on the grants back and forth with that. Bill has taken lead on getting that grant money on the uh the water tank and we've had discussion uh Wooten is going to provide as a u uh service included in their their work. they will handle the complex filings with the state for the reimbursement on the water lines. So, um we've discussed that accounting process and procedure. It looks really good and it's going to make it very streamlined. So, I'm anticipating that's going to go very well once we uh start that project. But overall, uh fairly normal for this time of year. Uh fairly normal for this u month compared to prior year's month. So, that's pretty much it. have a motion to accept the uh finance report that is presented by Mr. Mr. Anders.

So move. Second. All in favor? I I Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you'all. We're at committee reports. Do we have a report from the planning and zoning board? Well, we have their reasonzoning. I guess we had a Mr. Taylor, anything from planning and zoning that you can speak to other than what we went through earlier? Yeah, that's the the reasoning you did already did is uh what was accomplished at the Okay. Planning and zoning board meeting. How about the board of adjustments? Do we have representatives from the

no meeting? Mountains of the Sea is back in the back. We'll welcome you to the front. Ann Steel. I'm chair of the MST committee 8927 Grove Park Drive. We held our monthly meeting on November 18th and uh we approved the October meeting um minutes at that meeting. Um the headarters trail there's an area near the where the new houses are being built in Riverside. That's right. Riverside where there's some um erosion. There's a new house that was being built that um some of their runoff is occurring due to their irrigation system that they put in. So, um, we've been working with that area and also that homeowner has spoken to Joel Deon who is our, um, trail guru, um, and they're working out, um, some ways to mitigate that issue. We also have a big e issue, as you know, also with the beavers over there. Um, right now, we're just monitoring the situation and continuing to do our best to keep the trail open. And that's our plan for now. Um Martha Pitman has been named the vice president on the friends of the mountain to sea board. So that's really exciting. And there's a gentleman who wrote a book called Discovering North Carolina mountains to sea trail. Um his name is Jerry Barker and he is interested in coming to Oakidge and doing a book signing and an open house for the community. So, we are looking forward to

hopefully sometime in February or March having um him come out for that. Most excitedly, um we are ready to name our trails over on the east side of town. Um we are going to send a survey out to the community through Facebook, Next Door, Instagram, and through our um trail volunteers uh list that we have. And so I'll give you the um proposed names tonight. Um we have two trails. So for the first trail, which starts from where Scuba Tools is and heads in that way, um will either be called Fern Hollow, Hawk Hollow, Beach Ridge, or Craggy Creek. And then the options for the spur loop are carriage trace loop, footman's loop, old harness way, or white white oak way. So, we're going to um hopefully this month, hopefully in the next few days, have a survey that will go out and hope everyone can put their vote in and the um ones with the most votes will help name our trails. So, any questions?

So, tell me again, how are we going to send these surveys out? Um, there's going to be a survey monkey or some version of something that Ashley, I think, is going to help put together. Google. Okay. I think before we did like a survey monkey, but maybe something's different now. Okay. Okay. But it'll go back out through um Facebook, Next Door, Instagram, and we have a whole um list of volunteers and through email that we'll send out too also. Thank you. Will it be on the site as well? Sorry, the website, the town website. Um hopefully.

Yeah. Yes. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Uh conservation easement committee. Did they meet? They did meet. They did meet.

Um no, no actions were taken. Just further consideration of ongoing projects. As council person Ann just mentioned that was there was no action taken. We reviewed uh existing grant applications that we were have already been approved.

Good. Special events. Patty Dumchesky 7320 Hidden View Drive. Our Veterans Day ceremony was a wonderful success with a great showing from the community. The opening uh ceremony of the boardwalk was met with very um with many positive comments. Our guest speaker was the retired Lieutenant Colonel Christian Castelli who provided an inspirational tribute to the veterans. And thanks to Mayor Jim Harton for sharing the role that his family's military history played in our area. Our light of the night, we're gearing up for this Saturday. Additional lights, stars, Santon, and his reindeers have all been added. Uh we had a great turnout of the volunteers to help put up the 1,400 luminaries. Um on the weekend after Thanksgiving, Amy Kerakoff and Diana Mlin uh deserve so much praise. They did an outstanding and amazing job of coordinating the installation. Uh we had some electrical issues, but we dealt with those and it's all working now. The committee met this uh morning to review the project plan and we are all in good shape for Saturday. We hope to see all of you there um for a great night of different events from all of our community. As the uh vice principal pointed out, we've got Oakidge Elementary School coming. Santa Claus is coming. Uh the robotics team is coming. Destination Arts is coming. We've got 20 um food trucks coming. We've got 10 vendors are going to be there. I'm sorry, that's reversed. We have um uh 10 trucks coming, food trucks coming, and 20 uh vendors are coming. So, I think we have a little bit of something for everybody. um our 911 I met with um parks and

what time does that start? It starts at 2 o'clock, but if you'd like to come at 10 or 9:30 when the volunteers are all going to be there setting it up. And the lighting of the luminaries is at 5 and the town tree is at 5:45. 5:45. That's correct. So, um hopefully we're going to have some nice weather and it'll be a little bit warm hopefully. So 911, I met with the parks and wreck advisory board last week and got their approval for the small memorial in the Oakidge Park by the flag pole um with our donated 911 um steel piece. Any questions? Thank you. Thank you. Tree board,

you didn't meet. Did you plant a tree? Okay. Okay. Okay. Uh, parks and wreck advisory board. Any There you go.

Good evening, council. I'm John Browning, 8024 Lynville Road. Great to be here. Here to give the activities report for our parks and recreation advisory board. We held our meeting on November 20th. The bulk of our meeting consisted of um choosing a firm to perform engineering and design service for phase two of the Heritage Farm Park. Don't know if that information has come to you to to y'all yet, but it's just our a firm to recommend. We had four good firms to to talk about and uh we looked at their portfolios, past products and uh based on our research plus uh staff had spent a whole lot of time looking at that vetting these these uh companies. So, uh, it was their recommendation as well as as well as ours to, uh, to choose Revington Reeves who did a good job over at Heritage over at the Veterans Arning Force and they were our our unanimous choice about going forward with the design services for phase two of the Heritage Farm Park. So, we're we're we're pleased to uh hopefully to have those on board uh, you know, for your consideration. Uh, as Patty said, we approved u uh placing a metal beam from the World Trade Center. It's like a 12 inch by 14inch piece of steel that will be mounted near the flag pole there. So, u excited to have that. Um, we approve we approved a request from Shared Radiance Performing Arts Company uh to perform Romeo and Juliet at the amphitheater this summer, May 29th and June 7th. Um, and also we approved a request from Danny Annitz of the Oakidge Line Club to u have the statue of the line installed or to remain in place at the Tranquility Garden um up at Heritage Farm Park. Um, and was mentioned we we did have a

successful farmhouse uh community center openhouse with guided tours and book signing by Sandra. uh books are still available. So pl plug for Sandra's uh amazing book that that she had written. So we had approximately 75 people come out for the farmhouse community center and happy to report that all weekends from now till the end of the year or first of the year are are booked. So we're getting some good activity from the farmhouse community center. And we've already scheduled music on the lawn, not to be confused with music uh in the park, but on the lawn. It's going to be at the farmhouse on the back deck um May 31st and June 28th, Sunday afternoons 2 to 4. And speaking of music at the park, um I know it just seems so far away, but u uh it's an ongoing never- ending uh challenge to keep that organized. Ashley's been working hard. We've got five out of our six bands, and she's working uh on sponsors for the music in the park. So, um, we had a action-packed meeting, but that that's all I had to report. Any questions or comments?

Thank you. Thank you. Finance committee probably did not meet. Order advisory committee. Uh, do not believe that we met, but we're meeting this Wednesday at 1:30 here at the open house. Oh, yeah. We did. Oh, thank you, Ann. Yeah, we did have an open house to talk about the waterline and rough estimate we had about 15

15 to 20 residents. uh uh most of which are are um have residents on Oakidge Road, Highway 150, but there were some uh that were in local subdivisions or on spur roads coming off of Highway 150 and we have some work to do there. So, uh Historic Preservation Commission, anything from HBC? Did Did they meet?

They didn't meet. They didn't me. Okay, winding down. Public comments. Any further public comments? Mr. Anders, Sam Anders, 1829 Oakidge Road, Oakidge, North Carolina. Uh, last month I uh extended news that the Dewey store was open. It's supported by my church, Moravian Moravian Church. Uh, our congregation. Um the swim club has been extremely supportive and it's been a wonderful uh location. The community has supported us. Uh sales are best in years. How good? We're having a special chicken pie making because the community has just about cleaned our chicken pi pie supply out. And uh when we do these, they are cooked at our church. Uh there's an assembly line. Um very skilled uh folks make and roll the dough and the gravy and cook the chicken and everything. So um we don't have to worry. The chicken population in Oakidge is safe. Uh we we get chicken from outside of Oakidge, but it has been extremely extremely wonderful the support the community has provided to this. Um the funds from this do go to the church for our outreach program and a large percentage of that uh goes to fight hunger here locally through the sunshine room also with the rise against hunger uh that we work on with and communicate in u work with the uh military academy on. So there's other organizations this reaches out to but it has been wonderful the support we have received. And on the flip side, uh, some of you know I do support and have volunteered as as other members of the department have. We fly as medics with the Triad Honor Flight. If you know of any organization that would like to

donate to Triad Honor Flight this year, the Triad Honor Flight for the first time in history is going to increase the flights from two in a year to three due to the backlog of especially Vietnam veterans. And unfortunately with Agent Orange and other health related items with the Vietnam vets, um the waiting list is long, the health problems are rather severe and the mortality is much much more rapid than the veterans we served from World War II and Korea. Uh so they are opening up a third flight. Uh it will be I believe April the 15th, June the 3rd and then there will be another one in the fall which would normally be end of September, very very 1st of October. Uh but they are expanding and the Triad Honorflight program has expanded. There's uh sales forming at three other locations in North Carolina. One at Fort Bragg, one down near uh the coast and one outside I believe the Raleigh Triad area. So, um, this is a good effort. It's something to give back to our veterans and especially those that are starting to have a lot of health issues. Uh, they are trying to ramp this up so that they will have a chance to go and and have the experience of going to Washington DC. So, if anyone knows of a corporation or any entity that is looking for a good uh nonprofit that benefits veterans, they are gladly accepting donations and working on fundraising so that we can keep this expanded. and I thank you for your time.

Thank you, Mr. Anders. Any other public comments? All right, we'll go to council comments. Uh Mr. Grayson, none.

Miss Clark. Um, yes. I did just want to address um to anyone that may have been disappointed by the postponing of the special use permit hearing. I just wanted to explain my position um since I probably unusually voted against my own motion. Um, you know, I like to come in uh with an open mind and hear all of council perspectives. And based on that, I reminded myself that decisions that I make on council, I want to always allow extra time if needed, whether it be a situation of council needing deliberation on something or someone might need more information or in this case uh for a more conservative approach on a technical legal issue. So, I just wanted to explain that uh for anyone who wasn't disappointed. I understand the disappointment. It has happened to me before as well. So, I hope that everyone is able to come back for the February hearing.

Okay, Mr. Stone. Uh, yeah, the uh the lion at the Lion's Den, the Tranquility Garden, that that's just awesome. If you haven't taken a walk around Heritage Farm Park and seen it, that's it's amazing. Um, other than that, uh, it's that time of the year. Merry Christmas and a happy new year to everyone. May you all receive the blessings and the joy that this season brings with the birth of our savior Jesus Christ. Thank you, Miss Snder.

Yeah. Um I want to um thank everyone on this council. It's a new beginning. I always think that's exciting. So I wish us a fruitful partnership together. And I want to thank staff for helping make the transition happen also amid a very busy agenda and thanks to Michael Thomas for all of his guidance. Um, and greatly appreciate everything you do and it's a good time of year to remember that. I also wanted to let everyone know I was recently appointed to serve as the co-chair for the North Carolina League of Municipalities Legislative Policy Committee and I'll be opening uh a very exciting webinar on Tuesday called Demystifying Data Centers Insights for Municipal Leaders. So all the data centers going up around the state. Um there's apparent we've got almost a hundred people signed up for this webinar. So this is exciting, but more exciting than that, I think, is light up the night. So I hope everyone comes out for that. And I also wish everyone merry Christmas, happy new year, and uh happy holidays for uh those who don't celebrate those holidays. Thank you so much. I'm so delighted to continue serving Oakidge. I have some opening remarks as mayor, but before I want to continue the tradition of the mayor, Mayor Kinnaman, reminding everybody to give blood and uh at this uh this Monday starting at 2 o'clock, I believe at Oakidge Methodist Church. Bob Yarbor runs an excellent uh blood drive, blood mobile there. Um uh and if you can give blood uh that would be great. It's desperately needed during these times and it would could be your best Christmas gift ever ever. Uh I've been giving blood really since I

was 14. Um they didn't have any rules back then. So my mom tackled me and said take his blood might slow him down. Um but um and I think I'm I think I'm clearly somewhere around 20 gallons, but I don't know because I've lived all over the place most of my life. Um my comments are I want to thank the members of council for their support tonight. Uh though I admit that two years ago uh that I never would have been expected to be elected mayor. Uh there are and have been council members far more qualified than me and I think you saw that tonight uh because of the inexperience of dealing with special use permits and uh and public hearings. Um uh but so there more the people on this council far more qualified than me to be mayor. We saw on election day that we have a essentially a polarized town and because of that have ended up with a polarized town council. So you now have a mayor and an experienced town council. Uh so you now now have a mayor and a mayor pro Tim that have two years of experience. A member who has more than two years experience and has also served as mayor pro Tim. another council member who has served uh uh many years on town council and was previously mayor and operate uh managed many of the committees that that the town has occurred. And we have a new member who is at about almost two hours and um two hours and a half of being on council and

I I haven't done the math on Howard and so I'll come back to you on that. Um but through the election process, our town has chosen a council with the probably the lesser experience than those in the past and also those that have have not made the historic contributions to to the town as the town's desirable outcome. So I consider this for us and for me especially a brave new world. Uh, I will ask this town council to to focus on our efforts on projects and issues that we can impact and not waste time on things from previous councils that cannot be changed or reversed. Hopefully, with this approach, the polarity will lessen. Earlier this evening, I thanked and recognized departing Mayor Kennan for his almost 16 years on council and many years before that making contributions through committees uh to the for the town. Uh at the beginning, as I said, I did not agree with Mayor Jim on everything, but we found a way to work together on several major issues that face the town. He explained many of those and though he is no longer mayor Jim and not on council, I am pleased to know that he still wants to contribute to town activities and committees. So I guess I am now mayor Jim and not other Jim, which is a nickname that I preferred. You probably want to know what you can expect from me. So first uh know that I have successfully run large organizations but these were corporate businesses and in those cases I was the boss. Ultimately I was responsible for the business and the operations of a North American zone of a major Europeanbased business and I was

responsible for my decisions and ultimately the decisions of many below me. So, I know about business, and when I ran for town council two years ago, I had hoped to bring a more business-like focus to the town. However, in the past two years, I've learned that small town governments are quite different from my previous roles in scope, means of control, methods of communication. For example, no more than two of us can be together discussing town business without announcing a special call meeting. Coming into that, this seemed very inefficient to me, but apparently by statute, it is necessary to avoid the appearance of conspiracy. This means that I will need to discuss many things directly with each town council member and attempt to find a balance between their views and mine. Regarding regarding North Carolina statutes and other legal issues, I will count on Mr. Bruce, Miss Smith, and Mr. Thomas to guide me through these challenges. I will also ask town the new town council and staff to review the town's uh strategic plan and to be prepared to discuss individually with me and hopefully in a special call meeting any changes to the plan or new issues to add or emphasize or not. Having run large organizations, a strategic plan sets the guidepost for the entire organization, but it is a living document and should be adapted o over time. Usually in my p past, I have found that when things got wacky and seemed unbalanced, it was because the organization was either not following the strategy or that the strategy needed to be adapted. We should take that time as this new council to now make such

changes. Another important guide for this town is the town budget. Fortunately, Oakidge has an extremely effective finance committee that reviews with the town manager and town finance director past budgets and proposes a new annual budget and updated capital improvement plan every year. Believe me, this is tedious work since the budget has pages of pages and pages of line entries that need to be considered independently and adjusted based on income trends, changing needs, the impact of inflation, and any expected tradeoffs that can be made between some of those expenditure lines. Most of these lines are m mundane, but the most important are the few lines of planned expenditure that comprise the capital improvement plan. This is where the town can get divided, not because essentially of wasteful spending, but generally because disagreements about the validity of the projects on the list. Fortunately, many of the historic disagreements are behind us because those projects are completed or near completion. The remaining big projects that remain in front of us or at least the primary three is the first phase of the town's water system that is fully funded by grants. the town's commitment. Sec The second is the town's commitment to building sidewalks along Highway 681 150 in conjunction with the DOT projects for a new intersection in two traffic circles and three his heritage farm park phase two which includes facilities for pickle ball, tennis and basketball. The town has recently received a cost estimate for this project of a approximately $1.8 8 million. That's $1.8 million that we do not have.

With council's agreement, I will be asking town staff and Mr. Anders and hopefully the finance committee to evaluate possible ways to obtain this amount of money, realizing that we must still pay off our current $2.4 million loan for the purchase of the land and initial improvements at Heritage Farm Park. Partardiff grants will continue to be very important to financing Heritage Farm Park phase two. And for the for that effort to be successful, as John mentioned, we will be awarding a contract to a consultant to develop a design for phase two, which will be necessary to consider to be considered for such grants. to this. All of you should know that the opportunity for grants remains cloudy because, as I understand it, the state has not finalized its budget and that there is still a huge emphasis on prioritizing funding for our neighbors in western North Carolina who were impacted by Hurricane Helen. The bottom line here is a good plan is necessary to obtain a part of or any other grants and this will require major effort from our staff and council. That will take time and maybe more than the estimated 733 days that this council will be in session. I could go on but Mr. Re Greon would probably shoot me.

Uh so these are Anders, not Howard. So I will stop here. with the so I will stop here with these major challenges for your new town council. There are many others that are more granular in nature that must be addressed by town council, our staff, our capable staff and our many working committees that really do the hard lifting for the town. And certainly that includes me as the next mayor. Jim, in this regard, all of us will need your support and the patience during the next two years. Thank you. Okay.

Would you give them a chance to talk? I will. I thought everybody would talk. I thought everybody. Maybe they Yeah. Can we uh So, if if there are no further if there comments, we take them. But if not, we'll entertain a motion to adjurnn. First and second. Second. All right. And third. All in favor? I sorry.