Remarks by Michael Lee
115 remarks on the record, newest first · Page 2 of 5
- Play at 1:47:34
“I know we're gonna have comments and questions, but y'all, this is what a governance presentation looks like here. I want you to go back to your first slide with that one. And see, the thing about this is not everything is gonna look beautiful. Not everything is gonna be on track, not everything is gonna be ahead, but this is what we should talk about here at the board governance level. And we can easily see here how this is going and how we can advocate from a board level. how we can help with partnerships, how we can help with communication and so forth. And they even had a sunset scenario…”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:12:12
“All right. And again, thank you all for this presentation. I'm really excited about this. And a couple of the statements I was going to make have already been covered, but I do look forward as well to seeing if we could do a tour. I will be there. Okay. And I will do everything I can to support.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:15:37
“All right, very good. The next item on our agenda is an informational item. It's the Orange Factory Heritage Community.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:31:44
“Thank you for this. I'm curious, so when this designation, what actually does it mean? Is it a celebration of the history? And the reason I'm asking is I'm curious If this is the full history, on the website, I only see two references to enslaved workers. And I'm curious if people who look like me were able to live there. Because you mentioned people could buy land and so forth. But were the people who were actually mentioned here that were brought here, the people of color, added new people of color to the landscape, were they able to own land here? And do we represent that anywhere in this…”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:35:04
“I just want to make sure that we're being honest with ourselves about what we're honoring when we do these sorts of things. Stagville did a really good job with it. They just kind of talked about it and they talk about it and so forth. The further north you go in Durham County, as far as ownership goes, the less black it is or less minority it is. And you see a lot of that. We have this Durham to Roxborough rail trail thing going on. And you see a lot of people, this land's been in my family for hundreds of years and so forth. How did you get that? How did you get that land? It's because…”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:41:49
“Okay, all right, thank you. Thank you all very much. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right, so the next item on the agenda is the budget piece, but we're gonna take a little bit of a quick break, get some lunch, and then jump right into it, okay? Is that okay with the budget team? Good, all right, so you wanna say 15 minutes? You good with that, Wendy? 15 minutes? 15 minutes. We'll be back at noon. We are back. Thank you all very much for a little bit of a break. The last item on our agenda today is fiscal year 25-26 budget update and framework for fiscal year 26-27 budget development. We do…”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 2:59:53
“Does that work for you all? Okay, hopefully, okay, okay. Thank you very much.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 3:36:03
“Yeah, I'll just say I agree with that. I agree with telling the story and showing the impact of it. You know, people look at very high level numbers and there's a lot of people who say if it doesn't directly affect me, it doesn't exist. And we have to show how this could actually actually affect everyone in our community. So I agree with you on that, Wendy. But you had something else?”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 3:43:20
“Okay, and 24-25, that dip. There was a dip, you said? Yes, sir. Larger for refunds.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 4:23:25
“All right, there was plenty of discussion during. You want to... Go ahead, Commissioner Jacobs.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 4:31:49
“board members if you have questions just let us know all right thank you and I just look forward to the day when you Keith you provide a presentation that doesn't have that storm cloud on there I just I remember saying that when I was on the school board every year so I just hope one day One day while I'm still involved, we get to see like a sunlight, like a rainbow or something. You know, just something.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 4:32:41
“Thank you all. Thank you all. That is the last thing that was on our agenda today. It is a work session. We don't need a vote to adjourn, so I will call us adjourned. Thank you all very much. It is 1.33.”
Board of County Commissioners · Oct 5, 2026
- Play at 1:25:06
“good afternoon good evening everyone good evening all right prior to well first of all welcome to our regular session for today monday september 28th 2026 which happens to be my dad's birthday so if he happens to be watching which i'm sure he's not happy birthday all right the board met in closed session prior to this meeting no action was taken but guidance was given to staff all right given that i will start our meeting i'm going to read the public charge um commissioner valentine would you be open to doing the land acknowledgement and then um Vice Chair Alon, would you be open to doing the…”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:28:36
“All right, thank you very much. The next item on our agenda is the agenda adjustments or agenda approval. Are there any adjustments to the agenda as presented? Hearing none, I accept the motion to accept the agenda as presented. So moved. Second. It's been moved and probably seconded. We accept the agenda as presented. All in favor say aye.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:29:02
“All opposed, please use the same sign. Passes unanimously. The next item on our agenda are the announcements. Clerk Wallace. I'm not hearing anything.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:39:40
“All right, thank you, Commissioner Valentine.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:41:14
“Okay. Are there any other announcements? All right. Very good. So next on our agenda are the ceremonial items. We have three proclamations and two—well, no, no, no. We have four to be recognized. We have a proclamation and two resolutions. Oh, minutes. We've got to do the minutes. That's right. Okay, before we go to the ceremony items, we have to approve the minutes dated... Hold on one second. August 24th, 2026, September 8th, 2026, and then September 14th, 2026.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:42:06
“It's been properly moved and seconded that we approve all three sets of minutes. Any further discussion? All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed, please use the same sign. Passes unanimously. Okay, now on to the ceremonial items. A proclamation, I'll be reading a proclamation for the Duke Hospital. You have two of them, Commissioner Valentine, would you like someone else to read?”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:42:40
“Okay. Yeah. Okay, that'll work. All right, so our first proclamation is Duke Regional Hospital's 50th Anniversary Recognition Day. Okay, and I'll read that one. Okay, so Durham Board of Commissioners Proclamation, Duke Regional Hospital 50th Anniversary Recognition Day 2026. Whereas Duke Regional Hospital has faithfully served the residents of Durham County and surrounding communities for 50 years, providing exceptional health care services and advancing the health of our region. And whereas since 1976, Duke Regional Hospital has been an essential health care resource for Durham County…”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 1:48:39
“Anyone? Commissioner Valentine? Yes. You're moving on to the next? Yes, Cooper. No, I have one comment about it. Okay, go ahead. So I say this. People have probably heard me say this before, but Duke Regional holds a very special spot in my family's heart. All three of my kids were born there, and that is our first stop whenever anything goes wrong. There's nothing against Big Duke, but we deeply appreciate – well, back then it was Durham Regional, but we appreciate Big Duke, but we – Durham Region was our first choice. in all aspects of everything and we just really appreciate that being…”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 2:09:37
“Any other comments from commissioners? All right, thank you, thank you. Okay, the next item on our agenda, we have... proclamations to be acknowledged a proclamation and resolution to be acknowledged so the first one is the proclamation for fire prevention week 2028”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 2:11:09
“Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Jacobs.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 2:12:21
“Any other comments from commissioners on this resolution? Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. That was a proclamation. All right, the next item is a resolution that's recognized in Prince Hall Day.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 2:13:35
“All right, thank you. Thank you very much, Commissioner Valentine. Any comments on that one? Okay. Hearing none, we'll move on to our consent agenda. Now we're gonna have to do this a little bit differently here. We do have a public comment on one of the items. However, he asked if we could do it early because he thought public comment would happen early in the meeting. So I'm gonna go ahead and do it beforehand and we'll just do the consent agenda approval as one, okay? Now the item So I'll have Jim Savara come up and speak. He's speaking on item 490497, which is the DFI item.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026
- Play at 2:17:14
“Thank you so much. And I think the options that DFI will provide will help us make those decisions there. So thank you so much for your advocacy, and thank you for coming to speak tonight. OK. All right, so now we have the consent agenda before us. It's for approval. Any comments about the public comment? Go ahead. We have some. I'll go to Commissioner Jacobs, then Commissioner Burton.”
Board of County Commissioners · Sep 28, 2026