City Council - workshop

Good afternoon, everyone. The time is 5.01. I'm going to call to order this work session of the Pflugerville City Council on Tuesday, September 8, 2026. Our first item on the agenda is public comment. I don't believe we have any public comment for the work sessions. We will move forward to our regular agenda. This is a presentation and discussion regarding Unified Development Code amendments. Director Bailey.

Thank you so much, Mayor. Good evening, Council and City Manager. Before you tonight, we do just have a quick work session. We wanted to give you an update as to where we are in the Unified Development Code or UDC amendments that are taking place right now. We have been working on these for the better part of a year. And with that, tonight specifically we wanted to discuss the residential components that are in the code and how those might be opened up. We certainly have heard the comments about affordability and wanting to make sure that Pflugerville is a choice place to live. And another topic on there is going to be about data centers because it's a hot topic everywhere. But we did want to address and get some feedback on the data center provisions that we have in the UDC right now. So with us, we do have our representatives from Friesen Nichols, which is our third party consultant for this rewrite. And I will let Chance and Erica take it away.

All right. Thank you so much. Happy to be here this evening with y'all to give you all a good update here on the Unified Development Code and really kind of where we are in this. So for us this evening, we're after really two key things from y'all, which is a confirmation that the Development Code draft is to a point where we can start talking about it with the public. and getting feedback from the public that's kind of piece one to this and also identifying any specific feedback that you as council members as policy makers would like to hear during the the public process the open houses that would help you with your decision making process when this does come back forward for consideration in the future here So those are the two key pieces. We're going to cover four areas where we're at, some key changes, feedback we're looking for from you, and some public engagement guidance, all right? So a quick update for where we are physically on this. We are in phase three. We affectionately call this the refinement and adoption phase. So we've gone through the initial drafting. Now we're to the point where we are polishing. We are taking off edges, making sure we're calibrating things correctly to meet y'all's expectations here, and preparing for another round of public conversations to take people through, okay, here's what's being proposed. Here's how it links to other things we've heard. Back to your comprehensive plan. and any other key feedback to that. So we do have a few items that are scheduled for this right now. We've got a virtual open house scheduled to start September 17th that runs for about four weeks. a physical open house scheduled for the 30th, and then a joint workshop coming back to you all in mid-October, setting up a public hearing period in November, and then we go from there. That is the schedule as we anticipate it right now. It is running on schedule. I did want to touch on key themes. When you received your packet, you also received a memo that outlined several key changes. We've tried to connect these to some themes that appear across your Aspire comprehensive plan. Particular to that is looking at expansion of housing choices and neighborhood options for multiple pathways, walkable connected mixed-use places, basically places that have a sense of place, easy access to goods and services, Think of it as a city of convenience. Promoting quality development and neighborhood compatibility. Compatibility means two things. It's recognizing when things work best when they aren't together, but also recognizing when you bring things together, how they can actually create vitality through connection. Supporting reinvestment economic opportunity. Again, setting you up for having good jobs here locally, good access to goods and services where people are not having to go elsewhere for either of those things being the goal. And then promoting sustainable growth and community quality of life. This is making sure that you're growing in a way that is fiscally responsible, makes sense for you, does the math, but also does so in a way that is balanced with the needs of people. the recognition that the services cities often provide aren't necessarily a math lesson but instead are a here's the kind of city we want to be lesson so those are the kind of five key themes uh from aspire that we're looking to reflect in this and from here i'm going to pass this to erica

Great, thank you Chance and good evening everyone. So I'll run through these in a little bit more detail, but like Chance said, they're also included in summary in the memo packet that you received and there are also section references in there if you'd like to refer back to the draft to see those in even more detail. So the first item is expanding housing choice and neighborhood options. One of the first steps that we made here is replacing what's now called the 2F, or basically the duplex district. We've proposed renaming that with NFR district, neighborhood flex residential. And the idea of that district is to broaden beyond just a duplex option. So that allows more of the missing middle type housing.

Excuse me, Ms. Craycraft, can you check and make sure your microphone is on?

Yes. Sorry, can you hear me okay?

Well, no.

Okay. All right.

And I've got my hearing aids turned up to 11, so just if you could speak up a little bit. Sure. Thank you. And closer to the microphone, that'd be helpful.

Yes, absolutely. So the NFR district neighborhood flex residential, the intent is to broaden beyond just allowing duplexes, but also to allow townhouses and smaller scale multifamily development. That's like a three and four flex. So that would be permitted in additional locations. We also created a new neighborhood mixed use or NMU district. The idea of that district is to carry forward that NFR, that's the missing middle housing, and introduce a concept similar to your SFMU district. So that would allow the missing middle housing types along with a mixed use component. So that's a new proposed district. In addition to allowing these housing types in different locations, we've also expanded the standards that would apply to those. A lot of these are existing in your code today. It's just some improved organization to how those are included in the code. And then lastly, in the purple box that talks about alternative neighborhood design, this is more focused toward a single family subdivision, but has some alternative layouts for that. So incorporating things like cottage courts where it's maybe smaller homes, but they're oriented toward a shared green space in the center. expanding the zero lot line or patio home provisions and just some different alternatives for single family development as well.

Can you explain what a zero lot line is?

Sure. A zero lot line development would be where all of the homes are shifted to one side of the property line. So there would be a zero setback on one side. So instead of having a five foot setback on either side, it's shifted sideways. So there's zero on one side and 10 on the other. The purpose of that is to, you have a similar look as though you had the five and five foot setback, but there's more of a usable space for that property. Rather than having two really small side yards, you have one larger side yard. I would not have guessed that. Thank you for asking.

I did have a couple other comments as I was going through this, because if there's one thing I'm a little bit more nerdy about than water, it's probably land use. And so in looking through this, There were a couple of things that stood out to me. One, specifically thinking about redevelopment and infill. So all these neighborhoods, legacy neighborhoods that are SFR today, not in this new code, as far as I saw, not allowing things like a duplex to go in. I know we are pretty good about ADUs, but especially for redevelopment and infill, I think that adding that extra step in order to convert it an existing neighborhood and rezone it, I think would be a pretty big impediment. So I think that's something that could really restrict the amount of housing practically that could go in. One of the other things that I don't think we've talked about before, but it's Jonathan, could I stop you there for a minute?

Sure. I just want to make sure I understood what you were saying and what you're recommending there. Are you saying that we should amend existing districts to allow for these uses rather than add new districts?

I think where it makes sense, we should be opening it up some. Yeah. I don't know exactly what the answer is, but basically, so think about our existing neighborhoods, our old town with the overlay, right? We've had cases come through before where somebody wanted to do a perfectly reasonable duplex and they weren't able to, for example.

All right. Thank you.

And that was a topic that we discussed with the advisory committee, which is largely the Planning and Zoning Commission, about whether we should have this separate missing middle district, the repurposing the 2F into the NFR, or if we should instead take the approach of allowing duplexes perhaps by right in single family districts and not having a separate district.

It sounds like you landed on this scenario. And can you tell me, I'm curious how large the impact would be. I'm imagining that most existing SFRs that way because it's already under construction or complete? Is there a lot of infill opportunity that's already zoned SFR?

I would need to check this. Do we know? Do you know SFR?

Off the top of my head, there are not, except for in some of the more traditional neighborhoods in the core part of town. But a lot of what you would consider SFR that's in the city are more of your track home builders that are already built. So it would be allowing... The issue that we came up with was that if you say that you could do a duplex in something like Falcon Point, if someone were to then want to create a duplex on their lot, the HOA may also have rules against that. So are we really actually affecting change in some of those areas?

I mean, I live in a duplex in Falcon Point.

Right. Well, there's some that are allowed, but we had some for the QDABRA and things. If you have a complete loss, can they come back? Would the HOA allow it in some of their areas? Because they also have some controls over the private property rights.

Right. I'm just trying to understand, Jonathan making the recommendation that we allow people to build these housing types without necessarily going through a rezoning effort if there's opportunities, if there's existing property within these districts. i just want to understand how practical that is and it sounds like it was considered previously and i'm curious why you ended up going this way rather than you know the the alternative approach sure um i can

I can probably take that. So we actually presented, I think, three different options to the committee, the one that we landed on being one of them, but also presented them the option of, OK, what if you converted one or more of your existing residential districts? What would that look like? What they came back around to is that so much of Pflugerville has been was built kind of post 1990s, which means nearly all of them have some type of pretty active and pretty tight CCR standards that are privately enforced. And so would we actually be setting up essentially like we are? We kind of heard discussions about would that be setting up internal conflict? But also, are you setting up a situation where city saying yes you can do something somebody gets excited about it and then they immediately turn and get the door slammed in their face in another space um sort of situation we've leaned heavily into the committee for their perspective on it y'all know pflugerville best you know what's right for you uh we can make a great case for almost any approach well i know we've uh we've undertaken rezonings on some of the uh the larger lots that are available around town

And obviously, yes, going through a rezoning process would be onerous, but I think we've denied some of those rezonings in the past as well. So there may be a good reason for going through that process. And I appreciate the perspective from the commissioner.

Yeah, definitely. One other. Oh, go ahead.

Oh, I just, I mean, similar. I was just wondering where exactly in the city that these new zonings could apply. Have you contemplated that?

Sure. So the conversion of your 2F, your 2F already exists on the ground in different parts of Pflugerville. So this is actually taking what is actually a restricted duplex kind of district and making it a little bit broader, but still in that smaller scale that kind of contemplates an infill scenario without it triggering potential fears from people of, oh, you're going to drop a 12-unit apartment complex in here. But then you have the new districts that are created that are broadly available under several of your future land use designations. So you would have a basis for somebody to make a request and for you all to approve it based on your comprehensive plan, but it does have that discretionary review to it that comes with the zoning change case.

Thank you for that. I'm not sure if I heard as well, are these properties for rent or are they for purchase?

and um yeah sure so um under under development codes we are basically neutral on the ownership structure because we're regulating use for regulating the type of development we do not regulate the means who decides so what who decides what do you mean ruins the property who decides whether it's for owner for rent it'd be the property owner property just clarifying thank you

Yeah, that's a pro tem. Thank you for for voicing that. That's a concern of mine as well. I see a lot of the missing middle conversation centering around homes for rent and the built to rent product and not necessarily about the smaller units for ownership. And I'm wondering, is there something we can do in the development code that provides us with more of an opportunity to nudge it in in favor of one versus the other? Obviously, we've got the ability to develop in a condo regime without subdividing the parcels. I feel like subdividing the parcels may make it more likely to be ownership rather than rent. Is that something we considered? Is there a way to move the needle on that?

Sure. So within the development code, your options are limited. What you can do is you can create an environment that is supportive of it being ownership. That in many cases means having flexibility to make sure that if you have fee simple ownership or condo ownership, that there isn't like essentially a development penalty to that because you can develop one way and get more units out of it versus developing another way. You want to make sure that they're competing on the same level playing field. Usually when we have these conversations with cities, a lot of them have interest in this because they're interested in homeownership for a long list of policy reasons. What we generally recommend is you have to look towards what are the friction points that are keeping people from ownership. A lot of it isn't necessarily code related. It's related to access to funding or other things where you have to start looking towards a broader program to encourage ownership. It gets more complicated. Your code is part of it. It can't be your only solution.

I want to clarify, a lot of people may make the assumption that my question would lead towards I want it to be a rental property. That's not necessarily the case. I'm asking, I think I'm more asking because now that we've changed the way our water structure will go and I'm learning more things, Some of the condo units are set up with, I guess, what they would call this one-line thing or whatever. And so it would actually make their water bill higher. So I'm asking more from a perspective of learning one way. So I'm not leaning one way or the other. Of course, I will always tell you all that I am a renter. I'm a person with lived experience. But I'm really asking so that when we make these decisions on a bigger level that we're all really clear about what we're doing.

Jonathan, I think you still had another question.

Yeah, I had just two others. So one, I was curious about speaking to the feasibility of actually building less expensive homes. I noticed that our smallest lot sizes are only proportionally allowed to be like 25% of a subdivision or a neighborhood. And so I'm curious because that would imply that you're incentivizing larger neighborhoods with a section over here with small lots. instead of saying, hey, I've got this land that's not giant, and I can do smaller setbacks and smaller lot widths, and don't have to just put it off to the side. You could actually have a neighborhood designed around that, similar to what we're doing, I think, really well for cottage courts. But that was one thing that stood out to me, that it feels like we were being a little aggressive with saying, hey, no, the small lots are only a small part of a larger subdivision. So I'm curious to hear your thoughts or how you landed on that.

Great question. So the district that you're describing where it's a maximum of 50% can be a certain size and up to 25%, that's limited only to the SFR district, which is intended to, and it's an existing district, intended to have single family residential variety. So in that one district, that is the case. In the other districts, though, we have... And SFMU and then the neighborhood districts, they would allow the zero lot line pattern that goes down to 4,500 square feet. So those will be allowed by right in all of those districts as well.

I mean, I wonder if even for SFR, if duplexes should be by right for new neighborhoods, right? If we're allowing smaller homes on smaller lots, why not allow a duplex in that same area? Yeah.

what is the reason to separate and not allowing duplexes on sfr well there are two districts that we have looked at there there's the sfs district and sfr sfs is pretty common in the city that's a large portion of the the city's properties are the sfs SFS. The SFR is the one that's trying to get the lot size variety for the 50% can be a certain size. So it's trying to have different price points in the same neighborhood. And so that's trying to get a little bit different of a character. I think the SFS district, I think we either of them could be fair game for that conversation. And that was also really where we left off with the advisory committee was that we were comfortable with transitioning the 2F district into the NFR and having that be more the broad missing middle housing types. But they weren't quite sure yet about whether they wanted to recommend proceeding with allowing the duplex development in the SFS or any of the other districts. You will see whenever later in the presentation Chance talked about the second question that we have for you all is what type of feedback do you need from the community? That's one of the questions that we have proposed in here. One of the topics is what does the public think about what we've proposed regarding housing variety? Have we gone far enough? And so that could definitely be a question that may be appropriate to ask the community if there's support for allowing duplex permissions in additional districts.

I think it's really important to figure out who you're asking the question to. Because if you ask a homeowner who already has a home how they feel about variety in housing, you're definitely going to get a different answer from those who are living in multifamily homes, right? So I think who's responding is going to be really important. I wrote down that you wanted to walk away from this conversation making sure this conversation was code and public ready and you wanted to know what we wanted to hear from the public. For me, I want to make sure that your responses also were reflective of the diversity in the city and that your responses don't just come from a privileged background and that it's clear.

My last thing on this one, I'm curious to hear your all's take on why we're keeping the manufactured home zone, which is really just written for mobile home parks of 20, 30 years ago, versus a modern manufactured home really just looks like a home. It's not what people have in mind from the 70s and 80s. So I'm curious about us not allowing that in some other zones or not at least updating that one. Because again, it's sort of that's setting a particular housing type off to the side. And I just don't like that fundamentally, because like we've been saying, multiple housing types in the same neighborhood actually brings better diversity and connectivity. And so I'm curious about that, again, from an affordability lens, right? And even a lot of the homes that we're not calling manufactured yet, the roof trusses are still manufactured. Big parts of them are still trucked in, right? So I mean, a lot of the, especially the truck home builders, right? It may be 30, 40% of that home may have been constructed elsewhere, right? And so it feels like a kind of a strange thing to segment off. So I'm curious what your all's experience has been there and why you, yeah.

Sure, so you're actually, by way of your description, you're talking about two other types of housing. You're talking about manufactured and then you're also talking about a modular housing or what we call industrialized housing. So your manufactured housing is, you know, it doesn't, meet the same building code standards, your institutional, not institutional, industrialized, too many things to start with. Industrialized housing, modular housing, those are actually designed and built to meet the International Residential Code like any other house. Those are the modular industrialized houses. They are built off-site and brought in. And the way your code is being drafted now, those are treated essentially like any other site-built house.

Then is the distinction, I know there is a statute I think just went into effect that requires us to have a zoning district that allows for manufactured homes.

Correct, yes. And some of this goes to what's the most obvious way to comply with state law? And that is the most obvious way to comply with state law, is have a district that is quite literally called that and lay it out for them. What we've also seen working within the market is you rarely see developer interest in bringing a manufactured housing product in with a site built. They just don't, developers specialize to some extent. And so they haven't been generally comfortable with that. It also gets a little unusual with what we would call the land math of the market. So that's part of why we didn't step into that space is the market is probably not likely to follow you there anyway.

So I'm a visual learner. Just wondering, do we have a map of like where the city and where these different zones could apply? And then also I'm wondering about the process. Is this just like, okay, we're proactively changing whatever is... I forget all the acronyms, but the duplex one, are we actively changing that or does the landowner have to come and say, okay, you have this new zoning now and I want that and they have to go through this application process. So just those two things about sure.

Yeah. So for your new districts that don't exist right now, we're creating them within your code. We're not putting them on the map yet. That would require a zoning change effort. Those would come back in front of you where we're talking about with the two F to the conversion to the NFR, thank you. And that conversion, that's just simply a conversion on the map. But it sounds like one of the things that might be helpful is for where these districts are changing, actually giving y'all some type of like an interactive map where you could slide it back and forth to see what the change is on the map, like something like that might be useful.

I know we've got our color-coded zoning map available online. I think the zoning map is going to tell us where the 2F is and that's what's changing. It would be really our comprehensive plan and our future land use map that would be telling us roughly where do we want more density, which would be a concept of where we would have these implemented, but it would be up to the landowner to petition for the zoning change.

I'm just, I just want, what is the scope of these changes? Like how many acres does this actually impact is what I'm trying to understand. And I think, you know, depending on who you ask right in the community, that could make a difference on how they feel. You know, like, I don't know, is this only going to change 10% of our land? Or is it going to change 50% of the available land? I don't know. And so it's hard. I'm just trying to understand, like, what kind of impact this is. And then as far as density on those areas of land, what would this do? Like how many more people or how many more homes would be allowed versus the current zoning? Sure.

I think what you may have just told us is something that we do want to ask the public in terms of showing a visual to the public to help them understand that impact because while you're on city council, you are also a regular resident. And so that probably tells us that that's a good way for us to approach communications with the public. And if we do that for them, that means that you all get it too.

Yeah. I think that would be good. You know, it's hard to, I mean, this is theoretical, right? But seeing it on the map of like, what would the impact be is more concrete.

As a, I don't have the numbers in front of me. I am looking at your map. So I'll just estimate the change from the 2F district to the NFR. That's maybe 10 parcels, I would guess. It's a really small amount of land. And for the most part, all the 2F lots are already developed. So that would be generally referring to redevelopment. The NMU is not mapped, so that would just be a tool in your toolbox. An applicant could request the NMU district. The SFS is what we had talked about. We haven't proposed allowing duplexes in there, but that's a conversation that we can have. That's maybe 20% of the city.

I'm sorry, was that SFS?

SFS.

So single-family suburban, not the SFR?

Correct. SFR is a more limited land area than SFS.

So the new coding of NMU, theoretically, could that just only go where it's currently single-family zoned, or could that go in the corridor, CL4 and CL5?

It'd go anywhere we rezoned.

It would be a new district, so it wouldn't be on the map until City Council approves it to be on the map. It's just a new tool where if I'm a landowner, I'm an applicant, and I want to develop with those standards, I could come in and request from Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council, and City Council would ultimately decide whether it's appropriate to rezone a particular parcel to that district.

If we approve this, then the second step is what you're saying, that we would go and say, okay, this could apply to these current areas, and then if someone wanted to change, they could come and then request it. Yes.

well hold on i want to be be clear on that if we if we prove this then do we need to make a change to our future land use map in order to allow people to to apply for that in the comprehensive plan or we make these changes and people can start applying for rezoning as long as their parcel meets the definition within the future land use map

Yeah, your comprehensive plan was written to be kind of future-proof for this kind of scenario. So it's got different types of housing allowed with compatibility standards by different district or different land use district or future land use designation. So I'm kind of thinking we could actually create a map of that with here's your designations that would be eligible for this. Here's how many acres are involved. So that's kind of your sphere that you'd be working in, but you would still have a situation where people would have to apply for the zoning change.

So does that, how much of a barrier does that create when you have to apply for the zoning change if you are then in a designated eligible area?

I would say that there's a negligible barrier because if a developer's coming in, they were already going to go through some one of those processes to annex and zone the property. This would just give them another ability to zone something that aligns with the comprehensive plan that was adopted several years ago. So everything that we're doing now is to align with that Aspire plan and just make sure that we're actually giving developers the tools to enact the goals that were identified in that 2022 approval.

So similarly, in that same vein for something like the NMU, have you all built in an incentive structure to your point, Director Bailey, around if, hey, if that's one that we really want to see neighborhoods that have neighborhood scale commercial in them, how do we make sure that the code not only makes that easy, but also gives them density credits or something that can also make that easier to pencil and to work for these types of developers? That would be something I'd be interested to hear if you all considered it or if it's something we should talk further about.

Would that be in particular areas that we would want to see that level versus anywhere?

I mean, I guess I was mentioning specifically the mixed-use neighborhoods, which theoretically does have neighborhood scale commercial or retail in it, which we don't see a whole lot of today, right? for a variety of reasons, I'm sure, but it would be awful nice to have neighborhoods that have that type.

Could be, I mean.

Well, that begs the question about how many other cities do this type of development, how successful is it, and how much of a demand is there for it?

Well, that's a great question because I was going to ask, are there any other places in central Texas that we can use as a reference to look at to see how this has come to fruition? Or is this a new concept? I don't know.

For the neighborhood mixed use idea? Something like this that you're talking about. Okay.

I guess is this truly a path towards more affordable homeownership?

would say yes it is providing that pathway uh your your nmu district for example is allowing for a higher density that has been typically allowed uh in pflugerville so you are you have a baked in uh incentive that actually appears anytime these uses appear in other districts too is if they're choosing that path in terms of their essentially lot unit or unit return on lot acreage is going higher. That's generally usually good for a development in terms of that.

Right. The developers, the home builders, they're looking to maximize their return on their investment. The question is, does this density benefit create not only them reaching their return targets, but also producing homes that are more affordable?

Sure. So it creates an environment that they can get to that. Now, they can make their own market choices in terms of what they build. You often talk about with a townhouse, there are inexpensive townhouses, there are radically expensive townhouses, and they can be on the exact same stamp of land. So you can't necessarily control that as much. But in terms of creating an environment where a developer could choose that path, yes.

So that was one of the questions that had sent in advance along those lines of, and you had referenced the committee that was going over that, and I'm not sure who was on that committee, but has there been developer review of these concepts and the different stakeholder feedback about whether what we're trying to propose would actually incentivize them to do, for the outcomes that we're looking for?

We did have some developer feedback at the beginning, and then with the advisory board, that's P&Z. We have a member from the equity board, and then also, I believe, two from Parks and Rec. So they have been looking that over. Of course, as you know from the appointments, the P&Z is pretty well represented as far as the residents across. So we do have some of those professionals on that board as well. And then once we were able to get some of this feedback, they would also be invited. I have been individually talking to a lot of the applicants that we typically see, and they all know that we are going through. We do have the website of, you know, hey, come look here. So we have been giving that information out. I don't know if we've actually gotten direct feedback on what we have because we haven't released the actual draft document to anyone yet, but we have been letting them know, look, we're trying to do these things. What's an impediment right now that you would see What's something that we could change? I think we have a few ideas that came back originally of just what are we getting right, but also what are we not possibly getting right, or what are we just missing in the codes right now that would not only help us align to the comprehensive plan, but also help us align with the market as it is right now so that we could link those two up together.

And we do have development representation on the advisory commission, right?

We do, and also a real inter-broker.

So I guess my recommendation from a survey perspective is that we take these and we ask the development community. It's not a citizen-necessary survey. Let's ask the development community. Looking at this zoning district, what would you build? If we gave you these options, would it change what you built? Because I want to... I want to validate the concept before we start going through and saying, hey, what do you think of these things if they're entirely impractical?

I want to pick up on what the mayor just said about that. Now that Mayor Gonzalez is gone, everybody up here is from somewhere else. So we have these ideas. I lived in a fourplex and I loved it, but is that appropriate uh here you know i think jonathan mentioned he lived in a duplex in the past and and he enjoyed that um so i am curious as the mayor said about what the developer side demand is for this because if there isn't any it won't be built and we're just spinning our wheels um and i don't want to i don't want to waste your time mr sparks if if we're developing something that nobody's going to use well it's also important

There's the developers that are here that are building, and I hate to say it, a lot of developers get comfortable in their own space, right? They have their own market. So when I say we need to survey and figure out if this is practical, it's not just the people who are already building here, it's the nationwide, it's the other individuals who might be looking to get into the market.

Yeah, you're talking about developers within the region that are active in doing these types of developments. Some mix of our existing ones and ones that aren't here yet.

But yeah, I would like to understand that.

The development that's happening in North Dallas and what's happening around here are not necessarily the same. But it's certainly what we see in North Dallas is much more likely to be something that will play in the market here than something, you know, say in the northeast or in the far northwest. So, you know, if the developers are saying, we want to build this, but your code doesn't allow that, obviously we want to be accommodating to that. And also, you know, to the extent that there are current residents who say, I would like that. build a duplex on the lot next door to me or you know a lot that i want to buy uh if we can get if we get that if we're getting that kind of feedback um i think that would be that would be helpful to know all right i feel hot in my skin because i also feel like um

There's a lot of stigmatism associated when we say fourplexes and duplexes and all that. So I just want to make sure I put that in the atmosphere as well that I'm concerned about some of that that comes up when we talk about that. I'm just going to leave that right there.

What I can tell you is that I guess I live in a paired villa. Right? Because we don't use the word duplex sometimes.

It's about the wording. It's all about the wording and how you feel and your life experiences and where you come from. And I just want to be careful about that as we go out and do our surveys. That word play really does matter.

And I can see the bigger developers, the ones we know that are building bigger neighborhoods... Yeah, I could see them shine away from it, but I can see some of the other smaller developers saying hey This is something that we'd be interested in so I hope we're we're we're talking to a multiple array of developers Not just the main ones that we know well to David's point about living elsewhere I lived in the greater Los Angeles area and I lived in a townhome that was part of six together and

I had lots of friends who also had town homes and garages under and small, right? So, well, mine was kind of large, you know, with like 150 or 200, but there's others with, you know, 15 or 20 or maybe just six or eight on a redeveloped lot that was a blight and they turned it into beautiful, you know, affordable homes for people to get their foot into the market. So that's just why I'm kind of wondering where these are going to go, because it could be various reasons. It could be a large, you know, organization with HOA and all that stuff. Or it could, well, probably if they were attached, they'd still have to have some sort of HOA. But, you know, there's a variety available.

Could be some of the, like, five or ten acre parcels, right? Yeah. You could do something cool with it. Right.

there there are a few infill parcels where i think it uh it could certainly make sense and we saw a 10 or 15 acre parcel here not that long ago but i think that you know these are going to go where we allow them to go this doesn't allow them to go anywhere yeah they're going to go where they uh where someone asks us and and we grant them permission to go uh unless as jonathan was saying you know do we add it to existing areas that's where he gets into your point talking about the blighted areas i tear down and rebuild and someone puts up a six flex where there was a rundown hole right i think that's the more important conversation that we have that's why i i hate to say it jonathan i'm leaning away from that idea of including it in existing residential areas because i don't feel like we've got a whole lot of blighted areas where a teardown makes a lot of sense. I had a friend of mine told me, oh, you should buy up every house on this street and turn it into townhomes. I'm like, oh, they're really nice houses. I saw one for sale today, and I was like, oh, I should look that up. So I'm not as excited about existing. I'm not looking at any blighted tear down, rebuild at this point?

Or just small. Yeah, I don't necessarily see it as a blighted thing.

I'm not saying that was Los Angeles. I'm not saying that that's here in Los Angeles.

Right, but that's the example you gave, right?

Or on a busy street. Like, in Los Angeles, I go there, but, like, their home, and I mean, you know, three lanes each way, you know, you don't want to turn into your home off of that street, so they, you know, some of those, when they got older, they turned them into townhomes that you know, or more appropriate on a busy street. So those types of things, you know, there's little small lots.

Well, I think, you know, part of my part of what I want to bring up on that, too, is Sure, we can change this stuff periodically, but if you're thinking about five, ten years from now, there will be more of those properties, not blighted. But there will be homes in older neighborhoods that there probably will start to be people wanting to do redevelopment in.

Well, I think we've had several of those rezoning requests for road loop. We've had rezoning requests for... What is that street? Nimbus, I believe. Oh, yeah. So, you know, those are areas, but do I want to allow this by right, or do I still want those to have to go through a rezoning process?

You're just reducing the number, the accessibility of... doing that, right? An individual with a builder and an architect isn't probably going to have the money to go through a full on land use map update and a zoning update.

I don't know that we're talking about land use map updates, but we're talking about rezoning. How much does a rezoning cost?

how much extra burden does that put on that off the top of my head it uh well we got the fee schedule in the in the budget tonight yeah so don't i might need to phone a friend i believe the base is around a thousand dollars to get in depending on the size so infill it's going to be smaller it's by acre so if you're looking at more of an infill it is a little bit more cost effective um it's not that expensive it could come in when you have your impact fees and other things if you're the development could cost more, but just to get in the door to have the, even just to have the pre-application conference, that's free.

Yeah, and that's where I think it's the total cost of development is where things get, it ends up quick, right? I mean, I think even today, the last time I did the math on a single family home and a new development in Pflugerville, it's over $60,000 that is like all in to set up your development, to do the build per house, somewhere along there. And so I'm just mindful that, yeah, the fee may be $1,000, but it's 20 grand with their consultants and lawyers to get through and an extra six months because you got to do public hearing, EPNZ, and then it's got to come to us, and maybe we say no. So, like, if we're thinking about the incentive structure for more affordable housing, I think we've got to look at that overall picture, right? Do we just want developers coming in, building these types of things, or are we open to a resident who does buy their neighboring lot and wants to do their own townhome or, you know, a duplex or a triplex for them and their kids and their grandkids? You know, like, those are the types of scenarios I want to make sure we're not ignoring as we plan out the future of what these neighborhoods can look like. Sure.

And I will say, just for the record, we run our rezonings in about 60 to 90 days, not six months.

I was just throwing out a number. You're fine.

All right. We stopped you after, I think, slide two. What else do you have to tell us that we haven't asked you already?

There are a few more.

We have a habit of getting ahead of ourselves.

And we're happy to go back to any of the items. I do have... four more slides of these summaries and then we can go back to any additional feedback. So the next item is about creating walkable connected mixed use places. We have some updated standards about pedestrian orientation things like trail-oriented development. So if there's a trail adjacent to your development, that you have to have some type of frontage toward that trail so it's not just backed to the trail. Also looking at options for flexibility and standards, you'll see alternative compliance as a term that's used throughout the code that allows some more flexibility. That would allow some extent of administrative approval for more of the common sense adjustments, and that could also go to the Planning and Zoning Commission or others for additional flexibility. The orange box here about more usable public spaces. This has some options for some different green space within a development. There are incentives that go along with this. So things like you could have reduced parking or increased height, reduced setbacks in exchange for providing the additional public space. Also some flexibility in the parking. We've expanded on some of the shared parking provisions and also I did recommend establishing a maximum parking amount, so that would be 25% beyond the minimum. If you wanted to exceed 25% beyond the required parking, then a parking study would be required to show that you do in fact need the additional parking in which case it would be allowed.

Is this where I start poking at parking?

No, I have people in the last year tell me, hey, why don't you have car dealerships around here? I'm like, because I don't make money on parking lots. No, anything we can do to reduce the amount of pavement and increase the usable area is going to be beneficial to the community.

Yeah, and I think that's where I appreciate that you all add in added in the maximum. But quite frankly, I'm on the complete opposite end and say we just get rid of them all together. Even if we don't, let me tell you a different thing that I was thinking about that I think maybe mentioned in your report or in the code to I think to get an exception to reduce your parking minimum still required like a traffic study. I feel like, OK, if you're if someone voluntarily wants to build less parking we should let them do that and not make them go spend money on studies that will prove that they don't need as much parking because that's just us trying to predict the market as opposed to them addressing it so that was just something else I had mentioned or noticed in there it's kind of the flip side of the maximum although again I think we should just not have any and let the market decide but

We did add some additional parking reductions that would be built in, not really requiring a parking study, but if you meet certain design criteria, they would automatically be reduced up to 40%, I think is the maximum reduction that's in the draft right now.

So, again, I'm visual on this. just wondering how these changes compare like if we had an example okay you i don't know you're an apartment complex or you're a restaurant center whatever how does this look under current versus new and then i guess um I do like the market to determine things, but also want to make sure we don't have not enough parking. So I don't know where that balance is. But just wondering, like, how much parking would be reduced under these new rules? And then also, what kind of cost impact is that to, you know, to the property owner under the, you know, like, is it saving $5,000? Is it saving $100,000? I don't know. I'm just wondering the impact of these changes.

Well, let me pick up on that and also what the mayor said about you don't make any money off of parking spaces. When we let the market determine how many parking spaces they build, the answer is generally, well, my neighbor has parking, so I'm just going to piggyback off of him. We've seen that in downtown Pflugerville, where there is a lack of parking. And there's been disputes about the business a using the parking that actually belongs to business B so I am concerned about Completely eliminating those requirements Having some flexibility depending on business type strikes me as reasonable but then of course we have to consider the fact that the while there might be business type A in that location now while they're building the business, that subsequently might turn into business type B that then has a much greater parking need. Obviously, restaurants have a very high parking need at certain parts of the day, and then they have empty parking lots the rest of the day. Offices generally have a lower need, but it's consistent throughout the day. So I think we want to maybe look at the parking requirements depending on what kind of usage we're looking at there. And I don't know if that's what you're doing already or not. If it is, great. But I am leery of the idea of, and it pains me to say this as a free marketer, but I am leery of the idea of letting businesses completely decide their own parking needs because we have seen THIS, FOR LACK OF A BETTER WORD, PARASITISM ON THE NEIGHBOR'S PARKING. THE NEIGHBOR SPENT A LOT OF MONEY ON BUILDING A PARKING LOT THAT'S MORE THAN ADEQUATE FOR THEIR NEEDS, SO THE NEXT DOOR NEIGHBOR JUST TAKES OVER THAT INSTEAD OF PROVIDING THE PARKING THAT IT WOULD BE APPROPRIATE FOR THEIR BUSINESS. SO I APPRECIATE YOUR NOD TO THE FREE MARKET THERE, COUNCILMAN COFFMAN, BUT I THINK THAT We want to keep a little bit of a thumb on that scale.

And that may be okay. Maybe we're in the lowest quartile of our competitive cities. Even if we don't get rid of them completely, if we're at the lowest minimums of our neighbors.

Find a way to make it make sense. One other thing I want to mention there, you mentioned the public use spaces. And I just want to make sure we don't leave any loopholes in here. I've seen too many 10 by 10 stained concrete pads to say, hey, that doesn't look like a legitimate public use space that was dedicated for the purpose. So I want to make sure, you know, when we've got these regulations in place, we have some efficacy around them, that they will be implemented in the way intended and not abused. I mean, that also goes for the condo regime land use where we've got single family homes on a condo parcel because they didn't want to pay for city streets. And now they're burdened by the maintenance of that and an awkward situation because they're single family homes for all practical purposes, but they own a part and parcel of the land.

other thing with public spaces to your point about size and location orientation um going along with that is i just want to make sure that if something is public and they're getting credit for it that it's actually available and accessible to the public and not in the middle of somewhere where like no one knows and it's basically a private park but they got credit for providing public space

All right. So three more slides? Yes.

All right. Yes. We're doing our best.

Now that Rudy's here.

The next item is on quality development, neighborhood compatibility. Again, for those missing middle housing types that we've added and clarified, there are some standards that go along with those. We did carry forward a lot of the existing requirements regarding setbacks. If you have a taller building, it needs to be set back more, retaining the buffer yards and clarifying what some of those different terms mean. Also, I mentioned earlier a little bit about the flexibility, the alternative compliance is a term that you'll see throughout. And then also in the landscaping and different sections related to lighting and other development standards, tried to be more consistent with how that was organized within the document, so it's a little bit easier to follow.

That's another area just to point out where I would love to see some way that we're incentivizing people not to use turf. And it looks like you all reduced turf requirements, or maybe you got rid of them, something like that. But I do think if there's an innovative way of enticing more people to not put in grass. That would be fantastic. Okay. When you said turf, I was like, wait.

Oh, yeah. Native landscaping and grass.

Yeah. Now we, I mean, it's a reality situation. It's, I mean, it's not going to change. All right.

All right. And then economic opportunity and reinvestment. The land use standards have had some updates throughout. A lot of new uses have been added. Some outdated ones have been removed or renamed to align with current terminology. You'll see some standards added here for uses like data centers that are emerging more recently. So be sure to take a look at the proposed data center standards. I think there'll be a lot of public interest in that as we move forward.

I think that's another one where we need to think about what you're asking the public because they're just gonna say they don't want one. And I do think there's probably some more optimization in what you all wrote. I think in my opinion, there's a big difference between a five megawatt data center and a 20 or 50, whatever the actual tier was. size scale right yeah well no people won't but yeah it'll matter when one gets built i know and the other thing was for like practical purposes i don't think we have the contiguous land for a hyperscaler anyway um i mean because you're looking at hundreds of acres and yeah we haven't been able to put together a mega site so i think making it more clear making it more clear on those smaller ones that are more likely to potentially want to live here Um, especially some of the, so one of the, one of the other things, uh, that I noticed in there too was, you know, you had closed loop water, that sort of thing. I want to encourage you to make sure that it's technology agnostic, right? It may not be water. It may be some other resource or technology next that they're using. And if that creates more noise, for example, or some other type of. I don't want to say environmental impact because it's more than that, but let's not write our code to assume data centers are always going to use water even though they use very little water now. Yeah, you're kind of alluding to performance-based zoning.

Sure, yeah. In the reality of the situation, it's the same thing we had the conversation about seven, eight years ago. What's that place that David always makes fun of that it has its own pig, but it hasn't grown outside of the apartment complex? Oh, Pecan District? Yeah, Pecan District. What we do at Pecan District. I do not make fun of Pecan District.

I'm hoping that Pecan District will come to life someday.

Shots fired again One of the specific things we talked about then and we asked for was that They're gonna build a parking garage How are they gonna go ahead and convert that to apartments because the remediation is the reality situation was that? at some point in the future, we're saying, okay, you can have less and less cars for being bought. Same thing I'd like to know about when you're talking about data centers, what are we requiring for them to do after that 20 year mark? Because essentially what the math says is it's much easier for them to just go ahead and ditch it and pay whatever fees or fines, whatever for it, as opposed to actually convert that to something. So we're looking future wise and something like that. What does it, you know, what, you know, what demands were you making regarding any sort of remediation or transformation?

I think to that point, one of the ideas that I've been looking at was whether there's a mechanism that we can get like an annual report or something out of these, right? So how do we get a continuous feedback of how much power, water, et cetera, they're using? Because to your point, over the long term, that could pretty significantly shift and we would never know. I don't know if there's a way to do that type of thing, but that would be... Well, apparently the governor's office is having the same problem. That's why you have to do it proactively.

Yeah, I think... I'm not sure if I've voiced this to this group. My concern around data centers and energy facilities Related there too is not so much that they bring enough power to supply themselves But that they don't consume the entire allotment of power for a larger area we have we see a I Don't want a data center to come in and turn the area around it into a desert Because there's no development potential around it because they can't get any more power to the entire substation so so yeah, we we need to ensure that that If they have an impact on the power grid, they're mitigating the entire impact for the area, not just for themselves.

And specifically because of the fact that we know now that they are not built, our grid is not built to go ahead and maintain support. So the reality is, what are you doing with your power grid? with your energy, where's it coming from, how's it going to be sustainable, how's it going to be a reality situation to help, you said mitigate, or ultimately outright go ahead and doesn't affect anything else that's going on in the community. Because, I mean, it's not sustainable, their model right now. And so what does that look like?

Well, so I've wondered, and I don't know that I've seen the answer, although I think people have thrown this out, is when you're looking at this type of use, this certain amount of land that could maybe be used for residential, how does it compare with how much water and energy and other things and traffic and all of that? uh between the different uses because a lot i've been told well this is consuming less energy less water than if we had a single family you know a neighborhood there i don't know if that's true or not i mean i don't know but i'm curious to that and like what is When we talk about the energy uses and the sustainability, how would that also compare if there was a different use on that lot? And are we being agnostic about the energy use versus this use versus that use?

Yeah, I don't think, that's a good question, because I mean, I think the reality situation is that they know, you know, you've seen gas power, you've seen nuclear, all these other aspects, but they know that it's not sustainable to go ahead and electric. Their concern is this, is that flat out, is that what happens when they need a backup, and can they go ahead and plug into our grid? And the reality situation is, again, it's not sustainable what they're doing right now. So, i agree with you though like okay listen however you're gonna part with the reality is how are you going to make sure you maintain that because don't put it as the mayor put on the backs of the citizens everybody else out here wondering hey guess what i'm out of electricity why is that the case

and related to sustainable growth. So this is the last of the five slides to get through these highlights. A couple of the items here, we have proposed some changes to the tree preservation standards. So that would expand tree preservation protections and mitigation requirements to single family and duplex lots. Some more information on what that means. The tree preservation requirements apply already to those lots as they're being developed for the first time. Once the house is built, an occupant moves in. Currently, the tree preservation standards no longer apply to that. So those residents are able to remove any trees on their lot today. So what's proposed in here is if there's an occupied single family or duplex lot, if they remove a tree, there would be some level of mitigation required. It would be far less than what would be required for non-residential property or multifamily. would be i believe two trees would be required on the property so if you clear the trees only two trees will be required in replacement if they plant them on their property so that is um one item that we wanted to point out in the revised draft and the idea is to help support the the city's tree canopy and and Counteracting urban heat island effects and things like that consistent with the comprehensive plan additionally community character considerations So that is a change from the current code.

Yeah, I think I was I heard from some folks on the Committee as well that were pretty uncomfortable with that And I am I don't love the idea that we're gonna go in and charge fees to existing homeowners and require new tree permits and mitigation I have a hard time thinking of someone who has a house and is clearing all the trees off and not doing something else. I mean, I'm sure it happens, but people value trees. And I just, I'm not super comfortable with us expanding our own enforcement abilities to

homeowners I think the issue I've seen and I believe in some of our kids excuse me in our beauties we've had this and some of our I think the AL you are that we've implemented in the past they require a certain number of trees per lot they require that those be retained I don't think we have any enforcement mechanism so this sounds like it's adding an enforcement mechanism I'm not so worried about people just chopping down their trees. I'm worried about trees dying. And I've seen regularly where a tree has died and someone put in one that's not as big around as my thumb and it tips over after a few days and that's it. Or a stump sits there forever and is never replaced. Is that the intention behind this, is making sure that trees that pass away are replaced? Meet an untimely demise.

One thing I did not mention very clearly in this, this applies really for the larger trees. This is not if you have a three-inch caliber tree and you remove it. This is at 18 inches. So these are substantial trees.

So the standard builder installed tree, which is three to five caliber inches, this isn't applicable to that.

No, these are for the larger protected trees that are established on the property.

Yeah, my concern would be related to when we've got these trees in place, the multiple trees will often, one will out-compete the other. And we'll end up with, oh, you're required to have three trees on your lot, but then, well, one of them overshadows and the others don't make it because you've got one large tree. But you're saying this doesn't apply to those builder-installed trees, those tiny little things? The starter trees. Not the starter trees. It would take several years for them to reach that.

What problem are we trying to solve here with putting this restriction on residentials who've already moved in? I mean, my HOA already requires two trees on a lot. This happened to me. I was not happy about it.

We can hear in your voice.

19-year-old tree died, carpenter ants, root problem because we put a nice tree ring that stopped the roots from growing. It was a large tree. And so, you know, and I've seen some stories in our neighboring city about, you know, the city going after people for removing trees that were going to damage their home, you know, or damage their foundation. So I'm... i'm not sure what we're trying to solve here and then um and i also wonder about the additional cost or you know going from a eight inch to a six inch for developments or um i guess i guess i'm just not sure are we like really losing that many trees that are good um on some of these developments and so the two-part question and to be fair to melody's point um i had one of those starter trees

that died on us early on and we got in trouble with our HOA with the starter tree and we're like, wait a minute, We're not the ones who put the starter tree in. Why are we getting responsible for that as well? And the person who built the home, which I will not name, refused to... To warranty the tree? Yeah.

I did have one of my trees replaced under warranty at one point in time. It is unbelievable.

Home Depot, they will do it for a year even if it... No, my home builder... Oh, but I got... Trees live and trees die.

During the snow populace, a lot of trees died. You had a dead tree in your front yard, of course you're going to knock it down. And you're not going to replace it with a tree that's the same size. One of my neighbors had a tree that was substantially taller than their two-story house. They didn't replace it with a new tree that was substantially taller than their two-story house. They're not going to, and it's completely unreasonable to expect that. And you can say, okay, you need to have X number of trees. Most, if not all, of the HOAs in the city have some kind of tree requirement. The vast majority of the city is covered by HOAs. It seems like, you know, in the large part what we're doing is we're putting an extra pair of pants over the pair of pants we already have.

So to Council Member Ryan's point, I am curious, what problem are we solving with this? You mentioned it only applies to 18-caliber-inch trees, which are substantial trees. I don't know if they're taller than a two-story house, but they're pretty dang tall. What problem are we solving with this?

Really, it's just the removal of those much larger trees when they are still healthy. If it was a dead or diseased tree, we already have the ability to mitigate for those things. But it's truly to make sure that if we have a tree that's protected in a larger neighborhood, just like you would for commercial property, that once that house is sold, they're not able to just rip a heritage tree out that's still in great condition. And if that were to happen, that we do have some enforcement capability to be able to say, you need to replant a tree.

So what I heard was if we've got someone coming in to flip a house and they want a better picture of the front, so they chop down an 18, 20-inch tree, they've got to replace it.

is that what i heard it's very expensive to remove yeah a large tree yeah yeah yeah three five eight grand depending on the size of the fruit what is it what did you mean by minute if if it's dead or diseased we have ways to mitigate that what does that mean i mean does the homeowner has a dead tree and they still have to go through some city application process no they we have just buy right um allowances yeah not an extra

You don't have to get a tree removal permit if your tree is dead.

I have been through that before. I would rather not have that here.

Do we have to have somebody come out to the house and certify that the tree is dead? Yeah, how is it police?

I mean, if somebody says it, how do we know?

If a tree falls in the woods and nobody's there. Yeah, exactly. We can certainly get you a little bit more information on that aspect, just hearing the concerns on this one of just how does that feasibly, what problem are we trying to solve and how feasibly does that work?

Well, because you could have a healthy, I mean, this happened at another property that I own. you have a healthy tree what is going on with you killing trees it wasn't me no this was a different one where a tree was planted without good discussion and it was too close to the house and then now we have six eight thousand dollars of foundation because of this tree And so, like, someone else has mentioned that they have, you know, like, and then, especially if we're going to have smaller lot sizes, how many trees can you fit where it's not going to rip up the, the roots aren't going to, you know, the sidewalk, which happens in where I was, where I'm from, the driveway, and the foundation. So, like, I'm just concerned about all this.

And the water and wastewater systems.

Yeah, exactly. The tree roots of... I know all sorts of things. When you own a home long enough.

Boy, you have had some serious ass restoration. So I'm just asking this because we also talked about how, I thought of it as turf, but you know, we're talking about zero scaping, promoting some of those aspects. How does that play into that? Because what if I buy a home and I'm like, screw this, I want to go ahead and just get rid of everything. Yeah.

I want to get rid of all the trees and just have cactus in the front yard. Yeah.

Yeah. I think those are definitely going to be the alternative recommendations.

So, yeah, what I'm looking for is, yeah, is there a practical reason for us to move forward with that? Because I'm having a hard time finding a practical implementation for that. It seems like a very, very edge potential case.

We could probably go inventory those.

And then just have an ordinance for those eight trees. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I know you've got a couple more slides.

Just a couple more items here. So mentioning about the parkland requirements. So we proposed some adjustments in the parkland dedication section where we say appropriately sized. This would increase the minimum size of a park. Believe it's three acres now. It would be increased up to seven acres for a park with the idea being that Having the the larger parks. There's a lower cost of service to the city So it's more easy for the for the city to maintain over time The flexible park options we have identified here about regarding the private recreational amenities that can receive partial credit This is something that exists in the park Dedication requirements today where they're allowed actually a hundred percent credit in some cases for private amenities This is proposed to only allow up to fifty percent credit and that's only for the higher density development so if it's a ten dwelling unit per acre or Denser development, then they could be eligible to receive fifty percent credit.

What's the rationale behind it?

Will be the rationale for allowing any credit or reducing it from a hundred percent to fifty percent and Well, the idea of the park dedication section is intended for public park spaces. And so if it's not available to the public, it's only serving really that development. Is it really achieving the objective of the park dedication requirements? If it's not serving the whole community, it's really limited only to that development. It's more of a private amenity. So it's a bit of a compromise that it's serving their development, but not citywide.

It's recreational areas that serves the area, but not the larger area. I like that that's a reduction. I'm glad for the reduction.

because the neighborhoods so i mean because the goal is to build on the system right and we need to do it in a smart way but if you get 100 of your parkland just go to your private thing that only you can use then you're not adding to the system and then they're likely also you know to go and put more stress on other systems that are nearby caesar's folks always coming to my park all the time all right

All right. So we got through the summary slides. Our two questions as a reminder here at the end. One is, is there anything that we need to change before we can release this to the public for their feedback? We've gotten some great comments from you all already tonight. We're taking a lot of notes for adjustments to make. Also, we'll continue looking at the draft as we proceed in phase three. But our next step is at some point we would like to release this to the public for some additional feedback, both from residents also business owners as well as the development community for their feedback so just recapping if there are changes we need to make and then the second question is about what feedback should we be asking the public for we've talked about some of this already the first one is that housing choice we talked about whether duplexes should be allowed in SFS for example so have we gone too far maybe not far enough in terms of housing choices The parking question we had in here is just an example was if we wanted to reconsider getting rid of the parking minimums entirely, but it sounds like maybe there's support for keeping that. So maybe that's not the public question. It's more about flexibility for parking standards. The data centers, I think that's a topic that there'll be a lot of public interest in. At least we probably need to present those draft standards whether we wanna feature that as something we're requesting feedback on or not, but we may wanna share those.

So, I mean, what I said earlier goes back to this. I think if we don't have alternative uses to show this property owner could do A, B, or C, here's the impact of these things because A lot of times it's like, well, I just don't want anything on that land, right? And, you know, people have that about whatever is going to go next to the land, especially if it's been undeveloped for a long time. So I'm real concerned to go out to the public without context.

Well, and to your point, right, like neighborhoods, people don't know what a cottage court is, right? I only barely do. Now, if you show somebody a picture... and say, you know, rank this picture. You know, there's probably ways to do it without just getting people angry about apartment buildings and data centers.

I think you have to do it from a perspective, and I'm assuming y'all are the experts on drafting the survey questions. But my assumption would be, like, on parking... You know, the question you'd ask is that, you know, should we require parking minimums? It's, you know, how would you feel if you have to walk X distance in order to find a parking spot? How would you feel if you couldn't go to this business because you couldn't find a parking spot, right? How would you feel if there were so many parking spots that kids are playing hockey and you can't find a spot because they're all used by kids in parks? When it comes to the housing choices, would you live in this type of unit? Do you have family or friends who would be seeking this type of unit? Are you cool with us taking away your view behind your house and putting in large-scale home development? Which we should never articulate. That's the natural translation of should we allow this type of development on this parcel is no, I don't want you to take away my view. So we've got to make sure we're asking the questions about usability and functionality and not about... To some degree, yeah. The visualization is good. The specificity of it is not necessarily great because if you get too specific, then you're saying, well, yeah, sure, I like that idea, just not in my backyard, so no, I don't want it.

Yeah, nimbyism is a real thing. We all know that, right? But if you're able to put things in a context where they understand, as you put it, the downstream ramifications of it, That's when it becomes more curious because even when we talked about parking we were talking about Possible bonds and we talked about downtown the biggest thing that folks I started hearing after we said now they're like well I can't find parking downtown like well, you know, you didn't have this discussion when you had it over there as well I I get that And I think that, I mean, Erica, I saw how you couched the question regarding data centers. Absolutely, you should go out there and ask the question. But the reality of the situation is that you need to have the applicable information and data points for them to, pun intended, for folks to understand the context and unification of it. Because right now we have some in our community and people don't even know. And so, you know, which is exactly, yeah, exactly. Which is exactly, and that's the conversation. So how do you, because everyone has their perspective on what it looks like and how it fit into the context of our community. And so putting something where folks I think you heard enough about tree preservation.

I think on the data centers, yeah, you need to be specific on resource utilization and noise, environmental nuisances. Because that's the biggest thing I'm hearing about data centers is are they generating heat? Are they generating noise? Are they consuming resources that the community needs for other purposes? You know, asking someone, hey, is it okay to build one of this size? Well, if it's silent and it doesn't consume any water.

And it's surrounded by giant trees.

Yeah. And we got those inherited trees around it. And the giant trees that we cut down and moved over here. Then it's not a big deal. If they're running on their backup generators 23 hours a day, then no, absolutely I don't want that here. I don't want them running on their generators. 30 minutes a day. They can test them and that's it. The only, I've got two points to make quick, and there was one thing I've noticed in the UDC that I didn't see modified here, but it's really more, I guess this is more around residential uses. I saw in commercial uses, we've got, I think it's CL4, allows for ornamental heights to exceed the building height limits, but it's only in CL4 and not in any of the other districts. So I'm curious, was there a decision made why, the ornamental height is more or less relevant in CL4 and not in GB1 or GB2. And then the other thing, I'm a little concerned about you asking us about what needs to change before this is released to the public on the 17th as a target because you did hear a lot of feedback from us and i think a lot of that feedback is input into the process but i don't know that that feedback is that you need to go make changes to this right away i almost want to see you take our feedback and massage it a little bit and then come back to us Either it's going out in its current form or our feedback needs to be integrated into it before it goes out, but that needs to be reviewed by us. I'm looking to counsel for opinions on that. Is there any reason why 17th? What's the magic of the 17th?

One meeting or two meetings?

Do you feel that the feedback we have provided you today would make changes to this in what was released to the public?

There are changes, and that was in our plan after today, that we would go back, we would take your feedback and make revisions before we would share it to the public.

True, but we didn't vote on anything here tonight. So you may have heard some feedback from one or two individuals that five or six don't agree with, so we don't necessarily need that being reflected in a draft going out to the public.

Yeah, our thought process is that this helps us ask smarter questions in the public feedback process, knowing where at least a few of your heads are. on this so we can use that and then essentially get better feedback from the public.

So if I'm understanding your approach, it's take the existing draft but formulate questions based on our feedback here today and go ahead and release that to the public?

That feels the most sensible, I think.

But you said on the 17th we'll have a meeting before then? No, our next meeting will be the 22nd.

Can you all wait until the 22nd? Can we get another look at this? Do we need another look at this? Do we go forward with what's in there with questions around our feedback?

You're going to ask this person if you need another look at this? It might be useful to see what they do with the feedback they got from us today, especially if, as you say, Mr. Mayor, there's something that one or two people put forward that the other five or six of us don't necessarily agree with. We might want to see that.

And many of those may have been the same things that I said.

Um, but we have that discussion now like is there what are the things that there's general consensus about? What are the things that only one or two people you want to list the five?

I don't know if I actually heard anything that we like totally disagree on. I thought we were just having a discussion. I Thought that's what this was Um for me, um, I guess the only thing that gives me pause is the tree enforcement I love that word that we want to encourage it, I don't know about the enforcement piece of it. Because I think most of us know that trees actually add value, and with the way this heat is, why would you want to cut any trees down? So I think it's more of a conversation, education, awareness, and less oversight and enforcement around the trees. I don't see any reason for us not to move forward with this.

I'm fine with that. I don't think any of us had anything that was too contentious or that we absolutely disliked.

Nothing that changes the direction of the UDC, only that it changes the direction of the questions and questions. feedback that we received.

I mean, it obviously would be nice to see your next draft when it's ready, of course, right? So we can see what you all changed.

Or we'll all see something on the 17th, along with the public.

I guess I would also encourage that you're also listening for the questions that those you are surveying ask, and those questions may lead you somewhere else, just to be open to that.

And when the development community and builders see this, they're going to have a stack of feedback for us to consider.

You say a stack. The other thing that I think we want to think about is what people say and what people do are not necessarily the same. So you may get verbal feedback, I would like X or Y. And then when you look at behavior in the market, it actually turns out people don't want to buy X or Y. They want to buy E and F. That's what they actually do, but they feel like they should want X or Y. So I think it's important when you bring the feedback back to us that it's not just what they say on the survey, but how does that stack up against actual behavior? Behavior in the marketplace.

So we're Steve Jobs and we're gonna tell people what they what they really want.

We're not I think that goes back to my my comment, you know, I asked the question would you purchase a house in this community? Not how do you feel about this design standard? So what I'm hearing I'm Roughly counting. It sounds like we should go ahead and get this out public. You've got the community you've got the feedback for the questions that should be asked. Let's start garnering some feedback and then we'll see where it goes from there. We'll start making decisions.

So is the developer... Feedback going to be during that open house period of September 17th through October 4th. Developers here, as well as developers who do that type of project that we want to be considered. Yeah, it's virtual.

Yeah, we'll be looking to have those conversations with folks.

Well, I mean, like reaching out specifically, inviting, not just say, hey, fill this out if you want to.

Proactive, invited feedback. We have a list. I would hope so. I hope you've got a list. Go wide. And I'd love to see feedback from outside the region as well. As David mentioned, North Dallas market may be different than the Austin market, but there's a lot of similarities. So let's get feedback from folks who might be interested in entering the market, not just those who are already there.

I mean, that's how we got some of the folks down here years ago.

Indeed. Indeed.

I think we're going to make another trip.

Council, any final thoughts?

Sold.

all right uh that takes us to uh the next items on our agenda which are executive session items it's uh we're gonna consider these in the next half hour item 3b executive session pursuant to section uh excuse me chapter 551.072 of the texas government code deliberations regarding the purchase exchange lease transfer and or sale of real property related to the limestone commercial the pfluger farm lane north project Item 3C, Executive Session, Deliberation of Personnel Matters Regarding the Appointment, Employment, Evaluation, Reassignment, and Duties of the City Manager Pursuant to Section 551.074 of the Texas Government Code. And Item 3D, Executive Session, Consultation with the City Attorney Pursuant to Section 551.071 of the Texas Government Code Regarding Interlocal Agreement Between the City and Travis County Emergency Services District Number 2 for the Allocation of Sales Tax Revenue. The time is 629. We are in Executive Session. executive session during our work session no action was taken at this time we're going to adjourn our work session it is right there time for us to convene our regular session we're going to take about five minutes to get prepared for that we'll be back with you shortly work session adjourned all right Good evening, Pflugervilleans and those others in attendance. We welcome you to this regular meeting of the Pflugerville City Council. I invite you at this time to rise and join me in our pledge to the U.S. flag, followed by the pledge to the Texas flag, and if you would then remain standing as we observe a moment of silence. I pledge allegiance to the under the Texas flag, I pledge allegiance Thank you. Please take your seats. This brings us to the portion of our council meeting for public comment. In accordance with the Texas Attorney General opinion, any public comment that is made on an item that is not on the published final agenda will only be heard by the City Council. No formal action, discussion, deliberation, or comment will be made by the City Council. Each person providing public comment will be limited to three minutes. Several folks who have signed up to make public comment. Also at this time, any items that are included on our consent agenda, I will be asking you to speak at this time if that is an item that you noted that you would be speaking on. The first person, as noted, you'll have three minutes to speak. If you would come forward, William Otolora. If you would come forward, you have the podium for three minutes.

Well, my name is William Otoloro, and I'm here just to state a couple of information on law enforcement. You know, I feel like I was a victim of either racial discrimination or not following standard procedure with your law enforcement. A few years ago, you know what I'm saying, I left $12,000 in an Uber driver. You know what I'm saying? I found an Uber driver, called law enforcement, you know what I'm saying? Obviously, law enforcement profiled me because of my tattoos and the way I looked. They looked like I wasn't going to be financially stable. You know what I'm saying? You guys that are terrorists, you know what I'm saying, take $12,000 away from me and a Rolex from me. I ended up going a whole year with court, court for a whole year waiting for the deputies to show up, you know what I'm saying, to the court here to see what happened with the case. no call no reply no nothing so i feel like i'm a victim i wasted money time i went to the court and i haven't got no apology you know see what's going on with the case and see what's going on basically what everything is going on you guys had a terrorist living in an apartment building you guys had three terrorists living in the city of the city of flugerville and me because i got profiled i didn't get the time of day or the respect you know what i'm saying and i lost my money lost my job i'm saying and that person is still out there I mean, I beat the case. No law enforcement showed up. The person that filed charges against me never showed up. Clearly the dude was wearing my Rolex. I said it to the law enforcement, homie, he has my Rolex, whole nine yards. I got my receipt for my stuff, everything I purchased. You guys had 15 deputies harassing me and my wife and my kids versus somebody that had my property right there in their house. And you guys let them go. They signed a terrorist threat against me. Like I said, I went to court for a whole year. Nobody showed up or the victim. So where do I stand with that? You know, I lost my job, lost my stuff, lost my career, you know, over having terrorists on my record. I have nothing on my record. My criminal background is clean as a whistle. I'm saying, so I asked, you know, I guess the deputy Willie that I talked to him earlier, you know, what happens, he's going to investigate the case. But I'm asking, you know what I'm saying, I mean, what happens now? What happens to the person that filed charges against me when he stole my money and my watch? And that's what I'm here to say. You know what I'm saying? You know, my tax dollars went up over $8,000. I purchased my house. So I feel like I got somebody to actually hear me out. You know what I'm saying? And see what's going on. And that's it. That's pretty much all I got to say.

Thank you for being here tonight. Next on my list is Charlie Torres.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor, good evening, City Council. Just wanted to invite you guys to the Alma Leadership Network. It's a celebration for Hispanic Heritage Month coming up this weekend. It'll be there at the Gilliland Creek Park Pavilion, and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. The group is ALMA, Advancing Latino Minds Through Action. We just formed it about eight to ten months ago. We've got a board of directors set up. We've got our nonprofit organization status now. And it's going to be lots of fun, going to be some foods, going to be some treats, some fun, some booths that have some fun things for kids. And we're going to have some performances We have Infusion Dance. We have the kids doing their performances. So come out and have some fun with us and support us as we kick off Hispanic Heritage Month. So I hope you guys can make it. I think Mayor gave you a couple of flyers on this. And if y'all want to take photocopies of it or if you want me, I can leave mine here. And that's another copy. But it's fine. We're on Facebook. So thank you so much. Y'all can make it. Thank you, Charlie.

NEXT, I HAVE CHRIS ANDERSON.

GOOD EVENING, MAYOR, COUNCIL MEMBERS, CITY STAFF MEMBERS. MY NAME IS CHRIS ANDERSON. I'M A KEY VOLUNTEER WITH FOOD FOR ALL PROJECT HERE IN PFLUGERVILLE. WE ARE 100% VOLUNTEER LED nonprofit organization serving food insecurity in the Pflugerville and Austin metro area. We're more than just a food pantry. We are a resource for people for peace of mind, filling that table on a daily basis, as well as a food rescue organization taking food waste out of the Austin metro area. Food for All is an essential community service, not only here in Pflugerville, but throughout the metro area. We attempt to be open daily while other resources are often closed or have restrictions on attendance. Our mission is very simple, to take hunger off the dinner table and put food on that table for those families. The need in Pflugerville and the Austin metro area is significant. We serve over 160 families every day. 82% of our attendees are at or below the federal poverty level here in the area. Just in 2026, we have fed nearly 36,000 minors under the age of 17 through our daily food operations. We serve a very diverse population. We welcome all with no income or geographic location requirements. We have people of all ethnicities and food dietary specialty needs. These are our neighbors. They're working families, seniors, single parents, college students, military families, TSA workers. Many of these people are affected with government shutdowns, businesses selling, SNAP benefits that fluctuate and income that all of a sudden isn't there because of a shutdown. I also want to share a personal story that during a period of unemployment for myself in the last 10 months, Food for All Project has helped me stay grounded, connected, and supported. I've seen firsthand how this organization changes the lives of so many people. Recently, we received a stop order from the city stop operations because we were not in a zoned business district we've been working very hard for months to find a sustainable home for the organization to find a space we to find that space we even signed a lease in april of 2026 off of windermere to meet the needs of the city code Over the last several months, we have received several blocks in trying to get the proper permits that our contractors are trying to do. Bottom line, it's a critical gap for the ability to operate in a space that's fully aligned with the city code, yet the decline for food need in this area has not declined, only increased. we're not asking for special treatment we're asking for support clarity and timely action so we can continue serving the residents of pflugerville and the surrounding area with food on their table thank you thank you uh next i have uh jason is it burger yeah

Hey guys, I'm Jason Berger. I'm a real estate investor and I buy dilapidated shopping centers or underperforming shopping centers and I improve them. So in April, I signed a lease with these guys, Food For All, and I am trying to get them into my space. However, I've been stopped by the city of Pflugerville at every possible turn. So I applied for the permit in November. I found out in January that I did not apply correctly. And so I had to reapply, did everything. We're basically turning an 8,000 square foot previous karate space into three smaller units. What else? Oh, yeah. I get... I keep failing the inspections. So we do everything according to the plan. We do it with... My contractor is not perfect, but he does his best. And we do everything. We get the inspection. The inspector comes and he basically says, hey, you did this right, but you did this wrong. And so we fix it. We... do it again next week. And he says, OK, now this isn't right. It's like, well, why didn't you tell us that the first time? Because we just tried to do this inspection. We're just trying to do everything by the code, and we're doing everything we can. Every time I fail, I spend a lot of additional money to try to fix everything and make it right. And it's causing delays. I told these guys that I would be ready in September. And it's looking more like it's going to be maybe November, December. We keep going at this pace. It could even be January. I hope it doesn't get to that point, but it could. My same contractor is doing the same job in Leon Valley at a bigger space, the 17,000 square foot space. And he's had no issues with the city, no delays, no nothing. I was looking to buy other properties in this city, but given the experience I've had here, I think I'm just not going to do that. I even made an offer on one, and I basically took it back because I've been having such trouble with the city here. So I hope you guys can understand. I'm really trying to get these guys in here. They're doing great stuff for the community. I'm trying to do good stuff for the community. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next, I have Dana Ajern.

Good evening, Council. My name is Dana Azaran, and I am here as a volunteer for Food for All. Food for All is more than a food rescue. This nonprofit has been serving the community for many years. My sons and I have volunteered with Stacey Fletcher and her efforts since 2020. It carried us through COVID, and we continue to feed the community of all ages. And I've taught my sons through these activities through these volunteer activities the meaning of community, especially in a time of hardship. For six years, she has worked to establish Food for All as a nonprofit, built alliances with various organizations to increase the amount of food that is rescued, and worked in local spaces to distribute food safely. Food for All is currently closed at their current distribution location on railroad due to zoning issues as the gentleman before me have discussed. And I'm here to ask the city to please work with the organization to come to an agreement that will allow them to reopen as soon as possible until their new space is ready hopefully later this year. The organization distributes to an average of 144 homes each day, and they've managed to serve 157,254 people in those households over the past 12 months. They've saved over $1.7 million worth of food in the past 12 months. Food for All has been a great resource for those needing help navigating SNAP and other community resources that are very much needed at this time. Whether Stacey's brightening somebody's day with rescued flowers, bouquets of flowers, or fresh bread that they get to put on their table, Stacey Fletcher and the Food for All organization really need our help to continue to provide this vital assistance to the Pflugerville community, and I ask for your help. Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, I have Amin Abarabad.

Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Amin. Last meeting, I spoke on the financial aspects of the ACC tax. Today, I want to address the soul of our city. Fiscally, running a city behaves a lot like a business. To run a successful business, you don't just patch failing systems to keep the lights on. That baseline survival keeps you trapped in a bubble while massive forces out of your control like inflation, economy, and shifting demographics change. In business, you have to spend money to make money, which is usually a costly expenditure, but is the tried and true method to get a return on your investment. How can we expect to solve any issues in our city that require a nuanced approach without investing in the future of Pflugerville, which resides in our students and our education professionals? A growing city needs a diverse workforce with all kinds of professional levels to accommodate all the different demographics of people and all their different stages of life. Austin's growth boom from 2021 has already plateaued, and consequently, so has Pflugerville's. We can't ride on Austin's coattail forever. People will find a way to make a living if that means leaving Pflugerville because all it ever was to them is a convenient rest stop to have access to actual developing cities, they will do that. And in that future, God forbid, the budget crisis will only get worse and worse as homegrown Pflugerville residents leave with their money, talent, and community. This will only lead to more crisis management measures like Pflugerville's contract with Allegiance that proved to be a short-term band-aid with long-term consequences. Some measures like health care, education, and housing are non-negotiables. If you can't treat those as equally important to the people who not only want a roof over their head, but also want to be in good health, and not only want to have all their limbs intact, but want to feel fulfilled in their careers, then one way or another, Pflugerville will suffer. I'd also like to add that I find it counterproductive of you, Council Member Rogers, to argue in the last council meeting on behalf of Pflugerville's lackluster growth as compared to surrounding cities, while simultaneously aligning yourself with efforts that stifle Pflugerville's future potential. Cities don't just grow from attracting developers by lowering impact fees who don't give a damn about anything other than their own profit margins. The prospects of the city have to be attractive to the actual people living and moving here, including our neighbors, including our neighbors that live and grow up in Pflugerville with aspirations for greater things, not just the residents fortunate enough to have already bought homes here, which I should mention are not just used as domiciles for living in America. Homes are economic assets and generational wealth for the owners to use as financial mobility for themselves or for their kids. Either way, their value and marketability is a top priority for homeowners. Consider who and how your homes will be bought if the next generation that would become home-owning age can't afford to do so, which for the first time home buyers has skyrocketed from 30 years old in 2000 to 40 years old in 2026. I'm confident that the thought of selling to private equity that'll undercut your homes out of desperation isn't the plan you had in mind at the time of buying your houses. With all that being said, higher education is statistically still the best and most effective method of reliably increasing your financial mobility and opening the doors for young people to the American dream. An investment in education is the bare minimum, even selfishly, that we should all prioritize in Pflugerville. Thank you, and please vote yes to the ACC tax on the ballot this November. Thank you.

Incredible timing as well. Next on an item on consent, Les Wall. Les, if you'd come give us your statement.

I still need glasses. Well, I'm up here again on the Emanuel Road project. The first time I came before council and the planning group was in 2021. At that point in time, there was a little over 100 acres at the intersection of Wells Branch and Emanuel that were up for redevelopment. There was a lot of discussion about how that should proceed, and it was approved. And at that time, the group JCI said, we will pay for the chicken lane, a third lane that runs parallel to our properties, as well as give you a land for a park. Again, now this was in 21. In 2024, JCI and the city also went to the state licensing group, and in May, they were both reviewed, and JCI again used $4.5 million, and the city used $20 million for theirs. here we are in 26 and I know it was repaved and the biggest question that I've got out of this whole thing is JCI still kicking in four and a half million dollars into this deal because I don't see their money anywhere in our deal. Our initial amount was 20 million. Of course, we're getting 18.7, which is going to go to the Liberty Group. And Rodriguez Group, they also went before and did the engineering on it. And now we're doing another $160,000 for materials testing. I would have thought they had all the specifications before they bid. So if they missed bid or underbid and find out that the materials they're using aren't up to specs, in my opinion, they pay. But from that standpoint, again, the biggest question I've got is, when is it supposed to start as far as the road actually being torn up and traffic rerouted and number two is the 4.5 million including the 18.7 or is jci getting their own contractor to do their work separate apart from the city now that's the biggest issue i've got because in gatlinburg we still feel landlocked i do know there is a way to go through the subdivision out of wells branch it definitely won't be very convenient And one of the things I will say is the rep for JCI said, well, you can use the old bridge. Does anybody really think the Texas Department of Transportation is going to approve that bridge to be used? No, it's going to have to be torn down in the plans that we've seen. That's not part of what the use is going to be. But my big question is, is that $4.5 million still being contributed by the developer? And if not, what happened? Because in 24, he didn't make the application. So I will close up saying that and don't necessarily expect an answer now, but we'll come back and ask later. Thank you.

Thank you, Les. And another item on the consent agenda, DJ Lozada for consent item 5F.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. I stand to voice my opposition to Agenda Item 5F to authorize $4.6 million in additional funding to be transferred from the PCDC for maintenance and operations costs for the Monarch Community Center. My name is DJ Lozada. I'm a 20-year resident of the City of Pflugerville, Vice President of the Pflugerville Community Development Corporation, and a current candidate for City Council Place 4. I want to begin by acknowledging each of you. Public service requires sacrifice, and regardless of where we agree or disagree, I respect the time and dedication you continue to give to this community. My comments tonight are my own and do not represent an organization or individual with whom I may be affiliated. I am here because regardless of who sits on this council, the economic headwinds facing Pflugerville are stark. We have significant financial obligations ahead of us. I believe our most meaningful pathway to reducing the burden on taxpayers and strengthening our financial position is through economic development. When an issue requesting millions of additional funding came before the PCDC board, I was the sole vote against it. Tonight, I am asking you to heed my warning and not approve this $4.6 million commitment in PCDC funds for Project Fit. Let me be clear. I support the Monarch and I want it to succeed. But the question is not whether the Monarch deserves our support. The question is how we pay for it. PCDC exists to grow Pflugerville's economy. These dollars give us the ability to attract employers, support business expansion, create jobs, and grow our commercial tax base. That tax base matters because sustainable commercial revenue can reduce the pressure we continuously place on homeowners. And taxpayers have had enough. They are demanding that we do better. When we redirect millions in economic development dollars towards ongoing city operations, we solve one problem by potentially weakening one of the tools we need to address another. And we continue a troubling precedent. The Monarch needs a sustainable operating model. Moving another $4.6 million from the PCDC does not create one. There is a more responsible path. Fund the immediate need, then return each year. Show the actual operating costs and revenues. show what has been done to reduce the city subsidy, then allow the PCDC to consider its financial position and economic development opportunities before committing additional funds. None of us knows what's gonna happen tomorrow. but when anything does happen pflugerville needs to be able to answer economic development is not extra money it is how we grow the tax base we will most certainly need to support the community as we continue to build and grow that's more than leadership it is stewardship i respectfully ask you not to approve the 4.6 million for this reason thank you thank you uh and one person wishing to speak on executive item 7d david armistead

Good evening, everybody. My name is Dave Armistead. I've lived in Meadow Park South for 12 years, my wife and I, directly across from Duchenne Fest entrance, main entrance. So we've seen a lot of Duchenne, had a lot of good times. Duchenne Fest is coming next month, so we're going through it all again. I'm from a residence... From a resident's perspective, two issues have become connected in my opinion. Accountability and affordability. At 511 City Park Road, residents have documented reoccurring conditions for months. multiple vehicles, open storage, repeated notices, cases closed without records showing what was inspected, corrected, or considered compliant. This is not simply a neighbor dispute. It affects the appearance, marketability of nearby homes, and a major entrance to Pfluger Park. The city also confirmed through a public PIA response that code compliance has no written procedures concerning ADA communications, inspection standards, inspection, re-inspection, closure photographs, chronic violations. No SOPs. That means council can only see what residents are seeing, case labels and conclusions, without documentation needed to determine whether enforcement was consistent or effective. Residents now face the same problem with the water. My Pflugerville bill was $320.72. A comparable Round Rock bill was 120.93. Families are allowing yards to die because they cannot afford the water. Against the backdrop, the new city hall creates painful optics. Residents are absorbing rising costs while the city appears to lack basic written controls and essential operations. Councilmember Ryan's response referenced an operational efficiency audit. I appreciate that information, but residents need to know whether the audit is funded and dependent, includes code compliant parks, and whether its findings will be released publicly. Tonight, I respectfully ask the Council to take three actions. First, direct the City Manager to require every department to maintain current and written SOPs set with separate, specific standards for code compliance. Second, ensure the operational efficiency audit is independent, funded, includes code compliance and parks, and producing public findings. Third, require outcome-based reporting, not merely cases open and closed, but reinspections, photographs, citations, court referrals, abatements, repeat violations, and reasons for closure. We're not asking for perfection. We're asking for documented, consistent, transparent government and confidence the council is making decisions for complete information.

Thank you. Thank you, David. That concludes the citizen comment cards that I have received. Is there anyone else from the public wishing to make comment during this time? All right, we will move forward to item four on our agenda, presentations. I have two presentations to make. The first item I have tonight is a Mayor's Proclamation declaring September 2026 as Preparedness Month in the City of Fleurville. Texas faces many types of disasters each year, reminding us that emergencies can happen at any time. National Preparedness Month encourages everyone to strengthen their readiness to prevent, respond to, and recover from emergencies. The City of Pflugerville urges all residents to take part in preparedness activities. Residents are encouraged to visit ready.gov for helpful information and to sign up for emergency alerts through warncentraltexas.org to stay informed and prepared. So therefore, I proclaim 2026 September as preparedness month in the city of Pflugerville. We have Kaipo Cowan, our emergency risk and safety manager here to accept the proclamation. And I've had the opportunity to make this proclamation at CAPCOG as well. I invite everyone to make sure you get your Emergency weather radio for those times when the power goes out. When your cell phone dies, make sure that you have the ability to access emergency information. And next, I get to declare September 15th, 2026 to October 15th, 2026 as Hispanic Heritage Month here in the city of Pflugerville. Hispanic Heritage Month honors Americans with ancestry from Spain, Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean. The month encourages greater awareness of Hispanic culture, history, and diversity, inspiring future generations to learn from and celebrate this vibrant heritage. It also highlights values deeply rooted in Hispanic traditions, family, hard work, perseverance, and maybe most of all tonight, community. I do proclaim September 15th to October 15th as Hispanic Heritage Month, and I have several members of our esteemed organizations here with us tonight to accept this proclamation. I have former Mayor Victor Gonzalez, City Council member Cesar Ruiz, I have school board members, Charlie Torres and Claudia Yanez here representing the Hispanic community in leadership positions throughout our community. If you would come forward.

You said wake up.

I've been in deposition all day. No sympathy, baby.

Oh, the backup phone. I like that. That was Cesar's phone? I should have just given him my phone.

Council members, that brings us to the consent agenda. Are there any items wishing to be pulled from the consent agenda?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. I have three items. And because today is Star Trek Day, I'm going to give you the letters in the names of alien races from Star Trek. So that's E. L. Aryan. F as in Ferengi and H as in the Horta.

Can you give me those in... E, F, and H. Oh, that's what you're trying to say. D. D. Alright, I've got D, E, F, and H. Stop.

I don't know any Star Trek.

What would be a D Star Trek, David? Daya.

Are you kidding me, Dad?

Any other items, counsel? He's not a Star Trek fan. No, I didn't get that. Oh, and we are pulling 5C. There will be no action on that this evening. So Trista, can you read the consent agenda for me?

I have items 5C, 5D, 5E, 5F, and 5H pulled from the consent agenda. 5A is ordinance on second reading with the caption reading, an ordinance of the city of Pflugerville, Texas, amending the city's unified development code, chapter 157 code of ordinances. As a zoning map amendment by changing the zoning of properties located at 1304 and 1312 Taylor Avenue from an agriculture development reserve zoning district to a single family suburban zoning district and providing other matters relating to the subject. Again, 5C, 5D, 5E, 5F, and 5H have been pulled from consent. All remaining items may be acted upon in a single motion.

So moved. Yes. Second. I have a motion and a second.

Mine's broken. Is it broken for everyone?

Yeah, it's for all of us.

All right.

Yeah, refreshing didn't work. We'll handle this by voice vote. Mr. Ruiz? Yes. Mr. Mateo? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Holliday? Yes. Mr. Kaufman?

Yes.

Mr. Rogers? Yes. Ms. Ryan? Yes. Mayor votes yes. Consent agenda passes unanimously. Good, because I'm out of practice on that. That brings us to next item on our agenda is item 6A. Item 6A is to discuss and consider action to approve an ordinance on first and final reading with the caption reading, an ordinance of the city of Pflugerville, Texas, adopting the annual budget for fiscal year 2027, providing appropriations for each city department and fund, adopting the city's master fee schedule containing the cumulative clause and containing a savings and severability clause. Director Waldron.

Yes, good evening. So we've been doing this for several months now in public, and we're at the finish line here. I do want to point out changes that have occurred from when the fiscal 27 proposed budget was issued. Originally, we had expenditures totaling $495 million. and with the changes that were discussed at the last meeting regarding the 26 bond projects we have reduced the capital outlay in that capital improvement fund by 13.8 million so the final appropriations out of this budget would be the 481.4 million What was left in the budget was $1.3 million for the animal shelter and $150,000 for Reunion Park. In the summary, I also included several additions that you would see, changes between the two documents, forecasts for several of our major funds have been added, clarification of personnel actions regarding COLAs, step plans, market adjustments, and also which departments were not fully funded. That's all been added to the personnel pages. We added the city development agreements appropriately in that department, and we did find one error on permanent extension fee. It was not $5,000. It should be $500. It is corrected in the master fee schedule now. So the only adjustment was to the general capital fund was $123 million, and the proposed is now down to $110 million. This ordinance does require two motions, and I have provided those for you. There is an extra step of the ratification whenever you are using a tax rate that is going to increase property taxes. So that motion is required.

All right. Thank you, Tracy. All right. Council, this is to discuss and consider action. Do we have any questions, discussion related to the budget? I know we've been through it several times.

I do.

All right. Melody, what questions do you have?

So overall, my goal is to get the overall no new revenue tax rate of 0.5407. And I think we should also evaluate whether we can do better than that. But the bigger issue is the recurring cost base. Pflugerville is currently growing around 1% to 2% per year. So I want to understand whether personnel, contracts, facilities, and service costs are growing at a sustainable rate relative to the population. workload, and comparable communities. I'm looking at both immediate opportunities to lower the fiscal 27 tax and utility rates and structural changes that can reduce pressure in future years. One of the things that I saw in the five-year chart and the discussion of it was the assumption that property tax rates were going to grow 2%. And so I have concerns about that because I'm seeing articles, I see it in my own neighborhood, that property values continue to decline this year. So I am concerned because if we're having a decline in our existing properties, it's unclear what is the estimate of new construction and what's the estimate of existing construction. And so I sent that information Anyway, I got question our answers on Friday afternoon and reviewed them this weekend and I sent additional questions, but I'm concerned about that I'm concerned at our ability to continue to afford the operating costs that we have year over year especially for next year You know my own floor plan in my neighborhood was listed a hundred thousand dollars less and than what it was evaluated at. And so that's my concern. A couple of items that I want to talk about specifically about how I want to get to the new revenue rates is I didn't see any reduction, one of the items I didn't see any reduction in the canceled flock contract that was included in the budget. Another item was, and I think staff are looking into this, the vehicle replacement fund and the transfer timing, because we're estimating $150,000 of interest income And if we time it where we only transfer as we need, then, or to make a large transfer at the end, some of that interest income could stay in the general fund and provide property tax relief. Another item that concerned me was in the debt service fund and the arbitrage expense. Because the additional information that I received was out of the $615,000, $55,000 was related to the debt service fund, but the rest was related to capital projects. So my concern is, what is the policy of paying for arbitrage from the capital projects from the debt service when that money could be used to lower our property tax rate? Another concern is I know we've made some changes in our positions and we made some changes last year in our positions. And the last two years, our personnel expense has been, just for the general fund, a million dollars under budget. And I know that we have vacancy assumptions and thank you for making those more clear. BUT I'M CONCERNED ABOUT THAT, THAT WE'RE CONSISTENTLY HAVING A BUDGET AND A PROPERTY TAX RATE WHEN WE'RE COMING UNDER. AND IT'S A LARGER NUMBER THAT WE'RE UNDER BUDGET WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE CITY AS A WHOLE. ANOTHER CONCERN I HAD WAS BOND CONSULTANT. WE SIGNED A CONTRACT FOR 156,000. PHASE THREE WAS FOR THE communications if a bond went forward. We didn't go forward with a bond. So I'm concerned about, well, what's the 50,000 or so left on that contract? Another item that I wanted to bring up is the TERS, the Tax Incentive Reinvestment Zone. I had concerns about this in 2010 and 2011 when it was established and I did speak at those meetings one of the issues is that there is a city service payment of $250 per single-family home and 175 for multifamily home that is supposed to be, you know, all of the taxes of the additional value go into the TERS and then some of that money, the 250 and 175, is to go back to the general fund to pay for the services that are provided to all of those homes, which is almost 800 single-family homes and almost 1,400 multifamily homes. And that money, I mean, that service payment has not increased since 2011. But correct me if I'm wrong, our operations costs have gone up a lot since then. And so all of those almost 2,200 homes, we're not getting reimbursed for the cost of serving those homes. So that's not a thing that can be done tonight, but I think we need to look at it because where's the cost of installation? It's described as being able to reimburse the city for these services. So I think we need to look at that. I had some other questions about franchise fee revenue. When we're talking about the transfer payment from the Utility Service Fund, which there was an article about and people have asked me about it, multiple people, what is that for? And it was explained that it was a franchise fee, which makes sense for the utility to use the city land to operate. I'M CONCERNED WHY THAT FRANCHISE FEES ISN'T BEING CHARGED TO MANVILLE AND SOUTHWEST WATER AT THE SAME, YOU KNOW, AS OUR OWN UTILITY. SO THAT'S AN OPEN QUESTION. AND THEN OUR FRANCHISE FEES WERE REDUCED, LIKE, 40% FROM, LIKE, 6.7 TO 3 POINT SOMETHING.

SO THAT, I DO WANT TO CLARIFY, AND WE'VE TALKED ABOUT THIS, WE TOOK THE CITIES AMOUNT OUT OF THE FRANCHISE FEE CATEGORY AND PUT IT IN TRANSFERS TO CALL IT OUT.

OKAY.

SO THAT WAS THE REDUCTION.

OKAY. I GUESS I, WELL, THERE'S A LOT, AND I'M NOT SURE I SAW THAT WRITTEN IN THE BUDGET. OKAY. SO THEN THE OTHER, MY OTHER CONCERNS IS WE HAVE REDUCED OUR PERSONNEL BY 10 POSITIONS OVERALL. But personnel is still going up a lot. And there was a number of different things. And there is a market rate adjustment. And I don't recall receiving any report or anything about that. And we haven't discussed it as a council. So it's a large amount. I'm not saying that I disagree with it. But we haven't had a discussion about it. have the amount like what is the amount that this impacts our budget so these are just open questions that i have that we haven't discussed as a council um the other information i think it's important for us to know is what are the new operating costs for the facilities that we're going to be opening with city hall we know some of them with the monarch but also the public works It's going to be a partial year for 27, but it's going to be a full year for 28. There's not enough information. I got information about insurance and electricity, but I think we really need to have an understanding of what is the full cost of operating these new facilities and what is it going to cost us in the future years. um especially if we don't have property tax growth what do you think is missing regarding that i just just having the total number like what is you said you got all the parts and pieces and you need to well i don't i don't i don't know if i have all the parts and pieces but i did ask so what do you what do you feel is missing The total amount that's for each facility so that we understand How much is being added to our budget and what we need to consider for next year? Just it's it's just information that I did request but it's you know, normally it would have been in the the CIP but in previous years that information wasn't included to say what was going to be the operating cost for the next five years and And then downtown East is all lumped in together with the recreation center and the Monarch and the parking structure. So we don't know what's the information on each of those. That's just some informational. And then the bigger issue on the utility rates. And I don't have clarity on what our policy is. We have a budget of $10 million of impact revenue coming into the utility fund. And $8 million has been allocated to debt service to assist with the rates. And the other $2 million is for capital projects. But I think we need to have a larger conversation about, is that the right allocation? Why can't we use all $10 million to go towards water and wastewater relief? We also have a balance in our impact fee escrow fund. So there are funds sitting in there. So what is our policy about what timing and what are we going to tell staff when we should use it? Should we use it as soon as we have it, when we know that we have debt for the water treatment plant, the wastewater treatment plant in the Colorado River? But I think that's an opportunity of $2 million that we could use towards rate relief.

I think part of... Oh, no. No, go ahead.

I understand that there is, we're not sure.

There are projects that we have already assigned impact fees to. The $10 million is an estimate. I don't know that we'll bring $10 million in. We may only bring $8 million in. We might bring $12 million in. It's an estimate. We don't look at that fund or any of the CIP in a vacuum. We don't look at a one-year. We're always looking at a five-year estimate. And so we're trying to plan accordingly projects and the demands on the projects. Which projects can we use impact fees for? Not every project is allowed. So all of these things are considered. I mean, I feel like it's my job to look at all of this and to make those decisions. That's what I've done. I've made the estimates in the budget. I've made estimates on how much, I mean, we were paying no impact fees to debt, and now we're trying to figure out what is the balance of how much needs to go to debt and how much we still need to try and fund some of the projects with the same funding source to not have to go out and get more debt for these projects. So that is the way I look at it when I look and try to make those decisions.

And I guess the way I look to the rationale is that the reason why, you know, you said what the specific policy is, I think that, I mean, this is where I give staff a lot of credit because we said, listen, we need, they need some relief. Our citizens need relief right now regarding the economic conditions, everything that's happening around us. What can we do to do that? They went and they took the ball running and because there's SMEs in their own area and they said, listen, we can convert this specific amount $8 million and directly pay it toward that, which we allow for relief in this specific year. Then we got the five-year, because I want to say you gave us the projection on that as well. And, you know, I looked at it as, hey, listen, there's a problem We have concerns with this. Find us a solution. And they found a solution with that. I understand what you're saying. You're saying, well, why couldn't we just use it all on that as well and what the specific policy is? Well, I mean, if I recall correctly, this is one of the first times that we actually have used it directly to go ahead and do so. So that sounds like a good discussion when we get together, all y'all get together in January and decide what you're going to do with that. I do appreciate what staff has done with that, and I think that makes a demonstrative difference. I'm trying to understand better where you're coming from some of these items, because I get what you're saying that downtown east is all locked together regarding that, but what I want to say is that I give staff a lot of credit, because we're talking about project fit and all these other things. We're saying this is the M&O. This is what we need. This is what the estimate is right here as well. We're estimated for this amount of people, this amount, what's going to be taken into consideration for this FTE or, you know, project fit, you know, part-time, everything else that works for that, and for those different estimates. And they gave those amounts. I think that what you're asking is that you want a further breakdown regarding those specific areas. What I like is that, hey, listen, did you think about this? Because we are having these new things online. What are they going to cost? What are we looking at? Because, to be frank, we haven't always done that. You know, years, years ago here, and I think in the last seven, eight, nine years or so, we've done a pretty good job of saying, no, no, no, no, that's cool that we have this new shiny toy. What's it actually going to cost to operate? And, I mean, those are the two things I get from the comments that you've made and just trying to better understand that. Now, the franchise fee to Southwest and Manville...

Some of these things just need further, I feel like there needs to be further discussion and, you know, a policy direction or a strategy of why things are the way they are. Why are you doing that? So it's just that we didn't have a robust conversation last meeting and I had asked for a work session item. I missed the deadline apparently. um so that we could have more of a discussion you know in a work session um so that's why this is my last time to bring these up so i just i want to have more conversations about these types of things that maybe we haven't looked at in a while you know let's I'm just really concerned about the next couple of years and being able to afford all of the things that we want, especially given the commitments that we have with new facilities. So those are my concerns. Just have a couple. I just want to get it all out and you guys can do with it what you may. A couple of other things. Security cameras are still listed in the budget, and there have been some conversation about it. And my concern is with the policy. What is the criteria of when we decide that a new security camera needs to go in a certain location? You know, is there a certain level of damage? Is there a certain level of, you know, I asked for what's the criteria, and it didn't appear that there was one, and given our decision last meeting, I have concerns about that, because there's not detail about what type of camera it is and that.

Okay.

And then I think my final large thing is, and I brought it up before.

Are you sure it's your final?

I hope so. Okay. the Justice Center courtroom renovation.

Now, if you want to find money for animal shelter and Reunion Park,

There's a $2.2 million CIP, not all of it's in 2027, but it's 2.2 million. And out of that, 58% of it is contingency. So over 1.1 million and whatever it is, is contingency. And it's for 2,500 square feet to include a kitchen and some renovation of this space. So I just feel that's a vastly, overextended on the pricing on that. And that's an opportunity.

Wait, wait, wait. Okay, okay. You said you feel that.

Well, I reviewed some of the details. Well, obviously, half of it is contingency. You know, $80,000 on electronic lines. You know, things like that.

You don't think they did any of the pricing to get some estimate on it?

That was not the response. It said when the scope was more defined, then we could look at the cost.

What do you mean that was not the response? Well, in my written request.

So anyway, I think that is an opportunity that perhaps instead of spending over $2 million on 2,500 square feet, we can reallocate that towards the animal shelter.

I think I like the solution that we found, which I think we found both, you know, how to move both forward. I think one of the things that we've talked about here, and none of y'all get to see this, we get to see this rarely, is just how often this space is used. This is the space that they use for everything going on from there as well. So finally, the ability to convert this space and utilize this space as proper matter in a building. I mean, and that's another thing, too, as well. This building has been held together by shoestrings and bubble gum, I think is the vernacular utilized on this, over and over and over again. I mean, if you knew how much our officers and law enforcement are... know counselors have to utilize here it's ridiculous and so like to actually invest and try to fix some of this stuff trying to add some enemies that allows for honestly for this building to be used further as opposed to building a new city our new police station which we talked about years ago and at the same time it shows them a sense of respect and appreciation for what they're doing with that we're we're definitely moving forward the animal shelter i'm happy we're definitely moving forward we need a parking there I think that we can chew gum and walk at the same time. I don't know why I keep talking about bubble gum. But I understand where you're coming from here, but I'm guessing given how much Jerry Springer stuff is happening here that they've had to fix, they have some sort of idea about, okay, this is what it's going to cost to actually go ahead and get things done. Now, you're right. I don't know what they wrote in an answer to you, but I'm just saying.

Well, I received the Excel spreadsheet, which is $1.1 million in contingency, and normal contingency is 15% to 20%. So I'm not saying that it doesn't need to be renovated. I'm just saying that 2,500 square feet at $2.2 million is a lot. But they're in the market.

I mean, that's what I'm saying.

$2.2 million for $2,500 per feet is a lot.

I don't know what it costs as compared to you're using it as a police station.

Well, I think if we don't know what it's going to cost, we shouldn't have it.

Wait, wait, wait. No, I said I don't. I'm guessing since they gave that number, they didn't just go... They didn't go like that.

The contingency number that's hot, that's bad,

One of the challenges that we've had, I don't know if you remember the pool bathroom.

My gosh, what a mess.

Which we had an opportunity to pursue that, and I think it was $650,000, and that seemed like way too much to spend, and so we pushed it off for a year. What a good example. And I think we ended up spending $1.2 million.

At least 1.2.

So still less than the 2.2 million.

Yeah. But. I don't know what the square footage is of that.

Anyway, it's just in the market. Things cost more than we think they do. 2 million for 2,500 per feet. 58% contingency. That's what got me. I'm just telling you.

If there is that much contingency in there, then that tells me that we will have funds available for the uh extended renovations at the animal shelter let's uh let's expect we should we should allocate that now and what is i mean if all we if all we want to do is take the you you said 15 is normal we're at 58 you're saying it's 1.2 million in contingency somewhere around there somewhere around 1.2 million in contingency at 58 roughly 60 so if we move 850 000 of that to the animal shelter You're cool with the budget?

I'm cool with that part of it. Well, I said what I wanted for the budget was .5407.

You're looking for the... What's the impact to the median homeowner at that rate?

I didn't prepare that.

I believe I calculated that out to about $24 a year. Does that sound about right?

For the proposed tax rate, right?

Yeah.

Yeah. I think you were asking about the no new revenue.

No, no, no. Sorry. No, the difference between the no new revenue and voter-approved rate, I believe, is a difference of $24 to the homeowner. Now, I will also say one of the things that I undertook, because I asked the question, but then I also like to check my work, right? So I pulled every parcel in the city. I looked at everyone who had a homestead exemption last year and everyone who has a homestead exemption this year. I looked at their assessed value for each year, and I looked at the rates to see what is the impact, not just to the median home, but to... most people in the city, and I found that 70% of those homeowners would be paying less with this rate than they paid last year. 70%? Over 70%. Whoa. Over 70% of homeowners would be paying less at this rate than they paid last year. Wow. So that was a pretty significant story. It's because that's how tax rates work, yes.

I was about to say, but that's not, okay, yeah, I was about to say, you know, you can't make that argument because that's the way tax rates work.

Frequently we'll hear, oh, no, my value went up, but the rate went down. Well, why did my value went up? My value went down, but the rate went up. Well, that's bad, too. What I believe matters to our homeowners is dollars. not rates, not values, but dollars that they pay in taxes.

Absolutely.

And if 70% of our homeowners are paying less at this rate, I think that's a very compelling story.

so the other thing though is that you can't look at one year in a vacuum it's over time and so i did look at my own personal residence and you know just like when did when when values started really skyrocketing and so from 2020 until 2026 with this estimated my property taxes went up 1345 dollars a year just for the city So I'm just saying at one year, like, that's great. I mean, I'm in that 30%, you know, so, and I'm happy that 70% are going to get a reduction, but their, their increase from 2020 and over the last five years, it's been significant. And so, so yes, but we can, I think we can still do a little bit better and we have to, you know, like, And next year, I'm just real concerned about next year.

No, no, indeed. I mean, I saw your post online and I wanted to do the math as well. So you posted from 2008 to 2026. And what was your annualized increase in your taxes?

From 2028 to 2028? No, from 2008 to 2026, yeah. Well, I don't have it in front of me.

Okay. Well, when I did the math, it was 2.8% per annum with a CPI of 2.5. So it certainly has increased over the term that any of us have lived here. Which is the expectation. But has it?

But most of the increase has happened in the last five years, five, six years.

I mean, I would argue that our quality of life has also dramatically increased in the last 14 years that I've been here or whatever, right?

I think you're putting that lightly. And I think that's the reality. And we had this conversation many moons ago when it was at 8%. We had the conversation about, okay, do we need 8%? What's happened with the reality? And specifically, what we do is figure out, okay, what do we need? What do we want? And we go lower than 8% and trying to go from there, but our growth was going substantial with that. Now you're, I mean, again, telling y'all this, something that y'all are well aware of is that, you know, you have 3.5 and you see what's happening with the city. Like, let's be clear. If any citizens are watching this right there, accordingly right there, You are getting to a point where you're going to have to get used to every November going for a bond to figure out what you're going to pay for. Because guess what? If you want to support your law enforcement, you want to support your services, you want to support your parks, etc., you're going to have to pay for that. But we will not have the funds to be able to do so. And 3.5, as James has brought us this time around, is with a bunch of FTEs cut, with a lot of deficit, with a lot of, I'm not going to say shell gains, but a lot of machinations done to help support the citizens in this time of need. Next year, you will likely not have 3.5. You will likely have either two, if you're lucky. over here. And we know for a fact that with the growth and development and all the services and the things that people want, that is not going to cover anything that you're going to need here. And the concern for me is that if you're not able to go ahead and do what we can with 3.5, we're having an argument about 3.5 right now. I mean, what's going to happen then? Because I'm telling you, as Jonathan put it so eloquently, is that people move here because of quality of life. They move here because of the school district. They move here because of their homes and the services they have made available for that. And we're getting to a point where, again, being blunt with the citizens around here is that you're going to have to figure out what you want to pay for. And you have to go every November and figure out, okay, are we going to be able to go ahead and make sure we get that COLA done for our law enforcement groups? What are we going to do for those general services that we want regarding our roads and infrastructure? Because the city will not have the funds. I get where you're coming from, and I get what you're saying about, hey, listen, I want to be able to help with the leak. And I'm proud this council was able to do that and look at those things. The reality is, is that... You're in a situation next year, which I'll be curious to be able to sit out there and... No, I won't be out here.

Are you going to be there? I'll get a text message about it.

I'll go to five people online.

But these are real decisions that are really impacting cities, not just across Central Texas, but across the state.

So one of the things that we have said over and over, and I appreciate that PCDC is in the house representing, is that economic development is supposed to relieve tax residents. And we've grown and whatever. So the other thing is looking at it at a per capita basis, which I did. So 10 years ago, on a per capita basis, our property taxes was $366 per person. And now it's around 780. And so that's the other thing, is economic development and bringing up, we've brought in a lot of things. We have brought in a lot of things over these last 10 years. But yet, on a per capita basis, we are paying more. So has growth been paying for itself? So the no new revenue rate, which both Hutto and Williamson County, I saw in the news, were past the no new revenue rate. That's supposed to be the same for the existing and then you have your new development and you grow your services for the new commercial and the new residential. So we've done that and this is over double on a per capita basis. So I'm just saying there is a real cost. to the property taxes to our homeowners on the ratepayers with our utilities and these costs have gone up a lot and Some people are fortunate to have their income increase at that at that time and some people are not and so These are just some realities and you know great things are happening, but We're not in control of the market, and we're not in control of the legislature.

Tracy, real quick, could you remind me, how much do we expect to collect in total from property tax? I believe it's about $30 million.

That sounds about right. A little less, I think. In general fund.

In general fund. And our public safety, our police department, that budget alone is over $25 million, right? I think that's always an important thing to remember. It's in the budget.

I pulled that from the budget. I was going to say, let's be clear what the mayor said about that. So pull in 30, 25 law enforcement. And let's be clear, no matter what city you live in, Law enforcement services are going to be the biggest part of your budget, no matter what. And you've got to understand that that is not Pflugerville, that is not Austin, Dallas, that's how it is in America. And that's what drives a lot of the cops. So if you want to continue, because we talk about, as Councilman Rogers talks about, having one of the safest cities in America and working for those things. How are you going to pay for these things from that when you're having a further dwindling of your resources and revenue? Now, this is what I'll say to you regarding you said about PCDC and having commercial pay for itself as opposed to putting it on the backs of residents. We are back. Again, I've said it before. I'm going to say it again out here. We are back in the 2008-2009 period. where we're going to need our economic development corporation to go ahead and make some big bets and help bring some things in here from that. Because I would challenge you is that no one anticipated the homes in Central Texas to go skyrocket in value the way that nobody anticipated that. Nobody anticipated about the inflation. That's the part that, you know, we always talked about how it was high and flying and going. Nobody anticipated to where it's at here today. So the reality is that, you know, I think it's done well to go ahead and show that burden, that shift, but the reality is that we're at a point again where now, hey, listen, we've got to bring in some of these businesses, we've got to bring in these commercials, and we've got to have the infrastructure to do so. Well, if you're going to have the infrastructure to do so, you're going to have to pay money to go ahead and make sure you have folks who feel safe and secure in their homes. You have roads that people can drive on. Those things are basic needs, water services, that people can actually go and rely on. Those are huge things that people will go on from that. And I think that's, again, you're going to pay for things, but what do we get back? And what's great about this city is that I do believe that it's on the right trajectory to go ahead and regain some of the things that it needs from those things.

Let me bounce off of some of those ideas, because I want to first of all aggressively agree, if you'd like to say, WITH YOU THAT OUR PRIORITY SHOULD BE POLICE, ROADS, WATER, AND PARKS. THOSE ARE THE FOUR, TO MY MIND, ESSENTIAL THINGS THAT THE CITY DOES. I WOULD, HOWEVER, TAKE SOME EXCEPTION TO YOUR statement that none of this was predictable. In 2020 and 2021, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, the federal government printed an unprecedented amount of money. The idea that you could do that and not have large inflation after that is just ridiculous. Everybody knows if you print a whole bunch more money, you're going to get inflation. And both Republicans and Democrats did it, and it was totally foreseeable that we were going to have a serious inflation problem after that. And then, of course, you know, COVID caused all kinds of supply disruptions, which increased that. So those were not unforeseeable problems. Then, without asking the citizens to vote on the bonds, we issued the bonds for the new city hall and the Monarch. The citizens did approve $47 million for the Monarch. We were spending almost double that.

Why are we spending almost double that? On the Monarch. No, why are we spending almost double on it?

Because the council approved spending almost double on it without going to the citizens. The idea that we couldn't foresee that there would be substantial expenses and that the number of FTEs that are required for those new buildings, which are greatly in excess of our current needs, that we couldn't foresee that that would cause an economic problem, and that it would cause shortfalls for the budget going forward. is just not credible. It was completely foreseeable. I foresaw it. I warned this council about it. And of course, Councilman Coffman wasn't here then. But the rest of you all decided to go ahead without citizen approval and push forward and issue those bonds. And now we're paying the piper. It was completely foreseeable. We did it anyway. And now we need to tighten our belts and deal with it. But you can have lots of economic growth without exceeding the no new revenue rate. How do I know that? Because I look to Hutto and I look to Williamson County. Five of the last six years, Hutto has done the no new revenue tax rate. Now, they have budget issues every year. in part because of that, but if you don't spend all the money, sometimes you might have some money left over. And I think, and it's compounded too. We increase the tax rate this year, then the base rate for next year is higher. So if we do the no new revenue rate this year and next year and the year after that and the year after that and the year after that, you have a lot lower tax rate than if you go to the maximum every year. In my view, going to the maximum all the time is imprudent fiscal policy, and pushing forward for a quarter billion dollars in debt, a generational debt, without allowing the citizens to vote on it was a bad idea, and it has foreseeable consequences.

Tracy, I had a couple questions. I know Melody went through all hers. Real quick, there are a couple that caught my attention. I just wanted to see if we could get some quick clarification on it. The bond contract, the contract for bond services, was that included in this year's budget or was that in last year's budget?

I don't remember there being anything in 27's budget.

It's not in the 27 budget?

Mm-hmm.

Okay. And then there was a mention of market rate adjustment. Is that specifically the police department market rate adjustment, or is there a separate market rate for adjustment for general employees?

Yeah, I think she's also referring to just market rate adjustments that we make all year long. Anytime there are positions that need to be reevaluated. So there's two things. There's market adjustments that we make every year.

during the year and then there's the market adjustment that's built into the budget for the sworn officers okay and then the uh the the cola is three percent correct all right so how much is the how much is in the budget for market rate adjustments i believe we added the language i believe it averages like 2.8 not for police but for general uh employees

That's all that's factored in for market adjustments is the sworn officers. Everything else is covered under the COLA.

Everything else is COLA. Okay, that's not what I had heard in the question, so I wanted to clarify that because I had that same conversation down at CapCog related to the CapCog budget here a little bit ago. We have zero market adjustment, zero merit adjustment. It's strictly COLA. cost of living adjustment in our budget for personnel other than the sworn officers. Thank you for that clarification.

To bounce off of your question, Mr. Mayor, are the sworn officers getting two different adjustments or just the one adjustment, the market rate adjustment, not that plus the COLA, it's only the market rate adjustment?

They also get a step increase at their anniversary.

I'm sorry.

A step increase at their anniversary.

Okay.

They're on a step plan.

Okay. So the sworn officers will be getting a larger percentage raise than the general civilian population in the city. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that.

All right. Council, do we have any other questions related to this item? All right, this is to discuss and consider action to approve an ordinance on first and final reading. As I mentioned, this is, I was glad to do that math that showed 70% of our homesteaded homeowners will pay less. I'm also super excited that this includes the master fee schedule, which adopts a reduction in our water and wastewater rates, also providing dramatic relief to our residents. Council, do I have a motion to approve the ordinance?

I'd like to move two amendments. Mr. Mayor, I would like to move a one-third reduction on the roadway impact fee. And I would like to move that we move that $800,000 that was discussed earlier from the overage for this renovation to the work on pause. That's the Pflugerville area animal shelter.

I believe that impact fee motion would be out of order. Mike?

Is that, that's... It's not on the master fee schedule.

No, it's on, okay. I'm sorry, I thought that was a part of the master fee schedule. No. All right. Well, then, just a motion to move the $800,000 from the overage.

I'm sorry, is that a motion for approval with that amendment?

It's a motion for that amendment.

Okay. Does that get you on board? Well, let's see what happens to the amendment.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. We've danced this way before. He asked you a specific question, and he asked you that question for a reason. Yes or no?

I would love... for this council to show unity on this, if that's what it takes to get you on board, then I would be interested in that amendment.

Do you hear that? You have a second. If it gets you on board.

What about a motion for the no new revenue rate at 0.5407 with the amendment of moving the $800,000 out of the Justice Center courtroom to animal shelter.

I'll second that motion.

Further discussion? Go ahead and restate that motion.

Do I need to do it in any sort of requirement?

No, no. We just need to make sure that folks know what they're voting on.

I motion that we adopt the overall no new revenue tax rate of 0.5%.

So I am going to pause you there because that's not the agenda item we're on currently. That 6B would be the tax rate. This is specifically the budget. So I would advise if that's your intention that you identify the, what is it, $1.1, $1.2 million necessary in order to reach that rate.

So it's $336,000. No.

It was a million dollars between the two. What? It was a million dollars between the two.

It's a million.

It wasn't a million between .5407 and .5407.

It is a million dollars on the budget for general fund.

And we've done this before.

Well, that was Councilman Rogers' motion in our last budget meeting. Right. You were asking about $3,000, $1,000,000. The answer was $1,000,000. Somebody's got to find $1,000,000.

There's the debt and the M&O. So you could do no new revenue on one and not on both.

Yes.

So the no new revenue M&O rate is 2610. If you take 2610 and 2826, which is the debt rate, I'm sorry. The 5407 is the calculated no new revenue rate. It's not the MNO no new revenue rate. We'll get to that in the next agenda item.

Okay. I wanted to reduce it by $336,000, which was my calculation to get us from 0.5436 to 0.5407. So the 5436 is the total of the two rates.

So it's the total of the two rates. So debt rate is what it is. It's calculated what it is. the no new revenue for just mno is a different rate the 5407 is not those two added together so i have slides that have those rates on them yeah i'm trying to locate it in the budget and i'm just not finding the page at this moment But it is a million dollars effect on the general fund to go to the no new M&O rate.

So I'm not suggesting that we go to the no new M&O rate. I'm suggesting that we go to, because it was listed somewhere that the overall no new revenue rate was 0.5407.

but the 2826 debt rate is not gonna change. So the only thing that's gonna change is the general fund piece and it was the difference. So the no new revenue rate on the MNO, which is the only, it's the only fund that the no new revenue rate relates to, it doesn't relate to the debt service. So to go to the NNR rate for general fund was a million dollar difference. OK. So this budget is built on the voter approval rating.

I already have a motion and a second. We're in further discussion. But we were... But I do believe that motion was out of order since it was related to the rate.

Yeah, that's why I was... All right, you tell me. I don't know what... I do have a...

Okay, so I guess...

I have a question on this item still about something else, though.

So the previous motion, Mike, do I need to take action to dispense with the previous motion since it was out of order?

No, as long as it was clear on it.

That was on the rate, and the rate is six feet. What we're talking about now is the budget, so do I have a motion on the budget?

Motion to approve ordinance number 80899 to adopt the city's budget for fiscal year 2027 on first and final reading.

I have a motion and a second. Do I have any further discussion?

I have a question. Does this include the policies, the financial policies that we're approving?

Yes.

Okay, because there were changes that we have not discussed, but the ordinance said that it was discussed and that there was due deliberation, but there were changes. Changes in the policies and that I didn't find, I didn't recall and I didn't see it in our presentation that any of the changes.

It was in the July work session. It was just at like 1 a.m. in the morning that they were in the slides in July.

That's fair. Yep. That's fair.

So, um, there were, there were, the policies were redlined in the proposed budget and now the redlines have been taken out, but the, but the changes were reflected.

Well, I saw new information added that wasn't redlined, um, and just wanted, uh, not from proposed to final financial management policy. I thought, and I just wanted an overview of the main changes in those because they had had effective dates in 2026 and we hadn't discussed them or we hadn't approved them separately, which is what the ordinance said, that they had been approved separately.

I'll defer to legal, but I think it's referring to the fact that we put the policies in every single year. And so every budget, the policies are in there and they are approved.

All right. Council, you have a question in front of you.

What was the motion?

Was this my motion? No, this was Rudy's motion to approve. Motion passes 5-2. Okay. We've got a second item on that slide once we get back to it.

I know I can't. Motion, Mayor, you're in charge of motion. Motion to ratify a vote to adopt a budget that would require raising more revenue from property taxes than the previous fiscal year. I love that. Second.

All right, I have a motion and a second, and I believe this is the motion that requires 60%. That's tax rate, okay. No, this is still a majority vote. Motion passes 5-2. We will move on to Item 6B. Tracy, this is still you. This is to conduct a public hearing on the proposed property tax rate of 54.5436. Let's go with that.

Yes, Mary, and you stole my thunder a little bit because we do have a slide.

It's a beautiful slide, Tracy. Tracy just wanted to see us do the math on the desk.

So tax rate, yes, I actually did the math. Yes, these are the rates that were calculated. Obviously, the proposed rate of 54.36 is the voter approval rate. We had added the footnote on this slide regarding the 54 decrease that it was showing it was over 70% of the homestead assessed values. And we've also updated this just to reflect the updated amount from the jurisdictions that were listed on here. And that was the public hearing.

I'm tempted to make the comment that David made about... I'll leave it. If you making a comment about how huddles tax rate is about half or or how he talked about hey these cities aren't they're not growing Actually, this is a public hearing I'm gonna invite anyone from the public wishing to speak on this item Come forward you'll have three minutes

Howdy y'all. Tram Barlow. Been here before. Good to see you guys again. Thank you again for all your public service. Just wanted to speak a little bit on the proposed tax rate. I know Councilwoman Ryan has said a lot of things about the revenue rate and I've agreed with a lot of what's been said by a lot of people here about how we need to make sure that we have the funding necessary to fund our infrastructure. There's very, very important expenses in our future that we need to make sure that we have money for. And ultimately, the money has to come from the citizens. That's the point of municipalities. But I do agree with her point that it's a slippery slope. And if we continue to raise tax rates, that just... creates a higher and higher base, and we'll just continue to raise tax rates in perpetuity. It's difficult and painful to make cuts. I think there are places where we shouldn't make cuts or sacrifices, some of those being like police and infrastructure and things like that. But I think not to put too fine a point on it, but perhaps it would be easier to fund ongoing operations if we hadn't taken on so much debt recently. And I don't think the populace should have to suffer for those decisions, which while I believe were made with the best interests of the citizens in mind, perhaps could have been executed better regarding ongoing arbitrage expenses that we're seeing now and issues with having the debt out without having the project started yet. And perhaps we jump the gun on some of these projects. A couple of them maybe could have been delayed and the debt associated with them could have been delayed as well. So overall, I'd just like to say that I trust the council. I know that you'll make the right decision for our citizens, and hopefully there will be a way to lower the rate for citizens as well. I know that there's 70% of citizens that are seeing lower cash out the door on property taxes this year, but to the council's point, that's because of declining values, which no one wants to see either. We care a lot about cash out the door as citizens, but it hurts to see our property tax rate go up and our home value decline in the same year. We want to live in a in a city where our property values keep going up. People say the house is the biggest investment we'll make, so I want to make sure, and I know that you guys do too, that it was a really good investment for all the people of this city. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Is there anyone else from the public wishing to speak?

Move to close public comment. Sorry.

I've got a motion to close the public hearing. Do I have a second? Second. I have a second. This is a motion to close the public hearing. Let's see if this actually works.

All right.

The public hearing is closed.

And would you entertain a motion at this time?

Not yet.

Okay.

No, now I will open item 6C. This is where the rubber meets the road here. This is to discuss and consider action to approve an ordinance on first and final reading. With the caption reading, an ordinance levying an ad valorem property tax for the use and support of the municipal government for the city of Pflugerville, Texas for fiscal year 2027, apportioning each levy for specific purposes and providing when taxes shall become due and when same shall become delinquent if not paid. Tracy.

Yes, I have no other presentation. I have a motion. And it does have to be specifically read this way.

And this is our motion that statutorily requires 60%. Council, any questions, concerns, or motions?

So just to clarify the math, when I use 0.5407, which is the overall no new revenue, not the maintenance operations no new revenue, it generates $67,157,186. And compared to the projected revenue levy in the budget, that is a reduction of $360,192. So that would be the debt rate of .2826 plus an M&O rate of .2581, and those together is the .5407. So that is what my proposal would be.

Could you clarify for me? You did the math on that. What's the math on the median home value or the average home value?

To what the taxes would be?

Yeah. Well, what's the impact of that difference on our homeowners?

It would be a reduction of $11. Okay. So is this where if I wanted to make a motion, I could do it in this language and substitute the rate?

You'd have to get the percentage right, but yeah. Unless someone else beats you to it.

I'm doing the math.

make a motion I would like to make a motion to approve ordinance number 0898 and that the property tax rate be increased by the adoption of a tax rate of .5436 which is effectively a 3.46% increase in the tax rate alright I have a motion second I have a second

All right, let's do a discussion real quick. Do we have any further discussion?

Yeah, so there's a certain advertisement going around that's saying that cities want to go ahead and raise your taxes, and that's ridiculous and absurd. Is that advertisement out there because this specific language that we're being forced to say, even though 75% of people, it's actually going down, is that why that advertisement's even out there? Again, I don't think any citizens, any city council I've ever met in my life saying, yes, we want to go ahead and just raise your taxes. I think in fact what they say is... Have you ever been to Austin?

Again, again... The tax revenue is going up from $66.8 million to $67.5 million.

So that's an increase in the tax... And what I'm saying is that you're talking about, and we've talked about a lot of things tonight, and to your point... You're worried about how things are going to be paid for. I'm telling you right now, the biggest concern is going to be how the legislature is going to go ahead and affect the way that you're going to be able to operate moving forward.

Which is why we have to tighten our belts.

or have people understand how cities are run. Because remember, 80% of the revenue for the state of Texas comes from cities. Cities are the engine. We talk about the Texas miracle. It's because of cities, not because of the legislature. Let's be clear. It's cities that are there. Cities that partner with businesses. People who actually invest in their communities. These are the things that attract people from there. They don't come here and say, man, that's a great legislature. They come here because they have great cities, great schools, great parks, great roads.

Well, they live in other places because they have terrible legislatures.

I know.

I know. I'm just saying.

All right. All the votes are in. That passes 5-2. I believe that exceeds 60%. All right. Thank you, council, for that. I know. Tracy, especially, I want to thank you for your fortitude in getting us through that budget. I want to thank this council for establishing goals and policies and expectations on the way we serve our citizens. And I want to thank you for making the hard decisions that we have to to make this happen. And I want to thank the citizens and reinforce that I think 70% our homeowners will be paying less to the city this year than they did last and i think that that does speak to the growth that we've been able to see in our commercial tax base with that said we will move forward to item 7a item 7a is to discuss and consider action to approve an ordinance on first reading with the caption reading an ordinance authorizing the lease of city property To be located at 605 East Main Street, Suite 101, Pflugerville, Texas. To be located in the new city hall with two brews LLC providing cumulative repealer and severability clauses and establishing an effective rate. Deputy City Manager Braun.

Thank you, Mayor. Good evening, Mayor and Council. It's exciting to be before you and bring this to you this evening as it shows we're almost to the finish line with our new City Hall. So tonight we're discussing the City Hall Cafe Lease, and the cafe you've seen these renderings before is located right in front and intended to be the third space. That's one of the goals. I know. really the key components of bringing the community into City Hall as a place to enjoy. And so this cafe has been planned for quite some time, as you all know, and so it's exciting to bring forward a partner with us to lease this space. Downtown East has 19 goals associated with it, and this particular item addresses maybe more than four, but four easily identifiable ones to create a vibrant, equitable, walkable neighborhood where people will live, work, shop, play, as well as engage in city government. The cafe really is that kind of invitation into City Hall. It also has an outdoor as well as a connection inside of City Hall. Creates job opportunities, offers a high quality retail and dining option to residents as well as visitors, and activates the third space, the communal space to stink from home or work for residents within civic buildings. We've been asked by you all in the past and certainly on social media about, well, why West Pecan? West Pecan, when you ask people, you have a conversation with them about what does a third space mean? And then they follow up with saying, oh, you mean like what happens at West Pecan today? And so West Pecan's goal, their purpose, and they find this on their website, I didn't get this from Mary, but on their website is to create a space in Pflugerville where people could connect, have a craft beverage and feel at home in their third space. directly aligns with our goals for downtown east and the cafe within City Hall. And so it's creating that environment that council has asked us to create. So we reached out to West Pecan, a local business. You know that that business turned an old gas station into a very vibrant coffee space.

How many people remember that?

Yeah.

I mean, that was a dilapidated old gas station. That was horrible.

Yeah. Now, many times throughout the day, you can't find a seat in there, right? And people go there to meet their friends. They go there. I've gone there to have meetings. And so it's the same kind of environment that we're trying to create here. And so we're excited about the opportunity to partner with Two Brews and Mary and Josh with this space because it's, It's expanding a local business, a business that started in Pflugerville and that will be expanding here in their second location within City Hall. So we're really excited about this lease and this partnership and to support the community in this way. With that, we recommend approval of this ordinance. It's two readings like all ordinance to the lease the space with two brews LLC for the City Hall Cafe space.

Thank you, Emily. I do have an individual public wishing to speak on this item. DJ Lizada, if you'd come forward, you'll have three minutes on this item.

Hello again, I'm DJ Lozada and I'm a candidate for City Council, place 4. I'm speaking on agenda item 7A, ordinance 0891, the proposed lease of the city property 605 East Main Street to Bruce LLC. The economic strain many of us are feeling is causing taxpayers to scrutinize how every tax dollar is being spent in their name. I think that's a good thing. After all, it's our money that we have entrusted to your care. I have a lifelong commitment to fairness, equity, inclusion, and opportunity for all. This item is where those principles become very real. I support West Pecan and celebrate their success. But supporting one business should not mean excluding others from an opportunity created with public resources. The city says that West Pecan was identified as the ideal local partner. Through what process? Who else had the opportunity to be considered? This agreement provides commercial space at $2,600 a month, approximately six months without rent, and city approved provided equipment. Rent does not adjust to fair market value until four years from their start. So what is fair market value today? What is the value of the equipment? What is the total public investment? What is the return on investment to the community? I understand an RFP may not be legally required, but fairness should not begin and end with what government is legally required to do. I recently watched another business try to purchase and revitalize downtown property. Council imposed all kinds of requirements that, as I understood them, would have required approximately another $200,000 for street parking and other public infrastructure. That business ended up walking away and we remained stuck with the blight. So what's the difference? Why place substantial additional costs on one business seeking to invest downtown while providing rent concessions, equipment, and other benefits for another? And then there's Chapter 380. Texas law provides municipalities to establish programs using public resources to promote economic development. Yet this agreement is structured as a lease, not a Chapter 380 agreement. If Chapter 380 is now being proposed as a tool for economic development while millions of dollars are potentially being redirected away from the PCDC, why isn't this package of public benefits being evaluated through a similar transparent economic development framework? Where are the performance expectations, the documented return on investment, the opportunity for other businesses to participate? This is not about West Pecan. It's about whether our actions reflect the values we all say we believe in. An open process is what's needed. Open the door. Let the sunlight in. Let the taxpayers know that you are acting in good faith. Let the folks who dream of a better opportunity have an opportunity to bid and compete for that space. Instead of selecting a business that we all like, have that advantage instead. I urge you to vote no until these questions are answered. Thank you.

Thank you. Council, any questions on this item?

Well, I sent questions in advance, which Ms. Lozada covered basically all of them. My other question THAT WASN'T COVERED IS WHEN A NORMAL BUSINESS IS GOING TO BUILD A RESTAURANT OF THIS SIZE, ROADWAY, WATER, AND WASTEWATER IMPACT FEES ARE ALSO ADDED TO THAT BUSINESS AND THE COST OF BUILDING THAT. SO THAT'S ANOTHER CONSIDERATION OF, YOU KNOW.

I get it. But at the same time, we all have sat here many times over many hours talking about how we don't get restaurants and small businesses because of these impediments. And I do want to give staff credit for architecting a solution that's going to make a business, a small business, locally owned business, be able to expand and fully grow, hire new people, and solve for that problem. They're being given an opportunity to succeed in Excel. I hope that we can extend that same courtesy to OTHER COMPANIES AND THROUGH ADDITIONAL SUPPORTS FOR SMALL BUSINESSES. AND SO I THINK IT'S A GREAT OPPORTUNITY FOR THE COMMUNITY AND SOME GREAT LESSONS TO LEARN. NOW, DO I ULTIMATELY WISH THERE WOULD HAVE BEEN MORE PROCESS? SURE. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN GREAT, RIGHT? BUT I ALSO HAVE A LOT OF CONFIDENCE IN THIS PARTNERSHIP AND WHAT IT'S GOING TO BRING AND THE LESSONS WE'RE GOING TO LEARN TO BE ABLE TO EXTEND SIMILAR SITUATIONS WITH OTHER SMALL BUSINESSES.

President Kennedy asked, why do we do the hard thing? Why does Rice play Texas? We do it because we learn from the process. This is the kind of backroom, closed process that I objected to months ago when we did it the last time. Just like the last time, I like The selection.

What's the last time?

The last time was when we selected our city manager without doing a search of any kind. And I asked them, why did Bryce play Texas? And it's the same answer. We learn from the process. We bring our best efforts to the process. And we ultimately get not just a better process, but a better result. West Pecan's a great coffee shop. I've eaten there, eaten and had coffee there many times. In fact, I think I've had coffee up there with most of the people on this dais. It's not the only coffee shop in town that's locally owned. I'd like to know if all of the other coffee shops in town were given an opportunity to be part of this process. I would like to know why the process was not a public process. I'd like to know why... Well, I'd like to know the answer to all of Ms. Lozada's questions. Why are we doing this in a... smoke-filled room kind of way instead of an open, transparent process. And I agree with her. It's not legally required, but transparency, our duty to the citizens, goes above And beyond the bare minimum that the legislature requires us to do.

See, this is where I have a little trouble with you, Councilman. We've talked about this in the past during executive session and you were all for it. But now all of a sudden it's election time and you're against it and you're talking about transparency and all types of other stuff. If this is your agenda item, then, I mean, if you have an agenda on this, then I think we need to move on from the rhetoric. because you were all for it in the back, and now you're against it all of a sudden.

First of all, you're not supposed to talk about executive session in the open. That's a violation of our internal rules. Secondly, The idea that we're only going to have a single bidder was never presented. The idea that we were going to have somebody run the coffee house inside the city council was presented. But the idea that nobody else got an opportunity to be part of it was not part of the discussion.

So, Emily, can I ask some questions since everyone else is having their moments? If I recall correctly, even before we thought of what businesses were going to fill into these positions, The previous city manager and staff reached out to several local businesses and other folks that they thought they may have been interested in operating in that space. Is that correct?

We've been working on this for a few years now.

And we also made reference and let people know in the community that, hey, if you have interest in this space, please sign up. Because I know personally, I sent three or four businesses because you guys talked about it and they're like, oh, yeah, I'm interested. Let me go ahead and talk about this as well. So when I hear this wasn't like some open process or people didn't have opportunities, That's just not true. Now, I think you're talking about a procurement process standard by the state of Texas. That's true. But this was definitely a process where people got opportunities to ask, hey, listen, we're going to have this space. Are you interested in this? Hey, you're a partner in this. And that's where I'm... I'm miffed about what's going on here as well. I did hear about 380 agreements and some of the things that DJ brought up. So that was fair. And I think Jonathan addressed that essentially because it's saying... And I hope we can use them for the other spots.

Exactly.

Because again, let's be clear, this is not going to be the only thing that we got there. We still have opportunities in other places for this, for that as well. This is just one of many right there as well. At some point, we'll be able to announce the restaurant that we're looking at and other things like that as well. I want to make sure for citizens, you're hearing a lot of back and forth over here with it as well. The process was known. It was made known to us. I know that citizens and business owners were cognizant of it because they reached out to me, and I know they reached out to staff because they saw that staff had said, hey, listen, we have space here. We're interested in what businesses, restaurants over here with this as well. Ultimately, we have two brews. I was laughing with Melody because every time I see that, I think of beer. Okay. And I think they're going to be a good tenant here with that. And I think there are good lessons moving forward because I do agree that, you know, I am curious to see what we do from an economic development standpoint on some things. You guys are getting free labor out of me at least for one more year, so we'll see what happens with that. But I think this is a good learning lesson, and I think this is a good partner. I mean, that's the things that I do think they're a good partner for that. So this was not done with a bunch of old men and cigars in a back room or anything like that as well. This was... literally done in the service over the last several years saying, hey, listen, we've got space. We want to support our citizens. We want our local businesses to expand. come over here and see what you can partner with. And you got this one. And this isn't going to be the last one.

So we did have a public RFP process like we've done with other... No.

No, no, no. We did not do an RFP.

What we currently have out for... That's what he's saying. For what I think, Council Member Mateo, what you're referring to is the... We have a broker that's working with our master developer for Downtown East, CBRE. And so we get contacted all the time. I know many of you have been contacted by... there's excitement and great opportunity with this project and so the cafe it's it doesn't fit every mold right and so for many of those we sent them over to the other side of the street like for griffin's winterton and cbre to evaluate for the restaurant space and those others and so that those can be placed in those tenants we also have the

And those are where we would potentially need a 380 agreement if we were trying to support a local small business to expand within downtown East.

That's right. Because that rent rate is going to be different.

Those would be private locations that we would be partnering with. As compared to what we own.

Yeah. And we'll also have our current city hall, right? And we think that there's some prime opportunity there for some great tenant space. And those will certainly come back before you all were looking at like a call for businesses for that. And so there's a variety of ways to get tenants in city facilities. And what we have continued to hear from you all from the community is to support local, grow our home-based businesses, find businesses that support not only their business, but also the community. You see that what I didn't mention was like the first Saturdays. There's something that West Pecan started, but they also support other small businesses. And so I think all these tenants tie together beautifully with this tenant. That doesn't mean this is the only opportunity for any other small business in the community. And there's a variety of economic development tools that we can use from the 380s to leases and a whole other variety of things that we can use. And then you'll see coming forward with all the other spaces that we have.

And I was about to say, we have an economic development director who specifically denoted in his plan talking about these businesses and what the biggest issue is because I sleep next to somebody every night, who's lived here for 40, what?

Her age.

Long enough, long enough, long enough. Who talks about what the storefront looks for our businesses, for these restaurants. And for us to be able to, how do we work to help fix that? Because we do have a variety of, I mean, I've said it before and I'll say it again. There are major Fortune 50 companies They're along our 130 corridor who miss being near Pflugerville because they were able to go to so many different restaurants and different restaurant options here. And people just don't see it because they don't see the store. They don't like the storefront. They don't see what the restaurant, where it is located from that as well. So I know that you're working on these things. I know that one of our biggest goals is for us to tie our economic development growth and be able to get that to where it needs to be. And so I think this is just one start in what we're trying to do here to make a demonstrative difference. And I appreciate it.

so i have a follow-up question um you know and i'm i'm happy to hear that there's excitement um but if there is excitement about coming in and joining downtown east uh it just seems like a you know free rent and all of the equipment uh you know can we find someone who will pay market rent i i mean that's just what comes to mind what what is what is market rent

I don't have that with me. No. We've got a CPI calculator I know in the lease.

I believe that's pretty common to offer businesses an incentive to be in their area. I believe the Austin Library did the same thing with the, but does the same thing with their coffee shop right there.

We do see that to be true where you offer, you know, it's the first few months to get up and running and establish, and we want to ensure that they were successful. So that was part of our conversation with West Pecan about what that cost would be. They're leasing the coffee spot area, but they'll also be, you know, cleaning the tables in the community space as well as outside. Well, yes, the coffee, you know, people who are purchasing there will be using, but anyone in the community, it's a public space, can use it, and they'll be taking on... the maintenance of those tables and making sure trash is picked up and all those kind of things as well. And so it is, we did look at this as a partnership.

So one other question. Was there a reason that we didn't have PCDC involved in paying for these, you know, the free rent or the cost of the equipment so that it didn't come out of general fund?

Probably because it's retail. I don't think that's an allowable project expense for PCDC.

And the equipment was included as part of our FF&E with our master developer?

That's our restaurant space we're leasing to an operator. That's right. It's not like they get to carry it away at the end of the lease. That's our equipment.

How long is the lease? The lease is, I think, I'll have to double check, I think it's about four years, and then in the fifth year, we'll renew it.

I guess because the only thing that comes up for me around that is, you know, sometimes once you're in, you're in, no one else can come in. What does that look like in four years for the procedure of, because now it's open, it's established, you know, people have memberships at the Monarch, what the opportunities will look like in four years for someone else to be able to come in?

Sure, could look different. We'll, you know, reevaluate the rent structure that's included in there for years five moving forward. And we also hope that parcel five on the other side of the plaza offers additional opportunities as well. So this isn't a one and done situation. This is the start of this type of opportunity within our downtown and was, you know, one of the dominoes we needed to happen for all of downtown, not just this particular project.

And I like the way you put it, dominoes, because I will tell, y'all, what is today? 9, 8, 2026. I'm telling you that this is going to blow up. I'm telling you. Like, I mean, this is going to make a big economic impact here in Fulgham. I'm telling you that because it's something that we have decided what we want to see here. And we've set the standards. So now we require all the developers moving forward what that looks like. And us investing our city, investing our community, betting on ourselves, I'm telling you this thing's going to blow up.

So just a clarification because to I saw in the lease agreement that there's an extension option, and they have the option to extend the lease for up to two additional terms of five years each. So that's an additional 10 years after that. Unilateral? Well, it says that they have to give notice six months prior of its notice of intent to exercise each extension option. so and so to me that says if they say we want to extend then the city is agreeing i mean i think right like i don't think our goal should ever be to turn over a business in a yeah and they're she asked about the other possibilities and and what's the lease rate at that point then it does go up to market it says market yeah

So they would be faced with the opportunity to renew and they would not be subsidized.

But we wouldn't be necessarily revisiting it if they exercised their option to extend.

Because if they've been a good tenant, we'd want them to continue on that.

Yeah, I just wanted to clarify. We're not going to revisit this unless they... Well, let's also be clear.

You're the city council. You can revisit anything six flights from Sunday. So you can revisit it.

I think there is the general termination clauses in there. But this does appear that if... the company wants to extend, they're the ones that extend, and then it's extended.

Correct. And again, but we also have, as Mike has mentioned, and any other, David, myself, anyone who's been an attorney for cities, though, we do have the ability to go ahead and terminate and work on things, and it's been exercised numerous times by different cities. So if you're not seeing what's going down, and you're not liking what's happening with West Pecan,

I mean, I'm more concerned there's going to be too many people in the lobby. Oh, I mean, this is... How many people... Good problem to have.

How many times have we talked to people specifically saying, hey, listen, they want to have more of a space where they can just go and work and lounge. They've taken over West Pecan. If you've gone to...

Tee-Keezy? Tee-Keezy?

Yeah, Tee-Keezy. That's another place where people have just taken over the spots over here with this wall of things. This is going to blow up. I'm telling you that.

Well, Rudy, you mentioned this too, and I'm sure other council members as well, right? The businesses that are inquiring about the rest of our space over there are 100% the things that our residents have been asking for, right? Yeah. On all the sticky notes and stuff for downtown East, those are the companies that are actually reaching out.

Or when a crazy executive director puts out a Facebook post asking what businesses and restaurants people want. Yeah, those are the ones that are not there.

Council, do I have a motion?

I have a question.

Now.

What, specifically what other businesses were offered this deal?

We did not offer a deal to any other business. We reached out to West Vaucon, asked them about the space. We have had conversations with other businesses about what their needs are. They don't fit this space. So then we look at the retail and restaurant area and the first floor of the Monarch for those.

So no other restaurant or coffee business in Pflugerville approached you about this?

No.

That's what I'm saying to people.

But if we had had an open bidding process, there could be other businesses that want to expand it to an additional location that could have been interested and applied.

That is true. I was about to say, I know that there are numerous businesses numerous minority-owned businesses, numerous women-owned businesses who have been reached out and talked to about our space. Like, I mean, that's just, this is me saying that. This is not something hyperbole or theoretical. I know that's been happening.

Move to approve the ordinance authorizing a lease with two rooms LLC for the City Hall Cafe. Second.

I have a motion and a second. I can't believe you said it that quickly.

I know.

Motion passes 5-2. And I will say I am indeed excited that we are committing to our small local businesses, allowing them to expand, helping those small businesses. I know that's an important part of what we've talked about. on this council and our commitment to those homegrown businesses that are showing potential and have shown previous success. I'm glad that they will continue to be able to do so. uh that brings us i'm going to take us back to our consent agenda before we move on to our executive session item so i'm going to bring us to item 5d that is a professional services agreement between the city and terracon consultants inc in the amount of 165 410 for construction materials testing services associated with the tr 2103 a manual road project uh do i have a specific question or are you looking for a record vote i believe that was melody

Well, I was curious about the comments that were brought up during on this from the public about a previous deal and cost participation and So I didn't know if there was any history that anyone could add on that. But the other question that I had was just in general about construction materials testing and whether is this an item that is gonna be on all of our roads or is this specific roads or, and then if it's all roads or specific roads, is there a way to, have a larger scope to cover multiple roads. I'm not sure. When I looked back and did my research on the last time we had construction materials testing, I didn't get the answers. And I don't think I also saw anything about a bidding process.

David, what happened to Grand Avenue Parkway?

I was going to say, it wasn't Grand Avenue Parkway our lesson. Yeah. Do you remember that? Were you here for that? I drove up and down that all the time.

Okay, well, I remember about that, but I'm just unclear as to whether this is going to be on every road or if it's only specific roads.

So I would expect this to be included on every road. I believe, if I'm not mistaken, this is... This amount, the amount of this contract, is included in the budget for this particular item, and we're still within budget on this project. Is that accurate?