Commissioner - Regular Meeting

All right, good morning everybody. Welcome to the Queen Anne's County Commissioners meeting. This is a public meeting that is being aired live on our local cable television station, QAC TV 7. These media broadcasts provide county citizens an opportunity to watch and review our scheduled public meetings. In addition to our live audience this evening, Excuse me this morning. We are providing remote options for citizens to watch and participate in county commissioner meetings. Citizens may watch our meeting live on our website at QAC.org slash live or on our public access governmental television channel provided by Breeze Line Cable Services. Citizens may also participate by joining the live Zoom meeting by going to QAC.org slash public comment. And citizens may also email comments to public comment at QAC.org. All comments received will be summarized during the press and public comment period on today's agenda. We acknowledge everyone's participation and by attending you acknowledge that this session is both recorded and aired. Press and public comment will be taken and is limited to three minutes per person. If you do care to speak, please sign up at the information table in the lobby. Comments longer than three minutes can be submitted in writing for the commissioner's review. We will now stand and be led in the Pledge of Allegiance by Commission President Jim Moran.

States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right, commissioners, first up, we've provided the agenda for today's meeting, August the 11th, along with the regular session minutes from the previous meeting on July 28th. They've all been circulated for your review and consideration. Are there any additions or corrections?

Nope. Motion to accept the agenda as submitted and meetings from the 28th as submitted. Second.

A motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

Thank you, commissioners. We just held a closed session under the general provisions article section 3305B1 for boards and commissions and personnel and section 3305B7 to consult with council. I believe we have a few appointments to make as a result of our discussion.

We'll start with the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee. I move to appoint Randy Bradley to fill the vacancy on the Bicycle and Pedestrian Committee. This term will expire February 28th of 2029. Second. We have a motion to second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved. Next one is the Board of Electrical Examiners. I move to appoint Adam Webb to fill the vacancy on the Board of Electrical Examiners. This term will expire on June 30th, 2031.

Second.

Motion is second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved. Here comes the big one.

Want me to take that one? Yeah, fire away, big boy.

Okay. This is the Historic Stevensville Arts and Entertainment Advisory Board. I move to reappoint Paul Plasek, Rebecca Jones, and Nancy Cook to Historic Stevensville Arts and Entertainment Advisory Board. These terms will expire on July 31st of 2028. I also move to appoint Jeff Barba, Carisha Brooks and Liz Gilbert. These terms will expire July 31st, 2028. I also move to appoint Barb Whitten. This term will fill the remainder of a term expiring on July 31st of 2027. Second.

We have a motion and a second. Any discussion on this one? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved. We're pushing that one out too. Correct. Housing Authority, we want to do a little more research, so we're going to hold that one for two weeks. Police Accountability Board. I move to appoint Lisa Davis to fill the vacancy on the Police Accountability Board. This term will expire on June 30th of 2030. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right. Thank you, Commissioners. Okay, next up we have a press and public comment. So we appreciate all citizens for taking time to express views to the county commissioners. Comments are limited to three minutes per person. Comments longer than three minutes can be submitted in writing. This commission respects your desire and right to convey your message freely. When you come forward, please speak clearly at the standing microphone and state your name, your address, and your topic of interest. And in keeping with the dignity of the office, we ask that all views be expressed in a respectful and civil manner.

Mr. Falstead.

Good morning Commissioners, Jay Falstead, Queen Anne's Conservation Association. Later on your agenda this morning you're going to be considering a public works agreement on behalf of Chester-Avon Beach. And I'm going to urge you to vote know on this extension. I've been following this development and this developer for longer than any of you all have been commissioners. And I have seen time and time and time again efforts on behalf of this developer to simply muddy the waters. And that's exactly what's happening here. These agreements that come up are just an effort to try and protract something that's already unlawful. Last year, I'm sorry, in 2023, you all received a letter from the Critical Area Commission that said that this development does not enjoy the lots that the developer claims. And time and time again, this developer comes forward and tries to muddy the waters with something new, and that's what they're trying here. There's no reason to do this. Last year, I think about this time, this project came up. I urge you all to vote no against it. It passed on a 3-2 vote. Commissioners McLaughlin and Corcorino were in opposition. Commissioner Moran said at the time, let's let the courts decide. The courts have decided, and the courts have decided that the lots don't exist. The effort on behalf of the developer last year and the county was unlawful. There's no need to continue with this charade. And so if this developer were so confident, you should all ask yourselves this question. Everybody in the county should ask themselves this question. If this developer is so confident with this proposal, then let him go to the critical area commission, get growth allocation. That's the process. This developer hasn't done that. Instead, he continually moves around, tries to find a new shiny object. He takes advantage of changes in commissioners, planning commission boards. He waits and is looking for vulnerabilities. That's what he's doing. If he's so confident, go to the critical area commission, ask for growth allocation, and let's see what happens. He won't do that. And he won't do it because he knows he won't get it. So let's not waste any more time on this, reject this agreement, and let's be done with this mess. Thank you.

That's all who signed up. Would anybody else like to speak? Mr. Stevens, please do.

Thank you, Commissioners. I do want to address Mr. Falstaff's comments, only because I don't know if I'll be able to address you when you take the matter up during your regular session. I represent Chester Haven Beach, and in this instance, the facts do matter. And the fact is that the court did not decide the issue of the lots of record. The county has accepted that there are lots of record. The process will be that the developer has and will continue to recombine the lots for less than 90 as they agreed to in the last public works agreement. And the planning commission will either approve or deny that. If they approve it, then Mr. Falstaff will have whatever remedies he wants to pursue in regards to whether there are lots of record. And that's the way that'll finally get decided. Multiple times the courts have rejected The to decide the lots of record issue because it wasn't right. There have been no decision made by the administrative agency in terms of recombining of the lots. That's what's before you is simply to give us the time to go to the planning Commission and complete that process. And then whatever remedies Mr. Falstaff would like to have, he has and he can challenge that. Thank you.

OK, anybody else like to speak? Seeing none will close press and public comment.

Commissioners next up if you want to turn to tab number seven, we have a comprehensive water and sewer plan informational meeting Scheduled for Providence farm for the town of Centerville So this is an informational meeting that allows the commissioners to ask questions of the applicant They're seeking a water sewer plan amendment from s6 w6 to s3 w3 and this is on the the property known as Providence farm and adjacent to the county complex YMCA over here. And I know the applicant has some folks. Joe Stevens is representing this particular applicant and they have a presentation and some folks here that that may want to participate with the discussion. I see the developer, Mr. Bob Karen with Four Seasons Town of Centerville is here as well. This property was annexed into the town of Centerville. It's about 279 acres in size. Currently zoned was owned ag and the town has resigned that to TND as part of their annexation process i just want to point out too that should this get approved for the water sewer plan amendment uh from s6w6 to s3w3 it will have to come back for a second amendment to go to s2w2 when public sewer service is available from the town center bill so with that i'll turn it over to mr stevens for the uh presentation thank you commissioners this has been a very long uh um cooperative process with county

staff and employees and the planning commission as well as particularly the town and the staff and the Town Planning Commission and Town Council. The Providence Farm, as you know, is located in town, was annexed in 2024 and was zoned Town Traditional Development, TND, and is now before you for an amendment to the Master Water and Sewer Plan simply to go to S3W3, which is the three to 10 year planning period. It coincides with the expansion of the plant sewer plant for the town, which you've amended the master water and sewer plan for. Um, and this is, I think a very important component to all that, uh, both the county's plan all the way back to 1998, when the county and town had a joint plan, they didn't have separate plans at that time to now this property has been identified as part of the growth area and for like a complete plan neighborhood. with some non-residential along the 304 corridor. That's the process, that's what we'd like to pursue, assuming we can get this amendment, the ultimate approval of the zoning, and so on. So that essentially is what's before you today. We're here to answer any questions you have. Sharon Van Emberg, town attorney. Peter Flint is the town planner. And as you know, Carolyn Brinkley is the town manager. So that's what we have. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. Bob Karen's the developer. Mike Irons with KOF is helping us with the residential component of the community. And Bill Stoops is our local liaison to the town and business community. So that's our team.

Timeline. What's the timeline?

Oh, timeline. Well, I'll let Tom speak to the sewer, but our timeline would be to begin the planning process after we get these approvals. And we're probably in a two-year planning process. After that two year planning process, if the town had some limited capacity available, because their plant won't be done in two years, it's more like a three or four year time frame if things stay online. We would want to enter into things like developer agreements and PWAs and hopefully start a first phase in about three years. And then after that, if we have the entire community planned and developed, it will probably be another 12-year build-out after that. So you're probably talking about a 15-year timeframe.

And what's the total number of units?

Well, we don't have a total number of units, but I will say that the property is zoned for eight units per acre, and after the dedication to the county, there will be about 160 acres left. Excuse me, 260. But there's no way it's going to go anywhere near that. It's going to be around a smart growth density, which is about three and a half units per acre, which is what's required under the law for smart growth densities, priority funding area. The, you know, obviously the property is significant and important to the overall growth plans for both the county and the town. Because, as you know, the county has earmarked and has pushed the growth from mostly the sewer corridor that exists now, and obviously there's no growth in the rural area with the zoning and the state law that's in place, to the municipalities, and this is what's part of that.

So while you're here, and the public's hopefully watching, would you like to give an update on where you're sitting with your advances towards re-rating your new sewer system?

So right now we're in the design phase. We're at 60% design. Anticipate to be at 90% design by November 30th. And then we'll start the, once that's completed and approved by the state, then we'll start with bids for construction. We'll go out to bid for it. So we're not anticipating basically breaking ground for at least another 18 months.

So what kind of capacity will you have? What are you planning for?

A million gallons. So we'll go from 542,000 gallons per day to a million gallons per day.

What's the build-out going to take, Carolyn? So if you break ground in roughly 2028, January 28, what are they telling you?

Spring of 31. is what's anticipated right now.

And what do you have left now on your existing?

We have about 400 EDUs. The council last year set up a schedule for the remaining EDUs over the next five years. So there is Development, there's a portion of it that is set aside for development. Of course, if those eight EDUs aren't used, then it'll roll over to the next year. So we didn't use all of them last year for each one of the categories, but yeah.

There's a residential bucket and then like a commercial and industrial bucket. And so there's, you know, each year there's a certain amount of capacity that's available. So there may be some available for a first phase, but not obviously for the whole development until the plant is finished.

So what do you see as a first phase, just ballpark? So your number's 910? It could be 910.

It could be right around there. Probably 100, right around 100. We would have to comply with the town's staging sewer allocation policy, so it depends on what's available. And then have to compare that because the bulk of the infrastructure is going to have to get built for the first phase. The sizing of the pump stations and the water system and the main line going back over to the business park system because we're going to be providing some capacity to that system hopefully our preliminary design and what we've been thinking about so all that will have to be done for the first phase any other questions no well very good all right thank you commissioners thank you we'll see you in two weeks yes sir

All right, we'll have the public hearing on this application then on August 25th at the Ken Island Library. Our meeting will be at the Ken Island Library next meeting. One. Yeah, for the rate schedule.

We don't want to do this hearing at the Ken Island Library. Right, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, we don't want to do that. We want it here. Bump it to the next? Yeah. We don't want them to have to go to Ken Island Library to have a hearing on something in Centerville.

Okay. That makes sense. Yeah, we can schedule that, I guess, for the first meeting in September. I'll do that. That'll be a day. It'll be a daytime meeting. Yeah. Is there any advertising constraints?

Did we already advertise that? Yeah, we advertised it. It's already been advertised? Yeah.

I guess we're stuck with it. Yes, we are. Okay. All right.

Like I said, let's do it at Ken Island.

All right. Okay.

Okay. All right. Thank you all. All right, commissioners. Next up under tab seven, item number two is the Barclay sewer sub-district rate schedule. As you know, we had a hearing at the last meeting on July 28th to consider testimony on the proposed sewer rate increases for the sub-district in Barclay. So that is ready for potentially for consideration and adoption.

I got, um, so I moved to adopt resolution 2611 and the Barkley wastewater sub district service area rate schedule, which includes the following rate increases and order adjustments to be implemented October 1st, 2026. One to institute a customer charge of $6 per quarter per account. Two to modify the ready to serve charge billing from a per count basis to a per edu basis. Three, to increase the current operations and maintenance charge by 25% per EDU. Four, institute an annual rate escalator to be applied to the operations and maintenance charge and the pump maintenance charge effective July 1, 2027 and each subsequent July 1st thereafter. Five, to institute a ready-to-serve exemption program to assist homeowners with limited incomes currently defined as a gross income of $39,484 or less. And six, the above rate proposals will take effect automatically unless modified by the Queen Anne's County Sanitary Commission via resolution prior to the above shown effective dates.

I'll second that. Do we have a motion to second any discussion?

I just really want to make a comment more so than anything. Understand that these dollar amounts simply just cover our operating costs. There is no fluff. There's no Surplus of monies that we're gonna set aside to cover materials parts replacement service all that stuff This is just to cover our costs.

I think When you see these when it's whether it's something like your dump tickets or sewer water There's decision in the past where whoever's elected is afraid to make an increase that they're supposed to make in order to make the system run because just like your household bills go up every year the bills to run things for the county also go up here and then people cave to not making the difficult decision to vote for increases that should be in there frankly should be automatic increases that occur that keep up with the cost and then you get to the point where you're upside down and so other rate payers in another area are paying for somebody else and that's not fair so we're just we're making the correction that should have been avoided with right decisions in the past and it's unfortunate because comes as a shock we went through this with housing authority where they didn't raise the rents slowly over time and then they were forced to make a decision it impacted the residents hard and so it's it's right sizing what's upside down unfortunately and hopefully going forward the smaller increases will be put into place timely so that people can absorb it into their budget

To your point, we do it every year at Terrapin. We have the increase that we vote on every year. It's modest, very modest.

Two and a half percent?

Yeah, and had they done this in Southernsville, even here in Centerville, it's reared its ugly head with what they're trying to do as well. You just got to keep up with inflation at minimum. Like you said, Phil, stuff costs more every year, parts, all that stuff. Hopefully moving forward, this will clean that one up and won't be an issue, and we have Homes coming online, which will actually help here in the next, hopefully, three to five years.

We're entirely sympathetic to this. There's no doubt. But we're not doing the right service by not making you pay for the service that you're using. We're fixing it, unfortunately.

But it's a tough fix. Very good. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstain? So moved, my love.

All right. Thank you, commissioners. That takes care of Barclay. So next up, item number three, we have the Southernsville Water and Sewer Subdistrict rate schedule also can be voted on. We had both public hearings last meeting on July 28th to consider testimony on this particular rate schedule increase as well.

I'm going to adopt resolution number 2612 in the Southernsville Water and Wastewater Subdistrict service area rate schedule, which includes the following rate increases and or adjustments to be implemented October 1, 2026. Number one, to institute a customer charge of $12 per quarter per account. Number two, to institute a minimum quarterly flow of 4,550 gallons to all improved properties. Number three, to increase the current water and sewer ready to serve charge and the associated usage charge both by 35% October 1, 2026. To increase the rates established on October 1, 2026 by 15% for sewer and 5% for water for both ready to serve and the associated usage charge. effective July 1, 2027. To increase the rates established July 1, 2027 by 15% for sewer and 5% for water for both ready-to-serve and the associated usage charge, effective July 1, 2028. Number six, to institute an annual rate escalator to be applied to the water and sewer ready to serve charge and its associated usage charge of 5% to be applied July 1, 2029, and each subsequent July 1 thereafter. Number seven, to institute an annual allocation fee escalator for be applied to the water and sewer allocation charges of 2.5% to be applied July 1, 2027, and each subsequent July 1 thereafter. Number eight, to institute a ready-to-serve exemption program to assist homeowners with limited incomes currently defined as a gross income of $39,484 or less. Number nine, the above rate proposals will take effect automatically unless modified by the Queen Anne's County Sanitary Commission via resolution prior to the above shown effective dates.

Second. There we go. We have a motion and a second on this item. Any discussion on this?

I'll just reiterate what I said in the previous vote. This is covering our costs.

And both of these were presented to Southernsville and Barkley a couple of weeks ago.

Okay. That being said, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstain? So moved. Bye-bye.

All right, thank you, Commissioners. Okay, next up, we can move into the presentations portion of this morning's agenda. First up, we have Beverly Churchill, the Director of Human Resources. She's going to provide a peer support update. This is a wonderful new program that we've got a multifaceted team engaged in. So, Beverly, come on up and introduce your team members. Oh, you even got goodies, too. All right. That's great. So welcome. Good morning, everybody.

Morning. Morning, morning, morning. Good morning commissioners. Some time ago you approved the establishment of our public safety peer support program and since then we've had a lot of activity and just as a reminder to the community the peer support program is comprised of members from six agencies across Queen Anne's County our volunteer fire department, our sheriff's office, our emergency medical services, our detention center, 911 communications, and Centerville Police Department. And our public safety professionals routinely experience traumatic events that can take a lasting toll on emotional and psychological health. Queen Anne's County has seen increasing levels of operational stress, staff challenges, and since our peer support team was trained, we actually had four critical incidents. including multiple fatalities and internal emergencies requiring them to respond, which we are sad that they had to respond, but we are glad that they were there to respond. Our team recently branded them as an acronym RISE, standing for resilience, integrity, support, and empowerment. You can see they have their shirts on with their... their new acronym. And so these realities that they experience underscore the need for a coordinated, proactive, and compassionate approach. We appreciate your support in establishing our peer support program. And we are delighted today that we have partnered with Care First, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Maryland to support us in our journey. And I want to introduce Nikki Strickler and Kim Schmidt with Care First. who have provided to us some help along the way. They've been instrumental in connecting us with For All Seasons, providing behind-the-scenes guidance, and of course, they provide Queen Anne's County employees with mental health services and resources. And they are donating 24 backpacks and accessories to our peer support team, and these GoPacks will be used to help our peer support members when they respond to critical incidents and helping individuals in need. So we're very thankful of their support through this process. And in my office is 24 GoPags. We only bought a few here. But I have a table overflowing. So we are very appreciative of their support. Jessica, where's Jessica? Jessica and Kelly are really the movement behind the scenes to make it all work. And they said, Beverly, we need these GoPaks. And I picked up the phone and said, Nikki, this is what we need. And she said, sure, we can do it. No problem. And so they made it happen in just quick order. And so we're really pleased today to be able to thank them publicly for their support.

So I have a question. Well, actually, I have lots of questions. But first of all, I just want to say outstanding. So how did we get the folks that we have here? Because obviously we have some heavy hitters here.

We reached out to each of the agencies and said we need some volunteers for the peer support program. People stepped up that said they were interested. And then there was an intensive interview selection process with For All Seasons. And then there was a four-day training program that they had to attend, mandatory training program. And so now they're here, they're active, they're participating, and doing an amazing job.

So, so not to be stereotypical of our correctional officer here and our law enforcement officers. Um, sometimes you guys. Don't have the kindest people that you have to work with on a day-to-day basis. So to see you guys here is a big deal.

It is a big deal.

No, there is compassion in inside you guys considering what you guys have to face every single day. So to everybody represents some DES and a care first and all our partners in this thing. Outstanding.

So to give it a little bit of background, so this was born out of the FEC. They saw the need, and when it got first explained, that's probably six, seven, eight months ago, I guess, when it first came up, was that, you know, you got in, I see Chief Gerardo in here, is, you know, The firefighters specifically, they mentor each other from the top down, right? But when you get to the top, what does the chief do, right? Where does he go? Who does he talk to? And that's kind of how the conversation started. Like when you get to be the sheriff and you've got everybody under and you have to be there for them, where does that person go? So it was the whole idea was to create this peer group where You have that place you can go. And it came together fast. Look, government finally worked good. That's all I can say.

I'm not going to lie.

I mean, I'm amazed how quick it turned around. Literally, when they got their first graduating class, they were on the ground that Friday night after they graduated, sadly. But they were there. And it was great. And I know that we have a class in September, I think, coming up. What are we going to get?

We're getting ready to schedule the next. So to come, we have a grant that we just were awarded by Care First. We actually have a meeting on it today. So we'll be coming back with more good news, and they're going to help fund the next training class. We'll get another cohort.

We're going to double the numbers. I mean, it's going to be great. So it really does personify the name Care First. You care first. That's awesome. So now this next selection, is there anybody in the public sector that has an opportunity to serve on this? A citizen, maybe, that Has some background in kind of your mission?

You could be trained as a peer support. You don't have to be in the emergency services. You can volunteer.

And there's lots of different training opportunities that can be available for... There's Kelly. Oh, hi. I'm right here. Yes. And there's a lot of different training opportunities that are available to really anybody. But this one specifically we have geared towards our first responder family. And like for the sheriff's office, we do have Lori Kimball's and she's considered a civilian, which we thought was a really great piece to kind of have involved in our group as well. Kind of helps to tie it all in.

So now the Queen Anne's County is leading again doing something isn't or any other counties looking to duplicate what we're doing my next question.

So there is another jurisdiction Talbot County who is also working with for all seasons and they have their own peer support team. But we've gotten a lot of interest in a lot of people wanting to come and talk to us to see what we're doing and how we're doing it because we're really making moves and we're putting strides forward.

We're kind of used to that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Nikki, did you want to say anything? Sure, sure.

So I just want to say how proud I am of this team and Beverly, of course, so she doesn't get a lot of kudos or or give herself a lot of kudos, but you did a lot of work to get to this point and fast, right? Yeah. But Care First really does appreciate the opportunity to support this program through the grant funding, which I know will be shared later, and these peer support bags. It's important to us to be out here in the local community, and we do thank you for your partnership and for all that you do to serve the community and the county. So thank you all.

Where's Jessica? Did you want to say anything?

No. We're very appreciative for the partnership and unfortunately we've had to use our knowledge and our tools that we've learned, but we have done it with so much confidence and to the point that it's almost a PR thing for yourself. People see how it works and they say, how can I be a part of it? I want to help. So to me that just... kind of measures our success and that we are doing the right thing. So thank you. Thank you for supporting us. Yes, thank you.

Good job, everybody. I'll give you guys a hand. Thank you. Did the kids enjoy those donuts? Duncan, did the kids enjoy their donuts?

Oh, absolutely.

All right. Thank you all. All right, commissioners, our next presentation is from none other than the group behind all of our meetings, QAC TV 7. So tab six, item two.

You look like a game show host.

I swear.

You look like an attorney.

It's a family business for him. I heard he plays one on TV. That's right.

Thanks for having us, guys.

You're welcome. Did we have a choice?

No. Or we were going to cut the live feed.

I'm just going to put this right here where we can hear it. That's nice.

Kudos to Beverly, who perfectly had the mic set up. We want to come before you because we love to show you the numbers every once in a while about how amazing your meetings and all the videos we put out. But this is a promise I'm going to make to you. This is going to be the last time we ever come up here and compare ourselves to the other TV departments in counties in Maryland, because there's no comparison anymore. We're going to start doing nationwide. We're going to show you why. So for 10 years...

Please start. Promise me next time you come up here, you get rid of all that. I need a ball cap. I really feel like I got a past judgment on this. I've been saying this for years. I'm sorry. I don't even know who these guys are.

For 10 years, I have heard from some people that we should have uniforms and look nicer. So it's time to start. But guys, I really wanted to come up, and I also wanted to introduce the team, because for a lot of the time, QAC TV doesn't get all the recognition it deserves in the field, because we have amazing people like Ray, who's joining me. Ray does most of our editing for lots of our videos, so you might not see Ray in the field as much, but they're the one that's putting our pieces out for you. And of course, Chris, who is our broadcast producer, who makes sure all the meetings are live, makes sure all the equipment's running, makes sure everything's going just well behind the scenes, so that when my ugly face was on TV, it could be seen. And, of course, we have the county's favorite Nepo baby, Marshall Haas. We're going to let Marshall come up here and talk to you a little bit. But we're going to go through what we've been doing because it's been two years since we've kind of given you an update. And the biggest update we have is the happy retirement of Mr. George Harvey, who was a station manager with us for over 20 years. So, as you can see, we made a list of all the things George is going to do in retirement. They're all about playing music because George is very excited to go into the next journey of his life. He already has about 50 shows booked from now through the rest of fall. So we're going to miss George. He did a great job getting this county started, getting this TV department off the ground. He actually started it in 2006. So we're going to miss him, but it's time to say goodbye, and he's really happy to move on. And sadly, that means you're going to be stuck with me as your station manager at QAC TV moving forward. We want to give you a duck's eye view at the views in Queen Anne's County. As you can see on that chart, your Queen Anne's County TV is going to be all the light blue. That middle blue next to us is going to be the views that Montgomery County gets. And we use them as comparison because they have the largest TV department in Maryland for county government. And then to the right of them is our midshore community partners. They're based out of Talbot County. The reason we didn't put Talbot County up there as a comparison is because they don't actually have a TV department. They actually outsource everything to midshore. So that's why we use midshore as a comparison. So one of the cool things, two years ago we made a switch from doing funny, ha-ha television that we were kind of known for, which was great. I had a good time doing it. We made a switch two years ago to really focusing on government video and government stories. And in those two years, we've actually seen our views increase by 100% or more two years in a row since we made that change. You can see we did the land development series with planning and zoning, which was really popular. It was all about what do we do when you, everything from starting the planning process to the actual development.

Wasn't that the talent though that, was it the podium that put that on?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I just showed them the way.

You were the face of that night.

Yeah, that night was great. I think we got a lot of good feedback from people about that series and that night in general. But that series has over 26,000 views online. And then we also did the Queens County commissioner candidate interviews this year. And those got over 10,000 views as well. So people were really engaged this year during the election, even though we didn't get 10,000 people come out and vote.

Yeah.

I wish there was more turnout, but at least people were involved.

It's not sour grapes, everybody. I promise.

but yeah as you can see our views per video we averaged just below 5 000 views for every video we make that's based on community events or community experiences businesses economic development all that compared to montgomery county who barely reached a thousand and then uh midshore community gets about 25 views a video online And then next up in the middle section is our views per meeting. You guys average just below 2,000 views per meeting. So even though there's only about 40 people in here sometimes, there are thousands of people watching at home. We've had a couple meetings actually reach 5,000 this year. And your recent meeting at Barclay, I believe, hit 3,000. So people are involved.

Again, good. And that's not even adding in the podcast, too. The podcast, the audio version of this meeting, too, has been seen steadily growth. And there's people that will download those episodes as soon as we post them.

And then, of course, there's Montgomery, who they were barely getting about 200 people watching their meetings. And then the last is our total subscribers. So we are over, I think we're totaling around 17,000 subscribers on our social medias throughout the county of people who ingest our TV department. And as you can see, it's barely over 5,000 for Montgomery, and it's a couple hundred again for people in Talbot.

Is that their content? Is that the reason?

No, to be very honest, Montgomery County puts on amazing, amazing work. They have an amazing team, and their videos look just as good as ours, I would say. They're very, very good. I think it's just there's no mix between community and their government. They separate it. So it's hard to get people involved if they don't know what's going on in all realms of departments. And that's one thing we do do. We mix it all together. You can find Board of Education. You can find the Talbot County. You can find Times Centerville. You can find all of our community events in one spot. In Montgomery, they have like five or six landing spots. So it's hard to know where to go. So we want to talk about some money because we just talked about the views that we get. The cool thing about Montgomery and our comparison is they're about 10 times larger as a budget. So they are $5.1 million as their TV budget. They have a team of about 20 people, so their team is five times bigger than ours also. So I thought it was a very neat comparison that we're getting almost 10 times the views at a tenth of the budget. We produce videos for nonprofits, local businesses, Maryland state agencies, education, and government. And we totaled the value of those videos around $450,000 plus. That's for time, services, equipment, and all that, like going live, going to the TV channel. That costs a lot of money that people might not see. We also produce your meetings, playing and zoning, the Board of Appeals. We totaled that at about $400,000 a year. Then we do the Board of Education meetings, we do special events, and we do Town and Centerville, and we think that that saved taxpayers in our area over $140,000 a year. Because when you think about, we actually do the graduation events live now. We do that for the schools at no charge. And before that was costing them up to $10,000 a year. And then there's plenty of things that we don't do. We do the county website. We're handling ADA compliance, which you're about to hear about. We do meeting room operations, emergency drones, staff training, special events, free AV equipment rental. And we're graphic designers and podcast hosts, along with Beth Malasky, who's in the back, who would love a close-up if Marshall wants to get that real quick. So we've been doing a lot with the money we've been given. And the reason we thought we would point out that money is because Ballpark figures, beautiful picture right there, Commissioner Dumineaux. Our ballpark figures are that our budget for the county is $675,000, but we value ourselves at over a million dollars. And we were blown away when we kind of did the math on that. I think Chris is kind of mad that I only put us at a million.

I said over. Those numbers are, I mean, working in the freelance industry like I did for many years, I mean, those numbers are a very small estimate. I mean, sometimes $10,000 to do like a one-hour live show is, you know, like that's not even heard of anymore. Sometimes it's $20,000, $25,000. There's people that spend a lot of money to do the smallest things, things that we do quite easily, do it the exact same way, if not better. And we do it for free.

Which is also one more thing we wanted to bring up about money while we were here. It was never anything that was voted upon, but it was something that we've been doing for years. But I think maybe we don't have to anymore. And that is we charge the Board of Ed and we charge the town of Centerville for Queen's County services to host their meetings. They're minimal. It's $100 a meeting, $200 if it's a long double meeting. But we don't think we have to charge that anymore and we want to get your approval or at least your guidance on whether we could save the taxpayers a little bit of money by not charging for those services anymore.

I think we should double it.

it's it is money that goes about not raising rates it is money that we can use for equipment but it's we've been very good about saving for the future being ready having the equipment we need and we just think it's a little bit of help to those meetings well since you're on the screen for you want to make the motion yeah i'll make a motion that we go ahead and allow them to provide those services at no cost second

All those in favor? Aye. Very good.

She didn't even know that was happening.

And if you're ever on the baseball field and that guy's umpiring, be nice.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that's why we put the picture, so they know.

So now Centerville is going to be fine paying for the wastewater treatment plant. It just gave them a savings. That $200 a month is going to be big. That's right. That compound interest.

Next, I would like, because I did introduce the team, I'd like them to get a chance to talk about some of the things we're doing. So we'd like to talk about how many people will watch some of our biggest projects that we've done. And Ray's going to talk about it. And since Ray doesn't get a chance to really tout their success as much as I would like. So Ray, take it away.

Good morning, county commissioners. Nailed it. Good morning, county administrator. Nailed it. And good morning, executive assistants. My name is Ray Lee, and I do, like Bruce said, a majority of the editing. I've been with QAC TV for over two and a half years, and I've been enjoying it every step of the way. It's an amazing experience. But I wanted to highlight some of my personal videos that I've edited and that the team has made. And I'll start off on one that's actually currently in the works is right now, actually last week, Libby's right on the water on Kent Island has just installed one million oysters on their pilings as a good faith effort to start giving back to the bay. So we as a team and including our intern who is not here but she's been with us this summer, We went out and we covered that, and so that's going to be going out. It's just a really good, nice community piece that I think deserves a lot of recognition. Along with that is our Bill Peak video from last year, also pertaining to oysters. That video got 48,000 views, which was really exciting. Our Club One video, that video is just a really fun showcase of how our team works and just promoting local business and stuff like that. And another video is our Engineering and Science Academy. That video actually, Diallo Wallace has, I believe, spoken with you guys. Yep. And that video that we made promoting his academy, received recognition and accolades from members in NASA, including Reid Wiseman, who was the commander of the Artemis II flyby of the Moon.

Yeah, imagine our reaction when we heard that he was watching it. He was like, great video! We're like, what? I believe he watched from the Moon, but I cannot confirm that.

Drawing the Line with Michael Bell with the Board of Ed. We were just highlighting his art studio. That was a really fun one. Art is always a fun thing to highlight, especially around here. And then the Kent Island Heritage Society. That video received over 40,000 views at the start of this year. And then just in addition, we do, again, in the previous slide, we talked about all of the different departments we work with. We work with the Board of Ed for news pieces, DES, such as Sarah's Safety Corner. Canard African American Cultural Heritage Center, Economic and Tourism, Animal Services, we've done a few videos with them on how to's, how to adopt, how to foster, and also promoting some of their veterinarian opportunities happening. Queen Anne's County Goes Purple, Area Agency on Aging, and many more. Up there you can see on the third, that is the Bill Peake Oyster video. Our lives also get great views. We always love kind of just, you know, coming out having fun, sharing information and stuff like that. But last and not least, our Mandy at the Fair video was posted last Friday. it's already received almost 10,000 views and all these videos are just super fun to work with our you know all of our equipment is amazing and having a team that is able to bring me very high quality footage makes my job much easier but yeah

Thank you, Ray. And I wanted Ray to bring up the Mandy video last because our first big announcement of this new regime is the return of Around Town with Mandy at QAC TV.

All right.

So Mandy's joining our team again, which is great. She's very excited, and we're happy to have her back. So she's going to come on first as volunteer as we try to get the job listed for a new host position and hope that she applies for that. And she'll be right back with the team where she was last August.

Awesome. Yeah.

She's very excited.

She didn't spill the beans last night.

She knew we were coming in today. She was like, I'm going to let them find out live.

She never mentioned a word. She never said a word.

So the one thing we want to leave you with is our initiatives moving forward, and we know we're taking up a lot of time, so we're going to go through this rather quickly. But I want Chris just to talk about some initiatives we're moving to make our channel look even better for the community.

Yeah, so when we, since we have BreezeLine, and then we have Comcast now, and we have Talkie in the area, our goal is most local stations will just have paid programming on whatever channel it is. So for us, it's 7 and 507. If you look at our channel guide, you'll just see... QAC TV. Our goal is to television isn't really going anywhere but for now where television is we're trying to make an actual program guide so it'll be tune in television to where we can feed into it with all of our social media that can then kind of basically direct people to television if the station's on at say like 8 o'clock and it's like an around the town Mandy hour or just like there'll be actual times for people to watch different things and it'll be a program guide, which when we transition over to IPTV, which is basically just television but through an internet service provider, that'll already be built in. So that's our big kind of like goal to kind of build out a whole program schedule to kind of make it, like you said earlier, kind of go nationwide. Because when you have a program schedule, people take you more seriously. They don't just see you as just kind of like a local government access station, so.

So now people will be able to go on their guide, hit the guide button, and see Commissioner Meeting at 7 o'clock. I know it's tonight, 7 o'clock. They won't have to just see a loop from now on. I think that's going to up our game very much. And we're going to make Chris be the voice of the channel. So he's going to be like BBC News. Coming up at 11.

That was always my dream. That's still my dream to become the voice of the BBC. So it's just one of these days. Sure.

Something else we started doing is we are now the emergency drone pilots for emergency services. So Marshall and I are drone certified. We now have the emergency drone that can fly at night. It has infrared. It's really cool. So one more thing that QAC TV gets to offer to the county. Chris talked about the Triforce, the local TV channels. We are now on talkie, and we believe we've been told that we're on Comcast by Comcast. But since we don't have a Comcast feed, we cannot confirm. But we do know we're on talkie, and we're still Channel 7. Then the Open Agenda podcast was a cool way that me and Beth Malaski have been able to host with the help of the team to get news out. And we just want to continue through 2027 looking forward to the great ADA experience. Stephanie's favorite thing about working at county government is this new ADA that's coming forward. And we've had a chance to talk to everyone in the county about what that's going to look like. But this is new legislation that was put forward that we're going to have to follow as the county. And QSETV has been put in charge of it. I'm going to let Marshall just talk to you briefly about what that means for the county, what we have to do, and what it's going to look like.

right so if you guys haven't had fun yet this is the fun part uh so ada compliance for the most part is just making sure that all of our digital content is accessible for people who have disabilities so anyone who's using a screen reader anyone who's visually impaired making sure that they can still for example these meetings can still interpret the content and understand what it is that we're trying to put out and that's not just our videos that's all county uh content all digital content so that's even email that's the county website that's our videos it's really anything that we put out as a county so it's a federal requirement all the federal and states have already gone through it now it's kind of our turn as county and the smaller municipalities under that will be up next as well um the compliance efforts kind of protect the county as well because it's you know A big suing thing for a lot of counties. A lot of the audits that we're going through, you kind of explained a little bit about it.

Have you ever seen the video auditors that go up to people and they get in their face and they're like, they just want interaction. People are doing that with this. But unlike getting in someone's face, all they have to do is use a website and check it. And so we have to be ready for that.

It's very easy to see if something is not compliant on the website, for example, or through email, et cetera. So we've been making a lot of efforts to try to make sure all of our content is as accessible as possible. This is an ongoing effort countywide as we're always producing more content, especially the TV station. So just making sure that we put our good foot forward, make sure all the county employees know how to make their content compliant is big and making sure that we continue to do those efforts. And we've been also working a lot of training. So we've sat down, I think a little bit over 200 employees so far. and train people on what ADA compliance looks like for digital content. And we're also creating videos that people can go step-by-step with their content as well and follow through if they forgot. It's a lot of information for them, so just making sure they have the tools to be successful is very important. And we've kind of been a little bit established as a leader in the area for ADA compliance. We're probably one of the first counties to really jump

like straight into this at least on the shore especially so it's a pretty pretty big thing for us yeah marshall undersells it he's actually had other counties reach out to him for help because they don't know what to do and so after talking with uh todd we decided it was best that we help other counties so marshall's become one of the heads of training people in maryland which is why he was invited to speak at mako in a couple of days awesome awesome yeah so it's gonna be what day are you speaking it's on friday you're speaking friday yes okay I think it's at 1 o'clock on Friday?

Yeah, I think it's 1 or 2.

Yeah, and he demands everyone come. He wants standing room only, 30,000 people. I mean, it's going to be a ruckus crowd. But that's kind of what's going on with QAC TV. So next time when we come back, we're going to blow even more smoke about how we're the best in the nation. And next time we come back, the last thing we're going to kind of talk about is that we need a new face because as I move up and I'm taking over for these guys, we're going to need someone else to take my spot and be the face of our channel.

So if you're watching or you know someone... You need a new talent.

We need a new talent. We had one all lined up. She decided to leave and go to college. I know. What a...

I mean, I can't believe these kids. Why would she want to go do that?

Education.

Kids worry about their future. It's crazy.

So, yeah, so we are going to start that search very soon. So we're excited for the next step for our channel. We're going to look different. We're going to be different. We might not be in suits all the time. We're just going to look nice. Never again. But, yeah, thank you for your time. Congratulations, Bruce, by the way.

Thank you very much. Nobody could have taken it over better than you can. Thank you. You've been here for, what, going on nine years? It'll be ten years in January. You really brought some life to the station over the years, believe me. Thank you very much.

Do me a favor. I know that you're adding a little more serious twist and disseminating information out to our citizens. You guys do a great job with that stuff, especially with the stuff that's very, very important and affects the daily lives of our citizens. But don't lose the fun part as well.

Oh, you need both. We always say it doesn't always have to be funny, but it has to be entertaining because we need to give a way for people to dissect this information that sometimes is pretty dry, and we know that. So we try to find the best way to get it out to people in an entertaining manner.

You mean like the Amazon warehouse right across the bridge? It's the best piece we've ever made. April Fools? Best piece we've ever done, hands down.

That was great.

They talked about it in Ohio on like some TV station in Ohio, and there was a news article from Ohio. I was like, well, we've made it.

Do you believe what they're doing? Yeah, we look forward to the next step.

All right, job you guys. Thank you, guys. Outstanding. Always.

Probably get a video of the big flag going up on Labor Day.

We had video of the flag up. We weren't able to be there on Labor Day to actually see. Are you saying coming up? Coming up. We could do that. Yeah, we can make that happen for sure. We could probably go live and see it being raised.

I just don't know when it's going up. It could be Thursday. We'll find out. Yeah, we'll find out. Just let us know and we'll make sure we're there. That's a great idea.

Cool.

Drone footage.

Oh yeah. Fly right over the bridge. They love that. Thank you gentlemen.

That's one way to lose your life. I was going to say, we'll need a new drone after that when they shoot it down. Did you get your, did we get it close with Stephanie? All right, commissioners.

Uh, now we can go to the department of public works. So if you want to, uh, Flip to tab number two, Public Works. Folks, come on down, please. So we have, first, if you want, while they're coming in, commissioners, you can convene as the Roads Board. We have two items for the Roads Board. I make a motion to convene as the Roads Board.

Second. All those in favor?

Aye. All right, thank you. So tab two, item one, pages one through 14. This is the FY2027 Slurry Seal Resurfacing Program Bid Award. This is for slurry seal paving. with slurry pavers from Richmond, Virginia, for about 12 miles for $580,000 for FY27. I believe there's a map that our QAC TV7 folks can put up on the screen here for us real quick, and we get a motion on that. Any questions for these guys?

I move to award FY2027 slurry seal resurfacing program to Slurry Pavers, Inc. of Richmond, Virginia, using the existing Cecil County contract. Second.

We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstain. So moved.

All right. Item number two on pages 15 through 24 is the tar and chip resurfacing program for FY27. Also, this one's with American Paving Fabrics out of Hanover. This is 58 miles for a total of $1.62 million. And again, the map on the screen here kind of shows it's kind of hard to see, but does show all the various roadways that are in the program for FY27.

I move to award the FY 2027 Tarnship resurfacing program to American Pavement Fabrics of Hanover, Maryland, using the existing Caroline County contract.

Second. I have a motion and a second on this item. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved. Okay.

Thank you, Commissioners. Next up, if you want to convene as the Sanitary Commission, please. I make a motion we convene as the Sanitary Commission. Second. Oh, it was a favorite? okay item number three on pages 25 through 28 this is for the chesterhaven beach this is a request to amend their existing public works agreement uh mr joe stevens the attorney for chesterhaven beach is requesting an amendment to the current pwa uh would like to um amend that begin construction date deadline by 48 months four years to september 10 2030 and this magnitude of this extension is necessary due to the potential that any final approval is granted for This project, which is 90 lots, would likely be adjudicated.

I move to approve the request for Chesterhaven Beach to extend the under-construction milestone by 48 months and direct the Public Works Department to negotiate, amend three of the Public Works Agreements, and present to the Sanitary Commission for execution.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion on this item? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. Three to two.

Thank you, Commissioners. Item number four is the Graysonville Water Main construction bids on page 29. So we received sealed bids for a 12 inch water main extension along route 18 main street from Kenton arrows back to the Graysonville, uh, elementary school. We received four bids ranging from 3.2 million to $5.2 million. Recommend teal construction, the low bidder at 3.162 million for this project.

I move to award the bid for the construction of the Graysonville Water Main to Teal Construction Incorporated in the amount of $3,162,162. Second. We have a motion and a second.

Any discussion on this one? So, Alan, I read it right.

We budgeted out six for this, and it's coming in at three. So that's capital back for you on your side? Yeah, it's all capital. It's all water capital. Right. Okay. Good. That's good. Yeah, we were pleasantly surprised. I was going to say, something under budget?

You've got to be kidding me.

Pleasantly surprised at this one. I think there's less than half of what I thought there was going to be. That's awesome. Delighted. But it is going to be disruptive to the people in the area.

Shh. Let us bask in the glory of that first.

Don't you have enough left over to do another water tower? What water tower? I said, don't you have enough left over to do one?

I thought you wanted to add one more. Close. Yeah, we have a placeholder in there. We don't know what we're going to do. Once we get this connected all together, we're going to have to do a hydraulic study of the whole corridor and determine what, if anything, else we need.

All right. Any other discussion? Seeing none, are all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right. Thank you, commissioners. Item five on pages 30 through 36. This is a systematic equipment replacement for a tele handler. This is for the solid waste division, and they're recommending the acquisition of a cat tele handle tele handler with 1.7 and 1.2 yard bucket $213,500. And this is off the source. Well, pre established government contract.

I guess with this project, this water sewer project, you're probably going to need this piece. I moved to purchase one Caterpillar TH0842 till handler with 1.7 and 1.2 cubic yard buckets, 48 inch forks from the Carter Machinery Company of Felton, Delaware in the amount of $213,500 via the existing source well contract 011723-CAT. Second.

We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Is this thing more of a lull or a great all? Is it a lull or is it a great all or what? It's a lull. I got it. Yes.

Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? No, I'm good with that. That's what I'm used to using.

Commissioners, we have a few action items remaining on the agenda today. So if you want to turn to tab number three.

So we've got tab three.

Item one is training and business travel reimbursements and vehicle usage policy. Human Resources is recommending a revision to the training and business travel reimbursement policy and the vehicle use policies. This was at the request of managers to make some modifications so they're more consistent with various travel business reimbursement policies around the state and then some minor changes to the vehicle use policy to support clarifications with county vehicle usage when folks have points on their license. Which happens from time to time, unfortunately, but yes. So we'd recommend adoption of these clarifications to these two policies.

I move to approve the training and business travel reimbursement policy and the vehicle usage policy to go into effect in seven business days. second any discussion i gotta say i was very surprised by that commissioners are actually eligible for this yeah 12 years what have i been thinking um if we've never had this agreement with delaware

I don't understand.

It's for vehicles taken.

Oh, no. The travel the travel policy allows for take any out of state travel requires my county administrator approval. So this would allow people to travel to Delaware for training without getting having preapproval because it's, you know, we're right here.

I guess my comment was simply I'm surprised that that wasn't already the case.

But well, it's just a just a minor amendment to the policy. So it helps to streamline training opportunities for one less thing you have to worry about. That's right.

Did we vote?

Did we?

You had a vote.

Go ahead. Oh, man. Okay. All right. Well, here we are. No further discussion. All those in favor, signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right. Thank you, commissioners. Uh-oh. This must be going to cost us money.

You must have drew the short straw that you have to go last today.

Yeah. All right. We've got a few things for our... Parks and Recreation Department. Item two on pages 27 through 32. This is a tree planting contract at the Centerville YMCA property. And we've been working with the YMCA, the Chesapeake Planning and Zoning and Parks and Recreation to do an afforestation project to take place on the campus of the Centerville YMCA this fall. That's in conjunction with a trail extension property around that campus and around Providence Farm, our county complex. We received bids for the project, and we have a local vendor that was recommended for the award. It was just slightly higher than the lowest bidder, but we would recommend the local vendor preference low bid Chester River Landscaping, $159,859.

I move toward a bid to contract services to plant, monitor, and maintain trees at the YMCA Active Aging Center of Centerville in the amount of $159,895 to Chester River Landscaping. Landscaping Incorporated. Second.

We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? So what kind of trees?

I was just going to ask that. Crate myrtles?

There's a forest conservation plan Doug is versed in what is supposed to be in there. There's a variety of them. Like I said, there's 444 trees that are going to be planted. Right. Obviously, there will be native trees. There's a selected area along the parcel.

Great myrtles? They're all native. We did update the plant schedule for stock based on what's available. I believe great myrtles were species in there. And it should be a mix of evergreens and deciduous. So can you get a list? We can get you a list.

Please just give me a list.

Yeah, we're also going to look to do a small change order and adjust some of the street trees along Vincette Street and John Edwards Boulevard and take some of the scrubs out and replace those with some some more appropriate street tree species.

The cherries are beautiful in the spring.

Alrighty, any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right. Thank you, Commissioners. Item 3, pages 33 through 46. This is a public works agreement with the town of Centerville for wastewater allocation for White Marsh Park for the new comfort station, $17,354. And this is for the comfort station that is expected to be open next month at White Marsh Park.

Yay. I move to approve and execute the public works agreement between Canaan's County Commissioners and the Town of Centerville to establish wastewater services at White Marsh Park and pursuant to the agreement to approve the expenditure of $17,354 for sewer allocation costs.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right. Thank you, Commissioners. Item number four, equipment purchase. This is for a Ventrac tractor. It's on pages 47 through 50. Parks and Rec is recommending purchase of one Ventrac tractor with attachments from J&R Sheds in Churchville, Maryland, $61,340 using the Sourcewell pre-established government contract. This piece will be used for a backup mower, sidewalk plow, stormwater management activities.

I move to authorize Department of Works and Recreation to purchase one vent track with attachments from J&R Sheds and Equipment Incorporated in Churchville, Maryland in the amount of $61,340. Second. We have a motion to second.

Any discussion? This is four wheels?

I'm sorry, eight wheels? You can't get it that way. Okay, so this is just... We are getting it that way just because of, especially for stormwater, because of the angle. Oh, okay.

So it's more for keep the thing from tipping over.

Okay, I got you. And we've gone more towards multi-use pieces of equipment as opposed to singular. So, I mean, you can use it for snowplow, for mowing, for bush hogging, for ball field use.

Well, it won't get stuck, that's for sure.

I do.

All right. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye.

Opposed?

So moved. Thank you. Thank you. Hold on. Hold on. The Vincent building, who maintains the outside of that? Public Works? General Services? Our Public Works? OK. Never mind. Let's think of something else. It's all good.

OK. All right, commissioners, item five on pages 51 through 53. This is Maryland Affordable Housing Trust grant application. This is from the Department of Housing and Family Services, and they're recommending to submit a letter of support from the commissioners to accompany their application for the Maryland Affordable Housing Trust grant that's being submitted next month. The application does require a formal resolution signed by the commissioners, and this is for $150,000. And these funds will help to leverage the department's ongoing efforts to directly benefit low-income homeowners with homes that have emergency repair needs.

I move to execute the resolution and letter of support for the Maryland Affordable Housing Trust Grant. In the amount of $150,000 for the Department of Housing and Family Services. Second. I have a motion and a second.

Any discussion?

You want to say anything about it? Okay.

It says it all. Yeah, it says it all.

All right.

No problem.

All righty. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved.

All right, next commissioners item number six on pages 54 through 114. This is a sustainable community, Stevensville sustainable communities act, um, plan. The detailed application is rather lengthy, and I want to thank these two individuals for putting this together. But it's for the proposed Stevensville Sustainable Community Area. It's 213 acres in the Stevensville zone. It does include the, it's within the PFA and the Arts and Entertainment District in downtown Stevensville. The commissioners need to pass a resolution indicating support of this plan, which then ultimately is approved by the governor's Sustainable Communities Growth Subcabinet on the recommendation of the Secretary of Housing. So a lot of work went into this. If you have questions or if you want to give us a brief overview, Stephanie or Heather, please jump in.

Good. Um, so this was a joint effort between planning and zoning and economic tourism and development. Um, essentially it was a work group that was formed of those, uh, or business owners. Also, um, those that either worked in that area, the A and E district, and also, um, the historical, uh, I guess, organization within, uh, Stevensville. So that group met twice. They designated it the area and the location. Essentially it was the morphing of the A&E district and the heritage area or the historical area. And then a few properties were added in addition to that. And then also they went through an action plan, which essentially is they kind of go through different items as to what recommendations they want to make for the sustainable community. They basically talked a lot about traffic calming, connectivity, business retention, historic structure improvements, and economic revitalization. So those were some of the big things that were mentioned in the action plan. So essentially this application will go, like Todd said, to the Smart Growth Committee for approval. Once that is done, essentially those properties within this designated area will be able to apply for specific grants and also tax incentives. So it does give an incentive to that location specifically of the designated community for those funding benefits. And I know Heather can speak to some of how that area will utilize those grant benefits.

Many of the programs through the Department of Housing and Community Development when it comes to business as well as redevelopment and sustainable community best practices, any of the incentives you have to be a sustainable community in order to apply for those so like one of those is project restore that is a grant that will help back fill properties that have been vacant for more than 6 months for commercial use and so Stevensville was prime for that for a couple places so this will enable that community to be able to apply for its center bill as a sustainable community and they use that for their facade improvement grants here and and also on some planning i can see this also being beneficial down the road when we look at parking issues and there's parking constraints there whether it's planning whether it's actual land purchase or redevelopment of certain properties it really opens up opportunities

So similar to it being created as an arts and entertainment district, it made it eligible for some state programs that before it wasn't.

Exactly. And I just wanted to thank Stephanie for her work on this. You know, we had convened a while ago and she helped get it to the finish line and really thankful for that.

And is it something you have to renew every so many years?

Yes. So every five years, you have to go through your action plan and kind of give them an update as to where you are within that action plan.

There is a motion with this. Yep. I move to adopt Resolution 2613 to designate and establish the Stevensville Sustainable Community Area, SSCA, and provide the completed application to DHCD to continue through the application process.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? So moved. Thank you. That is a whole lot of information. A lot of work there. Yeah. Good job. Okay. All right. Thank you.

Commissioners item seven on pages 100 page 115. This is the notice of award for the feasibility study and market analysis for the multi sport tourism facility and conjunction with economic and tourism development. This is a request to award this project to Kemper sports for $45,000 feasibility study and market analysis for a multi sport tourism facility here in Queen Ian's County.

I move to authorize the Department of Economic and Tourism Development to award Kemper Sports the contract for the multi-sports tourism facility feasibility study in the amount of $45,000.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Why don't you tell us what this is all about? I don't think the public has any clue what this is.

So this is a feasibility study and a market analysis to determine if a multi sports tourism facility would fit in Queen Anne's County. It would help us determine where it would go with the economic development or what the economic impact would be. Does it pencil out financially? You'll notice many other communities in the state as well as across the nation are considering this as a tourism and an economic driver. In many cases they are, provide positive impact financially to different locations, different counties, different municipalities. So this is a study to determine if it's feasible and then from there the county can move forward if it so chooses on actually moving forward with whatever the study says and or it could come back and say that this is something that doesn't work for Queen Anne's County and then we know.

There are facilities similar to this in other counties across the state of Maryland. Any of them a private sector and public What's the term I'm looking for? Partnership?

I believe so, and those are the ones that are, which I believe personally from looking at those is the way that if Queen Ed's County were to move forward that they should consider that public-private partnership because there's experts in running these types of facilities and So anytime you can move that off the books of the county, that's important to consider. Cecil County is looking at this right now. We know Worcester and Ocean City. There is potential for, as I mentioned before, a positive economic impact. each community is different certainly queen anne's county is and so this will help the county determine if they should move forward and the other thing i wanted to point out is this is different than the community facility that the county is is looking at doing and they're two different projects yeah so there must be some sort of parameters with it with the study i mean they must say you know we're looking for x amount of fields or these type of fields and

Is there anything, or is this just wide open? I mean, you talk to these sports complexes, they're all 5, 10, 20 acres more. Is there some sort of parameters with this?

There are, but we're also looking to the Kemper Sports, the consultant that we're looking at, to say what could potentially work. We certainly in the RFP asked for what we thought we should have and the types of facilities, but at the same time, we're looking to them to say, you know, well, this facility I'm not saying we should have a stadium, but this big stadium won't work, but 20 grass fields that have multiple uses could work. So we are going to be looking to them to guide on that.

The concept as envisioned currently looked at an expandable that could be six to 10 lighted multi-purpose, you know, soccer, lacrosse fields, four to eight baseball fields, potentially a 3000 open seat stadium, mountain bike skills, park, pump track concessions, restroom. So it's a, it could be a fairly significant, uh, attraction for Queen's County, but as Heather mentioned, it could be scalable as well. So we're looking at all the supporting utility transportation needs, infrastructure, family amenities. There's a, um, it could be a potentially a, a rather big project.

I said on two of the interviews, I missed the first two, but the questions that they created, the group, were really good, pointed, and I think it brought out what, because they all, at least I got the impression they had done a lot of studying on Queen Anne's County prior to coming here. Actually, the whole corridor, what's around us and everything. So they had a pretty good idea, I think, in their mind of what would fit here. They didn't really share that whole vision, but definitely What's coming I think would fit the area. I think that's primarily what they focused on is like this is clean I mean they know about the bridge traffic and I mean they had all that in there You know their presentations, so they definitely did their homework before they came so Any other discussion seeing none all those in favor signify by saying aye opposed abstain so move Thanks, Heather.

I would just mention one more thing you did a Nothing more to say. You did great. It's not just tourism. This is going to be for our high school, our elementary, you know, T-ball to 103 years old. Okay. All right.

All right, commissioners. The next item, final item, item number eight. Um, this is, uh, in reference to the building moratorium decisions, resolution 2512. We have, um, a couple of final issues to resolve. One of which is the, uh, first is the, um, adequate public facilities, uh, ordinance. And as was previously presented, the staff had recommended raising the capacity of the high schools from current value of 100 to 110%, given the mobility nature of high school students. And actual capacity numbers of numbers of students enrolled so we can we're ready to move that forward through the process Secondly we have the comprehensive water and sewer plan That needs to be adopted and as part of that we have the sewer allocation policy that needs to be finalized and And the latest draft identifies two sort of allotments of remaining wastewater capacity, the first being about 150,000 gallons per day out of the three MGD plant, and then the 300,000 gallons that came from the re-rating. So the 150,000 gallons that exists out of the current three MGD plant We had earmarked 50,000 gallons for residential uses 22,500 gallons for commercial uses, not including commercial apartments and 77,500 gallons set aside for climate resiliency buffer. So we have that pot. And then out of the 300,000 gallon, Rerating allotment, we had 125,000 gallons set aside for the Marlin Farms in Dominion area. It's a public health concern region. 25,000 gallons for additional unidentified concentrations of other public health concern areas. 50,000 gallons per day for commercial and institutional uses. Again, not including commercial apartments. They will be considered residential. and then 100,000 gallons for other residential infill uses. So the key thing here is, do you want to set a cap on the remaining passive allocation annual cap for granting of allocation going forward? And if so, when do we want that residential cap to be applied?

So I'm going to make a motion to set the annual allocation cap for residential use at 15,000 gallons. Second. Okay.

all right we have a motion in a second any discussion um yeah just it's a little bit on my soapbox but we hear a lot of people talk about development over development all these things and we've been having the discussions on how the sewer allocation will work and these discussions go back well over a year and the public doesn't show up they don't comment they don't email us Complaining on social media is not civic engagement, people. You need to email the commissioners, call the commissioners. You'd be surprised how easy it is to talk to a commissioner. Come to meetings because this is one of the more consequential votes we've made on what's going on with sewer allocation in the eight years that I've been here. And close to zero public engagement. And we've had many meetings on it. There's been social media output on this. I've seen Jay Falstead put social media out on this. I've seen Joshua Willis, like people on all ends trying to get the word out and very little public engagement. So just if you don't like the way this turned out and you didn't say anything, it is your fault. because you didn't participate. And democracy requires you to participate. It is a full contact sport. And if you don't do that, you're not doing what the founding fathers did when they set up this country. You need to participate. Don't just sit on your couch and complain that the world isn't going the way you want it to go. Speak up or you haven't said anything. So that's just a point of irritation for me that I wanted to get out. Sorry. It really bugs me. It's the truth.

You're not wrong.

You're not wrong. OK. Well, I mean, we have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. Abstained? That's it. 4-1. OK. You want to go back and get the APFO first before you move forward? Yeah.

Yeah, and did you want to set a particular date?

So that's a separate motion. That's a separate motion. Let's do the APF. Okay, sure.

Go ahead. I move to direct the county attorney to draft a revision to the county code 28-7C1B to consider raising high school capacity levels of service standard to 110% for introduction at the September 8, 2026 meeting and with public hearing to be held on September 21st of 2026. And I'll second that.

So we have a motion and a second. Any discussion on this? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye.

Opposed? And I will say to that, Jim, I guess to explain, people say, oh, you're taking it to 110%. That's horrible.

It's 105% now, right?

No, it's 100% right now. But there's two dynamics to that. High school kids are much more mobile. And we have a tech center that's going to be built here in the next year and a half, which is going to take quite a few students out of our high schools on a daily basis. So it will kind of sell itself out to where the high schools are not going to become overcrowded because we're going to 110%. still won't exceed 100% capacity once the tech centers open.

We've been lower than most other counties on that for a while.

And it's a money thing, too. Going to 110, we're eligible for more funding when we do have to build an addition.

And I think that's the key to this. High schools are not cheap. I think North County High School in Saverna Park was $450 million.

Seven runs. Whatever it's called. Yeah, yeah.

It's a capacity number in order to be eligible for state funding for building the school. Absolutely.

All righty. So that's taken care of.

Now you can go back to your. So I will follow up with the 15th. I move to make the annual allocation cap for residential use as effective January 1, 2027. Second.

Okay. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion on this item? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. I guess since I'm no on the first one, I've got to be no on this one. So I'll stick with that. 4-1. 4-1. Yep. All right.

Thank you, commissioners. Thank you, commissioners. Thank you, guys, your whole group for all the work. Thank you very much. A lot of work.

So this will effectively, we will be lifting, the moratorium will be expiring tomorrow.

And it was expiring tomorrow by the moratorium, not because of the vote today.

Exactly. Just happened to be tomorrow's the day.

So anybody that walks into the permitting office tomorrow can get 20,000 gallons, right? Because you said it's not going to go into effect? January 1, right. January 1, that's correct. So they're all going to run in there.

But you are limited to what's there under the existing, because the re-rating hasn't been done yet.

Yeah, that's right. Okay. So I have to make sure right away.

$150,000. Well, you don't know when the re-rating's coming. They've been saying that for six months now. Okay.

Any other questions or comments? Okay. That's all we had, commissioners, for action items. So I'll turn it back over to... President Moran for roundtable or public comment?

Why not? Nobody. Public comment? Nobody. Nothing to read, nothing to write. OK. Phil, how about you going first? You want to go last? Yeah, I want to go last. Patrick, you get to go first.

I'm good. OK. Chris? 4-H fair, get out to the 4-H this week, all week.

All right, Jack. Yeah, just to follow up, we weathered the storm last night, and myself and Commissioner Corcorino officially got her opened up. So, yeah, go out, visit the fair. It was for a rainy thunderstorm night. It was still pretty crowded out there last night.

Good deal, good deal.

So. You want to go last? Wait a minute. I got nothing. Okay. You got nothing? Now I'm last. So I actually had an opportunity to attend the Southernsville Peach Festival. And I got to tell you, if you've never been to that, holy Toledo, what a great event. It was a wonderful evening. I had an opportunity to spend that evening with Major Dwayne Boardman and his lovely wife and John McQueenie and some other folks. And I was extremely impressed with the number of people that showed up for it and what a great job that they did at the farm. to pull this event off. So put it on your calendar. As soon as you find out what the date is for next year, I strongly recommend it. That's all I got.

There we go. OK, motion.