City Council - workshop

GABLE US TO ORDER. WELCOME BACK FROM OUR HIATUS AND WE HAVE WORK SESSION ON YOUTH ENGAGEMENT AND OF COURSE THE CURFEW. JONATHAN LAMBERT MELTON WILL BE 30 MINUTES LATE. IF WE CAN NOTE THAT IN THE MINUTES AND THEN I WILL INVITE UP KEN HISTLER OF RALEIGH PARKS, TYESHA MOSLEY OF COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND AMANDA ROLE OF THE POLICE DEPARTMENT.

Good morning. Taisha Mosley with the Community Engagement Department. And yes, as the mayor stated, this is going to be a joint presentation. So you will see multiple faces here at the podium. I am just getting us started. Everyone will be available for questions on their specific programs as we wrap up. So today, we will talk a little bit about context, we'll discuss briefly our current programs, we'll spend some time talking about the engagement efforts that took place this summer, and then next steps. When you think about youth engagement as a whole across our organization, it's primarily based in three departments, community engagement, Raleigh Parks, and the Raleigh Police Department. These three departments have continuously and regularly worked collaboratively to identify ways to elevate youth voices. We've done things prior to the events that took place in July, like develop a youth services division in the community engagement department. The Raleigh Police Department has created a community impact and engagement division. We're having conversations with Raleigh Parks about reimagining what the Raleigh Youth Council looks like. And then most recently, we've enhanced our centralized webpage for youth services. which is shown here, and what that does is create a one-stop shop for all things related to teens and young people. It's the starting point to learn what those opportunities are from arts, community, workforce development, et cetera. For the purpose of today's presentation with my colleagues, we're gonna be talking about youth. So you'll hear that and we're referring to individuals that are elementary school age. You'll hear us talk about teens. We're thinking more high school and then young adults over the age of 18. So you'll hear that throughout the presentation. So in the youth area, across all three departments, we have programs like AmeriCorps Foster Grandparents, which is where we have individuals over the age of 55 volunteer in local elementary schools and daycare centers. The Parks and Recreation Department does a wonderful job of identifying out of school time across all of those programs that you see on the screen. The Raleigh Police Department having Raleigh Youth Summer Camps, their leadership program and mentorship opportunities. Our current programming around teens within the community engagement department, I'm gonna start with Raleigh Summer Youth Employment Program, which a lot of people are familiar with, and when you think about it, its inception in 1983 was young people working in community centers over the summer. And I just wanted to take a moment to point out the growth in the program since then. So within Summer Youth, they do additional programming with young people. We've had two mental health summits, job readiness training, which is open to anybody who even wants to apply to Raleigh Summer Youth, walking them through the application process there. Several professional development opportunities, and some may not know that Raleigh Summer Youth also has a virtual pathway. So teenagers are able to work virtually with local businesses like York Properties or non-profits like the Garner Road Community Center. There they tackle real world challenges that the businesses identify and a part of their job is proposing a solution at the end of their summer. We also have our Digital Impact Program, and both the Connectors and the Ambassadors work to bridge the digital divide. They pass out computers to low-income families. They host programs like Advice About a Device, where anyone can bring their cell phone, computer, iPad, and have the young people help them problem solve. And with that, I am going to turn it over to my colleague, Ken Hisler, in Raleigh Parks.

Good morning, Ken Hisler, Assistant Director, Raleigh Parks, glad to be here with you today. A nice little transition as we think about the collaboration that Taisha just talked about is that Raleigh Summer Youth Employment Program. For those of you who may not be aware, a lot of those kids come and work with us, so they're in our summer camps, they're working in our park operations, so it's a great example of how our two groups work together. Now, as typical in some of my slides, you have a lot of information here and a lot of data to look at. But what I want to do today is talk about a couple things that you're going to see in there. One is this is data that we can pull out of our registration system. What it doesn't capture is all of that self-directed passive use of our greenway trails, our outdoor courts, our disc golf courses, and those other opportunities that people have to recreate within our spaces. The other thing I do want to draw attention to is things like I want to put in there is contact hours and also connections. So contact hours are how often do we have those teens in our programs, and then how frequently are they interacting in our programs. What I did want to draw attention to is a couple things, and as Tanisha talked about, out of school time's really important to Raleigh Park. So when that school bell ends, what are the opportunities that we have for both our youth, our teens, and we'll talk a little bit about adults in a minute. So two of those is our out of school time includes our camps, our specialty camps, our traditional camp, and our after school programs. What we want to do is make sure those are geographically represented in our after school programs spread out across Raleigh. But we also want to make sure they have an opportunity to get into different things. So when we get into our specialty camps, we're talking about things like entrepreneur camps. You guys may have remembered right before you broke for the summer, we had a bunch of teens that were in here learning about what government looks like. Do you want to be in a job with RTN? or we even had them out at our greenhouse. So we're looking at those opportunities that the youth, the teens, want to be able to learn more about skilled trades. Entrepreneur camp, we had them over to Ironworks. What does it look like to start a small business in Raleigh? The other one I wanted to draw your attention to is our Raleigh Teen Connect program. It's a membership where our teens can come in and they get opportunities for additional exposures. An example of that is having the opportunity to go to our pools as part of our after school program. We do believe that basic learn to swim programs and just provides them the access to do it. The other ones are bringing in special speakers that may speak to a trade, that you speak to a skill, something that is more of their interest. The other thing I want you to make sure that understand, we're really fortunate in Raleigh Parks that we do have program area-focused groups talking like teens and youth, but really the conduit is all of our general programming. You'll see at the bottom of that slide is our general program offerings. Those are the ones that are just, it's martial arts, it's arts, it's cultural, it's history, those are all the things that happen through the 50 buildings that we have within Raleigh Parks. And then on top of that, we have our athletic programs. Those are our leagues and things. And then don't forget about our passes. So what we do is we have lots of opportunity for open play. Can you come use the fitness center? Can you just go drop into the pool to be able to do some things? So what we're able to show here is kind of that holistic, when the school bell ends, how do we provide opportunities for our teens? And with that, I will turn it over to my colleague with Raleigh Police Department.

Good morning. I'm Amanda Roll with the Raleigh Police Department. I oversee our Community Impact and Engagement Division. Our division was created in October 2025, and the purpose was to bring all of our youth-facing and supportive services, including school resource officers, our community officers, our volunteers, our crossing guards, as well as our mentors under one umbrella for unity of delivery as well as command. Our approach in Raleigh Police Department has been with our teens and young adults to provide opportunities for exposure. Exposure with our cadet program. Our cadet program includes young people 14 to 20 years old, ongoing across the entire year. And in the last three years, we've had 24 cadets. The program gives these young people an opportunity to see a light version of the police academy. So they're exposed to the physical challenges of law enforcement, as well as doing ride-alongs and actually seeing real life situations. They include team building, physical fitness, as well as community service projects.

Should we be on a different slide?

If we can kind of help you get, I'm just trying to text the chief to say, hey, do we have slides for this?

I thought he clicked it. Okay, sorry, guys. That's okay. She was on a roll. I was. I was like, y'all are looking at me. Literally. So that's our young adults. So that's the exposure piece. The next piece is the application piece. Application comes when we take young adults in our criminal justice and other related majors from colleges as well as trade schools, and we pay them to work as paid interns over the course of their school year. As they are earning that credit, they are also having opportunities to ride along with officers, gain some specialized insight into what it's like to be an officer, as well as working with our detective division. What's unique about our internship program is that at the beginning, Chief Boyce directs them all that they are to be ambassadors. They're to not only represent Raleigh Police, but also embrace the fact that they are now part of our family, and we hope that they will go back and share their positive experiences with their colleagues, with their other college mates, to really debunk some of the myths about law enforcement and bridge that gap or divide between those age groups. At the end of their internship, they present to our command and our executive staff a very short presentation, but it's how did they apply? That's the application piece. What theories did they learn in college and how did they see it play out? How were they able to make that application in real time, in real life? The other purpose of our college internship is to lead them into a career in public safety. To date, we've had 18% of our police recruits converted to actual police hirees. So we've hired 19 of our 104 interns in the past three years. With that, I'll turn it back over to Kim.

All right, so Raleigh Parks doesn't just stop programming once you graduate from high school. Actually, we pride ourselves on cradle-to-grade programming. What I want to talk about here, again, that top bullet, these are program offerings for our young adults ages 19 to 25. General programming, again, comes in there. A lot of our programs are situated so adult, you will often find like in a martial arts program, you may have a 10, 12, 14 year old, but you must have a 35 year old. And so when we look at program offerings, they aren't always just specific for a target demographic, but they're looking at more of the skill that's in there. But what we can pull out is some information there related to our program. What we also recognize is once teams start to drive, it opens up new opportunities. So I really should have titled this slide, You Can Work Where You Play. And so what we have found is really a role for us is both working with NC State and our local colleges, and we have a very vibrant work-study program. We've worked with NC State for years on a federal work-study program that brings students in, and it serves as a pipeline to what does that again look like working in local government, and it helps to foster really just an opportunity and a joy and a passion to be able to come work within the city of Raleigh, and we do recognize that they may choose another municipality even though we'd rather have them there. Our annual internship program, we will bring in 10 to 15 students, not just NC State, we have students from across the state. This year we had them from App State, ECU, Central, and of course the Wolf Pack have one of the strongest parks and recreation programs in the country, but we're glad to have them here. But what we do is we expose them to all facets of the business. So they're not just camp counselors. They're not just working our athletics. They're working and meeting with our business session. They're having opportunities to meet with Steven of what does it look like to run an organization as big as Raleigh Parks. So they're really informed on what a profession may look like in here. One that we think is pretty cool, and we've shared information before, is that internship program has led into hiring a lot of young people. So for a guy who's been around for a day or two, we have a young workforce, 22 to 25, that we have 12 full-time employees that have graduated. Most of them have come through our internship program and are now full-time employees. So for me, it's like my daughter's now working with me, and I'm learning how to relate with that. So the other part of that, and it's really sometimes quite interesting, but the heart of our operations are part-time staff. We have 1,200 part-time staff that are ages 15 to 25. More importantly, we're wrapping up our summer season. So in order to make the 15,000 campers come through, it takes a lot of counselors. to operate a pool that takes a lot of lifeguards. 650 of those part-time employees are ages 15 to 19. And we like to tell them, if you need a little money in your pocket throughout the year, come be a lifeguard, come work for us in some capacity, and we'll find the opportunity for you to work with Raleigh Parks.

I'll hand it back over to Taisha.

All right, and wrapping up the young adult section in the community engagement department, we have something that's relatively new, which is a pipeline from the Raleigh Summer Youth Employment Program to the Raleigh Summer Youth Alumni Alliance. We found that important because there was a need to continue providing mentorship, networking, and programs to individuals that age out of Raleigh summer youth employment. We also have our Pathways to Public Service program and community climate internship. Both are open to college juniors, seniors, and recent grads. They work in city departments like the council office, the human resources communications, The community climate interns work more so in the Office of Sustainability, Raleigh Water, and we average about 31 participants per year across those. We're now going to transition over to some of our engagement efforts, and you're going to hear from Dr. Roll.

This was an exciting summer for the Raleigh Police Department and the city of Raleigh. The first Friday in June is declared National Gun Violence Awareness and Prevention, and our mayor was kind enough to do a proclamation for us. That also launched an effort to highlight in orange almost everything we did. So if you noticed orange and wondered why we had changed our colors, it was to continuously promote the message about anti-gun violence and gun safety. We hosted Raleigh Hoop Nights this summer, and we engaged 309 teens. Equally important, we engaged their families. Parents had an opportunity to drop their kids off at the centers and then come back, but they actually stayed, and they also engaged with us, and so we had an opportunity to meet them. Young people played basketball against our police officers, and I will tell you, nobody held back. including Chief Boyce. There were dunks, there were rejected balls, like it was quite, fouls, I mean hard fouls. We also used, many of our command staff members served as referees, so this was all in. Stormy came to I think every one of them and we almost got her to play. That was overall a great night. Kids were engaged, and we had doubled our numbers from last year. On June 8th, I'm sorry, on June 9th, we hosted a Something to Say Teens Against Violence teen hall. That teen hall was part of our summer action plan kickoff. What that was was an opportunity for us to collaborate with Parks and Rec and to bring teens from strategic locations that we selected, provided transportation, and gave young people a voice. We used the young people to co-facilitate, and we wanted to know what they had to say, not what we wanted to tell them. We engaged a total of 55 teens, and what we saw is that that engagement carried across multiple events. So we started to see kids show up at other events, and hoop nights had a following across the city. So as far out as Lake Lynn, we had a turnout with kids that we know from Roberts Park or from Chavis Heights. So overall, we had a fantastic summer, and we are looking forward to next year. I will turn this over to Taisha.

All right, that's gonna pause musical chairs into questions at the end, okay? I'm gonna bring us home and talk about the remainder of our summer engagement. So you've heard about all the programs that we offer, all the initiatives that we have. And we do want to pause and take a moment and acknowledge that there still very well may be gaps that exist. We want to ensure that we're doing our due diligence, streamlining our efforts across departments to enhance programming, look at operational adjustments, both in community engagement, Raleigh Parks, Raleigh Police Department, and throughout the organization. So this summer, we really did continue our efforts, our combined missions of meeting people where they are, and we began our conversations with teenagers through our teen table talks. We had a couple of goals here. And I want to preface it with saying this is just the beginning of this more so meaningful engagement. But we did want to share information about what we currently do. We wanted to understand how the city could better support young people and get feedback again on those gaps. programs, spaces, etc. We, in our partnership with Raleigh Parks, we went to several teen extreme camps. We engaged with the virtual cohort of Raleigh Summer Youth Employment. We were grateful that SAGE, Saving Adolescent Girls Everywhere, that's the photo there, they welcomed us into their space to have some thought-provoking conversations as well. We were also in the process of We are also in the process of setting up meetings with the Boys and Girls Club, YMCA of the Triangle, nonprofits who are already doing this work. There are plenty of nonprofits working with young people throughout our city, local high schools, and community leaders. All of that is in the works, and we wouldn't dare try to do it just in the summer. So those events here, we had our preliminary engagement included 15 touch points. So there were eight group discussions, seven tabling events. So that's us just going to national night outs or strategic places across the city, again, to meet people where they are, where we had a lot of conversation. And even if it wasn't facilitated, it was the opportunity for them to participate in our survey so we could hear more about what it is that we could do or focus on. We were also at Raleigh Hoop Nights, and the chief, he did a great job out there. So shout out to him. All right, so the survey, I'm gonna talk briefly about what we heard. I do wanna mention that the participants were able to receive or choose multiple options, and this is just the top four, so this does not include everything. We did ask, where do you hang out? You'll see here that the top response was at a friend's house, the mall, movies, or a community center. We posed the question, what are the barriers to existing programs? Why are you interested or not interested? Why may you not? Why? Excuse me. If you participate in our current programs, that's great, but if not, what's stopping you? And what we heard was that not close by was the top one, people not knowing what's available. We also heard a little bit about not having a ride. So those were the top four responses there. We posed the question, what's one thing you wish existed for teens in Raleigh? And I understand that we may say we already do that or we already have that. This is simply their perception, their lived experiences of what we offer, okay? So more ways to be heard and lead initiatives, unique spaces for teens. It says free and teens only. They said somewhat supervised. Opportunities to foster talent, study halls, free therapy, networking spaces for teenagers are all what we heard. And it was consistent. Just a hangout spot was what they were looking for. We also posed the question, where do you hear about current programming and resources? You'll see a family member, a friend, school, social media. We went deeper to say, well, what social media channels do you use the most? TikTok and Instagram were the top two. There was a lot of feedback about how they enjoy relatable posts. So they want to see reels and social media trends. They were interested in potentially having a social media with ran by teens, but with adult oversight and how we could look at that as an opportunity. So the key takeaways, gathering spaces outside of school, work, or home, increased awareness of city offerings, fluidity in the type of programs would be welcomed, and they want to be more involved in decision making. At this time, we're not posing solutions. We're not seeking solutions. We just want to continue to have conversations, and we want to understand what opportunities are. So that's why this slide is laid out in potential areas to explore. So social media, how we can connect to the strategic plan, developing a more formal pipeline between departments and youth so that their input can be incorporated, You saw our youth webpage, but how can we enhance that? Is it meeting the needs of what people and their families are looking for? Reimagining the Raleigh Youth Council, which we spoke to earlier, and having centralized coordination in our communications with the public school system. So our immediate next steps are just to continue gathering feedback on gaps that the city can fill. We want to build out on our partnerships with external organizations and establish shared goals, look at our exploration of operational adjustments, and then in the long term, we want to be able to say that we strengthened team representation, we created a pathway, and that we continue to adjust our program's events based off the feedback and updated team representation. And so with that, again, I'm here with Raleigh Parks, Raleigh Police Department to take any questions.

Thank you for a lot of information. Questions from council? Well, I've got some questions. Just when you talk about the centralized communication with Wake County Schools, given that they're finding out a lot of this at schools, that sounds like a good and important step. And I'm also just curious about Wake Tech, some of the other, just what's happening now and what can we do to strengthen that?

So, What's happening now is that we have contacts in different departments. We have contacts with different people in the school system as far as getting information to. And so when we asked the teenagers about social media, they said, we follow Wake County because they can tell us when school's going to be out. They don't have to watch the ticker anymore. But we just identified that we need a succinct way across departments to get information to and from, and that currently is not as strong as it could be.

First I commend you for the survey and the takeaways Worked on a similar project another say I don't want to mention it was called the yes loitering project Because in this particular city teens were being targeted in public space and so there was this project called yes Yes Lawyering Project to tell young people you are welcome in public space. And we did similar research and came up with findings very close to your takeaways. And I was impressed by it because the top one is hang out, unstructured, not programmed, just to be with friends, to just talk. Those are very good takeaways. I guess the question of the city manager, how is that now going to embed itself? Because that's very different than programming or rec centers. It's something different. And it's important because young people are saying, this is what I want. Even those call out quotes that you had, those three slides to me were very, very powerful. And it's our young people saying, not all, because I'm guessing 12% of our population between 10 and 19, that's 50 to 60,000 young people, you have a couple of thousand, not you, the city, in their parks program. What about the other 40, 50,000? How are we going to take some of those takeaways and recommendations? Because I supported it, agreed with it, and think it is their way of telling us, this is what I want.

Right. And so, yes, we did engage with youth that are already a part of our programs and initiatives, but a part, the main reason why we also scheduled pop-ups and community events, because we understand that there's another group of young people that may not be engaged in the programs that we already offer. And so we're planning to continue doing that and meeting people where they are, looking outside, The conversations that we're going to have with our partners is also going to be very important because when we met with the YMCA, for example, they're just trying to figure out where to start and what we're doing. And so there was a lot of synergy and organic chemistry around how we can build together. So we don't have the answer right now. We want to continue talking to our youth and then working with our partners, bringing the city together to figure out the best way forward collectively. Okay.

Council Cotton. Thank you for this. I have a handful of questions and some might not be for you, but I'll just start. So one I have is probably for communications around use of TikTok. I know that's where the youths are and I think we should try to reach them there, but I I wonder if we're even allowed to be there and how we might use partnerships with like influencers or something to stay legal, but get onto that platform.

Well, you about answered the question for me there. Robin Diekel, Communications Director. I know we do not use TikTok because at this point it is an application that both the city and the state have decided our privacy and security risks. So we do not have our own account there. There are ways, absolutely, like you said, through influencers, perhaps through an agency contract that we could have some information out on TikTok. Another idea that we are looking at is to use Instagram a little bit differently, perhaps with a different kind of account. I don't want to overpromise or give too many details so that the real content, video content, would be a little bit more teen-focused in its voice. Awesome. Thank you.

And then another question I have is around, kind of building off what Council Member Silver has mentioned, you know, we have about, in very loose terms, about 100,000 youths and minors in the city, and some of these programs are generously accessing about 1% of those, so we have lots of kids who are not being captured in our programs, and I'm curious if there's any Tracking done by any other agencies, any community health survey that indicates how many youths are being touched by like any programming, whether it's Raleigh Parks or YMCA or Boys and Girls at all.

In terms of quant, sorry, Ken Hessler again, Raleigh Parks. Quantifiable data, we can talk to our partners. So when you do, council member, if you think about the non-profits, the Y, the Boys and Girls Clubs, Wake County Public School System, lots of non-profits, the youth, the question of whether are they being engaged or are they being engaged by the city of Raleigh? I think that's an area where, as Taisha brought up, how do we work with our partners to understand who they're already serving is a really valuable opportunity for us to explore that to a little deeper level. And I think the school system relationship is significantly important because that's a conduit where we can find those kids that may not be engaged in some different opportunities and communicate programs, access, areas for them to get involved. They may fit more in their niche instead of us trying to put them into some things that already exist.

yeah I think that would be a really valuable area to explore more and have better data on I would love for all kids to touch the Raleigh parks program but I understand that it can still be productive if they are engaged in some something productive and so it would be nice to understand how many kids are being you know supported somehow

Amanda Roll, Assistant Director, Raleigh Police Department. One of the things I think you're getting at is the groups that we're also looking at in the police department. We're pretty focused on the missing data, where the kids were not touching and where the kids were touching but not necessarily documenting. Our division includes the word impact because you have to be able to measure the impact to know that you're moving in the right direction. Our officers are part of our Policy includes community policing. It has the premise that we're all community policing officers. So from the time the patrol officers do a cops on the block event, they're making contact with young people, their families, they're making referrals. Our school resource officers are also identifying kids who might be a good fit for our summer camps or need to be referred to other programs throughout the city. And so we're doing the work on that level. Every time we engage with somebody at a community center, we say, I also know, where do you go to school? Making those relationships and those connections. But our officers do a lot of identifying kids who could benefit. as well as our community leaders. So in the Something to Say event, many of these kids came from St. Giles, and that was because of a community leader that we reached out to because we recognized that that was a community that might not necessarily have transportation, and we actually provided that transportation.

And then just another just one more and I'll then I'll pass the mic I was curious on the feedback we've we got on the survey just anecdotally if I'm curious one if if hours of operation came up at all if teens were saying like I want a place to hang out late at night or and The things on which they want more opportunities to be heard and lead on were there themes within that like are they caring about park design or rezonings or what kind of if there was a characteristic of what they want to be engaged on yes that's a good question we did have that option around we had a question about what would

make you more likely to use one of our community spaces in later hours was a part of that. When we had conversations in our facilitated discussions about how to get involved, it wasn't that granular. It was more so we feel like things are happening to us. And we want to be able to contribute to the conversation before a decision is made. It didn't go to what types of opportunities.

That feedback could be broadly, civically engaged. They could mean sort of government writ large.

Sure. But also, you know, I'm sure there's interest in other topics that are more specific. We just didn't ask explicitly.

Got it. Thank you. Okay, Councilor Jones.

Thank you for this. I was wondering, with the Raleigh Youth Council, I know we're talking about reimagining Raleigh Youth Council, can we first define what the expectations are, what it is currently, and then what the hope, if there's a goal of what it turns into, What I've noticed in talking to around the community is that most high schools have a student council. And so I was like, wow, we also have a Raleigh Youth Council. So I'm wondering is in this reimagination of it, would it touch on to the already existing student councils within the high school system?

So let me start back with the question of what it is now. So actually in city ordinance there's an establishment of a Raleigh Youth Council that calls out to what it is. And so housed within Raleigh Parks it is actually a group of 60, about 60 students on average every year from across Wake County. It's really a leadership development program. It's an opportunity for them. They're self-governing. They set their own elected officials. They set their own policies, procedures. And it's part of the state councils of youth. So they actually interact with other youth councils from across the state through conferences, through community service, through opportunities such as that. So in its current state, kind of city-wide representation, They set their own rules, they do their own community service, they interact with other agencies from a community service aspect. One of the things that we've done, because this question's come up from a couple years, is now they have a standing report and interact with our Parks, Recreation, and Greenway Advisory Board. So we bring informed as they're working, so they'll help support some of our programs, like our specialized recreation activities, or they'll also share about their community service activities. One of the things that we've been looking to do, and as Taisha has brought up, is they're one of our primary conduits to Wake County public school systems. We're able to feed information back into the schools through these students because we don't have a centralized touch point. And that's our opportunity to make more awareness of that. Now what we also want to do is make sure that's more fully cross-representational. So a lot of it is those students who are actively looking for leadership opportunities, they're looking for things that they can put on their college application, what are the things that they're getting involved in? These are students that are already wanting to, they're looking to aspire to achieve at a higher level. What we want to do is expand the breadth of that. So how can we make sure every student who wants to be a part of the council knows, one, about it, and two, how do I get connected to it? So as we work through community engagement, what are our different pathways that we can get to? But then also there are other opportunities, and I will bring it back to this table. How can they interact more with you? Because that's what they want. And one of the things is having raised two teens is they reach an age where they don't like being told, here's how you do things. And that's not necessarily saying it's good or bad, but it's a part of going through teenhood. and how do they interact with the local officials for policies that are made about how they're gonna conduct their everyday activities. When we established the teen center, we set that up specifically, it's funny, as Tisha brought up, she was like, we're gonna step on toes, but they were like, it's our space. People your age can't come in. And I'm like, hmm, okay, can I come in when you're not open? Yes, you can come in when you're not open. But they were very specific about how that space would be governed. And that's what we're looking at. Can the youth council expand those opportunities, have interactions to meet with the city manager, the assistant city manager? These are the things that are happening. And right now, that's not so easy. And we get that people are super busy. So I'm not here to be judgmental, but that's what they've shared with us. Does that help?

It does. Thank you so much.

Definitely, thank you for the information. A couple things I just wanted to touch. I see where the students mentioned opportunities to foster talents. And I thought about growing up, there was a show called Sparks. And it was teens on stage. It was ran by WRAL. And they gave students the opportunity to show talent, do different things, work on stage and behind stage. And I know a lot of our, you know, we talk about working with Wake County Public Schools. Some of them have different studios and things of that nature. Wake County has their rules, so be it. Is there something that we could possibly do and foster as we're reimagining our new RTN location in the new building? to create a space for those that may be interested in that avenue of talent and opportunities. So that's one thing I kind of wanted to put out there, if there's something you all have thought about. And I have a couple of others after that.

Robin Deagle again from Communications. I think definitely with that new space in the building and we have hope to reinvigorate our community producer program where they would have more opportunities to come in with an idea and we can help them produce their show that goes on cable access. I think there are a number of ways that we can creatively use that space as we go forward and I would also that would be definitely in partnership with parks community engagement and perhaps Raleigh Police that has all of these programs to bring people in and run them through a program earlier this year, I think Ken mentioned it, we had some youth in here learning how to run the controls for a council meeting, and that was pretty interesting. They sat at the table, and some of them sat in the booth, and they had a mock meeting. We didn't broadcast it, but they did have that opportunity.

Cool. Thank you. It's good to hear that. And speaking of the success of Hoop Nights, I know it was during the summer. Is there an opportunity to have a once a month event throughout the year to continue, like a Friday night event or something? Because it sounds like we have gathered the attention of some of our young people. Now I think it's an opportunity, because a lot of times, things I hear is, well, you start, then you stop. So is there a way to at least continue the event throughout the year?

Absolutely. So the part of our impact is continuous engagement. It's not one and done. And so for hoop nights, we already have two. We're just looking for dates. One's going to be at the Islamic Association of Raleigh, and the other one's going to be at the Jewish Federation of Raleigh. They're part of our ICARE team members, and they want to open up their courts. We are also looking at doing weather permitting. There will probably be more outdoor ones. Pop-ups, just allow officers to really take that and decide if they want to host one, as well as bowling events. We've got some other. We've talked about hockey. We've done pickleball over the summer. Engaging with them in a variety of ways is our overall focus.

Okay. Thank you. My last one. While you're there, I know you mentioned police interns. 18% which is 19 that we hired but do we track any of the others that may have moved somewhere or they were hired by another agency or municipality do we track that data as well

Well, when they come in, as well as when they're leaving, we ask them, what are your intentions? And we get a fair amount who say they are going to grad school, which means we won't see them. Then there's some with similar or related majors who want to go into social work. And so they're getting the exposure with acorns, but they actually don't want to be a law enforcement officer.

And my last question for all of you is, if there's an established nonprofit that is already working with youth and they want to reach out and connect, how do they do that?

They can reach out directly to us. Our information's on our Raleigh Police Community Impact and Engagement Division website, all of our contacts, however they want to reach us. Okay.

If any others want to share, feel free.

Yep.

Mayor Bertin. Oh, yeah. It's Ken.

Oh.

Councilmember Branch, I did want to touch on, I'm glad you brought up the hoop nights, and one of the things we did want to offer with, what Taisha identified in one of the bubbles, and so this is, again, raising a boy and a girl, not everybody plays athletics, and so one of the things you looked at up there were what are the other things, skills, those type of things, so we've got great partnerships with folks like Raleigh Little Theater, other groups. So is there different activities that can speak to different interests? So as we look at those dedicated engagement efforts, Hoop Nights is great, right? I was just at Laurel Hills last night for the adult basketball, right? But there's also a whole group out there. We want to make sure we reach them as well. So we're going to explore different opportunities as we work with our partners to be able to do that.

Can I ask you a question on that? So how are y'all communicating that to the public? Because I know I had some conversations with some other folks in parks earlier in the year about some of the other things that you do, such as art and those types of things. But I don't think very many people know that that's what you're doing. And when they hear parks and recs, they automatically assume that it's athletic programming that's happening. So how are you communicating that to the community that there are other options?

So I'm going to go back to Tysha saying I'm going to say things today that are going to step on your toes. It's probably one of the biggest things we hear is we're not telling the story well enough. One of the pieces, and we've already talked with Robin, is how are we communicating? I hate to break it to you, for people my age, Facebook and the leisure ledger are still things, right, for youth or not. And so how are we getting that communication out? We've got to get more dynamic, to be perfectly honest with you, and make sure we're reaching them where they can. And what I'm really thankful for is we started these conversations. Robin's like, we can look at these. There's different ways to reach a target audience than some of our tried and true methods, because obviously they're not so tried and true when we're hitting some of those groups. So we can do better, to be honest with you.

I want to go to Mayor Pro Tem, but I also want to process check. I know we've got like a five-hour meeting starting at 1. None of us have eaten. And I want to make sure that I'm not putting counsel under very distressing situations where no one's had time to have a break. So what are the rules? Do we need to move on to the next question as soon as I allow Mayor Pro Tem? to give the curfew some time, and then what time do we need to break in order to start another meeting at one o'clock? Is there a, do we need a?

I believe RTN needs 15 minutes to start another meeting.

And I just want to be somewhat humane towards the counselors here and not force them into a situation.

If we wrap up with the comments on this one, we'll go right into the ordinance and talk about that a little bit. And if need be, we can kind of carry over after the 1 o'clock if you all aren't satisfied with that and move it to another meeting. space on the agenda. We do have that flexibility.

Okay. Thank you.

Yeah, I'll make my questions brief and you can even get back to me later, it's no problem. I was just curious to learn about that Teens Against Violence conversation that occurred in June, just to learn what the young people said. about the solutions that they see. And so maybe that can just be shared with us in some way after this meeting. And then also just curious, what is the latest hour for our community centers to be open for the parks? And has that been a conversation about having later hours perhaps?

Yeah, typical community center operations, we close at 9, Monday through Friday. Saturdays, we're 9 to 3. Sundays, 1 to 6. Those are our typical operating hours. Obviously, we have some that open earlier that offer before school, those type programs.

Thank you. Yep. Okay. I will thank everybody for all of that information. Let's move on to the curfew, and we have Karen McDonald, the city attorney's office.

Good afternoon, Council. At your July 7th meeting, the City Council directed the City Attorney's Office to draft the Youth Protection and Curfew Ordinance for Council's consideration. So today we will explain why the proposal is being considered and its purpose. The Chief will review the juvenile crime. trends and the events of July 4th and 5th. I'll then walk through what the proposed ordinance would actually do, including who it applies to, the restricted hours, and importantly, the exceptions. I'll conclude by explaining how the ordinance would be enforced and the potential penalties. Next slide. And so the proposed ordinance, next slide. The proposed ordinance is intended to protect juveniles from victimization and exposure to criminal activity. It also seeks to promote a safer environment for juveniles and adults. by limiting unsupervised juvenile presence in public places during the late night hours covered by the ordinance. And finally, it reinforces the role of parents by emphasizing reasonable parental supervision. Next slide. With that in mind, I will turn it over to Chief Boyce to talk about juvenile crime trends and the events of July 4th and 5th. And with that, I think he'll move his slides.

Yes, I will. Good afternoon, Madam Mayor, Council, Chief Boyce, Raleigh Police Department. Good seeing you again. Why consider an ordinance? Well, I'll start off by saying the Raleigh Police Department, we are an intelligent led and data driven department. It guides our decision making and how we continue to keep this community safe. It's important that we have data to justify why we do what we do. in regards to juveniles and the conversation that we have in here today. If you look at the slide here, you see in 2025 that we had 821 cases where a juvenile under the age of 18 was a suspect where we arrested or charged on juvenile petition. We charged through secure custody order and took custody of that juvenile. That is for the entire year of 2025. You look at the column to the right, 894 incidents, that is just from January 1 to pretty much about a couple of days ago when we collected this data. You can see that we're already at 894 cases throughout this year where juveniles are listed as a suspect. The increase there, 9% increase, obviously trending in an area or in a direction that is not good and is very concerning to us here at Raleigh Police Department. To drill down the numbers a little bit more from that 894, 821 and 894, you look at the first category of assaults and aggravated assaults, we're talking about our shootings, our stabbings, or incidents where an injury, a severe injury was caused as a result of an assault. In 2025, you see there 30, here year to date, 50. We're already seeing an increase and we still have four months left of 2026. Person shots. These are, once again, juveniles who are listed as a suspect. Entire year of 2025, there's seven. 2026, we're already at 12, and that trend is going up as well. Shots fired into a vehicle or dwelling. Single-digit number in 2025. We're more than double that in 2026 with juveniles shooting into cars and residents. This category next, the number of actual rounds, these are the actual bullets that were discharged in those, that number five for 2025 and number 12 in 2026. 15 bullets went through a car, went through a house all in 2025 involving juveniles. Here in 2026, that number is up to 190 bullets went through a car, a house, or some physical structure. just let that sink in, 190 bullets went through a car or a building, all from the hands of a juvenile. Final category, all totals, you see the violent incidents. All in 2025, 63 total violent incidents involving juveniles who we charged or obtained a secure custody for. And here in 2026, in August, we're already at 83, and we see the increase there. We are seeing the trend of violence with our juveniles increase year over year. And I only used 2025 since I was the chief, so I wanted to make sure I'm using data that I had some control over as the chief of police here at RPD. So let's talk about pretty much what was the catalyst, what got us here today. I shared numbers in 2025, but it really wasn't highlighted throughout our community of what we were experiencing within RPD. But when the events of July 4th and July 5th occurred, that really got everybody's attention, so much so pretty much throughout the entire nation saw what developed here in our great city. So on that night, July 4th and early mornings of July 5th, RPD, we investigated six separate shootings. I will say, well, I'll get to it in a second. We had one shooting at Broad Creek just after the fireworks display. We had four shootings along Glenwood South throughout the night. In early morning, July 5th, we had one shooting in 800 block of Capitol Boulevard. Four of these investigations have been cleared by arrest and we still have two remaining active investigations. I feel confident in our detectives that they will identify and arrest those who are responsible for those two remaining investigations. Also on July 4th, there was a number of adults, and I think we know that number, 29 other adults that were charged with various crimes, assaults, disorderly conduct, other crimes on that night. But the crimes where people were shot, where victims were rushed to the hospital, majority if not all of those included a juvenile or involved a juvenile. You look at the incident starting at Broad Creek. We arrested four, and actually today we arrested the fifth with help of the United States Marshals. They arrested the fifth suspect, a juvenile, in New York City. So we have a juvenile committing a shooting at Broad Creek, Fleeter area, and was just picked up this morning in New York City. The arrest that we made down on Glenwood South The victims are juveniles, and I'll walk through those cases. The first shooting that occurred on Glenwood South at the 600 block of Glenwood, both victims were juveniles. The suspect is a juvenile. The shooting at Tucker Street is a young adult. He's 18 years old, so not a juvenile. That is also one of our remaining cases that has not been solved yet. The third shooting, 14 Glenwood Avenue. The suspect, juvenile. The victim, a juvenile. The fourth shooting on West Johnson Street, that is also the second case that is unsolved. Those two victims are adults. We have not made an arrest in that case. Finally, the shooting in 800 block of Capitol Boulevard. The suspect in that case, 17-year-old female arrested in Goldsboro with the help of a Goldsboro PD. So you can see the violence on July 4th and July 5th where people were shot. Majority of those cases involve juveniles. So I showed you the numbers, showed you the data of the trend with the amount of cases that we are seeing here in the city of Raleigh. And I also showed you how many are connected to individuals who are under the age of 18. So You ask, like, why a curfew? I'll be the first to say a curfew is not a fix to what I just showed you. It is a tool that will allow the Raleigh Police Department to continue to keep this city safe. Some people probably say, well, all those crimes didn't happen at nighttime, Chief. I get it. You're right. But the connection with violence, we have been able to determine that. When we see a lot of, I get asked a lot of times, like, Chief, where are these juveniles getting these firearms? Where are they getting these guns? Well, we know, we've seen that they get these guns from breaking into cars. Well, guess what? They break into cars usually late at night And then now they're using those guns to commit crime, which once probably testing come back for some of those shootings on July 4th and 5th, we might be able to track that back to some of our motor vehicle break-ins, as well as a theft of a gun. So being able to put a curfew in place during a specific hour, days of the week, I believe as a chief will help curb some of the violence that we're seeing here in our city that's being committed by juveniles. And overall, this community deserves to be safe and there should be some accountability despite what your age is. We've arrested or we got a secure custody order for as young as 12. That 12-year-old was part of an incident where a gunshot, where somebody was shooting. We gotta hold people responsible for their actions no matter how old they are. So that's what I have right now. I'll turn it back over to city attorney for additional details.

Thank you, Chief. So we'll now look at what the proposed ordinance looks like. Basically, the proposed ordinance would be for youth under 18 and would run from 11 PM until 5 AM every day of the week. During those hours, During those hours, a juvenile generally could not remain in a public place or establishment unless an exception applies. The ordinance defines a juvenile as a person under 18 who is not married, serving in the United States Armed Forces, or emancipated. Next slide. So this slide shows a comparison of some of our peer cities, and you'll see that they also have curfews. And again, as it relates to the proposed Raleigh ordinance, it would be under 18, 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. So let's talk about some of the exceptions. Next slide. So most of our peer cities have the following exceptions. The juvenile would not violate the ordinance when accompanied by a parent or legal guardian or otherwise authorized adult 21 and older, when engaged in lawful employment, traveling directly to or from work, when responding to an emergency, when attending or traveling directly to or from a qualifying school, religious, recreational, civic, or governmental activity. The ordinance also protects First Amendment activity. And as previously stated, our ordinance, and we'll go to the next slide.

Can you say First Amendment activity? What is that?

So if you were protesting. Okay. So then if you're married or emancipated, next slide. Then we also, in addition to those exceptions that our peer cities have, we would propose these exceptions as well. So a private event, if you're out for a private event or errand. If you're a college or university student, again, ours would accept the U.S. Armed Forces. And we also think, and although not listed here, we also think and would recommend an exception for a public event, so that would encompass the State Fair, a performance such as a concert, a sporting event such as when the Hurricanes end up going into overtime a couple times and sometimes those games end late. So we would propose to add an additional exception to cover those as well. Next slide. So then what does enforcement look like? And so enforcement is not automatic simply because an officer encounters a young person after 11 p.m. Before taking an enforcement action, the ordinance requires the officer to verify the juvenile's age and ask the reason the juvenile is in the public to determine if an exception applies. An officer may not prepare a juvenile petition or issue a citation unless there's probable cause to believe an offense occurred and no exempt exception or applicable offense is present. So essentially what you see there, you have an encounter, you verify, you determine if there's an exception, and if there's no exception, then there's enforcement. Next slide. So then who can be found in violation of the ordinance? Certainly a juvenile if no exception applies. a parent or guardian who knowingly allows a juvenile to be out during the restricted times. Or if a juvenile is found to be out and RPD makes contact, says your juvenile is out, you need to come pick up your child, and they refuse to come pick up their child. An adult who aids or abets a juvenile and then an establishment could be in violation if they allow a juvenile to stay. It would be a defense to the establishment if they notified RPD, we have these juveniles, we've told them they need to leave, and they refuse to leave. But they would have to do that in order to have that defense. Then, if there is a violation, what does that violation look like? For the juvenile, it would be a part of the juvenile court process. For all others, it would be a civil citation, which would be issued as a class three misdemeanor, and a fine of no more than $500. Next slide. So that concludes my presentation of the proposed ordinance. The chief and I are available to answer questions.

Okay, thank you. I'll go for questions. Yes, Councilor Silver.

Just clarity about, we heard a lot about who attended the teen takeover, which was a catalyst for this to come before us. curious because you said that the teen takeover wasn't the impetus, it was the trends we're seeing in juvenile violence. We've heard that most of the people who attended were adults. I don't know if you were able to verify, because I just saw some of the images, they seemed like young people, but I know we're gonna talk about a teen curfew, and I just wanna make sure that as people talk about what happened on July, they're saying most of them were adults, they didn't live here. As I mentioned earlier, we have 60, 70, 80,000 young people live in our city. So can you kind of clarify, Do you know the age of all those who attended the teen takeovers, both in Briar Creek, or that's just kind of hearsay we've heard from the community? Because to me, that's kind of relevant of the conversation, that if they're all adults, we don't need the teen takeover. So from your intelligence, can you kind of give what your impression was about who attended those teen takeovers? Was it teens or was it majority of adults?

I can't give, Council Member Silver, I can't give you an exact number. What I can say based on just personal observation with Glenwood South, a significant amount of folks that were down there were, in my opinion, young adults, but I cannot confirm that. I didn't obviously speak to thousands of individuals that looked a certain way. But let me go back to what you said about the crime from 2025. Yes, it has been occurring, and we did not have any conversations about it until the July 4th, July 5th incidents that really highlighted the crime involving juveniles. As a chief, that was very concerning. We need to have some discussions of what strategies, what initiatives can we put in place to address this trend that we've seen year over year. A curfew was part of that strategy of like, if we had one, maybe we could curb some of the violence that we're seeing and some of the criminal activity that we're seeing late at night. Majority of the kids in this city, they do what's right. They're not involved, have very little interaction with RPD or any law enforcement. But there is a segment of our community where these youth or juveniles, they're committing serious criminal offenses. I am looking for strategies or initiative to curb the violence.

So it wasn't the teen takeover. It allowed you to take a deeper look and expose the trend in juvenile crime from 2025 to 2026.

That is correct, but also to protect them as well. We've seen that many juvenile shot on one particular night. It's time to take some action and do something.

Other questions or comments? Yes, Councilor Pat. I'm aware of the time.

So I think we, depending upon how many other council members would like to speak to this topic, we can break for lunch and then bring it back at the top of the 1 o'clock hour, or we can put it up under the city attorney's agenda if you want it to be later on in the day to finish the discussion. But I don't think you're going to be able to finish it and then break for lunch and make it back at 1 o'clock. So we have two options.

I have several questions, so I'm happy to... Totally up to you.

Those are the two options. We could also start our meeting just 15 minutes late or something like that to finish this conversation now.

In my opinion, I don't want to rush this conversation. I'd rather start at the top of the 1 o'clock meeting or put it under the city attorney's report so we don't feel like we've got an arbitrary stop point. That's just my thought.

Yeah. I mean, I would do it at the top of the hour just because I know we've got folks that are here interested and came for this particular conversation. I don't want them to have to break for three hours and then come back. So do we want to... Okay, yeah, I guess it's already 36 after the hour, so maybe we will recess for basically 20, 25 minutes, come back at 1, and instead of the normally scheduled, we will resume this conversation. Yes. Okay, so apologies to everybody on the inconvenience on schedule, but we will recess for a few minutes.