Arts Commission - Regular Meeting

All right, it is June 10th, 2026, Wednesday at 5.30 p.m., and we are calling this special meeting to order.

All right, roll call. Kate Cargill.

Here.

Britt Garcia. Aslan Hollier. Here. Sheridan Schaefer.

Here.

Arthur Simone. Here. Dixon Weems. Here. And Sarah Wingfield. We have a quorum present. Item 1 is an action item discussing its editor... Correction. It says in the comment period, none have signed up and none are present.

Jumping the gun a little bit.

Okay. Item one, discuss and consider approval of a community art project.

Yes, I'm very excited to hear about all the things y'all have done. So who wants to be a spokesperson for the TMC? Amazing work. They work really hard on this. I'm not the least. Thank you for doing this. I would love to hear from you.

Okay.

Please pull up exhibit item A.

And then please also have available, which is not included in exhibit A, the alternative exhibit B. And would you like to be our spokesperson?

Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. And I quickly added. You know, just, uh, and I can explain it more later, uh, on the, um. Proposal 4, so this would be kind of 5.

Um, if I didn't do it this way, I wouldn't be able to you mentioned you would not be able to tell from this the work that we.

And I have done over that it was pages of work and hours of, you know, for future reference that we now have a spreadsheet with information about all of the parks over Sam. So, for future endeavors, keeping track of things. So, um. We have something to fall back on and hand over, um, if we never get to certain things. Um, but so there was. Numerous different options that we were considering, and we had a meeting with train and then we also had a separate meeting with Charlotte and we tossed around numerous amounts of ideas, but a lot seems to get drawn towards veterans park with everything. And so we were. Uh, looking at what we could do to veterans park specifically. And so we have a few different proposals. Majority of them involved veterans park. So, proposal 1 is this artistic straight shape structure near the playground because veterans park, it does have a lot of. Tree shading with the exception of the playground itself. I was over there at, like, like, 435 o'clock. And half the playground had shade at that point in time. So, and there's enough space over there. And I think Arthur mentioned that there was like, 2 concrete slabs that were already.

It's like a slab already on the children's.

And there's a couple of slides that used to be picking tables and then there's a slap. With just a regular old metal bench that's. But it up against that.

Yeah, so there could that is potential. A spot perfect for this to be secured to the ground. And so here's some, I think that middle bottom picture is 1 of the, what you were talking about, right? 1 of the slabs. um and so those are like just two oh like we're kind of like a circle that kind of tucks in there yeah yeah yeah a little circle there um and so those are just two examples of an artistic shade structure that we could do um Uh, and I think on our other document, because this is a 2nd document, but the other 1 is. Has all of our ideas and stuff on there.

So there are some, I'd like to go through all the ideas before we pick out them. Or would you like to kind of discuss each 1?

I think discussing each 1, because they are different. But that might be the best or if we think that down to. Okay, so that's that one, uh, and we were advised by Charlotte, like, that would potentially because of architecture and engineering and stuff would take up, you know, the budget, the budget. That's one of my questions.

And I just want to add that we had proposed, like, some custom shade structure designs, and I think Charlotte let us know that that would not fit into the budget because a custom design would require more, like, engineering approval. So it would have to be something that's already, like, designed for a playground.

Right, they've already done one, and it's $5,000. Yeah, off the shelf. Yeah, yeah, kind of a...

Yeah, because there were some ideas thrown around about custom, making it interactive and touchable and stuff.

Which y'all can do later in another area that would be tourism related. Y'all have plenty of budget for that kind of shoes.

Yeah, yeah. So that is not off the table. It's in our thing. Okay, so scroll down proposal to revitalizing the gazebo area, paint, gazebo, concrete slab and add a table. And so, while we were talking about it yesterday, I was there and so and scroll down a little bit and make sure that. If my new note, my pictures didn't add, I literally just did it a while ago. So, I guess it didn't update, but that's okay. I'm going to stand if I can. So one of my thoughts was if you added a picture so you can visually see it. But underneath, one of my thoughts was there are like eight triangles underneath there. And I thought that was a great opportunity to have like eight different photos that represent Veterans Park, the community, anything like that. We'd have great creativity, the people to look at. But like this, like that pole, these poles, and maybe even this whole slab down here, maybe it could be painted white and do like a community painting day where the artist kind of, you know, helps people. But just giving them the kind of the power and control to decorate this some ways that they want. Maybe it's not the community actually doing the painting. Maybe it's them directing a painter. to do something there. I mean, the options are open, but another one of my thoughts was an artistic table, because like right over here, there's two holes that are just there.

Yeah, an old table, surely.

Yeah, like an eight-foot table that's like artistically thing, I think would be cool there. And that would provide just a good space for birthday parties, because you could have like the buffet table or whatever. then people sitting uh and then their own table um i just think that that could provide a lot of stuff um and so in general that could be an upkeep um but i just think with all that it could you know revitalize everything bring more attention because even when every time i've been there nobody's there except maybe one person taking a nap um that's me it was arthur

Um, we talked about using some of the funds to throw, like, a, a community party to, like, after it's been painted to welcome everyone there. And, like, no. No, I was to say no shade, but that that's like. it was not a pun, but like both the times Aslan and I went there, there were, there was, you know, a gentleman sleeping on the table under the gazebo, which like, if you need shade, no shade, but maybe just kind of revitalizing that space would, and, uh, kind of bring a little more community right around taking care of that area for like parties and stuff.

And the, uh, as far as the, the tables on there, I can confirm those holes that you saw, those did used to have, uh, tables and benches installed and the ones that are in the picture and that you've seen, those are more recently within the past like year or so installed because that's where we do our Viking practice and everything. So I've been going there for years and yeah, all that. So all that to say.

Yeah, I was like, I have questions.

Is that like large? Yeah. The so, uh, we might run into some issues if we're doing, uh, benches and everything, because those are like.

Recently installed and everything with those, because they don't have regular tables and. And, uh, picking tables, that kind of thing, because there is a problem with unhoused. Sleeping here and, uh, the neighborhood, I think made the request because it made them feel unsafe to go use the. the park when there was, you know, sometimes, you know, a dozen people sleep in there. But, you know, all of these options are mix and match. And when y'all are done, I can, like, have a few numbers in my head that I think, you know, can help you figure out what you want to do.

Yeah. And even on the first one, if there is like some small amount of money left over from the shade structure, we had mentioned like just painting the gazebo, you know.

Yeah, it's really cool. It almost looks like a folklorico skirt or, you know.

Yeah, yeah. It looks great and there's not a whole lot of graffiti on it or anything. So, I mean, it is what it is. It's just weathered and, you know, time. wear on it. But I do wish we could have somebody just regularly pick up trash because there's a trash can right over there. But whenever I was there's litter everywhere, which gets me personally. Okay, but so that one was majority just lost in and around that gazebo. Third option. Something similar to this, you know. Tribute sculpture, and there's plenty of different spaces out there that it could be implemented. You know, I would just if we did something like that in the event of there are any sort of plans of revitalizing the park anytime soon, just thinking about that, being able to easily be moved. Later possible to help out on that. Um, so it was that 3rd option, uh, and then. So, if my pictures didn't update, then that means that the other thing that you added to the other. Uh, no, I added it to the most recent that this way. Um, but. I don't know if, um. I'm not on my phone. I mean, maybe. Okay, so that was the picture that I took just to show where that table could go if possible. But I mean, scroll up.

And the triangles like up in there.

Yeah, scroll up. There's the one right above that should, oh maybe it's below. But I took a picture. Yeah. So that's what the trimers are like, and there's the heat of them going around. And I just thought it would look really cool. It reminded me almost like a church deal when they have the stained glass all around. I just thought that was cool. That's where the holes that I was talking about. Cool. And so all the way down to the bottom. This was something like I just. I just wanted to make sure that I mentioned this because I think it's super cool. So this is over there by Fire Station 5 River Ridge Park where I was scouting out all these different parks and went over there just because it looked interesting on Google Maps pictures. And it is what it is. They have a basketball court there as well. That looks like, you know, it's not really used that much, but while we were there, my son loves fire truck. So we took a tour of the fire department right next door and they met with Jake and Jake. And that was, it was such a cool experience seeing the whole thing. 1st hand. They said that they used to use that tower for, like. Like, practice with the ladders leading the ladders up and everything, but they were told not to do that. They also made use of the basketball court and apparently somebody got injured at 1 point in the city told them you can't. Don't use that anymore because we don't want you to hurt yourself a submission then for the analogies for the. Yeah, there is like, there's so much room over there. Nobody is ever there. He says they say that they see, like, 2 people. So, 1 of my thoughts was painting this and that that thing even talks about how it's dedicated to the community of San Marcus. And so I thought that was, you know. really interesting, like... One of my ideas was repainting it and using it as like with the fire station. It could be like an educational art piece with the fire. So it could be, you know, referenced somehow. And even if we wanted to consider a community art project, I feel like the top portion could be like an educational art thing. And then the bottom half could be a community art project, so to speak, with that. Um, but I just know that kids and people in general love, you know, fire education, the fire department's not going anywhere. Um, and so, and they were really cool. Uh, and I just thought it would be cool going hand in hand. Um. And it would bring more attention because, like, literally, we're paying for this and it's there and it's not being utilized and it could be, like I said, tons of space, lots and lots of space. So, it'd be cool to. Not have a whole bunch of stuff concentrated in 1 area continuously where people is just drawn in 1 area. It's kind of balancing things out. However, I do feel like this has potential because you can see this from I-35 as well.

So it could be used for... And we could ask, I think we talked about it at the mural meeting yesterday. So I'll have to ask Park and Rec if there's any restrictions because I think it was dedicated as a... monument to something, we may not be able to paint it to that.

I was going to say, ethically, we shouldn't consider painting it anyway, because it's a landmark in its city history, so it's a cultural... I think the idea is amazing, but considering its age, and there is one similar in Austin, right on Cesar Chavez, I think it's important to consider the cultural history.

We'd have to find out what the background is. So... There's not a lot of background. I would say I love the idea, but I don't recommend it.

without consultation.

Again, it's a cool idea. We can look into what options are for it.

I think it would be cool eventually to kind of consider making more of a moment out of it and creating that educational sort of like programming around it.

So train or fly between the one here and the one in Austin. We have those

Those tile panels, so yeah, this way we can look into that.

Yeah, yeah, that would be, I would like more information because the fire department, they didn't have that much information. So, to my knowledge, it just sits there and doesn't get any attention.

It could be really cool.

And then option five is, you know, this is a cool recycling thing, you know, with this wind turbine being painted and used as a bench. Was that like a segment of the pole that goes up?

Yeah, because they can't recycle the blades. Sure. Yeah. So...

Air movement airflow. So it would be a breezy spot to say.

Yeah. And so they have different ones. They have some that are just benches. They have some of the swings.

What does one of these run? What is one of these run?

Around 9,000.

So maybe two, just one.

What are we going to get one? And it could ship it would probably be another five or $600. And then if you do something like this first one, where it's a community thing, where you can have.

Yeah, it comes with the primer on it, so that's a good thing.

So, you know, you're talking maybe 11,000 by the time you get it in the ground.

Drive a specific location you were thinking of? I think that's important.

It was giving them an option on something that's a kind of turnkey with just having the community come in. Because then they could paint this, they could paint your gazebo, and do all the same thing.

Sure, you could still pull that off, right? Yeah.

I mean, doing a shade structure thing would be cool, but when I look at them, they were like $25,000, $30,000, $40,000 dollars.

That one I put on there, I somehow managed to find one that was 10 K and it was from like a playgrounds website, but everything else was like 20, 30,000. And we really, we were really, really wanting to do something with like recycled materials to like bring the cost down. But I think just with, the whole like engineering needing to sign off on it component sounded like that wasn't viable. Yeah.

They save money on the materials, but then probably have to pay an artist more to come up with something that is sturdy enough for, you know, because like the one that is inexpensive, that's probably for your backyard versus the ones that have the big heavy poles and bolted into the ground. Yeah. It's just...

If it's a matter of covering the children's playground in something shaded, it seems that this should be under the purview of Park and Recreate.

They're redesigning it. If you look at City Park, they're going to, in three or four years, redo that area. I think the purpose was, if you're a parent watching your kid play, you're sitting on a metal Uh, yeah, thing in the middle of that. That's where when they 1st went in February to look at it. That's why that idea came up.

Honestly, for the bench, I kind of liked it. If you want to scroll back up to page 2 tray, I kind of like that little. Same spot overlooking the playground. Sorry a little more.

Is that too small?

Would that be big enough for yeah, there's there's that. Because I know we could even extend the pad if we needed to. And I know between the playground and the gazebo, there is a bench there. So that's a bigger square. They could always remove that bench and put some other shaded text in there. We have a few options. I haven't gone and talked to Parker on details until we know what. I don't want to give them 10 different ideas and then have them overwhelmingly go, what are you doing?

Yeah. So if we went with the wind turbine, then that would, you said, around $11,000-ish?

With paint, yeah.

Okay. And then do you know kind of what cost estimates potentially this could be, something you don't know?

For the Zivo, if you're talking a community paint day that's more, because it has all the different stripes, not like a bunch of paintings, but like maybe just colors and... Yeah. Then it's just a matter of paint and then I would probably want to have an August hire that can wrangle so that there's not weird paint everywhere and nothing works.

So that could still be within the rest of the budget.

Yeah, I could see that would be maybe $2,000.

And if there's anything, well, if there's a little extra cushion at the end, we can use that towards throwing some sort of welcome party or something, or doing, like, identification, and that could come out of...

Well, I've got ideas. Before we do, I'm curious, what do you all like?

What's your personal picks? My takeaway from this is that we shouldn't dig too deep into the plans for the site because there are so many different little concrete slabs that I think could be cool to build things upon, but I don't know if they're going to stay there. Why? But then again, we have something, is this, is this bolted down? Is this guy?

Yeah. Probably. But we can work out paths.

I mean, I don't think that should be a major concern. I think that I'm more curious of these five proposals. What, what do you like? What's your preference?

I mean, my preference is like, you know, sticking to, you know, a gazebo thing as a whole or like a basic gazebo repainting artistically with... Something like this, because this to me, this is like a recycled art thing and it's a wind turbine and I feel like it could be painted to match a veterans sort of thing to fit with the park theme and stuff.

It feels that my question is, it is Veterans Park, but all the veteran stuff happens over over there, right? It's actually Vietnam, but it's just Vietnam. Is it going to remain Vietnam Veterans Park forever and ever?

Yeah, the name will stay the same. But a lot of it also, any time we do something like if there's going to be a sculptural piece or something like that, we'd have to do a lot more community outreach because it's not for us to tell the community what they want. It's the community to tell us. And they may want something that represents their heritage versus a Vietnam vet, you know?

Right.

And we have to have these funds spent by September, correct?

Yeah, we need to decide this. Yeah. Another reason why we were just trying to focus at this point.

I'm definitely leaning towards the wind turbine. Painting it and then doing just like a basic paint on the gazebo. Um, I'm a little torn on whether, like, I want it to be painted explicitly in in, like, a veteran. theme or if I just want it to be like colorful, like just bringing a little color and vibrancy to the park. Because even though it is Veterans Park and that is very important to honor that, it's also part of like a micro neighborhood that's really close to Centro and to the Triple Topek housing and to like Rogelio's and Casa Maria or Garcia's and just kind of tying in. Because like when you think about Mexican-American culture and, like, the way they celebrate death is with, like, color and parties and vibrancy. Well, not to say that, like, veterans necessarily equates death, but in my mind, I was making that equivalency. But so... But I want to make sure that I'm not, like, just ignoring what the park is.

Yeah. Is there a way... that if we agreed to this, that we would still be able to agree to this and do some community outreach.

That's my note, is that we give two options. We give the playful option, or we give more of a veterans' open-minded option.

If you look at this, this was painted at the top by the community. So it could be something that they take ownership and pride in, because they're like, hey, when I was a kid, I did that. Yeah. That area there likes a lot of family, you know, friendly activities together. So that could be, it would be outreach and maybe it's one paint day where they do this and the gazebo the same day.

So it's not in the packet, but I do have another idea that I want to get out there. On site, there's a lot of rubble. There's a lot of old building materials. I don't even know what this thing was, but the one with the pipe sticking out. Did you see this one? Oh, no, I didn't. There were like two ceramic pipes that were embedded in concrete at some point. but between that they're like concrete bits that have slag and piles of bricks and stuff and one of the things that I think a community revitalization project could include is

an overseeing of the removal of all this stuff and then the assemblage of a thing it's like maybe a grill like a bargain that might be something when they have the plan for what the park is going to look like yeah this i think for this to be approved by park and rec it's going to have to be separate oh in three years when we or however long it is when we put in the new playground we want to be able to remove this and then put it back um I don't want to dismiss what you're saying because they are talking to us about being involved in when they do that plant. They're having a cultural trail along. They're having more opportunities like that for their community. I'm saying that yes, and it might just be a little later that that could happen.

Yeah, well, it wouldn't be us. I mean, we would work with. Yeah, yeah, other groups that do that. We're our commission.

We, you know, the heritage, you know, historic plan.

Or community works.

Oh, yeah, the community works.

Department works. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Maybe them. Everyone's with the trucks in the jacket.

So what we're, what we're looking at is something that can be both more permanent, but also a little ephemeral. So, so that when that park is underway, it's not going to be, uh, a big wasted. Right. It'll be something. So like the gazebo may or may not, uh, stay. So the paint is something that's going to be really nice in the short run, um, and bring people together around the park, um, and then something like the wind turbine is both permanent and easily replaced, like moved and put back. So that would be a mainstay of that event.

So something bolted down the metal.

Right, yeah.

If we can go back to the third proposal real quick. This is from a park in Oklahoma. It's just three slabs of metal propped up and then a negative space of a figure. My thought on this was using the slabs and just picking three different ones, so not having them three in a row, but rather just take this idea and scatter it throughout the site. knowing that i think that i mean these might be might be in concrete but if something did have a base where it could unscrew and then certainly you could find these might be priced to be more than one um but i dig what you're saying I don't think that these come factory.

No, you would have to put a call for all that.

Yeah. Yes. And get proposals for metal artists. Yeah. Well, you know, I don't want to interrupt you on more you want to present, but I have some thoughts. Yeah, you know, just for discussion, but as far as let's stay on this 1, I had 2 thoughts about this as far as making it a memorial to veterans again. Yeah, definitely see the very obviously I do also. Personally feel like what we are hearing for the community is they want to bring their kids there and have fun. So I don't want to make it too. Heavy on the more thing personally, however. maybe a compromise is the idea of the toy soldier motif um could be a way that you could kind of work it in and then secondarily um we could do a lot of fun with paint and then also use the turbine as more of a memorial space uh that that circle like think about how the vietnam memorial provides this reflective wall the circle this terrible symbol that could be a way that we could Bring a mindful memorial into a fun area. You know, I'm not trying to put too much on what that could be just in a broad sense. Then I'm also thinking, can we go to the fire station again for a 2nd here? I, as a singer-songwriter, have played stages that were a corner of the ground, ground on tiptoes. I've played all sorts of spaces that were space because somebody said it was a space. and if we say that there is a performance space here and then denote it like i'm just saying words here but we could do paint on the on a certain area of the concrete and this is now the stage and people could be invited to come and bring chairs and we could invite our theater troops and our community orchestras and our local bands to have concert series in a space that we have just by putting purposeful, mindful paint on the ground as opposed to the tower, we could very easily create a secret concert space, a little local spot, a little place that could be a great thing in a variety of ways. And we're always looking for new ways to create performance spaces. So this could be a city. Well, yeah, sure. Sure. Sure. But we have this is a chance for us to do something there. So I'm just saying this the way that we could. I love this idea. Uh, these lost faces. Yeah, that is a way. And yeah, let's just yeah, let's put tourism money on that and do it. But I love this idea. Let's not lose this idea, but let's make definitely something like that.

That was my main point. I wanted to dug it in everyone's head and.

I mean, movies, I mean, there's so much we can do there. You're right. Space is so much. So with a little bit of paint, a little bit of mindfulness, you know, that could be a very easy thing to do.

Do we have a little idea bank where we can put, like, potential projects?

Yeah, that's kind of what we, I haven't finished it, but I'm doing a form that's for, like, There's going to be one for unsolicited from the public, but there's going to be one for you guys. So it would be like, this is my project idea. It fits this area of our Arts Master Plan. It's easy to resolve and for us, because I know when I'm trying to present something, I'm like, you know. It's really good because

I think that there needs to be some sort of Google Drive for us. Yeah. With the Google Maps that we talked about when we started. I mean, I finished the ag is stuff could be put in there. There's a lot that we could do without breaking quorum via. a shared space.

If it was a Google Doc thing, though, it would only have three of y'all that can use it.

Well, I mean, Google Drive is an easy, but whatever the city allows. If we go back up, just to put our attention back to any of the photos of the Concebo thing. I love that. I mean, we've gone out there and we visited it before y'all were involved in this, and I agree with the vision of this. Maybe a better picture than that. But Not that it's not a great photo, but it's a specific job that you're doing there. One thing that I thought then when we went and visited that I still want to bring up now is I love the idea of Yes, making it colorful, making it, you know, all the rainbow colors, all that, the fun of it. I also believe that it would be a lot of fun to make a yes sign. There's another sign that's all the no things that you can't do, but let's have a sign right next to that with that city vibe. But yes to this, yes to fun, yes to playing, yes to community, a yes sign. Um, and then also, um, let's make the sidewalk games, hopscotch, all the other wonderful every inch of that concrete could be another thing. And if we had 1 artist, as you mentioned, that was sort of overseeing the vision, and they knew the assignment that this user can, it's not the gazebo this park. is your canvas so have the gazebo be the heart of that the most fun the most intense part of it but have it spread over to that pool i know there's no photos of that cool sidewalk yeah so i say yes to that but let's bigger picture it let's bring artists and let's let's make every bit of the game every bit of the fun every bit of something weird interesting and unexpected yeah

I can imagine that the yes sign would come with a lot of legal. That would have to be something that once you park around, either signage. Yeah.

I mean, I'll happily fight that battle for us. I think it's a worthy fight.

I really like the idea of a sidewalk. Yeah, I think that's kind of cool. I mean, I could see a whole... A mast, a maze, yeah. Painting the gazebo, and there's sidewalks that lead right from that corner there to where the, you know, maybe the shape thing is.

There's a skate park there, too.

Exactly, yeah.

I haven't even thought about... painting the skate park stuff.

In our time together, I'm going to say this again and again. The difference between a maze and a labyrinth, a labyrinth is a set path that gives the person following it a planned experience, a curated experience, and there's an opportunity for a labyrinth here of a sort.

I love a labyrinth. It could be like little hidden animals that you have to find. Each little pad. A pad could be a meditation. Every little space that we choose to create with intention becomes art.

A lot of that stuff is going to happen when the

They're connecting this and all the ATV park that's right there. We're just going to be painting it. I thought you were talking about putting it in the wall.

I mean, right now, we could paint this. Lotus Gardens. Lotus here. This is meditation. This is pop stuff. We could... create with intentional dressing without any structure.

Almost like the street art sort of things, like when they have painters and it's like, oh, there's a hole in the ground, let's turn this into a mouth.

Yeah, yeah, stuff like that.

Or a 3D, like even a 3D sort of, you know, section to where it like...

Photos, I always, like, cut off, like, when they're, like, 3 words from finish, like, anticipated. Uh, I'm sorry. Uh, so if we did that, that would mean we probably couldn't afford the wind turbine as well.

I think for the level that we would do that. Well, let's say, are we still going to do the dance or not?

That is what I haven't heard back from you or.

Just to do or not to.

Yeah, I think maybe we hold off on that.

Okay.

That's $17,000. Okay. I think we're talking 10 for...

this piece installed, and then we'll need, I don't know if it needs special paint and whatever. That's a pretty good amount of money then to hire an artist to kind of... A real vision. After they talk to them, we could have a community meeting. By then we would have already contacted with the artist, so the money is encumbered, and that makes us do it that way. Say, hey, this is kind of what we want to do. Our next step... If that's what y'all want to do, and it's really the next step for us would be going to Park and Rec and getting approval there. And then we can do a call for, see if there's a neighborhood artist or do a call for art. I think we could, if we do it, we can get it done.

And I think I would like for the artists to... like if we just ordered like the blank canvas of this one turbine for them to have a inclusive vision of all of it tied together, the gazebo, the turbine, and like the side, I guess we're just going to say sidewalks and slabs. Yeah. And yeah, and that could, it could, and then we would, the artists could get the community feedback if we want it to be more veteran themed or if we want it to be more family friendly, playful, colorful, interactive. Yeah.

they could do it so that the little handprints are flowers or you know they can do that so that because we've done that with other projects where they paint most of it and then there's one little part like the one the one uh indigenous one that's on city hall is a deer step yeah a little bit at the bottom is where they have kids come and do their flowers that way they go by and they're really invested in oh this is my mural so it could be a combination okay cool so

Can we get a nice wind chime there somewhere?

Well, you know, even without the budget, one of the ways that we could do that is by reaching out to the community itself during our meetings and saying, we have the budget to do this. But here are some great ideas y'all could do if you wanted to do it, you know, and that's a way that we can inspire motivation and action outside of our ability to move, you know, and that's that's the power of our position here. It's leverage where the opportunity to get these people to work with these people while we throw a little art in the middle to make a bridge between them. So let's do that as often as we can.

So my only thing is like, so you have to go to Parks and Rec for approval. What are the chances?

I'll talk to the director. And she's the one who brought one of these things to us about two years ago. And at that time it wasn't something we were wanting to do. it wasn't fitting in the division so if she's like oh this is cool we have to get on the uh park board and they have to vote yes you can do another project in uh veterans park and then we're good to go so let's say that we get on them in july august we can put a call out for Art or for an artist qualifications to do this kind of because that's somebody that has. Some personality and can meet with the public. We're going that the hard way. That can, you know, get these kind of ideas and you can do this kind of stuff. And I think we will have. Then the September meeting. Or maybe it could even be the August meeting. We all decide which artist of the calls. Is chosen when I give this a few weeks. To give us enough time to get the contract done and encumber the money.

And so, yeah, is there is there any sort of chance that they would approve the painting, but not the wind turbine? I'm only asking this question to to think about if we need a backup plan that is full proof and quickly.

Executable well, I mean, maybe the backup plan is that we weren't we're pretty confident about the painting.

yeah so what luckily we were having this meeting only two weeks before our next one uh i'll go ahead and talk to jamie lee and and kind of feel her out on it uh but our backup plane could be the dance for the rest of the money it was my yeah but yeah well and then so if there's a chance of like we cannot do this but we can paint and it's like we're not doing this so we're doing the dance and the painting yeah and then we'll have some more money we can always in the in the meeting in two weeks have a have a thing that says dispel through

Which 1 of these other and we have a fairly good bank of backup ideas in our original in our brainstorming Google doc. But I think we, we ultimately decided, you know, uh, Charlotte. encouraged us like had told us that in the past there had been some attention on veterans park and that this was a good opportunity and i think ultimately we just decided we wanted to really narrow our focus um instead of like being like oh we could do this and we could do this and we could do this because that's how we kind of were in the beginning but um we can definitely be able to what can we do right no we did and a lot of those were like either they were going to be too much or they were more appropriate for um hot tax But there were a few small little ones, like one was like a kind of like a little free library, but instead of books, it was art. I mean, do you do we want what time is it? Do we want to spend? I don't. I'm always like, oh, we can scroll through a nine-page document really quickly and just parse through it. Let me add to this.

We just need to kind of pin a general thing down.

Let's pin this. If this is what y'all want to do, we'll vote on that. Now, let's say within a week's time, I will remember.

We can still meet as much as we want.

If I find out that this may not be the way to go, That's still give you all a week then to go. Okay. We're going to narrow it down.

We can come up with a plan B like real quickly. Yeah. Cause we have a repository. Yeah.

Sorry. We are. I mean, I have, I think I have a motion for us if we're all generally on the same page here. Nobody's yeah, I think so. Yeah, so I would we could correct me if I need to change this, but I would move to use the excess funds for a wind turbine and veterans park painting project to be overseen by a single artist and chosen by public call and made in conjunction with neighborhood input and cooperation with. A beauty in recording. captured it so you set in the motion for all those in favor say aye aye all opposed say nay no one's opposed all right that carries sit oh correct I can give that to you thank you all right next up real quick receive a staff report on upcoming meetings that the staff tell me a little bit more about this liking meeting

That would be after.

As far as the chime, just before I lose, I'm so sorry. If we got a donation from maybe a surplus, would you like military type chimes?

I just want to quickly add in I did some outreach asking like green guy recycling and, you know, certain stores, if they happen to have any sort of military equipment or something that we could turn into something I didn't get anywhere. It was all like small. But. But, yeah.

No. So, you'll be looking at this page here. We've got our upcoming dates to remember. Dates in red are in-person commission activities. Next one coming up, June 25th, is the Mosaic Steps Dedication Surprise Center at 10 a.m.

It's a work day.

You look great, Josh.

That's the day after our next meeting.

What day of the week is that? Thursday.

Thursday.

It's next Thursday.

It's next Thursday? No, it's two Thursdays from now. I was like, there's no way we're at the end of the year already. Thank you.

And then on the 29th, and we'll be sending out emails about this, we've got a Texas Hot Hotel I Won't See Tax Law workshop.

I want to say that, you know, I'm a nerd, so I embraced it. But I actually was pretty surprised with how helpful and entertaining it was to do this. So I encourage all of y'all to embrace it.

Oh, this workshop? They do it annually.

He's the lawyer for the... the association yeah yeah so they run it so that way if you have any questions like and and which is kind of good because you know like Rebecca thought oh no we couldn't do the basketball court he goes oh that's tourism you know so

It's and he gives you his cell phone number and he's like, call me if you have any questions and you can use it. You know, this is a great opportunity to make a connection at the top of the game in Texas based.

So he works for the state. He is a hotel.

The hotel logic association. Okay.

Check this hotel lodging out of the industry version of.

the government body so they're the ones that made the that pushed the legislation they wrote the law and so they are also it's all the hoteliers in the state that belong to it and so they're the ones that you know you can get one that will be like you're not using our hotel tax appropriately and the reason it's a hotel tax is to bring more people to stay in their hotel so it's basically self-imposed tax on them so i found it informative though it's pretty funny So that one I do suggest you go to because it's sometimes going to be hard to wrap your head around what this money can be used for.

I will be out of town.

Okay.

I will be out of town from the 23rd through the 30th. So the 25th and 29th, I will not be out either.

Okay. You're fine. I'm kidding. Sounds interesting. All of y'all. I just wanted to throw this thing out if you can. I know summer is really hard. Usually we would have this hot text in March or April, but I think Rebecca forgot.

What's that?

All of a sudden it's June. I don't know what happened. And like, the grant ones is just to kind of in case anybody asks you what the schedule is. The only thing you do need to put on your calendar or the. 2 dates 3 dates in red there. Because applicants will do a presentation on their, uh. On there what they what they're applying for and then, um.

Yeah, I will, I would say, let's just address that. This is such a huge part of what we do and this is going to be all of y'all. I think you were there yesterday. You had you just started whenever the grants I was there, but this is new for you all and I think that it's a fantastic thing and there is kind of like a homework aspect of it. But the more you put into that, and the more you'll get from meeting them in person. So, I just encourage you all to really do as much as you can.

We're all volunteering here, but it's a really cool part of our going to have 1 of the items on the next menu is us talking about the grand process. It'd be good to hit it up early, especially since only 2 of them. Um, and then that 28, that's your normal date, normal meeting date, but that's it. Last a little longer sometimes, because you are discussing how much money and it can be hard. And then just so you know, October is arts and humanities month. So we usually do these smarts awards.

The end is supposed to be capitalized, be thinking about your nominations because they rely heavily on us to pick who gets those awards. So, as the year goes on, as we head through the summer, keep an eye on it. You have this really cool opportunity to help somebody in a cool, neat way.

Okay. That was that support for upcoming meetings.

All right, next. Oh, item three, receive staff report on current projects and maintenance, and then that's this spreadsheet here.

The only big update were that the sundial and basketball court mural were approved by council. Oh, great. So that's what we're working on, getting that called on.

That's so fun.

Anything else? I'll call and let her know then.

I'll text her.

Kelly.

I'm so sorry.

Which one were you talking about?

The top two. Oh, okay. Awesome. Would you have been in the works for?

Yes. Yeah.

Oh, okay. Got it. Great. Yeah. It's awesome. Oh, the history trail is still ongoing. Yeah, it'll probably be, it's supposed to be February 27, not 26.

That's a long day.

So yeah, it's, they have the, they've chosen 20 names of businesses to, for the first installation. And so then we're waiting on to see if we get this grant funding to put the lights in along there because we would like to have lights along on the soap.

Were you all involved with saving the murals at the bottom of the Price Center stairs? Do what? I'm just impressed with the save.

Oh, yeah, that was Prince patient.

Yeah, that was great.

He actually had been fighting it before, and then when he got the thing on, he got to remove it. He goes, I'm not going to remove the bulb outs because I saw some in Austin, so I'm going to see what we have to do. So they went and had a router out all around it and put in a curve around the area.

Yeah, somewhat half curve or something. Yeah.

Okay. Let's still drive over it. Yeah.

It could be a cut out for wheelchairs, but that's just fine.

Still, that's a big win.

That whole area has to be redone. We have to then do the whole thing. You can't just do anything. Yeah. So anyway, any other questions? We will send these out each month so that you can see that the current status doesn't change.

I've heard you refer to the pollinator wings. Where are they located? It's to TBD.

That is through the mural program and that's going to be Like, you know how people have the angel wings?

Yeah.

But it's going to be birds and bees and butterflies and bat wings.

That's awesome. That was one of the things that I had somebody request when I did a little post on Facebook. Yeah.

They'll be in different art styles. So maybe one will look like a Picasso. Maybe one will look like, you know, the cut paper from Mexico. So that's my dream.

What about... I don't know if this is something we would talk about in our next meeting, but... Just the proposals that the other arts commissioners brought to the last meeting, including the interactive art walk, and then also the eco art project.

So eco art project, we were going to have it on this, but we knew we didn't have time. Okay. So we're putting that for discussion on the next meeting, because then we can talk about that. Yep.

And then do we have discussion about the interactive art map?

On the next meeting, we may have bigger fish in front. I do want very much to continue that process. I just don't want to leave on it. I think we might hold off on that, but let's do it. Yeah, we'll definitely keep track of that. It's it's 1 of my.

Awesome, maybe on this is where we can put instead of on hold. You can put ideas for another time and then just. How about running list of do like a wish list or something hopes and dreams.

Did this art project status usually include all the stuff from the murals?

No, I just put some of the bigger ones. Some of the bigger ones? Okay. Yeah, because something like the pollinator ones was murals. The mobility hub thing was murals. That's why I put the word murals in front of it.

Sorry, my... My OCD, like, I have had a past of being an executive assistant where it was my job to, like, track everything. And so then I try to understand. Is that unpaid? No. Oh, shit. Okay.

Is that it?

Is it?

Yep. Yep. That's all I've got. Okay. Item four, question and answer session with the press and public. There are none present, though.

All right. It's 6-29, Wednesday, June 10th, and the meeting is adjourned.