Town Council - Special Meeting

Monday, June 22nd, to order. We have on the agenda tonight quarterly strategic discussions, and tonight we have economic developer Ron Mail, economic development. What's your exact title? Director. Director. Didn't say the word director. I'm like, I know you're something. Economic development director Ron Mail to address talk to us about economic development within the county and to include county sewer discussions, which I think we just got an email addressing that too.

Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor, I can speak to that. So after talking with Ron, he used good judgment and said, hey, why don't we have county staff who's in charge of sewer come and be available to speak and answer questions about sewer? And they weren't available tonight, but they did set a a letter to you all later this afternoon. I need to mail it to you and print it out a copy there for you. Yes, yes, it should be right there.

Oh, there it is.

Alex, may I go?

Yeah, please. All right. Thank you for being here, Ron.

Oh, of course, of course, of course. Mayor Scholl, council members, Manager Sewell, I want to thank you for inviting me here tonight to share and talk about our economic development department and how we can continue to work together to bring about the types of investment that you and your citizens want to see. Just by the way, a little bit of a background. We are a staff of three. The young lady to be my right on the screen is Latoya Billings. Latoya came to us just three months ago. She started with us, with our team. Prior to that, Latoya was the director of corporate training at South Piedmont Community College. So she comes to us with a lot of relationships in the community with the businesses. So she has hit the ground running. We're glad to have her on board. The young lady to my left on the screen, I think many of you probably already know Rachel, Rachel Holzman. She is my assistant director and she has been actually here working in economic development for five years. We were able to hire her directly out of NC State actually before she graduated. So she's been a, both of these ladies have been a terrific addition to the staff. And then actually, sorry, just a little bit about myself. I'm starting my 22nd year of economic development work here in Union County. Started with the city of Monroe, and then for a short time we were with another entity. But that led to, in December of 24, Union County commissioners decided to create their own economic development department. And they asked Rachel and myself to come over and establish this department from scratch, from the ground up. And we've been really just honored to do that. So what drives us? It's real straightforward, our mission. The mission of our department is to improve the quality of life for all Union County residents through the attraction of new capital investment, and the attraction of new, well-paying jobs. Straightforward. Investment that increases the tax base, but even more importantly are the jobs that are created. So we feel that every job that pays good, sustainable wages is a family that is helped to sustain. So how do we achieve our mission? It's through our scope of work. And some of the key elements here that I'll touch on, municipal engagement. In my mind, that's the most important. One thing that we will never do is come to a community and impose ourselves. We come, we meet in person, we listen to understand what development goals you have, what you wanna see happen, and then we figure out how we can marshal some resources to help you all achieve those goals. Then again, we wanna be partners. Strategic planning. We focus on working with municipalities who are actively charting their own future. You all do that. Product development. That's a fancy way of saying that we're looking to purchase land, market it for commercial and industrial purposes. One example you may have seen a couple months ago, we purchased some property in Winget, and we will be marketing that property for industrial uses. I'm sorry, I'm skipping ahead here. Recruitment and BR&E, recruitment and business retention and expansion. On the recruitment side, Rachel Holzman, my assistant director, she is in charge of going out and identifying new business opportunities, either maybe in a neighboring county, here in the state, another state in the country, or often in another continent. Specifically over the years, Western Europe has been a real good target for us to attract a lot of foreign direct investment and jobs. Latoya Billings, our existing industry specialist, she is in charge of the business retention and expansion program. And in the world of economic development, Keep this in mind, 75% of all new capital investment and all new jobs created come from our existing industries. So you can see why it's so crucial that we go out and we establish those relationships, take a pulse, see where we can help, because we want to see them grow, continue to invest, and continue to grow the jobs. And again, 75%. Sectors that we focus on, again, aerospace and precision manufacturing for, again, my whole 22 years here has been a very lucrative industry sector. And those jobs, you'll recognize names like Collins Aerospace, Icon Aerospace, or ATI. typically very high capital investment and very high wages. I know it's a little hard to read, but food systems, that is something a little bit new for us. And what that is, is think of the expression farm to fork, farm to plate, sorry. In Union County, there's, and this is a number that I didn't realize, but I think it's really impressive, there's about 200 small family-owned farms. And these farms, they'll produce vegetables, berries, a little bit of protein, be the chicken, pork, or whatnot. So the idea here is to make that connection up the processing chain from... what is grown here, comes out of the land here in Union County, and then goes on to be consumed or to another customer that will further process it. I hope you have seen back in March, again, over in Wingate, we broke ground on our Food Innovation Center, and it's right there at Austin Chaney Road, right off of the expressway. And that is the location where we'll have like nine commercial kitchens that are rentable by these small farmers. And they can do their FDA-approved processing and get it to the customer. So just an example of a new segment that we have started to target. Office headquarters, the best example I can give you is one right in your backyard. At the intersection of Stallings Road and the Monroe Expressway, you'll see it. It's coming out of the ground. It's being upfitted. It's Cell Ethics is the name of that company. We were able to recruit them from Mecklenburg County down here to Stallings. And it's a $17 million investment. 85 jobs paying about $85,000 a year on average. So the most important thing I want you to remember here is the location. The connectivity for that company is a perfect example of why regional office development is something that we should look at together. Healthcare. You know, we're blessed to have the Atrium West Hospital Complex here. We want to leverage that by looking to recruit specialized medical companies, not companies, specialized medical providers, such as be it oncologists, radiologists, what have you, that will support the excellent care that's provided by the hospital, but the patients need that focused care and focused attention, and they can get it right here. They can get it right here without having to go up into Charlotte.

So does each one of these interactions with these groups, do y'all keep a portfolio? How is that arranged and what opportunities do you, how do you arrange it for creating opportunities within Union County and matching them with other opportunities as far as the actual tenant or the actual developer?

It's a combination of we have existing relationships with developers, with site selectors, and really also with the different municipalities as well. It's very common for a municipality to call us and say, hey, we've been, you know, we have plans or an application from XYZ, is there any opportunity that the county could come and provide maybe an incentive to help bring that about?

And I did want to... And do those get tagged as a particular opportunity? They do. Okay.

They do. They do. They do. We assign each of those opportunities a specific project name and keep track of that through... a CRM database.

And is that something that's available to us or do you have a tracking for that?

When a project is no longer confidential, we can share that. Does that answer your question?

They know me. I have a million more questions, but I'm doing it. Okay. I like these ideas, but I also, part of the conversation here is to be very specific about stallings and the opportunities here. Right. So that's kind of more my mentality.

Yep.

I mean, that's just kind of where I'm going.

You got it. You got it. Retail. Retail. As new rooftops are added to Stallings, of course, Stallings becomes even more attractive from an economic development standpoint. And one thing, and I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but from an economic development standpoint, just let me share some of the reasons that Stallings is so attractive. One, you border Mecklenburg County. You're just 15 minutes from uptown Charlotte. Quality housing options. How long? I said 15 miles from Uptown Charlotte. I thought you said minutes.

It depends on what time of day.

Yeah, I know. That would be like 3 a.m. and speeding. Yes. Of course, Union County Public Schools, a great benefit. But unbeatable connectivity. Stallings is the only municipality in Union County that has direct access to I-485 via three interchanges. That's a distinguisher. The Monroe Expressway is an efficient connection to global and domestic supply chain corridors. You get on 485, you go up to 85, you go over to 77, or you can just come back down to 74, and within two and a half hours, you're at ports along the East Coast. You all know that. Engagement that we have had with Stallings over the past 15 months. and also, more importantly, into the future. You all have invited me to participate in the Economic Development Committee, for which I'm grateful and eager to keep participating. Back in January, Max was able to give us a good two-hour driving tour of Stalling so that we're a little bit more familiarized. Hotel discussions. Atrium. I can tell you for 20 years, manufacturing companies have been and saying, look, we really need a little bit higher end hotel here in the county so that when our customers come or we're doing some training or whatnot, those customers don't have to go up into Charlotte or over to Ballantyne. They can enjoy, again, a little bit higher end hotel experience right here in the county. So we're looking forward to continuing to work with you in Atrium on that. I wanted to share, because I think this is good news, retail strategies. The Union County Commissioners a year ago enabled us to contract with a group out of Alabama, and it's known as Retail Strategies. And what that is, they are a national advisory firm that works specifically with municipalities to understand what type of retail uses you all wanna see. And then also, they're able to share what it is about the municipality that is attracted to particular retailers. So let me just give you a couple of examples here. Just in a, just a brief conversation last week with with retail strategies, I said, okay, what are you seeing as far as types of retail sectors that are eyeballing Stallings? So, again, these are just initial conversations. A national grocer looking to penetrate the Charlotte market, a regional high-end pet supply retailer, a national fast casual restaurant, a regional dental office, and then a national quick service restaurant. Not sure what the difference between that and the fast casual is, but basically wanted to let you know that Stallings, because of its location, because of its connectivity, and because of its growth, is getting the eye of several national retail chains. And here's the thing. You all... Again, like I said earlier, we don't come in and say, you need to do this, you need to do that. The retail strategy says, hey, we have these conversations with XYZ. I call Alex, say, hey, we've got this. Let's do a team's call or they're coming to visit. That way, you all are always in the driver's seat. So, again, the main point. Stallings is attractive for many reasons. Yeah.

Like for all of those that you just mentioned, is each one of those an active, excuse me, active conversation that's happening? Yes. And like, Is there like a periodic update that's happening on a weekly basis or some type of reoccurring basis back to Alex?

As they get to a particular stage, that's when we basically make you aware.

What stage is that?

That stage is where they have... It's not just, hey, we're looking at Stallings or whatever, but if they've identified a particular intersection, a particular parcel that might be on the market, that's when we let Alex know.

I apologize. That's okay. If we're trying to attract those businesses... Wow. It feels like that's almost like, well, they've already selected a place they want to be at that point. We've not been, I mean, we're not working to drive that. We would be like, hey, we've got this planned over here. You should be looking over here. It feels like that's one layer beyond where we should be getting involved to some degree. And maybe I'm misunderstanding that.

No, perfect question. Retail strategies, the folks that we interact with basically on a weekly basis, they are very aware of what's, like, for example, if there is a property that's on the market or a particular intersection, they, the folks from Retail Strategies, are in communication with the national retailer. And once that goes beyond just a casual conversation, we let you know.

You say folks from Retail Strategies?

Mm-hmm.

Okay. Usually that means something.

Oh, it did. It was just clearing my throat.

Okay. When you say those folks and retail strategies, who are those?

I can share with you by name. The company.

It's a company? It's not a strategy. It's an incorporated company called Retail Strategies. Oh, okay.

They have a contract with us to help us do all this. I thought it was more, yeah.

They're basically site selectors. They're site selectors that specialize in retail.

Okay, okay.

Hey, council members, I appreciate you bringing up this point because it's a really good one. That's one of the reasons we got together with Ron and his team and gave them a tour around town to really kind of identify the areas that we see on the ground that we think might be ripe for development. We talked a lot about the Union County, Union West Business Park, you know, I know that's now listed on their website, too, and retail strategies is really available. So that's one of the ways we try to kind of connect the big picture strategic goals to operationally on the ground, not just from their big picture strategy and funneling into the right partners, but also our local knowledge. That's how we try to kind of integrate it.

So with things like, you said a national grocery store that was looking to come, but we know that there is a person group building a grocery store. Would it go that far as to say, hey?

Yeah, absolutely. So we actually, we met with Ron and the retail strategies folks, from this corporate, from the group, and we went over all the different developments in town and let them know all the things about it, right? For example, if there's a grocery store we think might be coming in, let's make them aware so retail strategies can kind of get plugged into that. So those are the kind of conversations that we've tried to have in the past, I'd say, year or so since retail strategy has gotten involved.

So this is a recent.

Yeah, absolutely. This is a new initiative as far as I know from county and I commend Ron and his team for bringing this up.

Exactly, and I appreciate the questions. No, that's good. We actually have encountered that. Especially with retail strategies, folks, it's hard to understand that they are a site selector for retail. It's a little out of the ordinary, but they're a very successful firm. Yeah. Then also, as far as a new investment that we would, again, continue to like to work with you on is healthcare, hospitality, and again, retail. But specifically, I looked at your February 2026 council retreat summary. And a few things jump out that I want to make sure that you all know that we're working We're working on this with you. Marketing the former John Deere parcel. So again, according to how you all want to see that reused. The hotel at the atrium. Various retail opportunities. Also, the McGee Corporation property. It's roughly 26 acres. I think you all know that we are maybe a couple weeks away from closing on the sale of 60 acres to the McGee Corporation over off of Goldmine Road. So the question becomes, okay, what's the highest and best reuse of that property? You know, I can tell you 10, 12 years ago, I was all about industrial. Everything's industrial, right? Well, that 26 acres is just in a prime spot. So I just wanted to let you know that it's probably going to be a couple years before the McGee's are, they need to build their building over off a gold mine. They need to move. So in any way that we can help to identify a particular user that you want to see, we're gonna work with you to do that.

You said it's the prime spot for what?

For industrial? I have to give you my best opinion on that. I think it has grown beyond industrial. I think it has grown beyond industrial.

It's a great place for a data center.

Not that. But ma'am, to answer your questions, there's mixed use. You could have some living space, some retail space, professional office space there. So that's, does that answer your question?

Yeah, you're just guessing anyway, so that's okay.

It's, like I say, I think it's grown beyond, the market has grown beyond seeing that particular parcel as industrial, in my opinion. Also, on our website, we can list available buildings that are in the Union West Business Park. There's two or three buildings right now that are on the market. And then also at Union West Business Park, what was it, about a year ago, that the Union West itself was resurfaced. Thank goodness. Thank goodness. Now, a beltway could use a resurfacing. So looking at trying to identify particular funding sources, maybe from the state, that could help cover the cost of that.

Mayor, do you want to maybe touch just here with Ron?

Okay. Well, I mean, it's not a secret. I was up in Raleigh a couple weeks ago and was asked by Todd and his staff to come up with a couple of projects, and I included it on a wish list. Okay. We'll see. Gotcha. Until something happens, I don't get excited. So that's why I was like, oh, it's no big deal until then.

Okay.

It is a source. It could possibly be a source. Who knows? Very good. Just keep me posted. Oh, yeah. Big news. We'll be shouting from the rooftops if something happens. Okay.

Until then. So really, my overall recommendation is that you all continue to be selective about the development opportunities that present themselves to you every day. Stylings is only going to continue to be attractive. That's not going to change. So I applaud you for being, some, and I won't even use any examples here in Union County, but sometimes you see communities that had not seen development forever, all of a sudden they're attractive and they think they gotta jump on the first thing, the first shiny object that comes through the door. That's not the case. So continue to be selective. And again, we are here to help. NOW, IF I CAN, I WANT TO, BECAUSE I WANT TO TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT SEWER. AND I DON'T KNOW IF YOU ALL HAD A CHANCE TO READ THE LETTER FROM COUNTY MANAGER BRIAN MATTHEWS EARLIER THIS AFTERNOON, BUT TO SUMMARIZE, THE ONE THAT AS YOU WOULD SAY AT THE BEGINNING SAYS NOTHING BUT SAYS A PAGE AND A HALF OF STUFF.

Is that the one you're talking about?

Well, that is the one. That is the one. That is the one. But the capacity at Crooked Creek Basin, there still is some capacity. Poplin Road Pump Station has conveyance capacity, so that means you can move some of the load around from different treatment stations. Current major expansion underway at 12 Mile Creek. And then I know that one of the things that I saw in the council retreat notes is that you all had mentioned the prospect of engaging in conversations with a neighboring jurisdiction to maybe access some capacity that way. So as far as sewer, I am willing I'm more than willing, I will take back any questions, recommendations, anything back to county management and share those with them. With that.

I think the idea there is I think, like, I don't know about y'all, but reading this was like a minute and a half of my life I could never get back. It was useless as far as my concerns are. I mean, it seems to me like it's almost like a we have capacity, and then when developers go and talk to them, it's like they don't have capacity, or you're not going to probably get capacity for eight, ten years. So, I mean, it's hard to have a fruitful conversation when it seems like you can't get any... We get a lot of this, and not a lot of grit on the ground. And so it's hard to have fruitful conversations when you don't have some real dirt to throw about. Anyway, that's my two cents.

Sorry, but it's okay. I would conclude my remarks, and again, saying that I enjoy the working relationship that I have with Alex and Max and the other staff members and looking forward to continuing that. So if there's, I'm open for questions.

Anybody? I mean, Stephen's asked a few, so I'll give everyone else.

I'm going to leave you.

Ron, I got one real quick. Okay. I'm sorry.

No, you go, Brad.

I'm sorry. I didn't see. Your business retention expansion program, you mentioned that, a staff person. I assume that's a call program or business. Do you spend any time or would you spend any time with our businesses? We don't have staff to do that, of course. But what's the right approach to having you engage in a concentrated period of time with largest employers in our town? Is that a? Campaign you can run is at a time of the year.

Do you think it's it's easily achievable easily achievable? There's For for Stallings the the biggest employers you've got CEM You've got What used to be a EP and you'll forgive me. I'm drawing a blank on the name right now Thank you Very plastic. Yeah exactly exactly so but Brad, to answer your question, we could target a, let's just say, an eight-week period, even less than that, and just concentrate our visits on those companies and report back to you, are there any opportunities for expansion? What's going on? So we would be more than achievable. Thank you.

Early on you mentioned, you know, Incentives, what are incentives that are available to help attract business? I know like there's certain things we can do, you know, we're competing with another state for a major employer, but what are, aside from that, what are like some smaller things that we can do?

From the county, from our toolbox, Basically, the incentives that we have are targeted toward, it's our economic development investment grant. What that is, is there's a $2 million threshold. If a company is looking at making an investment that is at least $2 million, we're able to provide, it comes out to about a 50% tax rate. relief over five years on the value of that new investment. Now, as far as other types of incentives that target maybe retail or, well, actually retail, I'll use that. That is something that we're looking at. We don't have one in the toolbox right now. So, again, we're 15 months into this. Not an excuse, but I'm just saying that we have the flexibility now to add to those tools. Thank you.

Do you have a list of the top employers by municipality or at least by Stallings? I sure do. How deep does that go? 10, 15, or 20?

I would say about a dozen.

Does it have, what does that list comprise? What's on it? Does it give a description of the biz?

It does. Where? It does. It would obviously be, the business itself, it's addressed the number of employees, what they make, how long they've been at their location, and then also any projects that we have worked with them on over the past few years.

Any chance we might be able to get a copy of that? More than a chance. I'd love it if I could see that. I've been wanting to go out and visit our top employers. Certainly. And contacts, too. Yeah. Often we have a really good contact there. I've never met them. I think previous mayors have met them. Right. I have not.

Right. Fascinating place.

Oh, yeah. We have some fascinating businesses. They're small, obscure. You wouldn't think much about it, but dang, they're worldwide. They sure are. The CM is worldwide. Exactly, exactly. Barry's worldwide, but this is just one of their many, many. They have almost an identical one in Indian Trail.

I think they actually sold that one.

That one?

Hmm. Right, corporate-wide. There is a new corporate. I think they sold it.

Oh, well, anyhow, it's right on the railroad track, too, so. which looks like it. But yes. Anyhow, that would be helpful to... Totally easily done. Establish some relationships.

Thank you. Yes, ma'am. So you probably know that we are trying to establish a town center. Yes, ma'am. Is there things that you could help us with that, like bringing in, trying to... get other, like retail. Yes. Retail in the front, housing in the back, or just retail or things like that. And the people want to, the developers want to come in and just put housing, residential.

Yes, we, the short answer is yes, but we do not touch residential. Okay. But, Professional office, retail, that's right in our, that's in our bailiwick. So, again, would love to just continue the conversation.

Yeah. I mean, it seems to me that, you know, if you build it, they will come. Well, nobody's building. You know, we've got to get... a retail store or whatever in there to get other people to come. And I know that other people will come, you know, if we have a nice restaurant or whatever, but.

Certainly, it's the anchor, the anchor that you're looking for. So, but again, to answer your question, yes, we can certainly help with that.

Oh, good. Okay.

So is there, is there like a, again, like a monthly report that, you know, here's the entities that we're working on for your town and here's the conversations that we've had.

Yes, yes, yes. We can easily initiate that so that Alex has that and then he can share it with council. Okay, yeah.

And I guess on that front, I mean, the real question is, I mean, the economic development team, I mean, is there something that we should be doing above and beyond what we're doing today?

The only thing that I would ask is that... is that on a regular basis, just let me know what projects that you're looking at, what has come in. So again, sort of both ways.

Yeah, I had the same mindset, Ron. I just wrote down the exact same thing, is to make sure we're keep on communicating to y'all on a regular basis, here are the new projects. Because I know we went over some of the new developments last time we sat down with Retail Strategies, the group. and went over, like, for example, I believe we went over the Pleasant Plains One Town Center development that they're the ones that are scheduled to have some retail out front there to kind of make that connection. And maybe they can be helpful because I know that developer said they'd never developed retail before, right? And just having that ongoing new conversation to kind of refresh it, keep it on the front of y'all's burner, and make sure we're staying on top of things. So that would be it. That would be very helpful.

Again, thank you for the questions. Thank you, Ron.

Thank you, Ron. I think that might include your part.

Oh, I have to point out, brand new website, discoverunioncounty.com. Thank you. Sorry. That's a good one to close on. Thank you. All right. I will, again, end. You all know where to find me.

Thank you, Ron. Thank you, Ron.

Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate it.

Wasn't Mike the one that wanted to talk about town-owned properties and projected purpose?

You know, forgive me. I know there were several things on the agenda that Mike had asked about, but he removed the ones that he wanted to be here to talk about. So forgive me, I can't remember who brought that up specifically. I just know it came in the May meeting. And I'll pull it up here. You should have a map in front of you that has the.

You don't need to pull it up.

Okay.

I mean, we have it. We know it. There's not a whole lot of question. about what these are.

They're all parks or the only... I feel like it was maybe, Mike, and I think it was mainly for he and as a new council member understanding the orange and blue, not so much the green on these maps.

Right. The orange ones next to us. Yeah. I'm not sure. I can't remember why that's blue, that little blue, almost a triangle. Bacon. Bacon. There's nothing on it. Shake it. Oh, bacon. Well, it should... Land we own.

So we own that little triangle thing?

Yep.

What's the size of that parcel? Triangle? Yeah. Do we know how many acres that is?

It went along with that parcel that we purchased in front of it.

So I guess it would be by itself. Does it have any potential uses in the future? Or would it need to be combined with something? Too small.

Probably connectivity.

Like a driveway over to not only Stallings Road, but Community Park Road there. Yeah. John, the goal was to pick up that third piece that's there to complete that block across from the park, and then that would make more sense then, obviously.

Yeah. What I can do is part of my weekly email, send out this map. So, Mike has it as well.

I think Mike was, again, not just Mike. I think we all maybe need to refresh our own. while we bought the land at the corner. Mike asked Ron to put it on the Union County website, which is fine, but it's really not likely gonna drive a lot of interest and activity.

Were you on council when we did that?

It just started, yeah. I was, I remember exactly why. Yeah, so I can give the rundown, you can, of why.

What's exactly why?

Did I say the word exactly? You did.

You did.

We were in a hurry because the guy was, what's his name? I won't remember all the details. Well, don't start with that. We had a plan. We had a plan for this area. This was a downtown or town center development plan. We had hopes that someday that would convert. Well, all of a sudden, it did come up. It was under... The guy was going to sign a lease for 20 or 30 years to another very similar... She probably doesn't know what the... Retail, trailer plan, trailer, tractor, rental plan. That's the rental equipment.

Yeah.

Yeah, rental equipment. He was going to sign a long-term lease, and it would have locked it into that again for the next 20, 30 years. And we're like, what can we do? So we... decided at the time that we didn't have a sewer problem. We thought that we would be able to turn it over into a town center project of some sort, a public-private partnership. If we had the land, it would facilitate Well, we hate to use the word quickly, but it wouldn't take as long as it has because we didn't see, I think this was COVID too. Well, to be fair. I was trying to be fair.

No, no, you're articulating it like it's, like we expected more than we've gotten so far, and I disagree. I think that we bought it as a preservation of a very valuable piece of land that could be helpful for town operations and be a future development site. I don't think the sewer issue is the main problem there. I think it's the road construction that's going to start and last for the next five or six years. So the question is, does that building remain? We did a study. What would be the highest and best use of that land? Likely needs to be a companion partnership with the land across the street, which is really owned by four owners now, all of whom want to sell. So it's a very large piece of a very large puzzle. This parcel's for sale. I know you can't see it, John, but this parcel's for sale. That parcel's for sale. This parcel's for sale. Running off the map, Ms. Funderburg's property will be for sale. All of this land and that are all going to be a nice development site, but to my opinion, it's just waiting on the road improvements to start and get near completion, so there's somewhat certainty of what the road's going to look like. I'm glad we own it. I don't think we're I think we should be very, very patient with that. Yeah, I agree with that. I even had some reservations about locking it up for a 10-year lease with a brewery. It would have been great. It would have been fine. I would have been fine with it. But at the same time, in 10 years, we'll have a very valuable piece of property in five years once the road is complete, I estimate, because a new loop-around road is going to go right in front of our property Again, I think we just have to, I would recommend to be patient and maybe it would be the next council in four or five years that will be deciding what to do with that.

A question about, though, it's sitting there. Does it make any type of sense to use it for one-off events if folks want to do that?

I think the question is safety and fire code and risk. And the answer so far has been no. It's probably not worth it unless there's a cool event like you go down to a few communities, I forget the name, York, South Carolina, the town of York. They converted a similar property to like a market. Booths, consignment. Yeah, something like that. It'd be great, but then you're putting people in, then you've got to upgrade fire systems, and that's, you wouldn't do that for this building.

I didn't think we would because that would be same, it would be retail, same use. I thought that would only.

Not retail, the same use. It would be a public.

Yeah, so I met with the building code inspector. It's a great. Brad did an excellent job explaining, just to add a little bit more. So, we can use it for events for parking, right, the exterior, and that's been a godsend for us, right, to have that for parking. We can kind of really scale up the events and fill up the park with that parking. It's invaluable. So, we had the building code folks out here walk through the building, and basically, it's designated through a building code, and I'm going to use used probably the un-technical terms. My building code friends, please forgive me. But it's basically classified as a retail use. And if you started doing anything we were probably talking about at the time, whether it's sort of indoors farmers markets, having some of the things you mentioned, it becomes more of a use that's like a gathering-type use. And that changes the dynamic and the requirements, whereas it's grandfathered in for retail uses. If we were going to do a lot of the kind of gathering-type uses we'd want in there, that changes the use, and you'd have to start talking about fire suppression systems, sprinklers, things like that. It gets expensive very quickly.

I mean, what Brad was talking about, like potentially a floating market, I mean, that's retail. So that's the part I wasn't understanding.

Well, two things. First, you've got to – there may be a fire code issue of what does the town or someone need to spend to get the building up to whatever level. Maybe it's not fire suppression, maybe it's something else. I don't know. But I think the more important part is no one on staff has the time, expertise to develop that. Eunice would be the closest, but obviously that's not her job and her skill set. She would say so. No one in the community's approached us with anything more than like pickleball courts, which they checked into it, didn't kind of work. So it's just sitting there until now. I think we're entertaining uses. We're recruiting a use, very specifically in NARO, But I think we're open to ideas. And putting it on the county's website is fine. There's nothing wrong with that. I just don't think it's going to yield a whole lot. Those visitors to that site are corporate, industrial, looking for office, warehouse, that kind of stuff. So it might get some interest.

One more thing I'd offer to the board. I believe our last meeting approved an application to the UNC grad students to potentially study that building and that property a little bit more and maybe take a fresh look at it, too. And maybe something could come out of there. They might have some ideas that we didn't think of. So I've told them, hey, you know, the council's general direction is the brewery tap house, but really look at everything because I want to give you all, the board, all the options so you can, you know, have the flexibility to make an informed decision, whichever way we go.

Alex, let's just say, theoretically, something somebody comes in and makes an offer for, you know, a proposal for something there and they want to move pretty quickly on it. What is this town's plans for like how we're currently utilizing that outdoor space for storage and things like that for like vehicles, equipment, et cetera.

The right price, we could probably be off of it in a day.

Yeah. I'm like, what would, what is the contingency? Yeah. The current use?

Uh, I'm going to give, like, the lawyer answer, right? It depends.

Right.

I think for us, when we almost had a deal with the Armored Cow Brewery, we had built in, all right, we're not going to give you the whole property. We're going to save a little bit. That can allow us to kind of store, do things like that. Some of it, it'll make our space tighter. We might have to buy some external storage, things like that. And we might have to get creative. But with any deal like this, it's not going to be a one-week process. It'll be quicker, and it'll give us time to really kind of dig into that. But we have a framework with our armored cow deal to be able to address that.

Can I add something to that, Alex?

Yeah, please.

The statutes on disposition of real estate are pretty detailed, and nothing can happen really quickly. Okay.

We'd have plenty of time to figure out what to do.

You will have plenty of time, yes, sir. Thank you.

Council Member Ayers, if I can also add, there's only one restroom in that building today, so when you're talking about public or public markets, that's another thing.

I imagine the air conditioning or HVAC's probably not too good after not being used for several years.

There are some numbers that we've tossed around prior to councils. It might be helpful for you and Mike to know. We spent about $2.8 million to buy it. I'm guessing that's a round number. We own it. It's on our balance sheet as an asset, so we can and should sell it at some point, probably down the road, hopefully for more than that. And then the other question we've often answered is what we'd lose by doing that beyond the 2.5 and sort of tax revenue. Mr. Black, who owned the property, I think we did the math sometime. He was paying to our town, not the county, but about $1,000 annually. So we're losing some tax revenue now that it's off, but it's not appreciable. And hopefully, with the new road being built, we'll see the value grow so that we can dispose of it, and that will be a decision we make.

brought up sewer because maybe that's one of the biggest hurdles I see to our future. The road is coming, we know that's gonna come, we know it's gonna be way better. But there is no plan for sewer capacity increase at all. And we get the monthly report, I was just looking at it while Ron was here, and I'm like, we don't have. Within five, six years, even with the new addition down at 12 Mile, that'll be used up. we had our sewer consultant a year or two or so ago, stood right there and was giving us the report about hooking into Mecklenburg. And what would that entail? And one of the other questions was, He was also a Union County resident. I said, you're aware of what's going on here in Union County? He said, yes. Tell me your expert opinion. How long will that million and a half be used up once it's open? He says, well, given the amount of pent-up demand that is already being requested, and if we look at that report, that's beyond what's already approved. He said, that won't last two or three years. So we're not... While we think the road, I know the road will improve the appeal, a huge hurdle and roadblock is no sewer. No sewer. What are they going to do? What are we going to do? That to me is very frustrating. Because there's no solution in sight that I know of. Okay. Okay. Enough of that, guys?

Well, after that depressing note. It's just reality.

The other two maybe points would be those two orange parcels that we purchased already. We're using those, I think, maybe for storage. I'm not real sure, but I think there's asbestos in them. And then we also want to acquire the one on the corner at Community Park in Stylen to complete the block. I don't think that's a secret. And the whole idea would be to, at some point, tear down those homes. so that you have a street level sort of activity across from the park. So again, those are more buy and hold. The question now is do we tear them down? Does it help to beautify the town or add something of value if we tear them down? I think the staff has so far decided probably not worth the cost.

We are using one of them for storage too.

but we also, it seems like we're getting more people. I hope we get more staff in, and we might have to dig into, where is it, over there, you know, start moving that way.

That is a big question that, I mean, I brought it up last time, but if that parcel does develop, I mean, I think it's gonna cause us some grief, parking-wise. And then I also have some concern about the fact that it feels like the town hall is almost at capacity from a resourcing perspective. At what point do you make a decision that we do need to start considering either upfitting that building and looking for additional parking? We talked about the park, but the park, I think Eunice said it's only like, what, 40 or 50 cars or something? 60 maybe, she said. So, I mean, we could easily eat up that amount of parking pretty quickly. So, I mean, I guess how far into the future do you start laying down plans to do those particular things? I mean, if it's going to be, if it's going to take 15 years to get there Should we start having those conversations now? And I mean, do the people on the corner know that we're even interested in purchasing if they're interested in selling? We've had those conversations with them.

Yeah, thank you, Councilman Ayers. So a couple things. First, the board is already really laying the groundwork to determine kind of future facility needs and how we might accomplish those In the budget the Board approved, it includes a facility needs assessment, right, which will allow us to professionally and objectively determine, all right, what are our functions, and then based on our functions, what are the form of the facilities that we need, right, square footage calculations, things like that. I haven't had a conversation with the folks that live on the end parcel that we don't own right there that adjoins, sits at the corner of Community Park Drive and Stallings Road as of maybe three or four years ago, they were not interested in selling. You know, we're always happy to re-engage and have a conversation.

Well, what I would hate, the reason why I'm asking that is like, I would hate for them to go, oh, we need to sell, we'll call that commercial on TV and sell Without, hey, if you ever do think about selling, call us first.

Did you say three or four years was the last communication with them?

You know, that was just off the top of my head. It might have been four years ago. It might have been five years ago.

Can we put that on the front burner?

Sure. If the board would be supportive of that, I'd be happy to reach out to these folks, communicate with them, and let them know, hey, if you're ever interested in selling, please let the town know because we'd love to have a conversation. That affair, so it's not a super aggressive pitch, but we're here to try to avoid a situation where we want to sell, I'm just going to not even know to talk to the town.

Yeah, I mean, that would be the thing is just, you know, they don't turn around and sell it to somebody else and then we're kind of locked out of that corner for potentially, you know, decades.

Yeah, I understand.

Happy to do that.

All right. We'll run up on time. Past time for this one. Oh, I see 645. We do have a few more minutes.

Well, I mean, can we go back to what Brad was talking about just a little bit?

Of course.

I mean, you talked about the folks that own the parcel across the street. Have you had conversations? You said they're interested in selling.

No, their sign's up.

Oh, it's for sale.

No, the land behind it, Ms. Funderburg, she does not have it actively for sale, but her family has talked to the town and the staff over the years. Alex has met Ms. Funderburg. She's elderly, and her family would like to sell that eventually.

I was just curious if there had been something that you had heard lately. That's all. I know you have your ear to the ground.

No, not as much as you might think, but I would also say lift up about 30,000 feet and look down and perhaps envision that you don't even have an event park that drives parking. It's a policy decision, of course, neighborhood park, and you might have, instead of parking in the front, you might redo the park one day and have retail on the front with park space behind. Who knows? I'm just saying, let's not lock into... always an event park needing a lot of parking. And whatever development happens over there could involve some sort of structured parking that's shared with the town. Who knows? It could be. I think the biggest thing now is I would just encourage us to be somewhat patient about all of this. I think the road improvements are gonna stymie any sort of interest for the next five years. All the construction.

So, I mean, again, based off of that, no preparing or any way to put us in a more favorable location.

Maybe. If you put a brewery there, they're going to ask for nine years and 364-day lease, the most they can get, and then we're locked up that old, is it cool building? Sometimes I think it's cool. Sometimes I think it's ugly. You've locked up that building, and you can't sell the whole property to a really cool town center development, so maybe we just should be patient until the road is done. That'd be my argument. It's just sit tight.

And that's the reason why I brought up just the having some type of retail events like that there, just simply because at least it would be getting used. People would be coming to town, kind of things like that there. Anyway.

Is it a bond? Is it a bond? How do we have?

We paid for it with cash.

Oh.

Okay, good.

Y'all should have been there when we robbed that bank. It was great.

Okay.

What's the last thing on the item? Are we ready for the next item? Review of council ethics policy and code of conduct. Do you have something Alex we've got some items comparison You guys wanted to have a Code of conduct for the council

We discussed that at the last quarterly meeting and decided that we wanted a comparison of what we proposed the code of conduct with some items that you had mentioned for that and our existing code of ethics. So what I have for you is I have the code of ethics, which I will pass down, and then I also have what staff would recommend, which would be an addendum to the Code of Ethics if you wanted to move forward with the items that you listed in your Code of Conduct. Again, it might be best, I realize you can't make decisions on this on the fly, so it might be one of those things where you take this, compare them, let staff know your thoughts, let staff know what you would like incorporated, if anything at all, and then we can talk about it at the next quarterly meeting or a future quarterly meeting,

And this is proposed. The second one.

The addendum would be, is a proposed, the Code of Ethics is what is currently in the Stallings policies that you have. The Code of Ethics is a current policy. The addendum would be in addition to that, which the items councils discuss during your annual

Mayor, I would suggest given the time tonight that we just take this home, read it, digest it, and put it on a future agenda for a discussion.

Yeah, I'm sure.

That'd be fun.

So this is, we have this.

Code of ethics is the current town policy. I just wanted you to have in front of you with the other one what you currently have. Okay. And then the other item is just things council discussed calling it a code of conduct, but it could just be an addendum to your existing code of ethics. I feel bad.

Okay. All right. Good. Thank you for doing that.

Motion to adjourn.

Sorry, Lori. Motion to adjourn.

Second. All in favor? Aye.