Town Council - Regular Meeting

Okay, come to order. Uh, April 13, 2026, 7 PM. Thank you guys. Thank you everyone for being here. Um, let's get started. Um, we have a as far as the termination quorum, everyone's here, so everyone's present. I'm going to ask you go ahead and be quiet, please. Uh, stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Okay. Do we have any additions, deletions, or u adoption of the agenda from anyone? Uh, I have an addition. Uh, I'd like to add, uh, uh, Matt Ray, our code enforcement, uh, officer. Um, we had a meeting, Greg and I had a meeting. So, uh, this past Friday. And so, I'd like to enter that someplace so we can discuss that. I have, um, to add item K, a discussion of an of code enforcement audit of nuisance ordinances. Is that what you're referring to? I'm sorry. Can you say one more time? Discussion of code enforcement audit of the nuisance ordinances. Yes. Yes. That's K.

Item K. Okay. That's on the back. I have also um item L, a discussion of the resolutions of support of legislation to remove fluoride from the water supply. Um just a discussion. Yeah. And then I also have um I had an email from the League of Municipalities. We need to designate a council member as a voting delegate for the League of Municipalities Board of Elections. So, I've add asked I request that we add item M. Designate a council member as the voting delegate for the League of Municipalities. Okay. I just have one small I call correction to the minutes of the retreat. You want that now or then because it's on the consent agenda

and we should if we're doing a Yeah, it's one word. Okay. Go ahead. Give it to me at the uh end. Hold on a second. I had it here. It's the word. It is. If you look at the minutes under text amendments for the retreat on the planning dis planning board discussion text amendments on UDO. Yes. The very last one on steep slopes. Yes sir. The last word should be not re revised but reviewed. Gotcha. And that's all I have. All right. Thank you. What did you say? M was designate council member as voting delegate for the League of Municipalities Board of Directors election.

Okay. And that's the housekeeping type stuff. Yeah. Don't you want to run for the League of Municipalities for something? I got two. I don't. Sorry. Okay. Is that is that everything? We're all good. Can I get a motion to uh approve the uh make a motion? The agenda is presented. Make a motion to pres uh approve the agenda as revised. Okay. Uh all in favor? I.

Okay. Unanimous. Okay. Approved. Um number five, conflict of interest statement. In accordance with state law is the duty of every council member to avoid conflicts of interest. Does any council member have any known conflict of interest with respect to any matter or matters on the agenda? If so, please identify the conflict and refrain from any participation in the matter involved. Any conflicts? Okay, no conflicts. We'll move forward. Mayor, council member reports. Anybody have anything?

I can get started. Um uh this past month I had actually a great meeting with a group called the Native Plant Initiative. Uh Greg and I sat down and kind of talked through potentially uh if builders are going to um uh clear the land. Uh this is a potential way for um any participant who's interested uh either with a garden club or just an individual can kind of sign up and things would be flagged in yards that can come with a shovel and paint some things. And so uh they are native plants that you can put into your yard. It's better than just getting kind of disappearing into the earth. And it's good both from a PR basis for builders but also for residents, right? We can continue to encourage like happy nature stuff. So um we uh kind of worked something out that potentially and it's all Holland here, right? Um that we could do a pilot in April with Quaska. So we will get uh more information in terms of dates. It is a very low impact type of bay. you are uh they go people go in individuals go in and out in under two hours with a shovel and a sled and they take a couple of things and you pop them in your car and you're off ready to go. Um and so it looks like uh we will probably I will ask Karen but maybe we can put this on a website when we have a firm date just so people can be informed and if they're interested they will sign a waiver and kind of go out and work with the native plant initiative. So that's

as for information, can they contact you for as contact person? Yes. Okay. And your information is on our website. Correct. So it's Ellen Maloplin at townofwington.com. So uh if you have any questions, reach out. Okay. Awesome. Thank you, Ellen. Tom.

Okay. Um, first off, I have not gotten an update from uh DOT on any road improvement slash uh repaving of our residential streets. They have led a number of contracts for major roads, you know, numbered roads or whatnot, but not the residential streets. So hopefully by the next meeting, we will have an update from that. I assume they're working down from bigger projects to smaller projects. That's my best guess. Um, Wuma, um, we met in Mineral Springs actually had a did not have a quorum. We were short on people. We did, uh, discuss a bit of the fluoride, which we'll talk about later. And, uh, really didn't have we didn't really do much because we couldn't do anything. The next meeting will be April 23rd in stallings. So that is Luma. And u on just a separate non-Town note, I'll say I was I had the pleasure to be in Chapel Hill this weekend at the Duke UNC uh peace conference where they the graduates of their peace center program. They had 12 graduates graduate with a degree in confl uh conflict prevention and um I don't know the exact word of it anyway.

Yeah. resolution and conflict prevention, peace, peace and conflict resolution. And uh we had 12 12 presenters. These were all master degree students from all over the world. Very you whole number of countries, none from the US. The requirement is they have to be outside coming in and uh very interesting what they're going to do with their lives after they leave here. And uh the main thing they talked about is how people of different opinions should work together, can work together to come to common solutions for the good of their communities. So it was very interesting and u if Duke and UNCC can have peace and conflict resolution, anybody can. So u I'll just point that out. But it was very interesting that we have that the only center in the US is in in Chapel Hill up there. So, uh, we are we are the sole soul center of it. So, anyway, it was a very interesting weekend. I'll just say that. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you, Tom. Uh, anybody else? I don't have anything today. Nothing today. Nothing for me.

Nothing. Okay. We're going to move into our public comments portion. And before we before we do that, I'll I'll read my little spill here. Um, public comments are limited to four minutes. Public hearing comments are limited to three minutes. Comments are to be directed at the entire board and not individuals nor the public attending the meeting. If uh you turn around and start addressing the public and we'll have to stop you. If you continue on, then I'll have to stop you. Uh comments are to be directed at the entire board. Like I said, the uh public comments are limited to those that are remain to and within the jurisdiction of the town. Tomic topics are to be removed. Uh topics that are removed or impertinent from the business of the board shall be prohibited. Additionally, public comments shall not be topics that have an allocated or specific public hearing time. Instead, public comments are limited limited to those that do not have allocated time under a public hearing. A designated spokesperson for a group of three or more may be allocated to six minutes to speak. At least three members of the group must be present and names and addresses of those members present uh must be submitted to the town clerk before the meeting begins. Other than pursuant to this rule, you may not give any of your time to another speaker to increase that speaker's allotted time. You must be civil in your language and presentation and act within reasonable standards of courtesy. Use of slander, name calling, personal attacks or treat uh threatening speech or behavior is prohibited. The audience must maintain order and quorum in their conduct. Please refrain from disruptive applause, comments, or

disorderly speaking during the meeting. Disturbances that disturb the order and decorum of the meeting will be prohibited. The mayor or majority of the board may suspend these rules at their discretion. Failure to uh advise by the abide by these rules after receiving notice by the mayor may result in one termination of your comment period and or removable removal from the meeting altogether. Okay, Kirk, come on up. You're the first. Thank you for coming. You're welcome. Thanks for having me. Mayor Bell and council members. Uh my name is Kurt Vores and I live in Arbor Oaks, small neighborhood of 10 homes. Nine of those homes located on Bonner Drive and one on Amanda Drive. We have been engaged with Toll Brothers and the town of Weddington, voicing our opposition to the Bonner Drive connection to Morris Farm since this development was first announced to Weddington residents last uh June. Um since then, our focus has been uh primarily on the connection itself as opposed to the Morris Farm development as a whole. Now, over the last several weeks and months, and this is probably a gross understatement, y'all have heard from the residents of Bonner Drive, Amanda Drive, Kerry Lane, all three of those streets are going to be negatively impacted by this Bonner Drive connection. Now, the the common thread in all of the comments and the feedback that you've received is that we do not want Bonner Drive, again, a 9home culde-sac street, being used as a cutth

through carrying commercial residential traffic to and from a neighborhood that's going to be four times our size. Uh specifically, we believe a connection is going to result in an increase in traffic volume, vehicle speeds, and erosion of our home values. We firmly believe and quite honestly, it's going to destroy the our neighborhood's quiet character. We also believe uh it'll be a a significant increase in pedestrian and children and safety hazards for pedestrians and children. Um, many of you may not know, I wouldn't expect you to, but we have 16 kids just on Bonner Drive. So, it is and they're very active and they are all over the place. Um, and then also at the very end of the culde-sac, we have some really rather magnificent old growth oak trees, uh, several of them that will have to be taken out if that road is punched through. So, uh, council members, you know, for the residents of Bonner Drive, um, Amanda Drive, Kerry Lane, I mean, the stakes are pretty high. Um, and your vote, and I know it's not happening tonight, but your vote will have a profound impact on our neighborhoods and quite honestly our quality of of life. So, as your constituents, and we trust that you'll take that into account when it comes time for y'all to cast your vote on the project, and in particular the spawner drive connection. Thank you.

Thank you, Kurt. Richard. Richard Bailey.

Good evening. I'm Richard Bailey. I live on Kerry Lane, uh, Mandy's Plantation, which is adjacent to Amanda Drive and Bonner Road. Uh, I've lived in, uh, this development since 1982. I'm the second oldest member of that community. Um, back in 79 when I purchased my lot from Dick Bonner, um, I went to see him and asked him, uh, what his intent was for our road. And he says, "Well, I'm collecting money and putting it in escrow for the road to be paved when we sell all these lots." And so I went ahead and bought my lot with that in mind. Anyway, um as time went on, uh we filled out the community and uh we started thinking about getting the road paved and so we approached Bonner and uh he informed us that uh he didn't have the money and so promises made but not kept. So we went on with our business. So, five or six of us got together and uh decided to form a homeowners association and tackled the problem of the road because it was a gravel road that uh was not kept the best that could be and uh often when it rained it was a mud hole. So, uh anyway, we uh got together, formed a homeowner association and uh and we were charged with uh exploring the idea of paving the road. We set out bids, got bids in and uh determined how much uh it cost and we determined which one we wanted to select. We took it to the community and uh they were good with us proceeding with it and we um formed a committee,

elected officers to the homeowners association and uh we formed a committee and completed the the process of accepting vote uh accepting bids and going through them. uh we came up with a winner and uh went ahead and uh took it back to the community and said, "Look, now we've got to figure out how we're going to pay for this." So we came over several suggestions, but in the end we decided to uh uh basically charge each homeowner with road frontage on Carrie and our Amanda just pay a flat flat fee. We thought that would be the best approach and those who owned two lots wouldn't be hit as hard as one. So that's what we decided upon and we just took the bid uh the amount of uh the cost of the road and divided it by the number of houses and that was how much we charged for the road. We collected uh 90% of the the owners and so we'd put contingency in that we'd probably get about that percentage. So we had enough money to pave it. Went ahead and got it paved. After it was paved, the community got together. We worked the ditches and the sides of the roads and planted the grass and that's where we ended that process. Then we turned the road over. We decided to turn the road over to the state because we didn't want to have the responsibility for upkeep and having to go back to the neighbors again and uh ask them for more money. So, we all agreed. We turned it over to the state in 1986 and uh at that time you know things were good but over the years uh very rarely did we have the state come in and do

anything to the road. Few potholes here and there and then what last year uh the road was uh tarred and and chat gravel put down and packed and that's uh uh the end of that road. So, uh, is that time? I'm gonna give you 30 seconds. You finish it in 30 seconds of time. So, we're just asking you that, uh, we think that the road will, uh, probably impact our street to the tune of 50% or more. We too are worried for the kids and, uh, and, uh, there's a lot of speeding on our road. And so, we just ask that you give us due consideration since we paid for it. We're probably the only community in the area that

okay does did not have a contractor to pay for the road. Thank you, Mr. Bailey. Appreciate you coming up. Thank you. Uh Steve Holmes, thank you very much for allowing us to do this. Thank you for coming.

I appreciate your personal invite to come in when we learn there was some mixup about what nights this was going to happen. So, I don't know if we collected all of our group or not, but we caught a few. So, here we go. And I'll try to be I wrote mine down. So, I'm not as smart as these guys. Um, I think I can give a little context to the background of this because of some prior experiences. You know, I've been here in that neighborhood for 45 years along with Richard, you know, part of the original team that paved that those streets. We've gone through a lot of stuff. Um, this is the third uh version of people wanting to encroach in our community with transportation issues. So, we've dealt with it before. Um, in general, for context, there seems to have been a great concern for new communities access planning and a lesser concern for the resultant public safety issues that will negative negatively affect the legacy communities like like ours, the smaller guys who were here a long time ago. Um we believe that compromises uh our safety and at the expense of our safety for the benefit of others. So it doesn't seem to be practical to us. Uh our issues are like you would expect traffic volume, traffic speed, some liability and the biggest one is the deteriorated condition of our roads. Um they were there for those roads been on the ground for 43 years. uh all a lot of these folks in the room are originals and they have paid what constitutes a lifetime of taxes and no no show from NC do for for any reason. Okay. So that's kind of doesn't seem quite fair but that's the way that is. Um,

we have had a lot of contact with NC DOT and Lee Ainsworth used to be the I don't know if you fine gentleman had a lot of touch with him. NC DOT previously confirmed to us that the average life expectancy for a road like ours is 25 years and we're 43 years into it.

Okay. Um what's deteriorated our road is um the depth of stone that remains, the thickness of the asphalt, storms drainage issues, and obviously there's no curving and there's no sidewalks for pedestrians. You know, very small roads and um new developments. And I'm not sure what's planned for Toll Brothers, but uh I've gone out and just measured the one behind us with Vintage Creek. Those streets are 24 feet wide. Okay. Support a lot of a lot of traffic that with that um our streets are 17 to 18 feet wide. It's a big a big difference. Not only they deteriorated in the sub substrate, but they're very small and they vary from the from the years of use. Um, it's not uncommon if you meet a just a regular size pickup truck, you got to slow down and move over. Two pickup trucks, one's got to yield to the other and get their tires in the grass. That's how tight that can be. Okay, you know what I'm talking about. Um, so that puts walkers, bikers, children playing, they're in the road. It's their communities where they live up. That's the only place they got to play. traffic that is already burdening our roads is there. They're at risk. So, we don't feel like we need another 38 homes worth of potential volume that could theoretically almost double the demand on those streets at peak times. Just doesn't seem like a logical or correct thing that have happened. Um, and just recently in Ced, the only thing we ever saw from them is they put down what they call the uh the chips and fog seal which is basically a

your time is up but you can just wrap it up. Okay. Um we have uh I think I've covered most of this. The only thing I would say is that in introduction of that Bonner Drive extension would would put unwarranted kind of additional burden on roads that already aren't even fit for our use. And I will ask I don't think there is a statute that mandates that either by the town or the state. I think it's a perceived convenience for folks and you know nice folks in the planning board not whatever like to say let's do it but they don't understand the human impact. So that's what

thank you so much. I appreciate Thank you so much. Sound of the evening. It's something different each time. Right. A cattle prod. I know that was deep hook. The big net is Yes. Okay. Uh that'll be Is it Flanner? Yes. Come on up. Thank you for coming and we'll see what kind of sound you get. Oh, no. I've I've prepared something because if something starts barking, quacking, or nets come out, I will get derailed.

So, thank you all for being here, for my neighborhood for showing up and for the council for doing your due diligence. Um, my name is LB Fleer and I'm a resident of Weddington and a native charlatan. I live at 200 Kerry Lane and I have seen unprecedented growth in my short almost 40 years here and quite frankly, our infrastructure cannot support the growth that is happening so rapidly. I truly feel like I live in a little slice of heaven in the neighborhood in which I reside. We come together to reunite lost animals, break bread, and warmly welcome new neighbors. And most importantly, we support each other and we've rallied together multiple times to stop things that would destroy the quality, character, and livelihood of our neighborhood. This is not the first time that we've come before this council to request the integrity of our roads being maintained. Our road was paved, as Mr. Holmes and Mr. Bailey had said, by residents almost 40 years ago and most recently patched and by the NC DOT. I say patched because that was because what was done is not up to the standards or quality of our main roads. Opening Bonner Drive would be to the detriment of our community. It is our responsibility to steward what we have been given. And as I see it, we are leaving a mess for future generations to repair with limited resources. Our water quality is being depleted. Our schools are at capacity. And our lot sizes are shrinking. The very things that support life, we seem to take care of the least. And we all have to do better. So, please make the right choice in supporting your constituents and my wonderful neighbors by voting no to the proposed extension on Bonner Drive.

Great. Thank you for coming,

Chad. Good evening, Chad Eagle Road. I'll make sure I stay below four minutes. Um, I have a couple of agenda items that I would just like to comment on tonight. First is the environmental survey scope of work. A more concrete designation of environmentally sensitive lands has been requested from the town council for nearly two years now. Councilman Smith has asked for this a couple times. Given that that we know some areas based on prior submitts, can council go ahead and designate some of these areas on a map instead of waiting months longer. We know about the Bald Eagle's Nest, Aerop Plantation's Lake, and the delicate ecosystem there and the impacts to 12M Creek. We know of the Mundy's Run Basin and how the Woods project and Weddington Green could have impacted those and the pending railroad extension. Why not discuss and add items to a map as soon as possible? environmentally sensitive lands have been mentioned in both the current and prior land use plans. So, it needs to be addressed. Um, second is the architectural standards. I would like to see something like this adopted. If you compare some builders to what they put in places like Marvin versus Weddington, they're actually providing more which looks better and helps the property values. Things like more brick stucco and stone for one, side loaded garages, crawl space foundations are another. I would also like to see Weddington have guidelines around covering the skirting of the concrete foundations with brick or stone like you'll even see in Marvin. Having exposed concrete shows mud and is a maintenance challenge. Sometimes people even paint them to hide the appearance. Beachwood and Jones homes are examples of this if you look at some of their stuff in Marvin versus here. Um third, I wanted to speak of the website design contract. I think the aid to aid in transparency and improve community

engagement, it would be helpful to allow residents a window to provide input on what they would like to see in an updated website. For example, I would like to see status updates on development projects, both major and minor, so a resident can clearly see is this at a community meeting status, is it ready for the planning board, etc. It would also help to have a map of the town where you can see each of these projects so you know what's going on near you. Um maybe offer a window where residents can submit ideas to staff and see if that makes sense to incorporate in the new revised website. And finally, I'd like to mention in the planning board rules of procedure, I'm not really sure what's being covered here tonight, but in reading over it, I noticed in point 22G, it mentions that the planning board approves minor subdivision plats. In the minutes, I can see where the board has discussed and approved that in minor subdivisions in the past, but I don't see it happening in the last few years. So, I don't know if that's something that needs to be reconciled between the rules of procedure and our UDO, but I think it would be beneficial to have the planning board review minor subdivisions. I think that helps with transparency and ensures that we have a thoroughly reviewed development regardless of whether it's small or a big development. Thank you.

Thank you, Chad. Chris Ne.

Hey, good evening. Christopher Neve, 110 Chase Court. Um, I was disappointed last month to see the approval of the subdivision with halfacre lots on Forest Lawn Drive. Um I would like to see a greater level of transparency um about uh what you all stand for currently online. Uh the current statements uh are posted publicly um uh that on the Weddingington Wall website. Uh one council member states that they wish to ensure residential growth remains low density, one acre per home with an emphasis on environmentally friendly land development. Another states they support R40 lot size, one home per acre. Another states one acre lots only and RCD. Um these are all statements from current council members, three of the five of you. So it was disappointing. Um and a lot of residents were disappointed as well to see the approval of halfacre lots. It was um also the implication um was made that it had something to do with the downzoning law. Um that is inaccurate information. We do still have I want to stress we do still have conditional zoning in Weddington. Um conditional zoning means that municipal um councils such as yourself, legislative bodies and appellet courts in North Carolina have upheld this decision time and time again and given guidelines as to what it means. So what conditions can you all place on a development? You can place conditions so long they so long as they are reasonable, not arbitrary or unduly discriminating and that they are in the public's interest and in line with our town's land use plan. It is entirely up to you and you have this ability and authority to make these decisions and place conditions, including enforcing 1acre lots. And I would like to encourage that in the future, especially when so many residents have been led to believe uh that you will do just that. And this also speaks to um the B uh the Bonner Road connection with the upcoming

Toll Brothers uh development proposal and what a lot of residents are expressing today. You have every ability to place conditions so long they are reasonable on a develop a developer um when you approve that application. Also speaking to the uh park um I just want to state uh first of all to those who stepped up for the park and rec uh uh the park and events committee. I'm grateful for that. I always thought we could improve a lot our uh events here in town. I just think we should do it without the um uh expense to the town, a huge financial burden on our town and I would not like to see taxes increase. I don't think it would be wise to uh use our town reserve funds uh for the development of the park especially when we have no future uh plans uh solid plans as to how we are going to fund the park the maintenance and oversight of the park after it is built. So um I just want to uh encourage you to please present a a good plan um as to how you will not raise taxes and be able to fund the park uh after it's completed. Thank you. Brian Mason, come on up.

Thanks for coming.

Good evening. I'm Brian Mason. Uh I'm Cherry Hollow Lane in the Willow Oak subdivision. Uh the uh proposed Toll Brothers uh farm development will back onto my property. um understand through some of the details there will be you know 50 foot buffer zone and uh the uh with the addition of 39 lots. My concern really is sort of a broader context of what's been discussed here this evening already in terms of the uh level of development that's escalated in terms of traffic volume getting in and out of our neighborhood is becoming more and more dangerous and more and more difficult. So when we moved there 13 years ago, my wife and I thought we were getting out of sort of Matthews area more into you know rural area uh and in 13 years and probably in less than 5 years since we had moved there we noticed obviously the world will catch up with you at some point. We understand that but what my concern is I don't see it's being done in a responsible way in terms of traffic management infrastructure development. This is all two-lane roads service all this stuff out here. And all we do is we see uh or all that I see is that the developments are uh put in like the left-hand turn lanes for certain new developments to get the traffic off the road. Um okay, for them that's great for Harlo's Crossing those areas. They've got that stuff. We don't. So, and with the addition of the Weddington Road connector at 485, there is a noticeable change in the traffic volume getting in and out of our neighborhood at peak hours is and we have a a hill as well that can be obstructed by trees which you try and get DOT to trim back. It's becoming dangerous and I guess my concern is we keep shoehorning more and more infrastructure into these areas. We're not building roads that are that are going to handle this. The bonner connection is another issue of the sidebar that we're we're trying to shoehorn all this stuff in into infrastructure that doesn't support it.

And and from a safety perspective, you know, we're concerned. Um my other comment would be is what are we doing to hold developers like the Toll Brothers accountable? Okay, you want to put a 39 development subdivision in. How does that impact everybody else? and what do we need to come come to the have them come to the table and say hey you're going to have to fix this this and this on your ticket as part of your development make put have them put some skin in the game to make our infrastructure better rather than uh having to do go through DOT go through government as we all know it's going to be it's going to be an arduous process so my my point is uh let's hold these guys accountable let's do the right things for the neighbors here make them pony up the bucks if they want to put the development And why not? So, thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Mason. Scott Burns.

Thank you for coming. Thank you.

Thank you, council. Um, Scott Burns, Bonner Drive, 21 years in Weddington. And a lot of, you know, Kurt and Steve get some great feedback to you guys and I, so I won't, you know, reiterate all of that uh to you, but um Kurt and I are on the board of our massive 10 home neighborhood there. And uh a big part of what I wanted to do tonight was Kirk gave great information, but I also wanted to sign up just to be sure to make it clear that it's important to me and go on record that it's important to me and I also am representing the other members on Bonner Drive and those 16 kids and the impact it would have to their quality of life. The other thing I wanted to to bring up that I think you've already confirmed is uh there are probably a number of emails coming in from the Bonner Drive folks and then also our neighbors in on Carrie and and Amanda. And so, um, to Steve's point, I also want to reiterate that this isn't just a little Bonner Drive little issue. This is more a broader almost, you know, sub community aspect of what's going on. And so, all I would ask is uh a vote of no for the uh cut through on Bonner. Thank you.

Great. Thank you so much. Thank you for coming. Okay, getting everyone for public comments. Um, public safety report. Deputy Flower, come on up. Entertain us for what all the stuff, crazy stuff that's going on in town.

Nothing too crazy, thankfully. Okay. Uh, Deputy Pler, Union County Sheriff's Office, Town of Weddingington Contract Deputy. Our month of March report looks great. We had 34 business checks, which is just going in businesses during daytime and nighttime if they're open, making sure everything's okay, making our presence known. We've also had 645 preventive patrols this last month that's in your neighborhoods driving around looking at houses just checking up on the general neighborhoods. We had eight residential checks last month as well and that's uh a form that you guys can fill out on the town of Weddington or the sheriff's office websites. Let's say you're going on vacation or an extended business trip. You fill out this form. It comes to me. I entered into our system and then we will check on your house while you're not there just to make sure nothing nefarious is going on. Also, in the month of March, we had 146 traffic stops. Um that was us out on Providence Road and in school zones. We're really trying to tackle this speeding problem. That's probably our biggest complaint that we get is speeding in the area. So, we're really trying to tackle that. And a caveat to that speeding issue is we've had a couple incidents last month in the town of Weddington specifically with ebikes and emotives. I know that's a sensitive topic right now and I'm not trying to get in the weeds with that. Um but I want to reiterate that ebikes and emotives are are awesome. You know that they're fun to ride safely and responsibly and with sound judgment. We don't want them out on the roads if if they're not allowed to be. Um it becomes a a serious safety hazard and a slew of infractions and charges could come on them. So if you have kids, I would just reiterate to them that have fun writing them, but be safe and responsible. Don't make us be the ones that have to, you know, make the decision for them. Okay. So thank you.

Okay. Great. Yes, sir. I just want to add one little comment if I may. Um, this month I had a friend who went out of town and I didn't know she was out of town and at about 5:00 a.m. I get a call from CPI, but there was something that went arry and I was an emergency contact. So at 5:00 a.m. I jumped out of my car. They said police were in transit and I went to her property. You guys were resp responsive. You were there probably in about four minutes. Um, respectful, quick in the moments of panic. Like we could not see more than 10 feet in front because it was so dark outside in a very wooded area. Um and and they be I cannot say enough how grateful I am, how quick you guys were in those it when you're literally standing in the woods in the middle of the night going, "What's going on?" Right? So, I just want to give a shout out to you guys. I'm always uh um I can only sing the praises of Union County Sheriff's Office, but uh from experience, truly, thank you. Yes. Thank you.

Thank you for all you do.

Um we have a presentation from active waste this evening. Come on up. Thank you for being here.

Well, and we really don't have a presentation. First of all, um Mayor Council, I just want to say thank you so much. It's such an honor to be part of your neighborhood. Um we we decided to come before you and a great year last year. We um constantly are routes making any changes that we can to um you know when they're maybe a heavier on one day and not the other day. We're we're constantly critiquing that and we work well with the town staff. Um you know from time to time, you know, especially this year was a little challenging in January and February with the snow and um holidays and things like that. We did our best to stay on top of it for you. Um we did have some delays just because we don't want to put our guys out there and you know when there's safety issues and things of that nature. But I just wanted to tell you a little bit about your recycling. Um, so the glass, I know that's a big topic for you guys. Um, last year you um actually recycled 200 almost five tons of glass, which which is really good. So um, one ton of glass, just a fun fact, um, produces approximately two to 2400 new bottles. So y'all y'all made a real big impact in that. Um one ton covers approximately 20 to 25 square feet um at a 4 inch depth of new roads like a road base. Um and fiberglass it can produce roughly 1500 um pounds of fiberglass insulation um

material. So, you're doing good things. Um, of course, you know, glass, I'm not saying that it's not the ideal commodity to be um, recycled, but there's a challenge with it. Um, just keeping it from the other glass, you know, like when it's separated by color, it it definitely becomes more valuable. And we do our best to, you know, keep that separate. there have um there h we have come a long way because one of the things that we hope to do this year is open our own processing facility. So we are underway with that right now and the goal is August of 2026. Don't hold us to that because you know how permits go. But we just wanted to come and and talk to you and and let you know how much you mean to us and what can we do to make things better for you and the citizens of Weddington.

I just have one because I know we talked about this earlier is if we could have for the town to put on our website a basic little cheat sheet what you do and don't want in the plastic re or paper recycling. Okay. just something very because I know there's a lot of products you don't you either have to toss the whole mess away

or you know take a lot of time and expense to separate because I've heard a number of presentations from various recycling you know at towns or whatnot of what they do and don't want and there's a lot of things you don't want because you just can't you it's very difficult to recycle certain plastic products and for paper that could be deemed soiled. It's very difficult. So something that is a bullet point. We want this, we don't want that would be helpful that we could post on the website and send out to the residents.

We can do that. We can take it a step further for you guys, too. and we've we've spoke with a manager about this and we're in the final stages, but one of the things that we would like to do is go ahead and send out a calendar, a new calendar that addresses things like this. And it's more it's it addresses your holidays, number one. Um, it also addresses, you know, what we do and do not take. And we're gonna be more specific in it. It's not that we don't take it. We take it all, but if it becomes contaminated, sometimes it's just out the door. Like if paper becomes wet, it I mean, there's really nothing we can do with it, but we do our best. So, that's been kind of one of the things that we've been talking about. And we also are looking at um I think there are some maps on the website right now for routing and things like that, but we want to update all that. Um we hear you. We hear you. we hear the things that that you're needing and we try to stay um on top of that.

So, I am an avid recycler. Um but I also am very concerned what am I wasting my time? Am I do am I wasting more resources trying to get this clean to make sure that it's applicable for you? Right. Literally, I have a box of what I've been calling my trash, but it's semi-recycling stuff. Yeah, because I think every time these are things I'm like this is a mixed product, right? So, is that allowed or not allowed? And I don't necessarily No, it's not. Right. But but

as someone who I have no I have no resource to find it, right? Like I know that this is a can, but it's mine, right? Is that something that doesn't fall into the And so you start to with perspective. Do I need to open them, throw out the paper, separate it from the plastic? I've spent hours of my life. I've spent weekends of my life, really. And my time is worth something, too. And so, I'm not the only one. You compound that across this community. Yeah.

And I think that like it would it would behoove us to to share that information as much as we can. So, I would love to find out um because I'm not the only one that needs to get educated. Right. Right. Well, we like I said, it it there is like a little there's a gray area and we want to do as much as we can to eliminate that gray area and we do take what you do,

you know, when you're recycling, it's it's not easy. Listen, I've been in this business for 30 years. the the city of Winston Salem, they had the first um recycling program and they started with this little 18gallon bin. Well, even though I was in the trash business, I still wanted to throw it away and my little 5-year-old daughter at the time was pulling it out and say, you know, wash this. So, that's when it really came for me. And you are making an act and we do need to save the landfill space in the landfills. I mean there we are limited on landfill space in North Carolina. So I appreciate your efforts. I appreciate um your time and telling me what you need to know as as a resident and a council person. So yeah, we'll we will work on that.

So like do I need to sit there and separate? You don't need to separate. But if it is in a plastic like on if there's a plastic liner on it like a book a cover then yeah you would need to remove that. So even though it says number four Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, what's inside of it is number four. I mean it's recyclable. Yeah. So it's just the the outside liner. Um it's just like so anything that's mixed media too, right? Like the envelopes that have plastic paper and plastic together. Unless you want to take the time to rip out that plat.

Sometimes I do and sometimes and that's very timeconuming and I appreciate you doing that. I really do. I mean everything. Yes. It does help. It does. So this already will save me much time in the future. Thank you so much. Oh, you're welcome. Anything else? And I do have a question. What one of the probably most frequent emails I get from residents is, you know, I I use more plastic and Amazon boxes. We're a lot from Amazon. Get a lot of that. So, more less glass and more, you know, plastic and cardboard, that kind of thing. And I know we're we're, you know, two and two per month.

Just planting a seed. I know we're sort of locked into a contract. uh you know some point I would like to investigate you know u the feasibility of going to like one glass and three three of the other three of the you know plastic cardboard type deal because that's probably the biggest email I get from residents I use a lot more the other very little glass

well I will tell you that glass is the least recycled item it truly it is so you're headed in the right direction and just because we have a contract doesn't mean we can't talk about about it. So, let's do that. Let's let's talk about it and see how we can improve things because things are changing all the time. And, you know, back there was like a um I guess you know there were studies that came out and said that glass was the number one thing to recycle along with cardboard and you know, it was like top five, but it it really is not the top five currently. Um the the green glass is better. Yeah. Mhm. So that's the reason you see more of that being recycled.

Okay. So maybe we can look at the feasibility of that. Yeah. Let's talk about it. There's nothing we can't talk about. Let's let's improve it. Okay. Waste has been really great for my house anyway. And quick story. I think my trash comes on Tuesday. Mhm. So before Easter, I made my husband it out there on a Thursday and I looked in it and I said, "Did you forget to put the trash in the trash can because it was empty and they picked it up on a different day because it was out there."

We try to stay ahead of the game. Yeah, we really do. We try to stay ahead. I mean trash is one of the most personal things that you offer here at the at this town of Weddington and we write that. So thank you for the compliment. We love to get those from time to time. I would say there's one last thing that I heard about from members in my community and that's that that glass container is so big compared to how much you actually recycle of the glass. Is there any It takes up so much space in the garage, right? And I understand the logistics. It's as small as it can be and be rolled around. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So, I think

bad for people. Yeah. We just need to explore it. You know, if and the residents, so whatever you're hearing, let's let's adjust it as we need to. We're we're open for that. Okay. All right. Anyone else have any questions? Thanks so much for being here. What was your name? My name is Terry Hazelton and I'm the governmental rel solutions. Okay. And I'm very happy to be here. Well, our questions. Thank you. You're welcome. You're welcome. Thank you for being here.

Okay. We're going to move into our uh consent agenda. Uh we have the uh the minutes uh the retreat minutes from uh February February 12th, the uh March 9th uh regular council minutes, the approval of the continued participation in the Union County urban forestry contract and authorization the authorized tax collector to uh charge off uh some 2004 property taxes. Can I get a motion to approve the consent? make a motion to approve the consent agenda with the one correction I made to the uh retreat minutes. Got it. Okay. All in favor?

Okay. Okay. Pass unanimous. Uh old business um discussion of environmental survey scope of work. And I think this is sort of a Tom, is this your wheelhouse? And we'll let Karen should you start or Tom? No, no, you start. Okay. Well, I I I put this out there a while back and said we ought to examine this because I look at it this way. We don't know what we don't know. We know what the state says you can do restrictions on certain things and you know the core of engineers has their I'm going to stop you for a saying so the res can do about what you're talking about storm water

it's about anything it's development in general be it storm water what they can bulldoze away or how it impacts you know the environment or whatnot there's rules there's state rules there's federal rules s and I look at in a situation we have diverse topography, we have creeks, we have streams, we have lakes, we probably have plants and whatnot that may be endangered. We don't know we have them. We have no idea what we have in a lot of places. And I think we need to figure out what we have or if we have very sensitive areas. Can we put in stricter rules if allowed on certain areas to protect a stream bed or a wetland area or make sure you know we have to say well you can't do it if they get a core permit. I mean I know honestly most of these builders with a national permit can over wetlands and they are offset somewhere that you know somewhere else and ours is gone. So do we can we do this? But we have to know what we have first for sure. Those are pretty obvious. The flood plane we have those surveys. You have you you you don't have like from an environmental person any recommendations from them of what we should be looking at. And part of this is one scope. What do we have? And two, do they have recommendations of things we can do beyond the current UDO and current state or federal rules on certain things if allowable.

And that's what I want to find out. I want to find out what we can do to protect what we have as best we can. So a study of the area. Yeah. Of the whole town. So I asked we the basically the undeveloped areas. Undeveloped areas. So I asked last year when we opened up the engineering on call contracts, we we had several selected firms. SWCA was one of them. Josh Allen, can you use your mic so we can hear you? It's far away. Slide up. So I asked Josh Allen from SWCA to come and talk about how to kick off a scope of work for an environmental survey for the undeveloped land. And that's because we don't know what we don't know. Okay.

There's professionals that know this. That's the way I see it.

Josh. Yeah, good evening everyone. Josh Allen, SWCA, environmental consultants. Uh, like Karen mentioned, uh, we have a existing on call contract with you guys and SWCA, we're one of the pre-minent environmental consultants in the country and we have I I like to tell people we have every single ologist you can possibly think of when it comes to the environmental world. And we are more than happy to put together some sort of scope work to help you guys understand what it would cost to uh look at not only from an engineering perspective like you were talking about with like floodprone areas um areas that are maybe more uh prone to erosion that sort of things you know uh but then also on the natural environment uh threatened endangered species um uh you know uh areas that are more e ecologically or environmentally sensitive. And the advantage to these types of studies is that they are relatively scalable. So depending on the budget that you have allocated for something like that, we can kind of make it work with the budget that you're given, you know, and we can, you know, we can make it as detailed or as you know, 30,000 foot desktop level as, you know, as as fit for what you guys are trying to accomplish. I know this is a hard question, but how long does it take to do something like this for for a town like this for?

Best answer is it depends 30,000, right? Exactly. You know, like a desktop level uh assessment would probably take in, you know, the range of months. But then if you're actually having people on the ground doing actual delineations, doing threat endangered species surveys, etc., etc., uh that would probably be more in the scale of like months to years. Um yeah, for for an area such as the town of Weddington. Yeah. Uh but then you know again there's a hybrid approach where you could start at the desktop level, identify potential target areas that need to maybe be further investigated or investigated in more detail and then zero in on those to help limit cost and time uh when it comes to having boots on the ground.

Okay. Am I correct, Karen? There's ballpark a thousand undeveloped acres in town. That would be a question. That's a guess. Well, Greg, is that somewhere in the ballpark? I'm not trying to say, you know, hard number, but ballpark, I mean, there's the the vacant property within um the town limits is really centered around three or four kind of areas that are environmentally sensitive. Uh Monday's run, yep, you know, in areas off Providence is the most prominent example. So there's probably like four chunks of land that underdeveloped due to topography or environmental constraints,

right? Because you you have like the developed neighborhoods and their set aside areas are not going to be developed. It's things that could have future development on them, I guess, is where our concern is because that's where we can have control to right ensure the least impact. Probably one of the largest challenges I would see in a in a study such as this, it would be just um interaction or engagement with private property owners because obviously the entire town is not the under the uh purview of the town, right? It's a privately owned and so you would there would be a lot of coordination with private land owners that would be uh that would you know take time and be could potentially be challenging. Yep. Some may not want you on their property.

Exactly. And then in that case, you know, we can only make certain guesses as to what's there. And you know, uh could make that study a little less detailed, less accurate. But then you say if we can't get access to certain things, you can make recommendations to us to require certain things to be done by the developers prior to development. Absolutely. To make sure that is the Yep.

way. In addition to our technical staff, we have uh what we call our environmental planning group where and they are experts at working with on the policy side of the environmental world and and engaging with the public and helping them understand not only why these things are important, but um you know helping to to come up with ordinances and policies to help enact and protect those things in the future. Has there ever been anything done in regards to like a like a hybrid project? And what I mean by that is we have a public that is actively engaged and they uh like so people have reached out to me and said, "Oh, I think I saw this in my backyard." like if if have you ever worked on a a project where like you kind of open it up to x, you know, to to people in different neighborhoods. We try to filter what they have

100% that is an opportunity to kind of input and that may help also kind of alleviate

it may cause more work but but it could potentially also ease some of the burden. We work with uh the I used to be the North Carolina Office of Resiliency, then now under the Department of Environmental Quality, but their resilient coastal communities program. All that the BIL money that's being funded down through the state to help with these uh distressed and underserved coastal communities with sea level rise and uh climate change and the like. We engage with them. It's a fourphase process where we start uh with community engagement, bringing people together, you know, and this more on the resiliency side like where do you see flooding? where where your critical routes affected when it rains, you know, how do you you have trouble getting around town, that sort of thing. And we it then create heat maps based on that information. And all that user input is valuable because these people have lived in these communities forever, right? And so it that that information is priceless and it can really help save a lot of money and time.

Yeah. Yeah. Is continuous tree canopy your wheelhouse or urban forestry or I myself I'm an ecological engineer. So I I work mostly in waterways, wetlands, uh rivers, lakes, that sort of thing. Um but I do have uh people that I work with that are you deal with um you know their botists and uh forestry experts and the like.

Okay. No, I was saying I'm I'm on I've been on several state boards and still am on some that Yeah, I know about the coastal habitat program. They do ways down there programs to be smarter development on how to limit runoff getting into those waters down there. Absolutely. How to have more stuff go into the ground. Just all sorts of various things. So there's huge amount of work can be done if put in a in a thoughtful manner, intentional, thoughtful manner. Absolutely. To improve the environment. I was part of the uh the Union County um their um 2050 comprehensive plan. I was on the stormwater committee and

we were there together. Yeah. And uh and again that fine line between, you know, a we still need houses, we still need places, gas stations, Walmarts, that kind of thing. But like that fine line of creating that balance between protecting these ecological and natural resources that we have, making sure that we're taking care of the folks downstream, then also not being so prohibitive that you can't develop anything. Yeah, that's that's a very important thing. Yeah.

Well, I'm I'm going to ask the council, are you good with asking directing the uh staff to to look into this and give us options, pricing, and what level we need to be at? last uh I think it was Novemberish somewhere around there. I gave you kind of a scale of you know really high level desktop level assessments and then all the way down to kind of more detailed um but you'll be happy to expand upon that and um you know go further into detail and it is reflected in our budget that's correct which is obviously scalable pending July 1st. Okay. This is this is something we've considered the past calendar year. Okay. So, so council, we good good with that uh to give directive to Yeah.

to the council to to staff rather. Okay. And just come back with options, you know, pricing and budget. Okay. Yeah. As a resident of Weddingington myself, you know, I I'm uh absolutely vested and committed in protecting our natural resources. So, not only is my job, but I live here as well. So, cool. Any other questions right quick? Okay. Thank Josh. Thank you so much. Appreciate you coming. Thank you. Thank you so much. Um the next item for discussion is the accuration of the website redesign contract and and Karen, I'm going to let you talk about this, but really the reason we're doing this, we're sort of being forced to do this

and by the by the feds and uh so we're looking at it. We've got it narrowed down to two. And again, I'm gonna let you talk about this and uh and um and and I'll be the first one to say it is so hard to use our website. I do feel like it's outdated and uh sometimes when you you go on and you try to Google the UDO and it'll come up with a UDO from like 10 years ago or five years ago. That's the internet.

Yeah, exactly. And so that's why I've asked you to put the our present the current UDO on our home page on that little bar there. So I I know we've had developers look at the wrong UDO and come in here and they're like I don't know what they're talking about because it's totally wrong. So, so anyway, it would be nice to upgrade this and to uh and do this. So, and but go ahead. I'm rambling on.

So, this is primarily for a restructure of the website, not necessarily the content. That's something that will come after we go into contract to bring the website up to ADA accessibility standards that we are required to do by next April. Um, so and I've got civic plus and revised proposals and they are alike and different in too many ways. They are

which I'm going to ask you which one are you more comfortable with uh comfortable with and feel like you know we're we're we're just we're we're a handful of people here so we don't have time to manage and dive into these you know complex websites. Um, I've worked with Civic Plus on other with other um, programs that they have, other software. Um, and Revise seems pretty straightforward as well. So, I it's as far as my comfort level, I think either way, it's it's a technical thing that's the old dog is going to have to learn the new tricks anyway. Um, I do think Revise might fit our needs better just as a smaller town with smaller staff. Um, that said, they're both reputable companies. And

I I I can just tell you personally what I did is I also started to look at different towns websites, looked at what seemed a little more user friendly for me and that kind of gave me a sense. And then I I started to dig into, well, oh, this person that this this group I liked that and who who do they use? And so that kind of helped me narrow down and that was my process. So, and to me it I went on the more civic plus side of things.

Yeah. No. And and and I will say I've been in technology for 40 something years because of the business I'm in. And uh sometimes, you know, uh you you can you can buy all the bells and whistles, but do you need all the bells and whistles for where we're at? And I know Civic Civic Plus is it's cool. It's nice and it's it can make make your coffee in the morning. But with a small staff, small town, you know, if we you know, and this is just my

input, uh I I was leaning more toward uh revise their option two uh which is includes a little bit a little bit more uh uh closer to closer to Civic Plus, but not the expense of Civic Plus. And that's that was, you know, which you know, the way I was leaning. Um guys, any you know comments from the rest of I agree with simple. I mean I think that we can make it very user friendly and it this I mean they tell any business to the more simple the better because people just don't use all the extras. Right. Right. One question. Did you by chance contact any of the I did not the towns that they used the other

Yeah. Because they all recommended various towns or whatnot. Yeah. And uh I mean if they recommended them I can well they were big towns and smaller towns. I mean some you know the bigger one had some smaller towns and some bigger towns and vice versa. So it was a mix. Yeah. I mean if they were I looked at a number of websites and they all look pretty nice. But uh yeah.

Yeah. My son's one of these AI head of AI somewhere and I I couldn't pronounce it and he just said this stuff is getting progressing rapidly every year and going honestly probably with a simpler lower cost item now may be preferable because in a few years you might be able to do a whole lot more and cheaper than you you know it's just this is evolving so fast. He said, "Don't spend a fortune

on something you're invested in because in four or five years you can who knows what you can do for be so much better than what it is today and you can you won't be so far invested. That's just no and I to I totally agree that point of view." Um but I did like the idea of the little AI chat bots. I'm sorry. Yeah. Which would be option two. would be option two that they both have them but right it would you can add that anything u to me the cost difference for the size town our tax rate I'm all about my biggest thing is how much is it going to cost us you know and trying to keep cost down and

and the main thing is we have to do this because of the federal mandate for for ADA compliance right so right it isn't like we're just doing this because we're we want to have a new website we have to have a totally new website and while we're doing it, we need to just make ours incrementally better at the same time for probably not much more just to you can't fix what we have. Correct. That's the problem. Can't fix what we have. You have to start again. Right. And and and you know, this is just a provider. I'll say it that way. uh we we'll get into whoever we select the details

the details of you know we need a page for this we need a section for that you know that kind of thing that that comes later we just got to decide on who we're going to go with then we'll then we'll add in all the others I was reminded of that the other day because I was start throwing out ideas already yeah and the public will have should have ideas yeah yeah I mean what do what do they want inside this scope of things right yeah what is user friend Now, what is what do they want to see? I think that's pretty y simple simple ask. Uh do you have a I will ask you preference? I was scratching my head.

Okay. No preference. Uh it sounds like uh I did like what Tom said about perhaps I mean ordinarily uh you get what you pay for and and I've been disappointed every time I went the cheap route but given Tom's explanation that things are are improving rapidly that maybe cost it may be best to go the the least expensive way and still be compliant with what we have to be compliant will, you know, way you can add stuff too later.

You're exactly right. And the way I was looking at too when I was reading and comparing, I read a couple times through these things. You if we were a large municipality and we had different departments and water department and all this, you know, I I could see cit city plus if our tax rate was higher uh because that is a you know a good bit more and then okay, I can see that. But that's I don't think it's us.

Yeah. I mean convers well this was not with my son but with another presentation I was at not long ago the guy just pulled up his phone and said okay you have chat GPTt on your phone free one even and the version that's out there that you have there's going to be a new version in a month or something like that that is going to be take the same information you're putting in there right now and do it a hundred times faster and 10 times cheaper to whoever. And it's going exponential. Every every one of these things coming out is going exponential. And uh so I think we'll have opportunities to add stuff in the future. And I think not going too heavy. And we're a small town. We don't need to have things where,

you know, we don't have the departments that Civic Plus can incorporate and do all their work in. That's just my personal opinion. This is pretty simple, basic, economical for us. I'm not tech, so don't look at me. Yeah. Economical for us. And And I don't know if they can do automatic permitting for you, Greg, or not. I have no idea. Can I? Yeah.

I mean, I I know I see these ads come to me all the time say, "Add this in, you can do automatic building permits or something like that." I don't know if we want that or not, but you know, you can find all sorts of things. But I'm just of the mindset, let's be uh go with a the lower cost of the two more basic service even though it is very close but not quite to the same and uh it seemed like they were going to work with us. Well, I I believe we'll be okay.

I've I've the two representatives that I've been talking with have both been very patient and understanding and so I I really we wouldn't lose either way. The biggest thing for me um was the pricing stability with Revise. It's we're capped at five for five years. Um and Civic Plus is puts it right out there. They're going to increase it 5%. Yeah. So that's annually. That's Revise will do a free upgrade within four years, I believe it is. So it was just I mean I hate to say it all comes down to money, but I guess that's part of my job. Yeah. We're accounting 15,000, not 150. Right. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Exactly. The way I look at it. My my my if we got to spend the money, I would spend what we need to be compliant and

right reasonably good. Right. I would suggest option two with revised. That would be my two cents. Would we be in agreement with that? With the chatbot. I think Tom really liked the chatbot. Yeah. And I think you Yeah. You know, look into it because and the chatbot won't send you to the 2020 version of the UDO. The chat bot will bring you the you come in say I need this and hopefully it is supposed to take you to the right version of you know the land use plan the UDO here is the permit you know page here is what you the permit you wanted not a list of 10,000 permits you know the whole the whole thing long as we keep it all updated we're we're good do you need a vote on this or just direction

this is a vote isn't it I do need a vote okay to move forward with revise but I don't have I I didn't print out the contract in front of me, so I don't have the amount the contract. Um, well, we we saw the numbers in in the packet. It's in the packet. It is. Yeah, we we we saw that. Okay. I make a motion we do revive with the chat box. Option two. Option two. Yeah. Uh, okay. All in favor? Okay. It's unanimous, so we'll go revise. Option two. And if it goes bad, everybody can blame me. We'll throw you under the bus. Throw me under the bus. We'll be in that bus under that bus together. Tom. Okay. Just roll don't roll back and forth too many times.

One question would be, you know, go moving forward. At what point would we be, you know, I'll find out. Before April. Yeah. Oh, you mean implementing it? Yeah. Um I did he did give me a timeline and it's probably about six six to eight months, six to nine months. Okay. I'd probably suggest too that maybe we do some usability testing before we launch. That's all part and they do that. That's part of it. Standard, but I'm saying we we need to test drive.

Okay. All right. You guys good? We'll move forward. Um uh the new business here is CZ 2026-2. this application by Total Brothers for conditional zoning, excuse me, approval for a development of a 39 lot subdivision at 5017 Weddington Matthews Road. Um, uh, because of a public notice error that we have with with the town here, uh, we're not going to be able to move forward on this. U, we we we also noted, you know, so, well, we're not going to be able to move forward with this tonight. uh we did see as is the staff and also Leella uh some discrepancies that you know that need to be looked at and worked out. Uh I have a uh a letter um an email from our um from Chris Faul our um planning board chairman. And you know Chris, you're here. Would you like to come up and and read what you what you stated or would you rather me read it if you're here?

Okay. Chris sent me this today and I'll read this and then we're going to we're going to uh

move on past this. But uh it says, "Dear mayor and staff, as chairman of planning board, I'm writing regarding to the proposed subdivision currently under uh your consideration. Upon review of this evening's agenda materials, I have identified several significant concerns related to storm water management and compliance with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality NCDEQ requirements. As reflected in recent correspondence with NCDQ, the current proposal does not clearly demonstrate compliance with applicable uh standards uh for either low density or high density storm water treatment. This matter was specifically raised as a condition during the planning board's uh review of the project. Based on material submitted, it is my opinion that this condition has not yet been satisfied and therefore the project is not ready to proceed to council deliberation and vote in this current form. Uh key concerns remain regarding the proposed use of vegetated conveyances, limitations on imperous uh surface areas and the absence of a comprehensive clearly defined strategy for managing storm water runoff across all lots. Given the importance of these issues to both regulatory compliance and long-term site performance, the plan board believes that additional technical revisions and clarification are necessary for the proposal uh before the prop proposal can be responsibly advanced. According accordingly, we respectively uh request that the town council uh remand this planning board for further both and

ensure that I'll regular prior to any final decision. And uh this is again from Chris our our chairman of the planning board. We also got a letter too from um from Toll Brothers today requesting that they go back uh a request to to go ahead and do that. Uh you're here as a representative. Uh we're not going to discuss this. No discussion tonight, but if you want to say something, you know, short, you're you're more than welcome to come up. If not, you're good. I'm okay.

You're good. Okay. So, so, uh, it's it's it's my opinion, uh, that we, uh, that again, and it's the council's opinion, I believe, too, because we we had discrepancies and we saw errors and things that we did not agree with, uh, that this go back to the planning board as well. So, um, so with that, I'm going to leave it to the staff to to work that out. Hey, Jim. Pardon me.

Can can I ask Karen Walter a question first? Sure. Karen. Um, since we have we did not meet the required deadline for uh citizen notification, can we are we legally able to send this back to the planning board um as it stands tonight or are we going to have to properly post the meeting and then send it back to the planning board? Great question. So, at this point, the board does the council does not have authority to actually vote on the matter because the public hearing has not been held. However, so so you all cannot tonight take a vote and require that they go back to planning board, but it sounds like Toll Brothers has un has heard the concerns and is voluntarily going to take this back through staff and planning board. Um and so that does not create a procedural problem. So that is exactly if how it can work. We all can work through that. So Toll Brothers has agreed to take it back through the process um to get these issues resolved then that's what'll happen next.

Okay. I just want to make sure we're on solid legal ground. Right. And we are. Okay. Well, I wasn't sure we were, but now I am sure. Yeah. No, no, thank you. Good, good, good question. Thank you, Clayton. Voluntary request and Yes. And we have it from us and them and and the staff.

Um and I also request too from the staff um uh that this be worked out and not and this is just just my opinion, my request. Okay. that uh this not be because uh of concerns from the planning board, from our engineering, from the council that this not be, you know, rushed through and say, "Hey, we've got to have it to the, you know, to the um April planning board meeting that that maybe, you know, we take our time, we make sure because I don't want to be kicking this can back and forth down the road, uh till we make sure we get everything worked out." So, you know, we're we're we're good to go. We have all our eyes dotted and te's crossed. And so I would suggest, you know, earliest, this is just my suggestion, uh, would be May for me. So, uh, just to make sure we're we're all good and not rush through this because I last thing I want is planning board having to take time and it's still not we need this, we need that, and they're not happy. That kind of thing. Does that make sense where where I'm going with this?

Yeah. I would say as a council person when this thing comes to us, there were a number of conditions the planning board put on there. They wanted that all of that is resolved. It's all done in the package. No more you need this, you need this. it it comes as a full we're ready to go bow tie type proposition to us because I can't read 50 or 60 pages of flow water whatever that stuff was hydroat whatever I'm not prepared to do that I don't know

what it says I want somebody to tell me from deq and labella that this works this will work and that's what I want to see not a volume, you know, trees killed but virtually to uh exhibit something to me and any of the other issues that were brought up in the that the planning board said condition this, condition that, whatever, because there was a whole list of them. Make it all be incorporated, all done in the package, right?

And we'll have a nice package to review without questions and it hopefully meets every one of our UDO requirements. No, it is it is also staff's recommendation to send it back to the planning board so they can affirmatively tell you that it met all of those conditions. Yeah. Gotcha. Okay. Very good. Darcy, do you have something? No, I just fully fully agree. Yes. Okay. I'm so tired of getting things that Yeah. We killed virtual trees tonight is what we did with this package. We can't get it to print, but I know you don't want to print it. Okay. You don't have enough paper to put in a printer. Okay. Print. So, what we're going to do is we're going to take this off the uh off the agenda.

It's off. Yeah. Not yet. So, can I get a motion to remove this from the agenda? Give a motion to Is that Is that the proper way to do this, Karen Walter? Yes, sir. It is. Yes. So, yes, it is. So, so we're gonna You You made a motion to remove this from agenda. Okay. And then to go back to the Well, we don't need that yet. So, just just to remove it from the agenda is all we need tonight. Right. Staff will take care of us. Can I uh All in favor remove it from the agenda. All in favor? So, we're we're removing this from the agenda tonight and we're moving forward. Okay.

All right. So, thank you for coming anyway. Okay. You're ending up where you wanted to be. This table's Oh, here. It is getting candy time. Yeah. Okay, I'll pass it around.

Okay, so we're moving on to uh item B. Uh it's text amendment uh 0126- I section D 607 C is conditional reszoning. and Greg, I'm gonna let you uh take off with that before we do move into public hearing.

Uh thank you, mayor, members of council. Um there's two text amendments before you this evening. I think both of them are pretty straightforward. Um they were previously separated as individual uh ordinances when they went to the planning board. I thought it'd be procedurally more efficient to bundle them um based on where they're located in the code. Um this um se section before you is located in article six which is basically the procedures for zoning cases. Um this amendment in section D607 under the conditional zoning section which basically all of our resoning conditional zoning um is just somewhat of a grammatical error but it adds an exhibit for the aid of both our staff, our council and our applicants. So, this section references in uh section one, step one, the D910 901 section. Long story short, that section doesn't exist. So, it's referencing something that's not relevant. Uh that has been replaced with referencing D917B, which we'll talk about in a moment in a table 8D, which would be a new exhibit to our code. um that was a visual aid created by our uh permit technician and planning assistant that shows basically the two routes you have when developing property. So all vacant land in the town of Weddington is zoned R-CD. Um but that means that you could develop it in one of two ways when it's raw land. This provides a link to this table 8D that shows those two procedures and how to do that. Um this is ultimately what the planning board worked through and uh landed on in terms of kind of that aid which would be that new table again get 8D. There's a table 8 A B and C. This would be a new addition 8D and it just says you can develop land in one

or two ways. So removing a section that doesn't make sense referencing our kind of conditional zoning and actually conservation sections in D97B. and then uh adding to our text a table 8D as referenced in your packet. Okay. All right. And I'm going to open this up for public hearing. Okay. We're open for public hearing. There is no one here that's signed up. So I'm going to close public hearing for technical. Okay. Public hearing is closed. Discussion and consideration uh of this. Uh anyone have any comments? No, straight forward.

Straight forward. Okay, it's straightforward. It makes sense. And yes, Greg, I am correct that all basically all sizable vacant land in the town is zone RCD, which is the conservation allowable land. Correct. Correct. But you can develop it as R40 as one of those options. Yeah. As long as you've got six or more acres, you've got two ways to develop it. If you got less than six acres, it's just the straightforward one acre. One acre. That's it. Okay. That is the way the zoning is in town. Correct. Thank you.

Okay. Any other comments? So, okay. Uh do you have a I don't have the statement of land use consistent. We got to make a motion technical motion and approve. I'll make a motion we approve the amendment as stated. Okay. All in favor? Okay. Passed. Uh so statement of land use consistency. Can uh uh somebody read it? That's in the packet. Yeah, it's attached. It's in the packet. In the packet. Does it need to be read? Make a motion to approve it as presented by I make a motion as approve approved in the package. And I will I will copy it over into the minutes.

Okay. Great. Thank you. All right. All in favor? Okay. It's unanimous. Okay. And and guys, we're just cleaning up the UDO is what we're doing. We're just, you know, seeing stuff that this needs to be cleaned up and and this is what we're doing tonight. Uh text amendment uh 02026-2 section D917AG, private roads and gateous. Uh D917B L design standards for specific uh design standards specific to conservation lands. Uh D917E D lots and flood planes. Um so uh Greg, take it away.

Thank you, Mayor Council. I'll be super brief on this. These are uh basically grammatical errors u that we're addressing. These are all in article 9 of the UDO, which is basically our rules and procedures for developing any piece of property anywhere, not just conservation lands or major subdivisions. Any piece of property in town falls under this uh section D917A, D97B is specific to conservation lands, and D978 is specific to conventional development. But it's all the same thematic section of code, just how you develop land. Um, the section D917A is just referencing exhibit 2B because we have new additional stricter standards. So rather than making it go back to the planning board again or having it as an administrative review, it's just saying it has to be part of the initial submittal kind of common sense uh change. The section D917B removes any ambiguous language. It removes the reference to to the greatest extent feasible. Uh, and it also adds um more explicit language on existing trees counting towards the neighborhood green. This is kind of a direct result of the last vision that the town council approved.

And then D917E is the easiest of all. The word basement is referenced twice. You're removing it. Yeah. Uh so it's only referenced once. And that that's that's as straightforward as it could be. Okay. All right. Okay. uh open up for uh uh public hearing and no one signed up so we're going to close public hearing. Okay, public hearing is closed. Um discussion and consideration. Now these all make sense. I I did when I was reading the thing first time about basement that scared me until I went back and saw it was twice. I said my god they want to put basement in flood planes that

but uh I saw that it was a duplicate and removal. So I my heart attack went away and Bill had also had sent me a a text on it or the wiggle language of the wiggle language for all of us to get rid of the wiggles. They're going to do it. That is the simple thing to do. No. And I'd ask the uh the subcommittee bill's chairman to take out all this, you know, could should feasible and that kind of thing work. Yeah. Exactly. They've been doing a great excellent job at that. So, thank you. Can I just have one question, Greg? I know there was stuff approved at the last planning board that hadn't come that will come to us next month. That'll that'll come next month.

Has more but probably more teethy type things. Yeah, this is this is the easy stuff. We'll have more substantive changes next month. We don't know. That's that hadn't gone through yet. That's still under discussion. But there's other things in flood planes and primary conservation and things like that we're going to be seeing. So there were several other text amendments that were recommended by the planning board in the last meeting. So yes, more to come. I look forward to seeing them. Any discussion on this before we move to uh get a motion? Can I get a motion? We approve the the the amendments as stated. Okay. All in favor? It's okay. It's unanimous. Uh uh can I get a motion to approve the uh consistence the statement of land use?

Make a motion to approve the land use consistency as stated in the package. Okay. All in favor? Okay, unanimous. We'll move forward. Um, discussion of new text amendments uh section D9 uh 917D Agricultural uses of chicken coops and u we got a little bit of that sound from Debbie tonight, I think. But but go ahead Karen if you want to comment on this. Was that something? Um, well, staff has received um several staffing

phone calls and comments and about the um architect the I'm sorry, the standards for the agricultural buildings that house poultry close to the um property property lines. Thank you. Sorry. Go ahead.

No, in layman's terms, um everybody's allowed to have chickens already in code. We actually provide very broad uh protections for agricultural use in the town of Weddington because a lot of people have more than one acre and so we allow them uh the use of agricultural lands by rights as well as the uses of residents by right. Uh what's strictly put in the code under agricultural uses is that um the structures that house those animals have to be 150 ft away from the property line. And again, if you have multiple acres, that's not an issue. But if somebody wants to have just a couple of chickens in their backyard, that 150 foot setback requirement for that structure can be fairly restrictive.

It can't work right there. It could it could limit it. It could effectively um prohibit that use, which is a taking. So um we just want to explore maybe allowing that closer to the property line, but this is a a discussion. We haven't provided a text amendment to the planning board on this matter yet.

My understanding, what I see is we allow six hens if a property can have six hens. No roosters is what allowed. A lot of people have chickens around. They have it in my neighborhood, the neighborhood behind me. I do hear one rooster every now and then. So, I don't call Greg on that though. But, uh, it makes sense that if most of our residential homes are one acre and if you have, let's say, what's what's the minimum lot width on a lot? 140 50 feet. That's pretty close. Yes.

Yeah. You you there's no way to build a chicken coupe of any size, right? So, as long as you're building a my thought is a chicken coupe and you have no more than six chickens, hens, you should be able to be allowed to build a modest size to be determined coupe to house them in to keep the raccoons and whatever from killing them when they're, you know, not out, if they even ever get out,

uh, should be allowable. You know, people like chickens. They're not harmful, especially humans. And uh I I would say that we need to find accommodation of there has to be some setback from the property line to be reasonable. But at the same time, this is not the intent of having somebody have a chicken farm like you see on the road with thousands of chickens in it. This is this is you know something to accommodate six chickens. That's the what I think we're looking for. Wouldn't you say, Greg?

Yeah. You know, a pool only has to be 15 feet off the property line. An accessory structure only has to be 15 feet off that line. Uh even an accessory dwelling only has to be the setbacks of your home, which is 40t off the property line off the back, but still only 15 feet off the side. So yeah, you know, you could have 20 sheds in your backyard and there still can't have any, you know, chicken coop.

Chicken coop. And chicken coops are not big for six chickens. I mean, we're not talking about building chicken giant chicken houses here. And I don't think there's, you know, with the other restriction for six chickens, there's no way to do a chicken farm, per se, in town. Correct. If they wanted to do one, they couldn't do it. I would argue that a a true chicken farm chicken farm is pushing industrial use, which we would not allow in town. We would not allow and it go six chicken lemon anyway. So, so, so let me ask you this. Find a certain size that's permissible in and reasonable setback and I think we'll be re that I'd be happy.

How do how do we deal with uh I was going to say free roaming chickens. So, you know, you're like, I'm going to let them roam and now they're in the neighbor's pool area and they're all over the, you know, everywhere in the street and whatnot. How do we deal with that? Uh that would fall under kind of code enforcement and nuisance as far as animal rules. Um you can shoot them in Union County. I don't suggest you do that.

Bas basically every every uh thing that you do on your private property is not to impact your adjoining neighbors. So anything that crosses your property line on your neighbor's property line that would is a nuisance to your neighbor. So, what does a resident do when that happens? Who Who does a resident call? Call the chicken guy. Call the chicken. Animal control. Animal animal control. Just pick up the hen and take it back. Yeah. Union County animal control. Yeah. Okay. Basically, she them off your property, they'll go away. Yeah. But they

My my mom has a neighbor who has chickens and she has a fence. They fly over the fence. They're on her back porch. They're everywhere. And it's like, oh my gosh, I'll say this. The neighborhood hulk will take care of them if they're out too much. So chicken, you know, they will not have a longevity if they they run too far. So So what are you requesting from us uh just direction to look into this?

Uh I think I I have all the direction I need I believe um based on this conversation. Um this was raised by a citizen who provided public comment. Uh I've got opinions now from several members of the council. Uh I will recommend with the assistance of the planning board uh a more reasonable number from 150 to have that setback. You may want to think about limiting the size to some reasonable number. if you're gonna do this. But per per our discussion on the super easy tech amendments we just had, we're gonna try to bundle these as best we can. Amendments bundle.

I can't wait till the day when all of our public comments are so and so's chicken was on my property. You ain't kidding. I hope that's our I had a neighbor used to have chickens that came in my property. I didn't care. They didn't go in my backyard cuz the dogs would kill them, but they came in the front yard. I didn't care. They gave me eggs from time to time. So, I'm very happy. If this is the if this is the worst complaint I get, I will be very happy. Yeah. Okay. All right. So, we're good to move on from there. Are we good? Okay. The chicken's over. The chicken's over. Has one uh we're moving into the uh the agricultural agriculture architectural standards. Um yeah, I know the chicken standards.

The chicken standards. But the architectural standards uh you know as as Weddington grows and you know uh and and the value of our homes and and uh the status of our of our town. I feel like we we have a a a right uh and an obligation to have standards in in town instead of saying just you know come build what you want. You know it's okay as long as you water doesn't run into the neighbor's yard. you know, build what you want. I I I have a I dis I disagree with that mindset. I feel like we we're trying to just strive to to bring value to the town. I'm always valuedriven. Uh where with some when somebody builds something, it should add value to the to the surrounding neighbors where they're excited about what you build. Uh it it increases their property value. It doesn't decrease it. it it actually even adds value and revenue to the to the town through through taxes and and it's something that's going to withstand the longevity of the neighborhood and not in 15 20 years look, you know, run down. It's like what's what's going on here? So, you know, I I I wanted I'd like to have something that when a developer comes in, and Greg and I have talked about this a good bit to where we can present here's what we we'd like to see, you know, here's a here's what the town would like to see. U if a developer, you know, goes for it, then that's great. We we can't under North Carolina state law uh say, you know, it's either this or go home. We can't do that. But we can at least say, hey, this is what we'd like to see in town. this is, you know, what, you know, the the residents would like and and I'll go as far as saying, you know, if you, you know, come do something here, then you're going to have a much better chance of people liking and and being behind your

product. And so, uh, I I've started suggesting, you know, uh, you several things that I have suggested, and I'm going to I'm going to quit rambling and want you guys to speak into it. Um, is um, crawl spaces. No more No more slab developments. Crawl space homes. Uh side or basement. Oh yeah. Basements. Yes. Yes. Crawl space or basement. Cross or basement. Uh a side entry garage. Uh now you know that that little third garage, you know, it's

that courtyard garage. That's that's okay as long as your your main garages are, you know, is it's side entry. Uh, and and I'm real big on, you know, not having just total um uh I' I'd like to see more three-sided brick, stone, stucco type deal instead of having these developments that just look like a an all siding development, you know, with a white siding development.

A white siding development or this house is blue, yellow, green, purple, you know, that kind of thing. I'd like to see more at least three sides of uh brick, stone or stucco to that, you know, to that degree. And also as as as Chad mentioned earlier tonight, which is a great idea, uh the some developments have that exposed foundation, you know, and and so I I totally agree with his uh idea of uh they should be covered

covered that, you know, that that exposed foundation area down there, which makes it looks nicer. Um, those would be my four main areas that we could present to and and I'm going to let you guys talk here in a second that we present to the developer when he comes in and does his application. We can do that. Now, in speaking with uh Karen Walter, our attorney who she couldn't be with us, she's on, as you know, she's on Zoom tonight. Um, they this is this is quite common. Uh, she gave me an example in I think it's Karen several years ago. They went for what two years uh through design and architectural standards because there was a large development coming into to town and it was going to it could the scope of their town and so they spent a long time hammering out the actual standards. So this is not something that's uncommon but it's something I feel like we need to be more vigilant in doing and upping our standards of our town and what's being built here if that makes sense. Um, can I get um can I get input from you guys? And it's not it's not il I'll just say it's not illegal because it's done in other towns.

Well, I'm not suggesting I'm sorry. Can I just say something really quickly on this topic? So, this the the the concept here is that architect architectural residential standards would be part of a conditional zoning. one of the conditions in the conditional zoning and all of those would have to be a agreed to by both the developer and the town. So, uh this is not something that we can put in our UDO, right?

The we are not allowed to regulate architectural standards for residential houses anymore in North Carolina. So this would be sort of laying the table for anybody coming into town to say these this is what hey we're you know these are some conditions we are asking you to consider on your way into town just so you know where we are as a council and what what what we're looking for these are Tom priorities. So, I just wanted to make it clear that this is not an update or a amendment to the UDO, but rather something that we would just be presenting developers early in a project to see if you could get their agreement on these architectural features um for any project they were bringing forward.

So, I think of it like the council mayor wish list. Is that kind of what you would I mean, do you agree with that?

Yeah, that that works. So, um Karen, you and I had a brief conversation, um that one of the things I thought would be helpful and interesting to me, um is I also tree canopy is very important to many members here on council. And uh I had a conversation with Keith O'Harren who is our um Union County Arbor and I would love to add something along these lines. Not necessarily to it's not an architectural standard, but it's maybe a developer request. I don't know how to label it, but it would be can we have the two oaks per front yard or something and that so it creates canopy over and and he said that he could potentially recommend a list of six or eight

right trees that they can pick from that at least it's not they're not completely you know again this is um voluntary to participate in but Um, that's something that I think would look beautiful in the long run and continue to add value to neighborhoods in our town. We require trees now. I think trees, but they're not trees that can become heritage trees. I know. What I'm saying is we could look at changing that ordinance separate from what we're doing here and require those type of trees to be in the front yards or wherever it may be. That may be hard to do. I don't know upgrade our

I would love to our tree planting requirements UDO chains that's a separate issue but it's doable very doable and we should do it because you look at it you you go to places in Charlotte where they planted those will oaks 100 odd years ago. That's what you have now. It's stunning. It's stunning. And if you don't plan now you'll never have Exactly. That's the simple simple part of it. You'll have a tree that grows 30 years. 30 years and dies. And what do you have? You have nothing. Best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And we don't have bread pairs. Yes. Okay. So, I think that's a different Okay. request, correct, Greg?

Yes, sir. We have we have the we have the tree plantings for two in the front yard, four in the back right now, but it could be any species on the Union County arborist list. Uh we could tighten that up to say it has to be particular species. Okay. See if you can ask Keith O'Haron to make recommendations of what those trees should list already. It's on the website, too. Yeah. Yeah. Get them get them. I got it. Let's look at updating our UDO to mandate those versus other junk. So we're all clear. We can regulate trees. We cannot regulate aesthetics of residential buildings, right? Unless we have a voluntary agreement. Correct.

This is easier to do. We can say we're going to use these types of trees, right? And and basically you would probably say you may think of that that maybe all the front yard be the same type trees or something like that to to get continuity. Right. But they're all going to be good or long live hardwood. Yes. But you have you have a list. Is that good direction? Have that on and u I wholeheartedly agree with where you're going with this Jim. I think from an architectural standpoint it makes sense. It provides a certain level of quality our town. Okay,

I'll say this. I fully agree. I know we have had some preliminary meetings with several developers and we have preached this to them that bring your agame. Bring your best quality products. Do not bring us slab homes. Do not bring us siding homes. Bring us stone, brick, whatever to make it look like a true upscale. Don't do yourself a favor because in this town you could sell better homes and don't think you have to try to skimp on siding and whatever it may be. Not siding. Good lord no that's what I'm saying. Don't skip by trying to use I'm just kidding. Yeah you know white siding. I'm sorry. Yeah we got it. Yeah.

Yeah. We don't want that. That is not our town. Yeah. Clayton and Darcy any comments from No, I'm good with it. Like I said, it's I'm Thank you uh Karen for the clarification uh about it not being mandatory. I didn't think it could be mandatory. List of expectations. Yeah, I'm fine with that list of expectations and give it to the developer early on. Uh I just hope that the town understands that it's not something we can mandate.

Right. Right. And and I I know and I think we've sort of conveyed that to everyone that we you know state law we can't do that but I'm just trying to increase the value. So you know if a development is being built next to your development to your home it's going to add value to you your your res your your homes in the area. So it's not going to pull down and have a developer come in and and build something that's going to be sub subpar to what you've already own. and uh and and I'm trying to force higher value homes. Does that that makes sense?

So, as you smile at me over there, I'm not sure what that means, but uh so so so do you uh so Greg or Karen, do you have that list? Do you do I need to read those four areas that I'm concerned about? I I have noted. Yeah. Yeah. crawl spaces, side entry garages, three-sided masonry preferable, and then as Chad Emmer noted, exposed foundations, uh covered up. Yeah. Specifically, no exposed cover them up. Yeah. Crawl space three side three side.

That goes for crawl space andor basement. The most egregious are what basements that are left that way where they're concrete block and somebody kind of painted them over. That that's horrendous. and and Karen Walter has the specific president of the town of Kramerton which we will explore and base our yeah our wish list off of. Yeah. No, let me this is this was and by the way this was just the that was an example of a giant subdivision that had up upwards of a hundred conditions on the whole project. So, and architectural features of the homes being one and those were voluntarily um agreed to by the developer. So, just the clarification on that.

Yeah. And so, so Greg, that's three-sided brick, stone, stucco, that kind of thing. Okay. At least three sides. Okay. All right. So, we're good. We're good that conversation, guys. Yep.

Okay. Uh let's move forward. um uh engineer review of projects prior to planning board. Um what uh I think what the council is looking for and I think Greg you you you agree and you're doing this now uh is prior to the uh developer coming to the planning board is go ahead and have our our engineering uh company labella to send it to them get just an overall don't don't dig in and all the you know just just do a cursory review of the overall uh that the development whether it be storm water in each each area of it and just take a look at it way when it comes to the planning board. Uh you know some of the stuff that that like we've ran into tonight with our our planning board professionals. I'd like to make policy in part of the appendix 2B where it's part of the check where it goes to uh Labella or whoever that

engineering firm uh to look at that prior prior to planning board paid for by the developer and and that's another thing you know we need to look at the fee structure it needs it doesn't need to be on the backs of the residents so it needs to be developer paid for we're not here subsidized developers Correct.

Completely understood. I have it um preliminarily as so there's 57 requirements of appendix 2B. This would be the 58th. So item B 58th. I have it that that that's specifically the town engineer which is currently um Bob would be the person to review that. So not just anybody at Labella, it would be our town engineer uh their highest most senior member would review it. At present that would be a expense that the taxpayers would have to eat to add that additional review. However, it's it's pretty clearity in order to provide confidence in the planning board's recommendation, staff's recommendation before going to you guys. So, we will uh explore how to reward that uh requirement and so that it's not a financial burden to the town.

Right. Does that take a UDO change or does that going to be something on your checklist that that would we want that to be specifically a UDO change because if we're going to try to charge them for it, it has to be explicitly written down. Okay. Uh uh one CL Well, I guess I've got a concern because my impression was it wasn't going to be a quick beginning. It was going to be something more in depth. did uh the Morris Farm afterwards. No, they're still So, they're still going to do both. Yeah. Yeah. We're adding an extra step in there. All right. As long as they do both.

Yeah. They will still come They're going to do the first one before it goes. Then they'll come back and dive deep into the into the weeds of it. Exactly what you're saying. Again, I want to make sure that I'm being understood. Yeah. Sabella did not look at Morris Farm until the planning board passed it. Correct. I don't want that to happen though. That's I agree with you. That's where we are here. I I think well this before it goes to the planning board. It has to have that review. Period. And it has to be a thorough review. Yeah. A thorough review, not some fluffer thing. No, it's got to be a thorough review that this checks the boxes. Yes. Well, yeah. Well, Jim made it sound like it wasn't thorough. Well, it's a cursory type review.

Yeah. I don't I don't like the word cursory. I don't like Are you talking about one at the original application, but then a second one before it goes to the planning board? No. Are you calling for two or you calling for one?

Well, there's there's one primarily before it goes to planning board. So, so they will uh before it goes to the plane board, they'll have that overall view to look at it and see if there's anything that stands out to them and and there's anything, you know, that needs to be looked at and and and sort of a statement, you know, they'll have a write up saying planning board, you know, whatever you need to look at this, we don't agree with that, this needs to be changed, that kind of thing. Then once it goes to the planning board, they're going to dive deeper into it. Now, correct me if I'm wrong and if you feel like another way, too. But then we're not giving up one for the other. We're going to add we're adding another then then again some clarification. Okay. I do too. Because I don't want the planning board voting on it

if they don't know everything. If they don't have the deep dive by Labella, I don't want them doing it in between uh planning board and coming to us. That's too late. Finding out something's wrong. has two what's that the Morris Farm is a prime example of that they either do one during the planning board process so the planning board has it I don't care if they do a cursory in the beginning

but I want the planning board to have in their hands that labella has taken a deep dive into the engineering aspect of it before they make a recommendation and send it to us to me if I can the the the recently and Greg you might be able to help me out on this. We changed the 2B standard for the level of detail on the application submission to Greg do you remember what that level is? It used to be a preliminary plat or not preliminary plat it used to be a sketch plan and we've changed it to another name that

another level of schematic schematic.

That's correct. So if I may you know in 90% of other towns engineering is not involved in the resoning process. You're not looking at exactly how a project is engineered. You're looking at it on a sketch or kind of conceptual level. just how many lots it is, how long the road is, that kind of thing. Um, we've asked for more detail even before amending the text, but now that we've added this appendix 2B and specifically requiring what we call a schematic plan level of detail, we are asking for engineering details up front. So, if we're asking for engineering details up front and to the planning board, it does make sense to have an engineer review those plans prior to y'all's recommendation and vote. So, what did you just say?

I'm Yeah, I'm We It doesn't It would never usually make sense for an engineer to review the plans that you guys vote on. That's not how this proc works. Engineers review it after you guys vote on it. As we require it in our code now, we're now asking them to do engineering before you guys vote on it. So, if we're going to require them to engineer a project before you vote on it, it makes sense to have an engineer also review it for the town. I I know the the planning board has come to me, the chairman of the planning board has come to me and requested this because it would be very helpful for them to to have this. So, this is specifically a request from the planning board to have this extra step out there in front.

No, there's there's a lot of pressure on the on the planning board right now. And there and there is and uh

if I may one more thing so Clayton um the level of review would be the engineers review of the schematic design. So it's not the final engineering documents right because we will not have those but we will have the schematic level. And so this is this this would be a much higher level than you than would be normally expected under conditional zoning. Um but that actually would it would be what what the what they're expected to produce um to comply with 2 is the level of review that we would ask our engineers to to to confirm that they that that based on what you've given us this this is going to work. We we we'll need the details when the actual engineered drawings come out, but what they've shown us we believe is on the right track or this was going to work. And I think this is this time they realized I mean the the design or the documents they got did not meet that level of scrutiny. So

but that was done after the fact. I mean, here's my problem, Karen, and for the mayor and the rest of the board is uh the citizens frequently come to us after a development has been built and supposedly approved complaining about water runoff. And I they have my ear and my sympathy. And what I want to do, if we can do it legally, whether it's what other towns do or not, I don't really care. But if we can do it legally, I want it to be right the first time for the people who live there and for the people who live next door. I mean, that's kind of my bottom line.

Yeah. I mean, they what they have to do it right. But you so it's so it's it's just it's it's the the the the unknowns on the property that could pop up in the course of actually doing the construction and the final drawings.

Um but even if they find something later on, they still have to make sure that that storm water system works. And there's several levels of approval that come from our engineers. So they'll approve this schematic plan. They'll approve the first initial engineer drawings. If it turns out that those engineered something they run into something in the process of putting in that storm water system that they have to amend the engineered drawings that amendment has to be approved by our by LeBella, our people and then it has to be tested at the end to make sure that every that they that no more water is leaving that site than left it before the development was started and completed. So we just have to be better at monitoring that and I think those problems become much less.

Is that where these past projects have gone ary like because there's issues with water right now? Yeah. Yeah. And and I think I think a lot of it um you know we had we had we had several gaps with the planning without having the planning director in house. Um, and I think that it was that it was a lack of priority, but we we assigned this priority to Labella. Everybody's aware of it now, Greg's, we've got we've got people who are paying attention, and we just can't we gota we're going to catch them now. We're not we're not approving anything. We're not releasing bonds until all of this stuff is proven to work.

And then who absorbs the cost of the extra layers of the engineer, the developer? Um, this is this will be the new cost of I I think if that's the way you want it to be, I think that we could probably justify um charging for this to be this schematic level of of engineering review to the developer. Yes.

All right. Well, that's as best we can do. Well, I think that's the best we can do, but I just want to have a when it goes to to the board, planning board, they have something that says we have reviewed the basic items here as presented and this this works. This works, this is a problem. It needs to be looked at and fixed before it goes to council.

Right. And when it's fixed, I want count uh planning board to say everything's in here has been fixed. The staff says we have fixed everything that's come along and it's when it comes to you, we don't have a discrepancy over storm water. We don't have a discrepancy over creek setbacks or this that, you know, any of those things. Everything's been addressed and not subject to interpretation or nebulous emails that's back and forth like this last one on low density, high density and where does this 10 acres of water go and how does that really work in state law. I don't, you know, I want something that says DEEQ says this works. Labella or whoever looks at it and says this given this information should work. You know, that's and he's saying it works.

I I'd like to make two statements on that. I think the first one is this is very helpful in determining exactly what language goes into this code amendment. So before it was just have the talent engineer look at it. Now we're talking about have the talent engineer provide a recommendation basically on it be more thorough and lastly have the town engineer provide a recommendation on it and the time they spent providing that recommendation should be built to the developer. So we need we needed to talk this out in order to get that level of information.

So that's helpful. But then secondly, if it's kind of a point of clarification, I just want everybody in the audience and the town council to know that when a subdivision is proposed and voted on by you guys, it doesn't just, you know, go away and it's built over a period of years. There's numerous reviews, engineering documents, construction documents, DEQ, federal, state, you know, recommendations for revisals, you know, all these things that go on. Just because they're not legislative doesn't mean that there's not a lot that goes into there's a subdivision before it gets built. There's a huge amount of it on on that side.

And none of this is to negate the responsibilities of the planning board. It's just to give them another tool in their tool chest to use to make sure everything's correct. But like Tom said, by the time it gets to this level here. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I want to help the planning board. I'm not trying to hurt

no idea. I don't want the planning board to have to read 50 pages of some water document showing the hydraology. I don't understand who how many of the planning board do. I want somebody that says this works there. you know, the developers person start to find this works and label's looked at it and said, "Well, they say it works. It looks from, you know, a review that it should work and then if there's problems down the road, that's for y'all to fix. You know, if it if it doesn't work or some problems come up, but you can do upfront address as much as possible, right? Of course, storm water is the one that's driving a lot of this."

Correct. And if it doesn't work down the road, then it comes back to us or the planning board again to to you know, if they want an exception, they got to come to us or they got to fix it. That's it.

So, I probably should have added this to the agenda, but this is basically super related to this topic. It's we're talking right now about an engineer review of projects prior to the plane board. I'm also wondering if we should add and part of this is because is a landscapecape review and and and an inspection after and and the reason because we a um confirming through the consent agenda the um that the uh Union County uh forester that contract. Uh, one of the complaints that I've heard from residents as well is that the landscaping is put in and and this is process thing. The landscaping is put in and and then sometimes it dies and it hasn't really been checked. And so I'm wondering from a process standpoint, it would probably we're paying for this forester 48 cents 48.9 cents per person in terms of population. it's a set fee that we might as well use them and include them in the process. That would be

I'm sure that's the price. Yeah, this is not the place for that. Yeah. Can we add that to next month's agenda? Okay. Yeah. I just think it's a process question. What I'm trying to say is maybe we also had the landscape a review the plans just like you're talking about label label approving the plans and then b when those trees have been put in that they inspect to sign off and that issue. That's the reason I'm bringing it up. Now you're bringing this up. Did they comply with the tree ordinance after the fact? Is that what you're asking for or you talking about trees they planted? Trees they planted have to be supposed to be inspecting the but that's part

but that's part of what we're supposed to be doing to some degree I I assume right because it's in their agreements but talk talk to people like at Enclave and other places that has not happened right and that's that's something that we would need to follow up on I don't think that's something we need to add and correct me if I'm wrong guys we we're we're already doing that we we inspect trees up to two years but that's something we need to follow through make a point of order that is not on the agenda and we're not anywhere close to being at the end. Correct. Correct. So, no need. Thank you. Then we can move on from that.

So, I'd like to have it added then for next month, please. Because I think there should be a discussion in regards to making sure that things don't wind up dead that residents expect. So, are we okay uh on on on this here where we Yeah. with this here? Yes. So, so your three points, Greg, I think you were on on the money town engineer developer at cost uh a written recommendation at minimum from that town engineer.

Correct. Okay. Okay. Good. Okay. Um so we're going to move on to the uh discussion consideration of appointments to the board of adjustment and uh uh uh we're we're at the the point here of the the nominating uh just like it says to the appointments to to the alternates to the appointment to the board of adjustments and uh is that all we're doing is the alternates right now. Yes.

Be clear. Uh did did staff say that we had some other uh modifications to this uh to the policy or just we're just doing the appointments? Correct. I think after our discussion it you mean alternates? Yes. Yeah. I think after our discussion it was it was the alternates. Yes. I believe to designate the alter. Yeah. Designate the alternates. Yeah. Yes. Because the ne because the next one says uh amending uh board of adjustment rules and procedures. That's the next item, right? Yeah. So So at this point here, we're just doing the alternates, right?

And when you you know, so uh can I get a u get a make a motion? Okay. To add um to the board of adjustment that we would like to have Taylor Grove as an alternate. As an alternate Taylor Grove, correct? Okay. All in favor? Okay. All right. So, that's Taylor Grove as the alternate.

And I'm going to nominate Rusty Settzer as the alternate. And I want to explain this to some degree. It's been our I guess policy in some way that the newest members on the board become the alternates and as things progress, they become regular members. And that's been our tradition in this. It's not a slight on either Taylor or Rusty to be they're just the newest two members and we're following the way we have done this historically. Right. So that the other people are the voting members, but if they're not available, we do need these alternates to be in attendance because they may be called on to vote.

Yes. No. And Tom, you're correct. And what I would uh Karen, I would ask since that you're here for those meetings that uh because those meetings are typically prior to a planning board meeting when all the planning boards here. I would ask that the uh alternates not sit at the table uh that they go sit in the audience when the board of adjustments is meeting. Uh that way there's no confusion, there's no bad optics or whatever. So, I'd like for those guys uh to leave the table and go sit in the audience till that the board of adjustments is finished. Unless they're needed to be then then they will know that prior. They would know. Yeah. And and so then at that point after that's finished then they can come up obviously for the uh planning board meeting.

They're separate meetings. Yeah. It's separate. Exactly. Right. So nominate Rusty to fill that position. Okay. And and Rusty, can I get uh all in favor? Okay. It's unanimous. So, uh, Taylor and Rusty are the two alternates and so, uh, so we're good on that. Um, the, uh, the next item is consideration, um, or discussion of amending board of adjustment rules of procedure. And I'm I'm not, uh, leading that. So, I'm not sure, you know, where that's going to I think Karen had mentioned that it has been since what, 2021 that there

2002, I'm sorry. Yeah. Or to 2012. I can't. But it's there were 20s and twelves and twos in there, but it's been a while. And Car Walter and I um were talking about it and it's time to reddraft the rules of procedure. Asking staff to be authorized to review.

Okay. All in favor to ask staff to move forward. So that's unanimous. So we'll move forward on that. Um okay. discussion consideration of amendments of the planning board rules and procedures. Um I had put this on on here too. Um there's two things I would like to you know uh cover and it's and you guys may want to look at this as well but two items I would like to to look at. Uh I would like to give the uh chair uh the the ability to make a motion. Right now the chair you know he can't vote. He can't he's a tiebreaker but he can't make a motion. and he just sort of, you know, leads a meeting and I think he can add a lot to it and have great input to the planning board. And I think a little bit right now his hands are tied and I'd like to, you know, have that have him have the ability. Now, he can't he can't do he can't vote and make a motion from what I'm told, but I think he would have more more management skills to have that motion ability. Uh, and I'd like also to look at the uh right now you can you can miss a meeting. You can miss two meetings as long as you don't miss that third meeting. Then you can miss two more meetings long as you don't miss it. So you can miss you can miss multiples of two meetings all year long and still stay on the plan anymore. So I'd like to change that. If you miss more than three meetings in a year, calendar year or that whatever that year is, then you get replaced because it's It's it's a disservice to the community if planning board members are just not there. And so you're appointed because of your skill, your talent, your expertise to give your input. And uh and I'm I'm proud of our planning board and I'd like for them to be there. So uh I would like to see that move to uh more than three times. You know, you got you

get three passes, but that the next time you're out, if I'm not mistaken, Tom, you sit on a lot of boards and that's sort of the state or the average. I mean that's the norm, right? It is. I I'm on a state board, county boards, and it's a 75% requirement. There is an exception for medical reasons that can be approved, you know, to to prevent that. You have more than 75, you know, you don't make 75% of the meetings, you don't have a, you know, a real excuse, you know, typically medical like you're in the hospital or whatever, you know, recovering from an illness. you are resigned effectively, right?

And uh but I think there does have to have we have to have a little leeway for medical issues in doing it. But the concept is if you're going to be on a board, you need to attend and uh I go sometimes great lengths 200 miles to be in a meeting. So it isn't like you can't go two miles, right? And I took plan your vacations accordingly because you know you're you're on this board. It's an important board. You know, people are relying on you and there's a lot of money involved in in this when developers come in. I plan my my vacation around town council meetings where at all possible, right? Um so, um does

this need to be a motion or a recommendation to write a policy? Write the policy. Uh I guess there's two things here, isn't there, Karen? Yeah. Yeah. I would just the first one tell us on each one separately any legal opinion we need to be concerned with.

No, these are just procedural. There's no legal issues here. There are other legal issues inside these old um procedures. They, for example, they reference the old 160A instead of the new 160D and there's some been some changes with regard to conflict and that kind of thing. So, they just need a they just definitely need an update. So, hearing what the mayor said um on those two particular policies, um we can just bring you bring you all back a recommended new version of these for both um border adjustment and planning board that modernizes them a bit um and uh make sure that we're, you know, compliant with parliament parliamentary procedure and what have you and bring them back for your review. So, we can handle that. If you all want that done, then we'll go ahead and get it done.

Okay. So, so no vote just uh not heading instructions to staff to go ahead and get these things updated. Okay. All in favor to do that. Okay. We have a we have a head knot to move forward on all that from everyone. Okay. And you have documented what we we talked about. Yes. Okay. Um as we move forward and I promise we're hurrying um

parks and events h is this appointments. Okay. Uh this is appointments to the uh park and events advisory board. And I'm going to back up and say something right quick. Um you know, last month we we did appointments to the uh planning board and this month to the uh park uh and events advisory board. I want to say thank you for everyone who come who who came out, who applied, who came out for interviews. Uh uh we have a lot of just I'm just going to say it just you know down and dirty awesome folks in this town that want to be involved and just they're brilliant. I don't think we could go wrong with anybody. Uh unfortunately fortunately whatever you know we just we have to pick somebody but everybody's everybody could you know is you couldn't go wrong with anybody. So, if you're watching at a later later time, I want to say thank you for, you know, everything, you know, for the planning board folks who came out and you applied, interviewed, and same way with the, uh, parking events. So, uh, so it's, you know, I I appreciate everybody's involvement, wanting to be involved in the town, and that that just speaks volumes. So, thank you. Um, so, do I have a uh, and in in this too here, I'm just going to say this. We're going to uh select the not only the the seven members but also the chair and co-chair and uh

vice chair is yes vice chair co-chair of of that of the uh park and advisory board. So, do I have a uh a motion? Uh and and also one more thing because we're starting out, we have to set uh stagger.

We we going to have to stagger it. And so, uh there will be uh I guess three that are two-year terms. Normally, this disposition is a four-year term. Four years. Okay. So, the the we're going to select three people who are twoyear. Then there's going to be four who are four years just to get us into this staggered thing. Uh otherwise it's going to it would be six years and four years and so I think council felt like you know two years starting off. So I'm just letting everybody know that upfront. Okay. So uh when you give a nomination uh please let us know if that's the two-year or the four-year nomination. Okay? And uh then we'll go through it and vote on it. And

we're gonna vote on the chair and vice chair after we do the appointments. Uh that's probably the proper way. Yeah, I I think so. I think we need to do that. You're correct, Tom. Okay. Okay. So, do I have a U I make a motion? Okay. I am going to nominate Gail Butler for a four-year term. Okay. Um all in favor? Okay. It's unanimous. Gail, welcome. Uh, do I have a I make a motion to appoint Paula Smith uh to a four-year term. Okay. All in favor? Okay, it's unanimous. Um, I think I've got another one. I can make a motion to appoint Mike. I'm going to put on this name and I apologize.

Peritzo Petzo Petrizzo Patricio to a for your Patricio I think is the correct way. You sound more Italian to a four-year term. Okay. All in favor for for Mike. Okay. It's unanimous. I nominate Sundar Suban Sonan to a four-year term. Okay. All right. All in favor. Okay. I also would like to nominate Ann Marie Cruz for a two-year term. Okay. All right. An Marie, then welcome. And it's all in favor for Ann Marie as well. And uh uh I will make a motion to uh nominate Castor Shetty for a two-year term.

Okay. All in favor? Okay. It's unanimous. And I would like to nominate Nicole Dickens to a two-year term. Okay. All in favor? It's unanimous. Okay. What about uh chair and co-chair? I nominate Gail Butler for chair. Okay. All in favor? Gail Butler's chair. It's unanimous. Gail's chair and I nominate Paula Smith for a co-chair. Okay. All in favor? Paula for co-chair. I better not. Okay. All right. So, we'll say three for vice chair. Vice chair. Co-chair. Vice chair. However you want to Yeah. To do that. And chair. Yeah.

All right. And uh uh I want to say welcome to everyone and everyone who interviewed and everyone who's a part. ones who who uh uh I want to say to everyone who even that wasn't wasn't nominated to be a part of this and come out and and be a part and and I'm going to say to the to the board uh listen get input from folks and and take take advice and and you know and uh and those those folks that you know that weren't nominated to to be a part and and volunteer and come out. So it doesn't you know you you can still be a part of this. So and and so thank you thank you guys for for this and uh and Karen will be in touch with ones who are not here and um

so you you'll tell the people who were nominated and the ones who did not receive did not and uh when and you y'all will try to do an organizational meeting for these people in the near future. Yes.

Yeah. and in the bylaws uh it states the date and time for the first meeting so you'll let everybody know. So Karen will be in touch with everybody. So uh uh but again thank you everyone in advance for all the hard work already up top. I think it's going to be fun. So thank you. Um okay so I'm gonna Okay, we're good with that. So, I'm going to move into the uh uh discussion of the uh Weddington Youth Council. Um back uh months ago, I've had I've had quite a few high school students come to me, we want to be involved with the town, you know, how can we be involved? What can we do? And uh and at that point point during the during the campaign, it's like, guys, I I don't have time to think about this. We want to support you. the the school was just, you know, was was awesome. And uh so I reached out to uh uh Principal Bills at Wayington High School and uh I I think he's uh a lot of people see him like a rock star down there. Everybody just loves him to death and he's really involved with the students with the sports and and whatnot. And so uh I met with him and uh and talked about a wedding starting a Weddington youth council where it's a win-win. It gets them involved with the town functions and uh and it gets us it builds a relationship between the the town and the school. And when I when I met with uh uh principal Bills, he was like, "Jim, I I see there's tons of possibilities. I I think this was an awesome thing." He said, "We could have four or 500 people right off the top being involved in this." So, uh I also met with uh state representative uh Willis and and our board of elections uh

not elections but board of education u representative um um Kathy Highland and uh and they were real supportive and thought it was you know a win-win for for both sides and and really appreciated it. And so uh so what I'd like to to see us do and what I picture us to do uh there will be one meeting per month here the town hall uh they they will u they will do the do the leg work set this up waxall has already started one Monroe uh Charlotte uh it's a great way to get the students involved again uh I've had numerous students reaching out to me almost almost monthly Hey, we'd like to, you know, what's going on with this because so I think there's a ton of enthusiasm there to be be a part and uh and I think it's a win-win for them and for us and especially whatever, you know, if we end up doing something over here. Uh I think it it it pulls the school together. Um, and so I I don't want to reinvent the wheel, but I'd like to use some of Waxaw's, you know, u ideas of how they set it up and even on our web page, you know, u with, you know, something on our web page and on and for the parks and for this or for the events committee, I should say. So, um, I I'd like to get a u a head nod. I guess we just need a head nod to to to approve uh with the council to just them coming here at least once a month and to also two things uh well one other thing is they've already uh said they have a teacher that's going to be the from the school to the town the I'd like to get a from the town to the school council member liaison that works together. No, not a council member that's going to sit there and come up with all everything that's going to be

them. It's really just a conduit for answering questions, being here, you know, for for the for that meeting that that once a month meeting and uh and just making sure everything goes. But but not running the meetings, it's just being here, being a part of it. And and I I I see the sky's the limit for this. I see there's a lot of possibilities uh having that relationship with the school and and and uh with the students. And it it also brings just the parents in involved with us as well. So I mean I could ramble on and on because I' I've talked to them a lot about it and uh but you get the gist of it. Um is the council good and a favor with the council on this? Okay. So I have a head nod with that. Uh I don't know if I need a vote. Karen Walter um or just a head nod to of

That's good. But that's fine. Okay. Uh do I have a council member? I know we had talked. Uh I'm happy to um supervise the um the the youth council club when they are here at town hall which should be once a month. Yeah. And uh and if if I should ever have a conflict, I would hope then I could I would love to do it but it just depends on meeting times for me. But okay, I like between the two of us, I think we can cover and you guys could alternate or if you don't, you know, whatever if you want to be I I think I just think if there potentially there's a vacation once in a year, who knows what happens, but I'm happy to participate.

It's just it's building the relationship with with the principal of the school. We're not running it. We're we're just being a part of it. That makes sense. Okay. So So we're we're good with that. So Ellen, you'll be the primary and Darcy secondary. Sure. Right. Okay. All right. Uh so we're we're good with that. Um this discussion of the timing for the uh town council packets. I think that would be me.

Um I find the packets are you know 200 sometimes 200 pages in length. They uh we get them you know they're Thursday Wednesday Thursday depending. It's a lot to to crack through in a short period of time and it's very technical. Um I don't know if there's any opportunity to get them earlier to tech town council. Um so I but I can tell you I would really appreciate that. I agree. Especially because my weekends are crazy with sports, but they can't like and I had the same comment long ago and y'all can't get the information because it's not usually

out there yet, right? A lot of it depends on the time of the month. We we can't run the financial reports. It's like the earlier meetings. Last month, I think it was a the 8th was the council meeting. So, that that's hard to get it done. It's it's just getting everything together. sometimes the timing between the planning board and the council getting all of that back organized. Um, so Wednesday is the day we're we shoot for. Um, if it's financial though, I mean that's okay because that's only like two or three pages usually.

I mean, even like y'all are adding stuff to the agenda till last minute, we're getting emails till last minute. I can understand why Wednesday is kind of the drop dead. I just didn't know if it was possible to always do like phases, phase one and phase two. Then we're just reading all month long. Just book out your Sunday, I think. Well, just two cents worth. It seems like for me the the biggest chunk of it is the development stuff. And if we and if we could get

I mean that should be ready right after the planning board shouldn't unless there's conditions that are placed on there. Um sometimes we have to give them time like the the Morris farm case you know there are eight conditions we have to give them time to provide that information but but I think what you just heard from the mayor was we're not accepting anything from the planning board with conditions anymore. That's the new rule. That's been the policy that has been expressed to me. Yes. Yes. I mean that that's what the mayor expressed tonight. And we spent the whole night buttoning up, right, procedure. So if that happens, then we should there should be a lot less at least get the uh figure out.

Yeah. At least get the uh Well, that part could be posted early even on the agenda. And that's the biggest chunk of it. Yeah, it is. That's the biggest chunk. Yeah. like it deal lake was between 8 and 900 pages. Yeah. Yeah. And I would love to more carefully curate it so that it's the relevant information that you guys need that's digestible. Unfortunately, our our not unfortunately, but our citizens have very high demands on what the content of that packet is. And if there's one sheet missing out of 900, they're going to point it out. So, I have to give you everything. Well, we certainly want everything, but I mean, but again, if we can get that a week before,

well, and we if we have that review that addresses the the areas, we can read that, then if we need to look at the cursory information, we can look at it if we could understand it.

But anyway, you know, the proper the emails and the letter chains, we can go read that. The uh that is Yeah. But yeah, I know like this one you had, you know, all the A2 documents were there. Well, that's what's required. They need to be in the package. Even though, you know, digitally it killed a a couple trees, but we had them there for review in case anybody had a question, they were there. I understand. But uh yeah, having them when it becomes available, it doesn't hurt our feelings if it got posted to us as the development package that will be on the agenda. Yes.

Is the way I'm saying because I know you have to have time, they got to have time between the two. But when it becomes available, there's no reason to wait till the entire package comes out because that's the bulk of the work. That is the hardest part on us is is is if there is a development project going through the as you say the 900 pages of whatever that you had to put together, you know, so it just requests when the final version is available, it can be posted on the town website and sent to us. I mean, it's there's no reason to hold it back if it's on the agenda. I I I don't have a problem with any of that. I just need to get the development stuff early. Yeah. Yes.

And the other stuff I can get through rather quickly. Me too. Yeah. But the the development stuff is where I get bogged down in the weeds. Yeah. Agreed. It was hurting me yesterday and today. I guarantee you. Yeah. So, where do we come with this? You tell me. You whatever you want. What can you do? I don't know. I know I know I can do Wednesday so I won't know what I can do because it's it comes as it goes and it probably is monthto month right like

yeah can I make a suggestion at least with regard to the development stuff I understand that Greg needs to go through it and to make sure that every page is there I'm not worried about you sending stuff on Wednesday Karen what I'd like to get from Greg is after he's had the opportunity to give it a good scrub up to make sure all the pages are there. At least get the development stuff to us preferably as far prior to Wednesday as possible. And so you don't and you don't want as much of the the sewer permits and the that stuff. You don't need that. Well, I think they have to be they have to be in the package. I mean, that's kind of

required. Yeah, that's not what he's saying. thinking of all the talking about the bulk. Well, there is a bulk unfortunately the checklist costs for these items. Correct, Greg. What I don't Therefore, you have to provide the backup form. That's just that's the way it is. Yeah. We may have to wait through all this other stuff, Karen, that you send us on whatever.

I don't need that till Wednesday. That's Wednesday's fine on that. because I can get through that stuff rather quickly. But what I need from Greg is Wendy, I understand the need to uh go through it and make sure it's all there. I appreciate that. I want it to be complete. I don't want it to be rushed to the point where it's not going to be complete, but if Greg can do it prior to Wednesday, the sooner the better is I guess is what I'm saying. And but there's going to be I I guess that's going to preclude about any thing that's approved one month isn't going to be on the immediately following agenda because there's no time, you know, if you're the last Monday and you're going to the second and the way calendars can fall, you'd have a very you'd have a very difficult time getting, you know, everything done before the next meeting and may have to skip a council meeting to have time to have it all put together.

When did I I'm asking because I don't know you workload Greg. When did Morris Farm pass the planning board? February. February. Yeah. Right. And here we are in April. I know. That's what practical to do in the next month. It's got to be at least an additional month. Well, I want the one that's going to be on the agenda to be a voted up or voted down. Right. Exactly. I don't I don't need the other stuff. Yeah, I'll get that in due time.

I just need the stuff that is going to be like Morris Farm for example theoretically was supposed to happen tonight. And I would have liked to have had that Monday or even prior to that if possible. Yeah. I don't need something two months down the road. No, no, no. I understand. So, so, so what I'm hearing I think we're talking the same thing. Yeah, I think so. I think we're just talking, you know, he's got to have time to get it and work it and whatever. Then when it's all ready, when you say it's all ready, you it will be on the agenda. Is that the way you look at it, Greg?

The the compromise I would offer is I can provide you the information sooner. I would just hope that the town council, if you find issue with it or take issue with it, you respond back accordingly and not spring it at the last moment on, you know, a Monday night. I don't have a question. That's correct. Let's Let's check it. That's fair. And this may be creative,

but it I'm happy if you knock it down. Tell me if we're in those parameters or not. I know we've got um like rules and procedures, but what if we pushed the planning board meeting and the town council meeting apart a little more so that he may that maybe Greg would have the time to get everything assembled. No, they're as we're talking this. It's going to be a month or two later, you know,

physically a month or two, not not two weeks. It's going to be Certain benchmarks are 15 business days for a complete application and then 10 calendar days to advertise a public hearing. Yeah, we want to it's going to give you several meetings away once it gets past the planning board. Correct, Greg? Not necessarily. I'll I'll I'll do the best I can. But it easily could You're not sitting on full He has to go through so much stuff. He's not it's not done on Monday and he's just sitting on it waiting till Wednesday to send it. I think we're getting it when he's if it's going to be ready in time to meet the the stuff the the requirements, right?

If it's got to be out there so many days in advance, well, we need it. We don't need to get it later. And and and to to Clayton's, you know, defense, if if it's like, you know, one month and it's like waiting on it for a while, just go ahead and send it to us. You don't have to be all nice and neat and full packet. just sent to us. Let us be looking over it. If you want sent to us again, whatever. If you want it nice and neat, then everybody's gonna complain. Yeah. I think it needs to be as complete as possible so that I'm not saying which addition do I need to look at. Okay. Then then it's going to be hard to do that. Well, he's got to do the best he can. Yeah. Well, like I said, it's been a while since it was February what the planning board 23rd.

Yeah. Yeah. So we had March, right? Yeah. That's and that's what I said and you said that one. It takes an extra month or so to get one together. And the reason it honestly that it wasn't brought to you in March is partially because there wasn't enough time for public hearing notice from the planning board recommendation to the council meeting. There's not February doesn't have that extra week. Well, every every month is and every development is going to be different. I'm just I'm just asking Greg as soon as you

as soon as you can get it ready and make it as complete as you can make it. I would ask that you send it to us and Karen did not Karen not hold it until Wednesday to send it to us. Yeah. By the way, I I think it's when the package is complete and ready for submitt, send it to us and you guys will get it every Wednesday. Yeah. And but if it could be Monday or Tuesday or just keep going around and round on the same thing. I mean, it it just would be nice to get it to at least get the development stuff sooner than later. That's kind of the bottom line for me. Yeah. All right.

It has to meet the meeting requirements. So, I think we'll they'll do what they can do. So, okay, we're good. All right. So, go to K uh code enforcement this past Friday. Thank you, Greg. Uh Greg and I met with um uh Matt U Ray. He is a uh code enforcement. Karen works with him up at Lake U.

No, Davidson. Thank you. I'm sorry. Uh she she she's a code enforcement Davidson uh Ben uh former former uh town planner with the county uh credentials, you know, smart guy. Uh I met with him. I've been wanting to do this for quite a while. You know, as we're tightening up our UDO, I felt like we should be tightening up our our code enforcement as well, our codes. And uh so Greg and I met with him on where we're falling short or we are we you know do we have holes in our UDO I mean uh code rather uh code enforcement or you know others doing things that we should be doing that kind of thing. Uh so you know long story short uh he said that he can look at it uh and and do a uh an audit of our codes and and see where we're falling short, tighten up some things, give our codes teeth, you know, as we know, we we get a lot of emails from about, you know, different properties and that kind of stuff. Some of it we just don't have teeth. Some of it, you know, we need to change some wording on. We sat he sat right there and we uh we went through different things. He said, "I could change this. We need to change that." Obviously, we'll run this through Karen Walter there to make sure we're all good with it. But he said we could do an audit and um and tighten it up. And I even told him, I said, you know, if there's areas that uh uh that these other towns are not not doing that they should be doing, you know, just don't limit us to them, but you know, go ahead and tell us what we need to be doing as far as tightening up things. and that's what he's he wants to do. Rambling on by saying uh we have not met our budget for this year. We're still way under budget for code. So we have plenty of room in there uh for this. He's he thinks it'll take him

about 20 hours to to do this. U and so uh so I'm I'm estimating probably 14500 bucks to to to do that audit. And uh and so uh I'd like to, you know, see if we can tighten up, give our codes more teeth to tight to fix some of these areas in town that we've been Well, that's the biggest thing is struggling with Yes. or enforcement's the big thing. Give it teeth some bite where we can hold people accountable. Yeah. And that's what he's going to look at doing. Fines, whatever.

Right. And and we'll run it to Karen and and and and Greg's going to work with him as well on that. So, they're going to work together and then we'll go through Karen to make sure we're all good. But Karen was supposed to be the nuisance ordinance, right? Yes. Yeah. He's primarily going to work on the nuisance ordinance. Correct. Which is relatively a very small portion of our our overall codes. It's not within the UDO. It's in a separate ordinance, but in terms of size, it's it's very manageable. I think with Matt's assistance and within our current budget, we can audit that pretty quickly. Yeah. Include the chickens. Yep. Did I miss anything, Greg? And what I was saying? No, sir.

U also, you know, if there's any areas I'm going to say this to to I think Karen had mentioned to I mentioned to Karen Dwey that uh about trailers and motor home, mobile homes, that kind of thing. Add that into it as well. If it's not in that, have him look at that. Painfully aware of that. Yes. Yeah. Okay. So, okay. So, do can I I council, how do you feel? I fully support trying to remove some of these eyes and hideous things that have been left in this town for way too long. Y'all figure it out. I will be a happy man to vote for. It is unanimous.

Yeah, it's Yeah. And it's it's it's within our scope of budget, too. So, we're not going above our budget. It's inside the approved budget for the year to do this. Okay. So, do we need a vote or just a head nod? Head nod. Yeah, head nod. So, we got a head nod. So, we're all good. So, we're going to move forward on that. And sooner the better. Okay. Tom, this next item L, I'm gonna let you run with that because you're on the WMA.

Yeah. At Wuma, we had been discussing I may have mentioned water that is provided by um the county and that it is floorated. Now, for the background information, this does not affect anybody who's on a well. Half the people in this town, it doesn't make any difference to the other half. It may or may not make a difference to. But what we have figured out is that the water in the western half of the county, which includes us, comes from Lancaster. Lancaster flidates their water. Union County that operates processing plants on the eastern half of the county a couple days ago removed the fluoride from their water and the county's policy is not to have flidated water. But being we buy our water effectively from Lancaster, we can't do anything about it. The town of Marvin has passed a resolution that's gone to the county, the state of North Carolina, and to the state of South Carolina asking that they, you know, policy to remove fluoride from the water. Uh, Waxaw will pass resolutions on that tomorrow. These of course are non-bonding, but these are asking that the fluoride be removed in the water that would come to the western part of the county. They're they're in support of that. Um there's a lot of science and discussion both ways on whether you should or should not fidate water. Uh by researching this, there's different opinions. You know the one thing is fluoridating water helps

especially kids teeth but at the same time it's not just going on the teeth it is going into your entire body and it's a mineral that you're adding something not naturally occurring in our area into your water and there is certain science that says it's probably not that good for you and it may not be of any benefit by taking it orally like that to the teeth. Now, when the doctor puts it on your teeth, it's it's known to be good, but that doesn't affect the entire body. And u when you use it with toothpaste, I asked my brother, who's a retired dentist. I said, "What does it do?" He said, "Well, it's pretty good until you decide to wash your mouth out. Soon as you finish brushing your teeth, you did nothing. You washed away the fluoride. So, whatever they put in there didn't do any good. But what I'd like to see is that we have inputs from the citizens who are on county water. I think us on well I'm on well water. I think everybody here you're on

Nope. Nope. I'm not. I am on city water. And I've also done some research on this and um fluoride that is added to added to your water is not medical grade. Yep. So it's industrial industrial waste. It is considered an industrial waste. It comes from like uh expulsion of chemicals from quaries. Y I uh and most of Western Europe except for Ireland I think they've taken it out of their water. Uh they find Yes. Florine is fine topically medical grade on your teeth.

They have found when you take it out of the water it doesn't change the cavity rate whatsoever. So, I'm inclined. I have my own personal opinion. My own personal opinion is I would like to not be drinking water because they've never shown that ingesting it does anything. And there's potential that it's contaminated by lead and some other. So, I don't know where the rest of you are feeling and how much we want to open it up for public, but that's my gut reaction. Well, I like Tom like Tom's suggestion that we solicit input from those folks who are on the system. Yeah. Rather than just unanim rather than just Well, we we don't need to do that. We need to hear get great public input.

I would love to hear comments from the public, but I want to hear comments from the public who are affected. Correct. You know, like us. So, I am. Yes, you are. I'm not. I drink it every day. Do I want to put this on my lips? I'm literally paranoid every time. Not just because of that, but yeah. The water in the western half of the county comes from the Kataba River. That's where Lancaster gets the water, right? The the eastern part of the county gets their water from the Atkin River. And their processing plant does not do this. I would recommend that we actually put it on agenda for a public hearing.

Yeah. But in the meantime, could we direct the staff to put it, you know, like in our newsletter, you know, when it's going to go up, you know, we want we want your input through email or a survey on the website. They could just hit, you know, their address and do they are they for or against it. Yeah. So, but please people who are affected, I don't think we need to ask people who are not affected what what their opinion is here. This is for affected people. Correct. in the western part of well the entire town if you're on county water it comes from Lancaster. Oh okay that is what it is.

The eastern part of the county is is Union County processed water with no fluoride. Okay. So, all the water in in in our towns through here, these Wesley Chapel, us uh down to uh Waxaw and I think Stins are all served by this this water system. So, let's put it on the uh the agenda. Uh let's first of all staff just flood it. We want people's input. We want, you know, comments all everything we can get. You know, this is not us. Send an email to Yeah. Whatever we can get, we need people standing here public comments. Yeah.

Could you just you whatever ways we can get that out. Uh do you want that on the May to put it on the next agenda for May? Yeah. For resolution, but I would say that we ought to have a public hearing prior to voting on the resolution. Correct. When? Yes. Totally. I want people to say what they think. Okay. All right. So, are we good to move on from this? All right. access move in le of time. Uh Karen Karen Dwey, you mentioned um this item M is delegates for the League of Municipalities. Uh can you

council as a as a member of the North Carolina League of Municipalities, you all need to designate a voting member to vote for the NA the North Carolina League of Municipalities Board of Directors. I will when you once you designate them, I will fill out the form and you'll get the email with the ballot and all of that, but it's just a matter of being a part of this group. They can't have all of you. You all need to pick one. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, Jim, you win. Okay. You get to fill out the paperwork. All right. I You guys are okay. I'll Yeah. Okay. I'll do that. So, Karen, I'm on that.

No. None of us are running for league offices. Correct. Correct. Okay. All right. We're going to move forward to uh unless I've missed anything. Uh we're going to move forward to code enforcement report. It's in your packet. We talked about uh working with Matt um and the positive steps uh on giving our code more teeth. Uh we'll pursue that audit as soon as possible. We have to get that done by the end of the fiscal year. So, yeah. By summer. Okay. And and that's June, right? Did you say June? Did you come? Yes. It'd be by July 1st. Yeah. In order to be in the budget. Okay. Okay.

Out of this year's budget. Yes. Okay. So, we're good there. Greg, uh, update for finance officer tax collector. Thank you, Leslie. Of course, we pick a late night meeting for me to actually have stuff to report. Um,

the monthly financials are in your packet. The one thing that I do want to let y'all know is we had a March 31st hard deadline for our audit. Um, you might have remember we amended our contract to get us to that date. The auditor did not meet it. So, our audit has not been submitted. So, we will most likely get a nice little letter from the LGC that says this was bad. You weren't supposed to do this. The potential the worst case scenario state passed a legislative a legislation that if you don't submit your audits, they can withhold your sales tax money. It's very unlikely to happen under the circumstances because it's the first time we haven't. But the auditor reached out to me today to say that she thinks she's going to have it and we'll submit it within the next two weeks. We if we get a letter from the LGC, we'll just need to respond and appeal if they threaten to withhold the money. And even if they withhold it, once it's submitted, they will reinstate it and give it back to us. But I wanted to let you know that's happening. The auditor um said that she will amend the contract, reduce the fees because it is all it's on her. She it's she's the reason for the delay, but wanted to let you know.

Question. So yes, when we receive the audit because I know we have to approve the audit, right? Could we or should we consider if it's well in in a limbo between a meeting or a short special meeting to approve that to get it in quicker if they does? No, she'll go ahead and submit it and then the LGC approves it and then she brings it to you. Okay. It's after. Yes. Okay. It's that way. I thought we had to approve it first, then send it. No, we send it in first. Okay. They review it. If there's any issues with it, we modify it and then when it's accepted, she presents the final one to you guys.

Most boards I'm on, we review it before we send it to whoever has to go. Right. No, in this case, it's the other way around. It's nonprofit world.

Yeah, it's other way around. Other way around. And then the other thing that's in your packet is is the iteration of the proposed budget for next year. We got our numbers from the county the first of last last week. We got the tax valuation, which we estimated pretty pretty good. We didn't have to adjust that. We got the urban forester number, which was already in the budget. Didn't need to change. And we got the sheriff's number. That did need a change. So they indicated that with the number of municipal deputies that they have now they needed to hire a I guess an oversight you know an administrator to handle them and we are getting charged our pent portion of that cost for another sergeant. So that bumped our increase up. We estimated six. It's 13.3. So I did go in and modify some other expense items to to cover that. So the total budget didn't change, but that line item did.

Okay. So one question for the public in case they hadn't seen it. What is the taxable real I guess adbor value that we have in in this town? I had it. I know you did. I don't I don't know if I wrote it down. Oh, I did write it down. I did write it down. 5.1 billion dollars. 5.1 billion. Yes. So, and that is about three and a half% higher than last year due to growth. And then next month we will call we will have the budget. We'll call for the public hearing and we'll have the public hearing in June. Okay.

And we'll try to nail down any other outstanding items such as the website. Make sure we get that covered. Is that like because it's under it's where we have we have a we have a contract with them. No. Yeah. We have five deputies, right? Right. Is it divided potentially because we have there are five other municipalities and it's divided equally between those five or is it done based on uh it's based on it's based on Karen spoke to

spoke to Deputy Underwood this morning or this afternoon and he explained that the cost of this sergeant is split among the five municipalities that have municipal contracts um by their percentage. So we've got five of there's 14 deputies under municipal contracts. We have five percentage of the five. Okay. Except Indian Trail is not not in that because they have their own stand alone. Yeah. Just trying to figure out the math. Don't worry. Marvin Wesley chapter schools. Let's just leave it at that.

He did mention that that could change um because Marvin may be chattering about an additional deputy and wing may be chattering about an additional deputy. So that that amount may change. Um, and the county hasn't even approved those numbers yet either. I don't know. No, those are preliminary numbers from the county. They usually get adjusted, never down. But there's one question based on that you have basically a quarter of left to pay basically and most of the revenue has been received. Right. It appears we have enough unexpended budgeted to cover your expected expenses to

Yes. be not negative for the year. Yes, we we are looking pretty good right now unless there's some really late consulting fees coming in. We we'll have things happen but right but it looks like we have budgeted properly. Yes, that we will have a we won't be negative. Correct. Yeah. Correct. Thank you. All right. Thank you so much. I think we're good. Uh transportation report time. I will add my comments next time. So there's there's not much anyway. Uh council comments. Oh yeah, they got a planner.

Oh, I thank you, Bill. I completely I'm looking at the clock. I'm looking at the clock and I'm thinking, oh my gosh, you know. Okay, so thank you, Bill.

I will be brief still. Uh so Morris Farm I think the planning board chairman the applicant and staff are all in alignment that the best path forward is to go to the planning board. So I think that's the the right step was taken for that matter. Um that leaves that going to the planning board and you guys again in May. There's also the matter of um the Grand View subdivision that's kind of next in line. And then there are two other potential subdivisions that have had community meetings. Uh but I have not gone to the planning board. I've provided a a rough spreadsheet to Mayor Bell as part of his meet the mayor um presentation. I can share that with each member of council so they know so you know in what order all of our development projects including things that have been voted on years ago and what stage of development everything is in. Um but it is it is a very busy time in the in the planning department right now.

Yeah. Uh county administrator.

Yes. agree as well. I um I'm working with a company in Waxaw. Actually, they're not in Waxaw anymore. Signature Services looking um for apparel and other Weddington branded merchandise. They don't have a lot of the fun the no tres or the no soliciting signs or the ornaments, but um I'll I'll find them. Um so, yeah. And I'll have links for you guys to look at um a shirt to order, see what kind. I was thinking start simple with polos for everybody, but I I figure I would see what you guys want. And I'd like to set up a link on the website where people can go and order it so we don't have to. The only problem with that is she said they have minimums and sometimes that's difficult, but if if they wait until they get

Yeah, I guess that's the question. Can you can it can it compile up until you whatever? Yes, there's ways to get around that. like the sports teams open the store and close it on a certain date so that there's bulk orders coming out. So, it doesn't go this the good thing about this was it went straight to them and we wouldn't have to to deal with it but that might be a better Well, that's it's the same thing. It goes straight to them just like the coach will open it on this date and close it on this date. So, everybody does it on the same week. Who do they use? Do you know? I can find out. Or it could be open for a month then closed. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've worked with this company before. Um, and I just they're really good people. Small, local, keep it keep it in Union County type. But, um, if you can. Yep.

So, that is good. All right. Anything else, guys? We're good. Now, can we do council report? Council comments. Council comments. That, too. I guess. Just quick. Um, tomorrow is the, um, Garden Club of Weddington again. If you are interested, go over to Siler at 9:15 in the morning. We'll be talking about propagation. Thank you. Cool. um

we have covered so many things and they they might seem like technical admin tasks but this is all part of the process and I'm super grateful to people that have done the nitty-gritty work and research but it's part of the process to communicate you know modernizing how we communicate online gathering hard data on environmental footprints um so that we can give residents the tools they need to stay informed med um how we can protect our natural resources that we all moved here to be a part of. Um we're building a smarter, more resilient town hall and I hope that the conservation uh amendments and text amendments will make it clear that we aren't allowing, you know, homes on a quarter acre lot, but that overall it's still one acre lots like all of us had said we wanted. But we're also trying to preserve green space, trees,

you know, all sorts of different things. So, I hope this just makes it really clear so the process moving forward is so much simpler for everyone involved. No. And u uh well, the only thing I'd like to do is I wrote first article for council corner. Uh thank you staff for getting that in the uh our last last newsletter. Uh, and I think we need a volunteer for next month. And thank you. I meant to put that in my administrator's report. Thank you. Ask for somebody to do that. Yeah. Well, we uh I'm happy to participate unless somebody else is chomping at the bit. Chomp on it.

Well, again, I just kind of want to reinforce at least y'all be thinking about it. It's uh items of interest um that the community might have and and something that you're involved in. uh you know so an item of interest or explaining why things are the way they are educating like half acre locks uh there's a lot of things but uh they don't have to be legal I mean I've got a hundred legal ideas I'd like to get out there to educate people with but items of interest too um you know kind of break it up so be thinking about something that you might want to write and it doesn't have to be anything lengthy I don't I think

that's but and there's a lot of misinformation out there too that we can clear up. That's it. I want to try to misinformation try to clear that up. So absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Well, I want to thank everybody who came out tonight. Of course, only two of y'all uh from the public are still here. Thank you for waiting to the bitter end. Wow. Of this meeting. And thank I want to thank staff for putting together this package. It was voluminous. It was time consuming and it was Are they interested in that?

It was a bear. I know it was and I appreciate and it just not the the development packages but all the the other stuff we did. It was a lot of things we covered tonight. This was you know a lot of stuff and all the staff and I want to thank them for their hard and diligent work and u I hope more people there's nobody here. Um, they're watching. They're watching. Anybody please come out, give us your opinions, and we will want to hear about fluoridated water from people on county water. Yes. All right. Thank you. Thank you.

And and I want to, you know, like you're saying, you know, thank you to a couple of our potential youth council, Willington Youth Council, uh, members who are still here. Uh, but I want to thank, uh, the staff. You know, you guys uh there was a lot tonight and and we brag on you guys a lot. I'm going to brag on the council. I you know, this council is is dedicated, has a heart for doing the best thing for this town and making sure, you know, this town grows. Um it uh brings value to town. It's a win-win for all of us. And uh so they have a heart to do what's best for this town. And so they they don't do it lacadasically. They uh they put a lot of a lot of heart into it. So I want to thank uh this council for for what you guys do. It's it's a great council and u uh after this we're going to go into a closed session. So I'm I can I get a motion?

Make a motion to move into closed session and with a 10-minute break. Yeah, we'll take a break. But could I get a motion to approve the go in? Okay, I think Tom made it. Yeah, well, I'm sorry. Motion, but all in favor. All in favor. Okay, it's unanimous. Move into close session. We're going to move into close session, but we're going to take a 10 10 15 minute break right quick and we'll move in 15 10 break. Okay. All right. Youth Council, you may now exit.