City Council - Regular Meeting

So the podium is up and down. Okay, very nice. So Dylan says, "Don't touch the microphones. Touch this." Okay, gotcha.

Call the meeting to order. We'll take a roll call at this time. Mayor Pro Tim, are you here? I am. Council member Joiner, are you here? I'm here. Council member Andrews, here. Council member Al here. Council ment here. Council member Clinton Quintana here.

The chair is here. Everybody's here and accounted for. We'll have a recognition tomorrow night of the leadership Wilmington class of 2026 proclamation naming April 9th is local news day consent agenda. C1 is approval of the minutes. C2 is a resolution authorizing the city manager to enter into into a professional services agreement with Sigma Health and Life Insurance Company for medical insurance coverage and related administrative services. C3 is a resolution adopting the 2026 Southeastern North Carolina Regional Hazard Mitigation Plan. C4 is a resolution authorizing city manager to execute a contract with Odyssey Mechanical LLC for removal and replacement of the HVAC system in the main data center, the Skyline Center. C5 is a resolution authorizing city manager to apply for a $17,500,000 grant from the US Economic Development Administration for the 2025 disaster supplemental grant program which includes a required local match of 3,500,000 for the riverfront bulkhead replacement project. Then C6 is authorizing the city manager to execute a contract amendment in the amount of 1,500,000 with JYMCO Jimco Construction Company Incorporated for the annual needs sidewalk maintenance contract. And then C7 is a resolution authorizing the city manager to execute a contract amendment in the amount of 3 million with Highland Paving Company LLC of Fedville, North Carolina for the annual needs roadway maintenance contract. C8 is a resolution authorizing city manager to apply to the North Carolina Department of Transportation for a 2026 multimodal network planning grant. And then public hearings PH1 is an ordinance amending

the official zoning maps of the city of W to resone property located at 910 South 8th Street from R5 medium density mix residential district tox urban mixuse district. And then PH2 is an ordinance amending the official city maps of the city of Wilmington to reszone property located at 4118 Market Street from RB Regional Business to MD17 CD highdensity multi-dwelling residential conditional district for 76 unit multi-dwelling development. PH3 is for the year 2027 annual action plan for the CDBG and home funds and this is a public hearing only. And then ordinances 01 is an ordinance reappropriating 1.7 million in the building improvements capital projects fund to create a 1.25 million reserve for lease facilities maintenance and improvements and to pay 450,000 in broker commissions. 02 is an ordinance making appropriations in the amount of $212,285 in insurance reimbursement funds to the parks and recreation capital projects fund for the inino sports complex project and then 03A which is an ordinance making a supplemental appropriation of $131,78 for the Capefir public utility authority to the capital improvement projects fund for the front street bridge rehabilitation project. And then 03B is the resolution authorizing the city manager to enter the into an interlocal agreement with the Capefield Public Utility Authority in the amount of not to exceed $131,78 for the front street bridge rehabilitation project. Then resolutions. Resolution to amend city policy 212

uh paid leave and then reports RP1 report of councils and naming facilities committee. And that is all for this particular agenda. Are there any items any council would like to talk about or city manager? None. We do have um one report this morning that Meredith is uh our city attorney is going to uh introduce.

Okay. Very good. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Mayor, Mayor Pro Tim, members of council. This morning, we've got an update from Eric Cradle. He's the CFO for New Hover County. This is an annual update on opioid settlement funds. As most of you are aware, the city participates in the national opioid settlement. Um, along with New Hver County, we were one of the first North Carolina communities to enter into those settlements and to take part in them. We do receive a set um a certain amount of money from those settlements every year. The city has an ILA interlocal agreement with the county as to how to handle those funds and our funds go directly to the county. However, under the terms of the ILA, there has to be both a joint um staff committee that meets first to discuss how those funds will be used and then a joint elected committee which council member Joiner sits on. Um these recommendations have come through both of those committees and are coming to you today and as long as there are no objections or major changes that are needed um this is how uh the funds will be distributed through the county's budget process. So at this point Mr. Eric Cradle from New Hover County he's their CFO. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning Mayor Mayor Pro Tim Council. Thank you for allowing me to be here today. Um, I do serve as C CFO for the county and I'm joined by Eliza Baldwin who is our strategy manager. Um, I also serve on the joint staff op. And we're here today to provide an update on the fiscal year 2627 budget recommendations for the use of the funds received by the county and the city related to the national uh opioid legal settlements. We're providing you a summary of the process here today that has been undertaken by the and the resulting recommendations. We also include in the appendix to today's slides that I believe Meredith has got a more detailed presentation that was discussed with the joint elected committee that oversees the opioid funds. Okay, next slide. As background, in 2014, in response to the opioid epidemic epidemic, state and local governments across the nation began filing lawsuits against responsible parties. These lawsuits were eventually consolidated into a single nationwide effort and settlements with various defendants began in 2021. The the lawsuits were generally focused on companies that played a part in the opioid epidemic, including distributors, manufacturers, pharmacies, and consultants. Some familiar names that were part of those settlements include Cardinal Health, CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, and Kroger. As the lawsuits have been settled, the participating states are allocated a pre-established percentage of each settlement, which is approximately 3% for North Carolina. Once the funds are distributed to North Carolina, 85% of each settlement is distributed to local governments and 15% is maintained at the state level. The combined share of state proceeds designated for the county and the city is also approximately 3% of what North Carolina receives. Under this structure, the county and city have been allocated a total of 36.4 million thus far, and there are another $4.4 million in pending law pending

settlements that are awaiting court approval. The settlement payments are generally payable over eight 15 to 18 years and are structured such that we receive more funds higher amounts in the early years and less in later years. As indicated in the last bullet point here, the general philosophy of our committees has been to implement a plan to put the funds to near-term use to address the opioid epidemic in our local area as quickly as possible. Uh our local area had an overdose rate that was 40% higher than the national average. Okay. As part of the settlements, the funds are governed by a memorandum of agreement with the state that requires the funds to be used specifically to treat, prevent, or remediate the harms of the opioid epidemic. Annual reports are are submitted to the state to demonstrating compliance with those requirements. As Meredith mentioned in September 2022, in an effort to coordinate efficient spending of the funds, an interlocal agreement was between the county and city was entered into uh in which it was agreed the settlement funds would be pulled and administered by a joint elected committee comprised of two county commissioners and one city council member. Additionally, it was determined that a staff committee comprised of both county staff and city staff would provide recommendations to that committee on the use of the settlement funds uh for their consideration. The joint staff committee is comprised of seven members with the city and county alternating years that have four four members. The chairs of both committees also alternate years with city manager Betty Hawk Becky Hawk serving this year as the chair for the staff committee and council member David Joiner serving as the chair of the joint elected committee. Meetings of those two committees occurred in February and March of this year. And the recommendations that were approved by the joint elected committee for next year's budget are presented here today. The county commissioners were recently presented with these same recommen recommendations and assuming no objection from city council. These will

be the program recommendations carried out for the current for the for next fiscal year. U okay next slide. When the settlement funds uh started to be received in fiscal year 20 2023, a five-year strategy was adopted. It's adjusted annually as needed. The three there was three focus areas of the strategy. It was education and outreach, access to services and treatment, and then sustainable recovery and well-being. Uh the the idea was to identify programs with each one of those three focus areas, put out RFPs and implement the programs that would again treat that broad range of u preventive and treatment uh objectives. Currently, 15 to 20 programs are funded annually. Uh they're structured as one-year contracts with annual renewal options. That gives us the ability to look at performance and adjust um amounts and renewals as appropriate. Each contract has key performance indicators um that require quarterly reporting to the county for monitoring. Another aspect of the plan is there's monthly compass meetings facilitated by staff. You can see the uh what the word compass means out to the right there. collaborative opioid and mental health planning and strategy sessions. Uh these meetings bring in all the providers um each one month one Friday each month to meet in a room and uh facilitate discussions and try to ensure collaborations. I think one of the things the strategy department determined early on was uh there wasn't a lot of collaboration and knowledge that was going that was transferring between organizations that were doing similar type of things. So this these meetings have been very beneficial to kind of put the right parties in the right room and and try to come up with uh strategies to solve the opioid issue. Okay, here's a couple of the uh basic statistics that we review um in our

committees. Um the left side of the chart is nonfatal opioid overdoses. uh you can see it was in the n 600 um person range there in 2021 and it has declined nicely uh through 2025 and then fatal opioid overdoses and these are all New Hover County specific have declined you can see from a peak of 110 to 37. Overall, the nation's experienced a decline in opioid overdoses and and um fatal overdoses. And so, as a county, it's good to see both nationally and locally that the stats are are going down as this epidemic is being being addressed. Okay. This is our current inventory of programs uh that that they're part of the budget that's before you today. Uh the prior year fiscal year 26 budget is in the lefth hand column within with the amounts listed. And then today's recommendation is in the right hand column. Again, you can see the three focus areas along the left. The out education, outreach, access to services and treatment, and sustainable recovery and well-being. And you can see the variety of programs we've got that are u some of them take slightly different angles, but they're all intended to again bring this the opioid epidemic u improve the stats and bring it just improve the overall health of the community. go back. That's okay. Just go back. Yeah. So, um, again, the idea is we have one-year contracts and then adjust as necessary. You'll see some slightly different amounts for some of the programs based on that review. Um, again, as mentioned, the joint staff committee first provided these recommendations and the joint elected committee received the recommendations and approved what's before you today. And if you've got any questions on what I've just spoken about or any of these individual programs, be glad to help take those. And Eliza's here to help me with any of the program specifics.

Yes, go ahead. Um I noticed that the case management support has 75,000 for fiscal year 26, but not recommend. Um there's no recommendation for 27. That was a program that was going to be in our uh the county's DSS department and the need just never arose. Um um uh it was h we transferred some funds to do wraparound services that the actual providers are proving instead of the county's DSS department. So it's kind of a shift. Um I'm trying to remember which program it was added to. Um Eliza,

I can add a little bit more. So the um the wraparound support services is a program that we've provided funding to individual providers and they are essentially acting as those case managers for the clients. So we didn't find that we really needed the a position so to speak to manage the funds. So we were able to put the money directly to the providers who then can provide those services directly to their clients. So, we had it budgeted, but we never actually allocated the money to any program. Thank you.

I have a question um about the KPIs. Are they mostly focused on um patient outcomes, soiety levels? What kind of um what are you looking at? What kind of metrics are you looking at for the to renew the contracts?

So, per the MOA, we are required to uh measure three primary metrics. an outcome metric, a quantity metric, and a quality metric. So quantity is just essentially number of clients usually or number of nlloxxone kits distributed, something like that. The quality is it typically a percentage increase, percentage improvement, and so our providers are a lot of times um doing kind of pre and post surveys with their clients. You know, how were you doing when you entered the program? how are you doing when you've graduated the program? And so they report that to us. And then an outcome measure is typically a longer term period. So have they maintained employment, sobriety, um um a stable income. Um those are the things that we look at for that longer term outcome measure. So those are the three main ones that we are required to look at. But depending on the programs um we look at other metrics as well specifically the the tides program which focuses on pregnant and postpartum women um with opioid overdue opioid use disorder. We also look at number of babies born in the program um number of babies born with NAS neonatal abstinence syndrome. So there's other more program specific metrics that we look at as well.

Thank you. Very helpful. I have a question. Actually I have two questions. Uh my first question, where can we um find all of the results of that you were just speaking to?

Um we so the state does maintain um a website called coreNC and all of the data that we submit in our annuals reports roll up to that website. So you can go there. Um, we also do have a annual report that we've put out. Um, I believe it is on our website, but I will double check that. Um, and just for everyone else, so we have some reports out. I'll admit it's a little clunky. We are working to um, implement a new software where we'll have this in a more digestible way um, probably later this summer. Um, but we do have information available on our website and the state's coreNC website.

And on the state's website, is that broken down by county? It is. Okay. Great. Um, and then my second question, this last uh line item on here, the strategy development survey. Can you tell us more about that?

Sure. Um, so the per the MOA, we are required to refresh our strategic plan every four years, which is coming up. And so in anticipation of that, what we would like to do is work with a third-party vendor to basically do a um customer satisfaction survey um and interview clients who have participated with this pro with each program um to determine their satisfaction. um we felt that it would be more appropriate to go with the third parties to you know maintain um you know anonymity um and confidence in the data and then also ensure that our customers are having a positive experience with all of these programs. So we haven't um issued any RFPs or anything like that yet. Okay. Thanks.

Dave, I just wanted to thank you all for the work that you've been doing on this. I think that those charts and those numbers speak for themselves about, you know, we're headed in the right direction when it comes to overdoses and overdose deaths. Um that there was an asterisk related to the 2025 number and I think that's just because at when we had our committee meeting it was uh available through October, but

even so that's a pretty good number. Um and we're headed in the right direction. There's still work to be done but we're headed in the right direction. And I just wanted to highlight for council um you know we this these these monies are going to continue to come in through fiscal year 39 to the city and to the county. Um but but we are in the window where we're seeing the largest chunks come in. So we're in the 3 million $4 million a year. That will sort of drip down over time to where it's a couple hundred,000 by the end of it. So these charts I anticipate are going to get shorter. There are going to be fewer programs that get funded. But the strategy here is spread it out as much as possible. Look at which ones work well. And if they are things that are showing really strong results, those can maybe be fun, those can be folded into the county's public health budget as recurring taxpayer funded initiatives as opposed to these dollars which in no way, shape or form come from tax money. They come out of the pockets of the people who were contributing to the harm of the opioid crisis. So um those are just some of the details that I think are important for us to take forward as we continue to see this year after year. And again, thank you all.

Can I ask um to that point in respect to the monies, David, I understood that I know this was part of the the settlement with the distributors of the opioids, but does this also fall into line with the manufacturers of opioids? Because I understood that that was another class action lawsuit that was coming in behind or was it all jumped bundled together when this settlement was finally settled or is it going to be an ongoing issue in regards to the distribute? not to the distribute but to the manufacturers.

Several manufacturers have been part of the national sediments have already been that have already occurred. There's still one big pending one out there, the Purdue and Sappler one that would is part of the $4.4 million. It's waiting settlement. So manufacturers have been part of the settlements to date and litigation against them continues. Okay. Very good. Thank you. Anybody else? Okay. Thank you very much, Madam U manager. Do we have anything else? Is that it? No, sir. That's it. Okay. JC, did you want to say something?

Um, wanted to ask about the um back on the our agenda with uh public hearings too if I could get a site plan, a fullsize plan set of uh full-size site plan. It's hard to look at those site plans on my iPad. So, I don't know if I brought up now in case anybody else wanted one, but if I could get a fullsize print out of that would be helpful. We'd be happy to provide that. Thanks. Okay. Very good. And I do know that we have uh an appointments committee after this particular meeting is finished. So with that uh we stand a journ