Welcome to this meeting of the Denton City Council.

The time is 2 p.m.

We have a quorum, so I'll call this meeting to order.

First on the agenda is citizen comment for consent agenda items.

Do we have any?

Seeing none.

Moving on to item two requests for clarification of agenda items listed on the agenda for public consideration.

Yes, sir.

Councilmember Holland.

Ma'am, I I pulled three items dealing with our closed session.

It wasn't clear to me what the resolution of that would be relative to the order of our meeting today.

So I I still want to leave those pulled, but I might unpull them when I get clarification of that.

Okay.

And we do have closed session items where we could ask questions on those items.

Yes, thank you.

All right, thank you.

Any others?

Oh yes.

Um it is we have three items on the consent agenda regarding settlement of some lawsuits.

Um what are they?

They're items.

Yes, sorry about that.

It's uh L M and N.

All right, the three items.

All right.

Uh moving on to 3A ID 260825, receive a report, hold a discussion, gift staff direction regarding the regional transportation council's role as the policymaking body of the Metropolitan Planning Organization and relationship with the North Central Texas Council of Governments.

Good afternoon, everybody.

My name is John Polster with Innovative Transportation Solutions, and uh I see some new faces, so I'm gonna just up front apologize if I offend because I'm not usually let out in public very much.

Uh uh General Act Council person just to ask me to come and give you all a presentation and an update on the status between the lawsuit between Denton County RTC versus council of governments.

It's all public record, so there's it's just easy to do it in open form.

I'm gonna give you a history lesson real quick because it matters, and then um there'll be a test at the end and you do get continuing education.

1974, uh Governor Briscoe um designated the North Central Texas Council of Governments as the MPO for the North Texas region.

Uh, and when you hear the council of governments argue that that makes them the MPO, they leave out a critical part of that designation, and that designation had a caveat or a uh set carve out that said subject to a steering committee of elected officials being set up to um direct policy because the cities that were eligible to be in the MPO at the time did not trust the council of government structure, so they got a special designation in North Texas is the only area that has an MPO that has this special carve out that the steering committee would direct all the policy related to policy issues and the federal funding uh allocations.

So you'll hear the cog say we're the MPO because we were designated the COG in 1974, but they leave off the steering committee part in 1978.

Um Governor Clemens, at the request of North Central Texas Council of Governments, requested that the steering committee be restructured as the Regional Transportation Council.

Same group of people just uh formalized it and adopted a uh set of bylaws that formalized the RTC as the policy committee.

It's called the MPO policy committee for the North Central Texas Council of Government's MPO.

So then in 1988, you the state before then you had to renew this agreement every year, every year, every every year.

Uh they got tired of doing that.

In 88, the state said until the designation changes, you're the MPO indefinitely.

So you'll also hear the council of government say in 1988, the governor made COG the MPO permanently.

Uh, but it was the MPO structured based on the 74, which means the RTC was still in place, and the folks that have been in that role as a COG board this whole time up until the 19th uh not and up until 2025 understood that the RTC was the MPO.

Fast forward in 2005, Congress had a lot of people that were confused on what an MPO was nationwide, and so they decided in a new highway bill to define terms.

So in that 2005 uh CFR, I don't have it on top of my head.

They said that the MPO of the region was the MPO policy committee for that area.

So they by federal law said the RTC being the MPO policy committee is now the MPO.

And in 2006 to codify that, the uh Text DOT changed the agreement between the state and the MPO in North Texas to have it be a uh four-party agreement.

All the others are triparty.

You had Techstott, the MPO, and the fiscal agent.

In North Texas, they added the RTC as a signatory.

So in North Texas, we have four people that assign it.

RTC as the MPO policy committee, COG as the MPO, and Cog as the fiscal agent.

And two in 2014, there was another update of the federal law because the COGs were all that all the MPO policy committees looked different and they were structured differently, and the feds wanted to make sure that there were all entities involved around the table.

So in 2014, they said, okay, the policy committee is the MPO, and the MPO has to look like this.

You have to have elected officials on it, you have to have the state DOTs on it.

You have to have all the agencies that provide uh transportation services in the region as board members.

So that's Dart, DCTAs, the Metro, Cog board, I mean the NTTA, DFW Airport Board, all those are represented around the RTC table.

So it they said the policy committee's the NPO, and you have to look like this.

So 2020, 2014.

But between 2006, when they codified the 2005 changes, TechSot, everybody was getting along, so they didn't really look at the contract.

And so they re-upped that contract in 2018, that had the four parties, but they didn't come in and say we you've got to update it because the CFR said you got to look like this.

So in 25, you got a new executive board.

They intentionally ran off Mike Eastland, the former uh executive director for COG, right before he retired, so they could put their guy in.

And they started saying that we're the MPO.

And so in February, Denton County saw that they were gonna roughshod over the process, and this contract doesn't expire until September 2027, and the region we broke by then.

So Denton County filed a lawsuit injuncting restraining the council governments from acting as the MPO because they didn't, they weren't didn't have the proper structure, they didn't have the proper makeup, and they were not the policy committee, nor were they ever the policy committee.

So we just injuncted, we asked for a relief on everything the MPO does, and we were granted that relief in Denton County for a two-week period.

We knew we'd filed in the wrong jurisdiction, but we needed the TRO.

Judge Johnson said, I'll give you your TRO, but you got to go uh to Tarrant County to have the case because venues are there.

Uh so we went to Tarrant County, we had a hearing a week before the actual hearing because COG had asked for a hearing, and they said we have we don't we need to be able to do uh FIFA stuff in this injunction that we got from Denton County.

This is a lot of stuff, so it just flops around in my brain.

Um it's stopping us from doing uh MPO stuff, which was in incorrect because the only things COG was asked to do were things they would do as a fiscal agent, not as the MPO.

Uh but the Denton County says we'll change the TRO, remove those restrictions.

All we want you to do is not fire your transportation director and not usurp RTC's policy.

The judge granted it that afternoon, the executive director of the council of governments fired the Director of Transportation uh about four hours after the judge said heard from the defendants, i.e.

COG, that they weren't gonna take any action against the director of transportation.

So we rolled in a week later to a really uh I won't use that word, irritated judge, and uh the judge gave us a blanket uh injunction, temporary injunction for the entire uh entirety of the case.

So they can't usurp policy.

They can't fire Michael, and uh, but they can negotiate, we put that in the agreement.

They can negotiate the triparty agreement.

And ironically, as government works, after we got into the lawsuit, we found back in the records where TechSot had sent a triparty agreement to North Texas that changed it completely and saying Techstott is the department, RTC's the MPO, COG is a fiscal agent, and we've had it since March of 2025.

So a month after we started our lawsuit, uh, yeah, no, a year and a month before we started off, so we had a document that solved the problem.

We'd have just executed it.

At this point, the COG had already made their case that they're the MPO and they were not going to back down.

So they appealed to an appellate court, uh jurisdiction saying you can't sue them because of uh immunity, but we're suing you individually, so it didn't work, didn't they?

The judge denied it.

So they appealed it, and they wanted a temporary injunction from the appellate court.

The appellate court looked at the uh uh request for a TRO from COG to keep RTC from signing the tri-party agreement, and uh they denied it with one word denied, and it was uh something curium, something party curium or whatever that is, meaning we're not even gonna tell you why because it was so ridiculous, it's just denied.

So we're still got our TI, uh, make sure that uh the MPO doesn't, the COG doesn't usurp their authority.

Last Thursday, the COG board had their annual final meeting.

The past presidents nominated a new slate of uh board members that will solve the problem.

Um the problem is is nobody they don't know who's a COG member because for 44 years they never kept records because there wasn't ever any controversy.

So there's no clear understanding about who is and who isn't part of the general assembly that will vote to elect the board members.

So uh as of yesterday, the council of governments had not sent out a notification to all the board members, all the general assembly members, which is if you're an entity and you pay your dues, you're a member, and you get one vote that they're changing the process.

It's not it's not included in the bylaws, but this is what they're doing.

They've sent out a form that you have to fill out designating who your representative is for that general assembly on June 12th, and you have to be physically present to vote.

Now, as of walking in here, I've asked of several counties, several cities if they've received any correspondence from council of governments providing that link for you to be able to fill out that form.

And as yet, I have not found anybody that's gotten it.

So then maybe they're gonna send it out tomorrow or today.

It would have been either from Victoria Johnson or Todd Little.

So it's important that I've got uh as your RTC representative I got that to Jill yesterday.

It's a very simple form, it just says uh who you represent, your name, and your where you live, and then you sign in title and you submit.

So if you haven't done that, we need it.

You need you only get one vote, so you need to see the I would suggest your RTC member because she knows more about what's going on with all of the politics uh of all this.

Uh make sure you designate somebody and get that form in before I'm saying before June 10th because we don't know what they're gonna do uh as far as Tom Foolery.

And I'm sure I left something out, and uh, here's Robert reluctantly ask if you have any questions.

Do we have any questions or comments?

Okay, council member Justice.

Thank you for that presentation.

If I can, I'm gonna kind of sum it up in city council language.

There's a fight over who is city council and who is say planning and zoning, and that's the example that's been used uh uh before.

So for 40 years, the uh municipal planning organization, uh, you know, there's been some, I think, discrepancy with the document in the past, however, the Regional Transportation council, which is made up of 45 mostly elected officials and the transit agencies, have made decisions regarding the entire region, and so there's a ledger.

So sometimes all of the you know, transportation or uh a disproportionate share of transportation dollars might go to the Northeast for a few years, but then there's this ledger, and we all make sure that then the Southwest gets their due and we act in the best interest of the region.

Um, I think lately there's been a push for the North Texas Central Council of Governments executive group to perhaps want to do away with this decision making, and they want uh the monies themselves.

So going straight to the counties, they decide which projects they want as opposed to looking at it regionally with this 45 member body that actually receives all of the information and deliberates where uh these money should go.

So um, so just to add a point on that, so tech start recognizes the RTC as the MPO, and here's how you know the uh RTC funnels funnels moves money around about almost a billion dollars a year uh in transportation dollars.

None of that money goes before the executive board for approval.

The only thing the executive board gets to chime in on is when the MPO, i.e.

the RTC wants to hire a consultant to do a transit study.

They go to their fiscal agent who's the cog and say, Hey, we need a consultant to do X.

They come back and say, We are the policy committee, we don't want to do X.

And the RTC says you're not the policy committee, we are, and we're telling you to do X.

And that's what we took to the judge and said, here are these examples where they have usurped our authority uh as the MPO, clearly defined in the federal statutes.

And so the judge granted us a temporary injunction to stop the council of governments from doing just that.

So even the fact that for 40 years, 50 years, however long 74 is to now, none of the money that matters in this region ever even went to the executive board for a decision-making process.

It was always done between RTC, TechStot, and this city partners, DART, the T, Metro, that is the T, that was a T, that was the Metro, and the airport board and NTTA.

So they've never had to act on any of that.

So uh the we're gonna win on the merit.

We've never actually gotten before a judge to talk about the merit of the law because they always throw up jurisdiction standing venue, all these procedural things, and we're not scheduled right now because we now they're appealing the judge's ruling on jurisdiction and standing to the appellate court.

We're not gonna have a trial in the trial court probably till November if this issue resolves.

So why is it matter who you go, who get you who you send, and who gets there on June 12th?

Those folks that believe that they want to keep control have to keep control of the executive board.

They were roundly thrashed at the the past president's nominations committee.

There were 22 members that showed up that day.

There's typically five to seven, and they they picked the slate that the Glenn Whitley was leading the charge for the normal people, I'll call you that call it that.

And our slate that we put up was gotten, we got every person we wanted on the executive board, and we moved every person we wanted on the executive board.

They know that their last stand, their Alamo is at June twelfth meeting.

If they don't get that slate of nominees removed, they're dead in the water because come June 28th or 29th when the new board meets, uh Clay Jenkins and uh uh Bobby Mitchell both said they're gonna make a motion to sign the trial party agreement, which ends the whole thing.

It's done and done.

And so it's very critical that didn't be there, and then uh pay attention to whatever happens.

So they're trying to turn the Regional Transportation council into just an advisory group, and in that instance, I don't think you're going to get the county judges and all the mayors uh et cetera, around the table and the important people that really need to be there to represent our citizens and say what needs to happen and what's in the best interest of the region.

Uh so there's this also been a lawsuit because of this.

Denton County initiated it.

However, the Regional Transportation Council voted to enter into that suit.

So the RTC is currently a party, as is Denton County, as is the executive cog board.

And I think their members potentially individually, I don't know if they've been dismissed.

So we here's why we know we're winning the case, because as we keep pushing forward with our information, various members of the executive board.

We had to sue them individually.

And I've learned more law in the last six months than I ever want to, but it's uh various something where they're doing it outside their jurisdiction.

Ultra virus.

That sounds like a plague to me.

That's that allows us to sue them individually, and we sued everybody except Bobby, even TJ Gilmore.

We just said sorry, TJ.

As we've gone through these, we've won every hearing, every injunction, uh, every whatever you call that appeal plea.

Um, and so we have people start peeling off.

So TJ, Jennifer Justice, Bowie Hog from Arlington, all these people, they said we're not suing to stop you from signing the agreement.

We're not suing you because you don't have standing.

We're just going to sue you that you shouldn't be able to sue us jurisdiction.

Then two or more people came in and said, Victoria and uh and Clay last week said, Hey, we don't want to be a party to this anymore.

So we agreed to let them come off.

So we're peeling off the executive board members uh slowly because when you read when you actually read the documents and not just listen to what they tell you in a meeting, the documents are empirically absolutely unequivocally clear on who the MPO is.

And um that when we showed it to some of the other board members, they weren't getting that information from their staff.

Um they changed their mind.

So we're just fighting a good fight to keep it going, but it's important that everybody show up on the 12th.

And this has been in the news, so I just thought it would be good for all of council to understand because of course I'm representing uh this city as well as a few other cities as your representative, and so I just uh wanted to make sure we were all on the same page and uh with open meetings act issues.

I didn't want to approach everyone uh individually.

Everything I've said here has been said in open court and pled and yelled at each other in RTC and Cog board.

So it's yeah, it's it's draining, but it's not in the back room stuff.

Yeah, uh, but it it is uh of the utmost importance for North Texas, I truly believe.

Um I do plan on being at the general assembly uh and voting.

Uh if anyone else is also planning to attend, I would urge anyone interested to attend.

It's in Hearst, Texas, in a couple of weeks.

Uh but please uh reach out to me if you're going.

Um and uh it's gonna be an important day.

And in July, if this council re-ups me to be the representative to the RTC, I do move into the vice chair position uh as an officer of that 45-member board, which is pretty cool.

So um any questions or clarifications that anyone has.

Well, I appreciate the updates.

I appreciate you you know initiating uh keeping us updated on this as well.

Thank you, Mr.

Pilster.

Uh we'll move on to item B, ID 26-077.

Receive a report, hold a discussion and give staff direction regarding homelessness initiatives.

All right.

Good afternoon, Mayor Pro Tim and Council.

Uh, today we're looking forward to discussing with you the city's homelessness initiatives.

Uh I'm sorry, I'm Jesse Kidd, I'm the director of community services.

I got thrown off because we did Mayor Pro Tem instead of Mayor.

Um, excuse me.

So today we're gonna discuss the city's homelessness initiatives.

We're gonna cover an overview of the state of homelessness in our community, including several direct and indirect indicators, and we're also gonna look to provide an update on the council direction given last April to improve homeless services in the city.

From the implementation of the coordinated entry system to the development of the housing and homelessness leadership team over the past 10 years, service agencies in Denton County have worked together to provide services for individuals experiencing homelessness.

It's a collective effort of many different agencies supporting different aspects of homelessness services.

The city supports services across the housing crisis response system, with the largest annual contributions being the 125,000 for street outreach services, 400,000 to support the operation of the Denton Community Shelter, $98,000 for backbone support and system licenses, and $80,000 for the barriers fund, which is a fund of last resort used to help cover those expenses that can help someone prevent them from becoming homeless or to get them out of homelessness.

With COVID funding disappearing this year, council approved the combination of ARP funds that we had remaining from ARP home and existing home underspend to support the continuation of tenant-based rental assistance through this year and next year.

Because homelessness is a difficult issue to quantify, there are various direct and indirect indicators that can help us understand the picture of homelessness in our community.

Direct indicators include any numbers that are intended to quantify as comprehensive a picture of possible as actual homelessness.

This includes things like the point-in-time count, which is the most ubiquitous and federally mandated count of people experiencing homelessness across the country, the housing priority list, which is a list of individuals who have been assessed by the coordinated entry system from a front door agency.

And then we also track encampments, and there are several indirect indicators, which include public services and public perceptions of homelessness.

Each year, communities across the country participate in a point-in-time count of individuals experiencing homelessness.

The count is organized by our local homeless coalition, now known as the Path Home.

They support, with the support of various different staffs from different agencies, including the City of Denton.

It's conducted every year in late January.

It's meant to be one of the coldest times of the year, and that is because if uh your experiencing homelessness at that time, it's believed that you truly have no other place to go.

It occurs all day on the day of the count, and it's conducted by volunteers and agency staff.

Over the past seven years, homelessness in Denton has continued to rise, hitting a peak in 2025 at 607 individuals counted in the city of Denton.

In 2026, the pit count recorded a 41% decrease from the 2025 count within the city.

This number was a surprising result for many members of the system and the community as the impacts of homelessness and the needs present.

Don't feel like they've just declined that much.

Many agencies still struggle with the amount of need that they have to support.

The City of Denton is no exception to that.

But it's important to remember that the point in time count's eminence in the homelessness conversation is largely driven by the fact that it is everywhere.

So every community in the country that receives HUD funding does a point in time count.

It's covered in newspapers, everywhere.

It's rolled up nationally.

It's something that's just very, very visible.

But the prevalence of it is not a reflection of the quality of its contribution to measuring homelessness in our community.

The pit count is a flawed measure.

Many people have talked about the limitations of it.

So it is just one thing that we look at.

It is not the main thing that we look at.

One of the things, Councilmember Stevens, you had asked about was the volunteer count.

According to the Path Home that conducted the count, there were 137 volunteers who participated in the 2026 count, which was a 34% increase over the 102 that they estimated participated in the 2025 count.

It's difficult to say exactly why the count was so much lower in 2026 than in 2025.

Some possible drivers include council's direction on shelter stays at the Denton Community Shelter, increases in permanent housing through the housing crisis response system and cooling rental market.

But we want to look at some other measures as well to help provide a more complete picture.

When individuals experiencing homelessness seek out housing support, they can go to one of the front door agencies across Denton County.

These agencies will attempt to divert the individual and identify solutions that don't require a permanent housing solution, but when that's not readily available, the agencies conduct an assessment, which is called a coordinated entry assessment, and that's to determine the individual circumstances and their vulnerability for dying on the street.

The score categorizes eligibility and prioritizes individuals for housing programs administered by one of our funded agencies in Denton County.

The United Way of Denton County provides the backbone support for managing that process and tracking the system performance measures, which are on their excuse me, the housing and homelessness leadership team's data dashboard.

I would encourage everyone to go look at that data dashboard as there's a lot of good information on it.

At the time of putting together this presentation, there were 298 individuals on the housing priority list.

The housing priority list is a helpful tool because it's a more up-to-date tool.

It provides a better sense of the number of individuals engaging with services in Denton.

Over the same time period from January 2025 to January 2026.

The housing priority list went from 580 individuals to 347, a decline of 40%, which was similar to what we saw in the PIT count.

At the time of this presentation, there were 155 individuals who scored higher, or excuse me, scored for rapid rehousing, which is a lower level of intervention, and 139 who scored for permanent supportive housing, which is a higher level of intervention.

If we were to provide every individual in our community with housing support scaled to their needs, the Denton County community would need an annual investment of around $4 million a year to be able to house each of those households.

Following council's direction to better track encampments and coordinate the citywide response, the number of encampments seen in the city has remained relatively stable over the past eight months, with 109 encampments confirmed in this fiscal year.

Encampments primarily occur on private property with concentrations along the 380 corridor west of 77 and around the downtown core and along the eastern loop.

Although we're still improving the maturity of the data collected of those individuals identified at encampments, 78% have been encountered once, 15% have been encountered twice, and the remaining 7% three or more times.

I know one of the concerns that council had voiced when we were implementing the encampment policy, or we were getting direction on the campaign policy last year was that we would be kind of just shuffling people around.

An indirect indicator of homelessness is just the community sentiment.

We saw in the community survey that a strong majority of individuals view homelessness as a moderate or major problem in our community.

The public's view of homelessness is a major problem did decline slightly from a majority surveyed in 2024 to the 44% in 2026.

The comments were indicative of a very divided community in the city's approach to homelessness.

That's not surprising.

Every one of us, when we see someone experiencing homelessness, we recognize that something is wrong there.

That's not the way that it should be.

To homelessness have seen a large decline year over year citywide, but especially at the Denton community shelter.

They were averaging about 1.8 trips to the shelter a day for fire and EMS.

Now they go almost every third day.

How many of those about 1.8 times a day on average?

Although fire and EMS related calls to uh calls related to homelessness have declined.

Calls for service for the police department have remained steady or increased in recent months.

The police department has attributed this increase in calls to service related to homelessness to a change in the way they track data.

So it previously prior to January, the calls were tracked as homeless related.

They've gone through and since changed it to where is a flag on it.

So before an officer clears a call, they have to identify if it is homeless related or not, and also they have to specify what the call type was.

So it's not a the individual doesn't go to a homeless call, the officer goes to a criminal trespass call, and then they identify it as having to deal with um the call dealing with someone related, someone experiencing homelessness, excuse me.

They've also attributed the increase in officer-initiated calls to working more closely with property owners and helping helping those property owners manage homelessness on their properties.

So when we look at things together, the 2026 pit count showed a 41% decrease from 2025.

Concurrently, the housing priority list declined by 40%.

Calls related to homelessness for our fire and EMS services across the city are down between 30 and 40 percent year over year.

Alternatively, police calls have increased.

It's difficult to say how much of that is attributed to improvements in tracking and how much is driven by an actual increase in calls for service.

Encampments have remained relatively steady, but we are still growing in our data maturity when we are looking at tracking and managing encampments.

Taken together, these indicators point to an overall decline in homelessness in the city of Denton, though there is still absolutely much work to do to adequately address homelessness in our community.

Last year, the sitting the city council held a work session where the auditor presented findings and recommendations to the city on the city's homelessness response.

The audit demonstrated a city response that was siloed and a shelter that was operating far beyond its capacity.

Staff recommendations and council's direction were meant to both increase our level of support for individuals experiencing homelessness and right size our capacity at both at the shelter in our community.

We believe the staff have made progress in both of these areas.

The 2025 audit of the city's homelessness initiatives provided findings and 19 recommendations for staff to address.

Staff have completed 10 of these items.

Seven are in progress and two are planned to be complete.

This is not the follow-up audit.

The auditor will do their official follow-up next year when they'll validate whether our assessment of this is correct or not.

But we look forward to working with the auditor on the follow-up.

Steps have been taken to better coordinate the response to encampments in our community.

An administrative directive was issued by the city manager designating community services as the department leading the city's encampment response in line with council direction and minimizing law enforcement engagement to the extent possible.

The encampment response directive seeks to codify the philosophy and approach to addressing encampments in the city and addresses the recommendations of aligning the response with state law.

We're using technology to track the life cycle of an encampment from report assessment notice street outreach to cleanup in a way that is accessible to everyone involved in the response, both internal and external partners, and are meeting regularly with those groups.

On private property, we're working to support property owners with a property owner guide and consultation on how they can best address issues of encampments on their property.

And on public property, we've ensured that notice of encampment closure is posted in English and in Spanish and have differentiated between active city property and vacant property to ensure we are balancing the self-the safety and health of our community with the needs of the unhoused to right size operations at the Denton Community Shelter and housing, the housing and homelessness leadership team created an ad hoc shelter workgroup to support our daily bread in designing a program that met council's direction for a housing focused program.

This work group was composed of staff from our daily bread, the city, the homeless coalition, providers of shelter and supportive housing, as well as individuals with lived experience.

This group created a shelter stay policy that outlined expectations for shelter clients as well as what clients should expect from the Denton community shelter.

The program created a system that requires weekly case management, volunteer hours, and continual progress on an individualized housing plan.

The capacity of the shelter was tied to the number of case managers on staff with a ratio of one to 20 established.

The average length of stay has dropped to 107 days, and the median stay for clients in the shelter at the time of this presentation is now 59 days.

In addition to the 120 program beds at the shelter, there are also 12 diversion beds, which are available to community partners for individuals who have a plan but need a safe place to stay for a short period.

So they're not having to enroll in the program, but we know where they are, they're in a safe place, and we can help them get to their next step.

Moving forward, staff have several focus areas related to homelessness.

We'll continue to prepare for our follow-up audit in 2027.

The shelter contract is currently with our daily bread for comments and recommendations with an anticipated bringback date later this summer, and we're preparing for discussions on uh the budget with city council.

We recently signed a data sharing agreement with Child Poverty Action Lab in Dallas to be able to view client-level eviction data across Denton County.

This is a very exciting first step in the department's efforts to build an air traffic control for residents who are at risk of homelessness to prevent it when possible and when not to help them quickly get back out of homelessness.

We're continuing to work with our community to better address homelessness, which includes conversations with community members in public meetings, as well as creating and supporting spaces where nonprofit organizations and grassroots organizations can meet to solve issues in our community.

As always, we're committed to improving the quality of data that informs our work and helps council and the community better understand the issue and possible solutions.

And with that, I'll stand for questions.

Thank you, Jesse.

Any questions?

Councilmember Holly.

Excellent presentation, as always.

Um on slide 14, the encampments and street outreach.

I'm impressed with that.

Is this an idea that that was created locally, or is this something that's being done in other communities?

And oh well, answer that, please.

The uh administrative directive.

That was something that was created locally here in collaboration with both our nonprofit street outreach vendor as well as with the police department.

It's a it's a difficult balance between helping individuals experiencing homelessness while also uh representing uh property owners and um enforcing the laws required by the state.

It's essentially a warning ticket.

Uh we not a warning ticket, it's a um uh it depends on the property ownership.

If it's on public property, we let people know that it's not uh a place where people can camp.

We try and refer to them to the shelter or connect them to other resources, and then only if we get to the end when it's time to clean up and people still haven't left, do we engage law enforcement?

The goal is to engage law enforcement as little as possible in the process.

For a private property, that is really the wishes of the property owner.

Um, if they say we in the property owner guide, we say we do this thing, it's called street outreach.

This is how we do it on public property.

If you'd like us to do it this way, we're happy to do it.

But if they say no, I don't want that, I want these people to leave immediately, then uh we have to honor those wishes as well.

Okay.

Okay, to slide number six.

Um I'm sad to see that when the shelter opens in roughly November of 22, there's a decrease in homelessness according to this.

And then it just goes goes straight up to near not record but near record levels.

And only now is it coming back down about to where it was when the shelter opens.

How's that?

Yeah, the the housing priority list is those those people that are on the list to receive housing services.

It's difficult to say exactly what all the drivers were in that.

Certainly the rising cost of rent contributed the um those households, those Alice households that are are close to uh becoming homeless.

You know, every every single one of us is some number of steps away from homelessness contributed to it, and then also the Denton Community Shelter um likely did contribute to the number of people that we saw in our community.

It's an excellent presentation.

Thank you.

That's it.

I'm I'm gonna go now.

Yeah, okay.

Any other questions?

Councilmember Justin?

Uh thank you.

Uh uh I just want to uh start out by saying thank you.

Uh a lot of the things that I think council talked about before as far as um gathering information, uh, like you said, the the data um versus anecdotal is incredibly helpful.

And I have to say, since you've come on board, Mr.

Kent, this has continued to increase and it is just incredibly helpful from the mapping from the different ways that you have implemented to uh gather actual numbers, it really helps us as as council and not experts in the field uh see what's really going on.

Uh secondly, I would say for a one year time period, I think it's quite impressive where the numbers have gone as far as the number of calls uh for fire in the EMS to uh the shelter, the number of people that are getting homed out of the shelter because they actually all have case workers and some of the other uh implementations.

Um I I think that it has exceeded expectations as far as what can be accomplished in a year, and with that, I also want to uh express my gratitude to all of those at our Daily Bread and our other partners that have made these changes, have um listened to not only uh their hearts, their heads, the community, but also uh the city's direction as well, and and work together to be able to say that these numbers are real and that's that's amazing.

And again, it certainly has not solved um the problem in our country as far as those experiencing homelessness for a variety of reasons, but um as far as what our city, meaning everyone included all of our partners in the city, um uh I'm just very grateful for all of the work that's been accomplished and um again it's not like we're at zero, we didn't expect to be at zero, but um I think these are incredibly indicative of the tough decisions that were made, and now we're getting to see the benefits of those in actual lives and people getting employed and people being housed.

Um, I wanted to ask you, and then I also know that we do have some of our partner agencies here, um, what has been the feedback from either this presentation or you know what you've received recently, or um, do we want a couple of minutes if if any of the partners want to express what they think is working or not working, or what um we're doing uh that's moving us forward.

Uh can you talk a little bit about that?

And then, of course, it's up to the Mayor Pro Tem and up to our partners if they want to um uh give any feedback or not.

I just wanted to make sure that everyone's welcome to do that.

Go ahead.

Sorry, yeah.

Well, thank you, Councilmember.

I I think you you hit it right on the head that we have to thank the people in the room and those agencies across Denton County who have worked so hard to support people.

Almost nothing in homelessness related work has a this one thing than this response to it related to increases, decreases, how to help people.

There's no silver bullet to any of this.

But I think the work that the these agencies have done to get better at housing people, and they have housed more people over the years, the maturity of the system have all contributed to better supporting people experiencing homelessness in our community.

And I'm happy to invite up if somebody would want to speak for about maybe four minutes.

If you'll say your name as well when you get up to the mic, yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, Gary Henderson, president and CEO of United Way of Denton County.

I just want to speak on behalf of the larger system.

When council gives clear policy direction, there's collaborative spirit among the agencies, the staffed where we know how to implement that policy into action.

So it really did start with you giving clear direction.

And thank you, Councilmember Jester, for describing those actions that followed your policy as tough decisions.

Those were not easy actions.

But as a city, you also put dollars into the system for diversion that enabled folks who needed to exit the shelter, give us as a system time and funding to divert them to places, locations, family members, resources where their probability of succeeding is much greater than it is here.

Denton's a lovely place.

Pam and I love being a resident of Denton, but for some folks, the cost of housing, the cost of transportation, the job they can secure here doesn't align earning with what it costs to be a member of our community.

Keeping them here in that upside-down situation is incredibly cruel and inhumane.

Diverting them to a community where they have a higher probability of success is a very positive outcome.

So policy and funding enabling us to work collaboratively to move lives into places where they have a chance to succeed.

I would highly recommend we hear from our frontline partners who day in and day out interact with those individuals.

But on behalf of United Way of Den County, thank you for your clear direction and your financial support to implement actions behind that direction.

Thank you, Mr.

Henderson.

This is putting you on the spot, so it's okay if now's not a good time for anybody, but please would you like to?

All right, thank you.

Yeah, yes, great.

If you'll say your name, we'll try to do about four minutes.

I'm Wendy McGee.

I'm the executive director at our Daily Bread.

So city staff, um, city council persons, thank you for the opportunity to share a little bit and kind of expand on Jesse's report here.

Um I will say that um there have been a lot of positives that we have noticed from these changes that we've made at the shelter.

It was not an easy thing to do because we did remove the emergency overnight shelter piece, and that is only kicks in during inclement weather.

And that was uh that was difficult.

Um, but we felt like providing the inclement weather option was still providing some emergency shelter, still providing um nine hours worth of day shelter was a better option, and then really doubling the number of people who have an opportunity to have a dedicated case manager, have a longer term stay and really work on what got them to the shelter in the first place, try to overcome those barriers and have them exit out to the other side into um independent housing and and to live independently and not return to homelessness.

The fact that we were able to double that essentially with the new program was very um exciting, but still, it is it is hard to turn people away in the evening.

Um we have seen some benefits.

We've seen an increase in the number of people that we've been able to put into permanent housing.

Um if I compare January to May of last year and January to May of this year, there's been a 33% increase in the number of people that we have transitioned out of the shelter.

They've moved through the program, they've worked with a case manager, and then they've moved into permanent housing.

So that's a significant number, and we're just talking about a short period of time.

Is that 33%?

Is that 33%?

Yeah, so that's a 33% increase.

The diversion beds, and Gary spoke about this, diversion is one of the first things we try to do with anyone who walks through our door, and if we can get them back to a support system, we certainly want to do that.

And that is open to just about anyone who comes in.

And so that is also a nice compromise from where we were before.

Our case managers, our shelter staff was just so overburdened.

We just did not have the funding to manage what we had going before, and so a lot of people were getting left behind.

All they had was the emergency shelter option.

They didn't have the case management piece, and a lot of times we weren't even getting in front of people when they came into the shelter to do an assessment to see if diversion was even an option.

And so it is nice that we have we've carved out these 12 diversion beds in addition to the 120 beds.

And anytime we can get someone back to their support system, we want to do that.

A lot of that is done through the barriers fund, and I think that was a little bit of what Gary was talking about, so we do appreciate that funding and that support from the barriers fund.

We also have some individuals and organizations that have provided some diversion funding as well.

Now, last year we did have more diversion than we have had during that five month period than we've had this year.

So there was about a 43% decrease in our diversion efforts since we've got since we've implemented the new program, or at least over those five months.

But we still have diverted 13 people this year from January to May back to a support system.

And then temporary housing has increased under this program as well.

And what we consider temporary housing are maybe someone is a survivor of domestic violence and they are fleeing, and we are able to get them to a DV shelter that can help them with their specific challenges and help them overcome what they've been through.

Also recovery programs.

We send people out to short-term recovery programs that may be struggling with addiction issues.

We consider those to be temporary housing.

Sometimes they come back to us, sometimes they go on into sober living and then they go on into independent living.

That's the best possible outcome, but we still consider that temporary because they may or may not be coming back to us.

There was has been a 13% increase in temporary housing for those folks since the from January to May of this year compared year over year, January and May of last year.

So the benefits of this program is that there is more individualized case management for more people.

Before we had increased our transitional side of the shelter to serve 60 people, 64 people.

Now we're at 120 plus the 12 diversion beds.

So that's that's about 100% increase.

We are seeing improved housing outcomes.

That's all good stuff.

It's a quieter environment.

That can be, but for some of us, our staff that thrive on the chaos sometimes, that can be a little bit of an adjustment.

However, for a lot of our guests, it can just be a lot to be in a shelter environment where there is so much going on around them.

And so I think the mood of the shelter, there's fewer people coming in.

That can be a benefit to some of our folks who who struggle with that too much sensory or they're going through trauma or whatever that may be that that makes it a little more difficult to be in a really crowded area in a crowded room.

I think some of the challenges that we've had is while we're working with people, we've got some positive housing outcomes.

There are still the thought that we will have a housing plan in two one to two weeks is just a little transactional to me.

Our relationship, we are trying to build relationships with folks.

We want to get to the underlying issues of why they are here in the first place, how we overcome them so that when they move leave us and they move into independent housing, they're sustaining that.

So we're putting something down on paper that we want to obtain permanent housing, and we want to you know have an income source, but to really get to the root of while they're why they're there, that takes a lot of time.

And so while our numbers are pretty good as far as length of stay, we also know that that 120 days that we're shooting for is strictly an average because some people may need to be there for a year or more because their barriers are so significant.

So I think it's really important for everyone to understand that we are still trying to balance having a goal of having people out with a hundred within 120 days, making sure they have a housing plan within this time, but individualized care as well, and sometimes those two kind of conflict a little bit, so that has been a bit of a challenge for us.

Um people who are not ready to jump right into a program and start working with the case manager, that has been a bit of a barrier.

So now you come into the program and immediately you're meeting with the case manager.

We're working on trying to figure out how we're gonna get you housed.

We want you to sit down with us, explain all of your challenges and all your barriers and what your history is and how you got here.

Again, that is stuff that um can be a lot coming at someone, especially if they're still very much in their trauma.

They're not ready to move forward and accept people.

So the program really requires that you come in prepared and ready to be a part of your journey to exit homelessness, and that's not for everyone.

Before you had the emergency shelter, and we could move people over as they were ready.

I know that was not a popular thing that was in the audit, but it was as they were ready.

We could move them into the transitional shelter.

Now you've got to be ready day one when you come in, and you've got to be ready to go, and if you don't, you may be exited.

And so that can be challenging with the new program.

We've had a waiting list, and so that has been a bit of a challenge because maybe there are people who are ready to come in, but they're having to wait.

We also have had difficulty in locating people.

So you have to fill out an application, and then you're gonna give us your contact information, and we're gonna try to call you or send you an email or work with our partners.

So we have street outreach partners that we work with, we have city folks that we work with to help us locate people, but we know that the cell phones don't always work, they don't always have access to a computer.

So there are significant number of folks that have their names have come up for the program, but we're not able to contact them, and so that has been a real challenge and a real barrier around this program.

And I think while we really tried to put information out, and I know the city did as well about what the program looks like now, and that the shelter is still open and we still have day shelter, and everybody can apply to be a part of this new program.

We're still running inclement weather.

Um there's a lot of misinformation out there.

Um we hear from a lot of folks that people think the shelter is closed, or you can't come in for inclement weather, you can't come in and eat, you can't come in and shower, you can't come in and get clothing.

All those things are still true.

We're still meeting those basic needs during the day, and everyone has an opportunity to apply to be on the pro in the program.

But I think that has been detrimental to I think it's caused a little bit of reputation harm to our daily bread, but more so it's detrimental to the people who are living unsheltered who may not be coming in because they're hearing that these services are not available to them.

So to sum all that up, all in all, we are happy that we are able to help more people um move out of homelessness and into independent living.

But it has been a it's been a journey for us, and it has been, you know, it's been peaks and valleys, and it's been um really challenging, I think.

So I appreciate all your hard work, Wendy.

And y'all are still giving tours if any council members haven't done it yet or haven't been there in a while.

I know council member Stevens just did a tour with y'all.

So I recommend it if anybody hasn't done it.

I think I did it last year.

And we're still seeing a lot of people, so I think now we're at we this year um we've had 860 people come in it was 840 last week we've had we've had a week now come in to the shelter seeking services so that's you know that's a significant number more than what is in the pit count so there are still folks out there um who are experiencing homelessness although our numbers slightly reduced from where it was year over year.

Okay any questions yes sir council member holland thank you this is a noble calling and I appreciate you answering the call thank you thank you um perhaps a year ago we I the the council heard that there were people in the shelter that had been in the shelter since day one and there was an effort to to get them on to permanent housing has that how's that going?

Um we have we have moved like I think it was last month I think we had four people who had been in shelter more than almost 270 days so they had been in at the start of this program but they had been there long before that so we were counting from September 1.

We were able to move them into permanent housing.

So the case management works and it works so much better than just throwing someone into housing and then trying to wrap services around them.

So having the time to work with folks and to um I think address whatever issues brought them there in the first place and to try to connect them to services to try to overcome those I think what we're seeing is that people will maintain more so than they would have if we were just if it was just transactional getting them into a home and then hoping that we could wrap services around them.

So it's really important to have that time with them in the shelter and so to answer your question we have a lot of long-term people that have gone through the program now who are getting case management and they have exited and I mean some of these folks we were like I don't know how we're ever going to be able to find a housing solution but working and working working with our community partners working with the individuals themselves giving them that dedicated time and support has really it has worked excellent excellent thanks to you and to all of you.

You're welcome.

Councilmember Stevens thank you I do have questions later for for Jesse as well but I want to ask a few of these to you because um and I'll echo definitely go uh visit our daily bread um I had the opportunity to go for two hours last week and it is really impressive um you know Woody was a great tour guide answered all my questions and the most impressive thing to me was the kitchen operation I mean it's just wild um nicer than any commercial kitchen I've ever been it's beautiful spotless and it's almost all volunteers and yeah just to highly recommend visiting because I I just for myself it's hard to want to make policy decisions if I don't understand what's going on places.

And so um thank you for having me there.

Um I did have a question uh about the I guess like the HMIS count to make sure I'm understanding it correctly so I had heard it was 840 uh when I was speaking with someone um at ODB right that's eight hundred and forty for this year is that correct yes and so it was and I rounded down it was actually eight forty two eight forty two yeah and and uh that's that's eight forty two you need to be duplicated unduplicated.

And so last year the total at just ODB was eighteen seventy nine that's probably that sounds about right.

We typically run around 1900 2,000 people a year unduplicated individuals.

And you had you had mentioned it was slightly down do you have any idea I did that based on a projection of where we would be with um if you just took that out over the the next what, seven months.

Okay.

And so we're looking at actually, I think Jesse, 1789, maybe or right around 1800, so slightly reduced from what we looked at last year.

Okay, awesome.

Um if it trends the way it happened sure.

And I would imagine colder months are a little busier.

Is that or is that an unfair assumption?

Um I th the high that we had and for inclement weather beds in January was 88.

We put out an additional 88 mats or put people in open beds.

Okay.

Um but the summer sometimes can be because it's longer, it seems like we only get usually a little bit of a cold snap, um, and and then people are coming in for that.

So it just depends.

Okay.

The other question was about the average stay, and I don't I don't know if I heard Jesse correctly or not.

Is the average stay now is 59 days?

I don't I don't know about that, but you can that may be across the board with everyone.

That was the median length of stay for our current clients.

Okay, I don't have any questions other questions then.

Thanks so much for being here.

Thank you.

Thanks so much.

All right.

Thanks, Ms.

Again.

Any other questions for or was there any other um service providers that wanted to speak?

Okay, seeing no movements.

Any final questions for us?

Yes.

Pardon you do?

Yes.

Oh, go ahead.

Wasn't finished, sorry.

Um, even before the uh shelter opened, it's it was curious to me to see in the information provided that um Lewisville, which is similar to our population, had such a small amount uh versus Denton.

Any thoughts or insight into why is it that in our region or area um or even in our county that Denton is where they come.

I mean Lewisville is closer to the metro areas, it just seems to make sense.

Um you would think they would have uh at least comparable, but they don't seem to any idea?

Yeah, uh so we are the county seat, and most of the services that support people experiencing homelessness, low-income individuals are located here.

Um so the the existence of you know the county's public health indigenous care program being here, um previously the two psychiatric hospitals, now the one psychiatric hospital being here, where anyone who is um uh who's uh involuntarily detained gets brought to Denton and then they're here.

Um we we are where the services are located.

Uh we do have the the two shelters, both our daily bread and the salvation army.

Um so there is a lot of a lot of the nonprofit kind of I'd say the nonprofit center of gravity is is here uh within the city of Denton.

Um and those all contribute to our disproportionate share of people experiencing homelessness.

One thing that is interesting is uh what the the uh um the uh Christine just texted me, don't forget about the jail being here.

Yes, the jail is a good uh is another point of of why we have that.

Um one of the things that's been really interesting about getting that client level eviction data is that we've been able to start to piece together uh the pathway where we see someone in our housing crisis response system, and then a few months prior, we see an eviction.

Um, and it's been really interesting, and I'm I'm really looking forward to be able to dive deeper into that data to show that um where we have people from Lewisville, Flower Mound, Roanoke who are here in our system that were evicted in in another city in our community, and how we can work with those other communities to help and strengthen eviction prediction because uh Denton has a proportionally lower share of evictions than the rest of Denton County.

This is all fascinating, and I can't wait to see how it comes out into opinions as we continue to learn more and done.

Thank you so very much.

Thank you.

Councilmember Stevens.

Yeah, thank you, and thanks for the presentation.

Um I heard from so many different people.

I think you had a meeting with community organizations last week on on uh inclement weather.

Yes, sir.

And it was just really encouraging to hear from other people.

The uh eclectic group of individuals that were there and collaborating with each other.

Um I think that's a big testament to the city's work of of doing that.

Uh and so I just honestly wanted to thank you for that.

Um I had a few questions that I I just want to make sure I understand um in the presentation.

And one's out of curiosity, because you had mentioned the pit count, you know, that it's flawed as a as a as a way to count.

Are there other models that are used that are more accurate?

Uh as far as the the pit count or ways of conducting the pit count, or um you're just talking about ways of of um trying to better track the number of people experiencing homelessness.

Yeah, I think that the the housing priority list is one of our best our best measures.

Um if we are engaging with individuals experiencing homelessness, if we are trying to get them into housing supports, they're they will be on this list.

Um and this is a a monthly updated list, it's better tracking, and and actually over time we've seen the the discrepancy between the pit count and the housing priority list narrow, which is kind of a good way they can check each other uh to see to see how accurate it is.

Um yeah, those okay that's probably our best the data data dashboard that United Way maintains.

Um just a few other questions.

One was just about um you you had talked about encampments, and that obviously the goal is not to shuffle someone into a new encampment.

Do we have uh data that shows where they are going?

Um I know that one of our goals is to uh move them from an encampment into shelter.

What measurements do we have to to look at how that's been working?

So we do have some performance data from our street outreach vendor on um how many people they've permanently housed uh month over month and their goals within that contract.

Um we could also there are probably ways to identify um, you know, when we've made the transition, let's say we identified someone in an encampment and then we helped them enroll in our daily breads program uh where we could go back and kind of look through the the system and track it.

One of the things that's really difficult about uh homelessness data is that there are so many agencies working on it and so many different data repositories between HMIS, between Athena where the police records data, the um the fire department's data, our data on encampments.

It sometimes can be uh difficult and time consuming to try and stitch everything together to tell a complete story.

Okay.

Another question I had was about the police calls.

Sure.

Um and I and I th I really think it's just because I'm not understanding um correctly.

So uh you had said that what well I I had asked ahead of time about the increase and just really asking for a breakdown um of what type of calls were received and that uh I know the police department couldn't do that because of uh coding process.

Um says that was uh single call type that prevented calls from being identified based on types, and so that is what it was in the past, but they've changed that now.

Yes, sir, and I I'm the chief police here is as well.

So I can speak to that if um thank you.

Good afternoon, counsel Tony Salah's interim chief of police for this meeting.

So to answer your question, um we've changed the way we were collecting data.

It was before it was the the model was the call for service how to be coded as a homeless initiative or homeless problem, and then that we were record the call service that way.

Well, that was inconsistent with what far was reporting and our other partners were reporting.

So any now any call that has related to a homeless individual is we're coding it that way through a call type.

So there's a call there's call for service types and there's a call type that we're recording under now.

Okay.

So you'll you'll show now that it's an unhoused resident, but then also specifically what uh the call was about.

Correct, it could be anywhere from a shoplifting to a criminal trespass to a domestic, so before we were actually we were trying to identify the actual a call for service in itself, but we were missing all the data related to any other calls that were related to home initiatives and stuff.

Okay, that's great.

I appreciate that change.

Thank you so much.

You might see an increase because now we're capturing all the calls for servers that are coming in that are related.

Okay.

And have you, and so has there been, I don't remember.

Has there been an increase in calls from residents?

Sure.

Okay.

So we're capturing those as well.

So those are um dispatch calls that also respond to.

For instance, if there is an individual on the property that they want trespassed or there's they're causing a disturbance at a location, then we're capturing that data as well.

Okay, thank you.

And then I just have one more question.

I'm sorry, Mayor Protect.

Oh, sorry.

Related to police, or just for me, thank you.

Uh thank you so much.

Um so I had a question uh about the HMIS numbers, just to make to correct my uh probably bad assumptions.

Um, and so if the numbers last year were 1879, and and I understand this is just ODB, it doesn't include any other uh organization where individuals have come for servicing.

But if that number was over 1800 and and this year for 2026, we're expecting roughly the same amount, maybe 80 less.

I think how that computes in my head is there's still the same amount of people coming for services, um, and that maybe the unhoused population is quite a bit higher than the pick count is accounting for.

Does that is that of like a fair assumption that I'm making?

Yeah, I I think that um the pick count is always going to be an undercount to some degree.

Uh we we try and do the best that we can to count every individual.

Just like with the housing priority list, we do the best we can to engage every individual.

But there are certainly going to be people who are not represented in either of those counts that that are there and that need support.

I think that the best way to think about it is the just to keep in mind how transient this population is, and so although we may see 1700 or I think 1764 is the estimate that we have a fit straight lines across for this year.

Uh unique individuals at the at the shelter.

Some of those people might be here for a few days, they might be here for months, or sometimes they're here for years, and so it's it's difficult to say um what on the given day, and that's what the the point the pit count tries to capture is on this given day this was the number.

Um but the inflows and outflows of that are much harder to understand because the population is so transient.

Okay, thanks.

Um those are really my only questions, uh just a statement, which is that I think as I continue to learn more about this, I'm cautiously optimistic but slightly concerned at the same time.

Um, and I think looking forward to what next year's numbers will be, because it's either going to be a trend or maybe not.

Um so a little concerned just because of the increase of calls, a little concerned because those HMIS numbers seem to be similar, but it does not take away from the fact that we are moving in the right direction when it comes to putting people in homes uh with a wider uh variety of people working together uh to help uh the unhoused, and so I really do appreciate that and I really appreciate the presentation.

Thank you guys, thank you.

Any last questions?

Um, thank you, Jesse.

I mean, I I know that this is a a team effort, as council member Stevens was saying, you know, we need everybody involved.

So I appreciate the work of everybody in the room on both sides of the room, as well as folks that aren't here.

Um there's always gonna be more work to do.

So I really appreciate the work that everyone in our community is doing on this.

Um as just as a reminder, you said that the audit you we expect next year the follow-up, yes, okay, at some point.

I don't know when council approves the auditor's plan, but that's that's my expectation.

Yeah, the expectation is next year we'll see the follow-up.

All right, thank you so much, appreciate it.

Thank you.

Next on the agenda is item C ID 26 0624.

Receive a report, hold a discussion and give staff direction on pending city council requests for one, an AI data facility application process and two debt environments relief and retirement fund.

Good afternoon.

I'm the assistant citizen city manager, and I'll be getting you started on the two-minute pitch process.

So the reminder, uh the requesting council member will have up to two minutes to describe and justify their request.

Remaining council members will then have a maximum of one minute each to provide feedback and indicate their support for the use of city staff time to respond to the request.

Staff will respond to all requests for a consensus of at least four elected officials as established.

The agenda committee will assist in scheduling items receiving consensus based on priority offered by council members.

Uh priority can be categorized as hi and moderate or low.

Today we have two two-minute pitch sessions.

Uh the first one will be the AI data facility application process, and then I'll turn that back to you.

Thank you so much.

Councilmember Stevens, you will have two minutes to give us your pitch.

When you start talking, I will start the timer.

Alright, thank you, Council.

Um the the pitch is pretty straightforward, uh, and it's about AI data centers and the concerns that we've also seen in the community.

Um that came to a head this weekend when I told Mayor Protect before the meeting I was sitting there drinking a glass of wine and watching parks and rec, and I saw this email, it was very colorful from someone that that was really concerned about the same thing too.

Um I'm gonna read it to you and then just explain or reiterate what it is that I'm asking for.

I'm proposing a work session for the purpose of having a discussion and providing direction on creating a possibility on how we as a city approach data center applications moving forward.

This would include, but is not limited to it, discussion on a temporary moratorium on future applications for the purpose of evaluating whether the projected infrastructure demand, environmental impact, and financial return associated with the two currently approved data centers align with their projections once operational.

Um I think we all know that this has been a big topic of concern for a lot of people in the community, but I I want to be clear about what I'm asking for.

I'm not asking for anyone right here to have an opinion on this.

I'm asking for us to have a discussion so that we can all form an opinion.

I think that's the only way we can do this moving forward is have all of uh the data, uh all of the details uh provided to us to see what if anything there is we can do.

Um it's clearly very important to the community, and and so uh that that's why I brought that up, uh, because I think discussions are good.

And um, and I hope you agree with me on that.

But that's all I've got for today.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Comments.

Councilmember Varriel, you'll have one minute.

Absolutely.

Well, I'm fully supportive of having this uh rated as a medium priority, um, like council member Stevens has said, you know, from the villages of Carmel up to Southeast Denton folks in district one have been concerned about this.

Um I do have a quick question for Mac.

Uh if the city does pass uh a um moratorium, a temporary moratorium, that would not preclude the citizen related uh initiated uh ordinance from taking place if they want to have a full on ban.

Because I know that's been a discussion by some of the citizens here in town about pushing for some type of citizen initiated referendum.

Wow.

Oh, we usually don't ask questions in this format, but my first time.

I think it's not a just for next time for next time.

Okay, but um no, those two are independent processes.

They would not impact each other if they do go forward on both.

Yep.

So medium priority.

All right, appreciate it.

Councilmember Holland.

Uh I I think it's a uh a topic that that's certainly uh bears discussion.

I don't see the rush.

I I'd give it a low priority.

Okay.

Councilmember Jester.

Uh thank you.

You know, I think um I I'm sure with uh everyone else in the world has read um different articles uh both uh saying you know the sky's falling and others saying it's really not as worrisome as you uh think as far as the water usage etc.

Uh but I I certainly don't see uh any reason to uh not look into and I think what what's important is that it's an impartial here are the facts here's how much energy it takes here's what we have here's what it costs us here's what we make if it is a danger to our water supplies etc.

So uh in that vein I'm I'm uh in agreement um and I would say medium to low as in it's it's not something that's gonna happen tomorrow as far as any one new knocking on our door so um that's where I am and thank you all right um for me I'm certainly supportive of having the discussion on um priority this is based only on time so as council member Jester was sort of alluding um we don't have any data centers in the queue we're hearing that aircot is sort of throttling things a little bit right now as they sort of um work on some uh new i mean they're trying to deal with a whole bunch of requests all at once um and we've been told it's gonna be probably at least a two years before they'll even start accepting new things so from the time standpoint um I would go low priority on this but I'd love to have a discussion um all right so that's everybody in support um I think we're kind of tied on medium low so just I guess where it makes sense um to to put that medium I'll say yeah we're medium yeah medium rare sorry medium rare all right council member Variel whenever you are ready um you will have two minutes when you start talking fantastic before I get into the pitch I do want to say this originated out of conversations with both the firefighters association and the city manager's office and I am asking for high priority as it is critical to our fire department I'd like to request a work session to discuss two related items concerning the Denton Firemen's relief and retirement fund a cost of living adjustment cola for retired firefighters and the transfer of our 911 dispatchers from the fire pension system into TMRS.

On the first item our retired firefighters gave decades of their service uh service protecting this community the city of Denton's general fund balance currently sits at nearly 42.8 million uh 23.6 percent of expenditures well above the GFOA recommended 16.67 percent floor and our total governmental fund balance has increased over 47 percent since FY23 the city is at a strong fiscal position meanwhile our retired firefighters have seen inflation steadily erode their fixed pension benefits a COLA is not just a financial question it is a moral one these retirees make career long commitments to the city and we should honor that commitment with the work session to explore what a COLA would look like and what the city can responsibly support.

On the second item right now dispatchers under the age of 36 are required to enroll in the firemen's relief and retirement fund and contribute 12% of their gross pay every other city employee pays seven percent through TMRS there's a five point penalty on every paycheck for dispatchers at the start of their career at a time when we're already struggling to recruit and retain qualified 911 staff.

Moving dispatchers to TMRS aligns them with the rest of our workforce reduces the financial burden on new hires and strengthens our ability to staff the communication center both of these issues directly affect our ability to keep promises to those who serve and to recruit the next generation of public safety professionals.

I'd like to ask my colleagues to support scheduling a work session so staff can bring us full actuarial and fiscal analysis on both items.

Again this is supported by both uh the fire association and after conversations with our city manager's office and I am asking for high priority thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Stevens and thank you for uh presenting this I I agree with all of the above um uh I'm I'm very fascinated in particular with with the second item on there and really interested to see what we can learn.

Um but but yeah, I do think this is a high priority I I know that uh the city manager's office number one priority in has just been making sure.

Well, I'm gonna say my number one priority.

Um I think it is really important that as we work through the budget and everything else.

One of the things that we all want is to make sure that we are respecting staff, respecting employees, and and so I I I uh I I think it would be great to just look at the data and see what we can do.

Thank you.

Councilmember Holland.

Thank you.

Uh since it's supported, I'm gonna understand by the city manager's office.

I'd love to hear some something from the city manager about this.

Um and I'm and I'm fascinated by the the sentence the city is in a strong fiscal position.

Uh that has not been my understanding.

So I'd like some clarification on that, if that's appropriate.

Is that that's not typical?

No.

Okay.

Okay.

Based on not having that information, kind of where do you I'm I'm a I'm a police and fire guy.

I'll give it a high support.

Okay.

Councilmember Chester.

Um I know that it's highly technical, uh, just the little bit I do know about as far as I do believe we have meet and confer this year.

Uh so a lot of that is tied up in different types of um agreements.

I know it's different, our police and fire departments as far as uh the negotiations with the unions versus the executive staff, etc.

So, you know, saying it's a high priority, it still might take a little while because I think it is very technical, uh, but I think seeing comparables and making sure that we are doing our best uh for our fire and police.

Um, you know, I'm I'm always going to be in favor of so um I think it's a good idea.

Thank you.

Okay, um, and then I'm gonna add my voice to that as well.

Um, always happy to have a discussion, and and if it makes sense if we're able to put that in this cycle, let's do that.

Um, but you know, I recognize sometimes it's not quite feasible as quickly as we would like.

So um, I think we got high priority across the board on this one.

Oh, wait.

Oh, wait, we haven't.

Congratulations.

All black people are.

Before we go into closed session, there was one thing I forgot to say earlier about our consent agenda.

Um, on consent agenda, we are pulling it F and G as well.

Um, those items are just not moving forward at all, so we're not going to be voting on those.

So that is items F and G.

And with that, the City Council will now at 3.28 uh p.m.

convene and close meeting to deliberate the closed meeting item set forth on the agenda, which shall include the following item A, ID 26-0839, consultations with attorneys under the Texas Government Code Section 551.071 regarding resolution of a case styled Jesus Manuel Rodriguez Rivera versus City of Denton, um, and also consultation with attorneys under Texas Government Code Section 551.071 regarding uh litigation styled Brianna Leanne Nix, um, as well as item C, ID 26-0081, consultation with attorneys under Texas Government Code Section 551071 regarding resolution of the litigation styled State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company of Subrogyee Flow Electric LLC versus City of Dunn.

City Council has now at 357 p.m.

reconvened from closed session and no official action was taken.

Um earlier consent agenda items L, M, and N were pulled from consent.

They've now been placed back on the consent agenda.

And that concludes our work session at 3.57 p.m.

We will reconvene in the council chambers at 6 30 p.m.

Thank you.

Welcome back to this meeting of the Denton City Council.

The time is 6 30.

We have a quorum, so I'll call this meeting to order.

First item on the agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance and the pledge of the Texas flag.

Stand with me if you're able.

I pledge allegiance.

To the fly of the United States of America.

Honor the Texas flag.

I pledge allegiance to the Texas.

One state, under God, one and indivisible.

Next item on the agenda is presentations from members of the public.

I think we don't have anybody today.

So then we will move on to consent agenda.

Items F and G have been polled.

We will not be voting on those.

That's not going to move forward.

So do I have a motion for consent agenda accepting items F and G.

Councilmember Villarreal.

Move approval of a consent agenda except items F and G.

Councilmember Stevens.

Second.

Hearing a motion and a second.

Do we have any questions?

Alright, let's vote on the screen.

Oh sorry.

It's happening.

Nothing.

Sorry.

That motion passes 7 0.

Next item on the agenda is for public hearings.

Item A, S25-008A, hold a public hearing and consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of Denton, Texas regarding a request for a specific use permit to allow a monopole tower over 85 feet use on approximately 0.04 acres of land approximately located on the western corner of North Elm Street and Rhiney Road.

Good evening, City Council members.

Matt Bodine, Assistant Planner.

I'm here presenting case S258A.

So this is a request for a monopole telecommission telecommunications tower over 85 feet in height on in the mixed use neighborhood zoning district on approximately 0.04 acres of land at the western corner of North Elm Street and Rhiney Road.

The surrounding area consists of multifamily to the west and then public and institutional uses to the north and the south.

Applicant is requesting to construct a 105-foot tall cell tower at the location, along with a small building for technical support, and then planting shrubs and other landscape around the facility.

So this request was reviewed against the criteria for approval in the Denton Development Code, both for general applications and for the specific use permit.

Staff found that it should be consistent with those criteria.

And so this request is in alliance with that goal.

This request was notified to the public or the public was notified according to city and state law.

Additionally, the applicant held a meeting, but no residents attended.

And then staff has not received any correspondence from the public.

Staff is recommending approval of the SCP as it meets the criteria with the conditions that it substantially comply with the attached site planning landscape plan.

Additionally, planning and zoning commission recommended approval at the April 29th meeting.

I'm here to answer any questions.

Also, the applicant is here if there's any questions I can't answer.

Do we have any questions for staff before I open the public hearing?

Seeing none, I will open the public hearing.

Anyone wishing to speak can come down and fill out a card after if you would like on this particular item.

Anyone wishing to speak on this item?

Seeing none, I will close the public hearing.

Any other questions for staff or can I take a motion?

Councilmember Villarreal.

Move approval.

Councilmember Jester.

I'll second.

We have a motion and a second.

Any final questions?

All right, seeing none.

Let's vote on the screen.

That passes seven or sorry, six zero.

Next item on the agenda is items for individual consideration.

Item A, ID 26-0533.

Consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of Denton, a Texas Home Rule Municipal Corporation authorizing the city manager to execute a contract with Alderink Enterprises, Inc., DBA, CI pavement, Diamond M construction and Land Services LLC and Solid Foundations Concrete LLC for the construction services for parking lot repair, reconstruction, and maintenance of city facilities for the facilities management department.

This is for a one-year contract with the option for four additional one-year extensions for a total of five years, not to exceed amount of 17,800 and 808,000.

And the public utilities board recommends approval at 6-0.

Good evening, Tom Gramer, Director of Facilities and Fleet Services.

We're here to request a pre-qualified vendor list for municipal parking lot repairs and maintenance for the facilities management department.

The facilities management department maintains and repairs municipal parking lots with parks, streets, and utilities, also able to use this contract for ADA upgrades and other flat work needs.

The August 2023 parking lot assessment and ADA transition plan adopted on January 11, 2022, identified multiple municipal parking areas requiring repair, maintenance or rehabilitation to ensure safe and effective facilities access.

The proposed pre-qualified list enables job-specific contractor selection to complete required repairs, maintain adequate accessibilities for staff and visitors, and support ADA upgrades identified in the transition plan.

Staff uh the city will only pay for services rendered and is not obligated to pull a file uh pay for the full contract unless needed.

Here you're gonna see two two charts that highlight the contract estimate.

The first contract estimate by year is the work plan we derived from the parking lot assessment and the ADA transition plan.

The FY2526 council adopted CIP budget is what was extracted from the budget that could be utilized to fund this contract throughout the five years.

On the right hand side, you'll notice a uh example project where we upgraded the Civic Center ADA approach.

Staff recommends approval of a one year with four additional one year extensions and a total of five years not to exceed amount with CI pavement, diamond M construction, and solid foundations for 17 million eight hundred eight thousand dollars.

Any questions?

Questions for staff?

We have Council Member Holly.

Uh I may be having a deja vu moment.

Did we did we have a similar uh item like this come up just recently?

I don't believe recently, sir.

Uh the facilities management department two and a half years ago did bring a pre-qualified vendor list for general construction with inside the facilities, and that's for renovating offices as we need more space.

Okay, okay.

Thank you.

Yes, sir.

All right, any other questions?

All right.

With that, I'll take a motion.

Councilmember McGee.

I appreciate um the staff work that was done to bring this forward.

I will say for the public, I don't love the optics of this.

I'm gonna move approval, but the optics of this are once again, we're taking care of city facilities when there are a whole lot of streets in town that could use some attention.

17 million dollars is a lot of money that could go toward fixing more potholes and taking care of residential streets that those of us who are block walking this time walking up and down these roads so desperately know that those streets need to be done, particularly in Southeast Denton.

So, again, I'm gonna move approval, don't look the optics.

I understand what we have to do.

Thanks to staff for your work.

Sir, may I address that concern you have?

Of course.

So from here, if you notice that the departments that can utilize this contract, it also includes the streets right of way.

So while this is for facilities management and the municipal parking areas, say if we're in the municipal parking lot and the right-of-way of the sidewalk that's part of the streets um improvement area needs to be done.

We can utilize this contract to do that work as well, and then we also save on mobilization costs.

So we're not looking at just the parking lot, we are looking at adjacent areas that we could fulfill that need as well at this time.

So this also does solve some of that problem.

Councilmember Via Villarreal.

Second.

We have a motion and a second.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, we'll vote on the screen.

Thank you.

That passes 6-0.

Next item on the agenda, item B, S26-002.

Consider adoption of an ordinance of the city of Denton extending the approval period for a specific use permit for a multifamily use originally approved via ordinance.

Uh S23-001A for approximately 2.4 acres of land, generally located on the south side of North Elm Street, approximately 560 feet east of Ronnie Road in the city of Denton.

Good evening, Mayor Potem, members of council.

Ashley Extead Associate Planner.

This is S262, the SUP extension request for 3301 North Elm multifamily.

Their request is to extend the approval period for one year for a specific use permit for a multifamily use on 2.4 acres of land.

This property is zoned R7, and the future land use is neighborhood mixed use.

It is currently undeveloped.

The original ordinance was approved in September 17th, 2024.

And this is not a reconsideration of any of the elements of the initial project, it is only the extension request.

This site is located near North Elm Street, which is a primary arterial with four divided travel lanes and surrounding uses are undeveloped property, residential automotive fuel sales, church, and single family dwellings.

The site plan contains two buildings with 67 dwelling units.

They are three stories tall or approximately 40 feet.

The buildings are shown here in purple, and they are have planned them around the easements.

They'll also be providing a left turn lane, which is shown here with this blue rectangle.

And one full access point, which is circled here in blue, and one emergency only access point, which is circled here in green.

SUPs do expire 12 months after approval, unless the construction is substantially underway.

So this project would expire in September 17th of this year.

The applicant has approved civil engineering plans and a final plat, and they've also submitted a building permit.

They are requesting additional time due to the current cost environment and the need to secure additional financing.

The original approving body may grant an extension of the approval period for up to one year for good cause.

The DDC does not define good cause, but just some examples of recently approved SUP extensions, good cause was found to be financial in September of last year, and then additional time for easement encroachment agreements last month.

Staff does recommend approval, and if approved, the extension would be valid through September 17th of 2027.

I'm happy to answer any questions, and the applicant is also here for questions.

Thank you.

Questions for staff.

We've got council member Villarreal.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Uh, quick question.

So we know that it over the last 24 months, they've not been able to secure the financing or uh, you know, have reduced cost on the building materials.

We believe that's going to change over the next 12 months substantially.

I'm probably not the best person to answer that, but maybe the applicant would be better at you.

I can wait.

Yeah, you can go ahead and come up.

Hi.

Uh to answer your questions, yes.

Well, what happened is we have the fund and budget.

But because the permitting process and the architect and engineer design took longer than what we expected and inflation, that's why the budget be estimated for lumber and construction.

Uh has changed tremendously, as we all know.

And this is the difference we're trying to gather.

So we can start the construction, you know, even today, but then we just want to make sure when we started, we have enough budget to be able to finish the project as we promised in a way that we want it.

So this is the only reason we want the extension to be able to gather.

And to answer your question, yes.

Within a month, we have other assets and properties that we're trying to exchange and just uh put that budget into that land or get an investor.

This is our uh plan A and B that we have.

Awesome, thank you.

Of course.

Councilmember McGee.

And let us know who the question is directed to.

Oh, I guess um.

This will be for staff.

Okay.

Sorry, thank you.

Of course.

Thank you, guys.

So the code doesn't provide for specific reasons that a project can be extended, the timeline can be extended, correct?

It doesn't it doesn't define good cause.

So um this body can grant an exception for one year for good cause.

It does not define what good is cause is, so that is up to your discretion.

Have we done this before?

Grand extensions for the for specific use permits?

Yes.

There was one last month and then one in September of 2025, but we don't see them often.

What were the reasons for those?

So that one was financial and one was additional time to work through easement encroachment agreements.

Um I'm curious to know, Madam City Manager, if this should be added to the code, some specific requirements, if good cause should in fact be the defined.

We can look at different or staff has an opinion on that.

We can look at defining it in the code.

We're working on some code updates right now, so we can add that to our list.

Okay, because this is based on what you're saying, this is three now in this year's timeline, right?

In this year's last month and the September 20th.

So that's basically three now in a year, right?

Okay.

Um, and given so we're gonna do a year extension.

When does the applicant expect to actually begin the construction with securing the finance and all that stuff?

When is the shovel going to be in the ground?

Um, they have their narrative stated that they would hope to be in construction next year.

Um maybe the applicant can speak to more specific details of that.

Um do you mind, uh Madam Chair?

If it comes up again, yeah, sure.

Yeah, if you'll come back up to the microphone, please.

Thank you.

And I'd love to know your name if you don't mind.

You didn't start your name.

My name is Raza.

Speaking at the microphone.

Uh, can you hear me now right now?

Yeah, yes, sir.

Okay.

Yes, you ask for my name.

My name is Reza.

Uh, to answer your question, we are planning to start beginning of 2027.

This is the first quarter of 2027, and the reason uh we are planning that will work if we don't find an investor.

We have a medical office in Plano that is already for sale.

So by that time, we are hopefully we're gonna be okay.

So this is our plan, but we just want to hear extension to again to make sure we have the enough fund to start.

And uh uh to give you guys just more insights.

When we start this project, it was about three years ago, West, we estimate the lumber and construction roughly about uh eight uh eight and a half, let's say nine nine million, and right now the closest you know bet that we just received from different uh uh uh contractor is 13 and 14.

So again, it's a huge difference, and this is why we have to come up with budget.

It's not that we did not plan for the budget, it's just the inflation and uh the time period that we started this project by now.

Thank you very much, sir.

Of course.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Sure.

Any other questions?

We've got one more from Councilmember Stevens down there.

Yeah, hi, how's it going?

Um, I did have a few questions.

Well, uh one I just I wanted some clarity because when I was reading the backup material and I was really uh reading the extension request.

Um it had said that the the main reason was uh for you know increased uh cost of product, uh which I understand, but you had mentioned that there were additional reasons, which was maybe a cause of delay due to engineering, or or did I miss it?

No, no, no.

So what we to begin with, when we uh uh started this project, we didn't think that it's gonna take that long for all the pyramid things being true.

It took us almost uh uh two and a half years to get to this point.

So uh when we started it, our estimated lumber and construction cost, as I mentioned, it was around 9 million.

Right now it's way more.

So we're trying to come up with the difference.

That budget is already available, as I mentioned.

Right.

We can start like today, but again, we want to make sure in the middle of it, then if what if we cannot come up with the difference?

We don't want to use the cheap material, we don't want to stop the project.

We just want to make sure, as all we are five partners, we're all professionals and and details oriented.

So we just want to make sure once we started it, we can finish the project with the way we design and we want it to be, to bring the value to not only the denton, but the building that we have.

Right.

And you you mentioned multiple avenues for funding.

Um your best guess, I mean, what do you think the timeline is for you to receive the first quarter of 2027?

Okay, so this is what we're shooting for, but again, this is the the best scenario.

Okay.

What's the worst case scenario?

It's gonna be less than a year for sure.

Okay, yeah.

This is this is just the the again, we have no other options, and and to to give you more insight, we spent about $500,000 as of today for all the architect engineer design, as well as uh the permitting cost.

So obviously, if you don't start this project within you know a year, you're losing that money.

So again, there's multiple factors that you're planning to start, you know.

The best scenario, first quarter of 2027, and the worst scenario to answer your question is less than a year, no matter what happened.

Okay, and again, we have other sources to be able to to get that fund is just gonna take time to exchange that money from one place to another.

Okay, all right, thank you.

Of course, and I'll just ask you one more question before you before you sit down.

So just to confirm it's it's you're just looking for more capital effectively.

The costs went up, and you're looking for the capital to be able to fund the increase.

That's the basic notice.

Okay, that's all I have for you.

Thank you.

Ashley, I have one question for you.

Thank you, sir.

Um, and that they they can only get one extension, right?

Yes, it's one and and done, basically.

Okay.

Any other questions?

Do I see a motion?

Oh, councilmember Stevens, you have another question.

Yeah.

So it it's one year total that can be applied.

Uh could uh uh the council um extend this at first for a shorter period of time to see if there's movement.

So that the DDC has said you can grant it for up to one year.

Um I don't believe we've ever thought through that.

Okay.

All right, thank you.

I think Max's looking.

Councilmember McGee.

Yeah, I'll make the motion.

Um thank you for being here.

Thank you for the work that you all have done now.

Uh I'll be honest and say I don't love this.

Um, having said that, I do think this is this raises something very interesting.

Um that DCRC might want to take a look at, given that this is the third one, and this year, I do think that this is right for DCRC to look at defining good cause in the code so that perhaps this doesn't have to come forward to future councils, and the decision can be a little easier.

So don't love it, but with that, I will motion for approval.

Also don't love the fact that it's first quarter of 2027, it would have been a lot easier for me to do this if your construction was gonna be a little quicker.

I understand given the market, you don't know when your building and planel is gonna sell to inject more capital into this project.

I understand that.

So given those factors, I am gonna make the motion for approval.

Councilmember Jester, second.

Having a motion and a second, do we have any further discussion?

Councilmember Stevens.

Yeah, I um would just like I I guess to ask staff uh maybe six months down the road, if you could just provide an update to council.

I think it'd be helpful for me to see uh where they're at if they're closer to receiving that funding.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any further discussion or questions?

Seeing none, let's vote on the screen.

That passes five one.

Next item on the agenda is item six, concluding items.

Councilmember Stevens.

Thank you so much.

Uh great, very long meeting that we had here.

Um, just a few things.

Reminder, uh, early voting.

Uh so we've got that for until next Tuesday.

Make sure you cast your vote.

If you're interested in participating.

Also, uh I've got to say uh to the city manager, our our neighborhood streets have been looking phenomenal recently.

Sidewalks, new grass.

I love it.

And it has made such enjoyable uh walks.

In fact, Atmos even finished on Oak Street.

And so it's just been a beautiful stroll in the morning minus the humidity.

Last thing I'll say is it is June 2nd.

And so I just wanted to acknowledge Pride Month.

Happy Pride Month to our LGBTQIA plus brothers, sisters, siblings, residents.

I'm glad that you are here.

You're a part of this community.

You're loved by this community.

And you are loved by God.

And I'm very appreciative of that.

Thank you.

Councilmember Villarreal.

Councilman Stevens stole both the things I was gonna say, but go vote and happy Pride Month.

Thank you.

Councilmember McGee.

And to pick up there, we should go vote because if it didn't matter, they wouldn't be working so hard to make it more difficult for us to vote, as I say every time from this dais.

Happy Pride Month.

Happy Black Black History Music Month.

Um was really enjoying listening to uh uh Sly Stone on the way into work this morning or this afternoon.

Um, having said that, um, in the in the past couple weeks there has been some some ugly attacks um based on sexual orientation that has been levied in our community.

Um we know that these things are real, these things are still happening.

It was uh a congress member from Tennessee, not gonna use his name and give him any shine, who literally just tweeted out happy nuclear family month.

And we knew exactly what we knew exactly what the hell he was trying to say.

It's shameful and it's disrespectful.

And what makes Denton great is that this community is a place that respects all.

Everybody's welcomed here.

Everybody has an opportunity here, no matter where you're from, no matter what you look like, no matter who you love, no matter your skin color.

Denton has got to stand up and continue to be a place where we are all welcomed.

I am happy to live in this community.

I'm happy to help serve this community along with you all because it's us who will carry the torch in protecting those ideals for the most vulnerable of Dentonites.

So, yes, please go and vote, and let's all celebrate Pride Month and the way that it was intended to be to be celebrated.

Thank you, madam chair.

Councilmember Holland.

We give people so many opportunities to vote that they say, I could do it today, but I'll do it tomorrow.

Gosh, you know, I got a Girl Scout meeting tomorrow.

I'll do it the next day.

You know, we're gonna go to a volleyball game.

It it's so easy, it is so easy.

People say it's hard.

It is so easy.

I went to vote Monday yesterday.

I was the only human being other than the poll workers in the polling place.

It is so easy.

Don't let people tell you voting's hard.

Voting is easy, holy cow.

I met some people yesterday that have been rescuing cats, and they pay out of their pocket to uh neuter these cats, and they take care of them and they feed them and they keep them off the streets.

And um, and and I'm and I'm very, very proud of that.

I'm uh I think that's I think that's a noble calling.

Speaking of cats, I still want to sell dogs at the animal shelter.

I don't mean sell them, I mean go go to the animal shelter and find your new best friend.

He she is waiting for you, their tails are wagging, the dogs are clean, the place is clean, the staff is pro.

They are waiting to give you your new best friend.

Please go by and and say hello.

And I want everybody to keep a little box, someplace, someplace in your house.

And when you have a burned-out flashlight battery, put your flashlight battery in that box, and when the box gets filled up, call solid waste and say, I got a box full of batteries that I want you to come by and pick up, and they'll come by and pick it up.

They'll ask you how many batteries they got.

Pick them up.

It's easy.

It's just like voting.

It's it's so easy.

And and uh we'll keep we'll keep batteries out of landfill.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

Excellent job today.

Oh, thank you.

No others.

All right.

Well then I will uh end us with uh Councilmember Jester and I actually went on a parks tour yesterday with the parks board.

Um we hopped on a big bus and we rolled around the city looking at all the really great projects that are happening.

Um I was really excited by the villages of Carmel uh Park.

I didn't even know that was happening.

Um it's gonna be lovely.

I think the grand opening is gonna be July, I think is what they said.

So um lots of great stuff happening.

Discuss Denton has everything you could learn about what's happening in parks.

Um something else I wanted to let you know about is staff from development services have been hosting pop-ups during or going to be hosting pop-ups during the summer to gather public input on the proposed tree preservation code amendments.

These have been in progress for about a year before I even got on council.

This was being worked on.

So the proposal is out there for tree preservation amendments, and staff are gonna be gathering input.

It's it's pretty much scheduled at um uh at libraries um around the month.

Um Discuss Denton has a page about the proposed tree preservation code amendments so you can go look at those.

You can look at the red line of the exact code of what we're proposing.

Um so please participate in that, give your thoughts.

Um I think planning and zoning in council might see those items this fall at some point.

Um, and then I also wanted to add my voice to Happy Pride Month.

Um, this is a time for people to celebrate who they are, even as people try to force them to be somebody else.

Um you're you, you have value, you're loved, be kind to yourself, be kind to others.

And with that, at 7 p.m., we'll conclude this meeting of the Denton City Council.

Thank you.