Marcella, can you do roll call?

Thank you.

Councilmember Condi?

Here.

Councilmember Garcia.

Here.

Councilmember Solario?

Here.

Councilmember Weiss.

Here.

Councilmember White?

Present.

Mayor Paneda.

Here.

And Vice Mayor Nielsen has an excused absence today.

Thank you.

Yeah, you you're up.

Yep, Mr.

Mayor, you're up.

Well, good morning, everybody.

Thank you for uh being here this morning.

This is uh an important uh milestone not milestone, but an important opportunity for all of us to engage this morning uh as a as an organization to kind of set the tone for what will occur over the next few years, and uh in order to do that, uh the body of the the council um is here this morning to uh listen and to observe and to participate in this strategic planning process.

I'd like to thank our consultant team uh for helping us and assisting us with the with the process and our guests this morning, our panelists uh who are going to be presenting some information.

Um but uh I look forward to an uh an excellent day to really take everything in as um we push forward and turn that information into output for our residents, and I really look forward to it.

So thank you again for being here, and thank you to Coldwater Coffee uh Bakery and Coffee uh for the excellent breakfast this morning.

And uh I will turn it over to is it Anisa?

It is, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you.

Hi, Mayor and Council.

Again, thank you all for joining us today.

Thank you to our panelists for joining us today.

Uh we've prepared a series of panels for you, um, including representation from important areas such as health care, natural resources, human services, um, and economic development.

We want to again thank our panelists for volunteering their time with us today to share their perspectives on the current state of their industries and what future challenges and opportunities uh lie ahead in the next five years, especially as we go through the strategic planning process.

Uh we'll close the day with an update from our economic development director um and an economic outlook from rounds consulting.

So we hope today sets the stage as the council continues the strategic planning process and just thank you all for uh your time here.

And I'll pass it over to our consultants just to introduce themselves and let you know a little bit about them.

Good morning, Mayor, members of council.

I'm Nancy Hetrick with Jen Janae Janik and we are members of the consultant team that will be with you for the next couple days.

Tomorrow will be the day that we really spend time thinking about and strategizing for the next uh three to five years for the city.

We're really looking forward to that.

Today will really be an opportunity to whet your appetite for those conversations that will occur.

Uh I've been working um doing management consulting with local government since 2006, doing a lot of strategic planning and facilitation work um across the West.

Uh, and delighted to have the opportunity to work with all of you tomorrow when we all go live and we get into a real workshop setting.

Uh it should be really good conversation.

So looking forward to it.

Thanks.

Well, we have just a few minutes before our first panel begins.

I know we're still waiting on one panelist, so if we want to wait till 8 15 and give her a few minutes.

By the way, Centra's last minute, so this uh this wasn't originally on her agenda, so uh hopefully we'll give her a little bit of grace.

But um one of the things that I hope happens today and tomorrow is this is really the council's meeting, and so feel free to ask questions, feel free to probe.

It's also a great time to begin to provide uh feedback or direction um uh uh from individual council members, especially today if there's something that piques your interest or that you want to bring up for tomorrow.

Our consultants can help keep notes and track and bring it back tomorrow as part of the discussion.

So this is really meant for council to hear from community members, community leaders, and begin to think about what it actually becomes uh tomorrow.

So again, um this is for you guys, and so get the most out of it.

Feel free to stop us, ask questions and lead.

Uh we do have uh questions prepared for our panelists, uh especially this first one.

Uh but um you this is for you guys.

So if if you want to start with the questions or you you got a burning issue, uh this is a time to ask and to bring it up.

So again, hopefully you guys get that value out of today's meeting.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Thank you so much, Mr.

Corbin.

I saw the awesome pictorial that was done as we did the community meetings.

There was a drawing that was done with that.

Will we have that rendering anywhere with us during this process, or will we be able to post it up somewhere in the chambers?

Mr.

Mayor Councilmember White, I'm gonna ask uh Nancy to the United States.

I know the the images you're referring to.

We'll see if it's here at the city.

Uh because that would be a really nice addition to the conversation to have that around agree.

Uh you know, the summary and the takeaways from those meetings are all provided to you in the stakeholder uh summary report, but I understand the impact of the drawings are so much more uh alive.

So we'll see if we can track that out.

We love to bring art to everything.

Uh I'll end that in the picture.

All right, Ms.

If it pleases you, we'll turn it over to uh Jen, our moderator to introduce the group and get us started.

Good morning.

Mike Draw.

Good morning, Mayor and Council.

We are really excited to delve into the first panel of this morning with um this incredible group of experts here representing the economic development and housing panel.

Um, you'll hear me say this probably a couple times today, is a team sport, and we cannot do this successfully without our strategic partners to help us advance our projects.

Um so with that, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna quickly introduce everyone on the panel, but give each um panelist the opportunity to provide a five-minute overview of their role, um, their entity, uh, talk about any obstacles, priorities, and pretty much provide a landscape um overview of the landscape.

And then after we go through their um brief presentations, we will then turn it over, Mayor and Council, to you to ask questions.

Um I'm also happy as moderator to jump in with additional questions as well.

So with that said, I'm gonna go ahead and quickly introduce right next to me.

I have Jonathan Roblis with Estrella Mountain Community College.

He is the associate interim associate vice president of a lot of different things, I feel like.

So we're gonna have you jump into all your incredible roles.

Next, um, we have Eric Toon.

Eric is the senior vice president of land um at Brookfield Residential.

And then we have uh Jeff Campos next next uh to Eric, who is the president of the Southwest Chamber of Commerce.

And then Clark over here, Princell, is president and chief executive officer of Valley Partnership.

And then Sintra, who we are very thankful we added, very last minute, and thank you for being here.

Sintra Hoffman, President and CEO of Westmark.

Okay, with that said, I'm gonna have to go ahead and turn it over to Jonathan.

Don't be I can just use this.

Can everybody hear me?

Okay, excellent.

Well, good morning, everyone.

Um I'm kind of pitched pinch hitting today, Dr.

Rivetta got called away uh yesterday for emergency meetings this morning.

So he sends his uh uh regrets for not being here, but I'll do my best to represent the college.

Uh again, I'm Jonathan Roblis, um the interim associate uh vice president for this is a long title, but community uh alumni and foundation relations.

So my role at the college is uh fundraising for scholarships for our students, uh building external partnerships, uh representing the college um with our strategic partners and doing what I can to help the college.

I've been with the college since 2009.

I always like to say that with community colleges.

Um I'm very proud to work for the community colleges.

I don't know if anyone's aware of the history, but the community college system is uniquely American.

There's no other system like that in the world.

And for me, I'm very proud of that because it's an open access system for higher education.

So it provides a lot of opportunity and um and can start building generational wealth for families.

So I'm very proud of that.

And Dr.

Rivetta always mentions and reminds us at the college that the word community is in our name.

So it's incumbent upon us to be very um mindful of that as we go out into the community and really build that partnerships with folks that it's a win-win and it's back and forth, right?

We love to have students come and community members on our campus, but we also want to engage out there in the community as well.

So we welcome these opportunities to to engage with with our commun uh municipalities and our partners.

Just a little bit about EMCC.

It's 33 years old, and it's the youngest of the 10 community colleges within the Maricopa Community College District.

What's also unique about EMCC is that we serve six municipalities.

If you look at Paradise Valley Community College, obviously they're working with Paradise Valley Region, Mesa Community College, obviously Mesa.

So for us, we're very proud to represent Avondale, Buckeye, Lichfield Park, Goodyear, El Mirage.

I think I got everyone.

Tallison.

Can't forget Town.

So for us, you know, it's pretty unique situation for us as a as a college.

And it's challenging because we work with so many municipalities and the different the different environments that each one presents, but we take it, we take very much pride in that because we can represent and help them in their economic growth and workforce development in their communities.

A couple of uh highlights I want to mention regarding the priorities.

For us, we really want to produce, as I said, a workforce that serves our cities in their economic development growth.

And the retention of our students is one of our main priorities.

Our goal is to increase the number of completors from 1,053 to 1,300 by the year 2026.

In 2023, 24, we surpassed, we are at 1,176 completors at the college.

We have over 10,000 students at the college, and our semester withdrawal rate is down from 18% to 13%.

So we're making great strides in making sure that our students complete and move on to either workforce or transfer or get the certificates that they need.

Another key priority for us right now is the fundraising priority, or is called Empower Ed.

It's a three-year campaign that we just launched, and our goal for the college is to raise 500,000 over the next three years.

For the district, their goal is 20 million dollars.

So each of the colleges are have embarked upon this fundraising campaign for our students.

Obstacles that we face right now.

A chancellor a couple years ago used to say that we're state located but not state funded.

So it's an interesting fact that we used to be state funded, but we've lost that state funding, and we're just slowly getting it back with STEM initiatives, some nursing type funding that we have to support that that workforce, and then also teachers academy.

Hopefully, we can get some money to produce teachers.

But again, we're state located, not state funded.

Um, food insecurities is a huge challenge for us as well.

Um just last semester we had 3,000 students go into our food pantry.

So food insecurities is a huge obstacle for us, and making sure that our students and their families have enough food to eat.

So that's been quite challenging for us.

We do have a basic needs task force in the district, and we're working to see if we can provide equity across all the colleges in addressing basic needs.

Um it could be mental health, it could be uh food insecurities, as I mentioned, um different things that they might need.

So uh transportation, we actually are very grateful for Avondale with that microtransit that helps our students quite a bit.

The opportunities that we see, we're hoping in the next two years or so to get a bachelor's degree offered at the college.

We're looking at areas of maybe nursing, potentially maybe business, IT or cybersecurity are areas that we're looking at as far as bachelor's degrees.

Another huge opportunity, I'm sure you you see a lot of land around the college.

We have 70 acres of undeveloped land, so that's a huge opportunity for us.

Um there's been different ideas presented to how we can work together with public-private relationships to develop that land.

Um key programs of our college include, as I said, nursing, cybersecurity.

We're very proud that we've been for formally designated as a national centers of academic excellence and cybersecurity defense by the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.

So cybersecurity is a big one for us.

Artificial intelligence is growing as a potential degree and certificate for us as well.

And we're also proud to be a Microsoft Data Center Academy.

Um that's a great example of public and private relationships because they provide a hundred thousand dollar scholarships per year.

50,000 for Glendale and 50,000 for us.

Um that's that's really wonderful for our students.

STEM business programs.

We're hoping to have a small business development center created at the at the college.

Uh, we engage that that initiative.

Uh, so have some actual office space there.

We have a makerspace, which is great for our students and engineering students, innovation.

Um we welcome you to come look at that space as well.

Um notable accomplishments.

I allow me to brag about it.

Our nursing program is second in the state.

We have 100% passing rate of our um uh certification exams.

Um dual enrollment has increased 102 percent from fall 2022 to spring 2023, so that's amazing opportunity for our students in high school to earn a college degree.

Um and in 2022, we were awarded the governor's innovation award in academia.

So we're quite proud of those accomplishments.

I can get into other statistics, but I don't want to take any more.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

Uh, thank you for having us here to be able to provide some of this feedback to you guys.

I am a senior vice president with Brookfield Residential.

We are a large-scale master plan developer as well as a home builder.

Um, our primary business here in Arizona is actually master plan development.

We have three very large-scale master plan communities in the Phoenix Metro area, one of which is here in Avondale.

It's a project called Alamar.

I'm sure you're all very familiar with it.

One of our staple communities.

Um I've been doing master plan development for a little over 25 years now uh in various locations, Nevada and Arizona, and one of our key struggles has always been workforce supply chain and cost.

And uh public-private partnerships are very important when it comes to that.

We have a great example of it in our Alamar project with the CFD as well as with our partnership that we did with the City of Avondale on Alamar Park, which was a 50-50 split on cost with the developer taking the lead and collaborating with the city to create a great amenity in that community for all the residents of Avondale, not just in Alamar.

Something that um another thing that we need to focus on uh that ties back to the education side, and that is getting skilled labor.

Uh, we have a very big struggle with skilled labor in this town.

It is difficult to get enough skilled labor to be able to build the houses that we need to build to do the the community development that we need to develop, and in order to create these great places, we need to figure out ways to entice our youth to enter into the construction engineering and planning areas of uh master plan development in order to be able to continue developing these kind of communities.

We also have a land constraint here in Phoenix, which is a big deal.

Um partnership between the state, land department as well as the uh local agencies such as Avondale is a big part of our business.

Um, and one of the ways that we're able to pick up these large-scale projects that range anywhere from 500 to 5,000 acres.

Thank you.

Moving on to Jeffrey.

Good morning, everyone.

It's good to see everybody here.

Uh let's see.

Is that better?

Yeah, I think that's a little better now.

Uh yeah, I represent I'm the president CEO of the Southwest Valley Chamber of Commerce.

Um, look for a new change to come about, but I'm not gonna share that with you today.

You ruined the whole surprise.

But as an organization, uh I've been representing the organization for the last four years, approaching four years, any any month now, and uh uh it's been a great ride.

I've learned so much and and had great successes as an organization.

And uh first of all, the Saw's Valley Chamber is a nonprofit organization, so 501 C6.

Uh we're membership-based organization, advocating for our members' uh economic interest through networking and community engagement.

Uh chambers' role is really to help businesses grow, also bring in businesses.

Uh, not to the extent of what the economic development uh does here in in Avondale, but uh it it really prides us in uh supporting efforts that are being done in the community.

Uh we share economic development referrals.

People come to us as an organization saying, hey, this is what we would like to do in your in this town.

Who do we have?

Now uh the Sauwis Valley represents six cities, so we're a reach.

It but but we found that I remember one of my concerns was is it gonna be a conflict to work with so many different cities?

No, it actually is an enhancement because people come in looking, say in good year, and then they go they don't know about Avondale.

So we refer to say here's your here's your opportunities, we give them communications for all the cities we represent.

And that's been very helpful.

They come to us because of our strength in numbers, and that's what we utilize.

Uh I'm an Avondale resident, so I get a little biased that uh, you know, I want all these different things here, and Jen's aware of it.

But that stays in this room.

I don't want it to go out to my other five cities.

And Central, you don't share that.

You deal with everybody else.

So some of the key functions that as an organization that we uh do as a chamber, we're business advocacy.

We represent the interests of local business in lobbying government officials.

We as an organization have lobbyists that we share with other chambers out in the West Valley.

So we call ourselves to self-the West Valley Chamber Alliance.

So we share lobbyists, we meet weekly, we talk about issues that you know we we want to make sure that our benefiting our businesses, but at the same time also benefiting our cities.

You know, I remember yesterday there was a couple things that came up that uh we saw that the cities wanted us to support.

I mean it was obvious because they were all against it, so we uh we definitely opposed it as an organization.

So we do that kind of things.

Uh we work together to be able to really with the goal of the West Valley, and with us, six cities in the West Valley is is uh pretty prominent.

I don't think I mentioned the six cities, but we have of course Avondale, Goodyear, Tollison, Lichfield Park, El Mirage, and now the newly uh member is uh City of Surprise.

So you can see our reach is pretty broad, but uh we're uh experienced success with that.

Uh another thing is networking connecting, uh organization events, initiatives that foster uh relationships between businesses.

This is how they connect.

As a matter of fact, we have at our office right now, we have a business networking group that meets and they refer people.

So we continue to add things like that.

We have a lunch one, we do uh uh breakfast one, we do online sessions to be able to communicate our members because of our reach of geography.

So we're having great success with uh uh online connections.

Uh also attracting new businesses.

We we promote the community strengths, attract new businesses as I meant mentioned to be able to invest in those communities.

So we work closely with the economic development people uh in the city and and uh try to make sure that those efforts are being enhanced.

Uh we also are business support services where we're offering educational programs, mentorship programs, and access to market research to help them grow as a business from a small business to you know one that has maybe 10-20 businesses.

They they all are enjoying our training programs.

We have training programs that are from uh uh entrepreneurial training program, which is an eight-week course that we offer that gets the basics of starting your uh running your business from every aspect.

Uh we also have uh women in in business.

That's been that's probably one of our more popular ones uh where we have specific needs that are addressed for women.

We offer those in the training program monthly.

Uh we also have uh nonprofit training.

We have uh you know, different business series where we have speakers that uh and and Mayor Pineta was actually um participated in one of those where they address groups and talked about business opportunities that are enhanced, and I I think Max, you were also part of that as well.

So those are like just some of the training programs we offer.

We have a lot more on the board.

Uh some of them are in person, some are virtuous, which enhances what we're doing as an organization because of our reach.

Uh, and then we have community engagement, collaborating with organizations to address community issues.

Uh we work very closely with Stray Mountain Community College.

I mean, we're we're almost attached at the hip to some degree, uh, working together.

And uh, and then Cintro.

We we work with Cintra together, and and Centro we're gonna have to connect after this, we've got to re-engage what we can do together.

Absolutely.

So uh, and then we so that's those are some of the things we also do tourism.

We we promote the cities that we represent uh to be able to highlight and boost tourism in those cities.

And uh let's see Chamber as an organization, we promote economic growth and development by advocating for the interest of members in policymaking making, as I mentioned.

Uh the goal is to promote existing community strengths and and highlight what we have in person to be able to help them uh gain interest in participating in in this West Valley.

Uh working with ED, we have a great close relationship with ED and with Jen coming out, it's even enhanced even more.

So I'm really excited about that.

Uh and then some of the challenges maybe we have right now uh is that you know, four years ago when I came in, we were under 200 members.

We've almost quadrupled that in membership, so our sizes grow is has been tremendous.

We've added three, we're at three cities, we have six cities.

So it's a matter of having controlled growth for us to be able to manage those, which which also brings challenges to us.

So we're always working on trying to enhance that, trying to work more efficiently and being able to deliver the promises that we do as an organization.

So that's it, John.

And A Town always goes first in the updates, right?

I haven't always top of the list.

Okay, Clark.

Um I'm Clark Princell, President CEO Valley Partnership.

I have been there just over a year and a half.

Um Valley Partnership is an organization that has been around for 38 years to advocate for responsible and sustainable development within Maricopa County.

Um our membership is made up of developers, landbrokers, zoning attorneys, um, GCs, subs, Brookfield is a member, as well as utilities, and then the county and each city within the county has representation as well.

And one of the things that that as well as representing all segments of development are really what sort of differentiate us from some of the other um development groups that um that you will hear from.

So you know, I think where we are at and challenge wise is we have a lot of good problems to face.

The economy has never been as diversified as it is today.

Obviously, there was a number of announcements yesterday that were incredible for the region, and we will all um continue to benefit from, but we do have lots of uncertainty, especially at the national level on the macro level related to things like goods, price of goods, um how we how certain decisions will impact labor, and we work a lot with the community colleges and with the trades to ensure that we have a um effective and stable um labor force moving forward as well as the cost of financing.

The cost of financing has increased in the last several years, and there is uncertainty moving forward as we look at that.

At the more local level, um, you know, the three issues that I would point out first and foremost, um, and you guys are sort of confronted with is um your guys' resources have been cut in recent years with certain decisions made at the state level.

Those are resources that we work with you guys on to develop infrastructure and other things.

Um we are an attempt to be active in um explaining to our state partners why those resources are so important and what sort of constraint that that does put on you.

But we um acknowledge that and want to work together to ensure that again you guys have the resources that are required to not only build the infrastructure that we need, but to create the communities that we want moving forward.

Um, the discussion of power is one that my membership and my community has not really had to worry about since the creation of Palo Verde, but is a um ever-growing constraint on new construction moving forward.

Um, you know, one of the things that my organization works on with the div with the um utilities is how we ensure that we have the power available for that next project we want, that next advanced manufacturer, those next um homes we want, while also acknowledging an industry like data centers, how important they are and giving that industry the certainty they need to continue to grow and move forward.

And then um I am I'm not going to attempt to steal any of the natural resources panel moving forward, but water is a discussion that takes probably 80 to 85 percent of my time most of the time.

Um one of the things that puts us in a very interesting position is we advocate work with the cities and build in both designated and undesignated provider areas, so places like um Buckeye and Queen Creek, as well as um yourselves and other designated providers, so sort of balancing those needs and working with the public jurisdictions and the water providers on how we can create certainty moving forward.

You know, I think a lot of what and if I could leave you with one thing with this panel, we are constantly looking for certainty moving forward to both attract capital and then make investments in a region.

The ability to know that those investments can derive value and pay back the creditors in the decades to come is vitally important to um my membership.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Uh good morning.

I think you pretty much all know me, Centra Hoffman, uh president and CEO with Westmark.

And first of all, I want to thank you for this process because we just went through um uh strategic planning process at Westmark, and stakeholder involvement is so important.

And I don't think I've ever really seen a city um engage the community in the way that you have today.

And I was looking over your agenda.

So kudos uh to the way you're receiving this information.

Um little bit about Westmark.

I think again, uh most of you know, but we are an organization that has served the West Valley community for 35 years.

This is our 35th anniversary.

And we kind of operate in two primary roles economic development support, working with all of your with all of your economic development partners, Jen, Cheryl, and so on, and public policy, working with your Intergov Liz Barker on a lot of the infrastructure issues that you've been facing.

When we went through our and then with in the lane of economic economic development support, we have really focused in on workforce development over the last nine years.

Again, that's the key thing, as you all know, to making sure that our businesses come here and they're thriving when they do arrive.

So we have relationships with uh Australia Community College.

We've worked, as Jeffrey said, with the chamber on their workforce development efforts and so on.

And you know, one thing that Eric brought up was the challenge with the construction workers.

It is a challenge.

Years ago when we first did our regional strategic plan for workforce development, 72% of the construction workers in Maricopa County lived in the West Valley.

Post pandemic, that number has dropped to 45%.

So it is a huge challenge for a community in a region that's growing and where you need the construction workers and you need these expertise.

So some of the things that we're doing at Westmark is we created a 501c3 that is fully dedicated to workforce development.

They have their own board of directors and they're engaged in supporting, convening the business community, understanding what their needs are, and then working alongside the education community to make sure that we're sharing that information and they can create those responsive programs to address those needs and graduate employable students immediately.

Part of that workforce development area is we are working with Agra Freya, who obviously serves your community quite well, and we are the lead convener in their new program, the Southwest Academies the Academies of the Southwest.

So we're proud to work with them to again serve the community of Avondale and make sure that we're developing that workforce.

I always tell Cheryl one of the benefits of Avondale, there's many, of course, but one of the great benefits of Avondale is you know you're 10 minutes away from downtown.

You're kind of that first community in that has a lot of amenities that's really well rounded.

And when people drive this way, they don't really think, oh my gosh, it's so far out.

They're like, I can't believe I got here so quickly.

So I think that that's a huge advantage in selling tool.

And when we look at supporting the economic development needs and the areas that we've worked with with Avondale, specifically I know that bringing amenities and restaurants and so on is an important part of your focus area.

And so we work with all of the regional commun with all of the communities, bringing them together as a region, so we can bring brokers in to really sell that the West Valley as a region.

And they can, you know, there's always that friendly competitiveness.

I noticed that one of your um one of your areas of I don't like to use the word weakness, but opportunities perhaps is that uh there you need to be more regionally connected.

And I would say that you are very regionally connected and supported.

Um I I know that that's true at the elected leader level and definitely at the economic development level.

So I I don't know that I agree with that statement in here, um, or I have a different lens on it.

And we're getting ready to support Avondale and eight other West Valley communities in a healthcare investment forum coming up later on this month.

So that's another big thing.

And a number of years ago, uh, we participated or we rallied everyone together to really pitch the development community on investing in class A office development in the West Valley.

Unfortunately, a month later, COVID happened, but I I think Clark you'll agree that uh vacancy rates in office is is just it's they're so thin that now it's it's it breaks the argument that we need to start investing in those areas again.

Um again, we we recently redid our strategic plan, and the reason is because when I look at the West Valley over the last um 50 years, I guess, right?

We started growing, we're started as an agricultural community um growing, you know, agriculture.

And then about the 2000s, we started growing houses, right?

We were the drive to qualify region, and so we started growing all these houses and all these people, and our population started really exploding.

And about the mid-2000, uh about 2015 or so, we really started growing businesses because we realized that we had a whole lot of residents traveling east for work and out of our communities, taking their tax dollars with them during the daytime.

And so we really started focusing on bringing those jobs here.

I would say post-pandemic, what I've seen is the growth that we're experiencing really a quality growth.

So it's not just growth for the sake of growth, it's really quality growth.

And another thing I noticed in your strategic plan notes is that the perception is still a challenge.

Yes, it is, but I will tell you that today we have become the community of opportunity, the region of opportunity.

So there is that balance too.

There is that new perception that's out there, and that's kind of what we're hearing a lot from the investment communities.

There's also the opportunity of all the new residents coming in and all the new companies that are coming in that don't have those old perceptions of you know 30, 40 years ago about the West Valley.

So there is definitely a lot of opportunity.

So in doing so, we created a new strategic plan where we're focused on five pillars, uh marketing the region, which of again we work on with uh Jen and others, um, supporting the business growth, which again, the the investment forums and so on, that's how we're bringing that together.

Um supporting infrastructure.

A key thing, and I don't have to tell you is SR 30 and the opportunities that that brings to this region, to the city of Avondale as well as to the um the entire West Valley region.

And to the state of Arizona, I keep saying it's not just a West Valley project, it's a state of Arizona project because it's a reliever for I-10 and getting so getting goods from um the ports of LA and Long Beach.

Um, and then uh public policy, like Clark mentioned, that's an area that you know cities continue to get just get pounded on.

And it's a delicate balance, right?

Because we have to balance the business needs and uh and the city needs, but I think everyone's understanding that you all cannot provide the housing services and things like that that are required if you're not getting the funding to support that.

So we are definitely um I I think everyone at this table is definitely in tandem with that in support of your goals.

And then one area that I'm super excited about is creating a regional uh data dashboard.

And for the last nine years, we have increasingly become the organization, the go-to organization for uh data resources on the West Valley.

And um through our strategic planning process, that's pretty much what our stakeholders said.

So we're working with ASU right now to build a regional data um dashboard that will have more of that information that's deep into the West Valley, more at your fingertips.

So I think that's kind of it in a nutshell.

I just really excited to be here and to continue this partnership with the city of Avondale.

Thank you.

Okay, I'm open up to Mayor, Council for questions.

Any members of council have questions off that you would like to ask our panelists based upon what you've heard?

Okay, Councilmember White.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Thank you so much, panel, for the engagement.

I just wanted to um acknowledge the theme that I could hear through each one of you, which is workforce development.

I'm very concerned about that, and um it's interesting.

I think Century, you brought out the point that most of the construction workers a few years back lived in the West Valley and now they don't.

Um as we look at and then we're running out of land and space, we need builders, um, we need them educated, we need them to be able to have businesses and get that support.

If you all could give us one of your gems as um the business community on what we need to do to attract the right residents, we know that our average household income is increasing, but there's still food insecurity.

So, what how how do we kind of strike the right balance in our community with our people, our students, the youngest population, and the oldest population.

I I'm gonna jump in on that one.

Um again, going back to the partnership that we have with Algra Fria, I would say as the business community, open your doors to students, and it's never too early.

They really don't know what uh the the variety and the multitude of career opportunities that there are today.

So the more we can expose kids to that early on, the better, and they will get that interest.

A lot of times, and I think a lot of where we ended up today is because we we, the business community or the businesses, look at well, we're gonna get them when they're 18, or we're gonna get them after they graduate.

That's too late.

You've got to get them early on.

Um, and uh, you know, I always tell businesses, specifically working with Agua Fria, um, internships are great.

That's ideal, ideally what we'd like to see.

But if if there are limitations, you can't have um kids under 18 on your floor on your property, things like that.

You know, do a Zoom meeting, do a video, do things like that, but expose them to what your job and what your business looks like and what that operation looks like, and give them that kind of lens in.

So that that's would be my recommendation.

Just from the college perspective, I would concur that we would want internships.

We have a center for workforce development at the college and then experiential learning, and they're always coming to me saying we don't have enough businesses that are opening the doors for internships.

I just sent some information to Jan and Cheryl uh a couple days ago about the Blackstone Foundation is a partnership with ASU and us and and Glendale to develop to actually provide money to these businesses to hire students.

So I think we just got to get the word out stronger with with businesses working with the chamber, working with Westmark to make sure that they have these resources, and uh there are resources to support the businesses to bring in a student.

So that would be helpful for us as a call.

I I'd just like to add that I think it needs to start even earlier than community college or college, it needs to start in elementary school.

We need to change the focus of forcing kids to want to go and get a four-year degree and let them look at what they can actually do with a trade degree or um learning a craft because we're losing that.

The the craft and trade um group is aging out and no one's backfilling.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Councilmember Voice?

Yeah.

Hi, good morning, guys.

So when I was in high school, um I had health occupations.

So I could go work out, actually, it was out Luke Air Force Base.

We had a hospital there.

And by the time I graduated, I was able to get a job in the hospital right away.

Do we have anything set up?

I know that WestMec is coming to Awa Freya, but is there anything at the high school level for we used to have work um you know, woodworking and all the different things.

Do we have anything that we're looking at as far as apprenticeships for students in high school for construction, for plumbing, electricity?

Anything to get them started at that level so that when they graduate, they have like an entry-level job that they can build their skills and go from there.

I well, I have central.

I was gonna jump in about academies or WestMec.

Yeah, I I would say in addition to WestMec, then also again, Agua Fria is looking at specific academies.

So the the academies of the Southwest, all of the schools at Agua Fria 7 today, and they're expanding again.

But all of those schools will have a specific track.

And so students in the ninth grade, they get kind of that overview of you know what all these different career opportunities look like.

Um when they hit the tenth grade, then they actually pick a track.

And so I I do believe that construction is is one of those.

I know marketing, healthcare, those others are.

I'm I'm 99.9% sure I'm a little bit embarrassed to say, but I can double check.

But construction is one of those tracks.

And so, yeah, so there are opportunities.

One thing also that I really want to compliment Agua Fria on is this, you know, they they've spent uh about three years putting this program together, and it's extremely well thought out as to how to it how to grow their workforce.

And uh, I was having a conversation recently with um my cousin in New York and telling her about this.

Her kids went to private school, and they had that same program in upstate New York, more affluent community.

When I told her that this was a public school and across a school district, she was stunned.

She had never ever heard of this, and she's a school psychologist, a public school psychologist.

So, really kudos to what you have right here in your backyard serving your community.

Thank you.

And I just want to add also one thing, and we're gonna learn later about the economic development target sectors for the city of Avondale.

Um, but uh a lot of that is in alignment with either the existing workforce that we have or the future pipeline we're trying to create.

And so it does start in high school or even earlier with getting industry partners together to tell us what are the core competencies, what are the skill sets that we need to start?

So by hearing from the industry partners, for example, uh from SEMI, which is a huge association of semiconductors out of San Francisco, they're creating curriculum for the academies program in Avondale and others, so that way the nine core competencies, for example, in that target sector, will start to be educated or part of integrated almost as early as sixth grade, is what they're looking at.

Hi, everyone.

So I've talked to a few parents and um they love the WestMec idea.

It's great that it's coming Agua Freya, but if we're looking at it now in that perspective, there's not a lot of transportation options for children to go to these programs.

Is there anything other than maybe you know, when Awafria has theirs, obviously we ride, but are there anything that maybe any of you know in regards to possibly bridging that gap?

Because parents work, they don't get off till five.

Some I I knew of a parent that used to take her child there.

So that makes it even tougher for children that really want to advance in that career or look at something like that.

There's no transportation between the high schools to these places.

I would say that that is the number one issue that we hear from from WestMAC, and I think I believe you're you're spot on.

All of the schools are definitely struggling with that.

Um I mentioned earlier that we did a regional workforce development strategy, West Valley Pipeline.

Recently we um updated that to West Valley Pipeline 2.0, which the original version really focused in on the kind of nuts and bolts of workforce.

2.0 focuses in also on the social needs like you just described.

So transportation, child care, housing, and so on.

So it's an area that um we're working with the schools on, but there's no easy answer because it comes back to funding, and that's obviously a big issue right now that everyone's dealing with, but it's definitely on the radar for sure.

Because I like Sherry, when I was in high school, I went to high school in California and um in Southern California, and they were big on what they would call ROP recreational occupational program.

They you would go into um either a finance or a um automotive.

My youngest brother went into automotive, very successful, went to UTI here, successful working at Avondale Toyota.

I went into finance and did uh banking for Bank of America when I graduated high school, went into Bank of America to work for them, but there was transportation opportunities available in case you couldn't get there, and it was done through the LA Unified School District through public transportation, like a school bus, because they would go to these programs.

Mr.

Mayor, if I can uh interject real quick.

So as we concentrate on what the city can do to address some of these issues, know that our We program is uh flexible, and so as needs arise to help get kids uh to school, um we have that flexibility to amp that up.

The other thing that we do to help is um getting the programs into our neighborhood, so the WestMAC at Alga Freya High School, so they're accessible to the kids in Old Town and other places.

And so our role in playing that is making it as easy as possible to get it built and built quickly and fast, so as we expedite the uh the development process and the permit process.

So I just want to uh while we can't uh force a school to create a program or do those kinds of things, know that um we're looking for ways that the city can help address these problems, even though it's not necessarily our field of of uh our lane to stay in.

But uh through development, through We Ride and other programs, um, we try to bring the training to where the people are.

I think that's great because when we do that, we become more invested and we talk about these jobs that come back here.

We're invested in these kids at the high school level, so when they get to that level, they want to work here, they want to stay here, they want to be here for the jobs, they want to buy a house over there that they can afford.

Thank you guys.

If I can just jump back in, two things.

Yeah, I absolutely agree.

And and Ron, it's spot on.

I actually rode your re we ride uh in Avondale, and it's a great service, and and it really meets the needs of the changing needs of um students and young and people today and how how they travel versus the buses and the trains and so on that we often hear from the public saying, when are you gonna get this?

When are you gonna get that?

Really, micro transit is in my opinion, kind of where it's at because it's um it's very local and it takes you to where you need to go.

Um, Councilmember Weiss, I did want to verify that um there is a construction program um at Agua Freya Union High School.

Mr.

Mayor, can I uh kind of put uh the college on the spot?

I know you guys are working on um some of the high end uh the the uh artificial intelligence, your Microsoft programs, your cybersecurity.

Is there are there any in nursing?

I think it's another big one, and I think I heard you talk about education.

Is there any plans to create a skills program or to create programs for HVAC or uh engineering or those kinds of programs there uh at Australia?

Yeah.

We get asked a lot from developers about a construction program starting at Estrella, but it's a very expensive program to get started.

Um we have a construction program at South Mountain at Gateway, and I believe at Mesa.

But we would that would be an excellent example to build a partnership with industry um to support that type of program at the college, but it does take a lot of money to to get that kick started.

Okay.

Councilmember Garcia?

Well, I wanted to not really a question, but what I heard when you guys were speaking was opportunity, partnership, and I'm loud as it is, so this is just like but what Centra said was the community, the perception of it, you know.

I'm I've lived here since 2001, so my perception of Avondale is really different from the new newcomers that are coming in.

It is a community of opportunity, and when we speak of it that way, it just sh it just like changes the way that I view of like getting these businesses, attracting new workers into here because they they they don't want to come here because of an old perception, but because of the growth and everything that people like you folks are doing in the Southwest Valley in Avondale, it's changing the perception of wow, there's new opportunity in Avondale for us to go work there, for us to go live there.

Alamar, that when I saw LMR and I was like, wow, that community is an Avondale, like holy cow, like I live in Cortes Sierra.

I was like, maybe I'll move over here.

So it's it's wonderful that we have these partnerships with you guys, and that you guys see that there's opportunity here.

You know, I went to Australia Mountain since 2009, ongoing without a without a degree, but like I go there because there's so much opportunity and learning through there.

And through WestMec, I had a 17-year-old girl at a salon cut my hair.

Um, and she had something to do as soon as she came out of uh graduated high school.

So these opportunities are here, and I think what what we need to do as a council and as people of Avondale is let the community know that these opportunities are available because I think that's one missing part is when I go knock on doors and I speak to our residents, they don't know all of the stuff that we have available.

They don't know that we have these partnerships, or that Olafria has this new amazing program for their high schoolers, or that Estral has you know, working on AI and um especially um the Intel, like that's huge, especially for these kids that want to work, you know, in those things.

And I what you said, a lot of kids are coming out of high school and they don't want to go to four-year colleges.

Like that's enormous, and having something available for them is what we need in Avondale.

And I think that you know, working with this and working with this council, that that's what we want as well.

So I'm just happy to have this partnership with all of you folks, and for you guys to take the time to come in here and speak with us today and share what you guys have viewed for Avondale.

Thank you, council Councilman Garcia.

Councilman, do you have anything?

Okay.

Um I for me, what what's uh I I think has been a theme here in regards to not only the panelists but the information that you've all shared is just how uh beneficial it is to um be in tune with our stakeholders.

Um the theme that came to my mind after listening was really just agility, agility in the fact that from the elementary school level to the high school, post-secondary, and even with partnerships, that if there's an idea and us as an organization are looking to capitalize or leverage partnerships on how do we address uh community needs and demands through ideas and through ideation, look at how innovative we can be in terms of response.

And so agility to me is the theme that we're connected with the community college district at the post-secondary level.

We're in tune with Ahual Freya community uh, I'm sorry, all free high school district with the academies, uh WestMec, um our businesses and the business community working with Westmark and with uh the chamber, our residents getting benefits uh and our residents as a whole uh with public-private partnerships between us and Brookfield, uh, and examples of that.

And even in addition to that, uh, with the constraints that we deal with as an organization and having partners like uh uh Valley Partnership uh that allows for that communication to occur between us and the state level to really advocate for some of the constraints that we have to work under as it relates to budget and funding.

Because after all, uh without funding without the budget, it's very difficult to make any of these these uh ideas a reality.

So I think we're all in tune with that.

We get that, but having these kind of conversations, and as council uh member Garcia said, um communication and allowing our residents to be aware that these opportunities exist, but they only exist because of how connected we are and how responsive you are to our needs, and I mean us as a city, but also as a region.

And when um you look at the competitive environment that exists out there for uh labor uh for um business opportunity for workforce development, uh I believe that Avondale has a uh a large role to play in that and to be as competitive as possible.

So for us to communicate that as a body, policy making body to our stakeholders, and in turn hearing what our stakeholders have to offer our organization, then conversations like this, I believe are beneficial for that reason.

So through the strategic planning process, this is how I feel, you know, getting started tomorrow.

How we say, hey, remember how one of our partners mentioned this, and how we're looking for our opportunities here for our residents, let's connect.

And then we work out the details, whether it be through land, whether it's your property development, skill set, uh, it doesn't matter.

We're all trying to leverage opportunity, and um, I believe that this council here is is has ears and eyes open, and uh the desire to make that happen to be as competitive as we can because you know, while the I 10 is a parking lot and we're we're aware that SR 30 will be coming through, uh, we want our our folks to stay here.

We want them to go to school here, be educated here, work here, play here, and enter and have entertainment and and uh dining and opportunities here as well.

And so the more that we can do that by working with partners such as yourself as part of this long-term strategy, I think this is a great opportunity to get that started.

And although we've been engaged uh in the past, um I believe that we can continue to be just as engaged, maybe even more engaged in the future because of the importance and because of the role that we play as a municipality within this region.

So is there any other questions or comments?

Okay, Councilman Royce.

Well, thank you all for your time.

This was really helpful, and I think one of the things too is just listening to each other, right?

Like we have a need here, and we might be able to meet it here.

Um I did hear something about Class A office um spaces.

So, and I saw a couple nods.

Do you think that's something that we need since we're doing our strategic plan?

Yeah, I I mean I definitely think so.

Um again, I think if the if the pandemic hadn't happened, we would be in a whole different situation with Class A office in the West Valley today.

Um, so it's definitely something that you should be looking at.

We're we're seeing our office, as many of you know, is located in Westgate, and there is no office space in Westgate any longer.

We just expanded our offices and we had to do it within the existing footprint, which was not a hundred percent ideal, but you know, it's gonna work.

But but there's a huge need.

There's a huge need for office space that's increasing, which workers are returning to work to the office.

Businesses are requiring that, they're not being shy about it anymore.

And you know, people are making those decisions, they they do want to be in the office.

Um, one of the things that we're doing again is you know, bringing trying to bring amenities within our our our you know, office space so that we, you know, employees want to be there, and we have our little work family and companies are doing that all over.

Every single office I've gone into, you see, you know, like the foods ball table and you know, the little pot pot thing, and it's just a different environment.

People want to be, you know, located there, and they're they're done, kind of done with the isolation.

So I it's sorry, long long-winded answer, but yes, definitely put that on your radar.

Can I just say I'll make a comment on that?

We are definitely from our members' experience that they want a need for class A buildings, uh office buildings, and uh, you know, in addition to that, they also want the higher-end homes.

I mean, we got a lot of uh individuals that are relocating to this area and looking for higher-end office space in addition to the to the housing area.

So I'll throw a pitch out to Brookfield.

Mr.

Mayor, yes, sorry.

Council Murvoy.

Thank you so much, Matt.

Thank you so much.

I I I think there's a story that we have to tell here because um as we take a look at it, I I I have to thank the mayor.

I would have never known there was uh a maker space at Australia Mountain until he took my son there.

Um and then, you know, my son was a stage student through Helison Union.

I know we haven't shouted that high school district out, but now he attends ASU, and I think he entered ASU as a sophomore with all the credits that he got at Australia Mountain.

And now he's into design, and so instead of making sure, you know, we're thinking city planning design kid get a real job, but you know, he has a business, he's a small business owner.

So we have to be able to tell that story of how we first instill it in our kids.

But as somebody who grew up in industry and commercial development and looking at it, I remember signing the beams to the building of Legacy MBNA in Northeast Ohio that was owned by our learner, um, the credit card company.

And as we sign each of the beams as the buildings were built around us, um, and I think about how beautiful those buildings were they were sold to the Cleveland Clinic after our learner passed away, it was it was just the best experience of my life working in class a commercial office space.

So I I felt like I watched my career grow.

I watched this organization grow, and we want to have that for people who come out here.

And when I think about Beachwood, Ohio, for those of you who might know know about the suburb of Greater Cleveland, it's a very beautiful space, it's a very affluent place in Northeast Ohio.

And so um I think if we look to model our community as the space and place where we want affluent growth, you know, Cuyahoga Community College was right down the street from Beachwood, Ohio.

And when I think about it, you have to reinvest in the community and give people other ways, but so many people were in the trades back there because a lot of what Mr.

Lerner wanted to do is show the Marines there because he was a Marine.

Hey, you guys come and work here.

And most of them were uh most of the Marines I met at that time worked in the HVAC area of MBNA and made sure that we stayed heated and cooled all the time, but we were able to integrate everybody.

So there's a place and space for people everywhere, and I think that we need to understand whether you have a certificate, high school diploma, college degree, post you know, postgraduate degree.

I think that we can all come and work together and be at the same table in the same spaces and places, enjoy the nice things together, and we want people to know the nice stuff is over here.

So thank you all so much.

Mr.

Mayor, we we do have a couple canned questions.

So I'm gonna give if you we we can take a few more minutes to harass questions, but uh but I actually want to ask one question.

You guys have been very kind and nice and talked about good things, but you haven't really told the city what we can do better.

Uh you've asked for some growth, you you've asked for um uh but you haven't told us what we can do better.

What what can this group of leaders encourage or set as priorities so that we can help bring more housing, more jobs, more people?

Thank you.

So one thing uh thank you for bringing that back, Ron, because one thing I realized is that I'm looking at this and we're the housing panel, but we really didn't go deep in housing for you.

And I I think a recommendation that I would make is you know, there's a lot of of pressure on um uh multifamily housing and so on.

And it really is a decision that I think that the West Valley, like you said, Councilmember White, we're we're in a different place right now.

The city of Avondale is in a different place right now, and we don't have to take what is given to us.

We really need to um look at design guidelines, really need to hold um uh the the developer accountable to the design guidelines that you want.

And um sometimes you know, we get we get caught up in the pressure of we just need to, you know, we need to come up with housing or we need to provide that.

And I I I've been telling a lot of the West Valley communities that we're a different region today, we're a different community today.

So please be picky about it.

Don't just accept what's being brought to you.

Um I look at I look at uh different um and and I promote multifamily housing.

I think it's a great thing.

I think it's needed.

I think where it where it goes and what it looks like is really important, and that is more of uh I I think the quote unquote control that cities would have more.

So I would say that's something.

So while I agree on the uh holding the standards, we also need to be flexible because we need to be able to be able to be diversified in the housing that we that we provide, as well as be flexible in how we can develop that housing.

It's very, very costly today.

We need to have affordable housing for everyone, and multifamily is a big part of that, but um density is really the key, making sure that we continue to push the uh the envelope on density.

I would just add I would just say we have a quarterly and I I agree a hundred percent.

I agree a hundred percent with with you know both speakers, um and what Clark just said, because it is really important to make sure that the efficiencies are done.

Um and what Clark just said, because it is really important to make sure that the efficiencies are done.

Um I worked for a city for 10 years and got complaints from the development community because you know we we redlined stuff and we didn't do it completely, and then we redlined it again and we redlined it again.

And so making your your uh processes um a more efficient and more effective um because time is money, and so it it you know sometimes we don't think about the impact on the private sector, but it it is there.

Both me and Central are city alone, so exactly, exactly.

So we're on all sides.

It really ties back to that flexibility piece too because um as master plan developers, we get into a community, we may start with one plan, yeah, and you might find that that plan doesn't work, and to be flexible enough to be able to pivot whenever we need to pivot is huge in our world.

Well, this is incredibly insightful, and I just want to give a special thanks to the panelists for coming out this morning to participate and kick off this retreat or this afternoon or this to the next few days.

So thank you so much.

And um with that, let's give our panelists a round of applause.

Mr.

Mayor, if we can take five while we change out the case.

I was just gonna say we can take a short break and then uh we'll uh get the next panel seated admission, uh, what your organization is all about and how it relates to the city of Avondale, and then we'll open it up to our city council for any questions they may have uh to have some you know integrated conversation here.

And then um I also have some pre-planned questions if we if we need to get to that.

It doesn't look like we did at the last panel, so uh, you know, we'll see.

We'll see.

We'll play it by ear.

Um but I'm excited to introduce to you today.

Um I have to my left Cliff Lou, he's the vice president of strategy for the Phoenix Children's Hospital.

And then next to him is Dr.

Christina Conrad.

She actually oversees our Phoenix Children's Hospital in Avondale.

Uh and she is the emergency department director, medical director.

And then next to her is Tony Houston with Dignity Health uh Dignity Health Arizona Market President.

Uh so we're excited to have oh, I'm so sorry.

I messed, I don't know, on my paper it's different.

But okay, so that's actually Martha.

So if Martha doesn't look like Tony, you know, it's like a weird mix-up here.

So I'm gonna go with Martha.

She's the Arizona Complete Health Plan President CEO, and then next to her, we have Tony Houston with Dignity Health Arizona Market President.

So thank you all so much for being with us today.

And I'll turn it over to Cliff now.

Sure, I got this right.

Can everybody hear me?

So well, thank you for having us.

It's great to be here.

Uh my name is Cliff Liu.

I'm the Vice President of Strategy at Phoenix Children's.

I've been with the organization for almost three years now, by way of no one of those from Northern California.

Um I was uh with the Lucille Packer Children's Hospital at Stanford for approximately five years, and I can tell you that my my wife, daughter, and I have not quite gotten used to the temperatures here in the summer, but we'll we'll get there.

So it's it's a pleasure to be here.

Um, you know, one of the reasons um why uh I came here to Phoenix is just the you know, when you look when you look at the city proper and and and and Avondale, I mean you you have over a million kids, and and that that that's important, right?

We're we're here to serve the kids.

Um they deserve access to health care, um, the subspecialty care that they need, and we've always at Phoenix Children's embrace that, um, which is one of the reasons why we started our presence here in I think 2013, um, where we are now, and then built out the uh specialty care urgent care clinics and uh pre-scene the uh full service emergency department as well.

Uh as you're aware, you know, we also are uh based uh downtown at the Thomas campus with over 500 beds, uh full service ED and all the subspecialties that go with that.

You're also aware that we're located at uh Arrowhead as well as in uh the East Valley at our uh multi-specialty care site with dignity help.

And so as we as we think about uh growth, like I said earlier, we do we do want to go where the kids are.

Um we engage with uh community leadership such as yourself in terms of what is the need, uh, what is the patient demand, and we take that seriously and we think through what we can do, what we can provide in a meaningful way as the as the only true pediatric provider in the state.

So I'll wonder.

I'll pause there.

Thank you.

Good morning.

My name is Christina Conrad.

Thanks for having us.

So I am a pediatric emergency medicine physician, and I'm the medical director of our Phoenix Children's Avondale location, which opened in July of 2023.

And hopefully you have not had to take your children or grandchildren there.

But if you have, um, you know, it's nice to have something more local.

Um, you know, before, unfortunately, a lot of these kids were having to go downtown, and we have a pediatric emergency medicine physician 24-7 there.

Um, we have 40 rooms, including two resuscitation rooms, you know, six rooms that are designed, what we call like our safer rooms for kids that are having like a mental health crisis and need that help.

Um, we also have like a rapid medical assessment area for kids who might have like lower acuity needs that we can hopefully get them in and out a little bit more quicker.

Um, but we have a child life therapist on staff, we have a mental health therapist, we have a social worker, um, 24-7 X-ray, ultrasound, CAT scan.

Um, you know, we can do procedural sedations, orthopedic reductions, like those types of things that we provide at our other emergency departments as well.

And it definitely has served a need in our community in 2024, uh, which was our first full year in service.

We had over 50,000 children visit us, and we had over 1,600 um ambulances come to us as well.

Um, so it's really nice to be able to fill that gap out here.

Um, and I will oh, I'm also a local too.

I sit on the City of Avondale Employee Benefits Trust Board, um, and I live here in this community, Blitchfield Park, technically, but you know, we see our Avondale PD crews through my neighborhood and controlling all the time, and we're very appreciative of that.

So I'll turn it over to you.

All right, I'm Martha Smith.

I'm the plan president for Arizona Complete Health for the Arizona market.

Um I've actually been with my organization for close to 29 years, so I'm a long timer, um, but in the Arizona market specifically overseeing the Arizona Health Plan for the last five.

Um I'm afraid that's gonna roll off the table.

Um Arizona Complete Health has had a long-standing partnership with the City of Avondale with the resource center uh and we um we really uh value and appreciate that relationship.

Um we cover about 600,000 um Arizonans through our Medicaid program access, as well as our marketplace programs and our Medicare programs.

So we really uh tend to serve lower income populations in terms of our coverage and have again long history in doing that here in the market.

We are also the regional behavioral health authority in the north part of the state and the southern part of the state, so servicing the SMI population and those in in critical need for mental health services.

Um, and then we were also recently awarded the long-term care contract for the state of Arizona, which we're looking forward to implementing here in the not too distant future.

Um I would just say that in terms of some of the obstacles that we see coming our way, um, yeah, a lot of changes, as you all know, uh, from a federal perspective in terms of what might be coming down the pike with respect to funding cuts to Medicaid programs in particular, but also subsidies for the marketplace programs, and so we're really focused on making sure that our state and our communities understand what the impact of that could be to Arizona.

And so we have some serious concerns if there's some reductions in the federal match program, um, and what that could mean to the state is you know, potentially uh budget shortfall of as much as two billion dollars, and what that could mean to our services here in the community at places like Dignity and Phoenix Children's is fewer people covered by Medicaid and Marketplace, and that really puts a significant burden on the health care delivery system.

So I think from a just from a what can we do together perspective, that's something to me that's really important that we all need to think about and how we are interacting with our uh our representatives and it um at the federal level to encourage uh that that um that focus on making sure that we don't have those budget cuts from that perspective.

On the positive side, other um things that are uh potential opportunities coming down the pike is a program that is very uh closely tied to the marketplace, uh, referred to as ICRA.

It's an individual coverage program that is can be supported through small business.

Avondale is a community that is full of small businesses.

It's a program where um employers can do a uh basically a defined contribution for their employees, so they have a very fixed then budget for their health coverage, and then those employees have the opportunity to pick their coverage through the marketplace.

So it's a new program that we're looking to introduce over the course of the next couple of years in 2026 and beyond, that we think is a great opportunity for communities like Avondale, who have a large um uh small business community as well.

So I'll stop there and hand it over to Tony.

Thanks, Martha.

Well, good morning, everyone.

It's good to be with you.

I'm Tony Houston, the market president for Dignity Health here in Arizona.

I've been with our parent company, Common Spirit Health for 10 and a half years.

I'm newer to Arizona, been here since last summer, and it's been a incredibly warm welcome.

I mean, that figuratively and literally.

It's uh really great to be with you all.

You know, and as I arrived here, Arizona is actually one of the leading ministries in our entire company.

We lead in our people's scores, so that's an employee engagement.

That's our focus to be a great place to work and practice.

And so Arizona leads the way in our large company.

There's 160 plus hospitals.

We're in 24 states.

Common Spirit Health is largest Catholic health care company in America.

And Arizona leads the way.

So it's really a privilege to be a part of the company and see all the good things in Arizona and then get to arrive here and be a part of the team.

You know, so as I mentioned, we we've been around a long time.

Uh St.

Joseph will celebrate 130 years in Phoenix.

So I think about that a lot when the sisters that came to Arizona to start this ministry um really on the frontier and before we were even a state.

And so we we take really uh great pride in and understanding of what it means to perpetuate a healing ministry for multiple generations.

And that's our goal.

As Martha said, it doesn't get any easier in health care, it seems, but when we've got like-minded folks uh like yourself, and I'm I'm really pleased to be uh a part of this panel today and really engage with you on where we go next.

Uh it's exciting to think about what the future holds.

At Dignity Health, we've got eight acute care hospitals in the state of Arizona, six of them in the valley, two of them are up in in the Prescott area.

We've got a couple other hospitals that we share with a partner, specialty hospitals.

We've got multiple access points, our emergency departments that stand by themselves.

We've got 14 of those throughout the valley.

The closest one to you is in Goodyear.

We've got a smaller hospital in Levine, not far from you.

And we could talk more about we've got a fill-in in Avondale.

We're around you, but we're not we're not with you, so we've got some excitement about that.

Um 15,000 caregivers every day come to work at Dignity Health to perpetuate our ministry to be God's healing presence to the people we serve.

We have a special preference for the vulnerable populations, and that's what Martha talked about.

We uh we have uh ownership in a and a Medicaid plan as well, and we've been doing that for a very long time.

We also have a real pledge to be advocates for social justice.

And so we think about partnering with folks who can do that in the community.

And it's something that we've prided ourselves in long-standing relationship with Phoenix Children's Hospital.

We're a part owner in Phoenix Children's Hospital, and we've collaborated for many, many years.

We we do it together in the East Valley, and we think there's opportunity to do it together in other places in the Valley as well.

I'll close and get ready to engage in the conversation.

One of the things that we're looking at in the future, obviously, we've talked about workforce.

That's our our goal to be a great place to work in practice, and we can talk a lot about the efforts we've had.

We we actually have a medical school here now at Creighton University, and I'm a proud alum.

I got my doctorate at Creighton, so that's great to wave the blue J flag here in Phoenix with with our friends.

Uh so we're we're trying to put out the next generation of of health care providers, both physicians, we have our nursing school, our physicians' assistants, our physical therapists and occupational therapists, our pharmacists.

We teach all of those folks here in Phoenix, and actually the school in Phoenix is as large as the homeschool in in Omaha is.

And so, really a focus on workforce and as many as we're minting each year, we're still not minting enough.

And it takes all of us collectively together to think about how to perpetuate that next generation of the workforce.

So certainly something we're focused on.

And then as Martha said, the the economics are difficult in healthcare.

They've always been difficult, but even more so now where reimbursement is squeezed and threatened.

And then economics, you know, our costs are high.

Inflation is real in healthcare, especially labor inflation as it relates to trying to retain talent.

So we're always looking to engage with like-minded folks to help us try to figure out how to be um as attractive as possible in Phoenix for the workforce, but also how to afford health care with each other and think about novel ways in which to do it.

So again, it's a pleasure to be with you and excited to engage in the conversation and tell a little bit more about what Dignity Health is doing in the state and in the Valley.

Wonderful.

Thank you all so much.

So I think at this time uh Ron will open it up to the council.

Yeah, Cheryl, Council will start with you guys uh like we did last time, but we do have a list of uh uh I know Cheryl worked on it for several weeks on these questions, so she's hopeful you'll let her ask a couple of them.

But uh we'll we'll start with council.

Council member, uh Councilmember Weiss.

Good morning.

Thank you guys so much for being here today and for um your time.

When Martha, I'm gonna kind of direct this a little bit to you.

You were talking about long-term um, I think alts probably the long-term care.

Um, do you see a shortage of beds anywhere in the in the West Valley?

Is that something that we can um is that a need that we could possibly meet.

So that the that's an interesting question because actually one of the goals of the long-term care program is to keep people out of institutional settings and really support people living independently in the community.

So I would say, yes, there's a shortage.

Um and so is there a need?

Yes, I believe that there is a need.

However, the goal of the program is to make sure that people don't have to be institutionalized if they choose to stay in um in a um uh independent setting.

Now, assisted living facilities, supported facilities like that, I think, are there's a critical need for those types of services in the community.

Um and so I think you know we've got opportunity for sure to to look at what are the specific needs over the long term.

Um and I know uh certainly Tony on your side that you're you'll have thoughts on that as well.

Yeah.

Yeah, as Martha said, I I'd say all of our goals to try our best to keep people away, right?

Um, as Dr.

Conrad said, we're here for you when you need us, but boy, we'd rather you not come.

It's kind of a weird business sometimes, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah.

When you think about it that way.

But but just a couple stats for you, and our team works on this constantly.

Yeah, you all know this, and me being new.

We're we're growing so fast.

So if every single one of us that are in the healthcare provider business today, that's hospitals, long-term care, the folks that have the big assets.

If we could grow as fast as possible, as you all know it takes a while to build in healthcare.

I know your panel before was talking about uh wanting to build a little faster.

Healthcare takes a while to build with just all of our regulations and everything we deal with.

If we all could grow as fast as possible, we would still be short of the physical beds we need.

We need over 3,000 hospital beds to meet the demand in the state.

And and as fast as we're growing, it's still gonna be there.

So that that what Martha said, we have to complement that.

We are gonna need physical assets, there's no doubt about it.

And we need to continue to evolve the way we deliver care such that we can do it in your home or we can do it through technology and and and so we we have many of those things that we are doing.

But your question is really important one because it's gonna take all of us to engage in that healthcare continuum, families, caregivers, et cetera, and the physical assets, because you know you can't take Dr.

Conrad everywhere.

You're gonna have to come to her, right?

At most most times.

But it's a great point.

So I think it's a combo of we got to grow faster together and we gotta think differently about how we deliver health care.

Councilmember White.

Thank you so much, Mark.

Thank you for all the information from the panel.

I think um living in Avondale and kind of the color scheme here puts me in the mind of the blue zones throughout the world.

So I'm sure all of you know about them, Okinawa, Japan, Sardinia, to Italy, Icaria, Greece, Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica, and Loma Linda, California.

So when I think about Avondale, I want the people here to live healthy lives, which is why the continuum of care from childhood to long-term care at the end of the life cycle is important.

But my focus really is on how how do we get to that status where we're not constantly medicating and caring for, but we can actually enjoy a fruitful healthy life.

And so when I think about the uh one closest to us, I'll give you some of the characteristics.

There's a Netflix out there if you guys are really interested.

But if you look at Loma Linda, California, not far, so same type of climate and everything, atmosphere, all those types of things.

Um something that I grew up very close to.

It's the home to the largest population of seven-day adventists who are ranked among North America's longest living people to ministry, right?

Um, and then they live as much as decades longer than most Americans.

And why does that happen?

Predominantly a plant-based diet.

We're an agricultural society here in Avondale, that's where our roots are.

Um, moderate calorie intake, low consumption of tobacco and alcohol, high social engagement, which is why I love things like our senior center and our child care.

It goes all the way through the range.

And then exercise being an integral part of life.

If you guys could give us a forecast on what we could do to transition this space and this place into like a blue zone where, yeah, we got a lot of people coming through.

We got a lot of concerns with air quality, safe streets, all these other things.

But how do we make those people around us realize this is really what we want here?

Start young, right?

Um so I love the, you know, there's the sports complex, the parks here.

Like I love when we see kids that come in with an ankle injury from playing soccer, right?

That's what kids should be doing.

They should be out there um engaging in the community.

And so I love the different like having those things that are accessible to um all types of children, um, so it keeps them active as well as obviously um access to you know nutritious foods, um community, right?

That's one of the big things with the blue zone is engaging in a community.

But you know, if you make it a lifestyle, um, that's where it can like change their entire course.

So I don't know that there's anything like in particular that you can do other than keep providing those services for the children in the community, you know, because I love to see um a kid who comes in with a sports injury versus someone who has been on their phone and doom scrolling and you know now has anxiety or mental health issues, you know, related to that.

So I I would just say that uh can you hear me okay?

Yeah.

Try to turn it off.

All right, partnerships.

I would say partnerships are really critical.

So we we've partnered with different communities to help um build testing case.

Try that one.

All right, better.

Um to build fitness courts and fitness programs for the community.

So I know we we do some of those things already here in Avondale together, but um you know, we've got partnerships with uh food pantries to provide fresh produce, things of that nature that I think are really critical in the community to start young and make sure our kids have access to that to those types of services and that those are encouraged in the community.

I couldn't agree more with you, Dr.

Conrad, in terms of just starting early.

Um I think that's part of our challenge with with respect to what's happening from on the behavioral health side, right?

And so I think if we if we are able to partner together through community partnerships with organizations like ours and yours, I think we've got the opportunity to get us going in that direction toward more of a blue zone concept.

I love that concept.

And and so uh on Sardinia in Italy.

I'm a big love Italy.

My daughter studied there.

There's a there's a term called passagiata.

What it means is basically to take a walk after you eat, right?

So if you see in Italy, after they dine, they'll they'll walk as a community, they'll walk.

This the streets are safe, and it's a communal activity, and you're moving after you eat, which is good for digestion.

And it's interesting as a community like this, instead of having a particular weekend where we do a walk or a race or something, maybe every evening after dinner, you encourage people and their families to take a walk.

Um it it's just it's just an interesting way to think about staying connected for your health.

That's every day, not just a particular once or twice event.

Yeah, so it's it is those blue zoons are really interesting to study, but um, that's what my family we try to do is always take a walk after we eat.

Well, we have a second, I think that just kind of reaffirms at least for me, um, and I hope for others as members of the council of the investment opportunities that we have as a city uh in regards to walkability factor, uh, connectivity with our trail system and things of that nature, uh, and make it more accessible because being that Avondale uh, you know, from its origination to now has been a little spread apart, then I believe that as policymakers, our job should be to invest in closing those gaps.

And we've we've made big strides and we've done that, um, but there's obviously more that we can do um to uh provide that benefit to our community members and our residents, in addition to um starting early, as you mentioned with sports programs, programs in general that just get the exercise going and um a change of lifestyle.

Other council members, council member Conde.

Thank you.

Thank you for the panel for being here.

I really don't have questions, but I have a comment.

Um, I'm so thankful that Phoenix Children's Hospital is here.

So you talk about um kids, so I have a 10-year-old daughter, and so she broke her foot at school, and I took her right away to the emergency room.

And after that, they said, Well, we'll come back for a cast later, and I thought, okay, I'm gonna probably have to go somewhere else to get the cast.

But little did I know I got a text while I was in the hospital to set up an appointment so that she can come back and get the cast.

And the cast was right there in the building next door.

And so I'm just thankful to have it for the convenience sake.

And when I was there, I just looked around the room and I just thought, what a great place to have this hospital in our community where our demographic is families and young children that come here, and I just thought it saved us a drive going all the way to Phoenix, you know, and using the hospital there.

Um but before um something had happened to her a few years ago, I was in panic mode, and I thought I can't make it all the way out to that hospital um in Phoenix Children's Hospital in Phoenix.

And at that time we didn't have the emergency room open in this location.

So I took her to a different hospital in the West Valley.

And let me tell you something.

Service for kids is way different than adults.

When we went into that hospital, we stayed for a little bit, and then we were waiting and waiting, and it was just so uncomfortable.

I told my husband, we gotta go, we gotta take her all the way to the other Phoenix Children's Hospital.

And I'm so glad I did, but I'm so glad that you guys are here serving our community.

And I just want to just say thank you for all the work that you guys do.

Some things were mentioned about you know mental health, you know, as a council, you know, a lot of us have young children, and so I know we strive to do things with our kids to keep them off of their phone, off of social media.

So whether it's Parks and Rec, which we have a wonderful robust programming um in our community that we have, and like uh Mayor mentioned working on our trail system, and just um new opportunities keeps coming to my mind, and this is a way for us to get feedback from you guys on things that we can do to create new opportunities for our families so that they can be healthy.

So thank you.

Mr.

Mayor, can we let Cheryl ask a question?

I think she'd be sad if she didn't get to ask one of those questions.

Ask away, Cheryl.

You know, I just love the mic.

But I will say, you know, starting them young, we do in Avondale, right?

700,000 of them every single year at the Sports Center.

So I'm really excited about the program we we have here that does lead us to potentially a blue zone community.

So panel.

How can healthcare systems, local government, and community organizations collaborate to tackle public health crises like opioid addiction and rising chronic conditions?

So this is obviously a very big topic.

Many of us have um you know been talking about police chief, fire chief.

We have you know this issue going on.

What's some of your feedback of how we can work together as a community to try to tackle this?

Yeah, it's a such an important one.

There's a couple things there.

I'll just I'll start with opioids just to give you a quick understanding, and maybe Dr.

Conrad could jump in here too.

We we've seen a change in our practice over the years, just given what is happening.

And so many, many of our clinicians that in the past would have used opioids to help with pain relief are thinking differently.

You know, many of our orthopedic procedures is an example.

We do things that are called nerve blocks now, and and they're we can do them in many, many different ways and in much more many more procedures than we had in the past.

That we've got some really large procedures we do now that we don't use opioids at all.

And and so this starts there.

So we have to help with that, and we're we're doing that.

We have to continue to hold ourselves accountable.

I think at the same time, we have to get get the word out and education of of what all this means.

I do applaud all the first responders here for your ability to train yourselves and be ready for um the medications that can reverse um some of these things.

So that's critical, and thank you for anyone who was pushing for getting you all equipped with those things, the Narcans, et cetera.

And I think lastly, is we we have to recognize that that the stigma that comes with either mental health or or substance use disorders.

We have to continue to work to say it's it's it shouldn't be any different than any other chronic ailment.

And so we have to first start with it's okay if someone admits that they they need help and we need to be activated to to assist them.

So I think it starts with decreasing the need for opioids.

It it helps with intervening in the emergent situations, and then I think it it helps with decreasing the stigma and in allowing people to access the programs that we we all have to help people that are on the journey of substance use disorder.

We also um we have a grant um in the hospital where we um can offer patients who come in for any type of um overdose.

Unfortunately, we do see that in our teenage population.

Um we can offer them a free uh Narcan to take home with them, which is um opioid reversal.

So, you know, oftentimes these kids are going back into the communities, going back to their homes, and then parents are very fearful, like what if this happens again, you know.

So this actually empowers them to have something at home that they can give while they call 911, you know, and are waiting for an ambulance to respond.

So we recognize it as well, and all of our physicians do continuing medical education every year on um opioid abuse and addiction.

Um we also do we try not to use opioids uh first line as pain in children either.

And I'll also add that we we certainly try to get care out to the community as as quick and as expeditious as possible.

Um we offer uh a program called the Bridge Clinic, and what it essentially is is a as a means for children that are discharged from our ED that um with uh behavioral health concerns.

And what it essentially is is a means for children that are discharged from our ED that um with uh behavioral health concerns if they don't have a uh behavioral health provider, uh we provide that to them and we we assess that um at discharge.

So as a name implies, it's a it's a bridging strategy, but um we we ensure that um the child is cared for um in terms of the needs that they need through their journey, whether it's you know two days, two weeks, two months, and so we're that's important to us.

We're also um beginning to uh work with our uh network of pediatricians to provide uh behavioral health therapists within their pediatric offices, so it's not coming downtown to the Thomas campus.

Um we're getting better at um having therapists um rotate, if you will, through our general pediatric practices and our networks to ensure that that service is out there as well.

So Mr.

Mayor, if I can ask, so um you if you were here earlier, you heard us talk about workforce development.

Um what can the city do to get more access for our residents to health care, behavioral, medical, and others.

What can we do to bring more facilities here?

What can we do to help you get more staffing so that you have more providers, uh, more care?

We want to increase access to health care, behavioral and otherwise, to our community.

I think Arizona lacks uh behavioral health care uh significantly.

And so what can what can we, what can our council do to help encourage uh healthcare uh workforce growth access here in Avondale.

Yeah, a couple points there.

I'd say the whole country needs more mental health caregivers for sure.

And so we can continue to talk about, and I'd say not only just mental health, but just broadly caregivers, starting as early as possible to encourage children to think about uh health care as a career field, and it and it isn't have to be, you know, not everybody is going to be a physician or a nurse, but we have so many different ways in which people can serve in health care, and so starting early be one.

The second, and I think the panel before us is probably the experts on this, but affordable housing for the caregivers that work in health care is going to be critical for us to be able to deliver health care, obviously, right?

So I think anything we can do together to be thoughtful about how we encourage people to come to the valley.

We are growing, so we need all the caregivers to come too, but they're gonna have to be able to afford to live close to where they work, and so that that's something that we can we can spend some time on.

And then I think the last thing is as I mentioned, we can't grow fast enough, so continuing to stay creative in ways at which we can blend things that you're already thinking about.

I love that comment about the blue zone.

So if we're already putting assets into play for the community, is there a health care compliment that could be put uh you know connected to that perhaps that we can think about together?

Uh so I think those to me would be uh get the word out, healthcare is a great place to work.

Uh we need more people to do it, we need to start early.

Uh we need help in affording the housing for our caregivers, and then let's be thoughtful about how we can use shared resources to activate um access points in the delivery system.

And Tony, uh, real quick on that note, um, I was talking to one of the CEOs of the hospital, and I was talking about residency, lack of residency programs for physicians who are short on PCPs, primary care physicians, and he was mentioning actually the same thing to that to that note that you know residency programs are paying on average 60,000 annually.

So a resident has to go through a two to four year program on that salary.

And so that was one of the just to give a full um context to that topic.

Uh that was a point of discussion.

Yeah, and I I would just add that um so could not agree more on the housing comment because to your point, right?

If if residents are paid $60,000 a year and they're struggling to um to live in the community in which they're getting trained, what does that look like in terms of their longevity for staying in the community?

But I think that um in terms of other workforce development, we do need other um support roles within the delivery system, not just physicians.

We do have a national shortage.

There's no question about that with respect to physicians, but developing programs in our community colleges and even high school um programs to get people ready for working in the healthcare system.

So we've done um uh foundation grants to community colleges to help develop their programs and expand their programs.

We've got to have those kinds of things fundamentally in order to support the needs of the community.

And to your point, we're growing.

We can't keep up with the needs in the community right now.

And in Avondale, you know, we don't want, especially when you you say you're sending children home at Narcan, like that's really sad to hear.

Um but I do know that um I'm a veteran, so when I was in Afghanistan and I got blown up, the first thing they did is medicate me, right?

They gave me like all the sleeping pills, all the things to numb me.

And then I came home and they gave me more medications.

Like it was always more medication, more medication.

But once I left the military and I came into the community, the VA didn't really provide really good services for me.

And what helped me was community services.

Um, now I'm a PTSD peer coach, a certified coach, and I think being able to offer those um programs to assist people to go to their peers, especially um, and it isn't bad for like the way I'm gonna the way I'm gonna say it's not gonna come out.

There's a bad stigma right now with having mental health coaches in schools or in different areas because you know of the climate we live in.

And how can we get the the community to trust those people again to allow them because we do have a huge mental crisis issue and the opioid issue, and I I want to be able to trust somebody that I take my son to and not that they're gonna um affirm something he does, but to correct correct it or to help him actually get through it.

I know that I'm really thankful that you guys don't give out as many opioids now because now if I'm in pain and I go to the hospital and I'm used to that, they give me like Tylenol, and I'm like, I need something stronger, like in my head, but I don't.

It's because I've been accustomed to it, and I and I and personally I've seen the difference in it, but now I like I had to find it myself.

Like I had to find resources on my own because the hospitals were just medicating me.

So I think being able to offer those peer coaches or those those different types of um health care like roads that people don't have to medicate themselves anymore.

And I think something council council member White mentioned was like exercise, eating, you know, going outside, like that is huge in the mental like for your mental stability, being able to go out in the sun.

Um do you guys promote that when you have kids come in there or adults that are going through like really hard issues.

Do you go like, hey, you need like you need sun, you need to go outside and exercise, you need to go walking.

Um, I know I have a really bad back, and my physical therapist, I'm really thankful for them.

They told me do not get back surgery until you're not able to walk because you'll probably be worse off in pain.

And that they recommended working out.

Like, if I don't work out my back, I am in pain.

But if I do work out, I feel so much better.

And I think those avenues are a lot better.

But you mentioned it, like you guys are working less on that and more.

So that's great.

But I want to know, like, if you guys promote it with the children as well.

Yeah, absolutely.

I would say we're definitely um and we recently actually developed uh like an integrative health clinic as well.

So for some of our um kids who may have um chronic complaints that we've not been able potentially to like or maybe chronic pain from a serious injury or something where we can start to develop um we could try other avenues, you know, um, to really promote them to have a full and active life because they're young, you know, and we want to make sure that they um they can be as happy as they can be for their life.

But yeah, absolutely.

That's something that we that we promote.

Yeah.

I I would just add you you commented on peer support.

I think that's critical.

Um access the Medicaid program here in Arizona requires that we offer peer and family support programs, and um we have found that people who have lived experiences are are much better equipped to support someone through their journeys.

Um, and so we we have a very robust peer and family support program uh to support folks with substance use disorder challenges or other challenges that may have occurred in their life to make sure that they can they can back to a more productive space.

So I absolutely agree with that.

Thank you, Mr.

Cheryl.

Do you want to wrap it up?

Okay, perfect.

Well, I think we talked a lot about the other questions I had anyhow, which was on infrastructure and gaps and some opportunities.

So I think we had a really great discussion here today.

Um, I'd like to thank our panel for coming in and being with us today, and I'd like to thank our council for having this really unique opportunity to to hear from the direct community, our stakeholders that are directly involved with Avondale.

So let's give them a round of applause.

Thank you all.

We'll take about a five minute break, Ron.

Okay, perfect.

Thank you.

Lisa just gave me a dirty look, so I was just go ahead and get started with our next panel.

We'll be having our human services and nonprofit panel.

And I will go ahead and pass it over to Chris Lopez, our director of neighborhood and family services to get us started.

Thank you, Anisa.

Good morning, Mayor, members of council.

Really honored to be here facilitating this conversation.

I feel like it's a reunion here.

So again, just excited to have this conversation with our friends here.

I'm gonna start uh introducing our panelists here.

Most of them you already know, but uh next to me here is Kathy Dunolfi.

She's our chief program officer with a new leaf.

Uh next to her, we have Sam Labus, he's the vice president of corporate relations and social responsibility with United Way.

And then we have also with us here today, Delaney Russell, the regional director for First Things First.

With that, Mayor, I'm gonna go ahead and uh kick it over to Kathy and have her tell us a little bit about her organization and some of the trends that she's seeing in the community and um how she uh envisions us working uh together in the future.

Thank you, Chris.

Thank you.

Be here.

Thank you.

What an honor and a privilege to be here.

I don't know of any other city that's doing this, so thank you for inviting me.

Um my name is Kathy Dinoffee.

I've been with A New Leaf for 28 years.

Um we are a large human services organization.

I'm sure most of you have heard of us, although for an until about 2000, we were strictly East Valley based, and then we skipped over to Glendale and provided services there through Faith House, um, our domestic violence shelter.

And since then we've been growing and growing mostly through mergers and acquisitions.

Um and we've been partnering with Avondale for I was trying to remember Chris, maybe eight to ten years at least, um, just you know, working together as your city grows and as the needs of your city grows.

Um we've had a staff member here for about three to five years helping with housing, um, motel vouchers, uh, people that come into the resource center that are experiencing homelessness.

Um, and and um we're seeing a lot of need that shouldn't surprise you in all of our uh in all of our programs.

We have about uh about 40 programs addressing housing, domestic violence, um, certainly um foster care, uh community behavior health.

The list goes on and on.

We even have um a contract with the Office of Refugee Resettlement for unaccompanied minors that we shelter.

Um so we're seeing um most recently we're seeing a real uh real need um for uh stability around funding, of course.

We're not sure from one day to the next recently what our funding is gonna look like.

We're 85% government funded.

And even that, uh even that's concerning with respect to private funds and the way uh private donors want their dollars to be used.

So um I don't have to tell you there's a housing crisis.

Um, but it's a continuum of crisis from preventing homelessness all the way through permanent housing for folks that you know aren't able to work or earn an income because of their age or disability.

So we try and address that continuing continuum out of new leave.

Um but it's it's a challenge, it's a daily challenge in finding the resources to do so do so with such a great need.

Um Thank you, Kathy.

Next, I'd like to kick it over to Sam to tell us a little bit about United Way and uh needs that they're seeing.

Thanks, Chris.

Uh good morning.

Umorr, members of the council.

It's such a privilege to be here.

Thank you.

I thought you said something, sorry.

Um first I want to start by saying thank you to Mr.

Uh Corbin and Mr.

Lopez for their tremendous partnership and collaboration with uh United Way, but I think all of our nonprofits throughout the community, it makes the job a lot easier when there's when it's collaboration focused and um really focused on uh the community itself.

So thank you.

Uh again, my name is Sam Labis.

I'm with United Way, I've been with the United Way for uh uh three years in May, and prior to that um worked in the nonprofit sector and the former CEO of First Things First.

Uh so uh born and raised in in Phoenix, but uh proud Arizona input.

Uh but first uh first things first.

Uh United Way, uh we're about to celebrate our 100th anniversary uh this fall.

Um we've been strong partners, I I think with uh uh uh the city.

Um I think our real um I think a real strength and our what we count as our strongest capability as an organization is this role we play at the intersection of uh business and community in the sense that uh we partner with about 400 uh organizations, including um cities, but also um uh for-profit corporations and companies and try to connect them with the needs of this community and try to align their philanthropic goals, uh the priorities and the generosity of their employees uh with rural issues at a community level.

And I think that's um sort of been the history of United Way and where we see ourselves in the next hundred years.

Uh coming out of COVID and under some new leadership with uh uh new CEO at the time, uh Carla Vargas Jesa and our board and our community partners really took, I think, a really deliberate and concerted effort to reassess what life was going to be like and what the community priorities were throughout Maricopa County, including the West Valley and all of our partners.

Uh and through a year-long conversation at a community level and community level through our various sort of communities across Maricopa County.

We landed on what we're calling our our mighty change agenda, mighty change 2026.

But it's the broad strokes on it are a real focus on four key impact areas.

And what the community across and communities across Maricopa County were telling us were pervasive issues and areas that have we had to put our stake in the ground as a unite away where they wanted us to focus.

And those four impact areas are number one education, and very specifically on this idea that early investment in our youngest children is where we're going to see the strongest return on investment, upstream solutions.

And so we're focused keenly on literacy rates, third grade literacy rates, and how do we turn the dial in terms of better progress, uh, better outcomes on that.

The second is workforce development.

I think our committee has long understood that the key to breaking intergenerational poverty or cycles of poverty or advancement for our residents is through access to meaningful and gainful employment.

So we're we're focused on upskilling, reskilling, job training.

So workforce development is a key pillar.

The third is health and food insecurity, is uh, you know, one in five of our children and one in seven of our seniors throughout Maricopa County regularly experience food insecurity.

They go hungry, in other words, on a on a really persistent basis, and that's a concern.

So working with our community partners to close the gap on food insecurity is a priority.

And then the fourth, of course, is um is housing and homelessness.

You know, on any given night across uh Maricopa County, over 9,000 individuals will experience some form of homelessness.

Um the more and more that we're trying to understand our role in that opportunity.

Uh it's definitely partnership with awesome nonprofit organizations and community partners like the city uh and the new leaf.

Um but we're we're more and more focused now on what can prevention look like in terms of sort of like again an upstream solution, a view on uh the front end of a of a pipeline for lack of a better word.

Um that's where I think we're beginning to develop and shape some uh a refocus for United Way in the months ahead and in the year ahead.

Um but that's uh that's my introduction and looking forward to the conversation, and thank you for again for the opportunity.

Sam, thank you for that overview.

Next, I'd like to kick it over to Delaney.

Good morning, Mary City Council members and staff.

Thank you for the opportunity to come and share a little bit about early childhood and first things first.

My name is Delaney Russell.

I am a regional director here in Southwest Maricopa.

Can you hear me okay?

Okay.

Um I have the honor and privilege of representing Southwest Maricopa, one of our 28 regions here across the state of Arizona.

Southwest Maricopa encompasses Tallison all the way out to Harquahela and the Tonopah border, Palo Verde, down to Gila Bend, and back up.

We have roughly 30,000 children here in Southwest Maricopa, birth to age five, and roughly 7100 of those reside in the city of Avondale.

We are one of the core partners at the Arizona Complete Health, Avondale Family Resource Center.

It's always an alcohol, it always stumps everyone.

And we have been a core partner since uh 2010, I believe.

Uh it is one of 46 family resource centers that we fund across Maricopa County.

Uh we've just recently expanded down into the Pimas as well with Santa Cruz.

Uh, and we support the network of other community hubs similar to family resource centers across the state of Arizona.

Uh for those of you that may not be familiar, the first five years of a child's life are the most important, as that is when 90% of those uh that brain growth and development is occurring.

And we are the state's first and only early childhood agency supporting early childhood here.

We do it in many different forms.

Anything from family support, parenting education, uh, early childhood education and scholarships, professional development.

You name it.

If it touches a child, chances are we're in that sector.

Um it's incredible the work that the resource center has done over these last 15 years.

Our dollars help fund two full-time staff at that resource center, Jackie and Anthony, and they are absolutely incredible.

When I was looking through the data for quarter two, we had roughly 11,000 parents and caregivers come through that door, duplicated, receiving services for their children birth to age five.

So it's pretty incredible.

This resource center is one of our busiest family resource centers in Maricopa County, and as it stands right now is the most state-of-the-art family resource center.

Just recently in January, we had a tour that they graciously opened their doors for with some of our providers all across the state of Arizona through DCS and our court teams, as well as prevent child abuse Arizona.

So it is the example of resource centers.

I love to show it off any chance that I get.

So we're just incredibly thankful for the city's continued partnership and support of early childhood for your support of human services.

And thank you.

Thank you to the Laney.

I think I owe you coffee for all those kind words.

Thank you so much.

With that, Mayor, I'd like to kick it over to you and council for any questions and further dialogue.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Chris.

And any council member.

Okay, Councilmember Weiss.

Good morning, and thank you for being here.

And I just do have a question.

I've heard that child care is one of the things that we really need in this area.

And can somebody speak to that?

Yes.

So not just here in Avenue, but across the state of Arizona, we have an affordability and an accessibility concern related to child care.

The average cost of infant care in the state of Arizona averages more than the cost of tuition for uh university.

So if you are a family with an eight-week old looking to participate in child care, you can anticipate spending anywhere from 11,000 to 15,000 dollars a year, um, depending on the area and availability.

Uh so the cost of child care is increasing and has only increased COVID exacerbated our our knowledge and understanding of that impact to families, and then accessibility.

So the further out that you go outside of Maricopa County, you do have access issues, so there's not enough child care capacity to serve.

Um even here in Southwest Maricopa, considered a very urban area, when you start getting to the Buckeye area, you have child care deserts.

So here in uh Avondale specifically, you have about seven quality first sites, which has the capacity to serve roughly two thousand children.

Um you have other unregulated in-home centers, but um oftentimes they're still inaccessible or unaffordable for families.

Mr.

Mayor, yes, sorry, can we just so what can we do?

Yeah.

What can the city do?

Because I think the problem is highlighted clearly, but is it a city's role to subsidize that?

Is it what what can cities do?

What what should council do to help address the problem?

Ron, I was hoping you would ask that question.

Uh so I'll give you a great example of what one of our amazing partners with the City of Phoenix did two years ago.

They saw that there was a need for airport employees to they had a child care need.

So the City of Phoenix fronted, I think roughly four and a half or five million dollars in child care scholarships, so that employees at the airport were able to utilize scholarship dollars to send their child to a child care center so that people can go to work.

Um that's a very drastic measure.

That's a lot of money to anticipate.

Uh, but things like subsidizing the cost is an incredible starting point.

Also working with businesses.

Um, there's opportunities potentially to set aside uh tax revenue to create a child care fund to be able to be redstone.

Um, there's a lot of creative solutions.

There's not a one-size-fits-all uh kind of approach to it.

Um, but I think if that is something that the city is interested in entertaining, uh, we can we can look at doing a feasibility study here for the city of Avondale, really identifying who's in need of child care, where are they located, uh, is it a workforce development barrier?

Um, and maybe working with some of our business partners to come up with some creative solutions.

So I think just the starting point is asking that question and seeing how we can go from there.

Can I add observation?

I think uh so part of the the questions we're sort of asked to consider was thinking about uh partnerships and specifically like public-private partnerships.

I think child care is a really good example of public-private at work because you know, first things first obviously is is um is a state program, it's a government program, tax dollars, and we partner actually with United Way and First Things First in terms of um delivery of scholarships for families.

So we're actually the administrative home uh with United Way uh with first things first to make sure that those dollars are getting out seamlessly quickly to families and to child care providers.

So I think it's a it's a really neat example of how you can sort of rely on your respective strengths and coming together as a community.

The other thing that's really attractive about the first things first and its investments in communities is its focus on not only on access but on the quality of child care, and that's tremendously important when we look at outcomes for children and their families.

I should I should buy a copy wrong.

Councilmember White.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

Thank you so much for the panel.

I really appreciate hearing the conversation about child care being a part of infrastructure.

I realized as somebody who was differently able during COVID that the amount of child care I would have had to pay for to help my kids get through kind of school and everything was my salary.

So I it made it easier for me to retire because my kids mean that much to me.

If you know them, you you see them, you know they're the world.

I think a lot of people in this area don't have that capability.

Um if you're a single parent and you decide I don't want to work anymore, I gotta focus on my kids.

Where's that other income gonna come from?

Um so that's that's a really big concern because um I believe we all have families here at the dais.

We all have families, we all have children in our families.

Um one of the children being on the dais as well.

So when we think about how important families are to each and every one of us and how that shows up differently for all of us, I I just want some guidance on on what we do to provide parental extended family support as we care for the kids in our community because it's becoming ever more challenging.

I I think about simple things, and this is really not political, but very we don't have a lot of voter turnout because when people get off of work, they got to go home and cook dinner.

They don't have time to come, they don't have time to read those long ballots, they don't have that kind of time because they are worried about their kids, so they're taking them to practice, they're good on after school activities.

They're doing everything in their power to keep them off of whatever and keep them out of drugs and everything else.

So I find what we can do as a city is be there for each other, which oftentimes we are.

We really are.

But how can we kind of burst the bubble on that and let the joy spread?

Because I I feel like this is my support network here when I say something about my kids, they know I'm leaving, so it's not that conversation.

But how do we make sure we empower everybody in Avondale to know that we care for each and every one of them?

We want them to have the full value of their life in this city so they can take advantage of every part of every aspect of it, because I think they have so little bit of time, and they work so hard.

The people who live here work hard to afford to be able to stay here.

And it's it's it's a lot to balance, and we want them to have kids here.

We want them to have families as large as they can accommodate.

What do we do?

I think that's a phenomenal question.

I want to give compliments to the city because you're already doing it.

Uh, the family resource center is built around the five protective factors, including parent resiliency, understanding of child development, understanding of social emotional development, concrete supports, social connection, that's a big one.

Um so by already investing and making it a statement at that resource center that you are just not here to serve this Avondale but the neighboring communities, that is it you're meeting that marker.

Um I will tell you that, and maybe Chris can also attest to this.

Um, the need is only grown.

So I think anticipating that there will be a need for uh potentially more investments, a need for expansion, probably at one point uh to be able to continue providing those services.

But uh an individual can walk into that family resource center for one service and they're met with staff that truly care about them the same way that you as council members care about each other and your communities, and they're not just there to identify and support one need, they're there to identify um an entire circumstance of needs.

And so what ends up happening a lot of the time is a family may come in for one particular service, but engaging with Anthony or Jacqueline, um they're identifying other needs, and so on site at that resource center, the model that's been created allows them to do resource and referral, oftentimes in the same building with partners like a new leaf.

And so um just that model and supporting that model is is going to help meet that need right now, but just anticipating that there's there's gonna be a growth and a continued need in that sector.

So I hope I answer that and then yes, please do.

Okay, I I have another example of sort of that model at work in terms of thinking about community spaces uh and wraparound services and connecting families.

So last Thursday I um had the privilege of joining uh a site visit at Latty Court uh as part of a literacy hub site, a tour, but also it was a uh kindergarten roundup recruitment for families.

It was started at 4 30 all the way through six o'clock, and it was first of all, it was such an incredible site to see families there engaging and you know going to the different stations.

Um Avondale Library was there to make sure the parents and kids had access right away to library cards, a number of our community nonprofit partners there, like Make Way for Books, uh running some of the literacy sessions, uh, our staff from United Way who are embedded in the community there, school staff, um, but also like this aspect that Delaney's talking about, and making sure that we're also thinking about services and connecting family to those in real time or be starting with with raising awareness.

But it was it was such a um I mean it's one thing one thing to read it on paper, and it's another thing to sort of see it at work and real time.

And uh I neglect I ran out of the house and I forgot to bring these for but I'll make sure I get some.

It's it's United Way's annual report card uh called our annual scorecard, and I there's a whole highlight on Avondale and our partnership with the city and the school district and LaddieCor, both on um both on uh supporting attendance across Maricopa, which is our our absentee chronic absentee uh uh absenteeism initiative, but also our literacy hub.

So I want to make sure I get that to members of the council and the staff.

But uh I just wanted to build on Delaney's really good example around um not only being thoughtful but clearing out the hurdles and and maybe to answer to it, maybe um Mr.

Corbin sort of thought about what can you do?

Yes, resources always, right?

Uh so like expanding opportunities through resources, but also leadership from uh the council, from staff, community leaders, it sends a signal about what is a priority for this community, and the more that there is a vocalization of what is important to you as leaders um and community leaders, the more it helps then uh to uh all the rest of us in the community to see those signals and to lean in and see that yes, it is it is a priority.

And when there has to be a trade-off between this or that, knowing where our leaders stand um very uh in the in the community is tremendously helpful, you know, in like facilitating quicker action, encouraging all of us that are collaborators to be more collaborative and uh leveraging resources where there's opportunity.

So to the degree that you have provided that leadership, which you consistently do thank you, uh, because it shows and it's it's a definitely a point of pride for our organization in terms of our collaboration with the city.

Mayor Sam gave us four pillars for United Way.

Can he give those to us again?

The four things that United Way was it's uh early literacy, so it's very specifically uh increasing the percentage of our children and communities all across Maricopa County that are reading proficiently at grade level.

Um number two, it is housing and homelessness, so we have a goal about reducing uh homelessness and communities.

Uh and number three is health and hunger, so reducing uh incidences of food insecurity, so that you know the frequency and the percentage of individuals that go hungry in our community, students, children and um seniors, and and expanding access to health care largely through connecting people to uh eligibility, like um benefits, um Medicare, Medicaid, those sorts of things.

Thank you.

And then lastly, it's uh it's uh uh we have a focus on jobs.

Uh so reskilling, upskilling, job training, and uh and then uh a benchmark would be um uh number of engaged youth as opposed to disconnected youth, or I'm sure that's not the right term anymore, but um uh and then the number of individuals that are finding um that are increasing their household income because they found more gainful employment.

And then those will be outlined in here.

And I can send electronic version, but also want you to have a physical copy of them.

So sorry.

I don't ran out of the house.

I thought I forgot the.

Thank you so much, Sam, for providing those four pillars.

Council uh member Solorio.

I want to thank you guys for being here.

It's really important.

Um I serve on small cities council because I serve nationally as well.

And it's uh this is my third meeting in.

I have another meeting later on today during this portion, but it's very interesting that they said that small cities councils used to see topics such as housing, such as homelessness, uh, infrastructure, economic development, and one of the top ones this year is child care.

Um so it is very interesting.

They said that that usually is what they see in other committees, but never in small cities council.

Now, small cities across America make up 70% of America, so that's huge.

Um I shared with them some of the things that we do here in Avondale from you know first things first from that birth age, uh they were just shocked.

They're like, How do you guys even get the money?

Where does that even come from?

What does that look like?

So um, I think yesterday, Chris's presentation during council was very pivotal in sharing those are the things that we take from here and we share on a national level, and people are constantly wondering how do we do that?

So thank you to all of you who are here helping put the puzzle pieces together because on the level where we're at, it makes other cities want to know more information and how to do that.

And if it's one of the issues that came up, you know, in a as a nationwide issue, it's definitely something that needs to be addressed.

Councilmember Garcia, I ended up being one of those statistics in 2020 where I had to leave my career as a law enforcement officer because of child care.

Um it was child care, and I didn't want to get the COVID shot.

But really, it was child care.

Um I there was no child care available.

Um, and I didn't look into this.

I I lived in Avondale, I didn't look into the city for resources like that.

Like that never like it never occurred to me to be like, hey, I'm gonna go look at the nonprofits or the city to see if I can find child care, and sorry, I just left my job and tried to find something that I could find.

And if I knew about these resources, if I I might have been in a different place even today, because I would have had that opportunity.

And I think knowing that these are available, for me, it's like how do we get that to the community?

And I know you mentioned that you're going to the elementary schools, um, but a lot of people, especially in Avondale that I've spoken to, they're not attending the public schools anymore, they're attending the charter schools or the private schools.

Um, a lot of parents are now homeschooling, um, but they still need resources, and I think um being able to communicate to them and not focus in just one area of Avondale, but all of Avondale is important because I live in the north side of Avondale, and I do feel as if we are a little left out because people assume that we have we know and stuff like that, and a lot of resources are on the south side of Avondale, but I needed resources, I needed to know that, and like how can we reach all the communities?

Because just because we live in a different neighborhood doesn't mean that we don't also need those resources.

So I I know that Abe Wise and Avondale's communication system would probably be a great tool to be able to send information out.

Um I know that when large events happen or the health and resource fair is happening at the family resource center.

Um, word of mouth is is huge.

Um I believe there's over 160 partners now at that resource center, so for them, they're also um meeting and and chatting with uh individuals receiving services for them.

Um I do think that's always a big thing that we talk about a lot in our space is how do you reach anyone and everyone?

A lot of our grant partners are utilizing things as simple as Facebook and like mom's groups on Facebook to be able to expand the information of services.

So I think that's where we would rely on the city to really say what is the best method to be able to communicate, and then what can we provide for you as a collaborator and as a systems partner?

What information is most relevant?

Um, how can we direct people to the most accurate and accessible resources?

Um so maybe that's where we do some brainstorming together and see what uh the best solution is in that space.

Yeah, and I totally agree.

I think as a council and as a city, our leadership in getting the voice out is important.

Um, even the way we we show the community that we could get along with different our differences and them being comfortable to coming to us no matter where they stand, because I think that's an issue, is like they don't feel like they'll like I didn't qualify for a lot of things because I was $10, I made too much money.

You know what I mean?

And those people when they go, they they tend to leave, you know, not and they don't they leave the city, but then there's nonprofits that can help them.

So um thank you guys so much for being that like in between for for a lot of families who don't qualify for the resources that are like city available, but then they could go to you for different things.

So I appreciate you guys taking the time to be here today and offer that.

I would just quickly add um, you know, uh, for all the systems we have that make referrals to us for any service we provide, um, our best our best referral source is word of mouth.

It just is, and that comes from the people you live around, the groups that you're in, your church, your community, your neighborhood, your your friends and family, um, to say, hey, you know, uh, this is going on at the resource center, and and then um our our end of things is not only providing the resources but navigating the resources is very difficult to navigate if again you're a single mom with two kids and and you need you have multiple needs, and how do you navigate those systems?

They're very difficult, but at a new leaf, that's what we're paid to do.

Help people navigate the systems that are gonna help them first and foremost.

But honestly, just back to my my first point, just keep spreading the word that Avondale Resource Center is to Delaney's point, just a great, great opportunity for to for folks to get all their needs met, um, or at least start navigating the systems for this the services they need.

Chris, you have some questions that you'd like to ask for the panel.

Absolutely.

We've heard a lot of wonderful things about Avondale and the resource center, but we don't want to rest on our laurels, we want to take a long look into the future.

Um, can the panel help us kind of explore what are the emerging gene emerging trends and what are the the big needs on the horizon that we really need to uh be aware of and working towards addressing?

Um I'll speak first and let you know that uh of course again, affordable housing, child care, transportation, all the things we do here and know about.

Um but um support services is something we're really heavily focused on once folks become housed.

So it's one thing to lose your home, be live on the streets or family and friends and in your car.

And then if there's resources which we have often to help people become rehoused, but then just uh you know, not leave them to navigate on their own from there because there's still a need, even though there's a roof over their head and potentially food on the table, there's still this.

If you've lived on the streets for a while or in your car for a while, it's it's it's that need for support services for connection, for navigating other resources, those kinds of things.

So we're putting a real heavy emphasis on that in our housing programs to make sure that it's not just here's a place to stay, um, but also we're here for you for any needs that come up once you're housed.

Um one um point of view that I shared briefly earlier is you know at the beginning of United Way's plan, this five-year plan MC 2026, um, we had a real focus on uh on housing and homelessness still do, but it was a specific sort of point of view, which was um keep supporting uh shelter, emergency transition, and I think that'll always sort of be our focus for United Way.

Um but what we're in deep conversations now with stakeholders and the nonprofit uh leaders, uh community leaders, the Maricopa Association of Governments is uh coming to this conversation and looking at good representative models from different cities around what can a prevention framework look like and what can what role can a United Way and its and its partners and the business community at the community level have in terms of um what can that look like for our our communities?

And that's gonna be a that's we're at the front end of that conversation.

We've seen some good examples of a of a more uh comprehensive, a more efficient and connected uh how do you take these sometimes disconnected support services and have them work more seamlessly on a prevention sort of framework?

So that's that's what's top of mind for us and that we're we're working through.

Um so we'll more to come in terms of where there would be opportunities to engage in that conversation and put pen to paper to say what we think it that can look like.

Uh and the second thing that sort of comes to mind is um I don't know if it's short term or if it's going to be multi-year, but you know, we're also uh our our CEO has been hosting uh conversations with nonprofit leaders in terms of what are we seeing and potential impacts that we should be aware of as a community as it relates to any uh federal, state or local policy making uh and its immediate implications for resource availability or or any other impact it might have in communities.

Um so just sort of like keeping an eye on the the policy landscape, particularly at a federal level and its implications for any pass-through dollars or policies that um even if there are no dollars attached, what that could mean.

So that's that's sort of top of mind for us in real time.

And yes, it's real time, but it also has the potential to be a multi-year uh conversation.

I'll just kind of throw an ad that uh I think over the last probably decade, definitely post-COVID, we've seen just a higher need for social services.

Um I'm thinking to primarily um services and uh the need for programs such as WIC, SNAP, TANF, things along that line.

So here in Southwest Maricopa, we've had an increase in the number of families that have sought in uh enrollment in services like WIC.

Um, we've seeing over like 95% utilization rates of WIC, so families that are enrolled in these benefits are utilizing these benefits.

Um a lot of the time, so there's barriers to uh enrolling in said services.

Uh just now recently a lot of those providers are now taking things virtually, which is great.

Before you used to have to mail in packets or drop them off in person, which for families to your point, Councilmember White, um, if you're working a nine to five and the office closes at five, how do you get there?

Um so we're seeing a shift in that, but I would say we're gonna see an increased need and dependency on social services and financial assistance, whether that's through Department of Economic Security seeking for child care subsidies, that need has increased significantly in the last three years, or for programs like WIC and TANF.

So I think just anticipating that uh everything that's happening at the federal level is gonna is gonna trickle down, providers are already feeling it.

Um so just anticipating that that's both short-term and and long term.

Mayor, members of the panel, one of the things that I've heard throughout the morning is um workforce development and the need you know to to support that.

Um are you seeing um workforce development needs a shortage of human service workers?

And if so, what can Avondale do to support um nonprofit organizations as they try to hire the most qualified uh personnel for their organizations?

Uh so I know that uh academies at the Southwest Valley through the Awa Frect is an incredible example of sort of preparing those workforce pipelines from the human and social services side of it.

Uh a lot of those providers are those are low-paying jobs, but they're high needs jobs, right?

So coming from a child care lens, um, I remember when I came out of college, I had a four-year degree.

I went from uh being a barista at a resort, making uh like 45 or 49,000 uh to making 1375 an hour.

And um at that point it already had a mortgage, and so it was a big discussion within our own family of can we afford to take this on.

But I knew that I wanted to be in the field of early childhood.

Um a lot of our providers don't have um a privilege or an opportunity to make those decisions, and so they don't even seek out that career pathway.

So supporting the academies of the Southwest Valley is great because a lot of those jobs are technical jobs, but I think also providing incentives for roles that are on more of the social services side.

We fund programs like home visitation here in Southwest Maricopa, and uh we will go months and months and months with vacancies, and that means that children are not being served because we do not have a provider that has sought out an opportunity to take a job at $19 an hour.

Um and that's just the reality.

And so when you couple it with things like a housing shortage or housing um affordability concerns, cost of living increases, um, it just doesn't make sense for these individuals to seek out those opportunities.

So if there's ways that the city can incentivize, similar to what you did with the culinary program at EMCC, um, I think that is a phenomenal example of sort of adapting as a city and uh really showing support and rallying behind the providers themselves.

Um let anyone else add.

We're seeing behavioral health uh needs um as a crisis across our country and it it's impacting Avondil as well.

Um what can cities do specifically?

What are some actions we can take to address behavioral health needs in our community to to make sure that we're serving our residents and especially the most vulnerable folks in the community?

I guess I would start by um doing your best to remove the stigma around mental health um needs and services.

I think that that is a barrier for folks reaching out.

Um and we're all struggling in many different ways, but in our own way, um, as are our children and our aging parents, and and the list goes on.

Um but there's a stigma attached to needing mental health resources, and how we say it at a new leaf is if we were talking about someone that had diabetes or cancer, we wouldn't be stigmatizing them.

It's the same for um mental health issues and behavioral health issues.

So one thing you can do is spread the word about stopping the stigma, and then certainly lean on the folks like a new leaf and like other providers certainly here in Avondale that that work with this population and have those resources and and can help you help your residents kind of navigate again, navigate the systems of behavior health and what interventions are timely and um and most effective in helping your residents, I would say.

We've got one last question, and this is really um is kind of focused uh on Sam.

Sam, um Avondale prides itself on being uh an innovative city.

Are there any innovative human service practices or models that you're seeing um that you you think Avondale should take a look at?

Well, one I sort of mentioned, or I didn't sort of, I did mention it's highlighted because it it is an innovation that we're kind of leaning into and using Avendale's partnership with uh literacy hubs as a real example.

So like when we look at the and when you see this, you'll see the data, and something you are we likely already know, which is if we're looking at third grade literacy rates, we know why they're important because up until third grade you're learning to read, and then you know, you then you're um reading to learn after that.

So if you if you aren't at proficient, it's gonna be a challenge uh four times more likely to not make it through through school.

Um and so when you look over the trend line, it it's we can't seem to move the dial on on um literacy rates for our third graders, and so one of the innovations, it's it's an innovation is predicated on something we've been talking about.

So in some ways it's not really an innovation, right?

But it is it is not an inbid and it is not an innovation in the sense that we we we know what works and it's collaboration, it is bringing what we're all respectively good at government, nonprofits, private sector, and others, and bring our best to bear in collaborations.

That's that's not innovative, that's sort of like we know that works.

I think what's innovative about this particular model is that we're we're we're hyper focused on literacy hubs is hyper focused on on bringing all the best that we have in the community uh to the community itself.

So it's it's partnerships, um, it's wraparound services, it's informed by um what we call um evidence-informed practices.

We don't think they're gonna work.

We know that they work because um uh because the evidence and the research tells us that if we have an intervention and it's deployed in a particular way that we're more likely to change outcomes, we're more likely to help our children, we're more likely to help our families.

And so um the literacy hubs is this real interesting model that's that is like let's take that evidence-informed application that as it relates to uh literacy and working with young children.

Let's take this slice because it it it it it it it addresses digital literacy in a seamless way.

Let's take this parent engagement strategy that we know is based in evidence that works because if we we have to work with and this two-generation model, so I don't mean to go on and on, sorry, but uh but uh but I think that that's sort of an example of uh on two levels.

One is it is very specific to literacy.

We we already have outcomes.

You can see some of the uh uh aggregated data in the report, and that literacy hubs are working in terms of uh compared to those that aren't able yet to participate in literacy hubs, and we're focused with our corporate partners, with foundations, with donors, and saying, look at what works.

If you look over the trend line, nothing's moving the dial, but here we have an example where we're hyper-focused on innovating in its working.

Help us do that more in communities like Avondale in Avondale, across Avondale, beyond Avondale.

Um just sort of maybe one example.

Thank you so much for that.

Uh we're about out of time, but I just really want to take an opportunity to thank our nonprofit partners.

Thank you for your wisdom, and thank you for the work you you invest in our community every day.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Okay, another five-minute break.

Okay, five minutes, everybody.

Uh as you know, it plays a vital role in our lives.

They also play a part and role in our economy, our success in Avondale.

Stable and enduring water supplies, clean air, land and open space, healthy wildlife, and other elements of nature help us enjoy life through recreation, drives economic growth, and frankly keeps us alive.

So today's panel represents a cross-section of natural resources affecting the city of Avondale, and it's my hope that we can not only learn about these resources, but that we can have a broader discussion about how these resources connect and interact with each other and how the Avondale community can protect these resources responsibly and responsibly use them to influence and to support the other elements that we spoke about today, including economic development, housing, and health and human services.

So our panel members today, uh, right next to me is Warren Tenney, he's the executive director of the Arizona Municipal Water Association, representing some discussions regarding water.

Matthew Poppen, environmental director of Maricopa Association of Governments, which he can help us discuss air quality and some other elements.

Next to him is Bobby Lemerrow, land specialist with Arizona Game and Fish Department, able to talk about open space, um revitalizing the river and and uh wildlife, and then next to him is Ty Soupley, retired biologist from Arizona Game and Fish Department, and also working with the National Audubon Society.

I'm gonna have uh each member take about five minutes to introduce themselves, talk about the organization, provide us an update on upcoming priorities and obstacles and opportunities, and then after we do that, we'll open for questions from the council.

So I'll turn it over to Warren.

Thank you, Kirk, and thank you all um Mayor and Council members for this opportunity to talk with you about water.

Uh I think you know it's one water is one of those issues that as long as you keep turning on your tap and you have water there, you're not really too concerned about it, and yet water is never something that you can stop working on and making certain that uh you have the water security that you need for your community.

So, as Kirk noted, I'm Warren Tenney, uh executive director for the Arizona Municipal Water Users Association, or also known as AMWA.

And AMWA has been around since 1969.

It was brought together or established because of the foresight of municipal leaders in recognizing that water doesn't flow according to political jurisdiction.

And therefore, it's important to be working together when it comes to water resource and water policy issues.

Avondel is a member of Amwa.

Uh Vice Mayor Beatty serves on the board of uh directors.

Our board of directors.

Oh, what did I say?

I'm sorry.

Congratulations.

Um engineering would help.

What a chameleon.

Maybe that's foreshadowing.

Kirk serves on the management board, which is comprised of the water services directors.

And yes, our board of directors is comprised of either the mayor or a council member, and therefore it is Vice Mayor Nielsen who serves on the AMWA board of directors.

So let me see if I can get my train of thought back.

So Amwa comprises of Avondale as well as Goodyear, Peoria, Glendale, Phoenix, Scottsdale, Tempe, Mesa, Gilbert, and Chandler.

Comprised together, those 10 municipalities provide water to 3.7 million residents.

That is more than half of the state's population.

And also provide water to the businesses and industries that are key to our economy.

And therefore, each of the members of AMWA take very seriously the responsibility of providing water security.

What is water security?

That's to make certain that you know as a resident that you're going to have water.

Not just today, but for a very long time because cities are not in, our cities are in the forever business.

And therefore, water is the foundation for you having a thriving Avondale.

And it is also the foundation for our economy.

And so we have been fortunate in Arizona to have strong water policies in place as a state.

And to be also have available different resources.

You are also fortunate that you have a good group of individuals that are dedicated to the to providing water and doing the work that's needed 24-7 of making sure that water is delivered to the residents of Avondale.

Challenges do exist.

As I said, it's water is something that you cannot just uh sit back and just magically hope that it's going to be taken care of.

It requires a lot of planning and investing.

And that's what the reason we've been successful here in Arizona is because we have planned and we have invested.

But again, that never stops.

There's challenges with the Colorado River that we're that are going to be impacting the state.

The federal government is required to come up with new operational guidelines by the end of next year for how to operate the Colorado River.

That we know is that the river is producing less water, and we're going to end up having less water here from that resource.

There's challenges with our groundwater in that we have reached limits on our aquifer, and we also have just got to keep making sure that we're investing in new supplies, and those take time.

Water is a long game.

And I'll stop there.

Thank you, Warren.

Thank you.

Thank you, Warren, for breaking the ice with everybody.

Thank you, Mayor and members of the council.

I really appreciate this opportunity to come and speak with you and hopefully provide uh useful information.

So my name is Matt Poppin.

I'm the environmental director with the Maricopa Association of Governments, and I think most of you are familiar with MAG, but just in case you're not, we're a regional planning agency, where really our mayors and our city managers are the bosses, and we bring them together to make policy decisions on topics that need regional coordination.

And certainly environmental topics are one of those.

Both uh mayor and city manager have sat through a lot of my air quality updates each month, and so they're probably pretty familiar with it.

So MAG has three areas that we're focused in in terms of environmental quality.

Primarily, we are the lead air quality planning agency for both Maricopa County and parts of Penal County.

So as part of that role, we're responsible for developing these regional plans that we submit to EPA that says, hey, here's how we're gonna meet these national air quality standards.

And we're really at a very challenging time right now in terms of air quality because it is a struggle to put together plans to meet some very stringent EPA standards that the city might be emitting.

And really what we're finding with PM 2.5, the biggest issues that we have with that is residential wood burning and the consumer fireworks activity.

Those are the two things that really are the most unhealthy activity and really put us in non-compliance with EPA standards.

And that's sort of a shift for people because people usually think big industry, they think cars and vehicles, but really when it comes to PM 2.5, the problem locally is kind of one of our own making.

So then it's all about what do we do, how do we engage with residents about that?

Because everybody enjoys being outside using their fire pits, burning wood, and the consumer fireworks.

We presented uh last month that we had the worst air quality in the nation on January 1st, 2025, and that was strictly due to consumer fireworks.

It was also the third worst in the world.

There was only two places in the world that had worse PM 2.5 concentrations than the West Phoenix monitor at 33rd Avenue in Thomas.

And that's a problem strictly of our own making.

That's not industry, that's not cars, it's us burning wood and us doing the consumer fireworks.

And you you guys have all seen that, right?

You go outside on those on New Year's Eve, and it just gets trapped.

It stays at that level of the light, and it really is unhealthy.

If there ever is an unhealthy time to be outside, it's New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

So that's something we as a community can really address and look forward to.

The other thing I would say that's exciting in terms of ozone, ozone is much more harder.

It's much more distributed.

The ozone we breathe here doesn't necessarily come from here.

Um it's much more distributed, so it's a much harder pollutant to control.

Um the urban increment is much smaller.

Like, for example, we're we're roughly about 80 parts per billion, which is 10 parts per billion over the standard, but a place like the Grand Canyon is close to 70.

Place like Petrified National Park is close to the standard as well, where there's no sources, so ozone is much more distributed.

But I think what we're excited about is we're doing this steady this summer.

Uh ASU has been able to work with us uh with ADEQ, with Maricopa County, with EPA to really steady our ozone problems so that we can really understand what is happening locally, so that we can then come to policymakers and say, we actually have some science to say that these are the decisions that will help the most with ozone here locally.

So we're really excited about that study, and we're hoping uh that will give us some guidance on how to better address ozone moving forward.

So those are some of the long-term things we're looking at.

We just we just have a couple minutes left with this panel, so just so God, I'll be quick.

Okay.

Um, for GANFish perspective, the big one is open space, um, especially when reviewing those long-term plans that the city of Avondale puts out, like let's say the 20, like a 2040 general plan.

Um, identifying early and not flexing on the open space is a big consideration that we want in.

And frankly, City of Avondale from my time has done an excellent job of this.

Um, notifying us early in the process is really big.

Um, one thing that's been effective in some other regions as far as habitat restoration efforts directly within the Gila River and improving upon recreational opportunities is forming relationships early with private landowners, um, creating some sort of incentivized program for them to do treatments within there.

Um, we've encountered issues where we've been doing large-scale chunks.

We hit a pot of private land where it actually has a really rough invasive species population of stinknet, salt cedars.

So that's pretty much becoming a seed bank, so intrinsically it doesn't make sense to just leave that out.

So oftentimes we've been able to provide supplemental funding to actually pay that person to do the work on themselves, just usually going through educational opportunities, meeting with them really and often to get them on board on some of these projects.

Yeah, I like to say that that big picture planning is critical.

Uh, considering your sand and gravel operators, this corridor is full of open water sites that are the pits of the sand and gravel operations.

So thinking about how that's dealt with when those operations are done and move away.

Um, considering having local process for remediation of those sites and considering whether those sites might be a water source uh not only for your own use, but for natural areas and also some natural open space in association with the recovery of those.

I remember Mayor Mech was really interested in some of those sites when he was mayor of uh Backy.

So I do encourage the communities to think about the sand and gravel.

They're gonna move west, they're gonna move downstream.

So there'll be new operations going towards 85.

Uh so you can look at some of yours maybe phasing out in in the future.

The other thing to consider is working with the flood control district for natural infrastructure solutions for flood management rather than hardscape.

It's less expensive.

Uh a lot of that ties back to how you zone so that you allow for infiltration of your flood waters and dispersal of your flood waters, and you don't end up with big concentrations.

Um that's something else to think about.

Um it'll save you money in the long term to think ahead that way, and you get some natural open space benefits by working with the flood control district in that manner.

Uh having some setback with your industrial development along the um the state 30 route from the river corridor itself.

And don't back all that industrial right up against the the river floodplain and and allow for some transition.

I don't know how much opportunity there is in Avondale to consider farmland as being retained in your matrix, but keeping farmlands again near the river corridor itself that might not be suitable or be expensive to meet flood management criteria to turn it into houses.

Maybe those are the lands that would benefit from uh keeping it in agriculture.

So those are some of my thoughts.

All right.

Thank you.

I want to thank the panel for their time today.

And I think what we did today is we really kind of shed the light on the fact that these resources, water, air, open space, wildlife are really truly interconnected.

And that it they're also impactful to everything else that we're doing within the city with housing and economic development and those things are impactful to the water and their and the natural resources as well.

So I think the big idea is we want to make sure that we're always thinking forward and collaboratively on all of these issues, you know, for the best benefit of the of the city.

So with that, Mayor, I think we're done with this group.

Thank you so much for being here today.

Actually, Mr.

Mayor Lissa, I just want to um let you consider this.

So it's about 11.34.

Um we've got uh 45 minutes for uh Jen's presentation.

We could take an early lunch and come back at 12.30.

Um set up and have lunch, but I know you guys have some kind of conflicts, and then she can go uh uh right before our 1.30 uh our um rounds consulting firm and then do them after lunch, or we can you know squeeze in as much as we can before people have to leave or or go to lunch and then still come back at 1.30.

But I'm by moving lunch up early if you guys are rest of the council.

And then can we come back at 1230 then and um start with that?

Is is food uh on its way?

The food is ready.

Food is ready?

I'd rather eat it now than in an hour.

All right, so we'll convene back at 12.30.

Okay.

1230, everybody.

Thank you.

Do you have to do your gavel?

It's a fluid plan because we all know economic development has shifts, right?

So conditions may shift, priorities may be adjusted, things happen, and so we always want to be prepared and flexible to get into the strategic plan and make changes when we need to.

It's also important, like City Manager Corbin said, we want to make sure we're in alignment and that we are truly implementing your vision.

So I really encourage feedback and interaction during this presentation to help uh align and make sure we're we're all on the same page.

Umic development is a team sport.

So I was gonna do an analogy, and my husband last night stopped me because I was gonna be like, you're like the owners and council member and assistance and manager's like the you know, GNs.

He's like, don't just don't try to do a sports analogy.

But in all reality, we are all on the same team.

We're in it to win it.

And so I just wanted to start out by saying that it is a team sport.

Um, it takes a village.

I wanted to acknowledge so perfect timing to put Cheryl Covert on the spot.

Yeah, Cheryl has played an integral role in the strategic plan and even this presentation today.

So I wanted to give her a special um shout out as well.

And I also want to acknowledge um Jodi and Kim over here because this is definitely.

Thank you.

A partnership.

I mean, I was literally behind Andy's chair, hoping he wouldn't roll me over during a panel because we're trying to close a big deal.

So Jody was helping me um with that.

And so, and also council member uh uh councilmark I just city manager, maybe maybe one day he will be a council member after all this.

I just projected Kirkwell, City Manager Ron Corbin, um, and assistant city manager Tracy Stevens have been also very helpful in working with me on this plan, as well as the rest of the exec team, Katie Gregory and Dale, I still don't know how to say your last name.

Also have been very, very involved in this process.

And um I want to also thank Nicole and the city attorneys because a lot of the development agreements and things to advance the projects to this next to get us to the next level requires a lot of um agree, you know, making sure we do agreements that the right way when we engage with the partners, development partners.

Okay, so with that said, most importantly, thank you, Mayor and Council, for your support and your vision because that is what's really spearheading our excitement and passion today.

All right.

By the numbers, I wanna start by the numbers because all day long we could talk about that Avondale is the best city on earth, and it is.

It is.

And we storytell and we tell, right, Cheryl, every day we're talking about why you'll find success in Avondale, why we are here to help remove your barriers, why it makes sense for you to land here.

But the numbers are where the proof is, the proof's in the numbers, and that really helps us create that narrative to um while you'll be supported here.

Um before I get into the numbers, and and Cheryl and I talk about this every day, is economic development is really us building um the city for the generations.

It's not just for today, it's for the ages, and we want to make sure we talked about this mayor legacy projects.

We have one shot to get this right.

We have one shot to engage with the right development partners in the community to make sure we are delivering smart, intentional, quality development that will deliver the jobs and amenities that our residents expect and deserve.

That is the underlying reason why we're here is to ensure that we are going to execute that.

But by the numbers, okay.

Almost a hundred thousand population.

That's great.

We're growing, we're experienced tremendous growth.

We have a lot of housing and entitlements and things in motion, which really help with our narrative because we're we're we're a growing city.

We have and we'll get to why we believe, you know, we say we're the center of tremendous growth.

Um we have 235,000 cars on I-10.

I feel like I graduated to the big leagues because I finally got off the 101.

My two previous cities were on the 101.

So I'm like, I'm in the big leagues.

This is like a lot of people coming through Avondil.

And so we also experienced a 30% increase in our household average income.

Congratulations.

Take a moment to soak that in.

That made us the seventh highest median income increase in the United States.

So we this, and I'm gonna get to why that number is so important to us in a second.

Um, and that's according to the US Census Bureau, not me, because some people think I make these numbers up.

Only when I have to.

Oh, okay.

I I had circles up.

Okay, that's okay.

Well, so two numbers.

This is really important, and I'll try to be quick.

When we go out there to pursue businesses to come to Avondale, especially restaurants, they were going to ask me, well, they're gonna ask me like 20 questions, but I'm gonna just tell you the top two.

What's your household income, average income?

What's your population?

Oh, I'm gonna lie.

Three.

What's your daytime employment look like so that they have consistent business coming through?

Um so the fact that we grew our household income is really great.

And we're getting amenities again that we really desire.

But the average household income for stores like Whole Foods or Flower Child is 130,000.

120 to 130,000 is the average.

So right away, we kind of get dismissed.

But we're getting creative.

We're dropping the pin closer to Goodyear.

Put your earmuffs on attorneys.

We're stretching the borders just a little.

We are trying to get creative and integrating regional numbers to show that we have the strength, right?

So you're gonna start to see, and I tell you this because if you see one of our site books out there that says 117,000, that's what we're doing.

We're we're we're drop, we're going, we're going west, just to kind of show that we listen, we know whatever comes to Goodyear, I mean, Goodyear, Avondale's gonna go to whatever comes to Avondale, Goodyear, you know, from restaurants, right?

You're gonna have that cross traffic.

Um population.

This is important too because 101 trade area, the trade area that the restaurants look at when they're determining where to place their next restaurant.

Any restaurant south of Bell Road, all the way to here, is considered sometimes one trade area.

So the postinos of the world and the VIG and um Thirsty Lion, I'm just naming some of the restaurants we see a lot of feedback on, they're considered in our trade area.

Um so they might go to Goodyear because they're outside of the trade area.

The restaurants on 303, Cooper's Hawk, um, I can't mission barbecue, some of those, they won't go to Goodyear because they're part of their trade area.

So that's Cooper's Hawk, will come to Avondale.

Others will come.

So it's almost like we have to go after the 303 restaurants and they have to go after the 101 until the population changes.

When we are able to start to demonstrate that we're getting more population, guess what?

We create our own trade area.

And that's what we're doing right now.

We're we're literally working out trade areas.

I mean, I've I made up the river between Goodyear and I, I don't even know what that river's called.

What's that river called?

Yeah, that river, I'm like, that's a trade area, the big river.

Not sure.

Looks like a great, I mean, you can't cross that river.

Just pretend I tend's not there.

But um so we just have to get really creative.

But I thought this was important to spend some time so you everyone understood why it's a challenge sometimes to get some of those um popular restaurants.

Not to say we won't get them, because anything is possible, and I believe we will.

Maybe not tomorrow, but maybe in two months.

Just kidding.

But that's how fast we move.

Okay, move on.

Enough spent there.

So when we talk about Avondale, and this has really helped me a lot and has helped the team, and and and I and thank you.

I've even heard the mayor reference this, so I appreciate.

We are truly the center of it all.

And we are from a transportation corridor standpoint, we're in the middle of a massive transportation corridor.

We're in the center of growth.

We're in the center of semiconductor activity.

Big announcement yesterday with TSMC expanding their investment.

So we are halfway between TSMC and we're halfway in between Intel.

So when we pitch suppliers, which we have Jamie out there right now to supply our conferences, poor girl, with a lot of technical people.

Um, we are in the middle.

So it makes sense to create a supplier tech park to um house these semiconductor uh suppliers.

So we're we're in the center of it all there.

Um we're the center of again a lot of growth.

I found out from our city manager during our first discussion that we also have the center monument hill or mountain, is where the land survey, all roads kind of lead in zero-zero, right?

Starting points.

So we are truly literally the center.

In fact, if you go north on Avondale or 115th Avenue all the way north, you hit the North Pole.

Did you guys know that?

So we are a straight shot to Santa Claus.

I told that to a bunch of business people, and that's how they remember us.

They're like Santa's workshop.

I'm like, I didn't say that, but okay.

I said we have a straight shot to Santa.

Which is really funny coming from me.

But anyways, because I don't celebrate Christmas.

But anyways, but Hanukkah Christmas is all it's all fun.

Okay.

All right, moving on.

Product vacancy.

Hey.

We could pitch all day long.

Well, actually, we do.

So we pitch all day long.

And we are really, really team, I I again, Cheryl oversees the business attraction team, and they're outstanding.

We are very fortunate.

We have such a great team.

They're solid.

And they're pitching and they're bringing and they're enticing businesses, but if we don't have the product, we cannot accommodate or support them.

And then that makes us really well, it makes us really sad, right?

Because we're getting people interested in us, we just don't know where to put them.

So industrial demand is strong across all asset sectors.

We have 14%.

That's because we have cons, the former cons, 300,000 square feet, uh came online is available, and then we have 150,000 square feet of brand new product that came online, which is beautiful.

Um Class A industrial.

Office and health is really low at 2.4%, retail is at 0.7%.

I think former Joanne went out of business, and so we're gonna be back looking at backfilling that.

Umice and health, everything is is up in terms of leasing terms or re uh rates, $10.49 for industrial up 2.1%, office health is uh healthcare, medical office $32, and retail 2655.

Uh we talked a little bit about Class A office earlier in the first panel.

I do want to just full disclosure, there's 8 million square feet of Class A office in the valley.

So we just have to always kind of be mindful that there is a lot out there, but what there isn't, what we need is submarket.

So submarket office space is probably um what we'd pursue.

Okay.

Mr.

Mayor, if I can, what is submarket and why why is it good to have uh rates going up for rent?

So rates going up for rent is actually a good thing because that's showing competitiveness, right?

So now we are like we're competing, we're have healthy rates, we don't look too low.

This is funny, if you look too low, there's something wrong.

If you look too high, then that's like a deterrent.

So it's like kind of like the Goldilocks story.

You're always trying to find that right mix that puts you in a great position for recruitment.

Um and then also um submarket.

That's the financial services, the banks, the titles, the attorneys, the realtors, the CPAs, the tax folks that are looking for office space in their market, in the city they may reside or city nearby.

They don't want to go into downtown Phoenix, they don't want to go far, they want to have office um accommodations and assets nearby.

So that's what the submarket is.

Okay.

I can't see okay.

So to establish to establish Avondale as a central hub for innovation, healthcare, advanced manufacturing, entertainment, driving job creation, revenue generation, workforce development, business retention and expansion, and tourism.

Whew, I gotta take a breath, because that's what all we do.

Um while creating a long-term economic development strategy that leverages land resources effectively through quality investments to increase quality of life and make the community better for the ages.

So when we get out there and we're seeking investment, because really that's important, we have to demonstrate why would you want to invest here?

We've got great tenants, we've got great quality of life.

We have amazing parks.

I talk about all I brag all the time about our police chief, fire chief, Corey.

I mean, how this is the this is the place to be if you really want those quality of life amenities.

All right.

We are a city of opportunity.

I heard that from some of you a few times today.

Okay, this is what I'm gonna I'm gonna pause at the end, but please feel free to jump in because I want to make sure I get these priorities correct.

I've heard you, I've met with you one-on-one.

So I was like listening to what you what's important to you.

I've also met with exec and leadership team.

We're meeting with city manager and assistant city managers, what is important.

I've also listened to the community meetings for the strategic planning.

So this hopefully reflects a majority of those um feet interactions and feedback.

Job creation seems to be a very important priority.

To me, that's how we in order to get those household incomes up, the only way to get those household in average income up is quality head of household jobs.

So we are aggressively pursuing head of household jobs right now.

As well as other jobs as well.

But I just those are that's how you move your your needle.

Um revenue generation through redevelopment.

So we have um we're 90% built out.

We don't have a lot of land.

Uh it was it was a little stressful when I came on because I we had to do it was amazing.

The team we had to do quick land assembly, uh working again with Jody and your team to figure out what could we rezone.

So now I feel like we're in a much better place because the team is so incredible, and like here's how we get here's how we get the land ready for potential future development.

Um we do we need, I wish we can make more land.

SR30, we're gonna make more land there.

Um redevelopment is super critical in fill, infill parcels.

Um, where could we redevelop?

And that's what we're we're evaluating.

Workforce development, you heard it this morning.

It's so important.

It's the number one factor that site selectors determine when they're coming into a community if they have sufficient workforce to support their um their operations.

And then we have, of course, tourism, development, and destination branding, increasing our hotel hospitality assets as well as increasing um our partnership opportunities and program activation with Phoenix Raceway and some other entities.

Okay.

Economic development.

We'll go into the goals.

All right.

Goal one, create 200 jobs per year in the target sectors, which will be about a thousand over five years.

I I believe if we get the product we need, that's going to be much higher.

So I'm not saying bagging, because sometimes I don't want to feel like that, but that's kind of a healthy number based on the product that we have available, because you have to connect the two.

Umancial services is a really important target sector for us.

When we look at our target sectors, let me back up.

We are looking at what's in alignment with the current workforce we have today, the existing community, the existing workforce, and then the future pipeline that we're looking at through our educational partners.

So looking at the curriculum, the certifications, what's being trained, what's happening, who lives in our backyard today.

It's kind of like existing in future.

All the way down to when Delaney was talking about first children first.

I'm like, we need to start capturing the kids.

Um that's also important for workforce development because that's how we get, if they have good quality child care, then we have you know more people confident in the workplace.

Healthcare is a huge thing.

Cheryl has been building out our health care corridor, corridor.

Um, and we have a few strategic parcels left that we are really excited about that we are um happy to introduce some or share some announcements soon.

Advanced manufacturing.

These are my microchip earrings.

Um we again are in the half point of the semiconductor ecosystem.

So this is a microchip, it's a real one.

I made an earring out of.

It's a substrate in the back, and it's masking and lithography on the front.

Those are the sectors we're going after because where's Kirk?

Low water.

We're looking at low water semiconductor.

But some of the advanced packaging and substrates we are working with, but we know we can't, we can we could only probably maybe with a closed loop get one or two.

Um technology, Estrella Mountain Community College has an incredible AI learning lab, so we're capitalizing on that.

Higher educational institutions, retail entertainment, there's an opportunity for many amenities there, and hospitality.

Okay.

Attract new employees and target sectors.

That's really our our biggest mission.

Um short of getting a restraining order or getting arrested for trespassing.

Ron has agreed to be my first call when I get not arrested here, but we literally put ourselves in positions or places where we know key decision makers are present.

Not in a stock and creepy way, but kind of.

Kind of.

But we find unique opportunities and speaking engagements and places where we know that our target sector exists.

And then we meet them, we develop relationships, we build, we talk about our amazing assets, we invite them to Avenue, they fall in love with all of us, and then the goal is of course to land their business.

So we're really excited about our aggressive, um, very aggressive economic development strategy there.

Um building out the healthcare quarter, that's another huge part of our task, our goal, and that's happening.

We've got two big healthcare projects in the in the works.

Um position in Brand Avondal as a supplier park, we talked about that.

Grow and revitalize existing business, that's the heart and soul of our um, oh, oh yeah, of our um business.

We have a thousand businesses, and we want to ensure that they find success and that we help them through programs and resources.

We have dedicated a position to business retention and expansion.

That's all Adam does is he goes out, he visits, he works with the educational partners, he makes sure that businesses have support, services, and resources that they need to be successful.

And we're fostering and growing entrepreneurs through some really innovative programming through our partnerships with the chamber, SBDC, and other um local, like local first, other local entities.

Mr.

Mayor, if I if I can interrupt Jen one more time because I think she's not really telling the whole story.

So when you talk about short of stalking or getting arrested, uh do you mind uh sharing the story?

Uh you were at a uh that we met the young lady the other day uh and how you met her at a conference you worked attending.

What that went to the buildboard.

What's your name?

Oh, oh yeah.

So I thought, okay, yes.

I thought you were for a second I was you're gonna talk about when I kidnapped Terry Bradshaw.

And that's a true story.

I'm happy if you have one second to tell.

Um so that yeah, so we were actually um, and thank you, Mayor was was um was uh with Ron and Tracy and and met a potential prospect who is from California.

She's a high-tech supplier, she does the lithography for micro trips, really big deal.

She's a mic, uh she's a chips applicant from the federal government.

So this is a big deal.

This is a big, big deal for us.

And she she loved Avondale, but uh it came out in that meeting that I snuck into an event at the Biltmore to meet her.

I was at an event next door, and then I was like, that's really where I want to be, because that's where the CEOs are.

So I I did get permission, I did get permission once I was in there, I found the right people.

But you get creative.

Yes.

Uh Terry Bradshaw, really quick.

When I worked for Glendale, I was really upset with how many times they refer to University of Phoenix Stadium at the time as University of Phoenix or Phoenix rather than Glendale.

It's like so annoying when people are in the city and they don't, and it's hard, we're Greater Phoenix.

And uh I knew Terry Broadshaw was flying in his private plane to do the the what's the trophy?

I lost it's uh what's the trophy at the end of the Super Bowl?

Lombardy.

So it's 2008.

Back in Glendale, 2008 days, Super Bowl.

And uh I met him at the Glendale Airport.

I drove my car onto the tarmac, probably and greeted him, literally like stopped in his, you know, the stairs came down.

I'm like, welcome to Glendale, Mr.

Bradshaw.

We're so happy you're here to be part of Super Bowl.

And he's like, wow, what a great welcome.

And I'm like, I just want to make sure you know you're in Glendale.

And that, you know, just that Glendale's got game because that was our brand, and at the time.

And so he's like, Are you my ride?

And then I said, air muffs, everyone on the tourney.

And she I said, yes.

You can I said, yes, you you can you can get a ride with me.

Like I I was heading there anyways.

I had to go back to where my office was.

So sure, come with me.

He's like, sounds like a plan, let's go.

I took him back.

I took him to the Super Bowl for his big trophy, you know, presentation.

And then he's looking through his notes.

He's like, Are you Melissa, my driver?

And I was like, at that point, I'm like, do I do I say I'm Melissa or do I say I'm Jen Stein?

So I said, I'm I'm just I'm your driver.

So I hope I don't get in too much trouble after the story.

But anyways, um, and then he honestly, and I have it videotaped if anybody wants to see it.

He um at the trophy presentation, he thanked the city of Glendale, and he personally thanked me for picking him up at the airport and did a special shout out to 200 million people, and my mom was like, What did you do?

Jenny, that's what I'm calling.

So, yeah.

Okay.

So that's what we do, Cheryl, right?

We do really wild stuff.

So that's when I that's my only that's my only time I've ever kidnapped anyone.

So far.

Okay.

Um goal two, redeveloping an additional three percent of Avondale infill land.

So right now we have an active RFP that hit the streets for the boulevard.

This is a priority.

We've heard you.

This is very important to make sure we find a mixed use development partner who could deliver great experiential entertainment, restaurants, retail, that submarket office, whatever it may be, hospitality, hotels.

And I am really excited to say we've had so much interest from really, really great developers.

We had 80 downloads in the first day.

We had 22 people on our pre-committee call.

Everyone is really excited.

Um the team has done a great job basically of saying, like, you're missing out if you're not here in Avondale.

You're you're just you're behind the times.

So we sell, we sell, we sell, right?

And that's what we do is making sure they know that this is the place to be.

Park 10 is incredible.

They're doing really well.

Cooper's Hawk is going through our process right now.

That is a game changer.

That's a huge win.

Um so I I look at Cheryl because that was that was one of Cheryl's big wins.

Um that will recruit, that will prompt other restaurants.

That's what it's a catalyst.

We're looking for those catalysts that show and not only prove the market, but show others and demonstrate.

This is why, again, you'll you'll have a great opportunity in Avondale.

Old Town Redevelopment is is a special priority that I'm gonna talk about in the next slide.

I gave it it has its own slide.

Um SR 30, that is that is where we will unlock future land through development services, no pressure, Jody and team.

And then eventually, Kim.

Um, because that's really where we need to look ahead.

We're always anticipating the next needs, like the next the next big play in our playbook.

And it's gonna be SR 30.

Um auto district expansion redevelopment.

I have that down because there was some movement recently with Kia moving across the street.

We want to make sure we can kind find another dealership, another car dealer to go into that site and and continue to and from BRE continue to make sure they're happy.

They're happy in the district.

Yes, council our mayor, council member White.

I uh I would and I know that Lord Kango a couple days ago sitting at an intersection, I mean the polar and so the picture of origin, it's probably not working on the better here.

Um I feel like that's a bad standard, but if we pull in my priorities, you might see how like brand well.

Are we looking at any uh the luxury brand?

Um I know that uh local markets.

You know what I mean?

Uh everybody has a good sharing problem for you, probably get a room here, but we have a composition.

I just want to make sure we have the best model now.

I love our anchor based on our welcome thing.

So I mean, we're like are we gonna see them too because we don't want to shine away the folks that are giving us all of you know me.

Um but a lot of the retailers that we have here do have luxury brands available in their line, what are we doing against some of those luxury auto brands and out of there?

Thank you.

Yes, good question.

Thank you, Mayor, Councilmember White.

That's a really good question.

And so, yes, the c the answer is yes, we would like to pursue luxury dealers.

Um we in the state of Arizona, there's an interesting law or legislation where you have to be 10 miles away from another the dealerships, the OEMs, the brand have to be 10 miles apart, and you get these points, and it's in a complicated system.

So we are actually able to go after those.

We can go after Lexus or BMW, and we are.

We've actually had some conversations with some of these brokers out of DC, they have a lot of these auto brokers who we've been in touch with.

And so it really is a matter of the land, the ownership group, which is Kia, whether they're willing to sell to one of these other OEMs, and we're working on them because they have other plans that um well, we didn't like their other plans, right?

That's see so in addition to what we do every day of like pitching and promoting and uh attracting and recruiting businesses, we're also having I said to Ron, I was gonna say it nicely, active conversations with landowners and property owners on what we do what we believe we we should have or deserve.

What's in alignment with your vision?

And so um because there's a lot of uh there's a lot of low-hanging fruit out there, which is easy.

I mean, I get it, I get it.

I mean, I'm I'm asking people to you know, plop down 20 million dollars here and 50 million here, and they're like, that's great, that's not your money.

I'm like, you're gonna make it back, trust me.

But um, so yes, so to answer your question, yes, we are, but we we we just have to work through the ownership.

Okay.

Mr.

Mayor, before she goes on, this might be a good time to talk.

You talked about not uh accepting low-hanging fruit.

We deserve better than some of the things.

I know that some of the uh council members uh have received phone calls to develop land in the Boulevard area, not our private land, that would not the land we own, but the land nearby because council years ago put some very uh uh strict restrictions on what can go there.

Uh the goal to create um higher level uh eateries and retail and those kinds of things.

Should we be changing those standards?

Should we what what's the next step to make sure that gets developed?

I would like to maintain those standards or even make them more um I don't know, supportive of our vision because we are lacking some amenities.

We don't need more fast food restaurants.

And I'm sorry if anyone loves fast feed.

We do have fast food.

I mean, I I gotta be respectful of the drive-through folks that like.

Yeah, no.

Yeah.

We're happy.

But we want to, and you know, we want to be really strategic in who we approach and the type of development that is meaningful intentional development.

And so I called Jody, I don't know how many times a day.

I lost count a million, like saying, okay, and and Cher and I, every Friday, this is like every Friday we call it Friday fight for our land day, because that's when the landowners call.

And they're like, this is we got a convenience store and three fast foods and restaurants, and I'm like, oh heck no.

Like, right.

But then we say, hey, we always listen, customer service is really important.

So we always try to work with someone who might have that idea and find them the right place.

Yeah, we see it to get here.

No, we do.

We've we find sites that um might be a better fit, right?

It's all about the fit.

But yes, some of the really less desirable stuff we kick over.

But um, no, we we always are trying to be a good steward, a good um, you know, a good we want, hey, we have to have good relationships with everyone.

Because one at what at one point this developer might be seeking something we don't want, but then I'm gonna need them for something else another time, right?

And it's how it happens all the time.

So we have to be what we call best friends, uh, you know, close with them all the time.

Not best friends, but close.

Um that's that's where we're at.

Thank you.

Okay, so moving on, because I oh boy, I'm talking a lot.

Okay, this is important, so I'm gonna stop because I want to hear from you.

I'm gonna stop talking.

Um we are the proud owner of 518 East Western.

That is our new home.

I mean, not really like I don't live there, because I'd be squatting, and we don't want squatters, right?

So I need feedback from you, Mayor Council on your vision here.

But we do have some, we've been working with some conceptual site plans.

We have been working with the stakeholders and the businesses on Western.

We started to engage and we have a number of meetings scheduled with the business owners to make sure we hear what their vision is and what they what they would like to see.

Um after all that, we also have a site, a bus tour with a number of brokers and developers to bring them through to get their feedback.

Uh great idea from Cheryl.

I learned that because after the boulevard, I think I had 30 separate meetings, and I'm like, this is ridiculous.

We should have put them all on a bus.

So we're getting a bus.

Um then uh then we'll issue a request for proposal.

Similar to what we did with the boulevard, all that feedback helps inform and shape the RFP.

Uh with that said, I'm gonna take a moment to talk about 518 Western, 328 Western.

We probably will look at adding to the RFP.

That's another asset of ours.

That is um it I just forgot opportunity.

Over opportunity tree is is currently there.

518 East Western.

The question is an initial feedback we've received from some of the development community, is that it is um expensive to remodel and it could it could potentially limit development opportunity if you keep the structures versus clearing it.

But this is just uh some of the feedback we've heard, and now I'm gonna just turn it over to you, Mayor Council for any feedback.

Oops.

Thank you, Jen, and thank you for all the helpful information because often this is kind of the information that lives behind the scenes that many council members uh don't receive.

So we talk about economic development and these things, and yet uh the sausage making is kind of mysterious.

So this I think uh lends itself well to an understanding of where your team works from the the point out to to where we live here in policy making.

Um at this point in time, I'll turn it over to council if you guys have any questions.

Mr.

Mayor, I need to clarify we've got a few more slides to go through.

Okay.

What we're looking for here is uh she's we're gonna go out for RFP for 518 Western eventually to let the people uh make uh proposals to council, then council will be able to decide what to go there.

But we want to make sure this isn't a sacred cow.

There is a good chance that the pro proposals that come back will include demolishing the structures that are on there.

So if council says that's not an option, like you're not even gonna consider that, then we kind of need that feedback.

If it's one of those things that you'll consider as it comes in, then then we're good to move with that.

But we don't want to set up an RFP that doesn't uh that isn't even considered uh by council.

I don't have questions, but I just have a comment in regards to 328 Western.

So that used to be our old resource center.

And so when it was our old resource center before I got on council, I used to volunteer there.

There was a um a Vita site there, volunteer income tax preparation.

And at that time it was old.

So this was like 2016, 2015.

And the plumbing was bad, the bathroom was bad.

I just remembered all that.

So I knew that there was issues with plumbing there.

And even after Trinity Tree went in, I think we did some upgrades there.

And when I went after the upgrades, I said uh it needs more upgrades.

So I say all that to say I feel like that's something a building that um for me personally, I feel like um it would just take us more money to invest into it than um if we get rid of it, then we can really kind of see what we can put there.

The 518 East Western, I know that that recently was remodeled and they were kind of studios.

I don't know what they look like inside.

I think was they were never remodeled.

Oh, okay.

No, Mr.

Mayor Council McConde, they they were uh an air con uh uh window air conditioner was thrown in it, and this they tried to rent it to people who couldn't afford to live anywhere else.

It's one of the reasons we red tagged it, it wasn't safe for uh living in.

Okay, I'd never been in the but for me when I look at something like that.

I like the concept of small office space, right?

Because that's something that maybe people can't afford to be in an expensive, you know, the class A buildings, but they might be able to use something like that, smaller businesses, individual realtors, whatever.

I don't know what the inside looks like, but I wouldn't for me, I wouldn't want to invest a whole lot in repairing.

So um I'm curious to see what options they are if we demolish it and get rid of it.

Okay.

Councilman Garcia.

I I agree with Tina on both the buildings, but I would want to ensure that it doesn't go up, if that makes sense.

Like if they're gonna if they're gonna take it away or if they're gonna demolish it and rebuild, I don't want it to go up.

That way, thank you.

Go vertical.

Yeah, I would want it to stay one one level.

And then with the offices, if they're gonna if we're gonna keep those to remodel them so they look you know more presentable and nicer because the the area looks nice if we repaint it and redo the windows and stuff like that.

Um but I think both the buildings could be demolished and redone that way it looks present.

I just want to just go back real quick.

Whatever we put there, I just wanted to um because it's old old Western, right?

It's I want to maintain that that culture.

I don't, you know, putting something brand new with all glass windows isn't something I think would fit down there.

So I just want to be mindful of that as well.

Thank you so much, Mayor.

I have to concur with my colleagues.

I just first wanted to recognize PD, though, because my first ride along was there when they issued a warrant for 518 East Western, and I think I saw about 20 people who were um being detained at the time, and we really cleared out a place that was drug-infested, guys.

I mean, that that place was drug infested, it was a user central, and they were so emboldened to do it right across the street from our detention center.

So I just want to commend you and public safety for all that you do to make sure spaces and places like that are no longer places where people feel like they can congregate and do drugs in Avondale.

To me, that is why it should be demolished.

I don't want you to see any remnants of what you thought you could do here.

It doesn't exist anymore.

That's no longer available to you.

We're gonna change how this even looks and feels.

I believe the line of sight going vertical in Western takes away from it being like an old town western environment.

We did so much right there at the corner of DISART and MC 85 to kind of bring that you know carriage and wagon feel with everything that we did last year with Aqua Freya.

Um I really hope that uh whatever goes there will be something that the community feels like they can come to.

I think about the original resource center.

Um, you know, I I want folks to be in the neighborhood and have these beautiful edifices.

So I might disagree just a little bit because we have a lot of brass and glass, I feel at that San Garcia Library.

So maybe a little bit more snazzy stuff can go there because we got to bring our community up, right?

So if we put nice things around them, they want nicer stuff and they can then attain it and they can do it in their own neighborhood.

So yeah, I'm done with tearing it down, quite honestly.

I I would have it no other way because we have changed the face of that community, and we are we're taking away things that don't serve them, and we're putting in things that are gonna take them to the next level.

So I really appreciate everybody's efforts on this, and I'm really grateful that we can see development now here.

I appreciate the feedback.

Oh, if if if I may, really quickly, um, I agree with uh many of the sentiments here with 518 at East Western.

Um I would really love it to be something that the uh community could use.

I know that it's tough uh in regards to you know going in and out.

So I don't know traffic wise what what would occur there.

Um but being able I I think we demonstrate if we're taking the lead here, we demonstrate to the rest of the business owners on Western that we're also too um investing in opportunity of whether it be walkability or patronage of that that street.

And while there may be hesitation from some down there who currently own businesses to redevelop and to get it to where we would like to see it, this would be a a first step to demonstrate uh not only our investment but us taking advantage of opportunity uh in our respectful manner.

And 328 Western, um, unlike Glendale's library where there was a lot of public input regarding the uh the demolition of their library, because I I don't know how many of you are aware that that actually was a library product or a resource center.

Um and I remember doing homework there in like the fourth, fifth grade.

Um that demolishing it and making it something new would not be a bad thing.

So um I don't really think that there's a lot of uh community resistance to us doing that if we're gonna make it something that they would benefit from even greater.

Great.

This is really helpful.

Thank you.

Okay, for sake of time.

I did by the way give you I'm calling it the final draft of the strategic plan.

So um I'm gonna just go through quickly the next few slides.

We talked a lot about workforce, it's really important.

We have two initiatives for our first year goal.

Um we're working with uh women in manufacturing for workforce development panel, and Avondale's Got Talent with Astoria Mountain Community College, um, kind of like a America's Got Talent meets uh Shark Tank and do some kind of fun pitching.

So farming strategic alliances is really uh a big a big effort or where we're focusing our energy.

Boost tourism to achieve a three percent increase in bed tax occupancy.

Um Nikki Taylor, who just had a baby on Sunday.

Excited.

She is um our tourism DMO and she's done a remarkable job.

I mean, we have some of the highest consistent hotel occupancy rates in the West Valley.

Like that's that's so big again.

When I talked about graduating the big leagues, there you go.

I've never seen these numbers.

They're amazing, and they're really helping us take advances to the next level.

Um so we're looking at and and now she's actually helping with a lot of the business attraction of hospitality and bringing in new hotels and new restaurants, and I'll uh I'll get to some great news in just a moment on that front.

She's also working on working working on recruiting events, mega events, nationally recl you know, acclaimed events to draw people into Avondale.

So the if you're familiar with the Balloon Festival that takes place in Albuquerque, that company we're in negotiations with to bring them to Avondale this November.

That's another really big one.

And so that's that is that's that's all Nikki out there just again promoting and and working to bring um activate these events here.

Okay.

And then long-term economic development vision, we talked about this earlier about really identifying those key development sites and doing it through land assembly.

We knew we needed a supplier tech park and we needed to land assemble pretty quickly, and we did.

We did.

Um Cheryl's able to convince some of the landowner Z modular where Z Modular is.

We were able to get the land, we were able to get a developer to invest, I don't know, 20 million dollars in one second.

Um because we have tenants, we have tenants, we have people that want to be here.

That's enticing.

Jody is now working through the process.

And so right there, that dirt you see right there is going to be the Avondale Tech Park for RD and advanced manufacturer manufacturing suppliers.

So nice.

Thank you.

Thank you, things.

Strategic product development for growth and innovation.

That continues.

This is an ongoing um an ongoing critical piece of our strategy.

Location.

Yeah, they're just if you could give them the location north of Van Buren there.

North of Van Beer.

I 100 behind Lavana.

Behind Lavano.

Okay, gotcha.

Okay, thank you.

Um Z modular modular um multifamily that's going up right now.

Okay, gotcha.

Corporate drive.

So there we go.

Our our first Avondale Tech Park.

And we're also now working on a business park as of yesterday, but we'll get to that the next time we talk.

Okay.

In the last 100 days that I've been here, it's been such an honor.

I just want to highlight some of the um strategic plan outcomes that we've had in a few months.

The RFP was released February 22nd, like I mentioned.

We have incredible activity and interest.

Uh we have a healthcare gap analysis that's coming to us end of the end of this week, which really will help us figure out where are the gaps, the specialty services that we need.

We talked this morning with the healthcare panel.

There's obviously a demand for um health care needs in our community.

I think our um CEO, the CEO from Digney said three that were there's a 3,000 hospital bed shortage.

That's significant.

We'll take those beds.

Um and I'm gonna get to that in a second.

Uh creation I already mentioned of Avondale Tech Park.

Uh we did receive an LOI or the landowner received.

I just take credit.

We just take credit.

For a micro hospital.

So that is very exciting.

We are getting we are getting beds.

We're getting I mean, I don't know if that's exciting, you don't want to be in one of those beds.

But that's that's a very important part of um our community health care.

Uh workforce initiative, we talked about Avon has got talent and our our professional association affiliations, um, our interactions with the land assembling and uh grocery store.

We're working on grocery stores as well.

We have one big one that has committed, and we have a one or two behind it that I can't mention yet that are in the works because they see all the incredible activity that's occurring in that part of our city, and we're capitalizing on that.

Um with that said, I'm gonna talk about I'm gonna put this up and I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna pause because I really want to hear from you, Mayor and Council.

Here are the economic development priorities.

Am I in alignment?

Is this am I missing anything?

Is there something that you would like to add or any feedback?

This is where I really appreciate uh your input.

So thank you.

Council?

Councilmember Garcia.

I like that we're not going after the low-hanging fruit and that we're the standard's gonna stay where it's at.

Um that's something that I really really want.

And for us to be able to say no to things that we don't want.

And if you guys are doing that, that's wonderful because I think when I I go and talk to people, they're like, why do we have this going up?

And why are why you know, us as a council, why are we saying no?

And it and you know, I learned because it was already planned for that way ten years ago.

And now that you know, now that we have new council and new people being able to say no that we're not gonna build this, it's wonderful because then we could build what what people actually want in the city and that that we need um and that's gonna make more money, more revenue for the city.

Um so this this has been wonderful to to hear and see, and that you're in alignment, at least with like my vision of what I wanted Avondale to be.

You know, maybe I don't have to be in council in three years.

I was telling her earlier because I did everything I I wanted.

I get I got all the all the restaurants.

Kidding.

But um but this is this is great, and I think it is gonna bring in jobs, and I'm I'm really excited to see if we do get those semiconductor um uh jobs here in Avondale, that's gonna be wonderful.

And I know I I mentioned like I know Apple's gonna be investing in Arizona, and I'm hoping that we could also maybe get Apple to come to Avondale, because that would be I mean the job market here then it's gonna explode.

So thank you so much for this presentation and every your whole team and everyone who ever put effort into this because this is exactly what I see the future of Avidale looking like.

Thank you.

Yep.

Oh, yeah.

So just listening to some of the panels, what they what they spoke about this morning, it's I feel like we're right on target.

And so everybody's kind of talking about job creation, workforce development, all these things.

Tourism, like I I feel like you guys we spoke to you guys, we shared what with the of the vision with you guys, and you guys took it, and you guys are applying it.

So great job.

Thank you.

Councilman White.

Thank you so much.

Um, Mayor uh Jen, I really appreciate this.

I think the one thing I see that's missing, um, and uh and I uh and I'll I'll challenge Mr.

Corbin as well when I came to council.

I I wanted some type of aspect of financial literacy.

There's one thing that we're not doing.

We're not creating wealth in Avondale.

People aren't becoming wealthy just by living in Avondale because a lot of them are paying rent, so they don't own homes anymore.

And we need to create wealth in Avondale because then it's not about you know six-figure job creation.

That's nice.

Most of the folks in this room make over six figures, so I'm really happy about that.

You guys can go home and sleep well, but we're not creating that wealth for the three and four-year-olds.

You know, we're not we're not allowing their parents to buy a home and own land and cultivate that here in Avondale.

When I think about how I can even be in this moment in this space and place, I think about what my family has left for me.

You know what I mean?

And that's generational wealth.

So we need a mechanism in our economic development priorities that creates wealth.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

Council Member Voice.

Thank you so much for this presentation.

I learned so much.

And one of the things that I thought was really insightful was the talk about the restaurants along the you know, from Bellro down and from the loop 303.

I would not have known that if you hadn't had this presentation.

So thank you.

I learned a lot.

I really do feel like you guys have listened to us.

I really do.

And I support, I support your vision.

Is there anything that you want to share in regards to what you see here for economic development?

Well, first of all, I'm sad, but I was at Small Cities Council.

We meet every two weeks.

So one of the things that we just when I got on the call, we were talking about was how big economic development is for everyone.

And they asked us to share, you know, what are what are the people in your community asking for?

Some people's asks are much more or less, some people just want a strip mall.

That's it.

That's what would make their community.

I have a there's a woman on Small Cities Council that you know shared the last time I was on the call for um getting a subway in their town was huge.

There's about a thousand five hundred people that live in their town, and to have a subway would be key for them.

They wouldn't have to go a half hour into town for that.

So when I look at that and I see all the things uh that the opportunities as I see them as we're creating, I think that we are finally in an area where we're looking big.

And I know that I had shared with Ron before that what I thought was big was not big.

So it is great to see all the things that are coming, the things that you're working on, the level of businesses that are now looking into us, like I saw you guys did that RFP that was out there.

That's huge.

People were I saw the amounts of shares that was the people were looking at the comments.

I don't think I've ever seen that.

And I've lived in this city for almost 20 years.

So keep doing what you guys are doing.

Thank you.

You know, from me, it goes back to when I first got on council.

Um often folks would talk about Avondale as this bedroom community.

That's where you when you started a career, you would go to Avonville because you get a f it was affordable affordable.

Uh, and then when you you know went up the ladder, so to speak, you would move somewhere else because of of the of the value and the size of the home and things of that nature.

And and I often thought to myself, uh, you know, this is really as now that I'm on council and we are developing, it's kind of a uh self-fulfilling prophecy when you continue to approve those type of projects.

So you're you're doing it to yourself, so to speak.

So to go back in regards to the comment uh that uh Ron made in regards to you know, should we hold to this or should we relax a bit?

That would be going backwards in in my view of of being that self-fulfilling prophecy of of drive-through restaurants, and to your point, there's nothing wrong with them.

However, as I as I've always seen it, Avenue Boulevard or 115th Avenue, so to speak, is is the heart.

And McDowell has had its time and it will continue, I think in a different form with Health Core.

Is that what you're referring to?

Quarter.

Sorry, Cheryl.

Health Corps.

Yeah.

Um it will continue to develop in that aspect, but where I see our residents wanting to come with their children and spend their time, spend their dollars and live and work is in the boulevard here, and to keep um the uh development uh thought process to a higher standard is is what they deserve.

And I know as a member of this policy-making body that I will do what I can to keep it that way.

And so just keep pushing it forward.

I see uh several of the different bullet points here in terms of priorities to be right in line with what I would be looking for, because as you mentioned, and as we talked about many times, Jen, that these are legacy projects.

These are gonna stand the test of time and our mark, the next council's marks are gonna stand uh with these projects.

And so if we get one chance, we need to make sure we do it right.

So I believe we're on that path.

And thank you to you and your team and to all of city leadership.

Yeah, yeah.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

I I will follow up on two things real quick to round out this discussion.

The first is one of the guiding principles that I think was mentioned a couple times that we follow is um we say uh no and yes in the right places.

We want to make sure that our community has the resources they need.

So one of the things mentioned when I was hired was a bank south of Lower Buckeye Road.

We continue to work on that a project to try to get a bank on the lower side of our community.

The other thing, there's there's places along Broadway or um uh Lower Buckeye Road that maybe still need another gas station.

So maybe the QT goes there and not on McDowell.

And so one of our guiding principles is to making sure our community, making sure our residents have what they need to be successful to have a great quality of life.

We don't believe the boulevard is a place for some of those things, but uh everything Jen does and her team is strategic.

So it's a yes or no depending on the need at the moment.

And so the other thing, the number one, and I made this very clear when I hired her, our number one priority, in my opinion, until you all change it, is job creation.

And it really goes back to the heart of what Councilmember White was talking about.

I'm a strong believer in general generational wealth, and that you have to have home ownership, you have to own the land to build that wealth.

We believe that if we can get higher paying jobs, head of household jobs, increase our household meeting and eating income median income, we create opportunities for the purchase of the land that we're creating.

Now we'll come to council for for zoning and density and ownership, those kinds of things.

But we believe that we want people to be educated uh in cybersecurity or in artificial intelligence at our own local college and then be able to get a job here in our city and use our parks and give back to our community.

So it's a it's a big circle, and so I I just that job creation I think will lead to generational wealth.

It will lead to uh Avondale residents growing up here, staying here, and taking all of our spots uh at some point.

But I really appreciate your feedback uh on on the presentation today.

We'll we'll move forward.

Council Marcell.

One of the things that I would like to see, Jen, and I see other cities doing it, and I get that it's not maybe entirely a city issue, is really and we talk about this on a national level.

What is affordable housing?

We need to think attainable housing because I'm seeing it happen in Goodyear with like a master planned community, and it would be nice to have an attainable community that you know helps veterans, helps teachers, where it's a community from what I saw in Goodyear that they're developing is actually affordable.

Because what's affordable here, like I work at a hotel.

None of the staff there lives here.

That's the sad part, because they can't afford it.

They can come work here, but they can't live here.

I don't know how much of our staff can afford to live here.

You know, they live in Goodyear.

A lot of people live in Goodyear from campaigning.

I realize a ton of people live in Goodyear, so it makes me sad that people that work here can't live here because it's so expensive.

People that come in that visit and stay at the hotel, they might be visiting their child for UTI.

They might be they're like, this is ridiculous.

I can go live in Goodyear downtown for cheaper.

And that makes me sad because we are here to make it, and we always use the term affordable.

It needs to be attainable, it needs to be to the level of I think I'm trying to think of the name of Goodyear, the community that I think it's called Dominium or something like that, where they're working on that.

And those are the things I'd like to see.

Because once you get that attainable housing in, you bring in a whole nother level of individuals who add to that workforce who can come here and do that and spend the time and spend their money here.

But it for the time being right now, even when I sit on the national committees that council member White and I sit on, what is affordable?

Because it's not affordable to really anybody.

But what's attainable and what's possible is to look at other options like that for empty pieces of land.

And then, of course, you know, people talk about having too much apartments, but you know, because not even those are affordable.

So that's what I would say.

Attainable housing.

That's important points.

Uh Mr.

Mayor and uh council know that we're working on all of those kinds of things.

Attainable housing is very important to us.

Um we have some unique challenges that we have to work through, including landowners and the value of their land, uh, make penciling out some of these projects less doable.

So we have to help them find other solutions, whether it's through state or federal funding or whether it's uh the relaxation of of different things.

But uh we'll continue to explore those uh projects as they come forward and is and as we own land and as we um have the opportunity to create the project ourselves, then we'll continue to do that.

We are currently um looking at some veterans' projects housing in uh old town area on some land we own.

We uh there is a uh it well it was gonna be a LITEC, but now it's a uh uh what I'm gonna call workforce, but uh attainable.

I think it's mostly town homes, but there's a project on Broadway that we are exploring um that the landowner is interesting in in possibly doing, which would be uh uh the goal to be some percent of AMI, the area median income.

And so we are entertaining all of those calls as they come in.

Um Avondale, unlike some of our uh neighboring cities, have a lot more land and infrastructure to to connect to.

Um sometimes we're we're just more expensive, and it it's harder to get the number to pencil out, but we continue to entertain all those things, and I can tell you Jody and Kim work very hard to help find affordable solutions to to bring those products to our to our community.

And Mr.

Mayor, I hate to cut us short, but we do have a guest speaker uh that I think uh arrived.

I think I saw him sneak in the back door back there.

So if we can take uh a five-minute uh break and then we'll set up for our next presentation, if that's all right, Mr.

Mayor.

Sounds great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Five minutes.

Mike Outlook.

Pass it over to Louise.

Thank you, and uh good afternoon, everyone.

Um I just found out it's your last presentation, so I'll try to make it as short as possible.

But in uh light of today's news, though, I'm I'm sure there's a lot to discuss, but I'll try to keep it quick.

So today what we want to cover is uh just the broader U.S.

economy and what's going on with the market, uh inflation and is if there's the risk of a recession.

Uh we're gonna look at the state economy uh and finally uh what it means for Avondale.

So the US economy is in good shape.

Um I want to put an asterisk behind that subtitle.

Um we it might say was in good shape uh after a few months, we don't know yet.

But um we ended the we ended 2024 on a good note.

Uh GDP was increasing at about 2.3 percent.

Um however, we we did get some recent um uh projections on GDP growth for this coming year.

Um and one of one of the main ones that uh is uh is very worrisome is that the Atlanta Federal Reserve for their projections on GDP growth for the current quarter, they had a negative 2.8 percent uh projected.

So it's something that we really need to keep an eye out.

Um most of uh what the Atlanta Fed is taking into account is the soft uh manufacturing activity and investment activity.

Um there's just a lot of uncertainty going on around.

So companies uh and manufacturers are holding off on a lot of capital investments or hiring jobs.

So that pullback on all that activity is is likely to be seen in this first quarter.

Um another thing that we might see is uh a lot of the federal layoffs and how that how that'll impact uh spending uh in the entire economy.

Um so just something to keep an eye out for.

Uh in terms of job growth, uh we ended 2024, seeing above average job growth.

Uh again, something to keep an eye out is uh how the federal cuts and the federal layoffs will impact you know jobs across the country.

Um because it's not just the number of jobs that they lay off.

They uh as they earn income, they also spend throughout the economy, which supports additional jobs.

So it could have that ripple effect.

So it's something to keep an eye on.

Um so prior to uh to 2025 um unemployment rate was uh almost record lows.

So what did what this did was that pushed up wage growth, put additional pressure on it, um which is a good thing, but it's also something that contributes to inflation.

So as we all know, uh inflation, we just we saw a huge spike uh uh after the pandemic, and we have seen that that rate of growth decline, but again, it's still hovering about uh 3%.

And for prices to go down, we need to see that go to below zero, which we haven't seen yet.

So how do we get here?

And um how do how do we get to inflation?

So there's a number of different things, right?

So we can't just pinpoint one exact thing.

Um a lot of it has to do with uh you know the just simple supply and demand.

Uh during lockdowns, a lot of the manufacturing was was uh halted.

There was no transportation, so a lot of our we saw stores being empty, so just to restock uh all that, all the pent-up demand, all that push prices up.

But one of the major factors is just the amount of money that was put into the economy from the federal government.

So when we're looking at the how much the federal government uh spends on an annual basis, um the the trend was just going up, but then uh during COVID and after COVID, we did see a seven trillion dollar infusion in money coming into the economy.

Uh and just to put that in perspective, it's about one and a half times more than the federal spending uh before the the pandemic.

Another another thing that it's uh contributed to inflation, and that's why inflation has stuck around so long is that uh the Fed kept interest rates too low for too long.

So when we did see when the pandemic hit, one way to uh soften that the downturn was to lower interest rates.

And so that did infuse you know a lot of uh investment because money was easy to get.

Uh but it also contributed to a lot of the housing affordability issues we have just because the interest rates were so low that a lot of investors took uh advantage of that and purchased a lot of homes.

Um and then the all the people that were also buying homes and moving around, they were buying goods and and and all that, so that also contributed to a lot of the inflation pressures we've seen.

So again, uh all that money that was put into the economy, uh it ended up in the consumers' pockets, right?

So after lockdowns, people were flush with cash, uh, there's a lot of pent-up demand, so they started spending, and so that ripple effect caused even higher inflation to keep going.

So what about the outlook in inflation?

It's a lot of the same uh issues that we have to look at.

So a lot of uh federal spending, um, you know, what's going on in geopolitically is the monetary tightening, so is it or we're gonna have reductions in interest rates, uh or or something like that.

And then a big one, as you know, is tariffs and trade wars.

So as of today, we we did implement uh 25% tariff on Canada and Mexico goods, and there's additional tariffs on Chinese goods.

So when you're when you're thinking about trade wars, uh protectionism is is seems like a good idea in terms of protecting American industries, but in the long run, it's it's not.

So when you first look at tariffs, what first happens is that both the consumers and the businesses uh are the ones that are affected by that increased cost.

And then what happens is that foreign countries then impose their own tariffs, so it pushes prices even higher.

And then eventually the tr the tariffs do have slight effects on protectionism.

So you could see some companies you know returning or investment coming back, but all of that is short term because a lot of what happens is these industries depend on uh tariffs as uh protection as a subsidy.

So then there's less competition, uh there's less innovation, and so really what you're what you're doing is you're hurting the the current businesses and creating inefficiencies.

Um so is there uh risk of a recession?

Um it's uh that's the perfect reaction.

Uh there's there's just a number of things, you know.

Um we all one thing uh we like to say is that uh economists provide uh projections, not predictions.

Um there's when we when we are looking at the risk of recession, there's a number of different factors we're looking at, uh including job growth, uh GDP growth, um stock market, the yield curve inversion.

Um most of those right now are flashing, so it is uh a sign of uh uh increased risk.

Um in terms in terms of the Arizona economy, so we've seen steady continued growth in both population and employment growth.

One of the one of uh one of the big concerns though is uh, and it was brought up uh when I got here too is just housing and the affordability and attainability challenges with with housing.

Um when you look at state level data, uh the the share of homes that are affordable to the median income is at its lowest late that it's lowest rate that it's been in almost almost uh 40 years.

Um and uh there's there's a number of different reasons for that, but what one of the biggest reasons is just the shortage of housing.

So uh prior to so the chart here is just on single family permits in Arizona.

Um before the Great Recession, we were uh you know permitting close to uh 70,000 homes a year, and then after the Great Recession, that dropped down to almost 10,000.

And really the we haven't really um recovered from that peak.

And so there's just been a really long lag in construction.

So with the housing shortages, what that's done is uh increase the price of uh the cost of housing, and that's both in uh in rental homes and in median uh in for sale homes.

Uh if you look at just the median price of homes sold throughout the state, uh it's gone up about 80 percent uh just from uh the beginning of 2020 uh when all the pandemic issues started, and uh again that's when the low the interest rates were low.

So um in terms of the Arizona economy, so there's there's a lot of uh there's a lot of different levers that can be pooled and moved around, but um there's also a lot of uh things out of the our control.

So a lot of uh federal policies are really gonna have an impact on what what's happening.

Uh for one example, um with all the talks of federal uh budget cuts, um one thing we're looking at right now is the potential for Medicaid cuts to the state, uh which can range anywhere from a billion dollars to seven and a half billion dollars, and uh just the impact of that would be devastating on the upper end.

Uh the job losses are equivalent to what we lost during the Great Recession.

And uh unlike the recession where we had a natural bounce back, uh these are this there wouldn't be a bounce back uh from this loss.

And so it's not only the economic impact, but then it's also you know the impact on the community.

So a lot of people are losing their health care, and you know what what that not only does that drive costs further up, but um you know, just the human humanity impact of that would be just in uh insane.

So it's one thing to keep an eye out.

So uh so what about Avondale?

Um over the last 20 years, the city has seen steady growth.

Um over the next uh 30 years, we'll also see steady steady growth going forward.

Um population is expected to increase by about 50,000 people.

Uh jobs are expected to grow by 30,000.

So looking at planning for the future, um one thing that's been brought up is just the housing affordability issues.

Uh just like the state, uh Avondale saw a huge decline in construction after the Great Recession, and it took a really long time to start building again.

Um one thing that is uh uh promising about this chart that it shows the multifamily compared to single family permits.

Uh multifamily has seen that boost lately, and that's very important for diversifying the housing stock.

Um it was mentioned earlier how we just we need that we need different housing options to uh uh provide housing for different groups.

So it's it's not not so much you know high-end residential apartments, but it's also looking at workforce apartments uh and also that lower uh lower income uh rentals, and then also uh continuing to improve the single family housing market stock.

So similarly to the state, uh all the how this the complete halt of housing construction pushed uh the median price of homes sold.

Now looking at uh the workforce, so one thing that was very interesting when I was looking at the data in Avondale is that uh about 90% of the people are commuting from outside, and also 90% of residents work outside of Avondale.

So one thing that's that's uh an opportunity there is to reduce that leakage.

So looking at um see so looking at current industries and seeing where uh where the current labor force works, so um and leveraging that local strength to target those industries and get them to come to Avondale.

Um another thing is to target those high wage industries, so not just not just the industries that are uh that make up a large portion of the city's employment, but those that pay well.

So the the biggest thing right now is just the uncertainty.

Um there's a lot going on and it's all happening really quick.

Um the there's a lot of uh local issues as well.

The state um, as you know, can is looking at different policies that impact the city.

So that's one thing to keep in mind.

Um the the it's there should always be focus on uh investments in economic and community development, especially because that helps with job stability and resilience for your workforce.

Um we know that you know lower paying jobs or jobs with uh that require less educational attainment are not as resilient for during recessions.

So making that investment um has uh long-term benefits.

Uh and then um you know, looking at just municipal budgeting, um, keeping an eye on what's going on in the country and the state and just planning properly.

That's part that's it for the presentation, but happy to open it up for discussion or questions.

Do we have any questions based on what you've heard from any of the council members here?

Mr.

Mayor and uh Council, if I could.

So what's your prediction?

Are we headed into a recession or um one of the comments you had up there was uh municipal budgeting?

What should we be budgeting preparing for so what's my prediction?

Yes.

When?

I don't know.

Could be in 20 years.

Uh no, but we are seeing uh that increased risk of it happening towards the end of the year.

Um of this calendar year, just with uh what we were seeing right now happening on with tariffs.

Um thing, you know, uh uh right before coming in, I did see that Trump, so Canada imposed their own tariffs against the U.S.

And Trump uh tweeted that he was just gonna retaliate by that same amount.

So, you know, it might be a tool to bargain, but really it's it's uh playing with um all of our wallets, right?

So it it could have an impact, so it's just very, very uncertain.

Um the level of uh pullback that we've seen from uh companies investing um that also has a trickle effect.

So you know we don't know how long this uncertainty is gonna last.

Um but just you know all signs are pointing to a higher risk of that happening this year.

Um in terms of budgeting, um one thing to keep an eye on is uh so what are those one-time uh revenue sources because we we've all cities in Arizona have seen that increase in tax revenues due to a lot of these inflationary factors or that pent-up demand.

So kind of the so you so it be it would be good to kind of go into that and try to pinpoint what is that one-time revenue uh and what and what how much should you you be taking off the base to pro to not only plan for normal years but also plan for a year with a possible recession?

Mayor, not a lot not a lot of great news in there, but um uncertainty.

It's funny one of the um speakers earlier said what does what do businesses need to succeed?

They they need certainty, and so it's the opposite of our ending of our day.

But um he'll be right someday.

Okay, well, I guess if there's no questions, then thank you so much, Luis, for being here today providing the information, and uh we're thankful for it.

So thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

All right, we're actually ready to close uh uh a couple minutes early after uh uh worldwind day.

Uh um we've got you, Mayor, uh uh Tracy, and then Nancy to wrap us up.

Um in closing, I will just share with you what I've shared with others that I've had a chance to speak with today, and that is that you know I was really looking forward to this experience for many reasons, and um just didn't realize uh how significant the benefit would be to hear from our partners.

Um more importantly, uh as a organization.

I think that's gonna be key because there's a lot of different factors.

Uh us as policymakers, and I said that a lot today, but as policymakers, our our decisions are really rooted in uh favorability um for our our residents, and yet with everything that was discussed today, there are just so many variables to uh the outcomes that it's difficult to predict is what we're doing the right thing.

And so through the strategic plan, we're really just looking at uh not only just setting those goals and objectives and working within the constraints that have been defined for us, but more importantly, how we're going to do it.

And that was really the goal uh, you know, when asked about uh what should we do first with me coming into office and strategic planning or a strategic plan was was key to that is really what is the strategies behind getting to the goal and objectives and I shared with Nancy last week in my meeting with her that that's that's really kind of where the rubber meets the road for me is what are what what are the goals and objectives, sure, but what are the strategies to get there and all of the professionals in the room uh will will lead us in that direction, um, guided by uh us as policymakers, and we just have to work within those constraints while being as creative and innovative as possible.

Um we may not all have the opportunity that Jen has to call you in the event that we uh get in trouble, but uh but I I for one as an individual, speaking for myself, am all for each member here of the organization in terms of department head of being creative and innovative.

Uh you are all the professionals, you're the experts.

Um we are looking to you to guide us through some of the decision making that happens here.

And we're fortunate, I'll speak for us by saying that we are fortunate to have so many professionals and experts in this room to do just that.

And but I do not mind being aggressive, uh trailblazers, if you will, in this room.

And the way we get from point A to Z may not look like what other municipalities have done.

And with me, that's okay.

I'm I'm okay with that.

And I will work and speak with our residents uh to defend that mindset of of being innovative and creative to tackle some of the challenges that we have here.

So um there's things that I wanted to say today that I think are more appropriate for tomorrow.

Um, and so I'll hold off on some of those.

But I just want to thank all of you for being here and being a part of the process with us.

And um, I just look forward to another important day tomorrow of us speaking together and formulating this plan on moving forward.

So thank you, Ron, for putting this together.

Thank you, staff.

I mean, this is I mean, look at this.

I mean, we're all together.

Technology's working, great job, Jeff and team.

You know, we all have microphones.

It's just been a really conducive experience too, moving forward.

So thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor and Council.

Um, I I too, I'll save my comments for tomorrow.

But uh Nisa has worked very hard on this project, but I'll think we're gonna tomorrow.

And then um the the food and the setup um from uh Dillard and Whitney and Alexa and uh your team, and then I know that uh Marcella and everybody who helped her set up the room.

It's it took a whole team effort, but more about that tomorrow.

But I want to turn it over to Tracy to say a few things.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

Uh appreciate the time today.

And and we heard so much great conversation with all the panels in the room.

Um, one of the things that resonated, I think, throughout the day was just creating opportunities for all and attainable housing and creating wealth and workforce development, and then of course, job creation and the things that we need to do to partner um to make sure that we have a great healthcare system in our city for our residents.

So we all have been kind of taking notes, I think.

So we're gonna pull those all together and provide those to you tomorrow so that you have those in front of you to reflect back on as we discuss some of those issues and um come to kind of looking at the new strategic outcomes and reshaping some of those based on what we heard today.

So um it should be exciting and um looking forward to a great day tomorrow.

And I also want to thank Anisa for all our hard work and all the moderators too.

You guys did a really great job.

So um it was great.

And I will turn it over to Nancy.

Thank you, Mayor and Council on that.

What a wonderful day.

I mean, this really sets the table for our time together tomorrow.

I think it's gonna be um really powerful and inspired.

Um, you know, the the focus on the future and all of the topics of the day um really resonate.

And I think there was a lot of energy and a lot of themes around some really core uh issues and opportunities in front of you all.

And so I think tomorrow will be the way the time and the space for us to elaborate on what a success look like in those areas and to really sort of land the plane.

You know, what are the things you want to celebrate five years from now as you're anticipating the future?

So really looking forward to an inspired day tomorrow.

Um get some rest.

Here we go.

Um see you in the morning.

Thank you.

Thank you, Nancy.

Thank you, Ron.

Yeah, we'll start at 7:30.

We'll have breakfast ready at 7:30, and the program will start at 8.

So the work session will start at 8.

And can I can I also say really quickly so thank you to all the council for making it um a priority to be here today.

I know you have other things that happen between work, families, and other things, and so um it's a two day event, and we're all here.

So thank you guys for being here.

Appreciate it.

See you all tomorrow.

Can I please have a motion to adjourn?

Sorry.

I have a motion to adjourn.

Second, we got a motion from Council Mr.

Garcia, second from Councilmember White, all in favor.

Aye.

I thank you.

See you tomorrow.

I mean getting nice.

Thank you for having except Tina.