Okay, we're live.

We are recording to sort of by no.

Good evening, everyone.

I ask that we all rise for the pledge to the flag.

Pledge allegiance to the flag.

United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation under God with liberty and justice.

Mr.

Miller, please call the roll.

Mr.

Callahan.

Present.

Ms.

Cramcy Smith.

Present.

Ms.

Quitak.

Present.

Ms.

Laird.

Present.

Ms.

Leon.

Santa.

Ms.

Wilhelm and Mr.

Cologne.

Present.

Thank you, Mr.

Miller.

So a couple things.

One, Councilwoman Wilhelm will not be joining us this evening.

She is out of the state, visiting with family.

Mayor Reynolds will be joining us later in the meeting, as there is a World Heritage Related meeting this evening.

So he will be here later on tonight.

And then before we move through the agenda, a couple agenda items are gonna have been removed from tonight's agenda.

So that would be communication six B is pulled from tonight's agenda, as well as the corresponding resolution 10B.

So those were at the request of the administration.

We will not be voting on those tonight, and we may see them again in the future.

Moving on to the approval of the minutes.

Any comments on the minutes from the August 19, 2025 council meeting.

Seeing none, we'll continue on.

The minutes stand approved.

Public comment.

So we'll start with our first public comment as is custom for any subject not being voted on this evening.

So again, this would be for anything that's not uh being voted on as a resolution or an ordinance.

We have four people sign up in advance.

So I'll go around the room.

I do remind everyone we have a five minute time limit, and I ask everyone to be respectful of that five minute limit.

Our first person signed up tonight, Mark Riddle.

If everyone doesn't mind stating their name for the record for our clerk when he does the minutes.

Hi, my name is Mark, M A R C Reddle R I T T L E.

Um, and for the record, I live um in 1326 North Street, as opposed to West Fourth Street, which is the address of New Bethany.

I'm also the executive director for New Bethany Inc.

Um, I have some comments regarding the Norfolk Southern um decision, and mostly my comments are that I believe that it's unfortunate that Norfolk Southern has taken the position that they have.

Um, but I do, however, appreciate that we have a few months to get to a solution.

Uh, what does the solution look like?

Thanks to the city community connections team through the health department and the police department, Bethlehem Emergency Sheltering, New Bethany staff, and other outreach organizations.

We already know quite a bit about the population that we serve.

Um, so I consider that good news and puts us ahead of the game in terms of coming up with a plan.

Uh, we also know um that each person has a different barrier to um finding shelter, finding a home.

So a solution will be a combination of efforts, including dollars and space for temporary housing, resources for behavioral health services, and really a whole lot more than that.

Um, I look forward to the conversations ahead.

I am impressed by the Bethlehem community, the entire community, including uh residents.

I see people every single day coming into New Bethany to provide support, to donate supplies.

Um, and it's just truly kind of a beautiful sight to see.

Um, I speci I think that we're really good at coming together in a crisis as a full community.

I specifically want to thank the mayor, the city staff, Chief Cott, every single member of council, and I want to thank previous city administrations as well.

New Bethany has continually over the years experienced open dialogue and partnerships.

That's what I really love about being a resident of the city of Bethlehem for the last 20 plus years.

Uh, my hope is that we can find an agreeable short-term solution while continuing the dialogue for meaningful long-term solutions, and that's what I have to say today.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Riddle.

Next speaker this evening, Harry Faber.

Hello, Harry Faber.

I wish I had more time to have prepared.

A starting grad school has been very hectic.

So I'm gonna read for a newsletter I received from the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research.

I recommend everybody check it out.

On 12th of August, Samar Abu Ilouf, who won the 2025 World Press Photo of the Year of the picture above, posted on her Instagram account that her son's close friend Sammy Shakur had been killed while he went to look for flour to feed himself and his family.

Samar had taken Sammy's graduation photos just before the genocide began in October 2023.

Sammy's family owns one of the most famous companies in Palestine, which made Hallalawa with a tahini among the best in Gaza, Samar wrote.

Sammy, she added, was killed under a hail of bullets.

The sound was very terrifying.

We are not just numbers.

Each one of us is a story.

We have now entered the last quarter of 2025, the days galloping rapidly toward another year.

The image of being chased by horses is not idle, for these are not the wild horses whose beauty stuns the landscape of the meadow.

These are the horses of the apocalypse.

Everywhere we turn, there is a sniff of the far right of a special type at the gates of power.

It's leaders riding their horses at full sprint.

None of these leaders have a program to solve our crises.

Rather, they throw an accelerant onto them, stoking the fires of hell to burn faster and hotter.

They deny the existence of climate change and the importance of human dignity.

They want to deepen austerity and encourage war.

They promote irrationality and so and social suffocation.

Across the world, people of conscience are appalled by the rise of the far right and appeal to large sections of our social or of our of our societies.

At Tricontinental, we haven't studied the growth of this far right.

We have examined how its political base is rooted in the atomization of society, in the growth of institutions and other groups that favor their political orientation, such as new forms of religious fellowship and off the books economies, and in the collapse of class organizations and working class and peasant communities.

Part of our conclusion is that the political collapse of social democrats and liberals through their adoption of neoliberal austerity policies has created the conditions for the mass base of the far right.

Without an acknowledgement of this fact and without a renewal of the pre-neoliberal agenda, we cannot expect the social democrats and liberals to be significant allies in the fight against the far right of a special type.

Struck by the failure of the social democrats and liberals across the global to con across the globe to conduct this kind of renewal, and by the failure of liberals in the global north, particularly to stop their support for the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians.

I have written a letter, which I share below.

You have surrendered whatever limited neutral function the state had in the class struggle between capitalists and workers.

The oligarchy now runs the state with regulations set to a minimum and worker rights set to set to near zero.

You have watched as the oligarchy has set fire to society, breaking up the old factories, sending the machines to countries where labor is cheaper, and making money off the factory land through speculation.

There are no jobs left in the wasteland, only servile jobs to tend to the whims of the oligarchy and uberized jobs to provide mediocre quality services to each other.

You have urged the compromised state to cut to cut taxes and reduce its social services at the same time as unemployment and poverty have increased.

Old liberal ideas of helping the less fortunate have dissolved in the acid of individualism and personal ambition.

The money that used to be spent on social work war social welfare, now vaporized into the financial markets for the oligarchs race to become the first trillionaire.

What would they have been recycled through the tax system is now mired in the casino-like money markets?

The whoops and razzle of the money concealing the howls of the poor.

You have encouraged the state to build up its diabolical attachments to arm merchants and their wares.

Weapons eat the commitments to society, breaking whatever bonds had been promised by the modern state to its citizens.

There are families on the streets begging for food, and then high above them in the boardrooms, there are ugly deals being made with the people's money and the weapons companies.

The values of a people are not in their constitutions, which have been hollowed out, but in their budgets, which are so heavily biased towards weapons that there is almost nothing left for social welfare.

You have allowed for the growth of a culture of cruelty, monstrous behavior by the police against citizens, by angry men against women, by the hound of starvation against the cry of the hungry belly.

All of this is now normal.

The nature of modern civilization.

You have encouraged it.

You have authorized it.

You have hidden behind your social attitudes, your liberalism towards this or that social behavior, your occasional appearance at a pride parade or at an international women's day stroll, but you care nothing for the gay men who is dying of HIV or AIDS and cannot access drugs, or the woman who has no shelter to go with her children when her home has become unbearable.

Your liberalism has collapsed.

There is no liberal philosophers who are not merely analytical.

Their moral comp is trapped in an academic argument that has little relevance to this world.

Your thinkers are made for television, the foundation on their face, designed to prevent the light from shining on them, but also to prevent the light of reason from coming out of their mouths.

Your liberalism is advertising, not philosophy.

Classical fascist culture was a dead culture.

It was a culture of fake glory and genuine violence.

It made a genuine break from the liberal culture that preceded it.

Thank you, Mr.

Faber.

Well, the rest will be outside if you guys want to read.

Good luck in your coursework, Mr.

Faber.

Thank you.

Our next speaker signed up, Brian Hillard.

Good evening, Council.

For the record, uh, my name is Brian Hillard.

I'm in Bethlehem Township resident, 3901 Peacock.

Uh, but I am also an officer of Sir serving to aid and restore.

Uh, we base our operations at 75 East Market Street and UCC Church of Christ, as well as um Bethlehem Emerging Sheltering and uh other organizations.

Um, I stand here representing uh Star uh to speak uh on behalf of the Norfolk Southern issue as well.

Um I've been with Star for over 10 years.

Um, and uh for those who don't know, we distribute clothing, toiletries, tents, tarps, and other necessities uh to homeless and low-income and others that was in need.

Uh for the 10 years that I served there, um, anyone that's talked to me have talked about this.

The people that I've worked alongside have been the best people I've ever worked alongside.

And it's not just people like Timagory and our numerous other volunteers, but our clients as well.

Uh, some of the clients have come through our doors, have been uh some of the most wonderful people I've ever met.

Um, these people come from all walks of life.

And uh I would argue that every single one of them has had experiences and life thrust upon them, uh, has ultimately led to their current situation.

Uh, they're kind and considerate people, and they're just looking to survive.

They're just looking to exist, just looking to be.

Uh, these people need spaces to live.

Uh, through whatever experiences they have faced, there are four existing spaces that are constantly being stressed, whether it's from governments or businesses or residents or or just the trials of life.

Um, I can fully appreciate Norfolk Southern's concerns um uh as well as further others, uh safety alongside these train tracks on the very dangerous areas where uh they pose significant health and safety risk to those immediate immediately around them.

Um, personally, I I can um I can relate to that.

My grandfather actually had an accident, train accident, which took part of his leg while I was serving the army for the Korean War.

Um, you know, the land around these train tracks should be kept clear for non-uh Norfolk Southern personnel uh for their own safety as well as the safety of uh of the uh of Norfolk Southern personnel.

Uh with that in mind, I would just like to urge the city to be careful and considerate in regulating the areas outside those spaces.

You know, I understand Norfolk Southern has vested interest in their property, but the outside the spaces outside that property, um, people need spaces to live, people need spaces to be.

Um, Bethlehem needs to find space both physically and bureaucratically to give our neighbors uh spaces to live, and they've done so for a long time.

And I urge them to consider to continue that.

Um the city already acknowledges that we are in the midst of an affordable housing crisis, and the manifestation of that crisis sometimes is homelessness.

So we can't look at one issue without considering the other issue as well.

Uh, we cannot hope to help those who struggle to maintain their housing and then turn our backs on those who cannot afford it at all.

Uh, as our friend Mark Riddle has mentioned, City of Bethlehem has a great record in working with the homeless populations and working with the other organizations that support those people.

Um, I would like to urge the city that while they work with Norfolk and Southern to ensure track safety, as well as their their uh their property, um, to consider continu to continue to consider our neighbors uh and our friends who live outdoors that still be granted the space to seem to exist.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Hillard.

Next speaker tonight, Mr.

Mark Will Weber.

Uh thank you, Mark Weber, uh, here representing the the drip, the uh citizen uh advocate for water and sewer issues.

Uh after I left last week, I understood the conversation continued.

Um and uh I didn't go home and watch it on tape.

I was watching the Phillies and the Mariners, but I did see it the next day.

Um the back and forth with uh councilwoman Laird and uh Mr.

Boscola.

And uh some very interesting stuff coming up.

And I think um what councilwoman Laird asked that now that we have 55% of the smart meters in, certainly it is a time to explore uh uh adding some of these uh water monitoring devices, such as Aquahawk or Ion Water.

I say aqua hawk a lot because it kind of sounds like a superhero, right?

And it can be a superhero, it can really save uh uh the citizens a lot of uh money and emotional wear and tear.

Um, so it doesn't have to be alquahawk, but an app like that, iron water, they're all very valid.

And I did somewhere fine, I can't find it now, but I will uh was a video from Census, the actual company that that um our smart meters are from.

And it was a video made for municipalities and water and sewer uh professionals.

It wasn't for guys, well, maybe it was for me, but not for the average citizen.

And and they advised that you should introduce these individual uh water monitoring devices such as Aquahawk or Iron Water within the first 15 or 20 percent of the smart meters that get pointed in.

Point being that if there is some sort of glitch, you can straighten them out before you have the whole city on a system, and then find out that something's not compatible.

Okay.

Um Mr.

Boscola referred to me as a gentleman in that's kind of shocked me.

It was very gracious of him since in July.

We were nose-to-nose out in the hallway with uh some rather raised voices, and the chief came out to make sure there wasn't a WWF event being staged without a proper permit.

Uh so it is a heated issue.

Um, but I think at least we're talking about it.

I still kind of see his responses as a non-committal committal, sort of dancing around.

I once said he was Fred of Stair would be jealous of his dance steps.

Uh maybe maybe uh dancing with the stars is in his future.

But if we do get some kind of firm commitment and uh, you know, uh reasonable time of when these devices will follow the smart meters installation.

I'll be the first one to applaud Mr.

Boscola, Mr.

Davis.

Love to see a video of them on our website saying this is how you download Aquahawk.

That would be awesome.

It'd be good for everybody.

City would save water.

Uh he mentioned a little bit of expense, but guess what?

They're making money already on these new smart meters because they don't have guys going around the city in their cars with their little pads tabulating the uh the water.

Um they're saving wear and tear on vehicle and gas, that kind of thing.

Saving water.

Um, everybody should be interested in that in case you have a real catastrophe, like you know, Maine breaks up on uh Shannersville Road or on uh East Market Street or something.

Now you've saved water.

Uh think tank out of Chicago puts it as high as 15 or 20 percent of savings because once the people have Aquahawk or Ion Water, they actually it's almost like a video game.

They get into wow, I wonder if I can save even more water next month because they can monitor that hourly.

Um, I felt there was a little wringing of hands.

Well, there's a lot of moving parts.

I don't know if we can do it.

Uh he's been in the business for over 10 years, almost 12.

Uh, Mr.

Davis has lots of experience.

Uh I would think that the team of Bosco and Davis are as good as their contemporaries, their uh counterparts in these other municipalities where they do already have this established.

I'd say dozens and dozens of other cities, but probably hundreds and hundreds of other cities have it.

I was shocked that there's a city, I won't mention its name.

It's doesn't it's not doing that well.

One third of people have poverty in this city, about the size of Bethlehem, a little smaller, maybe.

And guess what they do have?

They have eye on water for their residents, even though this city is struggling.

They made sure their their residents are protected, and ours deserve to be protected too.

So we got to keep at it.

But it's a start, I will applaud Mr.

Boscola uh when this comes through.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Woolweber.

So that exhausts our list of who had signed up in advance.

So I'm gonna go around the room.

Is there anyone to my left who want to make comment who didn't have a chance to yet?

Is there anyone in the wide center who wants to make comment?

I'll work from my left to my right.

Sorry, Mr.

Shire.

Bill Shire, 1890 Eaton Avenue.

Um gonna be wearing my economist hat tonight, figuratively or metaphorically, I'm not sure which.

Uh let me let me say straight off that I think that every high school graduate should pass a course in basic economics.

There was so much misunderstanding of economics in our recent election, and right now, and five minutes won't be enough to uh cover it all.

So there'll be a sequel, perhaps.

But let me start with prices.

During the campaign, Mr.

Trump said he was going to bring down prices.

Uh-uh.

Presidents don't have that power.

Not even him in his wildest dreams, I don't think.

Uh they from time to time, twice in at least twice in my lifetime.

We've had price controls.

Once uh during World War II, I was dimly aware of them then, and then once during the Nixon administration.

And they don't work because what you get is what's called a black market, where things are bought and sold according to their true value, and it's against the law, and people get arrested, and then it's called profiteering, profiteering, but it just doesn't work.

Presidents do not have that power.

Congress does not have that power.

The Supreme Court doesn't have the power.

That's one instance where we have truly a free market.

But not only that, he's making it worse because in three respects.

The first is deportations.

We are right now at just about full employment.

I think it's the last number is 4.2%.

Maybe that's the last number we can actually trust, but that's another story.

Uh economists say 4% is full employment because one out of every 25 people is between one job and another.

I think 4% is a little high, but let's uh say we're pretty close to full employment.

So what do we do?

We're deporting workers.

And what's gonna happen?

There's going to be a labor shortage.

It's starting already.

Some firms are complaining, meat packing complaints, for example.

So firms are going to start competing for labor.

Wages will have to rise.

Now that's that's good for people getting higher wages, but it also increases the cost of production, which is going to result in higher prices.

The economists even have a term for it, because it's called the wage price spiral.

That's one respect in which uh inflation is going to increase.

The second is of course tariffs.

I don't um I don't quite understand when he says other countries are ripping us off.

Uh some we have a few we have surplus with, and most of them are deficits.

Well, there's a number of reasons for that.

Some good, some bad.

The tariffs, if anyone believes that the tariffs are going to be uh as uh uh oh my running out of time already.

If uh that they're gonna be absorbed by the importers.

Uh uh I have a bridge in Brooklyn and I'd like to sell to you.

Prices are gonna rise.

That's the second instance, and tonight's just gonna be about inflation.

The third thing is pressuring the Federal Reserve to put down lower the interest rates, it's gonna stimulate the economy.

We're going to have more inflation.

So get ready for it.

He's gonna blame it on Biden for sure, but uh, those are three things that he's doing to cause prices to rise.

Part two will maybe at the next meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Shire.

Is Nuna Hello, Valerie Noonan.

Um I have two things I want to comment on tonight.

I'm actually gonna start with the shorter one.

Um I'd like to express solidarity with Lehigh County Commissioner and former Bethlehem right to know officer, Zach Cole Borgie.

I do not know and do not care whether he did what he is accused of, because it's a complete joke that there are laws against cannabis.

Um he was charged with uh possession and intent to deliver.

Um Zach was always helpful to me in responding to right to know requests, and unless he was using on the job, I don't see how this has anything to do with his ability to assist the people of Bethlehem, and I'm disappointed to hear that he's been let go.

Um, the other you can probably guess, um, which is uh Norfolk Southern uh intending to evict the uh homeless encampments in Bethlehem.

Um this is a frustrating one because I can't count how many times the Bethlehem police or council or city staff or the mayor have fed the public have fed me the line that Bethlehem doesn't do sweeps.

Um and there have been a lot of times where advocates and unhoused people in the area have been treated like our fears were without basis.

Um most people have been told that they should feel comfortable coming to the city for help.

And I have seen that city workers have actually done quite a lot to try to build trust, but that doesn't change the situation we're in right now.

And I think it really comes to not making promises you can't keep because the promise not to do sweeps only holds as long as Norfolk Southern is okay with it, as has become apparent.

Um, and this is also a perfect example of how the police are not really there to protect and serve us, the people, they're there to protect the law.

Unfortunately, the law is not there to protect us, the people in this respect.

It's there to protect private property.

Um it's like whatever the individual intentions of officers or of the department here or of the city are they have to go by the law.

Um, and it's basically the same problem as the city's failure to make a stand against ice.

Um, if you look over in Allentown, Slumlord Nat Hyman is trying to see the city over the homeless encampment at Jordan Creek.

After putting up token resistance, the city found the perfect reason to evict people that the area was a floodplain.

They argued that evicting people was for their safety.

Never mind that homeless people had already voiced concerns about safety years ago, and this suddenly became an issue worth looking at when money not lives was online.

So somebody out North Fro, somebody at Norfolk Southern must have been taking notes because what I'm seeing is they're claiming it's unsafe because people are getting too close to the train tracks.

The train tracks have been there for ages, and so has the homeless population.

Um and they're saying the homeless population has grown too much, and that like the crowding is increasing the danger.

This doesn't really make sense.

The eviction is scheduled for December 15th, which is a month and a half after emergency shelters open for the winter.

And if you know anything about the Bethlehem homeless population or in general, the number of people camping outdoors reduces a lot in the winter for that very reason.

So there's gonna be a lot less people by the time winter comes around.

I'm not really buying this argument.

Um regardless of the reduction, there are still gonna be some people who cannot or will not make use of the shelters and they still need to camp.

Um, and I'm very concerned for their safety.

And I think that the frigid cold is a bigger threat to their safety than some train tracks.

Um I'd like to know what's really going on.

Does it have to do with Norfolk Southern's 85 billion dollar merger with Union Pacific?

I don't know.

Um, or is it just too much of an eyesore for their taste?

Either way, it's not a good enough reason to remove people.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Noonan.

Was there anyone else in the wide center who wants my comment?

Yes.

Hello.

My name is Sam.

Uh, I want to also speak on the proposed eviction uh of the encampments along the train tracks in Bethlehem.

Um I just want to basically echo and say that I'm another person who is concerned.

Um please do whatever you can to stop Norfolk Southern's proposed eviction.

Um everyone has a right to live in dignity and peace.

Housing is a human right.

There are enough homes, but many are vacant and people are priced out.

If our society had its priorities in order, such resources would be in use by the people.

Some of the current laws, as Valerie alluded to, only benefit the owning class, big landlords, corporations, etc.

They're about protecting property, not about protecting people.

Um, I just want to urge you to think about what's stopping us from ensuring that all have their basic needs met.

There are enough resources to go around.

We should not be reducing the quality of life for the most vulnerable.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Kirthall.

Hi, my name's it's working, Mr.

Kurtola.

It's on.

Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

My name's Artie Caratola, 813 Lawfer Street, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Um, last time, the last meeting, I would talk, it stays right here.

I think I said more than that, but I don't get I took notice.

Not everything gets into the notes.

I guess nothing's the other stuff's not that important.

This is important.

This was important though, to put in there.

Make me look like an idiot.

Okay.

Well, more than I am already.

Anyway, resident Arthur Curatola suggested moving the town hall to move to at town hall.

Yeah, rearranging town hall to move the lectern from the public comment so that the speakers' faces can be seen on live stream rather than the backs of their heads.

The readman would also allow for more seating, maybe 10 more, two more rows up front.

Uh put it up higher in the back there, you know, spend a little bit of the money for the people here.

So if you get more people, okay, you got more seating.

President Cologne advised me that anyone is concerned about the angle in which they are recorded while addressing council.

They can instead use the lectern in front of town hall entrance to his right.

The lectern has a microphone that will record their comments.

Now, see, none of us knew that before.

Nobody tells us anything in the city, and that's why we have the situation with the homeless situation, especially homeless veterans.

That should not be part of the equation in the American language.

I was a veteran out of the military in 1968.

I stuttered and stammered profusely.

I couldn't say more than a sentence.

I had to edit everything in my mind before I spoke.

Otherwise, it was stuttering.

I embarrassed me to stutter.

But now I have no problems talking.

I don't even use notes when I talk, as you can tell.

Only if I'm reading something.

You know, I don't have problems talking, but I did have problems before with stuttering and stammering.

Now it's hard to shut me up.

But the thing is, the fact remains City Council, the United States government does not let people know what they can do.

As far as it took till 19, not 19, I'm sorry, 2015, before I got benefits.

I didn't apply because I didn't want to take from other veterans.

But then I saw how much money elected officials are getting a hundred to two hundred thousand dollars out of the taxpayers' money.

If by some miracle I get elected as being a mayor, I am not taking one dollar from the tax from the tax dollars.

My money will go towards the homeless situation to eliminate the homeless problems.

Very simple.

When I didn't apply for any kind of assistance, I made my money through being a musician, memorizing the songs, singing, doing stand-up comedy, memorizing my comedy so I wouldn't stutter.

But the thing is, in 2015, I got the medical thing from Social Security from Medicare from Medicaid, but I wouldn't take any money.

Whoa, with a 30-year mortgage for about $350 a month back in 2010, which I paid off now because God has blessed me greatly.

But they can do that and tell the homeless people to get together, purchase a house on the south side for maybe 150,000, make the loan, and then you have your own house.

Does it work that way?

You just don't encourage the homeless people to do this.

You be you don't take care of the pawns, the poor people.

You want to get for the rich, so you get elected, keep the political machine going.

You're the knights.

You go for the bishops and the rooks.

You don't do nothing with the pawns.

Get out there and try to get the homeless people to go ahead and make a loan to get their own houses.

They can do it.

One third of the income, $15,000 a month, $1,500 a month from Social Security.

Two people can afford to buy a house.

Thank you.

God bless.

Thank you, Mr.

Caratola.

Was there anyone else in the wide center?

I'm gonna go in the third row and then I'll work my way up, Mr.

Antalix.

Brandon from Broad Street.

I'm actually gonna talk about something that involves city council for a change.

Um you guys installed these cameras last year, not installed, you paid for them.

I understand it was $30,000 for a license from Flock Safety Systems.

This is essentially how it works.

You put in those little solar powered cameras all over the place.

And this is not some right-wing conspiracy.

This is from the ACLU.

Those cameras are taking photos of everybody all the time.

They have facial recognition, they're taking pictures of your license plate all the time, and then they're selling this data to third parties.

They're selling, they're making money off spying on you every single day.

So we paid $30,000 for the privilege of being spied on and having our data stolen.

So I'd just like to know.

Did you guys read that contract before you signed our data away?

Thank you.

I'm glad you're back to the first row.

Thank you.

Oh, this is nothing personal.

Uh Stephen Antalix from the first row.

Um also 737 Ridge.

Who created the affordable single family home problem in Bethlehem?

Its own city council.

Consider Packer, Carlton, Hillside, Montclair, and Burkle Avenues, along with Fifth Vine, Morton Adams, Van Buren, Webster, Summit, Fillmore, Pierce, Verona, Butler, Renick, and Martell Streets.

For at one time, the majority of these streets maintained single family homes on both sides of the streets.

Also, Verona Butler and Renning Streets are no longer no longer exist.

Today, the number of single family homes might be counted on two hands in that area.

In post-World War II, the loss of homes began with consuls' approval of the appointment of a Lehi Dean and the Beth MCL vice president to head the redevelopment authority.

Both agencies who employ them, bought properties through straw buyers, and with the city not doing inspections, part of a scheme.

Large swaths of homeless were these declared blighted, allowing the clearing of blocks of single family homes for the schools and steels expansion.

This was equivalent to putting the wolf in the hen house.

It was planned.

Council further assisted in the loss of single family homes by allowing zoning changes to call five students a family.

Bethlehem is the only college city in the state that allows this.

Now reflect for a minute.

And make a mental count of single family homes that were lost in this process.

And if your addition is good, Bethlehem would not have a single family problem.

Housing problems.

So who created the problem?

Thank you, Mr.

Antalix.

Was there anyone else in the wide center who it may comment?

I'll start here in the front, and then sir in the second row after.

I want to talk about six things because I'm one of the people down at Norfolk.

Um, I honestly feel like you're helping all the wrong people.

You know who they are because they abuse the system all the time.

Um the rent is going up, utilities are being too expensive, like water, seriously, gas.

Um, and then putting others in the same category.

Often when they see us down there, they will put everybody in the same category, whether we do drugs or not.

I myself am a college student.

I work four jobs right now.

I'm literally working on getting my CNA, two different situations, but I do understand.

Um, there is a lot of people down there that obviously do that.

Um, a lot of us in the front work.

Um, the lack of funds and the misuse of the funds.

Um there's a lot of ringing around the rosies, and the truth not being told, and then when we sit here and tell you guys the reason why we don't want to rush into getting a spot is because we have to make sure that hey, I understand that the buses aren't gonna be late, I might not be there on time to catch the bus.

I need to make sure I have reliable transportation, which me, I want to save up to get a car.

I already have my permit, just simple stuff like that.

Um, and the the fact that for me, insurance and stuff is obviously going to be expensive.

First time driver on record.

Um, five, um, unhelpful support again, the ringing around the roses, and then being told that the lack of funds with Lehigh Conference of churches, and then like you're gonna wait till like now to like have these people kick us off.

I understand has nothing to do with you, perhaps, but to rush things like that, and then like know that people aren't ready.

A lot of the people down there, sure.

The reason why you can't always help everybody, they abuse the money they get for drugs.

You already know what's going on.

Um, it's no surprise, it's nothing new.

Um a lot of people are frustrated because they're tired of coming for help.

A lot of people choose to be in that position because what's the point of doing this every single time?

I mean, I've been living like this for three, four months, and I'm seeing it.

I already lived it, and I was even homeless before.

It's very frustrating.

It's to the point where I might as well just like figure something out.

I mean, you you probably would tow people, and you already kicking people out certain parking lots for just sleeping in the car and saving their money.

Like it really, what do you want them to do?

Because you can't turn to the shelters.

Two one one is taking forever to help people do anything.

Uh I have to have mental health or fake like I'm a drug addict to go to help for hope.

Who sometimes will close um cases and not help people in the first place?

So it's very frustrating at all to even turn to help.

But I'm just not always gonna speak for everybody, but I know I'm speaking for the people that I know that are working down there, so I'm pretty much done with what I had to say.

Do you mind giving your name for the record?

Destiny.

Thank you, sir.

In the second row.

Good evening, guys.

My name is Richard Moser.

I moved to Bethlehem about five years ago.

I fell in love with the community, love the people, love the neighborhood.

I started working at a food bank right across the street from my house, and I found out about these folks that live down here by the train.

It's about three years ago.

I started helping them.

The basics, a lot of the basics, the food, uh heat, solar panels, stuff like that.

I just found out they're getting evicted, December 17th.

Who picked that day?

I can't beat the train company.

I don't think you guys can be trained company either.

They got a ton of cash.

Can't we change that date for later on down, say May, June?

Get these people buried in for the winter so they don't die out on the streets.

My heart goes out to these people every day.

It's insane to see these people down there suffering so bad, and nobody gives a shit.

That's fact.

Is there any way you guys get it to change the date at least until springtime when they start waking up, coming out of the woods and find a place to live, not being stuck in the winter?

That's all I gotta say, man.

Thank you.

Was there anyone else in the wide center?

Yes, sir.

My name's Terry, I see H E W.

Uh on Norfolk Southern issue.

I don't have any notes, I didn't prepare anything, but I hope I have common sense and remind people to have some.

I'm one of the homeless people under there.

Apparently, I exist because I'm here.

I'm a life, I'm not a bum.

Far from it.

I work harder now than I ever did before.

But I reiterate what that man just said about the date.

I know Norfolk, Norfolk Southern, their property, etc.

I know there's people down there that know they're trespassing.

I'm one of them.

But you don't slap the city in the face by throwing your garbage.

I see all sides of this.

However, I don't see any point to reiterate what he said.

The middle of winter.

It's on somebody else's conscience.

And I'm not a bum.

I work hard, I repeat, I work harder than I ever lived, worked in my life.

And if you don't care, well, then you don't care, but I'm gonna tell you also.

And I mean this with all due respect.

You have to live that in your conscience.

What if you were homeless?

Not by choice.

We need help.

Thank you.

Was there anyone else in the wide center who wanted to make comment?

Is there anyone to the right who wants to make comment?

Before I move on, did I miss anyone who wants to make comment, sir?

Uh hello, Sebastian Zavaruka, 341B Spring Street, uh, to talk about the the threat of eviction from Norfolk Southern on their private properties.

I'm not going to comment on uh the legality or anything of that nature.

I just want to address like what I see as an overarching um stigma that's applied to these people.

I tried to do a lot of research beforehand, contacting different city officials, went to the police department early this morning, talked with uh community development agency at City Hall to try and understand some of their plans.

Um, and from I wasn't able to confirm this in time before this meeting, but my understanding is that this neighborhood, this community got attention because of some criminal activities that were allegedly associated with the tenants there.

Um, and then from that point, uh they the community uh was who was affected was some uh cooperative.

Um they um reached out to the city and weren't satisfied, and maybe if that happened or not, they then went and sent a letter to Norfolk Southern because they are they're making their own investigative report and allegedly identifying members of this community as being at fault.

And so from this potentially is what precipitated this action.

Um my concern, you know, I I don't have any hard evidence of this besides getting you know conversations from people, but I still think it holds true what I'm gonna say next, which is in regard to how our systems at be, the people who hold the power can very easily um hold sway um and apply a stigma against people, and that stigma travels very far and fast.

I don't see in our community when we have a member who performs white collar crime against individuals.

Do we go into their neighborhood and start ripping up their books and assessing all of their standards of living and you know, um start putting a deep lens on them?

Um, because my concern is that if this is precipitating from a point of criminal intent and activity, we're having a large swath of population who's being punished.

I speak I've spoken to these members of the encampment.

A lot of them have been there for many years.

Some of them have live been residents of Bethlehem their entire lives, right?

And they've been shuffled had this shuffle game happen many times, and they're prepped.

I mean, as as much as they can be to find the solution to find the moment.

And so I'm but all I care about here is just to you know shed light on the fact that in our community in our system uh where we're at, we have a very loose uh stigma application against certain demographics of our population, and this is one of the the ground demographics of very vulnerable, right?

Um, and so that's just my concern for the record and just a point of uh awareness for the community of what's going on here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Was there anyone else who wants to make comment who didn't have a chance?

All right, that concludes our first public comment.

Moving on to second public comment.

This is for any ordinance or resolution that's to be voted on this evening.

We didn't have anyone sign up in advance, so I'll go around the room.

Sorry, anyone to the left who wants to make comment on anything being voted on.

Again, I turn to the wide center.

Anyone want to make comment?

Sarah in the pack.

Hi, I'm Joe Paposki running for city council.

Um, today I'd like to talk about our changes to the Saldo ordinance.

Uh, specifically uh how our set the saldo ordinance, the new one, will affect affordable housing.

So I made an illustration here.

Uh there are good things in this saldo.

Don't get me wrong.

The storm order is very important.

It has to do with safety and it has to do with our environment.

Stopping the storm order, holding it some of it back will prevent disasters when you get too much storm order and flooding.

So we have safety there.

Uh percolating the water back into the ground and the table without it running off is great.

Um, but the one thing I want to address that I don't think is a good idea with the saldo is the bike and walking paths.

Um specifically, it says that um major subdivisions are subject to this rule.

Uh now a major subdivision could be five lots.

So let's take a look at this.

Let's just take a 10 watt subdivision as an example.

Take the 10 watt subdivision, and you lose one lot to the bike path or the walking path.

So now the developer has to redistribute the cost of the 10 watts to nine houses.

That increases the cost on those houses 11%.

If you take that 11% and add it to the 33% post cook post-COVID cost increases of the houses, we're up to 44% since 2019.

So I strongly urge that we look at this and maybe do something else.

Uh what we could do, and I think would be a good idea is to make the threshold 25 houses and no smaller, because if we went 25 houses, it would be a 4.17% increase on the price.

Sorry, I should have given y'all a sheet with this, but I didn't have time.

So what I'm saying is if we could do that, or maybe we change the square footage of the lot for the 10 lots, allow them to put the bike path in and still put 10 properties in and evenly distribute that.

Um so both of those are viable, viable ideas on how to make this move forward.

Um, but you all heard it.

We have a problem with affordable housing.

The girl that was just here has a job, she's going to school, and that's what I've heard with a lot of them.

So let's think about what we do before we pass this saldo.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Gail DeMolacus, 825 Carlton Avenue.

Um, you know, I have heard this argument against the saldo, and I'm not even sure if Mr.

Paplaski is saying that packing everything in like sardines would be affordable housing.

It would just be more housing.

And I have heard other people express money concerns over the sustainable elements of the new saldo, like solar panels, rain gardens, native plantings, permeable pavings.

I feel we can't afford to not incorporate these um sustainable elements that will work to improve our air quality, which we know is abysmal.

Um more trees and plantings can only help to mitigate climate change and trees, the simplest way to mitigate climate change, permeable pavement.

We we can't afford to have any more stormwater runoff in this town.

Um so I and in the long run, I believe solar panels will save save money and be more affordable for for people.

So I don't see the affordable housing and the saldo as clashing.

I I think we can do both, and I hope we do both.

And um, I think we can work on the affordable housing and also the sustainable issues.

And I I do hope you pass the saldo.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I will know Mayor Reynolds has joined us.

Welcome, Mayor Reynolds.

Was there anyone else who wants to make comment on anything that we are voting on this evening?

Resolution or ordinance.

All right, seeing none, we're gonna conclude our second public comment.

Moving on to old business.

Any old business from members of council?

Seeing none.

Moving on to new business, new business for members of council, councilwoman Leon.

Um, I had a couple of questions.

There's two obvious topics that were brought up tonight.

Well, one not so obvious, but it's it's in the news, so we should discuss it a bit.

Um, the first one I wanted to talk about is um everything that's happening down at the canal.

Um, some good questions were brought up tonight.

One of the ones that is sticking in my head is is who did decide the date for um the Norfolk Southern, like who picked December Norfolk Southern picked December.

Um this was not the first time that anybody from the city has had conversations in Norfolk Southern.

They have expressed concerns before um about their property.

And I think between Chief God and others, um, it was a determination in their conversations, oftentimes with the Norfolk Southern uh police was the idea that like if something is going to be done here in your property, we would ask that you would try to put push it off as long as possible to allow for the services to allow for the shelter to open and things like that.

So they were the ones that pick the date.

They could have picked October 15th or November 15th or whatever.

Um, but you know, as they have uh been in contact, especially with our police department, uh, the police department I think has done a great job, including the officers that interact with our community connections program to try to get across to Norfolk Southern that pushing off that date as long as possible was in the best interest of everyone.

Okay, so like the the conversation has been it is the it's the dead of winter and it is the dead of winter.

Well, I feel like June or July is the dead or sorry, January is the dead of winter now.

But like the the emergency shelter is open, then we have more resources available in the winter than the summer because UCC is open, and that and I understand um that, but there's also more people now than there have ever been.

And does UCC, does the emergency shelter have the capacity to house however many people would be pushed?

And I'm assuming that it is just Norfolk Southern property, it's not the entirety of the canal.

It is just no Norfolk Southern property.

It is Norfolk Southern property.

So it's a very specific area that they're being asked to move from, so they're fine everywhere else.

Norfolk Southern is asking for their property to be their property.

I believe, and I don't know, Ms.

Satul or Miss Collins, I believe, sent an email today, I think that kind of like outlined everything and um that was that was the plan.

But one of the things that I think is important to understand, and it was in the email, and you've heard Kristen and Sarah and Laura talk about it, is you know, our community connections program, which predates our administration, which we have expanded, goes back to 2020.

So the type of information that we have with our service providers is the information such as is somebody interested in using BES?

Is somebody not interested in using BES?

Does somebody have housing potentially lined up?

Some of the people that are unsheltered throughout Bethlehem have better relationships with other service providers than our Bureau of Health.

So it is a kind of constant, like we're pretty familiar with a lot of the people and our community connections program and our police and our service providers are gathering that information.

So one of the things that you know we had seen um based on what had happened in Allentown was the question had come up about what percentage of the unsheltered folks are on Medicaid if they qualify.

So that has been a priority for community connections for a long time.

So our percentage there is pretty good.

But as we move forward over the next three and a half months with our service providers with the health bureau, it's about asking those basic questions.

What percentage of people want to go to?

It's almost like can we get eight answers to eight different questions for every single person?

Is are they interested in going to BS?

Are they uh have are they able to access Medicaid?

Um, what else?

What are their kind of long-term prospects?

Are they interested in some type of continuum of care services?

Um, I won't read the whole um uh memo that Sarah and Laura sent yet, but it's the idea of like how can we gather as much information as possible to try to make sure that we are helping people to, and like I said, this isn't like a weak conversation or three and a half months.

Some of these individuals, and we have success stories.

There have been people that have been placed in permanent housing that are in permanent housing.

Um, and I think I saw Mark here before somewhere, and Mark is here, and uh, New Bath is a huge partner there.

That's not every story.

Sometimes people are like, I don't want services, I'm not looking for housing.

There's other people that you do a whole lot of work, months of work to line up housing, and then something happens where that person doesn't take it.

So we also have success stories along the continuum.

But like we've been doing this work now as a city very intensely for like six years.

So as we continue moving forward here, community connections isn't gonna stop.

Our interactions with Bob Ramp and BS aren't going to stop.

Obviously, everything we're doing with Mark, um, and we're having those conversations, Laura and Sarah or um Sarah and Kristen are meeting with the um the service providers in Lehigh Alley uh this week to kind of talk about that.

So it's going to continue to be this kind of what do individuals need, but we're adding on to a whole lot of information we have from most people that choose to interact with us.

Um can you expand on that a little bit?

What are they or anyone within the administration?

Because one of the the issues that's like weighing heavy on my heart right now is that like while some people are there in a more semi-permanent situation, we do have people that transition throughout the cities.

Um and my my big concern and my big worry is that like we have all said Bethlehem is a safe place, and I think that we have proven that Bethlehem is a safe place.

Um we are a place of limited resources.

So if we become a place where people feel like they can come and seek services and not get pushed out of places that we can actually control.

Uh are there any is there any work at the county level or anything like that that can really help the cities that are the ones that are dealing with this?

I mean, we all see the budget.

We don't have the most wiggle room in our budget.

We we need resources to deal with this.

Yeah, so I would say it, and it may not always appear this way, but I can tell you our community connections folks that go and basically every couple of months um find ways to determine what the number of people are that are in um uh the unsheltered communities, like that number rises and falls.

And it might not seem that way based on somebody saying, like, oh, I see a new tent over there, but if you look across the city, that number will go up to 90, go down to 55, go up to 72, go down to 61, partly because we were talking about it's because people do sometimes move around or they leave and they come back and things like that.

I mean, we are doing the best we can.

And one of the things that Laura and Sarah and Kristen talked about was just how successful we have been in being able to provide services to individuals in the community.

If the question is, would this be better organized at a county level or at a bi-county level?

The answer is 100% yes.

We have 62 municipalities.

And if you talk to Mark, if you talk to Bob, talk to Chris and talk to Chief Cott, talk to Laura.

Like, we have people whose stories are like I was in Bethlehem for seven months, and I was in Walnut Port, then I was in Allentown, then I was in Easton, and so on and so forth.

So we do get support in different ways from across the county.

But as far as a solution is concerned, you are correct in that the cities, Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton are doing more than their fair share as far as providing those services.

And I know there are people in the room that spend more time in this space than I do, Mark being one of them, and how challenging is sometimes even getting some of the surrounding municipalities to admit that there are people that are unsheltered that are living in their community, and especially getting them to contribute resources.

But if I if it was up to me, I I do wish the two counties with 62 different municipalities rather than three would be like, let's organize.

So if we have, and I and I the number is escaping me at the point at this current time and that point in time count as far as what the numbers are, as far as how many people, it's probably low, but whatever that number is, like to come up with a way that all 62 municipalities are contributing to the solution, I think is an ultimate and easy goal, I think for all of us.

Okay, I I have a I'm I need to digest that for a second.

I have a specific question about a specific program that uh the young lady brought up.

She said a program about health and hope, and she said a lot of the programs are for people that are uh suffering under addiction or have mental health issues.

Are there programs for people who are not suffering from addiction or have mental health issues?

What about people who like her are a student uh and she's not seeking any help?

She just cannot afford to live somewhere.

What programs are there for someone like her?

I might not be best equipped to name each and every program that we connect people with.

I guess a better phrase of the question are there programs that someone like her cannot participate in because she doesn't have mental health issues.

Are there programs specifically just for people who have addiction and mental health?

Well, I think it's certainly, I mean, it's certainly true that you know there's uh programs and funding that comes from the county mental health, right?

Or there's programs that are specifically run out of um places that offer substance abuse treatment, and you know, we can connect people who have those problems with those services, of course, but that doesn't mean that there aren't options for people who um, you know, simply are just looking for housing support.

I mean, a program that is you know, just offering housing counseling, New Bethany, for example, doesn't um you know prevent few people from coming in if they if they don't have mental health or substance abuse problems.

Yeah, yeah, I think so.

Like New Bethany Conference of Churches, you know, street medicine, all these programs, they're available to everyone.

Along along that line, we're talking, we're talking about housing, we're talking about affordable housing, attainable housing and housing within the city of Bethlehem.

Um, I mean, I heard I heard today that you could buy a house in South Bethlehem for 150,000.

Here to spell that rumor absolutely cannot buy a house in South Bethlehem for 150 or 50,000.

Um, it is much higher than that.

And if it is that low, it is a total gut job and it's not moving ready.

And we did a study, and I can't remember them the number.

What is the vacancy rate like within the city of Bethlehem?

So our our vacancy rate in our market when we did the opening door study was around two percent.

And and so a healthy market, your rental vacancy rate is like six to eight percent.

That's the number of units that are sort of available or turning over or like kind of coming back on the market at any given time.

So, you know, at that was one of the main, one of the big takeaways from our our opening door study is that we just have so much demand for rental housing.

We have so little vacancy.

And one of the things that happens there too is that we have less of a turnover rate even in our rental market, because once people move here, they want to stay here.

Whether or not it's renting houses or renting apartments, is that um they are less transient than they are in other places because once they move here, they oftentimes want to stay in the same apartment for a long period of time.

Okay, I have other questions about a different topic.

I don't know if you want to try to just ask all my questions, or do you want to you have the floor?

Okay.

Um, so before I move on to uh the next topic, I want to come back into the fact that it is uh the Norfolk Southern property.

And I understand that it's just hard to exist within the city of Bethlehem right now because we are a desirable city, but Norfolk Southern specifically, um, that property specifically.

Uh, can you tell me what the response looks like to trying to zero in on that one specific area?

I know we talked a little bit about it, but is there like we are engaging these community partners?

I'm assuming Mark and Bob, um, but just specific to that area, or is it like we're doing this all along the canal?

Is or is there anything we're doing differently in the area that's currently being targeted to prioritize their ability to still exist within the city of Bethlehem?

The delivery of service is obviously easier when you have more people close to each other.

So I'm not saying that um Carissa, who's kind of our main community connections person can get to every single person the same amount of times.

Um, but we are obviously one of the things that's going to be part of that conversation this week and moving forward is what are we able to do that is able to, if somebody has to move in the next three and a half months, like what services are we looking for?

But once again, I'm just being very honest.

Like it's a very personalized situation because of how much contact many of these service providers have had with individuals.

So it could be, and I'm just giving this as a hypothetical example, it could be a situation where you pick person A, and this is what we know about person A's life.

This is what the challenge has been from getting them from here to here.

So then it's not necessarily like you're sending more people in.

It's just like, well, we need to help that person get from point A to point B.

So there will be some people that probably we don't have that information on, but I'm saying as a general um kind of body of uh information, we have a lot of information about what have been the individual kind of um uh you know challenges for individual people.

Sometimes it's just somebody waiting for an apartment to open up.

Sometimes it is issues with you know drug and alcohol services that aren't necessarily that they're not necessarily taking advantage of.

You could have 91 people, and I think you have 91 different situations, but part of that planning is going to happen this week when we're engaging with the community partners who are already engaged.

So I think it's more about how do we continue the work.

Yeah.

So I mean, as as always, I'm gonna ask you guys to continue to like keep counsel in the loop about what we can, what we can do to support.

I know that the sheltering is something that we're supportive of, the the new shelter that's going to be over on the south side, the for the families, that's uh a step in the right direction.

Um, but it it just seems like with the rising cost of everything, everything feels like a catch-up.

It always feels like just a little bit too little, just a little bit um too late.

And so just whatever we can do, um, Mark, Bob, where you are, uh, just continue to keep us in the loop about what we can advocate um for.

And the last question I had on this was is there any negotiations about moving the date from December to further out, or are they like this is as far out as we're willing to again?

I appreciate it's not the 20 days, but is that as far out as they're willing to go?

Are there continued conversations um to maybe push it out a little bit further?

Or that's the date that they gave us, which is obviously different since it's private property than it's public property.

I will say that they have you know offered assistance because with some of these other service providers, different services and things like that.

I don't know exactly what that looks like yet.

I would look at what Lauren Sarah Central Day is kind of like the baseline.

So then the conversation with the community partners to understand if there are particular holes there once we have a like a firmer number about like intent to go to BES.

Um, but for example, I was talking to Chris and Wenrick today.

We've been spending a lot of time on this.

This is like the number one thing we've been talking about over the past couple of weeks in City Hall is trying to put together a plan here moving forward that it that will be able to um alter, move, mobilize whatever it is, depending on if if different things pop up.

But I was talking to Kristen today, and she was talking about how they're applying for grants for like emergency short-term shelters.

So one of the things that happens sometimes is we have dollars that let's say there's you know a fire at someone's house or something happens, and you know, we have had money in the past that we've been able to get through grants.

So like that's another potential area.

You're just talking about potential things that could come down.

Like it could be two months from now, by which, like we're saying is like this is a fund that needs $10,000 rather than $5,000.

Or we applied for this grant and this will allow us the opportunity, like those type of things.

So I think there could be a return as far as an ask is concerned.

We're just not exactly there yet until we're able to basically have that conversation with the service providers.

Okay.

Thank you.

And then I mean completely shifting gears.

Um I but not a lot to tons of people.

So uh completely shifting gears.

Uh, there's obviously been some news and Valerie brought something up.

Can we is can we talk about is it possible for us to finish the homeless conversation?

That's kind of what I was turning to you about because I know that everybody else is gonna have to.

Yeah, I just know everybody else is gonna have to.

Given the severity of the out topics.

Well, let's let's stay on the topic of the Norfolk Southern letter then and I'll work through council.

So if that's the Wolf Council, I will ask everybody then we'll speak on Norfolk Southern, get your questions at answered, make whatever comments you have, and then we'll move on to the other, you know, matter at hand during new business.

So if that's if you want to give back the floor, no problem.

Yep.

Um, anyone on council want to make have questions, comments as it relates to Norfolk Southern, Councilman Kramsey Smith.

I was just gonna say, um, would you be able to speak in the microphone?

Because I I have a hard time hearing down here.

Okay.

Well, thanks so much.

Thank you.

Um I just I know it's a really tough situation and we're limited.

Um, I just have a few questions.

Um, I'm wondering because you know, we'll have the BES shelter open by December, but then I think about where will the folks go during the day.

Um, I'm not sure if Mark at New Bethany, if most of the folks go there or if there's even room.

I'm just wondering, like you had mentioned about, you know, sometimes we do short term with motels or whatever, but is there any way that we could look at additional funds that can go to like New Bethany for daytime services?

Because if they can go at night to BES and we have a really cold winter, then what about during the day?

Yeah, and I think it's all on the table.

And as far as what those potential options are, um, I think now, if you talk to Bob at BES or you talk to um, like I will tell you that oftentimes, you know, it is cold in the winter, like even during the day, to the point that individuals that are living there now will often go other places now to be able to stay warm, whether or not it's the library or other places and things like that.

But I think there's absolutely the potential, which is why, though, we don't want to get out in front of that conversation with the different service providers about what they're thinking or not thinking before we can put together more of a plan as far as like a month from now or six weeks from now, saying like this is another fund that we might want to put money aside for.

Yeah, I think that would just be great.

Cause I mean, this is certainly a crisis we didn't anticipate.

Um, and it would be great if we look and see if we could, if we can, you know, Raw from Peter to pay Paul and do what we can to help these folks.

And I just want to thank um Mark and Brian and Tim for being here and everybody that works with you, because I really am grateful, everybody's grateful for all you do.

Um, I know this was brought up again, but you mentioned have you been in conversation?

Like, have you asked Norfolk Southern to delay it?

And also you mentioned that they offered assistance.

Do you have any specifics on what assistance they're willing to offer?

We've seen what they've offered in other places.

Um, but once again, we're not sure that like we don't want to say like, oh, we'll take A and B that you did over there until we come up with what we think is the once again.

I'm just coming back to like, let's say you decide that you know, this whole conversation comes down to, you know, we're able to get 50 of the 75,000 in fund A and we need 20,000 over here.

It's like we want to know what the specific ask is that we want to help them with rather than just basically being like, what can you do?

And then them coming with things that we either are repetitive or we don't need or service providers already have and things like that.

So like they they have been open to that that conversation and we're hoping to intensify those conversations once we're able to talk to the service providers in the near future.

As far as Norfolk Southern pushing off the the date, um, I think they have been made aware by people contacting them that there are people living in these particular vicinities.

There are people that have said, you know, to Norfolk Southern, like there are individuals that are living on your property, and we think you should do something about it.

This is not new news to Norfolk Southern.

Um, so I'm not gonna say that if something happened, there I don't I can't speak for them.

All I know is that we have consistently when the ideas come up in the past, said you can't just do this without giving as much time as you humanly can that would allow people the opportunity around here with the service providers and our community connections and things like that.

So, like when we got, we didn't know the letter was coming when we got it.

I think somebody from Norfolk Southern called both the health bureau and the police department, which was our notification that that letter was coming.

But like we didn't know what we didn't know what date they were gonna send the letter or whatever it was.

We just expressed to them over and over again, especially the police and community connections.

Like if you were going to do something, it really really needs to be like several months in advance rather than just something quickly.

Okay, thank you.

That's all I have for that.

Councilwoman Laird, staying on topic about Norfolk Southern.

Yeah.

Um so I had just had a couple of questions to make sure that we're considering um all options.

Uh one, has have there been any conversations with any nearby properties where um camping may actually be allowed for because we know there are people that for whatever reason either can't or won't utilize some of the uh sheltering places available, and for whatever reason, camping is the right option for them.

Um, so is assisting people with finding legal places to camp on the table.

I think you've heard that concept talked about in different places with different service providers.

Um obviously there's a challenge as far as um land is concerned.

Um, but I do not know of anything concrete at this particular time because there are a lot of things that go into that, including liability and insurance and things like that.

Um, so at this moment, I can't I can't say with any certainty that anybody has any type of concrete plan there as far as their property is concerned.

Okay.

Um, and in the past neighboring cities have uh opened warming stations for daytime use.

Um Bethlehem has not, to my knowledge.

Um, yeah, we do have public buildings that people are welcome to spend time in, of course.

But is that something that's being discussed as uh you know not a solution but a potential service?

I think everything would be on the table at this point as far as potential options once we have an idea of what the particular need is, including from the information that we gather from the individuals.

Okay.

Um, and then as you consider, I know you said you may be, you know, coming with an ask at some point in terms of budget moves or anything like that.

Um could you just also please uh make sure to consider any actual uh legislative changes that might be useful in supporting um you know vulnerable members of our our community at the same time, not just budgets.

Um absolutely I think that one thing that at some point and in the memo, it talks about how um the amount of money that's needed for BS is approximately six million dollars.

Um, but it is like they I believe are not the date that they're supposed to open is October 15th, November 1st.

Do we do we think of I think it's October 15th?

So, and once again, I'm just speaking hypothetically here, like that goes back to an agreement from I believe a zoning hearing board decision like years ago, like well predating our administration.

But and I don't even think that they're basically run by volunteers.

So I'm not saying that they necessarily, I mean, I remember one time I think it was like seven, eight years ago where they weren't supposed to open till October 15th, but it was like really, really cold on like October 12th and 13th.

And I think it was Mayor Donche's at the time that was just like open.

So I think there's a conversation at some point about what those dates are.

Um, but I'm not speaking for BES because they're the ones that staff it, it's their volunteers.

We have supported them financially in different ways to help with the operation.

I'm just saying, as far as legisl legislative changes are concerned, like that was a little bit of a like sure.

How do you come up with that?

So anything about those sorts of dates or what's allowable on different public land uses, things is things like that.

Um we've talked before about bathrooms be, you know, anything like that.

Just if it if it could be sure to be part of the conversation, since we have to be having these conversations, unfortunately, anyway.

Um, I want to make sure we're holistic about it.

Yep.

Uh, that was all I had on this topic.

Thank you.

Anything else from members of council, councilman Kuyatech.

I just briefly um because I think all my questions have really been asked.

And um, this was a very thorough uh accounting of all of the work that's being done and wanted to thank um in particular Destiny and Terry um for their story for their openness to sharing um their lives.

And I think that Destiny made the point um that I think Mayor Reynolds is making, which is that every individual has their own story.

And as Mark Riddles said, you know, every individual has their own challenges to um finding housing or or uh finding the right living situation for themselves.

And so it is a very individualized approach that needs to happen.

Um, I did want to raise awareness.

This is tangential but related.

We received a uh an email from um uh Andrew Block, who represents um community action uh Lehigh Valley, um, updating us on some very staggering statistics, and these are concerns that only add to the um unfortunately uh to the difficulties.

Uh and this is about um food in particular.

Um, so $13 million in USDA food purchases have been terminated.

He this is just a laundry list, but it's important to keep these things in mind.

Wiping out fresh produce, dairy, and meat from 14 Pennsylvania food banks.

Um our largest food donor, um, CLALD runs second harvest.

Um United Natural Foods is closing its warehouse this fall, which will mean a loss of 500,000 pounds of food annually.

10,000 people are receiving less food each month than before.

Um, and then you may have heard of the local food purchasing agreement, which is another federal thing.

Uh 1.2 million dollars lost from the local food purchasing agreement, which halted contracts with 43 regional farmers.

Um, and so I wanted to just say that as we're moving into the winter months and things are are um not only difficult for our unhoused neighbors down on the Norfolk Southern land, but all of the folks in the in the region who are struggling.

Um, we need to keep this in mind as well.

So just to add to the uplifting conversation we're having tonight, but very necessary, as Ms.

Laird said.

Thank you.

Thank you, councilwoman.

Any other comments on Norfolk Southern?

Mr.

Callahan.

My only question is uh the information that was provided was was very helpful.

But for the upcoming months, um how many is it how many beds is the current um housing um shelter that we have at uh I think it's center and market.

How many beds are can they hold?

And BS.

Yes.

Uh what is what number seven 70?

70.

Yeah.

Is that enough for the temporary time period until so one of the things that we have down there?

So historically, a lot of the people, I I'm using a lot, it's just a general number, but a significant portion of the people that choose in the winter, I mean choose in the summer or their circumstances summer that they're staying outside.

A significant number of them do stay at BES.

The number of people that we are gonna see, some of them are gonna choose for BES, some of them are going to make a determination to go somewhere else.

Go maybe it's I'm making this up, but like it could be that this person suddenly is going to live with their family or going to live with somebody else.

But one of the things we're trying to determine right now is through our files through all of our contacts.

It's like what percentage of those people are intending to go to BES.

And I'll just add, um, there are some other shelters that have other criteria, like there's shelters that you know, for for women, like Hoga Krea, for example, and then there are shelters in you know, Allentown and Easton.

And and I will also say, and the, you know, to give all the information is like some of the people that are unsheltered are not allowed to go to BS, like a number for a variety of reasons.

Maybe there was a disagreement, maybe they just said this.

I this we're not comfortable with this person here.

Um, their legal reasons as well.

So it's not like a one-to-one as far as like every single person here is going here because, and I don't know what that particular number is.

And I would say from a public policy point of view, it's very difficult to come up with what that exactly what that number is.

Um, but it will not be a one-to-one.

But like I said, that's what Chrissa and everybody are is doing right now, is trying to determine what the what the number is there, and if there is basically a a delta or an increase from the percentage of people that used to go as just part of the yearly kind of um uh, you know, uh choice to to go to utilize BS services and whether or not that number will be higher or not this year.

Thank you.

Any other questions or comments regarding Norfolk Southern?

Uh I'll just conclude before we move on by saying that thank you to everyone who had reached out through that memo today.

I believe it was a week ago today, if I'm not mistaken, that we were notified by Norfolk Southern.

So it's a lot of things happening quickly in a week.

Mayor Reynolds, you reference it'll take some time to see kind of what is on the table.

And I believe unfortunately, some things are gonna have to come off the table that we're considering a weekend just based on you know financials, operationally, things like that.

So I appreciate everyone keeping counsel informed as we move through.

We're about to get into a busy budget season with budget uh meetings and and such, but if it would be a benefit just to get information out there to potentially have a committee meeting, then that's something we could discuss as a council with the appropriate committees and um schedule that to see and just really try to get as many facts out there as possible.

Because, like we talked about, that number could be a hundred people, how many of those hundred uh individuals of free will want to choose option A, option B, option C.

And again, what's what are we going to be able to even offer or coordinate with our partners to be some solution to this?

Hi, Reynolds.

Yeah, just two quick things to follow up on councilman Queatech's point too, is like there is less money out there from the federal government than there has been in the past for this.

And we need to be honest about that.

We need to name that.

There are just less funds available than there used to be to be able to provide these services.

So we want to we want to name that.

But second thing is like it is really, I do think that is part of, and this is what you know, Mark and everybody has such a good job of this is like we need to expand.

I'm saying this as we say with you, not at you.

Like we need to expand the amount of people that feel responsibility for this across Lehigh Valley.

So any emails, any letters, anything to anybody with the counties to basically say, like, look, this is a responsibility.

Like, what are you doing to, you know, how are you helping to pull in borough or municipality or township X to help with this?

Like the only long-term solution here across the Lehigh Valley is getting all 62 municipalities to understand this is a shared interest.

And every single person in this room, if we agree and disagree on things, like we are doing everything we possibly can in the city of Bethlehem.

We need other people to chip in.

So anything that anybody's willing to do as far as advocating on different levels of government is is extremely appreciative.

Correct me because I may be misremembering, but when one of our recent projects and partnerships to help tackle the issue was announced, are we not the only city that are aren't these projects typically done at the county level and not at the city level?

Absolutely.

And we're unique that we are, if not one of the only city that's trying to tackle it at the city level.

Also, in that I think you're referring to that last grant that we talked about, is I think there were like 42 awards and 41 of them went to counties and one of them went to a city.

Um, and so that is that is fact.

So objectively we are doing more than other cities, but we can't do it by ourselves.

Because as we talk about, just like housing, homelessness is a regional problem.

Homelessness does not know municipal boundary lines.

An individual looking for safety does not know this is where the city becomes the township or where the township becomes the borough.

So I just appreciate that uh clarity as we discuss it.

And again, moving forward, three months is a long time, but at the same time, it's not a long time.

So I'm sure we'll have other discussions as we move forward.

Anything else from council about Norfolk Southern before we move on.

All right.

I will open it up since there is another topic at hand that has made news.

Let's move on to that for members of council, move on to the topic of our Lehigh County Commissioner, former city employee.

Mr.

Spurk, did you want to say something before we uh open it up to members of council?

Yeah, uh President Cologne uh regarding this matter, there's really not much we can say as you know.

Um this arrest was part of an ongoing three-year multi-state investigating grand jury task force headed out of uh Lehigh County, um spans several states and has resulted in a number of arrests, but it's ongoing.

And for that reason, the district attorney who's in charge of the investigation has because of his desire to protect the integrity of the investigation, uh has revealed very little information.

Now, along with that, you have the fact that all court documents have been sealed pursuant to grand jury's secrecy.

Those are the things where you usually get the probable cause affidavit and the criminal complaint and the charging documents, which are the things that show you the evidence and the facts and the underlying circumstances, which which we don't have here and may not for a while.

Um so because of that, as you know, the prosecutor, the DA has given out very, very, very limited information to preserve the integrity of the ongoing investigation.

We support that.

Uh we we speaking of that support, we we cooperate with that.

And in fact, the DA in his press release did single out the Bethlehem police for their continued cooperation and helping to make the whole investigation happen.

And of course that cooperation is continuing and that support is continuing.

And part of that is not going to share any details too much beyond what has been revealed by the prosecutor.

Um there is, however, one thing that I have been authorized by the prosecutor to state, and that is that there is no ongoing investigation of the city of Bethlehem or its officers, officials, employees, city council members.

There's no ongoing investigation of that.

And I have been authorized to say that much.

Understood.

I will still turn to members of council, anyone who wanted that being said.

Chief Cott, did you want to add to just the general comment before counsel?

Yes.

Just to reiterate that this is very much an active investigation.

We're very limited in the information that we can provide just because everything is sealed, like Mr.

Spirk said, but that the Bethlehem police department fully cooperated with the Lehigh County District Attorney's Office, and we will continue to do so.

Understood.

Thank you, Chief.

Let me add, separate from that, there is the uh personnel issue, the employment issue, the HR issue.

And as you know, um as is often the case, um, when you have a situation of employee personnel, or you have a situation of expected litigation, uh, there's gonna be very little to say about that as well.

Understood and working in an HR by day, I fully recognize the sensitivity of speaking on.

HR director has released a statement that the employee is affected last Thursday, no longer employed by the city of Bethlehem, and that's pretty much as far as we can go.

Understood.

I'll still allow counsel to have the floor as they wish.

Questions start with councilman Leon.

I understand that you're limited in what you can say.

So if you can't, you know.

Um so they have commended Bethlehem police for being active and engaged and part of it.

When did we become an active engaged part of this conversation?

I can't answer that.

Fair enough.

Um, I guess the only other two things I'll say, because I feel like everything that I have to say would be something you can't answer.

Um, one of the weird things that I found out about when you got on council is this thing called executive sessions.

And I have a lot of questions, and I would encourage counsel or the administration, we have that HR committee, we have executive sessions.

If there's conversations that need to be had that are delicate, we have avenues in which to do those things.

Granted, it's not going to change what you can and can't tell us.

Um, but there are avenues in which to have this conversation.

Um, the last question that I have, because I just know the other ones are you're not going to answer.

And I am a big believer in the United States.

I love our country.

Um, and I'm a big believer in this and until proven guilty.

So I'm just curious as to why he was immediately terminated if he hadn't gone through the full due process.

Can't answer that either.

Well, I mean, at some point, if there's litigation reasons and that that process would perhaps depositions, perhaps court hearings or something like that, and and don't wish to um prejudice that process when it comes out, if it should happen.

Fair enough.

Thank you.

Those are the only ones I have.

President Clark.

Understood.

Any other questions, comments from members of council?

Councilman Crancy Smith.

Thank you.

Um, I know it's a really delicate issue, but I just have two questions, I guess.

I'm wondering um were any city council members alerted by administration or the mayor to this incident occurring.

Was anyone a civil counsel alerted by the mayor or administration that this happened?

No.

Okay.

It can you tell us why not?

I mean, it was a newspaper story as soon as it happened.

I know, but this is my concern that I was told that an employee was arrested, taken out in handcuffs, and there's other employees and people in City Hall.

And I think that's traumatizing, you know, coming from a counselor's perspective, that's traumatizing for people.

And we are a branch of government.

And I could be wrong, but I feel strongly that as a branch of government, we should have been informed of this.

And I shouldn't have to read it in the paper or hear safe and people.

That's you know, truly how I feel.

Um the other question is, and and again, we may disagree on this, but I'm wondering why there was never any a statement from the mayor administration regarding this, just to reassure the residents of our community.

If you look at the statement that Lehigh County put out, it was benign, objective, and it was reassuring.

And I think that that is really important.

I think the people in the community look for the mayor or the leader to make a statement about something that is as delicate and concerning as this.

Well, the other flip side is he was employee in the city and he was arrested in city hall.

So I'm gonna ask we don't speak over each other everybody, please talk.

Mr.

Spurk, if you want to finish your comments, but and then respond, please, councilwoman.

I just asked we don't get in the habits tonight of speaking over each other.

Yeah, I usually don't, but I just like to get to the point.

Thank you.

Do you have anything else, Councilwoman?

That's okay.

I'm good.

No, I guess what I was going to say, and I'm sorry for interrupting, is that again, this person was an employee and the arrest occurred in City Hall.

So I think that the residents of the city hall are due some kind of statement again, just to reassure them because also um, you know, without getting into details, they worked in the legal department, and you know, people are going to be concerned about what what really happened and what's going on.

And again, I know we can't get into details, but we could have, I think, gave it just a very benign neutral statement and reassuring that we're doing everything we can to make sure that the city of Bethlehem is still operating as efficiently as we can.

And I I would just say, as far as me personally is concerned, um, it's that, and Mr.

Spurk could tell you that you know, there's been a lot more that I would like to be able to say that between Mr.

Spurk and our labor council, which was the advice of the labor council with the potential for employee litigation moving forward is don't say anything other than this person no longer works here.

I have a whole lot of thoughts, and I will tell you as a general comment, is that one of the unfortunate parts of this job that I didn't see coming was the fact that Mr.

Hockey or Chief Cott or somebody would walk in and say, look, this happened with this person in public works, or this happened with this police officer, this happened with this firefighter, this happened.

And there is a wide mix of emotions that I think a lot of people are feeling, um, especially the people that worked closely with this individual.

And I was my first inclination was was that I would like to say more than they want to let me say.

And Mr.

Spurk could be here, and he and he and I have had that conversation probably about five times in the last six days.

But it is the advice of our labor council for us specifically to not say anything other than the fact that this individual is no longer employed here because, as Mr.

Spurk said, you don't know what's going to happen next.

And you add that into what the district attorney's statement was, which is that it was ongoing.

Um, we appreciated his thanks to the Bethlehem Police Department.

We appreciated him as well going out of his way to tell Mr.

Spurk that this is an isolated incident as far as there's not anybody else that's being looked at here as far as the city of Bethlehem is concerned.

That wasn't something that he necessarily needed to do, in my opinion.

Um, but as far as like why I didn't have more to say personally, it's because they told me that I should not make any comments.

Thank you.

I think it's unfortunate because I I understand um that you can say a lot, but I think just giving some level of reassurance to the to residents really um would have been very helpful.

And to the employees too.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um, we can continue okay, because I have one more.

Oh, we're we'll stand t on this topic.

All right, then I'll and then we'll kind of move on to our traditional new business.

Mr.

Klone.

I I guess I would cite as reassuring the statement that there is no ongoing investigation of the city of Bethlehem or its officers, officials, employees, or city council members.

I would cite that as reassuring.

I found it so.

Thank you, Mr.

Sperk.

Other comments from members of council, Mr.

Callahan.

Yeah, thank you.

I, you know, it's obviously a very sensitive uh situation, and I understand I don't want to discuss any of the specifics of the arrest in City Hall.

I don't want to discuss anything about um his actions or anything like that.

I have uh I have questions about the process prior to him and the arrest.

I think uh Ms.

Crampsy Smith's point is I think 24 hours went by before it was in the newspaper.

And I think it would have been, you know, I I'm not picking on you, Mayor.

I I was upset with uh Mayor Donchez uh when I found out from uh a bunch of people that an individual who was under our custody hung himself in one of our cells.

I think when things like this happen, I think it's uh ultimately the responsibility of the mayor to notify his equal branch because here we here are an equal to you.

You need four votes to get anything done in this city, and I think it would be a common courtesy that if something of this nature, I'm not talking about something small, but this is this is obviously um a big event that council members, elected officials should probably have have been notified.

Whether you know, you you were I don't know if you're on vacation, I don't know what was going on, but it I just would hope that in the future, if something this big happens, that at the minimum city council is reached out to and and told of what minimal amount of information that you could provide to us, just so we know so we don't have to hear about it in a newspaper or get phone calls at 12 o'clock at night from from other people in the city.

Okay, go ahead.

Um, just to answer that, and I do remember, um, and obviously I know we have a lot of disagreements, but you are correct.

I remember you being frustrated at Mayor Donchez's administration that didn't share that at the time.

Um, so I just want to acknowledge that as being I remember that um as well.

It was a situation as well where we were in the process, and I don't want to speak for Chief Gott and Mr.

Spurk, but we were in the process of finding out information, including what was the Lehigh County District Attorney's plan as far as sharing information or not.

And it was not a situation where we necessarily were going to get out, because as Mr.

Spurk had said, information was sealed.

So we were also in the process of trying to find out what was going on, and we weren't sure whether or not there was going to be a press conference and things on Thursday or on Friday morning and things like that.

So it was one of those situations where we're looking for information as well.

The way that it got out as well from here was that people told other people, not in City Hall, that this happened, and rumors started flying, and people started sharing those rumors, and people started telling other people and things like that.

And it just we didn't have the information.

And the extent of the information that we got happened after that press conference at Friday at 11 30, which is what Mr.

Spurk just referenced as well.

So we were also in the process, and I believe it happened at the end of the day.

So specifically the chief and other people were trying to figure that out as far as this as far as that information was concerned.

If there was information that was clear to be able to share with city council at a given time, we 100% would have done that.

But also the information that we knew did get out as far as two hours later was concerned.

And we didn't know necessarily what was true, what everything that was true and was not true at that particular point.

So we were trying to gather information, just like I'm sure you happen, it's like, hey, I gotta find out the story here before I necessarily am able to share with what happened or what didn't happen.

So like that's what was going on necessarily in in real time, was not like, oh, this one thing happened.

It's like this one thing happened.

We want to know what else gives in here to be able to answer as many different questions as possible.

And as that information, we didn't know what was happening on Thursday, Friday, because as Mr.

Spurk said, it was a private private wrong way.

It was an investigation that was not the information was not shared in the way that oftentimes these things are.

What what time was the arrest made though?

Was it was it in the morning?

No, it was sometime in the afternoon, I believe.

I mean, I just think that you know Mayor, you got you have press releases and press conferences for almost everything, which which is a great thing.

We want people to know what's going on in the city, whether it's a flag raising or uh um, you know, uh uh the Irish American flags are gonna get raised here, or we're we're having some type of prayer.

It it's about sharing information as much as possible.

And in that situation, is is Ms.

Krampsy Smith said, um, Lee County commissioners made a statement, and I think the head of the um Lehigh Valley uh community action, she released the statement also, and there was not there was I don't know the lady's name, but she she had released a statement that was in the paper within 24 hours.

I just think that at the bare minimum, city council, we should have been told toll told of it, and I think at the bare minimum, you should have released a press statement, just saying that you know, at this point that there was an arrest in City Hall.

Um, as far as we know, we can't discuss any of the we don't know any of the information.

Uh, a city employee was arrested, he was taken out in handcuffs, and uh at this point he is terminated.

But but something should have came out.

I mean, that's just and I would say that our statement to every single media inquiry that reached out was that as I said before, as far as filing a layer labor council's advice was that this person is no longer employed by the city of Bethlehem.

Beyond that, Mr.

Callahan and Mr.

Sperker, Chief Cock could tell you, is like we're also following the like we can't tell the Lehigh County what to do.

We can't tell community action what to do.

But we also, as we talked about, have a good relationship with the Lehigh County District Attorney's Office, as far as the police department is concerned, as far as the city is concerned.

And there was it was not advised as far as talking about this information, because as we probably saw too, was the nature of how that information got out.

Was like it was only one name out of the people that were arrested.

So we were not going to like it was not in our space to tell the district attorney's office either the details of what's going on or how things fit in or things like that.

So I'm not saying it's an easy situation, but because of the nature of how whatever some people might say use the word leak got out, as far as somebody calling people and saying, look, this happened and so on and so forth before all of the information was together.

But we are always going to, and I mean, Mr.

Spurk, you worked in Northampton County District Attorney's Office for a number of years, correct?

Like it's just you're going to listen to what the district attorney's office wants you to do.

Right.

And I appreciate that.

And I understand you're you're put in a position, a very sensitive, you know, you know, position not to reveal anything.

I get it.

But I think at the bare minimum, um you could have made a statement to us as council members or to uh the public just saying, hey, there was an because you I don't know who's uh whose uh idea, I'm sure it wasn't our police department.

I'm I'm sure who's I don't know whose idea was to arrest him in City Hall in the middle of the day, but whoever did that I guarantee you knew that there's no way someone's being walked out of here.

I don't know what floor he's on, but there's no way someone's being walked out of here in handcuffs, and within 15 minutes, the whole city hall's a buzz about it.

I mean, uh, I started here I started hearing things about four hours later.

So, you know, you know, I'm just saying that a statement should have been made.

And I would hope in the future, moving forward, if something like this happens again, at the minimum, council needs to be informed of it.

That that's just my opinion.

Whether you filed that, I don't know.

But anyways, I want I want to move on from there.

So prior to him becoming uh the right to know officer, we had a right to know officer that was here for five years, and by all accounts that I've spoken to people did a hell of a job.

Why was Mr.

Borghi brought in at the beginning of your administration?

We uh I had a recommendation from um lawyer that I know and have worked with.

Um I had met him on a couple of occasions.

Um brought in a lot of new people with my staff, um, which is what I did at the county when I became county solicitor.

And does he work for you?

He works for you, he does, he's in my office.

Yeah, that's where he is.

He's the right to know act officer whenever there's a request for information.

Uh that position fills that processes that gets the information, makes the initial determination to whether it can be released or not.

And I think it was only like three months after he'd been elected by 59% of the voters in in uh Lehigh County District 3.

So I took that as kind of a recommendation too, that that people trusted him and that he would be a trustworthy.

So that's why I is there a a yearly evaluation done on him or on employees?

A yearly, no.

So he's never had he's been here for what three three three years now.

Yeah, and he's never had an evaluation done in any way today.

I mean, I would I'm I'm there.

I evaluate him.

So I don't know if this is true.

So what you know, I know how rumors go.

Um I've I've heard that he was a um he was a uh vacation planner prior prior to this job.

He was, and then he was uh ahead of the Northeast Community Center, which is a very small community center, I guess in Marvin and Pembroke.

I'm not sure how that qualifies him to become a right to know officer in the city of Bethlehem.

That's that's what I'm trying to get at.

Like, how did this guy get this position when we already had someone that that was there in the Donchez administration for five years and did an unbelievable job?

I don't know.

What was that person's qualifications before they took that job?

I don't know.

I don't know.

So I'm just I'm just I'm just puzzled at how uh a vacation planner uh becomes uh the right to know officer in the in the city.

So I I just feel that if that person was in a position and Mayor Reynolds, you'll know this again.

When Mr.

Donchez became uh mayor, he wanted a new police officer or police chief and fire chief.

I fought him on it because I I th I felt that it was his right to bring in a new administration as far as anybody that he wanted, but as far as public safety was concerned, there if there wasn't a problem with that current police chief and fire chief, I was against uh plain, you know, I'm in office now, I'm bringing in my own administration.

And I get that you need a lot of all mayors need a lot of leeway in hiring the people that they trust to be part of their cabinet, but I just felt at that time that that that was not the right move to do, and I I fought him on it.

I wasn't on counsel at the time when Mr.

Borgie came in, and I and you know the the the questions I had about the you know, the real estate uh businessman that got appointed to you know two weeks ago or a month ago.

I just think in there's things that are being brought up that are raising a lot of red flags of me.

And and I just think at some point the rest of the council's got to step up.

I mean, it can't be me all the time and and Miss Crampsy Smith.

Quite we we have oversight responsibilities, we do.

That's our main job as council members.

We're not here to rubber stamp everything and just let everything go.

We're here to question things.

I'm not I'm not talking about the library board, I was talking about the planning board.

I was just asking for a two-week delay on it, and we couldn't even get that over a 15,500 hour campaign donation.

So this is the kind of things I'm talking about.

I'm just asking for us to start acting uh as our our our our dutiful right as elected officials to provide oversight.

That's our job.

What uh what qualities of working for northeast ministries for a number of years would you think that would bring?

What what qualities in that person would you think would be working for a nonprofit for a number of years in Northeast Ministries?

And do you think those qualities and uh experiences would qualify him?

Are you talking about Mr.

Borgie?

Yeah, but what is it about Northeast Ministries that would be?

No, I don't know if it was Northeast Ministries.

I thought it was Northeast Community Center, Northeast Community Center, okay.

Yeah, I yeah.

I don't know.

Okay, I don't know.

So my question is this.

So and I this might be for you or or or or or chief.

Um he had access as a right to know officer, he had access to a lot of different things as a right to know officer.

One of the things that uh he had access to emails, everybody's emails as a right to know officer, does he have access to everybody's emails?

I mean, I'll just interject that only if somebody files a right to know.

Right, I was gonna say only if there's a right to know requests and he actually has so though so the police department also has there's all these different things that I've I have questions on.

He the police department has uh it's called Mark uh what's the police reports system?

Mark 43.

Mark 43.

Did he have access to that also?

He did, yes.

So he has he does every right to know officer get access to that?

Yes, okay.

So do we know?

So he has the ability to go into the police reports at any time.

Not anymore.

Yeah, I know that, but my my question is, and I think this needs to be addressed.

I don't know if you address it or if we need to send a letter to the district attorney.

Did he ever do we know if he if he ever accessed the police reports, the Mark 43 police report program?

Did he ever access it for something other than if it's a right to know request?

I get it.

He has to go in there to do some research on this.

But did he ever go in and research things and log in?

I'm assuming he had a password.

Did he ever log into that Mark 43 police reporting system where all the police reports are in there, right?

All the well, that that that's clearly part of the investigation, right?

That would certainly be something that would be part of the investigation.

Is that something that we're investigating, or is it Lehigh County District Attorney investigating?

I can't comment on that.

If I were a DA and I were prosecuting somebody, I that I arrested, I'd look at that, and I would expect that the prosecutors because my my my concern is if does that if he has access to that, does he have access to the state to other police departments reporting systems also or just Bethlehem Police Department?

Just the Bethlehem police department.

All right.

So I would just I I know that um we can't talk about it here.

I would highly um encourage you and and you, Mr.

Spurk, I don't know who what dealings you have with the the FBI or whoever's running this or Lehigh County DA.

It's Lehigh County DA.

Yeah, that there's some major things that I think have to be addressed.

Was he using that system outside of any right to know requests?

Because if he was that's I believe criminal that he he, I mean, if he has a right to know request and he has to go in, no problem with that.

That's his job.

He was doing his job.

But if he was going in and looking at police reports of individuals, maybe people that um that he liked or disliked, that needs to be addressed.

And my second question is if he did do that, well, it's been addressed, he's not there now.

Right.

That that's been addressed.

You know, you're right.

Not doing it now.

I know, but that needs to be addressed that yes, he was going in and accessing this this police reporting system for issues and and data that had nothing to do with any right to know requests that that that was asked of them.

But again, I'm sure that's part of the grand investigation.

And I I'd appreciate it if you made sure that or if you pass that on, right?

The second thing is um the the the aren't the the uh what's the RMS system?

Mark 43.

That oh that uh it's just a different name.

It's just a different name.

Yes, okay.

And then the um hold on a second.

So and then if he did do that, is there any civil liability on the city?

Yeah, I'm not gonna speculate or do hypotheticals on if all right.

Yeah, I would just ask that question.

Well, if there is, that would be another reason not to discuss it because it would be potential litigation, right?

But he does not outside of the Bethlehem Police Department reporting system, he has no other access to state police or Allentown.

No, so there was no way that he could access this stuff and tip off people that were in his his um I don't know what I don't know what you call it, group or long time ago.

Excuse me.

Uh um I'll just remind everybody because I know we're kind of tiptoeing around it.

These are there's a presumption of innocence, uh and we have to be mindful.

And Mr.

Callan, I appreciate your question.

So please I'm gonna give you the floor back in a moment, but that there is an ongoing investigation.

Uh there were some charges that were mentioned, you know, publicly.

There is a presumption of innocence.

Everyone has a right to a fair and impartial trial.

The district attorney is tasked with running a fair prosecution.

So I I just don't want us to get into the world of hypotheticals.

If this then this, what about this?

Uh, I do think there will be you know adequate time moving forward at potential dates to kind of talk in greater detail as other things maybe are you know released, come to light, information is shared, things like that.

I would just be mindful of um speculation at this point relative to the employee.

I'm trying to tiptoe around it.

Um I really'm seriously not trying to ask any questions that pertain to the investigation.

I'm just asking about uh this the city's role and liability in this.

That's it.

But there's liability on the city too, depending on how we answer answer some questions.

Right, right.

Um the other thing that that that came up and and uh Ms.

Jocky, I don't know if you can help me out with this or not, but uh or Mr.

Reynolds or Mr.

Spurk or or Chief, um we all know how rumors fly, right?

Uh so I don't know.

I've I've heard this from several people within City Hall that called me that A, he very rarely showed up for his job in City Hall, and number B and B he had an overabundance, is what I was told of right the no requests sitting on his desk that he never handled.

Yeah, we're not gonna discuss his job performance or anything related to that.

It's a personnel matter, and if someday there's litigation over the fact that he's no longer an employee, then I'm sure that'll all be the subject of performance things like that, and those will be in depositions or somewhere, but but not here.

As an HR matter, yeah, but we can't verify that we can't or we can't verify that he showed up to work on a regular basis.

Yeah, I'm not gonna uh discuss his work performance or anything about that or anything that went into any decisions that were made.

That's uh something that I think is a personnel matter and HR matter and something that's uh potential litigation that will best be addressed then.

Was there a clock?

Uh my my reason in asking this is because if he was not showing up for work on a regular basis, who was supervising him?

Why wasn't he uh reprimanded?

And then secondly, can there's a potential of a clawback of us uh taking back if he wasn't doing his job and showing up, and there's a huge uh backlog of right to know requests, there's a potential of us back clawing uh pay from him.

That was about half a dozen ifs, and I think that therefore they're hypotheticals if this, if that, what's it?

Right, but is this something that you will look into as time progresses, or do we have to bring this up again, or is it something that I can assure that you're gonna look into?

You're welcome to bring anything up at any time.

I no I know, but can you can you look into this for us?

Was he showing up on time?

And after after his trial's done, or whether he if he's found guilty at that time, then we can discuss this.

Well, I think I know a lot about his job performance, but I'm just not able to share it.

All right.

Um so again, my main questions are was he showing to work, and and I guess this is something that we we will have to look into later uh after the trial or whenever we're permitted to discuss it.

Was he looking at records outside of his scope of his job as a right to know officer?

And um was he showing up to work and then the backlog of another request.

And those are my main three things here.

My last question is, and and I'm sure you're not gonna be able to answer it.

I think we need to have a full accounting, um, and a full and fair accounting of what on of also of his cell phone.

Was he making phone calls from uh during work hours to any of the associates from what I was told or what I read, it was a seven state uh 40 or 80, I don't know if it was 40 or 80 people involved with his drug ring.

And was he contacting anybody in that any of those associates while he was working here at City Hall?

I think those are things that council needs to know, and there's residents of a city need to know.

And I think that's a fair question.

I'm certain the district attorney wants to know, and I'm certain that's part of his investigation, and therefore not something that I'm gonna discuss.

Um is it is it possible for city council as a whole to write a letter asking the district attorney um for the phone records of the individual to check and see if he was talking to any of his associates in the seven state drug ring?

Is that a uh is that something that council could do or the mayor, the administration could could do?

I council has separate their their separate, I'm not the solicitor for the council, so I wouldn't want to address that.

I would say that's something that any uh outreach to the Lehigh County DA's office you would do, Mr.

Callahan should facilitate through our solicitor steward.

I will thank you.

Um last question is, and this is important.

I'm not trying to play gotcha on it.

Was he involved with your campaign at all?

Mr.

Borghi.

What do you mean by involved in my campaign?

Did he help you out with the campaign at all?

Did he work with the campaign at all?

Did he uh I think he voted for me, but as far as assistance is concerned, I had one employee, so that was that was all I had.

So you did he he had no time helped you out with your campaign at all?

I don't know what he told people to do as far as voting is concerned, but he's a city employee, and as far as you know, I wasn't doing campaigning here, and the one person that helped me out out of here that I was paying to knock on doors with me and things like that occurred outside of here, and that's that's not something that I ever did with him.

Did he at any time give you any donations uh on record?

I don't believe so, but I would have to I'd have to take a look in that, but I believe the answer is no.

All right, for now, uh I guess that's it.

Um I listen, uh it's a sad day.

I mean, this is uh this is the third uh um Bethel City employee that's been arrested in the last three years.

We had Mr.

Civek, and then I believe there was a police officer um over in East Hills uh Mill School, and now this.

And uh I can only hope that I know nobody wants to be grilled ever.

Civek and then I believe there was a police officer um over in East Hill's uh middle school and now this and uh I can only hope that I know nobody wants to be grilled ever I don't want to be grilled in front of people I'm sure you don't either and but it comes with the position and I think that there's some reflecting that has to be done on not only on you as far as notif notification to council of the of these things but also to counsel that we start acting in our role as as uh uh uh an oversight uh in in uh a council that's supposed to be asking questions on a regular basis and not just rubber stamp and everything so until um I get more information um I'm I'm done with this thank you councilwoman quiet um yes I actually uh wasn't going to say anything but was um kind of alarmed to listen and consider the idea that there are uh people uh in positions of trust uh in parts of our city that are um spreading rumors and speaking to people about things which they shouldn't be speaking about um one of the things that occurred to me was uh this is not just an ongoing investigation here in Bethlehem but it is a multi-state investigation and they were executing a lot of warrants kind of simultaneously and for us to spread the information about an individual and name that person would have impacted the proceedings of the um the serving of the warrants of the you know there was obviously a it was a culminating moment in this investigation um not just here in Bethlehem but in in several states and um so uh I guess uh is there recourse for I can't imagine I mean I worked in HR for um almost 15 years and I can't imagine talking about uh someone's firing uh outside of the walls of the Office of Human Resources um that was just nothing that you did so um I and you know we had people who were let go within HR that you know to this day I don't know why um because that's how closely held this information is supposed to be so I guess I'm actually just more expressing a concern that um you know yes it's good in the fullness of time to get as much information as we can to hopefully prevent things from happening again I'm quite confident that um you know the the actions of uh the officer who recently I believe pled guilty to horrible uh activity and behavior uh is not a reflection on uh anybody else uh but that officer so I'm not sure where that's relevant but putting that aside um and again with the presumption of innocence uh that all um people who are arrested and charged with crimes have in this country I believe still you know checking uh the latest executive orders um I think I'm just expressing my concern about the fact that um that uh that this information may have been inappropriately shared and I hope that um you know I mean there are there are times when it's appropriate for a whistleblower if there is something uh truly that is to you know have a whistle blown um but just uh calling people to tell them things that you're not supposed to tell anybody uh seems like something that maybe should be followed up on with whatever department that um this took place in so no no question just a comment thank you councilwoman any other councilwoman laird yeah um I have three general policy questions because I do not want to um say anything that could potentially impact any investigations or whatnot or somebody's fair trial um general policy uh is there a written policy on employment status if you are subject to criminal charges or arrest for any employee in the city is that in the handbook or anything no okay um so it's a case by case situation okay um and then uh is there a policy a confidentiality policy uh referencing what councilwoman quiatec just said where if somebody who is a city employee inappropriately shares information about someone else's employment status or about uh you know anything that is confidential within our city um that outlines uh the ramifications or you know in black and white prohibits people from discussing people's employment status etc that would fall under the code of ethics and expectations but not specifically if we do this very okay so I'm just repeating because of the microphone Ms.

That would fall under the code of ethics and expectations, but not specifically if we do this very okay.

So I'm just repeating because of the microphones.

Ms.

Sahaki, if you if you respond again, if you don't mind doing so at the microphone.

So to repeat that would fall into the code of ethics is what the answer was.

Um and that that is distributed to every employee.

Correct upon employment, yes.

Um, okay.

So uh if it were to if it were to come to light that someone did inappropriately share information that wasn't to be shared about this or any other situation, then there could be disciplinary measures taken um in accordance with that code of ethics.

Correct.

Okay, thank you.

Um and then this one is uh more on communication, but in this regard uh is HR.

So I don't know who the right person to answer it is.

Um we've talked before about communications planning for the city, and that um there's future work to be done or just uh getting underway uh about communications plans to the public from the city.

Um is there a communications plan for the administration to city council and or to other government officials, like if something were happening that the county needed to be notified of, um, you know, it could be an emergency, could be a big happening, could be an event.

Um, is there a an official uh plan for how who is the start of a phone tree?

Whatever it whatever it is, you know, is is there something on paper about how that happens?

Yeah, I mean, as far as the public safety emergency services, like absolutely.

And Captain Griffin could tell you about that extensively if you'd like to, about kind of like what happens there as far as like who contacts who at what particular situation and stuff like that.

So that is absolutely the case.

I think in my seat I on that front, I would be curious, like who calls city council?

Who who's you know, who should I be answering the phone for if there's an emergency?

But um, okay, so that is in that plan beyond official emergencies, like uh that would fall under that plan.

Is there a communications uh method or that or structure for notifying uh city council or anybody other elected officials?

No, I mean I would tell you is like let's say that there's a fire, or let's say there's a police event or something like that.

Um it would be pretty much up to the discretion of the department head with a conversation, I guess, with the mayor's office, um, if there was an appropriate update at some point as far as city council was concerned.

Um, but that's generally been a there's a lot of different mitigating factors there as far as what that process looks like, depending on when it is, what happens, what's in the news, do we have different information from then?

Like this is kind of how it is there something that's kind of up in the air, like where people don't know what happened, if there was like a fire and 37 people were displaced, it's like, have we found a place for all 37 people?

So it's it's kind of an ongoing situation, but there's not like if a happens, then tell them at this point, because in any type of situation that rises that level, there's always different mitigating factors, as far as the chief being like, we can't say anything about this yet, or Michelle saying, uh saying this is an HR matter, like we shouldn't do that, or it also could be a situation where it's like we're trying to also figure out where Ms.

Sahaki was also like, I gotta talk to Mr.

Spurk, and then we gotta call our labor council, and then we gotta call this person, and like all of those different factors like are weighing together, um, as far as like necessarily when somebody is is told about something or or not, or also one of the things sometimes that's a trigger is city council members.

So like if a couple of members reach out to the mayor's office and say, hey, what's going on with this, or reach out to the chief, and then they say, okay, two council members asked about this, so we're gonna send this to this is that we're gonna send everybody information.

Um yeah, and I I do certainly recognize that there are individual circumstances that impact all sorts of communications.

I guess I was more wondering about um, you know, and it does not exist, it seems, but like um, could there be then perhaps uh framework recognizing nuance um that says whenever this type of thing happens or whenever this type of event is coming up, um, or you know, because it maybe it's not an emergency, maybe it's a planned thing, right?

Uh that would say here are the things that we always communicate to city council, and here are the things that you know we don't feel the need to specifically every single time reach out to say there's a pothole or whatever.

Um just you know, some level, and I I do recognize that's not a very straightforward question.

But since the city is looking at communications planning in general, I'm thinking that um communicating with other, you know, specifically our council, but it could go the other way too, like a county or whatever.

And and we we absolutely can have that conversation.

I think one thing that we have been pretty good about as well, um, is when there's a topic that's talked about extensively at the city council meeting, whether or not it's Ms.

Collins or Mr.

Tulo or Mr.

Alcall or somebody following up with more information as far as like this was something they talked about for 45 minutes.

Let's spend two hours tomorrow putting this information and getting it out.

Um, and then obviously forwarding thing to the city clerk's office to get out there as well.

As far as these like real time things, I think that would also be a conversation as far as like what you know what would be able to be shared at some point.

Um I will be honest with you is that at some point, as these there's always that determination that you have, and I'll just on my personal life.

Like if something happens at home with the two-year-olds, I'm like, I'm going to let this thing play out over the next 40 minutes before I call my wife and tell her what happened.

Because like she's gonna have these seven questions that I can't answer now, but I can answer in 40 minutes, or maybe I can answer and like she needs to meet us at the hospital.

I don't know.

Um, but like the you you understand is like there's always that in between.

And I will also be completely honest with you is I'm not talking about you specifically, but one thing I've learned in this job too is that like sharing, it's like whisper down the alley times a hundred, by which somebody tells.

So if I tell you something and then you post something on Facebook, and then somebody shares it, and then this happens, and then somebody calls me and it's like, I heard this happened, and I heard you're going to the moon or something, and it's just so far away from that.

So there also comes down to the sharing with information, and this is why I so many people here ask good questions because about everything, because then once we talk about what is true, I know all six of you go out there and repeat everything that's actually factual to everybody, and then other people in our community are like, you know what?

I did not understand this.

And then I had a conversation with this council person who found out the answer from the administration, and now I'm gonna make my mission to go out and share the proper information with people.

So therefore, misinformation is not shared.

So like I am very appreciative of the fact that all six of you do that.

It's something though that we're gonna have to think about in the future, though, as far as some of these situations are concerned, um, about like what should be shared, but we are also open to having that kind of communication channel as far as like, you know, what is it that people are looking to hear now versus something that can wait for the council meeting or wait for whatever it might be.

Yeah, and I I do recognize that whenever I've reached out with questions, um, or uh many times proactively, I have received uh any information that I'm looking for, I've never been turned away.

Um I was just thinking that sometimes it makes things easier when there are big things come up if there's a framework to start with um to point to as as a baseline for how things operate.

Um so those were my questions.

Thank you.

Any other questions or comments regarding this topic, Mr.

Callahan?

It's funny.

I did, you know, I think in this situation that that happened with him being arrested here in his office and walked out of City Hall, um everybody had to probably at some point realize this is getting out.

It's not something that like uh an employee uh felt something wrong, was going wrong in the department and went to the mayor or went to a council member or went to Miss uh Chihaki and explained something.

This is something that multiple people saw and within 15, 20 minutes, words running all over the city hall.

That's the only reason why I was thinking that there should have been a phone call to council, so we didn't hear this from other people.

And that's and and it as um as uh a count councilwoman Lair said, you know, it's a delicate thing.

We don't need to know about every pothole and everything like that, but there are certain things that we we would hope that you you as an administration would say, you know what, this is something that the council needs to know about because we're an equal branch of government with the mayor, and I would just hope that in the future, and and I want to tell all city employees uh this and I hope they they hear it loud and clear.

Um, if you see something wrong or or you feel something's not right, it's your duty and your job to either go to a council member, the mayor or Miss Jahaki and inform us about it because we're we're the people that are in uh in charge of uh the city, we're the elected officials.

And if you can't go to a council member or the mayor or Ms.

Hockey, then go to a department head.

But I can I can tell you and everybody that your confidence, I've never ever, I I have people stop by my house on a weekly basis or in and tell it and tell me things, and I've never ever mentioned anybody's name.

So I you're our city employees are our ears.

I can't know everything that's going on in every department, but I I want to know if something's wrong.

And I I hope you continue to reach out to myself and other council members um to make us knowledgeable of what's going on in the city.

Thank you.

Anything else from any other members of council.

I'll just conclude by thanking everybody for your discretion as you ask questions and look for answers.

That this isn't really an appropriate venue to discuss.

There will be uh, I'm sure a long timeline as it relates to these matters.

Uh I know member council had referenced an executive session.

Should it be the Wolf Council or someone interested in discussing that in the future?

I'm about to relinquish the seat in the middle uh in a couple months, but that's something that um, depending on the timing, either myself or um confident the next council president could at least have that discussion.

But again, we're working with unknown timelines, and these are things that are handled sensitively because they should be handsome handled sensitively.

And as it relates to kind of notifications and things like that, one of the things people hear me repeat as I repeat a lot of phrases is it's always good to know more than to know less.

I appreciate information, but at the same time, I recognize as it relates to what we're talking about, that there are certain things that we just have to be very mindful of.

And I uh going back to the previous topic because it relates to Norfolk Southern.

Um I'll say the administration reached out to me before it was released to the press, and we had a little bit of back and forth, and I had some preliminary questions that were answered, and I appreciated that.

And then shortly later that day when I actually had time to myself, it had already been been made public and everyone had a chance to see it.

So uh, you know, if there's ever ways that we could do anything better, of course, I invite them.

But at the same time, I recognize that things have to be handled case by case, depending on what it is that we're talking about.

So I'm gonna move on from that topic, but I will we're still on new business.

Councilwoman Cramsey Smith.

Okay.

Um I just have a committee um report, but I also wanted to say on that subject, I remember we used to have, and I don't know if we could look into it.

Um, I think it was every year, every two years, an executive session to get a um update on if there's any legal issues like lawsuits, and I think it's been a while.

I don't know if somebody could look into that and see if we're within that time parameter that we should be doing that.

Yeah, definitely something we could look into.

I mean, if my memory serves me correctly, we've had kind of general updates available in the clerk's office.

I believe at one point for council to review.

I could be misremembering, but long story short, we'll look into it.

Okay, because I thought there was a time frame that's like every year, every two years.

Yeah, we're sure we have executive sessions talk about pending litigation against the city and get updates on where we were at with those.

Okay.

I just have a um um announcement of the finance committee.

The finance committee will meet on Tuesday, September 16th, 2025 at 6 p.m.

in town hall.

A proposed budgeted transfer to support the World Heritage Program will be discussed.

Grace Cramsney Smith, Chairwoman of the Finance Committee.

Thank you, Councilwoman.

And as as I jog my memory, I think I'm thinking of audit results that we had our audit results available in the clerk's office to review at our at our leisure.

Again, I could be conflating things.

I remember just it was on like pending lawsuits of litigation within the city.

Yeah.

Okay.

Anything else on new business for members of council.

All right, we're gonna move on.

Thank you, everybody.

Thank you, Mayor Reynolds, Mr.

Spurk, Mr.

Hockey.

Communications, communication 6A.

In August 13th, 2025 memorandum and proposed resolution from business administrator Eric Evans.

Mr.

Evans recommends an agreement with Engel, Hambright, and Davies Incorporated of Wyoming to provide self-insured workers' compensation program management services.

Contract period would run from January 1st, 2026 through December 31st, 2029, and then you will cost of 60,000.

There are no renewals.

And resolution 10A is on the agenda tonight.

6B was withdrawn.

6C.

In August 27th, 2025 memorandum from solicitor John M.

Spurk Jr.

with an attached use permit and resolution.

Permittee is humanitarian social innovations and subpermittee is ArtsQuest.

The event is the Bethlehem Patias one year celebration.

The parade will be held from 1:30 to 2 p.m.

on September 21st, with a celebration to follow from 2 to 6 p.m.

Duration will be 10 a.m.

to 3 p.m.

for the parade and noon to 7 p.m.

for the other celebration events.

Premises will include the sidewalk at the corner of West Church Street and New Street for a parade check-in table and first street from Founders Way to the Eastern Terminus for the rest of the celebration activities.

And resolution 10C is on the agenda 6D.

An August 21st, 2025 memorandum from business administrator Eric Evans regarding the 2026 budget for the pension minimum municipal obligations.

Act 205, the pension reform law requires chief administrative officer to submit for 2026 purposes the financial requirements of the plans and the minimum municipal contribution to the plans of the governing body of the city based on the most recent actuarial valuations and payroll data.

The minimum municipal contributions that will be need to be budgeted for 2026 are as follows.

Police 7,65,459.

Fire 2,942,151 dollars, and PMRS $3,069.

Thank you, Mr.

Miller.

And that memo is for information only.

No votes will be taken.

Nothing to vote on.

Reports.

I have nothing to report this evening.

Mr.

Mayor.

Just two quick things.

One is uh we have a World Heritage Community Celebration on Saturday from uh 12 to 7.

Uh I want to thank Ms.

Jello and uh uh Miss Stein who have been working a lot on that.

Um, and also with our other partners, HBMS and Central Moravian and Raven University.

Um, so weather looks good for now.

So then um, but yeah, 12 to 7 community celebration on Saturday, and I'll just briefly talk about how we are very much committed at the beginning here of our experience with World Heritage to make this a true community celebration.

As I've said before, we are honoring our historic Moravian heritage, but not everybody in this city is a Moravian, and that is not where everybody is.

Um, and so we want World Heritage to be representative of everything within our community and the ideals of who we are.

Um so it is uh it's been very much designed with that in mind moving forward.

And then the only other update I have is next Wednesday um over at the Fowler Center um from 6 30 to 8.

We have our next opening doors meeting.

Um so we'll be given our updates on kind of where we are uh with some of the housing initiatives.

Ms.

Satula will be leading that, and those are my only two updates for now, Mr.

Clone.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Moving on to ordinances for final passage, Mr.

Miller, Bill 41, 2025.

Nordin's of the city of Bethlehem, counties of Lehigh and Northampton, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania amending the non-utilities capital fund budget for 2025.

Bill number 41, 2025 is sponsored by Ms.

Quietch and Ms.

Wilhelm.

Discussion.

Call roll.

Ms.

Cramcy Smith.

Hi.

Ms.

Quietek.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Hi.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Ms.

Callahan.

All right.

And Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6-0.

Moving on to 8B.

Please read the saldo.

An ordinance of the City of Bethlehem, Counties of Lehigh and Northampton, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, repealing and replacing part 13 of Codfied ordinances related to subdivision and land development.

Bill number 39, 2025 is sponsored by Ms.

Crampsy Smith and Ms.

Leon.

Discussion.

Councilwoman.

Also we're councilwoman Crampsy Smith.

Okay.

Thanks.

Um, I just have a couple of questions regarding this because I was able to if you have more in debt.

And I know we talked about this before about the um it being applicable with the new saldo or the previous one.

But can you can you tell define the difference between plans that are in the sketch stage versus preliminary plans?

Because um, with the new Saldo says any plan filed um within the sketch stage will follow the new ordinance, but the plan preliminary plan stage, they can follow either ordinance, correct?

I'm not can you tell me where you're reading from?

Are you reading specifically from the document?

Yeah, let me see.

It is um okay.

I only have it, I think it was on page 27.

I just said the page printed, but I think it was on page 27.

We talked about at the last meeting that um the developer could have a choice if they're in the I believe plenary plan stage that they can you don't they can use either the previous saldo or the current one, whatever is more beneficial.

Remember, so my my understanding is I'll back up and clarify.

So there's there's a doctrine called the pending ordinance doctrine, which applies generally outside of the land development context.

So, you know, if there's a like an ordinance proposed, typically, and Mr.

Spurkin, correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm just generalizing, but you know, typically if it's proposed, like if there's something that's coming up, you know, while that is proposed, there's sort of like an assumption almost that it's going to be passed, and and you do need to follow like the the will that is moving forward with it with the council in the land development process, that is not the case under the MPC and under case law.

So when I'm saying that, like a project that is proposed while the saldo is the new saldo is proposed, it's not subject in in my understanding to the pending ordinance doctrine.

And Mr.

Deshl talked about this when he was here, and I kind of am generalizing, repeating what he said at that time.

So I was just saying that a new plan that is proposed currently, not under the pending ordinance doctrine that you might typically know of as a legislator, because it is a land development under the MPC, which does not follow pending ordinance.

So if you've got a plan proposed, you you you can take advantage of the existing saldo, even before this one the previous or the current the current one.

Okay.

Correct.

Well, what do you mean by can you tell me if you have a plan proposed now and then tonight you pass the saldo and somebody who's got a pending plan is like, oh, actually, I really want to, I don't even know.

I really want to plan all those extra trees.

Like they can do that.

I mean, they can they can take after you pass it, like it is it is law now.

I guess I'm confused because I guess I just want to differentiate between like proposed or sketch plan and preliminary, like at what stage in the planning, like what stage of the plans can then would be applicable to either the previous or current saldo, and where where would you be at in your planning that you only can go by the previous saldo?

I would want to take I I I do, I would want to take each case and probably run it over with the law bureau.

I I mean I like if they went to planning commission and now maybe they're at zoning, would that be considered?

What do you think that would be considered?

Yeah.

I mean so right.

So a sketch plan is early stages, it's not a full land development set.

So when you do land development, there's full design, there's full engineering.

A sketch plan is not that.

It might be, you know, if if a full land development plan is 100%, a sketch plan could just be 10, 15%.

It doesn't have all the dimensions, it doesn't have all the details, the engineering worked out.

It's just a sketch of what they would like to do on the site to get some preliminary feedback.

That's what probably that like a sketch, they may not even be a planning yet.

They may not even at the planning board yet.

Or they a sketch plan would go to the planning commission.

It's an option that a developer could take.

They could submit a sketch plan and say, hey, I want to give you some of my basic thoughts and ideas, and I want to get feedback from various departments.

I want to get a general sense of are there any zoning issues here?

You know, before I move forward and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for full design and engineering, I want to give you this sketch and get some preliminary ideas of what direction I need to go in.

That's what a sketch plan is.

If I may, generally um, no votes or recommendations come out or formal recommendations come out of a sketch plan review.

It's really just an opportunity for a developer to come before the planning commission and get some feedback so that they can maybe make changes to the plan that they then present for preliminary and final review.

So, you know, the saldo, the procedures apply in terms of when you submit a sketch plan, you know, submit X number of copies, and this is what we're going to do with it.

Um ultimately where you know decisions are being made and recommendations are being made is in the preliminary and final review stages.

Okay.

So, like possibly if you have the plans and you're already at zoning and maybe they may have recommendations and you're going back and going to redo the plan, or would that make sense if that's more preliminary?

Because you have the plan, but you know, or either zoning.

Well, well, zoning is under the zoning ordinance.

And then once you get any required zoning relief, your proceeding for preliminary and final review and approval of your plan, so that you can go ahead and move forward with your subdivision or land development.

Okay.

And I know I brought this up before, but it says that it would be the developers that then have the option to if they're in the preliminary that they can use either ordinance, whatever's more beneficial to their plans or their development.

Right.

And I asked them what about residents or people who are opposed to the plan, can they also have that equity as far as applying either ordinance?

But I think last time I was told not.

Is that I think is there any way around that, or is that just the way it is?

Looks like I was um essentially the saldo applies to the plan.

So somebody who was coming in and expressing um opinion, you know, or had a concern about a plan, would have the opportunity to make public comment.

But they're not going to have an opportunity to they they're the plan doesn't really.

I mean, the saldo really doesn't um affect that.

That it's their ability to make public comment at public meetings.

That is their power.

Right.

Okay.

And but they cannot, they don't have the choice like the developer does to say, you know, I'd like this applying the new saldo or the old saldo is more beneficial to my case.

Let's put it that way.

Yeah.

There's no way around that.

Okay.

All right.

And then the other one is um, and I think this might fall under zoning.

If if it's not in the saldo, um, then it's you know, it's just staying as it is, it's not being amended, like if it's not newly listed.

But um, what about the dimensional requirements?

Is that more that that goes under zoning or are they staying this?

They're staying the same.

Is that under zoning ordinance or under saldo?

Because I didn't see that in dimensional um requirements are under the zoning ordinance.

So there's the zoning ordinance dictates what uses of land, things like lot, and then also dimensional requirements like lot area, lot size, those sorts of things.

Those are all found in the zoning ordinance.

They were before and they are currently okay.

So that makes sense.

Um the other thing I asked about was I know it came up before a lot of it is which is great that the climate action plan and EAC is more um input into this.

What about we talked about the one area where it talks about landscaping and privately owned trees where it says shall we're practical?

Can you define where practical means if there's an issue with a tree and um you know what in what scenarios will the city truly enforce the requirement to save it?

Like what does it mean by where when practical?

My understanding, you know, I'm not an expert on on each of the provisions of the zoning ordinance, and I might even have to turn to the forester for something like that.

But I my understanding is that like, you know, if just because we we we like a tree on somebody's internal property, we don't have the ability to tell them that they must preserve it.

Like if you have a tree interior to your property, you you are able to cut that down.

Okay, and what about like does the climate action plan or especially the EAC?

I mean, do they have any say?

I mean, I'd like to say power, but I'm assuming they don't in these situations.

My understanding is we are not allowed to by law tell people that they cannot cut down trees on their own.

They can only make unless they're street trees recommendations.

It's my understanding.

Okay, all right.

Um and then I know a lot of people or several people commented in the public about that um the new saldo is going to cost a lot more as far as housing because of the new requirements.

Can you can you comment on that?

I mean, is it really going to increase the cost of um developing?

I have said before that no, our assessment is is not, you know, and I'll just I'll back up once again and describe what these saldo changes are generally.

I because I I think we're kind of misunderstanding.

We adopted the saldo over 50 years ago, and we have not revised it since then.

The majority of the changes that you're seeing in the saldo are just aligning basic processes and procedures with long-standing practice and existing, you know, uh MPC municipalities planning code uh provisions.

That is what the majority of the things that are in the new saldo are.

They are not major changes, it's things like how do you record plans?

It's things like what is a sketch plan and and who does it and what's the process for doing that.

And those are all processes that we've actually been using in practice for quite some time.

We just didn't have them clearly spelled out here, and that actually causes confusion, and that actually makes development more difficult rather than more easy, like it's more difficult when you don't have things spelled out very clearly.

So, my argument would be that these changes that we're adopting for the most part are actually helpful in that they set out more clear standards, they help people understand what they need to do from the beginning, they cut down on confusion, and these are all actually generally well-respected principles in helping make uh development less expensive, less costly.

You know, we've looked where we can and we've added provisions in related to encouraging bike paths or you know, requiring that Lanta bus stops be a consideration in traffic counts, like the that's a shell, for example.

You know, but but on the whole, you know, a lot of what is in there again has already existed in our regular land development process.

We've talked to developers for many years about you know these different um goals of ours with respect to climate action, and we're just basically codifying them here.

But in our assessment, there's not any provisions in here that are raising costs drastically, like you know, that we're not requiring, you know, we're not requiring EV charging stations everywhere.

We're not requiring solar panels everywhere.

We're not you know making these widespread requirements on new development that would add substantial costs.

I think that I could be wrong, but I think that's the assumption because there are environmental recommendations, people think it's gonna cost more, but unfortunately, we're not gonna have a lot of weight to make them really happen.

So thank you.

Thank you, councilwoman.

Any other comments?

Councilwoman Leard.

Yeah, so um I really appreciate uh I you sent me a lengthy response to uh some of the questions that I had posed at our last meeting.

Um also uh the website link to the ordinance was fixed like 12 hours later at most.

So thank you for that.

Um I just wanted to like highlight a couple of the things that you said, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but we've got like 20 people watching online, and hopefully there's some of the people who asked questions at our previous meetings and uh we're awaiting the answers.

So in terms of housing, um councilwoman uh Krebsy Smith just talked a little bit about the um, you know, asked about the housing costs, and you explained uh effectively how um you know this might uh actually improve, if not but not hurt uh housing costs.

Um I did my own research also in the interim and was reading about how like the municipal planning code updates also are designed to help improve efficiencies in these processes.

So hopefully they can speed up building affordable housing um et cetera.

So thank you for that information.

Um in terms of the teeth and the weight, um you outlined a few different incentives uh that I'm sure are well, this is my question, I guess.

Um how are the incentives communicated to people who might be considering developing within the city so that they're aware of the options for um, for example, the Southside Lorda 2, you said there's additional tax abatement for lead certified projects or for the climate action plan um incentives that are outlined.

How do people find out about those if they're looking for a project in Bethlehem?

Well, I've so the two that I mentioned specifically that came to mind um and in terms of incentives.

Again, city council passed the Southside LERTA to and added the lead certification.

So if we have a project that comes forward that is in one of those um that's on one of those parcels that's in the Southside LERTA too, our planning letter will flag that you're in the Southside LERTA too.

So that would be the first step for a development, potentially the first step for a developer to know that they even have LERTA as a possibility.

Then if they're interested, they would likely reach out like to our economic development office and work with our economic development folks on you know whether or not that's a good incentive for them, at which point, you know, we would probably highlight, you know, here's how LERTA works, and you know, here's uh affordable housing component if you're doing residential, or here's you know, the the lead certification component if you're interested in taking advantage of that.

So usually that would be like on a case-by-case basis.

But again, the first time it would be flagged as, you know, if a plan comes forward in a sketch plan or a preliminary plan, um, you know, we would flag that it's in one of those districts.

The other example I think I gave was I think our zoning ordinance has some incentives for green roofs.

So that's you know, again, something that would probably be explored on a case-by-case basis.

If somebody came forward and said that they were interested in doing green roofs, we would talk about, you know, okay, the zoning ordinance has you know this incentive whereby I think you know, you don't you don't um count the building area covered by the green roofs, which you know helps you from a zoning perspective.

So again, that would usually be like a case-by-case situation.

Okay.

Um so that's part of the conversation in the planning process.

Yeah, okay.

And and one of the things I pointed out, yeah.

Well, if the saldo is outlining the doom process and you're kind of stepping through that with a developer, then I would imagine that would open the door for some of those conversations too.

If somebody says, Oh, well, uh, yeah, sure, I'll do these things, except like what do I get out of it?

Then you'd be able to point to them.

Okay.

Um, in terms of I I had asked about what the key performance indicators are for the new ordinance and how uh it moves local development trends.

And I understand that it's not a tool for tracking specific development outcomes, I guess.

Um I do hope that there can be some check-ins as and you did mention that um, you know, there's a housing dashboard in development with the housing plan.

Um, but even beyond the affordability part of it, um with an ordinance this big that will likely be in place as is for many, many years to come.

50.

Yeah, 50, right?

It's uh it's gonna take a while so anybody takes this one on again.

Um I'd like to know that it, you know, that it's it's doing something, right?

Like we're passing a big ordinance that should have an impact, even though a lot of it has been in practice for a while.

Um, so I do hope that there's some way, even if it's not as specific metrics to be able to point to hey, we've seen a general trend in increase in XYZ thing in the saldo.

Um, or hey, nobody's taking us up on this recommendation.

Maybe we need to look at it again um in some other area of legislation or policy.

Um so uh that's not a specific question, but just a comment on I do hope that there can be some thoughtfulness as this rolls out to how to see uh what impact it has.

Um and then the uh in terms of data on the costs of construction uh projects.

Um I do understand that you're not able to play out hypotheticals specifically.

Um, I guess that would be part of the general, you know, as as this uh ordinance takes effect, um, seeing if you're starting to get feedback from people saying, no way, like this is gonna raise my costs by XYZ and I'm not doing it because you can't make me uh or whatever.

But um, yeah, because like I said, it it it is good to know that when we pass something, especially this big uh up here that it has effect um and be able to point to what that effect is.

So um, but again, thank you for the the research you put into this and the conversations and the work of your team uh and following up with me on my questions.

Any other discussion from members of council.

Thank you, Ms.

Collins.

Mayor Reynolds, do you want to add something?

Just wanted to quickly to councilman Laird's point is uh I I also when I had said 50, I'd said in jest because hopefully some future administration does this and follows and so on and so forth.

But the answers to the these questions as far as like those costs and looking at them, and I remember having these conversations with Darlene Heller for years.

A lot of those type of numbers that shift that affect housing are in the zoning ordinance and not in saldo.

And I would say it's from this is just me not being Mr.

Deshler or Miss Collins, not being a lawyer, not doing land development.

It's infinitely more in the zoning ordinance versus the saldo ordinance as far as parking minimums, as far as density incentives, as those type of things that like I like I said, I used to have these conversations with Miss Heller all the time where we would spend all of this time in 2009 or 2011 talking about like, well, if we tweak this, what's gonna happen?

And then I'm like, I'm coming back to meet with you in two years.

And she comes back and she's like, nobody's done anything, like nobody's taken advantage of it.

Just gonna say, so in two, I've got two years left on my term to tackle the zoning ordinance, is what you're saying, right?

Well, I'm not all I'm just saying is like that's where a lot of the different um that's where a lot of these issues are of a much more um, and that's what you would hear from from people that develop homes and build.

And like I said, the one that when we reduce the parking minimums in some areas, like some people didn't think that was like a big thing, but people be like, yeah, because parking is expensive to build.

I think when we last, you know, right size the Wall Street garage, it was like 50,000 of space.

Uh so I mean, that's that's where that conversation is, much more so than in the saldo, but everything we do, Mr.

Alcohol and I talk about this.

It's like you hope people are constantly thinking about this from like a data-driven point of view, like is this working or not?

And then future administrations have the patience and the intelligence and the sophistication to spend like we are gonna spend our time in this because it didn't work and we need to continue to tweak it.

Thank you.

Anything else from council?

Mr.

Miller called a roll.

Ms.

Cramcy Smith.

I miss Quitter.

I Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6-0.

There are no new ordinances this evening.

Resolution 10A.

Be it resolved by the Council of the City of Bethlehem that the mayor and controller and/or such other city officials is deemed appropriate by the city solicitor.

We're hereby authorized to execute an agreement with Engel, Hambright, and Davies Incorporated to provide self-insured workers' compensation program management services.

Resolution is sponsored by Ms.

Leone and Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Discussion.

Call a roll.

Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Quiet.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6-0.

There is no 10B.

So moving on to 10 C.

Resolved by the Council of the City of Bethlehem that the mayor and controller and/or such other city officials is deemed appropriate by the city solicitor or hereby authorized to execute a use permit agreement with humanitarian social innov innovations for the Bethlehem Patias one year celebration.

Resolution is sponsored by Ms.

Leone and Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Discussion.

Call rule.

Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Quiet.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6-0.

I'll accept a motion as second to consider 10 D through 10H as a group.

Some removed.

Second.

Uh motion by Councilwoman Laird.

Second by Councilwoman Leone.

Discussion on the motion.

Mr.

Miller, call the roll on the motion.

Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Quietek.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6-0.

The Harb COAs are grouped together.

Mr.

Miller, read them, please.

Certificates of appropriateness under the provisions of the Act of the Pennsylvania Legislature.

Bethlehem Resolution are hereby granted for 10 D 446 Main Street to install one half inch thick by 12 by 24.

Two square feet.

PVC double-sided uh projecting sign using existing scroll bracket.

10E.

241 East Market Street to convert a garage into a one-bedroom dwelling and construct a second story addition to create a second one-bedroom dwelling.

10 F.

404 Center Street to replace the roof with a synthetic slate roof and place the gutters and downspouts with half-round gutters and round downspouts.

10G.

518 Main Street to remove the existing Tiger Hall lettering and install new signage for healing hands, as well as replace water damage trim repaint the first floor facade, replace two existing gooseneck light fixtures, install an access panel in the porch ceiling, and replace two existing lighting fixtures in the porch ceiling.

And 10H 81 West Broad Street to replace the existing logo on the existing 10 foot by three foot high awning.

Resolutions are sponsored by Ms.

Leone and Ms.

Crampsy Smith.

A discussion on the group.

Call roll.

Ms.

Cramsy Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Queatech.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

I pass 6010.

Certificate of appropriateness under the provisions of the act of the Pennsylvania legislature Bethlehem Resolution is hereby granted for 305 East Fourth Street to conduct various exterior renovations to the front, side, and rear facades.

The resolution is sponsored by Ms.

Leone and Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Discussion.

Call the roll.

Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Quiet.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

Aye.

Pass 6-0 and last 10j.

Send certificate of appropriateness under the provisions of the act of the Pennsylvania legislature.

Bethlehem resolution is hereby granted for 307 East Fourth Street to conduct various exterior renovations in the front, side, and rear facades.

Resolution is sponsored by Ms.

Leone and Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Discussion.

Call the roll.

Ms.

Cramsey Smith.

Aye.

Ms.

Quitec.

Aye.

Ms.

Laird.

Aye.

Ms.

Leone.

Aye.

Mr.

Callahan.

Aye.

And Mr.

Cologne.

All right.

That concludes tonight's agenda.

This meeting is adjourned.

Get home safe, everybody.