Good evening, everyone.

Welcome to the May twentieth meeting of the Chapel Hill Town Council.

We are glad to have you join us.

This evening we have four items on the agenda for discussion or action.

Um the first is a public hearing on the FY twenty twenty-six-27 recommended budget.

Um that will be followed by a discussion about updating the town's climate action and community response plan as we mark the plan's five-year mark.

Um third is a public hearing on a proposed incentive agreement for Project Stark Tower.

And our final item.

I tried, I tried to keep it tried to keep it serious.

Um thank you, David Putnam.

And our final item will be a legislative hearing concerning a request for a zoning modification at eleven White Oak Drive.

Um Council will also be making appointments to the community design commission tonight.

Um those names will be announced at the end of the meeting.

Um and council members, we have a closed session this evening as well.

Um to get us started this evening.

We have four proclamations to announce.

Up first.

I don't know, he's he's cracking up back there.

Um first we have Public Works Week.

Um Councilmember Louie Rivers will be making that announcement, and we invite our public works director, Lance Norris to join him up front, and we have a lot of people.

Norris, for being here with us tonight, and please share our deep appreciation with your entire team.

Our second proclamation is for Asian American and Pacific Islander Month, and Councilmember Camille Barry will be making that announcement for us tonight.

And we are pleased to invite members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities in the audience up front for that announcement.

Thank you for coming.

Good evening.

As the daughter of a Filipina, I am so proud to stand up here.

And Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders come from many different countries and cultures across Asia and the Pacific, each bringing unique traditions, languages, and stories.

Here in North Carolina and in Chapel Hill, AAPI communities have been part of our story for generations, providing leadership and have been and making contributions in many areas, including education, health care, business, technology, public service, and the arts.

As a community, we know how important it is to keep learning from one another and to celebrate the rich diversity that makes our community special.

And so tonight, we are pleased to recognize May 2026 as Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in Chapel Hill.

In so doing, we encourage everyone to take time to celebrate and to appreciate the impact of Asian American Pacific Islander communities here at home and around the world.

Thank you.

Council, we need a group picture.

Yeah.

Maybe make a back row, Council.

Thank you.

And if this I could scoot in just a little bit more.

There we go.

Oh, there we go.

Awesome.

All right, I'm gonna take a couple.

One, two, three, everybody smile.

Got it.

Thank you.

Thank you for everyone for coming tonight.

We are so grateful to have you here with us, and of course, all the contributions that you make to Chapel Hill and to our broader community.

That brings us to Affordable Housing Month, and we'd like to invite our affordable housing partners, advocates, along with members of Chapel Hill's housing and community development team to join Councilmember Miller Fushi up front, please.

Good evening, everyone.

I have the pleasure of reading two proclamations this evening.

I will start with our affordable housing proclamation.

Tonight we recognize May as affordable housing month in the town of Chapel Hill and reaffirm that access to safe, stable, and affordable housing is essential to the well-being of our community.

Affordable Housing Month highlights the innovative programs and collaborative solutions that help strengthen housing affordability in Chapel Hill and support a more inclusive and connected community.

During this month, we want to acknowledge the town's ongoing work alongside regional partners, nonprofits, housing advocates, and developers to expand and preserve housing opportunities for residents of all backgrounds and income levels.

These partnerships are critical to making meaningful progress and creating lasting housing solutions for our community.

Furthermore, we want to encourage residents to learn about and support these initiatives as we continue working toward a community where everyone has the opportunity to call Chapel Hill home.

So tonight, on behalf of the mayor and council, I would like to present this proclamation for Affordable Housing Month to who would like to grant it.

Council, we've been asked to do another group photo.

Everyone stay where you're at.

This is that's CHD.

We'll let the rest of the council go back and we'll let you do that one.

But y'all, please, our partnership wanted to come back up for that.

Oh, we're going to work.

So for our tonight's second affordable housing proclamation, this proclamation celebrates two remarkable, remarkable milestones for community home trusts, which is marking thirty-five years of partnership and leadership in expanding and preserving permanently affordable housing opportunities in our community.

During that time, the organization has created and preserved 300 permanently affordable homes for local residents, including working families, first-time home buyers, and essential workers.

In recognition of these important milestones and community home trusts' lasting contributions to our community, we are pleased to proclaim June 15th, 2026 as Community Home Trust Day in Chapel Hill, and encourage everyone to recognize and support their continued work.

Thank you.

If everybody could scooch in just a little bit more, oh take a couple.

Thank you.

Okay.

Congrats, congrats, three hundred homes is amazing.

Well done.

And thank you all for being here and for all the work you do every day.

So very exciting.

Our fourth proclamation is for Historical Preservation Month, and Councilmember Melissa McCullough is all set to read that proclamation.

And we invite members of the Historic District Commission and our planning staff to join her up front.

Oh, where's planning staff?

Bombard.

Okay.

Good evening.

Tonight we recognize May as historic preservation month, a time for our community to reflect on the people, places, and stories that shape Chapel Hill's heritage.

In so doing, we honor the indigenous stewards of the land and celebrate the diverse communities whose histories and cultural contributions form the foundation of our town.

We also recognize that historic preservation helps protect our unique character, supports sustainable development, and strengthens pride in the places we share.

During this month, we invite everyone to learn more about Chapel Hills historic districts, landmarks, and the many individuals who have worked to preserve them for future generations.

Thank you.

If you could both come over here so I can get the flags in the background.

Thank you.

I gotta get an open key before you go, sir.

One, two, three, thank you.

Wonderful.

Many thanks to the members of the Historic District Commission and to our staff for helping Chapel Hill celebrate the people and places that make Chapel Hill special.

That brings us to announcements.

I have three things to share.

First, um tonight we join communities across North Carolina in recognizing this week May 18th to 22nd as Heat Awareness Week.

We are feeling it.

As our region experiences more frequent extreme heat, we want to remind residents that dangerously high temperatures can affect anyone, especially older adults, young children, outdoor workers, and neighbors without reliable access to cooling.

Earlier this spring, the Orange County Heat Action Plan was approved to help local governments in our area better prepare for and respond to heat.

Additionally, state and local public health partners all provide heat alerts, safety guidance, and emergency resources to help residents stay safe during hot weather.

As temperatures rise this summer, and especially as our bodies get accustomed to the heat, we encourage everyone in Chapel Hill to take simple steps that make a real difference.

Drink plenty of water, limit time outdoors during peak heat, and check on neighbors who may be more vulnerable.

Small actions can help prevent serious illness and save lives.

To get the latest heat safety information and to sign up for OC Alerts, emergency messaging, please visit Orange County NC.gov backslash heat.

Second is a reminder that the Orange County Memorial Day celebration is scheduled for Monday from 8 45 to 1015 in the morning at the Veterans Memorial site.

Later that day from two to four, members of the local peace and justice community will gather at the Blue Hill Event Center on Elliott Road to comment commemorate the day and rededicate themselves to peace.

Council members, does anyone else have something to share?

Yep.

I would like to uh take a moment as the planning commission liaison, the planning commission last night.

We're we're discussing the strategies, uh the goals and the priorities that we worked together in the last work session on and made a lot of progress.

I thought it was a very good meeting where we were able to work with staff and um really drill down in what the priorities are for how we're going to work with staff on receiving the LUMO and making sure that it's meeting our priorities from a policy level.

We have a uh work session coming up for the budget.

And I think that's the only item on that work session.

I think the piece we're missing and that we talked about at the last work session was getting from the goals to the priorities and then to this idea of weighing the options on how those priorities can be best achieved.

And I would like to ask council and you, Ted, the manager, if we could make time of that work session to have a uh a process with staff where we do the same thing that we did for priorities, but take some time to go into the high-level options on how to get at each of those priorities in that document.

Um the main reason for this is I want us to be successful as we look at the LUMO when it comes to us.

And I'm I'm worried that if we don't spend more time looking at what the different options are for achieving these strategies, um I know I could be tempted to get in the weeds on the details of what each particular section of the new ordinance would have.

And I think it would be very helpful if we could have that conversation again.

And I think a lot of it is already out there.

I was on the planning commission and attend a lot of these meetings with this information.

But I think it's very important to document those conversations and reiterate the high-level policy parts of this process so that we're focused and we have a clear understanding of our role going into the final stage of this LUMO.

So I'm asking for time in the work session to discuss this further with staff.

Mr.

Manager, do you have information that you could provide on how you're planning on how you and staff are planning on bringing those options and policy decisions and then the draft and kind of getting us through that process?

Thank you, Mayor.

That conversation was teed up for June 17th meeting with council.

I think what we can do is take this interest back and think about it.

If council's not needing the June 3rd work session on budget or doesn't need very much time on it, we could flex and move into other topics.

So we'll take that back and consider how we might adjust.

Yeah, Mayor Partin Barry.

Thank you.

I understand that it is the interest of a single council member.

Um and I know that you tried to reach me today, but I have a policy, folks, of not doing business a few hours before I would try to decompress.

This unfortunately is not one that I support because I want to make sure that we are focused on that budget.

And if we already have a plan to discuss it June 17th, I think that that is sufficient.

So just to be just to make sure that I'm clear also if this is coming, I know that there may be is some confusion about the interaction with the planning commission and also what we're going to do in the work session.

So if you could help clarify what we're going to do, maybe that would help us feel comp more confident about the when I mean I'm not prepared to have a discussion about it right here.

Um, but we have information that staff's worked on for in preparation for the 17th, and uh we can maybe we can share that out to members for comment in advance and see where that leads us.

Okay.

Uh Councilmember Miller Fushi, did I see your hand?

Yeah, I just want to make sure that we understand how we do business in terms of like giving directives to the manager or staff to do things.

Um I I think um councilmember Barry was kind of touching on that, that when we give directors, it needs to like have not consensus, but support from the board to to move things forward.

Because we each have our own interests and things that we'd like to see.

And so I I just want us to be very mindful of that.

And so this I think is the opportunity that we had been told by the manager now that we don't have a petition process that this is the time of the meeting where we can decide that.

But I don't so that is the goal here, I believe.

Well, yeah, I would like to say, you know, and still feel very new.

I was directing it to this group here saying, is this what do you all think about that?

Because there's something that I would like to do.

Um I think bringing that up in this environment makes it very public and open.

And uh I do believe this is the time we've set aside for type of thing.

So I I thank you, Councilmember Barry, Councilmember Vashie.

I'm interested in hearing what others think about this as we head into this LUMO process and building off of what we did the last work session.

So if there's not a consensus, that's one thing.

That's fine.

I just wanted to raise it.

Yeah, I think it's if that's an interest of yours, I would like you to be able to like reach out to me so I can have a better understanding of what it is that you're asking as opposed to trying to make a decision at the day.

We're all working, but you know, taking the time to reach out to colleagues with these interests is important to me.

Understood.

Thank you.

Yep.

Um, Councilmember Ryan.

Yeah, um I just like to second council member um McMahon's comments about the last work session, which I thought were very productive.

Um, and I know that we're gonna move into the process of having to digest and analyze a very, very complicated document.

Um as he mentioned, I know that y'all don't want us getting into the weeds.

So I think we did some really good work at that work session of trying to set out what high-level goals are and then what our priorities are so that we have a yardstick as we're going through summer meetings and talking with you all about it, that we kind of know what the council direction has been decided on.

You know, I think the point has been made, we don't legislate or direct as individuals, we only do that as a board.

Um and I think it will be super helpful for the board to have time to do that.

I know that that June 17th meeting, shortly thereafter.

I mean, that's when we actually get the draft.

So I can see that it would be helpful to have the discussion about what those yardsticks are before we're actually going into the draft itself.

So I I would be happy to meet to have a discussion about those things and continue the work that we started at that work session.

Councilmember Nollert, maybe followed by Councilmember Rivers, I'm not sure.

Yeah.

Um, thanks, uh Councilmember McMahon.

Uh formality of the dais.

I I'm totally totally totally happy to be able to have a process like this to chat as a group about interests.

I uh you know, no no no objection to raising an interest in discussing it.

Um I struggled to see what the value add is of doing this like a week or two before we get the lumo.

Um might be a different question if it's uh a year ago, but um you know we've been having a lot of fairly long meetings, or we're about to get the whole lumo, and I I just don't understand yet what the what the value out of this would be.

So I'm I'm not in support at the moment, but appreciate the interest and and uh certainly no hard feelings about about raising it.

Councilmember McCullough?

I'll throw in two cents.

Um I understand the the reasoning um in all this, and I think that in some respects the way I see it, I don't want anything to derail either the budget or the the work that's coming forward to us.

So I I don't know that this is something that staff could even get done in the next couple of weeks before you already plan to do it.

But um, it does bring to mind the um the context of getting the draft explained to us, which I see as being um the way that the way that I would appreciate having it explained is sort of in the context of the of the whys and the goals, which I uh assume staff will probably do.

Um but that's just sort of my two cents on on this right now.

I don't know that there's time to do anything before then.

Councilmember Rivers.

Um Council Person McMahon.

Would you mind repeating your proposal?

All right, not to draw things out, but my proposal is that we build on the work that we did in the last work session, which got us from goals to priorities, but then that last piece is putting together some ideas of what are the different ways that you can achieve those priorities.

I've been doing Google searches on the priorities, and it comes up with like a bunch of different options.

I understand that staff is making those choices and they're putting that in the lumo.

Um my only concern is that uh I've been involved in these meetings on the planning commission and I know some of these choices that were made, but I'm not sure if everyone on council does, if we have an understanding of what those choices are, and I don't think people in the public have an idea of how informed we are and what those choices are made.

I don't want anyone to derail the lumo process now.

I definitely don't want to derail it four or five months from now.

So I'm trying to think ahead.

And if we have time, even if it's late, any amount of work we could do to help clarify, document, and really communicate among ourselves and to the public why these different choices are being made in a LUMO, I think it'll help us as we as we look through it.

Yeah, thank you.

Um in general, I support the idea also.

I don't see it as derailing the process.

I know that the planning commission has been very deep in looking at LUMO for a long time.

So I hope we wouldn't be seen as a derailment.

But if we want to bring in new voices, I'd rather do it earlier than later.

And I only see them as new voices.

I see these as like people who have been also looking at these documents in process along with us.

Um council uh Mayor Pro Temberry, followed by Councilmember Nollert.

Thank you.

Once again, I want to underscore that we have a budget before us that we need to discuss.

And we are looking at shortfalls from the county, not as well as other.

Um we have in work sessions before we got to the pieces, not addressed issues.

We've already let we've let them go.

So to turn around and ask our staff to come and hang out with the hopes that we will finish discussing the budget and then we can address what we've asked them to speed up.

Does not sit well with me.

I think that if there are specific things that you want, then perhaps we ask for small groups or you send in an email to all of us.

But I am very concerned about asking our staff to change and put pressure on our financial office to get through their presentation so we can reach a decision in order to get to the LUMO.

I appreciate the planning commission.

I was a liaison to the planning commission before you joined.

And I understand the hard work and many hours that those individuals put into it.

But um priority is the budget, then the limo.

Councilmember Nollart?

Yeah, I just want to say I think I mean it seems like we we need to move on, but I wanted to say would if you wanted to put something in writing.

I'm still struggling to understand the sort of specific new thing that we would be doing.

I can't tell if the idea is to like have planning commission members come and talk to us or if the idea is doing a new rubric or something like that.

So maybe if we could get something in writing, we can kind of come back to this conversation.

Um Councilmember Sharp followed by Council Member Miller Frischy.

Um I know that we were all given um Mayor Anderson gave us all a matrix that I to me seems like very much meets this need that you're talking about, and at least some of us have expressed strong interest in having information presented to us in that for some format like that.

And I wonder if we were able to know if we might be getting information in a format like the matrix that Mayor Anderson created for us all sort of as an idea of what could happen that might um ease some concern that we would not have that background information.

That's the intent.

Uh Councilmember Miller for sheep.

Yes, I I'd like to just underscore what um council member Nollard just stated.

I believe that in our work sessions, we've made clear multiple times um what our interests were.

Um and what I'm hearing um, Councilmember McMahon is the why, like the understanding of the why.

We've talked about that as well.

And having served on council for the last two years, any time staff is presented um changes, they present us with the why.

And so again, there's a gap for me in understanding what is going to be new that you're asking for.

Um I'm just not understanding.

I feel like we're repeating and revisiting something that we've already made clear to staff that we want, and we just need an opportunity for them to be able to do the thing.

And having um it before us, the actual LUMO rewrite before us, and going through the process.

If we need to make adjustments, then I can see that as an opportunity for that to take place then.

But again, thank you, Councilmember Barry.

The budget and the LUMO rewrite is the priority for me.

I guess I'll just um I'll just say I appreciate you bringing this up.

I think um I think some of the confusion that I myself am feeling is maybe that I'm not sure how the planning commission is dovetailing into our process, so maybe it's just understanding that and then also figuring out what what we're gonna be doing on the 17th.

So I'm I'm pretty sure that we can come to a good.

I'm hoping we can come to um something that will meet the interests of council, and I'm sure we can um get there.

And I think um manager Voorhees, if we could get maybe some information on how the planning commission is feeding into that, and then certainly if we I think we all would agree that the budget is the is very important and that we don't want to rush the budget, but if we had open time um that we finished up the budget, then perhaps that's an option, but I'm not sure that we need to figure that out this evening.

So does that sound reasonable?

Yes, it does.

Thank you.

The most TED response ever.

Okay.

Um council, um I think uh thank you for the helpful conversation, and I'm sure we will have a good work session.

Um next up.

Oh, any other council thoughts, comments, things to raise for the good of the cause.

Okay.

Next up, we invite members of the public to comment on items not listed on the printed agenda.

How many do we have?

Okay.

If you are wishing to speak, please sign up with the clerk at the table on the left side of the chamber toward the front of the room.

If you're here to speak on a specific agenda item, there'll be a presentation on the item followed by council clarifying questions and then public comment.

To help keep things running smoothly, Mayor Pro Tem Berry will call two names at a time.

The first person should come to the podium, and the second person, if you can make your way down to the front, you'll be on deck and ready to go next.

Finally, public input is very important to us.

And I want to remind our audience that we want everyone to be heard and to feel comfortable when they're at the podium.

So if you can please refrain from commenting or clapping, it also helps us on council hear the speaker.

So Mayor Pro Temberry, take it away.

Thank you.

Jerry Marcados, followed by PJ Miller.

Thanks, folks.

My name is Jerry Marcatos, and I have been a volunteer here in Chapel Hill for about three decades or so with a group that looks at media balance and accuracy and journalism.

Some of you may have attended.

Years ago, uh Councilman Bob Gwyn came to us with some exciting news that was something in the works to establish support for spontaneous and professional level um media work.

We need the timer on.

I am sorry to interrupt you.

We just don't have the timer on.

Oh, okay.

Oh, so it'll just go off.

Oh, well, see, I am so sorry.

I did not mean to interrupt you.

I apologize.

Okay.

Well, so what you know, one one of your own really led the way of uh I don't I don't think any of us really uh anticipated uh the depth of collapse that we're seeing uh in journalism.

And so um the importance uh initi local initiatives is uh just gets more more important as time goes by.

So I'm Mr.

Marcados, and we are both interrupting you.

I want the folks in this room to be able to hear you.

So if you could talk into the microphone, we can hear you, but the folks behind you I think are struggling.

Okay.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Well, I'm here to thank.

I'm here to thank this body for some work that started years ago.

Um you hear me?

When when Bob Gwynn's initiative uh took a a project in uh Atlanta as a model for what was possible here of empowering people to be able to come in with an idea or with something that they had done a sketch of and end up with professional equipment to work with.

And so as a former photojournalist and a professional photographer, I've been impressed with what you all are doing, making that uh available to our public, to our community.

So that's pretty much it.

Um I just think uh uh I I will mention that one example, and it wasn't through the People's Channel, but it's an example of what is possible.

Uh Diane Bloom lives in Chapel Hill, and she took she picked up uh a story that is now famous uh when Anne Atwater and uh the former client and the clansmen became friends because they realized what they had in common, what they had to accomplish.

And that was done as a documentary we showed at our uh at our gathering, and it was picked up by Hollywood and it became uh a movie called The Best of Enemies.

Well, pretty good leap from uh from a small town sketch of of important stuff.

So thank you again for making making it possible for important stuff to reach each other and a broader audience.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That was impeccable timing too.

Yes.

PJ Miller, followed by Bridget Adam.

Um good evening.

My name is PJ Miller.

I've been a community home trust homeowner for about three and a half years.

Um I live at 140 West.

And of course, that's right down downtown Chapel Hill.

Uh chose that particular community because it was close to where I was working at the time.

I'm retired now, yay me.

Um it's close to grocery stores, retail stores, you know, you've got the bus system right there, which I've been utilizing a lot lately with the gas prices going up.

Um I just want to say how important um community home trust and other uh housing organizations are for um affordable housing in the area.

It's uh so many people, especially now with rising prices, would find it almost impossible to be able to afford a home that they can, you know, a legacy that they can leave to their children and so forth.

So I'm I'm really just here to just say thank you to every one of you for supporting community home trust and uh and at the same time I guess commu uh uh supporting families in the area that that otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to live in Chapel Hill.

And that's basically it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Bridget Adamou, followed by Tom Jepson.

Good evening, Mayor Anderson and Council members.

Um I'm glad I'm following right on the heels of PJ.

My name is Bridget Ottomille.

I've been a Chapel Hill resident for several years, where I have worked as a public health practitioner, volunteered at the local schools, attended many events and celebrations, and raised my family.

I am proud to serve as the president of the board of directors for community home trust.

I'm here tonight to thank you for your continued support for community home trust and for your long-standing commitment to affordable homeownership in our community.

As you've heard earlier, this year community home trust is celebrating 35 years of service and the milestone of 300 permanently affordable homes.

This achievement would not have been possible without the town's long-standing vision, partnership, and investment.

What makes community home trust model so significant is that through a land trust, the homes remain affordable, not just for the present homeowners, but for future generations.

Every public dollar you choose to invest continues working for the community year after year, homeowner after homeowner, and family after family.

Your support has helped create a system that not only builds affordable housing, but also protects it over the long term.

Since its founding, Community Home Trust has served nearly 1,300 households and provided over 1.8 million dollars in homeowner support for critical repairs through its stewardship program, helping families remain safely and stably housed.

For me, this organization's mission and work is personal.

Because of community home trust, over 15 years ago, my husband and I had the opportunity to buy a home, a new home, I might add, which we are still living in today, in a wonderful neighborhood.

Being community home trust homeowners meant that we could put down roots, invest in our families' future, and live in a community we love.

I know that so many other families have had that same opportunity because this council has seen the need for affordable homeownership and prioritized it.

So we sincerely thank you for your leadership, partnership, and continued support for this very important work.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, Tom Jeffson, followed by Brianne Mendez.

Yes, thank you.

Uh my name is Tom Jobson.

I am the treasurer of the Chapel Hill Historical Society.

And first of all, I wanted to recognize the town council members who have attended and participated in our programs and events, uh, including our community treasures event.

Uh I thank you for your support.

It is much appreciated.

I also want to take the thank the town for designating May as historic preservation month.

The concept of historic preservation covers a wide variety of activities, not just preserving historic buildings and structures, but also preserving local history and the history of our neighborhoods and communities.

And I'm here to suggest that there are ways to turn this concept into action without major impact on the town budget.

One is to make historic preservation a strategic objective along with affordable housing, health care, and safety when considering applications for outside agency funding for nonprofits.

Another is to include historic preservation as a category for community arts and culture grants, since which currently focus on the visual and performing arts.

I am here representing the Chapel Hill Historical Society, which has been preserving the history of Chapel Hill and the surrounding area for 60 years.

In fact, we will celebrate our 60th anniversary as an organization this coming October.

But I also wanted to acknowledge the work of some of our partner organizations.

All these organizations are part of preserving history and all deserve your support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next is Brianne Mendez, followed by Talib Madjan.

Good evening, everyone.

I'd like to say on a different side of community home trust.

I am a tenant at the landing windmore.

I'm 80 years old in three weeks.

I have been a health care provider in UNC as well as Duke and Lab Corp.

I was injured during 2001 while working with the American Red Cross.

Were it not for the fact that I have been able to have a home or a place to live that's affordable for me, I don't know where I'd be.

My Social Security is only $1,000 a month right now after 25 years.

And I will tell you, it's difficult out here, as you all know.

So I'm grateful to the town of Chapel Hill and to this committee for giving me the opportunity to have a place that's in a decent neighborhood, the decent place to live, that cares about the community that they're in.

I thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Talib Madiun, followed by Linda Fajardo.

Good evening.

I'm on a here for the behalf of uh people's channel, and I was given a call today to come and how to speak and found you to help uh make a decision to uh keep them active because um we were given opportunity to to uh bring up program on the TV, and it was very very beneficial for us called Islamic Islamic Perspective.

Uh and um also the training that we receive.

I was a cameraman, so I'm not very good doing public speaking, so behind the camera was the ideal situation for me.

And Carson and she helped us out a great deal in that in that way.

And she was she was hard-tasked, and uh especially you got to stay still and all like that, but the skill set that we received from that was beneficial.

So I hope that the uh committee would take that in consideration of the service that uh they provide and also um given a chance to have a platform where uh where we can uh express ourselves because knowledge shared is knowledge gain.

And if we take that uh avenue away from uh from public uh broadcasting, then you know it's a bit would be a big loss, okay?

Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Linda Fajardo.

Hi, good evening.

My name is Linda Fajardo, and I am both a proud homeowner with Community Home Trust and a former member of the board.

Since 2018, my son Sebastian and I have lived in the lovely Ballantyne community in Lake Hogan Farms.

Having a stable, beautiful place to call home has allowed us both to thrive.

Today, my son is pursuing his passion as a culinary student at Wake Tech, while I am a veteran social studies teacher at North Carolina Cyber Academy, and I'm the chapter advisor for our National Honor Society.

In my role as a National Honor Society chapter advisor, I get to help high schoolers look beyond the classroom to see the real world needs right here in Orange County and across North Carolina.

I see my primary responsibility as cultivating their ability to spot where people are struggling and teaching them how to step up with impactful compassionate service.

And that is exactly what you have done in supporting community home trust for me and my family.

For me, CHT has been a lifeline.

As a teacher and a single mother, owning a home was always a dream that felt out of reach.

But thanks to community home trust, I didn't just find a place to call home.

I found a true partnership.

Knowing that they are always there to help means I never have to feel like I'm navigating the challenges of home ownership and maintenance all by myself.

Home ownership, while a dream for many can quickly become overwhelming without the proper resources and support.

Through the vital programs that CHT offers, homeowners like me are empowered to maintain their properties in a way that is permanently safe, permanently habitable, and permanently affordable, ensuring that essential community members like educators can continue to live, work, and thrive where they serve.

If you had told me years ago that I'd be living in a neighborhood like Lake Hogan Farms, I wouldn't have believed you.

As a teacher, my income barely covered rent, and the idea of saving for a down payment felt impossible.

Even if I had the affordable market options were always in areas where I wouldn't have felt secure.

Community Home Trust changed my family's future by matching me with a home in a wonderful community.

I never thought I'd be able to afford.

This life-changing opportunity exists because of this council's dedicated support over the last 35 years.

On behalf of myself and the owners of the 300 homes and counting that you have made possible, thank you for your endearing commitment to affordable homeownership in our community.

From the bottom of my heart, I thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And our last speaker will be Dennis Dowdy.

Feel like I'm back in college.

Now I came dressed for the occasion, but I don't see you didn't get the memo, did you?

Okay.

My name is Dennis Dowdy.

I've spent my entire working career in nonprofit public media, serving local and statewide.

I worked for 34 uh 31 years at UNC TV, now public media in North Carolina.

And in 2017, I began working for the People's Channel in Chapel Hill.

I was asked to speak tonight on behalf of the People's Channel and our director, Carson Riddle, who has been working diligently for months about putting together a package for uh budget for us, an additional budget for us.

Um I've been asked to uh help get this message out.

Um the People's Channel is your public access channel.

It services Chapel Hill, Carborough, and the Durham communities, but it's also much more than that.

Our mission is to give everyone in the community a voice while focusing on underserved children and adults.

We offer more than just content on a cable channel.

We teach individual and group classes in production and post production.

These classes are offered through the People's Channel and in partnership with the Arts Count uh the Durham Arts Council and the Arts Center.

Uh we have offered and we will continue hopefully to offer documentary and narrative film camp uh camps to children.

Um in recent years we partnered with public this public school systems, the Boys and Girls Club of Durham and Orange Counties, and the Emily K Center to provide these camps to the underserved kids, uh middle and high school students, free of charge.

We did this by securing grants from various uh community programs, and we appreciate what we've done.

Uh we also offer document um we support let me try this again here.

We supply all the necessary gear for video production.

That's cameras, lights, headphones, etc.

etc., as well as a video recording studio, an audio recording booth, computers with editing software.

Our members can air their productions on our channel channels.

Uh it's the Spectrum Digital Cable.

Uh it is their product, they get to keep it.

It is not ours.

There are we allow them to broadcast it on a channel, but it is theirs.

Uh this year we're planning to uh start an online channel to increase our footprint in its community.

But these tools that require to teach and learn professional video production are extremely expensive.

Uh but our membership uh and classes at the People's Channel are reasonably priced.

Our basic membership is $75 a year.

And no one is ever turned away because they can't afford our fees.

And they're offered to everyone in the community.

We are currently the only nonprofit specializing in video production and filmmaking that offers classes to the public.

And we've had members who go on to pursue the career in filmmaking and documentary studies.

We just had a former member who's actually won a Sundance Award with his first film.

Uh so we've been serving the community for over 30 years, and we've assisted the town whenever they need it requested.

Uh we did uh cover the Christmas parade, uh, Fourth of July celebrations, and PSAs.

Anything you needed.

Thank you.

And was that my time?

Yes.

Oh.

If you can just finish up your last sentence, that would be great.

We've never offered uh we never asked for support before, additional support, but our we've been getting dwindling funding from the town.

So now we're asking, please help us.

We just moved into a new facility.

We paid for that with our own funds.

But we need continuing operation funds.

So thank you for your time.

Thank you.

All right.

Um thank you to everyone who came forward with um support and also um with request tonight.

Um, while the town no longer has a formal petition process, um, sharing your ideas with your local government is a valued First Amendment right and one that we always support.

Council does not take immediate action on these requests, but they are carefully reviewed by the town manager and staff who will review the matter and respond to us and to you.

Thank you.

That brings us to our consent agenda.

Council members, do I have a motion to approve?

Move consent.

Move by Councilmember Ryan, seconded by Councilmember Miller Fushi.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous.

Up next is item number eight, which is a public hearing on the proposed 2026-27 budget.

And our presenter is Amy Olin, our director of business management.

Okay, good evening, Mayor and Council.

It's only there.

Which we can roll with if it's not possible to get it here.

I don't know.

We can't see here.

That's what they're working on.

No, we just came out.

Oh, try again.

If you are okay with it, I'm sure we can look there and then maybe it'll come up here at some point as you go.

You want me to go?

I think so.

I think I think we'll just crane our next for a little bit.

No, that's and then if it comes up, then it comes up.

Okay.

Then all the better.

Okay.

Uh good evening, Mayor and Council.

Tonight you'll have the opportunity to open up the public hearing on the fiscal year 26-27 recommended budget and to hear from the public.

The recommended budget totals 169.7 million dollars for all funds of that amount, about 100 million dollars represents the general fund, and the remaining 69.7 million represents the town's four enterprise funds.

That's transit, parking, stormwater, and public housing, the debt and capital fund, and our other smaller annually budgeted funds, and represents a 3.4% increase over the current year budget.

This budget balances day-to-day operations with long-term investments that support council's goals.

A key highlight is that we are not recommending a tax increase for the fiscal year 26-27 budget.

The property tax remains at 50 cents per hundred 100 evaluation.

This stability reflects our commitment to financial stewardship and long-term planning.

This budget is about moving from planning to action for council's goals.

It's incorporated complete community, our housing goals, our environmental goals, and our work towards fiscal sustainability.

The growth is primarily driven by the county's overestimation of how many revaluation appeals, which would reduce the tax base.

With fewer appeals than expected, revenues are trending higher than anticipated.

Last year we held the sales tax budget flat for 26 based on performance of that time.

Over the past 10 months, however, collections have exceeded our expectations, growing 5% in the first seven months alone.

Given the strong performance and statewide trends, we believe that a 3% increase is a reasonable estimate of what we can expect growth-wise to see for next year.

The town is intentionally reducing its dependence on appropriated fund balance to balance the budget.

This approach aligns with best practices for long-term fiscal and financial sustainability.

And our revenues and other categories remain fairly stable with minimal year-over-year change.

We're making intentional investments in our workforce.

This includes a 4% of market pay increase, a mandated 0.75% retirement contribution increase, and increases to our employee medical insurance coverage.

Based on feedback we heard from council at the 513 budget work session, staff provided additional details about the rationale behind why we're proposing the three new positions, which are a fleet technician, a library experiences associate, and the destination coordinator.

And that information was shared with council in yesterday's questions and answers.

We're also recommending that we implement the fire pay study based on the needs in that department and the skills-based pay adjustments for our inspectors to help with recruitment and retention in those areas.

And these investments help us remain competitive and support that employee retention.

The fiscal year 2627 budget focuses on investing in the five-year budget priorities for facility maintenance, street maintenance, vehicle replacements, and fire capital to help us reach our sustainable funding need in each category.

This budget continues sustained investments in key council priority areas.

We are continuing to create and preserve housing in low and moderate income households by leveraging federal funding, the affordable housing loan fund, and the affordable housing bond funds, all of which help us move closer to implementing the town's affordable housing plan and investment strategy.

We're proceeding with the public housing repositioning plan to determine next steps for long-term sustainability in our housing portfolio.

We're building on our ongoing climate action work by continuing investments in sustainable facilities, fleet electrification, and stormwater and resiliency infrastructure, and we're advancing our greenway network by identifying and evaluating creative construction delivery methods.

And we're partnering with our outside agencies to ensure funding is effectively allocated.

This includes building some in-house capacity to complete greenway segments, implementing innovative approaches to complete community by aligning with our strategic plans with fully funded capital projects that reshape how the community lives, moves, and connects, modernizing our internal systems and processes to streamline workflows, reduce administrative burden, and support consistent service delivery aligned with ongoing operational updates referenced across our departmental business plans.

Looking at our four enterprise funds, the transit budget decreases overall by 1%.

The actual town and our partner contributions are increasing, but that increase is offset by reductions that we're seeing in interest income and by the 420 route going back to Go Triangle.

For parking, we did some right sizing of some of the revenues, and so there's a 1% overall decrease to that budget, but important to note that that budget is balanced with a almost $2 million transfer from the parking fund to help support the debt service on the new deck, and we are working on kicking off a parking study to really look at the long-term fiscal and financial sustainability of the parking fund.

Our housing fund is up 4%, and that's really just representing cost of doing business increases.

And our stormwater fund is up 23%, and that is due to a proposed 8.79 centy nine cent per ERU increase.

And when you look at an average household, that average household would have two ERUs, which is equating to about a $17 per year fee increase.

And that is for an inventory mapping project that is required per the NPDES permitting requirements under the stormwater framework.

Could you help us?

Could you remind us what those letters mean?

Yeah, no.

The ERU.

Oh, yeah, equivalent rate unit.

Right.

And then national It's a national pollutant discharge elimination system.

Thank you.

So it helps us as well as the people who are not in this to understand what you're talking about and doesn't just fly over our heads.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So currently, with the current year budget, Orange County allocates $621,323 towards the Chapel Hill public library.

We received notice late in the budget process that the county is proposing a two-year strategy to eliminate this funding, meaning that we would now have to make up a $310,661.50 gap in fiscal year 27.

The town is currently approaching this issue with advocacy to restore this funding while also evaluating a mix of revenue and expenditure adjustments, including the potential of charging downtown residents a fee to access the library and looking at possible reductions in service hours.

So in summary, we believe that this budget uh maintains the current property tax rate with no increase, which we're really excited about.

We hope that it advances council's priorities in complete community housing, affordability, climate action in green ways.

Uh we hope that we find that it advances our five-year priority area funding levels, that it makes workforce investments in our market pay benefits and adds three new positions.

It reduces our reliance on budgeting fund balance, and it positions us on a path toward long-term financial sustainability.

That is it.

Questions?

Now that's green score.

Oh, it's back.

Um council clarifying questions.

Councilmember Miller Fushi.

Yes, um, I would just like to request just a little bit of information regarding um any emojis or contracts we have with the People's Channel to understand their funding over the years that we've provided and where we are today.

Thank you.

Are you asking for that information at some point in the future?

I'm sorry.

Oh, okay, good.

Sorry.

No, no.

I was lost lost the thread.

Um any other clarifying questions?

Okay.

Are there members of the public wishing to speak?

Yes.

George Barrett.

Welcome.

Hello.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is George Barrett, and I'm with the Marion G.

Jackson Center, and I'm also here today representing the Orange County Affordable Housing Coalition.

Um I just want to say that, you know, as we are continuing being this period of local budget cuts and strained budgets as ever, the Orange County Affordable Housing Coalition is here to speak on behalf of the important of housing as a service that keeps everyone in our community affordably and stably housed.

Uh this is especially timely as we are celebrating affordable housing month in Chapel Hill.

Um, as you know, we are still continuing to be in a housing crisis in our community.

Um in this current moment, Chapel Hill presents its own unique challenges, things we know around the area median income continuing to rise as wages and low-paying jobs remain stagnant, black home homeownership continuing to decrease and be a challenge in our community, and as we all know, property valuations threatening the displacement of black, brown, and low wealth communities within Chapel Hill.

Um we all believe that housing is a core service and affordable housing is crucial.

And so, as always, we know that even with the tight budget, we must continue to move forward on the town's affordable housing plan and investment strategy that was adopted in 2023.

We do want to thank the town manager and council for your efforts to prioritize affordable housing this year, even in a difficult budget climate and based on the 27 budget.

We are happy to see that the town is maintaining its level of existing support for urgently needing affordable housing through the affordable housing funding programs.

Um this funding is critical to meet current housing needs that our providers have to mitigate these challenges around housing in Chapel Hill.

Uh we are happy that the town is maintaining property tax assistance of $100,000 in next year's budget, though again that could always increase.

Um protecting the health and safety of residents by maintaining existing human services services and outside agencies funding, um, which we know these services are crucial to be maintained at the least because due to folks in our community needing these services because of housing insecurity.

In addition, we want to continue to uplift things that we know are important that we continue to strive for that are also in the affordable housing investment plan that the town adopted, continuing to figure out how we have rental assistance, upkeep of the town's public housing stock, and again the health of core human services that we need in this community.

And I just want to quickly say as we look forward to the next fiscal year, we know there's an opportunity to allocate up to 5.5 million in additional funding towards affordable housing, four million of that being bond funding, and so that these critical resources must be allocated to make the most impact in our community and advance the goals in the town's affordable housing plan.

So we urge you to uh the town to continue to identify sources, a revenue to fulfill your commitment for funding the plan and funding affordable housing and look forward to continuing conversations next year around the bond and other funding.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, council.

Um I actually uh I did have one clarifying question, which I forgot.

Um if you could just um kind of go over or remind us the approach to the um to the position in the library given the uncertainty with the county funding.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'd be happy to uh we've had conversations about uh all three positions that are proposed in the budget with respect to the fleet position.

We see no reason to make a change.

It's pretty essential and nothing's really changed with anything we've heard uh over the course of our deliberations.

Uh but with respect to the library position, uh we learned of the county's proposed funding cut after we had recommended the position.

Clearly um hiring a position while we're looking at potential impacts to uh part-time staff in terms of reduced hours or reduced services, uh those are sort of at opposition.

So we would um not be um just moving forward with that hiring without really working through that issue and and coming up with a uh you know uh uh uh uh an approach that uh makes sense in light of where the funding lands.

But we're leaving the budget as proposed because we don't know how this is going to land.

So that's why it it's presented as it is currently.

Um so should funding be restored, we'll know where we would go with the position.

Should funding not be restored, it's unlikely that we would hire a new position before we did other things.

Um with respect to the um experience or the uh destination coordinator position, uh David and I have talked about this that um in light of some potential leadership changes uh with the visitors bureau uh as well as some proposed um interests of the uh universities uh athletic department enterprise.

Uh we have a couple other partners who might be able to work uh down that vertical of um event attraction, destination development, uh heads and beds, if you will.

And so um we'll explore those options before making a decision about where that funding might be best put.

Very helpful, thank you.

Um Councilmember Miller Fried.

Thank you, Mary, for your question.

Um clarification to the responses that you gave regarding all three positions proposed in the budget.

So we just so I'm clear, we're looking to keep those proposals in the budget and holding off on hiring potentially for two of them.

That's accurate.

Thank you.

Okay.

Now that I dragged us back to questions, um any final comments.

Uh Councilmember Ryan.

Yeah, thank you, Manager Voorhees, for that comment.

Um, I appreciate your approach to the library funding issue.

Um, and I just would I I would strongly recommend or see how my colleagues feel, but I would very much sort of like to establish a priority list of if if we do lose that funding, that we then make it a priority to keep the part-time positions that we can and to keep the hours to the extent that we have to use this funding.

And then only after that would we would we consider um if we didn't need the money for those things, then we would consider hiring the position.

I mean, is that the position you're taking, or it sounded a little bit more fluid when you were describing it.

Oh, I think that's that speaks to the spirit of of the thinking.

Uh we we would not be likely to hire a new position and then end up uh setting aside our existing staff that just suddenly feel right.

So I I would I would agree with you.

Yeah, that's um so again, I would I would strongly support a commitment for that um that kind of approach to the to this uncertainty that we're file feeling.

Uh Mayor Protem.

to the spirit of of the thinking uh we we would not be likely to hire a new position and then end up uh setting aside our existing staff um that just sudden feel right so i i would i would agree with you yeah that's um so again i would i would strongly support a commitment for that um that kind of approach to the to this uncertainty that we're file feeling uh mayor pro temperature the library matter I would encourage my colleagues if you haven't already to please reach out to our colleagues our counterparts on the um on the board of commissioners to um hear what their perspectives are I have started meeting and I would like for us to be very clear in the facts that we are presenting um and I think we need to be really prepared for that for the moving forward with um the manager's proposal uh so far I've heard three people in favor of that because of what they're facing which is very much what we're facing right and I think it's helpful to talk to our to our colleagues who are on that that board um so this comment was really more towards uh the folks up here and I just know that we're gonna have to look at because we did really well you did your staff did really well in presenting us with a budget that delivers a lot and now it's it's my guess that we will have to you'll have to come up with something else and I just want to say thank you for what you were able to bring to us and um I promise to be open to consider what you present with the new information that we received already and what may come thank you any other comments um and to make sure there was something you just said that I guess made me then have a question which is are you coming back to the council before you hire those positions or are you just kind of waiting to see and developing a strategy I wanted to make sure because what I heard what I heard you say made me think that maybe I was missing something.

No.

So my thing was um I'm not expecting you all to run hiring through us that's not our role right what I'm saying is if you have to amend the budget that you've presented to us I understand I appreciate what went into it to deliver what I thought was a stellar budget once I could understand it where I am right now and I am prepared to consider any tweaks any adjustments that you may have to make to it based on conversations that I've had with with commissioners.

Because I didn't assume it was coming that those were coming back to us so I just wanted to make sure we were clear.

I heard in interest um and it sounds like we're on the same page um I heard an interest in creating priorities um yeah councilmember Rivers yeah thanks for an update I guess I'd rather see those positions removed from the budget and like if we go through this year and things are fine maybe we bring them back next year.

So I I know I'm a bit of an outlier here but that would be my preference understood.

For the not for the fleet position but for the downtown coordinator and for the library and is there I I have not heard a majority in favor of holding on those positions is there an interest in making a prioritization of current employees over hiring a new library position as part of the budget process I think that's what I'm worried about that.

I think that's what you were asking for correct yeah um councilmember sharp followed by council member Miller Fishi I'm in favor of um finding out what situation we're in before we make decisions about I think I think I'm in favor of for the moment proceeding as if we have our full library funding and knowing that that may not be the case and then figuring out what we do if that is indeed not the case.

That said I think it sounds like everybody's taking a pretty reasonable approach to the idea that we might not have our full library funding.

Well I'm got the microphone um I am in support of the uh destination coordinator position because we're moving money from one place to another it's revenue generating um it's um we were funding that economic development strategy through one vein and now we'd be funding it through another vein so I don't see it as a major shift in in policy strategy um and I I think our we're we're it supports our goal of diversifying revenue streams um so and as long as we have all of the money that we mean to have I'm in support of all three positions.

Um I I think our we're we're it supports our goal of diversifying revenue streams.

Um as long as we have all of the money that we mean to have, I'm in support of all three positions.

Councilmember Miller Fushi?

Thank you.

I think um Councilmember Sharp stated a lot of what I was filling and just wanted to underscore uh Councilmember Barry's point about running um hiring through council like our town manager will be able to with those positions in the budget be able to make the decisions and I think what I've heard tonight um serves the interests of what I've heard from my colleagues in terms of uh a new hire versus laying people off.

Like that's been clearly communicated.

So that's all I wanted to say.

Uh Mayor Pro Timvery, followed by Councilmember McCullough.

Thank you.

And I am so sorry, Mill uh uh Councilmember Miller Fushi.

If I'm repeating you, I didn't quite follow, and I want to make sure I'm going to say something, so forgive me if I repeat.

It means that I'm supporting.

Um I want to be clear that I do not want to dictate to you, Town Manager hirings.

And that is that for me is the scope of your work of how you balance that.

What I am curious to see if we have to, if um the county moves forward with the recommendation of their manager, how you think we should pivot financially where those investments are.

But I really don't want this body to say to our manager who has that responsibility of where the hirings are.

I'm going to trust you and your senior staff.

I'm making those determinations.

We know what we want the outcomes to be, but how we get there, I think that is your role.

And I just wanted to go on record for that.

Councilmember McCullough.

That's basically what I was going to say.

What what just to ditto what y'all said?

Other thoughts?

Uh Councilmember McMahon?

I mean, while we're all chiming in, I would say that uh I have no objection to the manager's approach of allocating but not spending.

Um I feel confident in the written responses and your verbal commitment to stay in touch with us as you make those decisions.

Um that's what I have to say.

Any other thoughts before oh, we didn't we didn't open the public hearing.

Is that fine?

I mean, I know we comment.

I know we kind of technically did.

By practice we did.

We're okay.

Okay, great.

Because I will never remember to do that.

Okay.

Oh do we do I have a um motion?

Well, do you have the information that you need from the council at this point, manager?

I do, thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

Uh do I have a motion to close the public hearing?

Second.

Um motion by council member Miller Fushi, seconded by Mayor Pro Temberry.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

I think we close it.

The public hearing.

Yeah.

I believe so.

Um then we vote on the this is just the public hearing, and then we'll vote on the budget when it comes.

Um all those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Uh motion is unanimous.

Okay.

Up next is item number nine, updating our climate action and response plan.

And we'll get the table a little higher for John Richardson, our community sustainability manager.

Is there a coordinate?

Is it off store?

I do not I have an old agenda.

Because I didn't have this on here.

There we go.

Okay.

Good.

You can see, you can hear.

All right.

Well, good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is John Richardson.

I serve as your community sustainability manager, and I'm back before you this evening to talk a little bit more about the climate action plan update, specifically trying to get some priorities from you all, or at least make sure we're aligned with your priorities heading into the community engagement process.

So the agenda tonight, I want to revisit quickly a little bit about the update and its purpose and why we're doing it, then talk with you about the schedule and some of the framing there.

I also then want to share some of the priorities and strategies from the current plan that I think connect well with some of the possible actions that we could see going over the next five years, and then end with a series of engagement questions that we we have for you all and that we think could potentially also be the ones that we provide to the public.

So uh the bottom line up front here is that the climate action plan calls for an update every five years, and as we told you last time, we've been preparing for the public outreach and engagement.

But before we take that step, we're here tonight to engage with you all and to share some of those questions and ideas and get your your thoughts to make sure we're getting off on the right foot.

Um so just a little bit about the update.

Uh just want to answer the question of why why we do this.

So really quickly, back in 2021 uh when the first plan was adopted by council, it was really led by council policy guidance.

We also had, of course, community input and it was all uh founded uh supported by technical expertise as well, and that's really important because a lot of this work is uh science-based in order to reach those targets that we have.

Um the five-year update is important because it helps us account for changes that occur over time, advances in technology, changes to state and federal policies or to funding levels and some other factors, and I'm happy to go into this if that's helpful at any point tonight.

And we're also uh not proposing a full rewrite of the plan.

We think the the plan and its foundation are quite good.

This is really a chance to provide a progress report to you all um later this year, and then also to through our work with the community and with you all to look for ways to make adjustments that will be important for the next five years.

So uh changing gears here to the schedule and the framing.

This is similar to what I showed you last time.

Uh what we're planning to do is May through July, conduct the public education and engagement.

So this is where we will share about some of the progress to date and check in with the community on some of these key questions between August and October.

We will then uh look at what we've heard, uh, analyze that information and begin developing an update for you all to consider towards the end of the year.

Um within the IAP2 public engagement spectrum, which I'm thinking you all have probably seen on different projects before.

We are um proposing to be in the consult end of the spectrum, and and really what that means is what you see on the screen here.

We're making a commitment to keep you and the community informed, of course, to listen and to acknowledge uh ideas and concerns and aspirations that are brought forward, and ultimately to provide feedback about how uh community input has influenced your decision in the end.

So with current uh strategies and actions, this is this is a framing uh that I as I mentioned earlier comes out of our current plan, and these are some of the the key questions that we have for you tonight and those that we ask you to consider for the public as well.

And I can go through these a little bit.

So we're wondering about are we missing any any priorities?

I've got a slide that follows this one that um serves as a reminder to what those high level priorities are.

We're also curious to know about town level actions and what you think may be missing to to help meet our goals.

Umilarly community level actions, things we wouldn't do ourselves, but we might promote and encourage within the community, and then finally programs, things where we and the community come together.

Uh what are some things that you all think might help serve and meet our goals.

So as promised, this is the slide.

These are the high level priorities that come from the current plan.

And as it says on the slide here, we we do believe these are still the right priorities.

And I'm gonna spend just a minute going through some examples within each of these categories just to give you a refresher on some of what is in the current plan.

So under buildings and energy on the left hand side, you see the strategies listed.

These are just examples of things.

And on the right, uh, what we have are action examples that connect to those strategies.

And so I talked with you all last time a little bit about the rooftop solar project that we've got going on.

That's that's a key um pillar for us, we think going forward.

And the reason that's uh in bold and in the next one down is because anything you see in bold is also one of your council strategic priorities, or it has a has a direct connection.

Um energy and water efficiency upgrades in town facilities, these are things we continue to do over the years.

We have a really good performance contract uh in place that's saving about $80,000 a year in three of our largest facilities.

Um we've done lighting projects at the library and public works and other facilities over the years that have also saved energy and money.

Um, so these are things that are ongoing for us.

Um the electrification program we've talked to you all about, that is something we are building and getting up and running this year.

That's gonna serve uh residents and help them electrify things within their homes that are not currently electrified.

So think lawn mowers, um possibly uh fossil fuel powered heating, that sort of thing.

And then finally, CPACE, we talked a little bit about that last time.

That's something that we're working on with David's team.

This is we think a really excellent financing tool for commercial property owners that provides long-term low-cost financing to do sustainability and resiliency upgrades, I should say.

Okay, so just I'll be a little faster with some of these transportation and land use.

Um you can see infrastructure regulations, vehicle electrification are some of the key uh example strategies, and of course, that connects to ongoing work that was started in the first plan, and we think it probably continues with the mobility plan and the everywhere to everywhere greenways planning and build out, uh, the LUMO rewrite, we know that's a priority for you.

Town vehicle fleet electrification, a continued priority for you.

Right now, our fleets at about 7% electric transits close to 20 if you're looking at their coaches, so that work continues.

Um, the North South BRT, of course, will be transformative, and then we want to maintain our public EV charging stations, even though the majority of charging uh still takes place at home, having public charging spread around the community is also serving our community uh in positive ways.

I just I just wanted to say I I think that the um North South BRT should be bolded.

I think that's a really central priority.

And I think that the community needs to understand why that's a climate issue during engagement.

We can do that for sure.

Under waste uh wastewater and natural resources, um you can see that the strategies range from waste diversion to natural resource conservation and enhancement.

So we would continue looking to do tree planting programs in neighborhoods and in our parks.

Um, the implementation of the stormwater plan, and that's something you all have been talking about.

Um, expansion of composting at town facilities and also programs like leave your leaves, uh, which are well received in the community.

And then with resiliency, again, you see a little bit of overlap here with the stormwater implementation and outreach.

Um, we've also been uh investing in uh flood early warning sensors.

We're looking at the possibility of heat sensors as well.

Speaking of heat, it's getting warm.

The mayor made an announcement tonight.

Um, we've got our new heat action plan, and we will begin implementing that this year.

Uh, and then that connects also to the resilience hub idea, which um uh is not lost.

I mentioned we did lose our federal funding, but we may be able to pick up some local funding for that.

So I'm gonna leave uh this slide again and just say that one other question we had for you tonight was uh is whether or not you have other questions you think would be important for the community as well.

Um I'm assuming we're asking you clarifying questions now.

Sure, right?

And then talking about are there questions that we want you to ask the community?

That that works in a bit.

So any clarifying questions?

Yes, sir.

Yeah, um, thank you for this.

Uh really critical program.

I I'm curious if we've modeled um in terms of thinking about total impact from vehicle emissions, for example.

Is it is it possible to try to approximate a sort of like if we had X miles of connected greenway and it's sort of and we hit a sort of critical level such that it were actually plausible that people would comfortably and safely bike around to multiple destinations?

I tend to subscribe to the thesis that like the vast majority of people here are not quite comfortable actually doing that with our current level of infrastructure.

Can we model the sort of like trade-off of emissions impact of like hitting critical point in the greenway network unlocking, say five percent more ridership or whatever, versus like vehicle investments and try to figure out some sort of like dollar to dollar comparison of if we make investments in this arena, we think we might reduce emissions in this range and in this arena, this range.

Um I have no idea what the outcome would be, but that's like uh a comparison I would be interested in getting approximations on if you were to tell me that it's possible to get meaningful approximations.

If you were like there is no meaningful way to model that, we would just be making stuff up, and I would also be like, okay, interest retracted.

So I we can explore that.

I don't have the answer tonight.

What you're saying sounds plausible to me uh based on the inputs that I know go into the modeling we have done, but we would probably just need to check on that to be sure.

Um council member Rivers, followed by Council Member Miller Fushi.

Oh, okay, followed by Councilmember McCullough, and then I'll keep going.

Yeah, thanks, John.

This is always thanks for the update.

Um I wanted to hear a little bit more about the engagement plan, specifically like how do you plan to engage with the youth during the summer?

Like you have plans to go to summer camps, maybe like the summer camps running by the town, think of like car graze, like kind of low-hanging fruit ideas.

I I think it's all of the above.

Uh we we've um we've got the plan to to go where things are happening more so than just being the I may have said this before, but being the center of attention and hoping someone comes and finds it interesting.

So uh I think it's it's summer camps, it's events, it's um it could even be things like office hours, uh it could be so it'll it'll be a variety of things that we are developing with the equitable engagement team, um, similar to other projects we've been working on lately.

Um council member Miller Fushi.

Thank you for this update.

Um I have a question regarding um our engagement and conversations with the university.

Um I know that we do some work with them, um, especially with um our buses.

Um the rapid transit, all of those.

Um, but what ongoing conversations are we having with them?

Like how are we getting buy-in?

How are we collaborating with them?

What kind of engagement are we having in terms of what their goals and our goals and how we I know they're their touch points, like I just mentioned, but what are some of the ongoing conversations we've had?

I know before, I think the first year I was on council, we had someone from UNC come and talk to us.

Um, but since that kind of reporting has ceased.

We we do have at the staff level, we have regular meetings with the university.

Um I think the alignment is very good in terms of what we're trying to accomplish and what they're interested to do.

And as part of this plan, I think we would ramp that up and look to find as many areas of overlap as possible.

I can tell you that one example um recently has been more on the research side.

So they with the water sensor project, you know, they helped do the research that led to sort of the proof of concept that we then implemented, and I think there's opportunities to continue doing things like that.

Heat is another example where we're working with them currently.

So I, you know, that and also um larger scale interests in terms of decarbonizing cogin and other things like that.

So awesome.

Thank you for that.

Um I know well, I want to preface this with I know this would really take um legislative action first and foremost.

Um, but looking at um energy, the ongoing rate hikes that um our community is facing um across the state, really.

Um, and just thinking about um our trip that we made to Ann Arbor.

Um I know just looking at their climate action plan, they have what is called a community choice um option, which is pretty much a um which allows local governments to um procure power on behalf of residents, businesses, and um other municipal accounts, um separate from um other allocated suppliers like a Duke Energy.

plan they have what is called a community choice um option which is pretty much a um which allows local government to um procure power on behalf of residents businesses and um other municipal accounts um separate from um other allocated suppliers like a doke energy again i know this would take legislative action um but being able to do something similar to that not just for us but other communities across the state where they could potentially have 100% renewable electricity that all of our folks business residents could benefit from um in your field have you seen any interest in that in in really pursuing that pushing that um any lobbying taking place to really empower us on a local level to be able to do something like that I it's possible I missed it I don't know that I've seen anything quite like that here um on the solar side I've seen the utilities trying to bring more utility scale community scale solar options to the table um and part of the challenge with those has been historically that the um there's only so much capacity and it gets eaten up pretty quickly there's also a lot of competition with tech companies who are interested in this renewable energy for their own purposes and so um I think to answer your question more directly though I've not seen anything quite like what Ann Arbor offers okay yeah I mean what they're doing there is just really amazing um but I think you know they have a state legislature that is willing to do that um but I think I just want to put it out there and um it would be so amazing if Chapel Hill could now make him a comment sorry y'all um could be on the voice the same way just raise your voice hand make it a question right yeah it'd be great it would be great it would it be great yeah so um council member mcull followed by council member sharp followed by council member right um okay I've got a few things um some of them might be comments one of the things is I'm wondering whether or not um you're considering during this engagement to sort of combine the the engagement for the climate action plan with the and the uh um engagement about the heat action um and and that program because that would be a a good a good way to um kind of get things home to people so that's one question I I think we can do that I think that's a that's a very good suggestion.

Okay and um per uh commission Councilmember Miller Fishi's questions I know that there are some things in the General Assembly right now I was looking I was there this morning with the CR club talking about the ratepayer protection act and um and if there are things that are going on in the in the um general assembly might you be able to tell us about those things so that we can do lobbying you can't but we we could um and and yeah um I that's okay I think the rest of them are just comments I was just gonna say I wait I think we we um we are part of networks that help track a lot of the legislation that happens at the state level both with the legislature and with the utilities commission so I think I think it is possible that we can continue to bring you information like we did with the legislative breakfast for example um so that you all know where those points of advocacy are possible.

Thank you um council member sharp followed by council member Ryan followed by council member McMahon um thank you um so in the responses to the questions that some of my colleagues submitted um I noticed a phrase that came up a few times which was to help monitor variety of topics we will be developing additional metrics as part of the council strategic priorities tracking process and reporting through the business plans.

I would love to have a little more information about what that means particularly um in a few areas that it was used to answer which were questions about tree canopy um stormwater planning alignment and the natural areas map because those struck me as um three areas that are pretty critical to our decision making when zoning decisions come before us and so um I would like to have a more concrete answer to those I mean they're very like uh ground level things but to me they feel like things that we can we can really affect when we are making zoning decisions or um conditional zoning decisions and make sure that we are looking out for things like tree canopy stormwater management alignment and and making sure that we are making the best use of the natural areas map um so I guess my question is uh uh can you tell us any more about the additional metrics that will be developed and when we will let's see track those and have a report on them through the business plans.

Um so I guess my question is uh uh can you tell us any more about the additional metrics that will be developed and when we will let's see track those and have a report on them through the business plans.

Yeah, it's it's a fair question.

So we um I think part of those questions where you saw that repeated answer are questions where we are seeing um connections to to metrics and ways of measuring information that we think directly responds to some of your questions uh as part of how we will um reshape and begin responding to your your um strategic priorities through the business plan process.

That was a that was a mouthful.

But um if there are specific details that we can help provide sooner rather than later, um that's something we can look at too.

And when you say through the business plan process, you mean the uh plan update process or the what are you referring to when you're talking about the business plan process?

Uh council member, each department prepares a business plan annually to operationalize the budget.

Got it.

So um the reporting back on metrics is related to that because that's um we do the business plans and then carry out operations, then we're tracking metrics from that that we want to feed back to council.

So it's got it kind of a lot of so when developing those business plans for each you will use these metrics in order to um decide how to spend money, essentially um well, they certainly inform how we sp spend our money and if we're on track or not, and if we need to make adjustments, if we need to change our resource requests and and future cycles, so yeah, they're they're certainly related to it, yes.

I guess a better way to phrase that would have been whether or not the ways we are spending our money are helping us reach the goals that we want via those metrics.

Um thank you.

I guess then comment or question, I would just like to reiterate my interest in making sure that we have uh metrics and information about the things that really affect how we make conditional zoning decisions so that we can be part of you know helping carry out our climate action plan and make sure we aren't working at cross-purposes to that when we make um development decisions.

Understood.

Um council member Ryan, followed by council member McMahon.

Okay, um, I would second what council member sharp just said.

I think that that's really important for us to be able to have that kind of information when we're actually doing our day-to-day jobs.

So thank you for that.

Um for um Theo's comments.

I agree any data that we can get, and I know some of it won't won't be available to you, but the idea is very intriguing that maybe um by investing in that greenway we could be achieving some climate goals, right?

Instead of directly investing in a climate goal, we are investing other places, but we're actually getting more bang for our bucks.

So I find I think that that's very intriguing if we could if there's any way to get at that kind of decision.

Um, and just to follow up on council member Miller Fushi, Apex has its own electrical utility.

They do.

They do, they do.

Yes, they're in electricity.

Huh.

So and I don't know, I don't know how renewable or energy efficient it is, but they run their own their own thing.

So I did I didn't know that either, but that's true.

Um my question, sorry about that.

My question is you talked about the engagement frame and you mentioned a string of initials, and I know that I've seen that slide before, but can you just remind me what that stands for with the organization is?

Oh, um international association of public participation, which is the P2 part, I think the public participation.

Great, thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Camille just said it wasn't me asking for the acronym this time.

Oh okay.

Still use Thunder.

Right.

Uh plenty to share.

Uh Councilmember McMahon.

Thank you.

Um I'll tack on with the evaluation angle, and the reason why I see that as important is this idea of we're adapting and how do we adapt.

So question for you is um as you prepare visuals to communicate with us and the the community.

I'm curious about how we indicate where the priorities are weighted, like where we're like I think of a pie chart.

Like, are we doing mostly in carbon reduction and salmon resilience?

Like what is a way we can communicate?

This is our pie chart now.

This is kind of where we think the pie chart will be in the future so we can clearly show how we're adapting with what we're doing.

So really investing with communications and these visuals that help people understand where the effort is being put and where the focus is being put.

Because I would imagine some of it is about how we're if we're not rewriting the plan, how are we adapting the plan?

Because adaptation is the whole thing we got to deal with.

Um so weighting those priorities um would be a great thing.

I would just like to see how you do that.

Uh situational awareness.

I'm wondering how you can integrate that into it as well, like helping people understand where are we at?

So I don't know what situational awareness uh information you're putting in there and just uh do you have volunteer groups that you're working with?

I feel like this engagement could be a real do you have volunteer groups that you work with that could help you with this.

Uh we haven't identified any at this point, but the last time we did the plan, we talked to a lot of local organizations who contributed to the plan and some of which were interested to really talk about the plan, and so that might be an opportunity for us this time.

Right.

So no one's tapped from like Sierra Club, the Audubon Society to actually go out and help you with this effort?

Not to this point.

All right.

Um these resilience hub grants, I see them framed as grants, but I'm wondering is there a concept of a resilience hub that we would create that the members of the community.

I think some people are gonna ask questions about how do we prevent and recover from disasters.

And I'm just I when I see the word resilience hub, I can't I imagine some organized prevention and response teams or something.

I just don't know.

Do you have a vision for resilience hubs beyond grants as a part of how we deal with resiliency?

We actually we use a definition that comes from the Urban Sustainability Directors Network, which really describes a resilience hub as um a trusted community space that gets used on a regular basis, but also one that not only provides services, it can be supportive to the community during uh a disaster or an event.

So there, I mean, I'm I'm shorthanding it, but um we do uh we don't define it just based on the grant proposal, although the grant proposal we think would help us identify ways to enhance the what I would call the existing resilience hubs that we already have.

So, in some ways, I would say the Hargraves Community Center, the library, and the um community center off of SDs are three examples of resilience hubs that we have that can be further enhanced through additional investment.

But John, I think we're doing we're actually applying for grants through Central Pines, right?

That's right.

Yes.

So that it's I know you maybe you have two questions, but it's not that we're it's that there is we're trying to get money to create these things.

It's not about giving out money necessarily to no no, I'm saying that aside from getting the money or not, I I think when we go out and engage with the public, there's gonna be a question of, you know, we talked a lot about mutual aid after Chantal.

Oh, like um, and it also ties in with how you're connecting with the volunteer groups.

Another question on top of that would be congregations, a lot of our congregations respond in these ways to help, you know, low-income folks.

So my question would be how are you engaging with congregations?

Maybe one question would be uh focus groups as a part of engagement where you would pull these, you know, really central community members and engage them at a higher level intentionally because they're all doing this work and being able to coordinate them, I think would would be good for the town and help us um be a be a good partner in that partner in that?

Yeah.

Question?

Question?

Uh-huh.

Question time.

But um but thank you, and I just I really uh hope you can thank you.

Uh Councilmember Barry, uh, Mir Pro Tembury.

Thank you for this.

Um I also am curious as we're talking about partnering and and working collaboratively with other groups.

We have a group that is connected to the town, and it's the youth council.

Have you considered this is a question?

I'll turn it into a comment next time.

Have you considered working with those young, brilliant people who are chomping up the bit to contribute?

I have seen some videos, and one may have just been released tonight.

Um, but I've seen some videos that they've done to um elevate services around the community.

And I so that's my question is have you considered that?

We we have actually we worked, um, we were fortunate last time we did this that the there was a member of the youth council who was on one of our advisory boards who um was a sort of an ambassador for the project back to the youth council, and then from there, um, and some of you may remember this the night that the plan was adopted, there was a petition of over 500 high school signatures from the community in support of the plan based on the youth council ambassador and their work within the high school.

So yes, we have considered that and we'll consider that again.

Yeah.

Um I mean get my brain together.

I'll get there.

Um I don't know that this evening you're necessarily really asking us about what's in the plan, but so I guess my question is more about um the engagement, and then I miss then I think what you said is then it comes back to us, then we talk through.

So I think that's great.

Um I I guess I'm having a hard time myself understanding how are you going to give the community members something to decide between or have like a realistic framing of what is possible?

Because I know that there are, I think we should always have an opportunity for people to come with something totally outside the box and amazing and interesting.

And I I think that we often set ourselves up to for people to be frustrated when they're like, I said I want wind farms all around town, and then you're like, well, that can't be a thing, and then people are frustrated and they're like, but you asked me what town level actions can help meet our goal.

You know, like so how are we helping people deal with the questions you're asking them?

And and how are we conveying at least some of the things like this this real I you know, I agree with this just shift to resilience and really thinking about what is resilience mean?

And so how are we helping the public answer those questions in a way that helps them be smart because you're smart, you know?

Like how how are we helping them to weigh options or at least have that those guardrails in place so that they can really engage productively and tell us things we think are possible or are reasonable or are on the table as opposed to like what should we do and what do you like?

And you know, some of it might be like, well, people really want people have wanted composting for a long time, but we just it just hadn't made sense to scale it up in that way when people can pay a service to come to their house, right?

And so, but then we're just asking people like, what do you want?

And so I guess I'm wondering how how are you actually going to be doing this engagement or how can we understand what you're really going to be asking people?

So and this happened the first time too.

Um I think this is this is a challenge of doing this work.

Um what I would say is, and we tried to do this last time too.

Um I mentioned this earlier.

We we try to make sure that the work is rooted in reality and science.

And so when we have questions, or maybe sometimes they sound like opinions, you know, someone might say, I think the solution is renewable energy.

Another person might say, and this these are real examples from last time.

I think the solution is 100% nuclear.

And um, you know, we don't control the utilities, so that takes us into a different conversation about what we do control and what we don't.

So I also don't think we have a zoning for nuclear power plants last time I checked.

But exactly.

Um so I think what we try to do as a staff is if we have good information when we hear those comments or those interests, we try to then turn that into a conversation that is based in reality and try to share what we know, not to discourage someone, but to educate and have that conversation.

Um, if we don't have the opportunity to have that conversation, then our commitment within the consult model is to try and provide that information in the written work that we will provide as part of this.

So if somebody sees their question, we will then try and respond as staff in in the best way we know how to say that this is possible for these reasons, or we don't think this is possible or practical for these reasons.

And that's just it's um a line of directness and honesty that we're just gonna have to take with the work.

So is it that the way we do this work is driven by this model that we've adopted, and that in order to change that foundational paradigm of if we could give people options or we could give them something up front instead of waiting for them to give us an answer that doesn't make sense, or then having them go and read a report.

Um I guess like what is the way that we get to a different way of engaging then, I guess is my question.

I I'm hearing your question now too a little differently.

So I think the other part of this is we would give them enough information to see, like you all can see tonight, some of our thinking around strategies and actions and things that we think would support some of the high-level goals so that they can get a sense of what kinds of work we're already imagining.

And so for them it's not sort of this whole cloth exercise, but more reacting and maybe thinking about well, maybe something's missing here, or maybe there's something we could change about this, or I'm wondering about this.

But yeah, we would we would look to complement um in some ways uh similar to the work we did um with uh the police station site.

We brought a couple of different scenarios and options and folks were reacting to that as opposed to sort of a blank canvas and um more generalized questions.

Yeah, that's helpful.

Thank you.

Um what's the timing on the sustainable facilities study study?

The study will be completed in July.

Oh, okay, so soon.

Um also I guess as we're talking about, obviously, stormwater management implementation is a huge part of council priorities and and and this plan too, I think.

Um how does the timing for the new stormwater plan work with the climate climate action plan update?

And um also do we have any updates on the um built to endure work that's going on with the modeling?

So I for the first question, what I would say is we still have to determine that.

Um I don't have an answer for you tonight.

And as far as the modeling goes, I believe we're scheduling we have something maybe the manager can speak to you.

I I don't have an answer on the modeling, um, but we'll we'll certainly try to get that to you.

What we're trying to schedule is the uh collaboration with NC State for the plan review, and that's we're obviously at the end of a semester trying to get the university staff on board uh has a little pause there.

So we're uh trying to get that scheduled.

Okay, thank you.

Um, could you give me a little bit more of a timeline on that that resilience hub grant application with Central Pines and kind of um I guess how long would it take to if we were to win, and then are there things that we can be doing in the interim?

We uh we hope to hear hear back about the results of the grant in June at our meeting in June, and then from there we would uh if if awarded, we would begin the work of the assessment process.

It would probably take us a month or so to get under contract.

Um, and then I think the assessment would probably be um three to five months following, maybe hopefully a little shorter.

Um and then from there, we would know what we can do to continue investing in in the hub space.

That's great, thank you.

Um council member Rivers.

And and for the resilience hubs, is there space in that for the community have a say in like what they would like to see?

Like thinking about the engagement, like absolutely the the assessment part would be uh sort of an exercise in what's possible, and then from there, before any decisions get made about changes to facilities, we would we would want to have conversations about what makes sense.

Okay, do we have any members of the public wishing to speak?

Okay.

Um council members, it's back to you.

Councilmember Ryan, followed by council member sharp.

Yeah, thank you for all this.

Thanks for all this.

Um so when you're talking about priorities, one of the things that um I've heard from a bunch of my fellow council members is um a shift to um not a change, but adding resiliency in a stronger way than was present in the original report.

I think we were back in 2000 or whatever, I think we were more optimistic about holding the carbon tide back and uh so I think that that is gonna be something as as we update and tweak things that that I would like to see more of.

Um in turn of in terms of actions, I'm really gonna need to rely on you to help us figure that out because I can I can think of things, but I don't know what's practical, like having our own utility would be fabulous.

I don't Ted, I don't know if you would run out the door being asked to implement it and operate in a town eternity.

But so I just need I just need guidance.

You wanted to, yeah, let them let her answer.

Yeah.

The long and the short of that is it's highly impractical.

Um years ago, municipal governments led the way and starting a lot of utilities.

Uh they built their own power plants to run uh trolley car systems and put lights on main street and that sort of stuff.

So you had places like Wilmington doing that and what have you.

Over the years, uh we've the state's already been carved up uh by the utility commission to assign service areas to the investor-owned utilities as well as the co-ops, and there really isn't any service territory left.

While you can read in the statutes that municipal corporations have uh some inherent authority to provide electric utilities and some other utilities as a practical matter once the infrastructure is in place, there's no there's no way to displace it without protracted legal wrangling and and what have you, and it's it's it's only been done once in a blue moon, uh to my knowledge.

I I thought you got a little paler when that subject came up.

Um so I you know, um Councilman Sharp brought up finding ways to operationalize things like the natural areas plan as part of decision making, so that we actually have so that we bring in that connection to environment and sustainability when we are making planning decisions.

I think it's super important.

Um I've long been jealous of Chatham County.

They actually have a I think it's a halftime FTE that does environmental plan review and looks at their looks at things from that point of view, and I that is something that I would love to aspire to for the town.

So we got information on that.

Um in terms of engagement, I know you presented it last week's climate council meeting, and one of there was a group there that was talking about volunteer efforts, and especially as the federal government has become less engaged and state governments have become less engaged just at the power of things at the volunteer level.

And I know that we have we've got groups like the ones who have done invasive removal on our greenway who've been incredibly successful, supported in limited ways by the town in terms of providing some materials and providing cleanup of the brush, but but the volunteers are doing the planning and the labor.

Um I think that if we can figure out a way to engage community in that way, um, I think people would love to find things to do.

The turnouts to those were incredible.

Um so I think that that might be one other thing we can add.

And in terms of engagement, I think the mayor spoke pretty eloquently about making sure that we're doing engagement in a way that's really asking questions that we we can act on the answers to.

And um, so I think that's gonna be I think that's gonna be really powerful.

Like, for instance, I can see if you guys, as the experts say, okay, here are a list of volunteer programs that we think could be viable, which ones would you participate in?

Right.

I think that would be that would be that kind of question would be a very useful sort of input from us because it it constrains it at the beginning to things that we realistically and legally could do, and then hears from the community about what kind of things they would like.

Um council member McCullough.

I think council member sharp receivers.

Sorry.

Sorry, no, you were next.

Um I don't know if you would put this in the town level actions, community level actions or programs categories.

I'll let you decide where it fits.

Um but a couple things that um I would love to see added to one of those places.

One would be street tree pilot programs to see where as we are advancing our um connectivity goals and multimodal transportation goals that we are also adding um street trees in order to make those both um more usable for people so that they are actually they actually function as a way to get people out of their cars and also um help mitigate heat islands.

Um I think just street trees are the best.

We should put them in everywhere.

And I know that that's tricky with DOT roads and utilities, et cetera, but I would really, really, really love to see us dig in and try to tackle that problem because I think it would just be such a huge benefit on so many levels.

Um so street trees, please.

And then I would also love it, and I don't know if this is potentially maybe more for stormwater, but it certainly seems to me like a resiliency issue would be.

Councilmember McCullough, followed by Mayor Partemberry.

Okay.

I've got opinions.

And you probably know what all of them are.

Um what I have to say is about the messaging.

And the first thing I want to say is that you've got two members of the Sierra Club Executive Committee right here, and I think we can pretty reliably say that Sierra Club will help with communication and outreach, however, however possible.

That we are in damage control right now, and we cannot give up on mitigation efforts while for resilience.

Um because this is such an important way to just teach the public while they're engaged.

I think it's important that we that we work on as we outreach to and engage the community, that we create a sense of identity and and buy-in and ownership.

Um there's a great book called Switch, How to Change Things When Change is Hard.

And this sort of creating ownership and identity as we are a town that does this is really important in actually getting people to that action, especially if we're looking for voluntary actions and people to buy into the money that we're going to be spending.

One way can I hope be the a community climate action fund?

Um, but there are other things that we could do that would be in the social marketing realm.

Uh with regard to council member Nollert's discussion about trying to estimate the kind of emission reductions and changes in vehicle mode share that might happen.

I think that where we can't necessarily come up with numbers, we can certainly come up with uh examples.

And I think to use Paris as a as an example, I believe that I think the last I heard was that in the city center, more than half of the people are are out of their cars, and that uh that the air quality in the city center has really have you heard differently?

You were talking about the city.

Oh, I'm so very sorry.

Paris, France.

Um with the with the five five years of of um bike infrastructure they have installed and the mode share that they have seen and the air quality in the city center has been really amazing.

And so I think that showing the before and afters of a place that was just as drowning in cars as America will be a very helpful thing.

Um you know me and Co-Benefits, it was in the it was in the original CARP.

I think that's something that we need to continue to emphasize that we're getting multiple multiple benefits for the same buck.

Okay, that's all for me.

Thank you.

Councilmember Barry.

I just want to say that I love my colleagues.

And thank you.

I'm gonna continue on the on the vein of uh engagement.

I am really looking forward to it for for the town, for the folks in the town, because they want to be part of the creative um the idea making and then the realization of those ideas.

And I want to go back to groups that we can tap into, and this is not the exhaustive list we've heard about others, but the youth council.

And not just the youth council, but area high schools and maybe middle schools.

And because our youth, as you know, are extremely passionate about this matter and want to have a say.

Um and then you've got service clubs in the area.

I belong to one rotary club.

There are three in this area.

They are chomping.

We are chomping up the bit to support, and in fact, I could see these groups, service groups um being willing to sponsor support in some way this.

So please um if there are ideas that you would like help from us, I think we have plenty of I'm a connector.

And so I would love to be able to connect uh groups that have asked to be of of help.

Anyone else?

Uh councilmember McMahon.

I echo everyone's sentiment.

I think I raised a lot of my things in the questions.

Um, but I I do I read this week that uh, you know, our our Chapel Transit's back up and running every route.

I'm an F-Route guy.

It's amazing to see it back.

And I again one of the things we talked about the last meeting was doing our best not to compartmentalize.

And I think one of our biggest heavy hitters in climate change in this town is the investment we make in transit.

So as much as we can keep transit uh for in the forefront here of of what we're doing and what makes this town special.

And um, I just applaud us and the Chapel Transit folks for getting all the lines back up and running.

And uh after filling my gas tank today, I'm going to find extra times that I can take the bus.

So uh thank you, Chapital Transit, and just making sure that that really stands out as one of our shining stars, in my opinion.

Uh Councilmember Rivers.

Cool.

Um I know you're gonna come back to us after an engagement, but would it be possible for us to see some like the high-level messaging themes that you plan to have before you go out with the at the engagement?

Because I I think councilmember McCullough has suggested some stuff, especially this idea of like mitigation and balance with resiliency.

So it'll be nice to see those before you go back out.

Um thank you very much for bringing this back um and for engaging with the council um in advance of the public.

I think that's um really helpful.

Um I think um I think that I uh I very much agree that it's not just resiliency or just mitigation.

Um I think a lot of our mitigation is actually our our carbon reduction is largely driven by UNC, or you know, that there's not as much as we that we can do in terms of our town investment in mitigation, but I love the idea of getting volunteers and getting people engaged and having that be a community ownership thing.

So to me, the mitigation is where I feel like the town has the biggest role, knowing that we really want to facilitate the other piece too.

So I don't think it's that we don't do it, I just think they're different.

Um so I really feel like it's important to make sure that there's a big focus on resilience.

Um the resiliency hubs, the resiliency proofing of the town.

I think it's huge, and and I don't want to give up on um carbon reduction goals as well.

Um I I do really like the idea of making it easier for people to volunteer, I think, in ways that would be helpful.

I know um I know there's a lot of interest in all sorts of things, but I think finding out from the public, like somebody said, you know, what are things that you would like to be able to do um in terms of participating and volunteering.

I think I hear all the time that people they want to go and pick up all that trash behind the um behind the what is it over there on Elliot?

The cookout.

Yeah.

And I'm like, bless, because that is terrible back there.

But like, you know, people really want to do things, and so I think finding ways to make that easier for them and making it more official or something that people can feed into, I think would be really, really exciting.

Um I think figuring out any other opportunities for partnership and then kind of really building that energy around November and trees in April and Earth Month, and you know, getting getting the community as engaged as possible.

And I think um I think all those metrics and other things will make that more interesting and more concrete for people too.

Like we're making progress.

We're actually seeing a you know, a needle move or something, you know, that there's something happening, and that's what I think will also motivate people, and then you know, we can like have fun competitions against our neighbors and do all you know, like whatever, just like well, we would win, obviously.

But um, paste, Carbro.

But yeah, Carbra will be mad if we say that.

But um anyway, I really um I think there's a lot of energy around this, and I think people are looking for things to do.

Um I'm I am really interested in those metrics and understanding how that's gonna fit into all this.

But um, but yeah, thank you.

And I think we're we're really excited to see how this goes.

I I personally am not one that I want I would ask you to go everywhere.

I would ask you to like go to really strategic places and and be smart about engagement.

We don't, you know, and getting some good sampling is great, but I think having you out like all summer talking to every single group is probably not what I would think is the best use of time, but um, I'm sure you all will figure out a good balance there.

Um, so thank you.

Um next up isem number 10.

Uh it's the public hearing on Project Stark Tower.

Um, and our presenter is David Putnam, who is our director of economic development.

I don't know how to lower this.

That's a high table there, David.

But thank you.

He's a pro.

Y'all might not know this about me, but I am the tallest one in my family.

It's all relish.

Yeah.

It really shocked my wife.

She thought I was joking.

Good evening, Mayor and Council.

My name is David Putnam.

I'm your economic development director, and I'm here today to talk to you all about Project Stark Tower.

So the location of where this project is proposing to locate in the town of Chapel Hill is the 136 East Rosemary Street building in downtown.

This uh would be a headquarters location for the project.

Um, and they would take over a significant amount of space over time in this building, reaching nearly full occupancy.

Um, and what the company is proposing to invest in the town is 152 jobs with an average wage of 77,000, uh 1.5 million dollars over the course of five years in personal tangible property, um, and again, a headquarters investment in downtown.

Uh what they are asking for an inducement from you to consider is 261,000 worth of parking credits for five years, $57,000 cash grant and award for five years, and then a per all of these um awards would be performance-based though, and breaked out annually.

So the company would have to perform in order to unlock the full package of the incentive.

And that is how we have structured this.

Real quick key points of return on investment.

Um kind of modeling what this looks like for you all.

Uh, I've uh forecast and combined parking revenues and property taxes.

Um this is a positive cash flow project uh right out of the gate, which is a really competitive position for you all uh to consider.

And over the course of about a decade, we're talking about um potential two million dollars in revenue for the town of Chapel Hill.

So this chart uh that I'm displaying today really describes two kind of timelines.

Uh we're gonna focus on the bar chart first.

Um so the blue boxes are essentially the expected revenues that the town is gonna see um again, combined revenues over the course of every year, and then the red bar is the projected incentive offering to the company every year.

And the green line, this is where it we start to get into a cumulative timeline.

This is where we are stacking the revenues over the course of the the full period of performance of this project, so about 10 years.

Um essentially the green box is just the difference of the blue and the red over time just added together.

So this uh Project Stark Tower is a priority industry for the town uh per year incentive policy.

Um it is a local business, in fact, it's a high impact project.

Uh and it also presents you all with a high growth opportunity, especially in our downtown central business district.

The company is Blue Sky Robotics, it's an advanced uh robotics and precision software company.

Uh they design, build, and deploy automated robotic solutions to solve complex problems in the fields of healthcare, logistics, manufacturing, um, and hospitality to name a few.

Uh they have a really diverse kind of industry offering that can be adapted in many different focus areas.

This is also a highly competitive project, due in part because everybody's chasing these.

Um this kind of checks the box for high growth technology companies that we should be really proud that we're getting this look for.

Um the company it's competitive, quite frankly, because the company's need for rapid talent and the industry sector uh that they touch.

Uh there is additional capital investment, like many office lease opportunities that are wrapped up in their lease negotiations with their landlord.

Um the 1.5 million dollar number that I'm showing you today is just the personal tangible property.

It is not recognizing the real property tax improvements that you could see from this project, but we don't have a way to capture those and report those to you right now.

Um but you'll be able to feel them over time, and you'll see them on the tax roll.

Uh this company is a launch Chapel Hill graduate specifically from the new powered by KPMG program that we're on the third cohort of.

Um, and so we're really excited to see that these sorts of investments from you all and partnerships are being fruitful, right?

And have rapid turnarounds on return on investment to the town.

And this is a heavy job retention and creation project, of course, because it comes with it 152 new jobs.

Uh this is a rapid talent uh project that I mentioned before.

Um, these are your core competitors, and of the three, Grapevine, Texas is the most real.

Uh, they have a partnership with an industry uh provider over there, and this provider is offering this company space, um, which is a really lucrative offer, considering space is in such scarce demand or scarce offerings, excuse me.

And so I I'm presenting this because um I have a recommended action for you to take.

Uh I my recommended action for you all is to approve resolution 2026 520 R2 offering incentives up to 318,000 allocated between cash awards and credits to Blue Sky Robotics Inc.

based upon again their company full-time job creation goals and performance.

And I'm happy to take any questions.

Council questions?

Members of the public wishing to speak.

Oh hold on.

Do I have to open the public hearing?

Okay, look at look at me go.

Um council, can I have a motion to open the public hearing?

So move by um council member Ryan, seconded by councilmember Miller Fushi.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous.

Okay.

No comments from the public.

So I'd like to move.

Um, sure.

So sorry.

I just have a an anecdotal comment to share, which is that one of our own employees who is a recent UNC graduate with a degree in computer science has been hired away from us by Blue Sky Robotics, which is bittersweet, but I just think it's a great we would we wish we could keep him, but it is a great opportunity for him.

And I love that it means that one of our UNC graduates, his skills are staying in town, and it's all happening, David.

So yeah.

It just gave me goosebumps.

It's working the way it's like.

Seriously.

That's yeah, that's the magical.

It's very cool.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's very cool.

Okay.

So do I have a motion to close the public hearing?

So moved.

Second.

Move by Mayor Pro Temberry, seconded by Councilmember McMahon.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous.

I'd like to move R2.

Second.

Move by Mayor Pro Tem Barry and something over there by Councilmember McMahon.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous.

Thank you.

And thank you for this excellent work and for bringing this exciting project.

Okay.

Last but not least.

Item number 11 is the legislative hearing on a conditional zoning modification for 11 White Oak Drive.

And Charnika Harel has been waiting patiently to walk us through.

The applicant, I'll let the applicant present first, and then I'll follow up with a brief staff presentation.

So you can be able to see how to hear.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Good evening.

Good evening.

My name is Brian Harris.

I'm with Dwell Design Studio.

We are the architect of record for this project.

And I'm here on uh behalf of our clients I'm living.

Um in light of the time, I know you guys have received the uh slides in your presentation packet.

Um I'm happy to jump right into questions and answers, but I'm also happy to do a brief presentation if you'd like.

Council, would you like a presentation?

Yes, yes, please.

Sure.

Absolutely.

Um it's showing on there, it's not showing on here.

Um I'm gonna try to go through the slides.

Um is there a way to move it?

Uh okay.

Um, so um I'm here to request a modification uh to the previously approved rezoning of CZD 20-24-6, which was approved by the council in June 2025.

Um as part of that rezoning.

Uh modification one kept the height of the buildings at 62 feet.

Um also part of that rezoning.

The plans identify the locations of the building on the site.

Um I'll pull up the site plan and we can take a look at that.

So this is the site plan.

Um, also as part of the reason the plans identify the locations of the building on the site that you see there.

The site is uh has a lot of land with a lot of topography change.

Uh we're at the intersection of old Chapel Hill and White Oak Road, going from old Chapel Hill north to the greenway is 20 to 30 feet of fall.

Same uh occurs on the north end of the site going south towards the greenway.

So we really wanted to have these buildings naturally step with the grade of the site, lean into the site instead of grading it out completely flat.

Um and as a result of this, the average grade plane that we were able to achieve, uh which is a calculation we must uh do and show for zoning compliance, was much lower than what it would have been if we just had a flat site.

So at the same time we were working on the design of this project and we were playing around with you know various roof lines on the exterior design uh to break up the facade, which was I think was a goal of the initial um a rezoning.

And so um we were looking at mixing sloped and flat roof conditions um uh to kind of give a blend of both traditional and modern aesthetic.

Um I'm gonna pull up the next slide, which will kind of convey.

If you look at this as one of the buildings on site, um we've got um in the blue right there is the sloped uh roof portions.

Um I am so sorry.

Do you mind backing up just a hair from the you're really close, so it's coming out really strong.

Okay, sure.

Just want you to hear me.

Yeah, yeah.

Uh is this better?

Not right.

Is this fine?

Okay, you can hear me there.

Okay.

There's no one else here anyways.

Um and so if you look at this, if you look at this um exhibit here, the blue area indicates the ridge of the sloped roof portions.

Um, and the other is of the roof would basically be the flat roof portions.

Um so with the natural grading of the site and the roof design coming together, we were dotting our I's crossing our T's, uh making sure we were building code and zoning code compliant for the roof measurements and determined that the the Chapel Hill Lumo calculates average grade plane and building height slightly differently than the building code.

Uh the state building code calculate calculates it with a couple measurements around the building, and then they measure to for a sloped roof, kind of the midpoint of the the ridge in the eve.

The Chapel Hill, I believe the LUMO states you have to have two points um at each end of the building along the street facade.

You take the average grade of those two, and if you're building fronts two streets, then you have to put the the lowest of that grade.

Um and they all you also measure to the the top of the structure and not the midpoint.

Um so with you know the aggregate being lower, the the height measurement being higher, um we realize that the measurement of the roof was higher than the 62 feet cap at those sloped portions, and again, the other 70% of the roof is well below that 62-foot max.

Um so the additional measurement we're asking is essentially you know, four to seven feet um of additional uh height, uh essentially you know, one of me, uh depending on what shoes I wear.

Um and so uh you know, do want to point out the following that you know there is uh no change to the uh the massing the floor area.

We're not adding dwelling units, we're not changing setbacks or any kind of um shadow issues.

Most of the roof is flat, it is well under the height.

Um we're just asking for uh um a minor uh adjustment to this technical discrepancy.

So that is the presentation and appreciate you guys' time and would open up to questions now.

Clarifying questions, counselor.

Mayor Pro Temberry.

Thank you.

Um what beyond aesthetics is the is the motivation for this change.

So as part of the rezoning, we um there's some stipulations and requirements to kind of break up the massing of the building.

Um, and so we wanted to undulate that with the roof as well, too, right?

Creating varying roof lines kind of helps break up the articulation of the building, break the massing down, uh make it feel more friendly and pedestrian.

So that was the goal of doing the roof lines.

So making it taller breaks up the massing?

Uh making it taller.

Making that making it taller.

Sorry, can you repeat the question?

So increasing that makes it breaks up the massing.

Am I understanding?

It does not break up the massing.

I was just saying that the various roof lines that we were trying to achieve.

Increasing the height allows us to keep the sloped roof portions.

If we were to not have the height um at those, if we were not allowed to have that taller height at the sloped roof areas, we would have the whole building flat, which doesn't quite, I think break up the massing as as it as well as uh the various uh sloped roof portions would council member McCullough.

Um of the solutions that you talked to then was changing the pitch of the roof from a uh 912, I think, to a uh 512.

And I was wondering what kind of a delay it would cost to have to redo all the roof pitches.

Um would it delay the project?

Um you know, we have submitted for plan review for building permit.

Um and we are well in the site plan process, so it would it would delay the design process.

Okay.

I'm not sure the magnitude, but it would.

Do you need me to open the public hearing?

Jam.

Okay.

Council, can I have a motion to open the public hearing?

So moved.

Second.

Move by oh, you get all of them tonight.

All right.

Move by uh council member McMahon, seconded by council member uh Nollert.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous.

Do we have members of the public wishing to speak?

We do not.

Shock.

Council members.

Yes.

I very much appreciate the articulation of the roofs on this project.

And I would like to put it to our planning commission that perhaps we consider um incentivizing articulated or gabled roofs with added height, since I assume that part of the reason we don't get those in projects is that that pitched part of the roof is not revenue generating because you can't lease it out as apartments.

So the fact that we were able to get better design by allowing a little more height, I think is really great.

Charnika, I didn't wait for your presentation.

I am so sorry.

It is fine.

It's late.

So I will just um put up the slide with the ordinance and resolution numbers if y'all are ready to do that.

Fantastic.

I think that is we are ready to roll.

Okay.

I can get the mouse.

We've opened the public hearing.

Yes.

You may or may not know.

We have received public comment.

Do I have a motion to close the public hearing?

Oh, I had a comment, but that's okay.

Anyway.

Move by Mayor Pro Tembury, seconded by Councilmember Miller Fushi.

Any final comments?

Yes, thank you.

I didn't realize.

I'm so sorry.

No, I didn't realize that.

I do want to hear from my colleagues.

So we're gonna do final comments.

We're doing it now.

We're okay.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

Thank you.

Yeah, I just um I actually have a different point of view from you.

I the gabled roofs on a big apartment building is always look super odd to me.

And I I think that the flat roofs just look more honest.

So I think it's an aesthetic.

I not that either one of us is wrong.

I think it's I don't know that I would want the town to put their finger on the scale for that just to let the architects work that out.

So that's my two cents on that.

Councilmember McCullough.

I don't know if this went to the CDC.

Um, but I I tend to like um articulation.

It's not gonna make this building pretty um, but it will make it less boring.

Um, and I don't think that the that the difference is gonna be that noticeable.

Um I am a little perturbed that this mistake was made, and I don't want to see future projects coming in and trying to make this mistake um intentionally and then going, oh, we we made a mistake, we want to get extra height.

Um not that I'm accusing y'all of that, um, but I worked in government long enough.

I know people look for loopholes, and so I just want to that I want us to be able to point out in the future um to people who are discussing things like this with staff that we make sure and point out this is what it means in ours, and you don't use the state building code numbers.

Um so that for what it's worth and the um the last thing is that if it's already in the process, I don't want to see it delayed.

We need housing.

This is already going.

Um I want to have it done and get some people uh with roofs over their heads.

Uh Mayor Pro Temberry.

Thank you.

I seem to recall when this came before us, um, that we had members of the community who were concerned about height um with different projects on that road, and this was one of them.

And so this does not lend itself um to me.

If it's for me, it's it seems to be just aesthetic.

And I had asked that question when I was approached about this some time ago.

Um if it were functional, if it were if it were serving a purpose more than this, then I could consider it uh more readily.

But for this, I'm not in support of it given uh what the public said when they came when this was considered.

Okay, I've got one other quick thing.

Sorry, you all are killing me.

Yes, ma'am.

Keeping you on your toes.

Thank you.

Uh just somebody had a question about the CDC.

They did see it and we're very excited about the project.

Okay, there's a motion on the floor.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Um, any opposed, please say nay.

Yes.

Okay.

What I thought you were voting against this project.

Oh, wait.

That was already.

We were closing the public hearing.

Oh, I even lost track.

Sorry.

We were closing.

And I said, do we have a second for closing it?

Okay, so I move.

I'm move that we put.

No, we have a second.

The motion on the floor, sorry, is to close the public hearing.

Motion is unanimous.

Do I have a motion for um for R3?

So moved.

Second.

Moved by uh Mayor Pro.

Councilmember Miller Fushi, seconded by Councilmember Noller.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Uh all any opposed, please say nay.

Nay.

Um motion passes eight to one.

Um do I have a motion for oh one?

So moved.

Moved by Councilmember Nollard.

Seconded by Councilmember Miller Fushi.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Nay.

Motion carries eight to one.

Thank you.

Um next up.

Um we have um the ballots for the community design commission.

We want to thank everyone who applied, and of course, we hope that people will always consider volunteering, be it on our boards or other ways in the town.

Um the council has appointed Kelly Mills and Rachel to shop to Shabe, maybe to the community design commission.

Um thank you, council, for turning in your ballots on time, except for me.

Um, and finally, um I need a motion to go into closed session.

So I move we go into closed session under North Carolina General Statute 143-318.11a6.

Second.

Moved by Mayor Pro Tem Barry, seconded by um Councilmember Ryan.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, please say nay.

Motion is unanimous, and we are recessed to room 102.

Thank you.

Can I see that one?