Regular meeting number sixty-one will come to order.

Please stand for the playing of the national anthem.

Councilmember Green, would you lead us in the pledge?

Congratulations to the flag for the United States of America.

Liberty this afternoon, Council is grateful to have Minister Ayana Fulham from Hope City Church to pray with us.

Ayana, welcome to Council.

Good evening, Council members.

My name is Minister Ariana, and I'm grateful to be here today.

And so, dear Heavenly Father, God, we thank you, Gloria, for this day.

We thank you for your grace, your mercy, and for your faithfulness, Father.

We come before you, God, in humility and gratitude, acknowledging that all wisdom, authority, and blessing truly does come from you.

I thank you for the city of Columbus, God, for his people, its neighborhoods, its history, and the hope that we collectively share for the future.

God, I thank you for each person who has been called to serve in this leadership and for the responsibility that you have entrusted to this council.

Lord, I ask for your presence and your guidance as decisions are made in this room.

I ask that you would grant these leaders with the wisdom of Solomon the courage to do what is right and a heart that leads with justice, mercy, and truth.

Ask for your continued blessing upon Columbus, that you will continue to bring peace to our streets, uh peace to our homes, and hope to all who live and work here.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thank you, Pastor.

Clerk, please call the role.

Thanks, Timberwolves de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Norris Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Any person who takes any action to obstruct or interfere with the conduct of tonight's meeting may be charged with serving a lawful meeting pursuant to Columbus City Code 2317.12.

Any person who enters those areas of city council chambers reserved for city officials or invited guests may be charged with criminal trespass pursuant to Columbus City Code 2311.

Can I get a motion to ensure the reading of the journal?

Clerk, please call the roll.

Thanks, Timberwolves De Padilla, Beatty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harding.

Are there any additions or corrections to the journal?

Hearing none, the journal is approved.

This week's communication received by the city clerk's office are listed on the agenda and will be published in the city bullets.

Not at this time.

Starting with Councilmember Banks too.

Thank you, Council President.

Just one announcement.

Uh this evening.

Uh this Thursday at 3 p.m.

I will chair the first of the 2026 operating budget hearings on many of the finance and governance committee.

Uh this hearing will go over the operating budget as a whole, and we'll delve into the individual budgets of the Department of Finance and Management, the auditor, the treasurer, and the Department of Technology.

Any residents seeking to submit written testimony should forward it to my office.

Uh in-person and written testimony must be emailed to Jonathan Brown at JB Brown at Columbus.gov by 10 a.m.

on Thursday with the subject line, December 18th operating budget hearing.

Each speaker will be limited to remarks lasting no longer to three minutes.

The meeting will be live streamed on the city's YouTube channel and also Facebook.

Again, this is just the first of many budget hearings that we will go over for the 2026 operating budget and ask that folks engage and lean in throughout this process.

Uh thank you, Council President Soul Hatt.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Councilmember Rosa de Padilla.

Thank you, Council President.

Uh well, friends, winter has come.

Uh, and it came in uh our second snowstorm.

I want to thank our snow warriors.

We had a full call out.

We had 88 trucks um at the height of the storm that were out.

We had 50 volunteers, and director, I'm looking at you to check my work.

We had 50 volunteers.

Those are that's essentially our auxiliary staff that pitches in from other departments.

Uh that can also drive some of our smaller plows to ensure that our folks stay safe over the weekend.

Our kids got a surprise day off.

I know mine were very, very excited about it.

Uh, but we kept the roads cleared.

Director, I don't know if there's anything that you want to add or you want to say.

Council President, uh, Chair Barossa De Padilla.

Just really thankful for all the help and all the patience and to help keep our snow warriors safe out there while we're trying to get all the snow and ice cleared.

And it was funny, I was actually going to have them come to this meeting, uh, but they had a well-deserved time off today as they worked around the clock throughout the weekend.

I also want to call out uh the community shelter board who really worked to organize folks to ensure that folks had a warm place to go, especially in uh the coldest of temperatures and at the height of the storm and those warming centers are still open.

I want to thank Coda.

Uh, just a reminder at that at a level two snow emergency, CODA is free for all.

That includes CODA Plus, which is our on-demand service.

So I want to also thank CODA for pitching in to make sure that folks can get to where they need to go uh safely.

So as we close out this council meeting, obviously we will continue to talk to the public should we have another snow event.

But I just want to thank everyone for pitching in.

I want to thank our residents for clearing sidewalks for checking in on your neighbors and making sure people with mobility issues, older folks were safe, um, especially as the temperatures continue to drop.

I know that we're gonna have a spike back up in this crazy yo-yo weather this week, but um this is the best of us, I think during these snow emergencies of checking in together and coming together for as a community.

So I just want to thank everyone for that, wishing everybody a safe and happy holiday season, however you celebrate and make sure, uh, especially during inclement weather that you're staying patient, giving yourself enough time to get to where you're going and be safe and be well.

See you next year.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Councilmember Beatty.

Nothing this evening.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Councilmember De Ocauer.

Council Mr.

Meeting.

Press Pro Tim.

Uh thank you, Council President.

Just one announcement.

Uh this weekend with uh I think a lot of the council members that are up here and our staff will be joining St.

Stephen's Community House and the Central Island Labor Council for Christmas Cares Union Chairs, uh, which is the annual event that provides over uh a thousand pounds of fresh produce, meat, and grains, and non-perishables items to over 3,000 households here in Central Ohio leading up to the holidays.

Uh it's been an event that we've uh council supported a number of years with our friends both at St.

Stevens and folks in organized labor.

Um there is an opportunity for folks in the community if you're interested in signing up to help volunteer.

Uh they're looking for volunteers all this week.

It's a whole lead up to this weekend where there's a huge drive-thru with individuals uh coming through to get the food that they need.

So if you're interested in volunteering, you can sign up to assist at the on St.

Stephen's website uh and pick a shift that would work for you and your family to help uh make someone else's holiday season a little bit more joyful.

So uh with that, uh that's all I have on the announcements.

Thanks.

Thank you, President.

Councilmember Green.

Councilmember uh Remy.

Councilmember Whitech.

Thank you, sir.

Uh I want to uh announce that I'm hosting an alternative crisis response hearing with Councilmember Green and Remy on December 17th at 5 30 p.m.

here in City Council Council Chambers.

We will be hearing from Mission Critical about their report in collaboration with the Department of Public Safety and Health.

So I encourage uh folks to come and be a part of that uh ongoing and growing conversation around how we keep our community safe with alternative crisis support.

Um now I'm very excited for this portion of the meeting where we get to welcome our newly appointed uh members of the LGBTQ plus affairs commission.

So uh would the new members would you start to come to the front?

It was someone helped direct them up tonight.

We take a meaningful step forward for our city as we formally seat and recognize the members of the Columbus LGTQ Affairs Commission.

This moment is the result of years of advocacy of community organizing and leadership.

I was proud to bring forward the legislation to create this commission in July.

It reflects a simple uh keep on going.

About right there.

There we go.

It reflects a simple but powerful belief that voices of LGBTQ plus residents belong at the table when decisions are being made that affect their lives.

The commissioners seated this evening represent many great residents in Columbus who are committed to a welcoming and inclusive city.

In fact, we received 125 applications for this commission, and that was a very, very strong pool of applicants.

These commissioners appointed here tonight come from different generations, different races, different ethnicities, and different professions.

They reflect a wide range of gender identities and life experiences.

And together, they bring a depth of perspective that will strengthen the work of this city.

Among this group are LGBTQ residents who have long been advocates for equity and inclusion.

There are parents of LGBTQ children who show us what love, courage, and fierce advocacy looks like every single day.

There is a straight ally who understands that standing up for equality is not about identity, it's about values.

We are joined by a veteran whose service to this country and this community continues in a new way, and we are proud to include two area commissioners, ensuring strong regional collaboration and a broader lens on the issues facing our community.

This commission reflects an important truth.

The LGBTQ plus community is not a monolith.

It is diverse, it is intersectional, and woven into every part of our city, into every part of our neighborhoods, our schools, our workplaces, and our families.

The charge before this commission is significant.

They will advise City Council and the mayor on policies and programs that impact our residents.

You will help identify gaps, you will elevate concerns, and you will make uh recommend solutions rooted in your lived experience and equity.

And you will serve as a bridge between the community and local government at a time when LGBTQ people, especially young people and families are facing increased hostility and uncertainty at the state and national level.

Columbus is choosing a different path.

We are choosing to listen.

To each of the commissioners seated this evening, we want to say thank you for stepping forward.

Thank you.

Thank you for your willingness to serve, to collaborate, to help shape a city where everyone can live openly, live safely, and live with dignity where everyone, everyone feels like they belong.

We are grateful for your leadership, and we look forward to the work ahead.

Now I would like to uh ask the newly newly appointed chair of the LGBTQ plus commission, is Jasmine Robert Cruz to say a few words.

Jasmine, welcome, and thank you for your leadership.

Oh, sorry about that.

While Jasmine is going, do we want to go ahead and do names?

Would you introduce yourself?

Let's uh if we can start, Thomas, you want to go first, come to the podium, introduce yourself, and then we'll have Jasmine uh finish out with uh introduction of the community.

Uh Thomas Savage.

I was told too you guys can face me too for the cameras, it's actually better.

All right, and keep on going.

Yeah.

Yep.

Jamie Lenzo.

Jayla Hollins.

Uh Riley Williamson.

Julia Applegate.

Sioban Boyd Nelson.

Jimmy Vera.

Robleys.

Jonathan Kyle Holtz.

Tyson Kringle.

Peaches Calhoun.

And I am Jasmine Roberts Cruz.

Um, good evening, everyone.

I'm just gonna say a few words.

It really is an honor to stand before you today as the chair of Columbus's first LGBTQ plus commission.

I want to first thank City Council President Harden for leading the efforts to make this commission a reality.

Columbus is now the second city in Ohio to have a commission of this kind, thanks to your vision.

I also want to take the time to acknowledge the ancestors.

Each and every single one of us brings into this room, those who guide and inspire us to continue this work of creating a better city, a better state, and a better nation.

I am a black bisexual woman.

I married the most beautiful and kind woman on Juneteenth a few years ago, which of course is also during Pride Month.

I share this because these issues are deeply personal to me, and I am not afraid to admit that.

I am sure some of the other members on this commission feel similarly.

Our commission exists for a clear purpose to advise, advocate, and elevate the needs of LGBTQ people in Columbus so that our mayor and city council can support us in a more meaningful way.

We want to make sure our voices are not only respected and heard, but also actually acted upon.

Too often conversations remain just that conversations.

But I'm hopeful this commission helps to push for generative change.

Through our work, we want to make sure there is special attention to the most marginalized within the LGBTQ plus community, which includes our trans people of color, who without them, there would be no pride.

Once more, there would be no pride without trans people of color, our queer youth, black, indigenous, brown, Asian queer people, and queer elders.

We also want to make sure Columbus remains and exceeds expectations as a thriving safe place where LGBTQ plus people can live with dignity.

The formation of this commission is timely.

Y'all know, given current events, we know that equality is not just something that'll be given to us.

We have to demand it and maintain it.

We have heard the headlines.

Some of us have even doom-scrolled on social media.

I am guilty of it.

Trans youth in particular being used to spread fear and misinformation.

Access to quality health care, access to safe affordable housing, harassment and discrimination in workplaces and schools, financial support to our community partners and orgs, police violence, and mental health are just some of the issues that demand our commission's attention.

These issues affect real people every day.

As chair, I do not for any moment take this opportunity for granted.

Our commission plans to work closely with community members, activists, local leaders, and policymakers to create effective policies, monitor legislation, expand access to resources, hold public forums, and curate cultural opportunities.

And the last thing I want to say is to my community.

It is an honor to advocate for and with you.

To our allies, we need you.

To those who want to support our work, your vocal support matters, not just when it's convenient.

And even to our opponents, we hope you soften your hearts and widen your worldview and see us as the human beings we are, because we have been here, we are presently here, and we will continue to be here.

There are indeed queer and trans people in the future.

Thank you all for your trust and your continued commitment to equality.

We are very grateful that each and every one of you raised your hand to serve in this moment.

Um this moment of advocacy takes courage.

Uh, and so we should not uh gloss over that.

Um, that there is uh it is a courageous act to step up in this way uh in this moment.

So thank you so much for being courageous uh right now.

I also want to speak to the uh my math is terrible, the 110 or so that did not get appointed to the commission, 12, 112.

That's the math, uh, who were not appointed to the commission, but also raised their hand to serve.

Um, we look forward to working with each and every one of you as well to continue to serve our community.

I think you heard that in the chair's remarks that we are going to do this together.

Uh, and so we are grateful.

Um, there's a lot on the shoulders of the first commission.

They literally will shape what this becomes.

As we said, they will have resources to go out and build literally their um roadmap, build their guidelines.

Uh, and so we look to this first commission to really lead and set the groundwork for the commissions to come.

Um, I before I turn over to my colleagues to see if anybody has any remarks.

I want to thank several people who made this happen.

Uh, Sam Dooling, where Sam at Sam Dooling and Jose Rodriguez uh on the council side.

Thank you so much.

Let's give it up for Sam and they worked really, really hard.

Literally, this could not have happened without the partnership of the mayor's office staff, specifically Marshall Choxel.

Marshall, thank you so, so so much.

Uh it was also supported by Deputy Chief Conley and our ODI staff, uh, Dr.

Love Benton and Dr.

Keanu Walker.

Thank you so much to ODI as well.

Uh, with that, I want to uh Councilmember Burrosade Padilla.

Thank you, Council President.

Um, I too just want to say thank you.

Thank you for serving.

I think it's wild for us whenever we want to stand up for our people, for our identities, for who we are, to say that that's brave and courageous.

That should never be a statement that we have to say.

And I think at a time when uh so many folks in our community are attacked for where they were born, what language they speak, who they love, how they pray.

Um, that we as a city said no.

Not only are we gonna put up uh immigrant and refugee commission, we're also gonna put in an LGBTQ plus commission that we are going to uh lean way in, that we are going to say uh when you were trying to push people further away from the table, we're going to build a table, and we're gonna pull up chairs for everybody to have a seat and for everyone to have a voice.

And so I just want to say thank you, thank you for serving, thank you for helping us to be more proximate.

Thank you for helping to educate us.

Thank you for um showing us the blind spots and the gaps that we will see.

Thank you for making our city better because when you invest in the people who are furthest from justice, all boats rise.

We make it easier for everyone in the entire system.

And so that's what your work here will do.

I'm so excited to see all the things that you will do.

I'm excited to see what will come.

Uh, we've even been talking about ways that our commissions can even work together because you know, there are cross identities that people have, and we carry so many different identities and have some of the same challenges and struggles.

And so um, again, from a very grateful city, thank you for your service.

And um, I I can't wait to see all the good things that will come.

If there are no other comments from my colleagues, can we give all of them a standing round of applause?

Because we are very grateful for this creation.

Thank you, Commissioners.

Thank you for your service.

Tonight also is uh special for this body because um it is council member uh Otto Beatty's final council meeting.

Um it's hard to believe because uh we've grown accustomed to his presence here on council, but he has been a model, a model of a great council member.

He has shown curiosity about every aspect of being uh a leader in this community, about attending hearings and asking tough questions, dealing with constituent concerns, and even passing a landmark piece of housing legislation.

Uh, we want to thank and congratulate Councilmember Beatty on his willingness to step up, his willingness to serve.

Um we're grateful.

We're grateful for you.

As I um said last week privately, you made a choice uh to raise your hand in this moment.

I think a lot like a lot of folks post uh last year's election, where we were all kind of reeling about what we can do next.

Um, we all entered the do something era.

You did the most uh uh dramatic thing, which was throw your head and hand and your hat into the political arena, into the governing arena, but you did it with all of your heart and all of your mind, and you made our city better.

So um on behalf of a grateful, grateful city.

Um, we do have a resolution, but before I introduce it, I want to um allow for my members and colleagues to go around the the dais.

Um and if they'd like to share any um uh remarks uh on our colleague, starting with councilman Bankstone.

Uh thank you, uh Council President, and uh echo many of your sentiments.

Um, Otto, uh, I appreciate you raising your hand and in a short period of time, uh, literally getting I think a transformative piece of legislation uh done for this community.

Uh and I admire that because you really sank your teeth into it.

Uh I also am grateful for this opportunity because I know it helped to strengthen our relationship.

I know I've learned a lot from you, uh, particularly uh in the economic development space.

And so I just want to say thank you because serving is not hard as you know your family is uh no stranger to that, uh, but it's different when it's you and you put your name on the line.

So I just want to say thank you.

And I also want to say thank you to raising the bar.

Most folks don't notice when council member Beatty was doing the ADU stuff, he was going around, he had this whole binder that he prepared his presentations, had all the notes and everything.

And so JP has a lot more work to do now because of that standard that you set.

Um but no, I just want to say I think that's what is one of the things that's refreshing is that you approach the work uh in a different way and a diligent way uh that I think all of us can learn from and that this council will be better for.

So thank you again for your service and looking forward to what you're gonna do uh in this community because I know that you will continue to lead uh and we will continue to lean on you as well as we move forward.

So thank you again and congratulations.

Um, first of all, I'm gonna miss you as my seat partner, Otto and I um often I appreciate his perspective.

I think uh we used that best, Council President, when you talked about reaching looking at things from from curiosity, and I think with the legacy that you hold, it's very easy for folks to think that you might come in with some sort of ego, and you never did.

You you always asked questions, you were always curious about why things work that they way that they did.

I think for anyone, you could very easily stay focused on one thing and you didn't.

You focused on all of the things, right?

And we shared many, many different conversations where you would challenge me or share another perspective or help me walk through things.

Um other thing when we talk about legacy that also struck me is um we did a reception for councilmember Beatty, and we talked about the 70 years of service that your family has given to this community, and that you now join the ranks of the rest of your family members is giving the opportunity to raise your hand and to serve, and you know, you could have been doing anything else with this this year, you could have been doing anything else with your time, and you chose to be here, and you made us a better council.

You certainly certainly made me a better council member by being here.

Um, I know our conversations will not end uh once you leave, and I will certainly call you for your counsel, and you'd certainly raise the bar in terms of being prepared and making sure.

I mean, when you run your own uh briefings, there's no members of the department.

Um that just goes to show the wealth of knowledge and how deep you went into every piece of legislation that you know was part of the ADU process.

So thank you for serving.

Thank you for um being my new bestie.

Um, and uh thank you for um the for living up to the legacy because I know that that's something that's very important to you, and something that we talked a lot about.

So oh, and also we never talk about this.

We're fellow east side kids for life.

You're just another kid from the east side, so my colleagues have said so much, and I don't want to um be repeating, but it's been so impressive seeing how you've handled your first year.

Because those of us who, you know, when we all started our first year and we remember how we felt like we were drinking from a fire hose and all those things we had to figure out, and it's like he came in here already knowing what to do and how to do it, and you covered it well.

Um, but it's just it is as they've all said, it's been impressive to see just how detailed and how um how you just dove into everything and showing up for all those hearings and everything.

And so I just really appreciate your dedication.

Um, we briefly had the gray-haired caucus here for a year.

Uh but yeah, we're gonna miss having you sitting next to us here, um, sandwiched between the ladies on this side of the day is.

Um, but I look forward to all the continued um collaboration that we'll be able to do in the future.

Well, Councilmember Beatty, I think I shared this at the reception last week, but um it is a rare thing to know that you have a finite amount of time to make a difference, and I think one of the things that I've so incredibly appreciated about your time here is that you understood that, and I feel like every single day you're in this building, whether Councilmember Banks is talking about you having the binder or you know, figuring out how all these different systems and departments and constituencies fit together, you were always trying to make the most of every single day you had here, and that is something that uh I think stands out for anyone I have served with.

And um, I don't know how you could have kept up that pace beyond a year, um, but you didn't have to, but it's something that uh I sincerely appreciate and will always appreciate you wanting to take up uh the accessory dwelling unit legislation.

It had always been on someone's to-do list.

It'd always been like we'll get to that at some point.

And you said, No, I will see this all the way through.

Um, and with the kind of intensity from a day-to-day standpoint, uh, to figure it all out because it was a lot of different things to fit together, and you were somebody that again knew you had a set amount of days, and we're gonna take advantage of that.

So um, thank you for that service.

It's going to be something that lives well beyond that year of service for so many residents in Columbus.

Um, so thank you for the service.

Thank you for deciding to use this year in a way that uh will mean a lot to to folks across the community in the future.

Thank you.

Councilmember Beatty, it has been um a real honor and a privilege to be able to work with you over this past year.

Um, Rob mentioned your legacy, of course, that will live on the ADU stuff.

I know you have a long history, very well known as um doing some um great work in the development space across our community and and um you know small as a small business owner.

But one thing that I don't want to get overlooked um is your heart and your passion for human services.

You know, I remember one one time you said something to me, because I, you know, I didn't have like, oh, is this developer guy coming in, you know, what's he gonna know and or think about what I'm advocating for.

And we were talking pretty early on, and you said something to me that really stuck with me.

You said, you know, Mosa, I know.

Uh I dried the tears of flat funding many nights for many years.

And um man, that stuck with me.

It stuck with me because you you know and you understand about the needs of our community, you know and you understand about how hard it is to advocate and people not hearing you and people not listening.

And uh not only do you know and you understand that, but your votes reflected that um every night here for a year.

Um, and so I have valued um everything that everyone has said about you, your attention to detail, your ability to collaborate, um, your um interest in asking um smart questions.

I think sometimes people think when you're asking a question and really it means you're opposed to something.

I'm a question asker, I'm not a yes or a no person, I'm a why person.

So I love to have another uh person like that on council.

But man, I think the thing that I just I'm so grateful for and I value and respect so much is your heart for people in our community and your willingness to uh stand with them every step of the way while you've been here.

And so I'm looking forward to continuing to work with you on those issues and others in the future.

Well, I've appreciated the opportunity to get to know you this year.

Um, of course, know your wife very well.

Um City Hall knows your wife very well.

Um, and she was a great board chair for Greater Columbus Arts Council, but didn't have the opportunity really to know you, and you know, having the opportunity to see you work and in the level of prepared preparedness that we've all talked about, even when you were trying to get appointed, the the level of follow-up, the le the calls, the thank you notes, you know, it really showed dedication from the from the get-go and to watch what you did this year with the accessory dwelling units.

Columbus is a much, much better place because of that legislation.

It was necessary, it was something that the administration didn't want to do necessarily at the time, but you drove it through, and that's gonna change lives around Columbus, and it's impactful.

And so we thank you so much for that that contribution uh to this council to the city and look forward to uh watching what you do next.

Certainly uh you'll have a little bit more free time on Monday nights, but uh but we uh we love you and we thank you for the service that you gave to our our community.

Thank you, Otto.

So, as the ninth person to speak, I I have the hardest job.

I don't know what uh councilmember Day Acho was talking about.

Um, but it does give me the ability to be brief because you have heard from many of my colleagues already about the amazing work that you have brought to this council over the last year.

I will say your passion has been evident from day one in terms of showing up at every single hearing, asking questions and details, and I will say in the last three days, Otto has scheduled four o'clock meetings with me and other stakeholders, and I'm like, Otto, I'm trying to cruise to the end of the year, bro.

And he's like, No, we have more work to do.

Um, so I appreciate you continuing to push us and ask the hard questions.

You will be missed by this council.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for raising your hand to lead in this way.

Yeah, Columbus was well served because Otto Beatty was uh council member in 2025 on that joke about him being the most prepared and uh using his time well.

Whenever you met with Otto Beatty, I'm an agenda person, I don't like meetings that don't have an agenda.

Otto brought uh two agendas, one for the person he was meeting with, and I could see on his paper his own agenda.

And at the beginning of it, it would say small talk, one minute.

And you would know when the small talk was over because he would get into the work of the meeting, uh, and he did the work.

Um I also see the first lady of the district is here, uh, Otto's wife, uh Christy Angel.

Thank you so much for allowing him to serve.

Uh individuals don't serve people do.

So thank you, Christy, and uh we remiss to also not thank your staff.

Tiggist and Leah have been an amazing additions to our team.

Otto, normally we give um council members resolutions to honor them and their service, but we thought it would be fitting to um frame a specific special resolution that is actually a replica of the uh suppressory dwelling unit legislation that you passed uh and signed by all of your colleagues.

On behalf of a grateful city, thank you so much, sir, for your service.

We have a long line ahead of us, so I'll keep my remarks short so we can get down to business.

Um, Barb Marley once said, Um, beginnings are always scary and exciting, and endings are always sad.

It's but it's the joy at the bill.

So I thank all of you for giving this opportunity.

I think back to when I was a freshman in college out of state, and I had the poster of the Columbus skyline in my dorm room because I wanted people to know that Columbus, Ohio wasn't just a big stadium with a little house, a bunch of little houses around it.

And my service here was for the love of this city.

I remember when you all made me earn the job, and it was the right thing to do.

And I came here as one of the ten and I made my speech, and there was a lot of big talk.

And that's not me, because I'm a doer and not a talker.

And my staff will tell you, I always say, show me, don't tell me.

So I just hope that I was able to fulfill the promise that I made to do the hard work, to work with you and support you, not try to be in front of you, not try to show boat, but to support you and what what we all were trying to achieve for this city and our residents.

And many people ask me, oh, well, what's it like to you know work with them?

And I always have to say that, you know, listen, I just want to establish that you know our city is in great hands.

Okay, nobody's perfect, but our city is in great hands.

You have a committed city council, a committed administration that work that works very, very hard.

And um, you know, to all the directors and deputy directors and everyone that I got the pleasure uh to work with, it really you know just solidify what I already knew.

I share with you my first night here that I probably I have probably nine to ten members of my direct family that are either retired from the city of Columbus or currently work for the city of Columbus, dispelling the myth that you don't have to have an Irish last name to have a bunch of family members that work at the city of Columbus.

So I knew about you know the great public service, but um I'm so glad that we have this leadership because I do believe, you know, on the horizon, we've had some great things that have happened in Columbus in recent years, and we make all these listener things like that, but there are so many people in our community who are suffering right now, and there's going to be more suffering over the coming years, and we're gonna have to be up to the challenge.

We're gonna have to be creative, we're gonna have to find new ways, and I'm very confident in this body and this administration that we are going to rise to the occasion to keep Columbus great.

Thank you very much for this opportunity.

It has certainly been the honor of my life.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Councilmember.

Before we move on, I also want to um just say that uh we as a city are continuing to pray for um the Jewish community around the world.

As this is the first day of Hanukkah uh dealing with the terrorist attack in Australia.

Um that we are Columbus is an open and welcoming community because of our strong Jewish community, and we join in uh the community celebration of light.

Light always does prevail over darkness.

So uh happy Hanukkah, everyone.

want to um just say that uh we as a city are continue to pray for um the jewish community around the world as this is the first day of Hanukkah uh dealing with the terrorist attack in Australia um know that we are Columbus is an open and welcoming community because of our strong Jewish community and we join in uh the community celebration of light light always does prevail over darkness so uh happy Hanukkah everyone um are there any comments from our auditors to the attorney's office treasurer seeing none uh are there we are not are there any requests by members of council for the removal of an ordinance or resolution from the consent portion of the agenda seeing none may we now have a motion to waive the reading of the titles of 38 legislation by the clerk clerk please call the role thanks Tim Barosa de Padilla Betty de Akawer Dornscreen Remy Weiss President Hard Thank you well the clerk now reading to the record their ordinance numbers on 38 legislation for tonight and finance and governance committee we have ordinance 3292 2025 economic development and small and minority business committee ordinance 2574 dash 2025 public service and transportation committee ordinance 33 39 2025 neighborhoods recreation and parks committee ordinance 3390 2025 3479 dash 2025 workforce education labor committee we have ordinance 3230 um and 3304 3361 dash 2025 health human services and equity committee ordinance 3316 dash 2025 public utilities and sustainability committee ordinances 2897 3196 3291 3303 3334 and 3352 uh and 347 dash 2025 housing homelessness and building committee ordinances 2859 and 3340 2025 um a bit of housekeeping for this evening will the clerk now read the legislation that is to have its second reading waived uh may I have a motion to waive this second reading of these ordinance and finance and governance committee ordinance thirty two ninety two dash twenty twenty five economic development and small and minority business ordinance twenty five seventy four dash twenty twenty five public service and transportation committee ordinance thirty three thirty nine dash twenty twenty five neighborhoods recreation and parks committee ordinance thirty three ninety and thirty four seventy nine dash twenty twenty five workforce education and labor committee ordinance thirty two thirty dash twenty twenty five health human services and equity committee ordinance thirty three sixteen dash twenty twenty five in public utilities and sustainability committee ordinance thirty four seventy seven dash 2025 housing homelessness and building committee ordinances 2859 and 3340 2025 thank you madam clerk uh clerk please call the roll thanks Timber Rosa de Padilla Betty de Akaur Doran screen reamy white president hard second rating is waived uh the following ordinance appear on our agenda as consent action with the clerk now read those into the record yes uh resolutions of expression 276x 277x 278x 279x and 280x 2025 finance and governance committee ordinances 3056 3078 and 3311 2025 economic development and small and minority business ordinances 2451 2852 3183 32 eleven thirty two eighty thirty two eighty four thirty two eighty seven thirty two ninety thirty three oh seven thirty three twenty four thirty three twenty six thirty four fourteen dash twenty twenty five public service and transportation committee ordinance thirty one twenty six thirty one forty eight thirty one eighty five thirty two thirty two thirty three fifteen and thirty three fifty nine dash twenty twenty five neighborhoods recreation and parks committee ordinances 2691 3142 3333 3429 and 3482 dash 2025 workforce education and labor committee ordinances 3218 3219 3243 32 I'm sorry 3350 3351 3364 3365 3371 3377 3388 3428 3430 and 3452 2025 health human services and equity committee 30 ordinances 3312 3460 34 and 3465 dash 2025 public safety and criminal justice committee ordinance 3092 3225 3246 3252 3261 3286 3358 3368 3457 and 3461 dash 2025 public utilities and sustainability committee resolution 257x 2025 ordinances 3028 3119 3120 3127 3135 3141 3144 3147 3174 3194 3207 3267 3276 3321 3386 3463 and 3466 dash 2025 housing homelessness and building committee resolution 269 x dash 2025 ordinances 2952 3174 3201 3202 3259 3264 3273 3329 3330 and 3470 dash 2025 rules and policy committee appointments from the mayor a 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 16

The Rules and Policy Committee appointments from the mayor, a 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, and 181-2025.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

There are no questions or comments uh on the consent portion agenda.

I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the row.

Banks Tim, Barosa De Padilla, Betty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss, President Hardin.

Bangston.

Yes, with the exception of ordinance 3287-2025, from which I'm abstaining.

Barossa DePadia.

Beatty.

Yes.

De Akaur.

Dorns.

Green.

Remy.

Weish.

President Hardin.

Yes, consent agenda uh passed with the noted exceptions.

We'll now proceed with the second reading of 30 day and postponed emergency legislation.

First community come before council is the finance and governance committee chaired by Councilmember Bankson.

Councilman, the floor is yours.

Uh thank you, Council President.

First, up in the Finance and Governance Committee, we have ordinance 3098-2025 to authorize the Director of Finance and Management on behalf of the Office of Construction Management to enter into a construction contract with 2K General Co.

for the old Fire Station 10 renovation project to authorize a transfer of $745,100 and expenditure up to $5,545,100 within the construction management capital improvement fund to provide a provide for payment of prevailing wages wage services to the Department of Public Service and to authorize an amendment to the 2025 capital improvement budget.

This uh ordinance uh authorizes the uh I'm sorry, the old fire station uh number 10 located at 1096 West Broad Street was added to the Columbus Register of Historic Places in 2005.

The fire station will be renovated while keeping the existing shell of the building.

Repairs and additions will include repair of the stone and brick exterior, replacement of the windows and doors, the addition of an elevator to the back of the building to provide access to the second floor, repair of the original wooden staircase, the creation of 9,450 square feet of office and conference space for the Westside Pride Center that will include two community rooms, workstations for area liaisons, and a 311 training center.

It's always uh great when we have have the ability to preserve historic landmarks while also giving them a modern day use for our community.

And I can tell you I am really excited about this project, and I know that the people of Franklin are as well.

Uh when I was at uh Gladden Community House, this was one of the things that we advocated for was making sure that we preserve this building.

So to see us at this point of finally getting it constructed, a new permanent home for our Westside Pride Center is a win-win for everyone.

Or any questions or comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I'm for passage.

Bangs temperosa depodia, beatty de accaurance green, reamy Weiss President Hardin.

Next we have ordinance 3165-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Technology to enter into a contract with Brown Enterprise Solutions LLC utilizing a state master cloud service agreement for the annual procurement and or renewal of various Adobe Software Application products to waive the competitive bidding provisions of Columbus City Code and to authorize the expenditure of 324,434.50 cents from the Department of Technology Information Services Operating Fund.

This ordinance is our annual procurement and renewal of Adobe Software Application Products for considerable savings over an open market quote.

The Department of Technology proceeded with the renewing the contract with an existing state term contract.

The Department of Technology was only able to obtain two quotes from state term product resellers because of this.

The Department of Technology requests a waiver of competitive bidding to renew the contract.

Banks Timberwolves depadia, Betty Day Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss, President Hard.

Pass.

Next, we have ordinance 3499-2025 to authorize a capital budget reservation for renovations and improvements in City Hall to authorize the expenditure within the contract management capital improvement bond fund and to declare an emergency.

As a result of council's 2024 expansion, we have needed to repurpose and renovate spaces within City Hall to accommodate additional staff.

The capital budget reservation will be used to contract with one or more vendors under a universal term contract to perform small-scale renovations and furniture acquisition as needed.

Is there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the role.

Thanks, Timberwolves today.

Thank you, Council President.

I move to the economic development and small minority business committee.

Please.

Thank you.

Tonight in the economic development and small minority business committee for second read.

We have ordinance 2942-2025 to dissolve the Enterprise Zone Agreement with Advanced TURF Solutions Inc.

and ATS Columbus Investments to LLC and to direct the director of the Department of Development to notify as necessary the local and state tax authorities of the disillusion.

This ordinance is a disillusion of a previously approved economic development agreement between the city and the listed entity.

For those who are unfamiliar with our economic development process, annually, the City of Columbus holds the Columbus Tax Incentive Review Council, which is short for TURC, meets to review all of the city's property tax abatements and tax increment financing districts.

As part of the process, the TURC contract contacts all entities whose reporting indicates that they will not meet their commitments to retain an abatement.

The TERC will then recommend agreements that should be dissolved.

Since coming into office, I've heard many speakers question whether the city has mechanisms in place to monitor whether companies are keeping up with their job commitments tied to our economic development deals.

This piece of legislation demonstrates that we in fact do.

In fact, there was an EZA originally slated for the agenda that I chose to not have come before this council because it did not meet our standards that we would have come before this body.

Since coming into office, uh I have dissolved 13 of these EZAs.

And so I emphasize that because we do take this very, very seriously.

And we really work to make sure that we get to compliance.

But more importantly, we want to ensure that folks are holding up to their end of the bargain.

Because this is not simply about a giveaway, but it's about opportunity for our residents.

And when those are not met, there are mechanisms for us to claw that back and to ensure that we are holding folks accountable.

My office takes incentives and their performance very seriously, and I would not support an incentive that I do not believe benefits our residents in the long run.

So again, I want to thank uh all folks that have been part of the TURC that take the time uh to go through this process.

Once upon a time when I was a mayor's office staffer, I sat on the Turk.

It is a very long day.

It is a lot of numbers and spreadsheets to go over, uh, but it's necessary.

Necessary to ensure uh that when we make these types of uh commitments that folks are holding up their end of the bargain.

So uh with that, uh before I move for passage any questions or comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Thanks, Timberwolves, Beatty Day Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Passed.

Next, we have ordinance 33 um 3300-2025 to authorize the director of the department of development to enter into an enterprise zone agreement with George Georgesville Properties LLC and Aerospace Lubricant LLC, collectively the enterprise for a tax abatement of 75% for a period of 10 consecutive years in consideration of the enterprise investing, a total project cost of approximately 5 million 50,000 dollars, which includes 1.8 million in real property improvements and 3 million 250,000 in machinery and equipment, the creation of 15 net new full-time permanent positions with an estimated annual payroll of approximately 1,476,800 and the retention of 37 full-time permanent positions with an estimated annual payroll of approximately $4,090,000 at the proposed project site.

Georgesville Properties LLC is a real estate holding company that was created to purchase, sell, and develop real estate, and is owned by Aerospace Lubricants LLC.

Established in 1973, Aerospace Lubricants is a premium grease and lubricant provider to the automotive industrial aviation and defense industries.

Aerospace lubricants is quickly becoming the industry leader and is in talks with a local defense company regarding a potential contract.

They are proposing to invest a total capital expenditure of approximately $5,050,000.

The first facility consists of a 5,000 square foot expansion to the company's existing $25,862 square foot facility manufacturing facility located at 1,600 through 1604 Georgesville Road.

The second facility consists of a 30,000 square foot expansion to the company's existing 17,280 square foot office building located at 1616 Georgesville Road.

They anticipate again the creation of 15 net full-time permanent positions with approximate payroll of $1,476,800, and retaining 37 full-time permanent positions with a payroll of over a little over $4 million.

The Department of Development recommends the Enterprise Zone Agreement for 75% for a period of 10 consecutive years.

All 15 positions are well above the $20 hour threshold that this body set.

But also this positions include some of the following benefits paid holidays, vacation days, annual bonuses, disability pay, employee discounts, paid family vacation and personal days, 401k retirement plans, medical dental insurance, and employee uniforms.

This project is in the Columbus Southwestern City School District.

The district currently receives $34,633 from this project.

Because of this abatement, they will continue to receive that amount.

That amount does not change.

They will continue to receive that $34,633 per year as a minimum.

The district is estimated to receive an additional $68,450 over the term of the abatement and will receive $414,780 in total revenue over a 10-year period.

That is simply because again, they will continue to collect what they have today on that property.

We are only abating $75%, so that $25%, they still get to collect.

And so this is a win for that for the district as we make improvements to that property, and when that abatement rolls off in 10 years, it will yield even more for the Columbus Southwestern City School District.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Again, uh I just want to say that with this particular one, this is a company that has sites all around the country.

And we uh the local ownership here fought hard to have that expansion here in Columbus.

And also preparing uh for a major uh aerospace company that is coming here, sets up this local company for success to be competitive and to make sure that we are continue to keep that Columbus dollar circulating here in Columbus.

So really excited about this particular project and what it's going to do, particularly uh for the Georgesville Road area, which is seeing a boom in investment and development.

And with that, I move for passage.

Clerk please call a role.

Thanks.

Timber also defadia, Betty de Akaward's screen, Remy White's President Hard.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

May I jump to page 29 on the agenda to read an ordinance I'm sponsoring the rules and reference committee?

Please.

Thank you.

Tonight in the rules and reference committee for second read, we have ordinance 3343-2025 to amend and enact various provisions of chapter 376 of the Columbus City Code in order to strengthen the levying, collection, and allocation of admissions tax for facility stabilization receipts.

This ordinance and ordinance 3344-25 and 3345-225 are a legislative package relating to the proposed renovations and improvements of nationwide arena.

This ordinance, 3343-25, increases the arena admissions tax by 2%, which will take the current arena admissions tax from 5% to 7% at the arena.

Ordinance 3344-2025 shifts and increases the distribution of casino tax revenue to the Franklin County Conventions Facility Authority from 32% to 50%.

Establishes an operations and management agreement between the city, county, and uh Franklin County Convention Facility Authority, which will contain details regarding how public dollars will be used.

Unlike other sports facilities, the nationwide arena is a public asset that is jointly owned by the city and county, which is why council is considering these financing options to support a transformative plan for the renovation.

The legislative package also puts the Franklin County Conventions Facility Authority in a position to potentially capture a once in a lifetime investment from the state of Ohio for the renovation.

With us tonight to speak to this legislation and larger proposal is Ken Paul, our executive director of the Frequent County Convention Facility Authority.

I'm going to have him come at this time.

And Ken, welcome back to Council.

I know you are no stranger here, and you know the deal.

Good evening, everyone.

President Harden, Councilmember Bankston, members of council, thank you for the opportunity to be here this evening, and thank you for your time, thoughtfulness, and engagement you have brought to this issue over the past several weeks.

For 25 years, Nationwide Arena has been a place where Columbus comes together to cheer, to celebrate, and to welcome visitors from across the region and country.

It has anchored the arena district, helped drive housing and job growth downtown, and generated economic activity that supports essential city services across our neighborhoods.

This year, the arena celebrated its 25th anniversary, and with that milestone comes an important reality.

If we want this building to continue serving Columbus for the next 25 years, reinvestment is necessary.

The why behind this project is straightforward.

Fan expectations have changed.

Competition for major sports and entertainment events has intensified, and the systems, spaces, and infrastructure inside nationwide arena must be modernized if we want to remain competitive.

This isn't about a luxury, it's about safety, accessibility, and long-term viability of a public asset that plays a meaningful role in our local economy.

Earlier this year, the Franklin County Convention Facilities Authority, the public entity that owns Nationwide Arena, began advancing a plan to fund a $400 million renovation and modernization effort.

That plan relies on a continued public-private partnership, one that reflects how the arena has been sustained for more than a decade.

Nationwide Arena was built entirely with private funds, but since 2012, it has been publicly owned and maintained with a combination of public and private support.

What we are proposing now continues that model.

The CFA intends to apply for up to 100 million dollars in state funding dedicated to sports facility improvements to issue bonds for a portion of the project cost, and to leverage substantial private investment to complete the capital stack.

The legislation before you tonight represents the first step in that broader strategy.

It does not authorize bonds.

It does not commit city dollars to construction this year.

Instead, it establishes the local revenue framework needed to demonstrate commitment, unlock state participation, and responsibly finance the project when the time comes.

Specifically, the ordinances adjust revenue streams that already exist.

One increases admissions tax at Nationwide Arena and Nationwide Arena only by 2%, while leaving all other venues unchanged and continuing to support cultural arts.

The other adjusts the allocation of casino tax revenue already received by the city and the county, gradually increasing the share dedicated to nationwide arena over time.

These changes involve no new taxes and have a minimal impact on the city's budget while ensuring that those who benefit from the arena's success help pay for its future.

Importantly, the amended framework also reflects conversations many of you have raised.

It ensures that city funds are not released until state support is secured, and a community benefits agreement is in place.

An agreement that can reflect shared priorities, such as workforce participation, sustainability, public art, and youth engagement.

And that alignment matters.

And we appreciate the collaborative approach that led us here.

The ordinances before you tonight are not the comprehensive solution on their own.

They're the foundational steps, building blocks that allow us to layer the investment, assemble the capital stack, and more deliberately lead us more deliberately towards a fully funded project.

They represent many months of work and coordination and position Columbus strongly as we pursue state and private investment.

And members of council advancing this legislation tonight is strategically important.

It signals local alignment, preserves our momentum, and places the project in the strongest possible position as we head into the next phase of funding decisions.

Most importantly, it helps secure the future of a public asset that has served the city well for 25 years and can continue to do so for decades to come.

On behalf of the CFA, I would respectfully ask for your support.

And again, thank you for your time.

Thank you, Executive Director Paul.

I know you answered a lot of my questions, but you know, I've said this uh to you probably and I'll say it to you publicly.

I want to thank you and your team.

This is a very complex uh math equation and government finance that is happening here.

Uh but again, I want to emphasize that this is uh a pathway forward for us to make this transformational investment with minimal impact to our uh operating budget as well as our capital budgets uh in ensuring that we continue to invest in something that we uh the people own.

And again, I want to thank you for leaning into this council and and I will thank you in advance for continuing to work with us as we work through this uh because we're not done yet, uh, and there will be many more conversations with this body.

And so, again, I just want to thank you uh for the work that you're doing.

This is very complex, it's very exciting uh for us uh to really ensure that we are protecting uh our our asset.

I don't know any questions or comments for uh Mr.

Paul, we do have two speakers as well.

I just want to point that out.

Council President Pro Tendor.

Thank you, Chair, I appreciate it.

Um, and want to thank you and your office for working through the amendments that are up for consideration.

Certainly, Director Paul for working hand in glove uh with council and the chair's office on this.

I think absent those amendments, I would not be in a position to be supportive here tonight.

And um, while I personally remain skeptical over you know public ownership of stadiums, uh that's not what's before us here tonight.

We're being asked about whether or not we can make an investment, or the city should make an investment about whether or not we should maintain something that is already already publicly owned.

Um, to the chair's point about um, you know, if you own a car, you gotta you gotta change the oil every now and again to make sure that you know that actually accomplishes what what you're supposed to.

Um but I did want to ask you one question about uh a issue that is not um in part of the amendments here tonight.

Um, you know, back in 2019, prior to your leadership at the convention uh facilities authority, um, there was a movement of workers at nationwide arena to unionize.

The management company at that time engaged in what I believe was uh an attempt um to pressure those workers to not support those efforts.

Uh, with this being a publicly owned facility, uh at the time, yeah.

I publicly said that was inappropriate at minimum, um, and that is not something that we should tolerate.

Um, unfortunately, the the amendments we have here tonight does not memorialize a change potentially to policies, but something that you and I have talked a lot about and something that I think, as you put it, this is a foundation, and there's future legislation to come forward, which could include things like labor peace that would prevent that kind of uh situation from occurring in the future.

Uh, but considering you were not there in 2019, um, but I know that you believe that uh what I believe in this instance that there is a different um threshold when something is publicly owned, what we owe um to workers in that kind of scenario.

And as we work towards other future pieces of legislation beyond this foundation, um, I wanted just to ask you personally what you believe as we're pushing for you know additional piece of legislation to come forward again.

So if workers at nationwide uh attempted to unionize again, that we would be in a different position than we were in 2019.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Uh Council President Hard and Councilmember Dornes, thanks for the opportunity to answer that question.

And um we agree that the right to organize is a fundamental right for all employees.

Um, most especially public employees and the CFA has taken a clear stance on that.

Uh, with the support of my board chair, we entered into a neutrality agreement that paved the way for uh Columbus's first uh Ohio's largest union hotel.

Uh and just recently, uh Levy is the food service provider at the Greater Columbus Convention Center under the auspices of the CFA uh also ratified their first contract.

Um, a little different with how the arena operates and that excuse me.

Uh uh Columbus Arena Management is the board that oversees the operation of not just nationwide arena, but the Shon Steen Center, the SHUE, Blackwell, uh, Mershawn Auditorium.

Um, I am a member representing the CFA on that board.

There are three other members.

Uh, and since our conversations over the past couple of weeks, I've reached out to all uh to let them know that this was an issue of import to this body, but to the CFA.

And I fully expect that in the course of these conversations that, and by the time that we come back to this body, that we will be able to similarly put in place a neutrality agreement that opens the door for employees at Nationwide Arena to organize if they so choose.

Thank you, Director.

Your record on this is Sterling, and I appreciate that commitment.

And just to be able to, for both of us to be able to say out loud that that is something that both council and I know you personally, again, given that track record that you have had at the conventional authority is something that we're committed working towards as future um legislation would come before this body.

So thank you.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you, uh, President Pro Tem.

Any other questions for Executive Director Paul?

All right.

Thank you, executive director.

We do have two speakers uh on this um ordinance, council presidents.

If I'm gonna call those speakers at this time, we have first Mr.

Tom Thomas Krauss who is with us.

Tom, welcome to council.

I'll just state your name, any organization you represent, and you have three minutes.

And I see you don't have your guitar with you today, so I'm not gonna get any singing.

I thought I would spare you that.

Um good evening, thank you, council, members of council, council president.

My name is Tom Krause.

Uh formerly a pizza maker, but currently the uh interim executive director of music Columbus.

Music Columbus is an organization uh designed to uh help support uh the cultural and economic asset of music in Columbus, Ohio.

And uh I wanted to comment on uh the fact that uh Columbus is an economic, or I'm sorry, my notes just messed me up.

I'm sorry.

Music is an economic driver for Columbus.

Independent analysis shows that music influence tourism has generated 1.3 billion dollars annually in economic impact in Columbus and produced 380 million dollars in wages across the nation, uh the region, I'm sorry.

Um Columbus must invest in the broad uh venue uh support of all sizes, and specifically large venues like nationwide arena are central to that impact from visitation, hotel stays, restaurant spending, transportation, music influence tourism alone accounts for more than half of that economic activity, and um certainly affects how Columbus is able to attract major tours.

Uh promoters make routing decisions based on venue conditions without modernization.

Columbus risks losing many acts uh to newer or renovated arenas.

So in addition, broader local music workforce is supported, not just uh headliner acts, but local stage hands, local sound and lighting technicians, uh local utility workers, local vendors who rely on a consistent uh uh music program through these venues.

Conducted in 2024 shows that for every one percent increase investment in music, you could see an additional 168 million in annual economic development, and that's more than 1250 jobs.

Maintaining a pet competitive music venue is essential to capturing that growth.

The music Columbus, we believe this investment protects a proven venue and nationwide arena and helps ensure that Columbus remains competitive and maintains a strong visitor-driven revenue and strengthens the city for decades to come.

Thank you.

Thank you, uh Mr.

Krauss, and all the work that the uh music commission is doing uh to bring vibrancy to our community.

Uh next uh we have uh Mr.

Dorsey Hager who is here with us.

Welcome back to council, Mr.

Hager.

I believe you know the rules.

I think that's the first time I've called you Mr.

Hager as well.

Uh Council President Harden, Pro Tem Dorns, Council Members Bankston, Barossa de Padilla, Beatty, De Alcauer, Green, Remy, and Weish.

Thank you for the opportunity to again stand here before council.

As many of you know, my name is Dorsey Hager.

I'm the executive secretary treasurer, the Columbus and Central Ohio Building and Construction Trades Council.

The Trades Council is comprised of 23 affiliated unions representing 18,000 members of the construction industry here in Columbus and Central Ohio.

And I am here today to voice my support for the Nationwide Arena renovation and modernization plan.

The plan set forth by the Franklin County Convention and Facilities Authority is a public private partnership that raises the 400 million dollars needed without raising taxes on citizens of Columbus or Franklin County.

The upgrades to this 25-year-old arena, which is publicly owned by the city and the county, are sorely needed.

Nationwide arena is more than just the home of the Columbus Blue Jackets.

The improvements to the arena will help the city maintain its competitive advantage for current and future events such as concerts, shows, regionals, and final fours.

And the timing of this plan puts us in a position to capture investment capital from the state of Ohio.

I was born here in Columbus and have lived in Central Ohio for most of my life.

In the late 90s, I had the opportunity to work on the construction of nationwide arena.

It gives me great pride while attending hockey games or other events to tell families and friends hey, I worked on this project.

With a commitment from FCC FA, the city, and the county on a community benefits agreement.

The work done at the arena on improvements, upgrades, and renovations will be completed safely, on time, and on budget by local workers who represent the diversity of our community in which we all live and work.

And those residents will also be able to say one day, hey, I worked on this.

Again, thank you for your time here tonight on behalf of the Columbus Central Building Construction Trades Council.

We support this transformative plan.

Thank you.

Thank you for Mr.

Hager for all the work you do every day to for our workers in this community, not just in the building trades, but I think the work that you do helps to benefit all workers in Columbus.

As I continue on, I just want to reiterate tonight.

As I believe the financial proposal before us tonight is a cost-effective path forward to invest in our arena, again, the arena that we own.

Think about this.

The average cost right now to build a new arena is roughly between 1.2 billion dollars and 2 billion dollars.

That's the range that it would cost to uh build a new arena.

Uh and so making these investments is critical at this point.

I also plan on amending ordinance 30 uh 344-2025 to add the following guardrails to the legislation.

Creation of a separate subfund specifically for the deposit of the additional casino tax revenue that the Franklin County Convention Facility Authority would receive with the revenue shift, a revision of the increased casino tax revenue distribution back to the current level of 32% once the debt obligation backed by the increase is paid off.

A condition where distribution of the dollars in the new subfund can only occur in the following conditions are met that the Franklin County Convention Facility Authority has been awarded funds from the state that the Franklin County Convention Facility has entered into a community benefits agreement with the Columbus Central Ohio Building and Construction Trades Council before construction commences.

Simply put, this is again a public asset.

And so when public dollars are going into, we want to make sure that there is a benefit to our community.

Lastly, with this package, I will motion to refer ordinance 3345-2025 back to committee as the piece of legislation needs to be edited and deliberated on uh further.

Uh so this is again just one step in the process.

What we will be considering tonight are the mechanisms by which financing mechanism, I should say, by which that put sets us up to pay for this 400 million dollar plan.

Uh, the details of how those funds will be managed is in a later agreement that will come before this council, and we will continue to work with all parties to ensure that this council's priorities are captured in debt.

Uh, before I move for passage, are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Uh Councilmember Green.

Um Chair, I want to thank you for your work on this and for the amendments that I think um brought a significant amount of improvements to the legislation.

But I feel like I would be remiss as your chair of your health, human services, and equity committee if I didn't formally express some frustrations or concerns about the inequity that I see in front of us here.

You know, when over the past year we've been going through the FRAC process, we have had the Greater Columbus Arts Council coming to us throughout that year to tell us that the ticket tax is underperforming, and you know, we need to consider raising it in order to be able to continue making adequate investments in our community.

Um we've gone through this whole year-long process, and and what we have before us is raising the ticket tax today just for the arena at offset this.

Um, you know, we have the human services sector that has come before us through that process, the emergency shelter system through that process to tell us, you know, without an increase in a dedicated line item or a revenue stream to support their operations.

Um they are at risk, their survival is at risk, and that means our people's survival is at risk.

Um and so the business of caring for business seems to move with such urgency.

Um, and I think that we still have more work to do.

So I look forward to in this next year, um, moving with speed and urgency to address those issues as well.

Um again, I think that um Ken has put together uh a thoughtful plan with support from your office to be able to do that in this case, and I just want to be very clear we need it all.

We need good jobs, we need a thriving economy, we need arts and tourism and travel.

Um, and we also need to be doing the investments in our people as well.

Um, and so um I look forward to working with you on that in the next year and supporting this legislation tonight.

Thank you, uh, Councilmember Green.

Any other my colleagues have any questions or comments?

All right, seeing none before I move for passage, I just finally want to say, you know, Councilmember Green, I hear your points, and I think that um as we move into uh budget conversations, there's always this question of uh prioritization.

And as I said a couple meetings ago, and I'll reiterate that uh we do not have to have a binary choice.

In this moment, we can and we must do both.

Uh this council last week uh passed a million dollars to save uh one of our leading uh uh alcohol and drug um abuse providers in this community in Maryhaven.

Uh tonight later, we will be passing uh funds for our community shelter board to ensure that we keep folks warm uh this winter.

Um so we can do both.

We must do both, which is invest in our people, meet this moment for our human services sector, but also not take our foot off the gas when it comes to economic development opportunities.

And I won't apologize uh for us when it comes to securing uh opportunities for our residents, opportunities for us to be economically competitive.

And I want to be very clear with this investment.

This is different.

Uh, this is not about a team.

Actually, 70% of the activity that happens in that arena is not related to the blue jackets.

It is the monster truck show that I took Xavier to earlier this year.

Uh it was me having the joy of watching my nephew walk across the stage because he was a graduate of Fort Hayes High School.

This is our asset.

And so what we are doing, we're not bailing out a team, we're not bailing out a billionaire.

This isn't about some corporation.

Nationwide is just the name on the building.

It is our asset.

What this is tonight is us as Columbus saying that we're going to invest in ourselves to ensure that this asset remains competitive, that this district, the arena district, continues to be an economic generator for next 25 years and for generations to come.

So again, look forward to engaging all my colleagues as we move through the amendment process and we get to final agreements.

But difficult times are ahead, that is true.

But we can do both.

Columbus has done both, and we will continue to do that.

And with that, I move for passage of ordinance 3343-2025.

Clerk, please call the role.

Banks Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty De Aka or Dorns Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Passed.

And for this package, Council President, we would jump back to page 202 for ordinance 3344-2025 to authorize an amendment to the city's allocation of the share of the casino tax revenues from the state of Ohio for 2026 and each year thereafter.

Again, this is a part of that package that I just mentioned.

I've seen no questions or comments from my colleagues.

I first move to amend and submit it to the clerk.

Thanks, Tim, Barosa De Padilla, Beatty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy White's President Hardin.

Amended.

And now I move for passage.

Thanks, Tim, Barosa De Padilla, Beatty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy White's President Hardin.

Passed.

Next we have ordinary 3345-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Development to execute an operating and management agreement with the Franklin County Convention Facility Authority and the Board of County Commissioners of Franklin County, Ohio for the maintenance, upkeep, and improvements of nationwide arena.

As I stated again, we will be referring this back to committee to continue those discussions.

Seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move to refer this ordinance back to committee.

Thanks, Barosa DePadia, Beatty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss, President Hardin.

Refer back to committee.

Thank you, Council President.

I'm going to jump to page 29 of the Rules and Reference Committee.

There we have ordinance 1659-2025 to amend chapters 151, 153, and 225 of the Columbus City Coast and modernize the city's information management and technology governance framework to clarify and strengthen the responsibilities of the records commission to formally establish the information technology investment and planning committee and to update the organizational structure and leadership title within the Department of Technology.

This ordinance contains several code changes related to the Department of Technology and the Records Commission.

It is a direct response to House Bill 96, which created new cybersecurity requirements for local governments via Ohio Revised Code 9.64.

In sum, this code, these code changes does do three things.

Strengthens and updates the responsibilities of our records commission.

This really codifies a lot of the best practices that our departments have already been doing.

It establishes the Technology Investment and Planning Committee, which will oversee IT governance and cybersecurity readiness.

Excited that both the mayor's office and city council will have seats on the on that committee as we continue to invest in our cybersecurity.

And this also clarifies that the Department of Technology is responsible for communicating with the state in the event of a cyber attack and meets the state's requirements of having a cybersecurity program.

Good evening, Council President Harden, President Pro Tendorans, Chair Bankston, and members of council.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you this evening on the proposed changes, chapters 151, 153, and 225 of the Columbus City Codes.

Modern city operations are increasingly powered by information technology that supports residents, businesses, visitors, and day-to-day work of government itself.

Core administrative functions such as payroll, timekeeping, budgeting, purchasing human resources, asset tracking, and fleet operations are almost now entirely all digital.

Public safety agencies rely on technology for emergency dispatch records and case management, secure communications, and capture and store storage of digital evidence from body-worn cameras to in-car cameras, transportation agencies use advanced systems to manage traffic flow and coordinate services like street maintenance and snow removal.

Utilities depend on technology to operate refuse collection, water and sewer systems, power distribution, street lighting, and remote meter reading.

At the same time, online portals, websites, and mobile applications allow residents to pay bills, request services, and apply for permits while open data platforms, GIS tools, and smart city technologies increasingly support transparency planning and real-time monitoring through connected sensors and devices.

As a result, technology investments have become foundational to how government functions.

Many of these systems are essential to delivering core public services and others, store sense of information subject to strict legal and regulatory requirements.

This level of dependence makes information systems not only indispensable, but also high-value assets that demand careful oversight, protection, and sustained investment.

The proposed changes to city code recognize the importance of information technology investments by strengthening and modernizing our city records management framework, reconstituting the information technology investment and planning committee to provide direction while ensuring sustained investment and protection and establishing a citywide cybersecurity program is required under section 9.64 of the higher advice code.

Chapter 151 strengthens and modernize city records management framework.

It clarifies and reform reinforces the authority and responsibilities of the records commission, aligns city code with current state law, and formally recognizes the need to manage both physical and digital records.

Important, it modernizes departmental responsibilities for records retention disposition, ensuring clear accountability, better compliance, and stronger stewardship of public records in an increasingly digital city.

Chapter 153 re reconstitutes and modernizes the city's long-standing but largely dormant IT commission as the information technology and investment planning committee.

This chapter clarifies the committee role in guiding citywide technology planning and investment decisions.

It establishes affordable governance body to advise on IT strategy, investment operations, and technology use, and to recommend policy standards and procedures covering planning, procurement, cybersecurity, privacy, and interoperability.

Chaired by the city's chief information officer included, it also includes leadership from the mayor's office, council, the auditor, the city attorney, and key departments.

The committee provides better alignment with city priorities, increased standardization, stronger oversight, starting with state mandated cybersecurity requirements.

Most importantly, Chapter 225 formally establishes the city uh citywide cybersecurity program in accordance with Ohio Revice Code Section 969.64, ensuring compliance with state mandates while strengthening the protection of city systems, data, and services.

Although the city had already begun advancing enterprise IT governance prior to the adoption of 9.64, the statute now requires all municipalities to implement similar programs.

Taken together chapters 153, 150, uh 151, 153, and 225, modernize decades old uh code, strengthen governance and accountability, and align the city with current state law and position Columbus to manage records, technology investments, and cybersecurity in a collaborative, coordinated, transparent, and forward-looking way that better serves residents and city operations.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak on uh these proposed changes this evening.

I'm certainly happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Thank you, Director.

Any questions from my colleagues?

Uh again, just want to thank you, uh, Director Orth.

You know, in this cybersecurity age we find ourselves in, the threat is ever changing, and so uh we have to be prepared as much as possible.

Data is also now a critical piece of infrastructure uh for any government, and so we have to do everything we can to protect it.

So thank you for your work and getting this across the finish line and make sure that we're compliance with the state.

Uh and after this passage, I will make sure I call you Chief Information Officer Orth going forward.

Uh any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I first move to uh amend as submitted to the clerk.

Thanks, Tim, Barroso de Padilla, Betty de Akaward Dorns Green, Remy Wise President Harden.

I now move for passage.

Thanks, Tim Bruce de Padilla, Betty de Akaward Dorans, Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

And lastly, there is one piece of ordinance back on first read with your permission.

I would like to go back and read that.

Thank you.

Um, that ordinance is in the Finance and Governance Committee and its ordinance 3292-2025 to authorize the appropriation and transfer of 550,894,000 dollars and 20 cents of cash assets from the neighborhood stabilization program one and neighborhood stabilization program three to the 2024 community development block grant fund to direct that any future neighborhood stabilization program income be deposited into a CDBG fund to authorize the appropriation and expenditures of 674,894 and 40 cents and to declare an emergency.

This ordinance closes out two 2024 grants with the U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development and transfers the remaining program balance to support 2026 administration and grants management staffing in our department of finance.

Seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, I'll move for passage.

Clerk, please call the role.

Thank you, Council President.

That's all I have this evening.

Happy holidays to everyone.

You have one more economic development.

Go to the next one.

Right underneath it.

I'm gonna do what?

You have one more economic development.

First read.

Oh, okay.

It's a team effort.

See, I appreciate that.

I appreciate the team.

Uh let's see.

2574.

Yes, uh, an economic development and small minority business committee.

Uh we have ordinance 2574-2025 to authorize uh the director of the Department of Development to enter into an enterprise zone agreement with TCG Corna owner uh one LLC for a tax abatement of 75 percent for a period of 10 consecutive years in consideration to of the enterprises investing approximately 21 million uh twenty thousand two hundred and seventy-eight dollars in real property improvements and the creation of twenty-five net and new full-time permit positions with an estimated annual payroll of approximately one million eighty-one thousand six hundred dollars.

Uh Director Stevens, could you please speak to this uh ordinance?

Uh President Hardin, Chair Banks and members of council.

Um, this is a ten year 75% enterprise zone abatement.

Um it is located within the um Gahanna Jefferson School District as well, and it will, as you said, result in uh an investment of over a million dollars as well as 25 new jobs.

Thank you, Director.

Any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing that I move for passage.

Bank Timberwolves deputy, beatty de account screen, remi wise president harden.

Passed.

Is that all I have?

Okay, that is all I have this evening.

Happy holidays.

Is there a motion to recess for zoning?

Clerk, please call the role.

Thanks, Timberwolves Day Padilla, Baiti de Aka or Dorns, Green Remy White's President Harding.

In recess, please call the role.

Thanks, Timberwolves Day Fidelia, Betty Day Aka or Dorans Green Remy White President Harden.

Can I get a motion to submit for the reading of the journal?

Second.

Thanks, Timberwolves Day Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans, Green, Remy, White President Harden.

Uh are there any additions or corrections to the journal?

Hearing none of the journal is approved.

We'll now go to the zoning committee.

Councilmember Dorrance chairs that committee.

Allow me to serve on it.

Councilmember Floyd is yours.

Uh thank you, uh, President Harden.

As always, before we get in tonight's zoning agenda, allow me to briefly explain our rules pertaining to speaking for speaking before council on rezoning and variances.

We will only hear a staff presentation of ordinances of a disapproval for recommending body, or if we have a public speaker sign up to speak against an ordinance.

We allow uh three speakers on each side, three proponents, three opponents.

We ask that the speakers limit the remarks to three minutes for the standard rules of the city council.

All speakers of the council variants go to need to see the staff, area commissioners, applicants, and members of the public will be sworn in before they give testimony.

Representative area commission are always able to speak on an ordinance and do not need to fill out a speaker slip, but we do ask you alert to city staff your intention to speak at this committee hearing.

Uh this evening we do not have any public speakers.

Uh on the advice of city attorney's office.

I will now swear in city staff.

Please stand and raise your right hand and be sworn in.

Do you swear or affirm this testing we're about to give shall be the truth, nothing but the truth that you shall answer under payments of penalty perjury?

If so, please say I do.

I do.

Thank you.

Uh please add the record flag that uh Joseph Rose from the Department of Building Zoning Services have been sworn in.

First, we have ordinance number 3271-2025 to rezone 3812 East Powell Road, being 1.49 plus acres located in the west side of East Powell Road, 320 plus feet east of Worthington Road from our rural district to C4 Commercial District.

Uh this site consists of two parcels developed with two vacant commercial buildings and a cell tower as a result of a recent annexation to the city of Columbus.

The requested rezoning will allow commercial uses, including retail uses such as disp uh such as a dispensary and this location uh through the amendments, um, though the amendments submitted to the clerk uh include new limitation text on permitted uses within this C4 designation.

Uh proposal is approved some city staff, development kitchen, but a disapproval from the Far North uh Columbus Coalitions, a civic association within that area.

Uh because of the disapproval, we will have a uh staff report from uh Mr.

Rose.

Sir Rose, the floor is yours.

Uh thank you, Chair Dorns, President Harden, members of council.

The 1.49 acre site consists of two parcels developed with two vacant commercial buildings and a cell tower in the R rural district as a result of the annexation as previously mentioned.

The requested LC4 limited commercial district will allow limited commercial due commercial uses, including retail, such as a dispensary at dislocation.

To the north and west of the site is undeveloped land in the L L AR3 limited apartment residential district.

To the south is undeveloped land in the CPD commercial plan development district.

To the east is undeveloped land zoned FR1 farm residence district within Orange Township.

The newly established limitation text establishes C4 uses at this location.

It also includes use restrictions prohibiting check caching, cabarets and nightclubs, use car sales, except when in use in conjunction with sale of new cars, pawnbrokers, mission or temporary shelters, halfway houses, billboards, blood, and/or Oregon banks, outside storage of items with the exception of items ordered for sale and accessory to permitted uses such as hardware lumber or landscaping sale uses.

The size within the planning boundaries of the far north area plan, which recommends mixed-use regional land uses at this location.

Plan also recommends redevelopment and reuse of vacant and underutilized commercial and office sites in a manner consistent with the land use plan and recommended design guidelines.

Staff also note that this area is under consideration for updated land use recommendation and corresponding zoning as part of the zone in economic and housing opportunity to which draft generalized to which the draft generalized land use recommendation is mixed use, which is also consistent with the requested zoning district.

Therefore, city staff's recommendation is for approval, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Mr.

Mr.

Revs.

Any questions from my colleagues for city staff at this point?

Seeing none, I will invite the applicant's representative for Ms.

Molly Gwynn.

Ms.

Gwyn, welcome back to council.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair, members of council.

We appreciate uh the Folsom staff report.

As noted, uh, this project does have approval from the development commission, and the applicant has committed to some additional limitation text limiting uh other potential noxious uses at the property.

The applicant has also agreed to enter into a good neighbor agreement, and they have engaged the local business community in the area with respect to the terms of that agreement.

And with that, I'm certainly happy to answer any questions that any members might have at this point.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Uh thank you, Ms.

Gwynn.

Any questions to my colleagues?

Uh again, just to uh underline so again we did have disapproval from the Civic Association with that area.

Um you mentioned uh some of the additional limitations that have had that have you all have entered into with this with the amendment here, but also additionally the good neighbor agreement.

Those are all subsequent from when that went before the civic association.

So we've um spent a lot of time the last several weeks, uh, you and your your client as far as trying to agree to some of the concerns that have been articulated by a number of folks.

So I just wanted to be able to underline sort of the timing of some of those changes uh have been subsequent from when that would be for the neighborhood.

Is that correct?

Yes, Mr.

Chair, that's absolutely correct.

Uh these these amendments were all documented subsequent to the recommendation of disapproval from the neighborhood group.

So we've uh worked as hard as we can to make everybody as comfortable as possible with the use of this property.

Thank you.

Great, thank you.

Thank you.

Uh any other any final questions?

Uh again, I want to thank Ms.

Gwyn and certainly uh her applicant and all the folks I have uh we've been in contact with over the last several weeks regarding uh this piece of legislation.

Uh so if there are no other questions, I first move to amend as submitted to clerk.

Second.

Bangs Timberwolves deputy, beatty de acauer dorms green, reamy wise president harden.

Thank you.

Next uh move for passage as amended.

Clerk please call the role.

Banks Tim, Pervosa DePodia, Beatty de Akaur Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Passed.

Thank you.

Uh next we have ordinance three three three one-2025 to amend ordinance number two seven three three-2025 passed December 7th, 2015 for the property located 4986 Avery Road by repealing the section one and three in replacement of the new section one and three to modify commitments regarding maximum unit uh count and building design and elements for property located in the LAR1 limited apartment residential district.

Ordinance number 2733-2025 was to allow a commercial multi-residential development.

This ordinance amends the limitation text for 9.83 acre portion of the site, known today as parcel number 0110-296461 by removing the maximum unit count commitment and removing commitments to building roof pitch and materials.

Uh all other sections of the prior ordinance remain unchanged or in effect.

Proposal is River and City Staff and the Hayden Run Civic Association, um, as there is no area commission within that area.

Is there any question or comments?

See not in move for passage.

Banks Timberwolves deputy, beatty de Akaur Dorance Green, Remy White's President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3346-2025 to rezone.

First six four Rathmill Road being 17.1 plus acres located in the north side of Rathma Road, 260 plus feet of Fosterston Drive from our Rural District to L A R L D limited department residential district.

So I consist of um one part of one parcel developed the religious facility with the applicant requesting rezone to allow for the development of a multi-unit residential development containing up to 216 dwelling units, proposals of approved some city staff development commission, and the far south area commission.

Uh any questions or comments, my colleagues?

See none of uh move for passage.

Clerk please call the row.

Banks Timber also deputy, Beatty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Passed.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3355-2025 to rezone, 5371 Bachman Road, being 99.7 plus acres local in the south side of Bachman Road, 2,770 feet of the intersection of Bachman and Winchester Pike from NG Neighborhood General District and NE neighborhood edge district to PUD6 Plan Unit Development District and L A R L D Apartment Limited Department Residential District.

Proposal is approved from city staff, development commission, and the Greater Southeast Area Commission.

Any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none and move for passage.

Clerk, please call the row.

Banks in Proposal Depotilla, Betty de Aqua Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you.

We move in the Council Variances portion of the agenda.

We have ordinance 3274-2025 to grant advariance provisions of Section 333-2.039 R4 residential district.

331 2.49 C require parking in 333 2.05 A4 Area District Lot Width Requirements.18D basis computing area, 333 2.25 B maximum side yard required, 332.26 minimum side yard permitted, 3332.27 rear yard of the Columbus City Coast through property located at 110 Chicago Avenue to allow two unit dwelling and a single unit dwelling on one lot with reduced development standards in the R4 residential district.

So it consists of one parcel, developed with a two-unit dwelling and the request of council variants will allow the addition of a single unit dwelling above attached garage, better known as the carriage house.

A council variance is required because of the current zoning district allows for up to four units on one building, uh, but does not allow the arrangement of two two unit dwellings and a single dwelling on one lot.

Variances to require parking, lot width, lot area coverage, front end minimum side yard, maximum side yard and rear yard are also included in the request.

Proposal is approved as the city staff and the Frankenton Area Commission.

Our first move to accepting chair of staff reporting into evidence as an exhibit.

Clerk please call the row.

Banks Temple also deputy, beatty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harding.

Thank you.

I next move to uh adopt the finance staff, the finance of council.

Clerk please call the row.

Banks in proposal depotilla, beatty de accourance green, reamy Weiss President Harden.

Adopt it.

Thank you.

I'm finally moved for passage.

Clerk, please call the row.

Banks Tim Proposal DePodia, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you.

Next we have orders 3275-2025 to granted variance provisions of section 333-2.039 R4 residential district, 3321.07 B landscaping, 331 2.49 C require parking, and 333 2.05 A4 area district lot width requirements and 333 2.15 R4 area district requirements and 3332.18 basis computing area, 333 2.19 fronting, 3332.25 B maximum side yard required, and 333 2.26 minimum side yard permitted, and 333 2.27 rear yards of the Columbus City Coast for property located at 69 Chicago Avenue to allow two units, single two single unit dwellings on one lot with reduced development standards in the R for residential district.

Similar to the previous ordinance, also on the same street.

This site consists of one parcel developed with a single unit dwelling, and the request of council variants will allow the addition of a single unit dwelling above attached garage, also known as the carriage house.

Council variants are required again because the current district only allows up to four units on one building, does not allow two single dwellings on one lot.

This has approvals from city staff and the Frankenstein Area Commission.

Any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I first move to accept the entire staff report into evidence as an exhibit.

Okay.

Clerk please call the row.

Bank Semperosa DePodia, Betty de Akawa Dornscreen, Remy Weitz President Harden.

Accept it.

Thank you.

Next move to adopt the finance staff of the finance council.

Second.

Clerk, please call the row.

Banks Temprosa DePodia, Beatty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weitch President Harden.

Adopted.

Thank you.

Finally move for passage.

Clerk please call the row.

Bank Samperosa DePadilla, Beatty de Akawa Doranscreen, Remy Whites President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you.

Next we have orders 3347-2025 to granted variance provisions of section 333 2.26 A minimum side yard permitted.

3332.27 of the rear yard and 333.255 permit yard and 333.35 G private garage at the Columbus City codes for property located at 464 Rathmill Road to allow reduced development standards for a religious facility in the R Rural District and Department Complex and the L ARLD apartment resident apartment residential district.

This companion variants, the rezoning we had earlier tonight.

The requested council variants will allow the site conditions pending a lot split for the religious facility and glued variants to include garage height, rear yard, and reduced required setbacks.

Proposal approved from city staff and the far south area, far south area commission.

Our first move to accept the entire staff in due evidence as an exhibit.

Clerk please call the row.

Bank Simple S de Podia, Beatty de Aquaur Dorans Green, Remy Weitch President Harden.

Accept it.

Thank you.

Next move to adopt five staff of the finance council.

Clerk, please call the row.

Bank Semperosa Depodia, Beatty de Aqua Dorans Green, Remy Weitch President Harden.

Adopted.

Thank you.

Finally move for passage.

Okay.

Clerk, please call the row.

Bank Stemperosa Deputia, Beatty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you.

And finally we have ordinance 3353-25 to grant advanced provisions of section 333-2.037 R2 residential district.

3312.449C require parking in 3321.05 B2 Vision Clearance and 333 2.14 R2 area district area district requirements.

Site uh is developed with a two-unit dwelling and the request of council grants will allow an additional two unit dwelling for four dwelling units on one lot.

Council Barrance require current district allows a single unit dwelling or a two-unit dwelling, but does not allow two two unit dwellings on the same lot.

Uh requests also includes variances to parking, vision clearance, lot area coverage, and rear yard.

Proposals uh approvals from city staff, the Columbus South Side Area Commission.

I first move to accept the entire staff report and do Evans as an exhibit.

Clerk was called the row.

Bank's Timberwolves deputy, beatty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harding.

Accept it.

Second.

Clerk was called the row.

Bankstin, Barosa DePodia, Beatty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Adopted.

And finally move for passage.

Clerk was uh fast.

Banks simper also.

Banks Timberwolves deputy, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

That is our final piece of legislation in the zoning committee for 2025.

Uh if there's no further business to come for the zoning committee is our motion to adjourn.

Clerk please call the row.

Bank simple deputia, Betty Day Akawa or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss, President Harden.

Things journal.

We'll reconvene for regular meeting uh shortly order.

Can you hear me?

Can you hear me?

We can reconvene.

Can I give the motion to reconvene uh meeting number sixty-two?

Clerk please call the row.

Banks Timber Rosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Meeting uh is reconvened.

Uh the next committee come before council is the public service and transportation committee.

That committee is chaired by Councilmember Rosa de Padilla.

Councilman Floor is yours.

Thank you, Council President.

Today I have seven items in public service and transportation.

The first is ordinance 3224 2025 to amend the 2025 capital improvement budget to authorize the director of public service to enter into contract with Pummel Construction Services LLC for the pedestrian safety improvements, TRR sidewalk replacement 2025 tree route project to authorize the expenditure of up to 1,157,724 and 21 cents from the streets and highways bond fund for the project and to declare an emergency.

This ordinance authorizes the director of public service to enter into contract with Pummel Construction Services LLC to provide payment for construction, construction, administration, and inspection services.

This contract includes repairs to city sidewalks damaged by tree routes by removing repairing and replacing concrete and other work as may be necessary.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3220 3238 2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Public Service to execute those documents necessary for the city to grant encroachment to legally allow the installation of the pedestrian bridge to extend over the public rights of way of the 20-foot alley located at the first alley west of North High Street and to declare an emergency.

The proposed budget will extend or sorry, the proposed bridge will extend on either side of the 20-foot alley right away.

The development is proposed.

Student housing for two buildings with approximately 198 residential units.

During the design phase of the proposed buildings, it was determined that for safety reasons, the pedestrian bridge was warranted.

Do my colleagues have questions or comments?

Seeing none, I'd like to first request to amend to emergency.

Banks Timber Rosa de Podia, Betty Day Akawa Dorance Green, Remy Weitz President Hardin.

Thank you.

And next I'd like to move for passage as amended.

Bank Stimber Rosa de Podia, Betty de Akawer Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next we have 3277-2025 to amend the 2025 capital improvement budget to authorize the director of the of public service department to enter into contract with Strasser Paving Company Incorporated for the resurfacing 2025 project one to authorize the expenditure of up to 12,929,493.

Director, can you just let folks know where they can go to find out if they um have hit the street paving lottery and where they can go to find uh if their street is up?

Council President, Chair Barossa de Padilla, members of council.

They can go to the public service website under construction management to find that site.

We are very grateful this evening for you know any resurfacing dollars that we can get with 4600 miles of lane lane miles of pavement to maintain, you know, any of these dollars are well suited, and yes, as you said, uh the lottery to uh figure out which of these 88 streets.

And I joke about the lottery, but honestly, this is how there is a process for figuring out the degree of streets and how they fall into disrepair, especially when we look at how we treat streets during the winter time.

Um, you know, after a while they do degrade, and so um we're excited.

I know everyone's excited to get a freshly paved street, especially um some streets that have been beat up because of the weather and other things.

So uh, do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangs Timberwolves depadia, Betty de Akaur door on screen, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3301 2025 to authorize the director of finance and management to enter into contracts with Mark Wright Lane's Equipment Company Incorporated for the purchase of a right on thermoplastic striper to authorize funds within the municipal motor vehicle tax fund to authorize the waiver of the competitive bidding requirements of the city uh Columbus City Codes to authorize the expenditure of up to 140,000 dollars from the municipal motor vehicle tax fund to purchase the equipment and to declare an emergency.

This equipment, uh the purchase of this equipment is intended to continue to provide traffic maintenance throughout the city of Columbus.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangs, Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa door on screen, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3320 2025 to amend the 2025 capital improvement budget to authorize the transfer of funds within the streets and highways bond fund and the streets and highways non-bond fund to authorize the director of public service to enter into contract with Strawster Paving Company Incorporated for the roadway improvements, hard road water quality and smoky row road drainage divisions or revisions project to authorize the expenditure of up to 1,311,882 and 82 cents from the streets and highways bond fund and the streets and highways non-bond fund for the project and declare an emergency.

This project involves installing several water quality structures on hard road between Sawmill and Smoky Row Road.

The project includes replacement of existing road pavement curbs, sidewalks, which everyone loves, curb ramps, and pavement markings.

The project also includes reallocation of an existing water line and other work as may be necessary.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangs Denverosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weitz President Harden.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3357 2025 to authorize the city attorney's office real estate division to contract for professional services relative to the acquisition of fee, simple title, and lesser interest in and to property needed for the rail or roadway improvements, Sanctus Boulevard project to authorize the city auditor to uh appropriate $1,170,000 within the Federal Transportation Grants Fund to authorize the City Attorney's Office Real Estate Division to negotiate with property owners to acquire the additional rights of way necessary to complete this project and to authorize the expenditure of $1,170,000 from the federal transportation grant and the streets and highways bond fund for the project to repay any unused grant funds at the end of the grant period and to declare an emergency.

The project will add a share you shared use path along Sanctus Boulevard between Worthington Woods Boulevard and Lazell Road.

Further improvements include the addition of a center turn lane where necessary, pavement rehabilitation, shared use path, sidewalk traffic signal replacements, and street lighting.

Do my colleagues have any additional comments or questions?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangs, Burosa DePodia, Betty Day Akkora door on screen, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Thank you.

And finally, we have ordinance 3380 2025 to authorize the city attorney to file complaints in order to immediately appropriate and accept the remaining fees simple and lesser real estate necessary to timely complete the pedestrian safety Sunbury Aglar project to authorize the expenditure of $3,37 and to declare an emergency.

The project scope can construct sidewalks, much needed sidewalks along Aggler Road and Sunbury Road.

The city must acquire certain fees, simple title, and lesser real estate located in the vicinity of the intersection of Sunbury and Aglar in order to timely complete the public project.

The city's acquisition of the real estate will help make improve or repair certain portions of the public right of way located in the vicinity of Sunbury and Aglar, which will be open to the public without charge.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bang Symberosa de Podia, Betty de Akaward Doran Screen, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Thank you, Council President.

And may I move, I have a couple items in rules and policy.

Please.

So this is on page 29.

Um the first piece, uh, I want to make a quick introduction.

We have some speakers and um and then I will read the ordinance.

So this evening, I'm introducing an ordinance that provides a necessary clarification in our city code regarding work in the public right of way.

Work that is essential to keeping our neighborhoods safe, connected, and functioning.

And I want to be very clear.

Columbus is a city that values its history.

Our history and our community shape our identity and tell the story of who we are.

And at the same time, we are a growing modern city that must maintain safe streets and accessible public spaces for every resident.

That's why it's called the right of way, because people have the right to travel freely through the city to reach their destination and enjoy the myriad of amenities our city has to offer.

By clarifying the city's authority in the right-of-way, we ensure that essential work like repairing sidewalks, fixing water lines, or upgrading intersections is not delayed or impacted.

I want to be clear that this ordinance allows the city to do necessary work in the right-of-way, which is a public space for all.

This council is committed to our historic neighborhoods in making sure that every resident, every resident can access the services that they need.

Two weeks ago on December 4th, this council held a public hearing, three hour, almost three hour public hearing, where we had 18 speakers and many more written testimony to discuss the public right-of-way and the certificate of appropriateness.

At the hearing, we heard concerns from residents about historic preservation, design standards, as well as the challenges that residents face with the ability to move around neighborhoods in Columbus.

Preservation and modernization are not opposing forces.

They are commitments that we can uphold together.

That is why, in speaking with the Department of Public Service and the Department of Development, we are committed to working with historic commissions to continue this conversation.

On Monday, December 8th, we passed a piece of legislation number 3298 2025 that will allow this council to put a put out a request for proposal to study historic preservation practices and policies.

This effort is being led by President Pro Tem Dorns as part of his Columbus Forward legislation.

Additionally, I'm committed to continuing dialogue with the departments of public service, development, the city attorney, the German Village Historic Preservation Commission, and community partners like the German Village Society to ensure that the city continues to prioritize historic preservation as we deliver some of the most basic services to all residents.

These ongoing conversations will advance our shared goal, born out of the December 4th hearing, and many other conversations to more closely regulate the quality of work performed by the city's contractors in the right-of-way in historic areas.

Whether that means adding language to requests for bids or specifying planned notes for such work or recommending or requiring closer collaboration between the Department of Public Service and the City's historic preservation office and stakeholders, as well as exploring equitable funding sources dedicated to historic preservation.

City Council will be convening these conversations to meet the needs of historic preservation advocates and residents across the city who take pride in the character of their neighborhood.

For anyone who believes the city is creating different standards for itself than the standards that must be followed by private entities proposing to do work in the right-of-way in historic neighborhoods, rest assured that city staff are still expected to work with neighborhoods to honor and preserve the character of streets, intersections, sidewalks, and other infrastructure being improved.

That is part of existing city protocols that are not changing at a as a result of this legislation.

Instead, we are clarifying the city's promise to residents that residents of all abilities will be able to travel around our city on infrastructure that we build for them with their support.

I've been thinking a great deal about something someone submitted in written testimony for the public hearing.

They said that they should that we should preserve German Village because it belongs to everyone.

And I appreciate the sentiment.

The right-of-way is a physical manifestation of our commitment as public servants to connect different corners of our community and knit us more closely together.

And I believe that this legislation helps to continue to make it true.

And I want to be clear, while we have had several advocates from German Village that have come to speak on the certificate of appropriateness.

It affects 18 historic neighborhoods or neighborhood or design review neighborhoods.

So when we talk about access to the right-of-way, we aren't talking about one neighborhood.

We're talking about a good portion of the city.

So we have several speakers that are here to speak about the uh to speak to this legislation.

So first, I would like to invite Anthony Meyer to uh the podium.

And Mr.

Meyer, you have three minutes to speak if you introduce yourself in any uh any organizations that you represent.

And welcome back to council.

Good evening, Council Presidents, Member Council.

I'm Anthony Meyer, and I'm here today as a president of German public society.

First, I want to begin by offering our sincere thanks particularly to you.

We recognize and appreciate the significant significant uptake to recharacterize the work, the legislation or emergency measure with traditional work.

More specifically, the city council's commitment.

Our discussion, we agree to actively work together to amend the work that has a passage.

This movement demonstrates a spirit of partnership.

We have and that honest commitment is the German Bible society has volunteer.

Isn't this the action?

This action is to prove that our goal is not competition.

We are here as well, parentheses public, fully committed to finding efficient, high quality, and really sound ways to achieve accessibility while preserving our historical work street teams.

We are ready to sit down and we are ready to work.

One piece is extremely important is I just want to speak plainly about legislative responsibility.

While we appreciate the commitment to amend this ordinance after it passes, passing flawed legislation under the assumption that we will fix it later is not the most durable and responsible path.

That exposes a city and the historic neighborhoods to unnecessary risk and uncertainty.

We agree that we want to work together, and therefore we have one unified request.

We ask that you just pause this process and sit down with the services department, the German Village Commission, representatives from the various different organizations as we've discussed, and legal counsel to co-author.

So we work jointly to move further forward together with compromise language that truly works for everyone.

I'm just asking patience.

I think that we need to first finalize a solution before we finalize the vote.

Thank you.

Thank you, Anthony.

Thank you for uh being here this evening, and thank you for your continued advocacy.

And it is honest, right?

Everything that we can do to work with you together, this is one step in a broader, broader momentum forward to work together, and I hope that it enriches our organizations, it enriches our community and makes it accessible for everyone simultaneously.

And we can do that together because we have experts that we can bring forward to help make sure it's done right.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh, next, I'd like to invite Robert Kaplan.

Mr.

Kaplan, you have three minutes, and if you will introduce yourself and any organizations that you represent.

Welcome back to council.

Good evening, council.

My name is Robert Kaplan, and I live in German Village.

Um, I'm here tonight as a resident, uh, homeowner, and someone deeply invested in the long-term health of this neighborhood and the city as a whole.

I want to be clear at the outset that access accessibility is not optional.

It is essential.

Uh, every publicly funded sidewalk and right-of-way improvement should be safe and predictable and accessible to everybody.

Uh, and I want this work we want this work completed fully and correctly.

There is no disagreement about that.

The disagreement has always been about how the work is planned and coordinated and executed across historic neighborhoods.

Last year, the ADA ramp installations and related right of way work in German village resulted in documented damage to historic materials and private property like my own.

That evidence was reviewed by the court and found credible enough to halt the work.

In at least one case, the damage was significant enough that the city or its contractor paid to repair a private home.

That matters because it underscores that the concerns raised were real and not theoretical.

Last week, in a true showing of good faith, the litigants made a conscious choice to step back and withdraw the lawsuit and the injunction to open the door to collaboration.

That decision is one of the reasons the emergency designation was lifted.

It was meet a meaningful gesture intended to rebuild trust and create a space to do this work together.

And trust matters, and good faith matters, especially when residents are still waiting for the city to fully remedy some of the issues from 2024.

I also want to speak briefly as someone involved in the business community.

German village is not just a residential neighborhood.

It is a major economic driver, a tourism destination, a place for people across the city and the country to come and experience.

Accessibility, infrastructure investment, and historic preservation are not competing interests here.

When done right, they reinforce each other.

Cities across the country have shown that accessibility and public infrastructure improvements can be delivered in historic districts with without sacrificing safety, character, or legal compliance.

We already have a draft amendment language that reflects the best practices and gives the city the flexibility it needs while protecting the neighborhoods from avoidable harm.

That is why the request tonight is simple and responsible.

Now that the emergency has been lifted, please use that time that it creates.

Sit down with city engineers, disability advocates, preservation professionals, and neighborhood representatives, and finalize the language before the ordinance is passed.

Doing this right now will save time, money, and reduce the risk of future litigation and rebuild public trust.

Most importantly, do you mind if I give finish my paraphrase?

Most importantly, it will ensure that access that accessibility and public infrastructure improvements move forward fully, thoughtfully, and in a way that we can all stand behind.

We are here, we are ready to work, and we will remain engaged with you as partners in getting this right.

Thank you so much for your time, Council.

Thank you.

Thank you for your continued advocacy and thank you for coming back down to council.

Um next, we have Anthony Harkey.

Same reminder, three minutes, introduce yourself, anyone you're representing this evening.

I gotcha.

Uh Anthony Harkey, I'm the current chair of the German Village Commission.

Uh, President Harden, Council members, staff, uh, thank you for the time to speak.

Uh I want to uh first off start with uh I appreciate the outreach uh since the last last hearing, uh last meeting.

Uh it's it's refreshing to have the dialogue start up again.

Uh appreciate German Village Society's uh uh position to withdraw their lawsuit uh in an effort of collaboration.

Uh I want to make sure that everybody's aware that the commission's stance is that we are not against accessibility.

We are not against ADA curb ramps.

We are not against making the neighborhood more accessible.

Uh we as the commission, we we derive our jurisdiction straight from the Historic Preservation Act from the federal government, uh, straight down through the State Historic Preservation Office to the City of Columbus down to the commission.

Um accessibility is a critical piece.

It's the law, it must happen.

Uh, preservation brief 32 from the National Park Service states uh that in order to do accessibility in historic districts, we should look at the historic character, preserving, demolishing only when necessary, uh, but there is retrofit necessary in this case.

Um I believe that the right materials, the right approach, the right collaboration, the proper planning is crucial.

Uh you'll hear you'll read through your description of the ordinance, uh, their statements of if we go with different materials, it's gonna be more expensive because of material costs, but also because of the cost to plan, because every corner is different, uh, every situation is different, and it's gonna require different kinds of curb ramps.

The fact that there is all those differences just further reinforces the fact that the planning is necessary.

Uh, you can't just cookie cutter take one situation and just stamp it all across the village.

Accessibility is not just curb ramps.

Accessibility is pedestrian access routes, pars.

Uh the ProWag ADA guidelines uh state that you need a 48-inch public access route.

Uh if you go through German Village, take a walk around, there are sidewalks that are three feet, two feet or even less, right up front of my own house, there's a telephone pole blocking the public access way.

Uh if we put people with disabilities up on a curb ramp, down a sidewalk, they get halfway on a block, and there's no way to even turn around.

That is a fundamental problem.

Uh just replacing curb ramps without having an overall plan for how do we make this a accessible district is short-sighted.

Uh, in terms of the orders language itself, uh, Section 3116, 3119, Title 33, TIL 34, those are specifically talking about the architecture, talking about the historic nature of the uh neighborhoods.

The other 19, 17 uh other uh code insertions is overkill.

Uh, when we look back in the in the future, looking back to now, uh, we're gonna say what's the intents of the commission of the council by putting all this in there.

They're gonna look at it and say it's because they don't want to have the commissions have any responsibility.

Uh and right now in the country we are facing situations with the federal government where we have we have preservation in place.

We have rules and laws in place, and it's not being followed.

Uh I don't want to see the same thing happen here in Columbus.

We should be protecting the future and not focus on a short term at this point in time.

Thank you.

Uh thank you, Anthony.

I look forward to our meeting on Wednesday.

Yes.

We will talk more.

I appreciate you coming down here.

I appreciate your thoroughness as well in the feedback that you've given us, and that's something that we'll continue to talk about.

So thank you.

Council of Dorans, when you get into the uh preservation review, happy to be part of that as well.

Um and lastly, we have Robert Jackson.

Mr.

Jackson, welcome back to council.

Same thing, three minutes, and introduce yourself and any entities you represent.

Hello, I'm Robert Jackson, and I'm a resident of German Village.

Over the past three sessions on proposal for 3314, we've heard testimony ten times from the associates of the GVS, four times from the associates of the GVC, and testimony from a Mare Olive candidate.

The common theme in all the testimony is that the right-of-workway is somehow beyond the City of Columbus without oversight.

That the City of Columbus, unsupervised, has done irreparable damage to the corners and to homes in historic German village.

I am not sure that any of the evidence presented to the council, to the media, or to the residents of German Village are irreparable damage.

There are numerous examples presented, but with only three minutes, I just want to take a look at the first photo that I saw and the most current photo that I saw.

In front of you is a document.

On page one is a photo of the property that, like the majority of the photos, shows what ADA ramp looks like during ADA ramp construction looks like during construction.

The center picture is the photo circulated.

A casual observer will have the perception that bricks were ripped out of the sidewalk and replaced with a wall of concrete.

The issue that I have with this photo is that if we look at the corner using Google Maps history, we see that the corner was always a wall of history going back as far as Google has history.

If we visit the corner ourselves today, we see that the installation of the ADA ramp by the city has actually put more brick on the sidewalk than was ever there before.

So where is the irreparable damage with the work done by the city on this corner?

In front of you is page two.

The most recent photo of uh property that appears to show significant damage to a foundation is a consequence of the ADA ramp installation.

The center picture again is the photo circulated.

A casual observer will have the perception that the home's foundation was catastrophically damaged by the city's construction group.

The issue I have with this photo is that again, if we look at Google Maps history, we see this home had a clearly visible foundation damage as far back as 2015.

If I take a close look at the photo, what I see appears to me is a mason's tray on the ground, and the mason has opened up the crack to clean out the material that has had moisture jamage for over a decade.

It looks to me like this photo is actually the city repairing pre-existing damage.

So again, where is the irreparable damage that necessitates oversight by the city?

So we just made the most basic second look at any of the photos of the damage.

I'm not seeing that so far the city can't manage the right-of-way without oversight.

I don't see that the basis for the objections to the code amendment are demonstratively objective.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Jackson.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for coming back down and for your advocacy.

I just um before I turn it over to my colleagues for any uh questions or comments that they would like to make.

I just want to be very clear that uh the code was the presumption of the code was that the city would always have access to our right-of-way, just as we do in my neighborhood, in many neighborhoods across the city.

The in the court ruling, because the person, which was the intent of the code would be an average person, they were defining the city as a person, therefore removing our right to the access of the right-of-way again, not only in German Village, but in 18 communities around the city, which then opened up the city to actually being more vulnerable.

So today, the move that we make and whether folks have an opinion of whether it is flawed or not flawed is yet to be seen.

What we see it as is clarification of the code that should have always been there.

Now, in the conversations that we had with the German Village Society, in conversations that we'll have with the commission, the purpose of the code is that we can always amend it.

What is good today may not be good tomorrow.

This happens all of the time.

We make co we make uh laws for today that don't always stand the test of time because people conditions change.

We have made a significant investment in having experts come in that can give us some good solid feedback and best practices on how to handle historic districts, and we want some of that to play out.

We have also made a commitment to look to working with the Department of Development to think about how we equitably fund historic preservation.

We've also worked with the Department of Public Service to look at how we work with contractors, our Office of Historic Preservation to say when do they look over plans?

I believe that we are making a good faith effort to meet the needs of everyone.

We are not always going to agree.

We are not always going to agree.

The strategy is going to be different, but that's what compromise is that each party gives a little bit.

And I want to make sure that we know that we've seen one community that has come out, but there are many more communities that were affected by this that didn't even know that they were going to be affected that have also reached out.

And so the purpose of today is to clarify our code to give the city back the promise that we make to residents that we can we can be responsible for our right of way.

And that's really what we're deciding today.

Yes, um, Councilman Beatty.

Um, I was a um 18-year resident of German village.

Uh I lived at 600 South Grant 206 East Beck in a house that was uh 1890s.

And I had great affinity and love for German village, and I believe that, you know, and I appreciate all of your advocacy and everything like that, and I certainly benefited from it.

But you know, many nights neighborhoods, neighborhood groups have come before this council, uh, usually in the context of a new project, uh, you know, apartment building or something like that, or even a uh commercial building, and they tell us about um the character of their neighborhood and uh how they've lived there a long time and everything like that.

And in many of these instances, we um ask those communities, those neighbors to broaden their definition of being a neighbor and broaden their definition of being a citizen of this community and broaden their definition of a community to understand that there are certain needs that we have in this city for more housing, affordable housing, other types of assets.

And so I would just say to you know, um the people of German Village, as we go forward, um, there's gonna have to be compromised.

There's gonna have to be a new uh attitude, you know, towards you know, neighbor and community.

It goes beyond just the folks that live in German village.

I lived on Beck Street, four houses in from Lindy's, and I remember looking out my window, and I would see at 7:30 in the morning the folks that did the food prep for Lindy's coming in.

And a little later on, the folks that the linen truck would come in, the trash truck would come in.

And so the economic driver is caused of your community and the tourism and everything like that.

It's not just the people that live in your community.

And the people that live in these other communities, they maybe don't have the in affluence and the ability to come together and everything like that.

You know, they deserve the sidewalks, the streets, and everything as well.

And so I, you know, I'm gonna be off council, and I will probably will not be part of those conversations, but I just hope that we are able to continue that dialogue, but please have an open mind and have a more broad version of community and neighborhood.

Thank you, Councilman Patty.

Any other remarks.

Chair, I I know you mentioned it, but again, we are planning to undertake an assessment of our current historical preservation policies of the City of Columbus into next year.

Um, in a growing city, uh we have to figure out how our, you know, over a dozen uh different historical districts and design review commissions and all these kinds of things fit together in a way that is respectful of towards our history.

Columbus is a city that all too often has uh not had preserving our history at its forefront when we think about our development policies.

Uh, but we also have to be thoughtful of Brown.

What does what do those policies look like in a context, again, of a growing city?

And uh folks were the hearing you heard me say this, but you know, no single neighborhood is a museum.

Uh neighborhoods evolve, and that does not mean that any one individual aspect of that evolution is gonna be more important than one another.

Um, but I think it's important for us over this next year to really assess internally what we're doing well, what we're maybe not doing well, what other communities are doing to incentivize um historical preservation as it relates to development.

Um, because again, when we think about the the jewel that is German Village or Victorian Village or Italian village places that I have called home during my time in Columbus, um these are historic neighborhoods that um again are great places to live and raise a family that we should all be proud of.

Um but there's also dozens and dozens and dozens and dozens of other neighborhoods in Columbus as well that also have history that we should be thinking about.

How do we make sure that those pieces of history in Columbus are also preserved and well respected as again every single neighborhood in this city evolves?

The only thing I think council can promise is that Columbus is not going to be the same five years from now, ten years from now, twenty years from now, as it is today, just as it's different than it was 10, 20, 30, 100 years ago.

And that's gonna be a constant as this community continues to evolve.

So um I think this is a this has been a I think a learning um example for both folks uh who are really deeply invested and engaged on these issues in Columbus.

I think it's been a learning um example for council as well to start to meaningfully engage as it relates to very difficult things like how do we make sure that we comply with federal law, how do we make sure accessibility is there?

How do we think about again dealing with preservation in streetscapes that were developed well before the size of vehicles that we deal with today when there wasn't recycling trucks coming through, linen trucks coming through servicing restaurants, all those kinds of things.

So these things are deeply deeply complicated.

Um so I think this is something that is going to continue to move forward.

And I appreciate the chair again trying to do their best to meet folks, uh particularly in German Village as close as we can here to figure out what is an appropriate pathway forward.

Um and I trust the chair to lead those discussions in good faith.

And I appreciate the folks here tonight uh saying that they want to and appreciate them showing that good faith by by again voluntaries voluntarily dismissing that lawsuit to allow those discussions to take place and become mature, and again, establish that kind of trust where we can move forward.

So uh just wanted to again highlight that and again looking forward to over the next year plus really figuring out how do we deal with this in a meaningful way uh moving into the future thank you, President Pro Tem, and I appreciate that.

I think um Council President, did you I just wanted to um I I just before I read the ordinance, the last thing I want to say is that what is what was very evident to me in our um hearing, what was very evident to me in all of the conversation is um that we had is that there is love and joy and pride in every neighborhood and people fiercely love where they live, and we fiercely love the city, and I appreciate every time folks come in to fight for their neighborhoods and for the things that they love and that they care about.

And just know that we are with you in that fight.

And um, especially when you have parts of our city that do hold our history that so many people come to visit, not just coming into the city of Columbus, but you have tourists from Columbus that come and enjoy all of the beautiful things that make up German village.

So with that, I will read ordinance 3314, 2025 to repeal and replace various sections of the Columbus City Codes to clarify that the City of Columbus officials, agencies, departments, agents, and contractors are not required to obtain a certificate of appropriateness see away from a historic architectural review commission or other commission with COA authority when performing work in the right way.

In response to the contrary interpretation of the Columbus City Codes as detailed in the magistrates decision filed September 22nd, 2025, and entry adopting magistrates and granting preliminary injunction filed September 29th, 2025 in the case German Village Society versus City of Columbus, Franklin County Court of Common Please case number 25 C V 7368.

The purpose of this code change is to clarify that the city is not required to obtain a certificate of appropriateness or approval from historic review, architectural review commission prior to working the public right-of-way in historic preservation district.

This legislation is important step to ensure that the city is able to bring the right of way into compliance with ADA so residents can rely on safe, reliable, and well-maintained public infrastructure while at the same time preserving Columbus's historic neighborhoods.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangston, Barossa DePodia, Betty de Akaur Dorn screen, Remy Weitz President Harden.

Thank you.

I have one more ordinance and rules and regs.

Uh it's ordinance 3360 2025 to enact and amend various sections of Title 21 of the Columbus City Codes to modernize the sections of code that govern parking infractions within the Department of Public Service and to further define and establish parking rules and regulations.

This code changes change seeks to modernize our parking codes, clarify definitions, and clear up inconsistencies.

It will emphasize safety and mobility focused violations, allow more time for payment before penalties are assessed, and introduce tiered and early payment to incentivize expedient payment.

We held a public hearing where we heard directly from our Department of Public Service why these changes are needed at this time.

This change is the next step in enhancing the safety of our residents in dedicated bus and bike lanes in anticipation of bus rapid transit as part of the Link Us Initiative.

I also want to clear I also want to um bring up the point that during the hearing we heard that there are quite literally thousands, thousands of residents that parking tickets are an issue.

And these moves that public state public service made to not only ensure the safety of folks, but also make it easier for residents to pay by giving them a longer time period to pay for those tickets before those rates go up.

If you pay early on, you pay a lower fee.

Um, all of this was speaking directly to issues that we saw within the system that we directly tried to address by making these code changes.

Director, is there anything that you would like to add to that?

Good evening again, President Hardin, uh Chair Bruce of Depatia, members of council.

Um, I would just add that it's been more than a decade since we've made any changes to the parking code, and we're really trying to simplify this and make it better for our residents and easier to be able to you know have that accessibility to for parking and be able to have accessibility to bike lanes and future bus lanes in the community by adding those regulations as part of this parking code as well.

And I want to be clear that passage of this piece of legislation, the effect the changes actually would not go into effect until April, correct?

Do I have my timeline correct?

That is true.

It is going to take some time to work with the Columbus Police Department on their um because they are able to write permit or write um tickets as well.

And so we need to make sure that we work through them to uh change their ticketing process as well.

Thank you.

We do have one speaker on this ordinance.

I'd like to invite Michael Wenhamman.

I think I mispronounced your name and I deeply apologize.

Um please introduce yourself.

You have three minutes and then any entities that you represent, because I believe you are one of our area commissioners.

Thank you, ma'am.

President Hardin, members of City Council.

My name is Michael Wyman, a resident of Clintonville.

Thank you for allowing me to speak today on ordinance 3360-2025, which addresses parking infringements and parking rules and requirements.

Unfortunately, as a silent on an issue I've been dealing with for over 14 years, the city's disregard with the Americans with Disabilities Act and handicapped parking.

It started with someone parked in a marked out area between two accessible parking spaces, a law firm's parking lot between my office and the statehouse.

By happenstance, I ran into a parking enforcement officer on the sidewalk in front of the offender.

The officer informed me that he couldn't issue a ticket because the sign in front of the accessible parking space didn't list a fine amount.

You suggested I call 311 and make a complaint.

I called and was informed that I would need to call ADA Ohio because the city does not enforce handicapped parking requirements.

This response took me aback and I began investigating.

Didn't take long to confirm this.

I was informed that the ADA is a federal law and that the city does not enforce federal law.

Over the past decade and a half, I have pressed city officials on this issue and asked them to incorporate the 88 parking requirements, only to be rebuffed each time.

I have continued to make ADA handicapped parking requirement complaints and been told that not only does the city not enforce federal law, but that the city does not oversee parking requirements on private property, that they don't enforce parking requirements on law constructed before 1995, and that the handicap parking is an issue between the private property owner and the disabled person.

These responses are not just from one city department but multiple.

They also come from the city attorney's office.

In my capacity as an area commissioner, I have engaged property owners and city officials over this issue.

When we used to hear parking variances, the commission would insist on 88 parking requirements and make that a condition for approving the variance.

Property owners would agree, but it was for not as the variance was would be approved without our request.

A lawyer representing a property owner before us told us that the city had never required him to comply with ADA accessible parking standards, and that he'd been representing people for decades on uh variances.

I am respectfully calling on the city council to require private property owners to comply with the ADA parking requirements and to require city officials to enforce them.

You will have to legislate both by putting ADA handicapped parking requirements into the city code, they can no longer be ignored by owners and city officials.

This would be this would send a message to Columbus that Columbus cares for its disabled citizens and visitors.

Please table this ordinance until the requirements are incorporated in an enforcement mechanism in place.

The ordinance is on your agenda, meaning it's yours, and you control what goes into it in its timeline.

I will respectfully answer any questions you may have first.

Thank you.

And I want to be clear: this is enforcement not on city streets or public properties, but specifically the feedback that you received is that on private properties there was not enforcement if someone was parking without a placard that was visible or license plate, correct?

No, this is actually setting up the parking spaces.

Um so across the city, we have an issue where these private property owners do not establish a handicapped parking space, and you have city officials who will not enforce the absence of that handicapped parking space or the fact that it you know it doesn't meet the ADA requirements where there's a lined out area next to it for a ramp to come down out of a van.

Chair Dorns or uh chair zoning chairns is what I mean in this particular instance.

Um can you speak?

Is there anything that you can speak to in terms of the zoning?

I know that this was something that came up during zone in.

Is there the requirement of ADA uh spaces?

Um I would have to refer back to zoning or building that director messer.

Uh, if you have anything, I know from a ratio standpoint there's a specific amount that's supposed to be provided.

Um, but I don't have anything at uh at this point to potentially aid in the discussion.

Yeah, uh unfortunately I don't have that number off the top of my head either.

Okay.

So this is what I will do.

Um, you have my commitment to go back and we can research this a little bit uh more so that we can get you a clearer answer.

Um I'm not gonna table this today, and the reason why is just because of the code changes, it involves um various different issues in here.

That doesn't mean that this one is not important, but clearly we need some clarity on what this looks like, and then you have my commitment to come back to you so that we can understand what that looks like, and then we can start to have conversations around policy or policy changes that we may need to make, and then we can move towards that.

So I mean, you have both our zoning chair here, you have the um our commission, our disabilities commission, that I'm sure this is something that they've been looking at and having conversations about, and so we will take this back so that we can look at how do we have better practices and then we can get back to you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Absolutely, thank you.

Thank you for your continued avocate.

Good to see you again.

It's been a while.

Um, do my colleagues have any additional comments, questions?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Thanks.

Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy White's President Harden.

Thank you, Council President.

You're gonna come back to me in a second and I'll say my feliz navidad and prospaña nuevo, but until then, you can move on to Council Member Dan.

Thank you so much.

Uh next community come report.

Just move to it.

I'm just kidding.

There you go.

Sorry, this side of the dice.

We're a little slow today.

I'm just here.

It's only 8 30, guys.

Sorry.

Okay.

You missed a whole ordinance.

May I move to page 23 in neighborhood recreation and parks?

Thank you.

Page two.

Sorry, just kidding.

Page two in neighborhoods, recreation and parks.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Weitch, for keeping us all honest this evening.

Uh ordinance 3435 2025 to authorize the city clerk to enter into grant agreements with a community refugee and immigrant services incorporated, Jewish family services, and ETSS to authorize an appropriation and expenditure from the neighborhood initiative subfund to authorize the payments of non-food related program expenses to allow food and or non-alcoholic beverage expenses incurred after the effective date of the ordinance and to declare an emergency.

As a budget earmark this year, I set aside dollars directly for our immigrant and refugee communities.

At a time when federal changes threaten their stability, our city must step up and ensure that families experience sudden cuts to assistance do not fall through the cracks.

The purpose of this legislation is to provide financial support to three community resettlement agencies for outreach and support regarding food and housing insecurity specifically.

The three resettlement organizations, Chris, Jewish Family Services, and ETSS will use this assistance to address food and housing insecurity in light of recent cuts to SNAP for immigrant refugee community members in need of assistance.

Increasingly, um federal policies cut out these communities.

Each organization will receive 67,000 to provide services for housing.

And like I said, because of the changes to SNAP, uh Columbus stands with its immigrant and refugees communities ensuring that they build stable and healthy lives in our cities.

Page two and back to page 23?

Hold please.

Thanks, thanks, thanks, thanks, thanks.

Which one?

That's her.

This one's yours.

Oh my apologies.

I thought I read that one earlier.

That's why.

Okay, all right, here we go.

Ready?

Uh ordinance 3339 2025 to accept various deeds for parcels of real estate to be used as road rightways to dedicate these parcels as right-aways and to name said rights of right away as described within the ordinance.

Um first.

No, it's done.

I'll move for passage.

Banks Tamborosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaur Doranscreen, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Okay.

Can I go to the other ordinance and pass it now?

Can I know, but she was gonna kick it over to me.

So she's got to start it.

Okay, just kidding.

Okay.

The next committee to come before council is the neighborhood recreational parks committee.

That committee is chaired by Councilmember Nancy Day Akar.

Councilmember, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Council President.

I will now give the floor up to my colleague.

Councilmember Lordis Barrosa de Padilla for the reading of the ordinance 3435, of which she's the sponsor.

So back to ordinance 3435 that I just read.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

I don't need to read it again, correct, Clerk?

Yeah.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

Great.

I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the role.

Thank you.

Banks Tamborosa de Fadia, Betty de Akaur Doran screen, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Thank you.

And that's really all for me.

Happy New Year, Felice Navidad.

All the good things.

Thank you.

Okay.

This is such an adventure this evening.

Um so council president, can we move to page three?

Yes, ma'am.

Um for for ordinance 3390 to authorize and direct the Recreation Parks Department Director to renew and modify the current revenue contracts for Rethfield Enterprises LLC Food Connectionaire at Airport Golf Course for hospitality LLC at Champions Golf Course.

Vittorio Investments Incorporated Food Concessionaire at Mental Memorial Golf Course.

Don Hospitality LLC Food Concessionaries at Raymond Memorial Golf Course and Lily's Concessions LLC Food Connectionaire at Turnbury Golf Course.

This is an annual renewal of our concessionaires contracts, and we are requesting the waiving the second reading to ensure that food concessions can continue uninterrupted.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tamborosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Passed.

No, my second ordinance, which also needs has had the waving of second reading, is 3479, which is Councilmember Lourdes Barossa de Padilla's ordinance for women's history month.

So I now give the floor to my colleague again.

I think we already done.

Yeah.

Please.

It's not a UFA.

Okay.

Okay.

Now you're good.

Thank you.

Thank you very much for that.

Here we do.

Okay.

Apologies.

Ordinance 3479 2025 to authorize an appropriate expenditure within the neighborhoods uh initiative subfund in support of women's history month.

So these dollars will go to support our annual uh women's work uh celebration where we provide resources for uh women and girls in Columbus.

Uh I move.

Do my colleagues have any questions or comments?

I move the passage.

Second.

Click, please call the row.

Banks Timborosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

I am now done with my legislation.

All right, we're gonna try this side now.

The next committee to come before council is the workforce education and labor committee.

That committee is chaired by Press Will Tim.

Press Will Tim, the floor is yours.

All right, let's give this a try.

Uh first I have ordinance uh 3195-2025 to make appropriations for the 11 months ending December 31, 2026 of the funding of the city employee insurance programs as contracts are moving at uh to a January 1st start day for 2027 to authorize the director of the Department of Human Resources to make payments for set appropriations declared emergency.

Uh this ordinance make appropriations for city employee benefits programs in accordance with the negotiated labor agreements for city employees, cost assessments for 2025 claims and fee run out and 2026 claims administrative fees are braced based upon the 2023 to 2025 benefit fund expenditures using a weighted average of actual city utilization expected changes to uh unit negotiations.

Input from insurance carriers in conjunction with industry trends and actuarial services are also key factors.

The revenue for the 2026 benefit fund includes the 2026 department budget amendments, employee premiums, COBA premium deposits, medical uh prescription drug rebates.

Uh emergency action is requested to ensure the health insurance program for city employees can't commence as soon as contractually possible, thereby maintaining continuity of service.

Uh any questions, my colleagues?

Seeing on a move passage.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3367-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Human Resources and a contract, United Healthcare Services Inc.

and to provide all run out claims and administrative fees for medical RX and COBRA benefits or COVID programs from February 1st, 2026 through January 31st, 2027 to author expenditure of 44 million 235,000 dollars in the employee benefit fund or so thereof uh as much necessary to pay the cost of site contract, way competitiveness provisions, called the COS declared emergency.

Uh this ordin is authorized the director of Department of Human Resources to enter a contract and United Health United Healthcare Services Inc.

and provide all runoff claims and administrative fees for medical RX COPA program from February 1st, 26th through January 31st of 2027.

Any questions?

See none to move past.

Banks Tamborosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harding.

Thank you.

Next we have orders 3369-2025 to authorize a director of human resources department to enter a contract community insurance uh company doing business with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield to provide all eligible employees and medical and tobacco cessation programs and eligible termination participants.

We cover coverage from February 1st, 2026 through December 31st, 2026 to author the expenditure of 139,674,000 in the employee benefit fund, or uh, or as much thereof as necessary to pay the cost of site contract and PC P PCOR fees and declare emergency.

Uh this ordinance authorized the Department of Human Resources to enter a contract with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield and provide funding for February 1st, 2026 through uh December 31st, 2026.

Cost estimates for the contract are weighted on weighted 2023, 24, and 25 benefit fins uh fund expenditures using the weighted average of this actual city utilization, uh expected changes due to union negotiations as well as input from the city's employee benefits and wellness consultant.

Emergency actions requested to ensure that the programs to the city employees and eligible termin are terminated participants can commence as soon as contractually possible, thereby maintaining continuity of service.

Any questions for comments from my colleagues?

Yes, I do.

For the director, Director Moses.

What how do these two um the previous ordinance in this one?

How do they work together and what type of employees fall into each category?

Or for former employees fall in each category, particularly with COBA.

Councilmember Hardin, members of cabinet, um council members of council, excuse me.

Um the series of legislation you have, the 3195 is for the total funding of our employee benefits fund.

The prior ordinance was for the run-out claims, so incurred but not yet paid or not yet billed from United Health Care.

This piece of legislation 3369 is for the new vendor anthem.

It's an 11-month contract through December 31st of 20.

Well, we're moving to uh annual contract, so it's an 11-month uh authorization for funding, and then it will go on those annual terms.

So uh this is for folks on Cobra, this is for current employees, and um does that answer your question?

Yes, it does.

Thank you very much.

Um any additional questions?

CNN to move a passage.

Okay.

Banks Timborosa de Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorance Green, Remy Weiss, President Hardin.

Um thank you, Council Presidents.

Moving on to Moving on to ordinance number 3370-2025 to authorize the director of human resource department to enter a contract with CAREMARC's PCS Health LLC and Employee Health Purchasing Corporation to provide all eligible employees RX program services from February 1, 2026 through February 31st, 2026 to author expenditure of 61 million five for seventy-five thousand dollars the employee benefit fund or so much thereof as may be uh necessary to pay the cost of said contract and declare emergency.

This ordinance uh authorized the Department of Human Resources to enter a contract care mark uh PCS Health LLC and Employee Health Purchasing Corporation provide all eligible employees.

Uh RX program services from February 1 of uh 2026 through December 31st of 2026.

After careful consideration, evaluation of six finalist bidders, CAREMARC PCS Health LLC and Employee Health Person Corporation were selected as being the lowest and best bid for pharmacy third party administrators for the city.

Emergency action is requested to ensure programs so the city employees can commence as soon as contractually possible, thereby maintaining uh continue service.

Any questions or comments from the colleagues?

Seeing on a move for passage.

Banks Timborosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaward Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Harding.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3372-2025 to author direct of the director of Department of Human Resources contract with Delta Dental Plan of Ohio Inc.

to provide all eligible employees dental insurance coverage from February 1, 2026 through December 31, 2026 to authorize expenditure of $8,760,000 from the employee benefits fund, or so much thereof may be necessary to pay the cost of site contract to weigh the competitiveness and provisions of the Columbus City Code and declared emergency.

This ordinance authorized the Director of the Department of Human Resources to contract with Delta Dental Plan of Ohio Inc.

to provide all eligible employees dental uh health insurance from February 1, 2026 through the end of the year.

Uh cost assessments for 26 and administrative fees again are based on uh 2023, 24, and 25 benefit fund expenditures using a average of actual uh city utilization, expected changes due to unit negotiations and contract terms and inputs from the city's employee benefits consultant.

Emergency action is requested again to ensure continuity of service.

Any questions or comments from colleagues?

See none move for passage.

Please call the role.

Banks Timborosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaur Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next we have orders 3374-2025 to authorize the director uh Department of Human Resources, the annual contract, the IMED Vision Care LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary, first American Administrators Inc.

to provide all eligible employees vision plan administrators from February 1, 2026 through December 31, 2026 to authorite expenditure of 1 million 319,000 dollars from the employee benefit fund or so much thereof as may be necessary to pay the cost of set contract and declare emergency.

This ordinance authorizes again the Department of Human Resources to enter a contract with IMED Vision Care and wholly owned subsidiary first American uh administrators aim to provide all eligible employees vision plan and minister administration from February 1st, 2026 through the end of that year.

Uh cost estimates again are based upon the 2023 to 2025 benefit fund uh fund expenditures again using a uh uh an average of actual city utilization uh and expected changes due to unit negotiations and additional uh input from our consultants.

Umergency actions requested to ensure again continuity of service.

Any questions, comments from my colleagues?

See and none and move for passage.

Questions follow the role.

Banks then Barosa De Padilla, Betty Day Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weitz President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3375-2025 to authorize the Department of Human Resources contract with Hartford Life and Accidental Insurance Company provide all eligible employees short-term disability insurance coverage from February 1, 2026 through December 31st, 2026 to authorize expansion of 4 million 200,000 dollars in the employee benefit fund, or so much thereof as may be necessary to pay the cost of said contract, waive competitivity provisions of chapter 329 of Columbus City Codes and declared emergency.

Uh again, this ordinance authorize the director department human resources contract with the Hartford Life and accidental insurance company to provide all eligible employees employees short-term disability insurance from February 1st, 26th through the end of the year.

Um cost estimates again are based on uh 2023 to 25 benefit fund uh expenditures using an average of actual city utilization, expected changes due to uh uh unit negotiations as well as input from insurance carriers from the city's employee benefits consultant.

Emergency action is requested again to ensure uh continuity of service.

Any questions or comments from my colleagues?

See and none and move for passage.

Bangs then Barosa De Padilla, Betty Day Akaurans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next we have ordinance 3376-2025 to authorize the director of Department of Human Resources contract, the Hartford Life and Accidental Insurance Company provide all eligible employees' life insurance coverage from February 1, 2026 through December 31st, 2026 to authorize the expenditure of $2,300,000 from the employee benefit fund, or so much thereof as may be necessary to pay the cost of said contract, weight committed bidding provisions of the Columbus City Codes and declared emergency.

Uh this ordinance authorized the department of the director of human resource contract with the Harvard Life and Accidental Insurance Company provide all eligible employees' life insurance coverage from February 1 of 2026 through the end of that year.

Cost estimate for 2026 is based upon the 2025 benefit fund expenditure and expected changes due to unit negotiations.

Emergency action is requested to ensure that the life insurance program can commence as soon as possible and maintain continuity of service.

Any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Timborosa de Padilla, Betty Day Akaurance Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Thank you, Council President.

May I move on to rules and policy?

Thank you.

In rules and policy, I have ordinance number 3379-2025 to amend chapter 329 Columbia City Codes to provide clarity to vendors regarding responsible wage requirements in the city codes.

This amendment clarifies that an explanation of responsible wage provisions, including the current responsible wage at the time of contract's execution, shall be included in all relevant city contracts.

This changes may help vendors avoid accidental noncompliance with these provisions of the code.

The current responsible wage for employees working on city contracts is currently $21.33 cents an hour, equal to the lowest paid full-time city employee.

I want to thank Kirsten Nestosi from our legislative research office who drafted this code change on short notice and has worked very hard at my office to make sure that all contractors were aware of their obligations.

We sort of identified some uh some instances in which maybe this was not as clear to vendors as it should be.

And if we're gonna ask our vendors to do the right thing by their workers who are doing work on behalf of the city of Columbus, we should be very clear with those expectations at the time that we contract for those services, uh, which is why we brought uh this amendment forward here tonight.

Uh any questions or comments from my colleagues?

See none and move for passage.

Second.

Please call the roll.

Bangs Timborosa de Pudia, Betty Day Akawa Dorance Green, Remy Weitz President Harden.

Thank you.

And Council President, may I move back to page 23 to read an additional ordinance from the workforce education labor committee?

Please.

Page.

Thank you.

Um Page three.

Page three.

Page three, I'm sorry.

Um that ordinance is uh again ordinance three two three zero-2025 uh to gr to establish a general buzzer reservation support of scholarship and education costs for students and parent workshops and supply drives for K-12 age students and their families.

Uh this legislation is sponsored by my colleague, Councilmember Weich, uh, who I would like to turn the floor over to.

Councilmember.

Thank you, President Pro Tim.

This ordinance authorizes the city auditor to encumber funds for our contract, which will support education programming for Columbus students and families.

Would you like me to call for passage or yes?

Um if you'd like to.

Any questions, comments from my colleagues?

See you none.

I move for passage.

Actually, Councilmember, I'm gonna first I'm gonna jump in there to wave uh second reading.

We've already waived.

Oh, we're already waving.

All right.

And council member, the floor is yours still.

And I will again move for a passage.

Second.

Thanks, Nimborosa De Padilla, Baiti Day Aka or Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Thank you, Councilmember Weitch.

That's all I have my communities now, Council President.

Thank you.

Thank you, President Potum.

Uh next committee come before council, the Health and Human Service and Equity Committee.

That committee is chair by Councilmember Green.

Councilmember floor is yours.

I feel like this leg agenda tonight is like the legislative version of like the the white board and a beautiful mind.

You know, it just is like kind of like all over the place.

Anyways, all right.

Whoa.

Hello.

Um thank you so much, Council President.

Tonight in our Health Human Services and Equity Committee, I only have one ordinance uh to read.

And if uh with your permission, can we go to page three on the first reading section of the agenda tonight?

Is ordinance 3316-2025 to authorize and direct the board of health to accept a grant from the Franklin County Board of Commissioners and the amount of $2,600,000 for the Ben Franklin Tuberculosis Program to authorize the appropriation of $2,600,000 and any additional funds from the unappropriate bonds of the Health Department grants fund.

Uh the Ben Franklin TB program provides comprehensive services for screening, diagnosis, treatment, and control of TB.

That stands for tuberculosis infection and disease averaging uh 1,800 to 2,000 clinical visits annually.

Services are provided to all Franklin County residents confirmed with or suspected of having TB disease, um, and residents who have been exposed to an infectious TB disease.

Services target high risk populations, including residents of nursing homes, jails, homeless shelters, recent um recent migrants with TB conditions and individuals exposed to the disease.

Are there any other questions or comments for my colleagues?

Uh no, okay.

First, I uh request a waive second reading.

It's already been waived.

Oh now I will move for passage.

Please call the roll.

Banks Timberwolves deputy battle the account door on screen, Remy Weitz, President Hard.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

That's all for me tonight.

I want a gold star.

Only one.

Thank you, madam chair.

Next committee coming for council is the public safety and criminal justice committee.

That committee is shared by Councilman Remy.

Councilmember, the floor is yours.

Thank you very much, Council President.

Tonight we have the our first six resolutions or for um liquor permit renewal objections.

These objections, we on um Tuesday, December 9th, we held a public hearing to review each of these objections in depth.

So if anyone would like more information on the liquor objection process or those specific objections, you can find that on um the City of Columbus's YouTube or Facebook page.

But before we consider the objection resolutions, I want to turn it over to Sophieano, the assistant city attorney to briefly share what the process was and how we got here.

Sophie, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Councilmember Raimi, President Harden and the rest of council.

Um good evening.

I will try to keep this short and sweet, but I'm here tonight to talk about um liquor permit objections.

So this is a process that we do all year or every year, um, but it is part of a larger year-long process.

Um, throughout the year, I work with a group in the city of Columbus called the Liquor Nuisance Abatement Group.

This is a group comprised of both city and state entities, um, and we are tasked with going throughout the city to determine, identify, investigate, um, and um help businesses that we have identified or communities that members have identified as um struggling businesses.

Um we do inspections throughout the year to um try to make sure we are getting the fullest picture of um the issues our liquor permitted establishments are facing.

Um this objection process, as I said, is just a small portion of what we do throughout the year.

We are also filing cases against problematic establishments that we identify.

Um, but every year we look at the list of everything that's come to us through police records, through community complaints, etc.

Um, this year we reviewed over 200 properties and came up with a list of six businesses that we believe are not doing what is necessary um to keep their communities safe.

Uh you can hear more about all of those properties.

Um, but we do believe that this is um a good representation representation of um of the problematic liquor permitted establishments in the city of Columbus.

Uh we work with many, many more than uh we're here to talk about tonight.

Um but with that being said, I'm happy to answer any questions anyone has.

Thank you so much, Sophie.

We appreciate the work that you did.

And of course, um Detective Mark Ryan with the Columbus Division of Police.

You guys work diligently all year long to get this list down to um this year, one of the smallest lists that we've had.

So um if there are no questions or comments, I'm gonna go ahead with resolution 270X 2025 to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0841-8994-88, held by Speedway LLC doing business as speedway, located at 2875 Stelzer Road, Columbus Ohio 43219, and to declare an emergency.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Bangs Tamborosa De Padilla, Beatty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Next, I have 271x 2025 to jet to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0648-3944-1, held by ROB Enterprises Inc.

doing business as Westland Shell Car Wash, located at 2805 West Broad Street, Columbus Ohio 43204, and to declare an emergency.

If there are no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move for passage.

Okay.

Bank Zimborosa de Padilla, Beatty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Next is 272x 2025 to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0285-0275-1, held by 4432 Walford Inc., doing business as Buckeye Supermarket located at 4432 Walford Street, Columbus Ohio 43224, and to declare an emergency.

Seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move for passage.

Bank's Tim Barosa DePadilla, Betty Day Akaur Don's Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Do I need to change any of that?

No.

No.

All right.

Okay.

Um next at 273X 2025 to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0841-8994-106, held by Speedway LLC doing business as speedway, located at 1165 South High Street, Columbus Ohio 43206, and to declare an emergency.

If there are no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move to adopt this resolution.

Banks and Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weitch President Hardin.

Adopted.

Next is 274X 2025 to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0907-3995-82, held by True North Energy LLC, doing business as true north, located at 2441 Lockbourne Road, Columbus Ohio 43207, to and to declare an emergency.

Seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move for adoption.

Bangs and Barosa de Padilla, Betty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

And finally up 275X 2025 to object to the renewal of liquor permit number 0418-6209-1, held by JK 2800.

LLC doing business as VP, located at 2800 Sullivan Avenue, Columbus Ohio 43204, and to declare an emergency.

Seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move for adoption.

Bangs in Barosa Deputia, Beatty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

And those are all the liquor objections we have at tonight.

Thank you again, Sophie.

Appreciate your help.

Next I have ordinance 3288 2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Public Safety to enter into a contract with Hosselert Inc.

for Haas Alert Safety Cloud subscription service for the division of fire to waive the competitive bidding provisions of what sorry missed one.

I'm gonna find it here.

390.

Okay, there we go.

Sorry about that.

First, we have um 390 2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Finance and Management on behalf of the municipal court clerk to enter into a lease agreement with Quaddiant for the purchase of mailing equipment, software maintenance and support to waive the competitive bidding provisions of Columbus City Code and to authorize the expenditure of 21,000 10476.

Um let's see here from the municipal court clerk fund to authorize the expenditure of six thousand three hundred and forty-eight dollars and seventy-two cents from the municipal court clerk general fund and to declare an emergency.

This legislation includes a bid waiver so the municipal court clerk can continue using its existing mailing equipment, software and support services without interruption.

The waiver avoids delays, ensures continuity of court mail operations, and allows the city to move forward efficiently using already appropriated funds.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Pudia, Betty Day Akaur Doors Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Next, I have 3288.

Um 2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Public Safety to enter in a contract with Haas Alert Inc.

Um for Haas Alert Safety Cloud subscription to service for the division of fire to waive the competitive bidding provisions of the Columbus City Code to authorize the expenditure of $31,742 from the general fund and to declare an emergency.

This legislation includes a bid waiver because the division of fire is already using this service.

It's working well and there's no practical reason to change providers.

This is a key safety tool that gives drivers real-time warnings when emergency vehicles are approaching and when traffic signals change to give those vehicles the right-of-way, helping prevent crashes and provide protect both the public and our firefighters.

If there are no questions or comments from my colleagues, I move for passage.

Bankstempurosa de Pudia, Betty de Akawa Doors Green, Remy Weitch President Hardin.

And finally, tonight I have 3385 2025 to authorize the director of public safety to enter into a new contract with mission critical partners, LLC to review and evaluate the city's existing alternative response program and develop a plan for non-law enforcement response for certain 911 calls for service to authorize and direct the city auditor to authorize payment to mission critical partners, LOC for services rendered per invoices approved by the Department Director in or designed in an amount not to exceed $75,127.57 to authorize the expenditure of $75,172.57 from the general fund to weigh the competitive bidding provisions of the Columbus City Code and to declare an emergency.

This legislation waives competitive bidding so the Department of Public Safety can continue and complete the alternative response plan with mission critical partners who were selected through a full competitive process and were the highest rated firm.

The contract is expired before the work was finished, and this allows the city to avoid restarting the process, complete the project without disruption, and pay outstanding invoices.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Don's Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you very much.

That's all I have this meeting.

Public safety and criminal justice.

Happy holidays.

That committee is chair by Councilmember Weiss.

Council member, the floor is yours.

Thank you, Council President.

First and public utilities and sustainability committee.

Tonight, we have ordinance 2899-2025 to authorize the director of public utilities to enter into a construction contract modification for the big walnut sanitary trunk extension phase two project with Obayashi Corporation to authorize the director of public utilities to apply for a water pollution control loan fund loan to finance this contract modification to make this ordinance contingent upon that loan being approved to amend the 2025 capital improvement budget and to authorize the appropriation expenditure of up to 14 million dollars from the water pollution control loan fund.

The big walnut trunk extension project provides sanitary sewer service to rapidly developing area between Hoover Reservoir and New Albany.

This contract modification will pay for the project work associated with the use of the A Road Header Machine due to unexpected site conditions.

This machine will be used to complete tunnel boring from the opposite direction.

Let me stop there, see if any questions are comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Pudia, Betty de Akawa Doorance Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 2917-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Public Utilities to enter into a professional services contract with SMS and ME Incorporated for the Upground Reservoir R1 and R3 Engineering Services Project to authorize an amendment to the 2025 capital improvement budget to make this ordinance contingent upon approval of a loan from the Ohio Water Development Authority to appropriate funds within the water fresh water market rate fund to authorize the expenditure of up to $4,442,883 from the Water Fresh Water Market Rate Fund.

This ordinance provides funding for design professional services on the upground reservoirs R1 and R3 Engineering Services Project.

This project facilitates the construction of two upground reservoirs, uh which will support the Dublin Road Water Plant and the future home road water plant.

In light of the projected water usage growth and recent droughts, these two reservoirs will provide a much needed reliable source of water supply.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions or comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Pudia, Betty de Akawa Door on screen, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 2985-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Finance and Management to establish a contract with Next Pro Trucks and Equipment Corporation for the purchase and delivery of one line truck and associated training for the division of power to waive competitive bidding provisions of Columbus City Codes to authorize the expenditure of 293,675 dollars from the division of power operating fund and to declare an emergency.

The purchase line truck will enable division of power employees to conduct maintenance work around power up round and overhead utility infrastructure.

Emergency designation is requested in order to secure a price lock ahead of impending tariffs.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions are comments for my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Thanks, Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 3137-2025 to also authorize the director of public utilities to enter into a planned professional services contract modification for the overall engineering services contract with MS Consultants Incorporated and to authorize an expenditure up to one million dollars from the water bond fund for the contract.

This ordinance provides funding for a variety of tasks order-based professional services, thereby supplementing the division of waters existing engineering personnel on as authorized as needed basis in order to fulfill capital improvement needs for this facilities for their facilities.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions or comments for my colleagues.

Seeing that I move for passage.

Banks, Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 3189-2025 to authorize the director of public utilities to enter into a construction contract with Claypool Electric Incorporated for the Southerly Water Reclamation Plant, variable frequency drivers and harmonic filter upgrades project to authorize an amendment to the 2025 capital improvement budget to appropriate funds within the water pollution control loan fund to make this ordinance contingent upon the Ohio Water Development Authority approving a loan for this project to authorize a transfer of cash and appropriation within the sanitary bond fund and to authorize an expenditure of up to twelve million five hundred and fifty-one thousand eight hundred and twenty-five dollars from the water pollution control loan fund and sanitary bond fund to pay for this project.

This ordinance provides funding for the replacement of numerous variable frequency drivers and harmonic filters at Sutherly Water Plant.

Replacement is necessary as this equipment is nearing the end of its useful service life and has become increasingly difficult to repair and maintain.

This work is part of the city's continuing effort to upgrade its treatment facilities, provide efficient, reliable, and cost-effective operations, and to enhance personnel safety.

Let me stop there, see if any questions or comments for my colleagues.

Seeing that I move for passage.

Bangs then, Barosa de Pudia, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 3239-2025 to authorize the director of public utilities to enter into a construction contract with the Lead Excavating Company of Ohio, Incorporated for the Germaine Drive Area Water Line Improvements Project to amend the 2025 capital improvement budget to authorize the appropriation expenditure of up to $5,809,493.

This ordinance provides funding for the Germain Drive Area Water Line Improvements Project, which aims to replace or rehabilitate existing water lines in the northeast and north central communities that have a high break frequency.

Replacement of these water lines will improve water service, decrease the burden on water maintenance operations and reduce water loss.

Let me stop there, see if any questions are comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Podia, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Next I have ordinance 3327-2025 to authorize the director of the Department of Finance and Management to establish a contract with Altec Incorporated, doing business as Altec Industries Incorporated for the purchase and delivery of a HD line truck for the Division of Power to waive competitive bidding provisions of Columbus City Code so authorize expenditure of 464,300 and 91 cents from the Division of Power Operating Fund and to declare an emergency.

This ordinance provides funding for the purchase of an HD line truck, which will enable division of power employees to conduct maintenance work, round power, upground, and overhead utilities infrastructure similar to the earlier ordinance.

Emergency designation is requested in order to secure a price lock ahead of impending tariffs.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions are comments for my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Banks Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hardin.

Thank you.

Last I have 3464.

Sorry.

To authorize the city clerk to enter into a grant agreement with community shelter board to support extreme weather activities within the shelter system across the city of Columbus to authorize an appropriation expenditure within neighborhood initiative subfund and to declare an emergency.

This ordinance appropriates the necessary amount of money to prop up the much needed West Side Warming Center.

Uh these funds are earmarked as part of uh my remaining extreme weather resiliency program fund in partnership with community shelter board.

This funding will improve access to shelter and resources for unhoused west side neighbors during extreme weather conditions.

Emergency designation is requested due to the arrival of winter weather and that risk of delaying such vital services would pose to the health and safety of residents.

I understand that uh president CEO of community shelter board Channel Isam is here, but she's going to be speaking on another ordinance later on, so we will save her the trouble of coming up twice.

Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues?

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the role.

Bangs Timberosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Passed.

Thank you, Council President.

May I move to rules and policy?

Please.

I'm sorry, within the Columbus City Codes, which currently provide the director of public utilities with authority over water metering systems.

The amended language clarifies that this authority extends to fire service lines.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions or comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Clerk please call the role.

Thanks, Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa door on screen, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Thank you.

That's all I have in rules and policy.

But Council President, can I go back to an ordinance on first reading on page five, please?

Okay.

Uh up for first reading.

Um, but we just recently moved to waive second reading ordinance 3477-2025 to authorize an expenditure within the neighborhood initiative subfund to support uh in support of one stage with weight.

Uh the community engagement program will educate constituents and residents about upcoming public utilities and sustainability community legislation topics and initiatives.

Let me stop there.

See if any questions or comments from my colleagues.

Seeing none, I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the roll.

Banks Tim Barosa de Padilla, Betty de Akawa Doranscreen, Remy Weitch President Hardin.

Pass.

That is all for me this evening.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Final committee to come before council is the housing homelessness and building committee.

I chair that committee.

And first up, we have ordinance 3212-2025 is to authorize the director of the Department of Development or authorize designee to execute those documents necessary to enter into a lease agreement for an eight-year term between the City of Columbus and the Regional Council of Governments for the Central Ohio Area Agency Own Aging for City Owned property located at 3776 South High Street, uh Columbus, Ohio, and to waive the provisions of the Columbus City Code Chapter 328 pertaining to the sale of the city owned realty.

This legislation is part of the transition of COAA's to the newly formed Regional Council of Government or COG and deals with the building and property where the agency is located on the far south side.

This legislation maintains the building with the organization that provides services to seniors in Central Ohio.

This agreement that uh would allow a lease agreement for eight years with a city-owned building, after which time the a sale of the building could occur to the COG.

If there are no comments or questions from my colleagues, I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the row.

Thanks, Tim Barosa De Padilla, Betty de Akawa Doranscreen, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Passed.

Next up, we have ordinance 3283-2025 is to authorize the director of the Department of Development or his designee on behalf of the Department of Public Utilities to execute those documents necessary to enter into a lease agreement by and between the city C D C C D C Holdings 37 LTD and the River South Authority, as may be required to authorize the appropriation expenditure of 4,819,920 from the water operating fund to authorize the appropriation expenditure of 11,608,340 from the Stormwater Operating Fund and to authorize the appropriation expenditure of $5,372,540 from the Sanitary Sew Your Operating Fund and to declare an emergency.

This legislation is part of a larger deal that we will be hearing more about in the new year.

The Dublin Road Water Plant is undergoing a plant expansion that requires the demolition of the 910 Dublin Road office building.

As a result, the Department of Public Utilities is acquiring office space downtown for these employees near the City Hall campus.

This lease agreement with the River South Authority would lease approximately 445,000 rentable square feet of office space in the building located at 37 West Brah Street.

This lease will last 10 years under DPU and apply towards the purchase price of the parcel.

This legislation also is contingent on the future appropriations from the city council and availability of city funds.

There will be subsequent legislation, but this is a lease agreement to allow staff to begin to move into the building.

If there are no questions or comments from my colleagues, I'll move for passage.

Clerk, please call the row.

Bangs Timberwolves deputy, Betty de Akawa Dorance Green, Remy Weiss President Hard.

Next we have ordinance 3322-2025.

It's to set forth a statement of municipal services and zoning conditions to be provided to the area contained in a proposed annexation, a AN 25-027 of 15.4 acres in Jefferson Township to the City of Columbus as required by the Ohio Revised Code and declared emergency.

This legislation was postponed at the December 8th meeting to allow for time for the appropriate paperwork to be filed.

This is a procedural step in the annexation of land within Jefferson Township to Columbus.

And the next step involves presentation of this ordinance to the Franklin County Board of Commissioners.

If there are no comments or questions from my colleagues, I move for passage.

Clerk, please call the role.

And last in my committee, we have ordinance 3349-2025 is to authorize the director of the Department of Development into a non not-for-profit service contract with Community Shelter Board, CSB in the amount not to exceed $2 million for the purpose of supporting winter warming services and to authorize the appropriation expenditure of up to $2 million from the housing business tax incentives fund to authorize the reimbursement of expenditures incurred prior to the approval of these purchase orders, including food and non-alcoholic beverages as operating costs to serve the public purpose for populations experiencing homelessness, housing insecurity, and food and security and to declare an emergency.

While I'm speaking, I'd like to uh invite up my friend, the president CEO of the CSB, Shannon Isam uh to the front.

This legislation is funding our community's warming winter warming services.

Um I'm gonna turn the floor over to uh Shannon Isom.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Good evening, good evening.

Council President Harden and members of Columbus City Council.

I would like to thank you all for this time, this moment that we're taking to speak to and think about the winter warming centers.

On behalf of the community shelter board, we appreciate your leadership.

We certainly appreciate you advancing these critical critical investments to support winter warming services and extreme weather response across the city of Columbus.

Just to remind you, the winter warming centers came out of this body asking for a more excellent response.

And tonight's actions reflect exactly that.

What we need is a strong coordinated and sustained commitment, protecting residents experiencing homelessness, housing insecurity, and food insecurity during extreme conditions.

I will tell you that this two million dollar investment to support these services provides operational backbone of our city's winter response, and it ensures that the winter warming centers and shelters have the resources they need to remain open to remain responsive and safe when temperatures become dangerous.

And every single solitary daughter that is committed, this $2 million plus goes straight back into community to increase capacity of our response within community.

Just as importantly, we are grateful to Councilmember Christopher Weiss for his leadership in supporting the creation of the neighborhood-based winter overflow shelter.

The $200,000 plus investment to open a neighborhood-based location at Westgate United Methodist Church ensures that not only West Side residents have timely access and safe, warm place, but it also ensures that we have locations in which everyone can access going towards equity, going towards an approach of thoughtfulness, as well as bringing so services closer to people where people are and delivered by people who are in community.

Thank you for that.

While these services meet immediate life-saving needs, they are not an endpoint.

Your continued trust in CSB as this system leader, and together with our dedicated provider, our partners, our frontline workers, our community workers.

It says here we are building.

I scratched that out and said we've already built a coordinated response system that ensures every neighbor in every part of our city has access to warmth and to dignity to protection during winter warming during the winter weather.

So for that, thank you.

I am happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Madam CEO.

I'm very grateful for you.

It is not a loss on us that as we speak.

You know, it is very important that as a city, and I will say my continued work will be to ensure that as we think about our support for uh ending homelessness and supporting those uh in the community, that uh having a coordinated uh years long strategy around warming centers uh becomes built in a process um of how we move forward.

I was telling a colleague earlier today that no one's uh supports warming centers without losing some blood because um it's not easy.

Uh when I first pitched uh warming centers three and a half years ago, four years ago, um I tell this story clearly, it did not go well.

Um someone got hurt in our center.

And uh what I appreciated that was actually you when you were first coming in, my first conversations was help save me.

Um, because the community was going um, they were they had concerns uh to say it lightly.

Um what I've appreciated is every year we get a little better at doing this critical work, and so my encouragement, strong encouragement uh to everyone is let's build this into the process.

We know that we need warming centers in emergency situations.

The emergencies are only coming more frequent and becoming more severe.

Uh, and so this is not something that we have to wonder if we need to do.

Um, or uh, and after doing it for several years, we are learning how to do it better.

Yes.

So I I appreciate your partnership.

I appreciate the administration for finding the resources to do this.

I appreciate my colleagues for stepping out there and uh giving some blood too uh uh in terms of uh supporting warming centers.

Um and uh just grateful for the work uh that you are and your team are doing today and every day to keep uh our residents safe.

Are there any comments from my colleagues?

Please.

Uh thank you so much uh for being here.

I think it's appropriate that you are the second to last ordinance tonight since uh warming centers and the work of emergency shelters of 24-7 gig.

Um and so sorry that you got to spend your night with us.

But um grateful for the work that you're doing.

You know, I think uh council president is right every year we get a little bit better, but I last year I think the data is so reflective of how well this coordinated system of warming centers is working because even though we saw in the point in time count a seven percent increase um in homelessness across our community, we had all-time low numbers of unsheltered homelessness of people on the land.

Um, and that was at the peak of when our warming centers were in effect.

Also during during a polar vortex when it was the most dangerous time of the year to be outside.

The data is clear that it is working.

I'm so grateful to you and the partners at CSB.

It is your mission to end homelessness.

Um, and you live that and you breathe that every single day.

But I just want to be very clear, it's our jobs to end homelessness.

It's your mission, it's our jobs as elected leaders in the city to be accountable to this issue.

Um and the funding that we spend on important life-saving programs like this is not discretionary, it is uh necessary, and I'm so excited to be able to support this.

I'm grateful to the department uh for coordinating uh the the resources to make sure that uh you are uh properly resourced for this year and reimbursed for some of the expense from last year, um, and looking forward to continue uh continuing in partnership alongside you and and advocacy um to figure out how we go further.

Thank you, Councilwoman.

Um just as a last, I want to just note because you've you've noted this is that as I walked in the door, uh President Harden uh as well as past councilwoman uh favor um were the ones that framed out uh winter warming center, and I appreciate that we've been able to continue to elevate it, but I would be remiss to not also thank the Department of Development who's continue to walk alongside with us and to be quite honest, helping us navigate.

Um, I will promise you, uh Councilwoman Green Green, as well as the other counselor that when we're here next year, that what you will hear is an already resourced uh response system that instead of us doing this at uh 9 30 that we're already talking about next year or the year after.

Please that's what they asked.

Absolutely.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

We have one speaker on this piece of legislation, that is Mr.

Nathaniel Wilkins.

Mr.

Wilkins, welcome back to council.

1612 early to have no Mr.

Lusanne George Wilkins.

First of all, let me say thank you.

I don't know that woman personally, but I do think I want some uh backlog on this.

How long y'all been doing this?

I do see a lot of people out there on Morris Road.

And so if this if this can be something that's something that have some drivers just to go around town to look to see who's home because I have witnessed a few people down Morris Road sitting at some um retail stores standing out in the code, bagging for money and stuff like that.

So we don't know what the situation could be.

Um I do reflect there was a family at the corner of uh Morris and Tamarack with some kids and a little baby.

But see, this information is somewhere can be accessibility, somewhere on the bus line, somewhere in the grocery stores, or some type of little business cards, you know, because I run into these people all the time, and I had rented to a young lady that's standing in front of Krugers because I work late at night on a Wednesday night, and I kind of asked her, I said, where are you going?

Because she's homeless.

So, you know, looking at some entity up in the North End where you have a lot of these people that's scattered all along Morris Road, different business doing late night hours in the morning hours.

And so as I go to work in the morning, there's a young kid standing out there with a little dog.

I don't know where he's coming from, but and again, it kind of bothers me where we have to have more resources in this community or somewhere along these corridors.

So again, thank you again.

I would just like to have some bat log on this to know how long y'all been doing this.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you so much.

Director, you uh we've been engaging with uh warming centers for several years.

I also thought this was an opportunity.

I cannot remember the name of the program.

We just passed legislation last week, but I think it definitely speaks to what uh Mr.

Wilkins was just speaking about in terms of finding and working with people where they are.

Um so I don't know if you want to hit on that in 22 seconds.

I'll do it in 20.

There we go.

Thank you, Council President.

Members of council.

So we've been doing this for approximately four years on funding the warming centers.

Uh the core team is what you approved last week, and that is focused really on how do we go out and increase our engagement with those um individuals living on the land.

Thank you so much, Director.

We we do think this is critical work in our community, so we appreciate the partnership with the administration.

If there are no questions or comments, I move for passage.

Banks then, Barosa De Padilla, Betty de Aka or Dorans Green, Remy White's President Harden.

Passed.

And tonight, uh finally, in the rules and policy committee, there is one ordinance left, and that's 3328-2025 is to amend sections of chapter 2045 65 of the Columbus City Codes to enhance administrative efficiencies in the residential tax incentive program by recognizing requalifying development projects and qualifying programs to standardize description of the residential tax incentive and to standardize approval passed through the housing officer who is designated as the director of the Department of Development.

This code update relates to the community reinvestment act or CRA tax incentive within our regional tax incentive program.

This legislation is about streamlining making our code cleaner, uh more efficient, and easier to navigate for applicants for the city.

Uh these changes are directly responsive to feedback the city uh received from partners who are already working within our housing ecosystem.

This is a technical cleanup that simplifies language, clarifies approved pathways, and reduces duplicative reviews when projects are already being evaluated through the city programs.

Uh specifically, this modernizes and clarifies several provisions, aligns uh terminology, and introduces clearer definitions that help both applicants and staff understand the process.

Uh, if there are no uh questions or comments, I move for passage.

Clark, please call the row.

Bang Sem Barosa De Padilla, Betty Day Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weiss President Harden.

Passed.

Um have a blessed holiday.

Get some rest, please.

I have more.

All right.

I get to join it with everybody else.

You're gonna have to walk me through this because I don't mind.

So we're with Page Ray.

We're on page five.

Ordinance 2859.

3477?

Yep, 3477.

Right.

Uh number 2859.

All right.

Uh you might want to stick close now.

The next ordinance to come before council is that is ordinance 2859-2025 is to authorize the director of the Department of Development to modify three not profit uh profit service contracts with Franklin County Public Health, uh Treasurer of Franklin County to extend the agreement term uh from December 31st to 2020, 2025 to December 31st, 2026.

Um if there are no questions or comments, I'll move for passage.

Clerk please call the row.

Bank Semperosa De Padilla, Betty de Akawa Dorans Green, Remy Weitz, President Hardin.

Uh and I think finally uh we have ordinance 3340-2025 to amend various sections of Columbus Building Code Title 41 relating to the home improvement contractor HIC license requirement.

If there are no uh further questions, I'm gonna pass it.

Clerk please call the roll.

Bank simple Rosa de Padilla, Betty de Akaur Dorans Green, Remy Weitz, President Harden.

Passed.

Um now happy holidays.

Get some rest.

No, no, no.

You have to you have to make a still close the meeting out though.

Um thank you.

I did need that help.

Um if there's no further comments that come before counter uh business coming for council, is there a motion to recess?

Clerk, please call the roll.

Bank simper was a deputy, Betty de Akawa Dorans green, Remy Weitz, President Hardin.

Thank you.

Um we have uh several non-agenda speakers.