All right, good afternoon, everybody.

I do show four o'clock, so we're gonna go ahead and we are going to call to order the Capital Improvement Bond Task Force meeting of the City of Jonesboro, Arkansas.

First on our agenda is the roll call.

And if you are currently present today, if you will mark that on the device in front of you.

Okay.

Do show five members present, so we do have a quorum today.

Moving into our next item of business, we have approval of minutes from our last bond task force meeting.

Move to approve unless there's noted change.

Okay.

I have a motion and a second to approve the minutes as presented from the previous meeting.

If everything looks to your favor, if you will denote your vote on the device in front of you, please.

Okay, which brings us to the next item today.

Um we were going to begin with public comments, but we're going to be moving that to a little bit later just because we do have some discussion to go through today.

And first, I do want to go ahead and I do want to read a letter that's been prepared on behalf of the mayor today that he submitted since he is out of town.

So it says, and I quote, first off, on behalf of the city administration, I want to thank each council member on this task for taking time to discuss these options for the real-time crime center E911 Center.

I appreciate each of your attention to the facts and want the public to respect that your decisions are based on what you feel is in the best interest of our city.

During the bond process, it was clear that further discussion on these options were needed.

And this task force was created to ensure those discussions were had in total transparency and honesty.

I can't think of any more transparent way than to talk about this in a public forum with factual information.

From the inception of the task force, I have stated I will support whatever recommendation is made.

I instructed city staff to provide information requested by the task force, such as development cost estimates, property offer paperwork, and economic impact analysis by the city's selected master growth planning firm and other various items so members could make an informed decision.

All of which is available on Legistar or has been discussed in the meetings for the public to review for themselves instead of taking a second or third hand opinion, which may not be accurate or worse, intentionally biased.

For those in the public who do not know, it is the mayor's duty to receive offers, negotiate offers, and then present offers or contracts to the city council that merit their discussion.

After talks with police and 911 leadership, the initial thought process was since the current police station property on Caraway can't be sold due to deed restrictions.

That locating the 911 real-time crime center with police admin and CID would allow them more efficient access, and eventually phase two would include construction of a patrol building and the additional Caraway property if purchased.

Ultimately, this would lead to the selling of the Washington property, offsetting new property cost or possibly turning it into a net positive from a financial standpoint after the property sale.

If the Washington property is selected, we will work to create a construction plan that creates the least destruct disruption possible for the current operations.

Just to be clear on a couple of items that may or may not be relevant to this task force, but have been stated by residents in one form or another, and the public deserves clarity on.

One bond funding can only be used to purchase property.

What was said multiple times during the bonding process was that a bond ordinance does not authorize the purchase of property.

A property purchase still requires a separate resolution to approve a land purchase agreement.

Paul Phillips counsel was contacted this afternoon just to triple check on this item.

Number two, I've seen statements that a possible children's museum would somehow be a city project that we would spend taxpayer money on.

It would not be.

Representatives of the museum effort simply stated that they were interested in the property.

Three, some had stated the cost of the Parker property is overpriced.

I believe the average is about $13 a square foot, which is in line with the appraisal of the city ordered property.

If you figure in half the cost of the road and utilities, it's more like $16 a square foot.

Just to provide comparison, recent appraisals on the city owned C3 portion of the property on Johnson were roughly $4 to $5 a square foot.

A recent appraisal on the tower portion of the Citizens Bank property was roughly $70 a square foot.

Obviously, both of those are notably different situations, and downtown property will bring a premium, but it's probably a fair assumption that the property falls somewhere between those two land values.

There have been statements that it should be priced at what the recent mall property auction was.

That was a private auction with multiple other factors that make it unique and is not an accurate comparison.

Number four, a lot of the initial stipulations requested by the seller were removed.

I do think we are down to the bare minimums the seller will accept.

So the latest offer that includes a shared road and utilities that has been shared and placed on Legistar is likely what would be presented to council.

These requests are not secret or hidden.

They are listed in the offer, and it is up to council on if those will be considerations that are worthwhile.

Now on to the Washington property.

One, any new building foundations can be built up enough to avoid flooding concerns.

Cost estimates were based on elevating the building pads several feet to avoid water getting into the building.

During high water events that shut down Washington, the Monroe entrance would be passable.

Number two, estimates were prepared based off city code, which requires that any new construction not increase flooding.

Site plans created meet those requirements.

We would not require that a developer correct larger drainage issues in that area.

So it would have to, it would have been unfair to inflate development figures to address those issues.

Three, at either location, the current justice complex will have to remain intact until the new E911 center is ready for occupation to ensure continuity of emergency services.

And finally, during all these discussions, it is important to not lose sight of the fact that this is a good problem to have.

We are debating about where to physically place an expanded center and add more life-saving personnel to our great 911 department and create a permanent home for a real-time crime center that has proven its effectiveness over the last couple of years.

Jonesboro's growth is why this is necessary.

There are countless communities across the country experiencing population exodus that would love to need a critical investment like this.

Whether you choose to locate this where you choose to wherever you choose to locate this center, it will make Jonesboro safer and city administration is proud to quickly move to construction planning once that decision is made.

Okay, which that's all the um that's all the statements from Mayor and if anybody has any questions about the items contained therein.

That will go ahead and that will bring us into the ongoing discussions for the capital improvements by the bond task force.

Mr.

Chair, I'll argue on behalf of the Washington property and Mr.

Street or somebody else can argue on behalf of the uh Caraway Road property.

But before we can do that, our rules require a motion and a second before we can have discussion.

So I'll make a motion that we select the Washington Street property.

I'll second that.

All right, with the motion and second on the floor, I'll begin the discussions.

I would like to start with just a couple of uh indisputable facts.

I'll keep my comments short.

I think we've been over most of this.

Uh both of these properties, Mr.

Chair will receive the exact same building, the exact same uh facilities.

Careway Road and uh Washington both.

Washington Street, phase one and phase two will be coordinated construction-wise, just like Caraway Road phase one and phase two.

Washington Street phase one can be completed without any disruption of city employees.

We'll be building on the corner of Munro and Madison.

Current city employees in the 911 will be able to occupy their building until construction is finished, and then we'll be able to move over to the new facility, and then demolition can proceed on the justice complex and the 314.

Other undisputable fact is the city owns the Washington property, clear and outright, and we'll have to purchase the Caraway Road property.

While there were several pros that I saw of uh selecting the Washington Street property, I'll keep the list down to just four or five.

The most glaring is the cost savings.

Phase one of the Washington Street property will save the taxpayer $654,000.

And by the time we complete phase two, the savings will surpass over a million.

It's actually estimated by the city attorney to be one or city engineered to be $1,034,000.

This alone would be enough for me to vote for the Washington Street property.

It's a million plus dollars and savings that can go back into the police department to find officers and equipment.

The second reason is the increased presence in the downtown entertainment district for festivals, events, the barbecue cook-off, winter wonderland, Joy Fest, Christmas parade.

You will literally be able to look out of the window from Washington and see our parking lots for the barbecue festival, Winterfest, Main Street, and a variety of other properties.

The third is strictly convenience.

Convenience for the police department, the city attorney, and the public to all have police, E911, the court system, literally in the same building and directly across the street.

So the public would be able to park in one of the parking lots.

You'd be able to go to the police, city attorney, the court system, the mayor's office, or any of our facilities on a short walk.

Item four, and I just discussed this with Mr.

Street.

It's not Washington and Caraway's abandoned.

The plan would be to construct our new building on Washington while maintaining the motor pool at the current Caraway Road location.

I see that as being a great asset.

In the event of a natural disaster, we won't have all of our assets or our patrol vehicles in one place.

We would think maybe that wouldn't happen, but look at us now.

Our building is destroyed.

We're spread out around the city.

Just recently as two years ago, the postal service lost all their vehicles at their main location due to a natural disaster.

So having facilities on both sides of the ridge, I think is just a huge benefit.

The next one would be stability of having government buildings in the downtown.

So I've been on the council for 26 years.

Our goal in the entire 26 years is the redevelopment of the downtown area.

When I was first on the council, I had a guy offer me my choice of 11 buildings on Main Street for $6,000 a piece.

Edwina Acock and I got in an argument over one of them because she didn't want to pay $6,500.

Look at downtown now.

One of the things that I credit that to, originally we met at 314 Washington, and then we moved across the street to the bank building, and then good fortune of Mark Duckworth, we were able to acquire this building.

We remodeled this building.

This is downtown.

One of the stable influences keeping our government buildings down here.

Some of the restaurants on Main Street with liquor come and go, they're in and out, but the government buildings are here for the long run.

He's not going anywhere.

One of the things we also overlook, there's some discussion about if we build on Caraway Road, we could then sell the property on Washington and maybe or maybe not recoup part of our money.

We need the parking lot on Washington.

If you came to the barbecue cook-off a couple of weeks ago, barbecue trailers were all the way down Munro and around the corner on the parking lot.

We have numerous festivals.

During Winter Wonderland, when we close the parking lot on Munro, the default parking is over there.

By maintaining our buildings and developing that parking lot, we'll continue to have access for the public to have festivals and other events.

The city attorney would probably have to address my next item because you alluded to it, but it's my understanding that we cannot take the proceeds of the bond and purchase the Caraway Road property right out.

Now, I'll default if the mayor says we can, but the city attorney at one time said we couldn't.

So I'll I'll I'll concede that point if there is a point.

The other advantage, if we build on Caraway Road, we still have two buildings down here and a drainage issue that'll have to be addressed.

Best estimates by the city engineer, it'd be over $700,000 to tear down the two buildings, remove the asbestos and address drainage issues down here.

That number was included in the project cost for Washington, and we were still a million dollars cheaper.

Somebody wants to do the last is just public confidence.

We have the first phase funded with the bond initiative.

It's $10 million to build the new E911 building.

The next phase costs $20 million, and that's the new police department.

Now, somewhere funding has to come up with that.

I'm not a big tax and spend guy, but eventually we're either going to have to have a public safety tax or we're gonna have to have some kind of fundraising to pay for that building.

What do you think the odds are the public's gonna back us and support us on that endeavor if they don't feel like we use the first million dollars in their best interest?

So the last point that I think is priceless is just purely the reassurance of the public that we're spending their money in the best and most appropriate way.

And with that, I'll yield the floor.

Thank you for your comment.

Excuse me.

Thank you for your comments, Councilman Moore.

Um the item that you had questioned there, um Miss Duncan or Mr.

Richardson, would you all like to speak about the bond funding being able to be used for the purchase of property?

I will say, Mr.

Moore, I don't remember saying that.

I remember saying that the bond ordinance did not authorize the purchase of the property, that that would have to be authorized separately.

But I don't remember saying that the funding couldn't be able to do that.

Maybe that was it.

If the bond did not authorize us to purchase it, then we'd have to do something different.

I'll concede that.

That's not what I said at that time either.

Just for just for clarity, because I actually I talked to Paul Phillips earlier today, just that double and triple make sure that you know the bond ordinance creates a revenue stream that you can draw from, but any time that the council approves a contract for like a land purchase or anything like that, that's a separate purchasing resolution, not a legally bound ordinance.

So that I think that's where the concept of that comes from that you know the passage of the bond, because there was some concern about that if you remember during the discussions that passage of a bond ordinance meant that you were you know locked into buying this property and you're not any property acquisition is a resolution in city council, it's a separate legislative action altogether.

But you can purchase property with the bond proceeds.

Yes.

And I'll concede that point.

I mean, it's just an argument of are we paying for it out of this fund or we're paying for it out of that fund.

So it really has no bearing on that.

So I'll concede to whatever the city attorney's opinion is.

Thank you, everybody.

Um, do I have anybody that would like to make any comments regarding the Caraway Road property?

Mr.

Street.

Well, I mean I agree with what Chris said, and really I agree with what the mayor said.

We're blessed either way we go.

I think we all want the same thing.

We want a dependable and functional public safety department.

We want one that will serve the citizens of Jonesboro.

We want it as cheap as we can get it, but cheapest isn't always best.

But my major concern on the downtown site was the drainage issue, which back 20 years ago when we addressed a lot of drainage problems, it was uh a little over three million dollars to address that one issue right there.

Now, if if Craig's confident that we can do that for the amount that uh he had there, and we are required to build, I think two feet now above base floodplain elevation.

So I don't think the building would be in you know flooded, but access to the building could be flooded if we don't address that in some manner.

I as we talked earlier.

I would hate to see us, I don't think it'd be prudent for us to walk away from our property on Caraway Road because we've got a couple million invested in that as well.

That's also taxpayer money.

Uh it's true we do own this property down here, and if it's functionally uh usable, my main concern too was having a consolidated department.

We've worked very hard, and you know, Chris, since we've been on here, we put almost all our city departments together where it's functional.

That's like this building where all our departments are here instead of being scattered all over town.

But some of the great benefits of that is the centralized location, fosters better communication among officers and departments.

It reduces delays in sharing information, leading to more efficient response times wherever it's at.

Shared resources, such as technology and facilities lowers operational costs.

Streamlined administrative functions reduce redundancy.

You have enhanced collaboration.

Officers from different units can collaborate more easily on cases.

Interdepartmental teamwork improves problem solving and strategy development.

A single location for all of our department enhances community engagement and visibility, which again, either side, I think would work for that.

It's easier for the public to access services and report issues.

Training and development, a big one.

A centralized command structure improves coordinated coordination during emergencies, as we experience with the tornado and other issues if we have a major earthquake or something.

Provides faster mobilization of resources and personnel in critical situations and facilities, unified training and operational procedures, enhancing overall effectiveness and eliminates travel time between two locations.

Now, if if if our CID, our 9-1 or Lifetime Crime Center and all that's down here, that eliminate the travel back and forth, and it will it will produce all of these things that I'd like to see in the unified department.

If it's possible that we can do that, hey, that'd work great.

I'd like to see our department in one spot either way, all of it.

CID patrol, lifetime crime center, 911, because those agencies need to work together to be a functional and and uh dependable public safety unit.

So that's my main concern on that.

And I mean, either way, we're gonna make it work no matter what.

But if we do decide on the Washington property, I'd like to see the majority of the department function together, the Lifetime Crime Center, E911, uh, CID and Patrol all in one facility.

And the only other thing that we wouldn't have quite as much room to expand.

Of course, that can be factored in, I guess, in the initial construction, but I hate to see us build it out and then have no room to expand as as you know, future demands would cause the department to uh to grow.

As I stated before, the building construction, Mr.

Street will be exactly the same.

The same facility would be built on Caraway as would be built downtown, and under no circumstances would the selection of Washington include the elimination of the Caraway property.

We would we would have them both just as we have them both right now, and I'm with you.

Consolidation of services in one building benefits the police, but it also benefits the public being right down here in the downtown area.

Mr.

Street, was there a question in there for asking Mr.

Light about the drainage for the downtown property?

Is Craig Craig here?

Craig, would you mind speak to that?

What'd you say about 300,000 for drainage?

Is that realistic, Craig?

Piece of paper showed 350,000 for drainage improvements.

Is that correct?

The money that was included in the estimate is simply what would we would require of any developer to develop that property.

It's not to fix the overall drainage of that drainage basin.

The estimated cost from that was almost three million dollars.

I think Councilman Moore mentioned that that it that we didn't include that in the estimate because if we sold the property to a developer, they would not be required to fix the drainage in the entire basin.

All they would have to do is manage the water on their site.

So we included some work that to ensure that what we did on the property wouldn't make things worse.

But we'd still have the an event, a rain event, we'd still have water buildup on Washington in front of the where it builds up now.

Uh, quite possibly.

What we included was a triple run of 42-inch pipe underneath the parking lot to provide some additional storage.

We'd also provide more green space in the overall development.

So right now it's currently asphalt and concrete, so you'd have more grass, more trees, hopefully less runoff.

But you know, that's that's what we would require of other private developers as well for redevelopment project.

So that was what was included in the cost estimate, not the total fix for the drainage basin.

It's interesting to note, Mr.

Street, it's where the problem is with the drainage right now, is actually where the end of the fire station was, and that will not be where the new building is.

So the drainage right there on that spot that Craig's alluding to with the 42-inch arch pipe to help address that.

Uh that's not where the building will be.

The building will sit back and back off to the east a little bit.

So we have plenty of room right there for drainage.

And I had to think this morning, I think I've lived in my house for 31 years on Madison.

I don't think it's ever been where I couldn't pass on Washington.

I've seen water out to the center line, and I saw the uh bay of the fire department one time flooded, but that building would be removed.

So that in itself will be a huge benefit.

Anyone have any more questions for Mr.

Light?

I don't have any questions.

I just want to make one comment.

I'm glad we're finally to this point.

When I ran my first time in 2008, this is one of the platforms that I ran on is to get public safety, you know, a new home, E911 is really operating out of an inadequate facility at this point.

They were at that time, and I'm glad we're finally getting this across the goal line.

Thank you.

Anyone else from the committee have any statements, any questions for the administration?

Say that's going to bring us to the next item on our agenda being public comment.

Um, at this time, this is an opportunity from anybody from the public to address the committee with any questions or concerns, and just to remind everybody that we do have a time limit on today's discussions.

We're going to be setting that time limit of five minutes on the clock.

And just to remind everybody that there's a lot of people here with, I'm sure a lot of things to say.

So if you do hear one of your points being made beforehand, just don't mind just to be respectful of everybody's time.

But of course, if you have something new to say, please feel free to come up before the mic and address the committee.

And at this time, we will um accept anybody that wants to come up and talk today.

Yes, ma'am.

Huh?

And if you'll just make if you'll just state your name and address for the record, please.

Yes, my name is Shalee Marquis.

I live at 5300 Prospect Road.

And I have a question for you on the committee.

Um, how many of you have actually done research into a real-time crime center?

Did you go visit a real-time crime center?

Did you talk to people who have developed real-time crime centers?

And have you asked them what worked and what hasn't worked at their crime centers?

Is that a direct question to us that you want to answer?

Yeah, I'd like to know what kind of due diligence you guys put into doing investigation because what I hear is I hear a lot of talk about location.

I hear a lot of talk about money, and it seems like money is overshadowing what this what's going to go on inside this building, right?

We're gonna get the same building regardless of where it goes.

But have you talked?

Did you guys do your due diligence?

And did you reach out and did you go visit real-time crime centers?

Have you talked to them about what works and what doesn't work?

Because I think we're missing that big section of the functionality and the future of this.

I mean, you guys are making a decision on a once-in-a-general lifetime right now.

We're not going to get another real-time trime center in this town or another police department while any of us are probably alive.

So, did you guys do that?

So, the answer to your question is the mayor formed this task force to address the location.

There's an architect and another group will decide all that information.

We're simply tasked with picking between A and B.

We have no other So, how do you pick between A and B when you don't understand what's going to go on inside the market?

That's exactly what we pick between A and B and some other group decides what goes on inside.

We simply pick the location.

Another group will design the building and evaluate.

I'm not talking about the design.

I'm talking about the work that they're going to do.

We're not tasked with selecting that.

We're tasked with the same thing.

So, how do you pick?

So, I'm going to say again, how do you pick a location that is going to house the real-time crime center?

It is going to house the 9-1-1, and it's going to house our police department.

So, how do you pick a location without taking what is needed for that to function properly into consideration?

Just like you said, we base that on location and fiscal responsibility.

We decide which one would be in the best interest of the people and which one would be the most cost effective.

An architect and another group of experts will design the building, evaluate the needs of the E91.

We're not, I'm not qualified to tell you how many screens need to be in there or what kind of connections you have.

That's not our job.

We're simply selecting between two pieces of land.

And two the two pieces of land have a direct impact on how that facility is going to run in the future.

While I appreciate those of you who are on city council, I appreciate what you do for the city.

I see the same situation occur over and over and over again, in that you choose to take this position and you choose to not do your due diligence on things.

You vote blindly on things or you vote vote on things simply based on a dollar amount.

You've got to do better for our city.

You've got to be making informed decisions.

What is going to happen inside this building you think has no difference whether it sits on Caraway or sits on Washington?

And that tells me this committee shouldn't be making that decision.

If I if I'm if I may say something, yes, Mr.

Hammond.

I think it's been said several times during this task force committee that the same building is going to be built in either location.

And it's not the actual building I'm talking about.

I'm talking about what's going to be going on inside the building.

That's not part of our what we were tasked with doing.

But what decision you make impacts whether that's successful or not.

And I've heard over and over again, people dismiss the things that Chief Elliott and members of his team have said, and it strictly is coming down to the money.

And you guys have to realize that yes, is the money important as a citizen who pays a lot of taxes to this city?

Do I care about how you spend my money?

Yes.

But I also think that if you're going to be responsible to select a piece of property that has this specific intention, right?

There's only one intention for this this property, right?

Wherever the building goes, it's gonna house the 911 center, the real-time crime center, and all of the things law enforcement.

I think you need to do your due diligence before you make that decision, and I don't think this committee has done that.

So these two pieces of property are less than half a mile apart.

Okay.

What what tell me what your point is here because the same thing is going to be housed within both facilities.

Correct.

Response time is going to be very similar.

No, it won't be.

Have you been down here at five o'clock in the afternoon?

Every afternoon.

We have one-way streets, we have narrow streets, we don't have direct on-ramp, off-ramp access.

I mean, it's it's congested down here.

Ingress, egress to the other intersection is congested as well.

Not like it is down here.

It's not.

I mean, I can I can get from Hill Talk to ma'am.

Yeah, my time's up, but he now I appreciate your time.

Thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

And if you'll name I'm gonna take this down a notch.

If you'll if you'll state your name and address for the record, please, ma'am.

I sure will.

Yes, ma'am.

Melissa Baldwin, 927 West Matthews.

Um this is out of my wheelhouse.

I don't like to speak up here.

I like to work behind the scenes.

But when I feel passionate about something, I'll get I'll get up here, I'll do it.

Okay, this weekend.

I was fortunate enough to have my very best friend from Tulsa come and visit.

And Tulsa does everything first class, they really do.

And she and her husband came and we went downtown for dinner.

And as we were going downtown from my house on Matthews, up Washington to get on downtown, she said, this is just a charming little town.

She said, I would not mind living here.

And then we got down here and she said, 'This is adorable.' She said, 'I just love it here.' And I said, 'Well, it is nice.' And I started thinking about the last time she was here, which was in 1970, how far we have come.

And I thought, it is charming, it is nice.

And then I started thinking after she left, and I started thinking about some of the things, and this has been on my mind before before that.

But I thought we hired a team of individuals to come in and look at our city for city growth.

We paid them.

I don't know if we paid them, I don't know what the funding was.

$885,000, $855,000 DPZ.

And they came up with some fantastic ideas for our city growth.

And we're doing a lot of them.

We're doing a lot of them.

We're walkability, bikeability, green space.

They had great ideas.

And if you've ever seen any of their work, it's wonderful.

The uh compounded Hendricks, gorgeous.

They're doing work in Northwest Arkansas right now.

But the last thing I remember them saying was invest in your downtown.

It will pay you back in dividends.

And if we as a city cannot invest in our downtown, how can we expect other people to invest in our downtown?

That's that's all I got to say.

Thank you all.

Thank you, ma'am.

Okay, next.

Yes, ma'am.

Name and address, please.

I'm Laura Sustage, and I'm at 905 Heritage Cove.

And my question is we've talked about fixing the drainage being maybe three million dollars downtown.

Did you speak into the market?

Oh, we've talked about drainage being being fixed at maybe three million dollars.

And I look at how much money went into the Justice Center that's now continually needing upgrades and things.

Why do we not invest in the Caraway property and do it right and not worry about the floodplain and all these other issues?

That's all I had to say.

Thank you, ma'am.

Thanks.

Name and address, please.

Patty Lack, 4108 Forest Hill Road.

And first I'm gonna speak for Ira Stevens.

She unfortunately couldn't be here today, but she sent me what she wanted me to uh speak to you about, and she said, after reading everything written about the issues, watching the meetings and talking to other people, it looks like the most rational, most logical, and best choice for everyone concerned is the downtown area and choosing the Washington Avenue location.

It seems definitely to be the most financially conservative choice and the most responsible one for the taxpayers.

All of the above are the duties and responsibilities that all of you have as council people to consider when making a decision for the citizens that elected all of you.

And that was from Ira Stevens.

My spot is that I'm I'm uh surprised that the mayor isn't here today.

Um, it's kind of interesting.

Um, but I'm gonna reiterate what I wrote a lot of you yesterday and saying that I hope you take your business knowledge and all your years of experience up here on the council seat representing the citizens of Jonesboro to select the best choice for the E91 Center.

With choosing the Washington Center, we get the E91 Center as we would on Caraway, and that is your only decision, what location?

It's the same building.

The city would be investing in the downtown area, just like Missy just said, and we'll have two police locations just in case there's a natural disaster, just like Mr.

Moore said.

That's important because we never know when that's gonna happen.

We can use the 1.5 million dollars, whether it's from the capital improvement fund that we have or from the back of the bond task force.

If we use the money from the bond task, that means we only have four million dollars to build the building if we use it to purchase the land from Matt Parker.

If we use the 1.5 million that we would have extra, then we can apply those funds to complete and the complete and finish the Washington Avenue location because of that $5.5 million that was given to us on July 22nd, is that we'll only have $4 million to work on the Caraway building.

The other day in the newspaper, it says Parker defends the Caraway Road offer.

When I read that, I thought, why is Mr.

Parker trying to defend us, the city from purchasing his land?

Why wasn't it Chief Elliott or the mayor defends that?

One thing I'm upset about is how come we don't have a headline here on the top page saying that citizens defend the Washington location because the citizens own that property.

Why weren't we given the same opportunity?

I shared with you in the paper or in an email yesterday that the letter from Matt Parker to me and to many others show a sign of desperation and entitlement that the city of Jonesboro and the citizens owe us to buy his property.

That property has been for sale for decades, and it's been seven years that Mr.

Parker has been trying to get the city to purchase that land.

And let me remind you that Citizen Copenhagen opposed that from being developed in 2019.

So it's been a long time.

So you ask yourself, why has this prime property not been sold or bought by someone else?

Well, yeah, you can look at the estimates of maybe maybe like the blue wave car wash down the street.

Well, guess what?

That's a better location than a dead end street here on Caraway right now.

So we have not seen the final contract on this.

We only see the contract on Legister with little post-it notes.

Well, what's the final contract?

We don't know.

We've heard about it, but what is the final contract?

So how can we say yes or no to that deal right now?

If it's taken this long to sell this property, it's not a good investment.

It wasn't in a good investment back in Mayor Parents' day, and it's not a good investment today for all of you.

So I encourage all of you to look at the bottom line.

We get the same building at either location, and we have a million and a half dollars more either to spend down here or to the police department that we can give them more funding of what they really need.

So I encourage you today to vote for the Washington Avenue location, and then when it comes to full council, I hope the whole council votes for that.

So I appreciate your time.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Oh I'm sorry, one last thing.

There's a bunch of people here in the room that are supportive of the Washington location, and I just would like them to stand up if they support the Washington location right now.

These are the people that you represent right here behind you.

I hope you make a good decision.

Thank you.

Yes.

And that seems that there's so much cash, and then there's commitments that we make to do in addition.

And that concerns me because a lot of times when you take on commitments like that, you run into things, and it can be, you know, end up costing you a whole lot more than it was supposed to.

If we're gonna do that, if I think we need to have a clean amount that we're going to pay, and if whoever it is wants to, you know, do any improvements like that, that ought to be done by somebody else, but we need to be careful that that doesn't run cost us an arm and a leg that we hadn't planned on.

Thank you, sir.

Is this a if you will approach the mic?

Yes, sir, please.

I think it's short enough for me already on Tom Lackey.

And just name an address for the record, please, sir.

Well, they got a nice picture of it.

All right, name Tommy Lackey, and those Joe Hefner.

And uh 1003 West Matthews.

Now I'm I'm a guy.

I mean I got a perspective, probably looking more at facts than I do other things.

I've listened to what the mayor said, I've listened to what Mr.

Street said, and I've listened to what Mr.

Moore said.

And I uh, you know, I take it in, and I'm a guy.

And the things that the mayor and Mr.

Street have said, they're stating soft fuzzy things, and I don't go with soft fuzzy.

Mr.

Moore has stated facts, and I go more with facts, and he has presented a logical process.

It's not soft and fuzzy.

And I'm not a soft and fuzzy guy.

I mean, that's it.

Y'all y'all address the issues like you look to.

What I didn't hear anybody say is that wherever it's combined with, whether it's here or there, and you combine them, we ought to be getting rid of resources like.

And I know this this is not it.

But we ought to be getting rid of people in management to give more people, but that's that's a different issue.

But that's my thoughts.

Let's just, and I'm not used to speaking.

So anyway, I'll I'll say what I said.

Thanks, sir.

Okay.

Oh coming around.

Sorry, I'm so slow.

Uh Tom Elwood, 1520 for our circle.

It's great that everybody participation of the public and the interest in Jonesboro is outstanding.

When they built this building, they they thought the city was too.

When they built this building, they they thought the city this was too it wasn't really big enough for input for people to come thought you know because we're uh we're growing, things are changing things will change again, but the one thing that won't change is that it's gonna rain and it's gonna flood on Washington.

That's just a fact.

And Washington is the uh the emergency route into St.

Bernard Hospital in case there is a national emergency or something from the bypass.

That's a direct emergency route.

It goes right by there, and every time it rains, it's a serious and every rain, not just not a season, not a widespread event, but anytime it rains, it's a problem getting through there, and that is not going to change in a bigger pipe storing water under the driveway or parking lot, that won't work because it freezes and it rains in the winter time and the summertime, the freeze and heat cycle will destroy the parking lot.

So you're gonna constantly build in other words, it was a mistake to build in there in 1960, and it's a bigger mistake to build in that area and not in 2026.

That's all I gotta say.

Thank you.

Thanks, sir.

Anyone else for public comments?

Yes, sir.

If you'll state your name and address for the record, please.

Hello, uh, I'm Lieutenant McDaniel with the Jones Royal Police Department.

I'm currently the administrator over the real-time crime center.

Um, I said a lot last time at the last meeting.

Um and I I understand uh where your level of commitment to stay in the downtown area is coming from, but ultimately um I would just like to remind uh this task force that if this is about public safety, it's more than just the building, it's more than just the technology in the building.

There's a human element that goes with it.

There's a uh relationship with that building and the current investigative division, uh, the public information office, the records division, the civilian employees in there with FOIA request, uh discovery motions from attorneys.

There's a constant flow of humans in and out of this building.

And if you take that and divide it geographically by about two miles, not a half mile, two miles, and limit the parking and put construction all around it, making it more difficult for people that I need to work with to come in and out of that building.

You're gonna fundamentally damage the efficiency of public safety in regards to that.

Um I just wanted to remind that that was kind of the crux uh to steal the term from an old friend of the situation here that it's about public safety and it's about what's best for that to work effectively.

And I understand we're talking about layering a police department on top of this years down the road.

So whatever we decide in this room is going to affect the police department for years, and it's gonna be a long time before it gets back to be effective and efficient the way it was before we were separated geographically.

You know, I've been with the city going on about 30 years, and I've seen um the band-aids put on the police department over and over and over.

And I know we're talking about a lot of money, and I don't take that lightly, I really don't.

Um, but it might take that investment to set us up for success now so that we can continue that success down the road when we layer phase two on top of this.

I understand it's a lot of money.

I get it.

Umfortunately, I think that we have been put off and put in damaged buildings, old buildings, buildings with asbestos and may do what's being spread around for so long, we've kind of forgot to change the oil on the car, which could have been not quite as expensive as now we're looking at replacing the car because we forgot maintenance along the way.

Um again, for the third time, simply would like to remind this task force that if public safety is the point of the location of this building.

Unfortunately, um I think that requires to be at the Caraway Road location to keep that human element, that active team, the the ability for detectives to come in and out of there, the ability for me to just walk down a hallway and uh and confer with investigators and making sure we're on the right path and finding new intel.

Um the store I could tell you stories on and on and on if you wanted to come visit and see how it actually works, it's all day long in there, and if you break that relationship, it will be detrimental to the efficiency of that division.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Well, actually, if you don't mind, I just have a question.

My name's Carol White, 5001 Nicole Cove.

Um I have a question.

Okay, so if we I'm I'm I'm not really followed this like to the nth degree, so forgive me if I'm uh confused on this, but the property on downtown, will we lose that completely if we go with the Caraway Road?

Will that be sold and there will not be a police presence downtown, and everything will go to Careway.

And if we do keep this downtown location and build here, will we have two locations?

We'll have the police department on Careway and we'll have the other offices and a good police presence downtown.

And one more thing.

Um I'm talking about the the alcohol, the the problems that we have had.

I'm sure that you know recently we had a pretty big issue.

I can't imagine us not having the police department and the and the facilities down here to patrol what is going on with these restaurants and the people that are frequenting them and and maybe uh you know doing things that they shouldn't be doing.

But anyway, I just had that question.

I I'll sit down and maybe y'all can answer.

The answer to your question, we would keep both properties.

Thank you, ma'am.

Let's see if there's anybody else that but uh if if we have time, I'll get back to you.

Okay, sorry, ma'am.

Name and address for the record, please, sir.

Rick Elliott, chief of police.

So I'm this discussion right now is for us out here, not for not for not for the police department.

If I'm out of order, I'll set it down and keep the through.

But it sounds like we're the ones that should be up there talking, not people that have a vested interest in Sir.

Thank you for your point, sir.

Go ahead.

You're absolutely right, sir.

I do have a vested interest in what we're doing for my police department and my people.

We do this job day in and day out, so I do have a vested interest in what we're doing here today.

So at the end of the day, where this beautiful building lands, that's fine.

Makes no difference.

We're talking the future, the future growth of the city and the police department.

Phase two, we keep talking phase two.

What's phase two gonna look like?

For phase two.

That's the day if we built down Caraway.

If I have to dislocate the evidence room and other parts of that building to combine everything here on Washington, now we have driven that cost up.

So we're at 20 million, 20 plus million dollar cost we're looking at to build phase two down here.

We're now going to raise that cost down here to 25 to 30 million because I'm gonna have to move some of this stuff down here because I'm gonna combine everything one place or another, except the motor pool.

So I can't just leave the evidence room down here and have my detectives going back and forth to get a piece of evidence out to examine it or do analysis on it and then run back and forth down the street.

It's not efficient.

We're not efficient today.

It's about efficiency.

And understand that you know everybody's at talking about dollars.

Well, okay, I'm talking about the dollars and the back end now.

The back end dollars the phase two, which we don't know, as you said, we don't know when phase two is going to look like.

I say it's gonna be 10 plus years.

So we're gonna be fragmented in multiple buildings for the next 10 years because I don't see anybody stepping up and coming up with 20, 30 million dollars.

So that's the the time we do that, we're gonna drive the costs up and the cost to build 10, 20 years from now is gonna be way more than it is today.

So it's about efficiency of police operations, and understand that is my goal at the other day.

If we want to pack everything up and build down here, then the cost of what's projected right now, we're gonna drive it on up and we'll move, we'll pack up and move down there.

But that big parking lot, it's gonna be fenced all the way around for security, and the concept of thinking that police presence downtown because of the bars, whatever that 9-1-1 center, there's not officers in there, and there nobody in that building is gonna run out to the bar or anything else for anybody on the west end.

That's not their job.

So police department exists today down the downtown.

It didn't have a thing to do with the fight on Main Street the other night or any other time downtown.

Facilities are already there.

It means nothing to those people.

It's about efficiency of a police department.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Anyone else for public comment?

Oh Brandon Reed, 1511 Honeysuckle Lane here in Jonesboro.

I just want to advocate for the Caraway site because it's like uh Lieutenant like Chief has said efficiency of the police department.

As a proud taxpayer and citizen here in Jonesboro, I want my taxpaid dollars to go to things that are most important to me.

If anyone out here disagrees that public safety should be the number one priority for any taxpayer, then we have to have a serious conversation.

Jonesboro is a great town to live in, and I think we have a great opportunity now to future proof or police department and public safety.

There's only one right answer for that.

It's Caraway.

Thanks.

Thanks, sir.

Yes, ma'am.

My name is Sherry Ray, and I live at 810 East Craig Head Forest Road.

I work hard for my money and I pay taxes.

Pay taxes, income taxes, property taxes, all the taxes.

I would I am about public safety.

I believe our choice should be Washington.

So the money is not spent crazily because at my house, I do not run up credit card debt, have brand new cars.

Do I live within my means?

And I would hope that you guys use their tax money and y'all's tax money and my tax money in a way public safety without spending tons for Caraway.

So I believe the choice would be Washington.

That's my only statement.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Do we have anybody else for public safety that hasn't spoken yet?

Okay.

Miss Patty, if you would like to absolutely Patty Lack 4108 Forest Hill Road.

You know, so what I'm hearing is that the efficiency, we have an efficient police department.

There is no doubt about it right now.

Your task today is to look at the location.

The location of the E91 Center is already down here on Washington.

So all we're going to do is that we're going to take the money and build them a nicer place right there.

We're not talking right now about moving the facility on Caraway down here.

That was, you know, that is so far down the line, right here.

So your main goal right now is where is the best location?

They're already down there.

As far as communication, gosh, I believe it, computers, texting, everything, electronics these days.

It's amazing what they can do.

They can communicate.

They're doing it right now, today for the last six months or how four and a half months that they've uh been moved from there.

So that's not what the goal is today.

Today is the goal is which place is the best efficient place and most cost effective that the citizens of Jonesboro, since we're paying for this, that you guys can decide we're efficient already.

That's not the question.

It's where this building goes, and it really needs to be on Washington.

Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Okay.

Ladies and gentlemen, that'll be all for public comments today, which brings us to um our next item on the agenda, which I have lost in my mountain of paperwork.

I apologize.

And that is um Mr.

Chair, we have a motion and a second on the floor.

I ask you to call the roll.

Okay.

And just to reiterate that motion and second, it is for the Washington Street property.

The Washington Street property.

So voting in favor of this will be voting in favor of the property.

I'm sorry, of the E911 Real Time Crime Center going on the Washington property.

Okay.

Madam Madam Clark, will you call the roll, please?

Mr.

Hafner.

Aye.

Mr.

Street.

Mr.

Gibson.

Mr.

Moore.

I Mr.

Emerson.

And I'm I recuse myself since it was not a tiebreaker.

So and at this point, the um motion on the floor does pass for the Washington Road.

For I'm sorry, for the Washington property, for the real-time crime center, for the E911 Center.

And that is all that we have on our agenda today for the Capital Bond Improvement Task Force.

And the next item on our agenda is adjournment.

So moved.

We do stand adjourned.