Everyone, welcome to our Mesa City Council study session for September 10th.

We appreciate everybody being here.

Man, we have a packed room.

We ought to sold tickets for this morning's uh session.

So all council members are present.

We appreciate you being here.

Item one, as usual, is to review the agenda we have for Monday, September 14th council meeting.

We can go through the agenda, but I'm going to ask that a presentation on number seven be done first, and then we'll answer questions on the agenda if that's okay.

Can we do the presentation first?

However, you'd like to do that.

Yeah, let's do that.

Uh Mr.

Adams has uh stop.

Are you here till 8 30?

Okay.

So Heather and your team, Kelly, come up and if it's okay, Council Duke number seven.

Yes.

So just so everybody's clear, we're talking about uh item seven A, number seven A is take action on the following ordinances and resolutions related to property or portions of property general generally located west and south of State Route 24, east of South Ellsworth Road, north and south of East Williamsfield Road, and west of the future South Christman Road Alignment, which includes the project commonly known as Legacy Park and Gateway Crossings.

That's what we'll be discussing.

Great.

Well, Mayor, uh Council, good morning.

Um we've got everyone here who has put in a lot of time and effort over a number of years on this on this project, and it is years, and we appreciate all the hard work that legal and planning and transportation and and really the whole um city uh team has put into uh the importance of this project.

Along with that, just a um huge kudos to um Andrew Cohen and Bill Levine, the property owners uh of the property in question, along with David Larsher, um, who you'll hear from in in a few minutes and his team at Vestar, um, who have been great to work with.

Um, as so many of you know, um, these conversations started a long time ago with the vision of bringing something really special to this um prime piece of real estate right at State Route 24 in the 202 off of Ellsworth, directly across from uh Gateway Airport and the future passenger terminal area of of Gateway.

And we knew that this piece of land um was special, and this piece of land needed to be used for its highest and best use for uh economic development purposes in the city of Mesa.

Um we talk a lot about the fact though sometimes we know that, but does the property owner know that?

And does the uh does the right development team all come together to make that a reality?

And as we talked about projects not just across the valley, but as uh we've looked at projects across the nation, uh it usually takes that that's that perfect storm of everyone being on the same page and and rowing in the same direction to make a project at this scale and scope and quality uh happen.

And we've talked a lot at this dais about placemaking.

We've talked a lot about um filling some of the voids that we have from the hospitality sector.

We've talked about making sure that we capture um sales tax and and retail back into our community, and I don't think that's ever been more uh acute than after the changes that we made.

And and Heather, if you don't mind maybe switching to the next slide.

Um let's go on to the next one here.

Um thank you.

Um the replacement of the sales tax revenue that that we lost because of the loss of residential rental and the changes, uh conformity with HR one and some of the other changes that we've all grappled with uh as a council and as a city over the last several years.

Certainly we've done our part um by tightening our belt, but all along the strategy has been we have to grow our way out of this.

We have to find opportunities to that we can increase our sales tax base in the city since that's so crucial for sustaining our long-term operations and do it in a way that that doesn't negatively impact the taxpayer, right?

We we can find opportunities like this through partnerships that um that help us restore that money and then um grow and and provide our fiscal sustainability as an organization um into the future, and that's one of the things that I am most excited about, and I know you all are most excited about about this project because of the prospects for what it brings um to the city uh in addition to um the amenities that we've been lacking in this part of of um the city and frankly in the Southeast Valley in general, but it also um is smart business sense um for the city of Mesa to have these kind of partnerships uh that can add so much to um to our bottom line to be able to sustain uh the city without having to go back to the taxpayers for for additional support when we've lost revenue.

And that's one of the things that I am most excited about, and I know you all are most excited about this project because of the prospects for what it brings to the city uh in addition to the amenities that we've been lacking in this part of um the city and frankly in the Southeast Valley in general, but it also is smart business sense um for the city of Mesa to have these kind of partnerships uh that can add so much to um to our bottom line to be able to sustain uh the city without having to go back to the taxpayers for for additional support when we've lost revenue.

So that's really crucial.

We've talked Agnaxium too about the the fact that we are leaking and bleeding sales tax to other communities.

They um we always say the joke that you know when when we bring in a major tournament uh or help partner with visit Mesa and thousands of people, uh tens of thousands of people are coming for tournaments like MLS Next and other activities that are happening at the Arizona Athletica Grounds.

Guess what?

They're not staying in Mesa, they're not eating in Mesa.

They're driving to Mesa, they're going to the tournament at AAG, and then they're getting into their car and they're going to their resort in Scottsdale, or they're going to their hotel in Tempe or Phoenix.

And so we are and and we'll show some information on that um in a few slides.

But again, this the these are sales tax dollars and and economic activity that should be benefiting um Mesa residents, should be benefiting Mesa businesses so that they can enjoy that instead of us sending that activity back to neighboring uh communities.

And so to be able to bring hospitality and retail that will capture that, and we've when we've heard that from our residents too.

They're they're tired of having to drive to other communities to have the type of uh restaurant experiences and and other activities that uh is represented here at Legacy Park and Gateway Crossing that we'll uh get into.

And so as you as you start thinking about the different priorities that we have, um this checks a lot of boxes, and this is and this really moves the needle dramatically uh in that regard.

Um Heather, do you mind searching too?

So it's numbers don't lie, you know, and that's and that's the good part about all of this is the proof is really in everything that we have done to comply with state law to make sure that as we engage in a public-private partnership that this way that we're understanding the true impact of this of the trade-offs that we have when we enter into those different partnerships.

You'll you'll um we'll dive into this a lot more.

But again, these these numbers represent economic activity that's going to um come to our community because of this partnership.

The the minimum requirements that we'll talk about in this development agreement um represent an economic impact of 7.4 billion dollars and 545 million in sales tax revenue uh or uh tax revenue, excuse me, and all different flavors of tax revenue that would be coming back to the city as a result of uh this development, along with so nearly 1,700 permanent jobs that would come along with that.

The folks working in the luxury hotel, the people working in the offices and the retail establishments that are that are part of the phase one of um of this development.

That's a substantial economic impact for for for any development or any series of developments, but to have that all and to have that all into phase one of this project um is is amazing.

But then Heather, as we transition to full build out, $58.8 billion over 30 years of economic impact um to Mesa, uh 1.4 billion dollars of tax revenue over that period of time, $13,500 jobs created because of this project.

And that is all done through our independent economic analysis that's required under state law as we look at um entering into public-private partnerships, that's required.

That's not our numbers, that's our independent analysis numbers of what this project will will generate.