Committee for Tuesday, July 28th, 2026 at 9.07 a.m.

I'm Oliverman Bauman, Chair of the Committee.

To my immediate right is Alderman Stamper, the Vice Chair to my far left, Alderman Spiker.

To his right, Alderman DeAndre Jackson.

And to my left is Chris Lee, our staff assistant.

We'll be joined by Alderwoman Coggs shortly.

First item on the agenda.

We'll read them both since they're gonna be held.

Item 1260362, substitute resolution relating to the designation of an area in the 15th Aldermanic District as a rental property inspection program district.

Item two, file two six zero three six three, substitute ordinance relating to the establishment of a rental property inspection program.

Alderman Stamper moves a whole of these two items to the call of the chair.

Hearing no objection to that, so ordered.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Moving on to item three, file two six zero three six eight.

Communication from the Department of City Development, the Department of Neighborhood Services, and the Office of the City Attorney relating to the 21st century Road to Housing Act and its impact on the city's tax foreclosed housing inventory and related housing policies.

I think we got some more people coming on this.

I think uh the council president and LRB are also what's our next file.

Uh why don't we go why don't we go to item uh we'll go to item four?

Okay.

And we'll until everybody's assembled.

Uh okay, we'll hold item three to a later point in the meeting, going to item four, file two six zero one eight three, substitute ordinance correcting the mixed zoning of the parcel located at 1993 South Muskego Avenue on the west side of South Muskego Avenue, north of West Rogers Street in the Eighth Aldermanic District, and assigning the zoning to local business LB2 to the property.

I think this is a mixed zoning case where you have one parcel with two zoning classifications.

Any anybody here on this item?

All right, well, we'll get to the looks like this meeting is gonna end real quick.

All right, we'll go back to item three.

Relating to the 21st century road to housing act and its impact on the city's tax foreclosed housing inventory and related housing policies.

Okay, we're joined by our common council president.

Do you want to take the leading?

Sure.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Um, as many know this uh congressional road housing act has uh we'll have an impact on cities.

And uh we just uh I wanted to get ahead of the curve in a sense and uh knowing that there's an enormous amount of codification that has to happen in this process for us to compete for whatever grants may be available through this and opportunities.

Wanted to uh I know the National League of Cities is um has kind of a roadmap that they laid out for their membership.

I'm attending uh council presidents um gathering in August.

Housing is top of our issue, uh, one of the top issues that we'll be talking about, and uh more importantly, wanted to either hear from departments as we move into a budget process of what are the needs, uh, how are we getting ready?

Uh, what are we doing to um compete?

And just hear from departments uh what are they what do they need from us and to put out there uh for everyone else to hear how we're competing for some of these opportunities that come come out of the act.

Excellent.

Excellent.

Who wants to take the laboring order here?

I'm happy to.

All right.

Uh good morning, Glory Kilmer with the Department of City Development.

Um at the table, I'm joined to my uh right by City Attorney Goickey and to my left by uh Decanter from the Department of City Development.

Um I do know in the audience we have representatives from DNS and uh I believe CDGA.

Um so the first item is we want to uh draw your attention to the uh attachment to the file.

Uh so we did submit the uh uh bipartisan policy center.

Uh, did a summary and a tracker.

Um we have noticed that many organizations are putting out uh different summaries.

So uh this is the one that we thought was um comprehensive enough, but also you know, only 25 pages.

Um so an overview, uh the 21st century road to housing act uh is the final version of prior efforts, uh including the Senate's Road to Housing Act and the House's housing for the 21st century act.

And I mentioned this because as you're doing your own research, um there are many versions of this out there.

Um so this is the final version, the 21st century Road to Housing Act.

The legislation contains a wide range of provisions that would expand financing tools, reduce administrative barriers, streamline development processes, and preserve existing affordable housing stock.

However, uh the act does contain more than 50 provisions that require new regulations, administrative procedures, and federal guidance before a single dollar can be spent.

Additionally, most of the new and expanded programs do not come with authorized funding, meaning that the soonest a few of the programs may have access to dollars is 2027.

We also want to note, uh, just for kind of comparison.

In 2016, uh Congress enacted a legislation titled Housing Opportunities Through Modernization Act, or HOTMA.

Um and HAPMA's goal is to modernize federal affordable housing programs generally administered by housing authorities.

Uh HUD issued their final rule in 2023, so seven years later, uh, after the actual congressional uh act was taken.

Uh and just now in 2026, HOTMA is still being rolled out.

So I say this all to say um a large housing package came through Congress in 2016, uh, and they're still rolling it out a decade later.

This experience combined with the massive federal workforce reductions over the past year, um, should set everybody's expectations of a long runway for the implementation of this act.

Um for the next step in the presentation, so um kind of giving you an overview and I'm gonna hand it off to Dee uh to talk about uh really what we think might impact the city of Milwaukee.

Um and then after Dee kind of gives her a little bit uh further in depth analysis, um we'll turn it over to uh uh attorney Goike uh if he has any kind of concluding remarks uh from our perspective.

Um thing to note before I hand it off to Dee is that some of the provisions in the Act may impact Hackham.

Um so we're not going to highlight the Hackham provisions.

Um if you're interested in those, um we'll let you uh proactively approach Hackham on the specific items that may impact their efforts.

Um and then I'll know although based on our initial review uh and speaking with our colleagues in real estate, uh we do not believe the act will have a direct or immediate impact on city tax foreclosed housing inventory.

Um but as I mentioned, Dee will highlight uh where we might see some indirect uh activities over the coming years.

So with that, I'll hand it over to Dee.

Good morning.

De Cantor from Department of City Development.

Um Road is largely focused on federal regulatory changes to east supply side conditions.

Um one of the bigger changes in their regulatory are an example that gets used quite a lot across all of the publications is removing the chassis requirement for manufactured homes to allow them to be more easily built on uh land.

Um there's other things that they focus on.

Um chassis requirement would be um for the transportation of manufactured housing that have to be built to fit on a chassis to be able to fit on the road.

So removing the chassis requirement one eliminates us about a five to seven thousand dollar cost, but it also allows the housing to be maybe built a little wider, a little taller without that chassis requirement.

Possibly harder to transport, but um HUD and the states will come out with um guidelines on how those will work.

The states will be allowed to certify to HUD how that will work.

So that's a state responsibility.

It will be a state responsibility to report to HUD at some point how that will work, yes.

Yeah, all in Stanford.

Where in the city do we have those types of homes?

Manufactured homes, I believe there's some out at West Lawn.

Um there's other places in the city, I'm sure that they are.

I believe the zoning code does go into that, but um I'd be 13th district.

Well, true trailer parks.

You have some true trailer parts.

So you're talking about trailer parts, right?

Um, we're not talking trailer parks, no.

We're talking about homes that are brought in, dropped on a site in a crane, and then assembled on site.

Right.

Manufactured homes like he's talking about are not really, uh to my knowledge, really allowed in that format anymore because of some changes in the late 1970s.

But so all of them, do you have manufactured homes, not mobile homes?

No, I I only have a handful of manufactured.

He has true trailer homes.

True.

Yeah, but manufactured homes could be what uh what used to be the Christian center does.

Yeah.

They bring it in on the well, that's that's panel.

I mean, there's a variety of different types of styles of manufacturing homes.

Yes, on truck trailers, right?

Yeah, and those are the types of homes we'd be talking about as the panelized on a chassis.

Okay.

And then they're then they're assembled, put together on small site.

Yep.

Yep.

Okay.

So this that new provision is in favor of those, correct?

Yes.

Okay.

Yep.

Um, I've been in quite a few of them, and they're quite quite a nice experience.

Yes.

It's a new way.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um, but more to the point, um, there are funding programs that have been created, um, but they have not been authorized funding at this point, as Larry was alluding to, so we'll have to do some further advocacy to see some of these programs.

So I'm going to go into a couple of those programs.

There is one program that I think that the city would be uniquely positioned to apply for and readily able to probably get with our experience in NSP and choice neighborhoods and pro housing and some of the other funding that we've gone and gotten.

The innovation fund is a competitive grant that's established to help state, local, and tribal governments as well as regional planning agencies implement planning and community development activities, such as updating regulatory processes, increasing capacity to conduct inspections and coordinate housing development with transportation planning.

This has got a short time frame to implement by HUD.

Um by July of next year, they must establish the program, which means that they have to get out a notice of funding opportunity or NOFO ready for um how the program can be applied for and then put out on grants.gov for municipalities and regional planning agencies on the like to apply for.

Um it's a 200 million dollar appropriation annually.

This is the only program that I have seen in um the Road to Housing Act that um has actual funding attached.

200 million authorized per year through nationwide.

Nationwide through 2031.

Um that's not enough.

Well, we got 390 RP money just for Milwaukee.

Yeah.

So 200 for the nation.

Yes.

Yep, per year through 2021 or 2031.

Mr.

Chair, but that's currently what's on the table to that they're saying could be available nationwide, doesn't mean that it's limited to just that.

Correct.

I believe the grants that they're looking at is a minimum of 250,000, and I forgot the upper range of that that grant it's it's 10 million.

10 million.

Thank you.

Okay.

So cities are eligible for up to 10 million.

Yep.

Gotcha.

Uh Home Homes Repair Act, which is based off of legislation from the state of Pennsylvania.

It'll establish a pilot program to provide grants and forgivable loans to homeowners and landlords for home home projects and modifications.

That program would sunset in 2031.

Unfortunately, there's no funding authorized for this program, so this is where the advocacy work would come in from.

City and strong home loan program, in essence.

Basically, in essence.

Things we already have.

Yes.

But additional funds for it.

And down payment assistance.

You said down payment assistance, correct?

I'm sorry.

You said down payment assistance.

I didn't say down payment assistance.

It's a whole homes repair pilot.

So it wouldn't be down down payment assistance in this case.

Um of the things we have in place that could make us eligible.

Yeah, this could be augmented possibly.

Yeah.

Revitalizing empty structures into desirable environments or reside conversion grant pilot would create a pilot to help local governments convert vacant or commercial, vacant commercial or industrial buildings into affordable housing, prioritizing economically distressed areas and opportunity zones, another federal program that puts tax credits into economically distressed areas.

Individual grants could range from one to ten million.

It would sunset again in 2031, but there's again no funding authorized.

Is Mario Higgins here?

Okay.

Did you want to talk about the entitlement grants?

Sure.

All right.

Um Mr.

Chair and Committee.

Um the effects of I'm sorry, Mario Higgins, director of community development grants administration.

Thank you, Altami Jackson.

Um the effects of the Road to Housing Act on C D B G a home.

I mean, there's some some positive uh things that are that are there.

Uh for CD CDBG, it will allow now for new construction of housing.

However, it's like 20% of your allocation, and it hasn't waived any of the um some of the regulatory things yet.

Um so unless they do that, it still wouldn't be like real feasible to build with CDBG.

We use most we use home um for for building actual construction uh costs.

Uh so that still would be probably more effective than CDBG, but it will allow for that now.

Uh so smaller communities for sure who don't get home home dollars would benefit from being able to use CDBG.

And home is an acronym for something.

Home is uh housing um thank you, Pauline.

It's uh it's a it's a goofy acronym because it's not actually an acronym, it's the uh housing uh housing investment partnership uh program.

So it doesn't home itself doesn't actually mean anything.

Um but yes, it's so it uh with for us we you generally use uh home funds for for new construction.

It also um it expands the eligibility under under uh the home program.

You can now go up to 100 percent of county meet county median income or area media income for for home buyers, only for home buyers those, so the other programs we run uh for on occupied, those would still be capped off at 80 percent.

Um but you can target then uh a large a broader uh avenue for uh for buyers uh for our home buyer programs.

Um I don't know that uh you don't have to do that.

You could still keep your programs um under 80 or whatever provision you want in those programs right now.

We do allow up to 80 percent.

Um could Mr.

Chair could you all and when you when you say that we what do you mean we about keep capping it at 80?

Those are HUD guidelines?

HUG guidelines currently were we're at 80 percent AMI, and so that's where our programs obviously.

This act that says you could do up to 100 would an impact HUD at all?

Oh, it does in back HUD.

That's what I'm saying.

Yes, we so you could so we could target up to 100 percent AMI uh with this new with this new act.

Okay.

So we could go up to 100.

Correct.

Okay.

So that's kind of what what I was trying to get at.

If we look at all the things we could be doing or getting ready to do, yeah to compete for the grant, we could easily go to 100 AMI.

Sure.

And it's this may not have any um bearing on that.

Is it was more of a relaxation of the activity for home.

This was this was actually in the house bill and came over to the road when they consolidated the bills.

Um so this was part of the house bill uh because grantees wanted to see it go to 100 percent AMI again around the country, uh folks who use home funds for for home buyer wanted that expanded income area uh range because they were probably having trouble selling homes to folks, especially with the cost of housing going up so high.

Um now you can get buyers with higher incomes.

Or cities are losing folks with higher income to other cities.

Correct.

So it can make us competitive to keep that income bracket here.

Correct, absolutely.

Um I'm trying to compare to what's now and what's coming.

Is this for new money?

Are those guidelines for new money or our current existing program?

Um I'm pretty sure it's for new money, but I I can check just to make sure because most of the provisions didn't go uh retroactive.

So even things that may feel more penalized, um, those weren't retroactive.

So I can check just to make sure though.

Sure.

So thinking next year in the FAT plan, we'll have two sets of money to apply for.

Um not not under not under the under this program, no.

So I'll get to I'll get to some of that.

You wouldn't have to apply for anything separately though.

Okay.

Um there's provision to uh suspend BABA.

I mean, really technically it's to do a study.

So they would suspend the buy America uh build build America buy America Act and order, so which has caused a lot of increases in cost on projects, especially things like tax credit deals.

Um they're you know 20, 30, 40 percent higher cost um because of uh because of that act.

So that's uh was something that um our national lobbyists and they work with all of the jurisdictions um to to uh help try to get at least suspended for the time being to do a study on it.

Um so that would be I think suspended for like three years to do this study.

Um so it's and that was retroactive.

So any program, any projects that were currently and say they hadn't started, you could suspend Baba, which would obviously um save them a lot of money on some of these deals.

And then the Bill Now Act uh this that's the housing production uh production metrics.

Um I think the key thing about that one is it um it doesn't it doesn't take place in uh for three years.

Uh however that's uh a pretty big metrics of where communities have to increase their housing stock um by building uh new uh new units by creating new units.

The penalty for that if you don't create enough units, you could have your C D B G allocation, uh your community community development block grant allocation reduced by you know 10 percent a year if you're not in compliance.

The caveat or the plus to that is those um those communities that get that 10 percent reduction, the other communities who make their metrices with that money would then be reallocated to those uh communities.

Um so you we could see an increase in our C D BG funds if we produce well and other communities don't.

So but you wouldn't know what that amount was because they'll be just using whatever those communities um didn't or their their penalty of 10 percent loss.

Um I think that's I mean it's sort of the primary things that was going on with on the block grant side, uh the C D B G and the home allocations Mr.

Chair August 10th is the 30 days after enactment date.

So this has started already.

Which part?

Uh the law Yeah, but so the the by the build now act though, that doesn't take place for three three years.

Okay.

So they wouldn't implement that.

They they will start uh notifying us though on what our current conditions are uh as far as uh the the units, the number of units we've created compared to uh the number of units that we have, so which what that uh would that increase would be.

Uh so we'll know that within like 60 days of enactment.

Okay.

Um so but again, that part of the bill doesn't enact doesn't go into place for for three years.

Gotcha.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um does the city attorney quick you have to go into.

Oh, just real quick, I have a question.

Um Mario or DCD, uh the FHA small dollar mortgages that are available for smaller, who whose department would that kind of fall under to help with any of that?

Um the small mortgage provision.

Yeah, there's a there's a pilot for home loans of 100,000 or less with lender incentives and buyer grants for down payment, closing cost, appraisal, and title.

And I'm assuming with whether it's newer homes, the rehab of homes, selling them to first-time home buyers, that could be uh part of the program or figure out a way that we're ready to compete for that.

Um it could be a tool to help, yes.

Um small dollar mortgages would be 100,000 or less, and those would generally be endorsed by private banks.

So it's it's a it's a tool that we can use in counterpart with like our down payment assistance programs or like improvements for whole homes repair or whatever if the program gets funded.

Yeah, it's a compliment too.

Um FHA would have to, I think within 180 days of the passage of this legislation, say how they're going to do that.

So hopefully by the middle of next year, more details will be fleshed out about that and a lot of these other programs.

Okay.

Even our partners at CDA, I'm assuming who we work with closely are have this on the radar to make it part of the package of helping first-time home buyers through whatever programs we have.

I would believe so.

And I could um I can add from our read of the small dollar mortgage pilot.

Um, there's two components.

One is to incentivize lenders.

Yes.

Um think of all the efforts that go into providing a mortgage from a from a bank.

Um, maybe there's less incentive to do it on smaller mortgages.

So this would help kind of bolster that back end for the lender, um, but also then on the front end pushing out incentives to offset costs uh for the for the uh for the buyer.

Um so absolutely on the second part, um, that would be something that we would work with uh CDA on or any other um take root type organizations um that are looking to um incentivize and promote home ownership.

And currently our strong homes does that include landlords for homes for the loan?

It does not.

Okay, because the federal grant would want to expand that to landlords.

So would that be a requirement?

Um so that's the whole home grants.

I'm sorry.

I mean that that that would be a potential problem.

I mean, I would not necessarily want to see expanded the landlords.

Yeah, well, unless there's money that comes with it.

Well, the according to our notes or my notes, it's repair grants for lower and for owner occupants at or below ADMI and forgivable loans to small landlords.

So let me let me add as well.

So a dollar amount is set in law, which what it is, but part of this conversation is just to get us ready and have these conversations ahead of time.

And then in 60 days, I think they're gonna kind of say, all right, compete for this.

That's the 200 million.

That's another is there a pot of money for that or no?

No, this is the whole home repair act pilot that that doesn't have funding attached yet.

Yeah, but let me let me clarify though, uh Chairman.

Um so the strong homes loan program that is locally funded.

Right.

So if the federal government has a new pilot, it's not gonna require us to use our strong homes loan dollars for for rental.

All right.

So to uh differentiate that under the whole homes repair uh pilot, um, there are two components.

So on there are grants for um as uh as uh President Prez uh mentioned grants for uh homeowners with an AMI max of 80 percent.

Um but there's also a secondary, so that's a grant.

There's a low interest loans for landlords who have fewer than 10 properties with less than 50 total units, uh, and that is for um occupants in those units of uh up to 80 percent AMI.

So but that would be uh a pilot program that to uh to Dee's point does not have current funding.

Um that's titled the whole home repairs pilot.

I try trying to get my head around what's the point if there's no funding.

But currently there is no funding.

Okay, but I'm not clear is the 200 million dollars.

So it's a different program.

Innovation grant programs.

Yeah, there are a lot of programs that are being created here, and most of them aren't being funded.

So you can't have a deadline if there's no money to there's no start.

There's deadlines for different provisions, um, but they have a number of programs that they're implementing, but not funded.

So Elvin Jackson.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I like this um revitalization of empty structures to desirable environmental So this is a conversion grant for industrial warehouses and things of that nature.

All factories and stuff.

Yeah, I mean, I didn't I didn't dive into that a whole bunch, but yes, I mean it's they're trying to encourage reuse of uh older structures.

I mean, some things that we have done.

I mean, they are even relaxing some of the environmental review processes for some of these programs uh to help streamline uh getting getting projects done.

So they're also allowing some looser inspections to get these things through the process, correct?

Yeah, yes, and there were a number of things.

You can tell that they want to get this done, and part of it is we're gonna well, I mean, the the act itself is uh forget what the acronym for build was is um but it's working with local governments in order to increase efficiency, is what they're trying to say.

So they they they want to get around some of the current processes of environmental review inspections and things like that to make projects move faster.

Mr.

Chair, uh uh good morning, Evan Goikey, City Attorney.

There's a provision of the Act that I would like to touch on.

Um the departments have done a great job of sifting through the many programs that are either created or modified.

There are many in the Act that have not been brought forward today that touch on rural American communities that we probably are not eligible for.

Um one of the more bipartisan provisions of the bill is a prohibition of the creation of uh uh a new definition of something called a large institutional investor, uh, an entity that owns 350 or more single family homes and a prohibition on large institutional investors from purchasing beyond that 350 single family home threshold.

Uh the president in January of this year signed an executive order uh to a similar effect called stopping Wall Street from competing with Main Street home buyers.

Obviously, executive orders have uh more limited legal authority.

Here you have uh Congress enacting this prohibition um and so it it becomes law effective January of 2027.

Uh there are rules that must be promulgated uh to add clarity.

I would be surprised if there is not litigation that ensues over some of those definitions.

Um very broadly, this stands for the proposition that large institutional investors cannot own or cannot acquire more than 350 single family homes throughout the country.

Uh there is a penalty in the in the act of up to one million dollars or three times the purchase price of that property, whichever is greater.

Uh at this point, that does not give the City of Milwaukee a cause of action to step in and seek that million dollars.

So take that off your scoreboard, sorry.

Um, for the HUD is really the enforcement agency of this of this act.

Um there are but that good question.

There are 11 uh exempt types of purchases that a large institutional investor may buy more than 350 properties.

They are largely for build to rent or rent to own or major uh rehab that takes place in that purchase.

I'll note that this is um a universe of property owners that we don't yet know.

Uh uh the large institutional investors are to self-report by January of 2027.

Um so this is all brand new.

Um it has a lot of bipartisan support, but there are enormous questions that remain.

This is a big paper tiger is what you are saying.

Yes.

It has it has the large institutional investors cannot have direct or indirect ownership of the 350 properties.

It then seeks to define what indirect means.

Um we're going to see a lot of litigation over ownership ratios, corporate structures, and how uh these are often huge entangled multi-corporate uh many tentacles, and when you deal nationwide, um you know, I don't I I think it it in in my personal view it's a step in the right direction.

I think it has good intention, but its implementation is going to be cloudy for the foreseeable future.

So the best of all your your knowledges is do we have any property owners in Milwaukee that would come close to fitting the profile that this legislation or executive order would apply to?

Well, so it is single family.

Okay.

The the Act does say single family may be one or two unit.

So a duplex may count, and that may be further clarified in the regulatory process.

Um I think we have potentially one or two that would meet the definition.

One of the challenges is those portfolios move somewhat fluidly.

And so a snapshot in time where you have 355 homes, a large institutional investor may divest six properties and then become compliant and not have to report because they only have 349.

Well potential violators are?

The Act provides that duty to those entities to self-report, and HUD is if they don't, then what happens?

There is a well I I don't know that the Act outlines a non-reporting penalty, just the penalty if they are caught purchasing beyond the threshold.

Who is going to ever do that?

I as I said, I think the enforcement of this is a $50 penalty.

The enforcement is going to be very challenging.

Mr.

That these property owners could do this at, is there any way to enlist any assistance from the Attorney General?

Or I mean I'm assuming that they I don't I don't know if we can or we should be enlisting help from the Attorney General at that at that scale, considering this is Federal law and the impact it has on communities like Milwaukee.

I frankly it it it deserves and will need an all-hands-on-deck enforcement approach.

Um it is very challenging to identify corporate ownership structures of real estate, especially these are you know highly sophisticated actors with tens or hundreds of millions of dollars in real estate across the country.

Um, you know, to your point, uh, Mr.

President, yes, and I I think you know I'm happy to come back and and and do a follow-up in early 2027 when the regulations are issued and we have some clarity over enforcement.

I would not be surprised at all if, as I said, there's mixed results or cloudy enforcement and Congress looks to try to clarify and really focus.

Thank you.

And for the record, I mean um the City of Milwaukee is in unloading properties to any one person at that scale.

Oh, no.

We're talking about financial institutions.

These are private transactions.

Private transactions where we need assistance with the private sector.

A large institutional investor is defined as an investment fund or a for-profit entity, and then the various ownership thresholds that are defined.

Okay.

I had a question.

Well, in preparation for this, is there a way that we can um engage or at least whatever we need to codify kind of the emerging developer community and in some of this in a way that makes sense?

We already do that with some of our uh some of our programs.

Um I just think we we need to codify that in a way that makes sense.

Um for instance, I I mean, I still don't I I got entities that kind of dabble in real estate, but I I don't have a Latino developer in the community at the level that we see other uh folks of color doing development and and we got to create these opportunities for that.

Mr.

Chair.

Yeah.

Yeah, uh Larry or Attorney Gorky, is there anything in this proposal or any provision allow us the ability to hold landlords accountable?

Uh negligent landlords, the particular act does not particularly commercial.

The act does not touch a state or local government's authority over a nuisance property or accountability to problem properties.

The the provisions that I outlined are really the the the bill is 90 percent programmatic, and uh whether it's creating new programs, investing in existing programs or amending existing programs, and then the one kind of enforcement provision is what I touched on, and it does not give us City of Milwaukee any additional powers or enforcement to or enforcement provisions.

Thank you.

Mr.

Mr.

Chair?

Yeah, all the Oliven Cog.

And forgive me if you already answered this, but um what happened to pre-existing ownership?

Does that in our gam are they grandfathered?

Yes.

It's a it's a prohibition moving forward in January of 2027.

So entities that uh exceed the 350 single family home portfolio do not have to divest the properties that they have to get under that 350 uh threshold.

Thank you.

And I just had a basic question.

What can we do proactively, whether we're lobbying, whether we're talking to our congressional reps, as some of this kind of uh gets hammered out in the next 60 days, nine months, whatever the case may be.

Can we do anything proactively to help shape what this looks like?

Yeah, mate, I think uh Alderman.

So a lot of the especially the provisions and how it um affected either home or C D B G, like we've been working with national partners and um using um IRD in order to help um get letters to Congress um and to this to our senators in order to make sure we were shaping some of that.

So again, I think with C D BG we landed pretty good in in and home with with the provisions that were out there because we did have a national lobbyist uh lobbying firm basically working with us.

Who was that?

Um it's NCDA and they um it's basically all the participating jurisdictions around the country.

Um they work with them in order to do that.

Who are they lobbying?

Just Congress?

Congress, yeah.

Yeah.

So they work uh pretty heavily in, especially when it comes around rules, rule changes.

Like I said, some of these uh provisions in here were encouraged by the by participating jurisdictions to get it added in for like the increase in um the income levels and things like that.

So some of the just a partnership we have, but we actually pay them to do this.

Uh we do have to uh we have a membership fee that we have to join every year.

But we do you know conferences and everything.

It's a really good organization.

They've already always been on top of all of the changes that happened within uh around home and C D BG funding.

So maybe in the next cycle at our uh Juddleg committee, we can get an update on some of those lobbying efforts and some history on it.

Thank you.

So just to summarize here a little bit, the only actual money authorized by this bill and all this fanfare is is a 200 million nationwide competitive grant pool for the innovation grant program?

At this time, yes.

Well, that's almost a joke, actually.

I mean, all the fanfare around this by bipartisan bill.

I mean, this is exactly what I suspected from the beginning.

We're not gonna get anything out of this Congress at this point, other than headlines.

I mean, the the whole home repair act pilot sounds attractive, but there's no money.

So what what what's the point?

I I suppose money could be added later with different Congresses, I suppose, but not at the present time.

So this is just some nice stuff that sits on the shelf, and when they get back, at least with this in uh innovation grant program, how do we position ourselves to be competitive for all of the 10 million dollars at the maximum we'd be eligible for?

Yeah, I I think um as D mentioned prior, uh we have uh a very strong track record since NSP of applying for federal dollars.

Yeah, um in addition to our our entitlement programs.

Um so I think just um dusting off our past practices, our past um efforts, um, and then really monitoring uh because as stated, uh it's it's not created yet, right?

Even uh even HUD specific branches of HUD, they haven't created the program for us to even consider applying for.

So um continuing to monitor, um I know Mario mentioned an organ trade organization.

Um there are a few others that um that we can connect with and make sure that we're ready uh when those uh deadlines come out.

But we might have another year before we see any detail.

Using federal money effectively.

I mean, I memory recalls during the Great Recession, there was the 2008 housing act.

I think we got 30 some million out of that just for Milwaukee, 30 some million dollars.

Yes.

Then there was the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of March of 2009.

I think we got another huge batch of money.

Then we got reprogramming money because we were so good at using it.

I think the total resources received by the city from the Feds 2008, 910 range was about 42 million dollars.

Yes, which we use extremely well.

Neighborhood stabilization program, gut rehab of housing stock that we acquired through foreclosure.

It was an outstanding program.

I mean, there's houses in our neighborhood that would not be standing today, many houses in our in the city attorney in my neighborhood, and I'm sure Alderman Stamper's neighborhood, Although Cog's neighborhood, that would not be standing today but for those programs.

And then of course, the American Rescue Plan was another 42 million dollars that we invested in housing, and now we're investing nothing, basically, in housing, at least in the short run, other than the possibility of a 10 million dollar grant with which we have to compete against every big city in the country for.

So I mean, for all those folks all geared up about oh, the Congress is doing something about housing, they're not.

That's not anything about housing.

For affordability, go ahead, Alderman.

Well, are you saying we can at least apply for these and just wait until they pick us or what yeah, when the um when the funding when a program comes available, of course.

I mean, we you know, we've got a great track record like uh Alderman Bauman has talked about uh on applying and getting these funds, even the last pro housing grant, the sort of the grant uh that just recently more recently came out uh from HUD.

Um I think they discontinued that particular program already, but uh we did get that grant.

Um so we're we're we're always been very competitive, and I think it's because we've had a lot of programs um in the city that are already model programs uh around the country, so we can dust things off.

Any any anybody talking about or lobbying in favor of restoring the uh Hope Six program, which was extremely effective in Milwaukee, in my humble opinion, in terms of reviving Carver Park, uh Hillside, uh Highland Gardens, uh West some of the other uh uh public housing developments in the city, uh complete reconstruction, all new properties, mixed income neighborhoods, mixing owner-occupied market rate with owner-occupied affordable with Hackham rental, uh indistinguishable between the two.

I mean, Carver Park, I think is a work of art.

Uh beautiful properties, great design.

And there was a recent uh piece in NPR about somebody did a longitudinal study of the Hope Six program in terms of whether it benefited children or whether it improved outcomes, and they said that it did.

But that the program ended in 2014.

I mean, any talk about bringing that back?

I hadn't heard anything on Hope Six.

Um so um the the next iteration heard us heard that argument no, but I want to listen.

So um, so my understanding is after Hope Six and I did uh that's when um uh the uh choice neighborhoods initiative program was launched.

Uh so that was the next iteration of Hope Six.

It included a lot more like neighborhoods, uh schools, commercial corridors.

Because is any any of this benefit housing authority?

No, they're not here, and we technically don't have jurisdiction over them, but I'm curious why am I curious?

Because just today there was a story in the journal Sentinel about the Merrill Park public housing development, which is senior disabled on 33rd Street, formerly my district, not anymore.

Uh they have no water, haven't had water in three days.

I said, what's going on?

Hackham seems to be going backwards, not forwards, despite all the Beecher Court didn't have heat during the winter for five or six days.

I mean, any of this potential improvement for Hackham to allow them to better maintain their facilities to make sure they have water, kind of basic stuff.

Well, um as I mentioned, we didn't dive into that uh housing authority components, um, but there are a number of provisions that um could potentially that could potentially affect HACM on many different uh measurements.

Okay, all right.

Well, and if part of the communication today, which I appreciate uh appreciate everyone coming out is you know, especially on our side, if if we have to codify anything, including stuff for Hackham that you know we we know about it ahead of time.

We're talking to one another, and um anything else?

Um I'm glad um that you everyone feels ready for the money that's out there, but we want to make sure that we let the public know that we are and what we're doing to compete, if anything uh when the time comes.

Okay, well, very good.

I guess there's nothing elder sample.

No, I'm good.

All right, everybody good, everybody call the three phone.

Okay, all the objects move the whole this call of the chair, hearing no objections to order.

Thanks.

Uh thank you.

Thank you for explaining this to us, I guess.

All right, moving on to item four.

Uh huh.

Thank you.

Item four, file 260183, a substitute ordinance correcting the mixed zoning of the parcel located at 1993 South Muskegue Avenue on the west side of South Muskego Avenue, north of West Rogers Street in the 8th Aldermanic District, and assigning the zoning of local business LB2 to the property.

If I recall this is a mixed zoning parcel, it is indeed.

Good morning committee.

I'm Tanya Fonseca, City Planning Director from the Department of City Development.

Uh this property previously consisted of two parcels, 2224 West Roger Street, which was zoned RT4, and 1993 South Muskego Avenue, which was zoned LB2.

And in 2018, the city owned Roger Street property was sold to the adjacent pro uh owner of the Muskego Avenue property.

And as part of the sale deed that was recorded, both sites were joined upon sale, which created a mixed zoning situation.

And that just becomes an X for anyone interested, kind of a thing that just comes up from time to time.

So this was recently discovered, and we worked with Alder Persons on Aripa to have a file uh introduced to correct the zoning to the site and assign the LB2 zoning designation.

Given the existing commercial mixed use nature of the property, which includes the La Jamenca Bar that is in the process of adding a commercial kitchen to their space, which is exciting.

The LB2 zoning context at the intersection of Muskego and Rogers.

And this site is within the near South Side Area Plan in the plans Mitchell Street District area, and the corrective rezoning of the site is uh to LB2 is consistent with the plan's recommendations.

Uh Alder Person Zamaripa is supportive of this file, and the property owner is aware of the steps we are taking to correct the current zoning error on their site.

Uh City Plan Commission held a public hearing regarding this file at the July 20th meeting, and at the time no one was present from the public to provide any testimony during that hearing.

And City Plan Commission you unanimously recommended approval of the file.

Okay, very good.

This is scheduled a zoning change, so scheduled for a public hearing.

Anybody wishing to testify on this matter?

I don't see anyone responding.

Uh that said, Elderman Samper moves past it, sharing no objection, so thank you.

Oh item five, file 252189, substitute ordinance relating to the change in zoning from two family residential RT4 and local business LB2 for the properties located at 410 West Concordia Avenue and 3301 and 3307 North Vale Phillips Avenue to detailed plan development DPD and the first amendment to the DPT known as the Bader Philanthropies to add the subject sites to the DPD at Courtney includes 330 North Martin Louis at King Drive and the north side of West Concordia Avenue, east of North Martin King Drive in the sixth Aldermanic district.

Good morning, members of the committee.

Umseca, DCD planning.

I'm joined here by the applicant team, uh Dan Bader, Sandra Bed Nards, and no, I'm missing one person.

This is uh uh good morning.

I'm Daniel Bader.

I'm president of C and CO Bader Philanthropies, Sandra Bernards who's operation director, and uh Tim Just, who is a consultant of the foundation and serves as our construction manager.

Thank you.

So this property at 330 North Martin Luther King Drive was rezoned from RT4 and LB2 to a detailed plan development in 2016 to help facilitate Bader Philanthropy's relocation of their global headquarters to this location.

The DPD zoning was subsequently modified in 2020 to allow a digital monument side.

So this custom zoning means we we come back from time to time.

Um representatives from the foundation are here, of course, to touch base on anything I missed today or any questions you may have.

In 2023, Bader purchased three properties adjacent to their headquarters at the corner of West Concordia Avenue and North Bellar Phillips Avenue.

Um this file would uh rezone them from DPD and amend the DPD to approve the plans that they have for the site.

Bader intends to construct a small accessory parking lot on the north portion of this um sites to help supplement the parking needs for their staff and vendors and free up additional parking for guests near the main entrance of their building, and that parking area is also a shared parking area.

The remaining portion of the site along West Concordia Avenue would remain as open space for their campus and the public.

The accessory parking lot will be constructed with permeable pavers and will be set back nearly 50 feet from West Concordia Avenue.

And it will be screened with an ornamental fence and gate with access from Bellar Phillips with significant landscaping.

A new pedestrian walkway shown on the site plan will also connect the parking lot to the building.

Additionally, this file will memorialize the small building addition at the southeast corner of the building that is already been constructed.

The subject site is within the northeast side area plan.

Um and it is consistent with that plan.

The plan recommends developing uses that are welcoming places for people to gather and serve as lot landmarks in the community.

Goals for the Harambe neighborhood include strengthening neighborhood identity through community programming and outreach and approving improving coordination among institutions and organizations to create a strong social network, promote leadership, and develop uh programs to strengthen the community and employment.

Since the establishment of the original detailed plan development, Bader here has been an important partner in advancing the plan's vision for Harambe.

Um while the proposal does increase the amount of surface uh parking by 10 area spaces, the applicant's exhibit provides a strong justification for the additional need in parking.

Um, and staff concludes that the proposed zoning change is consistent.

Um we don't typically recommend the demolition of structures for parking, but given this comprehensive redevelopment and the goals for the community, uh we think that it does achieve a balance.

They've already been demolished, and this is all academic, correct?

Correct.

Um this is located within the sixth Aldermanic district, and Alderwoman Cogs is a sponsor of the file.

Thank you.

City Plan Commission held a public hearing on this item at its July 20th meeting, and at that time nobody from the public was present to give testimony and City Plan Commission unanimously recommended approval of the file.

Yeah.

I have no objection um to this file.

And at the appropriate time, I will move um approval.

Okay.

Uh you have anything to add, or there's no need to add anything.

Uh good morning.

Um Alderman, good morning, committee.

Good morning.

Um I just want to express um our thanks to the city of Milwaukee for helping us with this.

We have a strong commitment to the city of Milwaukee to the Rambi neighborhood.

Uh this last year we spent approximately 15 million dollars in grants in the city of Milwaukee, and about 10% of that was for directly the uh Harambay area.

We're actually expanding our geographic zone uh in our immediate engagement area, so we'll be adding three new neighborhoods, which are Bortard Field, uh North Division, and Arlington Heights.

Um we have done, one of the things we've done uh not necessarily in response to the demolition of these three homes, but just as part of our entire strategy is we invest in housing, so we work very strongly with Habitat Humanity directly across the street from where these houses were actually three new habitat homes that we helped uh construct.

There's also additional housing on adjacent uh avenues as well.

Um so we have a strong commitment to the neighborhood.

We have a strong commitment to housing.

Um we will continue to do that as uh moving forward.

We appreciate the support in this.

Uh we uh in addition to uh serving our own needs as a convener and engager uh with about 5,000 visitors a year.

Um, we are also providing neighborhood amenities, so we have green space uh on Concordia Avenue, which will be expanded, which we doubled actually.

Uh and it's well used and well appreciated by our neighbors, and um we continue that commitment to the neighborhood.

Okay, very good.

This is scheduled for a public hearing.

Anyone in the anybody present want to testify?

Nobody's on the big board.

Very good.

Alder and we'll move passage and hearing no objections or thank you for coming.

Thank you very much.

Okay, moving on to six.

File 260432.

Resolution approving amendment number four to the project plan for tax and district number 75 Reed Street Yards and authorizing expenditures in the 12th Aldermanic district.

All right.

Sorry.

Good morning, Mr.

Chair, members of the committee.

Dan Casanova with the Department of City Development.

Good morning.

The item before you today is amendment number four to the Reed Street Yards Tax Incremental District.

Um this is in President Prez's district, and we haven't had a Reed Street Yards file in front of you for six or seven years.

So I'm just gonna briefly go through the history of the TID.

That's a good question.

I've had it for a long time.

But the blue circle is where the Reed Street Yards is today.

So it was previously marshland adjacent to the Menominee River.

Then the Menominee River was straightened and canals were put in.

But the site has never been properly developed.

In the 1950s, it was a rail yard.

In the 1990s, it was a truck terminal.

And then by the early 2000s, it was um vacant land, 17 acres of vacant land adjacent to downtown that had never been developed because it never had city infrastructure.

There was not a public road or utilities serving the site.

So in 2009, we partnered with the ownership, Peter Mead and General Capital to create tax incremental district number 75.

It initially funded six million dollars of infrastructure, then was later amended to add seven million dollars.

So a total of 13 million dollars of infrastructure to date.

And private owner kept ownership.

Correct.

We basically improved somebody else's property correct.

Correct.

Um but as you can see here, the base value of the property at the time was 26 million dollars, and now it is over 30 million dollars.

So a 315 million dollar incremental value created here, which is 24 times our investment of 13 million dollars.

This is the road going through the site.

It also provided access to the tannery buildings west of the 6th Street Viaduct, which previously did not have public access.

Um the Hank Aaron State Trail was extended through the site connecting the Menominee Valley to Walker's Point in 2016.

ZERN moved their headquarters from Pennsylvania to this site, and a number of the surrounding buildings were redeveloped.

The Iron Horse Hotel, the Bricks Apartment Building, the Global Water Center, and many others.

So all those are included in the TID.

Correct.

Uh okay.

And then more recently, Wright Height purchased a majority of the property and moved their headquarters here as well as their research and development facility, but you can see there's still several large development sites remaining.

And they would have purchased the property from the private owner.

Correct.

Okay.

Correct.

So just some shots of the Hank Aaron State Trail.

There was a ramp and staircase added to the Sixth Street Viaduct to make that connection through the Reed Street Yards.

Global Water Center building was redeveloped in 2013.

We already talked about Zern in 2016.

The tannery buildings west of the 6th Street Viaduct were redeveloped into apartments.

And then more recently, uh the right height headquarters.

So that brings us I'm just curious.

You know, that because I raised this back at the time.

This deal was very favorable to the private owner.

We basically made his property valuable to facilitate development.

Do we ever in structuring these TIDs do we ever share in in the back end return that a property owner realizes?

On this one, we didn't.

And in most scenarios, like the Menominee Valley or Century City were the property owner when we're putting infrastructure in, maybe the beer line would be a similar example where we help put infrastructure in and improve private property values that way.

So there were some restrictions on their property, but um instead of us acquiring it and marketing it ourselves.

Which stalled development in my opinion.

No, I that's no, I'm I'm just curious if we ever include a provision to share on the back end return.

That's something to think about for sure in the future.

Share other than the tax documents.

Well, here property owner Smith owns a piece of property that has no city infrastructure, no roads, no water, no sewer.

It's a wasteland basically.

But you got to give us a right of way, but we'll put in a road, we'll put in sewer, we'll put in water, we will make your land developable.

And he in turn, Mr.

Smith does in fact sell the land the right height for 50 million dollars or whatever he sold it to.

Well, maybe not probably not that much.

But you see, sold it for a significant price.

And the question is since we made that price possible so we provide the infrastructure.

Do we share in the back end return?

And those in in this case that wasn't part of the agreement, but in the future it definitely could be.

And in this case, that wasn't part of the agreement, but in the future it definitely could go.

We're eligible for that.

Yep.

Oh okay.

Okay.

That's awesome.

And then the same with the property west of the river at the tannery development.

That's also his property.

Correct.

Or it was it was at the time.

And that was the building that half the building, the top burned off back in I don't know, the 90s, 80s.

And they restored it.

Classic example of restoring these fire damaged buildings.

And but now that's usable and it's rented and it's generating return on investment, right?

Correct.

Yeah.

Mr.

Chair.

Yeah, all of them cogs.

You say sometimes we are able to do that.

Is there a reason why we didn't pursue that in this case?

I think Alderman.

I think you said it.

It stalls development.

Well, this happened way before me when this deal was that's true.

When the when this was done, but I mean, we've we've gotten some benefit from investment like on Pfizer Forum or getting a cut of the parking.

I mean Yeah, it's a good example, the cut of the parking, yes.

And it is possible to do it.

Wasn't done here, but um it should be something we look at at every TIFF, especially with this type of investment that $315 million increase in value.

It so is there a reason that we didn't pursue that here?

I'm not sure why why it wasn't done at the time, but we did get the $315 million of tax base out of it.

Thank you.

Okay.

Very good.

Um so that brings us to the amendment today, which is 17.2 million dollars in public infrastructure projects to support the success at Reed Street Yards and within a half mile of the district.

And like always, we met with DPW and the local Alder to go through the projects.

You can see them listed here.

I'm gonna go through some of them real briefly.

Others are more placeholders for the future.

Um but the first one, similar to the Reed Street Yards would be funding to provide public infrastructure to develop the Neeland properties.

Uh these are city owned, so what we were just talking about doesn't apply here.

But similar situation where the site does not have a public road utilities, um, and once developed per the Monomine Valley 2.0 plan, there should be a river walk along the Monominee River here, and so the funds would support making this developable.

It's 15 acres total, 10 acres are developable because of the the freeway over.

We envisioned in industry here.

I mean, nobody's gonna build condos under that freeway, obviously.

Right, it's envisioned for industrial or commercial type uses.

Okay, but there isn't a restriction on it, like next project would be rebuilding this section of second street.

Um the majority of second street has been rebuilt or repaved, but this second this uh section between Florida and Oregon underneath the railway underpass and the bridge abutments has not been touched yet, and so this would fund the reconstruction of that.

Um just the abutments, which are the city's responsibility.

They are really if you if you want more detail on that, Kevin's here to talk to talk about that.

So we own the first four feet of that bridge, and the rest is owned by the Canadian Pacific Railway.

We uh chairman members of the committee, Kevin Mews, City Engineer, Department of Public Works.

Um, we are responsible for the abutments holding up the sidewalk, not the columns coming out of the sidewalk.

Okay.

So we're providing the foundation for the bridge from a structural reserve.

Is that typical?

Um that's strange.

I think it's because again, we're we're the one maintaining again the public right-of-way element, which is the sidewalk piece, right?

But their structural foundation is integrated, yes, into our walls.

Are we gonna attempt to lower the road so there's a so there's better clearance under that bridge?

We can explore that.

We hadn't considered that.

That was prime this was primarily focused on as you can see from the photo, the pavement is not in great shape in this block, and then the walls themselves.

Rehab in connection with this uh monomine uh the mosquito bypass project.

Yeah, so that's a state-led project in in uh cooperation with uh Canadian Pacific Kansas City.

Um the I think there will be some changes, generally speaking, the bridge is structurally sound, um and it's currently reports, right?

Correct.

Although in this case, because there's a federal grant and the D and the state DOT is investing some money in this, I think there's you know more cooperation on that piece.

There are some safety enhancements on the railroad side that I believe are gonna be within the scope of the mosquito yard bypass.

They've got some requirements now about making sure there's enough space for like uh employees to walk alongside while there's a train and those types of things.

So um, but again, the state probably would be the better entity to speak on that f as they move through design.

Okay, well, we I I just would like the coordinator.

No, I I would I would think that it if you take a look, all you see is paint from vehicles that either get stuck there.

Well, that's why yeah.

Yeah, I mean I would assume that you'd figure out a way to avoid that as possible.

This is a although it's a small portion, it's a very it feels very blighted.

Yeah, you know, you have a lot of energy on both sides, development on both sides, and then you get this patch here.

So we're hoping that some beautification and lighting and uh it makes sense because it's it's it's not and it's dangerous when you look at some of the trucks that have collided with uh with the bridge.

So that's number two on the list of projects.

So okay.

Correct.

Um next one is the sixth street roundabout.

There's been a lot of safety concerns with the roundabout, and there's been some temporary measures put in place, but this would allow for some more permanent um I am astounded.

How many times that those barriers get hit?

There's nothing but debris and markings and and tire markings on those jersey barriers.

It's it's astounding.

Yeah, I mean um prior to those jersey barriers, um there was a very constant video of vehicles even getting airborne, um, traveling near the roundabout there when they get to the southern end of the Vidock.

The Jersey barriers have been very effective.

Um, but and we tried to make those look nice, Walker's Point.

I could go past this all the time, not since it's the only way to the south side anymore.

Yeah, the Walkers Point Association led the charge with trying to beautify them to make them as you know a little a little better to look at, but they've been effective, and we're looking forward to seeing what permanent improvements we can do.

That's the we so we're gonna narrow the road actually permanently.

Yeah, so what this uh the this project of the amendment uh would cover is uh we've been doing some work on the larger sixth street corridor.

Of course, we had the federal grant, most of which was rescinded by Congress.

Um but we did have uh a small portion of that to start the public outreach uh on this um during those conversations, and obviously in conversations with Alderman Perez and Walker's Point Association.

Um the temporary solution, which as the alderman said has been very effective from a safety perspective, um, is not necessarily the desired permanent condition.

And so next uh steps on this and and what this would fund is additional outreach focused really on the roundabout itself, determination of should we do a narrowed roundabout, which we have a concept design for from the larger sixth street project, or should we look at a different intersection arrangement entirely?

Should it be signalized, should it be something else?

Um and we want to have those public conversations and then proceed through design, and this would cover construction as well.

No, I mean look it from an infrastructure.

I mean, it's a problem because you get to the end and it's there's height and the lack of visibility, and when you get to the top of it, boom, you have to turn, which a vehicle went through wine merchants right through the building at one time.

Yep.

Uh before the bird uh jersey barrier.

So project four.

These tracks in Canal Street.

This this would remove those tracks which are a big safety hazard for cyclists along the Hank Aaron State Trail and also motorcyclists with the Harley Davidson museum.

That was brought up a couple of years ago.

And the argument was made that that cement plant on the north side of Canal Street may be reactivated at some point.

That's off the table now.

There's gonna need to be some conversations with them, but this would with this would put the funding.

We're not sure we can actually do this yet.

Um we believe we can, but but and the flangeways were filled in by a temporary temporarily.

Yes, yes, but there are still reports of of crashes uh particularly for people biking in this area, and then both ends of this track piece now are disconnected from the rails on either side.

They both are, yeah.

Both ends, okay.

All right.

Then the uh former fourth and mineral playground, now the Clementina Castro Park recently renamed.

This would fund replacing that playground through the MKE plays program.

Some improvements to the pedestrian underpass on see both between first and second, um paving or sorry, painting, lighting, um potentially some signage as well.

Working with Zocolo, um, this would just fund some initial design and and engineering and cost estimates to look at the alleyway behind their um property, um, that actually that whole block and and look at um making it an activated alleyway and extending the success of of Zocalone to the neighborhood.

And and just for the record, I mean tax cohes and other nearby stakeholders have all been engaged in this process to the alley's in really bad shape, and if we're we're gonna we're gonna reconstruct it, then let's take it to another level.

And then the rest of the projects, I don't have a particular slide on any of them, some of them are placeholder items, but um funding for future public art or a memorial that would have to come back to the common council for approval, but this would put the the funding in place, um some streetscaping dollars, neighborhood traffic calming dollars, funding to look at the feasibility of a parking structure in the Walkers Point area, not just finding the location, but really looking at cost estimates and um ownership and financing structures for a potential parking structure in the neighborhood.

A fee the parking feasibility cost that much um just the study?

We our our goal with this would be to have preliminary designs and cost estimates if we get a real good handle on on what a structure would cost.

So it needed a study and some design.

Correct.

Okay, correct.

Thank you.

Yep.

And and so on expensive and some yeah, it is expensive.

And some background um many years ago doing a whole boundary or just the area.

Just the walk just Walker's Point area, yeah.

I'm talking about within that circle.

Correct.

Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know how old the study is, but Walker's Point did team up with DCD um some time ago and did an extensive study of the entire area, what a parking structure could look like.

Uh many of the leadership and businesses look at the third ward nearby.

They have three, right?

And considering some of the same, you know, synergy in businesses, how feasible can one be in Walker's Point?

They laid out some areas, and now this would be phase two of what we could do with a couple sites and actually figuring out how to manage it in the similar way, like the third war did.

Okay, so the income will be to the city.

Well, that's one of the things they would look at is how would it be financed, how would it be owned, and how would the revenue um where would where would that flow?

And the third word, the the bids own those and the and the revenue goes to the bid, for instance.

Um but there's other examples out there.

Is anyone here concerned that there's an opportunity cost?

I mean, this is all great stuff, these projects all make sense.

What's the total amount of the amendment again?

Uh about 17 million million.

Uh is anyone concerned about an there being an opportunity cost specifically related to someday in the future when state laws amended and we have a different federal transit administration uh extending the streetcar through Walker's Point.

Wasn't that one of the reasons we were holding back increment on this particular TID?

Yeah, that's correct.

Um the TID has been very successful and it's at the end of its life now, and so um this would allow the TID to extend the.

I wouldn't say it's not a concern.

I get it, these are all worthy things, but I think if we weren't doing an amendment like this, we would have to look at closing the the TID out because it's at it's at the end of its life.

Mr.

Chair, uh on that note, um I believe there's there's still some room even after this.

I mean, because let's say the parking uh acquisition does work or some law does change that we can use TID for streetcar.

I just hope some people are thinking about this thing because in three months we could have a different legislature.

Could I say with a big capital C.

Sure.

And and if that happens, then I think we'll have that conversation.

And that could result in an amendment of Act 12, right?

Correct.

In terms of our ability to use tax incremental funding to fund local share, could but is no one thinking of these possibilities and scenarios uh uh assuming a streetcar expansion is still a priority because it's the only way to make what we've invested to date useful.

We also need the federal government that to change leadership too.

But at least study money.

I mean, at least get this process started, and as we've discussed, we got to front those costs.

We have no way to front those costs.

Well, we this is a way to front those costs, right?

Yep.

The project development phase because you can't go to construction until you've done two, three years of project development.

And we're we're at ground zero.

We have we haven't done anything.

So the ball's not moving down the field at all at this point.

And expansion is now 2035 if we're lucky.

Sure.

I I think I think there's also an opportunity cost to not moving forward with this amendment, though, because as DCD has noted, Dan just noted here that um it's at the point where it would be right to close um without an amendment.

And so that being said, as the alderman indicated, there is additional, you know, there's possibility for additional amendments in the future.

And so that is something we're considering.

It's not something we're ignoring.

Well, I recall back in 2018, 2019, when we were discussing expansion, one of the arguments to not draw a line further into Walker's Point was well, we have no TIFF available.

We have no TID available, right?

You recall that?

Oh yeah.

The Reed Street Yard is that it's we we don't know how much increment is going to generate.

Well, it generated over 300 million dollars in increment, right?

Well, I I don't I mean I know that we were told I don't agree with that assessment, but I didn't either.

I think I think all along they knew there was money there, was promised for something else.

Enough of that, yeah.

Alvin Stamper.

Refresh my memory.

Did we design Walker's Point in her in um Bronzeville streetcar design?

Nope.

Nope.

Well up to the discussion and the the what happened to that.

Uh we started, we got it all what happened.

We didn't vote for it.

Your colleagues might actually know more than I do because uh it was not it was not approved at the time it was.

Not the design money either.

Not that far, not those extents.

So yeah, okay.

Yeah.

Not out of West Town, basically.

Gotcha.

All right, anything else?

Well, just to your capacity question.

The with this amendment, the total project costs in the CID would be about 30 million dollars.

It would still be projected to pay off next year in 2027, and it's it's um generating between six and seven million dollars of annual increment.

So there's there's definitely capacity moving forward to the right.

Well refilling, basically.

Okay.

Yeah, Alderman Jackson.

Uh when does this uh Castle out and then we could move into the public housing part?

Well, so right now it would be projected to to be able to close out next year if we didn't do any further amendments to it for other various projects that that may come up.

So every time you do an amendment, you'd ex you extend the the TIDS.

Correct.

Correct.

The expenditure deadline is 2031, so um that would probably be closer to the time when we'd be able to do the housing amendments.

Okay.

Because we do get the we do get the additional year of housing on a t right.

Two years.

Correct, two potentially two years.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, plus there is a million dollars for housing projects in there that we want to look at affordable housing to help subsidize.

All right, excellent.

Any other questions or comments?

Hearing none, Alderman Jackson moves to recommend adoption and hearing no objections, so ordered.

Moving on to item seven, file 260436.

Substitute resolution approving a project plan and development agreement authorizing expenditures and creating tax income district number 135 for 1101 to 113 Westoric Mitchell Street in the 12th Aldermanic district.

Is this the building we were gonna tear down once upon a time?

Okay.

Good.

Well, I'm glad we're not tearing it down.

Good morning, Mr.

Chair.

Yeah, Alderman's Yeah.

If I could just um I want to thank Ms.

Cotton for um working with uh DCD, our office, and uh the historic Mitchell Street uh business association.

Uh this is a long time coming uh for many years.

The TIFF was underwater uh got back in the black through some donor TIDS and we've been very um conscious about um dipping back into the TID until we have a development, and I think we're we're really happy to see the reuse of this building and look forward to um Miss Cotton getting to the finish line on this and creating some housing opportunities for the community.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Good morning again, DeCanter, Department of City Development.

Um this would be the uh for consideration to have creation of T ID number 135 for 1101 to 1113 West Historic Mitchell Street.

Um it is located on the southwest corner of 11th and Mitchell Street.

Um Historic Mitchell Street is a as we know a very vibrant commercial corridor.

Um this proposal would seek to do a single parcel creation of a TID to benefit the the the building on the site and turn it into up to uh uh 25 uh workforce housing units.

Um I'd like to introduce uh Ziwana Cotton of BBB Investment and Development to allow her to tell her you a little bit more about her project and her firm.

Good morning.

My name is Zoena Cotton and I'm the building owner.

I have over two decades experience in residential real estate as a former educator.

Um I also am an acre alum and I purchased this property in Mitchell on Mitchell in 2020.

So like the alderman said, it has been a long time coming um trying to bring workforce housing to the area.

Um a little bit about my background.

I did complete a renovation of a building on 10th end state, a 59 unit multifamily downtown.

It's uh fully occupied now.

Um the historic Tim Street residences.

I worked with my mentor, Q Elamine, um, who is also the owner's rep on this project, and the team that's helping me uh develop this property, they have a lot of experience in historic um adaptive reuse, and that's continuum architecture form and Calic Construction as the GC and how Karas as the attorney.

And like um the alderman said, I've worked with the bid for years with on this process.

I've um attended meetings, I held community listening sessions at the bid, um also at the building, and so they are in full support of this development.

And so what we propose is um converting the second floor of the old grand department store.

So this has this building, um, portions of it are over 200 years old.

I mean, part of it, the building was built in 1891.

And we're gonna take the entire second floor and convert it into 25 workforce housing units.

There will be 12 studios, all of them will have dens that you can use as a flex space or a sleeping area.

Um, and then there'll be 13 one bedrooms and all um 10 of those one bedrooms will also have dens, and the rent will be up to um 60 percent AMI.

Um we'll also have a fitness center, coin laundry and community room on the second level with the apartments.

On the first floor, we will have a daycare moving in, Sesame Street Child Center.

They have a location on the north side, they're opening up a south side location.

In addition to that, the same um owner is opening up the empowered family network, which is a prenatal clinic, and it's going it the whole goal is to decrease the infant mortality rate for minorities, and so they'll connect um patients with nurse practitioners, help them get diapers, um parenting classes, milk for their children, and so um you know I believe this develop development preserves a historic landmark by adding a right size housing component with high quality workforce housing, and it really brings dense density to the corridor that is needed, and that foot traffic um along Mitchell Street.

Um we plan to start construction this fall, so we're really excited about that.

The part two for the um part of the capital stack is historic tax credits, has been approved.

Um we've applied for the WEDA um financing.

We'll find about that, find out about that this week.

And um, so we're gonna start construction in the fall.

It should be completed by late um 2027.

The TID would be created to support the 25 workforce housing units.

Um, it's a 9.4 million dollar investment on the part of Zuenna and her firm.

Um, it'll be a first mortgage, and as she alluded to historic tax credits, uh WIDA competitive grant and deferred developer fee.

We'd be providing up to 480,000 and a developer finance TIFF for up to 15 years at a 5.75 interest rate.

She is doing human resources requirements of 40% RPP, 25% small business enterprise participation.

There is a cost savings uh provision and a clawback provision in um the development uh the term sheet as well.

Uh yes.

I think this is a fine project.

I'm just curious.

That's an awfully small TID.

That's the smallest one I think I've ever heard of.

We have done some smaller TIDs in the past, and I'm forgetting the one that was an example.

Um you're right, it is a smaller TID.

But I I do believe that this is a neighborhood scale project, and it might be appropriate to do TID this way.

Okay.

And how why only 15 years?

Was that a negotiated uh term?

Or because that also seems fairly short by the normal standards of TIDs we get through here.

We size the TIFF based upon um a number of factors, including industry standards, but we want to make sure that we're putting the um right amount of term on it and the right amount of size of TID on it so that we're not over enriching developers, but we're not um under enriching either.

The workforce housing TIDs are also structured not to go more than 20 years so that we can take advantage of some of the extensions of the TIDs that you're seeing too for affordable housing purposes and public infrastructure.

And is this contingent on weed or tax credits, which you've not received yet?

It's not we do tax credits, it's the um the vacancy vitality um zero interest loans.

And so we I apply for those, but the project is still financially feasible if we're not awarded that.

Okay, very good.

Okay.

Um consistent uh this project is also consistent with the near Southside area plan and the housing element of the city's Milwaukee Comprehensive Plan, and it's compliant with zoning, and it promotes uh orderly city city development.

Um, Mr.

Chair, I will say that um this building is somewhat challenged as uh Ms.

Khan said the initial uh building on the corner was built, and then there were some kind of additions to it, and it makes uh the rest of the building challenged for some of the floors to be level and so it's been a long time coming.

Um, but uh we're glad to see this moving forward and uh agree.

And and like Ms.

Conn said, she she did tax credits, that didn't work out.

She's she's been at this a while.

Yeah, um, but uh I'm just supportive of seeing this move forward in order to get this project done.

I see you're keeping the second floor window arrangements.

Is that historic?

Well, it is historic.

I mean you have I'm just curious is we were able to work around that existing window arrangement for your type of units.

Yes, um on the um west side.

I'm sorry.

On the west side, southwest side, we are adding two windows.

Okay, and so it's not on the Mitchell Street facade, and then we're also adding skylights in some units.

Skylights, okay.

Got it.

All right.

Okay.

So some units may have no windows and just a skylight?

Correct.

Oh, that's interesting.

Yes.

Yeah, that was tried at the Grand Avenue over here, actually.

We were just talking about that.

Yeah, and okay.

It's part of the challenges with this building.

Yes, yes.

I I I agree.

All right, any other questions or comments?

Yes, uh, Mr.

Chair.

Yeah, hey, who's gonna manage your RPP and SBE?

Um, we're looking at the um Prism Company.

Right, Randy Crump.

Yep.

Okay.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Okay, Alden Stamper moves adoption, hearing no objections to order.

Thank you.

Oh, thank you.

Thank you.

Good luck.

Congratulations.

All right, moving on to good bronze.

Item eight, file two six zero four three three resolution approving amendment number one to the project plan and authorizing expenditures for tax incremental district number one twenty-one.

Bronzeville and art did Bronzeville Arts and Tech Hub in the six automatic districts sponsored by Aldroom and Cogs.

All right, what do we have here?

Good morning, Mr.

Chairman, members of the committee.

Lori Letzka with the Department of City Development.

I'm here with Michael Editorial, the developer.

I will kick off the slide presentation, give you a little bit of insight on the project we're presenting today, and I'll have Michael then introduce himself and give you a little history of the work he's done.

So you may have remembered in 2024, the Bronzeville Arts and Tech TID was created and provided a $700,000 developer finance TIF for the residential portion of the larger mixed-use development that includes new housing and commercial space in the Bronzeville cultural cultural and entertainment district in the sixth Aldramatic district represented by Alderwoman Cox.

The development is located on former vacant Rackham owned land at the northwest corner of West North Avenue and North Sixth Street.

The developer, Michael Editorial, a fit investment group, responded to an RFP, and the proposal, the Bronzeville Arts and Tech Hub was selected.

It was viewed as catalytic, and the arts and tech hub met the vision of the Bronzeville Cultural and Entertainment District.

Here is a picture of the first phase, the housing component now completed, and it includes 61, 2, 3, and 4 bedroom units across affordable income levels, and it includes 48 units that are affordable to families with incomes below 60 percent of the area meeting income.

The building is almost fully leased with the live work units remaining.

Amendment one to this TID will fund the commercial component of the project.

It will be a creative industry hub and includes approximately 29,000 square feet designed for nonprofits, creative industry startups, and entrepreneurs.

The space will contain office, co-working, studio production, and performance space, as well as a cafe.

The Bronzeville Arts and Tech Hub aligns with the vision of the Bronzeville Cultural and Entertainment District highlighted in the Northeast Side Plan.

The Bronzeville Cultural and Entertainment District is a redevelopment project plan to revitalize a commercial district and surrounding neighborhood in the historic heart of Milwaukee's African American community.

The hub also supports the cultural arts and entertainment uses proposed in the plan.

The site is also identified for redevelopment in the equitable growth through transit oriented development plan, an official amendment to the Northeast Side Plan.

Again, with me today is Michael Editoral, and I will have him introduce himself and give you a little insight of the developments that he has completed in the city.

Good morning, everyone.

So we are affordable housing and community development firm based here in Milwaukee.

You know, we're really passionate about uh community development, um, working on projects that are uh impactful, they have big impact, uh, multiple layers of impact, um, you know, that are transformative, that um address challenges.

Um, I think this project is really um, I think a good project that highlights some of those elements.

Um, you know, the theme of this project was really centered around you know, supporting entrepreneurs, kind of uh elevating arts and in our creative community.

And so, as Lori mentioned, it's a mixed use project.

Um, you know, uh phase one uh is uh a weeder project that we completed that just uh completed construction um fully leased up, and then phase two is this creative hub that really is centered around supporting entrepreneurs.

Um and so this this uh financing is really uh uh uh the last piece of that that that's needed.

And so we're really excited to be moving forward to this uh phase of the project.

Um, some of our anchor tenants include uh the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music.

Um of the things um that's really um was really important to me to this project is finding um uses that support programming and opportunities for our young people.

Um I think growing up for me it was really cool to be able to um you know walk to um you know camps um you know music education and things of that nature and so um you know this is really trying to to kind of uh uh do that same thing here.

Um another one of our anchor tenants is Black Arts MKE who is uh a very um well-known uh black theater group in Milwaukee.

And so they're gonna be um this will be their new office location as well as uh space for programming.

Um and they also have youth camps, etc.

Um, so we are um on track to start construction and close on a project this fall.

Um and so uh we're just looking forward and really excited uh to move this forward.

Thank you, Michael.

So the Arts and Tax Tech Hub will be constructed within the current TID boundary, which is located between North Six and North Seventh Streets, just north of West North Avenue.

This phase of the project will be constructed on the southeast corner of the site.

Here you can see the boundary of the TID.

Okay, as Michael kind of indicated, but I'll give you a little bit more detail.

Um it is a new construction of a commercial component of the overall project.

In total, it's approximately 29,000 square feet.

It's four stories, and again, it's designed for nonprofits, creative industry startups, and entrepreneurs.

Michael named the tenants announced to date, and he will also have a cafe.

Estimated completion is the winter of 2027.

So overall quick uh construction timeline.

So the financing.

Um, in total, the development costs are approximately, or actually they're north of 29.3 million dollars.

This phase of the project is 11.1 million.

We are proposing a 1.645 million dollar developer finance TIFF, amortized over 25 years at a three and a half percent interest rate.

Sources for the project include new market tax credits, a first mortgage, loans provided by the Greater Milwaukee Foundation, Northwestern Mutual, Rackham through their Brownfield Revolving Loan Program, Legacy Redevelopment Corp, Milwaukee Development Corp, and the developers equity.

Because the TID is greater than one million dollars, a human resource agreement will be entered into with re with the requirement of 40 percent RPP and 25 percent SBE.

So with that, we are gonna open it up for questions.

Thank you.

Yes.

Um congratulations, man.

I'm excited for you for the district.

Um could you did you break down a little bit about that elect that 11 million for the arts and tech stuff?

Like, is that brick and mortar?

Is that for programming?

That I mean that part of this project sounds so exciting.

So I just wanted to have you expand on some of that.

That budget is is um entirely construction and build-out related.

So that's supporting um the the construction uh site work um and then build out of all the spaces.

So um we'll have uh office creative office, some studio spaces, um, the cafe, as Laurie mentioned, um and it's four stories, so just all of those spaces.

The only space that isn't um initially built out is the the fourth floor, which were um we're still uh working on it identifying a tenant for that space.

And so we're gonna work with that, whoever that tenant is to build out that space.

Okay.

But floors one one through three will be built out.

And then and then I mean I'm assuming through other entities or opportunities you'll look at what that space, how you fund that programming of that, right?

Yeah, so I I think one of the things um, you know, we wanted to make sure we left some room for growth um and wanted to find the the right partners.

I think the the tenants, the partners that we have right now, I think are um everybody set the stage for the quality that we're looking for.

Um all of our um leases are 10 years or longer.

Um just from uh uh sustainability perspective that was important.

Um and so that's really the goal.

And I think it you know we'll have the time to um you know we'll expect whoever that tenant is to bring in some of their own funding, but we'll also help help fundraise for them as well.

Okay, yeah thank you, appreciate that.

Yep.

Oh god.

Any other questions or comments?

Hearing none?

Yeah, go ahead, all the time.

Sure.

I I might who's doing your management of your uh RPP and SB.

Uh it will be cross management.

Um they did the housing for us, so they'll do the commercial as well.

Were they successful with that one?

Yes, so I think um I think the final numbers are still um gonna be summarized, but we did improve, I think uh throughout the project.

There was constant improvement, but from what I looked at last, I think we were in the mid-30s, excuse me, mid-30s, um, which is higher than even the previous maybe couple quarters, so significant improvement.

Okay, and uh any workers continuing on this project from our first development to construction to this one?

Correct.

Yeah, so for the for the second phase, um, we're actually um working with a new contractor.

We're gonna be likely um working with JCP on the on the second phase.

Um but yeah, so that we're basically going through the planning for that right now and just getting everything pulled together.

We have um our basic building permit, but some of the build-out permits are still being pulled together.

Yeah.

Now you said it's leased up.

Are people in there?

Say it again.

You said it's leased up.

Are people living there?

Oh, for the for the housing?

Yes.

Yes, yeah.

The housing is um 57 of the 60 are at least up.

Uh the only remaining units are the live work units.

Okay, I'm in a pass over the time.

Where's the parking?

Is it in the back?

Yeah, yeah.

So the you know, see I saw you out there one time, and I don't see the money going in and out of the building.

Yeah, so the um we have indoor, we think you don't see it, we have indoor garage parking.

Okay.

So it's indoor.

Most of it is indoor, and then um I think a portion of it is behind the building.

Smooth.

Yeah.

Thank you, Mr.

Sure.

Congratulations.

Okay, any other questions or comments?

No, sir.

None of them.

COG moves are recommended adoption, hearing objections to order.

Oh, right.

Thank you.

All right, moving on to items nine, file two six zero four three five.

Substitute resolution approving a project plan and development agreement authorizing expenditures and creating tax incremental district number one thirty-six.

Yamani Homeowner Initiative in the 6th, 7th, and 15th Aldermatic District.

Okay, let's we're gonna use all the chairs.

Oh wait, all right, good morning.

Uh Larry Kilmer with the Department of City Development.

Um joined here at the table uh by uh Britney Roberson of the Dominican Center, Brian Sonderman of Habitat for Humanity, Michael MM of the MM group, and Frank Martinez from the CDA.

So TID 136, the Amani Homeownership Initiative.

Uh here's a general map.

Um kind of getting a sense of where uh where in the city we're talking about.

So the Amani neighborhood, so just north of North Avenue, uh, we're looking at between 18th and 26th Street up to Burleigh.

A little bit more specific of the map.

Um so as you can see here, again, uh 18th to 26th Street, Minaky to Burleigh.

Um there are 358 total parcels within uh this proposed TID.

Um and just want to remind the committee that um uh this uh this effort um uh for the most part mirrors what you've seen over the last two years um of the concept of a backbone TID.

So last year was the Harambe TID and two years ago was the Midtown TID.

Um so the overall approach uh again is somewhat similar to the last few years where there's a coordinated and targeted effort uh to support new construction um of uh housing on city vacant land.

Uh and as I mentioned this year, uh we're looking at the Amani neighborhood.

This is a unique collaboration between uh the partners up uh that I mentioned up here, including Habitat uh and the MM group, Milwaukee Community Crossroads, and Ezekiel CDC as the development team uh in addition to kind of the convener and the funder of the community development alliance.

Uh as a quick snapshot, and then we'll go into each organization's detail and come back to the project and the funding.

Uh quick snapshot uh Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity will be considering 50 new homes.

Uh the MM group will be considering 40.

Milwaukee community crossroads will be four homes in Ezekiel CDC one home.

Or what period of time are these houses going to be delivered?

Sure.

Um please distinguish the districts.

Um over a period of time, so I believe it's a five-year uh period of time uh through 2020 uh 2031.

Um I think I have some more details here, but yeah, let me uh I'm happy to get that.

Um if you don't mind if I have each of the groups introduce themselves and I'll pull out that information.

Oh, I I don't want to prolong this too long.

I mean I think this is gonna pass, so I don't know if we need a whole lot of salesmanship, but I'm just curious about that there's there's three model of houses that are being designed and built.

Yeah, I'm I'm happy to have each of the team members.

Um uh Brian, if you want to talk about uh your homes, and then Michael, if you want to talk about your homes, and that's the vast majority of what's being uh proposed, and then there are a couple additional development teams that I mentioned, but I don't know, Brian, if you want to talk about uh your models and timeline, and then Michael, if you don't mind.

Yeah, uh Brian Sonerman, CEO at Monkey Habitat for Humanity.

Um our plan is to build 50 homes uh over probably three and a half years is what our projection is, which is well within the deadline of the how the TID is structured right now.

Um we anticipate at least three house designs.

Uh there'll be consistent with other homes that we've built throughout the uh city, um, probably five to six different designs total, um, including uh you know a thousand square foot ranch home to a 1,500 square foot uh four-bedroom, two-story home.

Um so very very similar to the products that we have delivered.

We have 60 habitat homeowners in the Amani neighborhood already.

So we're we have not built in the neighborhood in over a decade.

In addition to the work that's being uh considered for this TID, um our commitment is to continue to offer the repair program uh that we offer in uh most of the neighborhoods of the city of Milwaukee uh in Amani.

And uh we will have uh for instance in the last three years we've done 15 to 20 projects, and we will continue to offer that for existing homeowners in the neighborhood.

All these homes are gonna have basements.

They'll all have basements, correct.

And what's your typical construction cost?

And I know since they're different sizes, it's hard to estimate, but on a per foot basis construction costs estimated.

Yeah, it uh if I can use raw dollars probably better, um, would be about 200,000 to 225 uh for materials and labor.

Um would be about 200,000 to 225 uh for materials and labor.

Um and uh and then with some level of of overhead.

Um we anticipate uh all in probably the subsidy level is 100 to 125,000, depending upon the house.

So you intend to sell them at what price point then?

Um well we habitats policy nationwide and one that we follow is we sell based on appraisal.

Um so a recent appraisal in the neighborhood um uh you know, and again it's gonna vary by house design, but ultimately we make the home affordable.

Um oftentimes using a second mortgage that we provide um that has no cost and no interest.

Um so we'll scale for affordability so we ensure that homeowners don't have to pay more than 30 percent of monthly income.

Okay, and that's true for for everybody, same model.

Well, we're the homeownership, yeah.

For our 50 homes, um, we also are able to provide lending products below market, no PMI, no down payment, between three and four percent interest 30 year fixed.

So that's how we make it affordable.

Um, hey Brian, do you know how many are in the 15th?

Uh in this TID or how many we've done total in the 15th district.

You know that?

Now you really stretch you know that yeah, off the top of my head I do not, but I will follow up later this afternoon and provide hundreds and hundreds and hundreds in the fabulous 15th.

For sure.

Um specific specific to the TID.

Um Michael will talk about his 40 units.

So all 40 of Michael's units uh will be in the 15th.

Yeah.

Um I believe approximately 45 uh or so of habitat units will be in um in the seventh, uh, and then the other five units, 10 units um will be uh uh between the seventh and the sixth.

Okay, I thought we picked about 10.

Well um yeah, I'll pick the few um houses for habitat, uh, but it's only five.

You said none or on the I will have to get back to you on that.

Okay.

Because I just know we have selected the lots, and I you know I have to determine how many are in your in the district.

Whenever we get a chance.

So all we'll do all 40.

Um I believe all 40 of the MM properties are will be in the 15th, I believe.

Okay.

Um and then the vast majority of habitats, I believe, will be in the seventh.

Gotcha.

How many are in the sixth again?

Um I believe it's six.

And now they'll be by Habitat.

Street.

Oh, um, yes.

Okay.

Okay.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Michael Lem, uh CEO of a member group, uh happy to be here with you all today.

Uh as uh Larry had uh stated, uh, we are uh involved in a project building 40 single family homes as well.

Our homes will be geared towards eventual tenant home ownership.

Um so this is a project that is financed with long-come housing tax credits.

We were awarded 1.2 million dollars and nine percent credit.

Yeah, so we will own and operate these homes uh for the first 15 years and then work with uh you know nonprofits uh to sell the homes uh to to our to our tenants.

In 15 years.

Correct.

No sooner than 15 years.

We have to rent them out for 15 years, but we're gonna start working as we approach that that deadline to habitat are direct develop and sell to owner occupants.

Yes.

Right out of the gate.

What why the least own component?

Why don't why don't we have habitat do it all for for sale right out of the gate?

I'm happy to let the development team answer that.

I mean the whole goal here is to so I mean I I I think for I can only speak for you know us as a developer.

I mean, we we were using the the the resources available you know to us uh with the affordable housing, you know, tax credits, uh habitat is addressing the immediate you know home ownership need.

This is a longer term you know, homeownership need uh to one provide quality affordable housing to people who may not be ready for it.

On the north side of Milwaukee, right?

I mean that's a dent.

Good dent, but it's a dent.

I mean, this is building rental housing essentially, albeit for 15 years.

I get it.

Okay.

You're absolutely right.

Uh I'm Frank Martinez with community development lines.

Real quick.

Mike, tell them what you can tell them how you convince me.

Tell them.

We have a no, we've been through this over and uh, on the better good, but why don't you go ahead and and convince them so we'll while we're public?

Because I I appreciate what you what we discussed and while we're moving forward with this versus the future, how you're gonna um focus on home ownership and selling right away.

So we got some stuff in the plan, but go ahead and expound on uh why this is a benefit.

Uh so I mean it it's a benefit because I mean there there is there's two needs.

I mean, yes, you do you have an immediate you know need for uh home ownership, um, but there is there's gonna be a continual need for for home ownership.

You know, we want to provide affordable housing opportunities for individuals currently living in a neighborhood to get them ready.

Um and you know, I we believe that delivering the the product now uh is is still a a good thing to to do.

Um there will be buyers um residents that will may not be ready to purchase a home, you know, right now today.

Um so we're committed to partnering uh with the the community organizations uh on that home buyer uh readiness.

I mean we're responsible uh developer and responsible landlord in the community.

This is a community that you know I'm from.

Uh this is the community my mother moved to on 23rd in Clark when she you know came to Milwaukee in the 80s.

This is the first house that I lived in, is right here at the heart of this community.

So I'm passionate about you know, seeing the the personal improvement um you know in in this community, and uh we we we believe that this is just one of many um you know tools in the toolbox to to address the housing need.

Also, uh that's excellent, but also uh what was uh Paramount is we're putting up reserves for repairs so it won't go on the homeowner in the future.

Yeah, so uh also uh I can speak to that.

So we're working out a lot of the details too.

Yeah, so we're working out uh the finer points of the the back end of uh of the deal.

Um but uh through collaboration with the community development alliance, uh we we are uh offering, we will be offering down payment assistance uh for the homes, and then we will be capitalizing.

15 years correct, in 15 years.

Uh but we also will be ensuring that those homes are not aged 15 if there's critical repairs that are necessary before we sell those homes to to the new homeowners, then we're committed to to making those investments in the properties.

And and these homes will sell for uh a hundred thousand dollars.

Uh in fifteen years or so.

In fifteen years.

Additionally, it'll lack in the current price now for future value.

Brian mentioned what uh assumably go up, but so what we have modeled what we have modeled is um in the TID model we we assumed assessed value of 130,000, right?

So we're underwriting the 30,000 as our contribution to to the eventual homeowner.

So their cost is 100,000.

Right.

We also are looking at in addition to that some down payment assistance so that they they avoid PMI to make it even more affordable to the homeowner.

So these homes will be less expensive than any of the other homes that have been historically been, you know, developed.

If you just go look at just appraisals, the average appraisal in in recent times, and Brian, you can speak better to this, but I think your appraisals have been between 150 and 180,000 for the habitat homes.

Our homes will be significantly less, and that's today's money compared to 15, 16, 17 years out.

We're still committed to selling these for a hundred thousand dollars.

And one last thing, uh Mike.

First rate of refuse will be to the homeowner, to the renter, to the homeowner.

Yeah, we we cannot sell these units.

We one, we we we cannot, we will not displace residents.

That's that's number one.

Um and in order for us to remove the restrictions that we have from WEDA, you know, associated with the tax credit financing, we must sell the units to a tenant.

If it's a vacant unit, then we can work with uh a nonprofit to sell the unit to a qualified buyer, but they still must meet the the income you know requirements to be able to purchase the the homes.

Thank you.

To the city, why didn't we insist on all owner-occupied out of the gate?

We we're providing we we can modulate the amount of the subsidy.

If additional funding was required, I assume we could increase it.

Why are we why are we in the business of developing rental properties at all?

They want to do rental properties in cooperation with WEDA, more power to them.

That's their right.

Private financing, separate track.

But now we're in the business of subsidizing rental properties.

Um I thought CDA was all about a home ownership.

This is not home ownership, maybe in 15 years, yes.

Not right away.

Yeah, in 15 years, and uh I understand your concerns.

One thing that I want to share, uh, you know, we definitely tried to make a big effort to listen to the to the residents.

Um the starting in 2019, uh led by Amon United and Dominican Center uh and the city came together and put together the Fondal Act and North Plan, which the common council adopted with regard to housing that specifically says that the residents asked for two things home ownership opportunities and higher quality rentals.

So this brings both, and then ultimately after 15 years, not our rule, but the uh WEDA tax credit is a substantial amount of money uh that will help build these homes here in Milwaukee rather than another part of the state that will be home ownership later.

And there's also an aspect of offering a menu of options to the uh residents of Amani.

Not all of them are ready for home ownership right now.

Some would just prefer to be in a higher quality new rental at a maybe a lower price than what they're paying for rent in a dilapidated uh neglectful landlord unit now.

And we also have um a few other different options, including from Ezekiel Hope, I know Jim is here, uh, and um and walkie community crossroads.

So it's about uh an op a menu of options for the residents as well as uh you know developing something council president Perez mentioned in an earlier item the capacity for some of the uh emerging developers, or I would think in terms of MM group emerged uh at this point.

Um so that there's really a options both in terms of the builders and what's available to residents with this initiative.

Okay, I get your what's the city's explanation?

Yeah, but rental property.

I guess the uh the twofold one, uh the vast majority of the TID efforts that we do are for rental.

Um right.

So in terms in terms of our overall TID portfolio, the majority of the units that are being delivered are rental properties.

Um and then the second part is um, you know, I I think um this is uh the team that came to us with the application.

Um certainly if a different team comes to us with similar opportunities for direct home ownership, if the capacity is out there from the development community, we would absolutely entertain that application that doesn't that doesn't sound like a very good answer.

What's our priorities?

I mean to so we just hand out money, any team that comes to us, no matter what the plan is.

So programmatically, our priorities we are we um we do prioritize homeownership um overall, right, for all of our programs citywide.

Um when it comes to TID, uh we are right, we are reacting in many cases to a developer that comes to us with a proposal.

And many of those developers are coming to us with uh uh rental property, right?

Um so the vast majority of the TIDs that you see in front of you um are supporting rental units.

Mr.

Chair?

Okay, all on yeah, all of them caught.

So just for clarity, you're normally coming with a TID for an apartment building.

Yes, all yeah, a multi-unit apartment building.

So even if there was no habitat attached to this and it was just the MM stuff and he was coming with um these homes for rental, your point is the majority of our TIDs go to rental anyway, because we're usually doing apartment buildings.

It's just in this case, the goal is to sell um for home ownership after the 15 years, and in this case, these are single family homes.

But the point is most of the TIDs that we see are for rentals, it's just that they're usually um multi-unit apartment buildings.

That is that the point you're trying to make.

That's absolutely right.

Okay.

Thank you.

I I would add too, uh, two years ago.

Um, so in the first back-owned TID, um uh the MM group was also uh part of that uh is with habitat um and the 20 units that they delivered um were similar, right?

So uh LITEC for future ownership.

Um so we've done this before, even in the three examples of the back owned TID.

The first example had a similar structure, but yes, all the Roman Cogs absolutely our bigger portfolio uh for TID is uh is rental, affordable rental.

And and Mr.

Chair, I will say, um I've had some some of these um in my district, and not too different from you, Mr.

Chair, at first I like the 15-year thing.

Um, and so I pushed it out of some areas and made them pick lots and other places and all of that.

But what I learned over time watching sales and watching and talking to residents and all of that, I had to go back um in one case to habitat and other cases to other developers and be like, okay, now you can't come over here because what when I start watching just private sales and the skyrocketing of the um the the values, yeah.

And the concern that so many residents had about gentrification that caused displacement I'll I I welcomed um the 15-year thing because at least it allowed an opportunity for residents who may not be able to afford purchasing a home in this moment um to stay in the neighborhood, and it balanced out some blocks that had we not allowed for that, may have ended up pushing out um those residents to help build those neighborhoods.

So it's like I literally had to sit down with DC and look at maps and look at neighborhoods and stuff to really think about how a combination of things, habitat, the 15-year thing, and just what was happening with private sales um could help balance a neighborhood.

And without it, we would have had a lot more gentrification cause and displacement had we not done it.

Um the MM group was not the developer of the ones in my district, but um, but still the same concept.

So I think I don't know, you know, I I get what you're asking, Mr.

Chair, and that's for DCD to answer, but I will say, as a person who didn't like it at first either, I began to see the value of it with trying to accommodate um the mixture of residents and whatever their economic situation was at the moment and helping to keep the balance and the character of the neighborhood.

Okay, sounds good.

Any other questions or comments yeah?

I'll make a comment.

Um I think for me what's confusing about the 15 years is and maybe there's some lessons learned.

I remember when the city had a kind of rent thrown or least thrown program.

I my recollection recollection is it didn't go well.

So what lessons could we learn from that?

Um, even though they're they're different projects and we mostly inherited these properties as is, and we didn't want the renters to leave that we could make that option available for them.

So for me that's that's that's that didn't work out well when the city ran it.

I want to make sure that we're doing that, and then if if the goal is renters into home buyer, then maybe we should ramp up even the multi-unit of you know affordable housing.

How are we tracking that that is a stepping stone to home ownership to you know increased revenue that that we're we're keeping track of that?

Or is it that um with the low-income housing tax credit it we don't see the movement the upward movement that I think people expect from that being an opportunity to move into home ownership?

Um yeah, so on the on the first part, um, and I I don't fully remember um all the details of the city version of the lease to own, um, other than I believe um there were units that were probably in fairly rough shape.

Um I think the problem positive piece here is these are gonna be new construction, uh, and as Michael had mentioned, uh ramping up on the back end of uh a reserve uh with a down payment component.

Um so I think some of the lessons learned would be how to transition from that 15th to that 16th year um to set that current occupant up for successful homeownership.

Um I think lessons learned on the front end of the city program, and again, I don't recall the details, but um I think those are gonna be um existing units that we had to put a lot of money into, and as a city on them, we had additional requirements for hiring uh and the costs were pretty high.

Yeah, no, I I look I went through a homebuying program right out of college, and I think most people think you can walk in, take a class, you'll be certified, be ready to buy a home, not understand what it takes.

There's a huge transition.

I also think there's a challenge between someone uh being in a home for five or eight years and then finally saying, hey, I'm ready by now, I want to purchase it.

I don't want to wait for the 15 or there's just there'll be a time where there's some tension about that, and I think we should be ready for it.

Mr.

Chair.

I have a question or statement.

Am I allowed to I raise my hand no, I don't know, it wasn't acknowledged.

My name is Helen Reynolds.

I'm an Amani resident 14 years.

Um is it okay to continue speaking?

No, we did there's no public, there's no public hearing in this.

So no, you're not recognized.

Okay.

So my issue with go ahead.

This is this is not a public hearing.

This will pass, don't worry about it.

Everybody will support this.

Okay.

So my issue or concern is also the 15 year um it's typically for uh a conventional mortgage, you're you're paying for 30 years.

So if I'm renting for 15 years, thank you.

Okay.

So uh thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, I just want to thank the mining group and everybody involved for again this project.

Um what you call an underserved community.

Wow.

I was over there um during um, I think election day.

I still have curves over there that that are brick.

I still have brick curves over there located on 24th Street, things like that.

Terrible infrastructure.

So I just think this push and this um uplifting in the area be able to foster other projects.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, very good.

Any other questions or comments?

Mr.

Sure, hold on.

Hold on.

Rennie, what would you like to say?

So um, Brittany Roberson, Dominican Center.

Um, first I would like to say thank you, Arder Woman, and thank you, Artum Embowerman.

Um, you both made very valid points.

I think as we've been going through this, right?

I've been a part of this for the last year.

This has been an ongoing thing for the last two years, right?

So we have been learning a lot as we've been working through it.

I do have to commend the team that has been putting this all together because it's been a lot.

We have seen a lot of different different iterations of what this was going to look like.

Were any of us really excited about it being rental for 15 years?

No, right?

But it was better than the model they first started offering us where it was gonna be condos, and we were definitely like no, right?

Um, and so like we are at a place where we are understanding we do need a lot of different housing in our neighborhood.

Now, to be fair, Amani Home Ownership Initiative may be a little bit of a force, right?

Um, because really it is more of a housing initiative because we have those pieces about rental, even for 15 years, we're looking at resident we first we have a very transient neighborhood.

So we consistently have people moving in and out of our neighborhood.

And sometimes that's not by choice, right?

That's by force because they can't afford to stay there.

And so we are looking at ways to make sure that if people want to stay in our neighborhood, that they can, especially those who we know income is around $30,000 or less.

Housing is always going to be a struggle for you.

But we want you to be able to have decent housing.

We want you to have quality, no matter where you're at in your walk, whether that's home ownership or rental.

And so again, I just come here on my team.

I thank you all for asking questions, and I thank you for seeing this today.

I appreciate those comments real quick.

Brenda, would you like to see this move forward?

Yeah, I think she's a good thing.

I think that this is my home, man.

I just talked to her.

Yes.

All right.

Thank you.

All right, no other questions or comments, Mr.

Chair.

Paul injection?

One question, one comment.

I have Chris Oes, housing and economic and development chair for Amani.

Also long-term resident, uh homeowner, free and clear of well over 20 years and 49.

I'm sorry, can I just so we have very active residents in our neighborhood?

Those two ladies who are on who want to speak are actually those who stay in the TA boundary and where this would be developed.

They were unable to make a hearing person today, but I would encourage you to talk to them if you have the time to.

We don't.

I'm not saying right now.

I'm just saying.

Uh Larry, real quick, can you go over some of the um things that we discussed in the background as far as the equity part of the plan that we talked about?

Yeah, absolutely.

Um so on the dollar side.

Um so each uh each tract is a little different, right?

So the direct-to-home ownership um uh that's going to be funded through so overall investment, 30 million dollars uh for the 95 homes.

Um the direct ownership uh version, uh that's gonna be funded by uh home sales proceeds, uh volunteer support, in-kind gifts, uh, philanthropy and TIFF.

Uh and on the uh the LITEC uh component, the MM group component, that's gonna be more of a traditional LITEC deal that you've seen in front of you.

First mortgage, uh Litech equity, uh deferred developer fee, philanthropy, and TIFF.

Um I do want to mention that on the philanthropy side, uh Northwestern Mutual Foundation uh has committed uh three million dollars to this effort.

So want to definitely recognize uh as the team and the CDA is fundraising, um, that is a very large component of the philanthropic money that you're seeing in this capital stack.

Um up to uh 3.57 million dollar developer finance TIFF.

Um so the development team uh going through the CDA um is able to get a 2.5% interest rate um up to 25 years.

Uh and then on the human resource uh side, uh the MM group will have the requirements of the 40% RPP, 25% SPE, and then best efforts for Habitat MCC and Ezekiel of 40% RPP and 25% SPE.

Um so those are the financial components.

Um happy to if there are any other specific So listening to the residents and uh the mining group, one of the concerns was you build four new houses on my block, and I've been living here for 20 years.

What you want to do for me?

Or I can you help me out?

Those are some of the products I want you to ensure my people that we can have.

Yeah, so from the city side, um, we're absolutely um uh happy and ready to connect with you on doing outreach for our existing programs.

Um we do have a portfolio of rehab programs uh available citywide, um, and then I'm happy to turn it over to the development team to talk about other efforts more specific here to Amani.

You mean for the incumbent occupants?

Yes, exactly.

Well, when we did Lindsay Heights years ago of memory serves, there was a big we had a bunch of two left.

And it included new construction like this, but included grant opportunities to existing homeowners.

Yes.

Now, of course, Lindsey Heights fell apart and became a huge underwater because of dramatic drop in real estate values during the Great Recession.

So in the end result, it it failed.

But during the failing, I'm sure there was investments still made that are still in place today that are benefiting the city.

Can you is that what we're doing here?

That some of this money will be sprinkled around to the existing homeowners.

So a couple of pieces.

One, uh, in the Lindsay, thank you, uh Chair for bringing that up in the Lindsay example.

Um, because we approached it as a square around the neighborhood, right?

Um that is a major part of the reason why we saw as property values dropped that TID was failing because of that.

Right.

It is very specifically targeted at trying to draw uh the boundary around as many city owned vacant lots as possible.

So you can go from a zero increment to the full increment when the house is built.

What that does though is it does limit the number of existing owners that are in the TID.

Now there are still a lot because we can't just simply draw around the random box uh around the random lots, right?

It has to be contiguous.

Um so um for the reason we saw some of the failure in other examples, um the the backbone TID is trying to solve that in the very complex boundary itself.

Now that doesn't provide us the opportunity to have another fund because we are very targeted on how that boundary is drawn.

Um because it is developer financed, uh, because we are going up to 25 years already.

Um there is not really increment for another pool of funds for the TID.

Now knowing this is coming up, knowing that this concern is and has been brought to the alderman's attention, um uh we have talked as uh as the development team about what other avenues aside from the specific boundary of the TID and the dollars from the increment of the TID can be um uh accessed.

Uh as I mentioned, happy to continue to promote our programs, NIDC's programs uh with the aldermen in the neighborhood.

Um, but I do want to turn it over because I know the development team has additional uh information they do want to share on that topic.

So yeah, I'm referenced earlier habitats critical home repair program, uh, which is uh we fund through private philanthropy, so there are no city dollars that go into that program.

Um we currently serve the Amani neighborhood and we'll continue to serve the neighborhood.

And I would anticipate that we'll probably do even more projects because we'll have that presence of building in the neighborhood.

People will see our signs, uh, we'll be able to go door to door.

We will work with community organizations, residents to make the program available.

Um so that's our commitment.

You know, we have that program.

We also partner with the city on a healthy homes program as well as NIP, and that's another avenue for us to serve uh homeowners in the neighborhood.

So that's something that we consider as part of our overall strategy, right?

When we build homes, we want to also do repairs because we know that not everybody uh uh is uh we have a lot of long-term homeowners, especially on fixed incomes, and that's about 80 percent of the families we serve are in fixed incomes and have already paid off their mortgage.

They want to stay in the neighborhood.

So you saying in this boundary group, building new houses, you'll be able so these people move up on a list, or are they more eligible?

We'll do targeted marketing um to homeowners in the Amani neighborhood.

That's our commitment.

Um, and we'll offer that program.

It can go up to 20,000 in scope.

So we do a lot of roofs, we do a lot of uh porch repairs, a lot of uh accessibility of bathrooms for seniors.

Um very targeted, very successful program, and we'll continue to grow that.

That is something we're counting.

Are you committed to any of the um other calls for long-term neighbors, long-term residents?

Uh we we currently don't have a funding source uh allocated, you know, to us to address critical repairs in the neighborhood.

Um, but you know, I'm committed to developing in in the neighborhood.

Um we separate of the amend group, we have our own construction management firm, which we will be building, you know, this project, so we're vertically integrated.

Um so uh we look forward to partnering with with Habitat for for humanity to uh on some of these critical repair projects in the neighborhood.

Um and and I would just add uh to going back to President Perez's uh question uh about you know more looking at the back end of of the deal.

Uh I didn't get into specifics, but I think this is an important you know, part two to address uh on the first Midtown uh homeownership initiative.

We partner with Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity on the front end on the construction, but we also have a separate agreement with Milwaukee Tap W Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity to partner with us to assist us with selling these units to qualify our tenants when we do approach that 15th year uh through their regular you know program that they already have established.

We're not trying to invent the wheel.

They they have serviced hundreds of families in the Milwaukee community.

We have an outstanding relationship with with Habitat for Humanity, and uh we're we're you know committed to extending that relationship on the Amani project to essentially revase replace our investment uh partner in in the project with Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity uh to get these homes into the the hands of of these tenants and you know residents in the community as quick as possible.

Has has the money I'm sorry, Mr.

Chair?

Sure.

Has the has the money ever applied to be a 10 a targeted investment neighborhood?

Not from my understanding, no.

Um because I know through the 10, and Larry, correct me if I'm wrong.

Usually it's up to 10,000, I think, um, that uh homeowners can get uh for repairs and things of that nature.

Um I would think a money could make a good case.

I said I in IDC too on board as a way.

I think they can make a good case to be coming.

I appreciate it.

We're happy to work with it because I was just doing the math on the 20,000, because right now we have a critical repair program that's going.

If we're talking roofs and porches, the highest we've seen, because our housing stock is oh and our homes are large.

Our roofs are coming in at like 3234.

So it's expensive, yeah.

Yeah, but uh Mr.

Chair, on that same program, when I got elected, we were offering $10,000 TIDs to the neighborhood, so the value came back, and we had a successful surplus, and many residents got $10,000 towards their home.

So it's possible for the TID to provide that funding.

If it was a contiguous, so if we yeah, there's leapfrogs around the vacant lots.

If the value doesn't include the entire neighborhood, but it's it's based on the value and the increments, correct?

And let me speak to that.

Thanks, Larry.

Um uh if I may, uh Chair Bauman, uh Lafayette Crump Commissioner of City Development.

Um mostly for the benefit, I think all the alders understand this, but so that it's very clear for those watching.

One of the specifics of this TID has been discussed is that it is committed to deep affordability and it's closing the gap on the construction costs with via the TID, and what that means is that the TID is not producing necessarily the increment that might otherwise be created if the uh deep affordability was not committed to.

And so this is a unique situation, like all of the backbone TIDs are um where there would not necessarily be those additional dollars available that has been done maybe in some other uh TIDs, but we're still committed to assisting existing residents through other programs that we have.

Uh thankful for to Habitat for the work that they're doing to provide other resources, Northwestern Mutual as well, helping with rehabs in the area.

Sure.

Sure.

So uh who's managing your RPP and SB.

Uh it will likely be cross management.

Um we we may end up doing it ourselves though.

Um our last project, we exceeded both the SBE and RPP uh requirements and look forward to to doing so on this one as well.

Excellent.

And then the management of the property management, are you doing that as well?

Uh Lutheran Social Services is our property manager.

Okay.

All right, uh, real quick, Mr.

Chair.

Uh Jim, it's good to see you.

So you get a property.

I will be doing a property.

You gotta be up at the microphone.

Jump, come on up real quick.

I'm happy to see Jim got a problem.

Jim on the record, Jim.

Everybody's gonna be a good one.

Jim has been asking for years.

Well, as everybody in here that knows me, my big thing is putting it in the middle of the house.

My name is Jim Gaylard.

I am the vice president of Ezekiel CDC and a lead trainer.

Um been pushing at this stuff with the city for years and years uh to get affordable housing, decent affordable housing, because being a master electrician, I work at a lot of these houses in an Amani area, and I wouldn't put my dog in some of them.

And I love what they're doing, is getting some these that's the only part about the rentals that I do like.

Now we got decent rentals here.

Okay.

Okay.

And the other part of the homeownership piece.

So my company stands for home ownership partnership and employment.

This is the partnership.

I'm doing employment.

Anybody's welcome to come by our job sites and see of putting people to work that never thought they would be electricians, carpenters, drywalls, so on and so forth.

Uh one of the big things is putting people of that community to work to work on that community.

The I'm trying to target that house that we're working on right now to one of our workers that live rents three houses away.

He's been trying to do that.

I like your program because you use people from the community.

I just wonder if there's any opportunity for some of his uh trainees to get some experience on electrical work during all of this development.

So I let you all work that out, but I love that.

But I'm happy for that.

I'm happy for you in your in your house.

Thanks.

Thanks, Mr.

Chair.

Okay, I think we've examined this pretty thoroughly.

Alderman Jackson moves a recommended adoption, hearing no objections to order.

Thank you.

Congratulations.

Thank you very much.

Moving on to item 10, file 260434.

Substitute resolution approving a project plan and development agreement authorized expenditures and creating tax incremental district number 132, the midtown commons in the second aldermanic district, sponsored by Alderman Chambers.

I know Alderman Chambers is in support of this, so let's uh proceed expeditiously.

Well, you're crazy all right.

All right.

Uh good morning again.

Larry Kilmer with the Department of City Development.

Um so now we'll be looking at TID 132, uh, which is Midtown Commons.

Um I am joined by uh the development team, including a representative from Gorman uh and representatives from 15 Olive.

Um I'll give them uh a moment to introduce themselves uh here in a few minutes and then uh go through the project and happy to answer any questions.

So uh the general map for uh TID 132 Midtown Commons uh located here.

Um so approximately uh 60th Street just north of Capitol Drive.

Uh zooming in on the parcel itself, so in a single um parcel.

Uh here you can see 132.

Uh the boundary includes uh a large parking lot, uh which is all part of the one parcel uh on the northern half, which is shaded, uh, and then the former Walmart building um to the uh to the southern half of the boundary.

Um the development itself for housing.

So looking at the development team is looking at uh purchasing the northern portion, the uh the parking lot uh and building two uh 100 unit buildings.

Here you can see the footprint of each of those buildings uh with parking in between.

Um these will be phased, but phased by uh a matter of months.

Um so uh both have funding lined up.

Um, but in terms of construction uh timing, phase one uh is targeted to start uh later this uh summer.

Phase two is targeted to start uh at the end of the year, early next year.

Existing conditions.

It's a parking lot.

All right.

Um so I'm gonna uh hand it over to uh Ted from Gorman and then to 15 Olive.

Is the next file could connect to this?

Uh yes.

All right, we'll call that too.

I thought it was.

Yeah, that's uh item 11, file 260485 resolution approving a term sheet authorizing city of Milwaukee to enter into a lease with AF with AFS Milwaukee LLC for a portion of the property of 5825 West Hope Avenue in the second aldermanic district.

All right, they're both before us.

Thank you.

Um thanks, Larry.

Uh Ted Matcom, uh Wisconsin Market President for Gorman and Company.

Um this uh opportunity was presented to us uh by the owner of the Walmart, uh, who you probably all know from many public hearings regarding the adaptive reuse of that facility.

Yes, sir.

Uh the lease is coming up, which will address that as well.

Our portion was the northern parking lot, where um what I've always thought in um living in and around Glendale when I saw Bayshore Mall and what Bayshore Mall did to try to revitalize that mall is to put apartments and people butts in the seats in terms of like using that mall.

If you've been in that mall recently, what they did there, which was very interesting.

I thought, geez, what are they doing there when they first did it?

And the actual effect and consequence of that development has changed that mall dramatically in terms of the traffic.

And uh we thought this would be a good opportunity here with a 10-acre sea of asphalt to try to redevelop this uh into a kind of residential campus with the Walmart, having city uses complementary across Hope Avenue, which is right uh south of the um our parcel there, and having kind of a comprehensive redevelopment of the Walmart parcel to benefit the mall.

Uh we've got children's hospital there, we've got a lot of uh we got a uh a great family grocer there.

Uh we have a lot of uh restaurants and things there that could benefit from this, and the and the residents could benefit from that.

So we thought it was a perfect fit in terms of how to adaptively reuse the parking lot.

So that's kind of where the background came from.

Yes, right there.

Yep.

Uh David Griggs, one half of 15 Olive.

Uh greatly appreciate the opportunity to be here with you all today.

Um we've been doing a lot of projects in the city of Milwaukee, a lot of tax foreclosures, um, single family homes, duplexes, smaller commercial projects.

But we really see this as an opportunity for us to grow in the opportunity that um through the QAP that we'd have had to incentivize large developers such as Gorman to um work with smaller developers such as as such as us to give us the opportunity to really learn about the process of doing a larger development and just the risk associated with doing this work can be incredibly high and the barriers to entry also incredibly high as well.

So we're just thinking about these type of opportunities to just be able to have a seat at the table is extremely important to us and want to take advantage of every time that we have that opportunity to do so.

Uh Greg Davis, other half of 15 Olive, uh second everything that uh Dave said.

Again, we've done partnerships with Gorman um on projects outside of the city of Milwaukee.

Uh we grew up in Rufus King neighborhood.

Part of um again, our company name is one five olive, uh grew up growing up on 15th and Olive.

Uh so being able to um you know put forth affordable housing uh in communities that we grew up in that we work intimately with uh was something that we just couldn't pass up.

We're really really excited of how this um project has transformed and um excited to get started.

Who owns this parking lot at present?

Uh the Walmart owner.

Uh and you'll be acquiring it?

Correct.

Okay.

At a rate that doesn't involve this has happened before where the city puts in a TIFF.

A dollar.

Thank you.

Yeah.

All right.

Make it clear at the box.

Real quick.

Yeah, Ted, I'm interested in how this would compare to the 20th of Belize project, because you completely turned that one around.

Oh, okay.

As far as difficulty.

How what's the difference between the two?

Yeah, how would you how would you easier by far, I would assume.

Well, it's a really good yeah, the Vlite one, of course, was historic, this one's new build.

Okay.

Um but um both of those are predominantly three and two bedroom to service the families.

So both as similar in size, it's gonna be similar size.

Uh in terms of the units?

Yes.

Uh well, the historic one always is a little a lot more uh uh square footage we have to deal with because we have lofted units there.

So it's probably apples and oranges in terms of the configuration of the units, but uh these are pretty large three bedroom units and two bedroom units per wheat of standards, you know.

Gotcha.

So uh do we have the rents for these units yet?

Yeah, so on the screen right now, so um I'm happy to give you the dollars, um, but the actual uh AMI bands are on the screen.

So new construction, 200 uh total units.

Um between the unit between the two phases, there's 40 uh one, two, and three bedroom units capped at 30 percent AMI.

There's eighty-eight units, one, two, and three bedroom units capped at fifty percent AMI, and then seventy-two units, one, two, and three bedrooms capped at eighty percent AMI.

So we have twenty in each unit that are thirty percent AMI, which will be a really good affordable rent there for those incomes.

Um and then the estimated completion.

Oh, sorry.

No, go ahead.

I was just telling him I'm I'm good, but go ahead.

Okay.

Um estimated completion is uh spring of twenty-eight for phase one and fall of twenty-eight for phase two.

Uh the financing package, so uh together, uh just over a sixty-one million dollar investment.

The sources are first mortgage, uh li tech equity, federal home loan bank funds, deferred developer fee, rackham revolving loan funds, sponsor equity, uh, and the TIFF that you're considering today.

Um the TIFF is for up to $3.95 million dollars.

It's developer financed, uh, up to 20 years with an interest rate of 5.85 percent.

Uh and then it will require 40 percent RPP and 25 percent SPE.

Um the uh development is uh consistent with both the housing element and the West Side uh area plan.

Sure.

And with that, we're happy to take any additional questions.

Very good.

Any other questions for the other thing?

Um Greg, Dave, have you all ever done work with RPP before?

This will be the first time for us.

Yes.

Very good, good.

So we're side.

Who are you gonna use to uh we have not signed an agreement, but we're interviewing both Carla Cross and and Randy.

Gotcha.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Okay, Alderman Shamper, who's recommended option, hearing no objections so ordered.

Uh lease file, what are we who who's the tenant and who's the landlord here?

Uh good morning, Dave Miskey with DCD.

And as a follow-up to the previous item, just to give you a little more uh background.

So the Walmart building and the property itself, 10 acres would be sold of the parking lot for the previous item.

The building itself, uh, as you followed probably with your colleague Alderman Mark Chambers and seen the self-uh storage component.

Uh that was approved by CPC a week or two ago.

What we've negotiated uh for the past year or so is to have a municipal use along the northern portion, a northern third of the former Walmart building.

So the Walmart building is about 160,000 feet.

About 50,000 then would be leased to the city of Milwaukee.

So we would and we would be the tenant, the landlord would still be the owner of the property currently.

It would be for one dollar for 30-year term.

Uh we can use it for any number of municipal needs or government uh uses.

Uh certainly a the the Capital Drive Library is a consideration, as are a number of other functions.

So we're working closely with public works and their facilities management team to determine what the best uses are.

One of the things that is happening currently uh is is the looking at the assessment or assessing the property itself, the building conditions.

So DPW has hired a con a contracting firm to look at the roof conditions, the utilities, things of that nature that would have to be separated out.

Uh we view this uh similarly to uh you know the condos that we've done with the library system over the past uh ten ten years or so.

So uh the term sheet is in the file.

I'd be happy to answer any additional questions.

If it turns out uh there needs to be 200,000 dollars worth of roof roof work.

Yeah, that's a great question.

So today what you'd be approving is the opportunity for us to sign a lease option.

Uh and and so during this due diligence period, if we make the determination, Chair Bauman, we could we could back out of at that point.

Got it.

Okay, that's that's more reassuring.

All right, well, Alderman Alderman Stamp removes the recommended action.

Real quick, Dave, any word on the lows on the lows.

So it's uh currently owned by Phoenix uh investors.

They they lease it to sellers absorbance.

So it's uh a company that's invested tremendous amount of resources and money up in the northwest side over the last 20 years.

So they lease it from them.

Uh it's used as kind of a distribution center.

They have several employees, but it's mostly warehousing and distribution.

Does it affect this project, Any?

Yeah, you know, I think uh it it does not.

Uh I think with the combination of the housing piece that you just heard, and then the activation of the northern third of the Walmart space, I think that'll that'll prove to be very useful and activate uh the mall itself.

But yeah, no, it doesn't seem to be any research on pick and save, and if they're staying.

Uh we have inquired about that.

Um they haven't really given us a good answer yes or no.

Um I I hope they stay or we figure out something there because that would be a huge loss.

You know, if they if they look at the Commissioner, you you spoke with him?

Mr.

Chair.

No, okay.

All right, thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Go ahead.

Yeah, thank you, Mr.

Chair, committee members.

Um to answer all of the standard direct question.

I I've been in conversation with Kroger.

Um they are ex about the um this project is uh I mean pending the approval, which I think already did.

Thank you for that.

Um, but um there's some other changes that I've have as of Kroger bar as getting um some more updates.

I know they recently remodeled that location, it doesn't really look like it, so there'd be more conversations um to be had with Kroger, but I do not for see uh them leaving anytime soon.

I think they renewed their lease for another 15 to 20 years um in 2014.

So um I guess to answer the question, I don't see them leaving.

Um, but anything could happen.

Um I I do think that this addition will give them ample reasons to stay.

Um but I just want to thank y'all for having the opportunity to speaking on this, and this has been a long time coming on this project, and uh thank you for moving it forward.

Okay, very good, excellent.

So Allian Stamper moves a recommended option, hearing no objections so ordered.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Okay, we will jump ahead.

So retrieve uh Alder Woman Dmitrievich who stepped out.

We'll take her item.

Oh, speak of the devil.

She's in the she's in the back room.

Item 17, file 251924, substitute ordinance relating to a temporary pause in the establishment and development of data centers sponsored by Aldwoman Dmitrievich, Olivan Brouwer, Alderman Stamper, and myself.

Yes.

All right.

Bob, wait a minute.

What's your name?

Let's let's do this, Bob.

Hold on.

I'm just much on the hearing.

Okay.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

All right, who wants to take the laboring or here?

Hold on, I'm just paging through my I'm gonna cut down my 30-minute speech here.

Hold on one second.

Okay.

All right, may I?

Okay.

Thank you.

Good morning, colleagues.

Um I wanted to first of all start by thanking um Chairman Bob Bauman, who has been very understanding and patient as this entire process has just been long and ever changing.

And if it feels confusing, that's because it is.

So we'll get to that.

Um, but I just truly thank you for allowing us on the agenda.

Um and allowing, you know, just a few speakers to speak.

I'd also like to thank this co-sp co-sponsors um who have been on this item since it was a regulatory piece, which I'll mention.

Now we're on a moratorium, or my preferred language is pause.

Yeah.

Um, and I just thank you for being there.

Really, the first um person was, of course, uh Alderman Russell Stamper.

Yes, sir.

agenda um and allowing you know just a few speakers to speak I'd also like to thank this co-sp co sponsors um who have been on this item since it was a regulatory piece which I'll mention now we're on a moratorium or my preferred language is pause yeah um and I just thank you for being there really the first um was of course uh Alderman Russell Stamper so who was right there and uh if you haven't caught it we also had an um an editorial piece that we co-authored um talking about this issue thank you last but definitely not least I have to thank um Dave Galtean here to my right who we've now spent I don't even want to count um hours and hours and hours and hours um he has become this is a testament to our legislative reference bureau and policymaking an expert um smarter than AI just a little joke there okay this this is working right okay um no but seriously um become a local expert and has helped me learn a lot through this process um and it's not often that we um get to really think um our legislative reference bureau when you have an idea and you have to keep changing it and we're on many versions.

So Mr.

Chairman and colleagues I will actually keep it pretty brief here because we're at kind of a crossroads in the pause we're pausing the pause a bit um but many of you I reached out to months ago months ago because I was absolutely committed to trying to find a true regulatory path to data centers.

And when you look around the nation um the the kind of easiest way was to do a moratorium I said okay I'm okay I'm open to that but I really want I knew that you couldn't do a moratorium forever and that we'd eventually have to roll up our sleeves and take a hard look to regulating this new technology and and economic trend really well the reason that many have chosen the moratorium path is because it is incredibly complicated.

It should not be easy to mess with the zoning code I've had to learn that pretty much the hard way it takes time and ZTC and CPC every acronym we could think of and you'll hear a little bit from the city attorney how we have to keep noticing it and going back.

And so you know I'm not frustrated with that but I want to make sure I let you know why we're here.

So what I've chosen along the way is really a simultaneous path.

The regulate regulatory part of this it's kind of known as substitute B right now and it's living within CPC still is under legal review.

We're not necessarily noticed for it here today but I just wanted to let you know that that's still going forward but because that's taking more time as it should right as it should um I have introduced the the pause in the moratorium that is before us today.

What I need you to know about the one year moratorium is that upon adoption by this body of the regulatory ordinance then the moratorium would be immediately rescinded so just trying to understand that we're doing both but the moratorium like many cities has done have done is in place until we figure out how to regulate it.

The regulation like I meant many difficult um we are not trying to stop innovation here or investment.

What we're trying to do throughout this pause and then the legislation is to really center people we've seen examples like I said throughout really let's just look at the state and Mount Pleasant being one of the largest Microsoft investing billions of dollars this is where we also saw people literally being dragged out of public hearings.

What happens in local government when the economy moves so quickly and I some of this may be hard for all of us to um hear but is that we're not at our best we've had to catch up to corporations this is the actual consistent theme here the empire of Joule for vaping right um short term rentals it's been incredibly difficult.

Thank you to all Roman Cogs who's led on that effort and every step of the way is a legal challenge as well as corporations trying to move quicker than we can regulate it right and that's how I feel the same way here.

Madison has done one year Dane has done I think 18 months in the city of Minneapolis has also done a moratorium.

As you know data centers are not in our current zoning code they're also not like anything else that we've really experienced.

They're not your average office building or warehouse and what makes them so unique Mr.

Chair is their unique land use power uses energy uses water to those things that we have big question marks.

We don't know we don't know how it may impact any of those items that I've listed there.

And we do need regulation before this rapid expansion I think that if we're responsible and we don't just take chase new technology but we actually protect public interest this is the way we can welcome innovation into Milwaukee that actually fits in Milwaukee and not the other way around so um that is where we're at right now I think that the one year moratorium and pause um represents the time that we need to put in good strong rules and policy and place people first.

So that is where we're at right now.

I think that the one year moratorium and pause represents the time that we need to put in good strong rules and policy and place people first.

And again, it is my hope that we regulate it, but in the meantime, we must pause until we put people first and have the correct um regulations in place.

So again, like I said in the beginning, if you're confused, it's because it is confusing.

But both items are hopefully set to go forward.

I wanted the pause because I have experienced, I'm uh able to say that it has been much more difficult to get these regulations right and uh legally acceptable.

So in the meantime, we should pause and make sure that we do it right and put the people first.

Just curious, i if if the defect here is lack of notice.

There is no issues with the actual legislation itself, assuming proper notice is given.

Yeah, good morning, uh, Mr.

Chair Evan Goikey, city attorney.

Um we have a communication in the file.

Um, and part of why we're here is to uh is to to state essentially that.

I'm not here to say that the body has lacks the power to enact uh the file or to put the moratorium on.

Um it's just how that a file like this proceeds through this body uh in city government.

Correct.

Well, why don't we hold a special meeting in August?

Why how so uh ACA Joseph Dobbs is with me today?

It it has not had a public hearing.

The moratorium itself has not had a public hearing at uh CPC, and I don't believe that the proper notice has gone out in advance of today.

I think we were behind a deadline that we could not meet given state law's notice requirements.

CPC means that we're gonna be able to do that.

So it will be so for the moratorium it will be.

I understand why for the the other legislation.

So the moratorium itself will have to go before CPC.

I just got that information.

I'm sorry, that's correct.

This is because of or an issue that has become more apparent in recent case law.

A number of court cases that uh include uh the summit case, which affected short-term rentals, have shown that the uh Wisconsin courts are taking a broader view of zoning ordinances than maybe they did in previous years.

So our opinion is that even though the moratorium might not look like a traditional zoning ordinance in that it's directly making the zoning code itself look different, it still has effects which are similar enough that it needs to have the same notice requirements that are imposed upon zoning ordinances by state law.

Which is a class A, right?

The 30-day class one.

You're telling me that's debatable.

Okay.

I believe the current case law strongly uh says that the moratorium is a zoning ordinance.

I believe that most other municipalities that have tried to do uh moratoria or pauses like this have taken the same approach.

So donate to CPC fires?

Yes.

Okay.

I will like to see that of cases when the CPC next meeting.

Do they meet in August?

We do meet in August, but we wouldn't be able to make the class one notice because that that would need to be in time for the Z and D hearing.

Or who hearing?

The Z and D hearing.

So the path that we're scheduled for is that this wouldn't both pieces would move forward for the September 28th City Plan Commission meeting and be noticed as such, and then it could be to Z and D by October 6th, and then of course to common council by October 13th.

You can't do any of this in August.

We cannot because of the the noticing requirements for the moratorium, correct.

What's the penalty for doing it now?

Uh we would be breaking 66102 of the state statutes, which is our development moratoria statute that we have to follow.

And that's based on your your case law.

Courts have found that uh zoning ordinances are completely void if they fail these notice requirements.

And you're saying this is a zone ordinance based on there's no change, it's just stopping from building.

There's no change in zoning or or regulation.

Right.

It doesn't change the zoning ordinance itself, but courts have held that a pervasive uh land use prohibition is a zoning ordinance.

So because this is sort of downstream of where we normally look at zoning, it doesn't look like a zoning ordinance in quite the same way.

But the effects are similar enough that courts have looked at that and said it needs the extra notice requirement.

It's doesn't mean that we can't do it.

It just has to have that extra public hearing.

So what action by a developer triggers their property right?

Filing of a application for certificate for occupancy permit for a building permit.

What what actions trigger a property right, which then becomes unalterable by subsequent zoning action?

Well what action by a developer for property?

Uh proper a developer who's filed a permit before the moratorium takes effect would have a vested rights under the code and state law.

If they require a special use a zoning permit, they would that would count.

If it's an occupancy permit, I believe that would count as well in most cases.

I would have to.

The concern is is enterprising property owners seeing this on the horizon will rush in here, uh file speculative building permit applications to lock in their right to do what they please in a what's now an environment where there's no regulation whatsoever to avoid being regulated down the road.

That's a potential, right?

Uh potentially, yes.

Those applications would still have to be complete and satisfy the rest of the code, so there might be other issues with their ability to get them together that fast.

May I just add so from the many memos you receive from Jim O on this, you saw that things changed even the last two weeks.

In fact, I had spoken to colleagues two weeks ago mostly about substitute B, which was the regulatory path.

But now it is the opinion, and I can let them opine of the city attorney that even the substitute B has to go back for a CPC hearing because it changed significantly from the first.

And that is where at that point I was full of frustration and decided we need it's going to take longer on the regulatory piece, so we need to move forward in the moratorium.

That's a fact question, Rick.

Yeah.

That's not always true.

We've we've changed files before that have gone through CPC and then have to go back to C.

Who makes that judgment?

The regulations have not been to City Plan Commission yet.

They've only gone through ZCTC, the zoning co-technical committee.

So we are now on the and that will be noticed.

That's a class two notice, so we're prepared to do the noticing for that in early September, and we're committed to working with the lead sponsor and other sponsors to continue advancing that.

Because the concern I think is vertical data centers.

I mean, we don't have there's nowhere in the city of Milwaukee with enough empty land to support the thing like the thing they're building in Port Washington or Correct, and the proposed legislation is for much smaller square footage.

But you build a 10-story one.

That's a different story.

Right?

It could be correct, depending on locations.

But uh, we don't currently have formal inquiries for one right now.

So we certainly want to get really strong regulations in place.

I think that there's in there right.

There's reason to be concerned on industrial or former industrial, and these are the talks that I've had with my colleagues.

And the whole idea is to get out in front of it.

Often we're too slow and reactive, and this is to get out in front of it.

So you you know why why I start off by thanking you, Mr.

Chair, is none of this is not shocking to me.

It was shocking to me a few weeks ago, but I wanted to come to this committee and have at least a hearing and have the city attorney say it in open session, the challenges we have, because I don't want the public to think that we haven't been working on this urgent issue when really we have been.

And I've and we've been working very hard.

Assuming we can muster the council during August.

There's no way to schedule this in August, late August.

No way that that could be done.

The moratorium or the regulations or both.

The moratorium, I don't believe so.

I believe that's been explored fully by the city attorney's office.

And and this is the timeline at hand.

Really?

Oh, yeah.

We have a memo from Dave that lays out the opportunity for everything.

Um frame, but that's which is why I wanted to have this be at least the first step in the moratorium direction.

Um also want to politely mention, I know we have other co-sponsors here, but there is just, you know, you had committed to two or three members of the public that wanted to speak.

Well, okay.

I don't know what they want to speak about, but that because we're holding this.

So go ahead.

Okay.

Well, there's two online, and then there's one um from the American Lung Association.

All right, just everybody wants to speak.

If we're approaching the noon hour, there's still files.

Uh this is not going to move forward, so say your piece, but say it quickly, please.

I do want to be who's who's responsible for if a permit is applied for?

I'd like to be notified.

That would be the immediate, please.

The Department of Neighborhood Services Development Center.

If anybody applause, uh please let us know.

Yeah, we'll stay in very close touch because they've been collaborating on the regulations as well.

Okay, please.

Hi, thank you for uh allowing my testimony today.

My name is Molly Collins.

I'm the advocacy director for the American Lung Association here in Wisconsin.

Um, and one of our strategic imperatives is to champion clean air for all.

Um and more demand for data centers is uh a very big concern here because we know that they have a huge demand for electricity, which should be being met with clean renewable power to protect the health of our local families.

And We Energies has um not committed to doing this, and they're not retiring the coal plants that have been slated to come offline in 2024.

The Oak Creek methane gas plant is being expanded and similar projects are being developed around the state.

Plus, many data centers use diesel generators for backup power on site, subjecting local residents to cancer causing particle pollution.

All of this adds dangerous pollution into the air of surrounding communities.

Um we have data that shows how this impacts our community specifically.

Um the American Lung Association's state of the air 2026 report revealed that several Wisconsin counties, including Milwaukee, received failing grades for air quality.

Obviously, the last few weeks have shown that that doesn't always come from our local pollution, but can come from wildfire smoke.

Um but it's concerning because Wisconsin and Milwaukee specifically is regularly in the top five cities in the country for asthma prevalence, and we've been seeing the cumulative health um impacts from Milwaukee's non-attainment status for the 2015 ozone rule, and we can't afford to exacerbate that.

Thank you.

Next.

Thank you, Maui.

Thank you.

Either Molly uh Melody or Samantha go ahead.

So um my apologies.

Um yeah, my name is Samantha Ducas.

I'm an organizer with PS on Milwaukee.

Um I was at the um June CPC meeting where um the small data research facility um was purportedly um was purportedly uh on the was on the agenda.

Um I support um this data center moratorium um as uh Alder Roman Dmitrievich also already mentioned.

Um this is something that succeeded in both Dane County and the city of Madison.

Sheboygan recently passed one door county is considering one.

This is not unfamiliar to the state and to the country.

Um, and we've been working directly with Alder Woman Dmitrievich on um you know creating the best possible legislation and taking our time to do so to actually protect the community.

We've held a number of community meetings precisely around the data center issue where residents were very clear and demanding a moratorium.

Um, as such, I believe we have a de facto moratorium in Milwaukee.

Should anybody try to propose um building a data center, um they would be met with so much um undeniable and incontestable community pushback um that that would immediately be rejected.

Um I have no concerns about that because ultimately, you know, power comes from the people and we'd throw it down.

We are only asking um that you know the common council see that de facto moratorium and initiate a official moratorium.

Um should anything come in the time um between you know now and when we actually get that moratorium on paper, there will be a de facto community moratorium on this because of the generalized opposition.

Um I also want to echo um the need for this to be um citywide, it's not just affecting you know downtown high-rise buildings, although you know that is a genuine concern.

Um, it is affecting um the industrial buildings and old retail spaces that we've seen, which are not appropriate uses, you know, which a data center is not an appropriate use within.

Um so this is something the community desperately wants, needs, and will fight for um regardless of what comes before the CPC in August or September.

Okay, thank you.

We will fight back against the apologies for going on.

Just just for just so everybody watching understands if uh application is filed for a permitted use, it doesn't matter what the community says.

A permitted use, they have the right to move forward.

That's why we wanted to change the zoning code to make sure that opportunity didn't exist right now, it's wide open.

Correct, it it depends on the zoning.

The people that are in this business are well aware of the process.

You're making it you're helping.

It could be by right in some zoning districts, correct, based on how it would be classified in the zoning code and the other.

No, I don't want to give false impression out there that somehow we have remedies beyond the point that someone locks in their property right.

We don't necessarily have representations.

Right.

And with all the respect, I also doing this legislation.

I also didn't want to give the impression that we weren't that this council wasn't leading on that.

We've been consistent and we are leading on it.

We are spending a lot of time on it, so the public had to get an update on it.

Exactly.

Okay, who's next?

I believe um Ms.

McCurtis is our last speaker.

Good uh afternoon.

My name is Melody McCurtis.

I'm the deputy director and lead organizer at Metcalf Park.

I also live in the 15th district.

Yes, ma'am.

First off, I want to hey Russell.

I want to thank all of y'all for uh working on this.

I think it was important to bring this forth today so the community can see that our uh common council is working on this moratorium.

Um, as we work to create regular regulations to prevent this uh uptick of data centers.

Um right now I'm in the 15th district, we have the 30th Street Court, or like Alderman um Bauman said, anybody can come and apply to do a data center in any of those industrial buildings right now, as it says.

And like Sam to Sam's point, we're gonna push back.

I believe in the power of the people, the midtown data center development did not go through.

So we're gonna keep showing up.

What I will say to DCD is that there is a CPC hearing on August 17th, and I'm wondering why this was not put on that agenda for August 17th, so that it could still be moving forward while our full common council is at recess.

So I'll yield there.

I'm just uh trying to understand why uh I know order woman Demetri Avich has been working on this for a long time, as well as Alderman Russell Snapper, why this wasn't said on the forefront, you know what committees it needed to go through.

Um, any time the the community and people powered solutions is is coming to the forefront, we're always hitting roadblocks versus a developer that's trying to develop a data center like the midtown one.

So why wasn't this um talked about on the front end because they've been working on this for for over six months, and I'm trying to understand why that's not gonna be on the August 17th CPC agenda.

Okay.

Um someone asked for that.

I mean, it was directed to DCD.

I can just, as the author um we did switch gears and and I've been able to meet with um anyone from the building trades all the way to uh Sam and uh Melody there.

When it appears to me when we switch gears that the regulations were still encountering more time um constraints and went to the moratorium by the time the moratorium got written out and whatnot, I it sounded like it needed a I thought a 30-day notice.

If I'm I don't want to speak, I'm not a lawyer, so I don't want to speak like one, and it didn't seem like we would um have that opportunity in time.

And so it's because it uh what I'm learning is is that when we're getting into the zoning code here and it had to go back to CPC, it did have to have that full was it right, 30-day notice everything's class one, yeah.

And we a class one, and we weren't going to be able to hit that in time.

And it is essential that we do this right.

So um when was the moratorium legislation entered?

Um was that like a week ago, maybe it was officially drafted.

This is Dave Gelting from legislative reference bureau.

I mean, the title was in a while ago to try to keep that option on the table in the title, but um, yeah, maybe the the file was filled, maybe the 16th, I think.

It was really close.

If this could be on the this is a legitimate question, as she asked, absolutely and if this could be scheduled on the August CPC meeting, we it would be on that agenda.

Don't no questions.

I it cannot be filled the city attorney's office review of the if it was failed on the 16th, and CPC is on August 17th.

Could it not have been put on the agenda?

The necessary notice has to be published in the newspaper of record, that's the daily reporter, so it's not just that it's on Legistar in enough time, it has to go through the LRB process to get that published uh with the proper information.

So we can't uh we also can't make that publication just when the files opened, it has to be uh filled out with uh the actual text of the amendment as well.

Well, that's part of the process.

The question is why wasn't it done?

Why or why can't it be done now?

Well, in with the to get that into the newspaper, and that that are when when the file was filled, we were already like right up on that deadline, so we just missed that deadline as far as when we were able to get the file filled and talk to the city attorney and make sure that it was all good to go.

Then that to get to get it to the daily reporter is even ahead of when the daily reporter publishes it.

You know, so that deadline to get it to the daily reporter, we weren't able to get that in time to get to that August meeting.

So does the the ordinance or statute or whatever for the 30 days, does it say uh what is it that's the that's the same.

What is the 30 day notice explicitly contingent upon?

Yeah.

Not what practice is, but what do you think does the whatever statute or legislation you're filing?

What is it specifically saying?

The statute about development moratorium, moratoria, rather, states that there needs to be a hearing that has a what's called the class one notice.

So that's one uh newspaper publication of the details, 30 days ahead of the public hearing.

There is that is different than a normal zoning notice, which is the class two notice, which only needs to be done two weeks before the hearing.

I believe that there is a way to do the moratorium using the two-week notice.

It doesn't have to just be the 30-day notice.

Okay.

But the choice between those two paths and the security that that the 30-day notice allows is something that I believe was in discussion.

I'm not privy to the final determination to schedule at CPC or not.

Yeah.

Mr.

Chair, on that point notice.

So is it two or three, or can if it's two, we still got room.

We had room.

There is a specific state statute on development uh moratorium that has 30 days in state law.

And I think there was some ongoing debate about whether that statute would be applicable here or whether there could be you know a text amendment change that would have the two-week notice.

Uh look, I I understand how frustrated everyone is from the citizens that are joining us today to the members of the council.

Uh ultimately our advice is to try to protect what you all are trying to do to the greatest extent so that it has the lasting power.

The last thing that we want to do is to try to in an effort to rush, and I understand that time can be of the essence, and there's a balance there.

But the last thing, what what I really don't want to do is be at this table in two months to say we've been challenged because we didn't properly notice something, and now we have uh a much bigger window or opportunity as the regulatory scheme gets debated.

And and and so it is ultimately uh I think our position as we've uh outlined to Alderwoman Dmitrievich that we should be careful in doing this and provide uh provide that notice and and not get not risk it in in essence.

So belt and suspenders, in other words, correct?

Ultra cautious, ultra conservative.

In the meantime, we open up a huge window of vulnerability.

Mr.

Chair, on that point, yeah, in chambers.

This gives me uh I guess the question, I guess the uh qualifying question I need to ask is is this solely on moratoriums or just any legislation where like this three-week or two-week thing that's going on?

The 30-day requirement only applies to moratoria.

Okay.

And then it was heard at CPC literally three days later, and then it was passed, like in like this.

So I guess to that point, how can I guess with the regulation with the regulatory the C the Z T the Z C T C is the issue right now that we're going to far as pushing forward with that?

So, like how come we can't get that to CPC in August instead of the moratorium?

So the ZCTC meeting, if that is required for this, has to be scheduled within 30 days of the file being filled.

So we're within that window.

What we're talking about is the class one notice for the public.

I'm not talking about the moratorium.

I'm talking about just the actual legislation.

So zoning code text edits uh require class two notices, and so we will be proceeding with those as well for the legislation, so that all of these files are advancing.

However, wait a second though.

This is again, you're living what I'm living through these past couple months.

Is that when the regulatory piece was heard at ZTCTC?

It has changed substantially, right?

From ZTC to CPC.

It we had a sub A and we're now on sub B.

Sub B is also under I'll say major legal revisions.

Um and it's just taking time.

As soon as I felt that pressure, I immediately said we've got to go to the pause because it's gonna take longer than we thought, which is why across the country, most cities have done the moratorium because of this.

When I did the moratorium, I got dealt this new deck of cards.

So it has been challenging, which is why, again, back to full circle with the chair.

I thought it was a time that we had to come to public to let them know what we're doing and how challenging this is.

So Joseph, on that, thank you, Matt.

Thank you, uh, Autobahn Demetri Average.

Um so on that point, you see the moratoriums in whatever places they're saying, Dane County, Port Washington, or whatever.

Um, did they follow the same rules?

Did they follow the same 30-day rule as far as doing that?

Did we look into that?

Did we like how did this come about and like there's a there's a variety of choices that some of the smaller municipalities have, I think, taken uh substantially riskier positions doing things uh that I would not recommend at all.

I believe what Madison has done is to treat it as a zoning ordinance, treat it as a moratorium, lots of notice, lots of hearings, very few changes, I believe, after the initial proposal.

So trying to make as much out of those initial notices and hearings as possible.

And that's the path I want to go down here.

I appreciate it, and I know that's happening and just putting it out there.

I still don't appreciate how the thing like this just came out with my situation that's totally unrelated.

I'm just gonna put it out there in the record.

Um, but I I just think we do need to be more aggressive as far as this.

I mean, I I I'm having a little bit of frustration about our um consistent risk aversion approach that we've been taking.

Um, no disrespect.

I think y'all are a fine group of attorneys, and I uh I appreciate the leadership of City Attorney Gwicke.

Um I just think in some situations we gotta just go.

I'm gonna say it just go just go a hundred you know, my hundred miles an hour and just get to it.

Um but yeah, I'll just leave that there, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Anything else?

Well Alderman Jackson moves a hold it'll call it a chair.

Hearing no objections to order.

Oh no, you do want to add seven all on the other.

Yeah, please if you don't mind.

Yeah, no, no, thank you.

Yeah, appreciate that.

Uh um, yeah, and thank you guys, everybody who's been working on this.

Really appreciate Alderman Dmitrievich um taking some leadership on this.

I I fully support this.

I let's move forward as quickly as we can.

I hear and feel frustration about that as well.

Um, but I I I hear from the city attorney's office and from DCD that we are gonna be able to move as quickly as we possibly can.

Um here.

I mean, this is this is such a you know, it's such a huge issue.

So I'm just really glad that we're dealing with this.

I just want to say that like this, you know, we can be a leader here along with Madison and hopefully inspire the rest of the state.

I mean, I said to We Energy's that this is you know America's dairy land, not America's data land.

We've got to fight AI slop at every single point that we can.

And so I'm really glad that we're uh that we're doing this here.

Thank you guys for having this and thanks for having the agenda.

But to this point, sorry to this point, Broward, to the chair's point earlier, and to Miss Fonseco's point earlier, we don't have the land to do these massive AI data centers.

We don't.

Yeah, that's that's correct.

Not the not the hyperscale ones.

Yeah, we we we don't.

So I I we needed more, we need the the legislation, we need the regular the regulations, you know, guard rails far as this 100% for sure, because I don't want that stuff in in my area.

Um, but I think that we need to be mindful because there are places here already.

And um, you know, and I'm going to foresee there there will be other places here.

So we just had to be mindful um of you know how we approach this because I don't feel the necessary need to get sued, but I think we need to need to make sure, make sure we have the guardrails.

That's why I'm in full support of your legislation um and making sure that we do what we have to do, but you know, just let's just get it done.

That's all.

Thank you.

All right, all right.

Real quick, Mr.

Sure.

Can you give me those timelines uh for as soon as possible again?

So the city plan commission meeting is September 28th, and then the next Z and D meeting is October 6th, and common council following that is October 13th.

So our sub tight do we have to do any more changes all to one?

It is not tight.

I wish it was, but it is not tight.

It means on the regulatory stuff, there's a a great deal of work to do on the regulatory piece, the substance.

The pause.

Oh, the pause, sorry, because there's two separate things.

The pause is going to move forward in the schedule that's been laid out.

Okay.

Um has had has faced some setbacks.

Gotcha.

But thank you, everybody.

I'm committed.

I hope I only have to come before you a few more times.

Um Melanie Arians also provided this um artwork that I said I would show.

Um you can take it any way you want, but I thought it was kind of nice.

Um we will we will get this done.

Thank you, everybody, for spending time with me.

Thank you.

Very good.

Thank you.

No objections for order.

We have a few more files to go through that'll be done quickly.

Yeah.

That brings us back to item 12, file 260451.

No, I got plenty.

She wants us to use them.

Resolution authorizing the redevelopment authority of the city of Milwaukee to enter into an amended ground lease with the Board of Regions of the University of Wisconsin system operating at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee for the property at 2185 North Prospect Avenue in 1925, East Kennelworth Place in the third aldermanic district.

Very so-called torpedo factory, is that correct?

Yeah, that's the one.

Yeah, yeah.

Uh so just a little quick history.

We do not own it.

We have a ground, we do have a lease though.

Uh so for in 2005.

We worked at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, who the state does own the building.

Um they gave us a ground lease to leverage some redevelopment revenue bonds.

They had uh borrowed 68 million dollars.

Rackham was the uh conduit for that.

Okay, so we have a ground lease and an operating lease that were established at that time.

They're two different dates for each.

They're asking that they they they move the one the operating or the ground lease from 2071 to 2036 to match up with the operating lease.

Not an issue for us.

They're paying the death service, no risk to Rackham or the city.

Uh we don't have any issues with it, but it helps them lease the space out.

I assume there it is.

I was talking with somebody in the audience.

Sponsor Alderman Brown, he's great with this.

Yeah, the UWM.

Okay.

Oh, yeah, oh, yeah, yes.

I didn't realize I'm I didn't realize we were out of order on the uh because we spoke sometimes.

Yes, uh, we've reviewed this.

Our office supports this.

I do want this to happen.

Very good.

Alderman moved to adopt hearing no objections to order.

Item 13, file 26042.

Resolution authorizing the sale back of former two former owners of the city owned tax deed property located at 920 South 33rd Street in the 8th Aldermanic district.

Hello, Cindy Rice Smith with DCD.

Um, yes, we just have the four files for the repurchase of the properties.

Okay, any questions about this?

Hearing none, Alban Jackson moves recommended adoption, hearing no objections to order.

Item 14, file 2604.

Resolution authorizing the sale back to former owners of the city owned tax deed property located at 2976 North 21st Street in the sixth aldermanic district.

Any issues here, Aldwyn and Cogs?

No.

Okay, very good.

Aldwood and Cog move the recommended adoption, hearing no objections to order.

Item 15, file 26045.

Resolution authorizing the sale back to former owners of the city owned tax deed property located at 3269 83 North 11th Street in the 6th Aldermanic District.

Okay, any issues.

Move adoption by Aldwood and Cogs.

So hearing no objections so order item 16, file 26046.

Resolution authorizing the sale back to former owners of the city owned tax deed property located at 2859 North 22nd Street in the 15th Aldermanic District.

Alderman Stamper.

Move approval.

Adoption has been moved.

Hearing no objections so ordered.

That does conclude our agenda.

We're adjourned.

Thank you.