Good morning, everyone.

Welcome to the economic development committee work session on Bill 39-26, Montgomery Canning Urban District, Sweden Urban District Boundaries Amendment.

Very excited about this event, this effort to move it forward.

For the record, we have Councilmember Evan Glass online, and I'm here with Council Vice President Balcom.

Uh let's start by turning this item to staff.

All right, I can very quickly run through the packet.

It's pretty simple.

The bill itself is a series of meets and bounds, which are a little complicated as all of our urban district uh bills uh tend to be.

Um but basically the the thrust of the bill is that it would expand the geographic scope of the Wheaton Urban District to include

the

Wheaton Library and Community Recreation Center and Wheaton Local Park, as well as the right of way along Georgia Avenue to connect those spaces to the current district.

Uh the most useful tool for folks to see what's going on here is on circle page six of the packet, which includes the map.

Um I'll quickly kind of run through the packet and then we can turn over to our invited guests if that's okay with you, Chair.

Um so the uh just quickly through the impact assessment, impact statements, little to no impact on climate, uh positive impact on racial equity and social justice, the fiscal impact for FY27 had a one one time $70,000 vehicle purchase and then a $10,000 uh fiscal impact for each year thereafter.

Uh the public testimony was uniformly in support of the bill.

Uh there are no amendments, so that's all I have to report.

And I can turn it over to our guests.

Yes.

Good morning, uh, Council President Natalie Fenny Gonzalez, Nadia Clude, uh Mid-County Regional Service Center Director.

Good morning, Councilmember uh Balcom and Councilmember Glass.

Um, yes, as discussed today, this is something that we have been um as part of the U Wheaton Urban District.

We have already been covering some of the areas and the maintenance.

I think this will make it a lot more official.

As you guys know, expanding this with the art center that is coming up in the upcoming years.

I think this is a great highlight to ensuring that we're enhancing all of those spaces.

Now I will pass it to Crystal Reese, uh, Wheaton Urban District Manager.

Hi, Crystal Ruiz, the Wheaton Urban District Manager.

Good morning, Council President Benny Gonzalez, Councilmember Bellcombe and Councilmember Glass Online.

Um we are really excited to make it official, uh, the work that we're already doing.

Our clean team is down servicing the library regularly, and we think we can bring um a wonderful impact to the community there by beautifying the public right of way and providing um an extended service.

If you've been down to the Marion Friar Town Plaza recently, you'll see the beautiful flowers, the amazing grass that the team keeps beautifully green that that you know our public spaces are an excellent service to the community.

We feel like that that extends and it should extend to the Wheaton uh library and rec center as

well.

Excellent.

Thank you so much for the feedback.

Can you go back on the issue with assumption of the car, the vehicle?

Yeah, what is that about?

As it stands right now, the clean and safe team utilize a warehouse that's within walking distance to the urban district.

So our vehicles are aging, you know, between 12 and 15 years old.

We actually just replaced our 20-year-old dump truck.

Um, so we need a reliable vehicle that will continuously provide us service to that location because it is not within walking distance with equipment and tools.

So we feel like it would it would only make sense.

We would never want to be in a position where we have an event or something happening, and we could not provide the level of service that our community expects from us that they see regularly to that boundary.

So it's a one-time purchase.

Well, it's on the record.

I want to I wanted an explanation for that, because you and I was wondering.

Um, but thank you for that.

Uh

I'm gonna turn it to my colleagues.

Does anybody have any questions?

Council Vice President Balcom.

Um yeah, I I don't have any questions, but this just makes sense.

I I would say that the the truck um maybe uh shouldn't be assigned to this expansion.

It sounds like you needed the truck in the first place.

Um, and uh now that it's all uh one urban district.

Uh we don't make that distinction between the old urban district and the new part of the urban district.

So I just questioned that when when I saw that too.

Um, but it absolutely makes sense to expand to the library in the park.

And um, and um it also we're in the middle of this discussion about the funding of urban districts and bids and main streets, and so it makes sense to get this done uh prior to to determining what we're gonna do in the future.

So I appreciate