Yeah, tried to run with it and software you can sure.

Okay, just do it.

All right, everybody.

Let's go ahead and get started.

It's 5 30.

Welcome to the City Council conference for Tuesday, September 9th, 2025.

We have one item on the agenda, and it is a presentation and discussion regarding the urban forestry master plan.

And we have city staff here from to uh talk to us about that.

Hello, thank you.

I'm James Briggs.

I'm the uh park development manager.

Um I am actually in charge of our city, our entire city forestry crew.

What you see here.

We have one.

We have another so uh we are excited about this.

It's been a long time coming.

So back in 24, we contacted and contracted with Davy Resource Group to produce an urban forest master plan, included a process of uh assessing the current state of forestry division here, gathering input from steering committee.

We had stakeholder meetings, we had public meetings, we had a lot of uh data come in, and we'll go over that as you see in the presentation.

We compared Norman's forestry division to cities of similar size, city is of similar region, and also to national uh standards as far as how forestry divisions operate.

Um Davey worked in close partnership with all different city staff.

We had meetings, uh, focus groups with different um departments, see how they interact with forestry.

Uh because it's you know public works, every utilities will all interact with our tree canopy.

So we're trying to achieve a uh urban forest master plan, which is sort of helped guide the work of forestry division in the city, all of us for the next 20 years, 15 to 20 years.

So after months and months of public study, Davey presented us a Norman Forest Master Plan draft.

We reviewed it, and then we kind of tweaked it to make sure it aligned up graphically and um philosophically with community wildfire protection plan, which y'all saw recently and we adopted um with the uh parks and rec and culture master plan, which we did as part of the A Norman process.

Graphically it looks the same as those, so they all kind of marry together.

Um parkboard last week, actually.

So it's it went through park board last week, and uh they had a couple little comments, but we're uh excited to share with us tonight.

We have Dana Carcher, who is the urban and community forestry specialist with Davy.

I'm gonna let her go through her presentation and excited to get this done.

Thank you, James.

Thank you for having me here.

I've been in this room before talking about trees.

I think it was in 2019 I came and visited, and um we had a really good conversation, and I love where this has gone and what has happened in this community.

So we'll start here.

This is our agenda.

We'll go through the process that Davy does.

Um we'll talk a little bit about the urban forest, what your urban forest looks like, what the program actually looks like, how it hop how it operates and how it works, and the most important thing really are recommendations.

So with our planning process, we really talk about it's a 20-year guide, right?

It's going to show um not only citizens, but it will also show internally what will happen, what should happen with Norman Tree Norman's trees over the next 20 years.

It sets goals that we worked on together, and then of course, recommended action steps to achieve those goals.

We use a typical planning process when we do this, adaptive management.

We look at what the city has, what they want.

That's partly through community engagement.

How do we get there?

What are the steps that are needed to grow the urban forest, grow the canopy?

We talk a lot about that.

And then how are we doing this really the role of Norman?

And how do you what are those benchmarks that you can measure yourself against or into the future?

Here's where we started.

I think this timeline really goes way back when we started having conversations a long time ago.

But we really started the project in uh 2024, late summer.

It was hot.

I remember being here.

Um and I lived in Texas then, probably too at that time.

Uh then we really went through the plan and the policies and the program review in the winter, and then we also worked on stakeholder engagement.

I had the opportunity to come here and do some stakeholder engagement.

My colleague also did as well, Sandra Albro.

We did public engagement with um, and we showed them draft recommendations as well.

We wrote the plan over the last few weeks, gave it to the team, they gave us feedback, and now we're in the final plan um stages.

We had a couple community meetings.

We had a steering committee, which people have the opportunity to take a look at it, both internal and external.

We did some focus groups, a lot of interviews that gives us that real detailed information that we need to determine where uh what people really want and what are obstacles also in growing the urban forest.

We did a community survey, and then of course, like I said, we had two community meetings, which were um one was held on a very rainy Saturday, and we still had fairly good attendance.

We asked, you know, people where they lived, and uh a lot of people live in Norman and they don't know where they oh they don't know what their award is.

Um this is not this is this is typical.

Um but 84 percent feel there are too few trees, and um in the park system, and many feel that is extremely important to have more trees in their neighborhood.

These are not unusual findings in any way.

So a little bit about the urban forest, really what is an urban forest?

It's all of the trees in the community.

Um they add shade, they have environmental benefits, they add beauty, and it's not just the trees that the city manages, although this is somewhat what this focuses on.

It's the trees throughout the community.

So a lot of conversation at the community meetings about the trees on their streets, the trees in their yards, and the trees and in the um, you know, at churches and schools and things like that.

So people really have a good concept of what the urban forest is in Norman.

The tree cover in Norman.

This was um from the the map on the um right is from the community wildfire protection plan, and that showed a 30% canopy.

Um, and then the the the one on the right, or I'm sorry, the one on the left is um from the American Forest, and that's a tree equity score map.

Both of those, the one on the left is uh free and available to anybody, so we included that in there.

Um and then the um community wildfire protection plan, you can see that grayed out area.

That's where the developed area and that's where the most canopy is.

I will say that one thing, and I think we go into this a little more detail.

Canopy is growing where you're growing because you're planting new trees, but there's also concern about trees being removed from development.

We had the pleasure of coming in as part of this project and doing a park tree inventory.

We um brought in, I think three foresters to do that, and they came out into the field and found 5,775 trees.

There is some breakdown in what that looks like.

Remember, these are only park trees, too.

That we did.

Of course, eastern red cedar is your number one.

You're not alone in that either, just so you know.

Uh lace bark elm, bald cypress, American Elb, and Lop Lolly Pine are really the major trees in the area.

Um, there's a rule, and it says you should have no more than 10% of one species.

So you're very close to approaching that with eastern red cedar.

We didn't include Sutton or the other wildland parts.

No, there are no there are other wildlife parts that were not.

5,700 without Sutton Wilderness or Saxon or Ruby Grant.

Yeah, that's right.

Council McPico.

Just real quick.

Do we have any plans for these or researcher?

Because isn't that an invasive tree as well?

Recommendation.

Okay, thank you.

We'll get there.

Thank you.

If we don't answer that, we'll come back.

Okay.

But we really like to talk about what the benefits of trees provide.

This is important for community meetings and community engagement because these are the actual dollar values that these trees provide annually.

So stormwater, carbon capture, um, absorbing pollutants, those are the things that trees do day in and day out as they just sit there.

The community really thought that cooling, create cooling shade was very, very important to them, and providing wildlife habitat was the other second thing that was the um the highest for them.

Um I think that there was a lot of discussion around building neighborhood character in the community meeting that I led, and I think that that was probably a bit lower because we talked about it so much.

And uh, there's other things that you know people don't really know about about improving mental and physical health, those are some of the newer kinds of sciences that are around urban forestry.

And I bet you that that 19% on reducing stormwater runoff would have gone up if we'd had the meeting after that rainstorm that we had to drive through to get to um to leave the leave the area.

So, this is a little bit about the forestry activities of your forester.

One of the things that I want to say is that in um we do a lot of plans across the country, and and you do a lot with a little, you do a lot with a little.

It's really important to give the credit for that.

But 687 trees were planted, which is really good.

Um trees were pruned, trees were removed, and 900 trees were given away.

Giveaway trees are great, they help increase the idea of the the role of citizens in urban forestry.

But at the same time, forestry staffing is pretty low.

So those numbers does uh would you go back to that, please?

If I know how, just a moment.

There we go.

This is a big computer, fancy.

Uh oh, I went the wrong way.

Yeah, this one.

I can't touch it.

There you go.

So that's trees planted by the city of Norman.

Is that and trees pruned, 85 trees removed by the city of Norman?

Does that include a street project that removes trees?

But is also adding them.

I think so.

We got that down from a tree city USA reports like and some of those numbers are skewed a little because it was during some of our big Norman Forward projects where we planted a lot of trees.

So the number went way up during some of those.

Like there was you know, a hundred and something trees planted at Reeves.

There was, you know, maybe a hundred and grand, several at the Wi Facts.

So some of those numbers run usually higher in some of that time.

So that would include trees that we've had to remove for whatever reasons and then trees that might have been removed because of a city project that was going on.

Okay.

All right, that's more on the 900 trees given away.

When we give away trees, are we handing out a brochure that's like right tree right place?

And they get actually talked to by our forester.

I think everybody gets talked to by Colin when they get their tree.

So here's the brochure where it says is it so it's kind of a it has both both planting instructions on one side and right to your right place ahead.

So great, awesome.

Thank you.

So, in terms of staffing, um, there's three staff members in the parks maintenance division that spend part-time one third or more on trees themselves.

Um, there's one person for proactive maintenance, and um, and then there's contractors for uh larger and immediate jobs, and then utility forestry, of course, is managed by the um corporate corporation commission.

And one thing that um we should note is that um I do work for a big tree contractor, and I say this anyway.

It costs more money to hire us than it does to have internal staff.

So that's been proven out a number of times.

And this is kind of what that staffing looks like.

So there's Colin down there in the green at the bottom.

And um, the people that help him when he has the opportunity, the US average, as you can see, and then cities with 100,000 to 250,000 have quite a bit, had quite a few more.

So, one thing to keep in mind is that um park maintenance staff, this is park maintenance staff, and so we're trying to compare apples to apples in this as best as we can.

Many cities have both manage both street trees and park trees, and that's their full that's their full department.

So when you look at the forestry budget, uh 450,000 dollars, you can see how um it is um divided up here, pruning removal is the largest cost.

That generally is um what goes on with cities.

Umagement, planting, and tree giveaway are the other categories that fit into that.

It is a small portion of the municipal budget.

Yeah, we can back our way into it.

So this is what it would it looks like in comparison to other cities, cities in the south, cities of the same size, and then all cities.

And this was out of a study that was done nationwide that is um used quite a bit for this kind of comparison.

I looked at this slide a little bit more closely yesterday as I was getting ready for this again, and the action center requests I think are really important.

So 40% of other debris is storm debris, is where you know, much many of those requests come from.

But if you go down there to emergency tree blocking services, and if you go down to emergency tree limb and emergency fallen tree, and you add all those up together, that's gonna be a significant portion of the action center requests with proactive maintenance, you end up um with less of those requests, and that's one thing to keep in mind for the future.

Also, um, and talking to my colleague with this, the private tree request takes the time of the forester to talk to people about their trees.

And you know, one thing about a good urban foresters are also really good with PR, and I think that you've got that going on here, but you do need to know that it does take time.

And the public concerns kind of mirror that whole thing with 44% um of people see downside in trees, you know, during storms.

And I know that people who've lived here for a long time have gone through some ice significant ice storms, some significant winds, and so they're worried about that.

And the other concerns are of course causing damage to utilities because their uh their electricity, uh, their power goes out, lifted damage, sidewalks, block signs, street lights, and visibility.

Trees are some people are concerned about the expense to maintain them, and that they drop leaves, seeds, fruit, and other debris.

We could use that number two on.

You can just bury as many of them as possible.

So we have some recommendations here.

And the first one is really about establishing a forestry unification crew within parks and recreation to grow the opportunity for Colin to have some people he could depend on to help him become a more proact proactively maintain the trees.

Acquire a grapple truck, a very important tool in urban forestry to handle the large woody debris so he doesn't have to contract that out.

Create a forestry standard operating procedures manual so that once he gets a crew, everybody knows what they're doing and they're all on the same page, and then release annual reports, meaning come report to you and tell you how it's all working.

Now it gives you an idea of what it would look like if we actually if you actually added more people and how you would catch up to the US average.

So it's a three-person tree tree crew and a chief as well, crew chief as well.

And that's what the budget would look like if we add if we added 1.4 million.

So you would take it up to equivalency of the programs in the South that were reviewed.

So recommendation two is to prioritize the maintenance of public trees.

And so we talk a lot about routine cycles.

So some cities really depend on this, and that they touch a tree every five years or every 10 years.

After 2008, Los Angeles went from a seven-year cycle to a 56-year cycle.

So it's important that funding may get maintained.

And cities vary on what they believe is the right cycle.

In urban forestry, it's this five to ten years is really pretty normal.

And then watering and caring for newly planted trees, that's a it's a priority maintenance idea.

When you care for a young tree, the first three to five years of its life, you could do it from the ground.

So you can create its shape and it can be it will grow better and need less pruning later on.

So that's one of the reasons why this is one.

And then enlist contractors for high priority removal and pruning, the big things, that you know, the giant trees that that Colin's team doesn't really want to deal with.

And then protecting the urban urban sport forest.

So recommend tree species, they're climate and pest resilient.

So climate with climate change, species are changing.

We're seeing more trees from central and south Texas that work up here.

And also there, there's new recommendations that came out from the USDA about two years ago.

So those tree lists are starting to reflect those changes.

Measure and track citywide tree canopy.

So although you have a tree canopy study that came out of the community wildfire protection plan, uh canopy study that can drill down a little bit deeper and see where trees need to be planted and what where what species need to go where will be really beneficial for you so that you can determine how much canopy you really want and need.

And then monitor and manage invasive species and pests.

There's a lot of things out there, emerald ash borer, um like the red cedar.

Right, there you go.

Yeah, monitor and manage invasive species and pests, yes.

So emerald ash borer is here, it's in Oklahoma.

Um, it is marching up from Texas as quickly as it can.

And um, it is um it is devastating to ash trees.

But there's others, and we detail those really in the plan as well.

And then support the park-related recommendations for the community wildfire protection plan, which we actually put in there as well, and then partner with nonprofits and volunteers on invasive species removal and ecosystem restoration.

Uh a program doesn't live in a loan, and there are citizens who want to help.

And that's the beauty of a community that um you know that came out to the community meetings and learned and talked to Colin about what can be done.

So I think that you have a really good start on that potential there.

Recommendation four is planning for sustainable growth, and that's um, you know, this is a growing community, and I I think that you've you know that probably better than anybody.

So, what is happening in the to the trees as this growth happens, whether they're being planted, being required to be planted, or whether or not they're being removed, those are all real critical things.

Identify priority tree planting areas for human and environmental health.

You can do that through a canopy study.

Um expand neighborwoods program to plant trees in lower canopy areas because that is what that American forest map showed that there are areas of low canopy that need more trees, and then work with other city divisions to plant along trails, bike lanes, and improve streets, and then study that tree canopy change by land use, which is um rather than just saying, well, we're gonna plant a bunch of trees here because there's an open space, that may be an open space on purpose, like a baseball field, and we're not planting trees there.

So you want to make sure that it's done by what you know by land use, and then review the development related impacts during pre-development planning.

So before the lot gets scraped, what's going to happen to those trees?

And then promote the right tree in the right place.

I love that this already came up once.

So provide resources that help residents, uh businesses and developers choose the right species, right?

Things are changing, new species, go to the nurseries, look to see what's out there, and promote programs that preserve historically significant trees.

This was something we heard that people like their big trees and they want to make sure that they're um that they are saved, and then pilot a volunteer program that trains residents to serve as neighborhood tree liaison so that they can keep an eye on things, you know.

Even if you add 3.1 people to the staff, it's still small, and so people who are engaged and concerned can help and support what's happening.

Councilman.

Um I was curious about the programs for historically significant trees, what qualifies a tree as historically significant, and are those resources in Oklahoma?

Um there are, yeah, it's up to the community what the standard is.

And you know, in some cities, it's um every tree over a certain um size, some cities it's um specific species that have to be saved.

In Austin, Texas, it's all their oaks, every oak, and every tree that isn't an ash tree right now.

Every one of those trees is considered to be preserved.

Historic ones are treated even more differently.

So it kind of depends on the community.

So Norman would need to develop its own historically significant tree program.

Yeah, and I think that you have a lot of citizens who are interested in that.

So you would you would you would find a um there's a happy medium in there, I guess is the best way for me to say that.

We are as a side note again.

Uh Davy helped us get started on this.

We're revising our tree ordinance.

It includes a whole section about kind of like the historic district.

Uh neighbors able to apply to be hit a historic tree district.

So, say the Oklahoma, where all the uh sycamores are, and they can apply in 51%.

We do that, we're working out the the working and all that to create these, and it doesn't make them our trees, but it allows us to help with the maintenance and then replacement of those trees half time goes on.

So we we are working on a way to just officially designate through the will of the people this area from this block to that block is a historic tree district.

Um, so that's sort of the angle we're doing.

That has a wonderful canopy of old trees.

Correct, and you know, and and people don't think about like Brookhaven as a really old neighborhood.

There's a lot of big trees out there too.

So if they want to apply for that area too, there's there's some older neighborhoods that are that aren't even in the core anymore that probably have areas that could say we're historically significant tree district or historic tree district.

So we're working that out, and it'll be coming to you soon, sooner than later.

Thank you.

Only one tree thing at a time, though.

Yeah.

Wild power, one maybe.

Right, right.

Um, so the last recommendation is partner on plan implementation.

So this this can't be done alone, and so we suggested that there's a review process for the team to come in front of the parks board and say, This is what we've done, and this is where we are, and this is where we're having challenges because you know, it doesn't always go as smoothly as we can write it all down on paper, but there may be something that happens like a huge ice storm that just puts it sets everything back.

So we want to make sure that there's that open communication.

Um volunteer planting days, tree care events, and educational workshops.

You've got some great resources.

Um, the state urban forestry coordinator is one of his one of Colin's friends, and so there's a lot of people who want to help, and um, I think that that's a really good thing as well.

And large institutions and businesses need to create tree plans.

You've got them some major landholders here that also they're part of the canopy, they are part of the canopy themselves, so you want to make sure that they're on board with what you're doing as well.

Um, partnerships and communications with utility forestry.

When I was in this room in 2019, that was the major part of our conversation, and it's come a long way since then, but I still think that there's there's we think there's more possibility there for more interaction.

And then participate in regional forestry networks to share information.

So there are some outstanding opportunities in Oklahoma.

There's some really great things in Northern Texas.

There are um conferences all over the country to get ideas and to learn from, and we suggest that the network we built and to get ideas and learn more.

So that is what I've got.

Okay.

Thank you for the presentation.

Do we have any questions, comments?

Council Pico?

Just one.

I saw you said he ran proposing a million dollar increase to the budget.

Is that what I saw?

That it's about 490,000 now and is going to go to 1.4 or something.

That's correct.

That's what it's I just I was curious.

I was curious if that was all staff, or if there was anything else of that money was going towards.

That was the staffing.

That's just for staff.

Yes, staff.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah, the grapple truck is probably one point.

I don't know how much ground truck is.

That's the one with the biggest.

Yeah, that's the one that yeah, it does that.

And it's interesting, and what I'm seeing across the country is more and more cities are getting grapple trucks because more and more cities are taking down logs in workable sizes so that they can actually reuse that wood.

And if you take them down this big, there's nobody but turn and bowls, you know, this big, you can make lumber.

That's a good point.

Because you could also use those for little trash pickup as well.

I don't know if that's the same truck, but it's just pretty close there.

Um I was curious about federal funding.

Um has that been slashed?

And that a lot has been slashed.

But I I spent a lot of time on the phone counseling a lot of people after the election this year with what happened.

So many of projects are gone.

Much of the federal funding was gone.

So that was mostly um there in the last budget, it was uh the urban community forestry program was zeroed out at the national level.

It was brought back for it's in the budget for next year.

Um, so there are pass-through grants, usually through states.

However, those are not very big.

Um, in in my notes, and I didn't read it because it's so negative, but it's time to stop.

Um it's time to stop depending on federal funding.

Um, urban community forestry has really um it's grown in cities, and there are many states that do not have anything but federal funding, they will no longer have a program this year.

I I live in one of those Colorado.

How do other cities finance uh tree maintenance?

So they there's a variety of ways.

Um they um they use um tax money through, like for example, City of Sacramento um used to use their gas tax money.

That's one of the ways that they did it.

Um mostly it's general fund.

Um it's um it really does come out of the general fund for the most part.

Um the there are um trying to think of other cities.

Denver uses uh uh has a use tax um that they have.

Um their parks, they have a parks board that does um, so they have parks and streets separately.

So they do um their parks board has uh uh parks tax within their um property taxes, so mostly tax funded.

Okay, thank you.

Councilman's beer.

I just like to say that one, what a great job that you do by yourself over there, you know, with a little bit of a guidance and everything like that.

But the work of 11 men, right?

But in the business world running businesses and stuff in the past and everything, it is never a good business practice to only have one person that works there and does everything because Lord forbid if you lose that one person, you just lost all that knowledge.

So I think that what we need to do, you know.

We might not be able to come up with a million for all the ask, but maybe you know, little by little, one person here, one person there.

That way he's able to share that wealth of knowledge, bring in some younger people with new ways of thinking also to help where they can collaborate together and come up with even greater ideas and everything like that, and be able to spread this word quicker where with one person trying to do all of this on their own.

I mean, it's going to take a lot longer time and everything.

So I think as a city protecting the assets of our trees for the future, an investment would be good to have somebody else too there.

Your priorities are our priorities.

Uh we are about that close to starting budget development all over again.

And uh we're happy to take that uh direction and bring it back to you and what that final document will look like.

I would say um if we can identify cost savings that we pay for it, as mentioned like what are we spending on debris removal, tree removal, storm cleanup.

We haven't had like a major big storm lately think that we've had a few in the past in the last decade, 15 years that we know.

But um, but anyway, if there are cost savings that we can identify on uh storm cleanup contracting, as you mentioned, if we're not having to hire a professional company for something because we are able to do it, because we have the grapple truck or whatnot, um how much of an impact could that have if we could identify those savings.

Um then the because I was just mentioned to you if we were to increase put to voters to ask them to increase the visitor tax again in the near future.

Um would uh we could probably dedicate propose dedicating a piece of that to this parks function because part of it already does go to parks and wrecks, so uh maybe that's something we can think about uh going down the road, and maybe we can get the public to get behind that too as a possible funding source.

Um and then I mean, I would like to see us really be aggressive about uh our policy on planting street trees and any street projects that we do that uh you know, we if we have to remove a tree, we put four of them back or something like that, you know.

Um that's just the example, but being aggressive about what we can do on city property where it's makes sense and is responsible to uh plant as many trees.

Some of the best, I mean, to me, the best streets in Norman are the ones that are tree-lined.

And I know that can be an issue if we're not taking real as good of care of them as we need to, and there's a storm and there's debris, but I mean, yeah, the best streets in Norman are the ones that are tree lined, you're stuck at the light, and you got this big tree that's blocking the sun, so you're not baking.

I mean, it's just uh, and it just it makes the city look nicer, it makes the neighborhoods look nice, and um yeah, yeah, it is.

It's always been one of my favorite things about Norman.

And we see when shriveled trees get cut down how like physically emotional people can get about that.

And so I feel that way sometimes I felt that way about the trees at Reese Park on Long Jenkins, you know, and so um so yeah, I'd I'd like to see us add into our plan being just as aggressive as possible on our projects when it comes to landscaping and tree requirements.

But I think we got a pretty good thing in front of us to a guide, a roadmap to to follow here.

And so, is there any other comments, questions, Councilor Fico?

I know we didn't talk about it at the retreat as a priority, but we had discussed that idea of a tree retrofit program six, eight months ago.

Basically, taking existing parking lots in places that don't have trees and figuring out a fund or a mechanism to retrofit those parking lots with trees.

So I'd like to see that come back sometime.

The hand for Hanford California policy.

What incentive might we offer to I worked on that policy.

Oh, really?

Yeah, because I worked on the one in Bakersfield and Baker's soldier and Hanford.

Um I was I uh took my dad there out there to the west coast to see the Pacific Ocean two summers ago, and we stayed in Bakersfield at a friend's house, and then I drove we drove up to Hanford because I wanted to see the birthplace hometown of Steve Perry of Journey that's what people who go to the Valley did.

But also because it's where we hired Daryl from uh was Hanford.

Nice!

And uh so I wanted to see what it was like where Daryl.

Fisher Valley, and uh we needed to use the bathroom, and I couldn't really find anywhere out there, actually.

And so we looked up where the nearest Walmart Super Center was, went to it, and I had never seen a big box retail strip mall have so many trees in the parking lot.

Like every fourth space, there was a big tree, like the whole parking lot was like shaded.

I never seen anything like that.

About every four spaces, right?

And it was like had all the drainage of the parking lot was going into the tree wells, and your work dynamic.

That part was not.

They modeled the they we had a we had one at parking lot shade ordinance and bakershield that we modeled off of Davis.

And I worked for the tree nonprofit at Bakersfield at the time.

And so then Hanford called us and said, What'd you guys do?

And so you must have been there when that happened.

Yeah, that's awesome.

I had text Errol while I was at there and sent me a photo.

I was like, yes, this is a Walmart.

It looks really good.

I've ever seen I think it's you when you brought that up.

Look at a canopy when you look at the canopy and you look at what heat island.

Um we talk a lot about heat island, but cities all all parts of cities are becoming heat islands right now, but parking lots in particular are that area that is really really bad.

So only thing you can do to offset a big asphalt parking lot.

Only option available is to in a neighborhood where there's a tree canopy and the houses have a lot of tree coverage.

And I've lived in one that's had almost entire tree coverage except for in the morning.

And I think about when I see houses that have no trees around them, and I think that house is just from sunrise to sunset, is baking in the sun, the attic, and your heat your running seeds.

If you don't have any trees at all, so I yeah, um, anyway, so okay.

Well, I really appreciate uh the work on this, and I think we got a pretty good thing to pursue on this with funding and other ideas where we can maybe reduce some costs and all that.

So any other final comment or anything?

Okay.

Thank you for the opportunity for us to think it's been great.

All right.