I think they're asking us to just let him get through all the information because there may be a lot of data that you know, and then we can ask the questions, knowing how detail-oriented and eager all of us are.

Um with that, uh I will uh hand it over to Mr.

Kimbrell.

Good morning.

Yes, uh, it is a pleasure to have your first item back.

Uh you know, a lot of history here, of course, uh as mentioned.

Um I can say with some level of confidence.

I hope the rest of your agenda items uh get better from here from this one.

Uh just kind of set the stage with assessments program in Raleigh, it dates back to the 50s.

Um and yes, a tremendous amount of history to unpack, and I just do ask for uh a little bit of grace as uh we we did our best to focus on the key details.

Um to give you some indication of that, one of the projects that'll show up uh has is origin uh originally uh authorized when I was in high school.

Um just a couple years ago, to be clear.

Uh so as we go through this, uh we'll start with kind of high level what is an assessment, what are project types uh that have been hit assessed historically, uh the options for pending projects.

So, and and you'll hear me say this a couple of times.

When we say pending, these are not new projects.

These are not projects that are uh still early in design.

These are really pending in the sense that uh they have not been adopted for assessments to be applied to those properties.

And we'll cover this a couple of times, but just really wanted to to emphasize that pending doesn't mean new.

Um in that spec.

So um and then the last thing uh uh if uh time permits uh is a consideration for the future of these programs.

So uh what is an assessment?

Assessment is a mechanism for cost recovery.

Uh recovery for construction of street infrastructure to be more specific.

Uh these are applied to the property, not the property owner, and they show up as a lien.

Uh the value of the assessments are based around a linear foot of the frontage along the scope of the project.

And they are calculated with rates that were last updated over 20 years ago.

Uh and you'll see this on the next slide, but ultimately these get applied to the properties through adoption of an assessment role.

Um that is the last step before it's uh while it's pending.

So here's our our lovely timeline.

Thank you to comms for the help on this slide.

Um as you as you might have noticed, uh, a lot of the similarities to a normal project, uh, authorization, design, construction.

Uh what makes an assessment project unique is that the very beginning, council would authorize that these would be eligible for assessments, uh collection of the assessments.

Uh and then around uh preliminary design, uh staff would generate a an estimate of costs for each property.

And then around uh preliminary design, uh staff would generate a an estimate of costs for each property, uh and those properties then would be notified that uh based off of your frontage, based off of the rates, this is what you'd be looking as uh as your assessment on your property.

Um at that point, we would consider this uh that pending state, and then therefore uh property owners may start to send in payments to the city, advanced payments.

Um there's more information that we'll talk about uh in a later slide on that.

Uh obviously construction, um, but then after construction and adoption, then at that point, staff would bring back to council through public hearing the final uh calculations of assessments uh for for you to review and ultimately decide to confirm the resolution, which again is that term assessment role.

Okay.

So here is an example of a capital improvement project that was done uh through an assessment means.

Uh picture on the left shows the before conditions, uh unimproved, and then after, uh, where uh median was put in, bike lane, sidewalk, um, and again uh recoup the cost through assessments of properties.

So just an example.

So to be fair, there are a number of accessible project types.

Um the rest of this presentation is really focused on these three here.

And so I'll I'll dive a little deeper on those three.

Uh petition sidewalks, and uh that is where someone from the public requests the city to build sidewalks.

Um that's a city initiated city, um, I'm sorry, a public initiated public requested project type.

Uh around 20 uh in 2011, council ultimately decided to no longer take assessments on petition sidewalk projects.

So after 2011, no new projects would be eligible for assessments for petition sidewalks.

Similarly, in 2018, capital improvement projects, which are city initiated, uh, those no new projects beyond 2018 would be an assessment projects.

So that brings us to petition street improvements.

Again, petition would suggest that that's a that's a public requested, public initiated.

Um in 2022, the requests for projects ultimately exceeded the available funding, which led us to pause and suspend that program and no longer accept new request at that time.

Uh and what you'll get, what you'll see here in the next slide, we have 17 projects in that pending state, and staff is requesting direction on what to do with these 17 pending projects.

And just to reiterate that point about uh petition street since 2022, which is uh when council directed staff to go and evaluate the assessments and and petition program.

We have not collected, we have not uh added any more petition projects to the list at this time.

So okay.

So again, I'll I'll just pause and just acknowledge there's a ton of information on this slide.

And not all the colors show up, so apologies for that.

Um but on the left are our capital improvement projects, on the right is are the petition projects.

One one thing I will just note quickly, so in the backup memo, there's even more information about each one of these projects.

Uh there's a series of tables there.

Um there is an error, and I want to just acknowledge that in the memo, Granville Drive and Carolina Avenue, which are in the bottom right, they are shown as not funded in the memo.

However, uh funds were directed to that through capital reserves, um, and so those projects are currently in design and funded for construction.

Um but just as a quick note there.

So as we dive a little bit into uh the information that's relevant for today, uh I'll bring your attention to the date directed.

Again, those that's the date that council ultimately authorized these projects to be an assessment project.

1999.

Yes, 99 is is up there.

Um which calls back to an earlier comment I may have made.

Um then the other detail that I would really like uh to bring our attention to, uh, so this is the cost recovery.

It's about two percent assessments are currently estimated to be around two percent recovery of the actual construction dollars for these projects.

And one of the things before I go to the next slide that offers the options for you to consider advanced payments.

I mentioned that prior.

Once a property owner knows that an assessment applies to their pro to their property, they can begin to prepay the city.

So that advanced payments we have received for some of these projects now for 10 plus years.

So as promised, uh staff has three options for you to consider.

Option one is uh as plain as it may be to continue down the path that we are currently, and that is to uh bring forward uh assessments on the 12 completed projects uh that you saw on the previous slide and schedule public hearings to then vote on uh whether or not an assessment role will be adopted or not.

Option two takes into consideration that capital improvement projects are city initiated and and therefore eliminating the assessments on those eight CIP projects uh while continuing to assess on the nine petition projects.

What that would entail, uh there would be uh rescind uh you would rescind the resolutions on the eight CIP.

Uh there would be an authorization for staff to begin the refund process for those advanced payments, which right now are estimated around 180,000 across the 17 projects.

I'm sorry, the eight CIP projects for this one, uh and then schedule the public hearings for the assessment rolls on the four completed petition projects.

Option three, which is actually staff's recommendation, would be to eliminate assessments on all 17 of these projects.

That would entail uh rescinding the all 17 resolutions and authorize staff to refund the approximate 200,000 that have been collected in advanced payments.

So again, just to reiterate, staff's recommendation would be to eliminate all 17 projects, uh pending projects and authorize the refund of the advanced payments.

I'll pause here.

Now we can ask questions?

Yes, please.

I'm just gonna start with uh council branch.

Um thank you.

Couple questions.

Um the first one is of the projects of the capital projects that were done before I think 2018 that we actually receive payment for.

Um I guess from this is more towards the attorneys.

If we were to rescind anything that predated that, and we know we have projects that we did receive payment on in that time frame, would there be any conflicts or anyone saying, hey, you're not charging them, but you charged us?

I am sure you I am sure you would have some people say that, but I guess the question really is relates to the legality of that.

Right.

And that is to do the assessment is that's within the purview of the council.

Okay.

Okay.

Can we go back to the chart of the projects?

I just want to see how many were pre-2018.

All but one.

Okay.

Well, I'm just looking at capital.

Yeah, on capital projects, all but one were pre-2018.

Do we have a list of how many projects we've received payment for as far as the prepayments?

Prior to, yeah.

Well, not prepayments, but projects that we actually collected funds for that are not on this list.

So anything not on this list would have come after 2018, therefore they were not assessment projects, or predated the decision and were completed out.

So assessment roles were adopted and applied to those property owners predates and the answer to your question is no, I don't have those with me.

Okay.

The program dates back a number of decades, unfortunately.

Thank you.

Um, Council Harrison.

Yeah, and I'm probably just getting confused easily.

But so all these projects have been completed?

That's what I see in the status.

So the projects that show up in black text, those have completed construction.

The city has accepted the completion of work, if you will, and or would be ready for to be in front of you for uh assessment role.

But the work has been done.

The work has been done for everything in black text, that's correct.

Okay.

And then for anything that's there's already been payments made, if we were to make refunds, would they go back to who those property owners were if there's been changes?

Correct.

So it would go to the property.

So the current property owner would receive the reimbursement.

Even if someone else paid it, correct.

So the way staff understands the cost, if you will, is applied to the property, and so therefore the value of the property, which through selling and exchange exchange of property would take into account the value, if you will, of the property.

Okay.

So and again, I I'm not sure I understand why do we want to send these refunds back?

It's just it's a staff recommendation for you to consider.

But why?

Because technically these property, these projects were fully funded through capital, the capital improvement program, and the assessment was based around the charge of the property of the value increase on the property.

But if we were to rescind the resolution, then therefore the assessment wouldn't be applied as a formal lien.

So the lien itself wouldn't uh actually be recorded against the property.

If I am answering that correctly.

I only somewhat understand, but I think that's enough for now.

Okay.

Um start going down this side.

Counselor.

For historical purposes, just so we understand why the assessments was rescinded in the past for other projects.

Wasn't it the case when a petition came forward?

People said they wanted a sidewalk, but wait a minute, now you're going to charge me?

No, I don't want a sidewalk.

And that seemed to back in 2011 and I guess subsequently in if in uh following year, uh there was some people petitioned, but others said, look, I don't want to pay for it.

That's the city's obligation.

So there was a policy that walkability is so important that we're not going to charge you.

It's part of the city's overall goal.

So is that fair to say now that you want to address all the assessments by refunding this as kind of keeping your policy consistent or providing walkability but not making the property owner pay an assessment?

Is that fair?

That's absolutely correct.

And and as I was I would present uh in the later slides here about the future of the program to consider, I actually go into the detail about the 2011 decision and how it what the response was with the number of requests that we that was received.

So thank you.

For for colleagues, I'm just trying to remember, you know, when I was here, it was very controversial.

People said I wanted sidewalk when they found out some homeowners said yes, I would love to have a sidewalk to walk.

Others said I love the sidewalk, but I don't want to pay.

And I think that's where the dilemma came in, and then a lot of those sidewalk improvements were ascended because there wasn't full property owner support.

So I just wanted um to make sure that that is an accurate description as we continue this conversation, which is why less kind of bring it all into uniformity.

We've made decisions in the past, and now let's refund it so that we're consistent across the board for both past and now present and future.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

Okay.

Counselor Patton.

Yeah, I guess I think to like when I think about the policy orientation, like I understand how it people could have like from a policy decision, people of the past could have said if you're going to petition your government to get this improvement, either sidewalk or street improvement, that's really benefiting you a little bit above and beyond the rest of the populace.

I understand why they might say like you have to put a little skin in the game.

I also think we have moved in the right direction to eliminate the petitioning programs so that we can take a more equitable lens across the city, because I think we were presented with data last term that people who partitioning for these things that generally have more connectivity, more um privilege and and on and on.

So I think the policy direction we've moved in is a good one, right?

I think especially if something is a capital improvement, that's something we've decided as the city.

You all as professionals have decided like are good investments, and it's not, I think not fair for us to then assess the public.

On these ones, though, this feels very messy because it sounds if I've understood what you're saying correctly.

We have, you know, these some of these projects are t 20 years old, almost 20 years old at this point, and some people prepaid, some people did not.

So we haven't recouped the funds, but some people did, and it sounds like we can't get the funds back if someone prepaid, we can't get guarantee we're getting the funds back to the person who paid.

We can only get the funds back to the current property owner.

Correct.

Technically, the the value paid went against the value of the property, so therefore it would be refunded back to the property itself.

So but some people didn't wait for the lien to like they didn't wait for their property to change hands.

Correct.

Right.

Yeah.

So I'm struggling with the idea that we would refund someone who is not the person who originally paid.

I also think on some of on these petition ones in particular, it seems to me that if the people were notified and expecting that they would have this assessment at the time, like in 2013, if they said, yeah, sure, I still want this street improvement, I'm willing to accept the assessment, then we should kind of remain consistent with what we told them, but at the same time, like 10 years on from that, calling them back down to City Hall to for a public hearing seems ridiculous.

So I this isn't not illuminating at all.

Fair point.

And I would mess.

Reiterate to collect assessments and apply assessments and communicate to the public is is an incredibly uh time consuming and administratively high cost uh service.

Um what we've seen through our evaluation, which would show up in a later slide, two percent cost recovery is not as much as we would prefer to have on a on a recoverable goal.

However, to increase rates simply then passes the burden down to the property owners themselves.

Councilor Lambert Melton.

Uh two things.

The presentation is not in it's not poor docs.

I don't know what it's called anymore.

It's not on there.

It's not on the internet.

Okay.

Um maybe helpful if that could get uploaded for us to follow along, but also at home.

Um this is also very complicated and technical, and yes, my thoughts have sort of bounced around when I've heard my colleagues ask questions.

But to be overly simplistic, it sounds like we are charging residents for something and staff is recommending that we refund those charges.

And so on a very base level, any time our staff is telling us, hey, we should refund the public for something we've charged them for.

I think we probably should just go ahead and do that.

And so I would be fine with accepting the staff recommendation.

Um with the understanding, this is also I know it's money, but as far as the city budget goes, it is a very small amount of money.

And it sounds like also this assessment is a very small amount of these project budgets.

So I'm fine accepting the the uh staff recommendation.

Other questions or deliberations?

Yep, Councilor Harrison.

Yeah, so just looking at this again, and I agree it wouldn't be helpful to have the presentation.

Um maybe what I'm seeing here then better now after all this conversation, is that there's just a lot process that's going to be required to continue this effort.

It's not worth the money to go through all these public hearings, and we should just be done with it.

That's what I I think of is being recommended to us.

I would not disagree with that statement.

Okay, thank you.

And I think just um just to answer councilmember Patton and Harrison's question about the assessments being part of um a financial transaction that were given to new tenants perhaps or new owners as opposed to prior owners owners, as part of that um sale of the property, assessments would be almost like a lien attachment.

And so when there is a title search done for the transfer of that property, the previous owner assumes that money in the sale of the property.

So the actual improvement is for the new property owner.

So that's why the refund would go to the new property owner as opposed to the previous, because the previous owner has realized that as part of the sale transaction, if that makes it a little bit easier to understand.

If I understood the m memo to your point, so there's some that I if I understood the memo, some are like still liens on the property.

So I understand that when the sale or when the sale property is sold, then that is like folded into that.

But there were some people who prepaid not waiting for the transfer of the property rate.

And the attorney's office can help on this, but if there is an assessment attached on that title search through the transfer of that property, it is still taken in consideration for the sale price.

Okay.

That's correct.

Yes, that's correct.

It would have shown as a pending assessment.

Okay.

Even if it's been fulfilled.

My only thing is uh uh there's other projects we had that we collected.

So that's I will leave that in the hands of legal to figure it out if anyone comes knocking.

And God.

Okay.

So counselor Lambert Melton had said he is prepared to make a motion.

Do we want to do it?

Do we how does this hand because we normally don't vote during the sessions?

So is that something that comes on the future agenda?

Correct.

Yes, you can just give staff direction and we'll bring it back as an agenda item on September 2nd.

Cool.

Okay.

I can endorse that staff's recommended option.

It sounds like the juice isn't worth the squeeze.

So it's a little I'm still not quite understanding how we're getting the money back to the people who are owed it.

But it sounds like it's a really small percentage of people and a really small amount of fund.

So I can get with it.

Okay.

Does that sound good?

All right.

So we will direct staff to bring this back to us uh on a regular agenda for a vote.

Thank you.

Appreciate the work.

Um as promised, I have a slide or three about the program future.

Um the beauty part is a lot of the few uh a lot of the discussion.

Thank you.

Uh a lot of the discussion actually plays into the content of these slides.

So thank you for that.

So to kind of reset where we are, uh those are those three project types.

Uh these were prior actions uh around this.

So really it's a matter of then focusing on petition street improvements and where the future of that program lies.

So again uh upon the ask uh of council in 2022, staff evaluated these programs, the the act of collecting assessments for street improvement pro programs, but also petition programs themselves.

Um and I'll just go quickly.

Uh assessments, the majority of those funds are capital, uh, and so they're constrained within the city's available budget.

Uh there is a certain level of uncertainty uh around where our projects are.

And so when we communicate to the public your project uh your the property uh is assessed and and owes funding uh toward the delivery of that, there's a good bit of uh animosity, frustration.

Um community um neighbors wouldn't even agree that they want that sidewalk or they want their street to be improved because of uh you know the end result of what that may mean uh to them.

Uh also as a previously discussed, uh just to facilitate the program has a considerable amount of administrative costs.

Um rates don't recover a sufficient cost uh and then to increase those rates would then pass the burden on to those property owners.

Um as far as petitions themselves, so the request, so the act of the public to request uh statements previously uh said here tonight today, historically those are unfairly or not fairly distributed, um primarily because folks who uh who would like that improvement and then when ultimately asked to contribute to that, either can't uh afford to or uh or choose not to.

And so it does create some um uh some disparity as far as the the fairness of how those those projects are distributed across the city.

Um and then as discussed the the different perceptions uh that different neighbors have around when uh if they want the project or they don't want the project and what they may mean to them.

Uh you stole a little bit of my thunder, but I'm grateful for it.

Uh so the petition street uh petition sidewalk programs uh in 2011, the city decided to no longer collect assessments on cywalk petitions.

As you can see in this table, uh the number of requests skyrocketed.

Um so left to right there, you see FY13, 14, uh, until we get to FY18 and 19 when there's over 20 requests per year coming in.

Um as stated, uh when folks aren't asked to contribute any money toward a project, they are more likely to support it.

Um so the request for these projects far exceeded the available funds for those projects.

Um ultimately we had to suspend the sidewalk petition program in 2020, uh and a strategic initiative team brought back a presentation that led to the elimination of sidewalk petitions in 2023.

And you'll see here in a couple months later this fall, the act of mobility plan, which grew from that effort where the city has uh uh ranked criteria on how prioritization for sidewalks and other infrastructure would occur.

So, again, zoom in, like focus our attention back to the street improvement petitions.

Um if there's no assessments, we would absolutely expect to request for those improvements to to increase beyond our current um funding allocation.

Um and ultimately from a policy barrier standpoint, these similar challenges that we saw with the petition sidewalk program.

So for your consideration, staff has also provided a recommendation to no longer assess for any future street improvement projects going forward.

As I mentioned, since 2022, we have not added any more to the list.

As well as to eliminate the petition process for project selection of street improvements.

Um we could uh staff could evaluate what potential criteria that would entail and bring that forward back to you in a later meeting.

Any questions?

Yep.

Yes.

Thank you so much.

I'd like to focus first on the sidewalk petition uh program that was eliminated.

And I guess it would also do the next one as or the next one as well.

But are have we increased our budget allocation at all for how much we are since we're not going to be doing assessments on any anything?

Um if we still keep the same dollar total, then we're still not completing uh more projects per fiscal year.

And I know that when we did the participatory budgeting trial, the trial, when we asked the community, every single district asks for more sidewalks.

And so when I think of that, and I think that the demand is there for more sidewalks, but we're capping, we're not doing any more sessions, we're not getting any more money into it.

If we don't increase that budget allocation, then we can't get any more projects done than we're currently doing that in that 20.

Have you guys discussed increasing or asking for that increase in funding?

Absolutely.

Thank you for that question.

Um in subsequent months, we will be back in front of you with the active mobility plan uh update, the proposal recommendations, and that would entail having some of that information for you.

Great.

Thank you so much.

And also you will recall, Councilmember Jones, um several of the past few years with capital reserves at the end of the fiscal year as we close it out, um, council has elected to spend some of that money on additional sidewalk um sidewalks outside of the regular budget process.

Right.

No, yeah.

And I appreciate that, but unless it's baked in, then that still just limits us to a year, year to year uh instead of it being seen as a widely, you know, the around the city we're gonna constantly need more money there.

So thank you so much.

Counselor Silver.

Uh I want to both echo what Councilmember Jones said and the city manager.

Just want to communicate to the public now that the assessment is going away, that the city is going to prioritize increasing.

I know we're saying active transportation, active mobility, the sidewalk infrastructure, um, and whether we could be a lot more the intentional or vocal as we put out those improvements.

There's certainly demand there.

I said many times, I'm a runner and a walker.

Uh a lot of the people I say the majority that I'm seeing are over the age of 55.

And it's not just the sidewalks, just the crosswalks.

I'm now taking photographs as Director Callum told me to do about those intersections that have no line.

Uh if we want to be a walking city, we have to make that experience pleasant and safe.

I like the improvements we can been committed to doing.

Uh but just want to make sure as we cease this program that we communicate to the public that walkability uh in this city is a priority, and that as we transition we can be crystal clear about the improvements we're going to see.

So I'm gratified to hear there's a commitment to the budget to maintaining uh the expectation that we're going to increase our walkability sidewalks and crosswalks uh throughout the city is something that uh I strongly strongly support.

Councilor Potton.

Yeah.

Um Yeah, I think echoing and building off similar sentiments, I agree.

No assessments, no petitions.

We we need to use taxpayer dollars equitably across the city in places where you all as professionals have identified are the best places to use them.

Um I also think I'll just sort of add a star exclamation mark that building capacity for doing these projects is something we should definitely be thinking about in creative ways, partly budgetary, but if there are ways we can gain efficiency on like utilities or in-housing, I know that canceling the leaf collection program is gonna give us some opportunities to in-house some stuff that was otherwise taking longer, but I just think the more we can build capacity to get these projects sort of through the through the snake faster is something we should continue to work on.

Yes, Council Branch.

Yeah, definitely thank you for the word presentation and and just working this out so we can just you know ensure our whole city is being built up and built out.

At the same time, I'm aware of some times when you all reach out, the community pushes back, and some of them may say no, we may not want this sidewalk, however.

And a lot of times you all as staff do a great job in not always sharing and letting us know.

Can you let us know so where we can be helpful in sharing the information, but also having that documentation so when someone else comes back two or three years later and says, hey, what about this street?

You didn't do this street, we can say we reached out, we worked, but we received a lot of feedback on not wanting a sidewalk added here and things of that nature, because I'm I'm aware of an area where you all did go out, and from what I even heard from the community was they didn't want a sidewalk.

Absolutely.

And there's nothing further in the work session?

That's it.

All right, so we will conclude the work session.

Yeah, I've got a few.

Actually, I got an email chain of like 50 neighbors going back and forth.