I'd like to call the order of the planning and development committee meeting for Monday, July 13th, 2026.

Tonight's avocation will be given by Chaplain Gary Lundberg.

We ask that you please stand if you are able.

And we will immediately follow that with a pledge of allegiance.

Heavenly Father, we're thankful that you have called us together.

Lord, you have brought so many blessings to our city, and we're thankful for all of those wonderful ways of providence and mercy for us.

Father, I pray for a blessing on our Rockford Fo police and fire department officers.

Keep them safe, Lord, as they could do their duties, protecting our citizens, and uh making our city the beautiful place that he is.

Father, we thank you for your promise that you will give us wisdom if we ask, if we have lacking in discernment and knowledge, we shall have all that we need from your hand.

As uh as the psalmist said, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight.

Oh Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Thank you, Lord, for that is an assurance that we shall hear your voice tonight.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

For which it stands.

One nation under God.

Indivisible and liberty and justice for all.

Um, if you have not noticed, we do have a new sound system, so we just ask that you step up to the microphone once your name is called.

You will have three minutes to make your comments, at which time you will hear an alarm sound go off, and we just ask that you bring your comments to a close at that time.

That being said, our first speaker tonight is Larry Washington.

All right, I ain't been here for a minute.

I'm normally talking about the Rockford Mass Transit District and how they treat those passengers down there.

And all you gotta do is go online and look at their reviews.

Okay.

Now you can't tell me ten out of twelve stars.

You guys are doing what you're supposed to do, and helping those passengers be treated the way they're supposed to be treated on that business.

And I don't get this prayer.

Because it's just going to be business as usual tomorrow.

That's all it's going to be.

So I'm going to talk about what Alderman McNeely taught me one day.

She's the only alderman, the late Alderman McNeely, that showed me she cared anything about those passengers.

She walked on them steps after I got through speaking.

She says, Larry, I'm telling you this.

Ain't nothing gonna change down there until those top five guys are gone, are replaced.

And she said the entire executive board needs to be fired.

Now this is just ridiculous, okay?

This is ridiculous.

Now I'm gonna talk about my the world I live in, and I've talked about this before.

You can several blocks you can't walk down that sidewalk because it's covered with trees and bushes.

One block of Rose Avenue, another of Michigan.

Okay.

There's uh buckling sidewalks on a school property for crying out loud.

You don't know how um dangerous that is, Miss Trina.

At the Barber School, Buckland Sidewalk.

And it's several in that neighborhood like that.

This is ridiculous.

Absolutely ridiculous.

Thank you.

Um, our next speaker is Prophet Yusuf.

Ladies and gentlemen, in the book of Proverbs, the first chapter, the seventh verse, it says a fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

But fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Get wisdom, but out of all thou getting, get understanding.

What I want to speak about tonight lies about African Americans.

They said there was no African Americans to get the Congressional Medal of Honor in Vietnam.

That is a lie.

I'm gonna name 21 tonight.

James Anderson Jr., he saved my life at Cam Lowe.

Webster Anderson, Army, Eugene Ashley, Army, Oscar P.

Austin, Marine Corps, Matthew Leonard, Army, Donald Long, Army, Milkmail Oliver Third Army, Captain Riley L.

Pitts, Army, Charles Kevin Rogers, Army, Rupert L.

Sergeant, Army, William Bryant, Army, Rodney M.

Davis, Marine Corps, Robert Jenkins, Marine Corps, Lion Stroh, Army, Bright H.

Johnson, Army, Raph H.

Johnson, Marine Corps, God Pill L.

Lanehorn, Army, Clan Sasser, Army, Clifford Sims, Army, John E.

Warren Jr., Army, Martin Lions, Army, African Americans, you have no reason to have your head down.

Because our people have fought and died for the United States of America.

I also want to thank all veterans for their service to the United States of America.

Welcome back home, my brothers and sisters.

And don't forget them 7,000 nurses that was in Vietnam that saved our lives.

I also I'm glad you're here tonight, Mr.

Sanders.

I'm glad you're in that little girl right there.

And Miss Sassy, Miss Sasha, I'm glad you're here.

I didn't want to tell you this for a long time, and you, Mrs.

Denzel.

I didn't want to tell you this for a long time.

And I'm gonna get it off my chest tonight.

I don't like you, and you, I didn't forget you.

I don't like you, I love you.

And you can't do nothing about it.

And happy birthday, my good friends, and I wish you many more.

God bless you and your family.

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday to my good friends, happy birthday to you.

Thank you for allowing me to speak.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is John John Tack Brentley.

I want to say good uh good evening to our Alderman.

I see the mayor's not here, and most of our citizens of uh Rockford, Illinois.

I want to start off by 250-year anniversary for United States.

Here we got a wannabe antichrist, Dick Taver, Donald Trump, a convicted sex offender, 34 counts of felony, sitting in the White House, corrupting this country.

We talk about a Pac Eye, a pot thai, a pot die in South Africa.

Yet the only wife that can come to this here country are coming from South Africa.

We look here at right here for an election.

This past election, and then don't let me forget about Project 2025 is alive and well.

White privilege is alive and well.

Jim Crow law is alive and well.

They just put them under three new new names.

ISIS is nothing but the Gestapo.

They have killed somebody today.

They killed somebody in Texas.

80% of the people they killed, and I mean they locked up, have nothing to do, never had a criminal record.

We hear electionists coming right up.

This past election we had 38.51 Democratics that voted.

We had 20.17 Republicans that voted.

We had 41.32 independents that voted.

We had 16% of the people that voted, 80% 80,000 registered voters here in Rockford.

Yet the mayor won by 11% of the vote.

Just think if 41.32% of the independent had someone that was running for mayor, the mayor would not be in office as we speak.

Another thing that bothered me the most is even in the 13th war.

The 13th war is made of 98% African Americans.

But yet we have an argument that when I come to him and talk about the concerns of our residents in the 13th war, he stopped talking to me and go and talk to a cock talk to a Caucasian and ignore me.

The next time you ever ignore me in public because the 13th war is my stronghold, I'm gonna go right up to you and interrupt you while you're talking to that person.

I haven't seen not one thing that our African Americans have done for us since they've been here in office.

They have taken away the uh memorial uh a hospital, the first hospital that was built here in Illinois.

They have taken away the public aid office from the south side from the west side of Rockford.

The um the biggest uh uh uh the uh the uh shoot uh uh Schnooks grocery store.

I can go on down the line that have been taken away from the West side.

What have our ethnic group, those that's in political positions, been able to do for us?

We need to start standing up.

We got 18,000 registered black voters, but only one thousand three.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Erica Reed.

In May.

None.

Okay.

In May, Senator Martinez introduced S 10380, which would require three semesters and two continue education hours on domestic violence for mental health licenses in New York, the New York Office for DV Prevention, the National Family Violence Center, and others supported the bill.

In June, experts Joe Corey and Kira McAndless Davis included my research and their training of therapist.

My research includes a review of the national curriculum, mental health journals, and government hearings, as well as accounts from experts.

What about Rockford?

Well, last November, Representative West consulted trusted advocates.

He repeatedly called them trusted.

He wouldn't sponsor a bill or disclose their names or even their reasons.

I asked three times.

He wouldn't even bring up the subject in his group that determines federal education priorities.

Since 2023, Vella ignored me and Stadleman's assistant Bonnie said that they were waiting on a recommendation from the Family Peace Center.

In 2024, I attended a focus group there.

I reported a local counselor who introduced me to a convicted batterer and other women reported attorneys and judges.

The facilitator said that they hear frequent complaints about counselors and asked for my number.

Jennifer told me to resend the bill to Staldeman.

None of this was in the annual report because nothing changed.

Villa and Stoneman finally agreed to meet for 15 minutes.

In November, Vella claimed that he was still checking the statutes.

Stoneman, who's on the Senate Education Committee, reprimanded me and said that he and the policy director at the coalition believed that classes would be a waste of time.

Bonnie reluctantly admitted that he's had conversations with Jennifer but wanted to elaborate.

She called a month later, said she couldn't remember whether she's ever heard of the bill, didn't ask me to rescind it, and suggested that I find counselors to support it.

That's not my job.

She told me that Nikki Tickner has been blocking training for attorneys.

The last time I saw Nikki, she said, You're still having trouble with that bill.

I'm preoccupied and walked away.

Why should we pay GV executive six-figure salaries to block education for relevant majors and occupations with high malpractice rates?

Why should we pay state politicians $99,000 and fund higher ed and accreditors like the APA when they refuse to offer common sense curriculum?

Until recently, Matissa Wallace was the director for the Illinois psychologist.

I talked to her in 2023.

Why do lawmakers keep handing out licenses even though they know about the malpractice?

I continue to urge the council to get involved.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, City Council.

My name is Denzel Winter.

And I want to piggyback on that young man, what he said about the uh the bus people.

I was on a bus one day.

This young lady had a baby.

And she had just come from the grocery store.

And she was putting the baby, uh putting the groceries in in on the bus.

And don't you know that she got reprimanded because she had to carry the baby in one hand and put a groceries on the bus in another.

That shouldn't be happening.

And I sat there and I've witnessed these bus drivers talking to these people any kind of way.

They're supposed to be serving the public.

They don't own them buses.

We do.

And it's time that they start doing something about them people, talking to the uh the bus riders any kind of way.

If they don't like their job, they should quit.

Another time.

A young lady got on the bus, she had a little a little baby, and uh she was asking the bus driver, well, does the bus go back down toward uh uh over there by uh uh McDonald's?

He says, No.

We don't have another bus.

And she said, Do you know of another bus?

Now tell me.

Somebody that knows their job or should know their job should know what buses that they need to get, that they need to tell these people to get on, to get home.

All he had to do was say, Well, this bus goes this way, this bus goes that way.

But he was too busy pumping herself up and talking nasty to people.

It's it's it's time that they they start respecting people.

They don't have no respect because won't nobody tell them anything, won't nobody do nothing to them.

They talk to you like they own the bus.

You know, and that's ridiculous.

This woman had to walk at night down dark streets with her baby in arms and her groceries.

What would have happened if something would have happened to that woman and her child?

You know, you could say, oh well, that's tragedy.

No, something needs to be done to these bus drivers that think that they own the buses.

They think that they can tell folks what to do.

I remember one time I was sitting in the bus station, and one of the bosses came in there and he got smart with one of the guys.

The guy said, Well, you know something?

I know what time you get off work, and I'm gonna be waiting for you.

And he sat there and he said, There, the guy was waiting, just waiting.

And then he started sweating a little bit.

Then he got off, got up off his dead behind, and now he wants to go and talk to the guy.

He should have did that before he got smart.

See, that's what I'm saying.

You need people that's gonna uh treat people like people, not treat people like the animals.

Not treating people like they they they have nothing, they they don't have nothing to do.

These people are human beings too.

We pay what we pay to ride on them buses.

Thank you.

Um we'll go into tonight's agenda for our planning and development committee meeting in just a second.

I'll allow these two gentlemen to take their seats.

Here.

Here.

Thank you.

We have one item tonight, uh, information only.

Item one is a 2026 infill planning and development guide presentation, which I will hand the floor over to you all.

Good evening.

Uh tonight I'd like to go through the planning and development guide.

This is an information only presentation introducing the guide, why it was created, what it contains, and how we intend to use it.

The infill planning and development guide is one of several initiatives the city is advancing to help increase Rockford's housing supply.

This guide is not a capital improvement plan or a list of approved development projects.

It's a planning tool that identifies where future housing opportunities may exist.

As our community continues to grow outward, one of our greatest opportunities already exists within the city.

Throughout Rockford, there are vacant, underutilized, and buildable sites that are already that already have streets, utilities, parks, schools, and public services in place.

This guide focuses on identifying those opportunities.

Ultimately, this isn't just a housing strategy.

It's also an economic development and neighborhood revitalization strategy.

Rockford's adopted housing strategy framework identifies a need for between 6,000 and 9,000 additional units by 2035.

No single solution will meet that demand.

Rehabilitation, redevelopment, adaptive reuse, and infill development all have a role to play.

This guide focuses specifically on the infill portion of that larger strategy.

After evaluating opportunities across the city, we've identified 50 strategic development areas.

Together, they represent more than 1,000 acres of development opportunity.

The sites support a variety of housing types from single-family homes to mixed-use development.

This guide gives us a practical inventory of opportunities that can be shared with developers, property owners, and future partners.

This wasn't simply an exercise in mapping vacant land.

Every site went through the same five-step evaluation process.

We considered infrastructure, access, compatibility with surrounding neighborhoods, development potential, and long-term viability.

The result is a focused inventory on sites with the strongest development potential.

Different locations call for different housing solutions.

Some sites are better suited for single-family homes, while others support duplexes, townhomes, or mixed-use development.

The guide intentionally promotes a balanced mix of housing options rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

The opportunities are distributed fairly evenly throughout the city.

They serve more than 20 neighborhoods, are located in every planning area.

While the West side contains slightly more acreage, opportunities do exist citywide.

The guide is intended to be a citywide resource rather than focusing on any one specific neighborhood.

These are conceptual examples showing what development could look like.

They're not approved development plans or proposed projects.

Instead, they help illustrate the development potential of different sites and different housing types.

The complete guide contains detailed profiles for each opportunity, including the existing conditions, ownership considerations, infrastructure, and the development characteristics.

The value of this guide is that it focuses on implementation.

Instead of just identifying vacant land, it identifies sites that are realistic candidates for future development.

It gives both staff and the development community a practical starting point for future housing investment.

Identifying sites is only the first step.

Going forward, staff will actively promote high readiness sites, coordinate infrastructure improvements where appropriate, keep the inventory updated, provide early development assistance, and continue marketing these opportunities.

The guide is intended to be a living document that evolves as projects are completed and new opportunities emerge.

In closing, this guide represents a proactive strategy for expanding housing opportunities while strengthening existing neighborhoods.

It provides developers, property owners, and the city with a common roadmap for future investment.

These are opportunity sites, they're not commitments.

Developers would still require willing property owners, market interest, funding, and the normal review and approval processes would still exist.

As we move forward, it's also worth noting that the recently enacted 21st Century Road to Housing Act reinforces many of these same principles reflected in this guide by encouraging communities to increase housing supply, redevelop underutilized properties, and make better use of existing existing infrastructure.

Well, implementation will continue to evolve.

Rockford is well positioned because many of the strategies outlined in this guide are already aligned with the direction of federal housing policy.

Thank you.

And at this time we welcome questions and discussion on the development guide.

Sorry.

I'll start over here to my left other woman, Terina.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for allowing me to speak on your committee.

Can you please go back to the slide?

It was like the third one or something.

It showed like the breakdown of the wards.

It wasn't broken down by ward, which I wanted to see actually, but I was trying to understand in the packet when I was looking at it the numbers.

Sure.

What are the numbers mean?

So these are just snapshots from the plan itself.

The full plan has a corresponding site index that lists all of these sites, where they are, the acreage, the type of development that we would expect at them as well.

So again, this is just a snapshot from the plan.

Okay.

My other question is this.

You mentioned uh promoting uh getting remote riding.

Promoting high.

Well, you talked about marketing and promoting.

What what would those efforts look like?

Well, I think we would be working with uh some of the developers and builders that we already talked to on a frequent basis.

Uh some of the sites that are indicated on this plan, uh we've already had discussions with some of the builders.

I'm sorry, can you can't concentrate.

Apparently, one of our speakers left their phone, I would say.

Um sorry about that.

Can you start from the side?

Yeah, sure.

Um so uh you know, we we have discussions with builders and developers all the time.

And uh part of this would be to help steer them towards some of these sites that are available that can be developed.

And we've had some that have come in already and talked to us about some of the sites that are listed.

And when I first said, hey, it would be a great idea if we would start identifying more of these sites throughout the city, uh Director Lies and myself uh said, hey, let's let's start identifying these sites, see what we can do.

So I came up with uh uh a rough list, and Colin polished everything off and did a fantastic job of putting this all together.

Uh but you know, it was uh uh uh basically looking at areas where we had infrastructure already, or if there needs to be any infrastructure expansion, uh it's just a matter of filling in uh those uh those holes that exist with maybe a water main extension or a sewer extension, but it would allow us to develop some of these areas and then create whether it's single family lots, two-family and some of the areas already zoned for R2 and R3, and we identify that in the plan.

So we say, hey, you can do multifamily on the site, you can do townhomes, you can do duplexes, whatever it may be.

So we're only working with developers we already know, we're not necessarily going outside of Rockford with any effort yet.

I've also got a couple other parts that you're not seeing here.

I've got some marketing pieces that go with this as well that are one-page handouts that when you guys are out in the community or if you're at conferences that you can hand developers or hand you know future developers.

Um it's it's again, this is just a kind of snapshot from the planning document itself.

Um, but we we plan on like definitely updating this more than once a year.

Um, as projects are completed, we can um update them in the plan itself.

We can add new um areas as well.

And the plan would also be to contact those regional builders and developers in the area that we that we know of, and we would also reach out to the Realtors Association and let them know this is available now on our website, and they can take a look at the document, and this way it will provide a lot of information and hopefully it can help generate uh some interest that way as well.

Okay.

I have one final question, please.

Um we get a lot of um uh questions and there's always uh talk about why don't we ever do uh tiny homes in Rockford?

Can you answer that question and would that be a part of this?

Yeah, so ironically, I was just in front of the community relations commission last Thursday talking about some of the proposed uh zoning uh tax amendments we have, and that issue came up is what about tiny houses?

And my answer always is you can put up a tiny home because we don't regulate the square footage of a home.

But what we do regulate is the building codes.

So as long as that home meets all of our building codes and our zoning setbacks for the lot, it's permitted to be in you know put up on any single family zoning site uh in the city of Rockford.

So thank you.

Did you still want to add?

Yeah.

Sorry, I'm learning this new system here.

No problem.

Thank you, Chairwoman.

Just to add and just to reinforce what Scott was saying, this is part of how we're creating a marketing plan because we have had a lot of interest in Rockford, the news that we you know that we're on different housing market study, like we come in number one, that immediately meant we got calls.

But we wanted to have a tool available when we found when we were on those calls, like we knew certain things about certain sites, but we wanted to have the full inventory and something that represented like this does a whole city view alongside.

Um because I have spoken at the home builders association.

I have gone to the realtors, like Scott said, um, and we know that there is a tension.

So this is um a great platform now that we will be able to use with a more developed marketing plan and connect more into those statewide conversations that are happening.

Um I was with a team of Illinois representatives um for a housing discussion just a couple weeks ago, so that was with um the head of IDA and others, and could outline and say we will literally have sites identified, and when you see the full plan, when it's it's site 48, you see a map, and then you see the map of where the utilities are, you see all the information that are developed, the first information they would need to say this looks viable for me, right?

So we wanted it now in hand, we will have that whenever these conversations come up.

And so we're starting to push it out.

We and after introducing it to you all, we will be doing even more of that.

Thank you.

I saw Alder Woman meets.

Thank you so much.

Okay.

So I hate to make this an east side west side thing.

I really do.

But what I'm seeing is 39 identified properties on the east side, 10 on the west side, and then one centrally located.

How did we get to this point?

Because I I really need to see where the energy is for bringing development on the west side of town, and I was really excited about this to be able to see how we were planning on utilizing those spaces that were open on the west side.

And this is not giving me what I expected.

Okay, I can I can answer that Alder Woman Meeks.

Uh, if you look at the slide up there, you'll see that it's 53% of the vacant properties are on the west side and 47 are on the east side.

So it's very equally balanced in my opinion.

Where are we?

You'll you'll notice uh look at the west side has a couple larger sites.

Yeah, tell me because I can't see that far.

Yeah, so the west side numbers-wise, I believe there's 10 um areas that we're looking at.

But two of those areas are over 200 acres of themselves.

Doesn't mean there's 200 acres total buildable area, but they're a larger area for that study area.

And and also I'd like to add that when we come forward with the tax amendments to the zoning board next Tuesday.

Um we're looking at this infill overlay district, and that that will be overlaid more than likely on the west side of Rockford with significantly impact hopefully the uh specifically the 13th ward, I think, which is the area one of the areas we identified as needing the most help, and that would be a large area that that overlay would be included in because there is an area of um you know there's areas where you go down a block and there's four houses, but then there's four vacant lots, and then the next block there's only three houses and there's five vacant lots.

So hopefully that infill overlay will help address that as well.

This is just a part of, as Sarah was saying, there's just another one of these steps in helping to develop a strategy for housing for our city.

Does this cover the specific wards that were identified in the housing study?

Because it was specifically, I know Ward 11 was heavy.

Ward 13 was there, Ward 5 was there.

Ward 11 specifically, there's a large area of R2, and one of the things that we're proposing with the text amendment is to allow uh three and four family developments on some of those lots as well.

So hopefully that will encourage people that own vacant lots in those areas uh to go ahead and and you know build a three or a four family, which would provide more units and more housing for our city.

Okay.

And this is there's not only the zoning one of map amendments, but you also um both you approved the beginnings of our in-field development, our direct infill development program.

This is a tool that we're going to be using to attract developers.

But if you remember we have the two programs where we're going to be looking at architectural designs and thinking about where we can help spur housing and those programs, the two programs that were approved last time, um, those specifically, that's what's we're first aiming for the wards that were identified in our consolidated plan, which I believe was 5th, 7th, 11th, 13th, um might have been sixth or ninth, I can't remember, but um off the top of my head.

But so this again to Scott's point, we're doing multiple strategies, right?

We're doing we're looking at our um our zoning code.

We have those in-fill development programs that where we're gonna start looking at how we could direct build.

And then this is another tool that we can use for marketing um large amounts of acreage to other developers to try and get those conversations started too.

And I mean, do you feel that the issues that we've had, the barriers that currently exist on the West side for getting developers to come and build?

What about this program is gonna make it easier or better for them to do that?

Sure.

So it you know, particularly the um the info programs that we've brought where we're looking at decreasing regulatory costs, right?

That was the point of getting some of those architectural drawings, is like because we're we're trying to recreate housing there that doesn't have the comps we need for new construction right now.

We need to like decrease some of our cost to make construction more viable on the West side.

That was part of that info program.

And our our goal with this then is to then show on pieces of land and the larger acreage.

Like in some cases, there's a plat already there.

This is the type of housing you it's already been you know structured to to absorb.

You could really do something here.

Um it gives, you know, like they're not having to find vet out, think about send staff to come to meetings to us to figure out where water is, to have to figure out where sewer is, to have to figure out all these different things.

We're just putting it out for them to see so they can react to more quickly.

That's cuts down on some of that time.

We're looking for all of the ways that we could shave off some of that kind of time in the upfront so that we can enter into conversations.

We're completely aware that probably for the first couple conversations, we're gonna we're gonna learn where we are financially, uh where is what's viable and not, what else we might have to come back to you on.

But what we're showing through multiple strategies is that the City of Rockford is ready for those conversations.

We're looking at this in several different lenses, and that we're gonna keep keep trying to innovate and cheap, keep trying to bring the solutions to you.

This is gonna help us start a lot of those conversations so that we can hopefully, if we don't have the answers yet, that we can come back to you and say, okay, this is what we need for the West Side.

This is what we're consistently hearing.

Okay.

And last question, um I thought I heard this.

This is this is just kind of a summary of the actual plan.

Yeah, that's that's correct.

The actual plan, I think, is 174 pages.

Yeah, when will we be able to see that?

Um that I just sent an email out.

You can check your email and you'll be able to look at it any time you want.

Okay, I will do that.

Uh it does take a little while to open.

Yeah.

All right, thank you.

Alderman Thunberg.

Uh one thing that uh I just read an article in the recent pass impact, probably in the past 48 hours.

So I haven't been able to run this by the uh the Northwest Illinois Alliance of Realtors and North W Northwest Building Trades, which they may be a little more familiar.

Um the crux of the article was was one of the denominators that is slowing progress in home building is the lack of qualified individuals, i.e.

labor, meaning trades individuals.

So uh they said that was a I mean it was a double-digit percentage factor that they figured in was causing part of the delay in this uh new home building.

So I guess my question would be have you, in the positions you're in, have you heard anything, any feedback from whether it's realtors or the trades of this dilemma locally.

I haven't heard about any shortages of labor.

I can let Director Lies speak to that if she's heard of anything, but um mostly what I keep hearing is I can't believe the cost to build a road, or I can't believe the cost of you know some of the supplies that go into the home.

I can't believe the cost of you know some of the supplies that go into the home and it's it's not just like you know you look at wood and you say oh what you know this is a great one cost but then you start looking at all those things with the HVAC and your electrical and your plumbing and those things are extremely expensive right now.

The cost of plastic and steel has gone up a lot and it's and those are some of the biggest things that are are causing a lot of these construction prices to skyrocket.

I would add you thank you.

I would add to that too that yes I have heard that the in even more than just right now there's an anticipated shortage by looking at who's becoming an apprentice and who's moving into these trades.

Again like I said I've I've attended home builders association and have talked to Andrew the current president has participated in several stakeholder meetings with us.

And what they have said is they can find people to do new construction but enough to do it in the places that pay really well right like if they're going to look to build and you can build the same house in Beloit and Janesville or McHenry and make more because of the limited amount of workers that they're having they're going to do it there because they'll make more money versus Rockford.

And they've even said they'll make money in Rockford they can just make money somewhere else and we don't have enough staff to to spread that out.

So that's part of the growing concern for for us then is to think about what we could do in that space how we and that's part of again looking at how we reduce costs in the front end in any way that we can so that that equation and that competition becomes less of a thing.

Like I mentioned the trip that I took to Columbus I went with an Illinois delegation to look at the creating of modular homes and how to do that at scale in a way that does workforce development and still uses unions for on site construction but the number of workers that you need is grace greatly reduced and that because you're doing things in factory um for in mass construction type of way this is part of the type of solution they're looking at knowing that the labor force for construction is dwindling thank you Alderwoman granted my apologies so I know the document talks about infill but there's a big section right in the middle of the let's just call it the map that is not there doesn't seem to be a lot of numbers in that section.

And so I know one of the concerns that I hear consistently is I have a lot of empty lots and I know that's a program that Director Lyzen were talking about but is there because I look at the properties that are there and they're all big properties like on the west side but there's still a lot of small properties within the center of that circle that can provide just you know that have the water that have the sewer that have all those things and yet they're not identified here.

Is there a way that we can correlate or put some of that you know individual lots into this diagram so that it's not forgotten about yes uh so there are a lot of there there's a lot of vacant lots uh throughout the city right we whether it be you know maybe a home was condemned and torn down or a fire and we had to tear take it down because of the fire but we didn't really concentrate on just individual lots that were scattered we kind of looked at more of the clusters of large lots uh that were part of this infill program individually if there are lots and somebody who's interested in building in your ward and we could I we we could easily identify a lot of those as well and come up with you know a list of properties that are available as well.

I guess I would just ask that that be included somewhere in the document so that I know that it is hard to build a tiny home or do something like that but that we have a lot of empty lots on the west side that are not as big as some of those entities that are on the peripheral of the map.

So that's the only thing I have to say thank you.

Thank you.

Were there any other questions or comments?

Alderman Logman Thank you.

Um and so that might be a deterrent from moving into some of these homes like in Central Rockford, where we all want Central Rockford or near West Side, near East Side to be strong for our community.

Um building up some of these rehabilitated homes, because of course what we don't want is you know, and I think we've all seen it in our wards a little bit where uh a home needs some work, uh no one lives in there for three, four or five years.

All of a sudden it's just a vacant home for a decade, and that does, you know, that is a negative effect of property values too.

So hopefully with the new federal legislation uh that can address that too, but appreciate the focus uh on rehabilitation a lot of the older homes in our city too.

Thank you.

Are there uh Alderman Salgado?

Thank you, Mr.

One for allowing me to speak on your committee since I'm not on it.

Um real quick, Scott, um and team.

Uh so I'm assuming this came out uh from the 2030-2040 plan that you guys proposed on high density, low density as part of those conversations to develop these pockets, these areas.

The question that I have did where when are we looking to engage like our land bank, our trustee program to kind of take some of those?

And I I say this because it's all about the margins, right?

Uh let's just be frank.

Um people are going to develop where they're gonna make some sort of margin, right?

Because there's gonna be real thin, no one's gonna want to build somewhere where assessment values they're not gonna get the return on investment.

Let's just be real.

No one's gonna want to build a 300 plus thousand dollar home in my the 11th ward, right?

That's just a given when assessment values are 115, 120, 125, 150 at the most, right?

And so by a time to get the return return on investment, it could be 30 years or plus, right?

And so unless you truly love that area and that's where you want to be, um, certainly you will build a house it.

And so um as part of the tools, I think that you know, as uh Alderwoman Meeks and some other folks are saying is you know, is there any tools that we can leverage with the land bank um as part of this process to address this?

I know this is one tool, one piece of it, right?

And so, you know, whatever plans we have coming in because we designated this in R2, uh multi-complex, whatever, it makes sense from that perspective, but um also engaging our partners, um, especially you know, when it comes to the land bank or the trustee program where some of these properties are you know in there that can provide some incentives for those individuals.

And I do agree with you 100% is let's leverage our utilities because it costs money to to figure out where this is, the hookups, the costs that are associated.

I like the architectural thing that we have platforms there for developers that want that don't have to spend that much money on on that.

So I think that's that's a good piece, but I also think you know, working with with our partners on that, and I'm not saying you haven't because that's not what I'm hearing, right?

Or have heard, but I definitely think that that is a leveraging point for us as a city to reach out for the land bank from that perspective, right?

And so um this is just a stepping stone, like you guys said.

I'm sure there's gonna be more details.

Um I I like uh Alderwoman granite, you know, to add to this some of this stuff, but um just wanted to get your take, you know, if that's one of the conversations you guys had with the land bank, a regional one plan to you know work on some of these strategic development marketing tools that you guys have out there.

Okay, so um I'll hold the land bank comment basically in trustee lots to the end to the end, but just to kind of address your point.

Um you know, we wanted to identify parcels that were in the private sector uh for the most part.

Although after we start going through this, we did include one land bank site as a part of this, and now actually they're actually going to market that site for sale and development for somebody.

That's the old um Martin Luther King Jr.

Um grade school site.

Uh we've identified uh a couple of excess park areas that they may be getting rid of as well uh and school district properties that it doesn't appear that they're ever going to build anything on.

So but the rest of this is all private sector.

Um and we just wanted to identify these parcels, saying here's some great opportunities that exist throughout our city.

Uh and as for the uh the trustee program and the land bank, I know that Director Lyas is working with them on a lot of different things, and she can speak to that, but we do part we do have discussions with them as well because obviously um some of the properties that have gone to the land bank have been out there and they've been rehabilitated and people are living in them now and they're nice, nice looking places, and they've done a great job.

You know, some people are getting uh a house for 30,000 and they're putting you know 80,000 into it, and it's now worth 200,000, which is fantastic.

That's exactly what we want to continue to see to Alderman Logan's point.

Reinvestment and rehabilitating these older structures as well.

Are there any other questions or comments?

I do have one final comment and question.

Um I too, when I looked at this map, I thought the same thing as uh the 12th board, Alder Woman.

Um, because you do see 10 identified areas on the west side, and then you see a bunch on the east, but then I looked to the right and I saw the acreage.

So my thought process was well, hey, we've got all this acreage over here on the west side, so it's like so.

I guess my my first thought was is will I start to see developments like uh maybe Concord or Fairgrounds or Auburn Manor or something like that, because they do have these large amount of of acreage, whereas you can do maybe some of the smaller units um on some of the identified on the the east side there.

So my question to you all as city staff, when you are having these meetings with developers and things like that, what will be your recommendations to these developers coming forth as to what your recommendation will be?

Is this going to be something that you are asking market value, something low income?

What will be the recommendation from the city when you're having these conversations?

Great question.

Um we were always gonna have a conversation of doing everything at market rate if possible.

Now some people are gonna come forward and they're probably gonna be you know dealing with some type of assistance, but that's not something from a zoning perspective that we're gonna be looking at.

Right.

Um these part these larger parcels that are spent that are primarily on the southwest side, um, those areas are targeted for mostly um medium density to uh and it's or I should say low density and medium density housing.

So I don't expect to see anything that that's the size of Auburn Manor or Concord Commons anywhere in those.

And I don't think we'd want to entertain that actually.

But but if it was uh if it was done right, obviously multifamily can be a benef beneficial to the city if it's if it's done right.

And we'll entertain you know pretty much anything from a developer.

And obviously the final vote on anything that would go through zoning is going to be the city council.

So understood.

Um Director Lyes, would you want to add something?

Yeah, I just want to add too, and part of introducing it to City Council tonight, and um it's on the website for anyone to review, but especially for all of you as you look at your wards.

Um, we're available to meet with you to talk over the sites that might be in your ward or other things that weren't maybe in this plan that you would have expected to, like Colin mentioned.

We need we needed a starting point.

We have a plan, we're gonna be marketing this.

That doesn't mean we won't um want to add to it, we won't want to talk about more sites.

We're more than happy to think about the the mix and what you want to see or the residents maybe you've talked to around these areas.

Um when we're getting developments in or we're getting interest, I'm trying to send you information on that.

We had one in the seventh ward, somebody brought in sort of a drawing of it.

I sent it to um to the alderman so then she could talk to residents about what is this mix look like?

What is what would you think that they would accept or want to see around this?

When things are coming in, we're hoping to start a lot of those conversations.

And if I know where where your head is and what you want to talk about, happy.

That's a great thing for me to bring into that room.

So feel free to we're available to you to talk this through more individually.

Thank you.

Are there any other questions or comments?

Thank you, gentlemen, for your presentation.

Uh, do I have a motion to uh adjourn?

Are there any questions or comments?

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, same sign?

This meeting is adjourned.