Oh yes, I'm sorry.

Uh Matt OJ was with the uh City of Syracuse Commission of Assessment.

Robert Sana, I'm the director of preservation at BFC Partners.

Connor Kenny, I'm a partner with SAA EBI.

So the department has requested uh an exemption shelter rent agreement from the common council looking to uh support the redevelopment of the first phase of Parkside Commons looking to develop two new buildings and uh renovate the existing property to the west.

Uh we're looking for the typical 15-year shelter rent agreement.

I've got my uh partners here on the development team who can talk a little more specifically about the details.

Sure.

Thank you, Matt Matthew, and thank you for everyone for making the time and agreeing to meet with us on this.

Again, my name is Robert Sana.

I'm with BFC Partners.

Connor Kenny here is with SAEVI.

Um our companies are joint ventured and uh acquired Parkside Commons in October of uh 2024.

Um we have a brief presentation today about um uh go back.

Can you go back to the agenda?

So we have a brief presentation for you here.

We'll talk about us, who we are, um what's what's happening on the site and what we've done so far, and then we'll move into our well we'll move to talk about the project and what we plan to do.

We'll cover both the renovation, the tenant relocation aspects, and the new construction components, and then we'll end with the residents at residents and community engagement that we've done so far that we plan to do as we as we continue to the project.

So can you go to the next slide?

So just to introduce uh my ourselves, BFC partners, uh we're a New York City-based affordable housing developer and general contractor.

We've been in business for 40 years.

We've done about 20,000 units of new construction renovated housing.

Uh we're experts in all things affordable housing.

We provide we provide construction oversight, we provide guarantees, we provide equity capital, we do the community engagement.

Um this we do many, many projects like this.

In fact, we're wrapping up a conversion of a public housing authority project on Staten Island in New York.

Very similar conditions, very similar parkside, um called West Brighton Houses.

Um so we we know this fairly well, and we're looking forward to and making making a change at Parkside.

Connor, you want to go?

Hello, again, I'm Connor Kenny, a partner with SA EVI.

Um so SAEVI, we were founded in Buffalo in 1977.

Uh we've been developing affordable housing using the low-income housing tax credit program since the program was incepted in 1986.

We did we actually did New York State's first low-come housing tax credit deal.

Um we've done about 4500 units across uh 4500 affordable housing units across about seven or eight states.

Um and like Rob's firm, we have uh a lot of experience working with Section 8 housing and rehabbing properties uh similar to Parkside.

Um I think we all are many of us know the property itself has um historically had a number of issues.

Um when we bought the property, there was quite a bit of deferred maintenance.

Uh there are crime problems at the property.

Um we just want to take some time to talk about the existing condition of the property and some of the things that we've done to this point.

Um for example, uh coming in with all the deferred maintenance, the code violations, the work orders that were existing on the property.

Um we've doubled the maintenance staff since the summertime from six to twelve, which was very needed.

And as you can see in the summertime, there was uh quite a few open work orders.

We had about 1200 open work orders, and as of today we're down to approximately 185 work orders.

Uh 335 of those have been completed in the last seven days.

Um part of the reason we're getting more effective.

Seven days, I'm sorry.

Yes.

You completed in the last seven days.

Yes.

Work orders.

Um the whole work orders and you're just getting them done, or they're just new ones.

What do you mean?

Were they new work orders that were just processed, like some projects that need to be done, or is it just something that just happened and you guys were just getting like were they I think it's a combination of both.

I mean, it's it's kind of like uh work orders are like whack them all, right?

Like you you you get the ones that are on the books, and then as you're finishing those, more come in.

Absolutely.

So that's what I was asking.

Were they like work orders that just came out of the blue, like oh we got no idea?

Oh, they were just a list of work orders.

Okay.

Yes.

That's right.

Good question.

Bad time.

Um can I start the of the 185 that you have outstanding?

How many of them are big projects versus like my tile is broken in my shower or my cost is leaking?

Like how many of those are global?

There's a problem with the furnace, there's a problem with like what are what's left there?

Yeah.

So how do you go come up and introduce yourself?

You can go right up to this.

The microwave.

I think that's the mendel mic.

How's everybody doing?

My name is Francisco Santiago.

I'm the regional facilities manager.

Um, I oversee the property.

Um, so to answer your questions, is it the combination of both?

You have um hub issues that we're dealing with with tiles um coming off the wall.

We have backups that we're dealing with with types that are broken that we're replacing, um, to both detectors, um setting, you know, putting alarms, um, doors falling off of um quote unlimited core up track.

Um, any of those things, um, doors uh not locking properly, there's a combination of all of them.

On top of that, we have the work orders from the code enforcer that he might come and say, hey, we've got a call from tenant, can you go look into this?

We go check it out, we take care of it, we take pictures before and after, and then we send the pictures to the quote.

So are you triaging those in a way?

So what's the turnaround time?

If someone calls and says, I don't have heat in my apartment, how fast do you think we're turning that around?

We'll go to the heat calls, those are how the safety, right?

So anything house is 50, we take care of right away.

So depending on if we if we have a part that we got to order, you could be within 24 to 48 hours.

If we have that situation with no heat, we give them an extra piece that they can plug in and have in the meanwhile while we take care of the part.

So I'm gonna defer back really quick.

So there was a situation a couple weeks ago that there was a building that didn't have any heat, right?

And what and they didn't receive heaters, they didn't get any of that, and no response back.

So I hear what you're saying, but I actually witnessed that didn't happen.

So um I don't want to even sort of go back to that, but I would love to see, like um Council Monto said, what is still open?

That is very important to make sure, like fire is the hot water tank doors off the hinges is off.

That's very important.

Multi detectors are very important, everything is very important.

But fire triage, like what ones are still huge fires like heat and all those things.

What are the ones that are still open?

And I think full disclosure, it's uh it's you know, it's my district and count Council Caldwell, obviously, it's that's it's her neighborhood, right?

So we got large, so it's all of our districts.

We get those calls, right?

We just get those calls.

I get I'm responsible for that.

My job is to make sure I jump on it right away.

So I wasn't aware of that incident, but if I can go back and look what's open, you weren't aware they didn't have heat.

I wasn't aware of that specific building.

I'm gonna wear about the buildings like 1903, having no heat, 201, not having hot water.

So I addressed those that we did.

What we did was with the ones with no hot water, we put in new tanks.

So we had we we take those old tanks out, put new tanks in, and now those dishes are how long did that take, Max?

Uh it was four business days.

So from the time they had hot water, it was only four business days.

No, that wasn't the truth.

I don't know what's gonna do to the manufacturer.

No.

When we from the moment we got the vendor in there to go look at it, so from the moment the vendor showed up.

That's better.

So from the moment he got there and gave us what we needed to do, it was four to five business.

So far as the ticket that was put in, how long from the ticket to getting it done.

So there's tickets that are put in, right?

Request from that time from the ticket was put in, how long was it before they got hot water?

So when we get the when we get the ticket, we address it and we need to find we go find out what's wrong.

Okay.

Once we find out what's wrong, if we can't fix it ourselves, we call in the vendor right away.

The vendors call right away, he comes in, you'll let us know.

Hey, this hot water tank is no good.

We need to replace it.

We can get it to you, it's gonna take you four to five business days, and we'll have it all inside.

It's it's not I can't force the vendor to get it quicker for us.

It's up to the manufacturer to get it to him so you can install.

Well, that really wasn't my question.

My question was just how fast we you guys addressed it.

I'm I'm pretty sure that right away.

I'm I'm pretty sure that um we're happy we're having to the rest of the statement of what you guys gotta say because I know that didn't happen at all.

So I want to start off on a clear slate, but we want the truth about really what we can make sure that this community and it and the people there, they deserve great stuff.

But we also want to make sure we you can make what you say you could do, you could do, right?

Because we know they didn't happen that fast, right?

We know that, right?

Well, I think what it happened was when the work order went in, historically, and Cisco can speak to this a little bit more articulately than I can, because I'm not not building maintenance guy, um, expert.

Um but historically, what we would do is we would go out to that building, right?

And then we would go in and there's a reset button that would be pressed.

And historically that was effective, and that became less and less effective.

Can you speak?

Can you speak to a little a little bit more to that?

Look, at the end of the day, it's just a process.

So when someone calls a bottle of hot water, the first thing we look at is reset button, right?

We can also look at cartridges, the cartridges inside the units.

If the cartridge is bad in their faucet, that can cost them from not getting hot water.

So there's a couple things that we do, what we call I call them five steps.

Let's do our five steps first to identify the problem.

If we can't identify the problem, then we bring in the act.

You know what I'm saying?

So there's multiple buildings.

I'm not gonna say here is that we haven't had this with multiple buildings yet.

Have we addressed them as soon as we get them?

Yes, we have.

Have we has the turnaround process has been as fast as it should be?

We run into situations where it hasn't.

So own that, but I also have to deal with the vendor that we're that's providing us the equipment to get it delivered so we can get it done as soon as the and there's been times where we've also asked um to ship it overnight, and we paid the extra money to have a ship overnight.

I think to clarify on this one too, so we have implemented a new process of addressing work orders.

Cisco and his team came to the site in about September.

So since Cisco and his team have come to the site since we've doubled the crew, uh, we hired a new main head of maintenance tech for the site as well, who's starting relatively soon.

Um that obviously was a problem.

Like we have since we're now having calls twice a week, reviewing work orders, going through things, making sure that everything is very organized and that we have an appropriate process that we're going through to make sure that all work orders are addressed.

Are you corrected the situation?

Yes, thank you.

And we were also I I'll randomly pick a work order that the guys close out, and I have the supervisor myself make a phone call.

Just to see if the resident is happy with what's done.

Um, I am requiring the maintenance tax.

When you go close out a work order, I want to know what you did.

Just don't put I'm done.

You were done with what?

What did you do in that unit?

Did you actually change the faucet?

Did you fix the leak?

Did you fix the drywall?

We I want details because when we get details, we maybe were able to give better response and better detail to other folks that are asking for it.

We're we're happy by the way to provide further analytics and data on our work orders, on our code violations.

Obviously, they run the gamut, some take longer than others, some are more serious than others.

Our goal is obviously to deal with them as quickly as possible.

Some are easy to address, some are some are not easy to address.

But it's always the effort to get there.

And so we don't have all that information with us right now, but happy to follow up after with with like specifics and numbers and time turnaround times.

I just want to be clear on um what Councillor Monto um put forward.

As far as the um furnace, is that per unit or is that a boiler system?

So we we run an electric key.

So there's electric key, and then we want the hot water tanks, the one two hot water tanks per building per building.

So I use an example of 1518 and 1813 have two hot water tanks for the whole entire building.

That's more than efficient hot water.

That's the water tanks, but the furnace for heating is electric per unit.

Yes, every unit, every bedroom has an electric base for heat.

Okay.

Oh, base port.

And we have replaced a bunch of them that are bad, we replace them with new ones.

Okay, thank you.

Actually, one more question, because I want to hear out the slide.

But did we the previous owner, and now you guys are totally tied?

Y'all, y'all are split now, right?

There's no connection, there's no anything, right?

Okay.

All right.

Okay.

Thank you.

Well, I'm I'm interested to know back.

What software you use for the maintenance.

Um I know that's probably a little more than one site.

One site.

Okay.

So each technician gets a copy of for one unit, two copies.

So each technician gets a copy of for one unit, two copies.

And I'm gonna say in a perfect world, they're supposed to leave a copy for the tenant.

We also like the tenant to sign the the work order once it's completed.

If the tenant's not there, we'll put tenant was not there to sign work order.

So I I have dealt with a lot of maintenance.

I'm sorry, not maintenance, a lot of housing entities.

And um, I'll just say that I'd like the approach of a supervisor calling um back to make sure that work was done.

But even the call and the sign off.

And I don't know, you know, you guys know your workers.

I have dealt with organizations that some of the maintenance staff were doing subpar work.

So although it's done and there's no one checking on it, then it continues to deteriorate because it wasn't done properly.

So that's that's just something I wanted to state.

Although you sign off or you make that call, that doesn't mean it's correct.

Right.

So one of the things that we did was in order for us to be more successful in how we deal with work orders, we divided the buildings.

So I have one technician covering two building two buildings.

So we went from six technicians to 12.

So we double the maintenance that um so that we could be better proactive instead of reactive.

We want to be proactive.

Yeah.

Um bringing in a manager that's gonna be there 24-7.

Is that the it's another thing that we're adding?

He starts he's starting next week for us.

And then we have a site supervisor.

Okay, and that's a local maintenance.

Yep, okay.

He's a local maintenance manager who's gonna start on Monday, and then we have the supervisor on top of that.

And then we also have six cleaners on site that we that are under us.

So we have a cleaner per two buildings.

So we're also doing that as well.

And the cleaner are they local?

Yep, everything's yeah, they're in our our in-house staff.

It's not a contractor, it's it's our staff.

No, no, no.

I understand.

And they're local.

Yes.

But we were told that some of your um maintenance were located in Buffalo, like you you guys travel throughout all of the sites.

So when we were dealing with the violations that we had to take care of, we had a uh third-party contractor.

Okay that came in.

That was an outside contractor that came out of Buffalo and out of Rochester.

So that's separate from our maintenance staff as local.

And then they're 24-7.

Okay, you have 12 staff.

Okay.

Thank you.

So aside from the the work orders, the physical improvements, we've also been focusing very much on security.

Security is a big concern and a big problem at the site.

Um, our first step is we hired a full-time director of security, Josiah Homan.

He works very closely with SPD and everyone else to either to coordinate investigations, coordinate um, you know, tenant issues, tenant complaints, things like that.

Um we've also made a lot of physical improvements.

So we've had to replace all every single entrance, entrance door, and all the hardware.

So what you're seeing here is two new doors that we've that we've had to install.

Uh there were about 20 units that were taken over by either by squatters or by drug traffickers that we've had to clear and we've had to secure, and we've renovated and rented those to to good people.

Uh we've installed 351 security cameras across the site.

That's both interior and exterior.

There's so you know, basically coverage in every public area in on the campus.

So we've got very good visuals as to what um that's huge.

I'm sorry.

I just bought the cameras.

Are they your own cameras?

Are they connected to a company?

Are they yeah, yeah.

So we so we purchase the cameras and we hired a we hired a company that's a security company that works with on all of our reliance security.

Okay.

Um, and they and they they monitor those cameras for us.

Okay.

So they so they monitor the they actively monitor the cameras, they field complaints from tenants from us, from SPD, and they they assist in investigations and and follow-ups with like based on that camera footage.

Okay, thank you.

I didn't I just wanted to know the company.

Okay.

Uh, with regard to the doors, the exterior doors.

We talk about the doors and locks being replaced.

Do they actually lock?

Right now, they do not lock.

We're waiting on some access control to arrive.

So just electronic strikes, electronic fobs, things that'll give us a little bit more detail as to who like who's coming and going.

The issue without that right now, if you lock these doors right now, um, the people who are trying to get into the property will simply destroy them.

Um we've over and over again had to replace doors, hardwares, catches, strikes.

When once those when those doors lock, they become uh they become a bigger security problem because you can't lock them.

We this and we actually and we'll get into this in a minute, but we've actually had to have in-person security presence while we were doing the cameras exactly for that reason.

So I feel like a detail like that seems to be missing from the information, and so um respectfully I look at all of this information with a little bit of skepticism when we're not getting the full picture.

I hear you, and uh everything is a work in progress there.

There's a lot of work that needs to be done, and we're in progress on a lot of it, and we're just trying to illustrate what we've what we've accomplished to date.

Go ahead.

So maybe I'm lost here for a minute, which happens.

So if I'm a resident living in that building, we're talking about the the doors on the east campus, right?

That we're talking about on both, on both east and the west campus.

And I go home, the door, that's doors just always open.

Right right now, the front doors are.

The rear the rear doors, there's the fire egress doors, those are locked from the exterior.

So you can't get in from those doors that you're not supposed to be able to, but right now the front doors, we don't have the locks set up yet.

And do you so in replace that?

Do you have a timeline?

When did you when did this start where they couldn't get into the that the doors have been unlocked?

So the doors we started at work maybe about two months ago.

We we fit we finished all the doors, and now we're well, we're moving on to the locks.

So we're hoping to have that done the next month.

And provide tenants all new keys on to access everything.

And had that been disclosed to the tenants.

Do they know do the tennis units know?

Like we're working in progress, we are changing doors.

Are we communicating this with them?

Yes, we we have a we have a whole community engagement team.

Um we're getting into the cadence of having monthly resident meetings with with everybody there.

As we get further along in the process, we'll have more granular meetings by floor, by building, to let people know about the renovations.

Um, but yes, we're we're working with the tenants very closely.

So just to follow up on the hot water situation.

So we uh we are aware that the building didn't have adequate hot water for some time.

Um, or build two buildings, I think it was, right?

Okay.

Um so I was made aware that a couple of residents, not many were relocated to a hotel.

Why what was the I mean, what was the difference with just those two or three versus multiple people on the shore?

I was in direct contact with one of them via text.

We text pretty regularly.

And you know, she was that's who I was in contact with, so I put her, we we put her up in a hotel for for the night.

Or the night.

Two nights.

Two nights.

Oh, okay, okay.

Okay.

All right.

I didn't know how long they were there.

I just was aware that they were there.

It was Christmas Eve, and I know her she has like a seven-year-old son, and we're texting back and forth.

So we put her in a hotel for Christmas Eve, Christmas.

The part was fixed on Christmas.

Um, but she stayed Christmas Day as well and came back on the 26th, I believe.

By that point, the the hot water was fixed.

Okay.

Thank you.

So just just a couple final thoughts on security.

So it in addition to our coordination with SPD, we've built them an office for their use.

So when uh when SPV is patrolling on the site, when they're doing when they're doing tours there, we've got a place for them to stay that's hooked up to all the security equipment.

Um it's fit out with with a fridge, with a coffee maker, it's a comfortable place for them, and it's a safe place for them to stay.

Um and with the with our camera system, we've helped in over I believe 11 investigations, um, and then 30 like tenant initiated complaints.

So tenant initiated, you know, there's issue here, someone's leaving garbage here, someone is you know loitering.

Um we've been able to resolve those using this system.

So how much security do you have overnight?

So the cameras run 24-7.

No physical security, like five.

We have five people.

Five security officers every overnight every night.

Yes.

Okay.

Spread out throughout the campus, both campuses.

Yes, yeah.

So I'm Sai Homan, uh, security director for the property.

So yeah, we have a team of five that operate uh 24-7.

One is on the cameras monitoring, the other four are patrolling the property, and that's what we have seven days a week, 365.

They're always walking around while one's on cameras.

Uh they see something, they'll radio to them, direct them to go where they need to be uh to make sure the issues are taken care of as quickly as possible.

I'm sorry, can you say who you are and what you do?

Josiah Holman, I'm security director for the property.

I didn't I didn't get your name.

Josiah Holman.

Josiah.

Holman.

Homeland.

Thank you.

Yep.

You can go to the next slide.

This is related to related to maintenance.

You know, we we have a very different situation here.

We have a population that that's actively resisting renovations that actually resisting security.

Um, you know, you could see in the bottom right, that's a uh camera that's been spray painted over.

The top right, that's a security camp that was ripped down shortly after use.

On the top left, you could see these are you know, this is the abuse that the doors take, and which is why we had to buy hardened things and why we need to be very careful about our access control.

Um, and in this middle, this was a squatters, this was a squatter's apartment.

Uh they left all the faucets on and left the apartments, creating a flood, creating issues for numerous tenants.

So we had there's there's lots of issues with the property, but there's a lot of super issues with the property, things that go above and beyond what what normal property management has to deal with.

And we've been we've been working hard to try to try to meet those challenges.

But I wanted to show at least some of this anecdotal of some of the issues that we face on a day-to-day basis.

All everything that you see here has been resolved already.

This these are pictures from a couple months ago.

Um, but the cameras are the cameras, the maintenance, it's a constant battle.

Most of that, the east campus.

Um that's that's a mixture.

Yeah, it's both.

Don't you renovate it?

Um they look really nice, but how many of them did you renovate?

I think we've rented a bit of 20 apartments.

Only 20?

Yes.

And out of all the buildings, out of apartments, 20.

20.

That's from the West.

That's on both campuses.

That's that's what we've would we've been able to recover from, like I said, from squatters, from from drug traffickers, secure those, renovate and lease them.

So you haven't done anything in the prior and to people that have already been there, not the squatters, not ones that were open, just people that are residents that are staying there, no new innovations or anything.

Nothing on those yet, but those are planned.

We'll we can get into that in the next slide.

So that's everything that's going on at the site.

So we could talk about what the project is, what we're planning to do, what we hope to achieve.

So the site is 393 apartments.

We refer to it as the West Campus, sort of outlined in red.

Those are there's 200 units there.

Um, and on the east campus, there's 193 units there.

So what our what our proposal is and what we've secured, uh we've secured financing for is to do an extensive gut renovation of the 200 units on the west campus, and then newly build 193 units that'll be one for one replacement for the for the um for the east side properties.

Our assessment broadly is that the west campus is challenging, but it's saveable.

The design makes sense.

It works with with the capital investment and active management that can operate like a normal, healthy place.

The east campus, there's some long-running public uh, you know, uh urban planning, design, and you know, just site layout issues that just make the site difficult to manage, difficult to secure, and just doesn't make it a good place for for the residents.

So our assessment is that you know the best way that to make a durable solution to this problem is to build new housing for the residents that live there that deserve it, relocate them into these two new buildings that are right across the street, and then ultimately demolish the eastern the eastern portion of the campus for a future for a future development that we'll talk about with the city when we're ready.

Oh, you want to demolish it, but you don't have a plan?

I'm sorry, you know your plan?

So first that first things first is to get to to help the residents that are there, and that means renovating the apartments and building new housing for the people that deserve it.

When we when we have that problem resolved, we could talk about the future, we could talk about what could happen on that site.

We're really open to being quite to being uh collaborative with the city and with the planning department of what that can be and what that can look like.

But I we think you need to start with what you have.

So I want to be very transparent.

It all should be a one part because you have to have idea what you want there.

So as you build in this, it would be very nice if you were very transparent of what your next step would like to be.

And we're and we're happy to just neighborhood the community would definitely want to know.

We're happy to do that.

We're happy to do community engagement of what it could be and what it should be.

Right now, our focus is on what how we deal with the immediate problems.

But I hear you, and we can and we should talk about it.

How many stories is building B?

Um, Building B, I think is six stories.

Six stories at home.

I know building B is building B is the south.

I think that's four stories.

Four stories.

Has there been any discussion with residents on that side of the um community?

Because there's multiple houses right on that street and sit right behind it.

Has there been resident outreach?

Um neighbors.

Yeah, not not the not your tenants, the neighboring property.

The neighboring property.

So we've done we've done both, but it was about a month ago.

We had a meeting with both residents and both uh we flyered and saw there.

The meeting was two people there.

At the church and the boys and girls club.

No.

We're talking about like engagement, like knock on doors, find a one.

That was an engagement.

That was a separate couple people came.

It was cold.

It was cold, it was snowing that night.

Yeah, but so we're talking about community engagement, like talking to the community, who's buying it.

We have a very strong community, and there's a lot of homeowners over there.

There's rental, they should be involved.

And we we mentioned that before in the meetings, making sure that they're involved in this process.

We were gonna have a meeting on the 21st of January, but we had to reschedule that our plan is to have a meeting first week of February to invite more folks from the community.

But we will have a meeting every month.

Yeah, monthly meeting.

For both residents and for neighboring for and for neighbors.

And in terms of, you know, you're talking meetings with tenants, meetings with residents.

I do know they have a tenants association, you know, at Park Side.

What is your engagement with the tenants association?

How often do you meet with them and and you know?

How much how willing are you to address their concerns?

Totally willing to address their concerns.

We love and appreciate tenants associations.

It helps us focus our energy, it helps us address problems more readily.

Um we would probably when you know we'll we'll get into a gaidance, we would probably do a monthly meeting just with the tenants association and then a meeting with the broader the residents in the community as well.

So what is the what's the um how many stories for building A?

I believe it is five stores.

There's a four.

If if we can answer that question, uh we'll have whole sections where we focus on on the new construction component.

Is it okay if we start just talking about the renovations?

Yeah.

Well, well, first off, you have five stories for both.

You're saying four and five.

Four on building B, five on building A.

Oh, you said four.

Yes.

Okay.

And just for the people, just I know we know what building A and B is, but people don't know.

So can you just say, you know, the building 1901 or where it is located?

Because people don't know if you're sure.

So building A is where the Patrician Bakery used to be.

Uh site B is where the the former Delhi site.

And to counselor Caldwell's question about the property, once we tear down the East Campus.

So are your funding stack for this project that you're showing us now?

Is that just for the other parts?

The HRC money to the Light Tech, that's just that's not including rebuilding over there.

Correct.

That would be part of a future phase with New York State.

Okay.

HCR.

All right.

You go to the next slide.

So we'll we'll talk about the renovation first.

So this is the 200 units on the west side.

Again, this will be a very extensive renovation.

This is we've looked at everything.

We need new roofs, we need new windows, new apartments, new everything.

Um here's a summary of the rehab scope and a before and after of a project we recently completed.

So again, every single unit will get all new kitchens, all new bathrooms, new appliances, do bathroom fixtures, um, but in addition to the stuff inside the apartments, we think it's important to address the the building systems and the infrastructure that make it a good place to live.

So we're looking closely at the plumbing systems, the electrical systems, the roofs, the windows, um, where you know, where the where the brick is and the facade, and then increasing the site, the uh, you know, adding landscaping, adding playgrounds, stuff that should be on the site or remove was removed from the site at some point and should be there.

Um so, you know, and you could see you know quickly just from these photos of kind of you know the kind of finishes we're looking at.

We're looking at doing upgraded, you know, upgraded finishes, um, quartz countertops, all wood cabinets, ventilation of the kitchens, um, you know, adding cabinets in the cabinets and the bathrooms, things like this that add that at and and like wainscotting and uh you know plastic protectors around the tub.

Um, all these things that just will make the residents' quality of life much much better.

Um and one of the upgrades will also be there's gonna be a new a new heating and cooling system.

Uh the whole um these will all be all electric, uh uh package terminal heat pumps.

Um so tenants will get uh heating and cooling from it, and they'll be much more efficient.

It'll be cheaper for the tenants to run their utility bills with those.

So that's that's what that's what we're doing.

That's what's going into the rehab.

So how are we gonna do it?

This that that rehab would be going on at the same time that you're building the two buildings.

So okay.

Correct.

So the expect so the expected timeline is where we're working with HCR very closely right now.

We expect to get the financing sometime between March and June of this year.

We would start the renovations and we would start the construction at the same time.

The renovation will probably take a little bit, it'll take a little bit less time, and the new construction will take a little bit more.

But the idea is we're tackling both problems at once.

Question.

Yeah, so I can understand.

You wanna where the patrician bakery well snowflakes brought up bakery is you want to rebuild there, right?

And put new ones, but meanwhile, the buildings that you're gonna knock down, you're gonna rehab and make them look like that.

Yes.

Not the buildings that we're gonna the buildings on the western portion of the campus will be rehabbed.

Question.

Which what is what would you consider what would be considered the western?

Right here, sorry.

Right.

But what I again explain to the people what would be that building, 1901?

1903, 1901, 1815, 1813, 1811, and 1809.

So the back side is the ones that you're going to redo, and then you're gonna knock down the front side off of right, and then rebuild those, but you're gonna renovate those, but knock the front side over, right?

No, so what's what's higher?

I'm confused because I don't yeah.

Absolutely.

Rehab new, new, with doors are complete here that's gonna get that right past.

That's the great funds.

Well said.

That's two different.

Just so Michael Collins, Commissioner for Neighborhood and Business Development.

Uh to provide clarity here, the this whole project has a contract with HUD, and they are not allowed to reduce the number of affordable units.

Works great for us.

We don't want fewer affordable units.

But what that means is that before anything can happen on the eastern portion, the 2000 block, the the uh one and two hundreds uh below, that they must uh build and be able to um move the contracts and the residents from the eastern portion into the new buildings before they could do anything on the other portion.

And so what we are in regular contact with HCR about uh New York State housing um uh homes and community renewal and then the subdivision of HFA, which is where all the funding comes through, is the fact that the developers uh the city through this agreement uh that we're uh in the committee meeting about for the shelter rent agreement uh and the state would all be together with HUD on making sure that every you every resident there is protected in having a unit.

Uh and so everyone that's there now that is a is current with their leases, and I would let the developers speak to that.

Uh, but not lease violations, the criminal activity, that type of thing.

They're either going to be in a rehabbed unit or a new unit, but HUD would not allow them to reduce the number of units.

So that's why the the two new buildings would have to happen before anything on the eastern portion.

So um you mentioned that, and I you could or them could answer you might want to stay up there, um, that this eastern section would be razzed due to multiple reasons.

Can you just tell us some of those reasons?

Because other than topography, I didn't really get what the concerns were.

Sure.

Well, well, the topography is a big part of it.

It's a it's a super block, it's super hilly.

You can't get emergency vehicles in and out of there.

Um, you know, if you um it's a big wide site, that's just hard to control.

It's just that it's just that big, it's spread out.

Um that's so the topography is important.

Um the second is that in the the building design itself.

Um each one of these buildings has numerous entrance and exits and tunnels underneath them.

So again, just from a security perspective, it's very it's a very hard site to control.

Where the tunnels go into.

There's so um, so in each one of each one of the buildings, um the you see the kind of ends that are sort of like Tetris shaped, and in the middle that connects them.

In each one of those, there's a tunnel underneath them that connects um one of the one of the the basements to the other basements.

And that was done for convenience for fire access for a lot of reasons.

But again, if you're you know, pursuing, you know, if you're pursuing you know a criminal or someone's creating crime, it's very easy for them to either run up one set of stairs and run across and run down or through the tunnels, and or like in order, like over the summer, we had I think 70 security, like 70 guards or 70 shifts.

Um, it's you know, it's not windows on the street, it's it's just it's poor, it's poor planning, and this happens sometimes with sensory developments.

And the physical deterioration is at a point where it's just we're not salvageable.

Yeah, yes.

It's and I I would add, I mean, if the when you look at what for people that have choice in where they live, and we all should what is there right now, the physical layout of it does not allow for any property owner to ensure that it would be secure and in an attractive site.

I could reach up to the ceiling and rip a camera down.

You would as well, we you know, you'd need a small step stool, counselor, you'd be right there with us.

Uh but you know, a few of us have been, you know, counselor, you grew up down the street from it.

I've lived down the street from this for most of my life.

So I'm very familiar with the buildings.

Um this has for my entire life been a security concern, and it is the design of the buildings that has meant that to have it secure and have what you need is just a greater physical presence than what a property like this will cash flow.

And what is most important to the administration is that it's not just that it's it's it's clean and affordable, but it's got to be safe, and we recognize that that's um that that's just not feasible with the current layout.

Um so I guess one of my main concerns, um, I'm I'm I'm fine with redevelopment.

I absolutely love um any time we get improvements.

Um my main concern is that you're taking such a large campus, taking that same number of individuals and then packing them into these two smaller uh campuses.

And for me, that like I I say all the time, I'm a greenscape girl.

Yep.

I I've had you you and I have had great conversations about that.

Absolutely.

I know how you value that.

So when you move me from, you know, all of this lush grass and you know, open area to these two smaller campuses.

I I'm gonna just go crazy.

I'm gonna tell you right now.

Um, so I have concerns with that.

Um but I would like you know, I need to see further designs of you know, okay.

Yeah, just while you're here, just confirm it with me, because I'm from the just keep it from the east side.

So when we talk east side, there's lower east side and low and high side, right?

You guys east west, we don't do that.

The upper east side, which is hilltop, we call it that.

So this is your plan, not downhilltop, right?

So everyone is there.

The lower east side, which it would have been close to like Kinney Square area, right?

That's the plan where you're gonna redo things over, right?

Renovate, correct?

That's right.

Yeah, that's you're correct.

Yeah, so that's the plan, right?

Yeah, renovate what's in red, new what's in yellow and green, yellow and blue, or yellow and blue, thank you.

Um and then the yellow, and then relocate from green to yellow and blue.

Which so it again, hilltop, boys and girls club, east eye, what teared out lower east side, which needed which rehab move everybody to the opposite side in that smaller area, and like which um council right there.

Everybody from Hilltop.

Hill right, everybody in the lower stays.

So that one space right there.

You say Kennedy Square.

But what I'm talking, I'm going back to the communication at the community.

When you talk about lower east eye, you're talking about closer to would be in Kennedy Square.

Kennedy Square is like right there.

When you talk about like demographic.

So this is Westmoreland.

No, they're talking about going down.

No, no, no.

No, no, it'll all stay within within what we've got right here.

We're not talking Kennedy Square.

We're we're not the only way that this is coming in.

I'm talking as far as I know what you're saying.

Yeah, I'm talking about fire is communication as fire's wording demographics.

Okay, so and then what I would what I would say.

No, I get I get it.

No, I get it.

Okay.

No, I got it.

Of course, it's the Sharon.

This not a this not an open meeting.

This is not an open meeting.

This is not an open meeting.

Sharon, if we have you speak, we have to have others speak.

Yes, okay, sorry.

Let's finish the presentation.

We'll get to it.

I got you.

Okay.

We got it, we got it.

Okay.

Um, Councillor Jones Rouser, to your point about the green space.

I'm with you.

And what we know is that families have long struggled, and especially this summer to feel safe and join the green space.

And so it is not something that they've really felt that they've even had access to all along.

So it is absolutely a challenge that needs to be addressed, and I believe it can be addressed in the future redevelopment of that site.

But what we're looking at as uh the developers acquire the uh properties that they're looking to acquire from the city is that the new buildings would be would would meet zoning as far as uh you know that they're not gonna need to go in front of planning commission for variances because they are oversized.

Uh but it is much more much more dense.

You're right.

Yeah.

What's the plan for Hilltop?

The the demo the demo portion.

What are we doing?

So that to work.

So we we would look to the developers to be working on that once immediately once they close on the financing for the current project.

I I will say when you look at all the projects that we've got going on across the city, uh East Adams, you're all familiar with that's being done in 11 to 12 phases.

Those phases are 100, 140 million dollars apiece.

This right here combined just what we're talking about today is 220 million.

So to uh ask a developer to at the same time have the um expense without uh recapture uh for a long period of time on the design of the other phase from a cash flow perspective is it's unlikely that we'd we'd be able to see that.

How far out are we looking on that?

Uh uh I'll defer to the developers.

It it would probably be it would probably be after these buildings are built.

I would think in that time period while we're doing the construction and the renovation on these, it would be a great opportunity to engage with the community with the neighbors.

What do people want to see?

You know, do they want do they want open space?

Do they want retail?

Do they want affordable housing?

Um I think that's I think we'd be really open to having those conversations with with the people in this room and the people in this neighborhood.

Yeah.

And so uh a comment like, you know.

Afterwards.

Give me give me a time frame.

Probably pretty general.

Probably at least two years.

Yeah.

So I think the way that this would work is we would engage with the community, we'd get ideas.

We also will need to work in conjunction with New York State homes and community renewal in HFA, the agencies that Mike referenced.

There's a process with to work with those agencies.

There's lead times, there's you know, you got to get in a queue to get funded.

It doesn't happen necessarily immediately.

So during the once we break ground on this existing plan, the idea would be that we would then engage with community members.

We would also engage with New York State.

That would, I think, tee us up nicely to hopefully start construction on future phases around the time that we're completing construction on the what we're talking about here.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, I would say uh from the city's perspective, we want it to move as fast as possible because you otherwise you've got vacant buildings sitting there.

We all know what a challenge making buildings are, and you're not gonna have the financing to tear them down until you've tied it into the financing for what you're gonna do next.

But what we do want is a significant amount of community engagement to understand what's possible right there.

And you know, Michael, I know that you mentioned 220 million dollar project, it's probably getting towards the the end.

You're talking about financing.

What's your capital stack look like and how does the shelter rent play into this whole equation?

Sure.

Sure.

So we can we were gonna spend a little more time talking about the the um the design, but can you go to sure can you go to the the page of the project cost so as Michael said the total project cost for this is about 220 20 million dollars?

125 million of that is just the bricks and sticks and just you know direct trade costs for what it costs to build the building, and then the rest of it is your you know your architect fees, your engineer fees, your loan interest, your design permits, things like that.

Um we so we are getting about 75 million dollars from HCR, and that's a combination of taxes and bonds and subsidy um that they are gonna put they're gonna put into the uh into the deal.

Um the remaining stack, about 100 million dollars, that's all low-income housing tax credits and state low housing tax credits.

Where's the other 45?

The balance so the balance of it turns be is like things like accrue, uh accrued interest, um uh assumed debt from HCR, which they're gonna extend rather than having us pay it down, they're gonna agree to extend it and push it further out.

So they're all like non-cash sources.

And how many?

I know you it's in a packet, but how many apartments is it gonna be now?

It'll be it's 393 now, it'll be 300.

It's a one for one replacement.

So it's on one in one.

So it's gonna be 393 to 393.

Exactly.

Yeah.

And are you changing?

So I know are you are you gonna increase bedroom size or DC?

Unit unit breakdown per HUD's regulations remains the same.

One for one, you're not adding any, it's just gonna be the exact same.

That's right.

So the shelter rent.

So the shelter rent.

So in order to get the the senior mortgage, we need to have a reliable tax, a constant tax, and that's the the pilot payment.

Um, so with this what this shelter rent tax will do right now, the property is under a Michelama shelter rent tax abatement.

The property tax is about 270 to 330,000 a year.

Uh when this project's when this project is complete with the same number of units, we're actually gonna be paying more in real estate taxes.

We think the total amount will end up being about $800,000 a year.

So we're actually gonna see a net increase in taxes, but it's that it's but it's the uh it's the con it's the consistency of the pilot that's really important to the lenders and to the bond agencies that make that really important.

So it's it's more taxes, but it's something we're willing to do in order to to work with HFA.

Uh I just uh just to take a step back because I know that the resident engagement is sort of important.

So can you sir?

Can you go to the um uh back to the to the the rehab scope slide?

So again, this would be the level of finish for the rent for the renovated apartments.

So this is gonna be the high quality, serious stuff that we're doing in order to do this in order for the residents to have the best experience.

We generally gonna ask tenants to relocate for about a month.

And we have a plan about how we'll how we'll do that.

Can you go to the next slide?

So all two all 200 of those those people, we're gonna ask them to move to a different apartment for for about a month.

Now we'll meet with every single household and figure out their household size, if they have pets, if there's medical equipment, if there's mobility issues, important things like that, so we can figure out exactly what the what the appropriate place to put them is.

We're here in Syracuse.

Uh on this on the property.

Um probably you're gonna do one for one.

So as you're moving, yeah.

You're gonna move them over and do it that way.

So we'll we'll hold about like 30 or 40 apartments vacant.

Uh we'll renovate those, and then as we're going through the property, we'll approach every family and say, you know, are you willing to move to this apartment for about a month while we renovate your current apartment?

Hopefully they say yes.

We move all their things for them.

They they don't we cover all the relocation costs, we try to make it as easy for them as possible.

We renovate their apartments, we come back to them, we say, Oh, you're we're we're done, you can move back.

Are you holding empty apartments now in the out of those 200 units?

Yes.

How many are empty now?

Right now that we think there's about 60.

60?

Yes.

You said you would ask them if they're willing to.

What if they're not willing to?

Well, what it really comes down to it, if they don't want us to come in and they don't want the renovations, we can't force them.

We're not going to force them.

Um, it's it creates construction logistics and headaches.

But at the same time, it's gonna be our job to convince that resident that they want this and this is right for them.

And whose job is it to convince them?

So that's that's the development team.

That's us.

And so hopefully it should be us too.

Yeah, sure.

I mean, it should.

Yeah, I mean, if there's if there is a situation, we we might want to be able to be hands-on with the people that we know in the community.

Um, so yeah.

At the end, at the end of the day, when you know we show people, so we'll we'll have like a so we'll renovate an entire apartment first, and we'll do tours, we'll show everybody what they're looking at.

Uh, try to get people excited for the fact, you know, moving is a hassle, renovation's a hassle.

Um, we know we know all that.

We try to get people excited for this so that you know you could you can start to visualize what the future can look like.

Um, and we'll do that engagement.

We're doing that engagement now and just kind of getting people excited.

And then as the construction period goes on, there's gonna be constant engagement, constant reminders, keeping people updated in the schedule, trying to keep all keeping people at least like giving them like 30 days notice of like where they would go and when they would go.

Ideally, we have we give them more time than that, but 30 days is the absolute minimum.

Um, and just continue to work with them as we're as we're working across the site.

So the resident engagement and the tenant experience is really really important to us.

So it's uh before we enter our meeting, and a few questions.

What is the current uh monthly rent for a tenant now?

So so all residents are on section eight, so they pay 30% of their income.

No, and no matter what, they come in, they do an income certification.

We file that with HUD.

HUD pay, they pay 30% of their income, HUD pays the balance.

The out like what the actual rent is is anywhere between like like 900 and like 19 uh 1900 a month.

Yeah, somewhere around there.

Okay, so when they come back, the rents are gonna go up.

No, so it's I think it's important because Rob said they pay the residents will pay currently they pay 30% of their monthly income.

When they return, they'll pay 30% of their monthly income.

So the their out of pocket rents will the formula stays the exact same as it is now.

Okay, so the qualifications to go in, you must be what your income level?

It's income.

Correct.

And we have we have regulatory agreements with New York State HFA and with HUD that regulate different different uh income levels for different apartments.

What's the income to start with?

The lowest uh the lowest income.

Well, it it could theoretically be zero, would be the would be the lowest one.

But I'm concerned.

So a person who is a very low income, their apartment will they all be the same or yes.

Yes.

It won't be if they want one or is there gonna be multiple bedrooms?

Yeah, so there's a mixture of ones and twos and threes.

And then obviously, I mean, the renovation product is gonna be really, really, really nice.

Um, it's not gonna be the exact same as a new construction building.

So the rents are gonna be different for that, but the tenant is still gonna pay 30% of their income regardless of what's sure about say 30%.

And many of them who are here probably some may have a pension, some may have social security.

What if a tenant is having financial difficulties?

It's having financial difficulties.

Do you work with them?

So if they fall behind, there's no fear of them being, you know, evicted.

Because I want to make sure there are some protections for them.

Right.

One of one of the really generous portions of the Section 8 program is that you know, exactly what you said.

If tenants have if people have a, you know, if they lose a job, if there's changes of social security, if there's anything else.

If they come to us and they say I'm having an issue, there's a problem, we could always do uh recertification with them, submit that to HUD and adjust their rent for whatever it needs to be.

And even if that's zero, if it's zero, the federal government will come in and pay the whole thing.

So they will always look at the tax.

So they're guaranteed.

Not for bed, they lose their job.

The the key is communication, right?

Like having those lines.

Yeah, I agree, it's important, but they know they have some security, you know, if they're temporarily out of work, that they they have security, and that you, as the company, will work with them.

There will be no immediate pressure on them, and that any needs that they may have in their apartments, whether it's got to do plumbing, electrical, or any other issue, they will still receive the same assistance.

Am I correct in saying that?

Yeah, correct.

Correct.

You're correct.

Okay.

That's what I wanted clear.

Okay, no further questions.

The question because I know we're getting close to the time, and I'm I'm a um be very transparent about you know, we've met.

So there's a couple questions.

This is probably for the city of Cycle.

First of all, I want to say we do need to do some renovation on East Side.

Is it is dearly needed.

It they needed it a long time ago.

There's a lot of issues, right?

But this might be like the second biggest um housing transformation in our city compared to the East Adams one that's being built now, right?

And it took a lot of we demanded that when they came in that they did a lot of communication with the community, outreaching, figuring out that community, and when I was saying east side, lower east side, I know the terminology because I grew up there.

There's two different communities that you're changing, you're messing with.

You think they're one, but they're not, right?

So just the first part I want to explain.

So with that, you have to do community engagement.

The housing, taking all those houses back, their homeowners has been there 30, 40, 50 years, have owned their homes, uh, families, in order for the project to move forward and to get the community support, you guys have to do what you say, right?

Not oh, we were or this.

If you're gonna do community engagement, do community engagement.

Let's have that happen.

And I need you to do it for both buildings and all around it, because when you do something like that, it doesn't just affect uh Westmoreland and Fayette Street, it affects the whole entire community.

Um making sure that there's someone here that can be that responsible person that is connecting with the community, connecting with the people in the building.

That's gonna be very important, right?

And then when you say you're gonna fix something, like now our you know, it's like your first impression when you meet somebody, like, okay, everyone gets one in a second and third.

Let's make sure that when you guys have you're gonna say you're gonna do something that it gets done.

It's not like, oh well, transparency is gonna be the best thing because they have been told they have dealt with several different owners, they've been dealing with people, and people have told them the same thing, and look, things are falling, and that's not fair, right?

So we need to make sure that that happens.

So that means you guys gotta get you can't say you're gonna do it.

Y'all gotta be out there in a community engaging with the people.

And guess what?

We're gonna know, because we are the people, right?

So we're gonna know that if you engage with them and what's going on.

And I'm gonna be very honest.

I'm very skeptical about this next building when we can't even get the process of this building, at least going, you know, the doors.

And you and let me take it back.

I'm gonna hit you with a little bad and good.

You guys have done some improvements.

I do know that.

I know it's it's gonna take time.

But being transparent and being um honest about what is gonna take and what it looks like, and communicating with the tenants are gonna be so important.

They shouldn't have to deal with some of the things that they're dealing with that I won't even mention because we're gonna put that in the past.

We're starting off clean.

But that's gonna be important for that community.

Cause if not, I'm gonna be honest, I'm gonna be one of the people that's gonna be looking at y'all like, uh-uh, right?

Cause I am part of the community, right?

And that's the whole city of Syracuse.

But they deserve to have something nice, but they also deserve the truth behind what's gonna happen.

I'd like to real quick, Smithy, can you go to the new construction?

Uh I just wanna show you guys some images of a project, Section 8.

Um very similar that we completed, keep going.

Like we completed in Buffalo.

Um, so this is in downtown Buffalo.

Go back.

Yeah, right there.

Um, you know, we're going to do a very high-end quality product.

It it'll be on par with, you know, some of the highest end market rate housing that's available.

We very, very much believe in providing extremely high quality housing.

It's like at the core, it's in our DNA of what we do as developers.

Um, and I I hear you.

Like we we Well I got fake that you can build it.

It's not that it's the process before time.

Yeah, right.

And making sure that the community, like I said, this might be the second largest um development in our city that we have had besides these Adams one, the pioneer homes.

And there were months and years of communication, getting figuring out what the community need, like a community needs assessment.

Was any of those things done?

Well, we do have a needs assessment that's out there right now.

Yeah, we've done, I think we got we we've had about um 30% response to that.

And that's what's informs our our resident meetings and um and like community engagement thing.

So we've done a handful of events based on the feedback from that.

Like one of the things we're working on now is I think we're doing uh like a homework help class with Boys and Girls Club.

We're trying to bring it onto we're bringing it onto the site rather than at boys and girls.

So that was something that was brought to us in one of those surveys that we're that we're implementing now.

It's one, it's one small thing, but that's we wanna focus on things like that.

And I think to counselor Caldwell's point, the the population has, you know, in I'll be honest with you, this city has failed that corridor for a long time.

I'm just gonna be honest with you, like that.

That whole corridor has needed help for a very long time, and people get lied to for decades and decades and decades.

Terrible housing decisions by this city and by other municipalities.

It's not just us that make those terrible decisions.

So you can show me all the pictures in the world, and I will say, I'm sure you can build that.

You know, there's a lot of companies that go out there and build it, but we have to make sure this is not just new construction on vacant land.

We're moving people, like we're moving bodies across the street.

And I will say this, I've said it a million times.

I am not in favor of warehousing people.

Like if we're going to build, we need to build neighborhoods.

So we need to we actually, you know, we can't just build gigantic high rises and just stuff people into them.

Um I'm skeptical too, but that's that's okay.

We're we're we'll we'll keep working.

We'll have you come back regularly and talk us through this as we go.

Um and Rashida means that she will call you every day if she has to.

So yeah, it depends.

Call me anything.

Yeah, we right now.

We welcome it.

We welcome we welcome the we welcome the engagement, we welcome the skepticism.

It's it's our job to build trust with you.

It's it's our job to build trust for the residents and with the community.

And we don't want you to walk away from here thinking that we're scolding you.

It's just that we care about not just that neighborhood, every single neighborhood, but that neighborhood specifically.

We get a lot of calls.

Like people are not afraid to call us and they're afraid of where they live right now in many cases.

And that's we can't have that.

We can't operate like that.

I would I would sentiment to say we have several community ambassador programs that are some within the city, some that are with other organizations.

Utilize them to help do your community relations or whatever services you're doing, so that they're ma you're maximizing, but the people are actually really getting it.

Because what I'm telling you, you're serving two, I'm a person from the east side, you're serving two different communities.

You're in one, but it's really two different communities.

A street can be a different community here.

So you gotta understand that, and that's why I said it's important to do community dialogue and have some community engagement because you guys, if y'all have done that, y'all have known that.

That's why I can say lower east side, higher each, you say east and west.

It's two different communities.

And we had the same situation with um these out of us, the people in the um part that's now demolished.

They didn't feel like they were a part of the pioneer homes, they didn't want to integrate per se.

Yeah, and I I love the example.

Uh, because they they you're right, exactly right next door to each other, exactly the same landlord, completely different communities.

The um uh so and I I appreciate you bringing up the community ambassadors because community ambassadors have been involved uh very successfully multiple times uh uh with this property.

So uh we are continuing to demand and support uh on the outreach.

Uh you know, we it was we were able to facilitate the time uh the conversation last year that led to CNY Jazz being at at that location, uh which was the first time that CNY Jazz had been there for their their summer series, and uh you know, we we have high expectations for the engagement and what this looks like when it's done.

One of the things that's unique about this compared to East Adams is East Adams is an expansion of uh of units and an expansion of price ranges.

What we're talking about with this project right now is staying exactly within the existing contract, so that expansion would be that phase two uh and and and the upper side.

Uh and so I think I think it was more or less about the communication piece, absolutely like even saying like we're gonna have it um at one site at the site versus at the center.

You may have this group over here who doesn't want to come over to this site, like they don't feel like that's their space.

That's gonna be important, yeah.

No, and and and you're exactly right.

So uh that that's where uh so I I will tell you at this point right now.

I have a weekly meeting with this team, uh, but uh along with my um very I you know I talk with HCR on uh at least a weekly basis.

Uh housing finance agency has said that this is their number one priority in uh in Syracuse.

Um and so we appreciate the fact that once again New York State is saying we're gonna invest in Syracuse, and so it's up to us collectively to make sure that we end up with the right uh with the right development afterwards, uh, because they want the state wants to invest money in Syracuse, and we want to take advantage of that.

Definitely, we just want to make sure they do it right.

We've got to do it right.

We absolutely have to do it.

One more question.

Sorry, Jimmy.

I know you know we've got it close.

No, go ahead.

Um go ahead.

You the current maintenance staff will not be the ones doing the renovations of the current no.

We knew we wouldn't get to everything in an hour, so we'll have you come back again.

When is the next community engagement meeting that you have coming setting up?

We're planning for the first week in February, I believe.

Yeah, February.

Where's the location?

Park side, which one so that's only for that part of the building.

What about the other people?

Okay.

They're not there yet, but they I just want to understand two different maybe we'll modify how we're approaching that.

Absolutely.

Because that's why you're not getting engagement too, right?

You gotta understand that, and making sure that it's flex time or maybe I don't know, Zoom, or just opportunities so that everyone can get there.

And the community room is it is yeah, no, I know it's 1901, but they're capacity.

Yeah, I know where capacity.

We'll have a meeting on it, it's a decent size, like they could.

But then I'm just cute.

Yeah, probably 50 or 60 people.

Yeah, I was gonna say you would we we would all be okay if there were 50 people in there.

Okay.

I we'd check with the fire marshal, but the rest of us would be okay.

We're doing everything in English and Spanish, right?

Yeah, okay.

With snacks, right?

And water, bring pizza.

All right, thank you for everybody for everybody.

Thank you very much.

Most to adjourn.

Yeah.

So