Are we ready?

I'm starting to live.

Okay, I'm calling this meeting to order.

Welcome to the 2 30, which is now 3 30.

Public works committee meeting.

Item number one, call to order.

Number two, resolution authorizing payment of $25,000 to Kathy Bennett on behalf of Luther Bennett and Greg Diddy Law.

From the sinking fund is payment of a judgment and fee.

And welcome.

Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Chad Becker from Treasury.

Here as always to give council assurance that there's sufficient cash in the sinking fund to pay this judgment ahead of our levy placement on the property and tax rolls.

The judgment has been approved by the court and the mayor.

And with council's approval, finance will uh file paperwork with county to levy the human over three years.

And Jack's gonna talk about this case.

Just very briefly.

So uh Mr.

Bennett was as you vehicle traveling southbound on Martin Luther King Boulevard, our police officer traveling northbound, observed two cars racing southbound, initiated overhead lights.

Uh starting to make a U-turn in front of uh the vehicle that Mr.

Bennett was the passenger in uh collided with the vehicle, Mr.

Bennett uh suffered injuries and and probably tort claim for those injuries and pain suffering.

Uh initial claim was an excess of seventy thousand dollars after some back and forth negotiation in this uh admitted liability case.

We're admitting liability in this situation.

Um negotiated a settlement of 25,000 dollars.

The mayor's approved that uh for your consideration.

Thank you, Jack.

Very helpful.

Any questions?

Okay, we can leave the door open.

Yes, it was just because I was too loud.

Okay, we're gonna continue on.

We're in a meeting.

Number three, resolution authorizing payment of $95,000 to J.

M.

Brown Plaintiff and Donald Smolen Plano, Oklahoma Healthcare Authority from the sinking fund.

This is you as well.

Me as well, and my part is the same.

So we have a covering here to talk about this case.

Okay, counselor.

So um in this case, uh Mr.

Brown was traveling on the riding his bicycle on the sidewalk near Springdale Park uh off East Pine Street, and this this occurred uh June 21st of 2024.

Um the month before the city had removed a piece of the sidewalk to repair a water leak, and uh they had broken up the concrete, and we never replaced it after repairing the leak.

And so he was riding his bicycle at 9 p.m.

Uh, did not see the piece of uh portion of sidewalk missing, front tire went into the crevice.

He flipped over the bicycle, ended up breaking bones in both his hands, uh chipped and dislocated his front teeth, and um, of course the city admitted liability and uh we negotiated a settlement with him and his attorney uh for 95,000.

The settlement was presented to the mayor.

Mayor's approved the settlement and that's where we are today.

So that's the cost of two front teeth replacement.

Where was this again?

Which street?

So it was off East Pine Street next to Springdale Park.

Okay.

Thank you.

Uh Councilor Bingle.

Contractor or city.

Uh, this was the city.

So I'm sorry, so we fixed the utility and didn't replace the sidewalk.

Yep.

Or we were in that process, and it just we just hadn't gotten there yet.

Or I'm really trying to understand, or did we not put up barriers warning that the sidewalk closed?

This thing was closed, or the side, yeah.

That starts the sidewalk.

We had not.

Did we not mitigate the potential for that?

No, we we uh we had not fixed the sidewalk yet.

Um, there were for some reason it was that there was a daily, it had been over 30 days since we fixed the water leak, and when this occurred, there was there were no columns, there was no fencing around the missing sidewalk.

Okay, terrible.

I agree.

Okay, anything else on this one.

Thank you, appreciate it.

Number four, ordinance closing a certain utility easement requested by Joseph McCormick for property located at 1533 East 31st Street, block four, block one.

And Mr.

Zachary, you're here to talk to us about this.

Yes, ma'am.

CD four.

Uh this is a case of a clouded title uh on this property.

Uh we did receive a request from them uh from this plat.

Uh the easement that he has built the home into uh lines at all, and it was partially closed on a the other side of the lot line, but this was discovered.

I'm assuming in a refinancing or a sale uh so we were able to relieve uh this with your all's authorization.

Uh we have no objection to closing this, and we didn't receive anything from private utility companies as well.

So we'd recommend closing this easement, and then this will also relieve uh his title being clouded as well.

Any questions or concerns?

No.

I suppose you're here for number five as well.

If I can yes, ordinance closing a certain portion of an alleyway located at 1519 South Quincy, Quincy Avenue.

Uh situated between slots one through eight, lots nine through sixteen, again, C D four.

Yes, ma'am.

Uh this is will also clear a title that Marquette Catholic School building.

Uh it was built over the alleyway in the 1920s.

So we're catching up, you know, give it a hundred years, and we'll catch up with it.

Let's uh get that done.

Uh so anyhow, there are pictures in the group that show the hundred-year-old building sitting there.

Um, but I think it's one of those things that a lot of these things were built over old subdivisions, and it just wasn't an issue until it became an issue.

And uh so some new sharp attorney said, you know, we need to clear this title.

So that's that's what we're going through.

It hasn't been open in the last five years or the last hundred and five years.

So there's no meeting required, but we would recommend approval of closing this easement.

Clear the title for Market.

Well, I think we ought to wait another hundred years.

All right.

Um questions?

Okay, great, thank you.

Number number six.

License agreement between the city of Tulsa and Metroplex Investments for property located at uh 5004 street.

Um platted to install and maintain a two-inch pressurized force sanitary sewer line.

C D three.

Yes, ma'am.

Uh during some redevelopment and some other things, these folks are trying to get better sanitary sewer service, uh, and they have found a way to be able to uh run their own pump station, lift station from their business, and they're routing a two-inch force main uh that's gonna go over and then tie into an existing public main.

Uh they're going to do all the maintenance and everything on this line, uh, but they just they were in such a way that they just could not gravity to the existing city mains.

So they're building this two-inch force main, it's gonna be uh utilized by their own private lift station.

Uh but they are crossing Braden uh perpendicularly right through there, and in the in the back up you can see that just the area that we're licensing as they cross this uncurved one and a half lane braiden uh through this area, but it is going through public right away, so we do require a license agreement in case any of our public utilities or us uh need in there, then they need to they will need to relocate their force plane accordingly.

But uh this seemed like a good solution for them uh and their neighbors, and it does not adversely affect anybody else.

So we would recommend approval of this license agreement, and it's not going to be any increased liability for the city of Tulsa to get their sewer and all that.

So it's a I think it's a win-win.

Yay, district three.

That's great.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you all very much.

Appreciate it.

Alright, number seven discussion with the representatives from the mayor's office and the department of resilience and equity on the Office of Financial Empowerment and Financial Empowerment Center regarding the proposed 26-27 budget.

Welcome.

Hi, just such a reminder when you speak, just introduce yourself so those on TV can remember.

Absolutely.

Well, good afternoon, counselors.

Thank you for having us.

My name is Amber Gibbons.

I'm the director of the Office of Financial Empowerment and Community Wealth, and I am here with community dixon, who is the local government manager for the FEC, as well as the program assistant, and then Chief DeMontre Hayes for our department.

Good afternoon.

Hi there for having us.

Oh we don't have enough.

Do you have any more of the handouts specifically?

Yeah.

Um, share with someone.

Yeah, we'll share.

We have to pass it down.

Yes, okay.

I don't know if you could voice one away.

We just need to.

Thank you.

Sorry, go ahead.

We're sharing it.

Would you like to make sense?

Just that one more project.

Oh, it sounds like one in front of you.

Thank you.

Awesome.

I'm sorry, go ahead.

No worries.

I'm glad you have it.

Um so everyone has a passage of them.

Um, I am pleased to share a bit of information about uh the work of the office of financial empowerment and the financial empowerment center.

Um, this is one of our programs, one of our main programs that the office does support and lead.

Um, and so we'll just kind of jump right in.

Um, the great thing about the financial.

Well, first let me start with the financial empowerment center.

As you all may know, it is a service that started in December of 2020, where we provide we partner with Goodwill Industries of Tulsa and Tulsa Responds, and provide free one-on-one counseling to anyone that lives, works, or plays in Tulsa.

Um, we have had very clear, measurable and quantified results for all the Tulsa residents that have participated, and we are pleased to share that with you.

Um, if you take a look at that first sheet, you'll uh towards the lower middle, you'll see the non-mortgage debt reduction under the year 2021.

We were about 40,000 in.

That's how much debt we've helped clients and participants reduce.

Um, and then in 2025, we really had an uptick.

We were helping people reduce their debt by 1.8 million dollars, and to date, we've helped uh Tulsa residents reduce their non-mortgage debt by 4.6 million dollars, and we're on pace to hit $5 million before the year is all out.

Um as far as savings increased in 2021, uh, we had 46,000 dollars where we helped residents save in their own savings in 2024.

There was about 300,000 dollars in 2025, 800,000.

And so far, we've helped residents save 1.8 million dollars.

Um, and once again, we're on pace to hit something close to two and a half, three million dollars this year.

If you take a look at the second page, also the page numbers are in the lower left corner.

On that second page, financial counseling sessions.

Um, just in 2025, we had about 4,800 sessions.

We're on pace this year to reach over 6,000 sessions, and in totality, we've helped residents uh with over 11,000 counseling sessions.

Um, achievements and outcomes.

Umievements and outcomes are what we track and measure for participants.

So that could be anything from maybe you've never checked your credit, and so an achievement might be checking your credit, but the outcome is that you actually saw what was going on, your counselor made a plan with you of action, and then you raised your credit score by at least 35 points.

That's the outcome, and so achievement outcomes throughout the years is over 9400 for all the all of the participants, and then residents who recognize the need for financial empowerment.

Um, that number is over 8,600, and then active clients participants.

We have about 4,500 so far.

Um, this year we're on pace just in just in 2026 to serve almost 35, 3600 people just in 2026.

Um, can I ask a quick question while we're on this one?

Because I knew we maybe to another.

It seems like you have substantial increases from 24 to 25 in all of these charts.

Yes.

Like more than double.

So what happened from 24 to 25 for that substantial increase?

One our team.

Two.

I'll also say it's really the popularity of the program.

I think we've done a really great job, and I'll even say kudos to council in supporting the effort, making sure that people know and are aware about this in communities.

It's really been an increase in participation.

The popularity of our municipal courts program really has kind of expanded one access because we have more co-locations and then participation and really the reputation of the program.

Perfect.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Page three.

We'll talk about the municipal court integration.

First, I actually want to thank Sarah.

You were really interested in kind of championing this court effort, this partnership, and so I do want to just kind of publicly thank you for your work in your championing this effort.

But if you were not aware, the municipal court integration is a partnership that we have with the municipal court that says if when we have a counselor on site three days a week inside the court, and if anyone owes fines or fees, they can go to the judge and say, hey, I can't quite afford to pay this.

The judge will assign them to a counselor.

After three sessions, 250 dollars is waived, and every subsequent session, an additional 100 is waived.

We've had people waive up to 3,000, $4,000 just by participating in this program.

But I think what's more pertinent is that we've also helped people really kind of jump out of that judicial cycle of poverty, right?

The ability to not have your license uh canceled means that you can keep your job and you can still drive.

It means that your car insurance doesn't go up.

It means that you can keep your employment, it means that you can still feed your family, you don't incur more fines and fees, and then you don't continue in that cycle.

And so we're all we love hearing the stories of families that were able to really interrupt that cycle of poverty.

Um next, you will take a look at what we've what you really can see is like the lifetime progress of the program.

So all together, we wanted to put it on the sheet to make it a bit more visible, and so in the upper left, you'll see we've helped people like we said reduce over 4.6 million dollars.

We've helped them save 1.8 million dollars that next session over, um, is really the return on investment we're getting.

We've helped people the average person reduces their debt by 2,000 just by participating in this program.

The average person saves at least 2,000 dollars.

Um, further down, we've had over 450 people increase their credit score by at least 35 points, most increase it by 40 or more.

Um, and what I love about this is that you know, we can talk about credit reduction and savings all day, but fixing your credit really does change the trajectory of your life, right?

Um, I always share about how a person can go and buy a 30,000 vehicle, right?

And with bad credit, or not having that extra 40 or 50 points, they're paying 21% interest rate, which is the state maximum on a $30,000 vehicle, so a thousand dollar note, or with a credit increase, buy that same $30,000 vehicle at 7% interest rate and only pay three or four hundred dollars a month.

That means that they have the money in case there's an emergency, in case there's a problem, in case they just need to feed their children, so it's really the impact on lives that we love seeing, and then all the way to the right is a little bit about our our typical client base.

We are serving women who are typically under the age of 45, whose average income is about 29,000 per year.

Um, and they're coming at least to two sessions, but on average, it's three or more.

And I think it's important to know who these women are.

They're city workers, they're teachers, they're daycare workers.

We talk about the strain of daycare.

This is how we help people stay employed.

This next sheet you can take a look at is um a clear map so you can kind of see who in your district is participating.

What what of those teachers or daycare workers or social workers or city of Tulsa workers in your district are participating?

Um, you'll see typically in areas one, three, two, and I'd say five are our highest participation.

But I do want to note another service that we've recently brought out, which is called legacy planning that we rolled out in October 2025, where you can have a living will, a last bullet testament, or a power of attorney, or a transfer on death deed filed in uh with a counselor.

A lot of those services are done in districts seven, eight, and nine.

Sorry, we're in this district breakdown.

We're using where we can see the number of participants.

Yeah, here at the bottom under Black College of District.

Oh, okay.

No, no worries.

Yeah.

It's just the quarter.

I'm sorry.

515, 2026.

Second quarter.

Okay.

Well, before we go, that's thousands of people though.

They've only served 400 4,557.

Right?

Is that right?

This is as of the 15th.

For the council specific map, what's the time frame of the data and the service it's showing?

So that is active clients.

That is that is also active clients that have given their address.

No, that have decided to disclose it.

We have we have more clients, but not everyone wants to disclose their address, just like maybe not everyone wants to do certain parts of the program, right?

Um the next sheet uh you can take a look at.

Um we wanted to note that last year we did hear you loud and clear.

There was a lot of questions around the clarity on, and this is page six I'm referring to.

There was a lot of questions around the clarity between the uh general fund, the 150,000 dollars that we requested, and then the funds that go directly to municipal court.

And so we were hoping that this would make it a bit clearer that these are two different contracts, that the general fund dollars are not overlapping the 38,000 that goes to the municipal court, that they are going to two things that although we are all a financial empowerment center, the 150,000 goes to cover a program manager and three counselors.

This is at Goodwill Industries of Tulsa.

On the other side, uh, the $38,000 uh that the municipal court utilizes goes directly to Goodwill, but that covers the financial counselor, their fourth counselor that we do not cover with the general fund that is embedded into the municipal court, so these funds are not overlapping.

And then I think there's a document that just tells a little bit about the municipal court.

Something I did want to note is that uh recently the uh municipal court was listed in the National Center for State Courts, and we were listed there because uh we are uh one of a very few cities with a court program that's designed to interrupt this cycle of poverty.

We are really kind of leading some of this work when it comes to this partnership in the municipal court.

So we were listed for the National Center for State Courts, and we can send that over to you all if you'd like to see it, because that also is in part to your partnership here.

I'd love to see it.

Yeah, thank you.

And then something I did want to highlight May 7th, or actually all of April and into the first week of May, we celebrated Financial Literacy Awareness Month, and we did through multiple events.

We wanted to be intentional.

As you all know, you were there when we did the proclamation, kind of declaring financial literacy awareness month.

From there, we had an event with uh street school.

We came and brought some financial literacy materials and some uh banking and financial literacy information.

We then had an online uh program where we talked about student loans and what the next actions you can take, and then we summed up the whole thing on May 7th with an event at Rudassil uh called the Financial and Neighborhood Fair.

We partnered with neighborhoods, and we brought over 22 vendors, we gave away car seats, we uh we had free food, we brought all types of vendors so that anyone, whether they had they needed something financial with maybe a permit from the city, or even if they just needed um to low how to get a car loan, or maybe how to fix their credit.

All of these vendors were in one space.

So if you were in this neighborhood, you could access these financial opportunities in your space in your neighborhood.

And we got a really great feedback, it had over 200 attendees.

Lastly, I'll just go over our our legacy planning.

I did talk about it a little bit, but just wanted you to see the flyer and the services that we we've rolled out.

We established it in October of 2025, it's a new service we provide.

Um we you can see you can have that living will, that power of attorney that HIPAA authorization.

We also added transfer on deaf deed support to ensure that anyone who does uh file a living will or have create a living will in the city of Tulsa without a transfer on deaf deed, you still go to probate, and we wanted to make sure that those who were participating were fully protected.

So that's an additional service that we did uh add.

Um we've had almost a thousand people participate so far, um, and we're seeing great numbers and great outcomes because people are really getting the information that they need.

So, with that, the ask, as you may know, is that you continue to partner with us on this effort.

We're making great strides, great impact, and as you can see, even as you noted from 2024 even to now to 2026, the word of mouth, the impact, the numbers, the excitement about the program has significantly grown.

And so we want to continue to maximize that momentum and continue to move forward.

Um, and lastly, I'll end on this.

I I'll I've told the story a couple of times, but I was on TikTok one time when I have free time, which is rare, but and I saw a story, an interview with Reverend Jesse Jackson and an interviewer in like 1960 or 70.

And the interviewer looks at Reverend Jackson and says, Reverend Jackson, why is it that overwhelmingly people of color seem to excel in sports but not in other areas?

And the audience kind of leaned in, really assuming there'd be some anecdotal response or something, you know, that he'd say.

But instead, Reverend Jackson folded his arms, leaned back, and said, it's because sports is the only arena where the rules are openly known and understood.

When people know the rules to the game, they can actually play and win.

That is what we do with the Office of Financial Empowerment.

That is the literal work of the Financial Empowerment Center.

We are giving people the rules and the tools to actually play the game of financial empowerment and win.

Thank you.

That's great.

I appreciate your enthusiasm.

You're very good.

Counselor Bellis.

Yes.

Well, I'm so glad you just named that piece at the end.

One of my favorite essays is called The Tyranny of Structurelessness about when right rules are not made explicit and that only certain people know how to access the information or protocols for a system or space, then it exempts people.

Okay, yeah.

Um, so I'm glad you mentioned that.

I wanted to think you this is such rich data, it's really exciting.

Um, and it's really cool to see how the program has scaled.

And I used to some of that is that word of mouth factor.

Um, do you see I'm just kind of curious?

Like, do you feel with like current what you all are requesting for this year and existing kind of staffing?

Do you think there's more capacity for this to finish growing?

Or I'm kind of curious, or continue growing.

I'm just kind of curious if as far as the service numbers go, you're like, hey, this is kind of us realizing the scale and scope of what's feasible here, or we see there's more potential.

Um, I'm just kind of curious what you think it looks like for this kind of scaling-wise with or without more dollars, or you know, with maintaining the dollars that we have, just seeing how much more has happened over the past two years, which I know we'd spoken in the past, maybe last year about how there's kind of a lag in launching some of these things from the pandemic, or and so it feels like now things are really taking off.

So I'm just kind of curious for all our perspective on what you're projecting outcomes wise.

So I think what I'm hearing, and I want to make sure I'm answering your question.

Yeah, um, I think what I'm hearing is based off what we're requesting, we feel like that's sufficient to continue to scale forward.

Yeah, or if you just think, like, hey, we can hold with this, we'll be able to keep like what we did in 2025, we could do it in 2026, or you know, continue doing it to the next fiscal year.

Uh like just kind of curious if you guys are, hey, we're now into maintenance mode, or we think this is still growing, and yeah, if that can happen with the existing dollars, or if you know, I think we're always in a mode of going, hey, if something's high impact, I'm not saying it's in the cards this year, but in future years, is it worth consider you know, continuing to double down on it in what way?

Yeah, um, one, I'll always say obviously I think there's a clear line between investment and the outcomes in this particular program, and so would we love to have more funding if there's availability?

Absolutely.

It would actually be quite helpful.

Uh, but I will say this request we have this year is sufficient to continue to aid us to continue to scale, and we are on track to continue to do that.

Okay, that's exciting.

And I will add we do have anticipation that more people will become aware and utilize the services with our informal women campaign.

It is our partnership with the Carter Center that hopefully you all have gotten some data and information about as we fulfill women's rights and information to let them know about city services, and our primary goal is push about the empowerment center given the data of the demographics of the temple that we serve being primarily women.

Counselor Lakin.

Okay, so um help me understand all the costs because I'm I'm just looking for returns on investment.

Uh has the city invested a hundred and fifty thousand dollars per year in each of the six years.

What's what's fair what what's the number that the city of Tulsa has invested in the goodwill has invested in funds?

So last year, and Krista, you may be able to speak to this.

Last year was the first year that the city gave we were in the general fund, and that was $150,000.

Um prior years, and Christine if you correct me, this there was not a it was ARPA funds, and there was not a direct city allocation, it was ARPA fund funding.

But it's still money.

I mean, what I was just looking for what's what's been put in.

So we're seeing what returns are being produced.

So 4.6 million dollars in non-mortgage debt reduction, uh 18, 1.8 million bucks in savings, but I don't know what that cost in order to generate.

So what what did goodwill put in the form of an investment and where did the city through all of its resources put in?

So and you can send it to me if you need to.

Okay, yes, because I can speak to this year.

I started last year.

So I can speak to this year and last year.

But the the other information I definitely can send to you.

But I guess, so for this particular year, um Goodwill has put in over $300,000.

Um the same is true of the Tulsa Community Foundation.

They've both committed $300,000.

Okay, and then the city put in $150,000, so $750,000 in one year at least.

Yes, plus the municipal contract, uh court contract, which is outside that $150.

Yeah, I don't know.

Right, then that could be an additional.

On top of that, plus if goodwill is doing anything too.

Okay, um, well, if you get me those numbers, that that will help.

And then can you I I don't know if I'm doing the math correctly, but on this sheet, page number six.

This one or four, I think it is.

So it says debt reduction at two thousand dollars per and savings increase to two thousand dollars per.

I don't know how how you drive those numbers.

Um I'm doing the math that 4.6 million divided by 4557 people to get a thousand bucks.

And I'm doing the same on the other, but they could be different streams of people.

Some may not be coming in for debt reductions, and some may only be coming in for savings.

So in whatever use.

So those numbers are average.

But I know, but I did I did the average just the way that I I in a in a uninformed way.

So I'm I'm giving you all the the benefit because I don't know how you came up with these numbers.

So I just would love to know how you came up with the numbers.

For sure.

And what I would add to that is that we use a program that's called FEC Bot that's provided to us in kind from the cities from financial empowerment.

Um, and through that, everyone who participates their data data is listed in there that what they would like to share, it is also protected.

And that is a consistent tracking.

So we'll we'll definitely share that with you.

Okay, yeah.

Do you see what I'm trying to be coming up with the average?

Basic basic math was just to take this one divided by the number of people, but I know that that's not the right way to do it, but I can't I can't figure out how it's $2,000 per per each, given that one savings is 4.7 million dollars, and one is almost $2 million.

Feels like they have to be about the same number going in either direction with the same number of clients.

But yes, some of those clients might be getting both those services.

Yeah, well I know that's why I said, Yeah, yes.

Yeah, either or or both.

Yeah.

So there's we're happy to provide you with some additional documentation for clarity.

Thank you.

And then just annually how much you've spent and then total what's been invested in producing these outcomes.

And then is there a reason for going from 300 clients served in 23 to 782 to 1719?

Is that just are you just growing your base and some of those active clients are not rolling off?

They continue to be active clients, or how's how do those numbers grow?

Yeah, well, I think I might be able to speak today.

Um, so I'm in fact five the system that we use quite often, and these are repeat clients who find that the financial empowerment center does give them some type of um help consistently, so they come quite often to come with some money, and they continue those sessions.

A lot of those folks are folks from municipal court, um, so they have to come to reduce those fines and fees, but even after they reduce the fines fees, they continue to come as well.

So, it's from both sides.

Do you have okay?

So that's that's great helpful information.

Do you have a new client number that you could parse out by year just so we can see what active base is compared to a new base?

I'm glad that the ones who are active seem like the remaining active.

I'm just also trying to figure out what kind of growth there is in the program.

Thanks.

Okay, um sorry.

Yeah, that indirectly, uh not along with the same thinking that you did, but yeah, those were kind of some of the same questions I had.

But I have one more question.

Uh, outside the municipal court aspect of it, um, the only other thing that I can think of, or the only other organization that I can think of that would do this type of work would be like consumer credit counseling.

Is that comparative to what you all do for the services?

Because if I understand this correctly, consumer credit counseling helps folks do some of this same stuff right here.

So it's not a it's not credit being critical of you, so I want I'm trying to put this on the right frame.

So comparatively, the folks that come in there, it do I'm sure consumer credit counseling charges a fee for their services.

I'm pretty sure we provide this for free to our citizens, correct?

Okay, so comparatively, if you looked at what you're doing versus what they're doing, are you more successful?

I don't have insight to their program, so I couldn't speak to that right now.

Because I'm assuming that's what they do, uh, folks who have financial debt that are struggling, right?

Uh, like credit card debt or whatever the case may be, maybe not traffic tickets, right?

That's why I said, with the exception of municipal board issues.

I'm really curious on the on this program, and this is where I'm more interested in this program because it is a service and because you do have these specific numbers that you're going to articulate versus recurring clients versus new clients over year over year.

Um I'm trying to get a get an understanding in my own mind comparatively on a private service versus a city funded service, what that looks like.

Well, let me add this, and I I definitely can follow up, but let me add that yes, one, it's a free service, so we're removing the barrier to entry, right?

Two, we're serving most of the people you saw 70% that would not be able to afford this at all.

And we're in the districts with the lowest or lower moderate income, right?

So we're serving these people that could not access that.

We also are providing an additional service.

One, we're walking alongside the client for as long as they need to meet their their goal.

Um, and it's a wraparound service from budget credit, savings reduction, things like that.

And then the reason, which I probably should have added, the reason we added um legacy planning is because we saw that once people met their goal, we'll have a logical set.

You need to be able to uh cover those assets that you've acquired, right?

We helped you, you bought your house, you fixed your credit, you do that.

You but how do you keep these assets in your family in your lineage?

How do you how do we now move you from I'm okay to my family's okay?

I can pass on this this essentially wealth, and whether it's a small amount or a large amount, how do you pass it on so now it becomes the next generation's wealth?

And so these are things that I don't know if it's in credit does, I assumptions they don't, but I don't want to speak about them.

Yeah, that's why I was asking because it kind of feels like this is what we are around that same path that they do.

So I'm just asking for a value comparison, right?

Versus what we provide versus what a private company works is it like comparable for what we're investing on on what you're asking.

That's kind of what I'm asking if if that makes sense.

And I may not have a lot of times I don't frame my questions correctly.

So I just kind of wanted to see if there was that comparative.

Like the person's private organization for this public organization, um, or private organization, whatever they are, and then going through the fine through the FEC, what would the comparative be if I was a client?

Would you say it's like a cost per person served per outcome?

Okay, we'll have to send the CIA in to do that.

Well, I think that's sorry.

So many guesses.

Okay.

My wife is the CIA in our family, so I can't say that for everybody.

So anyway, I appreciate that.

So are you done?

Are you finished?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay, counselor.

Yeah, so um first I want to thank you for the presentation.

And it's obviously grossly apparent that it is females that are suffering the most financially and have the greatest problems advancing.

And child care pushed out of the way.

Well, I understand that, but I'm just saying it's all the issues associated with being females, it's the uh females still getting paid 80 cents to the dollar of a male.

It's it's child care, it's the minimum wage problem that we have in the state of Oklahoma.

It's senior parents also not receiving adequate compensation at times for children.

So I'm really glad to see that being highlighted highlighted.

Highlight highlighted.

Boy, I haven't pre-scribed a while.

And um all of the turnaround as well of the increase due to the outreach to me is phenomenal.

And I'm wondering are you also utilizing the NCI data that we have to kind of measure these outcomes as well as as well as the population that needs it most, which apparently is female, and my district rates number two, and the use of the services.

So I'm just wondering about those statistics and that data.

And to the point of consumer credit uh service, they will only um work with you within certain income levels, and so I think that also can put a hindrance, say on people that maybe have faced eviction, women that are faced evictions and are in arrears for those costs that they were had able to have the eviction removed from their record, but they're still in arrears, sometimes up to $8,000 and having to pay for alleged damages, uh, in order to be able to get further housing.

So something I'll add is also about 20% of our participants are looking for resources around eviction or rental assistance.

So we are also serving that population.

Yeah, that's really important, and I appreciate all that work.

I supported a hundred percent.

It's good to see that women are being focused on in this manner.

Anything else?

That's it.

Okay, counselor Dr.

Roy.

Thanks.

I just wanted to clarify, because you had said, um, for people who live work or play here, is it Tulsa residents specifically that are served, or is it Tisa County, or it doesn't matter?

The focus is Tulsa residents, however, comma.

If you we will not necessarily turn you away if you're not a resident, however, if you live too far, we will we are not gonna it's not gonna work.

And so we we are a bit softer.

Obviously, if you're Tulsa adjacent, that means that you are typically spending your sales tax if you're coming here often, and so we'll still service you.

But if you live in, you know, I don't know, a specific city, but if you're you know, if it's an hour to come here, you're not close enough proximity to be to be necessarily served.

But the bulk of our clients are all Tulsa, correct?

Okay, of Tulsa.

I mean, with this public-private partnership, I'm not saying that there couldn't be people from outside the city of Tulsa.

I just think we have to be good stewards of Tulsa dollars.

Yeah.

So if it was serving, you know, people in Rogers County or something, yeah.

I'm not saying it shouldn't because you said Tulsa responds and Goodwill Industries is the partner.

I would just then want to know, like, ratio-wise, but it's it's you all are saying the primary clientele.

I would also like to know about duplicated and unduplicated.

I think what I heard is you all become a trusted resource, like maybe through the municipal court experience, and so then they feel comfortable coming back to try to address some of the other issues.

It is not lost on me too that the statistics are largely women under 45, which means they're probably parenting, probably doing it on their own.

Um, 29,000 dollars, we don't need to say how far that doesn't go, and then again going to the subsidies that have been diminished at the state level.

Working poor, yeah.

So I think, and this is I mean, you all are doing the work that you do, and I appreciate it.

I think again where we have to as a group really hone in on what are the things that are our responsibilities, what are the things that we can partner?

Which this I'm glad you asked that question, counselor, because I think I was under the impression that we were funding the whole program, but it sounds like we're not even one third.

We're coming at a half of a third or whatever it is at this point, um, so that's a little more clarifying.

Um, and I will say, not too interrupting.

Yeah, no, you're fine.

I will say, you know, the highlight is that we've been able to use the city's participation, the hundred and fifty thousand dollars to leverage those additional dollars from partners, okay.

And and I do want to also thank publicly goodwill because they they have been great partners, and they are investing quite a lot because they believe in the power of the program.

Okay, it's also community foundation.

And Tulsa Community Foundation, response is part of TCS, absolutely.

Go out the door and come back in the different literal, but but to tie it to what counselor was talking about.

It came from credit counseling services local, but they went out of business, yeah.

And then we sent it to entities that are doing credit counseling.

Is that your CSC?

Proper that's it is independent, it works in the building at like uh 47.

It was hard.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Just on the west side, yeah.

Yep, it was there forever.

Okay.

Anything else?

I know we're short of time.

I think one more thing.

I also applaud the bilingual aspect of it.

Yeah, that's so important.

I really appreciate that.

Thank you.

We also have counselors that speak remind me of Kennedy Spanish as well as Sony.

I feel like there's so many and there's another language.

I don't want to misquote, but we can add that to it.

We we have multiple languages and intentionally hire counselors that can speak multiple languages.

I appreciate that.

That's great.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you all for that before.

Thank you.

All right.

That number eight, we're adjourned.

We all have a responsibility to share the road.

Together we can be kind and make streets a safer place.