Winston-Salem City Council Meeting - March 3, 2025
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Winston-Salem City Council Meeting - March 3, 2025
The Winston-Salem City Council met on Monday, March 3, 2025, at 6:00 PM at City Hall, with Mayor Allen Joines presiding. The meeting included a City Manager update, approval of a consent agenda (with one item pulled for discussion), and three informational updates on pre-K initiatives, federal advocacy, and housing. A closed session was held for legal and economic development matters, and the meeting adjourned at 7:24 PM. Council Member Robert C. Clark was absent.
City Manager Update
- City Manager Mr. Pate addressed recent news reports about the Fire Department, clarifying that staffing numbers have not been cut. He explained that the department reduced minimum staffing from 89 to 79 firefighters per shift to stay within the overtime budget (which was increased by $2.4 million this past year). In practice, the department has averaged 85 firefighters per shift, and on structure fires typically sends 29 personnel, exceeding the NFPA recommendation of 17. He noted that 75% of the overtime budget has been spent to date.
- He announced that bulky item collection began on March 3 and runs through September 5, with postcards mailed to residents in advance.
- The Business Inclusion and Advancement department will launch a small business plan contest on March 11, with two $5,000 grants for winners.
- A virtual MWBE meeting on 2025 capital projects will be held March 4.
- The sustainability department is promoting a "No Mow March" campaign to protect pollinators.
- NCDOT will hold a public input meeting on the Long Ranch Trail extension on March 5.
- Tom Kurecka, Chief Information Officer, was recognized as one of Government CIO Outlook's Top 10 City Government CIOs for 2024.
Consent Calendar
Items on the consent agenda were approved unanimously by a 7-0 vote (Council Member Clark absent), with the exception of item C-4, which was pulled for discussion and later approved separately.
- C-1: Approval of the February 17, 2025 Council Minutes.
- C-2: Resolution approving the Winston-Salem Transit Authority's Public Transportation Agency Safety Plan.
- C-3: Ordinance establishing a school zone for Winston-Salem Christian School on Patterson Avenue.
- C-5: Resolution authorizing a supplemental agreement with NCDOT for additional funding for sidewalk construction on Robinhood Road.
- C-6: Resolution awarding the Robinhood Road sidewalk construction contract to Country Boy Landscaping, Inc. for $620,154.24.
- C-7: Ordinance amending the project budget ordinance for FY2024-2025.
- C-4 (discussed individually): Resolution awarding a contract for parking lot resurfacing at 14 city parks to Ruston Paving Company, Inc. for $1,617,281. William Royston, Director of Recreation and Parks, explained that the lots selected are in the worst condition and prioritized based on safety, accessibility, and internal circulation. The motion to approve carried unanimously.
Discussion Items
G-1: Update on Smart Start of Forsyth County Pre-K Initiatives
Dr. Louis Finney (President/CEO of Smart Start of Forsyth County) and Dr. Tatia Prieto (President of Prismatic Services, Inc.) presented on the ARPA-funded pre-K initiative. Key points:
- The city contributed $350,000 in ARPA funds in 2023 and an additional $175,000 in fall 2024.
- One in five families in Forsyth County has access to affordable child care; families spend 25–30% of income on care.
- Smart Start works with 90 licensed child care centers, serving 13,000–16,000 children daily.
- Dr. Prieto presented evaluation data: teacher retention in ARPA classrooms was 100% halfway through year two (vs. four resignations in year one). In year one, 40% of classrooms achieved high scores on CLASS assessments; 39% of students were at or above average in literacy and 65% in math.
- The initiative faces sustainability challenges as ARPA is one-time funding. Dr. Finney noted the state goal of 70% of counties meeting NC Pre-K funded slots; Forsyth County is at 27%. He discussed efforts to partner with businesses, foundations, and the county to secure ongoing funding.
- Council members asked about the drop in participants from 352 to 250 at mid-year (explained as mid-year snapshot vs. full year) and the comparison of ARPA vs. non-ARPA classrooms. Dr. Finney stressed the low wages ($11–$13/hour) and lack of benefits in private child care, and that the initiative focused on salary supplements and retention bonuses.
G-2: Update on National League of Cities (NLC) Congressional Visit
Kyle Leopard of Strategics Consulting LLC presented the agenda for the NLC Congressional Visit scheduled for March 9–12, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Key points:
- Hill Advocacy Day on March 11 will include meetings with the North Carolina Governor's Washington Office, Senators Thom Tillis and Ted Budd, and new U.S. Representatives Pat Harrigan (10th District) and Addison McDowell (6th District).
- The city's 2025 Federal Action Plan will be presented, highlighting priorities in affordable housing, workforce development, infrastructure, public safety, and quality of life.
- He noted that the city was awarded six grants in 2024; two grants (a $4.5 million low-no bus grant and a Safe Streets Planning Grant) are still under pending agreements and will be raised with congressional offices amid federal funding uncertainties.
- A request will be made for the new House members to visit Winston-Salem.
G-3: Update on Triad Housing Summit and Affordable Housing Process
Samuel Hunter, Assistant Director of Neighborhood Services, provided updates:
- The Piedmont Triad Regional Housing Summit was held on February 27 (the prior Thursday) at the Benton Convention Center, attended by 260–280 people.
- Keynote speaker Patrick Bowen of Bowen National Research presented a housing assessment for the region, including vacancy rates and strategies to increase affordable housing stock.
- Tyler Mulligan from UNC School of Government defined affordable housing, promoted low-income housing tax credits, and encouraged use of city-owned land.
- Panels included local elected officials (Mayor Pro Tempore Adams) and cross-sector collaboration.
- Regarding the city's affordable housing development process: The request for proposals opened December 10, 2024, and closed January 24, 2025. A total of 50 proposals were submitted; 27 were deemed responsible and responsive. Four of the developers are based in Winston-Salem.
- An internal review committee scored the proposals, and the Affordable Housing Coalition conducted a qualitative review on February 28. Next steps: staff will present to council on April 14 (committee) and for final action on May 5, aligning with the NCHFA tax credit application deadline.
Key Outcomes
- Consent Agenda approved (7-0, with C-4 removed).
- C-4 (Parking Lot Resurfacing) approved unanimously.
- Closed Session: A motion was made by Council Member Taylor to enter closed session pursuant to N.C.G.S. §143-318.11(a)(1) and (a)(4) to discuss privileged information and business location/expansion. The motion carried 7-0. The closed session ended, and the meeting adjourned.
- Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 7:24 PM by unanimous vote.
Meeting Transcript
Good evening, everyone. I'm Alan Joins, Mayor of Winston Salem. It's my pleasure to call to order this March 3rd meeting of the Winston Salem City Council and ask the city clerk to call the roll, please. Councilmember joyner. Present. Councilmember Clark. Councilmember Andrew Bowen. Here. Councilmember Scipio? Present. Mayor Pritim Adams. Councilmember Taylor. Present. Councilmember Hall. Present. And Councilmember Burke. Here. Thank you very much. Would you please join the city council and me in a moment of silence? Thank you. Would you join the city council meeting the Pledge of Allegiance? I Pledge Allegiance to the United States of America to the Republic for Stands. Thank you very much. Our Sergeant Arms tonight is Lieutenant Vernon Chu. Thank you, Lieutenant, for being with us. And uh fire marshal tonight is Micah Bodford is here as well. Thank you for being with you. Uh let me uh recognize our city manager for his update. Thank you, Mayor and Council. Uh just a uh several things tonight. Uh, first let me uh start off with I know several of you have asked for some clarification on issues that have been reported in the journal about our Winston Salem uh fire departments. Uh just to reiterate that I have told the to each of you we have not cut any staff in the fire department. Fire department has still has the same number of staff that they have typically had. In fact, as a reminder, council, you added 2.4 million dollars in overtime cost to the fire department budget this past year. That's in addition, we're getting some additional research on clarifying all this, but over the past five or six years, you've also added two safer grants, which are usually about 12 firefighters each, so there are about 24 firefighters just with those grants uh to the fire department staffing allocation as well. So I know there's been a lot of discussion about all this, but there's also have been some misclarifications as to what it means by staffing versus minimum staffing. In order to manage operations within an adopted budget amount, which we every department has to do in the city, the fire department did recently make some operational changes to reduce minimum staffing levels from 89 to 79 firefighters per shift. This is to adhere to the overtime budget that has been put in place for them, which again was 2.4 million dollars higher than what they had previously. This does not mean that we limit our staffing to 79 firefighters. In fact, since the staffing changes were made, the department has averaged 85 firefighters per shift, been as high as 90 and hit the minimum of 79 once for half of one shift. Just to put that in perspective, if we are fully staffed, and every firefighter is available for duty on that day, you would have 117 assigned folks to each shift, and out of that 117 is what we get our minimum staffings from. So reducing the minimum staffing means that staffing levels would only be down due to employee absences such as sick time, vacation, injury, or other approved lease. In those cases, now when we get below 79, the fire department wouldn't call in employees to work overtime before they had been calling in folks when they reduced below 89 on each shift. There's also been a fair number of references to the National Fire Protection Association or NFPA standards. The main standard that we look at is the recommendation of having 17 personnel that can respond to any initial alarm of a fire at a single family home. So if there's a structure of fire, we want to have at least 17 people respond to that call. We have 20 stations strategically located across the city, and the fire department has an average response time of just over six minutes, deploying more on-seen resources for higher house fires than the 17 recommended by the NFPA. The chiefs has reported that even at a minimum staffing level of 79, we would typically send 29 people to a house fire. We average about 300 house fires a year in the city. And so at each one of those, we will we are consistently providing more staff members than is required or not required, but then it's recommended by the NFPA to adequately address those house fires.
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