Finance Committee Meeting Summary - April 14, 2026
Finance Committee Meeting - April 14, 2026
The Finance Committee of the City of Winston-Salem met on April 14, 2026, at 4:00 PM via Zoom, with Chair Robert C. Clark presiding. The committee unanimously approved the consent agenda and discussed two general agenda items: the early termination of a parking deck lease and an update on community agency funding for FY 2026-27. The meeting adjourned at 4:35 PM.
Consent Calendar
- C-1: Resolution authorizing an agreement with Forsyth County to share 2025 Byrne Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) funds ($249,047). Recommended approval.
- C-2: Resolution awarding a sole source purchase order for Live911 Platform Renewal with HigherGround, Inc. ($114,000). Recommended approval.
- C-3: Resolution authorizing an agreement with RK&K Engineering for the design of the Old Greensboro Road Bridge Replacement Project ($733,061.85). Recommended approval.
- C-4: Resolution awarding a construction contract for Sprague Street Recreation Center Renovations to MWM Construction, Inc. ($517,440). Recommended approval.
- C-5: Resolution approving a lease agreement with T-Bird Enterprises, LLC for the Twin City Thunderbirds. Recommended approval.
- C-6: Consideration of items related to FY 2025-2026 Budget Ordinances (amending the annual appropriation and tax levy, and the project budget). Recommended approval.
- C-7: Approval of the Finance Committee Summary of Minutes from February 10, 2026. Approved.
All consent items were approved unanimously by voice vote (4-0) and referred to the City Council meeting on May 4, 2026.
Discussion Items
G-1: Resolution Authorizing Early Termination of Lease and Conveyance of the Fourth and Church Parking Deck to R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company Assistant City Manager Aaron King presented the item. The deck was constructed around 2000 in a partnership with Reynolds American (now R.J. Reynolds) and was originally slated for city management through 2037. Following Forsyth County's decision to exit the arrangement and concerns over safety and maintenance, R.J. Reynolds offered a $1 million payment to the city to accelerate the termination. The proposal would transfer full operation, maintenance, and control of the deck to R.J. Reynolds. As part of the deal, Reynolds agreed to allow the city public parking in a surface lot ("K lot") north of Fifth Street, providing approximately 133 spaces. The $1 million would be split with Forsyth County ($328,300), and the remaining $671,700 would go to the city's parking fund, with potential use for elevator upgrades at another deck. Committee members expressed strong support. Council Member Clark noted the city currently has the obligation to maintain the entire deck but only receives income from half the spaces, resulting in a net loss of approximately $300,000 annually. The early termination would save that amount and relieve future capital needs. The committee voted unanimously (4-0) to recommend approval.
G-2: Update on Fiscal Year 2026-27 Local Community Agencies Funding Process Scott Tesh, Director of Budget and Performance Management, provided an informational update. He reviewed budget assumptions: the General Fund allocation for community agencies is expected to increase due to a policy change for per capita funding (currently just under $930,000 for FY26; FY27 baseline is higher), while the Occupancy Tax Fund allocation is held flat at just over $400,000 due to flat revenues. A compilation of input from the mayor and city council identified 15 agencies receiving four or more recommendations from the General Fund and five from the Occupancy Tax Fund. Some currently unfunded agencies (e.g., City with Dwellings, Second Harvest Food Bank, Salvation Army Senior Services) would receive funding under the recommendations, while some currently funded agencies might see reductions. Mr. Tesh emphasized these are starting points; the formal discussion is scheduled for a budget workshop on May 14, 2026, followed by a public hearing on May 18, 2026. Council Member Adams requested a matrix comparing city and county funding and a list of other funding sources (ARPA, HOME, CDBG) for each agency. No action was taken; the item was for information only.
Key Outcomes
- The committee unanimously recommended approval of all consent agenda items (C-1 through C-7) and general agenda item G-1, referring them to the City Council meeting on May 4, 2026.
- Item G-2 was received as information; no vote was taken. The budget workshop for community agency funding is set for May 14, 2026, and the public hearing for May 18, 2026.
Meeting Transcript
You're watching WSTV Digital Media, and I'm not sure if you're not going to be able to do that. Chairperson, Councilmember Clark? Here. Vice Chair, Mayor Praetham Adams. Here. Councilmember Scipio? Here. And Councilmember Taylor. Present. And by the way, I do have and see all you folks in person. We'll start with the consent agenda. Are there any items anyone wants pulled? Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Second. We have a motion. I think that was Adam second by Scipio. Are we voice voting this? Yes. Okay. All in favor of the consent agenda? Respond with aye. Aye. Any opposed. That is approved. We will now go to the general agenda. If the clerk will please read the first item. Item G one resolution authorizing early termination of lease and conveyance of the Fourth and Church Street Parking Deck to RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company. If the staff will please give a report on this, this is a very important item. Everybody needs to be up to speed on it. So this um this deck came to be around the year two thousand in a partnership between the city and Reynolds American in an agreement to really construct this deck on land owned by Reynolds American. Subsequent to that agreement. So that was a one-time payment. So that put them up to 725 spaces out of the 1,500 spaces in the deck. So that prompted a series of discussions between the city manager and the county manager staff on both sides to try to get to the bottom of that. You kind of had a little bit of a culmination of things. You had the county first prompt in that discussion. You also had, I think at the same time, we were going through our process of switching over our downtown parking program to go to kind of the pay by phone app and then kind of the camera license plate readers in and out of the decks. So we were holding off on making some improvements to that deck until ultimately that got over the finish line. That in turn was causing, I think, some safety issues for the folks at rentals who were parking in that deck, and they voiced frustrations to the city about some of those issues. So you kind of had a convergence of issues that all came to the table really at one time. So we had conversations with the folks at rentals and they inquired about accelerating the termination of essentially the city's management and operation of the parking deck. We were basically slated to manage that through 2037. They inquired what would that look like to end that agreement sooner. So we basically tried to work through some values on that. Um in December of 2025, Reynolds presented to the city an offer of $1 million payment to the city to basically accelerate the termination of that agreement. Essentially, um, should council desire to do that. Um basically rentals will take over the operation maintenance and full control of the parking deck there. So that's that's what essentially has got us to this point again that came in December. Um we've been working back and forth with their team up until this point. One of the other concessions that Reynolds has offered to the city as part of this is they have um since we would be losing some uh public parking in that deck, there is a surface lot that's owned by Reynolds, the K lot, which is north of Fifth Street there.
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