Environmental Advisory Board - 1

from this end.

You're number one.

I'm Devoni Jio. I'm a high school student.

Thank you.

Yeah. Uh my name is Daniel Vay. I'm newly appointed. Um and I uh recently moved to the AP to Apex about seven months ago from South Florida.

Hey everybody. [snorts]

Your turn.

Ann Gary. I've been a member of the board for almost a year now. I've been in Apex for uh almost eight years.

Bill Jensen, a retired engineer and I have uh been an Apex for 25 years or something like that. 30. [clears throat] And this is uh I've been on this board for about two years.

Suzanne Mason. I've been a resident of Apex for 20 years and I've been on the board for five years.

I'm Mark Schwaggel. I'm the chairman of the board and I've been in a Apex probably two two and a half years but in this Wake County area for about 20 years now.

And Jerry Mhler um vice chair. I've been a resident of Apex for about five years and been on the board for almost two.

Yeah, I'm Charlie. I'm a chemist. Um I live in Apex for two years and a half.

Uh John Garrison. I've been in Apex for 35 years, I guess. Um, retired and been on the board for six years, I guess.

Melissa Ripper, newly appointed, been in Apex 27 years.

Uh, I'm Sandre Venor. Um, have been on the board for a few months now. Um, and lived in Apex for 16 years.

Everyone, thank you. Um, so I'd like to before we begin also to have a motion made to add the tree city and the B city

in the new business section moved up before the data center discussion. Do I have a motion?

Motion made.

Do I have a second?

Second.

Any discussion?

Hearing none. All those in favor say I. I.

Fantastic. Thank you. Okay, we have the uh we have next order of business is to approve the main meeting minutes from from February and the tree subcommittee meetings that you should have had in your package. Hopefully everyone's had a chance to read through them. You'll have a motion to accept and approve these minutes. I move that be accepted.

Anyone second?

Second.

Point of discussion.

Yes.

Um I would like on page seven, line eight of the February EAB minutes to change way to waste. I don't think we want to install weigh stations. We want waste stations.

Good point.

Any other discussion? So, let me see. I got a motion. I got a second. I need new motion to accept the change. I need a motion to accept the change as presented by Susan.

So moved.

Second.

Any further discussion? All those in favor say I.

I.

Thank you. Next is public comment period.

Thank you, Nora.

So, right down. Mr. Gilbert. Right. Good evening, Chair Schwiggle and members of the board, Mayor Pro Mahaffy and Town Clerk Alan Coleman and staff. I just want to say first of all the environmental advisory board. This board right here is is the best board in the nation.

Thank you.

Y'all know that, right?

Do now.

All right. [laughter] I just want to start out by saying thank you so much for your service and congratulations to the new members Melissa and Daniel for um becoming involved and engaged in what we're doing here in the town of Apex. I won't be before you long. I just wanted to come up and address you as um you do have an agenda item tonight about um looking at the possibility of forming a subcommittee um as an attachment to this board. And what I want to share with you is just kind of give you some input um from the March 10th town council meeting where I made a recommendation to uh establish a subcommittee for the data center research. And what I'll say um and I reiterated this at the meeting staff did a wonderful job. Um Mr. preventable, Miss Bunts and the entire staff and my understanding thousands of hours were spent on the research to bring back to council and planning board um to uh to see what is the best way to ensure that Apex is protected in these decisions involving data centers. What I'll say is that I believe we're at our best when we bring many perspectives to the table. And what I propose is not to overshadow or go against what this board is designed for. Uh what I like to see is a collaboration and I believe we're

at our best when we do that. So I would like to see a subcommittee uh established as a part of the research as we move forward. And I left the meeting with a question uh what would it hurt? And and that's my question for this board as you think through the decisions tonight with this agenda item. Um a multi-disciplinary board will allow not only environmental concerns to be addressed but also the many other components that may impact our quality of life. And this is a new thing. We understand that this is something new for our community. And all I'm advocating for, all I'm stressing, I'm passionate about is that we do our best. And the question again is what would it hurt to establish a subcommittee to work alongside of you? And what I envision is seeing members of this board working a working group with other members of the community, experts, even those who may be in support of a data center working together side by side and helping staff with some of the research and recommendations to the council and of course the planning board. So, I ask you to uh really give us some deep thought tonight as you navigate through it. And the question again is what would it hurt? But I'll answer that by saying what would hurt is if we didn't do our best and involved as many residents as possible to be a part of decision-m. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

We need to address

unknown caller. My apologies. Thought I had that turned off. Is that Linda Cafrey? Thank you.

Okay. Hi.

Don't start the timer yet. Okay. Good evening, EAB members. I am Linda Cafera and I live in Apex. I am here this evening to ensure that notice is given to each of you that details the duties and obligations each of you have promised to the people under oath under the oath each of you took before becoming a member of the environmental advisory board. It is necessary that I give you notice of the required duties and obligations to the constitution and laws of this state because once you have been informed of these, any violation going forward will be knowingly and willingly. This encourages transparency and accountability and ensures the people's liberties are protected. The preamble of our state constitution clearly conveys the people were grateful to almighty God, the sovereign ruler of nations and create and created the constitution to preserve their civil, political and religious liberties. It goes on to say the purpose of the constitution is to make sure these protections are upheld for all future generations. The constitution created the government. So its only purpose is to serve the people. The liberties of the people existed before the government was created and they continued and they continued to exist in perpetuity. The charter of the town of Apex clearly states that in no way is the town negatively to negatively impact the rights or interests of the people. Therefore, those who work for Apex in any governmental function would be in violation of the law if they take any action that harms the people. This is fundamental. The general statutes define how government can achieve the obligations of protecting the liberties of the people and they must be followed by

everyone acting in an official capacity. Faithfully executing the duties of the office to which the person is serving is imperative. This is not something that can be taken lightly, nor can be explained away by the person not knowing the law. The definition of faithfully requires that things are done truthfully, sincerely, and accurately. Thank you. Uh, commercial activity is what the town must regulate um must regulate, control, and prevent from violating the rights of the people. Everyone acting in a commercial capacity agreed to this when applying to do business in the state. The people have the right to inquire that public about public business that has been conducted and receive confirmation it was done lawfully or not. This is also fundamental. Please take time to read the notice you were given to understand the requirements of your oath and reach out if you have any questions. This is not an accusation that you have done wrong. Only a reminder to ensure the people are honored and respected by those serving in government positions. This is what you should expect from yourself and your peers as well. Thank

you. [laughter]

Rosemary.

Good evening. My name is Rosemary Senotki Daws and I live at 5128 Beckwick Drive in Fway Marina. I know you can't answer, but I have some rhetorical questions regarding perspective. [snorts] Who do you believe you work for? Is it the town staff, the town council, or the people? And if you answer the question with the people, which is the correct answer, as Linda reminded you under your oath, does that mean only the people who agree with you,

people who want to move here, or all people of Apex and the surrounding impacted areas? [snorts] And if you answer the question, all people of Apex and the surrounding impact areas, how do you determine what the people truly want? Do you guess? Do you listen to what the staff says? Do you listen to what the town council says? Or do you truly listen to the people? Thank you.

Next order of business is the council member comments.

Good evening everyone. Um, how you doing? new faces. That's awesome. Um, I'm Terry Mafi for those who may not know me. That better? All right. I'm Terry Mafy, Mayor Prom, Apex Town Council. Uh, for the new members, what I like to do, uh, what's on the agenda every meeting, I can speak for a couple minutes about stuff that may have happened. The biggest thing I want to report out to you guys is, um, we had a meeting, me, the chair, the vice chair, and we spoke about, um, the idea of having the EAB vote on potential items. You guys remember that? was good times. So I followed up with the lawyer. Lawyer, you know, wrote some stuff back to me. We went back and forth and um there was some push back about two things. The first is it's the opinion of our legal team that we need to amend the UDO to assign new responsibilities to um to the environmental advisory board. It spells out the rules and uh lawyers would be more comfortable if we did that. If you remember the meeting, I was pushing back a little bit hoping not to do that. But uh that's the conclusion. We should amend the UDO. So, I'll I'll follow forward and and do that. The second thing concerns voting on the proposals themselves. Um, state statute puts specific standards in when it comes down to approving or denying or recommending developments, things you

have to consider, different characterist, a lot of complicated stuff. It's what the plenty more than town council have to go through. And the concern there was if we voted on the projects as a whole and we said, "Okay, we're going to recommend or or deny it. We have to follow those standards or else it could be problematic for a variety of reasons." Um, and that's something we could do. You know, we could teach you guys what those standards are and read through them and go through a process. Or my kind of workaround was I suggested that instead of voting on the project as a whole, we put forward a UDO amendment which has the EAB voting on the environmental conditions being sufficient to address concerns etc etc yada yada yada. You're voting purely something scoped to the environmental conditions offered or not offered and whether they address the concerns you have and not as a project as a whole. And that might avoid a bunch of complications that are a little bit above my head, but you can see where I'm going with that. So, that's the direction uh that I think we're going to go in um that I want to tell you guys about that I'm going to push forward on. We put forward a UDO amendment that would uh change the list of responsibilities for the EAB to include whatever this vote is and then we would craft a language around that vote to be scoped to just a subset some environmental stuff that doesn't trigger other elements of state law. And um that'll probably take a month or two to to go through to draft and has to go to planning board and then the town council. And if you remember, we also talked about um having the the staff um change the rules and procedure to have them come back to a second meeting to talk about it and that would be when the vote would occur. So those are the two pieces kind of moving together and that's where we're going. And we'll talk more about the other stuff about the uh the uh the data center research that's on our agenda. So I'll save some comments till then. Any questions? All right. Thanks, guys. Next order is staff comments or

announcements.

It is officially creek week here in Apex. So, happy week.

Creek week.

Last Saturday.

It's a creek week. Sorry, it's never mind. [clears throat] [laughter]

Big sweep stream cleanup event. Um, our storm water crew partnered with Wake County to get that event up and running. Um, we worked behind the church on East William Street and we actually removed 2500 pounds of debris from the little stream bank behind the church. We pulled out tires, a couch, a TV, bundles of clothes. So, we removed um just a ton of stuff. I was really really shocked but really thankful that all those volunteers came out. So that was awesome. This Wednesday, this past Wednesday, um Ellison is actually going to present here with me. She's our volunteer coordinator. Um I and some of our storm water folks led a try out camp for some of our youth that are here. Um we did a little storm water lesson and we did a cute little soil snack about different layers of soil. So that was super fun. And then our last creek week event is actually tomorrow. So we're having another invasive rem at Apex Community Park. That's from 10 to 12 and you can still register. It's online on our volunteer portal. We would love to see you come out for that. That's all I've got.

Thank you. Right now on to new business. We'll start with Tree City.

Sorry y'all. Didn't mean to wake you up.

Appreciate y'all. The last time I was up here, I was so nervous. I don't even know what I talked about to be honest with you, but we're not as nervous as this time. Uh what I want to bring to the council's attention first.

Yeah, I want to say some stuff first.

Okay.

Uh the Arbor Day Foundation has stepped up the rules. So for the the board [clears throat] that represents the Arbor Day, we will be having Arbor Day in October this year. and we have to have a schedule for it. Events that we'll be having at the Arbor Day. We got a lot of good ideas, a lot of good plans already uh from all ages from the youngest to the people that want to learn how to prune their own trees. We can have videos, activities, but we have we've outgrown Earthfest and we have our own day and uh that's the new thing for the Arbor Fest. They also want us at um in events. And so we have Peakfest that we need to be at to represent the tree board that represents the uh Arbor Day Foundation. And luckily we have a tent down there at the electric department. It has the tree cap on it. So the tent's already bought, the flags are bought, and the table is already there for the event to be set up. We just need people to man it and come up with giveaways and stuff like that for the events. So we're we've already beat the problems. we we just need to need to attend. Uh and they also want a yearly tree cap accomplishments on what we did in Apex for the tree board did for trees. And so uh I'm here to help us out on all of this. I take pride in knowing trees and I would like to bring it day peek's attention that we have to break the cycle where we're on because the way that we are planting our trees and treating our trees and [clears throat] managing our trees is just leading into problems in their old age. I went to two places in Apex, three and about three trees I got shows how we can stop all the future problems by correct planting and correct pruning. And I hope uh my PowerPoint does you well. And so we'll start it. Have y'all got TV y'all see looking at? Yeah.

Okay. All right. Very good. Uh starting the journey of being responsible for the trees we own. So we need to know our trees and we need to be responsible for

them. We don't need a citizen telling us that our tree fell on their property. We need to know our trees. And so we'll just go from there. Uh so one thing that we don't do right, we don't plant our trees right. And I learned this by the planting the peak. They augur a hole just big enough for the root ball to go in. The augur hold is crystallized. It's already on compacted soil. It is a miracle that any of them survive at all. But they're so stressed out that a lot of diseases and insects get on before we do anything. So if y'all can see by the the diagram here, that's what we need. We need it's very simple. You just make three augur holes, two half the size of the first one. And then we can go from there. I can take you to a place right now where the tree is planted and you can see the rope the root ball cage wrapped around it. We need to make sure it's root cages are gone. But people's going to do what they're going to do to get by and get paid get going. I understand. But we need to kind of monitor how they're being planted and just eyeball it because this is the most important part in tree planting. In tree in plant the peak, the reason why we don't plant the trees is because they're people that are professionals that plant the trees and they got a very good growth rate. They give them good soil to go back in there. And so this is the most important part of it. And we shall move on. Any questions, please. I love answering questions. This right here is at the New Pleasant Park. That mound of dirt is probably 10 inches tall. It's not mulch, it's dirt. So they augur the hole, they clean the augur, they drop the hole in, they leave the dirt, they put mulch over. That tree's feeder roots is right underneath that 10 inches of dirt. It's never going to get water. and it it don't even know that there's water in the grass outside of it. So, it just stresses itself out. And we need to make our uh our mulching beds a little bigger. The tree behind it, if you just brought that mulch into that mulch, till the ground up a little bit, that tree's got a probably another 100% chance of living. And same here with the tree that's up front, just bring that mulch down to the curb and

back up to the sidewalk. Remove the dirt from all the trees. We need to make our tree rings bigger and remove the dirt. You can put in the back of the truck. I got enough ruts in my house.

You put a transition zone kind of between the mulch, the dirt you put in and the and the primary dirt.

So there's no added dirt in between there. Yeah, I would put like some just some good soil, maybe some additives.

Kind of figurate the roots to hit the soft dirt and get some speed up. You hit that dirt. But if you come in at a slope, it's they got a good head start before they hit that hard code.

So, how does that happen that that's incorrectly? I mean, did we hired a landscaping company that incorrectly planted or

I'm not sure, but we need to monitor on that.

I mean, I think we need to figure out how it's happening incorrectly to be able to correct it.

Agree 100%. Right. We need to hold people accountable for this because that tree right there costs pretty good money.

Excuse me, sir.

Be a warranty on it, right?

Should be.

Yeah. And what happens in these cases for something like Pleasant Park, like we're not hiring landscapers, right? Where we got, you know, we hire a project manager, project manager has a general contractor, general contract, all these subs. So, the person who's actually making that decision is like five levels or something. That's how it can happen. Uh, I'd like to follow up and actually teach classes. Uh, I teach classes about we can do proper planting people, proper pruning. I don't mind it. I'll enjoy it.

On a project, Can I ask you on a project like Pleasant Park, how involved are you on like the sign off? There's comes a day where we close out, we do a walk through, we get a punch list.

I'm not involved.

I'm sorry. I'm not involved at all, but I'd love to be. As soon as you pull in to the new entrance, you know, and you go around, you can just start seeing how we could have done better in planting the trees. And we're going to get into the pruning first. And I'm not

talking down to nobody or anything, but this is what I do. And if so, I kind of sometimes I don't see the sky because I can't get my eyes off the trees.

Yeah, I think that's really the answer, guys, is like in that walk through process when we close out a contract, we meet that final punch list, you got to have right people So probably got someone looking at it, but he not may not be an expert in landscaping. It's like planted trees like we should,

but that's a time when you have, you know, talk to the the general contractor, whoever, and say, "Hey, we don't think this is right." They call back in their subcontractor and fix it.

I'm involved in a lot of like older trees that people want to deal with, and I go out and assess them, and we we do some equipment checks on them to make sure they're healthy and worth [clears throat] maintaining the stuff. But I'd love to be involved in in the check off. That would be nice. So, this is there. We won't get into the trees planted in the back because I can't see them good. And this is right across the entrance. So, you pull into the parking lot. Now, this tree right here, that is even taller than the one that's 12 in. And there's three things wrong with this tree. Three things. Besides the mulch being there, we need a bigger mulch ring. I'm not being picky. But right here, somebody pruned this tree. One bad prune. Two bad prune. They left the lower limbs on in parks. We need limbs up making shade and we need a strong leader. Without a strong leader, you're going to run into troubles in the future. And this all starts at planting and pruning. And we'll get into pruning a minute. And then if you look almost at the bottom, there's a wound there. There's the wound. I know I can't say I don't know a car didn't hit it, but that had to be there when it was planted. And that is one large dead area. tree. The crack in the bark starts at the bottom from the open wound all the way down. Now, that tree is going to spend the next five years trying to heal that wound and eventually blow over in the wind once it grows enough leaves to heal itself. So, these are like the top three

things that we need to look out for while we're planting trees. I hope I'm not getting myself in trouble. [laughter] [clears throat]

Most, sorry. Do most landscaping companies have like someone of your level of expertise on staff? Like how?

No, I can't say for all of them, but they they give a lot of their money to the design part of it. And when they walk away, they walk away. And that's something we also need to work on is the watering of the trees. We'll put them in the dirt. We And we'll, you know, we say we planted so many trees. I know towns around Apex. They probably going to plant thousands of trees, but I bet you 10 might survive because it's just about getting the word out of what we've done. That's why plant the peak is such a great thing for Apex is we actually we make the homeowner sign saying, "Hey, we're going to water it. We're responsible for it." Before we was paying Leaf and Lim to water it, but then we said, "Hey, we plant 100 trees. Let's plant 234 trees." And people water their own trees. And that's been pretty good so far. So we give a little responsibility. These trees right here are not on us. I really don't know the subdivision. If you come down all chapel where the bridge was, it's the first place on the left. But just an example here. Swamp oak tree. It's got a stake. The black speckles on it is the tar and asphalt when it was putting the roads down. And after removing the stake, still got the tree up. Yeah. Those are the things that's left. So, not only do we need to go back monitor the trees, we need to make sure that the stakes are taken off and just basic maintenance on young fresh trees, especially in their first two years. We need to really pamper and take care of them.

Have Have you written a pamphlet on this? So,

I got a a five-year program that we could look at and talk about and I love field trips if anybody wants to go on field trip

and require the planters and the to follow that. Exactly. Yeah, I would love

uh I've come to beg y'all to help push to to get them planted like this and take care of them because it's Apex is going to be keep growing and every every Arbor Day all we're doing is replacing dead trees in town hall or on some property that we have because we we need we just need to take more care of and a better stock too. You might pay more for the tree, but you'll get a better stock. Uh and this also right here that's probably two-year wound heal up maybe and uh it's planted in the ground. All right, this is across the street from the police station. This tree right here has no drainage. It's got moisture in the soil. It picks up a pathogen which becomes dead area all the way down. When that crack bark like that, it's peeling off. There's no life in that tree whatsoever.

That's the new Sandre Street lot.

Yeah, it's right across the street. Well, not new, but yeah,

I think I'm going to try to invest in a soil moisture thingy tester just to see, but I'm pretty sure that just ain't got no drainage and it just could be clogged, you know. All right, so we went from things we can do at planting after one year. How many people see these flopping all over the trees everywhere we are? If I see them, I'll cut them. If they're tight, I cut them. If they're loose after one year, you can wiggle the tree. You can see got his cut. Well, nobody's coming back to cut them and you end up with just my Well, this is a good one. I've actually had them sticking out both sides when I've cut them. And that's some of them. This is across the street from the planting department. This is something else we need to do when we do it is branches rubbing each other. Come back after a year, take your steaks off, cut branches that are rubbing. Basic maintenance cherry tree.

Now, this was cut pruning or probably one of those first. It done pretty good, but now we're going to have to cut this whole limb off because it's rubbing good. It's already in. All right, this is at the park right across the street. I do not know what happened to that tree unless a UPS fan got in a bind and just hit it about three or four times. But it's a beautiful flowering tree, but it's got the scaly mold. It's is damaged. What I would do is I would not put no trees around the ball field due to the traffic, the foot traffic. I would expand them bushes out. Nobody's going to walk through bushes. They would actually have to walk around. Just keep the trees out, put the bushes up. They can walk on the front of the bushes and still see the game. But if you need to fill that spot, but I wouldn't put another tree there. That's what happened to this one. I just extend the bushes out. All right. Now, the pruning that we do when we plant the trees, you can get your landscaper to do this, but you're going to have to pay up. Now, these are two different trees, and they would take me probably the total of 15 minutes for both of them to prune them, get to brush up, and be gone. So, this this is not long. It's not hard, but our goal is to have solid leader trees that are urban compatible for the environment that they're in. If you don't bring the forest to the tree, the tree is not going to make it. So, as you can see on the right here, I would remove that whole leader to suppress that growth and shoot up that mainstream to get the good taper, the good growth when the wind blows. And everything else I would just reduce because I want my canopy to go out. When you cut a limb, it's going to suppress that limb cut and it's going to grow when it's attached to it.

The leader is the big one that goes up or what is the leader?

Yes, sir. It's the middle growth. We want a good taper. We want the wind to blow it and we want to see them little arches in five years up road. We don't want this tree to die in seven years. We

want it to be huge in seven years. We want it to be big. And to do this, we can do this through pruning. And you're going to prune maybe every two to three years. But just little pruners. It It don't take long and you can Well, that's just me talking too much. And right here is another large oak. Now, before I'm going to show you some pictures. If you don't do this, we're going to see pictures of it. I would reduce that one to the side and reduce that one above it. Reduce those three and that main leader. You see the taper how big it is at the bottom. Then it kind of narrows up. All of that juice that that tree is making is going to shoot straight up that tree and grow a strong leader. And then we can just elevate those so trucks and people can get out and jump and not be hit. Uh this is the big trees in front of the police station. If these trees were trimmed when they were planted, we wouldn't have this rubbing. You got to do something with that. I mean, you have to. So, we'd cut that. And right here, somebody reached up with a pole saw and cut these three, but that's broke. We need to take it. And it just promotes disease and decay if you don't need the right cuts. And right there, some more rubbing. The one on the left is going to be a pretty major. And right here, this is a tree across in right from police department. The very two top circles are what you want to see in a tree. You want to see that U-shaped union or a wide union. It gives the tree room to grow. The one below it is going to be included bark, which means the tree can't grow. It's going to push each other apart to split. The one below that is going to be included bark after that just because it's a V-shaped U. And then that's just trimming stuff there. So these are things you do. We put them in the ground, right? We trim them right and they can grow free. The roots can

grow and we can avoid this in the future. Here's the big one that is included bark that is a 50/50 ratio of a tree that's going to split. Which one's going to fall as the right winds hit it? That could have been done [clears throat] at plant. These trees are how long the police department?

Oh, okay. [laughter]

But we got we got what's that?

They've been here a while.

Okay. So, we got we got answers to this. We're just trying to prevent it in the future.

Do you cable the two leaders in something like this to try to prevent splitting?

Yes. And we would determine that on the length of the the crown to determine the wind sway. If it's short, we would just brace it. And I'll show you a picture of the brace also. Yeah. It would come with a cable embracing or just embracing. And there's another one at the police department. It's just on what trees do, but that center is included bark. It's not growing strength. It's pushing against each other. And that is the result of one they had. This is the only picture I think the only picture that I did not take in Apex. And I love Apex. And you go to the neighborhoods and they are beautiful. They have great tree canopy. just amazing to be honest with you. When they took that study back a few years ago, they said Apex, you know, number one lose canopy and I thought, man, Apex got a lot of can. But that's included bark right there. Home Depot had one of their trees do that split. It was there for a long time before they This is on Tontol Street. This is a large oak tree. The power lines behind it is us. The homeowner wanted us to take this tree down because and that's the results that included bark right there. You can see it healed the crack. It just ripped apart. That tree is 15 feet and two inches outside of our rideway. So, it's on him.

But he shouldn't have to do that. I wait for some decline to happen. That's a large tree.

So funny. Like I I understand that that's a problem in an urban environment, but anywhere else that would be great habitat for a lot of

Yeah. critters

and technically I'm going to say this is another 20 30 years left in this tree. People see that and you know big things make people afraid but it don't seem like it's decayed in seem like it's sealed off pretty good rain in the future maybe to got good healing wood on the right side peeled down pretty good and right there's a bracing rod so it keeps it from splitting. And basically it's just a drill the rod threaded rod tap it in. These are at the park JC Park. This is a good example of a threaded rod before it gets closer. Just just maintenance. Beautiful pruning cut right here. But we need to monitor how deep the rod hole is in. Another good example of one that could be braced and another one could be braced at JC Park and just kind of monitor the depth of these holes. Probably have wildlife in there. And then finally, wow, mistletoe. Anybody know anything about mistletoe? All right.

Kiss underneath it.

Yeah, you can kiss under mistletoe. It was It was You know, it's so green in the winter, so everybody look at like it's great on a lot of trees. Mr. Toad, don't bother. On oak trees, it is a killer. It just it just kills oak trees. These are the three large uh oak trees at fire station three. The one in the center has a poxland canker, which means it's on a spiral of decline along with the mistletoe. We'll be taking it down soon. But the one to the right of it, we took every bit of mistletoe out of that tree last year

and it went up the limbs and popped out up where the leaves did, which is kind of good news. Now we can go make smaller cuts and get rid of it. The only way to get rid of is to cut it away from the tree. The roots of the mistletoe grow underneath the bark and it'll pop up somewhere else. Now, how did it get there? A bird ate it and a bird dropped it and it's sticky and it stuck to the tree and it roots right underneath it. And so the branch that makes the the the sugars, carbohydrates from the tree, that mistletoe gets all that juice. So that tree is trying to heal itself. That mistletoe just gets it and gets bigger and greener and prettier and it's underneath the bark. So if you cut it off, it just roots out. But it it rooted all to the leaves, which was pretty neat. See it how it all went to the leaves. But if if it's on a big lead, like a big le a big lead that big, you got to remove that whole lead because it's all in underneath the bar. But that's an invasive species and we need to if possible eliminate it in the historical district and our older oaks before it becomes a problem. And so what did we do? We planted three small oak trees 20 ft from the large oak trees. Every one of these trees got mistletoe because the bird ate mistletoe and flew up. On one of these trees, we cut it off and done tree paint on it. On the other tree, we cut it off and put black tape around it. And on the other tree, we just cut it off and did nothing.

So, there is a native species of mistletoe. Is this not the native plant?

Yeah. Yeah. In the woods, this wouldn't be nothing. This would just be part of nature in the woods, you know. Um,

is there any herbicide you can put on the mistletoe once you cut it to just run it down?

There isn't.

They're still experimenting with it. And the big companies that do a lot of tree science stuff, they're still experimenting with.

Okay.

Uh, so of course I lost I was on a truck then so I lost my paperwork on which one we done what. But it seems like the middle

one done good. Like we could go back there and make two minor cuts and the mistletoe is gone. I did. This is stuff we do. We we the electric department, but when we get called for trees, we we do all the tree work in the town for every department that's needed. And that is one spot at the park that we could take off right there and the birds could eat this toe beds and it would be good. Of course, there's a lot of maples in there and they really don't affect maples. All right, what do we want? We want to be good stewards of our trees. How do we get what we want and know where our trees are? How do we know where our trees are? Street tree inventory. I know it's a long time down the road before we get a nice GIS layer of our street trees, but we can just locate. It's It's all about knowing the tree when you walk up to it. There's trees at 113 South Mason Street, six nice, beautiful oak trees. They are our trees, but you would think they're the homeowners trees, but they're our trees and we could treat them if we needed to or we could mitigate any issues when it come to it and not let you know, it's good to know our trees and not other people know our trees is what I'm trying to say. This is a map of the land that Apex owns that is adjacent to subdivisions. I think I said that right. So, what do we do with big areas of trees? We do what we call a level one assessment. That's we just walk through the woods and we look for anything that sticks out, document it, and that's what we do. Some trees break off 10 feet up the ground. You never know it was going to break, but we just done a level one assessment. So, with this right here and with a street tree inventory map, we uh we'll be way ahead. We'll be par. And I know it's going to take some time to do all the do all the stuff, but I just wanted to was it It was really bothering me that we could stop a lot of the

problems that we have now by starting when the trees are young. And it's it don't take much. It it don't take much. Little classes, little training. Uh I took some street not street parks guys up showed them, you know, what a tree's about and how a tree grows and how to cut it and trim it. And you know, when you pull in a park, you want to see a pretty tree, not a

something like that. you're going to have dead trees in the course. It's just what's going to happen, but in the parking lots and stuff. All right. Well, that's my presentation and I thank y'all for your time. I've got one question back on uh on planting the trees on on town property. Um, it looks to me like perhaps if there were were something in the design phase, uh, that spelled out conditions and and procedures for properly planting the trees, that might eliminate the issue of of going in and finding out they're bad when you go in and do a do the punch list.

Yes, sir. That would be a great start. Yeah. Uh, so I I don't know how how we can we can get that done other than asking the the town staff to look into that.

Yeah, it it wouldn't take much to feed the roots from the top six to eight inches of the ground. I mean, you know, you could just

I think that could be a condition put in the in the project. and minor pruning. If if the uh nurseries don't prune it for a strong leader, we come in a year after it's planted, prune it up, and we wouldn't need to come back for two more years. Have a watering program. Also,

yeah, I think I think it'd be great. I think we'd see a big difference in the just the glow and vitality of our trees. I do have a a scent nor a five-year plan and uh on year one where it says the baseline inventory, you know, we can work up to GIS just just being able to

know our trees. That's that's basically it. And right above that is always go by the best standard practices of the industry and it would be the A300 ANC300 for planning, pruning, stuff like that. So

roots um So we have a technical review committee under landscape plans that are submitted with every project.

Uh that that is correct and we do currently have details for planting especially for trees and other types of landscaping as well. Um it might do us well to console consult with uh Philip here and make sure that these are up to date and the best practices moving forward. But we do have details.

Yeah. I'm curious like what's the process for reviewing the landscape plan specifically? What are you looking for? Are you looking for um you know just number and location or is it actually you know go to the level of detail I imagine you know like who who reviews is it you guys? So, initially we review at the plan stage. So, we're looking for uh species, number, quantity of detail, uh location, slopes, all these types of things, spacing, um what what's what's the goal of it, whether it's screening, whether it's uh additional landscaping, decorative things like that. We're looking at all those things at that stage. Once they're planted, our uh zoning compliance officers are the ones that will walk the property to make sure that all the trees are in place that are supposed to be there and that they're in good healthy condition.

Okay. Do those people though have the level of expertise to assess if they're in good healthy condition?

Uh, currently one of them is a former uh arborist himself. So, we do we do have staff and um have been doing this for a while, but we can always work on additional training if necessary.

Uh, Philip, I have a question. Uh, not to pick on the police department trees, uh, but going back to the slide where you show that lone tree, um, that you mentioned that had little to no drainage.

Yeah. Um that's not an ideal location for a tree. Um I don't know how big that tree is going to eventually get, the growth of it. Um what is your recommendation for those little uh areas

of soil between parking spaces?

Uh so the way I look at it is we took the forest away from the tree. We got to bring the forest back to the tree. So we need to bring the soil back to it and we need to make sure the leaves fall back in. We don't need to be blowing all the leaves away so it looks like our mulch is pretty. We need to bring the forest back to it.

And that's that's the main thing if that sounds good. I didn't mean to step on planets touch. I promise y'all that.

Okay.

But those are essentially little islands within the parking.

We call them we call them concrete caskets.

Right. So ideally trees should not be planted there or or

we need certain type of shade. Yeah. If not it'll be a heat island. You'll be able to see from the satellites. So, we need something that's going to kind of keep the heat off of it. And so, we can do the trees and they'll grow. We just need to make sure that soil's right. The drainage is good and the soils right and that tree get big.

Yeah. You got to treat them like babies for the first four or five years.

Yeah.

Yeah. I I just wonder um you know when when they're when towns or time of Apex is developing new construction, new parking lots, like the old trees that are already there, are we cutting those down pre-development? Are we leaving some? Um what's

what's kind of like the

That's above my pay grade. I'll have to stop where I don't know where I should be talking.

I can answer that that [laughter] question. Um, so where we do have preserved areas and large trees, especially those that are 18 inches in caliber and greater, we protect the full critical root zone of those trees, which is one foot for every inch of um diameter at breast height for those trees. So that's where we install our tree protection fence to ensure that the root zone is protected. For newly planted trees, we have minimum planting area. So the width the the square footage of the area that the tree is planted in um is regulated dependent upon whether it's a small tree or a large tree. There's different areas required for each of those um uh whether

it's a small type or large type tree. Um and we we measure every tree island when we're when we are reviewing site plans to ensure that that area is met. Um and in other areas we ensure that there's at least a 10-ft width of planting area. So that we have a lot of standards currently in the development ordinance, unified development ordinance with regard landscaping and trees. Now is there room for improvement perhaps? So u we can you know planning can continue conversation with with Philip to ensure that you know we're we have best practices as Bruce mentioned earlier. [laughter]

Hey planning can't be mad at me. I just

I'm not mad at you. We're a team.

Yes. Yeah. But yeah, they do a great job. Uh when they can save a large tree, it's saved. It's It's not like they go in and just blast everything down. We actually went um I don't know the proper term for it. There was a tree that had a treehouse in it. Somebody mentioned it. So we me and my crews went and removed the treehouse from the tree and it had this big tubix stuck in it and we thought, well, there we go. We can't do much more. And uh eventually it had to come out. But the town goes they go out of the way to save trees. It's not like we just take them all. I'm just trying to say to for an urban environment when you bring a sapling up from the urban environment, you just need to start taking care of it young and making sure that the pruning is being done right. The planting is the key part. Just the planting of the tree and it'll prune up and you can you'll be success successful with it. Yeah, I' I've looked at a lot of trees for apex on a preserving for the large trees and stuff like that and yeah, I think Apex overall does a well job. So Philip does so

there seems to be a lot of handoffs in the life of any of these urban trees

right

so like at the police station you mentioned not leaving the leaves around the base of the tree that is a contracted landscaper's responsibility who's moving them moving

the leaves or leaving the leaves okay and are they so you happened upon the tree during just tree cruising is is that something Do you normally do like are you the responsible person for caring for that tree or is it really the contractor or if it's at a park is it the park and recck staff that are keeping an eye on it?

I will do what we do at the electric department. We think we own those trees. So we prune those trees to proper the way it should be pruned. So the way we just went over, we went through the whole electric department trees that way and when it dies we're going to make sure it gets planted. Not we got some dying. We had some that died not long after they put it in. And [clears throat] uh when we do replace them, we will be doing that. I just

I look at trees and if I don't see nothing being done, I just want to speak about them. Speak for them is what I want to do. So it's me and and those my bleed for trees.

Yeah.

So who is there anybody looking for? You're looking for it sounds like primarily like pruning issues, but is there anybody else sort of looking for disease issues that could be treated?

I don't think so.

Okay.

Yeah. I look in if I see a disease, I I'll

But there's no like coordinated. We are caring for our trees because it's expensive to grow and replace them.

Just a guy that

Yeah. Okay.

eyeballs all the trees

for p private trees like in the parking lot. We require the tree to be put in and then I I look at uh the Harris ter parking lot and beautiful green mistletoe throughout one of the trees.

It's going to die.

Yep.

How do we enforce that at a certain point? Because

I don't think you can. And I'm this is my ignorant speaking here. I don't think you can. But if you go to Publix, they're going to have the same problem. We have the police department now on every one of their trees because they just wasn't pruned correctly at planting. Now they're looking healthy. They're looking good, but every one of them's got co-ominant stems and it's just going to keep coming to a wind and

it's going to split it. Trees do this in the forest, too, when they're trying to just reach the sunlight, and that's all this tree is doing. So, it's not doing wrong. But I don't think you can go on somebody's private property and tell them, you can educate them about mistletoe, but I I mean, I don't know, Bill, to be honest with you. It is private property, but when that subdivision or that parking lot went in, we had a requirement for a tree.

Yeah.

And if they don't take care of the tree, maybe we need to have an ordinance that says you have to take care of the tree somehow.

That

because I mean I I know it. I know those trees in the Harris deer lot are going to go. I

I think there might be a state law saying we can't have that ordinance. saying we can't have that ordinance, that we can't regulate.

You're probably very right.

Yeah. in our legislature

educating people. I've stopped by and talked to in my past the homeowners association the president and I didn't never told nobody what to do. I just said, "Hey, look at all this beautiful stuff you got here. You're choking it out with water lines that you never used." And

but if a tree dies, I would think that we would be able to put it require they put it back in even if it's a two and a half inch caliber

because it was required when we when they put the subdivision in. So that tree should be there. forever, [snorts] Mr.

or some tree.

Mr. Jensen, there there is a requirement in the ordinance that trees that are required by the code be replaced.

So, we we do have um we do have standards for that.

When it falls, it'll be replaced.

So, like the landscaping plan is like a commitment that they have to maintain.

It's a zoning compliance issue. Yeah. Um if we become aware of it.

Yeah. I guess the enforcement around it.

Are you only enforce what you know about?

Yeah. If it dies and goes away, but give them fair warning. Say your tree is dying. You need to fix it or we will have you put replace it.

Our neighboring town, I've worked in their historical districts and

if they have a private tree that is not what the town has as a standard, they give them a 30-day notice to do something about that issue. Example, if you had a tree in your yard, it's dead. Of course, they'll call and we'll take care of our part. But like in our neighboring town, they'll start giving citations until you remove that dead tree. Uh you can't have nobody work on a tree in the inner city of this Raleigh without being a certified arborist. And maybe I'll come back again if y'all have me and we'll talk about the historical district. It's in the five-year plan and how we need that. We need to copycat that a little bit that you just can't have somebody knocking on the door and scaring people. We need to have certified arborists fill out a a risk report. We go out and check it as the town to see if they're right and uh make sure that people's not cutting down stuff. And I'm talking 6 inch trees and up because dog woods can be huge at 6 in and that's our state flower. So, we should make sure that they're protected. So, that's that's another story, but it's in the five-year plan. Please, please read and uh thank y'all for your time.

And don't be mad at me. [laughter]

Thank y'all. Appreciate it.

Next on the agenda is B City. Bill and I had an agreement that we wouldn't take more than 25 minutes of your time. So, I'm going to be here for like 30 seconds, so [laughter] we'll be great. I'll be quick. I know you'll have a lot to discuss after this. Um, but thank you for having me. Um, my name is Ellison Lambert. I am the town's volunteer coordinator. Um, so what that means is anything volunteer related comes to me usually at some point. Um, so I work with our special events, um, managing all the volunteers there. Um, I work with our athletics coaches, um, instructors for the parks and w program,

work with all of our adopt a park and trail um, adoption groups and park operations staff on those work days. Um, I also work with our apex youth council. So Tatan's one of our students in that. Um, so that is a group of 200 middle and high school students that are all dedicated to service in the town. Um, they've already hit 3,000 hours just this school year alone. Um, so they're a really, really awesome group. And then what I'm here for, the Pollinators and the Peak program also falls under my umbrella. So, um, we'll just kind of go through some of this. So, um, these are kind of our core activities. Um, so Bity USA, that's the one everybody knows. Um, that's through the Xerxes Society. We have been members of that since 2020. Um, and we renew that pledge each year. Um, also in 2020, a school group reached out to Mayor Gilbert, um, asking him to take the mayor's monarch pledge. Um, which he wonderfully did. And so I help renew that every year. Um, basically just making commitments to monarchs and our native pollinators. Um, we have a pollinator garden at Apex Nature Park. Did we know this? Yeah, maybe. Last time I was here, some people didn't. So, we're making progress. Awesome. So, um, we have a wonderful pollinator garden out at Apex Nature Park where we host work days, events, educational, um, topics, all sorts of things. Um, that picture in the far left corner, um, or the bottom left corner is of the nature park. We have a bee motel. We've got bee houses. That's a shed that Apex High School painted for us. Um, it doesn't look like that now because it was not weatherproofed, so we just rebuilt the outside of it. Um, and we're going to have a big community event for everybody to come and paint the shed. um and come together for that. Um the students are planting plants down in the garden as well in that bottom right picture. Um we do our evening in the garden event. We've done that the past two years. Um and so that is also at the nature park garden. We have vendors come out, different museums. Um the library does a story hour. Um food and beverage, honey

themed things telling people about the difference between native bees and honey bees. Um just kind of an educational get outside type of event. And then we also have a dedicated website now for pollinators on the peak. Also ask questions along the way. [clears throat] All right. Awesome. So, since I was last speaking with you guys a couple years ago, um we have added a lot of additional activities. So, these are just some of them. We've been added some environmental and pollinator programming. Um so, as Nora has probably shared with you, um we did a backyard birding event a couple weeks ago. Um so, that first picture is of our bird flashcards. you could test your knowledge on the backyard birds before you went out. Um, we had a couple people come to it, so we're hoping to expand it in the future. Um, we did creek week as Nora just shared. That middle picture is of everybody presenting to the students. Um, and then we also have a summer volunteer workday series. Um, the far picture is of our Apex Youth Council students. Um, and all of those bags are of weeds that we pulled out of the garden. So, uh, needed a lot of love that day. I also work with all of our Boy Scout and Girl Scout um troops that come in and want to do projects with the town. So, um the picture on the left is of the little free seed library that I worked with a troop to um create uh last year I believe and that has um native seeds, vegetable and fruit seeds um anything in there. People it's it's like a library you know you can drop off seeds if you want to take your own, leave some. Um, so we stock those and then community members will also drop those off. Um, we also work with the high school and middle school gardens. So, um, I've worked with Apex High School and Salem Middle School to plant pollinator gardens in their spaces. Um, I provide recommendations on pollinator plants to neighborhoods, HOAs. Um, really anybody that wants help. Um, but happy to provide some education on that. And then also we do seed, excuse me, seed handouts at events, which I did bring

some for you guys. Um, I have a bin back there that I'll leave with Nora afterwards. Um, but we give out blackeyed susan seeds and purple cone flour seeds at events. Where's the seed library? Sorry,

it is at the pollinator garden as well.

Yes. Um, yeah, that was a really cool project. I think that was their bronze award. um and working with that group potentially again on their silver project this year. So very excited. This is something that we're all very excited about. [laughter] Um last time I was here, this was just a dream. So um now it is in action and thriving. Um this is our habitat certification program. So um I can kind of open it and walk you through it, but um basically it is just to recognize those people in the community that do have native pollinator plantings in their yard. Um maybe perfect. So just a form that they can fill out. We don't overly not that is not true. I check it. [laughter] I'm not going out and inspecting their property is what I should say. Um I'm not, you know, out in the yards. Um but they fill it out. We get some information about how they heard about us, all the things. It's a school residential business. Um, they can tell us the size, if they added new things, they didn't make any changes, they were already doing this, anything cool like that. Um, we have a pollinator pit stop map that I will show you next. Um, so basically it walks them through they have to have a specific number of wild flowers or herbaceous plants. Um, and we have these different tiers that it shows. So we wanted to make sure it was accessible to everybody. you know, if you have an apartment building with a patio or back, you know, little area, you can still participate in this. Um, so you have to have a few of each. Um, we've got some education topics here. Um, tree shrubs and vines. So, the egg tier, you don't have to have any, so you

can still participate if you have a little patio. Um, water source and shelter are all required um for our pollinators. And then we ask about um invasive species or any pesticide usage that doesn't disqualify somebody, but it's just nice to educate and and find out. Um people can upload files. So I love getting all the pictures of all the creatures and um plants at their houses and then just some information on how they heard about us. So we are currently at 29. So if any of you want to be my 30th habitat, I would love that. But um usually that program ramps up in the spring as people get outside, get excited to plant things. Um and we'll do a social media push from parks as well for that. And then the pollinator pit stop tour. Perfect. So we kind of modeled this after the like tour of Frights, Tour of Lights that Parks does as well. Also, I'm house of parks. Um, I should have said that earlier, but um, we didn't want people driving around to look at people's gardens. Sometimes they're in backyards, anything. So, this was super accessible. So, um, these are just some of our houses. We're going to update it again soon with our new ones. Um, but it just shows their yards. It goes through and shows all the different trees, shrubs, everything that they've got. These are pictures that they've submitted. Just scroll through a little bit. There's a baby monarch. So really awesome. I do get to go out and drop those signs off and get to see the gardens then. So it's very very fun. Yeah, we're at 29. So we're excited to grow that. So just some things that we're currently working on and then our future goals. Um we've kind of outgrown our space at Nature Park quite honestly. Um, if you are familiar with native plants, you know they recede and grow and take over, which is what we want them to do. Um, but we've kind of run out of space out there. And so Nora and I have been

working together along with um some members of our parks planning um and just parks team in general park ops um to find new spaces. So um very very excited to tell you that we are um going to create a new pollinator garden outside of the community center. Um we're going to be planting that on Earthfest day. Um, so that's April 25th. It's at the end. Um, last Saturday in April, but we'll be adding all the pollinator spaces there. I have heard uh before I was here at the town that used to be a pollinator space. Um, and then something happened, plants got taken out, so we're going to put everything back in. Um, so we're really excited for that. Community members can come out, take a plant, plant it out there in the garden. Um, so it'll be a good project for everyone. Um, we are also working with Apex High School's uh, horiculture class to learn about native planting. They're going to plant the beds around the main circle um, outside. So, that's going to be awesome. They're doing that in a couple weeks. Um, Nora and I have also been working with storm water um, and park ops at Claremont Park. Um, I don't know if you guys are familiar with Claremont Park. It's one of our neighborhood parks. Um, but there's a stream that kind of goes through it and it just half of the park is wet all the time. Um, so we are trying to add some native aquatic species of pollinator plants um out there to help soak up the water. Um, so we're going to plant some in the actual stream bed. Um, and then we're also going to once the culvert is replaced once that's going on um expand the sides and make it more of a garden as well. And then Seagros Park also has some random wooden planters out on the sidewalk. I've I've been told they used to have crepe myrtles in them um in a planter. Um [laughter] anyways, that's just grass now. So, we're going to take those and add some pollinator planting to that as well. Um we'd also like to explore additional funding opportunities for adding um these pollinator spaces.

So, I'm very very grateful that we do have a budget line for our pollinator initiatives, but we always have more space and we always have more needs. So, um I'll be exploring some grant and funding opportunities this year. Um, of course, we always want to give out more native plants to people. Um, and if we have a full garden, we might as well collect the seeds and process them and distribute them. So, that's another program that we want to start. Um, you heard me say grow the pollinator habitat certification program earlier. That's my big goal this year. a lot of big goals this [laughter] year. Um, and then the environmental symposium, we've chatted with a few of you about it. Um, and I'll share it again later, but this is something that we are launching this year. So, um, we're partnering with Trees for the Triangle on this project. It's going to be four different, um, lectures, uh, panels, anything like that at the Halley. Um, and I have the dates on our last slide, so you can all save them and add them to your calendar. Um but it'll be different topics like environmental justice um or just some other topics but we will invite the public to that um and we are super excited to host that. It's been hosted in Kerry in the past um and now Trees for the Triangle has decided to come join us and hang out with us for the year. So um we're hoping to make it a yearly thing maybe fingers crossed if it goes well. Um so would really love your support at that event. And then last, how can you get involved? Um, so my first thing that I would love to see, um, is an integrated pest management plan. Um, like I said, I am the volunteer coordinator. I don't know much about pest management, but I do know that it's important and the Xerxes Society would be city wants to see us have one of those. Um, as far as I can tell, do we have an official one? I don't think we really do, right? So, um, something that we're exploring, something that we would love your help with, um, in whatever capacity that looks like. If anybody has expertise in that, we'd love to pick your brains.

[laughter] Um, again, environmental symposium, if you have any ideas of topics you want us to explore, speakers, connections that you have, um, just really anything that you want to see from that, it's our first year doing it, so we have a lot of freedom and trying to figure it out there. So, um, just let us know. Email me or Nora, give us all your ideas. Um, also, if you see a grant or you know of an organization that you think could be a good fit for us to get some funding with, let us know. [laughter] Um, I'd also love to I'm going to skip down to the last one. Obviously, share it with your networks. Um, any of our events, which are on the last slide again, um, or any programs, just help us get the word out about those. And then lastly, um when B city the there used to be an actual committee for the B city. Um when we disbanded that committee, everything was kind of moved under EAB. Um and I'm not sure if anybody overly knew that um or focused on that. So I'd love to have some like quarterly by annually, whatever you guys want to do, but just have some like dedicated discussions around the B city. um pollinator initiatives um and getting some directives from you guys of what you want to see, what you're interested in, what programs you think we should do, just anything like that. Um so here's your long list of dates to add to your calendar. We'll see you tomorrow morning at the invasive species removal. Um that is from 10 to 12. Um and then all of these other events that we've got going on. So we have, like I said, our summer garden workday series that's volunteering out at the nature park garden. um gardening for wildlife. Your very own Nora is going to be presenting on that talk. Um we have a pollinator garden learning lunch or sorry, pollinator learning lunch. Evening in the garden is June 18th. Uh moth night is a new one too. Um so that's going to be park after dark. Um and then

environmental symposium for four weeks. So that's all I've got for you. Do we have questions?

Um I have a question. Um, you mentioned pest control. What is your definition of pest in this instance?

Great question. That's that's what I want to rely on you guys for. Um, I don't have expertise in this at all. So,

so I asked because uh one of my notes here I have uh education in caterpillar like the the yeah the larvae stage um educating the the residents about these these caterpillars eating the plants and understanding that that is a natural process absolutely of this um often times what happens is that people end up plucking these

these pollinators not unbeknownst to to them. Um, so, um,

yeah, I think that if you can add something about educating residents about what is a pollinator and the different life stages and what they look like and

what they can expect as far as like them eating their native plants. I think that would be um, ideal.

Um,

absolutely.

I think something you can add um, I I'm highly invested in tracking wildlife. Um um something you can add is to your to the

to the residents of Apex that are already participating in this in this program is utilizing I naturalist. Yes.

To for them to be able to take pictures and um share amongst the community what they're seeing in their in their homes. That way you don't have people stopping in unannounced.

Um you mentioned that you want to expand to other parks within Apex. Correct.

Yeah. Um, I think educating residents that live near those parks is essential. Um, as to create stepping stepping stones for these pollinators to not bottleneck their populations.

I think that's essential as well.

Um, yeah, you already answered that question.

I love it. Give me all of the ideas. This is awesome.

You may want to consider also reaching out to Apex Apex Friendship High School to their ECS classroom. It's their special ed classroom. They have beds outside of the school there that they have used for gardening purposes in the past that they would probably like to get involved with the apex pollinating.

Perfect. And I've I spoke at their environmental club last year. So, I will connect with that group. That's awesome.

And I'll I'll tell you um as an educator, I I can tell you that a lot of schools have unused garden beds.

Um

so that's

that's exactly what Friendship Environmental Club told me. Yep. [laughter]

Love that. Yeah, come on.

I'm microphoneless, so I'm going to walk up and steal this microphone. Um, I think everything that you guys have said is awesome, but also you guys are also tasked with helping with this as well. So, you know, for B city and Tree City, it would be great to have you guys, you know, we can plan more events and have EAB come and, you know, teach citizens about I naturalist, teach them, work with high school kids or just be there present. Um, so I think that's kind of what we were getting at with, you know, you you guys are the board now. You are the Tree City board, the B city board. So, anything that you guys want to do, you have the right to do it and I'll help. I would love to plan more events with Ellison, with Phil. Um, so whatever we want to do, let's do it.

Yeah.

Yep. Just add that.

I had one quick question, I guess. Uh, and Phil Barnes could Philip can probably answer this. Um, we have we have town beehives.

How are we doing? Are do we expect to ever expand that?

Come on up. [laughter]

So, we're kind of open with the beehives. What we would like to do is test mic control on them this year. So, we're going to do a blue rag method on two on

one April guard and apron bard on other two. We're not going to treat one at all. And then we're going to see the cost on it. And we would probably be letting the town know and any other beekeepers know the best cost method to treat mites. And if we get honey, we get honey this year. If we don't, we don't. We got some for that.

You're looking to get honey. So, you have a

If we get it trap and everything in there.

Yeah.

Festivals.

Yeah. We give them away. So, TreeCap and BCD, when y'all do the events, we'll get y'all some honey straws.

I hate to throw cold water on this. I mean, I love honey. I like bees, but honey bees are an agricultural animal. They're not a native thing, so it doesn't really go together with the And they compete. They do compete with the native pollinators if the people who have them are not planting enough. Yeah, we we we we feed ours uh tree blooms and gold rod in the in the fall. And fact check me please, but I think in 1971 or 75, North Carolina made the honey bee their honey bee.

Yeah, I would be interested [laughter] to see what the Xeri Society has what they say about that since the bee city designation is their their designation. focus on the native bees,

but they do acknowledge that honey bees are also beneficiary, but all of our programming that we do more focuses on the native pollinators. Um, and that's why I mentioned that the I don't know why I'm still um that's why I mentioned at the um event, we do have a live display hive out there, but it's to educate people on people love to see the live. You know, they get excited, they can come up and see it. Um, but then it's a great teaching opportunity. That's awesome. Did you know that all these other fun things are also trying to share?

Yeah. I'm going to ask Alison and Nor if they'll put up the [clears throat] pest

of the month for trees now since we're talking spotted lantern flies and stuff like that. Got to go. So anyway, we're getting a little nerdy on you here. So [laughter] we'll uh we'll let it go. But yeah, we we're doing the bees all right. Some sometimes we get good, sometimes it goes bad, but they're there. And I took some beautiful pictures of golden rod and it's got native bees all over it along with our honey bees also. And when things [clears throat] start going out in the fall, that golden rod pops up and it's beautiful and you can just you can sit excuse me [clears throat] s look at you just see all the pollinators on it. So as long as we keep promoting which is a natural plant I guess uh in our rideways if we keep promoting that we're just promoting the pollinators in our rideways also. And so that could also be awesome. We also become tree line this year, which means that the electric department of Apex works with tree health basically more than they do uh line clearance. And I got a motto that this ain't about me either. It's B city time. But uh it's not about the homeowner, the electric department is by the tree. And that's my motto when when I represent the electric department. So we are a treeine. Apex is a treeine city now along with Aubberdale Foundation. But it's Ellison's time. I'm We all work together. [laughter] Um, I did write down something when you guys were chatting earlier and I don't know how feasible it is, but Nora and I took a tour um of the pollinator garden um out at Chattam Mills. Um, it's the North Carolina Cooperative Extensions Pollinator Garden. If you haven't been out there, it's beautiful. Um, but they when you're talking about the heat islands in the parking lot, that's one thing that they have done out there is they know that the trees aren't great out there. It's all pavement and they've done native pollinator plants that can do full sun just in those little tiny beds. So, if it ever gets to that, maybe that's something we can explore as additional pollinator space as well. [laughter]

Thank you.

All right. Yeah.

Question um for these educational events or the pollinator garden work days about

how many community members or volunteers are at each event.

Great question.

Or if you have like a year or an annual number or something.

Yeah, great question. Um so last year we had eight work days um in the pollinator garden specifically. um had about 120 volunteers that came out to that throughout the year. Um and then you've had probably 12 or 15 invasive species removal days in the past

year and a half with a lot more coming. Um I'd estimate over 200 volunteers at this point for those. So,

and sometimes if we do them like weird times of the week, like a Tuesday, we'll have three people come. We still pull a lot of invasives out, but we've had like I'd say lowest is three, highest is 32. So, it's a good amount of people.

We've got about 25 registered to come tomorrow morning. So, it's also a Wake County teacher work day. So, we try and schedule those too to be, you know, if students want to come out on their day off, that's a great time. And then I also, since I oversee the youth council, use that as an opportunity for them to come out and get some hours as well. So, awesome.

Just one other couple things. Um, any thought about maybe getting milkweed seeds to in addition to your uh cone flour and black eyed susans? Just since the we have the mayor's monarch pledge, I was just wondering if that I don't know how easily they germinate or anything like that.

We um recently last fall um made a new contact um thanks to council member Moo. um she has somebody that actually propagates and grows milkweed and he donated a hundred plugs that we put out at the garden. So, we'll see how many pop up this spring. Um but he's a wonderful contact. He propagates them. Um and then we did a monarch release after that. I should have put pictures of that in there. What am I doing? Um but he's a wonderful contact that we're going to hopefully work with on getting some propagate or like some plugs to give out. Maybe that's more beneficial than seeds. you know, it's easier for

somebody to go home and pop that in their garden rather than grow a whole seed and transfer and all of that. Um, so yeah, definitely when we when we reorder seeds, any native is on on the table. So, yeah.

And I don't I've never heard of this and anybody doing this, but I just wondered like to get more funding m since you are going to be installing so many gardens in public places, maybe like an adopt a space program.

Yep. That's on. Yep. Yeah. So, we when I talked about adopt a park earlier, we have over 45 different spaces that are adopted out. All of them are full.

Um, so that is a new thing that, you know, we always have interest in people adopting trails and parks in our area. Um, but if people hit their requirements, they're able to renew each year. Um, and so that's been something is, um, youth council has adopted the pollinator garden at nature park. Um, but I also have a, um, sorority that is interested in adopting the new space already. Um, so as we grow those spaces, that's a great way to get involvement. They volunteer. It helps on our maintenance side of things.

But do they actually pay to like have their name up or anything?

They don't pay. We do give them a sign, [laughter]

but the funding of it. Yeah.

You know, if they have to look at that,

like a sponsorship type of thing. Yeah.

Exactly. Exactly.

I love it. Love that. I worked in fundraising before this, so my brain is all over the sponsorships. [laughter] But I'm excited for the gardening for wildlife because

I mean I just think those type of workshops uh I mean I don't have land but people who have

you know land or can grow their own I just plant in my parents home. I plant I've planted milkweed and we've gotten monarchs. So, everyone has their own power to use their space.

And I just see a lot of homeowners just have nothing, just grass, and that's not natural.

The same with leaves. Leave your leaves, please.

Um, but yeah, I'm excited. And if you need any I also have some connection, so

if you need any help with anything, just let me know.

Awesome. I love it. Awesome. Well, I'll just wrap it up and say obviously it seems like there's a lot to talk about with both of these topics. So, moving forward, if we want to do like Ellison, I know you suggested maybe quarterly. Um, and you guys don't always have to come back. Maybe it's just we, you know, they communicate with me. I relay what they say and we work on any initiatives you guys want to do or maybe staff wants to see. Um, and we can kind of get that on the books. That way, you know, we really are acting as the boards for both of these designations. But does that sound good? Thoughts on that?

I recommend quarterly or

quarterly.

Does the Does the B city um certification have a requirement for the size of the board or what the board does? You say there has to be a board.

I think Yeah, I think it just has to.

Okay.

Yep. And I think the same thing for Tree City. There just has to be an acting board.

Okay. So I'll say the intention of council when we try to consolidate things is really to empower this board and kind of put everything under one roof and have it all report up to the one thing. And the notion was and it's up to you guys but that there's you could establish subcommittees which is a subset of you guys who would be the B city board or a subset of you guys would be the tree city board and you can meet on a separate schedule and um meet with staff you know whether it's [snorts] quarterly monthly whatever talk about the B city stuff for the tree city stuff that's specific to that that program and then report back to this board as to what's going on and if there's any you know policy changes that come out of that that it would come you know from that subcommittee then you guys would approve it and then it would come to staff eventually to council to go it. So we're trying to make sure that one place has the whole picture. There's not silos working on different stuff and duplicating their effort. It's all supported by the same staff. And that one place is you guys right here.

Yes. Yes. I'll take those. Thank you.

Right.

Next order [clears throat] of discussion is on the data center research and progress for public engagement.

Hi everyone. How's it going? Bruce Medal, Planner 3 with the planning department. Um, I wasn't listed as a presenter, but I just wanted to come up here and give you guys a little run through of kind of what's going on and what you can expect, and then we'll open it up for discussion among yourselves. So, a little bit of background. You may all be aware, uh, last year around September, we received an application for resoning and UDO amendments for data center use that was submitted to the town. Between September and December, town staff researched and drafted a white paper as we worked on these applications on the potential impacts of data centers. In January of 26, uh we had two different uh work sessions where we presented on the findings of this white paper. Uh so staff presented the impacts to areas such as energy, water, environment, noise, land use, traffic, public safety, economic factors. Um, at that time, council provided staff with additional areas of interest for further research, which is still ongoing. In March of this year, this month, uh, the applicant that originally had submitted those applications withdrew their applications for the resoning in the UDO amendments. At that time, town councils decided to explore initiating moratorum for the data center uses for 12 months. Town council has also referred the continued research on environmental and economic impacts of the data center and potential UDO amendments related to the use to the EAB now and that's why we're having this discussion. So some of the things to be aware of uh there's some next steps is to define the EA's work plan and process how you guys think that you guys can work best in order to achieve this goal. Uh establish a timeline and then we the council has

asked that we deliver any recommended plan to them within 60 days. So this was issued referred on March 10th. So 60 days from then is May 9th. So we'll have to have something presented to them by then. As just a heads up, um the way your schedule lines up, we'll probably have to have an additional special meeting in order to come up with a recommendation and finalize all this stuff in order to get it to them by May 9th itself because your meeting I think falls on May 21st. Um and then you received a memo from uh planning director Dian. Uh there was just a couple options on there. These are not the only options that are available to you. They were just options that were presented that we could talk about here and to help encourage your discussion. So option one would be that the EAB is to call special meetings or their own subcommittee meetings at least twice per month to review and work on the draft. Additional meetings are likely to be required to complete the task by the moratorum's end date of April 27. The AB would need to decide on how to receive public input and bring in subject matter experts. Special meetings and subcommittee meetings require public notices and production of minutes. So just something to be aware of. um some challenges if we go just kind of the subcommittee route and things like that. Um they still require a quorum to be present. So however many people wish to be part of your subcommittee, you still have to have a quorum for that. We will also be have to be able to produce a quorum for any additional special meetings. So that's something to be mindful of. If we have two meetings a month, we'll need to be able as a full board, we'll have to be able to produce a quorum for that as well to be able to process, receive presentations and things like that to move forward. So it's a big time commitment. Just wanted you to be aware of that. Um there's a potential to have collaborate collaborative conversations directly with community members through public input sections um on the agenda during subcommittee meetings or during regular or special session meetings. Um additionally we may require additional meetings in in order to relay the information. So if we do do a subcommittee there is the potential that the whoever is on the subcommittee will have to come back to the board and present that information to them and just give them the timeline that may require an additional special meeting as well. we could try and work that out

however you decide to go so that these meetings are pretty predictable and regular but still additional stuff might happen. Um one downside to having a subcommittee is uh the entire board is not present for all discussions and presentations and that really depends on how um on the expertise of everyone here and then who has a voice in the in the matter who has input to provide. If you guys feel very confident having a subcommittee with the members who wish to be a part of it that's awesome. We'll work with you guys and help you there. But if you wish to have it be the full board so everyone can participate and have a voice in that that way we can explore that option as well. Option two um this is the staff recommended option but again it's up to it's up to your call and it's open to discussion. Staff would assist with all elements of the process. So staff will meet with interested party members of the public through scheduled remote meetings throughout the year. So, uh, similar to what was done with the western dig branch plan, what we're proposing here is that we will set a dedicated time every week or every month to have people come in through via teams or if they have special needs, come in via person and we'll sit down, we'll have a conversation with them. We'll get we'll document all of their their requests, their needs. We'll take any paperwork from them, whatever, and then we'll distribute that back to you guys for your review as well after we assimilate the information. uh continued staff will create a data center subscription list for the public to receive communications from the staff throughout the process including regular updates from EAB meetings where the data center amendments are be discussed. Staff will provide updated UDO drafts to the EAB at monthly special meetings so that the regular business can continue during the regular scheduled monthly meetings. The special meeting would include subject matter experts who could present regarding a specific topic for each month. we'll have kind of a suggested uh uh primitive timeline to go over to show you kind of what that would look like. Um and the EBA could set aside time at the end of each meeting to get public input and take questions on specific topics discussed at each meeting. So we'll look at that now. Um so this is just tenative just kind of

an idea of how this might look break this down. say we have an additional meeting in April where we could do the presentation of the white paper if you like. This was presented uh again in two meetings in January. It did take a long time to get through. It was probably a six or seven hour process as Mr. Mappy can attest to. Um we could shorten that down and make it a bit more digestible for you since we're planning on bringing in subject matter experts on a regular basis as well. But um just to get everyone caught up and kind of where up to speed with where the council is and the planning board is and staff is that's an option we can pursue. And how this breaks down is in May we could break it down for have given you a presentation and discussing the UDO amendments related to land use, lighting, landscaping buffers. The following month environmental impacts these will probably take a bit longer given your expertise and your your particular interest in the environment stuff. So, air quality, water quality in June. Maybe in July, we look at hazard mitigation and public safety and how that works together. August we can do uh economic impact just so you're aware of all factors of of this process and what the UD amendments might look like. September, energy consumption. We bring in some experts to talk to you about what what the state of the industry looks like, how much power these need, where the power come from, um what the how the industry is moving to, you know, BYOP, basically bring your own power behind the meter. have further discussions on that so you can have a better idea of what that might look like. And um October water consumption, November public health, January noise, uh February, we would review and input uh the full UDO amendment draft to you and you would have the chance to read and provide input. This again the goal here would be each month we would have a presentation to you. We would have a draft of UDO amendments. You would review them. We would discuss them. We would make amendments then and at the very end in back here in uh February, we would come back to the draft and we would re-review those to make sure that they're in line with what we think is best. March, we would come up with the final review for the revised UD amendments and recommendations and then in April they'd be presented to the planning board and then to the town

council where they would make a possible vote. So challenges with option two, it'll require at least two meetings each month to stay on track again for the 27 deadline. Uh we'll need a quorum for each meeting again so the full board will have to have a quorum for that. U the presentations from staff and subject experts. Um we'll have to start planning those out to get the right people in here so you guys can have the right input from the right people. And then uh there is the immediate opportunity for people to come and maybe someone's very passionate about the environmental impact. So they're very passionate about the water use. they could come to that specific meeting and provide that input directly when we're talking about water or we're talking about energy and things like that as well. So, so that's that's what I just wanted to present that to to kind of open the discussion process, answer any questions you guys may have. Um, so yeah, absolutely questions the subject matter experts for each of these specific topics. Um we have uh so we would lean on so for for some of the environmental stuff we have contacts with DEEQ. We bring them in to speak specifically to the things like that. Um we're in contact with them now and they've mentioned that they'd be happy to come to one of our boards and provide information. So that's who we work with there. Um we do have some subject matter experts in the town. Um our engineer I'm sorry electric director Kathy has extensive experience working with um electric cities and things like that. She could easily speak to a lot of the stuff. She's very experienced and it would be a it'd be a work we'd find out exactly we'd find it we'd find very good experts we exist also outside of staff as well.

Yeah. Thank you.

Regarding um people outside of staff um I know you have a lot of people that this has been a hot topic um especially in Apex as well as nationally. uh you have people that have formed a coalition in the area. Um and I happen to know that quite a few of them are very familiar with certain subject matter. That's what they do for their living. Um is it possible to even get their input

being that they are residents of Apex?

Uh there'll absolutely be opportunity for for public comment, additional public comment from them as residents of Apex. We'll have to con well I'll say have to confer with my director and also legal staff as well to find out exactly who should be presenting as a subject expert sponsored by the town. So there may be obstacles to that but there will absolutely be opportunities for anyone part of your co the coalition itself to come and speak on areas they are experts in.

So Bruce up to this point it seems like the focus has been a hypers scale data center. um is the intention to create UDO language for sort of all sizes of data center or just a focus on the hypers scale data center.

Yeah, the focus originally was that because part of the application was for essentially what was a hypers scale data center. Um, I think it would we would be well served to kind of explore what that might look like at different scales. Whether it's a hypers scale, whether it's the collocation, which is essentially like a strip mall for data centers where they have large spaces, they get all the entitlements, then they rent out rack service spaces or they rent out parts of the building or the enterprise. So that'd be like your internal or your localized uh servers for a bank or for a hospital, things like that. So we would explore that too. We just kind of see how we need to break that up, how these need to be categorized. Um, I think the the most the the biggest obstacle and the one that gets the most amount of news is the hypers scale. It's the one that'll use the most power, the most land, the most water, and the most electricity. So, it's the one that will also have the most generators. So, they'll be potentially the greatest environmental impact as well. There are, you know, data centers all around the triangle right now, Durham, that are are small. They're more the internal size and you wouldn't even know they're there um for the most part. So, we are looking kind of at the larger scale for the collocation, even some of the larger enterprise or the hypers scale itself. that we'll have those conversations as we move forward.

Proximity to residential areas being [clears throat] also the fact that we don't have like a high industrial area in the apex area. Um would that be

looked at and and discussed because that would obviously be a huge environmental um factor on residents?

Yeah, absolutely. I think uh having some type of heavy industrial district or something explored is absolutely on the table. Um, you know, again, that might be most appropriate for maybe the hypers scale itself, maybe not even the smaller enterprise or things like that, but that's definitely on the table to discuss and have potential drafts uh in the UDO amendments that we bring before you when we talk about land use and such.

Um, so obviously this is a big issue. There's a lot of information to digest.

Absolutely.

In December of 2026, there are eight members whose terms are up on this board. So, how does the effort carry forward? You know, potentially in the absence of of a lot of people who have heard of of all these things.

I guess that's a concern with with how

how we decide to do this. Yeah. So, I mean that is, you know, that that's a great concern and I think that's something that almost every board, even elected bodies have to deal with themselves is when it comes to re-election. I think we could prioritize um maybe specific topics that this board specifically wants to address or talk about for those who are up for uh either reappointment or who are stepping aside um to really a chance opportunity to leave their mark on that. But it would be up to the new members to continue the process as we move forward in the new year once they're appointed. Suzanne, I think your concern is a large number.

Not just that there are some

whose term expires, but there's a large number.

Do we know how many um would be eligible to be reappointed?

We're looking now.

Okay. Thank you.

Is there ever a um like a special exception for like a continuation maybe to potentially push that? So, whoever basically is involved in the start sees it through to the completion. Yeah, we'll have Allan check that out. Make sure he'll provide us with some input on that.

Yeah, I'm not sure how many are actually

I think it's just one.

Yeah, I mean the people are up for reappoint all the time. The reappointment rate in Apex pretty high. [laughter] And whenever it doesn't happen, like it's a thing you read about in the news. So, it's really really high. So, generally, if you want to get reappointed and you haven't done something terrible, you probably get reappointed. Um, unless you're not planning to. If you're dropping hints like I'm out of here in December, eight of us, we're we're sick of it. Um, that'd be good to know. But like, you know, Bruce is saying, this is a thing that all boards deal with. Like the work has to be agnostic of the members there and carry on and carry forward. And you can plan around a little bit, but it's not in any way, shape, or form unusual. We all deal with it. There's rollover. Staff deals with it. You know, that's why it's good a lot of times to have staff be the drivers of the process. Um, to the extent that's practical to to do so because they'll presumably still be here when the next guys are there. But to bring it back to what we're doing today, um, as the council member, I'll say what the what council referred to the EAB today was to make a plan, right? Like it was like, okay, this is a big thing. We want to do something. So, we're not solving it today. We're not even making a plan today, but in 60 days, I think the expectation is that the EAB will return a plan to the council, say, this is what we think we should do to go through this process. And in front of you, there's two options that staff put together. It looks to me like option one is you guys decide everything and option two is staff does most of the stuff like where do you want that needle to be or is there an option between them that you you prefer that's something that you have a little bit of time to discuss. So I think what happens is the talk of the special meeting is you'll approve some recommendation at some point that goes to council and council say yes go do that or change it and do something else on it. But again this comes down to us trying to empower the EAB. We want you guys to be uh the one place that this stuff goes through and to to feel empowered and to be empowered. And I think that's something that may been missing in previous years. And that's why we're doing these changes with the UDO. We're doing the changes with the the guys coming back. We're trying to make sure you have um sort of

the weight you need to accomplish the task you want and to let you know that we trust you to do those tasks. And um yeah, this is just another one of those things along with the tree and the B thing. So

other discussion

well I'm going to suggest something anyways. We take a look at doing a little bit of both. We have a subcommittee of no no fewer than five and f and work with staff and utilize this schedule that's already on the back trying to leverage everything we have right here that was provided. Well, if there's some of you that are more uh gung-ho about it than others, like that'd be a good way to form a subcommittee and have those guys really come at it. It it does split you up a little bit. It's fine. And then the people aren't on the subcommittee would get reports from the other people. Subcommittee would have double the meetings and you have your subcommittee meeting with staff. Subcommittees are nice because they could be a little less formal sometimes. Doesn't have to be in this room. Could be around at a conference table we have somewhere. You know, discussion could be a little more

more fluid. Um

still public.

Still public though. Yes, that's right. And um the other big discussion at council was how does community engagement work exactly? You know, there's a tremendous amount of interest uh in in engagement here and and how does that work? And I I was advocating saying staff actually does an excellent job with community engagement if we let them do that. If you look at the planning process that we've gone through, they've done a really good job with the outreach and the you know, Western Wake plan and all sorts of things. Um but you know, again, the plan that you come up with could include whatever you want to do for community engagement. it it it was referred to you for your your opinion. Um, so

any other thoughts?

I'm sort of leaning towards the the option two or some variation of it myself. I think we need to rely on the expertise of the staff to the extent that possible

and I do think with the western big branch like you know it has its own web

page and it it's very obvious that that was a very deliberate and very thoughtful approach um and that seems to be more align with option two

sorry can we go back to the question um of how the experts are determined of who who who presents and who's sharing information.

Well, first well, first we'll lean on a town staff that has expertise like outside of just working for the town, but like you know Kathy has multiple decades of working with electric cities and working with the government and Duke and all these other things in different capacities. Um and then outside that we'll explore other agencies first. So, we'll go to like DEEQ. We'll try and find some other uh people to speak on the particular topics if we can't locate someone specifically within town who has the appropriate amount of expertise to speak to you. Um, it won't be me up here talking to you about electricity because that's not my thing. Um, so we'll work really hard to make sure you have that. And then if we have to reach even further out beyond another state agency or another municipality, then we'll do that. Whatever it takes to find an appropriate person.

So, all the recommendations and connections are coming from town staff. Is that correct?

We're open to recommendations if you guys have people. um we would just want to make sure that there's um you know that they they're they're slightly vetted and things like that. We can have communication with them to make sure that things work out. But I mean if someone if you have a professor or if you have like you know someone who works for the state or something in an official capacity, we're happy to talk to them and have initial conversations.

Yeah.

So there's flexibility on who is presented as an expert.

Uh poss possibly. I can't make any guarantees, but I I'm open to talking to anyone and everyone. Absolutely. I would say at a minimum they'd be able to participate in the uh open discussion for community input,

right?

I'm sorry. What do you What do you mean?

If if if they're able to provide input through the community interaction and stuff, they'd be able to put out their thoughts and stuff.

Oh, sure. If if there's a resident who

who's a subject matter expert, they can absolutely share their their information. Then um we're we're looking for established you know people who are working in the current field or state stuff like that like the state office DQ someone who's actually applying the rules and stuff like that to come explain to you like if you have a large data center come in what are we going to look at as the the body that protects you the environment for the state. Yeah.

So we don't have a motion on the floor yet. John, would you like to

Well, my my my the real question I I see is whether it's the the full board or a subcommittee uh going with uh some version of that too. I I could go either way on it. Uh I I think there positives and negatives for for both both versions. One one thing to keep in mind is this is like a year commitment. Um and so for whoever if there are members of a subcommittee you move forward with that just be mindful you know we deliberately don't have anything scheduled for December out of respect for the holiday and stuff like that. But um if you know doing the full board you would might have options for people to be able to miss to go on their vacations and live their life and stuff like that. That is not to influence you. That is just practical be mindful of.

I mean that is a good point. We also I don't think have a meeting scheduled for July either. So

we can schedule special meeting.

Yeah, special meeting.

Yeah, just a regular board meeting we don't have in July.

I guess I have a a slight concern if it's the entire board. Uh, and not to say this isn't a worthy commitment, but then everything else we talked about earlier gets way down on the priority list,

but this becomes this entire board's full focus for the year basically. I ideally that is that's the point of the

the additional meeting is that's the focus of the additional meeting because we understand that you're have your you do all of the regular things plus like there's still time

in addition to everything else.

Oh okay. So, so we would still have regular time for other

So, so the goal the goal would be if if looking at the agendas though if we can work anything in to the the original scheduled meeting that's ideal but there's going to be opportunity and there's going to have to requirement to have that special meetings planned in advance where we will cover the particular topic or however you wish to proceed.

Okay.

Yeah.

Sorry, I misunderstood that.

So, let me ask sort of a technical question. Does the resident advisory board attendance policy apply to special meetings? Like if you get

Yes. Now, if you if it's the full board, then yes. I mean, if it's a subcommittee, that would be a separate

Okay. What's that to have a subcommittee?

Well, it' be a separate set of attendance,

correct? Track. So, isn't the time requirement like 50% or something?

It's it's more than that.

More than that, 75%.

Oh, jeez.

Maybe an extens.

So, if you did the full board, this would be more meetings. So, if you missed more, then it would actually be less because you would have more meetings to add to that percentage if that makes sense.

And it doesn't have to be all your meetings, too. like taking looking back at the examples of how staff has run things like this before. They'd have open houses, you know, maybe and and you could do uh they talked about mailing lists and some online stuff like all that stuff too is going on to get input that you could participate in um in addition to to any meetings. I think the meetings would more be like checking in, getting information and there might be some decision points where you can steer the amendment to to where you think it should go based on what you've learned at those points. But the whole point is the staff actually does the authoring right based on the experts and the

experts help you steer it to where you want it to go. So

how long would each of these presentations on average be? I think that's one of the concern you might have had.

Um I mean your your typical meeting

two hours. So so we would try and schedule your meetings I think within a two-hour window. So that would be a presentation and time to answer your questions and discuss UDO amendments. If it takes longer, then we would staff is open to attending and being there to support you for longer if that's what it takes. But I don't think it would be less than two hours per special meeting.

It does. I mean, we have one meeting a month. We could always add another meeting as necessary. Is that if people are interested in that to accommodate this

that that that's what we're proposing is an additional meeting. Yeah. To accommodate just the data center part of it. Yeah. I thought there was might have been one or two, but it might have to be.

So, so we're we're thinking, you know,

one a month extra

an extra one a month and then we'll have to see how the workflow goes if we need additional meetings to to cover other things.

It's a it's a big it's a big commitment.

I would certainly be willing to come down for a second meeting if we're going to do it as full board.

I would be okay to put that, too. I mean, I I'm okay with it. I but I I'm retired. I don't have family.

I'm not sure I can commit to

I don't have a lot of little kids running around either. So,

or as Mark suggested, maybe we have a subcommittee that can meet once a month with staff. Is that what you were saying, Mark?

Yes.

But that would

just make sure it's like at least five, not just two or three people.

I think we can't have more than five.

I'm sorry. I don't think we can have more than five or if everybody showed up.

Yeah, I guess you're right. That would make sense actually to have a subcommittee

that could meet once a month as necessary

and they could give an update during the

and then

whole board here.

Yeah.

Know 15 minutes, five minutes, whatever it takes. The reason it's five, just to clarify, is because if you had more than five, they could essentially act as the board as a whole.

So that's that's why it's limited to five. Just to clarify, where did we get that number from? Because if there are six, then we essentially have a quorum of the EAB and they can act as the full body.

No more than five.

Right. Right.

Or you want to put the motion together. There's 11 of you, right? everybody here. What if you split up like five for the data center that's going on for the committee of three for the tree committee and then so you have these guys you're doing your stuff you're having different meetings and you come up and here's where you consolidate all your information what's going on res committee interest them and then we have that one reporting structure that would then build through the current chair I would think the B committee doesn't have to meet once a month either though. [laughter]

That's an easy committee.

Okay. So, can we get a motion, please? I'll make a motion that we adopt option two uh and establish a subcommittee of five members uh to follow through on this option.

Do I have a second?

I'll second that.

Any further discussion? All in favor say I.

I.

Any oppose?

[laughter]

And then do we have a motion for the B subcommittee?

I'm sorry.

It it sounds like we are.

Yeah, I I just heard a motion and a vote to do option two. So I think we need to do the subcommittee members

be on the data center committee. Anyone else on data center?

I'll be on it.

I'll join you too.

That's four.

Need one more or no one. [clears throat] [laughter]

So So who raise your hand again.

So Melissa, John, Mark, Suzanne, and Bill.

Would we want to have alternates at all?

Oh, can we do that? Can we have alternates also?

We just can't We just can't have five people meet period,

which I I would think you could have alternates.

The alternates could be whoever

10 but not vote.

Yeah.

That would take care of it. That way they're up to date. Could step in.

So So the regular members, John, Melissa, Suzanne, Bill, and Mark.

Yes. We need a motion.

I'll make a motion. Do I have a second?

Second. [laughter]

Standing up before a firing squad.

It feels [laughter] like some days.

All right. Can we get a vote on the approval of the members of the board?

I.

Any oppose?

Okay. So, now back to the B committee. We need three members. We need to have a

motion to have a subcommittee for the

I'll make the motion.

Oh, no.

You already voted. [laughter]

Do I have a motion?

I'll make the motion for

Do I have a second?

Thank you. Um, any further discussion on the bees?

Remember,

let's have some members, please.

We could have some more, but just At least three members, please.

Three standing members. Yeah,

that one.

Two. [clears throat] Thank you.

There we go. Thank you. Three. We have three.

Any further discussion? Please vote. Um say if you agree with the committee along with those three members. I

I

And then we have the tree committee. And can I get a motion for three members to be on the tree committee?

Um, I have a question there. Sorry about this. Subcommittee for the tree. Uh, there's not a specific requirement currently for that such as for the data.

It's more so

it's just establishing.

Okay. There's no action at this point in time other than to vote someone in. So I got motion in a second. Any other discussion?

I guess I I would say I'm interested. I have some work a fair amount of work travel probably coming up that might limit my ability to participate, but I'm interested and passionate about it. But I sound like the perfect chair for us. [laughter]

I don't I hesitate to commit without having a full understanding of um

I don't think that the tree would be

need to meet any more than be city. I mean it's it's more periodic I would think.

Okay. Okay. that that in my opinion based on what we've heard tonight is a less or of commitments than the data center or the either the monthly EAB. That's just what I heard from Mr. Barnes and Miss um Ellison Lambert.

Any So, do I have three members? One.

Sure.

Two.

I'm feeling very peer right now. I'd like the minutes to reflect that I'm feeling What did Susan say? Just a minute. I feel like I'm being made a firing squad. All right. Any other discussion? Okay. Vote for the committee with the three members as mentioned.

Vote.

I.

Thank you.

Excuse me, Alan. If we wish to have a meeting for the subcommittee in April, do we need to make any kind of motion or anything for that this time?

No, we can schedule that. Okay, perfect. Thank you. And I I do have one more thing for you guys that I promised last time. Um yeah,

before we move,

um just to clarify that the the data center subcommittee will meet a couple times in April and then their plan that's been outlined here in option two and then anything else will come back to council for that first meeting in May. Is that what I'm hearing? the plan whatever they come up with the plan will be presented to council on the first meeting

first meeting in May because some of these dates go through April of 27.

Oh that that should be the end when we provide council with the final recommendations. Yeah.

I just wanted to clarify.

Yes. Absolutely. It will come back to in May. First meeting.

It will come back the first meeting in May and then they will continue through this plan.

Absolutely. Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah.

All right.

So you guys had worked really hard on native plant species UDO text amendment and I have the updated language here for

you. It's very similar to what you guys provided in your resolution. Um, so I'll just kind of go over that for you real quickly right now. So, uh, we we're adding the landscaping on town owned property as a new section to the land general landscaping design standards. Uh, all new or replacement landscaping installed on property owned by or dedicated to the town of Apex, including public rights of way, parks, open spaces, and other publicly maintained areas shall utilize native plant materials as defined in section 12.2 terms defined. Preference shall be given to species native to North Carolina where practicable. Plant selections shall be consistent with the town of Apex's development and design manual. Final plat Final plant selections shall be subject to town review and approval by the technical review committee to ensure consistency with local ecological conditions, maintenance practices, and adopted long-term sustainability goals. Um the following non-native plants are exemptions you guys provided. Just some one was slightly adjusted for wording. um shall be exempt from this policy. First one, non-native turf grasses. Um number two, replacement of existing non-native plant species that have been removed or have died provided such replacements are the same species or functionally equivalent non-native species in order to maintain the continuity continuity of the established landscaping design. Number three, native plants. Non-native plants where the primary purpose is crop cultivation, scientific research, botanical or historic historical gardens or plantings for wildlife. you did have museum, zoos, and aquariums on there. Um, staff decided they're probably unlikely the town of Apex will actually own and process a zoo and so we remove that for now. If we're ever in the position to own and operate a zoo, we can always revisit that in the future. Um, and then definitions, we're adding terms adaptive plants. Adaptive plants are plant species or cultivars that are not native to the local ecosystem, but have demonstrated the ability to thrive in regional climate and soil conditions without invasive tendencies, excessive irrigation, chemical inputs, or extraordinary maintenance and that do not pose a threat to native plant

communities or local ecosystems. And then uh for native plants, native plants are plant species that are that the United States Department of Agriculture, the USDA, has classified as native to a state or county in the southeastern United States. For this purpose of the list, southeastern USA includes the states of Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and the following counties in Florida, Bay Calhoun, uh G, Holmes, Jackson, Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, Walton, and Washington. And so that's that's the updated language. We're preparing to take this to planning board and council in April as well. So just want to give you guys an update. Sorry for the delay, but we're going to get it there for you.

Thank you.

Yeah, absolutely.

Right. So we have just a few more items before we adjourn. We need a tree canopy update from from the team. Okay, here's the update. We're working on it. Yay. Um I think we'll come back in April next month at the monthly meeting and um present what we have. We present to town council at the work session on April 30th. So that's the final date that all of our tree canopy subcommittee recommendations will be presented. But next month, be prepared to see what we've got so far and we'll take your feedback then. Um, and we have a couple more subcommittee meetings to make sure we actually incorporate that. So, we're working on it.

Next is the Earth Fest planning.

Um, all of our supplies are in. We have table we have table weights. We have um the giveaways that we're giving away. And for new members, Daniel, I think you already signed up through the signup genius. So, thanks for that. Um Melissa, I don't know if

I will do that. Yeah.

Perfect. Um, so you have your times. It's on April 25th. Um, next month as

well, we can talk about I think we're going to do the recycling game again. Um, so that's not too much set up. We already have the wheel. Um, we've got the trash cans. I can bring in recycling materials, so that should be easy. Um, anything else EarthFest related?

Does everyone have shirts?

Oh, that is a good question. No, we have two new members. more.

I think I have two extras. So,

yeah, I'll get with the new members um to get some shirts out.

Could you send out a reminder on who has signed up for what time?

Yes. Um

we can present that next month, too.

That might be helpful for some of us.

Yep.

But it is displayed right on that link that you shared.

And you should get a You should get an email when

it should email you too. Yeah, I think it would still be good if you could Yeah. [laughter] show us right before

how many people can like fit in that booth? Cuz the sign up allows for 10 people, but I don't think like 10 people could really all be there.

No. Um last I think last year the most we had was like what four or five of us at once. And I think it's spread out. I'll look again at the sign of genius. But I mean, you know, if you've been there two hours and you're signed up for the next two and there's a bunch of us there, you can go. There's you don't have to stay the whole time. There's no need. Um, but you can also just kind of walk around. There's going to be a ton of cool stuff going on. So maybe, you know, if there are a lot of us there, switch out and go look at all the other neat stuff we've got planned that day. But it we'll get there. We'll cross that bridge when we get there. Shouldn't be too crowded. And the last item then is the workshop for next month.

Yeah. Um do you want to talk a little bit more about that just to like refresh?

Sure.

The idea or like let everyone know what you were thinking.

So especially for the new members, it'd

be good to know how when we get the application to kind of see how more senior members have analyzed um the applications and just go through what kind of like the checks and the review process. So Suzanne has graciously decided that she would kind of walk us through her process. So we decided next month that we're going to get together and kind of have her walk us through her process.

And this is during normal meetings like when developers come to give their presentations.

April should be a light meeting. So we figured hopefully

Yeah, hopefully. [laughter] We'll see.

We could do it then.

Yeah. Um or I mean we could move it up if we had to. Right now, no one has emailed me to present next month, but I mean that could change the week before, so we don't really know for sure. But other than that, the agenda, I think, is just what we've talked about, like going over um Earthfest, like finalizing some of that, um showing the sign up times again. So, there there would be time, I think, to kind of recess and go do um a workshop or whatever we want to call it. and Allan, maybe you have more insight into that, how we would need to do that.

Yes. So, we'll um likely need to do a separate notice um so we can recess, leave this space, go to the third floor, have a little bit more um collaboration. We will stop the live stream and make it truly a work session, if you will. Um, if that's the pleasure of the board,

I'd be interested too in um um your recommendations or thought process around like the questions to ask and u the dialogue I think with the developers presenting. Okay.

So, not just what you're thinking when you're reviewing, but things that you think about like

asking them and

anything else.

All right. Get passed. Can I get a motion to adjurnn?

So move.

I have a second.

Second.

Any discussion? All those in favor say I. I.

Thank you everyone.