Work Session

Welcome everyone to the March 24th Council work session and at this time I'll turn it over to interim town manager Russ Overy. Thank you Mayor and Council. Just go through the agenda real quick, but we're going to review the upcoming meeting schedule and then we're going to have part two of our capital budget discussion led by assistant manager Dana Wendel and then I'll do a few updates and I don't believe we're having a closed session, Lisa. No. So I'll throw it to Jenny. All right, so this is the upcoming work sessions and regular meeting and then we just added our budget open house, another way to get the word out there. For this list just wanted to call out some some dates that we know Council members won't be here. So Lori, you've let us know April 28th and April 30th you won't be here. And then when we go to the quarterly May 14th, August 13th and November 5th and so Lori, you let us know May and November you won't be here. Did I say November too? And then Michelle and the Mayor won't be here for August. Correct. So November and May, right? Yeah, okay. Do we [snorts] want to move them? That's an option. Yes, that's probably recommended. That's possible. May is our hardest one to move cuz we don't have any a lot of flexibility there. August we can look at moving and bring that back to Council. We would look at the Thursday before or the Thursday after and then November also your direction if you would like to move it. Could we [snorts] could we look at dates for moving the November one that's also I know it's election week. I don't know if that matters to other people. I don't know if that means her being out.

[clears throat]

I guess they clean up right after

election day, right? Well, they they use the gym. They use the gym. So but it might make it a little bit more Well, actually no, it's after election. Yeah, right. The third. I would love it, but I'm also keeping um an understanding that Thanksgiving is 2 weeks after that. Couple weeks after that, so. [clears throat] I don't know if am I the only one out November? I think there's a couple in Yeah. You're the only one for May and November. And just the Mayor and Michelle for August. Oh, okay. Okay. I'm open if you guys want to move them. But I can also call in remotely. I don't know if Harold and Michelle want to move theirs. Yeah, that would be ideal. We'll be overseas, so we won't have an opportunity to dial in probably. Or it would be very late at night for us. I haven't even thought that far ahead.

[laughter] [snorts]

So I haven't planned that.

I'm completely flexible, so whatever works best for the group. Mhm. Agreed. I have no conflicts. So maybe bring back some date options. I'll bring you back date options for August and November. May is the hardest one to move. We don't we looked at options today and we don't really have any. Are you okay with that, Lori? That'd be great. Okay. So August we'll bring back options for August and November. And um to Council. All right. And we'll turn it over to Dana to walk us through the [snorts] next iteration of capital budget discussion. So I'm happy to be here in Stacy's place. Not happy for why I'm in Stacy's place, but she'll be joining us again in the future, of course, and doing a lot of work behind the scenes. And everything you're going to see today is

to try and describe where we are in the process. Directors have not done additional work over the last week. So essentially all of the information that is in here is basically the same as it was a week ago except for that it's been the budget staff that has been working deep into it to double check funding sources, double check amounts, get more into the detail of the projects. So you could see adjustments in numbers that are based on that work and that work is still going on. So we're going to talk a little bit about the schedule and the process. Of course, the get into the capital budget summary by category and by funding source and that was an effort to give you a sense of what dollar amounts are available in the different types of funding sources that we have. And then we'll get into the projects that are included. We'll take a pause, let you have all the discussion that you want to have on that and then we can get into the projects not currently included and we can then take a pause after that and get into as much discussion as you would like and we would like you to say everything. So if you have particular thoughts about something that's included, please say it. If you have particular thoughts about something that is not included, please say it. So as you know, we're now at March 23rd through the 27th, which is getting into tonight's work session. Really this is where we really want to hear what you have to say about capital. And then the rest of the process process will continue in the future. And of course, a reminder this tension that that we all

feel and you all are going to feel as you get into this, which is this um concept that people really want to have stable services, but lower taxes, which really means more density is necessary. Um but if there's really want low density, it really ultimately turns into service cuts. And of course, lower density and stable services usually means higher taxes. And the Cary Community Plan was really a set up to try and balance this as much as possible for a suburban community because a suburban community is it this is very typical in the life of a suburban community. You have to go through these this time frame as they mature. This is the budget process. We are still in the January through March uh portion, which is directors working on the capital part of things, and they're about ready to get into the operating part of things. Uh so, there have been several boards and commission meetings already. We are logging everything that uh is given to us as budget input at the boards and commissions. We We think everybody here has been logging as well, and we'd like you to talk about it when we get uh towards the end uh and get through everybody. But we've you know, we've included all of their results of how they ranked things. Um so, you know, different boards are obviously going to rank things differently, but we used the exact same process that was with the council here. And uh so, we'll we'd like to go in through that in detail once we get through them all. Which will be at the May quarterly is the plan. Yeah, the last one is economic EDC in May, early May.

It's not going. So, it's different from our

Oh, there we go.

Yeah, we have a different additional

slide. Oh. Uh yours with we updated that one very late. That one's the most accurate

Okay.

because of a few cancellations. Okay. Sorry about that. This is moving very slowly. Did I go two ahead or did I just get one ahead?

You're on the next slide. I'm on the I'm on the correct one. Thank you.

[laughter]

Um so, as a reminder, the budget priorities are these here. You will be seeing updates to the definition. Uh we've continued to maintain the definition that was the draft before, but um you will see updates at the May quarterly as sort of a, you know, final do you agree with the definitions for this year. Do you think it's this? You've got to say mother may I.

Yes, clearly. Jenny Truong, yeah. Thank you. So, did you click it last time?

I just clicked it, yes. The time before that, though? No. So, it did ultimately work. It just [laughter] took a while. Uh so, as a reminder, these are the budget priorities that were identified by council the first time that we went through this, which was at the retreat, so it was all very new. Uh and um community safety ranked high as well as several things then pretty close to equal right beyond that. So, when we develop a capital budget, we look at it kind of in multiple ways, and one of the ways is by these categories. Uh we historically had a downtown category. You can see there were no requests because we're kind of moving into a different phase that downtown projects are not as prominent. A lot of work has been done downtown, and the possibility exists we won't need that um category in the future. Uh but fire, for example, um general government, those are all be consistent

uh that you'll see in past years as well as future years. And if you look at the first column, the March 12th date, that's the dollar amounts that were as a part of the um requests that were made for our capital budget. So, that was all requests that were made according to those categories. It added up to close to 138 million. And uh and essentially directors are asked to give their best recommendation. They may or may not collaborate with other departments when they submit in November. And then as time goes on, we get more and more specific and more and more clear about uh about those projects. So, the March 24th date shows you the uh dollar amounts that have been reduced to get it closer to a budget um that would be uh be able to be recommended to you. And uh and so, as of today, the dollar amounts for total are at uh about 84 million. And I'm going to get into the funding sources so you can understand that a little bit more. And you can see that the majority of the cuts are with general government, and that's for a very good reason because any amounts in that area come directly from the general fund. And um just for a little bit more specific information, parks rec and cultural resources, they have some specific funding sources available to them. Um so, parks payment in lieu, transit is was not reduced at all, and uh in fact, it is a a good portion, particularly in capital, is dependent on a whole 'nother decision-making process with with Wake Transit. And so, this what's included in this is the results of that decision-making process with Wake Transit, and therefore we agree that it should go forward that way. And then transportation is another area that has uh additional areas of restricted

funding uh that goes specifically to transportation. Powell Bill is a perfect example uh for which it's, you know, many millions that we get in Powell Bill funding. The most important um words on that slide are in orange. Uh that this is development in progress and not final. For those watching at home. And for everybody watching in home at home, how this works is until it's a um a manager recommended, so when when the council gets uh Russ's the interim manager's recommended in May, at that point we then start logging the changes um specifically to that that are requested. So, there's changes that are happening all the way through it all along. Um but once we get to that kind of date, then we start to very specifically log the changes that are happening. And as a reminder also, that when the manager makes the recommended budget, that we've been giving feedback all through the process, that it's not staff saying what the budget will be. It's after they include what we think is best based on resident feedback. Yes. Yes. So, you your feedback is very important to this process.

earlier is helpful to all of us in development. Okay. Um now we're looking at the capital budget by funding source. And this is again to try to give you a sense of uh the all the different funding sources and the restrictions associated with it. So, it's very complicated to ask you to add or subtract a specific pro- project because of this this right here. Um however, if you are very articulate about different things that you're interested in, we can then go back and figure out if there's trade-offs that we

can do with these things. Um so, what is in front of you today um shows utilizing a good portion of the remainder of the um GO bond for both parks and rec and transportation. And so, uh no additional changes there. Um the instal- installment purchase debt uh has come down essentially since the directors submitted things to where it is today. And so, that those are things probably like, for instance, it could be um large vehicles that they believe we could go another year without um making those purchases. Uh general fund transfer is really where the meat of a lot of projects are at. Uh so, if you think about a lot of stormwater, if you think a lot of housing, police, um a good portion of fire, uh a lot of what you consider the core of government ultimately comes from this general fund transfer category. And you can see it moved from 52 million down to almost 14 million. The LAP EPA grants, um their their that numbers looks like it's a little bit off. There was a minor change in that um over the over the period, which was a reduction of an EPA grant. Remind me what LAP stands for again. Local Administrator Projects Program. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yes. So, federal funds that are competitive through the region.

are federal funds.

Correct. Okay.

Yes. And there's the standard

criteria the Metropolitan Planning Organization sets. So, they award it. That's what lane it That's what Dana did before she came here.

Right. Right.

Yes. Yes. So, it's a very It's a a

requirement of a federal agency to be um objective in their review of things. So, they have a whole scoring system and it's different for transit than it is for bike ped than it is for for streets. And uh and so, the lap grants are something that we make when we think we have a good application, we will make it for a you know, a greenway or a sidewalk or whatever that uh we believe will compete well. So, Dana um is this like lap is something that town requests for these funds based on different projects and they will review and say yes, these projects are relevant and no. Um which category does um funding go into? Let's say when our Congresswoman office, she works on some projects and they get us the grants. So, that EPA is um an example of that.

Okay. So, it depends on what the category of the grant is. Uh this we've been very successful in the stormwater area. I think we're on our third one. Uh we just The only reason why we're saying you don't necessarily need to put it into the budget this year is we don't think they'll be ready the feds will be ready for us to spend it until you know, the next budget round. Um so, stormwater goes to EPA, housing would go to HUD, um housing and urban development, of course, EPA Environmental Protection Agency. And uh and so, it really those are the primary areas we've been successful on and they rely on the agency associated with it.

Got it. Thank you.

And with the lap funds, it used to be we're competing with our neighbors. Mhm. And if we don't spend that money, let's say they did took a while longer than we expected something to happen, then the feds could rescind that money and that hurts everybody. Right. We really We really got to be careful. Correct. It's kind of a shot clock on

most most grants. Right. And [snorts] uh the the difficulty of that situation right now is that Carrie is not unusual in that we have asked for lap funding in the past uh for projects that are now costing a lot more money to implement. And uh and there's you know, when you consider all the transit agencies, there's like 25 agencies that are eligible for these grants throughout the metropolitan region and that is a universal problem that is have it happening. Meaning they made a request in 25 for a project and when they got farther along in to 26, the pricing is different than what they had imagined. So, which is causing problems in getting the money out the door because they have to come up with more local funds and I was going to say there's a matching there and if you don't do your share, they're not going to do their share Right. Right. Yes, it's just a complex thing that uh will probably settle out because the construction market seems to be settling out. I someone told me today that rebar was starting to come down. Oh. Great news. Great news.

[laughter]

I don't I don't I didn't I didn't validate the source, so

but but any movement is good movement. Um and so, unless it goes way up like it did before. Uh and so, you know, it's just a problem that is happening with construction. Oh, so Dana, where are you mentioned the housing? Where the housing uh budget from? The general fund transfer?

Yeah, so when we put funds towards housing, it's from the general fund. Um I mentioned it in part because we have gotten uh some from the federal government uh that were through housing and urban development. They would have been listed as a grant. So, right where we have EPA grant, if we had gotten one for housing, it would have been listed there. But all of our funds that go towards housing are general fund. So, housing also include affordable housing

or it just affordable housing? Yes. Yes. So, typically the way that we evaluate projects is um if they are if there's a gap in the market, uh which you know, is the the more deeply affordable uh units. And and if there's a proposal that helps fill that gap, then we will we will try to assist with it. Uh the reason why I I mentioned this because last Saturday um Michelle, Carissa and Surita, four of us went to the uh Chatham uh States conference and um when I come back, I a friend of mine told me that in Wake County, the mobile home park are all full. So, if they are going to move, they have to move the closest to like 50 miles away. Mhm. So, that's bring me the concern about the working force uh in our uh community. So, it's also the housing what the government can do, what Carrie can help them to still rent or live in Carrie. Mhm. Which is is why council um has committed that a $100,000 seed funding for Stable Homes Cary. But as we learned at the Chatham Estates press conference, that is not enough to rehome 140 households. Yeah. Um it's It's a heartbreaking. Yeah. Yeah. Can I have the housing fund numbers cuz I know you have it on another slide broken out? Do they fit into one of those buckets there or are they in a separate? General fund. They are in general fund. And will Should we only focus on the 13.6 million? Do we need to understand why what was in the 38.9 million that fell off? Mhm. Uh we can

You'll see a list in just a little while.

When we get to the list that is the not funded, generally speaking, it was probably general fund. Okay. If that helps you. So, it it's not 100% universal, but the non-funded um not you know, not currently recommended for funded, um probably were the majority of that. Okay. I know the purpose of all of these exercises is that we know they will numbers will continuously change as more input is given. It was the goal to get it down to a certain amount? Like I know when we previewed this before,

Yes. I will we'll get into that in just a second. Thank you for Thank you for previewing that right now.

[laughter]

Uh so, the rest of the page you can see all the different restricted funding and um and that's you know, basically the puzzle we work on uh to make the funding match the project requests. Okay. So, if you look at the first three items that are now boxed in white at the top of this So, this is the same slide, same numbers. The first three lines, those are all different types of debt. So, GO debt bond debt as well as installment purchase debt. And uh currently, the number for those that area totals 52.1 million. And uh and 10% is a good understanding of how much you have to pay in um payments to set up that much. So, so, 52 million in in debt for a year equals about 5 million 5.2 million in debt service for the year. So, debt helps get projects built

um and typically at a very good rate. We've been very good at um historically getting great rates with that. That changes all the time. Uh but then the debt service ultimately is part of the general fund. Okay. General fund transfer. So, if you look at the the green bar to answer this question. So, we had targets in the amount of GO debt approximately that we knew we were going towards and then we had targets of approximately that we felt like would likely be a general fund transfer amount. So, the way it sits today, um the note on the left says potential general fund transfer amount and the way it sits on March 24th, the total amount is 13.6 million. The target, generally speaking, that we spoke to the directors about was about 10 million. And the reason why we gave them that target is because at the end of fiscal year 25, our fund balance was fairly substantially above um policy, which then leaves you open to for the option of transferring funds to do things one-time things like projects. And so, you can see that that is um we're at a difference now of about 3.6 million. A penny is 5 million. So, you can start to see what um uh what potential additional cuts we need to have or what potential potential implications there are on the tax rate. And Michelle, probably to get into your question, I don't right or wrong answer here or way a way of go about doing it,

but in November, directors in the departments and budget staff within departments were given direction to ask for whatever you need.

Right. Um they weren't given, "Hey, you have we have $10 million we're trying to get." So, we've kind of worked down uh some some years in years past you may have given a target to reach from the start. Again, no right or wrong way to do it. This is the way we did [clears throat] it this year and um that's why it's good to have discussions like this as we get into the projects list to get feedback on kind of what's in or what's out. It was out at this point in the game. And really the theory this year was we had heard that there was starting to feel like a backlog of projects and we felt it was better to know what they were. Um and then try to figure out what to do with it and then work on our targets. So, we're about $40 million backlogged. Sort of on projects. Sort of, yes.

Based off of what folks think would would, you know, be ideally done now. Yep. Yep.

But could potentially wait. Could be deferred. Or have to wait. The This is where I get hung up. There's a difference between we can wait a year to buy a a large vehicle and we just don't have the money. But it's we it's really important and where does the delay in purchase end up costing us more money overall? And that's where I I struggle to get I know I just asked you to give me the world's most difficult to ingest piece of information. Just want to acknowledge that, but that's where where I struggle. Um you know, it's it's not terribly different than personal finances and I've used the clean your gutter to save your roof analogy before. But I'd like to know of that 38.9 million, how much of that is gutter cleaning? And we can when we get to that we can kind of like walk through them a little

bit more. Yeah. Uh I would probably describe it um I think the best way to describe it is that it you'll see that some of these are value choices. And we are we are attempting, as difficult as this is, we are attempting to say how we view uh putting money towards our own projects is the same way we view putting money towards um for instance a housing project and how we view putting money towards a construction project is the same way we would view putting money towards a um police project. And so, it's very imperfect because you can't they don't they don't measure up against each other, which is why the sort of the priority conversation is very important to us. It helps us try to balance those things. And uh and in the end, you know, just lots of questions. Lots of questions helps you get a a little bit better sense of how directors feel about it. So, so I want to follow up on that point. It's very good. Um I guess the way I would ask it is if you delay something, let's say it's a million dollars to next year, is it going to be a million? Is it going to be 2 million? Is it going to be 5 million? Is it going to be 10 million? Exactly.

that's where you're going. And if it's going to be not 1 million and substantially more, I think we need to know about it. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah, it's a perfect point for teeing that up on what is on Thursdays, the road resurfacing is a perfect it's like your gutter example. Where do road projects fit in in that bucket? Are they under Where are they also in general fund? So, um it depends on the road project. So, as an example, there were some road projects that were part of the 2019 bond. Right.

So, bond could be a potential thing. Um

But maintenance. Um resurfacing projects

Resurfacing. Resurfacing quite often is we have used resurfacing bond money for resurfacing. We almost always use Powell Bill for resurfacing. Okay. And uh and um things like it's not it would not be unusual to say you could use general funds if you wanted to. It's just the general fund area is very competitive in lots of other areas and so that's typically not somewhere we go with it. The reason I ask is um it was an exciting document. I love it. You said that the other day. It it recommends an investment of at least $8 million a year to keep us at 75 or 74, wherever we are. Yes. Are we at that? Are we at 8 million? So, how far away are we from that 8 million?

We continue to lose ground. Um in the staff report on Thursday night it'll do a good job kind of unfortunately illustrating that.

And I get that, but is that reflected in the budget is what I'm saying. Since we're talking 9.5

9.5 currently is in the budget for 9.5 million for street resurfacing. In the proposed right here in this

And what do you need to maintain? The I think Cassie should get up and talk a little bit about that study to get that clarity. So, over the past year, I think we were talking about it being around 11 million at the retreat last year. In the staff report, I think it references around 14 million now. Um to and we've we've slid from 77 down to a 76 rating. Um and so, we you the documents you have in front of you tonight propose almost $13 million for resurfacing because of other projects and needs, we did propose reducing that to to fund some sidewalk projects. So, so there was an effort to

to bring some of that forward, but there's been some shifts and that's where that 9 that 9.5 it's more than we have this year, so more than what we're asking you to approve on Thursday and begins to continue to address and get back to where our budgets had been. Okay. Some of that though also funds say a consultant doing the rating and or a construction management funds. So, you know, there's some contingency in that that you're not having exactly that amount and it's subject to cost at the time. And but it gets right back to Carissa's point that we're going to pay a lot more than what is it? 2 3 million the following year to make that up. It'll be much more than 2 or 3 million. I learned all about road resurfacing delay hazards from you, Mr. Mayor. And I So, I want to make sure I understand then when you say there's about 9.5 something here, that's after the Powell Bill money which makes up the difference between the total Cassie just described and what you're describing. Um so, if you were to look at the specific sources here, uh what is recommended in here, I'm just going on memory, includes some of the restricted transportation, which is some Powell Bill and some of the GO bond um transportation.

Okay. Is there a roof on Powell Bill money? It's based on mileage [snorts] and we got like 5 million. Six or seven, I think. So, it's based on mileage.

Yes. We turn in a report annually um to figure out what funding you're going to get. Unfortunately, you add miles, which gets you more money, but it's not enough money to take care of the miles you add. And [laughter] you're seeing this that um we have to fund uh school improvements on roads now, too, which is could also be Powell Bill or other fundings, which is kind of eaten to that amount. And so, the original, I guess, intent of my question was to you know, we paid all this money for a consultant to tell us how much we should put aside just for resurfacing inclusive of engineering. It was a great report and

are we aligned with that? I guess is my question. Well, Cuz saying 11,000 or 11 million or 13 million cuz it includes schools and other things, are we aligned with being at least in the recommended um area or are we not?

Not at 9.5 million in the budget. When you say aligned, do you mean are we funding it at the level that's recommended?

Correct. And he's saying, "No, you are not." 9 million compared to 14. What would it So, it should be 14? Yes. That's what Cassie just said. Is that that's what that meant? Yeah. And I should add Thanks for the clarification.

as you talk about um standards or levels of service, you have not or we have not decided on what level of service you wish to be.

Sure. I mean, the mayor as the mayor knows, but a lot of communities are and as the staff report goes into detail on Thursday night, what good and fair, maybe bad is. Um we've been in the '80s. We're certainly going down. I just bring to the point of you we don't have a standard at which you wish the rating to be to fund the level. You have best practices that are being presented. So, in that report they have pictures. Yes. Oh, yeah. They're great. And so, that's how they actually rate them. They have people that go drive around and rate roads. And that's what they do for a living. So, Yeah. if you look at those pictures and say, "I want it to look like that." then that should be our PCI. I think that's worth a discussion for this council to discuss what road quality conditions, you know, we expect because if not it feels a little mealy to discuss how much funding to set aside for resurfacing and and road projects if we don't know what the North Star is. Right. What what we'd like to

Even if we want to just keep where we are right now.

Correct. Which may be right. We're certainly somewhere in the middle of the pack. All the other ones that were higher were

basically communities that all built brand new roads while it's free.

skewed your PCI. Yes, excuse it. So we're coming down, but where do we want as a council as a community to be is in somewhere in the 70s, somewhere, you know, what does that number look like? And then in turn we could get a recommendation from staff on how much money do you need?

Right. So Russ, um if we go by the plan that's being shared right now without this assessment, how do you plan to uh fill the difference of I believe how much uh five or six million? Just for that one item. Um this is

do you how do you plan to fill the gap? Like what is how will you Where will you get the money to fill this difference? Because in even in next budget cycle looks like it's only nine and a half million, right? That's right.

So and it's going to take four 14 million. Yes. So where

Rising likely. So where will we Where do you plan to get Um it's You need to Yes, you need to increase your revenue somewhere, general fund unrestricted. Um in years past uh the one thing that I guess leads to unrestricted general fund uh capital reserve has been things like um transportation development fees. So as we've talked about in in the past, a development in a lot of ways has been able to fund um you know, some of your road construction projects. And as development has slowed, there is less revenues in that capital reserve uh funding pot to go towards these things, and I think that more than anything else has probably led to uh these discussions with you of how to bring in different types of revenues in the future to fund these types of things. Um it's interesting to hear I did I didn't even know that from Cassie, but staff's consternation is they decided in in this iteration of recommendation by directors is to continue to fund some sidewalks at the cost of not fully funding um the street

resurfacing. So let me um rephrase what you said just to confirm my understanding and for those listening, you said that, you know, when there's a uh new project that the you know, we take some fund for uh revenue for transportation development fund. Is that what you said?

In a high growth community where um new growth is largely developed

gets approved in a layman's term, they the developer or the applicant gives us a fees that goes into a big pool. Yes. And because a lot of times people ask this question, this project was uh started, they give the money, and you're not putting a signal, right? So um it Yes, and you know, it's um it's not a question of that money is sitting there. What I'm hearing is that money goes into the pool, and that pool is used to maintain the roads. Or it's right, your signal projects or other projects that can be funded with um restricted funds. Got it. And we're not discussing it this year, the balanced policy. However, it is a good argument. I think Lori was the one that investigated the other municipalities, and we're way above, and it makes no sense to not maintain something and spend more the following year when you're squirreling away money and not using that. That's Right. If you don't need it. And we've in the past y'all have bond referendums that included resurfacing, sidewalks, other things. There's other ways to get to it besides tax increases, but it's also you know, could be tax increases. Because technically if it was one of our highest priorities and we decided to we could raise the rate by a penny and take care of that this year, correct?

Take care of that possible one item. Right.

[laughter]

Is Dana, I have a related question. Last year's budget was billed as a a

maintenance budget, and Mayor, correct me if I'm wrong, but I I think you characterized that as unsustainable. That it was maybe defensible to be in maintenance mode for a year, but much beyond that you were going to start seeing repercussions, and we're talking about some of that domino effect. This might be unfair to put you in the hot seat here, Dana. How would you characterize this request? Is it Is it in the same mold as last year of of being that maintenance, or is this trying to balance some of digging a little bit of the out of the hole that we've created or or trying to stay on top of of more projects? And to get clarification, you mean what directors submitted at the whole 138 No.

we're at it that now at the 83.9.

Okay. Can Can I Or I guess maybe both, but my understanding was the 137 was basically tell us what you really really needed.

Yes. You know, what it would what would it what it would really take to do everything, not exactly a dream list, but a realistic list of if we were to fund everything in the pipeline, and the 83.9 is whittling that down. And I guess I'm asking, have we whittled it down like we did last year to kind of bare bones, or does it still have enough there to to start uh again like digging out of the hole or or getting out of

to I want to add to that question. Make maybe clarify. Are we really maintaining, or are we still losing ground? Well, let's put it within a larger context. 137 million is 1 year. You have about a billion dollars in capital needs that have been identified over the years. A billion. So the 137, just kind of keep that in mind. That was for a year. Okay. The way I would describe it um based on the details that I um

remember and I'm familiar with for the current budget, which is fiscal year 26, and where we are at with the 83 84 million for fiscal year 27, I would call it uh like slow growth if that's a a good way to look at it. So one one rung up for me. Not not um not bare bones.

Not full recovery. But not full recovery. Yes. So So we often talked about the sales tax revenues um having very very slow growth. I kind of would describe this maybe not quite as slow growth as that, but you know, kind of slow growth, but but nonetheless growth, which is better than sort of decline, which is almost where I would have seen it as last year. Great question.

And And this is all before council members weigh in with their own particular Yes. interests. interests and operations. I'm just All right, [snorts] I'm just This is all Hey, here's the professionals have said, here's what we like, and then we each have our own potential priorities. Okay. And we have directors here, so you can as you dig into things, we can try to give you the discussion that happened uh to tease out the thinking. And you may wish to refer back to uh sheet nine cuz I think Brittany, that was a great question because your second highest um priority exercise result was new capital investment.

Right.

You know, as we classify these, [clears throat] and that's what we're trying to move to, you know, are we hitting the mark with what your overarching priorities are? Um and as we build this, we'll be able to share more. Um but y'all some of y'all will remember having uh budgets where it was very maintenance focused. I I do say because of that uh 2019 bond

uh money that's still kind of sitting out there. So you look at 21.9, I mean, that's all of that is you know, basically new projects. Yes. Um so you were a little fortunate that we're still working under to complete some of those 2019 bond projects. Yep. And And part of what's going on, we're planning on talking you in great with you in greater detail about the bond projects after this year. So we're we're getting to where we're programming um a good bulk of what is left of those dollars, uh but then we need to really get into the detail of how much is exactly left, um you know, what are some of the outstanding projects, etc. And that'll be a whole exercise in itself. Can I ask what the what process is preferred? Um like you know, Lori said, we all do have some priorities we'd like included in this in this budget. So we're reviewing capital projects right now, and then we'll review the operating budget. Do you if for example, if if this body wanted to see the amount um that we invest this next year in say road resurfacing and other road projects increased, do we tell you that now, or would we wait until you've gone through everything um and then sort of bring our asks or bring our shifts in priority from what's being described from what the directors and and y'all have pulled together that's far.

There is no wrong answer to that. So, now and later are both appropriate. It would be most ideal if you can say this is more important than this. That that that because just saying we want this is makes it a harder

It's additive at that point.

It's additive. That's correct. I I think for me I I feel like you let's say we got to have that. Okay, so we've said we've got to have all these things. Now it goes okay, you got to do five pennies on the

rate. Okay, can't do that. Then we can So do at as a group, do you want that kind of process or what? That's I guess. I will leave that up to Russ to answer.

I like that you're asking the question cuz one thing that comes to mind is a new council. Yes. And you have new folks that are on the council as a result of the election. And an election year you almost can't get to it much quicker than the retreat. Um so, you know, there's probably some way to back into this a little earlier and and at the same time this year we showed you more at the retreat than the than we've shown you in a long time. So, I think this level of discussion, especially moving forward, um because really you you could do this in July thinking towards the next year. Um if if you wish cuz as you saw in the prior one of the prior slides, budgets are year-round job for all of us. So, I think this year's a little probably a little clunky and maybe we get better, um you know, moving forward with planning and what and parties. And then if you throw um if there's uh council desire to want to talk about bond referendums and things like that, then you really get into, you know, when do you need to do it to meet certain dates on the calendar. So, I'd hope that some point in our future that we have that conversation.

conversation, too, yeah. And I say that because what you know, I see a lot of these as um they're competing priorities in a lot of cases, but there's also it's not just this or that to me. It is, let's say that we as a body discussed, just using this as an anecdotal example cuz this is sort of where my brain is leading me. Let's say that we wanted to prioritize uh road projects of road resurfacing over net new sidewalks where there isn't currently a sidewalk. Is there a third option where we prioritize resurfacing of road projects where we can simultaneously do sidewalks and it saves money and it's easier project or it's less disruptive. I don't know the ins and outs well enough to know where those tradeoffs benefit both dollars and cents and, you

know, the community and and like that. I also don't know the intimate detail of when you've got a list of sidewalks and a list of road projects, what the logic applied is to prioritizing those, but I think those kinds of questions it's very similar to my approach to almost anything. I prefer to do all of this than all of that. Not a little bit of both. Um and that's part of my sort of hammer approach at stuff, right? That doesn't make it the right way to go about it, but it might be worth having that kind of competing priority discussion with all all of us. And to be fair, the way you just described it is exactly how the downtown redevelopment happened. Yes.

Right? Which is we're not going to just keep doing it a little bit at a time. We're going to invest a lot in it, get it going so that

And then move on. And then move on. Yeah. And to be fair, if you're a constituent in district C or D and you're waiting for that sidewalk connection so you can walk safely along whatever road, you might not come downtown, but that sidewalk gap closing could make a really big difference to you. So, I think having a discussion when we get to it about what matters to to each of us would be really helpful to hear what every single person thinks with respect to their own either their district or something that they care deeply about like tennis or whatever. And an update on what the the real costs are at this point and is there any hope you know, rebar, we talked about rebar like it was a leading indicator on the economy.

[laughter]

The cost of rebar is coming down. Well, is the cost of sidewalks potentially ever going to come down because

We'll see.

cost of asphalt is gone up. Gone up. Gone up. Rebar because of oil.

43% increase on asphalt. In the report we got. Yeah. But that's that's I'm not trying to hyper complicate this. That just is the the questions my brain is and I get stuck on them and they sort of loop in

my head when we go through these large numbers. We would like you to ask the questions. I could probably elaborate a little bit on some of Cassie's thinking. For example, this year is probably slightly different than the decision making they might have made three years ago or potentially different than the decision making they make two years from now. And that is in part because we have projects that are fully designed. Ah.

Yes. And so so if you think back to what we went through in the past year and a half, um too many projects, not enough funds, and uh the net result is that some projects, um and sidewalks are one of them, are fully designed sitting waiting to be done even though they cost a lot more. It, you know, it's just a decision making process and and so from the perspective of our transportation department, they were trying to balance that a little bit. That makes perfect So, we've already invested in those projects, you know, that's the kind of stuff I need to know to make it rain. We can highlight a few that dropped on or off the list. Um and I I think it's a I mean, some of this could just be a math exercise and there you could rate everything, but then you lose the values discussion that you have in it. Um and then a bigger discussion at some point it probably does get into fund balance discussions. There's not a dedicated funding source for capital. Um and they're probably really with this exception of some unrestricted or restricted funds. Um your $10 million in fund balance is from savings this year.

yep. Or the past, exactly. I mean, we don't have we're not putting two pennies to Right.

have fund, you know, the general fund. And you could uh but we've not had that level of discussion of what funds capital. Utility fund being different, we're not talking about utility fund tonight, but the ratepayers pay, you know, utility fees and it's a different conversation with regards to utility fund funds versus general fund funds.

And everybody gets very caught up in what the tax rate is and that's not our conversation for tonight. Yeah. So, just for the people that are watching, we have to have a balanced budget. We cannot spend more. And so therefore, almost always or has to be always, we have money left over. That money left over is above the policy. We take that and use it as revenue for the next year. You use it as the 10 million. That's a one-time One-time. And so that's

was for the full time that you've been mayor, that's the that's the way it has traditionally been done except for a few years, 20 3, 20 4, that kind of time frame. So so a future exercise that I want you to look into, especially talking about sidewalks, we look at a million dollars a year roughly. What is the break-even point hiring a crew? Well, um Lisa

have to answer that.

Actually, we've learned some new information on that and Lisa may as well share it. Yes. Um so, state law restricts how much of your own forces you can use to construct projects. So, you're limited to using $200,000 worth of labor on a project and up to $500,000 of a total construction project. So

A per project?

So, you can do very Well, there's also language about, you know, not breaking things up into small pieces just to avoid that.

[laughter]

Like a sidewalk in West Cary is it different than a sidewalk in East Cary? Potentially. I mean, you wouldn't break up a mile of sidewalk into, you know, two quarter miles. Yeah. At that rate though, that That's that's not a lot of work. It'd be a very small sidewalk. Worth hiring full-time employees. That you have to not

equipment.

in the equipment and the capital cost in equipment to do $500,000 worth of work when we're talking about millions of dollars worth of work. It might sit I don't know what the offset if it even saves anything, but

that was kind of new. And I think you said it it's also prevents competition against

Yeah, I mean, the point of it is that to allow contractors to compete for work. And so the local government can't build up its own construction contracting force and not use local contractors. So, that's the purpose of the legislation. We can do that with picking up trash with services. Yes. Services. Fascinating. That was a good word.

[laughter]

But that was um something that had been brought up in the past and it I was

came up in some small groups. Lisa looked up the law and it was a little disappointing with

Really wanted Chris's idea of a sidewalk department. Department of sidewalks. hear about it.

Do any municipalities do that? Or not in North Carolina? You mean I mean, we do spend very small projects. He's nodding his head. Um I think we have a concrete mixer. Yep. So, we do small

no variation by size of municipality. No, it's a state law across the Now, there I I haven't researched every charter of all 525 uh towns in North Carolina. There could be a town that has local legislation that allows them to do more, But, the state general state law is $500,000. So, great idea doesn't sound like we're going to be able to do it. How How is the bidding process? Is that very competitive or there only a few two options for us to choose from? Or there maybe more? I think it's been pretty competitive. I mean, you'll see a bid tomorrow night. Lowest qualified bid, right? Lowest responsible and responsive bidder. We always have to take the lowest bid. You have to have a minimum of three bids. Oh, three?

Three to do an opening. Ah, okay. This very good information cuz a lot of people don't know our process of bidding or just we choose one or they come to us we have to consider carefully to spend. Also following state law. Yes. A very regimented process under state law. And I just want to build on something

that Russ said. Uh doesn't make it easier, but the sprint to the adoption of a budget is a very difficult time. It It's It's difficult on staff. It's difficult on you. The more you engage in it, the more difficult it is. So, the another um way then you start to look at it is then jumping right back in and looking more and more long term and starting to get, you know, so logging the questions you have, getting the information so that each time you're getting more and more information, gets a little bit easier. And some of the thinking as we jump to the project list here in another slide or two, you're going to start seeing I mean, we say this on our website, sidewalks if you fund it the first year, it's probably 3 years before you can design, buying right of way, and then construct. Um it's nothing for any other bigger capital projects. It's 3, 4, 5 years depending on the So, a lot of times you're funding the very early planning stages or as you'll see with fire stations, um design. Um so, you you can think of it as some of these projects being shovel ready. Maybe more important to bring the construction funds to them now because if construction keeps going up, you wished you would have done it a year ago. Um you can't predict the future and it is hard to get ahead of something that's 5 years from now. And and that's the another great variable then. So, how much will sidewalks change in a year if we delay those? And how much more is maintenance if we wait a year? Pretty much everything's going up.

Yeah. All All while things are going up. Except rebar. Apparently [laughter] except rebar.

Yes. It's apparently the bubble has burst on rebar. [clears throat] And revenues. At least temporarily. So, that means our term, every term, 4 years, we want to do something until we need to be reelected for the next term to see the results. [laughter] If you do a big project, um please plan on getting

reelected. Several times.

[laughter]

Several times? Okay. Um so, we've had lots of discussion. I don't think we need to necessarily pause here um because then we can get right into the actual projects. So, what you're looking at here is what we're calling the director's revised general capital budget summary. So, this is not the utility fund general capital. It's just the general capital. And um and of course, this is development in progress. It is not final. We continue to refine numbers. We continue to refine descriptions. All of All of that is still happening uh while you're getting this information. I'm going to go real just high level on some things here without getting into detail um just for everybody who's watching. You can, you know, Booth is kind of self-explanatory and that's for Booth Amphitheater. Um DEV stands for development. Uh so, that relates to some development we sometimes pay um fee payments on and then development also includes our schools where we're obligated to do certain things with um roads associated with schools. Fire, of course, is fire. GM is uh stands for general maintenance and lists a lot of the things that our public works department does to maintain our existing facilities. Go Cary is uh self-explanatory and it um the majority of that, all but the 75,000 is is all part of the Wake Transit funding. And the 75,000 is a base commitment required as part of our agreement with um Wake Transit Transit. And then housing, of course, is all of the various housing programs. And I'm

going to go to the next slide to get through all of it and then we'll come back. Does that sound okay? Okay. So, PED is um pedestrian. So, you know, primarily uh new sidewalks. Police is police. Signals relates to various locations of um of intersection signalization. The soccer park is WakeMed Soccer Park. STM stands for stormwater. And so, those are stormwater specific projects. Um street intersection is doing more than just the signal. It might be doing crosswalks and realignment things. And uh and then street lighting, of course, throughout Cary. And then street maintenance, that's where you're going to see the primary money. So, the bridge and culvert repairs. We have a program that makes sure our bridges are in good condition. It goes throughout Cary. And then, of course, the street maintenance is the one that you all have been talking about here. And then, Carpenter Fire Station is identified as a new street widening project. Let me see if there's one more. There is one more. Uh and um the remainder include tech. So, various uh funding that is required for uh tech initiatives, tennis park, traffic calming, turf is the artificial turf replacement. Um USA Baseball is the USAB. And then, vehicles, the many many different vehicles that we uh have here for Cary. And I'm going to go back. And then uh Dana, then we've attempted to shut to not highlight things like in part one, so the last work session. And we just have two columns that have yes, it's a bond project and yes, it is uh funded um from the previously unfunded reassessed list. So, if the yeses um In the second

draw your attention to anything, just we can talk about them as as you go. Ah,

got it. I should also add there's probably a great example just as we said the fire station in this example um is kind of the first year, although maybe it's really not because for Station 10, we've already programmed and bought land. So, you previous council made a previous decision to fund um you know, a project. And so, but think of that as the first year, whereas you go to Carpenter Fire Station um as the 9.5, that's in addition to what's already been funded and spent. And in some previous handout that if you have your book, it has more detail if it was already a funded capital project, it will have detail on what the the funding was up to this point. I think Russ put Fire Station 10 and 11 we own the land. Yes.

Yes. We um we finished the design phase and we probably just have to move to the next. Is what I remember.

This would be the design.

This would be design.

One would be land that is maybe jointly owned possibly with Wake County. Um in O'Kelly Chapel, I remember we bought that land sometime.

Yeah. Which was probably got 5 years ago. Yes, which was a good decision at that moment in time. Cheaper. Chief Cooper is available if you have specific questions. I have a just a couple of Or is it time for Yes. questions? Please ask away.

thing I think is very interesting that I think the average resident might not know is the fact that we have to reimburse the school system for the road improvements required around the the school. That's $800,000 that the school doesn't have to pay. Now, granted, the school is also us, too, cuz we're taxpayers, but sometimes that people are very surprised that their Cary tax dollars, that part, has to fund the school districts um impact. But, the one I I guess I have a couple of questions on the housing numbers. So, all of those

items that looks like it equals about 1.8 million. And you all were talking that we had more investment like CDBG and other funding, although looks like some of these may come from CDBG. Where Where do you see us in the Where do you see us in from a numbers perspective on affordable housing at the end of the day that is invested? I'll I'll let Heather, if you want to stand up or I'd be happy to

you giving her the nod. Uh yes. I'd be happy to get into the detail that I know. Yeah, that's a great question. And the numbers that are up here are just representing the um general funds portion and most, not all, but most of our housing expenditures have some blend of CDBG funds. We try to use those CDBG funds when that's possible. But, there is a cap on how much you can use for services. So, we are still working with where we can maximize the CDBG funds and then what really needs to have general funds. Um, that plan will will go for public comment next week because we'll be bringing it to you in April. So, we'll have a tentative draft for the community to to see and that will include the forecasted CDBG funds which like these budget numbers we don't know until HUD approves that final allocation. So, is this all this does not include CDBG funds? Yes, that's correct. It does not. Which is Just just general funds. It looks like that's $1.8 million of of general fund. And CDBG funds we're projecting about 743. Yeah, is our number for this year. Um, and then there are some other federal grants that are potentially there are applications out there for that we've that we've done on behalf of some of the projects

that would also you know, flow through Cary and would be projected to benefit some of these projects as well. Okay. So, with the addition just doing some rough math so that'd be about 2.5 million combined without knowing any additional federal funding and and last year we did 3.6 million so it's about a million less than we invested last year of our own plus CDBG money. Okay. If I were giving feedback I would love us to be at about a penny on the tax rate of affordable housing investment which we're set to be about 5 million. And the reason I say that is because we had 9 million invested. Now, a lot of that was ARPA money. In 2024 we did 5 million. And then last year we did 4.2 million. Right? If you include it. And so I think what we've heard from our residents is they want a more of a investment in affordable housing initiatives. So, I would love I love what you guys have done already and I'd love to fully fund what the ask might be so that we could get up to a place where we can have more affordable housing options. And maybe maybe a little bit of discussion if you don't mind Heather on readiness of a project. So, so some of those funds that you referenced from prior years um sat for long periods of time. Uh, because there were not projects that are ready. And so we've been working really hard within our own projects to very much focus on readiness of a project and and Heather can talk a

little bit about that as it relates to housing as well.

Yeah, in particular the line item there that says gap financing that's really primarily used for large developments like Greenwood Forest Baptist Church is one that you all awarded funds to last year. That's also a tax credit project. So, by the time they ask us for gap financing they know their total development budget and they've lined up many other sources of equity and other grants. So, we work often with developments for several years. You may have awarded them pre-development funds for a couple years to help them get that through get through the first couple years and then they really know their total development budget and what their gap is. So, that gap financing really does come to projects that are fully ready and ready to come out of the ground within the next couple of years. So, we do have other ones that are in the pipeline that are working toward that. And that's what those pre-development costs tend to tend to help with to get a project ready for the kind of bigger dollars that come when they are looking to move toward development. And credit to both Heather and Mary on this area. The level of sophistication is going up and up both in how we are functioning and the expectations that we have, the information, etc. as well as the developers and partners that we have in the community. No, and I I want to first state this whole idea of pre-development soft cost financing is brilliant. Being able to help a church that is interested like as we have talked to a couple of them recently because they don't have the funds to even explore an idea. So, being able to help them you know, get to a point where they know whether or not it's feasible is a brilliant idea because they're the ones that have the land and real kudos to that to your group for doing that. So, it's a great idea. If

if I said you had 5 million, let me ask it this way. Um, what what changes would you make in the capital um, improvement to actually use it? I mean, if we made if we made 5 million available could you help build more affordable housing? I can speak to the applications that we received this year. We did have we had one project that asked [music]

[clears throat] for that would be the Greenwood Forest Baptist Church

Susan says pennies don't exist. Um, figured what's the tax rate

We've we've just moved on. We've just moved on to nickel.

Sorry, it's going to be it's going to be the future. Tax rate

two nickels. I I would maybe also offer that sometimes what happens and this is why we had kind of bigger awards in prior years is that these developments do take several years to grow. So, while in one year you might not have many projects but several years later a project would consume a large amount of money. So, and that's sometimes why many my many communities don't fund this work in in the annual you know, capital budget because it's needs longer term thinking, longer term capital thinking. But I bring it up if there's interest by council in having dedicated funding to housing then we need to have that discussion because otherwise we don't have dedicated funding towards housing and it's

That's why I have requested for that work session for housing. Mhm. It's on the my list, right? So, I wanted to kind of discuss that affordable housing. Yes, which isn't specific unless you wanted it to be specific to funding by tax rate for housing. I I think we took it as a broader discussion on So, I was I was probably focusing more on where do we get the funding from? Understand that a little bit more in depth since we have newer people and I would like to understand this a little bit more

myself. And help here with organizations and build the capacity. Um, it's definitely a need in the community and how do we stay ahead because we we will add 50 units and there's a need for 100 units out there. So, how do we especially like with ADUs, how do we work with HOAs around across Cary to make sure that they understand what we have approved and you know what how can we work with them to make those changes in their um bylaws so that they can you know start letting people build these units. Things like those like that's was my intention. Well, to put a finer point on what Lori was saying, my perspective is a little more um I feel as though quite a few members of this council have committed to a penny on our tax rate to affordable housing verbally said yes. Um and it doesn't have to be capital projects though. I think there's a ton of value in any kind of you know whether it's services like what where the spending is. I don't I would never be prescriptive, you know. Staff knows a lot more than I do on where the most impactful places are to spend that money, but the the that we honor the spirit of that investment to me is really really important. So the April meeting is a great time um because the the process that we go through for distributing the CDBG dollars, we also include we do the same you know same process for general fund dollars. And we do our best to give you the full big picture of how much money is um is a part of that. So staffing costs etc. And um so I believe it'll be towards the end of April, but um but even some of the

stuff that's going to start to come out next week is is getting closer to accurate about what kind of funding levels. So I think we're looking in the um uh 3.4 million range plus the 1.5 million grant application. So that gives you a sense of where things are at. Yeah. Well, in in to like Srikanth was saying when there's a larger need than we're currently meeting. Um I think the Greenwood Forest DHIC project is a good example of where this is a higher impact project because just cuz the the number of units that are being created. So I would be um I'd be very interested in in discussing supporting the their gap funding needs if the the federal funding uh can't be found. I think that's something that maybe as a a body we could discuss. Um Do we know is there a confidence level on those federal funds? Does anybody have a We usually get it. We've been very successful. I kind of I just assumed when y'all cuz I did was told about this earlier and I just assumed that you know you wouldn't be bothering if you didn't you know what I mean like you of course you know the process and such. So I just was working under an assumption of confidence that they would get those We started doing it um pretty quite a bit um about 2020 and uh I would say what we're getting more sophisticated with is the administrative burden that is coming with it. Um so recognizing okay um this is what the ask is and this portion needs to go towards ensuring that we can handle the there's a lot of administrative burden with the federal grants and so it's more sophisticated.

And y'all are working with a couple of faith communities. Right? What would you say there's are you working with to support them? We are. Um there some of them you know we're in very early. They're just really

in in inquiry stage with us. So um but several around Cary are starting to get curious. Um sometimes it's because you know they are they have a big piece of land they're not sure what they want to do with or they're having you know maintenance issues that they're trying to fund. Um so we send them almost all of them to Pastor West at Greenwood Forest Baptist Church, but there's also a pretty large national community that's developing capacity around this. So we're connecting them with each other. Um so so that is a big area of opportunity because they have well located patient land usually um which is a subsidy in and of itself. Yeah. And the the Pastor Rickhouse who has also um working out of the Duke Divinity School has also offered his um engagement. They did a project. It didn't work out for their land, but

He's he's he was at Cary First Christian down the road correctly.

And he's offered to meet with churches as well. I think one of the important things for me is to ensure that we're able to share that we are making that commitment no matter where the money comes from. Comes from the federal government CDBG, our own general fund that we're utilizing those resources to make a difference. And I would like to you know see a housing bond on on an upcoming ballot as well. It was very very close and I think I think uh our residents would would like to see that as well. So don't write down the 1% yet. voted on it. No, you have not. No, no, no. We just And the reason we haven't in the past because that's more like throwing money at an issue. We'd rather be specific on what the ask are and then fund those ask and that's why we never had a policy in the past. So I would like to set when we discuss fund balance policy, when we discuss this would be a perfect time to discuss that too and how it would be needed. If we could have a bond, it would be perfect. I would love to discuss all of that rather than

I feel rushed and I feel like oh no, we're adding more. It means something's got to go away or the tax rate's got to go up and I'm like you know, that's that's how I feel right now.

wasn't committing to that. I was just using that as our talking point. I didn't take it that way, but at the same time if the council's goal ultimately is to have one penny spent on housing, we we wish to hear it.

Yes. I think you know the the objective is that how do we pull our partners and resources together to build that support for affordable housing. Like I had a very constructive conversation with Congresswoman Deborah Ross and she gave wonderful feedback for Shelley and she's been working with Shelley. She said this the past three years she's been getting us funding for storm water, but this year she said she will get funding for affordable housing. So you know that was help us with this bucket and we should continue to pursue those kind of partnerships I would say. Good feedback. So so last last week uh Lori and uh Michelle we went to the affordable housing uh event in Garner and I saw Raleigh, Garner, Apex, Morrisville. They're all focusing on affordable housing projects. Made [snorts] me feel a little bit nervous cuz Cary is like here they're like there and I I was thinking if people like the working force and teachers they are all moving to other towns, that means the Cary uh it's not so competitive on workforce. Everything will be more expensive if you want to hire someone and drive to Cary to work every day. So the end users like our consumers will eat that result. So if we don't provide enough affordable housing, those people needs to live in Garner or Holly Springs. So it will affect our economy. That's

our small businesses will be affected a lot or the uh hospitals. So a lot of people work in the hospital. There's a lot of thoughts on those comments.

Yeah. One, we created a desirable place which drives up demand which drives up cost. Our average median income is 135,000. To get workforce housing would have to be half that. Uh and that's going to be really hard to do. And still worth doing.

[laughter]

Really? I've been hearing how hard it is to do for like the last 10 years. And I feel like it's one of those things where we really need to throw down on this issue cuz it is So so intractable. So there's you can try to spend your way out of it. I don't think we will ever do that. I think if you provide transportation options which there's a lot in the works with BRT, regional rail, all kinds of to get to work every day.

years down the road. Well, I mean you got to work on all of these because I don't think you'll have enough affordable housing to house all the teachers, firefighters, police officers, uh service workers. You're not going to be able to do that unless you take the quality of life and the average median income down, then you might be able to do it. And that's not the goal.

to fail trying. I would like to for us to try I I think 921 or Marigold is a great Yeah, I guess so. um pilot for what we can do on town owned land. And once that gets going, I think we have other town owned land. And that's a perfect example of a place that's going at 30 50% median income, you know, we're all looking for new ideas. If there are other new ideas, I would love to see us be as innovative as staff have been in that respect because everybody's waiting. I mean Apex has done their own thing, but everyone's really waiting to see how successful that will be and I

think it'll could be a model that other communities would leverage too. But it's one that's targeted at that you know, firefighter, police, teacher. Yeah. And and it's a huge partnership. There are a lot of partners involved.

Absolutely. Absolutely.

what it's going to take to do these projects. We can't Personally, I don't think we can fund our way You're right. Personally, I don't think we can fund our way out of this issue. There's just no way.

I always feel like why reinvent the wheel when it's already invented. And there are so many places like New York City, super expensive, but people have to live there, they have to work. You know, it's a place for everyone. They can, you know, kind of study their model and understand what are the things that, you know, places like these have built to build that, you know, affordable housing structure. Well, those would be good studies to to I would I would be interested in learning about those. So So, Heather's like an encyclopedia. Just talk to Heather. I know. She's worked in the Northeast as well.

Yeah. So Yeah. So when I hear we need to try, makes me think this is the number one priority over everything. That's why I ran for office. Yeah, me too. Over everything. Yes. Maintenance, everything. Everything else is lower. Well close second. I don't want people's houses to burn down. Okay. I mean So I'm not where you guys are. Public safety's I mean I think public safety came in first, right? This year public safety is first. So I think there are I think I'll tell you my perspective, the existing residents and their quality of life is important to me. Okay. But, you know, as and when we get the opportunity, we have to find ways to build affordable housing to the point where Councilwoman Wong said, you know, that we have to build workforce housing.

Totally in agreement.

And we have to keep trying and for that

Totally I totally agree. But that does not mean that we take away from our existing projects and

priorities.

There's At least that's where I am. There's no community in the nation that has solved the affordable housing.

Oh, absolutely. I mean, one person cannot

not going to solve it.

No, we cannot. If you'll indulge me in a quick story, and it might be a parable that you're familiar with. So I'll condense it as quickly as possible, but it's something that's resonated with me for years is the story of the starfish. Does anybody know the stories of the starfish? Yes, right. And so the quick version is there's a woman on the beach. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of stranded starfish, and she's throwing them one by one back into the water. And a man walks up to her and says, "Why are you wasting your time? You are never going to save all of these starfish." And the woman picks up another starfish and puts it back in the water and says, "Well, it made a difference to that one." And that has been such an instructive parable for me that just because you can't solve the problem in its entirety doesn't mean it's not worthwhile to do the work you can for in this case the people that it helps. And so, you know, it's it's akin to also not letting, you know, the perfect be the enemy of the good. And so I I agree, Lori, that sometimes trying There's there's a lot of value in trying. And And [clears throat] I don't disagree. I'm just trying to be a realist here.

Yeah. And then I'm trying to understand everybody's priority and to me it sound like the priority of this council is affordable housing over everything else. And that's not where I am. If the General Assembly would allow us more funding area I mean like if we had diverse funding opportunities uh uh ways to bring in revenue I don't feel bad saying that I would be fully in favor of raising the tax rate significantly knowing that we could put additional money into helping the people who can't afford it and still give the people

all of the amenities that they want. There's like a you know, a set of people who moved here from a place where the tax rate was so much higher and it's your tax rate is so low and it's, you know, it's so much nicer here. And then there's the you know, there's a group of people who've lived here their whole life. They inherited their grandmother's home and they live here and you know, or they've raised their family here and now they're retired and they can't pay their taxes or they're struggling. So that's my perspective. Well, I could have a whole another discussion about paying tax, but You all are struggling with exactly what this issue is all about and uh and the concept of helping one um is in part why we really very much uh appreciate the sort of regional approach with Wake County. We work very directly with them to make sure that they're partnering with us on things and moving forward projects. And um and it's also because the the issue is a regional housing is a regional market. That it's just the reality for anybody Cary is competing with Garner. That is a reality. And um it's just the way things shake out is how, you know, different people are going to different locations based on the availability of what's there. So when you keep moving forward trying to add more that diversifies it, that's really that's really the key is within any community fitting within this regional market. If you can diversify the different types of housing that is available, then you're going to keep attracting different people to it. And I just wanted to jump in and say that it's 7:00 so just a little time check here. So So, if the passion of this council is affordable housing, let's do a bond. Let's do it this year. Let's do affordable housing bond. Yeah, let's we'd we'd love to have some discussions, too. You know what I was just thinking? In all fairness I know what I said when I was running

for office. But you weren't at all my campaign events. You're a busy man. You don't know what Michelle said and what Britney said. Well, I know a lot what they said cuz I was at a ton of their events, right? Like Sarika stood and listened to me talk. She has, I think, a better first-hand understanding than than you do because you weren't at all of our events all the time. Do you know what I mean? Like it's But I'm not disagreeing with you.

no, I'm saying I think it's worth us having a discussion so everybody hears all the same things. Instead, what we've got is some people have heard some. Yeah. I think there are two aspects of this conversation. One is affordable housing and the second one is housing affordability. I think we want both and that's where we are struggling in my view because we want the right we want to do the right thing for our residents today. We want to make sure we don't make it too expensive for them to live here and that's going to require some commitment from the council and I I'm committed for that. Um I'm pretty sure everybody else has that commitment because I see them struggle when people are not able to sustain the taxes that they have to pay. But um affordable like we are competing and there is definitely that need um for attention, but I agree with you. We may not be able to achieve everything overnight or maybe in the next 10 years. But if we start putting some

The one or two million not going to do anything. Go ask for the 30. You know? Well, uh Maybe 40 or 50 now,

[laughter]

but yeah, I I mean, whatever. The thing is that unfortunately we're all doing here as we, you know, violently agree from different [laughter] areas is that it's not really just affordable housing. It's it's it's economic development, right? It's workforce attraction, right? It's schools and public safety. They all fit

together into a a stability plan for neighborhoods, right? It's about neighborhood stability and we unfortunately are only carving it as affordable housing or housing affordability, but it really impacts all of that because if a teacher has to drive because they can only live in, you know, north of Wake Forest or south of Garner, their quality of life is impacted. It makes it harder for them to do their jobs. And so having the people who serve Cary be able to afford and live in Cary as well as the people who have been here forever having more money available for preserving natural affordable housing, basically the affordable housing that's in Maynard Loop, I think is worth investing in those families who made Cary what it is today.

I feel like I'm being painted as somebody against affordable housing.

You're not. You're just being realistic and and And I'm like, if you want to do something, do it. The million dollars is not going to do it.

Well, yeah. I mean, I think Go big or go home. I mean, jeez.

[laughter]

Okay. And I And I think when you go big when you go big, it's probably not going to be this year. Okay. Cuz it takes about 5 months to get through the process, right? That um Kim and I just conferred. She will talk with our advisors tomorrow. I do not We do not believe that based on the calendar that's required under state law to do all the things that you can get it done this November.

Get what done? A bond referendum. Oh, okay. I thought you were talking A bond referendum on the ballot for this November. But I want you to know that we're going to Well, we will have that conversation tomorrow. Based on the quick way we do the math, we don't get there. We don't get in the with the required numbers of

days of this, that, and the other thing. Um that doesn't mean you shouldn't not say anything about your opinion or that, but when you were thinking about going big, I want you to think about going big is big is probably it's it's probably 27. Probably. But but but we will ask the question. Thank you. Yeah, and I I am aware because just because I've been working with some other council members on regional boards, there are a number of other municipalities that are doing housing bonds this year. So, it wouldn't be unusual if we could do it. Yeah. Yeah, is it we're just we're just behind on the on on on all the steps to everything.

thing I would like to see this year, and I know that our bond failed last time for this very reason, to get more details on what exactly where the investment is going, and you know, we all need to agree on that investment on the projects. And I probably think that would need uh take some time, but I'm open for I have open mind. I'm I'm ready to listen. And I want to say into the microphone. Mr. Mayor, we know you're not against affordable housing. We do. We just got so excited to finally be having this

[laughter]

That's what you just saw. This was not us thinking you we had to convince you. This was us being like, "Oh, it's finally happening."

I second that motion, Carissa.

that.

Yeah. Violently agreeing from various locations, yeah. And I did move the slide forward if you want to talk about other topics.

[laughter]

But I just want to say

Nice try, Dana. Dana, I just want to say one last thing. But Mayor, you know, we don't like you're absolutely right by putting 50,000, 1 million, fighting for penny. I don't think that will solve our problem. So, I agree with you that if we do really have good intentions, and we do want to make that difference, we do need better planning. And I think that's where your experience comes in handy. Yeah, and if you had bond money that you could match the projects

Yes. And meet your housing

That would make me feel good as somebody

feels well, I mean, I know some people don't think I'm fiscally conservative, but rather than throwing money Yes. at something, have something that you can actually pull from. Agree. Um yeah, and I'd say that and just knowing that it I think having a work session or some dedicated time towards this that's probably not part of the capital budget discussion. You're in the sprint right now. Yes, I think your topic is on your list

[laughter]

everybody has received. But yes, we'll we'll work to get that in, even if it's a quarterly, probably knowing what we'll learn with the bond potential bond discussion is that you're going to have time to do it, especially if the direction isn't to add a penny specifically this year and to get input on if the housing if that's and including what Heather said, funds the needs for this upcoming year. Knowing that you can also revisit it um during the year. Technically. Yes. I have about 30 seconds I want to say. I took such good notes from what Lori and Bella had said. Bella started talking about how not having affordable housing like affects our community as a whole. And then when Lori was talking about this being more than just affordable housing plans, economic development plans, and stability plans. Looping back to Chatham Estates, there's approximately 700 people there, and I know that's a drop in the bucket of our thousand. I know some of those are children, some are maybe older and not working. Although, if you don't have Some of them may be working until the day they're no longer with us because they are lower income. But just thinking about the conversations we've had with the Chatham Estates residents, we have school workers, hospital workers, small business owners that live out there. Some of them walk to work, some of them take the bus line, they carpool because they have a neighbor that works in the same area. I can't say it's going to be interesting to see what will happen, but

it's going to be impactful when most of those are no longer able to be in Cary. A lot of them will not be able to come back to Cary to do those same jobs. It's estimated 40% will be able to live in Cary. That's what I heard. With assistance and such, yeah. But I think it might be worth I thought maybe that's where you were going, Bella. Yeah. Um it might be worth having a discussion of just having a discussion on whether we want to increase the funding for the Stable Homes Cary program to make up the gap. Yeah. And Russ is trying to keep us

I know, and I I think we're on the same topic. Because I this was a very worthwhile conversation.

[laughter]

I am anxiously awaiting discussing what we call the sad list.

Okay. Can get to that. Okay. Real quick. I'm going to I'm going to suggest because you have a very limited of time to get to that that maybe we um use some of the April work sessions to keep talking about capital because if you have one more topic like that, you won't get to much else, and there's a couple of things that I would like to update you Can you just make this last comment because Oh, on the Yes, we haven't even introduced the sad list.

The sad list is on the Sad list. This was on the happy list.

Yes. Yes. Yes. [laughter] BARELY GOT CAN YOU IMAGINE WHAT THE SAD LIST WOULD THE FIRST PAGE of the happy list. Yeah. I don't think if you talk about one topic it counts as a list, y'all. Can [laughter] we just make a quick comment? YES. I APPRECIATE THAT.

DISCUSSION, lots of that. Dana, you want to advance us Yes. Here's the not included list.

show it on the screen. Sad list. My first question about this is the ones that are designated as LAP funding. So, how does that work? Does that mean we're forgoing funds? It's possible. Possible. Yes. You we compete every year. Well, these already have funding, but if you need more, you'd still compete. Um but further delays could impact what you've already received.

There's different answers to different projects. Um but I would say that almost guaranteed on several of them that say LAP, we would be giving the money back and have to compete again should you decide to move forward with that project in the future. And Hagins probably represents the best example I understand from staff's discussion of it is um you know, if it was maybe a project that didn't have a greenway or any type of pedestrian facilities on it, uh maybe they would have recommended it. Obviously, it was in the first pass, it's not in the second pass because there are two sidewalks on both sides of the road in that stretch. Um so, you know, you you want to do the project. Um it's just with all the other competing needs, is it you know, is it worth doing this year or not? And I know we don't have as much time to fully spend on it, so maybe we'll loop back again, but my my quick thoughts are there've been a number of people that have reached out recently with concerns about um wanting to prioritize that. So, I think it warrants uh just an open discussion. Yes. That's that Just say it. Well, I'm sorry. [laughter] So, cuz I don't think I'm understanding this correctly. Cuz if we had $13 million worth of money sitting there dedicated to this, we would do it. We wouldn't forgo free money to get free greenways. So, I I'm not still understanding then what the LAP designation means there. Does it mean there would be some dollars, but not enough to cover the expense of it, or is it because of where it is that This is our cost. Yes. That's what you said. Yeah, that is that's hard to give you that specific, but yes. And um many of them um that were kind of before the escalation in cost, so the cost went way up, um but also to be competitive, we offered more than so, an 80/20 is a normal match. There are many projects

that might have a 40/60 or 50/50 match. Um and so, it really is different for everything, and we can of course give you very specific information particularly on that one since it's been identified and pulled out. Russ, just to be clear, you are intending to have to continue this discussion. We're not going to stop it tonight. I Y'all need to give us more feed Sounds like there's interest in in giving more feedback. Obviously, you can send it to us. Um we can talk about this at upcoming work sessions because while staff's working, they can nod a little bit. So, good Dana, working on the operating, we have a little time to talk about uh Russ, I'm just sad that Green Level Church Road widening did not make it to the happy list. I'll just stop. Oh, there's going to be so much of that. You're going to have a I'm just I'm just documenting my thoughts.

is noted. If you want to advance us one slide, I'll give you my preview. Oh, one more slide. Or do we go back? This one. Yes. So, some of my colleagues have already heard, but I'll say for the benefit of everyone, I'm going to go to bat for District A, and I want to have a serious conversation about Louis Stephens. Uh that is a long delayed capital project that District A would really like to see. I understand it is a very expensive project, but the conversation would be worthwhile. So, we have run out of time tonight, so that is just a little teaser. And what I would I'm Brittany, it's expensive because it's not a it says it's sidewalk, but it's really the road uh expansion. Does anyone who's familiar with that route know what the limitations are? Well, and I will I think I've heard 15. I may just have to And it was a bond project.

[laughter]

Didn't have enough bond funding. Yes. And you know, that that is a very difficult reality that we're dealing with with constituents in all of our districts is, you know, talking about what what was approved for going on 7

years ago, versus what it cost to do today, uh is an education piece and a limitation, but there's still just the popular notion of, "Well, you told me 7 years ago that I would get this, and we're still talking about it." So, we can we can keep talking. Does that road need to be resurfaced? It doesn't have curb and gutter. Yeah. Needs to be right away. Um we have been purchasing right of way and believe that Yes. Or easements. Or easements. Yep. Last time I heard it was 12 million.

Correct. That was the last time we

Last year when we put it on the meeting. How much for this project?

12 million. And I think I'm hearing closer to 15. 15 now? And it was 12 million. Because we waited. Some has been spent. Ouch. [clears throat]

Designed, possibly right of way. And

So, that's the total of it all. Are we going to knock on Wiley's door? Yeah. And and for a little bit of context, if you were to add up all of the pedestrian, if we went back a few slides, all of those pedestrian line items that are on the happy list, even if we were to say, "Well, we're going to we're not going to do any of them." It's 3.7 million. So, we could fund a fifth. That's right. You could fund some of it. Reallocate funding sources.

[laughter]

Yes. Yeah. Chris's point, love to we spend a lot of money on a little bit.

Right.

why I asked you if we might need additional work sessions. Yes. And with the bond I would like to remind you with the bond, it will go on past this year's budget. We'll need to keep talking about it in the summer and the fall. Okay. With the specific bond projects. Okay. How much money is left in the bond? Sorry for that. We can't give you a very um exact number. Um generally speaking, in the ballpark of 10 to 15 million in the transportation, we think. For us. Um not being spent, not allocated. Not not allocated.

Potentially not allocated.

Not potentially not allocated at this point.

Potentially it could fund Louis Stephens. But we have carpet.

that's why I might have changed the We look forward to bringing that detail back to you. Russ. [laughter] Thank you, Dana. Thank you for your Keep going. Great comments. Uh because some of these updates we uh started at the last one uh last work session, but some were left over from the retreat, which is why I feel some level of urgency of getting this uh to you, because the uh most urgent to us is really whether or not to move forward on a business alliance, because we have a consultant uh that we've selected, but not signed a contract on uh to consider if council wishes to proceed in this engagement or not. Um you can not have the conversation again tonight is fine. If you want to move on to other topics and think about it, it just means, you know, we're at some point and many times like this, consultants may ask to um uh not take their name out of consideration, because they need to move on to other projects. So, that's why I feel some urgency on our papers. um to this. So, Russ, are you looking for the potential for us to make a motion tonight and make a decision on this?

We would like that, yes. It would be something come out of the This is already budgeted funds in '26. Um and we'll determine if more budgeted determine options to consider um you know, potentially in the future if there if there are any. I I'll go ahead and reiterate what I said in the last work session, which is to me, this is not a reflection on the merits of the business alliance. It very well might be a a worthwhile pursuit. I just don't know that town dollars are the best source of that investment. 100% agree. I I feel like this is really a Chamber of Commerce activity. Just my opinion. Uh and and I have to say, I met with a lot of the folks, and I think their passion is in the right place, and as

you said, it's a a very important um organization, right? We've seen organizations like these, downtown business alliances, make a huge difference across the country. Uh so, I think they're valuable. The question is, as you right both rightly said, who funds that type of work? And I'm not sure that we should be in the business of funding that. I really I I would really like and hope that the chamber would step up and and help these folks, because I think that's the right organization where it should be funded. Mhm. And we can have that conversation with the chamber as well. And maybe what we also hear you saying, if that's in the form of a motion or not, is not right now. Do you need a motion to do not right now? Um if there's consent it it probably be best um to close out the issue. I'm comfortable with it. I make a motion that we remove the current scope of work cost of $75,000 from our fiscal year budget. Not move forward with this.

forward with it, yeah. There's a motion. Second. And the second. Who was the second? Discussion uh Bridget. Second, thanks. Uh discussion. All in favor. Aye. Opposed. Thank you for that. And if it needs to come up in the future or more on it as we talk to the chamber. Um I thought this was something that we wanted to get to, because at this point um John's going to be able to tell you that I think Where's John? It's come up quickly, but I think we're going to be issuing this RFQ this week. Um he can tell you a little bit of um We were just talking about this today. We'll have a request for qualifications for cricket. Um and this is something you talked about maybe last Oh, it's on there. September 11th was the discussion. Obviously, there's been a lot of things going on that have to some degree led to this not being prioritized. Uh John and his team talked about whether to do a RFQ or RFP. There was some feedback by even uh the PRCR

advisory committee, and I'm probably speaking for you at this point, but I think you're doing a great job trying to move it forward. Uh that's going to be issued Let's say Monday or Tuesday next week.

Okay. Next week. Because but hopefully I ideally this is released by the end of the week. We have gotten really good feedback from lots of different groups. Uh lots and lots of staff input. Also, the uh the advisory board for um PRCR, and it's been a really interesting process trying to figure out what are we really going to be able to learn from the community that wants this and that will engage with us on it. So, we're really excited to to get this out there uh and and see what comes back. Novice question. I know the acronyms RFQ and RFP and what they stand for, but what is the difference between [clears throat]

[laughter]

a request for qualifications versus a request for I I will take a shot at it. There are lots of folks way I'm I'm still the new guy. I was waiting for a little chuckle there. He is not the new guy. But I on this one I am. So, between the two, um my understanding, the RFQ is going to allow us to understand what capacity all of the different groups and interested stakeholders and parties have to bring to the table versus a proposal would be asking them to really bring us almost a finished a more finished product. Um and further down the line. And so, we aren't really there yet. We have a lot of interest, a lot of grassroots, a lot of ideas, a lot of all all of those things. And so, trying to figure out um we actually have some thought that there may be a couple groups that end up wanting to work together to bring something forward, which at the state that we're at uh to try to make that a uh finalized formal proposal just feels like a little one step too far. And we want to make sure that we get the opportunity to engage as many folks in a meaningful way as possible. And you'll short list to get maybe it's one, maybe it's two, maybe it's three, but uh then move forward with proposals from a a smaller group that you feel very

comfortable with that may accomplish what you wish to hear, which I believe the past discussions were to possibly offer something at little to no cost to the town was something that you all talked about in September. RFQ to do what? Forgive me. I can't remember

provide We asked for RFP for asked for an RFP cricket in Mills Park.

Park. That's what I Okay. I just wanted to make sure I recall correctly.

fields, maybe maybe also Maybe the intention was to not like build Carey level facility. This is where they're already playing, right? We want to build the proper facility.

Yeah, but it's more about youth cricket, offering just a facility, so that somebody could partner with us and build this pitch up, which is going to be very expensive. I think that's the intention. Correct. We'll return to you with uh updates and see what people give us. So, I I think it's good news. One question, John, that I keep getting is like how like how would people find out about this? Where do they go? So, it will be it will be posted uh both on on our website, and then we're going to be speaking with and have gotten a lot of questions from folks. Uh folks who are watching this right now. Uh so, there's actually a lot of interest from that community. I feel really good about how we'll be able to get the word out.

be able to send me that information?

it all to all of you, and you can also promote it. Yeah, because I think, you know, some people have asked for this information, and I don't know where to go to get this. So. Yeah. It will be with you by early next week.

Okay. Wonderful. Thank you. So, good news. Um this was the other one I wanted to get to that I also think is good news if Heather has a really quick Yes, really quick. moment uh to tell us the good news.

Yeah, this is an exciting one. This is Rose Park Manor, which is currently welcoming residents. They are open um and have signed a number of leases. It's 81 units of deeply affordable senior housing. Um there are five residents from the Chatham Estates Park who have signed leases here.

To give you some context since we're talking about money, this is like a $25 million development. There are tax credits in it for 12 to 15 million and Cary contributed 3 million and Wake County. I forget the dollar amount for Wake County, but to you know, so there's a substantial amount of our money and other other government [clears throat] money in this, but they are open. It's right behind Glenaire. It's a beautiful building. They'll have a ribbon cutting or some other event soon that we can all welcome you and give you a tour. So when you say affordable senior housing, like what is that like what what is your classification of affordable here? Yeah, so affordable they're all affordable at a at a maximum for they're at 50 60% of median income and many at 30% too. So

does that mean in dollars? 30% of area median income. I don't know what the rents are, but we could look up and tell you what you know Let's see. That that's usually the number that rings. So there's like $36,000 income is 30% So people with income of $36,000 can afford to live here. Seniors can afford to live there. And is there any restriction with like if they want to bring their family members like kids? It is it is age restricted. It's age restricted. Okay. Okay. Well done. All right, you already saw the good news about Cedar Street last week. This parking deck is opened with 290 new spaces. Any hints about the and this Academy Street is likely we hope going to open next week. Both of these parking decks are there's some maintenance agreements with regards to we've created HOAs kind of condo associations.

of legal documents to get through. Yes.

Get to opening, but we're working to make it happen. A quick question I've been asked multiple times. We have parking people in front of our decks because we don't have smart parking. We have like somebody who

That's I would say that's true. Tell tells you whether or not there's car park that's it. For special events or busy specifically at the Walnut Street deck busy weekends. Right, like Friday night market as an example I had someone standing there. Well, we also have that on at Rogers and We hope not because of the Cedar Street is just public in and out. You don't have library users. We have a three-party agreement if you will library and then the apartment complex with a walker who do not have dedicated spaces. It's mixed in spaces. So that one's very complicated from operations. This one Academy Street's going to have nested parking. So it also too could be a little bit easier to manage with regards to get to the top or two floors up and there's a turnaround spot cuz you can't go through where the residents park. So in theory these are going to be a little bit easier on operations, but we're thinking about using some of those parking ambassadors for Pimento Cheese. Wait. Just to parking ambassadors. Yes, just to see what we learn. We've received a couple of emails about from people asking about it. Yeah, good questions and we've updated some information on our website when that one goes live hopefully next week even even more information. And then I'll I'll just end it in this because this is something we haven't updated you on. Near and dear to Jamie's heart obviously is we're continuing to study Cary Apex and Holly Springs wastewater capacity. And just to show you some signs of when we may expect to get some study being completed this summer and then deliver results to you all in the fall of this year. Continue to follow up with my counterparts both at Holly Springs and Apex as as we talk talk about this. Holly Springs obviously is very interested as result of some of their industry that they brought to to the region. So we had a joint meeting with Holly Springs Council that may be something

that there's interest in doing again as we deliver results of these studies and talk about capacity in partnership with Holly Springs. So I just wanted to update on that and with that I'll probably end on this slide. There's nothing else. I was going to give a little history. Holly Springs was a part of our wastewater in the beginning years ago. They were? Yep and they pulled out. Oh, I didn't know that. Yep. Yeah and now they they have a water allocation from Jordan Lake.

Right. But and now they want to work through Council or work through Cary to get water as well. So there's quite a little bit of fallout from that because they backed out and now they have to kind of ease their way back in.

Yeah. Yes, but that lots of makings of deals and yeah, fine points that we need to be talked about as we get results of that study. And that's all we really have for tonight.

want to share how perfect the format is for the these capital project descriptions by the way. This is absolutely perfect. You also these are the descriptions. It says that if you solve for all the 138 million and to make sure that was clear to everyone that you can you know whittle your way through all of them.

This is the wish list.

all the detail that you can see what they are. Then you have a pulse report was the other thing in your packet regarding comments to date on budgeting. Anything else?

Just one last thing. I really like to thank the fire department. I was lucky enough to participate in the community emergency response team this weekend and you know, we all hope that we'll never see a firefighter because if so in at our house or somewhere else, it would likely be an emergency, but the firefighters were amazing with the the 18 people who were in this class and they I heard from each once I was outed as a council member. Thank you. I heard from each and every single resident how proud they were to be part of Cary and how immensely

impressed they were by the Cary Fire Department. So thank you all for that. Anything else? All right, we're adjourned. Thanks everyone. Thank you.