It is now 435 p.m. And I'm calling this meeting of the design review board to order Recording secretary, please call roll Board member birch is absent Board member cook is absent, but he'll be arriving late Board member lip-tack here Board member Sharon here Board member with rich Here vice chair Weigel here Chair Jones Carter here Let the record reflect that all board members are present with the exception of board member birch and Board member cook who will be arriving late? Item 2 approval of minutes and there are no minutes to approve Item 3 public comment We are now taking public comment on item 3 Non-agenda matters. This is the time when any person may address the board on matters not listed on this agenda But which are within the subject matter jurisdiction of this committee? Recording secretary, can you please provide instructions to the public? If you're a member of the public attending in person, please make your way to the podium Chair Jones Carter. I don't see anybody making their way to the podium. Let me check zoom As a reminder for members of the public joining via zoom You can select the raise hand the raise hand icon to make a comment if you're calling in please press start 9 Board member Jones Carter. I don't see any hands raised Public comment is closed Item 4 board business statement of purpose Zoning code chapter 20 dash 5 2 point 0 3 0 f project review This review authority shall consider the location design site plan configuration and the overall effect of the proposed project upon surrounding properties and the city in general Review shall be conducted by comparing the proposed project to the general plan any applicable Specific plan applicable zoning code standards and requirements Consistency of the project within the city's design guidelines architectural criteria for special areas and other applicable city requirements Item 4.2 board member reports. Are there any board member reports? None to report Item 4.3 we have none and Item 5 department reports Thank you chair and members of the board. I have no department reports this evening. Thank you item 6 state statement of am I Cannot say this word Thank you Are there any abstentions on the item 8.1 none. Thank you Item 8 scheduled items Chair chair Jones-Carder you skipped over item 7 Sorry Are there any consent items? None, thank you Item 8 scheduled items. We are moving into the first scheduled item The cannery at railroads railroads square this item is information only and no action will be taken on the item I Believe project planner Susie will introduce the item and then the applicant will give a presentation Yes, thank you very much. Sorry. I missed the table there Good afternoon chair and members of the board This is a I want to say thank you first to the applicant team for doing this This is really going above and beyond this is an approved project that never went before any of the boards that would have Normally seen it including the waterways advisory committee the cultural heritage board and the design review board Last night. They did a presentation that was very similar to what you'll see tonight, but really focused more on cultural heritage board matters if you will and They got a really nice review from the cultural heritage board there. There are two concerns Really were addressed to the the pathway the promenade that extends down to the creek and the hope that at one point That will actually connect to 4th Street, but that segment will be constructed with this this project And then the other one was about the water tower So we really went through that last night and then tonight. They're really focusing more on matters Of interest to this board. So with that I'm going to also put another reminder that the project architect will need to leave at 530 promptly The rest of the team is still here to answer questions But if during the presentation you could make notes on your architecture related questions and then Other questions we can kind of follow through with the applicant team afterwards after Mimi Sullivan leaves, okay? And thank you very much Oh, and I'm sorry project Michelle Gervais from the project team and I'm going to let her introduce the other members. So take it away. Thank you Can't say anything without first starting with kudos to the city It's worth noting that we've actually been working on this since the property was acquired in last century in 1998-99 There's a bit of history. I'll go into it can answer more after Mimi's gone But in this latest round of entitlement and we have been before many boards over many years With different variations on the theme but for this project in particular and thanks to the SB 35 process And especially thanks to Susie and company This this miraculously was approved in a very timely way so In the interest of time I will move on but we can't say enough good so My name is Michelle Gervais. I'm a local planning and development consultant The John Stewart company has really been the known lead of a partnership that purchases property as I said last century It was really it flowed from grassroots community-based project that was known as root at which is all about downtown Revitalization and hundreds of people participated in those years in this revisioning of how to connect and Really fortify life in downtown arts culture food wine transportation and Connectability and housing and then the policy that supported that people eyeballed this property that used to be two buildings that connected and With a with a canary line going through it conveyor belt And they saw that this idea of the four-street connection to the creek would be awesome If it weren't for those buildings that were in the way John Stewart and Rick Devine bought into the vision And between the vision and the practicality of site cleanup Which meant taking down buildings to get to old storage, you know oil tanks and then soil cleanup and toxic remediation And ground water cleanup and lots of it almost seven million dollars of cleanup that they absorbed themselves They then had sites ready for proposed development and they have this four-street corridor in 2003 Susan Clark authored the historic reports that Cleared the path for the partial demolition retaining the walls that contributed to the historic fabric of the national registered Historic where it's queer association. That's why you see those remnant walls And then the rest of the five-story building could come down to make way for the the clearance the site clearance and Housing There's been a lot of drama since then but John Stewart was a fabulous man and great storyteller and it was almost like that Academy Award winning movie this year It had every genre of Story in the in our trajectory since and he was willing to sell the film rights, but not the water tower and So I could tell you more about that later For now though, I think it's best in the interest of time I will turn out the microphone on Don Lesty who is director of development for the John Stewart company and Mimi Mimi Sullivan with slightest Sullivan. She is probably I would say singularly the most involved a team member. They have done Probably a hundred different variations on themes of probably 20 themes of development plans So she has lots to offer. We have had it's just also worth noting in addition to Susan Clark Diana painter whom you may know. She's done a lot of work in Santa Rosa and also Stacey to Shazel we're both involved as historical consultants along the way and so Don I'm gonna turn it over to you and then to Mimi Good evening. This is Don. Can you hear me? Yes, yes Yes, we can hear you You're good Don. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Good evening Board chair and board members. Thanks for letting us present tonight This project that as Michelle is so eloquently described as 20 close years in the making we're super excited about it I I think you know, I've been doing this for about 25 years and I think this probably the most transformative Affordable housing project. I've ever worked on just in terms of what we envision will happen. Sorry Don. I'm sorry Don I'm sorry to interrupt. You're having a hard time hearing you again Well, is there a way to speak really loudly It's clear but it's better Try again, this is better. I don't Is this better? They're looking at the controls to see if they can make you any louder Yeah, I I mean, I tried my headphones last night as you know, it's in working. This is I'm calling it on I'm not really sure what else to do if you can't hear me Why don't you just run through the project overview and the timeline and then why don't we go to the project overview and just speak Slowly but loudly. Thank you Okay, this is better Yeah, go for it. Can you hear me? Okay, so we're looking at the timeline. This project was entitled under SB 35 in August of 2020 which was a state Proposition designed to expedite the entitlement of affordable housing We closed our construction financing a couple years later and 2022 we started construction immediately and we anticipate Being finished with construction in early 2025 you can go to the next slide This project is 129 units 128 of those units will be affordable to low-income families earning between 30% and 80% of area median median income with a set aside of 25 percent of those units 32 units for formerly homeless families who will be referred to the project through the housing authority and Who will come with project-based section 8 vouchers to subsidize their rent? You can see the monthly rents on this screen depending on the level of affordability For that unit there are 52 parking spaces 50 bike spaces and A large community space with the joining patio Computer lab lots of outdoor amenity on the backside of the of the property towards the creek and most importantly the installation of the pedestrian promenade that will link the new road that we're putting in With with the Prince Memorial Greenway and eventually as Michelle and Susie mentioned hopefully connect to 4th Street through the cornerstone property I'm going to turn over to our architect Because I think most your questions will be directed to her, but I'm happy to sustain answer questions later. Thank you Your turn Mimi. Thank you. Good afternoon. Can you hear me? Okay? Yes, thank you. Okay. Great. Um, good afternoon madam chair board members and community members Thank you. It's Donna Michelle. I've already stated for inviting us This evening to share our project that is near and dear to our hearts And really a labor of love I say that because we started on the project with Michelle in 2005 so you can do the math 18 years later we could not be more thrilled. It's coming out of the ground The view in front of you is should be a view that most of you probably recognize with the cannery walls that are existing Out on site today. This is from West 3rd Street And you will see the two cannery walls that are being preserved a loading docks as well and the metal canopy along West 3rd We are keeping the clear story openings in providing Some cable rail because we've set the building back the new building that is back from the cannery walls approximately 12 feet behind that and the clear story level our individual unit patios for the most part and at the far end Near the promenade which you can talk about later is a community room that has a community patio So the idea was to still activate and see activity and people through the clear story by setting The building back and also by setting the building back, which was important to us to accentuate and Make more visible. We hope the historic walls In this view you'll also see There are Balconies, there's a lot of modulation in terms of the building mass and both in its roof line and in its vertical and horizontal elements and the color scheme is really coming from a long process with the historian Who was a consultant to our NEPA consultant and who wanted the new building to be more Quiet if you will I guess as a word I'll use and so we worked through several color schemes to try and Compliment the brick not copy the brick yet be sort of rich in its materiality and colors But not too Overwhelming so let's go to the next slide Here's a view we did to illustrate the view down 4th Street You can see the railroad I start railroad station there on the right and The wall in the distance the cannery wall in the building rising up behind it And the water tower Go to the next slide Here's the site plan and on the up on the top of your screen would be the New Street will call it a street doesn't really have a name yet that will be provided Let's go back one. Sorry. Thanks a Street and that is running the long length of The existing cannery brick wall and you'll see the loading dock there with the sort of trapezoidal edge and Then to the left is the public promenade And so the the development team Decided to actually do a lot more in adjustment and that was the way that this public promenade could be Provided so they did move the lot line approximately 40 feet over From the edge of the existing cannery to provide this public access As husband mentioned from what we hope is a through line connection to 4th Street We will do our part to provide that from the new Street across this development down to the Creek trail this diagram also shows the backyard For the residents and which includes a number of different outdoor amenities. There's sort of an outdoor green There are some picnic tables with an olive Bosque Harkening back to the orchards in the history of the cannery itself There's an outdoor deck for the residents. There's a taut lot. That's adjacent to a laundry room Etc. The white obviously is the building footprint You'll notice too that the footprint of the building from left to right sort of steps in Conjunction with the property line and sort of the curve of the creek But it's so that's actually not a sort of flat Composition against the creek it actually has three wings and modulation to Let's go to the next slide, please This is actually the second the podium plan second floor And this was really to illustrate again how the building has these carve-outs of two fairly large Courtyards and then the three wings of the building surrounding those courtyards. So again More amenity space. I failed to tell you to the one of the reasons of course for activating that backyard In a robust way was to provide more visibility and and eyes on the creek So we have at the ground level all the things that it just described and on the podium level We have units and also obviously the courtyard spaces too and then as you go up the building more units So a lot of visibility on the creek with this project. Let's go to the next Okay, this is the elevation for West 3rd Street Showing the brick wall the canopy and then again the building the new building rising up behind it Here I guess what I would like to point out because you saw the modulation in the perspective Here what I'll point out is some of the materiality. So the vertical stripes is a bored and batten material the surface that doesn't have a stripe if you will is a cement plaster and then Described earlier the metal balconies and then this metal stair kind of sculptural stair to Activate again the 3rd Street facade Okay, let's go to the next this is Facing a street if you will the new street and the Cornish stone property in the future And the longer side of the existing brick wall and and dock and again the building rising above it stepping back from it And again just material-wise we have the bored and batten and the vertical stripe We have a horizontal stripe in this particular facade indicating a lap siding and then again the Smooth plaster finish Okay, excuse me. We do also point out we have the one garage entry along this Facade if you look to the right of your screen. It's the fourth bay in so on the ground level behind the brick wall is a parking garage for the most part and obviously needed Utility electrical rooms and those kinds of utility spaces as well Okay, let's go to the next this elevation is along the public promenade you'll see from left to right the less sort of bay of the Existing or historic brick wall turning the corner there The main entry to the development is that two-story Storefront glazed with the double doors that is the main lobby into the project and above that is the One of the court sort of the main spine of the corridor running the length of the building as well And then we have a second sculptural stair Uh Hopefully people want people to really use that stair and again sort of be visible coming and going and activating that edge and Then the same materials wrapping around in terms of the vertical board and batten siding and the plaster and the horizontal lap siding Okay Next line and this is the facade facing the creek. It's a little bit hard to read Just because it's two-dimensional. That's why we showed the second floor podium plan So if you recall that we had the two large courtyards that the three wings were defining So those courtyards on the left from line e to g is the first Courtyard that starts at the podium level it goes open to the sky and Then from lines l to n is the second courtyard again starting at the podium level and open to the sky Same materials are Applied around this facade as well. You're the next slide. Okay, so here's a just a summary of the historic Resources that we're preserving the two brick walls that we have shown the canopy and the loading docks The landscaping is not obscuring these historic elements. So we've kept that to a very minimum Along those facades and there's a much more robust landscaping on the back and along the public promenade. I mentioned the the olive boss or orchard Harkening back to the cannery history where we're providing picnic tables for the residents to enjoy and the water tower Is now tied to the future plant five project next door Okay, next slide It's an interesting project from a design perspective because as you are seeing each of the four sides is pretty unique in terms of What they're facing the street the creek the promenade and so as an opportunity to use a variety of materials and textures in Purposefully contrast those with the historic brick walls I mentioned we stepped the new building back as well to highlight the historic walls and by doing that There's kind of a double Gets a double duty in a way. We're stepping back to honor the brick wall also creating Space in between for patios and for the community room collective patio as well Mentioned in that podium plan the way the building is carved out on the backside around those two courtyards creating the three wings and the two courtyards the next bullet point and The building modulation both horizontally and vertically is Very true to the objective design standards working with Susie in the planning department to make sure we did get as much modulation and shadow and Variation through materials and massing that we could and Then the two exterior metal stairs You know picking up on some industrial material vocabulary and also Really as I mentioned trying to activate those facades hoping people will really come up and down quite a bit And the next slide and the creek considerations. We've heard Early and often from the community that eyes on the creek 24 7365 are really important and and we understand why and we agree so we've done everything we can to Activate the backside of the property in the ways that I've described and also all the units that now look will now look over the creek The promenade creating that public access for pedestrians and cyclists Is really important to all of us in the project and we hope to the community as well And eventually again, hopefully connecting to through a through line all the way to 4th Street in the historic road road square Commercial area The landscaping is meeting all the water efficient landscape requirements. It's providing a buffer between the building and the creek trail Serving a lot of recreational needs in the backyard for the residents and is sensitive to the wildlife setting And the next slide please Oh, that was it. Sorry. I thought there was more. Okay So I'll turn it back over to Suzy and Michelle then Thank you so much Mimi well, that really concludes the presentation and As mentioned, it's been under construction now for a couple months. I was just out there today Podium is going up for the parking and it's exciting a lot of work to be done I did hear that the I think framing will be done this calendar year So it'll be interesting to see then, you know What the scale might start to feel like? but we're here to answer questions and I'll be quiet Do this are there any questions from the board to staff or the presenter? And maybe we should direct the questions to the architect first since they have a time schedule Well, thank you. No question It's in it. Yeah, we realized to that that it's a it's a bit strange that we're sharing something with you for which Your comments are appreciated, but You know being incorporated at this stage is probably a management consideration. Maybe more than a design one But you know if you have questions people are going to be seeing it go up They might ask about things. We want you to feel fully equipped. I think we would I do have a question. Okay. Sorry artificial turf is We don't have a landscape member on the team, but Mimi you've been working with them a bit. Would you like to speak to the? landscape artificial turf that was a decision both Landscape and property management decided on to be honest about it um Don I don't know if you recall did if we start if we talked about having actual turf, but then there were just challenges with maintenance and so, you know water efficiency. I think that was another Concern or maybe ever What I want to call it sort of a prohibition because there's only so much water for the for the irrigation and trying to keep it You know very water efficient that might have played into it too. I apologize. They don't have a really clear recollection of that decision-making I Just bring it up because I know that there are some environmental concerns about using artificial turf in the breakdown of the sub tires, so My two cents Okay, I'm not sure if you hear me I'm not really sure if you can but if you can it really was about water. I think maybe you're correct Did you all hear that? No, he said it sounded like he said it was about the water. That's correct Yeah, I mean for You know a lot of playgrounds and also multifamily developments We are seeing a lot of artificial turf just in you know our design space because we can't meet you know Grass is a very thirsty plant as things go. So yeah, I mean we're doing a lot of turf for durability We're doing a lot of other stuff. That's not grass for playgrounds and things like that. So I mean, I'm not surprised by it From a design perspective You know because it'll probably last longer than real grasswood and hopefully you know pets and stuff won't be Relieving themselves on the artificial turf either. So that's which would also kill the grass I didn't point out if I could have just address your pet Comment, which is great. There is a little pet Relief Area off to the side there So we hope that people are not going to let their pets go out there too given them a space to go to Are there any yes A brief question About I guess it's really a hypothetical is the water tower Which I understand is part of a next phase or another phase. How far is it? From the apartments that are Right there on the back there. There's one image where I was like, oh Am I looking if I were in that apartment? I'm you know, how far is it away? From the building Michelle, do you want me to speak to that? Sure. Yeah, so in that in that Um Rendering that we showed you early the water tower was On the promenade at that point in time. This is quite a while back. I will admit and It was fairly close to the building and that wasn't Necessarily what everybody wanted, but we also recognized as a team That not everybody would want to walk under the water tower That might be not very comfortable on the promenade So we tried to create a path around it as well But Moving forward and don can speak to this a bit more. It won't be where this rendering Thought it would be at the time so at the If it goes up at the Along the closest edge of the plant five site in the future That would be at least 40 feet away from The cannery units at that point. Thank you. Thank you. I don't know where it's going to end up on the plant five So I'm just that's hypothetical for me Yeah, I'm sorry. This is Don and we don't know where ultimately will Be reinstalled as well. We don't have any Plans yet for plant five But not closer, is it right? Oh, definitely not closer I actually had the same thought when I saw that rendering Up from my window and I'm looking at big water tower There is a stack of probably two units that were I mean That's not I'm not saying that's inconsequential, but you're right and we recognize that too So, um, it was not an easy element to Find the right home for to be honest just given those kinds of challenges But again, if it when it goes on plant five if it were placed at the closest edge, it would be 40 feet away Hope that helps Yes, thank you Any other questions? Okay We'd like to open public comment On item 8.1 If you're attending in person, please make your way to the podium Hi, I'm lianne wenz Um here with ann gallantine. We're both members of the saturday afternoon club And we were part of the history section. We're very interested in keeping history. So we're Our focus is the water tower And I had a couple questions. I was here. I was here yesterday too. So I this is the second time I heard your presentation and What is this plant five project? And um You're talking about maybe we'll put it on the On the property line of that and I'm just wondering isn't that where the other wall begins and is there going to be an attempt to save that wall as well I'm sorry. I should first ask Are you folks Part of the plant five project or is that owned by someone else and another project altogether You can go ahead and um List off your questions and then we can respond after the public comment period. Okay. I didn't know how that works. No, no problem. So, um So that's the question on So the next question is where is the property line? Um, I think it originally was right down the middle between the two walls which would be in line with the middle of fourth street And was the water tower originally sitting straddling that line between the two properties I'm interested in seeing that the water tower stays center of fourth street So that visually from railroad square you can see it But it's kind of close to those buildings and the other building for project five or plan plant five It will be really important to know the elevation Wall there and how close that is to the other side of that promenade Okay, so I think that's it. Those are my questions. Thank you Chair Jones carter. We don't have any members of the public participating via zoom just the applicant team Thank you staff would you like to Try and address the question I have a follow-up question It kind of tied to all that To the public comment if that's okay so I was I was looking on google earth And it looks to me like currently the water tower is north of fourth street north of the property line. It's like on the I guess the other lot where you did the lot line adjustment, right? So it's to the north and then I was actually looking at the There's a bunch of trees in the way right currently on fourth street. Are they gone or I can't You can't always trust google street view because you know things change But yeah, there's a bunch of trees along railroad square, right and you can't actually When you look down fourth street also for the rendering You actually don't see the northern Chunk of lot in between the cannery and the sixth street playhouse, right kind of at least from fourth street Is that right am I misunderstanding that? Chair sorry to jump in. I think we still need to close the public comment period Thank you. Thank you We are closing the public comment on item 8.1 But I yeah, do you get my you get my question right it gets tied together in terms of like The view corridor And The photo the photo you guys got a screenshot. It's not quite a straight shot. It's kind of like a oblong kind of shot. I guess We're going to bring up a couple of the Slides here to help Don would you like me to speak to the water tower and future for plant five or would you like to? Um I'm I can just say that you know, we understand the importance of the water tower, but we don't have any plants yet for plant five. Um, we were trying to avoid Putting the tower directly in the middle of the public promenade because we We didn't think folks everyone would want to walk under it So, I mean, there's a lot left to this sign and michelle you can take over from from here I think you understand where we are Yeah, and um, thank you don't I think uh You'll like this bit of history that the lot line Well, what you're looking at right now when you look at the um to the left of the slide the white edge of the building there um The brick wall wraps around the corner at the top And then just below that where is now our entrance. That's where the plant five building used to connect So the property line hugged the edge of the building and then On the creek side of plant five. Yeah, like right where your cursor is amy. Thank you or susie In that vicinity was where the water tower had been back by kind of the uh, yeah, right in a little south of there Or west of there and toward the creek. So it had been on the plant five parcel Yeah, kind of toward that edge of the building Um The point being that it's now The property line has shifted to the opposite side of that Um pedestrian pathway so that it could all be part of this project but um But the water tower is not in this project because it had vested with the plant by site and and then frankly Nobody it's awkward to talk about money, but it's it's worth noting as decision makers that besides Um writing off million several million dollars worth of site and cleanup that had not been known about at the time of acquisition Groundwater and soil remediation and Few big huge tank extractions and other things Those walls cost about five million dollars by the time they were um Maintained Tied back designed around and so forth So keeping those walls was a very expensive venture and ultimately Um Don I I'll just speak to this because of the sound issues, but the cost per unit is is almost $750,000 a unit It's an expense and it's not fancy. It's wonderful It's it's it's wonderful, but it's expensive And so the water tower which is a sizable structure Which needs to be done properly in terms of restoration That also is a very big expense the fact that that happened to tide to plant five In historic context is a blessing because it would we wouldn't we wouldn't have a project if that had to be paid for also right now so So just something to know as you're looking at projects and how they come forward and what what's entailed um It is a beloved element by The project team and so to answer i'm sorry to answer the question plant five is owned by the same group that owned the cannery projects or Maybe there's some legal constructs, but it's the same people and john stewart was the Real um visionary leader of it all and the water tower is beloved by him And so it will it will be protected and preserved But the good news is there is room In time to talk about exactly where that should go You know, maybe exactly what goes on it. Um, I don't think john would want his picture on it But what it is is a is a community asset In a way that there's room to talk about So let's see if we got all those questions. Um, the property line, um, plant five Plan is is getting away way yet to be determined I think I think those are the questions Yeah, I think I mean to to just I think wrap this up what I would what I was trying to look at is You know fourth street and the proposed a street, right? They're not They're really not going to be orthogonal to one another Right, thank you. They'll be close, but they're they're going to be a little Yeah, nothing's plum. Yeah, nothing's exactly exactly. Yeah, nothing's going to be exactly where fagin with one another. So it's I think to your point As you finish this project the cannery project and as you move on to the you know the next project it's going to take some Adjusting and monkeying to find the best spot for it that works from a context perspective Financial perspective right because when the plant five site eventually does get designed or whatever It may Not work where it is. It may not work where you guys kind of have a plan now It may not tie into the promenade, you know all that kind of stuff You're not going to know until like you kind of live in it a little bit Yeah, um an earlier plan At one point this development team was also the developer of the smart site That changed along the way, but in those Pretty popular plans The water tower had been brought for is still on the fourth street access But it was closer to the rail line And more visible because it is a challenge when it's if plant five becomes You know a taller building with housing is back up at the same the same concern and it may be dwarfed It may be an impediment to you know comfortable views of the residents all sorts of things So maybe it belongs on the smart site. We're we're here to share It's just what works best for the kind of district vision And you're exactly right. We know we saw Adam do you remember when that was when we saw the smart site the master plan for the smart site? It was like a year ago a year and a half ago Yeah, and like but there's a new different developer for the smart site, which then has I think their plans call for I think four buildings five buildings of housing plus a promenade that would potentially connect to yours plus You know interconnectivity to the both the you know the public Sorry the smart train station plus a connection to The trail to get into the trail way. I mean, so there's a lot of kind of elements here Both competing and working for each other at the same time And I think that's That's the challenges So, you know, you guys are the first domino right in many ways And so you're going to set the precedent for the development of the surrounding properties And then the then they're going to key off on you and what was done and then You know, you may not even know the site for that water town till that's all kind of landed in many ways So, yeah, that's that's I think that's important context to think about too for members of the public to know like if if you didn't know that There's development plan for the smart site Then then you'd be like it's kind of it lacks context not knowing the other pieces Let's see. Does anyone have to a comment to make before we adjourn? We've had discussion questions any comments. I have a comment That's true. Um, yeah, Adam. Sorry That's fine Um, yeah, no my my comment is really just to thank you for for coming and thanking the applicant team. They're off in the ether Usually i'm on the other side of being remote and so it's interesting to hear the disembodied voices Um But uh, just to thank you for for coming and presenting to us and then for also for sticking with this project and and and fighting for decades um to uh to to to see this happen and um, Yeah, it's a it's a it's a it's good to see a quality project come out of this sp35 process too You know with the review as well and so commending staff for um for that process as well Um, I personally yeah, i'm i'm really excited to one see this design and to see that it has been under construction and looking forward to um to the future and just really expressing thanks um for Giving us this context giving um multiple public meetings for the public being responsive to so um Thanks very much for that and i'm really excited to see this happen Anyone else? I just i had a comment about the the architecture Um, I remember seeing this in the press democrat and it had a totally different color scheme and I had a small panic attack um to see the new color scheme I i really um I want to commend the project team for making that shift um because I think the palette here is much more contextual not only to the The relationship to the other elements within railroad square um What's so unique about railroad square is that it it kind of is the only place in santa rosa that has Lots of brick lots of masonry. There's the hotel la rose or whatever. That's a total masonry building big You know granite stones and stuff. So it's really nice to see um the shift So I want to commend the architect for I think Either hearing from somebody or making the decision on their own to shift the palette to really meld Much better. I I I think the colors are bold and and inviting and interesting and unique. It's uh It's it's it's definitely uh Going to fit in line with some of the other projects that are either almost completed or Soon to be constructed in terms of like Some really unique and iconic architecture that is not your kind of standard Garden apartment And I think that's what's really special about these kind of these projects that are happening downtown Like uh, what are 420 mendicino? Which is a david baker projects kind of have like core 10 steel on it another kind of random stuff Of course, Dave baker and then there's the tlcd project on uh four of four street That um has yellow and gray and some other kind of really nice colors So and I think this will fit within that context because it's Bold architecturally but in a way that fits and that so I appreciate that so thank you No other comments Well, thank you very much for the presentation I enjoyed it and anytime we can get some affordable housing done. I'm really excited to uh see that happen and with that This meeting of the design review board is now adjourned Thank you very much


My name is Dave Ripplinger, a Bioenergy Economic Specialist with NDSU Extension. Welcome to our December edition of the Agricultural Market Situation Outlook webinar. Again, we've been doing this monthly since COVID-19 hit in March of 2020. I have a series of presentations that actually have quite a few today. One thing to note, Frayn Olson will have to leave us. So if you have any questions for Frayn, please share them as he's talking and we'll try to get to those before he has to leave us. But with that, I'd like to turn it over to Brian Parman, our first speaker for today. Hey, thank you, Dave. And, yeah, I guess this is going to be our last presentation of the year of these Situation and Outlook webinars. So thanks for everyone for joining us. And I know there's a lot of stuff going on as far as production costs. And I've covered those in previous webinars quite a bit. And I'll hit those again as we kick off 2022 and see where we kind of sit with that. But today I kind of wanted to talk a bit more about some of the macro data that's come out recently specifically like today's jobs reports and the inflation data that we're seeing. And, of course, inflation is probably going to have somewhat of an impact on production costs as well. So my first slide shows that inflation number that just came out last month from the previous month. And this number basically says there was a, for all prices or all goods, 6.2% inflation over the 12-month period ending in October, ending at the end of October. So information coming out after that. And all items except food or energy rose 4.6%, which is the largest increase, the largest price increase since August of 1991. So almost 30 years. So one of the biggest 12-month period of inflation in about 30 years. And speaking of food and energy, my next slide shows what food prices actually did for that 12-month period. And they were up 5.3%, which is a fairly high jump, but actually lower than the overall inflation rate, which was a 6.2%. And my next slide shows why that is, and that's because energy prices. Energy prices over that 12-month period were up 30%. So, again, overall inflation, 6.2%, core inflation, as they call it, was 4.6%, which excludes food and energy because of the volatility in those two items. But energy prices have just been really high over that period. And as well as other items, it's just energy at 30% kind of dwarfs everything else. So that's been the key driver of some of the inflation. And I think everyone's well aware of that. But the fact is it's just been a long year as far as prices and their march upward. And I'll be talking probably later on at the beginning of the year or January-February timeframe on perhaps some inflationary impacts on production costs. The other report that came out, and this came out just this morning, is initial jobless claims down to 184,000. And so I'm showing this chart from the St. Louis Federal Reserve. And what it shows is initial jobless claims. And those typically had hung around historically 200, 250,000 on the low end. But 184,000 is the lowest it's been since the 1960s, actually. So a very low initial jobless claims report. And when you consider that when the pandemic hit, it was close to 6, 7 million initial jobless claims in a week, that's a very low number. And then my next slide, you know, shows the continuous jobless claims. So you got initial jobless claims, which are newly filing for unemployment. Continuous claims are people who are having trouble finding a job for several weeks and they continue applying for it. And that's right around 1.9 million people, which is just just above pre-pandemic levels, which were, you know, closer to 1.7, 1.8. So that's getting back down to where it was pre-pandemic as well. And unemployment overall has fallen to about 4.2 percent, according to the BLS. That's the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which is approaching that pre-pandemic level of just below 4 percent, it was around 3.8 or so. So as far as the metrics of employment and unemployment, those numbers are basically reflecting where we were prior to COVID, that those numbers most folks are pretty satisfied with. Well, my next slide kind of puts all, brings into focus exactly what we're thinking about and concerned about. And I know that consumers are concerned about is, how long is this inflation situation that we're in going to linger? I mean, because it basically has for a year. And, you know, the question is, will the Fed need to take action? And I put in parentheses the word sooner because they already have said they're going to be tapering and maybe accelerate the tapering of the quantitative easing that they've been doing. But if this inflation rate persists, if we just keep seeing these inflation numbers hang around, is the Fed going to take action? Or are they kind of laying it at the feet of supply chain issues, driving higher prices up? Or do they think monetary policy is going to be necessary? And then the other question, when you think about interest rates, okay? Inflation, a lot of times, if you think about interest, it has to stay higher than the rate of inflation in order for anyone doing any lending to actually make any money outside of the fees. I mean, you got the fees, but then you have the interest rate as well. And if inflation, let's say is 7, 8, 9% per year and the interest rates 2% per year by the end of a 10-year loan, I'm paying back with dollars that are worth significantly less than I borrowed them for at an interest rate below the inflation rate. So I guess that's a question going into this. Is there going to be any changes in interest rates? Because right now, they stay fairly low. And is the Fed going to take any action? And then the other question is on the employer side. Because we just saw that unemployment is very low. So we've got all these open jobs right now. But for the most part, folks have filled them, who wanted them, with this low unemployment rate. So how are employers going to adjust to this great resignation as it's been termed where folks exited the workforce and are maybe not likely to return? Even as wages keep creeping up, are they unlikely to return? I did a talk about this, I believe a few sessions ago, a few webinars ago, on discussing has there been a permanent shift in the labor force? And I think that there has. We had some folks retire who maybe weren't planning to retire due to COVID. And they're not coming back. They figured out how to make it work. And then other folks who went down to single income and exited the workforce to deal with uncertainty of childcare and things like that. And are they coming back? You still go around the city of Fargo, other cities around the nation. In other states, a lot of businesses having trouble filling open jobs. You drive by a lot of the hospitality and food service establishments. And they all say, we're hiring jobs available here, competitive benefits, etc., etc. Doing all they can to incentivize people to apply and it's been slow. And with the unemployment rate fairly low, it begs the question, are there enough workers out there to actually fill these needs? Or are employers going to have to adjust and figure something else out? So those are the questions as far as the macro economy goes that are on my mind headed into 2022 and how essentially just kind of trying to figure out how we're going to basically deal with those two situations is going to be key. So with that, I'll go ahead and turn it over to Frayn Olson, who is our next speaker. So thank you. All right, thank you, Brian. Again, I apologize. I do have another session going on and I'm going to have to leave a little bit early from this one. So as I'm going through, if there are some questions, please feel free to type them into the chat box or the Q&A function and we'll try and get those answered. If not, please here's my contact information. I'd be happy to try and visit with you or send an email and I'll try and answer your questions best I can. So my first slide is just a summary of the supply and demand estimates from today's report. It was actually released at 11 o'clock today. I wanted to compare the results from the report relative to what the trade was expecting. Typically the December report doesn't have a lot of surprises in it. This is also one of those cases where it was a very neutral, I guess on wheat, slightly negative report. So the row on the very top is the average trade estimate from the private analysts and traders that do forecasting. What their average expectation was for the USDA report today. So news agencies like Reuters and Bloomberg will survey these analysts and ask them what do you expect the numbers to be. So we kind of use that as a benchmark to measure against what we actually got. So if we look at the top row highlighted in black, that's what the trade was expecting to see. If you look in the highlighted row on the very bottom in red, that's the numbers we got today. So very little changes. The corn and soybean numbers were unchanged. Basically the left unchanged from the November report. The wheat number, the ending stocks did increase slightly. But again, that was spread out across several different classes of wheat. So not major changes, not major adjustments, but some small refinements. Next slide is actually the same information summarized for the South American production estimates. So as we move forward in time now as we get our US crop kind of in the bin and figure out how many bushels we have. Now attention is really shifting to weather and yield forecasts and production estimates coming out of South America. That combined obviously with the Chinese buying just because they are such large buyers of both US corn and as well as US soybeans. So if we look at what is the trade expecting for yields and more importantly total production coming out of South America, both Argentina and Brazil. The highlighted black row on top provides what the trade was expecting to see. So again, these are private analysts putting together their own information. On the very bottom highlighted in red is the current USDA forecast for South American production. So as you see, you compare the top one with the bottom one.  Again, this is not a surprising number. The reason I'm going to go through this is as we move forward in time, especially as we get into January and February, these numbers are going to become critically important to price movements for not only corn, but also for soybeans. So a couple notes, a couple of things to remember and I'll show you some maps in just a moment. But Brazil has had a very early planting progress. They started the planting season earlier than normal this year and they've had a very rapid planting progress. Okay, so right now most of the most of the private analysts are saying Brazil is basically done planting soybeans. The last report I had was 98, 99% planted. So Brazil is essentially done with their soybeans and their first crop corn. I'll show you some graphics in just a moment. Brazil is about half, I mean Argentina, excuse me, is about halfway through their corn and soybean planting progress. So again, we're a little bit ahead of normal planting, which tends to lead towards expectations of above average yields. As we start looking forward in time, the other numbers I want you to compare would be the blue numbers, the highlighted blue numbers, which was the estimate for last year's production and all of this is in a million metric ton versus the red. So now let's compare the blue versus the red. So last year's production for Argentina as well as Brazilian corn and soybeans were lower than this year's expectation. So both Argentina and Brazil are expected to increase the total available supplies of corn and beans for a couple of different reasons. In Argentina, they had some very heavy drought conditions last year. Their average yields were below normal. Today, the numbers you see out of Argentina are basically using a trend line yield. So they're assuming that we're going to look at the change or shift in planted acreage, apply a trend line yield and what do we think the total production will be. So you can start to compare first Argentina and now more importantly Brazil. And I really want you to look at the Brazilian numbers for corn at about 86 million metric ton last year versus 118 million metric ton this year. Very substantial increase from last year. Again, last year's Brazil corn crop was impacted negatively impacted by some drought conditions later on in the in the season in the growing season, which again reduced their supplies. Well, if Brazil has the kind of crop that people are expecting today, those corn supplies and again a large portion of the Brazilian corn crop is exported and competes against US exports is going to have an impact on the timing and potentially pricing of corn in the global markets. I also want you to focus in and zero in on the production numbers for soybeans. Last year, Brazil had a record soybean crop of 138 million metric ton. The USDA is forecasting 144 million metric ton. Most of the trade analysts that I've read at least looking forward are really projecting between a 140 or a 145. To put that in perspective, this year's crop out of the US, which was basically a record, we tied our old record or slightly exceeded it, was that about 120 or 121 million metric ton. So when you start looking at a six million metric ton increase just out of Brazil alone, and then we add in about another 3 million metric ton increase from Argentina on the soybean side, the globe is going to have plenty of soybeans available if these crops and the crop potential actually is fulfilled. So these numbers, I want to review them quickly, but I want you to start thinking about these numbers and listening as you're listening to the kind of the market analysts and you're listening to the radio reports or reading articles. These are the numbers we're going to be spending a lot of time talking about over the next several months. So my next slide is just provides a map of where our soybeans produced in Brazil. I've shown this before. I just want to refresh your memories. And the reason this becomes important is because as we start talking about weather and weather conditions and soil moisture conditions, we have to realize Brazil is a very large country, just like the United States. So you can have a drought in one area and you can have surplus moisture or flooding in another area and you can have fantastic yields in another area. So think about what happened here in the U.S. where the Western Corn Belt was on the dry side. The Eastern Corn Belt had a fantastic year. We came out with basically an average crop. So you can't just throw the entire Brazilian crop into one big bucket and say, well, this is where we're at. You do have to think about the different growing regions and the different zones. So the darker the green, the more bushels or more tons of soybeans that are produced. You can see kind of in the upper left-hand corner there, Mato Grosso, that's obviously that great big soybean producing state. We spend a lot of time talking about that region. However, the growing region for soybean in Brazil is much larger than that. And what happens in central and southern Brazil is equally as important to what happens in Mato Grosso. So we can't get too focused on one particular area. All right, so on this map, I just want you to geographically notice on the right-hand side, we have that little bubble or bulge out on the side that goes into the Atlantic Ocean. So I want as a reference point, if you take kind of the lower part of that bulge and go straight across, that's kind of the northern end of the growing region for soybeans. Now my next slide shows the exact same thing only for corn. Next slide, please. There we go, that one. So if you look on the right-hand side, if you look at the map on the right-hand side, that's where corn is produced in Brazil. Now that is what's called the second crop or safrina crop of corn. Notice that the corn area and the soybean area I just showed you are very, very similar. So what's happened now in the northern growing regions, they plant soybeans right now, after the harvest of soybeans, they come back and start planting corn. So the increase in corn acreage has primarily been to try and break up some disease problems because of almost growing continuous soybeans for so long. But that's called the second crop or safrina crop. That's not going to be planted until we get into this January, February time period, as the soybeans are being harvested in northern Brazil. So the safrina crop, the second crop, or what they call the winter crop, is about 75% of their total production. So that's really the big crop in volume. If we look on the left-hand side, the map on the left-hand side shows what's called the first crop corn. So this would be like Iowa corn soybeans. You're planting corn and soybeans at the same time and you've got this rotation from year to year to year. Notice that on the first crop, which is about 25% of the production, is towards the southern end of the growing region. So Mata Grosso doesn't have a lot of first crop corn because they're planting soybeans. The reason I'm going through this is the first crop season will be starting harvest about in that January, February time period. So about the time that the corn harvest starts in the south, the corn planting will start in the north. So corn in Brazil is a little more complex. When we think about the corn export season, the ability of Brazil to be able to export corn into the global market, we have these two seasons. And the southern part of Brazil is also where they have these short-line railroads where the feeder system from the farm into an export terminal is relatively short and pretty efficient. So a lot of the first crop corn is harvested and is exported into the international market. The second crop, the map on the right, in particular like in Mata Grosso, a lot of that corn in the northern region stays domestically. That's the corn that's used for internally in the country for their livestock sector and some of their ethanol. So the exports of corn and the corn volumes available are typically in the southern part of Brazil. So we have a first crop where we tend to get a lot of exports. We have the second crop where, again, we can extend that export season a little bit longer because of the corn grown in the south. The corn grown in Mata Grosso typically does not hit an export market just because of the distance that has to be transported. So coming back to weather, when we think about what's going on not only in soybeans, but now also in corn, we have to be very careful about listening to where, what's happening in different parts of the country and how is this going to impact both corn and soybeans? So my next slide is a soil moisture map. Now this is again, satellite imagery taken by NASA. And again, they've tried to ground truth this process that the imagery given the information we have in your US and they extend it to other countries. So the NASA's got satellites that are flying over. They do the satellite imagery for not only rainfall, but also we've Apple transpiration. They make some estimates or calculations of what is the soil moisture for this graphic in the top three meters or top one meter, which is about three feet of soil. So think of that as kind of the root zone. So this is a photo of kind of the entire South America. On my next slide, what I've tried to do is highlight with this little triangle, that black triangle, the major growing region for corn and soybeans in Brazil. So when we, again, talking about weather conditions and about soil moisture conditions, and in particular now about La Nina. So La Nina is the dry spell that we tend to see impacting negatively impacting Southern Brazil and Argentina. If you look at where the red zones are now in Southern Brazil and into Argentina growing region, which I'll show you in a moment, those areas are starting to be on the dry side, but for soybean planting and for corn planting, at least first crop, realize those red zones are areas that are just being seeded or completed seeding. So the growing season really is very, very early. As you all know, from agriculture up here, this is gonna be rainfall through the key reproductive stages later on that's gonna really dictate final yield potential. But this, as we talk about La Nina, the weather conditions and the amount of rain that might come both in Brazil, which is this map, and then the next map, which it would be Argentina, those that I've tried to circle kind of the core growing region in Argentina. We have this mixed bag. There are areas that are starting to turn very dry. People are getting really concerned about emergence and about what this means longer term, but it's only selected regions of their production zone. Some of the core production regions like the North for Montegrosso in Brazil, as well as the Southern regions, as you get closer to the Atlantic Ocean, can help offset some of these drier conditions. So right now, yield expectations have not changed a lot, but the weather and the weather patterns are being watched very, very closely. So with that, I'll finish off and hand things off to Tim, unless there's any questions that come in the next couple of minutes. Okay, good afternoon, everybody. And if there is a question, just go ahead and take a frame, but we go ahead and get going with my presentation on the first slide here. Since I last talked to you a month ago, we've seen really nice improvement in feeder cattle prices and not unexpected because you have to go to the right hand side of that chart you see last year's in purple and then 2019 in green. We have those V's usually in mid-October. And then after mid-October, we see some improvement. And this year, no exception, we hit our lows there in mid-October.  In fact, when I talked to you last time, the previous weekly average was 166 on these 550 to six weight calves. And last week was 180, 44. So they've just been going up seasonally. And a number of reasons for that right away there, but, you know, by mid-October, all of a sudden the big runs hit, the PG checking kind of get over and the calves go to town and they're typically not weaned and all of a sudden big bunches come in. And then the further out we go, then the more they might be weaned and have a little more time away from being a balling calf. And so on many other things, the winter wheat crop, you know, comes on. And so there's winter wheat grazing. So that stimulates demand, particularly in the Southern Plains, but it affects prices all over. And another big thing is that later on here, after the corn belt, I'm talking Iowa and Southern Minnesota feedlots, you know, they grow a lot of corn and they wait to buy calves until they get the combining done. So when the combining gets done by mid-October late in there, they come in and they really, really spark the market particularly in Eastern markets here. West Fargo is closed now, but we'd see that every year, but you go down to Aberdeen and in there, when those farmer feeders hit the seats, the year-round cattle buyers that are buying for the Colorado and Nebraska lots, they kind of have to sit on their hands because those farmer feeders down there are aggressive. They like high quality cattle and they bid. So we saw that, you know, the harvest wrapped up and they're back on the seats, that sparked the market. And yeah, and some bigger things that we're gonna talk about now is that we have fewer numbers. The calf crop has went down for three years and I've got some Canadian issues I'm gonna talk about. And then, you know, the other market classes above them, you know, feeder cattle can go higher if a backgrounded cattle go higher and backgrounded cattle can go higher if the fed cattle. So we're gonna talk about that, but a little bit longer than going to the left-hand side of the chart, you see, we're already up to where we started there in 2018 and we expect better prices, you know, up there throughout the year, better than the last, actually four years that are on the chart now.  So again, our corn crop is gonna be a big thing and that fits into calf prices and change corn 10 cents a bushel, change calf price a dollar in the opposite direction. So like he said, you know, comes as we get closer to spring, things are gonna get volatile on the corn side and the same thing is gonna be on the feeder cattle side, but, you know, it looks like now we'll have even a better year next year. So go to the next slide. Then, you know, calf prices have went up and so how does that fit into backgrounding? And anyway, we've got higher feed than we had last year and we're short of feed. And so maybe some still making the backgrounding decision. So five of us went ahead and put together a backgrounding series of videos and just the website is showing up there. Easiest, I think, just to background, just to Google egg hub, end issue egg hub backgrounding or something and not put in the whole thing. But Brian that just got through talking to, he did budgeting for steers and heifers, different gains. And Jerry Stucker talked about health issues. I did the outlook and some risk management and what LRP is doing and Carl Hoppe did. This year, of course, we're short of hay and but we did have a lot of silage and corn is high price. So Carl talked about other, how do we have a silage ration? For instance, maybe use some DDGs or something and some non-traditional backgrounding and then Zach finished up with a ration. So let's move ahead to the next slide here. Again, on the right hand side, you see now our calf crop has been down three years. So that's supporting prices and into the next year's calf crop, the cow herd has continued to go down with the drought. So we're gonna have fewer calves next year. That's all supportive to prices. So go to the next slide. Another thing that's happening is kind of an interesting for us up here in North Dakota is following Canada because for many years in the fall of the year, some producers were concerned because feeder cattle came down from Canada and competing with our cattle and went to feedlots and so on. But now the cow herd in Canada has continued to go down. Go to the bottom chart there. The dark blue is the US. So yeah, we took numbers quite down for eight years into 2014, but then we expanded back up. And so by 2019, we were the same as 10 years ago on the cycle there in numbers, but the gray is Canada. And you see they were down into 2014, 15 as well. And they just kept on going down. So they got fewer cattle. So now the tide is turned and we're sending feeder cattle up to Canada, 40,000 or more a month and compared to very, very few years ago. And so that's sparking the market here as well because they're buying them at our Northern market. So go to the next slide. Here are the heavier weight cattle. And again, when those prices go up, remember I told you a month ago when I talked to you the average 550 weight prices, there were 166, but now those spring futures, those March, April futures are up there about 170. So for eight weight cattle, so that's actually higher than calf prices were back a month ago. So that helps spark the calf market as well because from our backgrounding then we can actually, we can do a 170 LRP, livestock risk protection or you can do an option or futures, whatever you want to into those months. And so those higher prices brought the calves right along. And then again, longer term, by the time we get to next fall at this time and into the November futures and stuff for next year up there at 180, compared to our 162.35 right now. So we look for better times ahead in the cattle complex. And the thing that's driving these higher 758 prices are fed cattle that we'll go to next then, fed cattle prices are sparking as well. And that means that feedlots can pay more for given keeping corn constant, they can pay more for feeder cattle. And so there again, you've seen these before, but that red line is this year's fed cattle cash price. It's just continued to inch up.  So you see that spark there from down there, 122, 123 to last week, we're over averaging over 140. And so what's important, depends on those heavier weight 800 pound steers are gonna finish in April or so. And so you see April futures there, those orange squares were up there at 142. So that's why we had the prices that we do for those 800 pounders and, you know, fed cattle futures for the entire year until right at the end of the next year, similar to what they are now, but significantly above last year. And so that's, you know, what feedlots can do to lock in prices for fed cattle coming out. So that helps the feeder cattle as well.  So it looks like every year going up. So some of the things, we can go to the next slide, but the things that are helping fed cattle are what Brian just talked about. This is in the macro, the unemployment is going down to levels, people are working, beef is relatively high price. So people have to have jobs, but the market there is positive. And so our domestic demand is strong. And then the other thing is, again, we're doing record export demand. The new numbers for October just came out yesterday. We set an all-time record high for beef and also our competing that I don't have a chart for, but we've got record exports of chicken, pork and beef. And, you know, for the competing meats, if we export them, we don't have to eat it here. So that's all positive. Just so we're going to do record high exports this year on the bottom. One of the reasons for that is the big amount of meat that we're sending into China. And they've went to nothing in the first couple of months of 2020 until we, phase one agreement went in and now there are our third best customer. A lot of reasons for that. And I do have to move along. And there, you know, there are issues there.  And Argentina that frame talks about had high inflation on beef. And so they restricted him exports. And so, you know, this isn't a guarantee that it's going to continue, but that's really helped us out. And anyway, we're going to do record exports. And the prediction for next year is that we will continue to do record exports. But, you know, China just kind of a big drill in the room. And right now the Olympics are coming up and we've decided not to send diplomats. We are going to let the athletes go over there. And so China isn't too happy about that as long with some other countries. And they're strong, arming Taiwan and we're siding with Taiwan.   But as of now, the fed, the cattle market fed cattle on down to calves is, is sparking and doing better. And our expectations giving some catastrophic event is that to continue for the next several years. So with that, we'll go to Ron and talk about some crop insurance. Oh, yeah, there we go. Okay, thank you, Tim. Good afternoon. I just wanted to update you on a few crop insurance changes that came down the pike here just recently. And so my first slide then, basically it's the hanging and grazing area. The USDA RMA is making it permanent this new provision. Now it's permanent until it's changed again, but it's permanent as of now, that allows producers to hay grazer chop cover crops and still receive a prevented planting payment. So the next slide. Now, if you remember last July during the drought, it was concerns that they wanted to, hay or graze some of the prevent plant acres that had cover crops. And in July then, they announced that they could actually do that and still receive 100% of the prevent plant payment. Previously, the old rule was, you could not do anything until after November 1st.  So people really, it kind of prevented people from even doing anything. So this is a permanent change now. They're reacting from the producers. So next slide. It's also recalled that there was a pandemic cover crop program that helped maintain cover crop systems. I think it was a $5 payment. And that was implemented through the RMA, through the crop insurance. Another change, next slide, is the prevent plant four in one requirement. Back in 2020, RMA implemented a policy that land eligible for PP prevent plant, the acreage must have been planted, insured or harvested at least one of the four most recent crop years. They've kind of narrowed that down. There was always some controversy, but they put it in writing a four in one requirement. Now there's some more flexibilities added to that to recognize different farming practices. So the next slide, these are the new flexibilities. So that includes the, if you have annual growth of an insured perennial crop, such as alfalfa or red clover, that would be considered planted. Also, if you have a nap, if you have a crop that's covered under nap, the non-insured crop disaster assistance program, that will meet the eligibility requirement. And also, if neither crop insurance nor nap was available for this crop, but you prove that it was planted and harvested using proper practices for two out of the last four years, then that would meet your requirement. Okay, the last change now then it deals with organics. And there was always some controversy on the different terms being used. So they tried to be consistent and get that terminology right. So there was no confusion within the various programs, organic programs and labeling with USDA. So with that then, also there's a couple of changes. RMA is providing an option for producers to delay measurement of their farm-stored production for 180 days. Okay, they also added earlage and snaplage as an acceptable measurement. If you remember back during that drench show, I think it's always pronounced that big wave of rain that hit Iowa. A lot of people salvage their corn crops by earlage or snaplage. And that was a way of, they allow that as a measurement now. And lastly, I want you to make sure and contact, if you have questions regarding this, make sure and contact your crop insurance agent or FSA to get the further details. So with that, I will turn it over to David. Great, thanks, Ron. Just some brief comments about some developments in the last two days regarding the RFS, again, which mandates biofuel use in the United States. There was an announcement from EPA regarding what the renewable volume obligations for 2020, 2021 and 2022 would be. Those numbers are important because they tell us how much total biofuel needs to be used by different categories. Corresponding with that, there was also an announcement regarding small refinery waivers, which I've talked about recently, and just a little bit of detail. So this is kind of different than what, or the same as Ron had mentioned. So on Tuesday, EPA finalized the numbers for 21 and 22 and revised the final numbers from 2020. So it makes you wonder how final they were. And then it also was raising a question for the industry, are any numbers ever final? 22 has long passed and those numbers were finalized and in the books for quite some time. So the question is, how might those change in the future? I just looking at some of the numbers and the real focus in this is on the corn ethanol numbers. And what we saw was a reduction in 2020, the math you have to do by taking the difference between the total amount of fuel, a total renewable fuel in the advanced biofuel to calculate the conventional biofuel numbers. That's essentially the corn ethanol number. Although there's no mandate, and this is really important, there is no mandate, there's never been a mandate to use corn ethanol in the United States. There's a spot that works relatively well for corn ethanol, but it's not manned by any extent. Anyways, that conventional biofuel pot which corn ethanol typically dominates was reduced from the number of 15 billion gallons which is the same number in the original law, now to 12 and a half billion gallons. So if you think about that, that's a significant number of gallons that won't have to be used or at least have RINs generated for that year. Going forward, the number for this year is less than the mandated or the number in statute that 15 billion. And then going into next year, it does rise back up. This is interesting and kind of continues this practice that we've seen with EPA which is adjusting those numbers to actual use. Again, last year we had COVID, this year we have COVID transportation fuel use, gasoline use went down. And so here we're adjusting those numbers. So you know, I've mentioned it before, often in the last decade is different administrations have tinkered with the policy. The law itself says that you can only change numbers because of economic harm or inadequate supply and supply is not demand. So more liberties taken by EPA this time under the new administration. The good news, there's actually two pieces of good news in this, at the same time as the announcement was made in terms of those numbers being shrunk, the EPA did deny 65 applications for small refinery waivers. So those are waivers by smaller refineries to not have to participate in the program at all based on hardship. There was a number of gallons, you know, billion gallons plus that were part of those potential exemptions. And so this might be a trade between getting rid of those exemptions but also just getting rid of that total requirement. At the same time, USDA did announce that they are awarding $800 million to the industry, to the corn ethanol industry because of COVID-19. This is something that was actually part of the March stimulus bill. And it finally came out, you know, the checks will be out shortly, again, responding to those losses. And then finally, we're ready for some questions. Again, if you'd like to use the chat feature or the Q and A feature, that would be great. And I actually have a question for Tim. You may not know Tim, but there's a new Guinness, Book of World Records record. The largest vegan burger ever was cooked in Ireland, in Northern Ireland this week. And so my question for you is, what did they do with the ham, with the burger, not hamburger, a vegan burger? What did they do with it when they were done? They threw it out. No, they gave it to homeless people who they threw it out. Interesting. All right, it looks like we do have, oh, it's just a thank you for the information, which is appreciated as well. Are there any questions for any of the panelists? I would mention one thing too, with Brian's talk, we're actually interviewing for a new macro economist to serve on the faculty in our department. And I had a conversation with one of the candidates earlier today. He happens to be from another country originally. And I just asked him about inflation, what do you thought could happen? One of the things he didn't bring up that could happen is that we may just have new expectations for what inflation is. So a lot of the thought is it's gonna go back to what it was some day, somehow. The other possibility is that inflation, just the expected rate of inflation becomes 4%. I thought that was an interesting comment. As it appears, there's no questions that any of the other panelists have any questions or comments for anyone else. If not, I wanna thank everybody for joining. We'll be back next month after the next WASDE report. So I hope you can join us then. You should be able to find a recording of this webinar and the slides on the URL on the screen, as well as those from previous webinars. With that, I wanna wish everybody happy holidays and I hope you have a safe, enjoyable Christmas season. Thanks.


Good afternoon everyone, this is Melissa with thestockswish.com, thought I would do a market review here today. Nice beautiful bullish market here following through, Target for the Spy is $196 and actually I think we're almost out there, yeah, $0.10 away. And I did feel the market would have a nice strong big green bar one day this week. I actually don't think today is it. It's looking like it could try to do it today. It's early enough. It's $11.30. But I think we're going to close the day with a medium body, green body, medium or small. I don't think today is going to be the monster green day, but who knows, it could, anything's possible. Beautiful buying is coming into this market. I called this market very well and it is rallying and it is higher. And actually I saw it here in this charts this morning that the Target for the Spy is $200. It's $200 and my call is that we get there and we get there in the next week. So whenever that happens, again I don't know, I get up every morning and look at the gaps, but I did talk about this gap in the market today. In fact, let's go over it and I said it was very bullish. Market actually was gapping down a little bit this morning, but I called it neutral. It was a neutral gap in the market which was bullish. That's how I read it. It was a good read in the market. The market's been rallying ever since this morning. It came in a very little bit here, very aggressively early in the morning. You could have bought the market and it was on the one minute chart. Let's go here and here was the buy. Right in here immediately. You could have bought the market long this morning if you did, you're in it. That was the low of the day in the market. Right into the open. A lot of people get confused because they're not sure what to do when the market looks like this, but it's a long. What do you do when you play something bullishly? I only play gaps, but if I play gaps, which is what I do and if I like to go long bullish gaps, which I prefer shorts, but I would take the entries on the bullish gaps. I would just take the entries on the bullish gaps and I'd look at the gap and read the gap and that's what I've been doing to determine what to do. You could have gone long any one of these gaps in here in the spy. They are all continuation gaps that are falling through higher. People keep making attempts to think that this market is going to make a top or come in short, but you can see here how it's a nice rally and it's falling through and we will get to 200. I thought the market would be bullish all year. I think the market is going to hit some big numbers here this year that are unexpected for people and again it's so, so important not to try to determine when you think a move is over. There was no reason to think the move in the market was over here back in the earlier this year in February March. Market was definitely, definitely higher. Could have come in more before it ran higher, but didn't want to do it. Again, another show of strength, a tower of strength that's happening here. So when I read the gap today I thought it was bullish. How we close here, I don't know exactly, but we will close with a green body. If we end up having a monster green body today, we could gap right up to 200 overnight tonight since tomorrow. However, I think that we're not going to hit that 200 number until Wednesday, Thursday this week. It's going to be before Friday, I think. I day trade, so I get up and I read things in live time in the pre-market and the gaps into the open of how they trade and I see things in live time. And I go to reading price in live time, which is how I've called this very well. So I can't really predict too far out what something's going to do, but the spy will hit 200 in the next week. That I see happening, I saw it this morning. And also, you could have gone along this market here. If you did, and the market hits 200, that was a $10 move. And many people don't understand how to really trade gas. But this was a very bullish, good gap, a quality high, we rated gap here in the spy. They could have gone long, and if you did, you're up. And even here, people were running to short this market. It's so many different places. And eventually, what's going to happen is I think people will give up on, keep shorting this, but probably not. The more strong and extended bullishly the market gets, people still can't believe it sometimes and think that it's extended and then want to do the opposite to try to make money. But the way to make money is to play with the trend, and that means go long. That means go long. The answer is to go long here. You go long the market, okay? And there were plenty of opportunities to do so. There's even opportunities this morning to do so, aggressive. But if you saw the market was going to be bullish today, you could have bought the market in a set up aggressively in the morning. And you could go long here, any set up that happens in the market today. I believe that this uptrend here holds today. Although it's late, best entry was in the morning. Best entry is always in the morning on the gap tree. That's why I like to trade out of the game between 9.30 and 10. So nice extension here in the market. Target is $200 for the spy and it will get there sooner rather than later. And my call is that that happens actually this week. We'll be very surprising for a lot of people that thought that this market was coming in or seeing a top or was going to struggle with the bullishness. And a week ago today, I did a webinar where I talked about Jim Cramer's call on mad money that the market was going to struggle last week with this bullish moves and struggle and where we near the highs. And I said, no, we're strong, we're higher. I've called this market extremely well. You can learn how to trade from me because I trade gaps well and I reprice well. And that's why I teach a class that people are taking and coming and paying me to do because they're learning how to trade from me. Learning how to read stocks and the market in order to be able to take trades to predict moves before they happen. It's very easy to say now that this market's higher here. Back where I was calling it, not so easy. Particularly because a lot of people weren't even calling it that way. I was one of the few people that was continually calling this market higher and now I'm telling you it's going to hit 200. So the reality is when I look at the gap every morning do you see it? But I think there's a lot going on in here now. And the people that were trying to short this now may have given up on the shorts, but probably not everybody. People will come back in here, try to make another attempt if it closes with a topping. Taylor does anything where it looks like it's reached an extension. But I really think we just get right up to that $200 number. I'm not saying we have it right up there in a series of green gains. We could have a rest day in between there. That's what I'm saying, possibly Thursday. Or we could even do it in a gap. We could even do it in a gap. But there is nothing but blue skies ahead for this market here for this year. And here we're going to hit over $196 today. Really nice. So one of the days we're going to have a big, big, strong, stretchy green bar. I don't know when. I don't think it's today. But who knows? It could be today. $196 is the target for today, which is going to get to in $0.10. And really I'm just looking for the $200 number sometime in the next week. So if you learn how to trade gaps, you will not make the mistake of predicting tops and bottoms in charts for trades. You'll feel very comfortable and confident in actually taking a gap trade and actually taking something like the market long in a position, in a long that you think you wouldn't normally do because you don't understand this. If you have a comprehension of gaps, you'll understand the power and the meaning behind this thing here. Doesn't look like much, but it is very powerful and you can see it. And all the other gaps that have happened that are good quality bullish gaps and you will not have any fear or issues or question yourself and you'll have conviction to take a bullish entry here. When you don't understand gaps, you're not sure what to do. And then you look at the overall trends or higher highs and higher lows and pivots and you're looking at many, many different things that actually aren't the right things to look at. Gaps tell you what the stocks or the markets going to do in the moment that they happen, whether the quality of the gap is poor or high, you make a determination. If it's a high quality gap, it's bullish or bearish, you go the direction of the gap. If it's a poor quality gap, bullish or bearish, then you just don't trade it. But it's very important to understand these gaps and how they work. It's the reason I've called the market well, and I think it just needs to do its own thing here now. Anybody that's long any core stocks here, let them ride on out. You can keep riding them on out here, all right? Get as much as you can at this market move here with this push, because it's going to help everything that's strong. And there's some charts that are getting really nice lists, which I talked about in here. I'm going to talk about it in here. I said, stay with any of your core lungs in here. This market's higher. It's going to make a new high. It's exactly what it did as continuing to do it. Nice market rally here. Really good call by a stock swished by me, Melissa Armo, in this market. Markets not struggling going higher at all.  Very comfortably, very easily, with beautiful positions in it. And you just carry it on through. So we'll get up tomorrow morning. We'll look at the gap in the spy and see where it does. And I'll look and see how it closes tonight. But $200 is the next target for the spy. It's not the dream target. This is actually a realistic target in this market now. And I think it happens sooner rather than later. So have a great day, everyone. The next golden gap class is June 21st and 22nd. I added a second class this month because the price of the class is increasing as of July 1st. And some people emailed me they wanted to do it too late to sign up for this weekend. So I have preregistered and so ready for the 21st and 22nd if you want to do the class before the price goes up in July 1st. And actually it's a good time to do at the end of this month in June because earnings season starts in July. So you'll learn the information to rate the gaps in the class in June to start out trading when all the earnings come out in third quarter at the beginning of July, first week of July. And then you can join the live trading room to be in the room with me to get the trades. So nice call here in the market. Follow it through long today. I wouldn't be in any shorts today unless something's crazy, crazy, crazy weak. And even then I really wouldn't be in anything. Just let this market rally this afternoon and do its thing wherever it goes. It'll hit up over 196 and then wherever closes today. Although I don't think today is the big stretch day. However, it's very early. I will say that. And anything's possible in a market that's continuing in its own direction of its own accord with lots of power and that's what's happening here. And that's why you don't trade against it and that's why you just go with it. And go with the flow. Go with the flow of stocks in the market. This is Melissa with the stockswush.com. Have a great day everybody. If you're interested in signing up for the next Golden Gap class out of the class for June, June 21st and 22nd, email me and Melissa at the stockswush.com. Thanks everybody, have a great day.


Classroom in 2019 – How Technologies Influence Teaching Technologies are constantly evolving and improving. There are literally dozens of new technologies that can be applied to the modern classroom in 2019 that have not yet made their way into mainstream usage. New tech changes the way subjects are taught, how students learn and the way teachers and students communicate with each other. Developing from new types of interactive whiteboards, classroom response systems, use of social media, tablet computers and classroom websites to the more exotic and potentially cost prohibitive texts such as augmented reality, R, virtual reality VR or even holographic projectors are commercially available for use in the classroom. Students in ancient Babylonia and Samaria inscribed their lessons on clay tablets with a stylus, bread a scissor to the pen and pencil, in cuneiform writing. These could be used wet then erase to be used again or baked to create a permanent document. In India in the 11th century, teachers used something similar to personal blackboards in their lessons. By 1801, the rather obvious solution to the problem made its debut. James Pillins, headmaster and geography teacher at the old high school in Edinburgh, Scotland, is credited with inventing the first modern blackboard when he hung a large piece of slate on the classroom wall. Blackboard Although still used in older schools, the venerable blackboard is becoming a bit long in the tooth in 2019. Once an instrument central to the modern classroom, the blackboard started to be replaced in the 1980s by the whiteboard a less messy and easier to maintain solution, which by the 2000s has begun to see it's the replacement by the interactive whiteboard. In 2019, the expensive but amazing Microsoft Surface Hub 2 offers an 84-inch high definition HD display that serves as an interactive whiteboard with HD video conferencing capabilities built in. It uses the popular Windows 10 operating system. The instructors in class notes can be instantly streamed to a class website or to a student's portable device and stored for future reference. PC The tablet PC in its modern form has been around for about 10 years. It is generally defined as a mobile device with an operating system, a touchscreen display, and a rechargeable battery. Early Wi-Fi or cellular connectivity is incorporated. The introduction of Apple's iPad push tablets into the mainstream but its usage in the classroom is still developing. I think the tablet PC stands out as a potentially revolutionary educational tool that may conceivably achieve mass adoption. It is especially useful in underprivileged areas of industrialized nations or in developing countries where access to high quality, low-cost learning material is not available. The continued decrease in cost should make ubiquity in the classroom possible. The use cases are abundant and diverse. Interactivity is rich. Connectivity between teacher, students and when applicable, the students' parents can be higher than ever before. No more outdated textbooks, the need for notebooks or the pencil sharpener. Most class teaching materials can be made available to everybody. Soft and Apps Just a sample of the top-free or low-cost education-based software apps available for the iPad in 2019 include Epic, a library of digital books, intended for kids under age 12 or under, which boasts unlimited access to 25,000 high-quality e-books, audio books, learning videos, and quizzes, Kids Academy more than 13,000 educational games designed to teach your child in a fun way, endless numbers and app designed to teach children numeracy including number recognition, sequences, quantity, numerical patterns, and simple addition. Similar apps are available for the Android operating system. One of my favorite new educational tools for language learning that I use on my Android tablet PC is called Duolingo. It is free of cost and designed for learners of all levels. As of January 2019, the language learning website and app offer 85 different language courses in 24 languages. The app has about 300 million registered users across the world. Wikipedia 2019 The number of educational resources and software applications available for the tablet PC are numerous, often free or low-cost and will continue to grow in number for the foreseeable future. R and VR Two technologies for the classroom not likely to achieve mass adoption anytime soon, augmented reality R and virtual reality VR have great potential for teaching. Virtual reality R is an interactive experience of a real-world environment where the objects that reside in the real world are augmented by computer-generated perceptual information, sometimes across multiple sensory modalities, including visual, auditory, haptic, somatosensory, and off-factory. Virtual reality VR is an interactive computer-generated experience taking place within a simulated environment. It incorporates mainly auditory and visual feedback, but may also allow other types of sensory feedback. This immersive environment can be similar to the real world or it can be fantastical. Unfortunately, they will generally require the use of specialized tech similar to Microsoft's excellent HoloLens 2RI wear $3,500 or Oculus Rift VR headsets, $350, which are too expensive for most schools. The prices especially VR headsets, are coming down but the software is not yet prevalent and it may be some time before these revolutionary tools can be used by everyone. Are you ready to implement new technologies in your classroom? Some of the more interesting and engaging technologies for the classroom may not be practical or affordable just yet but hopefully, trends in education will facilitate the implementation of currently available, clearly useful, free or somewhat affordable technologies not in widespread use today. Speak with an ITTT advisor today to put together your personal plan for teaching English abroad. Send us an email or call us toll free at 1-800-490-0531 to speak with an ITTT advisor today.


Listener Chuck shares yet another one that I did not know He says How many times have Mac users had an app store flag that an upgrade was available? Probably substantially fewer than iPhone apt updates, but he says So there's his fish shake. Yeah, you got to hit command R when you go into the app store and go to the updates tab Hit command R. It is a web browser. Yeah.  That's one. That's right. Yep Yeah, you hit command R and it will refresh like it would on a web page and you will see all of the ones that aren't there I have to credit Someone told us about the command R but we wouldn't have even learned about it if I hadn't ranted about it because Mac updater will show that there are updates that the app store is not showing and We talked about that on the show and then it was somebody was like, yeah, just hit command R and boom that that's when they all show up So anyway, you hit command R and it solves that problem. I'm glad I read Chuck's rant Otherwise see we wouldn't have had this extra tip to share But he says during today's garage band update my cursor accidentally hovered over that little progress circle and it shows the why the the data transfer speed in real time of The update coming down in megabytes per second It shows how many bytes have been downloaded and the speed at which they are currently coming down So you can see if there's if it's stuck, you know, some updates are huge, right? You know like Xcode or something it right and if you hover over that little circle you actually get more information That who that's two. That's two. Yep. Same. I'm gonna be done by 815 Yeah, usually we finish quick tips and I'm like I've hit my quota Maybe maybe Yeah, I know just that too. I'm like when did this start happening? But thanks for pointing it out. Yeah. Yeah, no, it's good. That's very cool Yeah, maybe maybe you will have to raise the the number from five. I mean we started with three Several years ago. We got we went to four briefly and now we're at five quick five things that you're gonna learn Maybe we have to raise the number. Well, you have to give us a break cuz those were tough years in there The four year was tough. That was a tough year. That's right. Yeah You