good evening, everyone. Good evening, everyone. Yeah, I'm speaking to everyone. And welcome to our City Council session of January 17th, 2017. At this time, we will have a moment of silent meditation. I will certainly ask that you reflect on this past weekend and those values of virtues that you've taken from the activities that you attended. Thank you. Mr. Davids, would you please lead us in the pledge of allegiance of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, the physical, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, sir. Madam Clerk, would you call the roll? Yes. Mayor Bill has an excused absence. Mayor Pro Tem Cole McFadden present. Council Member Davis, Council Member Johnson, Council Member Moffitt, Council Member Reese, and Council Member Scholl. Ceremonial item tonight and it is the Neighborhood Spotlight. So if Mr. James Clark could join me, if his village is with him tonight, would you please join him? Let me just share a little bit about the program. The purpose of the program is to recognize residents who have gone above and beyond the call of duty to improve our communities. And so this is a resident who we're grateful to have in Durham and we will present to you a certificate and let me just, and it reads James Clark is recipient of the Neighborhood Spotlight for the month of January 2017. The Neighborhood Spotlight Award recognizes community members that have gone above and beyond and volunteering their time to serve the community. This month, James Clark, I've said your name several times now, a resident of Autumn Woods, of Woodcroft neighborhood was nominated and selected because of the wonderful work he has done in his neighborhood, including but not limited to keeping neighborhood residents informed about PAC 3 and city activities, promoting education, awareness and reporting of suspicious activity, monitoring American tobacco trail to ensure a safer experience for visitors. Congratulations, Mr. Clark, on being the January Neighbor Spotlight for the city of Durham and thank you for all the work you do to improve our Durham community. Come up and so we can get a picture. Is there a photographer here? Oh, you're the photographer. Okay, come on. You need to be. Now, there are announcements by my colleagues on the city council. Mr. Shwell, Mr. Moffitt. Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I do have one announcement. I wanted to make our residents of Durham aware of a new program for Durham renters who aspire to become homeowners. This is a program that has recently been announced and it's called Neighborhood Lift. And what the program does, it provides down payment assistance of up to $7,500 to eligible applicants and eligibility includes a couple of things. One is people must be at or below 80 percent of the area median income. And there is a partial matching requirement and home ownership counseling is also required. There's about $4 million in this neighborhood lift funding that's available in Wake and Durham counties. And this was just announced recently. The mayor was actually part of that announcement at a press conference. And we need to be encouraging Durham residents to apply. The first day, the first announcement already created over 500 people who've been interested. Of course, not everyone who applies will be eligible. But it's really important that we have Durham people who are applying for these funds so that we can make sure that some of this money does come to Durham and not just to Wake. There's a website that if you are watching today, you can go to and it's DHIC. It stands for Downtown Housing Investment Corporation, but it's DHIC.org. And I encourage any Durham renter who is interested in being a homeowner and feels like that they are eligible to go to that website. And we have already spoken to Beverly and we hope that the city and the county will be using our resources to push this message out as well. So that's all. Madam Mayor Pro Tem, thank you. Is this through a bank or what is the entity? The entity. So the money comes from a settlement with a bank and it's going through NeighborWorks, which is a national organization. And then locally it's going through DHIC. Thank you. Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I just wanted to note that on Saturday, I was invited to a meeting of people in the community along with, I know in attendance was our colleague Steve Schull, as well as county commissioners Heidi Carter. Thank you. I just blanked out and Wendy Jacobs. And there were 28 people there. It was one of the most diverse groups I've been in. People from all over Durham, various ethnic backgrounds, various ages, young, old, my age, genders across the board. Everybody was focused on the issue of the rising rate of violent crime in Durham. But they were particularly focused on finding solutions. And it was organized by a woman named Robin Cooper. And I just wanted to give a shout out to Ms. Cooper, to the people who spent Saturday afternoon in this meeting and to people like them who are working on solutions here in the city of Durham.  Thank you. Priority items by the city manager. Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. Members of Council, good evening, everyone. No priority items. Thank you, sir. Mr. City Attorney. Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. No priority items. And Madam City Clerk. No items. At this time, I will go through the consent agenda. These items have been discussed and represent pretty much a consensus of council. But if there's an item that someone would like to pull, we can feel free to do that. And the consent agenda is as follows. Item two, Firefighters Relief Fund Board of Trustees Appointment. Item three, home written agreement, community partners, long pool between the city of Durham and North Carolina Housing Finance Agency. Item four, into local agreement with the North Carolina Department of Transportation and the city of Raleigh for the NC 98 CARTA study. Item five, amendment number one to Central Park Waterline Replacement Project. Item six, professional engineering services for phase two, sanitary sewer flow monitoring and inflow, infiltration reduction evaluation. Item seven, selection of systems integrator for the now North and South Durham Water Reclamation Facilities Process Improvements Project. Item eight, amendment to professional services contract with alert, is that Alert and Associates Network and Division Inc. for security improvements implementation at priority sites. Item nine, sewer only extension agreement to serve 8405 NC Highway 751. Item 10, Ravenstone and Stone Hill Estates Paving 2017 ST-278 contract award. Item 11, managed network security and services service contract. Items 12 through 15 or items that can be found on the general business agenda, public hearings. I will honor a motion to accept the consent agenda as outlined. Are there cards? Madam clerk, will you open the vote? Close the vote. Thank you. It passes 6-0. Thank you. Item 12 is as follows. Zoning map change 108 Celeste Circle II. Is there a staff report from the administration? Thank you, sir. Good evening. I'm Kyle Tate with the planning department and I can affirm that all illegal notices have been executed in accordance with local and state law and affidavits and such are on file in the planning department. Zoning case Z160006 108 Celeste Circle II is a zoning map change request for .46 acres. The subject site is presently zoned residential suburban 20 with a future land use designation of design district and is located within the compact neighborhood tier. The applicant proposes a zoning designation of planned office of office and institutional with a development plan. The pro plan, the development plan associated with this request graphically commits to the following general location of access points, location of parking envelope, size and location of building of the size and location of project boundary buffers. Tech commitments have been proffered. A complete list of these tech commitments can be found in the staff report or on the cover page of the development plan. A few of the proffered commitments will require that the driveway access to the property will be limited to the southeastern corner of the site. The proposed use will be a surface parking lot. Stormwater runoff will be controlled up to the 100 year storm about 25 additional 35 inch tall evergreen house beyond what is required by the LDO will be planted. Planning commission recommended approval by a vote of 11 to zero on November 1, 2016. Staff terms of this request meets the UDO standards for transit supported development at build out. While this request is not consistent with the future land use map of the conference plan, it is consistent with the spirit and intent of the comprehensive plan. Which provides an ultimate future vision for this area. However, unlike the comprehensive plan, the UDO recognizes the need for interim development to occur in the compact neighborhoods by allowing zoning districts such as OI to be utilized until such a time that the compact design zoning district can be implemented. Staff has determined this request is compliant because one, the application was submitted prior to the adoption of the staff initiated comprehensive plan updates regarding compact neighborhood tiers in design districts land use standards. Two, the UDO parking regulation regulates that will apply to this committed parking lot, develop are governed by the tier and are the same regardless of the zoning district. Three, the OI zoning is an allowable zoning in the compact neighborhood tier per UDO section 4.1.1A and four, the proposed office use is permitted in the compact neighborhood tier district. Thank you and staff is available for any questions. Thank you. I have one person who has signed up and that's Dan Jewel, a proponent. Dan, you have three minutes. Thank you and good evening. Mayor Pro Tem and members of the council. I am Dan Jewel of Coulter Jewel Thames, Landscape Architecture and Civil Engineering firm here in Durham. We've been asked by the partners of Central Dermatology to help this with this application and say a few words here tonight. We are here with a substantially different proposal than what you saw two years ago. Central Dermatology is the applicant rather than previously it was University of North Carolina. They are simply looking for more parking for their business, not for the center in general. You may or may not know they were actually the first medical facility to locate down at that corner almost 20 years ago now. They had no parking problems at that time but since then UNC has moved many more medical facilities into that area creating a parking problem for the neighborhood even to the point where sometimes Central Dermatology's patients can't find a parking place because other folks are parking in their parking lot. We met with the neighbors earlier last year. We heard what they didn't like about the previous proposal and we made all those changes to the plan. Kyle went over a few of those but specifically the previous plan actually had a driveway off of Celeste Circle because Central Dermatology controls the property next to it. Their entrance will actually be from the neighboring property so there will be no impact to Celeste Circle. The previous application was requesting a stream buffer variance to impact a stream buffer. We are no longer requesting that. We are committing to saving trees and buffers where the previous application did not and we are also committing to providing a security gate so that when the last person with Central Dermatology leaves at night they will close up that parking lot so that any concern about folks who don't need to be in that parking lot hanging out there will be alleviated. And of course the big concern that folks in that neighborhood have out there is stormwater runoff. They've had issues for years and years so we are committing to managing the stormwater to a hundred year storm which is kind of unprecedented for most projects that I am aware of. So for these and other reasons we would ask your approval of this application tonight following the steps of the planning commission which gave us a unanimous eleven to nothing recommendation for approval along with some very fine comments. I also want to point out that the day or two prior to the planning commission meeting actually received an email from Chris Selby who is actually listed as the last president of the Eastwood Lake Neighborhood Association over there and Mr. Selby said Dan your clients have done a good job of listening to the neighbors. So we don't have an issue now with the project as you've proposed it. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. Thank you. Are there any other person to like to speak on this item. If not I will close the public hearing and the matter is before my colleagues Steve. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I just wanted to I voted against this two years ago and this is a small neighborhood that's under a lot of development pressure and I really appreciate the efforts that you all have made with this proposal. It's much better and I'm looking forward to voting for it and in fact if you would like Madam Mayor Pro Tem I will move that we approve this. That's good. Can I get a second Madam clerk. We have a motion and second would you open the vote. Close the vote. It passes 6 to 0. I need a motion for the consistency statement please. Madam clerk would you open the vote. Close the vote. It passes 6 to 0. Thank you. Thank you very much. Now we will move to item 13. Street closing of Nevada Avenue. Chester Springs Road and Hickman Avenue. Good evening again Kyle Taylor with the planning part department and a Bressie proposed to close 1,505 linear feet of public right of way. The crest comprises of portions of Nevada Avenue. Chester Springs Road and Hickman Avenue. The right of ways are currently dedicated and unopened in the portions of the streets requested for closure are bordered by property owned by Wallace design construction, Bigfoot N.C. and Triangle residential options for substance abuse Inc. If the request is approved the portions of these right of ways will be recombined with the adjacent property owners. The areas owned by B. Wallace design construction LLC is being recombined with this request is currently vacant however the applicant intends to construct a 14 lot single family subdivision in this area that attachment is in the staff report. There are currently no outstanding issues regarding this request and staff recommends that council approve the permanent closure of 1,505 linear feet of these streets. Thank you. Thank you. I will open the public hearing and I have four people who have no there are five people who have signed up to speak one proponent and four in opposition. Jared Eatons. You have three minutes. Yes ma'am. Thank you. Jared Eatons with Eatons land and representing my client. It's a B. Wallace constructions is a small local builder that we all know in the community. I'm going to make a couple of key points because I want to focus on what's being considered tonight was it which is a street closing and I'm not really going to talk too much about a subdivision design unless I'm asked to because tonight we're here to consider a street closing. The streets that we're talking about closing all run along existing jurisdictional streams. It makes a lot of sense to not build streets across these streams and to close them and do something different. I think that's a fairly common sense approach to what we're trying to do here. The new houses that we're talking about I'm just touched on there is a 14 lot subdivision and for review that's true. I think it's a good thing that 14 new homes will come to downtown without the need to tear down any other homes to make those homes happen. These are similar products to what was built at Southside that the city basically incentivized redevelopment of those homes have done very well. There's no issues with our plan that I can see. Again it's a great product it's a to me a simple street closing and I'd be glad to answer any questions you may have. Thank you. Thank you sir. I have signed up. Mr. Atwood Ian Atwood Andy Slaughter and Duncan and Elizabeth Sherra if you would line up in that order. Yes sir. I didn't say that if everyone gets three minutes I would appreciate a chance to respond with remaining time if necessary. Good evening. Good evening. Thank you all for having me. My name is Ian Atwood and I am here to speak to you all to ask you all to please delay voting on this. Could you share your address with the public. Yes sir. I live at 1925 Ward Street which is around the corner from this proposed development and street closing and I am asking for you all to delay for a number of reasons one for the lack of notice to the neighborhood. There was very I think there were one only one neighbor that I know of that was notified of this activity despite the fact that the neighborhood association has been in contact with this developer for at least the last two years. There was a similar development that is actually adjacent to this property that some similar issues came up and we have been in contact with them regularly since then asking to be updated and just in a communication less than two weeks ago we received no notification that this other additional development had been planned. We also asked for a delay so that neighbors can voice their concern. I know that many folks there's four people signed up to talk tonight but there were several others who voiced their concerns that they were not able to come tonight and voice those concerns and we also asked that we have time that the neighborhood can work with the developer on issues of walkability and connectivity and also establishing some sort of public space in that area and to deal with issues of stormwater runoff. Thank you sir. Good evening council members. My name is Andy Slaughter. I live at 1712 Chester Springs Road and I'm here to ask you to please delay the street closures. To my knowledge as Ian said the neighbors received did not receive notice of this hearing tonight for the approval of the closures. Current neighbors who live in this area are already experiencing issues with runoff drainage on their properties and also several neighbors on the streets of Huron. Wawa Ward and Chester Springs have voiced concerns about the additional traffic and stream stream protecting issues by the closures and this development. Thank you. Thank you sir. Good evening. My name is Ann Duncan. I live at 2514 Nation Avenue and I'm also here to request a delay in this decision. This is the first step in a 14 home development by B Wallace. The land is at the heart of Tuscaloosa Lakewood a neighborhood that doesn't have a central community spot or park. And it impacts our quality of life for reasons that I detailed in an email to you earlier today. B Wallace has proposed in the development plan for a children's park for these homes these 14 homes. But they the park would be controlled by the HOA and so access to the larger community could be restricted. So we're requesting more time to work with the developer parks and rec other possible partners to find a central spot communities place for us to gather as a community. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Everyone. My name is Elizabeth Shearer. I live on 1714 Chester Springs Road. Several reasons that I'm asking for a delay as I think the previous speakers have spoken to there's been insufficient time for the neighbors the neighborhood to really talk about what impact this new construction. This is the second version. I think this came before you maybe two years ago. We asked at that time for Wallace to stay in contact with us. We asked to be kept abreast of any developments. They have failed to do that. So we are on a we were unaware until I received a certified letter a week ago that I I went and picked up. So insufficient time. We had asked as a neighborhood to be informed about the original construction of I think it was eight homes. Now it's 22 homes. The 8 plus the 14. And so we need that time to look at the impact for us as a neighborhood that is indeed close to downtown but is getting increasing pressure in terms of the existing houses. One speaker alluded to and I'm one of those properties that has had significant water runoff and has to had to spend a great deal of money to to deal with that water. I'm right by the stream. And so we're there are a lot of slopes in that land. And I see no reason why the some of the proposed sites won't have the same issues that we're having on Chester Springs Road. So thank you for your consideration of this request. Thank you. Thank you. Other others who would like to speak in opposition. Mr. Eden that you want to respond. I'll give you three minutes. Yes ma'am. Thank you. Appreciate our neighbors coming out and I recognize some of the faces as far as notification does. I mean the city makes a notification for street closings. So if someone wasn't contacted then maybe we should check the city mailing list or something like that. But that's not anything I can address with you. As far as again we're talking about a site plan that's not under review. But I would have to guess in the city of Durham because site plans don't involve neighborhood meetings most likely because when you have proper zoning you just go do your job. I would imagine there's two hundred site plans in the city cycle process right now and not a single one of them probably notify their neighbors because it's by right to do what we're proposing to do for our site plan. So I'll talk about the street closing because that's what I'm here to talk about. The public space understand there's a need for public space all over town. I've got I've got four kids four and fifty. It's the same where they got four kids or fifty kids.  I don't think it's the responsibility of B Wallace to take a small property and say I tell you what we're going to do we're just going to cut out two or three lots here of property we bought and just dedicate public land and maintain it for all the world to use. I don't think that's what we're trying to get out here. I think that if if our neighbors would identify a parcel in the Lakewood area and I'm putting this on record you would like to see a sketch on a part my staff will gladly do it for free because that's the appropriate way to get a part in downtown. You don't try to force a developer to build it for you. So if we can find some property downtown. I would love to assist free of charge regarding stormwater. I think it's pretty safe to say that if we if we dig up these roads are platted their their roads of record their platted roads. We're not removing streets like understand we're not removing roads that people have been using for years and years we're removing paper streets that are just on a map they don't exist.  It's in the Jordan Basin. I don't have to have a dinner permit to build that road. I just have to go through the city's process and fill out what's called a no practical alternatives form. Well when I give my reasoning for happen to build those roads on the streams I hope it won't be because my street closing was denied because the next step would be have to build the roads that are there. We're proposing a plan that is very much more environmentally friendly and removes platted rights away that I know for a fact the city probably doesn't want on record because they have streams running down the middle of the right away. So I'm asking tonight that we close these streets like we should and then we will gladly work with our neighbors on park and other concerns but I'd like to focus on the street closing if possible. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else who wants to be heard if not. Yeah. Did you already you did not speak before. Come. Yes you may but I need you to get a sign up card before you leave. Please sir. Are you a proponent or opponent. Are you an opponent. To the area where the houses will be built. Could you give me your name and. Bill Graham 1923 Ward Street. Thank you sir. My concern is as the other neighbors said we have not been informed of what has been going on. I'm also concerned that I've looked at other houses that Wallace has built. They do not conform to our neighborhood. In my opinion they're hideous looking. They look like Easter eggs. They're purple. They're yellow. They're green. They don't conform with our neighborhood. First there were eight in the small area behind us. Now there are 14 crammed into this area. This worries me greatly. In our neighborhood. Not only the the blending of the the houses. To the neighborhood. But the large number of people coming into the area. Which we would welcome if it was a smaller number. And the lack of information that we have been given. Which all of the neighbors have told you. So that is my concern also. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you sir. Could the staff person address. The notification. Peace please. So the notification requirement for street closings actually comes from the general statutes not for the UDO. And the general statutes require that all properties adjacent to the actual street closing so those immediately afraid of facing or butting on that street receive first class certified mail. Additionally we did post signs for this property. A total of six two for each street closing. And those are posted on December 15th. The general statutes actually requires that we do it within 10 before 10 days before. But it was posted on December 15th. So who among you received notification. So that's because you're within the limit just outlined. I suppose. Okay. Well that's that's okay. I just needed clarity from from staff. I'm going to close the public hearing. I think we've heard from everyone who signed up and someone who didn't. And the matters now back before the council. Mr. Moffitt. Mr. Shul. Yes. Let's just start with a basic question for staff. I know that the UDO encourages connectivity. And so my question was I was looking at the street closings. I was wondering why it's not in the length of the cul-de-sac that would be left there. And I'm thinking about city trucks getting up and down there and providing services. So my question is why not. Why not a connection to Chester Springs Road. And then from there to Ward. Sarah Young with the planning department I'll answer briefly and then I'm going to turn it over to my colleague in the transportation department. But the findings for street closings are different than meeting all the ordinance standards to do a subdivision. Mr. Edings was correct. This is a separate application than the subdivision. And therefore we're not necessarily looking at the same things for this application that we would be. They would be required to meet all applicable standards for the subdivision. But I'm going to defer to my colleague in transportation talking detail about that. Bill Judge with transportation. I think one of your questions I guess was the maximum length cul-de-sac. The the UDO does allow up to eight hundred feet. In this case it would be measured from. What is it Huron Street I believe the where Nevada intersects. So so that that eight hundred foot would be measured from there. So far as street connectivity and the connection. Mr. Edens could probably provide better information about. The existing environmental features at the end of Chester Springs. But it's my understanding yet that there there is a stream buffer there. That they are trying to avoid impacting. Other than that our department generally. Well not generally but does support connectivity and tries to encourage it for all the the various reasons of service delivery as well as just interaction between neighbors. Miss you can I have a question you said I understood what you said you said. That the requirements for street closings are different than the requirements for subdivision approval. Are you do I read between the lines there that. There's a possibility that. The subdivision layout. That's contemplated in the street closing request would not be approved. Because I don't I haven't reviewed the subdivision request itself so I can't attest to that. But hypothetically someone could close a street. With the intent to. Platte a subdivision that may or may not meet requirements. I will say that the requirements for the street closing are on page two of your staff report and it's basically two things. That the closing of the street or alley is not contrary to the public interest. And the second is that no individual property owner in the vicinity of the street. Would be deprived of reasonable means of ingress or egress.  Is it possible that the result of the street closing would be a subdivision that the planning department would not normally. Recommend or not mean if someone came in with a rezoning request. And they had this kind of cul-de- sac on it. But the department. Work towards more connectivity. So typically we there are multiple aspects of development that are regulated in the ordinance and sometimes we have to balance them. In this particular site there's some environmental features so one thing that we try to do is minimize the amount of times that streams are crossed for instance. So this is a case this is a good example of a time we would have to buy balance environmental concerns with connectivity. You know planning 14 lots on a single point. Is really compared to much much larger subdivisions not an issue for the planning department. Okay. Thank you. Have a question for Mr. Eden. Mr. Eden staff has said that. That there is reason to not connect to Chester that they think that you have reason not to connect to Chester spring. Because of environmental issues can you can you. Say whether or not that was accurate and illustrate how that is accurate if it is. I mean there are there are jurisdiction streams associated with where the existing rights away are. And again I need to state it again the subdivision plan in my opinion should not have been in the staff report. Because it's not under consideration tonight it's a preliminary plan that's currently in review that has no approval. So in my opinion that's not part of what we're considering tonight we're considering a street closing. We're closing streets to try to avoid some environmental issues if a project follows it which obviously we're here to develop a project. That's fine but. We're not we're really not here. To me to consider the design of a 14 lot subdivision that is designed per code. That if staff reviews it and approves it. By law has to be approved because it meets the code. But the street closings to your question Don I believe that there are some environmental their environmental features that we can avoid. By not building streets in existing rights away. OK. I'll just say that I'm actually considering whether or not the street closing will eliminate. A point of connectivity that might be important in my opinion. Thank you. You finish sir. Mr. Shul. And then the day. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. So just for the neighbors I hope this is clear but in case it isn't I'll do my best to explain it. And other council members can chip in. So the the property under consideration is being developed by right. In other words it won't come back to us for any kind of rezoning consideration. So if the sometimes you hear about or read about the decisions we the council will make about property. And whether or not it can be rezoned. This is not one of those situations. Property will have a site plan and it will still have to undergo rigorous administrative review from our planning department to decide if it meets all the requirements that we have having to do with storm water and everything else. And so those are not things that we will be deciding. So it is true as Mr. Eden said that. This is really a consideration of whether or not it's a good idea to close these roads. Or these rights. And a couple more comments. Just I want to say first of all Mr. Graham appreciated your comments. But I do want to say that my in my experience and I have seen a lot of the homes that the Wallace Company is built. They build a lot of really good homes that are in very high demand. I think about Southside. I think about the area north of Geer Street where they have built a very nice very popular in demand neighborhood. And so I think that they that the in terms of the builder and its responsiveness to the neighborhood and its ability to build good houses and commitment to do that. I do feel that I feel good about that. I understand. However that the neighbors feel like they haven't had enough notice that it is a that they have concerns that they would like to talk about with the developer. So my recommendation would be that we delay the vote on this for a month. Come back up at a date certain that we would set that it would come back here and give the developer and the neighbors time to talk. But I personally would anticipate at that point that that I would be supportive of the closing of the streets barring some something else that I have not found out about that I would find out about then because I do think that from what I can tell and what I know about this area that it makes sense to do so. But I also think that I understand that the neighbors want to have some time to discuss this and don't feel like they have. And so my recommendation would be that we would delay this vote for a month and have them have have the developer and the give the neighborhood a chance to talk to the developer about what's anticipated. Thank you Madam Mayor. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I guess my my question the initial questions were answered by Ms. Young when she talked about the requirements that she put forth. I guess the question that I would have for Mr. Eden after Mr. Shull's comments has to do with what is your timeline in terms of the development of your clients timeline in terms of the development and would Mr. Shull's recommendation pose a hardship for your client. Appreciate the question and before I start one thing we haven't talked about the development tracker that the city has developed online. The the website is a development tracker website. It's very good. It has current applications. I'm doing an advertisement for the city here. So I'll I'll send a bill. But there's a development tracker online that you can look and see projects that have been submitted that are active. And I think staff does a good job of keeping that up to date. That's my public service announcement to answer your question sir. We're in a housing market where you can't build homes fast enough. And we're also in a development community where projects take a long time to get done because everyone's so busy out of respect for Mr. Shull if he wants to know the 30 days for us to talk about it then that's what we're going to do. I do feel that when I come back if I'm asked to provide public park space for Lakewood my answer will be no. And I do feel if I come back we may not be able to come to an agreement on some of the issues that are going to be brought up. But if we need 30 days to have another meeting and we'll go in with open minds then that's fine. But I don't know where we'll end up in 30 days. But I do know that a lot of people want to buy down here and it would be good for the city to have more population in this area just in my opinion. Thank you. Yeah I think it is important that we sort of dissect the closing from the development. Yes sir. Can I follow up and ask for those opponents who talked about time is there anything that other than not having been informed is there anything that would happen between now and the next 30 days that would change your mind about the project and cause you to move from being an opponent to a proponent. I'll ask Michelle who will come since you're the person who received the notice. So thank you for the opportunity. I think understanding the environmental issues is very critical for us. We are surround and there are a lot of streams and so trying to understand that. And then this whole issue that Mr. Moffett brought up is around the connectivity. It seems I'm looking at it and it seems very fragmented and there are lots of people there are different pieces and I'm not sure I even understand the 14 plus the 8. So that's on me. I understand that but as a neighbor as someone who lives there if I can understand. Oh OK so this is how it will work and you've addressed the stream and you know the issues around our environment being preserved because you don't want to construct and build and then have your existing residents who've lived here in this neighborhood compromised and their quality of living hurt because you're expanding. We recognize that Durham is expanding and that's exciting but you don't want to hurt the current residents. So environment and then the whole issue of connectivity. I don't think I understood some of the staff response in terms of balancing environmental versus connectivity. So those will be some things that would help. I think our our understanding and support of this project. And I think I understand what is being said that it's the street closing is separate from the development. But no it's not because it's it's for us. It's where we live and it's leading to the development. So we wanted to come and talk about the sort of the the logic of the street design is the prelude to this development and the impact it will have on our our homes and our lives. Thank you. Mr. Moffitt. I have a question. Well first of all people keep talking about eight plus 14. Can you is there any idea what the eight. I'm going to defer to my staff that knows more details than I do. So I believe the eight lots that she's referring to is if you look at Hickman Avenue on the context map and you look directly across from it you see another right of way there that used to connect through that area is now being cul-de-sacred and eight lots are being developed over in that area. I believe that's the eight that she's that's on another piece of property. Yes. Right. OK. Thank you. So when I look at the wait but don't go away yet. So I have a question. When when I look at the flats currently it looks like there are 20 not I think 27 lots platted in this area now currently platted are those all by right in the words can they build on all 27 of those lots by right. So they would have to of course deal with the stormwater issues related to the streets and so forth. But currently the same area that they're planning 14 homes for is currently platted for 27 is that right. Correct. Those are platted lots of record and they do have the right to be developed. Right. OK. Thank you very much. Mr. Shewell did you have your hand raised. OK. Madam Mayor Pro Tem I will move that we delay consideration of this until the meeting of February 20th. Is there a second. Second. It's been moved in properly second Madam Clerk will you open the vote. Is there a discussion on the motion. I will support it. Support it only because I think it's important that Mr. Eatings get together with them and I know you don't have to do that. But just in the sense of cooperation if you will do that we will certainly appreciate it. You love Durham. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Madam Clerk would you open the vote. Close to vote. It passes five to one with council member Moffitt voting now. Thank you. The next item is. With its school. James a Whittitt school landmark designation. Good evening. Good evening. Carla Rosenberg Planning Department so this case is J.A. Whitted School Landmark designation LD 160001. The applicant is Belk architecture represented by Andy Scholl and the request is to designate the structure and the associated four point one acres of land as a landmark. It's located at 200 East Umstead Street on the southeast quadrant of East Umstead with South Rocksboro Street staff recommends approval and the Historic Preservation Commission recommended approval of the structure with the land on a vote of three to two on their at their August 2nd 2016 meeting and those two dissenting votes were to represent to recommend the designation of the land alone. So I'm I'm sorry the building alone. So if you have any questions okay I will open the public hearing and there are two persons signed up to speak who are proponents and they are Andy Scholl and Darrell Jones would you come before us in that order if you're here. Oh okay. I certainly support this designation this the building and the grounds in that I was in school in the building and on the grounds to some sort of historic myself I guess. Okay I will entertain a motion. I close I'll close the public hearing. Oh I'm sorry. You have a yes. Okay. Yeah I was going to look. Okay. Hey thank you. I just wondered if you could speak a little bit about the decision to designate just the building or the building and the grounds and how you came to the decision to do the building and the grounds to request the building and the grounds. Would that be more of a developer question from a from an architectural standpoint the land associated with with the school is historic in much the same way that the building is because mid-century schools have a very distinctive style of land with open open lawns very minimal landscaping and the idea was to have that land and that architectural features beyond that land protected to prevent trees from being built up to obscure the architectural features. Sir could you share your name and address again. Yeah my name is Andy Schell. Belk architecture addresses 1508 Glendale Avenue here in Durham. Thank you so so the historic designation on the land would prevent that land from being developed in any way. Exactly and in addition to that it would also protect the sight lines to the building. Thank you so much. Don. Yes. And I'll just show. At the question was raised previously about the in this and I wanted to check at that time I believe the information I got that we received was that the actual value of the property is not not very high the tax impacts of giving a historic designation are not very significant. Would you confirm or deny that. Carla Rosenberg Planning Department. So if you look at the section of the report that this describes the fiscal impact this property contains three tax parcels. One of those is for the land which is negligible. The other two are for the residential and commercial parcels and those of where the value lie. So where in most parcels they're divided into structure and land this one has a different tax layout. So the land actually doesn't hold the value. And so as staff we recommended approval of both the land and the structure because the it provides the greatest benefit to the city for the least. Thank you. I just want to say that I'm delighted with the work that's being done. It's been been completed there. There's no question that this is a historic structure here in the city that has great meaning in our community. So I support this application. Thank you Madam Mayor. Pretend I just want to second first of all what Don said it's is if there was ever a building that was had tremendous historic value this is clearly it. And this is an obvious choice for a designation and I'm fully supportive and appreciative of the work that's been done and it's exciting and I understand you have a CEO. Is that correct. Partial CEO yes temporary CEOs were achieved in December. It's great. Congratulations. I do have a question about the valuation section of this Carla and thank you for your work on this. I assume the one point five million dollar valuation is prior to the current renovation and that the value will be considerably more. So that is prior. That is 2016. Those numbers we got in September and so. Assumably the next time it was evaluated that number may go up. But I can't say specifically. Right. So let me then ask the developer. I anticipate that the value of this land will this the property will be significantly more than one point five million dollars upon completion. You want to give me a range of estimates. Daryl Jones integral group one ninety one piece three street Atlanta Georgia and answers yes definitely much harder. Definitely much higher. So I just ask that because that means that the fiscal impact eventually will be much higher as well. This is the fiscal impact that's indicated here is based on a very low valuation. You all are doing it tremendous. How much would you give me an estimate of the size of the project. Total for it's it's roughly a little bit 20 right. So this is the fiscal impact is actually going to be a lot higher than what's listed here in two ways. One is that we will be receiving much more tax revenue than is indicated here. But at the same time the value of the tax break will also be much higher than what's indicated here. So I just want to make that clear. I'm still planning to vote for it that doesn't change that but I do think that the the actual the the valuation and the fiscal impact is is is much bigger than what we see here. So I just want to clarify that I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you madam. Thank you madam. Pro Tem I just want to follow up on on the comments that we've heard before I too support this designation not only for the building but the land. I think it's important for us to recognize not only the fiscal issue that is sure raised but also about the the value of the history of the people who have attended that school or who have had some connection to that school over the years and the fact that that the building was built on a hill and it had a wonderful visual look at the city of Durham. I think that gives even more value to that land. So I think it's important and I think you would have a lot of people who who are in the 80s and 90s and younger who would appreciate the historic value not only of the building but also the land. Thank you. Us who attended Hooded Junior High back in the day. I was certainly vote for it and I'm a part of that history jacket history myself. And so I will close the public hearing on that note and I'd like to recognize Carl Webb as a local person who is working on this stand up for Carl and I will close the public hearing and the matter is back before us. There's a motion of second. Madam clerk would you open the vote. Close the vote. Passes six to zero. Thank you. Thank you. Give them time to exit. Now the next matter before us the public hearing to receive comments related to our annual action plan and how many people. Right now Pro Tem members of City Council Reginald Johnson Director Department of Community Development. This is one of two public hearings that we conduct annually on the federal entitlements. I will introduce to you miss Wilma Kanyas federal programs coordinated to outline the particulars. Good evening. Mayor Pro Tem and members of Council. The purpose of this public hearing is to discuss citizen comment on the community development needs in Durham neighborhoods as it relates to the use of the receipt of community development block grant funds known as CDBG home investment partnership known as home emergency solutions grant known as ESG and housing opportunities for persons with AIDS known as Hopla funds. This public hearing is a requirement for the preparation and submission of the city's 2017 18 annual action plan. Notice of this meeting was advertised in the Harold Sun Carolina Times and Caposta newspapers as well as via general lists serve as a recipient of community development block grant home ESG and Hopla funds. The city is required to hold at least two public hearings prior to its annual action plan. The first meeting must be held early in the development of the plan. We anticipate the second public hearing to be held approximately late April. In addition the city is required to publish a copy of its draft annual action plan for at least 30 days prior to submission of the plan. The city's annual action plan must be submitted to HUD by May 15. The Department of Housing and Urban Development has not yet announced the FY 2017 entitlement allocations. HUD has advised grantees not to submit their consolidated plan and their annual action plan until the final formula allocations have been announced. The city will incorporate contingency language in its draft annual action plan to explain how it will adjust the proposed figures to match the actual final figures once they have been announced by HUD. For planning purposes the city expects to receive approximately 1.8 million in CDBG funds, 800,000 in home funds, 160,000 in ESG and 290,000 in hot war funds. In closing a summary of the comments from this public hearing and written comments received from citizens will be incorporated in the final annual action plan. Thank you. Thank you very much. I will now open the public hearing. We have nine people who've signed up. You have more Diana. So we have 10. So I will allow two minutes per person and if you would line up as follow Selina Mack. Katie Huffman will meddle it. Daniel Sargent, Mark Folletta, Benjamin Filippo, Marilyn Boddison, Vanessa Mason Evans, Becky Wenders, Wonders, I'm sorry, and Andrea Stendell in that order. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Selina Mack. I'm the executive director of Durham Community Land Trustees. That's 1208 West Chapel Hill Street, Durham, North Carolina. I want to start by just saying thank you to this city council and to the city of Durham for the tremendous amount of support you have shown Durham Community Land Trustees over this over our 30 year history because of your support DCLT's portfolio is approaching 300 permanently affordable housing units. And specifically tonight, I'm here to ask for your support of DCLT's application for home funding for the renovation of existing affordable rental housing. For some time, DCLT has desired to expand our mission of permanently affordable housing to include Northeast Central Durham. Rather, what we've experienced when housing becomes available is that it's a very competitive process. And they're receiving multiple offers and selling in less than a week at oftentimes well above the asking price. And unfortunately, these sales result in displacement of low income families. However, in December, DCLT was able to seize an opportunity to purchase 54 units of existing rental housing in Northeast Central Durham in a private sale. 31 of these units is actually in the 10.01 census tract, which is the target area for the mayor's poverty reduction initiative. These units are now in need of extensive renovation to increase the quality of living for the residents who are living there and to increase the energy efficiencies of these units. And this is essentially the crux of DCLT's request for home funds or application for home funds. And again, I want to ask for your support of that application. I want to conclude by emphasizing the urgency of gaining site control of existing affordable rental housing, particularly in Northeast Central Durham. Now, this is a community that's approximately 70 percent. Thank you. Rental housing. Thank you. If you have comments, would you please give them to the clerk? Thank you very much. Hi, my name is Katie Huffman and I work at Senior Pharmacist 406 Riggs B Avenue. I'm here representing the Durham Home Repair Collaborative. Senior Pharmacist is a nonprofit agency here in Durham that helps seniors understand their medications. And for those who qualify, we actually help pay for some of their medicines. We also do tailored community referrals. And finally, we do Medicare insurance counseling. While our primary focus is not community referrals and resources, we pride ourselves in trying to help our participants access the services they need because we learned early on that someone cannot focus on their physical health when they're concerned about food or housing insecurities. And often these same stressors end up having a negative impact on their health. At Senior Pharmacist, we try hard to help our participants avoid agency run around and dead in referrals. But sometimes the help we need just isn't available. I'm here to share a story of one of our participants, a 75 year old gentleman named Alan Dillard Sr. He had asthma and COPD, which required him to carry oxygen with him everywhere. In spite of his health troubles, Mr. Dillard tried to be as active as possible and even served as a volunteer on our agency's participant advisory council. In April of 2016, Mr. Dillard let us know that he had mold inside and under his home and that he had recently been hospitalized due to exacerbated pulmonary issues. Between April and October, Mr. Dillard's home condition deteriorated to the point that he had holes in his ceiling and insulation falling down. Throughout this time, we tried to help Mr. Dillard access several housing repair programs, but we're told that the necessary repairs weren't offered or that there were long waiting lists for assistance. Mr. Dillard had already done what he could through a reverse mortgage he had taken on his house, trying to make ends meet, and he did not have the money to pay for the repairs himself. Unfortunately, Mr. Dillard passed away in December, but I'm grateful to have his sister Wilma here with us tonight who will say a few more words about her family's experience. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Wilma Dillard and I was invited to speak to attend this meeting by the senior pharmacy group. I'm asking for more more funding for the Habitat for Humanity and rebuilding together of the triangle on behalf of my brother, my late brother, Alan Dillard Sr., who was a client of the senior pharmacy until he passed away on December the 24th, 2016. Alan had COPD and used oxygen machine to help him breathe. We found out in March that there was mold in his home and under his home, not sure how long it had been there. The mold adversely affected his breathing. Many trips to Duke. We were able to eradicate the mold that was inside the house, his daughter and I. But we were not equipped to address the mold under the house. We found someone who agreed to address the mold under the house. We paid him half up front and we never saw him again. Upon hearing about what happened Alan's mold condition, the senior pharmacy directed Alan to Habitat for Humanity of Durham and rebuilding together of the triangle in March of 2016. Both great entities and resources for seniors. However, Alan died nine months later after his ability to breathe failed him. It is my desire that more funding be made available for Habitat for Humanity and rebuilding together of the triangle so that seniors and economically challenged tax-paying citizens of Durham can get the help they need in a timely manner. Thank you. Thank you, Wilma. Good evening, Council. My name is Dan Sargent. I'm the executive director of Rebuilding Together of the Triangle. That story breaks my heart. We have about 85 folks in Durham waiting for assistance and at this point our funding at the moment looks like it will only be able to do 10 to 12 homes this year. Obviously, we have a lot of different programs as was alluded to and one of the things that we're hoping to do with the Home Repair Collaborative is to help as much as we can deal with coordination issues and try to make sure that our funds are being used as efficiently as possible. I think we've identified coordination issues that we're going to work through, but we also do have scarcity problems. We need more funds to help deal with the issues in Durham. Our organization focuses on providing safe, healthy homes for low-income families around the triangle. We serve Wake Orange Durham and Chatham and one of the things that we have observed here in Durham is in some of the neighborhoods the housing stock is really in deteriorated condition and so makes things more expensive to do and just limits the number of homes we can serve. In addition to that, we are excited about the opportunity we had to work with the Collaborative Group here and we believe that there are some real opportunities. We've had some success with these types of opportunities in Chatham County and Orange County doing collaborative intake and helping instead of having a homeowner have to sort of navigate through the different programs and the different requirements and the different funding sources and all the things that go into the reason that we have multiple programs to accommodate these different needs, what we've tried to do in other places is to absorb some of that navigation and to meet we actually in Orange County specifically we meet monthly with the agencies that do repair and look at applications and make sure that sometimes we have to split that application up and one agency can do one thing and another agency can do another but the goal is to make sure that the agencies that are better equipped to manage those processes and understand sort of what the funding requirements are and what the restrictions are able to do that more quickly and not require the homeowners to try to navigate a system that's really opaque. Thank you for your time. Could I ask a question of clarification? I noticed a garner North Carolina address. I am where you live. I'm sorry. No, that's our that's our headquarters are Durham warehouses at 607 Ellis Road. Oh, I just I put the wrong address on the record show. Thank you. Okay. All right. Getting the council. Thanks for your time tonight as we have a brief time to speak. So we've given you some flyers with more information or you will have my name is Martin Velletta. I'm the director of housing and home improvement for resources for seniors, which is in Raleigh, North Carolina. We're a nonprofit that used to be called Wake County Council on Aging. I don't know if any of familiar with it for 43 of those 45 years. We were strictly a Wake County agency. All services were there. Two years ago, we took on the weatherization assistance program in Durham County, which does a lot of great things for energy reduction, making homes more comfortable. Power bills reduce usually 20 to 25 percent. What I have to point out to you is that is not a home repair program. It is strictly an energy program. So when we come to Durham and we find the homes that Dan alluded to in terrible shape, we can't weatherize them. So we've partnered with the collaboration to try to get a network of folks that can make those repairs so that we can come in and provide the weatherization services that we want so badly to provide in Durham. We also have one dilemma is that Durham is an unusual county. This is really the big municipality here and out in the rest of the county. There's no big cities like Wake County with all these other areas. We run the Raleigh's limited repair program. We do carries. We have a lot of connections in Raleigh under one roof. So we can just say, well, let's take that program and fix this and then we'll go do weatherization. We don't have that in Durham. That's why we join this collaborative. I just hope that that we can work together as collaborative and with the city to sort of reduce the duplication of efforts and have some way that we can all get together. And so when a client has a need, we can sort of shuttle them through the process to all the people that players that are available so that we can help as many people as possible. I thank you. Thank you, sir. Good evening. Thank you members of council. Benjamin Filippo 2002 East Main Street on the executive director of Preservation Durham here to speak in support of the home repair collaborative as you have packets in front of you. Preservation Durham has recognized that there is a major need, as has been suggested, to find ways to retain homeowners in their homes, particularly as it relates to preserving and protecting minority assets and wealth throughout the city and county of Durham. As has been alluded to, there's a great array of repair problems that people face, even as a preservation organization that is not necessarily the first number of people often call when they need a home repair. We get one to three calls every single week, typically from elderly homeowners who have many of the same problems that we've heard here tonight. Oftentimes contractors who have left oftentimes bills that they are faced with that are completely insurmountable and have physical health conditions whereby they can't actually take on the repairs themselves. This year we'll be starting the preservation equity project along with self-help credit union, which will be a model based on Cleveland looking at free technical assistance for older homeowners matched with a subsidized interest rate home equity loan. And our hope is that this program, along with the many others you're hearing about and seeing in front of you tonight, if we are able to streamline and make more efficient the intake process for these numerous programs with the city's help, we strongly believe that we can be more effective. We can reduce the number of waiting lists that we currently have as you'll hear and continue to hear are very long for just about every program we have. And we have many people who simply don't know how to navigate to the resources that may be available to them. So again, I ask you to review the documents and support sort of, you know, long term strategic funding for home repairs across the city and county. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Vanessa Mason Evans. I stay at 32 23. Dear Boyn Drive, Durham, North Carolina 27704. I am one voice of a Bradtown community, which I speak for many voices. We have a community that has been unseen and unheard until violence hits our community. But there are people within our community that truly have a concern and want to see our community grow to be a better community and a safe community. Deontay Hart is a young man which was killed on my property, which is at 602 Martin Street, the corner of Martin Street and Dear Boyn, in which I own the property. We would like to see changes within the community because of the violence is going on within the community. We feel that it's deemed to be unsafe because of the shootings, not only at my property, but within that area. We have a lot of dry bodies that have been shootings at the store. And we want to change the environment of the store and not just the store, but the people who live within that community. We have homes that need repairs and we have sidewalks that have not been finished. These are the needs. We need a playground that can be upgraded because our playground has been upgraded in years. We would like to see improvements not only to the store, but the entire community, not just Bradtown, but the surrounding area of Bradtown. And we would like to be able to network with not just Bradtown, but the entire community of Durham as a whole. So I'm hoping that you take what I've said into consideration. Thank you for listening to me tonight. And thank you on behalf of the Bradtown community. Could I have a copy of your remarks? Yeah, let me take it. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. My name is pronounced Marlinda. Marlinda Boddison, 607 Canal Street, Durham. And I'm here just to piggyback on what Mark and everyone else is saying about the community and the needs for housing repairs and the tax increases that we all have received this year. My taxes alone more than doubled from one year last year. And now it's more than doubled what it was last year. We have a lot of elderly people in East End Community and the East End Community that really cannot afford to pay double what they were paying last year and having problems paying that. I know a lot of people that are on fixed incomes or disabled or even have children that they just they don't know where the money is going to come from. And a lot of it is going to come from monies that were allocated for one thing that could now going to have to choose between food, medication, education, even coats and shoes for their children or for themselves or their whoever they are taking care of. If we could get a grant to assist the people with their taxes it would really help all the homeowners who have experience doubled or more tax increase in the last year. Also the homes in East End they're old. They need repair. Just like gentlemen was saying about the weatherization. They can't do that because of the repairs necessary to actually. Thank you. And I understand what you're talking about and that's something that we're looking at too. Thank you. Andrea. I am calling. Hello. My name is Andrea Stoidle. I am an AmeriCorps volunteer with Habitat for Humanity, which is that am I supposed to give my address for the organizations? I'm at 603 North Driver Street. Habitat is 215 North Church Street. And I'm part of the repairs team at Habitat and we enact 50 repairs per year to households that are at or below 50% of the area median income. And I know that we receive a ton more applications than we're able to serve. And so just want to add to the chorus of folks saying that we need more of this. I can just speak personally that I've seen over and over again with about halfway through our year. And over and over again when we can do critical home repairs it really like incentivizes those homeowners to also have pride in their homes and to do something like we've had people remodel after we've repaint their house. Let us be like, you know, also a lift in spirit, which seems really important. So thank you. Thank you for your enthusiasm. Rebecca Winder's Winder's. I'm sorry, I was just thinking I was next to the last. So my name is Becky Winder's and I live at 1304 Seton Road. And I'm a member of the Durham Community Land Trust and the Coalition for Affordable Housing and Transit. But I'm speaking for myself. And I'm kind of saying the same thing that other people have said in a different way. But we need to find a way to do more. Last year, the Council wisely commissioned a thorough analysis of housing needs that adopted some sensible goals. And I'm grateful to you for your creative efforts to keep affordable housing, keep housing affordable. But I just want to emphasize the urgency of following through with or increasing the goals that have been set, especially the goal of preserving affordable rental housing. Based on 2012 data, the city had 15,000 low income houses, households paying more than 50% of their incomes for housing. And then in addition, we had another 61,000, 6100 households who were living in subsidized housing and needed help to meet their housing needs. So total, that would make a total of 21,000. And currently we're meeting 30% of the less than 30% of the need. So the need is understated because of the timing and the ice had a more stringent standard of 50% and it also does not account for the homeless. Of the 6100 subsidized units, 1240 will reach the end of their period of restricted affordability within the next five years. And maybe some of them have already done it by the end of 2016. Because of their age, we can expect that they will require additional subsidies for renovations to keep rents affordable while maintaining quality. So the plan, which is ambitious, only called for 10,095. Thank you, we have you. Comments. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.  Thank each of you, first of all, for you, the work that you're doing. And secondly, for carving out time to come and share with us how you feel our funds should be expended. I am going to close the public hearing. The matter is now before the council. I won't entertain a motion to just receive the comments. That's what we need to do. Okay, I will make that motion. I also make some like to make some comments at the appropriate time, but I will move that we receive those comments. Move the property second, madam clerk, would you open the vote? We would like to discuss the motion, please. Just a moment. Just a moment. Let me run this maybe later on. Mr. Moffett, make your comment. Okay, thank you very much. I appreciate it, madam mayor, and Mr. Schell appreciate you don't mind me going first. First thing I want to say is there were comments about subsidized housing and I just wanted for those people who may be watching at home and maybe some here just to point out that anybody who's taking a mortgage deduction is living in subsidized housing. Not to say that I'm not commenting anything about what was said here that the subsidized housing is a broad term and anybody might be watching at home and takes it in a certain way and needs to realize many people are living in what is subsidized housing. It's really important that we use tax dollars to help with housing across the city. As I've listened to the comments tonight, I've been thinking about the mayor's emphasis on parks. And one of the things that he has said over and over again is that we should not be building new parks until we can maintain the parks that we have. We have an ambitious plan to develop more affordable housing throughout the city. And it's and I support the comments tonight in regard to the need to also maintain the affordable housing stock that we already have. And then one other comment I wanted to make was regarding property taxes. I understand the whole the plans that are being worked on and supported that. But there were comments about elderly people having make choices between taxes. And warm clothing, for example. And I just Marlinda and anyone else that's working with people like that. There are tax abatement programs available through the tax administrator's office with the county. So in fact, for they should make sure that people are aware of those programs. That's all I wanted to say. Thank you very much, Madam Mayor Pro Tim. You're welcome, sir. Mr. Sure. Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tim. I have a couple of comments. First of all, I want to also appreciate everybody that came out tonight to speak. We heard some really important things and really appreciate it. Just a couple of comments. Becky, you're one to appreciate your emphasis on us doing more and we have a plan. And it will. I think that we will will be doing a lot more and we will be hearing from our administration about what some of this is going to cost us. And we've already got preliminary know, but we need to start paying for it. And so I want to say that if we're going to do the work that we need to do in Durham on affordable housing, it's going to cost us some more local funds and we need to be prepared for that. I'm very excited about the Land Trust purchase of the 54 units. And I think this is a very exciting development. We have been talking a lot. One of our highest priorities is the preservation of naturally occurring affordable units or units that are coming out of mandatory period of affordability as permanently affordable. And this is one of the first times that I have heard that we have had this kind of opportunity. It's exactly the kind of opportunity we're looking for. And I just want to congratulate those who have worked to make this happen and look forward to its success. And I'm really grateful to you all for leading that. I do have a question for the gentleman from Rebuilding Together Durham. Is he still here? My question is of the 85 homes that you've said were seeking repair or let me ask it this way. What's your average what's your average repair cost for a home in Durham? We're between typically well to do sort of the key health and safety priorities were typically between twelve and eighteen thousand dollars. Okay. Thank you. But it varies widely. Okay. And does the is the does the person from Habitat have similar information on those figures? The Habitat repair she's she stepped out but I do know they administer the the urgent repair program for the state housing finance agency the cap there is eight thousand dollars. I believe that's their primary source of funding. Okay. So I guess what I would be interested in from the collaborative is. You know is there a number that is the number that you all are thinking about. And it you know not tonight but at some point it would be useful to know that. And we are lucky that. Well more conures as you all know has done a great job on this report for many years and these these applications very big very complicated. She's here listening but for my standpoint what will be good and useful is to have some sort of some idea of what what the number is that you're that you're interested in. Also I was really pleased to hear about the preservation equity program that seems like a really a real good advance in the way we're thinking about preservation and I appreciate you working on it. And then finally I just want to comment about the playground in the in Braggtown. I'd be here at some point it would be good to know the location that program and that playground and who owns it. Our city playgrounds of my understanding is that they're all in at this point in pretty good shape whether we have a steady program of renovation. So if this is one that I'm not aware of or if the city is not aware of that it is city owned I'd be very interested in knowing about it. And I'm sure that our administration will as well. So those are my comments Madam Mayor Pro Tem and I appreciate you. Thank you. Sure. And I hope that the collaborative was make sure that you keep our administration in the loop because they're the ones who are going to be working and bringing these matters back before. So don't forget proper protocol. Thank you very much. We'll call for a motion to accept the comments. If there are no other comments. It's been moved. Can I get a second? It's been moved in proper second that we receive the comments. Madam Clerk would you open a vote close vote. It passes six. Thank you. Thank each of you for coming to speak on this matter. And before we move to our last item I will let those who are not interested in that item exit the room. We have one supplemental item tonight item 17 a proposed city charter amendment to change the process of conducting Durham municipal elections. The purpose of this public hearing is just to receive comments from the public on this item. Mr. Turning. Thank you madam mayor pretend members of council on this item I have provided you with a memo. It reads as they frequently ask questions memo. I tried to anticipate the questions that would likely come either from council or from members of the public and also as an opportunity to educate the public as to what this particular public hearing is about what it's not about. And if there are any questions that anyone has I'll be happy to do my best to answer those questions. But I do want to reiterate that that tonight you're only receiving public comments and at some point in time you may choose to take some other action on the item. What has happened in the past is that after the public hearing has occurred no action has been taken which essentially means that no change would be made to the the election process that we have here in the city. But I'm happy to answer any questions that you have. Clearly we have four people who signed up and we definitely would not be voting on anything with that kind of participation tonight. So we will open the public hearing and call to speak Anita Keith Faust Jackie Wack staff Chris Tiffany and Jim Svara. And each of you have two minutes. Hi I'm Anita Keith Faust three two three West Trinity Avenue. Good evening Carolina. Good evening. I've already sent you an email with my point of view on this issue and basically I think it's a money issue. Somebody may think they're going to save money. Well it's been a long struggle for civil rights in America. And we're being forced to go back in time. And this is another issue that I think falls into what has been going on on the state level where people are being disenfranchised under the guys are saving money. Okay so we know that you know Governor McCrory lost the election probably because HB to but also because of his stance on Medicaid you know disenfranchised people being further disenfranchised by their publicly elected officials. Also I think it's important for us to realize that all of this packing and stacking or whatever they're calling it from the way that they redistricted changing the lines this falls into that type of thinking. And I just want to get you to look at my email and those who are out there in the television land I made a request for it to be part of the public record which it probably would be anyway. Please if you're interested you can get a copy from our clerk Miss Ann Gray. But we need to really look at who it is that is suggesting that it's better to give people less of a voice. We have to look at each one of you now and see which way you're going. I understand Mr. Attorney that there's no voting on the half and this is just a voice out opinions. But we're going to take a look at this. Please make it known when you're going to vote on it. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. This is not the time. This is really not the time to propose changes in the charter of the Durham Municipal Election. We just went through a tumultuous year. 2016 I don't even think we're over 2016 election. We had shenanigans going on over in Raleigh and the legislators trying to suppress voters trying to take away their ability to vote through many means. And we were over there. We know what they're doing. And now we have a suggestion of amending doing an amendment to the charter which would allow for one election which you know that off the election yield low voter turnout among the black community. Let's be clear. What happens in this case with this you have if nobody gets 50% of the votes at the end of that one election you have to have a runoff. That runoff will take place at least 45 weeks after that election. Well we don't come out the first time. We definitely not going to come out the second time. And if you are a personal color that's running who have little means to run but you may be a good candidate. You're going to you're going to exhaust all of your resources on the first election. You're doing a runoff you're never going to win. This board will look like it has looked a lot of times not like us. And it's not fair. You're taking away the ability to be able to have a voice. We need to leave it if you want to do something. Look at this war system that it's not a war system which is really at that large system. Think about adding two more members to this council. And injecting a true war system where only people in your ward can vote for you. Not that you have to live in the ward to run for the seat but everybody in the city. So if I ran for district one and all the white people are on the other side of town don't like me then my representation is not going to happen because they're going to outvote these black people. We know this it's been happening for years. So this is not good. We need to look at some other things that are going to happen. Thank you. Interfied Durham is anti-democratic, small D's, oppressing local minorities in many ways. Speak out in defensive democracy. Turn out for local elections is usually low. Primaries especially sometimes less than 10 percent. Local elections are held in off years as one of many tried and true ways to suppress the vote to help incumbents. Like at large voting the tactic designed to help incumbents to suppress minority votes to minimize representation of local minorities. Like having Woodcroft and Parkview decide who will represent East Durham target areas or Fayetteville deciding who represents Durham in Congress or South Carolina voters choosing McCrory and now you want to eliminate primaries which threaten incumbents supposedly because it's cheaper. You could save money on elections designed to minimize representation of local minorities by giving unwanted voters no choice at all. As it is every single election cycle for decades local cops your enforcers have persistently threatened people engaged in voter registration activities threatening arrest on some trumped up charges for trying to get people registered to vote. Running off people with voter registration forms selective voter suppression like the FBI abusing its authority to influence last year's elections even worse than the power of Russia and the FBI exercising clandestine political influence or law enforcement organizations honestly making political endorsements they should not abuse their authority by threatening people engaged in important democratic processes. If you all truly want to facilitate support and defend democracy you will oppose all forms of voter suppression including persistent blatant threats to democracy by armed enforcers who say their job is not law enforcement but social control and at large elections which minimize the representation of local minorities and odd year local elections instead hold local elections and primaries at the same time as statewide elections and primaries even if that means some challenge to incumbency. Durham has spent a large chunk of a billion dollars oppressing people. Save money, save democracy. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. I am Sivara 11 14 Woodrin Road. I want to encourage you to wait before making this change for two reasons. First it may not work in what I think is the intended outcome and secondly I hope you will keep looking for a better alternative. Within the scope of the current election system and other kinds of proposals have been made as well. Greensboro uses the primary general election system. Riley uses the general election runoff. In Durham our history has been to have four to eight percent turn out in the in the primary eight to seventeen eight to eighteen percent in the general election. The consequence of going to a general election and runoff is that fewer people will make the final decision. The ultimate choice of the winner will be determined by a smaller turnout in what is a less an election that generates less interest. I think the logic of the change is that there will be fewer and less expensive second elections if most elections are can be resolved in the general election. It appears from a quick check that only one of the last four elections in Durham would have entailed a runoff. But changing election rules could very well change the dynamics and make that happen more often. So you would have the second election and in Durham given that all voting is at large at large members and district members who are voted by who are elected by all members any single seat that's not resolved in the general election will require a city wide election for the for the runoff. So I think it may happen more often than you're suspecting and it will be just as expensive as the current approach. Will the change reduce turnout overall. I think it's a concern you need to keep in mind. Do not make this change is the second point I would make until you've explored explored the instant runoff voting alternative. I know it's not permitted now but I encourage you to fully explore the option of a local bill to make this possible. Thank you sir. Thank you. Thank you. Okay.  So I will close the public hearing. And the matter is before I close the public hearing. I mean you can still speak now. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. It's my understanding so I know that there is another meeting that's happening this evening that includes a number of individuals who would like to have been heard at this public hearing. And I'm wondering if it's possible for us to hold this open until our next council meeting so that we can as opposed to closing the public hearing. And maybe our staff can help us figure out if that's something we can do. If that's the will of the council we can we can do that. Just wouldn't close the public hearing. You just continue it for the next meeting or whichever meeting you'd like. Well I'll open the public hearing. I will reopen the public hearing. And what's the date. That's really up to council. Julie. Thank you Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I just had a quick comment. I was I had asked previously when this issue came up about the possibility of using a form of ranked choice voting like instant runoff in our elections. And our city attorney gave me the sad news that it is currently not allowed under state statute. However there have been in the past short periods of time where the state has allowed municipalities to use ranked choice voting. And that is on our legislative agenda for this year to ask the state to allow us to use that. And I just in case folks were unsure of what that is it's a system of voting that allows you to rank your choices in an election rather than just pick one candidate. So you would be able to say this is my first choice my second choice and then there's a process by which the lower vote getters are eliminated and their votes are distributed to those folks second choices. So it's a much more democratic way of actually determining the result of an election because it prevents the spoiler effect. So it prevents people from having to vote strategically for someone who they think can win rather than who their true choices are. And so you get very different outcomes. So that's something that we are continuing to look into. And I want to appreciate everyone for coming out and speaking on this tonight and I'm glad we're going to be have the opportunity to hear from additional folks at our next meeting. The other thing I wanted to check in about was that there's a possibility that the state will be holding elections this year a primary and a general. And we were told that if we were able to like hop on to those elections that we would not have that it would be less expensive for us. We wouldn't have to pay for our own elections. So I'm not sure that we want to that if we move this forward we might not want to make this decision for this year. Regardless because of the possibility that a state election will happen that would enable us to do it more inexpensively. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. So I guess I need a motion to a formal motion to continue the hearing until February 2nd. Six. I have a motion. I'll make that motion. I'll second that. Move it properly. Second that we continue the hearing to February 6th. Madam clerk would you open the vote. Close the vote. It passes six to zero. Thank you. And I have an item that I want to discuss at the meeting on Thursday. And it's a letter that I saw from Congressman Price regarding Medicaid expansion. And I was hoping that we will support that letter. So I'll get copies made for everyone. It was on his Twitter account. If there are no other matters to come before this August body the meeting is adjourned.