We have people from the public online. You better get going. That we adopt the agenda. Second. Any discussion. All those in favor. Which brings us to. Approval of your minutes for Mary 22 meeting. And move the adoption. Second. Any discussion. Seeing none. All those in favor. Aye. That's also unanimous. Which brings us to public forum. All right. Nobody from the phone. Who wants to speak. Nobody in the room. Earlier today. We are. Growing up. Well, we also don't have anything too terribly. Contentious on our agenda. So I guess we'll open and close public forum. Which brings us to our deliberative agenda. And the first item of our. Deliberative agenda is to get some information. On the South Burlington solar ordinance that was. Adopted earlier this year. Andrew. And bill. From our permitting inspections are here. To. Gage us in a discussion on this. So I've been trading email with Andrew. And I asked him about. The specifics around this ordinance. And he had pointed me to the. Is it the land development. Requirements. Are all the other. Regulations. Yeah. And there's a section there. And what I did is I printed off the, what I, the pages referenced by Andrew. So I've been trading email with Andrew. And I asked him about. What I, what I, the pages referenced by Andrew and, and, and sort of they're part of the agenda now that, and I think I also included them in emails to you all. So I don't know if you want to start off and just tell us about it. And then we can ask some questions. Before I start, let me just thank you guys because we've been. Slavishly or trying to slavishly copy a lot of the stuff that you guys. Put a place like the renewable energy ordinance and we're trying to do leaf lower. So other stuff that you guys have put a place. So thank you so much. And I'm very, very grateful to be able to return the favor to, to some extent. So I think this is, I think this is really, really good. In terms of the. Solar ordinance, it was kind of a two step process for us. And kind of two parts. So one part is already contained in the Vermont. Commercial energy standards. There's an appendix that municipalities can choose to adopt. And it's a solar ready. Requirement for commercial buildings. You may know that for residential buildings, if you've got a strict code, solar ready is already already part of that. So this kind of fills in that, that gap. So, so if you adopt that appendix to the commercial energy standards and all your buildings or new buildings requiring social solar ready. And the neat thing about that commercial solar ready appendix is it does a lot of work. It's a very thoughtful appendix and it deals with a lot of the issues that you might think about in enacting a solar. So it addresses, you know, do you have enough sunshine? Is the building oriented correctly? Is there, you know, roof garden, like all the different things that you would think about, do they already have a renewable energy system on site? You don't need the solar. It does. It does a lot of work in a few words. And when and if you adopt that, it makes it a lot easier than to have, you know, a few words to actually then require PV. So as I said, we do this in two steps. You first adopted that solar ready ordinance. And then once that was in place, you could do this at the same time, but we moved a little slowly once that's in place and new buildings are required to have that solar ready zone. We then basically added that, you know, now you got to fill that zone up.  And we also then set a limit. You don't have to put more on your building than you, than you think you're going to consume than electricity. You think you're going to consume. We have some other exemptions, like if you couldn't interconnect to the local utility, you guys would have that issue. But you know, some other things. And that was really, it was pretty, it was pretty simple, you know, again, because the commercial solar ready status did a lot of work already and we didn't have to write that. We just had to adopt it. And honestly, we didn't really get pushed back. You know, we put out the public hearing. We didn't get pushed back on the solar ready when we put that in place. We didn't get pushed back on the, on the PV when we put it in place and people, people seem to be happy with it. I will say that in prep, we did talk to folks about, you know, PV requirements. And the residential builders were not happy to have a PV requirement. The commercial builders were fine. They said, you know what? We recognize solar is really cheap. It's probably cheaper than we can buy from utility.  And like, they were fine with it. They didn't have any issues. So that's, that's kind of where we came out. Do you have numbers in terms of the buildings that have now been built that have? Well, I'll say it just came in place in this range. So nothing would have been built yet. And honestly, I mean, I've not, we probably should do that. I've not been in touch with our DRV like what's, what's, what's come through at this point. You know, but I don't think we'll see the fruits of it for a couple of years, right? And you were saying that the residential is already part of the, the state building code. Well, I've probably adopted the stretch code. The strategy standards. No, we have adopted the, the fire and building. Well, so, okay. So South really get adopted the stretch energy code for the residential. And if it really didn't have it, honestly, I would urge you to do that. At least not in the building code. Okay. I mean, that's like, it's like really key important thing because it requires lots of different stuff. It requires really good weatherization. You should renew residential buildings. It, it, it opposite anti on, it was required for TV. It was required soul. Like it really hits a lot of coins. It does a lot of work for you, you know, as a municipality. So that those, those stretch standards for residential already requires already. Is that a state standard? It's a state standard. But again, just like the commercial solar ready appendix municipalities can choose. To adopt that more strategic code. It's really important. I mean, I think it's like, honestly, like foundational. Um, yeah, I mean, just to, maybe just to fill in some other blanks, not necessarily relevant to the commercial energy standard, but like, we also did, um, to kind of increase the viability of residential solar is in our LDR department. So that means you have to, you have to have the, you have to have the, you have to have the, you have to have the, you have to have the. Require alignment of streets, building lots of buildings to reasonably maximize solar radius. So now you've got like new homes basically have to be aligned to catch the sun. They have to already have a solar zone. And like, we felt that in that, but we didn't have to mandate then new residential holders to actually put the solar arm. Like if everything is kind of set up and greased. I would expect wouldn't do that because they'll realize it's cheaper and the folks that even having done that are being transigent and wouldn't do it are the folks who would scream a lot of stuff and be required to do it and it just it kind of felt to us like we'll get most of what we need residential by what we already have in place. My quick look at the zoning ordinance does not find a anything that would cover it in the performance standards. I didn't see anything that especially abuse standards as well. Can I ask a question? I just wondering if you are aware of this stretch standards? I mentioned the topic we have a trade strategy today and I think our team would be happy to come back and answer specific questions. Two building inspectors, two electrical inspectors, who would be involved in the code deciphering of what it is required and what each building did we need to commercialize? They felt we're already doing that. They were meeting the CV standard that was mentioned so it's not to be an issue with the commercial properties and they felt that most new residential construction already meets the standard that would under the building code the Vermont Division of Fire Safety meets the conditions to make it solar ready. So I think it really would come and come down to some of the final points that the Vermont lab safety code which in South Burlington would probably be regulated by Terry Francis. I'm not sure if Terry has either signed on or had input on the changes? Well I mean just so some of the adopted the strategy standards in 2017 it's been it's been in place for a while and as I said my my understanding is it kind of hits a lot of different points for buildings that I think are quite important. We don't regulate but we don't have any compliance around that. We don't inspect whether builders do it. The state mandates that I mean there's been a lot of discussion statewide the state mandates that builders complete a form that's provided to the first homeowner where they build out to check the boxes that are required to demonstrate that they've built the building to the level required by the stretch standards. Now they could cheat and lie I guess but like my perspective is if someone's actually filling out the form and actually checks a box it says yes you know we've done this type of installation and yes we've done two by six is it yes we've you know weatherized the basement like if they check that box they've probably done it you know but maybe not but but in any event my perspective is you're even if people are going to make you cut corners and cheat you're probably getting more than you would have had you not adopted that standard so you know. So I actually think that we can do a follow-up where we ask our people and that would be those people but also Megan Tuttle and the the city attorney's office to give us a report regarding whether the state stretch code for its commercial just residential energy stretch code the residential energy stretch code and the commercial solar ready appendix are part of our regulatory system and we need to do both the building and electrical but also the zoning because where they have it is this part you know so for new development you've got to have a zoning permit and that's where you get it up front so it's a little different than people who are like modifying and going to like put in a solar array because they want to sell Burlington to say you got you build buildings at this level you got to put solar which I strongly support us yeah we key to the permit so yeah so I would just love to get you know an analysis by all those three entities in terms of it and you know in terms of its current applicability and then its advisability and you know potential problems so people think that there are you know there's a bad idea because it's going to disincent certain things let's get that on the table I'd rather hear it here before you know to do that Bill is so kind of waiting his hand he's not waiting I just want to say that in addition to that I can from 2021 I can pull that when we went to the new opening system we should be able to produce some numbers for you on the we are collecting those forms and we are doing the compliance to see you have Ted Miles who does it on the zoning side and our building folks do the two building officials confirm that they've met the CBEs Ted is collecting and actually helping people fill out the residential forms the RBEs forms so that is a check off in our commitment so we should be able to give you some numbers on those yeah but again it's a different I think the the stretch has a more requirements on that one yeah having just filled out or had my builder because it's the builders that are supposed to fill it out you know it covers the entire building construction perfecting system so certain things are not necessarily going to be not going to be required there but it would be sort of helpful to see if there are in the solar construction world what numbers exist with there and how they're filled out absolutely we're sad you know for a community long shot actually right out of state next week you know we'll be here next week um no I think that's a good idea I'm also curious to see what we've come up and I know these codes that were the overlaps and we're probably doing it anyway it's because I'm I'm almost certain that we're doing a bunch of stuff already we're now requiring solar on the residential but around leatherization and some of these other things I think yeah we're probably hitting a lot of some some stretch codes more inclusive than just for solar right oh yeah that's right so so yeah it'd be I'm curious about that as well and one of the questions had did you do you know about other communities in chitin county that have done this is it so in terms of commercial solar um I was able to find border town massachusetts and um state california and who stayed in california um I think that's it okay um at least when when when i last tracked border town massachusetts it's interesting um so yeah was sparser than um that I would have hoped right yeah and then in terms of the um residential again I mean I know we weren't here to talk about that and we haven't we didn't do residential pv for the reasons I articulated that kind of felt it was things were already a place of folks but there there is there are I mean just at california I know uh thick miami there were a bunch of places that require solar pv um so but again I think if you adopt the stretch code you're so ready you get you know you make sure that all the buildings and lots of things are aligned kind of kind of how you need them to touch the side if this was possible to get back for our um October meeting I I know that we have a lot of things and I know that we'll have one item around the vehicle for hire tax who stopped coming back to us um it's I'm trying to coordinate this behind the scenes but essentially I think this will be coming back to us it'll be referred to us by the council um and I know but it wouldn't have to be at the October meeting but perhaps we could do we could do both depending on what other staff items come to us in October certainly in a in a meeting very soon I mean I'm thinking just in terms of assuming that there is or there are ordinances to propose ordinance changes proposed you know we could do that work and then put it in but then the process is just a little it's sort of out of our hands was the ordinance committee right so um the way I can conceive of if we if this makes sense and we've been in it of us adopting something in this term which I would love to be able to have done well certainly we can request that um the uh city attorney planning and uh permitting inspection do this work um and uh see if they can fit it in and get it done in a timeline that would get us something to review and deliberate on next next to the meeting um but uh and then we just have to see what what the feedback we get on that request yeah that's fair I don't think we need to move anything see a consensus I'd like if the minister can reflect that everybody's nodding then I think we we're okay okay let the meeting let the minutes show that we'd like that to happen um um okay awesome thank you for having me um thanks for having me I love this collaboration I'm really I think this is really cool um and I'd love to see what else we can kind of get that together yeah I'd love to follow you Andrew so yeah I'm gonna keep it up plagiarism the highest form of flattery that's right okay thank you everyone thank you and see you um thank you so thank you so thank you well you're welcome to stand so that brings us to our next item 4.2 the proposed north woosky have feedback survey a lot which is very good for that so uh Claire do you want me to open that yeah sure um so we had understood from the uh 250 you wanted to see a draft survey before it went out as you know the implementation of the repaving and the lane adjustments have been made along the corridor we've put together a draft survey it's short and sweet for your consideration the thought was to get this out in October it's been a couple of months after the change has been made so people had a chance to settle into them uh and I think the important thing is we've been uh listening and uh still engaged in the corridor I met with the Dolens uh I think last week to discuss loading zone concerns uh you know the council had approved the extra $15,000 for the community health center to do the additional geotech design work uh for their off-street parking perusal so with that happy to get your feedback uh on the survey so that we can finalize it and send it out Corey anything you want to add number thoughts okay I hesitate to take our time to micro manage this I I think that there are some changes that need to be done um the uh for example uh well first of all you asked possible demographic example uh questions I do think that there needs to be those and I think that there is a real distinction between the people who are living on the street and the people who are off the street and so the um questions three and four um don't really recognize that and you're going to get you know if somebody's on the street how often do you use North Windows Avenue it doesn't I don't I don't think that it gets us enough information um so uh you know it's it's different when you when you're talking about people who are living on the caterer the crombie we also you know etc and I'm particularly focused on the the area that we've changed the uh the parking um I also think that like on number four where you talk about how do you travel most often I mean I I I sort of would like to understand the full range that people are are traveling on North Windows Avenue so here we're asking them to pick one but people use it in three ways you know generally speaking even if you park your car you're still walking around a corner say you're going to go to the market say you're going to go to uh the restaurant there on that corner go to the food shelf maybe ride your bicycle there and park it then you walk so I mean I think that you know trying to understand the the travel is um uh it is important and the the number five question where it talks about the primary destination I I also think that it is it would be more helpful for us to understand the the demographics um the demographic distinctions between the people who are living on the street and the people who are living off the street from a porch forum um conversation a week ago or so uh had um a plea for people to improve their parking that people were taking too much space and this was a person who was you know um trying to get into her into her house and trying to also use the the parking spaces like on the street there and it was a it was an interesting conversation um so our ability to sort of parse that out would be really helpful um there I said I didn't want to here I am march age or all of them sorry uh I don't know that the question on just asking does does it enhance safety for all road users is much safer I I know I know what you're sort of getting at I can appreciate that um somehow I don't think it's an effective public comment question or is it meant to elicit um what um what we're looking for in terms of safety um I don't have a question in the top of my head um uh and perhaps the more it should it's sort of the same when you say does it make it more functional and then is it more functional for who functional for what I mean then there are distinctions between the two I really love riding up the east side of the street on my bicycle without competing without going into the lane um I don't do it all that often just because of where I live and the best way for me to to ride but um it's it you know so that question sort of doesn't get to the to the distinctions there so I those are the substantive points I I totally appreciate to come back to you taking this effort right we can work through those comments I think just different yeah um I think the key demographics we could add I'm wondering if we add into number two clarity of a homeowner on North Moody's D Avenue or adjacent homeowner you know or you know renter on North Moody's D Avenue adjacent so whole concept would be number two gives you the data of where someone lives and then can filter all the other questions by number two if you also want gender and age or income demographics let us know we thought where you live was a demographic that was important to kind of cut the data by but we didn't know how far you want to go into demographics I think it's really important to understand agents I think it's important to understand race you know gender yeah I think so in terms of safety even so I would encourage that it helps us when we're thinking about other need elder transportation needs there are we we get to fill them okay what other inputs I think that all sounds good to me I mean I feel like Jean is closer to the issue just because you're hearing from folks that are in these neighborhoods every day so I think whatever changes you think should happen I would echo just because you're seeing it on your report form yeah I'm traveling yeah you're in the neighborhood I'm not so but I do think that expanding the demographic question will be huge um I I appreciate these I was thinking there was another sort of category of use that wasn't um mentioned in five and that's like access to services that are along the corridor which isn't really traveling through our shop it's not it's sort of not captured and I know that there are service providers on that corridor on thank you and the other the other thing is as I read it it sort of skirts around like sort of the point of this whole thing I think it's really good and we have to go about it this way but I'd like to be more direct about asking people about impacts both positive and negative you know I'm a cyclist it's made this this my commute safer or I go to pho hong and there's nowhere parking out you know it's or maybe just to get that sort of to elicit that in a way other than to have give a place like you do in number 10 for additional feedback and so people just ask something more about the the impacts that you have experienced as as a result of the change good or bad yeah because I think there's probably there's a there's probably a bit above yeah um I think that's all in addition to what that's what someone said that I would offer but I appreciate you doing this and I appreciate your continued effort to try to to make these changes less impactful right we worked hard to try to make this neutral so I know we didn't want to have the perception that we were leading people so we tried to use terminology and brandy cakes and ways that were more kind of impartial but to your to your point mark for asking about impacts uh good or bad do you see that being a long form question or is it somehow multiple choice I'm trying to think you know what kind of information you're seeking to get out of that well there's other places where we ask people for short answer here um so it could be that or it could be at the end too yeah and it may be you using long form but I'm just I can't figure out how to make it a short question because you probably it probably drives down response rate to establish people to fill the right stuff or you get people that are you know that are you know have have strong responses instead of those that have more neutral I don't know and maybe the words impact and positive and negative might not be no I'm not a survey creator um but I just think we need to get at that right now that a little bit and there may be a different approach that you guys can offer you know at the end of the day I think we want enough information to know that if there are particular problems that we can assist in that mixes on then you know that would be good you know and do we need more bike racks right if you look you know and I don't know how you know I'm just thinking and just in terms of the way that we do that you know I mean I go up to desicito I put my bike up again often against a street sign right there are no bike racks over there there is a meager one all the way on the backside of the dinsdale's parking lot you know on the other side of the building that's useless as you're going in that door so um some way of us being able to to to get at are the the changes that we've made how the how are we doing what other ones could be an item yeah thanks so I guess the question would be um should we my thought is stop and thanks choreo film for working on the survey with a uh do you want to see where we've landed and then via email and then any final kind of thoughts you could get us via email and we ship it out or are we waiting for the next month I don't want to wait till next month um you know so I'd be happy with seeing um an email and giving me a time to like at any final thought to get to give my input if I don't make a sort of a deadline give me enough time and not too much if I fail and you go run and I just lay myself with that we don't want to slow it down too much so let's see if we can do it in the email without having an open meeting now just get feedback and uh yeah and see how that goes yeah so our plan would probably be sending it to you all individually giving individual feedback yeah thank you yeah great thank you moving right along late speed this afternoon I just did yeah 4.3 is a railroad enterprise project update all right so yeah just here to give a quick update on the railroad enterprise project so we've provided this previously but we just periodically want to come and do this while project is moving as we continue at milestones so a little background again just again the project area obviously kind of over there in the south of downtown area so and then the three alternatives the railroad enterprise project the originally came out of the Pell study and supplement itself are sitting here with the 1b the 2 and the 5b and the 1b is the one in which we had previously presented and discussed and had gone to council and spoken about getting that concurrence with a selection of that for an alternative which is where we are currently with the ea uh smelt process environmental assessment environmental assessment thank you yeah and so currently where that stands is that the draft ea or the environmental assessment and the 4f sections documents have um been compiled and they've been submitted for initial review and they're right now open for public comment period and these documents are located both hard copies at uh the ct office at the city hall as well as here at 645 pine but are hard copies available to people to view as well as more conveniently located on the project website as well as a ability to comment through the website as well submit comments so we're in this comment period until october night and so you know this is another one of the we've sent out communications through a project website as well as uh through the uh our consultant as well as on uh mailer for just kind of again uh soliciting input and comments on the ea 4f documents so kind of from that point where we sit right now the project is that uh it's anticipated that kind of in mid october the 4f submittal to federal highway which will include any received public comments and responses to those comments will be submitted and then in mid december we look to get the final ea submitted um submittals of e-trans at federal highway uh following those additional uh comments and responses and then from that we would look to get a mid january we'll be getting a final 4f submittal to federal highway and in between each one of these steps there's a few rounds of review with federal and state partners to have to go through each submittal and so that's just kind of the time gap in this and then we look to uh finally get the federal highway issuance of a decision in late january of 24 and with that uh that would allow us to kind of continue with the progress of the project and move more into formal design work in late january so uh we previously submitted uh and shared the south end project sequencing plan um that had kind of been incurring for uh a lot of work in the south end over the years since 21 obviously you know now that we are a couple years further along there have been you know some projects have completed already and we have other updates as far as ongoing projects that we have as well as some new projects that aren't currently listed on this the city is working on updating the south end sequencing plan just to be more accurate to the current status of all these projects as well as including the projects that weren't previously identified on the earlier versions and so kind of a quick summation of this right now um jimmy do you want to do that or do you want to do that? uh i'm happy to do that um i think what we're seeing is that some projects are shifting and adjusting and we also have the addition of the new projects such as great streets cherry street and bank street where grants were secured so the plan is to update the sequence for south end and downtown and that we would come back to you uh with kind of an updated version here i think it's fair to say that the work uh in the permitting phase here to get the approval through the federal permitting process has taken us longer than we would like on the rep and we are also finding that the champlain parkway construction is moving at or better than what we expected we're going to be looking at great streets main street which bids just came in last week and trying to reconcile all these pieces and bring forward an update document to you soon so i actually have some more points to add okay so just for council members understanding once we complete the ea then it opens us the opportunity to begin design to preliminary design into into uh hopefully construction um it was another point i was trying to make and that is oh so one of the things that the council members will see in the near term is uh here's currently pursuing a phase two of design with stand tech which uh develops it's a scope that allows them to proceed with some of the design work early than late one of the fourth piece that puzzle is to get survey done this fall versus waiting till spring which enables us to continue on our schedule fairly promptly uh otherwise if we moved out of space a significant delay and we certainly don't want to do that so council members should know and prepare for the thought that uh our consultants assembling a scope and a fee and uh once we have that in place then we'll go to council and go through seeking your your authorization authority to execute but that work needs to happen that survey work needs to happen this fall in order to keep keep pace so it's an important element to managing the project now and that was the point i forgot to mention that is the aspect of that though is that this is done with a little bit of risk in that we are trying to be proactive with the assumption that header highway is going to concur with our decision so you know in order to as long as i keep things going on a good schedule we want to feel pretty confident the project team that this is the right direction for the project to go and there's no indications that your assumptions are wrong correct so that's where we're moving forward on so that normally we'll be coming again then uh in the near term yep so one more point in this public public engagement with the EA approval assessment is we've also worked more directly with the uh properties that are directly affected by the butters so they're aware of where we are with this project beyond just broadly broadcasting to the public we're reaching out to them specifically sharing with them the draft EA their comment just another point is that uh your individuals who are looking to provide feedback on the or f like i said the project website has the availability to submit comments there also if uh individuals are so inclined they can also email them to me directly and i'll get them to the project team for filing and for records and then just as the project we team went through the comments the responses are not immediately sent to those who have sent the comments in we compile all those rat responses and then provide those responses back at the end of the at the end of the time period so i just would say that just in case someone said oh i didn't get a response back to my comments it's part of the process is that clear when you uh are is that clear the documents when they're i don't think it is thinking back to it i might not be clear if it's online i haven't looked through the online simple process but when i've received emails i've typically tried to contact us indicating that you know we've received this and we will be responding in kind to all responses at the end of the period okay yeah i mean i think as long as people know what the expectations are yeah oh yeah well i don't know if anybody has any questions or um i just have the one question around um what you said we have to do the survey this fall the risk is that the federal highway doesn't um concur with us then we could have spent money on the survey that we could that money is essentially i just want to make sure i mean so in conversation with our state state project manager he's of the belief that it's proven for us to do that and we'd be project eligible so i don't think there's any financial risk okay i think it's just we don't want to be wasteful we want to be state federal or local resource we also want to be recently thoughtful about how it affects schedule and that affects the federal public obviously we want to have this advance that's reasonably quickly as possible but quickly okay that that helps um and then you think it'll become due to council line october early uh i don't know if we will because we will get the documents for the next phase but then there'll be some discussion back and forth prior to us having the final documents to bring to council maybe i would say probably november probably november there's more for our ability availability we think we want to get it for snowballs yeah to his point they're getting surveys critical maybe snowing in november according to the farmers are in the palm and that's what that but you know what i think about snow so um so i think i read that opponents to the champlain parkway who are um supporting the r.e.p have but you know have continued to express that is that is that accurate and uh you know in terms of the prior opponents to the parkway is there any indication that they would not be supporting this i've not heard anything direct that would indicate anyone opposing the progress of the r.e.p i i recall one individual named names that he his belief was supportive of it and just to execute as planned because it would do it this quickly right so prudently yeah right yeah and we are so yeah so i think that was and in terms of the property owners um is there any indication that there will be roadblocks thrown out i i don't think that can really be known until the full determination of impacts and the right-of-way phase gone in those conversations okay you know but at any point someone can change the mind about how they feel about something so i don't want to speak out of turn and say that everyone's on board with everything we'll just simply say that we're in clear communication and continued communication with all the property owners and they are you know trying to be as prudent with providing any information that we have available that we can provide at this point to them upon request you know red flags that would be as transparent as we can but and and you're not i mean it would be helpful for us to hear if there were red flags or even yellow flags that are out there well some of the property owners who are being the most impacted do have their concerns yeah and they voice their concerns and some of them have voiced their concerns many times and we are hearing it but again as this process is you know federal process we are proceeding through we are meeting with them at the appropriate time that we're able to and you know giving them the information what the next steps are and when we get to the right-of-way phase and we're able to actually have those communications start doing assessments uh of property and of property valuations then you know you can have more detailed conversations if they are wanting now that we are unable to to because of the process but you're at least hearing about where they're at and kind of make a sense for this degree yes degrees of concern but it's without any specificity yeah they're just kind of widely kind of accepting where they're at but i think there's also an expression for the need and desire to be to have a path forward and not have kind of a moneyed decision making that's not moving forward yeah you know i understand it says to my way of thinking the more you can understand where people are at and what they're looking for the better you're prepared to deal with it whatever way you can so i think the biggest challenge we're probably going to be parking for and how they how various parcels will either share it as a common resource or work to their own individual interests on their own parcel and how that plays out it's so creative yeah thinking about you're trying to encourage for that high-levels cooperation but it's really kind of up to them how they want to approach that now they want to make use of their property but i think there's some seen opportunity with improved access and improved snow water so thank you thank you i appreciate the update it's exciting stick remains an exciting project okay next on that is a potential executive session and we have language on emotion we need to do that you want to provide some update that for the public before we make such a motion i think the public update that we've provided to the board of finances is as much as we have i'm happy to do that again but maybe so for the listening public just just something brief so people know whatever you can share that we're talking about or we go talking about it do you want to do that so just what was shared at the border finance just where we are generally outside of anything when we discuss an executive session yes so last week uh we went to border finance and city council requesting a one-year extension to the second mo you with chitin solway district in the city of barrington around 195 201 flint avenue the request was granted by council so cswd is going to consider that at their meeting which is this tonight no tomorrow night Wednesday with the full board at 6 p.m. tomorrow and so this is about overall trying to achieve two main goals one having a modern drop-off center chitin solway's drop-off center in barrington and two having a united and better structured soil management facility for the city of barrington and by having access to 195 201 flint avenue the thought is that that could be an effective soil storage area and management area for the city as well as a potential future site for the drop-off center should it no longer be able to be accommodated at 3 3 time and street whether that's because of the rail yard enterprise project which we just discussed or any other adaptive reuse of that property that makes a you know solway's drop-off center not the optimal use of that property and so this executive session it relates to to negotiations contract negotiations correct is there the mo you that's currently approved expires at the end of september in four days and we are negotiating with them certain terms under either a police arrangement or a purchase and sale of 195 201 and staff would like to share the elements of those negotiations and since it's a real estate transaction it is a allowable reason to go into an executive session you're looking for i have to get a guide to again those negotiations so i and there you go very good um i will move to enter executive session to one vsa the director's report turn over to captain for that i will help keep the meeting on track i'm happy to answer any questions under a councilor item i i mean if if you told me i guess the one item on the north plant sewer second break is that we are reviewing bids that came in for repairing the pipe in the river so that we can abandon the surf official bypass the existing above ground bypass before winter so that we're not trying to operate that through freezing conditions um we are reviewing the bids i'm confident that we'll be in front of you on the council in probably the late october meeting for approval that construction contract femas indicating that that work in addition to the bypass work that was done initially will all be eligible at 75 25 and of that state pays a portion of the 25 so our likely share is going to be around 12 of all of this work so we'll keep you posted but that's the update on the site of break i have two questions about that one is um did you identify the nature of the break i know that there was some question of whether or not it was near the shore or further out into the yeah river the diver were able to get down uh they were unable to see because the river still was cloudy at the time but they were able to feel their way and the pipe had been undermined on the outside of the curve there's a large oxbow at north plant and the outside due to the flooding had become eroded and the pipe was no longer suspended was suspended it was no longer supported and um the pipe separated at that location by the bend in the river the outside bend so we are evaluating repair of that section and understanding that that is not going to be the permanent long-term repair that we are going to be then evaluating with fema some hazard mitigation funding or something to do either a uh land oriented force main that goes around the river or directionally drill underneath the river as was done in 2006 the last time there was this the other question was around the um oh because of the it was because of the flooding and the erosive effects of the flooding there's also been discussion around um the undermining of the bite bridge i don't know it's unrelated to the plant but it's that whole area still and is there any update on on that parks is uh in active communication with us uh we are taking the lead on the storm event filing and work with fema um but parks knows the window in which they need to determine whether that damage to the abutment was storm related and and whether there is structural damage there they were waiting for the water level to go down as well to expose the uh more of the abutment so parks has to do that work and then work collaboratively with tpw correct okay well that's that's new information and i'll definitely follow on that okay and derek roach is their point person now that cindy's out on this cindy is out just for a couple weeks could we convocation a one week at a conference well thanks for that update um just i don't have questions i have but i'm sorry would you like to do your notes for during consular irons yeah okay there's nothing else on director so we'll move to consular irons um on thursday third four city hall seven p.m. or over zoom the warden p.a. will be discussing the vicky so i just want to join the discussion you can meet us okay excited we're going to be able to be doing a presentation during that no i think i need to like gather up all the items that i threw your way and so i can figure out where things are at we're picking through them slowly and i'd say one and we're you know we can put them on to a hat and start to get that way it's a possibility let's say nor the wisp ahead of time so to some of those items i know that um our agenda planning that chicken and i and maddie have been doing we know that they're some of them are coming and they're sort of talking about things so yeah yeah i mean so is dpw involved with the at all with the bird bikes november right you're gonna is that when they're coming well we are involved we are signatory we have a agreement with katma katma is the one who had a contract with bird bikes but we are a partner in that agreement so the thought was to come to you around november with what the performance data for the year has been we the contract terms that katma has with bird is that they can cancel with 90 days notice before the renewal period the renewal date is in june so the 90 days ends in sometime in march the thought was if we started a conversation with you all in advance of march well in advance of march then you all could give us any guidance on whether any modifications to the contract need to be negotiated between katma and bird i would love to get something in writing through katma you know maybe through through you from katma related to how it is why people leave their bikes in the middle of cyborg everywhere everywhere you know like is this that the bike dies and they just okay this thing is heavy i mean i you know because if you pick them up then the alarm sounds they're in words so yeah so this is this is and this is a uh that question i mean i yeah no i think people i mean people comment on it is that's weirded yeah i can get around them but it's you know yeah but i have concerns when you know they're still using them during the winter and they abandon them on the sidewalk and then it snows and then our sidewalk just comes through yeah and we just so i think they're not waiting not waiting for that you know the other metrics the uses you know etc those are things that you probably wait but that's the one operational issue which both other people and myself kind of interested in and you think about someone who's not even a body trying to get by so walk around more day any day like i have had so many i know this is a discussion now but so many property owners and renters that have called me that like after a night out they'll come back and even in the parking lot that my apartment building's in there'll be like six bird bikes in the middle of the parking lot and so then no one can use their cars then people are late to work no one knows how to move them and it's just like a fall up college street all down Bradley street like it is just absolute chaos and a few neighborhoods so yeah i can give me a new think about somebody say on a motorized scooter because they can't walk right they are not yeah walking you know they're not driving on this i mean on the intergrass so yeah i think we need to need to express and i would love us to express dislike of that in addition to getting the reasons before us and and some and asking Katma and Bird to like come up with some ways that this won't happen because the current way don't work so could we is that something we could do do before november since it's in an emergent sort of situation around could ask Katma to come in actually yeah maybe we maybe just just thought it's just like it's the process that i'm still interested in the usage it seems like yeah there's a lot more usage now that there's not like the system where that we had when the previous like model so that's encouraging it's just like how to get them how to keep them out of the way when they're not yeah well this relates to TDM and the operation of transportation demand management and so that's why you've got Katma to do that sorry because it's a partial of that so over a we haven't we've got an idea it's not working perfect it's not working even really at least on this area just make some changes so that this thing works okay i guess i will update my update then as i'm just copying Katma's update but the award for seven NPA is doing they're having the McNeil night so that's it's seven o'clock at the Miller Center on Wednesday the 27th i think is tomorrow yeah um it will have a uh on our agenda is the McNeil discussion PD and others would be there talk about pros and cons with energy yeah um and that's my update so if there's no other councilor items um talk about our next meeting uh currently scheduled for uh October 24th if it was regular time five o'clock do we have this room then yeah um is that work for everybody yeah one second please that would be the fourth uh that does not work for me if that would make my or too much that would make my wife on that i do that all the time so i don't think i ever did i i make a habit of it i do okay now it's like you've got an opportunity to make work that's true it's true um i would do 17th work that's three weeks right that's a third that'd be the third yeah Tuesday i don't know if we could have the room then that works for staff this room isn't available but um on thursday the 26th two days after the regular schedule that was working with that i didn't check staff calendars but at least i can also my NPA is almost always on the last thursday what time is that on the internet seven uh normally seven right so we could maybe like we can't just i just send the only councilor that goes to it so if i don't go that they don't have anyone we don't let me keep you from that but that would put that set 27th work i have something that i can make i can do so that i do it so yes so the 26th i have um packed the fourth wednesday i've been wednesday is the 25th so the 26th the 26th so thursday right yeah i can make that work so um what time at five the room is available all day i can book the room so we have it and then confirm with you guys after the fact because i haven't checked all the staff's calendars i'm sure that it looks worth it yeah five o'clock i think it was giving more time to coordinate like yeah some of these things is better than drawing it out i i i agree i'm sorry for complication yeah that's oh wendy that uh we're doing it for her i will do that i i expect to get some credit out we get the soil pile out of the inner valve and we're good to go that's you know that won't get you any problem that's the end of our agenda three counselors have to get down to c a on church too we're so slow yeah so i would entertain a motion to adjourn since jean's busy outside yes i am i'm just locking it in all those in favor of germans uh all right all right and six oh seven okay nice thanks everybody thank you all get to the ruby survey and uh good bye now he gets me more keep it on the bird bites recording stopped it's interesting because i know i feel like some


Live from Bahrain, it's theCUBE. Covering AWS Summit Bahrain. Brought to you by Amazon Web Services. Okay, welcome back everyone. We are here in Bahrain for the special exclusive coverage of AWS Summit in the region, and the big announcement of the AWS region being deployed here, and that's scheduled for Q1 roughly in 2019, as Theresa Carlson told us today on theCUBE. This is exciting opportunities for the Middle East and the region and the ground in the world.  Our next guest here is Lana Alatar, founder of Good Juju, and amazing logo on their card. Empowering good, welcome to theCUBE. Good to see you. Thank you for having me. Great to meet you yesterday, and when we were chatting, take a minute to explain what Good Juju is, and we'll get to the meaning of the logo if you can see it. I'm not sure you can see it, but. Go ahead, what's that? What's Good Juju? Good Juju means good magic. We're a digital agency with a conscience, and how we do that is a lot of our clients are people that have any kind of social good to them, so we're talking autism schools, or even normal schools, for example. They might charge money, but they're still in the industry of education, so it's fantastic. So we help the little guys. We give them the technology that they need. We empower them with technology, and that's what Good Juju's about. On the other side of the spectrum, we also hire mostly women to do the development, so we hire and train. We hire refugees as well, and most recently we've signed a contract with a company, and they provide us differently-abled people, but they're fantastic designers and developers, so we've expanded into that as well. So we pay our staff to be heroes. They are heroes day in and day out, and that's why I told you to wait. I can see you're impressed. Oh my God, I'm impressed. Well no, I mean, there's a little bit of capitalism in there, too, that makes me go, wow, that's a brilliant idea. Arbitrage of the labor market, but they're also helping people, and you're giving, tapping into passion. You're taking a passion project, turning it into a business, help people bring it all together, magic. Exactly. Do we help people? That's good magic. Exactly. That's where the name Good Juju comes from. Great mission. I love your mission. Talk about some of the things you're working on. Okay, so most recently we're working on a diversity on board project, and initially it will be to, so we handle the tech part of this. So a lot of people, they come to us, and they try to partner with us, or even get us to complete their projects. And this particular project, it's, if you go to any part of the world, usually in the Middle East, it'll be Middle Eastern men on the boards, and if you go to the States, it'll be like middle-aged white men on the board. So there's no diversity, and that can be a problem for certain companies, because you want the 360 view. It's a problem period. I think pretty much people have figured out that diversity gives you more than not having it. You see things from different angles, because if you have the same kind of age group and the same kind of gender and the same everything, then you will not foresee the different challenges or opportunities that come by. So this is a matchmaking portal that we're working on, and it's soon to be launched. We're already testing internally in beta, and then we're going to expand it to like a private beta group. So that's one of the things that I'm working on. I recently, within the company, did one for the Women Power Summit. It was the largest summit in Bahrain for women. We had 500 women attendees and about 50 speakers. Some of them were international as well. All women, men were welcome, but majority of them were women. And just to really up the game in the gender equality, so we did the technology for that as well, so we did an online ticketing system, credit card debit card payments, a reservation, so it was a lot of fun. And who's coding all these apps? Oh, us internally in the team. We have about nine in Bahrain, and most of them are women, except for one, the digital marketer. Mm-hmm. People getting down and dirty in coding away. Yes, although it does take a lot of training, so in Bahrain there's been a shift, right? So I also run a local development community, so the Google Developer Group in Manama, the Manama chapter, and we have like 651 members, right? So it's picking up, and people are learning. TensorFlow is like candy for developers. We did do a few TensorFlow. People love TensorFlow. Oh yeah, definitely AI machine learning, deep learning. It's on right now. It totally is. All right, so talk about how do you find all these people, do they come to you? You've got an open policy, you're hiring refugees. Is there like, it means there's like a network? Are you tapping your own network? So what we usually try to do is find people that are on the ground, and then they tell us like, oh, we have like this kind of facility set up, so can you find us a job? And I will never say no to people wanting jobs, and to be very honest, in my line of work, especially when you're catering to charities and NGOs, you have an abundance of clients. It's overflowing, because they don't have the capital that they need in order to accomplish their projects. You do big firms, you're like conglomerates now.  Yeah. You got to write a big check. Exactly. And you might not get the service you need anyway. Exactly. And if you're an NGO, you don't get the love that the big commercial clients would get? Exactly. So we cater to those kind of clients. And also we have, so our slogan is empowering goods. So we empower those that empower other people. We would never sell our clients something that they don't need. For example, we focus primarily on like, sometimes they want a website and an app and the whole nine yards, and then they just need one pager to accept payments or donations online, and that's all they really need, and some good branding. And so we make sure they focus that capital that they already have, and really capitalize on that capital that they have and give them the maximum bang for their buck, basically. That's awesome. Now, who do you work with? Do you have any partners? Are you doing it solo? What are your? It's just me and leading the staff of nine. And then we tap into a global market of 10. So we have associates that we bring on. I believe in the gig market. I don't think that having full-time staff long-term is something that is sustainable. Even, so I recently came back from China from the annual new meeting of champions and the common theme over there, whether it was the future of work, the future of education, or even the future. Okay, wait, there was work, there was education, and there was one more. Did you hear something? Yeah, e-commerce, there we go. Digital, like online sales. And we noticed like, there was a very big trend towards everything being digitalized. And with the exception of having community clubhouses to have that human factor over there. So people love to still have that engagement, that bonding that I belong to that company or I belong to that mission of vision. But everything is going online. So I really believe that the gig market's going to, it's already started taking off, so it's going to be a thing. And then being a part of community really brings the shared experiences together. And when you have that kind of co-creation or interaction, it makes people feel part of something bigger. Exactly. And that's bonding. Exactly, so even if you look at e-commerce stores, a lot of them have their like flagship stores, but they're not there for sales. Because most of their sales gets done online. They're there for giving that experience. So when you walk in a store, you have that experience. That's super. What's the biggest thing that you've learned doing this? Is there any things that surprised you? Things that jumped out at you? Things you didn't expect? Things that were successful? You go, wow, that was amazing. Things you tripped over? I tripped over a lot. It's constant tripping. So that's how you learn.  How does that work? I learned very earlier on that people value what they pay for, so don't give things for free. You charge people, but charge them reasonably. So you say, okay, I'll charge you this much for this kind of service. And this bit, you can do it by yourself, right? We'll give you the guidelines. We've done it over and over.  So there was a lot of, for example, oh, you can't hire refugees and why can't I hire refugees? There's a lot of trial and error. Obviously you'd have people that would sell their... You got to give it a shot. You got to try. Yeah, of course. And the experience has been unbelievable. I mean, some of them start off with WordPress development and then end up with full stack JavaScript, right? And you give people a chance. It's just like that example of Professor Mohammed Unison, Grimanc Bank, where he said, oh, you can't loan to beggars. And he's like, why not? And the default rate is so much more lower than the conventional banks and they don't have any credit ratings, right? So I learned to not, I try not to follow the status quo. My mission is purely to empower people, whether I'm employing them or I'm doing a project for them. So there's always that angle and it's very different when you know what your values are and you go in, so. And then you got to have an alignment. Well, Lana, thanks for coming on theCUBE and sharing. Great to hear your story. I think Bahrain is going to be a great tech scene. Obviously I'm very encouraged by the entrepreneurs I met. You can kind of spot an entrepreneur mile away. They chirp a lot, they want to move go faster. Where's the cash? Where's the collaboration? So they don't, I'm not in the mean way, I don't mean that. And then the other thing that surprised me was Teresa's women's breakfast yesterday that was blown me away. How dynamic the group was. I thought that was phenomenal. Just great to see the startup community here in Bahrain doing just so much energy and support. We have a very tight ecosystem. I'm sure some of the other people probably have already mentioned this. Everybody talks to everybody. So you're always one step away from whatever it is that you need. So either you ask a person, they know exactly what you need. Or they refer you to that person and they give you like name and number right then and there. So we're all intertwined. I think you've seen as old how the ecosystem is just amazing. That's important and it's super important as communities with open source, you can see this when Amazon comes here. It's going to be a goodness of open source. And you can have now scale. You can have pull new opportunities going to be coming in. It should be a fun ride. I'm looking forward to covering you guys. I've been telling everyone that it is amazing time to be a woman tech entrepreneur in this region. Amazing. Congratulations. Thank you. Our doors always open in Silicon Valley if you need anything. Okay, that's more cube cover.  Stay with us. We've got a couple more interviews. We'll be right back after this short break.