--------- City council meeting back to order. Natalie, can you read us, out of, closed session, please? Certainly. I move that this council certify by recorded vote that to the best of each council member's knowledge, only public business matters lawfully exempted from the open meeting requirements of the Virginia Freedom of Information Act and identified in the motion convening the closed session were heard, discussed, or considered in the closed session. I'll second. Second, are we voting electronically? Not everyone signed in yet. So Okay.
All in favor, please say yes. Yes. All opposed, please say no. The motion passes, five to zero. We will take a moment of, silence. Before we do that, we made some appointments in closed session, and councilor Ashwin will read those. To the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund, at large, Sarah Malpass, and Affordable Housing Beneficiary, Jamala Hamilton. For Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau Board, food and beverage rep, Brad Oll, and accommodations, Zarena Yefezova.
Community development block grant and home task force, Salitha Carr to the Rosehill seat and Jamala Hamilton to the Fifeville seat, historic resources committee to Jennifer Trumpeter, human rights commission, Hannah Langlet and Callum McCain von Schill, local board of building code appeals, Robert Peneo, Personnel Appeals Board, Rafaela Doudzai and Adam Hastings. And Sister Cities Commission, rescinding appointment as the business rep and reappointing as the Huey, Tenango rep, Kristen Petrostego. Okay. Is everyone signed in?
If not, I'm gonna take a voice vote. Oh, can I get a I'll second second that? Motion to appoint them? Yeah. So moved. Second. Second. All in favor, please say yes. Yes. All opposed, please say no. That motion passes five to zero. I wanna thank those individuals for agreeing to serve, the city, numerous committees and, we will have a moment of silence, please. Thank you. We have a couple announcement. First is that there is a new, technology for the downtown garages and, they have
signs and things that you, to, you know, with these, changes, but the main changes that, Sam, do you wanna say what the main changes are? Or Actually, I have asked Chris Engel to come on the January 5 Okay. So he can go into greater details. But, there is signage in the garages for people to access the QR code for being able to set up your ability to make those payments. And I think we're working on the kiosk now, making sure that it comes live
as well. Yes. I know we have a a lot of questions and on that, but the website has a lot of information. We'll and we'll get more in about two two weeks or so a little bit. We'll probably I will make sure that we have multiple news flashes go out so that that information is readily available. The system goes active tomorrow, so people who do come to the parking garages will need to sign up, once they do enter. They will not be able to exit without signing up. Yeah. And for just for the public's awareness, this is a company that uses, AI in
order to automatically, guess what your license plate and car model are, and they are under several, class action lawsuits, including several from state attorney generals for systematically sending inaccurate bills as well as improperly handling private information of customers. But on a happy note, you won't have to. You'll have your little badge because it's wet. Right. So much better than a parking lot attendant. Yeah. Yeah. Before we move on, I just wanted to take this opportunity to, thank my colleague,
Brian Pinkston. This is his last meeting. I know we we still live on the same block. We're still gonna be friends and engaged, but I'm gonna miss your, your input on counsel, my dear friend. I we, appreciate your your four years on council. The your input with, the, Buford, Charlottesville Middle School and the various committees and things that you're on has just been, so valuable, and we're gonna miss you.
We have a couple of things here for you. We have something here for you and the missus to to go enjoy yourself at Cardinal Hall. I know, you like that. And this is a, a plaque, so you can put it with your, your name tag that we we we had up here. It's just thank you recognition for your commitment for making Charlottesville a place where, all people can thrive in with great appreciation for your four years. Just wanna thank you, sir. Appreciate your service, man. Is this a time frame there?
Yes. Please indulge me. Yeah. I had a couple of gifts that I wanted to make, if that's okay. Yes. This this is for James. Oh. It's a it's a rubber mallet. It's not a hammer. But sometimes things need a little bit of a budge. So, that's for you. I got this for Sam. Sam, this is a compass. People say that we need a plan. We have a really good plan and a strategic plan. Okay. Mhmm. And, not that you need that because you've already got a really strong North Star.
Remember what I will. Thank you. I got this from my very good friend, Lloyd Snuck. This is a remote to help you turn off your year. One more thing I have to figure out. And, thank you. I think. There's this there's a backup one. Oh, okay. I did have a few notes here. Yes. Yes. So, Sam, steer the city through the maze at his strategic plan is all about the people.
Ultimately, you get that. Lloyd, I just wanna say that you've changed my view of loggers. What people may not know about you is the level of care and compassion that you have. You're deeply a compassionate person who cares for everyone in the city. And, you've been a real friend and mentor to me. Thank you for that. Thank you. Yeah. I've got something for you. Juan, I know you've got a stash of these in your hand. Yeah. Yeah. Let's go and put this in some tits rolls. So I just wanted to say one, I've never known a person who lives out
the second commandment to love your neighbor as yourself the way that you do, and thank you for your friendship. It's really cement the world to me. Thank you, brother. I got this for Natalie. Uh-oh. Shouldn't be a surprise. I love it. It's perfect. They're right next to my helmet. Natalie, I just wanna thank you for helping me to see new things. The importance every time I'm near a bicycle lane. I'm always like, what would Natalie do? So thank you for helping me see that. Michael, I got something special for you. Just see if I can find it. A Virginia tie. Yeah.
I know how much you enjoy ties. And, I know that those colors will really resonate with you. Certainly want to rep the University of Virginia. Say again? Certainly went to rep the University of Virginia. I just wanted to say I paid sales tax on that. Yeah. Right. I just wanted to say, Michael, that I've learned so much from you. My opinion of you going in was very different than how I learned you to be. Just goes to show how we can have wrong assumptions. I found you to be just an amazing colleague.
You've been a real partner. I'm really grateful for you helping me to always, like even earlier tonight, focus on the poor and the people that are marginalized. I'm very grateful for that. Kina, I'm almost done. Oh, hey. There you go. Are. Kina, this is for you, and this is for Max. I'm saying that's for you. Kina, I just wanna say thank you and your staff for all of the late nights and weekends for taking care of us. People don't see how much you go people have no idea what goes into the
logistics of these meetings, and I thank you for that. And, Max, the same, for you. I just wanted to let you know that one of my high points of every meeting is I can always count on a really good meal. Yeah. And I know that's because of your care and attention. And I also gave something to Ashley. I'm grateful to her for helping me see new things particularly with respect to the unhoused and the marginalized. Thank you. Thank you, brother. Appreciate it. I'm sure you'll be thinking about us the first and and third Oh, yeah. I'm thinking Mondays.
Mister mayor Yes. Make a quick quick comment. One of the things that I I wanted to point out for folks who may not remember that four years ago, we had no plan for how we were gonna build Buford, how we're gonna remake Buford into Charlottesville Middle School. We had put a number in the budget a couple of years out in the capital improvement plan, dollars 50,000,000, But we didn't know how we were gonna get there. And Brian, in the budget season in early twenty twenty two, basically, at the beginning
of his term, he jumps in and he says, okay. Here's how we're gonna do it. We're gonna cut this. We're gonna move this to a next the next year. We're gonna do this, this, this, this, and this. And now we had a plan. And that was a plan that nobody else had come up with. For about ten years, we had talked about this. And Brian put the plan together. And then it made sense, and the rest of us voted for it. And I think that it's one of those things that, you know, they're not gonna not gonna name the school after you or anything. But it's it's something that those of us who are who are in on things
at the time recognized as a real contribution, that is gonna make a huge difference for everybody. It's making a huge difference, for our, what, sixth and seventh, seventh and eighth graders and six and about to be graders. And it it just made a big difference. And it it took somebody who had some fresh eyes on the problem, brand new to council, fresh eyes and a willingness to throw things up in the air and and have them come out the right way. So thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. And, and, obviously, I know the thing that you're going to miss is the retirement commission, and, you're gonna have a lot of tales to tell people about the retirement commission. It's been lovely. The work you did on it. But, no, I mean, to just echo what Lloyd said and as you said, obviously, we came in being ideologically different, you know, in the grand scheme of things, not that different, but more moderate Democrat versus myself being a Democratic socialist. And certainly, we disagree and have disagreed.
And, like, everything in politics when you disagree, you know, you can get annoyed and grumpy. I'm also grumpy all the time. So but, but in all seriousness, you know, I think you've always been, open and listened. You've changed my perspective on things. You've helped me see things a different way. And I think one of the the things, you know, I always clearly saw is that every decision you made whether agree or disagree with it, it wasn't rooted in a personal grievance or some calculation of this. Will will this be politically advantageous?
At the end of the day, it was rooted in what you believed was right. And as Lloyd touched on, there's a lot of things behind the scenes that people in the community don't necessarily see. And I think you've been a part of a lot of behind the scene work on, getting things like, as Lloyd mentioned, a plan for the completion of Buford renovation and a plan to approach, school facility buildings in a better way, to be support for, you know, the Dogwood housing portfolio purchase to prevent displacement and long term create
affordable housing on approving a unionization plan that was more expansive than maybe some of the initial plans coming forward, and, environmental initiatives, affordable housing initiatives on zoning investments, other areas. And, again, people in the community, you know, maybe don't always see all this stuff, but you've you've played a very important role behind the scenes on, all those issues. Thank you. So thank you.
I'll say something brief because my term on council has been brief compared to the rest of you. But from the start, I was I was talking to Brian before the meeting started about this is a council that I'm I've been, it's been really nice to be a part of this particular council, and a lot of that has to do with, we're we're on two boards together, MBO especially. I walked into that kind of feeling a little lost, and it was good to know I had somebody on our team to, to kind of guide me through that right at the beginning and and being on council in general.
Like like Michael said, your decisions come from a place of doing the work and considering the angles and, always being kind and open minded. And, I really appreciate that example that you've set and for being part of what feels like a team. Even though we do differ, we differ at the margins. We're all trying to do the best for for our community, and I think you really exemplify that. Thank you. Enjoy your your retirement. Your new your new time. Yes. Well, thank you.
The next item on our, agenda is community matters. We have, four preregistered speakers, opportunity for 12 more. And the first speaker is Rebecca Ellison. Good evening. My name is Rebecca Ellison, and I'm a City Of Charlottesville resident, but here this evening representing VIA Centers for Neurodevelopment as the director of advancement. VIA is a Charlottesville based nonprofit that's been serving the community for nearly thirty years by providing compassionate evidence based services for people with autism and related disabilities. We offer specialized schools, adult day programs, and early intervention, meeting individuals and their families
at every stage of life. VIA is a proud fiscal '26 recipient of the vibrant community fund grant. I sincerely thank you for being an essential partner in our work and wanna share more about the significant impact your support has had on the families we serve. Many of the individuals in our program engage in challenging behaviors that displaces them from their home public school stemming from an inability to communicate basic wants and needs. Through highly individualized programs, we teach communication, academic, vocational, and social skills to replace those
challenging behaviors with functional communication, allowing them to build the skills they need to be active and engaged in our community. This specialized care offers an equally critical service to our caregivers, relief and stability. When a loved one is safely and productively engaged in an Avaya program, parents and guardians are able to work, care for siblings, and attend to their own health. Currently, the demand for our services exceeds our capacity. Every day, a student is on our wait list. They miss opportunities for essential skill building and the family shoulders the burden of full
time care, often impacting the caregiver's ability to work in our community. To address this, we are undertaking a capital project to expand school services. The new school, once complete in late twenty twenty six, will serve up to a 100 students in our Charlottesville community. A special component of our school will be an intensive neurobehavioral classroom. The goal goal of this program is to keep children facing placement and out of area residential facilities here at home in our community and with their families. Furthermore, our adult services offer dignity, structure, and continued growth.
Medicaid waivers only cover about half of what it costs to for quality program for individuals with significant disabilities, so we rely on operational fundraising and strong community partners. VIA is also in the very early stages of building a residential services program to answer the question of aging caregivers of what will happen to my loved one when I am gone. VIA is not just a service provider. We're an important part of Charlottesville's social safety net. We give some of our most vulnerable community members a voice, a future, and a safe place to learn, which allows them and their families to thrive.
I wanna thank you again for your continued support and ask that you remain an active partner as we expand our capacity to serve more folks in our community. If you're interested in learning more, I'd love to host you for a tour. Councilman Pinkston already took me up on this offer about a year ago, and I'm just grateful for your support and partnership as we work to make Charlottesville an inclusive community. Thank you. Thank you, Rebecca. And I appreciate, buyers' participation in cooperation with Charlottesville City Schools. I know that y'all do, a lot to draw people to this community because I
know what you're doing is some of the more innovative things on the whole East Coast and, you know, so thank you all for you for your work, and thinking about your residents, your students beyond once they age out. So you're you're thinking a few steps ahead. So thank you. Yeah. I'll I'll be in touch. I don't see Joy here. She's the next speaker, so I will go with Wendy. Hi. Wendy Gao. I organized at FAR. I have spent a lot of time recently listening and talking to elders in our community about land.
West Main Street is built on violently stolen, unseated, Monacan land and formerly black owned land. Most people don't know that the flats in the standard are standing on land that used to be part of Gospel Hill. People most commonly associate the UVA Hospital and Lee Street as sitting on top of Gospel Hill, but it was expansive and stretched up to West Main Street to the site that LV Collective wants to build their 11 story building on. Gospel Hill was home to many freed black families in Charlottesville after Reconstruction. But UVA violently destroyed Gospel Hill in the sixties and seventies to build parking lots
and medical buildings. There's no physical trace of Gospel Hill today. What remains instead is the flats and the standard, which you can see looming over West Haven from the bottom of the hill. Every night, over a thousand UVA students in the flats in the standard lay their heads down and go to sleep in luxury apartments on land that was stolen from free working class black families. You can't talk about LV Collective without talking about Gospel Hill. You can't talk about LV Collective without talking about urban renewal, Jim Crow reconstruction, or chattel slavery. West Main Street used to exist for the community before it was an outpost for
UVA. There used to be a Safeway and a Reeds for people to buy food and groceries. Stacy Hall, the UVA administrative building that is being used as a marker to allow the mark to be built with less affordability requirements used to be a Sears. The Lark used to be a furniture store, and all of it was affordable and for the community. But all of that has been lost lost. The loss and transformation of all of these community fixtures into the Omni Hotel in 600 West Main and The Graduate have also meant the loss and displacement of many people who used to live and work here and be able to afford living here.
This isn't about supply or demand of housing or more tax revenue for the city. This is about the black community of Charlottesville getting the land from under their feet literally ripped out from under them for for profit and money over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. Tomorrow, the mark on 7th Street is going to the board of architectural review, and an appeal will inevitably be headed to council in January. You all have a work session about student housing and by right zoning scheduled in January. When that time comes, please deny the mark and do whatever you can to fix
the zoning code to protect black neighborhoods. We will be there, so we'll see you in the new year, and we definitely will not be letting up until we get the protections that black communities in the city need and deserve. Thank you. Alicia. Good evening. My name is Alicia Lenahan, and I live in the county. In regard to the resolution condemning nontransparent federal immigration enforcement tactics, I appreciate the questions raised by members of the council and hope to use this time to respond. First, we agree that the constitution is the supreme law of the land. I have said that the first, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, tenth, and fourteenth amendments
support passage of the resolution. You have said that the constitution precludes you from regulating how federal agents operate in this community. The facts and the law bring me to a different conclusion. The FBI has reported that individuals posing it as ICE agents have committed violent crimes, making it necessary to confirm the identity and legitimacy of those claiming to act as federal agents. There is no question that the Charlottesville police department can and should, indeed is required to arrest someone committing assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, a crime that would
be aggravated if the assailant was wearing a mask to hide their identity. The resolution says the city strongly condemns using unmarked vehicles, masked agents, and unidentifiable personnel in immigration enforcement activities conducted within the city and views such tactics as harmful to public trust, community safety, and constitutional protections. The resolution directs the police department to monitor any suspected federal enforcement activity in the city, and when legally permissible, confirm the identity and legitimacy of individuals claiming to act
as federal agents. Second, from the beginning, you have expressed concern about calling attention to Charlottesville. Retaliation is a common theme. Now is the time to lay low and let the storm pass. We need look only as far as UVA to see what conciliation and capitulation are doing to an institution founded as a place where truth could be pursued freely and recognizing that ignorance threatens freedom. You've also said that things are being done quietly without publicly bragging about not helping
ICE, except that the chief has publicly highlighted the limitations the city has placed on its use of lock cameras. He has publicly highlighted the city's refusal to enter into a two eighty seven g agreement. This body is too cautious to affirm our commitment to due process, equal protection, and the rights of all individuals within this jurisdiction. This body will not uphold our values as a safe, inclusive, and law abiding community where government transparency and political safety remain paramount. I'll close with this from survival.
Because if you don't, 13 more speakers. Anyone else want to speak right now? Yes, sir. Good evening. Good evening. My name is Paul Beder, and I live at 211 5th Street Southwest. First off, I'd like to, applaud the council for holding a working session on student housing development in Charlottesville.
This is desperately needed given that so much student housing is currently being built and that so much is currently proposed. When I started investigating this subject several months ago, I was shocked at the lack of any coordination between the city and the university. I hope that your working session will closely involve the university and that you can develop a joint strategy strategy that considers both the current and future supply of housing as well as the demand for that housing. Second, I'd like to correct a related but misleading statement by the director of neighborhood
development services to council at your session on November 3 when the student housing work session was discussed. In response to a question from councillor Payne, Kelly Brown stated that the grounds is not defined to include any of the hospital system. This is not correct. The zoning administrator has recently issued a determination of the boundary, in the case of the 7th Street luxury student housing proposal that follows NDS's past practice of including entirety
the entirety of the old hospital up to Jefferson Park Avenue within the Central Grounds definition. You may be surprised to hear that as nowhere is the term hospital used in the definition affordable housing guidelines. I shall be appealing the zoning administrator's definition to the board of zoning appeals and hope that you may join me in giving witness to your legislative intent. Lastly, I'd like to invite all members of council to attend the board of architectural review meeting tomorrow night to hear firsthand the community's opposition to the luxury student housing
development on 7th Street. The BAR decision will almost certainly be appealed to this city council. So this will be a good chance to hear the arguments that have been made on both sides. My apologies if that means another night away from your families. I truly appreciate you give the service you give to our community. Councilor Pinkston, I thank you for the last four years. You are excused. Thank you very much. Thank you. Who else would like to speak up? Let's start over here. Here in the middle, anyone else like to speak right now?
Anyone up here? Oh, okay. We'll close the public hearing. There'll be another opportunity at the end. We're now going to the consent agenda. Madam Clerk? It's a long one. Yes. So, consent agenda number three, minutes, October 20, November 3, November 17, and December 1 regular meetings. Four, resolution to amend f y twenty twenty six contribution to the Charlottesville Albemarle Convention and Visitors Bureau, $167,867, second reading.
Five, resolution to appropriate Virginia Department of Education Special Nutrition Program, child and adult care food program, $25,000 second reading. Number six, ordinance amending the city code to define school zones for all schools and reflect their current names, second reading. And I just wanted to note that you all have a physical copy of the corrected, ordinance in front of you, and that includes comments made from councilor Snook that you all agreed on for the distance for signage at 750 feet.
Seven, ordinance granting a franchise agreement to MCI Communication Services LLC, second reading. Eight, ordinance amending city code section two dash 38, organizational meeting, second reading. Nine, resolution to, actually, there are two resolutions. One is to dissolve the Regional Transit Partnership, and two is to approve a memorandum of understanding for administration of the Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority or CARTA by the
Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. Number 10, resolution to grant $50,000 to the residential energy retrofit mini grant program, one of two readings. 11, resolution to accept Huntley Avenue and Morgan Court into the city street system. 12, resolution to comp sorry. Resolution for a compromise of claim, water and wastewater leak credit of $10,707.03 for the Melbourne Park Owners Association 13, a resolution for a compromise of claim, water
and wastewater leak credit of $12,454.93 for McGuffey Homeowners Association, 14 resolution to appropriate $303,660 from the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities or BRIC grant program for the city of Charlottesville, Rock Creek Watershed Management Plan, one of two readings. You're right. It was it was, can I, get a motion to Move for adoption of the
consent agenda? Second. Second. You need discussion? And then similar to last meeting, I'm fine to just vote for the consent of agenda noting my opposition to item number four. Opposition. The the Same same as last meeting. Yep. Yep. There's no need to discuss or anything. Are we doing so I initiated the vote. K. Okay. The next item on the agenda is city manager's report. Yes sir, mister mayor and members of council, members of the public.
Few things, in this report. The first item is an update on the status of the city's use of the flock system. The one year pilot ended at the October as was originally allowed, when, CPD began use of that system. Chief Kotches held a series of community briefings, at the end of that period, a requirement that was approved as a part of the pilot. Council has since received a performance briefing and learned of the positive results in solving cases. But because of ongoing concerns for protection of data, potential for misuse by outside forces,
and an and an inability to guarantee our local parameters will protect information from being used outside of how the local, law enforcement personnel were using the system. Council has requested, that we, not move forward with this system. So that pilot has now ended. The cameras are being removed, and we will continue to do our responsible work just without the use of, automatic license plate readers. There has been a request, for a technology work session, so that we can dig
into how systems like this and other things are becoming a part of the normal, use, in law enforcement activity around the country. And we need to have more discussions about that. So just wanting to report that publicly for the for public consumption that we have ended the end of the use of flock. We're not gonna carry forward with that program. It's not the only system, which is why we're interested in having the technology conversation, and that will be scheduled in your upcoming work session series, for 2026. On that in addition to that, we are going to have an what we're calling
an approach to student housing work session. Right now, it's tentatively scheduled for January 20. It'll be a chance for council to hear more about some of the varying, situations that have arisen as it relates to where we're permitting student housing, to what degree we want to have, the volume of student housing, the height concerns, and things that have just been a part of the conversation, as we have even heard this evening. So we're gonna plan for a work session there, and staff is working to build,
what that work session will consist of, and then turn that into a discussion point for you all. An update for the public. The city manager's budget series is a new thing. I've been doing budget forums since I've been in the seat. We've done a budget forum for, in fact, probably forever. Right, Chrissy? But I am doing, I'm taking the series to the people. So instead of everyone coming to one location, we're gonna have three budget series budget work sessions, January in three different places in the city.
Be talking to my leadership team tomorrow because they're excited about the chance to join me for three consecutive nights in a row. But the goal would be to make sure that we create the opportunities for the public to engage with us in the crafting of the f y twenty seven budget. Last year, I introduced the use of monopoly, using monopoly money, and we're gonna continue to do that because it was a hit for those who were able to make it, and try to use that as a way way for helping individuals understand what it feels like to be me when it comes to making decisions. Very, very difficult decisions with limited amounts of money, but a whole lot of priorities.
And then the last announcement that I have big for me, and and the team is that I am happy to report that I have extended offers and they have been accepted for a new assistant city manager, Evan Pilachowski, will join us on January 5. He is relocating from Manatee, Florida. And another assistant city manager, Sam Roman, will be joining us on February 2. He's relocating from Roanoke, Virginia, and he has agreed to go by Roman, not by Sam, so that we can distinguish which Sam is anyone's referencing because I'm the only
Sam that matters, of course. And then, we have an economic mobility officer. Her name is Abigail Wade. She joins us on January 5 as well and she is local. So we have these are the new members to the reorganize city manager's office, which is meant to bring capacity and a committed focus to quality and consistency. You did you say Abigail Wade? Yes. She's there's no kin kin to me. I was waiting for you to say that. And that is my report. Not that she willing to claim anyway. I know. Yes. And sorry. Sam, when is everybody starting?
January 5, for Evan and Abigail, and February 2 for Roman. Great. So, any other items? That's it. That's it. We're now at the action items. The first item on the agenda is the ordinance to vacate Clark Court, a city maintained street, and it's the second reading. Matt or I'm period. Oh, I'm sorry. The man. Evening, counsel. John Maddox, city attorney. 100% of the item, Clark Court. As you recall on November 3, the city council conducted a public hearing and, following that public hearing, authorized my office to enter into negotiations regarding vacation of Clark Court.
From that prior meeting, you'll recall that Clark Court is a small cul de sac off of Murray Avenue, which is in turn off of Jefferson Park Avenue. The cul de sac touches, two parcels, both of which are owned by the applicant, the Jefferson Scholars Foundation. The focus of the negotiations for, vacating the right of way was, first of all, the securing of easements that are necessary for, utilities passing through the area, this would be able to access those in the future if needed, as well as appropriate compensation
for the loss of City Street and five parking spaces that go along with the, use it as a public right of way. And evaluation by the city assessor, return a valuation of $618,000 for the right of way. And so the negotiated price of $750,000, reflects a significant premium, vacating a right of way and for giving up, five public parking spaces. As such, it is my recommendation that city council adopt the proposed ordinance vacating Clark Court. Now, of course, I never get up here without some kind of wrinkle, and just
before I stepped up here, the applicant actually handed me a, a slight modification to the ordinance language. They had a survey done, and, to fully define the the land, that encompass to the right of way. And I'm so I'm suggesting a small amendment to the ordinance. Essentially, just saying that, in the first and be it ordained, the subject street survived closed, vacant, abandoned. Said area of the Suffolk Street being more particularly described as follows. I instead of saying a 48.14
foot platitude street, I'm just gonna say a street designated as Clark Court running from Maury Avenue and adjoining the lots identified on 2025 city real estate tax max 17 parcels ninety one and ninety two. So with that amendment, I would recommend, adopting the ordinance. So that's a modification to what we're seeing is page one ninety six of our packet. I believe that's that's correct. Yes. Or an ordinance closing, vacating, and discontinuing public road, etcetera. That's correct. And so you're striking the measurement of 148.14? Yes. That's correct.
What did what was the change that they came up with? I was handed these documents five seconds ago, but I believe that the area was actually slightly longer as indicated on the, the plat deed or on the, on the survey that was conducted. So it is just slightly longer, and the applicant is here. I can maybe ask their attorney to step up and explain that slide. That'd be great. Thanks. This is Scott Rainey, with Thorpepett, and representing the applicant. And I had noticed, just in looking over this survey one more time, there's a
line that's a 148.14 feet. There's also another small line that the surveyor marks as l one because of how short it is. And it's about an extra 10 feet. And so rather than specifying a different distance, I thought it's just easier to say it's the platted street between those two tax map parcels. Okay. So I'll start with you, Michael. Do you have any questions or comments on this? And I think you we all kinda expressed it before, but we wanna give you the opportunity.
And, just to confirm, I see it in there. But, there's easements for the city for all public infrastructure, for That that is correct. This you see that the, vacation is, conditioned upon the applicant granting the city any and all easements necessary and appropriate for maintenance replacement or upkeep any public utilities within or adjacent just to the subject street. So they're going to need to grant us those easements prior to this becoming effective.
And I'll just say I you know, I'm not saying that there's anything, not allowed or illegitimate. I'll just remark that, the strangeness in my mind of a private entity, entity very closely connected to you via, but a private entity, right across the street from this parcel having bought it after multifamily housing was approved, stopping, development there, unsuccessfully trying to challenge, multifamily development approved down the road.
And then, to my knowledge, at least according to city's GIS, employees of the organization owning property directly behind what is in question tonight. I will just remark on the the oddness of that. Again, just not not saying anything not allowed or improper is happening, but it is very unique in terms of what I've seen on council. I will say when this first came before us, we were giving away city land for, $10, I believe, which I think was, particularly absurd and unwarranted. And so to have it come back before us tonight, for, you know, what is
in the world of fair market value as determined by the city assessor and not just giving away city property for, not what its value is worth. I think is a far, better and more reasonable outcome, the overall strangeness of the situation not withstanding. Would just for the record, the $10 was a placeholder while we before we negotiated, there was never going to be a $10, price for the for this piece of property. Sure. Thank you. Natalie? Nothing for me. Lloyd, do you have any?
As I recall, it has been the policy of the city for number of years that if if a a property owned if, basically, if if somebody owns, property on both sides of a of an alley or dead end street or something like that where passage through is not an issue, that we have, tended to honor requests to vacate that alley, for example, and to sell that property to the adjoining land owners. Is that your is that a pattern? My understanding is that it was kind of the wild west.
I'm not I'm speaking just from what I've been told. I wasn't here certainly. But, it was kind of the wild west of people were making requests and some were making their way and a lot were all coming to council. And so I believe in 2019, council adopted a policy that really create a scoring system. So which particular, vacation request would reach council depending on on a on a a certain score in the rubric, whether it met certain policy goals in the council. So I think it's much more, structured, and there's more more process behind it now. And does does this request fit into that process? It's raised by, at least in some comments to me after the meeting last time,
is that one of the fundamental premises of land use law is that when you're making a decision about something like this, you're making it based not on the on whether you like the particular applicant, but on whether the land use makes sense. Is that fair to say? However, council wants to make its decisions, it's not really for me to say what would you decide generally you making decisions based on the identity of an applicant is not to be favored, just on the bare facts on the ground.
I can't say that's fair. That's all. Thank you. Can I get a a motion, for this proposal, please? I move adoption of this, resolutions ordinance. As amended. As amended. I'll second that motion. Okay. Can we vote, please? The motion passes three to two. Thank you very much. Thank you. The next item on the agenda is the Derry Bridge public hearing summary presentation for
endorsement. Good evening, Mayor Wade, members of council. Hello, sir. Mike Goddard, deputy director of public works, here to talk with you about the Derry Road Bridge project. In July, we, gave a public hearing at the Walker Upper Elementary School, regarding this project, and I want to report out, what we heard from the public and to request your approval to continue, the design process. So a little background on the project. So I'm just gonna go through the presentation that we gave to the public. There's been some work since this, obviously, so, I'll update you on that as well,
and there'll be some time for questions. So a little background, that we gave the public on the bridge. This is the Derry Road Bridge, which was built in 1953. It had an expected life expand, life expectancy of fifty years, which obviously is well expired. The bridge condition is currently rated as poor, and has been load restricted for quite some time since 2007. So we would very much like to place the bridge as quickly as possible. Back in 2021, v dot agreed to award a $7,200,000 in state of good repair
funds for replacement of the bridge. I'm not sure all the background on how we got to 2024, but in 2024, $8,100,000 was, was granted by v dot, and that was increased to 12,600,000.0 in 2025 once we've gotten far enough down the road of design to understand the real value of the project. So a little background on the funding. Feed out state of good repair program is meant to replace infrastructure in the most practical and cost effective manner possible.
V dot is paying for a 100% of this project currently. These are state and federal funds, and there are no city matching dollars currently. But the funding and the scope is fixed by v dot. We did, look into some alternatives, as part of this project planning process. First of those would be the western alternative, so in the center, of the three lines going across the bypass, that's the current bridge. The one to the southeast side is our current pedestrian bridge, and then the blue
is the alternative, on the western end. So this would essentially be a way of leaving the existing bridge in place while we constructed a new bridge. The challenge here is that there are significant, right away concerns there. We would take property that would potentially render people's houses unusable. There's some significant utility impacts. And, if we were to redesign in this direction at this point, it would be in about an eighteen month delay. We expect that overall, this would, contribute to a 50% increase in the project budget
overall. We also looked at the alt, eastern alternative. So this essentially replaces the existing pedestrian bridge with our bridge. The bullet here says the removal of the pedestrian bridge temporarily, but, something would have to be done to replace it in the future. There would be, again, significant utility impacts. We start to get into a a large transmission line poll that you can kinda see running through the, southwest side of project. So Dominion overhead lines could be, impacted. There are significant impacts on Dairy Road and Gentry Lane, so that would be a
right of way concern. And, again, the redesign, about eighteen months. We estimate that would be a 45% increase in the project budget. There's also been the the suggestion of an in place alternative. So if you were around for the, Belmont Bridge replacement, people have suggested why not use half of the bridge and then switch to the other half, leaving it open for travel. Some reasons there that you can read, but really the last one is the only one that matters, which is that this bridge is too narrow to be done that way. And we need to completely remove the abutments that the bridge rests on.
So that's not really a viable alternative. So and again, all of those increases in value, VDOT's unwilling to pay those. So that would all be, local funds that would have to cover that difference. I'll talk a little bit about the detours. We've got some experts here as well who can fill you in if you have any questions about them. So we anticipate that the Dairy Road Bridge will be closed for twelve to fourteen months. I think we've really narrowed that down a little bit. I don't think fourteen months is likely, but of course, we don't want to, we've got some contingency in there.
We don't want to give that away just yet. But the closer we get to fully designed, I think we can trim that down a bit. All the local roadways will remain open, but there is a detour option, which I'll show in a little more detail. And there are some temporary, movements that are going to help with that temporary signal at 250 eastbound off ramp at Rugby Avenue. And we're going to review signal timing at Hydraulic Road and 250 Bypass. Part of what complicates this project is that a lot of the work has to happen overnight or nights or weekends because we have to maintain traffic flow on the
bypass. So here's a look at the detours. The main movement, detour is on the left where basically people come off the bypass upon the off ramp and then continue down the on ramp next to the, what is now Walker Upper Elementary School. And then in the other direction when they're and when we're having intermittent overnight detours, folks will go down Rugby Avenue to Barracks Road. And, of course, as I said, all the other streets and options are still open open so folks can go whichever way they want to. Just to give you an overview of the public hearing, it's held Walker Upper Upper
Elementary School, as I said, July 15. There were 44 people in attendance that signed the form. Some might have snuck out without signing. I'm not sure. We had 16 official comments received, 14 via online form, etcetera. Generally, it was a pretty even split of support or lack thereof, but there were a few main comments that came up. Obviously, people are not pleased with the length of the closure. It is an inconvenience to folks who travel across that bridge on a daily basis. And one of the main things that we heard was that the, the bridge was
not visually appealing. The renderings we showed at the time were pretty basic. It was a basic bridge We did reach out to v dot and they agreed to make some changes and to give us a little extra funding for some niceties. The main element there is an architectural stone finish. We want the bridge to look a little bit more like, the bridges at the bypass, John Warner Parkway Intersection, if that makes sense. So they agreed to pay for those. It's a minor package, but it's, it does make the the bridge fit in a
little better with what we've got in town. And then the question of the length of the closure was was a big concern. One thing that we have looked into is trying to trim down our construction window as much as possible. And also we're working with VDOT presently to see if we can provide monetary incentives. We're not quite up to the point where we need to bid the project. Yes. We're still working through all of that, but we do hope to provide some incentive to speed the construction process of where possible. There were some questions about the detours and our agreement is to closely monitor traffic
patterns. Once the detours implemented, obviously, we could make signal timing adjustments, temporary changes in signing and marking along the effective routes and, increase, traffic enforcement on the neighborhood streets. And then a little view into our project schedule as it stands. We plan to advertise the project August 2026. Construction begins December 26. Closure begins February 27. New bridge reopened March 28 and construction complete May 2028.
So that's all I have. We also, in the packet, have a, rendering. Kina, is it possible to bring that up, or is that That'd ready. Oh, sorry. Well, we'll see if this magically appears or not. In the meantime, and this rendering would represent what the bridge would look like after our new amenities were added, the the beautification package, if you will. So that'll, welcome any questions. Lord, I'll start with you. Mister Goddard, is there any place in the vdot evaluation process for considering in some
numerical fashion, like a cost benefit analysis for the cost of inconvenience to to drivers, to the public as a whole, for traffic delays? None that we're aware of. We have not been offered any opportunity. We've mentioned, you know, our VDOT partners have been with us the whole way on the project, and they've heard our concern. But they, they consider this situation where to to fund sort of an advanced or accelerated building process would be outside of this just doesn't come to the highest level
priority for them in terms of paying for that sort of thing. But they made that determination that it was too expensive without having attempted to put a monetary value as a Federal Highway Administration, cost benefit analysis might on those those those other costs. Correct? As far as I'm aware, yes. So if we were to say that it costs too much, how is too much $5 too much? Is it I mean, I know you've estimated that it it would cost 20% more
to do one of the accelerated bridge construction techniques. Techniques. But if you're not putting any value at all on the negatives, and the only thing you're doing you're counting is the cost of the of the contract, you're not really considering the value or the the cost to the community. However, some of our internal folks have done a few calculations, to try and determine based on our own sort of internal figuring what that would come up to. And Brandon, would you mind coming up and giving a little background on that?
Brent Takan, city engineer. So so I after you had kinda given us some of these questions, I I went through, and some of the there's some assumptions in this, you know, as far as how much the value of someone's time is as they're driving, you know, and based on the travel time of the detours and those things that we were given by the, consultant, McKinley Horn. If we went for an overall, the the longest possible duration of fourteen months, you know, the value or, I guess, the the detriment, value of that would be roughly
a million dollars, of travel time. If we went with the two month option, that It's just a number I Yeah. Yeah. No. We here. You know? And and but but I I wanna use that as an example here because, one, we don't think that's really reasonable. But even if you use that as kind of the fastest you could possibly do this, you would still have a two month outage, which would be about a 150,000. So you've got about a $850,000 delta there between a two month option. Realistically, we think that a six month would be like, if you were building this
out in a field where you didn't have to deal with, you know, two fifty traffic or any traffic, like, the fastest you could actually build this bridge, with no restraints, would be about six months. If you use that, that's roughly $4.36. So, again, you're maybe $550,000 worth of savings, with using a premium of $2,000,000, you know, to do alternative building methods for the bridge. Realistically, and and Mike had started talking about this, we think we're probably gonna be
more in, like, a ten to twelve month range when we're actually done get closer to, full design here. So, you know, that's gonna put us down, you know, in a 300, $450,000 delta. So again, that that 300 versus a million, you know, or versus 2,000,000 for alternative bridge, design, you're, you know, you've got a delta there, like, 1,400,000.0. So I don't know if that I I note on the on the website for
the project, which if anybody's interested in dairyroadbridge.org, it notes three takeaways from the public hearing on July 15. The first was the length of construction, longer than desired. And and just to be clear, I I I have no expertise in all of this, but I did talk to some folks who have considerably more expertise than I. And basically, they were suggesting that, you know, twelve to fourteen months is both optimistic and pessimistic. The optimistic side is that there is no no cost overrun, no major delay, no
obstacle found that that gets in the way. The pessimistic side is that assuming no other delays, if you were to do something with perhaps financial incentives to motivate a contractor, a contractor who's told we'll we'll pay you x number of dollars extra if you get it done with no more than, say, a six month road closure. All of a sudden, human creativity is amazing. And I would hope I I saw that there was some mention in here and
perhaps in the comments that, that you all made to me in response to my email, that suggested that maybe something like that could be could be done. You hadn't gotten to the bid stage yet, so maybe you could structure a bid such that it would include some incentives like that. The other the second point that's made, that was made consistently at the public hearing, was issues about making point over the John Warner Parkway, that's at least some reference,
because one of the concerns that people had at that meeting was, you haven't given us anything that looks like a design. I will tell you that the the picture that's up there right now, to me is is appealing simply because it gets rid of the pillars. And for a whole lot of reasons, it it looks kinda kinda cool and kinda sleek. Looking at it from the other side, of course, you've got the pedestrian bridge to contend with. And assuming that some engineers and architects and people could figure out how to make those line up so that they seem to make sense, I don't care about the
picture. I just care about what the reality is gonna gonna be. And I assume you would figure that out. And then, of course, the concerns about the proposed detour. You know, I I live in Greenbrier. I know that an awful lot of people get into Greenbrier, particularly coming from the university by going up and across that bridge. I also know that since the changes in Hydraulic road and that whole realignment of things, the the stacking lane. I mean, the the you know, Vidot even doubled the length of the stacking lane
on, two fifty eastbound, and it's still stacking way up up to the the 29 Bridge. I counted 35 cars at one at one point stopped in line, and that's effectively doubled, I think, from, say, six months or a year ago. And when I saw that y'all had done traffic counts that suggested a certain number of trips across that bridge, I was thinking, was that before or after these changes at at Hydraulic Road?
And particularly because if you if you do in fact if you are in fact particularly because if you if you do in fact if you are in fact coming eastbound on 250 and you wanna go into, into Greenbrier, an awful lot of people are going up to the Dairy Road Bridge rather than trying to negotiate that left turn and waiting through three turns of the light to be able to make the left turn on the hydraulic. The consequence is you're now getting a traffic back up at the top of of that of that off ramp. So I've the the numbers in in terms of how many trips, per day are
going to be interfered with there, and more importantly, how many trips per day are going to be put onto other inadequate roads, I think is grossly underestimated. Well, I just, checked in with our engineer who's who's here with us, and he, he did affirm that those numbers were taken before the changes to the traffic pattern there. So, I do think that's, a concern. I don't think that this project is gonna be painless. I wouldn't try and, convince anybody of that. What I would say is that we will do our very best while the project
is happening to monitor and and keep an eye on those traffic patterns and do what we can in terms of light timing and potentially temporary signals or changes to traffic patterns, to make it as safe as it can possibly be. Those are the major concerns that I had, which I and I I had sent a long email to to a number of folks in the city government with my concerns, and I appreciate your responding in time for me to process them. I didn't wanna play, you know, Stump the Expert here on on live TV, and
so I'm I got invited to get some actual answers. Your your results will certainly be better, when we have time to think about it ahead of time. So thank you for that. Brian, any comments? I know that I've already asked you this question, but I'll ask it again for the benefit of the public. The pedestrian bridge will stay open during the whole project. Right? Hold generally, yes. I would say there there will probably be a few intermittent blockages just because some things might have to move through that zone that would be unsafe. With it or something. Generally speaking, yes. It's open to the entire project. Okay. Great. So people can still bike and walk back and forth.
Yeah. I guess that's one of the benefits of biking and walking. One of the many. Okay. Thank you. You may have already touched on this, but is the city or VDOT doing the project management for this project? Our capital development division is through our LAP program with VDOT. So it's our project managers. Okay. And, you know, I kinda already know that the answer is no. But does the city have anyone who performs the role as kind of like city architect who would be involved, you know, earlier on in you know, earlier on in
a project like this and having some role in the aesthetic design of things? Not presently. No. I would say that, not formally. Our our team in capital development typically holds, a very high standard in terms of aesthetics, but different projects, I would say, have different needs, and we try and respond to those needs. In this case, the bridge is you know, I went through great pains to explain
the condition of the bridge. It's safe today, but it won't always be that way. So, spending time on a Belmont Bridge level, design process, I think, would be, detrimental. Generally speaking, we are kind of the the folks who help guide design in the direction we wanted to go. So, where we can, we do take great pains, in that regard. Mhmm. And I know, you know, this project is advanced enough along.
Along. It's not gonna happen. But I do think it was something that was discussed ages ago having, you know, a more formalized role if someone's performing that kind of role, which I do think would have be a value because, you know, I don't think this or every project needs that kind of Belmont Bridge community design engagement. But I think a a non engineering, non project management type perspective on aesthetic designs that is not, you know, just free for all on what could happen, I think can address some of the concerns the community has.
I mean, certainly across Virginia, certainly across the world, you can see public infrastructure projects, which, you know, are not gonna be studied by architecture departments, but are much more beautiful and very functional ways than what we've done. Final question is is for where the traffic is gonna be rerouted. Is there currently any plans for, addressing the increased traffic that's gonna go there for what we'll do to, protect pedestrian and bike safety in terms of doing things like
adding speed tables or more things to slow down traffic? We don't have a plan for that just yet. Correct me if I'm wrong, folks who are here. But I I do think that's a consideration we'll be looking into as we get into the the final stages of design. We'll put a little more work into the detour paths and make sure that those are safe. And as I said, we'll be monitoring things as it goes along to try and remedy any unsafe conditions that we notice. Can I ask something? Absolutely. Come on up. Mhmm. So for the the main detour routes, the one kinda to the the Northwest is
utilizing the the roundabout the new roundabout at Hillsdale. That one has rapid flashing beacons as, you know, where most of those pedestrians would be crossing. The other direction would utilize the Rugby Avenue, exit, which we've just recently installed the four way stop there. And before this bridge goes in, and the detour routes would go into place, we're hoping to have, the small section of sidewalk and crosswalk at that intersection as well, to help deal with any get getting pedestrians through that intersection, you know, where where
there may be conflict. So we do have plans that we are working on or that are already in place, for both vehicle and pedestrian safety at kind of the the conflict points. Mhmm. Well, obviously, I think that just, you know, has to be a major priority. And looking through the comments, I think, obviously, this bridge needs to be replaced. There's no question about that. No matter how it's done, there's gonna be a disruption. There's no question about that. Reading through the comments, it's like with everything. I think there's some people who are like, they don't want it to happen, period. But I think there's a lot of people who agreed it need to happen, knew there was gonna be a disruption, but were concerned about, some of the basic questions
about design or what's gonna happen with the rerouting, what will the path of rerouting be. And I'll that just end by saying, like I said, I know this needs to happen. But as I read the feedback, I think, I think skepticism from the community is completely warranted and fair when you look at the history we've had on infrastructure projects. How many are still, over budget? Not completed yet. Things like with the Belmont Bridge, pedestrian and bike infrastructure that wasn't, added at the end of it when the expectation was it that it would be.
I know we've improved a lot, but I think that some of the skepticism of the community is just we have a lot of work still to do improving. You know, we are making positive changes, which I believe we are, but that's how I interpret a lot of the community feedback. And I agree. That's that's, fair feedback. You know, we the history of this program is, is what we have to bear, but all we can do is work towards improving it, and, I think we're making great progress in that regard. So, public sentiment doesn't come around in a day. So we'll we'll continue.
So what are what is being requested of us tonight? There's a a document in the packet, that Basically, we're being asked to endorse the plan that we're seeing and basically, the time frame that you're giving us because we're under a budget restriction. So if if we wanna come up with some option of being able to expedite it, we'd have to figure out another fund source for that. So I guess that's a is that something y'all wanna figure out tonight, or is that a later thing? Or what you need right now is just overall endorsement to be able to get
this going. Correct? Yeah. What I would say is that the options as I see them are to endorse the project that we're working on now. Otherwise, we'll need additional time, additional funding, and it it it's not a path I would recommend. Yeah. I wouldn't either. So I would One small question before we make a motion. Who rates the bridges? Is it v dot? Or is it It's the, agency. Brown. I mean, it's we we do our own, bridge inspections, but they're part of the
FHWA overall program. So we do it. We send it to vdot. V. Sends it to the feds. Mhmm. But it's a There's a criteria. National rating program. Okay. Thanks. I was just curious. Thank you. Okay. Would you entertain a motion at this point? Or Can I first ask one more question, mister Goddard? In your answers to me about other things, you wrote, we've reached out to v. One of the key takeaways from the public hearing was an interest in making the bridge more visually interesting than, the provided renderings suggested. We've reached out to v dot and made the play for additional funding to this
end. V dot was willing to provide a $100,000. And then let's say we included a rendering of what the effect of these funds would likely be. Do I understand that VDOT has approved the notion of of us spending a $100,000 in some further design process, or is that $100,000 already been spent to generate these renderings? That's, that $100,000 is construction value. So that goes into the, the materials and the construction of the bridge and the To make it more aesthetic?
More aesthetically pleasing fashion. Yeah. Okay. So it's not the 100 I I I I may have misunderstood this. I had thought that $100,000 was in part to allow for some other, you know, design professional types to to take a look at the thing. No. That's those are that's a construction value. And, essentially, what they're looking at is, the stamp concrete treatments that I talked about, as well as, some colorations and some different railing treatments.
It it might help to know that the renderings that you're seeing now were not shown at the July 15, public hearing. That is the result of our Like this this Yeah. That's that's what you would have seen. So Okay. This is what we saw in July or this is the I mean, these are things that we provided in the back. There's a We had no renderings in July. That's what I thought. Okay. So yeah. So this is this is the new version That's the new version. That we think might be a $100,000 more. Correct. Yeah. I'll entertain a motion.
Yeah. I move to proceed with bridge design as initiated with the inclusion of aesthetic treatment as approved for funding by VDOT. Second. Any further discussion? I would like to ask whether if if that were the simple motion as it was put forward, mister Goddard, would you interpret that as including the notion of being able to set as a condition for the funding of this or the bidding process, some kind of incentive perhaps to to expedite the time during which the road the
bridge would actually be out, or do we need to specify that as something else we want you to consider or redoubt to consider? I will certainly, work on that consideration. I can't agree to, make that contingent on the whole process that that consideration is approved by v dot, obviously. But, yeah, we absolutely will. Well, you need funding set aside for that. Correct? Well, that's what what I'm getting at is I just wanna make clear that I
want that effort to be undertaken, and that there is still time to undertake that effort. There I want it undertaken because I don't want to just say, okay, we're willing to live with fourteen months. Because I'm not happy about that. Nor those you you live not too far from there. I'm sure you you would not be happy about it either. I guess I'm only we tying a future council's hand or something if we We can just say we would prefer that you keep those options in mind, but it's not contingent on anything in the motion. Yes. The question is effort and guarantee.
Those are two very different things. Yes. Not that we there's no guarantee what the direction has to identify. Because we can put forth the effort to make sure that that is discussed and and worked into the arrangement provided funding is available to actually fund an incentive. Otherwise, we would be short of the resources necessary to even pay the incentive. If I can't go back to VDOT and ask for more money, we know that for sure. Sure. Yeah. Go ahead. We have an expert. Good evening, John Oliver. Kimberly Horne and Associates for the consultant hired by the city on this effort.
We do a lot of work with VDOT in the city of Charlottesville and elsewhere, so we're very familiar with the VDOT process. And usually, the way it works is they will allow you to use some of this 12 point something million dollars as a portion of that Usually, those costs are recovered out of that pot of money because as the contractor finishes early, you are not paying a consultant or an inspector as long to be out there. And so, basically, that cost savings that you're not paying an inspector or an engineer, as DDOT frequently allows can then go to as DDOT frequently allows can then go to the to the contractor.
So there are some financial ways we can in our bid documents, incentivize the contractor without having to come up with the city's money. Now what those costs are and will VDOT approve, I cannot say, until we involve them at that point, and we have to be very close to having a detailed schedule to understand the cost. But that is very common in VDOT bidding and construction process to allow that to happen. And to clarify, the twelve to fourteen months includes contingency. It's all entirely possible it gets finished earlier anyway.
Mhmm. We would we would fully expect, that we would incentivize a contractor to say, if you finish this in less than the bridge is closed open in, I'm gonna say, nine months, ten months, we'll pick a right the right number. If you hit that date, then you are, eligible for financial incentives. And on the contrary too, there are, ways to disincentivize the contractor if they say, If you take longer than fourteen months, we are going to start charging you by the day. At that point too, you are paying an engineer and inspector to be out there everyday because of the contractor. It is a financial balance point when you determine the right construction length for a
project. Right? If you wanna get your kitchen renovated and you tell every contractor that they have a week to do it, you're gonna run everybody off. Right? Or if someone's gonna give you an outrageous number. So it's it's it's setting the wide enough window to get competition to bring prices down while not giving the contractors more time than they really need to get it done. I want the effort to be undertaken. I understand it can't be guaranteed. Yep. K. Okay. So it's been moved properly second for the discussion. If not, if we can vote. The motion passes five to zero.
Thank you all very much. The this is the second opportunity for public comment. You have one additional item. I'm sorry. Yes. Good evening, Mayor Wade, mayor of the council. I'm Chris Cullinan, the city director of finance. This agenda item is a, report, presentation of the FY twenty five audit results by the city's auditors. The code of Virginia requires that localities have their accounts and records audited annually as of June 30 by the independent certified public accounting firm in accordance with specifications furnished
by the requires the city's auditor to report to the public to the governing body at a public session. Tonight, Michael Lupton from the firm Robinson Farmer Cox and Associates will present a verbal report to city council for the fiscal year 2025, which was 07/01/2024 through 06/30/2025. I'm also joined tonight by mister Charles Klemmer, the city's comptroller. Mister Lupton is gonna, invite him up now to give his report, and he and myself, mister Clemmer, will be available for any questions you might have.
And once we've concluded that, we'll kinda kinda lay out the road map for where we go from here, with finishing up, closing the books on f y twenty five and the next steps for the urine appropriation. So mister Lupton? Thank you, Chris. Mister mayor, members of council, good evening, and thank you for having me this evening. As Chris noted, my name is Michael Lupton. I am a partner at the Charlottesville office of and I have had the pleasure of serving as the concurrent, partner in charge of the city's audit for the last several years.
We issue two reports as part of the annual comprehensive financial report document. Those two reports are the auditors report, and then our report over government auditing standards. The rest of the document, which, is about a 160 pages in total, is that of city management. They are the creators of that document, and they are responsible for the fair presentation of that document. Our auditors report, within that report, it includes the section that distinguishes management's responsibilities and
the auditor's responsibilities as part of the audit process. Management, as I mentioned, is responsible for the financial statements. They're responsible for making sure the financial statements are materially correct, and materially correct, and fairly presented in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles, and they are also responsible for maintaining a system of internal controls conducive to the fair presentation of those financial statements. Our responsibility as the auditors is to perform the audit in accordance with our professional standards, and ultimately to obtain sufficient and appropriate audit evidence to render an opinion on
the financial statements. There are still items we are working through to resolve and to, complete as part of the f y twenty five audit process, but we fully expect to be able to issue and render an unmodified opinion on the financial statements. The unmodified opinion is the best opinion that we can offer in our profession. It is a clean opinion, and it means that the financial statements as presented is materially correct in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. The second report that we include in the annual comprehensive financial report document is our
report in accordance with government auditing standards. As part of an audit in accordance with government auditing standards, we review the internal control environment, for the purpose of developing our our audit procedures. Excuse me. We do not opine on the effectiveness of those controls. However, as part of that process, if we become aware of any deficiencies in the controls that we deem to be significant deficiencies or material weaknesses, we're required to communicate those to you. I'm pleased to report that as part of the f y twenty five audit process,
we did not deem any deficiencies to be significant deficiencies or material weaknesses. With that, that concludes my report, and I welcome any questions that you all have for me at this time. Thank you very much. Any questions on Only one. The for the public, the text of it will be published on the city's website, December 31. Correct? That is the date we are shooting for. We have a requirement from the audit of public accounts to have it in place by then. We can't get an extension, but we do not want to go there, as they
say. So, yes. We are endeavored to get that full report, done by the end of the above. And as Michael mentioned, I think we're actually up to over 180 pages now. And this this is one of the increasing challenges. I think when I started here ten years ago, the report was about 150 pages. And so those it might not sound like 30 pages, but the year we get new accounting standards every year promulgated by, the government accounting standards board, which is commonly known as GASB. More and more things that we're required to report and show and document, and, it
just adds time and length to this process, including that of preparing the report. There's the the the number crunching audit side of things, but then we actually prepare our report ourselves, which adds time to that because we have to prepare it. They have to review that. There's some back and forth in terms of corrections and so forth. And so it's, it's just the process that we go through to to produce that report, is getting lengthier and lengthier. And while the the intent is to provide more transparency, to identify more long term
liabilities to to more accurately depict the financial position of the city, not only today, but going forward, I would certainly offer the opinion. It's adding more and more complexity and more and more pages and more and more tables. And so, I sometimes wonder if in that effort to increase transparency, it's not making it a little bit more opaque, in terms of those additional details. But with that, I'll, I'll be happy to answer your question. Mister if you have any more questions for mister Lupton. That's it for me. Thank you. I'm good. Okay. So so where we go from here is, once the audit is finished, we have
the report written, we have the written opinion from the auditors. We will be bringing to you some of the time in January the year end appropriation for FY '25. There are typically some housekeeping things that we have to do in order to close the books. We'll have those for you. And there will also be at that time, an in-depth analysis. There's a discussion by myself of how we got to those results, what happened during the, fiscal year twenty five. Also to the extent that there are surplus funds, available, there will be a discussion and opportunity for the second community matters.
I don't think I see anyone else in opportunity for the second community matters. I don't think I see anyone else. Anyone any public, like to speak? If not, can I get a motion to adjourn, please? So moved. Alright. Alright, brother. Thank you. Alright. Set the vote. All in favor, please say yes. Yes. All opposed, please say no. All in favor, please rise. Brian, this is That's amazing. Part: 2
I call the Charlottesville City Council December 15th, 2025 meeting um to order. Um um Madame Clerk, will you please call the role? >> Councelor Ashin, >> present. Councelor Payne, >> here. >> Vice Mayor Pinkston
>> here. >> Councelor Snook >> here. >> Mayor Wade >> here. Is there a motion to approve or amend the proposed agenda? >> I move it approval. >> Second. >> Okay. Um, all in favor, please say yes. >> Yes.
>> All opposed, please say no. >> Motion passes 5 to zero. Um, the meeting a meeting today will be divided into three um sections. The first will be now work session where we will discuss um presentations that do not require a
council vote and then we'll have close sessions a a close session and then we will come back at 6:30 for our regular business meeting. And today we're going to switch it up a little bit. We're going to start off with the emergency management update by John Orendy.
All right. >> Good afternoon, uh, City Manager Sanders, uh, Mayor and Council. >> Good afternoon. >> I appreciate the, uh, time, uh, and this opportunity, um, this afternoon. I'm John Ory, the city's emergency management coordinator. Um, and though
you all are all well aware of what it is that I do, um, I do get the question a lot. What does the EM coordinator do? Uh, and so I do have a a little bit of an elevator um, speech, if you will, that I use. it's pretty much on the screen before you um essentially develop
and update emergency plans, train and exercise those plans, um run the uh city's emergency operations center, uh and coordinate at a state uh local federal level um whenever we are um operating in that atmosphere. So, and all that is to help the community
withstand and recover from disruptions. Uh two such plans are the emergency operations plan and the continuity plans that we have in the city which are both foundational to um our success. The EOP
outlines the city's response and recovery from incidents impacting the community at large. Um and then continuity plans ensure that the city's essential functions can um continue despite some sort of a disruption uh such as a disaster. And um I had when I
was last before you for a work session um I gave you some brief information that I'd be um exploring some of our policies and our plans, our emergency plans and procedures. And so um part of this is just giving you a little bit of an update of where we are on that, what what my findings were. Um and these two
plans, particularly the EOP and our continuity plans are in good shape. Um the continuity planning just went through a cycle of revision and we had a training early in uh November. um that uh set the citywide continuity plan and all of the individual continuity plans
uh for um each of the departments and offices uh in place. That revision went pretty well. Um so though we do have some uh exercising and training that will go on indefinitely um uh those those plans are at least are in place. In terms of the EOP, um the emergency
operations plan um that's in good shape as well. Um there are some things that I have identified um that I'd like to make some changes on and I'll be doing that over the next uh several months. Um so specifically um I'm going to work to clarify the roles and responsibilities
that are outlined in the EOP. Um frankly there should be no question in the midst of an emergency um who's responsible for what. The EOP does lay out those responsibilities but I think in some cases it's a little bit ambiguous. So, I want to tighten that up and make that
crystal clear. Um, so we'll we'll do that work. Uh, in addition, we're going to update what's called the concept of operations within the uh EOP. And I want to make um the emergency operations uh that we partake um in within the
emergency operations center look a lot like our daily operations to the extent possible. um we're all human and what we do day in and day out is a lot easier to continue versus trying to try on a new structure or a new way of doing
business. Um so I'm going to align those as much as possible through that concept of operations and I'll be working with staff to do that over the next several months. Some other good stuff uh if you will that I found uh we have a shelter
operations plan that's in good shape. Uh we have a um city multi- agency coordination group or MAC group um that is uh also known as the policy group um that was in existence. We made um some
minor policy adjustments um but that uh group is up and running and is the leadership of the city during uh an emergency and run by uh city manager Sanders. Uh we have uh resilient together.
they're working um and kind of leading some efforts within the community to uh help the community through adapting um and building resilience for climate change and significant uh weather events that occur. Um that o lines up with
emergency management in terms of preparing the community for those types of things. So I've established um relationships with them. I actually had already had those relationships before coming here. So, uh, really just kind of approaching it from a different, um, perspective. So, that work continues and
that's great. Um, you've established internal and externally emer external emergency communications systems, public information and warning. We have that through the ECC, uh, through CUA 911 alerts. Some work we need to do there to
make sure that everyone is signing up for that, but we will continue that. Um, but that is a great system and is in place. Uh and then internally civic ready uh for um the uh staff within the city so that we can make emergency notifications to staff. We have a safety
committee uh in the city. Um I thought that was fantastic. I have my offices in city space um and so uh as people come in and out of the of city space conducting different um activities. One that I have seen quite a bit of is the safety committee at work um training our
staff on um being ready and resilient preparedness. uh CPR courses. Um and I I I thought that was uh fabulous and we are participating uh as the office of of emergency management um in that work as well. Uh we have a seat at that table and so that's that's good. Um local
emergency planning committee um that was defunct for a while is back up and running um and has met uh meets quarterly and has already met three or four times um and is being led through the emergency communications um center through their uh uh liaison. Um, so
that's uh that's great as well. Sorry. So, sorry that that got slightly out of order. I'll back up to that. So, first I want to talk a little bit about investing in our capabilities, where we're headed. Um, we are going to uh
focus on some improvements over the next uh six months beyond that as well. But um I'm hyperfocused over the next six months on development of the uh city's incident management team, training EOC staff members, um and then doing some practicing uh training and exercise at
all levels. So I'd like to touch on each of those real quickly. the city incident management team that we're going to establish. An incident management team or an IMT um in the simplest of terms is simply a team that comes together um
that is uh that has a lot of expertise in um focusing out 12 or 24 hours in the midst of a disaster um and bringing a group through a planning process to prepare for managing that disaster um in the future. uh when we're in the midst
of operating in the EOC with staff that's in there, um we are focused 10, 20 minutes, half an hour, an hour, maybe two hours down the road and we're handling that disaster. Um if we don't focus beyond that, then we run the risk of not being prepared 12, 24 hours from
now. We don't have the resources that take a while to get here. We haven't um taken the time to figure out what resources we need to order. So that incident management team is a team of experts that can focus on pulling that group up to a higher level for a short period of time, bringing them through a
planning process um and then leaving and writing that uh incident action plan while they continue to manage the the uh uh operations that are ongoing. So that's important uh ability for us to have by mid June. My goal is to have at
least 20 members. We need more than that, but at least 20 members by mid June who have been through preliminary team training. And then we're going to invest in within that group. Um we need a small number of folks um that are going to be part of a regional uh state
team and they'll travel to areas outside of the city, outside of this region um to gain some expertise and knowledge. The Central Virginia Incident Management Team is the group that we will be participating with. Um and the reason we'll do that is twofold. One, it
provides that uh that small group of folks the training a level of training expertise uh development and the ability to deploy to emergencies outside of this area so that they can bring that information and knowledge and what they've learned back
here to the city and then train and mentor the rest of the people on our team. Um, and then the other thing that does is that it exposes our folks to emergencies, lessons learned in other areas, other localities that they can then bring back here and share with us
and we can adjust our plans and our training and our teamwork so that we have already made adjustments for that. Just this past weekend, I've received as a member of the central Virginia team um a deployment request to Washington State where there is a lot of flooding going
on right now. Um so they were looking for some team members to go out there for a couple of weeks. Um so that's the type of deployment we might be able to um take advantage of and bring that information back here. Uh my vision is for this team to be a regional team even
even at the local level. So the city will invest in that. The county is already investing in it. The university we can come together and share that that uh group of IMT members uh so that we all can um rely on each other. uh in in the midst of some sort of an emergency
to develop that that that team at that uh local level. Training EOC staff members within the next 30 days. Um departments will actually identify specific EOC members to um respond in when we uh activate the
EOC. By early April, our goal is to have at least 80% of staff, including those EOCC members, through the National Incident Management System training that's required. And then most staff across the city, um that's going to mean about 6 to 12 hours
of training behind a computer. It's all virtual training that they can get for that baseline level. Some staff uh have it, others do not. So, we're going to bring that um up to compliance. And how frequent is that? Annually or to to >> one one time. Um
once you're certified, you do not have to reertify. Um the reality of that is that um the the this uh the ICS uh training is something that is perishable. Um and so that's why the training and exercise the
exercise portion of drilling and doing some regular activations um is going to be really important. If we continue that then that baseline training is is you know is sufficient. >> Yeah. >> Uh and then there are some public safety
staff that will actually go through a 24-hour course in addition to that that we're going to host here. Um we're going to co-host it with the the county. It's already scheduled for mid-March. Um, and we're going to have some public safety staff focus on that. Um, and then finally, the EOCC training and
exercise. We've got um three training uh or exercises already planned. I have an EOCC workshop that's scheduled for late March. Uh, and I um anticipate that 90 my goal is that 90% of the EOCC staff that we identify will participate in
that two-day workshop. uh before the end of the fiscal year, we'll have conducted an incident management team training or exercise that will also support the EOC. Um and then I've applied for and then we received recently a Virginia Department of Emergency Management Technical
Assistance Grant. There's no match required for that. It's the use of VDM staff to conduct an exercise here locally. Um as well as VDM contractors. Uh so we're going to in the fall of 2026 we're going to do a sheltering exercise.
We're actually um my guess is we'll use um this uh Charles High School to do this, but we'll actually do uh we'll open that as a shelter and have um DSS staff and other staff there in support of that and fully open it and exercise that opening component.
Uh, all right. So, dropping back, um, I recognize that, uh, that all sounds great, but it's all stuff that's down the road, at least three, six months or even longer. Um, what happens if we have to activate today? So, I wanted to quickly cover an example of what that
looks like so that, you know, um, that we've got that covered as well. Um, hypothetically, a snow ice storm is coming in on a random Sunday. Um it's uh you know freezing cold. We have a windshield is is probably much like the temperature was yesterday only we've
added ice and snow to that. Um and then we have power outages. Power outages is probably the biggest vulnerability that we have in an ice storm like that. Once that power loss is uh occurs, I contact um Dominion. They let me know we're looking at three or five days for some
reason before we get power back on to 40% of the city. We obviously have a problem. So I begin making notifications through our VOCC system. Um and I make that first through uh the city MAC or our policy group. They come together. We
talk about that the fact that we may need to operate the EOC. We make the decision to uh activate it. I send out notifications to that EOCC staff. Uh and then they will come together either virtually if possible, but in this case we don't have power in the area. So it
may be that we actually have to physically come together at the city. uh EOC over in city space the city MAC um then will coordinate with the county and the university uh and we'll have regular uh meetings with that policy group so that that at that
regional level we are coordinating and then the EOC goes to work um they come together our EOP right now identifies that DSS has a role in opening shelters and warming centers and that they um coordinate that with the county uh so that's what we would be running within
the EOC uh they'd be in there. Uh we might have to put people up in a shelter. We might have to put um folks into hotel rooms. We'll make those decisions and plans within that EOC. The other thing we'll be focused on is in the midst of that making sure that we are getting consistent and factual
information on the situate on the situation and what we're doing to resolve it to the leadership to the city MAC to the city manager um and then ultimately to you all as well uh so that you can share that uh with your uh constituents.
So, uh, kind of summing that up, uh, key takeaways, these plans are in place. They're solid. Uh, we're going to lean into exercising them, and that's going to help us a lot. Uh, we want to practice so that those emergency operations become second nature. We're
doing a lot of training and development over the next year and beyond that. So, I thank um, city manager Sanders for placing a priority on it, and I thank you, council, for your support. um as well. No matter how good we are though, at the end disasters are chaotic and
they require a lot of time to mitigate. Um we need individuals and the community to be prepared. So that is certainly a takeaway um from today. Even our plans call for people to be prepared to take care of themselves for at least 72 hours. Our resources and something
significant will be depleted and we'll be waiting and relying on bringing in resources from outside the area. So individuals must be prepared. We must do the work to help them be prepared. And those who feel they are prepared uh should be focused on knocking on their neighbors doors and making sure that
their neighbors are prepared as well. So Mr. Mayor, counselors, I know you all are very active and you're an informed council. Um you're vital in connecting with the community and setting the tone for our response and our recovery. And so um I certainly appreciate that. I
pledge to ensure that we're giving you the information that you need to do that. Uh and I trust that you'll identify and advocate um for the needs that you identify in the community through uh city manager Sanders. So um that's all I have for you today. Uh I'll
take any questions now or you obviously can uh uh contact me at any point in time. But thank you very much. I appreciate it. >> Yeah. Thank you, John. And I'll get comments from council. But um as we talked before, I think that this is
vital for local government. Many times the only time the public will look towards their leaders is in an emergency. And so we must be prepared and and and show that we have our ducks in a row. And so I feel confident that we do. So
thank you so much. I'll start with you, Michael, if you have any comments. Yeah, no um questions but just for the public two comments um on agreement. I think you know this is really important work and I know this is the kind of work
that's easy to uh for local governments to put on the back burner until you know that crisis moments happens and then you know everyone regrets there wasn't as much planning years ahead. Um but the comments the first is obviously the
biggest um emergency planning failure we've had in recent years was August 11th and 12th 2017 where there were failures of communication and operational planning on multiple levels. Um and I know everyone is familiar with the he report as whether as well as
other documents that made various recommendations about um what went wrong and what could be improved going forward. Um, and some of that I think is addressed in what you talked about. I think things like um the uh exercises
you mentioned will be helpful. Um, but I I think that's, you know, everyone who was in a decision-making role when that happened is no longer here. Um, so some of that institutional memory of it has faded, but I certainly think for the community it's kind of the biggest memory of what failed and um, I think
still more to prove that we've incorporated all the lessons that we could have from it. Um and the second comment is just um in the the uh you know in the information in our packet that I was eating militus ahead
of time that the two largest risks that are identified are hurricanes and tropical storms as well as flooding. Um and I just continuously always want to highlight that because I do think that is our biggest risk. Um if we have even a tropical storm that's fairly weak that
takes a path through central Virginia um there's a high likelihood Scottville's levy could become overwhelmed. You're going to see extensive flooding in both Charlottesville and now moral. Um and so not just in emergency the kind of emergency management planning you're doing but I hope as we think about our
policy decisions across the board we're thinking about them being part of emergency management planning. even if there's a time lag of 10 or 15 years between a policy decision we made about impervious surfaces and when that tropical storm event happens because it
is going to happen and climate change makes it more likely that it will happen. So >> names Natalie >> um thank you for the presentation and for for briefing us. Um, I got a couple couple of just questions
that you've covered lightly, but I would like kind of a little bit of an expansion. Um, can you talk more about who comprises the team and are they people from other departments coming together? Are they specific for this kind of how big is the
team and who's going to be there? >> The incident management team. >> Yeah. Um, right now, uh, I am going to be starting next week recruiting for the incident management team. We need at least 30 people total, um, to fill all of the positions, all the roles that are
on that team and to provide some level of redundancy. Um, my goal is to at least get 20 up and running by the uh, six month mark. Um, and then have a team training. Ideally, that is a um, makeup of folks across the organization. uh not
only public safety. Public safety staff typically have the best grasp of ICS because they deal with it on a daily basis, but they are also everyone that's going to be on the front lines. Um and it's hard to grab them to then help manage. So, if we can bring other folks
up to speed that may not have a frontline role in the midst of a disaster um with ICS, then they could participate on this team and provide a great benefit to us. um and free up that public safety person, but we will need
some public safety staff to be on it. Um uh there was a second part to your question. >> Well, you know, that was how big and who is it made of? So, that answered it. >> Yeah. >> So, I'm really trying to target some folks that are um outside of public safety to balance that.
>> Um great. And then um what supplies are we going to need that we don't currently have? not ones that I know like I know we'll be able to get if it's a really big disaster and there's a big state of emergency we'll be able to get
supplies from from elsewhere like >> big stuff but what stuff do we need now that we might need to stockpile or have on hand for something more local >> yeah that's a that's a that's a great question um I know that they have already done some work in in the office
emergency management to bring in some um supplies and things that are necessary to support the uh the EOC itself and managing that Um, I think I would probably like to um continue to kind of evaluate that over time and get back to you with maybe some
ideas of some of the things that we might need. The reality is I've not identified anything in the last 3 months that jumps out at me as something that we should have and we don't. We have public safety, a fire department, police department, public works that have a lot of tools and equipment that are they use
on a daily basis for a number of different things that they will also pull together and use in the midst of a disaster. So, um I I've not found any glaring gap, but I'm sure there's some redundancies that we'll identify and some backup equipment that might be necessary that I'm just not aware of. >> Okay. But there's currently not a dire
need for like this one type of thing. >> Not that not that I've come across of across yet. That's good to hear. Um and then um can you talk a little bit more about the um communication with residents and the mass alert system? How
do people sign up for that? Um what is the plan to get messages out to people as needed and just kind of a little more about that kind of community uh communication would be great. Um, I will let me back up for a split second because it just occurred to me that one of one thing I did identify, but I've
already um kind of worked on it through uh the city manager's office as part of the budget process was um we don't have some equipment and supplies for pet sheltering. Um so I have put a plan together along with uh u my assistant Brent uh to uh address that gap. Um it's
not a significant gap um in terms of dollars um but it is something that we are required to do is shelter people and pets together. Um and so we have identified that and that's uh in play now and being worked on. Okay. >> Um and then some other things that you guys have identified in the past. Uh the
the uh meridian barriers is something that is been talked about and I think is going to be something that um is discussed again. So that may be something. But outside of those that have already been kind of identified in the budget process, I don't see anything else. Um the um
>> if you could just just for the public and my edification as well, the Meridian barrier, what what is that again? >> Yeah. So, um it is a um right now when we have an event like we just had the uh grand illumination and we use public
works trucks and staff to block uh the intersections where we need to make sure that vehicles cannot get down into a crowded area. These are um in place of that uh setup, these are barriers that we can put in place that are built to
withstand a a vehicle impact so we don't have to have staff right um every time. Yeah. Um, and I'm sorry, >> communication. >> Yes. Uh, so, um, the process for signing up for that, it it's run out of, um, the emergency communications um, center,
ECC. Um, and if you go to CUA 911 alerts or you search CUA, which is Charlottesville University, Almarl 911 alerts, um, that will bring up a page that guides our, um, residents through the process of signing up for alerts.
Um, and we we need to be pushing this information out regularly. Um, it's a optin system, so people go through that sign up process. uh they um register their cellular phone. I mean that enables us to quickly contact the ECC
from the street as a uh police uh commander or fire commander uh contact the ECC and say we need this public information this public information and warning to go out. The ECC has that and they'll send out that information. Um we're going to be working, we right now
are in the process of putting together um a plan to script some of that messaging across the city, county, and university so that it is consistent, understood, and something that we can push out to the residents of all all three areas um with a little more
consistency. >> Okay, great. So, there is the text system and then is there I assume there's probably a plan for like a website popup, an Instagram post, all of those other things are part of the communications process as well.
>> Uh, that's another good question. Um, I believe so, but I have to admit I am not an expert on our rave system. Um, my understanding is it will do text, it will do popups. Um it has the capability to even um do some public information and warning for specific local events.
Um so we're exploring the idea uh of being able to communicate to a crowd of folks that might be downtown for a specific event or something. But the nuances of that I would have to engage with the ECC. They run that system and have them probably address that. >> Okay. Thank you. >> That's what I've got at the moment.
>> Brian, no questions. Thank you. >> Yeah. I have um my first question is is as you're planning for various environmental disasters, is Ravana Water and Sewer Authority involved in your planning as well? >> Yes.
>> Obviously, their dams are upstream of us? >> Yes. >> We want to make sure that that's taken care of. >> Yes. Um, in fact, um, because of, uh, a number of a number of reasons, um, with my work with the county, I have a, a
great relationship and a tremendous amount of respect for the engineers over at, um, Ravana Water and Sewer. And so we went through a um FEMA technical assistance program um as a county and I participated in a number of different um meetings and got a um an education and a
great relationship with uh with the staff at at Revana Water and Sewer. Um and so some of the work that um we were doing relative to uh the uh dams, the warning systems, the warning systems at Sugar Hollow relative to the rest of the um folks that live downstream from
there. um all uh you know um helped me create a good relationship with them. They'll they they will be involved in our u mitigation planning through the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission um and in our we do a risk analysis every five years. Um they'll be
involved in that as well. Um so uh I think if if that answers your question, they're involved. Um and I I feel like I have a really good relationship with them. >> Of course, the RWSA experienced something a couple years ago in the a storm that nobody anticipated
when their pumps failed because something overflowed and I don't remember all the details. The important thing is the engineers figured it out. But in the meantime, it was a good week or so during which that facility wasn't processing, wasn't wasn't uh cleaning
our water. Um at least not much. And one of the things that that tells us is that there's always something else out there that you hadn't thought of. >> Yeah. >> And one of your tasks is to try to rack your brain to think of if there's is
there something we're leaving out. Uh so you don't want to have a failure of imagination. >> Yeah. Um, the second thing I just wanted to mention by the way that the in my experience and I I've if I'm recalling the situation correctly, I have tried my
wife has tried a number of times to sign up for CU the CUA notification system. It will not go on my home phone. It doesn't work well with VIP systems. >> Okay? And one of the things that happens is they'll say, "We're going to call you
and you have to pick up the phone and and hit a button to acknowledge that you've received it." And for some reason, it doesn't get where it's supposed to get to in the VIP system. So, if you talk to some people who are really experts on on telephone things,
see if you can figure out with them why it is that that's happening. >> Yeah. >> Okay. I'll get some more information on that. I've not heard that, but I can contact the ECC and find out. So, I I have no idea what's going on in Charlottesville because I don't get your alerts. >> Okay, >> that's a problem.
>> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I did just sign up on my cell phone and it went through smoothly. So, that's also a >> perfect >> the cell phone part works. The I guess the land doesn't for us. >> Yeah. >> And that may be we have Let me find out
some more information. >> And it's not unique to you by the way. I also find that the callback systems like the at the doctor's offices. So they get lost somehow. I don't know how it is, but you know there other there's some technology out there that surely
somebody understands better than I do to say, "Oh, we got a problem there." >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I I will definitely look into that and get back. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Thank you for that. >> Thank you, sir. >> Thank you. >> Appreciate your work. >> Thank you all. Yep. Appreciate the questions. Thank you. >> The next item on our agenda is the city manager will present the housing um
budget brief. All right. Good evening, uh, mayor, council, members of the public. This is, uh, part three of three, so I'm done after tonight. Uh, budget briefs. Uh, this one being focused on affordable housing. Um, wanted to make sure that
we, uh, spent some time on this particular topic because it is a big part of your budget. And in putting it together, there are a number of people in the room today who are here to help answer questions cuz I don't have all the answers even though people believe that I do.
>> Uh just to remind you reassuring if I told you we didn't believe that. >> I know. I know you don't. It's It's fine. It I try to have all the answers, but I do lean on so many others to help me make sure I have them and that they're correct. Uh the budget drivers for FY27 budget, as you would anticipate, are transportation,
affordable housing, and schools. Uh but we always make sure we leave uh public safety in that list as well because it's important for the public to hear and understand that we are working on this issue at all times even if it is not the lion share of what makes up the budget. Uh and then the city schools item I
added just to I added public safety therefore making it four drivers instead of three because the schools part is to be determined which you all should recall that you have a meeting on Thursday joint meeting with school board and that is them giving you a preview of their needs so that we begin to have the
rest of the budget begin to take shape with that ask. So, I'm going to walk you through a series of things uh that we've identified that are associated with this budget that are either in the budget, being talked around the budget conversation as it stands right now, and
new items that have started to uh materialize that are associated with things that are already in the budget. Therefore, projects that are stuck, getting stuck, or approaching stuck. Uh and all of them have a financial impact, which is why they are a part of this
presentation. So, we'll look at uh production within the housing uh with the redevelopment housing authority, CRA. Under construction today, you have two projects that are uh have received funding from the city. South first street phase 2 is $6 million in it. And
Sixth Street phase one has $3 million in it. And there's been a commitment of $15 million in West Haven redevelopment, of which the first $5 million was slated for this year. Okay, I'm looking at Chrissy for shaking her head. This year. Uh so over the next two years there'll
be five million each uh for that $15 million commitment. Under construction as well in Pont Housing Alliance portfolio you have Kendallwood phase 2. Uh we're doing the planning work right now or waiting for the planning work to come back in regards to Park Street Macka which is
3.7 million and then Park Street as well for 2.25 million. Um there's planning that's continuing to be done on 501 Cherry. Today the commitment has been 3.15 million and then phase three of Kendallwood is 4.15 million. These are
all in your budget already reflected items uh indicating the supports that we've committed to affordable housing with this particular partner. And then we have additional not for-profit uh arrangements that are in play. Vista 29 has uh will receive a
total of $936,000 from the city in support for permanent supportive housing for Vista 29 which is the former Premier Circle uh that is being uh is under construction as we speak. And then the Carlton mobile home park the 8.7 million that you see there
is just in acquisition and loan servicing. So that's the act of getting the property under our control and servicing the loan that was used to purchase that property. It is not about construction of units. Um that is to be determined and at this moment we just
know that this is to replace the 60 units with a significantly larger uh affordable housing development that will come in the future. Again already in your budget and reflected as one of the changes in your CIP for how we've had to
adjust for the loan servicing terms. Uh this is your uh chance. This is your first chance of being able to see what came in during the NOA round. Um I even though I was on vacation last week, I did take in the uh public hearing on the
CIP. I had a few comments to myself. Uh but just want to point out to you that even though there is an expression of we don't have a process, I take issue with that because we do have a process. The process is that within the NOA that is released, the annual affordable housing
NOA that is released each year, one of the deadlines is a request for uh information on development projects. And that is a chance for any developer who is interested in seeing if the city would consider an investment to respond to. Uh these are the three uh projects
that responded this uh cycle. Each of them has made a request. We've identified those for you. Community Services Housing has identified a request for $900,000 to produce 40 units of 40 to 60% AMI units, which is a LAITC
rehab of a multif family uh property serving persons with disabilities. Brick Lane Better Communities is a hotel mixed income conversion and I think that is the Holiday Inn. >> Yes. >> Yes. The the Holiday Inn on Emry conversion uh from the Holiday Inn to a
multif family project. They're requesting 1.75 million uh for 192 units ranging from 60% AMI to market rate. So that's something else for us to now consider. And then the third request is POA uh preservation of affordable
housing. This is the partnership with University of Virginia property on Wartland. Uh $3 million is requested here for 170 units. This is a process of which now um me sharing this with you, our goal would be to begin to have
conversations with you on what do you feel about prioritizing these considerations for the budget. If you would like to see them funded in the budget, that now means that myself and Miss Hamill and others have to go and try to figure out where it fits, how it fits, what it costs, and can we
determine affordability of being able to do so. And if there is a reason that you can clearly indicate as to why you would not support the projects, then we would like your assistance in that so that we can notify parties because they have responded to the RFI which was a part of the no for process and we now need to be
able to respond back to them with an indication of support or not. And then the note at the bottom is to indicate to you that our team has identified that because there are criticisms of the process. We are going to spend a little time looking at additional steps we might take to kind of beef it up. Um but
ideally the intention was that in the NO for round is where we would find out what other interests there may be and there's no prohibition as to who can submit. They can submit whatever uh project that they have that's in the affordable housing arena and then they provide that information. and we
received that and again we produce this particular slide or multiple slides is what the plan will be going forward. We've been doing this now for two years. >> Okay, keep going. >> Can you clarify? >> Oh, I knew somebody might say something. >> Yes.
>> Um the acronym you're using >> acronym >> NOA NOA notice of funding uh availability or opportunity. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Sorry. >> Thank you. So I'll try not to >> I can I can say that's for the general public's information but also for my
>> So that is and I'll just go further. So what we do is in October, was it October? >> August, >> August of each year, we identify a series of opportunities where individuals can submit a request for funding and they are basically responding to uh request for proposals.
And there's just a series of them for the calf, the Charlottesville affordable housing fund, uh for the hops and CDBG and >> community development block grant and vibrant uh communities uh for housing
assistance for operating support. Uh hops. Uh those are all individual opportunities to respond with the project requesting support. the RFI, the request for interest. Uh I thought it was investment. Is it interest?
>> Request for information. >> Information. Um but it's a request for investment is really what it is. So that that round is a chance for individuals that are working on development projects to also say, "Hey, we have a project. It's an affordable housing project. It meets the priorities of what we understand council would like to see and
we would like to have you consider making an investment to make it possible for us to move this project forward. It may be a LITC project and in some cases it may not be. >> Okay. And so I know currently there's um no shortage of requests. Yes.
>> But it is a requestbased process. >> Correct. >> Yes. >> And and to that point um so naturally I'm not asking you to say yes yes no no yes no or anything like that because I have many more slides and there are other things that are not in your budget
at this point. these are the first three things that are not in your budget today and I have multiple things that are coming up that are also not in your budget. So that's the tension and the trade-off conversation that we started earlier this year. >> Yeah, that question was more of like for putting together our
housing policy for the process of like how do we want to spend X dollars that are coming in, right? >> That's a request based process, not a city-led process. >> Yes, I'd say that is that is most accurate. I think part of what we're trying to get to is is maybe a hybrid
approach. I think it's important for us to figure out ways that we can engage you all in discussions and it may be that we have a special engagement each year where you get to talk about priorities specifically uh looking at results. You'll get your affordable
housing presentation I think is in April when we normally do that. That's when we give you the resultsoriented discussion as to how we've been able to reach the targets and where we've missed the mark or what have you. Then taking that information and driving priorities from
that so that then you could start to put out a RFI that says we're looking for projects that reach this for this number of people by this date and then no one else need apply. >> I mean you could always turn it into shape. >> Yes. >> Got it. >> Okay. Thank you.
>> So go ahead. While you're while you're on this page, is there a specific proposal on for community services housing? >> Yes. Um this is the information that we receive to how much more detail do we have? >> I have um actually it's all available on
our website all the full application packets. >> So that's what we're that's what our next step is going to be is to get you this information so that you can have a full appreciation for the ask >> and the website reference. >> That's on on the city's website. If you go on >> website,
>> is it NDS's page? >> Yeah. Um, probably what I just >> We'll get you the link. How about that? >> It's on the NDS page because the housing program is now back in NDS. >> So, um, Sam, so um, you had mentioned
that you wanted uh, whether we want to include this in the budget. Do you want that now or we going to have a work session or something? >> We're going to we'll get the information. We'll get you the details. I think what Councelor Snook is looking at, he's interested in going to see the project. We're gonna get you the link so you can do that. Um, but I need to give
you more stuff to wrestle with because that's my job. >> Since all three of these are new to us, at least new to me. >> That's right. >> That's right. They are. >> So, just for clarification because we get information on deeply affordable to 30% and less. These are proposal that um
private developers essentially um or quasi public >> or nonprofits could be any of them. Yeah. that they have presented to the city to say, "Hey, we want um you know to use your funds for this program to help construct,
>> right? CRA can come in through this round if there was a new development project that they were planning. This is what we would now ask them to do. This wasn't always the way we've done it in the past. Uh Pont Housing Alliance for any new project that they would consider, we would ask them to come around, come into this round as well.
This is a way for us to kind of forecast what's coming. Uh not every project is ready to go today, which is why we do this every year and we're looking for them to tell us what is the status of your project, when is it likely to start, and to give us updates along the way. >> And that's for planning purposes, of
course. >> Thank you. >> All right. So, here are the requests. These are things that are beginning to mount up in the projects that exist today. uh kind of giving you now the indications as to why some of them are stuck and how we've been engaged in conversations as as to ways to get them
unstuck. 501 Cherry is a project that you've already supported as I showed you on the screen before I think the number if I'm remembering correctly was 3.15 million. Uh there is a gap uh there has been considerable effort to work to eliminate the gap that exists that which is why there has been no movement on the
site. Uh the request that has recently come in from PHA in making this project possible is now an additional $700,000 in addition to the $1 million performance grant. So that this would make it possible for the project to move forward. And the increased request is in
association with the proposed grocery store uh that would go on the property. Uh this would be still supporting the development which is right now stuck because your investment is into the residential units that would come from this project. You would now be
supporting the possibility of the grocery store joining those units on site with the other features of this of this project. >> But to clarify, it's supporting the shell of the commercial >> the shell of the space basically making it possible for a grocery store. It is
not a full commitment that there will be a store because the team that is working on that still has significant work to do. And while all bets are on the idea that we would see a grocery store and many would like to see a grocery store, there's not an ability to commit to that
at this time. But there's work in progress though. to the shell of a commercial space that potentially independ >> that would be reserved right now for the grocery store and then could be used temporarily in in place of them being there just to help fund things until they are ready.
>> Okay. >> So, it's more or less producing what I describe as a runway. Gives the the food co-op a runway to continue their work without the pressure of finding the money first for a space that they can't operate in. This just guarantees that a space will eventually be available
should they find the need to use that space. >> And would it be paid back or would it be a grant? >> It will be a grant. >> Thanks. >> So that's one request that has now materialized. In addition to that, Kendallwood phase 4. Kindlewood is a very complicated
project. I've been talking about this my whole tenure here about how complicated this project is. I could have seen that from day one. And I think what we have found is that over each phase, we've had to come back to the drawing board to figure out what next, what next, what
next. And most of it is because we're just in a time that things are changing so rapidly. Uh, and it's very expensive to do the things that we have uh dreamed of being able to do here. We currently have $4.5 million committed in the CIP for phase 4. There is a $3 million
funding gap. Uh to get to the number of units that are expected based on the original agreement, we would need them to produce 131 units in phase 4, which would give us a total of 425, which is the bottom of the range that we com
asked them to commit to. Uh but with no additional funding, there is an indication that they do not see being able to deliver the 425 units. So that would now be 388 instead. We know that this is going to require some conversation. Uh we're reworking
our work session schedule, the first wave of your work session discussions for the new year to try to make it possible for this conversation because I think the way we all look at Kindlewood is the city has deeply invested in this project which means that it ranks
differently than a lot of other projects that you have made some investments in. So, we need some reconciliation on are you okay not having 425 units delivered? Are you going to insist on there being 425 units being delivered? And if you
are going to insist, are you willing to help close the gap to make that possible? Because as it stands right now, we're at a crossroads. So, that's me being pretty simple and trying to be accurate as to where we stand at this present time. So, there's more to talk
about in my I'm working with the team right now to try to figure out how quickly we can have the conversation and it's shaping up that we're going to do this as your first meeting in January >> because it's that important. >> So, that's >> to to address phase four >> to walk work work through this and a few
other hot >> uh topic issues because >> time is everything. >> Yeah. uh and we have a number of deadlines in play and there's there's things that we need to make sure that you all just get the opportunity to consider and and make your decisions.
So, I'm going to quickly just kind of give you a little history of where we are and history meaning history of what the budget is made up of, but this is what you will see in uh our budget going forward. five $1.5 million is contributed annually to the CIP in
support of the affordable housing grant program which today generates $823,000 in direct grants out each year. Uh the housing operations and program support HOPS program is $575,000. It also hits the street in the form of
grants to nonprofit organizations that are doing housing related work. And then we have administrative expenses which is a part of your affordable housing plan. And that's the hybrid approach to being able to say that you have a $10 million commitment and how are the funds then divided up to support the work that
you're doing. But we have requests uh from the staff. Uh we are processing these requests now as we are building the budget uh for legal support, additional studies as well as professional fees um associated with the tax abatement study and updates to our
ADA manual. Those are just things that'll be part of the makeup of the budget, but I just wanted to be able to touch on that with you as well as the team has pulled together a way for me to give you a snapshot of everything. Uh there's been many uh references of a
strike fund, councelor Payne specifically, but other members of the planning commission have also um grabbed hold of the idea of it sure would be nice if we had a strike fund. I have not prioritized the strike fund in this current year's budget. I am struggling
to see prioritizing a strike fund in the new fiscal budget. Uh but I do believe what I have offered and will continue to offer as what amounts to a strike fund is your CIP contingency fund. That fund is made up of your surplus dollars and
they get added to each year. Uh the point that I would suggest that you look at the strike fund as a notion is it's the funding that you have available to make the decisions that need to be made at that particular time. That's the strike aspect of it. Uh, and it should be associated with how much money you
have available and not necessarily a fund where you just simply put $5 million into it and say this won't be touched. I think it's hard for me to appreciate how do I get you where you all want to go, uh, where this community wants to go. if I set aside five million
and say we don't touch it because I think we always tend to find a way to come close to needing to touch it before you say we're ready to touch it because the strike isn't there for an a housing project but there are other projects and other desires and other needs that come up as this whole presentation was coming
together I kept scr scratching my head as to how much it was going to cost to get through presenting this to you as to all the requests that have now come in before I first started imagining what this presentation was going to include. What I'm saying in regards to the strike fund is that today there are funds in
your CIP contingency. I have not brought to you a need to spend every dollar that is in that account. We have not done that before. We have really tried to discipline ourselves in when we come, how we come, and why we come uh to ensure that there's always funds available. I think what we have taken to
heart in the references to the need for a strike fund is to try to see if we could develop the relationships with the individuals associated with projects that are likely to come and see if we can get some indication of how much money might be needed for each of those.
And that way we can at least try to anticipate if one were to come online, how much money is going to be needed to be able to purchase it, take it down, or enter into some kind of partnership. So, I'm I'm referencing that we are acknowledging that the silk purse
portfolio and both of the LITC unit projects that are expiring 2026 are things that we will not lose sight of that could become a possible uh priority for discussion. Uh and we will bring those back to you if we were to hear
about them uh as being available or an interest in them shifting out of affordability. And we would want to try to preserve those. Uh and as it stands right now, we do have uh CIP contingency funds or former surplus funds. Your
finance director will begin the process of identifying for you the audit results tonight. And in the first meeting in January, you will hear the actual surplus number. Um I guess I should say a surplus number because we're always positive. Um but we don't know what that number is yet. But that is going to be
added to what goes into that CIP contingency fund provided the recommendation that I make to you is approved. >> So Sam, Mside Forest is not in the county or >> it it's it's in the county, but it's an affordable housing project that we think is important enough for us to not lose
sight of because it's naturally occurring affordable housing as it stands today. >> Would there be county regional cooperation? >> I think that too is part of the conversation. like we have a really good connection with our peers in the county and if a project were to come forward, I
think we both would try to engage in discussions. I think we all know that we're more situated to try to buy something in total versus not. Uh so that might make it difficult to see where the county will join us, but I think we should give them the opportunity every time, especially if
it's a property that's in the county. And if we uh for the silk road purse for the sorry for the silk purse portfolio um you said we'd wait and see. Is there any active engagement? >> There's conversations. Um I'm aware that
CRA has been in conversation um with um with Jeremy about his portfolio and that there is a a portion of it that might end up um being conveyed and we are in those conversations uh with John. I've I've talked to John about this a couple times.
>> Okay. And >> and I think maintaining the relationship is really what I'm getting at as what's important at this present time. >> And if we would the idea be that if we purchase them either on behalf of
one of our >> agencies or through the city, um part of the cost of that would also be the loss of real estate taxes, right? >> Yep. Okay. >> And and Mside has city resident vouchers
>> more than likely. >> Yeah, probably. >> Yep. I would think all of them probably do. >> Um I think part of what you're getting at though is that's part of the ongoing work. That's the continued work that has to be done. The determining what to do
is where we have not yet been able to get to. Um I also heard reference last week in the CIP. I'm kind of airing my grievances, but there was a reference to us, I guess, being in some turmoil as it relates to our housing program. I will push back on that notion. Maline is
doing a great job carrying what is a platter. I granted that she's carrying a platter right now, but we are fine. Uh we have a vacancy. It's a position that we need to fill. We're going to advertise and get that position filled. We have had conversation about adding
capacity. Um Kelly is very good, like James, at asking for things. So, we're going to make sure that we take serious consideration of that and working through that process, but there is no turmoil. I would say we're working through a process of filling seats and making sure that we can get the capacity
added to our team capable of doing some of the things that we just haven't been able to get to. That's been a theme of mine this year and I'm I'm really supportive of the idea of making sure that our housing program gets to be a little more robust, which I think is really the complaint and not that it's in turmoil.
So, >> thanks. >> All right. I'm just gonna also I'll just point out to you um the inclusion of homelessness in this is is just to point out that we know that it's expensive. It's it's it's going to be a continuous
process of us figuring out uh you all know that we purchased the 2000 holiday drive site. We are in conversation with our partners, our key community partners on working through what could become of that particular um facility. We've been doing all kinds of various work and and
supports to that community specifically led by Ashley Marshall uh as well as the collaborative approach to bringing in different members of our team to try to figure out softer ways to address various displays of things that have become a challenge. and we're looking at
programmatic improvements to some of the things that we're doing, including how some of the funds are being used by some of the partners. We'll continue to do that. Uh we'll always have to come back to you and talk to you a little bit more about homelessness specifically because it's about what are the many things that
we're going to keep trying to do. But as it stands right now, I'm not asking for anything else because we're focused on 2000 Holiday Drive. I can assure you that by the time we finish the program uh the the budget process there'll probably some things
that will have risen to the surface. Uh we included Home to Hope is a re-entry program because of course those citizens returning to the community are always uh subject to difficult situations and sometimes find themselves homeless. And we are continuing to do our work in
support of that as well as looking for even non-traditional ways of partnering with organizations that are serving this population even who have beds available that there's been a recent offer for us to consider uh being able to partner with them and seeing if we can help pull certain individuals off the street into
those spaces uh for them to get the supports that they need as a part of their transition. And then we continue to do rental assistance. Our department of human services uh continue to operate the community resource hotline. They do housing navigation as well. So our
pathways fund is supporting uh various needs along the way. We have a lot more uh things to talk to you about in the future with that. And then the commissioner of revenue continues to support our various relief programs and I'll show you some of those details as well. We have identified a real
intervention that is needed as it relates to rental assistance. Uh in Kendallwood specifically as a part of our ongoing conversations with PHA, we've identified that there are a number of households that have not been able to make their rent payments and this is despite their uh income evaluations
indicating an ability to pay from the numerical aspect of it. We're still seeing that individuals are not paying rent. So there's something going on there. And as it stands right now, we have no way of knowing what that is. Uh so one of the requests was to consider a pilot program that would allow for pilot
co u financial coaches to begin working with those households to identify what is happening within the household that is inter interfering with their ability to pay their rents and then we would also set up a fund to help clear the arars for those as we work through resolving some of those issues. This is
the kind of work that I've done for a very long time so I relate to what it takes to get people out of situations like this. So, I think this is going to be something that we're going to try to explore and figure out a way to bring back that for your consideration. So, just sharing with you that this is a possible future request.
And then the CISA program, that's the Charlottesville supplemental rental assistance program. That is the city's voucher program is the best way for us to describe that for you. $900,000 annually. We have that included in the budget uh as well for FY27. uh you just recently I think even
tonight might be finalizing the approval of the continuation of the program. Uh we're going to continue working with the 68 households that are at or below 30% AMI because we see that as a very vulnerable population. And then the question could very easily be do we
change the number and increase it. I will say at the start of this fiscal year, at the start of this fiscal year budget planning, I was thinking that that would be the ask that we would make is to increase the CISRAP program, but based on the various new requests that I've already identified for you and some that I haven't told you about, I'm
having difficulty identifying how to do that. So, we will see um what shakes out by the time we get through the school's presentation on Thursday and a few more details on revenue projections that we're anticipating at the beginning of January.
And then I'll just walk through just for your benefit and for the public's benefit of seeing how our tax relief, our relief programs are working. U so this is the elderly and disabled tax relief program. So 518 people qualify for $1.9 million
as well as 206 in the rent program for $134,000. Those are maximum grants of $2,000. Our affordable housing, the chat program, 317 individuals received 610,000 and varying grants of $1,000 to
$2,500. And then we have 39 disabled veterans or spouses who received $222,000. So I would suggest that we have a very robust uh relief and intervention program assigned to those individuals who are having difficulty with our high
rate of real estate taxes. And then the last is surviving spouses. We just don't have any individuals that have applied and qualify for the program, but if we were to have some, there are funds available, as Todd has indicated, we could assist them just the same. So, I'm going to shift and just remind
you of things that are coming up. As we all know, the joint budget meeting is this Thursday. So, tune in for those who would like to watch us have that conversation talking about school needs for the next fiscal year. And this year I'm doing something different because I want more people to
come and talk to me about the budget so that they can stop telling me I don't know what's going on. So I decided we're going to talk about it on three different occasions, three nights in a row in three different places. So we'll get you those details. Um I'll announce that at the next council meeting so that
people will know exactly where they are. I'm anticipating that these will be 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. each of those three nights and we're going to bring the budget to you in the community. Uh last year we integrated monopoly as a part of our process and I like monopoly because
I like to win and I like to use that as the visual of how you make choices on spending money. So we're going to use that as a feature of how we unveil our budget and help the public share with us priorities and setting those. And then I will make my infamous budget
presentation on March 2nd and it will be the beginning of the end of my stress of trying to put a fiscal year budget together when we as a city punch above our weight class. And I will have all the battle scars for it and trying to pull this this budget together and
making sure the numbers add up because it must be balanced. And then we will adopt that budget on April 9th and get ready for its beginning implementation on July 1st. questions. >> Yes, Sam. The meeting Thursday with
school board, is that I know it's a work session for us, but I can't remember if we take public comment. >> I don't think so. >> The schools do. The schools usually have >> the schools do. Okay. >> Oh, yeah. That's true. They did. Yes, there will be public comment. I'm just
remembering that. >> Any questions? I thought >> and I have others here who would love to come to the microphone and talk to you as well if there's anything specific that you want to know. >> Um yeah, Michael, >> so what are you anticipating for that
January uh a work session about uh Kindlewood phase 4? >> So it won't be just Kindlewood phase 4, but it will definitely be uh Kindlewood phase four phase 4 because they are on a deadline situation for moving forward.
So they need to have the clarity of is the unit count reduction permissible or not. Is there going to be further cash invested or not? Uh and then just to have the back and forth on the priority that you set out when you decided to
redevelop the former property. Are you getting what you wanted to get for that? And if not, how do we reconcile that? That's really the question. But I'm imagining that we're going to have to uh identify additional priorities. Uh I am concerned. I've been alerted by the uh
continuum of care that u by federal action. Our permanent supportive housing program is in peril for financial support. U they were going to be going to court. The court item was pulled. So there's no resolution now. Uh and that in itself means that there's probably
going to be an interruption of funds in a bigger way. And if we don't get those funds, then that's going to be a loss. And there's roughly 31 32 people, I think is the number that I heard, uh, that would be left without any direct assistance. And I would think that that would be a priority for you to consider
backfilling some portion of that until the feds settle down and resolve whatever the impact is likely to be. But that would be >> that's crossings one getting defunded. >> I don't know exactly how it's spent. I just know the numbers cuz I was given the alarm bell on that as well as we
know that we have other priorities that are coming in relation to SNAP benefits. Uh and a few of our local nonprofits appear to be having financial difficulties as well. >> And then what if anything are you >> in the homeless space? I should I should prioritize.
>> What if anything are you anticipating for the conversation around CISRAP? for CISRAP. I think where we are is we're comfortable with the program continuing, which is why we brought the item forward. Um, as I said, my thought was that we would be looking to indicate to you a desire to increase the amount
of funding so therefore we could reach more people. I don't think that is the case uh that we would prioritize at this present time because I think the discovery that we've made in regards to the number of households that have not been able to pay rent even though again
the financial evaluation that says your income supports your ability to pay this amount and that's not getting paid is a problem and it's one that we need to try to figure out what's going on. It is not Kindlewood exclusively. It is happening with CRA properties as well and those
that are outside of that and the numbers are staggering how much is not getting paid. >> Go ahead. >> Yes. >> Oops. >> Just just to add a little bit of additional detail. So staff is planning to initiate an evaluation of the CISRAP
program uh in the first part of this year. Um so as Mr. Sanders said we are recommending at this time to keep that funding at 900,000 a year. Uh we may recommend changes to the program um looking into next year. Um but there is
additional funding in the program left over from last year that could potentially support um an incremental increase. The consideration of the issues going on at Kindlewood, the delinquencies, in some ways we view that as a separate issue. Uh, so the CISRAP
evaluation could also include some recommendations for that, but just trying to create a distinction between CISRAP and the the questions of delinquencies at at Kindlewood and CRA. >> And I know >> another way of saying don't give us more money until we figure it out. I have
done that, too. >> But then if we wanted more money, it would come out of CIP contingency. >> Well, no, because we're building the budget. So, we would just work it in. So we would know before the budget how much we might want to adjust. >> Not that specific.
>> Yeah. So we are not recommending at this time uh to add more money through the CIP for SISRAP for fiscal year 27. If we come out of that evaluation at the end of this year and we identify opportunities to expand the program, it would likely include recommendations
that are not only about funding but also staff capacity, questions of you know overall management of the program. Perhaps there is some opportunity to incrementally increase the scope and scale of that program and we would look at um existing sources of funding that
we have um not any sort of new money. Now, the question of how we address delinquencies um at Kindlewood and CRA, that's kind of a separate conversation and something I think that we may consider in more detail in January.
>> Yeah. >> And um obviously, you know, there could be a whole work session of discussion of it, but I think part of it is, as you mentioned, it's not just Kindlewood. This is pretty much all affordable
housing that uses low-inccome housing tax credits because it's tied the affordability is tied to the unit itself via the assigned area median income that is determined by LITC and if it's not attached to a voucher the price someone has to pay won't vary with their income
it will say stuck in the unit at that price and particularly during the T pandemic because AMI is calculated with CPI their calculation exploded and what everyone had to pay went up even if it didn't correspond to how much their income increased. So, I just know it's
across the board problem we're going to have to confront. And then you look at the cost to bring a 60% AMI unit to 30% AMI is like $120,000 a unit um just to keep up with the the paying the the debt
and associated costs with that unit. But um ne next question kind of related to that is what kickstarted in large part the adoption of our affordable housing plan and the $10 million commitment was an intervention assessment tool that was
created that estimated how many interventions, not necessarily new units, but just interventions across the board would be needed to meet the existing affordable housing gap um at different AMI levels as well. And that's how we got to 10 million. That was the
estimated cost of about 3,300 interventions. Obviously, that was done in 2018, 2019. I think the cost of that today, if you just adjusted for construction cost inflation, would be 145 million. So, we've already lost ground. But um the housing advisory
committee recently was discussed if on their own they updated that intervention assessment tool for current data and that was available as a resource to kind of look at proposed investments, compare it against the interventions we need,
compare it against what AMI levels it touches, which AMI levels it doesn't touch. um is that something that staff would potentially be interested in having them do and utilize because their concern was they spend the time to do it um but then there's no desire to kind of
rely on that tool. >> We very much appreciate uh the housing advisory committee commission's interest and uh providing us with tools that we can use as a data point to inform um investment consideration. So, yes, thank you for highlighting that as an opportunity.
>> And I'll add that um I needed her to say that just because I've already told them that I wanted them to update the tool um because I was curious because I know that this was it was done a long time ago and at this point it's a data point even though we have additional analysis work. It would be great to have as much
of that as we can possibly get our hands on. Mhm. And um I mean I think I mean I think part of the discussion is going to have to include that we've lost ground since you know our affordable housing plan was adopted just because of
inflation. And the pandemic was not normal inflation. It was very atypical and very high. So if we want to achieve our original goals, you know, you're talking about a meaningful amount above $10 million annually. So we need to be adding to it as much as we can. Um, and
I'll just end with um a comment that I think, you know, all this is so important because we're a community that's very divided by income. It's very divided in who has a four-year college degree and who doesn't. Um, and,
you know, just one stat that I think is very in, you know, in strikes me is that the median black household in Charlottesville is at 50% of area mean income, about $44,000 a year in income. the median white household is more than double that. And these interventions
we're talking about um what are investments and strategies that aren't even providing an opportunity for the average black household in Charlottesville? What strategies are who do we miss? Who do we not miss? who uh you know what parts of
our community are maybe not as vocal in attending um work sessions in planning meetings historically who we've overlooked in our planning processes and I think you know what we've done is there's a lot more to do but I mean the reason we're investing $10 million a
year is because reaching so many of our community members requires social housing and it's very expensive and it's very complex but it's the only way we're going to provide housing opportunities for them because these are housing options that don't make a profit. So,
they're only going to exist if we do that. And I think it's also important just to highlight that there's a lot more to do. These are very complex projects we can improve. But we've spent more per capita than any other locality in Virginia, one of the highest in the country. And I think for community
members who I think rightly can say we need to do more, it's not enough. I think it's important to see that we've done a lot and it takes time to build. But um otherwise I think it's easy to think well what's the point? But we really have seen a transformative change in how we invest in what we do. Um but
there's a long way to go and I hope we just don't lose sight of the importance of this. Um and um final comment is I think I do worry we've maybe lost some backslid a little bit on planning for
purchasing of land which I do think is really really important because all affordable housing development is going to start with having access to land and maybe it takes several years for the funding to come together but if they can get that land it can happen. If they don't have it it never can. Um, and as
you highlighted, we know there's some low-inccome housing tax credit properties with affordability periods that are expiring soon. And to me, that's a five alarm fire. That's a crisis. These are hundreds of people at immediate risk of having their lives upending upended and never being able to
afford to stay in Charlottesville again. And I think we've got to prioritize being able to stop that from happening and planning for it and long-term having a really coherent strategy for land acquisition. And I know for the moment we've kind of abandoned the land bank idea. I'm certainly open to other ways
that are high impact for land acquisition. Um the um program to provide a funding gap is just not nearly expansive to fill, you know, that need of land acquisition. Um, so I
I do worry about that and um, >> okay, >> I'll just end I mean I just the Carlton mobile home park just to humanize it. That was a long saga with a lot of lot going into it. One of the families there had lived there for
decades and and you know conversations people had with them. you know, their husband was terminally ill and dying and the last months of their life, they had to worry about how am I going to prevent being homeless? How am I going to have
to place find a place to live? And that moment of their life, people who had worked the jobs that keep this community running their whole lives, that's what a local government has the power. We have the power to upend people's lives to that extent. We also have the power to help people's lives in that kind of
situation. And I just hope we we keep that kind of human element of the importance of this in the front of our minds. >> Thank you. Um Natalie, >> um thanks. I really appreciate seeing all of this at once. It's good to get that list of yeah, what's coming online?
What have we already invested in um and kind of seeing that all together because as Michael said, we have done a lot and unfortunately construction takes time. So, um things are going to um to fall into place as uh as those units get
finished. Um there there is I think you also made another really good point that this is expensive. It costs a lot of money and so we have to be on the lookout for ways that we can increase our revenue for these types of projects, whether that's general fund
transfers or specific affordable housing fund input. Um so to that end when we got our presentation back in August uh at the retreat where it said that the city was at our fiscal stress limit um
then we have to think about how can we bring in revenue that is outside money um which is being enthusiastic about um people who are interested in building additional housing that's market rate um
to make sure that the real estate taxes we generate go up to also provide more housing opportunities for people to shift and climb that ladder. Um I know we're going to have a discussion next year about shaping locations a little differently maybe than we are
now. Um so I'm open to you know talking about that. But in general, citywide, that's something we need to support, both to create more additional units and to increase revenue that we can spend on these specific projects, which are dedicated to helping people stay where they are, um, or let them come back. Um,
that's really all I have to say for now is we can we can do both things. dedicated affordable housing that has subsidy costs and allowing market rate housing to help fund all of that and increase tax revenue not just in real estate taxes but in other things that
people spend in the city. >> Thanks. >> Thank you. When I was on the board of Pedmont Housing Alliance now a decade ago, one of the discussions that we were having at that point was suggesting that phase
4 of what is now Kindlewood might be something other than housing simply so that they could develop some income so that they could keep their own processes going better. Has that now been abandoned? Do you have any sense on that?
>> I would say yes because I think they need the site now to be able to produce the number of required units. >> So for the record, Brenda Kelly, I haven't had any recent discussions with PHA, but yes, at one point they were talking about some commercial uses, some market rate units on the site, but I
don't know if there's been changes to that discussion recently. >> Okay. It hasn't been a feature of it being anything but housing units at this time. I wonder whether that's because it's their expectation that that's what we might want and whether we ought to have
some other thoughts about I mean just as I've I've tried to encourage CRA to to work in some kind of revenue generating use of some of their properties uh mixed use kind of a situation whether we ought
to try to do that uh encourage that out of PHA again recognizing that the way that the feds have structured public housing is it's always going to run a deficit. And clearly, if we're going to not have it always run a
deficit, either the city's got to keep Annieing up money every time we turn around, or else they've got to figure out a way to to make some to make some money of their own. >> We can get that part of the update for that conversation though, just to be able to tell you that. >> Thank you. S
>> I just want to clarify there is a commercial component to phase four. >> There is. Yes. Okay. Yeah, I just checked. >> Okay, live. >> There you go. There is a commercial component. >> Um, other comments? >> Nope.
>> I don't have any right now. You have any you? >> Nope. Just more work to do. >> Yes. Thank you all so much. This is it's good information. Um, if there's no other action or comments now, we will go into close session. Um, do we
Uh, pursuant to section 2.2-3712 of the Virginia code, I move that this city council closes open meeting and convene in a closed session as authorized by the Virginia Freedom of Information Act as follows. Pursuant to Virginia Code section 2.23711A1
for discussion and consideration of prospective candidates to be appointed to the following boards andor committees. The Board of Zoning Appeals, Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund Committee, Charlottesville Almaral Convention and Visitors Bureau Board, Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority Board, Community Development Block Grant and Home Task
Force, Historic Resources Committee, Housing Advisory Committee, Human Rights Commission, Local Board of Building Code Appeals, Minority Business Commission, Personnel Appeals Board, Pedmont Family YMCA Board of Directors, Sister Cities Commission, Social Services Advisory Board, Thomas Jefferson Water Resources
Protection Foundation, the Towing Advisory Board, Tree Commission Vendor Appeals Board and Youth Council. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> Um, all in favor, please say yes. >> All oppose, please say no. Okay. Motion passes 5 to zero. We will be back at
6:30.