City Council Work Session Transcript – 07/28/2020 Title: City of Austin Channel: 6 - COAUS Recorded On: 7/28/2020 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 7/28/2020 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== Please note that the following transcript is for reference purposes and does not constitute the official record of actions taken during the meeting. For the official record of actions of the meeting, please refer to the Approved Minutes. [9:02:31 AM] >> Mayor Adler: We have councilmember alter and councilmember kitchen, councilmember pool, councilmember Flannigan, councilmember Renteria and myself. We have a full day so let's go ahead and get started. This is the Austin city council work session. Today is July 28th, 2020. It's 9:02 and we have a quorum present, meeting held virtually. Colleagues, we're going to start this morning with the covid briefing. At 11:00 we're going to go into executive session because we have outside counsel sell. If we finish the covid briefing we'll go to pulled item until 11. At 11 we'll go into executive session and we'll break from noon to 1:00 for lunch. [9:03:31 AM] And at 1:00 we have speakers to speak in the second briefing issue, which is our St. Johns. When we're done with St. Johns we'll go into the budget briefing. Ed sent out an outline this morning. We'll follow that and then we'll do the pulled items. We'll begin with the covid briefing. Dr. Escott I'm going to turn it over to you. Today's briefing will be both the general briefing. We'll have the opportunity to ask questions about that, but in that briefing there's going to be special attention paid I think to the nursing home issue that councilmember kitchen asked for and we'll be incorporating that into this presentation. All right, Dr. Escott or [9:04:32 AM] director Hayden, whichever one of you wants to lead us off. Or manager, did you want to say something before we did? We'll have director Hayden start off and then Dr. Escott and ask questions of Dr. Escott before he leaves for commissioners' court and before the presentation about nursing homes. But director Hayden why don't you start us a. >> Organic, I'm director Stephanie Hayden, -- I'm Stephanie Hayden, director of Austin public health. Staff continue to trace and review target populations. We are reviewing our testing and contact tracing services. We are continuing to prioritize and as translation and ensure that we are providing services that are bilingual as well. We have with our testing locations, we currently have [9:05:36 AM] dove springs, walnut creek communities and this Saturday we will begin testing on Saturday. So we will be testing four days a week as well as the pflugerville location, which is also a Monday through Saturday site. These are walkup sites. We continue to have our testing availability. Our nurse line is available to assist them to register and schedule an appointment. We are looking at a few more testing sites in the 78741 and the 78745 and 48 to establish testing in those communities. We are committing to having a testing strategy that is flexible and rapidly respond to changes in the community. [9:06:36 AM] We currently have two vendors that are assisting us with testing. We are able to provide targeted population services. With our nursing home and long-term care facilities, our incident command staff continue to meet weekly with our long-term care staff from nursing homes and assisted living. And per our testing plan we continue to provide that support to them. As far as a year to date number, we have coordinated 7,000 covid tests in facility settings. After the initial 32 nursing homes in Travis county, we [9:07:38 AM] have processed an additional 29 long-term care facility test requests. As we continue to work off of the clusters and testing plan, we will continue to work through the long-term care facilities. In addition so that, we are also assisting other facilities that may have testing needs as well. We've determined that there are some social service agencies we are asking some of our vendors to do that. Our strike teams have the primary function of stabilizing staff at the impacted facilities so the provision of the strike team assures the facilities have a staff to provide resident care, but it also provides additional staffing for the team for people -- when they have covid positive individuals. And then we've also been [9:08:42 AM] able toll model appropriate ppe use so we've been able to provide some training to ensure that appropriate use of ppe and make sure that our teams are focused on process improvement and patient care to address the outbreak. Year to date our strike teams have been deployed to 19 facilities. This is 13 additional strike teams since we responded in may. So a total of 134 agency staff have received strike team training and 167 agency staff have received an n95 fit test. As far as the need for the strike teams, we are continuing to work with the agencies just to determine their need. We are continuing to address this challenge by adding staffing through a contract. With our ppe, our long-term [9:09:42 AM] facilities were offered a one-time what we're calling a ppe push-back to all of the facilities. 35 assisted living and 32 nursing homes have assisted this ppe as of today. With training we continue to provide training to our long-term care staff and so 299 long-term care facility staff have been trained on various topics, including n95 fit test, infection control, on-site ppe and [indiscernible] Hygiene check off. So these are some of the things that our team have been doing. As I shared in a memo last week, the U.S. Department of health and human services will provide $2 million to the provider relief fund which is good news to our long-term care facilities to build out the nursing homes [9:10:44 AM] and enhance nursing home support. So the funding can be used for hiring additional staff, implementing infection control and mentorship programs. Ooze a parts of that, 15 -- as a part of that, 15,000 testing devices will be sent over the next few months and 600 were shipped out last week. According to the center for medicare and medicaid services to receive a point of care testing site, you must be considered a hotspot, and in Texas, Dallas, Harris, hildalgo and Travis are considered to be hot spots. In order to receive point of testing device a facility must meet about the criteria and must have the library improvement amendment certified of a waiver to receive a testing device. With our homeless, all four of our pro lodges are full. That's 300 guests. We are excited about this. 17 people have exited to [9:11:48 AM] permanent housing and we are going to activate our protective lodge as ongoing emergency response and infection strategy. With our partnership we have tested over 650 tests have been administered and focus opportunities for multiple shelters and encampment areas across the city. Downtown Austin community court front steps, salvation Army and communities for recovering integral care are continuing to provide that focused case management and supportive services. With our childcare facility as well as our school age children, we have established an incident command structure. That incident command structure will work with all childcare facilities with our task force as well as school districts to assist them with reopening plans. So more of that will be [9:12:49 AM] coming. The last thing I did want to share is we have continued to work on the survey results. As we review the results that came into the department, 29 of those 53 strategies have been implemented. Our team is working with our outreach folks so we can establish and work together a little closely on the 24 that need to be implemented. So at this time we want to really spend some time to meet with community in those strike teams to address how can we do more targeted work in the populations that have disparities. That includes my report and I am going to shift over to Dr. Escott. Thank you. >> Thank you, Stephanie and [9:13:50 AM] thank you, mayor and council. I'm going to ask our av folks to pull up my slides if you don't mind. Excellent. Next slide, please. Mayor and council, as you can see, we've had a substantial decrease in our number of new confirmed cases over the past 12 days. Right now our seven-day moving average for new cases is 275, and just a few weeks ago at the beginning of July, you know, we were closer to 550 to 600. So definite improvements. We saw a report yesterday that Travis county has the 15th highest number of active cases in counties [9:14:52 AM] across Texas. And we're proud of the progress that we've made. And I think this is a result of a community that has been engaged together to really get a lid back on this. We've got more work to do, but we're certainly headed in the right direction. Next slide, please. This is a graph of our doubling time with the yellow representing the seven-day moving a average of our doubling time. You can see back on June the 7th we were at a little over 40 days. At the beginning of this month we hit our lowest doubling time, which was around 12 days. Now I'm proud to say that we are over 60 days now with a seven-day moving average of 65 days at this stage. So this is the best position we've been in in terms of [9:15:53 AM] the doubling time. Again, this is also a function of the number of cases we have. The more cases we have, the more difficult it is to double it. But it's also reflective of the fact that we have fewer cases being reported each day and we certainly hope that trend continues. Next slide, please. This slide shows you our key indicator of new admissions. Again, the yellow is showing the seven-day moving average of those new admissions. So again we've had 12 days of decreasing numbers on the moving average, which is currently at 47. And this is a now full 21 days from the peak of that moving average. So again, this certainly does appear to be a downward trend. Again, this did not occur by magic, it occurred because we had a community committed to decreasing the spread of disease. If we remove that [9:16:54 AM] commitment, the disease will return again. And this is why it's more important than ever to stay the course and for us to continue those protective efforts not only to decrease the admissions and the burden on the hospitals, but so that they can be in a better position to open our schools and get kids back in the classroom. Next slide, please. This graph is showing us three things. The blue again is showing us the total hospitalized individuals. The Orange is showing the icu admissions the gray is showing those individuals on a ventilator. The hospitalizations has had a seven-day decrease in that moving average, which is currently at 424. You can see a more gentle downward trend in the icu in ventilated patients although we still would call that a plateau at this stage. Again, it's not increasing, and that's something to be [9:17:56 AM] grateful for, but on a slide that I'll show you here shortly, it will explain a little bit why that number is likely to stay plateaued for at least a little while longer. Next slide, please. This is an update on our graph related to race and ethnicity among our hospitalized individuals. The right side is showing you the last week admissions in the race and ethnicity break down. That shows that our hispanic population is representing 51.1% of the admissions last week. Again, a downward trend from the previous weeks, but still overrepresentative of the hispanic population in our community. Our white non-hispanic in blue is at 31%. It's a relatively plateaued from last week. And our African-American in gray percentage is 11%, which continues to increase. Again, also overrepresenting [9:18:59 AM] our African-American community in terms of hospitalizations. Next slide, please. This graph is showing you the breakdown of hospitalizations by age group. You can see that on the right side of the screen is the results from last week and you see a cluster of lines representing the 50-plus age groups. About 50% of the hospitalizations last week were in individuals who are 60 years or older. About a third of them are 70 years or older. And again, this tells us that the likelihood that the ventilator numbers and icu numbers are going to continue to plateau. And also is a bit ominous in terms of our predictions regarding deaths. We know that particularly over the age of 60 the risk [9:20:00 AM] of death is substantially higher. So I think this tells us in the past several weeks has told us that we can expect that our death numbers are going to increase as these individuals have increased their representation amongst hospitalized individuals. Next slide, please. This slide will give you an aggregation of data from a number of different testing entities around Travis county. So this includes Austin public health, community care, Austin regional clinic, ascension Seton, St. David's and others. And this shows us trends over -- well, since the beginning of June. Now, you have to remember that the right side, the last column of July 19th through the 25th still has some results which have not been received yet so that's not going to be a complete [9:21:04 AM] picture yet. And in terms of the number of cases -- number of tests that were performed as well as the present positive. But you can see that we have had three weeks or particularly the past two weeks where we've had substantial decreases in the rate of positivity. We are also notice is that we have a decrease in the number of individuals who are requesting testing through our drive-thru site. Again, we want to encourage folks if they have symptoms or they have an exposure to go online to the website and do a self-assessment to see if they need to be tested. We are testing individuals who have risk factors, who have exposures and who may not be symptomatic at this stage. So it's important for folks to go and sign up for testing to see if it [9:22:04 AM] triggers a request for a test. Next slide, please. You can go to the next slide. Sorry, that's just a redundant slide. This graph is showing us the percent of positive cases by age group. Again, last week this is the data from 7-21 to 7-27. You can see that the 20 to 29 age group is more than 20% of the cases, of the highest number of cases. Followed closely by 30 to 39 and 40 to 49. So this is still quite a bit of spread amongst the individuals are testing positive in terms of the age group. We are trying to get some additional information on this data to determine percent father by age group. Looking at some other datasets, those datasets are [9:23:06 AM] suggesting that the 10 to 19 age group have the highest rate of positivity over the past two weeks. The fact that they are being tested less is why they represent a smaller number of the percent positive cases. But we are seeing disease spread amongst that group. And we want to be able to provide additional information for you, particularly as we consider the schedule for school reopenings. Next slide, please. This chart is an update on our nursing home and long-term care facility outbreaks. So a total of 113 new cases in the past seven days. This is a decrease from the previous two weeks, but we clearly have more work to do in terms of nursing home outbreaks. You can see that this information is still coded [9:24:09 AM] and is not listing the facility name. This is a result of a legal opinion by the city attorney's office that the recent ag ruling which applied to hhsc does not apply to the city. So we'll continue utilizing this format of sharing information until we get a different ruling. Next slide, please. And finally, I want to touch a little bit upon where we are with the school's discussion. We are working with our school districts as director Hayden said. We have a team working on guidelines. One of those guidelines is going to be centered around our staging. And you know, I think we're likely to advocate for a phased reopening of schools based upon the level of risk that we're in. [9:25:10 AM] You know, we face a lot of questions about when is the right time, how much students do we let in. What about extracurricular activities and those are items that we're working on. I will say that our priority has to be safety. It has to be maintaining public health. We've seen over and over again that when we rush to open things, if we don't have the appropriate protections in place, it leads to cases surging and shutting those things down again. And we do not want to be in that situation in terms of schools. It is important for us to try to get kids back in the classroom, but we also must consider the continuity of education for these students and we do not want to be in a situation where schools are opened and closed and opened and closed because that may be worse than just [9:26:11 AM] waiting, progressively opening schools with a relatively few number of students, allow the schools to work out the processes. Allow us to be in a better place in terms of this stage of risk in the community and then progressively allowing more students into the classroom. Again, we are working on these guidelines, we're working on algorithms to allow schools to have some uniformity in how they respond to various events such as a new case or a cluster. And we're also working on some requirements for school reopening. So these are things that we hope to have done this week and hope to engage our school districts and superintendents on so that we can have a relatively uniform approach to school reopening. I also want to mention that [9:27:13 AM] I do have concern about the differences in application of public health principles, between public schools and private religious schools. I understand that the attorney general of the state of Texas has stated that this is a first amendment issue. And I don't personally believe that's correct. A public health issue is a public health issue. And when we had a uniform concern and a uniformly applied standard for public and religious schools, it's fair and it makes sense. Our teachers at private schools are in the same circumstances teachers in public schools. And I think we have to continue to work together as a community to address all of these various settings to ensure that the protections are in place uniformly for [9:28:14 AM] our educators and for our school staff. And with that, mayor, I will turn it back over to you for questions. >> Mayor, you're muted. >> Mayor Adler: Can we return the screen to the participant page? Councilmember pool. >> Pool: Thanks, mayor and good morning, everybody. Dr. Escott, I had a question for you and then I guess -- I don't know if it's a question for you or for legal. So on the positively -- positivity charge that shows hospitalizations, it looks like we had about 8,000 tests administered last week. So can I just estimate that we are testing a thousand people a day? >> So councilmember, that's the total testing from the [9:29:18 AM] entities contributing results to us. And those are the once that we have results for. So there may be additional ones from last week that are pending results. That's just what we have back so far. >> Pool: But just looking at that chart, knowing that it is all the reports that have been -- that have come in in a certain time frame, can we do a simple division and say that generally we have about X thousands per day being tested? >> Yes, but again, this is only about eight different contributors. There are many more doing testing, including urgent care centers and freestanding emergency rooms and clinics. So this is a snapshot, but a [indiscernible] Snapshot. >> >> Pool: A limited universe, do you know what the larger universe is that is not being captured in these numbers then? >> I do not. >> Pool: Okay. And then the second question I had is relating to the ag [9:30:22 AM] ruling and the publication of the names of the different nursing homes. We talked about being able to list them. We went to the coding protocol in order to preserve some anonymity although that is not in my mind holding private particular patient's particulars. So why does the attorney general's ruling not apply to the city of Austin if that information is public and of record in the newspaper in Austin, why would we not add that also to our charts for transparency and accountability? >> Councilmember, we got a ruling from the attorney general telling us that we had to keep the information confidential. We already have a ruling so that's what we're abiding by. >> Pool: Can we go back, please, to the attorney general and try to align the more recent ruling with the previous ruling so that there are no gaps. It seems odd and people were questioning why the city of Austin doesn't have the same information that is publicly [9:31:22 AM] available on a newsstand. >> We can look at it again. >> Pool: What I'm asking is will legal please connect up with the attorney general's office and review the disparate rulings so that we can get some continuity. Clarity. We are seeking clarity when we get rulings. Can we do that? >> I'll be happy to connect with them. >> Pool: That would be great. Thanks. I think that information does need to be reported in our files for pros tearty. Thanks. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: I just want to say I agree with councilmember pool. I actually -- at some point I know our schedules are packed right now, but at some point I would like to have another legal conversation about our discretion. I think it makes no sense to have the names available [9:32:24 AM] publicly and then we're not releasing them. I mean, some of it is a disconnect. So as a result we get a disconnect on what's actually happening with regard to these facilities. So I can talk to you offline city attorney and others. Again, I know that our schedules are packed, but I would like to have further conversation about our discretion as a city to make data available. I think it really important for families. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Councilmember Ellis? >> Ellis: Thank you. This question might be for Dr. Escott. Where there is a chart that you used a couple of times that talks about race and ethnicity. And the first day or two there's this jump from 50 to zero in two of the lines. Can you tell me if that is an anomaly or is there a change in the way the data was collected early on or what might be causing those [9:33:24 AM] numbers to jump in that way? >> Councilmember, it's because we had very few cases. So there was lots of variation in the beginning because we had a handful of individuals hospitalized back then. >> Ellis: Okay. That's helpful. Thank you. >> You bet. >> Mayor Adler: Colleagues, any other questions? Councilmember tovo. >> Tovo: Mayor, I just wanted to follow up on a conversation we had I think at our last covid briefing. We had talked about the situation with the schools and the questions that parents were facing as they made that decision of where their students should go to school, where they're scholars should go to school, to use a great phrase of councilmember harper-madison's. And I just wanted to say that we did explore the idea of having a joint subcommittee conversation around that or having a different community meeting. And because the situation was changing so quickly and indeed that week aid and other school districts [9:34:24 AM] announced that they would not be going back to school in person until September, we are not moving forward with that plan of having the committee convene that conversation at this time because there are just still so many changing situations everyday with regard to schools. I'd like to remind folks, mayor, you and I talked about in it the meeting of convening a conversation. I wanted to follow up with my colleagues and let them know that this the a point we're kind of watching the situation. Dr. Escott, I know that as you said, you're in close communication. So if there is an interest and you think there would be a facility for having that broader situation when we're down the road, that would be good. Of course, aisd is also participating in these conversations with their population of students. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Councilmember Casar. [9:35:24 AM] >> Thanks for the presentation and of course we want to keep urging people to do what they're doing. Of course with that there are people who are still getting very seriously sick and dying. How are we planning on getting information to us about-- broken council about what targeted strategies we should be pushing further to reduce spread, especially based on economics? I know we've had economics here about do we know how many people are denied unemployment insurance and that's why we're going to work and cases are spreading at work, versus people who aren't given sick time and that's where we see spread versus people getting sick because of a gathering or because they didn't know they had it and weren't tested. Because each of those things, mayor, it's a different strategy and I know we're working on each of them, but I still am not clear about how much we're seeing each of those common drivers of cases getting [9:36:25 AM] people into the hospital. >> Councilmember K I'll start and then I'll have director Hayden respond as well. You know, there continue to be barriers in terms of people getting tested and people isolating. Some of those are economic. We're still hearing that folks are going to work despite the fact that they've been identified as a case. And there's concern that people will lose their job or certainly lose the ability to support their families. Having said that, I think we have growing evidence across the country that disease spread is more likely to happen in gatherings. [9:37:26 AM] In family gatherings, gatherings for parties, for birthdays, for funerals because of the duration and the nature of those interactions. So I think it's important for us while we focus on the importance of getting folks to have the support they need to stay home when they're sick, we also need to focus on reminding the community that they're not safe around family and friends. In fact, they probably have increased danger of transmission in those personal settings, those face to face settings than they do in a workplace or going to a restaurant or a business. And I'll pass it over to director Hayden who may be able to comment further on some of the other elements. >> Casar: And right before director Hayden does, that is also anecdotally what I have seen and heard. The mayor and I together [9:38:27 AM] with a group of about 20 Spanish speakers, primarily from my district the other day, just a group of constituents. And it was heartbreaking, but -- and real that of that group of 20 people a decent handful had covid-19, several had been hospitalized and every single person knew someone with covid-19, people knew folks who had died. And the stories were varied from people being forced to go to work, having no other option than to work, not getting tested or not knowing or getting it at a gathering. We know that all of these are serious. I think my question is more to are we getting information about how much each of those kinds of spread we're seeing in the community? Because of course we have to work on all of them, but it's hard to know which ones are impacting us the most right now when you go to a meeting and hear that all of these things are happening, I don't know if it's each thing is happening equally or far there's more of one [9:39:28 AM] that's an issue than another. >> You know, according to my conversations with our epidemiologist, you know, they feel that it is more of the personal gathering. I think that even when you don't live with another person that's your family, it's your family. So even though you may not be going out in public, in public spaces the gatherings are continuing. So it is still a significant amount of that that is occurring in our community. And that is why we have always emphasized the importance of, you know, just trying to find other traditions. And it's really hard to have people to do that. If a grandparent is turning [9:40:29 AM] 90 or 100. Everybody wants to come and be in that space. So we continue to emphasize that. We have received information as well that are, you know, our staff have really emphasized to the folks that we're talking to, reminding them it's not a good idea, you know, to stay home. And, you know, some folks are doing that. I mean, it is reflective in the numbers. But we know that there's going to be more targets work that we're going to need to do. So in those strike team conversations that you know, we will be having, we need to get more ideas from our partners of what strategies that -- additional strategies we can take. >> Casar: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Dr. Hayden, can you close the loop on that memo? There was a plan that your office put out, which I [9:41:30 AM] appreciated. You took it to the community. It was input that came from the community, just to close the loop on that by identifying what -- well, finish it with whatever input that you've gotten, but then to identify for the community what they could expect to see happening. What is the priority of the things that are in there and when they're going to be done and who is going to do them. And in that regard, if events are now overtaking those kinds of things and it's more the family kind of stuff that may or may not have been -- if you could close the loop on that memo so that people could see what the priorities are, what the time framing is on what they could expect to happen from that, I would appreciate that. And then the other question that councilmember Casar asked, which is I get asked a lot, relates to kind of the contact tracing in the city. We had a chart that showed where the contact tracing was showing the greatest [9:42:30 AM] incident of stuff. If we could renew the reporting of that chart I think that would be helpful for the community to see what -- where we're seeing things. And colleagues, as we take a look at where we are on the longer arc as we bring the numbers down and the infectivity goes down, Dr. Escott and director Hayden, I've asked them to take a look at what the contact tracing is in a world where the numbers come back down. And to take a look at what would happen if we were to quadruple the number of contact tracing that we do relative to what the national standard is to actually have something that more closely aprojectionmizes what's going on in other countries, what would that take, what would that look like, what would that cost and what would the benefits if any of doing that in our community. So director Hayden, thank you. [9:43:30 AM] Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Good morning and thank you for this information. I was wondering if -- I'm not sure if this would be Dr. Escott or Dr. Hayden. If you could speak to any more information we have about potential spread in childcare centers or if we're not experiencing that here in Austin, if you can comment on what we are experiencing. >> Currently one of the reasons why we added what we're calling an incident command structure was we were starting to see an increase in childcare facilities. Initially we established a childcare task force. And so because of the increase in the number of facilities, because more people are going to work, they're taking their -- you know, their children in to facilities. And so the goal of this [9:44:31 AM] group will be is they will have -- be set up just like the nursing home task force, and they will be able to, you know, provide more technical assistance in -- you know, if there's a need to show them how to use ppe, how to clean the childcare facilities but be able to provide that weekly, daily kind of intervention. There will be a mailbox set up. We've identified epidemiology staff that will be assigned to that area and we're doing this just so we did see that increase and we want to get ahead of the curve and be able to provide the additional assistance at these facilities as we see clusters at each site. >> Alter: Thank you. I wanted to add on to the conversation that councilmember tovo raised before about the joint [9:45:32 AM] meeting. I believe that Dr. Escott and some other staff spoke with a bunch of school board members recently and I know that was very much appreciated to have that opportunity for them to interact directly with Dr. Escott. And I know I'm in touch regularly with trustees and there's a lot of conversations, a lot of complicated decisions going on, but just want to continue to reinforce our need to be available and supporting our school leadership as they make these really difficult decisions about opening and support them in any ways that we can. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Anything else for -- Pio, councilmember Renteria. >> Renteria: Thank you, mayor. This is for Dr. Escott. Have you noticed -- and if there's ever a cluster of [9:46:35 AM] infections in a day care center, are you allowed to report that where the location is at? >> Councilmember, I don't know the answer to that. I think generally we approach it in a similar way to nursing homes where the childcare center is responsible for notifying family and staff if there's a case there to ensure that those individuals who may be exposed are notified. I don't know that we've looked at the issue of public disclosure of that yet or not. >> Dr. Escott, I don't think we have. I'm happy to take a look at that. I think a difference might be with a nursing home people are living there, so that is the real issue that has been a concern. But happy to take a look at that, councilmember Renteria, and Dr. Escott, and get back to you. >> Renteria: Yeah. Because I would really like to know, you know, if [9:47:36 AM] there's infections going on at these day care centers because we're getting pretty close to opening up our schools, even at a very -- hopefully in a way that's -- in a scientific way, but I'm really concerned because if transmission is being passed around in day care centers, then it would also be passed around, I would assume in our kindergarten and elementary schools also. >> Yes. And councilmember, let me just say that yes, there is activity in childcare centers across the state of Texas. Yes, there will be transmission in schools across the state of Texas. You know, we've got to be very careful. Again, when we reopen schools. And we don't have finalized guidance yet, but it's likely that the first step of reopening schools will [9:48:36 AM] probably be capped at around 25% of students in-person because we're making sure that those children who really must be in person have the opportunity to be in person. Those are our special needs students, those are individual students who may not have access to digital services at home or a support structure at home to support education. It's -- those k-5 students that I've mentioned before. And we have to make sure that we have the processes working with a small percentage of students. Make sure that we work out the details of the spacing and the masking and the social distancing and the hand washing and how the cafeteria services and transportation services are going to work. There's still a lot of heavy lifting to do for our school districts. And, you know, one of the things that I want to mention is that there's [9:49:39 AM] still ongoing discussion about athletics and what we should do about that, both at the secondary school level and at the college level. And, you know, I think we really have to focus on the primary mission, and that's education. And once we sort that out, once we get into a better situation and get kids in classrooms, then we need to have the discussion about the other elements of the activities, the extracurricular activities, but we've got a lot of work to do. >> Yeah. What concerns me a lot is one of these young kids could get infected and a lot of my people in district 3 and I'm pretty sure in district 1 and 2 also and in 4 where there is big families there with the economy the way it is. [9:50:39 AM] They're moving into one house and you probably have multi-families living there. And that really frightens me is you will send a kid to school and then we should also really focus on the families who are sending their kids there and educate them to immediately take care if one of them get infected. Because I know an incident where one person gets infected and the other ones get tested as negative and then five or six family members down the road they get infected. So just because you get a test and it comes negative the first time doesn't mean you can't get it later on, especially in a housing condition and where everybody is breathing the same air. And the heat, the way it is here in Texas, everybody is staying inside air conditioning. So I'm very concerned about that. [9:51:40 AM] >> Mayor Adler: Okay, thank you. Colleagues, anything else while we have these folks with us? Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: This can be answered later. I would just like at some point to understand what the decision making is around adding an additional pro lodge. The last I heard that we had a waiting list for our pro lodges for homeless individuals, and so I'd like to understand if it's being -- I thought it was being considered to open a pro lodge. I'd like to understand what are the criteria to determine if that's a yes or no and who is making that decision and when? So again, it's not something you have to speak to today unless you know that, but I would like to understand that the pro lodges have been pretty successful in terms of addressing the risk for our homeless [9:52:41 AM] individuals. It's also intended to be a path to housing, as you mentioned earlier. So while 300 is certainly something to be -- to feel good about, 300 people in our pro lodges, there's additional need. So I'm wanting to understand where that stands. >> Maybe it would be helpful, manager, if you can get an update on the real estate issues because I know there's some activity happening there in part in response to councilmember kitchen's [indiscernible]. >> Will do. And we plan to bring this up at the August 4th work session so we'll have a full briefing on this at that time. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Thank you. So that same point if you can also update us on the hotel that we purchased and when that will be online because it should be about [9:53:42 AM] online from the prior predictions and that may provide some additional way to transition folks into housing. >> Will do. >> Mayor Adler: Anything else? Councilmember Casar. >> Casar: Before we close out I want to add my voice to the chorus that I would really like to see us make another purchase soon because I think in my view we are behind the timeline on that as well as the worker resource center question that I had asked earlier. I would like to see both of those up and running soon. >> Mayor Adler: I think the community needs to see us making proactive steps to provide housing opportunities and try to leverage the opportunities we have now to be able to do that. And then I just want to conclude as you guys go off, [9:54:43 AM] I think that you and your staff have done a really good job, especially Dr. Escott and director Hayden, for us to have had the community response that we've had. It happens in no small part because of the messaging that's coming out of the offices and the work that your staffs are doing. We've driven down the numbers and that gives our city a really unique opportunity to be able to get to a place where maybe we're going to be in a stronger and better position to be able to sustain the opening of schools or in a better, stronger position to be able to sustain businesses being open. If we're incredibly protective of this opportunity we have given ourselves, which means that even while the numbers look good, as you said, Dr. Escott, people have to double down on wearing face coverings and social distancing now that we see that that works and people have to be prepared to do this indefinitely until there's a vaccine. But with that inconvenience [9:55:43 AM] may really come opportunities that we can show how it works, and there have not been many cities that have been able to maintain that vigilance and diligence when things get good. And we need to make sure that our community does that. Okay. With that, we'll let you go. Thank you very much for the work that you're doing. >> Tovo: Mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> Tovo: Mayor, as they're going I just wanted to acknowledge something that director Hayden said earlier about 17 individuals leaving the pro lodges into permanent housing. We all had questions and comments and nobody hit on that and I just want to recognize the significance of that. That's really tremendous and so thank you to Della Carmen and director Hayden and many others in public health who are making sure that for our neighbors who are experiencing homelessness that the pandemic becomes a way of really getting them into safe and stable housing. So thank you for highlighting that information this morning, director Hayden. [9:56:44 AM] >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Colleagues, we're going to -- >> We're going to release Dr. Escott and then director Hayden is going to introduce the presentation from the UT partners that we have on the nursing home study. Dr. Hayden. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. >> Thank you very much for the presentation. At this time on may 7th council passed a resolution that directed the city manager to plan and collaborate with the design institute for health at Dell medical school to analyze, evaluate and identify approaches for systems improvements to protect residents and reduce the risk of spread of covid-19 in nursing homes, assisted living centers and other long-term care facilities. Today I have Stacy Chang, who is going to provide a presentation, and this is one of the first presentations that they are going to provide. And so I will turn it over [9:57:45 AM] to him. Thank you. >> Thank you, director Hayden. Hopefully you all can hear me. >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> If av could bring up the slides, we'll -- I'll begin the briefing then. While we're waiting for that, by way of introduction, my name is Stacy Chang. I am the executive director for the Zion institute for health. And as director Hayden mentioned, this briefing is a report, if you go to the next slide, is a report back on the first phase of study that we've conducted over the course of the last two months. A particular note of gratitude to director Hayden, Dr. Escott and [indiscernible] From Austin public health for helping to facilitate this study. They're hard won perspectives from the frontline of this crisis has been alternative helpful. So I'm going to give you a brief rundown on the work that we've done to date. A little bit of grounding around nursing homes, but I want to spend the bulk of the time discussing four insights that have emerged [9:58:46 AM] from this first phase of work and leave room for a bit of discussion and questions from the council itself. If you go to the next slide... We are just we are just concluding this first phase of study, because in it there are no areas of concern. We looked at facility issues such as facility space, layout, proximity of staff and residents, density and flow through the utility as well as shared space. We looked at protocols, group activities, caregiver handouts, scheduling timing of care, and finally focused a fair amount of effort understanding the challenges around staffing, which had us consider both personnel roles and responsibilities, as well as staff concerns and priorities. The subsequent phase of research, which begins this -- this week, which we've determined the broadened investigation will be termed the broader discussion of [9:59:46 AM] this phase, which I will share shortly. 3, 4, and 5 are the challenges identified in phases 1 and 2, evidence for efficacy and to make recommendations for changes based on that evidence. I will note at this moment, we are not proposing solutions just yet, although we have plenty of ideas. As we require some additional depth and breadth from the research effort before we draw specific conclusions about the definitive issues we want to address. Next slide, please. The institute has specific expertise in the process of identifying and solving complex systemic problems, but we are not experts in nursing homes, per se. And so recruited a notable cast to serve as the steering committee on this project, including [indiscernible] From aph, as well as Michelle [indiscernible] And Michael Gail from the states health and human services commission. I wanted to make particular note of that. As the state area was statutory oversight over the nursing homes, they've been quite [10:00:46 AM] invaluable in providing perspective on regulation, quality improvement, and policy and enforcement. Their participation, in particular, has been uniquely helpful in understanding the balance of influences on nursing homes. The remainder of the committee is rounded up by leadership from three schools at U.T., school of nursing, social work, and of course the medical school as well. Next slide, please. In this first phase of work, we begin with secondary research to form a baseline understanding of the nursg home landscape and the current covid-19 response, both at local, regional, and national levels. And then we conducted nearly 50 interviews and observations in facilities, with every manner of staff listed here, along with subject matter experts, either on the steering committee or recommended by the steering committee members. Much of the interview and observation work was done on site, in nursing home [10:01:47 AM] facilities. We had planned to vivid five sites spread around Austin. We completed four of them. The fifth had a covid outbreak just as we were about to visit, and with respect to managing infection, both for staff and residents and for the team, we deferred that until later this week. Go to the next slide, please? These are the five facilities represented in the phase of work. You'll see on the left a match the five facilities, and then some details in the images on the right. There's a geographical diversity here that is not yet complete. We recognize that there's a gap on the east and southside, which we'll remedy in the coming phase of work. We will -- some of the facilities included memory care units caring for patients with dementia, and one included independent living facilities as well. We will focus more intentionally on assisted living and independent living in the second phase of work, where this [10:02:47 AM] first phase of work, the focus really was on skilled nursing facilities, also known as nursing homes. If you go to the next slide. Just as a brief glimpse into our process, we don't just conduct interviews. We actually observe facilities and personnel in operation firsthand. Interviews are usually only the beginning of the story. They are the truth that people can or choose to relate. We like to see what lies behind beneath that. These are in the comprehensive report we filed with the city and I think was provided to the councilmembers as a preread. You're welcome to dig into more of that detail. I will say that we had the opportunity to see every manner of operation in a covid-19 context, from laundry and food service to social distancing and isolation protocols. And if you go to the next slide, we saw quite a bit of how space inside nursing homes was being converted and workflow was being adjusted to Biden by infection protocols. So that's the brief [10:03:48 AM] introduction. I want to establish a little bit of context. If you go to the next slide. I think unless you've spent substantial time -- oh, sorry, the slide previous. Thank you. Unless you've spent substantial time inside a nursing home over the last decade, you might not recognize how much it has changed, and the insights that have been emerged from this first phase of work, I think, require a bit of familiarity with some of the challenges that the facilities, the staff, and the industry face as a whole. I won't presume -- I won't presume you all are experts in nursing home care, so I'll share with you a few facts to ground you in the reality industry before we dig into the insights. Next slide, please. So the type of facility depends quite significantly on patient acuity, essentially how much medical care and living assistance an individual needs. The first is the high need, high lively side of the spectrum on skilled nursing facilities, again, what we usually call nursing homes. We will expand our [10:04:50 AM] investigation and include independent living, assisted living, and maybe even some in-home care. We -- those assisted and independent living are sometimes part of what we call continuing care retirement community, which usually envelopes all three levels of care, and we did have an opportunity to see one of those in this first phase of study. Next slide, please. So, an important point to emphasize here is that the level of patient care in nursing homes today is similar to what you would have found in a hospital just a decade or two ago. Wound care, enter veins therapy, orthopedic care, breathing treatments, are all standard protocols in nursing homes right now. Ey're very much medical facilities and not retirement homes as you might have remembered from a couple decades ago. Next slide, please. The most common reason for residents in the nursing home is the inability for someone to perform activities of daily living, bathing, changing clothes, feeding themselves. More than 80% of [10:05:51 AM] residents need help with three or more activities of daily living, more than 90% in nursing homes who can walk need assistance. More than 75% of residents have trouble making daily decisions. At least a third have problematic behaviors. Half struggle to understand others or have trouble communicating to others, issues with comprehension. So the point here is the acuity of need for residents is actually quite high, and that point is important. If you go to the next slide. 80 to 85% of nursing homes in Texas, the residents depend on medicare or medicaid funding for their care. And this is important because the funding for medicare is time-limited to 100 days for recovery after an incident that requires hospitalization. So 100 days after you've been in a hospital, the funding for your care runs out. And because medicaid's lamented daily reimbursement rate can't fund much more than essential services, these [10:06:52 AM] are pretty narrow margin businesses. If you go to the next slide, to-wit, 86% of Texas nursing homes report costs that actually exceed the reimbursement they get from medicaid. And this has been the case for decades. Which means that most of these residents, who are majority medicated, depend on private care pay, they are always running between the red and the black. Next slide, please. Even though in any given moment there's only about 3,000 folks in Travis county in nursing homes, over the course of a lifetime, 70% of people over 65 can expect to use some form of long-term care. And as the demographics in Texas shift, this is a challenge that will only grow. So this is not an issue that will be diminishing over time. Next slide, please. [10:07:52 AM] 55% of residents have been medically diagnosed with dementia. And that helps you understand that most of these patients have some level of cognitive impairment, which makes navigating this covid-19 moment even more difficult. A lot of the changes that are being pressed down into the nursing homes, that they're experiencing, actually don't make sense to them, and the residents struggle with that. Next slide, please. I think you may recognize that nursing homes are highly regulated. In addition to the federal statutes, the operators have to follow thousands of other codes that the federal, state, and local level. And failure to do so means they may lose their accreditation and their eligibility for medicare and medicaid payments. Minor infractions may have small penalties. Large problems can have a pretty catastrophic effect on their ability to stay in business. Next slide, please. Staff workload is disproportionate to hourly wage. On average, in Texas, a [10:08:53 AM] certified nursing aide, who's the individual who provides most of the hands-on care for patients, makes less than minimum wage here in Austin. They make, on average, between 12 and $13, even though minimum wage here in Austin is 15. This is quote we heard from staff. You can essentially make more duckies over the weekend than you can as a certified nurse aide working an entire week. Next slide, please. That means competition for staff is pretty fierce. Skilled nursing facilities are the second largest health care employer in the nation, and in the health care industry where supply of skilled labor is insufficient to meet demand, the competition for that staff is actually quite stiff. And what that means -- on the next slide -- is that staff retention is a constant challenge for the facilities and their administrators. I'll call your attention to the second to last line. For certified nursing aides, who are the folks who provide most of the bedside care, on average, [10:09:54 AM] in a facility, 85% of that staff turns over in the course of the year. That high turnover is a constant reality and a strain on not just continuity of care and familiarity with protocol within a facility, it's also a particular strain on very thin operating margins as well. So thanks for accommodating that run through some facts. I think it's useful then to give context in the next slide. One, about the state of nursing homes, but then this is specific to Austin -- it is specific to Austin. There are 31 nursing facilities in Travis county at any given time, four to five thousand staff working in those facilities, and in the usual time, about three thousand residents, which represents about 75% occupancy of those homes. There are nursing homes in nearly every district represented by this [10:10:55 AM] council, and so the need and the challenge is diffuse. So I'll move then into insights, if you can go to the next slide. I shared all that previous context because these next four insights actually derive from that context. Again, this is just the opposite from the first phase of work, but it's clear that each of these sights represents a significant challenge in need of a solution. If you go to the next slide, before I show the insights, I need to apologize -- pause and acknowledge that as complex a system as this is, it really is a complex system of people. It includes people who need and provide care, and in between these sets of people are some very human stories of strong relationships between staff, between residents, between residents and staff. There wasn't a facility we visited where there weren't a half dozen hero stories, of staff making really incredible sacrifices in their own personal lives to ensure the safety of residents. [10:11:56 AM] There's one director of nursing who separated from -- she's a single mother and had separated from her son of three years, her three-year-old son for three months, in order to protect the safety of the residents. Really -- and that's just one of, you know, dozens of stories that we came to know in the research. I think at some point it's easy to forget that this system of care is really a giant set of intertwined human relationships, and it's important not to lose sight of that. So let me step into the insights then on our next slide. The first insight is something we've named theory versus reality in nursing homes. And it reflects this notion that, as important as infection control protocols are in theory, how their operationalized on the ground is affected by clinical, operational, and human realities on the ground. That operationalization can be very challenging and in some cases, almost impossible with the theory and reality conflict. So let me give you a couple examples, if you [10:12:56 AM] go to the next slide. There are a lot of -- there's a lot of guidance around creating isolation units, patients who are at risk or have contracted covid-19 have to be separated from the rest of the nursing home population. Putting those infection control units -- isolation units in place, in some cases, violates life safety code, you know, creating separation means egress is then limited. It displaces residents out of a room that they've lived in, in some cases, for years to another part of a facility, which for someone with dementia is very upsetting. And it separates staff from residents that they're familiar with, trying to keep staff isolated to certain units so there's no cross-contamination means some of the relationship between staff and residents are broken. Social distancing is something that the nursing homes have been asked to practice. In temples patient care, I didn't meet a single certified nurse assistant, aide, who said I can practice what I [10:13:56 AM] need to do at a safe distance of six feet. If I'm going to dress, bathe, feed a patient, I'm going to be in contact with them. Residents often are moved to nursing homes to have opportunities tore for increased socialization. That is now essentially forbidden when we're trying to practice social distancing. And actually a number of residents are losing April tight, there are a lot of reports of folks not eating because of anxiety or depression. The quarantine has eliminated family visitation and also field trips out of the nursing hme. I'll talk a little bit about the effects of that in a second. The use of ppe is actually -- produces a lot of anxiety for patients, especially with dementia who don't understand why their caregivers are now dressed like astronauts. Wearing masks is sometimes an impossibility, made even more difficult by those who are hearing impaired. You watch interactions, eventually a mask will drop so somebody can [10:14:58 AM] actually communicate with somebody else. Many of the care providers are now being -- the appointments are being had via telehealth, which has an additional burden on top of care providers' workloads. Then the financial impact is not -- is not to be lost here. Turning double occupancy rooms into single occupancy rooms in order to create these isolation Zones, the reduction in elective surgeries, which these nursing homes depend on for business in recovery, and then their trepidation around new admissions, especially patients who are high risk or might wander and, therefore, increase infection risk, are all issues that these nursing homes are dealing with. And so infection control theory is really important and good theory is important. But the operationalization of that inside the reality of the nursing home can be sometimes extremely difficulty and sometimes impossible. If we'll move to the next [10:15:58 AM] slide. Insight 2. This is not meant as a commendation of any agency or any team. We're in an unprecedented moment where guidance is hard to come by, and he --and evolving constantly. But nursing homes are constantly receiving guidance from a number of agencies, communicated much more than weekly, almost a daily basis, and they come from a lot of different sources. You will hear administrators say I have to -- I'm observing guidance from Austin public health, from hhsc, from the CDC, from the world health organization, from osha, and from my own corporate, trying to make sense of the 90 emails I get in a week is extremely daunting and more than I had planned to do. If you move to the next slide. Every time a facility receives infection control guidance, they're [10:16:58 AM] asking a number of questions, doesn't it apply to me? Does it evolve previous guidance? How does it affect my facility? How will I disseminate it to the staff and ask them to accommodate it? What happens if we have questions or clarifications, who do I go to? In many cases, they abide by the guidance from the agencies who can penalize them, and that's often the regulators, like the surveyors from hhsc. We saw a big distinction between those with strong corporate governance who could interpret it and press the interpreted guidance down to the facilities themselves. Weak corporate operators left the facilities to themselves, and then independently operated facilities really prioritized the things that protected the safety of staff and residents, and they're a little bit overwhelmed by knowing [10:18:00 AM] which one to abide by. The lack of support for staff bullet here really says that a lot of this guidance doesn't yet recognize the kind of impact it has on staff, and so it's not designed yet for consumption and utilization just yet. Next slide, please. Insight 3 is really around staff. The novelty of this virus really has a particular -- the novel challenges around this virus have had a huge effect on staff. And not just in the work environment, but in their personal lives as well. If we go to the next slide, the staff themselves have a lot of fear, one, they're working in an environment where they're the height and risk for infection, and they also don't want to be the person that brings that infection [10:19:00 AM] into the facility. They don't want to be that person who all their colleagues will know brought the infection into the facility and incurred a bunch of additional work and protocol. They're -- they are wearing masks. Therapeutic screened on arrival. There's a lot of different protocol which is making the work much more difficult. And in many cases, in most cases, the staff feel -- feels lying it's unsustainable. They keep wondering when they'll return to normal, and the administrators keep telling them this is your new normal, and most of them don't think they can sustain themselves in this new normal. There's a particular note here around staff risk. When the edict came down staff should confine themselves working in one facility, and many work across facilities, they had to choose, and tie their fortunes, their economic fortunes to a [10:20:01 AM] single facility. And they're nervous about that. If the facility goes down or has a covid outbreak, there's real concern from an economic standpoint that they won't be able to provide for themselves or for their families. And that's something that came through in a lot of the research. I'll end with this one, which is insight 4. The medical needs of patients in this moment haven't really changed that much, but because of the quarantining, the lack of visitation, and the lack of opportunity to get out of the nursing home, the psychosocial sequences have been psycho -- consequences have been really high. Residents are suffering from anxiety, depression, loneliness, and the only remedy to that, really, are the staff in the facility. So they're doing Yeomans work, trying to comfort and ease the difficulties of those residents. That has a cascade effect [10:21:02 AM] of actually making the staff's lives much more difficult as well, and they're carrying emotional burden and mental burden as a result of the pandemic as well. If you go to the next slide, you're seeing family who's been isolated from their loved ones, making increasingly difficult requests of staff because the staff are the only one side who have contact with the residents. The staff themselves are finding it hard to process all of the emotion and the additional workload that's being asked of them. Staff retention is an issue, as it has always been, in this moment even more so. And the impact of staff burnout is starting to be seen, people who are having their own mental breakdowns and asking for time away, which is just exacerbating the staff retention issue. So I'll conclude with this next slide, which is what we'll call emergent insights. What I just shared are not an exhaustive list. There are several others, [10:22:03 AM] I won't read them to you here, but further exploration, we will be pursuing that in the next phase of work. I'll pause here before I talk about next steps just to see if there are any questions from the councilmembers. >> Mayor Adler: Council, I can't see everyone because of the screen view. Does anyone have any questions before the next steps? Why don't you go ahead and proceed. Council member kitchen, did you have something? >> Kitchen: Yeah. I would just say that -- that I appreciate the insights related to workers. I'm especially concerned that we're talking about, you know, low-wage workers. I mean, below minimum wage for us. I don't know if you have any statistics on this, but my understanding, if it's correct, many of them are from minority [10:23:04 AM] communities, communities of color. And who just don't have much options from an economic standpoint. So I'm hoping that as you proceed through this study, that at the end of the day, there will be something that we as a city can do to help these workers. And I'm pleased that you have engaged the state. The state does regulate -- I haven't seen the state step up to the plate at all in helping out these workers. As we've done with many other workers in our community, hoping that we can find a path to be of assistance. I think you said four to five thousand workers in these facilities in our community, as less than minimum wage, under very unstable economic situations. So I'd invite you in the future to provide us more information about the [10:24:04 AM] demographics, to the extent that you have it, and looking forward to, as you conclude through research, helping us think about what we can do to assist these workers. So thank you. This is very helpful. >> Thank you, council member kitchen, for the suggestions and guidance. We will certainly focus on that in the next phase. >> Mayor Adler: Council member tovo. >> Tovo: Thank you, too, for really providing some depth to the way in which individuals within these group facilities have been impacted by the lack of contact with their family members. We've been reading about it in such a global -- from such a global perspective that you really helped me better understand how -- what the daily impact might be on someone who's living within -- within a facility of that sort and may be suffering from medical dementia and now is experiencing the world in a very, very different way and experiencing the [10:25:06 AM] people within their most familiar -- in terms of care giving, in very different way as well. I know that there have been discussions about ways -- ways to link youth with individuals in nursing homes and some other creative programs. I wonder if you could let us know what this -- what the state of sharing that kind -- those kinds of best practices. It seems like we have roles within our programming, and perhaps we are, and that's what I'm remembering in the back of my head, but I think our parks program is piloting a program of contact among youth. And I wondered if you could share that, and again just kind of bring it around to what is the -- what are the networking opportunities for sharing these good ideas and opportunities among -- among our facilities in the area. >> Yeah. Thank you for the comments. There are certainly bright spots in a briefing as quick as [10:26:06 AM] this, not an opportunity to do all of them justice. There are certainly improvisations in nursing homes that are solving for some of the challenges. They're not complete. Developing networks. We saw some ad hoc networks develop between nursing homes to share best practices. That's something we can help the with the city with as well. Austin public health plays a role in that in their weekly calls. I think it's about managing the infection in and out of the facilities, and to the extent we can engage other members of the community who want to have an effect, I think we should, and, you know, the park -- a fine example of that, engaging in an outdoor space where risk is low is an opportunity to mitigate some of the challenges that the isolation has caused for these residents. And so as we move to the solutioning side of this study, we'll begin to start aggregating those, building on them, and [10:27:09 AM] hopefully formalizing new ways that everyone can utilize the information. >> Tovo: Great. And I was really speaking specifically about some of the virtual programs that I see, individual calls or, you know, writing, if that's not -- not posing challenges, things of that sort. Thank you for letting us know that there are networks of that shared information, but to the extent that our own city programs are already refashioning what they're doing with youth and with others, it seems like an opportunity to really maybe bring them into contact with -- virtual contact with some of these facilities. >> Absolutely. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Why don't you go ahead and move to next steps. >> Okay. We'll bring the slides up. Just to close then, in terms of next steps, the next phase of work, when Evie brings these up, I'll read these as she [10:28:09 AM] brings them up, studies -- additional nursing homes in other areas, Austin perspective, would be informative. We don't have perfect geographical representation, which we'd like. We'll expand the study to assisted living facilities and other models including aging in place. We'll focus quite a bit more on residents and family and to staff in part of the field because of consequences of existing prices, look at roles and utilization of technology, and then evaluate policies in place that may impact nursing home and staffing and see if there are opportunities to amend those, as well as reviewing some of the cost and value that -- that the city has provided in terms of temporary staffing agencies and seeing if there's better ways to utilize that funding. And then ultimately develop some frameworks to understand where the challenges are, which ones are the most predictable ones to [10:29:10 AM] respond to. That concludes the presentation. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Council member kitchen? >> Kitchen: I'm glad to see you'll be looking at specifically aging in place. We have many seniors, or actually elderly people across our community whose families are taking -- trying very hard to take care of them at home, and so understanding the challenges there would be helpful. That also happens because of the inability of families to be able to afford placing their family member in assisted living or a nursing home. So aging -- aspect of this, it would be interesting to understand that as an approach for reducing risk, but also understanding the kinds of burdens it places on [10:30:12 AM] families and whether families actually even have that choice. And if it really becomes an economic choice. So thank you. >> Thank you for that reinforcement, council member. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Council member Renteria. >> Renteria: Yes, and I really want to thank you for that report and the way you mentioned how these workers are really -- really heros that are taking care of our seniors. I have a -- my son -- a good friend and mother of my daughter-in-law just turned 70, we're both the same age, and I tried to find out why she didn't want to retire, and she said, they're all my friends. You know. And I need to keep going to work to take care of them. So I really want to thank you for that comment. >> Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you for the report. Thank you. >> My pleasure. [10:31:13 AM] >> Mayor Adler: Colleague S -- thank you. Colleagues, it is 10:30. We have a half an hour before we break -- or recess to go into executive session. So let's do some of the pulled items that we can do now. First on the pulled item list, item number 29. Council member alter, you want to address this? Are you still with us? >> Alter: Yes, I am. I forgot to put my video back on. So item 29 is asking for an amend to -- an amendment to a.f.d.'s budget. I have a question about the 5 million. I shared those questions with Mr. Van eenoo yesterday. I don't know if he's prepared to answer them or if I need to have the conversation with him today and bring this up again tomorrow. I don't know if Mr. Van eenoo is on the [10:32:16 AM] >> Flannigan: Mayor, if you would, as you announce the items, which competing the item is for. I also pulled 29, but on the 30th. So this should be confusing. >> Mayor Adler: I'll do that all of the items today we have pulled are all on the 29th with the El Paso examine of are -- all on the 29th with the exception of the zoning case that you have pulled. Is Ed van eenoo with us? I don't think he's with us right now. >> Alter: Okay. So I will continue to work -- >> I am here. >> Here he is. >> Alter: I don't know if you're prepared to answer the questions now or if you want to continue our conversation and have it pulled tomorrow. >> I think it's probably best to have the conversation [indiscernible], council member, it's a fairly complicated issue. I think if we could talk first, that might be a better way to answer a lot of your questions. [10:33:16 AM] >> Alter: Okay. That's fine. I did just want to, you know, flag for folks that I have a number of concerns about this amendment and the first one that I need to get addressed is whether we have calculated the amount correctly for how much the overtime should be. I have mentioned in some other places that I'm somewhat frustrated with the process for bringing forward this amendment and the need for the overtime and would have liked to have seen more solutions from staff addressing this much sooner, since this goes back to supposedly being identified in December, and we are now in July. So I will bring that up tomorrow after I've had a chance to go through the nitty-gritty with Mr. Van eenoo and we don't need to have everyone else work through that with me via this virtual setup. So thank you, Mr. Van eenoo and hopefully we can find some time later today to [10:34:19 AM] connect as you answer those. >> Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: The next pulled item is -- did someone have something? Next pulled item is item number 43. This is on the 29th. Mr. Flannigan, you pulled this? >> Flannigan: I'm sorry, mayor, I think a few folks are still unmuted. Can you repeat what you said? >> Mayor Adler: Not a problem. We're pulling item 43, this is on the 29th agenda. Council member Flannigan, you pulled this item 43. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor, yes. My concern on this really is just on the very first section interlocal, it includes the phrase "No more than 7," and I just don't know if at this moment we want to predetermine how many mental folks we want to put in the 911 center. So my question for staff really is, does this preclude us doing more? Or what is the process? Since we're about to [10:35:20 AM] entertain some pretty deliberate public safety budget conversations. >> Mayor Adler: Is staff here to respond to the "No more than" language? >> I believe we have it. Assistant city manager Arellano. We were considering postponing this if there were other questions, I'll see if assistant city manager Arellano wants to speak to this question directly. >> Good morning, mayor and council, and council member Flannigan. The no more than seven really -- first of all, can you hear me? >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> Thank you. That number 7 is really based on space considerations and what is currently envisioned in terms of the em arrangement that we currently have. Certainly if there is more information or budget decisions that require additional personnel to be staffed [10:36:20 AM] into the ctec dispatch call intake center, we would certainly see how we might accommodate that and amend [indiscernible] [Audio is cutting out.] It's a space consideration at this time. >> Flannigan: So I'm getting just some duplicating info about this item from staff, if staff wishes it to be postponed. If it was going to be postponed, I probably wouldn't have brought the question, we would have just worked on it offline. >> If I may, I think based on some conversations that I've had, we're intending to postpone it, and that decision was just recently made, just based on the conversations that we're having during the budget process. >> Mayor Adler: Council member kitchen. >> Kitchen: Yeah. I'm with council member Flannigan. I think we postpone it or we change this language. I would rather not pass something with this language and then have to change it later. [10:37:20 AM] So -- and I'm okay with either. I would take out the "No more than" if we go forward with it now, or we would just postpone it until after we complete this. >> Mayor Adler: Sounds like staff is going to postpone that. Can we just assume that at this point? It'll come up in the budget conversation when appropriate. Okay. So this item will be postponed. Please note that on the yellow sheet. All right. The next item that we have, pulled item is item number 49, also pulled by council member Flannigan. This is on the 29th agenda. >> Flannigan: This one, I have two questions who may need offline information. This is pay for success, I don't feel like I've been given satisfactory answers for the future with pay for success with Travis county. It is my recollection, deciding to no longer participate in that [10:38:20 AM] program. That's one question. The second question is, this appears, according to the backup, to have been poofed in the budget -- having been approved in the budget almost 12 months ago. This issue is a high priority. Why would it take 11 months to bring this back? I don't feel like we adopt an annual budget expecting the contracts to come back 11 months later. >> Stephanie Hayden, director, Austin public health. So the first question with the pay for success. This was a pilot under the pay for success program to kind of get that off the ground. There have been, at the August 4th, they're going to provide an overview about the pay for success. But because we have these individuals that are living in these facilities and they need [10:39:21 AM] this additional funding, this additional funding adds additional funding to funding that was added before eleven months ago, to add additional funding to take us to the end of September. So this is just basically bridge funding that will keep -- help us to keep these individuals housed until a formal briefing will happen on the 4th that will provide an overview about pay for success. >> Flannigan: Then I guess it's less than ideal to have it on the budget -- have it on a council agenda days before the briefing. But, you know, there's a lot of stuff that's moving quickly, so that's just my -- that's just where I'm at. I don't know that it's worth stopping. It's only $100,000 in the context of a very large budget. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. My sense is -- director Hayden, does this make sense, regardless of what happens with pay for success, is this going to [10:40:21 AM] be instructive information with respect to how we move forward on -- on homelessness interventions? >> Yes. I think the biggest concern with these 24 people, they were part of a pilot, and so the funding for that pilot has -- they no longer have enough funding because the hopes was that pay for success would add this 24 to the 250, within that strategy. And so we have to make sure, just to stabilize and keep this group of folks housed as caritas continues to work with them, so caritas, as well as wells integral care, with assertive services. We must keep them housed and then we'll have a [10:41:24 AM] larger conversation. >> Flannigan: But if I might, mayor, jump in, what I'm hearing you say is, because pay for success didn't move the way we were planning for it to move, what I heard was, because Travis county pulled out, now we have to spend more city taxpayer money to address the situation because choices made at the county. I don't want to put words in anyone's mouth and if you're uncomfortable addressing what I just said, I understand that, but that's what it sounded like to me. >> I'm -- that is not something that I will say. I think the challenge is that pay for success was not completed in the timely fashion to allow these 24 individuals. And so we -- ultimately, we have to ensure that we keep people housed. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Council member kitchen. [10:42:24 AM] >> Kitchen: I understand the questions that council member Flannigan is raising, and look forward to that conversation about -- about pay for success. I think with regard to these individuals -- and like -- I agree that it's -- this is a relatively small amount of number, and the bottom line is we need to keep people housed. So I think it's okay moving forward with this and just understanding when we'll have the opportunity to talk about the pay for success program. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> Tovo: At the time -- mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Yes, council member tovo. >> Tovo: At the time we have that conversation, I think it's really important, we have even more people engaged right now in -- in the civic process who are voicing concerns for their neighbors who are experiencing homelessness, and pay for success, I continue to believe, offers us, you know, an innovative way to get some new partners involved. You know, it has been -- this would be the first pay for success project in the state of Texas, [10:43:25 AM] and so, you know, like any first innovative project, there have certainly been some hiccups that took a while to get the legal mechanism that satisfied the city, and certainly it's really disappointing to see a few of our initial partners, people we thought -- entities we thought would partner with us, decide in the end not to. But it has brought forward some potential funders who we haven't worked with before and I continue to think that pay for success offers the kind of strategy that allows us to get entities and foundations and potentially even individuals who don't -- who don't currently invest in housing solutions, individuals experiencing homelessness to invest. So, you know, I think it's a good thing we're not having that conversation now, but we have, as a council, passed two resolutions to move forward with pay for success. And I'm really eager to continue to pursue that model. But absolutely agree with everything that's been said about this particular contract really being critical to -- to support. [10:44:29 AM] >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Let's go to the next item. The next item is item 59, pulled by council member Flannigan, on Wednesday, the 29thth agenda. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor. This is the digital content contract for the library system. My question is, it seems rational, the explanation that there's been a very increased demand for these digital materials as a result of literally everything right now. But my question is really why this is a three-year extension of expense, a three-year with expended services, when we don't know what's going to happen next year or the year after. It seems like a one-year expansion would make the most sense. >> I'm check marks I [10:45:32 AM] believe we have Roosevelt leaks, director leaks on the line but we just have to move him over to answer your question. Here he comes. >> Mayor Adler: You're on mute if you're trying to speak, Mr. Leaks. >> Sorry about that. Good morning, mayor and council, Roosevelt weeks, director of Austin public library. Council member Flannigan, probably over the last five years, we've seen an increase in our virtual services up to 485%, and that is not going to slow down at all. The pandemic we've seen over the last four months, our virtual services have gone up 37%. And with the rise in cost of ebooks versus digital books, that is not going to stop anytime soon. So it is our -- we're looking in the future planning for that growth, of the new customers that [10:46:33 AM] we're bringing, here in the city, we're looking -- from the library standpoint, we're looking to add an additional 80,000 library holders when we go out and visit the charter schools that's in the area, we're talking Texas empowerment academy, the ideal schools, the [indiscernible] Of the city, adding those folks, that would just increase the demand on our virtual services since we don't know when those kids are going back to school. So we see a trend that we are going to continue to have to provide virtual services this year and way into the future. And so that's the reason we want to extend that to three years versus one year. >> Flannigan: Yeah. It's not -- it's -- obviously, the three years is only a question because the annual authorization is more than tripled. So it's not a small increase. And it's certainly not one that's increasing [10:47:34 AM] with demand. It is a dramatic increase, immediately and for the next three years, and I -- that just seems like a lot of money from the general fund to be allocating when we don't know if we need to go from a million dollars to effectively $3.3 million in the next budget. >> And just so we're clear, it's not going to increase our material budget. We're actually looking at spending less on our physical books, less on our management services like -- I mean [indiscernible] Books, cds, things of that nature, we're not looking to expand the budget but to move money around to help out with the virtual ebooks. >> Flannigan: I understand that. It's -- you know, as the public knows, there's only a couple of departments where the digits come. The same source. And parks and libraries [10:48:34 AM] is right along there with public safety budgets in terms of where the dollars get allocated. It's nice to hear that the physical -- that the costs around physical collection -- Dr. Lyrics you might want to mute because there's a lot of feedback -- there we go. It makes a lot of sense and I'm glad to hear that the department is looking at the utilization of physical materials and adjusting the budget accordingly. I'm just concerned that this is a very dramatic increase in one year and locked in for three years when, as digital products are concerned, you can be a lot more flexible with when you dial that up and match it to need. And so, you know, maybe we'll have a little more conversation -- well, you know, the problem, city manager, with nearly 200 items on a week like this [10:49:35 AM] is that there's just not time to really figure out what we're doing here, and that's also -- that's also problematic. You know, without knowing more details on how these contracts are structured, I don't know if it's possible to say -- because it's digital, you can scale the contract with the equal utilization, as to -- as opposed to predetermining the utilization. The advantage of digital is that it can be adjusted in time, type of allocation. I wish I had more time to really dig into this because that's $2 million we could certainly find uses for in Austin public health or in other areas. >> Mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Council member pool. >> Pool: Thanks. Thanks for raising the question about overdrive. I just want to let our director know how important that particular online electronic book distribution system is to this city. With all of us staying home and our students at [10:50:36 AM] home, the utilization of the ebooks has, as I understand it, really gone through the roof, and I -- even if we get back to where we were prepandemic, I don't think that will abate. This also opens the door a little bit into the conversation about just general technology access across the city and making sure that every corner of our city has access to high speed wi-fi. Because you can't get your ebook downloaded to read it or do your studies if you don't have wi-fi. So that's a conversation for further on into budget, but I do see that these -- the electronic aspect kind of ties in. And I think it is important across the city for all levels of involvement. So thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> Flannigan: Mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Yes, council mber Flannigan. >> Flannigan: Thank you, council member pool. I appreciate that additional insight. I think sometimes when we get into a conversation, [10:51:36 AM] even on the virtual dais, we take kind of a question about scale and we talk about it as kind of a binary "Yes" or "No." Obviously no one is saying we Von have this service entirely, it is really about how it scales and do the cost scale with the customer demand; right? But the second upon the is really very fascinating. If we're talking about taking an additional two to three million dollars a year and investing it in the resource, does that mean we're investing it only in the parts of this community that already have wi-fi? Might it make more sense to take part of those dollars and invest it in broadband access right now so that folks in this community who don't currently have broadband could then access it? I think that's an interesting kind of -- I hadn't thought about it that way, but I think that's an interesting and maybe more pointed way to talk about how the dollars could serve multiple purposes. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. >> Tovo: Mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Yes, council member tovo. >> Tovo: You know, I think the question of [10:52:37 AM] broadband access and expanding broadband access is clearly one that our community has been challenged with in these last months. I really applaud aid and the other districts for finding creative ways to get that internet access to those students who need it. Aisd, of course, as most of you know, had staged school buses around -- around the city, and I know they have done, you know, really tremendous work in reaching out to their students individually to ask them if they needed a hot spot, if they needed other ways to connect online so that they could continue with their work. And I recognize this as a critical area of need. A continued need. I would have that our private partners in Austin step up and help us meet that need. We have some great technology companies, some great telecommunications companies. I would like to see our city funding within the park -- within the library budget go to helping provide people with those resources they [10:53:38 AM] need, either for school or work or enjoyment. I see our libraries functioning in all of those ways. Job -- for job seekers, resume writing books, public libraries truly are critical to our democracy and I would rather use our funds for that funds rather than use it to expand broadband access, again not because it's needed but because I think this is a need that others in the community -- other entities in the community can step up and help us fill, and I hope they will because it's obviously going to be a continued need, not just for school age kids but for the many others in our community who need that access. >> Mayor Adler: That's an interesting question, director weeks. None if it's possible maybe reaching out to aid or the other districts, if in this period of time W now have a greater feel for where it is that we don't have service, which I think was one of the questions the districts were trying to ask. [10:54:40 AM] That might very well pose something that would be appropriate, either as council member tovo suggests, trying to engage the balance of the community for helping us to fill or otherwise, but given fact that this is a service that we provide, a material we provide, really having a real good feel for where our gaps and holds are so we would know the dimension of the problem we need to correct, I think would be really helpful. >> That's a great point, Mr. Mayor. I just want to point out that the parks department and the library department is working with aisd right now on seeing how we can support their kids, our kids, in the future. And one of the things that the library is doing, we're looking at providing additional hot spots in areas for those students who don't have it. We applied with a grant for $50,000 for the Texas state library association, we got $50,000 and we're looking [10:55:40 AM] to enhance our hot spots and [indiscernible] Will be back with those funds. >> Mayor Adler: That would be really good. If it's possible, if you can just drop the council a memo to get a feel for -- now that you're working with those partners, just the scale of the challenge that we have with respect to that, I think that would be really helpful in terms of getting service all over the city. >> Yeah. I'm in contact with their -- I'm in contact with their technology person and they're supposed to give me a list of what their needs are and what the gaps are, what they're providing versus what the students need, so I'll get that information to you. >> Mayor Adler: Great. Thank you. Council member alter. >> Alter: Thank you. I just wanted to note that all of the school kids in aid, and I believe in at least one other district, have access to Austin public library cards and have access to the overdrive system through that and are accessing that system, so it is multiplying through our [10:56:41 AM] community. I also want to add that I've been working on trying to figure out how to expand broadband for about a year and a half, and working closely with [indiscernible], trying to bring together some of the telecom folks. I know that council member harper- madison has also been beginning to think about that. I think this is really a broader issue that we need to be working on, that our folks out in the community who are trying to think about how to bring philanthropy to bear at a higher level, because obviously, covid has laid bare the inequities, but it is also a basic structure question for this city. And as we look ahead, you know, to future bond issues, et cetera, we will need to be thinking about that as we think about our legislative agenda. Come January, there are lots of restrictions on our ability as a municipality to set up a -- any kind of [10:57:41 AM] broadband system or to facilitate it that we would need to have removed if we want to take many of the steps that might be of interest. So I just want to flag, if folks are interested, that we've begun some of that work and welcome other -- other ideas and thoughts in helping to push that forward. >> Kitchen: Mayor? >> Mayor Adler: Great. Anything else is this? Council member Casar and then council member pool. >> Casar: I would really like the city manager and staff to look at this more closely. It was just shared with at least me and the mayor pro tem this morning, some work San Antonio is doing that does not conflict with the state law that exists. And so I would really like to see how we better -- how we can better use city dollars to address this and how we can leverage infrastructure projects that we're in the middle of because if we can be connecting hot spots to more traffic infrastructure, when we're adding utilities, there's just -- there [10:58:41 AM] seems to be really good reason for us to be trying to -- you know, universal broadband, free and accessible to everybody as a public utility, has always made sense. And just like everything else in the pandemic, things that made sense before, now we can see how critical they are. So I think we've heard enough interest I think during this conversation, I think, manager, that you bring us a more comprehensive look at this, and I'd like to thank council member Flannigan for having. >> Pool: I would reiterate the importance of ensuring that broadband is available for everyone in our community. The pandemic brought that home. It's not something that we were not aware of. Previous councils have worked with Google and other telecommunications companies over many years, but that effort did stall out a bit a few years ago and I think we just need to commit ourselves to ensure that ever single corner -- every [10:59:42 AM] single corner of austin-travis county is covered. We can have other hot spots too, but it needs to be a blanket of access thrown over the entirety of our community is how I see that. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember alter. >> Alter: Just to follow up on what Mr. Casar mentioned. So since we've been working on the mobility bond and with the [indiscernible] Of the corridor program, I don't have any of the corridor work in my district, so I've been talking with them about how do we integrate this technology, make sure that we have the piping that we need for broadband built into those corridors when we're digging up those streets and looking at it in those different -- in different ladders so when we're building the infrastructure we're building the space for us as we grow to identify ways that we can build out that infrastructure so you think R. I think some of those conversations have started and we've been working [11:00:43 AM] closely with Tara, the group responsible within the city. And I think there is a tremendous need, but there also are tremendous obstacles that we have to navigate through. We've started looking at San Antonio's package, their covid framework looked somewhat different than ours in that it also had a huge investment in workforce development, which I'm hoping that we'll have some ability to have additional conversations about as well. It had a large segment for broadband and a large segment for workforce development and still trying to understand how they were able to find the the money for what they did put in and what they are actually investing in. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. All right, colleagues. It is 11:00. So we're going to go ahead and take a recess now and go into executive session. We'll eat lunch hopefully about noon to 1:00 and be [11:01:44 AM] back here at 1:00. We'll begin with the briefing on St. Johns. We'll then go to the budget briefing and work session, probably for a couple of hours. And then we will conclude by picking up the pulled items that we have yet to address. So the city council will now go into closed session to take up two items, pursuant to # 551.08971 of the government code city council will discuss legal matters related to item e3, the sj Louis construction of Texas matter. And e4, which is the wells matter. Items e1, e2, 5 and 6 have been withdrawn for today. Without objection, we will now go into executive session on the items announced. It is 11:02. See you guys in executive session. [11:02:45 AM] [Executive session]. [1:00:22 PM] >> Mayor Adler: Greg's here, Jimmy's here, Cathy's here, Leslie's here, Pio is here, and I'm here. So 1:00 P.M., today, July 28, 2020, work session, we are now out of closed session, we discussed legal matters related to items e3 and e4. We're back and we're going to pick up with the briefing on saint John, then when we're done with that briefing, we'll go into the budget briefing and then conclude the pulled items we haven't addressed. Is staff with us to take us through the St. John's briefing? >> Yeah. We're going to have assistant city manager Gonzalez introduce and then turn it over to staff. >> Thank you. [1:01:23 PM] Rodney Gonzales, assistant city manager for economic opportunity and affordability, strategic outcome. Today's briefing is an overview of the study of the St. John's site which was conducted in collaboration with the university of Texas at Austin center for sustainable development. You may recall that on June 24th, staff provided a memo to council to the way both an overview of the study, as well as the study itself. The study was conducted to inform council and the community on redevelopment opportunities that exist on the St. John's site. And in doing so, multiple site planning options were assessed in order to bring forward the community vision and potential development scenarios. Additionally, the study reviewed financial gaps that would exist under various financial scenarios. The next step we mentioned in our memo toward the redevelopment of the site would be an issuance of request for proposal. Prior to taking that extension it's important for us to have a dialogue [1:02:25 PM] with council about the study and financial gap and council's prioritization of the St. John's site in those terms. At this point I'll turn the presentation over to Christine Maguire for the economic development important. Christine leads our redevelopment division. >> Thank you so much, rod any. Good afternoon, mayor and city council members. Can you hear me? >> Mayor Adler: Yes, we can. >> Okay. Great. Thank you all so much. I'm very pleased to prevent this new vision for the former Home Depot and former Chrysler properties. As per city council resolution in December 2017 and reaffirmed by city council resolution that brings upon the university of Texas group of architecture for sustainable effort to lead this effort. [Indiscernible] The entire economic development department is forged for forming partnerships to bring about many different community benefits for a [1:03:28 PM] vibrant cultural arts community, music, heritage, helping small businesses grow and entrepreneurs develop as business owners, and bringing in new business and helping businesses grow. Our special spot in the redevelopment position is really taking property that the city no longer has use for and repositions that into the private market with the private sector development community to bring about socially responsible real estate development that is grounded in council policy and market reality, but really does achieve over time really important community goals and benefits, be it affordable housing, mixed use development, retail for small businesses, parks, open space, the whole gamut of what really makes a complete community, and public/private partnership to really align this reward and return through [indiscernible] Agreement. As I mentioned, this want pro is no exception. [1:04:29 PM] This is well-grounded in council's strategic direction 2020 for economic opportunities goal, and also imagine Austin complete communities. We're really excited to bring forward the reenvisioning of this site. It will be called a site. It's really an assemblage of two parcels that the city bought in 2008 and then 2013. This city bought these two parcels that are roughly 19 acres for the expressed purpose of municipal court and police substation. And we used 2006 public facility bond dollars to do that. Those are tax-exempt dollars. By the time the city went in a different direction, the city had spent about $12.4 million of those bonds. So the vision and the strategy really isn't in keeping those bonds up property to make those clear, the bond covenants. We do, though, think that even though there's a [1:05:29 PM] little bit of hurdle, that the site it excellently situated with highway and frequent bus service access that connects this site not just to the ACC highland mall campus, but also to the crestview station on the white rail line. It does have, though, certain challenges. It is [indiscernible] Area, albeit there is a St. John's park that was rededicated in 2019 with facilities, we're very excited about that. I do think that the powerpoint does need to get up, however, so I apologize for that. Can we have staff help bring this up? Or I can share my -- I don't know how to share my screen, but we probably do need some assistance bringing up the presentation. [1:06:33 PM] Okay. If you could please advance to slide 4. Thank you. All right. Now we're cooking with gas. So this is the site. The St. John's park was kind of rededicated. It's been around since the early '60s, but it's rededicated with new facilities, so that's a true aspect that we hope to build upon for the reenvisioning of this property. And, you know, this site is well-situated, it is actually, though, seeing early signs of gentrification. The population by and large, it's hispanic, 80% of the population is hispanic. The population is predominantly two-thirds out of a low to medium [1:07:33 PM] family income. This area, the St. John's community is no Tankersley to -- its nostranger to fastly escalating rent and house prices. The city council received a presentation in 2018 or 2019, really has this early pipeline. If you can advance, please, to the next slide. Next slide. I do want to talk a little bit about the history of the site, and the history is part of Austin's history. And it's important to know the history, to really put in context the community's future vision. The site has a long history in Austin, particularly the African American community, as it is the location of one of [1:08:33 PM] Austin's original [indiscernible] Community. The St. John's missionary Baptist association founded this area in -- it's a 350- acre purchase in 1894. The St. John's missionary Baptist association subdivided in the late 1930s to make what is now the St. John's neighborhood, it's a former Freeman's town. A lot of the services including a school that served that community before it was annexed into the city, before the advent of interstate 35, was on the western portion of the acreage. With the advent of I-35, also many other -- as was repeated in many other parts of the united States at that time, the interstate bisected this [1:09:35 PM] African American community, this vibrant African American community, bisected it, thereby separating the school founded in 1942, which really supported that community and actually forced it to close and reopen at what is now the St. John's -- the Home Depot site. So this site does have historic significance. However, the site -- the school had to close with the advent of forced busing, and the school closed in 1971. It was vacant for ten years, and then repurposed by aid for the next decade as [indiscernible] An alternative school, only to be closed in the early '90s and purchased by Home Depot corporation. Home Depot did operate that store, but did close [1:10:35 PM] it in 2008, and that is when the city purchased the property. The city purchased that property in 2008, and the Chrysler dealership in 2013. Over time, between the '70s through the 1980s and 90's and 2000s, the St. John's community transitioned from a predominantly African American community to now it is predominantly hispanic, and we now see signs of displacement of this -- of the St. John's neighborhood residents. And what is really important and foundational to the strategy is to really have solutions and answers to help bring goods and services to the community, but also kind of have accountability against these forces of gentrification and displacement. And that was certainly the intent of the resolution that city council unanimously passed in December of [1:11:37 PM] 2017, where it called for a new vision, but also laid out a way to look at that would be community beneficial, such as affordable housing, such as jobs areas for nonprofits to locate to provide youth services, and to increase the park and to bring new recreational and specific opportunities for the community residents to congregate. After the community -- an engagement process, we actually, in partnership with the council offices, the council offices issued a survey with over 600 respondents to that survey, and we worked closely in order to engage the university of Texas at Austin in June of 2019 to -- to actually help lead the study. [1:12:41 PM] And as you know, the center for sustainable development, does an incredible amount of deep work in terms of looking at property, at how to reposition property, and looking at stages. It also has a number of really key faculty that really are experts in ways to combat gentrification and displacement. So that, combined with economic and planning systems, is really a dream team to help really lead the repositioning process, and we do have, I believe, members of the faculty for the center of sustainable development here, as well as a couple community leaders who might be available for any questions that you might have afterward. The robust community engagement process not just built upon the surveys that were over 600 in number, but also had three main community meetings, one in September, the other in November, and then a final one in March. And the March one did [1:13:41 PM] happen at the very beginning of March prior to the advent of covid. We had one-on-one -- one-on-one meetings. We had coffee with the principal. We had a series of focus groups. And the result was a series of scenarios, and these scenarios really have certain things, we are showing scenarios b1 and b2, c1 and c2, and the salient differences between the B scenario and the C scenario was, B actually introduces back a street grid to reassemblage. And C was [indiscernible]. What is important that underpinned all these scenarios is what the community called for. And the community really, [1:14:44 PM] majority really favored all four of these. So, really, the underlying theme is really what we want the private sector developers in the response to the [indiscernible] To bid on, which is mixed use, mixed income, increase open space, infrastructure development, and flexible commercial and public space, particularly for small businesses to serve the community. I am on slide 9, if that is the slide that others are seeing. Yes. Great. So, again, these scenarios, the b1 and b2, those differences between thoses two scenarios and the c1 and c2 are really the different types of tests for the different kinds of densities and intensities of uses that can be brought to the [1:15:45 PM] site. As you can see, the uses which are -- really are focused on what is more environmentally and community standard. I will say that along I-35, there's a lot of pollution that comes off of interstate 35. So every single one of these scenarios actually sets aside a non-residential buffer area that would be for more auto serving uses, such as more commercial in nature, as well as office. So commercial, non- residential. Outside of that hundred-foot -- 500-foot buffer, however, from the back end of the site and the site that really abuts the community park, that is where the affordable housing, the mixed use, in terms of multifamily and single-family are, and the communal space that [1:16:46 PM] really tie in. Also, what it all calls for is that beautiful offset of the park and really building upon that for more open space. This is obviously an image of the current conditions of the property. It is a little bit hurtful on the eyes. But what we do want to really project is -- next slide, please -- is -- next slide -- are really the images of the future vision, that we do want to message to the private sector development community. Again, mixed use and mixed income. And to be accountability force to the gentrification and displacement that we're seeing, we're asking that 50% of the units be set aside as affordable for making making at or below 80% median family income [1:17:48 PM] for single-family, 60% or or below for multifamily. The images show what we want to cultivate for small businesses to provide retail opportunities, especially in an area that's really hard to access healthy food, and, obviously, open space and building upon the park to help bring community together and congregate, but also to recreate and to be a place for children's activity. And, finally, we want a place for jobs and to have areas where tenants -- tenants such as nonprofit tenants that could help provide important social services be made available that could be located to serve that community. Next slide, please. To the rsp that we hope to issue, what we do want to do is clearly articulate that community vision, but more [1:18:49 PM] important, the bridge that gets the vision to reality. And all of the scenarios, particularly the B and C scenarios, the university of Texas at Austin, in partnership with economic and planning services, that consultant, really has done an amazing job at calibrating, but order of magnitude, a rough order of magnitude of the financing gap, a difference between when the entire development is on the ground and stabilized, what is the market value of that development versus the total cost of development. The total cost of development actually includes the need to [indiscernible] The bond, bonds for which we have spent to date on the property. And it also includes bringing back that street network, either a grid or the north-south green [1:19:50 PM] corridor. So it's putting in and remodernizing the grid pattern. It's expanding the open space, increasing the park, and recreational and community gathering space, but it's also -- the gap is attributed to uses that are not paying market rate rent, and that would be income restricted housing, both for sale and multifamily. But also, if there are spaces for nonprofit organizations that are really doing good in community, they would get a reduced -- isn't it a factually reduced rent in reduced -- they would [1:25:11 PM] financing gap, for which city council in 2014 approved a matter plan and planned unit development. This is also a meritorious project, based on many years of very robust community engagements and the community leaders who are debted into as partners in this process, under an exclusive negotiation agreement as of may this year. We're looking at a strategy that we're going to bring forward to city council within the next few months, how to close what is an estimated hundred-million-dollar gap, recalibration of the pump, we'll look at a package of public improvements, package to consider, and look at ways to finance that [1:26:12 PM] infrastructure through mechanism, a future bond or issuing certificates of obligation. Next slide, please. You also will be receiving in very short order a memo that provides an update on the south central water flow. This slide might have a little bit of new information, but a memo is coming very soon that will explain and update the information that might be a little new on this slide. This is 118 acres that is mostly privately owned, but the city does run Texas center there. It's also for the same reasons as St. John's that this project does have a gap which is meritorious to figure out how to cover. They're looking at the revision plan that has been adopted, the modernizing of the current street grid infrastructure, the inclusion of new parks [1:27:12 PM] and open space, and the addition of affordable housing units, much more affordable housing like -- than what currently exists today. The gap here is between 400 and 600 million and the way to Cofer that gap includes a tax reinvestment zone, planned unit development or regulatory plan, as well as affordable housing bonds and other types of tools, and also there's mention of an economic development organization that you also have been briefed upon or will be briefed upon in the near future. Next slide, please. Today we do want to hear any questions that you have and really hear and send you the -- what we can message to the private sector in terms of priority for this project. And really, this helps [1:28:12 PM] key up item 83, item from council 83, I believe it's tomorrow's city council agenda, that really does basically more eloquently articulate what we just covered in this presentation, but also reaffirm the need for public/private partnership and innovative projects, and also to initiate zoning, zoning that's appropriate to achieve the community vision. And initiating zoning really sends a very strong message to the private sector development community that the city and the city council leadership are very engaged and supportive of the vision. And with that, I -- I'm sorry, next slide. With that, I am -- we are ready to hear council's input. We do have a draft rfp that we can tweak Oracle [1:29:13 PM] berate, depending on the disposition of council, that can be put up in fairly short order within the next 30 to 60 days. So we are ready to take the next step and look forward to this conversation with council. And I do want to acknowledge other guests here as well that can help answer my questions. With that, thank you so much, acm Gonzalez and city manager cronk, mayor, and council. >> Mayor Adler: Would you go ahead and take the screen down? >> Casar: And, mayor, do we still have the university of Texas and St. John's community folks up next? >> Mayor Adler: Council member harper-madison, your hand is raids. Raised.did you want to speak first? >> Harper-madison: I'm sorry, I can't higher. >> Mayor Adler: We have a couple more presenters. You had your hand up. I didn't know if you wanted to -- [1:30:14 PM] >> Harper-madison: I can wait until the conclusion of all the presentations. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: All right. Rodney? >> Mayor, I don't have anything, other comments to offer at this point. We will, of course -- there are other guests that have been invited that council member Casar may want to call up and part of the presentation. >> Mayor Adler: Goat it. Council member Casar, is there someone that you wanted to speak to us? >> Casar: I think we just have the folks from U.T. And the community members that worked with them to talk to us for five or six minutes and I don't know if they're on the line yet. Are. >> Harper-madison: Mayor, if they aren't on the line, I wouldn't mind sharing any commentary. >> I'm here, but I'm happy to wait. This is Liz Mueller. >> Mayor Adler: Why don't you go ahead. >> Okay. I'm -- so I'm Liz Mueller, from university of Texas, a member of the team at the center for [1:31:14 PM] sustainable development that worked on this project, and I'm just going to say -- just make a few points, and then I'm happy to answer questions, and I know my colleague Jake Wegman who is also here and will speak after me. We were excited to work on this project. As you may know, Jake and I worked on the uprooted worth. This was an area identified in our map as one that was in the early stages of gentrification and it was also an area that we chose to drill down on to learn more about the particular needs of that community in the report, as kind of an example of how you might do that. So we saw that it was an area that was already showing some demographic change but not yet a lot of change in the housing market, but we knew change was coming because of things that were happening around the site. So it's exciting to think about doing something at this site now. It's also exciting, I think, give the history of the site and the engagement of the residents at the area in coming up with ideas [1:32:15 PM] about community benefits that they would really like to see there. And also it's -- because of its history, it presents an opportunity to think about how we might create opportunities for people with ties to the community to return if they want to. This site, also as a site sitting along the highway, in an area that is somewhat isolated by other parts of the city by that highway, represents an opportunity to think about how do we transform such sites in ways that protect the community from the pollution coming off the highway and all of the scenarios as Christine mentioned, have tried to build that in, so we're trying to keep residents and active uses of that land on the side of the property away from the highway and do things next to the highway that provide a buffer of some sort. We also were trying to accuracy opportunities [1:33:16 PM] for housing of different types, and Jake will talk a little bit about the affordable housing in a minute. And also community spaces that could be places that offered services that the community has identified as important or allows for activities to take place that bring the community together that are also things that have been expressed by the community. So I think that's kind of the main thing I wanted to say. I think one -- one thing I wanted to just amend from what Christine mentioned before about -- she mentioned the income targeting for single-family and multifamily, and I think it would be the income targeting for owner-occupied versus renter-occupied housing. Single-family doesn't -- you know, because something is a townhome doesn't mean it's necessarily occupied by a renter, so I just wanted to clarify that point. So that's -- I think that's all I wanted to say, and I'll turn it [1:34:17 PM] over to Jake, who can talk more about the affordable housing and financing gaps. >> Thank you, and good afternoon, council. I'll keep it very brief because Christine Maguire, I think, covered the gist of our -- of our scenarios very well. I'll just further emphasize a few points that she made. Early on in this study, you know, there was an idea that there's this, you know, value on the site, and it is a very valuable site, and that that value could be tapped and captured to achieve goals such as affordable housing and open space and others. And we quickly realized -- and she mentioned this -- that just given the level of debt on the site and the need for demolition and environmental cleanup, and to basically start from scratch with infrastructure, that, you know, there's unavoidable need in our view for city [1:35:19 PM] funds, in one way or another, to realize these goals. I guess the good news is, she also intimated there are -- there's a lot of flexibility in exactly what that would look like. But, you know, bottom line, to achieve these affordability levels of between 48% and three-quarters of all the housing units, which was the range in those four scenarios that she showed, you know, that's kind of what's involved. And the only thing I want to add to her excellent summary of the different possible financing tools is one real opportunity here, and I'm stating the obvious to all of you, but of course this site currently generates zero property taxes. So if it continues to generate property taxes in the future, to the extent some or all of those property taxes can be redirected into the project to close that gap, that's some real money. The most aggressive of our scenarios, we [1:36:21 PM] projected generating upwards of $30 million over 30 years, and the city's portion of property taxes, so that could go quite a ways towards closing [indiscernible]. With that, I'll invite questions if there are any. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Council member Casar. Do you have someone else that you wanted to hear from? >> Casar: Mayor, I think there were two communities that worked on each team on this that were supposed to be on the line. I don't know if reverend Horton or miss van Winkler are on. >> Can you repeat the last name, beginning with van? >> Casar: Daryl Horton and Sherell van Winkler. >> Okay. They've been added. >> Casar: Reverend Horton, can you hear us? You're on. >> Yes, council member, I [1:37:22 PM] can. Thank you so much. Good afternoon to mayor, council, and to city managers. Thank you for this brief moment to share with you. I just wanted to stop in and to let you know that this has been a very impressive process where the community has been given an opportunity to share their voice about what they desire to see on this property. You've already heard the presentations. You have already seen the slides about how historic this property is, beginning with the St. John's district association and the legacy that they have left behind. What I would just encourage each of you as you consider this moment is just to let you know that all of us recognize that we are unable to rewrite history. All the wrongs that have been done, all the neglect that has taken place, you you and I cannot rewrite that. But I am excited that we have an opportunity now that we can make history that will establish a legacy for future generations. I do think if you move forward with this project, that you will give us an opportunity to move toward the claim and the statement that we [1:38:22 PM] always hear about the great city of Austin, and that it is a desirable and affordable and an equitable place for all people to live. And I think that this project helps us to do that. And so the only thing I'm asking today is that you strongly consider moving forward with the proposal that you have so that we might honor the foundation that's been established by the St. John's district association, and that through this, the city would be making a body statement that affirms the desires of the present community, the people who are living there. Also, we would be demonstrating to our state and to our nation what it looks like for a city to really respect, to value, and to prioritize their communities of color. As you leave the city, as you enter the city on I-35, what a blessing it would be to be able to see a beautiful redevelopment right there at St. John where people have to come in and wonder, what is the city of Austin doing at St. John and 35, and we can shout with joy every [1:39:23 PM] time somebody asks us the questions, that this is an investment that the city of Austin made into its community of color and an investment that they made to honor the legacy of those who were there before them. So just wanted to give my support for this, say thank you to council member Casar for all of his hard work and his staff. So, again, thank you, mayor, thank you, council, thank you, city managers for your time. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. >> Good afternoon, everybody. Thanks for taking some time to listen to me and thanks, Greg, for allowing me to speak today. I think that he understands how passionate I am about this project. My name is sherelle van Winkler, born and raised in Austin. I'm director of health and advocacy community in the St. John's neighborhood, also on the African American survivor commission. [1:40:23 PM] I have had the privilege to be part of this process from the beginning. As a clinic, we thought it was important for our patients in the community that we served to of a voice in what happens in their neighborhood, and so we -- we wanted to be a part of this. So we participated in block walks and house meetings and hosted things at the clinic, as well as at the rec center and with the neighborhood association. It's been really great to see how many residents have become more active in their neighborhood association post this work, and how many of them are still active. All of those things that I am, I'm not a resident of Austin because I cannot afford to live in Austin. Four years ago I bought a house in manor and I cried for a week because I was moving out of Austin. I've always been super passionate about Austin, and I think a lot of black residents leave because of black culture here. For me, I only left [1:41:24 PM] because I couldn't afford it. And this opportunity for people to be able to return back to a place that they're as passionate about I think is great. And I'm not the only person in Austin who left because they could not afford to live there, no matter how much they love the city. I work in Austin. My kids go to school in aid, and I'm a commissioner for the city of Austin because of the passion that I have for Austin, but I can't afford to live there. So I think pushing forward with this is not only going to help Austin as a whole with -- with the black residents, but it will really help this community to thrive. There's so much history there that is -- is to be lost if we don't do something now. I'd just like to say, you know, I think that it's not -- as a city, we can't just raise people to love Austin and to want to work to make Austin better. We also have to raise, you know, austinites who actually are able to [1:42:26 PM] afford to live in Austin and not just be passionate about Austin. But that's it. Thank you guys for your time. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you so much. Colleagues, I know that council member harper-madison raised her hand, council member Casar, I think you've been working on this project, do you want to speak first? >> Casar: She can go ahead. That's fine. >> Mayor Adler: Council member harper-madison. >> Harper-madison: It's totally appropriate that I go first because I'm going to gush and brag about council member Casar and the hard work that -- >> Casar: I didn't know you were going to do that. >> Harper-madison: Oh, yeah. It's coming. So I just wanted to say that I had the opportunity to be a fly on the wall a couple times throughout the course of this process, and I was absolutely impressed to see council member Casar to be able to work so closely with the partners at U.T., with community members, to see how dedicated and committed sherelle and the folks over at community clinic were, to [1:43:26 PM] see reverend Horton and some of the other clergy get involved. It just was really amazing. I tried to attend one of the meetings at the people's community clinic and I couldn't get in. It was too crowded. And so I just want to say what a beautiful, beautiful testament to how we can actually get work done when we work together and we think in a way that's comprehensive and very intentional. I used to live in St. John's as a kid, and I just -- I have some really interesting and funny memories of that lot. And then as an austinite everything driving past, driving past it empty and run down for a decade was really just been sad, frankly. So to know that we are actually going to pursue this opportunity towards a complete diverse community, with open spaces and community spaces and mixed use and really -- really achieve our goals around [1:44:27 PM] affordability with housing. I'm super proud of my colleague. I'm watching everything you do here because we have so much in d1, similar city-held assets that are just sitting there going to rot. And so I hope very much that I'm able to duplicate a lot of what you've done here, including some of the right to return program that y'all worked so hard to figure out the legality of. So I just wanted to say thank you for your leadership here, and I'm watching and I'm going to copy a lot of it. So I hope it's not trademarked. >> Casar: It's definitely not. Thank you for saying all those things. >> Mayor Adler: Council member Casar. >> Casar: Just to save us some time on tomorrow and Thursday, I'll make my general remarks about the property. I really appreciate what reverend Horton said, which is that we can't rewrite history, but we can create a better future. And if we do right by St. John, we're really showing really progress in changing the city. [1:45:29 PM] As reverend hton mentioned, this is a community established by a Baptist minister so people free from enslavement could have a community to thrive. But there were lots of places the city got in the way, when the community tried to grow west with zoning request, request to the city, the city denied those requests to enforce the color line. Then the city billed I-35, and the state, right through the middle of this neighborhood. In part, we heard in the presentation today that part of why we'd have to clean up this property is because of -- environmentally clean up this property is because of some of that pollution. The city and school district got rid of the school twice, and now there's still conversations about whether to keep or close Webb middle school, which we need to keep. More recently, when the community asked for support from the city, the city made an investment and purchased this property for a police station and [1:46:29 PM] courthouse. But what we've got is an empty big box store that's falling to disrepair and barbed wire fences. So now I think we're showing that we can do better. And in conversation with the community, that neighborhood has not been asking for continued overpolicing, but instead for housing that's affordable to peoples that want to stay, not have their school closed, opportunity for family members to come back, places for small businesses and nonprofits to thrive. And I think that would really do right by this and it would be good not just for this neighborhood but for the whole city. You know, I recognize that this will take some financial work by us, but that's exactly what the housing bonds were for, what the parks bonds were for, and as professor Wegman mentioned, this property is off the tax rolls. If we do no, I'll tell you, it's been off the tax rolls for a decade with nothing happening and it will stay off for another decade probably if we don't step up. So he at a minimum, [1:47:31 PM] reinvesting tax dollars back into this project that are redeveloped by this doesn't cost us anything and can do a whole lot of good. Apart from the St. John's neighborhood itself, you probably received letters from the Baptist union, the housing authority, people's community clinic, Asian support services, the urban leaping, ajc measure and lots of others. So I recognize that while this is in the middle of my district, that this is a neighborhood that has really deep history and importance for people throughout the city, and I thank everybody for their -- for their support co-sponsoring the resolution to keep moving this forward. And then if we do so then we'll get proposals back in this rsv process and we can talk about closing that financing gap that is actually not that large when we look at the ability to reinvest tax dollars back into the property that come from developing it in the first place. So thank you, mayor, and thank you, everyone, for [1:48:32 PM] your time today. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. We're going to treat this as items 83 and 117 being pulled any further discussion on these items? It's exciting project, council member Casar, and I'm anxious to see it move forward and develop. I know that you've been working on this since the day you arrived here. And it shows. Council member alter, then council member Flannigan. >> Alter: Thank you. First, I also want to thank council member Casar for leading on this property and helping us to envision something that we can all be proud of. I did want to clarify, and and I am going to get the numbers wrong, are those two different items or does one replace the other? >> Flannigan: The 117 replaces the -- the earlier one, the city manager had some cleanup language and we just decided to repost it to keep it very clear. [1:49:34 PM] >> Alter: Okay. So I need to review that. My next comment was really just I wanted to ask our staff that when they post this for rfp, that they particularly make sure that some of the developers that have proposed some pretty massive affordable housing opportunities at mckalla place and were not even going to need -- they were going to pass money for the land, that they be included. I think they have some interesting approaches to how they're doing their developments. I do not know if it can translate easily from over to that area, to this particular property, given proximity to the highway and some of the particulars, but I do recall when we were reviewing the whitfeld chin development and [indiscernible], there was more housing development in those proposals than anything I [1:50:35 PM] had seen coming before council and they were not asking for handouts from the city. I'm not saying that we shouldn't make investments, but I think if we have developers who are willing to be creative and work with the community, that we want to make sure that they're aware of the opportunity and brought into the conversation to be able to put proposals before us and, you know, my hope is that our developers can, you know, join the conversation of how we make our city more equitable in new ways, and hopefully they will have learned something over the past several weeks and be able to step up in new ways, and want to welcome them to do that. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Council member Flannigan. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor. Great work, council member Casar and community members who have spent the last few years working through these issues. Reading the backup in terms of what -- what is being presented, in terms of the objectives for the [1:51:35 PM] property looks -- looks pretty great. I'm -- I'm particularly interested in what council member harper- madison said. There's a lot of projects that could come after this one, in other sites around the city, of different sizes and scale. Many of them are in council member harper-madison's district, one in particular that I'm interested in is the Asian resource center in Rutherford line site, which we also adopted a resolution last year, engaging in a similar process to say instead of just spending a parks bond to build the facility, we should explore a much bigger reimagining and opportunity for city-owned property, it's very similar. I'm super excited to see another example of how we can be more creative in how we fund these types of community projects and get value out of them. The presentation talked about a funding gap that had a very big price tag on it. And I just want to [1:52:36 PM] understand -- there are going to be folks in the community who think that means we need to find $70 million in bonds. That's not what we're saying because there's a lot of tools in a redevelopment project that can help address some of these issues. Is that a fair statement? I'm asking staff. >> Council member, this is Rodney Gonzales, then I'll hand it over to Christine. The financial gap that's there, we want it to be very transparent with council and the community to make sure that you understood that. At this point, what is put on the table through council member Casar's resolution is a tax increment financing district equation. That won't completely cover the gap, you know, so what we'll have to do is look at other options, like housing tax credits, perhaps some affordable housing bonds that have already been approved or on discussions with our housing department. We may have to look at reprioritizing some [1:53:36 PM] capital projects that are already in the hopper as well. We'll work very closely with our cip counterparts. And we may also have to issue debt. As Christine pointed out, certificates of obligation. At this point, it's not very clear what those various options would be that would be employed, but at the very least, I would think that we'd have to do a tax increment reinvestment zone. And that, of course, results in the issuance of debt to offset those costs. I don't want to say we're not going to issue bonds because that actually could be a potential scenario. We wanted to, of course, bring forward the great [indiscernible] That was done and highlight the fact that there was a gap, and as we move forward to the next stage to rfp, it's going to be very clear that that gap is going to exist and we'll work through [1:54:37 PM] options to filling that gap. I'll turn it over to Christine -- >> Casar: I just want to say, sometimes I think we get into these -- words mean different things to the public than they mean to staff. I acknowledge that capital projects require debt. But when the public hears the word bond, they think voter approved bonds, stuff from the past that they already think is going to be another thing, programmed to a new thing. While that is always on the table with confines of contracts to the voters and other bond materials, that is not how the public generally describes a tax increment financing option. But, Rodney, you said that the tif option is in the items for the agenda this week? >> That is part of council member Casar's resolution, highlights a tif as part of that. >> My reading that? I don't see that in the item. Is that item 83? >> The one -- >> Flannigan: Oh, there's a new one, the 117 [1:55:39 PM] resolution says tif. >> Casar: Mayor, if I could help clarify some of that. >> Mayor Adler: Please. >> Casar: The item 83 says you should be aware of the financial options laid out by staff, which is what Rodney just said. In the memo that staff sent to us, item 117 is the same intent, it just actually writes what those are in the resolution rather than referring to a memo. >> Flannigan: Okay. So it doesn't say use a tif, it says a tif is on the list of things that can be contemplated. That's a very different -- very different thing than what I heard Rodney say. >> Casar: Exactly. The point being that, to council member alter's point, we could get a respondent that is entirely mission-driven and putting a lot of their own money in, and the gap may be smaller than what we anticipate, or it could be larger, or something with more density could -- so essentially, we don't need to decide that now because that's part of what the rfp is about. [1:56:43 PM] >> Flannigan: Yeah. I got tripped up because it sounded like Rodney was saying we're deciding it now. >> There is none now, the resolution says support the prioritization of the object and options to include, of course, a tif, so there's no decision yet on a tif, but it certainly lays out the options very well for council. >> Flannigan: All right. I would just encourage staff -- I think the work the community has done with council member Casar sounds amazing. I'm particularly interested in the kind of legal and financial structures that come with a project like this because, as council member harper-madison said, this will not be the last one. And so I want to -- I want to offer my partnership to staff in working through those options and considerations because there may be things that are more appropriate for this property and less appropriate -- more appropriate -- like, I want to be involved in all of that, because as we think through one Texas center or we think through the Asian resource center, or the [1:57:44 PM] Ryan lane property, there's a lot of stuff on the list and it would be great to know the sort of suite of options with this project's completion as another test case. >> Mayor Adler: Is the economic development corporation among the options available to be considered? >> The economic -- >> Go ahead, Christine. >> I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. >> No, no, you're good. Yeah. We envision the corporation being able to assist with the myriad of projects, not just [indiscernible] Project, but a lot of other projects that are currently in the hopper. >> Mayor Adler: Agree as well. Council member kitchen? >> Kitchen: I just wanted to say this is -- I also wanted to say I'm very excited about this project and appreciate the effort and the work that's gone on in the last few years. I think it is an example of how we can be [1:58:44 PM] deliberate about -- about doing something very useful and important for the community with property that's just sitting there. So we have other property in the city, some of it much smaller. In my district, we have a few pretty small parcels, and so this helps me think about what kind of process might work for that. So I support this moving forward. I want to echo what council member Flannigan said, you know, in terms of public not misunderstanding when we talk about maybe having to reprioritize some capital investments, we don't want the public to get scared that that means that something we've passed specifically on a bond was going to get reallocated to this project. So to be more specific about that would be helpful. People should understand, to the extent that we pass bonds that were specifically named for [1:59:46 PM] particular projects, that's part of our contract with the voters and that's not the kind of thing we're talking about in terms of moving money around. We have other options to make sure we -- whether it's a bond money that's not specified or whether it's other financing mechanisms, that's what we're talking about when we're talking about our priority. I think it's really important that people not misunderstand that. >> Flannigan: And council member kitchen, I think it's almost ironic that we're talking about this on this site, purchased with bonds for a different purpose that we will have to refund in order to do this purpose. It's almost its own proof of that statement. >> Kitchen: Uh-huh. >> Mayor Adler: Council member Renteria. >> Renteria: Thank you, mayor. You know, there's a lot of -- there's a great opportunity here. We have been discussing that particular area for years, and we have a lot of tools in our toolbox. I mean, we can look at [2:00:47 PM] the Mueller lot. I mean, we have over 25% of affordable housing there at Mueller presently, you know. And we went into -- capital metro went into a long-term lease there at saltillo and we got 18% of affordable units through there, and they still own the land. So there's a lot of opportunity besides tif's and bonds. And we would have opportunities at one time where a developer was going to come on one of our lands and build apartments, lease half of them at market rate, and the other half would be ours to control and rent it out to affordable housing. But a hurricane came through Houston and wiped him out, and so he had to pull back out. But there's -- those are the kind of opportunities that we have. And I think that, you [2:01:47 PM] know, these are the kind of great opportunities that we need to take advantage of, because we know that we're limited in funds, especially when it comes to developing our own property and going to build housing. But we've got a lot of -- a lot of nonprofits out there, foundation community, neighborhood -- have all these groups out there that can get calculus -- get tax credits also. We need to look at all the opportunities available for us. But this is a great -- great project. You know, growing up in Austin, I knew all about the history of St. John and how a lot of their land was taken away from them, you know, with the Jim crow era. And that's what happened to a lot. We've been -- we saw what happened to Clarksville. You know, those are the kind of properties where end of land grants -- you know, after the civil war, we ended up losing [2:02:47 PM] it. You know, we've got rhyme we've got prime examples of what happened in the past. This is a good opportunity to bring people who grew up there the right to return, and that's what I would love to see happening to that area, you know. We just -- we need to right the injustice that happened in the past, and I think this is one of the great projects that we could start up. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Anything else on this before we go to the next item? Yes, council member tovo. >> Tovo: Yeah, I too wanted to add my thanks to council member Casar for carrying this project forward and really doing the kind of community engagement that allowed it to be successful. I think it is going to be a great example. I want to just also mention that back around the time that this was being identified as a track that could be redeveloped, potentially, there was several others, including [indiscernible] Drive and one or two others that the staff [2:03:49 PM] mentioned would be -- would be good to consider for redevelopment with affordable housing as a primary component. So I know council member pool has provided leadership for Ryan drive and that will be a project moving forward [indiscernible] -- [audio is cutting out.] I think we do have great opportunities. I would suggest it as a backup [indiscernible] >> Mayor Adler: Cutting closer to your microphone, Cathy? >> Tovo: Such a great -- yeah. Any better? >> Mayor Adler: Yes. >> Tovo: Let me get off for a minute. The other thing I wanted -- can you hear me? >> Flannigan: I was going to say I think the real broadband we need is for council member tovo. >> Tovo: Well, I'm doing the best I can under some pretty -- >> Flannigan: I'm sorry, I don't mean to make light, Kathie, I know that it's tough. >> Tovo: Yeah. The other thing I wanted [2:04:49 PM] to just thank, the other people I wanted to thank is largely the community. I think they did absolutely tremendous work, as my colleagues have said. And I want to thank our staff, our real estate staff really have made some very strategic moves. And the auto dealership was a piece that was added to this tract. And, you know, they saw the opportunity and seized on it, so thank you to Jenny plumber and Laurie Rizer who were involved with that. Can you still hear me okay? Okay. Great. Thanks. I did have -- I don't have all my materials with me at home at the moment, but I wanted to ask if someone could please -- or with me at the moment, in front of me, can somebody please remind me exactly what the bonds -- I know they were lumped together, and I'm looking at them, but is there no way to separate out what this individual -- what these individual tracts -- the [2:05:50 PM] portion of those bonds that constituted, or is that 6 to $9 million truly the Home Depot plus the dealership portion of that? Is that 9 to $10 million actually the amount -- >> Hi, council member tovo? This is -- council member tovo, this is Christine Maguire with the economic development department. The bonds bought both properties. So -- at different times. But the same bonds with the same covenants. And so the total spent, which includes appraisal studies, in addition to the acquisition, total 12.4 million. And because the language in the contract with the voters stated a municipal [2:06:52 PM] court, it was actually in the bond brochure, then that, I guess, makes us a little stuck. We have been working very closely with our bond counsel and our law department about the parameters of the bonds and going through all sorts of kabooky dance on how to overcome that hurdle. And so we will continue to work closely with legal counsel and bond counsel. But right now, what -- our cleanest path forward is to look and ask for basically and up-front payment that would pay what we currently owe on the bonds. And there is a prepayment penalty, just full transparency, we reness refinanced those bonds [2:07:52 PM] not too long ago, so we owe 9.1 million. The prepayment if we pay anytime soon, is about 1 million. I hope that answers your question. We have been looking at different pieces and parts of how to parse this out, but it is complicated and we have involved bond counsel, and we will continue to involve bond counsel as we continue. >> Tovo: Yeah, thank you, I was hoping you were going to say it was closer to 2 million, so that's still a pretty significant sum. And I know that we have gotten some revenue. I toured the site at some point with council member Casar, we toured the automotive site, and I know we were renting it out -- the city was renting it out at that time to film companies and others, so I know -- I assume that the dollar figures you're looking at also subtract out any revenue that we received during that time. >> Council member, that's a really good point, and [2:08:52 PM] we will dig deeper into that. Thank you for pointing that out. We appreciate that. >> Tovo: Sure. Thank you very much. Sorry again for the technological challenges. As I mentioned, I'm experiencing a pretty significant family situation, and so I'm doing my best to balance all of this, and so my technology is not -- not up to par at the moment. >> Council member tovo, I appreciate that. I also wanted to state really quickly about the Ryan drive you mentioned, that is one of the other properties for which the economic development department is actively repositioning. We've been working very closely and should be issuing a memo very soon that actually uses the same form and structure of a report that summarizes a vision and strangely to achieve the vision, and we're working towardsan rfp in the very near future that has been drafted. We are on track. >> Tovo: That is super exciting. [2:09:56 PM] I know the mayor asked about an economic development, I hope we're on the verge of seeing that in real life, I think it would really help us on this front as we continue to move these projects forward. Do you have a timeline, by chance, on that? >> Council member, it couldn't happen soon enough as far as I'm concerned, but I do believe Veronica Briseno or [indiscernible] Acm Gomez is on the line. We're targeting August for a more robust conversation. >> You may recall that we had issued a memo, I believe it was in late may, about an update for the economic development corporation. We expect to get council the report and memo by the end of this week. >> Tovo: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Council member pool? >> Pool: Thanks to [2:10:56 PM] Christine and to Rodney and everybody for all the work that they're doing on these -- this land that the city of Austin is repurposing. There really is some amazing and exciting stuff going on. My district has the Ryan drive property, but it's right across Lamar from council member Casar's [indiscernible], so they are also joined with crestview residents and [indiscernible] Residents to work on that plan, too. So we've got so much really great work going on with our -- with our communities. So inspiring and heartening to see the work -- energizing, too, to see the work start to come to fruition. So thanks to our staff for all the diligence. Really appreciate it. >> Mayor Adler: Anything else? Then I think we're ready to move on. Thank you very much. [2:11:57 PM] Colleagues, thank you, Rodney. Manager, I think that gets us to the budget presentation. >> Yes, thank you, mayor and council. We're now turning to discuss the portion of the work session on our fiscal year 2020-2021 budget. To do that, we have asked our chief financial officer, Ed van eenoo, to lay out some of the dates and framing for this discussion and for future conversations. I'd also asked our deputy city manager to talk about what we're doing for the next steps on the reimagining [indiscernible] Conversation. As you know, when this budget was presented two weeks ago, I highlighted the fact that it's one of the most challenging budgets that we put together. Not only are we dealing with the crisis of a pandemic of the world, a very difficult discussion around how we look at public safety in our community going forward. So both of those combined, knowing that we [2:12:58 PM] had to produce a budget a month ahead of time than what was normally scheduled, has kind of been the situation. So we talked about a moment in time budget that would be amended over the course of this next year. And so hopefully that will be part of these discussions as well. But with that, I'll turn it over to our deputy chief financial officer, Ed van eenoo. >> Thank you, Spencer, good afternoon, mayor, mayor pro tem, and councilmembers, Ed van eenoo, deputy chief financial officer for the city. I just had a few slides to get the ball rolling this morning, to talk about our upcoming budget dates, and the proposed agenda for the next two work sessions, as well as the process that we'd be recommending to council for councilmembers to bring for your various own amendments to the city manager's proposed budget. Let's move to the next slide, please. So on this slide, you see [2:13:59 PM] our upcoming budget dates are. This isn't all the dates, we had a bunch leading to this point today, but here we are, July 28th, at our first budget work session of two. We'll be back July 30th at the regularly scheduled council meeting where we'll be holding a public input session on the budget. This will be our second public input session. On August 4th, we have an all-day budget work session scheduled with the city council. August 6th, there's a public safety committee. This is not officially part of our budget calendar, but on the public safety committee agenda is a discussion of the city's public safety budget, so I put that on there for reference. And then on August 12th, we'll begin our budget adoption proceedings. A little bit different than what we've done in past years, those proceedings will start off with a final round of public hearings on the budget and the tax rate. That will then be [2:15:00 PM] followed by the proceedings to adopt the budget, including council considering the various amendments that councilmembers elect to bring forward, and then finally, after the budget has been adopted, that's also when council would be asked to do a tax rate election related to [indiscernible] Next slide, please. So for today's work session, it's 2:15. We estimate this session will probably take about two hours. This is not going to get through all the questions, we're really looking at this work session to try to tee up the areas we need to spend more time on and working with councilmembers on. Here I am talking about the work session agendas and I'll get into the budget amendment process in a bit. When I'm done with that, we would like to plan a staff briefing about what is going on with the continuing effort to reimagine public safety and what next steps staff [2:16:01 PM] is recommending in that process. After we do that, we would then be looking to turn it over to council to have a round table discussion about the reimagining of public safety and using that as an opportunity for council to start bringing forward additional ideas you may have about what that could look like for fiscal year 2020-2021. Staff would then want to come back, based on the ideas we hear today, back to the August 4th work session, information about the various concepts we hear today and to continue that conversation. Then finally we also then -- a similar process to what I just described to the reimagining of public safety, but any other budget topics that councilmembers feel that we need to have additional conversation leading up to adoption of the budget on August 12th. I'm looking forward today largely hearing from council about the special points in the budget that [2:17:03 PM] we need to spend some more time on before moving forward with adoption. Moving to the next slide and planned agenda for August 4th, we would propose this to be an all-day work session starting at 9:00 A.M. There's a lot in this budget related to homelessness and of course the consultant report on homelessness recently came out so we would propose council using this work session to talk about those two things, breaking for lunch, then coming back at 1:00 to continue the conversation about the reimagine and public safety concepts that were identified at the July 28th work session. Then from 3:00 to 5:00, doing the same thing, but for the other budget topics on what we identified today for council, things you want to hear more about. The next slide, after August 4th, on August 6th, the public safety committee is having a meeting to further discuss the public safety budget and [2:18:03 PM] of course this meeting will be open to all councilmembers. So those are the key dates, the timeline ahead of us. The next slide then we put together a process for council -- what we hope is an orderly process for council bringing forward amendments to the proposed budget. This seemed to work last year so we're following the same process as last year. I sent to you last night a standardized form for councilmembers to provide your amendments. This will help ensure that we have consistency across the various amendments. We would ask that councilmembers post their perspective amendments to the council message board no later an August 10th to give everyone sufficient time to review the various amendments that will be considered. On August 11th, staff will compile all the amendments that we have received that have been posted to the message board into a sealed packet and send that to councilmembers on August 11th. And in doing so, that will ensure that everyone is working from the same documents at the [2:19:03 PM] beginning of the budget proceeding on August 12th. I'm going to take a pause there, if you can go to the next slide and put that up there, this is just for anybody watching to get a whole bunch more information about the city's budget, it's speakupaustin.org. But I take a pause here, mayor, to see if there's any questions about the timeline or the agenda for the meeting or the budget amendment process I just laid out. >> Mayor Adler: Any questions on those topics? Okay. Why don't you go ahead and proceed. >> So I just have one more slide, if we can move to the next slide, please, before I transition over to deputy city manager, I wanted to lay out for the city council in a little bit more detail -- >> Kitchen: Ed? >> Mayor Adler: Hang on one second. Yes, council member kitchen? >> Kitchen: I'm sorry, I had my hand up. So, council member Flannigan, you've been doing a really good job [2:20:03 PM] of letting us know how you want to handle meetings. So when you get that clear on -- for the August -- whatever date that was, meeting, if you have a way in which you want us to provide our thoughts on amendments, let us know because that -- that meeting will be before we actually will be posting, although some of us may be able to post before then, so thank you. >> Flannigan: Well, I think some of us have already posted on the message board, using the form that Ed has put out. And I think the sooner we can get the bigger ideas out, the more likely it is we can find a way to fit them all together, and then dig into the details at the committee meeting on the 6th. I'm hopeful that if folks are able to participate on the 6th, then we can spend the 4th on all the other things we've got to worry about, because there's obviously a lot more in the budget to focus on. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you. So I'll work to make sure that any suggestions I [2:21:04 PM] have are all on the message board well in advance of that meeting. >> Mayor Adler: Rodney? Go ahead. Sorry. >> So back to this one slide, we just wanted, before turning it over to deputy city manager [indiscernible], I wanted to provide the summary of the ins and outs of the police department budget and how it changed from the fiscal year '20 budget to fiscal year '21. Budgets are complicated, a lot of moving pieces in there, a lot of numbers to discuss, so I put this slide together to try to help council and the commity to understand the ins and outs of the changes in the police department budget. From so on the far left, that first blue bar shows the fiscal year 2020 approved budget, that's the budget that council approved for the current fiscal year, $434.5 million. A standard part, kind of a beginning part of our budget process every year, when we did develop [2:22:08 PM] the department back in March and April, to work through the department base cost drivers. For the police department, there was $7.9 million in cost drivers that we added to their base budget for fiscal year '21, that was the 30 additional officers, police staffing plan, as well as 2% pay increases both for civilians and sworn personnel. There's other ups and downs in there, but for the most part, those are the two largest drivers of the base increases. Then in June, the city council provided direction to staff to do a number of things. City council directed staff to not add the 30 officers per the police staffing plan, so we took those out of the base budget. Furthermore, they directed us though delay the cadet class and do a calculation of the positions that couldn't originally be filled. The cadet class resulted in some savings, then we estimate there are 70 positions that we will not be able to fill, even with running cadet [2:23:11 PM] classes -- cadet classes through the course of fiscal year 2021. That totaled an $11.3 million reduction from that base budget. Then some of that 11.3 million I understanded up beingal indicated back to the police department. Two items in particular, the record management system and additional funding for training needs was the $3.2 million added back. You take those ups and downs and end up at $434.3 million. I just wanted to put that out there because we received a lot of questions about all these different changes and 11.3 million versus, you know, the $200,000 reduction, and if you look at fy2020 versus fy21, hopefully this clarifies some of these numbers not only for council but the community too, who is interested. I'd be happy to answer any questions about this slide. Otherwise, I will pass it over to deputy city [2:24:12 PM] manager. >> Thank you, Ed. If there are no questions, I will move to my presentation. >> Mayor Adler: Go ahead, please. >> Great. While that presentation is being brought up, I'm [indiscernible], I'm the deputy city manager. We, as staff, I'll say, have been watching with great interest the message board and really excited to see so many comments and initiatives align with some of the ideas that we've had and some of the conversations we've had as well, and seeing some new ideas as that moves forward. And today I just wanted to share with you a very high level overview of what we have been doing on the work to reimagine public safety so far and hopefully give you a sense of some of the conversations we've had and the direction that we're going. Next slide. [2:25:13 PM] So as the city manager convened a leadership team, you'll see the members, the core members in that team there, assistant city managers rey Arellano and Chris [indiscernible] Chief equity officer Brian oaks, chief Manley Bryan Manley, ac Troy gay, Jessica king have really been the core leadership. From the very beginning, I'll say that we took to heart what the manager said in his message about really co-creating with community. We really wanted to make sure that we centered on the voices of those community members and organizations that frankly have been historically impacted by police violence, and so we came up with an initial conceptual framework to really think about how do we move this work forward, and knew that, frankly, there was some bridge- building and there was some [2:26:14 PM] trust-building as we needed to move forward. So the next slide? I want to focus the bulk of my comments on this conceptual framework because it is something that we have shared in large part with the community organizations that we have reached out to. When we thought about creating a city community reimagining task force, we really wanted to make sure that, again, that it was centered in folks who have been working in social justice initiatives, who come to this work knowing a lot of -- are advocates or nonprofits who come to this work really knowing a lot of background and history in Austin about policing, generally. But we also knew, and perhaps as a new person to the community, not just a year here in Austin, it was a good opportunity to have some one-on-one conversations to share the initial framework that we had thought of, but to really make the invitation clear [2:27:15 PM] that we didn't want to just put something out there that was baked, but we really wanted to of this conversation and co-create the next steps with community. And so we have endeavored to do that. I have two last conversations left that hopefully should wrap up by this week. But in those, we asked for some feedback on where we were moving towards and what we were thinking of. In that framework, at a high level, we shared that part of what we wanted to do is to create this really city community task force that would be seeing the umbrella of what we imagining looks like. We anticipate, because we don't want to be a single body that bottlenecks or has things networked that is concurrent, I mean that is consecutive, we would like to have concurrent work as that moves forward. So we anticipate having a series of work groups that would bring in experts, again, from community, other staff [2:28:18 PM] members, depending on the topic, and that work group and those recommendations would come up to the task force as well. We've thought in that framework that that would also allow not only for work to go faster, but frankly, would allow additional opportunities for input from some of our community partners as well. So as we thought about this co-creation and developing a work plan and creating these advisory groups, we threw out there in our conversations that at the -- at our concept, that we thought of use of force and Dee escalation deescalation as two of the main topics, kind of together topics for a work group. We also thought that alternatives to traditional policing is a topic that has come up, and in particular, expanding or exploring other models for mental health or crisis intervention, approaches to homelessness response, victim services needs is a topic that has come up, and we wanted to explore [2:29:18 PM] what that looked like. We too had thought, and I know we saw it in the message boards about creating what does that look like as we move forward. Other topics that we have proposed, once again, when this community task force is convened, we hope that together we can formalize the topics and priorities to be doing next, but we have not taken anything off the table and have conversed about governance models, there are a variety of jurisdictions that have either boards or planning commission commissions that are civilians. Examples such as Boston that has actually a police commissioner that heads the department with a superintendent in chief that is sworn, there are other governance models out there as we move forward. Reduction of -- reduce the amount of intervention that [2:30:19 PM] community officers do this. Certainly work happening and conversation goes happening about training. There is current work already happening about culture change in the department and looking forward to seeing some of those existing reports come forward and I'll talk about that in a moment. The other aspects that we talked in this task force is we talked with our community partners is that we are exploring the hiring of 21st century policing as a real active facilitator for this work. I know that my colleagues, acms, [indiscernible] And areno has talked to the folks at 21st century policing. I'm joining that conversation with them directly with Ron Davis tomorrow as we explore that and what we hope sort of scoped out in terms of that work is a facilitation -- an active facilitation and a national perspective much like we have done with our homelessness consultants with Matthew courtty and Barbara coffee as we have [2:31:21 PM] brought them forward. Daugherty. But certainly to assist us with the task force, but frankly also to be technical advisors directly with pd as we move forward. As the work of reimagining progresses, we also make sure that the day-to-day work happening in pd continues to be aligned with how we are moving forward in that remeaning framework. We also have a -- reimagining framework. We have also have a group focused on data and research. We are having one-on-one conversations. Those conversations have been certainly instructive and then I think really necessary to pull this group together. We didn't want to be waiting for some of the work. We want to be ready to jump in as soon as that task force is convened. So we have the innovation team, Karrie O'Connell looking at 911 review and [2:32:22 PM] analysis. Also taking some of the work that has already been done in community, particularly the ajc work they hired with analytics, also performing a deeper dive if getting additional research and data from APD directly. We are looking at peer city reviews and have a whole set of conversations and models to look at. Whether it's kahoots, councilmember Flannigan I know that you brought that into the public safety committee. I know other jurisdictions like Denver and San Francisco have taken that approach and made it work for their jurisdictions. And there are others, new York City has life camp that really focuses on violence, other cities across the nation do different violence prevention. We want to take a look at a variety of other things that are happening in the nation [2:33:22 PM] to see what could work in Austin. So we are exploring those. And then we're also exploring the role of bias. And in not just data collection. We saw some of that with the racial profiling report, but the equity office, innovation team, [indiscernible] But we also know for example, I will speak a little bit about this in a moment, under concurrent work. If we are thinking of -- of taking dispatch or the emergency call center, 911 and making that a separate standalone entity or removing that, somehow from the current police department, that that achieves one perhaps aspect of separating duties. But there still continues to have to be underlying work on the bias that we all have to work. Like bias is all something that we all have to work on, that we all have to move forward. How those calls are received. How the questions are answered. That is ongoing work. To make sure that we are paying attention to that as [2:34:24 PM] we move forward in assessing those calls and then really diverting them to potentially other folks, in addition to pd, but perhaps other folks like our mental health, our crisis prevention, whether it's host, whether it's expanding mcot to really see what that looks like. So that research is ongoing, we hope by the time we convene the city community reimagining task force, early next month, that we are able to then move forward and have some of those at the ready for them. The other thing that I'll say about the city community task force is that it is our expectation that we will come to council periodically seeking either approval or budget amendments, in fact. I mean, I know that as we are moving forward with some of the ideas, we chose not to forward them in budget at the moment because we just didn't know how that was going to land. I gave some examples of thinking about and I'm jumping a little bit to the [2:35:25 PM] concurrent work column, but we are currently working on those moves because we believe those can be done administratively, but when we are thinking about 911, where we're thinking about the forensics lab, or shifting some of the management services into other departments or to the corporate departments, the corporate Pio or it or hr or finance, there are some under-- there's underlying work that has to be done. Do we have a standalone, do we not? How do the shifts really fit into the current classifications or department? There are questions that we have to do. We did not have those answered yet. But we have already convened some of those meetings and that work is ongoing and as that work progresses, we anticipate coming to council in pieces, not waiting for the entire framework to be done, but we anticipate seeking approval to shift budgets or yeah shift budgets around through [2:36:25 PM] budget amendment process. This work and this framework, as this continues to move forward, will, of course, require a great deal of community engagement. We anticipate trying to really engage the whole of community at this time and have not been able to do that yet. As we're just kicking off the work. So we asked our team, our core leadership team, we had equity office and opo and our innovation office and our project lead for resilience, [indiscernible], to really think forward about creating a pilot listening session and thinking about what could that be that we could then engage other organizations, we can do this ourselves, but also engage other organizations in helping us with this template, across the city, because we also have to recognize that for -- for -- there are communities and there are areas in which government is not the most trusted voice and so we really want to leverage those community [2:37:26 PM] members and organizations that can reach community deeper than perhaps if it were just government hosting a listening session on its own. We are piloting an initial listening session with that template. This Thursday. With the public safety commission, with the joint inclusion commission and with our quality of life commission. So we'll know more as we get feedback from them on Thursday evening. About what that looks like. It had been a date that was set a while ago, at least in our calendars. And so we are going to give that a go and see what feedback we get. What tweaks we have to get. And if it resonates as we move forward. So we are hoping that -- that that will be successful. We're also working with the equity office to see how we can leverage their minimum knee grant programs so we -- mini grant programs so we can support those communities that can take on some of these engagement work and we find ways to [2:38:27 PM] resource that as well. In these conversations, I'll say, too, that we want to have focus groups. It is hard for us to imagine doing this work without speaking to some of our internal staff as well who will be impacted by this work. We have not yet heard from pd. We need to hear from pd voices. There are a lot of whether it's civilian or sworn voices that we have not heard from. I mentioned victim services before. It is an area that has been publicly talked about in terms of whether that is an area that could shift elsewhere or whether that needs to stay within pd. And I appreciate the concept of thinking about different ways that we can do it. But we have not spoken to staff that actually do that work. So we want to create some listening sessions with pd directly. We have also heard and we've had ideas ourselves about expanding the role of ems or host or shifting some of the functions to code or to pard and others and we have not had a conversation with them [2:39:27 PM] to see how would that impact your mission, how would that impact your work. We want to make sure that we host some focus groups with internal staff as well. We are also creating, I know that communications is working on this as well as opo is providing some assistance on creating a really robust communications plan. We want to try to be as transparent as we can be. We believe that's the best way to build trust as we do this work. So we are working on a website landing page that -- that will contain where we are with the listening sessions, when they can be summaries of those, summary of our meeting notes as we think about the city community task force because we also want to be as transparent as we can be about that. We will have some surveys, survey results in different languages and be able to provide progress reports as that moves forward. So staff is actively working on creating that landing page that we can share out. And then I mentioned a little bit that we are not waiting to convene the city community reimagining task [2:40:27 PM] force where there is -- where there are things to be happening. So there is some concurrent work that's moving forward. There were already some consulting work and I'll talk about -- I'll share with you some slides in a moment. About what that looks like. But we are mapping out existing initiatives in terms of what consulting work has already been or as a result of some of the resolutions that you have passed as a body, that we were following up on. I mentioned that our innovation team is working on the review of 911 calls. To see what that looks like. Including sort of all of the usual metrics and including sort of officer initiated call trends, the categorization of type and sort of the geographic dispersion and response times amongst other metrics as we move that forward. I know that they are slated to come forward before the public safety committee soon and so -- so while I don't expect that they will be [2:41:27 PM] finished with their entire report, I do think that they will be able to provide some good initial data about what that looks like. Part of recent resolution also has the opm, office of performance management. Partnering with our -- our equity office and our innovation team to really review metrics and benchmarks and how those baseline measures are established and enhanced racial justice goals in alignment with sb 23. So that is work that is ongoing, I am sure that we will be reporting on that soon. And then, I finally mention as we move and are getting things done and some of the review that we're looking at administratively, we have also had additional conversations about other items. And I know that those are conversations that you yourselves are having about other areas. Can we move or should we [2:42:28 PM] move some of the policing that happens by APD in parks or Lakes or the airport, could we shift that differently. There has been a lot of conversation about internal affairs, quite frankly. I know that there are national trends that suggest that should be a standalone. We are looking at what that looks like. But there are legal concerns that we have. So we have not brought that forward yet. And wanting to make sure that it does not incur some unintended consequences in terms of the candor, particularly that officers are able to bring forward as -- as they are required to be to report out on incidents. So that is some of the work that is happening. I can go to the next slide for a minute. So as we thought about to pivot a little bit to some of the unanswered questions that we don't know. One of the reasons that we didn't bring a big change in our recommendations through the budget process yet, because we -- we just didn't [2:43:28 PM] know what some of the impact of things like chapter 143, and -- and pertinent case law about where sworn versus civilian rules and who can assume those and who can supervisors those supervise those, we wanted to be thoughtful about changes in classifications, pensions, as we rethink what are some duties civilians could have versus sworn officers or if sworn officers were asked to respond in different ways, what does that look like. Again as I mentioned, some of the best place for these moves, how does that fit into the department's organizational structures and their mission. Then importantly, I have learned now being in Texas, that Texas law has some peculiarities that we have to work with. So what proposals might require legislative changes as we move fort. [2:44:28 PM] Next slide. Move forth. Finally, I just wanted to share with you, some of the mapping of existing work and give you some general time frames that have been happening. We have mentioned that there was already consulting services that we expect to have some initial analysis at the end of this month. And some actually development of some strategies in next month that are happening by Dr. Joyce James and her team. I had the privilege of meeting her and hearing a little bit about her initial work and I think some of that work and some of her assessment and recommendations on workplace culture I think are going to be really instrumental for our work moving forward. In part of -- there was a different resolution or a different sorry city manager's initiative that is looking at AFD and some of the dispatch emergency medical response. While that evaluation of [2:45:29 PM] proposals is happening, at the moment, there could be some areas where that fits into our broader framework. And we certainly wanted to make sure that we kept a track of where that work was and that we apprised the task force as a body of what that work is as we move forward. There was in a recent resolution a comprehensive evaluation of how sexual assaults that are reported to APD are investigated and processed. That work is ongoing. And a final report and a presentation are expected in 2022. We will be monitoring that work to see what, if any of that, can be brought into the current work that we have as well. Next slide. And then recent -- another resolution about the investigations follows the Tatum report and so that final report and presentation is expected to come forward by December 6th of 2021 and we will see, again, if there are segments or if any learning [2:46:30 PM] from that can be brought into some of the remeaning work as we -- reimagining work as we move forward. Also a very view of cadet training academy that is scheduled for their final report in November of this year, with intermittent report on individual topics, so you will have an opportunity to see that soon. Finally, that review the metrics and benchmarks and baseline measures aimed at zero based racial policy goals are expected to have an update and interim recommendations by October of this year. So, again, I hope that you -- this gives you a better sort of update on and a better perspective on where we are as staff in moving forward. We can go to the next slide, ich is my end slide. We are really thankful and I have to say that really so appreciative of the time and the insight that so many of our community members have given us as we have thought about this task force work moving forward. We were happy to see that I [2:47:31 PM] think conceptually we were very aligned with our community partners. There are some, it has given us some insight and some recommendations to think about in terms of the composition of the community task force. As we heard some feedback from community members on -- on the role of staff in those task force. So we will be thinking through that. But didn't want to make a final recommendation to the city manager until we honored the fact that we have two more of those conversations to go. So happy to -- to answer any questions, but just wanted to be -- so appreciative of both our community members and frankly our staff who has been that core leadership team and the expanded leadership team that you saw in the beginning, they have been working a lot together to -- information and to move forward. We need as a group, the core leadership team, we meet weekly for a protracted [2:48:33 PM] period with a lot of work happening in between. We anticipate that continuing and to put that sense of urgency on this work as we moved forward. We are as committed as you take this opportunity and -- an amazing opportunity that frankly is happening all across the nation, to make systemic and sustainable change that will be a legacy for the city. With that, I will stand for questions if you have them. >> Mayor Adler: Sound good. Can you return us to the full screen. Colleagues, any questions on any of the presentation that you have? Councilmember Casar? And then councilmember Flannigan. >> Casar: I really appreciate this work. I posted to the message board that I think it might be useful as we finalize the [2:49:34 PM] budget to -- to -- to -- [indiscernible] [Cutting out] Between community council and -- and city staff [indiscernible] Coming together on the calendar of action. In several parts of the proposal as laid out, but I'm interested in -- something that we can't easily just do with budget changes. For example, if -- if there is a really large number of commercial burglar alarms that are false alarms, reduce the work that we go to, reduce the amount of police time that is needed, you wind up in the chicken and the egg scenario where you can't reduce the overtime until we know how many of those calls we can introduce and then also works the other way around. So I would be interested in is how do we calendar out ways to -- to reduce the number of things that we [2:50:35 PM] address specifically with policing and -- and reallocate dollars associated with that, sort of in a calendared way. After -- after, you know, after we do whatever we need to get done specifically in the budget in August. You know, other things associated with that, you have got through a lot of those in your list. I think passing a calendar that shows which months, that those have policing policy and budget implications at the same time. It's really of interest to me. And -- and maybe we should find a way to work on that calendar all of us together. >> Councilmember, I appreciate that. I reference that a little bit in the work plan as we move forward. It is our -- we did not want to create a calendar and a work plan. Again. We want to co-create this with the task force. We hope ones that task force is convened we can together create the calendar because this will create the [2:51:35 PM] necessity to prioritize what topics are we taking first, when do we think we can put deadlines and dates to it and come back to council. But we did not want to do that as staff on our own. We really are grounded in trying to do this with -- with community as a partner. So we have stopped short of -- of calling this -- this a formal framework with -- with -- that is all baked in that really it is about the conceptual framework. And believe once we are able to convene quite quickly, we all have a sense of urgency to come forward and think through what is that calendar and prioritization look like. Councilmember Flannigan? >> Flannigan: Thank you. Yeah, this is a lot of good work in process. One thing that you said about -- about having not engaged with -- with the pd yet, you know, the council [2:52:35 PM] has. And the public safety committee has very intentionally included officers who are -- who are doing work now in the conversations that we've been having about -- about budget and use of force and 911 and -- and all of those issues because you're right, it is important to have those conversations. I didn't want the public to think no one was doing that. >> Excellent. >> Because in fact the council is doing that through the public safety committee. Something you said at the end wanting to co-create the work with the task force, it's important to also co-create it with the council. If we don't do a better job collaborating in tandem on this work, we're going to go off in different directions. I'm concerned some of that is happening of the it is not a typical process. Normally council does a resolution, staff goes off [2:53:36 PM] and does some work, brings back an answer. There's nothing about what's happening in our community right now on any level that is normal. We have to think about how this work gets done in a different way. I'm not going anywhere. I'm at home. I can zoom call with anybody at any time. So let me -- let me please engage the council, engage the committee, in this co-creation. Because it's -- because it's absolutely essential and a lot of the community engagement occurs through our offices. Through our constituents, through our appointments to committees. To appointments to commissions. You have seen proposals that I have put on the message board, councilmember Casar, councilmember pool, councilmember alter, councilmember kitchen, a lot of us have put proposals out on the message board and it's unknown how much of that is -- is actually part of the work that you have done or -- or how much of it has been in tandem. It all sounds great but [2:54:37 PM] please do a better of partnering on this. I have to be able to answer to the public every step that you are taking. Otherwise I'm going to start creating my own steps. >> I appreciate that councilmember Flannigan. I think that we as we continue to do that we wanted to -- to make sure that we had a concept that was -- that was supported and that was -- that was -- I think would be something that we could work with community on as we move forward. I know that we have had some conversations at a certain level, but I take your point that we want to do more. We want to be even more engaged. In our engagement plan and in our listening sessions. We certainly include conversations with council and council offices, we wants to make sure that we -- that we know from you directly what are some of the organizations out in the community that you think are critical that we should -- we should move forward, but certainly as we saw -- the -- the amount of -- of [2:55:38 PM] some of which we share,? Some of which are novel. I think we need to continue to bridge and collaborate. A matter of finding better avenues, we will certainly work with the public safety committee to continue to bring ideas forward and share where we are. >> I think one of the places where that conflict shines a light is it's natural for -- for you and -- city manager cronk and the staff to want to have a very slow and thoughtful and deliberate process where you have dotted every I, crossed every T, figured out every legal risk. You have made your own decisions. Then you have the public that says do it now. And the council is the place where that line between do it now and take -- have this long elaborate process, we are the ones that have to decide when you stop doing the long process and you start acting. That's how the democracy piece works for me at least. So that's -- that's in part why I think the collaboration is so [2:56:40 PM] important. When we're talking about -- you know, reimagining or reconstructing or, you know, pick a word, we are doing things that no city has ever done. They are inherently going to be unknowns and risks and I think the council as the -- as the elected representatives of the public need to be the ones who are determining what level of risk we are comfortable with. >> I appreciate that. Councilmember. I'm often -- I often say we don't want to let perfect be the enemy of good and there is -- there is a sense of urgency here that we want to balance between at least exploring and there are some things that we have to know. We have to know some of the legal barriers. We have to know what does that look like as we shift. But we also don't have to have it so completely Polish and wait as you say until every I is dotted, every T is crossed before we bring it forward. We want to wait until it is [2:57:41 PM] sufficient to bring forward. Most of what I wouldn't even say delay, most of our prework has been to make sure that we could bring some of the community folks into this task force so we can convene that and come together. It wasn't just staff. But I certainly take your point that we have to continue to work with community, with our staff, with you as council to really, truly get to the work that we are all trying to get to, which is reimagining public safety. >> I want to repeat what I think what I hear Greg saying and what I heard Jimmy say. I think it's -- I think it's really one of the key issues for -- for how protective this could be or not or how the community and the stakeholders see something like this. And -- and it's -- the audience -- [indiscernible] You have raised a lot of issues and ideas that I have heard. [2:58:41 PM] The community raised as well as my colleagues raise. But on its face, there's nothing in it that -- that would suggest that -- that it's -- that it's different than yet another committee or task force that's analyzing the -- the questions. And I think that councilmember Casar in asking for a calendar is going to - - going to the issue of -- of how is it that -- that as a community, we would know that institutionalized or baked into this was something -- that actually raised the level of confidence that things would, in fact, reach to conclusion and would -- would result in -- in real transformative change. I think the institutionalizing of the idea itself, because that -- because that to Jimmy's point is -- is every bit as important as are the ideas [2:59:44 PM] themselves. It's the resolve that it actually works. And I appreciate, for example, the fact that -- that you would anticipate coming to the council, numerous times as you have ideas, that are ready to come, but if there's a -- if there's a group like this that's looking like you need to come to the council more frequently than that because the council may have things that it wants to raise with you, questions from the community, so the point of -- of getting together can't be just when -- when you feel like you have something ready to -- to report. And that >> And that also needs to be institutionalized or baked into the processes as well. >> It has to manifest on its face, the direct assurance that this is open, transparent, fast and designed to realize change. [3:00:45 PM] >> Uh-huh. I appreciate that, mayor, and I -- you know, I certainly can have this conversation with some of our community organizations, how is this task force different, right? And all I can say is we are committed and we're leaning in. The people on the task force and, you know, not only am I leaning in, but people that I believe community trusts on the task force, and whether that's our equity office, our po office, the activists that we have in the nonprofit organizations that we've been talking to, I think we are building that trust to know that we're moving forward. I think we will lose that trust if we don't make good on some of the commitments that we have made early on. And part of those is coming forward early in the fall to think about what does -- what do some of those moves mean. And the commitment we have by saying out loud, yes, we are thinking about some of the transfers or moving some [3:01:46 PM] notions or expanding notions of crisis intervention and mental health. And committing to it. I mean, all we can do is to move forward and to show how committed we are. Certainly, understand that, again, that there's bridge building and trust building to happen. And I'm hoping that as soon as this committee or task force can convene, that one of the first things that we do is to provide ourselves a calendar, because it is that work plan and that calendaring that creates accountability for all of us as we move forward. So... >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Councilmember alter then councilmember kitchen. >> >> Alter: I actually wasn't raising my hand yet, so if councilmember kitchen wants to go. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember kitchen? >> I just want to echo what my colleagues have said. I think a calendar would help everyone understand what the process is. [3:02:47 PM] I think it's also necessary to put some specifics about what -- around what the process is for people to share their -- their questions or their concerns. I don't -- I'm not -- I don't know where that is in the process, but there needs to be. >> Uh-huh. >> Kitchen: Because there's a lot -- I think that there are people -- you know, we're all on the same page, I think, about safety and about -- about matching the function to the right person, which is a lot of what I see reimagining and reallocating is. We've talked about how heltd, homelessness, other things. It's really a better fit for a nonsworn officer or for a mental health professional or some other type of professional to address those concerns. And I think that -- or to address those issues. And I think the police would agree with a lot of this, and [3:03:50 PM] they have said, as councilmember Flannigan has said in the conversations that we've had in the public safety commission. So with that said, a lot of people in our community don't know what we're talking about. They're worried what we're talking about. And so they need to understand -- they need to see a timeline and they need to see a place and a time in which they can express any questions that they have. So -- >> I take -- yep. Sorry, councilmember, I apologize. >> Kitchen: No, no, that's it. That's it. >> Okay. So, again, the timeline, I think we already anticipate working out. The robust communication's plan, not only will have the website, but we will, again, we will plan on listening sessions across the city. We plan on surveys, we plan on putting this in Austin speak up. We've got a variety of other areas in where we want to hear as many voices as we can. We have designed the listening [3:04:50 PM] sessions in part to be able to quantify some of the conversations that we've had that when we sort of come and share with community and with council, we can say we've heard, you know, thousands of voices. And of these voices, this is where X percent say this is where I want a uniform to show up or this is where I don't want a uniform to show up because it is a triggering thing to me in community, because they're alternatives that you should have. So we certainly are moving in that direction, and as soon as that is finalized and we continue to work on that with our -- with our communications design team and our equity team, and think through with community, particularly those community members or organizations that will take advantage of some of those many grants to do some of that engagement, we will be continuing to showcase where those events are happening and have dashboards about some of the input that we receive. So, again, we are trying to be as transparent as we can as we [3:05:52 PM] do this work, because we believe it is so essential to building and then maintaining the trust as we move forward. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you. I appreciate all the work that went into this and the thoughtfulness of trying to tailor options to Austin and make sure we're moving forward in the most effective way possible. I didn't see in your presentation, though, who is on the task force? I saw the cmo leadership team. Can you help us understand who is on the task force or which groups, at least? >> Sure. I can share with you some of the groups that we have spoken with, but I'll also say that they, too, needed to go back to some of their boards to see if this -- if this is the right place for them or if we design different tables, if they wanted to be on that table. But we have thought of -- we've talked to the crime [3:06:52 PM] commission, we've talked to aclu, we've talked to naacp, we have talked to ajc, we have talked to gave, to Austin interface, to Texas appleseed, to just liberty. We have a few more to go. Austin Asian community health initiative and -- are some of the organizations we have not talked to yet. I'm sure I'm missing some folks that have not come to the fore , but those are the types of organizations that we're speaking to directly as we move forward. Some have expressed an interest in serving, absolutely, on the task force. Some have expressed an interest depending on who else from the city staff is on the task force, and in particularly, the role of pd, as we move forward. And so we take those -- that insight and that feedback to heart. Some have said or at least one have said that maybe the task force itself is not where they want to sit, but if there is a [3:07:54 PM] space for them to provide best practices and research, that that is the area that they feel that they want to do. I did not mention communities of color united, and that is another organization that we have spoken with as well. So we are waiting to have those final two conversations, we hope to send an e-mail out to all saying, all right, now we've finalized those conversations. You've had a chance to go back to your organizations or your partners or your board, let us know if you're in, and we will start the work immediately. But those are the types of organizations that we have focused on. >> Alter: Thank you for that overview, and I just want to redirect something that I've shared with you privately, is that I think that we need to have victims voices in here. And I didn't hear any of the sexual assault advocates or the gun violence groups being part of that. [3:08:54 PM] >> Uh-huh. >> Alter: And I think that, you know, if we're holistically going to reimagine public safety, it is not just the criminal justice side of it that we have to look at. It's all part of a process, and we risk fixing one side and leaving another side broken. And I think the goal is to make everyone feel safer in the community. And so I would like to make sure that those voices are able to be a part of that and I think, you know, in some conversations that I've been hearing where they've been absent, I think there's been some jumping to particular approaches that may not serve the victims well, and we need to really be asking about what our choices do for the victims in particular cases as well. One of the things that I also wanted to just flag in terms of calendar process, you know, and this came up a little bit earlier today when we men moneyedtia we had thinged that [3:09:56 PM] we passed in the budget that we were first being passed today, I know that we have an ems and fire rfp out for, you know, an efficiency review that we passed in last year's budget. It is July. It hasn't even come back to be, you know -- be approved yet. And so I do worry -- you know, there's some realities of government and our ability to act, but I don't think they're going to be in very sync with the demands that we're hearing from the community. And I don't -- I don't know how we square that, but, you know, we need to recognize that we're not evidencing that we can get things done quickly, even when we care about this, that that study in particular had been, you know, on a prior budget and was funded and then, you know, it's not there. And it would be really good to have it back right now, as we're trying to reimagine public safety. So I think we have to figure out how to navigate that, both [3:10:56 PM] for the public and for council in terms of the timetable for getting everything done while at the same time we have to understand our staff have limited resources operating under covid, et cetera. The other thing that I wanted to -- you know, this is very heavy on APD and there's -- and how we change things relative to APD. We had a lot of other departments that operate in public safety realm that I believe should be part of our reimagining public safety. If we really want to get to the root of things and change things for people in our community, we have to be inviting fire and ems and, you know, public health to be really at the center of these discussions. And so I understand the emphasis at first on some of the challenges that we're [3:11:57 PM] experiencing and thinking about how to improve with respect to APD, but we really need to keep our eyes on that larger prize which is reimagining public safety much more broadly. >> Councilmember, I appreciate all of those comments as well. I think we had -- and I believe in one of the slides I specifically point to health and to code and to ems, but certainly understand that as we think about public safety, that we are really thinking about it more broadly. We are starting with pd because we have to sort of think about the work that they do, but then also think about there's been some great work done by ems and how they're managing call volume. And there's been some great work with the host team about what they're doing. There is some thought about thinking about what roll code could play in moving some of these functions as we move forward. So it will be kind of a conversation that we have with a variety of stakeholders, but we're also cognizant that we [3:12:57 PM] can't do it all at once, and I don't think at all that's what you were suggesting. I take to heart that it is about some prioritization, but please know that we envision having a much broader conversation. And to your first point, I believe that is something we've talked about in our work groups and more targeted groups as that moves forward. We're trying to balance the desire for many people, perhaps, to serve on this task force and keeping a number that we can move forward quickly and agilely and seeing what other folks in community can bring their expertise to some of the work groups. But certainly, we'll be bringing back and thinking about if there are critical folks that we have missed in the ability to hear all these voices as we move forward. But I appreciate that. >> Alter: I do think there are people in the victim community who know a lot about how these [3:13:59 PM] things work and how they don't work, and their voices are very important if we want to prevent other people from becoming victims down the line. >> I hear you. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Colleagues? Councilmember kitchen? >> Kitchen: I think I've mentioned this before, and I think it's part of what you're thinking about nuria, but for those who might be listening, we also have a wealth of [lapse in audio] Community and other parts of our community into our boards and commissions appointees, so at some point in your process, reaching out and hearing from those folks. There's the obvious boards and commissions, like the public safety course, which needs to be front and center, and then our quality -- various quality of life commissions. But there are other -- you know, we have a broad range of commissions that are touched by safety, public safety, and [3:15:00 PM] they can be helpful in terms of hearing from the community and understanding community's thinking, maybe. >> I agree, councilmember kitchen, and I think that once we pilot this first listening session on Thursday, we'll learn more on whether we are thinking about it the right way or whether we completely missed the mark, which I hope we have not. But the anticipation is that we then take that and move forward and do a much more robust citywide, and that includes internal and external stakeholders. T and what I'll also say is that our communications plans envision is that is not the only place that we have listening sessions. As we bring forward ideas and recommendations and do that, we continue to engage community. We hope that this is a constant feedback loop and that we really engage the city of Austin in general about reenvisioning public safety. It's a lofty goal but we're [3:16:01 PM] really hoping to take on community engagement in really big ways that get to particularly those voices that have traditionally been underrepresented in our community. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember pool? >> Pool: Thanks, mayor. Nuri rk a, I just wanted to thank you for the comprehensive approach you're taking on this. There's a lot of openings for people to get engaged and share their concerns and their stories and their ideas. As we're all working toward a better future in policing in our city. I wanted to also note that each one of us as councilmembers can also engage our specific district communities to get their feedback, too. And to that end, Natasha and I are looking at having that sort of a focus group next -- I think it's going to be in September, we were looking at doing it next month, but [3:17:01 PM] there's too much going on to try to specifically talk to district 7 and district 1 about their particular issues. And then I fully intend to feed this information back into the larger group so that anything and everything that we're able to compile can be added to the good compilation that you're also working on and leading on, so I imagine other folks -- excuse me. For some reason, I just got something stuck in my throat. Everybody else will probably be doing things like that, too. Providing feedback to you as well. >> I appreciate that, councilmember. And once we finish the pilot session, we hope to package that and offer that, share that, hopefully, if that is useful to councilmembers as you do engagements, because we'd like to get some consistency on the feedback, but there could be other ways to do it. You know, anecdotally I'll share that in my former city, if someone had told me that [3:18:03 PM] I'd be able to move minimum wage forward and do 26 listening sessions and get council to approve it in under a year, I would have called somebody a liar. And, I believe, Spencer, the city manager knows as well, because he lost his deputy for about a year as we did this. It was all I did, and he has encouraged me to think about shifting those responsibilities currently to really focus on public safety. I know that this is important. It is important to you as a council body, it's important to community, it's important to us as staff, so we will do all that we can to be as accountable as we can be, but it also means sort of thinking about those opportunities to continue to have engagement with community as we move forward. So know that we have planned to take on the lessons that we learned from this pilot session and share that with your offices and as we have additional tools on engagement, we will do that as [3:19:03 PM] well. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Casar? >> Casar: Thank you for saying that and I just want to express because we've asked a lot of questions and pushed a lot here. Just my confidence, and I know it's shared by so many of us in you, deputy manager, leading on this and the city manager assigning you to lead on this work, and I think many of the suggestions come just because it's so important. And I think having a council vote at the end of the budget that sort of solidifies this sort of calendar or work plan can show that we're all committed to doing this together. But I'm grateful for the work you're putting into this. >> Appreciate that. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Flanagan? >> And to that end, you know, I don't think everything we're saying today is stuff you weren't already thinking about, and so I'm acknowledging that, too, but it's also important for the public to know that the council's also thinking about it, so, you know, with that spirit, I just want to say that I -- I also want to be [3:20:03 PM] sure that we're not engaging in a process that is trying to reinvent the very longstanding work that black and brown-led nonprofit organizations and community leaders have been doing for a long time. A long time before any of us used a lot of the words we're now using or members of the community use the words they're now using and making sure that that hard work is centered, because I think a lot of the challenges and questions may have already been answered through the work of those groups. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Renteria? >> Renteria: I also want to thank you. When I came on the council, I really was pushing for community policing, I thought that, you know, that was going to be able to solve some of the problems that we're having [3:21:03 PM] over here. It worked really well in my community when we implemented it about 20 years ago under chief Watson, and she implemented that community policing. And we ran with it. And it was very successful. You know, we used to have drive-bys and people were afraid to call the police because there were incidents where you call the police, and then you're the one that ended up getting shot and killed. And those were the kind of things that were happening over here on the east side. And through community policing, we were able to, you know, get the police out and we have very good programs, we had officers that worked with our kids, we have police ice, it was a lot of work and a lot of outreach, but -- and I was -- when I got on the council, I thought maybe we could replicate that around [3:22:04 PM] the city and other parts that were having problems with the police, but it just -- I could never get it going after that. There were just too many incidences with police in community they lost the trust that we had worked so hard to build. And, you know, it just takes one or two officers to really -- really create this big problem, you know, and unfortunately, that's what happened. It's happening here, and for some reason, they're just -- no matter what we tried at the academy and training our officers, just didn't work. And there were some officers here that just didn't want to be told that you're working for the community, you know. You're not working for the union or you're not working for, you know, your brotherhood, you're actually getting paid by the community. And we need to really just look at that and remind the officers that, you know, it's [3:23:05 PM] our hard-earned tax dollars that we pay every year that's paying your salary. And we want the respect that we deserve as everybody else, as people of color have always been, you know, looked down upon and the police, we always felt that the police were the tools to keep us suppressed. And that's the way I -- you know, we grew up here in the east side thinking constantly, and I -- you know, we finally got community policing here in my neighborhood and we had a very good relationship. But I see that going down. And we really need, you know, our staff to come back with a good program. And please come with the calendar so that we can see, you know, what's -- what we're going to be doing so the community can also see it. >> Will do, councilmember. >> Mayor Adler: Is there anything else in this briefing [3:24:05 PM] before we go to pulled items? >> City manager? >> Thank you so much. >> Mayor, I did have a quick comment. >> Mayor Adler: Yes, councilmember tovo? >> Tovo: Thanks. Deputy city manager, I appreciate the process that you're engaging in and the content and really the perspective that you're bringing to it of making sure that it is centered, coming from the community. I think that's really, as you've articulated, just so, so important and so thank you for that approach and for the care that you're taking to reach out to all of our -- all of our offices and making sure that we're informed. And your openness to hearing ways in which that we can assist in getting the word out as you move forward. I know it's very -- I don't want to put you on the spot, but I hope that either you or our city manager at some point in today's discussion or perhaps next week will help us understand, you mentioned a couple times that the kinds of conversations you're having at the leadership team are very in line and some of the same [3:25:06 PM] ideas that you've seen posted on the message board have come up in your own staff conversations. And so I hope that you can help us -- you identified a few of them, I think the forensic lab was one, the parks police was another. As we discussed, either today or next week, those more specific proposals, I hope that you will provide us with your staff recommendation on whether those -- whether -- if there are things that you've already talked about, I appreciate that we want the community to be engaged, there's just a tremendous amount of work to do, though, and so, you know, I'm really interested in talking about and supporting some of those proposals and moving forward during this budget process. I hope the staff will help us and chime in as we're talking about those, and let us know how they align with the conversations you've already begun. >> I appreciate that, councilmember, tovo, and I think that we will -- as we [3:26:11 PM] have seen that more and more on the message boards, because we had not really seen all the ideas that were happening, and really some exciting new ideas that are interesting to explore, we, at the moment, have perhaps more questions than answers to that in terms of how and the dynamics and the mechanics of shifting things over, but we absolutely will take the opportunities to engage in conversation on some of these ideas that we seem to be very aligned with in the future. Some of those, we will -- we are thinking about having those conversations with communities and others as I noted and perhaps you noted are things that we can do administratively, and it's just a matter of figuring out all the moving pieces as we move forward. So we will certainly continue to converse with you as a body. >> And, mayor, that's a great transition, if we're open to it. But going back to when Ed was laying out the goals for this afternoon session to not just [3:27:12 PM] talk about what some of those ideas that may have been posted by your colleagues, but also things that may be brought up for the next work session. And so before we go to pulled items, I wanted to at least create a space for the council to be able to air some of those publicly so we could have a discussion around them. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. So we'll open up the conversation broadly on budget before we go into pulled items. Councilmember kitchen? >> Kitchen: I think I saw this on the budget, I appreciate the opportunity to hear from the consultants on the homeless report. I think that's scheduled for next week. I think that that -- I'm wanting to understand how our budget aligns with those recommendations, understanding, of course, that we're -- that I don't -- I don't think we've gotten to the point where we're funding all recommendations at this point, but I want to make sure that we're aligned with those. So I'm looking forward to [3:28:13 PM] having that conversation. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you. I already mentioned this to Ed, but I would like to have Dr. Escot present at our next work session to talk with -- through with us the opportunity to create a chief medical officer position and to beef up the medical director's office to allow us to better meet the public health needs across ems and public health and fire, and I think he would be the appropriate staff person to help us to understand the possibilities there on a larger scale for our city. And then I posted this and then I posted this morning some amendments that I'm offering along with councilmembers Ellis, tovo, pool, and [3:29:15 PM] harper-madison, and I think council member kitchen chimed in she also supported with ems in providing additional resources to immediate covid needs and the needs of our growing city. So perhaps we can have ems there to talk about what some of those needs are and how -- how these kinds of proposals would help in that direction. And I've mentioned the office of violence prevention. I think that's -- a couple other folks also mentioned it, and I know that several people wanted to work on that, and we'll work towards having more concrete thoughts on that for next week. >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Council member Flannigan? >> Flannigan: Thank you. Thank you, council member alter and your co-sponsors or your group for putting the ems reports together, and many of us, myself included, expressed support for those. [3:30:15 PM] I'm interested in nailing down the funding sources for that I think given the pandemic that we're in, adding resources to ems 11 months from now is probably not going to be enough for us. So I'm very interested in figuring out how to -- how to adjust the budget to accomplish that goal, those investments for ems. I may have missed what you said, city manager. Are you wanting us to lay out what we posted on the message board yesterday? >> I think that would certainly be a good use of this time, if you're willing to. Again, it's on the message board so it's public. This is a chance to have your colleagues ask any questions if they have any or to at least say that this is a discussion item you want to be having at the next work session. >> Flannigan: Great. If it's okay with you, mayor, I will go ahead and talk about my two proposals. I posted two proposals on the message board yesterday. One is a significant restructuring of how reorganize public safety [3:31:15 PM] assets that are currently allocated to the police department. You can read the longer version of that on the message board, and I hope everyone has been able to do that. This type of structural change is obviously not something you can finalize in two weeks. So no one, I think, is saying that you can magically wave a wand and answer every question in that time frame. However, I do think there's a lot of significant value in thinking through policing and public safety resources in a different way and by creating these additional departments or restructuring it in this way, you can have more civilian leadership because the way the state law is written about chiefs, it actually doesn't use the word chief, it says department head. And so you can eliminate some of the higher level sworn leadership because you can then replace them with civilians as long as it's departments that you're talking about. And then so there's a little bit of cost savings there by going from sworn to civilian [3:32:16 PM] and better oversight, I think, in large part by going sworn to civilian. And then in one case, creating a civilian-led department, that's the emergency calms section which would include not just 911 and ctek but also data analytics and forensics and things like that. I think this is compatible with what council member Casar had posted where he talked about certain areas wanting to be moved out. And so one way to do that is through the proposal that I have put together. And there's certainly multiple ways that we might accomplish this in terms of sequencing. We might -- a staff might decide that the best way to accomplish it is one at a time, where you create one department and you still leave an Austin department, while you set that one up, break off another piece, move it -- so I'm certainly open to that level of analysis from staff and really figuring out the right way to implement what is ultimately a significant conversion of how we manage, creating more civilian leadership in [3:33:17 PM] kind of a chain of command circumstances but also by being in separate departments, we can be more in line with what the mayor pro tem put together in her metrics solution, where you can have a different set of metrics for each of they got departments and that will better drive organizational culture and how decisions are made by got am. In my proposal, I also say that the department, I suggest to handle what is currently neighborhood policing and control resources should also include technical squad, bomb squad, those kinds of things, that the leadership of that department be in line with the proposal I had daylighted to the public earlier, where you have each of the four regions, plus downtown command, which are currently led by a commander, that those five operate as a group with one technically department head to confirm to state law, but your also somewhat of a 10-1 styled geographic council where you got more diversity [3:34:19 PM] and broader perspective with leadership decisions made in that bucket. So there's obviously a lot of detail that has to be figured out in order to fully implement the proposal. And so, you know, it may not be something that is, as I said earlier today, I's dotted and T's crossed before next week's adoption, but something I think is a significant movement towards accomplishing some of the other ideas. That's one proposal. The other one is a little more straightforward. You know, the current site of the A.P.D. Headquarters, which was also the former site of the municipal court, we already took care of municipal, that new facility opened in April, credits all the staff for pulling it off and my now former clear, council member pool, Casar, mayor pro tem, and council member harper-madison for moving the muni court as quick as possible, and [indiscernible] Had a big role in that too. That site has already been identified prior as something that was an opportunity for redevelopment. I think this public safety reimagining [3:35:19 PM] conversation is also an opportunity to expedite the current remaining staff that exist on that sight, moving them into other facilities that are emptying out because we have built new facilities in Mueller, a new [indiscernible] Building, we'll have offices that are empty. For the public, in some cities, the police department headquarters also serves as a booking facility or a jail. That is not true. In our community, we partner with the county for those facilities. So this is ultimately right now just offices so there's no reason why that couldn't be moved into another facility that, frankly, where the building is safer, where the building has better working conditions, a building that is not at the understand of its useful life. My proposal is to expedite that process, demolish that building, initiate a process, community led process to design a way to leverage that asset, to help address historic inequities for the black communities and to [3:36:20 PM] support future black community economic success. Given that property's location downtown, to the green way and I-35, it has the opportunity to represent some pretty significant value and asset for the public, not that dissimilar from the conversation we just had on St. John's. This one had a -- will have a much different symbolic meaning, but I think can result in a pretty significant asset, in a place that ultimately might be, instead of a barrier to east Austin, a gateway to it. Those are my two proposals. >> Mayor Adler: Council member Ellis? >> Ellis: Thank you, mayor. I appreciate all the other councilmembers that have put their information on the message board. I think that's really helpful for some of us who may not be in some quorums to be able to see what everybody is working on. We are working on parks & recreation department issues. I know parks foundation that's asked for more funding. Obviously, our park [3:37:22 PM] spaces are cherished in our community that a lot of people feel are underfunded, so we are taking a look at that, and also looking at the role of park rangers. I think council member pool had also put that specifically in her post, so might be able to talk about what you've heard, if you're not in a different subquorum, and look at the role of park rangers and policing and citations within our park system. So that's something we've been working on and addressing the uses of clean community, noting that the clean creeks resolution continues to move along, and we want to put ourselves in a good position in this budget to address litter abatement, street sweeping, things between social recovery, parks, and watershed protection, to look at that fee and what uses it's set up for. Then we also, on the [indiscernible] Campaign a couple months ago, mayor pro tem also had [3:38:23 PM] one, I think they were a couple months apart, I know there's some work with the safety task force, but I apologize, council member alter, I haven't made my way all the way through it, but I like the idea of your office of violence prevention and would like to be able to work with you on that. And you may have a couple ideas through our research through safe storage, specifically, that might be able to either happen parallel or in conjunction with that. So I just wanted to say there's topics that we've been working on, and appreciate council member alter's leadership on ems items that we've also been able to assist her. >> Mayor Adler: Council member pool? >> Pool: Thanks, mayor. I put up my proposals for discussion and consideration on the A.P.D. Changes on the message board, so that's all there for everybody to see, and I appreciate the advocates in the community working closely with my staff in order to [3:39:23 PM] highlight the work that they had already done so that I can see the work -- see that work and then adopt pieces of it, knowing that other pieces will be taken on by others on the dais. I have additional budget amendments that I'll be putting up on the message board, just basically briefly working with an A.F.D. Staffing, Norris crossing fire station, we need some additional fte's for an aerial ladder and maintenance. Ems, appreciate the input and look forward to working in the partnership with the association and president [indiscernible] Asks from the union with council member alter, working on some additional pieces of it with council member kitchen and also with council member Ellis. There are some adjustments that we're making to the requests and will be presenting [3:40:27 PM] those. The parks rangers, as council member Ellis mentioned, looking at those, also operations and maintenance on trails, child care at the rec centers, I've had that in past years, I'll be bringing additional money for that and again bringing money this year for facility repairs. And, let's see, watershed, working -- the workforce first program, what I brought last year, I'll be bringing some additional increases to that, so we will do that good work. And the abortion access logistics program that we pioneered last year with the leadership of mayor pro tem Garza and council member Casar that I helped on I will be bringing additional monies for that item [indiscernible] >> Mayor Adler: So for me, I appreciated deputy city manager, the part of your presentation that talked about more than just policing and criminal justice and taking a look at the strategic direction having to do with equity [3:41:31 PM] more broadly than that. And I think that this is really the time to be looking at the city, really, from top to bottom in terms of everything that the city does. So I'm real excited to see what those initiatives are. And in a budget cycle like this, whether that leads to different prioritizations within departments, all departments. Two in particular stand out to me, recognizing that there's no -- there's no civil justice without economic justice. So the conversations that relate to the workforce development plan and program that have come back to us because that, I think, is one of the necessary ways you start addressing wealth and income inequalities in the city. There's a proposal in front of us now from workforce solutions. And then beyond that, I [3:42:34 PM] think that in the same thing in terms of economic development, child care. We're going to be talking about that later this week. That is perhaps one of the chief roadblocks in this city, as in many cities, for people being able to get jobs and take jobs and get education and get skills and then to advance their families. So I think that especially right now, given what's happening with the virus, we're really in danger of losing what child care infrastructure we have as a city. So I don't know how that relates to potential few cares funding versus otherwise, but I think it's -- regardless where that money comes in, it's got to be something that we figure out how to -- to be able to resolve. And then the last one, in terms of -- and there will be lots of other examples again as you're looking at equity throughout the city, is in health care delivery. [3:43:34 PM] I know that question has come up. There's certain things we do and that we don't do the way health care in our city is being provided. But we had talked about using this moment to really leverage what we did in the city with respect to health inequities, longer term health inequities and using this opportunity, I think -- I haven't seen that, and it's probably happening, I just haven't seen it. But that's something that I think is a real important priority for the city as well, to recognize the inequalities we're seeing in susceptibility and figure out how long-term and start changing those underlying inequities. Council member Casar. >> Casar: I posted three amendments to the message board as well. The first one relates to -- you know, we've been talking about which sections of the police budget we want to separate, and I think council member Flannigan is proposing something [3:44:35 PM] really significant, and I'm supportive of making that kind of significant change. But internal affairs, in particular, being separated, I think, is something we should move on with all swiftness and potentially the Siu as well, to provide Independence. The third amendment is about moving forensics out, which we've just had a conversation about for so long and has been advocated for at a national level by national scientists for so long, that I think we can just move forward with that one swiftly. As council member Flannigan said, I don't think we have to pass a budget and expect that there is a new department head and that every -- that all the shifts have happened by day one of the fiscal year, but I think since our budgets are a planning document, I would want to make sure that people understand that that's happening in the course of this budget, in the course of this year. My second amendment that I posted -- sorry, I went out of order just because, as I said out [3:45:36 PM] loud, it makes sense to bucket those two together -- is not having the next three sets of cadet classes that are planned. There's a Q and a posted that has a smaller level of budget savings with it. I'd be interested in having the budget manager clear up. If we don't have those classes and don't fill those positions, I think there's probably more of a salary savings by fy2022 than what's currently listed. If we just don't have those classes at all and don't fill those positions, we generate in calculating about $100,000 worth of salary and benefits per position, so nearly a $20 million reallocation. And I think that we should reallocate that money to things that prevent harm and prevent violence, specifically to things that improve public safety. We talked about a lot of those in committee in community. We haven't added a family [3:46:37 PM] violence shelter bed in years and years. We should do that services for people experiencing homelessness. The office of violence prevention, as council member alter and others have mentioned. And I think we should really focus on things like gun violence intervention and preventing violence and harm that vendors sex work and sex workers and other evidence-based forms of violence prevention. In that amendment that I wrote, I would really like to make sure that we provide direction that some of those reallocated dollars away from policing are directed to areas of the city that face that violence or inequity or poverty or public safety challenge. I think it's really important for the community to understand and for us to act in a way that shows that this is about reducing harm and reducing violence, and that that is a big part of why we're trying to change public safety budgets, because we want to make things safer. And so in part, I would [3:47:39 PM] want to see that redirection of dollars really go to address those issues of violence and harm. So those are the primary three amendments I have floated, but I know that there are many others out there and I generally am supportive and want to work together with you guys to land it. >> Mayor Adler: Council member kitchen, then council member Flannigan. >> Kitchen: Well, as you all know, I've already been making the -- moving forward on the proposed additional dollars for the first response for mental health calls, 911 calls and the [indiscernible] Initiative. Those dollars are reflected in the proposed budget. I will have a budget rider that speaks to some additional details around that program, [3:48:40 PM] specifically things related to data analysis and -- and evaluating impacts, as well as the project management component of it that we included dollars for. And then as council member pool mentioned, I'll be working with her on budget amendment related to additional dollars for community health -- community health paramedics, the thinking being that those paramedics can be of assistance with our homeless population and potentially -- and could also be of assistance to mental health calls to -- to supplement the program that we have right now. So -- and I appreciate what everyone elses bringing forward. Look forward to discussions on those. I support what many of you are suggesting and have commented on the -- [3:49:40 PM] actually, I support the direction that all of these are going in, and I have commented on the message board my request to be part of the -- the budget rider related to the -- related to the medical director -- the health care medical director, as well as the -- the gun violence task -- gun violence force. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Council member Flannigan. >> Flannigan: Yeah, I wanted to just add two things. One, council member alter brought up the public safety outside of police, and I think having a published schedule of budget amendments the way council member Casar has included in his message board post, which I think a lot of us have been talking about, is important. I think the public safety committee can start really digging into more than just police, getting into fire and ems, and code enforcement, which is kind of an [3:50:42 PM] unscrutinized but needs scrutiny area of city -- of the city right now. So I'm excited to do that work, too. On the cadet classes, you know, I think there's an important conversation to have with the community about wanting to reiterate, at least for me, to reiterate that these decisions that we're making and the shift in reimagining is -- is in no way intended to leave a 911 call unanswered. And so the hardest part of this is how do you -- how do you find the money to stand up a whole new program while you don't -- how do you make that transition is a hard -- is a hard question. So I'm comfortable with saying that in the context of the review of the training academy, that that is not to a place that I am comfortable with, to of a November class. So I'm comfortable with that. My suggestion is that classes beyond November that we kind of put in a holding pattern until we can complete and have comfort with the review [3:51:42 PM] of the training materials and the process of the training academy. In part, this is because, you know, we have regular attrition from our department, and those numbers might go up or down in whatever ways we want. And so, you know, there are parts of -- of work that still require sworn officers. And but for legislative changes, there will still be work that require sworn officers. And if we have a training academy that we're excited about, then we're going to want new cadets coming in and allowing older officers who maybe don't feel that their approach to policing is where the department is headed, to allow them a graceful exit. And so I want to kind of reserve my support for the future cadet class decision, but I also don't want to go ahead and prespend that money, knowing we're going to do it. It's all, for me, based on the review of the training materials and the academy process. >> Mayor Adler: Colleague S? Council member alter? >> Alter: Thank you. [3:52:42 PM] Mayor, I just wanted to underscore your concern for the opportunity for child care actions that are important, particularly under covid, and also the work the workforce is developed -- workforce solutions is doing and the opportunity to make a relatively small investment that would get us started on really ratcheting up our workforce training, and that's one thing I'm looking at. I've been holding on that, trying to figure out if Travis county is funding it first, which would be preferable, in my view, to get us started in that. But I think that's -- that's important. I'm excited to have these conversations, and I hope that, you know, as we have them, that we can ask questions and try to understand things without it resupposing where we are on something. Because there's a lot of unanswered questions, and [3:53:43 PM] I want to underscore the comments that one of my colleagues made earlier, really inviting staff if there are questions or issues that we need to know about a particular direction that we might be going, even if you don't have the answers, we need you to surface the questions so that we think about it. I also like the suggestion that council member Flannigan is suggesting that even if we do identify cuts or possible cuts, that we don't have to spend all the money immediately as we move through budget, that we might be able to take a little bit of time to think through, to make sure we're making the prioritized choice most effectively. >> Mayor Adler: Colleague S, anything else? Manager? >> As we wrap up, really appreciate the discussion today and airing some of these important ideas out there. I'm going to see if on [3:54:44 PM] you are deputy -- computer chief financial officer has any closing remarks. We look forward to working with you on ideas as you put the amendments forward. Ed? >> City manager, I'd only add that we'll continue to monitor the message board. If you have additional ideas to formulate, please post them on the message board. We'll get them from there and come prepared to facilitate [indiscernible] And of course I'm always available if you want to talk to me directly. >> Mayor Adler: All right. Ed, thank you. Manager, thank you. Colleagues, that gets us to the last two pulled items that we have. The first one, council member Casar, you pulled item 74, heard on the 29th, relief enterprises of Texas. [3:55:45 PM] >> Casar: Yeah, mayor. And I have been in touch with department directors and will probably have further conversations about it this evening before it comes up tomorrow. This has to do with our continued efforts to pick up trash around the camps of folks experiencing homelessness. Obviously, there's major issues and it -- because when a person is experiencing homelessness, they don't have trash service like everybody else. And so we have had prior conversations about making sure that these contracts work to pick up trash, which -- and literature, which -- and litter, which everybody agrees with. And people should not be treated poorly and people's personal possessions, like their medicine or their id and other things that are important to them, are not trash. We've heard some, you know, amount of community concern about whether or not the contracts that we've been executing [3:56:48 PM] achieve those goals. I've talked privately with some medics, as well as service providers who have found that some of our processes, in their view, create tensions and strain and are sometimes counterproduct the I have productive to ourgoals. I'm glad that with this contract, seems like the staff have put in stricter protocols to make sure this is about picking up litter and not anything else, but I still have questions and concerns. So one idea that I'm going to be working on with the staff and wanted to air it now is that we have another program which also picks up litter and trash, and that is more of a program where we provide the opportunity for people living under bridges or in encampments to throw away their own stuff and for us to provide the level -- some level of trash service because that's the biggest reason [3:57:48 PM] why there's trash. One, obviously, if you don't have a kitchen and other things that -- a lot of you don't have a lot of packaging, that is -- that's a challenge, then obviously you don't have trash service. But a conversation that I intend to have tonight and to try to bring forward something tomorrow, is, can we shift some amount of the funds from these programs that seem to create some tension because it is people showing up and deciding what is litter and what is not, can we potentially shift some amount of that money over to getting our purple bags and other voluntary programs to a greater level of scale? And then can we see how that goes? Because my hope, and what I'm hearing from folks on the ground, is that if people actually have the opportunity and the space to clean up their own area, that are -- that people do. And -- and I think that then people have to wait [3:58:49 PM] for a while for people to show up to pick things up, which also creates tensions. And so I have been supportive of increasing the level of trash pickup as it relates to encampments. I'll continue to be supportive of that, but I think we need to do it effectively and potentially reallocate some of the money from the -- from the contractors and move some of it to the more voluntary model that seems to be working but may need scale. So I just wanted to raise that, but I don't have a particular proposal at this minute because more and more staff are reaching out to my office to try to sort that out. >> Mayor Adler: Great. Council member kitchen. >> Kitchen: I agree that -- I agree that we need to learn from on you -- from howwell our purple bag program is working. The purple bag program, for those who aren't [3:59:50 PM] familiar, is sort of the name for making receptacles and other bags so that people can -- can, you know, get rid of their own trash. So -- but I -- I would be very cautious about reallocating money or reducing money. What I would rather do is say that this is -- this is a program -- this is one program, and we need to emphasize, wherever we can, that people have the tools that they need, the resources they need to clean up. So -- but I don't think this is a -- you know, I don't think that these things -- well, I want to be sure that we don't characterize this as an either/or, and we also don't characterize it as -- as -- you know, as a conflict in any way. We were trying to do that, council member Casar, but I think there are circumstances under which it's helpful for people who are living in [4:00:53 PM] certain places to have trash pickup. And so I think that that's really important. And so I -- I'm not -- I'm going to be more interested in not reducing this. I could see us, you know, making it a one-year instead of a three-year contract. I could see us doing some explicit direction to staff to provide us specifics on which parts of this program are making supplies available and which parts are actually having folks go out and help with cleanup. So -- so that's what I'd be looking for. The other thing that I think is really important is written policies and procedures about how these programs operate, which I have not seen and they're not in backup. So I would ask staff to make that available to everyone so we can -- all we -- all we're operating off of now is conversations about how this is supposed to work [4:01:55 PM] and how we have seen in some circumstances it doesn't work. So -- so we really need to see written policies and procedures, and I think they need to be in backup. I apologize if I've missed something that was recently sent to me. I haven't noticed it in my -- I haven't seen anything in my -- in my box, but I do think it needs to be in backup. So I think that's really important. And the hand in glove with this is the storage issue. So part of the problem that people have is that then they welcome the assistance of our city to come and clean up, but they may not have a way to make it possible for everyone to understand what is property that needs to be, you know, kept or stored. So I think we need to understand how that works with this also. I also want to understand what kind of [4:02:56 PM] recommendations were made as part of our work of our -- of our consultants, to the extent that they focused on these issues, I think it would be helpful to understand that also. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Anything else? Council member alter? You're muted. >> Alter: Did you want to respond to Ms. Kitchen first, Greg? >> Casar: However you want. That's okay, I can go next. >> Alter: Well, you may answer my question so why don't you go ahead. >> Casar: No, I just wanted to say that I agree entirely with council member kitchen as it relates to storage, and I agree entirely with council member kitchen that we shouldn't be reducing trash pickup budgets. I think the question I'm going to try to sort out [4:03:56 PM] and bring ideas for tomorrow is the ratio of the budget as it relates to more voluntary trash service programs versus the contractor trash public program and what -- and so I think that that is the outstanding issue. >> Mayor Adler: Council member alter? >> Alter: So, I want to just say that separate from this item, my staff has also been asking for some clarity on documentation, and I think we would all be served by knowing exactly what should and should not happen when we're doing this kind of litter cleanup. I wanted to suggest that, you know, I see that it would be great to step up the voluntary trash opportunities and the [4:04:57 PM] service of the litter pickup, which I think we've begun to do at a greater scale. I'd love to see that additionally, but I would really like to see us move forward with this contract, make that a yes/and, that does seem kind of out of the scope of the contract, and the posting, and I would hate for us to not be able to move forward with this. We had one contract -- I don't know if this is the same contract, but we had one contractor decide not to continue anymore. That created some very long delays on top of covid delays. And I think it would be good to see this contract move forward. I'd be happy to work with you, council member Casar, to see how we can increase those other opportunities, which I think are very valuable. So I would like this to be a yesand, which is -- ayes/and, which I think both of you have suggested you're striving for. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Anybody else on this item? [4:05:57 PM] All right. The last item we've pulled is a zoning item. Council member Flannigan, you pulled this. It's up on Thursday. >> Flannigan: Thank you, mayor. This one is -- it's a case in my district, and it's in this area that is -- has got some very odd annexations, it's weird patchwork. Parts of this area looks like a chess board, in, out, in, out, as you go along 620. The street this is on, Buckner road, is a dead-end street. This isn't full purpose jurisdiction. The current property is sf-2. The applicant is asking for gr. This is not a neighborhood street. This is a street where there is a ton of automotive uses and businesses that have been built, inconsistent with any of the zoning that exists in that area. There's a lot of Dr, and [4:06:57 PM] council member alter knows how much Dr there is out in this part of the world. Stuff got built and then it was annexed. So it's just not -- it's not something where the old planning principles of, well, if you've got sf-2, you should keep sf-2, really applied. It honestly reminds me of a street in council member pool's district that I first heard about during the north shoal creek neighborhood plan on dwell avenue, where there's a whole neighborhood around it, but this one street the community acknowledges is a place where they want kind of light industrial and automotive uses and things. It seems very much similar to Buell avenue but just out on 620. It's unclear to me the premise under which staff is denying this zoning request because it just seeps so in line with everything that exists in that area on -- on Buckner that the community is comfortable with. [4:08:00 PM] >> Mayor Adler: Hang on a second. I was wondering if staff was here. >> Mayor, this is Jerry rusthoven. Council member, you're correct about the hodgepodge uses and the backup, this is the very edge of the city [indiscernible], and a lot of the uses were built before the city annexed them, and therefore, they're allowed to continue. The reason that we are not recommending it is, as you stated, it doesn't meet the criteria for [indiscernible] Zoning, which is typically at a very major street or intersection of two major streets. This is a 25-foot wide [indiscernible] Similar type uses along it. While staff has supported gr zoning further up, closer to 620, to try to match the [indiscernible], if you will, of the proposed dealership. But into the street off of 620, we felt [indiscernible] [4:09:01 PM] >> Mayor Adler: Thank you. Council member pool. >> Pool: Thanks. I'd just say I'd be happy to look at that with you and help support what you're trying to do. I will say in Marshall creek, when we approved the zoning on that street during the neighborhood plan process, we did what the neighbors wanted and we endorsed what was there and we endorsed that it would continue to be that special place because it is unique. But then when we came in with our development code changes, staff went in and made changes on one-half of the street so they would be exactly the same on both sides, and that was a complete -- that completely overturned the agreement that we had and support for the neighborhood plan. So we were still trying to make heads and tails of that situation when we, you know, paused the land development code issue. But I am sympathetic to [4:10:02 PM] what you're talking about, and in these instances where neighborhoods have blown up around areas and have embraced them as they are, I think there's a debt of respect that we potentially can owe to the neighbors who are asking that we not get too far afield from their vision of what -- of what that particular part of their neighborhood should look like. I'd be happy, Jimmy, to help you with that, should you need any additional help. >> Flannigan: Thank you, council member pool. Yeah, this similar to Buell in that sense, but dissimilar in the sense that there is no surrounding neighborhood. The neighborhoods in that area are on the other side of the highway, they're on the other side of 620. And I'm not aware of any community input having been provided on this case, so it's not so much that we're trying to navigate a community perspective, it's more of a question on what are the principles under which we are getting recommendations and why don't they seem to make sense to me? Maybe a revisiting of [4:11:04 PM] land development code in some distant future is going to help us come to a unified agreement on how we do that. So I'll take your help gladly, and we'll try to figure out the best way to handle the properties along Buckner road. Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Sounds good. Colleagues, I think those are all the pulled items we have. If anybody doesn't have anything else, it's 4:10. No one has anything else? Then at 4:10, this meeting is adjourned. City council meeting tomorrow, see you guys then.