San Angelo City Council 2-18-25

[0:00:00] in rolls on in here um you might think it's going to get cold here tomorrow but my family lives in Western Kansas their high today is five so we've got a warm front coming in so just in case you you thought you knew this meeting is officially called to order as usual we will start with our chaplain prayer and pledges so if U Marcel Jenkins would come forward and lead us in both morning to everyone out there let's bow our heads and pray dear wise and loving father first let me say thank you on behalf of all who are gathered here today thank you for many and Abundant Blessings thank you for the life itself for the measures of Health we need to fulfill our callings for substance and for our friendships thank you for the ability to be involved in useful work and for the honor of bearing appropriate responsibilities thank you as well for the freedom to embrace you thank you for loving us even so for your boundless and gracious nature in the scriptures you have said that citizens ought to obey the governing authorities since you have established those very authorities to promote peace and Order and Justice therefore if I pray for our mayor The Honorable BR Gunter for the various levels of City officials and in particular for this assemble a council and for our First Responders I'm asking that you graciously grant them wisdom to govern among the conflicting interest and issues of our times a sense of the welfare and true needs of our people a keen thirst for justice and righteousness confidence in what is good and fitting the ability to work together in harmony even when there is a honest disagreement personal peace in their

[0:02:04] lives and joy in their task I pray for the agenda set before them today please give an assurance of what will please you and what will benefit those who live and work in and around our beloved city of St Angelo it's in your blessed name I pray amen amen I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God visible with Liberty Justice for All honor the Texas flag my pledge allegiance to thee Texas one State under God in and indivisible we have one Proclamation it is the recognition of the United Way the conso valley Centennial year so if you all come forward to the next 100 United Way the koncho Val is thrilled to celebrate its Centennial year marking 100 Years of dedicated service and impact in the koncho valley since 1925 United Way of the koncho valley has remained steadfast in its mission to improve lives by harnessing the caring power of this community Through funding essential programs and addressing critical needs in Education Health and financial stability the United Way has played a vital role in creating opportunities and fost in Hope for all for a century the United Way the koncho valley has United the community to confront challenges

[0:04:07] support those in need and create opportunities for a brighter future thanks to the unwavering generosity of Partners donors and volunteers countless residents of s Angelo and the surrounding region have benefited from the organization's efforts through its work the United Way has empowered a network of social service agencies to deliver vital programs that address the most pressing needs of the community these include providing emergency food and shelter supporting children through educational and Afterschool initiatives access to Mental Health Services preventing and treating substance use services for survivors of child abuse and domestic violence and preventing homelessness as it celebrates this historic Milestone the United Way the Kono Valley remains committed to its founding values of collaboration service and hope looking forward the organization will continue to innovate and adapt to meet the everchanging needs of the community ensuring that every individual in the Kono Valley has the opportunity to thrive the city of St Angelo fully supports the United Way of the cono Valley and we ask that you do the same therefore I Brenda Gunter mayor of the city of s Angelo on behalf of the city council do hereby recognize and applaud United Way the Concho Valley for its achievement and positive determination to make a difference in our community so true would you like to speak come on thank you so much mayor Gunter uh my name is Ashley Ammons and I am the president and CEO of the United Way and I just want to say thank you uh for a hundred years this community has been supporting the United Way you're helping us have the resources um to be able to help those who most need it in our community um we've been saying this whole year we have a whole lot of plans and so while we are going to be looking back um on the past 100 years we are actually really excited to look forward to the next 100 uh what we can do for this community what we can do for every person um in our in our community in St

[0:06:10] Angelo in the in the koncho valley making sure that we're providing hope a hand up um and just being there for our neighbors uh so and that is possible because of you so thank you all so much e we will now move in public comment members of the public May raise issues or concerns not listed on the regular agenda during this time to participate please sign in with the city clerk prior to the beginning of the meeting speakers will be called in the order they signed in when speaking citizens must speak from the podium address all comments to the Das Begin by stating your name and address or single member district number and limit their remarks to 3 minutes or less do we have anyone here to speak to public comment yes ma'am Kea Stone okay Kea would you come forward do I hand them to y'all or good morning my name is Kea Stone and I am the owner Homeowner of 2501 West Avenue L St Angelo Texas a purchased my home in 2017 and in 18 I had a driveway Port so I could park my vehicle

[0:08:13] somewhere besides the grasser street like previous owners in 21 I had a carport installed to increase the property value limit congestion in pedestrian and vehicular traffic on public streets and prevent hell damage to the vehicle so my premiums would not increase or be denied in your packet on page 3B there's a listing of 87 National Weather Service issued severe warning weather warning where hell was reported in St Angelo since I purchased the home in 2017 September 24 I received a notice of compliant violation for not having a permit for my three-year-old carport in your packet you have a timeline of all the things I've done to try to acquire a permit after numerous trips to City Hall and speaking to several different people I was told they would look at my re request and get back to me in a week I've not heard from anyone from City Hall on page one of your packet is an aerial view of my home I live on an island across from ASU with only two homes I have no alley Avenue in butts up to my backyard and the side yard is Johnson Street very high traffic streets therefore I do not have accessibility to a carport in my backyard or side yard on page 2 and 3A of your packet is my home before and after the driveway in carport I've tried to do nothing but my house better and increase its property value UD abara compliance officer called me each week to see if there had been any resolution to my notice of violation I explained all I had done and that no one from City Hall would get back in touch with me October the 7th on my third trip to City Hall I was asked to speak with Austin Reed and planning on pages 12 through 14 of your packet are pictures of other car ports in my neighborhood I asked Austin why others in the neighborhood were able to have carports and asked to see if the map of my neighborh hood on the computer on page 11 of your packet I was showing Austin other homes and that had carports and he noticed that there was a carport directly across the street from me and that we were not in the open structure Zone the dark area on the map shows where there is an open structure Zone

[0:10:15] and there's about four and a half blocks north of Avenue in that are not in that zone he recommended I get in touch with my city council representative to see if the March 23rd 1959 ordinance could be changed you see in the timeline my numerous attempts to contact my city council representative either by phone or email my neighbor across the street received a notice this January for his 24y old card port and was ordered to take it down by the end of the month he did and you can see on page 12 now we have a tent and an umbrella covering the vehicles November 8th 24 was the last time Rudy called and asked me what my plan was and I told him my guest that we would have to file a criminal complaint with the city attorney's office like the penalty stated in my violation letter there was no contact for 3 months from anyone February 10th last month I received another notice of violation with two violations chapter 12 section 513 and section 107 I'm asking for a variance to these ordinances since I'm on an island with no alley or sidey yard for our carport Andor updating the ordinances so we can include be included in the open structure Zone and allowing me or allowing me to get a carport thank you need to wrap up thank you go ahead your last com and I truly would like guidance on how to resolve this issue thank you is Aaron in the room today Aon vet is here he's over planning if you would get with him following this meeting or now okay and see what we can discuss and work out okay thank you okay thank you is that the end of public comment yes ma'am we will now move into our consent agenda there is one item which is I item I that has been removed for the consent agenda and will not be discussed today with that I am going to ask uh if there are any other items from the consent agenda that need to be pulled um for consideration or conversation Larry no ma'am Karen no ma'am Lucy no ma'am Tom Tommy no ma'am

[0:12:20] Tom scared you didn't I Harry no ma'am okay with that may I have a motion for approval of the consent agenda with exception of item I which has been removed so move by Harry second by Tom public comment on anything on consent agenda with that we'll take a vote all those in favor say I I with none opposed consent agenda has been passed 720 we will move into our regular agenda item comments regarding items on the regular agenda may be made by the public when each item is discussed as outlined above to participate please sign in with the city clerk prior to the beginning of the meeting speakers will be called in the order they signed in comments are limited to less than three minutes applicants proponents and appellants are exempt from the time limit above and instead must limit their remarks to less than five minutes we will start with item a consider resolution designating a venue project for the mise convention center and identifying project financing Tina you are on on this item thank you mayor Tina Dei Director of Finance um to start off we're going to have I think Alan and Sid maybe come up and kind of discuss the project and what would be involved and then when they're finished with that and answer any questions you might have then we'll go into the process of a venue tax okay okay good morning mayor council um my name is Al Tores construction manager for the city of s Angelo uh basically I was asked to look at uh the possibility of expanding our Convention Center specifically to add an exhibit hall and some meeting rooms so what you have here is basically a site plan of the existing site showing in red what I would propose to add um you know this isn't of course a final Design This is just something that could happen so what I'm showing here is a 20,000 square foot exhibit

[0:14:24] hall which is this area here um 20,000 ft² is the size of the exhibit hall in abene and a couple of other places that's pretty standard uh so that's what I went with I'm also showing a lot of uh you know back of back of house spaces uh loading docks storage areas a big Lobby in the front that can be used for Gathering other meetings things like that I'm also showing additional meeting spaces that would go above the existing North meeting room uh we'd have to look and see if that's structurally feasible but I think it might be so anyway so this is this is um remember how to change Pages here so I think is this T is this your slide or my slide okay so basically the existing square footage is 35765 square feet uh what I've shown drawn is about 47,300 ft that's the exhibit hall plus meeting rooms plus all the uh accessory spaces more bathrooms uh hallways corridors that that large Lobby in the front for a total of 83,000 and like I said that includes a 20,000 ft exhibit hall uh we currently have eight breakout rooms and I'm including this room as three everywhere we have the the divisions um it could be a separate break room so we have total of U we have these three three in the north meeting room that can also be divided and the two upstairs we would add um seven new ones so we'd have a total of breakout rooms of 15 so this is tinas so basically again it's just a very preliminary design um hopefully it's enough information for you to kind of decide on whether to move forward or not I think the rest of it is up to Tina before Tina comes up could I have Jeremy Barts come forward Jeremy you want to talk about the need for the MCN Convention Center absolutely um you know everything that that art just showed us is exactly what

[0:16:26] we're what we're looking for um some of the things that we've heard are breakout space being an availability issue um exhibit hall space being lacking uh the one question I had can we use this room as a breakout room considering it is city council chambers is that even an option this thing can turn on hey uh Jeremy uh actually when we take a look at what we want to do moving forward with the convention C absolutely we can talk about that and see how how the whole facility can actually be used especially we're talking about bringing big conferences or bigger conferences to our community you better believe we' be looking at ways to actually uh maybe we have a separation already in the middle of the room anyway but we can talk about that how that so that that again addresses a lot of needs uh as you and I have spoken as many of us have spoken in the past that uh without that additional exhibit space there are limitations on the numbers of groups that we can get here uh the meeting space is great we'll pack it on Thursday night with 550 people plus a stage and that's going to be great having that additional space for exhibit Halls would be phenomenal and and something that we desperately need so I thank you for that okay thank you thank you Al oh I did want to add that uh after we drew this up and talked about it a little bit uh Carl and Rick and Sid and I went and visited several convention centers in the area we went to witto Halls Midland abene and toured their facilities and in doing that we we got a lot of great ideas for other things that are not in here one of those things was and again like I said this was a preliminary design so once we hire somebody and get an actual design laid out and everybody all the parties are involved and what we need what we don't need um it's possible that we may create a new um Council chamber somewhere else in the project and this will become strictly meeting rooms you know those are questions that need to be answered as we go down the road so okay thank you Tina so the purpose of this agenda item was

[0:18:39] basically kind of a concept discussion to get your buy and whether you're wanting to make some improvements to the convention center and the way that we would finance that would be through a venue tax so a venue tax adds 2% to the existing Hotel occupancy tax which currently that's 15% 7% of that goes to the city and six % goes back to the state um the venue tax would support the approved designated venue project so it has to be a specific project um even so specific that our bond attorneys would like to list the address so that it you know doesn't um down here where you know that three-year limitation comes in it doesn't cause any other venue projects to be inhibited because of this particular venue tax election if it's called um and then it presents residents obviously the option to vote for or against attx um and so once if this resolution is passed by the city council today the next steps would be um you would act formally to start the process we would then send the res the signed resolution to our bond attorneys which they would then send that to the state com controller to basically ask permission for us to implement a venue tax and that's just to give the state the opportunity to to decide whether a venue tax would have any impact on their revenue sources um from what our attorneys have told us it's the hotel tax is usually pretty a pretty easy one to get passed by the state and so we don't foresee any problems with that but if they do deny it then the next step would be for us to file an appeal um to still try to get the venue tax if that's what city council wants to do um and then if if they do approve it we'd probably call for an election in me in November depending again what city council wants um and the proposition must include both the hotel tax as a financing source as well well as um the actual project that's planned so just to be very clear on this idea this concept it does not in any way impact property tax is that correct no it's not expected

[0:20:43] as long as the venue tax and other financing sources are um at a at a level that are able to fund The Debt Service on the project yes we would not expect any tax property tax impact at all okay mayor yes uh actually know for further clarification talk about the 2% uh as far as who would actually pay for the the venue when it comes to the venue tax right right so that again it's it's added onto the hotel tax so really it's being paid by Travelers and tourists that come into the city when they stay at one of our hotels or at a short-term rental so the citizens who live in Sanel will not necessarily be the unless they had family in town or weding or something more than likely it would be those coming into the community um that would be supplementing this and I would assume that the many many cities many I know is not a number but there's a large number of cities who have a venue tax you're correct yes ma'am and many of our you know what we would call sister cities or comparable cities even have this venue tax in place right now for different convention centers and venues in their So This Is Not Unusual this is pretty standard process in terms of uh expanding or building convention centers I would say yes it is questions from Council Larry yes ma'am on the bottom there it says the type of financing for the project can you you expand on that please that's just referring to this the type of venue tax um there are several I think Brandon like six or seven different types of venue taxes and so um there's one that you can put on car rentals um adding a percentage to that you know um parking fees at the airport there's different types so that is designating this specific 2% on the hotel tax and then that would be used to leverage against a debt issue that would pay for the project um last year at the end of the year if we had had this 2% included in our hotel tax rate that would have yielded about $850,000 last year um and so with that we've looked recently at some Deb service issues in

[0:22:46] the range of 15 to $25 million and of course you know timing and interest rates come into play with that but most recently we've looked at The Debt Service payments that would be somewhere between $1.1 and $2 million on a 15 to2 $5 million project so that just kind of gives you an idea how much this could fund and what it could do to help us leverage a bigger project like this um Tommy I guess this may be for Al is Al still here is this does this give you enough time or whomever enough bit you or you working with an architect or whatever between now and November um for me this is this is new to me um I'm just wondering if if if we've if we've got enough information um on which you were able to I'll say base your uh rendering that you you you put in the packet is is it enough time between now and November to to make sure this meets the needs that we have I would say yes um assuming we start pretty soon and send out rfps or rfqs uh and get an architect engineer on board um pretty quick so they can start that process and get everybody together and and and get that done okay the other thing is that the the clock really starts clicking so or ticking um clicking click yeah actually when the the venue tax is voted in and so in November when the community approves or disapproves the venue tax that's you have a year from that point to issue the bonds um so you know depending on whether we want to use those bond funds to pay for the design it may not be that we have to have the project shovel ready at that point so that'll give them at least time to you know look at different ideas and have better ideas of what what and how we want to do the

[0:24:49] project so but but the least still we need to get a a firm quote or cost estimate in place so we know how much we're talking about so yeah that would that would should give us enough time between now and then thanks Tom first things first we've needed this so long and we finally have an ident identifiable very specific venue uh fortunately with my job I get to travel entire United States I can't tell you how many other people's convention centers and things I personally have funded all right it's great to finally see something like this coming here to give a a way in a path forward my question to you is we talk about this as just Hotel specific can we expand that to include rental cards and things that may come in like let's say we cover parking at the airport within the 20-year window of this venue tax can we expend this venue tax to cover things that we might add I I don't want to do the venue tax and limit ourselves if there's another way to tax the parking at the airport and rental cars I mean I pay those fees all over the US I just don't want to get the cart in front of the horse here and if it's not away it should never block the path but I don't want to limit us to where we could gain extra money are you are you asking if we could do two separate types of tax for this one project or if it would limit us with future venues so my question right now is it's just on hotel tax M can we include rental cars and future parking Brandon and I would probably need to research that I have seen one community in the recent past an article that came across my desk where they did do a hotel tax and a and a car rental tax but I don't know the specifics and how they made it work but it's something we could look into that that's fine I just don't want to cut ourselves short is there if there's ways to shorten it or provide us additional income that like like Bren say this does not have to go at all on the taxpayer um here property tax in St Angelo Texas this is by travel and

[0:26:53] basically tourism coming to Angela the other issue Tom on that is and I think it's great you're thinking outside the uh the lines here but we also could have future projects at the airport that you'd want the uh monies the tax monies to be used for improvements at the airport which we know can be an economic engine so we also don't want to limit our opportunity continue to develop the airport because of this this we ought to be able to afford through the venue tax um and bond and not hold our eles obligated to other opportunities down the road which I think we want to look at right so I'm with you on that brend I just I think it'd be easier to drop those things out we not move forward but I get it we don't want to handicap ourselves any we don't particularly when the airport's a significant opportunity cool I'd like Sydney Walker to come forward as well please good morning Council good morning may mayor good morning just talk about this facility and the need for expansion and Improvement of the facility yes obviously I've been here at the magnes convention center for quite some time and obviously with the we do get we work with uh CBB in regards to the bringing in trying to bring in conventions and I mean one of the things that does hold us back is not having the proper space that's needed to be able to bring in these conventions so we're already again Against the Grain whenever we're going against some of these other cities because we don't have the adequate space that's needed obviously we can do more with a lot more space that's in our Convention Center if we can have the proper rooms um proper breakout rooms ex exhibition Hall would be great for bigger trade shows that we can bring in and I just feel that this this is something that we should be able to push forward and let's give it to the uh to our um to the people of the the city the citizens of the city to be able to vote

[0:28:57] on this side on this project yes Daniel may I also want to point out that on our end we talk about the venue tax and what that would cost a 2% to visitors to our community but um with a bigger facility and as Jeremy mentioned a while ago to be able to be able to go out there and truly recruit and bring conventions to our community you have people staying in our hotels you have people spending money locally you have sales tax revenues that'll go up as well as we know uh sales tax supplement our property tax revenues so really that would help the property tax per especially if we're looking at the improvements the community needs infrastructure wise what have you that could actually actually bring those monies in the revenues as well so I just wanted to point that out and again this does not cost the citizens any money this is paid for through this venue tax it's the opportunity and the way that many cities have in developed convention centers and we know our hotel people need us to bring in conventions and more people to sustain our hotels our hotel motel taxes down we need to look forward to figure out a way to support the hotels which we desperately need and we need them to be successful and this project is one of those Avenues to help us get that done yes and like you said we we visited witto Falls AB Midland and I mean just going to those facilities we just noticed we're definitely behind and we need to we need to get up the speed we got a lot of competition ma'am quick question yes Lucy uh yeah I just wanted to ask you how long how old is this building this building is actually I believe it's 19 882 03 yes not 03 definitely not 03 yes correct 8182 looks yes 8182 the last uh Renovations was 2008 yeah well I agree with everyone up here is that yeah we're definitely definitely in need of expanding and bringing in those uh conventions into our city for the mere

[0:30:59] fact of getting some more revenue and keep going so I'm very much for this project yes and Karen uh Sid and maybe Jeremy I'm curious how often we lose an opportunity can can you quantify that in any way or is it too so so Sid and I were just talking Sid lost one last year we lost two uh just due to the lack of space lack of breakout space and I will only count those two because those were two that were rfps where every other need was met it was the breakout space and the exhibit hall space that we did not have um and so we ended up losing that one so that again I won't speak for Sid but I know that is a consideration every single time we have someone that reaches out to us they need that larger space it's it's just when they're wanting to bring in 5 600 people they need the space to be able to place out their Wares host their main meeting and then have breakout spaces as well so uh you know one benefit that um that wasn't mentioned here we are one of the lowest in terms of average daily rate that people can stay our dollar stretches further in the city of St Angelo a 2% Hotel occupancy tax venue tax does not necessarily hurt travel to St Angelo in fact it may end up helping it it makes it seem like it's the place to be so as we've talked through average daily rates we've talked through various different things you know we're always on the lower end of the Spectrum which is is a fantastic thing you can come here and you can spend your money and you can have a little to go home with we're just asking for 2% on top of that it just adds to the to the Allure of the city and and and drives people here as well may yes sorry I'm sorry um Jeremy just really quickly so you mentioned you you lost out on two you lost out on one but of course when you send a proposal out and you show what we actually have yes sir sometimes you wouldn't hear from those individuals uh so again you really truly don't know what you actually missed out on because when they go out you have we we may have missed more than that abolutely once the once the RFP was

[0:33:02] sent and they looked at our location looked at the facilities that we had we may have lost 10 to 12 we just don't know there you go U some of them just don't respond the other issue is that many of these conventions that hold annual conventions there's on a fiveyear roll three to five years yes' and so that means if we said no to you today because we you said no to us today because we don't have the facility it's going to be 3 to 5 years before they come talk to you again anyway so we've got a time frame to improve the scenario so that the next go around with many of these repetitive conventions we would have our foot in the door because we could actually say yes absolutely we have and that is something that we' put our place in or put a foot in the door with now to say we want on those lists yes we've just got to we've got to take what we can get while we can get it now and then move on as we as we continue to expand Harry yes since I'm the only council person that hasn't spoken I want to say I I appreciate we got to yeah got to this particular spot uh I worked with Jeremy and his predecessors over the years uh convention visitors bureau DMO uh to try to make sure that we've got people come to Stan Angelo to see what we've got uh we know we got to get them here before they'll move here and and uh having that opportunity I think is great uh I'm a little surprised that we got to this stage so Qui quickly but uh I'm glad we did so uh I'm I'm I'm in favor of making this move go forward thank you thank you Harry anything else than Sharon and then I have a follow-up question I don't think anyone questions the need for this for this sort of project I I certainly don't I think we do need it and we are lagging behind however I my question pertains to how did we determine scope of work or we in position now that as we go excuse me as we go forward scope of work for to maximize our return on investment can be

[0:35:06] considered as we move along as an architect may be hired I don't mean to put words in anyone's mouth but we all would of course want to maximize the city's return on investment I will how do we figure it out I'll have to defer to Al on that one because I'm not an architect at all that's a good question Karen and to be honest the scope of work isn't finalized yet you know that's one of the first things we'll do as part of this process uh right now we I was just looking at Is it feasible to do uh the big picture you know get the exhibit hall in there get the meeting rooms parking do we have room on this site to do that uh which the my answer to that is yes I believe we do as as to all the actual scope of work that's something that again like I said we'll have to get a group together as we move forward and say what what else do we need uh like I said visiting the other places I've already got other ideas on things that uh we can adjust this and and add to um Sid's already mentioned he wants a larger kitchen um I I think this should be better connections between the kitchen and the two spaces so a lot of things like that uh another thing that I think is important is the connection of the conven center to the river space we we should probably do something to kind of and I address that a little bit in that design but um you know those those are things that we need to decide what else do we need to add what else needs to uh change or or uh to make this the best Convention Center we can get flexibility between now and yes point and I can add a little bit to that our uh Bond Council the resolution that they prepared the way they summarized is the designing acquiring constructing purchasing renovating improving upgrading updating enlarging demolishing and equipping of the existing convention center location so they left it very broad um I know it's been said several times that there's no cost to the

[0:37:09] taxpayers to do this project I I just want to say for myself that it it we just need to be fiscally conservative know what we're spending our money on before we spend it um and if we don't really know exactly what we're getting hence my question that's all right Larry there's a screaming need for that exhibit hall but I'm curious as to why we need 15 breakout rooms are you considering simultaneous conventions or that's a question for J Larry I can speak to that that is a common concern that we have is when you have a group of say five to 600 people that are here for a gathering space in the middle of the the uh event space that's great but there will be several breakouts that take place where they have say for instance a speaker in one room that'll host 200 and then you've got another speaker in another room that may only host 15 to 20 you need to be able to divide those rooms out equally for the size of the group that you need so that's the reason for the number of breakout spaces um it's not every convention that is that way it's not every trade show that is that way but if you go to some of the larger conventions that we've been to and part of what we see in the travel industry you will have have specific areas where people want to go learn certain things about the travel industry itself but that's remedial for certain other people so they would go to a separate breakout space you just need to have the flexibility of having that available to you well my experience on is limited to when we had a tml conference up here and yes you know they they don't need anywhere near that but we're still dealing with perhaps 500 people sure and and certain places don't require it at all certain groups do not require at all uh but in case of the um I won't I won't speak to the name of it but one particular group needed 20,000 ft of exhibit space 14 breakout spaces a 1300 th000 or 13,000 event space 13,000 Square ft of

[0:39:14] event space this would check off all of those boxes and allow us to bring that group in meaning that it would all be encompassed in one location we were looking at trying to Cobble together five different places in town to put that together and they said we won't come and and it's a large group that kind of leads me to my next question in their decision-making process is an impediment uh a lack of our hotel space closely connected to the area not necessarily directly impacting it but it is it is a concern um you know one thing that we've we've tried to make sure that we do from a DMO and and CBB perspective is not to tout one particular Hotel over another I know in other cities where this hotel occupancy tax uh addition has been made that that is the downtown hotel that supports that Convention Center we don't want to be in that situation we need all of our hotel Partners um you know one thing that we again one of the benefits of being in St Angelo is a 10-minute drive anywhere most days right so 12 12 depending on what you're doing right depending on what you're doing 10 to 12 minutes so the other issue is is the following that even when let's say we have a hotel next to the convention center Center and we have rooms blocked out what you find is many convention goers don't even take advantage of that because they might have Marriot miles I mean marri at points they might have holiday end points and they choose to stay where their points accumulate loyal regardless of that and that is always an issue so and unless we had a 600 D I'm sorry yeah there they are down there the guilty ones a six a 6 to 700 room Hotel downtown would be adequate for that particular process so if we're talking about putting in 6 to 700 rooms in one hotel then certainly that could that could be your convention Hotel you know the thing that Karen brought up about being um conservative remember over 51% of our sales tax dollars come from outside the

[0:41:19] citizens of St Angelo Texas if we can't find ways to drive the sales tax revenue the sales tax revenue will not grow and that is a key component of our Revenue structure we have two areas property tax sales tax if we can't and the one we can impact most aggressively is bringing things into our city to increase sales tax dollars we need the tourism dollars we need those sales tax dollars to grow and this Avenue is one of those most important ways absolutely and the revenue generated last year as you all heard back in May um I mean it saved average taxpayers anywhere from $400 to $467 depending on the size of their their home last year so that is that is something that every time we have someone come in that's a general concern so that's fiscal responsibility in my mind and this is one opportunity to bring in excess Revenue that will not increase property tax rate or dollars and that's may help it they may it may help it which is key we hope it will yes other questions comments rebuttal not really rebuttal I I just I just want us to be good planners good planners before we go forward all there is to it there'll be a plan may I have a motion I move a motion by Lucy second second by Harry public comment Heather with that we'll take a vote all those in favor of approving this item a please say I I I are there any individuals opposed no with their no no votes then those motion passes 70 and travel time depending on who you're writing with yes how fast how quick you get there you can get there in quicker than 10 minutes if you're right

[0:43:22] with no one's listening in the back of the room to that comment I'm sure don't traffic camera s there you go thank you Sydney all right the next one is you as well so uh Item B is consider approving contract number 23-19 for the purchase and installation of 14 HVAC units at the MCN Convention Center at 501 Rio cono drive with Advanced Service Group in the amount of $524,500 utilized ing hot fund balance and authorizing the city manager to negotiate and execute all related documents Sydney you're on yes so you all have heard some of the issues that we've had with our HVAC units so it would be great if we can get these items replaced we're looking at trying to replace 14 of our top HVAC units that serve this this meeting room as well as the South meeting room upstairs meeting room and the main lobby I'm sorry the uh North meeting room this was installed in 2008 the HVAC units that we have currently that's when they were installed um we have worked with facility maintenance on this item and we're we've received a quote from ASG in amount of5 24,576 um City staff has identified fund 605 um as the funding source for this um and the 605 fund balance is at 3.6 million currently we will not need to close for any installation on this project and all I'm looking for is just approval so we can get started on this item questions comments for uh Sydney did this go out for bids yes sir it did other questions for Sydney move to pres approve is presented thank you hary second by Tommy um any public comment Heather okay with that let's take a vote all those in favor say I I motion is approved 70 Carl you are on for item C discuss and consider the proposed theme Style

[0:45:27] and scope for the Riverwalk wave finding signage and provide direction to staff regarding the funding of the project yes last year city council funded um budgeted some money for us to start looking at wayf finding particularly wayfinding along the river trying to forward to the slide Brian can you help me with for the slide please there we go so we started the we started this process looking at some guiding principles first in terms of the signage the way finding signage we looked at wanted to look at function uh locations in in the map where where those signs would be located the design of the signs the cost of the signs and the maintenance of the signs we linked up with uh architect Craig Kenny who was the primary architect on the River Project back in 2011 finishing in 2013 and then we worked with the graphic arts class uh at ASU uh that class with about 20 students they paired up into teams of two and we met with them several times to discuss the project review their Concepts and proposals and give them some guidance on how to improve their proposals based on the guiding principles we had established so the final concept uh we'd like your uh input on and direction if this is the way you'd like to proceed um this is the signage there's three types of signs in the scope of this project there are directional signs this one is a directional sign um I'll discuss the materials here in a

[0:47:30] minute so along the path um there would be directional signs between locations directing you to those locations another type of sign and I've got another image of this one is a map sign there will be fewer of these they would be at key locations you go up to the sign you look at the map you look where different locations are and then there are information signs or Placer signs that would be at key locations letting folks know they've arrived at a location and information about um what's at that location maps of the signs so the Western scope starts at civic league park currently the Eastern scope ends just past the um the nursing home across the river you see the commission Center here a total right now of 24 signs this is a closer look of the map sign so again it shows the map locations and the legend also a star showing you are here these are still at the beginning stages of the the detail of the information and of course we can add QR codes to these signs as well to link to a website for more in-depth information another closer look at the graphics of the map the materials there's a concrete base it's ctin steel which is the uh the steel that that rusts and stays Rusty and just looks like that forever almost for forever we've used this at different locations uh the the sign at the Bosque for example uh some of the signs along

[0:49:34] the redoo they've been there and haven't required any maintenance since we installed them um brushed aluminum pin mounted letters weather resistant polyurethane plastic signage and brush stainless steel brackets here's the U that's the ctin steel this is the polyurethane signage and these are the brushed letters and these are the brackets at the end I don't know why I can't get this go the right way looking at cost with a total of 24 signs and some contingency we're looking at a little over 211,000 we're not proposing any lighting for these signs uh that would increase the cost in the maintenance of them we have discussed whether we might want to extend the signage from the 24 signs to an additional three signs that would go all the way to the Texas Bank Sports Complex adding another map sign information sign and a directional sign that would increase the cost to about 200 36,000 at this point the design for the project is budgeted and we can proceed if this is the direction you would like us to go uh implementation for the project is not budgeted a recommended uh funding source is the hotel occupancy tax um and if this is funded we could proceed with the design and implement this project this year and the the way these signs are built they're expandable so we could extend them into different locations different length of the trail going back outside of the trail if you would like that as well I know that the river is one of our greatest assets and that many people

[0:51:37] utilize the river and our uh and all the areas around the river but no one knows where they're going if you're from outside of St Angelo Texas and sometimes even when you're in St Angelo Texas you know you're on a trail but you're not sure where it's going to go or where it ends or where it leads to so we need a much better way of way finding to really improve um the trails in the downtown River area we've got to let people know where they're going so and I like what you've presented um I'm very glad that we involved um Angelo State University students to help us in the concept of this and working with us I think it's a great Outreach so I'm going to I ask if there's council members who have comments or questions Karen totally agree I think it's outstanding that you involve the graphic design students from from the University and gratitude to Mr Kennedy for Mr Kenny sorry Craig for um leading that leading that effort just curious what is the lifespan of the graphic component of the signs would uh the graphics when you see maps and pictures and and whatnot how how quickly is that degraded dep on how quickly we grow and develop and new there you go any kind of that signage is going to fade a little bit sure this is similar to some of the signage other signage we have at the red aoria which has been there since 2016 eight years it's still looking pretty pretty good but I would suspect that within 15 20 years you may want to look at replacement that's pretty good that is pretty good yeah thank you other questions and comments Tom how sturdy I mean I love the I'll I'll go in two parts here I love how clean these are all right I in places where I worked before sometimes you try to sell every square inch you have and when

[0:53:40] you're done you have 67 different people advertising I I don't know about y'all but I love how clean these are and I don't know if commercially somebody's going to try to sell some sponsorships or things on them but I just love the clean effect of it number two and here's the one that you hate to how easy could somebody 10 guys get over and push this thing over are can they knock this over I don't think they things up like this in other places before and they have don't give anybody an idea I know I know it's that crude this is ctin still about 38 inch thick it'll have brackets in between it it's on a concrete base so it's going to be pretty sturdy you're not going to be able to wiggle it and knock it over okay but if a car runs off the road and hits it it's not going to stay up okay no you've answered it everything I need mayor I move approval is presented okay great do I have a second second by Karen public comment on this item Heather no okay question before we move off of this was the approval for the three additional signs Tommy yes okay thank you okay good good question so the total number would you presented and that will come out of Hotel occupancy tax so it's a funded item okay all right so that vote is all in favor say I all motion passes 70 get to work we we'll come back with the budget spring is coming up we'll come back with the budget amendment at the next meet couple meetings look nice cool those are cool I like d first reading of public hearing of an ordinance annexing into the city of s Angelo by Petition of the property owner unaddressed tracks with a total of 1, 125.5 73 Acres in Tom Green County Texas located south of US Highway 67 east of US Highway 277 and US Highway 67 interchange and Harriet Road being more fully described in the adopting ordinance and Aaron you are on thank you mayor um Aon Venoy

[0:55:45] planning and development services director uh this first item that I have this morning is an annexation of city-owned property to our uh I would say to our Northeast along Highway 80 or Highway 67 um and you can see here on the map uh if you are looking where we are we're we're down here on the left side but right in here is the county uh facility that is right in that area you can see 277 coming in here and then 67 going across there there are a lot of this all of this gray area is city-owned property it is not owned by any other private owners at this time uh this is an area for future develop Vel M uh whether that's extension of our Industrial Park uh we have some um areas that are adjacent to some other Utilities in the area that might be beneficial to folks that want to develop as well as a future uh potentially future landfill site um in this area as St Angelo continues to expand but here's just kind of the aerial that you can see all of it currently is undeveloped or not developed significantly there's no real structures in the area there's a couple of minor things but nothing that's really impacting uh future development um we believe this is a great opportunity for the city to expand its City Limits at this time and as future projects come in um whether it's kosa DC or our other partners in Economic Development can negotiate items that will help um continue to make S Angelo Thrive so with that we did adopt the petition to hear this item uh we are requesting today to adopt an annexation ordinance for the approximate 12,000 or 125 Acres along Highway us67 between Harriet Road and The Interchange of us 277 and us67 to be annexed into the city of St Angelo and with a second reading to be scheduled on MAR March the 4th questions for Aaron move to approve no wait one second please Larry is there any City funds

[0:57:50] that are required to make this project happen or is it all on the owner well we are the owner of this property um through the service agreement we we could start providing Services since it's not developed um there are not significant services that the city would do if there are developments that come forward uh that would go through the standard platting process and the standard uh zoning processes and throughing those processes they'd have to extend water Andor sewer if it's available those types of things I do know in the future as the area develops then that's more of a an item for our uh public uh uh Safety Services whether that be fire police ambulances of how it uh increases in density and how we service that area but as of today there would not be any additional funds to bring this annexation in and and start allowing folks to look at it for development sounds like we need another uh fire station at some point this area will probably be outside of the current service areas uh particularly the one that's on Smith Boulevard and cl to pulum um but that is certainly for future considerations to think and as the city owns this land there may be an opportunity in the near future to designate an area that is set aside for all right this is where we believe a future station would be and then as as that time comes uh then that's a budget request that comes forward to how to fund that and and get that moving forward any other questions or comments then I'll accept Harry's uh uh request to uh approve the motion I need a second second second by several people so I think it is seconded and so with that is there any public comment no all right we'll take a vote all those in favor say I I motion passes 70 we'll move on to the last item on the agenda which is item e first reading in public hearing of an ordinance for Z24 d17 a request for a zone change from The

[0:59:55] General heavy commercial zoning District to The General commercial zoning District located at 2401 North chadburn and Aaron you're on again thank you mayor uh city council and Mr Valenzuela this is a rezoning for a property that has received some tiar funding uh it's along the chadborn corridor you can see there at 2401 North chadburn Street it's a building that's had some uses in the past but they are uh changing that use to make it uh two uh General commercial spaces uh which we're very excited about because right behind them uh in a few months ago we rezoned to rm1 for some future lowrise multif family and having some areas that are more General commercial uh would be very beneficial along this Corridor so this is in the neighborhood of Reagan and Miss Lucy Gonzalez District 4 the vision uh plan is commercial you can see it's 3 um 321 acres and this is request to go from the general heavy commercial U The General commercial and heavy commercial down to just the General commercial not allowing basically heavy commercial uses there you can see here is the corridor on the left side most of the areas are um the cgc through the ti program to receive the ti funding that is a requirement uh to go through a rezoning it is no cost to the applicant to go through the rezoning to reduce that from the cgc to one of the designated items the applicant in this case is looking for The General commercial uh um zoning because they want to do two retail shops there and so you can see it also matches our vision plan of that area staying commercial so it is compatible with the area it is Frontage on a major thare which means the commercial zoning is still appropriate there is a community need in this area to have more uh General retail uh type of places or stuff that do fit our commercial uh environment and currently since the property is completely built out uh there is no um effect on the natural environment

[1:01:57] this did go to Planning Commission uh in January they did recommend approval with a 6-0 vote and the city staff also recommends approval from this change from uh General uh commercial heavy commercial to just straight General commercial at 2401 North chadman Street be happy to answer your question your District would you like to U make comment or offer I just can make a comment and that's like what you just said that this is going to be very beneficial to this area and it's only going to improve it even more so with that I'm good with it and um move to proof is presented is there second second by Tommy public comment let's take a vote all those in favor say I I motion passes 70 at this point we will move into our closed session executive session on the provision of government code Title 5 open government ethics subtitle a open government chapter 551 open meetings sub chapter D exceptions to requirement that meetings be open under the following sections a section 551.071 consultation with attorney regarding Joshua louder milk litigation and B section 551.071 deliberations about real property regarding approximately 200.1 Acres out of survey 20 WC r.com abstract 8138 approximately 143.5 eight Acres out survey 19 wc.com I mean.co abstract 4018 and approximately 8.39 Acres out of survey 4 and one half JW Johnson abstract 8647 and two approximately 316 Acres out of Sarah B Robertson survey number 178 abstract 8474 we will now adjourn to um our executive session meeting is officially called back to order at 105 7 a.m. and having uh finished with our executive session

[1:04:01] we have one announcement to make and Tom Thompson you're going to make that announcement please yes ma'am I want to make a motion authorizing the city manager to negotiate and execute an engagement agreement with the law firm of Denton Navaro to provide professional legal services relating to the Joshua Loudermilk litigation is there a second is there a second by Karen and we will obviously no public comment so we will take a vote all those in favor say I I motion passes 60 um we will now consider approving various board nominations the animal shelter advisory committee Dr Karen fber furan from mayor to first term ending January 2027 construction Board of adjustments and appeals Scott Allison the mayor to third term Gary cortiz sd4 and Jordan sephi smd5 to second term all ending February 2020 27 and the public art commission Kathy Villa smd3 to an unexpired term ending April 2026 may I have a motion for approval of all of the above or if anyone would like some specifically pulled out that would be fine so move by Larry second by Lucy public comments seeing none we'll take a vote all those in favor say I I motion passes 6 are there followup um issues that a council member would like to make any announcements on yes I'd like to ask uh for consideration of a future agenda item recommending a town hall to address civic league park security issues okay mayor if I may yes uh we actually Karen as far as an agenda item we don't need one just if you want to call just for a town hall meeting we can schedule it and start working on a date on that so you're asking for the city to schedule for the city to schedule a town hall meeting yes ma'am for the cor you're welcome perfect any other announcements Tom couple things we're looking at uh redoing maybe the announcement for Kirby Park due to the weather and then part

[1:06:02] two that I drove by just the past two days we were working uh similar to a battery area there on like 19th in Armstrong and we were doing we did we voted for a tax AB bment did we ever come further with that yes sir we're working on the agreement the abatement agreement um and I've been in contact just last week with their attorneys on that doing red Lin so we're finalizing that once we do that um we'll have to publish a notice uh for 30 days before a public hearing where that agreement will come back to you guys to approve it um so we've posted the notice just the other day it should be March 18th um meeting that it would come back for approval when was this approved for because the time frame on this is ridiculous yeah so the prior approval was for the Zone this is for the agreement um within that zone and it has to be separate uh hearing I have a constituent that I know it's actually in Lucy sck but anyway they're like four blocks south of that and they asked me just this weekend and I was like I we'll do some followup so if we're rolling when did we approve so I just need to know our time frame because it just seems like to me it's like been six months I don't know I don't remember yeah regardless you're on it this is the end of February and that discussion was October okay October bar we're good motion for approval I mean motion for adjournment or approval move wej we're going to adjourn there's a second and I'm sure 6 Z vote but I'll call for it is there a vote all in favor of adjournment We Are usally adjourned at 11:01 a.m.

Captured 2026-07-26 · source: youtube.com/watch?v=8rqgqh29yKQ