Ann Arbor Environmental Commission 4/27/23

001just ice um so Sean you know did um um did Sarah have more of a prepared presentation I know we didn't ask for one welcome to the April 27th 2023 electronic meeting of the environmental commission this meeting is in accordance with executive orders from the governor to affect social distancing and mitigate the spread of the covid-19 virus we intend to conduct this meeting similarly to an in-person meeting however please be patient if there are technical issues public comment will be via telephone only to speak during any of the public comment opportunities please call 877-853-5247 or [Music] 312-626-6799 and enter meeting ID 922-9696-1644 again call [Music] 877-853-5247 and enter meeting ID 922-9696-1644 this information is also available on the published agenda in the Public Notices section of the city website and on the broadcast of this

002meeting on CTN Channel 16 at T channel 99 and online at www.a2gov.org watchctn single word okay um do you want to move on to the Sean could you read the land Heritage statement and then the Roll Call thanks Jeff all right um start off with Lane Heritage statement I acknowledge that the land the city of Ann Arbor occupies is the ancestral traditional and contemporary lands of the anishinabe including Odawa Ojibwe and badewad me and YN dot pupils I further acknowledge that our city stands like almost all property in the United States on lands obtained generally in unconscionable ways from indigenous peoples The Taking of this land was formalized by the Treaty of Detroit in 1807. knowing where we live work study and recreate does not change the past but a thorough understanding of the ongoing

003consequences of this past can Empower us and our work create a future that supports human flourishing and justice for all individuals thank you let me just make sure I've promoted everyone who should be a panelist and all right I will start the Roll Call uh first uh council member Aquin here Ann Arbor thank you uh chairperson Brown you're in Ann Arbor thank you commissioner kalawart president thank you uh commissioner Curtis here Ann Arbor thank you commissioner Dale here in Ann Arbor thank you uh council member dish you're Ann Arbor thank you uh commissioner Gabe Randall here in Ann Arbor thank you uh commissioner Graham I think Mr Graham's sound was not working earlier so um don't see them online he was on for all of it so um commissioner Gruber here in Ann Arbor thank

004you uh commissioner Marson here in Ann Arbor thank you uh commissioner mursky here in my home in Ann Arbor thank you Vice chairperson Mitchell you're in Ann Arbor thank you uh commissioner nedric here in Ann Arbor thank you uh commissioner oriel and commissioner weyhing you're in Ann Arbor thank you uh and that is a quorum great thank you Sean um so let's move on do I have a motion to approve the agenda as submitted second um um any discussion any suggested amendments hearing and seeing none all who approved the agenda as submitted please raise your hand and say ah hello hi hi um in the opposed any abstentions okay it passes by uh unanimously the next item on the agenda is approval of the minutes of our March meeting um do I have a motion

005to approve the minutes um Shannon Gabe Randall and seconded by Lisa dish um any discussion raise your hand no I don't hear see anything um so who approves the minutes as submitted by uh by Sean raise your hand or say aye aye aye any days any abstentions okay I hear and see none so the minutes were approved uh unanimously as submitted uh the next item on the agenda is public commentary so this is an opportunity for persons to speak for up to three minutes please call 1-888-788-0099 I'm not sure that's the right number here please call 877-853-5247 and enter meeting ID 922-9966 we'll start that over uh please call toll-free 877-853-5247 and enter meeting ID nine two two nine six nine six one six four four this information is also displayed on the meeting agenda

006and video feed City staff will select callers that have erased their hand one by one using the last three digits of your phone number in order to electronically raise your hand to indicate your desire to speak please press star nine on your phone you will hear an automated announcement that the host is allowing you to speak when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television or background sounds so that we may hear you clearly please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments and be patient there can be up to 30 seconds before a connection is established now do we have anybody online yet uh yes we do I have a caller ending in a number ending in one three four again that number ends in one three four

007I've had allowed you to speak thank you Mr Reynolds and chair Brown I'm Ken Garber I live at 28 Haverhill court on the gas ban resolution Ann Arbor's direct greenhouse gas emissions are rising fast due to new construction 30 separate gas burning developments now underway are in advanced planning will put almost 24 000 metric tons CO2 equivalent emissions into the atmosphere each year for decades to come dwarfing emission reductions from the city's free solar projects uh recently the city approved 320 new gas burning Apartments off Pontiac Trail and 78 new gas burning townhomes on Platte Road um it's constant but few are paying attention reduced communal emissions will offset only a fraction of the damage the a20 plan relied on the state to enable cities to require most new buildings to be Net Zero Energy

008but that didn't happen nor will it for several years to come so we need to ban gas connections and new construction we just can't keep locking in new emissions for decades going forward that CO2 as you know remains in the atmosphere for 200 years or more Keating the planet there is no path to a livable climate if we don't end fossil fuel combustion Banning gas and new construction should be the easy part a no-brainer we have proven and cost-effective Alternatives this should not be hard other parts of the of decarbonization of the transition will be but not this you may have heard that a three judge panel from the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Berkeley's gas ban ordinance this is obviously not good news but it's important not to overstate its implications for

009Ann Arbor first Berkeley has signal letter plans to appeal second I spoke with a U of M environmental law professor who calls the decision legally faulty third Berkeley's ordinance amended its building code Ann Arbor on the other hand is proposing to amend its zoning code and courts give much greater leeway to localities in general when it comes to zoning than it does for building codes so our situation is somewhat different also your resolution does allow for interim measures other cities are doing this for example Burlington Vermont has implemented a carbon pollution impact fee starting at 150 dollars per ton carbon for new construction with fossil fuel thermal energy systems um and also for uh Renovations and expansions we should look at something like this for an Ann Arbor bottom line of the resolution you have

010before you tonight um is uh sound uh it's common sense it's only a first step but we need to take that before we do some of the harder things so I urge you to pass it tonight with enthusiasm and thank you for listening to my comments yep thank you Mr Garber um anybody else on the line Sean uh I do see one other caller on the line but their hand is not raised so I say give them a couple seconds to see if they want to raise their hand if not we can move on yep again you need to you need to press star 9 on your phone all right I am not seeing a hand race okay well um well this ends the first period of public commentary uh there will be another opportunity

011for persons to speak at the end of this meeting um so the next item on the agenda is unfinished business uh which is the second reading of our resolution and supportive accelerated action on an ordinance to ban natural gas connections and new construction and major Renovations and in support of devising and implementing implementing interim measures to incentify all electric construction so um let's see do you want to put up the document Sean and you share your screen and put up the other document uh not the red line version just put up the the final word the the version that's all right can everyone see that yeah so first uh well do I have them first sorry do I have a motion to um um to consider this resolution I don't see Hands Up um Dharma

012Ackman has her end up uh Brooks Curtis seconds um so let's proceed to the discussion um this will be the second reading um I don't think it's been um significantly changed since the last reading um I think that whereas Clauses are all um are all straightforward and support the uh the resolve clauses so let's see I could read it out um a social and why don't I read it out um I do see a hand from commissioner Merson oh okay um um yeah commissioner Marston you have the floor yeah I mean I don't know if you wanted to read it I just had a question about one of the clauses sure um the the fourth From The Bottom the whereas the 2022 inflation reduction act provides substantial new Financial incentives for electrification and heat pump

013installation um I was under the impression maybe I'm incorrect that that was primarily for retrofitting existing buildings and so I just wondered what the you know rationale was for including that pause in this resolution but I might be on that might not really understand fully the the uh that inflation reduction act you know the provision in there there is something an inflation reduction act that addresses new construction um I believe it relates to uh part in the tax code called 45 L um and um I can't tell you exactly what the uh incentives are but there are incentives for new instruction uh construction as well as refer retrofits like you said yeah I have a vague memory of that um any other questions about the whereas clauses okay let's why don't we move just move

014down to the resolution Clauses and I will read those out so there are two resolution Clauses the first one is therefore be it resolved that the Ann Arbor environmental commission concurs with the Ann Arbor energy commission and urges the city council to ask the city administrator to work with the City Planning Commission to draft and pass with the great urgency fitting and declared emergency an ordinance Banning natural gas connections with extremely limited exceptions for all new construction as well as major Renovations and additions for council's consideration and the second result Clause is therefore being resolved that the Ann Arbor environmental commission urges the city council to ask the city administrator and the City Planning Department Commission to draft and pass with equal urgency a set of recommended carrot and stick measures that city council and

015the city Administration could Implement for example the restructuring of fees priority processing and using greater discretion when providing incentives such as tax credits and helpful guidance in order to promote all electric sustainable healthy reliable and affordable Construction in addition to other measures such as an updated state of Michigan energy code and zero code appendix so these are the actions that we're asking we're recommending to city council um um are there any comments about these any concerns questions on John mursky you have your view of the floor it's my understanding that the renters commission also approved this about a week ago last week [Music] okay yeah that makes sense because um in many communities some utility costs are now higher than than housing costs so um so this is always this is always a you know

016a question about rental housing um so let's see Chris Graham you have your hand up well hopefully you hear me yes we can hear you now and to reload Zoom okay um there have been some court cases out west maybe Boulder maybe somewhere in California John or somebody have you scoped those decisions to see whether there's a way around them here we had a public comment by Ken Garber um there's recently been another the City of Eugene Oregon has passed an actual gas ban this being sued as well uh where there's a lawsuit that's been filed um so John Mercy you have your hand up here over the floor yes uh Christopher or Chris addressed the question to me uh my understanding is the same as Ken's so it's obviously of concern um clearly the

017laws in the two states and the methods uh were different than what is potentially possible um here uh I have not read it yet but there's a lawyer on the energy commission and uh he did a review of the decision and um the situation in Berkeley um and it was his opinion that while it's not good news for Ann Arbor it's not something that is something that would uh indicate that we have no pathway forward even on on the first resolve clause [Music] okay thanks um commissioner Mitchell you have your hand up thank you I just want to say that I strongly support moving forward with this resolution which is advice to move forward for the city we are in a climate emergency and it's time that we take action that has some visible tangible

018outcome and I think that the one suggestion that we just heard from um Mr Webber who called in to consider a fee that addresses the emissions related to any installation that includes natural gas right now is a way forward it's not something that might feel good but it's in the other hand we will be suffering the carbon emission output of the any building that has these installations for years and years to come this isn't a decision that would be for just now or any time that that a building is completed it will be something that is in existence for 30 years 40 years and we're talking about a timeline of 2030. so we need to take actions that we can be confident will start to address our goals and we need to see solid measurements

019that show our progress on reducing emissions all over overall in the whole city regardless this is a small step forward and I encourage us to move forward with it all right uh thank you commissioner Mitchell um are there any other comments or questions concerns um I just well I will just add it this um juncture that I have several uh old friends that are prominent environmental attorneys uh with environmental law firms practices um that I've been inquiring about their potential interest in providing pro bono work for the city in this regard um this has become a legal issue obviously and so um I think if the city legal department would accept some pro bono assistance that might help address some of their concerns about their budget and time so I think this is something that

020could be that could also be looked into um if uh should that should the uh you know should the challenges come um so let's see um uh do I have a motion to uh to consider a vote on this resolution uh Bridget Gruber erased her uh and then well Lisa dish you have your hand up here of the floor thank you I just wanted to say before we get to the vote that I will not be supporting this resolution I think that there there are some really good elements in it and I share very much the sense of urgency and concern about uh climate change um but okay I am uh I'm a lot more put off by the Berkeley result and because I have a you know I can vote as a member of

021this commission uh which is just an advisory vote but I'm actually sitting on the body that we're advising and as a member of the body that we're advising there I just can't see my way to put in a city in the kind of legal Jeopardy that um accelerating the gas ban ordinance would do and as you all are aware the city is currently also pursuing a path of renegotiating its heating franchise with DTE which is something that the city has a a clear right to do and so um back in February when we weren't aware of that option I was and the Berkeley case had not happened um I was more willing to say you know there are times when Ann Arbor should plays trails and be the first and you know okay Atlantis in

022court not a problem but I I feel like that's more reckless in light of what I know today so I'm not going to be support I'm not going to be voting in favor of this resolution but um I honestly understand that it's coming from a very good place for all those of you who have labored over it and are bringing it forward and will be supporting it tonight and so that's just what I wanted to say so thank you okay um thank you uh council member Desh um um Norma Ackman you have your phones your your hand up you have a floor thank you I wanted to also extend my appreciation to the Commissioners who worked on this as well as the aims of the resolution I am similar to council member dish I won't

023be boating uh in favor of this tonight I did want to say a few words just about kind of my perspective on you know what's driving this so I'm fully on board with using electrification as the means to meet our climate action goals and that we need to get fossil fuels out of our homes as I mentioned several times we're in a climate climate emergency and we need to take action and also you know I appreciated that the resolution made very clear we have the tools you know on the market today we have the technology for heating our homes heating our water um that are able to operate without gas and to do so with much higher efficiency Even in our Michigan climate um however I don't think that creating an ordinance to ban natural

024gas is the best path forward at this time primarily because I have serious concerns about the legal challenges both at the state and the federal level and also in light of the opportunity that I think that we have right now with respect to uh renegotiating our heating franchise um those two things basically are what's informing my thinking I did appreciate that this talked about incentives I think that that is a direction that is definitely worth consideration it's something that I've thought for a long time so also appreciate that aspect but will not be supporting this resolution tonight um commissioner murski you up the floor I would like to point out two things first of all the guest franchise does not expire until uh 2027 that does not mean that parties could not reach an agreement

025um on a new franchise in advance of that date but um I think everybody should consider who we're negotiating with secondly I would like to point out that there is a second resolve clause in this and it doesn't rely entirely on the first result class and by anyone voting against this resolution effectively they're voting against both resolve Clauses thank you um yeah um uh councilwoman this you have your hand up you have the floor we could split the resolution and vote separately on the resolved Clauses um I would support the second resolve clauses if it only if it didn't have stick but only had carrot in it but I wouldn't vote for carrot and steak because I think that that's actually redundant to the first resolved Clause because the sticks would be regulatory things like

026a ban in an ordinance or a tax or a theme so if people are interested in splitting the resolved Clauses there may be others who are just including them and if anybody's open to taking out the stick I would be happy to support the second result clause and I understand that you don't have to rewrite the stamping for Meaningful it's really hard on it and we can agree to disagree I have commissioner mursky grab the floor I for one would be willing to split the two just to make clear what position of the various Commissioners are that means we could vote on both I'm personally not in favor of removing stick because it would essentially take off the table anything like what Mr Garber mentioned it would also take off the table any fee increases

027and it would only then allow for incentives and we know incentives um often cost money and we may not have money to do that and also it would potentially take off other kinds of measures um so uh that's my my two cents thank you [Music] um thank you any other comments or questions okay well I'll just say that um I do think that the sticks um I don't have any problem with sticks remaining in there because um because oftentimes that's what's required to get just get people to consider moving out of their habits moving out of their habitual ways of doing business is when they see the sticks then they'll uh then they'll become more attentive to the uh to the carrots as well that's been my experience um uh commissioner Mitchell you have the

028floor and then commissioner Dale um we can we can't hear you sorry I'm generally not in favor of splitting and would prefer to have this be one single document however if we do do a split I want to make sure that we vote on each of them not just one oh yeah yeah so um so yeah my understanding is I I think it's a friendly Amendment so um I think so I'm willing to be contradicted but um I think it could be split um I'm happy with that myself um uh commissioner Dale you have your hand up here I I agree a split is better than than having two of our commissioners just say no to it right um so I think that that would make sense I maybe I'm just not understanding but to

029me taking the stick out I think what I heard was that having the stick is redundant because because of the first whereas yeah um if we are doing them separately it's not redundant right because now you're you're saying okay so if you're saying no to the first then the whereas or the the stick it's not it's no longer redundant for the second one right like because you might you might be saying that you're okay with incentives and you're not talking about a full band at all right so is it okay to have some sort of thing that's discourse discouraging it I mean to me that that seems reasonable so I I'm in favor of the sticks staying in oh okay um commissioner mursky and then commissioner Dar and then council member Ackman and then commissioner

030Morrison I would like to point out that the only stick is not a ban or is not severe restrictions there's a multitude of possible sticks and I would also add a stick could be that if a developer proposes a natural gas connected uh project that that be accompanied by a technical and financial evaluation and so you know that's not even necessarily a significant monetary stick um it's not a fee increase or anything else so there's a variety of different carrots and sticks and we're not in this resolution prescribing any carrots or sticks or simply suggesting that carrots and sticks be evaluated and that were not also even dictating what council and what the council resolution would look like the council resolution is simply this is advising Council to take this action and council could completely

031rewrite this based on our our input so I I think we should take that into consideration and in my view is we should leave the full palette of possibilities or possibilities on the table for Council as well as for City Administration uh that includes the legal office that includes planning department that includes the Planning Commission thank you thank um council member Ackman yeah I just wanted to say my understanding with respect to Sticks is I you know in its redundancy is that we're very limited in the sticks that we can apply and I think that the sticks are kind of limited to the ban so in that sense I think it's redundant another way to look at I think carrots and sticks or incentives is you know the status quo is the stick yeah not

032getting the incentive is the kind of the thing that you're missing out on so I would be in favor of splitting this but again I think the sticks kind of kind of I think it should come out and be focused on incentives well I think in some degree um you know the carrots and sticks are in the eye of the beholder I think we could we could substitute language saying any and all mechanisms such a you know to encourage something like that um but carrots and sticks is uh you know a traditional English phrase I think anybody understands um what's the um did you wanna okay um commissioner Marson you have the floor yeah yeah just thought I'd weigh in here on the carrots and sticks thing I think a band is a band says

033nobody can do it carrots you know you get a little benefit for doing something stick says you can still do the thing but there's a penalty to pay so to me ban is not equivalent to stick um and I think uh even if sticks are limited um it's still worth exploring what they are yeah yeah okay um uh commissioner council member dish yeah I'll just um I I have I have a lot of concerns that any sort of fee or whatever we would want to impose for people who went ahead with mass would I I would want to hear about the legality of that before I did it um I agree with council member agman that the stick is the status quo we have heard from Doug silby I think hasn't spoken to us or

034has he just spoken Planning Commission and Council how utterly impenetrable the processes he described his project which is a wonderful uh passive uh it's going to be a it's going to generate more energy than it uses his house that he's putting in Ward one and he described that he felt that his project had been hung up by by a year by a full year by our existing processes so um I think that there are a lot of things we can do for carrots and I would be fine with the language of any and all measures to encourage um electrification that's fine with me um I'm not going to vote for sticks so and I understand the expression and I'm well aware of the difference between the two but um from what I am hearing from

035developers including Jennifer Hall who stands in the position of a developer with respect to 121 East Catherine is that there's a lot that we can do um to with to City procedure to improve things and uh to do that for an electrified project would be a meaningful change so I am um I'm comfortable with moving forward with carrots and I won't vote for six hey um commissioner Mitchell and then commissioner marsky I just want to say that when I first heard status quo I thought that the the stick part of that meant that we're continuing to have the carbon emissions so um it was important for me to hear that explanation I don't um I just really feel that we are at an emergency and I understand that that there are others who are in

036a different position than me personally but um we are all going to feel the effects of the carbon emissions until we finally draw some kind of line so I'm drawing my particular line here so thank you commissioner Mercy I would like to say that I appreciate council member Jason's flexibility I would just like to point out I'm extremely familiar with Doug Selby's uh project and I would just like to point out that the obstacles that he faced have nothing to do with the sustainability features of his project or the fact that it was natural gas connected or anything else it had to do with the multiple layers of approvals it had to do with feedback from City staff saying one thing and then a reversal at a later point in time so it really this

037the the obstacles that he face and the The Five-Year timeline that he had had really nothing as I said to do with sustainability features and so we're we're not implying that we're adding additional sticks that would impede the kinds of projects that he has put forth in that Planning Commission and city council have approved and I would like to point out that about a week ago I sent an email to commissioner Gib Randall and her role as head of the the Planning Commission outlining a list of about I don't know six to eight different um possibilities of using the the phrase carrots and sticks broadly interpreted as other Commissioners have mentioned what types of kinds of measures the city could potentially consider I'm not advocating at the city Implement sticks that are unreasonable or that

038would not hold up to Legal challenge um and I think also that simply a consideration of carrots and sticks could lead to a brainstorming session that might lead to other avenues open to the city so I I think really um I mean I don't care that much about what we vote and do I certainly hope that what we do is see Mo activity on the part of planning department Planning Commission on City Council on on these activities that's my last comment thank you okay um any more comments on that topic because I'd like to bring up the negotiations with DTE as well that was also mentioned earlier [Music] um I'm not sure um um I agree with commissioner mursky that um 2027 is a long time in the future considering we're targeting 2030 for carbon

039neutrality and that these buildings will be will be there for and potentially be heated with gas for a long long time um so um is there I mean is there any since I'm sure there are sensitivities about these negotiations I'm not sure what um what the city has agreed to is there a uh is there a non-disclosure agreement formal non-disclosure agreement with DTE or anything um or anything like that that would um they would inhibit any uh Public Communication over these negotiations until they've been finalized uh tell her how to take it or leave it stage um I'm not sure if those uh I haven't heard anything about that um but this this concern was raised so I'm just putting it out there that um if we are negotiating with DT about an alternative known

040gas heating and then um and the deadline for that is 2027. um then um I would hope that there's some um that there's some public engagement on this issue um going forward over the next uh four years commissioner Ackman um I mean council member Ackman you have your hand up and then commissioner Graham yeah no problem I wanted to just comment on that I mean I think as commissioner Mercy said 2027 doesn't mean that that's when it's actually going to be you know when any negotiation is going to be finalized that's just we know that that's coming so I don't think we should read that as this is going to take until then um secondly I did want to point out that you know I I'm not part of the you know legal negotiations and

041that's not you know subject to discussion however I did want to say that there are public engagement sessions about this that were just announced I believe yesterday um and they're happening in May May 18th or sorry May 11th and May 18th um I believe this was announced to the office of sustainability so just wanted to let you all know since you have asked um well thank you so much um commissioner Graham um I'm going to vote for the resolution in respect for its ideals but I'm sure the council will do what it does um but there's a whole different Avenue of I guess electrification or get the fossil fuels out of houses that perhaps we can get more traction from I have a substantially gas Field House and one bill in 1960 which isn't terribly

042well insulated um the quandary of without a lot of time to recoup my investment being in my 70s um sorting out how to proceed with diminishing the use of gas here is not something that's easy and I'm I'm I'm cognizant about these issues I understand engineering I I get it but it's still complicated and it seems to me that again without sticks um the city could have programs that help those who are inclined to do stuff more than we are and in a gentle way again without sticks it's less threatening and and um maybe more people will shift sooner maybe the net result is more than we might get from new buildings that aren't willing or that are willing to go for it all electric just my two cents thank you um Shannon you have

043the floor um I feel like if this is going to have any effect at all that um the planning staff has indicated to me through uh the planning manager that they are basically booked in terms of their capacity and so in terms of what they see is the priorities they've got the comprehensive plan and all kinds of things happening the only way in my opinion based on what I've been hearing that they are going to work on this is if they get direction from Council and so it feels pretty important to me that if any of this is going to go forward that we need to have um Council supported and so you know I I haven't been listening to all the City Council meetings but if both of our representatives are saying that they're

044not going to vote for it then I think that it would be pretty unlikely that everybody else would on Council and maybe maybe um console presentation and Ackman could kind of let us know what the temperature is that would be my my guess but they can let us know um so it this is really hard because like it on the one hand I don't want the the perfect to be the enemy of the good here because it could just the whole thing could just get tossed out um at the same time I completely agree with the fact that we are in this emergency we need to do something about this and so uh but I feel like you know it's not just up to us it's the only way that this gets any traction is

045if city council tells planning staff to work on this and so um I feel like if if we're going to be able to get anything out of this that we probably need to put this in a state that is more palatable to what's going on with city council um and um but I would be curious to hear what our city council folks say about that obviously you're not in charge of what other people's opinions are but you've been talking about some of these things I'm sure so I'd be curious to see what you what you all think um thank you um uh commissioner Mitchell you have your hand up here you're you're muted I am muted I'm not muted this is the message that's really what this is and I really hope that council members

046I I know that you're hearing it and I know that you agree that we're in this emergency but somehow we do have to make our way forward because we are running out of time and it's not just for us it's for the future hey I'm commissioner mursky and then commit and then council member Ackman I'm going back on my word only to comment to commissioner Graham's comment commissioner Graham this only addresses new development and major Renovations so it doesn't have anything to do with uh existing natural gas customers and forcing them to go over just so that everybody is clear they just want to make that that clear for everybody to say thank you and I'm quite clear of that too okay um commissioner Ackman you have you have the floor and one and two

047respond to commissioner Gib Randall I appreciate the question as you said of course we can't speak for counsel but I would say that um as council member dish said I think splitting this off editing this to say recommended set of measures that city council and the city Administration could Implement you know I think I feel like the rest of that is just fine and I would be supportive of that so if that would be a way forward to split this into two resolutions but that I would feel good about that okay um thank you um so we have uh what I would consider a friendly Amendment from Council Members Ackman and Dish about splitting this into two uh splitting this um into two resolved Clauses with the same whereas Clauses so that's my understanding is

048we'll maintain the same whereas Clauses with both resolutions but we will have two separate uh resolved two separate resolutions with just the one resolved clauses and those one for the second result should say recommended set of measures instead of carrot and stick okay so do I have a motion to um to accept that Amendment from anybody um maybe just the changed wordings sent to us and then just to make sure that I'm not voting on something that um and so usually if John could make uh if Sean has a clear sense of what we're asking for and could make the change and either show it on the screen or send it to us that would be great um there were a couple of objections to the idea of splitting and I'm not sure that um

049it can be considered a friendly Amendment if there were a couple of objections and so I think and I have I am not an expert in parliamentary procedure but I think we might need to take a roll call vote on splitting um given that there were a couple of objections unless people wanted to people who made those objections wanted to withdraw them now and if anybody knows this better than I do please speak up but I know that's how we do it right right yeah I think that's the right way so I think the first item was um the first consideration is to alter the language in the second resolve clause and the first result in the second result Clause to remove parents mistakes Sean could you put up the uh the resolution is submitted

050yes I can do that so here we have both of them so so the amendment is to remove the suggested change in the language of the second resolve clause is that a set of recommended measures that could Implement um so just removing striking the Keratin stick in quotes um language from that resolution so do I have let's see do do I have a motion to accept this change this amendment the second resolve clause I'm having trouble seeing people and so moved yeah so which order should we be voting on all this in them to read the splitting first and the amendment then the change language or I think we'll change the language and then we'll do the split okay cool then vote on each foreign so okay so we have uh and I think we've

051exhausted the discussion on this topic so let's proceed to a roll call vote um Sean could you what is what is it exactly is the language now of the second Clause it would be just striking the Keratin stick and just leave it as a set of recommended measures that city council and City Administration could implement thank you um if I will just uh chime in and say if it is helpful I can make uh the um after votes have happened I can make whatever changes are voted on behind the scenes while we move on to our next agenda item and then after that agent item we could return to this and half of it um we might do that um but um I think I let's get let's um let's conclude this item on the

052agenda first um but um but it would be good to see the final versions um so the amendment is what we're voting on is just striking the Keratin stick um phrase there in the in the second result clause so um let's have a roll call about on that um I have a movement from commissioner Marston I don't believe we had a second on that motion then oh we did from commissioner from council member Ackman okay thank you and so discussion I don't see any hands up um I don't hear any anybody so um so all who vote uh to strike that keratin stick language um let's see let's uh let's go through the roll call for that I think that's required all right um council member Eckman yes thank you uh chairperson Brown uh yes

053thank you uh commissioner yes thank you commissioner Curtis yes thank you uh commissioner Dale yes thank you uh councilmember dish yes thank you commissioner Gib Randall yes uh commissioner Graham yes thank you uh commissioner Gruber yes thank you uh commissioner Merson yes thank you uh commissioner burski yes thank you Vice chairperson Mitchell no thank you uh commissioner nedrich no thank you uh commissioner Oriole is absent uh commissioner wahing s thank you uh is um two no's and uh the rest of our guesses except for the absent yep so that uh so that passed so the next vote would be um splitting it up into two into two separate resolutions so do I have a motion um for that against consideration um Lisa dish seconds um let's let's just uh why don't we proceed to just

054I think we can do a voice for it on this one I don't think so because there were objections to splitting so yeah leads to my recovered okay well this is my reminder that I need to revisit the Roberts Rules of Order so I'll defer to your judgment on that so okay let's um so the question is um shall this resolution be split up into two separate uh resolutions which maintain all the whereas Clauses in both resolutions but which uh the resolve Clauses are separated that's the question um so do I have uh uh do I have a motion to consider that I think we did didn't we I think we're good yeah um I think I was the uh the opponent and I could withdraw that opposition [Music] if I was the soul one

055to avoid you know request not splitting okay I mean I I would like to point out that this doesn't prevent anybody from voting in favor of both resolutions well that's correct yes so um all right so do you want to just go through the roll call again on that on that question on um all right uh councilmember Aquin yes thank you uh chairperson Brown yes thank you commissioner Keller work yes thank you commissioner Curtis yes thank you uh commissioner Dale yes thank you councilmember dish yes thank you commissioner Gib Randall yes thank you commissioner Graham yes thank you commissioner Gruber yes thank you commissioner Marson yes thank you commissioner mursky yes thank you uh Vice chairperson Mitchell yes thank you commissioner edrich yes thank you uh commissioner Oriole is absent and commissioner waking yes thank

056you uh that is unanimous yes all right thank you okay so um the next question is um uh voting on the first resolve clause which is urging city council to ask the city administrator to work with the City Planning Commission to draft and pass with a great urgency fitting a declared emergency an ordinance Banning natural gas connections with extremely limited exceptions for all new construction as well as major Renovations and additions for council's consideration so do I have a motion to vote on this um on this resolution on this revised resolution uh Lisa dish um and seconded by anybody ah Brooks Curtis um seconded it so any discussion all right we want to do the roll call again on the first resolution the first resolve clause all right uh vote on the first resolved calls

057uh council member Ackman no thank you chairperson brown uh yes thank you commissioner yes thank you commissioner Curtis yes thank you commissioner Dale yes thank you uh councilmember dish no thank you commissioner Gabe Randall yes thank you commissioner Graham yes thank you commissioner Gruber yes thank you commissioner Marson no thank you commissioner mursky yes thank you Vice chairperson Mitchell yes thank you uh commissioner netridge no thank you uh commissioner Orioles absent and commissioner waking yes thank you um uh that is four knows uh the rest yes which I believe passes so it passes so um okay let's proceed to the vote on the set on the second resolution amended resolution uh containing the single resolved clause with all the uh We've submitted whereas Clauses so the second Clause is therefore be it resolved that the

058Ann Arbor energy commission urges the city council to ask the city administrator and the City Planning Commission to draft and pass with equal urgency a set of recommended care measures that city council and the city Administration could Implement for example the restructuring of fees priority processing and using greater discretion when providing incentives such as tax credits and helpful guidance in order to promote all electric sustainable healthy reliable and affordable Construction in addition to other measures such as an updated state of Michigan energy code and zero code appendix so do I have a motion to vote on this question um council member dish do I have a second um uh Brooks commissioner Curtis seconded um do we have any discussion no I hear in CNN so um let's proceed to a roll call vote Sean on

059the second resolution all right but on the second resolution as amended uh councilmember Eckman yes thank you chairperson brown yes thank you commissioner Kyle work yes thank you commissioner Curtis yes thank you commissioner Dale yes thank you councilmember dish yes thank you commissioner Graham yes thank you commissioner Gruber yes thank you commissioner Merson yes thank you commissioner mursky yes thank you Vice chairperson Mitchell yes thank you commissioner netridge yes thank you commissioner Oriole is absent and commissioner waking yes thank you uh that is unanimous yes all right thank you Sean so I think this concludes this matter and um I understand and just in closing I'll just say that I understand the objections to exposing the city to Legal challenges but I have to say that um I don't think any meaningful change I'm aware

060of has ever happened without legal challenges and that uh and that I I would encourage City staff to look into look into and accept any pro bono help that may be offered uh that's acceptable and what might help them um um through this process so um so the next item on the agenda is the solid waste updates and budget discussion um thank you so much um we've had a lot of data submitted that's been posted to the registrar so um you have the floor I'm gonna I'm gonna kick us off and then turn it over to Sarah if that's okay commissioner well thank you all for the opportunity to speak to you tonight we um we received some questions and we want to take the opportunity to hopefully address the questions you've had and answer

061them tonight um our plan is for us to go through the questions that were provided by chairperson Brown and commissioner mursky and hopefully address um you know the full amount of questions that were provided to us um we also would like to take the opportunity to share some things that we've identified um SM opportunities associated with the solid waste program where we see the environmental commission um helping and providing support and guidance to our Solid Waste team so we'll hope you you'll be open to hearing some of our thoughts on that I want to first thank our staff for spending the time um Sarah Mason spent a lot of time and also some of our financial team um pulling the information together that's been provided to you and also drafting the answers to the questions

062that you'll hear from tonight so appreciate the help that they have provided we have in addition to Sarah tonight we also have Molly mashieski here so we brought our both of our subject matter experts on our Solid Waste program so we're we're hopeful and confident that we can address the questions you might have um I'm gonna just uh start with answering the first question that was provided and then I'm going to turn the floor over to Sarah and she will take us through the rest of them um and that question was who is responsible for understanding um budgeting and monitoring and achieving Solid Waste Financial targets um the the budget that we have for solid waste is is very complicated and has what I've been told is somewhere close to 3 000 line items so

063this is not something that one individual is responsible for necessarily completely understanding and um being conversant in the complete budget so we operate in a collaborative environment when we have a team our Solid Waste leadership but also our financial um support from the CFO and her staff so together that is where the the expertise lies in being able to be able to communicate um and Converse about the full content of the budget so it's not a single individual's responsibility or purview so with that um I will turn it over to Sarah and she will walk you through the rest of the questions thank you thank you Brian um good evening everyone thanks for the opportunity to go through this I'm not sure if every all of the rest of the commission saw the questions submitted

064so I will read them maybe paraphrase and then provide a response just so that you're clear on the discussion so the first um set of questions after I was the one that Brian addressed was around the new climate Village revenue and related Solid Waste expenditures um I believe you did get a written reply from OSI before this meeting and then I'm going to address the other couple of questions that were mentioned so the first question was around what the exact plans in the final budget for the spending of the climate military related to Solid Waste programs in the uh it does list two uses um one is the purchase of a truck for the expansion of commercial recycling collection that's budgeted at 450 000 and the other is for creating implementing and managing a commercial

065compost program and that amount is actually four hundred thousand dollars I think um there needs to be a correction to that amount for the total of 8.50 that you saw in the response from OSI within that four hundred thousand dollars um for the commercial composting program there is flexibility on exactly how that money will be spent for the program development we are intending to hire a person that will help us flush out what that plan looks like the second question in this category was around um if the plans had changed from the original two-year allocation and it said if plans changed versus the original two-year allocation plan when and why was the environmental Commission in the solid waste Community not consulted before the budget proposal was finalized our plan did not change the next question

066was around the purchase of the truck and as I mentioned we have one truck budgeted there was a follow-up question of if the truck would be an EV consistent with the a20 plan and they the truck will not be in EV because the technology is not there for a front load garbage truck um that's an EV there are side load trucks EV that are being used in communities but not front room trucks at this time the next question is around the that why is the full-time employee that's budgeted a tenth of the commercial compost program is supposed to be operated on an ongoing basis in its attempt position because this position is intended to develop and start the program to get it to a place where then it would be managed by existing staff and

067an ongoing manner the next question here um what are the smart goals for the commercial compost program and um any metrics or targets by year that will indicate whether or not the program is a success and at this time the measures of success for that program are not yet defined that will be part of the program development that's Yet to Come however I do want to mention that this is an area I'm in the after we finish going through these questions I also have a short update part of that is talking about our Solid Waste metrics in general and there is an opportunity there I think for the commission to help with looking at what those metrics are and maybe looking to redefine them at the tracker programs so that more to come on that

068question later the next category of questions are around solid waste budget variances and you've received several Financial reports um there was a fourth quarter FY 22 report provided at the October meeting and in the interim I believe in March we provided a year-end annual summary from FY 22 and so the question here is that um there were why were there multi-million dollar changes in the operating budget between the two reports and I think that there was just some confusion in um comparing the numbers so the uh Solid Waste fund fourth quarter report for FY 22 um included non-operating expenses um it it lists total expenses that includes operating and non-operating expenses however in the annual report those two categories of expenses are listed as separate line items so if you compare the total expenses in

069the fourth quarter report to just the operating expenses in the annual summary it's not uh comprehensive because it would be the fourth quarter report is the sum of both operating and non-operating expenditures further the finalized FY 22 numbers were not complete until after that October 27th meeting and so there were significant changes between what was reported at that time in the final figures so the annual summary report for FY 22 was post audit and the FY 22 fourth quarter report was before the audit and so that is the other reason that those numbers do not align the next question in variance is um this is a question around what caused the variances between FY 21 and fy22 and what were the drivers of these variances and how will they be reduced in the future um

070and there on the revenue side um the biggest variance for mpy 21 was around the recycling processing credit it was reflective of an unanticipated Rebound in a volatile Market which has in fact gone back down so if you have any familiarity with the Commodities Market related to recycling it goes up and down as an example um the basket value for our recycling the composition of the city's recycling proton in April of 2022 was 99 a ton in November of 2022 it was seven dollars a ton so we're back up to around 25 but it goes up and down and it was up unexpectedly I think as a rebound after covid so um and the other variances there were reflective of investment losses the next question still around variances um oh we received a question also

071on year-to-date operating budget status for FY 23 which is the current fiscal year we did provide those reports earlier this week um and so I think you've got the information there through the end of March and the final question in variance is the big positive variances in FY 21 and 22 were in the non-operating expenses they added 9.3 million to the solid waste fund balance our significant non-operating expense variance is expected in FY 23-25 and if so why so those big credits that 9.3 million that was added and the fund balance calculation are primarily reflective of the year-end net present value of future liabilities for those non-operating expenditures so a significant factor in the changes the liability calculation is a singular data point and the 30-year treasury note rate at the time of the calculation

072which is the last day of the fiscal year due to this the changes in liabilities are difficult to predict but we are currently projecting increases of 225 000 annually for fiscal year 23-25 okay um the last category of questions were around the solid waste Reserve fund and I just want to say the point of clarity there's no separate fund we have one solid waste fund so that's just there's no separate Reserve when there's one fund uh the first question is can the solid waste Reserve fund be used for any purposes other than Solid Waste related expenses and the answer is no and the fund only be used to cover unanticipated variances or one-time expenses this is like a slightly more nuanced but not necessarily however it's best practice for our operating revenues to meet or

073exceed our operating expenditures therefore it would be counter to that practice to use the fund balance to add recurring expenses to the budget without an outside Revenue Source eventually the budget would reach a point where you don't have enough and Reserve to cover those ongoing expenses uh so the next question um is around future use for the solid waste Reserve funds or the fund balance so we do keep there's about 19 million dollars at the end of the last fiscal year and fund balance and 25 of that is held in reserve of the 25 of the operating budget is held in reserve which is about um five million dollars which leaves about a 14 million dollar balance and so that will actually come down quite a bit because we do have capital projects such as

074the drop-off station that will be heading over the next couple of years um as that gets built and the project cost for that at this time is estimated between six and a half and eight million dollars so we won't know more until we get construction cost but it's gonna be a pretty expensive project uh the last question in this fund balance category um is an acceptable practice that available access Reserve funds sit in a bank or investment account for years and earn a return that is not allocated specifically for solid-based purposes no returns gain on Solid Waste funds are allocated specifically for solid waste purpose um there was also a question about what spending has proposed an upcoming upcoming budget cycles and the solid waste fund operating budget largely stays fairly consistent year to year

075so unless a new program is added there's not a lot of variability in that spending year over year okay um and that is all the questions that we received in advance on the financial report I don't know if there are other questions at this time um we'll do our best to answer them or I can move forward with the rest of my update um well thank you Sarah yeah why don't we yeah let's not wait till the end for all the questions so we have one hand up now from John mursky you have the floor I I just wanted to say thank you very very much those were excellent answers um forgive me for all the detailed questions but it really helped me better understand um the situation and hopefully it helped the other Commissioners

076and hopefully maybe it even helped you that's my experience with these kinds of things is that when you have probing questions everybody learns in the process and so thank you very much I have no further questions yeah yeah I also want to thank you Sarah um for for answering these questions um in a thorough manner um yeah and I hope I hope you learned something about it too they weren't intended as criticism stressed trying to broaden our understanding you know of the solid waste program um I think let's see I had one question um and that was um I know that the the city can face liabilities for the closed landfill you know for its close landfall so I was wondering are you reserving uh are you dealing with that or did have you purchased

077insurance um to cover those eventualities or do you have um do you have uh money reserved out of the solid waste fund for that eventuality yeah that liability is accounted for in the non-operating expenditures for the solid waste fund so there are um I think it's three different categories I know that one of them is opeb one is the landfill liability and yes the other is capital assets so those are the three categories of non-operating expenditures um so yes that is accounted for okay great um thank you um so on uh commissioner Dale you have your hand up and then uh councilman Brockman yeah I also just wanted to um thanks Sarah I think um a lot of the questions that were posed by other Commissioners or ones I had so I appreciate that um

078and I appreciate how succinct your answers were while still being very thoughtful and thorough and um and I'm wondering if I am I imagine maybe you have those answers written down just for quick reference since you went so uh quick through all of them is that something that you'd be willing to share I know it would be nice for me to be able to go back to those answers if I you know you went through a lot so if I wanted to reference those in the future is that do you have a document like that that's like the FAQs um that you could share with people who are interested it's currently written as sort of note so I would have to see yeah um just sort of notes to myself at this time but we

079could probably provide something um that summarizes everything yes thank you um council member Ackman I just wanted to hop on the Gratitude train um I had heard that this budget was a very complicated one I didn't know it was 3 000 lines so I just really appreciate the work and the collaboration that went into providing these very thorough and succinct answers so thanks to everybody that worked on this yeah any other questions for Sarah at this point City staff no all right so Sarah please continue okay let's okay I do have just a couple of slides just to let's just okay yeah Sean can you um can you give Sarah the Privileges okay it's not I see something that says advanced Advanced sharing options I don't see oh it just apologies I got it okay

080all right we can see that thank you okay wonderful go through this kind of quickly um the first is just the things we're going to cover Solid Waste fund update which we just went through a quick update on downtown Solid Waste issues winter compost metrics where I do want to spend a little bit of time uh talking and then just touch briefly then a couple of things we're looking to do in the next year or so things that we're focusing on we have covered this so downtown Solid Waste update um city council did approve the new commercial franchise contract with WM for refuse falling on March 20th that does include a subscription service for commercial compost collection to be provided by my green Michigan as a subcontractor to WM The Collection under that agreement begins

081on July 1. and we're currently working with WM on the transition plan and Communications I mentioned this previously the biggest change is that um the billing and customer service will be responsibilities will be moving from the city to WM and the city retains oversight for those functions but customers will get to interact directly with the waste hauler which is something we heard during our stakeholder engagement and putting together the RFP was that they wanted to be able to have more direct access to the provider otherwise we have seen some improvement in the downtown alleys we continue to work with the downtown stakeholders including businesses to improve the Aesthetics and another part of this new contract is we have a focus on trying to consolidate some of the collection containers to improve the efficiency and the

082number of containers you see in the space that will also open up room to add compost containers should businesses want to add that service as well um on winter I was also asked about a winter compost update we've had winter compost for two years now we started with the winter of 2022 and we continued in 2023. um relatively small volume collected over those the services provided the first week of the month uh on your regular collection day um but we do think that it has increased uh the amount of compost collected on the whole at least for 2022 2023 will be a little more difficult to tease out because we had an ice storm at the end of February and then immediately started collecting storm material as well so it might be a little challenging

083to discern the impact of each I did want to share though um the tonnage collected so the blue bars represent 2022 the orange bars 2023 January February March so you can see in both years each month a little bit more is collected this is obviously what I was mentioning um a bit outsized because everyone's trees had damage uh but we we did see even an increase you know in the first two months of the year over last year so we think that we've did a better job of letting folks know about the service and more people are aware that they could put their card out that week for collection so we'll continue to track that we don't at this time have any changes planned for the program for 2024 once a month seems to meet

084the need for most residents for that collection okay jumping right into my metrics conversation um this is shows you the percent of the annual tons by program type so orange is compost or Organics blue is Recycling and gray is trash uh percentage of the whole from these are fiscal years so from 2018 through 2022 which is the last complete year we have data for um and so to get at the city's diversion rate you would it's the difference between the tons landfilled or the percent landfilled you know in the total we've we've been averaging around a 33 diversion rate um this looks fairly static um however I'll show you on the next slide our overall tons collected have continued to decrease which is um a beneficial metric to see so okay sorry I see John

085commissioner Calvert you have your hand up because you have a question yeah Sarah quickly sorry if I missed it but what is this based on weight volume good question yes so wait so percent of the hole by weight yes um and I also want to just mention that you know this is an imperfect number this represents the tons that we have data for we know that there are some um leaks in the system if you will there might be more recycling that's happening that we're not able to capture and so we are also looking at ways to gather more of that information if we can gather it in a way that's sustainable and repeatable year over year um yes please I just want to point out too that the university has their own recycling collection

086so this is this is what the city collects and what the city of contractors collect only so when we're thinking about community-wide we're not capturing that data in our metrics yeah very good point Thank you Molly for jumping in this is a similar chart to the one you just saw however this is just in tons so total tons collected by program type and so I've circled this 47 700 as you can see that the total tonnage which is really the ultimate goal is that we would like to see waste generation go down recycling more is wonderful but we are very focused on waste prevention waste reduction and then what you have left doing the most responsible thing was either composting or recycling and so we do think that that's a good indicator this is where

087I wanted to spend a little bit of time however weight-based metrics are challenging um we have seen a light weighting of packaging material over the past couple of decades and so when you look especially at like a recycling rate the material going into the recycling bin has gotten lighter weight by Design you've seen newspaper drop out you've seen a lot of glass containers drop out so when it's a percentage of a whole if your trash is staying heavy then it gets increasingly difficult to add percentage points to a diversion rate based on weight also a weight-based metric completely misses anyways prevention that happens so that doesn't get captured because you're not collecting it and weighing it so um there's some leading communities and others in the industry who are really looking at Upstream metrics how

088can you measure waste prevention how can you look at maybe waste generation per capita is it decoupled from population growth is it you know how far is it above some baseline if you have a baseline um people also look at things like capture rate instead of recycling rate which is of the available recyclables generated how much of that are you actually capturing and then there's also a need there's some qualitative measures there's some intangible benefits that happen especially in the circular economy work when you're making connections and you're keeping things out of the landfill you're keeping them in circulation you may not have a way to record every transaction that occurs but there are still benefits that are happening so all of that to say um staff are looking and evaluating what metrics we're using

089and trying to choose you know the optimal subset of metrics um that better reflect the city's current climate and circular economy goals at reducing overall waste generation things like preventing food waste and increasing reuse and I think that this is really an area where staff would welcome um input from the environmental commission and working with you all on thinking about what those metrics could be that's my plug for that discussion um to be had later so I also wanted to give an update on the proposed new drop-off station we continue to work on that and we did do stakeholder feedback which the commission amongst others we sent out an email to around 85 sort of interested stakeholders folks that represent communities uh that their residents use the facility or otherwise are interested Partners we also

090have held two public engagement meetings we helped one at the senior center at Burns Park one at Pittsville Township Town Hall and got a lot of great feedback we have narrowed the three conceptual designs down to one which I'll show you on the next slide but just a general timing update at this time we're hoping to have the site plan submitted to let me back up a second in case you're unaware the proposed facility is within Pittsville Township so while it's a city-owned property we do have to go to Pittsfield Township Planning Commission and their approval process for this project so we're hoping to have that site plan submitted this summer and when receive approval then we would um go out for construction document hopefully get that started early next probably early next year at

091this point and then the facility would open in the fall of 2024 spring 2025. these are very broad timelines because once we get into the site plan process there are some things that are out of our hands in terms of how fast that moves along I did want to show in case you you have been there's a project website a2dropoff.com if you haven't been there it's got all the background information if you did see the three conceptual designs that we were working with originally this is the final conceptual design that was created and we did incorporate um stakeholder feedback and made a few changes the largest one is that this main building that you would drive through this is where you drop off like single stream batteries Electronics things like that um originally had traffic

092on both or operations on both sides of a center drive through line and we it was redesigned to have one long linear building so all the operations can be on one side and the cars you know that are coming through the drive-through would drive this way the other big addition is we added this space here and I apologize if this is very small I will see if I can zoom in it's also on the project website where you can look at it this is a reuse space um a space noted as a 5 000 square foot building for some future re you reuse activities that would be defined so um commissioner Graham did you have a question I did entry off Flat Road or entry off the main entry to the compost center and and

093mrf and over the scale entries good answer um yes but for two different traffic streams so this is plat over here on this side and I can show you a different image I can pull it up that puts you more in the world of where this is located and that entrance would be for the passenger vehicles for those that are coming to drop things off that traffic is indicated by a red arrow on this site design and there is a proposed access road this way that goes this is the city's existing Compost Facility that goes across that railroad easement this way to enter the wheeler Center so the blue arrows represent the heavy truck traffic and those trucks would would enter the wheeler service center in the existing gate off plat where the scale is

094but then they would be able to access the compost site through that interior axis road so there was a strong desire to keep the industrial heavy truck traffic and the passenger vehicle traffic separate from one another so that will allow that to happen good thank you thank you you're welcome okay so I encourage you to check out our website if you have um any interest in kind of seeing the the other stuff that's been put together for this project and the last thing I just wanted to touch on a few things that we're working on we do have a contract at the Ecology Center for marketing Outreach and education for all of our programs and one of those work areas is around social based social based marketing campaign um we are working with them now

095uh to hold focus groups to start thinking about attitudes and behaviors towards trash Recycling and compost and develop messaging that would motivate more people to participate in those programs we're also um our compost program we have never we do bi-annual composition audits for our recycling stream we've never really done an audit looking at our compost stream and that is something that we agreed to do in um the First Amendment to our operating agreement with we care so we will be doing an audit of that material it'll be more visual than weight based but it will allow us to see what the contaminants of concern are for the compost stream so that we can do education and Outreach around that we have a group of a20 ambassadors that have an interest in that area and we're

096working with them on a project we've also been piloting some multi-family uh property Outreach for recycling and then hopefully for compost as well as we start to develop those programs move in and move out move out for the spring of this year is going on now it started yesterday we'll be open again tomorrow Sunday Monday and Wednesday but we also are looking to broaden what we're doing with move out and we've had some great conversations with our partners at the University and let the apartment association and others about looking for more collaboration to do to provide additional programs and services to keep more material out of the landfill we've talked to others a lot of other university towns other cities people are doing a lot of creative things and we think that there's more that

097we could be doing here um to recoup some of that material and keep it from going into the trash also um Brian mentioned we had a couple of areas where we thought we could interface with the commission and the zero waste working group um you know recently reconvened and I think one of the things we might talk about there if there is interest is starting to research around c and d and deconstruction ordinances looking for examples of how other cities have structured them what their approach and timelines for implementation as well as looking to see what we might need locally to support that so and that's a another area where we're hoping that we can work with the commission on researching those ideas and look to see what might work for us here in Ann

098Arbor and that is the end of my remarks I want to thank you all again for the opportunity and if there's any other questions I'd be happy to take them at this time um well thank you Sarah this is all very thoughtful and um things that seem to be moving in a very good direction so thank you so much um Chris you have your hand up I do I I'm reminded when I was a boy when I would see Burma shape series of signs along the roads um it seems to me one way that people will bring recyclables compost materials particularly in is to have some sort of electronic signage where you might give them messages it's astonishing to me how much especially plastic trash comes in with compost loads it's just ridiculous that that

099isn't separated out before these guys put this stuff in their trailers and whatever they're bringing in primarily compostable but serious trash and you could educate um you might have to do it in Spanish as well as English with signage on the incoming Road uh and might help a little thank you um Lucy you have your hand up thank you thank you for this presentation it was really wonderful and Incredibly exciting um I have one quick question actually two quick questions one is I know that you guys have been really entrepreneurial and won some great grants for the Dos to to support that how much of the 6.528 million and actually probably higher than that will be covered by the grants great question so we have 850 000 of grant funding from Eagle to put towards

100the project additionally Washington County has given a soft commitment of around a million dollars towards the project that cost sharing has not been set up yet but that's the the figure so um close to two point million will be covered by other funding sources but that still leaves um a good amount that the city will be covering and I will just chime in that is subject to approval by the Board of Commissioners still at the county um we're not going to take that forward until we're ready to go out for then it seems like a more perfect time once we get that site plan approves from Pittsfield then we're we'll be ready to move forward wonderful wonderful and then I wanted I wanted to know a little bit more about how the ReUse site was

101envisioned to be used and I just toured the Murph and it blew me away um that and the wastewater treatment plant are currently my favorite places in the city but neither of them lets me walk my dog there so won't be a freaking visitor so and um one of the things I learned at the Murph is that they're going to do Outreach with Perpetual um to find out people's I guess preferences or I'm not exactly sure what they're looking for but people's feedback around returning containers and you know I guess where would you do it what what would make you participate what would be attractive and I wondered if um I don't know if you wanted to say something about that because this commission could certainly um promote that to their own networks and um

102I think the engagement is at the end of May and I think I don't know if some of it is is any of it an online survey or is it most of it virtual so actually that was more than one quick question I'm sorry um so I guess starting in Reverse I I think that that Outreach and engagement that live zero waste and Perpetual is doing um is in person um Sean you can correct me if that's wrong but yes they are looking for feedback on how to expand the reusable container program and scale it up so the wide we um we did partner with Perpetual on an EPA Swiffer Grant which is their infrastructure grant for recycling um to ask for additional funding for the Dos as well as including um some infrastructure to

103collect the containers we've not heard um yet any outcome on that Grant but I know that Perpetual I think has other funding and is looking to move that forward um either way so that is exciting I want to say it's May 22nd is that right Sean uh so May 22nd is going to be an event that is focused on uh government officials nonprofits and business owners um and then there will be I believe two or three other events that are for the general public to attend um I had a meeting with them last week and it sounds like the the main focus is on these in-person events but they do plan to have some virtual engagement opportunities right and then council member to your other question about the ReUse space at the dos the programming

104for that is not known at this time we just knew that it was a priority and something we wanted to incorporate into the site design from the beginning so between the project team that's been working on it which is recycling Ann Arbor Washington County the city and our design consultant RS all that expertise together felt that the size and space that you saw on the concept plan would support a robust reuse operation if I could say one more thing I want to tell you that um I assign my students in my class to do a project and one of them did a flea market uh as part of Spring Fest at umich and so I think that in terms of uh having options other than just disposing responsibly of the things you don't need I

105think the students are geared toward I think they would love to sell their stuff but you know we could even perhaps persuade some of them to swap it and the ends end and beginning of the year are good times because you know you you move into a new size residence uh and you need things that you didn't need when you were in a dorm so there's I think there's stuff we can do and there are a couple of student groups that are active and um and I would love to help in whatever way I can and see us really um tap into some of that energy that those young people have thank you very much I will remember that offer and so he um get that planning started um John mursky you have the floor

106uh Kudos on a really good presentation this is one of the best presentations we've had at least that I can recollect in quite a while so thanks very much and also thank you the three of you for spending part of your Thursday evening with us I know that probably wasn't your first choice so thanks very much I have four very quick points um the charts um were helpful um John kellerwort and maybe I think one other person made a comment or two that might be good to footnote about these being weight based and things like that so um if we sort of update and reuse those charts it'd be great to add those footnotes um my sense is that you're absolutely right about moving away from diversion rate and looking at tonnage to landfill um

107but one of there's a couple of I think good reasons for continuing to use diversion rate because it is a can be Illuminating first of all a lot of other communities use diversion rate and secondly it is a rate it's something that is uh normalized and one way of of normalizing tonnage to landfills do it on a per capita basis and then you can Benchmark again you know just absolute tonnage to Absolute tonnage is is not something that you can easily Benchmark diversion rates or attendance rate to landfill or something that you can uh Benchmark and it it provides some level of elimination so I think that's something to consider um but I I generally agree with the the movement away from that um I just want to make um two two suggestions that you

108don't have to respond to um first is I'd like um staff to look at exploring providing some level of resources to Raa for better maintenance of the r to Z uh recycling guide it is linked to the city's website and I've been told by three different people in leadership at Ria that they don't have enough resources to do that and it's not necessarily always up to date and it's not necessarily always um as I understand it even consistent with staff's understanding and I don't know how much money that would take but please reconsider that maybe talk with them about what might be appropriate and then the last thing is I had posed a question by email and I'd received a good response but I just wanted to put it out there for everybody else to

109know and that is an energy commissioner had recommended to me and I passed on the idea of put putting solar on the roof of the Murph I understand that the city has a lot of other things that it's juggling right now but I really think that's something that should be put in the parking lot as far as I recollect it's it's a a good south facing roof there is a load that corresponds almost exactly to when solar power is being generated so you can actually just use the power right on site and it just seems to me it's something that is really a good idea and should be considered for the midterm let's say um or whenever appropriate so those are the four points and again thank you very much um Mr Sigma so you

110have your hand up you have the floor thank you and thank you for all the comments the great questions and we're we're happy to be here and to be able to support this group um I did want to make one comment when as we were talking about funding for the drop-off station um we are also continuing to explore other opportunities so just so you're aware that that's no the the funding sources that we've identified are not the the end game we're still continuing to look for new opportunities um and then I guess the last point I'd like to make is that I am offended by council members dishes comment that the Wastewater Plant is one of her favorite locations and not the drinking water plant because I was the one who gave her a tour

111of the drinking water plant and obviously that did not resonate well with her so no it's so stupid that's what I meant I've never been to the voice I will do a quick plug though and let you know that we do have an open house coming up on May 6 from 10 to 2. so um you're all welcome if you do are interested and haven't been we will be doing tours for four hours of the city's drinking water plant thank you thank you uh miss pachowski you have your hand up yeah um Brian I was going to make sure Brian gave a plug for the water plant open house but I'll spend top of that one right away um the one thing that we were remiss in not talking about and I apologize what's the

112cost of service study that we have planned for solid waste that is something uh that that's long overdue and we're committed to doing that we're working right now on an RFP but basically when the solid waste millage was set up it was decades ago and we were thinking trash and then even just really in the infancy of recycling and things have expanded so much um yeah the millage sort of remains as it is and so uh performing this cost of service study over the next year will really help us understand where all you know the millage money is and how we can maybe look at programming and being more strategic about expanding programs so just wanted to give an update on that we'll have more to come and if um you know probably the next

113meeting we can tell you where we are with that all right thank you um oh um um Molly um just one just one question um yeah but it's a solid waste millage up for uh for Renewal that's a great question I'm not yeah I'll check into it okay it's not soon I know that much because I think it was just renewed not that long ago um uh Shannon you have your hand up you have the floor yeah thank you all um and um I'm wondering I was just in uh Vancouver a little while ago and um they had bins for textiles for cycling in the apartments uh apartment buildings and I'm just wondering is there any kind of scenario where that you all are considering that for the future I know that you know sometimes

114I have stuff that is just like you you can't give it away if it's got too many the socks have too many holes or you know whatever it is and I'm just wondering what you just wanted to ask the long-term question around that right thank you um I do know that in the solid research management plan textile recycling was one of the things that was identified as a program to explore so we haven't that would I think was recommended more of like a curbside program for collection um however I know there are some dropboxes they're not affiliated with the city I've seen them around so I can't speak to who collects them um but related to your idea of or the thing that you were mentioning about putting them in apartments for usable Goods that

115is one of the things that we know some communities have done around move out is actually had it takes a lot of partnership though because you have to monitor them carefully but put collection boxes closer like in in apartment comp or in properties where there's a Lobby where there's a space that can accommodate it's not a fit for everything that's why I think it's a mix of programs to address that but to collect usable things um but textile recycling is on our list things don't have updated this time on yeah I can add to that at the when we put together the solid waste Resource Management plan and looked at the curbside program we looked at some other neighboring communities that we're offering and we found out that a lot of those textiles um even

116like the holy socks they're turned into regs and used you know so they are being reused um and that's something that if you continue to explore as we yeah if Sarah should look into this more so it could be it's probably going to be a combination of things that we offer great thank you um commissioner mursky you have your hand up you have the floor yeah I thought I might respond to that real quickly and by the way Shannon thanks for the tip maybe that's a good place for all of us to look um Steve and I are members of a group called The Washington waste Coalition and we've talked about this and um a lot of textiles um when they go to for example um the various resale stores there's some materials that are

117then uh they're not judged to be usable there and a lot of those are shipped overseas and there's a lot of stories that indicate that a high percentage of that actually then just ends up being dumped somewhere um and then there's another problem with textile recycling in that you have got all kinds of different materials and even materials are mixed materials and usually if you have different kinds of uses like insulation and things like that um they they have to be a particular material they can't be mixed with you know a mixed material with spandex or with polyester or this and that or the other so I think maybe we could learn from Vancouver I would think that they're pretty uh Advanced on these kinds of things but there seem to be a lot of

118pitfalls with with doing is not something that's easy to do um so thanks hey thank you one last thing if I make and that is um could um Sarah's presentation be posted to register I don't know if it has been in the meantime but it wasn't a couple of days ago thank you yeah all right well thank you everybody um thanks for your time and uh I think it's been very it's well appreciated so um let's move on to the next item on the agenda which would be reports from committees other commissions Council and chair so let's start with a report from from the uh natural features committee Chris I noticed in the paper today that the contract is approved by the council for the consolidation of the city's Master planes which I understand is

119going to include the natural features management plan I guess I would say it is time to respond to the environmental commission's request to have our participation at the table and how that plan develops at least with regard to natural features it won't be satisfactory to cast our opinions and wishes and desires with the general public we want to be at the table a duly noted um I'll have a comment I have a comment during the chairs report about this as well so let's move on to the pollinators thank you uh I want to uh thank Steph and Sean and Commissioners Gruber Ackman and and um Dale for participation in getting us to our new program that is the evolution or you could say the metamorphosis of nomome into the pollinator aware Yard Care Program um

120and so I guess I would say it launched this week we had a really nice article in the newspaper yesterday it's been on uh a few social media things I believe um and Sean has informed us that we've had something like 50 people register for the program in order to get a yard sign which is really nice so this program has yard science available it's really nice they have some instructive information on them so that people walking by will get information that's relevant to supporting pollinators which is avoiding pesticides and having native plants and a QR code that goes to our website that is linked as a hub to multiple sites within the city website entire website that includes uh oh thanks Sean there we go that includes nap and um the Water Management I'm

121not saying the right name but Jen Lawson's Department um so that people we're not doing being redundant within the city services and we also have references to outside organizations um so there you have it I'm really pleased I was I had to be convinced but I am particularly pleased that that we moved from focusing on a single month to focusing on the entire year and meaning the entire um life life cycle of of pollinators that contribute to life and natural features in our city oh hi council member Ackman you have the floor I just wanted to chime in to say that there was also a really nice M live article that had commissioner Mitchell some pictures and I just thought it was a good insight into what different people in our community are doing to

122support pollinators so we'll miss that check it out it's great all right um Chris Graham you have your hand up here you're muted you're muted I'm sorry kudos to Rita for um making this absolute Blossom this spring I I was afraid we were going to lose this program and and uh uh she really deserves a lot of credit for uh really expanding it this year well thanks Chris I really do want to pass that that credit on to many other people because it was quite a a broad effort please do yeah it's wonderful to see um okay let's uh how about zero waste working group yeah hi uh thanks to uh Sean's quick efforts in your inbox is the link to the report uh completed recently by the U of M sees Master students on

123the circular economy initiative uh they presented to the environmental commission a couple months ago but this is their final report that they've wrapped up uh they also presented last Monday along with Jenny Petoskey from the city to a wide group of City staff planning Public Works OSI resource recovery solid waste on kind of the big picture of everything that's been going on with the circular economy initiative I think some of our next steps with that work is the kind of Outreach and engagement strategy that we're putting together based on some uh work that a consultant is doing right now uh aiming for equity in those efforts uh I think that'll be our biggest Next Step um but we're also thinking about how to really keep the energy going around this work Lisa anything you wanted

124to add to that I think you covered all of it I think we have had a brainstorm and a couple of big ideas but until we are sure that those have support from staff we don't want to flip them that's prudent okay um let's see um the water quality work group did not meet but Tom Sarah do you have anything that you'd like to let us know about uh no I don't have any updates at this time okay thank you um I'll schedule a meeting for uh for the next month um let's see so let's move on to other commissions um how about energy three quick updates uh we passed the natural gas resolution basically in the form that we originally considered it in um this evening uh that was one point of our agenda

125second main point was that Missy Stoltz presented the natural gas franchise um situation that was after it had already been approved by Council um so if anybody's interested in details on that I encourage you to go into legendstar and look at the last meeting where there's her presentation um and I'd just like to point out that uh as as Missy has has presented to both Council and us there's you know lots of potential um options and ways that this could go uh so if you're interested in some of them uh one idea is and this is implied also in the the name of the agenda item in the energy commission and that is that the natural gas franchise could be transitioned into something called a a heating uh franchise so instead of supplying natural gas

126to provide heat that you actually provide heat directly through geothermal and that's being piloted into the city of Boston um and there's a non-profit there called heat h-e-e-t and if you Google that um then you can find out what Boston is doing and um actually it's my understanding that the city just received a grant from the doe to run a pilot of a District geothermal system in the Bryant neighborhood I think it was a million dollars or something like that um so obviously that's uh obviously going to be obviously really a a regional um possible Trend you know there's even other kinds of things that could happen in California and other places um they're mixing in hydrogen into natural gas um and testing that out as a possibility so this could explore you know lots

127of different opportunities um for the city and it would address what Chris talked about earlier not just new developments but all the customers that we currently have so um keep your attention on that and like I said go to legendstar and then finally I just thought I'd mention that we're having elections um next month and um both I as chair and Carlene Calvin Garcia are both termed out our bylaws state that you cannot serve more than three years um in your office and so there will be a new chair and vice chair of the energy commission and potentially also a new liaison to the environmental commission so those are the three things we covered we talked about the the elections and the duties and things like that those are the three things that were on

128our agenda thank you all right uh thank you John um oops sorry okay um let's go for um parks Parks advisory hi we uh we just met last week um some updates are solar installation has begun and our Parks properties that had been designated for that program um the parks are going to be participating in the the new and improved pollinator aware program I think several Parks have been earmarked they're going to have areas um that will have less mowing happening over the course of the summer um so thank you I know Rita was involved in that in talking to the parks department about that um Fuller Park is has been designated potentially being a part of the bicentennial celebration next year um summer camp uh getting the the parks department right now is is

129heavily involved in getting ready for summer camps getting the pools ready liveries um golf courses and all that so um a lot of activity there and apparently the summer camps have been um the the enrollment there has increased um over the past few years and they're um excited about a big year this year for that and then finally um in January that some of the fees for the for golf and the um canoe libraries will be going up so that's about it thank you um planning yeah we've had two meetings I was able to go to one because I've um been sick and the one meeting that I attended the big item on the agenda was um the credit union that's over on Plymouth Road and I would say that um how it pertains to

130to this body is that it was a um a special exemption use because they were looking to do a drive through and we denied them because we have discretion there and um because we are trying to move away from drive-throughs and car dependent uh design and they also didn't have um really much going on in terms of sustainability so we had more discretion with that vote um they uh I think are um thinking about trying to come back and change their plan so we'll see what happens as that comes um and before I hand it off to Lisa who's going to cover the next meeting I just wanted to respond a little bit because I I did talk with um our planning manager about natural features kind of being involved in some of that and

131what he said is that the natural features a portion of the master plan will definitely be updated um what he said with this next effort what he said though is that um there really needs to be a whole Community discussion around priorities because there's I know that we've been hearing it on Planning Commission they're there's a lot of emphasis right now on um increased housing as well and so he indicated that we really needed to have a bigger conversation about where the community is in terms of priorities with with changing some of those things um and so uh that he hopes that we'll have a robust dialogue around that during the um the information kind of during during those sessions so um come out and make your reviews known I'm sure many other people will

132too um with with that whole process but that uh that's kind of where things are right now um and is that we we really need to kind of figure that out you know with with our own Community about what where we want to put um where we want to put our energy for that so I just wanted to report on that and then I'll hand it over to Lisa to go over that some changes that were discussed for the new Transit Corridor um yes thank you Shannon um well we had a funny meeting because um we had six numbers there but one had to recuse themselves because their uh their employer owns property along the tc1 corridors and so that meant that everything we voted on failed because we had a sub Corp but um

133but um uh but so we voted on we voted on some tweaks regarding automobile related uses on the tc1 corridors and we voted to change Auto and Truck and Equipment Repair and auto sales and rental from a uh to it it would be normally prohibited along tc1 but there was robust discussion of that when we rezoned a stadium and so we changed it to a special exception use staff had actually recommended that it just be a permitted use and that they felt that so long as it conformed to the form that we have along tc1 it would be fine but the Commissioners wanted to make it a special exception use um I didn't vote with them on that um and uh so that that failed four to one so I had four votes in blah

134blah blah very funny then um the we also decided that automobile Services have to be located in an enclosed building and that failed with a unanimous vote of approval um that's the way to put it uh and staff didn't really have a chance to kind of um analyze whether there were unforeseen consequences of that one but um when that by the time that comes to council that'll be foreseen and I anticipate having a chat with you commissioner Gibb Randall about that meeting in full so that um I can understand where you can maybe help me understand better how the discussion unfolded um there and I can fill you in on some other stuff but your voice was missed I can tell you your expertise hey thank you um anything on Transportation my darling yes sorry

135it just took me a minute to find the mute button um we got some carbon Reduction Program grants so 1.18 million dollars in carbon Reduction Program funding for two projects that support both a20 and vision zero which is our transportation plan uh the first is a project that will happen in fiscal year 24 that will convert All 4 000 some odd low efficiency DTE owned street lights to LED fixtures that are about 1.2 to three times more efficient the second is a fiscal year 26 project that will fund the planning and the implementation to create I've heard this called a variety of things you could call it a bike Boulevard a Greenway and all ages abilities bike network uh on West Washington Street which has been in discussion for quite some time I understand that's

136it great thank you um so let's see Council Council report anything I would just say that we passed the 415 uh Washington uh PUD which pre-entitles the property to be developed and we added um a requirement at the table to make it at least so you can only if I get this wrong uh already okay yeah okay all right thank you um anything else no okay um so just for the chair um I have a brief just a brief um question um which should involve some discussion and that is that um there's been some talk about um about um about miscommunication and misalignment between staff and the commissions I'm not just talking about the environmental Commission now um and it occurred to me during some of the discussions I had especially with um Council woman

137dish that um the zero waste work group that she works on has regular staff participation in the working group and also as I recall um from conversations with Chris Graham um the ordinance changes that were worked on for many years um you know for natural features um were were done in conjunction with a staff member until a few years ago so I'm thinking that the working groups we we could probably all become more efficient and effective if all the working groups had regular participation from a city staff member and I would just like to throw that out there and um and I'm hoping um to explore this um so I'm open to any ideas or any discussion we don't necessarily have to have it tonight but we can I'd like to have it at the

138next meeting we might have some discussion and um and um I'm not sure what all the city administrator's opinion would be about this but uh it's been a tradition and it seems to me that it's been a fruitful tradition um that's been lost for some of the working groups especially the natural features working group since the just before the pandemic and some of the other groups so um um Sean you have your hand up you have the floor yes thank you um I'll just chime in and say uh that this has been discussed as something that staff wanted to bring towards the environmental commission as well um so thank you for bringing it Forward um uh chairperson Brown um there are commissions such as the energy commission where it is in the bylaws that there

139must be a staff liaison to every working group uh the environmental commission is not one of those so it is not written in the bylaws um but we did want to bring forward the recommendation that their BSF lies on all the working groups um so I certainly would uh support um having a conversation about that at an upcoming meeting okay well if um if the city staff is in agreement um why don't I just send a memo to you and um ask uh ask for volunteers for who would like to participate in the different working groups sounds good thank you okay um um council member dish you have the floor I think this is a great idea moving forward and um I wondered though if maybe we should consider um ask for staff feedback on

140prioritizing our working groups because there it may be difficult to staff all of our working groups and um but I heard you know I mean Sarah Mason called out a couple of things that she was hoping for participation on and obviously natural features is a key group and obviously pollinators are steaming or buzzing along however we want to put it and also have staff support so but it might be good for us to kind of take a holistic approach to our work and think about um I think one of the reasons why the zero waste working group has been successful is first of all that we worked on the circular economy initiative which was kind of a little bit of a shift but not really because those are just terms but also because we thought

141about lending our energy and expertise in an area where the city wants to move forward but doesn't have the capacity so we don't want to the way we would love to have this work is to have um our capacity fortify staff capacity rather than our commissions working groups spreading staff thinly so maybe before you sent that forward we might think about reviewing our working groups and just thinking about our priorities more um more holistically if if that's not if that's okay with folks no that's a great suggestion I mean in particular like the water quality working group a lot of what are what's written into our our man our our mission um involves actually not just the city staff but also the county water commissioner and their Huron River Watershed Council so um that's the

142place where I think it needs a little uh especially needs some more thinking and discussion okay so um the next item on the agenda is a report from staff um um Sean Reynolds posted um a staff update registrar um so Sean do you want to do you want to let it stand as it is or would you like to highlight a few things or uh yes that document is available for everyone to view I do want to highlight the two items that are at the bottom from the city of quirk's office um those are that commission reappointments are going to be on the city council agenda on May 1st for their first reading and then on May 15th for their second reading um and approval from city council uh once they are approved Commissioners who

143are up for uh reappointment which is several of you on the line um should receive your reappointment letters from A Serial on us before May 31st um also the clerk's office is going to be hosting an orientation for new and existing board and commission members um that's going to be a 45 minute presentation and then a 45 minute q a that will be in mid-june the data still being finalized but it will be recorded and available for later viewing for those of you who are not able to attend um we do highly encourage all commissions to depend to get a refresher on the commission uh roles and the handbook that I did send out in a email a few weeks ago as well um so those are the two main updates there also uh stage

144that didn't make it into document because we heard after I put this document together uh is the announcement that commissioner mursky made earlier about the grant for um uh uh geothermal um so I don't have the exact amount that we uh were awarded in front of me unfortunately um but it was a 13 million dollar total grant that went out by the doe uh to 11 different communities and we are one of those 11 um and that will be focused in the Bryan neighborhood on efficiency and prevents rooftop solar and battery storage for heating and cooling of 262 different households uh the Bryan Elementary School Brian Community Center a mental health facility and also the public works um so we are very excited about that and those are our enough well yeah I'll just say

145Sean that um there was an article in mlife this afternoon that was posted online about that and I think the number I remember is Psalm 588 thousand dollars for that Grant for a district-wide geothermal project you know to for the whole neighborhood plus you know the community center and Mental Health Center and so and also wheeler and uh the the wheeler site that the city owns so that's um yep and John mentioned uh as well so um and also I want to remind everybody that um when we're when we meet in may we will have our appointments and we'll also have a part of the agenda item will be an election uh for chair and vice chair so you know so be looking for nominations then um so that will be in uh the next

146item on the agenda is items for the next agenda so we will have a vote um once the new new commission is formed under the chair and vice chair um an overview of the nap activities from City staff um especially focusing on invasive species management so um are there any other suggestions for agenda items for May I don't hear or see anything so um the next scheduled meeting would be May 25th 2023 at our usual time Thursday at 7 pm um this oh this starts our the next item on the agenda is the second public comment period so this is another opportunity for persons to speak for up to three minutes uh please call one eight seven seven eight five three five two four seven and enter meeting ID 922-9696-1644 uh this information is also

147displayed on a meeting agenda and video feed City staff will select callers that have raised their hand one by one using the last three digits of your phone number in order to electronically raise your hand to indicate your desire to speak please press star 9 on your phone you will hear an automated announcement that the host is allowing you to speak when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television and background sounds so that we may hear you clearly please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments and be patient there can be a delay of up to 30 seconds before a connection is established so again press star 9 on your phone if you wish to speak um is there anybody on the line yet Sean we do

148not have anyone online okay well let's wait 30 seconds just to be sure and then we'll return the meeting and I'm sorry it went past nine o'clock but I think it's been a very good meeting anyway and I'm relieved that it did go till 10 14. like last time uh let's see is there anybody there yet Sean there is not okay well I declare this meeting adjourned at 9 24 PM thanks everybody