City Council Meeting   10/14/2025

I call our Tuesday City Council meeting to order.

October 14, 2025.

City Attorney Brown.

Here.

Vice Mayor Fleming.

Here.

Councilmember Robinson is absent.

Chief Tobia.

Here.

And Captain Grubbs.

Thank you.

If you would please stand for a moment of silence or a private prayer, if you wish, and remain standing for Pledge of Allegiance.

Okay.

I have the honor to do a proclamation this evening supporting or recognizing October 23, 2025 as National Lights on After School Day.

And we have some guests here with us this evening.

So if this is your first time, don't get nervous.

but I'm going to call you up and you're going to come and you're going to face the audience and stand up here while I read the proclamation.

So can I have On the Road Collaborative and Boys and Girls Club come up with your directors and I think your parents are here as well maybe.

Come on up.

All right, you ready?

A proclamation recognizing October 23, 2025 as National Lights on After School Day.

Whereas the citizens of Harrisonburg, Virginia stand firmly committed to quality after school programs and opportunities because they provide safe, challenging, and engaging learning experiences

that help children develop social, emotional, physical, and academic skills.

Support working families by ensuring their children are safe and productive after the regular school day ends.

Build stronger communities by involving students, parents, business leaders, and adult volunteers in the lives of young people.

thereby promoting positive relationships among youth, families, and adults and engage families, schools, and community partners in advancing the welfare of our children.

And whereas Lights on Afterschool, the national celebration of afterschool programs held this year on October 23, 2025, promotes the importance of quality afterschool programs in the lives of children, families, and communities.

and whereas more than 28 million children in the US have parents who work outside the home and 15.1 million children have no place to go after school and whereas many after school programs across the country are facing funding shortfalls so severe that they are being forced to close their doors and turn off their lights and whereas the city of Harrisonburg, Virginia is committed to investing in the health and safety of all young people

by providing expanded learning opportunities that will help close the achievement gap and prepare young people to compete in the global economy.

Now, therefore, be it resolved, I, Deanna R. Reed, Mayor of the City of Harrisonburg, call upon all citizens of Harrisonburg to observe October 23, 2025 as Lights on Afterschool Day and be it further resolved that I,

endorse Lights On After School and commit our city to engage in innovative after school programs and activities that ensure the lights stay on and the doors stay open for all children after school.

Thank you.

Michael Parks, are you back there?

Can you come out and take a picture please?

All right, everybody.

On me, one, two, three.

All right, thank you.

Awesome.

Wow, thank you.

Yes, and on that note, we will be celebrating Lights On After School on Thursday, October 23rd from 5.30 to 7.30 at the Lucy F. Sims Center.

It will be a community-wide event hosted by several organizations within the Out of School Learning Coalition led by Mayor Reed.

So yes, we'll have different organizations, different community resources, food, music, fun and games, and it's open to the community.

And we will also on the 23rd be lighting up some buildings in the city.

So we normally light up SIMS for the Boys and Girls Club, the Gus Bus will be lit up as well, Big Brothers Big Sisters, and CAC for Parks and Rec, and the color will be blue.

Thank you all.

I know that y'all are not going to stay for the rest of City Council.

I will say, Sandra, that this morning I had the privilege of speaking on the panel in DC, and I had the opportunity to mention your work.

at that summit and then in the morning I'm going back to DC to the National Press Conference and I'll be speaking there as well on behalf of keeping the lights on after school.

So thank you so much for bringing our children here, our students here today and the parents for coming out and let's celebrate our after school programs.

Thank you.

You can go.

I know you're not staying.

Oh, yes.

You too, sweetheart.

Thank you.

How are you, sweetheart?

Good.

I love you, too.

Oh, thank you.

Oh, hey, beautiful.

Yeah, do you want to warn her?

As you like.

Of course, yeah.

Madam Mayor, it's a little unorthodox, but while we're still under special recognitions and they're gonna hate me for doing this, but we also have some other guests here this evening.

The Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative.

Students from, excuse me, students but also leaders in nonprofit and government agencies across Southeast Asia are being hosted at James Madison University.

Thank you for coming.

Excuse me, thank you for that city manager.

I met some of these young people at the JMU event the other day and a couple of them came to planning commission.

So they're really motivated and dedicated to learning about our city government.

So thank you, you'll be great leaders.

The other thing to mention about them, so they were in a highly competitive process in their countries to be selected

by their government leaders to come here to spend six weeks.

Four in Harrisonburg?

One in Boston and one in D.C., which seems like the appropriate breakdown to me.

And, you know, are really some of the sharpest young folks and really not future leaders but current leaders, you know, where they live.

Okay, we can go into our consent agenda.

Any item placed on the consent agenda shall be removed and taken up as a separate matter, if so requested by any member of council.

Move to approve the consent agenda.

Absolutely.

Any more discussion?

Mayor Reed?

Alright, we can now go into our public hearings.

6A, Adam?

Thank you, Madam Mayor.

Good evening.

The first item I have for you this evening is the rezoning at 910 North Liberty Street.

The request is to rezone the site from M1 General Industrial District to B2C General Business District conditional.

Conditional meaning that the applicant has offered up proffers to place further restrictions on their request.

So the site here, outlined in red, the parcel is 26,800 square feet in size, located here on North Liberty Street, surrounded on all but one side by other M1 zoned properties.

So the brown color represents the general industrial district, and then the purple color there is an R7 development with some single-family homes and duplexes, the media adjacent uses being duplex residences.

Long term plans for this area of the city begins to transition a little bit, so maintaining hopes for industrial uses on the northwest side of North Liberty Street.

The pink kind of fuchsia color there represents properties that we have planned for commercial.

So if you're following along, M1 to B2 is in line with our land use guide.

And then the light brown there is medium density mixed residential where we begin to pick up some additional density for residential development.

So that's what you're looking at there in that image.

And then if you're familiar with this area of the city, this area is for the most part built out.

Many of the parcels do have development upon them except there you can see some undeveloped properties at the corner of Charles Street and North Liberty Street.

If you're familiar with this site, this site was operational for a long time as...

As the Anna Sierra Veterinary Center, this photograph, thank you Pam, was taken across the street.

If you've had animals helped, you may have visited this site as Anna Sierra has operated there for quite some time.

Anna Sierra remains the owner and they continue to operate on site if the planned use, which I'll speak about here in a minute, does not make its way through all of the processes and get appropriate permitting from not only the city but through the Department of Social Services.

NSDR can continue to operate because the veterinary hospital was permitted in the B2 district so it does not take away their ability to operate and it would allow many of the other B2 uses aside from those that have been prohibited by the applicant.

So if you're familiar with the site here is the subject parcel.

The applicant has offered two proffers with some details here.

So the proffer number one is that they have prohibited the three uses there on the screen, A, B, and C. So they will prohibit funeral homes, vehicle fuel stations, so gas stations, and any type of drive-through facility.

And then the second is a catch-all proffer that you often hear us talk about, which is it helps the applicant when they proffer something like this to

forego essentially a traffic impact analysis at the time of the rezoning, but it does capture the opportunity that if the change of use happens on the site when they go through their engineer comprehensive site plan or their building permit process, the staff has an opportunity to check the numbers to see if the use that's being proposed at that time would trigger a TIA and then they would either, they would complete the TIA or request to do further proffers and go through a rezoning process.

So that's what the second proffer is.

So to complete

a traffic impact analysis if it does hit the 100 vehicle trips and then to implement any of those mitigation measures that are provided in the traffic impact analysis.

Quite a bit of conversation at the staff level and even a planning commission had to do with entrances and parking.

As you read through in your staff report as well as in the minutes, you'll see that there was quite a bit of discussion about entrances here.

So the site currently has about a hundred feet in width of an entrance, which is much larger than our maximum of a 50 foot in width entrance per the design and construction standards manual.

As you can imagine, when you have such a large entrance, it creates some

Conflict points and some confusion with traffic maneuverability as folks are putting on their blinker and where they're turning into the site can be problematic.

With understanding some of staff's concerns, they submitted a conceptual rendering of what the site could look like and I do want to emphasize that this is what it could look like because there are still some things that we brought to their attention about concerns about this traffic movement.

So what they're proposing here in this conceptual rendering is a one-way in, one-way out, which on the surface seems to be okay.

However, when you start to place in the reality that there are currently no controls on the site, they would have to either put up a fence or some type of chain.

which isn't the best solution.

And we threw out some examples of potentially creating like a landscaping median to help control that.

Nonetheless, even when you take a look at the turning radius, which our city engineer did, there are still some conflict points.

So even at an angled parking, what you're seeing in the bottom image is just a conceptual rendering and an analysis here showing the turning movement when you're traveling northbound on

North Liberty Street that a vehicle turning right into it has to make a wider turn which if you apply that turning radius into their parking analysis eats into their angled parking.

So they still have quite a bit to work through to make this work.

And with their parking, it's really not a significant number of parking that's required.

The existing 2,300 square foot facility would require nine parking spaces if they were able to convert the building to a child daycare center, which is what they are planning to do.

The hope here is to rezone the site to then lease the property to Little Roots Early Learning Center, which is a child daycare center.

Their plan is to remodel the entire facility, the 2300 square foot facility to accommodate child care for children, up to 30 children in fact, ranging from 12 weeks to 6 years old.

And they plan to operate from 6.45 a.m.

to 6 p.m.

Monday through Friday.

And they even have already looking into details about staggering drop-offs and things like that.

So with their idea in mind, we were looking at this just to give them some thoughts as they continue forward if the site is rezoned.

Another, I'd say, concern that staff has is with regard to the floodplain.

And what I'm going to show you here in just a moment is how encumbered the site is.

So here's the aerial and then wiping across the screen is the floodplain and the floodway.

So the site is entirely encompassed within the floodway and, excuse me, the floodplain.

The red hatched area is the floodway.

This area is known to have flooding, and staff pointed out some other concerns that we observed when we were on site, which includes that they have erected a fence in the floodway, which can cause problems with regard to having, you know, things that are of flotation can cause backups and things like that.

So they still need some work to do, and we'll continue to work with them as they work through the process to go through

changing the use of the building.

Some of the other things that we were able to point out for them was that the with regard to the floodplain, the floodways that an elevation certificate was submitted by them and it indicated that the top of the bottom floor is not fully elevated above the base flood elevation which could mean that they have to do additional flood proofing.

As noted, there are fences installed, so a fence could potentially be okay so long as they submit for a floodplain development permit and any other type of

of facilities that might go in, whether it's landscaping, whether it's traffic control installations, all of these things may be permissible in the floodway and the floodplain.

They just have to do a floodplain development permit.

It is concerning to have such significant flooding in this area.

The staff does not endorse the idea of locating a child care center on this parcel due to the flooding risks and knowledge of flooding in this area.

However, we do recognize that there is a great need for childcare in the community, and we further acknowledge that it even works towards other components of the Comprehensive Plan, being that Goal 7 is to provide a wide, accessible, and equitably distributed range of educational opportunities for all.

Objective 7-1 is to adopt a holistic approach to education that considers the academic, social, emotional, intellectual, and physical needs of individual children and more specifically strategy 7-1-2 which is to support quality and affordable public and privately run childcare and education for children under five years of age.

Even with these concerns and as noted staff does not endorse the idea of operating child care center in this area.

The proposed rezoning is in conformance with the with the city's comprehensive plan with regard to the land use guide and with that we believe that it does align generally with the comprehensive plan and we support the request to rezone it to B2C as did planning commission five to zero.

Note that we are still one planning commissioner down, so we do not have a full staff, and one commissioner recused themselves.

Commissioner Seitz recused himself from this matter as he was affiliated.

Yeah.

Being a child care center, they'll have another number of licensing requirements to go through.

And obviously, with the flood playing, there'll be further evaluation.

Can you describe who else will be involved before they could even open up a center there?

Sure, so just with the city, the city's zoning administrator will be evaluating this along with our building official.

They may or may not have to go through an engineer comprehensive site plan.

It depends on what they actually do to the site.

Nonetheless, they will have to go through a building permit.

Which, yeah, I guess we have public hearings, so I guess they can come up if you have any questions.

Maybe during the public hearing, you can come up and talk through that.

Any other questions?

We'll go ahead and go into our public hearing.

If anyone wishes to speak on this item, please state your name and address.

Hi, my name is Erin Lehman.

I am counsel for Anna Sierra and for Little Roots.

So I came to answer any questions you might have.

I actually found out since we did the public hearing my client has been handling all of the child licensing on their own.

It's actually regulated now through the Department of Education.

Regardless, whether it's social services or the Department of Education, there are significant oversights that are going to be occurring.

I mean, even for the child licensing, the child care licensing, they have to get, you know, submit building plans, site plans, they have to detail if they have an outdoor playground, what is going there.

And my client was already aware, since we've been going through this process, of the floodplain issues.

They in no way

either of them wants to have any children in danger part of their application process will be having emergency procedures you know set forth where the staff is trained so if there was flooding what's going to happen and and to try to be very proactive about that so I don't know if that addresses your question other than the fact that it's the Department of Education that will be looking into all of that

The Department of Education will have experience in looking at buildings in floodplains and floodways.

You know, they've more recently taken over the child care operations.

And the current building will stay there, operating?

Yes.

They are currently operating out of that location because they are doing repairs and renovations on their primary site, which is on Medical Avenue.

And so currently they are doing their vet clinic there again.

But once the renovations are done on Medical Avenue, they'll be their base operations will be back on Medical Avenue, which is why they were looking for an alternative use for this space.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Panajatishna Kudos, City Resident.

Madam Mayor, something that I would like to hear discussed is not just the horrific possibility of children being swept away in a flood, which I think is how we've talked so far, but what happens to a building when it floods.

I was a part of passing this past session of the General Assembly a bill on indoor air quality for public schools.

and it's not something that we can take for granted that there will be adequate addressing of mold especially adequate addressing of indoor air quality that might that might become a problem after a building floods so I hope that I could maybe we could hear a discussion of that so that we can be sure that we really are going forward safely with with the school and also I did with this

facility.

I did speak in favor of another development in the floodplain zone, and that one made sense, and I just wanted to be clear.

Also, I'm not in favor of just doing anything, anywhere, everywhere.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Seeing none in person.

Thank you.

I will close public hearing on this item.

Second?

Now we'll go into discussion.

I think we're, you know, I think this is where you were getting that, Vice Mayor, is that there has to be some

procedures you know there's going to be numerous people looking into this area and and the I guess the flooding and approvals will need to be made so it's not going to be that they can just move in and open up right there's going to be a

I would think a lot of eyes on this for them to move forward.

We need child care and the fact that it's 12 weeks is something that's very needed as well.

I do appreciate what Pody said because we do have to look at the fact that

you know there might be some other issues that come after a building is flooded so mode is one of them but we want to make sure that the kids are and staff are safe in that building but I feel like there's going to be enough eyes on this and approvals that have to be done

for this to pass.

Yeah, and I think kind of the question was aimed towards, you know, to put it in place, there'll be plenty of reviews and I trust those reviews generally in the event that something does happen and there's flooding.

You know, what's the process to go back into a place and make sure it continues to be safe, right?

You know, again, I would, I don't know at the school level what kind of going back into a place is flooded.

And, you know, schools do have air quality control reviews.

The State Board of Education does look at that.

Will they look at a child care center in a town and does the Department of Education have the wherewithal to exercise those oversights?

I don't know exactly.

I trust that would be the case.

I like this.

The planning notes, when I was reading over the notes, I really like that the building, because I realized that you all had moved, and I really like repurposing the building, specifically in that area where there's manufacturing going on and there's already a high need for child care.

And I thought about the mold issue in that

That street at times had been closed because of the amount of water.

But then I thought about friends of ours who have pets.

And I know that their pets are like their babies.

If there's mold in the building where there's an animal, it's going to be handled just as stringently as if there was a child there.

So I assumed that because of that, if there had been previous issues, they would have been taken care of.

But knowing the strict licensing regulations, when you're trying to open up a child care center, because I've gone through that process before, I assure you that there will be no overlooking any

kind of problems that might pop up.

So, I like it.

I like the location.

I mean, we're just going to have to stay on top of it, and I'm sure they will stay on top of it.

Roots, isn't that the name of it?

Roots Child Care?

Little Roots?

I'm sure they'll stay on top of it because the building is hard to find.

A building with the correct amount of square footage where you can still have a profitable business.

because that's one of the issues that I came up against.

It's like you find a building, but you can't make enough money because it's too small.

So when I thought about the amount of space there, I was really happy that you guys could work something out.

So my understanding is that they are not able to get these licenses, for example.

I think Mr. Fletcher could probably

speak to that.

I think what we heard from counsel is that it's happening independently, so the Little Roots administration is pursuing the child licensure through the Virginia Department of Education.

Yeah, if the child daycare center idea does not work out for this particular organization, any other use that wasn't specifically prohibited in the B2 district would be permissible.

Yeah.

If you approve it, it would remain B2C.

Yes.

I think the other, I know during the planning commission someone had sent a letter, a neighbor, about traffic turns, the parking lot.

You know, at this point the building isn't sited, hasn't gone through planning, but I guess there will be an engineering review.

of that once a plan is proposed or given to the planning department or community development and review.

Does the drive-in work?

It'll hold up to 30.

But also with staggered drop-off and pickup, which to me really stood out because the problem is everyone trying to drop off at the same time.

Well, I would say, I mean,

It was a functioning building before business, so I mean... My dog is from there.

Yeah, as well as mine.

And that, you know, that number, I mean, if you are, if you have someone under one, from 12 weeks to one, then you're not getting to 30.

Right, the numbers will be lower.

Right, there are strict licensing requirements for the ratio of staff to children, depending on their ages.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Aye.

Mayor Reed?

Aye.

Thank you.

We'll go on to item 6 p.m.

The next request is another rezoning.

This is a proffer amendment, a master plan amendment for the Bluestone Town Center.

Very straightforward, very condensed here, so a very small amendment to the master plan.

In fact, everything aside from what is discussed this evening that's being amended, all other documents will be readopted as part of the master development plan, so everything would remain exactly the same aside from the things that I'll be just talking about this evening.

but for folks that may not be familiar with the location of this project.

So you have the vicinity map there on the left-hand side.

It's on the western edge of the city near Garbage Church Road.

On the right-hand side, in fact everything in purple, is the Bluestone Town Center property which went through a master plan amendment back in 2022, 2023, excuse me, a master plan process and was approved in February of 2023.

Just one detail of that is the maximum number of units that were planned was 900, 450 max for multifamily, 350 max for townhomes, and then 145 max for single-family, detached, and manufactured homes.

Those are just the maximum numbers that would be permissible, but again, it's capped at 900 per the master plan.

So long-term plans for this area of the city shown here on the screen.

So really we're at a very large view of the city in this area.

So you're picking up a lot of different colors.

This property aside from the cemetery is designated

Low-density mixed residential, a lot of the fuchsia down there on the bottom is the B2 planned business area of Erickson Avenue, and then of course you're picking up Harrisonburg High School across the street from the subject site, which is a fairly large piece of property, and then it's adjacent to Hillandale Park and the golf course.

I don't know why it keeps doing that.

It doesn't like me this evening.

I said I was going to go fast.

Thank you, Pam.

and then the aerial showing that it remains in undeveloped 89.25 excuse me 89.75 acres and this is a master plan amendment so our sevens are not conventional zoning they are known as planned community districts or a master plan community essentially you have a few different components of what a master plan is there's the text

the layout and if there are any proffers that are submitted by the applicant and the text of a master plan is essentially its own zoning so they work very closely with staff the applicant does to come up with zoning that works for their project but it is also enforceable and it's very flexible there can be as little as zero setbacks in the R7 you have the ability to have single-family duplex townhomes multi-family and a component of non-residential

and as noted earlier they have maxed this at 900 and they plan to have townhomes and multifamily predominantly with up to 145 for single-family and manufactured homes.

So anytime there's a change to the master plan you have to go back through this process.

You go back to essentially a rezoning process and they're just amending the plan.

Just a visual showing the layout of the site.

This is just showing the different types of housing and where they could be located within the project, each different color representing different types of housing.

And then jumping right into the amendment.

So the amendment is only to three different sections.

The first is what's shown on the screen.

This is to proffer 1AII.

And it is just changing the text as you can see.

So the income restrictions that they had placed on the first time sale of the for purchase units was originally restricted to households with incomes between 80% and 120%.

And after they have been able to study this, they've continued through the process.

They're in engineer comprehensive site plan, and they've now contracted with NVR Incorporated, also known as Ryan Homes.

They have come to the realization that they can actually provide some units that would be

below that 80% mark but this was so specific that it restricted them from being able to open up the opportunity to sell them to households that made less than 80% of the area median income.

So this amendment would just create a larger pool of individuals and households that could buy units within the development.

So they are simply striking and adding the text as shown on the screen.

And then the only two other changes are with regard to proffers 2B and 4, both of which were not approved by you all in February of 2023.

So they're just changing the text for both of those proffers, striking all of the details, and just adding a statement that it was not approved by City Council on February 28, 2023.

If you recall those two proffer details, one was associated with impact fees, actually that was the latter one was associated with impact fees, and the former was that there was an applicant preference system that was given priority to Harrisonburg residents, Rockingham County residents.

Neither of those two proffers were accepted by you all, so they are simply making it clear in the master plan that it wasn't approved that way.

Aside from that, everything else would remain exactly the same.

We offered our favorable recommendation to Planning Commission.

I think that that language that's there between 80 and 120 percent of AMI or adjusted median income was the target

Yes, and I believe in the Planning Commission you said, or someone said that Ryan Homes, because of its scale, is able to offer financing for some of the lower income people.

Thank you.

I'll open this item up for public hearing.

If anyone wishes to speak, please state your name and address.

I'm Dawn Keplinger, 1691 Park Lawn Drive, Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Thank you for just a moment to hear.

I passed that magazine from Virginia Wildlife over to you this evening.

I believe she gave it to you.

Okay, I just would ask as you continue building in Harrisonburg that you would look at

what their plan is, Virginia Wildlife's plan for the state of Virginia.

It's mentioned in that magazine and it's not a long article so it's not a tough read.

I would like to ask if it's, it's never too late, but

Please preserve forested areas as much as you can.

Build where it's clear.

We have a lot of protected wildlife there.

There are people.

We have a bird club here, Rockingham Bird Club.

They do bird counts every year and many of the birds are protected by law for migratory bird acts and such.

All the counts are down.

Someone spoke about that.

I wish I had her name on WHSV a while ago about raptors and

I hope nobody's really smirking.

I see smiles, but butterflies and bees.

I'm not a tree hugger, but we need all that.

They're essential for food for us and for life, for mental health for all of us too.

So the Shenandoah Valley is a precious resource.

Once you pave it over and build on it, you'll never get it back.

And what makes it beautiful here is nature.

and I know we need housing so I'm just saying if it's possible can we work towards a healthy balance when we plan things in the future and remember to take a long view because it's our children's future that's going to be affected someday too.

Thank you.

I don't know the previous speaker.

I had not skewed the previous speaker that they might find smirks on the dais here, but they may not know that people did speak disparagingly about birds and butterflies, saying that they didn't get to see birds and butterflies, so why should other people's kids get to see birds and butterflies?

Unfortunately, that's the situation we're in.

For people who haven't been following, this being discussed today is an ecological disaster.

It signaled the downward spiral, the start of the downward spiral for Harrisonburg.

And at the time when this very controversial topic was brought up, we were assured that this was for teachers and firefighters.

Okay, now we're taking the bottom and lowering it and being a little more candid about what's going to be happening here, that we're going to be concentrating poverty into this area.

The issue of the forest has been spoken about eloquently.

It's 40 acres of forest, and it was one of the biggest.

And after we did that, it really set a benchmark.

So before that, Harrisonburg was really in a strong position.

We had a tight labor market.

Employers were complaining that they had to improve wages and working conditions and stop discriminating.

horrors.

They said please give us more housing so we can get out of this terrible tight labor market.

And with the Bluestone Town Center approval, that was a signal to the major low wage employers that they would have either a compliant or a committed city council.

And some of us had talked about what's going to happen to taxes with schools.

Well, something was going to happen.

And what did happen is we ran out of water in the spring.

the three big users of water ramped things up knowing that they could go pedal to the metal and that they could keep those commitments because they would have unlimited resources and unlimited labor and we ran out of water and instead of building new schools we're going to be building a new water treatment plant.

This was an unmitigated disaster beyond what you heard about the forests.

I had been hoping that we might hear something about the quality of Ryan Homes but we heard about finance.

Okay, watch the AI bubble and think about finance and recall the housing bubble and think about what we're going into.

And also let's think about what we're doing to our community.

There are sweeps going on now.

I mentioned earlier about what happened with the increase in enforcement staff.

One more people were having negative interactions with the city and I found out now that way they have so much time on their hands that they've now started doing proactive zoning enforcement.

That means that there are sweeps in the city that will dislodge people and move them over to the 0% lowest possible AMI concentration between the turkey shed and the poultry plant out on the outskirts of the city.

This is a bad situation and people should just remember

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm Avram Fechter.

I live in Loudoun County, but I'm here with a joint venture with the Housing Authority.

You guys might have had some questions about the right home, so I'm just here to answer the questions.

Any questions?

It is.

Ryan actually told us when they were in initial discussions with us, they're finding that in the other projects they're building in the area, about a quarter of their home buyers are

below 80% of area median income as first-time homebuyers.

So if we did not change this language that we're asking you to change tonight, those buyers that are buying in their other communities would not be able to buy here.

And that made them a lot less willing to want to build this community with us because it was restricting the pool of potential buyers they had.

And if you think about it, if you look at what 80% of area median income is for this area,

It's higher than you think.

It's gone up over the years.

And if you're sitting at 78% right now, you wouldn't qualify to buy one of our homes.

So obviously our intent has always been to deliver as much affordability as possible with this project, as we've talked about previously.

So the price point for the Ryan Homes seems lower than what the previous price point had been for those homes.

And we do have Ryan Homes is building in the city.

So kind of on the south side of Harrisonburg, a good bit of them going up.

I did see that Michael Wong with the Housing Authority did

dig into the quality of the homes.

I know that's something that Michael will look at, look at the quality of the homes.

Yes, I know that the Housing Authority, a couple of board members and staff that take tours of the Ryan Homes communities, as our joint venture partners, obviously we can't make any move on Equity Plus aside without their approval.

We also, as we're going through the underwriting process, our lenders have done the same thing because they're obviously lending to us to then

I think their local presence speaks for itself.

The balance of the project is to have more for sale homes.

It's still half homeownership, half rental.

We're just tweaking the language on what what income levels you have to have in order to buy one of our homeownership units.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Mayor Reed, there are no callers.

I will close public hearing on this item.

Madam Mayor, I move that we approve a request from EP Harrisonburg owner LLC and Cook Creek Church of the Brethren Cemetery to rezone proffer amendment 1010 Garbers Church Road, 1645 Erikson Avenue, 1781 South High Street,

Any more discussion?

I think this is wonderful.

Wonderful opportunity for first-time homeowners to get in there and able to purchase townhomes

I was ecstatic when I read the planning notes that this was about lowering, well, opening it up to folks below the 80% AMI, so I think this is great.

This is great.

Roll call, please, Paige.

Councilmember Dent.

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson.

Aye.

Vice Mayor Fleming.

Aye.

Mayor Reed.

Aye.

The last item I have for you this evening is an alley closing at 530 North Main Street.

In fact, it's adjacent to 530 North Main Street and adjacent to tax map parcels 34E1 and 2.

The applicant owns both sides of the alley closing request.

The alley is outlined here in blue.

Properties to the north and south of it are both zoned B1 and the applicant owns both sides of the property and they're hoping to close the alley to avoid potential concerns and questions related to matters such as maintenance and access that may arise in the future.

Vacating the alley would also help with any future plans to construct additions on the existing building or for redevelopment of the parcels.

This is, as you can see, a sort of a breaking point between the B-1 and the M-1 in the north end of our downtown area.

So across North Main Street here we have some M-1 properties.

Long-term plans here is to really extend the idea of mixed use in this area.

So the purple is publicly in property.

That's the county office building.

But you can see pretty much everything else in this image for the most part is all planned for mixed use.

So ideas to promote more of our downtown space.

creeping to the north, creeping to the south, of course, but in this area everything in this image is planned for mixed use.

And then an aerial photograph.

of the area in question.

So it is a relatively short stint of an alley here.

As noted, it's a little over 2,700 square feet.

And when you are on site, it's quite difficult to show exactly where the alley is.

This image, really just taken from Google Earth, looking, if you just follow my cursor, is roughly in this area.

In fact, without knowing exactly where the building is and exactly where the alley is, we're not even sure if there's any encroachment into this area.

But the alley stretches within this area and then looking from the other direction that's taken from North Main Street Again, just kind of where my cursor is going here in this general area

The alley has quite a bit of history.

Records demonstrate that the 12-foot alley dates back to as far as 1859.

Sadly, during the urban renewal in the 1960s, a segment of the alley which would have run through today's North Mason Street was vacated.

Portions of the alley, in fact I have an older image here showing coming up, portions of the alley extended easterly into what we now know as Mason Street and then into portions of the Rose's property.

But this area too is encumbered quite significantly by the floodplain.

Again, the floodplain almost eats up all of the alley itself and a large portion is also in the floodway.

If you're not familiar with downtown Harrisonburg, you would think

What floodway and what floodplain?

Well Black's Run goes underground really right here.

So it goes underground from that point a little further south and then it becomes sunlit again but it actually goes under the building of the county office building.

So if you're not aware of that, some interesting history about putting Black's Run underground there.

There are some utilities.

There is not water or sewer, but there are overhead power lines that sort of crisscross in this area without an exact survey.

We won't know exactly how encumbered this area needs to be reserved for overhead utility lines through public generating utility easements.

And because of the floodplain and the floodway and where Black's Run is, there's also a space that we'll need to

retained for maintenance of just really a small portion of the eastern side of the alley.

I'm just showing just a rough little area where you can see there's even a concrete boxed area there where drainage is, where Black's Run goes in.

So we'll just need some space there reserved if you all wish to close this alley for maintenance for drainage in this area.

I have a neat image here.

This is from a map of Harrisonburg in 1877.

The highlighted area is the area we're talking about this evening, and you can see it extended further to the east.

That black squiggly line is Black's Run.

What I found to be quite interesting is the Mrs. Kelly being adjacent to the alley.

Note the spelling, and also the spelling of Kelly Street in 1877 as well, which I thought was kind of interesting.

and History Stuff and old Harrisonburg like I and some of my colleagues.

I was really enjoying researching and looking at this.

And then to fast forward into the 1960s to the Platte, although quite grainy in this image, is showing the portions of what became North Mason Street and as it intersects with Main Street.

And so the area we're talking about is just that small little section in green and then the portion that was vacated in the 1960s would have extended across in that area has already been vacated.

As part of this and with a lot of communication with the Northeast neighborhood, we extended some conversations with representatives of the Northeast Neighborhood Association as well as Shenandoah Valley Black Heritage Project and asked them if they had any concerns regarding the proposed

We offered a favorable recommendation to Planning Commission

with the condition noted on the screen and they in turn recommended unanimously to you all to do the same with that condition and I will try to answer any questions.

Any questions?

Thank you.

We'll open this item up for public hearing.

If anyone wishes to speak, please state your name and address.

Good evening.

I am Mike Martin.

I am a city resident, but I'm also representing the property owner in question.

So happy to answer any questions you have.

And I think Adam brought up.

So the easement for the utilities needs to be five feet from the center of the two poles.

I already talked to Harrisonburg Electric.

So it would essentially be 10 feet.

They just said five feet.

Center up the utility poles, five feet on either side.

They said it's close to the building on that north main side.

They said they'll just stop the easement at the building.

Thank you.

Yeah, we would, Ton told me, and maybe I should say Ms.

Thank you.

Madam Mayor Panagiotisianakouros, city resident, I commend the applicant for acknowledging that we shouldn't be doing things on a personal level, we should be professional in this venue and it's really refreshing to hear that and refreshing to hear the applicant go first rather than waiting to have the last word like dark money financiers might.

On this item,

The general principle that I've continually insisted should be governing paper rallies and public land in general is, is there a compelling public use that would motivate us to go ahead and give up public land?

The test that the city and planning commission have often been applying is, do we have any use for it?

And putting the burden of proof on the city as opposed to putting it on the applicant to show us something compelling that would make us say, okay, we want to change the status quo.

And generally these have been treated as a burden.

However, you should know that with a paper alley comes not just a right that the city has, but also a protection.

A little history that you've heard me tell before, there's an exemption from the tall grass and weed ordinance that is attached to paper alleys.

That means if a future owner wanted to have an ecological project, they could do it without anxiety.

And would there be reason for people to be anxious?

Well Broadway recently did a very foolish thing and started enforcing a lawn ordinance and the county heard testimony that indeed somebody's pollinator habitat was destroyed.

So that could be a valuable protection for future users.

Does this applicant have a compelling public use that would override taking that future protection away?

Well, because I want to sell it, I would offer to you is not a compelling public purpose.

In fact, what it's telling us is that we are favoring an entity that might come forward in the future and do something that

the neighborhood might not be happy about.

And now the neighborhood doesn't have an opportunity to have a public hearing and say, well, this is not a compelling public purpose.

This is actually something we really dislike and would like to stop.

Well, this precludes having that kind of public hearing and would make the land in that sense more valuable to that kind of user.

as opposed to it would make it less valuable to the kind of user that might want to put a public amenity there like a green space.

So I would urge denying this.

It's not going to take anything away from the applicant to sell it and then the future user can go ahead and close it if they need it.

But they'll have to make the argument.

Also, a side note here about Planning Commission.

I tried to call.

Madam Mayor saw I went over previously.

I always hit my mark, but there were technical issues, and so I didn't.

Again, there are technical issues.

So I didn't know if I would be able to be heard.

But the Planning Commission got a little bit of tunnel vision.

They didn't come up with this idea.

So please, as you appoint people to Planning Commission, think about not only technically competent folks, we got that, but having folks that are not going to have tunnel vision and group think, have some diversity in the perspectives of your Planning Commission.

Thank you.

Good evening, my name is Karen Thomas.

I'm the founder and president of the Northeast Neighborhood Association, and I would just like to thank the city for reaching out to the Northeast Neighborhood Association, the Shenandoah Valley Black Heritage Project, and many residents in the area about this alley closing.

I know for myself that I extensively talked to several people that were of age that can remember this part of town and there is no historic or any concerns that people would want to keep it for any reason.

So I just wanted to say that because I think that area of town needs some development.

And I think this would be a good start in whatever they're going to do right there.

There's no concerns and no worries about what's going to happen from the residents.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Seeing none in person.

Thank you.

I'll close public hearing on this item.

Second.

Any discussion?

I do want to echo what Ms.

Thomas said.

I do appreciate the fact that staff did reach out to the two organizations and you two were able to speak to people in the neighborhood to make sure that this was okay.

I think that's what we're working toward.

Councilmember Alsadun?

Aye.

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Aye.

Mayor Reed?

Aye.

Thank you Mayor Reed, members of City Council.

I'm Amy Snyder, Deputy City Manager.

I am here before you tonight to bring forward a request for a roadside memorial sign on Ramblewood Road in memory of Josue Serrano.

Just procedurally to remind you all drive safely roadside memorial signs for victims of traffic crashes are required to be brought before city council for approval.

We have, unfortunately, several of these throughout the city in memory of individuals who lost their lives and also to remind people to drive safely while around the community.

If you all grant your approval this evening, then the Public Works Department will send an invoice to the requester for the cost of the sign to be fabricated and installed.

And this mirrors the process that VDOT has for similar signs that you see on VDOT roads around the Commonwealth.

and then Public Works will make sure there's no utilities or other things in the way and go out and install the sign.

Since 2009 we've installed three of these memorial signs throughout the city.

Josue's family approached us with this request.

They couldn't be here this evening.

They authorized me to share with you that Josue, their precious son, he was seven when he lost his life.

after a collision from a drunk driver on Ramblewood Road.

And it was right before he started second grade in 2021.

So he would have been 11 and a sixth grader in middle school this year.

So they are interested in having the sign placed on Ramblewood Road.

There's already a memorial that they have erected to whose way you may have driven by on your way to our Ramblewood fields.

So there'll be a permanent sign with his name on it that the family can then decorate in his memory and also be used again as a reminder to individuals that there are alternatives.

to getting behind the wheel when you're intoxicated.

You can call a friend, you can call an Uber, you can just not get behind the wheel of a car so that no other family experiences the tragedy that they have.

Thank you.

Um, so, Council, I think it will be an honor for us to approve this for Josue and his family.

Well, I just want to appreciate Deputy City Manager Snyder for speaking on behalf of the family.

And I'm sure they will appreciate the care that she took in measuring this through.

It's very emotional for the family and it's very important for them.

So, Ms.

Snyder, thank you for bringing that through.

Yes.

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Fleming?

Aye.

Mayor Reed?

Thank you, Madam Mayor.

Ms.

Snyder and I recently celebrated Mr. Vandenberg's one-year anniversary with the City of Harrisonburg.

He's been doing an excellent job in the city manager's office.

His focus on policy analysis and providing statistics and analysis for city staff and city council has been recognized.

In addition to some supervisory opportunities, one of the additional duties we have shifted to Mr. Vandenberg is for him to officially take over as assistant as deputy city clerk.

which is an important role so that when Ms.

I'll move to appoint Brian Vandenberg, our assistant to the city manager, as deputy city clerk as well.

Any questions?

Roll call please ma'am.

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Aye.

Alright.

So we have several meetings coming up.

We have Veterans Day coming up, so we need to go ahead and discuss how we're going to handle our October, November, December meetings.

As we stated before, October 28th,

Our city staff will be at a conference and our vice mayor will be at a conference as well.

And so all we would have is our attorney.

That's saying he can't handle things because he can.

Well, the problematic thing is we're not likely to have

Okay, but I won't be here.

I don't know if NLC Summit overlaps.

I think we'll all be here.

Okay, I won't, but that's all right.

We'll have the 12th and then we will have the 25th as well which is a couple of days before Thanksgiving.

So that'll give us our two meetings in November and then we have December 9th but we normally take off December 23rd for Christmas.

So we haven't missed any meetings this year, I don't believe.

We haven't canceled any meetings this year, I believe.

Counseling the 28th, moving our November 11th meeting to the 12th, because it's Veterans Day.

And we'll have November 25th.

December 9th.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay I can try.

That we meet on November the 12th instead of the 11th.

Yes.

Any more discussion?

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Aye.

Thank you.

Pam, you got that?

All right, so we'll now go to our item 8A, Larry.

and you have the next three.

Go back, just stay away.

Evening, Mayor, City Council.

We do have a couple of supplemental appropriations on the agenda tonight.

The first one is a request to appropriate $180,000 in a sanitation fund for the purchase of a recycling baler.

And these funds will come from the sanitation fund fund balance.

I may be able to answer questions for you, but Mr. Hartman is here.

All right, see if I can do this better than Adam did.

All right, good evening.

Tom Hartman, Public Works, along with for the $180,000 supplemental appropriation that Larry mentioned, we want to start baling our recyclables.

So current operations, we collect our recyclables two ways.

One, folks can bring them to the recycling convenience center and they self-sort themselves into the different bins.

If you've been there, it's a pretty slick operation.

Or they can bring the recyclables to one of the mobile recycling center locations that we go throughout the city.

You get to interact and talk to Vitali.

You drop the recyclables into the trailer.

We bring it back, put it in the bins.

Those materials we take loose to these various providers.

Dave's Recycling takes a few of the items, Valley Paper takes a few of the items, Recycle Management does.

We generally generate between $12,000 and $20,000 in revenue from those loosely delivered recyclables.

Again, like we've said, since we've changed our recycling operations, we have good quality, but our quantity is a little bit less.

So, recycling now is all about the quality of your product and can it be used?

Is it recyclable?

So our planned revisions would be to install the baler inside of our, if you've been out to our recycling convenience center, the big warehouse.

The next slide will show you where we'll place it inside the warehouse.

But we'd install a baler and we would bale number one and number two plastics independently into separate, they're about a thousand pound bales that we would create out of the baler.

So number one, number two plastics, mixed paper, cardboard, and aluminum.

And then those materials, once they're baled, and once we've accumulated 20 bales, we will then work with a provider named Circular Services, who will be our broker, essentially, of those baled materials.

They will bring a trailer in, we will load them through our loading dock onto the trailer and they will be taken to market at a much higher recycling rate because they are good quality and they are a baled product.

So we're not hauling air.

One example would be like for the number one plastics, if you've been out to our, if you know what a 40 yard container is, so that's like if you see like an industrial site, like a big dumpster.

We can take all of that number one plastic material and put it into one bale.

So we now make 20 trips to Dave's Recycling, for example, to deliver what we will now deliver with one tractor and trailer because it will be baled because we're not hauling that air.

So we're making a better product and more reducing that transportation cost.

Here's a layout of our recycling center.

Bottom of the screen is Berry Road.

Top of the screen is where you would go, where you come into the center to dump off or to deliver your recyclables.

This is easy for me to understand, but if you don't look at this every day, it's pretty confusing.

Sorry about that.

But it's just to show you that we have space inside that current facility to accommodate all these operations.

Current staff will operate the baler.

So at the volume that we have, we don't need to run our baler eight hours a day, five days a week.

We'll run it one or two hours a day.

And our current recycling staff and sanitation staff can accommodate those operations pretty seamlessly.

So there's no increase of staffing to do the bailing operations.

Here's a quick slide of just an annual tonnage of what we estimate we collect yearly for each of the different materials along with what that baled per ton value is.

And then at the bottom right you can see what we anticipate our annual revenue to jump to.

So we will go from $12,000 to $20,000 collected annually to just a little bit over $80,000.

Again, this is all market variable.

So if the market is better, we do better.

If the market is worse, we might hold on to a truckload a little bit longer in the warehouse and wait for the market.

That's something that we'll do with our broker.

They know the industry and they'll know when to call and when we need to hold or when we need to sell, essentially, to maximize our value of the collected material that we receive.

So here's a quick little picture of what the baler would look like.

So our recommendation would be we would supplement with the appropriation.

We then purchase the baler into the agreement for the brokerage with Circular Services.

And then our staff will continue to look for partnerships with either way we can work with JMU, bring material in and bale it, or if there's opportunities with towns that are collecting recyclables.

If there's opportunities, there could be opportunities out there if we have this up and running and we find it to be a success in the city.

Any questions?

Well, commending you on the efficiency, for one thing, you're saving greenhouse gas emissions for not hauling 20 trips of air versus one bale.

That's right.

And I also am looking at the purchase price of $180,000.

Correct.

And then I think the lifespan of 10 to 12 years would be the lifespan of the baler, so we will definitely get our money back.

Potentially.

We'd have to figure out how those tipping fees and things would work.

Those are just ideas.

We have great people at Public Works, and they're full of ideas.

And those are just things that we're always thinking about.

Yes, based on the volume that we collect, we would operate it one to two hours a day.

And depending on how much of each of the products we have, when it gets to a point where we have a full bale, then we'll run the bale to build that material.

That would be the case.

I'm assuming the model Titan 6 CV has a larger version, the 8 CV or whatever it is.

But if we were to see a potential use of

It would just run more often.

Um, then you get into that.

If it runs more often becomes, you know, a bigger operation, that's when staffing comes into play.

Well, I mean, I've said this, and I'll say it again with you guys, thank you for, again, looking at your operations, looking at your processes, trying to add efficiency to them.

As Councilwoman Dent said, also addressing our sustainability goals at the same time with this, and it feels like ditto saying to you, right, because Public Works, you guys continually

Thank you.

It's a win-win for sure.

Second.

Just to note, this is coming out of the sanitation fund, so not other general funds.

Councilmember Alsadun?

Aye.

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Fleming?

Aye.

Aye.

This is a request to appropriate a little over 1.2 million dollars for our share of the Children's Services Act cost.

This is, Rockingham County acts as the fiscal agent and this is a supplement that we've had the last two or three years.

We've come back.

The costs have continued to increase and we're a bit behind on our budgeting.

Good evening Council Members, Amy Snyder, Deputy City Manager again.

I'm going to try to briefly explain an incredibly complex and very important program that we are requesting supplemental appropriation for you this evening, but there are some critical points I need to make to you all and some things I need to make you aware of.

I'm standing before you because I am your appointee to the Community Policy and Management Team, which is the governing body for children's services in our community.

I also serve as the co-chair of the CPMT alongside the representative from Rockingham County.

CSA was founded in the 1990s.

It pulled together funding from many, many children service agency, put it all into one big pot and then created children services agencies in every locality around the Commonwealth.

They are all structured similarly to ours where they have a community policy management team that is the appointed governance structure to oversee the program and to be the fiduciary entity.

In 1992, the city and county formed one jointly.

So that is why we're the HRCSA.

CSAs are mandated to serve youth who are deemed eligible for services.

So that means that all of this money are going to youth who we have to serve.

They're mandated to be served by our program.

And again, they're all CSAs are

served by the CPMT, so I am not alone on that board.

Local government representatives are on it, community services board, social services, Department of Juvenile Justice, both the city schools and the county schools, the Department of Health, a private provider as well as a parent representative.

So it is a big board represented by children serving agencies.

What is before you this evening is a portion of the local match that is required towards state expenditures to serve the youth that are in our services.

The state sets that match rate, so we don't have the ability to change what the local match is.

The state essentially sends us a bill.

Our total match for FY25, which just wrapped up, was $3.1 million.

And our budget that we budgeted was $1.9 million and that is why we are back before you this evening seeking an additional $1.2 million.

That is money that has already been spent to serve children.

So cases that are served by us could be children served by the Community Services Board, children with IEP services in schools, children in foster care, and youth court ordered to services through the Department of Juvenile Justice and a wide range of other children who are deemed eligible.

So because of this, it makes prediction of annual expenses challenging because a child may come in, be deemed eligible, and we have to serve them, right?

We're here to help kids and their families through really difficult situations that they're facing and to try to keep them in their home, help them into adoptive placements, help them find stability in their lives.

Our program jointly in FY24 served 583 youth and their families.

And in FY25, which is the one we're coming before you regarding, between the city and the county jointly served 602 children.

So as you can see, we are increasing the number of children who have been served year over year.

With that, we also have experienced an escalation in expenses over the last five years.

Between last fiscal year and this fiscal year, our expenses increased by 15.8%.

So our governing body, the CPMT, is working to gather data and better identify what are the driving factors behind the increase so that we can be the best stewards of the program, care for the children and their families, and provide the best services possible.

Right now there's so many factors that could be driving it we haven't been able to pinpoint a particular cause but we're gonna keep working at it.

I did want to be transparent with City Council that our oversight entity which is the Office of Children's Services did just complete our

audit of our FY20, I believe it was FY24 program.

We go through an audit every three years and it concluded in August 2025 and the Office of Children's Services did determine in the audit that there were major deficiencies in compliance and internal controls, particularly regarding governance and operational practices.

Some of the areas that were identified in the audit were known to CPMT and were things we were working on addressing in our program before the audit and has been a primary focus since the summer of 2024, which was when you all appointed me to the CPMT.

There's been significant efforts undertaken to improve our program.

Some changes that we've undertaken include additional trainings, an extensive review of our policies, procedures, and practices, and additions of some really fantastic staff to our CSA office.

So I'm going to give them a shout out.

They're at training this week as well down I think in Roanoke.

They're doing a really fabulous job focusing on improving our program.

We did recently submit a 26 part quality improvement plan to our oversight entity in response to the audit's findings and we are waiting for them to return comments on it.

Our CPMT is focusing immediately on what we can control, so really looking at our trainings, at our policies, at our procedures, at our practices, but we understand there's some long-term efforts that are going to take us more time, such as recruiting more evidence-based practice vendors to our community.

So I want to reassure you that our CPMT, our CSA staff, and our family assessment and planning team, who are the ones who meet with families and youth as they craft their service plans, are dedicated to improving our program to provide the best quality and effective services to the children in our community, while also remaining fiscally responsible.

I am confident that we are headed in the right direction with our program.

and I look forward to reporting back to you all next fiscal year on our progress both in the quality of the services that we're providing to our youth and families as well as our financial stewardship of the program.

So I have a couple questions.

First, you keep saying CPMT.

Sure.

Yes.

This is a program I'm still very much learning and it's full of acronyms.

So I've been in this role, like I said, for a little over a year since you all appointed me.

CPMT is the Community Policy and Management Team.

and that is the state lays out in state code, the Commonwealth and state code, our duties, our responsibilities, our authority, as well as who sits on that board.

You all as city council have the ability to appoint one member, which is me, as well as the city and county can appoint a parent representative and that is Maria Blair, who you all recently appointed.

And then the rest of the entities are appointed through different means by their own boards.

Maria and I are two of the board members.

Okay.

So it seems like that every year we're increasing with numbers of children that we have to support.

Yes, ma'am.

I guess you kind of named some of the, I guess, best practices you have put in place.

Have you seen a difference since you put these practices in place of a reduction or any type of reduction?

Yeah, so we with, it came to our attention that there was one area of our services in what are called community-based services in the category called mentoring where we were a significant portion of the statewide spending in that category and our community policy management team put a policy in place that

placed some, I would say, guardrails on in what instances, the number of hours that could be requested, the length of time that that service could be received, with the opportunity for someone to essentially appeal it and come forward and make a case to us that they may need above and beyond that.

That policy went into place, I believe, in May, and since then we have seen a several hundred thousand dollar

reduction in spending on that service.

So that was an area that was flagged in the audit by the state that I think we were a significant portion of the state's spending in that category.

You said that you'll come back and report again next fiscal year.

Is there any way that, because I don't want to wait a whole year, and we're right back here, or we're not?

Yes, I mean if that is the desire of City Council for me to come back with a report more frequently, I'm happy to do so.

Like I said, we do have some things we're focusing on.

We're completely revising our local policy.

That's something our CSA team is working on.

another area that was identified in the audit and then we have engaged the services of ICAD at JMU.

We just had an initial scoping meeting but they're going to be supporting our board through

I think Dr. Alexander described it as a strategic change retreat.

So we're working on getting that scheduled for early winter, but that's something we could come back.

And then last question for me is how many of these children are from Harrisonburg?

I want to thank you for your transparency.

We started at the same time.

I want to thank you for your transparency in areas of efficiency because I know there have been some concerns, but by stating upfront

that deficiencies exist it shows that you're actively or the committee is actively working toward rectifying any problems and making changes so that things get better because in the grand scope of things it's all about serving these children who are dealing with all sorts of trauma and I know in the area of the

Therapeutic mentorship because I've done that in the past for this group.

It has often been used I would can it to be similar to Mentorship slash babysitting because there are so many areas where people need where the children need help but the parents need help as well and so I've often wondered about how can we increase the number of

practitioners that look like the children that they're supporting.

So there's so many needs.

It's like, how can we make sure that we're dealing with the trauma, not using this as a babysitting service?

How can we make sure that needs are being met and that the children are getting what they need from practitioners?

But we're always working with the same group who see not to be able to take on any more children,

who don't have enough hours to support those in need.

So this is a great service, but I'm glad that it's changing.

The money part, it makes it sound like we're not going to have enough money to get kids to

Well, to the mayor's point about a check back and Monica as well, I wonder if the comments that you received back from your, I forget the process, but the back and forth between you and the state agency might come up with some things to report back to us on, for example.

In transparency, it's my first time going through this process with the Commonwealth.

So potentially, I will see what we receive back from the Office of Children's Services in response to our quality improvement plan.

Yeah, thank you for serving in this program.

How do you select the children?

How do they select it?

Sure.

I don't have the eligibility sheet in front of me, so that... It just changed on July 1, new state code.

came into effect that did expand the criteria for serving children in the community.

There are some children who are automatically eligible for our services so for instance children who have IEPs in the schools they're automatically eligible to be funded through our program and there are there's other eligibility criteria that automatically makes a child

eligible for our funding.

So if a child is in foster care, and I think DJJ, and then for other children, there is a set of criteria set by the state.

Let me see if I print it off.

I did not print off that sheet to bring to you.

I believe the county does pay, have a little bit more of a match than we do, but that would be because they serve more children or because of the services that the children are paying.

So just for clarification, we are a joint program, which means we are administered jointly and we are governed jointly, but city taxpayer money only pays for city children.

and county taxpayer money only pays for county children.

That's why I want to see what that percentage is.

Yes.

I can get you all that breakdown.

Now, Nasser, one of the things I can add to what Ms.

Neidl just said, when a student comes before the FAP team, you have already tried everything.

You have exhausted all possible services and you need something else.

So it's not like, oh, we tried this.

No, we're just going to go before the FACT team and see if we can get mentorship or whatever.

It's not that easy.

Well, we went through the school.

Through the school, you can make a suggestion as a parent that we need something else.

and through the IEP process, we decided that then you need to go before the FAP team because you need additional funding to pay for XYZ services.

So a family can't just say, oh, just send me there so I can get extra money for mentorship.

How are our services making an impact on that child?

Because we can provide all the services

we want, but are we making a difference?

Are we making an impact?

Is that child approving?

Unfortunately though, Mayor Reed, it's like you can have 20 kids and we might have

18 or 15 that improved because of the additional services and then you may have five that no matter the continued services it just doesn't hit right or the trauma is too intense or I mean you just never know so it's good to know that we are

So the children are coming through a number of different avenues to get through here.

So if it's an IEP through the school,

A couple of different metrics.

So the first is that the state, the Commonwealth and Office of Children's Services loves uniformity and an ability to provide an assessment that cuts across all cases.

So they have a uniform assessment tool.

They call it the CANS.

I don't know what the acronym means standing here, but the CANS and all cases have to

have the cans completed upon entry into the program and then at various checkpoints along the way.

And that is an evaluative tool that the Family Assessment Planning Team looks at, the case managers administer, and then we also have to report that data to the Office of Children's Services.

And then they're tracking that at a macro level of are our services having an impact on

these different evaluative criteria for youth.

They also have us track length of time in service, cost per service, length of time in residential services if that's where a child has been determined to be best placed or served.

So there's all of this data and that's one of the areas where that

CPMTs well before me have identified as an area of growth and something that we are working on focusing on to the point of a great team.

We now have a dedicated staff person who has been focusing on those types of assessed evaluations for us.

She's brand new to her role, but she's taking a look at

All of our cases from that lens.

And she's also started to report data to us as of last month.

So to speak to Mayor Reed's thought of reporting back, we'll be heading some significant budget times where we need to understand where this is.

So we've seen some progress here, a reduction.

You know, to be able to, this is a big number, so to be able to predict, you know, where our budget stands, we ought to think about a report back time that will be helpful as we're making budget decisions.

Yeah, and I would just add because of the previous two years of having to come to you for supplemental appropriations and some of this to a certain extent, you know, Ms.

Snyder bringing up the three-year audit which really showed those deficiencies.

There have been a lot of discussion among the mental health experts, whether it's community services board, whether it's Department of Juvenile Justice, the schools, that there was some anticipation coming out of COVID that some of these costs and the number of cases were going to increase.

So, there was some anticipation of that, but because of the two previous years of supplemental appropriation needs in the FY26 budget, we actually did increase the allocation by Mr. Prop's 600,000 in anticipation that, you know,

Even that amounts a pretty significant percentage, right?

You know of increase and so I think you know one thing is I think by just important to recognize that this was flagged through an audit Lowering this figure I think is not an option Right.

I think you know, I think that the the state agency is telling us

You need to address this in some ways.

And there's something we want to see you address.

It sounds like we've already had some successful addressing of that.

There's a plan in place that hopefully will, do you have any idea about when you might hear back on that?

I am not sure when our really fantastic auditor, she was so great to work with.

Truly, just really, really wonderful and supportive of us.

I'm not sure when she'll have a response back to us.

They said there were 26 different areas that we needed to address and all of those had an action plan that was written and crafted with various steps and timelines.

So my anticipation is she will thoroughly review it and provide us feedback.

I'm hoping that this action that you're doing right now is received by that department as well as a proactive move addressing city council who is putting the funds into this and they would see that as a proactive step that

I don't know if I would assume that there's going to be a drastic reduction in the amount of money spent because if there has been, if we've been flagged for excessive spending in the area of mentorship, when I think of children, I think okay,

then if this child is still a child in need of services, then we're just maybe not giving them the right service.

So maybe the money that was spent in mentorship maybe needs to be spent on more one-on-one counseling or family counseling situation.

Yeah, I think that's a great point.

I know we're here because we're talking tonight about money, right, and local taxpayer money and being stewards of it.

The community policy management team is a group of individuals who are in public child-serving roles, who have chosen careers

based on serving children and families and that is behind every decision that is made by CPMT.

Understanding that every case is a child with family members behind them or perhaps adoptive families or foster parents or guardians and that as we make our policy changes, as we evaluate the effectiveness of our services, it's always with the child and the family first.

So we

We are making changes to our program understanding that we have to look at each case, its unique circumstances, and the needs of the kid and their family, and what will hopefully produce the best life outcome for them.

So you're right that as our family assessment planning team takes a look at services, it may be deemed that one is not effective or maybe

The child hopefully can be stepped down from something.

Maybe they are in a residential home and they can or a group home and they can be brought home with some community based services wrapped around them.

So it's always of what is best for the child.

Yeah, I think that's because we're talking about a significant amount of money that we have to be good stewards for.

So I get what you're saying, you know, but there's also some red flags in there that you brought to our attention.

That means that we need to tighten up on some things.

And what that is, I'm sure

the CP and whatever MT will move forward in that but there are some things that we need to be really looking at because we're talking about $1.2 million.

Additional.

Is that in addition to the 1.9 that we already budgeted?

That's their job.

That's what I know.

I already know.

Yeah.

And that's where we'll see that.

That's where we'll see a drop at.

Okay.

Okay.

So we need to approve this $1.2 million.

Okay.

I cannot make it.

I respect that.

I'll second that.

And just for clarity, this is money that we owe.

Is that correct?

So, um, yeah, this is a service we have to pay for that's been rendered.

Yeah, I respect.

I respect your decision on that.

And yes, we owe it.

Okay.

I just want to be transparent as we be transparent.

Did we get a second?

Any more discussion?

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Fleming?

Aye.

There were two, actually two main ones, a million 483 in additional paving money from VDOT for public works and this was paving on locations on Court Square and also Stone Spring Road.

$200,000 from the Virginia Opioid Abatement Authority.

This is a continuation of a cooperative partnership grant with Rockingham County.

that was sub-awarded to strengthen peers last year.

So this is a continuation of year two.

And then the last one, 180,000, this is actually for the National Park Service for a project up at the Simms Center.

When you said Park Service, I was like, huh?

Yeah.

Motion.

Questions?

Second.

Any discussion?

Well, this one is easier because it's moving money around that comes from elsewhere, right?

These various grants and settlements and such.

It's not coming straight out of taxpayer dollars like the other one.

Okay.

Councilmember Dent?

Aye.

Councilmember Robinson?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Fleming?

Aye.

Aye.

and Mayor Panagiotis Kianakudos.

I came early today and I saw something that made me change my plan testimony.

So tonight, instead of talking about things we should be ashamed of going to COP 30, I'm going to talk about who

We are siding with when you hear me testifying here at the dais.

So what did I see today?

It was about half an hour early.

I walked down Main Street and I walked past the community foundation.

Now I have my differences with the donor class, but generally speaking,

Those are folks who at some point in their life feel some urge of compassion, more or less generally speaking.

And if you look at the yard around it, it was very painful for me.

It was beautifully landscaped in rocks, in pebbles.

And I know what that is.

I know what that is.

And you should know what that is, too, with us undergoing sweeps.

And right next to them,

is the Arts Council, intending to bring beauty into our community.

And they are a little bolder.

They have a pollinator garden.

And in the pollinator garden, we have this.

Okay, what's in here?

It's a beer bottle.

It's partially full.

A crushed up hard cider can.

Okay, who are we siding with?

What message was being sent?

And if you don't already know what this message is, I know this message very well.

I was at a race recently and I got to see the faces that you would see if you unmask some of this.

Most people in the neighborhood planned ahead, parked outside the race area, but some did not and drove through.

And they were so, generally speaking, so polite.

Saw a couple of young guys in a big muscle pickup truck, and they were so polite, so apologetic and mindful of and celebrating the runners, except for a couple.

There were a couple who didn't slow down.

Can you imagine in this time, in this day and age, and in this place,

Not slowing down, going into a crowd of people with an automobile.

So one of them, the first one, came roaring through.

And then on the way back, there's another car coming out.

They're not slowing down.

Maybe the city didn't put their sign far enough back to give people notice.

and as the person came by, oh, it was one of these perpetrators who call in tall grass and weed complaints.

And as they refused to slow down, an elderly gentleman was pulling up the last part of the race and crossed in in front of the car that was not wanting to slow down.

Another one came the other direction in the jeep

and tried as people did to slow them down.

They came out into the intersection and the poor runners coming down a hill had to break their stride and try to figure out what to do going around.

Okay.

The faces that we're seeing.

So, what does it mean when somebody throws something like this into a natural habitat?

One thing that it's saying is, look, I have an open container in public.

Furthermore, I've emptied it.

So I'm intoxicated in public and some of them do it while they're driving and what they're saying is I feel that I have impunity and I can bully you and I can suppress you and you know what?

The city's not going to do anything about it and maybe they're going to start siding with me.

And what does that feel like in a community?

People are afraid.

People don't want to challenge them.

People know who they are and they won't say.

and they feel like the city is siding with them.

Okay.

Take that to COP30.

Good evening.

My name is Carl Larson.

I live at 487 South Mason Street.

I absolutely love our city and I very much enjoyed meeting with people over the last several months and learning about all that goes into a large rezoning proposal like the one currently being considered next door.

There's so much to discuss but this evening I'd like to raise what I see as two brief but pressing points that I hope may be helpful as you discern how to vote on Mr. Lindsay's request to rezone his property from R3 to B1C.

My first point is about the importance of analyzing the full fiscal impact of the rezoning proposal.

Of course, rezoning would bring in more property tax income, but it would also increase costs for our city.

Things like traffic calming, parking enforcement, potential water and sewer upgrades, and the addition of students to our public schools.

What are the total costs?

That's a central question and I don't feel we've just yet examined it as carefully as it deserves.

Our city staff's planning commission memorandum template already includes a section for fiscal impact analysis.

I understand that it's not necessary to complete that section for every little resounding request that goes through the system.

But if we don't do a fiscal impact analysis for this development, which the developer describes as the largest single investment in downtown, then my goodness, when would we ever do a fiscal impact analysis?

My own view is that the fiscal benefits of this development seem rather small, and under some future scenarios I wonder if the impact could even be negative.

But regardless of what I think, wouldn't it be prudent and helpful to have our own city staff look into this some more?

So my first request is this please City Council I gently ask you to request city staff to conduct a full fiscal impact analysis of the link and their Planning Commission memo looking not only at added tax revenue but also at the added cost to our city of allowing this development to proceed.

After all this talk about money, the second point I want to make is this.

Money isn't everything.

And in this case, I don't think considerations around money should overshadow what I see as a much more important question, which is, what is our community's vision for the best zoning of this land?

This particular parcel is unique.

It's at the Gateway to Downtown, right next to City Hall, Turner Pavilion, and the Future Park.

It's a defining space and it deserves special care.

We only get one chance to get it right and the decision we make here will shape downtown for generations.

So many members of our community have voiced serious concerns about the prospect of rezoning this property and more than 1,300 residents from all across the city.

have signed this petition asking to keep it zoned as R3, not B1C.

This isn't opposition to growth, it's a desire for balance, for growth that fits the character and scale of this site that sits within the boundaries of the Harrisonburg Downtown Historic District.

There are many other sites in Harrisonburg that would be well suited for large dense B1 development, including other sites downtown where higher density projects could truly thrive.

Voting no on this site doesn't close the door to dense development downtown.

It simply keeps it open to happening where it fits best.

I ask you gently to please honor our community's vision, the vision of people from all across the city by voting no on rezoning this site to B1C in favor of keeping the current R3 zoning.

This is a vote for thoughtful lasting growth that respects our heritage while also welcoming new opportunities for the city that we all love so much.

Thank you.

Todd Alexander, um, I just wanted to give you a heads up.

I don't know if you guys know, but I'm assuming that you do.

Um, Monday at 12 noon is our first meeting with the mediation group.

So I didn't know whether you guys had an update on that or not, but they just sent that house to us this afternoon.

Hi, I'm sure you guys are really tired of hearing about the link, but I'm going to say another thing about it.

I'm extremely in favor of this.

My name is Sarah.

I own a business downtown and I live on Broad Street.

I'm extremely in favor of the link.

I think what keeps being overlooked

By building a project to the link is it's not deciding whether we're going to put a high density housing project there or what else we're going to do with it.

It's where either putting the high density housing project there or we get 30 units of townhouses that are going to sell for $700,000 a unit.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Mayor Reed, there are no callers.

Thank you.

I will close public comment.

Yes, last Saturday, October 11th, I honored to witness the

Loungewell Valley Education Reimagine, first of its kind, public-private partnership with area employers to increase access, affordability, and teacher attention in early childhood education.

Well I have some big exciting news and that's why I'm not going to be here in November.

I'm going to Brazil for two weeks for the COP 30 United Nations global climate negotiation.

I'm being sponsored for my attendance by the elected officials to protect America that I've done this leadership certificate with and I want to make very clear that none of this is on taxpayer dollars.

I'm funding my own

travel there, and then the EOPA covers my ticket and accommodations, which are rare, with tens of thousands of people descending on this Amazon city.

And my role there will be speaking up for what we in cities in America are doing for climate action.

And a sort of second piece of exciting news at Virginia Municipal League this past couple of days, I talked with Steve Patterson, the mayor of Athens, Ohio, and the president of the National League of Cities, and he appointed me sort of the unofficial ambassador from the National League of Cities to COP 30.

So I'll be speaking for 19,000 cities, towns, and villages all over the country saying here's what we're doing.

The basic message is we are with you.

No matter what our national governments are doing, subnational governments are bonding together to do the climate action that we know we need.

So that's all really exciting and I've been collecting vaccinations to prepare for it because it really is right in the Amazon basin.

And I mentioned briefly the Virginia Municipal League where several of us were.

I also went to the Virginia Clean Energy Summit a couple of weeks ago and again I was, as far as I know, the only local elected official there.

It's mostly industry and agency and think tank kind of

I'm gathering, so I've said that that's one of the most impactful conferences I go to because it's a mix like that.

And I was bragging on HEC for doing battery storage.

That was a big topic there as well as data centers of course.

And more sort of local news, I participated in the Walk to School as many of us did.

Like Councilwoman Dent mentioned, several of us were at the Virginia Municipal League where Vice Mayor here presented on housing for Liz Webb.

Wonderful sessions.

I was commenting to Councilwoman Dent.

I was sitting in on a session that had to do with

Parkless Live More, I think is what the title was.

And I felt like I was having a one-on-one with our former planning commission, Chair Brent Finnegan.

And I said, oh, oh, OK, I've heard this stuff before.

But it was good to know that our city is, well, felt good to know that our city is up with all that's trending and becoming the right thing to do with cities.

Let's see, I attended a CCJB meeting, the Criminal Community Justice Board meeting, and we had a real council listening session which just talked a lot about national themes and the discontent and how cities don't quite know how to deal with different things that are going on and

The theme is just hang in there, that we're all filling the ups and downs, but we're going to get through all that's going on.

We had an HR, HA, I attended with Deputy City Manager Snyder and Ms.

Thomas from Northeast Neighborhood Association, Harrisonburg Redevelopment Housing Authority CAB meeting, which is the Citizens Advisory Board,

and I felt that it was a wonderful presentation by Ms.

Snyder and that we have made yet another friendly group connection with a group that lives primarily in the Northeast neighborhood that want to do a lot of work that's already been laid out in the small area plan.

So I thought that was a very productive meeting.

Well at the end of September at the Turner Pavilion, the Latino Business Council had their launching event.

Mayor Reed, Bethany Reed and I were there to welcome them.

The city was a sponsor for this event.

and it was an effort to promote, support and develop our Latino and immigrant businesses in the city as a support network.

a bit like a Chamber of Commerce for those groups but also looking for doing some specific support and of course our grant program that I believe we will likely get the Southern Cities Economic Initiative will be supporting that work there.

It was a fantastic event.

It also was done under the cloud and the fear of folks showing to the event.

something that you know we see regularly across our community and so you know I commend them for continuing and having that event it was something they decided to do recognizing the the danger and the concern they had about that but also the importance of being able to move forward and supporting their businesses as residents of our city and all in all I think they they felt

Very, very proud as they should and excited about what they're moving forward with.

there.

Also, at the same time here in the chambers, we had another promotional event, the fire department.

So the chief had a number of promotions and new folks who came through the academy.

And so our fire department is well taken care of.

Our service is well taken care of under really the just very inspiring leadership of our chief.

then I was again with at the Virginia Municipal League so along with folks there I was voted on to the board of VML so I'll be a board member for VML so it's a nine-member board across the state and I'm chairing what's called the urban sections so really all the large cities kind of down to us and maybe about down to 30,000

So I chaired that group for VML and then presented the housing presentation for Ms.

Webb, which went well.

Maybe 180, 200 people at that.

And then convened, while we were there, I convened a number of the cities who are hosts to higher education institutions.

So university towns, college towns there,

We have a little over 30 universities and colleges in Virginia, 20 or so cities, towns that are hosts and this is kind of the first convening of that group.

So to talk about are there issues of concern that we share and of course probably the number one issue that we all share with other university

the housing challenges, housing students, housing our residents but the mix and the challenge of student behavior and residents living around students and how to make that a compatible and supportive relationship with each other.

We'll continue that.

I think kind of a new group, an old form within VML, are those university cities in Virginia.

We had our JMU city liaison meeting, so Councilwoman Robinson was there and the city manager was there, along with President Schmidt.

and his leadership team.

Um, and so our first meeting with him officially kind of talking about things we're doing the city, um, you know, from all indications.

And, um, Syria keeps popping up.

What we've seen is the president is not only willing but really excited and engaged to partner with the city and leadership seems they're willing to do that.

So continued collaboration between the city manager and GMU leadership around planning issues and vision issues I think will be important.

I believe our city staff will be meeting with

the JMU team and consultants that are putting together the JMU strategic plan.

I think that was a positive development for them to proactively reach out and at our meeting we also put forward an idea that we've been planning for quite a while which is a resident student

Committee to look at the cross-section of where students and residents are together, pulling together JMU leadership, JMU students, community residents, city staff to talk about those issues when they come in the conflict of how to make sure that students living in our

neighborhoods have understandings of how to be residents here and then how our residents can work proactively with students to make that a good relationship, a positive relationship.

So I believe we'll move forward with that.

The city manager

or one of your staff obviously will work with someone from JMU looks like they have assigned someone who will be the lead person there and develop that committee moving forward and hopefully we can get that set up and kind of defined and have some residents you know we all get feedback from residents with concerns so a place where they can kind of maybe take that and proactively work on that relationship.

Yeah, interesting today at the Virginia Municipal League, at the closing event there, they had some speakers.

One was the CFO for Carilion.

So, you know, in Southwest Virginia, kind of the largest healthcare provider.

And, you know, talked a lot about, you know, what is the impending and kind of the rolling down, the boulder rolling down the hill of us, at us around healthcare.

and talked about the impacts that we are going to see with Medicaid and Medicare cuts.

The impacts of those cuts and folks who will be going without insurance get passed on to the rest of us and our insurance premiums going up to account for that.

His view was he thought there's still some time until that comes into effect.

I don't know, maybe it's sooner or later, but we know it's coming down.

And it's a frightening figure to look at, the increased health care costs to the city, to employers, to each of us individually.

And then Eric Swarzoni, who is the head of the William Cooper Center, was also there.

and talked about the federal cuts that we're seeing in Virginia, not quite as large as we might have anticipated at first but it's hard to know until they start getting unemployment numbers and insurance claims in for that.

But one of the things he talked about because folks were saying, hey, what do we do?

you know we can see this it feels there's a great time of uncertainty you know what's the response for for cities and and he was saying you know at the state if you're a state legislator you you in Virginia you're looking up to the federal government and looking for where that money is coming down from you're looking at the policies their impact they're enacting and that drives what happens at the state level and then you know it all flows down to us and we get whatever we get here

They're saying, really now, we can't count on that.

We don't know what we can count on at the federal government level right now.

And cities need to work with their states, need to proactively prepare, one, understand, look at our budgets and make sure we're being

Thank you for having me.

You know, push down to the local level.

And if federal funding goes away, federal support goes away, the problem is still here.

So cities and states have to take a proactive approach, a collaborative approach.

And it may be an innovative approach.

The state may have to recognize that solutions at the city level might require that they give us some allowances to be creative and step into these responses and plans is something for us to think about as a collective group of cities and individually.

We have a staff that's very creative.

and is constantly looking at how to do programs.

That may come into play very soon for the type of services we may have to fill in because we're not getting the dollars from the federal government coming down here.

All I have to ramble on about.

The Virginia legislative, the VML legislative committee, which I'm on, passed kind of our priorities education.

So VML, the cities have placed as one of the top two priorities education funding.

and then land use policy, making sure that cities still have control over how we build and run our cities.

For me, September, I attended Royals Go Downtown, which is EMU's, Eastern Mennonite University's version of the block party.

We had about 300 students that attended that.

I attended Royal Appreciation Week.

I went to Parks and Rec lunch and we were celebrating our employees by giving them lunch.

That was the last week, every day last week.

I also attended a candid conversation of well-being and mental health with First Lady Kim Schmidt and First Lady Suzanne Youngkin at JMU.

What else?

EMU Homecoming was last week, last weekend.

GMU's Homecoming is this weekend.

I'll actually participate in their parade and some other events, so we'll have a lot of people in town again this weekend.

Some speaking engagements that I have.

Spoke earlier today in DC at the Future Youth Summit at the National Science Academies focusing on

After school programs and summer learning.

I'm going back to DC in the morning to speak at the National Press Conference again about the impact of after school programs and summer learning.

There is funding for our after school programs that is in jeopardy.

And so that's why I'm out here advocating.

to 21st century grants are what heavily funds a lot of our nonprofits that work with after school programs.

And so that's in the budget to be cut.

And if that is cut, a lot of our programs will suffer.

Yeah.

I'm also

Next week I think I'm speaking at the NAACP State Conference in Richmond and Vice Mayor you brought up about federal funding

I don't know if you remember, I know Brian was with me, at the navigation center they had a forum on federal funding cuts and they were focusing on health care.

I am working with Healthy Community Collaborative, which is HCC.

They put on that one because I felt like there needed to be a part two and it needed to be broader.

And so with JMU community engagement, myself and HCC, we're having a part two to that conversation.

It'll be October 28th.

9 a.m.

to 12 at EMU and so we're gonna we're gonna talk about broaden it out so it's gonna talk we're gonna talk about health care our nonprofits so if you want to learn more about what's what's in this budget that can be potentially cut

Please come out to EMU on October 28 from 9 a.m.

to 12.

And just to kind of give a little shout out to the Navigation Center because our Navigation Center is having a lot of tours.

And so we have another tour that's coming up from Charlottesville.

They'll be visiting

as well, but they have had a lot of guests from other localities to come during when we look at the facilities.

So I'm very proud of what they are doing.

That's it for me.

I just want to note someone else.

So we also have in attendance here today

Okay.

All right.

We'll go now into our boards and commissions.

First, we have planning commission.

One vacancy.

Todd Alexander and Stanley Gisour.

I think that's how you pronounce it.

Well, I spoke with both of these people and I believe they're both here.

We heard from Todd Alexander and Rob Jezior here.

And now, Todd Alexander applied to both Planning Commission and BZA and when I talked to them I asked, does he have a preference?

He said whichever one we need.

And since we need the vacancy for BZA field, I would propose appointing Todd Alexander to the BZA and Rob Jezior to the Planning Commission.

Rob has an impressive background as an architectural engineer.

He's served on our Transportation Safety Advisory Committee as a bike advocate and very interested in helping us form downtown.

So I think that's a good fit on both counts, so we'll have to move them separately, right?

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

I did that for decades.

Any opposed?

Thank you.

and Social Services Advisory Board.

Abreu.

To Nanjala Sabreu.

She's also the victim advocate at the Commonwealth's Attorney Office.

And with Harrisonburg Police Department.

I got a motion.

Aye.

All right and then we have 10D board and building code appeals.

We have Gerald Bland and Hunter Woodard.

Any discussion?

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Thank you.

Before they go for the students who are here visiting maybe right after you adjourn the meeting they come up and we do a picture with them.

Do you like that?