All right. All right. Good evening. Welcome to the May 7th, 2024 meeting of the Ashland town council. Thank you for being here. We start off with a moment of silence. And I always talk a few minutes before that. Maybe it should be silent. But something to reflect on, I had the pleasure earlier today to a lunch and sponsored by AARP, hand of AARP, honoring veterans. And one of the gentlemen in the room was 86. And so most were older folks, older older than me. But also a group came from toddler town and saying some songs. So you had the blend of people, 86, and a lot of children, under six, just reflect on our rights, this country and appreciation for those that serve. And so anyway, I just thought I'd offer the information that we'd have a moment of silence. Thank you. Mr. Vice-Morning, would you please in the pledge? As your able, please stand and join me in the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which stands one nation under God and indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. All right. Take a look at the agenda for this evening. Next, we have our consent agenda which includes minutes from our April 16th town council meeting. We have our invoices bills for the town to pay we have our piece officer memorial week proclamation and Also, we have a referral to our planning commission Well actually, it's just subdivision subdivision 24--0325, Gleason, Treg Will. After our consent agenda, we have our citizen input time, opportunity for individuals come and speak to council on an item. If it's on a public hearing, best to wait for the public hearing. But that's an opportunity for people to come forward and just speak on anything that's a concern to them or something they want to speak to Council on. After citizen input we have our public hearing. The first one, fiscal year 2425, real property tax public hearing. Followed that with our public hearing on fiscal year 2425 budget. Followed that with an action item. Town manager's 2023 evaluation resolution. We have two discussion items. First is legislative update from Mr. McRoberts. And the second erosion and stormwater management code changes from Mr. Jennings. After that we have our reports, Councilmember reports, mayors report, public works, department report, and town managers report. Do we have consensus for the agenda as presented? Yes. Yes. All right, thank you. All right, are there any, well, I'll tell you what, with the Peace Officer Memorial Week, I've asked Dr. McGraw, if he would go ahead and read that for us. Certainly. Whereas the police officers of the town of Ashland safeguard the lives and property of our community without regard to the peril or hazard to themselves. And whereas these officers performed their work to the highest standard of integrity, selflessness, professionalism, equity, and devotion. And whereas through the enforcement of law, the same officers provide our residents, businesses, and visitors with freedom from the fear of violence and liberty to exercise the rights and privileges afforded by the constitutions of the United States and the Commonwealth of Virginia. And whereas by their service, these men and women have earned the gratitude of the town and whereas the national observance of peace officers Memorial Day and police week have honored all law enforcement officers and particularly those law officers who have given their lives in the service of their communities every year since 1962. Now therefore, on the behalf of the Ashland Town Council, we do hereby proclaim an affirm May 15, 2024 as Peace Officers Memorial Day in the town of Ashland, in honor of those who have served and are currently serving to protect our town. And be it further proclaimed that the week of May 12 through May 18, 2024 is hereby designated as police week in the town of Ashland, wherein all community members are encouraged to participate in appropriate activities and recognition of the service and sacrifice of our police officers dated this seventh day of May 2024. All right, thank you, sir. Thank you. All right, having read that, that's part of our consent agenda. So I ask because they're a motion To approve the consent agenda. I Moved Mr. Mayor to approve the consent agenda as per the incident and pay the bills. I second All right. Thank you So Paul I vice mayor Hodges. Hi Dr. McGraw. Hi Miss Barnhart. Hi mayor Trevet. Hi All right. Thank y'all that brings us to the citizen input time and just as I said Opportunity for anyone once come forward speak to council on a matter that's not one of the public hearings and so invite people this time Seeing no one will close it is an input time and go ahead and move forward with our first public hearing We'll close it as an input time and go ahead and move forward with our first public hearing the fiscal year 2425 real property tax public hearing this is a pretty much a regulatory item and Our manager will help me not mess up My understanding is because of the amount of increase in the real estate, I guess, our what we'll be receiving, we don't have higher tax this year. But due to the assessments, we will have a higher amount that'll be coming in. And it's such a percentage that the state requires that we have a public hearing to adopt that. You've accurately described that. Yeah, so if our assessments go up over 1% from one year to the next, then we are legally required to hold a public hearing, advertising a tax increase, even though we are keeping our rate perfectly flat. And so essentially, if we were to equalize, which is kind of the conversation we would have, our tax rate would go down to 0.094 cents per hundred instead of 10 cents per hundred. And so for that reason we have to hold the public hearing. Again, the important part, I think for the public is the tax rate is not changing. We are not recommending a change. And this is a leak really required public hearing that we have to hold. Okay. All right. Any questions from council to the manager? All right. Seeing none, officially required to open the public hearing. So we'll open the public hearing. Anyone wants to speak to this? Invite you to come up at this time. Seeing no one will close the public hearing. Bring it back to council for discussion, a hand or a motion. No motion, next to the action. Thank you. Yes. And the next one will be the same. All right, moving on to the fiscal year 2425 budget public hearing. All right. Yes, and this one we have a presentation for. So it's relatively brief. I do apologize. The presentation that was included on Granicus was the one from, was April 16th when I initially presented the budget. Head prepared a much shorter, more condensed version for tonight. So I'm actually going to go from the one that was prepared for this evening. And it will hit the highlights since we went into all the detail back in April. So a little bit of history where we've been, we've really tried to garner significant public interest in the budget process. So we held an unofficial budget public hearing in February where literally, as folks, come tell us what you want to see in the budget before the ink is even dry on the paper. When we start preparing the budget, then we hold budget work sessions where we go through every line of the budget that our departments and I are presenting to you as options. And that is a time when we're looking at both wants and needs, not just the needs. We want, feel it's important for both the public and the town council to understand all the things that our department heads are thinking of and that they may want to propose to you. And then after that process, we take input from the public as well as town council and it's my job and I did that on April 16th to recommend a proposed budget to you. That was what we did on that day. And then subsequently, tonight is where we hold the public hearing. Again, it's already been mentioned. You don't vote tonight. You can't vote on the same night as the budget public hearing. So I will touch on the highlights. Some goals that we had in the budget preparation process is making sure that we held operating expenses in line with revenues. That's kind of fundamental budget, but balanced budget work. And this budget does that. Our revenues cover completely our ongoing expenses and any use of unreserved fund balances largely going to capital projects, which is typically good for one time revenue sources to go to one time capital projects rather than covering ongoing expenses. We continued funding the council goals in connectivity. We have heard loud and clear from the community that connectivity, especially in the former sidewalks and trails is very important. But I also view that in connectivity with the community, making sure that we're funding our community engagement function. I think we've seen great success from that, and Ms. Miller is doing absolutely outstanding. Not only making sure we can physically get to each other through the sidewalks, but making sure that people know the resources that the government offers have opportunity to communicate with the government. And really, she's now kind of moved on to helping them communicate between one another and not just always going through us. And those have been really successful efforts. We obviously need to continue investing in our employees. We have a great team here, and they do wonderful work, but prices are going up, and the region is still very competitive for employees. And I believe this budget does accomplish that. And then again, you've heard me and I am a broken record on this one but our ARPA expenses largely come to an end. This coming fiscal year that we're budgeting for and so we had to plan a very smooth transition off of those federal dollars to make sure that we could fund our ongoing operations with local dollars. And again, I believe this budget does that as well. So some of the highlights that you'll see funded within the budget. Again, town council priorities were paramount in our mine. And so just wanted to throw some of the numbers on there. $300,000 new in sidewalk money. Rupert won an Archie Cannon drive starting to plan for a light at that place using CVTA funds. It's Ashwin. You hear me say it too often is a bit of a swamp. So drainage and infrastructure in that sense is always going to be important. So we're putting more dollars towards that to reduce some flooding in certain areas. North Ashland Park, again, Parks and Rec have received a lot of funding in recent years, but it seems to be a community priority. So we are putting additional $100,000 in for that park. That is largely for the planning exercises that we will go through to make sure that that Park can get planned and then we have to fund the implementation of it. And then trails again right along with the sidewalks We want to make sure that in where areas where it's appropriate for a trail rather than a sidewalk we have funding for that. And then again, public art. I think Miss Miller has shown great Progress in funding or in moving our public art options along the commission is doing wonderful work we should see success I would say within the next three or four months with our gateway arch project that's really exciting and then again the public art commission is going to be working on a strategic master plan that hopefully will inform what we want to do and then they can use this money to move on to their next project again I won't be a repetitive there but using the arpePA dollars and making sure we're transitioning successful. I'm very proud of and I think we should be proud of the work that the economic development authority is doing on our behalf. They have really started to get that flywheel turning of one project leaning into another, leading into another and all that takes funding. And so, I'm glad that they were able to figure out a way to sustainably fund them into the future. From the finance background, I always think leaving a little bit of a cushion is important and making sure when times are uncertain that we leave sufficient funding for future years. So we have left some in our onesigned fund balance to make sure that we do successfully transition off of ARPA and the plan works, but we do have some dollars there for uncertain issues, whether it be the economy or if a project faces us we were not expecting. I've mentioned it already, but it continued to investment in community engagement as well as tourism and marketing efforts. And then finally, that investment in not only retaining our workforce, I mentioned that earlier, but we do still struggle to attract workforce. The application pools are not as deep or as wide as they used to be, so the number of applications and maybe the quality of the applications are not what they used to be. And so this does contain some dollars to both increase a benefit that I mentioned to you, the longevity program, another thing that we can use to try to attract employees to us, but also allows us to move along in our compensation plan so that salaries keep up with the region and we're able to keep competing on the region level for those good employees. And with that, next steps, we have a budget vote on June 4th. That is obviously optional. You don't have to do that, but you should probably adopt a budget, but happy to go through the public hearing, taking up the budget, but that we receive, answer any questions that you may have, and then really talk about, is this the budget you're ready to vote on or are there any changes you would suggest of me? And with that, I'll take any questions you may have. All right, any questions for the manager at this time? I'll have this time. All right. And just as you said a moment ago, the budget vote set for 6'4", but you've made the point before, if we don't take any action, what you've presented automatically becomes the budget. Yeah, so. All right. All right. No questions from council. So we'll go ahead and open the public hearing. Give individuals opportunity to come and speak to the budget. Just come forward and identify yourself by name and address if you would. We didn't have a sign-up sheet and we're not so many people that we needed that, but invite you to just come on up and speak your mind. speaker Madd. Good evening my name is Chris Ray at live at 2009 Henry Clay Road in Ashland. I'm the owner of Origin Beer Lab and center of the Universe Brewing Company. Here speak a little bit about Ashland Soundtracks tonight. I know all you all received my letter in the public record and had the opportunity to meet with Councilman Hodges and Councilwoman Soapal today, which I appreciate. I came away with two different things. First, I think it's clear that the program works, that people enjoy it. It is bringing the energy, movement to downtown during those 24 Saturdays during the year. And the second thing is kind of the sticking point on the funding of the project, which I understand setting a precedent for town local funds being used for private individuals or businesses. I can see how that president would potentially cause an issue. And so I'm speaking with both of the council members. I do have options for that funding. I spoke with EG Allen who is the chair of Downtown Action Association just a little bit ago. He's very excited about the possibility of bringing that program under their umbrella. And so obviously that he hasn't talked to the rest of the folks at Downtown National Association first, but that is an opportunity for the program starting in 2025 to move under their umbrella. I would still do all the work, but all the town funding would go to the nonprofit, the nonprofit would pay for all the bans and then I would just handle what I've been doing in the first place. So if there is an opportunity to get that program funded for 2025, I'm happy if you want to apply a contingency on there where that no funds are released until the program is officially under 501c3 umbrella in the, and I'll be happy to make that happen and put that together. Any questions? I don't know if you all do, back and forth during... We generally don't. Unless there's something that kind of necessitates your question. Sure. Well, I think there might be. Maybe. After the public hearing, if the break can come up or... That would be appropriate, I think there might be. Maybe. After the public hearing if it's right can come up or. That would be appropriate I think. So if that's all right. Sure. All right, thank you. Thank you. Good suggestion, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Good timing. All right. Anyone else? Oh. OK. Going, going. Okay. Going going. All right, God. All right. Thank you for being here. So at this point, we'll close the public hearing, bring it back to council for discussion and perhaps interaction. So. interaction. So, well, yeah, I'm happy to start off some of the discussion for this in particular the topic of the Saturday soundtracks because I did see that initially as something that was specific to downtown that I thought the downtown, Ashland Association, downtown association should handle that because that's what the entity was put in place and then I saw lots of interest from many residents, from business owners. And so it got me thinking. And so I sent a letter to Mayor Trivet and to town manager Josh Farah suggesting that if this is going to be a town thing that maybe we investigate looking at hiring an events coordinator or manager and changing the way we look, changing the way we operate the Downtown Ashton Association. Because residents may have other events that they want to see continue and I bring that up, I know it's a long-ed to get to this, but I just want to make sure I'm being transparent. I bring it up because there are many nonprofits in our community that are, for whatever reason, are tiring of continuing with the events that we have traditionally known in the end. And looking to the future of that new events plus wanting to keep traditional events it might be beneficial for us to investigate actually running events ourselves. And the president for that for us is a few years back the same thing was happening to the tomato festival and that's just just an iconic thing in Hanover County and eventually the parts in Wreck for Hanover County took over operating of that. So it's not unprecedented for there to be that type iconic thing in Hanover County and eventually the parks and rec for Hanover County took over Operating of that so it's not unprecedented for for there to be that type of model I might be suggesting something a little bit more aggressive and it may be a Huge workload and may not ever work at all But I wanted to say that and then so so then that brings me back to my question if you wanted to come up Chris and I'm sorry to take it but since I got them, I want to just get it all out of that I have. Roll on. Yes, so if there was funding available, do you think there would be potential for matching funding from the community members or do you think that it just needs to be funded or by itself? I can't say that there couldn't be. That would be challenging. Obviously finding a sponsor for it is something that could offset some of the funds needed. I can't solicit a lot of the downtown businesses. Anyone that has a BC license, I'm not permitted to do that just because I'm a manufacturer of products that they carry. But sure, I mean that's obviously something that could be looked at. I don't have a sponsor in mind, but that's fine. I just didn't know if you, because when you said, you know, looking to make things happen, I didn't know what else was behind the scene. That's just curious. Yeah, really, I mean, this program, it doesn't really have anything to do with me or my business specifically. And so whether I'm running it or if it's under someone else's umbrella, that doesn't matter to me. It odd is, I know what it's done to the town and the downtown. And I think it should keep going. And I'm happy to do whatever town council or the town. I have a question. When you spoke with Mr. Allen today of the Downtown Ashland Association Board, did the subject come up just about the sponsorship coming under their umbrella or did anything come up about funding? No, I basically told him or asked him rather if downtown national association be willing to put it under their umbrella I'm mentioning to them that it wouldn't affect their budgets or you know what they're looking for from the town Thank you. Thank you. Yes, sir Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, sir. As I understand it from our discussion, you've pretty much been running this program and the application for funding bears your name, which I think the town manager has correctly pointed out. We really, this area of the budget really was intended for nonprofit organizations to be considered for funding. And your willingness to do all the work in essence, whether it's run by a nonprofit or if it's run by a nonprofit does and I don't mean to speak to the manager but at least in terms of my concerns help address that issue. I think the project has been a success. We've got a lot of feedback, positive feedback, personally experienced, the vitality that it brings to this time on Saturday nights sort of switching from the day to the evening activities. So I think we, at least speaking for myself, I hope we don't lose that momentum that we have, and I would hope recognize it. And I hope that downtown Ashland would be able to run the operation, but I understand they're going through an executive officer's change and there isn't time Really in terms of this year's Budget that we're voting on to really change The or get commitments and come up with an agreement and do all the things necessary But speaking as one council member, I would be supportive of funding the project for $4,000, which is half of the requested eight with the understanding that before any money was, and this is not a motion, this is a statement. No funds are released until a non-profit is established to organize and run Ashland, Saturday, Ashland soundtracks. And I understand that's acceptable. It's also my understanding that Saturday, Ashland soundtracks is funded through this summer. And basically the budget we're talking about would affect the spring in 2025. So it seems like there would be ample opportunity to both discuss with the full downtown Ashland board this opportunity with the full downtown Ashton board, this opportunity for that to assume responsibility and potentially to solicit private support for activities so that there might be a sharing of this responsibility. And at least there'd be some assurance that the town was, if we were to support what I'm suggesting, there would be assurance that the Satterdy-Ashland soundtracks would have a base of funding to build on. And that's the direction I'm going in, Mr. Mayor. All right. Any other comments? Well, I won't add a whole lot more because of my colleagues have said so many wonderful things. But I love this program. Excuse me, and I hate to see something happen to it, that it would go away. And we lose, as you said, the vitality of downtown and on Saturday. We're kind of in between a rock and a hard place because we're close to the end of, where we vote on our budget. But I think this is an unusual situation and even though we don't usually fund a private or activities such as this, I think that we should make an exception this one time to find a way to find those pennies and help them make this program happen. Do you have a question? Would you be more comfortable if a nonprofit runs? Certainly. I think everything you have said, and it sounds like he's on the right track of working through that and going to downtown Ashley. I think it's an excellent opportunity for us to discuss with downtown Ashley. They are in a place right now where they are making some changes and this is a great time for us to talk about those changes and how we as a town can be a part of all of that. So yes, I think I've gotten, oh, not profit would be a great way to go. I just would hate to lose this program. Wait, Mr. Mayor, do we want to invite Christus down? We're not going to ask him any questions. Yes, dear. I mean, he's welcome to stay at. I just didn't know. I mean, if you're here. So I know it's going to sound like I'm going against something a little bit online. To your point, do you have a question? I don't have a question. OK. Thank you. Oh, I do. Oh, OK. A statement Where are you saying something? No, I was saying someone's going to ask him a question or can he sit down? You can do whatever you want. That's right. Glad to have you. Yeah, I can wait. No, no, I didn't know that you were going to ask. Well, I just want to talk to Vice Mayor Hodges' point. Yes, it makes me more comfortable if there's an entity that's managing it that goes on well beyond when you're not doing it anymore Some because sometimes really good people do great things and then there's nothing there to carry it on And they stop doing it and something great goes away And so that was one of my initial concerns I'm not so beholden that it has like it has to be Have funded by someone else or not So I am comfortable with it being funded within the budget that the manager is presented and he can find how to make all that work with the intent going forward that that would be our future. That it would be, to me, it doesn't have to be right now funded by a nonprofit. It has to be organized to me. But the intent of that going forward needs to be in place. And so I don't want to force entities or anyone to rush through something that could be organized much more cleanly just for the sake of getting the funding. It's what I'm trying to say. I know that's long winded, but just. OK. I just want to say say meeting with you today, I really appreciate your willingness to cooperate and how you're so willing to wait and know that this transition is going to take place and your eagerness to work along with the nonprofit and how you even just got the information that you did so quickly from the meeting at 3.30. Thank you very much. And I do think, you know, having the nonprofit, whether it's today or next year, how are we ironing out, it just needs to be as Councilmember McGraw-Sea, we want it to be someplace where it can continue to grow and not be neglected and So I whether it's $4,000 or $8,000. I want to make sure that we fund it and we take care of the program Yes, I may need to speak to the 4,000 The request was for eight Which we have funded in the past three years. However, as the manager has pointed out, we're in a transition from ARPA funding, American Recovery Plan Act funding to General Fund funding. So I think the project's been a success as it help in transitioning going to $4,000 and soliciting private funding to help continue it the way it is. I think is the best course of action and a transition that hopefully will help sustain it. Now, we're not voting on the budget tonight. But I do have a motion to request that the town manager, let's see, find if he can end the advertised budget. This is not a request for new money. $4,000 to fund the Origin Beer Lab request that has been made. With the understanding that no funds are to be released until a non-profits is established to organize and run Saturday, Ashland Soundfracts, expected in 2025. Is that... I can make that work, sir. As long as the group votes for it. Is there a second? Oh, we have to vote. It's not just... Not voting on the budget. You're just voting on that direction to the town council. Yeah, after the fine, for it. Is there a second? Oh, we have to vote. It's not just voting on the budget. You're just voting on that direction to the town council. I have to define the funds. You'll have to agree to the town manager. Sorry. I'm sorry. Could I hear that motion again? The best I can. What I'm asking, if I may, maybe an explanation, if that works, I'm asking the town manager to reallocate funds from what has been advertised in the budget, although it's not new funds, but funds, because we don't want to have to go back through re-advertising everything for this amount, which means we would not be telling the town manager where to find it. It would be his responsibility to come back to us. I presume in the June 4th meeting to show how, if council wanted to, it could be funded and what, where that money would come from. Thank you. Is that a... Largely correct. I mean, I can tell you where it that money would come from. Thank you. Is that a largely correct? I mean, I can tell you where it's going to come from. It's going to come from savings in certain salary lines. Inevitably, we already have vacancies that I know will carry over to the next year. So best practice budget for the salary that you know is going to be there. But we go even the month before knowing that we'll have some savings in certain lines. Okay. That's exactly how that We go even the month before knowing that we'll have some savings in certain lines. That's exactly how that's going to be. Mr. Vice-Mayor, did your previous motion also reiterate the nonprofit? Yes. Okay. Well, I'll try to restate it. Requests that the town manager find in the advertised budget $4,000 to fund the origin beer lab request with the understanding that no funds are to be released until a nonprofit Non-profit is established to organize and run Saturday, Ashland Soundtracks in 2025. I can second that. Second. Dr. McGraw. Aye. Ms. Barnhart. Aye. Ms. Soapall. Aye. Vice Mayor Hodges. Aye. Mayor Trevett. Aye. Aye. All rightal. Aye. Vice Mayor Hodges. Aye. Mayor Trevett. Aye. All right. Thank you. All right. We've opened and closed the public hearing on the budget discussion. Is there any other discussion concerning the budget before we move on? Then we'll go ahead and move forward. Dispenser for our public hearings and go to the action item before us. We have one action item, Town Manager's 2023 evaluation resolution. We have an ongoing process to do an annual evaluation of the Town Manager as he does the evaluations for his staff. And in doing that, we have the authority. And we've so chose that we'd like to provide a bonus to the town manager this year. He has said that it's not necessary. He's satisfied without that. But we wanted to highlight that how valuable our town manager is. We know of other jurisdictions and their woes and we know how well manager Farah has gotten us through COVID and beyond. And though we've had an understanding about not raising his compensation salary wise, we have wanted to continue with a bonus. We take note that last year we had an assistant town manager who chose to resign and took another position and that left more weight on our town manager's shoulders including basically serving as finance finance director or town manager and assistant town manager. And we want to take note of that and show our appreciation in the way of a bonus. So I'll read the resolution at this point. Whereas on January 25th, 2017, the Ashland Town Council hired Josh Farrah as the Ashland Town Manager and whereas the Town Manager's employment agreement requires an annual evaluation of his performance by the Town Council. And whereas the Council has completed an annual evaluation of the performance of the Town Manager for calendar year 2023 and whereas the Town Manager's rating for calendar year 2023 was outstanding and the council determined that he had successfully attained his annual performance goals and objectives. And whereas for calendar year 2023 the council finds that the performance of the town manager continues to be excellent and that the town manager continues to achieve all of his annual goals and objectives. And whereas at reviewing the financial position that the town manager continues to achieve all of his annual goals and objectives. And whereas at reviewing the financial position of the town, the council finds that the town managers outstanding management fully enables our provision of a bonus. And now therefore, let it be resolved by the Ascent Town Council as regular meeting on May 7, 2024, that a bonus in the amount of 6% of the town manager's salary should be provided to Joshua Farrer for his outstanding performance as town manager during the 2023 calendar year. Now, someone will have to make a motion and we'll go through that process. And then after we make our motion, I'll give others opportunity to say what you like in the way of thanking our town manager. Mr. Mayor I move to approve resolution 2024-06 town manager 2023 evaluation and bonus as presented. I second. Miss Barnhart as presented. I second. Ms. Barnhart. Aye. So call. Aye. Vice Mayor Hodges. Aye. Dr. McGraw. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Thank y'all. And thank you, yes sir. Yes. I just would endorse the mayor's comments and the resolution we adopted, I think. There have been many curves thrown at you and you've always raised rose to the occasion. Keep up the good work. Thank you. I just want to say being new on town council coming in in January, it's been great working with you Josh. You have helped me tremendously in my adjustment, and it means a whole lot. Thank you. Yes and D. We're very lucky to have you. Yeah. We are. And we can go around the commonwealth and come home and say thank you, because we have such great people, but our take care of us. Thank you. Thank you. we have such great people but our taking care of us. Thank you. Thank you Yes indeed so the bonus is not nearly what it needs to be for what the work you put in and The cost savings that we actually made when we lost a financial director and so I know you didn't ask for it and I know there are other things but we did feel heavily that we had to do something to recognize that because you were an Ansel director, the assistant town manager, and the town manager, all of the same time for a bit, and that was a lot of work, and I don't know if anyone ever felt that things were tough. You know, they just kept moving along and so I greatly appreciate that and I greatly appreciate you. Thank you. All right, we'll move on because I know you're humble, you've heard enough of that. Yeah, and I'll just say obviously the feeling is 100% mutual. This is one of the most awkward experiences you can have as people talking about your performance in public, but I'm genuinely appreciative. And I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't say, you all play a big part in that. You're very easy to work with. You're a great council. I can will go across the state also and look at other councils and be very happy and be thrilled when I come home. So, and the same thing goes for staff. I mean, it's hard to take this kind of recognition when you know they did most of the work. So just know I'm very appreciative and I'll work in here. Thank you. All right. So we'll move to our discussion items and the first one legislative update, Mr. McRoberts. Thanks for bringing this to us, sir. Well, thank you all very much. I appreciate the opportunity to address you. Usually I get off-handed comments and no time to prepare. So I was appreciative of the ability to prepare this time. I prepared a 34-page outline which I'm gonna go over for the next two hours and No, I'm kidding. I think I'll cover this in about 15 minutes. Okay If you'll turn to page five of the I think I'll cover this in about 15 minutes. Okay. If you'll turn to page five of the materials I have in front of you there. These are procedural statutes that the public may not appreciate, but I think that certainly staff will. They are trying to standardize public notice requirements so that there's a consistency in how it's done. Right now there are, and if you go dig into these things on the Virginia Legislative Information website, you can see there's dozens and dozens of procedural statutes, everything from adoption of the budget to doing zoning to if you want to change your form of government. It's huge. And the idea behind this is it really organizes all of those statutes into just three groups. One of them is if you want to go do something like say counties for example, if they want to sell property they have to hold one public hearing and It's seven days the second group is you basically have two notices that's like zoning for example that you'll do Shorthand for years has been once a week for two weeks. Well, that's not really exactly what it provides now. You can advertise it earlier. You can't advise it later than seven days, but there's two advertisements. And then there's a whole category of three times, things like changing your form of government, for example, or charter amendments and things like that are in that category. The second one is allowing a little more flexibility and advertisement. If you have to notice a proposal of something you intend to do, like an ordinance or an act or a statute requires an advertisement of a resolution, you can do that on an online publication. And there's a whole process in the statute for how someone qualifies and gets the local circuit judge to authorize them to have your ads. That's the second one. Turning to the bottom of page six, it just is seconded here. I'm sorry, go ahead. I'm sorry. Will you take questions now? I'll take them as we go. That's fine. As a practical matter, how do you see that affecting us, or maybe that's a question for the mayor? Well, it's probably a question for staff, but I would think that some of these online publications that are out there now, if you could find one that actually caters to Ashland and meets the requirements, it might be less expensive, and it might be more accessible to the public sometimes and waiting around for a newspaper to arrive. And so I think it provides more flexibility. I think it was a compromise between the long status after local government request which is can't we just put this on our website and satisfy our notice requirements and those that said no, no, no, we can't possibly have you just handle it on your website. So what this does, it opens sort of other than just the normal newspaper publications, it allows an online publication. So let's just say that there was an online publication that is like Inside Ashland or something and somebody ran that here and you wanted to put an ad there and presumably they could petition the court and satisfy it and then start getting your ads. And thank you. That answers my question but I will say it is an adventure to find the ads in the Richmond times dispatch now whether it's in the local sports page, the front page, there is no standardization and I feel for the public in trying to be alerted as to those requirements. And whatever it is, hopefully we can standardize it and focus and find it. Thank you. Sure. And anyone, you know, procedural wise, we can just follow the vice-mares example there. And if you have a question, jump on in. Yeah. Yes, sir. I'm curious would they consider, I know we've run it, but through Comcast, I think we have a program that runs. Don't we have a feed that runs? That's a channel. Yeah, the channel we have in TN is our access channel. And so that's a public, would that count? Would that be enough? I don't think that meets this requirement, but we can look into it. Because that's ongoing and it's publicly accessed and it's easy to... I've got my every one on four. Okay, well, all right. Okay. We have another competitor coming in offering alternative to them. We'll have an access channel with them, but there are some limitations for cord cutters, let's say. Okay. That was my thought. I'm running it on channel 17. It's access, but not for everyone. Right. Right. It goes to the vice mayor's point too, that if you're hunting through a newspaper, it's also you don't know what you're not going to see if you wait three hours or what you just missed five minutes before you sat down. So anyway, all those things are potentially, all those things are potential to help, but they don't necessarily meet the requirement as of yet. All right. I don't want to belabor this, but Doug just be heads up. I may put you on the spot a little bit. Understanding the confusion with newspapers, we've had issues with our local circulation and getting ads in the appropriate places. We've had to switch to the times dispatch from the local. There are some legal issues that are going on there. We have either started or at least evaluated considering every ad that we put in a paper, we have a web page where you can go to and actually see the ad. So it's not like we're doing an either or. We are kind of trying to make sure that the website is going to be the backbone no matter what, whether it's the legal approach or not, and then we'll do the ads knowing that they're going to be difficult, but the page exists where you can go to see the ads we put on the website. Yes, sir. We started that back in the fall of 2022, Ms. Cornelius and I. We'll populate that. It's under the How Do I section of the website and it's like the first one. And the reason we created it is so when we can go and try to talk to our state legislative delegation, we can show them. This is what we had been doing for the last two or three years. And this is easy to find. Easy people can just book market and go back and visit when they can. They can get alerts from our website. It truly is what we need to do in the future. But I will take Mr. McRoberts' lead and look at this code and have you some answers. Maybe by the end of this meeting. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All righty. Turning to page six at the bottom under elections since Ashland is so well run, you probably don't have many vacancies on the council very often. But every once in a while there's a resignation or some other reason there's a vacancy. And this tweaks the process to require an announcement and for a seven-day sort of announcement before you do so. I think that I will say you talk about going around the state and seeing how other places are run. I have a lot of clients that have done a lot of appointments and so I'm more familiar with this area of law than I should be. And I will tell you that there really was no process required, although then the governing body gets to make the appointment. And if you don't within 45 days, the court gets to do it. Now, many of my clients had a very extensive process. But what this statute does is require a minimum process. The names of the people being anticipated have to be published basically and the public has to have access to their resumes. So it just, it makes it a little more transparent. Moving to the next page, we're going into the conflicts of interest act. Just so you know, those of you who are required to fill out a statement of economic interest and financial disclosure under the Conflicts Act, now they've changed the date from February 1st back to December 15th. So that's something they've also tweaked the form. And you can go and look at 2.2-3115, effective July 1st of this year. And it's tweaked the form a little bit. My understanding the forms come up from the Secretary of the Commonwealth. There's some such place. And then you'll fill it out. So it may not be a big deal, but just know the form is going to be tweaked. And it's going to be due this December. So Merry Christmas everybody. Switching to page 13 under environmental, agricultural and utilities. Senate Bill 93 Stanley allows localities to establish an animal cruelty registry Stanley allows localities to establish an animal cruelty registry for felony convictions of certain things. I don't know if you all have animal control officers or if that's something that handover handles but it's something that is now at local option. Down on House Bill 906 next to the last on that same page, House Bill 906, Shinn, establishes a statewide prohibition on utility disconnections under certain circumstances, basically making sure you're not going to freeze or kill people in a hot box if you turn off their utilities. Turning to page 16, there's a whole bunch of amendments to Freedom of Information Act. That seemed to be a very, very popular place to go and try to amend this year. So I'm going to spend a little more time on FOIA than I have on all the other stuff. On page 16 and 17. Several amendments regarding electronic meetings. We're still fresh from COVID. We're fresh from electronic meetings, and people realize that these things are important. In many cases, it provides public access that otherwise would not happen. There are other situations where there was basically a knockdown dragout at the General Assembly over how you could do electronic meetings. The sad news is that you still can't have an all electronic meeting at local government. If you were, oh say, a regional entity or a state agency or a state body, you could have an all electronic meeting with the blessings of the General Assembly. But if you're the local governing body, the school board or the planning commission, you're just out of luck. You have to show up and be there in person. There still are, is the ability to have electronic participation for various reasons, including personal reasons, health issues, home, taking care of a disabled person. There's a whole lot of different things that are in there and there are tweaks to the electronic meeting participation ones. I'll highlight the two at the bottom of page 16. And this arises out of the litigation cases that came out of the Supreme Court about a year ago that it caused a lot of concerns. that came out of the Supreme Court about a year ago that had caused a lot of concerns. The second to the last one is Senate Bill 244, MacPike, and it's a response to Barry versus Board of Supervisors of Fairfax County. You'll may remember in that case, Fairfax at the very beginning of COVID had shut down and was holding all electronic meetings, and they went ahead and adopted their brand new zoning ordinance, which they'd been working on for five years. The Supreme Court decided in their judgment and wisdom that it wasn't an emergency for them to go ahead and adopt that and that they should not have done it and basically struck down their zoning ordinance. Fairfax went ahead and re-adopted it and Paul is well in Fairfax, but I will say that there was a concern amongst many local government lawyers, developer lawyers, landowner, citizens and governing bodies and staff that well what about all the other stuff that we did during the pandemic in an all electronic meeting? Is that void too if the courts decide that it wasn't an emergency enough? And so that kind of second guessing was a concern. So this bill was the result. It basically takes the modern electronic meeting requirements that we currently have and says, well, look, that's retroactive back to the beginning of the pandemic. So we no longer have to worry about somebody coming in saying something you did during COVID is void. It's OK as long as you met the notice requirements. And of course, we all knew that there was an emergency declaration. Those are the really the only requirements. The last one of that list is the result of Gloss versus Wheeler, which is a Virginia Supreme Court case, serizing out of the post-George Floyd riots up in Prince William County. Many localities were struggling with the appropriate public response. Proper police response at that time. Prince William was no different. There was a meeting to be called that night by the Board of Supervisors to discuss the issue about the proper police response on the agenda that afternoon. There was a meeting of the police advisory board that was considering the same topic. Because it was such a big matter of community concern, the majority of the members of the governing body showed up at the police advisory board to hear the discussion and sort of be better informed for their meeting that night, which is fairly common. I know you all attend many meetings throughout your community to be well informed as members of council. The problem is, again, the Supreme Court upon review said, well, there was a majority of council, their board of supervisors there, to address a matter of public business that was in fact coming before that board. And in fact, they, at least the the chair did stand up and said I'm the chair. We are here to you know support the process and so there was some discussion albeit I think there's a question as to how much. This bill here is intended to make it easier to comply with FOIA. It has some basic real common sense rules. You can go, even a majority of you all, can go to somebody else's meeting. Just don't discuss amongst yourselves public business while you're there. You're there to absorb for that group whoever they are, to have their meeting, and it's not your meeting. Other things are if two members of the council are appointed to another group that doesn't start triggering that being a council meeting. It's still a meeting of the other body which to me is always made sense. So really this bill take a look. So really, this bill, take a look at it. I think that staff will take a look at it. I suggest that all of you all take a look at it. All of these bills are available on the Virginia General Assembly legislative information website or we can provide you copies. But it says two or more members of the public body is not a meeting if you don't discuss public business. And that makes some sense. And two or more members can go to another body and it won't be a meeting of council. It just makes sense. Going to page 17, there's some technical adjustments that will probably more affect chief air and hold and clerk regarding release of criminal investigative files. There are some technical changes in who gets to have access, for example, not just the victim, but the victim's insurance company and the victim's lawyer can have access to such information and then also if there's an ongoing criminal investigation, if you are a victim or a lawyer or a victim, etc. Even if you're not a citizen of Virginia, you can still access this information under FOIA. Because generally speaking, you may remember that under general law, you have to be a citizen of Virginia or a media outlet in Virginia, those kinds of things. You have to have a nexus with the common well. I think I've already covered the elections one there. Now we're skipping a number of pages over to page 23. This is really more of a concern for I think the town manager and his budget, which is the line of duty death benefit is tripling related to a disability directly related to service in the line of duty that occurs starting in 2025. I will say that the statistics I've seen are that the amount of money that has gone to these programs, while I'm sure we'll intentioned and probably doing a wonderful job, it has significantly increased. And so it's increasingly sort of something that we need to keep an eye on. In the middle of page 23 there is a bill SB 391 that prohibits discrimination against employees for the lawful use of cannabis oil. So if you have employees that are lawfully using cannabis oil, except for police, sorry, Chief Aaron Holt, you can still be discriminated against for use of cannabis oil. I'm kind of my tongue is in cheek on that. But now, to be clear, this doesn't say that you can be intoxicated under the influence all of that but if it's simply being used, you cannot discriminate against somebody. Moving over to page 25, land use, Senate Bill 538 Bag B. Basically doubles up the fines for that that are permissible for violating the building code. Senate Bill 48 allows a town to require a vacant building registration if it's been vacant for 12 months or more and it meets certain criteria. I don't know if you'll have vacant building problems but a registry might be one way to try to at least get your arms around what you're dealing with. At the bottom of that page, House Bill 634 prohibits a locality from enacting or enforcing an ordinance that would ban the rental of residential dwelling units for 30 consecutive days or more. I call this the right to rent act. Oh, I don't know what they call it. But the other requirement, in addition to saying you can't ban somebody from renting their property more than 30 days is if you have regulations regarding rental property and if it's more than 30 days it has to be equal to the regulation of unerunner occupied residential unit. So it's basically a no discrimination against rentals, statute. Does that all apply to Airbnb and VRBO? Is that kind of the nexus of a little bit of this? I'll get to that bill in a minute, but yes, there's some of that too. There's a lot of no discrimination, no you can't do things to both Airbnb's and non-AirBNB rentals, but we'll get to that one in a minute. At the top of page 26, there's a bill House Bill 650 Coiner, it satisfies and ends a long-running debate amongst local government attorneys. Local government attorneys like me for several decades have said, of course a local government can impose a term of years as a Condition on a conditional use permit. Of course, all they have can impose a term of years as a condition on a conditional use permit. Of course, all they have to do as long as it's reasonable and it's related reasonably to the use that you're allowing. I mean, you can't just do it in all cases for willing nilly, but if you've got some specific reason to apply a term of years, you can. That's what was my opinion. Some attorneys, like the longtime deputy county attorney in Henrico County, Tom Tocars said no, a local government cannot, because under the Dylan rule of strict association of your powers, you may not. Well, this decides it in favor of me, and yes, you may impose a term of years in a conditional use permit if you want to. The next one there are localities by ordinance can have civil penalties for certain local property violations. You can have a higher fine or a penalty for industrial commercial properties. Maybe there's more of an incentive for those types of persons to have a higher penalty. That would have to be by ordinance. There's some provisions in House Bill 914 regarding local historic districts for tax incentives. If there's some interest in getting those folks to work on that. I told you we'd get to STRs. At the bottom of page 26, SB 544, it basically says what's interesting is it says no local ordinance that's enacted and the governor inserted or amended after December 31st, 2023, shall require a special use permit or conditional use permit be required for a, basically, a short-term rental Airbnb, where the dwelling unit is also legally occupied by the property owner as the primary residence. Primary residence under the IRS regulations is basically the most important place you are. Where are you most of the time? Where do you keep most of your stuff? That kind of stuff. The interesting thing is SB 544 didn't put it in Chapter 22 zoning where you would think you would regulate conditional use permits. They put it in the short-term registry statute, which is actually over in a completely different chapter of Title 15.2. The other thing is the way it's written is if you already have a provision for addressing short-term rentals by conditional use permit, this doesn't prohibit that, as long as you don't enact a new requirement for them. On page 27, middle of the page House Bill 1415, McQueen authorizes a locality to adopt an ordinance establishing a civil penalty for raising, demolishing, moving, building, located in historic district. Apparently some local governments have had an issue with people tearing down historic structures. House Bill 1461 says no local ordinance shelf prohibit an operator from operating a property as a short-term rental. Soly on the basis, the operator is a lessy or sublessy. Apparently some local governments were saying you if you're the lessy of that, you can't operate it as short-term rental. So this statute says you can't discriminate on that basis. At the bottom of the page House Bill 281, basically allows childcare facilities and office building, which I did not know they were prohibited. So that's a good thing to know. At the top of page 28, House Bill 1395, basically has a stay on a local government issuing a permit to raise or demolish historic landmarks if someone who has filed a building permit or demolition permit application. Basically I guess what they're saying is, you know, hold on local government. Let's see if this fixes the problem before you go and tear it down. SB 701 on that same page is a vested rights provision. There's already vested rights provisions regarding issuance of building permits that even if it's illegal under the zoning, if a local government screws up and issues a building permit and they start building it, there's already vested rights provisions that says they get to go ahead and keep it. This expands that and provides that if they go ahead and build something in reliance, the local government cannot treat it as an illegal use but has to treat it as illegal non-conforming use. Which is kind of interesting. This next thing is more of an issue, I think, for Nora and the folks over in the Community Development Office. But for a long time, first because of the Great Recession and then because of the pandemic, the General Assembly has found reason after reason to keep postponing the expiration of subdivision plots and site plans. For forever, before all of that, it was, once you approve one, you have to go and finalize it and record it, all that stuff within five years. That was the rule forever. Starting in the Great Recession, they said, well, a great recession, they need more time. Let's extend it. And then let's extend it for some years after the Great Recession, they said, well, a great recession, they need more time, let's extend it. And then let's extend it for some years after the Great Recession is over. And then the pandemic hit. And then they said, and now it's been extended to December 31, 2024. So if you've got old site plans floating around the town, that may be why. This was, by the way, the backstory on this is that all the people that extended it the last time, Pinkie swore that they would never ask for another extension and that they wouldn't need another extension. But it somehow got slipped into the budget at the last minute. All right, moving on to page 31 under procurement. There are some very technical amendments. I'm not going to go into details, but if you have a purchasing resolution or ordinance or policy that tracks the procurement act, I would go look at these because it tweaks exactly the criteria under which you can award and how you need to go about it. I think of most interests to me are the top one that requires local public bodies providing electronic means for submissions of bids. In other words, you got it basically taken email submission. You can also require paper copies if that's something that helps you. And then at the bottom of page 31, it increases the size of the small purchase limit that you can allow in your small purchase policy for certain types of construction up to 300,000. Flipping over to page 35 and we're very near the end, I apologize, it's taken a lot longer than I expected. If you have a cigarette tax, you might want to tweak your ordinance to expand it to certain types of nicotine products that are intend to be burned or heated. They've changed the definition of cigarette. I told you about the line of duty ag being expensive. That's addressed there in Senate bill for the cost has grown from 8 million statewide in 2011 to 188 million in 2023. So this does expand the availability for this kind of relief. And finally, transportation. The middle of page 38. I think you have one or two school zones in the town. If you wish to have photo speed monitoring devices, if it is a high-risk intersection, which basically means it's within a thousand feet of a school zone and someone has died there in the last decade, then you are now authorized to have photo speed monitoring. And then lastly, on that same page, House Bill 1071, speed limits, you are a town. I think that does not control your own roads. And so I think this applies to you. So now you can lower speed limits if you want to. You have to notify the Commissioner of Highways if you do. And I think that's it. That's sort of a speed reading through the General Assembly and believe me, I did not read the other 34 pages to you. So you're welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions? Any of them? Very helpful. Yep. Thanks for all the work. All right. We'll move on from this to discussion item B, erosion and stormwater management code changes. Mr. Jennings. Good evening members of town council. I'll continue with the code change theme here. What I bring forward to you tonight is a discussion item just to just to kind of start the discussion give you a heads up but ordinance 2024-07 I expect to bring to you all to your June 4th meeting for town council for actual public hearing. But I just want to kind of give you a heads up and talk about the background of it. To not catch you off guard at that meeting. Basically, based on a General Assembly Act, where the Act was actually called the Erosion and Stormwater Management Act that basically required all localities to combine their Erosion and sediment control in stormwater management regulations into one ordinance by July 1, 2024. So basically this, what this program is intended, it facilitates submission and approval of plans, issuance of permits, the permit fees, coordination and inspection and any enforcement, or any land disturbing activities. So what we did was we received a template from the state that they put together. And we basically ash-onified it if you want to put it in a interesting term. So but basically it just combines what we had in two sections of the code into one and all this does is just basically combine that like I mentioned but doesn't change any of the way we did the programs, it doesn't change our permits, it doesn't change,, plan submittals, our enforcement activities or anything. But so what we are planning on doing with this before section our article 4.1 was our environmental protection section in the code. So article one of that was called under was titled stormwater management. So our plan is to put this whole combined section under 4.1, article one, under 4.1, and then call it erosion and stormwater management. What that'll do is it'll actually, it used to go from 4.1 to 4.1 to 4.1, 17, 4.1, 16, now they go to 4.1, 20. And then there was a reserve section from 17 through 199, but the reserve will actually go from 21 through 199 now. And what this will do is also eliminate section 5, the chapter 5 of the code, which used to be the erosion and sediment control section, will eliminate that and hold that and reserve just in case it's ever needed. So this is interesting, kind of thrown at us. It's not typically when we bring code changes to you, we can red line the existing version that's in the code and it's straightforward and we can advertise the changes. But since this is a total rewrite, we can't just read line what was already in there. So, I'm not sure if that's clear what we're doing and I'll be happy to answer your questions at this time. Right, anyone? It seems like it's more of a wear than a what. Yes, it's where it's going to be located in the town code, but it's nothing's really going to change just to combining the two sections into one under Article 1 to 4.1. Yes, sir? I appreciate very much. You have to be careful what you asked for. My 30 page is basically brought down to the first page is a change in the last page is a change. There aren't really any text changes. Is it literally consolidating the two with no changes in wording other than combining? Pretty much yes, sir. Because both of them had sections on fees, and violations and handling plans, but it just combines the two into one. Thank you. After our reges, Mr. McGandrews, a legislative report, I'll jump into this one. OK. So right now, the plan is just so you'll know we plan on advertising in the local on May 15th and May 22nd and being here at a public hearing at your June 4th meeting. So I've reached out to some of the developers, some of the large tracks of land. Just to give them a heads up like the Holland track just to make sure that they didn't see it in the paper and go what the heck is this and does it change how I can develop my property so I just kind of reached out to them and give them a heads up and they were very thankful. Mr. Mayor. Yes sir. As you might imagine we're reviewing this for many localities all over the state so if you just send me a copy of it and we'll take a look at it. I'd appreciate it. I do have one question though. Like you said, the state gave like a model form ordinance. Is that what we're doing? We're basically adopting their model. Yes, their model and just put it in national terms and the way we do things. Yes, sir. All right, yeah. We'll take a look at it. Thanks. Good deal. All right. We'll take a look at it. Okay. Good deal. I think that's good. No further discussion. Thank you. All right, that brings us to our reports. Okay. Council Member Report. We go. Well, the art commission will meet on May 20. So I have nothing to share with you from them right now. And also parks and record planning will meet later this week. So I have nothing new to share with you from them right now. And also Parks and Record Planning will meet later this week, so I have nothing new to share with you from them either. I will tell you that I went by the Maple Street sidewalk and it's looking really good, so I'm excited about that. It's nice to see those sidewalks developing. And I did go to the CLA meeting and a great group of people and had a chance to listen to our community engagement, individual Martha and of course, Emmy with our parks and rack and they did a great job as you could imagine. I mean, it's just really good things to hear them. One last thing, we're in the last final weeks of school. It will be ending in a couple weeks. Kids are in the middle of testing right now and graduations right around the corner. So just ask our teacher friends to hang in there. It's not much longer and summer almost here. Also one last thing, too. You can buy your pool passes right now for those folks who are interested in getting ready to go to the pool and be open very soon. So you can go online to find all the information about purchasing our pool passes. That's all I have to share. Thank you. Mr. Vice President, attended the April Richmond Regional Transportation Planning Organization meeting. We're in, there was a commitment made by the staff and they followed through on it to add a regional study to analog, analyze and catalog at grade railroad crossings with an emphasis on safety and freight impacts. They've also added staff to do this test. Hopefully this will provide a basis for dealing with some of our long-range train related issues. Excellent. For the first time in my memory, Council led the Western Hanover Little League opening day parade with remarks in the first pitch by the mayor. At Randolph-Macon attended a moving naturalization ceremony with large contingent of students from Liberty Middle School. With the mayor and the manager attended a successful Ashland Han over liaison meeting with Ms. Dibble, Ms. Pritchard and county staff with Ms. Miller, met with the president and staff of Preservation Virginia to discuss future collaboration on events at Scottstown and the upcoming 250th commemoration of the American Revolution. Finally attended with other council members on the 3rd annual Ashland Book Festival at the Ashland Theater featuring a great presentation by Senator Tim Cain and John Lugbill for Richmond Sports Packers. And I did have one other, I remembered I did as as Barnhart did make a brief presentation to the community leadership program, class I appreciated the invitation and was impressed that Miss Soapall was a member. That's all I have. All right, thank you. Dr. McGraw? Well, it quite is involved. This month is y'all aware. But in addition, we the theater did meet and turns out that there's a little issue with the front doors and We're the landlords and so I think we're taking care of that or we'll be taking care of that and the board was greatly appreciative of that and They had a nice Book fair book. There's the third annual, I'm probably saying it wrong, book fair that was hosted by the Ashland Theater and well attended. Tim came and Mr. Baldeshi, if I'm saying his name right, was Baldacci. All of those were great talks, well attended, as I said, and it was a pretty cool time at the town. The train day was fantastic. And what else did I have? Plan RVA did not meet this month, but I guess I should break the news because of changes and things, a death and someone not getting it reelected, my position got elevated to July will I'll be inducted as the chair of Plan RVA. You guys, thank you. I don't know if applause isn't it yet. It's all right, Ronald, right? Yeah, I went, I skipped a few positions to get there. So looking forward to serving, and it is need to be part of that. And that is all I have. Thank you. Ms. O'Paul. Okay. I to attended the naturalization ceremony at Randolph-Macon for about 55 people who became US citizens and that was very nice. The Market Ashland Partnership April meeting was a great networking opportunity. We had lots of fun and they had a special networking activity for us and that was really fun. The Market Ashland Partnership meeting is tomorrow morning at eight o'clock. Downtown Ashland Association continues the business workshops, which are very informative, being the liaison to Downtown Ashland Association. I'm attending those meetings, but I'm learning a lot also. And Downtown National Association, fourth Fridays, begin May 24th. I attended the Arbor Day, I'm sorry, the Arbor Day ceremony at Randolph-Macon. I also attended the Fall Line Groundbreaking ceremony last month, the 43 mile trail which connects Ashland to Petersburg. And it's not complete. It won't be totally completed until about 2030, but I guess we'll be able to use parts of it as they're doing it. And then I attended, I think just last week, I attended, I think just last week, Hanover County students were honored by the Strawberry Fair Committee with $1,000 scholarships. And that was very interesting. And the last thing, the farmers market started Saturday, May 4th. Thank you, that's it. All right. I'm gonna repeat some of the same events. And I know we're fortunate, not every jurisdiction provides any kind of compensation, any kind of stipend to council members and we do appreciate that the town does. From time to time, you kind of wonder, the public may wonder what do we get for our money, but anyway, just listening to what all y'all mentioned so far, there's a lot that goes on. And I appreciate that if you broke it down, it's probably, you know, you probably get at least $5 an hour for your town. So, and I don't have all these dates in order, but April 17th had opportunity to come and visit with the auditors, to do the auditing for our town. And we're fortunate we've had the same group for a number of years and they're very familiar with the town which just adds to I guess their ability to sum everything up to be accurate but also to have relationship with the town and their complimentary of how things are done here. And so I just want to mention that. So an opportunity to do that. The Arbor Day event there with Randolph-Macon, it was with their youth, the making of Difference Day, but also their serve committee, that SERVE, and that stands for Students G. I had it all memorized, and I've lost it. Students, I noticed. No, no, no. It's responsible volunteer experience. Students engaged in responsible volunteer experiences. And so I really appreciate all that they've do and they've rendered services to people in the town. Therefore, they rendered services to the town. So, thankful for that and for Randolph-Macon, wonderful partner in that. Also, the Fallon Trail, that ground breaking and all the attention that had garnered from people across the seven jurisdictions and happened to be people there that day who were there to walk and bike as they've been doing. So great things come in for Ashland and all jurisdictions from that. The little league that was a pleasure. I'm glad we got to participate in that. The Naturalization Ceremony, again that Randolph-Macon hosted that. And so it just brings again that our appreciation of having our own local colleagues here in the town. I joined the officer chip Watts and went to the RAPANIC regional round table. And that was in Fredericksburg at the RAPANIC regional criminal justice facility. And Senator Warner was there and what they were looking at is just caring about and wanting to make sure policy is good for guarding the mental health and I guess just good well-being and peace of mind of law enforcement agencies so, and individuals. So that was very well done and I really appreciated that Officer Watts was there and it was show for me up there and back and spending time with him. I just I really appreciate the quality of individuals we have in our police force. So just wanted to say that. I came back and then I went over to the Hanover Extension Agency. They were having an open house and so they're willing to do whatever we would like them to do in the way of supporting our B city so more on that to come. The liaison meeting with the county that was productive and always wanting to maintain that relationship. It surprised me that we went down the line before Train Day was mentioned, which certainly just that makes note of how many things have been going on. But Train Day, the weather was not the best. But I think it was one of the best train days in layout, participation, satisfaction, and comments from the public. So anyway, that was well, well done. And as mentioned before, especially when our former council member, Ms. Abbott, the virtual rail fan people came out by the hundreds or so and I would say that I'll change the letter from virtual rail fan to a virtual rail fam Because they do come as a family and they had nothing but positive things to say I was able to watch some of their postings even as leaving the town going back home and saying I can't wait to come back next year. So great rapport. Just one of the positive things. I had the, I started to take so much time. Had the opportunity to join in the inner city visit to Atlanta, Georgia from April 30th to May 3rd. Atlanta, Georgia from April 30th to May 3rd. I was going along with 203 individuals from the Richmond region. And so we were down there having opportunity to look at different issues that Atlanta was dealing with and has dealt with. And we were able to do some comparisons. Look at their metrics and look at Richmond's metrics. And I heard a lot of positive things about their Richmond region. One of the individuals down there who is an employee of the Fed, Federal Reserve in Atlanta, has a family and was previously a resident of Richmond. And he talked about the reputation of the Richmond region and individuals that he brings and visits Richmond region with friends from other states and California and others. And he just said it's just amazing the transformation. And so I bring all that up just to say the good effects of regional government, such as plan RVA. And so the greater Richmond Chamber, plan RVA and Richmond Region tourism, were sort of the gathering organizations that set this visit up. But I just want to, But I just want to, when I used to have a hesitancy to want to go to different conferences because I didn't want to spend the tax dollars, I didn't want them to spend on me to go unless I felt like I could bring something back of value. And if I had not talked to anyone in Atlanta, if I had not gone to any of the dozen or so opportunities to learn something in Atlanta, the value was still there for having conversation with not quite all but almost the 203 individuals who were involved in local government, corporations, nonprofits. So I thank the town for helping me to participate in that. And I'll just stop at that point and say, there's a lot going on. And I really appreciate our council that you can be part of something. But as individuals, we have the choice about how deep we want to sink. council that you can be part of something. But as individuals, we have the choice about how deep we want to sink into the workload. And I saw I plugged my peers for being willing to go the extra mile to attend these different events, these different functions become officers in these regional government organizations to serve Ashland and so Ashlands I'll just say the center of the universe's profile is really high and I'm honored to be part of it there. Sorry for the long length of that but I'm very pleased with all of that's going on. All right sorry Mr. Jennings takes a long but we invite you back for the long length of that, but I'm very pleased with all of this going on. All right, sorry, Mr. Jennings, it takes a long, but we invite you back for the Public Works report. It was worth it. Good evening again, members of town council. You have the Public Works April Report as part of your packet. I like to hide a few things, operations wise. They started mowing the public streets. They also mowed the parks and some other public areas. They also did a lot of drainage work this month to prepare for all this rain work. It seemed to be getting right now. Out at Carter Park, they replaced the roof on the pavilion. They also installed a new grill and there was a tree that got blown down so they cleaned that up too. And they also helped prepare the pool for this upcoming season. They power washed the area of the slide and to make sure all the water was working properly out there. As Ms. Barnhart mentioned, the Maple Street sidewalk construction project is underway. They've really done a great job, not only building the sidewalk, but also tying in the walkways and driveways along the project. They hope to wrap that up within the next few weeks. And once they're done with that, they're going to go back over to that swanney drive BMP over the slash cottage neighborhood and do all those plantings in the BMP. They're going to go hold off on the trees for now, because it's not a great time to plant trees. over in the slash cottage neighborhood and do all those plantings in the BMP. They're gonna go hold off on the trees for now because it's not a great time to plant trees. They're gonna wait plant the trees in the fall but they'll get back on that project. Rat 1 project, the Ashcake Road to Arbor Oak. Now that that project's fully funded, VDOT's gonna expect it to advertise for construction by the end of this month. And then with the plans are to give the contractor notice to proceed by some time in August. So they should start that either this fall or depending on the weather this fall or early next year. The England Street Project from Henry Road to our Henry Street to the railroad avenue. I'm still working on some of the access agreements and stuff like with some residents, some businesses. But we still have one property owner to work on agreement to relocate the power lines, but we're getting close on that. So hopefully that'll be resolved soon. We also gonna work with the Hanover County to do some upgrades to the water line. We can actually start that pretty soon. And we did the decorative light post have been delivered and they're up at the shop. So we have those ready to go. So one of the things I wanted to update y'all on is the Mount Herman truck restriction. As y'all may recall, it was open for public comment period. Well, that actually ended April 11th. And now it's in the V.Dot signature process, which it's kind of interesting as to go to the state traffic engineer, to the head traffic engineer, to the commissioner. And then once the commissioner of V.Dot signs it, it needs to go to the Commonwealth Transportation Board for their review and approval. So worst case, it'll be July. It'll be approved by July. That's what, and hopefully it could be, you know, approved before then. So, and with that, obviously, we'll coordinate putting up the no-through truck sign on our section once, you know, once we get all that going. So, and with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions. Questions or comments? Yes sir? Comments I agree with Ms. Barnhart and others comments about the work the sidewalk on Maple Street and the other projects that you do it's a It's amazing the number of property owners that you're dealing with and having to And their minds and crotch on their property y''all must be diplomats because we don't hear criticism and the work gets done and it looks good. Thank you. Anyone else? All right. Thank you. Thanks to your team and you. Thank you. All right. Mr. Town manager. Yes. Thank you, Marin Council. I will give you a few updates on things that maybe have happened since I put this report together and obviously now I'm noticing it says March and February, so I apologize about that. But a few updates. As the mayor mentioned, the audit did go very very well and I've just followed up a little bit on your comment. Yeah, we've had that firm for I think since 2011 but one of the things that we do with them just so the public knows to keep, make sure we have fresh eyes on our finances. You don't always want the same people looking. Is the team that actually does the audit changes every three years, and so we get that rotation, but the principle of the firm stays the same so that they have the understanding of our finances, the historical perspective, and so we found that it's a really nice arrangement and they do really good work and we're kind of in their niche of a size of locality they like to work with. While we're talking finance, some delinquent tax letters did go out to those who had not paid their personal property in real estate taxes. I understand there are some concerns in the community that they may not have originally received the bill. That is something that I am in discussions with our finance director Terry Stone about. We are coming up with an approach to try to deal with that. We have some limitations with state code about our ability to actually waive penalty and interest. And so we're trying to come up with a solution that is most lenient with the citizens, but make sure we don't break any state laws. So I would imagine we will have a solution available by the end of the weekend anyone who has sent you or us an email will receive a response with what that approach will be. I will steal from next meeting a little bit of Miss Amos' thunder because it's such exciting information. We got a little bit of a report from the GRTC link and how ridership is going surpassed all expectations of GRTC, our local expectations as of what was it, five, three, so what day was that over the weekend, I think, 63 trips that day, which is a remarkable number for our community. Yeah, hey, hey. That's great. Yes, so much so that we may be getting a little bit worried that the current load can't be met. And so there is an opportunity in July So that we may be getting a little bit worried that the current load can't be met. And so there is an opportunity in July to have discussions with GRTC about expanding that service to another bus or additional services. I don't really add if I read my agenda right, it looks like GRTC will be extending bus service up or out one to Virginia Center Commons by September. From the town? No, I'm sorry, from Richard. Richard, good question. But they're getting close. That's true. It's not far from the food line shopping center. Yeah, it would be great to have that link. Yep, and even if it was the micro transit, right? I mean, just fill in the gap. It cares who's providing that service, let's get folks where they need to go. And so that was the highlight, but I do also want to take one moment of a little bit of professional privilege and take a moment to thank both soon to be assistant town manager Doug Goeman, but also Ms. Bernie Cornelius. This week is Professional Municipal Clerk's's week and so thank you for all that work it is very important One of the unharbled in positions of local government. So thank you for that. We appreciate it And I'll take any questions you may have I have a question. Well, not a comment. I was happy to hear that We've had the same firm for auditing since 2011 But what I was happy to hear was that the team rotates, not just the same people are coming in all the time. That's good to hear. That would put us at a prod, where it's good if we'd add the same people for 13 years. Yes. Good point, good point. Anything else? I do have a question. I think it might be for Vice Mayor Hodges, actually, because he might know it. There's been talk on social media about this micro transit and the fear that it might be costing residents in the future. Is there any discussion? Someone will pay the bill in the future. Right now it is free through GRTC and ARPA funds. They're using their ARPA funds for these purposes as well. We have not been presented with what a future funding mechanism might look like. Obviously that when you come to funding public transit, there's a lot of options. You can try to get grants to offset. You can completely subsidize locally if you wanted to do that, or you can start charging some form of a fair. But that would be a discussion for your future time, and we don't have any perspective of what that cost could be yet. Okay. Yeah. What he said. Excellent. I just wanted to at least ask it. That's all. Yes, indeed. All right. Nothing else? Come before us. We're adjourned. Thank y'all.