Bangor committee approves mobile home code changes, CDBG plan, and property sales

[0:17] Joseph Leonard: Good evening everybody. Welcome to another regularly scheduled meeting of the Business and Economic Development Committee. I am the chair, Councillor Leonard. Other committee members are Councillors Falloon, Councillor Baller, Councillor Fish, and Councillor Carson. We're also joined by Councillor Hawes, Councillor Deane. We also have a community economic director and Creed join us as well. And just a reminder to the committee, I do want to control the committee in the way that we did last time. So just to reiterate that, treat me as the conduit for all your comments. And when you do want to make a secondary comment, check in with me, raise your hand so that we can have a better communications. So I will be enforcing that again as well. And that will also go for staff. So with that said, the first one is going to be proposed code amendments regarding the mobile home park. And are you taking the lead on this, Anne? [1:29] Unidentified speaker: Yes, I am. So this is a change just to make the requirements for mobile home parks the same. You may recall we came while back to make some changes for mobile home parks that were constructed before 1971 and but that kind of made all of the ones that were after it a bunch of them non-conforming to the point where some of cre previously created lots weren't able to be constructed on. So this kind of gives a level playing field for all the different mobile home parks and the differences were the dimensional controls like the setbacks and the roadway width [2:15] Joseph Leonard: it seemed pretty dry to me i don't know if anyone has any questions or comments they would like to add on us not seeing any and we just need staff recommendation to council to full council yeah so I would entertain a motion recommendation we have a motion second we have a second and unless doubted that will move on thank you okay so the next one that we have is it's my list okay so yes that 's right the receipt of housing opportunity program municipal ordinance development grant go ahead and take it away. Yeah when a lot of these [3:01] Unidentified speaker: housing legislation that's been happening from LD 2003 on forward the state did create a funding mandate which doesn't always happen where the state actually provides funds to communities to cover the time it takes to make to make the changes. So we did you had to apply for it so we applied and put in our staff hours and so the city is going to receive ten thousand and dollars to cover that time. So this is a request to receive that receive those funds [3:42] Joseph Leonard: Any questions or comments? Does anyone not want to respond? I'll be entertaining an emotion motion. Second, unless doubted, that will carry over. Okay, and we've already done is, yeah, yes, thank you. On to the community development block grant action plan for years 26 and 27. I'm assuming here she comes. [4:16] Unidentified speaker: Community development officers here. [4:18] Robin Stanicki: Hello, Robin Stanicki, community development officer. Thank you very much. So you're probably, I'm probably getting tired of talking about the Consolidated Plan, but we are here. In your packet, I have included the funding and the budget for the Consolidated Plan, and the plan will be on your agenda for next Monday, where we will open up for a public hearing. So this will be the formal process by which it's another, just another way to publicly receive those comments from the community. And they'll, you know, if there are any individuals that, you know, attend the meeting next week and want to make a public comment. And at that time, I will also have any comments that were submitted by email or in any other fashion, they'll be attached to the plan as well. So you'll see that. Accompanying that, so this letter that I submitted in your packet together is the product of a new process. So this process is every year I'm trying to do something more that kind of increases the level of engagement, and this seems to be something that really works, something that I'd like to use in future years. So everything that's pretty much I talk about in this letter really has, I think, some enduring quality of, you know, just having people be more participatory in the process and really understand kind of the connection between here are the needs that we see and this is how we're going out in the community and we're trying to find a solution to undertake an activity for that year. So I talked a little bit about the budget specifically, we have some unused funds that we carry forward. I wanted to just bring this up to make a clarifying point. Some of this unused funds carried forward, you see this line is $390,000. dollars some of those funds are projects that didn't move forward, but it does include one project that has not moved forward because of the contracting process, and this is where the parks and recreation funds have sat since the city council approved a new park structure for Williams Park in the FY24 budget. They went out to bid for that, but needed to do some extra things for federal procurement. So they were not able to actually go and use those funds in that RFP. So that's why you see it written in your budget here as says co-park because they're doing all of the parks, but the one with federal funds that went out was Williams Park, but it wasn't a federal RFP. So they had to put it on the whole park because that will have the federal procurement language in the RFP. So it's the same amount of funds that are carrying forward. One was just for Williams Park, but because the Williams Park RFP didn't have that specific language in there to use federal funds,, they have to use it on the one that they hadn't released that RFP for. So in this process, we had a series of meetings. All of the funds that we brought forward in the notice of funding included the money that we're allowed to use for social services and then the money that we planned to put forward for other development, brick and mortar activities. We also have the committee look at the remaining funds to go toward our standing programs, so our rehab loan program, as well as our, home homebuyer program as well, and so this is this chart that you have on the third page is the short description of the project and the amount of funding that is recommended and inside this budget, so I don't want to take too much time if there are specific items that you wanted to discuss. But this does leave us with a balance of funding that I did not designate. I believed that it would be very prudent to leave some undesignated funds inside the CDBG account so that in the remaining year, if there are, for example, a funding opportunity that might require a match or some other use of the funds, it might be a good idea to [9:40] Joseph Leonard: have some that are not designated, so before I open it up, before, oh, I'm sorry, dude, will you finish from, I am okay, before I open up for discussion and questions, just one point I wanted to add, I completely understand where you come from with the unassigned balance, honest, at the end, what I and, I know you already do this, I think what I would really like to see in the future is plans already put forward for maybe existing city projects or city of not bonds partnerships of like what we want to put forward in the future. I do like that flexibility that we have. So I don't want to go up the works too much, but I think that proactive planning mindset, I think that would help us overall with future projects. I don't know if you had any comments or ideas on that. [10:42] Robin Stanicki: So to say that we would look several years [10:46] Unidentified speaker: in the future for setting aside funds? [10:48] Robin Stanicki: Okay, that's interesting. We'll have to think about that a little bit more and see where there's an opportunity. [10:53] Joseph Leonard: Sure, and maybe that's an item and we want to discuss at a future BED meeting. Anyway, I don't want to get too in the weeds with that. Does any other council member? Yes, Councillor Fish. [11:04] Unidentified speaker: Do I address you with the question? Or can I address it? [11:07] Joseph Leonard: Technically, yeah, you would address it. [11:10] Unidentified speaker: So I'm wondering, did they only have six applicants, and were they expecting more? And did they get enough, this is awkward, enough applicants to satisfy with all the new activities they've had to make that you know extenuous [11:27] Robin Stanicki: outreach to the community and get more is that a question that is clear it is so since we moved to an annual application process which is definitely easier from an administrative like staff standpoint it also makes it easier for you to look at a line of applications and compare them one to another. Since we've done that, I think that we have seen an increased number of applications. The number, I think that we got a total of nine applications. One of them we had to discount because they had already completed the project, which isn't allowed. But I think that 's a pretty good number. What impacted I think the number of applications this year is that we had just completed an application cycle for a round of funding for the opioid settlement funds. So there were a lot of people that were on grant writing teams that had already completed another process and potentially that could have impacted their ability to then put in another application. I'm not sure if that's the case, but I know that those rounds were pretty close together. But I think that this is pretty manageable tangible for the program of our size to be able to monitor because we have to monitor them and work with them every month. Thank you. [12:48] Joseph Leonard: So that answered your questions. Awesome. Okay. Any other questions or comments for staff or discussion? I do have one nitpicky thing under development activities funding. So, under the YMCA Accessibility Project, but my general question of that is, okay, because I'm assuming that 's for the new downtown facility. Okay. A general question I have is, how come that's not part of their overall plan for their facility? Why are we giving them funds for something that they're already in development of producing [13:34] Robin Stanicki: something? Right. Well, I really, I don't know if I can fully answer that question. I believe that in their budget for the entire project, the funding stack looked really diverse. So they were, in many cases, these projects, they're trying to find a funding source that will be appropriate for that eligible activity. And if they saw that there were CDBG funds available within the city, it would have been something that wouldn't have been able to get on like the state level of the CDBG or something like that. That. So they might have looked at that as a way to diversify the funding stack so that then they're looking for other funds and they can say I'm leveraging CDBG, you know, in this project. Fair enough. [14:28] Joseph Leonard: I won't get more into it. Okay, that was my only question. Unless there's any other questions or comments. This is an item that we will need a motion on. Staff recommendation people motion do we have a second and unless doubted this will move on thank you right there thank you thank you so much and we do have some [14:58] Unidentified speaker: Director updates. Yeah, just very quickly with some of the discussions that have happened with changes to historic preservation especially for newer members I wanted to kind of give a little bit of perspective on what is a certified local government what does that mean and you know how long have we been part of this and what are the advantages to the city on that so that's why that memo was placed in your packet. I also reinserted into your packet at a previous memo on the difference between what TIFF is and tax increment financing and the credit enhancement agreement and the special assessment districts because I know as you're reviewing those budgets it can be confusing which is which so I wanted to make sure you had that. And also, I've been working with Maine Downtown Center. They want to have their annual statewide meeting in Bangor, which is good. And we're trying to do much more attraction of having, you know, statewide or beyond groups coming to coming to Bangor. So it's pretty exciting that Maine Downtown Center wants to be coming here next year. So I just wanted to let you know that was happening. [16:30] Joseph Leonard: Any questions or comments for the director update? I do have one that I wrote down. It was regarding the historic restoration for residential property owners outside downtown. Yeah, and if you need time to get this answer, I totally understand, but like, are there alternatives or additional funding sources that staff is exploring beyond tax credit bills? Yeah. [16:56] Unidentified speaker: I mean, it's a real, you know, sort of missing issue with historic districts and that, you know, we can use the block grant funds for facade downtown, and pretty much any newer facade side you see downtown was likely funded in part by the block grant program. That's been very successful, but that same, you know, we're not allowed to use it for residential. So it really is frustrating for us because we want to create a grant program for residential owners. And, there aren't any anything at the federal. Level, the National Park Service does have funding programs, but, you know, it's some of it is for like church staples and nonprofits that are in that are housed in historic properties, you know, so like museums, things like that, but nothing for the single or even multifamily structure. Structure. So that's one of the reasons why we came to last year to ask if we could lobby on your behalf to help get that tax credit through so that at least we can offer that to people. So the answer right now is no. I would love to see the State Historic Preservation. [18:29] Joseph Leonard: Commission, you know, created a grant program for residential owners. Okay, thank you for that. I know it's a long answer to no. Yeah, any other thoughts or comments on director updates? We do have an executive session. Would anyone like to make a motion? Oh. [18:56] Unidentified speaker: Oh, before you do that, we do have, it's actually four items for executive session and not to some things came in later in the week after the packets were closed up. So we wanted to, you know, they're under the same auspice of economic development and, city owned property. [19:19] Joseph Leonard: And just to reiterate it, 's pretty much the same a designation for each executive item that's correct would it be applicable to just say the executive line once and then for four items i'll ask grace is that okay [19:39] Unidentified speaker: Hi Grayson, is assistant city solicitor. Yeah, that's okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. [19:45] Joseph Leonard: Sure, let me now move pursuant to one MRSA section 405 6c acquisition of real property or economic development. There are four items that we go into exactly. We have a motion. Do we have a second? Vote and seconded. We will need a roll call vote. Councillor Fish, yes. Councillor Mauer, yes. Councillor Carson, yes. Councillor Faloon, yes. And I will be a yes. We are an executive session. Need a reminder on those movements. Are we live? Okay, so we are out of executive session and I will entertain any motions if there are any. Chair Leonard, I'd like to move we empower the headboard to move forward with the leases for GD. Okay, we have a motion. Do we have a second? Moved and seconded. Unless doubted, that will move on. I want to make a motion that we empower the city manager or designate to sell the property addressed at 45 Allen Street to Todd Let's for 50 000. Emotion, do you have a second? Moved and seconded. Unless doubted, that will have passage. Okay, I think that concludes everything that, oh my god, so many emotions. I'd like to move that we empower the city manager or designee to sell the property addressed at 117 4th Street to Shannon D Kalon Smith for 72 hundred dollars. Second motion seconded. Unless doubted, that will have passage. Thank you for catching me on that. All right now if unless there's any other items that staff would like to bring up or any other accountants would like to bring up, I'm not seeing any. It is currently 841pm. We will be.