Budget — Eastern Market / City Council and Divisions

3:45PM Apr 1, 2024

Speakers:

President Sheffield

Keywords:

market

detroit

executive session

eastern

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year

shed

support

work

madam president

budget

funding

food

member

farms

project

community

councilmember

resolution

katie

Right. Good morning. We will now call to order the budget expanded budget Finance and Audit standing committee. Mr. Clark, please call the roll. Councilmember

Scott Benson. Scott Benson. I don't remember afraid to hold the third. Councilmember Leticia Johnson as it councilmember Gabriela Santiago Romero present. Councilmember Mary waters present. Councilmember Hanjo with O Callaway, Councilmember Coleman Young, the second council member, council Pro Tem James Tate. Council President Mary Sheffield. You have a quorum present.

All right, thank you there being a quorum present. We are in session we will go straight to our budget hearing. We will have the Eastern Market Corporation Present. Mr. Carmody, I see you are with us can join us at the table so good to see you. Yes sir.

Right Mr.

out to everyone. Okay, so whenever you're ready to begin the floor is yours.

Thanks you trying to log into sharing?

On one second, Miss Katie she pairs is going to help you yep, yep. Cargo note member Callaway has joined us good morning.

Kosovo.

Okay.

Morning The clerk will note we have been joined by potentates Hello

All right. Are you guys you prepared to move forward now? Are

you alright, there we go

alright

make sure your microphone is on. Press the bottom. Yep. There you got

good morning Council President. Good morning members of council. It is a pleasure to be back in front of you again. Rather eventful year for the market and me last year. So thank you for all your support over the most difficult time. Happy to talk about Eastern Market as always. We are moving well along in our authentic Eastern Market campaign. This was a campaign we designed a couple of years ago to support the market as it underwent really a generational change. You will call that property values rising quickly in a lot of apprehension around the community about what Eastern Americans survive its success. And its authentic use from market was our response really looking to enhance three key roles of the market. We are a wholesale center crucial to the regional food Academy. This is something we've done since 1891. We have steadily seen our market share erode as we came to depend more on private and consolidated enterprise to distribute food and we saw during the pandemic what happens on we have an over reliance on large companies that are too big to fail that suddenly fail and so a lot of investment around the country and we're happy to report some real success and growing the wholesale aspect we use to market talk a little bit about that in a second. We're also placed with significant opportunities to either find a job or start a business particularly for those with limited means. And that's work that we have continued to hone and building a supportive infrastructure for food businesses from three birth through maturation. We also are now also providing a different and wider set of support for non food entrepreneurs. That we've come to support to our particularly the operation of our Sunday market. And then lastly, we're a dynamic commercial district, one of the largest small business centers in the city, a place where everybody is made to feel welcome and we thought without some of the support for the authentic use for America campaign. All three of those roles were in jeopardy as we sort of looked at higher real estate pricing that has moved food out of a central city of every other North American city. Eastern Market is the last one standing of local food districts in major cities. My are two peers that were around when I began work at Eastmark in 2007. Chicago's Fulton Street Market is now the home world headquarters of McDonald's Corporation and the regional headquarters of the.com companies. It's a really cool office park, but it's just another office park. In Washington DC the Union Market neighborhood used to be a lot like Eastern America, two and three storey warehouse buildings, emerging food companies in a space of 10 years, those small buildings are almost all gone. And in their place are eight and 10 storey residential towers. Again, just another really great urban neighborhood but not a food district. So a supermarket is special. It's something that's being increasingly recognized. Last year we hosted Secretary Vilsack who came to the market in June to announce a couple of policy initiatives. And in February we're also the site of a meeting between Senator Stabenow and Undersecretary of agriculture who came to discuss a couple of food access programs. So we are on the national radar in the space of regional food economy. We're very pleased to announce that this year, we will begin construction of a new distribution center dedicated to our regional farmers. This is something that's happened within the five sheds that we've had going all the way back to 1891. If you recall, walking in those sheds for Saturday market or events, you might have noticed the lack of refrigeration, except on cold days, or docks. And those are two innovations in the early part of the 20th century. They kind of made distribution a little bit easier. And our farmers have been working without those conveniences for the last 6070 years so pleased to announce that we will be expanding a facility north on Russell about two blocks from the market campus. Currently a warehouse for some of our wholesale growers will be expanded and completely modernized with cold chain compliance. That was made possible by a $14 million grant from the state of Michigan. Again, state of Michigan and USDA and federal government recognizing Eastern markets role in trying to strengthen regional food systems make it more resilient so that if we have another occasion like the pandemic or some natural disasters that are still able to feed to traders, to projects that are will be added as early as this year. Finishing up hopefully by next year. It will be the addition of two two food business accelerators to our roster of food business accelerators. We currently operate the Metro, the Metro food accelerator, which has five production suites and three smaller retail suites. Construction is finally completed on that project and a final tenants will be moving in this year. But the two new accelerators are one is a space for growers from the thumb region of Michigan who grow organic wheat, rye and barley to actually mill those products into organic flowers for direct sale. to Detroit consumers as well as commercial establishments that was made possible by a member initiative through Senator Stabenow is office two budget cycles ago. Please report in the most recent budget cycle 2.8 5 million was allocated for a meet business accelerator and this will be similar to mero. When marrows doing meat products require an on site USDA inspector and be able to putting four of them under one roof we'll be able to share that cost across four businesses making it more affordable for them. We're very excited about the success we've had in first of all, getting the national folks to understand because of the pandemic importance of places like Eastern Market and getting the support from a state to go along with our ongoing great support from the city of Detroit. So we also wanted to initiatives I just want to bring out we completely restructured our provision of classes and education for food entrepreneurs and have a much more detailed curriculum. that's now available. We support those entrepreneurs with low cost space to sell their products and get customer feedback from as many as 40,000 people each Saturday. We provide low cost space to incubate and accelerate your your business. Now we have a much stronger wraparound provision of technical assistance to help those businesses and then as I said we moved into the retail non food retail space by a partnership a tech town where we have to now finished and a third coming that will be small retail spaces for non food businesses celebrating those merchants that sell at the Sunday market which are making great products that just happened not to be food. With that I wanted to turn it over to President of Eastern American partnership Katie Troy. I guess I didn't introduce myself at the top end. My name is Dan Carmody for the record and I am CEO of Eastern Market partnership. Katie.

Morning, everyone. I'm Katie Trudeau and president of the Eastern Market Corporation. I've been on the job for my year anniversary is in two days. So happy to be there. I wanted to talk a little about a couple other of the pillars of the authentic Eastern Market campaign and approach that we're here to talk to you about today. In addition to a focus on strengthening the regional food economy, we also have a focus on building race, racial equity and creating opportunities for more affordability of the neighborhood. We have a fair amount of historic experience with this and want to leverage that experience to support community based organizations as well as small urban growers to to have opportunities to build their own capacities. And we are doing this through several different initiatives partnering to deliver affordable housing. We have a few different projects in the neighborhood where we are not necessarily the lead developer but a supporting developer working with private housing developers to ensure that their while Eastern Market remains a working food district. There are also opportunities for in particularly workforce housing for those folks who are who are working in the district. We're also working on several initiatives to accelerate the capacity of urban growers in Detroit and in particular black owned farms. That I will detail in just a moment and then we are also we work on several initiatives to support local community groups. In the in the neighborhood, in particular, in the block clubs and small grassroots organizations that are really important to the fabric of the Eastern Market neighborhood. Some accomplishments we've had in these areas so far. In this past summer and fall, Eastern Market was awarded approximately $2 million grant from the US USDA through the Michigan Department of Agriculture, education to pack food boxes. It's uh, the the program is local local food purchasing program through USDA with the intent. This is a newer program that was released in response to the pandemic where they found regional and national food supply chains were disrupted significantly. This program was intended to not only put 1000s of food boxes into the homes of Detroit errs and Metro Detroiters, free of charge but also to help those urban growers in Detroit to accelerate their their their farming businesses. And we were pleased at the end of this past year to have packed over 13,000 food boxes with about 50% of the produce that we purchased was from black urban farmers based in the city of Detroit. They were also distributed to local nonprofits and senior centers. I'd say about 80% of those were located within the city of Detroit a few in the the suburbs, which made us more competitive as it served the Southeast Michigan region. We've also in the past several years provided funds through the NEA from the nerd Nature Conservancy to the grassroots organization, grassroots Detroiters for home repair programs in their neighborhood. We continue to provide access to small business incubation and acceleration opportunities through several levels of opportunity, in particular our public market stalls both on Saturday and then our summer Sunday markets as Dan mentioned, our expanded community kitchen programs as Dan mentioned and accelerator suites and then we're also working as I mentioned with partners to advance drawings in partnership on multiple affordable housing projects in the neighborhood. The next pillar of the authentic Eastern Market campaign is around enhancement of the public market in District. We are in the process of completing due diligence and pre pre development activities for several projects including a new shed four, which Dan will talk about momentarily in greater detail, installation of stormwater solutions. We've been really fortunate to have raised some philanthropic money for this so far and then enhancement of the public realm, one of which we've been able to do in the past few years with operation or I'm sorry, capital support from the city of Detroit. Some recent accomplishments and these are more focused on those capital improvements that we've done with City of Detroit funding. We've made improvements to the eastern Mark office. We've made major compare repairs to all surface parking lots, which we operate through the management agreement with the city but are owned by the city of Detroit. And then we've made several major repairs to facilities under the sheds, including shed for vendor lighting. There were several months last year where the vendors in that shed for we're operating in near darkness for the first hour or so of the market. So we've been really we've been really great stewards of that city capital. Funding and have really worked hard to invest those dollars back into the public market sheds and facilities.

organizational stability is key. That's a core part of the authentic use market campaign. So that $15 million dollars is meant to help find all of these four components and a little bit to support the organization during a time of transition from one generation of leadership to the next. And our succession planning couldn't have been any more important than it was last year when Katie got an unexpected five months. chance to leave the organization and came came through with flying colors. So leadership succession is really important. We're also proud of the team we built to support mid management people we have a great team in place with leaders that can hopefully take over when Katie's generational turn at the helm is over. So we are not quite back to our pre COVID staffing levels. We hope to get there this year. It's important we have a lot of program expansion planned. Talked about the work we did with trying to put more local content in those food boxes and that that took a sustained effort. You know we have large farmers and we have small farmers and it's pretty easy for us to get on the phone and get a pallet of peppers or greens one of our large growers and when you have to call 12 growers to get a pallet of greens or a pallet of peppers. It does take staff time and it's time we'd love to invest in the successful expansion of urban farmers in Detroit. The proposal before you that we submitted the share was $300,000 for operating support up from the traditional level of 225,000. And we know that the administration is proposing that the $300,000 level be adopted as the the amount going forward and very appreciative of that support. We also know that city administration is not recommending either of our capital requests either the 250,000 for another third round of smaller capital improvements around the campus, which would kind of bring us all up to par on where buildings need to be with some of their lifecycle costs and performance. And then in a strategic million and a half dollar investment in the new shed for our project. And both of those are critical to the organization. We really do want to keep the previous $20 million that we've invested in sheds 235 and six over the last since 2007 was 16 years, and over a 16 year period went to make sure those those investments are well protected going forward. Shed for for us is a key project. It is the last of the sheds, that the nonprofit hasn't made a major investment in since taking over operations in 2006. That's because it's the most complicated of the projects we propose replacing the existing shed that is our smallest obviously a shed not a structure with enclosed that means no heating that means like an the previous two Saturdays when the flower girls come back from the Easter season. That means shed for is activated whether it's 32 degrees out or at 38 degrees in windy which is what the last two Saturdays offered. And in fact shed two is operationalized last week and happy report sales were brisk as almost as brisk is that as the weather so shed for as we envision it would feature the same footprint you see there now on the at grade level, but enclosed similar in fashion to sheds three and shed five so that from early November to early May when the weather can be iffy we would have enough indoor space to accommodate the size of the winter market that has grown over the last couple of decades. So very important to actually provide the best possible market experience for our consumers and sales opportunities for our vendors by having that feature. It will also in core substantial event revenue we do rent sheds three and five out for a number of events. Shed three is larger one at 35,000 square feet shed five is a smaller one and 25,000 square feet. Shed for a new shed forward are about 15,000 square feet. So from a science perspective, it's a nice portfolio of event rental spaces that will allow us to raise additional revenues to reduce our dependence on outside support. But probably most importantly for work for the future of Detroit is that the second floor of shed for the over the years we have proposed a number of different things we finally waited to the right idea came up in that as we propose building a regional food nutrition and education center that would feature a number of kitchens. Teaching kitchens with hands on workstations for people to learn how to cook a performance kitchen for each market to provide for some social media and other other media to focus on recipes that are delightful, healthy and fun to prepare and then a number of classrooms and then a gallery space for trying to provide a rotating exhibit where particularly families on market days could come and learn about where food comes from. So this community education and nutrition center we think is critical. to helping really bring home all the food access work we've been doing over the last 20 years from building out community markets around the city helping through leading the trade committee markets partnership to our own farm stamp program to the food box program. Katie just talked about all of that it's about getting nutritionally dense food into the households that needed we provide any number of incentive programs from Double Up Food Bucks to SNAP benefits to fresh prescription benefits for to discount the price. Of those nutrient dense foods to vulnerable households. The last key important part is to give them the wisdom they need the tools they need the confidence they need to take that nutrient dense food they might need a little more preparation than some of our culinary habits have devolved to and get families better fed. So we're really believe strongly in this project we have we've it's estimated to be a 12 to $15 million project at this point. We've begun through the authentic use Mark campaign to raise money for it we have a million and a half dollar commitment. Our ask of you is to leverage that money as you have with all of the previous shut improvements. You know, we've spent $20 million on your sheds at Eastern on our sheds, I guess it is to market. And I think that's about four or 5 million collectively of city various bond revenues and other support but it's two thirds, three quarters, three quarters Excuse me. Other investments that we found to leverage that investment improve the city's assets. So we're asking again, we think 1.5 million from you all match with the 1.5 initial grant from philanthropy will get us about 25% of the way there. We are up in Lansing actively trying to find some support this year. There is funding available we think through one of those state programs that is funded with federal dollars that could come to support this project. So we're hopeful that we can complete financing this year and get design work done and then figure out how to build it because we have to build shed for round. Very hectic growing season and it will be disruptive but however, not as disruptive as another project that Katie would like to spend a little bit of time and talking about. We just to conclude. Thank you so much for all the support over the years. This may be my last time here so I don't never not get a shot here at the end of the year. I believe Katie will really be in charge at that time. That was our succession plan. And we didn't expect to get a trial run. The to have seen that the changes in this market has been wonderful. That's been the highlight of my career. I can tell you that in October or September of 2007 Ray came for the second interview. I'd never been nice American on Saturday morning when the weather's nice before. I would have been really upset if I didn't get the job because I'd never seen any place like that ever in the United States and I'm happy to report that 1617 years later, I haven't screwed that up. So Eastern American on Saturday mornings is still a spectacle to behold. And you'd like to think we've enhanced a little bit along the way. So but there are some threats. There are still the threat of rising property values, but what's another threat Katie?

Thanks Dan. Another thread that we wanted to just give you a quick update on is the I 375 project that is under leadership from the state of Michigan's Department of Transportation. So, we had the Eastern Market partnership have been extensively engaged with MDOT we have had several concerns about the project as it impacts the neighborhood. We've had several concerns about the overall design of the project as well, including design elements that don't immediately impact the Eastern Market neighborhood but do impact all of the greater downtown area in the city of Detroit. So we've been staying we took a vote of our board of directors and highlighted to them several of the concerns that we had around the design that's currently on the street. So it's our understanding from MDOT that they are making some amendments to the design. They had. As I'm sure you all are aware the design, as previously conceived was done based off of pre pandemic traffic counts. And so they have gone back to the drawing board pulled new traffic counts. We had we were fortunate to get a preview of some of those design changes that are not yet public about two weeks ago, and we are pleased with the progress that's been made. The design does show some massive improvements. There are a couple of elements of it that will impact Eastern Market greatly. In particular, the work that they're proposing to do along the I 75 North service drive. We're we're really staying very very close to the project as that directly impacts Wolverine packing, which as I'm sure you know is a 85 plus year family owned business that's operated in the Eastern Market that entire time and employs over 1000 workers including many who live in the city of Detroit. So we were as I said we were pleased to see some of the design improvements. We will continue to stay close to MDOT and the city the planning and development department who's working with MDOT on planning study, we plan to stay close to them on this we will continue to try to represent the voices of the various business community in the Eastern Market neighborhood. We'd really love to see and we understand it's coming in the market in the next few months. Some starting some conversation around a construction mitigation plan. We haven't heard anything yet from MDOT on what that will look like including what sort of detour routes might be deployed. And so we eagerly anticipate that conversation to get started. So that we can really start to understand that once construction starts that how our businesses and our markets, we we kind of view ourselves as one of the bigger businesses in the neighborhood given that role of operating those really critically important public markets and special events like flower day and Eastern Market after dark. So that's where it is right now. I would not say that. We have come out publicly fully in support of the project. We have been pretty open that there's improvements that we'd like to see. And we will continue to work with the state and the city. On on seeing where those go Alright, great. Take any questions.

Thank you so much for the presentation. We will move now to questions from my colleagues. And we will start with you quantum tape. Oh.

Thank you, Madam President. And Dan wanted to commend you on 1617 years old oh seven, who's not many folks who were getting those positions prior to me being here, but you're one of them. So congratulations and continuing the great work that you've done over the years. Just a one question and also want to say that we've had an opportunity to work with Katie in the Planning and Economic Development standing committee prior to her joining you. So we know that ESA mark is in good hands and will continue to provide the support we need but I want to ask one question right now regarding you indicated about partnering with affordable housing development. So talk to us a little bit about that. I know there have been some controversy surrounding some of the outlying developments that are just kind of on the border, if you will of Eastern Market. The Talk to us about this the partnership you mentioned in those slides.

Well, we had two and we're down to one. So we're working with a group out of Cincinnati that was new to Detroit. They've done projects in Michigan. They staked out a site within the what we call the Food Innovation Zone The expansionary of Eastern Market area east of st Alban. That was actually designated in this framework plan that we that the city and we worked on a few years ago for workforce housing and was unable to get project specific section eight certificates from the housing authority. And without those points, they didn't feel they could get section nine tax credits. So they withdrew. And that was their second attempted section nine section 42 credits and so they decided just to abandon the project. So still a good project will still work. There's still plenty of other developers out there. So we'll continue to work on that. We are working with American community developers on a site along the Dequindre Cut is a city owned parcel that they have they want an RFP process for a couple of years ago. There were the same developers that are in a major project in Cork town and unbrushed Park and they have been delayed but we're still hopeful that that project will get to the finish line. It's about 120 units. currently configured is about a mix all the way from 40% to market rate. And with about I think last time 6000 square feet of commercial space that we would partner with them and provide that as part of our portfolio of spaces in the Market District that we will hold long term at below market pricing to be able to continue to incent people with limited means to start and grow their businesses

will have a potentially some additional questions, put it on my other hat if you will, as we move forward on those projects on that particular project and others but for now, again, thank you. I wish you all the best and you're not going yet but wish you all the best in your next

Tim and Eric would know we've been joined by member Durvasa member waters.

Thank you, Madam President. And so good morning. Morning. How are you Mr. Carmody?

I'm doing well.

All right. Very good. I just want to first of all, thank you for responding to all of our questions in advance frankly, we will make sure that we post those for the community to review so thank you so much for your detailed responses. I just have one quick question regarding them. The kitchen cooking in a healthy cooking that kind of thing because I get pretty excited about that. immediately came to my mind you know, seniors who are looking for some things to do during the day can learn more about healthy cooking, and then our students, is there an opportunity for them to come by and learn because you know that they're the worst eaters oh my goodness, um, to learn a little bit more about it and perhaps either receive some class credit or community service hours or something like that. I'm pretty excited about that whole thing. And the work that you're doing with that she had four as well. So,

just a couple of points on that. Absolutely. I mean, I think our target audiences are particularly families with kids and seniors in terms of who the education ought to be aimed at. You know, we dabble in that space in the shed. We have a commercial kitchen and shed five that is principle but uses to help small businesses grow and so we have any at any one time 15 to 20 food makers in that space. It's kind of second order use is to be available for people having large events and shed five as a catering kitchen. Then we throw in a little bit of education when we can and it's an afterthought. And I think we're doing a better you know, we've done a variety of approaches to it. And our current approach is we're not in the business of content creation for nutrition, but there are so many partners out there that we can partner with, from all over some of the area agencies on aging and others. We have a long tradition of partnership with people that Gleaners and forgotten harvest, we know that we'll continue to deepen those. We're, you know, we think there's a wonderful opportunity here because of the role of the market and bringing people together and being that Saturday morning plays for everybody comes how can we really add a stronger narrative about healthy eating without it's not beating people over the head with it? It's trying to make it fun. It's trying to make it somewhat simple. And you know, there are it's estimated that Americans spend about a third more time watching cooking shows they actually do spend cooking and nearly none of those shows feature simple recipes, ones that people can, you know, not necessarily nutritionally beneficial recipes and and to make it fun at the same time. So those are the three kinds of things we think can really helped focus and make differentiate a little bit but you could get a decent microphone, you could get it at home on your expanded channel platform and key and streaming services.

Like it. Alright, so Thank Thank you, Madam President. All right, remember waters

remember Callaway.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Good morning, everyone. I just have a quick question. I remember last year putting in the closing resolution regarding increased support of minority farmers. And I know you kind of touched on it just recently. Can you just explain in more detail what your outreach is or your engagement to our local minority farmers. Some people call them urban farmers and go

first and then so kale, take the meat of it. You know, we partnered a lot you know, we are a long term participant with keep going to Troy whose headquarters is in eastern America. We help facilitate that purchase of their site so that they were moved from earlier site when real estate values went up. And so they're very sensitive and we found them a place they could call home and perpetuity and they serve 2000 firms in Detroit. As members providing free transplants and classes at their farm. We also have worked a lot with Oakland Avenue community firm, helped build them out, help help them build out sort of a small food hub up there which has actually been helpful as we put these boxes together there Kato talked about and then we work just trying to make you know this year we expect 10 new small farmers I think half of which are from the city of Detroit actually selling at the market. So we we've over the years come up with a program that allows small farms half price to get started and see if the market is a good fit for them. We're not the smallest market we charge more than most people and you got to have enough product to warrant being there. And so far, I think we've learned from my think five years ago zero urban farmers other than the ones that were working collectively under the grown in Detroit table, which is another 12 or 13 at one time, but we already have I think eight Detroit firms already selling at the market and we look for an expansion this year.

And you throw the chair when you say Detroit accent minority because a lot of the Detroit farmers are not necessarily minorities. Right? We're talking about two different categories, right? I'm talking about specifically women and African American farmers in the city of Detroit. I know you talked about some initial initiatives in the thumb area, and I know you also talked about the millions of dollars that you've gotten from Stabenow. How are those millions of dollars helping minority farmers in the city of Detroit, not necessarily Detroit farmers because that's their separate two different types of farmers. We're talking minority and we're talking Detroiters because a lot of Detroit farmers are not necessarily minority or women.

If I could through the chair to Councilmember Whitfield LOA. I'd like to speak explicitly explicitly to your question around minority owned farms in the city of Detroit. So when I mentioned our food box program, that program started out of necessity at the beginning of the pandemic where we had several regional farmers with an abundance of supply and as you as you recall, households in need of that fresh produce. It was it was viewed at that time as a successful program. But it was really kind of we were working with regional farms, many of whom are white owned regional farms. And what we observed and we have, we have a Director of Community Partnerships at Eastern Market, Patrice Brown, who manages our community markets network, and manages the relationship with Oakland Avenue urban farm, as well as with many minority and particularly black owned farms in Detroit. We also she also manages our our relationship with the black farmer land fund, who has been a huge partner on this evolution from working with regional farms to explicitly black owned urban farms in the city of Detroit on that food box program. And because of that, the success that we had historically on food box the food box program and the relationships we've built locally, that's how we were the recipients of the $2 million in USDA funding through the Michigan Department of Education, and that those dollars are intended they are intended to be spent locally and USDA standards of locally is within 400 square miles. But the goal of the Eastern Market Corporation is to first purchase from those black owned farms in the city of Detroit. And then in order to have the boxes be well rounded then after we've sort of maxed out the purchasing potential of those local black owned farms. Then we're sourcing additional produce from some regional farms but starting first in the city of Detroit with those farms and last year, so we've had this is a three year program. Our first year 20 being 2023 Almost 60% of the purchasing was for to those those black owned farms. So the goal is to pack the food boxes but it's also to give those farms a guaranteed mechanism through which they can they can plan annually how to grow and how to build their businesses. Ultimately, as well. I think it's important to mention that part of this program is getting of those farms to build their capacity towards either wholesale and or supplying produce to the Detroit people's food Co Op. So it's it's through that program and we have two more years of it. We're going to expand it the first year we had 12 Farms. This year, we're adding two so we'll be working with 14 Farms this year. Hopefully, we're I was in a meeting on Friday where we talked about trying to double the purchasing. And we've been meeting with those farmers since the winter to help them plan accordingly so that they can grow more that we can purchase and then going into year three next year. Hopefully we'll be expanding that even further. So there's a lot of intentionality behind this. It's been it has it has been a lot of it's been a labor of love. It really has and it's one where we really believe strongly that the capacity that Eastern Market offers to the city and the region really should be utilized to build the capacity of local businesses and local farms, local black owned farms.

Thank you. Thank you so much for that. And Madam Chair. I'd like to move to have the black owned farms moved into executive session and also the closing resolution and then I just want to know where they are. So Madam Chair, that is my motion to move the black owned farms, corners into executive session and the cultural resolution. Thank you, ma'am.

Any objections to add this to our closing resolution? Hearing none that action will be taken. Right is that it member Callaway Okay, Mr. Carmody, can you speak a little bit about the challenges or if there has been any regarding the inmate MKT zoning classification that recently council approved

tonight to date, I don't know that there had been any significant challenges to it. Our ability to expand goes beyond just rezoning. So we still have land acquisition to complete. We have significant infrastructure investment to make in streets in gas, sewer, water we did lose the EW global expansion project. They're still made live on as a reduced project in the future. But they were able to secure a production facility in the suburbs and they just got tired of a lot it was taken for the project to move forward. So we have to do a better job of getting site ready development in the expansionary zoning is a huge part of that, but it's not it's just a piece. So the good news is there is there is about $5 million, I think worth of infrastructure improvements that the city is channeling, either this year or next year to begin the process of taking what was residential and and making it suitable for light industrial and multifamily residential construction. All right,

thank you. And then I just wanted to understand the $1.5 million request again for capital. So to date, you've only been awarded 1.5 as well. So if the city does not allocate this 1.5 in this budget, can you explain the impact that that will have on construction timeline and where you will move forward?

You know, it's been our experience in the past with the last four projects that the early money is the hard money to get in when you get three or 4 million, it's a lot easier to get the next three or 4 million so we're really looking for you all to support the project in a way that will help. We will leverage the public investments has made and really get us some momentum going so that when we go to particularly to go to Lansing during this session that we have your support that we can help leverage some state support at the same time.

And has the construction started with the I

guess construction would start hopefully spring of 2025 Okay, if we don't get this kind of support, I think we're looking at probably a 12 month delay. Okay.

Okay. And this specifically again, the 1.5 is for shed for sheer for renovations in general. Okay. So I would like and then you had to request the 250,000. That was for

other a small capital improvements on existing market sheds and I'm assuming

the priority would be the 1.5 for that would be correct. Okay. Okay. So if there is no object what may have a motion, I would like to add the shift for construction to our Executive Session. Do you want point five? All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. All right. Thank you, Member Santiago Romero. Thank you, Madam

President. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for the work that you do. I in so many of us love Eastern Market. So really appreciate your leadership. The only question that I have is I don't know if it's been addressed yet. But there is 75,000 under the non departmental budgets for Eastern Market additional funding for operations. Can anybody let us know what this funding is for?

Yes, through the chair. That is so in your historic budget yours Eastern markets operational allocation was 225,000. And last year at fiscal year 2020, for the city budget office recommended increasing that to 300,000. And so my understanding is this 75 is a permanent making that 300,000 The permanent base operational allocation.

Thank you for the trip that was mentioned. I just am now making those connections. So thank you for that overview again. And my only other statement is just thank you for the work that you're doing with tech town I hear when exciting projects happening in southwest soon. So we're really excited for partnerships and work to really expand opportunities for Detroiters. So thank you. Thank you Madam President. All right.

Thank you. I remember John

was talking about that partnership. We think we're the sort of food specialist and when it comes to general retail rather than build a staff around that, let's partner somebody's already doing that. And it's kind of now they're looking at us to help them with some of their food prospects. It's been a good partnership.

Thank you, Councilmember Johnson.

Thank you, Madam President and good morning. So, Mr. Carmody, first let me say thank you for your leadership over the years. With the Eastern Market and its growth I greatly appreciate it. Appreciate your historical knowledge that you provide and staying with it, through everything that you have been through. So we appreciate that you are you have a succession plan that says okay, we're not just going to I'm not just walking away and you know, going to do whatever it is that I choose, but that I want to ensure that this is handed off in, in a way where the market can continue to grow. And then to Katie Trudeau thank you so much for stepping in and continuing to do the work and being there just to see the market continue to grow and to flourish. Greatly appreciated. As many of you know, I am a member of the board of the Eastern Market Corporation and I really just appreciate all of the work and the intentionality that you all put into supporting urban farms and Detroit residents as well. In an effort to encourage all of us to eat healthier. And so I do want to ask a question relative to that because I know of the commitment. Can you talk about local community groups or neighborhood markets? That you support and what type of support if any that you give to them?

So the Detroit community markets is a network that we helped convene, I think starting about 2010 and it can range in size from 15 to 20 different community groups around the city that might operate a seasonal outdoor market. I think we're actually at the cusp of one becoming a year on market. The East Warren partnership is building a market that will be 12 month your market and I think actually, the start of Microcenter is also offering a year round market as well. We support. We support both of those initiatives. We have provided sort of consolidated grant writing we've found resources for that and we often will able to provide for new markets set up like 10 tends to all the same color and we do marketing and there's an annual map that goes out that shows people where all the community markets are that particular year. We promote best practices between them. And then we also operate something called each market farm Stan and we'll bring in a summer bases 25 to 30 Fresh Food fellows that will operate those firms stands to also get to pack up for you food boxes and learn about the food system. It's actually been one of our best ways to identify Detroit talent and bring them onto the team. Those farm stands often are the major produce at some of those smaller community markets. We're not at all of them. Some of them have found their own farmers and don't need our produce. But when we're asked we'll show up at anybody's market and be there with our prop firm stands that are selling produce from the variety of growers that we serve from small black urban firms to large regional firms through this firm stance and pop up typically at anywhere between as low as 15 during the depths of the pandemic to as many as 30 Some of the years prior to the pandemic.

Awesome. Thank you for that. I didn't realize you were going to mention to district for farm stands but certainly do appreciate the support that you've given to them. I do know that the East more farmers market is currently going through an expansion expanding their building and looking forward to having a greater farmers market and I'm glad to see the success of it because probably almost 20 years ago, there was a farmers market there and it just it wasn't very successful at all, but this time around it looks like things are going really well. So certainly do appreciate that support. You Katie Trudeau you also mentioned Oakland Avenue. Oakland Avenue Farms is a community land trust. One of the things that I am really looking to do is to provide more support of community land trust in the city of Detroit and seem to be making some progress in that. And so perhaps there's an opportunity for us to work together. Because I'm really trying to also identify ways that land can be within a community land trust that can be utilized to generate revenue for the organization with the effort of not only providing food for the community, but also providing affordable housing for residents in the community as well. All right. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you member Johnson member Doha.

Thank you and good afternoon or good morning. I'm sorry, already afternoon. Good morning to you. I don't really have many questions. I do want to say to you, Dan, thank you though, for your leadership and your dedication and as member Johnson articulate also sit on the Eastern Market board as well, and attend the meetings and have the opportunity just not to see you work in Katy. But there's so many of the other board members who are dedicated who take their time out to attend their meetings, take their time out to attend the events and really work to help Eastern Market work to help make Eastern Market what it is. So again, thank you so very much and thank you for the history as he articulated as well. There's so many things I did not know about Eastern Market prior to serving on the board and I always look forward to those board meetings because I know we're going to leave with a little piece of history before that meeting is over. So what I have again, no questions. One of the things that I wanted to do was put that into executive session and and and the closing resolution as well just relative to the funding, it has already been done, which is a great thing, meaning that it is support for it, and we can move the market for it. What I will say just in comments as this budget passes, I do look forward to even going up to Lansing with you to ensure that we can leverage some of that funding to ensure to get that money back down here as we've done before with the grant that came from the Senate. I think we got some really great partners up there that enjoy the market and want to invest in a market and I think it's incumbent upon all of us to keep pushing that narrative of how great Eastern Market is. So again, thank you for your leadership. You as well. Katie, thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember. I would just add that, you know, East America is one of those places where the urban rural divide sort of disappears. The reason we got funding from the state is because Senate Appropriations Committee at that time, led by the errors at two farmers whose family sold at Eastern American. So this is a place that serves the whole state with special focus on residents of Detroit. And so it's a way to bring more resources into the city, whether it's from the state or from USDA. We will miss Senator Stabenow. Through her leadership, I think total is about right just shy of time I've been here just shy of $8 million dollars we've gotten from USDA over that time. Hopefully that will continue there. You know, we have a strong presence in Washington with USDA at the at the staff level, so I don't think we're gonna say go away, but we got to work on that new relationship there as as next senators elected.

Oh, what I will say is Through you, madam president, that's a special shout out. I never sought out a Republican. But I sat out to Senator Roger victory who helped push that forward. But I think we our chances are pretty good in this legislature. Time is obviously of the essence as their budget season right now, deciding their priorities, but again, just look forward to having that conversation and even maybe putting a resolution for if after budget is done to urge that and just kind of solidify that as well. So thank you again. Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, member Hall. All right, that will conclude all of the questions from my colleagues. We again thank you for being here and wish you all the best. And that will conclude our budget hearing for the Eastern Market. All right, thank you so much.

All right. Our next budget hearing is for City Council currently.

Maryam Mara presents city council. So this is your last budget hearing with the City Council, and it was up to you if you want to just put it into executive session if you want to discuss it. We're here to to help me with that.

I know after speaking with a few members, there was possibly desire to add this to Executive Session for sure. We can still have conversations at the table but we can more than likely move this into Executive Session. But we can open it up for any questions or comments now at this time no. So their motion to add this to our executive session. So all right, Hearing no objections, we will add city council to our executive session. And Mr. Coralina Mr. Whitaker, did you all have anything I see. Director Todd joined us virtually. Mr. Todd, do you have anything for City Council's budget? I'm not sure if you can hear me.

Madam President. Yes. Good morning, Madam

President. Honorable City, California. Oh, just a couple

of words. No rush.

Looks like he's froze a little bit.

I was going to speak on his behalf but if he can speak for himself if he's available. Director Todd Are you there?

Morning Madam President, Madam President, can

you hear me? Yeah, you want to maybe turn your camera off and see if it works better that way. We're getting little

let me make one other switch. Pardon me, please. Okay.

All right. Is this better?

Yes. We can hear you perfectly. All right. Must

be the headphones. Again, good morning. Good morning, Madam President. Good morning honorable City Council. I was just merely joining my colleagues Mr. Whittaker and Mr. Corley, but if there is a particular item that Mr. Whittaker would like me to speak to at this time, I certainly can.

Madam President,

yes, go read it.

I think it's important that we speak about the continued work of coal studios. There's some additional work that needs to happen as far as putting together our proposal to the city regarding the the rezoning of the city, the zoning, ordinance and there's additional work that will have to happen in next fiscal year. And I think we would need According to our calculations about another 70,000 to complete that work. And I also wanted to say that right now the mayor's proposed budget does not include any monies for for a council retreat, and if that's something that council wants to have for next fiscal year, you would have to add it in in this budget cycle. And we are asking that that money, we think 150,000 should be put in the council administration to care to carry out that work.

All right, thank you. Mr. CD not Mr. Member there. Ha. Thank you, Madam

President. And no, that was actually one of the motions that I wanted. To make, but also I know we're adding this entire budget in. So one of the another motion that I would have liked to make, as well, as many of you know, Council offices receive an amount of ARPA funding from the American rescue plan to have employees and do ARPA activities throughout the community. It is no secret that ARPA may not seem as prevalent as they used to be, or sorry, not ARPA COVID. But it is still around and they still exist and the effects of COVID still exist. And so I know, even as many of my other colleagues have expressed, the utilization of those ARPA dollars has allowed us to put more boots on the ground and the community. Spend more time with seniors spend more time with community but also utilize that funding to help staff our offices appropriately. The average or close to the average staffer does not nearly make as much as they are worth and I can speak specifically for Mize. Who may come here from nine to five and then they leave and then they go to three or four community meetings each and every night. And so in that same vein, as I have done in previous budget years, I will be asking and making a motion to add funding to the council budget for each office so they can at least hire one employee, but also maintain a level of funding noting that we will not be receiving any more ARPA dollars in the following fiscal years. And so to add $1 amount to it. I understand that we still have to be fiscally responsible. But I think the number is close to 1.5 million, which would at least allow each council member to have close to 150,000 to $170,000 in their budget, if they were so to hire another staffer and have the ability to pay benefits and fringes so my motion is to add $1.5 million to the city council budget. For the purpose of pardon me, let me specify reoccurring funding to assist with staffing and community engagement. That was my motion, Madam President.

All right. Any discussion? Any objections? All right, hearing none that will be added to our executive session.

Thank you, Madam President. And while I still have the floor, I'd like to add make a motion to add the $150,000 to the council budget for our yearly retreat.

Right, any objections?

And present? Yes. Is that we currently reoccurring Thank you.

Hearing no objections that action will be taken. And

finally Mr. Winograd. I don't know if I needed a motion for anything else. I know you were talking about the rezoning is it? 70,000 I like to make a motion for that as well, Madam President.

All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. Thank you. And since member Doha made those motions, we need the entire I don't know if we even need the entire city council's budget now and Executive Session. Unless there's other outstanding issues or concerns that need to be addressed. All right,

Madam President, so yeah, if you wish we can take off the City Council budget, since we have these Morses.

Anyway, like it'd be very nice. Okay, so we added those three items. From City Council's budget. All right, anything additional.

Only to say if you have things right now that you know that you want to put in. In the closing resolution, we'd appreciate language, so that we can start to draft the closing resolution. Okay.

All right. Thank you for that. Yes,

ma'am. President and to remind the public tonight at 5pm. We have a public hearing according to the city charter, and will you invite the public to attend

and then we will move into executive session starting tomorrow at 2pm. And you'll have our spreadsheet to us probably tomorrow or

Madam President draft this afternoon. So that we want to make sure we are capturing you know what you put into executive session but our form road spreadsheet would be submitted to you right before the two o'clock second session that starts tomorrow. Yeah.

Yes. Thank you. I would like to motion few items for the closing resolution and variable may shift them over to the executive session discussion, but as of right now, I've got about five I want to make sure Mr. Corley has them before the two o'clock so I'm president like the motion for the EGC and analysis. Again, it's just for closing resolution, the small business development and health along the Grand River streetscape.

All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken.

And President would also like to motion for the closing resolution again for the de EGC a rolling collection of vendor information for recipients of the Detroit means business awards.

Right Hearing no objections. That action will be taken up to President

for the municipal parking would like to place into the closing resolution enforcement of residential parking violations during street sweeping hours.

Right Hearing no objections. That action will be taken Protune

president for the city clerk a create programming for off year voter education in addition to educational efforts throughout an election year.

Hearing no objections that action will be taken.

I think when present, I believe we've already put this one I think this one is actually in the Executive Session for the increase capacity for the city server placed that into executive session last week Mr. Corley, for doing that. Don't

recall that one. So yeah. Okay, thank

you move to place into the Executive Session. This executive session and increase for the service base to allow increase capacity for online videos on the city's website, including the page for past videos of Detroit city council meetings and we will discuss with you the funding aspect of it.

All right, Hearing no objections, that action will be taken.

Thank you, Madam President.

All right. Thank you pro tem member Callaway, did you also have the promotion, Madam

Chair, through you to Mr. Corley, would I put into executive session, we need support on the avenue of fashion and I understand the D EGC. might be the place for that to land.

So

I guess as member as Pro Tem just indicated for the DGC and Grande River, can we also do the same thing I make a motion for the same thing. for the avenue of fashion. With the DGC not that necessarily goals in the closing session or executive is the

same thing you want to in the closing resolution to urge them, that will be through the closing resolution.

Okay, so that's where I make a motion to put the DGC slack and avenue of fashion into the closing session.

All right. Hearing no.

actually was member Callaway okay. And also, the bandshell is now being the ground was broken I think about a couple of weeks ago. I'm really concerned about the lighting over there and parking. So Madam Chair, I'm trying to figure out what would be the best route to get to recommend to make a recommendation or motion to have solar lights installed around the bandshell area right now there is there's no lighting. And also I'm concerned about the parking but I'll start with the solar lights. So where would I put that through the chair to Mr. Corley for solar lights around the bandshell on seven mount next to the 12th precinct. Would that go into closing resolution or executive session because it needs funding?

And President so if you do have a figure from maybe the public lighting department or public mining authority, you put that executive session if you do not have a figure I would suggest you put into the club and resolution for the administration to help you investigate

with the dollar amount would be okay, so So move Madam Chair and also I'd like to I know Mr. Rising was here. Um, he said there was a $20 million that they were considering the administration for housing since we do have that $20 million in ARPA funding. I'd like for us to consider using part of the ARPA dollars for the solar lights at the bandshell on seven miles so I don't know that would be a motion. Madam Chair. Okay, so

let's go back to the first one, okay, for the where the bus stops you. So where are you going to add it to the

resolution or to the executive session? So thank you and funding. So through you to Mr. Koerner. Do you think they should go in both

the solar lights at the bandshell? Man president so um, we can put it in both. And so if if you are able to get a figure, okay, we can put in the ball and if not, we can just put it into closed

resolution. Okay. Okay. All right. So motion has been made to add to both our closing resolution and Executive Session, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. Thank you, Madam Chair. All right. Thank you member Callaway.

All right, Member Santiago Ramiro following member Doha. Thank you, Madam presidents. I would like to also move some things forward to Executive Session, just to ensure that it makes it in I believe we already made some of these motions but we weren't sure on our on our end, but I would like to move participatory budgeting to Executive Session

for a closing resolution. Right Hearing no objections

that action will be taken.

Thank you, Madam

President. I would also like to add 355,000 to the Office of Immigrant Affairs for staffing to Executive

Session, they are under HRD. Right Hearing no objections that action

will be taken. Thank you, Madam President. Three more that I have one is adding the importance of language access to the closing resolution and we will share this language with you all soon.

All right, Hearing no objections

that action will be taken. The next item for closing resolution would be language around

support for nurse navigation. Right Hearing no objections

that action will be taken. Thank you Madam President. My last motion is to include $2 million that is needed for our shelter system under HRD. That's in an executive session. And excuse me, I'm going to motion 2.3 million we'll give you an exact number, but 2.3 million for our shelters into

executive jumping into Executive Session. All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. Thank you.

Thank you, member Doha.

Thank you, Madam President. Madam President, I'm so sorry. So what type was shelters that we're

addressing? This is into our current shelter system. That is currently overwhelmed. And it would potentially be a one time spent to address the overwhelm system currently, but it would be a one time spend of $2 million.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam President. All right. Thank you Member Santiago mural

member Linderhof. Thank you, Madam President. I don't know if I added this but under the municipal parking budget would like to add assessable map street parking to the park Detroit app and add features to find accessible street parking for

members of our disabled community. Right that was to the quality resolution no to Executive Session. Okay, Hearing no objections that will be

added to our executive session. Thank you. And then, Madam President, I would like to add in a closing resolution to urge the administration to find funding to house or cover one of the swimming pools at the rent and pool aside

as my motion all right Hearing no objections. That action will be taken. And

can you say it again? Yes, absolutely. I would like in the closing resolution, just urging you to read I will send the language as well though the specific language by urging the rest of our urging the administration to find funding to provide a covering for one of the pools at the Brennan poolside Rouge Park

All right. Any additional items for our closing resolution.

Right. Anything additional Mr. Whittaker?

Mr. Corley? So my presence as I indicated earlier, you know, we're we're sent counsel a draft on later this afternoon draft of the Executive Session spreadsheet. So by that time, if you have, you know, more figures to add, that would be wonderful. Help us, you know, clarify the language that would be wonderful. Just remind the council, you know, we we have until April the eighth or next Monday.

It's like a session. That's my wife's birthday

team anyway. So that's the President's Day. Um, and so we have to do this week. Yeah, we have a lot to do this week. And you know, the goal would be to try to get done, you know, by Friday. I know that's optimistic. But you know, the more you know more specifics, you can provide

just the better so thank you so much. Yes, Mr. Winterkorn, if we shoot for Friday, it will be good. But if you if you send us the language as quickly as we can, a lot of oftentimes the delay is giving the closing resolution together. So as quickly as you can get us the language that you want, included in a closing resolution, the better off we'll

all be at thing. Got you. Understood. Thank you so much. Mr. Whitaker and Mr. Corley, we will work hard to get you all that information as soon as possible. All right. Anything from you? Yes, yes. Madam President, now we're finding historic designations. All right, risky Thank you. All right. We will go straight now to our public comment. And Mr. Foster, you've been waiting you can come on up for public comment. You have two minutes.

Good afternoon. Good afternoon, through the Chair. First thing I just want to reiterate, is the value of veterans in the city. When I was listening to the Eastern Market director, Mr. Dan. It just reminded me of when I was out looking in the urban development and how many federal grants and funding that was available just for being a veteran. And so a lot of these bonds that they're looking floor, they will be able to get if they open a lot more doors open to veterans. And so I'm just very grateful. I want to reiterate that second thing when it comes down to city council, and their budget, one thing I would ask is that you guys allow yourself the room to eliminate red tape. A lot of the citizens grievances comes from things that take years and years to get address little things. Also you guys deal with a lot of things that are outside of your charter responsibility. So if you're gonna continue to do that, then you should have the funding and the staff available to address those issues. So that you could do a whole heartedly and not have standard. The other thing when it comes down to you guys and staff, I think that you guys should probably put a little margin in between it allows for bonuses based upon production, and not just a standard amount to be just paying folks. When you could look at quarterly. How did you evaluate how did our team do and then they could be motivated to get bonuses. I think that'd be more better for our community and for you all moving forward. So I got a lot more to say.

But I appreciate you all. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Mr. Foster, we appreciate you as well. Here's how many callers do we have? Madam President, we have seven callers online. Okay. The first is ADOS Detroit. Right. ADOS Detroit Good afternoon.

ADOS Detroit Good afternoon. Through the Chair. Good afternoon. May

I be hurt? Yes, we can hear you I'm in agreeance with fall Mr. Foster. I think you're making a budget this unattainable for this for the residents. I don't see a lot in it for residents. We seem to gravitate toward giving our money away to people and not asking what are the residents going to benefit from it? I would like to also add that during the pandemic, the Eastern Market went to took fresh produce produce to neighborhoods and why can't they continue to to do that because that's one of the problems that we have is getting access to fresh vegetables and and produce in our neighborhoods because we don't have proper grocery stores. And I was wondering if we could we could reinstitute bringing them to the neighborhoods because we do subsidize a lot of different things in our budget that don't necessarily benefit the residents and the city and I would like to see a little bit more research on the council side to determine what things are benefiting the people. What things are increasing the general fund balance and not put things on the city or the people the residents that are on a tenable we don't have an increase in our general fund it seems because we have lots of pilot programs that exists without paying taxes. And I think is very unfair the structure that you all are creating of private taking over our all of our assets and managing our assets and all we are doing as being the funding for these things. Every time I turn around, we're giving more money to this organization and this but I'm not seeing any improvement in our conditions.

Please address Thank you. The next caller is Betty a Varner. Good morning to all within the sound of my voice This is Daddy a Barna president of the soda Ellsworth black Association. I don't know if Mr. Cunningham is still on the line but I just want to say I saw you miss Cunningham being interviewed. Thank you which travel traveling you did a great job talking about their cat surface and the the new bus. I think it's DAX. I'm just asking the council. First of all I want to say I appreciate the council. I appreciate last year that you're allocated money for the new program for the thing new accessibility home repair fund. That is a monies that is needed. There are a lot of things that need that service. I'm asking that the town's to please consider come up with a program or some way to us As community organizations that are maintaining parks that are in there or creating a path, the city has shown that they think parks and recreation centers are very important. And so do organizations who are maintaining and creating parks and their community just need help. And so I'm asking for that help and asking you to please continue to support the soda health or black Association project to think Acorda thankful and Domino is too painful and why on me, please support a park that we are creating the diba community park and the memory of our late vice president Glen Dillon, the near we're not asking for hand out we're just asking for assistance. We have done good work on our own. Like I said before, we saved that. My knees and we bought the pop. Out of I do's my knees, move remove tree. So please help

us. Thank you. All right, thank you. The next caller is Galaxy

A 14 5g.

Good afternoon

Good afternoon to hear I'm there with the Coalition for property tax and Justice. Thank you. Councilmember Callaway, you are a the gift that keeps giving. Thank you for pointing out the discrepancies. And the fact that I'm not the discrepancy but the difference between minority and black people of Detroit and black people. There is a big difference. We are the majority. And the problem we're facing is racism. In Detroit. We have a racist mayor, a racist governor, and the governor even admitted that she's racist. She says she has implicit bias which has met racism. That's what ignites. The reason that we're having problems here with racist mayor and the races governor the racist governor is not helping us get reparations and reciprocity in the $600 million that was stolen from us by the racist mayor and 100,000 homes that were illegally foreclosed by the racist mayor. This was done under Mayor Duggan now he's blocking the two resolutions you guys were kindly kind enough to pass to get help get us reciprocity Rottens paucity and still be able to protect ourselves from racist policy. We want to thank you, President Sheffield, for being the Nancy Pelosi I knew you always could be you know what I mean? And I want to thank again, member Callaway, you are the gift that keeps giving now if Mary Sheffield if you leave and become mayor, we need to have you member Callaway as president of the city council because you do everything right. Only thing I disagreed with you was one thing, but I want to thank you for everything you have done. We want. Anytime a CEO can come in and steal money from

us. They need to be out.

All right. Thank you Miss Ahmad. The next caller is Samsung SMT 733 Good afternoon.

Good afternoon.

Hello. Yes. Good afternoon. Good morning. Good afternoon. This is toy wise from shallow village Association. I want to know where do we find all this information that this spreadsheet is going to bring what's how much money each individual want to say individual department is going to repeat from all of this budget meeting and how we go about finding it at the end of this budget transaction that we're going through right now. And that's what I like to find out to get the information and when is the last day of the budget is today to submit anything, and I would like to know that part before anything else. That's it.

I yield back. All right. Thank you so much. Miss watts. Today is the last day of the budget hearings. However, we do have a public hearing today at 5pm where you can call in and we also have executive sessions that start tomorrow at 2pm. That spreadsheet will be available online again, Mr. Corley.

I know in the past we have posted it online. Yes, Madam President unfought.

Tomorrow it'll be available. Okay. All right. And then also miss watts. You can always give our office a call and we can get you all that information. All right. Thank you. Our next caller the next caller is k WKW. Good

afternoon. Hi. Yes, hello. Yeah.

Why is Why is five why is this meeting at five? Up? Yeah, I'm just trying to figure out where it's at five o'clock. I'm all markdowns here and your your your retreat? Ken, can we get a copy of your agenda? You know, your agenda. As a matter of fact, I was looking for him. I couldn't find your agenda from the last couple of times. I'd like to see the agenda, what's on your agenda, but you got to be talking about cuz we're not gonna be here. So can I get a copy of that, please? And let's see one other thing. Oh, they, um, the individual like the individual allocations. We're still not getting them. We still don't see them. And I saw him last year, but I don't see him for this year. And I don't understand why we'll stay we're still paying for Miss dig when we don't have any cables that DTE should be doing that. And the straight black news. Oh, you know, they got wires all overhead so we're not miss digging that that's all overhead. So they're giving you a crock as usual when it comes to that. And if you want some solar lights, Councilwoman Galloway, we can take care of that you'll be waiting the rest of your life if you're waiting on those guys. Text me and we will take care of it for you. So that my son yeah we will take care of it. And one other thing. Yeah, hope you guys are Yeah, I want to know about that budget. I heard him say 175 $75,000 That's a lot of money. You know, and I don't like it because I don't like you guys get in the way. We can't see it because you too, you know you're not transparent enough. We don't it seemed like he had purposely tried to shield us, you know, from having an opportunity to participate in the process. When you never know you may hear something that you don't you want to get him some good tips. You know, so I just think it's not doing your diligence like you don't you know, try to have limits participate. All right, thank you. The next caller is Marguerite Maddox. Scarlett that afternoon is Madox?

Yes

Yeah. I

did it look it up again

well

today

yeah, that goes through and then

there we go

know

i

So, be prepared. I'm good. Thank you. All right. Thank you Miss Maddox. The next caller ends in 270. Good afternoon, caller 270.

This morning, almost afternoon, Luke Shelton. And I just want to speak a little bit about the new bonds again.

Now understand that in 2004 and 2009. The residents of the city of Detroit voted on some unlimited tax you're on vacation Bob. However, unlimited tax general obligation bonds are supposed to be used for large scale capital improvement infrastructure. And also, pursuant to state law. You don't issue long term, unlimited tax them against general obligation bond funds for items that do not last as long as the duration of the unlimited tax, your obligation bond. So therefore, even the items that were put up by the bonds that will put up to be voted for by the 2014 2009 electorate in Detroit. That was not even done properly. Do you factor in that since 2004 2009. The city has gone has gone through enormous changes. It's gone through the largest bankruptcy of any large city in the nation. There's been momentous changes in this city. And so why doesn't and his CFO continues to want to reach back and grab these old bonds with the rationalization justification that what you know the voters voted on and what voters this city has lost over 250,000 residents since 2004, and probably another 200,000 sent or close to it since 2009.

Right Thank you Mr. Shelton. Madam President, the last caller is William M. Davis. Good afternoon, Mr. Davis.

Oh, good that no cannot be heard. Yes, you can. Okay, I'd like to start off by saying that the city charter retirees was was one of the groups that was mostly affected by the Coronavirus and did a whole lot needs to be done to help and assist us. I think there's been some hopeful signs of some voices being raised but more needs to be done. Also, I think that that need to be a Western market. You know, you know, we need to have fresh, more fresh fruits and vegetables and meats and stuff available on the on the west side, especially like saying district seven and district one. And I think it would be very beneficial. And it could be a revenue generating asset. I think the health department should be greatly expanded. There used to be a whole lot of federal and state funds to assist in that that would supplement that their salaries and they would still be able to you still would be able to get taxes from them income taxes, but what happened that can help overall general economy in the cities child is in poor health. You know, and this is National Health Week. So you know, we need to be doing more in that area. You know, the City Truck retirees a great number of dat in the last five years, you know some of us do to the Coronavirus and some of us due to the fact that you know, we was raped, robbed and benstead our money has been stolen every month. Oh the last time I have to say I'd like to say happy birthday to my young city council person who was born six years after I started working for the city of Detroit.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Davis. And he beat me to it but Happy Birthday member there. Ha. Happy birthday. All right. Thank you. Is that the last caller? Yes. All right. Thank you. I'm just really quick before we close, I wanted to add one thing to the closing resolution that I forgot Mr. Corley. And that is and this is for the closing resolution, more programs and we'll get to the exact language but programs and grants that support the middle income residents in Detroit. We continue to hear from residents in Detroit that all of the programs particularly home repair grants are aimed for those who are at the federal poverty line. And there needs to be more assistance for middle income and middle class Detroiters. So we are going to submit some language that supports that. Is there a motion to add that to our closing resolution? All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. And if there is nothing

else, yes, Mr. Corley. Thank you, Madam President. So I heard from councilmember Young's office day he would like to send me a memo clarifying some of the items that he put in since I have session but he may have a couple extra new ones. Okay, is it okay if I add those and then of course we're going to take them up

when we go through the second session spreadsheet. Sure. I just want to let you in so we can take them up on Tuesday. Okay, yep. Thank you. Okay. All right. There is nothing else to come before us. We will stand adjourned. And we'll see everyone at 5pm. For our public hearing for the budget. This meeting will stand adjourned.