- Call this meeting of the Bloomington Commission on Sustainability to order at 6.01 p.m. And we'll go through the roll call. Tara Dunderdale. Here. Justin Vassel, I'm here. Matt Austin. Present. Here. Zero Rose. Present. Do you have a camera? Here. Perfect.
- All right, here. John Elden. Dave Rallo. Here. Here. Quentin Gilley. Not here. Jamie Scholl. Here. Here. Evan Nix. Not here. Annalise, is it Yonka? That's the correct way to say it, but Jakey as well. My family says it. Here. Gotcha.
- Okay, well, welcome. Here. And Diana Ogrodowsky. Ogrodowsky. Thank you. All right, 0 for 2. You know what? It's pretty impressive. Nobody ever gives it that close. Exactly. All right, and Shenghuai Xu. Not here. Okay, so we've got eight people total, and we've got more than half here in person.
- We are good to go. Okay, so first item on the agenda is the approval of the agenda. So are there any, is there anyone who wants to suggest a change or amendment to the agenda? Okay, so all in favor of approving the agenda as it was sent around, say aye. Aye. All opposed, nay. Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't wait for the people on the Zoom line.
- All opposed nay? Any abstentions? Okay, the agenda is approved. Let me just make a note here. John just walked in. Okay, so the next item is approval of the minutes. We've got three sets of minutes that need approval, but none of them are ready yet. So, unfortunately nothing to approve today.
- So next time we'll have four. So yeah, it's like a Voterama. All right. And with that, we'll move on to public comment. So we've got 10 minutes set aside for this portion and up to three minutes per person. So is there anyone from the public either here in the room or on Zoom? Maybe we'll start with the room and then we'll go to Zoom first that would like to address the commission.
- OK, not seeing any takers in the room. Is there anybody on Zoom? OK, going once, going twice. OK, that does it for public comment. Then we will move on to reports from commissioners. So the chair's report is up first. Oh, wait, hang on a second. I'm looking at the wrong, I've got the wrong packet open in front of me.
- Well, I still got the order of things right, so that's good. Okay, so, zoom window go. Oh, on the work chart? Yeah, it's good to know when it's time to just, you know, send a,
- call up the chain or whatever but um yeah there you go there you go um yeah so this is the state of the org chart of as of today um so we've had some changes um so uh hunter holly uh his last meeting was last month um so we're bidding farewell to him and then we're welcoming uh two more members uh onto the commission now so that brings our total number of filled seats up to 12
- So we've only got two vacancies and that mayoral vacancy there is very fresh. So hopefully that'll be filled soon and the county commissioners as well. So since we've got two new commissioners with us, I thought maybe we'll give them an opportunity to sort of introduce themselves and say a little bit about sort of what their background is and their interests in sustainability. So Annalise, why don't we start with you?
- and sustainability is a lot better than my past in sustainability, but I have huge passion for it. I'm currently a project manager at the Center for Rural Engagement at IU. So that's definitely a skill set I hope to bring to this. I love taking community projects and making them happen, making them reality. So I hope to do that here. And then in the future, I hope to go to law school and work on compliance law with sustainability.
- I've been a police resident for about 10 years and I currently work in the nonprofit sphere. So I've done lots of different things with that in our community, particularly I have a background in housing.
- and homeless services, as well as other experience doing case management with pretty low income families. And so my hope is to bring a lot of the perspective of those families and those experiences to the commission as part of our economic sustainability. And also, I would really love to make sustainability something that is accessible to those families and to our most vulnerable community members. So thank you for having me. That's awesome. Welcome. OK, we can go on to the next slide. OK.
- Yeah, a couple of upcoming events of potential interest here. The first one there I had up on the slides last time, IU Economic Development Summit August 12th up in Indianapolis. And then this one was sent around to us by Julie or Sean or both. I can't remember exactly.
- This Earth Charter Indiana holds their annual, I think it's annual Climate Leadership Summit, and this time they're doing it up in Indianapolis, I think where it all got started. So, encourage folks to sign up to that. I've registered for it. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to make it, but if not, hopefully somebody from here can. Yeah, Matt? Just a comment. I haven't been to the IU Economic Development Summit, but I have been to the Earth Charter for the last three years. Oh, awesome. And it's definitely worth going to if you have
- the time and the opportunity to do. Yeah. Are you going again this year? Yeah. Yeah. Good networking and good content and a good way to spread ideas that you have and listen to others. So very worthwhile. Awesome. I'm definitely looking forward to it. What's the date and time on that? 5th of September. It's kind of an all-day thing. All day. Do we know what date that is for today? Friday, Friday? Yeah. OK.
- Indianapolis is a good place because it's been all the way up in Gary previous years. Yeah Yeah, don't have to travel so far I'm cool and if anybody has like events that they think would be good for this Slide that most of the Commission would be interested in just shoot me an email at some point. I'll throw it on there You try to fill it out a little bit more instead of having to Okay, so
- A glance at the funding and award status for this year so far. I've changed the color of the gray so that it doesn't appear white on the white background here on the projector in the room like it did last time. So hopefully it's a little more easy to read. But we don't have anything that's been formally proposed yet. We don't have anything that's awaiting approval. We've got some ideas that are sort of in the hopper. Some of them are more developed than others. And we sort of just have estimated amounts
- you know, that those would end up for in the proposal. So, you know, none of that is in stone or anything like that. Yeah, John. I started talking to an environmental science teacher at, I believe, Huntington South about working with student, I think it was a student club there or student groups anyway. Is there any reason why that would not be appropriate for these funds, you know, if I work with them and make sure it makes sense?
- Yeah, so using the funds to work with them. That would probably be more of a question for you, Steve. I know the sustainable neighborhoods couldn't go to schools, but that's probably a separate thing. Any reason why the working group funds couldn't go to school or indirectly to schools? It could. Schools is one of the appropriate partners for the sustainable neighborhoods fund, actually. Oh, it is? Yeah, great.
- So if you got something in mind, write something up and send it over. Yeah, so we still have 10,000 to spend and we do have some of these things kind of in the pipeline. So hopefully we'll be able to get through, I think we'll be able to get through some of them before the end of the year. But just keeping in mind, the cutoff would be our November meeting since we need to have everything
- kind of out the door for the city to take care of their side of things logistically before December 1st. So we've got a little bit of a early cutoff. Sorry about the distraction. I'm trying to let Evan in, but it's just not working for some reason. And Quinton is having the same issue. I'm emailing them. Would you show me again? They just need to go to the link in there. I missed that.
- The link in the email didn't work. I had to go to the city website. So they've googled boards and commissions. They'll see the calendar on the right and then click on that. Interesting.
- Yeah, Dave. Yeah, we just have to have the sort of final approved proposal to ESD
- early December, right, and so before our December meeting. Yeah, you'd want to vote and have it approved before you, before December 1st. Yeah.
- for now. OK, so we'll go to the next slide. Oh yeah, I suppose we'll have to keep going back and forth. Yeah, perfect. OK, yeah, so some news from outside of the commission. So a couple of things here. One of the big things that caught my eye recently was that the city announced a pretty big shift in how they're approaching the Hopewell neighborhood development.
- So, you know, what happened was, at least in my understanding of it so far, is that the city basically just rejected the previous developer proposals that were sort of in front of them for the Hopewell South neighborhood blocks nine and 10. And are sort of pivoting to a new approach with this company called Flintlock Lab, you know, focusing more on sort of local, you know, developed by locals for locals kind of strategy.
- And they're focusing on things like pre approved designs to streamline permitting and really engaging in like community centered development. So I think there's a couple of interesting things here for us to be aware of. Number one, it's a good opportunity for us to get involved in these.
- conversations and sort of educate ourselves and identify opportunities where we can provide valuable input as this moves along. You know, they're really looking at things like housing affordability with this change. So that's something that we've been thinking about. That's one of the sort of priorities that we have this year. And so an opportunity for us to get involved. And you know,
- Like I said, they're trying to kind of streamline things, which can be a good thing. But also something that is a good opportunity for a commission like ours to sort of have another set of eyes to watch to make sure that it's not just rushing along. If there's some input we want to provide about how the timeline progresses, then we can do that.
- It sounds pretty exciting. I think in the press release, it was referred to as a guinea pig project for city-wide process reform. So looking at things like cutting red tape and trying out some new things that haven't been tried before. So definitely something that caught my eye. So some of the questions I was just thinking about is if the goal here is affordability, how are we balancing permanent affordability with temporary affordability?
- What are the building standards and design features that they're going to include there? If there's process improvements that are going to be made, how do we actually measure that and verify that? And are we actually getting measurable sustainability outcomes out of it? So next steps, not totally sure. It might be good to have a
- But more detailed discussion about this at the next meeting if that's something that people are interested in just to get you know we can maybe invite somebody you know knowledgeable on this to come in and sort of give us a briefing and get us caught up on it. But it might be a good opportunity for us to think about you know where we're going through the.
- the sustainability assessment report right now. This might be one way where we can kind of think about frameworks by which we look at things that are happening in the city to evaluate them on a sustainability spectrum. So yeah, where can we help? Where can we get involved? That's kind of what I'm thinking about that. So the other thing on this slide here is just
- City Council schedule, and I'm sure Council Member Rallo probably has more to say about this, but just they've been in summer recess for a little while, and that's coming to an end now. And over the next several months, August, September, and October, there will be a lot of sort of stages of the budget process playing out. So just something to kind of keep on everyone's radar. So before we move on here, maybe I'll pause for any quick questions, thoughts, especially about the Hopewell stuff.
- What was the cause of the strategy shift? Is that the previous administration versus this one, previous mayor anyway? I'm not sure. Do you guys have any insight on that? What was the question? It's kind of odd to say like, oh, we're doing a total shift in direction. Was it that the direction came from the previous mayor, and then this one has different interests? Do you know anything? But just curiosity. It's not interesting.
- So I think we have to be more realistic to as to what's feasible so I think they're just they've had to take a pause and and revise What the previous administration wanted to do, but I don't know these specifics about what they're looking for Whatever happened to that
- 10,000 unit development that there was somebody came in last year. It was like the Sudbury group. I think that was developing that. Is that right? I don't remember. Yeah, it's different with the city being. Yeah. Was that everyone moving forward? Yeah, I think it's still moving forward. Oh, I'm sorry. I think it was, and maybe Dave can add in, it was approved by council. And so it went to planning. And I'm not sure where it stands, but I'm assuming that it's
- still progressing, and it was going to be implemented in phases. I don't have anything to add. It was approved by council. I think it was subjected to all the material costs. Tara has her people. Oh, yeah. That's her. Go ahead. I guess I want to add maybe as part of the questions for our commission, if we have
- If there's data available about occupancy rates of things like existing property developments that have come in in the last few years, I know there's a lot of apartment buildings that are way over market rates, but are also seen as empty. We have data on that. I'm not asking for an answer right now. I just want to add that to our questions for the commission.
- The department to ask that question would be the housing and neighborhood development. OK, sure. Good. Yeah, Dave. Just to respond to Tara, this is the perpetual question. It's self-reported, so we really don't know what the occupancy of these developments are. But we've heard anecdotally, actually from people who work there, that some are as low as 30%.
- But they always maintain that they've got 80% plus the occupancy. So if anybody has ideas on how we can maybe get that a better idea, that would be very useful, I think. Is the way the data is collected bound by any code reasons? Or is it that's just how it's been collected? Are there legal?
- read limitations to how you're allowed to park the data? Yeah, there are. I mean, there are privacy concerns. And we're sort of stymied by those. So it's a good discussion maybe, Justin, for maybe as an agenda topic in the future.
- pick that apart a bit because it's certainly relevant. I'd like to follow up on this before coming on to the commission. I followed what was in the old Kmart site, Blooming Foods East, that development. And there were supposed to be gardens as well as family type housing. Although after it was built, I
- and starting to be occupied, I called to find out about the rentals. Because getting online, I saw that they rented by the bedroom. It made it way too unaffordable for a family. And that's not the way you would rent to a family. And so I followed up with one of the local reporters. And I think I might have asked Dave, I can't remember, to find out what happened between the time it was approved
- with council by the time to when it was actually constructed. And there is some kind of change that happened between that time frame. Something happened in planning to make that basically more luxury student homes. And that's a concern of mine that with anything that gets approved, that council approves it. They go through their process. We have no oversight into that.
- process. There's no one that knows. It's not being reported on. The reporter, I believe it was Dave Askins, I think I talked to and reached out to him. He wasn't aware of it. No one I asked was aware of this. So I think it's something we should keep in mind. As a commission, I'd love to have someone here come and tell us and give us updates about Hopewell.
- Yeah, so somebody in the Zoom chat actually, by the name of Eric, just posted a couple of links and said that the consolidated plans from hand include some housing vacancy info. So I will open up these links in my browser and send them to folks so everyone can take a look. But yeah. And as far as, I didn't quite get the name of the new members. Are they on the email?
- Is there an email that was out as far as an address to contact them? Yep. OK. So yeah, we've got the green building working group going. And we're doing this sort of little art bench garden project as an example of green building. But from the beginning here, and it's part of what I expressed in the interview to be on the commission, was an interest in affordable housing. And the main way of doing that is
- including ecological components and efficiencies as ways to generate revenue for the residents and lower the cost of living. So we'd be interested to do working sessions, the Green Building Working Group as well in direct relation to housing. And this Hopewell development is, being this city property,
- It's kind of a unique opportunity to shape how the city does something different than these default status quos that go along. It sounds a little bit like they're saying that we can't afford to do anything besides the basic standard. But that's something that sort of builds in these predatory systems with utilities and stuff. So I'd like to arrange that, and I'll send out
- an announcement, particularly to, like I said, I didn't quite catch the names of the two new people, but the one in the unhoused and housing sphere. Yep, that's Diana. OK, yeah, perfect. So it sounds like folks are interested in this. So I'll try to find something for our next meeting, get somebody to come in and talk a little bit more about it. And if other folks here have ideas about something specifically we could focus on, just let me know.
- Okay, great. So switching into sort of internal focus commission updates, just a couple things on here right now. First, just wanted to make everyone aware of some new sort of like legal obligations. Some of these are coming from the Indiana General Assembly from their most recent legislative session, which was effective as of July 1st this year. So one of them is that
- the commission members' names, their terms, and who appoints them has to appear on each agenda or notice that we send out. So that's not a huge change or anything, but something that you'll see on the agendas going forward. And then the other one that might be more notable is that all commission meetings have to be recorded and posted to the city's website now. So that includes working groups and things like this in the work sessions that we do. So we've got a work session coming up in a few weeks.
- and I'll just be planning to put that on Zoom or Google like we've done before and then just record the screen and make sure everyone's audio is recorded as well as part of that. But just want to make sure everyone was aware of that. And then the other one is I think more of a city specific thing. It's just that any formal statements of opinion that we put out as a commission like resolutions and things like that just have to have a disclaimer on their specific
- you know, piece of language that states that the commission does not speak on behalf of the city, that the views are our own, that sort of thing. Yeah. And then the other new thing from here for this meeting is the standard operating procedures, which I had talked about just a little bit at the last meeting, putting together some, you know, documents that could serve as sort of roadmaps for common things that commissioners do so that
- you know, folks know what the process is and, you know, so how everything works. So I put one of those together so far. I sort of came up with a list of various things that we do, and this is just to kind of guide those processes.
- You know, the first one that I wrote here is number three, curiously enough. It was just the third in my list, how to submit agenda items. So yeah, we can go to the next page. Thanks. So yeah, there's a screenshot of it. So if you want to submit an item to the agenda, take a look at this. I've got the link to this at the end of these slides, I think, and maybe on the previous slide. But there's just a folder in the,
- read-only Google Drive that we put together. We can send these things to you guys as well to put on onboard. So you'll find them there as we start to populate them. They're non-binding, so I don't think it's anything we really have to vote on. This is the way you have to do things. It's just best practices, basically. So yeah, if you want to submit something to the agenda, here's the instructions for how to do that, a few steps with some
- extra context there to walk you through the process. So give it a try next time you want to see something on the agenda. If part of that procedure seems confusing or just seems like too much red tape or something and it's slowing you down, let me know. That's definitely, you know, bureaucratic hurdles is not something that we want to introduce here. But hopefully it'll help, you know, especially, you know, for, you know, new commissioners and stuff that are onboarding to like
- get a good sense for how the commission actually functions. Yeah, so there's just a list of things that I've sort of come up with so far and some of them are just wisps of an idea. And if anybody wants to help write some of these too, let me know. Definitely would take the assist on that. Okay, good.
- Okay, commissioner focus areas, we've been starting to fill out this list week by week. So if you haven't picked an area that you're interested in making some progress on this year, let me know, send it my way. But we're starting to get some of those items filled out there. And again, this is not to corner people into you have to work on this specific thing, but just to give a little bit more structure and
- help to kind of grease the wheels a little bit as we think through things that we can do. And for the new commissioners here, don't feel like you have to have ideas ready to go onto this spreadsheet. It usually takes a few meetings to kind of get into the swing of things. But if you have something, send it my way. All right, upcoming meetings. So we've got a couple things.
- on the business side of things today. Our next meeting, we've got some tentative items there. So amendment to the BCOS bylaws, this is something that's sort of been like one meeting away for a couple meetings now. But as long as things like resolutions are coming up and bubbling to the surface, I'm happy to push back the bylaws stuff until there's time for it.
- So yeah, you can see a couple of the things on the agenda there. So what's not listed there is on the Hopewell discussion that we'll hopefully have. So that will be a fourth thing to add to that list there. But yeah, there's a couple of things that are probably coming down the pipeline that are just not scheduled for any particular meeting yet. Work sessions. The next one is July 29th. I booked the room at the library. We have it.
- We'll be recording it. And hopefully, I haven't confirmed this yet with Tara and Evan, but hopefully we'll be talking about the sustainability assessment report and maybe workshopping that a little bit. I know that's been sort of on deck for us to have a working session on. So if nothing else, that will be the topic at hand. Otherwise, we can just brainstorm stuff. Okay, we can move to the next slide.
- I think we're getting close to being done here, so we can move on to the good stuff. Okay, so we've got a resolution before us for our first reading today. So I just, and this is, you know, we passed our first resolution in a while back in December, but it was sort of a, you know, we were approving something that we had input into that process already. This is sort of the first resolution that we've had in a while where we're sort of suggesting a new policy or a policy change specifically. So, you know, good to do the two readings on this and,
- There's not a lot in the bylaws of exactly what first reading and second reading means. So there's some room for interpretation there. This is just what I think would sort of make sense. For the first reading, to have some sort of brief presentation from the sponsor, from whoever is bringing that resolution forward, just to give some context to it. And then we can have some time for a discussion, Q&A.
- Um, and then, uh, basically it'll just be a vote to advance it to the second reading. Um, so just a simple motion and a second, and then we'll just do a voice vote, um, for that. Um, so we don't have to worry about introducing amendments or anything. If you see some wording and you're like, no, I don't think we should word it like that. Uh, we don't have to make those changes now, although we can kind of discuss a little bit and brainstorm. Um, and, um, you know, just, just to make clear that, you know, voting to advance this to a second reading doesn't mean that you're
- you know, for it and you're in favor of it, although you may very well be, that all comes during the second reading with sort of the formal passage, right? So once we get to that at the next meeting, we'll have a motion in a second to sort of consider, you know, that resolution for adoption. And then that's when we'll have our discussion where we talk about the merits and everything and offer up amendments and that sort of thing. And then for that, we'll do a roll call vote for the actual adoption.
- on that resolution. So just to give a little structure to this process here. And I think I'm mostly going to skip this slide because I'll send some stuff. I'll send this out over email after once making amendments actually becomes more germane. So the last slide there that I have is just the typical resources slide. You can see I've added the BCOS
- The standard operating procedures link there. So that links to the folder that currently just has the one file in it. But hopefully soon we'll have more. OK, good. Any final questions for the chair's report before we move on to the next item? Yeah, Matt. Oh, thank you. I'll correct that.
- Accredits, forgive me. Okay, great. We'll go on to the Waste Management Working Group. Matt, do you have anything for us this week? Yeah, multiple things. We had an interest meeting at Unitarian Universalist.
- church on Philae and they're going to start adopting Bokashi. We have about 20 residents and they had a lot more that were very interested in and we're finding out that neighborhoods are good but faith groups are much better because they already have a leadership team and they want to care for the earth. For those, the new folks, Bokashi is fermentation of food waste. It's done in five gallon buckets compared to composting. It's
- On a scale of 1 to 10, it's like a 9, whereas composting is like a 4 or a 5. Because you do still, unfortunately, create methane, and you lose about 50% of the minerals and nutrients to the composting process. Bokashi is done in a 5-gallon bucket. It's anaerobic. It's a cold process. So you keep 90% to 95% of the minerals and nutrients. And once it takes two weeks to ferment in that bucket, you can put all your meat, bones, dairy, oils, all the things you can't put in traditional composting. And once it's fermented, you can then put it into a pit. And in three months, it'll be soil.
- So we already have partnerships with the Bloomington Community Orchard, partnered with the Taste of Bloomington and just went to the vendor meeting to figure that stuff out. And then all the food that's fermented from the Taste of Bloomington is going to Will Detmer Community Gardens to turn into food waste. So that's moving along. We are looking for volunteers for that. There are shifts of two, two and a half hours. I'll send out the
- link to sign up if you can volunteer. Otherwise, I've been at, I'm going with the Citizens Advisory Committee. I have been going to the
- farmers market two Saturdays a month is what I committed to. And I've been meeting various people, met the environmental science, AP, environmental science teacher at North, biology teacher at North, teacher at Montessori, and we already have pilots at four different schools. We're talking with the project school right now. We have Harmony, we did a two week at Templeton, and we have Marlin as well, so we're looking to expand into the schools. Even more so, these are like three to five year old kids that are doing Bokashi.
- on their own and figuring that stuff out. So we're really working on that culture shift. And then we're still looking to figure out who we're going to partner with for the next festival so that we can apply for the BCOPS Working Group Grant. I think I've mentioned this before. We're looking at Lotus in the Park and the Boys and Girls Club for 2026, the Strawberry Shortcake Festival. But we have a lot of other irons on the fire.
- Right now they're happening, and then July, the next Monday is the plan commission, and there are multiple UDO changes or additions. One of those is urban ag commercial, which will allow residents to not only, they're already allowed to have their own urban farm, but they're not allowed to teach on their own farm. You literally can't teach at a garden on your own property in the city. So that's one of the things on the agenda.
- I would encourage you, if something like that matters to you, to show up and make public comment that you are for. And if you're against that, say that you're against it. That's what the platform is for, to voice your opinion about the way that you want the city to go. When is that planning commission meeting? I think it's July 14th at 5.30 PM. OK. And then also on August 11th at 5.30 PM. It supplies to me.
- I had some things I could comment on it immediately because it affects me. And there's likely going to be proponents and non at that. And so I don't think that it's going to end up getting voted on and get pushed. But we'll see. Yeah. So with that, if they were to, say, approve that, then would it go to city council? It would go to city council. OK.
- So we could draft up a resolution for that case if it came before city council to say that we support that provision going through and why we support it. So yeah, something to keep an eye on. And definitely in a second, go to the Taste of Bloomington. They have the most vendors they've ever had, 51. And they're trying to break the 10,000 visitor mark. So if you have folks that are from outside,
- Monroe County invite them in because it's going to be an awesome event from 3 to 10 and people are putting a lot of work and it's the entire stretch of Kirkwood so it's going to be and open containers you can walk you can't go north and south you can walk all along Kirkwood with open containers which is without the college shoes which is pretty smart. We get one day. So 3 to 10 so please be responsible about that and there will be Bokashi will be featured there to
- expose that to residents, and whatnot. That's awesome. Awesome. Thank you. Those two events on July 14 and August 11 are what? Say that again. Plan commission. So it's a planning commission. They have to vote on all the proposed UDO changes or additions. And then once, if they vote yes on that, then they go to city council after that. Yeah. It's urban agriculture commercial.
- I could read you the numbers, ZO-18-25. It wasn't as easy to find online as what I thought it would be. But there are some things on those points, like operational standards, the definition, and soil quality that I have some questions about and doesn't seem to be very clear. So from the person who needs to know this, I just can't attend to those.
- those times. Yeah, there was the Joe Davis case of abatement with hand that kind of defined things as garbage that could seemingly characterize anybody composting in the backyard. But yeah, that's different. That's already in the code, and it's under the word putricible. Yeah, I've addressed that.
- Anyway. What is that word? Putressible? Putressible could be a log decaying in your yard, which then is actually building soil, because it could attract certain quote, vermin. So there's this lack of, this is something whenever I first joined the commission, I brought up, I think, just over a year ago, because there were some
- having attended those meetings, some of those meetings for the hearing, there were some inaccuracies there, and then the lack of definition, and some of those are not supportive of sustainable practices. And yeah, anyway, I could go into it, but I'm not going to take any more time off the agenda. Anything else, Matt? No, I could say a lot more, but I'm going to hold my tongue.
- Thank you very much. Okay, yeah, the next slide report here is the sustainability assessment report. Now I know we haven't had a chance to workshop this at all at a work session, but Tara, do you have anything on that front? Or Evan? Yeah, Evan shared his section of the assessment with me, so my plan is to consolidate those two documents and then we can, at the next work session,
- Hopefully do some tweaking and refining so that we could maybe put it on the agenda in August is my hope. Awesome. Or September if August is already full. I forgot one big thing, sorry. Yeah. Well, here, let's wrap this up. OK, that sounds good. Definitely looking forward to that. I'm good with that being the agenda for the working session. I can be at that session. Perfect. Excellent.
- Okay, Matt, one more second. The makesoil.org. I talked to Tom McGlasson of the Waste Reduction District. We had a meeting, a Zoom meeting with one of the representatives today. Makesoil.org, they have an app that allows people who already compost to partner with people who don't already compost. And this is something that when Joe Winio was on the commission, we were trying to create something and the Waste Reduction District has a Google Sheet where we've sent out surveys
- And we're trying to pair residents that are already compost with ones that want to compost, or at least not have their food waste go to the landfill. And so we had that meeting today. And it looks very, very promising. It's not cheap to have a subscription to it. But what residents can do, if we can popularize that, there's no cost for residents to do it. So they can just sign up at makesoil.org or download the app.
- and do that, and they can start partnering with each other. And if we can get enough residents signed up on that for free, then that will be more likely that the Waste Reduction District would fund that, or the city in the Waste Reduction District would fund that, seeing that buy-in already. But it is a fantastic platform. It's a way they can monetize on it. It's, yeah, it's just, they have the advertising, they have, yeah, it's just, it's what we've been looking for, but nobody's been willing to spend the money
- to build it out, and they're doing it, and so thank you for bringing that from Cincy, because Cincy's been doing that, and I think they have a $10,000 a year subscription, but that is pennies for what the results can actually happen. So please, if you haven't, download the app, check it out, sign up as a soil maker or a soil giver, I forget the exact terms, but it is there, and we need community members to actually
- join and start showing that there is support for that. Because when EarthKeeper shut down, what was the city getting? They're getting calls about what do we do now? And here's an answer that the city doesn't have to do anything with that we can say, go to makesoil.org, download the app, and sign up and find somebody that's already composting that's willing to take yours. Very, very simple. So we're looking for those solutions. Let's take action on it. That's it. Thank you.
- All right, Council report from Councilmember Rowe. Well, as you said, Justin, we've been on break, so I don't have much to report. But as you said, we do have budget hearings coming up in August. So I thought I'd mention that. Of course, we're the legislative body, and so we do things like pass laws, ordinances, and influence policy.
- a big role that we have is we oversee the budget and we have a number of days dedicated where the administration presents the budget to us and then we vote on it. So it's a good opportunity for people to see the workings of city government, various departments, the specifics about their work and projects and so forth, and of course the expenditures of the city. And the first meeting is generally reserved for the controller
- to give a kind of a broad overview of revenues, expenditures, debt obligation, and so forth. So anyway, those dates are, it starts Monday the 18th of August from 6.30 to 9.30. They're all 6.30 to 9.30. So Monday, August 19th, Wednesday the 20th, Monday the 25th, and then Wednesday the 27th.
- And this is probably going to be quite a new experience for us in many ways because the state legislature passed SB 1, which restricted taxation. And so our revenue stream is going to be affected. So I think it will be an important meeting to hear from the controller on how that's going to influence our budget.
- So that's all I've got. Great. Thank you. Thanks. OK. So that brings us to the local food resilience strategy, which is a discussion of topics not the subject of a resolution. You might have noticed if you're looking through the packet that there's some memos sort of prepended to some of these agenda items. We won't go through those memos here in the meeting.
- for you to read to get a kind of overview of what we're going to be talking about in the meetings and kind of, you know, sort of come prepped, you know, to think about that. So we can go straight to the slide deck that Jamie is going to present, which starts on page 23. Yeah, there we go. Perfect. Great. And you have the floor, Jamie. And actually, really quick, let me just, let's see, I want to make sure we're keeping track on time here. So we've got about 20 minutes for presentation and discussion.
- Great. That's what I was going to ask. All right. So I've been kind of working in this space and started going to some of the meetings that Dave had mentioned about 15 years ago. And it can be eye-opening. I would love more residents to go to see where our money goes. At that time, I'd also.
- started working and thinking of urban agriculture. So I'd moved into town, completely different life changed for me, and I was wondering, how am I going to feed my kids? And so going back to my grandparents and how I was raised and food security being what you had in the cellar and what you could raise,
- But also as informed by my experience of going through a natural disaster in San Francisco and the global created earthquake and not being able to open cans of food. And no electricity, gas lines broken, water lines broken. It was a disaster area and it took many months and to take a hot shower was like so amazing. We didn't have cell phones so we couldn't call family.
- So both of those things had a huge impact on me. Because I could see how it was a beautiful day, and there was no food to be had, even though we had a wonderful growing climate in San Francisco. So those things have continually informed what I do. So a friend and I, back about 15 years ago,
- first thought about the urban agriculture amendment and about a year and a half it took for us to go through do that work with planning and then for city council to go through and pass it and at the time we were the first city in the state to have an urban agriculture amendment so thank you um not long after that i was very proud of that accomplishment and working with others to to do that um and then
- About, you know, six months later, I'm like, you know, I, you know, we had a chicken ordinance had passed. There's a modification to that where everyone needs to get neighbors to sign off and approve. No broosters. We still have no roosters. And I thought, okay, you have to pay these fees. Well, that's a hardship.
- for many residents so maybe they can have permission to grow or if they own their home this is something for a lower income family or even child if the parents can't do this that they could have a great food source and a very nutritious food in eggs and those could be raised at home and if you know maybe barter trades or whatever that child might need to do so that also informed me because i was substituting at fairview and a few other schools and
- found that there was that need. The current state that we're in now, and with seeing we can move on to the next one. Thank you. We've had a lot of changes now, and the challenges that we face, yeah, we're on the right one.
- We see so many things. If we could go back to the other one, why food challenges we face. We're seeing immigration raids. These are disrupting the food sector at the national level. Although those were put on hold, there is no guarantee that they're going to stay on hold. So this could be meat packing plants.
- It can be farm labor in California. It can be a number of different things. We have many immigrants working in farms all over this nation. We're also seeing federal food programs like SNAP and the LFPA grant. There were two tracks which I mentioned previously. Those have been impacted and the LFPA grant program has been cut.
- We are not going to see any of these kind of more diversity type programs in the ag sector anymore. And this has already started impacting our local food banks in a pretty significant way.
- AI is something else we have on the horizon that's displacing jobs in the various industries and sectors. We're usually seeing it in service jobs, but we're also having threats in the medical for radiology where we're seeing AI being able to read, say, MRIs and pick up things that doctors can't.
- So there's a lot of things going on besides the climate disasters, which we've just seen another. We haven't recovered from Asheville where it's been a very difficult year for growing here in the state of Indiana as well. And we have this, a dollar that, it's a monetary system.
- And we've already had inching up. I've had to go back and redo this report and make changes because certain things have changed. So maybe the LFPA grants are completely gone, but one other has been re-, it was cut and then brought back for a short period of time just to finish off the year. So we're living in a time that's so incredibly volatile. And I know that in government it takes a while to have change.
- But I feel like we don't have that time. As farmer and grower, if you're talking fruit trees, it's even further along than that. That if we're seeing having folks call the alarm that we're going to have a recession starting this winter, and it could last a few years, we still don't know what's going to happen with interest rates and folks losing jobs right now.
- things are shifting. We've seen that even locally with IU at the state level. We're living in a really volatile time. And we can go on to the next one. We're seeing, we've already seen that there's sensitivities in the food system. So we've seen that with COVID and maybe that was just a warm up for what we're going to see.
- And I was able because I was a registered grower to go into like Johnny's Selected Seeds and buy some things in bulk and be able to get them to local people and have them packaged out. And I know that there are some few nonprofits nationally that do that to make sure that there's seeds for people to grow. Right now,
- you know, why now? Well, we have some of those I've mentioned, but some of this harkens back to, I know you've probably not read it, but the PECOL Task Force Report. Dave was one of the people that was involved with that, as well as a permaculture designer, and one of my teachers was also involved with that, so I'm very aware that
- You know, we have only about three days of grocery inventory because we go on an in-demand model. You know, it's just like order a t-shirt and it prints on demand. Well, it's a similar thing for our large-scale grocery stores and even somewhat our smaller ones. So our reliance on these just-in-time supply chains, you know, food supply chains, makes us be in a very vulnerable state.
- Um, and frankly that's, that scares me because we also have, um, we have a population and homeownership that's down to, I think it's on one of these others. That's, um, I have 40%. It's actually less than 40%. It's 36%. And we may need to verify this again by hand. There it is. Um, that means that we're going to have less, uh, ability to grow our own food unless it's at,
- in a public area. And even our garden spaces are quite small, and it's more kind of learning and hobby gardens than being able to actually supply food for our community or even an individual household. I mean, you'd be struggling even with one person. And I could go through and we could do the calculations together. But there are calculations where that could be done.
- So I've gone through and looked at all of these things. The farmland, there's city boundaries. So we want to reduce the ability or the use of fossil fuels to transport food into the city. So those things can then be assets to feed our community. The local food systems, I just gone through and talked about how
- that economics and food security is not really there. So harken back to many years ago and food sovereignty. We were talking about food sovereignty a lot about 15 years ago. And so this is where, you know, we may need to think about food sovereignty and the seed saving and what is going to grow here in our climate, even though
- we're having such hardships with so much inundation of rain. And what's been forecast is we'd have wet seasons and then dry seasons and those droughts. And we've already started experiencing them about 10 years ago in a significant way to where you try to dig down. If you could get your shovel in the ground, you couldn't find an earthworm, which means that everything's really hard compacted.
- So in permaculture, we have a thing that the problem is the solution. So if we have a problem, what are we going to look at in the solution? And in entrepreneurial ways, it's that you can see the opportunity. There can be a problem. Well, that problem is actually an opportunity. So I'm seeing this as an opportunity. So an opportunity to move possibly quickly
- So I've created this document, I've spent months on this to create a document that goes through looking at the food system because I'm really curious and like I said, I'm very concerned and worried about what the future holds. So in the risks we face, if you're wanting to know more about some of those economic instabilities, some of the references I've had, Ray Dalio, anyone look up Ray Dalio, he has a new book out.
- And he looks at debt cycles. We have Dow, we have FITS, we have Howe, Neil Howe talks about social orders and how generations are cyclical. And so both he and Dalio look at the cyclical nation of things, which is very much into like soil and how we renew ourselves. We'll go through, you know, there's more of that federal support ending.
- AI displacement. We're seeing it mostly in retail, but it's also happening in marketing as riders are being replaced. The medical I started to mention, but there's a few others that are being threatened. So this is not just a low, you know, lower income situation we're going to be facing. We're going to have some very highly trained people that are going to be facing these situations. And since Bloomington does have a lot of
- interest and investment in the medical sciences. This is something we need to think about. So here's a few of the climate extremes, floods, droughts, and storms. And then the tariffs and import disruptions. So fertilizer and processed foods, which as a health coach, trying to move folks off of processed foods for better health also just is better for our
- our environment for various reasons. Fertilizers can be imported in from whether that's Ukraine. And if anyone's been growing, then you knew that when all of the, you know, the invasion of Russia into Ukraine, we were not able to get phosphate or triple super phosphate, which is important for root development. The only way other to get that is actually through urine.
- So we, you know, really needing to look at, okay, where are our supplies and how can we move those to being local? So next slide. So where we stand now, we've had some really good progress in the past. We have a number of farmers markets, some of it was somewhat
- Difficult growth in that from some things that happened here locally, but we do have other farmers markets. We've had some garden expansion, so it was larger. It contracted a bit, but it's gotten larger again. And then we have more urban farms.
- than we had before in a few local orchards, but we don't have recent data for that. So the Bloomington Food Policy Council does have an old website that has a report that was created that talks about that. So also the challenge is that home ownership rate of really 36 percent, luxury development as we were talking already is sometimes displacing green spaces, but also is not
- putting in the sustainability type features of being having a resilient food supply. We have minimal food focused zoning and small animal ag is prohibited or very limited, which is why looking at those county areas that are right next to city borders is very important.
- And we talked about back in the PECOL Task Force Report and I think one of the other reports, the goal was 20% self-provisioning goals and we've fallen below that. We've not met that and it's been about 15 years. So how do we move forward? Well, we can look to what was adopted by this commission right before I joined and that was looking at the UN
- What is it called? UN Sustainable Development Goals. So SDG. So when we think about that, we can look at those and find that there are many that fit into sustainability. So the regional food system cooperation, since we need to cooperate with the county and
- You know, this would be also like Ellisville and other townships of where do they get their food? Well, it would be have to be grown in the county. We cannot grow our grains in the city. That's for sure. It takes way too much space and you know, we're not set up for combines and such. We also can't do animal husbandry and things like that within the city. So really looking at
- at some kind of cooperation, cooperative zoning, any kind of development grant-backed infrastructure before these grants go away for production, storage, and distribution. So that would be in partnerships. I've talked to Lost River Co-op and Paoli.
- and have been working with them on the Food is Medicine program, and they did apply for one of these grants, but it took two years for it to come through. So we need to be very aware that even though it may be an annual grant cycle, it may not fit, you know, we may not be getting those monies in the way how volatile it is now. I'd like to move forward on this as quickly as possible before those monies contract.
- We've made a lot of progress in urban agriculture, so looking at this development, which was mentioned earlier, Sudbury, that was placed in a food desert. The BFPC, Bloomington Food Policy Council, we did a look at this area and that was at that time a food desert. That was not something that council had been aware of or
- was reminded of so that was passed without any kind of look at the food system in that area although they did get you know a school added. So zoning for edible landscaping and food production and development so that would fit this sustainable development goal of climate action as well as responsible production. To build food hubs and cooperative infrastructure to make that food access and those points just like the co-op or the Bloomington
- growers cooperative on Kirkwood. They could also be possibly emergency collection points or distribution points because it's within a neighborhood.
- And then local seed banks. So this would be great to partner with libraries or schools. So schools do a lot of distribution and they have a large reach. So that say there's one nonprofit up in Northern Michigan and they were able to work with schools to get foods to the children and the children's family through their network and was able to raise money to pay the farmers instead of having the farmers donate. I think around here it was please donate.
- except the farmers need to keep the land and that cost. So that was SDG 2 and SDG 15. So we can go to the next.
- So the immediate opportunities for some of these grants, and this isn't all of them. I think there's what I found were three or four more than this, but this will give you an idea of the timeline. So the urban ag grants will close on August 15th, and that is something for equipment, outreach, and planning. That's something that we could apply for right away.
- All of these on the very right-hand column will tell you what it would help, you know, the funding would be for. So we could start to think about how this fits into a larger scale plan. Okay, I can go on to the next one, please. The immediate action that we talked about before in the spotting, I think,
- Others would be interested in this. And we really don't know, I don't remember why it was just only one flock size, but our lots are all different sizes. So to increase that availability of nutritious foods and the poultry waste, which can be, it's a very high nitrogen fertilizer. So there need to be some education for people to know how to manage this.
- But it may be, you know, a bokachi kind of thing could be integrated in somehow. That to look at the lots and then increase the amount of hens someone would be able to keep. That would greatly increase our proteins within the city.
- that we wouldn't otherwise have. This would align with the Sustainability Action Plan, the Peak Oil Task Force Report, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. And that would be the 2, 3, 11, 12, and 13. OK. Why don't we give you a high five for that? That's awesome. You're welcome. And the next one would be, this is the proposal. Yeah, so real quick, just before we move on to that, so for the report,
- that you've put together, and Jamie's put together a very detailed and well-researched report that I think is pretty much ready for people to take a look at, or maybe it will soon be. I have allowed some farmers and those at Bethel Lane Farm Stop, as well as a few other people. So if they have anything to add, they will have. And they work in various areas of that food system and are farmers, too.
- Um, so yeah, that's like 45 pages. So if you want to deep dive into this and most of it's going to be bullet points that will flow. So I'm sorry. Oh yeah. Um, yeah, so it is, it is a deep dive, like, like Jamie said, so, you know, we'll send that out to folks, um, so that you have a good chunk of time to peruse it at your leisure. And, um, you know, we can discuss certain aspects of it and stuff at, at the, at the next meeting and, you know, the, the,
- chicken resolution that we're looking at today is one of the recommendations that you made in that report, right? So yeah, I guess that's the only the intro that I have for that. So yeah, we can move on to the to the resolution first reading here. So if you want to give a quick introduction of like, you know, I mean, you kind of already did, but you know, why why these numbers and
- Anything extra you wanted to say about it in two or three minutes, and then we can have a very brief discussion before we move to a vote. Sure. Some of the urban ag, when past 10, 15 years ago, excluded mobile home parks, which planning is adding in. So I'm really happy about that. Since that time also, we have agri-villages, and this is something that we may have more of.
- But mobile home parks could possibly also be agri-villages because they are already a cohesive neighborhood. Some of them are 55 plus here in town as well. And this is something that could allow the expansion even if they are not, you know, individual really small lots or really large lots will allow
- all as many people as possible to be able to help sustain themselves and create a more resilient community. Because sustainability can be great, but it's almost assuming that everything's going along just the way it always is. But unless we can flex with all the bumps, and we are experiencing a lot of bumps right now in all these different areas of life,
- that this is one way to help us get to get through those bumps, to continue to be sustainable and go back to things we want to do rather than just, OK, let's do this. It's the jolts. We've got to find a way to get through the jolts. Can you scroll down a little bit with the therefore clauses?
- Yes, there's a couple sections to it. Yeah, it's the scaling up based on lot size is section one and then the agri-villages and mobile home parks that Jamie was just mentioning is section two. And then the section three. Yeah, do you want to say anything about section three? Well, it's part of that for resilience and sustainability goals that we already have an action plan. And the commission has been very active in other areas that the past
- few years and not since the farm stop has been, I think, off the ground on Kirkwood, have we really looked at the sustainability of our food supply. And so going back to the sustainability action plan and then, of course, the PECOL Task Force report and aligning them with what we said we were going to do with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
- And this will help you find which ones those are, two, three, 11, 12, and 13. All right, so we've got a few minutes for any thoughts or discussion. Again, the bulk of the discussions and suggesting specific changes and things can happen next meeting. But just food for thought, that's going to be good for the rest of the commission as we think about this over the next month.
- Yeah, sorry about that. Yeah, I have two related questions. So the lot size refers to the full size of the property lot, not like the part of the property that doesn't have a house on it, right? Right. It is the complete lot size. And then there are, just like there are now, there will be setbacks. And there are setbacks for all of those. Yeah. And so it's just ex- OK, I guess that's my other question.
- Yeah, I'm sorry. There are regulations about like distance from property edge. So it's it's square footage minus those distances. No, it would include. I'm thinking that would include those distances and then that 10 feet or 15 feet or so with the buffer would you would set it in
- inside of that. Can I jump on that? Yeah, sure. So yeah, so the lot size is the entire lot size including up to the sidewalk, right? But then there's rules that you have to have a setback from how far the chicken coop or run has to be from there. So yeah, so it would be the actual entire lot size is how you would qualify. So I guess that's my question is that if these numbers
- I don't know a ton about chicken farming. Are these numbers sufficient to have a coop that would be large enough for this? Yes. With those easement rules? Yes. And 5,000 square feet, I just looked it up, is the size of a basketball court. So it's more than large enough to have a house on and have a flock of five, because you don't need a lot of space for a flock of five.
- No area measurements in football fields. But there are square footage requirements about your run size as well based on the number of birds. Correct. That's really what my question is about, is about the run size. Yeah, I think it's, I forget, 20, 25 square feet per chicken, something to that extent. But it's very, very reasonable and people that have the larger lot size have plenty of room to have the larger runs.
- All right, Council Member Aralo had his hand raised and then John. Yeah, well, I mean, I think that this follows really. Well, first of all, let me say, I want to thank Jim for this because it's needed updating for many years. I was the sponsor of the original chicken ordinance in 2006. And it was quite controversial because people couldn't conceive of it.
- The controversy died down and I haven't heard of any problems since then. But that said, I think before the council would adopt something like this, we'd probably engage the hand department and animal care and control just to see if specific to the flock size and see if they have sufficient
- staff and staff time in order to, because they're concerned about humane treatment, of course, and making sure the code is followed. But I don't really anticipate any problem. I just think that it's something to kind of open up lines of communication before it's adopted as an ordinance. But I think this is a great way to go because building resilience for the community, this is a year-round protein source for people.
- And I think that the fox size today has been insufficient. It's been too small. So I really like it. I think this makes sense that the hinging on lot size as it is just essentially extends that five number for small lot and adds birds relative to the size of the lot. I think that's completely logical and I think
- I would expect it to be supported, but anyway, we'll see about that. But this is a really good resolution, thanks. I can add something. I had a few years ago, since I worked on that chicken ordinance too, that when I called animal control to
- I think it was two, three years ago. To see how things stand, I periodically will call. And most of their calls and complaints are for dogs or something else. It's definitely not for chickens. So that was a concern at the time that this was passed, that there would be a lot of overhead, but there really wasn't. Yeah, that's a good point. John? Just glancing at the document, it looks like in some places it says chickens and sometimes it says hens.
- Are roosters free prohibited? Yes. Yes. Okay. Good. You can have a hundred hens, but if you have one rooster, it's a whole different thing. And this is, this is something I- I can do to them don't. This is something that because you can't have an ongoing flock with fertilized eggs and no hens, that there's, that, that isn't really sustainable.
- Either unless we have this cooperation with the county and we have somebody who's willing or a few different folks and this is where the problem is a solution. It can be a business opportunity for someone who wants to, you know, sell more chickens or something. Something else was in mind and now I can't remember what it was. So I'll let go of the floor. I would see any discussion about urban research very separate.
- What I'd experienced is that without the broosters, that I've tried this twice with hens and one of my hens would act as the brooster and it was not even a pleasant type crow. I'm putting this hen in my back shed and I eventually, you know, I couldn't work at home with it. It would have been much better to just have the rooster than a hen that was wanting to be the rooster because there was
- you know, an imbalance there. So anyway, most people probably don't know about that, but it does sometimes happen. And you can either cull them. So we do have, as part of the ordinance now, where we can butcher our own chickens. So that eliminates that. In seven years of chicken husbandry, we have not experienced that. I'm glad. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. Councilmember Morello, and then we'll move to the... Thanks. Something I forgot to add.
- Back in 2006, when I was bringing this forward, there was the specter of bird flu. And people were throwing that up, which was really kind of a spurious thing at the time. But it scared a lot of people. And I actually had to go to the hospital and get infectious disease experts to sign an optimal letter to say it wasn't any more of a risk than backyard bird feeding. The real danger are these big CAFOs.
- Like the one in Jackson County where they had to do this mass slaughter because there are so many purges you can find to a small area. So to me, this is the antidote for that. But I just want to put that forward in case you all hear any rumblings about that because I had to do some work to convince people that wasn't an issue. I do just want to note the time and I do have one announcement to get to. Perfect, yep.
- Great. OK, so yeah, so we'll move on to the vote here. And again, this is just the first reading. So this is just a vote to advance this to the second reading at the next meeting where we can introduce any amendments that people want and discuss a little more thoroughly. So do I have a motion to, I guess, not to adopt? Motion to vote on first reading. Motion to advance. Yeah. Motion to advance. There you go. OK, we'll call it zero. Do I have a second? Second. OK, perfect.
- Okay, we'll just do a voice vote for this. So all in favor, aye? Aye. All opposed? Aye. All opposed, nay? Any abstentions? Okay. I will note that I did not consider that an abstention. Okay, great, so that advances to the next meeting and we'll pick it up for formal adoption at the next meeting.
- So thank you, everybody, and thank you, Jamie, for this. And it was trans chickens, roosters, stud farms, and a solution to the price of eggs. All right. And on that note, we'll move on to the next agenda item, which is report from staff liaison. Thank you. And I just want to say thank you to everybody for all of your hard work. You guys are doing amazing.
- work in our community, and I really appreciate it. And I appreciate Justin's work on all of the agenda items and presentation slides. You're doing a great job, Justin. So I really appreciate that. Very well organized. I think the best I've ever seen because organized. So thank you. So I have a good announcement. So the city of Bloomington has been selected to move forward on a grant proposal that we submitted for the municipal investment fund.
- We are anticipating being awarded $250,000. You might remember that I asked because to be a part of the proposal letter and to sign off that you would help to promote our proposal. So the proposal was to hire an engineering design firm and a financial consultant to provide free technical assistance to building owners and developers so that if they have ideas for solar or energy efficiency projects,
- That team would go in and do the design analysis and financial analysis and provide that to them. The funding will also pay for developing an energy navigator program. So we would need volunteers from the community to be a part of this volunteer group that would go door to door explaining to residents the benefits of energy efficiency and renewable energy. And another part of the grant program is to
- contract a consulting firm to conduct an EV charging study for our community so that we know where the best locations are for EV charging stations. 50% of the funding needs to be spent in LIDAC, low income and disadvantaged communities. And so I wanted to put that on your radar. It's something that we're going to need a lot of help with. And so the goal of this program is to provide
- the organization that's managing this grant, there is Coalition for Green Capital and ICLEI, two different organizations that are managing this program, but to provide a list of projects that we want to see implemented in Bloomington and to bring private capital to Bloomington. And so there's $2 million that will be allocated. They're going to select 10 different plans to provide up to $2 million for low-cost capital.
- If we're not selected for one of those 10 projects, we still have our list of projects, and we're going to be asking private investors to come into Bloomington to help fund those projects. So it's a lot of work in a short amount of time. We only have six months to complete all of the work. So I just want to put that on your radar, and I'll be asking and begging for help. Yes? I have a question. So for clarity,
- So 50% of the grant monies are to go to low-income neighborhoods. Is that for the EV chargers? It's not to implement any projects. It's that we are going into those communities. We're asking them, what type of projects do you want to see in these census tracts? If there's a multifamily unit that is interested in solar and energy efficiency for those buildings,
- We have our free technical assistance program to go in, design those things, tell them how much it would cost, and that project will be on our list. So 50% of the planned projects need to be within a LIDAC census tract. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. I think Bloomington, the city of Bloomington or Monroe County should be its own utility.
- get off Duke, and then we can hold IU's feet to the fire, and then otherwise micro grids. We should look at micro grids, which could be neighborhoods fully self-sustainable with their own power generation. If you have batteries in there, they'd be much more sustainable to the disasters that are going to happen. So we have a multi-family unit that serves all residents. They can be a part of this. And batteries. This is the amount of funding that we need.
- So for the installation, so that's for the design. For the installation, does the city have how much grant monies would there be to make sure that these are installed? So this would be private capital that we're trying to bring to Bloomington. So it's not city-funded projects. It would be the building owners that would be applying for this capital. So the financial analysts will let them know, what is the return on investment? What does this look like?
- and for developers, too. So it's exciting. It's a lot of work. And so if the Hopewell development was made truly affordable, it would be one of those low-income disadvantaged communities, senseless tracks, and would be a way to shore up the funding that seems to be an issue with Hopewell, which is right on the B line. People could go without cars and yet have renewable energy.
- So that will be proposed to the developers of Hopewell. This project is here. We've got the free financial or free technical assistance available if you're interested. So yeah, it's really exciting. So we're competing with 52 other entities that have been selected for this program. Yeah, exciting. I don't have anything else.
- So let us know if there's anything specific we can do to help with that. But otherwise, folks can share. Is it on the website? Like posted to the website yet? I haven't posted anything yet because we don't have a signed contract yet. So I'm not going to post anything or do anything extra until the money is. So we've partnered with Indiana Energy Independence Fund. They're sort of serving as our fiscal sponsor. So until that funding is there, we're not going to.
- announce anything or do anything so I just wanted to put that on your radar that that it is coming that you know we have to submit a lot of different forms and have the contract signed so it's going to be a little while but it's it's on its way. I will keep you updated.
- Because then we can help with the outreach because the time frame is so short, too. It is so short. We have six months from the time we start to finish. So it's kind of crazy. Yeah. Jolie went to a meeting, too, and we're like, we're ready to go. Deep breath. Yeah. Yes. It's going to be a heavy lift, but it's going to be worth it. Yeah. Awesome. Well, thank you for that report. OK, that brings us to 730. So do I hear a motion to adjourn?
- And a second. All in favor say aye. All opposed nay. Okay the ayes have it. So we're adjourned at 7 30 p.m. Thanks everybody.