- I usually start these things on time. I am one minute late today getting started, but
- I'll give you just sort of a snapshot of what's going on in the city and then I have
- my colleague Tim Street here who is with Parks and he'll give you a little bit of an update
- about what we're excited about in the Parks Department and then we really facilitate these
- based on what you're interested in hearing. So it's a free for all in terms of questions
- and the only sort of rule of engagement here is just to honor the fact that we have several
- people who may be wanting to answer questions and, hey Terry, and so just if we do end up
- filling the crowd here, just be respectful of other people who may want to ask some questions.
- So let me get my list of updates here for you. The first thing I want to talk about
- is the storms that we've just experienced. We've had a lot of rain in the past several
- days and the great news is that while we have been really soggy in Bloomington, we've had
- a lot of the work that we've been doing over the past several years to do storm water mitigation,
- especially as we're looking at climate change and the impacts of the rapid ground water
- movement that we get. That storm water mitigation is really doing its job. So I know we have
- some residents with some wet basements and some other sort of hassles, but we did not
- see the massive flooding on Kirkwood that we have seen in the past. Likewise, we have
- had lots of flooding on the south side, sort of down near Switchyard Park. We even had
- someone swept away in a car a couple of years ago during the June storms and so we're really
- pleased with that and my thanks goes to CBU, the utility for all of the planning that they're
- doing with storm water, but also for the 60 employees of CBU who've been working since
- Wednesday on making sure that all of the grates are cleaned in the street and maintaining
- all of the inlets and making sure that our plants are surviving all of this storm water
- well. I want to talk a little bit about community safety. The first update is that how many
- people here live in this neighborhood or in District 2 generally? One, two, ish. Okay,
- so I'll leave things that are just pertinent to this area for later if we have time. The
- good news is we have our statistics in from last year. Our violent crime went down 24.3
- percent last year, so that's a pretty incredible statistic. Our police department is getting
- to the place where we're nearly fully staffed, and importantly, what that means is that we
- can get back to doing community policing. Of course, we have a robust social work team
- there now at the police department, which is awesome, yes. We really have some of the
- most forward-looking and forward-thinking policies that are available. My thanks to
- our downtown resource officers that are part of the police, but also our downtown ambassadors.
- They work through community and family resources department. The other thing I want to update
- you on related to policing is that we are looking at 714 South Rogers Street, which
- is the large concrete building at the corner of ... It's about first in Rogers. That was
- part of the old hospital site acquisition, so part of Hopewell. We have wanted to preserve
- the building, both to be good stewards to our earth, but also to be good stewards of
- our tax funds. As we have looked at it, it is really clear that it would make a great
- police department. Our police department is very cramped right now. It also is in a building
- that continues to flood, although it did not this past weekend, and really has some major
- issues of accessibility, and also having a welcoming feel, especially when we are getting
- people who are victims of crimes. Let me also update you on the fiber network installation
- that we are doing. I put out a press release on Friday. Did that go out, Desiree? The subcontractor
- that was working on that installation, and this is for our digital accessibility, so
- high speed internet everywhere, the subcontractor went bankrupt, and so they are no longer on
- the job, and the meridian who we have a contract with is working on replacing that subcontractor.
- We do want to see the installation complete so we can get fiber everywhere in the city,
- and we also know that AEG, TrueLine, they changed their name midway through. They really
- had some challenges. Residents had some challenges with them, and so we are looking forward to
- putting together a great network, getting it fully operational, and working with a subcontractor
- that can really put our properties back the way they were when we found them and improve
- safety on the job sites.
- Trades district, you may have also heard that we had some vandalism at the trades district
- last week. That is very disappointing. Every dollar that is spent to repair things at trades,
- things anywhere that is due to vandalism is money that can't be spent helping meet basic
- needs and doing other things for the community. I'm disappointed in that. We are working with
- the forage and others to make sure those repairs get made. I really just want to encourage
- Bloomington to use your powers for good. If there is a challenge and you want to talk
- about whatever problem you are having, happy to be part of the solution and we are really
- trying to be an outlet at the office of the mayor for creative problem solving throughout
- our city.
- We are excited about the CCC grant. That's the campus community collaboration grant that
- came through Lilly. That is helping with the trades district. All the funding went to the
- university and then it is being used to really build a tangible partnership between the campus
- and the students there and the commercialization that is going to come out of the university
- and be used to help our economy here and especially help with innovation.
- And finally this Thursday April 10th at 6 p.m. we will be dedicating the new art installation
- at the trades district which is titled OT 987 and so the public is invited to join us
- at that community celebration. I'm going to let Tim make a couple of happy
- notes that are directly owned by the parks department but I will just note that Kirkwood
- is closed which means it's open for pedestrians now and open for outdoor dining and we did
- that just in time for the weather to change briefly but we're looking forward to summer
- days of enjoying Kirkwood together. And I'm going to turn things over to Tim in just a
- second. I just want to recognize a couple new members of our team. Keisha is here. She's
- waving to you. Keisha joined office of the mayor today. Do you want to stand up and tell
- us your role, Keisha?
- What did you say your title is? Community engagement director. I think that's it. I do, so you
- can reach them at call the mayor's office, you can leave a message. Today is my first
- day, so everything is kind of getting settled in. Yeah, you can definitely send me an email
- to work. Our new staff are available only for one-way communication today. You can't
- ask her any questions, but she can tell you what she knows. And then we have Lucas who
- is here, maybe a familiar face. Yeah, so my name is Lucas Gonzalez. I work on the communications
- team for the city, so I'll be working very closely with Desiree. Before this, I worked
- with Desiree, WFIU and WTIU, so a little bit of a different change-up for me, but I'm very
- happy to be serving the community that I love. Awesome. And for those who haven't met Margaret,
- my assistant, she's back here, and Desiree is our communications director. And I'm going
- to turn things over to our parks director, Tim Street, who can always upstage me with
- all of the fun things Parks is doing. All right. Welcome. As the mayor said, my name
- is Tim Street. I have the great privilege of being the director of our great parks department
- here in Bloomington, and it is basically our job to make Bloomington a great place to live,
- or to help make Bloomington a great place to live and enhance our quality of life through
- our parks and trails and programs and all the things that we offer. So tonight was an
- opportune meeting to join. One, because we're here in the Banneker Center, which is a great
- community resource that we operate for this neighborhood and beyond. Some great things
- happen here. And two, we're right at the cusp of launching so much of our season. We get
- a little bit quieter over the winter in terms of programming and things like that, but just
- this past weekend we had our first farmers market and we had, gosh, a thousand people
- come out despite the rain, which was really wonderful. We've got the highest number of
- vendors and artisans we've had in a number of years. I'm really excited about the momentum
- of the market and the way that that's been going. It's really positive. It's a really
- wonderful slice of Bloomington and beyond. We would have opened the Griffey Lake Boathouse
- this weekend had it not been underwater, but no launching boats because the boat ramp was
- underwater. But again, no damage. We're very thankful. We have a little bit of cleanup
- to do after the weekend rains and everything like that, but for the most part everything
- tends to be okay. I'll just update on a few projects and things we have going on right
- now. We're in the midst of completing a slew of accessibility projects funded by the final
- ARPA dollars available to the city that we budgeted in 2024. So some things you might
- hear or see about with that is we're getting ready to do some improvements to the building
- trades park. This park is from 1949, so it's one of Bloomington's older parks. It is a
- previous quarry. And some of the amenities, especially the accessibility, things like
- that are a little dated and in need of an update, especially with the Hopewell neighborhood
- going in across the street. So I'm excited that we're going to be tearing down the old
- wooden ramp that was providing some accessibility and is getting a bit decrepit and putting
- in a new accessible path north-south from 2nd Street to Howe Street, adding a new more
- accessible shelter, tearing down the old one, which if you've looked at it, it starts
- to have a little bit of a lean. So we're ready to decommission that one. So that's going
- to be starting probably the end of this month or early next month. At Switchard Park, we've
- been working with the community council on accessibility to add our first tactile map,
- which I'm really excited about. This is a map for park users who have visual impairments.
- So it is a map that, one, everyone can use. So it has, just like a regular map, it's printed,
- it has colors, it has everything, but it also has braille and it also has textures that
- you can feel. So we'll have a map of Switchard Park going in in May, which I'm very excited
- about. We've been working on new accessible doors at this facility at the Frank Southern
- Center at the Allison Jukebox building and coming soon to the Twin Lakes Rec Center.
- So new push button entry doors for accessibility. I mentioned farmers markets. One other big
- thing we have going on is we're working on our five-year master plan. And so you will
- probably be hearing more about this coming up. Our department, like most in the state
- and many beyond the state too, operates on a five-year master plan. So every five years,
- we sort of pause, we take a step back and we really engage with the community to find
- out what is it our community needs from the Parks Department. You know, every week I get
- a lot of requests. We need more fill-in-the-blank, pickleball, soccer, just blank space, you
- know, you name it. A lot of people have different things that they really want to see from the
- Parks Department. And while I wish we could just do them all, that is not our financial
- reality, nor is it responsible for us to. So just this past week, we engaged in a bunch
- of focus groups with community members to begin that process. We had five focus groups.
- Over this year, we're going to be doing a statistically valid community survey about
- a needs assessment for our system. And then we'll have some other engagement opportunities,
- an open house about the master plan. And this is sort of a process that runs throughout
- the year and that we take back to our Board of Park Commissioners to adopt. And it really
- sets our main goals and our investments and our priorities for the next five years to
- come for the City of Bloomington. We do have a particular focus this time around on financial
- sustainability. Our Parks Department, like many out there and like many municipalities,
- we have a lot of aging facilities. We're lucky in the last five years to have some amazing
- new things like Switchart Park and now Hopewell Commons. But we recognize that we need to
- have a really important focus on how do we sustain the things that we have in a really
- quality fashion for the community. So, for example, our two pools are from 1957 and 1963,
- I think. Those are pretty dated, the ice arenas from the 1960s. We know that these, the longer
- we go and defer maintenance and things like that, the more expensive it's going to be
- to take care of them. So our plan this year is really going to focus on how do we maintain
- the quality of our parks that our residents have come to expect and our trails and all
- of our program offerings well into the future, you know, beyond our time here in Bloomington.
- And I'll just, lastly, just mention a few other projects we have going on. We're closing
- in on getting a bid packet ready for our power line trail. This is actually one of the city's
- bicentennial projects back from 2018 that had some delays in implementation, but this
- will build a new trail running west from Switchyard Park along the tall power lines that you see
- here. It'll actually pick up a connection to RCA Park and the new Habitat Osage community
- along the way, and then the summit district development that is to come in the future
- will extend that trail out towards Weamer Road. So the B line is a really great recreational
- and transportation spine for our community, and the more we can connect people to that
- via walking, biking, rolling, whatever it might be, the more we can help with problems
- like traffic and climate change and things like that as well. So that's a great project
- coming up. And then lastly, I'll just mention Hopewell Commons. So as part of the city's
- overall effort at Hopewell, there was a desire to build a vibrant common space to function
- as basically social infrastructure for that neighborhood and for the city, a place for
- people to gather, to connect, to be together, to provide green space for those future houses
- or whatever type of living it ends up being. And we're really lucky to have this new one-acre
- park right off the beeline. So if you are in the downtown, just south of downtown area
- in the vicinity of the Seminary Square Kroger and you look west, you'll see Hopewell. It's
- along the new University Street, which will be opening probably sometime in the next month
- or so. But the park itself is already open. You can come in. There's a lawn space. We
- have temporary pickleball courts set up there to help activate the area. And it's a really
- fantastic area with a lot of great design features, like wood sourced basically from
- here in Indiana and kiln dried here in Indiana. It's a permeable pavers that help with stormwater
- penetration. It's a really great modern designed facility that I hope will provide a lot of
- recreation and connection for years to come. We're going to take questions. If you have
- a question and you're willing to come up to this microphone, that is how folks at home
- can hear what the question is. If you're not comfortable doing that, there are two options.
- We have some note cards so you can fill out your question. I'm happy to read it over the
- microphone. Or as long as it's not too verbose, if you want to ask your question from your
- seat, I'm happy to repeat it into this microphone. So those are the options. And while you're
- thinking about or writing down questions and coming up, I'll give a couple of other updates
- that you may be interested in. Part of the reason we may not have a huge crowd here is
- because our election board is also meeting tonight and they'll be meeting again to take
- a final vote. They are considering doing vote centers. And in order to implement vote centers
- in Monroe County, the election board has to have a unanimous vote. And vote centers allow
- people no matter what your precinct is in Monroe County, you can show up to any of the
- vote centers. And so, for instance, we heard from folks at the meeting tonight that lived
- way out in Unionville, but they work downtown and they don't get off of work until 530.
- A person like that and have daycare drop off ahead of that. A person like that could leave
- their work at 530 and go straight to a downtown vote center and get there in time. A person
- who may be a new voter or whose precinct area changes or their voting precinct changes, they
- can pick any of the voting areas. And we have had a number of students especially show up
- at the Union trying to vote, but they don't live in the precinct where that actual precinct
- voting center is. So a county vote center, and there will be multiple county vote centers
- if they approve, you can pick any one. And so you can go close to home, close to work,
- close to school, you can go in the middle of the day, et cetera. And so as one of my
- priorities is to get voter engagement up and the bare minimum is to get people to vote.
- So anything we can do to remove barriers to voting is a bonus and your voice is needed
- at the next vote center meeting or you can write to the election board. It's the county
- election board. So it's the vote center or the election board meetings are available
- online through the county website. You can find them there. You can also go in person
- to their meetings. They happen at the county courthouse, which is the building that's in
- the center of our square between 6th and Kirkwood, Washington or Washington College and Walnut.
- So that was long and still nobody's at the at the microphone. Yeah, Don.
- Why are vote centers even an issue? It doesn't seem to me that that's, I mean, I'm a little
- bit out of it, but why is it even an issue?
- Yeah, so the question is, why is it even an issue? Well, you didn't introduce yourself,
- so I'm not going to do it for you because maybe you want to be anonymous. But I am not
- sure what the opposition to vote centers is. I was not able to stay long enough to hear
- the end of the discussion tonight, but it is a bipartisan committee. I don't think voting
- should be a partisan issue. It's just about participating. But I would, if you want to
- know, I would encourage you to engage with the folks on the election board.
- I mean, we want everybody to vote, but a lot of people will say, "Oh, I had to work." So
- maybe it's just a good idea to take every excuse away.
- I do think we need to make it as easy as possible for people to vote.
- Now, the old Napa building downtown has operated as a vote center for a good while. I know
- that city.
- It's county. It's county. It's county-owned. So the comment is the old Napa building. Well,
- those of us who've been here a long time call it the old Napa building, but it's at Third
- and Walnut. That has operated as the early vote center. There has been no election day
- vote center. So if you want to vote at that place, you have to be in that precinct on
- election day. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the proposal is to have a number of vote centers all over
- the county. Yeah. So people wouldn't even have to come downtown if it passes. And I
- didn't want to hijack the meeting with vote centers, but I'm happy to continue talking
- about them. The other update, and you can think about more questions, more topics, is
- that we are in the middle of, well, we're at the very beginning stage of city and place
- branding initiative that helps us tell the story of who we are in Bloomington and helps
- us welcome everyone to Bloomington. And so there is a website up now called and you go
- to WeAreBloomington.com and you can give us some information about what you love about
- Bloomington, what makes Bloomington Bloomington for you. We're trying to get all kinds of
- voices into this process. There will be more public input as well, but that website's already
- up now. Come on. All right. Thanks, Steve. Break the ice. And if you're willing to introduce
- yourself, that's how we can help build community. My name is Steve Layman. Don's my great-grandpa.
- Okay. So I was going to ask, I know last fall you had an event at 11th and Adams to announce
- a new daycare and residence area. And so my question is, is where are we at on that? And
- I think I told you this most exciting thing I've seen come out for a long time. It's really
- awesome. So this is a project to do a daycare that is, it's an education center, and it
- is up at about 11th and Monroe. It's more like maybe 12th and Monroe. That is a project
- technically owned by the Bloomington Housing Authority. It is very exciting. First of all,
- we don't have nearly enough daycare spots available in Monroe County or in the city
- of Bloomington. This is right near a bunch of housing where people live that need daycare.
- And having daycare really close to your house is really important. It will be affordable,
- and it'll really be just fantastic opportunity for that neighborhood and for the city in
- general. Sorry, you want to ask where we are in the project? So I haven't been up there
- probably in seven days, but they were moving a lot of dirt and putting concrete in the
- ground. So it's moving. Oh, okay. Oh, from Community Kitchen Express, yes. It's about
- a block and a half away from there. Yeah, Terry. I know it's infant to three or four,
- and I don't know about the cost of it. But that, again, is a Bloomington Housing Authority.
- So while it has Bloomington in the name, it's a different organization. We just happened
- to provide some funding to it, but it's... Separate. Yep. That's right. Yeah, but still
- not enough daycare. Yeah. And really, when a community doesn't have enough daycare and
- does not have enough affordable daycare, we really are keeping people in poverty. It can
- cost more to put a child in daycare than what you're going to end up netting in your job.
- And at a time when we really need people working, if a parent is able to work and wants to work,
- we want to make that daycare accessible to them. Yeah. So we are happy to get back to
- you with lots of information. Again, it's not a City of Bloomington project. I am excited
- about it. The City did provide some funding, but that's a BHA project. So if you gave Desiree
- contact information and you're asking about this, we can circle back with you about that
- project. I'd like to claim it because it's one of the coolest things happening. You're
- right. It's called the Early Learning Center. Can you look that up while we're talking?
- Go ahead. I have more of a couple of brief comments than questions, one of which does
- relate to parks and rec. That one is that I have ridden my bicycle out to the Cascades
- Park, which I believe is a city park rather than a county. I do not feel it would be any
- advantage to me as a biker to have the roads cleared, closed off. It would not help me
- one bit. However, it would make it more difficult for handicapped people and for people who
- are trying to bring in picnic supplies. My other comment, as I was going downtown today
- on my bicycle, I went by a food truck creating huge amounts of noise with its generator and
- spewing toxic fumes and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. We should not be at -- supporting
- - administratively supporting food trucks in Bloomington. We should try to discourage
- that. Thank you.
- No. I mean, that ship has sailed. Yes.
- Hi, Corey Hawkins. This is kind of off the heels of what Tim said about failing infrastructure.
- We're here at the Banneker, and if you look around, you might notice that it's failing.
- So the Banneker is more than just a building. It's a living, breathing monument to black
- history and a critical third place for marginalized communities in Bloomington. So what specific
- measurable investments is this city making in this place? One of the places that not
- only historically has preserved kind of the integrity of the black community and other
- marginalized communities here in town, but also currently meets the needs of black LGBTQ,
- low income marginalized communities as they're being attacked across the country.
- Sure. I'm happy to talk about that a little bit. And I see that Kevin, who is our Banneker
- director, has joined us in here this evening. But yeah, as I mentioned, the Banneker is
- a really important and great community asset. And third place, absolutely. You know, from
- after school programs to I stopped by here the other day and on the third floor, the
- weather was crummy and there was like four or five different moms with their infants
- using the third floor. There's a podcast library, there's teen engagement, there's a whole lot
- of things. As a historic building, it is a challenge. And it is a challenge that we're
- constantly facing with how do we keep up with this? How do we maintain the historic standards?
- And how do we also make sure that it stays usable? A lot of that strategically going
- forward is about picking our battles and making sure we're making decisions to set us up for
- sustainability long term. In terms of the building itself right now, there are a few
- things going on. One of the advantages of having a historic building and serving the
- populations that we serve here is it tends to be eligible for a lot of different types
- of grants. And so we're able to go beyond our funding just for the city and find other
- ways to help fund improvements to the building. So we did receive this year a designated historic
- places grant from the state. That is specifically tackling the front steps and restoring the
- front steps with new limestone. If you've been on them, you've seen that the salt over
- the years has really eroded them. So later this year, we're going to have new front steps.
- So that is going on. We are also right now working with Ball State. For the state of
- Indiana, if you want to do like historic architecture projects, Ball State is your place to do that.
- They've got a lot of students, a lot of expertise. And so this semester we are working with a
- professor who I've actually worked with before on our Cascades history and one of his master
- students on a complete building assessment and recommendations on not just how we can
- make repairs, sometimes we know that, but how we make them in a way that is consistent
- with the historic standards that we need to stay with because of the historic covenant
- on this building. Kevin's been doing a lot of work and investigations into the roof.
- We've actually got another grant. Kevin is in the range of like 20K I think we're looking
- at to do that project, the roof project. About 30,000 we're looking at for that. That's
- in process right now and then back to the Ball State thing actually right at the end
- of the semester here. Can you tell me the date? Do you remember the date we're doing
- it here? Early May. We can follow up with that. We're actually going to have a presentation
- of their findings and then we're going to use those findings to prioritize and continue
- to help find ways to solve issues in this building like water penetration and things
- like that. It's either late April or early May. I don't recall that date offhand. Actually,
- I didn't even mention that, but we are working with the Economic and Sustainable Development
- Department. Oh yeah, nope, and that is actually in the works. We're going to do a full LED
- conversion here as well as at a couple other facilities that we have. We definitely recognize
- the value of this and need to continue to find ways to make sure it remains thriving
- and in good shape. Yeah, I'll have to get back to you with specifics on that. I don't
- have any strategic plan in front of me that I know what we're doing next on that, but
- certainly continuing to support the after school programs that meet here. There's a
- lot of, I'm always amazed at the range of events that happen here from sumo wrestling
- to Rubik's Cube championships to churches on Sunday to free computer giveaway with United
- Way. So certainly we want to continue to find ways to activate and make things happen here.
- But I think you're asking more specifically for the local community that really needs
- that activation, how are we going to continue? Yeah, I wish I could give you a bunch of specifics
- right now, but it remains a priority and something our staff here is doing a great job of, and
- we're certainly going to continue with the fair, the carnival, the bike giveaway, all
- the things that we do here. Other questions? Yeah, see. This is a really
- random. Okay, so I remember about eight or 10 years
- ago, the city bought a section of property on the north side of Cascades Park. And if
- I remember correctly, there were several structures there. I drive through there three or four
- times a week. There were several structures there. I believe that there were some Tibetan
- monks living out there and things like that. City bought the property and the structures
- were taken down and everything. And it's been empty ever since. And since I drive by there
- numerous times a week, going to my favorite place, Cascades Golf Course, I always wonder
- are there any plans for that property? Great question. The short answer is no. Those
- properties were bought essentially to preserve the natural landscape of Lower Cascades Park
- when those buildings were basically being sold and abandoned. They were in poor condition,
- the monastery and everything. I was not here at the time, so I'm speaking from my historical
- knowledge, but I believe the desire was to buy those properties to protect what is otherwise
- a very unimpeded natural landscape of trees and forest and creek and everything. The buildings
- were taken down. Additionally, it would be a challenge to put any major buildings back
- in that location because it's also floodplain from the creek there and it floods pretty
- substantially. So essentially more nature space. We may come back there at some point
- and unpaved hiking trails, things like that, we may try to put back into that space, but
- no formal plans for development.
- The comment for those watching was about the boardwalk that we put in a couple of years
- ago at Cascades up to the waterfall. That is certainly one of the sort of natural icons
- of Bloomington. And speaking of, you know, branding our community, I think our natural
- features have a lot to do with that. And so making that more accessible to people who
- are using strollers or walkers or power chairs that I've seen going up there is a huge delight
- to me to see people be able to enjoy that.
- And if you haven't been out there in the last couple days, the waterfall is really gushing
- right now. So now is the moment to go see that waterfall. Other questions? We don't
- have to stay till seven if nobody has questions. Margaret has her hand up. A comment. Thank
- you, Margaret, the Reverend Dr. Marvin Chandler Early Learning Center. And is there are there
- are notes about how many spaces are there?
- A lot of the detailed questions we should get from BHA. But we can get you and in contact
- with somebody there if you're really interested in a bunch of the details. So 28 early learning
- spots, 0 to 3. And for those of you who are not parenting that age group, which I'm not,
- but I am paying attention. MCCSC last year did fund four year olds into pre K. So that's
- accessible to the whole community. So there's zero to three spots are what we're really looking
- for in the community just to highlight there should not be a gap from four to five while
- you wait for kindergarten.
- MCCSC has a great vocational learning center, which is called Hoosier Hills, and they do
- a lot of great projects throughout the community. And and we do try to hire and train where
- we can. And including and I'll give a shout out for Tim's crews, even though I have no
- idea if we're looking for seasonal help right now in the parks. Yes. So we still have some
- openings there. But it's great to learn some of these things during the summer and contribute
- back to your community while getting paid. So look on our HR site for open jobs, even
- seasonally. And I will note another thing that's happening tonight. And in this very
- building is the NAACP is meeting upstairs. So we have some people who are coming through
- sorry. Yeah, started 15 minutes ago, but they're still meeting up there. Yeah. Other Yes.
- Yeah, great question. So the question is, how will we be sort of working on our community
- needs assessment? So we have sort of a two prong strategy for that. One of them is to
- try to get still, it's increasingly a challenge to do this, but to get statistically valid
- survey responses from a representative sample of Bloomington households. So that is one
- prong we are working on is randomized sampling of people that we will be sending the survey
- to and hoping we get a good enough response rate to reach that random sample size. So
- we want that, but then we're also doing what we're calling equitable engagement. So that
- started with focus groups, but that is not the end of it at all. So we had some focus
- groups. Now we kind of take a step back and we process what we got from the focus groups
- to sort of build that next step. So there will be, if you're at parks events this summer,
- if you're at the farmers market, we're going to have info tables set up. We're going to
- do sort of a parallel survey to the one that we send out, the statistically valid one that
- will just be available for anyone. So that way we can sort of compare the here's the
- random sample one with here's just one that people who are interested found and filled
- out. And then we'll also have at least one sort of major event about our master planning
- efforts to as a chance to share how far we've gotten so far. It'll be kind of like a midpoint,
- like here's what we've done with our early work. Now continue to give us feedback to
- guide the latter half of the plan development. So there'll be lots of opportunities coming
- up if you're tuned in to like parks channels. Yeah, that is something we've actually talked
- about with our consultant team. And you know, oh, I'm sorry. The question was how might
- we get feedback from some of our unhoused neighbors who also use the park spaces, because
- park spaces are for everybody. Everyone is welcome to use our parks, of course. And that
- is something we've talked about. But we don't have a specific strategy in place yet on that.
- But it's something we anticipate working on this summer. Yeah. Potentially. Sure. Talk
- to me after. Yeah? Thank you for reminding me to repeat the question. I keep forgetting.
- Is there a specific strategy to get people who are not engaged in parks events? So first
- off, we did community focus groups this past week. And we tried to purposefully select
- different groups of people and invite people to represent different community interests.
- So from business and civic leaders to people who represent different user groups and participants.
- Like someone who, we had a parent of a kid who goes to Kid City. We invited a parent
- of a Banneker student who's here a lot, as parks users. Pardon me? Right. Yeah. But so
- I'm just saying as we go across the range of people that, you know, we're trying to
- grab as many different types of people that we can into those focus groups. Some of this
- is still a work in progress because we've just kicked off. And so some of the strategy
- we're still working on with our consultant that we're working with. And our surveying
- company like we haven't even had our kickoff meeting with them yet to develop the survey.
- So more to come on that. And certainly we'll keep that in mind and keep thinking about
- that and how we can engage those folks. Let me just hop in for a second. So one of the
- things that my administration has been trying to do is reach the people who don't naturally
- show up at meetings like this. People can't come at 6 p.m. People don't necessarily want
- to come to a public meeting. People may not know about a focus group, etc., etc., etc.
- So we're trying to stretch our bandwidth to think about how to meet people where they
- are and how to get the input in a way that's comfortable for people. So this is a great
- opportunity for us to say, if you have ideas for how we can reach people that we're not
- currently reaching, please share them with us. We're super open to hearing them. We do
- online surveys. Not everybody has access to Internet, etc., etc. Not everybody's going
- to come to the farmer's market. Not everybody's going to be a parks user yet, and we definitely
- want to know why aren't you a parks user, and could we make it more accessible to you?
- And Keisha has lots of experience in creatively engaging people in public processes, so we're
- just so, so thankful to have her on our team. I'm going to encourage you to share thoughts
- with her either now or later, or you can share them with me after the meeting. But we really
- eagerly want, not just in the parks process, we want to know how our government can do
- better serving the people that are feeling unserved. So that is a, it's a priority for
- our team, and if you have thoughts, please share them with us, because we, we are only
- so many people, you know, thinking through this, and an outside perspective is always,
- always welcome. Dave?
- [inaudible]
- So yeah, so the, I'm, I'm going, you can tell me whatever I missed, but I'm going to try
- to repeat the, tonight at the Redevelopment Commission meeting, which is also competing
- for people's attention tonight, they did a public opening of the bids on Hopewell East,
- and the bids, the project proposals for Hopewell South also have been active, and so Dave was
- asking about, did he miss something? No, no decision has been made about Hopewell South
- yet, and sorry. [inaudible]
- It's still in flux. Yeah, so, and, and Hopewell is, we're really proud that Hopewell Commons
- is open, and it's been my administration's priority to try to get a high number of affordable
- and attainable homes in Hopewell, and it is, affordable is one piece of the puzzle, and
- so what I'm talking about is technically affordable, which comes with some kind of government
- subsidy.
- Usually those are low income tax credit projects, so there's a formula for how you, how a developer
- could afford to build a project that is specifically designated for low income households. Then
- there's what we refer to as attainable, which is for people who make enough to not qualify
- for a subsidy, but still not enough to pay for what otherwise might be market rate in
- Bloomington, which as we know is very high, how are we going to house those people? And
- how do we make properties available to them? That actually in today's market is a much
- more difficult challenge. And so as we look at the other tracks in Hopewell, which is
- comprised of several different projects, my goal is to make whatever is not technically
- affordable attainable to folks who are not otherwise wealthy. So we continue to problem
- solve on that. Other questions? No? Hopewell. Yeah. Yes.
- To my knowledge, Orchard Glen is actually affordable. It's it has subsidy attached
- to it. Yeah. And so we we have talked to the property managers over at Orchard Glen who
- also now have some some other successful properties about how they're doing what they're doing
- and and what the formula is. Those aren't new construction. And so we're in a slightly
- different paradigm now. I want to take this opportunity to thank the folks who run Orchard
- Glen, but also the other responsible landlords in our community who are dedicated to keeping
- properties attainable and or affordable, those who are taking our housing choice vouchers,
- because we still need more landlords who will accept those housing choice vouchers. And
- as we look to really solve the challenge of people who are experiencing homelessness without
- a shelter, so literally living outside, we need to keep people housed where they are
- with eviction prevention and other diversion. And we need to make sure there's enough supply
- of low income housing. We also need the attainable housing for others. So when we're looking
- at the housing spectrum, we need several pieces of that spectrum really bolstered. And that's
- how we're going to get to a good picture of a Bloomington city where people can truly
- thrive. Okay. I'm going to give you three minutes of your night back. I thought it was
- way earlier than that. So I'm only gifting you three minutes. I want to thank you for
- coming tonight. Really appreciate your participation. I do these six times a year, one in each city
- council district. I also do traveling office hours for people who need 15 minutes of just
- my attention with nobody else really listening. And those are great opportunities and have
- been accessed by people who don't love coming to public meetings for one reason or another
- or have something private to talk about. So you can tell others who may not have wanted
- to join you tonight, those traveling office hours are done in the months when I don't
- have a town hall. So 12 months a year, I'm out in public doing something for input and
- encourage engagement. And Margaret is telling me to tell you that you can sign up ahead
- of time. Is that what the charades were? Door knocking. And I also go door knocking once
- a month. And I just I pick different neighborhoods trying to get all over the city. So if you
- want me in your neighborhood, let me know. Yes. It's a great idea. So Terry, you always
- have great ideas. So I'm going to I'm going to just let people know you can talk amongst
- yourselves so that we can say goodbye to the people on screen and and thanks again for
- coming tonight. [applause] [music]
- [music] [music]