Welcome. We're at six o'clock, so we can officially start. I am Mayor Carey, and I have Director Tim
Street with Parks here with me today. And if you're new to these town halls, these are an opportunity
really to... I give you an update. I usually invite a cabinet member. We always invite the city council
member from the district to come as well.
I'll give an update. Tim will give an update. Councilmember Zulek is in this district and unfortunately
she couldn't be with us tonight and sends her regrets and wants you all to know that she is available
to you. So if you live in this district and we're hoping to see Councilmember Zulek tonight, please
do reach out to her.
She will be with me tomorrow, and I expect we'll probably have low attendance here tonight because tomorrow
I have a listening session that is particularly targeted to hearing feedback about the Kirkwood closure.
So if you're here tonight and you can't come tomorrow, please feel free to express yourself.
I'm hoping not to spend a bunch of time on Kirkwood tonight, though, because I know people have other
things they'd like to talk about. So these town halls are really meant for you. I'll give you some updates,
Tim will give you some updates, but then, you all get to ask questions based on what you would like
to hear more about. We do try to end on time, and my thanks to the Monroe County History Center
for hosting us tonight. We do move these town halls around. So we have six council districts.
We move them. So we hit each council district throughout the year. And on the months that I don't have
town halls, I instead have traveling office hours. And that's a time that you can connect with me one-on-one.
We do have you sign up ahead of time for those office hours so that people don't have to be
standing around waiting for a turn. You know when you will have a chance to sit down with me.
And as always, thanks to Katz for being here and making us accessible to the folks at home. I wanna
wish everybody a happy Pride Month.
In Bloomington, this mayor celebrates Pride Month. I know we've had a declaration of Pride Month that
also came with a proclamation about nuclear families. And I want to tell you that we celebrate organic
families here in Bloomington, which is all kinds of families. And love means love here. And we want
everybody to feel welcome and supported in Bloomington. And I think our community does really
great job of that. Let me start with a few updates, and I'm going to try to keep this super short, probably
unsuccessfully. We are celebrating, in May, we had unanimous votes from
council following the unanimous vote of Plan Commission earlier in the year for the first phase of the
Hopewell development and we are really pleased with that that will provide compact lots some multifamily
housing there and of course the core building is
close to completion, and we're really excited about that. Hopewell is also home to our farmers market
every Tuesday. Tim may mention that as well. So we hope that you come out and enjoy Hopewell Commons.
We have it programmed with music every Tuesday night. So it's a great place to hang out, buy some produce,
and listen to some music.
I want to talk for a minute about SEA 285. That is the statehouse bill that illegalizes sleeping outside
on public land. That goes into effect on July 1st, and I am pleased to say that in the past two years,
we have taken a really strategic approach to
to entrenched encampments. There were more than a dozen when I took office as mayor. When they become
unsafe, we have been providing, when possible and almost always it has been possible, we provide a 30-day
notice along with outreach to the residents of those encampments.
for services and we have successfully closed down more than a dozen of those camps. There's only one
remaining and we have already noticed it given the deadline that we have of July 1st. What the state
house ruling says is that we can then only give a 48-hour notice and if there is no
no alternative place for somebody to go, or they refuse to move, that we are compelled to arrest them.
We don't want to be in that situation. So we have, we believe, only seven residents left in our encampment.
That is less than half the size that it was when we noticed it. And so, what we've found pretty successfully
is when we send outreach workers
and work in partnership with the residents of those camps. They do move willingly. We really continue
our call for reunification where possible. When people don't have supportive services and network here,
we know that they will get services better.
if they are close to where their family of origin is or where their most recent supportive network is.
I wanna talk for a minute about infrastructure and roads. As I mentioned, Kirkwood listening session
is tomorrow, so I'm not gonna talk about Kirkwood closure tonight. It is construction season now.
And what I like to say during construction season is sorry, and you're welcome. You will see our trucks
out, contractor's trucks out. We are spending this year, as of June 1st, we have already addressed 6,242 potholes.
in calendar year 2026, not that we're counting. And we have $4.7 million of improvements along Kirkwood,
Rogers Street, Grimes Lane, Patterson Drive, all coming to you this season. That planned work includes
street paving, some sidewalk improvements and repairs, accessible curb ramps, traffic signal improvements,
We have curb changes and stormwater infrastructure and median islands and bump outs for traffic control,
all happening within that $4.7 million. So there's a lot going on in...
on various streets this summer and thank you for your patience as we work to improve our infrastructure.
You might also notice that we have a new raised sidewalk or crosswalk across Rogers near near Switchyard
Park. If you don't notice the signage before you go over it, you will certainly
notice the raised walk. So that is to encourage people slowing down and pedestrian safety there.
And again, if you don't know this already, we will be closing College Avenue so that they can complete
the overpass there.
And so that's gonna be about a month-long closure. And I know that's a hassle. I am sorry, and we'll
all be happy when it's done, but we are really pleased to be working in conjunction with the CIB on
that, and to be able to do it at one of our slowest traffic times of the year. So hopefully,
those alternative routes will work out for you. Talk a minute about community safety.
You may have noticed that I chaired a meeting this past week in collaboration with County Councilmember
Kate Wilts on the topic of the new jail. To be clear, the jail is paid for and run by the county, and
there may be some things, while it is a county
project, it's obviously a concern to our whole community. I engaged because it's a community impact
project, and really, we needed to make sure that the county knows and that we're at the table when we're
needed, that we're willing to partner in any way we can to facilitate the planning that they need or
other things that may help facilitate
ease of finding a new location for that jail. So not our project. I did chair the meeting. I will be
on the working group. I am looking forward to this renewed collaboration with the county. We collaborate
on many things. This is a new work topic for us, and I'm really hopeful that we'll make some good progress.
Fire and police are all
increasing their staffing. Fire is now fully staffed. Police is getting very close. We have a goal of
getting police fully staffed by the end of this calendar year, so I'm very hopeful that we'll make that
goal. Also, just a reminder or a news piece for all of you, if you see people in crisis this summer
and it is not
actively dangerous to the public, not a not a threat of crime. You see somebody out in the sun that
looks like they're having a health crisis, you witness somebody having a mental health crisis, the right
place to call is stride. So again, no imminent public danger. Desiree at the table over there has stride
cards. It's a great idea to put
that in your wallet so that you have the number handy, or you can just plug them right into your phone
24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. They have mobile outreach. They will go to the person who
is in need and help them, or people can stop by. Again, 24 hours, 7 days a week. They have mental health
professionals there. They are the right place to go.
If it's not criminal activity that's imminent threat to the public, please do call Stride because we
have been much more successful, ultimately, at getting people the help they need by using Stride. I
am going to turn things over to Tim with one final shout-out. We have lots of great things going on
this weekend. Friday is Juneteenth.
a really important celebration, end of slavery. We will celebrate down at Switchyard Park. That goes
on from 11 AM to 9 PM, so a good day-long festival at Switchyard. It's gonna be a blast. Always a fun
time for the whole family. And that's on Friday. Again at Switchyard, then, on Saturday, we have Grand Faloon.
This Saturday, we have Waxahachie giving a ticketed concert. We are really excited about that. And to
talk more about all the fun things in Bloomington, our Parks Director, Tim Street. All right.
Thank you. Thank you, Daniel. My name is Tim Street. One person applauded. I am the Director of Parks
and Recreation. He does not.
I am the director of parks and recreation for the city of Bloomington. I have a really great job. We
get to make Bloomington healthier, more connected, and more resilient in a lot of different ways. With
us tonight is Satoshi Kido, also our sports director. I'll just note that he's here in the audience.
Satoshi's a great leader for our sports division and is also available to talk if anyone wants to talk
about one of our sports related initiatives.
As Mayor Thompson noted, it's a busy time of year. There's a lot going on this weekend. There's a lot
going on this season. May and June are probably our busiest months of the year in terms of programming
and things going on and preparations. We've launched our Banneker and Allison Jukebox Kid City summer
camps. Those are in the middle of going on. We have concerts, a lot of concerts at the Tuesday market,
as well as events at Switchard. Just this past week, we completed the Strawberry Shortcake Festival, which
It's not our event, but we get to host it. It's a really big day. They had a 5K as well. Also, of course,
FoodTrump Fridays are going on through the summer. We've had a lot of great crowds and great energy
at Switchyard with everything going on. It's also a busy season because it's the season where we are
most stretched, trying to keep up with e-reports and tree growth.
limbs that overgrow trails, and all the things that come up during the course of a season that our staff
are out there really working tirelessly to clean, to trim, to maintain. And we know every May, June,
we get a little behind. We have to triage and get through things, and then we'll catch back up as the
summer goes on. So apologies if there's some branches and things like that. We're doing our best to
get to it.
We are really excited about the new partnership with IU for concerts at Switchyard. This is a really
great new mutually beneficial partnership to bring.
Grand Faloon to Switchyard Park to bring more concerts to Bloomington to create a regional profile where
people may start to hear about this and recognize the name Grand Faloon even more than they already
have and travel to Bloomington in the summer to take in some of these concerts. So Waxahachie is this
Saturday. I'm excited about that. I just found out they're going to be doing a little
I don't quite know what to call it, but an art light display at the end of the show as well with some
of the trees, like an LED lighting of the canopy on the way out. Should be very neat. Then in July,
we've got Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch. And in August, we've got hometown band Duran Jones and the
Indicators. Looking forward to that. We're dealing with a lot of facility.
things. We have a lot of old facilities. This has been a big focus of our master planning, which we
just concluded and adopted to the park board on June 1. A few things with that mills pool has been delayed
opening this year because as we were filling the pool, it wouldn't fill, which means it had a leak somewhere.
All of that is underground, we had to bring in a leak detection company to look try to figure out what
was going on. Analyze of course mills pools from the 60s. There's a lot of
Generations of wear on the pool, we'll say. The good news is, while I can't say we fixed the leak per
se, we did enough to mitigate it that we are going to plan to open Mills Pool this Friday for the remainder
of the season. And we are going to have to look at that more
as the season ends, though, and bring in the company and take a look and see how we can really work
on that. That, of course, is not our only old facility. Bryan Park Pool is actually even older, 1957.
The ice arena, if you know, we had a leak in March, which is something we prepared for, and thankfully,
it went as it should have, as we prepared for, but we have a working group of stakeholders that Keto
and others are working with to talk about the future of the ice arena.
Winslow Sports is another one that we're looking at in terms of just it's been around since the 70s.
It hasn't had a lot of investment in recent memory. And things are just showing their age. So we have
a lot of needs. We have a very diverse community that uses different facilities and recreates in different
ways. Of course, there's pickleball. We always hear more pickleball, too. So what we are trying to do
with our master planning and with our community engagement
Right now, we are building a list of all of our top capital needs and basically building a menu of options
of how we can invest and respond to those capital needs at the pools, at the ice arena, at Winslow Sports,
all of those things. And spoiler alert, we don't have enough money to address all of those capital needs
at once. So what we are necessarily gonna need to do is work with our board of park commissioners and
ultimately probably the city council, office of the mayor, and of course the public on
what we are doing to prioritize response to these needs and how we will invest in our community offerings.
So our four master plan goals that we came out of our master planning with for the next five years are,
number one, we need to have meaningful community impact. That's what I was talking about. We make Bloomington
more connected, more resilient, healthier, all of those things. Number two is invest in what we have.
We need to recognize now is the time for us to be investing in things we've had.
and need maintenance and need care to last for future generations. Number three is financial sustainability.
We've talked a lot about SEA-1 and its impacts and looming fiscal implications. And number four is how
we do all that, which is with a strong connected parks staff. So that's a sort of internal focus goal
to make sure we're taking care of our staff. So I anticipate we're probably gonna schedule, I don't
have this yet, but after we get through Bloomington summer and get back to school, having a,
I don't know if I'm going to call it a town hall or a public meeting, but a specific parks board meeting
about capital investment where we can hear from the public. We can present the preliminary list of needs
and start to talk about building a package of investment for what we are able to invest back in these
facilities. I'll just mention a couple more things and then I'll
turn it back to you mentioned crane balloon. Believe it or not, there's also a Sunday concert at Brian
this Sunday. So we have that coming up. If you don't know parks manages for Bloomington, we are a tree
city, the oldest tree city in Indiana. We are a bird town USA. Birds are town for not city for some
reason. And then we are also a B city. So we manage those three things for the city of Bloomington.
There are three great
certifications that just show what we're all about. But June 21st through 28th is Bee City USA and Pollinator
Week and BioBlitz. So we're going to have a few different fun events. There's going to be one at the
Lilly Library in collaboration with IU. BioBlitz is going out and identifying certain plants and things
like that in areas. So there's more info on our website about that. Of course, we're right around the
corner from the 4th of July and the parade. We will have the parade again this year.
The parade fell on a Saturday this year and we were kind of trying to figure out how to do market and
parade at the same time. The good news is we are doing them at the same time. So Farmers Market and
Fourth of July Parade combined downtown on that Saturday, which I think will be really fun. Farmers
Market on Saturdays is going extremely well. We love all our vendors, our food and beverage artisans.
Attendance is great. We think it's such a lively part of the downtown. This Saturday is also Youth Day
at the market.
which is really special. We've actually expanded that because it's been so popular where you'll see
a bunch of the youth of Bloomington selling their wares, whatever that might be. Lastly, a couple of
anniversaries and things coming up. We're going to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Sherwood Oaks Park
in July. I'm affectionately dubbing that the SO50. So we're just having a little fun with that.
And actually, Bryan Park is turning 75 this year.
So we're going to do a tree-related event later in the year in the fall, and we're going to celebrate
the 75th birthday of Bryan Park. Then lastly, just project-wise, we don't have a lot of active projects
right now, but we do have the Powerline Trail going in. That is why we put the raised crossing in at
Switchyard is to better connect, not just for the trail, but in general, bringing pedestrians and people
safely to Switchyard Park from the west. The Powerline Trail, as you drive by, you'll notice it's going
to start to be built
back under the power lines heading to the west to eventually connect with the summit development that's
out there. But in the meantime, it will connect to RCA Park and the habitat, Osage development. The
trail will be about a mile long. And a cool feature of it, because we cannot put vertical infrastructure
in the ground because it is underneath Duke Energy power lines, we are going to be putting glow aggregate
in the top layer of the asphalt.
that will charge up from the sun during the day and then glow for a certain number of hours at night,
just to give a little bit of illumination. And I think it's also gonna look really cool. So I think
we'll be the second trail like that in the state, which is also pretty neat. I'm very excited about
the glow rock. Me too, I really wanna see it in action. Jennifer, can I ask for your help? So we have
this handheld mic. Jennifer will help pass it around for your,
questions. You don't have to frame it as a question if you just want to hear more about something, whether
we've talked about it or not. Now is your time. Do you want to go first? Okay. Is that a bid? I heard
you talk about the
more police officers now. And so I have a question related to that. As a bicyclist, I've been recovering
from being hit by a motor vehicle two years ago, and I've been waiting for the day when Bloomington
vigorously enforces its speed limit. And I've been told that we don't have enough officers, which made
sense, but now we're getting more officers. But it appears that it's still not being done. So what is
it gonna take to enforce the speed limit?
Um, so, uh, we do have officers who, um, you know, enforce a speed limit. Um, we don't tend to have
enough police to set up speed traps everywhere. Um, but, uh, we are actively pulling people over for,
um, speed violations and other moving traffic violations, and, um, I'm sorry to hear that you were,
uh, hit. Um, that is a, um, unfortunately, I-I think, um, there-
Around the country, we're seeing more of that, and that has to do with many things. Distracted driving
top among them. So my encouragement to all of us who do drive is to put down your phones and focus,
and there's no need to go beyond the speed limit.
And we do have some great bike ped infrastructure here, which doesn't solve all of the problems, but
we're trying to do a happy medium. I have a question for each of you. So this is for Tim. I think it
was about two years ago when this is for
the golf course, Cascades golf course. When Jason was named as the new pro, you had a little celebration
ceremony for him. There was talk about improvements to Cascades, and one was going to be like irrigation
of the tee boxes, which haven't been done. When the new clubhouse was built, it was wired for security
cameras for the parking lot, which have never been installed. So my car got broke into, I had three
windows smashed.
over a bag that was sitting there with nothing in it. So the wiring's there, and any more cameras are
cheap. I have two offices, and one has 12 cameras, one has cost less than $500 for that system. So I
wonder what kind of improvements are going to be made to Cascades? And what's the chances of getting
security cameras?
Great question. I actually have a meeting later this week about security cameras in general that we're
talking about, and that's gonna be one of the points that we're talking about to see if we can use some
available dollars that we have, not just there necessarily, and I'm just talking about regular security
cameras, right, like just video recording. So that will be one location we certainly talk about. I'm
sorry to hear about the car. In terms of improvements, things that are on our radar for Cascades right
now, and I just wanna say Jason's doing a really fantastic job up there. He's an excellent manager.
The irrigation is number one on our list that we're trying to figure out as part of that capital list
that we're talking about. We're discussing using a revenue bond to basically completely redo,
which is needed, 18 holes of irrigation. It's very old. Keto, do you remember how old that irrigation
is on that?
It's 25-ish years old, the irrigation system, for the original 18, because the other nine were added
later, as you probably know. I think it's running on, we found out, like, Windows 98 or something like
that recently. And that took me back. So that's not where we want to be with irrigation. So right now,
we're talking, I was actually talking to the controller this week about it, we're talking with Reedy
and Sons about how to work on a revenue bond to use revenue from Cascades to proceed.
The other thing we're looking at, we're actually looking at partnering with a private donor about a
new on-course restroom. Right now on which nine Keto? Corey and Ridge. So a new on-course restroom out
there that would actually be plumbed. And then yeah, the security camera thing is another thing we will
absolutely look into. I thought about doing a year report for some of the potholes in the golf cart
path. Well, hopefully they're a little better.
I am not a golfer myself, so I need to do better getting out there. But I do know we worked with our
street department last year to pave quite a few sections. But as you know, it's an endless task. But
we'll have to take a look and see if we can get some more of those filled. OK, so I won't do that now,
because now you'll know who it is. Yes, no problem. So my question for you. It's OK if we know who the
you report comes from. There is no shame in making a you report.
how we create a list of what we need to do. Thank you, Tim. So my question is, when there's multiple
employees from a department working on a project, what would be a reasonable expected time for a response
from them? So if you ask for an update, should you hear something in a week? Should it be a month?
is there any kind of guidelines from that? My... my just sort of common courtesy would be that somebody
would respond to you within a week to say, we're working on it, at least. I think it really depends
how complex the project is and what we're talking about. So a general answer would be... common courtesy
is just to respond, I got your email.
working on it. But this is a vague question. I can't. Yeah. So then the other part of this was we had
to go through city legal. And once they did promise the project was approved, or it should be approved,
and we're waiting on a letter from a department. It took us over three months to get a basic letter.
And part of that letter, when we finally got it sat on the director's desk for over three weeks before
the person signed it.
as we're just, like a weekly basis, just say, hey, can we get an update with no response? So just putting
that out there that there needs to be a little more communication, maybe, and maybe some oversight of
when people respond. Yeah. So, Carol, I'll just invite you. You can send me a note if you're waiting
on something.
This is very vague, and I can't really follow up on anything this vague, and it's not appropriate to
be more specific with personalities in a public setting. So this is probably not the right place to
take care of that, but I am happy to follow up on things. And, you know, there may be a reason that
something's delayed, and we're happy to try to troubleshoot.
This is not a question. It's just a recent observation. In fact, I was meaning to talk to the mayor
about it. We live fairly close together. They marked up the street next to my house for a storm sewer
excavation. I know for various reasons I won't bore you with. I know what the marking codes are. And
I called the city of Bloomington, water and so forth. And I got two calls back within 35 minutes. I
was extremely impressed.
you're getting good customer service, Ian. I walk my dog past your house almost every night. So he's
doing great. Yes, I do just want to... I mean, we are really trying to improve customer service all
over the place, but some of these departments literally get thousands of emails a day.
So it's a job. Hi. Thank you for having these meetings around town. And I want to do two different things.
One, as an individual, I can't come tomorrow night, but I would like to say that having worked in downtown
development and redevelopment for many years, I really want Kirkwood to stay open.
during the spring, summer, and fall, except when we have special events. That's the way you deal with
those kinds of things in my mind. So that's my personal. Secondly, as Glenda Murray, president of Prospect
Hill Neighborhood Association, I do want to say we've worked very smoothly with street,
the engineering department right now to work on those changes that are happening on Rogers, while Rogers
is closed now for 14 days, except that we need some more signage. My husband spent a half an hour this
evening helping a giant tractor trailer back up Jackson Street, which is a narrow neighborhood street.
And he turned at our house, and I think he looked
I went running out, because I thought, he cannot do this. We've seen this before. And I was yelling,
no, no. And he went straight south on Jackson Street, which is a narrow street. And then he was stuck.
So he had to back up. And it took a long time. And Patrick was even helping him go this way,
go that way, to get out so that he could go again. So we just need some more signage for the detours. OK.
I, too, have experienced this summer with a contractor not having any signs up until it's too late,
and you have to U it. There's not enough advance notice for a detour coming, or there's not enough to
tell you where to go, or both? Right now, I mean, Rogers is closed as of this morning.
And I was thinking by mid-afternoon, not too bad so far. We saw a whole lot more people on Jackson Street,
which is a narrow one-way, not two-way street. But there's not much signage to say where to go when
you can't go down Roger Street. Okay, great. We'll get some there. Thank you. Hopefully by morning.
Thanks for letting us know. Thanks. And you can always call
If there is an issue like that, our teams can get out there quickly. And we don't want the traffic backing
up because people don't know where to go. So thank you for letting us know. Good evening. I just have
a quick question for both of you. Let's start with the mayor. How are we doing on the Meridian project,
the gigabit now?
as far as how much is laid down and subcontractors and all that issue? So Meridian Project is back.
After a long pause, we got... we, they got new subcontractors to do the install, and they've been working
first on fixing problems that were left over,
And then we'll be moving on to laying new cable and getting things done. I don't know off the top of
my mind the anticipated completion date, but there is one now. So I can follow up with you on that,
Christopher. But this has been really a marked difference from the last contractor. We've been working
really closely with Meridian. You may know that I,
issued several stop work orders on the last contractor. And we're really pleased to have somebody new.
And, Tim, I appreciate your candor on some of the capital projects and the financial difficulties in
SEA 1. Is it on the table from the Parks Board that maybe unloading some of the public land or coming
up with new fee structures that benefit residents of the city
Because I've seen a lot of when the financial struggles come that deferred maintenance term comes in
and it really destroys a parks department Which we've seen a lot of examples over the years, especially
with the the Great Recession from 208 Yeah, actually The 2008 reference is spot-on because Bloomington
like many municipalities you can go back There was actually it was a study. I think it was
out of Pennsylvania somewhere. I want to say Penn State they did a
a combined aggregate study of municipal park department budgets from, like, 2000 to today. And healthily,
you know, in the early 2000s, there was typically, you know, maybe a 15%, 20% reinvestment in capital
every year. And when the Great Recession hit in 2008, 2009, what happened with a lot of budgets, and
we see it with the National Park Service, we see it other places, in order to continue to operate services
at a certain level, personnel, supplies,
contracts, services, the capital line is what was cut. And the percentage across the country of what
municipalities were putting into reinvestment in terms of capital, dollars, equipment, things like that,
went down, down, down. And Bloomington was no exception. Bloomington was part of that same trend.
So now, almost 20 years later, here we are, reaping what was sown with that lack of capital investment.
It's a tricky challenge because when you have a bunch of deferred maintenance, how do you get out of
it? How do you break the cycle and start fresh with keeping up with something apart from just building
something new? Building something new is really exciting. You can get all people on board excited to
build it, but you've got to also account for the ongoing expenses for it. So that's the puzzle that
we're working on right now. And I'm sorry, I'm trying to come back to the first part of your question.
Give me the first part again. I was stuck in the second part. So we haven't talked specifically about
unloading public property. That would be a pretty drastic step if we said, you know what, we're going
to take this land out of the public trust and we're going to sell it, for example. We have explored
that a little bit with some of our assets that are more private or rental in nature.
and are exploring that possibility. We end up being stewards of a lot of different things for the city,
but not in terms of just parkland or trails or anything like that. Fee structure, that is something
very much we're working on is our cost recovery. Oh, and resident, nonresident. That was the other point
I wanted to come back to. We already do have a fee structure in place that is cheaper for resident,
nonresident in some ways. In some ways, it's a challenge to implement
because our software is also antiquated. So we are also looking right now at updating our software that
we use to register for parks programs to one, make it easier and cleaner and quicker to register for
parks programs, sports leagues, things like that, to encourage growth and good business and stewardship
and everything like that. But we're also looking at our cost recovery goals in different areas. So an
area like the golf course, for example, that is largely private benefit is expected to
receive close to 100% cost recovery or more. Whereas when we do community event like the 4th of July
parade, that's for everybody. That's not expected to cost recover. So that's some of the work we've
been really working on studying and setting new goals. While we're talking about money and repairs and
things, I started this evening by
talking about how many potholes we've filled and significant projects that we're doing with sidewalks
and ramps and repaving. I just want to note that in our state, we have repealed the gas tax. So Governor
Braun repealed that gas tax. That is money that we use for these very projects. And so, there may be no...
And you may not feel that hit this year, but you will feel that hit in the future. And so, that was
done so you don't feel the inflation at the pump as a result of the war that's going on. But I do just
want to note, people, you know, send lots of angry emails about potholes and other things.
when they happen, and I'm just laying the groundwork. With SEA-1 and no gas tax, it's a double whammy,
and you can expect we probably won't be keeping up with roads as well as we have been in the past. Awesome.
She was noting that the sidewalks downtown have been repaired and they're clean. Paul. Earlier, I didn't
know I could ask more than one question or a follow-up. I really appreciate what you said about distracted
driving. Distracted driving and speed, in my opinion, that's 90% of why people get hurt. But I've bicycled
about 1,000 miles in Bloomington streets this year so far, this calendar year, and I cannot recall one
police officer pulling somebody over
that I saw. There may be a philosophical objection to having more policing. I understand that some of
my friends don't want more enforcement of moving violations. If that's what your administration's position
is, I encourage you just to say that instead of telling us that you're increasing enforcement when I
don't see it with my own eyes. Question about the parks. Technical question for you.
about glyphosate? Do you know how much of it you use, and are there alternatives? First, let me just
volunteer that about two weeks ago, I got pulled over on Walnut for changing lanes without a turn signal
with no one around me. So they are out there. They saw me do that. Well, I did not monitor the entire
police department. Just I'm volunteering my personal experience there.
try to drive safely. I apologize for not using my blinker. Glyphosate is an important tool in our management
of invasive species, and we try to balance that, of course, with how we apply it and where we apply
it. So near water sources, it's particularly sensitive, and we use a particular type of glyphosate.
And pretty much everywhere, we do not spray
glyphosate like we are not doing foliar applications of glyphosate. Instead, what we generally do is
cut stump treatment. So, for example, when we are taking on Asian bush honeysuckle or autumn olive or
some other similar woody invasive herbaceous plants.
Staff go through and volunteers, we have a massive weed wrangle program as well who help us go through
and cut, identify, you know, get those out of there. And then while it's a fresh cut, the glyphosate
is applied with blue dye to the stump itself. So that glyphosate goes directly into the root system,
not out and about and around. So recognizing we have an integrated pest management plan that actually
we're working on a periodic update right now.
Glyphosate's not the only thing we use, but in talking to our urban green space manager and our natural
resource manager, and in terms of their keeping abreast of best practices in other places, it is still
a very important tool for us to use to combat some of those invasive species. Any final questions from
people who have been quiet so far? There we go.
I had two things real quick. One, I do not work for Tim, but I have met and worked with him and I do
appreciate him, so I did want to put that out there. But I did want to say I really appreciate all the
events and happenings at the parks and through the city. The ones I want to go to the most, I always
have a conflicting
thing going on, but I love being able to see how much is going on, and I really appreciate it. So I
just want to let you know I think that is fantastic. I love it. I tell everyone I can, and we try to
tell all our visitors to the museum about everything going on at Bloomington. And just having that stuff
helps us as well. So I just wanted to say thank you for that. The other question I had, and I realize
I may not get an answer today, and that's perfectly OK. As I live on the East Side and I try to frequently
bike to work,
I know everyone's gonna be shocked. It's always move in and move out. But there are so many times cars
are just parked in the bike lane. And I usually, when I'm on my bike, I don't know if I can even get
a ticket for texting while biking. I don't wanna find out, but I always feel like when I'm way down
somewhere, by the time I arrive here safely out of a way, anytime I'd be able to do that, I feel like
by the time anyone got there,
the car's not gonna be there, so I'd hate to waste any police officer's time going somewhere where the
person is gone, and as much as I'd love to be deputized to be able to hand out tickets to those people,
I don't think that's a feasible solution. But I'm just curious enforcement on that, like what's, because
it's not, those are the primary two times, but there's times throughout the year people park there,
those throw flashers on, and I see someone like checking
addresses obviously for delivery of sorts and it's just difficult because I'm not where I'm supposed
to be as a cyclist and some of those streets just get narrow. So I'm just curious, that's all. Yeah,
so I'll tell you Daniel, we'll
We'll take ideas on this. We have had parking enforcement try to patrol those areas more frequently.
We and we've been trying to notice times of day. It's mostly a problem, you know, things like that.
Police obviously will
ticket if they see it. But again, it's, you know, even if you stopped and called while you're on your
bike, it's probably somebody running into a building to do something and running back, and it's the
rudest place to park. So really, if you have better ideas, we've really been trying to step up enforcement
on that. Because it's also dangerous. I mean, I know
I know all of our cyclists pay attention, but sometimes when I'm commuting, I'm going at a pretty good
clip, and I'm sort of like, okay, I'm in a bike lane, and then all of a sudden I look up and there's
a car. So it can be very dangerous. So anybody listening at home, please don't park in the bike lanes.
That's not what they're for. And again, outside of increasing parking enforcement and police enforcement
of that, really open to ideas.
It's a challenge. Yeah. Another one here. Hi. Hi. In a succinct nutshell, what is your overall vision
for the progression of Bloomington as a whole? Awesome. Bloomington will be a city that
where anyone can find a place to belong safely, and we'll have a thriving downtown that has a balance
of economic development that supports a great quality of place and quality of life. Is that succinct?
Not detailed enough, though. It's very broad. It's beautiful.
thriving downtown, people belonging, community, especially in this age, a lot of people are... isolated
in certain ways. I know I feel it. So I explore a lot of different places, trying to find connection
and warmth, whether it's the park or various spiritual places, and here, today.
seeking to kind of forge community, and that's really it, building the bonds of community. And I'm a
very spiritual man, so that's... but I think there's a separation of church and state, I guess, in your
philosophy. But I like to see our institutions transmit a sacred respect to the land and people,
I think that should be imbued in institutions, but something to think about. Yeah. Thank you for coming.
I hope you do feel welcomed here and happy to connect with you afterwards. You know, some of the things
that you said are really important as we move forward. Our former Surgeon General,
our biggest health crisis is a lack of human belonging, right? So we're lonely. And that was exacerbated
by a pandemic, of course. But in a city, you know, part of my job is with public safety is to make sure
people feel and are safe. So that comes up with
with cyclists and pedestrians, but it also comes up with what you believe and what you look like and
where you feel like you belong. And belonging is a much more complicated thing. And so, as a person
who has been a student of community building most of my life, I really think that
things like our parks, all of our sort of third places, so not home and not work. Creating enough of
those, but not so many that they're not populated, is really important. And then, having the expertise
to think about how those places are built, so that they encourage interaction and belonging, and,
you know, as with parks, and maybe a place that you can find some serenity and solitude if that's also
what you're looking for. So, you know, we are going to be talking a lot more about how Bloomington,
we have branding that is forthcoming,
And a major theme in that branding is that Bloomington always has been a place where you can find an
amazing array of really gifted people in a million different topics. And you never know. I had one meeting cancel,
on Tuesday last week, and I scooted over to the IU outdoor pool to get in a really fast workout. I only
had an hour, so that means like a 20-minute workout. And I get in the pool, and I realize I'm swimming
with an Olympic gold medalist. And she didn't kick me out of the lane. But these are the kinds of collisions
that happen in Bloomington, where a middle-aged person can swim with an Olympian.
and where our entrepreneurs bump into professionals who may be researching the solution to the problem
that they're trying to solve. And so what we do as a city is to help foster that human potential and
help foster those creative collisions. So thanks for that great question. We're trying to get
better at it, and we're happy to have more voices at the table. So thanks for showing up tonight. And
I think that's a great note to end on. For those of you who want to come to another meeting,
tomorrow night, 530 in
Council Chambers, and that's in the Showers Building. I'll be having a listening session. So this is
not three minutes at the mic, but it is a solution-based listening session on Kirkwood, on the topic
of Kirkwood. And I look forward to seeing some of you there. And I'll let Tim say any last things you
want to say. He is all good. Tim, on behalf of our city, thank you for running an award-winning Parks
Department.
I personally wish I could hang out in the parks 100% of my time. So thanks for being here and taking
part in improving your city.