So, I will call to order the Village Board meeting for August 18th at 6.06 p.m.
Brandi, would you please note the road?
And let's see.
Jim, you want to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance?
Well, the Village Institute of Allegiance, I think I can say it's a prayer at the two
of the Republic, or it should stand on the nation, and it will deliver to you in just
for all.
Thank you.
Just one little announcement here in relation to Melanie's announcement of a meeting or
so ago, she had her little girl, Emery Iris, on Saturday, seven pounds for ounces.
Bill?
We would like to pull off the Lenari items, the development agreement, and the CSM.
There was a request that came in late to make some changes to the agreement, and so we'll
have that at a future meeting.
9.1 and 9.2.
That's correct.
And since agenda, does anyone want anything separated out?
To the next meeting.
Did you say to the next meeting?
You drew me.
Thank you.
Okay.
No one wants anything separated out of the consent agenda.
I would take a motion to approve.
I'll make a motion to approve.
Second.
Alicia, second by Jan.
Any discussion?
All those in favor?
We're going to keep by saying aye.
Aye.
All those opposed?
No.
Motion carries unanimously.
General public appearances.
Do we have anyone wishing to speak on anything in that on tonight's agenda?
Okay.
We have no public appearances.
Let's go to presentations then.
Resolution 2026-100.
The resolution thanking Chris Cooper for his 26 years of service to the citizens of the
village of the forest.
John.
Thanks.
I'll start it now like Greg Gels to talk.
Greg worked for many more here tonight, but Chris has always been a, in my opinion, a great
team and we'll, we'll miss him being around.
He's always a, a jovial person, brought a lot of laughter and humor to it and, uh, was
just had a candy attitude in my opinion when I watched him do his work.
So, um, I really appreciate all he did for our community.
You and wiped out my mailbox one year.
So, um, I didn't.
Wiped it down or wiped it out.
Wiped it down or wiped it out.
Wiped it out.
Knocked it right off.
So, um, and I thought that was a perk of being a village president at the time, but
it wasn't.
Um, so, uh, but no, he's, he's a great guy.
And, uh, like I say, we're sure going to miss him, but it's a well deserved after 26 years
of hard labor for our community and he's born here or left here.
Most of you went to school here.
Um, he's the epitome to me of our guys and the pride they take and what they do for
this community.
So.
Thank you, John.
Greg.
Yeah.
Judd took most of what I wanted to say as well, but working with Coop for, uh, going on
21 years.
Um, I mean, Coop, Coop was always the, the guy we looked up to.
He was always had a positive attitude.
Always had a smile on his face.
Um, and made everybody want to come to work, right?
Because we had such a great person working with us.
He knew he had his car back.
Um, he is a hard worker.
Um, still is, obviously, but, uh, we're going to miss, uh, Chris a lot.
Um, and we hope, uh, your future is bright and I have a lot of good things ahead of
you.
So congratulations.
Okay.
I heard his, I guess he took your mailbox out.
He took your mailbox out too.
I don't think he took my mailbox out.
Oh, I.
That's a lot.
Behind real.
Yeah, we don't have to worry about railroad tracks.
But I just want to say that in a great place.
You're like, you're like, you like the family.
Um, and I was so glad to be a part of it.
Um, and it's just, I mean, it's hard to really quantify 26 years.
I mean, I've seen, I've seen a lot of growth.
Um, and I was just so happy to be, you know, to be part of a wonderful team.
And, uh, you know, Greg was always great to me.
Judd, you know, Judd was always great to me.
Um, I couldn't have asked for two better, uh, uh, bosses.
Um, you know, they support the whole team equally.
Um, and it's just, I mean, they are leaders.
So it was, I mean, it was a pleasure working for this community.
Um, I'm going to miss, I'm going to miss the guys the most.
And, you know, the joking and everything else.
But, uh, I probably won't miss the snow plowing to be honest with you.
So, but I just want to thank everybody on the village board.
This has been, been an honor.
Um, and I, I really appreciate it.
Thank you.
Now I'm going to read your resolution, Chris.
Okay.
This is a resolution thanking Chris Cooper for 26 years of service to the citizens of the village of the forest.
Whereas the village board recognizes the hard work commitment and exemplary service.
Chris Cooper has provided to the village of the forest as an employee mentor and great teammate of the public service team.
And whereas village trustees and staff recognize and appreciate.
Chris Cooper's dedication, diligence and positive attitude to make the forest a highly desirable place to live work and play.
And whereas Chris Cooper was the senior member of the divorce parks crew,
where he provided the residents of the forest a robust, well maintained park system.
And whereas Chris Cooper helped his teammates to maintain clear and safe streets.
To the winter season.
Always carefully dodging mailboxes, except judge.
Devoting many hours before and after regular business hours.
And whereas Chris Cooper has also worked on building maintenance, water monitoring, street maintenance, equipment maintenance,
many other job duties so that residents and employees can continue the work or play.
And whereas the village of the forest board wishes to express its sincere appreciation to Chris Cooper for his dedication and the service he provided to the residents of the community.
Now therefore be it resolved that the village of the forest board of trustees.
And it's on behalf and on behalf of the staff and residents of the village of the forest.
Thank Chris Cooper for his exemplary service of 26 years to the village and all of its residents and presents this plaque in commemoration.
They're out.
Adapted a regular meeting of the forest village board this 18th day of August, 2026.
Congratulations.
Motion to approve.
Motion to approve.
And a second please.
Second.
Motion by Brad second by Jan.
Motion to approve this all in favor say aye.
Aye.
All opposed no.
Motion carries unanimously.
Okay.
Thank you.
So if we could just get a photo off if Colleen you wouldn't mind coming around and getting Chris with the handshake.
The resolution will be signed by all of the trustees after the meeting and a plaque will be put together and I think I know somebody that might be able to deliver it to you.
So.
That actually.
Drone.
Did I do this to you?
No.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Do you want to do a selfie with Stacey?
How to do the village selfie?
I do the bomb in the bomb.
All right.
All right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Everyone.
I'm going to get out of the picture.
Right.
Thanks.
Thanks a lot.
Okay.
Seven point two annual review of the forest comprehensive plan initiatives and metrics is marked with it.
Okay.
I don't know if you're able to hear me now, but I.
Yes, there you are.
Okay.
Thank you.
Sorry for the delay.
I had to get mentioned to get through and I, if there's a background noise, I apologize.
My, one of my nerdy nephews is 3D printing something 3 feet to my left.
And it's not quiet.
Good evening.
I'm here to present briefly.
Our annual performance evaluation against the comprehensive plan initiatives and goals.
And your packet information to support this.
As you know, no doubt, no, the comprehensive plan is the villages long range.
Guide for growth development and preservation.
It was last fully updated about 3 years ago.
The plan includes 27 priority initiatives spanning the gamut from land use to economic development and natural area preservation and more.
The plan also has a tool by which we are to annually evaluate it to help gauge whether we're doing a good job and achieving those initiatives and reaching those goals.
And this is the, I think the third time we've done this now.
Early in the summer, we visited with P and Z and shared a similar.
To it.
But recently, and all the information in here is.
Based on the handy work of several people, including some in front of you here tonight.
The first of going through this effort is to again, gauge performance, but also to.
Identify potential amendments recalibrations to the plan as necessary.
And priorities as the board thinks about the.
2027 budget and other things moving forward.
We've got a couple of rules to share with you.
And if I plan initiative achievement, one of which we've summarized on the next page, because we frankly have done too many things over the last year.
And our format doesn't work great for presenting the information, but the summary.
Broadly speaking, I'll talk about the achievements here and will be available to answer questions tonight.
In economic development, an initiative was to.
Grow different aspects of the, of the villages base.
Just highlighting that we have two new hotels under construction one, I think is very close to opening.
Contributing property tax and room tax tax to the community.
In the area of natural and cultural resources, several initiatives.
Aimed to continue to improve the water quality. I think many of you know that it.
The water is clearly improving. The DNR has recognized that.
And you see several ideas and initiatives that the village has undertaken and partnered with.
Private entities like your hardware or headwaters and trot unlimited to advance and improve.
A significant natural resource.
In the housing and neighborhoods front, you'll see, and I think you have more on your agenda tonight.
The CDA, which was put together not in two dissimilar time frame as the comprehensive plan was updated.
Is really moving forward and making change happen through projects and initiative like home reach to forest.
And the affordable workforce and senior housing project at north and main.
Charging forward in the area of land use past years have been a big year for industrial building development in particular.
We've had a number of different folks who build leaseable space and their own space.
Construct new buildings in different parts of the village, including quick trip.
And the dickman's in particular building a larger least industrial buildings and not to forget.
Orest yards continues as continue to open in phases and will need to do so over the next several years.
In the area transportation, I think kind of an unsung hero is how well the village takes care of the roads it has.
It's not consistently knocked out road improvement and rehabilitation projects in its tenure capital improvement program.
And sought grants and partnerships to do projects like the new signals down into the forest south area on either end of Williamsburg way.
And upcoming next year to reconstruct roads like been burned on hickory lane and with stolen street coming.
After that, the area of community facilities and utilities plans being designed to improve and renovate nine parks in the system.
And three of those are being carried out here in 2026.
You see the other ideas that I know the board's been very aware of in the areas of park and other community facilities.
And one of them ties directly to their government to cooperation the construction of fire station number two that's now underway.
Near the south end of the community and a new boundary agreement with Westport.
The first of its kind between the forest and Westport, which will eventually lead to.
Incorporation of Westport as a village and some promising outreach with Vienna towards a new boundary agreement.
A lot of good stuff to happen to achieve some priority initiatives within the comprehensive plan.
The next page, I'm going to ask Alex or whoever is controlling to zoom through fairly quickly.
You need a magnifying glass or extremely sharp eyes to read all this, but this is the detail behind those pages that you saw.
And I just worked through. And next year, I think we'll work hard to come up with a better way to present this because this is a little bit challenging to work through it.
The final thing I'll present and then be available for questions is above a benchmarks evaluation.
This has less to do with this stuff that keeps.
Village staff, and you and consultants busy more about what types of positive change are actually happening within the community.
The 23 come plan, we identified some.
Turnable measures and I'll talk about a few of them.
One of them is in that first economic development cell.
A goal or a benchmark of increasing non residential property value at least 5% each year.
You know, frankly that which is.
That may need to go all the percentage increases get harder over time.
But the last measurable year was an increase of nearly 19% in non residential property.
The value increase, right.
The other thing that's going on in the community,
tracking down to land use is.
There's a goal or a priority of permitting at least 100 new housing units per year.
The village of the forest last year, but you know, Brandi's reported this and others has had permitted more.
New housing units than it ever had in its history.
Over 700 new housing units.
One of those one of the priorities that relates that you can see.
Right below it, no significant change in single family housing as a percentage of total housing units.
And we can report with all the multifamily permitting that happened last year.
The percentage did drop and we have the stats.
To the.
In the document, I should say that shows, you know, what happened.
Whether making a value judgment or not, we have a couple of new projects in the pipeline.
You heard a little bit about Lanar's efforts to jumpstart heritage gardens.
We expect up to 147 new homes within the next few years.
Single family homes in that development.
And the NOLs, the northern and last neighborhood in conservancy place.
We'll see in concept at the next P and Z meeting with a single similar number of single family homes over a period of years in that development.
So we anticipate that.
Sort of flipping a little bit over the next several years with more single family housing development occurring.
At this point, I think I'll, I'll pause be available for questions, comments, reactions.
And I know other people in the room are also available, especially if it gets a little too detailed on a particular subject for me.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mark.
I had a couple of questions. The first one we talked about.
I saw the non residential property value increase.
I would assume that if that was going up 5% each year that residential property would also increase just by the nature of it would not.
Not necessarily. It's related to new construction in a non residential.
Building commercial industrial development.
I don't have the particular numbers on residential, but if we certainly think about the multiple family developments, the townhouses that have been occurring there has absolutely also been a residential increase.
Hey, Mark, this is bill. Just a quick clarification here. Is this a new construction or is this a property value overall?
Overall property value. So it factors in.
New construction and I'm already on the ground in property value increases, I believe.
Okay.
So it's a brand to clarify your question. I mean, if you remember, we went from assessments every year to now doing it every other year.
I can say that on average, the assessment this year.
16% I think increased and that's that's all the markets. So we are generally seeing property value increases on both commercial and residential sides.
The last couple of years.
Okay, I would just question for myself whether or not I would want that as a goal, but I understand growth being part of this.
And then the industrial rooftop solar initiative. I don't know about that. And I'm wondering if somebody could just briefly explain.
I can do I can do that. So within the 2023 comprehensive plan, we.
And effort, we have a variety of initiatives public and private to promote.
Energy efficiency and alternative energy generation.
And one of the ideas that came out of that planning process.
Was we've got a lot of industrial buildings, you know, with a lot of rooftop area, you know, a couple,
couple three hundred thousand square feet.
In many cases, wouldn't that be a great place to have solar panels to help.
Support the energy needs of that.
That business.
We bring it up Alex, Alex and brandy know this every every time I meet with one of those folks I bring it up.
There's always a reason and I, you know, I think they're often good reasons why they're not being installed.
Sometimes it's conflicts with other things that are going up on the roof.
Sometimes it's the fact that they're.
Tenants pay for energy costs and so there's no real incentive for the owner of the building to install panels.
If they're not paying the energy costs within the building.
So that's been one area. It's been a learning experience for us.
And, you know, in some cases, a frustrating one to not get any results.
Well, you show you the quick you want to talk.
Yeah, so the report talked about economic development progress.
Also kind of why noting that an amendment had failed for zero lot line and mixed use house amendments.
I was wondering if you could talk a little bit more or what our strategy would be for missing middle and attainable home ownership.
Alex, would you like to tackle that one or you want me to start?
Sure. So maybe two years ago, we had brought forth a series of zoning code amendments related to housing that addressed a number of things.
Part of that was sort of the missing middle and.
Sort of that in between allowing for additional density and residential neighborhoods.
I know we had some conversation about traditional neighborhood development and getting an ordinance in place with that.
That I don't know if it were was referenced in this document, but that amendment did fail on a tide boat at the time.
And I know at staff, we've been having conversations about revisiting ordinance amendments in general and doing it in a more comprehensive way that gets.
I guess more input from trustees and our plan commission members in the general public.
In advance of sort of putting together a package to you all. So it's something that still I will say is on our radar from housing perspective.
If you look back and I can share this report out. We did a 2024.
Like localized to forest housing strategies report to add some of those in there.
And you know, it certainly is on our radar to, to still make some movement on.
Jim.
Yes, I wanted to elaborate that because I know that traditional zoning has been something I've been bringing up for probably at least five years.
But there's a trigger. I think it's a 12,000 and.
That doesn't really happen until the next census.
But we will be over that and we'll be forced into doing that. So.
I personally think that should be something we prioritize and maybe we do have a workshop to bring those two committees or boards together to see if we can come up with a solution.
Yeah, that's helpful to hear feedback. And I think we'll probably at a staff level and with Mark as well, try to bring something that approaches this in an intentional way to get additional feedback from the full group on some of these strategies to.
I don't know, Mark.
Yeah, I think that.
I don't. I think you said it very well.
Everybody else said anything.
Okay, I guess not. Thank you, Mark.
Oh, thank you very much. And one more thing. I mean, if I heard a comment, you know, it.
Does the plan reflect the policies of the current board? You know, again, this was a plan adopted by the village board three years ago.
It can be revisited and amended at any time. So.
You know, but it is until it until it is amended. It is our sort of a marching orders as staff and consultants to move forward.
So thank you for your time this evening. Appreciate it.
Thank you.
Again.
Mark started and let you go quick enough, but I wanted to bring up what's to me brought up often about like a 60 or 70% mix a single family.
I think that's actually not necessarily in the comprehensive plan.
But I wonder your, your take on that. And I specifically want to bring up, like, say that.
I don't know if you want to call them townhouses or the duplexes, which to me is more or less a single family, even though it's a duplex and all that gets counted.
Do you know what I'm getting at?
Sure.
The villages comprehensive plan over the years has had different policies and percentages.
Of my guess goals for keeping the number of single family homes or own occupied homes at a certain level with threshold.
At present, the plan has an aspirational goal of 60% of all units in the village as single family detached homes.
It's not a law. It's not a mandate.
The plan does say if that number drops substantially below 60% single family detached as a percentage of total units that the, the village will take a beat and determine whether, you know, some, there's something amiss with the policies and programs to try to achieve the goal.
As I mentioned earlier, we're working hard and there's others working hard to get single family homes on the market. That's been a big part of the issue is that we just don't have enough lots for people to build single family homes right now.
But it is, it is currently tied to your comment, Jim. It is currently tied to single family detached units. And so I do plex condo that, you know, that would be owner occupied is on the 40% side and not the 60% side as it's currently written.
Thank you, Mark. And I, I do agree. It's been a challenge that could say single family lots established.
But I, I wonder if it is some point, I guess I'm looking at the board more than anybody is like, is it a single family home or are we worried more about homeownership? I think we decided that in the past, that was hard to define.
But again, I feel like a zero lot line or a condiment in my eyes do plex. I personally feel is a pretty much a single family home and I'm wondering opinions if that's something we want to look into.
Bill, if that's a policy that the board was just to look into a couple of things to keep in mind.
In regards to the percentages, I think time frame matters. You know, there's a 60 to 40 all the time, which would be more restrictive.
I think in regards to how the market moves as far as on a development side in what we do for recruitment and setting up development for future years.
If it's defined as then say a comprehensive life term 10 years and making sure that you keep within those percentages, I think that provides a little bit more flexibility for us to move to the market.
And as we know in the scene, the past couple of years with interest rates increasing, the challenge was bringing single family homes to market where there was more opportunities for multifamily.
Again, we're seeing that kind of live here, whereas we aren't seen as much multifamily proposals.
And then we have previous, and we've seen that single family come back so think about that. And then how do we define that.
Want to touch a bit on on our occupied versus renting.
You know, that is hard to get a handle on.
Because people have different life situations that may come with homeownership.
And so the only real way to kind of address that is having some kind of registration process.
And I don't know if we want to go there. So those are things contemplate as we look at, you know, how much do we want to regulate.
And control versus being flexible to move to the market.
There was a 6% decrease over the last year for single family.
Do we have estimates of what will be at the end of this year with all the approved projects is it going to continue to go down or do we think we're going to get closer to 50%.
The last we checked we didn't we didn't have a lot of single family or multiple family permits in 2026.
So I would be surprised if it changed appreciably at the end of this year.
I would just to pick you back up with some of Bill's comments, considering those types of policy changes.
However, that looks just understanding the I guess the rationale or the impact that we're trying to regulate against too.
And whether that's if it's a if it's a regulatory policy in place because we're trying to mitigate against impact from a certain kind of development on provision of public services,
or what that just what the basis of that is to like why rather than arbitrary percentage one way or the other, the rationale behind that approach to because I'd be curious to understand that.
I just like to add on marks comprehensive plan initiatives talks about transportation a lot with residential growth single family homes.
We're talking about lots of new roads, correct, and keeping up with our older roads.
We're trying to go for a pays rating of four, a lot of our roads right now.
There's a majority of them that are skirting that four or five rating.
So moving forward, we just got to remember when we're budgeting and approving budgets for future years is to keep roads and the plans to resurface.
Otherwise, we're going to get way behind on our roads research scene projects.
So just kind of incorporating all the things togethers transportation and it's a big portion of this too.
Okay.
Good point.
Is that it for this topic?
Okay, Mark, you're released.
Thank you. Good night.
Next up, a resolution establishing fees for building permits and inspections in the village of the forest.
Alex, and Brandi, that presentation.
This is an update. I believe we came to the board earlier this year with a initial update on the fees. So most of the significant changes here as you can see in the memo.
Adjustments to account for the zoning review component.
So Brandi, when we get building permit come in, she'll do a zoning review, regardless.
Well, mostly regardless of the kind of development it is, but specifically between commercial or residential. So we had to account for that.
We also miscalculated the way that the trade inspections, the fees were allocated for residential development. Those are actually on a per square foot formula.
So we made that modification, our, our fire inspection services. So GEC, they had initially set forth fees for doing fire.
Inspection for various projects. We do that in house.
We, but the district does that in house. So we took those fees out because they charge separately.
And then some additional changes to align with the contract and then some items that we missed specifically electrical inspections for above ground pools.
And then a couple other permitting items there. So you can see chicken coop patio and pergola.
Smaller changes, I would say, but happy to answer any questions.
Questions anyone.
Yeah.
I don't think I necessarily saw, but then there used to be like a minimum, minimum cap. I want to say, if you stayed under a thousand, that you didn't have to do some things or just sort of gone.
Well, maximum.
Yeah, there in some instances, there were maxes and then the contract with GEC essentially removed those maxes. There still are minimum fees for most of these.
I meant like, writing windows doors that are under 1500 don't require permit. Yeah. Yeah. There you go.
I had a question.
Under the single family homes and the duplexes, it shows a construction fee per square foot.
Why doesn't it show that under multifamily and the commercial industrial.
It should, if you scroll down at the 11 cents.
The way it was worded, it was kind of confusing to me.
Yeah. And I think that's why we're kind of correcting some of this is because we were a little confused. So 20 cents a square foot. You can see it under new construction and additional inspections.
Okay. And then they create their square foot charges there.
Okay. Thank you.
Anyone else?
Any public appearances? I'm not going to assume no.
No.
All right. I would entertain a motion for resolution 2026 dash.
102.
Anyone like to make a motion to approve that?
Make a motion to approve a resolution.
Motion by Jim is there a second.
Second.
Second by Brad.
All those in favor indicate by saying aye.
Aye.
All those opposed? No.
Motion carries unanimously.
Thank you, Alex.
Resolution 2026 dash 103 resolution granting a waiver of park impact fee requirements.
But the deforest CDA gave air crossing low income housing development.
Alex and Bill.
So I can kick us off here. So we've received from the.
Community development authority a request to waive park land.
Dedication fees and new and park improvement.
He's in new for the development of your heart crossing.
This is the building proposed as a.
Mixed income low income and mixed use.
So the consisting of approximately 62.
Units and commercial space on the first floor on Main Street and North Street.
CDA as you know.
Is pretty much the redevelopment arm for the village.
And has been tasked with redevelopment in the villages downtown area.
This project encompasses we did not only redevelopment and in a blighted area,
but also addresses workforce housing.
And senior housing.
And as you can see in the proposal, a reservation for veterans.
We do have a current funding agreement with the CDA.
Thus far we've invested approximately 1.8 million.
From tax increment district number 6.
To the CDA for acquisition of property in that location.
And we remain committed.
For a portion of.
For a construction loan for a portion of the construction cost.
Moving into next year.
CDA has reported that as they work through 90% plans and design.
They're coming up across costs inflation due to market impacts.
And have worked to reduce that cost as best they can.
But holding to the idea that this is a.
Cornerstone for the village and that there needs to be some standard here.
With that being said, the amount of.
Cost of impact from the parking pet fees was estimated.
At the units with the 62 units at approximately $230,000.
And the villages code allows for the village board to waive that fee for.
Affordable housing projects.
All pause there and I'll let Alex explain kind of the steps that.
They've taken to help reduce costs.
And then I know that Alicia has the chair of the CDA may have something to say to.
In regards to the project.
I guess the only things that I'll add is so we did have this authorization to submit this request to the board at our CDA meeting last Thursday.
That was unanimously approved.
We so we had this in projects initially priced out in May of 2025.
We've been working at this for a couple of years now, at least.
I see it used me August the 2025 reprised in May of 2026.
With call it like 60 to 70% plans.
At that point, we were pushed to about $2 million over the initial budget.
Part of that was this bill has indicated some increasing cost.
And then as we just have progressed into more detailed plans, which sort of reworked some of the pricing and scene where that comes in.
We're now at 90% plans and we're going through.
Excuse me, another reprising exercise right now to get.
What will probably be a pretty detailed set of costs.
We are currently also working through some value engineering items right now.
Going through changes to the windows switching from fiberglass windows to vinyl windows.
Considering removing the solar on the project, although I will say at the same time as we're trying to cut costs.
I'm also trying to bring additional funds into the project.
We just approved submitting a grant to WC for $250,000, which talking to the state.
They really liked the fact that solar is in there.
So there's some trade offs being made there.
I guess my point is with some of the value engineering that we're doing, we're trying to maintain the quality of building at a very prominent corner that the village wants.
And then not taking this request to you all lightly in that.
We're trying to find other mechanisms to reduce this cost first before impacting our park.
So happy to answer any questions about the project itself.
I will say this is potentially a significant tax based generator for the village.
2025 property taxes on the three parcels that were there previously, which you put at the liquor store, the duplexes.
Six unit that was there and then the vacant car wash, I think was totaling roughly 25,000.
We're anticipating that this would generate $110,000 on top of that in property tax base.
So it is a positive increase from that perspective, too.
But Alicia, I don't know if there's anything you want to add.
Yeah, I mean, I think I just said currently we're in a housing crisis.
Just for definition is a dangerous, difficult or unstable time that needs quick action.
So I think tonight it's not about just simply like reducing the fee.
It's more about again, Alex just talked about all the ways we're trying to close that gap,
but this would help make this development possible.
This would be for 62 affordable homes and there would be commercial space.
Really, we just got done talking about the downtown, but at the heart of our community.
And really, I think this is for the most vulnerable in our community, our seniors and veterans.
As someone who's worked in community health and knows the struggle that it is to find affordable housing.
I think this board has the.
Has the opportunity tonight to make a meaningful local change.
Take local action by waving these fees and help helping us close that gap to make this development possible.
I think thank you, Alicia. That was great.
One additional piece. If you've got the, if you can pull up the site plan,
that I do just want to highlight as it relates to the provision of park space and outdoor space.
So this building is going to be a restricted 55 and up.
Obviously, it's adjacent to our across from the senior center community center, which has its own is planning to include some outdoor activity space as well with veterans part and Western green.
Just to the south, but if you can scroll to page 10 of the PDF, I think is our landscape plan.
We are planning to incorporate significant.
Both outdoor amenities and then indoor amenities to for residents as well. So there is a fitness area interior to the building with women as well as some class spaces.
One more page or a couple more pages. One more. There you go.
In the northeast corner of the property is a public plaza.
So while that won't be dedicated, that's obviously privately maintained that's open to the general public.
The thought is that that would serve most of the commercial space there. So we are including that space publicly available.
And then the residents in the southwest corner have an outdoor space, which is, I would say, probably a little over a tenth of an acre with some grilling stations picnic areas, a dog.
Waste area and then some community space in general, too. So we are trying to on a very, very tight one and a half acre space to accommodate outdoor and indoor activities as well.
Jan, go ahead.
I think that you make a fair argument or the waiver of the park fees.
My only question is with your comments that you just made, are we doing this prematurely? Because you said you're trying to reduce costs. So should we be voting on this tonight?
It would definitely help.
Because we are still fairly far over and trying to bring in additional funding sources. I think I included in the memo the status of our funding sources.
So in addition to the CDI grant that we're applying for, which is $250,000, there's also just under $500,000 loan through Madison Development Corporation that we'll be seeking as well.
So when we go into a project like this, both WHEDA, from a tax credit perspective, they have underwriting criteria where we have to meet certain debt coverage thresholds.
And then our lenders, obviously, on the construction loan and Madison Development Corporation will also need us to hit those.
And so they're looking for those numbers as we're going through their underwriting process, which is essentially now.
So the more that I can take costs out of the project now, the better.
So I understand what you're saying and perhaps, and I think I even mentioned this off-handedly to Bill, you know, if there's an avenue for contingency funds to be used in the future, I obviously don't want to make that promise because I don't know that we're going to have contingency funds.
I haven't been a part of a project where costs somehow go lower than anticipated.
But, you know, certainly there could be an avenue for us to make a payment out of contingency funds.
One of the requirements of a tax credit project is we have to hold 5% contingency, and that's what they base the award on.
And we have to use all of that contingency.
So if that's still there, we have to allocate that cost somewhere.
Is that kind of?
Yep.
Thank you.
Jim.
I guess who's ever controlling. Can you go back to the site plan?
And I guess I just want to be upfront is I personally do feel like.
That they're getting rid of those and say 230,000 for park improvement fees is.
A commendable thing to do, especially with the population there.
I do like that you've got sort of a prominent corner and I think that is more or less a park feature in itself.
So that's some given a take there.
This is the first time I've seen it in six months or a year.
So I would say that I'm.
I do like this.
I think there's a sidewalk along.
Say the what is that the east side, but not necessarily the north side.
And I'll just mention that I'm a bit disappointed with that because I can tell you.
The area street has quite a bit of pedestrian traffic.
Right now they're walking on the street and now an acre Parkway.
The why bring this up in this light is if we could put sidewalk on north street and even connecting with malaria.
That that I think would be a big asset to that.
Community.
But again, and why bring it up now.
Is that is a potential use of my opinion that maybe we search for a tab grant to do that.
And should the sidewalks really be more of a street improvement and can we look for funds.
Say the sidewalks and current gutter.
And streets rather than necessarily the CPA.
I guess that's something I look for financial.
Thoughts on that I guess.
I'll also think in gender Greg is there a plan for trail on the north side.
We do have the trail plan for the north side of highway V and 28.
We certainly can.
Look into tap grants. I don't really.
I'm caught flat footed, so I don't know that this is the funding cycle where we're at in that.
But to do that section from main to malaria wouldn't.
It wouldn't be a overwhelming dollar.
Certainly something we can get it estimate from from our engineering folks to say here's what that cost would be.
There is storm water through there though so that's done through.
Just overland. So there might be additional costs that contribute to having a sidewalk.
Meaning we not storm water underneath that to carry that water out.
I had that thought on at home before I drove here and when I.
I drove past it on the way here and that's does seem to be a high point.
So I think the storm water would be relatively minimal, but.
I do appreciate your thoughts that there's more cost involved, but I just.
I'm looking for other opportunities that maybe we can separate some of these street improvements out of the project cost and.
Maybe find grants other ways.
Yeah, I mean, we can also look at this again from a design standpoint to.
And see this isn't the full picture of the site plan, but I can bring it up with our team.
And remind me the CDA is expected to manage this long term.
Yep, that's correct.
Any thoughts on putting in a stipulation that if it's sold within and so many years that it would transfer park fees over to that new order.
I don't know how that would relate to our ordinances.
I can tell you from a sale of the property or not.
Because it is an affordable housing project will have a land use restriction that the 30 year land use and typically when these properties sell.
They're not really an attractive thing for an investor to come in and buy.
When they do sell, they typically sell at year 15 as the initial tax credit investor is exiting the property.
But it's certainly, I guess I could talk with that all about it and see if that's something we could do.
We have done it in the past with developments or at least proposed it.
I don't think the development actually went through, but we've done that when there was no binding commitment for a 30 year low income assurance.
In this situation, we do have the 30 years. So that's not something that probably would come into play.
I also just had to add just for additional information, which probably nobody cares about at that 15 year point when the investor exits the CDA as the manager member will have a right of first refusal to purchase that property.
And so it'll be essentially for a formula price for the outstanding debt.
So it will be a really nice price to purchase that property and then we become the outright on that point.
Okay.
And do we have any public appearances on this?
Nothing. All right.
Then let's take a motion to approve resolution 2026 dash 102 zero motion.
Oops, 103. I'm sorry.
26 dash 103.
Motion to approve.
I'll make a motion to approve resolution 2026 103.
Second.
Motion by Jim seconded by Brad. All those in favor of the Cape by saying aye.
Aye.
Aye.
All those opposed no.
Motion carries unanimously.
Thank you.
That register was in your packet committee commission and board reports for a stereo public library.
We're reviewing the budget right now as you have heard the presentation last meeting.
They just held a Harry Potter event that went very well wrapped up the summer.
Reading program.
They're conducting a space needs right now with somebody from.
The library system.
Producing that report.
And then working through reporting issues with the new interlibrary system that they're trying to.
Work out some of the details of.
How they calculate some of their numbers and compare that system wide and it's not just our library that's off.
It's every library in the in the system. So they're trying to work out some of those details.
Thank you, Brad.
The forest public safety commission. I missed the last meeting.
It was a very short meeting. We approved a couple of liquor licenses and that was it.
Thank you. Cornerstone community center.
At that meeting, we continue to.
Look at our doing our outdoor space further.
But nothing real new has come out of that.
Community development authority.
We just talked a little bit about what's been going on, but we.
Are we to.
Isn't our initial view and it's entered underwriting for our tax credits. So.
That was good. And then we talked.
We put some funds into a CD for six months.
Or directed to do that. And then.
We just got done talking about your heart crossing and how we were working to close that gap. So thank you to.
The board tonight and also we.
Approved a resolution to apply for a $250,000 state grant as well.
Okay.
Planning and zoning, Jim.
So at the last meeting, we talked about a DMK development group.
Proposal that is the senior.
Living residential units that are north.
That led a complex on is a cube of value renovation drive, whatever it's named.
And that we talked about their.
Additional use permit.
They're playing unit development in the FDP, their final development plan.
So I believe all that stuff passed.
So I don't think there's any more steps and they can just keep moving forward now.
So.
I would expect we'll be seeing ground broken soon.
And then we also talked about.
Lenire Corp, or the Lane Erickson, also known as heritage.
What arms were there.
That was the thing that was on the agenda tonight.
So we will be talking about it here at some point.
At a planning and zoning, we amended the plan unit development.
Did the final development plan.
Also approved a preliminary and final plan.
And then the last thing we talked about was the review of the comprehensive plan,
which is what we also had on the.
Meeting tonight here.
Thank you.
First one fire and EMS board.
The fire department is in the process of making sure that the village of divorce and the village of Windsor have.
Ordinances that can be enforced equally the same in both communities.
That's a big rewrite going on there that will be further reviewed by attorneys and individual boards.
Host tower is the wall anyway is up.
Oh, for heaven's sake.
That's okay. We didn't have a meeting.
Nothing to report.
Gee, thanks.
All right, I'm done. They're working on the ordinances.
The whole tower wall is off.
Steel is going to be late incoming so that could put us behind a little bit on station to.
And those are the highlights, but it's looking good.
And I think that does it for committees, commissions and boards.
Any other business that lawfully comes before the board.
Okay, our next movement then is adjournment. Is there a motion to adjourn?
Really? I'll make a motion to adjourn.
Thank you, Alicia. Is there a second?
Second. Seconded.
I'll meet my Alicia seconded by Jan. All those in favor and to keep in saying aye.
I suppose no motion carries unanimously. We are adjourned at 706.
That's the first.
So, yeah.
All those in favor.
All those in favor.
All those in favor.