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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes CC - 11/10/2014 - MINS 11 10 14 WS (Migrated from Optiview)Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page I of23 This summary is provided as a convenience and service to the public, media, and staff. It is not the intent to transcribe proceedings verbatim. Any reproduction of this summary must include this notice. Public comments are noted and heard by Council, but not quoted. This document includes limited presentation by Council and invited speakers in summary form. This is an official record of the Milton City Council Meeting proceedings. Official Meetings are audio and video recorded. The Work Session of the Mayor and Council of the City of Milton was held on November 10, 2014 at 6:00 PM. Councilmembers Present: Councilmember Matt Kunz, Council member Bill Lusk, and Councilmember Burt Hewitt, Councilmember Joe Longoria and Councilmember Rick Mohrig. Councilmembers Absent: Councilmember Karen Thurman. Mayor Joe Lockwood: • Work Sessions are an informal setting to update Council on business items. • No votes will be taken during these sessions. • There are four (4) items on our Agenda tonight. • Public comment is allowed that is germane to an Agenda Item. • If you wish to speak you are required to fill out a comment card and turn it into the City Clerk staff. • Public comment will be allowed for a total of 10 minutes per agenda item and no more than 2 minutes per person. • Public comment will be heard at the beginning of each Item. • Once the item is called, no other comment cards will be accepted. Agenda Item #1 was read. 1. Update from Fulton County Schools. (Patrick Burke. Deputy Superintendent, Fulton County School System) Patrick Burke, Deputy Superintendent, Fulton County School System Thank you, Mayor and Council members. We are trying to get out periodically to our municipal govenunents to give updates on how we are progressing in our Capital Program. We received a lot of public support for the one percent sales tax and we feel an obligation and responsibility to come back to you on a regular basis and give you updated information on how we are doing executing the program. Today we are going to do a quick review of the program's execution to date. I want to talk a little bit about revenue projections and what we are seeing on the cost side of the house from a construction perspective and then what things are happening and being planned for the City of Milton area. Revenue Projections -We have been at the planning process for capital execution for some time. Council probably recalls that the SPLOST referendum passed November 2011 and revenue collections started in July 2012. We have had a lot of revenue projection fluctuation over time. We originally Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6 :00 pm Page 2 of23 projected about a $900 ,000 ,000 budget but subsequent legislation since has changed property tax. Taxation has been changed on automobiles. Automobile tax represents about eight to ten percent of the revenue that we receive in sales tax collection. When the state came in and changed the law regarding automobiles and forgave us on birthday tax, it did have an impact on our sales tax revenue. We initially adjusted that down so our sales tax was down to $742,000,000 projected. Most current projections, because the economy has been turning up, are closer to $221,000,000 . This has not had an impact on execution yet. We are starting to see a tightening between revenue and projected expenditures. The economy turning up has been great from revenue prospective, but what we are seeing is an imbalance in supply and demand on the construction costs. I am sure the City of Milton is seeing it as well going forward with public procurement of construction projects. We are starting to see pretty substantial increase in construction costs related to skill trades such as HV AC, etc. We are not at a point where we are concerned in terms of the execution. We think we are going to be able to execute everything promised to the tax payer but it is something that we continually monitor on a regular basis. Programs that have impacted Milton: Cambridge High School , which opened in 2012. We have completed the punch list and are just doing warranty work at this point. We do have a couple of items outstanding on this program. Cambridge High School consists of 99 instructional units, 320,000 square feet, designed by COLS Architects and executed by Evergreen Construction. We are in the process of expanding. I know having just opened the school this sounds odd but right near the end of our design process our CTE (Career Tech and Education) program had come to the construction staff to ask if we could add in a program around Veterinary Science. It was too late by that time because we had procured the project, so we decided to go ahead and stub-out and run conduit and plumbing to the site where this would be located and build it separately on the site within the next Capital Program. That is coming to fruition now and we are in the process of final design. This is projected to be open in the first semester 2015 (Fall). It is one instructional unit with a typical classroom design. There is a lab setting and it ties to a pole barn idea. We would not house live-stock here. It would allow us to work with local organizations and local farms to bring in live-stock to create real experience opportunities for our students in the City of Milton. Hopewell Middle School Addition This is scheduled to open next fall as well. This addition is currently under construction with Hogan Construction (construction management firm) and Stevens and Wilkinson (our Middle School prototype designer). It is 15 classrooms and is situated to occur on the backside of the property. It is going to be in two separate locations basically building off of those back wings with a little different design. We went through a process of engaging our instructional leaders about what types of classroom space they needed to achieve their objectives. We had a conversation with the public a year ago about this concept of traditional classroom design which is largely what is in those classrooms within that building today, versus a more imrnersive design or flexible design that allowed different types of learning environments for our students . We did decide to incorporate some of that within the Hopewell model. If you look at the floor plan, they are broken up into learning spaces and the idea is to make the physical environment align to the middle school groupings model so that you have your core classes working Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November J0, 20 J4 at 6:00 pm Page 3 of23 together as a team approach in middle school and we are creating a space that allows that collaboration to happen. It has more interconnection and interdependency and the principal has in mind how he wants to use this space. Not a lot of change but it does allow some flexibility within the learning environment to do more differential learning, small group projects, etc. Crabapple Crossing Elementary School Renovation This is currently in design as we speak. It is a fairly substantial renovation occurring this summer for Crabapple Crossing Elementary. It will have a wonderful impact on the environment at the school. These types of renovations are not going to be easily seen but will help the instructional environment. A lot of mechanical work (HV AC) that is due for replacements. A significant improvement in building temperature control, better environment, and the kids will have the learning environment we expect them to have in our schools. System Wide Projects: Sports Flooring at Elementary Schools We used to have carpet in our gymnasium in the elementary schools and we have replaced it with rubberized sports flooring which is a more durable product, better life cycle costing and a better tool for the type of activities that are happening in those areas. Playground Upgrade It affects 37 elementary schools who have not received upgrades in over a decade. The newer schools like Birmingham Falls are not affected. This was an oversight with our last Capital Program and this is making up for that. A lot of work is needed with this project. It is more a site development project that is needed to upgrade the playgrounds. Safety and Security A number of security enhancements have been made in this area and we are going to continue to invest taxpayer's dollars around this effort. Safety is our primary goal. We have put in place front door access controls . We are still in the final stages of implementing them. We have a couple of schools that are either under construction or trying to find the right option based on the existing architecture. Those systems allow us to provide better access to who is entering the building . Once they have entered, the individual has to go through the identification scanning system. Many schools have those already but we have standardized the tool as well as how it is used. The tool now goes and hits both the Georgia and the National Sex Offender database when that scan occurs and then allows us to keep track and send an alert to appropriate individuals if we had somebody in the building that did not belong there. It also ties in with the volunteer process and schools have better surveillance of who is in their buildings. We tied the tool that checks to see if the visitor is a mandated reporter for child abuse or neglect to the visitor identification system, so we basically have just one database that is clearing all individuals in that building. Technology investments Fulton County was quite behind in how we were executing technology in our classrooms. This is a figure we have seen as we discussed our SPLOST prior to the vote. We continue keeping laptop and printers up to date for new teachers and the refresh oflaptops on a seven or less year cycle. A lot of time has been spent increasing bandwidth at our schools, reliability of the network and the building up the infrastructure that is there to support any new learning tools in the classroom. We are rolling out 3,100 interactive projectors in the classrooms county wide. We have put in place digital repositories of educational content so teachers have more tools to pull from. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 4 of23 We have put out mobile device management, which will manage the technology that is being implemented and make sure students are using the information appropriately within their classrooms. We are moving ahead with a mobile device, it has yet to be determined. There is an RFP out right now for mobile learning. We have had several efforts both within the Atlanta Metro Region as well as in other regions of implementing student device strategies. We wi 11 see a three year roll out of this technology integration within our classrooms. Do you have any questions? Council member Mohrig It looks like at Hopewell Middle School you are taking a different approach and actually getting more permanent space expansions versus doing the portables, which I commend you on that because that is much better from a long term stand point versus just putting a patch out there. Is this something new you all are looking at from a footprint expansion? Patrick Burke We have moved to the model that we use to determine portables and how we determine classroom placement and away from the State Capacitors model. We are always going to have portables and variability with enrollment. We are not going to change the attendance boundaries every year nor would I expect the community to want us to do that. We are trying to get permanent units in the right places. Katie Reeves, Fulton County School Board Member Can I take the political question I think he was asking: Are we going to make our middle schools permanently larger and is that the long term plan? No, we needed more middle school space and we had in the SPLOST that we were plalU1ing for additional middle school space. In the last redistricting, you might have recalled it was a little heated. We heard from folks in that process and from the public forms for the charter district. People said regarding the middle school space to please get the feeder patterns lined up, look at additions and do not look at a new schools. We heard that so resoundingly from the community that Patrick and his team went back and asked what would happen to our feeder patterns if we looked at additions at these middle schools. It is still controversial because we had some folks asking why did you make the middle school bigger but we feel that there are some advantages that Patrick and his team have built into this. But back to have we permanently changed to have larger middle schools, I do not think that has been determined as of yet. Councilmember Lusk With the property on Freemanville Road, at one time projected putting a high school and a middle school there, is there any current plan within the next ten years of developing that property? Patrick Burke Not at the moment. We are already begilU1ing to plan for the next Capital Cycle and we will see what comes up from that. The idea of putting a middle school there and domino the entire north Fulton area to fill that school is not needed immediately. The Board is holding that property and keeping it in our inventory. We anticipate we will need it within the next ten years but we have not identified the use specifically. Councilmember Lusk One of the biggest issues out here is our traffic and noticeably the morning and evening traffic is lighter during the summer months, is there anything we can do to get kids back to riding school buses? Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 5 of23 Patrick Burke It is a tough question. It gets back to personal preferences. In this area, students drive in large numbers. We will be tightening up the utilization of the bus fleet after we know the pattern of ridership. We would love people to ride the buses. Council member Kunz With the weather getting colder, what are the contingency plans for weather events? Patrick Burke I think we learned some hard lessons last year. We have completely revamped how we make those decisions making it a much more detailed process. We are relying very heavily on National Weather Service and when they come up with their updated reports, how often they come up with their updated reports and are making those contacts directly. We did learn some hard lessons but in some ways it was very good preparation in case of a horrible event occurs by knowing what gaps existed in the process. We are training all the new principals this month on all the new processes. We did unify our bell structure with elementary, middle and high schools. This gives us flexibility on executing early dismissals. For example, it will allow us to flip high school to the first run and do it flawlessly. Every bus driver has a book on early release and late delivery and what that means on every single stop on their route and we will be training the principals on that this month as well. Mayor Lockwood We appreciate the update. Can't say enough good things about what the elected board and the staff side have done with our school systems in North Fulton. It is a huge draw up here. Agenda Item #2 was read. 2. Conservation Update. (Laurel Florio, Conservation Initiative Consultant) Laurel Florio, Conservation Initiative Consultant Tonight, I would like to talk about private land conservation and some of the ways we can implement conservation and the tools we can use. I would also like to give you an update on what I have been doing within the community regarding enhancing education and working toward some actual conservation on the ground. We all know that the reason we are even discussing land conservation is to try to balance the development that is taking place in Milton along with the ability to preserve its rural character. In the green print that was presented to you by Tom Daniels, it showed that between 300-350 acres per year is what is being currently developed within Milton. If we continue at this pace, then 5,000 acres will be developed over the next 16 years. In addition, Tom mentioned that number could even begin to exceed what our comprehensive plan originally provided for. So, we are moving very quickly in a developmental phase right now. Conversely, we have to look at our conservation efforts so far. Much of that conservation is in our parks. In order to protect and preserve land in Milton, we need to be finding ways to preserve 5,000 acres at the same time that 5,000 acres are being developed. In truth, however, we are behind the eight ball for 2014. We have not been able to preserve 350 acres of green space during 2014. Tom made a few suggestions, one of which is creating a Land Preservation Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10, 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 6 of23 Advisory Committee to assist in making decisions and outlining areas that could be protected within the city. He also mentioned that we might like to determine the amount of area we would want to protect in a certain period of time. If you do the math based on the projected 5,000 acres per year being developed and/or conserved, it comes out to approximately 32 acres per year which is a very attainable goal. Tom also mentioned all of the conservation tools such as TORs, PDRs, and strict donations of conservation easements, as well as, the donation of land to the city or to a land trust. Long term financing is also an option going forward. Using flood plains in storm water areas is also another avenue that we can utilize. Our trail system and our committee that is looking at impact fees are also other areas we can use for conservation initiatives. Our Parks and Recreation Department as well as our Public Works Department are moving forward with outstanding conservation initiatives. So, how do we look at the particular needs of the landowners and fill our need to conserve those spaces that are privately held in the city? We know that landowners want to develop, sell, or conserve their property. Landowners know that they can obtain an economic gain from their land or they can conserve it for the good of the city and all its citizens. There are investors out there that are interested in purchasing land in order to talk about conservation and reap the tax benefits . In terms of protecting, conserving and preserving the land, the land owners also have many options they can use. They can donate to a Land Trust for protection while obtaining tax benefits at federal and state level. They can sell the development rights in a PDR situation as well. So, there are many ways a landowner can work within the scope of their land and reap benefit from it. Tax incentive is a huge draw and they do work. Also we found "Leaving a legacy to the neighborhood/City" was something many felt strongly about. There are about 2 ,300 acres currently under the Current Use Value Assessment (CUVA) which means those properties are temporarily protected from development by a state enhanced program where the property tax is reduced a little for the protection of the property for ten year periods of time. I believe the time period is 30 years and every ten years after that they can renew or not renew. As of now, the people who have this in place are happy doing this. This is another good option for the land owners to have if they desire. The big question is what is a conservation easement? It is a legal agreement, uniquely drafted for each specific property. Land trust will establish a template and the landowner and the land trust will negotiate the terms of that contract. It is a partial interest in real property and this document will run with the property forever unless it is judicially extinguished. There are two types of easements: 1) Those that qualify through donations for the tax benefits and 2) those that are intending to just give public benefit and that the landowner has either sold or reaped monetary benefit instead. Rules for tax incentives for landowners are based on the Non-Cash Charitable Donations under the IRS code. Donations of easements give a federal tax deduction as well as a potential state tax credit for the people within Georgia. Also there are the Bargain Sale opportunities where the landowner might donate part of the land and sell the rest. With regards to the federal tax incentive, we are watching closely how the Senate takes care of the Enhanced Conservation Incentive. It was in place from 2006 -2013 and was the best tax incentive for landowners ever, in terms of conservation. We have flipped back to the old rule which is 30% of income and carry-over for six years. We hope in the next six weeks the new rule will renew and it is 50% of income (100% for farmers, ranchers and forest landowners) and carry-over for up to 16 years. The state tax incentives are going through changes in Georgia as well. Georgia and South Carolina landowners get tax credit and also can transfer and sell them for money. The issue with the Georgia tax credit is the new regulations put an upfront fee of $5 ,000 non-refundable on the landowner to even apply for the state tax credit. That has not been extremely successful in Georgia so far. There are also local tax incentives that vary from county to county, town to town ... really have no set rules. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 7 of23 Estate tax incentives are not very well known by many. The permanent estate tax relief can be used by people who want to protect their property. Their property is put in a conservation easement and then it is reduced in value and therefore affects the estate tax the family would have to pay at a given time in the future . The estate tax incentive allows for $5M per individual. We also have a post-mortem deduction which is where landowners (who have owned the property for three years and are family of the original owner) can ask to put a conservation easement post-mortem on that property and will reap all the tax benefits in the estate tax relief that would have been available to the original landowner when he was alive. This is a really good option that a lot of landowners are not aware of and really does change the potential for the landowner to reap benefit after having lost someone who owned the property. State laws that may apply to conservation easements are conservation easement enabling statutes, contract laws, real property laws, including deed conventions and recording issues, marketable title acts and charitable trust laws. I bring this up just to show you how complex this process can be. The bargain sale of land or easement is merely selling that land for less than the appraised value and the landowner would walk away with tax deductions for the donation portion as well as cash in hand for having sold it a less rate. There are also other incentives for landowners that exist such as: Donation with Lifetime Income, Purchase of Development Rights and Transfer of Development Rights. There are many, many options that landowners can look at with regards to their property besides just selling it out right to a developer. Money, tax deductions/credits, limited development, leaving a legacy and protecting the property are some of the needs and wants a landowner has. Our primary concern is protecting those properties for the public benefit. We can accommodate the landowner's needs and desires working within the realm of conservation and figuring out what is best for them. We can begin the process determining what the landowner wants. Accredited land trusts are important parties to these transactions and the procedures that the land trust use in establishing the process of the documentation of the flow of the deal. All of these things require expertise of the landowners so they know they need to have their CPA, attorney, etc. involved right from the beginning. City of Milton is acting as a facilitator to partner landowners with the land trusts in order to accomplish conservation. The land trusts have a very important role they play perpetually. The land trusts assuming they are accredited or working towards accreditation, they have to live and work by the standards established by the Land Trust Alliance out of Washington. They have to establish the parameters of the transaction and then go through all the way up through stewardship and perpetuity. Some of the potential available land trusts available to the City of Milton are: Georgia Land Trust, Southeastern Trust for Parks and Land, Southern Conservation Trust, Georgia Piedmont Land Trust and Athens Land Trust. As of now we have seven properties in some shape or form worthy of some type of protection. Unfortunately, one was recently sold to a developer. Another was an outright donation. The family has decided to step back so it is on hold indefinitely. Another is a farm that produces something that can qualify for special tax benefits under the ALE program and also give the landowner cash in hand. One other property wants to sell outright. We are going to keep plugging along hopefully making conservation the winner over all. A lot of communication and establishing partnerships have been going on with all of these properties which is the nature of the business. By laying the foundation and explaining and educating this to the landowners it is enhancing the knowledge for our landowners as to what options they may have. Currently we have an additional eight landowners on the call list. We have a high development of demand right now and we know it is very difficult to balance the interest of conservation and development. As a facilitator for these transactions the best we can do is put together the landowner and the land trust and hope they make a partnership , coming up with the best option for the landowner and protect the property. The landowners have hurdles to go through with this process be it examining their options and affording due diligence costs . The due diligence costs are Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10 , 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 8 of23 quite hefty . Some of the sources to help with funding could be city coffers , NRCS, conservation fund and land trusts. The most important City objective is to balance conservation and development. I would love to take any questions or comments at this time. Mayor Lockwood You went over some of the numbers or properties that you had talked with, I am going to assume it is slow going at first but once you get the first landowner, I see it growing exponentially. Is that what you have seen? Laurel Florio Yes , that is what we have seen in other parts of the country and I know it would happen here if we can just get those little starters . Councilmember Longoria Who are those starters ? We have a goal of getting over 5,000 acres into this program over a certain period of time. We know who the landowners are , we know where the property is so there is some called to action that we should be promoting now in order to get those property owners to wake up and look into this. We are not going to succeed if we do not get an engine revved up behind this. At this point , I would think we have already identified the short list of property owners and have worked with convincing them this is a program they should participate in. Laurel Florio There are some of those people right here . They are part of the seven people I discussed earlier as well as part of the eight. Part of what the discussion tonight was aiming to do is to have us start thinking about what we can do to enhance their desire to be part of it. Councilmember Longoria We need a tool that can help us identify and track the process that we are moving some of these landowners through. I am just guessing but in order to achieve 5,000 acres in Conservation Easements, we need to identify and talk to 50 ,000 acres worth of landowners. I do not know how many that would be but the conversion rate we need to get from some big number down to what we want is going to be extreme in this case . What defines this process? What well-established tools can help us manage the communication , the material we need to deliver to these folks, the education ... ? We need to be very efficient with this or otherwise it will be 30 years before we achieve whatever goal we have set up for ourselves. And at some point in time the door is going to close and we are going to lose the option for the land we had an opportunity to convert. We need tools and what tools do we need? Laurel Florio It is money. Councilmember Longoria It is collateral material we need ? What kind of collateral material do we need? I have written notes that I would love to discuss with you further after the meeting. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10, 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 9 of23 Laurel Florio I would love to do so. And that is what I mean by planting a seed because if! am seeing that most of the hesitancy is over money, which of course it would be, and because there is no precedent set within the community. These are the hurdles we will have to get over. Councilmember Longoria In your experience for drawing on the best practices of other communities that have gone through this process, do we have an idea for what the cost is to succeed in terms of dollars per acre? Do you think it is realistic for us to achieve our goal by spending $10/10011 ,000 per acre on this program? What is the number you think we need to achieve success? Laurel Florio I don't think of it in terms of acres, I look at the due diligence. Cost is the biggest and most compounded, easily determinable number and we could divide that out to determine per acre. Councilmember Longoria I am thinking of all the costs associated with this. Laurel Florio I understand. That can be done but it could be very daunting. Councilmember Longoria Let's pretend that it is $1 ,OOO/acre, we are talking about a $5M program. Is that what we thought of when we approved this? Laurel Florio Ifwe look at what the projection was in our Green Print plan there was a figure of$25M. Now that is a projection based on capping easements at $1 O,OOO/acre, which is not really realistic, plus also some other factors that I am not really sure of nor how we came up with that figure. The fact is that figure is probably bigger than what we initially thought about. Councilmember Longoria I am not talking about the cost of land. I am talking about the program cost. Councilmember Mohrig When you look at where it has been successful, do you see the municipalities actually putting money into this program in order to get the process rolling? I know ultimately, the landowner has to make the decision based on all the complexities . When you look at where it was most successful, how did it get started? What did those cities do? Laurel Florio Well, it really depends on where you are talking about and the climate. We are coming post-recession again and that is part of the factor too . I have seen where we have two things. We have municipalities deciding that it is important enough that they are going to put up X amount of dollars and work it with the program that once those dollars are used then that is it for the time being. For example, we could come forward from the City and say to the landowners if you close a conservation deal by December 2015, we will reimburse your appraisal cost. The responsibility then is on the landowner to pay up front but to enhance the program we will reimburse you if you close the deal by the December 20 15 time Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday , November 10 , 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 10 of23 frame. Some cities have gone this route. Other cities jump right to tax, SPLOST, etc. and I don't think we can be thinking about these alternatives based on what we have going on in the city. Again, we have the interest to do the conservation but not yet the willingness to allow tax dollars to be spent on it. Other situations, we have neighborhoods that are strictly donative and they just want to donate it. These are the wealthy land owners that want to leave a legacy. It can be done in all those different ways and it has been done in all those different ways. Here, what I am seeing and what I am feeling is that we just need to get somebody to take that plunge and maybe it would be in our best interest to think about how we can enhance that from the city's level and get people on the bandwagon. Councilmember Mohrig I would be interested in seeing some concrete steps brought back to the Council to help us move forward with this program. I am trying to wrap my head around all the steps and processes. It is not a simple process. Laurel Florio I have been working on a procedural document which would show a flow chart on how things would take place. Councilmember Mohrig That would be interesting to see how things would flow with this process. Mayor Lockwood Back to what I said earlier, once you get the first couple going then people want to get on the bandwagon so we may need to get some incentives going to make some deals happen. Laurel Florio Also from a public perception, we need to show we are serious about it and are willing to proceed to help you find the reasons to do it. I have seen in different communities land trusts have been successful in raising money and then taking that step. Maybe Preserving Milton Committee could take on this job of starting to raise the money to put together the funds to assist with this program. I also think it says a lot when the municipalities decide to offer to put in a certain amount of money in order for the program to be successful. Councilmember Longoria That is what I want to see from you, recommendations on what it is going to cost. Councilmember Hewitt Do you see us as a city going out and purchasing the developmental rights? Laurel Florio The land trusts would be the ones. It has always been my understanding that the City of Milton was not interested in forming a land trust because that is a whole business in of itself. So these land trusts are in the position to purchase these development rights and hold them and extinguish them. Councilmember Hewitt That is who a developer would go to? ------~~~------- Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday , November 10, 2014 at 6:00 pm Page II of23 Laurel Florio Not through a TOR program. This is strictly through conservation easements. What you are talking about, through the TOR program, is more established by a banle That is not something our ordinance allows right now but I know Ken has been asked to look at that too. That could be a possibility down the line but not feasible now. Councilmember Hewitt There aren't any entities that do that now, we would have to take over that? Laurel Florio Generally you have to establish a 501 c3. Councilmember Hewitt That is a way we could potentially conserve on things ... dare I say "pennies on the dollar" versus going out and buying properties . Laurel Florio Yes. There are many organizations that don ' t even do TORs. They just purchase the development rights, the easements and done. Councilmember Lusk The issue with any new program is education. Trying to inform these landowners that they have some real life options that are actually going to benefit them as well is a daunting task. My experience with these landowners has been one where the landowners are mystified. I would like to see your sales program and make it as simple as possible for these landowners who maybe older and more cynical. Laurel Florio I find with the landowners and especially the older folks, I do not bring anything with me but my camera, so they are not overwhelmed . We just have a conversation to see if they want to go forward. Councilmember Lusk With respect to expanding your base and the numbers we could pull in, are we looking at the current conservation property owners? Laurel Florio The ones that have the CUV A? Yes. They are the ones that are the savviest. And then there are others who know nothing about their options . If we could put together meetings in neighborhoods and plant the seeds that way, that might help . Councilmember Lusk How critical do you think it is at this time to form a committee like the Land Preservation Advisory Committee? And do you think it would be effective? Laurel Florio I think it is hard to say. It would have to be established with particular goals in mind. I wish I could say yes let's put a committee together because the more people involved is what we need, but I don't know if that is the right way to go about it now. We should examine it and see if it is the right time for it. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10, 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 12 of23 Councilmember Lusk Bringing citizens together to form this committee and educating/training them about this program is an idea. Laurel Florio Now using the committee that way is the perfect use for that conunittee. Putting a group of people together who would become highly knowledgeable about what is going on and then be able to spread that knowledge. Councilmember Lusk I think it should be a highly selective process of staffing the conunittee if we choose to go that way. You need highly qualified and motivated people for this committee. Laurel Florio I like that spin on the goals of that committee which is different than what he suggested in the book but it would give it a more educational base to spread the word. I like that. Mayor Lockwood Let me poll the Council. Would the Council be willing to earmark some additional monies to get some of these properties started? Let's say $20,000 or whatever to pay for appraisals and some of the upfront fees to maybe get some of these few started. Laurel Florio I think we would have to look at the legal ramifications and all of that but I think that would be an excellent way to incentivize landowners to get on-board . Ken Jarrard, City Attorney You might want to see a policy put together that contains some specifics perhaps the amount of acreage that is implicated before we pay those costs, when they might be available ... other words at the closing. That would give Laurel a nice blueprint when she is going to talk to these people, as far as what are the parameters of when we might be willing to throw in some costs. Councilmember Longoria Is this just a problem of putting the money in the right place? The reason I kept coming back to that and it didn't make any sense to me is because if we do not understand what the tax benefits are to a potential donator ofland, then we can't put together a presentation that would convince the landowner to make this deal. Perhaps maybe we could get to a point where we gage with the landowner asking them to sign a "Letter of Intent" that if the appraisal comes in at a certain level and your economic means are met then they will proceed with the program. Does a "Letter of Intent" have enough binding authority to tie the landowner into the process if we take those steps? Ken Jarrard From my perspective, a "Letter of Intent" is going to be a contract that has a future contingency in it. It is basically a private agreement with the city that says if we fund this and it meets some benchmark, you agree to do this. That is something more we can talk with Laurel with respect to what makes her job easier. To the extinct that the city is monetarily incentivizing these sorts of transactions, my simple point is at some point that has to be distilled into a policy on an ad-hoc basis. ------~--~~---~---~--~~---~ Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10, 2014 at 6:00 pm Page 13 of23 Councilmember Longoria I believe what we are talking about doing here is more than one or two nights talking to landowners. believe it is going to be many sessions with the landowner. And I keep coming back to what materials do we have to promote this concept? This is something that needs be in people's minds for a long time before they come to a consensus that is what they want to do. Councilmember Kunz Is there any kind of partnering with real estate agents with regards to this process? I would be curious if there was any way we could educate them on this process. Laurel Florio I have already spoken to several different real estate agencies. It does get it out more and it enlightens the realtors of options when they run into a landowner who has bigger acreage and is tired of running the horse farm. Anyway we can collectively spread and enhance the interests would be great. I really like the committee idea Bill suggested. Councilmember Mohrig One of the things we did not dive into was the TDR. Do we have a process that outlines the TDR process? Laurel Florio It is a working document that is with the Staff right now. We have started developing a document that looks at the process and how to make it happen. Council member Mohrig When you do a TDR, is a conservation easement required? Laurel Florio Yes. The conservation easement as a legal instrument will establish that and those development rights associated with the land are extinguished. Each document is written uniquely for each property . Councilmember Mohrig Do you have any idea when we might see that process that outlines TDR's? Laurel Florio I will find out where it sits right now. Ken Jarrard Would you like to see an outline or skeleton of a policy that is aimed at attempting to incentivize some of these transactions? Would it be as simple as, "We would like Staff to bring back a proposal that says , so long as it survives legal muster that the Council will appropriate some funds with respect to reimbursements for some of these due diligence costs?" Councilmember Kunz I think both would be good. I would like to also see some marketing or promotional work with our Communications Manager to try and promote some of this as well. I think we need both sides , the marketing as well as the legal. Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6 :00 pm Page 14 of23 Councilmember Lusk We need some process to kick start this program. Laurel Florio I have policies and procedures from my past history so all I need to do is tweak those for marketing materials. CounciJmember Lusk Are you going to be able to put that together and if so, when would we expect it? Laurel Florio I don't know, but I think it would be sooner than later. Mayor Lockwood It would make since if you could get together with our staff (Stacey Inglis and Jason Wright) and come up with some ideas on how to get it done the most efficient way. Agenda Item #3 was read. 3. RZ14-14 -Discussion of an Ordinance to Amend Section 64-1596 Event; Special Indoor/Outdoor, of the City of Milton, Georgia Code of Ordinances to Include Provisions of Chapter 34, Article III, Division 2, to Streamline the Existing Regulation of Special Events; and to Limit Sales from Vehicles at Special Events; to Provide for the Repeal of Conflicting Ordinances; to Provide an Effective Date; and for Other Lawful Purposes. (Jason Wright, Director ofInnovation and Engagement) Jason Wright, Director of Innovation and Engagement Thank you very much for your time tonight. I am here to bring you this Special Event Code section. The City Manager asked me to look at the process and we reconfigured how one would apply for a Special Event here at the City of Milton, essentially having concierge service through Angela Thompson. In the process of reconfiguring how to apply for a Special Event, Robin MacDonald pointed out that the Special Event Code existed in two places, Zoning and Parks and Recreation. Therefore, we took the code from the Parks and Recreation section and placed it into the Zoning section pertaining to applying for Special Event. What is before you is what was originally in Parks and Recreation moved into the Zoning Code so that it is now all in one code section, along with the changes the City Attorney's office and the Planning Commission have requested be made. A lot of it is conflicting code language or sure up what we meant when we wrote the code originally. Our code does forbid sales from Food TrucksNehicles because this was written prior to Food Trucks coming to Georgia. We changed that to say you can sell from a car but it has to be from a Food Truck. The code is pretty standard among municipalities. Councilmember Hewitt What are the markups on here? What are the reds and blues? Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 15 of23 Jason Wright The red is where it came from, Parks and Recreation, and moved into the Zoning Code. Blue is the City Attorney's Office, Paul Frickey. Yellow is the Planning Commission. Purple is where Paul Frickey struck entire sections and wanted to change the wording. It will come back before you in the next Council Meeting because it is in the Zoning vote. The next time you will see this you will vote on it. Thank you. Agenda Item #4 was read. 4. Discussion Regarding Freemanville Intersections. (Carter Lucas, Assistant City Manager) PUBLIC COMMENT Michael Cummings, 14945 Freemanville Road, Milton, Georgia 30004 I want to thank you for the opportunity to trust my concerns regarding the proposed intersection projects on Freemanville Road. I learned about the proposed changes to this intersection in this room on September 17,2014 at the Open House. Roundabouts are 35% more efficient than stop lights, less expensive to maintain and accidents are less severe. A couple weeks later, I sat in this same room and watched a presentation on Conservation Subdivisions. I found it ironic that when it comes to land we use words like conserve and preserve and we try to limit the number of houses on the land, there is no discussion about roads. The lady before me gave a nice discussion for over an hour but no mention of roads. Our policy on roads is to put as many vehicles on it as they can through roundabouts shooting cars out like a machine gun. Not realizing that our road policy and our land policy have to work hand­ in-hand. Preserving land will be negated because of the road situation. I own the land on the southwest comer of Freemanville Road and Birmingham Road, it is 21 acres. In the morning, all a roundabout will do is move the bubble down the hose. People exiting the roundabout have nowhere to go other than to another intersection which is inadequate. We are going to back up Redd Road and people off of Thompson Road will not be able to get on Redd Road. At roads like Dinsmore Road and others, people are going to be stuck at another stop sign and any gain they had at this intersection they are going to lose somewhere else. I do not think we are improving anything plus we are increasing the volume from traffic diverted into Milton. The afternoons are worse and this is Why. We have the car in front of the horse. We have an intersection of Birmingham Road and Hwy 372 that sometimes backs up all the way to Freemanville Road and that is without the roundabout. With the roundabout the backup there will be more and with longer waiting periods. No one coming from Hopewell will be able to enter the roundabout. Traffic is going to come to a complete stand still. At least now with the stop sign you can go every other one. I think it makes no sense to address this intersection until Hwy. 372 and Birmingham Road are addressed. I know it is a state road but I don't think people who have looked at this have spent time up there at 5:30 in the afternoon to see how it backs up into the rotary. It is not the roundabouts do not work, they work too well and the rest of the system can't handle the pressure. It is like putting a jet engine in a Honda Civic. It is not the jet engine is not efficient, it is highly efficient, but the system cannot accept it. I know we hear complaints about developers all the time, but personally I think roundabouts are a greater threat to our rural character than any developer. The developer's impact is limited to the property borders and maybe the neighbors but the impact of the roundabout is miles and miles. This roundabout at Freemanville Road at Birmingham Road will affect Freemanville, Dinsmore, Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10, 2014at 6:00 pm Page 16 of23 North Valley, Redd, Hopewell, Bethany and on and on because the system is not ready to accept the amount of volume that is going to come through it. I own two properties on Freemanville Road; in total I control 38 acres. I have lost my fellow horse farmers who have left Milton drawn by cheaper land and lower taxes to the north. Invariably, their houses have been sold and the pastures, barns and riding arenas give way to another non-descript subdivision. So far my wife and I have chosen not to sell. We accept higher taxes and a list of other impediments associated with owning a horse farm in Milton, but what we will not accept is the feeling of becoming a prisoner in our own property due to a constant stream of traffic resulting from an intersection design which does not provide breaks in the traffic. In my opinion, it does not matter how efficient an intersection is if you cannot get out of your driveway. I do not envy you with the respect to the hard decisions you need to make regarding traffic challenges facing our city. In order to make good decisions we have to be realistic. The reality is there is very little Milton can do to improve trip times. The fact is any gains we make will be quickly negated by volume increases from other communities. They simply have too much undeveloped land. Said differently, they have more undeveloped subdivisions than we have unimproved intersections. I am convinced we cannot roundabout our way out of this problem. I ask you not to destroy what little rural character we have left by trying to do so. Roundabouts have their place, in my opinion; the place is not this place. Thank you for your time. Carter Lucas, Assistant City Manager Good evening Mayor and Council. Tonight is our next installment in our ever on-going intersection improvement program. What I do want to cover tonight is how we got where we are and what information we have gathered through the public information process, where we have ended up with our concept improvement plans and offer you an opportunity for comments, questions that you may have at this point before we get to the point of being finished with the concept plans. Tonight we are looking at two intersections: Freemanville Road at Birmingham Road and Freemanville Road at Providence Road. These intersections were identified as priorities through our Transportation Master Plan which was approved by the Council back in 2009. These intersections were identified either because of peak hour delays, public comments, tied to intersection improvements along these corridors, or safety concerns. We have been working our way trying to tie these intersections together in a systematic way such that we do have an overall system improvement in place and a program to improve these intersections system wide rather than individually. I think we have seen from other intersection improvements we have had the comments we just heard are exactly correct. As you begin to improve these intersections you will move the traffic more efficiently and move them down potentially to the next blockage point. What we have tried to do in these programs is to identify those points and move to those in a systematic approach . We are trying to identify those in priority either from east/west corridor or a north/south corridor. The intersection at Freemanville Road at Birmingham Road is one that we are coordinating with GDOT. We will look at where they are with their process and any improvements we do are coordinated with the efforts by GDOT. We currently have the roundabout under construction at 372 and ProvidencelNewProvidence. We expect the same things that we saw at the Hopewell at Francis/Cogburn intersection that improved efficiency. At the SR 372 intersection it will probably add additional traffic to Providence and Freemanville and that is why that one was included in this particular study so we could be prepared for that in the future . One of the primary things we looked at was what came out of the CTP. Most projects from the CTP report are complete or design is underway. We like to keep one plan in concept, one plan in final design and one plan in construction each year. Hopewell at Birmingham is moving into construction and Freemanville at Birmingham Road and Freemanville at Providence are moving into concept and final ----------------------~~------~---.----~---- Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 17 of23 design this particular year. We looked at the crash history at both of these intersections (Freemanville at Birmingham Road and Freemanville at Providence). Those highlighted in yellow (on the slide) we felt were correctable either with the installation of a signal or installation of a roundabout and where it is highlighted with green we felt those crashes would only be corrected with a roundabout. At the Freemanville at Birmingham Road intersection the roundabout would have corrected ten of these accidents and the signal would have corrected five. Same color coding holds true for the Freemanville at Providence intersection. In May 2014, we began this project. We have gone through with Boundary and Topo information to assist us with the development concept alternatives. On September 17,2014 we held an open house here at City Hall to allow the general public to come in and give general comments on those intersections. We also held and are still holding Online Information and will take comments all the way through this concept design phase. Sara Leaders, Transportation EngineerlPlanner Some of the highlights of the public comments regarding the intersection improvements are: 100 survey responses from either the online surveyor the Open House held September 17, 2014 Sent letters to potentially affected property owners The questions on the survey were: Should the intersections be improved? What improvement do you prefer? 20% thought no improvements were needed on either intersection. We looked back at the last two concepts we had done and found around 15% that have typically said that improvements were not needed, so this was a little higher than what we had been seeing. From the results of the survey, the preferred alternative was the roundabout and the "Do Nothing" percent were higher than adding turn lanes/signal. We like to take the addresses of where the comments come from and a good portion comes from the project areas. Holcomb's Farm subdivision which is at the Freemanville/Providence intersection had 16 comments. A lot of comments about SR 372 at Birmingham Road needed to be looked at, at the same time. The main concern is during peak hours at these intersections. Some of those were in support of improvements and some were if it is just a peak hour problem, let's do nothing for the intersections. Now Richard Feynman from Pond and Company who did the traffic study and put together concepts for us is going to go through some of these traffic elements. Richard Feynman, Pond and Company Good evening. We looked at the traffic operations at these intersections. We took traffic volume counts of both the turning movements and the regular volumes during the AM and PM peak hours. We also observed off peak hours trying to see how long the peaks lasted. It did occur that the backups are primarily during the AM and PM peak hours with today's conditions. We ran an intersection analysis using "level of service". The level of service of an A or B are the best level of service where E and F are considered failing and unacceptable level of service. The table you are seeing now we highlighted the level of service E's and F's. Looking at the existing intersections of Freemanville at Birmingham and Freemanville at Providence we see the AM peak hour had the highest concentration of traffic coming at one time and primarily in one direction (east bound) that had some of the highest backups. The flip side of that is the backup from Birmingham Hwy. at Birmingham Road intersection during the PM hours, when it does go through the intersection, does cause quite a backup as well. In 2014 we are at the edge of capacity for these intersections. When we Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday , November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 18 of23 look in the future 20 years you can see we have many movements at the intersection that are receiving a failing grade. We think we will have a worse condition in the future than we do today. During the AM peak hours there is a primarily movement eastbound and southbound traffic and during PM peak hours it is westbound and northbound movement of traffic. We also looked at growth projections and found the growth rates around 2 - 2 .5% a year. I think we used 2.7% for the last five years but in the long term we use the 1.4% which is the long term growth rate from your CTP . We try to make sure we are anticipating by using that larger growth rate with some of these developments that are online now and have been approved to move forward and will be coming on line in the next few years. We looked at different design alternatives. One was to do a "No Build" with just the "All Way Stop" control but again we had failing level of service for 2017 and 2037 time frame for that alternative. Then we tried to look at stop control with right tum lanes but even there we are having enough through volume and volume on single lane approaches that with a stop control that we would be failing again during the time periods. Next, we looked at two cases: roundabout and traffic signal. The next design alternative is where we use a single lane roundabout with no additional auxiliary lanes and we found that those work marginally well at the Freemanville at Birmingham intersection but more failing at Freemanville at Providence without having some of the auxiliary lanes . Then we looked at adding some additional bypass lanes which received an acceptable rating from the level of service. Also with the signalized with left turn lanes we were able to receive an acceptable level of service, but may have higher delays with this alternative. One difference to point out is when you look at the signalized levels of service the delays are sometimes a little higher. When you look at the methodology that the Highway Capacity Manual uses for traffic signals, we allow ourselves to have a little more delay than non­ signalized intersections. That is just the way the methodology works and it reflects the fact that if you are at a traffic signal you know that you are at least going to get a chance and are willing to accept higher delays sitting at a traffic signal. Traffic signals operate at a little bit higher delays than a roundabout, but both considered acceptable. We next looked at what would be the footprint here as far as effects of right of way at the intersection with the two options. At Freemanville and Providence you can see the green shows the amount of right of way to accommodate the left turn lanes and the red shows the amount needed for the roundabout. You can see there is needed more right of way to accommodate the roundabout condition and it is all on the western end. Our first concept had shown the roundabout to be centered on the intersection . Then after comments from the public meeting and some of the impacts we were going to have on the properties to the east that were already occupied, we found that by shifting it further to the west it did increase the amount of right of way overall that was needed, but it was on prope11ies that did not have active uses close and adjacent to the roundabout. At the intersection of Freemanville at Birmingham, not as much right of way is needed and not as big of footprint needed. On both these intersections the case of a traffic signal does require less of right of way needed. Councilmember Lusk Is there a wider right of way distance on Birmingham Road than Freemanville Road or are they the same? Richard Feynman They should be approximately the same. Councilmember Lusk Is that 60 ft. on Freemanville and is that the same on Birmingham? Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,20)4 at 6:00 pm Page 19 of23 Richard Feynman Both are approximately the same on those two roads. Also part of the trail section is included in these designs, which takes up some of the space as well. Since this is ultimately a plan for your trail network, we have shown that in the slides with the right of way calculations. Councilmember Lusk My point is there seems to be less property acquisition required at that intersection than at the Freemanville at Providence intersection for a roundabout. Richard Feynman Part of that is the geometry of the roundabouts. I think when you see the two of them you will see a little bit of why that is and that both of the rights of way are fairly similar. With the intersection of Freemanville at Birmingham the traffic is very heavy from Birmingham going east. The traffic goes through the intersection but about 30% is going south so we added a right tum lane at the roundabout to pull that traffic out and allow the roundabout to run more efficiently. The roundabout at Freemanville at Providence has more space. We have a heavy east bound traffic flow here and 30% of the traffic is going either north or south and not straight through so to make this intersection operate more effectively, we put in an additional lane. We will have two lanes approaching the roundabout from the west heading eastbound. One of them can circulate around heading north and we also have the right tum bypass lane there as well. The movement here is heavy. In the afternoon coming northbound and westbound and in the morning it is a concentration going eastbound more than going southbound, which creates a challenge there. This is why there are a few more property impacts here and we also shifted it west to avoid those properties. You can see some of the existing road in the southeast comer that is there and uncovered. We are not covering over all the existing right of way. We are taking as minimal right of way as we can. We are shifting a little to the west so there is some area there that has some actual road now that will be taken up and not utilized to try to avoid having more impacts on those properties that are pre-adjacent on the eastern side of that intersection. Councilmember Kunz People going east on the roundabout, you don't worry about them going straight into the left tum lane? Richard Feynman There is a symbol we put on the pavement at each of those intersections. Carter Lucas I think at any of these multilane approaches there is a little bit more of a learning curve than with a single lane roundabout. It has a lot to do with signing and marking coming into it to make sure everyone gets into the appropriate lane. Richard Feynman We found that by adding an additional leg on one intersection, you can do that and keep it simple for the users. Once you start putting a two lane roundabout around all the legs that is when you have to be extremely careful which lane they are going to have to enter. Councilmember Mohrig It looks like on the south side you are changing the direction of the road like we did at Providence and Highway 372. Are we moving it actually west to try to redirect versus how it goes almost due north now? Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 20 of23 Richard Feynman Yes and that is partly because it helps with the redirection of vehicles but in this case that shift to the west was primarily to try to avoid more property impacting. Carter Lucas Fairly similar to the configuration we will have at Highway 372 at ProvidencelNew Providence. We will have multi-lane approach there too. Councilmember Lusk Do you see a problem with the downgrade southbound on Freemanville Road going into the roundabout? Richard Feynman There is a downgrade there but the roundabout itself will be able to be constructed in a way that you are on level elevation. Councilmember Lusk Do you raise the elevation there to compensate for that down grade? Richard Feynman That part that is on that edge would be raised up a little bit but you do not want the grade in the roundabout to be too severe. It will be similar to the Hopewell at Birmingham roundabout because it also has a downgrade approaching it. Carter Lucas In the final design we will look at how that approach comes in. The more we can provide some warning coming into that approach the better off we will be. With that, we wanted to give you an opportunity to provide any comments if you had them. Also, if you wanted to take this package with you, feel free to go through it with more detail and look at the comments we received. And over the next couple of weeks if you could provide us some comments or input, we would appreciate that. Our next step will be to work through the Development Concept Plan and finalize that. We then would bring that back to you with final recommendation from Staff on how to proceed. And as always, we would put in a plug for our intersection project website where we try to keep all our intersection project information up to date for anyone who is interested in those particular projects: www.miltonintersectionprojects.com So if there are any more questions, we would be happy to answer them at this point. Councilmember Longoria So if we wanted to put a halt on this thing right now, how complicated is that and what is the process to follow? Carter Lucas You would just tell us to stop. Obviously we are contracted through the Concept Plan and we would continue with the completion of the Concept Plan but if Council chose to go in a different direction or did not think these were a priority, it is certainly up to you to make those decisions. Councilmember Longoria Where we are right now is strictly in the planning phase? Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 21 of23 Carter Lucas That is correct. Councilmember Longoria Everything is soft? There is no right of way that has been purchased? There is no money other than what little that has been spent to put together some mock ups and things like that? Carter Lucas That is correct. Councilmember Longoria So if we really did do some homework and agree with some of the citizens or landowners in the area, we could change course and go somewhere else? Carter Lucas That is correct. Under our normal process we would go through a Concept Developmental Phase before we get into any Final Design. The following year we would be in Final Design. This year we have one of these intersections programmed for Final Design but we have not made that specific determination yet. Then the following year after that we would move into construction. We are still early on in the process and we want everyone to provide comments on how we process with these projects. Councilmember Mohrig Do you have any update at all on Highway 372 at New Providence and how soon we are going to get that complete? Carter Lucas As of our last update, we were probably two to three months out from completion. They are pushing the contractor to get to work. Mayor Lockwood I think he is in the liquidated damages at this point, isn't he? Carter Lucas He should be. I think the original completion date was October 1, 2014. Councilmember Kunz I am at the Freemanville at Birmingham Road intersection every other day and the traffic there is pretty bad but this is actually the only project we have that Sudie sends out a request whether or not we approve the contract. I have hesitation on it because I worry about the priority of this particular intersection versus some others that are coming up in our area like Hopewell at Hamby and Hopewell at Thompson. In my thoughts, I feel we have more dangerous intersections that might be a priority. Is this the end of the five year plan? Carter Lucas Yes. With the list that was originally developed in the CTP, Bethany Road at Providence would be the next important one as we look at that east west connectivity and moving from Highways 372 to Freemanville at Providence. Yes, this is the end of that list. I think we are always looking from a safety prospective at any of these intersections that may have had something happen to them during the five Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10 , 20 J4 at 6:00 pm Page 22 of23 year program and try to prioritize those where we can. I think with these two intersections we have seen a pretty high accident rate over the last five years . We felt like it was appropriate to move these projects forward. Certainly we do have our CTP program update this year which we could roll this into that. Councilmember Kunz Freemanville at Birmingham is going to get done eventually , from a priority perspective, if there was a replacement option, I would replace Thompson at Hopewell first because of what is going on with that, but that is just my thought. I do not know all the traffic studies, that is your job and I am willing to be swayed but I do see that. Also the Birmingham at Birmingham intersection, we want to make sure we tell GDOT how we want them to do that intersection. I felt like we just had more dangerous intersections based on speed, curvature and grade that may be looked at as a higher priority. Councilmember Lusk At Providence and Freemanville , I believe it was brought up back in 2006 or 2007 which was going to be funded by the state at that time and we decide to put it on the shelf to work on some Qther intersections . I was working on Northwest Fulton Design Review Board in 2003 and 2004 and we talked to GDOT about putting a roundabout at Hwy 372 at Birmingham Road. During that time the state would not talk to you about roundabouts but I think in their new found wisdom they have learned to appreciate the value of them and moving traffic through. I hope that is the next one we can do up there . I think as with any traffic improvements and I think just about everyone can relate to GA 400 and how that has progressed over the last 15 years in widening it in sections . So to speak to Mr. Cummings point, as we do these projects it just pushes the bottleneck further down the road and that is just the nature of the beast. Carter Lucas Yes and one of the reasons we are try to look at this as holistic system wide approach. We can really only do these one at a time and that's what we tried to do and identify these as they occur at each one of these corridors . Back to the Birmingham and Birmingham, I will say that we have met with GDOT on that. It is going to be a particular challenge with the existing right of way that is in place and they are doing some feasibility studies to determine what they can do there. How they fund that will determine whether or not they have to stay within the existing right of way or work with the community to acquire some right of way. Once they have gotten through that feasibility study, we will look at that as well in conjunction with the timing of our Freemanville at Birmingham Road intersection to makes sure those are done in conjunction with each other and we do not create a worse situation at the other intersection with either of the improvements . That is something we will coordinate with GDOT. Councilmember Lusk I think the overwhelming point is the development in Cherokee County which is just aggravating our situation here and we are left to deal with it. Carter Lucas Yes that is true. With any of our transportation issues unfortunately that is something we have to deal with system wide and wh y we look for regional approaches to these situations when we can. As well as alternative funding sources when they are available because it is not something we have complete control over when we are dealing with traffic from surrounding areas . Work Session of the Milton City Council Monday, November 10,2014 at 6:00 pm Page 23 of23 The following Agenda Item was rescheduled to the December 8,2014 Work Session. 5. Discussion Regarding City of Milton Naming Policy (Public Parks, Buildings and Facilities). (Chris Lagerbloom, City Manager) Date Approved: December 15,2014 Sudie AM Gordon, City C erk