Habitat loan and Leisure Lane

1:08:46Okay. Um Commissioner Moore, I I did have a motion that I wanted to make um that wasn't on my notes for some reason. Um If you would indulge with me, I d um I did receive that letter from Mike Sutton. I think you all received that. Um about habitat. And um I had told him that I would make this motion um As you know we we loaned them five hundred thousand out of the um I guess it was a general fund. And I think they paid back a hundred thousand of it already,

1:09:17but it's really hampering their efforts to revitalize that area. And I think we we all know how important it is to um keep that momentum going. And and I wanted to do two things. Um I wanted to suggest That uh waived the rest of the money that we lent to habitat and I'm gonna make that an emotion form.

1:09:41And

1:09:41um Um I wanna also get a clear understanding of where the city of Newport Ritchie is on that program because they wanna annex Leisure Lane, but I'm hearing that maybe they don't wanna cut their impact fee and we're we're waiving ours. And so um Definitely wanna I want the I wanna hear their position on that. I know I I think I have a meeting coming up with Jeff Starkey and the city manager, but um So I wanna make a motion that we waive the

1:10:11remainder that Habitat owes the county.

1:10:16Perhaps. Could I have a little more discussion with it, Commissioner Starkey? Yeah. 'Cause I I I do like the the fact that we're joining. Mr. Chairman Mariano

1:10:26Yeah go ahead. I mean I I thought w Okay. Go ahead.

1:10:29Mr. Chairman, I I would suggest either Mr. Commissioner Mariano seconds it for discussion or the Commissioner withdraws her motion just so that we keep the the discussion clean.

1:10:42Let me second the motion.

1:10:46Well I but I want to have a discussion with it because I have a an approach I'll have to do.

1:10:53All right. So We have got a lot of community development block rant money we could try to get. Years ago we tried to do it, it didn't work because we knew the other habitat wasn't going to be built build all the homes they could. Right now we get a program that we are looking at to try to go to the State Legislature to get about two million dollars. We feel real confident we're going to probably get that money or in good position depending how the budget goes this year. Uh if we can do that, they can build homes quick enough. I think to make it work and and maybe Working with Kathy Pearson,

1:11:24Marcy, et cetera, they can find a way to actually get us the money through that so it doesn't come out of general fund money to reimburse them. But at least it it could find a way through C D B G to reimburse them.

1:11:36So since there's a mo since no since there's a second on the floor. And we're in discussion now. I would never

1:11:48waive this requirement of of paying back the general fund. This is me personally I'm saying You're gonna have a line out the door. You do it for one, how many more people are you gonna have to do it for? That's our general fund money. We're in dire straits right now because of the COVID nineteen. Um we have not even met with staff individually on the budget in the hit that we're going to be taking and if we let somebody off the hook for a five hundred thousand dollar loan without actually bringing this back

1:12:18to have a and letting staff do more research.

1:12:24and just blatantly do this, I think is a is a terrible idea at this time. I mean where again we're still look the staff still having to look at the budget. The numbers from the property appraiser just came out last week and they are lower than what was estimated. And I I would assume you all saw that letter. Um so if anything I mean I'm okay with not a motion or uh but to say direct staff to come back and have this uh placed on the agenda. for

1:12:55a future discussion to talk about what other like Commissioner Mariano just mentioned. He mentioned there might be different resources out there. um to help out with their situation. But we cannot forgive a five hundred thousand dollar loan out of our general fund. Our general fund has to be paid back.

1:13:13Okay, I'll I'll withdraw my motion, but uh it isn't five hundred thousand. They've already paid back um a hundred and something thousand, but uh about

1:13:20forty fifty six sixty thousand, I think. Anthony Pearson can tell us that.

1:13:26Uh Commissioner Mariano, I'm glad to hear that um we we may have an opening, but uh you know, we we never know what's gonna happen with the state. So um Um I It it becomes a real a nightmare when um all that land sits there and um no homes are on there. It's it's could be a law enforcement and code enforcement nightmare, but Um I'll look forward to Taken up Commissioner Moore's suggestion that we bring it back Um to

1:13:56the county on the different funding sources that may be available to keep this um push going. I actually think it shouldn't only be habitat in their building. I think we should have the private sector in their building as well. Um And but just to keep it moving so it it doesn't become a problem again. Thank you.

1:14:16All right. Thank you. Mr. Steiner.

1:14:18Mr. Chairman, uh thank you. Uh I've only got one item. Uh

1:14:24if I could, Mr. Chairman Mariano, could I just finish that up? I'm sorry. I thought you were going to tag onto that. Mr. Chairman Mariano. Okay, go ahead. So I will draw withdraw the second. I did one in the discussion though, so I I appreciate that. And I do share your sentiments as far as general fund money that that should go back into that. With Habitat losing money every time, th what's gonna happen is they're not gonna build and that's th that's gonna be a problem. The fact of using C D B G funding that's gonna be out there, the allocation was real strong. If we Have staff bring us back something to go look at how can we apply C D

1:14:54BG funding, let them get creative, let them go find a way. There is a funding source in there to to I think fund that money back. And then we can also work on the longer term, which is we do need the infrastructure. We can't just have have people go and build septic systems out there. We need to go water and sewer. So that will take the state state approach going forward, which With the legislative team that we have around this region, I think we got a very good chance to get it through. Uh Representative Mariano was in a meeting that we had. Uh Senator Hooper was in a meeting that we had. They have had other conversation with the President. Uh uh

1:15:25Representative Latvala. Speaker Sprouts, Senator Simpson I think, and they're all on board with trying to make this happen. So I think we're gonna be in a good spot, but I think That five hundred grand finding a way to get a reimbursement from C D B G would be a great start. Thank you.