09-26-18 DDP Board Packet

DOWNTOWN DOVER PARTNERSHIP BOARD OF DIRECTORS September 26th 7:30 AM in City Hall Conference Room BOARD AGENDA as of September 20, 2018 1. Agenda Additions/Deletions 2. Approval of Minutes – May 2018 3. Dover Police Department Update – Captain Chad Bernat 4. President’s Report A. Welcome Message B. North Street Update C. Demo-680 Forrest Ave. D. Budget Updates (FY18 Final Review, & FY19 Proposed Budget with Amendments for Approval) 5. Staff Report A. FY19 July & August Budget Review B. Unlock The Block/New Business Updates C. EPA HIA Report and Potential Enterprise Opportunity Zone D. DDP Highlights-See Attached Sheet E. Bi-Laws and Strategic Plan Updates 6. Mayor’s Comments – Mayor Robin Christiansen 7. Legislative Update – Sen. Brian Bushweller and Rep. Sean Lynn 8. Planning Department & Restoring Central Dover Update – Dave Hugg 9. Committee Reports: See Attached Highlight Sheet A. Parking & Safety – Jonathan Street (1st Tues @ 8:00 AM) B. Design – Kristin Pleasanton (2nd Wed @ Noon) C. Economic Development – Mitchell May (3rd Wed @ 7:30 AM) D. Marketing/Promotions – Tonda Parks (1st Thurs @ Noon) E. Merchant Committee – Tom Smith (2nd Wed @ 6:30 PM) 10. Other Updates A. City-wide Economic Development – Dave Hugg B. Wesley College – Robert E. Clark, II C. Bayhealth – John Van Gorp D. Tourism – Wendie Vestfall 11. Public Comments 12. Executive Session (3) – Legal Matters – Pursuant to 29 Del C. §10004(b) (3) NEXT DDP BOARD MTG- October 24th at 7:30 AM @ City Hall Conference Room

DOWNTOWN DOVER PARTNERSHIP BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING MINUTES May 23, 2018 in City Council Chambers ATTENDANCE: Bob Clark, Lucy Findlay, Dave Hugg, Diane Laird, Maxine Lewis, Mitchell May, Donna Mitchell, Greg Moore, Councilman Fred Neil, Todd Stonesifer, Erin Thwaites, Wendie Vestfall STAFF: Tina Bradbury, Maureen Feeney-Roser, OTHER ATTENDEES: Chad Bernat, Jeanine Kleino, Herb Konowitz, Thomas Smith, Jonathan Street Agenda was approved: 1st Todd Stonesifer 2 nd Greg Moore All approved/No Opposition, motion carried April Minutes were presented via previous email and hard copy at the meeting. Approve by: 1st Dave Hugg 2nd Todd Stonesifer All approved/No Opposition, motion carried Dover PD Update: Chad Bernat Burglaries 46. At the end of last year there was 23. Serial burglar was arrested this morning and is suspected to have committed 2 or more of the one in Dover. Robberies 25 this year. Slight rise since this time last year. Shooting 13 with 54% cleared. Getting these things solved is hard as many people do not want to come forward. This time last year there was 25 shootings. This year there has been 1 homicide, 4 assaults, Seized 36 guns. Smash and grab, using rocks to smash windows and grab objects. Dover PD is working hard to get cadet numbers up. Presentation on Interfaith: Jeanine stated that in 2008 Interfaith Mission began by providing shelter to homeless men during the winter months. The owner of 680-684 Forest St offered to sell to Interfaith at the same time the City wanted to acquire the site, Interfaith was not in a place to make the purchase at that time so a deal was worked out with DDP and Interfaith to rent the property for a fair price. Renovations were made, a grant with DNREC to help clean up grounds. Since 2008 we have gotten more than 50 Faith communities and organizations involved. We have sheltered 2800 homeless men since we began. Started to keep track of the results achieved by men that they have helped to get back on their feet. Most recent study

done in 2017 showed an 84% employment rate and had been in the 70% in the past. More than half of the men come to us from imprisonment, the others come to us as they have hit a hardship in their life, where they have lost their housing, job or family and we take them in and try to help them get their life back together. We have 4 full time staff members and several volunteers. Along the way we had received many concerns about the homeless people hanging out on the streets, so we created the resource center as the Smyrna School District gave us a construction trailer, and the construction company set it up for us. We came to the DDP to get permission to erect the trailer on that property and connect it to the city services. We have incorporated shower and laundry facilities and is used as a resource center and is used as an address for those do not have a physical address. We have 6 case managers that help try to get these men back to work and help with other needs. We would like to continue to do this as we see a great need for this in our community. We realize that the property belongs to the DDP and our lease expires at the end 2019. We have asked in a written formal letter that we at least have a 2-year planning period. I know that there has been discussion among many of you at the summit meeting about the future of this location but at the same time to keep these homeless men off the streets, we need to have a location for them to go. On the site we also use the old barn warehouse to repair bicycles to give them to the men to use as transportation to get to jobs. We get donations of bicycles from Walmart and the men take great joy in fixing them up for others. Herb- we have been in contact with Dave Anderson about real estate options. We have discussed a large house over the railroad tracks. We are in the process of purchasing a hotel in Felton located near the IHOP. Working with NCALL as well. We also bought a former office building off Walker Road and renovated it. We have 4 other houses scattered around the community that house men that have been put on the right track with a job but are finding it hard to find a rental agent that will rent to them. We will continue to search for places to grow this great program to help men. We have seen such great success with the men that we have helped serve. Erin Thwaites asked if they have seen the demand grow over the past few years. Herb confirmed that yes, they have seen the need for these shelters and programs. We have received a small grant from First State Community Action Agency that has helped employee men in the shelter such as an administrative assistant, facility managers of the non-shelter properties as well as a few men within the shelter so that there is always someone available for help day and night. We also receive a small grant from Bayhealth that allowed us to hire a mental health counselor. As many of the men that come into our shelter do need some type of counselling. Tina asked about women as we have noticed an increase in the homeless women population. As of right now they do not have anything in place as Shepard’s Place and Whatcoat accept women and children. However, that is something that we would like to look into in the future. We do allow women to use the access center if needed. There is a very great need for low income housing that is just not available in this area. We very rarely have a bed available at the shelter but if we hear of a dire need of someone needing shelter, we try to accommodate by setting up a cot for them especially in the winter months. We are a part of the code purple network. We have a commercial sized kitchen and we take donated food. We cook dinner nightly on a budget of $0. We would

welcome anyone to donate food. We appreciate your support and if you ever want to come out to visit one of our facilities please just contact us and we will be more than happy to show you around. We do our best to make these men feel comfortable and help them get back on their feet. Herb has handed out contact information. Financial: Tina spoke about April’s budget, things in the past were coded under different areas and we are trying to get it all back in the appropriate sections. We had to allocate things such as events to go under organizational as well as Maureen’s pay as we did not anticipate the extra salary. Anita has approved all of this. Greg Moore spoke up and questioned why things were coded under organization when it should have been under salary. Maureen informed that she was not a salary employee. Tina spoke that she was not aware of where Maureen’s pay was being allocated to as this was between Anita, Jenn, and Maureen. We were coding things under organization such as volunteer things as we did not know where Anita was coding Maureen’s pay. Greg stated that it should have stayed under one category such as contractual services even if it went over budget so that we can see the correct amount being spent. All in favor. FY19 Budget was difficult to put together as I was not aware of the current budget that we were working with since Joan was coding things under different categories. We had to go up in a lot of the categories as we have some large upcoming projects. I went through each category to see what needed to be increased and decreased. Maureen’s pay is going to be put under contractual services. We have developed our own system starting July, Brynn has created a spreadsheet for us to keep track in our office as we do not have access to the budget from the city. Consulting for FY19 will be decreased as we will not be doing a strategic plan as we did in FY18. It was suggested that consulting stay at the higher rate as some things may need to be coded under that. Tina stated that she sat with Phil, Fawna, Jenn, Donna, Val and many others to see exactly what their expected costs are for FY19 to make the corrected budget. We are working with the city to make sure that all things are recorded properly. I welcome any suggestions, and this is why I sent it out last month in hopes that if changes needed to be made that someone would reach out but no one had any suggestions. I met with John VanGorp multiple times regarding the budget. Lucy asked if the board could make an agreement once the budget is updated so that it can be turned into the city before the deadline. Tina asked Donna what the latest that the budget could be turned in to the city. Greg suggested that the executive committee make the decision. Councilman Anderson made a motion that the executive committee oversee finalizing the fy19 budget. Lucy stated that an email will go out to the board after the executive committee to discusses the budget. Dave Hugg asked who does the executive committee include, Lucy informed him that it is Anita, Lucy, Todd, John Van Gorp, Greg Moore and Diane Laird. All in favor. Wesley College: President Clark wanted to thank everyone that reached out and attended service for Coach Mike.

President’s Report: Lucy spoke about the Executive Director search and stated that they had 7 applications were received. Only 2 met the requirements, after meeting the committee decided that neither of them met expectations and letters were sent out to all of them. The executive committee has decided to wait until after the Strategic Plan is finished to see where they need to go with the executive director search. Until then Maureen has agreed to stay on part time. The strategic plan may show that we only need someone in that position part-time and that may be the direction that we go in, but we will wait until we have gone over the strategic plan to make the final decision. Second item is 3 of our board members have terms expire as of June. Greg, Todd, and Erin. Todd and Erin would like to continue; however, Greg has declined and his last meeting as a board member will be in June. We will decide after the strategic plan if we need to fill Greg’s position as we may end up changing the size of the board. Third: Strategic Plan workshop on the 11th. Final recommendations and report should be done by the end of June. DDP Staff Report: Tina mentioned Unlock the Block and how her and Diane are working with many partners as this is a collaborative effort to develop downtown Dover. We will have a pitch contest as many of the businesses are looking to start right away. There are 2 candidates that are looking to purchase property as well as open their business downtown. The Governor has reached out and sent 2 people to join in this process. Annual report went to council and was well received. First Friday including the West end coming up in June. Map and Guide went out on Labor Day. We also took it out to the Races with Kent County Tourism. We currently have someone going around to each location to make sure that all information is correct. If you see any changes, please let us know. We are moving to making another rendition that will be digital and will include all businesses such as law firms and bail bonds. We are hosting the CTA class and the merchant committee is offering to pay for merchants interested in taking the class. Mayors Report: President Clark spoke for the Mayor as he was unavailable. Mayor is part of the Kent Economic Partnership and would like to bring them back to make a presentation at a future board meeting. Planning & Restoring Central Dover: Dave Hugg gave report that on the 29th the first big art project will begin and will start on the corner of Governors and Loockerman and is being painted by the Dover High Art Club. On June 13th there will be an Economic Conference at Wilmington University. Planning side, business as usual. Working on coordinate changes, building inspections, signage, parking, advertising, etc. Still working on plans with the county

airpark. Restoring Central Dover updating strategic plan. Renovations are underway on 13 for the new shopping plaza. Committee Reports: Parking and Safety: Lighting on Bradford, minor street ally lighting, 2 merchants would like to offer up their building for murals to coincide with new lighting to brighten up the parking areas. Design: Electric box designs are being submitted 2 have will be completed this week and others will begin in June. Economic Development: Will need to discuss in executive session. Merchant: Lighting downtown, DDP working to get Wesley Discount off the ground, Military discounts have been advertised. Next meeting with be the Merchant Mixer located at Zuha Trend. Tom would like to reiterate the merchant committee sponsoring merchants to take the CTA class so that they can have more knowledge of tourist attractions when customers ask questions. Tourism: Wendie said Thank you merchant committee and DDP for your support. Dover Days and Nascar was a slam dunk. We saw many Nascar fans come to Dover Days. We ran ads. The Villager was at the track with information about Downtown, Tina and Brynn helped at the track. Kenny Wallace did a video for Dover Days. Tourism will be out at Firefly. Fam tour is scheduled for the end of June. Chef Dennis was in Dover this past weekend. He has over half a million followers. Lucy commended the whole day of Dover Days and H3 and enjoyed the fact that it was brought closer to downtown. Erin commented that she saw more traffic than usual from tourists. Meeting Adjourned: Go to Executive Session