all right good evening everyone we're going to get started with tonight's meeting I ask that we all rise for the pledge to the flag pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republ for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and for [Music] all house the clerk to call the role Please Mr Callahan pres M gmy Smith present M quch present Miss L present Miss Leon Miss Wilhelm present and Mr col present so we have a couple public hearings tonight prior to consideration of our regular agenda items City council's going to have two public hearings public hearing hearing number one will be to accept public comment on the request made by the bethleem parking authority to amend the city zoning map involving the Walnut Street Garage at 33 West Walnut Street the parking garage at this address accompass three Parcels in the central business district an additional area zoned RT which is high density residential district the request is to change the area of the parking garage site that is zoned RT to CB which is Central business district to match the existing site use and that is what will be proposed and our second public hearing is a matter related to the first the Bethlehem parking authority and West Broad Street Associates LLC seek to vacate a portion of Walnut Street as particularly described in exhibit a the street vacation request comes in conjunction with the proposal to construct the new public parking garage on the property owned by West Brad stre Associates l l c and the BPA so I'm going to call the first public hearing to order and this is concerning the proposed amending of the zoning map um involving 33 West wut Street in conjunction with this public hearing there are two Communications I will ask the clerk to read communication 6A January 11th 2024 memorandum from Darlene heler director of Planning and Zoning advising the city's Planning Commission voted 4 to Z to recommend approval of proposed zoning map Amendment proposal is to rezone a portion of the parcel located at 33 West Walnut Street from RT high density residential to CB Central Business and I'll also ask the clerk to read Communications 6B January 16th 2024 letter from jelli and sites senior community planner with the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission stating that the proposed zoning map Amendment aligns with the intent of future LV the regional plan further states that quote providing a single Consolidated parcel for a development with uniform zoning that aligns with adjacent zoning districts is also best practice in managing land use and development unquote thank you Mr Miller I'll recognize a representative from the petitioner to address this matter yes and and good evening Mr President members of council my name is Jim Preston I'm solicitor for the parking authority and to my right is Mr Steve frrom who you all know to be the executive director of the parking authority I will introduce the application Mr President okay very good so we're here on a petition for a resoning the resoning uh is to uh rezone a particular uh piece of property from RT to CB uh the Practical implications are are this there is the Walnut Street Garage which fronts along Walnut Street if you go into the garage go through the garage through the joining properties the next street you come to uh is West Market Street West Market Street parallels Walnut Street and if you drew a line between West uh between Walnut Street and West Market Street dividing those properties that line would also be coincidental with a zoning line so the properties south of that line other words those properties fronting on West Market Street are all in an RT Zone the properties to the north of that line that is those fronting on Walnut Street and all the way down uh through that area are all in a CB Zone save for one area which is in RT so in essence what you have is the RT Zone instead of running straight down through there has a little bump out which sticks up into the CB Zone and it's right around where the uh condom minium project is on West Market Street uh what we're asking is that the zoning be consistent on either side of the Line south of the south of the line remain RT north of the line uh be all CB and we are asking that again for the reasons that were just given uh in in the uh planning commission's letter to provide for uniform zoning to allow the properties above that line that is north of that line to be Zone consistent with a a CB Zone thank you any other comments from the petitioner not not with respect to the reone we think it's pretty straightforward if we had it and if that screen were up there I could probably point it out it's pretty obvious there's a when you go along the existing zoning line you get to where the condos are on the on West Market if you go behind the condos there's a bump up over and back and then you continue with the zoning line so there a little piece of the RT that jumps over into the CB zoning District it's pretty obvious when you see it and again uh those who have looked at it people smarter than me with respect to planning and so forth have all agreed that that's probably not good planning that that should be consistent along that line understood and I'll recognize a rep from the administration to address the application thank you is this on it is okay and uh I would agree with attorney Preston that it's it's pretty straightforward we have one um project that's in two different zoning districts I think what this project is trying to to do overall really is to clean up some um inconsistencies that are left over from when this project was originally constructed in the 1970s so that would include this zoning map change so that we have one zoning district for the entire parcel um also we're uh consolidating the Lots there's several lots that uh constitute the the footprint of the garage right now that doesn't make sense either so some of these things that you're seeing are really to clean up some of um the inconsistencies that are left over from the original development plan so um the the rear portion of the Condominium Association has a piece of uh parcel that extends back underneath the garage sounds a little convoluted and you know it is so the lot consolidation separates that off um that'll be Consolidated with the balance of the parcels that make up the footprint of the garage and then we will have one zoning District uh for that real rear parcel it will all be in CB Central Business typically um well I can't think of another parcel in the city that has two zoning districts it's just not something that we we we do it it doesn't make sense it's a little confusing then when you're reviewing plans Etc uh determining use so this is really I would say sort of uh a way to administratively clean up these Parcels understood thank you Miss tell so I'll turn to members of council for comment on the proposed zoning change now again this is a public hearing so these are single agenda hearings right now we're simply talking about the request for the zoning change to move that part from the RT zoning to the CB zoning so is there any comment from members of council I see none I will simply ask Miss heler real quick that I have one question if we can answer it so just so we're clear right now the existing parking garage rests on a large footprint that that footprint is zoned two different way so there's no change in use it's all just a garage right now but back in the early to mid 70s when this project was approved built everything like that this was how it was zoned or was the zoning changed between the 50 years ago and today I don't believe the zoning was changed between the time that the garage was was constructed in today I don't actually know how that played out um it's it's very unclear frankly and we're trying to clean some of those things up yeah understood thank you miss Helen so I will take public comment as it relates to the proposed zoning change and then we'll move through our agenda for the other agenda items uh we didn't have a signup sheet for the public comment about the zoning change so I will go around the room I'll start with the left is there anyone who wants to make comment I'll start here with Mr PS and then work my way around I will ask everyone to uh adhere to our customary 5 minute time limit uh throughout the course of our evening as it relates to your comments please thank you hi Bruce Hayes 63 West Church Street um I I think that when I saw this on the agenda I felt it was a little presumptuous on the part of the city and the part of the parking authority to even put this on tonight's agenda which would slow down us getting to what the real issue is that we're here to vote about because if you are to accept the harb recommendation which is to rebuild the garage in kind there is no zoning change required because the garage is grandfathered and so rebuilding it grandfathers it including putting retail which is there now so I I it seems to me this should have been deferred until after the vote tonight uh and if if the hard prevails then this is an unnecessary event because the garage can be rebuilt without changing the zoning thank you Mr Haynes I will in the back with your hand up hi my name is Megan lysowski I live at 650 East North Street I think it's kind of important to understand what the central bus business district is um I like zoning it's something I do as a hobby so here's the definition from our um zoning ordinance to provide for an orderly coordinated development of varied Commercial Business and office uses in combination with limited intensive residential development in the Central Business areas of North Bethlehem and South Bethlehem and to encourage Excellence of design and the development of the properties to promote pedestrian friendly uses as opposed to uses that are autod dependent so changing this zoning ordinance will allow for commercial businesses offices and residential the current zoning with that little bit the RT it's just for residential another thing that I would like to point out that our zoning ordinance has in its in its zoning ordinance um when a commercial business district AB buts a residential district so when Walnut Street the garage AB but the the residential on West Market Street this applies where the rear lot line of a property Zone CB AB buts from a residential Zone the maximum height permitted in the rear 60 ft of the commercial business district shall be reduced to 75 ft so anything that's built there has to be under 75 feet in the rear what the properties are going to be against is it's not going to be the sky is not the limit the limit is 7 ft I would like to close by saying I support this zoning Amendment because it supports a healthy North Bethlehem and our historic district thank you thank you was there anyone else to the left who wanted to make comment on the proposed zoning change I turn to the wide Center was there anyone in the center in the front I believe that's Mr sh and I was correct that that's Mr sh yep yeah didn't say the hand behind the lectr this time um bshar 1898 Avenue uh underneath the proposed apartment building on wut street if I'm correct is a small piece of land zoned RT which is the densest residential district you were being asked to rezone this small parcel to CB the downtown zoning like the rest of the garage on the surface this seems like a no-brainer certainly the Planning Commission thought so they approved it unanimously with little discussion this was after they were told by their solicitor that they could only consider what was before them this implica implication may have been that they should not consider any implications but shouldn't implications be uh considered by someone shouldn't they be considered by our elected and appointed officials what are the implications if this little parcel remains R te I do believe though I'm not a lawyer much less a zoning lawyer I believe the height of the apartment building would be limited to 3.5 Stories the maximum height permitted in an RT Zone although the zoning hearing board would likely allow a reasonable variance saying no longer than the parking garage next door but if the parcel is reson to CB the height limit becomes 150 ft or 12 stories plus a little this uh the harb would almost surely object and the council would be asked to accept or override the the harb there would be a Fierce and Furious debate not only about the apartment building but also about the future of Bethlehem in general this commotion and consequ consequent stress can be avoided by not resoning the parel in the first place by keeping the RT Zone in place you would also have an additional Ally in the zoning hearing board in keeping the height to a reasonable level also once again the cart is being put in front of the horse we don't even know at this point that there's going to be an apartment building if not the rezoning is meaningless let the this issue come up later if necessary thank you thank you Mr sh is there anyone else in the wide Center who had comment on the proposed zoning change I turned my attention to the right anyone to the right sir in the very back hi my name is Doug I live at 77 West Broad Street the Pac and house Community I'm part of the uh board uh of the pacing Community here and I just want to Echo um uh Bruce's comments about why this issue is coming up now and it seems like it is out of order uh we should vote on the uh HB uh item that's really the main reason why we're here today but more than that the whole process I'm not accusing anybody of anything but the whole process of the building of the garage seems shrouded in secrecy we don't know what the uh what the commercial space is going to to be I can't believe that there's not a developer there's not something in the back pocket of somebody that knows what is going to be in the retail uh the proposed retail space uh but it's not de closed and in fact not even the not even the final plans for the garage have been approved because that's why we're here today right to approve uh to see if they can go up 120 feet or uh or 12 stories and the this lack of transparency anyway this this item here today seems to be a legal workaround that in the event that the harb proposal that's here uh today if it does not go the uh parking um uh administration's way that this resoning is a way to still circumvent the will of the people that are all present here and so it kind of adds it just adds to that lack of transparency about the whole building of the garage and the the retail area uh that's there and it just disturbs me that that this is what's appears to be going on right now that and in fact even here today as the solicitor and other people supporting the the resoning area simply presented as a consistency this is an anomaly in the zoning district and they just want to do it to to clean things up neatly and make it all one uh you know one zone which seems like a decent uh purpose there but there's obviously much more behind this request by the parking authority that they're not being transparent with us and again if they were transparent they would have said we need this so that we can go up Seven stories 120 feet but they're not transparent in that and it just frustrates me that this continues to be the process about the building of the garage and this proposed retail space thank you thank you I I will continue to the right was there anyone else to the right who would to make comment on the public hearing so was there anyone who wanted to because I know there might be some people out in the hallway was there any one who want to make comment on the first public hearing which is the proposed zoning change hearing none we are going to continue on tonight and the second public hearing is now called to order and this is concerning a request for a street vacation involving 33 West Walnut Street in connection with this public hearing there are two Communications I will ask the clerk to read communication 6C January 11th 2024 memorandum from Darlene heler director of Planning and Zoning advising that the city's Planning Commission voted four to nothing to recommend approval of the Bethlehem Parking Authorities petition to vacate a portion of West Walnut Street recommended approval includes conditions that the city's traffic consultant provide a favorable review of The Proposal and that all public utility sign offs are finalized and also please read communication 6D January 10th 2024 letter from Brian height Transportation plan with the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission which states that the proposed Street vacation would not negatively affect traffic circulation he recommends that if approved the city ensure adequate safe and efficient pedestrian access including with respect to the Americans with Disabilities Act Mr height also reminds that access to nearby utilities should be maintained thank you Mr Miller again I'll start by recognizing a representative of the petitioner on the street vacation okay Mr President thank you uh so this is a petition to vacate uh a portion of the of a public Street that's in front of the uh that's in front of the park the Walnut Street Parking Garage is that on good we can hear you okay I I apologize so it's it's for a a portion of Walnut Street that portion of Walnut Street would be closest to an abing uh the existing wut Street Garage uh the the current uh uh Courtway as it exists today uh we think that that whole area can be improved upon and in fact I'm going to ask Mr fernstrom here just to to to give us a little bit of his knowledge of why this would be a good idea uh for the city to vacate this portion of Walnut Street that is the portion along the front of the garage Steve if you would uh Mr President members of council so we view the transformation of this street as a positive enhancement for the city throughout all of our very public and very transparent discussions about the project we've consistently used terms such as walkability vibrancy everyone please I'm gonna ask to please hold disruptions for everyone this evening uh I don't ever like to be a certain kind of way but that goes for the entire room we're going to have a long night tonight so I I please ask everyone to be respectful when anyone is speaking whether it's public comment anyone up here anyone over there thank you thank you Mr President I'm going to start over we view the transformation of this street as a positive enhancement for the city throughout all of our very public and transparent discussions about the project we've consistently used terms such as walkability vibrancy and livability by narrowing the current wide and unwelcoming street we aim to extend the sidewalk fostering a more inviting environment and creating an engaging quarter this revitalized quarter is expected to draw people in energy east of Main Street our Engineers will elaborate on the details explain that the street will be narrowed to promote a safer environment for pedestrians and bicyclists while also calming traffic furthermore we plan to widen the sidewalks from their current 5 feet to 14 feet the expansion of this sidewalk aims to enhance the walking experience potentially introducing sidewalk dining and offering the opportunity to introduce Street trees on Wallet Street our goal is to transform Wallet Street into a secure vibrant and pleasant thoroughfare encouraging more people to walk bike and actively participate in our community this initiative represents a strategic move in urban planning rectifying one of the many mistakes made in the 1970s in unifying the entire project to elevate the overall quality of Main Street thank you thank you anything else from the petitioner uh not at this time understood any comment from the administration and I'll just say that as we review this we do believe that the the proposed Street vacation is a benefit to the community as well um as a caution um the uh uh DPW did require that there be a traffic study be done to ensure that the removal of the left turn Lanes does not uh create a problem that there is no backup at the intersections that removing one of the Ingress egress areas for the garage is not a problem we had our traffic consultant review all of those things and there are no traffic issues that are rose uh the fire Bureau uh reviewed the uh narrowing of the road the street vacation and had no issues with safety either um we if we look at this the sidewalks will be widened they're currently 10 feet they'll be 13 feet in the future curb to curb will be reduced by 10 ft The midblock Crossing will be reduced from 35 ft to 26 feet and what this really does is uh as was noted uh calm the street slows the traffic allows more safety for pedestrians um it really improves the entire uh Walnut Street quarter that's just one element of how the walet street Corridor will be improved there's some commercial elements that'll be introduced Etc but there'll be Street lighting and um Street trees also installed as a part of this project so the street vacation is just one element of the overall picture so we do support the street vacation as it's proposed understood any further comment from the a question if I may uh Miss lowski are you gonna speak on this issue okay very good so rather than steal her material she spoke at the Planning Commission rather than steal her material I'll uh I'll wait until she makes her comments thank you understood any discussion from members of council as it again for the second public hearing this relates to exclusively the street vacation is there any discussion for members of council related to the street vacation councilwoman kmy Smith thank you thank you uh Miss tell I just had some questions the um Bethlehem Planning Commission also stated that they wanted to that any necessary relocation of Public Utilities will be addressed at the time of development review and construction of the garage yes and that is a part of the Land Development review process um we've gone through a review of the garage Land Development um provided some comments to the parking authority and as DPW reviews the project they'll um address utility relocations Etc if they're necessary okay and does that also include Verizon because I know we had spoken at the last meeting to do with some issues with the Verizon and um lines underneath the garage it would include all the public utilities they have a right to comment um if there's any relocations that are necessary so everything with Verizon has been resolved then it would have to be yeah yeah I can take that over yes uh yes that's correct we're in collaboration with them and working with them throughout the process yes okay thank you and the other issue um leab valy Planning Commission said they they had um just some contingencies also recommending that again adequate safe um pedestrians access and also making sure that there's access um within the Ada and I noted the last meeting I'm concerned because I think that we're negating the spirit of the Ada if it comes to pass that we have um the UN the unknown area is apartments and then we're putting a garage farther away from the destination which I think really goes against the spirit of the Ada whereby those with disabilities are going to be farther away from their destination I have to make that point again and I'm happy that Lehigh Valley Planning Commission did make that point and I think it really needs to be noted thank you well you did make that point uh last week um I think the comment from the lvpc really is the ADA requirements within the garage and within the public improvements along that street Corridor those are federal guidelines we will need to meet those we will certainly ensure that um all of the hiat ramps and and and everything else that's required for uh uh Ada um uh review that those requirements are met I think the location of the garage um if I would compare it to the North Street Garage the garage portion of that development project is not at Maine and Broad the garage portion is behind the building that was constructed at Maine and Broad and that's basically what's happening here um so the activity center is closer to Main Street the commercial units the residential units the parking garage is tucked behind typically we would tou tuck uh a parking garage behind that wouldn't really be front and center so this you can sort of compare this to the way the North Street Garage was laid out thank you and and well I understand that I still again as an advocate for people with disabilities in the Aging population I just feel that um it's not within the spirit of the law that we're going to put the garage farther from Main Street and put 40 to 100 Apartments closer if that does come to pass feel that it's not um you know on our part is something that I I cannot advocate for because I think we really have to be um aware of those with disabilities and mobility issues and we need to have parking um as accessible as possible for them we certainly are trying to plan for all yes thank you any other comments from members of council related to the street vacation councilwoman lard uh just a question about the stre streetcape component um you mentioned you know potential trees or uh other improvements for pedestrians and the the visuals um what sort of uh like who would that fall to in this particular stretch whether that's one office or multiple and what level of community engagement would there be in figuring out what that streetcape becomes we have requirements within our subdivision and Land Development ordinance that specify um Street trees need to be so many feet part if there is certain kind of a tree the the um we have a city electrician that will review the layout of the street lights um there are some uh pretty detailed uh requirements that are within the subdivision of Land Development ordinance so that's really what basically every Department in City Hall will be reviewing the Land Development um and they will have to meet those requirements and just like anywhere else in the city uh they are responsible for the Improv movements in front of their project they'll be the parking authority will be responsible for those Street trees Etc um there the the Land Development is reviewed at the Planning Commission meeting that's the public review of the project uh and um yeah I'm not sure does that answer your question okay thank you any other comment from members of council as it relates to the street vacation I just had one quick question for whoever wants to take it as we talk about reconfiguring that portion of the street is there any discussion about changing the ENT street parking spaces as they're currently configured today I can take that one um presently we will know we will lose no none of those on street parking spaces as a result of this so would that also mean not add any on street parking not add any either no that's cor understood thank you any other comments from Council before I open it up so again I will recognize the public for public comment and this is for the street vacation of Walnut I'll go around the room any comment from anyone to the left in the back row my name is Megan lowski live at 650 East North Street um as solicitor Preston was saying I was at the Planning Commission in back in January and anytime I hear of a road being narrowed I get very excited whenever you have to cross a wide road that is more time that you are at risk of being hit by a car the dimensions that I believe uh Miss heler gave are the road is going to reduce from 36 feet to 26 feet that you're in the road um I work with small children they don't walk that fast the longer period of time that they are on the road that's more of a hazard for them when I think of what people are doing down there they're spending time with their families um another point that I would like to point out is the lvpc wants adequate safe pedestrian access the width that the sidewalk is going from five feet to what did they say 14 feet that well exceeds um Ada pedestrian access for being able to walk side by side and to wheel a wheelchair as uh Mr fernstrom was saying we're not losing any on street parking um with that you can I'm not entirely sure how our parking permitting works with handicap spots but if that designated space for a handicap person needs to be closer then that could be an option um I would like to close by saying I support the street vacation thank you is there anyone else to the left who Mr H Bruce haes I still live at 63 westers [Music] um obviously I like trees I like white sidewalks um but I'm going to bring a different perspective to this tonight and that is that uh we're about to hopefully uh be a world heritage site uh as the hotel representating hotel betham we're probably the we're the major promoter of Tourism Nationwide to the Heritage traveler in the city of Bethlehem and uh we expect 250,000 new visitors over the next cou in within the next couple of years to be coming to Bethlehem probably 25% of them will be coming via bus um we currently have on Main Street no bus unloading area uh you we used to up until Mr fernstrom came here last year or two years ago two years ago we used to be able to load buses in front of the visitor center to do our bus by night tour at Christmas time on Thursday Friday Saturday and Sunday nights at 5 6 and 7:00 but Mr fernstrom decided to start ticketing those buses so we have we cannot load buses anymore in front of the visitor center so the hotel offered to move in front of the hotel of course our unloading Zone isn't big enough for buses either and in requests to eliminate one parking meter there to allow buses to be able to pull in because buses have gotten bigger since 19 50s when that unloading Zone was created uh they can't fit in there but one extra parking space would do the job we've been denied that so there is no bus unloading area on Main Street and we have all these new tourists going to be coming here and it would seem appropriate that the major bus unloading area would be on Walnut Street uh across from the garage presumably then they walk down Walnut Street uh hopefully have a men's and Ladies Room in this garage uh restrooms which we don't have public restrooms the ones that were there they closed because they couldn't maintain them and and then hopefully maybe they stop at a visitor center on the way and then they get to Main Street uh so my my point is I think we're missing something big here in narrowing the street when we're about to have where are we going to unload buses and the a logical place is Walnut Street and the wide Street maybe across from the garage um so so that that's to me something that's that I think has hasn't been considered up to this point but I want you to start thinking about this that this is not a no-brainer to do this and um and so we need to start giving some thought to that and I believe vacating again similar to before we got the cart before the horse you know first off we ought to be replacing the garage in kind that's what we're going to talk about later and then don't if I don't know if the new garage is taking up part of the street because they squeezed the garage but we need all the street we can possibly get to for unloading buses thanks thank you at Christmas time and and and uh also during Music Fest I can tell you without the left turn lane coming down from New Street the or right now with a left turn lane they're backed all the way up to New Street I've been there I've been in the I've been right there so not only have they backed up to New Street they're backed all the way down to Main Street trying to get in the garage during those times so I think it's the traffic study people obviously weren't here when the big demand is for the garage yes on a Monday and a Tuesday and a Wednesday you don't need a left turn lane but we have a lot of festivals in Bethlehem thanks thank you is there anyone else that left who wants to make comment on the street vacation I turn to the wide Center is there a one in the center uh I will start in the center row in the orange coat ma'am yes please good evening my name is Margo ging I live at 806 High Street good evening mayor Reynolds all the city council and all of my fellow Bethlehem people I thought I was going to talk at the open part but I think this needs to be heard now so I'm going to say it now because it relates to everything you're talking about um I have lived in Bethlehem for over 64 years went to school St ANS Northeast Liberty owned a business in Bethlehem worked in Bethlehem Bethlehem has been my home and um like I said I live at 806 High Street which is 5/10 of a mile from here and 3 minutes okay um on October 31st 2023 in Bethlehem I'm talking about living in Bethlehem was the scariest Halloween that I've ever experienced I was trying to um like I said I live about 5 minutes from Lehigh River and the fa Key Bridge that crosses it on Halloween at 2:45 p.m. I was on route from my house to my loved to take my loved one for medical care across the river I first attempted to go over the hill to Hill bridge but it was blocked off by two police cars so I quickly turned around to head towards Spring Street across Main Street and on to Lehigh Street and finally the fahe bridge at New Street traffic was backed up from Main Street going forward I was stuck right where I was couldn't move I heard them say on the radio that Route 22 was also blocked at shville Road I thought of heading for the meny trail bridge but I was afraid that Third Street may also be blocked I continued to check on my loved one they were not a very verbal person so I wasn't really um too concerned but I was I was getting anxious the lines of traffic were not moving at all as I looked at the back of City Hall and the library my thoughts were racing all over the place as I said I grew up in Bethlehem I noticed a lot of change Chang isn't you know I'm not afraid of change change is not always for the better though when you go to your doctor and he says the tumor is growing that's not a good change I hope we think about the changes we make to Bethlehem thoughts were racing all over my head as some people who were walking through the um I noticed some people were walking through the wooded area it made me think of lahina Maui traffic was coming from all directions trying to get over the bridge what if we had some sort of an event or an incident and we had to get out of the city which route would we take the bridges were uncrossable Hill tohill Bridge you couldn't get across Third Street was probably blocked Route 22 was never reliable route 512 Freemansburg Avenue trying to head towards East we're sitting pigeons it took me an hour to reach the fahe bridge an hour I noticed an ambulance was trying to get on the bridge too when I finally got got to the bridge I was head-to-head with the tractor trailer I didn't even know they were allowed to go over over there I'm thinking how the heck are they going to squeeze in I was hoping that he would let me go in front of them but he didn't he you know nobody was going to uh pass up their their place in line everyone was out for themselves no go on the bridge I realized it was packed two lanes going in both directions I think a lot of you are familiar with the fahe bridge two lanes going in each Direction no room no wheel room whatsoever once on the bridge there was no going back I realized I'm sitting there looking out over the river thinking I can't move I can't change my mind about 10 years ago I had an incident with another one of my loved ones it appeared they may have been having a stroke I rushed them in my car and drove them to mberg about 1.6 miles from my house we made it with no problem right about now my heart is pounding but I know I am close to Third Street and then I can race on up the hill and get medical attention for my loved one the reason for the backup was there was a car struck or broken down on the bridge man I am G ma'am I'm going to ask you to wrap up your comments please okay I quickly tried to get off there Third Street was closed I couldn't go up Third Street no traffic cops in sight I get to Fourth and and New Street which was an hour and 45 minutes and I live 5 minutes away okay ma'am thank you we're we're over the limit here I am going to continue the public comment but there will be uh opportunity to comment more when we get into our regular council meeting thank you thank you I'd just like to tell you that my loved one didn't make it to the medical facility and when you're making these decisions I hope you decide whether or not quality of life is important how about life itself thank you is there any other comment on the street vacation from anyone in the center I recognize Mr sh my only comment on this issue is that it will we create more space ultimately for an apartment building again the card is still before the horse and I'm not horsing around thank you Mr sh anyone else in the center who wants make comment the street vacation sir in the blacka Michael Bianco 424 Center Street can I ask a question of Mr frrom this is your opportunity to comment to council this is just for you to make comments all right um so we're talking about a 25 foot wide Road 25 fet is enough for one lane in each Direction with no parking so we're saying 25 ft but we're not reducing the parking um I'm looking at the ground plan that you submitted um for version two and it does show a 25t but then there's an extra added space for parking so the confusion is is that nobody understands this because there's no drawing there's no model there's nothing we don't know what it is in addition um previous versions have shown that they're widening the building not shrinking the building and that's so that they can go from diagonal parking to straight end parking they need six foot wider on the building so they're increasing the width of the parking six feet according to the national Safety Council 20% of every car accident in the United States happens in a parking garage 20% of every accident car accident vehicle accident happens in a parking garage significantly more happen where there's straight in parking instead of angled parking so this is something that was never addressed or made public um so we're taking up six extra feet of our already narrow sidewalk we're now widening it to 13 feet and we're shortening the road to 25 ft so something somewhere doesn't make sense the math doesn't add up there's no extra room for parking we can't have the parking if that's what they're saying we can't have more than two lanes in 25 ft Maybe you can but then it's really narrow standard width of a SUV is 7 feet 7 feet standard width of a parking Lane is8 feet so if you have eight feet that cuts down to no space between for passing so something doesn't make sense um it was mentioned that this is very transparent I find this to be the exact opposite of transparent thank you thank you I will again Ask in the center is there anyone who wants to make comment on the street vacation yes ma'am Mary gel mcool 449 Grand View Boulevard as far as the the landcaping in the trees that's going to as those trees grow they're going to inhibit visibility they're going to take visibility away and with whatever's is there is there even going to be enough sun to support these trees for them to even be able to grow because they do take an awful lot of sun and it's just seems like it's counterintuitive to put trees where they're not even going to be able to grow thank you Miss mol is there anyone else in the center who wanted to make comment on the street vacation I turn to the right anyone to the right who want to make comment on the street vacation sir hi Doug Lidle again at 77 West Broad Street I have two comments about this number one is why now we still don't have a final garage plan we don't have the final plan for the residential and retail space why make the decision now to narrow vacate Broad Street the administration 30 20 minutes ago just was not transparent with us about the real reason for resoning and we don't know it makes me suspect what is the real reason behind narrowing Broad Street at this point is it because there's some developer there that is demanding this so that that's the only that's one of the conditions that the developers will then do for the retail and condo space I don't know but there is lack of transparency here and I just don't understand why now and it's similar to the rush to destroy the garage why now destroy the garage if there's not a final plan for these things it's just a pattern of lack of transparency and apparent rushing of this whole situation that I just don't understand number two um it's about the traffic flow there right I live on my address is on Broad Street but my unit faces gutter Street and as you come down gutter Street going toward towards Walnut Street the only thing that you can do is make a left to go past the entrance of uh the Walnut Street Garage the entrance is still going to be at the essentially the same location on Walnut Street for the new proposed garage and it doesn't take Music Fest it doesn't take you know Christmas time for cars entering into the garage to get backed up and right now the current width of Broad Street allows people to go around two three four cars that are in the middle of wall uh Walnut Street trying to get into the parking garage narrowing it is going to limit that traffic causing Health potential health issues as the lady mentioned behind us uh so that you just cannot redirect traffic in a orderly efficient manner thank you thank you was there anyone else to the right who wanted to make comment related to the street vacation tonight is just to be fair is there anyone in the hallway who wants to make comment on the street vacation I'm not sure how many people may be out there outside this room okay so we are going to conclude our public hearing uh just a reminder ordinance 9B is on the agenda for first reading as it relates to the street vacation thank you continuing on to our regular council meeting approval of minutes for January 2nd 2024 I do know that these minutes had been approved at the January 16 16th meeting however it had been caught that the four-year terms of the newly elected members of council Mr cahan myself Miss leair there was a correction of the minutes they were listed as terms ending in 2026 when it should be 20128 and similarly uh also for our city treasurer Miss Fox so I will accept a motion and a second to amend the January 2nd minutes to reflect the change with the correct term uh expiring in 2028 so moved second so motion by councilwoman Wilhelm second by councilman Callahan any discussion on the motion to amend the minutes I'll just thank Mr Miller for his catching it and I will ask Mr Miller call the role Miss grmy SMI I miss quch miss L present Miss Lam I miss Wilhelm I Mr Callahan I and Mr colog I thank you so the amended minutes pass unanimously and then our January 16th 2024 minutes any comments on the minutes from the January 16th meeting so our minutes shall stand approved so moving on to public comment our first public comment as is tradition will be on any subject not being voted on this evening so anyone who wanted to talk to council about anything not on the agenda we have five minutes to address Council I'll start going in order and then open it up to the room again uh I will say our first Speaker Mr zett moer you had noted the garage did you want to wait till second public comment it's up to you sir if it's if it's related to the the co ways or the street vacation uh then if it's just in general the floor is yours Mr zelmore what I have put in front of you is a rather large exhibit but nonetheless this is what was designed in 1966 during the Crossgate study does anybody know why the garage was cited where it sits today because there was something called a hinge block strategy we were planning on doing a lot of Tourism type things in the city and what was going to happened was the garage was going to face getter Street and be able to take cars and buses off of Main Street and put them in the garage well unfortunately the garage was not designed for buses they were thinking of doing that down at North Street years and years ago as a result the Crossgates people said well then let's just make that for the cars for the tourists they can come up Walnut Street or come up getter Street get into the garage and then walk right down into the sunin courtyard so as a result that was what the hinge block study then with the Crossgate study went hand inand as a result later on a row of homes were built on getter which prevented the traffic flow as well as The Pedestrian flow down to the sun in Courtyard so you had to kind of walk down Walnut Street and then make a rightand turn into the courtyard if that had been known prior to that somebody else was going to block that exit we didn't have to take down the arcade that was there then which was a very nice thing as well as public bathrooms downstairs so that's really why you had a garage put where it was and I would strongly say please read your studies your Crossgates uh the study that built this Hall which was cl Clark rapana completely paid by Bethleham steel some of Crossgate study was also paid by the former predecessors of PNC Bank because they were Phil a Pittsburgh based firm but city council for 50 years wrestled with that plan and trying to get the corner of Main and Broad developed so please I'm imploring you don't make the same mistake that was done 50 years ago you can see on that plan there's a very nice green area between what was planned and City Hall and that then became Reese Jones's 12-story monstrosity that we now used to call First Valley Bank and that was all done with a handshake with the Redevelopment Authority you can go through back through their ledgers and find out if you want from a planning perspective what went on you can also read some of the library notes that are in Community Development regarding these two plans and then you can see really what the basis for the building of that garage was thank you thank you Mr zedel Mo our next speaker signed up Margo ging I apologize if I'm mispronouncing that man as I said before Margo ging 806 High Street um and you know I before I said to the Bethlehem citizens because you're the important people here you're the ones that live here and everything and I have lived here a long time and it's really important to me there's somewhere else I'm supposed to be tonight but this is just extremely important to me and I just you know can't stress enough all the things that people have been talking about traffic traffic like the city the proper the city of Bethlehem it's one little block it is not made for the things that you are planning and doing walking how the car is going to get out of the parking lot into walking on that street and as I said you know I couldn't get across the fahe bridge couldn't even get up the one side of the of Lehigh Street was open but the other side was blocked and everything coming out of City Hall down Center Street everything was packed Third Street at that time of day is bad anyway but why weren't there any police traffic cops or anything they have no other ways of going and you know we want to live here we want it to be a pretty pretty place and all that kind of stuff the trees Bethlehem graced my street with some trees they're down too low they scratched all the cars everybody pulled off the branches you know and now I've got red berries all over the place probably got some of my my shoes and in my my house and everything so you know I really hope you think about a lot of stuff but mostly I just want you to put yourself in that in my place sitting in the in that car trying to get to medal the attention for your love one and not being able to get there it could be your daughter your son somebody was hurt in a ball game or something trying to get rushed for medical attention and they they can't get there I mean we have all these medical facilities all over the place now but now we can't get there and perhaps maybe some of you people aren't from Bethlehem originally and you're used to living in a little apartment and having things crowded and traffic and everything but like I said Bethlehem wasn't really made for that it's not a big area I don't know what the square footage is but I know because I walked those streets all during my childhood walked from my home to my to whatever it is I had to do and so I want you to really think about the quality of life that you can give your children that you can give people and not the newest shiny building that's going to make somebody rich but what is it going to do for the people that actually live here it's it's devastating to find out you're too late your loved one doesn't make it and you think what could I have done differently I don't know you know and I don't want that to happen again I don't want it to happen to anybody else so please as you make your decisions about everything take into consideration the traffic take into consideration the roads the Construction Construction all over the place and you can't get there you don't you know there's just no room anymore more this place that was built obviously it's getting smaller and smaller we can't fit everybody in here that wants to come and talk so I beg you to please think of those things all you people that come and talk all the time about Bethlehem I thank you I thank you for your concern thank you for trying to keep Bethlehem what it is and not some pie in the sky idea that people ran away from and came to this beautiful little place that everybody wanted to live in all the people wanted to do the Christmas movies in a place like our city so there must be something good about it and I just thank you for listening to me thank you ma'am our next speaker signed up Mary Joe MC m m just to clarify because I know you put Gage for for the first understood just want to clarify mayor Joe mle 449 Grand View Boulevard last week's committee meeting regarding the Walnut Street Garage was laboriously long over 5 hours in length councilwoman Leon tried to keep the meeting moving along but was hamstring in doing so in all the meetings I have attended whether Council planning or zoning the same result happened one side took control and monopolized the floor last week's meeting was no exception the administration the parking authority and architect utilized over half the time this was a deliberate attempt to shorten the time for public comment once again the public got short changed the council's decision to have all council members questions fundle through the vice president Leon first and then she repeated and directed questions for a response only further delayed the proceedings I do not claim to to be an expert on protocols for conducting a meeting but allowing members to directly ask their questions surely could have helped move the meeting along more more smoothly without rule debate amongst the governing bodies I truly hope any future occasions AR occasions arise the council will utilize the same format as regular Council meetings all questions asked by the council I felt were extremely important and relevant to to those in attendance prior responses are no reason to believe that they will continue this was is what is wrong with the government on all levels what happened in the past should stay in the past every time a person with a different opinion speaks time grow time time to grow up and move on this Administration has been extremely specific and not transparent on the agenda which may be in the best interest this Administration has been extremely specific and not non-transparent on the agenda which on their agenda which may not be in the best interest of the residents of pen of Bethlehem thank you thank you our next speaker this evening is Jim filer good evening Jim fer 2222 Main Street going to touch on a couple topics during this session the white box and apartments the question is not can the garage be right sized in the current footprint but why is it not once again there's no need to locate an apartment at this core historic and business district location the city is experiencing a significant growth in apartment housing already throughout the entire city we have thousands of apartment departments approved to come online with numerous other projects in the works not to mention the proposed Ali home initiative Martin Towers grv Boulevard Boyd multiball and East Third Lyndon Street Boys and Girls Club eastn Avenue Broad Street Victorian house food co-op West Union North new westforth East forth Church of the manger and the hundreds potentially coming at the First Presbyterian and Penbrook Reb bu locations as previously recommended this downtown additional apartment can be located at the broad and Long Street lot during the committee of the whole meeting one briefer noted that if needed an additional parking Gage could be built at that location in the future why wait and build a more displaced Gage there later an apartment there would work now on to the budget I commend our city for doing a great job in paying down debt over the past 20 years when I ran for mayor in 2003 the city had over $320 million in debt and today's dollars that would be be around $500 million at much higher interest rates and with the city budget 40% smaller than it is today so to see that we are about to go on a total of 100 million that has been great progress in paying down our debt in recent years and during the 2024 budget cycle speeches and public presentations we were constantly told with pride how great the city's finances are and that current revenues are beating projections so why suddenly during the committee of the whole meeting last week in a diversion move and scare tactic contrary T's previous statements proclamations and record the mayor warned a financial distress and a potential default of backing a larger Walnut Street Garage during their emergency meeting last night the BPA was confident in the 35 million debt level but doubled down on the budget catastrophe warning that the BPA would be an imminent threat of default and that any additional debt would lead us down a path of bankruptcy in Bethlehem but we will be okay with a larger guards proposal look at and compare those numbers over time we're talking an additional $8 million at the present time with an annual servicing of 700,000 that represents a mere 0.64% of the current $110 million budget or we could reallocate some of the remaining 6 million car act or 5 million lost Revenue monies budgeted for 24 and 25 since we are experiencing higher projected revenues government governmental long-term debt is used for capital projects and this project fits the bill do we no longer plan to use any City backed debt for any future projects this city has traditionally backed capital projects of the ities this is a perfect situation to back a small addition onto the city debt to promote a garage to fulfill any future Downtown parking requirements for decades into the future thank you thank you Mr filer our next speaker signed up Miss Angela Mitchell good evening good evening my name is Angela Mitchell I reside at 430 Cherokee Street Bethlehem Pennsylvania and I want to say it was great to see and hear about the new accomplishments that were established in 2023 at the in the Southside Art District last night however how can we reev Revitalize Indian Hill district I'm really concerned about the accidents that are happening on Cherokee Street at the intersection of Delaware Avenue Third Street in Cherokee Dakota and D um Cherokee Street Fourth Street and Cherokee Street F Street and Cherokee Street constant accidents that are happening all times of the day in the afternoon in the morning in the evening so I want to know what do we need to do to get a copy of the police report to see how many accidents are happening sometimes there's two in one week you know so I'm really really concerned because I believe there's going to be a fatal accident and something has to be change there is too much traffic speeding traffic on Cherokee Street it's like a Raceway and cars just zoom down the street that wasn't happening 10 years ago so um once again I want to know how do who I can give the petitions to and then the second thing that I'm really concerned about is the garbage on Sunday I walk down the street around 4 42 to 5:00 and I took pictures of all the garbage cans that don't have a lid on them in the summertime when it's sweltering hot going into your house you're smelling the aroma of garbage it is a health issue and I want to know who can help me with this matter I've been to code enforcement I'm not getting anywhere with them so who do I need to speak to provide you with pictures because it's not only on Cherokee Street it's throughout the city of Bethlehem and I am really concerned because no one should have to live that way when I first moved there we had a Cod you couldn't bring your garbage out until 7 o' the night before where I live we have a retainer Hall a retainer wall so you can't keep garbage in the back and now you telling us that we can't bring through our house I understand that things have changed great things are happening in the city of Bethlehem but I'm really really concerned about the garbage who do I file the complaint with why do the city's um residents have to make the complaints and you do and nothing gets H nothing happens so once again I'm appealing and I I would like to know who can I submit these pictures to if I got to walk through the whole area and start taking pictures I will do that for you because something needs to be done thank you thank you Miss Mitchell and then I will just say if you want to follow up with either Mr Miller or city clerk he could direct you or our community and economic development office is now responsible for trash enforcement or you can stay till the end of the meeting but it might be a little late by then our next speaker signed up is Mr markwell Weber I didn't realize as many people come out for the water thing but it's good to see everybody uh Marell Weber 66 West of Elizabeth Avenue I'm here to represent the drip the drip is our uh citizen uh group that is looking for transparency heard that word tonight earlier and accountability from the water department uh since I was here last we blew through 200 members uh we got 220 something members uh early December I think we had 40 so we're starting to uh gain some traction out there and uh one of our main purposes is to be a bulletin board for uh any of the citizens that uh have disputes with the sewer and water department because uh in the past they just basically handled those one by one and nobody knew what was happening across the board but we do now uh for instance we have uh I think 10 to a dozen uh people that have very similar issues uh as we had uh went on vacation came back to a huge water bill that kind of thing um so that's important so we we are able to uh interrelate and uh give some tips that kind of thing uh I also wanted uh to use the drip to give the people a dose of reality and by that I mean what they're going to be in for if they decide to actually dispute a water issue uh in other words you go on vacation you get home and they say you use 50,000 gallons of water while you away uh which has happened to uh more than a couple people uh I had somebody new on the on the trip who said hey can I trust these guys and I I thought that was kind of interesting that they'd ask me that but I said yeah you can trust these guys you can trust them to number one mislead you purposely because the first thing they'll do when you dispute their water uh issue is they'll say well if you want to dispute it you can but you got to bring a plumber in and pay for the plumber yourself now anybody in this room any reasonable person at that point would think okay if I do that and the plumber comes back and didn't find anything then they're going to look at my situation again and re-evaluate it but that's uh that's just the smoking mirrors they have no intentions of looking at it you've already lost now why do they do that they do it because they want to look like they're on the up and up but they're not you've already lost nobody wins it okay uh the second thing they'll do is they'll try to Dazzle you with tech talk their favorite it's an oldtime favorite they'll come at you and say well uh you might have had a loose toilet flapper loose toilet flapper is about 200 gallons a day a waste okay um in my case uh it would have been the Liberty swimming pool filled up twice so it doesn't the math doesn't add up but they'll tell you that and if if you talk to these guys from sewer and water these sewer and Waters are it's not just here but across the the country really they'll look you right in the eye and say you know the Titanic didn't really sink because it hit an iceberg it sank because uh the captain had a loose toilet flapper in his cabin that's how uh cemented they are to the the loose flapper thing so we you know we we want people to know about that up front because they will do that to you uh it's it's kind of a weird thing because uh uh you know we can sit here and parse aart uh whether being purposely Mis misled is a an actual lie or not okay I think it's tanel out to lying okay they look your right in the eye and say oh yeah you can fight it but you can't you've already lost it's uh reminds me of something that the Russian dissident so nits and said uh I'm going to paraphrase it because it's much longer than this but he said we know that they're lying and they know that we know that they're lying and yet still they lie thanks our next speaker signed up this evening is Sally willber good job hi Sally will Weber 6 6 West Elizabeth Avenue continuing the water issue uh thank you for allowing me to speak uh we'd really like to thank the newspapers who have been covering us uh the last articles um really boosted the drip and made many people aware gave a lot of attention and positivity to our cause um I have to say in the morning call article I was surprised that Mr Bola is still claiming that there are only a handful of odd cases cases as ours was called um we know of at least 10 and we've been looking into this for about 3 months so that's more than a handful I'm hoping someone on Council is really looking at the actual data and not taking his word because I don't think it's valid it's our hope that Council will create a policy to address these odd bills so people don't have to go through what we went through we've done search and we found several cities and counties who have policies in Florida seol county will adjust one bill every 24 months using the previous bill amount Castleberry will adjust a bill from unexplained water usage once every three years Daytona Beach will adjust a bill if it is triple the normal bill or more using an average in Texas Fort Worth will just one bill every 24 months and charge you half we offered to pay half but we're literally laughed at by the water department Austin refunds 100% of the amount which exceeds the average usage if the customer meets their requirements Houston will adjust a bill once every 12 months this policy was put into place after a councilwoman received an unexplainable bill for water usage now everybody benefits so as you can see having an working Pol working policy is possible and is fair to everyone I know some people on Council are looking into red flag policies and this is a great idea once all the smart meters are in Eric from the water department came to our house after our issue to look for leaks or damage none were found he recommended at this time that we have a smart meter installed is selling points were that we could keep track of our water usage on a phone or tablet and that alarms would sound at the water department and a problem could be addressed immediately he failed to include that the self-monitoring would not be available for 6 to8 years and according to Mr boscola the alarms will only be used for commercial customers not residential definitely not the way it was presented another issue with this system is how current is the Water Department contact information they claim to have called us after our meter was read which was after the fact using our landline which we haven't had for years they used our original information from 1981 no phone no cell phone numbers no emails regardless of any other issues they really need to update their information and lastly we've talked about how this experience has negatively affected us lots of sleep anxiety fear of going on Long vacations we monitor our water now twice a week we go down and actually take a picture of the meter so we can prove where it is but a friend recently read the article that was in the morning call and she knew about the problem but she had no idea what the extent was she was raised in Bethlehem her parents still live in the house she grew up in they're in their mid90s they live alone and she was very concerned because she said that if her parents ever received this kind of Bill that would be the end of them they would not recover so that is just something to think about it should be beyond the money it should be about how you serve your constituents and how we're treated thank you thank you that exhausts our list of who had signed up in advance of the meeting for again this is anything not being voted on tonight so I'll go around the room is there anyone to the left who wants to make comment on anything that we're not voting on this evening I turn to the wide Center anyone who want to make comment on anything not being voted on this evening anyone to the Mr analex Stephen and Stephen and town 737 Ridge I ref refer n to the qualification of the current city solicitor but rather the procedure in in the of the appointment something I brought up the last meeting but I bring it up again because in the meantime I discovered additional facts which pretty disturbing me historically prior to 1986 there was no council solicitor City handled all legal problems for both but there was a problem arose which created a need for a solicitor and in 1986 Mr morganelli was appointed as a first solicitor in 1992 he left that position because he was made the district attorney for Northampton County and replaced by Joseph Leon Jr who remained in that position until 1998 at which point Christopher spon was appointed and served until 2014 at which time he was very unceremoniously re replaced by um Mr Panella who was then rather Mr spon Excuse me was replaced by Mr spurk who then left the position because he became the city solicitor and then replaced by Panella I Have Not Included the appointment of the current solicitor since the circumstances involved in the appointment so D so dramatically different from all previous procedures previous procedures involve public discussion candidates opinion or were allowed to speak and also the public was allowed to speak on the candidates qualifications and the final decision was made during executive session so this procedure had been totally abandoned in the appointment of the current solicitor how someone in the in in the on Console decided to sub contact three individuals and ask them if they were interested to submit a request uh the credentials for appointment um there was no executive session and the public found out about this when they saw it was on a resolution to be voted on so this is who who on Council made the decision as to what three candidates would be invited and how did Council make the decision why all the secrecy and why the departure from standard procedure over the number of years I contacted the um conflict of interest group in Harrisburg and also the uh uh and they were said that it didn't look well and S suggested that possibly that this be brought up through legal action which I don't intend to do so I suggest that conso disc continue this type of behind the scenes activity and do its business in public session thank you thank you Mr Anal is there anyone else in the center who would to make comment on anything that we're not voting on this evening in the back right hi I'm M Carol I live at 77 West Broad Street I'm in apartment 9 I'm also the president of Pon House condominiums um I just have two things to say one is uh in regards to the work that's being done at the garage we live adjacent to it we now park in the North Street Garage uh this morning when we were walking to the when I was walking to the North Street Garage the crosswalk was completely iced over um because of the water uh that was cleaning off the dust and debris from the garage that needs to be taken care of um it's a risk this morning cars were you know slipping and sliding all over the place so that's something that should be looked at um that's first and then the second I I actually wasn't planning on speaking today but the second is the uh woman that was spoking speaking about the garbage problem so we have a huge garbage problem with uh within the sunin courtyard you know we're talking about um building new buildings and bringing in new residents becoming a world heritage site having visitors visit downtown Bethlehem uh and our downtown is disgusting so we do our best we work with Rd sanitation to pick up our garbage um he comes several times a week however it's not enough uh we have o over Christmas and Music Fest our garbage B I know during Music Fest the city brings in bins however uh Christmas our garbage is overflowing there are people that are just throwing garbage into our uh areas and if we want our city to be welcoming together and we don't want you know uh if we want it to look nice we need to do something about it and that is something that needs to be considered as well as we're planning these changes and um having you know having a vibrant City that's it thank you thank you is there anyone else in the center who wanted to make comment on anything we're not voting on this evening to the right I'll start with sir in the black again hi Doug Lidle again at 77 West Broad Street uh two issues number one since um the start of the demolition of the garage gutter Street um has been shut down sometimes and the traffic flow from gutter Street to uh Walnut Street has been greatly modified um and the parking situation on on gutter street especially on the weekends and on busy nights is like the Wild Wild West everybody is parking anywhere that they can find no nobody is is adhering to the loading zone 10 minute uh you know drop off times and people are parking on the street to get something at the coffee shop or at crave or maybe pick up something at a at a local restaurant they're just parking on the street they may have their flashers on but it's becoming wild wild west and so what I'm requ re questing is Bethlehem parking authority has been not super confident uh competent in issuing those tickets to decrease the um the the likelihood of offenders like this so I'm requesting that the police have a greater presence on gutter Street in that area so that there'll be less likely for people to double Park Park extended amount of period of Time find their own new creative parking spots for a long period of time where they never get ticketed so that's point number one point number two is about the garage and the retail space in general it's the Bethlehem parking authority why are they suggesting Apartments they're not the Housing Authority they're the parking authority the parking authority is there to provide parking for the city so that the city can have greater business and and access uh with with visitors right and so maybe it makes sense that they have additional retail space there but why are they proposing Apartments certainly it's because that they're trying to increase Revenue I can understand that but all of the problems that everybody's complaining about the size of the the structure the lack of transparency about what is the residential and what is the business uh uh retail area that they're proposing all of that is driven because they want all of the all of the Apartments there if it was just parking there'd be no problems whatsoever if it was parking in retail there'd be almost no problems either and with Jim Fowler I believe mentioning all of the new apartment uh and housing projects going on in the Bethlehem Area you've got Martin Court that's going to be a huge housing place you've got the boy that's going to be another place you got the co-op on Main Street another place why is the parking authority turning itself into the housing authority to try to make Apartments it makes no sense other than other than reasons that that that go beyond me and I don't want to make any accusations or anything else like that and I'll stop my my comments there thank you thank you was there anyone else to the right who want to make comment on anything not being voted on this evening I believe that maybe Dr Van W with her hand up hello bet you didn't think I was going to darken your door again did you um page Van Wart 42 West Market um I'm here despite the uh most recent Council popularity poll I think it was 0.9 0.9 out of five that I got but I thought you might just want to hear what I had to say um I think a lot of people in the room might know me but for those of you who don't um I'm a physician I own my own practice um we just hired our 50th employee and 46 of them are women um I was previously an urban planner I work for the City of New York as a project manager and I have a masters in urban planning from NYU um following that I did a stint as a municipal Bond Analyst at Moody's and um I spent six years on Council here um and you know during my time on Council I think I just called it as I se it saw it I didn't take sides um I I think I spoke pretty plainly about things I was the chair of the community and economic development committee for years and I was also liaison to the BPA for the last three years um tonight I want to talk about the unprogrammed space um I will talk about the garage during the next uh meeting so I just wanted to talk a little bit about um the way I feel about this project in general but mostly the the land in the unprogrammed space which I think of as open space because once the garage comes down this is going to be open space I was at the harb second meeting and up until that point I kind of accepted that this was happening I live downtown I you know try and acknowledge the fact that I chose to live downtown and change happens downtown but at that meeting the harb um attorney sort of tacitly threatened harb with a 60-day um time frame for them to make a decision and I thought what this something's wrong here this is our city threatening our city and it took it all the way back to an epiphany that I had that really this is not the BPA land nominally it is BPA land but realistically it's the citizens land and the BPA is controlled by the administration the mayor excuse me controls who runs the BPA the mayor appoints the people on the board of the BPA the the mayor can take them off so in my mind this land is really land that belongs to the citizen and the way I feel it about it is that we should not be selling our most valuable resource which is open space to a developer this is open open space that we as a city can never get back open space that done correctly can actually drive development in the private Market just much like most of the development on the south side has been within one block of the greenway and a a park actually does Drive development particularly in under underutilized places like the Bethlehem Plaza Mall this is a singular opportunity that we have here to show Vision in how our downtown operates and breathes I think of Central Park I think of the Boston Common and the vision it took to say no to developers at that at in those places I do not believe that as a city we should use this valuable resource the selling of our open space to Spur private development why would you do that in a market where private development is more than willing to build market rate apartments and why would we want to develop more retail right now when the best we can can do in one of our most high-profile retail spaces on Main Street is now going to be a vape shop compounded by the effect of the Walnut Street garage's um parking pressure um if this apartment building goes through which I'll talk about a little bit more in the other comments um I feel development is a much better steered to the BPA lot on Broad and long it's part of the commercial limited District thus must provide its own parking which decreases the pressure on our public system so I very much ask this Authority and this mayor and this Council please do not convey this valuable open space to a private developer without citizen input without Council input and without a thorough analysis of how changing market conditions changing residential development and the resulting effective utilization of the Walnut Street Garage is done after all in reality this space is owned by the citizens and preserving this unprogrammed space as open space a park with trees winding paths a small playground to attract those apartment dwellers a place for tired Shoppers to visit and rest on a bench under a Shady Tree this would give us allow the urban core to breathe and provides much greater benefit to the common good than an another market rate development please do not fall in love with the answer here fall in love with the question what is truly the best and highest use of the people's land thank you very much thank you Dr V was there anyone else to the right who wanted to make comment on anything we are not voting on this evening so before we go on to the second public comment one more time is there anyone in the hallway who wanted to make comment on anything we're not voting on all right that will conclude our first Sir Anthony Spagnola 587 berries Bridge Road I have Soto on Southside and I have a doio 530 Pembrook Road my real concern is underneath the Trestle we have a lot of uh uh homeless people okay so I don't think it's a city problem because we have a lot of you know Charities Catholic Charities uh New Bethany Ministries and they need to F the these the I've been down there I fed them not you know my point is this that we need to have rules and regulations we all follow them if they want to you know stay down there and put their trash up top the city's getting them and taking that trash I heard this other lady talking you know we got to keep everything clean so if we can you know set a parameter if the police go down there someone goes down there and sets a standard like listen you you know you have to go to the Catholic charity house you have to go to you know the uh Salvation Army New Bethany a and you know you have to find a job you have to uh not go in uh you know alcoholic or so forth you also have Victory house Keenan house and it really is a huge problem my cousin came maybe he left I came and spoke to you about uh homes you have a plenty of money to spend uh for these uh facilities you know you can appoint someone and let them take you know it's a different kind of Pride so like these people are very prideful that they're down there we live in tents we're not paying electric gas so forth you know we're bathing in mother nature but it is it's becoming a problem and you know they come up they come to the restaurant they want to use the bathroom not a problem you know I I pay for what I pay for these services so H that's just one point and then two I would like to go on to the uh the the the rental fees so you talk about low-income housing on the other hand um I've been hit with like fees for like if I have three units I have to pay $150 so someone that has I mean there's so many apartments if you have 150 if you have over 50 units you play a $600 flat fee H how is that comparable and in comparison to me paying $225 I have three and they have 50 units and you know that's that's $600 I don't know The Landings or I Asar out there all those apartments that are conglomerate together and my rents aren't that expensive you know a one-bedroom 750 a two-bedroom 1100 a a four bedrooms 1,500 but I myself have to pass these fees on and then you know if the city's picking up all these rates also for inspections you know one one3 is a $100 if they have 50 and up it's there's $4,500 it just doesn't equate so just again just looking into these fees uh Mr bosil was great with the I had a question about the uh the Water uh my sewage um you pay a standard fee for like a sprinkler system and and the fire lanes and Fire Lane one and two but and he said to me that Lehi and also Moravian and and the greatest industry in Bethlehem are warehouses they all pay it so I'm going to take him at his word um um as to that and uh that's all I have to say those three those uh two items uh thank you thank you Mr spola was there anyone else who want to make comment on anything not being voted on this evening thank you all we're going to move on to our second public comment and this of course is for ordinances or resolutions to be voted on this evening we have 17 people previously signed up so again I ask everyone to stay within their 5 minutes we'll exhaust the list and open it back up our first speaker is Mr Neville Gardner hi yes good afternoon good evening um I want to start by saying that I love all the harb signs um it's very nice that uh we have a historic Bethlehem board that takes care of our architecture and all the great parts of Bethlehem so a great respect for the work that they do um as a business owner uh owning two different businesses probably the closest located to the Walnut Street Garage um I'm probably in a very good position to talk about what effect uh the changes would have um I believe that Main Street and Broad Street as we are at the moment needs more retail and I mean I appreciate the comment uh that maybe some of the people that have rented spaces could have made better choices but I believe that with the right retail uh with more opportunities for the right retail it would definitely enhance the city um on a cold Tuesday in January or February it's not Music Fest and we need feed on the street so the Downtown betham Association which I currently I'm the co-chair of uh our mission is to basically increase business um by running events and other marketing techniques but one of the goals the main goals is really to put feet on the street so as the as the building closest to the new development uh I'm in favor personally of changing the zoning to mixed juice uh and I think that that site is one of the key sites in Bethlehem that's left undeveloped I personally believe that having a really really fantastic high-end development there will enhance traffic and the businesses downtown now you know if you're going to put retail and restaurants on the ground floor you got to put something above it so I understand why people may say why does the betham parking authority want to have housing above it it's the obvious choice if you look at Main Street or you look at Broad Street anywhere downtown if you've got retail or restaurant on the ground floor level you're either going to have an office or an apartment or a condo above it we need people with a dispens income coming to our businesses Mondays and Tuesdays and Wednesdays in January you know so those are the that's the time of year when we're really when we're really a little undernourished so that's the reason why I'm in support of having uh ex juice zoning there so thank you thank you Mr Gardner our next speaker is Diana hod Hodson good evening my name is um Diana Hodson I live at 1108 West Market Street as well as I'm a member of the historical um har board uh the Walnut Street Garage is a leged a legacy decision for all of us to um to make and it's a decision that we've all been working on the decision and the garage will outlive all of us on harb as well as most of you or all of you on city council and it will affect the historic district of Bethlehem so this decision in our opinion is a very serious one each of us realize that there is a need for a new garage however it can't be built at the expense of the historic district the proposed design of the new garage is too massive harb did not approve the COA because the mass and the height of the building is not access acceptable to Federal uh historic standards harb is asking for a new design to be created so that the new garage remain the same footprint and the same height and mass as the existing building please do not approve this COA it is simply not ready for approval thank you thank you our next speaker is Joe McGavin I'm Joe McGavin I live at 1228 mafit Avenue in Bethlehem and I am the real estate broker representative to The Harp I found a few interesting points from the January 29th meeting that I would like to discuss one it was presented that the harb only wanted the new garage to be the total length of the existing garage and that's not true I know Diana did mention that was what we would like to see however we did not pass a resolution or ask for a plan with the exact same length garage yes harb would like to know what is in the white box but I may be wrong we're not looking for the garage to be the exact same length at least I don't we want to know what's going to go in the white box at the last har meeting the question I was looking for an answer to was how could the new garage be configured to provide the space faces the parking authority once without increasing the height of the garage I was told it was not possible because there would need to make changes to the internal structure those changes would add additional cost it seemed very difficult for anyone to provide the answer on the length just that it would be too expensive how does anyone make a decision just by saying it would be too expensive at the end of the meeting the parking Authority staff City staff and the Consultants were clear that they would not consider any modification to either of the two plans that were submitted to harb number two the mayor provided an excellent historical presentation of various aspects of development Redevelopment and parking analysis for the city at the meeting on January 29th the point that I found extremely interesting was that approximately 15 minutes and 30 seconds into the presentation mayor Reynold discussed the 1974 I believe that was the year Pedestrian Mall and urban renewal projects that displaced 40 lowincome families he stated we should learn from what what happened 50 years ago I also believe we should learn from what happened to those families 50 years ago I do not have supporting data support this particular case however in my experience and I've been in the real estate business for since 1972 in my experience those families would have been compensated for their Move May mayor renolds presented a very negative light implying that it should not have happened to those 40 families shouldn't we learn from that experience and consider the property owners affected by the new garage does it not matter to the administration because the property owners in the historic district are not low income families should it matter that those families have made substantial investments in historic Bethlehem the question that I have as a result of that discussion is how will members of council and the parking authority be looked at for what damages they are inflicting on the property owners who are being forced to accept an increase in the garage height that their backyard and by the way using an average height that I've said of of the over 200 foot span is very very deceptive to your consult to your constituents the citizens knowing what is in the white box possibly smaller white box is important to the ultimate decision I know they tell us that it really is not important because the ultimate developer will need to come to harb for approval will that also be a waste of time for the members of harb since the administration will come to council to override any possible harb veto to give the developer whatever they have been promised I ask every member of council and every citizen here in attend attendance today how would you feel if this city approved a variance that was rejected by The Joint Planning Commission for the develop for a development project so that a 75 foot wall could be constructed in your backyard how would you feel if a 75 or an 85 ft tall apartment building was built in your backyard with Windows or decks looking into your private backyard would you feel offended would you feel that the Privacy you may currently have and your home has been destroyed I ask everyone to think of those property owners who will be adversely affected by the project the property owners who previously the property owners who had previously bought into the city of betham was selling when the city promoted the historic district I might add adversely affected by the project without compensation for the adverse effect on their property value or quality of life again I am sure that th at least that those 40 families relocated by the Redevelopment mayor Reynolds referenced in the in his presentation on January 2019th Mr McGavin please conclude your comment we're compensated think hard before you approve approve a certificate of appropriateness for the current garage plans think hard of the families affected by the decision just like the should the city should have thought hard for those 40 low-income families that were displaced in 1974 thank you thank you Mr McGavin our next speaker signed up is Karen wri good evening sorry good evening members of betham city council mayor Reynolds and members of the community my name is Karen whitrick I am one of the owners of V restaurant in Bethlehem I also own serve sunay Side Up in Forks Township I sit on the board of directors for the betham parking authority and most recently I've assumed the roles as co-chair of the Downtown batham Association Along With Mr Neville Gardner Edge Restaurant has been open at the corner of Main abroad for 22 years nine of which I have been a part of we are a part of the community understand that when our community thrives we all Thrive during Co we work with bth Mar School District offering over a 100 meals per week to our City's family the desire to give back to our community then turned into monthly events where we highlighted and provided monetary donations through pre-ordered meals to our local organizations here in Bethlehem such as the Mount of police histo historic bethle museums and S betham food co-op Mony Farm project betham public library and most recently Kure culture Alliance you're probably wondering why I share my Community Connection and experience I truly understand firsthand what it means to be a community partner to give back directly to organizations that bring people to Bethlehem and put feet on the streets which is why I stand before you tonight as I sat here last week the concept of an in-kind garage was suggested mayor Reynolds touched on the impact of rebuilding a garage the same scale and size with a massive cost associated with the garage of this caliber he also touched on what that could mean for many betham organizations that rely on the generous funding that comes directly from the betham parking authority I wish to speak directly on the impact it would make to those funds be limited or nonexistent specifically for the Downtown betham Association being one of the recipients the DBA is a hardworking machine who is dedicated to oversee the work that directly affects our business Community with betham parking Authority funds we are able to host child creative Trails free music street fairs and incorporate a incorporate a well-rounded and diverse calendar of events that continues to bring guests year round to Bethlehem we communicate with the energy and excitement of our downtown through the comprehensive website which each member in the DBA has their own web page and multitude of social media platforms where our members are consistently highlighted we are also able to invest in community in initiatives like free parking downtown during the Christmas season in partnership with the BPA Leo Valley Health Network the DBA and Southside Arts District finally are able to initiate beautification projects for each season including cleanup days landscape efforts the immediate impact who however allows flexibility for larger products some examples include the addition of 15 brand new Huts in 2022 new lighting holiday Decor initiatives the building and maintenance of the membership website I referenced a multimedia marketing campaign promoting historic betham downtown throughout the year the decision made here tonight truly impacts the work done by many organizations that Aid in driving the economy here in Bethlehem I wish to express that having the BPA build a larger than necessary garage or otherwise unnecessarily delaying the garage Redevelopment could have severe financial and CommunityWide impact the BPA is a primary fun of the DBA and our association relies on the financial stability to support our operations for the downtown business Community we are eager to see this project move forward and I believe that delaying the project would need needlessly burden the downtown and its Merchants that rely on the parking system thank you for your time and thank you again for continued support of the Downtown betham Association thank you thank you miss woodrick our next speaker is Jim filer good evening again Jim fer 2 222 Main Street as The Shining Star of the Lehigh Valley's historic treasures and downtown business districts betham deserves to continue to lead the way in preserving promoting Our prous Heritage on the 6th of January the har voted down the bpa's coas and you heard reasons why because they refused to present any alternate plan both COA still spinoff property portion of the property the majority of the project goals will would be incorporated in a full property parking lot or any other project to use the city's terms including walkability commercial space vibrancy livability engaging those are terms that are going to happen no matter what goes at that at at that location there was no real use of future parking projections and the historical statistics presented in the presentations came from a PO Co and postco Recovery period And Thus are generally invalid to any long-term projections as economic recovery and growth continues and more businesses return to an increased activity level as one businessman described in the committee of the whole meeting how he's now up ramping up quick this year in his parking requirements and customers downtown what will come in the next 50 years many IND individuals and members of the down pound Business Association through their two petitions presented their disapproval of the bpa's course of actions How can any business or Association economically or financially support less parking and a core business and visitors District that supports their own businesses for economics they would not only for political Central planning purposes would someone support this significant Park reduction the DBA as just spoke is paid money by the parking authority so they naturally will have a biased and influenced perspective on what so I would expect them to support what the mayor wants because they're getting money from the city so if I was being paid I'd stand up and say whatever I wanted whatever they wanted excuse me from the committee of the whole I thought we were briefed that the parking authority doesn't make money doesn't make a profit they must be making money if they have all this money to hand out in Grants and programs to support the communities so which is it you know the infamous speaking out of both sides of their mouths all things exist or not as the results of the decision of people this is perhaps the biggest decision everyone in this room has faced during anyone's time in public service is this the right thing to do this is a case where you cannot go back anything else you can generally go back and amended like a budget transfer this is all set up to impose upon the council the biggest case of regret and buyer remorse everything hinges upon the white box apartment building and there have been many attempts to divert the focus to extraneous points just like I described in my earlier budget and debt discussion does the desire for this one specific apartment building supersede the long-term support to our historic district and unique downtown business district do not regret a vote to prioritize one apartment in this core downtown location to the detriment of the historic district and business Community I would not be proud to have my name on the plaque in celebration of an apartment building at that location I ask for your independent View and in no vote on the bpaas just like the Barb for the sake of our downtown and historic District's Futures and not for an unknown developer and a few future apartment tenants thank you thank you Mr Faller our next speaker signed up Mary Joe MCU Mary J mol 449 Grand View Boulevard the information presented at last week's committee meeting was extensive I hope the Council has truly done their due diligence reviewing all information presented last week most importantly harb's recommendations and those of and of those extremely valid points stated by residents and Council I believe due to the delicate nature of demolishing the existing garage due to surrounding historic buildings instructions construction on the new garage will not happen within next month or so enough time for The Architects to formulate new plans that meet the harb guidelines as well as those from many other governing bodies I hope the council took the opportunity to walk the neighborhood along Market Street and got their own perspective not merely using the site drawings that provided provided with the ant on the sidewalk looking up at the house while the need for the new garage exists proposal submitted I do I feel do not within the harb or Department of interior guidelines and to quote something from the OJ Simpson trial if it doesn't fit you must acit thank you Miss MCO our next speaker signed up Aon zavage thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak with all of you this evening my name is Erin zavage and I have lived at 112 West Broad Street in the condos at the corner of Maine and Broad since 2006 yes the last 18 years where has the time gone I've seen many changes over that time however I have always said and still say that living in the heart of downtown Bethlehem that I live in the best place of the Lehigh Valley there is so much to offer right outside my front door I love walking to the restaurants and shops and all the festivals Music Fest Celtic classic Harvest Fest I could go on and on in short like many of us in this room I love this city I have also been the Southside arts district downtown manager for the last two years the Bethlehem parking authority is the second largest sponsor of the Southside Arts District just behind Lehi University as Lehi looks at changes in their future investment the continued funding from the BPA is even more critical to our programs in addition to to our many events such as our annual Chili Festival and cocktail crawls which draws thousands of visitors and res residents to our Southside businesses annually we also support our small businesses through promotions advertising and educational opportunities throughout the year I can tell you from personal feedback that I receive frequently from our small business owners residents of the Southside and visitors they are so appreciative of what the Southside Arts District delivers to our community I want to thank those who presented and participated in last week's meeting regarding the Walnut Street Gage I also appreciated seeing the detailed data analysis and potential financial implications to the BPA and the city and Building a garage with parking that would go unused I also believe is important that the dollars that come from the BPA are reinvested in our city Comm continuing to support and economically thriving Community as a lifelong resident of Bethlehem I want to assure that we are making wise financial decisions for our children's future I encourage Council to approve the the park and garage that is right-sized and supports our continuing growing city thank you thank you our next speaker is Peter schneck good evening my name is Peter schneck 214 Pinetop trail of Bethlehem as a proud and lifelong resident of betham son and Grandson of betham Steel employees Freedom grad of 2002 and Survivor of Mr cahan's floor hockey class I'm here today as an advocate for positive change and progress within our community I would like to express my support for mixed use development the mixed use development initiative that I believe will enlarge and improve the already vibrant downtown area to live work and play as someone who witnessed the transformation of our city over the years fostering the opportunities um fostering opportunities that encourage spreading this vibrancy is key not only to the C to grow the city but to maintain it the prospect of a space that blends residential and Commercial elements in our downtown is not just an exciting opportunity but it aligns with our evolving needs and desires of our diverse population I'd also like to commend the efforts put forth by the city and the betham parking authority through working with many design experts to develop this project that is both sized appropriately and will meet the needs for future Generations it has been a long journey getting us to this point and I've read countless updates and status reports on the Walnut Street Parking Garage stemming from years ago having lived in Bethlehem and visiting downtown fre frequently each year throughout my life my memory of this block and the block leading to the parking garage existed without much purpose other than providing me a route to Music Fest from New Street to Main Street in fact prior to McCarthy's red stags investment and changing their whole area outside there I remember this area used to be lined up with portons for Music Fest and I would strategically have my mom pick me up on New Street through this route we now have unique an we now have a unique opportunity to transform this area into a hub of activity activity and vibrancy while adding more walk ability to our community I'm filled with optimism for the future of our city as we embark on this transformative Journey this mixed use Development and Construction of the new parking garage signify a commitment to progress and thoughtful urban planning I'm confident that these physical improvements will not only enhance our City's landscape but improve the lives and wellbe well-being of our community I would like again to express my support for the Mixed use development and extend my gratitude to city council members who considered this exciting opportunity I appreciate the dedication to keeping the interest of our city as a whole not just today but for the future I look forward to the positive impacts these decisions will have on our community together as we build the future of Bethlehem the way that we can all be proud of thanks again for your time and commitment to our great city thank you our next speaker is Anthony bronico apologies if I mispronounce that um hi uh Anthony brono uh 1623 eaten Avenue um I'm just here to say I support the uh smaller garage proposal 1B the one with 527 spaces uh the presentation last week at the committee of the whole uh was very enlightening it seems clear to me that the old garage was overbuilt and that a smaller one would serve the future of the city better and put more of a priority of people over parking uh also save the city a good amount of money which we' done a good job paying down our debt and could continue to do that um personally I always found the Walnut Street Garage to be kind of visually unappealing and rebuilding in kind wouldn't really solve that problem um and the projection say the parking wouldn't even be supported and I don't think that we should be planning around the couple times a year we have Music Fest or Christmas time yeah we bring money into the city but then we have a bunch of parking spots sitting empty costing money when we could be using that space in a better a better way whether that's the mixed use development or like Dr Van W said maybe some sort of Green Space um so I I just don't think that we should rebuild the garage in the full size um and I hope that we don't so that's all thank you next speaker sign up George harab George har 77 West Broad Street I've lived on West Broad one block away from the Walnut Street Garage for 30 years I've parked my car within its former confines virtually every day during those three decades it's with that particular perspective that I come tonight to make comment some quotes a charmless merely tall and blunt building artless and dumb arrogant in its placement plain and lacking despotic brutal and despotic a Mis choice of priorities these are actual quotes of comments made about a set of plans regarding a particular City's uh important construction project no these words are not about our proposed garage but they were all made in and around the 1970s when discussing the Twin Towers at the World Trade Center it's easy to forget with the hindsight of history that many many people hated the twin towers that of course changed over time and those two structures eventually became beloved and emblematic of Manhattan and even of America itself now I say this not to equate our humble City's construction plans for a garage with one of the most esteemed and iconic architectural symbols of all time but to say this change is hard I get it back in 2002 I watched in abject brokenhearted sadness when the massive and beautiful trees that once occupied The Pedestrian Mall in front of the Boyd theater were cut down cheers no worries a anyway I watched in abject sadness when the trees that uh once occupied The Pedestrian Mall in front of the Boyd theater were cut down in order to prepare for the reopening of the street some of you may well remember uh the huge Maples and Elms that were there that had to be chopped down and turned to mulch it was awful I could see it happening from my living room and at the time I just didn't understand why it was necessary I loved those trees now all this time later after having a front row seat observing the positive results of deciding to open up Broad Street I can't imagine it any other way I wish I could somehow tell my 2002 self don't fret too much trust the process it's going to be worth it change is hard but change is necessary and the results of change are often very difficult to predict so what do you rely on well hopefully you gather data and information and use that to decide what should work best for whatever set of criteria you're trying to fulfill I truly think that the BPA and the Administration have done just that the mountains of data collect and collected over the last few years have been impressive and quite honestly overwhelming at times but that's why qualified professionals crunch data in order to provide us with suggestions and options to wit I found it curious that some people in this chamber last week even some members of council uh could both vehemently demand and insist that the administration be as transparent as possible then proceed to complain that the mayor was talking too much tell us everything why are you talking so much it's just strange I get it change is hard but change can be exciting in watching the beginnings of the demolition on Walnut Street again literally from my living room window there's already an amazing sense of possibility to suggest that this process and advancement should be delayed because of unfounded worries of a secret cabal and ulterior motives somehow related to an unprogrammed space that hasn't even been officially proposed yet kind of seems unnecessarily conspiratorial and even a little bit willfully obtuse change is hard things don't become beloved by mandate Things become beloved over time and through exposure now please pardon the slight pretention of this but voler said the perfect is the enemy of the good the perfect is the enemy of the good in that spirit I ask Council to trust the data and to make the hard choice to approve one of the really good proposals that are planned for the new garage it's time thank you our next speaker Miss Barbara diamonds Barbara Diamond 425 Center Street I'm just going to read you the email I sent in case you didn't get a chance to read it I know you probably had a lot of communication on this issue so dear president cologne and members of the Bethlehem city council I spoke at the committee of the whole meeting last Monday I'm writing to again encourage you to support harb's recommendation to reject the latest plan for the garage a project of this magnitude and importance is where harb's expertise is especially vital and should be given utmost weight the garage that ultimately fills that space will have a far-reaching impact on the Vitality of our downtown business businesses on the economic impact of Tourism especially as a UNESCO world heritage site on the beauty and historic Legacy of the historic district and on the quality of life of residents living near the garage the members of harb are your experts their charge is to work with the city this is a quote from the website City website to ensure that our historical cultural archaeological social and economic Heritage entrusted to each generation is enriched and passed on to Future Generations in taking this broad that's the end of the quote in taking this Broad and Long View harb's decisions serve as a butress against short-term political decisions they took the time to study the plans and listen to the Consultants City Administration and the community by all appearances they gave the project careful and thoughtful consideration I hope you will honor and respect their work by upholding their recommendations the administration should take the time to get this project right and for the right reasons and as a postcript I would say if you do reject their recommendation and approve this project I hope and expect expect that you will explain your reasoning to all of us who've come here to to ask you to support harp thank you thank you Miss Diamond our next speaker is Mr [Music] Diamond as usual I running after her so I'm uh Steve Diamond at 425 Center Street um chairman uh uh cologne and members of the city council you know in real life I'm a I'm a physician so I'd like to give you a scenario that perhaps you would understand let's say you're one of my patients and I'm a family physician and you go to a Cardiologist and the cardiologist says that you need to have uh surgery uh cardiac surgery and then you come back to me and then you ask my opinion should I do this or not it would be malpractice for me to cancel the cardiologist's order why I do not have the knowledge or expertise to reverse the opinion I could potentially do you harm although I have the right to give my opinion you are in the same situation as that family doctor per se you are intelligent generalists but not experts in historic development and architecture I believe there's not one of you who is a uh architect sitting on the council the experts are the historic and Architectural Review Board that's har they are your experts that know architectural compatibility and what the law demands by going against their knowledge and expertise you are potentially doing harm to the historic district and Bethlehem itself I would also like to bring to your attention that during the marathon presentation by the mayor there was not one explanation why the area designated as the white box must be subdivided for development for apartments there was never an explanation why the footprint of the garage could not be elongated onto that property which is owned by the parking authority also and perhaps perhaps if we use that property the garage height could be lowered because that way you could take up the spaces that are necessary it was also presented that the number of spaces was dependent on a cost of a parking space given at 45,000 a year this determined the carrying cost of the garage which limited the number of spaces and subsequently the bank loan that can be proced cured how did they come up with that cost of $45,000 I would like to be able to see it to me just taking a number without having verification is questionable remember please the decision by harb was not against the number of spots or the development of restaurants but it had to do with the ugly facade and the height of the structure I leave the decision of the number of parking spaces needed to another expert who I hope represents the public and who can review the city's numbers sadly I don't believe there's anyone on the council right now who is an expert in developing parking spaces so uh if you would I would hope that you would uh support harb and and not um okay T the project thank you thank you Mr Diamond our our next speaker this evening Brian carahan um my name is Brian carahan I'm a resident living at 444 North New Street my wife and I moved to Lehigh Valley in 1985 I worked at Rodell press she worked at the Allentown Art Museum we lived in ammus Muni and zionville we liked living here we liked coming to Bethlehem to Music Fest in Celtic classic our kids were born in Allentown hospital but in 2000 I got a job offer in Birmingham Alabama and we moved we thought we'd beat away for a couple of years but a couple years turned into 21 through all those years we regularly visited family and friends in the Lehigh Valley including an annual trip to Bethlehem at the holidays to visit friends in the historic district and to walk up and down Main Street in 2018 our son married a girl from Coopersburg and they settled in Easton at the end of 2020 we both retired and we made the decision to move back to the Lehigh Valley we specifically wanted to live in the historic district we liked the neighborhood and its walkability we were lucky enough to find a home and we moved in in September of 2021 we haven't regretted it the neighbors are welcoming we like walking to the shops and restaurants on Main Street and Broad Street and walner Street and the Southside we like all the activity at the holidays and during the festivals we love being in the middle of the fascinating history of this city we're very lucky we did an extensive renovation in our house we live in including an outdoor project that we reviewed with harb we appreciated going to harb and are grateful to have a board that by Statute looks out for the architectural Integrity of the historic district what upsets me most about the proposed replacement of the walner Street Garage is the profoundly negative impact it will have on our neighbors on Market Street what is equally upsetting is the breathtaking level of disrespect and contempt this Administration has for the historic district this Administration views the historic district and the Architectural Review process is an obstacle it must overcome rather than an important part of the city with guidelines it should honor and work with it is orchestrated a strategy intent on steamrolling the residents and businesses in the historic district harb the press and now use city council so it can get its way they are proposing to wedge into the historic district a much taller parking garage with fewer parking spaces and a sstory 85 ft 100 plus unit apartment block just steps from the site of the home of Frederick Beckle where Lafayette convalesced after the battle of Brandy Wine in 1849 Frederick Beck's great grandson built the home we live in bethlehem's Moravian and industrial history is the Beating Heart of the City this Administration is trampling on that history with what is being proposed for the walner Street Garage harp backbone when it declined to recommend a COA for the project now it's your turn city council I urge you to reject this project thank you for your time thank you thank you Mr carahan our next speaker this evening Chris bedoni thank you for the opportunity to speak uh my name is Chris spon I a lawyer in bethle in my entire adult life for some 48 years my office is at 1413 eastn Avenue and my residence is at 608 Melrose Avenue um first off I think you need to understand what you're voting on you are not voting on the project you are not voting on the subdivision but you are voting on a COA a certificate of appro roess and I would ask your solicitor to direct you in that regard much of the discussion tonight and there have been pros and there have certainly been cons but it goes to the COA it does not go to a building permit it doesn't go to a setback it doesn't go to the violation of utility rights of way or any other indicia of the building or anything else the first thing I think you should do and I see the people here from the heart they spent a lot of time reviewing this they were over several meetings and the vote was 4 to one to deny a certificate of appropriateness the one vote that was for it is a city employee and we can all imagine or conclude why he voted the other way their job is to make a recommendation to you and as you heard before I sat on that side of the table for about 20 years and you can accept or you can reject their recommendation that being said however you are bound by the guidelines of the Department of the interior and I would ask that your solicitor guide you in this regard and I'm taking this directly from the guidelines and if I may I'm going to give you a handout then to be sure that you have this I gave it to the clerk and sent you some mail but I want to be sure that you have this the role of the historical and Architectural Review Board is to review and provide a recommendation to city council regarding any erection alteration demolition relocation adaptive use or new construction project within the bounds of the central betham historic district that is visible from a public Street or a public R of way that comes directly from the Secretary of interior guidelines they go on to say in the guidelines that your review and that of har by the way is Guided by principles contained in the Secretary of the Interior standards for the treatment of historic properties and more specifically the standards for rehabilitation I appeared and I appreciate the committee of the whole meeting and it was rather painful to have a two and a half hour two two hour 35 minute presentation and then we're limited to five minutes but we recognize the concern and we appreciate Council doing that as a whole now the important part is the following at the end of that meeting and as of tonight can anyone say what they refer to it as the white tent it might be the white elephant as of today you do not know what is going in that site there there's talk about apartments there's talk about the size of the building it could be 85 feet it could be 177 Apartments but there is no delineation in fact the words of the mayor word that's not delineated I don't know what that that means other than it's not disclosed and we heard something about transparency before here's the important part this comes directly from the guidelines principles require the encouragement of sensitive Rehabilitation involving the least amount of intervention or change to Identity retain and preserve the overall form materials and details that are important in defining the architectural and historical character of the building and I emphasize and the entire site the entire site today contains that white box the white elephant you as council members do not know what is there I'm not suggesting that you you support the harb I'm suggesting you have no alternative but to support the harb and deny the certificate of occupancy you do not know what is on that site and I would I sat here for several hours and the director of community and economic development the mayor and and their experts but nobody wanted to talk about the white elephant you don't know what it is and the public doesn't know what it is the word transparency has been bannered around tonight and that's that's not being transparent frankly and we understand the pressures here that are being given but you're for the certificate of occupancy and to support the harp and I would ask that this handout that I have be given and made part of the record to each of the members to be sure that you're aware of your obligations under the standards by the Secretary of the Interior because candidly and I wrote the the uh guidelines and the ordinance for both the Southside and the wests side historical district and I would suggest you that someone make they go to the Secretary of interior and jeopardize the entire historic districts in the city of bethle thank you thank you Mr [Applause] speedon our next speaker signed up this evening Craig Adamson good evening my name is Dr Craig Adamson and I represent bucksmont Academy in the IRP Graduate School uh we own three buildings located at 531 544 and 546 Main Street um someone referenced earlier where the portapotty are during uh music vest that's us that's right on our sidewalk there um and Neighbors to to nville um I can appreciate the community's passions and and perspectives on the project and I wish there was a more inclusive and transparent process and I would urge the council to gather more useful data prior to making a final decision my main points today are that I'm concerned about one the lack of future parking to the misinformed data that was used to create the total the total parking spots needed uh and overall parking needs to be convenient easy and friendly um I've heard about plans and I listen to mantras of right sizing smart parking and some local business associations deciding on the significant reduction in parking my concern is is I'm probably one of the uh top five largest employers uh in town closest to Walnut Street and nobody has asked for my input or for my projections of what I'm proposing uh for the coming years I decided to run some of my own numbers and stats um and I hope this will uh further inform the council making their decision I appreciated the Parking Authorities data from 2223 and understanding they just implemented their um electronic systems uh but like what I said last week uh it didn't include when we were at the height of our training um so um what I did is I asked our institutional assessment team to run some numbers for me regarding uh Trends from 2016 to 2018 training registrations prior to covid so from 2016 to 2018 an average of 151.50 registrations per month and I aggregated that over the year the majority of these registrations were for four days of training uh or for our conferences that we have that are for three to four days long these are weekday registrations not weekend a conservative estimate would be for each each of these registrations represented for three days park downtown Bethlehem so for public event attendees represented about 400 and 54.6 parking days per month on an average of 20 to 25 spots per weekday just my parking needs alone are 60 to 65 spots daily on average at Walnut and we're starting to plan in-person trainings again starting this March so there was a gap from 20 when covid hit to now none of the presentations that I've have taken into account the number of people that Buckman and IRP bring into the parking garage at Peak in October in 2016 I was 1,16 registrations and in 2017 I was 1,310 this has not been taken into consideration in the 20 22 and 23 data uh for the parking space us usage not to mention that businesses creates throughout the historic district I hear bringing feet into the City and I think our companies do that quite often our October 2019 conference Drew almost 500 people over several days the Main Street and Walnut Street Parking Garage being our directed place to park for our registration guests we haven't had a conference in Bethlehem since covid so none of those numbers have been a part of the data that you've received as the council respectfully you need more information on the needs of the community and what it should be built in that space I feel that you're being given bits and pieces and not a holistic plan of what that looks like and what the needs of our business is currently I have 27 uh monthly spots um that I have to park in Spring Street right now that's not convenient uh I talked a little bit about that last week I'm spending we're talking about money and investment I've our companies invested millions of dollars in the center of of Bethlehem I'm now in the process of renovating our 531 main office about half a million dollars to add multiple more offices for staff I expect us to rent more than 40 spots uh from Walnut uh when it's rebuilt so I really need the council I mean I need a commitment for whatever the number of spots are that there's enough parking for our Vents and for our staff thank you thank you our next speaker Megan lysowski Megan lysowski 650 East North Street on I'm going to present a petition to the city I'm going to read the petition first it's received 130 signatures the petition reads I am in writing in support of the mixed use apartment and parking garage projected at the site of the Walnut Street Garage Pacific specifically I support submission 2 commonly called small garage that was proposed before the historic architecture review board on January 3rd 2024 the small garage proposal will support around 530 parking spaces this number of spaces satisfies the demand for current and future uses compared to the current garage it will have fewer parking spaces take up a smaller portion of land and be taller the small garage proposal also incorporates feedback from neighboring residents and limits the height along the resident backyard these Dimensions allow for a mixed use retail and residential apartment building on the remainder of the lot a mixed use apartment building will allow new neighbors to move in and more businesses to occupy the retail portion Walnut Street will become an extension of the vibrant and walkable Main Street and Broad Street corriddor it deser deserves to be I ask you city council member to vote to support the small garage proposal that meets the demands of the parking meets the demands of the city enriches the walkability of Walnut Street and increases the housing supply thank you with the remainder of my time I'm going to speak on my behalf not on behalf of the 130 people people that spoke um all the people that are here that are voting to protect their neighborhood you are lucky enough to live here you already have a home here I hear people talking about the ability to walk to shops to be close to all these places not everyone has that space is limited if we add housing you can have more neighbors who will have access to that um I want to close by saying I support resolution teni on the agenda tonight for submission one B for a 527 space garage at 33 West Walnut Street thank you for your time thank you and our last speaker who had previously signed up Roco [Music] deato it's difficult being number 17 come of preparation and hero list up and your head explodes um uh I'm here purely for the historic district issue uh and I think my view of it be should be a slam dunk vote no um just as a preference uh preface rather uh I embrace change um except when I'm in front of harb and I want to change the color of my house or the size of my shutters or the screws that go into my by door that becomes an issue because it is an historic district in that world you want to keep things in context so um I don't think anyone who lives there is is a lite doesn't want to do have any change but I think they want to preserve something that's a gem um I think it should be a no-brainer because the residents of this District have this neighborhood have come repeatedly in front of harb and in front of this board this Council uh to object to not a new garage uh not even the absence of an apartment building most many do but I don't but the scale of it in the impact of it on the historic district um the intensity of the opposition I think has been demonstrated by the marathon of meetings we've had and the last one that went five hours and people 34s of the people that came were here at 11:15 when it left that's intensity of of opposition I think that should count for a fair amount um Bethlehem historic district Association uh which really represents the households in the district um the membership is $20 a year so it's certainly not a country club um it is opposed to these plans both of the plans uh they was a signed a petition that was presented to harb and to the council uh there are 36 businesses although this isn't quite a historic district uh uh support businesses have their own agenda uh signed a petition and opposition um I do understand that DBA and by the way I think Karen and Neville's restaurants are fantastic you got to go for the duck and the hamburger Karen place and the Sunday and the Sunday brunches and the scones at Neville's place so there's no there's no animosity here there is only a a plea to understand that historic district is is one that has the very smallest amount of change um uh I think that the important thing is the scale of this thing we're talking about a monster of 60 feet 50 feet 70 feet of a wall and I I don't know 75 100 there the numbers blur but they're huge in in relationship to the context of the neighborhood um I I uh I'm only asking the PA to be reasonable and respectful the historic district let me give you an example uh I live in a house that was built in 1762 it was George Washington was 30 years old it uh it was a the was the colony 20 I think it was uh it was a colony wasn't even Pennsylvania uh and I'm told it's rumored that the president gave a tree to each colony became a state and tet poer don't even know what kind of a tree that is but it was planted in our backyard the one in Pennsylvania and we heard earlier about the mar de Lafayette uh and there is a rumor I say not confirmed the rumor but it goes on and on and on this rumor uh that he he he had cuting from ouria Bush which is over 260 years old and send it back to France now they're rumors but the rumors cannot it's no town no house that can actually support these rumors the house was there those guys were here so it's eminently possible it's a gem the place is a gem we want change but we don't want to change the gem we have um I think there's also along that part of the street that uh north side of the street are houses from the mid 19th century and one house 1741 precedes mine which has lovely gas lit lanterns it really is uh reminiscent of the past it's going to have a 60 foot wall or a 75- foot building is his backyard how does that represent context how does that represent this neighborhood and they come for those food that food but they come because of the beauty of the district don't let it get away thank you Mr dearo that does exhaust our list for the second public comment so again I'll go around the room starting with the left again this is anything being voted on this evening Mr Haynes uh Bruce Hayes uh I want to follow up on what he's talking about the first store is where P van W's house is and we're talking about an apartment in her backyard of who knows the size you don't know nobody knows looking down in her backyard maybe I don't know a 100 uh picture windows maybe balcony and and all of a sudden the quietness of the wall that's behind her now which is appropriate by the harb in 1976 the size of the garage right now is appropriate to the size of of the three and four story buildings in the in the historic district so we're talking about as bad as you may think they were the harb then new UN understood the height limits that make sense so now we're talking about in Shelley Brown's back yard instead of a 33 foot wall we're talking about a 61 foot wall and and down near the other side instead of a a a 41 foot wall we're talking about a 55 foot wall so we're talking about one that's either 30% higher as much 85% higher and then and then in the white box a walls one thing and that that wall quite frankly isn't the Great Wall of China that's that really has authenticy auth authenticity to it right whatever authenticity uh we're talking about a big damn wall that is 150 fet from the national the nominated District of the world heritage God's acre it is a absolute tragedy and you have a document from me that I that we sent with my comments in there where I challenge Mr gamble on his his carving out out of the garage from the buffer zone it's in the historic district it's only and so in that location we were only protecting our job in in to the UNESCO is to protect the nominated site and in this particular area he chose to only protect 150 fet and not even go to the limit of the historic district going east he went 900 feet to Center Street going south he went 600 00 ft going west from the colonial industrial quarter he went 400 feet and 600 feet North but here really we carve out we carve out the garage that's in the historic district he found some map that is unrelated never used by the city not even on the website to to come up with that reasoning it's wrong it's wrong and and in my mind we are jeopardizing our world heritage thing no matter what what they tell you it's not in the buffer zone I'm telling you when you got a wall 150 ft away from God's acre you're jeopardizing our our nomin if you if you vote to not support the harb you also might be voting to keep us from getting a world heritage site now I want to go over the numbers I want to go over the numbers because so let's start it's it's 770 today the proposal is 590 now now take away from the 590 take the 26 of the condos that are underneath the garage that are now going to be in the garage and take away the 54 units from the bner so by 2026 when the garage opens it's the capacity effective capacity once they do their thing is 510 now how much how many apartments are there going to be there you don't know and the amount of Apartments if there's 40 Apartments okay so now we're only 70 cars 1.5 but if there's 177 cars there's 77 there's 250 cars taking away from the 510 let's assume there's 100 Apartments times 1.5 now we're at 150 so take 150 from 510 right what are you at 360 cars so the effective capacity of this garage that is being proposed and is a two high garage by the way is 300 60 so I use their numbers and you don't use average numbers when you're trying to build a garage their daily numbers 125 days the peak capacity in the garage exceeded 360 cars 125 days of year we're going to be turning away people and that's based on 23 before Craig brings his people back and that's before National kitchen and bath Association that has 50 people up there but only five working and he's about to bring 4 more back this year and he wants to add another 50 people and the Bank building has 15,000 square feet un unused right now that's another 100 people Mr Haynes I'm gonna ask you to start drawing your I'm I'm wrapping up please what is so that's bizarre that we're going to turn away 125 but even more bizarre was the proposal to use uh Plan B the small garage that reduces it to 300 cars capacity guess how many days in 2023 had over 300 cars in the garage 265 out of 365 this is not right sizing the garage this is grossly under sir haes where we going to move on thank you sir was there anyone else to the left who wants to make comment yes man good evening my name is Kelly Ronalds and I reside at 448 Main Street I also manage Hotel Bethlehem the rooms division for the Hanes um I wanted to give you a little background on the Genesis um last week Mr Frank felici who is a resident uh here in the historic district provided you with a business uh Petition of businesses that were against the proposed project and I wanted to share the Genesis of how that came about he was putting a petition together for the residents came to the hotel and met with Bruce and I and said hey how do the downtown businesses feel about this we're like you know what I don't know I know the few that I've I talk to because I live on Main Street I knew their feelings but I didn't want to speak for the businesses that are all downtown so he said do you care if I do a petition no it'd be great to see what they have to say out of the businesses that signed that petition 27 of the 50 there are 51 downtown Bethlehem Association business members 27 more than 50% are against the project as proposed and I just wanted to share that story with you and I'm going to give you this is the um shopping and dining guide for the uh downtown that the visitor center the hotels we put out the Hiatt some of the businesses have and I've we've circled the members to correspond with those that signed so that you can see which businesses are members because there's 36 signatures and some are not members thank you and please vote against the COA thank you Miss ronals thank was there anyone else to the left Mr grub thanks uh Dana grub 2420 Henderson Place in the words of the spiritual Beetle George Harrison watch out now I'm not going to sing it take care beware of greedy leaders they take you where you should not go the song Beware Of Darkness the proposed pro project the wo Street Garage has felt suspect from the start the lack of discernable public input before it even became public and as a result the city and Bethlehem parking authority are responsible for the self-inflicted controversy surrounding this project prior to the September harb meeting the city sought written public comment during its uh during the harbs demolition review someone in City Hall suppressed those written comments which had been submitted by a number of residents who couldn't attend I was one of them the har meetings initiated many questions concerns and objections from residents and business owners the kinds of things that could have been addressed sooner rather than later had there been Community participation from the start since then the city and BP have been trying to manufacture support with negligible results and the statistics that were just given to you over 50% of the businesses downtown are opposed to the project so I'm not quite sure how much weight the chamber and the DBA actually have the cities and Parking Authorities seemingly tyrannical push on this demonstrates how toned deaf they have been equally insulting have been the immature and disrespectful behavior that we all see over here by three public officials at every one of these meetings and it continued tonight the smirks the little Whispers The Laughing as public residents got up here and spoke to you ironically the mayor in ton the name of community activist Jane Jacobs three times at the committee of the whole meeting noting her philosophy on urbanism Jane Jacobs fought public development projects to preserve the Integrity of neighborhoods not wreck them the bpa's pitiful proposals to barely even lower the garage height to appease the harb eliminated more spaces which should also reveal to everyone their shotgun approach to right sizing if the mayor May and CD director who is not an elected official have seen details in the four white box proposals then so should councel schedule an executive session require that they remain confidential Council should consider going to court to get that meeting if they refuse you as elected officials should have that information when you make these kinds of decisions the mayor his administration the harb and Council are required to follow the law so in the end the certificate of appropriateness must be denied the BPA needs to get back to the drawing board and the public both residents and businesses need to be respected and heard and listened to there is no other just or legal path forward on this project thank you thank you Mr grub is there anyone else to to the left who want to make comment on anything that we're voting on this evening who has not had chance yet I turn to the center anyone to the center Mr hacket thank you my name is Bud hacket and I live at 21 East Mada Road and if we're going to hear from voler and George Harrison it's almost worth waiting three hours to come to our council meeting uh my comments could be very brief this project is not ready for approval it will be ready for approval but it's not ready now for all the reasons that you've heard whether it's design issues height issues neighborhood involvement issues uh the reliability of the assumptions and the data upon which The Proposal is made it's not ready right now you'll get a chance to vote on a new garage and you'll get a chance to vote on something that's going to be built there but it's not ready right now um people tell me all the time I should never tell people what to do so I won't tell you what to do but please exercise your Independence as as a city council you have wonderful work being done by the mayor and his team but you have a separate job and that's the job of checks and balances that's a job of asking tough questions uh and bringing up important points I would hope that you exercise your Independence as City Council on this issue with all that you've heard to a project which I believe is simply not ready for approval and I should get extra points for being brief thank you thank you Mr hacket Mr shy I believe your hand was up Bill sh 1898 Avenue first a footnote um at the committee of the whole meeting uh we heard that if uh the garage the proposed garage was larger like the old garage that the revenues wouldn't cover the bond payments and the city would have to guarantee the bond payments and this would not be desirable thing actually it's a very desirable thing uh in my checkered career I spent some years in airport planning and I learned that there's something called revenue bonds those are bonds where the payments come from revenues that were generated in this case the parking authority and then there's General obligation bonds which are guaranteed by the Municipal Overlord if you will in this case the city and in every instance you would want to have if it can be avoided you don't want to have revenue bonds you want to have General obligation bonds because the guarantee of the bond payments gives you a reduced interest rate that's the advantage of the city guaranteeing the bond payments and the city would want to default by the parking authority anyway because what would that look like city of Bethlehem parking authority down the tubes what about the rest of the city are we going to lend them any money well we will but we're we're going to charge more interest so guaranteeing the bond payments is a good thing the Administration has proposed a second proposal for a new M Street Garage in order to um respond to the objections from the first proposal that was too tall and too small the second proposal is not as tall but still smaller than the first proposal still to be revealed is what is inside the mysterious white box we have been told that it will contain an apartment building of five to seven stories what is it about this apartment building that is so important that the administration uses pandemic data to convince the council that future demand will be less than present demand in order to make room for this yet to be revealed apartment building in my 20 years of attending Council meetings I have never seen an Administration go to such lengths is there something about this apartment building that Council may not like possibly the desire is for an apartment building so luxurious and so dominating under over Main Street that would be quite a stretch is it something else here I'd like to know what it is thank you thank you Mr sh Mr analex and then I'll keep working my way down the road Stephen Stephen and Alex seven Ridge Untitled this a review of fundamentals all citizens who reside and pay taxes in the city of Bethlehem May well be call joint owners of the city they collectively cannot run the city so consequently they elect an an individual who has indicated their desire to perform this Duty and Grant that person title of a mayor the mayor has paid a salary from public funds and given a monetary budget to appoint staff for his assistance in order to ensure that this meral group is effective in the administration of the city's welfare these citizens then elect seven individuals who have come forth and select them to act as Watchdogs over the administration they're called city council not Watchdogs and are also paid from public funds for their services so both Administration and Council are equal agencies independent of one another so we can logically assume that since all these individuals have asked to serve the citizenry and by accepting public funds for their services we may call them public servants who now are required to serve the will of their Collective employer the citizens of Bethlehem this can be described to be an accurate portrayal of classical representative democracy is he this evening we have before us an important issue to be voted on resolution 10f and 10g this issue has been very contentious and has aroused dramatic and very intense P public concern as noted by public attendance and comments of these various committee at these V committee meetings from the nature of public comments at these meetings the will of the people has become quite clear will City ccil act in their role as Citizens as the citizens Watchdogs and vote to support and vote in support of public will or support the will of the administration let us hope they respond to their moral judgment and act as Citizens Watchdogs counil take great care in how you vote this evening thank you Mr analex ma'am my name is Jill ammerman I live at 55 East Church Street literally five houses down the street um I've lived here about a year and a half now and I don't know even the streets that people are talking about but I do know how to develop product and what I don't tell people since I've moved from Massachusetts because I keep parts of my life secret is that in a previous life I was the Nerf lady and Michael Colon is probably young enough that he played with two of the products that I did one was the Nerf Turbo foot ball and the other was the Nerf blaster ball and actually the mayor knows about them too one my favorite toys yeah I I am a um big hero of 13-year-old boys and remain so and um I thought that the way it was developed might have some interest to you guys because I get the credit for but Parker Brothers developed it and what we did did was we listened to people and the way I discovered that we should do a Nerf Turbo football was because 11-year-old boys were throwing footballs they were throwing the old ner football you remember the old one the orange ones that all over the place yeah and they're going look at that spiral and I who can't even throw a football I'm looking and going to the other people who did product development with me that thing's not spiraling so I said if we could develop a ball that would spiral we could have a hit product and we spent 18 months cutting footballs throwing footballs going to the MIT thermal aerodynamic tunnel I didn't even know it existed there's two in the world we were lucky to have one in our backyard finding being told you could not develop a better football and we developed a better football and the reason we developed a better football was because we did it as a group and I got the award of the Fe for doing it I get credit for the year that it was developed selling more product than aari sold that year but it wasn't me that did it it was the whole community of Parker Brothers by the yet what I did was be the leader and every time someone one including being called into the president of Parker Brothers office and say Jill Let It Go you're not going to develop a better football and I go yes we are those boys deserve it that's why I get the credit for it now one of the reasons I love living in this little crazy town of historic Bethlehem and I didn't know what I was moving into my husband had to move here we're looking around I said this is the only area I can live Robert I didn't know why after I moved here I learned why and the reason is it is 10 blocks of the most close-knit communities that I've ever lived in mayor I invite you to come to our knitting group tomorrow night you learn something you learn a lot we've got a lot of opinions the baby oh well you see bring the baby we'll take care of her for you you've never met my wife um people take care of each other there are three very strong organizations in this community there's the Bethlehem historical district Association there's the historical society and there's the merchant Association it hurts me that those groups were not consulted about this garage and all I want to say is I hope Council you'll put a hold on this maybe let the whole city learn how a community can come together and they can because all three of those groups have Representatives who would sit down a minute with the city and talk about what shouldn't shouldn't happen and then I think you will have your turbo football that everybody will be proud of and you won't be having these long meetings discussing whether you should or shouldn't do it because everybody wants a new garage but everybody wants the right garage thank you thank you is there anyone in the center yes ma'am pass them around thank you my name is Electra my name is electri deato and I live at 65 West Market Street with my husband Roco the reason I mentioned where I'm sorry we moved here from Troy Becca 12 years ago where we live for 30 years the reason I mention where we lived is because it is a historic district which is similar to ours in Bethlehem which is the preservation of a neighborhood in trca if you were to convert a building you had regulations that had to be followed the building could not go any higher than originally built but I'm corrected by my husband unless you took square footage away if an air conditioner unit or water tower had to be installed it could be near it couldn't be near the sight line of a building or scene from the street I'm pointing this out because we here as a community need to also abide by the advice of harb our home is about 100 ft from Main Street three houses west of God's acre and two houses between us we across from all our neighbors on West Market Street which will have the Great Wall as their backyard fence I've taken a photo of the garage as it is today from my second floor window and distributed another 20 ft higher is the Great Wall and will destroy the Integrity of the historic district The Proposal is just too high yes we need a new garage but build it in kind we need to preserve our history thank you thank you ma'am was there anyone else in the center who hasn't had chance speak yet on anything we're voting on tonight who wanted to make comment anyone else in the center I turn to the right is there anyone to the right who want to make comment yes [Music] [Music] ma'am Gina kachava 139 East Market Street I hadn't planned to speak tonight but um one aspect of this project that is confusing to me is how you could possibly be proposing fewer parking spaces I mean if when uh the Moravian settlements in historic Bethlehem become a world heritage site there are going to be significantly more people visiting this city and I know uh what has been mentioned is other than Music Fest Celtic Fest Harvest Fest the Christmas season the parking garage is 40% fewer or is is vacant about 40% um of that building moving forward you have to assume that there is going to be there are going to be more people visiting the city I've heard from people a neighbor who works at the visitor center at at least 30% more people were there at The Visitor Center they were depleting inventory and had to scramble to reorder well before December 25th so fewer parking spaces makes no s sense to me and I am opposed to uh the project as it is right now thank you thank you Miss Kellow was there anyone else to the right who want to make comment sir at the end good evening Council Scott Shear with pfm financial advisers 100 Market Street Harrisburg um so I had uh I act my firm acts as financial advisor to betham parking authority and to the city of betham as well when it comes to debt related matters have been representing both bodies for about a decade or so uh I've had the the privilege and pleasure to work work with both bodies and two other parking garage Endeavors in 2016 and 2020 or so for for those two respective garages we've worked uh extensively with the financial planning of the team of the authority on all those various garages including the planning for this new garage we have worked with the city over the years as well with financial planning and kind of most importantly when it came to parking debt uh have changed the structure substantially of the debt which has impacted very positively the city's financials and the city's credit rating initially when we got involved the city was issuing General obligation debt uh for the parking projects uh the parking authority was kind of directing money over to pay some of that debt that was sort of prior to our involvement then when we got involved we switched models slightly uh because it takes a while for the market to be able to absorb it from a general obligation bond issue all taxing power pledge to that debt to then guaranteed revenue bonds so the authority was actually issuing the debt the city was guaranteeing it that was for the Southside garage back in 2016 so that was a good step forward to start to create some autonomy with the parking authority and have kind of separate autonomous bodies then uh when we did the PK stre garage because of the financial viability ility of the authority we were then able to just do Revenue note for that transaction so no City guarantee that would also be the um the goal for this transaction as well for uh the wut Street Garage that's how we've been planning it so there's kind of a lot that goes into it we've seen the financial success of the city from the administration the policies and everything put in place by city council over the years to see again the financial strength the credit rating Improvement the financial strength of the authority that's all that's all great and so uh with the planning that we've been doing obviously running a lot of models not just looking out this year next year but also looking out kind of far into the future we've been doing that planning for the Authority for these various garages over the years when we run the models for the current uh the kind of current projections the current size of of the of the GR garage we are able to meet the various debt covenants that have to be put in place for banks to lend money investors to be able to to buy the bonds we meet those different criteria uh when we were asked by the authority to look at running the models where the increase in the budget amount maybe eight to n million more we obviously did that uh and that comes at a substantial cost that I believe you all saw a memo uh from from my firm outlining the additional cost so it' be about $700,000 a year of additional burden um on the budget that translates into over $20 million over the life of the debt so that's kind of a lot of money but again doing that additional amount which comes down to financial affordability for this project uh it does not meet the debt covenants so the banks will not lend the investors will not be able to buy we will not be able to move forward with financing if we can't meet those various Covenants um so obviously there's that would come with the only way to do that would be um to substantially change the projections in the future for Revenue received by The Authority uh through their different different mechanisms so that would include additional rate increases well above what we're kind of already looking at it into the future that could also involve the city guaranteeing the debt so you know not only do we work for bethon parking authority as an adviser and the city we've also worked for many other municipalities across the state across the country we're the largest financial advisor uh in the nation we have seen many many instances of where the guarantee does come into play and there becomes a lot of financial issues with having to get things back on track the guarantor credit rating drops substantially investors will not lend to those bodies so I'm just here to reiterate this all comes down to affordability and what we're able to actually get the financing forward to move forward with the project thank you thank you Mr shair was there everyone else to the right Dr Van W hi PA van we at 42 West Market Street um I'm going to Chuck a little bit of what I was going to say uh tonight because I really think this needs to be said this project is a complicated and nuanced project there's lots of competing interests here lots of different Visions here um unfortunately though I've heard a lot of disdain and contempt and even paranoia at the administration and I think the shade that many of you throw is completely unkind unfair and untrue I feel that this mayor and this Administration has been working so hard since day one and while the vision they may have is different from the vision many of you may have I think communication about this issue needs to be done with respect now I'm not friends with Mr Reynolds I'm not friends with Mr fernstrom but I've worked hard with them over the years and I trust them and I understand that they have a vision that they're pursuing you have every right everyone has a right to stand up and say just like I did before what you think but I think it needs to be done with an understanding that this Administration is super hardworking they've done a great job so far in taking care of bethlehem's frailest people in getting the grants and awards that are have the potential to change the face of this city and while this is an important project certainly everybody has their own opinions on it I think that the respect that needs to be shown for the process need needs to be said out loud and I know that may be an unpopular opinion but I'm going to I'm going to say it because I I fully believe that everyone here has the best interest of the city it's just that different Visions are are in place I'm going to say a little bit though about um my feelings about the apartment building I'm going to go back to the fact that I do agree with some of the numbers that um the apartment building can potentially impact the number of spaces um available in the new garage especially if the highest density project is chosen at 177 spaces that would potentially end up in 200 or more cars being parked in the Walnut Street Garage but yet I'm not saying that we need to increase the size of the garage over 526 I'm saying we need to ask the right question which is why would you put an apartment building in this space putting that much more pressure on the parking in the new garage um but I think I've made that point pretty clear the other thing I wanted to say is I think when when we're talking to council and I can say this because I was up there and I can say this because we on council at that time overrode harb on the decision for the skyline West um project and we overrode HCC on the decision for the banana Factory there wasn't a whole lot of um tears shed over that it wasn't great we don't feel good going against harb but the reason is harb's mandate is super narrow it's it is very very delineated by law council's mandate as you all know is much much broader it is about the health of the city as a whole and so I know that and I trust that this council is going to take into consideration that there's more to it than just the historic district which is near and dear and and you know it's me but there's a lot more on the line and I know that that's what council's doing is their very broad mandate in what is best for this city I don't envy you this vote I'm just going to say real quick I do love do I love the garage as proposed no I do feel that Miss Fritz's comments um at the committee of the whole and Nick nicholet letter at the harb meeting were spot on the suggestions by harb should have should direct the BPA to tell its Architects make this garage reflect Bethlehem this garage this Northern facade could be right out of rest in Virginia where's the industrial past the maravian past reflected in this facade it reflects nothing of this District I do think the South Wall of the garage is crying out for a much better design solution as well and I hope the BPA will reconsider and re submit architectural details to harb that will mitigate the impact of the South Wall on the historic district and very much reflect the city's character and finally I just want to say that my family and I a month in have been mightily impacted by this project I'll admit that I teared up when I came home one day and all of my mature fruit trees were cut down to accommodate the temporary easement um for the construction um it was necessary I knew it was coming but it still was pretty darn painful um the noise the vibration are deafening at times and we're only one month into a two-year project but I support this project because I chose to live here and because our downtown is so awesome change is inevitable and it doesn't have to be harmful it can be transformative and I hope Council and the administration will continue to keep open ears and open minds as we come together despite all of these different interests to find a common path a pragmatic path that will make the downtown sing thanks a lot thank you Dr Van W was there anyone else to the right who wanted to speak on anything that council is voting on this evening so again I will just open it up is is there anyone in the hallway awake maybe not awake anyone else in the room who had had a chance to speak yet on anything being voted on tonight then we are going to move on thank you everyone for your comment any old business from members of council seeing none Communications communication 6E January 23rd 2024 memorandum with proposed resolution from Deputy controller Michelle lberto requesting a destruction of records from her Department Miss lberto has re reviewed the municipal records retention Act and the records listed on the exhibit accompanying the memo fall within the categories where destruction is permitted and a resolution will be placed on the February 20 2024 Council agenda communication 6f January 23rd 2024 memorandum with an attached resolution from police chief Michelle cot Chief cot has reviewed the municipal records retention Act and the records listed on the exhibit accompanying the memo fall within the categories where destruction is permitted and a resolution will be placed on the February 20 2024 city council agenda communication 6G January 30th 2024 memorandum with an attached resolution from police chief Michelle cot seeking to destroy a second set of Department Records Chief cot has reviewed the municipal records retention Act and the records listed on the exhibit accompanying the memo fall within the category where destruction is permitted and a resolution will be placed on the February 20 2024 city council agenda communication 68 January 29th 2024 memorandum with an attached resolution from Edward boscola director of water and sewer resources Mr boscola recommends a contract with AECOM of kah hakan to update and implement the EPA required risk management plan for both City's water filtration and wastewater treatment plants an update is required every 5 years years for facil facilities handling gases chlorine the contract will run from the notice to proceed until June 17th 2024 the cost will be $35,200 there are no renewals in resolution 10c is on the agenda tonight Communications 6i January 19th 2024 memorandum with an attached resolution from Michael alol director of Public Works Mr alol recommends a change order to a contract with Western leh High Services Incorporated of Valen town to modify work being done to repair the Johnston Drive detention Basin this change order would add a cost of $1,878 19,4 57.9 for a total cost of $141,200 Mr alol explains that the additional work is necessary for exploratory digging and related measures in response to sink holes instruction is to be completed by June 30th 2024 there are no renewals and resolution 10d is on the agenda Communications 6j January 31st 2024 memorandum with two attached resolutions from Council president Michael G cologne president colog recommends the council consider rule changes to the rules of council he proposes that rule 3A eliminate the invocation and move up new business on the agenda between unfinished business and Communications president cologne also recommends changing rule 4 to amend the meeting submission deadline to 4m on the Wednesday preceding Council meetings and these resolutions will be placed on the February 20 2024 city council agenda communication 6K January 31st 2024 memorandum with an attached resolution and assist and Associated use permit agreement from city solicitor John FB Jr Pere is Touchstone theater and the purpose of the agreement is to cover theater and creative art events Productions performances rehearsals student and Community lectures workshops and related activities the agreement covers various times and dates January 1st through December 31st of 2024 at parum Park and resolution 10e is on the agenda uh Mr colen before we move on I would just coun woman might we consider just a five minute recess really quick um if that's cool with Council so the way that would work we are going into close to 11 here uh it would be you would make a motion for recess there if there's a second we would call vote there is no discussion on a if there's a second there's no discussion on it we just call the vote so are you making the motion for five minute recess I second recess second Mr Callahan for five minute recess uh s cler to call the role Miss grmy Smith nay Miss quch hi Miss L hi Miss Leon hi Miss Wilhelm hi Mr Callahan hi and Mr colum I passes 61 everyone we're just gonna take an intermission for five minutes given that we're four hours into the meeting so if anyone needs to stretch their legs we still have to get into our reports our ordinances our resolutions so we will resume at uh in five minutes use your time wisely yeah there's one outside the community Ecom development off I can work and I left my jacket there we discussed this possibility know those doors that's luckily winter jacket I'm not of it's not a all right everyone we're g to get started back up Brian Grace Hillary you good Rachel up all right everyone we are going to resume I hope that was a a useful intermission we are going to resume our regular agenda we left off with the start of report I'll ask everyone to either uh take their seat or take any conversations to the hallway as we resume our business so for my report president Council just want to briefly Breeze through we did uh assign our Liaisons and our committees so I'll just read through what the assignments are going to be for 2024 and 2025 our city council liaison will be for the betham authority councilman Callahan for the betham Housing Authority councilwoman quch for the envi environmental advisory Council councilwoman lard for the Lehi Valley Planning Commission councilwoman ksey Smith for the library board councilwoman Leon for the parking authority councilwoman Wilhelm and for the Redevelopment Authority and the bladed property Review Committee councilwoman Leon our committee assignments for this year and next for our community development committee it'll be chaired by councilwoman quch and then the other members are councilwoman cramsey Smith and Wilhelm for our finance committee that will be chaired by councilwoman cramsey Smith the other members councilwoman quatech and Leon for our human resources and environment committee chaired by councilwoman Wilhelm other members councilwoman Leon and councilwoman lard our Parks and Recreation committee chaired by councilwoman leair other members councilman Callahan councilwoman Wilhelm our Public Safety Committee chaired by councilwoman Leon other members Mr Callahan Miss cramsey Smith Public Works committee chaired by Mr Callahan other members miss quch and miss L and those are our committee assignments and the Committees can now get to work respectively as they choose to on Council business moving forward that is my report for this evening Mr Mayor thank you uh president colog I have two administrative orders and then several uh uh report updates uh first administrative order I hearby uh reappoint Barry a Coen uh 1057 pill Road betham Pennsylvania to the code Boards of appeals and this appointment is effective through December 2026 administrative order for Barry a con codes board of appeals resolution sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne any discussion on the appointment we'll call the rooll Miss gmy Smith i quch i m lard hi M Leon hi Wilhelm hi Mr Callahan hi and Mr colog hi passes 70 thank you and uh the second administrative order I hereby reappoint a flexer ilc 20 Wall Street betham PA 1808 the codes board of appeals and this appointment is effective through December 2026 administrative order of a flexer ilck code Board of appeals resolution sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne any discussion on the appointment call the rooll please Miss KC Smith hi Miss quch hi Miss L hi Miss Leon hi Miss Wilhelm hi Mr Callahan I and Mr colog I pass 70 thank you just several other updates I know we talked a lot about in the 2024 budget those four paramedic uh um positions that we added uh we did we have now all four of those filled um so you know these days as far as trying to to make sure we get employees to apply um I really want to commend our HR department as well as Chief aaki um to you know to work and everybody in our um EMS Department to work through that process remember the idea about adding those positions was about reducing call times we have been Mutual call AIDS call Aid call Mutual Aid calls have been going up with our surrounding townships and we wanted to uh increase that percentage so once again I thank city council for making that investment and within the next couple of weeks we should have all four of those positions filled so that will allow us to be able to run that next shift um also uh yesterday uh Chief cot I traveled to Harrisburg to have a meeting with um several of the other Mayors and the police Chiefs throughout Pennsylvania to talk about different ideas about retention and attraction for our Police Department I know we've talked a lot about that um the good news is that as with most things the city of betham is doing better than I would say any other City around um there's always more work to be done but both between our Police Department internally and our HR department there's been incredible amount of work done uh I think it was 10 days ago that I swore in four new officers right here in this room we have several that are in the academy now uh and we're going through the process of hiring some more as well so we'll be sending more officers to the academy in July um so we are pretty much keeping up with the retirements um so we're right around that four five6 area um and that's about how many officers we were adding as well um so obviously in between theems officers always Tire I mean we have almost 150 um so it's impossible pretty much to have 150 at all times because you're always going to have some in the academy um but we are we are uh fairly happy with where we are but we're going to continue to look both internally and it was really a great conversation lieutenant governor and the other Mayors and police Chiefs about some of the things that from a structural point of view that um Urban police departments face um just a couple other quick things one is um yesterday we had the Southside Arts District annual meeting a lot of wonderful things going on there there um I think there were several people that were in attendance here that were there I know I saw Mr bavage before but I just want to thank Council for supporting that there were a lot of compliments on everything that we've done throughout the year um the governor Shapiro released his budget today um who knows what's going to happen in the legislative process over the next three months but a lot of potential exciting things in there as far as economic development is concerned as far as housing is concerned as far as investing into our uh commercial corridors and things like that uh we had a conversation today with Mr alcol we are going through um some of the engineering language for the RFP for the design of West Broad Street where they Safe Streets for all money um as we've talked about before obviously people like the ribbon cuttings but it's really that grind of good government that you know we want to make sure we write that RFP and talk about what we want out there that goes along with the uh Broad Street active Transportation study um that we had supported um but that's really going to be the important work to make sure that the reality of what we end up spending that money on from the federal government matches what uh our vision is um I want to thank Miss Collins and Miss satula we had a wonderful and I know there are several members of city council there as well we had a wonderful open doors housing meeting last week at NCC we've obviously been spending more time than anything else talking and I think Dr V W kind of referenced it before um talking about our housing crisis within the city of Bethlehem and you know we presented the strategies Mr tul did a great job and the design of those meetings and we're going to probably have those quarterly going forward is to uh be able to update all of our partners as well as Citizens and they're going to be open to the public as that was I mean we just had a great turnout we thought a lot of people were going to come um and even more people came than we thought we going to to talk about the most important issue we have um and that's that we have so many people struggling with housing affordability um so that's something we're going to do on a regular basis and then finally last thing I would to say is in the next couple days we are going to be announcing um the P the first public process steps in our engagement for the South Bethlehem Community Center um so we're going to talk about a community meeting coming up as well as some opportunities for people to be able to weigh in on what their vision is for that Community Center it's taken um we've been very deliberate about reaching out councilman Leon has been very involved in this process uh and making sure that we are building something that meets the what the needs are of our youth and what what meets the needs of our um our citizens in South Bethlehem um and that's really been one of our priority focuses over the past past year and we're excited to be making those announcements in the next couple of days I'm not sure if it's going to be Thursday or Friday or Monday but Mr tul and Miss Collins and myself are hard at work trying to get all that stuff ready so I think that concludes my reports president col thank you thank you mayor Reynolds just a report on the committee the whole as many are aware we had a committee of the whole meeting last Monday January 29 2024 at 6 p.m here in town hall to discuss the wner treat parking garage project the administration in the betham park paring Authority provided a presentation on plans to redevelop the Walnut Street Parking Garage property comments were received from council members and the public the committee meeting was for informational purposes only no votes were taken that evening and I just want to again extend my thanks to councilwoman Leon for presiding over the meeting as I was home with the sick family so thank you councilwoman moving on to our voting so there are no ordinances for final passage this evening we on to new ordinances I will ask the clerk to read bill one of 2024 an ordinance of the city of Bethlehem counties of Lehi and Northampton Commonwealth of Pennsylvania meing part 13 of the codified ordinance of the city of Bethlehem as amended known as the zoning ordinance of the city of Bethlehem by amending City zoning map Bill 01 2024 is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr clone any discussion on the amendment to the zoning map I'll start with councilman cramsey Smith okay um I'm going to be voting no on this because I just feel like I can't in good good conscience approve a rezoning of an area in which I don't have specific comprehensive details of the development plan for the area that's going to be reson understood any other comments for members of council Mr Callahan I'll be voting no as uh also I and and the reason why is very simple it's the the property's not subdivided yet number one we don't know uh the exact height we don't know the number of units that are going in there we don't know the number of parking spaces uh in the garage we don't know if they're going with garage plan a garage Plan B we don't know what the residential component is going to be whether it's going to be 40 or 170 units so um you know I I had asked kindly for the uh rfps and I think the administration could have uh given us the rfps and blackened out the sensitive areas where was uh items in there that were financial and data as far as uh what the each uh um proposal was in the rfps we could have seen uh the pertinent information that we needed to help make this vote so I will be voting now any other questions or comments from members of council Miss quch thank you um for first of all I would say that uh my view on uh this resoning is that uh while we are at the Land Development phase of this project it seems to make sense to make it a cohesive lot in terms of the zoning um it does seem that the whole rest of the block is CB and it makes sense to do that um I have a point of order St your point so um we passed a conflict of interest ordinance last year and it's very clear that um when we have a conflict uh we need to um disclose it it doesn't mean that we're um corrupt or doing something nefarious or something secret or lacking transparency um so I just wanted to ask if what the procedure is if someone does not um disclose their conflict on their own I will defer to our solicitor in a moment to correct me but per our ordinance and I'm going by memory right now there is no process to that my recollection going by memory and without having it in front of me is and I I recall Mr Panella noting this on the floor of council that it's essentially good faith system that there it's the honor System good faith that there is no Mech ISM or penalty within the ordinance itself when there is a financial conflict and just for further background what councilwoman quch is referring to is in 20 uh 21 within the last couple years 2022 city council had passed a conflict of interest ordinance where council members had to disclose any Financial interests uh or conflicts related to uh agenda items that we were voting on and that included uh ownership of land or or businesses that would be benefiting from such a vote or also uh there was a threshold for campaign donations that council members would receive But to answer your original question and and the point that you raised I don't believe there is any any penalty or or mechanism in the ordinance and then again I'll defer to our Council solicitor just to make sure I'm properly citing what it is I'm also going off memory at the moment but I did I did look into this issue specifically um just in case this question would come up and under Bol statute and the ordinance the definition of a conflict is very narrow and very individualized to a a council member um and that their vote would um benefit them in some way that would be a vote in favor of a project that they were going to benefit from so absent that you you don't have a conflict and it is a matter of the individual disclosing their conflict and can I ask just a follow-up question certainly um it's also related to um relatives isn't it not under the state statute and I isn't it in our conflict of interests orance I I would just like a it doesn't have to happen tonight I just would like maybe we just put my computer down to make more space on the Das thank you but I will um guide you further but I my recollection is that it is narrow such that uh I don't think it's invoked thank you Soler Stewart yes thank you any further any further discussion while you have the floor Miss quch no that was all I had I'm going to turn to others who haven't commented yet miss L um yes regarding the zoning specifically um due to the fact that the parcel is not separated yet um or maybe wouldn't be who knows um I would vote I plan to vote to support the rezoning so that it is consistent across a consistent space of land um that block and the parcel itself thank you m l any other discussion from members of council Mr CL Mr Callahan I I I was actually sitting here trying to wonder who um Miss quch was referring to so when she said a relative I said oh maybe it's me so uh my brother John is with prone development and I think they submitted an RFP isn't that correct that is I think that was incl in Miss Colin's email to city council okay so um I guess I have a a brother uh that's wood prone development who donated $500 to Mr Reynolds and uh hold on We're not gonna hold on hold on have these I I'm voting against the project uh I haven't spoken to my brother John in in two and a half years over a business dealing so in no way am I uh doing something nefarious if that's what uh you were ref referencing or thinking I was doing something illegal it's incorrect I uh Mr Callan please refrain from assigning motive to her comments please well I have to take it because I'm the only one I think that has a potential conflict and I can tell you uh I have never had a conversation with my brother about it because we don't even talk anymore over a business conflict and uh I'm voting against it so I don't see uh you know I think maybe uh there's an attempt uh to stop you from having a discussion about it but you know I'm voting against the I guess I'm voting against my brother's interest so I will remain in the in the uh discussion thank you I I will say thank you for that clarification and also I remind all members of council to please refrain from assigning motive to to anyone thank you was there any other discussion from members of council before we call the vote I had one question that someone from the administration may be able to answer that as it relates to the consolidation of these Parcels whether it was 20 years ago 10 years ago today or tomorrow in order to to subdivide they would have to be um uniform correct so even if they would have Tak in these Parcels that are now three or four however many the the parking garage occupy currently if they wanted to consolidate them all previously they would have had to have been you can't consolidate something that's zoned two different ways is correct we are con we are currently reviewing we've approved uh a lot consolidation plan for these Parcels so it was a lease for it might have been five Parcels um that were um for whatever reason this was never cleaned up when they originally constructed the garage but um uh the lot consolidation is to take care of that so it's been reviewed by our office and by the Department of Public Works uh it's been approved uh We've signed off on the plans to consolidate uh has not yet been recorded the lot consolidation plan also does show two separate Parcels one for the footprint for the um proposed garage and one for uh a separate development plan parel um it's not a requirement that the Lots be zoned um uniformly to be subdivided but it's much much more difficult to review a project when a parcel has two different zoning districts on it um it's a it's a big gray area we would we would never Zone that way we would never plan that way so um clearly the lot in its total had been used commercially as a commercial parking garage and that's the way that it should be zoned understood thank you were there any other comments from members of council before we call the RO I'll ask the clerk to call the role on the amending of the city zoning map Miss grmy Smith nay miss quch I miss lard hi Miss Leon hi Miss wilham hi Mr callah n and Mr cologne I passes 52 the clerk will read Bill 2 2024 ordinance of the city of Bethlehem counties of Lehigh and Northampton Commonwealth of Pennsylvania authorizing the vacation discontinuance and striking from the city's General plan of streets of portions of West Walnut Street in the Seventh Ward of the city of Bethlehem County of Northampton Pennsylvania Bill 02 2024 sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne any discussion on the street vacation councilwoman KY Smith um again I'll just and again it's not that I'm against the the rezoning or the street vacation but I just don't feel in good conscience I can vote for um a street vacation for a project that I don't have specific um and comprehensive details on thank you councilwoman Mr Callahan uh I I feel the same I I have a quick question for Miss heler if she couldn't St up Miss in so you I respect you 100% you've been around a long time in in all the years that you've been here uh in the city of Bethlehem do you ever recall a time when uh a a major project came came to it might be yes I don't know that's why I'm asking has you have you ever seen a major project come before harb planning zoning or even city council be voted on and there's a gigantic piece side of it that the car harb doesn't know about you might know about it we don't know about it though I mean I mean if that's the new standard are developers now allowed to come in here with a giant proposal and show three sides of it and not a four side is a is a resident allowed to come in here with a um a plan to put an addition onto their house and now show you only three sides of the addition and not the four side and say hey just trust me we'll we'll talk about it later well that's that's kind of a I will say there are times when uh development is phased I mean that's it happens well this isn't phase this is attached Mr Callan I would just ask everybody when it when someone's answering a question please don't interrupt them I will the floor is still yours for any followup questions thank you I would just say that there are are times when um for a variety of reasons a developer may want to phase uh development so it's it's not um it's it's not as if it's never happened that someone has developed a part of a a lot or a parcel and then they plan to come back at some later point I can't say that's never happened correct so I'm not I'm not questioning like Martin Tower where they're right now they're going to do the the two medical buildings and later on down the road they're going to do the residential component those are all different buildings and different aspects I'm talking about two buildings that are attached to each other have you ever seen that before and maybe the answer is yes and and and well that would just be expansion of an ongoing project I mean we've seen some things in uh lb7 I I think uh you know us Cold Storage things like that I mean every project is reviewed on its own Merit I I don't know of a uh parking garage project that's been you know that I wasn't around for the North Street Garage I would say that's maybe was a similar project because there is a garage component and there's a commercial component um I really was not around at that time so so if a resident wanted to add on an addition onto their house they could show up to your office with a a design of it and uh neglect to put the one side on it because hey maybe later on I might I might build on to it I me that's basically what we're doing here I don't think that's what doing here I think you know um you know you know what's happening I mean you're you're aware of what's Happening there's a separate uh RFP that's been sent out to develop that parel yeah but I I'm not sure if it's 40 units7 units 100 units I'm not sure if it's Ian we we I don't know how high it is I mean there there's a lot of uh lack of transparency in the information that we got and when that proposal is selected did it will go through a public review process like every other project so it's in the district it'll go to harb it'll go to the uh Planning Commission there will be a public process for review um just like with any other project thank you any other comments from members of council I just had one question I want to rise whoever can answer is it relates we heard earlier about traffic as we're talking about vacating that Street narrowing the street I know there was a traffic study mentioned as part of this process can anyone speak to just what the traffic um observations are how traffic is monitored and controlled moving forward do we look at controlling traffic so now the traffic study is done so let's say the street vacation happens at what intervals if any down the road are we monitoring traffic whether it's um painting different traffic pattern patterns changing signal timing things like that the the the uh the traffic study showed and then and then we had our uh the city's traffic consultant review um what was submitted by the parking authority our traffic consultant concurred with the findings but it showed that there would be no negative impact to traffic so uh we're anticipating at this point that um the proposed layout or redesign of w nut Street will stand um I don't think there'll be a reassessment of that unless there's some uh something unexpected that two different traffic Consultants um didn't anticipate understood thank you Miss H is there any other comment or question for members of council before we call the role on the street vacation I will ask the clerk to call the role Miss cramy Smith nay miss quch I miss lard hi Miss Leon hi Miss Wilhelm I Mr Callahan nay and Mr colog I passes 52 moving on to resolutions ALS the clerk to read resolution 10A be resolved by the Council of the city of bethleem that the mayor and the controller Andor such other City officials as deemed appropriate by the city solicitor are hereby authorized to execute the grant award documents for funds to be received under the 2023 Edward burn Memorial Justice assistant Grant also known as Jag in the amount of up to $39,600 Mr colom I passes six I I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I will accept the correction thank you passes 70 resolution 10B Mr Miller we resolved by the Council of the city of Bethlehem in accordance with Municipal records manual hereby authorized the disposal of Records in the fire department as set forth in memorandum dated December 18th of 2023 from fire chief Warren AI resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr alone any discussion on the resolution please call the rooll Miss gry Smith I miss quch I miss lard I miss Leon i m Wilhelm I Mr Callahan I and Mr colog I pass 70 resolution 10c resolved by the Council of the city of Bethlehem that the mayor and the controller Andor such other City officials deemed appropriate by the city solicitor are hereby authorized to execute all documents and agreements with aeom to produce and impl Implement an updated risk management plan at the water filtration and wastewater treatment plans resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne discussion we'll call the role Miss grmy Smith I miss quch I miss lard I miss Leon i m Wilhelm I Mr Callahan I and Mr colog I pass 70 resolution 10d be resolved by the Council of the city of Bethlehem that the mayor and the controller Andor such other City officials deemed appropriate by the city solic are hereby authorized to execute all documents and agreements with Western leh High Services Incorporated for a change order perform additional work associated with the Johnson Drive detention Basin resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne any discussion we'll call the rooll Miss grmy Smith I miss quch I miss lard I miss Leon I miss Wilhelm I Mr Callahan I and Mr colog I pass 70 resolution 10e be it resolved by the Council of the city of Bethlehem that the mayor and the controller Andor such other City officials is deemed appropriate by the city solicitor are hereby authorized to execute a use permit agreement with touchdown theater for 2024 activities in parm Park the resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr cologne any discussion on the resolution Miss Wilhelm I just wanted to notify everyone that is an employee of Touchstone theater I'll be recusing myself from this vote any other discussion call the RO please Miss grmy Smith I miss quch I miss L hi Miss Leon hi Miss Wilhelm recuse Mr Callahan I and Mr colum I passes 60 with one recusal resolution 10f certificate of appropriateness under the provisions of the act of the penssylvania legislature Bethlehem resolution is hereby granted for to replace existing wut street parking garage at 33 West walmut Street with a new parking garage resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr col so before I open up to discussion I am just for information going to turn to our Council solicitor just to again restate the context of what council's responsibility is as it relates to the COA we heard about it during discussion tonight and I think it's important for attorney Stewart to G to State what our scope is as it relates to this these V these next two votes so attorney Stewart certainly as I've already advised Council uh your consideration of a certificate of appropriateness is subject to both Commonwealth statute and city ordinance the uh relevant Commonwealth statute is section 8004b of the M Municipal historic districts law and I will read that any or read the first portion of it any governing body in determining whether or not to certify to the appropriateness of the erection reconstruction alteration restoration demolition or raising of a building in whole or in part shall consider the effect which the proposed change will have on the general historic and Architectural nature of the district the governing body Shall Pass upon the appropriateness of exterior architectural features which can be seen from the from the public Street or way only and shall consider the general design Arrangement texture material and color of the building or structure and the relation of such factors to similar features of buildings and structures in the district the governing body shall not consider any matters not pertinent to the preservation of the historic aspect and nature of the district now I will read portions of the relevant portions of article 17113 his historic Bethlehem this is your city ordinance in relation to certificates of appropriateness specifically article 171 13.14 Council approval or disapproval procedure in determining whether or not to certify to the appropriateness of a proposed erection reconstruction alteration restoration demolition or raising of all or part of any building within the Historic District Council shall consider the same factors as the board of historical Architectural Review set forth in section 17131 and the report of the board I will refer back to section 17131 which is the same um reflects those requirements set forth in the in the um statute it states in determining the council to be in determining the council to be present to council concerning the issue of a certificate of appropriateness authorizing a permit for the ere I did not write this for the erection reconstruction alteration restoration demolition or raising of all or part of any building within historic district the board shall consider the following matters a it's going to sound familiar the effect of the proposed change upon the general historic and Architectural nature of the district B the appropriate of exterior architectural features which can be seen from a public Street or way only and C the general design Arrangement texture material and color of the building or structure and the relation of such factors to similar features of buildings or structures in the district thank you attorney Stewart and just two other points for information I'll make before we open up to discussion I will note that the applicant is still here I see Mr fernstrom the executive director ctor of the parking authority and also because these this uh resolution as well as the next one come to us as denials the Voting is flipped so voting um voting I is to affirm or voting yes to the denial voting nay is voting an opposition to the the denial so a vote of I is to not not approve the COA and a vote of Nay is to approve the COA I just want to offer that clarification before we get into the the votes just so everyone's aware that being said I'll open it up to discussion for members of council for resolution 10f Mr Callahan so I I I just want to um go over some things and my my whole my my whole concern here uh to everybody is that and I'm sure Mr Reynolds feels the same way is the vibrancy of our downtown I'm 100% for that and we are I think we can all agree that our downtown our main street is one of the best main streets in the United States and it's uh it's heavily leveraged on um restaurants and and stores which need parking so my my vote tonight is is uh on this is do is to uphold the harbs ruling for a variety of reasons number one we don't know what's going into the the white box we don't know if it's 40 units we don't know if it's 170 units that has a drastic effect on the number of spots that will be used in the in the W Street Garage we don't know if for if they're going with garage a which is 5 90 spots or garage B which is 530 spots we don't know this yet this is all information we don't know we don't know the heights of of the uh of of the garages either because we don't know which one they're going with so I want to thank M Mr fernstrom is he here he's right there he spent he was kind enough late notice um to spend two hours with me yesterday drilling down the data and I agree with him and Mr Reynolds when he said we got to think of the parking authority as a whole unit and I agree with that except for one exception we got to think of a parking authority on the south side is one unit and then the north side we can't we can't look at PK Street say oh there's 500 spots open there and think that that somehow benefits the north side it doesn't the same thing with the new Street Garage that the the South side's the southide North no one's going to park on the southide and walk over here so if we break it down from North just on the North side okay and these these aren't my numbers these are the parking authority numbers if we go with a plan a and and and my my main concern that we were looking at on the numbers yesterday uh it was in every 15 minute period in the walner street garage and the North Street Garage so every 15 minutes we got a a new new number and the number and this is based in 2023 so I I I probably should have went back as as the uh uh the doctor that mentioned about the the IRP we should have probably went back to pre-co times and I would be curious to see what those numbers are but I did go with the 2023 a I think it was August of 2023 so at every 15minute interval from 4:15 to 7:15 why am I picking that time frame Mr fom showed me 100% we have enough parking in the walner Street Garage during the daytime we do uh as as as it as it currently was and at in the North Street Garage my whole concern is from the 4:15 to 7:15 time frame when the people that are working downtown go home and the people that are parking living downtown come back home or people go come down to shop and spend money in your stores and in your rest restaurants so we need to have enough this is my my whole angle this the 415 is 715 why 715 I think at 7:15 I think it's safe to say anybody's gonna go out to dinner they're already down right and then in in the data that Mr F even showed me it at 7:15 7:30 it went down a couple spots and then the next 15 minute period it went down then it went up a couple maybe a couple people showed up for late dinner then then it started gradually going down to I think it was like 220 spots overnight which stay consistent through the morning so my whole concern is Mayor I hope you are correct on on on the numbers and and I'm going to trust you on the numbers and Mr fernstrom but these are the numbers I'm drilling down on this is plan a it's 590 new spots the condos in the back um which are going to be now included in the 590 spots right now they have their own separate area that's minus 26 spots that they're promised so now we're down to 564 the car is in the garage at all times from 415 to 715 was around 248 spots out of a out of a 700 spot garage they're correct there is at that point a lot of parking left but we're going back down we now we're now we're going down to 590 in garage a if we go to garage B it's 530 to start so 590 minus 26 26 spots for the coms we're down to 564 if we go with the white box 170 units that is now 248 spots that are going to go in the Walling Street Garage if we go with the uh and that takes us down to uh 316 spots left if we go with the 100 units because I I'm going to assume that the RP one RP is 4 40 That's the low the high end's 170 let's go with the average 100 units let's say there's 100 units it could be 170 let's go with 100 we're down to 300 uh M minus the 150 spots at 1.5 spots per unit and that's assuming there's you know no kids living there that might have a car um we're down to 150 minus 150 spots we're down to 166 open spots in the walner Street Garage dur what I consider peak time when people are coming down to entertain and and eat and Shop so we're down to 166 spots in the wner street garage if we go with the plan B we're down to 106 spots left still still sounds good though right it's still good the factors that we know is a residential components between 40 and 170 again if it's 100 if it's 100 spots times one and a half it's 150 spots it's 170 spots or residential units it's 255 spots big big difference the other uh component that we know is the IRP needs 60 to 65 more spots because they want to bring back their clients preo that's not all this growth here that I'm going to talk about is not included in any of the numbers yet so we're down to 166 spots if we go with the garage a we're down to 166 spots so now we go with the Benner project which is which has already been announced that's 33 units times one and a half spots that's 49 and a half spots so now we got to subtract another 49 spots the bner Project's going in IRP needs some the fact is we don't know parking for the commercial retail space that is going to go along the garage the the new garage standard is five five spots per thousand square feet that's not calculated in into the 166 spots left so we got to throw that in there we got to throw in the 60 to 65 the IRP needs we we got to count in world heritage we got to count in the current vacant office space in the downtown area we have 15 to 20% current current buildings office space that has not came has not come back from from covid that has a potential all we need is hey someone says okay I'm bringing back my full force or some new company comes into town and says hey I'd like to rent out the you know the the fifth floor at you know at the brick building you know so we we don't have any room for growth this garage that that that we're building right now is supposed to last us 40 years for 40 to 50 years so before it even opens if we go with plan a we're down to 166 spots minus minus the IRP minus the residential component if it's higher 177 units minus the world heritage minus the uh current vacancy Miss um Collins had mentioned that the Gibbs Market study has a potential for 250,000 more square feet of commercial retail in the downtown area where's that going but let's not even count that Martin Tower 1080 units are going over there they don't need parking downtown during the daytime and at night they have their own parking over there but if there's a 1080 units over there and and there's one and a half Cars per unit you got to figure some of them are going to start coming down after after work to park in the downtown area to eat to go out and buy and and buy things so if we go with if we if all those numbers stay accurate which which they were if we go with the plan B we're we're down to 52 open spots and that's before we account for world heritage IRP commercial retail space it's current currently vacant and the Gibs Market study and the Martin Tower area so Mr Fon well we have we have the Long Street Lot yes we do that's currently full and it's there's a waiting list right now for people to park there long Street's forget Long Street it it's Phil I don't know what you guys think or anybody else here on Council things I live downtown I work downtown because I drive my d red students all around you know the downtown area and I play downtown I go out to restaurants all the time I don't know what your experiences but my experience is anytime I'm even walking anywhere or driving anywhere during the daytime or during the business hours of 4:15 to 7:15 if there's a spot that opens up if someone puts on their Turnstone someone walks out to their car and hit and hits their their fob and their lights flash on they're getting ready there's someone pulling over already and saying hey you know are you leaving yeah oh thank you and they put on their turn sign I've very rarely seen a spot stay open for a few minutes down there you if someone doesn't pull up right away within a minute or two someone pull oh my God look at this I got front I got front row in Apollo so we have no availability for any additional room in the in the meters now I know Mr Reynolds has said and and and I forgot what Mr uh fernstrom said too I think they're going to do some angle parking and that picks up what another 60 spots Mr fom on on Market I I forgot what the number was if we go with the angle parking four all right so so there's a potential for an extra 40 14 let's say 30 spots we are still severely short in the waln street garage if it goes to if the units go to 170 we're in the negative and we haven't even started building it's not even open yet so then he said Brian there there's a lot of space down at the North Street Garage there is the North Street Garage is 800 spots the cars in the garage at all times from 4:15 to 715 266 that leaves 534 534 spots left open in the garage the boy because we haven't accounted for that yet the boy's 204 residential units times one and a half spots is 306 now the boy is is going to have uh the boy complex is going to have 50 to 60 onsite parking spots so to three 36 minus the 60 they need 246 spots to go to so 800 minus 266 that's currently in there the current that current number is solid that's not projecting any future growth that's what's there now minus the 266 we're down to 534 minus the boid minus 246 we're down to 288 spots in total parking in the whole downtown area not counting Spring Street because I'm not counting that because the Spring Street Lot nobody wants to go down there and walk all the way up that hill whether it's the nicest day in the world no one's walking up that hill a half mile up the hill they're not doing it the businesses that are already that got told on Main Street you can't get a permit to go into uh the North Street Garage you got to go down to the the uh the um Spring Street Garage they're livid over that they don't want to go down there how would you like to D dve walk all the way up there especially if it's raining so we're down to 288 spots in the in the whole downtown district area that sounds like a lot but we haven't accounted yet for all the any additional growth so my my idea is this they're telling us we have a lot of spots open I guarantee you within four years after the North Street or the W Street garage is open they will be coming back to us for a proposal to build a brand new garage at at long and Broad guarantee it there's no reason why this residential component can't be moved out to Long Street there's no reason I don't know why I'm Mr I'm all for your your plan new garage it was old it was it was terrible I I I I voted with you to appropriate some money many many years ago to keep it going for a few years and I'm for the retail I think it's going to help Mr Gardner's place it's going to open up the vibrancy of of the whole downtown area you know in that alley I get it but the I don't know where this residential component came in and how and why it's going to be very interesting once it's decided because we're GNA have to start looking at some additional things why is this going on Mr Callahan I'll just remind you the COA does not Encompass I know the res please keep your marks this away as we further discussion I I I would just like to say that the the roll out of this I I I think is backwards I but we're so far deep in it no one no one can no one wants to back down the hard didn't say not to build the garage without retail and amenities and like restrooms they simply asked to build within the same footprint and the height that's it that's all they're asking I think the the the parking I think we should either table this or vote no on it and let them come back to us without without the residential component make it the same height make it the same footprint have the retail down there and if there's room left over according to their calculations and they want to still stay with the 590 or or the garage B uh which is 530 then put whatever amount of residential component you can in there but for us to vote on this and P it not knowing it's 40 units or 107 units is a huge huge difference um Mr Callahan can I open discussion to other members of council and then I just want to finish up and and and I think I'll be done here so again the the harb Deni this on size height Mass that's all they're asking I think if we if we deny this I mean if we uh um Den the harbs ruling this is severely going to harm the harb this is a is is egregious of an overruling uh that you could ever find in the harb area uh I I met my wife uh got married had my first child at 32s Market which is right next to brockland the veto and one door down from uh uh Dr Van W that garage I looked at every day and I like how how could they do that now they want to make it bigger there's no need for it we we can make it the same height make it appropriate in in in 1974 I think it was when when they uh when they built it it was it was uh made the appropriate height for the harb district in the harb district and that's all I'm asking thank you thank you Mr Callahan is there any other discussion from anyone else on Council as it relates to resolution 10f Miss lard uh so just to confirm which I I think you sort of just did we're looking at only certificate of appropriateness for uh plan 1A right that that would be at time that would be correct that is what our comment is limited to the question before us right now that we're going to vote on is the first proposal that the parking the taller of the two proposals that's the fair way to look at it the caller of the two proposals so we know what we're discussing right in this moment um okay so my comments on this proposal are very brief and really are just a a thanks to all of the citizens who have been engaged in this process regardless of your perspective or the opinions that you have um I truly believe that engagement is extremely vital to our community health and uh seeing so much discussion and sharing of ideas and opinions is something I really value and appreciate um through my research and discernment process outside of these meetings I've had the opportunity to speak directly with and hear from downtown business owners who have a wide variety of opinions uh the employees of those businesses um including some who are tasked with actually caring for the historic sites that are being referenced uh being close to this uh potential development um I've spoken to a number of garage permit holders in both North Street and Walnut Street and nearby residents including adjacent property holders the ones who would be living with whatever size wall will go up and who have lived for many years for many of them with the existing wall um also many of my followup questions and requests for additional data from the administration and the parking authority were inspired by my conversations with these community members and I'm not going to get into rehashing every bit of data that I've requested but I can tell you that my follow-up questions were exhaustive um they looked at angles that have come up in public comment and not um and uh that I I am appreciative to the administration and the uh engineers and the parking authority and the solicitors uh for responding quickly thoroughly uh sharing extra data from pre-pandemic years even um and uh you know putting putting extra time and effort into making sure that I felt I could make an informed decision tonight I'll hold any other comments until the second proposal thank you Miss L any other comments from members of council Miss cramy Smith thank you I'll try to be as brief as possible um I guess a few I think it was three or four years ago when I first got on Council I remember we had a a l um a detailed meeting about the garage and the need to either demolish it rebuild it or um rehab it and I certainly at that point I saw that it was so much more financially feasible to demolish it and rebuild it and I was totally in favor of it but um I'm confused because I don't recall any mention whatsoever at that at that meeting or since then regarding anything but rebuilding the garage as it existed and um I have to say I'm just I'm just disappointed in the whole direction that this whole process has taken because I don't understand um why there was a lack of transparency um you know we rfps went out over a year ago and there and we were not advised of what the intention of the rfps was in were until last week and I still feel like I don't have specifics and I think that's that's really concerning because for me I mean I'm not a developer I'm not an engineer but I think that Common Sense tells you that you really need to know what a whole plan is if you're going to demolish a building and then you're going to rebuild it you need to put the whole plan out there I mean that's just in my mind is common sense I voted no to demolishing the building even though I know it has to be demolished because again I felt that if we demolished it before we knew the what the whole plan was the whole process could be delayed and I'm afraid that's what we're seeing here I know this is a really conflicting um issue and I really thank again everyone that came out no matter what how you feel on the issue there's a lot of different opinions I know um you know a lot of the residents and businesses in the historic district are against the um the proposal but I always like to speak to my constituents when there's a an issue that is so conflicting and I did speak to a lot lot of people who live outside the historic district and I can say that almost all of them said that they um they disagree with the plan that is being proposed and they agree with the horb decision and they always they also said that even though they live outside historic district they have to drive into town and there have been numerous times where they could not get parking even within the garages so they have a hard time understanding why um we feel a need to decrease the number of parking spots and I know we talked about the need to have more a walk area biking area and I get that and I agree with that but you know we talk about garages as far as you know almost being obsolete but when we look at the data when I do a little bit of research is basically is the opposite that in this country alone we're looking at a compound annual growth rate of 4% for garages and the one thing I found that was interesting is how many cities like Denver and tex uh States cities and states like Denver and Texas and other areas across the country what they're doing is they're future proofing garages so instead of decreasing the spots and adding misuse residential there F future proofing garages upon construction so that if when a carless future arrives they'll be easily convertible to alternative uses including housing what they're doing is they're planning today for your future with less demand for car parking building garages in such a way that someday down the road they can be made to be converted into residences offices and other uses once the parking spaces are not as needed as they are today that's something that I think is pretty smart um smart planning and that would have been great to look into in this instance um as far as the harb goes in the coas um I think people brought this point up and it is really important if a resident or a business came to hard with incomplete plans they would be denied why why should this be any different how can the Harbor City Council be expected to vote on a project of such enormous significance to the city when the plan is 42% incomplete the white box or the uncompleted area whatever you want to say is devoid of specific and significant details and as Dr Van W has said and I totally agree with that we're looking at public land that is owned by the citizens of this city and we're looking at selling that land to a developer so that they can make residential units whereby most of the citizens in of this city won't be able to afford to live I think that's a travesty to me also the height is an issue it's not within the historic guidelines horb is a group of qualified experts in historic preservation architecture real estate Etc and while I might not always agree with the decisions that they have made I was extremely impressed with how they conducted the meeting that I did attend regarding this project they asked really difficult and necessary questions and they stayed strong to their conviction and their mission of preserving and protecting the architectural Integrity of the historic district I feel I would be remissed if I did not uphold the harb decision I feel that we would set a presidents that anyone can go to Har with an incomplete plan and get it approved we would also undermine the Integrity of har members who devoted a significant amount of time to this decision and process finally we would not be voting for The Voice of the majority of people whom would be most impacted by this project and especially the unknown of this project Pro I believe a vote against harb's ruling is a vote to allow lack of transparency lack of comprehensive and allinclusive planning and most pointedly a vote against the appointed body that has been established by this city to provide guidance and recommendations to city council regarding the preservation and protection of our City's most esteemed historic district thank you councilwoman cramsey Smith I will turn to any other members of Council Miss willham thank you president clone bethlehem's harb is charged with reviewing all exterior changes proposed to buildings within the bounds of the Bethlehem historic district in an historic City like Bethlehem this is an important mandate but as was mentioned earlier it is a narrow mandate as council members it is our responsibility to look at projects from multiple perspectives taking into account the full scope of our community and its needs that is our responsibility we serve as council members 365 days a year our votes reflect much work done out from behind this stas we research ask questions speak with multiple constituents meet with members of the administration we review articles and ordinances and we weigh these many perspectives and yes we walk Market Street multiple times I've done so not just to test the sight lines myself but because I live on Market Street and to clarify we are voting on a complete project we are not voting on an apartment building this evening but I look forward as I have said to some of you in this room I look forward to applying the same scrutiny to that project whatever it is as I have as we have to this unprogrammed uh to the unprogrammed space the Walnut Street Garage is a part of an entire parking system in our North Side downtown which uh upon the construction of the new garage will consist of nearly 2,000 parking spaces to so to refer to one garage at time is not an appropriate perspective and when I say 2,000 spaces I mean 2,000 spaces within a five minute walk of Main Street and I will note that this do not take into consideration the three-level parking deck at the Hotel Bethlehem which I believe contains approximately 100 parking spots that would accommodate tourists so when we talk about the potential when we talk about the potential expansion of tourists in an already tourist heavy Town we're not suddenly going to become a tourist destination I think it is important to consider in particular Hotel bethlehem's parking spaces because it it stands to reason that individuals who Come to Bethlehem for its historic character will want to stay in the Historic Hotel Bethlehem and leave their cars there the resizing of this garage within that parking system was determined using a thorough and datadriven approach by our parking authority with garage use yes collected in 15minute increments through day and nighttime use through high and low tourist seasons including Music Fest and winter holidays it also took into consideration multiple development projects both ongoing and on the horizon the Bethlehem parking authority and its board have actively engaged the public through through numerous Communications and meetings including both those initiated by the BPA themselves and at the request of residents seeking more information some of you here in this room sought and were granted that opportunity and had the opportunity to hear the presentation fully for you and have all of your questions answered news articles on the project often contain quotes from harbon Council meetings focusing primarily on the negative perception of project but public opinion is not stated only at the podium it's important to note that we have received emails calls and letters of support some of whom you've heard from tonight from the downtown Bethlehem Association and the Southside Arts District from Maine and Broad Street business owners not employees who were approached out of the blue on a with a petition on a busy weekend night that's not the same as business owners we've heard from nonprofit leaders interested citizens again you've heard from some of them tonight including individuals who've parked in the garage on a daily basis some for decades and yes we've heard from residents of the historic district including individuals currently living in the shadow of the garage and who will be most directly impacted by its demolition construction and future development historically speaking when parking mandates were enacted in the 1950s more parking was perceived to be a part of a vision for what a successful town would look like as we became a more car dependent Society the Walnut Street Garage is actually part of that story it was built for a vision based largely on the conversion of Broad Street into a pedestrian walkway that never came to fruition and I believe we should not make that mistake again moving to a different Paradigm can understandably create tension we are creatures of habit for some a smaller Walnut Street Garage May mean parking somewhere else once in a while it may mean walking one tenth of a mile up Main Street from the north Street Garage to McCarthy's as opposed to walking one tenth of a mile down Walnut Street to McCarthy's and yes it is the same distance I'm not only convinced that we'll all get there but I can tend that some of these habits such as choosing to walk or bike or use public transport instead of getting in a car at all are not only achievable but they are beneficial to our health and well-being and to the health and well-being of our city thank you thank you Miss Wilhelm any other discussion from members of Council on resolution 10f Mr Callan thank you um I just got a couple brief questions I I don't know M Mr Reynolds if or mayor Reynolds if if you want to answer this or Mr furn room at what at what point though did the residential component get thrown into the equation Mr Callan I'll just restate the co the COA does not include kind of residential component it it's it's part of it as as Miss hel said it's part of it understood understood I I'll defer to the administration if you want to answer the question of when this was considered I would just say without turn to Mr spurk to review what has been said about what is what is uh before you as far as the COA the point of the presentation last Monday was to go through the history of this particular project going back to when the parking authority first started having these conversations seven eight nine years ago and in 2018 I believe was the first time that they did a condition survey condition study by which it came back and they said that they were going to look at what the potential options were as far as the garage was concerned as far as what downtown demand was concerned and that there was a potential at that point which they obviously talked about at Public Authority meetings there was the potential at that point to be able to look into the concept of how to be able to do that and I won't go into everything I talked about last Monday where I went through the timeline about how they did this study in 2018 then they did this study in 2019 and then they stopped it during the pandemic and then they restarted it but the idea was was that they would look at what could be what were the potentials there to be able to use on the property that would not necessarily cover what their parking demand was that's kind of the background there which goes back to 2018 I think was the first study that the parking authority did where that came back as a conclusion that that was something that could be investigated all right so so the so that proposal or the idea came from the parking authority not the not Administration I mean we were on city council at the time I could take a look back I think I have a copy of the presentation here from last week but it was if you're asking the question about when it happened it was in February of 2018 the the BPA completes the city-wide facility study recommends the Walnut Street Garage is demolished and replaced further recommended to study the right size of the new garage and explore development opportunities I think Miss tulo at the time wrote a couple long articles about that where it was that this was what they thought was the future at the time obviously different mayor different parking authority executive director but that is kind of when they first started when the parking authority first started looking at the idea that if you didn't need to use all 500 feet you could use the ex area there for some type of other use okay and Mr um col I if I think this is part of it because it was brought up by the administration and they also had the the guy from um the uh the the bond rating s uh on the financials I I'll just speak again though Mr Callan that what we're voting on is a certificate of appropriateness all right but the new garage but they did bring up the financials not not we didn't bring it up they brought it up we heard during public comment about the financial and Mr Reynolds brought it up during the committee of the whole meeting and the committee of the whole meeting was not about the COA okay the whole meeting was about the garage just to put into context can I ask a question about the financial what is your question so um I I had asked last meeting at the community hall meeting has there been any discuss so I'm assuming right now because you you had said that the uh um finan don't uh show that they could support a uh a full-size garage there so I'm assuming that the current financial status of the betham parking authority is solid enough that because you don't need the bond right you're not asking for the city to to uh support the bond they're doing it own they have the money to build this garage correct they will have to borrow the money to build the garage so obviously right now there is no mortgage being paid because the garage is already paid off so the conversation then that they have gone through is what is their ability to be able to get that financing on their own and what has gone into that process is obviously Banks taking a look at the revenues what their projections are similar to the garages that we approved at New Street and PK Street who also went through this phase development by the way those projects were not done together so I think that that's a pretty good Apples to Apples comparison when it's talked about like what the development piece versus what it's not like on those two projects they were private developments that went along with it so it was phased the same way but they then went through the kind of cost kind of analysis about what they're able to pay for because obviously they go from having no debt payment to I believe that the debt payment on the $27 million principal borrowing is in the first year I believe it's $1.5 million which is obviously essentially a new expenditure because they haven't had to pay that so then as I had said last week the garage estimated maybe brings in about $900,000 in Revenue based on what the demand is and things like that so then to get to that 1.5 million you need to get $600,000 from other parking revenues whether or not it's meters whether or not it's fines whether or not it's off Street Lots whatever it might be so the conversation there which went back before I was involved that went back a couple of years ago I was not mayor yet was how much demand is there how much demand and how much revenue are you going to be able to pull in to be able to pay for a garage throughout the whole parking system because it is one parking system as far as revenues are concerned so what they have been concerned about is obviously is you know they brought forward two different options engineer ing doesn't say like oh you can build 594 rather than 590 because of the way limits work so their 590 was one that $27 million they're able to cover that if you go up to 770 as we talked about last week in principal alone that's another like 89 million and that is well over it's not far past $27 Million by which the city guarantee would have to kick in which as I said last week Banks don't want to give that loan to the parking authority because they don't believe they have the revenue to pay above that 1.5 million million dollars so this is what I had talked about during the hour last week as well yes and I appreciate that so I'm assuming that as of right now they've went to the banks and asked the banks and show their financials to the banks and the banks have approved the the the construction of of the new garage correct that's Mr Shear's job is to be able to work with the uh parking authority to be able to look at what those options are to understand what the capital markets are going to support to be able to um understand what they're going to be able to get financing for um one of the you know I had I call them deleted deleted scenes deleted slides from last week looked at different potential garage options that were 30 32 33$ 35 million um some of them could have been higher that like they ran numbers on is like this is not something that we either financially can support or we necessarily want to support like we weren't going to support a garage there that was 165 feet like the Bank of America building us across the street so like the ability to do something like that even on that footprint was something we weren't going to do so one of the things I didn't talk about last week were all the options where we just basically said that's not going to work and all of them included the idea that if you go too far above 590 spaces 27 million like it's like if it was 5.97 or 601 you could afford but that's not the way engineering works right if you add a at a level you know it's three four million bucks so so I'm going to assume then that as of right now with the current Revenue coming in the banks are fine with uh the uh you know the loan and that was where I had my question last week I I I think uh um vice president Le only had asked it a few times but we never got an answer on it is there any discussion right now I don't think we would need it because the banks have already said is there any discussion right now about having to raise meter rates parking garage rates or fines to help support and fund the new garage I I'm assuming no because the banks have already agreed to the financial um alone for the new garage so there's there has been no discussion there's no plan in the future for any meter rates increases I would say that we are always looking at and just to answer your question is that one of the things that we have said from the beginning and I've said is like people's inefficiencies with the parking system like the ability to get parking spots what you talked about before as far as parking turnover some of that comes down to what our current rate structure is so we we constantly need to look at what say it takes to park on Main Street versus it takes to park a couple of blocks away these are conversations we've had with the businesses before and one of the things that we need to be able to do and once again not to go back to it but one of the kind of deleted scenes slides was the idea of like the way to improve the parking efficiency to be able to solve a lot of the parking problems doesn't come from adding parking Supply it comes from doing what other cities have done as far as using technology taking a look at like sensor availability being able to look at garage availability using your apps to be able to invest 50 75,000 in those type of things that would then allow you the opportunity to be able to save like I know where I'm going I know if I'm driving down I can know where I'm going and the reason why I bring that up is because part of that is going to come down to this idea of like short medium and long-term Parkers the solution to the parking inefficiencies we have is and like we've talked about this before if I'm going downtown for like seven well Natalie and I will probably walk downtown or find a different way but if like people are going to go down for a a longer period of time we don't want them parking on the street we want them parking and off street parking and part of that is going to be a conversation about rates and it's not a conversation that we want to have today nobody's figured anything out but at some point you're going to have to create an incentivized rate structure by which you're able to market-based get people to park where you want to to create that result of the parking turnover so the businesses are able to get people in these in these different spaces which is the way that we're kind of looking at the parking system versus the idea of adding static Supply that's probably not going to be used I I I hope that that kind of answered your question is that like everything though I'm be honest with you everything in the future is on the table as the way to necessarily adjust that and I'll give you one example and then I think I have answered your question every mayor here has always when they've raised the rates said we're going to raise them a quarter or we're we're going to raise them 50 cents with all due respect to previous Mayors including your brother like that doesn't make any sense to me because not every on Street spot I think we have 282 downtown on street spots they're of different values so like there's no reason why you can't leave a certain amount of spaces that are static versus cheaper because then you can get people to park there and then you can have you can consider something like demand pricing where it's a little bit more expensive and a turnover and this is a conversation we've had with Neville and the other businesses so those are the type of Concepts that we're talking about that we're going to continue talking about so I'm just trying to give you as transparent as complete and answer as possible fair enough uh we get in past midnight Mr last last question last question has there been any discussion in any future uh plans to do anything with the Long Street lot I mean as of right now we shouldn't because according to everybody what everybody's saying there's more than there's ample enough parking currently so I'm I'm hope I'm hoping you're you're right but has has there been any discussion of building the Long Street Garage between you or the parking authority I don't think that I have not any had any serious conversation about it so I can I can tell you that there has not been something that is on the radar there's been other priorities here as you know there's a lot going on that is not something I think it is a parking lot I think the Parking Authorities probably I can't speak for the board members talked about what you know potentially could be down the road but I think putting another I can tell you this putting a third garage on the Debt Service here is going to restrict the ability to be able to build a garage there for a while fair enough thank you Mr rynolds any other discussion from members of council as it relates to the COA resolution 10f seeing none I will ask the clerk to call the role on 10f again a reminder of an i is affirming the denial of the COA and a nay is approving the COA wait wait wait so and so if you vote in the affirmative you're saying deny the COA if you vote I you're voting deny the COA if you vote in the negative nay you're approving the COA everyone is everyone clear on that yes and Miss Stuart I explained that correctly yes you did thank you I know if you vote Yes you're s you're denying the COA if you if you vote no you're denying the COA so just to clarify so if you vote Yes you're denying the COA if you vote I uphold the COA a nay overturns the denial yes an i upholds the denial of the COA yes let me re that a high upholds the hard's decision so voting I denies the co voting nay grants the COA correct because the resolution is written in terms of denial understood and this is only on 10f which would be the first submission of thank you for bearing with me at 10 past midnight everybody I will ask Mr Miller to call the role Miss KY Smith I miss quch I Miss L I miss Leon I miss Wilhelm I Mr Callahan I Mr colom I resolution 10f the denial of the COA that resolution passes 70 now I'll ask Mr Miller to read resolution 10g certificate of appropriateness under the provisions of the act of Pennsylvania legislature Bethlehem resolutions hereby granted four to replace existing Walnut Street parking garage at 33 West Walnut Street with a new parking garage with an alternative SLC design that removes 63 spaces from the upper deck and lowers the height of the rear South facade of the overall garage all other aspects of the original garage proposal remain the same the resolution is sponsored by Miss Leon and Mr colom thank you Mr Miller discussion on resolution 10g which is the second submission from vpa to harb with the the shorter of the two submissions the the less tall of the two any discussion for members of council councilwoman quch thank you so um I have some remarks they're slightly more than five minutes I apologize we be here while this might not be particularly satisfying for M uh for many as we've discussed with our solicitor it's my duty to remain within the bounds of what we can consider when we're making this decision tonight this is certificate of appropriateness decision therefore I will not be commenting on many of the things that residents have shared with us in their comments their emails and other Communications whether supportive or in opposition to the project which are extraneous to the matter at hand so first and foundationally from a legal perspective the fact that both design submissions call for the subdivision of the existing lot leaving a second parcel for future development does not render them incomplete it does not uh also render them unreviewable the creation of a second parcel is not a missing element of the plans the application um I'll speak in the singular now since we've we've upheld the the first one the application for certificates of appropriateness are from a legal standpoint complete plans for the replacement of the outdated and overbuilt original Walnut Street Garage so I've received a number of emails many identical in their wording that assert that the mayor has mischaracterize the harb recommendation uh but I don't think that it can be any clearer the recommendation specifically Ally says the revision should quote utilize the entire existing site unquote and Quote Match the existing garage's footprint and height profile unquote now some have suggested this wording doesn't really mean the garage should utilize the entire site but however you interpret these words in the recommendations it still would restrict the parking authority to one application for the use of all of the land at One Moment In Time as was explained last week that's not feasible these projects are on different timelines and in the uh the Poke Street project reminded me of the many many residents who have said to me are they going to at least put a mural on that thing um when in fact there now is a plan for uh residential units that will um go right alongside the PK Street Garage um so um as I stated earlier it is not legally required of the parking authority either to uh present one proposal in one at one time uh the plan uh okay so I'm sorry right so the plan as first presented which we upheld the denial and the second submission presented in response to the initial COA denial are complete and reviewable um so one of the things that I found a little problematic was um some of the the feedback that we actually got from the harb in terms of the official report um and so uh I would in future prefer that the harb give us a much more detailed uh report of their uh concerns um as it is outlined in section 13 of ordinance 17113 now most of the time when we get reports from the harb they are on things like shingles and um and shutters and doors and things like that and so it's it's a little different but in this case I would have liked to have seen uh more detail but in at any rate um last week's Committee of the whole meeting two members of the board did speak publicly and I found that their their uh statements informative one harb member said uh quote mayor Reynolds spoke of the Redevelopment and the 40 families that were displaced but now you're doing something that will affect people who have a substantial Financial investment in the historic district and you have to take that into account unquote I I have to admit I was taken a back by the lack of sensitivity to what happened to those 40 low-income families uh and comparing their situation to that of the current homeowners setting that aside the statement that we have to take that into account with regard to the resident's Financial investment provides a window into what uh this particular harb member uh considered in their decision to deny the COA and in fact and by law we do not have to take that into account rather neither should any uh other voting members of the harb section 8004 of the municipal code as the solicitor mentioned earlier clearly states that quote the governing body shall not consider any matters not pertinent to the preservation of the historic aspect and nature of the district unquote in addition this board member spoke in their comments about the as yet unplanned mixed use project that will build be built on the west end of the property however that project was not before the harb and it is not before us tonight their job was to review the plan for the garage that was in front of them not to speculate on a future plan which would naturally also be subject to all the review processes required by any Land Development in the city and in this case including the harb so the second harb member who spoke uh last week uh remarked that the new garage would be quote a towering shadow that may be visible from Mars unquote which is clearly a gross exaggeration they also said the second submission was a quote smaller garage made with a few clicks of a mouse obviously the revised plan was more than a few clicks of a mouse for to remove a full level and readjust the various Heights of the structure would have required engineering calculations as well as calculations to ensure that there is sufficient parking within the revised Design This har member also referred to the potential mixed use project on the site which again suggests their decision was not entirely focused on the design in front of them but rather on speculation related to the not yet decided upon design plan for the second part of the property as noted earlier the designs submitted are legally complete and reviewable in their initial State and revised States the har me that har member also stated they only really looked at the size elements height length massing but not any of the design elements quote although they were presented to us as pure perfection unquote the commenter did note the white wall on the western edge of the design in their statement however that was not included in a specific concern in the harb's recommendation the harb certainly could have requested a new design that included more details regarding the West Side W West Wall of the garage they did not this also suggests that the harb did not truly consider the design in full in front of them so again staying within the bounds of what is appropriate to consider in making my decision I consider these public statements of har members an illustration of the thought processes used by them in voting to recommend the denial particularly with regard to submission 2 which was a response to the initial height concerns I will re reiterate speculation as to the inventional design of the proposed mixed use building to the west of the garage was and is not an appropriate consideration in this case I find it troubling that strous considerations such as the not yet presented plans and property values went into votes on the Harm's recommendation either because their members were not well advised of the law or for other reasons parking garages are by their nature modern buildings their purpose is one that is completely outside the known universe of the people who built the 18th and 19th century architecture of Bethlehem and that is the Paradox of the historic district we seek to preserve and appreciate history but we cannot be entirely Bound by its limitations because they cannot serve the needs of the current and future residents of our city the the original Moravian settlers were inventive ingenious folks they created the first Municipal Waterworks and they did in fact build large structures within the limitations of the technology of their time garages can be sensitively designed for historic districts with features that refer to or Echo the historic elements of the district's architecture the current design specifically submission 2 was designed with the present and future in mind it will be of superior quality much more attractive and on a more economical footprint than the 1970 structure the plan submitted to harb replaces a garage with a garage its design is indicative of its time and driven by data that indicates it is sized appropriately for now and for our growing growing future its facade is not a replication of historic buildings because that is expressly against the principles of of design in the historic district however it does use materials and Illusions to buildings in the district to better harmonize with its environment yes the rear wall will be higher than the one that is currently there however the highest elements of the revised plan which take up a very small portion of the structure will face the north side of wall nut Street not in the historic district while height is one factor to consider in reviewing a design it is not the sole determining factor in the overall effect of a structure in this case the shorter length of the structure the facade Design Elements and modifications to the street and sidewalk proportions which create a more pedestrian friendly block and will calm traffic result in an overall visual impact that is more human scaled than the massive unbroken and faceless facade of the former garage I thank the harb for its work and for its recommendation and that is what their role is to report a recommendation to council however the council makes the legally binding decision the reason for this is is clear the harb is appointed and the council is elected we are accountable to the voters I recognize there are voters who will not be pleased with my decision tonight and that decision may impact the their future opinion of me I respect that and I accept that as part of this process thank you thank you Miss quch is there any other discussion from members of council Mr Callahan I I would just ask that the um um the whole Council consider all the comments made by everybody tonight and that uh I think um it's it's not too late to ask you know to to either table this or to um uphold the harb's decision and have the parking authority go back uh I appreciate the the fact that they came back with a garage B which now gets us down to 530 spots which you know is going to clarify a lot of information as far as how many spots we have in the future um which which is even less now but um I I I would ask the uh Council to either table it or uh uphold the har decision have the parking authority come back with a uh a new design that's no higher than the current existing um Garage in the same footprint uh and obviously um add some character uh to the outside um viewing to the streets and and the back property and the east and west side of of it so it's more aesthetic looking for the historic district that's that's all I'm asking it's not I don't think it's a big ass I don't know what the rush is I don't know why we have to be uh pushing through this um as fast as we are some something's going on I don't know what but we'll figure it out later and um I just think it's it's it's it's not too late to just ask them to come back no higher uh same footprint and it if you have uh right now you want to put 530 spots in there um limit the number of condo uh uh residential units that were putting in there you know I I I think that's not too big of an Ask of the harp you know for the harp to ask us so I I would ask to uh ta table this motion so just just so I'm clear Mr Callahan you're making a motion to table resolution 10g yes I would like to table it and have the parking authority have some additional time to come back with a a a now see option garage that's no higher that's basically what the park or the harb's asking they don't want there's already existing wall there they're just asking hey don't go any higher stay in the footprint don't go any higher and put as many spots there as you want and make it aesthetic looking for the historic district and if there's room left over let's put some residential units in there if that's the will of the mayor and theart Authority Mr Callan you've made your motion so there is a motion on the floor to table resolution 10g is is there a second with in absence of a second then Mr Callahan's motion dies thank you any other discussion for members of Council on resolution 10g Miss L yeah um so so since this is uh one of my first notable voting experiences on Council and boy is it is it a memorable one um and because you know uh at least one person uh in public comment said that they do hope uh to get some perspective on where each of us are coming from I want to give a small bit of context I am not a historic preservationist I am not an architect but I do think I have lived experience and personal experience that is Val valuable in this decision Mak process um so you know personally just like everybody here has their connection to the historic district I grew up taking family walks through the historic district participating in the historic Bethlehem partnership and Girl Scout Heritage Patrol uh youth programs I then went on to take most of my college classes uh as a graphic design student at Moravian in the buildings that were part of the original Moravian settlement and I was incredibly proud to have an art studio housed in a building with such Rich history I focused a year of my independent study in fact salvaging discarded Victorian area children's books and transforming them into artwork that reflected the rich history of the time including some about Moravian morning practices I completed some of that work while employed in another cherished historic institution that sadly is gone the boy theater uh I was the first female projectionist at the boy a few years after graduating I found myself accepting a job at the Moravian Theological Seminary where much of my work in marketing and graphic design involved integrating the Moravian religious and educational history with the Contemporary needs of our students and the field of Education after several years in that role I've transferred to maran's IT department where I'm responsible for major project management where I look at complex issues from a holistic perspective in my daily work granted they're technology focused not parking focused but I'm sure you can see where the the skill set transfers there um it's helped me understand the various aspects of this project even as my career has involved though as evolved though I've remained engaged in our community history recently serving on Moravian universities preserving and promoting uh our history strategic plan pillar so weaving into my appreciation for history though I also value Community growth and development without moving forward we have no context for our history I have worked hard as a volunteer to help our city develop in ways that are sustainable creative collaborative and Community focused having served in leadership roles with the betham food co-op and presently chairing the Northside alive economic Vitality committee I recognize that growth sometimes builds off of the strengths of our past um and the value in our history but sometimes it needs to address the shortcomings or poor decisions in our history we're presented with an enormous opportunity that will have a lasting impact on our historic district and on our downtown business core and on our City's Financial standing it is rare to see significant construction projects in our historic district and just as council members did in preparing to vote tonight the thought process and decisions in this process process may be dug out of council records 60 70 years ago uh from now which is my understanding of the lifespan of the current the newly proposed garage uh when a new garage may be up for reconstruction um and we'll be examined with the same sort of critical eye all of these lenses have helped me have a deep understanding of the importance and complexity of this vote which truly had me in deep discernment approaching tonight's uh meeting um as a person who values our historic assets I do feel let down by harb's lack of realistic and actionable guidance Beyond a recommendation to replace in kind with quote the only guidance for approval being here's the quote utilizing the entire existing site and matching the existing Gage's footprint and height profile end quote I feel that the second proposal demonstrates responsiveness and consideration for the view from from historic sites and that a replacement in kind would not only uh would not have benefited the historic district the current garage is not a gem um and that a um nor would it have provided fiscally responsible path for our taxpayers as a graphic designer I am disappointed um in what I see as a lack of creativity or diverse options presented in the architectural design particularly on the south facing facade while I think it's an improvement on the current garage's aesthetic and not specifically against the standards that we need to consider I am hopeful it can be improved and I am hopeful that harb will share in constructive detailed conversation on that aspect of any plans that move forward as a project manager I love a complete project plan from the get-go but I also understand that circum ances whether inherited from previous leaders or responsive to new realities do not always line up to having the details all hammered out in the same phase and phase project planning is a reality and a necessity so keeping in mind uh the needs of our city at large and the complexities of this project I do support the datadriven financially responsible proposal to the shorter garage I'll wrap up my comments with this note this vote as several of us have commented is not about the unprogrammed space that if this garage uh C certificate passes tonight becomes an opportunity for our community to do something truly amazing as others have noted this is public land that would be placed back on the drawing board with the time allowed for the planning of that space du the this phased project my expectations for Creative Truly Deeply Comm Community involved environmentally and historically sensitive Solutions will be a high priority and my votes going forward relating to that space will strongly reflect that there is a big responsibility that comes with having this freshly unprogrammed space if this passes thanks thank you miss leard any other discussion from members of council Miss Leo so I I completely agree with what she said about the unprogrammed space the way I view the unprogrammed space is completely different than I view the garage itself um I have what is hopefully a very quick question for you Mr fernstrom um I don't I don't like the south facing wall I think regardless of what goes there whether it's 30 feet higher or like nothing at all it's it's what is going to be butting up against all of the property owners that you've been having conversations with and I've been looking around at how can we make garages more visually appealing especially considering the cem and all that stuff um is it within the realm of possibility for the parking authority to engage with those community members whose property butts up against there and does something truly like cool like a living green wall that isn't attached to the garage but separate from the garage so it doesn't deteriorate the garage but gives a masking effect and if you're standing in in a sorry this is Dan nito's picture but if you're standing here what you would see is basically what would look like trees as opposed to W uh yes sure um just as uh council person lard made the comment um Mr Zulo turned to me and whispered to my ear you know that's something that we can certainly look at that back wall and you know make some appropriate reasonable adjustments to that's that's really good to know I there was a thanks you don't have to understand it's cool um that is that is great to know there was some comments made at the the committee of a whole meeting that we had that were made by uh Miss Fritz that had a lot to do with the detail of the exterior of the garage and historical appropriateness I hope that's taken on board um and I would have liked to have seen more conversations like that at the actual hard meetings about the actual exterior and how do we make this um something that is acceptable to not just our community members but the needs of the city um I also talk to a lot of people in my community I think the people we talk to reflect the community that we're at and uh a lot of people on the southide are just like yeah what's the hold up with the garage and I'll tell you uh it's not that they don't live in a historic district they live in a historic district there is a historic district over there and I understand the difference between the HCC and the har but like I wrote comments I don't like reading comments but a historic district it's a historic district that has seen demolition without plans in place it's a historic district that has seen the taking down of real contributing structures and there's currently a mixed use Garage there right now that is the garage is built but the mix use component isn't built yet um which is I guess what we're looking at right here and the majority of that kind of development was done in the name of private development not in the name of the public good not in the name of the businesses that need parking but in the name of private development so it's not like I approach this Loosely because I live right outside of a historic district that I see value in um so all that to say if we wanted examples of how this exact process has played out before it's less than half a mile right across the right across the river um and it's not we aren't two separate cities with two separate histories that have one lesser history than the other we are one city with one history that we should move forward together and care about all of our histories but like all that's to say none of that really factored into how making the decision there was something that Mr Diamond had said about blowing out the Western Wall and why don't we just go into the unprogrammed space I thought that was a good idea but that's not what's before us right now we had two options and a replace in kind so those were the things that I considered um I looked into Harrington historic district Maran Square um other places that have harb districts to see what they saw as tolerable in height variance so that's where I really grounded my ision thank you Miss Leon any other discussion from members of council then before we call the vote I will just say that I appreciate everyone's input and I always look at the coas as our solicitor had mentioned and and read the the establishing ordinances and what are to be considered as applications either meet a standard or they don't uh almost uh pass or fail either you meet the standard or you do not meet meet the standard I I will say I believe without to meet the standard that the application does not have to utilize the existing footprint and the existing height profile and and I would say I would question the standard that was met or what standard was applied when this garage was built 50 years ago we heard our solicitor mention one the things to consider is the effect on the district there was no block-long parking garage on this District that's something that is a bit revisionist and we look back 50 years ago we couldn't even and I we had Mr Miller look we couldn't even find hard minutes from 50 years ago so when we talk about what's the effect on the district we got here as we heard at the committee of the whole meeting because what was a residential commercial part of the city was knocked down to build a block long parking garage that now we're considering as part of the historic character of it was adopted into the historic character the district but going back to the standard as it relates to the ordinance that I'm not going to repeat what Miss Stewart read I feel that this application our resolution 10g meets the standard and that said any future applications just like any previous applications will be held to the same standard in the powers that are put before us in and the laws that were were held to that M that our solicitor had read so I will be um voting in favor of resolution 10g to Grant the COA this evening without any is there any further discussion for members of council before we vote I will just restate in simple terms that voting I is upholding is upholding the denial and voting nay is approving the application are we clear on that I will ask Mr Miller to please call the role Miss grmy Smith i m quch nay m l n Miss Leon nay Miss Wilhelm nay Mr Callahan I Mr colog nay the resolution fails 52 that concludes all of our action items this evening any new business for members of council before we adjourn seeing none thank you for ruining theity good night and good morning everyone remember to vote