Hello Copperas Cove! Tuesday, August 13th, the City Council held a Special City Council Meeting followed by a Special City Council Workshop. The items covered ranged from the Visitors Bureau, dispersion of the Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT) Funds, and possibly raising the Utility rates 1%.
The Council:
Mayor Bradi Dewald Diaz-Present
Joann Courtland-Present
Fred Chavez-Present
Dan Yancey-Present
Jay Manning-Present
Kirby Lack-Persent
Marc Payne-Present
Charlie Youngs-Present
Place 5 Candidates:
Dianne Campbell - Present
Gary Kent - Absent
Special Council Agenda
Public Hearing:
"The City Council took a record vote on August 1, 2019 at a Special City Council Meeting proposing to set the Property Tax Rate for Fiscal Year 2019-2020 at 0.7865 per $100 of taxable assessed value. At the same meeting, the City Council called for two public hearings on the proposed tax rate increase to be conducted on August 13 and 20, 2019." - Ariana Beckman, Interim Budget Director / There were no citizens to speak for or against this measure.
The amount of Hotel Occupancy Tax that is available to the city every year is based on the total amount hotel/motel revenue times 7% tax. For example, if the total amount of hotel revenue in the city in one year is $2,000,000, then the total the city will have to disperse is $140,000. This means that if you pay $100 for a hotel room, you would pay $100+$7+8.25=$115.25 per night.
Action Items:
Five Hills Art Guild: They were requesting $16,000 for "Art Fest at the Gap". In 2019, the Art Fest found a new location as well as new festival activities. For 2020, the Art Fest will be March 27-29, with the 27th being mainly for vendor setup. This will be their 5th annual Art Fest, and was recently awarded the "Copperas Cove Leader Press Best Community Event". They worked with News 25 for increased visibility, brought in more vendors and worked with the Boy Scouts, JROTC, and Police Explorers. The Scouts and JROTC helped the vendors find their spots and set up their canopies, and then set up tents and stayed overnight to help watch the vendors' canopies and trailers - earning some badges in the process. The Police Explorers helped guide parking and even helped stop unauthorized vendors who would stroll in and try to sell things out of their back packs. At the Fest, there was even an art scholarship given away. Some of the performers brought in ranged from competing step dancers to local belly dancers, and even the 1st Calvary Band who took turns serenading different people in the audience, and ended the show with a very romantic proposal. Youtube Proposal Link They also touched on the fact that there was an increase in hotel stays during that weekend. Dan Yancey complimented them by saying the "Art Guild has a tremendous amount of energy" and "their application is so good, it should be used as an example for others to work off of".
Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce - Rabbit Fest: $18,375 . The Rabbit Fest will be celebrating it's 40th anniversary on May 14-17, 2020. They will be working with a budget of $101,139.57 - the funds requested from the HOT will go towards advertising, entertainment, and attractions to attract vendors and visitors which will impact the local hotel occupancy for the weekend. Last years funding allocated to advertising was $11,255, which brought in approximately 31,027 attendees. They are expecting to break 35,000 attendees for the 40th anniversary Rabbit Fest.
Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce - Kris Kindl Market: $17,400 - Total Event Budget: $41,943
This years 26th annual Kris Kindl Market with be December 6th-8th, and the location is still to be determined because they are trying to bring in a skating rink. Funding doesn't qualify them to bring one in with the way things currently are, so they may need to move the event to the City Park and Civic Center. Proposed activities for this event include food vendors, retail vendors, ice skating rink, snow slide, entertainment, lighted parade, sip and stroll, a downtown decorating contest, and more! They are expecting this to bring in approximately 14,000 attendees with approximately 600 + staying overnight. The skate and slide would be a $20 all you can skate and slide wrist band.
Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce - Jack Rabbit Run 5k and 10k: $1,417 - Total Event Budget: $7,254 - May 9, 2020 - Ogletree Gap - This USA Track and Field sanctioned race will be a Rabbit Themed race with health and race gear vendors onsite. For 2019, they had 221 race participants, 39 hotel rooms reserved, and 132 participants came from outside 76522.
Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce - HEB Summer Run to Fun 5k: $1,962 - Total Event Budget: $9,809 - June 20, 2020 - South Park - This USA Track and Field sanctioned race will be a 5k but also incorporate a blow-up obstacle course with slides. In 2019, they had 211 participants with 13 hotel rooms reserved, and 122 participants from outside of 76522.
Copperas Cove Chamber of Commerce - Convention and Visitors Bureau: $103,221 The Chamber of Commerce is also requesting to take over the Convention and Visitors Bureau. If this happens, they will have 2 full time and 1 part time employees. Funding will go toward operations, equipping, and maintaining the Visitors Bureau, as well as advertising and promotions associated with the bureau. They will be making a new Copperas Cove visitors map, "Shop-Dine-Entertainment" brochures, a "Tourism and Visitor Guide" to send to outside Visitors Bureaus, and a new Visitor Center. They will also be soliciting for trade shows, Fairs, and Conferences to be held in Copperas Cove. They will participate in area trade shows/fairs such as "Hood Howdy", "Destination Texas", and TACVB summits and conferences. They aren't planning on just dropping city events - they will support, and/or host current Community Events which generate attendance from the Citizens of Copperas Cove and neighboring communities with no minimal or direct impact on the convention and hotel/motel industries without utilizing Tourism Funds. Those events include the Farmers Market, - Fall O Ween Festival - Tree Lighting Ceremony - Polar Bear Plunge - and Egg Hunt. When Fred Chavez asked if they are doing Visitor Bureau type things now, it was responded that yes, they are. When he asked what they plan on doing differently vs our current Tourism Bureau, he was told they will be trying to market Copperas Cove as a "Tourism Destination"
This community enriching event is geared to give residents in and around Copperas Cove a variety of events and activities such as safe trick-or-treating, bounce houses, vendors, a petting zoo, pony rides, games, and much more. FY 18-19 saw between 3,500 and 4,500 attendees. Due to the last minute change of venue and venue layout, they were unable to lock in a more specific number or identify out of zip code guests.
City of Copperas Cove Tourism & Events - Tree Lighting Festival: $14,750
This years tree lighting ceremony will be bringing in pictures with Santa and Cookies with Hot Chocolate provided by our city departments. These lights are the only lights the city puts out during the holiday season.
City of Copperas Cove Tourism & Events - 5k to the Polar Bear Plunge: $8,325
5k run/walk followed by a Polar Bear Plunge into the City Pool. FY 18-19 had 186 runners and 50 plungers.
City of Copperas Cove Tourism and Events - Farmers Market: $3,400
The Farmers Market is set up every Thursday at City Park. It brings farm fresh foods and vendors to the community. They currently have 20 vendors who have applied. They have a $25 annual vendor fee as well as t-shirts and totes they are selling.
City of Copperas Cove Tourism and Events - Food Truck Festival and 5k: $21,290
Food Truck Competition this year with a Kid Zone, Yard Games, Market Vendors, Beer, Wine, Entertainment and More! 30 Food Trucks are scheduled to come out for this event in 2 weeks.
City of Copperas Cove Tourism and Events - Convention and Visitors Bureau: $75,543
The CVB covers costs for events and distributes publications for events.
After about 30 minutes of in depth discussion covering topics such as why last years Fall-O-Ween Festival was free, to where the money goes that the Tourism and Events brings in, to the city shouldn't be making off citizens and even why some events cost so much (like $8,000 for a Polar Bear Plunge). Fred Chavez asked both the City and CoC if they have mechanisms in place to safeguard the money and keep it with accounts allocated.
With that, the Council was ready to start talking about funds allocation. Before doing so, they decided to vote on placement of the Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) - keep it with the city or let the Chamber of Commerce take over?? With a 7-0 vote, the measure to move the CVB to the Chamber of Commerce was PASSED
With that vote out of the way, they were able to automatically reject funding to the City Tourism Director, Approve funding to the Five Hills Art Guild, and work on bringing balance to the rest of the fund within the Chamber of Commerce.
Council discussion of funds allocation video.
Special Workshop Agenda
The Special Workshop wasn't quite as long. It was in regards to a request for the city to raise the Utility rates so the Utility Department could perform much needed repairs and maintenance in the city. Ryan Haverlah started the discussion with a question he's been asked - is a 1% increase enough for the Utility Department needs? He thinks so. However, it should be known that in the past year, there have been 3 emergency repairs to the Utility Water system. As he's reached out to all department directors for budget requests, he's let it be known NO budget increases have been authorized for this year. In fact, as far back as he can remember, departments have always been told to hold their funding amount or reduce it. From there, Scott Osborn stepped in and gave an update based on his research as the new Public Works Director. The first thing he wanted to touch on is no matter where you go, all water systems always need upgrades. The water-sewer business isn't cheap: Pumps can run 30k-50k, for example. All the components need to be maintained and replaced pro-actively which saves money vs emergency repairs. When an emergency repair is needed, you can't really price shop at that point, and a lot of places will raise the costs for it being a last minute repair. Additionally, there have been a lot of recent ramp ups with City growth which requires additional equipment to accommodate the new neighborhoods. Plus, as equipment ages, it needs to be replaced. Deferred pro-active maintenance can lead to fines with TCEQ and/or emergency repairs, so from that stand point, it's cheaper to do the pro-active maintenance as it's needed. With those needs, he's seeing that his department would need to raise the rate to a 3% increase over the requested 1% increase - so 4%. With that 4% increase, he would be able to tackle: regular replacement/upgrade of water lines around Copperas Cove (if not done, we will see 1-2 go out per year based on the age of our current system), Another Operator: the system has grown and employees are currently overloaded and always subject being called in while on-call. This would allow them to break up into teams and tackle twice as many problems at once. He would get one back-flow prevention employee who would allow improvements to the program, helping bring things into TCEQ compliance. He would also focus the funding on Pump Stations maintenance for a lot of the aging pumps. He would bring on a Development/Construction Manager for Sewer/Water. This person would specialize in "Horizontal infrastructure. Currently we have no employee dedicated to this. After some deliberation of how much a 4% increase would cost, Bradi Diaz said she's not a fan of this because she's tired of seeing costs go up around here. To this, pretty much the rest of the Council reminded her that if we don't address these problems now, they will only get more expensive with time. Marc Payne added in that "you gotta make hard decisions". The council decided to move forward with option #2 of the budget.
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