The Aubrey City Council voted to adopt the city's new comprehensive plan on Nov. 20.
Senior Planner Stephen Cook and Planning Analyst Aden Herrera of Dunaway Associates spoke to the council about the process of soliciting community input, the information collected and the subsequent plan developed to help Aubrey direct its growth for the next 20 years.
'This is not something that you just look at,' Cook said. 'It is something that has real data behind it, and we want to make sure that it is useful to you.'
The process for the plan began in April 2024, Cook said, and in addition to the steering committee comprised of people who are part of the Aubrey community and the Aubrey 2045 website, the company solicited information at the Peanut Festival in 2024.
'We had a lot of great input at that Peanut Festival,' Cook said. '… We had a lot of people that were able to come up and talk to us not only about what the city is overall and what the city meant to … them, and so we wanted to make sure that those ideas, those thoughts … are reflective in this plan.'
The plan includes a guide the city can use to guide future land use when developers inquire about properties.
'This is not zoning,' Herrera said. 'This is a guide for development and trying to note those priorities that staff have seen along with what we heard from the community.'
The adopted plan is accessible at aubrey2045.com.
The council also heard from Birkhoff, Hendricks & Carter about the stormwater master plan.
It found 29 culvert crossings and eight bridges that could be addressed to help address flooding issues.
The recommendation City Engineer Justin Ivy included that work should start where issues are identified downstream so the work will not exacerbate flooding.
'The city has been accused in the past of just dumping water in places, so I don't think that's going to be the plan,' council member Matt Jones said.
Also at the meeting, the council voted to reject the bid by Haynie Leadership Group for $4,809,723.76 in favor of the bid by Mayim Municipal Builders for $4,905,645 for the 1 million gallon per day Rock Hill Pump Station and ground storage reservoir.
The reason for the rejection was Haynie was considered non-responsive, including because it 'did not provide appropriate experience requirements' or the required five references in the allotted time.
Two representatives from Haynie, which also does business as A&V Water + Utilities, spoke about their protest regarding the decision.
'The city doesn't have the right to arbitrarily deny our bid if it's a minor irregularity,' said Matt Peterson, of A&V Water + Utilities. 'Your staff is arguing this is a material omission. However, law dictates that this case is simply not that.'
Also at the meeting, the council heard from Jeri Harwell with Republic Services about the contract adjustment of 5.38% the company requested for an annual price increase based on the August numbers instead of the June numbers as were used the year before.
'[That] actually worked out in your favor a tenth of a percent because the June numbers reflected just a little bit higher increase request than what the August numbers did,' Harwell said.
Mayor Pro Tem Jeff Perry brought up his opposition to mid-contract adjustments, prompting Harwell to say she would plan to work on the contract prior to the next negotiation period to minimize those types of issues.
