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City Council Meeting Minutes January 7, 2020 What caused the delay in the permit process maybe was not done on purpose was due to council wanting an additional study and there was a changeover in staff which made it slow down and the money disappeared because of the deadline. Keep the dam. Please study the Mill Race to create one with small amount of water. Make it narrow with stable banks. The concrete banks that are there are not historic and terribly undercut. The Mill Race is a mess and the channel upstream of Cape road between there and 35 is getting wider from floods which is not historic. Models that were done can help you decide on how wide the Mill Race should be. Kelly Stone, stated that she is able to walk here and cross the river to be here. She is supposed to be in Dallas, but she needed to be here to talk about freeing the river. She has been coming here since last January when you were re -discussing your decision to remove the dam built by Mr. Thompson's slaves that was made to increase his fortune with the Mill Race. You stalled on this from 2016 until January 2019 when a small group of well-financed folks in cahoots with allies from the City brought it forward to make it a historical marker. Decisions made in this room are not made in this room but in more private rooms, where we are lobbied sometimes on the Mill Race paddling, in parlors and in historic homes where decisions are being made and that is not ok. You are aware of the science and the selective history in honor of the 1800 industry and ignoring indigenous people, it's ignoring our culture and environment. She shares with her class, they give us history book and in order to learn history, women history, African American history we have to get another book, the default is the white's man history and he who wins writes the history. That is what is being argued, the river, our environment and we are creating a climate crisis in Texas and in the U.S. you need to be in the right side of history and remove the dam, please free the river. Joleen Maddox Snider, stated that this is the "damn dam" at our house. Ms. Snider gave a brief history of the dam. The first part of the dam was built in the 1850s and in 1867 the actual dam that is there now went in but there was work done before that in the 1850s. Kathryn Thompson Rich, a descendant of Dr. William A. Thompson in 1978 application for the historical marker that is there has been disputed and not valid but states that is valid. Dudley R. Dobie Sr. in 1948 in his Brief History of San Marcos and Hays County wrote, "In an interview with the late A. D. McGehee, the writer was told that the first cotton gin was owned and operated by Dr. A. W. Thompson. Thompson purchased his land in Caldwell County, in 1851 his land consists of over 2,000 acres, Clearly, William Thompson was in Caldwell County, Texas by 1851 and planning on staying" is information found in the Caldwell County archives, City of San Marcos Page 3