Call the meeting to order. City of LA regular council meeting council chambers 11 tank Houston Street January 28, 2025, 5:32 p.m. >> Pledge of Allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. One more silence, please. [snorts] >> Thank you. May be seated. Before we go into the minutes, I'd like to bring up certain items. Mayor roll call. >> Sorry. Sorry. Roll call first. Roll call. Go ahead, please. >> Honorable mayor Dr. Victor D. Trevinho. >> Present. >> Council member District 1, Gilbert Gonzalez. >> Council member District 2, Ricardo Ranel Jr. >> Council Member District 3, Melissa Saroa. Council member District 4, Ricardo Rick Garca here. >> Council member District 5, Ruben Gutierrez Jr. >> present. [clears throat] >> Council member District 6, Dr. Tyler King >> here. >> Mayor Portamp, Vanessa Perez, >> Council Member District 8, Alisa Cigaro. >> Mayor, you have a quorum. Mayor I make motion excuse >> from district 3 motion >> second >> motion second all in favor >> I motion pass >> mayor if I may the approval of the minutes for December 2nd 2024 and December 20th 2024 >> before we go there let me move this uh items sir >> WBCA and public on com on public comments and uh number six for lemon and uh move item 12 104 after passing over section seven. >> Yes. Although this will be added to 112 A and 112 112 A1 12 and 3 and 112B plus items for Dr. Mayor, can you accept B2? >> It's not. I believe Texas is here and and they can give that presentation as well. >> Here you accept amendments, mayor. >> You accept the amendments. >> One 12 B2. >> Accepted. >> Second motion second. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion passes. >> Yes. Would it be poss would you like to bring your item up as well since it would be a presentation on utilities? >> It'll it'll it'll I'm not sure if there's going to be question and answer. So staff related so we might be able to wait until Thank you. Appreciate that. >> Okay. First of all, WBCA will bring them up. It'll be the representatives. >> Good afternoon, everybody. Afternoon. Thank you for having us, Mayor Dr. All the members of city council, city leadership. Thank you all very much for having us here today. Uh my name is Him Fuentes. I am this year's president-elect for the June 27th, uh, Washington's birthday celebration association. And to my left is second vice president, Anamea Herbik, to my right, our current treasur, Rafael Martinez. Uh, we're here to formally, uh, invite uh, all of the people of Laredo, including all all the leadership, to our festivities, our upcoming facilities, which uh, kickstarted most recently with our commander reception at the Savings Auto Arena, and we'll go through March 1st through the end of our celebration with our capping off with our golf tournament. uh in between all as you all know we have a lot of different events that we do to to enhance the the quality of life and and the uh as showcase Laredo uh to to a much grander stage and we appreciate this couldn't be done without uh all the support we get from the people in this room and all the citizens of Laredo that come out to support us. So we'd like to just say thank you. Uh we have our by George magazines out uh for for the people to get. uh we very proudly have uh been able to print 65,000 of those that will be spread out throughout South Texas and into Mexico that will help uh you know bring tourism to the city. Um, and we have also uh arrived with a gift for you all. Uh, our our this year's poster called Love Letter to the Border uh by Anel uh Seal. Uh, very great in the little different uh poster than we've been listening to, but uh they always have their little quirks and their little uh their little Easter eggs like to call them. So, uh just on behalf of the organization, thank you all very much and we look forward to seeing everybody at our events. >> All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. >> Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Thank you. >> Right. Item number six on Miss Lemon recognition. She >> Yes, mayor. You have a recognition. Certificate of recognition. Mayor and City Council hereby recognizes Iet Lemon, Loro Bridge System Director, in recognition of over 20 years of service and contribution to the city of Laredo and international trade in the community. Thank you very much. CONGRATULATIONS [applause] >> and would like to hear. Let's get a picture first. >> [laughter] >> Somebody want to bring me a break, please. [laughter] >> I'll move to the back. >> Ready? One. >> You can be the quarterback. >> One, two, three. One, two, three. >> One more. >> Ready? One, two, three. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you very much for your service and [applause] would like a couple awards from you here in the front. >> Mayor, if I may go ahead, >> please. Miss Lemon, I just want to tell you thank you so much for everything you've done for our community, for our bridge systems. You've done a wonderful job. I know it's been a tough one for you because I know we ask a lot of you. We certainly did, man. So, from the bottom of my heart, I want to say thank you for sticking with us. Thank you for being with the city of the radio over 20 years. Can't thank you enough, man. Thank you so much. Enjoy your retirement. >> Thank you very Mr. I just want to say Miss Lemo on behalf, you know, my behalf, thank you so much. the uh when I started, you're one of one of the first people that reached out and and asked me if I I had any questions. So, thank you so much for that opportunity and and show me the ropes of how the how the bridge system works. So, thank you so much. >> Thank you, council member, >> honorable mayor, members of the city council, last time I lean for the record. Um, it was an honor to have served >> as cashier, superintendent, assistant director, and director for the rad bridge system. I want to thank you all for your leadership, Mr. Neb, Chief Mr. Valdez. Congratulations, Ramon. Thank you for your support while in engineering, to my colleagues, and last but not least, to my family in the back and to my staff. I couldn't have done it without them. I have I had wonderful bridge employees over 150 employees that work day, night, weekends, holidays in support of international trade. So without them, I couldn't have done it. So thank you so much for this recognition. It was an honor. I enjoyed it. the late hours, the calls with the system failures and the traffic backups, but nonetheless, I enjoyed every moment of it. And now I'm getting to enjoy my my two grandsons. So, >> congratulations. >> New role. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you so much. [applause] >> [applause] >> here. Mayor May, >> thank you, Miss Limo. I apologize for the late entrance, but I just wanted to add to my colleagues um appreciation of all of your work, all these years of service. I know that the bridge operations have grown tremendously under your leadership that you oversaw that and every interaction I had with you was always so professional and you shared as my colleague uh council member Ranel was saying so much valuable information. I really appreciate your leadership during that time. Thank you. Thank you. >> Also, I know there's several members here to the port of entry advisory committee. They're a pillar. They um thought in the best interest of the trade community and every topic uh we tackled and we worked through it. So I want to thank the port of entry advisory committee as well. Council member Bettis just walked in. Thank you so much for your leadership. Um it was an honor and a pleasure. >> Mayor F. >> Go ahead. >> Um thank you for being a great um liaison to the port of entry. Um I know we spent a lot of hours together. um myself and a lot of people on the committee and we really appreciate all your hard work and we're sad to see you go but you know you're always welcome here. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> We're gonna take another picture with all the council members. Congratulations. >> No, you're good. >> [laughter] [clears throat] >> She said on Tyler right >> one more here. >> Ready? One, two, three. [clears throat] >> We take another picture, but management first. >> Yes. Okay. Ready. One, two, three. Cheese. >> One, two, three. Thank you. >> Thank you. [applause] Thank you for everything. Appreciate >> [clears throat] >> All right, Mr. Secretary, for the record, we have Council Woman Vanessa Perez, District 2, and Councilman Melissa Siga, District 3. >> Motion second. Favor. No motion. No motion. >> All right. Let's proceed. Yeah, we'll proceed with uh >> 112A discussion with possible action to increase bridge tolls as part of C25C-06, a traffic management strategy during the known peak hours in an effort to reduce congestion and emission from idling and reduction of commercial and non-commercial interaction and any matters related there too. Now the reason I brought this item forward is to start the discussion on raising the bridge tolls. This is not going to happen overnight because my goal is not to disrupt successful international trade environment that we currently enjoy. But I want to start with a plan of action to increase while at the same time obtaining some policy goals for the public to balance their quality of life when it comes to impending expansions. So what I would like to direct management to do within the next six months and my motion is to recommend an increase on the amount of the tolls a timeline for implementation to include the trade industry in their discussions and whether the policy of of goals of achieving less congestion and reducing commercial and non-commercial traffic can this be achieved. I'm still going to engage our Mexican counterparts as they also have a role to play in this. >> I'll second for discussion. >> Second, if I may. >> Discussion. >> Second for discussion. >> Second. All in favor? >> No, no, no. Go ahead. >> Go ahead. Go ahead. >> Sorry, I as for the discussion. Sorry, but go ahead. Go ahead. >> Question. When you mention during known peak hours, what hours are we specifically talking about? because our bridge system is open so much and it's always peak time. So what were you thinking about mayor when it came to the time itself? >> The reason for this is peak hours is we when we have the most amount of traffic versus when there's less amount of traffic and that's a discussion we need to have to determine that. So this is a a method to identify what are the peak hours what are not the peak hours so we can modify on how the tolls will be increased. So this is just the explanation >> what once peak hours then from once peak hours from the staff are spoken about then they will come back to us and let us let us know what amounts will be increased >> and then we'll discuss that here again. Correct. >> Exactly. That's correct. [snorts] >> Go ahead. Sir, do we have the amount that we charge right now? >> We do. Yes, sir. >> Can we can you represent? >> Yes, sir. >> Good evening, Mayor, members of council. Kent Richard, interim director. Uh, currently the commercial rates per axle are 475 per axle. So, if you're looking at a typical 18-wheeler, which is a five axle truck, that's $23.75 for that crossing. >> I'm sorry, sir. I'm sorry. >> 23 what? >> $23.75. >> Do we still do we have uh the comparences of the valley or eagle pass for >> we are working on an analysis of that? Uh we have been talking with our competitors in our custom district which is from Del Rio all the way to Brownsville. Uh we can do an in-depth study on that and we can get back to the committee um in the next couple of months. Can you bring it back when the in the next council meeting so we can have and compare to see and how far we are from from those uh from them and and we can have the increase. >> Yeah, mayor and council um we we track that on an annual basis. So what Mr. Richards is talking about is bringing it all up to date because we're we check we check every year to make sure we're in line with everybody else. But the idea is to get the most accurate information for them. >> Mayor Fund. Yes, go ahead. >> Um, [clears throat] I know we do have a comparison chart because we talked about this at the port of entry. I don't know if there's any way we could if there's a we don't have access to that at this time, but I know that um this is not Mayor, thank you for bringing this up. This is an important topic. Um, this has been discussed at the port of entry a couple times. when before we when we first started um working [clears throat] with the port of entry, Mines's road was a lot more congested than it is now. So, this topic actually came up uh at that time. But um the discussions about raising tolls and designating specific uh use for some of the funding has come up again recently where we could start to al pre-allocate or start to save up in combination with some of efforts like the TRZ. um start to put some of this money aside for infrastructure improvements for the you know the hightra areas the commercial because those are the ones that run through a lot quicker. We see potholes very quickly because we have you know asphalt and we have a lot of issues. So um I think this is a good effort if we're talking about peak times but um I think if you look at some of the comparisons uh I don't have the numbers with me right now but we are lower than a lot of other ports. We do charge less. Um some of our competitors are charging a lot more and we're seeing um a high volume, but we're paying for that high volume in terms of wear and tear on our roads congestion um idling trucks, things [clears throat] like that. I think that um it would probably be good for I know the industry is not in favor of an increase and I know that they pre-desate their contracts 6 months to 12 months in advance. So, we wouldn't want to make changes today because that would affect some of their contracts that they've already set pricing for and we don't want to cause anybody to lose money or anything like that. But, we do need to have this conversation and I think it's a good step forward for us. It's unrealistic for our prices to stay exactly the same for over 10, 11, 12 years, which is kind of where we're at right now. Um but I I think during peak hours would be good because the World Trade Bridge gets used the most. Um peak hours affect um school buses. They affect um especially during school pickup hours. So from the um hours of 2 to 6, 2 to 7, those are like mostly where you see a lot of non-commercial mixed in with the commercial because you have a lot of school buses. You have a lot of parents to and from the elementary schools. Uh the high schools get out. You have school buses bringing the kids from United High School over to the Mines Road. And then you have people leaving work uh that work out there around 5 trying to get out of the the traffic. So, if we could route some of the traffic or incentivize um people to move some of those trucks to Colombia during those specific hours, uh I think it would help a lot for the alleviation of the commercial versus non-commercial. Meanwhile, we try to work towards something like the river road and some of these other arterials that we're trying to get off the ground. So, um I think it's a good step forward. I think it would help to have at least a plan for some of this funding because um we could find a balance and gain favor with the industry if we had a better plan of how we're going to use the funding. >> Like I said, we'll we'll check we'll make sure our analysis is up to date. We'll get additional information from our competitors. Uh this item mayor was brought on the January 15th port of entry committee uh meeting. Uh the committee chose not to discuss the bridge tolls themselves. I am happy to state that tonight there is a few port of entry committee members here as well as the chairman and they would like to touch bases on this if you allow them. >> Yes, go ahead. >> Uh good afternoon Rick Lau port of entry advisory chair. So uh we were brought this this item up and I want to read it verbatim as how is it was brought up. discussion with possible action on raising bridge toll fee fee to fund one a port of entry a port ad authority department two bridge expansion projects and legislative activities associated with the port. So this is what we were referred to. We were not asked for peak hours. We were not asked for anything of that nature. So referring to that as it was stated to us as a port of entry advisory committee chair and I speak on on the behalf of of of the committee and also a concerned resident and business owner in the Laredo Illo regarding the proposed bridge increased tolls while recognizing the importance of maintaining and improving our city's infrastructure. We in the trade and transportation industries must respectfully decline to support the measure this measure city management has brought forth until further clarification is provided regarding how additional funds will be allocated particularly in relation to the development of a port authority you mentioned. The bridges in Larredo play a critical role in facilitating trade, supporting our local economy, and maintaining our city's reputation as a vital US hub for international commerce. However, the lack of specific information about the toll increase such as precise increase, the project it will fund, the projects it will fund, the timeline or implementation and how it aligns with the long-term vision of the port authority makes it challenging to evaluate the necessity and potential benefits. As members of the community, we are fully committed to supporting initiatives that promote growth and economic vitality. Transparency in financial matters is key to fostering trust and ensuring that stakeholders, including residents and business owners, can make informed decisions. We kindly request the city first adopt the port authority that was created back then by the honorable state rep. Henry Quuad in 1989 and then work on a detailed breakdown on the intended use of the increased total revenue and how it aligns with broader infrastructure and economic goals. Additionally, I encourage the city to in open discussions and or public forums where stakeholders can express their perspectives and concerns. Thank you very much, mayor, for your attention to this matter. We appreciate the hard work you, city council, and your administration do to serve our community. I'm confident that with greater transparency and dialogue, we can find a path forward that benefits all of Laredo. So, it it's a slippery slope, right? We haven't increased rates, like you said, councilwoman, in 10, 12 years, whatever that might be. But the last time I heard that there was an increase was 2016. And there was an increase that was proposed to city council so that we can work on the uh fast lanes. Uh the increase happened but the funds were not allocated to the fast lanes. Uh then city manager Oasio Deon had to divert funds from other projects to be able to create those fast lanes. So in other words, we didn't really see the benefit of that increase. It was just a shuffling around the money. So, as you can tell, when our committee was brought up, you know, that there was going to be another rate increase, everybody, you know, pretty much said, you know, it's it's it's it's not it's going to it's going to hurt down the line all the way up north uh to customers. Um there are many proposed ideas. There's much more to talk to be, you know, talked about. Um but at this moment I would like the way it was proposed to us was to be able to fund a port authority a port authority [clears throat] that can take on and tackle the bridge expansion projects and other you know projects that that are correlated too. So I'd like to to see what any questions you guys might have or what conversations we can open. >> Mayor May. >> Yes. Go ahead. >> Um Mr. I appreciate your perspective. I think um that it is the beginning of a conversation about raising fees, but at this point I [clears throat] think I am uh inclined to listen to the bridge department to see what they see in our competitive field, what it seems that other communities are doing. You know, the city of Laredo is in the unique position to own its bridges and it becomes a basis of revenue for the city. So, it's not just bridge specific bridge projects because those end up getting funded by the city as well, but it's also infrastructure needs to deal with all of the um increased trade that you see, the industrial complexes, all the uh utilities extensions that we need to do, the extension of our police and fire. I mean so much more so much more goes into funding this trade industry. It has all these different arms tentacles that reach into different departments. So um I think the conversation as far as I understand is that we want to be competitive with our our competitors but we have needs as a city and so the bridge department is here to see how they can contribute to that revenue so that we can meet the needs of the residents who live here. Not just specific to the bridge, but all of the other places where that pressure from increased trade happens to fall as well. >> Correct. Mayor, there's also the water carriers association president that's here and I think you know he'd like to >> Thank you. Good afternoon, mayor, uh, members of council, city management. Jerry Maldonado, chairman of the board for the Laredo Motor Carers Association. I am also the director of operations for Warren Transport, a uh, trucking company asset base that operates, you know, within Laredo in Mexico. Um, we, you know, the item on the agenda today, 112A1, uh, specifically goes into the bridgeto increase. We understand that things cost more every year. We we completely understand that it happens in our world and we understand it happens in the city and in the bridge. Um what we want to do is have the conversation be included in the conversations as you just mentioned you know with management with with these things you know have a plan where we can go to an extent and say all right within this time frame there will be an increase you know we also in that study uh let's also consider the fact how much has our industry grown meaning bridge crossings how much have they increased in the last five years all that also means means additional revenues for the city. Yes, developments also take you know costs for utilities etc. But every development that is being developed also needs to pay for their own stuff. If I build another terminal, there's costs associated with that. You know, at the end of the day, you know, we want to be a resource for you all. We are experts respectfully in what we do and and please use that use as as a resource to do this. you know, if you just throw the the word out, we're going to raise the riches. Clearly, the industry is going to say, "Oh, what do you mean? No, we don't want that." Um, but if we have the conversation and analyze and use the data, you know, um, the peak hour issue to an extent, we can't really control that because of the way our world works. The bridges closed from 11:30 or midnight till 8:00 a.m. And that's fine. The drivers go home. More than 90% of the drivers that cross every day live in Mexico. They're Mexican nationals. So every morning when their shift starts, their first load comes from Noaro this way. And that that's how it works. And then once they get here, let's say they they wake up bright and early, they're here by 9:30, they have to wait for another load to be ready to go back into Mexico. And that's the problem we have as an industry. Unfortunately, the way it's built, the customer base that we have, which you know, we we service and and the city is blessed to have them in Larredo, they work the way they work. So, the loads going back into Mexico are not ready at 10 in the morning. Unfortunately, they are mostly ready in the afternoon and that's why we have peak hours. We cannot promote who we are and expect not to have side effects. We are the busiest port. There will be side effects. There will be bottlenecks. We do everything in our power to minimize them as an industry, but there's only so much we can do. Very recently, we sat down, we had the pleasure to go to Nagaredo and sit down with Anam with the Coronel and everybody in Noeredo. And he openly said to us that in the last 5 years, he has lost 41 people from his staff. 40 41 people have left the noana and he never got replacements for them. That is also a key factor because at five, six, seven o'clock at night when everybody's trying to go into Mexico and the lines are on Mines's road, there's not enough staff to open more more to process them faster. So, there's other factors. It's not just, you know, the industry wanting to cross late. Believe me, we we want to go home, too. You know, our drivers want to go home, too. But, it's something that, you know, we we thank you for letting us be here and speak. Uh, and let's have the conversation. You know, let let's continue it. And there may be things we can do to to make it better. >> Will it ever be perfect? I think it's it's going to be a little difficult. >> And this is the purpose of of the agenda to to start conversations >> and identify and include industry, include management and include everybody. So [snorts] these are things. Did you want me to read the you wanted me to read the the item again? discussion with possible action to increase bridge tolls as part of F2-C06, a traffic management strategy during known peak hours in an effort to reduce congestion and emissions from idling and the reduction of commercial and non-commercial interaction and any matters related to that is that is item go >> quick question well not question it's just actually um may be the question uh Mr. or management or Mr. Lel or Mr. Maldonau, can you answer this question? It's just for the community out there just to find out what does a port of entry or port authority consist of and what do they do? So they can know what you know what we're requesting if we if we do go that route. We want to know what does a port authority do? Where does that money go to or how does that how do they in a nutshell and something that we can just so they can listen and know what's what we're doing and just because all right now the only thing they're hearing is uh we're going to increase you know we're going to do a toll increase. So let's just you know come together and say hey this is what we're going to do this is what a port authority does and this is what the city does. So in the research that I did and and we some of us did in the in the port of intervisory committee currently there it doesn't exist on a land port all the port authorities that currently exist are with oceans right so that does not mean that we can't create one right we can create one and it basically and the ones that it does exist they're the ones that manage the issues of the port completely from you know needing to pave the roads to increasing the bridge toes and to guiding the fun to make sure that it stays within that port to better it and make it work and make it bigger, make it the bridge expansion is coming up, right? And that's a topic that unfortunately as as far as I know because we asked the the cost of it is going to be in the millions, but there is from from our meeting there is right now no funding to start the bridge project, right? So where are those millions going to come from? We have to figure that out as a community, right? uh the port authority will essentially take over from what I understand the actual bridge and its its operation and its revenues [snorts] and its problems too you know not only the not only the good everything included and then manage that as its own entity >> so Mr. In other words, you're trying to tell us that if we do create a port authority, let's say like Miss U Councilman Sarro said that main the our main bread and butter for what we get our main revenue comes from the bridge. So the port authority is going to have that opportunity to control that that that funds. >> So that's what we've been talking about. Um in other ports like Mr. Maldonado said the port authority does control those funds here. It has to be a hybrid because city of Laredo is already using those funds to survive, right? And to fund other department projects. So what the original uh item on the agenda was the increase or a percentage of the increase was going to start funding the port authority. The Port Authority was not going to take all $75 million that that it it handles right now. It was going to start small and then grow as as as we go. So, no, we are not here to recommend that the port a port authority a future port authority take 100% of the bridge total revenues. That is you. We can't do that because that is your main, like you said, bread and butter, your golden goose. So the it would basically be a a department within the city that would manage that would be run by somebody who's internationally trade inclined. >> So so the clarification there was that further clarification on what it would be. Respectfully I don't know if management or legal could could do some research on on what it actually how could it actually be structured. Mayor if I may. >> Okay. >> Uh just I know it's a little bit complicated for the port authority because we're it would be intertwined with city operations in terms of police coordination, fire coordination when it comes to traffic. So I think that's where the difficulty comes with the inland port having a port authority. Um, so there's there's there's some some some logistics that need to be kind of worked out and then the legislation as it is right now does designate 100% to this authority which you know is is it does interfere but we do we do when we created the port of entry advisory committee I think it was a good step forward for the city to recognize just how important it is to have you all at the table advising us and we've done a lot of great work over the years um to try to help alleviate some of these issues. So, um, in terms of like coordinating with the industry, I think that's a good step forward. I think that we still need to work out, um, how this would be structured and the logistics of it, but I definitely respect your concerns and and your opinions and and I think that those are very valid and and expressive of the what we hear from a lot of other people in the industry. Uh, and I think we would have to take those into consideration because um, you don't want to agree to increasing funding and then not see any improvements because we know that we've got requests made for improvements at the bridge that we're not seeing. We're not we're not seeing some of these things that um, have been in the plans to make the the bridges specifically more efficient. And um I think if we're going to think about uh increasing revenue, we need to make sure that we can [clears throat] fund some of those specific projects and fund fund some of the specific concerns that the industry has. Otherwise, we're never going to get your all support and that's important for us to have it. Another question that was asked was, is the increase going to be just on trucks or is bridge one and bridge two also going to be affected by and pedestrians also going to be affected by it? Because I do I I mean respectfully, [clears throat] not only Mexican trucks come over here and use our roads, but Mexican cars and Mexican citizens come over here and use our our facilities. So, is it just going to be for trucks? Is it going to be for cars? How's you know there's a lot of questions that that need to be asked and answered >> and all of this will be discussed and that's the reason why management is going to chime in on this. >> Mayor if just one last comment um >> industry just so you know this is just the beginning talks of it. >> Yes. >> If it should happen it's going to happen over a year from now. So, we're just going to bring it back. Staff will bring it back to us. Let us know. And then, of course, you will certainly be involved with the discussions of what the increase is going to be, if there's any. Um, and as far as pedestrians and commercial vehicles and your typical car, well, that's probably a piece that we need to take into consideration as well. So, it's something that staff needs to bring back to us. So, um, yeah, don't don't bite our heads off yet. No, >> maybe next time, but not now. >> Yeah. No, and we understand that and we we appreciate that that this item was sent to the port of entry advisory committee uh mayor [snorts] and uh you know we're fully engaged in whatever it is that you guys need. We like Mr. Mana said we are the the subject matter experts. So whatever it is you need on trade and transportation we're here. >> Thank you. >> We have the comments from the management. >> Yes sir. uh mayor, city council, port of entry authority, and uh with everything that we're doing, let me let me cover first. >> We should not be raising rates just to raise rates. I mean, I think we see the signs. If we haven't raised them for a while, that means we haven't looked at it in a very uh the the entire model that we have to when we look at our rate structure and we are in the process of a rate structure review with the utilities right now. And I I just wanted to kind of cover some of those points with that because you're supposed to look at the historical revenue, the the expense trends, the current projected budgets. What are we trying to do with the money? Exactly what you're saying is what are we trying to accomplish? What is what are we not doing right and what do we need to do better? We look at our reserves. We look at our fund balance. We look at our debt service. We looked at our fixed and our variable costs. So the idea is that we want to make sure that whatever our rates are set at are to cover the cost of the service that are associated. And I would say that the the funds that are pro brought through the bridge revenue into the city as well through the general general fund that is part of the cost of doing business for us with that structure. The conversation of a port authority to where our structure is now that is a separate portion of that conversation having you can you can develop out a port authority in a lot of different ways. We just talked about a few here. There's a lot of different methods that can be built within that structure. So, I think we need to walk through that as well, too. Uh, if I go back to the mayor's item on there, what the mayor's item was on there for was is that we have a big influx and and we'll we can we'll be able to show you the trend line as to how many trucks are crossing at at what time of day because uh there's a there's a big start at the beginning and then it kind of tapers off a little bit and then there's a I think everybody's trying to cross at the end of the day as well too. And depending on how our systems all work then it ch it shifts it all the time. But we'll we should be able to see you should see a bell curve or a trend line, right? That shows here's where majority of the traffic is happening. I think we'll be able to do the same thing at bridge one and two. We can look at all of that. The idea and Laredo has tried this before where they've tried to um incentivize rather than disincentivize. So there's a difference within that that terminology, right? What we are saying is let's set the rate here, but then if you're going to travel across at this window, then we'll we'll that there's a premium to be paid, a convenience fee to come at this point in time. That's what that conversation is. I I I would like to make sure we just got done with board and commission training last night with all all of our boards and commissions. I would like to make sure that management works with the board of entry to put help put this model together so that when you get the information as the council, you have all that information at your fingertips for that. Um it'll take us a little while to run through that because I don't think it's just about raising a fee. It's about what are we trying to get done with that? And I think that's going to be the key to exactly what everybody's talking about. But um I love the conversation because I don't think we can sit idle much anymore. I think we all feel the pressure of what's happened on Mind's Road and all this and I think Ricky you had said it is that >> it's just the beginning. >> Yes, >> it's going to it's going to grow from here and I think that's why we just need to be a front in front of this thing. And so uh we'll we'll be able to move it very quickly. What [clears throat] I will do is I I think we can get the crew together. We'll bring uh we'll bring back to the council at the next meeting what we're going to be able to accomplish and give you a time frame as to how long it'll take it to get done. There will be a multitude of steps in there because if we initiate a true rate study to review all of this information, we have to set up a system for that as well too. But that's acceptable to everybody. >> Okay. Be happy to help. >> We do have a motion in a second. >> Just just to be clear about the motion though, um the motion is not necessarily because the way the item's written is to increase bridge tolls. So just for the record, Mr. Secretary, can we clarify that the motion is not to directly increase tolls today. It's to >> we can make the motion to increase and evaluate by recommendations management and industry. >> Mr. Nept that is the motion >> second. >> All in favor I opposed motion passes. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. 112 A2 discussion with possible action to use mayor priority funds for 25- C-07 ADA improvements at the health department not to exceed $100,000 or any matters related to >> All right. Second. >> All right. I bought this item up as a supplement to the ADA improvements at the health department that would cover the facility, this facility. I would like to use the mayor's priority funds for these improvements. Being that we're medically underserved, we may not see more federal funds coming in. Hopefully, we will, but uh this is something that I want to anticipate. So, that that is the reason for the motion. >> Motion second. >> Second. Motion second. All in favor? I >> opposed. Motion pass. And one pill A3, discussion with possible action to revamp qualifications and 25- C08 standardization term limits from some of the some or all the voluntary city committees and any matters related there too. Sponsors, councilwoman Sa Perez. And now I brought this item up because we could have a discussion over the standardization of the committees, but I understand that some of the committees are governed by state statute. But there is some room for improvement when it comes to attendance, qualifications, term limits, and other meetings being videotaped or livereamed. So these these are these are issues that sometime don't have happened at these committee meetings. So, we want to see if we can standardize. >> Second for discussion. >> Mayor, may I >> go ahead. >> Uh, Mr. Neb, I understand you had a committee meeting or a committee training yesterday. What did you think of the outcome? And does that fall in line with these items brought up by the mayor? >> You know, mayor and city council, thank you for that question as well, too. Um, we Laredo has done board commission training occasionally throughout. We we intend to do it on an annual basis because these citizen committees are very important to us just like the conversation we had with the port of entry. Every one of them should serve a purpose. When I when I got here two years ago, one of the requests from the council was please review all the boards commissions. If if they're not doing anything, then let's let's look at whether or not they needed to be there. I wanted to get a foundational shed. It took me a little longer to get to this conversation with the boards and commissions, but they are all advisory in nature and so they are supposed to be providing advice to the city council. So if we're not getting advice from our citizen committees, then I don't know if they're performing the way to the level that we all wanted them to. So that was that was where I started with this. I think one of the things that we discovered throughout the conversations and every as we were building this out for that exactly with what the mayor is talking about there, we have a we have a set standard that we use within our ordinances at to how we treat them all. But then over the years, we have created some subgroups within our groups that we treat some differently than others for different reasons. Now we all we have the statutory ones the the bigger ones like plan commission and everything they are regulated by statute and such but we have a almost all of them have the ability to say this is how we will operate with them but then we create a um uh if you if you look on the list on the city secretary's site we have ad hocs we have task force we have committees we have boards we have commissions and that it all blends itself to having just a little bit different rule for that most of them have bylaws but not all of them. most of them have u if they have to have certain requirements in them but not all of them and I think that's where what what the mayor is seeing as well too is something that we we've been working on is trying to get it a little more standardized so that when our citizens there my my fear is and I think that's where we have some of our boards and commissions that are not meeting on a regular basis the way they should and we told everybody last night please meet on a monthly basis and if it's a short meeting and nothing no action then at least you've communicated with each other and you and you move it forward. I I truly believe we have over 400 people on those boards, commissions, and committees that should should be helping you do the work that we're trying to accomplish. And so, I think I think that's my background with that uh on on what where we've been headed with that. I think this is uh well placed for this. We need to walk through our ordinances and make sure that we've standardized that. Uh I know we talked a little bit. And I think mayor mayor got this chance to speak with them last night as well too. Sometimes the term limits kind of get in the way of us as well too because they're voluntary positions. They're they're they're providing their their uh experiences. They're providing their education skill sets and such. And I I don't know if that's exactly what we want to do. Uh they are all tied to almost all of them are tied to each one of you individually. So there's a a rotation if we replace you know through through uh through the term limits that you have as well too. So in my mind I think this is going to be really good for the next step of that because I want to make sure all of our all of our cit people know exactly how appreciative we are of them their support and their their work and that they they feel like they're making a purpose and they're making a difference for what we're trying to accomplish. And so I I believe that was the directive of the council when when I when I took that on. And so that's where we're at right now. >> Okay. >> Motion second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I oppose. Motion passes. >> Now I did want to bring item. >> Oh, go ahead. You have your gohead. Yes. Thank you, mayor. Okay. Uh it's 112 uh D2 uh presentation by Rock Solid Trails in discussion with possible action regarding the completion of their uh mountain biking and trails concept plan which was uh paid for by the city of Laredo in 2024 with discussion on how it could be implemented and funded and any other matters incident there too. Uh so just a little background on this one and I know we have a lot to get to so I'll try to make it as quick as possible but basically uh the cycling community uh you know has been wanting and needing a revamp of the Shiloh hike and bike trails. Uh there's constant flooding and deterioration uh of those trails uh over the years and the idea is to enhance them and preserve them. So last year we uh we contracted with RockSolid Trails Worldass um trail company uh and they came down from Wisconsin and they're based out of Bittenville, Arkansas in Michigan. They came down uh and they um spent uh about four days here uh looking at our trail system there, but also they when they got here they wanted to know are there any other trail systems near recreational community centers. So Mr. Tommy Ramirez from parks also took them over to uh Faskin Rec Center near Father Magnavville in the trails there and then also Hannes Rec Center uh near Chuckleton Creek. Um and so those two extra things were added along the way. Um but the focus has been on enhancing the Shiloh trails but then you know they they kind of gave us an extra look. So you know we paid 19 500 for this plan. Okay, so this is uh this is just a highlevel concept plan. Um this is RockSolid, for example, is a design build company, but they're they're currently they just did the planning. Uh we have um Hogan on the line from Wisconsin to present this uh virtually uh and kind of give an overview of what they came up with. Um, and I will leave it up leave it up for him. >> Thank you, Tyler. Yep. Uh, can everyone see the screen? >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Thank you. Um, again, my name is Hogan Kosas. I'm the senior trail planner at Rock Solid. Uh, I appreciate being here. Thank you, council members and elected officials for pursuing this activity. Um, you know, one of the original engagements of this project was to make a site visit uh that was purely based around how can we increase recreational opportunity uh you know in this in the town of Larredo. And so this trail concept plan really focuses on improving those recreational opportunities and really enhancing the quality of life. Uh, one thing I want to preface through this document as we cruise through is that you'll see a lot of bike references and bike relevancy. Uh, but we are a multi-use company. We are not just a bike company. So, we we pride ourselves in our approach and inclusivity and reducing barriers when it comes to accessing the outdoors. Um, as a company, we really focus highly on how people can be affected by the outdoors. And what that really means is providing spaces outdoors that people can use that are, you know, a free service to the public that ultimately creates a sense of community because of how people interact with each other and are able to enjoy uh the amenities that are put forth. Uh so uh in this project in this pursuit we looked at goals and opportunities which is ultimately you know opportunities and constraints uh within the the city of Laredo. We looked at median age we looked at potential users um and we looked at the population and their love of the outdoor sports. Um, as it pertains to, [clears throat] excuse me, the analysis piece, um, we essentially are, you know, we we were contracted to do an analysis on the trail system and then offer up some creative ideas within the Shiloh trail system. So, a lot of it was on-site observation and how things could be improved upon. And so this first part of the presentation is really about making a site visit uh documenting tread needs um how the trail is being used, how it's being maintained. Um and then trying to find really creative solutions that really have an impacting uh you know legacy so to speak of how these trails impact the community. Um so looking at bike and pedestrian infrastructure the we looked at greenway corridors. Um we looked at the urban trail experience of the town of Laredo. Uh we acknowledge the city leadership support in that space. Um we looked at neighborhood activation, community centers, and how to effectively promote an active lifestyle within the town. Um a big portion of how we've approached this is understanding how people use trails. Um you obviously have a beautiful hard surface trail and a beautiful bike path, so to speak, that cruises through town. Um, looking at areas of opportunity along those greenways and these green spaces allows the town of Laredo to preserve these green spaces in perpetuity. Um, what is nice about looking across the spectrum of the community in your potential green spaces is that you have opportunity to not only just it's not just building trail. Um, there might be, you know, vagrant issues that exist in these areas that can be better managed. um and more suitable for public engagement. We can look at uh how the community center engages with these spaces. Um there's a lot of opportunity in these green spaces in the town of Laredo that that do present themselves. Um we've assembled the document uh you know to look at constraints. We've acknowledged some of the the flooding that's occurred in in the Shiloh trail system. We've looked at soil types. Um we've looked at some of the limited green space in town. and and we do acknowledge that funding is a mechanism uh that that does need to be supported in this public space to support these these endeavors. Uh but I do want to note this funding aspect uh in this space of trails and public recreation. Trails are the one of the least expensive things a city can fund that has one of the most highest impact and greatest rewards that is immediate and effective of its council. So, um, I've done this for 20 years and I've helped shape trail systems across the canvas of America. Um, and I can tell you firsthand that if if it's well supported, um, you can phase this in over time and it will transform your community uh, beyond what you can imagine. Um, there's many success stories that have followed the path that we've kind of put forth. uh in particular the Shiloh trail system which is would be you know obviously this is relevancy based. So as we cruise through this document they are organized in in relevancy and precedence. So Shiloh bike trails is what we would recommend uh exercising first so to speak and through this trail analysis we have kind of tried to paint a picture of what is possible in that space. So, we've included some imagery that's relevant to Texas topography and terrain uh that you could garner with a positive approach in the Shiloh Trail area. Um, a lot of it includes uh you know reorganization of trails, drainage uh stabilization. Uh there is some bank stabilization that's needed uh but it would be considered repair and maintenance. It would not be an active FEMA so to speak. It's it's really just about managing surface hydraology uh in this area and lifting the trail. Uh so that you know again it's it's not just I mean obviously the mountain bikers were a big portion of this um but as you increase trail quality you will increase trail uh captivity so to speak. So the the trails will get more popular and more used and it'll be an amenity uh that that carries the weight and time. So um we've tried to organize things very logically in this document. So each zone including the Shiloh trail system um across the opportunity zone so to speak within uh these green spaces they all have cost assumptions associated at a concept level so that you can use these as a guiding document. Um so that if you're having discussions of precedence and or funding um you can you can look at these areas that have potential but know that this document has set somewhat of a precedence of of uh you know hierarchy if you will of most relevant to lesser relevant. Um any of these upgrades that are conveyed in this document would be good additions to the town and would help an active lifestyle. Um what we notice in our line of work is that the multi-use birectional single track gets used the most. It is the least costly to maintain. Um but it does not discount how impactful these bike playgrounds can be. Um so little kids on little bikes like to cruise around and uh mom or dad walking young one in stroller so to speak likes to watch the little one while they do their thing and have fun. And these parks embody that approach. So we think about how the trail runner is running. We think about how the the wei person is cruising around on their little bike. And we think about the opportunity that the adult has to manage all of that and have some tranquility in their life. Uh we analyze the the um the the Chicone Creek Greenway, excuse [clears throat] me, and we looked at areas of opportunity along the greenway corridor. Um, if trail density increases in town, in other words, if cycling becomes more popular and people start using these outdoor spaces more, this is an area of opportunity that could depress the the potential trail conflicts that do exist. So along this corridor, you'll have essentially, you know, in the future more mountain bikers per se or more cyclists traveling to and fro. There's opportunity along this greenway to interact soft surface trails that can offer a different experience for trail running and essentially just separating soft surface users. So, um it can reduce trail density and trail conflict issues in these corridors. Again, we've taken our best attempt to help guide the council as they make decisions. We have industry pricing in here. These are averages. So, we have not cut anyone short in the potential of planning around some of these uh estimates. Um, and you know, this document tries to capture again imagery that supports key strategies that that provide popular experiences. And so, um, if you have any questions, we can we can always be reached out to, but we feel that this document really has the opportunity to enhance, you know, the recreational infrastructure in Mido um, and the greater community. And so, um, as we work through this document, we just kind of point this out real quick. We were hired to assess and plan, and which is what we've provided. We've provided some, uh, conceptual estimates that are supported by zones with experiences and trail typology. And so, the next process or, uh, you know, flow of how this may work would be to design the trails. um whether the city chooses RockSolid or not, most likely due to public procurement policies. Um we are asked to put together construction documents. Um so to put out for public bid uh and then obviously the trails could be constructed, promoted, maintained and uh we would try to insulate this evolve part. So in other words, as your trails grow and get more increased uh usership, we would try to plan from that from the beginning so that there is you know little evolution. so to speak, your trails will be a hit from day one. Um, you know, these are some some design parameters that we put in here for how we approach how we as a company or a professional trail building firm should approach uh a project such as this. Uh, and essentially we we do touch on uh maintenance [clears throat] um and we talk about the overall you know trail concept conclusion here at the end. Um and ultimately it leads into some definitions that support trail typology and difficulty uh and how these trails can be uh interpreted through this document. Um so again these are all broken up into a diverse audience. So, we take, you know, all the way down from adaptive mountain bikes that are in a hand cycle all the way up to your veteran experienced mountain bike uh to the one- wheeled enthusiast, the electric one-wheeler or the scooter person. Um, it's a multi-w wheeled modality approach. Um, so even though we talk about bikes in this document and we refer to wheeled uh sports, we really try to take an inclusive approach ac across the spectrum of all trail users because that is ultimately what makes your trail the most popular thing since sliced bread. Um, uh, moving down at the bottom, you know, these are just some standard definitions to help understand at a civil level what they are, uh, when they were referred to in this document. Um, but kind of, you know, getting down to the to the bottom, I'd like to move it back over to Tyler because I think this is um, you know, I think he has additional comments or possible motions to make uh, based on what we've provided. >> Yes, thank you so much for that presentation and thank you for getting through it in a quick quick manner. Um and and I know this was disseminated to the council just a couple days ago, so I know it's probably still need to digest everything, but um my hope with this, well, first I think we have public comment from the cycling community uh I believe Mr. Fernando Valaso, who I should give credit for and uh for uh really promoting this rockolid um to to to come down here and uh you know leaned on that interest and Mr. Need for and the council for supporting them. Uh but I I believe you might have u you signed up for public comments or >> no just reference. >> Okay. As >> okay, no public comment >> and Okay. So if there's no comment is any any there's any thoughts from the council. My my hope was that um that this could be forwarded to our discussion uh on Thursday uh in regarding to the bond referendum election. I told it all up uh you know it was so each each section you know the Shiloh trail section 777,000 uh for all the enhancements they recommended uh on the on the higher end and then um for the Fasinfather Magnavable U recommendations plus u the Hannes and Shak Creek it all totals up to about $2.5 million if everything was so um All of course wouldn't have to be done at the same time necessarily, but if if we wanted to consider it for the bond referendum, that's I know there's already a big agenda, but my hope since we started this last year and we knew the bond referendum was coming, my hope was to coincide it and we're just kind of hitting the deadline, but I was hoping that we could consider it uh possibly in the bond. And if not, I mean, it's still a reasonable enough price that we could consider it this coming August in the in our general uh fund CIP. Um uh but my hope was my motion for tonight uh was to forward it to Thursday's discussion on our on our bond referendum to be up for consideration. >> If I may add something uh in regards to shadow trails um I get asked this you know and it's a legitimate question why now instead of before and uh I thought about this and it's there has been considerate uh development in the area. Uh my name is Fernando Valdaso for the record. Um so because of that development now there's more water flowing into Shiloh trails and it has completely damaged the trail. At this rate I think uh in two years we will not have any trails if we don't work on it. Uh because there's so much water now flowing into that creek that obviously before there was development it will be absorbed or upgraded. And um when Rock Solid was here, I toured with them and with parks as well. And about 30% of the trail was gone just with uh in the last heavy rain we had. I think it was like September. So this is I think something that we if possible we could rush on it, you know, before more damage and it will be costlier to us. So just wanted to add that. >> Thank you. Go ahead. >> Mr. Qu Shadow trails. I've never been on them before. Does the city of Laredo maintain them? Have they been in there maintaining them? >> Yes. Uh parks and w uh maintained them and um previous uh councilmen have added a little bit, you know, we added some shade, some uh drinking water. Um and uh but parks is the one that's been maintaining it. There's some volunteers also who maintain part of it because it's impossible. is always it needs constant maintenance especially after heavy rains. >> Okay. >> But uh yeah they do a great job. >> Okay. Can I speak to the director please? Mr. Gomez, please would you approach? >> Yes sir. >> Coach u Mr. Baso stating that the last heavy rain was in September. What type of maintenance have you done since then? And do you see it deteriorating as much as they say that it is? >> Uh good evening. There you go miss parks director. Uh councilman. That is correct. We we we have challenges there. As you know is growing. I think the subdivision there in Monaco is now keeps expanding the they're building more town homes right behind the variety meat market uh that right right behind the town homes are variety meat market. So all that drainage goes into the the creek trail. So it gets a lot challenging for our for our guys and our guys do a great job with whatever we can because you know like we you have your your regular road but once you start getting into the level twos and the level threes get a thicker brush and unfortunately we don't have that kind of machinery to to be able to to maintain. So little by little started closing up on us and it's harder to tell it to to take care of. >> So let's just say this gets I'm sorry I'm not one more question. Um let's just say this gets approved. >> Yes sir. Would you be able to maintain this? >> We we would have to get we would have to get machinery with the new type of machinery to be able to handle the level twos and the threes and that means because the level ones it's more open. >> You've asked for that already? >> No, we have not. We have not asked for that machinery yet. >> So you'd have to ask for that on top of getting funding for the project. >> That's correct. That's correct. >> Just just me one second. >> Do but do we have that machinery and and any other other department that we can use to utilize that? Uh there's some stuff that we can probably, you know, get together with public works that we can probably get, but there's fun. There's some uh specialized uh open up the trails that you can see and other parts that I don't I don't think I haven't checked with our department, but I don't think we have that. So, you're talking about one or two different specialization machinery that would have to need to go in there uh uh to be able to clean that up to to do it the right way. So, >> one more question. Do you do you have like is there a schedule? Because I know last time I went uh we had a walk around with council with council. He he had a walk around at uh what is it? What was it? Uh slaughter park >> and there was some trees that were trimmed down. Some trees that were just laying over. There was some trees that uh branches that were you know almost falling. And that's something that that we got asked if there was maintenance around it. Will we do maintenance? How often do we do maintenance? And that's something that >> No. Do you have a schedule, Mr. Gomez? >> Yes sir. Thank Thank you for that. So yes, we it is challenging because we know we have a lot of trails and manpower. We've recently hired another 12 groundskeepers and part of their schedule now is to help us with the parks with the with the trails uh council. Now, we do have a more manpower to to be able to help us with this uh with this trails and hiking bike trails. Uh the Shiloh was a little bit more challenging because that's when it has a little bit more dip than go through. But as far as as a slaughter, we do it at least we try to do it at least two to three times a week. >> Mr. and let's say we do we go we do go around that route and approve and improving uh this uh this this these trails. Do you have the do we have the Are we able to, you know, maintain? Do you have the the capability with the people that you have, the staff that you have, are you going to be able to keep up and, you know, do all the improvements, all the cleaning and all that that maintenance that it needs with the staff that you have right now? Because if you know, we're going to add this and then we're going to add, but you still have the same staff, you know, it's not going to >> you're not going to be able to catch up. >> Question. Yes, sir. Councilman, to answer your question, I think it comes down to machinery. If we can get the proper machinery, we don't have to comm a a palak, you know, try to trim everything that we can get the actual proper equipment, but five, six people takes us to clean a trail. We can do it with one or two guys with the proper machinery, you know. So, right now, as you know, we're growing and growing and growing with the trails and all that. So, it's challenging for our guys to go out there with the, you know, with the saws and all that stuff to keep it up. But once you get the proper machinery, it'll take one or two operators just to go in there and just clean clean out the clean out the area. Let me add something to what Mr. Anel is asking. Uh once these uh trails are built by this company, the I've seen some of the designs. Uh there will be ponds actually. So now the rain water will be able to collect it and use it uh for decoration instead of damaging the trail. Now these uh obstacles that we have will turn them into something positive. So the maintenance will not be as challenging as it is right now. That's that's that's that's the objective is to have it less less work on parks and rec we're going to start directing redirecting the water the flow of the water towards uh >> uh we we'll do they'll create ponds and we'll create bridges over them. So now they will be they be used as decoration and uh or maybe for other stuff but uh they will not damage the trails anymore. it will be redirected in a positive way in the flow and uh so that parks and for us not to have you know any more damage on it that's that's the objective >> question um I just wanted to commend uh council member King for uh bringing this forward and expanding it out so that we could look at a more holistic approach and uh Mr. Gomez when he's talking about interconnecting all of these trail systems. So, it's not just a Shiloh Creek, but we have so many beautiful areas that could benefit from this this um reinvigorated use of trails and making it attractive to bikes. I really appreciate the fact that this design team was looking at um what they call the bicycle playgrounds, but a way in how do you attract more usage? We have right now the Texas Healthy Challenge going on and um hopefully everyone has signed up for that. It's out of our Laredo Public Health Department. But the idea is more activity so we can be a healthier community. And this proactive approach that looks at a lot of different trail systems all over the city really does um speak to that need to get outside and enjoy this beauty that we have. I hope that we don't neglect the river system. I know there was some mention, a very small mention in the document about the existing river trails because right now we do have plans for from Chakon Creek all the way to um the sh the Slaughter Park area and up through um Laredo College and the idea is to one day connect it to even Father Magnabo um because that leads you to some of the most beautiful areas in our city >> and all the way to the max. >> Yes. Well, that would be wonderful. But those there are existing quite schematic design all done and incorporating that into um what this design team is doing so that we can leverage some of these attempts that we've had before in specific areas to look at that holistic approach and I hope the department Mr. Gomez takes a proactive role in looking on how to plan for the future so strategically we can have all of this connected green space. I think next >> Mr. Do we know uh how long is the the the stretch that's being damaged by the water due to the development? >> Um last rain I think was probably about 20% of the trails >> right about 20% of the trails were damaged um or insecure. I mean maybe the trail was there but it was too dangerous to ride on it. And it also it there's clay so it's takes a long time to dry so it makes it almost impossible to ride for like 10 days. It depends on weather. >> Mr. Ch, have we looked at anything that can be done temporary in house to alleviate this these rains or >> erosion? city council that opportunity to visit with parts and I know there's developments in the area but they have to maintain their uh uh storm water uh pollution prevention plans and things like that. So, uh, if he allows that opportunity, we'll look into those. >> I mean, I I can just tell you it's just like unusual rains that we have, you know, we have like over an inch when it happens, you know, just the system gets overloaded, you know, and it's because of the expansion of the city and natural development, which is understandable. But, uh, hopefully, you know, the faster we move with this, uh, you know, the faster we approach the system and we lose less trail and it'll be also less challenging for the constructor to build it. Well, I'm thinking the fastest way is is maybe uh you know look at this in house for right now and do a temporary fix if it's a a 20%. >> Yeah, anything will help. Yes, definitely. >> Thank you. >> Yes, go ahead. >> Mr. Wallace, I have a question Mr. Rodaso also. >> Uh I have a question about the grant. Didn't we receive a grant for this uh to build out the Shiloh trails? [snorts] >> The Yes, ma'am. And Mr. Travis can also help. So we did but it was just a phase of the top part of the of the Shinewood Trail. Okay. It's just to connect to connect the Divine Mercy Park to the top of the top of the of the actual trail. All right. What we're talking about is more on the interior inside the uh so the money that we was to connect Springfield in through the top of the shadow trails heading in towards McFerson. Is that is that correct? This is not into the actual uh routes on the very bottom council woman may protect of the very bottom of the of the of the trail. So the grant that we got is just for the top part to do a hike and bike trail from from the top of the creek. Go >> ahead and elaborate. So yes, our uh uh engineering department is currently under design uh for that project. Uh we're designing that trail and and we're coordinating with Texas Parks and Wildlife. Uh we received that grant. Uh we're working on uh [clears throat] an environmental assessment, but the plans are are uh have been approved by Texas Parks and Wildlife. >> Mayor, followup question if I may. >> Yes, go ahead. >> So So the trail has not had it. You haven't spent any of the grant money yet? >> No, the design uh was conducted in house and again those uh plans have been approved by Texas Parks and Wildlife and so we're just waiting on on the environmental uh and archaeological to be able to tap into those funds. So, how does the plans are ready? >> How do those plans >> um affect this this plan here? Is there are they in coordination or >> and then this one expands out? But this is more of a master plan or conceptual plan. We can still go out for grants for any of this um uh you know work that's in this plan as well. I I I briefly looked over it when I received it um on on Monday or yesterday, but um It doesn't seem like they have it broken out in phases or am I am I incorrect because I didn't see a phase two or a phase one or like how we could you know or is this going to be um better done all in all in one swoop. Is this one of those >> project? So uh there is uh within the uh report that we received so there's uh the three areas that were analyzed. It was focused on the Shiloh trails, but we do have an assessment done uh by Solid Rock Trails uh on the Barbara Fasin and and Father Magnambo area and also uh on the Hannes Rec Center and the Chone Creek area. So I see this as an opportunity, this report that we received, uh to be able to use this information to not only uh take it to the next step, which would be design and construction, but also at the same time allows that opportunity to to perhaps look into some grant opportunities with this report. >> Mayor, if I may just have a follow. Um, I just want to kind of, um, I guess bring up an issue that, um, when I first came into council, I know the previous council member had left some motions on the table with the terms of the the trails over there in the Labota area. And I remember getting a letter saying, you know, that the city wasn't going to pursue those trails. Um, I know you all went and looked at those, but the motion for those trails was also kind of on the table. I'm curious to know why it wasn't uh those weren't looked at for the study. >> Actually, if I may, mayor, go ahead. >> And I actually I wanted them to um look at Labota, but um it was brought up um that it's that Labas on private property. So that was uh the reason that they ultimately didn't go in their short time that they were here. That's why they didn't go there. And Mr. Tommy Ramirez brought them to um Josh Blum who's not on the call right now because he couldn't make it. Uh Hogan's filling in uh but uh who was here Josh uh he had asked for uh loca trails near recreational centers. So Mr. Ramirez brought um because you know there's also talks about Casablanca. There's also talks about other locations that the city doesn't necessarily have as much control over and since we were the city was paying for this parks, you know, felt like it made sense to uh and they agreed, rock solid agreed that it made sense to focus on the areas that we know we can control the the situation and you know, this is just a start, but um and then so the pump tracks and the kind of for kids and the cool stuff they added um near the rec centers uh was kind of a a bonus uh to the plan. And then um and then just to clarify on, you know, on the on the Texas Parks and Wildlife grant, that was to about $267,000 that actually gets to go towards in its own reimburseable form also uh from this from the state. Uh and about 60,000 that go that we did as inind for manpower so to speak. Um and the 267,000 you know with parks and engineering they um uh you know the the way that we got that grant accepted was through a lot of discussion about making it ADA accessible. So, um, so the the staff felt that getting it approved because everything every little design had to get approved by the state. There's been back and forth back and forth. Uh, and the state finally approved that basically connecting the new Springfield phase three uh to McFersonson through Shiloh Trails and behind Monaco subdivision and all that. The idea of course being that Divine Mercy Park and Shiloh Trails eventually become what is known North Central Park West, right? And you connect that underneath McFerson and you have this super regional park. Um so that's like the big grand vision. So connecting all three, Divine Mercy, North Central, Shiloh and making it one big connected park. Um so that's the status of the grant. Um looking forward to our local getting it built out now that state approved the plans. And then when RockSolid was here, we made them aware of engineering's plans and then they superimposed our local engineers plans for that part of it into their planning. So they didn't do any double work or anything like that. >> So uh Tyler, just a question. So uh this grant can be used to enhance child backs correct? because that was the purpose when we wrote it and when I wrote to parks and when I sent they asked me for volunteers you know that we've been working to prove to them that we you know there's group people and stuff like that. >> Yeah, I'm sure theoretically um you know the the argument from staff has been that um that it would be less likely to get approved by the state um because >> um the grant was approved but then the plans have to be approved. Um, but nonetheless, what what RockSolid's recommending is costs 777,000. So, the money still, you know, needs to come from, uh, somewhere, right? Uh, to to get some of this big stuff we want done. So um but that's that's where we are on. >> So, it's a yes or >> the the grant the plans have for the grant money, the plans have already been submitted by engineering. uh to connect Springfield to McFersonson through a ADA approved uh walk hiking and walking trail. Um >> so it was changed to its original intention. >> Well again there was turnover and uh was handed off and that's ultimately what staff uh felt like could get it approved from by the state because they were going back and forth. So um so that's a again we're I understand the point um but that's where That's where that has landed with with staff and back and forth conversations with the state. So, >> oh again that that 260,000 would not pay for for the things >> 60,000 goes a long way on back to us right now >> as opposed to >> Go ahead. >> I just going going back to the presentation and and the item at hand. Um, I did I did just want to comment that I loved the presentation and I think this is a really great yes it um we need to understand the the funding and where this would come from, but I do think it would be a great [clears throat] exercise in um an investment to the city because um initiatives like this really have a a great econ economic impact. Um it boosts local the the local economy and businesses. It could bring in tourism revenue. Um, it increased property um values and studies have shown that for every dollar that um that invested in in biking infrastructure, there could be a return on investment of four three four five dollars. And so I think this would be amazing if we could um truly consider funding >> the project. But obviously that um >> what was >> Yes. Go ahead. Point of order. What was made the original question? Oh, motion. >> My motion was just to to forward this um package to for consideration in our in our bond review workshop on Thursday for this coming Thursday. >> Motion second. [clears throat] All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. >> All right. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Hogan. >> Thank you. >> All right. Before we move on, would like to bring move section 12 staff reports after section 7 appointment to commiss, boards, and committees. Do >> section. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> Motion passes. >> Mayor Morgan, bring up >> number seven. >> Number seven. Appointments to commissions point of order. Mayor, >> we've skipped the approval of the minutes. >> Oh yes. Go ahead. Do the minutes. >> Approval of the minutes for >> December 2nd, 2024, December 20th, 2024. >> Second. >> Motion. Second. All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. All right, >> mayor. You had a uh your motion to bring up item number uh 112 >> 112 V2 and uh item number 104 also. >> Yes. >> Yes. Just go ahead and do this. >> All right. So we're pending 112 >> 112 B2 >> B24. That's my we have >> 112 >> B2 B2 >> B2. >> All right. Uh discussion with possible action to request text to give an update on up overpass in the city. So the reason I'm you know trying to do um you know brought this up uh I had the the privilege and the opportunity to the part of be part of the no uh and I wanted to start seeing you know showing the community the the the progress that you know that we're doing with text dot I know they see traffic going on and the the connectivity that we're doing in not only south Laredo but in north Larredo and west Larredo and east Laredo. So, you know, right now we're going to start off with the overpasses in South Reload, which there's always a conversation I can, you know, my uh colleague Mr. Wanes can vouch for that. Having that conversation that we get asked as as uh almost every other day, you know, when are they going to do the overpasses or whe they're going to do the the changes or how is it that Quatroento is going to work on Sierra Vista. So, you know, that's why, you know, we ask for textile just to to just tell to the community then ask them where we at with where are we at with that and have uh how soon are we going to start with the with the overpass since maybe a starting date and not not a an ending date but a starting date. >> Okay. Uh good evening uh mayor uh council members city leadership Jose Vargas. I'm the air engineer for the Leler office. So today I'm going to concentrate on the projects that we're doing along uh what we typically know as loop 20 or US 59 and quadrientos. Uh I did presented some other projects in in the no. I can briefly cover them >> but I'll start from the north and then I'll cover the topic in what was >> start the other way around from the south and the north. Yeah. So let's start off in there. So, uh, Lazour project, as I mentioned, no, uh, that project was led back in November. Uh, the investment for that project is, uh, 50 $50 million. Uh, we're still working on on the contract, getting the contract awarded. The successful contractor is Anderson Colombia. So, we're projecting to start work uh mid towards the end of February on that project, seeing some equipment there uh to start that project. And the duration of that project is approximately three years. So probably by the by the end of 2027 uh we should be uh seeing uh or we should be nearing completion of that of that project. Um going south uh we are under uh development of authority on Sierra Vista and Celito Lindo. So what that means is that the state has uh funding to start the design of those uh overpasses. We still don't have funding for construction. Uh currently uh they sit for a leting date in 2030. What the district is doing is working on the plans to have uh these projects on shelf. As funding becomes uh available, we can potentially lead let those projects uh sooner. So Sierra Vista is currently at 60% PSN which stands for his plans uh specifications estimate pretty much the plans ready for a contractor to bid on that project. So we're currently uh at 60% of the plans for for SA Vista. Celito Lindo falls a little bit behind but we are also uh re-evaluating that overpass as we're also working on the connection on the extension of Quroentors towards the uh international bridge uh four and five. So uh we're already working on you know the possible routes and schematic and we're evaluating where city toolindo is going to fall in the master plan. So uh that's what that's the status that we currently have for for south. So right now are you saying that LS well cityindo doesn't have uh the funds yet but in the planning you already at 60% of the planning >> on planning we do have development authority for both >> okay for both Sista and Celitoindo >> but what delay celtoindo a little bit is that we're also working on expansion towards Rio brao >> okay so good question so the with the with the connection of lazul it's going to be to have the overpass overro Proentos road. So the connections is going to start off you see you said uh late February early March or midFebruary early March and then from there is there any plans that we're going to connect right across that's going to go that something that's going to benefit the South Laredo which is something that we're very excited it's uh the sports complex which if I'm not mistaken should be done by April May around that area. So, is the road going to continue and do that connection from from Lom Lomul connecting all the way to 359? >> Do we have an other another uh connection or is is that it and and right now for the overpasses? >> That's uh that's what we're calling the the outer loop if I understand if I understanding correctly is the connections on 359 I guess uh and 59. Yeah, >> that's what we typically call the outer loop. Uh we're also working on uh evaluation of the alignments and we already have some some alignments uh being proposed by our consultant. Um I don't have them here. That's right. But uh we were also working on the outer loop but uh the connection uh towards 83 continuing to mangana and eventually connecting south of Rio Bravo. Uh that's coming sooner than the other. >> Yes sir. >> All right. So, can you continue with the the ones going north? >> Yes, sir. So, um can I choose back? >> Oh, there you go. So, uh now on the north side, uh we have approximately six miles of of construction, ongoing construction. Uh we're going from uh International Boulevard all the way to uh Jacaman. So this project was um awarded to James Construction Group for a total investment of $345 million. Uh work began on last March 2024 and we have an estimated completion uh on you know by the end of the year of 2029. So this project has uh includes the construction of four overpasses and again I cropped this from from the schematic so some visual uh I guess representation of the of the overpasses. The first one is at Jackaman. Then we have University at the entrance to to Tamilu. Uh then we have Delmore and then the last one will be Shiloh. And we're going to eventually connect the main lanes of international. So um this is a reconstruction to full interstate standards. What it means is that bringing south uh the footprint that we currently have from I35 M international. We're bringing that footprint uh towards the south. Uh the only overpass that is pending uh it's already funded but we're working and relocating uh some facilities there in in loop 20 is the overpass at the airport. Uh but again during this contract we have uh these these four uh overpasses. >> Go ahead. >> Jose basically going south to north as far as overpasses over the next four years. Were you just listing them? Was that a coincidence in how you were listing them or is that's the way it'll be? you know, Jackman University, Delmare shot, that's the order they'll be completed or they'll be kind of all completed roughly together along the four years. >> Yeah. So, the sequence of construction starts from the south, but ultimately uh in order to open the entire facility, all the all the overpasses need to be constructed. So, uh we need to finish this these four overpasses within the contract allotted in this contract. So, >> so people kind of need to be prepared. Our in your job and I appreciate your your Facebook pages and updating us all the time, but um people kind of need to be ready to be driving past a fully com constructed Jackaman overpass and not be using it until the next three are done, right? >> Yeah. >> So, just just kind of mentally preparing for seeing it there and not been able to use it. >> Yeah. So, typically there's going to be concurrent work in the overpasses. I'm just going to throw an example, right? For example, the the drill shafts, the foundation for the for the bridge typically has been done by by a subcontractor. So, what typically happens is that they mobilize that subcontractor at once. So, we can expect uh for the bridges to be, you know, following, you know, behind each other. So, it we're not going to be having large gaps uh from the construction. So, we don't typically construct one and then just, you know, uh move to the next one. uh we could see uh you know a sequential [clears throat] construction on both of the four uh four overpasses. So if uh because the way we're handling traffic uh we cannot put one of the overpasses in service it wouldn't be for you know very very much time >> and last year we were told it's a fiveyear timeline roughly from 24 to 29 right? >> Yes. >> Would you say that we're on track? We're on track weather permitting for example just last last week we have uh weather days uh I mean uh but yeah the contractor is on track >> and when will the more disruptive uh things start happening because this first year was all like utilities you know not a lot of the moving around traffic as much um when is so so the public can be anticipating this when when are those really more disruptive traffic changes going to start? So, uh, starting, uh, next next month, we're going to start, uh, seeing some, uh, night closures on on Loop 20 and maybe some shifting, minimum shifting of traffic as we cross some of the major coverboards, uh, across Loop 20. And by the end of spring, we're going to start seeing some payments on that new rideway that that we acquire. But the major shifts uh will probably be towards the end the end of the year probably I don't know the fall of of this year where we're actually uh switching uh the main lanes to the newly constructed frontage road. So in the next month is going to be minimum just to cross drainage structures and then major shifts. Uh it will be towards the end of the year and of course uh we'll be coordinating with with the city. uh we also coordinated with UISD and all the the stakeholders along the corridor to notify and kind of uh present how these these switches are going to occur. >> Thank you. Um thank you so much for the update. I I wanted to just touch on I know that text hosted a public forum and asked for input for the realignment or a different alignment of 69. So when 59 comes into the city that will become 69. That's the plan and how it connects to loop 20. There were some alternatives presented to the public. Has any decision been made about that connector? >> Uh no. We we met uh just uh recently and we we narrow down uh the options uh yes to to three, but uh to my knowledge we still don't have a final decision that we can present. >> Okay. So this would if if it were to change then that piece of 59 that connects to the city that would change. 69 would connect to loop 20 on a different route >> on a different route. Yes. For for the north but still uh we still that we still need that connection from South Ledo >> to the north. Yeah. So uh all the investment that that we're doing especially with the the presidential approval of the international bridge uh we're still also uh connecting south to north and and that is uh being analyzed the connection now from I guess the north part of Laredo towards 59 going towards Houston. >> Yeah sure. >> Thank you. So may >> So you're saying that uh so did we reach out to uh have you reached out to uh United LISD and all those schools just to allow them or just to have like a a conversation with them letting them know that how traffic is going to get from here you know especially vista well that's a you know that's a corridor that a lot of uh of our buses and a lot of kids kids go through. Uh I don't know if we can do that and have uh uh like a little town hall meeting just uh just to let have the people out there uh you know let the people come in and have that communication with us with text dot along with with the city and and and you know uh how we're going to you know go upon that. So if we have that opportunity management, can we organize have a little a town hallow meeting? Uh let's reach out to one of the whoever has a auditorium and see if we can have those that conversation to have text out there and ourselves just to let them know what's going on and the overpasses. >> Yes, sir. Mayor and city council, council member. Yes, of course. Uh town halls are >> are a good way to put that information out. >> Yeah. >> So great. No action needed. It was just a discussion. Do you have a question? >> Thank you. >> Uh I know this item's specifically for overpasses. Do we have an update on the concrete medium that's the median that's going to stretch all through Quattro Ventos in South Loro? >> Uh it's included in um yeah, sorry it's a little laggy. It's included in the project for for LAS. Okay. So with the construction of the of the overpass in Lazour, uh we have a concrete uh barrier. Yeah. >> That connects all the way to the uh bridge uh over 359. >> And how south is it going to go? uh just uh I guess where we merge back the ramps towards towards existing quadentos and then we're going to continue that barrier towards Savista and and then that footprint is going to carry further south uh as as we of course uh >> well that that medium will initiate also midFebruary the the barrier >> um we haven't had the pre-construction uh with the contractor but he's going to get constructed uh within this project. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So yeah, it's going to depend on the phasing of of the project but but yeah >> it will extend all the way to LS >> to Lur and connection 359. >> So it's going to cover I guess there by Halapa Ranch all that area all the way to L. >> So pretty much we're extending the existing uh concrete barrier over 359 south towards L. >> Okay. and then in the future towards Raista and then >> yeah as as we continue yeah I know it's it's not allow me to show yeah it's going to continue further south >> okay thank you >> thank you so much >> mayor may I >> yes go ahead >> mayor I'd like to make a motion to bring up uh item 112D3 we have a couple of veterans sitting here who've been waiting for a while now >> second motion second all in favor motion passes Thank you. Thank you for that. Council member um mayor, this is a discussion with possible action to adopt a resolution by the city of Laredo supporting House Bill uh number 2540, which was introduced two years ago originally uh by state representative Richard Raymond um which seeks to provide tuition and fee exemptions for siblings uh of veterans who were killed in action, died in service, or missing in action provided that the veteran uh does not have a a spouse or a child to uh pass that exemption. um which would this would also further allow us to the mayor and city council to formally convey this during our state legislature uh visit and otherwise. So and I think thank you Ricky and member of the veterans from Foreign Morris for doing >> good good evening. My name's Ricardo. Thank you Councilman Rubis bringing it and council member Tyler King putting it on the agenda. real quick. Uh it is my understanding that uh some of you are going to go next week to the state capital to lobby for citizens and we ask your help. The the veterans community organizations ask your help. One of the we're asking is to advocate and lobby for House Bill I know it's here. It is House Bill 2540, but it changed since it just got filed uh on January 15th. I just gave the paperwork uh to the city attorney if you can just pass them out. Uh it it has a language on the Hazelwood act and what it is is House Bill 1867 now and the Senate bill also is going to come up because I've been talking with Judy Safari's office to also want to file in conjunction with uh Richard Raven. Hazelwood Act is what it is is a service member who uh enlists in the state of Texas and comes back to the state of Texas, the high public education, they're exempt from tuition, >> right? If a service member gets killed overseas uh in Iraq, Afghanistan, or any future wars, uh if I'm married and I have kids, well, if I die, that's fine and dandy. I know my family's going to get, you know, the benefits. >> But on August of 2021, we had a casualty here in Laredo. That's coral. He did not have a wife. He did not have kids. But when I met his parents and his siblings, he did have siblings. He did have three siblings, a brothers and sister. And I started thinking it's like his benefits just go away. Why not change the language to add siblings? And that's what Rich Raymond is doing, changing the language to if a service member is killed in action, those benefits are going to be given to the siblings and they won't just go away. And we are asking for your assistance when you go and lobby and advocate for Laredo. also advocate for this because it's not only going to affect Lorowens, it's going to affect web county residents and whole state of Texas in a positive. That's all I also have miss here and uh we're headed on this. That's it. It's just quick. >> Thank you all. >> All right. Thank you, >> Mayor. If I may amend the motion to uh just uh change it to correct it to the new house bill 1867 now frame 2540. >> Second that motion. >> Motion second. All in favor >> oppos. Motion pass. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Mayor if I may. >> Yes. >> Just to add um I'd like to make a motion for PIO to create a um an awareness I guess social media awareness for this and maybe information on how they can contact uh the representative and let them know that they're also in support so we can share it and promote it. Um so it's not just from us as council but it's also from people in the community so they can know about it just to support the initiative by Dr. >> We also have Mr. and Mrs. here. Parents of David Hosa, you want to say some words? >> Yeah, Elizabeth comment on the item. >> Good afternoon. Thank you for hearing us. Um, I would really appreciate if if you all, like Mr. Piano said, if you all would talk for us, you know, with with this um with this House bill, you know, it's a I know it's going to be hard, you know, but it's like where would this money be coming from? You know, as when my son was enlisted, he um he was entitled for his service and you know, I could ask like where did all that money go from? Why not allow the siblings to to use it? Um, I would really appreciate um at least to be considerate to consider it and take it out there for us and and we could be out there to, you know, um, supporting this act. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Can I say something? Yes. U name for the record please. >> Yes. My name is Victor Manuel Dominguez, Senior. I'm the stepfather of David Espinosa. Uh like my wife was saying, uh one of the questions we had from the beginning is uh when when it all happened, of course, we had uh Marines that advising us and helping us through the process. We didn't know what was going on, how to how to approach it. And uh one of the questions we brought up from the beginning was his GI bill because that same year his oldest his brother after him had just graduated high school. He had a brother who was a junior brother was junior in high school and a sister who was an eighth grader. So we brought up the GI bill hoping that somehow someway he could use it and of course we were told that that was for he couldn't use it because it was for him and then there was no benefits or nothing behind it because as Mr. Ghano said there was he wasn't married and the benefits will only go to the wife [clears throat] and the children and he didn't have because he was single. There was no benefits at all for him after that. And in a way we felt bad because here he is giving his life for the country and yet he can't do nothing for his own brothers and sisters. So, uh, this this bill, uh, House Bill 1867, if it comes to life and it it it does get approved, it would be one big benefit for for his brothers and sisters. Not only them, but also in the future, because as long as there's conflicts and wars, this this will happen again. And that would be something that would benefit also siblings of other families. So we appreciate everything you guys are doing and hopefully you know this this becomes a bill. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. >> Mary say a few words. >> Yes. Uh Mr. >> For the record, uh my name is Albert Ernnandez. here as a community veteran uh in support in requesting uh your support uh in in lobbying for this particular issue. And I just want to put it in perspective in what the Texas case uh exemption does. This exemption, what it does is that for any individual that entered service in the state of Texas and returned to Texas, if they served more than 181 days of active duty and they received an honorable discharge or a general discharge under honorable condition conditions, they're eligible to use this particular exemption that waves uh approximately about uh 85 to 90% of tuition and fees in Texas public colleges and universities. So while the G bill is a separate bill at the federal level, this is an extra benefit through the state of Texas taking care of its Texas uh troops, those that basically served uh our nation and came back to the state of Texas. And just to put it in perspective, what it does is that currently an individual veteran that that uh meets all the criteria after they've used their GI bill, the state of Texas then basically is telling public institutions in higher ed, we're waving the majority of that tuition, making uh continual uh higher education, somebody wants to go beyond uh a bachelor's degree or even into graduate or post-graduate degree, they can do this. What it does is that currently the Heswood Act, if I decide not to use it, the state of Texas several years back, they introduce the Texas uh legacy allowing a veteran to transfer those benefits over to their children between the ages of 18 to 25. an individual veteran whether while in service or after service they're service connected to 100% service connected disability then they're entitled to get those benefits not only them but now the state of Texas allows them to expand that to their spouse [clears throat] and to their children for individuals that pass as it was stated earlier while in service if they have no dependence meaning that the service member was not married and did not have children for lack of a better word that benefit dice with them. And what we're asking is to lobby across the state of Texas and we're thankful for uh our representatives that are taking this to the Texas Hill. But in addition to that is that this exemption Yeah. also permanently just to put a little bit more in perspective a veteran that is a grandfather or a uh uncle of one of uh their their uh nieces or their their their grandchildren, the state of Texas allows an IRS dependent to use this benefit. So there's already an uh a process to expand the benefit to other immediate I'm sorry, for other immediate family members. And all that we're asking at this point in in your support of in the the Texas legislature is for the the policy to now be extended to include siblings, particularly those that pass while serving their country. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Mayor, like to make a motion to approve the appointments to commission, [clears throat] boards, and committees number one through 14. >> Motion. Second. All in favor? >> I may. Motion and >> motion to bring up item 104. >> Motion. >> Second. All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. >> Honorable mayor and council with the budget department. I will be I will be presenting a budget refund recap for the council. >> [clears throat] >> The >> we're missing one. The recap that I'm going to cover, mayor me mayor, is uh part of the Friday packet presentation that was sent to council last Friday. Uh in there had a a booklet similar to this. In there, it had all the uh presentations from the committees, uh some analysis, and part of the uh uh screens that I have in here are tied into this uh bigger report that was sent out on Friday on the Friday packet. First of all, I want to take a minute to thank the committee members. Uh this slide slows the upon referring committee members. Uh we had the four categories, the public safety, public infrastructure, health and wellness and the enhancement services and it has all the members that serve. Uh we had multiple meetings. uh listed in here on the top were the the chairs of all those committees and all the members of the committee that that worked uh throughout different months and I believe we do have a couple of members that are present today. U there's [clears throat] any members that were in the committees kind of stand up and >> thank you all for your your work that you all would be [applause] Before Before we continue the presentation, I'd like to just backtrack a little bit uh on a public comment on Fernando Basalda. >> He's on this item. As a matter of fact, I want >> this item 104. >> Can we turn this on here? Okay. Um, thank you uh for the time. Uh, I was honored to be on the committee on the bond committee. Uh, thank you for your trust, Miss Perez. And, uh, I learned a lot, you know, and, uh, I did a lot of research as well in why we need this and, uh, the money that we're spending. And I came to realize that other cities bigger in population have a lower budget than us. So, I decided to bring all this information to council to make you aware uh where we're at before we make uh recommendation and maybe we need to look at this before we go for bond. Maybe we can delay it, you know, for next year while we look at this information. uh you know, Texas government, our governor, Texas legislature, Mr. Raymond, they all working on bringing our taxes lower, our property taxes lower. And uh so this kind of goes against it. So, uh our I think our budget for next year or this fiscal year is about a billion dollars, you know, according to Laredo Morning Times. Then a city like Arlington that has the Cowboys, has six black flags, has Texas Rangers, and has about 30% more population. It has 398,000 people, has a budget for this year of uh 722 million, 35% less for a city that's 30% bigger. So, um Maybe we there's something they're doing right or there's something we're not doing. Uh I think you know this is reason enough to maybe look into this information before we proceed into getting more money because I think uh the money is here. I mean our budget is big. You know, we have about a billion dollars and before we ask taxpayers for more money, I think we have to look at ways to cut down the fat, cut down where we need to cut down to see, you know, how can this city which bigger and has uh better quality of life, you know, coming to professional teams and parks spend less a year than us. Just wanted to make you aware of this [snorts] information and maybe By looking at this, we can delay the grant hopefully like I mean the [clears throat] what is it called the bond a year while we look into this first before we ask citizens for more money. Okay. And uh I don't know if I'm allowed to ask you know to unrelated topic but I was not aware Mr. King that the grant had shifted because everything that I wrote was for sh. >> Sorry. Yeah topic. We can deal with it. >> Just to be clear, I did email that to him last year. I can show everybody, but anyway. >> All right. We'll deal with it. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. Please continue. >> This slide shows the uh we initiated the uh committee meetings on September 30 with a kickoff meeting with all the committee members. Uh in this meeting um there was a presentation by Mr. as to what the committee's uh duties responsibilities were going to be. During the month of October to November uh in December, the four committees met uh numerous times and had presentations from the staff and other uh parties that had projects related to um the bond referendum. Keep in mind that the bond referendum is looking at tax tax uh a tax rate and it's looking at the property property uh tax rate. So most of the projects that are in there are going to be tax supported. So October to November the enhancement services meeting uh met between October 10 through November 26. The public safety uh committee at meetings from October 7 through November 6. The health and wellness uh committee met from October 17 through December 9 and the public infrastructure meetings were from October 10 through December 24. The main committee had three meetings. Uh the first was a public uh and they met November through December. The first was the public safety uh police and fire uh committee that presented to the committee and then the uh subsequent second meeting was the enhancement health community development uh uh presentations. Uh then we had one more recap in January which was a recap for what the main committee was going to submit to council which is what we have in our next slide here. Any any questions so far? So here is the by category and departments and the subcommittee which is the middle column is what they submitted to the main committee for their review. Public safety fires had 98.6 million worth of projects. Public safety police department had 261.9 million of projects. Health and wellness health department had 70 million worth of projects. community development, which is on our health and wellness uh category as well, uh had a $10 million project, and that's mainly for the Hamilton. The public infrastructure uh public works paving program subcommittee did not have a proposal. The enhancement services, parks, and recreation had 92.9 million. Total recommendations from the subcommittee to the main committee were 533,464,49. As the main committee met, most of the amounts that were presented from the subcommittee uh got approved, fire was 98.6, public uh police 261, health to 70. Uh the only one that had a different amount was the uh parks and wreck which came in at 77,900 and the main project in there was the water park was not recommended by the uh main committee to move forward to the council's review. Then as we reviewed this uh city administration met and analyzed some of these numbers and there were some recommendations from the uh city administration staff. The fire recommendation was 98.6. Police was uh reduced to 176.8 million and this was done by conversations with the uh police department as to prioritizing uh their request. Health remained at 70, community development 10 million. And one of the projects that staff uh felt strongly that is a need for the city of Laredo was our paving program. Our paving program uh recommendation that we have is 120 million. Barton Rex has 46,200. The total for the city administration is 121,710455. I do want to point out that in the parks and wrecks the difference between the 77900 and the 46 are two rec centers that are not in the city administration. Partially part the part part of the reason for that is that there is the M impact for those. uh all of them have an M impact and I have a a slide as we move forward trying [snorts] to estimate what the M impact is because one thing this is the the the projects to build or execute those projects then we have an M component that comes into the general fund that's going to have an impact as we move through the next five years. So the one of the reasons also was because of that we wanted to have the council consider that M know in the consideration of those two uh recreation centers. One was in district six and the other one is in district 8. There was a misprint on the packet on Friday just showed one in district 6. But we're talking about two rec centers. Uh 15 million each was the estimate that we got and that's what is missing on that difference between the 77900 and that 46. Um, any questions so far? Good. Okay, next slide. Impact analysis. So, what we're what we're showing on this slide, starting from the left, is a penny. The penny impact would generate about $2.4 million of revenues from property taxes. This would finance approximately $40 million of bonding and uh either through any different or any kind of financing mechanism to include bonds or any uh any uh monies from the text dot or any other places. So to the right we have a 10 13 cent 15 cent and 20 cent increase as a analysis of what that impact would do. 10 cents would generate approximately 24.7 million in revenues which could have a bonding capacity of 400 about approximately 400 million. There's a lot of factors that come in here. So these are approximate numbers interest rate uh and and that have an impact on that. I have a question. >> Yes. Go ahead. >> For what amount of time are these bonds being proposed? >> Typ typically anywhere from 20 to 30 years. for it in its entirety. >> Yes. >> So you're talking about vehicles that we're going to be financing for 20 to 30 years. >> Um clarification on the vehicles. What happens on the bonding when our our uh financers advisors put that together as they have different components of the financing? So we have the vehicles, we have things that are 15 years life capacity, 20 years, 30 years. So imagine you have five loans within that main uh bond issuance. So the the payment is a total amount but it gets amortized or paid over the life of those assets that we're bonding for. So we pay off the cars first and then anything that's 10 years and 15 years 20 years and and so on. And the reason I'm saying 20 to 30 years also is because some of the items here are buildings. >> Sure. >> Buildings expect. And I understand that, but I just want the public to know that we're not financing vehicles for 20 to 30 years. I want to make sure that's very clear. >> Yeah. Go ahead. >> So, I see that public safety fire came up from 98. The fire didn't come down at all, but public safety police did. So, is there a reason that that we went from 261 or Yeah. 261 to 176? Is that um what what do you what did uh we remove or was it the cars? M management chief can you answer that for me or >> I think what what got approved in the 176 and there were conversations with with the chief as we prioritized the 261 as to what items were the most important items for him and and I'll let him speak for for him in that 176 represents mainly I think it was the admin building the training facility and I think the vehicles. Okay, let me let me hear from the Let's hear from the chief. >> Good evening, Council Chief Rodriguez. Uh Chief, please. Yes. Uh the the conversation with management was what was our priority and what was the >> So what is the main priority, Chief? >> So definitely the headquarters uh definitely don't fit in in the headquarters that we're currently in. And of course our training facility which we continue to say that we're as of right now we're still training as a Martina Puarez and other facilities that are not the city because we do not we do not have facility. >> So chief what did the committee say when you presented this this information to them? What did you know was it >> they were they were given the uh the information they were given the tour of the police department. They were given the tour of our current training facilities. They were also given uh given a visibility as to how our current status is with our uh trading equipment, our vehicles and things like that. And uh all the committee agreed that it is a need. Um but we're very much aware that we also have to you know and in times like this where we have to meet halfway uh to make sure that we get to everything in those bond referendums that we're putting out that we are going to prioritize. Right. So if we're asking if you're asking the police department what are we going to prioritize it's going to be the headquarters the training facility and of course our vehicle which are crucial to our operations. So let's say that well let let me Mr. Sponsor let's say that we pass this bond or whatever we request of the amount we get there. Let's say it doesn't it doesn't pass. What happens to the vehicles? Are we able to get more vehicles or is it something if the bond doesn't pass and the vehicles are included, we can't get vehicles anymore? >> Yeah, I'm going to let our bond council answer that question. >> Thank you. >> Good evening, mayor, council members. For the record, my name is Jay Huades. I'm an attorney with McCall Park. I have the privilege of serving as bond council. Also here are Pettis, their co-bond council. Uh so to answer your question, yes, if any of these measures are turned down by the voters, y'all cannot issue cos for them like you all are used to financing things. There are other financing tools, one of which is a tax note which has a seven-year max amortization schedule. So you can still finance vehicles and stuff like that, but if they were to turn down the buildings and stuff like that, you all are kind of stuck not doing those for at least three years. Legislation has been proposed that might extend that to five years. So let's say so you're saying if we pass this 176 and let's say it doesn't pass that's including the cars the vehicles am I correct uh let's say we pass the vehicles and we don't get so there's not going to be units the end of life for a vehicle the that you use five years >> chief for the record and I I've had this conversation with our our budget director and management that our vehicles is is crucial to our operation daily operations so this is a conversation that continues because We do get a little bit nervous if this doesn't pass how we're going to get vehicles and I can tell you uh that this coming year the minimum that is going to be required of vehicles that are that are going to go end of life this year are 85. >> So why you know administration why add the vehicles that we know that if let's say anything happened and you know mid come when it comes to elections and bond referendum things could happen and let's say the people don't you know go for this because it's too high. Yeah, mayor and city council. Let me let me have Jay, don't go anywhere. Um, let me have bond council take it a little bit farther because one of the things that you'll you'll you'll find out it is how we frame the question as to what it is. It has to be specific enough on what the projects are, but what I would state is make it broad enough where we have the the if there's any room to be wiggled on that. The challenge we have with our vehicles in the police department is that we're not replacing them fast enough because the the cost it's incremental within our structure. We have a lot of other needs as well too. The whole idea about the bond the bond referendum was to give us that kick start over the top again with that. But but in my understanding is that uh if it is if it if the bond question is specific enough that's going to eliminate the the three-year window with that within that structure. And I think that's where I've been challenging the bond council to write the question in a way that close that door completely. >> Uh >> you see what I'm saying though? >> I see what you're saying. And sometimes we can narrowly kind of tailor and wordsmith the language. I think here it would be way too long of a proposition to put in front of the voters and AG is being very very difficult these days. So the where where we're at right now is really for the mayor and the city council to determine what we're trying to draft and craft. I mean I I think that's where that's where we're we're kind of it's chicken and the egg to a certain extent with this. >> Yeah, I I've provided a draft election ordinance. I don't know if that was printed for you guys. If not, I can get that in front of you guys so you can start looking at that. A lot of this language is pretty boilerplate. We try to be, you know, broad enough to capture all potential projects. And we try to be clear enough that the voters don't get confused because if the proposition does get wordy or confusing the AG will give us an issue. >> But I would also say that if if we are not able to fund like the vehicles and if if the question wasn't broad enough and it was voted down. It just means we can't go out for a bond referendum for the vehicles. We can utilize other sources of funding in order to purchase vehicles. We just can't do it within within a bond referendum structure. >> You can't do it within a bond referendum. You can't do it with certificates of obligation as you all used to do. But there are tax notes for the vehicles. So you all do have other options. Yes sir. >> So uh what our whole strategy within this thing was keep with the traditional method of how all the all of our other sister cities operate through that the school districts and everything else as well too. And then as you've made your decision as a council, what is the priority and where you're wanting to go? Then we would look at these other things in future conversation saying this is how we're going to have to deal with this issue from that point because we're we're not going to go after the bond referendum question for that if that helps. >> Mayor May, go ahead. >> Um so I imagine we'll go into more detail on Thursday's meeting. Is is that >> it would that was the hope was that is to really uh present it out here get get some of this information in your hands because there are um there are paths to take within this conversation and when we start going down one path then there's a whole series of of pieces that we have to talk about >> because it it just from your original when you came up your original statement it sounds as if perhaps the vehicles we could find other ways to fund them but the incredibly needed headquarters would be a completely different kettle of fish. >> And maybe at the bond meeting that we'll have on Thursday, we can talk about forecasting what that would look like and what alternatives would be available because I think we need to be made fully aware. we've got some serious needs out there and um what are all the alternatives that we have >> and and and mayor and city council you know one of the questions I think it's in the presentation if it's not there is is actually and I put it in the email when we were talking about how where we were at within the process it is also uh what questions we ask of our of our citizenry as to what they're going to do you know you can lump it together in one one question one bond you can separate them out into six different levels. You can follow the four categories here. You can do it a lot of different ways. And so the idea was to I I think when we were talking about it is more of a cafeteria type style saying public safety, public works, enrichment services and such because u something different for all of our citizens. We've we've not done this. I I know council member Garza has has dealt with it a lot at in the school districts and everything, but we haven't went out to our public this way. Uh but I think that's where uh we need to we need to show them of what those needs are and I think that's what's been the best thing about this group. So >> yeah, go ahead. >> Okay. Thank you, sir. Um I just I know like it's it's been almost six, eight months or more since we got this process started, but so much of it was in the hands of the of the bond commission uh committee which was which was great. Uh and then we had some local crises that of course happened um along the way and th this council, you know, we I'm I'm sure we've been communicating with our appointees, but I just want to like remind everyone or refresh set the table like the reason why this type of thing is like for example, San Antonio does a bond referendum election every five years. They just Dallas just did a 1.4 billion one last year. We're not going to go that big because we're not as as large as Dallas. Houston has one every five years in the billions of dollars. So the point the reason why cities have to do that in Texas is because the state legislature lowered the the cap on property taxes that that we can that we can get. So in the past it was six 7% increases uh per year and then just a few years ago there was a battle about it and it was going to be 5% and then it got voted down and then the next session they came back and brought it down to 3%. Um, so that's why cities have to do this across Texas uniquely because because of that cap, which is in a way it's great because it makes sure that it forces cities to be financially responsible and makes them not increase taxes uh too much. And anytime there are some needs or wants wants for the community, you go to the voters and say, "Okay, maybe we can't get this in our in our standard consolidated budget in August." here. We think this is something you might be interested in having. It's your choice, constituents, voters, and taxpayers. So, I just want to remind everybody like this is what all the other cities in Texas are doing. We haven't done this. And um and you know, when I I just get so frustrated when we compare [clears throat] ourselves to other cities like why can't we be like McAllen? Oh, well, how did McGallen get their amazing convention center, their 60,000 foot convention center? It was through this process. It was through a bond referendum election. That's how they got it. So, frustrating when we say, "Well, why can't we be like them, but we're not willing to do what they're doing." So, um, I just want to remind everybody that that is the method of getting some of these extras done in the state of Texas due to what the state has put cities in as a good thing. You know, lowers make sure we're stay responsible. If we want extra things, we have to ask the voters. So, I just want to remind everybody that's where we're at. >> Mayor, if I may. >> Yes, go ahead. Uh I was a liazison for the public safety uh group and talking to both chiefs and and spending time with both departments. The the vehicles were very very necessary for for these departments to function so that they could respond to the emergency calls out there. So when we discussed putting the vehicles forward to the voters, we knew that that was a a high priority, but it's like rolling the dice. And so the question became, should they even be on this? Because if they don't pass, then what happens to the vehicles because they're just going to get further and further behind. And so in talking to bond council, the tax note option is still there. And so ultimately, the vehicles will still be pursued by us because we have to do it in order for the departments to function properly. So, um, it was my recommendation to the city manager, to the committee that we continue to present the vehicles forward because if the public the public knows that if they want a fire truck in front of their house, an ambulance, a police car, they got to support at least that part of the bond. And if they don't, well, then we'll go to the tax notes. So, there's a way to fall back. There's plan B, as Mr. have this in for the vehicles. >> So, are you saying are you saying I'm sorry, mayor address. So, are you saying that it's it's either the tax note or the bond refer the bond referendum? >> If it if it goes forward, mayor, council member, as an item to be voted for this bond and and but we're still rolling the dice. >> Yeah. Well, yeah, they'll vote it down, but then the mechanism of bond council will go for the vehicles under their tax note. So, there's a plan B. So, the the vehicles don't get shut down. That's why you move forward with plan A, but >> the bond the bond is the better way to do it if we can do it. >> It's the more stable way of the process. The tax notes will have an impact on us in the longer term as well too. Generally speaking, to overly simplify things, if it's equipment or vehicles, there's going to be an alternative option to finance it. If we're talking about real property and buildings and streets, uh there aren't other financing options for those. >> And and saying that, mayor council, if it gets voted down for any reason, we still have an option for the most critical things, which are the vehicles to get to the incidents. As far as the buildings are concerned, you know, the fire stations, the training facility, the police headquarters, if they get voted down, we'll just have to wait. But the priority of the vehicles, we have an option. But what would we want to do? We have the best opportunity to get this bond referendum passed. So, let's say that we have the 176 million. H how much would it go down if we is that including the vehicles? >> Yes. >> So, do we have Okay. So, how much is it Do you have the number for the vehicle that broken down for the vehicle? >> It's in the next slide to click it. Probably a couple slides down. >> No. >> Yes. Go ahead. >> Well, actually a question. Um, in the in the book that we were given on the presentations um there's the recommended list by city administration is it doesn't reflect in our packet what was taken out. It the packet is all the opposed. So it's I think it would be beneficial for us to see what was removed and what was recommended and then also at at the same time if we could also get a little bit um I guess more information on like in the fire some of the info on um like the stations and like um I think also the the PD headquarters. I had I had a question about that one too. Um because right now, you know, you all have outgrown your space, mayor, if I may. >> Um I know PD has outgrown their space and we had that discussion about, you know, not owning the the land and all of that, but I had a question for management. Um, since the land is owned by us anyways by airport, is there a way for for us to release that property under TA or TSA guideline or FAA guidelines, federal guidelines? Is there a way for us to get that building removed from their oversight so that it could become police and then we could just grow from like how they had wanted to do before with with the with the annex area like it grow in some of that land that where it already is because if they vacate then that building will become vacant and then you know it's a high cost for them to relocate but um I mean they just want to they just need more space. >> Mayor Mayor city council let me ask answer the question on the FA FAA and and the property ownership and everything. Of course we own the property but it is governed through the FAA because it is considered airport property. That's what we're talking about here. We have an obligation that uh we have to keep the airport whole. So we can release the property to us. Essentially, we're going to purchase the property from ourselves, keep the airport whole, but then we we eliminate the lease payment for that. We've sold property out there that's out outside of the fence area essentially over the years. You I can show you the history with that. Uh but we we have an obligation because of the federal uh protections within within the FAA. We have to protect the airport and that property is essentially funding the airport in some way, shape or form. >> Mayor, >> my argument is that we have we have guarantees within our our whole structure for we guarantee that that airport will be sustainable. >> Right. And that's the only problem that regardless whether we take the land back or not, we still need to continue funding the airport. Correct. >> Those $30,000 that we pay for monthly on the lease needs to be done regardless whether LPD's in the building or they're not in the building. >> We we have to we have to we have to satisfy that requirement within the FA and that's that's the method of how you walk through it. >> Exactly. So whether we take it back or we don't take it back, we need to continue funding them those $30,000 a month. >> Yeah. [snorts] >> I was follow Is there a way to relieve PD from the burden of having to pay that that fee that they were like it's because we're taking it out of PD's budget and and [clears throat] now we're going to be building like a Excuse me, my voice is cracking. Uh yeah, I'm good. Um we're going to be funding a new building somewhere else. We're still going to have these other costs. So, it's I don't know if there's a way to figure out another kind of structure to still expand where they're at and they can meet all what the needs that they have where they're at. And if and then if that would be good enough to bring this cost down >> and and mayor and city council, it it's >> it's just calling it something different really for what it is because the police department is in the general fund and so it's covered by property taxes, sale tax, and and all the bridge funds that go into the general fund. If we were to remove it out of the police department budget, because budgets are to track the expenses associated with this service. So if we remove it out of there, we're still going to pay for it, right? but we're going to pay for it in some other form or fashion. It's still going to be general fund money. It'll still have the same impact on that. It just won't we would we would we could call it facilities maintenance or whatever if you would like, but I think the impact is same. It's uh it's two and a half cents one way, nickel and a half the other because it's it's the same numbers really at the end of the day. I think that's been the challenge that we've had with with um with uh these the general fund services that we provide for that. There are other ways to take the entire service out of the general fund because there is no requirement in state law as to what gets paid for by the general fund. And to and just if I may, Mr. Neb, I I think the uh that was one of the conversations with the committee. And so when you really look at the whole picture as to what we're doing with our rent at headquarters, we're paying about 30 $32,000 a month, right? So it's a 65,000 foot building. Really, we're paying very low rent. If you if you multiply what the market rate is at about maybe 250 $275 two $2.75 a square foot really we we can get another person release that building another department other another entity to release that building and really get fair market you know little rents from but for us right now we just don't fit and so even if we go out and buy the land and add an annex and do all these other things you know we're still going to hit you know we're still going to have to go a bond referendum to do all that and make sure that we have a complete you know headquarters that that fits our our needs. So I think we just we did have this conversation and we had the conversation about also going into maybe a space of like Mald Norte where there was the old Sears building right we looked at that management gave me the green light to look at that and I think the uh the problem with those locations is that it cannot be secured and we cannot be CES compliant there's ements that we have to give them access to there's no way we can secure the parking lot there's a lot of things that go into play with those buildings so we we kind of shy away from those So I think at the end of the day this is this is the direction that I would recommend we go with a new building do everything from brand new and let it stand there for the next 40 50 years so that we don't have to come back and ask our community to fund again the police department be recognized. All right. So, let's say we go. No, I understand that you need the new building in U chief, but is there do do you have another option saying that you have a training? Do you want a training center, but you already have we already you share training center with uh with fire? Is there a way? You don't. >> We don't. >> Okay. Is there any way we can do can we we can do that? And if there's a way we can fund it a you know fund that trainers training center a way that be suitable for you and and for your training and you know is there any way that you can you bring those numbers say you know what we can do this go to that go to that same because it's how many acres there >> so there's multiple acreage available >> at fire >> 260 >> 265 acres so there's a possibility that we can you know maybe do something just add some more money instead of this whole budget of of adding you know buying a new training facility or buying land which are we utilize the land we already have and share it the way you know as you know as as a family you guys are you know public safety >> Mr. Mayor, if I may address that, go ahead. >> That facility was it was named after both departments. PD actually put in money to help build that facility >> and I was assigned out there when I was a district chief back in 2003 2004 as one of the training chiefs and the facility isn't booked all all the time. There's three training rooms available. It is a drive out there. So that's the inconvenience. And I understand that. But what I'm saying, can we work on it? Can we do something, you know, is there anything that we can come up with >> to make it, you know, more suitable to your standards or what you're looking for for the training that you're looking for Mr. >> So, Councilman Rael, I I think, you know, we can we can do anything you want to, right? We can make it happen if we want to. uh what was put forth here is what um talking to command uh best practices is what we were recommending right one of the things that we have challenges with when we're talking about Mines's road area is the fact that PD does training almost every day and so it's a challenge for us to release our our our officers all the way to Mines Road just by going to headquarters and going to Mines Road that's about a 45 minute to close to an hour drive and then getting out of there for and then releasing them. It becomes a burden going all the way out there especially with the traffic and then here comes you know the 5:00 traffic. So things like that we look into also the other thing that we look into how are we going to enter when are we going to do our exercises going through again through the property that is currently accessed by fire department. So disrupting that part of the training you know is just for us it's not really feasible. We we're looking at it but again we can make it happen. It's just The only reason I'm bringing it up, chief, is because I think it's >> I think we're looking for the best opportunity to pass this referendum and to bring to bring the the that number down, you know, to use you utilize as much money as we can. You know, if we bring something, let's say, let's say right now we're at 176. we go to, you know, 75 just for the building or maybe I'm just saying I'm just throwing numbers out there and they're gonna be like, you know what, it's a it's a building that we need and something that, you know, they they are growing that building they have. So, let's let's let's build a bit a bigger uh police station. But, you know, it gives you a bigger I'm just looking to get a better opportunity for the community. I like like like the the other day I heard as a taxpayer as you know, being a taxpayer, you know, as a as a councilman at the same time, you know, I'm seeing, you know, this is the best opportunity not to spend as much, but to utilize everything we got. >> Yeah. and and the the 261 that you see here, a lot of the things that that we were we said that not to prioritize is because we're >> pretty much uh using other funds to sustain till we be able to go to another bond referendum. And what I'm talking about here is also our body cam system. you know, sitting down with management, we were able now to find a way to fund them now because right now we're in a critical situation and we don't have the body cams that are needed. Uh we're in the working conditions that that we need. So right now we're moving forward just on that with the current budget that we currently have. We're in in talks right now. So we remove the $32 million that it takes to sustain that subs because it's a subscription as service. We no longer own the equipment. everything is paid, you know, on a yearly basis. So that $32 million was removed. The tactical equipment, all that stuff that we put input in here, we removed it, we can weigh because we can right now purchase some of the much neededed equipment through trust fund money. So all those things we removed already. We shaved a lot of it. And so this is just the critical needs and we're going to put it to the public and we can very well justify this need to the public. We can go to town hall meetings and show them exactly why we're asking for this >> um so I I I think the discussion here um kind of shows we have a a hard deadline of February 15th >> 14th >> and here we are the end of January and we're still talking about making decisions for the final product and perhaps on Thursday it will all come to pass and our questions can be satisfied and we can have this really amazing plan that we can clearly communicate to the voters because if we can't clearly communicate the money that we're asking for and what it will pay for, I think the chances of it passing decrease dramatically. But there is another option. We could wait till November so that we could finalize these plans and then really do that outreach to our community so they understand and are willing to get on board. And I don't to say that ahead of time. I'm just saying that if on Thursday we come back and we haven't satisfied some of these really basic questions, then maybe we just need to entertain the idea that this is something that should wait for November. >> Council Chief with with the at the rate the city's is growing, it's to uh expand, right? You wouldn't vacate where you're currently at. >> We will vacate. That's our main headquarters. Yes. And so right now we also shaved off uh from this uh ask the uh the central uh sector bureau which is uh what we're doing in south in the in southo area. >> What we're doing next to the wanavista park we're going to do in central lredo. Uh we're also going to do one in north lredo. Right. And what that is, it's a command where people can just go walk in and everybody reports. Everybody that's assigned to that command reports there and has a complete structure, a complete police structure, a captain, lieutenant, and their sergeants and the patrolman. So all that was shaped off. We can go out uh for the the same bonds later in the future and we can do that later. Uh but we will vacate the headquarters that we're in right now. Uh we will no longer need it because that's our main headquarters. we can make it our central command, but I can tell you right now, it's just going to take some upkeeping to make it our central command. So, I I think it's it's it's it's one of those that I'm going to be very honest with you, we would definitely vacate the uh the the building. >> So, with uh 65,000 square feet right now and then at the city annex that you have, what's the total that you're occupying and what what would the new building? >> So, right now we have 60,000 65,000 square feet at the headquarters and then we have an additional 22,000 ft at the annex. itself it's about 80 something. We we're adding uh we're we're we're recommending constructing 120,000 on our first phase. Uh but with a with with a chance to expand that in the future so that we don't have to worry whenever we set out the plans and whenever we can do phase two that phase two. So this also is going to help us in building our our property room and things like that that are we're in much much needed. >> And is this uh the land is the land included included in this? Yes, we included the land. I know we we we spoken to different subject matter experts and and and they're they're they're actually telling me that we should include more money for the land, but my thing is I think we go with something like this and then just build the plans and then build out in phases, right? If there's something that we cannot build, you know, the much critical things that we need as far as space, for example, our 911 center, our 911 center was built in the '90s. So we we outgrew that back in 1996 when we first went in. I mean we're 2025 and we're still operating in the same operating center. So that's critical. Our property room back in the day we were 230 officers. Right now we're 575. So we're talking about a property room that does not fit our our needs. So those are things that are critical. That would be phase one. of course our detective division, our our traffic divisions, our tactical uh division, our training division, all those things that are critical phase one. Phase two, we can worry about the rest. So I know we talk about numbers here. I'm well aware that it might be where the land might not be 5 million, it might be 8 million, then we shave off eight, I know three million from from the building itself. That's the way I'm I'm thinking of maybe formalizing this plan and again getting creative, right? because we want to be make sure that we we get this done >> and being due to this would uh consist of in May. Do we have an area in mind? >> We want to stick into the area of of Saunders uh very very centralized uh headquarters, police headquarters. That's that's our main focus. Uh but again, you know, we've talking to uh our economic develop uh development director uh also Tina, you know, they they have different areas of Laredo where there's also availability of land. So we're we're open to any suggestions. Uh we just want to make sure that where we build there is room for expansion. >> Thank you. Mayor Couple questions. Chief, one thing well two actually. The training facility $33.4 million. Is that including the purchase of land? I'm assuming it is. How much money was budgeted for land? >> 5 million. >> 5 million. Yes. So as you all know, we have property at Pinto Minto. We've got property at the 13 mile marker. Consider the rate of own, thousand acres. I think >> 1500 >> 1500 acres out there. So, we'd be able to shave that. And the reason why obviously, you know, we want to shave it because we want to make it look pretty for the public because these are things that the city needs. You all need it. The public safety needs it. And obviously, our citizens need public safety. That's what we, you know, we thrive on you all being us being the safest city in Larredo. So, those are things we can shake. Can you let me know what was cut from the 261 million to get us down to the 176? Do you know exactly what was cut? We have the entire list here. LPD headquarters 110, the training facility 33, sector sector station 9 million, warehousing. Do you have that? >> If I may answer that question that was presented earlier in the packet that we submitted in the first tab that has a recap and impact. >> The the very first page is a summary, but as you go through the pages, you're going to find each each uh public each one of the uh categories in there. So there's one for police in there and the the one in green is showing what was approved. So you can go down the list and you can see what was left out in >> Yes. Go ahead. Is there a possibility you can get that package here so we can see >> just the power for that? >> For the list >> for the list. Yeah. Because we're having the conversation. We're going back and forth and we're seeing what's cut off and me and councilman we're trying to figure out even trying to figure out what are we're talking about right now. So I was just wondering if you have the PowerPoint just to see >> in the PowerPoint we don't we didn't go down into the detail because it it is quite extensive as it lists every item in there. I mean we can >> come back I'm asking can we get it right now? So >> we have time still we still have time. >> Do we have extra books and everything anywhere? Um, >> do you have I can provide Do you go over here? Do >> you have ahead? >> I can provide you a copy of the book. >> I have some here. Let me sir. We might have some right here. Thank you. >> Okay, there we go. >> Mr. Neil, will we be discussing this in on Thursday? >> I I would hope we would. Yes. And and and if we could uh while while we're handing those out and everything, if we could pull back up the slide on the impact analysis, you know, we're we're we're talking about the structure of of what should be in each one of these projects and everything. I wanted to focus a little bit on this slide here with everybody. Mayor, if I could, while we're while we're handing out there, >> when we talk about the impact to our taxpayers and everything, the information is here. And this is what I want to show you. and and the mayor mayor alluded to it at the state of the city as well too for over 23 years we have lowered our tax rate every one of those years and and so we in my mind when we go to the taxpayers we're asking just for some of that back in order to kind of make that difference so we can have that impact analysis slide yeah and yeah this is the historical tax rate but on the on the what one of the things that I wanted to make sure that we put together and if you look across the top it says each penny that is the estimate the one penny the 10 cents the 13 cents the 15 and the 20 so regardless of what you put in there and I'm I'm going to back you from give me a number and then we'll fill the number up right so that's the concept that I'm wanting to walk through that each penny will generate uh that amount of money in that second uh line that's filled out the estimated bond capacity when we do the leveraging of that is there the home valuation $200,000 is a average of our home values in Laredo. And so we use the average because you can go plus or minus. If it's if it's more expensive, it'll be higher. If you if it's less, it's lower. Look at the estimated increase as we go through there. So now both the bond referendum committee and the city management, however you want to break up the projects is fine. We're right about that 13 cent column right there in the middle. Okay? If you so if you look at the 13 cent column and come down if a if a value is home if a home is valued at $200,000 a year the estimated increase for $500 million is $250 a year. All right, that equates to $2083 a month. What I want to make sure you see that the leveraging of these funds in order to do the capital is what what we have the benefit of doing with with with Laredo. It's that leveraging out because of our community. We're able to have an impact. We were able to borrow $500 million which pretty much takes care of everything on on either one of those lists. There's there's room for movement as well too. Uh but it's a $2083. Now, I'm not I'm not going to say whether or not somebody can afford or not afford that. That's not I don't think that that's something that you all have to think about when you're doing that, but that impact um at $20 a month just for the adjustment. Look at all the projects that we can do and look at the work that we can do. We can get public safety moving in the right direction. We can get public infrastructure moving. We have room for the quality of life stuff. Um the the Hamilton Hotel, that one on there is that's the that's the uh repairs of the Hamilton Hotel that need to be done for HBAC, the windows, all that work of of that that affordable housing that we have there. So, uh but I wanted to make sure I drew the attention to that because I don't know if the numbers too high or too low that I think that's everybody. That's what the voters are going to determine. But at $2083 a month, that's the impact for doing this. I also want to leave you with as well too, our goal with this and every every of all of our sister cities out there, all of our comparables out there, you go out for a bond referendum every 5 to seven years and then you and then it kind of cycles through and then as everything falls off, it comes back on. We're doing that right now with our regular bonding as well, too. That's why we're able to reduce our tax rate while we're while we're doing all the wonderful things that we're doing. So the whole idea about this is that we we go out every five to seven years. And so when when Chief Rodriguez is looking at that and when he says here's my top priorities and then here's the secondary [clears throat] that most of that list in there is tactical stuff I believe is the way Chief Rodriguez had mentioned that. He said we might be able to hold on to that. Some of it's out of grant money and everything. As long as that all stays stable, we can still get a lot of wonderful things done. But the the challenge we have is that we're g if we do our jobs right, we'll be going back out in about seven years and saying, "Hey, what did we do about these things as well, too?" And that's the challenge we have with Laredo. It's a growing community. We're we're not slowing down. I think we heard that with the port of entry. it's going to pick up and and I think that but I wanted to make sure you saw the true impact to what our taxpayers are. We are working very hard to try to keep those numbers in check, keep those numbers in line because we're all taxpayers too, right? And we're trying to make that sense of that, but we also understand the importance of public safety, public infrastructure, all of our quality of life. So, I'll I'll get off my soap box, but I wanted to make sure I shared this slide with you because I would really like when we get to Thursday or when we have the opportunity that we can walk through all this information. This it's really to to u to complement all the work that that bond referendum committee did. They they they worked hard. They beat each other up. They they had some really good conversations. And now it's now we're trying to set it in front of you saying okay which projects are a priority to take to our taxpayers in order to uh have the best chance of success with this. I'll I'll stop at that. Go >> ahead for that. I just wanted to clarify with this chart that's home valuation of 200,000 that and that's roughly Laredo's average. But we also now have a for the next four years anyway thanks to our state legislature a $100,000 homestead tax deduction. So really um the median home value of 200,000 you deduct a hundred,000 from that and it's even less than that for >> Yeah. I'll I'll leave that to bond counsel for for those with their homestead. I just want correct me if I'm wrong. >> Point of clarification on that. So the $100,000 homestead exemption that passed last legislative cycle was for ISD school district taxes, not city taxes. >> Just for Okay, apologies. Thank you. Mayor if >> yes, go ahead. >> Um, so we we did just have we just did we did just have that conversation about like, you know, earlier about the the bridge tolls and everything. Um, I think there might be a way for us to kind of be specific on, you know, finding revenue for some of these items, um, in a way that it doesn't result in like a big increase for people that may not want to vote in favor of of something like that. I think um times that we've bonded out have been for specific projects like do you want the sports complex? Do you want this? Here we're asking for a lot of items that um some people may not um want to agree to an increase of of taxes to pay for. So, um I know that the committees tried really hard to um request, you know, give us your entire wish list. Um and I know that we're kind of tasked with the responsibility and and when you say for us to consider affordability, I think that is our job, right? Is to kind of consider what the that [clears throat] affordability level is for our constituents. And um you know, I think for most people um a $30 a month increase would be a lot. I I think even um for a lot of people some of these numbers would be would be hard for them. So um I think it would be helpful for uh the departments to tie their asks to the different levels as well like um you know if we were going to go with let's say a 10 cent um what would what would their ask look like versus you know giving us their ideal right I think that would be helpful for us because I understand that for police and fire with public safety you you know, everything is is a priority and and we we're we're never keeping up when it comes to parks and wreck. You know, we're never keeping up with the needs. Um we just I just want to make sure that whatever we present to the public is is a successful package, something that they can feel feel good about funding and for it not to be a thing that they feel that like, well, where did where did my tax money go? Because then they're not going to support future ones. Mayor, if I can add a comment to Mr. Mr. Nep was saying, >> the 250 at the 13 cents or 15 cents that would generate the 600 million, which would be a $25 impact on the monthly amount would not come into effect on year one. As we get the projects approved, we would only be issuing the debt that we would be building on on a year within the next five years, per se. So we might have five issuance in the next five years to cover the projects as they relate. So we're looking at 500 million. Let's say we're going to just for example purposes, we're going to issue 100 million every year. So the tax the the the 20 the the $250 or $300 would not be an impact on year one. It would be phasing as we issue some of these projects and or we start the projects and issue the the bonds themselves because the the other side of it is the M. we're going to have to tie in the when we do the projects that have an M and as we move forward in property taxes generate more that's when we're going to be able to absorb that because the other potential there is that we would have to then address the M side as we address on this projects that we're doing. So I just wanted to point out it's not an instant $250 $300 per taxpayer at as we initiate it will be throughout the next five years or as we execute this project going [clears throat] forward. Um, and I'm listening here to you. Um what I might suggest a couple of things for Thursday is that when we talked about the cars and everything else that that you guys have mentioned um that you come prepared for any scenario of questions that might be asked in terms of um answering how we would get the cars and which is a it's a viable question that people are going to want to see because everything that they've wanted over the past six months I think this bond referendum has been going on Um I may have I may have a different view of this but I mean I I really think that everything that is in there is absolutely necessary. All right. So um the idea of of of cutting it down to the bone and and and not getting and getting the bare minimum from from these bonds defeats the whole purpose. Right. But if you do have other options to get other things that do not belong like in the vehicles have a five 10 year life expectancy. So yeah this it doesn't belong in there but everything else that goes in there that's going to last you for 30 years the brick and mortar and all that kind of stuff. I really don't think that we should short change ourselves because you just mentioned a key component of it right there and there that a lot of people might not know. The bond issuances don't you you get the you pass the 500 and some odd million dollar bond. It doesn't go straight for you don't go buy or you don't go sell those bonds at 500 million. You buy you sell them as you go along. Whatever project you have, you want to start the police department first, you sell those bonds and then you phase everything in as you go along over a long period of time. By the time you finish, you're almost at the next level to go out for bonds again. And I think that's the idea. But the but the the qu the other question that should be asked is that whatever else that you're going to get the cars and everything else where well you just mentioned that you'll be getting off of another um I forgot what you called it. >> Yeah. So so now we we have to be looking at what kind of uh you know debt load debt load are we looking at you know across over a period of time is what we're going to need. So and how is that going to affect our bond rating after that? So those questions I guess can can be answered um on Thursday. But I think the most important part about Thursday is to figure out and kind of lay at ease everything else that that that we're talking about here and saying we still have a lot of other options to go and consider before you know we we start slashing everything to death. You know because the other thing that I was worried about as I spoke to the chief uh when I went to go visit their department is that by the time this police station we go break ground, it's going to be three years from now. We don't know what the cost of equipment and materials and all that kind of stuff is going to be. It can be the whatever they they satisfied or whatever they put 8%. But at the end of the day, it might be 10 12%. We just don't know. And so, um, I would love to see that we we we settle in and we get comfortable with the idea that May is going to be the day because it is it is I've gone to a police station and it is something that we need and it is something that the public should understand and know that we are in dire need of a new police station. So, uh, I can only speak for myself in saying that, uh, that that I wouldn't sell our our our numbers short with what we have. In fact, I think I spoke to chief that I might say we we're short in some areas. Uh but I I think we should really consider um every angle and every question that's out there that the public is going to want to know because we do need I mean he does really need the vehicles, you know, and so uh for Thursday, I would I would just suggest that we come uh prepared to have an answer for those things. And so because really what you're doing is you're practicing for those type of questions that the public is going to ask. Everybody's going to be wanting to know, you know, why did you slash it here and where did this where are we going to get the money for that? And then we asked Mr. Nip, how's that going to affect us in our general fund or how are we going to be doing, you know, to to satisfy our budget. So, uh, I think that's my two cents for it. And, uh, hopefully we can get get all that tightened up by by Thursday. and and mayor uh to councilman council member Gatsu's point one of our committee members in one of the meetings made a very good point as the committees were trying to add or remove basically remove some of these items that was going to be presented to the council to y'all and that was that anything that we remove there we're taking the ability from that constituent or that citizen to vote on it. Uh so if it's not there for them to vote, they cannot vote it in for example. So that was one take away from me from one of those committee members that said anything that we take or like you're saying reviews, they don't have the ability to say, well, I do want that and I I I'm willing to vote and take an increase on that because I'm going to see something beneficial for for them and their community. Well mayor >> so let's uh hopefully Thursday we can have even the committee members that were involved in in all this come out and be invited so they can come in and just have their two cents and ask them as not only as a committee member but as a you know as a citizen and a taxpayer why it was the reason that you you you voted this way or you decided to go this way. So you make a big point. And if I may, I uh I have the next slide that that I was trying to touch base on was a historic tax increase rate for the tax rate that we have. If we look at the left side, fiscal year 15, our tax rate was 64 cents. And as to council members, uh Dr. King's point in 21 is when the changes came about and that's where the tax rate started reducing to 62 57 53 and we're at 51. >> So just for illustration purposes that green bar would be like the $500 million amount and like Mr. mentioned maybe we can look at what that amount what amount are we comfortable with and maybe come back and backfill the projects that we need to but if we were to get to the 500 margin we would be basically at 63 cents which is still below a penny of what we were in 2015 and that is the impact that Dr. King was touching on and the difficulty that general fund has had to balance the budget. We were we were going from an 8.5% growth to a 3 and a half% now and that is a challenge that we have in general fund. General funds budget is 278 million. It is not the 958 million that we talked about which is our consolidated budget that represents every other department that we have. General fund relies on 278. That's the the fund that provides most of the services that our citizens get for public safety, parks, and those type of of uh programs that we have in there. And it is very difficult when we balance the budget because we're basically using every penny we get to provide those services. So when it comes to your point, when it comes to me building a building, there's no possibility we can do it through the regular general fund. It has to be through referendums where we get this authorization to to do this projects. Now, the other point I guess that I wanted to make just really quick is just because we have the 521 million, it's it it's it's what the citizens are giving us the authority to bond for. So, it's not necessarily we're going to go ahead and do it because we need to make sure we absorb the M as I mentioned before. So, just wanted to make two of those points. Uh, but I wanted to make sure that we just covered this slide because this would get us back to 2015 tax rate that we had back then and uh, madam chair. >> Yes, >> man. Why is it that we came in with came in with the number 120 million for pay for public s for public uh, public works and we didn't have a committee for that? We have a committee for everything else except for public works, you know, finding out, you know, if they >> Yeah. And mayor, mayor and city council, the there was a public infrastructure committee subcommittee within that structure. what um what I believe when when they went through their conversation when they went through their debate uh the recommendation because there's about three recommendations coming out of the bond referendum committee that are were not related directly to their specific requirements of what their what their mission was. Uh but one of them was they wanted to have the city council consider taking five cents out of your current tax rate and committing it to streets which would generate x number of millions of dollars in order to do that work. Of course the bond referendum committee and and I had that conversation with them as well too. The bond referendum committee is to figure out what bond referendum we should look for debt service. That's really what the their their mission was. But that recommendation will be coming forward to you from the bond revenue committee because but I I I said it was outside their scope and and so the idea was uh that was a recommendation that you probably saw that same recommendation in the charter revision. They wanted to put that into the charter uh rules that part of our current money goes to streets because nobody's going to complain that they're streets. The reason we got to the 120 million was is that we have 900 miles of roads. They have a life expectancy of probably 25 years. If you figure that up per lane mile and Mr. Chavez can can get into some of those numbers if we need to. We figure we need about 30 to$34 million a year going into our roads right now. Currently with the work that Mr. Orila is doing is the PR we we do some other road reconstruction, but the majority of our work is three to four million dollars a year is what we're getting done. And I I believe that at some point in time and and Mayor Pro Tim Perez talked about that as well too. We we've got a lot of good synergy within our conversations. Our roads are going to wear out faster because of what we are. I mean because of all that traffic that we see coming and going. So in in our estimation for city management 30 to $34 million you need every year in order to go to that. That'll help um that'll strengthen what Mr. Orfield is doing. That'll help with the engineering and doing all the extra the streets. I would I would argue that it will also help us add new roads that we need or it'll be our local match or whatever you want to call as we try to grow our north, south, and our east west corridors to help alleviate the traffic. And so that's why we ended up with where we were at. Uh and in my mind, since we're only looking at a five to sevenyear window, I wanted to change the mindset. I wanted to make sure that we were putting public infrastructure dollars out there and I think that's what we were all talking about trying to say we have to have some money in there. That's how we got to the 120 million. >> Okay. [clears throat] >> Go ahead. >> Does anybody have any questions at this point? I did mention I think I had a this slide here. We didn't go over it. This is kind of an approximate of what the M would be. Uh we're projecting it's about $42 million on the M for all the different projects. And I think that's all I have for you today. Uh I look forward having another meeting and go over the the other different projects or uh recommendations that council might have. >> All right. Thank you. >> There's one question over it. I understand there's a lot of things here um but to be able to separate um what which which items have a 20 year lifespan versus 5 10 >> and >> yes mayor and city council council member yes we can do that we can we can establish and at least give you that life expecty of any one of those items that are on there. Uh we and and I think based upon the conversation that we heard as well too, we need to do a little bit more on our M side and so that every you have the full picture of how we will absorb it and how it would fit. So but we'll take the booklet has the breakdowns within the booklet. We'll make sure that we we adjust those worksheets to show all that information. Mayor motion to open a public hearing in the ordinances. Motion second. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion pass. Number one, public industry ordinance authorizes the city manager to grant non-existent franchise of Coyote Invato STX to use and present the future streets avenues alleys roads highways, sideways, easements, and other public rights for the city of Laredo for purpose of constructing, maintaining, and operating a commercial container, refuge, gathering, and disposing service franchising will be deposited with the general funds. Number two, public ordinance of the city of Ledo, Texas, amending chapter 6 animals and follow of the code of ordinances by reinstating the full function of animal care services of the division of the rad health public health department abolishing the animal care department and director position originating to ordinance 2016132 designating assistant director of supervisor responsibilities over the division defining key terms setting enforceable restrictions of animal ownership and keeping in conformance this current state law providing that this ordinance shall be cumulative provided severability clause providing for publication declared an effective date. Number three, public ordinance amend city radio court orders chip 28 article 9 public right ofway management division 1 section 28-165 definition section 28-167 to the deportation defining hydro excavation mandating hydro excavation to expose existing utilities of public rideway that provide for the greater control to reduce the potential damage to save's infrastructure public rightway number four public interestree ordinance to save Texas amending the city of radio's FY2025 annual budget by appropriating revenues and expenses in an estimated amount of 900 9,000 in the 2019 certificate of obligation bond affecting various funds 2019 co 2019 co environmental and 2019 co transit funds the interest earnings being appropriated for are for the are for the arbitrage liability payment due to the US treasury funding is available in the 2019 certificate of obligation bond various funds number five public interest free order the city of Larredo Texas amending the city of Laredo's fiscal year 2025 annual budget by appropriated revenues and expenditures in the estimated amount of 150,000 in the waterworks and sewer system funds 2019 waterwork sewer revenue bond. The interest earnings being appropriated are for the AR arbitrage liability payment due to the US Treasury. Number six, public interest report. The save Laro Texas amend the Sar Lo fus fisc year 1225 annual budget by appropriating revenues and expenditures in the estimated amount of 28,360 to the 2019 personal property finance contractual obligation bond. The interest earnings being appropriate to the for the arbitrage liability payment due to the US Treasury fund is available in 2019 PFCO bond. Number seven, an ordinance is the city of Rado, Texas, amending chapter 19, article 7 of the code of orders by adding subsection N to prohibit the parking of vehicles on a public street within 8 ft of the mailbox. Number eight, for the union discussion of the voluntary annexation initial zoning of M1 light manufacturers on attractive land totally 8.55 acres more or less as described by meets and values of the day and known as annexation track five all carriers track located south of FF 1472 and southeast of diesel road. The plan zoning commission recommends the approval of the annexation initial zoning staff supports the annexation and initial zoning. Number nine, public hearing for public hearing and discussion on the voluntary annexation initial zoning of M1 light manufacturers on a track of land totaling 13.4940 acres more or less as described by meets and bounds in the attached exhibit A is known as annexation track 6 L track located west of West Park Road and north of Elpico Road. The plan zoning commission recommended approval of the annexation initial zoning staff supports the annexation and initial zoning. Number 10, public hearing and discussion. Public hearing and discussion on the volunteer annexation and initial zoning of M1 light manufacturing edition on the track of land totaling to 120.32 acres more or less as described by means and vows in the attached exhibit A known as annexation track 7 fast R investments track located north of FM 1472 and west of FM 3338. The plan zoning commission recommended approval of the annexation and initial zoning staff supports the annexation and initial Number 10. Number n. >> All right. >> Pardon me. >> Okay. Any motion to close and introduce? So move. >> Yeah. For against start with number one. >> Four or against. For against or against. >> Okay. >> Second. Motion passes. Number two. Four against. Four against. Four against. Motion second. All in favor? >> Motion pass. Number three. Four or against. Four or against. Four or against. >> Motion to close. Introduce. >> Second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> Opposed. Motion passes. Number five. Four or against. Number four. >> Number four. Sorry. Four. Number four. Four or against. Four or against. Four or against. >> May. >> Yes. Go ahead. Um I I would assume this would be addressed to city management. I would just like an explanation of what arbitrage liability payments are and how um the 2019 certificate of obligation bonds are need how we are obligated to pay this to the US Treasury for bonds that were over six years old now. Good evening, Mayor City Council. Ruby Savala, assistant financial director. For the for the record, um, usually in all of our bonds, uh, we have a three year three year that we can spend all of our interest earnings without having a rebate liability. Basically, what that means is that whatever interest is earned on bonds on the first three years, the city gets to keep them. You we do not have to to pay them back. After the three years of a bond when you still have balances left over any interest generated has to be returned to the US Treasury if it's not spent the interest generated especially and only when um whatever we're we're paying the the investors let's say for example in the 2019 that you were saying we sold those bonds at 2.45%. And after COVID and everything that happened and inflation the market was um CDs were doing very well they were earning to 550%. So you see we were earning way more than we were paying our investors. So we have um um we have full top securities is actually our arbitrage consultant and they every five years they do this rev calculations for all of our bonds and so this time it was a 2019 so for these past years uh they earned um in combination of all the threes about 1.8 million of of interest earnings that have to return to the US treasury. So my recommendation is just like whenever we get bonds spend them within the within the three years. >> All right. Um Mr. Neb, is there uh so this gets very technical, right? Because a lot of these bonds are put out for projects um that we don't necessarily know the details. We make assumptions about that money being spent and yet here we are having having not spent all of the money. Were the projects completed? Were they changed? How is it that we end up with such a large payment? >> So, and mayor and city council, uh, this was a conversation that we had and this is a a renewed interest. Finance has been working really hard for the last I I say the last nine months for sure, at least within this whole budget year as well too. We are we keep we we are asking the departments to spend the old money first. And so if you if you we have a we have a sheet now that finance carries with them that shows even money that we had sitting back from 2016 and we use that money close it out move it forward because I don't think there's I don't know if it's leftover cash essentially for that but that we have to account for it up in that process and so what happened is and I we we when we found that uh you know this this ends up happening for this year but our marching orders coming forward forward as we get this money spent so that we don't keep returning the interest, the extra interest with on that money. >> And so, >> well, and as um as council member Gapsa was um commenting earlier that we do need to be very good stewards of the money. And this is not I don't think the public should mistake this to mean that somehow um there was something going on that wasn't properly accounted for. Actually, this is a way to keep very close tabs on what the city is spending. And um I'm very happy that our finance department is looking all the way back to all of the money that's out there to make sure that we do meet our obligations. But um with such a a large fund, I would like to make sure that or I'm sure council would like to make sure that the projects were completed as intended. So, in a really really layman's terms and a simpler way to to actually say this is that essentially we're paying back the interest we should never have earned. >> Right. >> That's the method of what this is because we should have spent it on the projects that we borrowed the money for. And uh some of that's out there and yes, exactly what you're talking about. We have a big utility. There's a lot of funds that are in there. uh saving grace is that some of those funds are being reallocated to the work that we're we're doing in order to to replace the lines and everything, but uh I think we have a system coming forward that we won't run into this situation. We should it should be very rare from here on out. >> I I think that's the the best suggestion to make sure that the our systems are in place to avoid this situation in the future. >> Thank you. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> All right. We move forward. Okay. Second. >> All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. Number five. Four or against. Four or against. Four or against. >> Motion tot. >> Motion. Second. >> Second. >> Second. All in favor. >> Opposed. Motion pass. Number six. For or against. Four or against. Four or against. >> Motion to close and introduce. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Second. All in favor? I >> oppose. Motion passes. Number seven. Four against. Four against. Four against. >> I think motion table. >> Motion. Motion. Second. All in favor? >> I oppose. Motion passes. Tabled. Item number seven. Number eight. Four or against. Four or against. Four or against. >> Apologies. Just really quick, Vanessa from your planning staff. >> Yes. Uh good evening, mayor, members of the council. Uh these items are on not for action. They're just for discussion purposes and public hearing. So we'd be happy to give a presentation or we can do that at the next meeting if you so choose. >> Please >> for eight. >> Yes. Number eight. >> Number eight through uh 10. >> How long is that explanation? We can leave it for the next meeting if >> we can do we can do it the next meeting. >> I think we should for the next meeting. Thank you. All right. >> Just to close the public hearing. >> Close the public hearing. >> Give you an explanation of the voluntary annexation. >> All right. Next meeting. >> No, not introduce. Just close the public hearing. >> That was 8 n. >> All right. >> Next is number 11. motion to introduce uh motion to open the inter. >> Motion second. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion pass number 12. Four against four against four against motion to approve final reading of ordinances. 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 >> 20 >> I'd like to call out 15, please. If we could >> 15 is out quick. >> You have to go all the way. >> No, I I would I'm sorry. I retracted. I retracted it. >> 15 retracted. >> Yeah, >> that's fine. >> Continue. Motion to approve the ordinances 13 through 20 and I'll continue to 21, 22, 23, and 24. >> Second motion second. All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion passes. >> Motion open up the consent agenda 256. Motion >> second. >> Second. All in favor. >> Are we I'm sorry, what what items? >> We're just opening up 25 and 26. >> Thank you. >> Opposed? Motion pass. >> Mr. Richard, anything on 25 or 26? >> Recommendation for approval. >> Correct. Uh Ken Richard, interim director. We have a motion for approval on items 25 and 26. >> Motion to approve 25 and 26. >> Second motion. Second. All in favor? >> Number 27. >> At 28. >> 27 28. Mr. N. >> Motion to [snorts] approve. Yes, sir. Uh, please. Uh, yeah, these are both just the updates. You have all the information as to our legislative trips as to what we're going to try to cover. >> Second. >> May I have a question? Um, will you be uh assigning us? I saw the the schedule of meetings that they're still developing. Are you going to have assign well assignments or um >> Yeah. Yeah. Mayor and city council. As soon as we have a a confirmation on what meetings we have, then we'll put out the all call and we'll we'll we'll essentially divide and conquer, right? And we'll try to get everybody on everything that they want to participate with. Uh because that it seems to work really really well. At least it did last year. So that'll be the intent. >> Yes. Go ahead. >> Uh so Mr. Do you have any do we have any samples of what we're trying to to find in legislation right now? >> I'm sorry. Sorry. Do we have like uh the the categories right now at least >> just to >> Yeah, I I believe they were sent out and uh we do have them. >> No, but just also so the public can see what we're trying to Yes. So we're trying to go figure out. Thank you, Mr. >> Karen. Go back. Yes. For the record. Yes, we do. Um so they are part of this agenda and we will have a a landing page on our website with that information as well and that goes part of our efforts of um having more like engagement and communication about these topics both internally and externally as well. So that is available. >> Yes. And and mayor and council member yell we'll make sure that we put all that information out there. We're going to keep you hopping. We're going to keep you busy. >> Yeah. Hopefully we we use uh PIO to encourage the community to have to engage us and in case they like like the veterans did today uh in case they want to have any information for us to ask in legislation and just to ask them to any questions they want us to ask. >> Certainly make sure that they have that that opportunity and that to reach out and have that uh that opportunity just to have >> Yeah. Yeah. I understood. We can make sure that that happens as well too. And then and we'll also have uh what the municipal league puts out saying these are the bills that are going to affect your work as a city and then you'll be able to help with those as well too if that's what you choose to do. So yes sir >> and ju just a quick comment to council member Sro's uh question regarding the call. I did send out um what we had since Friday. We have had a few more meetings added and I will send that again um to you tomorrow. But from those of you who have joined us before, some of them do come very last minute. So, we'll try to move you around and and update you as they come. But um we'll have to follow up tomorrow for that. >> I'm sorry. From the top of your head, do you know if there's an animal shelter uh meeting? >> There's not um a like an an item specific to that. We are meeting with the department of state health services and they do oversee some programs related um to uh funding for possible animal care issues. So that is one of the topics that we want to discuss with them. But we do have a lot of health um issues here. So um if we don't get to that then I've already mentioned to them that we are willing to go up again or hold a virtual meeting to talk specifically about that issue. >> Okay. And we can have a >> yes included. Okay. All right. >> Motion to approve number 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 through 32, 33, and 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, >> 39, and up to 41. >> 32. >> Anything else? Go up to 32. Motion motion open number 32. >> Second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion pass. 32. >> Consideration to renew contract FY24-029 sensible services, Holy Springs, North Carolina for billing and provider credentiing services for the detoxification department for an annual amount of 216,000 for a total contract value amount of 648,000. This award was for a one-year period and provided for the possible extension of this contract for two additional one-year term periods upon mutual agreement of both parties. This is the first extension of two and funding is available in detoxification budget. Hello, Dr. Mine. I just wanted to ask um and and it it could be just the way it was written is what does the $648,000 cover? >> Um good evening, Mayor Council. Dr. Ri Minis detoxification director for the record. >> So uh what Sensville does for us they do all our credentiing applications and maintain our credentiing with our network providers commercial insuranceances on Medicaid and Medicare and they do all the billing for us. Um so we document in our EMR they extract everything to conduct the billing and then um any um anything that gets denied any appeals that um happen for insuranceances that do not want to approve and then also the continuation uh for services as they usually um approve anywhere from five to seven days. Our patients say up to three weeks at times. So then when the uh authorization expires then they uh move forward with um getting that authorization renewed. >> So is well it says the annual amount is 216,000 and the total contract value amount is 648,000. >> So they have already they've already done a year with us. Um the original proposal was that we could extend them up to two more years. So to um the first year was a little more little more than the 216,000 because it included some initial applications and whatnot. So the total the 648,000 would be the total for if they were to get renewed [clears throat] this year and then the following year it would be for a total of three years worth of services. >> Okay. I think >> mayor council just to clarify your question we're trying to put into Hi Mata agent for the record. >> Thank you. >> I'm sorry. Um we're trying to put here in every agenda item um the annual amount that we're going to spend on that contract. However, the contract value includes um the possible extensions for you to preapprove basically the extensions whether the city would like to either extend the contract or decides to terminate. >> So does that mean that you would not come back to council for the next contract extension? >> Correct. that would expedite the process for every department because if we bring it back for an extension, it usually takes more time um to be able to continue to terminate the contract with with with the vendor. >> Okay. And is is that a normal practice then that you extend out and you don't kind of keep >> in my experience? Yes, it of course it depending on management. Um we we had already spoken to legal about it and they said that it would be possible for us to include it like this. So we won't have the same items coming back again and again and again for five years or for three years or for the for the amount of the of the contract uh term. Well, if if management's comfortable with that, it I guess it's just the idea that council provides some um oversight, but >> correct. >> To be honest, if if management is looking over it, then I think >> well actually that's it. It this is only if the contract stays as is. Of course, any amendments to a contract, we have to bring it back to council. >> So, management, what do you what do you recommend? What is the your recommendation? Yeah, our our recommendation mayor and city council is to approve this and move forward. We had a successful year with them last year and so this is just an extension of that with with no changes. Is that correct? >> Correct. >> Yeah. >> Motion to approve number 32. >> Motion second. >> Second. All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. >> I would I would I would just like to add um because this is a question we get very often. We average approximately $200,000 a month worth of billing. We don't necessarily get all that. Any of you that have worked with insuranceances is right, you will build an amount and then whatever they but we do, you know, because it does seem like a very high amount, but we are averaging $200,000 worth of billing per month. Um, and that is um, you know, based on what we're billing for right now. And so we have about 32% of our all of our population with some sort of insurance. Most of the insuranceances are for underserved individuals which are mainly from the uh uh marketplace but just so you can get an idea. So what would cost us for a year is what we build for in one month. >> All right. Great. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Motion to approve number 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50. Second. Motion. Second. All in favor? I motion passes. Motion to approve number 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70. >> Second motion second. All in favor? >> Opposed? Motion pass. Motion to approve. 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84. >> Yes sir. >> Table item 83. >> Motion table 83. >> Motion second favor. >> Table number 83. >> 84. Correct. Okay. Motion to approve 84, 85, 86, 87, 88. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I post. Motion pass. >> Motion to approve. 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 >> 101. 101 out >> 102 and 103 >> motion accept uh >> 101. >> All in favor? >> I motion pass >> 101 item number 101 authorizing the city manager to execute change order number one to DM Tanks Inc. of Wakeville, Massachusetts in the amount of 347,819 and87 cents for the Southline ground storage tank demolition and replacement project. Supervised contract amount is 9,622,13987. Funding is available in the waterworks fund 2022 water revenue bond. Uh hello Mr. Fisher. >> Good evening. >> Um it is a very large amount for a change order and so I was just wondering if you could explain a little bit why it's needed. >> I can. Um, as most of you know, we've changed the scope of that project at the Lion's Tank to accommodate a park and some other things. And that then created a deviation from the original plans, which is what the note is here. And so therefore, we had to reconfigure the piping and some of those things. Uh, so that count that is a big part of this. And then you're also probably aware we're installing a new 36 inch line which will end up at that tank site and go to the Jefferson plant. Uh so we're accommodating that that 36 in connection is part of this activity so that we don't have to dig the ground up again when the pipeline gets there. So it's a combination of things. We've changed elevations to accommodate driveways and things to get into the park, which has modified the piping. And we're accommodating the 36 in now as part of this versus when the pipeline gets there. >> So the park proposal, how much is that >> or I guess is does it exist just around the tanks? Yes, there's a walk pattern and a little park that's being created around those tanks and there's an entrance to that and that's changed the barrier walls and the and a bunch of the elevations and there's a driveway now that goes in there. So, uh that's that's the uh elevation change that changed the piping. >> All right. Well, thank you very much for the explanation. >> You're welcome. >> I'm sorry, sir. The also the the 36 in line is ted out so that minimal minimal damage will occur when when you come back into it. >> Yes, we're we're proposing to make that u adjustment now so that we don't have to re-exavate when the pipeline gets there. >> Smart. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Motion to approve number 101. >> Second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I post. Motion pass. Mayor, before we go into executive session, can we skip to Laredo Mass Transit Board? So, my motion is to recess as a Laredo City Council and convene as a Laredo Mass Transit Board. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion pass. >> Motion to approve number 109, 110, and 111. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Yes. >> We need to approve this first. >> All in favor? >> I motion passes. The motion to adjurnn as a Larredo Mass Transit Board and reconvene as Larredo City Council. >> Second. All in favor? I vote. Motion pass. >> One. And I believe we can bring it together with uh Mr.'s agenda co-sponsored by Mr. Second, we bring also agenda item which was >> uh 112 C12. >> All right. >> Second, would you like to >> did you want to add something? >> It's about utilities. No. Okay. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion passes. discussion with possible action and update on how utility department manages the m maintenance and ex exercising the vows as well as the documentation documentation of contractors and any other matters incidents there too. The reason I'm bringing up this item is that I know that last time we had this uh this water boil uh we had a problem with uh working the the vows that we had and I want to know if we have any if we have a program or something you know already end of movement and see if we had you know how many vows we have how many how many times we exh you know exercise them and the the more critical vows have you changed them and how many vows do we have around the city? Do you have that those numbers, Mr. Pittsburgh? >> A lot. [laughter] >> I'm saying I think >> I don't have the exact number. >> I'm thinking around 59,000 vows that are under 59 to 40 59,000 more or less. >> Uh that sounds like a lot to me, but a lot more than a lot. >> Yeah. So, but anyways, it's a lot. We still got to have a program that is that we're working those vows >> because we're trying to isolate. Last time that we had the problem, we couldn't isolate from one side to the other. >> Let me remind council of the presentation I made when I first came here >> with that little seessaw and I talked about valve programs and water leak detection and those kind of things. Uh, and I'll remind council that you approved my request to purchase two valve turning trailers. Uh, those should be arriving here fairly soon. That program will be up and running. That's a valve maintenance is a core program for a water utility. That's not an optional item. And so we will have one and we will turn the large valves at least annually. That's 12 in and above. >> Okay. >> And then we'll get to the smaller valves less often, but we'll get to those. So which which one of the do you have at least do you have the most critical valves that that we mainly use coming out from that distributes the water to the community or have we ever have we have we change those or have we even looked at them or how how old are they? >> Well, what will happen and you'll see this when we start a valve program we will find valves that have been closed for 10 years. >> We will find valves that we can't find. We will find valves that are broken and we can't operate and we find those every time we have a main break and main brakes extend their time and extend their span because we can't operate valves. All that will be fixed and we will be tearing up streets replacing valves. You can make book on that. >> Okay. >> Do you have a starting date of that? >> The valve equipment should be coming in in the next month. >> We will be on it. We've already got plans to do that. So, it will be happening and that will happen in coordination with a lot of our main replacements and you're going to see a lot of activity in the great city of Laredo. >> Okay. Are you are we going to go up for contractors or is that going to be in house? >> The valve maintenance program will be inhouse. That's a core function of our department. That's what we will do. >> Okay. >> Any action? >> No. just uh just ask asking question. >> That's for discussion. >> This is for discussion only. >> All right. >> Okay. >> Any other questions? >> All right. Thank you. >> We'll jump over to my discussion for on 112 C which is in in light of what Mr. Frank was asking. >> Okay. Go ahead. >> Discussion with possible action regarding an update on utilities department status highlighting improvement or report a newly appointed utilities director and any other matters and incidents there too. Uh first of all uh and and I say this from the bottom of my heart. I cannot be more proud of our utilities people out during the weather. U that and what I witnessed as a new member of this council. I got to see firsthand and stand right beside them at on two or three occasions when we had ruptured water lines in freezing weather. And you know, when you see something like that, you can't help but feel proud. And sometimes people go unrecognized for doing that. I just want to let you know that uh I'm proud of the the work that those people are doing. Sometimes it goes uh unrecognized and and and what they have to go through in terms of how the public perceives them is not fair. there are certain things that they have to do in standing there. Uh for instance, the one that I one of the ones that I saw was at 1:30 in the morning of a line 3000 Lion Street and they have to be there and uh and yet people are upset at them that because they don't have any water. So, with the programs that you're putting in place, and I remember I I put this item because I just got here and I'm really not sure what the status of anything is in terms of your department is, but what I saw was um extraordinary to say the least. I just wanted to make sure that uh uh from from from your vantage point since you've gotten here, uh more importantly, do you see us headed in the right direction? in terms of uh I'm not sure if we're going in the right direction of getting a permanent fix for a lot of these things because these things are obviously ground moves, ground swells up, it freezes, it contracts, it expands. It's almost like a living organism, you know, that just constantly moving. Um, and I just wanted to get your opinion on as as we move forward because I have no clue what you do for a living, right? So I needed to just make sure from from my perspective that uh these people are being taken care of. Number one, number two that we have an action plan in place for uh at one point or another eliminating those things from happening. >> Um mayor, council, city manager, u I have a short presentation which I think will give you some insight into what's going on in the utility department. And I'll be tell I'll just tell you I'm damn proud of the people. They work hard, but they need the tools to work well and I'm going to do everything I can and I'm sure you'll be supportive to do that. Valve operating equipment's part of it, but there's a lot to it. And you know what? It's cold out and it was raining and uh it was pretty ugly a couple of days I went out on main breaks >> and so I so I so I compliment them and so thank you for that comment. I appreciate if you I'll start into my little presentation. Um, this is a picture of our our water museum. And I don't know if any of you have been there, uh, but I happen to have my wife in town after we went to the Rose Bowl. And so the one of the first place I always take my wife, she's seen a million water plants as you can imagine in 54 years, but I took her to the water museum. My wife's a retired educator and she was wowed. Okay. And I felt that excited me. Unfortunately, some of our exhibits there don't work. That's going to stop. They're all going to get repaired because when you have people in a facility that you own and operate and the exhibits don't work, they look across the street and say, "Hey, does that place over there work? That's the Jefferson Water Plant." And I think this can be a real positive thing for our community. I know council has some some interest in that also. So, we're going to make that part of our DNA, so to speak. We're going to hold meetings there. We're actually doing that stuff as we speak. Sheila Cerna is our curator, and I give her that title because I want to raise the esteem of that facility, and I think she'll do a great job there. Um, and and I also think that facility lends itself to corporate sponsorship. So, we're going to look into that. Remember, I was CEO of a hospital system and water is health and health is health. And so, I think there's a lot of synergies there. So, we're going to be pursuing that because I want that place to be top-notch and first class. Okay. Cross connection control. The boil order. It's in our rearview mirror, I hope, and it will be. Uh, we've put a lot of things in place, but one of them is a cross control program to get us in compliance with what the TCU TCQ expects a city to do. We will be top-notch in cross connection and they're very impressed with the work that Sheila and her group are doing. Uh, so that's playing itself out and it's more than just uh backflow. It's They're adding technology so that people can report things more efficiently and more effectively and we can process things and so there's a lot to it. Uh but they're they're really on it and I think they're going to do a great job. So you can rest assured we're going to continue to get better at that [clears throat] sampling. Uh hopefully I don't know whether you've ever seen what sampling takes place and how we do it but there's a picture of it. Um, we've made some major changes in our sampling processes. All of our bacteria sampling is now done by certified operators. It's under the guise of the water treatment plant, which is the way it's done in every other city I or utility I've ever been associated with. It wasn't here. It was kind of bifurcated. So, now we've put it back in my mind where it belongs. And we have certified people doing it. We're going through our little challenges of proper sampling and those kind of things, but we'll get better at it and we'll be the best at it. So, rest assured, we're we're going to be on that lead and copper rule. We were supposed to be in compliance with doing an inventory of our service lines for type of metal in October. I got here October 21st. That was after the deadline. We had three years to accomplish that. We didn't do it. We are now in compliance and we've got kudos from our regulators and we've done the notices. We've got them on the website. I'll be bringing to you some opportunities on how we might address lead service lines as we move along that process, but there's a lot of work to be done yet. The next reporting period is 2017, but we're in compliance. And ironically that we had a uh a ratings call about a week or two ago and one of the things they asked us were are you in compliance for lead and copper we are. Okay. It means something especially when you talk about risk. Okay. That's been accomplished. Jefferson plant I talked about >> Go ahead. You said 2017 or 2027 next >> 2027. Did I say 2017? I'm sorry. Thank you. Thank you for correcting me, mayor. Uh, picture of the Jefferson plant. This is that 36 inch line I was talking about that's heading over to the Lions tanks. This is where it goes into the treatment plant. This is a replacement of a 30-inch line that we had problems with a ductal iron pipe. Fascinating stuff. There's a lot of neat stuff going on in the utility department. I want everybody to know that. It's important for my employees and it's important for this community in my humble opinion. >> Okay. And by the way, the failure of this line a few years ago caused a massive boil order. Some of you may remember that. That'll be a thing of the past. Okay. And then this is an interesting picture. Can you tell what is going on there? >> Sludging. Yeah, that's that's the 54 inch line that we were all set to put the extra flow from Zakate in when the new manadis plant is done. Remember, we're going to split those flows. Guess what? If we' have put that flow in that pipe that's 40% clogged, we'd had a problem. And sometimes you get lucky in life. Okay, we had a break on this line. And so this is why you do robotic pipe inspection when you don't think you need it. I can assure you when that new plant comes online and we start diverting flow at the end of this year or shortly thereafter, I won't be here, but that pipe will be clean and it'll be ready to take the flow and we won't have a oh no type of moment in Laredo, Texas. Okay. And by the way, this is a robot that we're going to I'm going to come to ask you to buy. I'm going to buy two of those if you give me the permission. That's a robot that takes a place of a $400,000 truck and a piece of equipment that does CCTV in our sewer lines. This is what can be done. That's a $90,000 item. >> It's self-propelled. >> What's a CCTV? >> That is TV that goes in the sewer and takes pictures. >> Okay. And so this does that. It's all self-propelled. You drop it in, it goes and comes back, takes all the information, and we download it. >> Well, no, it doesn't clean anything. It >> looks inside the pipe to tell us what's in there. But that's that's what it >> You know what? I like that. >> I'm a healthc care guy. I'm into that, right? >> Yeah. >> No pun intended. You know, mayor, I used to I used to tell our our mayor in Arlington who questioned me about bacteria samples. I said, "Mayor, it's like having a tumor. You test them and make sure that they're really malignant before you get crazy about it." Right? Same concept. But anyways, this is the kind of thing we can bring to four that will improve our processes and allow us to do a lot better work. This is for 8 to 12 inch pipe. There's a much bigger robot that you use for the 54 inch stuff. And by the way, that robot has three, it's called threedimensional robot, okay? Multi- sensor. It can look above. It can get CCTV. It's got sonar. And then it's got laser, so you can see below the water level, so you can see that kind of stuff. Remember, when you put something in a pipe to do TV, it floats. You can't see down in the water and see 40% of the pipe being clogged. with 3D centering you can. That's why you do it. Okay. So, those are things coming and things we're going to do. Um, and so I want to give you a little view of my world when I got here and what I saw and how we react to it. By the way, if you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer them. But um our utility website, we hadn't renewed the contract and of course that became very important to do all of our lead notices and all the stuff we need to do. So we quickly got that ina in in place. You know what happened in October. So we stood up a cross connection program that I'm really proud of. We've now achieved compliance for lead and copper. We reviewed the chlorine dioxide project that was in front of you at my first council meeting. We had the pre-construction meeting this week and we're going to have a groundbreaking if the mayor's available in September or in February. >> I'll be here. >> Okay. So, we're off and going. I told you about reorganizing the water sampling activity. We're we we've talked about doing a partnership with the health department. That may be changing. Uh, and by the way, we did purchase some water rights from the Rio Grand that you approved not too long ago. Okay. Financial improvement. Uh, I'm a I'm a kind of a fiveprong guy. Okay. I think we ought to be able to walk, chew gum, and then spit it out and jog too, right? So, you're going to see the kind of way that I do performance planning. And one of them obviously should be financial improvement. As you know, we found some unbuilt septic fees from a year ago. We've recovered all of those. So, we've enhanced our revenue stream by 241,000. We've consolidated some divisions. I' I've talked about how we consolidated conservation and and the pollution control and call it water monitoring. That's a savings. Uh we re-evaluated a purchase we were going to make for some property and saved $ 1.5 million. Uh I'm excuse me I monitor accounts receivable. Uh one of the things one of the little clicks I have having once been a business manager is when I typically go somewhere I try to look at all the payables for about a month or two just see what's going on. And it's funny when you ask a couple of questions about why we're re why are we renewing that and where does this go and people go I don't know and then you ask and we were just paying it because we've always paid it >> and so you so there's money to be found and we found some okay um and then the updated pricing for city services I'm not going to put a price on that but uh to traditionally we put in fixed fees for things and then we you know we charge 500 and it cost us a thousand And I'm not sure that our residents want to be subsidizing that kind of stuff. So now it's at cost. We we'll we'll we'll be the cheapest cost in town, but we'll get full recovery of our cost. And I think that's appropriate. Operational efficiency and staff training. You're going to hear a lot about that from me. We got to get better. We got to get smarter and and we got to get more efficient. I told you about the operating the valve equipment. That's in play. You've approved that. Thank you. Uh I put people I put people at the water museum. Uh it's staffed. Um I I want some activity down there. Uh we engaged our I'll call our water quality consultants, Nacho and Ardura. and we've done some training and we're going to get better at sampling and we've got some SOPs that I think you'll be proud of uh to how we handle if we ever have a positive because I don't ever want this whole city to be affected by a single bad sample. Okay? There's ways to prevent that and deal with it and we're going to do everything we can to make sure if we have a problem we isolate it and deal with it quickly because we've thought about how to do that. um scheduled training for our staff for you know visits for backflow prevention and those kind of things. And as I said to you, we've transition to water bacteria sampling to the treatment plant, customer service and billing. Uh we're going to be changing out our AMI meters. We've got a system that doesn't work. We've got stuff that's half working and not working. And it's it's it's it's a it's an interesting puzzle, but we've got it figured out. It'll take us four years, but we'll have it right when we're done and and we'll have the efficiencies we should get from that. Um, updated procedures for customer communications. Uh, kind of fascinating. And of course, Council Member King, him and I get to send texts all day and all all night on main breaks. Uh, but what it did point out is we've got some issues with how we communicate to people and tell them what's going on. So, we've addressed that with our PIO and I think we've got a good system now and hopefully we won't have to use it a lot, but when when we do it'll work. The other thing there's a there's a thing there that says implement SOP for planned water outings outages. As I said, we're going to be operating valves and we're going to be replacing mains. So, we're going to have outages, but we need to go about them the right way. If we're going to shut down a fiveb block area and there's four broken valves, I want all four valves replaced in one shutdown. You know, this stuff is not complicated. It just takes a little thinking. You go and excavate all four valves and you put a plate over them and you get every valve ready to go in and you go in and go snap snap and you put four of them in. You put four crews there and you're done in two hours and you replace four valves. We're not going to do it four straight days and shut the same people down four times. That's a a better SOP in my humble opinion. Road repairs. Another agenda item that I hear a lot of from you about. And and I, by the way, you'll find out one thing about me. I've had two or three people from the community, contractors and stuff, come in and see me and they gave me some great insights and I implemented things because they gave me those insights. So, I don't get offended. I get embarrassed and I get energized when I find out things aren't working the way I think they should and that don't reflect well on this department. And so we're going to be on that stuff. Road repairs will be done, final repair in 15 days. Okay? So we have a repair today. We put the temporary patch in. Okay? Within 15 days, we'll have the finished patch. And [clears throat] that's the deal. And I that, you know, we've talked about that with my people. They've said they can do it. I said, I expect it. I'm a I'm a big fan of Disney. Disney tells you we'll do it in 15 days when they know they can get it done in seven. >> Okay, that's creating expectations and managing because we're going to fix it. So, we'll see how it plays out, but that's the expectation. Uh, we published the lead service line talking points. That seems to have gone pretty flawlessly. You know, there's a lot of when you publish lead things and all these, you know, disclaimers you have to publish. Some sometimes it causes a lot of issues. But when we do that kind of stuff, we have to be smart enough to give people the answers so that people answering the phone can be responsive and I want the right message the first time. I don't want to have to unravel somebody's opinion or those kind of things. So, it seems to have worked pretty well. Identified waterline replacement listing. This is kind of the punch line. Uh we've identified 69 water main projects that we're going to do. There's something for all of you in every one of your districts. Okay. Uh here's the game plan. We are having three of those lines designed as we speak. They'll be done probably next week. I will then be going out to bid on those those design plans. I believe we will get biders to use a new technology that I piloted in Arlington, Texas called pipe bursting, pre-cllorinated pipe bursting. If in fact we get some biders that do that and the open cut biders, we'll have a comparison on cost. We will then pick the best methodology and we will go right down that list of 69 pipelines. Now, the 69 pipelines represent about $29 million. And mayor, I just wanted to make sure we could use up all of that 25 million we're we're going to get. So, I I didn't want to leave you in the lurch, but you will see that happening. That will probably start March or so. Uh, and what I want to do is I want to have a public display like a Do you ever see when United Way I was always United Way chairman in my community. We put a thermometer up and you keep filling it up. We're going to do that with a water drop. And every time we put a main in, we're going to fill in a because I want people to know this. >> I think you want people to know this. So, we're going to be outward facing because we're doing good work and I want people to know it because I want our people to know it. That's important. You want to talk about morale and pride and the development, that's how you build it. You do right things and you get recognized for doing right things. Okay? It's not a bunch of rhetoric. It's just do it and do it well. So, we will be doing that and you will see that also happening. Regulatory compliance. This is my five five things that I've always used at every job I've been to. We're installing and testing backflow devices on at all city facilities. Uh I'm a big fan of if I want to make you do something, I better be doing it. We didn't have backflows at all of our own facilities. >> We didn't have backflows on all our hydrant meters. Those days are over. We're going to set the example and we're going to expect the community to do that and follow suit because What goes around comes around. Complete followup of 362 identified potential cross connection sites identified during that boil order effort. I'm very pleased to report to you that we have remedied all of those except 44. And of those 44, 11 are pending a new installation. 27 are testing devices that hadn't been tested. That's non-compliance. Four are modifying their plumbing to eliminate the cross connection. And two are actually going to cap their irrigation system. So, they will all be completely dealt with. And we continue to add to the list as we go out and do our our inspections and stay on top of these things. Actually, I'm I'm thrilled to tell you that we got our first complaint from a resident that said, "Why are you bothering about me about this backflow prevention?" So, when I got that from the TCQ, I almost jumped for joy. Very seldom do you do that when you get a a a complaint report from a a regulator, but that was that was a sign to them. And by the way, they notice and they've been down here and they've been very complimentary of what we're doing that we're starting to get serious about something that's that's serious. And so we dealt with the complaint and we were right and the person adjusted. But the point being that's the kind of thing we're going to see a little bit of, but that's okay. We'll we'll handle that and we have respect for our customers, but we also have respect for our responsibility to protect them. Uh, somebody might have asked about bacteria sampling sites. Some of the problems we've had, I believe, are sampling sites and sampling errors. In fact, I know that. And so, we are re-evaluating all those sites so that we get sites that are clean so we can get a true good sample. And and so we'll the part of the process is you go out and we have 150 sampling sites, by the way, in this city. And we do we sample one of those every month. And so what you do is you go out and analyze those and you pick out better places, more e easier access, etc. U and by the way, some of the sampling sites that we were using, I will say were littered with feces from animals and stuff. That's a problem. And when you try to get a sample and you contaminate the sample, guess what happens? So we're getting smarter about that. But the the process is you go out and identify those and then you got to submit your new sampling sites to the TCQ. So that'll take a month or two. We're already working on it and it'll be done. And then of course uh I I mentioned we're in compliance with the lead and copper. Uh and I I can just say this to you uh and you could look at my history but uh I don't believe utilities should ever be out of compliance. uh we produce something that people drink and eat and bathe in and uh I think we got to be 100% right 100% of the time. Now, that's a tall order, but we can do it. And and I think people are committed to do that. And so when you give us a compliment, we really appreciate it. I compliment my people a lot. We're getting better. Uh and we'll continue to do that. And with that, those are my comments. >> Mayor, if I may. >> Yes. Go ahead. Uh just unfortunately not a compliment. Um what Arkansas and Wamante meet. I know one of the city managers called you about it. I don't know if it's the first time the first layment or the second one, but you hired somebody to do that paving there after your crews were there fixing up the water line over a month and a half ago. I called city manager Steve Lundine. He called you. To this day, it's been five weeks. They still haven't repaired it. I don't know what company you're hiring or who you're using, but they did a terrible job when it came to paving that that area. >> Yeah, we we we know a little bit about that. Steve and I talked about that. That's a contractor project. Uh but, uh, as I've told my folks, just because it's a contractor doesn't mean we're off the hook. We still have the responsibility. Uh, and we're working with actually working as as we speak with public works, they're going to do the paving there. John's going to do it. The reason that wasn't finished, by the way, to be clear, is the e we were told or the expectation, I don't want to get involved in that stuff, that that was going to be paved by the city. So, we did a temporary repair and didn't make the contractor do the finished repair because it was no sense doing a finished repair and then repaved the street two months later or something. So, there's a story behind the story, but in fact, that's the story. >> Thank you. >> Okay. But I appreciate that. >> Thank you. >> And I'm happy to be able to tell you that. >> Okay. I do appreciate it. Thank you. >> No, no problem. Uh any if there's any other other questions? >> I I just failed to mention I'm sorry. I just failed to mention that u part of that thing is some of those projects are handled by public works and public works our people are doing it, you know, working their behinds off given the given the conditions that we have here in this town. Uh, but I did see what uh uh um Ruben saw and and uh but I got a greater explanation from from Steve on that and and I appreciate that. Uh it it sort of just downplays your good work when you have the finished product being done by somebody else that just just does not follow. >> Yeah. But they're they're our partner and they do a good job and that's just one of those things and uh we need to get better at it. But you know, no, I'm not going to cast any aspersions. My point was that I I was I was I I really uh you know being in here um and people that I've the limited amount of people that I've talked to here is is that that pride and that sense of responsibility and that sense of go-getness is is really where I come from and and um and and that's the type of of um that's what we need to spread around here. You know, that's what it is at the end of the day. That's what it is. and everything that I've done follows that same philosophy you just spoke about right now. So, I'm really really grateful for you to come up here and uh because I was asked my my constituents, we haven't heard from this gentleman. He's been here for a while. What does he do for a living? What why is he here? And all of a sudden, the explanation says it all. So, thank you very much for being here. I truly appreciate it. >> Yes. Go ahead. >> Um Mr. Fisher, thank you for that very comprehensive report and I know you had been letting council know that in January you would be giving us this this update. Uh, but I do have a question about the PEL water treatment plant because prior to your arrival uh it was undergoing repairs, revisions and um some to very serious degree and I just wanted to know if you had any update on how those repairs are going. >> I do. We have a basin there that was built brand new that we've never been able to use. It's half of our treatment chain. That's unacceptable. I guess there was a lawsuit. Uh but we didn't get enough money out of it or something happened. Don't don't need to go there. Uh I've told the engineering firm I want to plan to be able to use at least threequarters of that basin. I'm just not going to spend all the money to replace it 100%. That was the first suggestion. So that's not acceptable to me. But that basin, threequarters of it can be rehabbed and and and there's a plan being produced that will be able to accomplish that. It probably cost us a few million dollars instead of 15. But that will get fixed. That's unacceptable. And I can tell you that I I I will tell all of you this because I think it's important. And so just give me a second. We have some facilities here that are not up to the standards of this community and we're going to address those and so I'll be coming to you and telling you that. >> There was I'm sorry just to follow there. There also was an issue with the pumps and there was some redesign going on to make sure that we could get enough pumps there functioning. Um it we've gone down to I think one and um plans had already been established to increase the number of pumps and to uh I think realign them so that they could function properly in with drawing water out of the river. How how is that proceeding? >> We have a we've already done the preconstruction on a new pump station for the for the one wing. So that that will be in the another ribbon cutting. Mayor, we're going to keep you busy. >> That's all right. >> Okay. That's that's in the works also. And I let me say this because you bring this kind of stuff up. You know, if you have a savings account and there's no money in it, you don't have a savings account. When we put four pumps in a pump station, I expect four pumps to work all the time. We don't let two of them get broke because we got four because then we don't have any money in the savings account, right? So, we're going to be 100% operating 100% of the time. That's the standard. We'll get there. We've got some wastewater issues we need to work on, but that's going to be the standard. The only reason you have duplicity of facilities is to make sure they all work or you don't have it. you know people I don't know how we get here but it's not just Laredo but that's my standard and that's the one I will be articulating to my team >> mayor >> so I'm sorry I'm not I'm trying to bring this back up but I know that uh before Mr. Garcia was here was trying to replace some some pumps or some pumps that were before he left where before he left uh they were coming in from I don't know where across I guess across the pond and they were going to be replaced and we replaced those valves that were they were going to go to the Jefferson plant if I'm not mistaken management you may correct me if I'm wrong on this uh I don't know if uh we replaced those val because two were down and then we're going to replace the other one or maybe is the we're talking about the PO per but that's that's that was the plan and I was just wondering Mr. Mr. us by any chance has those vowels already come in been changed out or are we still are there still the ship or the movement? >> I can't speak to what you're asking because I don't know about any valves being ordered. >> Yeah, >> we had some pumps at one of our west plants pumps. I'm sorry. Oh, okay. That were supposed to come in. >> Yes, sir. >> And whatever. And we were down to one pump which is I think what council member was talking about. >> Pardon? Was it for the Pico plant or was it for >> It was one of the wastewater plants. Pico is a water plant. >> Okay. >> Okay. But that's been dealt with. >> Okay. [snorts] >> But again, that's the example. We had five pumps. >> Yeah. >> And then somebody says, "Hey Buzz, we're down to one." I go, "What do you mean?" Well, we got two over here and then we just sent this one out. And again, that's to me that's not acceptable. And we'll get that fixed. >> All right. Any question? >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Presentation. >> Mayor, before we go into executive session, I'd like to make a motion to extend the meeting to 11. Second. >> Motion. Second. All in favor? >> I motion passes. >> Motion to go to executive session under Texas government code 51087, 5510711A, 551074 A1, and 551076 to include legal and any other staff member that is deemed necessary. >> Second. Motion in favor. Motion passes. Executive session. Back to regular session. It is 10:56 and 12 p.m. All right. Any items left >> there? No. No action was taken on any of the items on item number 105 just to direct staff to uh proceed as directed. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> Motion pass. What? Uh on 108 that just should be uh I'm sorry 107 that should just be tabled. That way you can take it up the next meeting if you want to. >> Motion to table 107. >> Second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> Motion passes. >> Number 10 106 the same thing. No action was taken. First step and proceed as directed. >> Motion second. All in favor >> opposed. Motion passes. >> And for number 108, no action taken. with possible action to name >> discussion to possible uh discussion with possible action to name the the Freddy Benz fieldhouse after Civia Barera any any matters there incident there too. The reason I'm trying to do this, it's uh Miss Vel was was been has been there uh you know started off with Sarah High School when back in I wouldn't say the 1985 and u you know coach Vanz opened up with alongside the CHS dedicated countless hours towards coaching coaching she did with a with a lot of passion to create wonderful ladies to later become great citizens and leaders in our community. So this is the reason I want to name that that uh that building that that was just uh added to uh to FZA. >> We'll second that motion. >> Mayor, may go ahead. >> So um council member, we just had uh the city manager just talked to our our committees and there is a name a name nominating committee. Would this not be an item that could go to the nomination committee? It sounds as if it would be a very worthy candidate for for placement on that on that building. It would allow our committees to start functioning. We would be in a position where we could receive their input. >> I will respectfully deny because it's right now I I think it's uh Miss Celzes was one uh an admirable person that you know was uh you know deserves this this opportunity this naming of this building and I hope my colleagues you know can give me that support. >> Motion second >> call for the question. What? Just just one last thing. I I do believe that she's very worthy and I think the committee would find that out as well. >> I don't >> and I understand Miss Miss, but you got to understand that already. We already called I've been already calling for the question. Already I got a second. No disrespect me but and I understand the committee but I call for the question. So >> call for the question. All in favor? >> I opposed. >> Motion pass. >> Motion to second. >> Motion second. All in favor? >> I know. Right now meeting ajourned.