Morning sir. >> Morning everyone. Ready? >> I believe so. Good morning everybody. Are we on Marisol on on teams? Good morning everybody. I'm Eduardo Okalo, executive director of the El Paso NO. Welcome to the uh August meeting of the transportation policy board. So with that, Mr. Chair. >> So good morning everyone. Welcome to this meeting of El Paso MO. Today is >> August 22nd, 2022. It is 9:09 a.m. This session is now in order. If we can have uh if we can please rise or pledge. >> Before we do that, >> one moment. I apologize. I need to call the meeting to order for the county commissioner's court. Thank you. >> It is 9:09 a.m. on Friday, August 22nd, 2025, and a quorum of the county commissioner's court is present at the El Paso Metropolitan Planning Organization meeting. Thank you. >> Fantastic. Now, if we can please rise for the pledge. >> I pledge allegiance 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. [Music] Can I have the roll call, please? All right. All right. Roll call. Um, starting with uh Senator Cesar Blanco, uh, Chair Mayor Pere, Commissioner Jackie Butler, Mayor Rudy Cruz, Representative Chris Canales, >> Mayor Ramono, Mayor Miguel Chakon, uh, Representative Alejandra Chavez, uh, Senator Joseph Cvantes, Aaron Chavaria, Anthony De Kaiser, >> Representative Art Fiero, >> uh, Commissioner Gloria Guos, >> Representative Mary Gonzalez, Iet Hernandez, >> Commissioner Elan, >> Morning. President, >> Mayor Renard Johnson, >> here. >> Mayor Martin LMA, >> present. >> City Manager Dean Mack, >> here. Representative Joe Moody, Representative Eddie Morales, Mayor Danna Murio, uh Tony Navarez, Representative Claudia Ordas, Representative Vince Perez, Mayor Rachel Kintana >> here, >> Mayor Andrea, >> uh Judge Ricarda Mano, >> yes here, >> Sarah Silva, representative and Thomas. >> All right. >> So, we do have court. Mr. Chair, >> I defer to the county. >> The county president, county judge Ricardo Sango, Commissioner Leo Dean, and Commissioner Jackie Butler. there. But I need go on to um public comment or open comment. >> Do we have anybody? >> We have Alex McCrae. I'm not sure. >> As a reminder, there's only three minutes for the public comment. >> I also did have a a presentation. I don't know if that was But good morning community leaders. Um I don't know when my time starts but I did want to uh discuss to you today about a couple issues that are kind of being brought up especially as new budgets are being proposed and tax rates are being amended. Um over the past 20 years, the El Paso MSA has seen an increase about 30% in the debt to income ratio for majority of the constituents. Um and I do believe that a large part of that is due to mobility constraints between constituents and their representatives and people in in policym positions. Um I did want to reiterate the importance of having a multimodal type of infrastructure for our region. Um I I do believe that having this connectedness that isn't reliant on single occupancy vehicles would greatly benefit a lot of the issues that are of concern right now. Um, I do think part of that solution is integrating a lot of these transit services to create a regionalwide simplified accessible transportation network that could be accessible to all at all periods of the day. Um, I do have more information, but since it's only 3 minutes, I'll keep it brief just to bring the importance that there needs to be a transformation of our mobility within the region and that hopefully something can be done within a reasonable time frame. So, I I would like to present it. I did have a I did have myself time for the three minutes, but I'm kind of going off of a tangent. Um, but I do hope that with these upcoming agenda items that people are more aware or that you guys could be more aware of the importance of having a balanced network with the way that everyone in the region moves around. Um but other than that, thank you so much for letting me speak to you guys. Um if there would be like if this the presiding officer would like to accept my time, I would greatly appreciate it so I could discuss maybe a little bit more in depth of what I'm talking about. But other than that, thank you. >> I would like I would love to extend your time, but I do have to leave early. So I think we can talk to staff about extending that and and further down. Thank you. >> Okay. So what would be the >> if if you can turn in the presentation to to uh to the staff and then we can fold it around and then if there's a request by the board to add it, we can add it to the agenda for further discussion and uh at that point we can have an extended debate or discussion about the presentation. >> Okay. Thank you. the public comment >> at this time at Diver County. >> We do not have anybody pre-registered. Is there anybody from the public here that would like to speak? No public comment for the county. Thank you, Chair. >> Great. >> I'll defer to the county for some procedural items. >> Thank you, chair. As a matter of expedience and because the commissioner's court has adopted the EPMPO agenda with only changes necessary to acknowledge rules or laws that apply to the county commissioner's court, EPMPO's reading of each agenda item is also considered readin for the county commissioner's court. In the event there is any action taken by individual members of the commissioner's court, such action will be deemed taken in his or her capacity as an EPMPO member and not the El Paso Commissioner's Court. and therefore no commissioner's court action will be noted after each agenda item. Thank you. >> Go to item number one. Uh consider approval of the minutes of the July 18th, 2025 TPB meeting. >> Motion approved. >> Motion on the floor. It has been seconded. Um any discussion on the minutes? >> Seeing none and hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> I. All post say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item number one has been approved. Item number two, consider approval of a resolution supporting textile El Paso district's request for dual designation of I 10 and Loop 375. >> So for this we we have a presentation from uh El Paso district. You can go to the graph. Good morning chair and policy board members. The uh this is Oh, there we go. This is Marty Boyd. I'm the director of advanced transportation planning and the district is preparing a request to our transportation commission to remove the existing designation of Talbet as state loop loop 375 but putting it on the existing um item from Trans Mountain all the way to Sunland Park to complete our loop. This is the last item on our checklist to have a complete loop around town without stopping. So, we need to make sure that we formally name loop 375 on our maps on any planning document. So, we need a resolution from the MO from our policy board and also we need one from the county and from the city of El Paso as we find out the requirements for the request. So, I'm sad that it doesn't count for the counties because we could kill two birds with one stone today. But, we'll bring it up to the county uh commissioner's court and also to the city council. But, uh Tekk has approved this item and we respectfully request your support on this. >> At this time, I would entertain a motion to approve item number two. Have a motion on the floor. Motion has been seconded. Discussion by the board. Seeing and hearing none. All those in favor say I. I. >> All post say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimous unanimously. Item number two has been approved. Item number three. Consider approval of the 2025 update to the El Paso MO congestion management process. >> So for this item uh we have a Robbie Gutard from our consultant team WSP. Robbie are you there? Mar. Do we have Robbie? Perhaps Mr. Chair, can can we uh skip this item and if if we get to the connection with the consultants um bring it back later by the board. >> Seeing none, we'll move on to item number four. Approval. Consider approval of a proposed strategy to achieve fiscal constraint with the anticipated 2026 Tex unified transportation program funding totals by amending certain projects in the regional mobility strategy 2025 2028 transportation improvement program. >> All right. So for this item we have an Gante from El Paso MO with a brief presentation. >> Good morning chair and board members. Now, a couple of meetings ago, um we brought forward the fact that um in the uh UTP that's uh that was adopted yesterday for uh Texas's transportation funding. And what that is is that's the 10-year plan that says for each year which uh which portions of the state are expected to get how much of what categories of money. So every year there's a new plan that extends 10 years. In the 2025 plan and years prior, we were anticipating roughly $9 million a year in CMAC funds. That's category 5 funding. That is for projects that improve air quality. We program a lot of things like sidewalks. Um we did a uh a traffic management system for the city of El Paso with a lot of that funding or it just it's things that are expected to um to improve congestion and air quality. So things that maybe eliminate sim single vehicle trips uh fund transit things like that. Um, so because the MO has to demonstrate fiscal constraint, meaning that for every project we've got within the four years of our transportation improvement program, we have to have actual dollars tied to that project. So when we receive a UTP that gives us a 25% haircut that creates fiscal constraint problems for us because we have you know that that money is that we were planning on having is spoken for. So we are in the in a position of needing to move some money around uh move move projects to different funding categories in a couple places maybe you know postpone them a year um in order to make sure that we retain the fiscal constraint that we are required to retain with the uh funding loss that we are ex that we are now experiencing. Um and in addition to that, this gives us the opportunity to more fully program our category 10 funds which accomplish a similar objective um and are set to go away after fiscal year 2028. So within your backup, you're going to see a list of amendments that we're proposing to make. Um, this task was frankly made quite a lot easier by the fact that in the uh MTP project call, the city of El Paso let us know that three of their projects that were anticipated to be funded with these CMAC funds have uh been accomplished through either other means like Texas TASA or another category of funding. and we're no longer going to need to have programmed CMAC funding in years 2027 and 2028 as originally anticipated. So that made it a lot easier to find the money to make sure that we can still do everything that we were planning to do and move money around. Other than that, most of the amendments that you're going to see is moving things from category 5 to category 10. And then there's one project that's moving from fiscal year 2027 to fiscal year 2028. And so um this is on your screen is a map or a chart rather of um kind of the befores and afters that shows what what we're doing to make sure that we stay in fiscal constraint as required. Um so next month's meeting uh provided the strategy is approved today we are going to bring forward the 3D programmings as formal amendments and everything else will be administrative because we're just basically changing the color of the money. Um and there was uh and so we're going to more fully program and exhaust our category 10 funding and we are going to dig our or we're going to get ourselves out of the hole that the uh current UTP created for us. Also within your backup is a chart kind of demonstrating the previous year's funding assumptions for CAT 5 and what happened. Um and and essentially uh the money for category 5 was redistributed amongst the NPOS that receive it. This is only available for uh NPOS that are out of what's called attainment with air quality, meaning that pollution thresholds are exceeded. And there's a formula that that determines how you know who gets how big a wedge of pie. And in the most recent uh running of that formula um because we have not experienced the same rapid growth that the other uh m uh CMAC receiving NPOS's experienced and because frankly they polluted way worse than us. you get you get scores based on if you're a mild poller, a moderate poller, or a severe poller. Your your your allocation gets weighted and they apparently were just way messier than we were. So, they get more money. So, um they experienced a little bit of a gain. We experienced a loss that because we didn't have as much as they had in the first place as a larger proportion of our of our funds. Um so what we're bringing for forward today is just what we plan to do to remain in constraint and we will go ahead and make those changes ASAP as possible provided we receive approval today time I would enter a motion to approve item number four request then we'll do discussion after the motion >> the motion on the floor is there a second has been seconded discussion by the board >> um just to make sure I'm interpreting correctly All of these projects end with an unrevised total funded amount. It's it's simply the shift between categories. All the fund funded amounts are the same. >> No individual projects have their totals affected. We're just moving Oh, sorry. >> Yes, that's correct. We're not we're not moving the uh we're not amending anyone's total. We are simply moving funds around. >> Understood. Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> Any other discussion by the board? >> Mr. Chair, if I can also just add one more thing. the uh the fiscal year 26 UTP was approved yesterday by the Texas Transportation Commission. So that's another thing that we were waiting for. So that that is now official. And like Ann discussed, uh this sort of like the strategy, but the actual amendments, the tip amendments that that are needed or that will result from these changes, we're going to bring them to to the board uh probably next month. Right. >> Hearing further no further discussion. All those in favor say I. >> All post say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item four has been approved. I noticed uh representative for item three is now available. >> Yes. >> Any objection to return back to item three at this time. >> Mr. Chair, if I could um ask that we continue with uh five >> um >> that way, >> six and seven, and then come back to to three if we could. >> All right. Objection by the board. >> None. Item number five, I'll let you read that one. >> You were doing so well. Okay. Item five is consider approval of amendments to documents related to the receipt of additional funding through the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality TCQ writer 7 state and local air quality planning program. A amend the contract between El Paso no and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to add additional writer 7 funding 25,21385 for the Ozone program and 13,323 uh dollars for the PM2.5 program and to update the scopes of work. B. Authorize the executive director to execute an amendment to Texas&M Transportation Institute TTI task number two cameras for vehicle counting in Satuarees monitoring through machine learning technology to increase the budget to $114,000. C. Authorize the executive director to execute an amendment to TTI task order number three improving regional emission estimation tools to increase the maximum budget to $141,000 and D authorize the executive director to execute an amendment to UTP task order number four monitoring of PM 2.5 exposure from traffic congestion at international border crossings to increase the maximum budget to 155,7 $771. So, uh, very briefly and and also to, uh, save a little bit of time. So, as the item states, uh, we were notified by TCQ that, uh, there was a little more money available. Um, but we if we wanted to use that additional money, it has to be done with the same clock. So, the funds have to be expended by Octo October 30th. So, it's more money. So the answer for us was was yes. So this will it's not a lot of money but it it allows us to do a little bit more of the work that we're currently already doing with uh uh for the ozone program and for the the PM2.5 program as well. I mean it's relatively small amounts but so we need to amend the contract with TCQ to receive that money and then amend the task orders that we have with TTI and uh and UTP to provide that that money for them to do the additional scope of work. We we have a full presentation if you want to um get more details. >> At this time I would enter a motion to approve item number five. I have a motion on the floor has been seconded. Any discussion by the board? >> Seeing and hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> All post say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item five has been approved. Item number six, consider authorizing the executive director to execute task order number seven with the University of Texas at El Paso for phase 4 continue support of the tip and uh PRF for an amount not to exceed 448,000. So for this we have Angayante again with a brief presentation. >> Good morning once again. Um this item pertains to the uh uh online uh platforms that the city of El Paso had uh created for us but that we're working with our consultants to I'm sorry not the city of El Paso. You have created them for us. We're now working with our consultants so that they will be hosted by the city of El Paso, the same with our other IT functions. Um the uh contract with UTEP that not only included the development of uh the uh EPRF database and web tool platform, but also ongoing technical support and maintenance is set to expire on August 31st. The project of migrating everything is a several monthsl long project. And so in the interim until everything has been fully converted, fully updated all on the city of El Paso's servers, we would have a uh tech support gap. And so this contract provides uh for UTP to continue the technical support function. So, no more developing, no more designing, just making sure that if if uh when people try to amend and submit projects to our EPRF database, if they get a 404 message, we've got somebody on board performing tech support to make that message go away and get the site live. So, we will be uh utilizing them for the several months until the uh work is concluded on fully migrating everything over to the city's servers. And that's what this contract is for. At this time I would entertain a motion to approve item number six. Have a motion on the floor. Second. >> Motion has been seconded. Uh discussion by the board. Seeing any hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> All post say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item six has been approved. >> Item number seven, consider naming the border highway east project as an MO priority project. >> Mr. Chair, >> I would actually like to make a motion to postpone this item indefinitely. There's still some discussion that has to be had and also so that our legislative delegation can be present. >> I have a motion on the floor made to postpone indefinitely. Motion has been seconded. Discussion on the postponement. >> Seeing and hearing none. All those in favor say I. >> I. Say nay. Abstensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item seven have been postponed indefinitely. Item number three consider approval of the 2025 PO condition management process. >> All right. So, uh, for this for the congestion management process, we have a presentation with from our consultant team. So, if Robbie, if you're there, please go ahead. >> I'm here. I'm here. Can you all hear me? Okay. >> Yes. >> Okay. Great. Um, can I share my screen? Sorry. All right, guys. Uh, I have my sh screen being shared. Um, hey everyone. My name is Robbie Gutart. I'm planner at WSP. Um, I've met with y'all a couple times before, giving you updates on the CMP, the congestion management office, and where we've been at um each stage in developing this document. And I'm here today to um present on um just this final step um that the CMP has been drafted and I believe it's been shared in your packet um that draft for your review. Um, last time the TAC met, uh, the TAC approved um um approved the document and has forward it to y'all for adoption. Um, so just to give an overview, this slide here shows our eight-step framework for the CMP. So we followed this eight-step framework. It's the framework that is recommended by the FHWA um and US DOT. And I'll just give a quick recap of how we kind of went through this process. And these are all the key um points that I came to y'all to give an update on where we were at. So we really kicked off this process in with steps one, two, and three and establishing um the regional objectives that were derived from the MTP's vision and goals as this CMP and the MTP have that um integrated relationship between one another. Um step two, we define that CMP network um which really this is for the NO. So it's um all roadways um that we have the congestion data for within the NO boundary. And then three we developed multimodal performance measures that we aligned with the objectives um that we developed in step one. And these performance measures are really coming from guidelines and mandates um um from uh federal sources as well. And then four, five and six is really the part where um you know we do the heavy lifting with the data analysis. So that's analyzing the data um analy identifying what those congestion challenges and needs are. And then uh the really important part in developing those CMP strategies to address those needs that we've identified. Um and step seven is that key point where we um are integrating with the MTP which as you all know is under development right now. Um so making sure that those congestion reduction strategies um and added capacity projects from the CMP are captured in the MTP. Um so that's something that's ongoing in the MTP process after this. Um and that last step is uh really just developing a framework for evaluating the effectiveness of the strategies that we've identified. Um which next time we come and do this update of the CMP, that's really that baseline um step zero as I think I called it early on where we're just looking back to see, you know, are the strategies that we chose um did they work? Did they help with reducing congestion in the region? So then I just have a few slides here just showing um you know these really the the most important part of the CMP really are these strategies that we identify. So I have three slides here just as a reminder I went through these last time um but we have these maps in the document itself with a lot more detail. There's tables accompanying them um identifying um each of these segments um and intersections with these recommendations with the need that was identified and what these um strategies are. So just as a um snapshot here um we did separate them between recurring congestion management strategies and non-recurring. So on screen here I have recurring which just as a reminder is um recurring congestion is generally predictable. It's regularly recurring and typically it's caused by um uh excessive demand compared to the capacity of the system. Um so just as a grouping of those recommendation recommended strategies those include increased capacity travel demand management re reconfiguring weaving sections on the roadways transportation systems management and operations so TSM interchange and intersection operation improvements and traffic operational management at intersection level. um very similar um just at the intersection level. Um and we have quite a few intersections that we developed um strategies for across the region as well. You can see that map to the right hand. And then for non-recurring um congestion, we see less need across the region. And just as a reminder, non-recurring congestion um causes unreliable travel times as caused by um those transient events that are more um temporary or temporal like traffic incidents, weather conditions, work zones or even special events um like concerts and um you know game day events. So those strategies can be you know summarized into providing additional positive guidance. So that's meaning like rumble strips that you feel in the car, stripe lines, race pavement markings, and even some speed. Uh and also intersection operational improvement and ICE studies at uncontrolled intersections, advanced uh control signage for work zones, making sure people, you know, know in advance before getting into those construction zones that they're about to enter them. Um and also making sure that um using signage that's compliant with work zone traffic control. So that's the DMV. Um in addition to just generally enhancing and maintaining signage and pavement. Um and also some educational campaigns are recommended as well. And then really just the next steps here are we're requesting uh the TBB's adoption of the CMP and Eduardo. I think that's all I have for this. >> At this time I would entertain a motion to approve item number three. >> I have a motion on the floor. Is there a second? Motion has been seconded. Discussion by the board. >> Good morning. Can you describe what I an ICE study is under recommended strategy? >> Sure. So an ICE study stands for so ICE stands for intersection control evaluation. So it's a um you know you look at the intersection, you identify the issues and come up with some recommendations be it how to control that intersection with a couple different means and can be a signal um like a traffic signal, traffic light um maybe a stop, maybe adding um a turning lane um and develops a couple options like that. So when we have that recommendation because this is a more highlevel um strategy, the project would then um that we maybe implement into MTP might define what that actual project looks like. >> Right. >> Thank you. >> And if I could could add on on that, um a lot of these intersection projects uh also are good for well they're eligible for a CMAC. So and again as you know category 5 CMECH is congestion mitigation air quality. Um so they they have the additional benefit not only of congestion relief but also reducing emissions like Ravi said by adding a dedicated turn lane or improving the signal timing of a of an existing um signal and and so on. These are they may they're not very big sexy projects but they're pretty pretty efficient. >> Thank you. Any further discussion by the board? Seeing hearing none have a motion on the floor has been motioned seconded. All those in favor say I. I. Say nay. Extensions. Motion carries unanimously. Item number three has been approved. Reports and discussion update on the RMS 2052 MTP project hall and project prioritization process. >> All right, Mr. Chair and members. Uh this just a very brief uh uh update. Um, as you heard earlier, we are in the middle of uh developing our our metropolitan transportation plan, the 2052 uh RMS MTP and we are right now in the evaluation of all the projects that we received from all the the entities. We're going through the evaluation and prioritization process um that that WSP and the consultant team is is working on. So the next step on on that one is for us to to receive the the prioritization, take a look at it, make sure that that uh that you know there any you know major glitches or anything and then go go back and have discussions individually with the with the entities with the county, the cities, the municipalities, uh Sun Metro, etc. Uh just to make sure that that uh you know we are in agreement with the priorities and and so on. Um and then once we go through that process, we will come up with a final list which we will bring to you all um next month. That is important is relevant because what we need to have that list that final list of projects so that we can start coding our models and running the air quality and the emissions models and the whole conformity thing that you know how much fun it is to to deal with all that. Um but we we we do need to have that pretty definite list uh at some point. So we anticipate have bringing it to to you all uh next month. So happy to answer any questions on on that topic. >> Any questions by the board? >> All right. Director's report. >> All right. So for the executive director report, there's a it was a very busy month since we had the the last meeting. Uh let me start with the the IBC strategic plan. It's the international border crossing strategic plan. As you've heard before, this is a plan that uh the MO is uh is leading um to look at our six uh border crossings that we have in the region starting with Santa Teresa to the west going through the ones in within the city of El Paso and including Tornneo on the far east side. So, the six crossings, we're going to take a good look at them to see how that we can find any any efficiencies in in looking at them as a system instead of looking them as six standalone crossings. Um, so we had our kickoff meeting on August the 6th. Many of you attended that. So we really appreciate and uh not not only attending but we we hope that you will continue participating with this because again this is a very intense uh stakeholder involvement process. We need to make sure that that uh we get good participation good feedback from the public sector uh the three levels of of public of government federal state and and local from both sides of the border. Uh we're very excited that event on August 6 was well attended. uh from uh people from both sides of the border, not just the public sector but also the private sector which are the users in the case of of cargo of truckers, mackilas and and so on but also the the users the the the traveling public. So it is important because um Salvador 80 some percent of the of the vehicles right there of but it it's the the number is pretty high about 80% or so of all the vehicles that are crossing between Huades and El Paso in both directions are registered on the Mexican side whether they're trucks or private vehicles. So who are the users right? So we have to be uh engaging the the users again whether it's it's uh for commercial or for uh or for private uh vehicles we have to engage the users on both sides and so so far so good we were really excited um so we had also different meetings with uh agencies on ones you know on July 23rd we had a meeting with uh conco that's a economic development organization that is that is sponsored by the state of Chihuahua but it's it's regional so we're obviously working with the one in Satuis we also had a formal uh kickoff u work session with EME which is our counterpart in in the kickoff on August the 6th. So the so we have uh established a a work group in addition to the steering committee a work group that will be dedicated to to actually doing the work. I mean of course the when we get the big event like on August the 6 it was great uh great photo opportunities and all that but it it's really important to to get the uh the the excitement going but in parallel we've got to get to work. So there's a lot of data collection, a lot of data analysis. And for that, you know, we're going to need also the help of of the the bridge operators and and owners, you know, the county, the city, and on the Mexican side as well with Municipio Emib and um and Fil Miso, which is one that that charges the tolls going northbound. Um in the backup, you know, there's more more detail on on the scope of work. So with that u again calling for everybody's help to to help us with this in this study. It's we estimate we anticipate completing it in December of next year. So there there will be a lot of opportunities uh for you all to to participate. So I don't know if you have any questions on that. All right. Uh briefly the border trade advisory committee meeting BTAC that was held last week. Commissioner Holgin and and myself along with uh Roberto Tinero from the city um John Barela from the Border Plex Alliance and Rafael Dre from TTI were the members representing the El Paso region. So it was a good meeting. Um also though the timing is good because Texad is also initiating the update to their Texas U Mexico border transportation master plan. So, if you recall, this is something that was done about four years ago. Um, similar to what we're doing here, a lot of parallels, obviously an overlap with what we're doing here locally. Uh, so the timing is good. We want to make sure that we coordinate both efforts. Um, a lot of the data collection is going to be the same. So, there hopefully there will be some economies of scale there and and u as opposed to having duplication of efforts and so on. But it it was it was a good meeting. Uh, Commissioner Gin, I don't know if you want to say anything there. >> Um, I guess the only comment I would make is always very jarring when we're at these meetings and we see all of the money that South Texas, the Rio Grande Valley is getting for their ports of entry because we get presentations from all the different areas with ports. And I mean, it's just incredible the amount of funding that they're getting for the airport. So, I feel like we need to really look at how they're doing it. Um, because it's just incredible. Every single meeting we go to, there's another presentation about the expansion of I don't know how many lanes and new ports. Um, and I mean, it's just it's an incredible amount of money that they're getting that we're not. So, I feel like we really need to delve into that more, have more discussions about, you know, strategy to try to get more access to those funds because it really is jarring when when we're watching all these >> and and to that point, that's one of the objectives of our uh strategic plan is really to come up with not just analyze how we can operate better, but identify projects, specific projects to improve our our system, right? uh at this point like commissioner was saying the uh we we have ideas we have u you know needs and and so on but we don't have a list of projects that can compete for example with a project to to u you know widen the world trade bridge in Laredo or to build new new um you know bridges in Eagle Pass. So to your point, the the the number of presidential permits that are being processed in the other regions, there's two in Eagle Pass. Laredo I think has two more and in the valley there's a bunch and um and we don't have anything at this point. Um you know something has to be said also of having sufficient capacity at this point. We may not need a new crossing, right? But what we absolutely have to do is improve the whole crossing experience, access to and from to each of the individual crossings and and see where we can expand. Well, let's let's see expand like the idea of expanding these Letasa bridge. I mean, it's not easy because there's obviously a lot of a lot of issues, you know, land availability and so on, but we we need to look at it and see how we can do that. In the same way, the judge, I know that we've had this conversation before. You know, tornado is is maybe in a different stage, but it's part of the solution, right? We we need to figure out how to make tornado more more attractive. It's not going to happen overnight, but for the same reason, we have to start doing things to make tornado more attractive. And the same goes for Santa Teresa. There's a lot of a lot of initiatives that are going on both sides of the border. So, we've got to, you know, coordinate all those and and um and, you know, see how we can collectively more holistically take advantage of that. But, thank you for bringing that up, Commissioner Huggin. >> What are the I think we also have to have skin in the game. I mean, we have to show, you know, the private sector getting involved in a tornado site to make it attractive. And it's really hard to to push for something where we just have some, you know, vacant land and you cross over. Uh I think they have to see that and and you know I invited you and others to that uh having a tour of private investors wanting the land possibility of industrial park move that quickly because just showing people that we need a you know to see that there's plans you know textile has to see that there's things that are available happening not just hey we'd love to to get your help here. So that skin in the game I think is very important. I think the commissioners make that very clear that we have to do some things ourselves >> before we they see it's an attractive uh you know possibility. >> Absolutely. And and again it's it's a it's a holistic uh approach right because it's not just the public sector providing you know building infrastructure right it's part of the the equation like you were saying judge is is providing the you know the other um um elements that are necessary. you know, we need warehouses out there. We need uh you know, restaurants, you know, fuel stations, all these services that uh that, you know, it'll be more the the role of the private sector to develop, but but we need to encourage that as part of a of a of a strategy. All right. Um All right. So, so that was BTE. And then finally, um, for the Border Flex Safe Mobility Plan, if you recall, uh, we we're working on this, uh, regional safety action plan with a SS4A grant that that we received uh, two years ago. It's been a while, but we're in the in the final stretch. Um, so we are, as you can see here in the in in the in the backup, the final draft nearing completion with a 30-day public comment beginning in September. And then we're having our fourth and final virtual stakeholder meeting the week of September the 4th. So again, you know, keep an eye on that. We will be sending invitations and we hope that that you all can can participate. and and also the second and final public open house uh September the 10th at the M Michelle T AI >> Jimmyian >> Amian sorry Amian Recreation Center uh located on 9031 V count and and again we anticipate the final adoption of the plan in November of of this of this year in a couple of months. So that that's it for me. Happy to answer any questions. >> Questions by the board. >> Seeing and hearing none. That concludes all the business for this meeting today. Um there's no objection. I have 9:56 a.m. This meeting is adjourned. I'll defer for final adjournment. He became the permanent chair and the commissioner's court has adjourned at 9:56 a.m. Thank you.