[Music] [Music] he [Music] since conted to and guided the development of albuquer we also recognize that Albuquerque has long been a Gathering Place of diverse indigenous peoples tribal Nations and pblos of New Mexico and Indigenous nations from around the world and that this sacred Place continues to be their traditional homelands tonight's meeting is hybrid where all participants will be in person or on video or audio conference members of the public will have the opportunity to address the committee if they have signed up for public comment in advance for I believe we only have one speaker so we're going to just say that comments need to be addressed to the committee members only and that you'll have two minutes to present we're going to move right into agenda item a that is uh By Me By Request 074 creating a new Article 19 in Chapter 2 to approve a community Energy Efficiency development block grant from the New Mexico State energy minerals and na of a seed program project and accepting the terms and conditions of the grant agreement I move a due pass and seconded by councelor bassan uh any questions counselors counselor that is the great thing about this program that is funded by the state is that we are not asking our lowest income residents to Pony up money um to get this assistance really is providing free assistance from the state with no City money used either um to reduce their energy burden and do whatever is needed to make their home better okay and Madam chair the requirement for this and again I'm just trying to gain clarification it all makes so much sense but it drawn up some questions of just clarification and better understanding for me uh it says that the gross household income uh to require for to requirement is going to be at or below 200% of the federal poverty level what what is the federal poverty level councelor champan I think an Simon is here and she can come up and tell us are we using the 2025 feder federal poverty level good evening uh Madam chair and committee members uh I don't know I wasn't uh involved in the application process I know that um the census tracks that were identified were identified based on the federal poverty level and so if that's the 2225 number that's the number that we're using um we've identified census block groups already in the grant so we know the areas that were targeting um and it's based on a federal number thank you um director Simon I will just say that I just quickly looked it up and federal poverty level for a family of four which is kind of an average average is $31,200 um so that would be double that um for a family of two it's $2,440 so double that for a family of two so Madam share it would be at or below 200% of it so you double it as long as it's below that number so 644 okay yes um okay uh and the project application who decides this process of of the process of the application it said that in there it said that the there was a process of how to determine who gets these what what's that process director Simon uh Madam chair and committee members committee um member champine uh we work with a community partner Prosperity works that uh is trusted by the community works with community members and vets all of the applicants to the program because those applicants tend to live in those census block groups that we already know what the average income designation is we don't we don't make them prove their income status we um we do what's called self attestation so they they self attest that they meet the minimum criteria and um and the community partner vets those those applicants those families Madam chair that brings up my last question it says there that it does it it's uh that it's there's no income verification base it's all self-reporting so it's up to the person to tell you what it is does that play an effect of making sure that they're meet the 200% criteria because you're relying on them for the answer and you're not verifying it they could have more but they're going to tell you something different or or not or enough uh mad chair and committee members Committee Member champag yes um we do rely on they do have an affidavit that they sign so we we tend to believe these families councelor champine if I can just add to that one thing that I think is really important to understand about how the seed program works at the at the state and therefore within this grant um you have to work with a community partner um so the city of Alber could not just apply for these funds and and then say this is what we're doing we had to work with a community partner that is already out in community working with folks to reduce their energy burden working with folks to make sure that they remain housed and so the community partner in this case is prosperity Works they are the ones recruiting folks to participate in this program so this is not an open to anyone and you sign an affidavit this is this is a program that is administered by Prosperity Works they are out in the community working with people and they choose who to offer this program to and they are working in um quite frankly some of our most disadvantaged communities um neighborhoods uh mostly in District Six at this point um I would love to get it to be large enough so that we can go beyond there um but really we are we are focusing in on blocks of of communities where our most disadvantaged neighbors live and so I really don't see any concern with um someone who is not in that that bracket really even being approached for this program thank you madam chair it seems like that that one of the things that follow is they have a good history with them and know their background and know that they they are in this position that they are the deficiency or you know uh income deficiency at that level so it's not some brand new person off the street sort of they have it sounds like they have a history of it okay thank you for the clarification thank you councelor champine any other questions or comments all right I will um just close really quickly by saying that you know this is one of my favorite projects and one of my favorite programs at the state level I think that uh we are getting a pretty large chunk of the $10 million that was set aside for the entire state of New Mexico and we're going to get additional funds put into that state fund during this legislative session and so I want to make sure that we do a really good job on this program so that we can continue to get legislators to give more and more money to that seed fund because I think this is really very important that we should to be helping our most disadvantaged folks with reducing of energy burden so that they can spend those funds on on you know food medicine clothing for their children so with that I urge your support go ahead and take a roll call Vote councelor bassan Yes councelor champine Yes councelor groud is excused councelor Rogers yes Sheriff aorn yes that passes 40 thank you all right do pass on that thank you um director Simon for being here and we will move on to counselor Rogers uh agenda Item B thank you madam chair this is R 25123 approving the expansion the downtown 2025 Metropolitan Redevelopment area boundary and really this is U just combining the already existing mras in councilor baca's District to one and it would so it would repal the mcclinon Park Railroad Metropolitan Redevelopment area boundaries and plans and roll into the new 20225 plan so I move and would urge your support we have a motion do we have a second second seconded by councelor bassan uh any questions comments we have a public speaker do they are they here Madame chair we have Solomon Sledge signed up to speak and I'm not seeing him here nor in Zoom yeah the the room looks empty um if can you double check zoom and we'll come back but I see someone named Zoom user but I I can't identify this person all right thank you madam chair well we tried um any questions or comments from counselors on this one I guess I have a quick one um and Council Rogers I don't know if you want to answer this or if you want to have uh director Bruner come down but I guess I just have a question on why why are we needing to combine three when we have them already designated and they're all that entire area is already um you know applicable to all the benefits of an MR sure I think what I heard from councelor Baka was incorporating these areas into the downtown MRA um strengthens opport unities for redevelopment and increasing the area especially adding the tiffs to the equation um it really eventually would be eliminated anyway in the 2050 plan um based on what I heard from councelor Baka but yes if director Bruner wanted to give some more specifics about the why but I asked the same question and that's um was just really about strengthening the opportunities um especially as we um Implement tips director Bruner do you want to add to that um thank you madam chair I'll also add that um we are doing a new downtown plan and the two districts we're looking at that border the traditional downtown area mlen park and railroad those M are 40 and 45 years old so this was really part of an update um those still meet obled criteria um there's still areas in need of help so we thought as an effort to kind of clean it up um uh this would be part of that um we are trying just overall councelor uh Lewis asked us this asked this last year um that we have 22 Mr a lot created in the 70s and 80s that honestly have changed or you know really merged into other areas and that's certainly the case we think with with mlen Park and and railroad districts that are kind of no longer kind of in a sense on their own they could easily be merged in the into the downtown thank you director um one more question for me I just um you know I just am learning about mrss I have one that was started by my predecessor we finally got it approved it's very small um can you just talk through the process for um expanding mrss sure well there's a couple different processes so we can expand them like we're doing here through a new plan on a new boundary designation uh so that's kind of uh in this case we're doing that internally at Mr um hiring a consultant doing a new plan that all started last spring um in 24 and taken about a year you all should see the uh the plan coming forward for downtown 2050 in a couple months um we also now get a lot of boundary extension requests so we've had a couple on West Central um we expect to have a a third coming in on West Central that tend to be project by project driven like please expand the boundaries one block this way so we can incorporate this vacant lot that is a process we have available online through our website and um we are altering it a little bit because it tends to be developer driven and we want to add a little bit more Community impact uh input on it so we may change that slightly and the demands for that process are increasing because of our tax abatement program so developers trying to get their Lots within an MRA so we're getting a lot of requests and we're trying to kind of get our arms around them and control that process a little bit more so we don't get too many and we're a little bit more thoughtful about it I definitely agree with that I have a concern that we're just going to have the entire city be an MR um area before long um so my understanding was that you had to have an MR Plan before you could get B boundaries officially set but with bills like the one that we're looking at tonight it's the exact opposite we're now expanding the the um area and then doing a plan and I just I I'm confused by that because I was very much told that I could not have the manol IMR District in my in district 7 um designated until we had that plan completed so that's what I'm trying to understand sure uh Madam chair so the boundary change uh per ordinance always precedes the plan so we these are going in a sense simultaneously so you all will approve the boundary change and then you will get the plan as a draft docu as a draft approved by the ADC next and and it's supposed to go in that sequence um according to Legal councel their interpretation has been if there are slight changes to the MRA not major modifications like we're moving at a block or something like that that does not require an entire entirely new plan that is a uh just a small change so that's what that's the difference in what we're seeing these days didn't used to see that as much but like I said with the tax abatement program we're seeing a little bit more thanks for that clarification any other questions or comments councelor Rogers to close thank you madam chair I urge your support go ahead and do a roll call Vote councelor bassan Yes counc champine yes councelor Rogers yes Sheriff eorn yes that passes 4 Z congratulations all right well in the most efficient meeting we've ever had I am going to say that there being no further business this lups committee meeting is adjourned there is food in the back if anybody wants [Music] [Music]