uh good morning it's friday it's 8 am and we do have a quorum good morning mayor good morning this is a special meeting of el paso city council for monday june 6 2022 it is 8 o'clock am mayor lisa is present in council chambers along with representative hernandez representative pollinar representative salcido representative rivera representative zaraga representative rodriguez is joining us virtually the item on the agenda this morning is discussion in action to override the mayor's veto of the returned may 23rd motion of city council authorizing the first amendment to the amended and restated employment agreement between the city of el paso and tomas gonzalez which lists the amended terms thank you miss prime before we do get started i'd like to stand up for the pledge please the united states of america and to the republic for which it is thank you and also before we get started i think it's uh really important that we do have a moment of silence for the huge tragedy that happened in uvalde it's um you know we can talk about any problems we have in life but there's no greater loss of life when someone takes someone's life senseless in the life of any children and like i said there's never a greater problem there's never anything worse in life than our country and these parents and these family members that are going through for no reason senseless loss of life and um i know that um everybody has got the families and the victims they've been in their prayers and in the minds have you seen it through things that's happened to our community but i'd like to have a moment of silence to think about the gift of life and how no one has the right to ever take that gift away from anyone and no one should ever have to bury their children with that moment of silence please thank you episode hernandez that you put your oh okay thank you go ahead um miss pine let's hear for the record of mayor pro tem shortline has arrived in council chambers we're on item number one the discussion action to override the mayor's veto of the return may 23 motion of city council authorizing the first amendment to the amended and restated employment agreement between the city of el paso and tomas gonzalez which lists the amended terms thank you representative nundes hi good morning everyone thank you for being here bright and early um mayor if if we can would you be amenable to allowing for public comment first pardon me if there's any public comment yes ma'am that's uh miss pine yes mayor we did receive 16 requests to speak along with two written statements we'll begin with the first speaker we have mr joe wardy he will be followed by arthur westbrook daniel libas brian kennedy joseph pickett rick boner kenneth bell good morning mr wardy you have three minutes sir good morning my name is joe wardy i am a concerned citizen of the city of el paso good morning council good morning mayor good morning mayor thank you for my three minutes um i'd like to open up explaining and defending the veto power of the city council of the mayor i'm going to tell you that the veto is a very important part of government as you can see at the state level and at the federal level it's to bring balance to government sometimes to bring a different attitude and a different place to decisions that are made that maybe are not totally in the best interests of all involved when we pass the city the council manager form of government is very important that the council and the manager know what their unique roles are and that they adhere to them and it's been a little bit of a disappointment to me and others uh i i still very much strongly believe in the council manager form of government mr gonzalez and miss wilson are very qualified individuals and so this isn't a personal comment directed to either one of them but i think a little bit has happened here where the managers assume an outsized role in city government the city managers work for you they are employees of the mayor and council and serve the citizens of the city of el paso when you ran for office most of you ran under mentioned transparency in your campaigns i follow city elections and i can tell you that the process that occurred here was not transparent if there was an interest in extending mr gonzalez then that should have been brought as an item on the agenda and discussed in the public for all the voters and citizens of el paso to see the discussion and then it go forward to be negotiated but i think you might have done something that you have accused others in the past of doing there's a process for government the citizens of el paso ask you to represent all of them and to set an example above reproach and you all have signed and sworn to that duty so i ask you to please consider that as you move forward in this thank you very much for your service and thank you mayor lisa for your courage in vetoing this action which i think it has nothing to do with mr gonzalez it is strictly about process and process not being followed and not setting a good example for this community thank you thank you the next speaker is raymond palacios followed by arthur westbrook dan olivas brian kennedy joseph pickett good morning mr palace good morning good morning mr apologists great day in el paso i'm here once again to voice my support for uh extending the employment contract of our city manager tommy gonzalez as all of you know his accomplishments for our city are extensive he has received the highest awards that this city that this nation can offer uh in his field he's helped reverse a decades-long slide and he's changed the trajectory of our city uh we are moving forward i hear people complain that his salary is too high i wonder if those people are aware that he saved us hundreds of millions of dollars all of which affect the services that the city receives the private sector would pay considerably more for someone with his talents i've heard some people complain that mr gonzalez gets paid too much because the average the median income household income for el paso was forty thousand dollars uh which is extremely low but i would argue that our our attention shouldn't be fixated on bringing accomplished people down instead our mindset should be on bringing people up and that's exactly why we need people like tommy gonzalez i've been a businessman in this community for 20 years i've been engaged in numerous economic development initiatives education and i can tell you tommy has been a game changer for us one of our council members said i was quoted in the media as saying that he believed that this the opposition is politically motivated and i will say if that is true our city deserves much much better council members i ask you do not pander to negativity do not pander to political motivations it is exactly that type of leadership that has set our city back instead i ask you do the right thing keep el paso moving forward for the sake of el paso override this veto thank you thank you the next speaker is arthur westbrook followed by dan olivas brian kennedy joseph pickett rick bonart good morning mr westbrook you have three minutes here good morning sir my name is arthur westbrook i'm with the ywca i'm the chief strategy officer i am here in dr silva acosta stead and she wanted me to read this letter out loud to you and it reads as follows dear city council and mayor lisa the guadalce region has many partnerships throughout the community but one of our strongest is with the city of el paso i am grateful for all the accomplishments together both pre-pandemic and since the start of covet 19. much of what we have accomplished has been made possible by the city manager mr tommy gonzalez in my experience nonprofit organizations are often left out of the loop when it comes to city planning and response under mr gonzalez that is not the case he is a true ally of the non-profit community responsive and has always considered organizations needs and listen to feedback to determine how to best serve el paso in september 2019 the city of el paso co-hosted dinner and dialogue with the ywca and the el paso holocaust museum this event brought many more than 200 el paso together to share a meal discuss the tragedy of august 3rd and begin healing i remain impressed that mr gonzalez knew this type of gathering was critical and directed his team to support those efforts since the pandemic mr gonzalez has managed millions of dollars to ensure that the community's needs were met he's been flexible when challenges arose and steadfast in his commitment to proper distribution of funds with his support ywca was able to provide more than a million dollars of child care at no cost of parents during covet 19 pandemic less than two months ago six community organizations hosted a reception to celebrate mr gonzalez's lifetime achievements award by the ballrood foundation and to thank him for all of the support he has provided over the years that several community organizations came together to honor and thank him is evidence of the impact he has made on the nonprofit community in el paso i want to reiterate his commitment to the organizations that serve our community when there have been challenges in the world of child care providers and domestic violence shelters the huawei was able to reach out communicate those challenges to mr gonzalez and together we found solutions this includes funding free child care for parents bringing vaccines to our senior housing and transitional living centers and more it is a privilege to work closely with mr gonzalez and his support has made the wider saves work in the community possible it would be a real loss of the nonprofit community and the el paso community as a whole to lose him thank you for your time and consideration sincerely dr sylvia acosta ceo of ywca thank you for your time thank you the next speaker is dan olivas followed by brian kennedy joseph pickett rick bonard kenneth bell andrea ramirez good morning mr olivas you have three minutes sir good morning good morning mayor good morning council good morning mr lewis manager my name is dan olivas for the record and on behalf of community and accion cea we formally support the extension of city manager tommy gonzalez's contract and have the city abide by the promise made to him when he declined the position in frisco texas mr gonzalez as a latino manager city manager represents less than seven percent of all city managers in this country he is one of the few latinos that are charged with leading a city of this size el paso is more than 82 percent hispanic the leadership in this community must reflect that having qualified latinos in leadership positions helps our children in our community to aspire to ensure that leadership in our community accurately represents the demographic makeup of this community through mr gonzalez's work and commitment the city has seen tremendous growth the downtown area which for a long time had not seen any investment is now a central gathering place for families single youth and community events his work with neighborhood associations nonprofits and community leaders has resulted in renewed investment the efficiencies that mr gonzalez has introduced through his management skills have also drawn outside investment and innovation in our community mr gonzalez's leadership was critical in moving the el paso community from one of the hardest hit and the epicenter of the covet 19 pandemic hospitalizations to a community with one of the highest vaccination rates in the country good leadership does matter during the august third tragedy mr gonzalez worked to assemble his team in partnership with community organizations to rally support and resources for those affected again good leadership does matter mr gonzalez supported an important project that cea has spearheaded through his support the men of company e monument which sits in cleveland square will be inaugurated on june 30th of this year this monument is a testament to the lives of the many mexican-american veterans that have given their all and have served our nation in the military when this idea was brought to him he understood the importance of this effort he understood because he understands the culture and because he is also a proud veteran he understands that government business and community have an obligation to tell the stories of all citizens including latino heroes he understands that the voice images and leadership of latinos in our community needs to be listened to acknowledged and celebrated thank you finally leave us thank you mr oliver can i go ahead and finish thank you finally as business leaders we all understand the importance of reputation thank you sir your three minutes are up we appreciate your time thank you mayor thank you sir the next speaker is brian kennedy followed by joseph pickett rick bonard kenneth bell good morning mr kennedy you have three minutes sir good morning my name is brian kennedy and i'm a local attorney here in el paso and i'm here today to speak against overriding the mayor's veto because let's be clear if the mayor's veto stands tommy still has a contract he's still the city manager he's got two years left it seems as if we're talking having two different conversations one is is it time to extend the contract and the other one is the job performance of the city manager and i will say that those are two different conversations but we seem to have merged them into one today is a business decision on whether you extend a contract for the next seven years is how long his contract will run then and i will agree when it was said last week this has now been turned political this is not a business decision here's what i have to say i agreed with concerns when one city council member said that the agenda for the contract parameters had been set in private by one council member and the city manager when i asked the city how that could happen they ostensibly said if the council has the power it filters down to the individuals that stance however is laughable to the legislative attorneys i've spoken with thinking that negotiations can be taken by a single member without counsel authority is not an appropriate action then i discovered a press release that was reviewed by a single council member before it was issued and this is the email to prove it before the press release went out one single council member got to review it and no one else according to this that's a concern makes no mistake this has become political and something frightening is happening with this issue this is an issue about a contract extension it's turned out to be job performance that's not on the agenda this is not a discussion about job performance but you'll hear a lot about it there is a subset of this council that seems to be in a rush to make things happen and i believe the deadline is the end of this council's term though not illegal it is certainly ethically suspect and i suspect it will continue and accelerate first there's a push to put the city contract city manager's contract to seven years which would push it past the entire term of the next city council but for heaven's sakes let's not change any of the egregious portions of the contract next we'll be talking about removing a veto give more power to the city manager one thing the public has been together about is they support this veto public comment has become almost howling into the wind the question is who are your actions serving the many or the few i would ask you do not override this veto start a new trend start listening and representing the many in el paso instead of the few thank you thank you the next speaker is joseph pickett followed by rick bonard kenneth bell andrea ramirez good morning mr picket you have three minutes sir good morning as many of you know a little bit about my history i retired due to some medical issues i'm pretty healthy and so one of the suggestions was to get physical build some buildings get involved and the way i worked is i ask a lot of questions and i'm here against the extension of the contract because of the questions that i had for this council and the management form of government that we had starting two years ago i got involved like a lot of people busy paying my bills online and i got a utility bill in the mail for the first time in many many years and noticed all these fees on there when i called to inquire what the fees were i got no answer so i formally sent a letter to the city manager's office in february of 2020 asking what those fees were for i'm still waiting for an answer since that letter you have collected 78 million dollars in those additional fees well thinking maybe the city manager is not going to answer to me maybe he'll answer to you the elected official so i contacted my representative miss salcido and asked her the same question here point of order i'm sorry this is not germaine to the topic as well representative with all due respect this is not germain to the the item on the agenda and as a legislature you should as a legislator speak hold on yes sir just make sure you follow the rules i'll take care of that mr pickett you do have to stay within the topic please sir yes and the topic is about the things that you are discussing i know that sir but the topic is about the extension of the contract you're extending the contract and what you have left out to the public is how you evaluate i'm letting you know how i would evaluate based on the experience that i've had so what i'm asking for is to let the public know over the next two years how you're going to evaluate this contract and if you're going to give a total of seven years a multi-million dollar contract what do we the public who pay these bills you don't pay the bills we pay these bills how are you deciding whether the city manager does a good job or not by the savings you can go to best buy and spend fifteen hundred dollars on a tv but you save two hundred dollars it's all smoke and mirrors as a member of the public who has not had anything answered to me about what i pay and the evaluation of the city manager do not extend this contract he's here for another two years let him provide all the information and you as a council need to tell us the public how you're evaluating spending of millions of dollars for this salary person i know and this is strictly about the value of the extension of the contract and the veto of the contract thank you thank you the next speaker is rick bonnard followed by kenneth bell andrea ramirez good morning mr bonner you have three minutes good morning mayor council i'm here today to support the mayor's veto um you know i've i've worked in el paso since graduating from veterinary school in 1980 i employed people for over 35 years and recently i was invited to go to lunch with some of my employees having retired um they just wanted to get together after coming back into into town one employee worked for me for over 30 years and another one worked for me for 20. so i think i have some experience in hiring people and keeping them on the job and keeping them happy and one of the things that you have to look at is when you're dealing with employees or any contract is the deal's a deal when you make a deal your word is your bond and it's only as good as what you're willing to um hold yourself to that standard and so there's still a couple years left on this contract and the issue is is that you have to wonder why someone with such a lucrative contract with so much time left would look elsewhere for employment as somebody whose experience in keeping employees that would be a red flag to me and money is normally not the cure for those kinds of issues because at the end of the day there will always be another offer from someone the issue was also raised that this was a recruitment issue and it wasn't somebody who went out looking for another job it was simply an opportunity presented well you know i have friends that have jobs all over the world that are employed by big companies they're always being hit up by headhunters for new jobs and they can turn those down they don't have to apply for those jobs so you have to ask yourself are you by extending this contract or maybe giving a raise actually solving a problem or will this be revisited again in some time in the near future and i think the answer is unless you explore this more closely that you will find yourself sitting here with the same issues again so i don't think it's wise to proceed at this point in time i think that mr gonzalez has a contract i don't know that you had made him a promise that if he turned down a different contract he would be guaranteed future employment that would be ex parte and not appropriate as the other speaker has said so i encourage you to respect the veto there still will be time to renegotiate a contract and explore what the true issues are thank you thank you the next speaker is kenneth bell mr bell star six please to and meet your telephone kenneth bell good morning mr bell you have three minutes all right good morning everyone my name is kenneth bell i am a resident of district three and i am here to speak up against agenda item one i believe that mayor leiser was correct in vetoing the contract extension of the city manager and i want to thank representative zanello and molinar for voting against the contract extension um here we go again two weeks ago council deleted an agenda item to overturn mayor leader's original veto only to turn around and use another agenda item to give the city manager another contract extension this was after you know public complete uh declarations were made that council was listening to people and that they had a change of heart but that seems to not be the reality we keep being told that the city has saved millions of dollars i believe the numbers 227 million but yet our city is billions of dollars in debt there are city services that are still not operational such as many of our libraries including the jose cisneros silo vista library which is my of my library that i have to use or used to use before it was closed down and there was a 96 million dollar significant of obligation passed by this council to finance projects that should be covered through the general fund in addition to that there's a bond being proposed in november which will cost taxpayers even more money yet we're being told how much money we've saved and how great everything is many of you claim that you voted in favor of the contract extension because of facts and data like these so for the aforementioned millions of dollars in savings yet you voted against making your scorecard evaluations public so people can see what those metrics are and how you are evaluating the city manager everyone on that council ran on transparency to the community and hiding your scorecards hiding your evaluations is not transparency it is the opposite and then you turn around and claim that we're misinformed yet many of you have not responded to residents who emailed you about this very issue the reality is that the contract extension was done as a reaction to uh city manager gonzalez applying for another job he has two years left in his contract right this is the council jumping the gun and thinking irrationally if he wants to leave let him leave the city does not revolve around any one person whether it's the city manager the mayor or council if that's not how you have effective uh continuous stability you can't revolve everything around one person he's not a king that's not how that's not how stable governments work and finally two weeks ago representative schwartzbind claimed that community concerns that were being expressed were politically motivated if anything was politically motivated because council made it political you all made it about yourselves at the expense of the community and you're doing it again today so if you have any integrity thank you mr bell you've reached the three minutes mr bell thank you we'll move on to andrea ramirez followed by lily limon christian marquette lisa turner good morning ms ramirez you have three minutes man good morning good morning mayor lisa and our city council representatives my name is andrew ramirez and i'm the chief executive officer at amistad and i'm also a military spouse mr gonzalez became an el pason in june of 2014 at a time when this vibrant border plex was in the crosshairs of political scrutiny immigration concerns were clashing with nationalist ideology to a degree that has us on the news but rarely from a positive perspective mr gonzalez has worked to rebrand our image in the eyes of the world so successfully that we have received several designations and accreditations being named the all-america city multiple times we then suffered a horrific tragedy of a mass casualty when a gunman opened fire with the express purpose of harming our community for daring to celebrate a multicultural diversity again mr gonzalez was a voice of reason compassion guiding the healing and cultivation of resiliency that we have done since this growth and development were put to the test when a global pandemic tore through our community much like a wildfire serving as the ceo of amistad i can speak firsthand to the dynamic role he has played in rallying his leadership serving as the point person for city-wide efforts to improve the lives of our constituents he coordinated strategy he coordinated innovation among leaders from non-profits health care institute institutions and the military's infrastructure his work it is phenomenal it's recognized nationally for best practices he is ingrained in the fabric of this society he represents our hispanic community our future opportunities for growth and development having been raised in a humble home he knows what life is like when a family struggles to make basic needs he knows what it's like to be hungry he builds upon adversities to generate resiliency and success the sun city is the home of fort bliss he is a retired lieutenant colonel he understands military culture he knows how to align our city to meet the needs of service members and our amazing veterans a crucial challenge facing el paso at this time it's that devastating brain drain in which our best they're forced to search for quality career opportunities away from our beautiful city mr gonzalez has cultivated a wealth of knowledge about this region and has strengthened it through a community driven strategy if we do not advocate to retain him that knowledge will be lost leaving us to start from scratch at a time when we are demonstrating our excellence my hope is that the steps needed to retain him in this region will be taken for the benefit of all of us this is thank you mr ramirez thank you thank you man we now go to a statement submitted by lily limon which reads good morning i'm writing to you on behalf of the paso del norte tejano democrats we spend extensive time greeting voters throughout our city while working on behalf of candidates for a wide range of offices it is no surprise that this is a time of great economic stress for our neighbors with a pandemic lingering gas prices rising and confusion over property tax bills these are all common concerns shared in our community i am sure that if you take the time to listen to your constituents you would hear the same concerns with this in mind we are due to support the mayor's veto of a contract extension for city manager tommy gonzalez in addition to public comments during your meetings we've heard directly from many el pasoans who oppose altering the city manager's contract before it's close to expiring extending his contract is a bad business decision you know the city manager's contract includes a set bonus structure that will pay him over the term of the extended contract it is not necessary to commit the city to that level of investment actually it is disastrous to the taxpayers plus you now have committed future councils to continue paying out the contract if he receives an offer from another city or county this council can always vote to counter the offer but make sure the offer is real not like the bogus frisco situation where he was not the top contender we urge you to listen to your constituents and follow the lead of a mayor a successful businessman who understands how to manage and negotiate contracts sincerely limon the next speaker is christian marquette followed by lisa turner dora oaxaca isela castanon williams patrick hernandez sigarista peno pierre good morning miss marquette you have three minutes good morning thank you good morning council mayor lisa and community members as a born and raised el paso in fronterisa constituent of district 8 community organizer and social worker who specializes in policy practice and is committed to work that amplifies the voices and secures the needs of community members i am here today to speak against the action of overriding mere lisa's veto and i support not prematurely extending mr gonzalez's contract through 2029. this is a commitment to mr gonzalez that our community cannot afford will not and has not benefited from and it would be unprofessional to extend a contract while a current contract exists as merely has stated previously this is unnecessary to do so far in advance this is especially true a city council does not know in advance what the needs of our community will look like even in two years time i agree that this is not only unnecessary but neglectful in practice in terms of the city council's responsibility to adhere to its constituents demands mary lisa has continuously emphasized that the community does not want to extend mr gonzalez's contract i know many community members who don't even want this current contract to exist as it has been a waste of resources taxpayer money limits merely capacity to serve directly in his role which she was voted into and ultimately puts too much power in the hands of a stranger who doesn't even live in our community and lives unaffected by his choices the choices he makes for our community members and el paso mr gonzalez is not a member of the el paso community and instead has chosen to be considered for a position in another city this is not a challenge to our city council to extend his contract instead this shows a great lack of commitment and part of the problem is rooted in the fact that he's not in el pasoan the city manager position could easily be replaced by hiring local community members who have similar experience and expertise who could serve in financial and managerial advisors positions appointed to support our city mayor marilisa was voted in by the people of el paso and mr gonzalez was appointed not voted in by opposition community members mayor sorry this is kristen karam uh we there's there's a rule against personal attacks and some of these comments are personal in nature i'm not sure what else to say resides that's untrue and personal in nature okay no problem our community makes on average according to the u.s census 23 000 a year per individual and 48 000 a year per household about 19 percent of our city according to the census is living in poverty and i'm one of those children who was raised under those conditions as the daughter of an immigrant who was forced to see the few wealthy around this town while we went hungry other community members continue to face this today as we are still living through a global pandemic and confronting the consequences of this pandemic which has caused a great deal of stress for our community members oh excuse me was the was the clock running i'm sorry while go ahead smart i'll try to finish fast you have five seconds um okay uh city council members i urge you to listen to your constituents and not override merely serious veto we cannot leave our community vulnerable and disempowered we cannot ignore what it is thank you miss marquette thank you thank you the next speaker is lisa turner followed by dora oaxaca isella castano williams patrick hernandez cigarista pineal peer good morning miss turner you have three minutes ma'am good morning marion council we are here today because you all failed to do your duty on may 23rd when this issue came up you decided not to vote on an overriding of a veto you advocated your responsibility for those of you who work together to do that and i say work together because it required more than one person you got me back and you got me back for good and you know you're not gonna like it that's the fact of the matter this is wrong it i felt feel like i fell in a sewer because you failed to vote on the issue at hand and there was a another issue about the contract that to me reminds me of oh what is it what did they call that walking quorums people walking around making arrangements in back rooms stinks to high heaven i don't have to know i stepped in fresh cow dung i don't have to look at my shoes i can smell it and that's what i smell in this council it's exactly what i smell in this council we can agree to disagree that i learned under miss wilson and by the way i sat on the city charter commission to craft his responsibilities i said on a selection committee that picked him i've got 25 years following city council i know more about this council i know more about its secrets than you do talk to that mayor right over there he can tell you how i can be oscar can tell you pardon me mayor mayor lisa can tell you how i can be i'm a royal pain i expect you all to do things honestly i expect you to do it in the open i do not expect deceptive actions i will get out here and call you out i have no qualms about it i'm a citizen i put my life on the line or with me this country's uniform yes veteran transgender woman yes and i have been homeless and when i went looking for services there were none yes business is happy you know why because the tax burden has been shifted to renters and homeowners and they're getting a free ride so i'm quite sure business is happy with mr gonzalez's positions i'll tell you right now this is wrong what you're doing contract you've got plenty of time to do a contract the way it's been done makes me think something dishonest has been going on thank you thanks turner the next speaker is dora oaxaca followed by isela castanon williams patrick hernandez morning miss oaxaca you have three minutes man good morning and thank you representative on this for putting this item on and i just want to say that i'm here as a concerned citizen i think that this is completely wrong to mr gonzalez to his family i want to thank you and congratulate you because now this is political mayor you've resurrected uh politicians from the past you've resurrected people that are running for office to use mr gonzalez as a pinata and this is all because of a contract of a contract that is doing go going well a city that is doing very good a city that has been transformed and i'm going to give you a visual because sometimes visuals gets people thinking and this is a city but before and i couldn't find a beat up old car that's how the city looked like and when mr gonzalez got here he transformed that beat up old car into a shiny red and i don't know what this is because i'm not good at cars but i can tell you something he start the car moving and rolling forward and that's exactly what this contract is about this contract is about extending for two years and we're not in bad timing because many of these folks that are in business understand that if you have somebody that is pulling and moving that car that that car forward and driving it because the wheels of government turn slow but they're turning this time and there's a transformation and there's people from the outside coming and recruiting not only him but the best and that's what we want to keep here and two years is not premature it's perfect especially when there's cities when there's companies out there that are that are that are trying to get out of covet and are looking for the best another thing i'm telling you i'm sorry something else that i want to share with you that is that is very important here is that you have folks in this room that were part of that old car that didn't move because they wanted to keep cheap labor good here in el paso they didn't want mexican americans to excel to the top and be those professionals that are now representing the majority of what looks like me and some of you and we know what this is about because if his name was smith it'd be a different story but his name is gonzalez and it is the truth it hurts but you know what this city is a better city ever since he got here and five years is not good enough and fast enough to get where we belong thank you thank you the next speaker is castanon williams followed by patrick hernandez sigarista feno pierre helen torres good morning ms castano williams you have three minutes ma'am good morning everyone good morning i'm here to speak in support of overriding the mayor's veto as a citizen in this community i know that many many many other people in the community want this community to move forward while it is true that we have very low salaries in this community it is our dream that we work towards being able to provide a community that can provide better salaries for people in our community i understand that it has been said that if you extend this contract that it is you are extending a contract for the life of this for for a time that exceeds your time on the city council but as this city council you have to make decisions now some of you may be on the city council in the future it has been said that this is not about job performance but it is about job performance because mr gonzalez has performed above and beyond he has been recognized by many organizations in this community who value his work he has saved millions of dollars he has done the job we came to you a few weeks ago and we told you about the state democratic party convention in 2024 that is about the time that this gentleman's contract would expire if you do not take action now he has done an outstanding job we are going to have national national tv coverage of that state convention in 2024. we need to be sure that we have a well-oiled well oil city government working and mr gonzalez has been a great leader with his staff we need to have him be able to work and know that he has the confidence of the city council to do all that he can do and to continue the wonderful work that he has done i urge you to not make this a political issue this is not a time to have it be about who who is not a fan of tony of tommy gonzalez this is a time to take action on behalf of the community and to keep the community moving forward i urge you all to override the mayor's veto may or i ask that prejudices not be not be provided at this at this point this cannot be a power struggle this needs to be about decision making that moves our community forward and giving this gentleman an extension of his contract is the right thing to do thank you thank you so much the next speaker is patrick hernandez sir if you're in the q star six two and mute your telephone patrick hernandez sigarista star six please good morning you have three minutes good morning good morning may i begin to speak yes sir go ahead yes i would uh just like to say that uh i do not know uh any of the city council members uh very personally or the city manager i've only you know seen them in passing maybe a handshake and the city does seem to be doing very well but one of the things that i'm extremely concerned about is the certificate of obligation debt that we've incurred so what i would like to ask if the city manager does decide to stay and if we do extend his contract let's figure out a way to make things better uh without spending so much money without leaving a debt burden on homeowners as to this particular agenda item i do support the mayor's veto i think el pasoans are only asking for what's fair for our government uh to be open and to recall during the pandemic that 156 employees were furloughed and some of them even finally let go 300 contract and seasonal employees were also let go and those are the people who needed the jobs the most during the pandemic and i'm not saying that the city manager isn't doing a great job i'm a veteran myself and i'm proud of him you know i'm proud that he's attained the level of success that he has but one thing that i do ask is that you just give el pasoin a fair deal and that would be included in keeping things open and honest thank you for your time thank you the next speaker espanol pierre mr pierre if you're in the queue star six two and mute your telephone vanilla pier star six i know pierre star six i don't see mr pierre's phone number in this crime i think he sent a letter in that we all received yesterday to read i'll search for his letter while we move on to helen torres miss torres helen torres star six please i don't see helen torres in the queue josh simmons charles simmons star six please good morning good morning mayor city council distinguished city staff my name is josh simmons i am a resident of district 5 a community member and i am a concerned citizen of the city of el paso over the continued revisiting of this issue over the city manager's contract i support the mayor's veto and when i also outline what has been already mentioned before by previous speakers this has become entirely political now the only reason why this overreach of extension of the contract for the current city manager has been met and to point out that those seven years would exceed the next term of city council members that are currently sitting or those in looking to futurely run you want to speak about bullying well this is bullying on a different level the city manager holds a lot of many of your projects within your district's ransom for either lack of support either on this issue which may be what the discussion may have been behind closed doors or the assumption of so and the only reason why it's from those members who have voted in favor is because yes they have future uh political aspirations whether it be for re-election or higher office within the city government this is why this is happening currently this is not the way city government should be run and regardless of the man sitting in the position the city manager position has too much power it has left the hands of the people has been put in place of an unelected long-term contracted employee and this person regardless of their merits and their certifications these are not unique duties to the human this human can be replaced and a lot of the comments said today sound a lot like a eulogy so i say we let the contract uh the extension not continue no cap on this going forward we reviews at this and address the salary cap individually let his contract face those two-year renewal periods and let's evaluate it from the public's perspective again those merits and criteria in which the city council makes their determination of performance for the city manager must be made public this is a city government for the people not by the select few that sit in elected offices or those who are rubbing elbows who are friends and money filled and overflowing with money who are oligarchs this needs to be a motion from the people to make sure that we control our government and we make those decisions for ourselves for the benefit of ourselves and not for any one particulars pocketbook or payroll salary so 400k is more than enough to do the job we have city uh staff employees who are working tirelessly to do a lot of the background work and they are underpaid overworked and overburdened so i urge the city council to uphold the veto uh against the city manager's current city managers contract and let's evaluate this from a more strategical and and smart way because we have budgets that are due this is a waste of time for the city and the city uh staff thank you very much thank you i located the comment from mr pear and it reads again i unequivocally support the mayor's veto decision the city manager contract extension is a non-issue for district 2 residents with rising inflation costs my family my family and i would hope you all use your time and energy to address all the pressing issues that alter the lives of folks in district 2 and quite frankly our residents furthermore our quality of life hasn't been the same since covet 19 hit our city there is a wide consensus to continue improving risk mitigation why don't you work on that and finally now is a great time to tackle our aging infrastructure in district 2. it is time to move on from endless bickerings and focus on the work before us pinup here the next speaker is mesema acosta good morning mesa costa you'll have three minutes you're on mute man star six please to end meet your telephone you hear me yes ma'am hello can you hear me yes we can hear you mr costa okay thank you i'm having a little bit of problems here um good morning mayor and council i'm calling you today to ask you to uphold the contact amendments that were already approved as i understand it at a work session held on may 23 2022 president city charter it is under the explicit purview of city council to oversee and adjust any agreements related to the employment of the city manager and whereas for the city charter the authority to make amendments to the city manager's employment contract is granted to the council as a whole and not to anyone member or individual of the voting body we are sending a message to future highly qualified hispanics and individuals to be hired in el paso not to not to believe what they may what the council has approved because one week it may be approved followed by a veto another week it will be approved again followed by another veto i'm asking you again not to do this it sends a bad message to others not just in texas but throughout the nation everyone is watching el paso right now we have a very highly qualified individual as a city manager so much so that other cities are trying to recruit him so let's keep him in our peso let's keep the best of the best the creme de la creme what other individuals may be saying what other individuals may not be saying is besides a point i believe that if council a super majority of council has agreed on a contract that that contract should be honored because that is what was voted on and not to be reneged week one and then week two again it is sending a very bad message to others it is sending a bit a ray-ban message to future highly qualified individuals let's keep the best of the best thank you thank you next is a comment submitted by elizabeth reed and it reads dear mayor lisa and city council representatives as the city of el paso resident and a registered voter i remain opposed to extending city manager tommy gonzalez contract at this time i apologize for the delay in sending in my comments i recently injured my back my concerns are the following number one why extend mr gonzalez's current contract as it does not expire until 2024 and it is 2022. in my opinion mr gonzalez considering employment elsewhere is not a reason to renegotiate his contract two years prior to the employment agreement expiring number two what is the fine fiscal impact on the city and us taxpayers to extend mr gonzalez's contract prior to it seniors for sure inspiration number three i'm sorry can you mute your your microphone please everyone in teams please mute your microphone thank you number three what is the complete financial impact to extend his contract by seven years the city has not been transparent in the total cost number four how is the city manager's salary package determined conducting research i learned that other city managers in texas who have larger populations who have a lower salary than city manager gonzalez has the city of el paso in the last five years contracted with a reputable company to conduct a salary survey if not it should consider doing so looking in recent history the city council has a disturbing pattern of giving razors to top level executives at the city i have no direct knowledge of the work performance of the city manager or other higher administrative staff at the city however i find it irresponsible to dole out twenty thousand dollars in merit raises as the city did in 2019 during the pandemic and time of layoffs how do you think the rest of city personnel feel about such actions how is that financially responsible when other many when many other companies and governments were freezing salary to try to avoid layoffs according to media reports the twenty thousand dollar merit raises have been part of the employment contract if that is accurate the city of el paso should include force mature clauses in their employment contracts that norma raises are provided during difficult financial times and national emergencies such as a pandemic the nation continues to plummet into financial crisis as inflation and fuel prices continue to skyrocket it is the city council thinking of all city personnel or is your primary concern with the management level and the city manager's job satisfaction there is a perception in the community that the city council is out of touch with constituents and true needs of the community improved streets flood medic mitigation enhanced public safety solid waste remediation economic development and the list goes on are things that are needed not for the city to continue to waste taxpayer dollars on having special meetings about the city manager's contract when the contract does not expire until 2024. mayor that concludes public comment this morning on this item thank you very much i appreciate that and uh one of the things i i do want to comment on that this is um obviously not a bit against mr gonzalez mr gonzalez has done a good job for the city mr gonzalez is still under contract whether the veto is upheld or not one of the things that's um you know i received and i looked at a lot of facebook posts and this book is totally full of people in support of what we're doing and it's it's kind of kind of sad to see that someone would come up and talk about whether it's a racial or not because it's not it's not political it's not racial we have a contract so i'm going to give you a perfect example here also that so we extend the contract for nine years if you look at the contract of mr gonzalez we could extend it for 100 years but at any point mr gonzalez has the right because there's no clause on there that he could leave and at any point this council or any other council whether it's in january of next year and 24 or again in 25 26 27 whatever it may be that contract can be voided null so today we do have a current contract and in that contract it can be terminated by either party at any time so extending a current contract that can be terminated at any time it doesn't make a lot of sense we have a contract that should be negotiated when it's time and no disrespect to the council and and that it's never been intended no disrespect to mr gonzalez mr gonzalez and i have been working in the last couple of weeks and mr gonzalez has been nothing but a professional and i want to thank you for that sir um and um you know we've had probably four or five meetings and and they've been nothing but professional and it has continued to operate the city in that manner but again if we extend a contract for seven more years at any time any council can terminate it and so it didn't really make sense to continue to extend this contract when we have a contract we have a contract that will continue to have mr gonzalez continue to lead the city council can i mean the city and it's 6 000 employees so it's not about pay it's not about performance the performance valuation will be down below later today and and that's has should have nothing to do with this so i just want to make sure that people know that we have a current contract it has nothing to do with mr gonzalez his performance and again it has to do with timing and the way it was done so i am again no disrespect to the council as i am i've enjoyed working and continue to enjoy working with you all representative nunes hi okay good morning thank you mayor um so first and foremost i want to thank all of these speakers today and for all of your comments i think that there's one common trend that i've heard from the majority of speakers today is that we do have an exemplary employee in our hands that is pushing this community forward and so that is really the major driver here as to why this council feels through previous action feels that it is proper it's not improper that it's proper to extend the city manager's contract mayor lisa you said that there is no disrespect to this council but um unfortunately these vetoes have casted a negative light on the city's workforce on our operations um as well as the credibility of the city i've heard speakers say here that all eyes are on el paso um and and this council in this body that's absolutely true um collectively the supermajority of this council has already spoken and we are collectively the voices of the majority of this constituency in the residence in el paso um we are their voices and we were elected to make those bold decisions to ensure that we have a professional that is leading this community forward and in 2014 mary lisa when you approved with the council then a contract for mr gonzalez for five years then in 2014 we agree that there has been momentum that the performance has has been exemplary and when your entire body here on council evaluates a manager with raving reviews the objective here is to continue to provide that continuity and momentum and when we offered that extension for mr gonzalez when he accepted and withdrew his name i think this council has an obligation to look at the long-term vision for the city and i think mr gonzalez has been able to achieve that and in any business in any workforce we do have an obligation to make sure that we keep our best and brightest within that organization and that's what this action does here today and so i'm really looking forward to focusing on the real issues at the city this council has to work on a budget we have to work on economic development agreements we have to work on bringing viable skilled jobs for our workforce and we have other crises like the lack of population the reduction of population we have values that are skyrocketing we have a plan that we want to ensure that mr gonzalez is part of uh so that we can um adjust any of the concerns of the community um i've heard from city employees as well some are concerned about what does this mean for our department what does this mean for collective bargaining agreements um do you want to work with a city manager who has experience in that or do you want a city manager who is going to be brand new and is going to cause a lot of problems in the future if we don't have a trained city manager um and so do you have a hot mic if someone can please please mute your mic at any rate um so i do want um to to first thank um mr gonzalez uh for for accepting this extension um there's nothing improper about that we we do see value in your management your administration the workforce agrees here that you have done a lot not only further compensation there's a lot of salary increases a lot of lump sum there's been a compensation study so you are trying to right right-size the city's workforce salary and i think i've heard loud and clear from from this workforce over 6 000 employees that they're appreciative of that and that we need to do more of course but anytime there is additional savings on the table your first response along with your team is what can we do more for this workforce that gives every single day they sacrifice for this community to lead it forward this is not a matter of is if mr gonzalez is worthy of his performance he's demonstrated that our evaluation has said as much it is what can we do to keep a professional a talented professional in our community long term because as an employee they are any employee can can leave our community and so it's it's incumbent upon us to make sure that we make a competitive market-driven offer and i think we've been able to achieve that today but unfortunately um it's just it's just gone a different way and and i'm just very sad for for this community because i know each and every one of you are doing the best um you want to do the best for this community so with that said i just want to reiterate that at any point in the future any council can contra can cancel this contract for cause or convenience that is up to future councils what this council wants to do today is to ensure that there's long-term continuity there's momentum and that we have a profession in this role going to lead the administration with the utmost professionalism and talent that this community deserves and so i i want to make a motion to to approve item number one voting guests in favor of overriding would put back the previous action which was to extend mr gonzalez's contract for five years these decisions will have to be made in the next 12 months at at any point but now we feel it's appropriate given recent news and of course given the performance of the city manager and so um that's my motion i move to approve second take your representative and um remember pro-tem your second so that stops the conversation or no no only only for deletions no we can go ahead mayor potem go ahead sir i i'd actually removed it i know that representative molly and i wanted to go so you moved your audience here you went from you were next go ahead sir thank you very much mr mayor appreciate everything you've done for us and to all everybody that came here out of their time to address the podium here and give us your input i want to say thank you very much for those of us who called in for those of you who took the time to write it's a democracy in action but we also have to respect there's a process and we got to make sure that we do things right and we've got to make sure that we do things well and to me there's many things that are um very disheartening about everything that has been happening in the last month of may uh 2021 i saw some amazing things good and bad for us here at city council but the last month six weeks have been more amazing than 2021 so we have another full six seven months to go in 2022 to see how that's going to ride out but either way let's get back to the topic and so i have nothing against personally immigrants mr gonzalez you have done great things for our community i will said that to you publicly said that to you privately but to me the timing of this is not correct it is just not does not sit well with me and it's very um just very different when you go out i was at a community event on saturday and as soon as i walked in i had a flood of people at least four or five people that came up to me whether i knew them or not they were just telling me oh thank you very much for voting thank you very much thank you very much and so it's just something different people i don't even know people from from other districts not even district four and so it's just very different phone calls our emails have been in support only one person has said you know why did you vote the way you did and i called him and i explained to him my purpose and the way i voted for that but it's just i believe it is not the correct time to do this there are two years left in this contract we need to make forward you know we talk about economic development we talk about our employees i can tell you the employees are talking and the ones that i've heard are screaming that hey thank you very much for what you're doing thank you for supporting us it's just very different i was a city employee and i was a very proud city employee and here on this dice i'm still a very proud city representative and i am more proud to represent northeast el paso i hope my colleagues understand what you're doing here city representatives you are the voice of the people that you represent that you elected um you can remember the exact speaker i think as mayor wardy mentioned about the process about the transparency and things like that and so far er all of this has just been taken away from us taken away from economic development taken away from the budget taken away from all these other things you know we talk about once again el paso strong and that's great like i said we all have a voice to say in what we say and how we say it but this has taken away so much that we could focus our time our money our energy into positive things to make this community better and make this community great thank you thank you representative thank you mayor to be honest this is pretty disappointing and frustrating when there's so many other activities um and momentum and development going on in our city and that has occurred um over these last seven years i'm in office and that we're um back to the sort of chaos and confusion of when i first started on the council uh it's pretty disappointing and frustrating but not at all surprising we are not elected here for a popularity contest as far as i could tell we are not governed by facebook many of which comments are coming from people who don't understand exactly how a council manager form a government work who are busy trying to put food on their tables and work hard for their community um for their families and don't understand um how a council manager form of government works and don't don't want to care they see a price a a contract for the city manager and and see the politicization of that occurring let's be clear this is not about the city manager's performance here today we heard it from our city our our own mayor that this is not about a city manor's performance but in a sense it is very much about a city manager's performance we have an exemplary city manager that has brought savings to this has brought innovative and creative strategies and practices and processes here including creating the first renewable energy strategic plan because there were members of the react board that were frustrated with a lack of movement and momentum and from that strategic plan we're now planning a 5 megawatt solar farm on el paso electric el paso airport land the energy from that is going to be able to cover the offset for the energy from the airport and other city facilities that is because of a strategic plan that the city manager worked with the entire council not just one member this is not about terminating his contract right as we heard it from our mayor this contract can be terminated by either or party at any time in the future month from now representative rivera can put an item to terminate city manager's contract we can do that in two years we can do that in three years we can do that in seven years whatever we owe him is whatever we owe him nothing more nothing less and this extension does not change those dollars it does not change those sense but the action that's happening here makes no sense it makes no sense towards good governance it makes no sense towards fiscal responsibility it makes no sense that a businessman a businesswoman would come up with these kind of ideas except if we understand truly what this is about said it before i'll say it again this is absolutely politically motivated these vetoes by the mayor are here to help candidates that align with the mayor to turn out incumbents people that are sitting at this council that have been working hard for many years representing this community and those vetoes that are placed are there to create a talking point are there to create a weapon against incumbents for november's election that is what is going on here that is why a veto in theory is a great idea but i would actually rather hear our mayor vote on every single item that to me is democracy don't you want to know where your marriage stands on every single item that this council votes on not just vetoing when it happens to be time for an election or to gear up for an election because the only times i've ever seen vetoes happen from this mayor and the previous mayor was when it was right around election season or they had friends that they wanted to put in the election season so this isn't about his performance we figured that out this isn't about terminating his contract and evidently it's not about salary right because we know that his salary um started back in 2014 with a five percent merit increase and that five percent merit increase was not created by this by any of the members that sit on this council here except for the mayor the mayor in 2014 agreed to a contract with that city manager who is a brand new city manager that authorized a 5 increase in his salary every year if he merited it if his contract evaluation his performance evaluation was above average that's why his salary is at over 400 thousand dollars today it's not because of a council that's out of control it was because when that contract was agreed upon in 2014 by this mayor that's sitting here then and that council they were the ones that agreed to that so you should know that you should understand that and why this is happening here this is not good governments this is not a way to be fiscally responsible but it's a great case of political theater and it's unfortunate because there's too much important business going on here on this council going on in this city to focus on this we have heard it from our own mayor's mouth this is an exemplary performing employee we have somebody that other cities want to have lead their city why would we not keep them further we know that there's somebody here that is working hard for our city i wish more people understood what a council what a city councilman and a city manager do together alongside a mayor but in the case here when you have somebody that has proven results to this community that is working hard why would you not keep them here again extending his contract today does not does not change what he is owed if both parties to terminate him it doesn't make a difference that happens next month two years from now four years from now or five years from now and so it's unfortunate that we're in this situation again i want to thank every member that was hearing my wardy thank you again for your time speaking um and others that we're here today i just think it's important that we call this out for what it is and understand that moving forward um because there's a lot of great things that are going on and we need to continue to mo this momentum in this community thank you thank you mayor pro tem and i think you couldn't be any more wrong about the contract now the contract is what the contract is of course and this is not about that did you authorize it do you authorize all right did you authorize the five percent i saw the floor did you realize a five percent increase i did not interrupt you you authorize a five percent increase on his all right this is not a debate at this point you need you need to be professional i thought we're in the democracies all right and that's why i have the floor and you need to be quiet while i have the floor you understand now i remember my mayor margot did not like you why mayor margot disrespected you because you seem to want to interrupt me and you seem to have a problem with the prior mayor you have a problem with me now and it's got nothing to do with me remember i have you physically threatened you physically threatened me you are the common denominator you physically threatened me before at this time let me explain to you sir that the biggest issue is that we need to have the quorum here and i allowed you to speak and i will continue to allow you to speak now this is not about the contract or what's in the contract it's not about that if he quits with or without merit he gets paid for whatever he gets paid a million dollars or whatever that's got nothing to do with this whether he um if it's not approved by anyone in two years it renews by itself for two more i mean at the end of the country renews for two more years those things that were not in there in 2014 so let's not discuss what you want to discuss which is the five percent in the contract which was in there the one and a half percent that now he gets plus was not in the contract then we didn't want to discuss that so yeah if he terminates for with or without cost he has the ability to get paid an additional year plus vacation plus sick leave that's got nothing to do with this you're right mr gonzales has done a very good job and you know it's funny that i sit there and you might want to go look at when joyce wilson was leaving we heard the same thing from the community the community came in and the community was very upset and this was right after the vote for the ballpark this was very they were very upset and this was that ms wilson who was moving the city forward that we had just voted for a ballpark was going to be gone and we did not offer her a new contract so this is no different than than it was today so and we did have the community speak we had people speak and at the end of the day it was very very important that we picked someone different and you're right i was the support of mr gonzalez i was and i am in support of him today mr gonzalez is a professional and has done a good job and that's where we have the contract that we have because mr gonzalez has done a good job it's got nothing to do with a contract and no contract there was a contract offered with a cap that was a contract with no cap this is not about a or b it's about c it's too early to negotiate it's too early to move and to do the contract over again so it's not has you know and it's a shame that we bring up about mr gonzalez because you're right this is not an evaluation of his performance his performance has nothing to do with this and you're right i did say that and i'll continue to say that and i'll continue to respect and be courteous to mr gonzalez as he has during our last four or five meetings so again the contract in 14 and the contract in 18 and 19 have a lot of the things the same and it's got a lot of things different and that's things that will continue to be negotiated when the contract comes to time for it to be renegotiated for that to be political i think you forgot that i didn't ask mr gonzalez to accept an offer to go apply somewhere else that was something to do with mr gonzalez which was not offered to me i didn't put the item on the agenda which the community is against to extend this contract i think he forgot that that was done by you all so it had nothing to do with me now i didn't agree with it and i so you think that i politically asked mr gonzalez to go apply somewhere else you think that politically i asked you all to put an item on the agenda to extend this contract absolutely not that had nothing to do with me i don't so to help who uh mr pickett who i asked to stay in line because i wasn't a topic so i helped him with that i think you're very mistaken by your statements it is political but i think you're going on the wrong way about thinking about where it is political i do respect the council this is i have the right to veto you're right this council deserves and the community deserves to know where the mayor stands nothing more than not i always base my opinion on any item that's going on today or any other day and our veto items that i believe and i'm not running for reelection because guess what i didn't i don't know if you realized i can't run for re-election so it's got nothing to do with me neither can i neither can i there's good things right so anyway so i i think that this is getting out of hand and accusations are improper and out of line and i think you need to see it for what it is instead of trying to make it something that it's not thank you go ahead sir i know you have the floor next no and i appreciate it mayor and um again i know that we're all in here for for the uh for the for the right reasons wanting to see this community forward again i i think the frustrating part is that is that we've had these conversations um with the council and the mayor present and um the position that you've taken hasn't been one that's communicated to this to this council as a whole so oftentimes we we don't know where you stand on these items till there's a press release sent out and we find out in that press release that you want to veto something no but you do remember and i'll ask you a question when you brought it up an executive session that you thought we ought to extend this contract when it was not an item i said i don't recommend we we're we're we'll be violating open meetings violation but i don't recommend we do that i don't i will not support it so mayor tell me that i won't support something up front i'm not going to support it first of all you're releasing information from executive session unfortunately the information releasing is not true because i did not bring that up during that and nor are those words insane however you have leaked classified information that was shared by other council members during your one-on-one meetings in your office information that was personally damaging we can stay on topic it's just it's important to understand that this lack of communication um is really something where you know you have a counsel and a mayor again that it's just very unfortunate and this council and this community deserve better in terms of leadership thank you and i think the voters will have an opportunity because that item is going to be put on the for the voters to vote in november whether they want the mayor to continue the veto and whether they want the mayor to vote on all items and i that will be up to the community and i can tell you again these emails and facebook posts that i printed 90 over 99 of them were in support so thank you for that and without miss prime we do have a motion and a second yes mayor representative rodriguez will you please turn on your camera ma'am so we can see you on screen representative rodriguez your camera is off you need to turn on your camera ma'am so we can see you i'm not sure representing mayor while we're waiting for representative rodriguez may i may ask a question may i ask a question while we're waiting for representative rodriguez thank you um so uh mr gonzalez i have a question for you um because i keep hearing this over and over again um are you aware that the city charter is requires that a city manager establish a residency um in el paso yes ma'am okay do you are you prepared to say whether or not you have a residency in el paso today absolutely i've had a residence in el paso since i've been in el paso in june of 23rd of um 2014. i actually was in um in june 23rd 2014 i had temporary housing and then we got into a home the end of july i believe and we've been in that home ever since okay well we were in that home i say ever since and then we moved into another home and we're we're in a third home right now okay are you aware that your contract also requires you to establish a residency absolutely and i have a residence here okay we live here every day 24 7 365. okay thank you i just want to make sure that um when members of the media who have the responsibility to report factual and accurate information understand that you've heard today from mr gonzalez that he that he has established residency and he has lived in el paso since 2014. anything other than that is is untruthful unfair and wrong and so we just want to make sure that that is cleared by the record i've heard multiple outlets report otherwise without correcting that or giving you opportunity to correct that and then mrs brian were you able to determine if mrs rodriguez were on i've asked mrs rodriguez to turn on her camera however she says she has no camera option i'm just checking with our legal folks to see if she's able to vote i think she just sent you if we can't see her miss hamilton is checking really quick just to make sure that she has the option to vote even if we can't see her on screen is there a requirement to be online i'm checking there one okay thank you i apologize um so uh is it okay i think mr gonzalez in his press release did clarify that because uh it was mentioned in abc extra and he wanted to make sure the community was aware of that so he did clarify that no and i think that unfortunately because it wasn't corrected immediately now there's this misconception in the community um at no fault of their fault of their own they rely on responsible journalism in this community to to get their information um but in the in the absence of responsible journalism it's it's incumbent upon us to make sure that we clarify that um the other thing i wanted to mention um a concern that i heard regarding um the other provisions and and mr gonzalez's contract i just want to you know share with council um that i am i am in favor of reviewing these evaluations and i'm also in favor of re-looking at provisions of the contract i know that the public has heard from irresponsible reporting that salaries were going to be increased as a result of this action i want to be clear that city council does not increase salaries unless our employees are able to earn those performance merit increases and so when when people are stating um when the media or reporters are stating that this action would inflate or boost or increase the salary or may increase it lends the community to believe that this council has increased that without any performance metrics or without any evaluation so i also want to be crystal clear to the public that this action would not increase or inflate or boost or may do that in the future that an employee has to earn that right earn that merit increase which means that the city manager city attorney would have to work with every single member of this council to ensure that their evaluations are astounding and good and meets expectation or even better we could hear you represent rodriguez we just cannot see you okay it's required you can do it without representative rodriguez can you turn on your camera we can't see you or hear you at this time it's required that she be visible mayor okay thank you can we recess for technical issues so it can be resolved so we all are here present to vote well she'd be able to get camera you know if we recess and doesn't happen we don't need to well she had she had her camera on earlier i'm unsure can you can you all hear me and see me i don't we can hear you but we can't see you representative rodriguez um is showing my camera is on can you hang up and call back in uh representative rodriguez if you hang up i'll call you back in and see if that works okay so you're gonna call me yes if you'll hang up i'll call you right back in okay thank you miss pry now save you she could use her cell phone let's see if this works for she's gonna disconnect and call her back in representative rodriguez i'm going to remove you from the meeting because we still can't see you but i'll call you right back in okay i don't think she can hear us let's see if we call her back in i'm going to remove her from the meeting but i'm calling her back in she's still up on the screen i'm calling her in now hello representative rodriguez do you have your camera on mim i still can't see her representative rodriguez your camera isn't on we don't see you on the screen can you hear us ma'am representative rodriguez do you hear us she's having technical difficulties she's not able to hear us or we can't see her motion to recess this meeting or can we resist you need to watch him motion to recess i'll second in five minutes 10 minutes there's a motion and a second to recess for five minutes to address technical difficulties all in favor anyone opposed is there anyone else opposed besides representative anello there's the motion passes with a majority in favor of the recess for five minutes will return at 9 40 a.m miss prime can we reconvene please it's been five minutes yes or more council if you'll return to the dais we can resume the meeting it is 9 44. council if you're in back can you please come up miss pun we do have a quorum now if we can council may we have a motion to reconvene there's a motion and a second to reconvene the special meeting all in favor anyone opposed the meeting is back in session at 9 4 a.m mayor i moved to recess until after the agenda work session pardon me second before we do that i'd like to call the question ms prince she just made a motion we need that we have a we have a motion and a second on on the floor and i mean unless they understand can we call the question though or in the middle of a motion we have a second motion in a second on the floor miss uh christian we do have a motion in a second um if the motion remains you could call the question but i think if there's a question there's a motion is the parliamentarian if there is emotion there's emotion on the floor that if there's a motion to recess i don't know how that this emotion comes in the room okay so since my motion is the main motion that motion to should take place first you can pull your your motion the original motion and then there's no motion in a second but currently we have one so that would be good on the floor of representative rivera would like to withdraw his second in order to recess no you don't withdraw your second in order to recess so um we're calling for a recess until after agenda review that's what i'm saying but you already have a motion in a second so what you're saying is if you can pull your seconds you can pull your second on the original motion then we can recess because there's already a motion on the floor so that's how she's saying and then we can come back but yeah right now there's a motion in a second for item one if you want to postpone recess on it we should pull the motion correct that's correct if representative rivera will withdraw his second for which which second did you make to approve oh okay so he made a motion come back and you can second it again right and so correct and so that's the motion that we should keep on the floor what i'm saying she's saying is the motion to for item number one has been second she if we call the question then we have to take a vote if he pulls his second out on that we can recess it and come back to it um that's not what i understand the motion previously on the floor was to approve and it was made by representative hernandez seconded by representative rivera representative rivera do you uh remove your second on that i see what you're saying and then we can recess and come back to it so the motion originally that i made was to approve the discussion action i thought we were talking about separate motions we're talking about the the motion to the main okay i'll remember i'll withdraw the second thank you merchant recess thank you now we have a motion second which is the second motion yes thank you mayor for clarifying there's a motion made by mayor pro tem schwartzman seconded by second representative hernandez to recess the special city council meeting until what time after the agenda work session until after the agenda review meeting excuse me a gender review agenda thank you okay and this is a motion in a second teresa until after the agenda review meeting all in favor yes anyone opposed the motion passes is anybody else besides representative vanello and molinar opposed to the recess if not the motion passes and the special city council meeting is in recess at 9 48 a.m in order to convene the agenda review meeting may or may we convene the agenda review meeting thank you good morning this is an agenda review meeting of the el paso city council for monday june 6 2022 it is 9 48 a.m present in council chambers our mayor lisa mayor pro tem shortline representative vanello representative hernandez representative molinar representative salcido representative rivera representative lisaraga representative rodriguez requested to be excused from this meeting on the agenda is the agenda review for the regular meeting and the mass transit department board for june 7 2022 may or we do have a quorum for agenda review i was trying to help you oh okay if we may mayor can we begin with item number three are you on the regular agenda we're on the regular agenda the agenda review for for the regular agenda may or may we begin with item three please thank you item number three figure it out good morning memphis of city council this is jessica gorgava with economic and international development item number three is the first amendment to the chapter 380 agreement with fly zone also known as ifly to decrease the maximum aggregated grant payments due to the applicant over the term of the agreement by five percent this is a consideration to the approximate five percent reduction to the minimum investment thank you very much uh item four she's got a question i'm sorry uh representing this saga thank you mayor i'd like to request to move this item to the regular agenda please yes ma'am we'll add it to the proposed revisions thank you mayor yes ma'am thank you next item please miss prime item number four is a solid wastelands number five please good morning for the record ben five uh managing director of cultural affairs and recreation item five is a resolution for temporary alcohol sales and memorial park reserve for the 2022 art in the park event thank you item six item six again ben five is approval of a resolution to authorize the city manager uh to amend the 2022 public art plan to include a mural on the side of the the acosta sports center thank you sir item seven mayor i had a question about uh number five go ahead please um item five you said yes thank you thank you um i'm just curious how many years is this art in the park event been going on for uh art in the park has actually been going on for 30 plus years sir okay and then the amendments relating to certification reports that change the certification amount if needed what what does that actually mean in uh i would defer to legal on that sir mayor pro tem kristen karen for the record uh that would just be any changes that are required by the certifications related to the alcohol sales so it would be state law requirements if there's if there is a change in what they submit in order to comply with the with the state law requirements okay thank you thank you so we're on item seven good morning uh lindsay adams economic and international development item seven is for the city managers to be authorized to sign an agreement between the city and focused advocacy for consulting services relating to the legislative services um there will be a revision to this item for tomorrow in order to clarify the term to better align with the legislative session thank you mate good morning mayor and council yvette hernandez with the capital improvement department item number eight is the first amendment to the on-call agreement for professional services this is between the city of el paso and cbre it's increasing from two years to three years the dollar amount from a hundred thousand to three hundred thousand total contract amount including options not to exceed five hundred thousand thank you item nine and again the streets and maintenance department item nine is to authorize the city manager to sign the traffic signal group agreement between the city of el paso and franklin property brothers uh post where the city agrees to maintain the traffic signal improvements installed by franklin property pros located at the intersection of state highway 659 north side of brussels road and your brand new drive thank you item 10. good morning terry capshall animal services director this item is a request to allow the city manager to sign an agreement between the city and the el paso community foundation this partnership will help promote animal welfare initiatives and promote a non-profit vehicle for gifts from private and other donors for the benefit of animal services the initial terms for five years with an option to renew annually thereafter thank you for sure mayor we do have public comment on item 10 do you have you want to comment personal would you like to make comment public comment please miss turner signed up to speak on item 10. miss turner you'll have three minutes so uh i'll have my questions answered come tuesday and i don't have to ask about them so hello can y'all see me yes ma'am could somebody go into further explanations for this please so i can fully understand what this item is about chief yes uh this is going to be a partnership between city of el paso and i meet the community foundation it allows us to work together to help promote animal services and life-saving initiatives they'll set up a foundation similar to what we've done with other organizations within the city the history museum has the same type of agreement and we work it together to to have fundraising events people can donate directly to the foundation and that gives us a mechanism to purchase items such as leashes and that type of thing or any other things that we may need through the donation process so so will this reduce the city's responsibility to the animal shelter no it would not no it would not it's a it's a force multiplier okay so this is basically an additional revenue just to work together miss turner it's an additional it's it's additional assistance a good example of partnering with another non-profit that does that on a continual basis so this is a force multiplier okay thank you yes ma'am thank you sir yes sir thank you chief representative rodriguez we can't see you man there we saw you briefly but we lost the connection no ma'am we can't see you on screen okay mayor can i ask you yes ma'am please uh so i just i chief i know that i was not uh president at the april uh asac meeting so i wanted to see was this uh brought forward to the advisory committee in april because i know it was not in may no okay i would just ask that i know they're just an advisory committee but you know we've appointed people in the community who are very committed to our animal services and animal shelters across the community and so i would just ask um that this be something like this be brought to the animal services committee prior to council and i would ask that you you know this is on the agenda for today i will not postpone this or ask to postpone this um in the sake of time because i do think it is a good agreement um so i would ask that you do brief them at the next meeting on wednesday um but but in the future these are the kind of items that do need to go before the advisory committee before coming to council thank you thank you representative vanilla representative thank you mayor do we have any idea right now what type of vehicle we're looking at your receiver partnership with is it a van is it a pickup truck is it a four-drawer vehicle something that accommodate uh animals uh equipment how large anything like that no sir this is just a mechanism to accept donations um anybody that's looking to donate to uh healthy animal welfare within the community they can donate directly to this foundation it's a 501c3 and then again it goes directly to benefit animal services go ahead representative thank you chief one more question so are we just talking about monetary donations are you are you talking about actual items as well because i know right now um animal services uh does have an amazon list that they ask individuals for and so just wanting to know if that's going to change if everything will have to go through the health foundation or through the community foundation no those types of donations will still accept as well people do drop off items as well or through the amazon account like you said and people also bring miscellaneous items directly to the shelter uh those uh we do accept uh this would just allow us to accept a larger monetary funds as well it's just an easier mechanism for both the the person donating they can use it for tax write-off purposes as well and again it's also through the the they're experts in managing these types of funds as well okay thank you thank you mr prime um item 11 through 16 are board appointments that's correct sir item 17 is tax liens refunds i mean yes so it's a tax refund over twenty five hundred dollars and item eighteen is a council education yes sir it's a notation of a donation great item nineteen please good morning gretchen garcia with purchasing and strategic sourcing uh this item is linked to strategic goal number seven enhance and sustain el paso's infrastructure network the linkage to the strategic plan is subsection 7.2 improve competitiveness through infrastructure improvements impacting the quality of life we're requesting that the purchasing director be authorized to issue a purchase order under this change order for the remainder of the contract time for contract 20220156 motor oil antifreeze lubricants transmission and hydraulic oils and fluids thank you item 20. good afternoon my name is vanessa lagunas from the purchasing strategic sourcing department the strategic goal for this item is number two to set the standard for a safe and secure city the linkage to the strategic plan is subsection 2.3 increased public safety operational efficiency this was a liberated procurement there were a total of 19 viewers online one bid was received being local an inadequate competition survey was conducted and we recommend the award of solicitation 2022.0068 engine and transmission lubricants coolants and antifreeze to cnr distributing llc the sole lowest responsive responsible bidder thank you item one two one pardon me oh 21's council item 22 council item 23 24. [Music] mayor can we remove the lost dog from that item yes ma'am that needs its own separate item so we'll so what do you want removed from there lost dog okay thank you thank you so much and we'll add the revision to the proposed revisions to strike out the words lost dog from your item yeah i will follow up at the next council with an item for lost dog i just think they do their own items thank you so now we're in item 25. now item 25 will be the first i'm sorry item 25 26. good morning mayor and council item number 26 is the briefing to counsel from the bond overview advisory committee i'm sorry mayor um we had a question from the public on item 23 okay item 23 we have miss turner that signed up to speak this is a council light hopefully you all passed that and can somebody tell me who to talk to when it comes to uh the rams on the sidewalks and other things that impede those in wheelchairs and scooters area has a really bad situation going down right now you can talk to me or miss jerome after okay thanks yes ma'am thank you mr turner i see uh representative rodriguez can you hear us item 26 item 26 ms turner also had a question on item 26 it is the bond overview advisory committee briefing is there some backup for this that i can look at and read and what bonds are we overlooking it's the bond overview advisory committee for the 2012 quality of life bond and they are required by amendment to provide a briefing and so they will give an update on the projects that we have completed review the entire projects and also some of the recommendations that they have provided to the city as a committee okay thank you now we go to the first readings yes sir item 27. yes ma'am good morning roe garcia inspections item 27 is the first reading of an ordinance rezoning property to m1 light manufacturing this is for property at 9751 pat american drive this would allow an existing wastewater treatment plant this is essentially a cleanup rezoning which is uh resulting a smaller portion of the already much larger property already zoned and won there was no opposition cpc was unanimous approval thank you item 28. item 28 is also first reading this ordinance is resorting property to c1 commercial this is for 7249 dale road this would allow proposed commercial retail we did receive two emails in support as well as one phone call and one petition with 17 signatures in opposition it's important to note the concerns have been addressed through proposed conditions on the rezoning cpc was unanimous approval thank you item 29. in 1949 also first reading of an ordinance rezoning property to a4 apartment uh this is for property located at spur 16 and iceland proposed multi-family apartments two emails and one letter in opposition and cpc was unanimous approval thank you item 30. good morning mayor and council this is maria pacillas item 30 is an ordinance authorizing the city manager to execute a corrected tax resale deed to fit figueroa holdings llc the prior deed contained a clerical error in the property's legal description thank you that's in the first readings item 31 uh representative thank you mayor thank you um yes i'm just wondering um can we get an address for this property and i believe orchard park edition is no longer in district 8 but there's this needs an address i think okay um the property id number i have a property id number but i don't have an address it's by paisano but let me look into it uh representative um lisa and make the correction needed okay thank you very much thank you thank you ma'am item 31. item 31 evernote capital improvement department this is discussion and action on a task work order for the solicitation of the renovations at fire station 21 for an estimated award of 1.4 million dollars thank you item 32. good morning derek russell with purchasing the street sourcing department that's your goal for this item goal number two set the standard for a safe and secure city the linkage strategic plan is subsection 2.9 promote building safety this is a low bid procurement for on-call demolition there were 48 views online two bids were received one being a local supplier an inadequate competition survey was conducted no protests were received for this requirement and we are recommending award as indicated to alamo environmental inc dba alamo 1 the lowest responsive and responsible bidder thank you item 33. chief dagostino oh item 33 ms prime item 33 is a public hearing on an ordinance granting a franchise for elite medical air transport dba emergent air to operate a non-emergency ambulance transfer service thank you item 34. good morning mayor council peter pacius item 34 is an audience amenity titled nine to clarify the reasonable sensibility standard to clarify the maximum sound level the levels apply to properties producing the noise and the location of sound readings to clarify that vibrations can occur on any affected property to clarify the city may seek civil actions and penalties of up to one thousand dollars per day and to clarify which departments have authority to enforce penalties provided by this section uh it's been postponed three times mayor um i i would ask um if we can postpone this item 34 and 35 will be attending a funeral tomorrow and request from the council that we postpone this item until the next council meeting and yes sir this is yes thank you sir item 36 good morning elizabeth triggs economic and international development item 36 is a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign a chapter 380 economic development program agreement between the city and champlain cable for the expansion of a wire mill facility at the company's location in the mission valley area at 9 600 pound american boulevard the agreement requires champlain cable to make a minimum investment of 5.686 million dollars the retention of its existing 70 employees and the addition of 29 new employees over the term of the agreement as consideration the city will provide performance-based incentives and an amount not to exceed 285 000 over a five-year grant period in the form of property tax rebates a development fee rebate and construction materials sales tax rebate all generated off of the company's new investment thank you item 37 item 37 elizabeth triggs economic and international development item 37 is a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign a chapter 380 economic development agreement between the city and transperfect translations a new business services operation specializing in translation and interpretation services to be located in northwest el paso at 1015 belvedere street the agreement requires transperfect to make a minimum 1.56 million dollar investment and create 484 new jobs over a two-year period including a 684 thousand dollar investment in employee trading the addition of the 484 jobs will result in an annual estimated payroll of 15.75 million as consideration the city will provide performance-based incentives in an aggregate amount not to exceed twenty six thousand four hundred and twenty four dollars over a five year grant period primarily in the form of property tax rebates generated as a result of the company's new investment thank you adam 38 mayor a council mayor and council staff is requesting to postpone item 38 for two weeks and for clarification uh for the record tracy jerome senior deputy city manager um we're requesting the postponement um because we continue to work with our community stakeholders as well as our colleagues at the county on this very important resolution and the formation of this commission so we appreciate your patience um with the postponement of two weeks two weeks is enough time for you i'm sorry there's two weeks enough time yes sir we do believe that two weeks will be enough time thank you very much okay thank you ms turner signed up to speak on this item as well me thank you item 39. who are these stakeholders mrs turner have you signed up she did say yes okay thank you thank you i'm sorry who are your stakeholders so the stakeholders per the the direction that was given by the council will be the entire community and we will continue the outreach the outreach is just beginning um the commission will be will be formed um working with it with the with the with the county um and again with other community stakeholders who are giving input um and then with counsel and then there'll be regular interaction like there are with all of our other advisory boards and that makes me a stakeholder then doesn't it okay uh yes ma'am absolutely i want to see this commission formed and one of the first things on its agenda when formed is i want a breakdown on the number of rape kits that are untested in this city and if there are any i'm going to want an explanation as to why and how soon if there are any untested rape kits they will be tested thank you thank you item 39 you every nunda's capital improvement department item number 39 is discussion and action that the city manager be authorized to sign an advanced funding agreement this is between the city of el paso and txdot this is for the sean haggerty drive extension it's a design of a four line bridge and the price is estimated at 21.7 million with an estimated local government participation at 1.375 million thank you we do have one executive session item yes and miss turner signed up to speak on that item sir thank you one of the reasons why you saw so much stuff today is people don't know what it is you're evaluating all they know it could be is it mr gonzalez our city manager throws one heck of a super bowl party and has good beer so a little more transparency would probably help avoid a lot of this stuff thank you thank you and we have mass transit we have a mass transit agenda board member rodriguez from the meeting okay item three street better first and metro this item is the strategic recovery plan for transit services okay item four good morning garcia with purchasing a strategic sourcing department this item addresses strategic rule number seven enhanced and sustainable classes infrastructure network the linkage to the strategic plan is subsection 7.3 enhanced regional comprehensive transportation system this was a request for proposal uh procurement there were 39 views online only one proposal was received coming from another local vendor an inadequate competition survey was conducted no protest has been received for this requirement and we are recommending an award as indicated to a new player of america the sole highest ranked proposal based on the evaluation factor established for this procurement thank you mr prine that brings us to the end of agenda review may we have a motion to adjourn second there's a motion and a second to adjourn the agenda review meeting all in favor yes anyone opposed and the agenda review meeting for monday june 6 2022 is adjourned at 10 15 a.m move to convenient agenda excuse me mood to convene the special meeting there's a motion and a second to reconvene the special city council meeting all in favor yes anyone opposed the meeting is back in session at 10 15 a.m on item number one do we have a we have a motion do we need to have a motion again or yes mary i move to approve item number one there's a motion made by representative hernandez seconded by representative rivera to approve item number one which is discussion in action to override the mayor's veto the returned may 23rd motion of city council authorizing the first amendment to the amended and restated employment agreement between the city of el paso and tomas gonzalez which lists the amended terms would you like to call the question mayor pardon me can i call the question please i'm sorry i didn't yes ma'am okay call for the vote miss brian i'm not i'm not um signed in so i'd like to take it verbally he's not mayor pro tem isn't signed in it's my fault you don't i mean i can just verbalize it what is your vote mayor potent um and i would be to overturn i is to to all right and representative rodriguez yes thank you in the voting session i t thank you i.t and the motion passes with six affirmative votes representatives anaelo molinar representative schwartzwein hernandez salcido rodriguez rivera zaraga voting eye the motion does pass that brings us to the end of the agenda and move to adjourn there's a motion and a second to adjourn the special city council meeting all in favor yes anyone opposed and the special city council meeting is adjourned at 10 17 a.m mayor would you like to convene the work session please thank you good morning this is a work session of the el paso city council bye everybody have a nice day for monday june 6 2022 it is 10 18 a.m present in council chambers our mayor lisa representative vanello representative hernandez representative molinar representative salcido representative rivera representative lee zaraga representative rodriguez has requested to be excused from the from this meeting the first item on the agenda is presentation and discussion by the covet 19 response and recovery cross-functional team providing information on key activities efforts and processes and we began begin with an overview from city manager mr tommy gonzalez miss fine i'm also here for the record mayor pro tim schwarzwein is also present in council chambers at 10 18. thank you sir so good morning everyone good morning again since the beginning of may we have seen an exponential increase to the positivity rate of daily new cases of covet 19 viruses specifically daily new cases have increased from 30 to 184 over a seven day rolling average or about six times higher than they were in early may the positivity rate has similarly increased from six percent to over 49 percent that's nearly eight times higher than it was back at the beginning of may hospitalizations have also increased however they have done so at a slower rate since beginning of may hospitalizations have increased by about 60 percent from 25 to 40 hospitalizations over the seven day rolling average in terms of percentage in spite of the increases covet hospitalizations as a proportion of total area hospital capacity has remained low so it has not overcrowded our hospitals our community level also remains low it's reflective of low case rate and the hospitalization rate all taken together these trends suggest that the vaccine remains effective against severe illness from covid but there is still a high level of infection as far as a vaccine update we're at 56 of daily new cases over the seven day rolling average are breakthrough cases uh that that has significance in that you know if you're vaccinated people are still getting the virus so you have to protect yourself by either separating and staying away in in close quarters or putting a mask on and again just washing your hands as often as possible the city continues to lead the state and the nation and vaccination rate we're at 82 fully vaccinated with two doses while the nation's at 71 and the state is at 66. as far as the boosters we're at over 40 percent so that we're making progress there as well and that is something we keep pushing so the city continues the free vaccination and boosters there's no there's no appointments necessary we have clinics on stanton rem con railroad and alameda throughout our community if you recall and they're open monday through saturday from eight to five and if people need additional information again for the covert vaccine or the booster they need to just go to epcovetvaccine.com or 212-6843-212-6843 at this point i'm going to turn it over to ms garam to continue the update on the legal front good morning marion council we have a very brief update for you if i could have the next slide please and while they're pulling that out as you are aware the greg abbott in his official capacity as governor versus the city of el paso statewide mandate litigation is still pending and there has been no no action or no movement on that case which is in the eighth uh texas appellate court and there has also been no update on the other two cases that are pending related to the mask mandates next slide please some additional updates for you related to the texas supreme court emergency ordin order the texas supreme court issued the 51st emergency order regarding covet 19. it is effective from june 1st through august 1st of 2022 and it continues to allow for remote hearings in all cases except for specific criminal jury proceedings it continues to authorize all courts to require or to allow for remote hearings and also we wanted to update you that the el paso municipal court does anticipate uh reopening jury trials this june on the 23rd thank you back to the city manager thank you i think it's dr o'consis next uh yes go ahead please thank you so i have two questions um uh first uh for miss hamilton um we have this council uh during the pandemic the beginning of the pandemic we passed in um i'm to use the wrong words but the words that are coming to my head is anti-inflation uh but that's not what we passed we basically uh p pass an ordinance to stop people from unnecessarily price gouging thank you that came to me sorry i just want to talk it out um and so we amended that uh at the request i believe of the fuel industry uh to meet market rate correct okay so we've heard congress lately talk about and we've heard many people talk about this many experts but congress has also taken up the conversation about uh inflation in oil and gas prices because the fact of the matter is uh the cost of gasoline a barrel of gasoline per fuel companies has not gone up but they are passing that cost onto the consumer and so i i'm wondering how that is impacted by our our anti-press gouging ordinance because while the the market i guess you could say the market is dictating a rising cost but that's not based on actual numbers um so i would like for you our city attorney to get back to this council on what purview we have on that because if if if the oil industry across the nation is price gouging we hear congress talking about that we have legislation and passed to prevent that i know that the again the wording of dictated by the market is tricky right because when inflation what is dictated by the market is is a rise in cost but the actual cost of a barrel of gasoline per these uh gas station gas companies is not actually rising um so i think we as a council really need to understand uh what our purview is on that thank you uh representative vanello uh we can work with the city manager and his staff also to analyze that the pricing issue and how the emergency ordinance might relate to those prices and and if there is any power of uh controlling yeah and i would like to understand if we need you know if we were to uh go back to the original right removing kind of the idea of uh market what the market dictates from that ordinance if that would have any impact as well right we'd have to look at what we'd have to research any preemption issues i also understand congress hasn't been able to solve this i i don't i'm not expecting the world from y'all but i would just like to understand thank you and then my next question is for mr gonzalez so um i know that we've seen an increase i believe it was about six months ago you know we as a community had declared that we um have heard immunity based on the number of vaccines administered but i'm wondering if that's actually based on the number of vaccines administered or the number of individuals in this community who received the vaccine because i can tell you i know a lot of people who do not live in el paso county who came to el paso to receive the vaccine and so i just really want to kind of understand what exactly the number of like what herd immunity does look like in this community and so how we're basing that is it based on the number of vaccines administrated or the number of vaccines administered to individuals in the community which i know is going to be hard because this council also was very clear about not asking for things like residency or status we wanted to make sure everyone received the vaccine but we also want to make sure when we're talking about herd immunity and numbers increasing what that actually looks like so i don't know if you have an answer so when the comment was made about hurt immunity at the time that was the the phraseology that the federal government was utilizing they've since backed off of that and so have we and we were simply just regurgitating what the percentages were based on what they claimed were uh what was considered hurt immunity with res and we did get there the fastest but the the point that you're making anyone and everyone who came to us we vaccinate it so it's it's our region and and really we continue to push the vaccination and yes it's everyone who's come to us and not everyone is located in our backyard so to speak but it's in our region if that's our bigger backyard and it included people like when we crossed on the bridges uh those numbers as well so um we were very aggressive on that tact and so yes ma'am that's the answer and then dr karan says on if he wants to add anything to that dr o well i would just first of all phraseology i'm going to start using that i really enjoyed that term um but if you if you could all work to try to get us what that number looks like uh locally versus region because again i know that was the direction of this council i'm not at all saying i you know disapprove of the fact that we were giving a vaccine to anyone who came here that is what i wanted that's what everyone here wanted um you know really appreciative that you all did that i don't want it to come off like i don't you know i'm looking down on that decision that was the right decision but i do think it is important as a community we understand what the numbers do look like here locally so i don't i don't know if it's possible to get an accurate number yeah um again because of what we asked for you know details we asked for you not to take but but as close as we can get to understanding is this specific community here what are the vaccine what is the vaccine right are we at humanity and i would just say our numbers are reflective of or reflecting what the nation's seeing in terms of the uptick and the what the state is seeing as well so our numbers are no different in terms of the fact that we have a higher uh number of infections uh but there's not the numbers of deaths that we had in the past or the severe illness that we dealt with in the past so that's the standard that's that's also being seen across the state and and across the nation we'll work on those numbers to see what we can get in terms of answering your question and i would say we're not unique i think other communities if people would travel to odessa as a matter of fact or midland in the early stages of the pandemic in order to get a shot faster because there were certain areas of the state that weren't really pushing it and people weren't necessarily a fan of the vaccine so they had slower lines or lesser of a line and so early on a lot of people went just to all parts of the state in order to get their vaccine so again we're not unique in terms of giving the vaccine to everyone who came because the idea was that you'd come in contact with someone we needed to vaccinate everyone but yes um we will work on that number to see if there is a way to track that down so dr owen and the chief will work on that thank you good morning one second doctor please thank you mayor i i can wait till till the end of the presentation for my question go ahead thank you so much doctor good morning sir good morning uh thank you very much and and i want to say thank you to the council because that strategy of immunizing everybody regardless of the place of residence has helped us tremendously and this is going to be a quick explanation how vaccination has helped our community in such a way that we're seeing a rise in the number of cases and we see it with our neighbors we see it with many of the large gatherings that we have attended and how people are positive for covet but yet the hospitalization has remained with a very modest increase in not overwhelming our health care system next slide please i want to emphasize and i put this page on the dashboard which speaks about the healthcare readiness the hospitalization that's that's going to be the metric that is the most important and we'll talk a little bit more about the community levels but on the hospitalizations as you can see we had two large spikes and one was the worst spike that we had in the country and we were the worst spot in the country and the second one was the one that we saw in january with the omicron variant right now we're seeing a very modest increase in the number of hospitalized species but the severity is not there which is thank you to the vaccination and is over and over proven by science by science that the vaccination is effective in preventing this hospitalization and death from covert we present in previous city council meetings how the people that are unvaccinated are the ones that we're seeing passing away from complications and coming in comparison to the ones that had the vaccine and in comparison to those that have the booster i have been mentioning and recommending strongly recommending the people that don't have the booster to come and get it this is the right time to come and get your booster right now you can get your vaccination without an appointment you can walk into the clinic and receive the vaccine bring your children or the other adults that are in your household to receive the either complete the vaccination schedule or receive your booster shot we have some other tools in our public health toolbox which one of them is the antiviral we're using more of the oral antiviral more than the infusion because of the susceptibility of the some of the sub variants of the omnicron to some of those injectable or infusion monoclonal antibodies next slide please and while we were seeing that the number of kisses are rapidly climbing it is a big discussion now to whether we need to continue paying higher attention or a lot more attention to the positive cases or the hospitalizations we all agree that the hospitalization is going to be the metric that we need to keep a close eye on because of the vaccination because of the antiviral because of many other uh factors such as a natural immunity we're going to see that many people even when they get reinfected with the covet are not going to end up in the hospital and that's what we want to do we want to prevent hospitalizations and death we want to see and evaluate the severity of disease and that's the way that we're going to see it by watching very closely the metrics as far as the hospitalization and that's how the new community levels have been built upon we cannot ignore the number of positive cases because these hospitalizations come from the number of positive cases so what do we do we continue to recommend the prevention and prevention is extremely extremely important and as mentioned to the public we will continue to see some fluctuation in these numbers it's going to go up it's going to go down there's going to be different factors affecting the number of possible cases when we are in large gatherings then we are risking ourselves to get exposed and to get infected with the corvette that's why we continue to tell each family to assess the risk assess our loved ones who needs to take less risk then don't take him to those large gatherings that's going to be the way that we're going to be preventing some of those positive cases or breakthrough cases and ultimately hospitalizations because vaccination does protect against hospitalization but when we have somebody that is frail already with chronic conditions if they get infected or reinfected then they can develop some complications next slide please these are the metrics on the community level and this is based upon hospitalization i want to keep emphasizing and that's why we continue to be in the low community level so far if we see that the hospitalization start to rise then we're gonna be recommending some other public health interventions but the best recommendation for now is prevention we need to anticipate we need to not let ourselves uh get caught with with our guard down and that's why we need to continue telling the people just be careful next slide this is the visualization on the new cases of code per 100 000. the levels uh that we mentioned in the previous slide as far as community levels he talks about less than 200 cases per 100 000 over the last seven days or more than 200 cases per hundred thousand in the last seven days we haven't reached that level yet but if we can see at the beginning of the month that's what we started seeing the climb on the positive cases next slide please and this is the new admissions not the total number of patients that are hospitalized but the new the new emissions which are people that are newly uh in the hospital and we saw that we saw a small hike and then it goes down it's going to continue having that fluctuation on the new emissions but hopefully we don't surpass that rate that is 10 new admissions per hundred thousand over the last seven days next slide please and with that uh i thank you now i'll be happy to answer any questions thank you dr i know you you know you're talking about the transit going up uh what's um what's behind all this trend going up and you know we always seem to seems to hit us always a little later than normal um what's um coming from outside our country and what's already in our country that we can need to be prepared for well there's still some sub-variants of the omicron which are the ones that are uh starting to circulate more and more it's not just the omicron but their sub-variants so those are the ones that are being more infectious and so far we haven't seen that the severity of the disease has increased which is a positive thing we have been experiencing large gatherings with graduations with just getting together we had some holidays also that were meant to be together that probably those give a rise to the increase in the number of positive cases now that the schools are over for uh for regular session and it's going to be in summer [Music] vacation if you want to call it then we're going to see that there's going to be a decrease because definitely the schools are a setting where you have large gatherings and you can drive some of those numbers up as well but now that they're going to be in summer vacation then we expect that we're going to see those numbers going down after all these large gatherings also at the end of the summer or before the school starts again we're probably going to experience a positive trend because of the people that went traveling so traveling we need to be careful as well if you're taking mass transit you're you can wear your mask you can continue practicing that prevention so this way you'll enjoy your vacation in such in such a way that you're not going to be sick while you're on vacation you're not going to be bringing back the virus to some loved ones and we will continue to monitor as far as any new variants because any new variant there's three things that we get concerned one whether it is more infectious second whether disney variant is gonna cause more severe disease but the third is how this new burn is going to escape the immune system and all the therapeutics that we have which are the antivirals which are the vaccinations we still are protected against the omnicron variant and the subversions with the booster dose even though their protection is slightly less than what initially was but nonetheless it will protect us and and that's what we continue to strongly recommend for people to get the booster and and i don't know if i answer your question mayor yeah you did and um what's um what's up coming for i know that there's been i've read a lot of stories that were children five and up or you know they're recommending a booster shot but i've not seen it approved yet is that coming in the very near future you think and or is there's still studies to be done and what's go ahead there's two things that are coming pretty soon in the horizon the main one is the vaccination for children under five and that's the one that we are preparing the fda and the cdc are going to have a meeting very soon whether to prove it or not yet there's been studies in which pfizer and moderna are submitting their information as far as effectiveness of the vaccine for children from six months to up it is it has been quite challenging because the effectiveness of the vaccine hasn't been as high as the one seen for older teenagers and adults so that's what they initially were sent back to provide more information they were looking at different doses but also they were looking at the number of doses administered to achieve more desirable level of protection and that's what we're going to be seeing in the very near future very not long ago they approved the booster dose for children five and up and initially was 12 years of age and not and uh our clinics are getting ready also to provide the vaccination once it gets approved for those children less than five years of age so we can provide that vaccination thank you sir um mayor pro tem yes thank you um one of the things i have a question as it was mentioned there so um out one thing that might be good in in terms of looking at at getting the word out i think is is really um helping to emphasize again that those care clinics that we have um that again were paid with the cova clinics we have paid with karezak dollars um those are operational again monday through saturday 8 am to 5 pm and again those are all those are all within walking distance to mass transit correct yes sir that's correct so that was that again i think was a big reason was again to have that that continuity and the ability to utilize mass transit for a variety of el pasoins to utilize i think we should just as um it looks like we're going to be expanding some of our mass transit options as well as yes we shift more towards recovery i do think it would be a good idea to help advertise again to the public access to those to those cares funded coveted clinics as well that we have i also again too there's other community members as well that have that have these booster shots as well as vaccines immunize el paso for example is one um that's there recently received my booster as well and definitely threw me more for a loop than uh the last one so um i think too if there's a way to also highlight as well some of those other community partners i think it's always good again the best best way we can help our our community is again with the vaccine by being healthy and by doing those things are appropriate so and again we're we're not out of we're not outside of it they're seeing again a rise in transmissibility and a rise in cases throughout the country as well so um what you're seeing in other communities will probably hit here if it's not already thank you with that mr prime uh mr gonzalez i'm sorry that's okay there's nothing really else that i have to add i think we've covered everything just the the infection is on the rise uh mayor pro tem you're correct when those were purchased the council made that approval because of the fact that we felt like it would be a three-year stay with the covid and it's covet 19 and now we're in 2022 so unfortunately that prognostication was on target unfortunately and we think that this will continue and as even though the cases are milder because of all the preventative measures that have been put in place to include the vaccine and the booster it's still a concern and as the doctor said dr o there's sub-variants and then there's other things that are coming down the pike that you've seen that you've read about that are concerning and so these clinics being throughout our city not only helps us with the virus and also with any additional things like sub-variants and other things we might see but then just the continual things that we provide to our community like the flu vaccine and other vaccines of that nature and and the clinics that we have for stds and so forth so these clinics were done strategically and no general fund money had to be used or no bonds had to be used so it was a strategic move on the council's part in order to again stave off additional debt so thank you for that and that's all i have unless you have any additional questions for me uh no sir thank you thank you mayor pro tem yeah i just i just wanted to add something again you know i'm just bringing up this issue of of communications and those care clinics yes because it's something that's going to be with our community in the future it's an investment in public health um as you're aware you know i'm communication and how and out and outreach is something that's very central to my office it's very central towards i think what we can do as a community you know i literally have a set of covet 19 vaccine mailers out here so this is something that is really important is is getting the word out on these and that's something that's really important again for for my office as well so just wanted to like yeah and the council's help is encouraged and appreciated i know y'all send a lot of things out through your newsletters and they're really good by the way and i think i've commented on several of y'alls that you'll put that out so you pushing that out really helps the effort so thank you thank you with that mr prine yes mary that brings us to executive session is there a motion to recess there's a motion and a second to retiring to executive session all in favor yes anyone opposed and the city council of the city of el paso may retire into executive session pursuant to section 3.5 a of the el paso city charter in the texas government code chapter 551 sub chapter d to discuss executive session item one city attorney and city manager annual performance evaluations matter number 21-1043-688-551.071 and 551.074 these matters are taken into executive session under 551.071 consultation with attorney and 551.074 personnel matters it is 10 46 a.m yes motion to adjourn i want you to there's a motion and a second to reconvene to come out of exec to come out of executive session and recommend the meeting all in favor anyone opposed the work session is back in session at 2 16 p.m mayor pro tem we're on ex1 no action thank you that brings us to the end of the agenda is there a motion to adjourn there's a motion and a second to adjourn the work session all in favor anyone opposed the work session for monday june 6 2022 is adjourned at 2 16 p.m thank you