for e e e e e e e e e e e well good morning everyone we are going to get started here and good morning El Paso good morning city council good morning Miss Prime we're ready to go to work good morning mayor good morning this is a meeting of the AL Paso city council for Tuesday February 25th 2025 Mayor Johnson is present presiding in council chambers along with mayor potim Chavez representative ACO representative Roa representative threo representative noo representative Leon representative Canalis is running a few minutes late it is 9:02 a.m. will everyone please silence your electronic devices so as not to disturb the meeting and rise for the invocation delivered by opesa police chaplain Joe Mor good morning good morning morning if you'd like to receive the invocation today let's bow our heads together and let's pray we begin these proceedings today with thankfulness and appreciation for the freedoms and the rights that we enjoy in our nation our state and in our city we ask for guidance today for all those who represent and work on behalf of the people of this community grant our elected and appointed City officials the wisdom and understanding to make the decisions they need to make and and best how to serve the residents of of our community let us be a community that as your word teaches us to be have a selfless Spirit of love that today throughout El Paso there are numerous needs we ask for your blessings for every organization whether it is government whether it is private or religious or whether it is friends and family to be able to help to meet the needs that are within our own Community we also ask and continue to lift up in prayer for the victims and for their families in the Sun Metro tragedy that happened recently in our city be with them comfort those that are grieving help those that need healing and just pray for them to be able to feel your everpresent strength and abiding presence we also ask that you would bless and protect all our First Responders and their families today in your name we pray amen amen represent you want to lead us in the pledge and this morning to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance we have gaana Toano barasa from Paul Moreno monor Elementary School at the invitation of City representative Lily Leon United States of America and to the stands one nation under God indivisible withy and justice for all [Applause] Texas awesome lot of people one two three and yeah I know the prin yes go uh Miss prime before we begin before we begin we're going to have a moment of silence as you know Ruben iata one of our employees at Sun Metro passed away on February 13th uh from the the injuries that he suffered at the Sun Metro Fire Ruben was born June 16th 1995 and he joined Sun Metro in December of 2024 as a fleet maintenance technician while his time with the Department was brief he was part of the Sun Metro family his loss is deeply felt by those who worked alongside him the city of El Paso stands in solidarity with his loved ones and the entire Sun Metro family during this time of morning we ask our community to keep them in your thoughts and prayers and to honor Ruben's memory by supporting one another and showing compassion in the face of this great tragedy would you join me in a moment of silence thank you Miss briy thank you mayor that brings us to the mayor's proclamations for those of you receiving a proclamation this morning your group will have up to 6 minutes collectively to receive the proclamation and say a few words at the podium the first procl clation is National girls and women in sports day whereas National girls and women in sports day recognizes student athletes Champion athletes coaches administrators and lawmakers committed to providing Equitable access to sports for all girls and women and whereas the city of Al Paso recognizes the importance and Prestige of national girls and women in sports day and whereas playing sports provides lessons and competition along with sportsmanship academics leadership and character which builds traits that are found in our everyday lives and whereas a University of Texas at El Paso are giving ladies enrolled in area school districts the opportunity to get involved on this special day and where I show your support for female athletes on February 1st 2025 as a UTP Women's Basketball team plays Middle Tennessee State University and now therefore be it proclaimed by the mayor and City Council of hle that February 5th 2025 shall be known as 2025 National girls and women in sports day signed by our honorable mayor Renard Johnson congratulations thank you thank you Mayor Johnson thank you city council um I'd like to introduce myself I'm Julie LEC Deputy athletic director at UTP and the senior woman administrator um and so thank you so much for this opportunity to recognize all of our great female student athletes uh in the city and at UTEP and also our outstanding athletic staff female staff members that are here today with me uh we celebrated National girls women sport day on February 1st uh with a women's basketball game and we recognize local winners uh of our Flo Heyman Award winner we had one winner from elementary school one from middle and one from high school and so we had a great celebration we had a keynote speaker which I'm sure everyone is familiar with Kayla Thorton so she came and spoke at our banquet and it was just such a great day and we've continued to celebrate it all month with events at our softball games uh our tennis matches and then also here with with all of you so thank you so much for everything you do to support girls and women's in sports around the community and out and at utap um I'd like everyone to introduce themselves who are here today good morning Amanda poo the director of student athlete development thank you all for having us Cammy Carrera uh director of compliance good morning morning hi I'm Liliana valdespino I'm assistant director for strategic Communications good morning hi I'm Claire gay I'm a strategic Communications graduate assistant I'm Taylor Harold senior associate athletic director for compliance good morning he doesn't need any introductions everyone knows who that is and I'm Jim CER the director of Athletics and uh I'm I'm just kind of tagging along and these ladies are allowing me to be with you today so thank you very much we appreciate you guys and everything that you do and your hard work you've got a really tough job but we appreciate your leadership and uh in what you do to serve our community gold miners than you we had we brought posters for everyone fantastic we'll pass them out and congratulations you guys well deserved good luck I thought were very tall a little bit less just a little less there we go that looks good all right ready one two three are we all doing pick up all right ready one two three thank [Applause] you please no you're welcome and the next Proclamation is UTP X Al Paso Electric National engineerings week whereas February 16th through 22nd 2025 is recognized as National Engineers week to honor the nation's engineers in all Fields who use their Knowledge and Skills in innovative ways to fulfill our society's needs and ensure a diverse and well- educated future engineering Workforce by increasing understanding of an interest in engineering and Technology careers and whereas Al Paso Electric has a family of more than 1100 employees including approximately 123 Engineers dedicated to serving the communities where they live and work as a regional energy provider with a responsibility of providing safe and reliable energy to more than 460,000 customers Al Paso Electric understands the crucial role their Engineers play every day in transforming the energy landscape in partnership with other team members pasu electric Engineers are designing the future that will enable electrification more renewable energy and a brighter Energy Future for everyone and whereas 28 Professional Engineers 18 engineering assistants and 20 engineering interns across the Texas tech. El Paso District are integrated in each aspect of the agency's work from design planning traffic maintenance and construction they are part of more than 1,000 across tech. Statewide working tirelessly every day to provide a safe reliable and integrated transportation system that enables the movement of people and goods and whereas utep's College of Engineering had 5,055 students enrolled in the fall of 2024 in its 10 bachelor's degrees and 17 master's degrees and six doctoral degrees that produced 815 gr Engineers last year many that are Hispanic and first generation and many that graduate and place in Fortune 5,000 companies across the globe there is also a larger Regional National impact as a College of Engineering is a significant contributor to research expenditures for the University therefore assisting and sustaining the University's R1 status according to the Carnegie classification system and whereas Engineers serve as role models and sources of inspiration to our students and Community to realize the power of their knowledge they will work to further promote a diverse and well-educated future engineering Workforce and will be recognized with the lighting of the star on the Mountain High 10 turbines and down arches all in green the color of the engineer nor therefore be it proclaimed by the mayor and Council of city of El Paso that February 16th 20 through 22nd 2025 shall be known as National Engineers week for engineers at Al Paso Electric Tech Al Paso district and utip signed by our honorable mayor Renard [Applause] Johnson good morning good morning thank you very much Mayer johnsen and CD my name is Martin seio I'm the associate de of engineering for people culture and en and environment and it's a true pleasure to be here and thank you very much for the uh the opportunity for the recognition of the importance of engineering uh I'm very thankful to our sponsors as well it makes such a difference for all of our students uh eventually at the end of the day what matters is our students um Des recognition is not only important for the students that we have currently in our College of engineering and yes we went beyond 5,000 this this year so it's it's it's amazing and it's so important but it's also uh a way to put it on the radar on the picture for all of the incoming the pipeline students who are currently in middle school high school and it just signals to them that they so important and we have such great support in the city so it it's just a a full ecosystem so thank you very much for the opportunity and the recognition and I let everyone uh introduce themselves and then say a few words as well thank you very much [Music] [Applause] [Music] congratulations uh good morning morning morning uh thank you thank you for this recognition National Engineers week um my name is Omar Madrid um I'm the director of maintenance for Tech here in El Paso uh we are very glad to partner with both UTEP and EP electric um you know to uh to celebrate our engineers and to um um and to continue to uh to inspire new ones um as an engineer I me who graduated you know from from UTEP and you know have made a career here with tech um I know the importance of uh you know of you know um continuing to Mentor our new engineers and also um um the recruitment of of um of um future engineers here at Tech we currently have um um 28 um Professional Engineers in various disciplines of the uh Transportation field we also have um um 18 um um engineering assistants and 20 engineering interns they are it's a it's a very diverse I mean young group um they they work very hard to learn the transportation field and they're working to earn their professional license as well so um on behalf on all of them we'd like to thank you and we really appreciate your support congratulations yes so good morning mayor good morning morning Council my name is Eduardo Perales I'm the director of Transportation operations for text autop Paso district and you know first of all thank you for the recognition uh but again the recognition is not just for all of the engineers current Engineers that this great city has but again the the week is more hopefully geared to that future engineer the that stand behind us as well we have our our EAS as Omar mentioned so that engineering program that techto has you know we saw the vision we do have a fountain of opportunity here in the city uh partnering with UTP and you've seen that so we took that opportunity in teot and we went ahead and expanded our intern program it used to be a summer intern program and we had great students from all across the country looking for that internship but we transferred it into a yearr round intern program so you got to work and study at the same place right so that gives that opportunity to our UTP students our community college students to get that opportunity to work and study at the same time uh again thank you for this recognition and hopefully we inspire a lot of new Young Engineers that will retain and be a part of our community either working for Tech City of Al Paso County uh Al Paso Electric anywhere hope we can retain some some great knowledge here thank you yeah [Applause] congratulations good morning uh Umberto Mendes distribution engineer with Al Paso Electric good morning hell good morning uh Richard Kio distribution design supervisor for p Electric good morning hey good morning my name is Michael areta with a distribution design with a p Electric um I'm honored to have this opportunity to speak to you all uh today uh during Engineers week uh first and foremost I want to extend the gratitude that you guys invited me to speak to you all for engineers week as well I serve as a distribution design engineer and I I'd like to share a little bit about the critical work that we do at opas electric our primary responsibility is to um provide electrical services for new customers and existing customers that are tied to our grid um this entails to designing necessary infrastructure to ensure that reliable power supply based on the customers are request okay all our our work uh involves planning the layout of the new overhead and underground facilities that require electrical service for businesses and customers um throughout our efforts we strive to ensure that our community has the access to the electrical service that they depend on contributing to the continued growth and transforming the energy landscape once again thank you for having us here and acknowledging Engineers throughout this week than very welcome congratulations I think we have enough time for everyone to introduce themselves real quick there we go hi good morning Jesus I'm an engineering assistant with text good morning Sarah pons Leon also an engineering assistant with teot good morning Jezebel Ray engineering assistant at teot good morning uh Raymond Salazar engineering assistant with Tex Ando also engineer assistant with Tex good morning everyone joia kyama an engineer assistant in the Min section with Tex good morning everybody I'm Ry Boyd I know most of you I'm the director of advanced Transportation Planning at Texa good morning I'm Asian misher a mety and materials engineer engineering student at EP good morning I'm Gilbert Guzman I'm a computer science major at utup morning everybody I'm ran SE senior signing electrical engineering good morning I'm Dante Lopez I'm a computer science major at Utah well congratulations to everyone [Applause] I e e and for the record mayor protim Fel has also joined the meeting than e e and the next Proclamation is First Sergeant Dan [Applause] wey but before we read this Proclamation while there the veterans are coming up a yeah they're still coming look at this awesome awesome awesome well Dan you you do travel with an Entourage I can see so uh before we read your your Proclamation you you truly don't need an introduction and I just want to say I had the pleasure of meeting Dan along the campaign Trail at the veterans at breakfast and for what you do for our veterans we cannot thank you enough and I I learned a few things about you that I I do want to share um one of them is that um you were in Selma and and you marched along uh Dr Martin Luther King uh uh and Congressman John Lewis uh quite some time ago and also when you were 12 years old and you met Dr King he was speaking at a local church and there was a quote that Dr King uh said that really touched you and that was uh if one person is denied their basic rights we all suffer so I took that and I said you know that is that is a truly great quote but Dan all the work you do in our community feeding the homeless uh your your acts of kindness your your uh unwavering commitment for our veterans we we cannot thank you enough and it it's truly we're truly blessed to have you in our community and for all what you do so with that I'm going to turn it over to representative tro to say a few things this is great to see you all here it's beautiful you know I also met Dan during my my campaigning and every once in a while you come across someone that you say wow right for because of all that he does within the community Dan thank you for being that person who cares we appreciate you so whereas Black History Month is an annual observance recognizing the achievements contributions of the African-American history and culture today we recognize and honor retired army first sergeant that web a veteran of the United States Army having served 24 years in active duty and a prominent figure in the El Paso Texas community and whereas Army First Sergeant Dan web founded and created it welcoming space for veterans of all branches to socialize access essential resources and raise awareness of veterans issues through Veterans as breakfast an organization he helped formed in May 2010 and whereas driven by the loss of his friend Sergeant First Class Roger Army first Army First Sergeant Dan web embraced the guiding principle of no comrade left behind and dedicated himself to serving both veterans and the displaced through Outreach meals care packages and uplifting others in the community and whereas Army First Sergeant Dan web's Legacy has been to tily tirelessly advocate for civil rights dedicating himself to educating and inspiring others through lectures at school universities churches community events and inspiring generations and whereas his legacy includes having marched alongside Dr Martin Luther King Jr and Congressman John Lewis in Sal Alabama demonstrating his lifelong commitment to Justice and equality and now therefore it be proclaimed by the mayor and Council of the city of op Paso in honor of his lifelong dedication leadership and commitment to service in our community and in honor of Black History Month that February 25th 2025 shall be known as Army First Sergeant Dan Webb day [Applause] good morning everyone my name is Joe Mard The Honorable Mayor Johnson thank you very much the esteemed City Council Members Madam city clerk Madam City attorney Madam city manager my name is jalina I'm happy to be here I'm excited to be here Mr web I call him Dan ask me to say a few words and I've known him for many years many years and um he is a man of gold you know he has a big heart he does everything for the community for the homeless for our veterans for our disabled uh used to work with him at the veterans at breakfast when way when he was very in its infancy but beyond that the man has a great faith great leader great Community leader he just does so much for the Northeast and the entire city of El Paso and we're proud to call him friend thank you good morning mayor and councel we love you Dad certainly it's a pleasure to to be here this morning uh I uh I want to thank you for this honor that you give me this morning uh as someone that grew up in s Alabama and March along with Martin Luther King and John Lewis uh I uh I think it's more of an honor that you recognize me and give me the honor on this black history month so again thank you and thank all the those who came out to support me thank [Applause] you well Dan you you got a big group with you we'd love for them to say who they are real quick if you don't mind Betty halberton treasurer of veterans at breakfast man' president and found Dan web everybody knows me as bird I am the a PR assistant Gloria Nicholson all glory Memorial member Doris Daris Barbara Nichols farmer Diane Williams Dennis Danes I sered with and we and Echo 27 during the golf War Maria Gonzalez founder and executive director of the first women veterans organization in Al Paso my name is Maria Castro Gonzalez and our group's name is the El Paso Texas women veterans thank you and thank you Dan lay public relations veterans at breakfast good morning everyone God bless everybody I know Dan for so many years but uh my name is Dave Garcia I represent the disabled American veterans Northeast chapter7 whoo Billy light homeless veteran social worker retired good morning everyone Ramona Moore and thank you Dan for what all you do in the community we love you you good morning to ma Davis and thank you Dan Vanessa Betts president of the North Hills neighborhood Pride Association good morning God bless Minister Ron Betts good to meet everyone God bless retired first AR Jessy uh twitch kick and Tik Tock streamer and small business owner who Tony benitz past president of Northeast business Alliance thank you mayor thank you city council and thank you Dan and everyone that's here thank you hello everybody Jeremiah Jeremiah heger good to see you all Dan congratulations you're a good friend bye-bye Joe Loya United States Navy veteran just a humble servant next to dank [Applause] command all major retired Reggie Daniel been uh knowing Dan for many years and uh 2011 I retired I came straight to the veterans group the veterans at breakfast been with them ever since and I tell you Dan is amazing amazing amazing we love you brother keep doing what you're [Applause] doing good morning everybody my name is Deputy Sergeant Constable Deja pascali I am the sergeant at the Constable's office in the Northeast under Danny Zamora I met Dan webman 2008 when I used to work at first light I was a loan officer he was my client uh amazing man from the git we formed this great friendship he's always been there for me um so Dan thank you thank you for being the a great role model a great friend a great father and thank you for always being there for me my kids when I needed you morning everyone re arm first class Danny Zamora United States Army and also retired El Paso Police Department and I'm currently the conal of Precinct to Northeast Dan thank you so much for everything you've done for not only the Northeast but the citizens of El Paso we love you and God's blessed us to have you in our lives I I just want to acknowledge that we do have some folks that came out here to support me and they are from the I did a lecture uh every year with black history with the job corp and they're here in the audience they didn't come out I I wanted to acknowledge them thank you so very much and and Dan before we we take a a picture with your group I'm going to ask city council and other members of the audience that we have a number of veterans that are here in attendance today and we want to honor you guys and thank you for your service and your sacrifice [Applause] want to hear no jokes Oh no you're F oh hey yeah yeah this is my going to be a lot of them dude go ahead go ahead chap he's calling you up there sir [Music] okay thank you myow shorty oh no no okay I've been a part of these pictures before be here the person is short too um can I get you right here yes sir no just right here right there and can I get you in the Hat right between these two e e holding guys got some hands in the botle sorry all right ready keep going she wasn't joking with the 57,000 I two three thank you yeah all right hi thank you for coming thank you all for coming thank you thank you congratulations Elizabeth hey all right Miss Brian we have one more Proclamation yes sir the final Proclamation this morning yep ises go ahe team Dating Violence Awareness Month representative roacha good morning everyone thank you so much for joining uh this particular uh Proclamation today is uh very special to me not only because it's super important for teens to be able to have um understanding of what situations they're in uh I became very close to uh to Dr Richardson who has Jennifer's uh her granddaughter was affected by by teen violence several years ago and still remember that to this day so with that being said I appreciate all the work that you all do to be able to bring awareness to this uh very important situation that teens can find themselves in without even knowing that they're in it so uh whereas teen Dating Violence is a serious and widespread issue that affects individuals families and communities with 1.5 million teenagers in the United States experiencing physical emotional or verbal abuse from a dating partner and whereas teen Dating Violence awareness month is an opportunity to raise awareness educate the public and engage young people parents Educators and Community leaders in conversations and actions to end the cycle of abuse and whereas this year's theme you deserve respect serves as a powerful reminder that every individual is worthy of relationships built on on trust respect and equality and it encourages youth to recognize their value and advocate for healthy relationships and whereas the center against sexual and Family Violence provides vital resources and support to survivors of teen Dating Violence educates the community on the importance of fostering healthy relationships and works tirelessly to prevent dating abuse in our region and whereas the city of El Paso recognizes the importance of addressing and preventing teen Dating Violence by partnering with Community organizations like and I'll I'll say the letters cfv known as casva by supporting initiatives that promote safe and respectful relationships among youth now therefore be it proclaimed by the mayor and Council of the city of El Paso that February 2025 shall be known as Teena teen Dating Violence awareness month signed by The Honorable mayor Renard Johnson good morning mayor good morning um good morning city council it's a pleasure to be here with you this morning my name is Sandra nades Garcia I'm the executive director for the center against sexual and Family Violence I've had the honor of working um with this organization for the last 22 years actually started in 200 took a short break and so the work that we do just across the community is really important to us um and we have particular awareness months this month being teen Dating Violence awareness month as we know one in three teenagers are affected by some sort of teen dating violence and so the month allows us the opportunity for a couple of things one to bring awareness that it is an issue for our young adults in our community and to hopefully Foster those relationships and conversations not only in our home life but at schools and Community organizations and community events because often times that's where our youth are getting the information from and so we now collectively everyone in this room are prime examples and are modeling those relationships for our youth and unfortunately um a lot of the times our young adults don't have necessarily the best Role Models within their Rel within their family Dynamics and so that's where touch points become pivotal for these individuals um making sure that they know that as our message you deserve respect is a pivotal foundational um base for any relationship right we we utilize this in personal relationships um Intimate Relationships familiar relationships um public relationships so it's not a a message that's uncommon and is not taught throughout the universally and in the worlds that we live in and so again teaching individuals that they deserve respect from the beginning what does that look like um that it's okay to create barriers for yourself and boundaries and ensure that you have uh a standard of what those relationships need to look like for you um is pivotal and extremely important not only for them now but as they roll into the future and future relationships and become mothers and fathers teachers Mayors and representatives right um it's super important and so I do have a small group with me Mighty um we are about 75 employees they're back obviously we run a 24-hour emergency shelter and a Family Resource Center and so they're back at home base um keeping the the lights on and seeing clients currently but I did want to introduce Annabelle edin nandes who is our um uh primary prevention coordinator to talk to you a little bit about some of the events that we've done this past month thank you good morning good morning that was very new hearing my new last name um so I was like wait oh yeah that's me um so yes my name is anot and on this I'm the primary prevention coordinator at the center against sexual Family Violence so we do a lot of community work and a part of teen Dating Violence awareness month is something that not only we can really just do on our own it really just takes a whole CommunityWide initiative so we did um partner up with a lot of community members so we have this event called Shock about love that we do to try to promote healthy relationships especially with the youth and we partnered up with the El Paso Public Library so we already had multiple um libraries done throughout Al Paso we have our last one this Thursday at esperansa aosa Moreno um so they have been a really huge big partner for talk about love events we have also been been at EPCC and UTP job corpse uh Montwood middle school and options High School um the chauffer house and as well World Boba and coffee just I mean we ought to throw in some boba and coffee in there to make it a little bit more interesting um so that was a really great event that we had so it was not only the primary prevention team that was able to get this together right it was the Prime prevention casby as a whole the Outreach facilitators but also the community so um we couldn't have done it alone and another thing that we are excited about as well we are going to have our third annual chalk about love at the County Courthouse to raise awareness about healthy relationships and the importance of respect in any relationship um so because of our ongoing partnership with the district attorneys the county of El Paso as well as the County Attorney um we've been able to do this these past three years so we want to go ahead and just shout them out thank you guys um and we are going to have this tomorrow um 12:00 p.m. to 1: p.m. at the county courthouse so we would love to see as many people there to try to just bring that support and to promote healthy relationships for all ages and trying to think I feel like that's most the events that we've done this month so it was a lot um but yeah um so we encourage everyone in the community to join us at the County Courthouse from 12:00 to 1: um just come join us promote healthy relationships and of course if you you or someone you know needs support reach out to our local resources help is available 24/7 and no one should be able to face relationship abuse alone so you're more than welcome to call our crisis hopeline number at 915-5957 300 thank you thank you yeah there we go sure hello good morning thank you so much for giving us the opportunity to be here today my name is yasine ptis I'm the director of client services for to the center and I hope you all can join us tomorrow and we can see some of your artistic skills during a little lunch break thank you uh hello everybody my name is George Molina and I'm the primary provention facilitator at casv and yeah I hope hope to see you tomorrow yeah cool thank you we also have Mr Luis Salas and I just lost him but he's taking there he is he's our background he's our associate director of community relations so make sure that we look presentable websites you all those important messaging things and that's a critical part of our team well congratulations and thank you for all the good work thank you [Applause] and for the record representative Canales join the meeting at 9:47 e e Council per The Rules of Order no use of personal cellular devices nor personal communication should take place on the de while the meeting is in session once you obtain the floor from the mayor you will have up to 10 minutes for debate and may speak twice per item please speak into the microphone and refrain from side conversations at the day while the meeting is in session for those of you're joining us virtually please make sure your microphones are muted to reduce any background noise that brings us to the consent agenda all matters listed under the consent agenda will be considered by city council to be routine and will be enacted by one motion unless separate discussion is requested by council members prior to the vote members of the audience may ask questions regarding items on the consent agenda when the vote has been taken If an item has not been called out for separate discussion the item has been approved Council May however reconsider any item at any time during the meeting mayor potim good morning Miss PR the proposed Provisions for the February 25th 2025 meeting agenda are as follows page three item three move to the regular agenda per representative Canales page 8 item 26 delete per Mayor Johnson page 15 item 42 revise per capital Improvement Department It should read District 2 on the bottom page 15 item 43 delete per purchasing and strategic sourcing all right is there a second there's a motion and a second any discussion call for the vote Miss bran and mayor we do have public comments on a few items on the consent agenda we have Miss Turner she signed up to speak on item 14 okay item 14 is a resolution that the city manager sign a traffic signal flasher agreement with the AL Paso Independent School District whereby the city agrees to design install and maintain a set of two Solar School flasher signals okay good morning Miss Turner good morning youall are doing this for free and there's you go out take care of it just like that yet I'm sitting here within the last week watching in an ambulance sitting traffic on Mesa and they're stuck in traffic waiting for the light to change you're supposed to have the thing that turn the lights green I've had nothing but excuses for years as to why they can't turn the light screen on Mesa now if that person is having a stroke and that amulance is sitting in traffic for 2 minutes it's a bad outcome this has to be fixed somebody has to start paying attention to what's happening on Mesa you have a line all the way down through the North Desert South desert intersection in9 10 in the afternoon because there's no turn on no lanes for people to turn left off of Mesa onto Barlett you have the same problem when you get up the street to badier and then you've got people well you know how people drive you get all these long lines and they're doing all this number it's impossible and then with I 10 traffic we now have to our residential neighborhood uh traffic that's usually going down I 10 and police and fire and ambulance can't get into the uh assisted living and Skilled Nursing Facility because you've got a a mile line of traffic bumper to bumper on Bartlett all the way past lante nobody is doing anything somebody please do something our police our fire our EMS cannot do their jobs if they're stuck in traffic you're hurting people thank you thank you Miss Turner representative go ahead represent Canalis thank you mayor I just wanted to clarify this the school's own flashers in this item are being funded 100% by episd at a cost of $50,000 uh dollars and $50,100 you're saying you're going to design install and maintain correct the city designs installs and maintains and the school district compensates the city for that work but nobody's doing anything for Mesa which is in your district and district one to miss Turner also signed up for item 15 and this is a resolution that the city manager be authorized to sign amendment one to the advanced funding agreement with the state of Texas acting through Texas Department of Transportation for the downtown bicycle improvements phase one project okay it is not safe downtown to be a pedestrian let alone somebody on a bicycle I don't think it's wise I think it's just simply unsafe for people being on bicycles riding through downtown on the streets we've already had multiple pedestrian injuries and deaths and most of the people who ride bicycles don't bother with following the traffic laws that's why I ask you not to do this Miss Turner also signed up for item 18 and this is a board appointment for Edward hton I to the public service board selection committee by representative Alejandra Chavez I apologize for using this item we need someone sitting on the PSB who will represent those of the people in this city who are on fixed income there is no voice for the people at the PSB for those who are elderly disabled or living on fixed income so when it comes to setting rates there's no voice there we need that voice so mayor since you sit on that can we get do you all need to do something later on put an item on the agenda to add another seat or what but we do need somebody to represent that population of the rayer thank you thank you Miss Turner Miss Turner also signed up on item 24 and this is a notation of Special Projects discretionary fund expenditures and peard transactions for mayor city council representative city attorney's office and city city manager office and staff from December 21st to January 20th again I'm going to ask that no council member or anybody working with the City who has access to a PE card use that at a Walmart a Sam's Club or any of these other businesses whove decided to do away with the EI I understand there were some firings today at uh the VA um these are attacks on people of color and we are 82 85% Mexican American and then the rest of us don't come into my community and say we're not equal I'm sorry uh and I expect my mayor and my Council to stand up I expect you I mean I look at you two three we have four women I'm my county is off today cuz I'm I get a little upset when I start thinking about what I'm seeing and what my government is doing and the Discrimination that I'm seeing and I don't like it I expect my mayor and my Council to stand up we've got a lot of people who have uh soggy pasta for backbones I don't want that from the nine of you thank you thank you Miss Turner for your comments mayor there was a motion made by mayor protm Chavez seconded by representative Gales and this is to approve the consent agenda as revised representative Chavez thank you mayor I want to recognize um my board appointment to the boak committee Melissa gavar who's in the audience today I just want to publicly thank her for stepping up for our community and serving on this committee many of us serve uh in the in the public and it's great to see you um she's someone that I've known for over a decade she is a CPA someone that is very financially and fiscally and ethically um just responsible and just a wonderful appointment to the boat committee so thank you for being with us Melissa thank you for accepting this appointment and thank you for serving our community thank you Marisa all right any more discussion all right Miss Prime call for the vote on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously mayor would you like to take the item that was moved to the regular agenda before recessing for mass transit or did you want to recess for mass transit yes sir is there a motion to recess second there's a motion in a second to recess a regular city council meeting all in favor I anyone opposed and the regular city council meeting is in recess at 10:05 in order to conduct the mass transit Department board meeting good morning this is a special meeting of the op Paso mass transit Department board today is Tuesday February 25th 2025 it is now 10:05 a.m. presentent presiding is board chair Mr Johnson also present in council chambers are board members Miss Chavez Miss roacha misso Miss lion Mr aavo Mr noo Mr Fierro and Mr Canalis there's no public comment on this agenda there's also no uh consent items and we move on to the regular agenda item number two discussion and action on the resolution of the mass transit Department Board of the city of op Paso authorizing the city manager to take the necessary actions to address immediate and continuing necessary City responses to the February 11 2025 fire at Sun Metro Transit Operation Center to include authorizing Contracting and purchasing without further action of the mass transit Department board pursuant to allowable exceptions to the competitive bidding requirements under Section 252 022 of the Texas local government code AS amended authorizing city manager or designate to execute documents required in response to this emergency to enable routine mass transit operations to resume is there any public comment on this Miss Ryan we do have uh two two speakers okay mayor can we see the presentation first sure so that folks know what they're commenting on good morning good morning mayor city council Anthony deiser the director for public transit Sun Metro yes pleas it will you please bring up the president presentation for item two on the mass transit Department board agenda so again good morning today I'll be uh giving you an update on the update regarding the request for the Sun Metro resolution again the mission of Sun Metro is to connect op pasle community and we recognize that serving our public is a reason for our existence and that's what Sun Metro does on a daily basis this the agenda for today I won't read it I'll just let you look over that for a second the purpose of this resolution is to authorize the city manager or her her design the ability in the future to authorize Contracting purchasing and fether action for the mass transit um and further action of the mass transit Department board given exception to the ordinance 16515 and 16736 this is to ex expedite the preservation of Municipal property as well as to assure public transport Transportation excuse me meaning to facilitate the um design and reconstruction of our facility to support maintenance operations the fire as you know impacted operations including but not limited to injuries to employees and damage to property this fire had significant impact on maintenance operations so the maintenance division recovery and stability operations has been a key focus of s Metro essential to bringing a back to full service more importantly and tragically five Sun Metro employees were hospitalized due to the incident and later one of our one of our employees succumb to his injuries as you know ruing abot the fire remains under investigation so I can't say too much about that I can tell you the affected area of the the building was on the east side side of the maintenance Bay if you look at the slide here that's the portion that's has the red box on it again the extent of the damage is still being investigated I know the east side of the maintenance building will have to be demolished the timing of that operation will be driven by the ongoing investigations there's several investigations going on to include the Fire Marshall the cause and origin uh folks the structural evaluation and some other entities that are looking at the investigations right now once all those investigations are complete we will also know the structures stability of the and the the rest of the building of the rest of the building and how we will be able to proceed for restoration it is Sun metros and the city of El Paso's intent to rebuild and eventually resume uh maintenance operations from the to as you know following the incident we adjusted operations to modifi to a modified Sunday schedule holiday schedule this was to ensure that service with we could continue service with safe uh buses and also meet Federal Transit regulations and safety requirements since the incident Sun Metro has operated for eight days with a modified schedule that's with um all Brio routes on a modified schedule start but only starting earlier at 6:00 a.m. to try to help those individuals going to school work early in the morning and then the the routes for Sunday holiday schedule that were fixed routes that we we did there were seven of them and those mostly covered the East Side to help cover that area and then we also ran our amnat routes that they help us with because those were 10 routes that helped us with the West Side to help cover to help cover that area currently s Metro set up temporarily part of our maintenance operation down at the Union Depot and so we have seven days that we can do maintenance operations at the at the Union Depot so um we also still have some Bays for Bays that we can use up at up at the T and we're going to do our our Brio maintenance out of there so down at the Union Depot we've conducted facility maintenance warehouse and safety inspections at this facility prior to us starting up our operations there to make sure that we're being safe um I can expect to be fully operational sometime this week at the at the Union Depot and this will drive us getting back to um full service as we ramp up the the maintenance operations and get back to to our full capacity for upcoming service modifications we're simply moving back towards full service Monday or yesterday we started servicing 92% of our routes or 48 of 52 routes we didn't Ser go back to servicing them with the same frequency it's it's less frequency but we did service 92% of the routes and our goal is to get back to service them all the routes with all the same frequency as our full-time service I expect for us to do that here shortly I think by Thursday we'll be able to announce what we're where we're going to move from where we're at now to moving back to full service and what that would be on Thursday um and that'll be based upon the operations and how we're standing up down at the at the Union Depot so um we are working with the investigators to determine the original cause ensuring uh preservation of the site and access to the the investigators we're working with capital Improvement departments and other departments for future rebuilding and operations as we look to the to the Future to get back to our our new normal um planning and scheduling is underway with the intent to return to full service in the near future and ensuring safe and reliable transportation so this is the presentation I have for you um today um subject to your questions uh this this is how Sun Metro is basically moving forward I'm trying to go back to full service ensuring that we're conducting safe operations ensuring that the buses that we have and that we're putting on the street are fully um inspected for safety and and have the proper maintenance conducted on them before we put them back on the street okay representative Roa thank you mayor I appreciate it thank you Mr deiser for everything that you're doing to keep us updated on the situation uh very unfortunate very tragic um and and thank you for the for the updated information on your routes we've had a couple of um constituents that have reached out regarding the lift service would you be able to to give me some information on how that was impacted and what portion of that presentation um represents the lift so the lift portion wasn't affected at all except for the fact that the one day of the incident um all the buses had to fuel at the the lift facility and so we have two two places where we fuel at the lift facility and at the T facility the lift facility doesn't the fuel doesn't pump out as fast it it pumps out about 80% slower but the vehicles that it normally fuels are cutaways or Vans a little bit larger than than Vans and so it doesn't normally require that however on the day of the incident the electricity was turned off which rendered the pumps at the TP inoperable and so what we did was um in the area of the whole talk the staging area was quarantined off and so what we did is we parked all the buses at the parking rides on on Montana on the Montana Avenue and and we staged them there and then we rotated them through the the lift to fuel but all the the the normal pull out for um the lift Vehicles every day is about 45 to 50 vehicles but on the following days of the the incident all 45 to 50 vehicles of the lift were fueled on time and and pull out for the lift was was met so it shouldn't had any impact on on that um currently this month we're riding we're um just at 90% on Time Performance um for the lift and so the industry standard is generally 80% but we know that if we work at 80% a lot of people are going to get left behind or not left behind but they're going to get be way outside the 30 minute on Time Performance window and so we're still tracking 90% for this month for ontime performance for the lift thank you so much Mr teiser I appreciate it yes ma'am is there a motion to approve this resolution I move to approve the resolution second there's a motion and a second any discussion Miss Brian call for the vote we have comment yes and we have two members of the audience signed up to speak the first member is Miss Janet Flores okay hi good morning everyone good morning my name is Janet Flores I'm here today to urge you all to please begin cooperating with the attorneys of the victims and the third party experts on the current investigation that's being conducted the city as of now has yet to provide any Clarity on their proceedings their findings and the reasonings behind their lack of cooperation with the victims and their attorneys you continue to give the public vague answers uh right now what I just heard was that you're working with investigators and other departments we want to know who these people are what is their experience what is their background how can we trust that this is an unbiased um investigation we want to know these details um we don't want to be questioning whether or not you all are being transparent with us and so moving forward what we would like is for you all to conduct an investigation that is transparent and that centers the dignity and worth of the victims involved I understand that this is impacting a lot of people because this is regarding mass transit for the public but I keep hearing the victims being an afterthought a side comment and we are not hearing anything about how you're working with them and the families in the meantime um so please keep in mind that your approach to this tragic incident will be a reflection of how you prioritize the people that you all have been elected to serve thank you thank you second member of the public is Miss Jasmine Flores good morning you have three minutes hi good morning good morning well today's meeting agenda is focusing on operations of Sun Metro I believe that the immediate and necessary City response should be PR prioritizing the victims we want to know how are you working in cooperation with the victims with their families with their attorneys attorneys and how to ensure transparency of the investigation your current actions have been concerning and have the public questioning the re reliability of your findings we want to know with clear and specific answers how will you ensure this investigation is fully transparent you are basically investigating your own investigation how can we ensure that you are not going to be biased about this investigation how can the victims and the public trust that what you're sharing with us and cooperating with the victims and their attorneys is unbiased if the investigation's findings find that there's negligence on behalf of Sun Metro will you be will you divulge those findings in detail to the public and how will you ensure their accountability is that is in that case the victims their families and the public deserve truthful and detailed answers I urge you to begin taking actions and that prioritize all these questions that the public has to ask thank you thank you okay we have a motion by board member Mr Canales seconded by Mr Fiero we have U represent leemon thank you mayor it is with deep sadness that we all acknowledge the incident at Sun Metro and we want to at least I want to convey my deepest condolences and certainly look forward to a full and clear investigation I have a lot of trust in our city manager that will be um leading this and I hope that we can get a different view out in the media out in the community and that it becomes a very clear transparent process which I know that you're working on that and perhaps um communication always is the best way to resolve some issues and some concerns so thank you for being here today appreciate it ready call for the vote I Haven voted voting session is open Mr chairman you also vote on this one may and the voting session and the motion passes unanimously thank you all right Miss PR let's reconvene is there a motion to adjourn the mass transit Department board meeting second there's a motion in a second to adjourn the mass transit dep mass transit Department board meeting all in favor I I I anyone opposed and the mass transit Department board meeting for Tuesday February 25th 2025 is adjourned at 10:22 a.m. is there a m to reconvene the regular city council meeting second there's a motion in a second to reconvene the regular city council meeting all in favor I anyone opposed and the regular city council meeting is now back in session at 10:22 a.m. may or may we take item three that was moved to the regular agenda yes thank you item three is a resolution authorizing the city manager or designate to submit a Grant application for a project identified as El Paso 2024 operation Stone Garten through the office of the governor Homeland Security Grant division the police department is requesting $1,558 18115 with no cash match required good morning Chief good morning mayor city council morning and um so this is a resolution authorizing the city manager design need to submit a Grant application for the opas police Department project identified as 2024 operation stone garden this is uh through the officer of the governor Homeland Security Grant Division and the amount uh uh we are requesting is 1,558 uh there's no cash match required for this Grant and we have uh the city of op Paso has uh submitted and accepted this grant for the last 16 years the grant period will be March 21 2025 to February 28 2026 represent Canales thank you mayor um so we're we're speaking today about operation stone garden um it's a federal program passed through the governor's office is that correct correct so it provides uh funding to local law enforcement for uh border security efforts uh not not immigration enforcement yes but border security to combat drug trafficking organizations in our community so El Paso has participated in this program since 2009 correct correct um and today we're deciding whether or not to continue our participation in that program um uh I want to point out that I think the context in which we're making this decision this year has changed dramatically uh across recent years but especially uh in in this year and especially with the rise of of Senate Bill 4 uh before which was passed in 2023 but for now has been held up in court um with with this the the changes uh that have been happening in the in the shifting landscape of of immigration policy Nationwide and and the broader National conversation about the Border in general um I think it's important to assess what risk we have uh with El Paso's continued involvement in in operation stone garden um first off I think it's important to point out that there's no penalty for deciding not to participate in operation stone garden participation is completely voluntary for local jurisdictions um and the federal government uh doesn't impose any kind of sanctions on cities or counties that choose not to participate in the program so whether or not to participate is totally our decision um with with no strings attached from from the federal government um in the past I know this decision may have been seen as just another Federal funding opportunity um and it has indeed provided additional funding to to police over the years primarily in the form of of overtime pay for officers working surveillance of the of the Border outside of their regular duties you know if you're driving on uh Border Highway you may see Vehicles police El Paso police vehicles parked typically with their lights off uh those are typically officers working operation stone garden is that correct yes you're correct one of our uh strategies that we use uh on this in in this operation sir is deterrent yes so since Border Highway is a common uh transport route for Contraband and illegal narcotics uh we do uh have high visibility of officers but that's anywhere in the city that we have officers to prevent crime and uh this is a very effective uh uh strategy that we use among others but it is to combat uh uh illegal trafficking from illicit drugs coming into our community and Contraband of money and weapons going into Mexico so it's a it's a good strategy so I I'm a firm believer that our Police Department should be focused first on service to our community our neighbors our neighborhoods the people who call a pass a home the people who visit here um I I don't think that it's uh a worthwhile uh investment of of police time to be watching The Border um I think the federal government has their own people for that goodness knows they spend a lot of money on it and and ultimately I feel it's their responsibility it's the responsibility of the federal government to do to conduct that kind of Border surveillance and not that of our our local police officers um you know I think that sitting in a parked car watching the border is not policing um it's it's not in service of of El Paso and El Paso and and what our our local needs reflect so um just in the last few weeks we've seen state law enforcement and uh military personnel deputized and and deployed here to El Paso to conduct uh border enforcement uh Fort Bliss is being used as a major deportation Hub there are people being flown directly from our community to uh Guantanamo Bay Cuba I never thought I'd say that sentence um we we also find ourselves now facing a a not so unimaginable situation where local law enforcement could be compelled to assist in federal immigration enforcement um something that I think would be in direct conflict with uh the the Community Trust that the the police department has has worked so hard to build um and and really a total departure from the the Department's current policy that I think uh you know I I think the chief you've you've clarified uh very very clearly for the public what what is and what is not the role of the police department at this moment um but with the the rise of Senate Bill 4 uh and its potential to be fully enforced later this year uh the the risks of continued involvement in in operation stone garden I think are far greater than ever before so s sp4 will be on trial in federal court there's a hearing scheduled for July 2025 um should the Court rule in favor of allowing sb4 to take effect uh we could see local police officers including those involved in in operation stone garden uh operations being legally required to participate in IM immigration enforcement efforts um if that happens we'll no longer be talking about just voluntary participation in a in a federal government program uh we'll be talking about legal mandates that could undermine the the the fabric of trust that I think uh the police department has worked very hard to to build with our community um and and operation stone garden in that case would be a direct method of of funding that so I think we can't ignore the reality this year that that our involvement in in operation stone garden could put us in the path of of these mandates um and if sb4 is is upheld local police could be caught between the the new directive to enforce Federal immigration laws uh that they would be facing and their ongoing Duty and and I think Prime responsibility to serve uh and protect the people in El Paso um so my colleagues on the council I I urge you to consider this question very carefully it's not business as usual this year for operation stone garden um I think this isn't just about continuing with the status quo and and accessing federal funds that that feel like low hanging fruit maybe um and I understand in the past they've provided reliable funding to to certain operations of the police department uh but I think this is about making a choice in this particular moment with this particular National context and at a time right now when people across the country are watching border communities like ours to see how we react to the the pressures of the changing landscape of of Border enforcement so um our our participation in in operation stone garden this year and Beyond could I think have lasting consequences for how our Police Department uh continues to serve our community or otherwise is forced to turn its attention to something else entirely something that I think would be serving the the will of specific people far away from El Paso in in Austin or in Washington DC um given the risks that that I've described here I I don't think I can in good conscience vote in favor of uh the city's participation in in operation stone garden and this application that we're being asked to approve today um so I I plan to vote against it today and and you know I've given you this disclaimer before Chief it has nothing to do with wanting to take any kind of funding away from the police department um these are overtime duties that the police department performs that officers perform um and I think there's plenty of demand for police overtime in other areas um that that could make up that overtime um regardless of of how the vote goes today I I do think it's important that we put appropriate guard rails on the the city's participation in operation Stone guarden should the council choose to move forward uh with with this application today um so as such I I'd like to offer the following Amendment um and actually did do we have have a motion on the table mayor not yet okay um I will hold then okay uh it'll yield the rest of my time and I'll come back to speak again thank you mayor representative [Music] leemon thank you mayor I had the opportunity also Chief to go by go through operation stone garden and and look at the at the guidelines the goal the funding the eligib eligible recipients and the funding use and right away it it kind of sent an alert to me because the funding used clearly states that grants can support Personnel equipment acquisition and maintenance and border security activities and while we've heard repeatedly that the El Paso Police Department is not into um the the role of immigration uh questioning I believe that this could change very dramatically and and I have a very deep concern for that we are seeing and hearing so many stories of our community our students running into um situations where I thought it had ended a long time ago when border of Patrol was is at Buie high school and questioning students and staff and faculty I thought that had been resolved with a federal ruling but it's back again and so just because it says that it can be used for border security activities I cannot in good conscience um supported um I value your work I value what you do and I value the police department but I I am going to be u a no vote on this as well thank you sir thank you representative saeto thank you mayor chiefz did you have something to say sorry I was like I see him wanting to answer um I just wanted to kind of talk about this a bit I had a an opportunity last week in Austin to meet with um head officials from the Department of Public Safety and we had a really good meeting overall we were kind of discussing what the chases have really done to our community and concerns that my constituents have had and in that conversation they really said the the Border isn't an issue and they actually want entities and funding to and resources to be diverted away from the border and that was directly from the the DPS officials that I met with so I thought that was really interesting and as we're considering this one of my top concerns and is on the minds of my constituents is really Public Safety right and and we've seen that time and time and again and one of my worries right now is that we're we're getting better with with the numbers of police officers we were we're working on getting to where we need and we've been short for a while so I'm glad that we're making efforts toward that but I feel that we need to be more in the neighborhoods that's where the people are really asking for for us to be um we are in the neighborhoods not to say that we're not right but I I just think that those resources would be better served in in that sense and also um I have really appreciated your your leadership and everything that you've done and how open and accessible and transparent that you've been with with what you're doing and I think when I see you speak um at press conferences that have happened in the past few weeks you've really done a great job at communicating to the community that we are not enforcing Federal immigration laws right and and I think that some of my constituents have kind of worried when you're saying that but then they see a parked car by the border so like are they doing it are they not so I've gotten a few calls over the year and and I kind of have to explain what it is and and talk about this funding that we've gotten and so I feel that as we're kind of moving forward with what is to come there's a lot of things happening on a daily basis that are really changing a lot I I want to make sure that the community is clear as to what we're doing and what we're saying and what they're seeing and I really want that to kind of be the same thing if that makes sense I don't know you have something to say y before you before you speak Chief representative V thank you mayor you know I'm kind of offended by this sitting there in park cars making it seem like our our Public Safety officers are just sitting there doing nothing um somebody said that part of this this this um is deterrent and I think that we we can use all the deterrent and overtime money that we can and this is money that's coming from the state this is money that us as as local taxpayers would have to put up as as uh overtime if we didn't have the funds coming from the state you know let's not forget that visibility is going to slow down the Speeders the visibility is going to slow down crime the visibility is going to hopefully slow down some of the tunnels that we're finding and crime is not going to stop you know we need to continue to to have our our police officers our law enforcement there um serving protecting us and and I I I would just want to make clear that these dollars are used for us as a community to keep us safe you know I mean with that I make a motion to approve and we have second there's a motion and a second um any further sure what's that sure any further discussion from Council uh representative Canales then we'll I'll come to you Chief I just want to make sure rip Travis hasn't spoken yet the rules say that would get to speak before me if okay and I'm also going to hold councel to the the 10-minute rule here but representative Chavez you're up thank you mayor what I heard from the chief right now is that uh those officers protect and serve our community in terms of uh preventing um drugs from coming across the border and and other things that maybe Chief basas can speak to right now um but I do believe that the reality is we live on a border so having eyes and ears on the border is part of being uh in our community and serving our community as a first responder so I want to thank the police department for their service and for their presence I know that um you know we are uh underst staffed and that we do need more police presence maybe in neighborhoods but uh that's a conversation for I think a different time I I agree with representative Fierro in terms of getting this money for overtime or whatever it might it might need be and uh I disagree respectfully with representative Gales in terms of voting against something for fear of something that might happen down the line I think we need to make decisions based on what we know today and not based on what we just don't know yet so um I am in support of this thank you thank you Mr chavz represent Canal you want to let the chief go or do you want go next um I'll go ahead okay go ahead thanks sir um like I said I I think it's important that we put guard rails on the city's participation here if if the council is going to approve this today um with that I'd like to offer the uh the following Amendment um and this is just to the the motion on the table currently is to approve the resolution uh so I moved that move to amend that motion to depend at the end uh that the city council further directs the city manager and City attorney to promptly take all steps necessary to terminate the Grant and end the city's participation in operation stone garden in the event that Senate bill for 88th Texas legislature regular session 2023 takes effect okay so we have an amendment to the motion is there a second second there's a motion and a second any discussion mayor we do have Miss Turner that would like to speak sure again good morning mayor councel good morning if you have to wait till something happens then you're out of luck because you haven't prepared now our police officers have a hard job to do and to do their job they have to have the trust and faith of the community the moment the community loses trust in our Police Department is the moment crime goes up the moment that crimes don't get solved because no one will longer trust them the simple perception that my our Police Department is participating in what the present activities means they will lose trust people will no longer call them people will no longer talk to them this is a bigger issue the trust of this community in our Police Department that they're going to do their job and do it correctly is at stake you just cannot say oh I'm going to wait until something happens there's a reason why we have seat belts doesn't mean that we're going to crash in a car we wear it because just in case I have brakes on my car just in case I have to use them the thing here is the community's Trust In The Police Department the moment they think that our Police Department is involved in what is going on presently is the moment that that trust is lost and once trust is lost it's very very difficult to regain it they know I know it you know it best practice is back away from this don't jump in because you don't know where you're going to land thank you thank you Mr Chief I'm going to give you an opportunity thank you mayor counsel so a as uh was spoken we've been under this uh this grant funding for several years and our track record has has shown as it has been for my 40 years on the police department we do not enforce immigration laws we enforce State statutes State traffic laws and city ordinances where they come in now with that with those tools people coming into the country with Contraband whether that's drugs uh weapons or other uh illegal activities that fall under our purview and jurisdiction that helps protect El Paso as a whole and the country as a whole the El Paso police officer does not take their oath lightly they understand they took an oath to the Constitution of the United States and the the state of Texas on there we understand that veterans like uh the sergeant web that was just honored earlier today on there all the way going back to George Washington's uh Army has sacrificed to get us the freedoms that we have in this country uh all the way over there the El Paso police officer understands that they police constitutional constitutionally so that we don't violate people's civil rights on there and there's repercussions if a police officer does violate somebody's civil rights not only Statewide uh State uh statutes but Federal statutes uh on there we will not violate people's civil rights on there we are here to protect people's ability to live under the Constitution Constitution and be able to live their lives with all the protections that they have I can assure you that the El Paso Police Department does not enforce immigration laws Federal immigration laws we don't even know what's going to happen with uh s sp4 that has to be lit litigated in the courts we're not even looking at that and once that's litigated we're going to be working very closely with the city attorney's office whichever way that turns out that's a big unknown but our track record with this grant has helped us uh protect the community as a whole I appreciate uh everybody and the support that you give the El Passa Police Department thank you Chief I'd like to ask you guys to stand while we call the vote on the amended motion Mr Mayor are we what are we voting on right now the amendment the amend the amendment am before we vote on the amendment can we ask uh Miss nean if it's even legal for us to put this amendment on there Hi refiero um Eric senior assistant City attorney um so so I would caution against having language that conditions the grant um that we're going to have for this period right it's a fiscal year that we have this Grant and in the middle of this grant period a ruling might happen and we're not sure if that ruling is going to get challenged we're not sure if it's going to be on the books um in addition to that there's also concerns about any terminations of the grants we have to make sure we're following the Grant application process that we have with the governor's office we have to terminate we have to make sure we return all those funds um and that's all in this resolution already with the city manager Authority so this current resolution you guys are voting on outside of the amendment allows the city manager the authority to terminate modify um or amend the grant so can we take the amended motion or or not recommendation is that we not that we not condition the language of the grant at this period okay motion can can I offer a clarification here mayor just very quickly yeah yeah so the the the language of the resolution itself grants the city manager the authority to uh terminate the grant um and so the the further Direction that's offered in the amendment is simply to uh direct the city manager to exercise that Authority that's given to her by the resolution uh in the event that s sp4 takes effect and again sp4 would create a a state misdemeanor uh for entering the United States without authorization so it would then police the police department would be enforcing state law um if they were acting to enforce that that uh class be misdemeanor the the recommendation from our office is even if that rolling happens there's a period of time when there's appeals so that wouldn't happen instantly at the time of a ruling at whatever stage it's in there would be additional period of time that the ruling would still be questionable and none of our officers would be required to enforce that law until there was a final ruling right we don't know how that's going to affect so that's why I I chose the specific language that it's in the event that sp4 takes effect so not it's not conditional on any any ruling in any particular case but the law actually taking effect so miss name it's your your office's recommendation that we don't take the amendment but representative Canalis you want to have this amendment okay yes all right so there's a motion by Chris Canalis and a second by m represent Lon that's correct mayor all right can we read what they're what they're asking yes the amendment is to append to the end of the main motion the on the resolution that the city council further directs the city manager and City attorney to promptly take all necessary actions to terminate the Grant and end the city's participation in operation stone garden in the event that Senate bill for at the 80th Texas legislature regular session 2023 takes effect okay may mayor can I clarification from the parliamentarian please doesn't my motion to approve go first no sir there the amendment goes first then the main motion is voted on it last yeah if this one fails we'll go back to to a main motion okay call for the vote Miss Bryan yes sir and this is a motion made by representative Canal seconded by representative Leon to amend the resolution on the amendment call for the vote and the voting session and that motion fails Representatives Treo Leon Canales voting I Representatives Chavez ACO Roa noo and Pierro voting nay the motion fail okay let's go to the main motion now yes sir and there was a motion made by representative FAL seconded by representative Chavez to approve the resolution as originally presented on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes 523 Representatives Chavez Roa tjo n Fierro voting I Representatives AO Leon Canales voting the motion does carry all and chief I just want to say thank you to you and the entire police department for everything that you're doing and I can tell you that when I've traveled to Brownsville and Laredo and other parts of uh Texas that this is not uncommon in in their communities to have PD along the border and we know that a lot of drugs are coming from the southern border so I think it's important that we have deterrant that are along our our us Mexico border doing that in any resources that we can give you guys that is not on the taxpayers back I think is is important to do so I want to commend you guys for a job well done and I know it's difficult times and we're going to navigate through this and we will get through this but me and you have had press conferences together where we have discussed that we are not going to use our local resources to enforce immigration and we stand by that so again I want to applaud you guys for everything you're doing thank you thank you okay Miss Prime yes sir we now turn to page eight item number 27 and this is presentation discussion and action on the sale process for 17 city-owned properties located in the union Plaza area of downtown El Paso bounded by West Overland Avenue to North South Santa Fe Street to the east east by Sor drive to the South and ALB to the West good morning good morning good morning mayor and Council Jessica thoris economic and International Development um today we're bringing before you this presentation um if City it can bring up the presentation please yes it this is for item 27 please thank you not sure if the presentation is posted online I'll check it the presentation is posted online to item 27 if you can display it from there please it is working on getting the presentation they're getting it from the online agenda we're waiting on it Miss PR yes sir they're pulling up the presentation from the online agenda okay and and when council is ready we do have nine people of the nine members of the public that signed up to speak at the time council is ready to hear public comments okay yes uh representative uh leemon while we're waiting and not to diminish in it but mayor I'd like to um if we could recognize that we have U Senator Jose Rodriguez present here at our at our council meeting and certainly acknowledge Him as um an incredible Senator Community leader activist and we welcome you Senator Rodriguez thank you for joining us today good afternoon Senator welcome thank you miss m welcome thank you all right we'll give them a few more minutes here miss Brian then we'll start taking public comment yes mayor there we go okay okay so this is the presentation for the city-owned properties in the union Plaza okay and we have a bit of the history in the background of the any previous action back on October 10th of 2023 the city manager was directed uh to begin the solicitation of the letter of interest for the purchase of the properties um in March of 2024 the release of uh the RFI uh was uh sent out we work through the letters of the interest for the process back in on June 10th of 2024 the city council um the direction of the RFI um there was no um it was on pause for the sole process to wait for the results of the bond election to determine the requirements of the properties on August 13 2024 special election called to decide on the revocation of bond Authority for the MPC on November 5th 2024 the voters approved the measure revoking the city council's authority to issue the remaining bonds and December 17 2024 Council resolution committing to use the proceeds from the sale of the process to defe the outstanding months okay and this is the uh the location of the properties there are 17 city-owned properties and the red dots indicate the properties eligible for the National Historic registry and those are six prop properties I'm going to pass it over toel hi good morning mayor and Council um danela Casada City architect for the city of Al Paso good morning good morning I'm here to talk to you about the project goals that have been made abundantly clear in the RFQ um so previous to this RFQ we had a feasibility study done for the area and this was for the entire site we gathered well through a pretty robust public engagement process we gathered over 1 1500 points of input from the community and this is what led to the vision statement that you see in the presentation um since it's not up I'm just going to read it there we go so the the main uh message that we received from the community is that they are very interested in seeing this whole area revitalized revitalized in such a way that it supports local businesses that it is community oriented that it can draw people from all walks of life and that it really understands the history of the area and that whatever revitalization happens in this area reflects that so we could go to the next slide please so in order to achieve these project goals the RF is making it clear that we would like to see um all respondents we got a quick question sorry can we go back and actually please read the vision and the rest of the points absolutely thank you so the vision um from the community is that the district should be viewed as an asset to the community a place where children can play and Learn Friends can share a meal local businesses can incubate and Out of Towners can Marvel at Al Paso if we could go to the next slide please and so in order to realize these project goals and and make the community's vision a reality um the RFQ is proposing um that all respondents uh have an Adaptive reuse plan to accompany their um response and what adaptive reuse does it's a it's a very common delivery method it allows buildings that have no longer their original use um be currently allowed let's save with current building codes uh to see new life uh we've seen many successful examples of this not only Statewide Nationwide but in our own Community you're all very familiar with the Basset tower that was previously an office building which has been adaptly reused into the beautiful hotel that it is today and it serves our local community and uh visitors that come to the community as well and so through adaptive reuse we're hoping that we'll be able to preserve as much of the architectural character of the built environment within the neighborhood but we'll be able to introduce new uses that currently aren't there such as potentially new housing units we'll be able to activate the ground floor to introduce retail perhaps entertainment uses as well or even cultural uses and so we feel like this will be able to attract new sectors into the downtown to really invigorate the economy for this whole area okay so this is a two-step process step one was already taken care of which is the RFI the second step we are recommending is to go into the issuance of an RFQ okay um the request the uh for in interest the RFI it was a method for the city to collect the real-time insights from industry experts and community members it was more to gauge interest to get what kind of responses we would receive any type of feedback um there was no uh specific um documentations or anything uh requested for this okay it was released on March the 3rd of 2024 and it was extended through April 26 due to the lack of responses um again no minimum information was requested no restrictions five letter of interest were received from three different entities they were presented to city council and executive session however it was declined to move forward with any of the negotiations at this time we are recommending to move forward with the second phase of the solicitation we're looking to seek experience development teams to redevelop the properties using adaptive reuse the sites will be able to be negotiated as individual Properties or as as a whole for a master plan uh development participation in the RFI um is not required in order to submit for the new RFQ we will evaluate this statement of uh qualifications through a multi-step process the initial evaluation we will assess the respondents based on their experience their technical competence Financial ability past performance and qualifications the second steps are presentations city council will have the option to invite up to the four top rank respondents to present to city council if selected for the award uh these will not be part of the scoring process and then third step of course would be the final selection and negotiations okay the sell of any of these properties shall be subject to the following um the first of course is um being able to use the Adaptive reuse plant any building Rehabilitation must comply with the design standards for the union Plaza and the independent eligible properties must be listed on the National Historic registry which are six properties and these will help them with the financial incentives uh federal tax credits and possibly assist with uh their financing the properties must be sold at the firm market value um this graph just shows um the weight of all their criteria it'll be more heavily on the Adaptive reuse plan at 25% the capacity to perform work at 25% the development team qualifications 10% proven project success 20% and financial stability and cap uh capacity at 20% okay and right here we just more of details of all these um criterias um for the development team qualifications we are evaluating the team experiences Staffing past projects of similar scope for proven project success we are evaluating their references design quality and adherence to the schedule and budgets for financial stability and capacity it's to measure the respondents ability to secure their financing capacity to perform work reviews the overload the project management plan and the team organization adaptive reuse plan examines the uh respondent's ability to propose the property uses okay and for next steps um today February 25th discussion and action on RFQ the issuance uh we are hoping to release the RFQ mid-march we'll have a question and answer periods and uh we will offer site visits for any interested parties to go out to the site um 60 days after that we will have the response for the submissions deadlines 60 dates afterwards the evaluation of their responses and then return to City Council in the fall with any recommendations and possibly award okay so requested action for today is the approval of the proposed request for qualific ifications process for the adapted reuse of the 17 city-owned properties in the union Plaza District in accordance with the December 17 2024 action and properties shall not be sold for less than the fair market value and proceeds shall be used to deas the outstanding bonds thank you thank you we're going to have a lot of discussion on this one but we'll start with representing Canalis thank you mayor um yeah this location's in my district um and so uh I've been very aware of everything obviously that has happened over the last uh decade plus with regard to this site it's uh been quite a saga um once the uh voters uh voted in November to uh abandon the NPC project essentially right to to uh the city's authority to to issue the bonds to complete the project um that that triggered I think a a fiduciary duty uh to make the make the public whole for the the funds that we had already spent on acquiring the properties uh in this location and so uh a sale process uh makes sense and I think is is what is required of us um but I I want the public to feel at ease I think this is uh the best possible sale process that we can go through this kind of RFQ I want to read one more time uh the the vision and the goals um I think that they align perfectly with what I've heard from uh the community over the years of what they want to see uh in uh the union Plaza area and Durango if the the NPC didn't go forward um again that vision is the district should be viewed as an asset to the community a place where children can play and Learn Friends can share a meal local businesses can incubate and Out of Towners can Marvel at Al Paso and then the stated project goals are Breathe new life into downtown understand the history of the area and reflect that story draw people from all different walks of life prioritize Community well-being and connection provide pedestrian and bicycle access along with green spaces and uh support local businesses family events and dayto night activity um again I think those that vision and and those goals together with the requirement for adaptive reuse of the buildings um and and preservation of the uh the national register eligible properties um it it is essentially exactly what uh I think the community has been asking for and so I'm I'm very enthusiastic about moving forward with this RFQ um I I anticipate that there will be uh significant interest we will see um but I I do think that this is a great opportunity that many cities don't have right this is uh a large number of properties in the downtown area uh with significant history to draw on um and a story to tell and it's a it's a huge uh Redevelopment opportunity uh that I think as long as it's sufficiently Community focused is is is a big uh a big plus for us here in El Paso so thank you to the staff I know you've worked so hard uh on this for many years um and you know you've had different directives from the council at different times that have meant uh you you've completed a lot of work that hasn't uh necessarily uh resulted in in a in a hard end product uh but uh I think this finally will we're we're at a place now where we're ready to move forward um with with doing something here for the community so thank you all thank you rep represent and move to approve second there's a motion in a second uh we have a lot of public comment Miss Brian yes sir we have nine members of the public okay would you like me to call them up yes ma'am okay the first person is ignasio VI Maro followed by Carmen Rodriguez Jose Rodriguez Veronica Carvajal David Dorado Romo good morning sir you have three minutes good morning good morning uh mayor and councel good morning um I think as as everybody agrees you after 10 years clearly we have to move forward and and maximize the the value of those properties and and drive the benefit for the city of El Paso especially downtown uh to make it to continue make an area what more attractive and uh enticing for people to visit to spend time in ETC um so in that sense clearly uh as support moving forward the project um my only concern would be in terms of reading the RFQ and the presentation that was put together is while some of the objectives and goals uh that I know representative Canal especially for his district has I'm I'm concerned they're may be a little bit idealistic especially in today's environment with high interest rates you know people concerned about the economy and also the conditions of the properties I'm not sure how many of you have actually gone down there and looked at those properties even the engineering valuation that was done was about four years old and so while adaptive reuse is is um let's say a a good ideal to have I think what we really should be focused on is how do we those properties maximize the the enticing or the the value for the city in terms of economic prospects and also the entic ofen of downtown and that area for not just the local community but for Al Paso um overall so I I guess um in addition to those objectives and goals and the decision criteria I think we also have to think about whatever project we put in in there how sustainable is it going to be in the long run right it's great great that we uh we have certain objectives and and and ideals for how we're going to select the properties how the teams or the projects are going to be selected but it shouldn't just be about who can do it now but whatever we do with that property and that area needs to be able to have a long-term sustainability and ability to to become to maximize the value for the city for the downtown and for the community overall uh and then the last point which is a little bit on a tangent but I think it goes along with what we're trying to do with with downtown is um I'm glad to see that we're trying to redevelop downtown and some of the older areas in the city uh I think one of the challenges as city as we continue to expand and and grow outwards you know whether it's west or east and that's putting a lot of strain on the resources we have right it it comes with it's good that the city is growing but at the same time it's not necessarily growing as efficiently as and effectively as it could be and so I think Beyond uh this project the city should also look at other areas you know other parts of town how do we help uh redevelop whether it's Central Downtown uh that we can be more effective and efficient with that growth of the city and and you know take this project and see what other areas in town can maybe uh use with Redevelopment and and helping those local communities versus just continue to grow out whether it's north west east Etc thank you thank you the next speaker is Carmen Rodriguez followed by Jose Rodriguez Veron kaval David dor Romo good morning ma'am you have three minutes good morning good morning good morning city council thank you for your willingness to serve our city I'm Gman Rodriguez I'm retired from practicing law and have been a longtime Community activist uh I'm also co-founder of project regener a nonprofit that we formed uh in order to protect the baros uh not only Durango but uh the down the other downtown baros um I'd like to relate my comments a little bit to the general subject of Heritage tourism mayor you like to say that El Paso is open for business but is it open for visitors it should be we all know we have a rich and unique history we all love our city yet I don't think we promote it as we should back in the mid90s I had the opportunity to attend an economic development training conference that focused on Heritage tourism as an industry my eyes were open to the fact that communities have to work intentionally and strategically to develop their existing cultural and historic resources and assets Heritage tourism has great economic potential but it also creates a sense of Pride understanding and unity in the community after that I joined the and supported the Mission Trail Association and I tried to support other groups that were involved in this effort um I became involved in about 2005 when Segundo bario residents became concerned that city leaders were planning to eradicate the downtown Barrios and they sought support from our Legal Office to uh protect their homes and their properties as a member of the Senate District 9 Heritage tourism advisory years later we met for several years with different groups and Advocates such as representatives from the moffen home the AL Paso Community Foundation the Mission Trail the Mission Trail Association the tigua tribe uh the Railroad Museum lero Vera and many others to discuss how they could support each other and work collaboratively each group was working indep dependently and the smaller groups were struggling with lack of resources and other kinds of support they often discussed the need for government governmental en entities to support uh the this industry we appreciate the efforts that were made to save Durango and now we are happy that the positive work of rehabilitating this area is uh taking a next step we hope to be a part of that next step and we hope that the housing is supported and the continuing opportunity for input from Community groups historians preservations and others thank you very much thank you Mr Rodriguez and thank you for your service to the community the next speaker is former Senator Jose Rodriguez followed by Veronica gajal David Dorado Romo Joe gudenrath Jerry CA Lisa Turner good morning good morning Senator good morning morning Senator good morning mayor and councel it's a pleasure to be here I appreciate the opportunity to just offer a few comments on this very important agenda item I want to thank representative Canales for bringing this forth and especially for his excellent uh letter to the editor in the El Paso Times this past weekend I should just shut up and say just follow what he said and that's my that's my message uh I have a few points I do want to offer uh I did just finished serving a two-year term on preservation Texas which is the only Statewide nonprofit uh organization that supports historic preservation across the state and promotes uh Economic Development and cultural awareness protection of our heritages across the state and uh they've taken a very strong interest in this particular neighborhood Durango they designated it as a uh as an endangered uh place they are supportive of the Redevelopment and revitalization of the of the neighborhood and and so and so so am I I I think that it offers us an opportunity as maybe has already been stated to uh develop and Revitalize an area that is the most historic part of this city and which without a doubt would attract interest from throughout the state and I would say even the rest of the country uh because we have much more to offer than most other cities in terms of our history in terms of proximity to quades and New Mexico and uh we are just uh an abundant of Rich riches if you will uh you know Paso I would just like to comment on some of the points that were made on the presentation I I do like in fact the uh the uh vision statement and the goals that are set forth there uh my emphasis would be on the cultural development of the neighborhood and providing affordable housing uh opportunities for artists and uh other businesses to to establish themselves there and offer uh what that neighborhood uh has to offer for for all of us um and we see that as already mentioned in many other communities but two points one is uh you have only six or seven uh properties that uh you are calling for the potential developers to uh list with the with a National Historic uh register registry uh seems to me you have about 11 or 17 properties there I have visited them uh including one recently with the city's support uh they are in a dilapidated State they need to be uh rehabilitated I would like to see the language that says that that the developers Must List them to a shall list them thank you sir you've reached the three minute thank you thank you Senator thank you yes sir thank you thank you next speaker is Veronica caraja followed by David dor Romo good morning ma'am you have three minutes thank you good morning good morning mayor and Council um I'ma gval with Houston in action I'm a climate um Justice and civil rights organizer I also um I work with the ransa Coalition which is an a coalition of um seven of our South Central neighborhoods that also hold a lot of history um and project you heard some of their members um is is also part of that Coalition I was also an attorney that represented a lot of tenants during the fight to save Durango and I also practiced real estate law when I was at legal aid um thank you for recognizing that Durango holds um a lot of historic social and cultural value as well as economic potential thank you for incorporating much of the community's input into the request for qualifications um including the need for affordable housing as you all know um we we had um low-income tenants um mexican-americans some who have passed away who were removed by the city um um in in Prior years now um we do have some concerns about the requests for qualifications um one of them is it does not protect the historic buildings in perpetuity um while um the RFQ seeks experience development teams to develop the properties using adaptive reuse um this um only protects the properties in this initial transfer from the city to the new generation of property owners after that the new owners will have their freedom to sell their properties again and unless you have Protections in place um they can do as they wish including demolishing the buildings that our community fought so hard to protect um I am requesting that the RFQ um and the future RFP include um restrictive covenants and the Deeds of all of the real property that has buildings there are some parking lots and vacant buildings um in the um in the space but those buildings should be protected with restrictive covenants and this request I believe was made a couple of years ago I believe in 2023 it was brought to your attention that this needed to be a part of the the Deeds um more than ever we need to protect the remaining histo historical assets of black indigenous people of color mexican-americans and other racial and ethnic groups in our country more than ever we must honor and be proud of our Collective history and our ancestors contributions to Al Paso our border our country and this um because of the community's long-standing fight to protect these buildings it's an incredible opportunity and I'm very grateful that we've reached this Milestone um and I just don't want us to lose sight of the fact that and administrations um happen very quickly and we must um think think towards the future and protect these buildings as we all intended to thank you so much thank you the next speaker is David dor Romo followed by Joe Gooden reth good morning you have three minutes good morning mayor and city council good morning uh my name is David Romo I'm a a founding member of project reg dedicated to restore Durango for the last eight years many of our members have stood to together with residents to stop the demolition of their neighborhood during this time Durango residents with the support of Architects historians and preservationists created a community generated Vision they called plan for the rebirth of Durango the plan and Visions the return of a vibrant neighborhood as well as a Heritage Corridor showcasing the incredibly Rich history of this neighborhood historians have called the birthplace of El Paso I want to thank representative Canales for meeting with us in the past and standing and attending a recent architectural Forum organized together with Texas Tech School of Architecture that focus on on ideas and designs for the restoration of Durango and I say that some of these ideas have been uh included now in in this new proposal but at the same time we're still concerned that it might not go far enough to include community members in the process and we have some initial questions first of all how do we ensure that this new vision is truly responsive to Durango and South El Paso residents will the city help set up Community benefits agreements for instance to make sure that the residents directly benefit from this new restoration project whether be um a forum where all city council can listen to community generated Visions before it makes its final decision have City officials considered restricted covenants to the property which give more teeth to the overall OB objectives of this new V vision and will the city begin the process of National Historic District designation for Durango while it still owns the buildings and by the way uh I've passed out some of the books that remember Durango that will show specifically 12 buildings that you ow own today that should be included with in this uh national landmark um status so we hope there will be future Community forums where these questions can be raised by the community and answered by City officials in Greater depth I believe project regeneration is particularly qualified to help showcase the historical significance of this incredible important Heritage District our nonprofit group is interested in buying one or more Durango properties currently owned by the city of El Paso we are interested in creating a community garden in one of the empty lots that the city of El Paso owns on 321 Chihuahua Street a property where part of a Mescal Apache peace Camp was located in the 1700s we're also interested in purchasing the 19th century building on 309 chiua Street and use it for educational cultural and public history purposes thank you so much for your attention thank you the next speaker is Joe GTH followed by Jerry CA Lisa Turner and Victor uo good morning you have three minutes thank you good morning mayor city council good morning city manager City staff uh my name is Joe gudenrath I'm the executive director of the downtown Management District I'm here today in support of this RFQ its goals and its efforts to seek Developers for the properties acquired by the city of El Paso uh previously for the Downtown Arena however there there's one request I I would like to make to truly sparkk the creativity of the private sector maximize what's possible for the site and spur a new wave of Downtown Development I encourage you to consider removing the requirements placed on the proposals this is unique and game-changing opportunity for El Paso uh like representative K said very few if any downtowns across the country have this size of a de of developable space within their downtown close to a Convention Center hotels theaters historic shopping district public transportation hubs housing and a street car system a dense Urban mixed use development can fuel a new wave of downtown investment living small business employment and additional historic preservation if you look at recent projects within the downtown man or within the downtown district you can see the potential that does exist for these properties projects such as West Tower which was $85 million on a square block the crest building which is over $19 million of private investment uh Hotel pel borte a restoration of historic property of $100 million on one square block just kind of give you a glimpse of what the potential for this approximately three block uh site can do and the opportunity for a true Urban mixed use development removing the requirements does not prevent developers from pursuing those goals and objectives or the city from giving priority to various aspects of the development but it does give the development Community the opportunity to truly visualize what is possible now is not the time in place place or now is not the time to place limitations on what we can achieve regardless of how you move forward today it is a step forward and the DMD is ready to assist the city in obtaining the highest and best use for this extremely rare opportunity I look forward to continue working with you all to continue the great momentum of downtown El Paso get these properties back on the tax roles and being a benefit for the entire Community thank you very much thank you the next speaker is Jerry CA followed by Lisa Turner and Victor Ural good morning you have three minutes good morning morning honorable mayor good morning members of council I'm jerich C ta I'm here representing the Community First Coalition some of our our members are here and one of our former members is sitting there welcome back Lily it's good to see you here um and I want to speak in favor of this resolution and particularly giving a second to the com ments that uh Dr Romo made you might know the Community First Coalition we are a nonpartisan network uh of organizations and leaders whose purpose is to empower the community to bring about improvements in social economic and political conditions in El Paso through planning policy advy and Community Action I saw some of you at the uh candidate Forum we hosted last November and uh in conjunction with the League of Women voters I did bring some brochures for this Madame clerk would it be possible to get these to the council and there thank you so I want to Second the comments that Dr Romo made our city is blessed with having an abundance of historical buildings Community First Coalition hosted a screening of the film about Durango and the drama around its uh uh almost demolition a few years back if you haven't seen that film I urge you to try to get to see it in fact if you really want to we'll arrange some type of uh screening of that there are some heart pounding moments in that when individuals who are living in buildings found out that their building was condemned when it started being demolished when the wrecking ball started hitting it we can't have that again our concerns as a coalition are the preservation of historic buildings and particularly the Heritage uh as associated with them we're very interested in seeing accurate and historic Rehabilitation done here with considerable Community input and the city seems to be doing a good job of that right now most importantly I would ask unlike the last time this was an issue is that there be transparency in the city's dealings with the developers the investors and those who will be uh responsible for doing this but particularly with the constituency around during gido and the historical ramifications that have including the people who were displaced I hope they will be in your hearts and in your minds as you pursue this opportunity thank you very much for your attention May Council thank you the next speaker is Lisa Turner followed by Victor orado good morning again ma'am good morning I W going to say this is good uh I was here when we went after sco burial the downtown plan they because basically all the Mexicans living in South El Paso describe them as being lazy and dirty uneducated and that was justification for kicking them out of their homes and this is what you did with this neighborhood kick people out of their homes for a developer now you're going to do it again you're not going to even give them a chance to buy the property back at the price you pay plus a dollar so you'll make a profit you won't do that you heard the gentleman from downtown this isn't the end they're going to take everything everything of South El Paso what makes El Paso is South El Paso it is our heart it is our soul it is who we are and what we want to do our down developers and downtown businesses we want to destroy it because they're Mexican because we don't want any Mexicans downtown this is just a continuation of the thought process of the Glass Beach study under Miss Wilson and all the business people this is just uncalled for but I know what you're going to do you're going to go through with this you're not going to take care of the people of South El Paso they are our heart they are our soul and as a member of District 8 my representative is not representing District 8 so you know I don't know what to say I did help defeat that downtown plan but eventually we're going to lose councils are going to sell out to people South El Paso and then what are you going to be like you're going to be just like any other city in this nation you're not going to be different you're going to be just like a carbon copy my city always wants to be like somebody else we want to be like Dallas Oklahoma City LA tuon Phoenix Memphis but we don't want to be El Paso why are you ashamed of being from El Paso why are you ashamed shame to embrace El Paso and our history thank you Miss Turner and the final speaker is Victor or good morning you have three minutes good morning mayor council I'm Victor Walo West Texas program officer at preservation Texas a Statewide nonprofit focused on historic preservation at the Statewide level uh we were founded in 1985 and we have Reg offices throughout Texas including here in West Texas based here in El Paso um as you heard from former Senator Rodriguez uh we included Durango in our most endangered properties uh places list back in uh 200 and 2016 um and uh in my role I cover over nine counties in West Texas including El Paso uh part and partial of what we do folks is really collaborate with all stakeholders uh interested in in uh historic preservation um our headquarters is based out of San Marcus and with Regional Offices throughout Texas I'm really here to lend our support in any way that we can uh we offer preservation planning uh as well as uh National register and tax spread application help um keep in mind that there are several properties in question that are National register eligible as well as five that would be contributing to a national register historic district uh that which that we could also help in determining the eligibility uh of each of these properties um which also if uh these properties were included in National registered District folks it could unlock a a a slew of tax CR opportunities that we could also uh assist with I you with the rest of my time thank you very much thank you mayor that concludes public comment on this item all right so we had a motion in a second is there any discussion representative U leemon thank you mayor I do have several questions um I'm I'm concerned because I think our presentation talked about 17 properties in the Durango district and that six were eligible for the National Historic register but then we've heard a different number from uh Dr Romo and then right now perhaps from Mr ortado so if you could help me understand yes um So based on a 2017 assessment that was conducted by the county This was um in conjunction with their application for a downtown district being listed in the National register of historic places all the properties within that downtown boundary were assessed only six of them were found to be independently eligible for listing and those actually seven but we're not uh talking about the tro uh Firehouse but the six and question have been highlighted in the presentation because the downtown district was never listed um the other properties that were assessed as being potentially contributing to such a district do not hold any kind of eligibility for independent listing so without a district um there there are no contributing properties because there is no District that was ever listed in the National register and that would be the ultimate Authority or expert to make that designation um so another assessment could be made on the properties um it the 2017 assessment was obviously some time ago so um an additional assessment could be made on the different properties but we know right now that the independent eligibility of the six properties um stands for any future property owner to then move forward with their application to list that property in the National register of historic places and the assessment would require what what what would need to be done and what would be the cost um so representative I don't have all of that information with me right now I would be happy to download all the documentation from the Texas historical uh commission um all of these applications are online they're made available to the public um we had a gentleman speak um there's obviously a lot of organizations that also provide assistance so the city would be more than happy to provide any additional documentation on those processes to anyone who's interested and and if there was anyone um person or organization that was interested in providing um additional information on properties um you'd be willing to accept that information and take it into consideration and at what point in the RFQ would that come in could that come in at the beginning or cladia from purchasing come in but we are going to have a a Q&A portion of the RFQ where we're going to give any interested party the availability to ask any questions all the questions and the responses from the city will be made public so that everyone has access to these um now that period I believe uh CL it's 30 days 60 excuse me no go yeah go ahead good morning with purchasing and strategic sourcing department so yes we're finalizing the uh document to be released and we're going to be including all the details that the public needs uh to submit questions and then we're going to have a period of time to respond to those uh questions and any additional information that we may miss at the original phase but we're anticipating having everything we need in there okay well well then that's very good because I think it ties in perfectly with something that I feel very very strongly about and was brought up by Jer Jerry The Importance of Being the importance that this process be very transparent but I would add to it um that it'd be very honest because we're still suffering from dishonesty that took place with another major project that was promised to us that is very very important to me and I'm glad that that that you mentioned that I do have another question and that this was brought up about um restrictive covenants and there was reference to perhaps a council meeting January 2023 does that still exist no I don't believe there's a reference to that in that in this presentation now so okay so that um that was a council meeting where restrictive covenants were discussed and it did um it did pass it was approved by Council possibly January of 2023 um are we not going to hold true to that action that um direction that city council gave so the direction on January 20123 was for the council the council directed staff to no longer designate that area as the site for the MPC correct they directed staff to look for alternative city-owned facilities for the site and to honor the will of the voters there was language in that um motion that said that no buildings would be demolished or and I'm trying to remember off the top of my head demolished or destroyed there was no discussion ma'am on that portion of that motion regarding restrictive covenants but it was approved by Council correct ma' okay so that could be a discussion topic in the Q&A sessions perhaps we hope thank you mayor thank you very much for the time represent Leon all right there's a motion in a second any further discussion Miss bran call for the vote Yes sir the motion was made by representative Canales seconded by representative Leon and this is to approve the proposed request for qualification process for the Adaptive reuse of 17 city-owned properties in the union Plaza District on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously that brings us to item number 28 thank you Miss briyan and this is presentation and discussion on Workforce Focus initiatives including recruitment retention compensation employee benefits and next steps good morning mayor and councel good morning yep we're still morning Mary Wiggins Chief Human Resources officer if we could bring up the presentation please Perfect uh let's see public okay so we are here today we wanted to just come and be able to focus on our Workforce and and just kind of bring you a review of what's going on and some highlights uh Workforce is always going to be tied to our strategic goal six we want to make sure that we're always setting the standard for sound governance and fiscal management while retaining uh recruiting and retaining a skilled and diverse Workforce so we have a two-year action plan that we've been given a directive um and so in that two-year action plan it has different items like developing an alternative benefits package and one of the things Al there also on there is just making sure that we focus on uh liveable wages and making sure that we're recruiting and retaining a skilled Workforce which we're going to highlight here today so our agenda today is going to be kind of to just highlight what we're doing our Focus area for recruitment uh retention we're going to uh talk about compensation and exciting things that are coming up uh here now and an employe benefits and what our next steps are moving forward so you know why are we here to talk about the workforce um we're we're here because 72% of the budget which is going to be our employee salaries taxes and benefits that encompasses 72% of our entire budget so that's a very large line item and it's something um in order to accomplish all of the goals that we have for the city it's our Workforce it's our employees uh that are managing that are doing the work and that are making us successful so we want to make sure that we are recognizing those we've talked about uh we all know you know and we've talked recently about how it's it's have been very difficult postco to be able to recruit and retain a skilled Workforce we we found it difficult we weren't quite sure where the workforce went um but you know we we're struggling to be able to to be able to attract them and so the shortage it just kind of highlights we need to do something different we need to make sure that we are upskilling and rescaling our current employees and it's just making sure that we are responding to a rapidly growing environment we don't want to be left behind so this these graphs here kind of just give you an idea of what our Workforce looks like you can see that we have like 947 employees for fire police 1115 my eyes aren't doing that great up there and 42.99 for our civilians um and then on the next graph we've broken it down just a little bit more granular for you to see as far as GS pm and executive and then our fire and police as well so you can see how it's well rounded out as um as far as all of our employee population so what are we doing um H how are we going to handle all of this and so we're having to be flexible we're having to be creative and so we're looking at what we can do again to recruit and ret retain so we're looking what kind of programs you know can we enhance or what can we do and so I just want to highlight some of those ones that have um been successful and and that we continue to to Market on one of them that I like to point out is the airport employee career enhancement program so this program additionally started off in 2021 um as a request for ESL for um English as a second language the employees asked for it um and they wanted it to be for the front line and the custodial workers because they wanted to have better communication skills with the passengers so that's how it started so we you know we were able to start that program and it was Employee Le that has continued to grow now they are doing other types of training programs computer training programs they're doing peer-to-peer uh career counseling sessions they're doing job shadowing so that program is continuing to grow and Market the employees at um through the airport program and so they're able to grow uh to date they've had 115 employees go through this program and they actually started a new class just this week so we we we just want to make sure we highlight that one another one is the collaboration with job score for our technical skills those are just some positions where we're partnering for some of our more technical like Fleet Maintenance um so we're we're partnering to be able to as we talked about earlier to upskill and resk skill our employees and again we talked about how we're having to kind of be you know flexible so we you know we all know about hiring and recruiting fairs but in the past year or so we had to be even more creative we H we started having some on-site recruitment fairs especially for some of those positions that we find it more difficult to feel and we didn't really have the advantage of being able to go through the entire um recruiting program so we had um many of our different departments come together to go onsite to where the the recruitment fair was on location and they were there to help the applicants actually fill out their applications in neogov so they applied there right there on site we had supervisors on site ready to interview and then in some cases we were also able to make um job offers on site so we're having to be able to get in front of you know our applicants and and be competitive and so we're doing whatever it is that we can to be able to meet them where they are and instead of always having them come to us another um is our intern and V program we' had this for years but we formalized the program last year and so we've had 73 um interns that have actually been a part of our program and have got their career skilled program uh through the city of El Paso so another strategy is our veterans strategy so we recognize that the city of El Paso or El Paso as a whole that we you know our military community and so we want to capitalize on that so one of our programs is the bridge fellow program and it's a 90-day service member transition program that allows transitioning service members their spouses or veterans to perform an unpaid Fellowship in any of our city departments um this helps them to be able to bridge their work experience from the military life into a more civilian life and this has also been a very successful program we've had 97 um uh go through the program already and we have four new ones that will be starting in April um and in a lot of cases those employees as they go through this unpaid fellowship program it gives them an opportunity to see what we do what they like uh to forge um uh I want to say friendships but to to get to know different leaders and to know where they may want to apply once they finish the the fellowship program I'm also proud of the military spouse employment partnership so last year we actually applied to participate in this program Mr Paul Albright who runs the military program um we applied to be a participant in this program and so we we were granted um to be a member and so what this means it's part of the Department of Defense and so it's for our military spouses is to prepare them to get ready for example if we have someone a military spouse member that's living in Asheville North Carolina and their husband is getting ready or wife is getting ready to transition or relocate to El Paso we are able through this program we're able to post our jobs on the Department of Defense website and we're able to recruit for them in Asheville North Carolina or across the whole United States so they're able to see our jobs apply for our jobs from where they are before they ever even make it to El Paso we actually had our first um applicant two weeks ago so we're really excited that this program is already we're starting to see success in it and we want to make sure that when they get here that they are active members of our society the third program is the pays program which is a strategic partnership between the US Army and the city of El Paso and this provides um our El Paso youth uh to join the Army as well as any newly enlisted Army soldier um in the nation and it provides them an opportunity to serve their country while preparing them for the workforce and so the pays partner guarantees soldiers in this program that for positions that they're eligible for once they complete their service if they're eligible it guarantees them an interview for the positions um with the the city of El Paso our goal with this veteran strategy is to make sure that our service members who are here and retired they stay here in our community for those that have left our community that maybe have gone to other states that they want to return back to El Paso for their retirement community and then the end ultimately we want them to choose El Paso so you know just like you saw with the veterans program some other flexible and strategic things that we're having to do is like targeted reclassifications so for our jobs we're always constantly whenever um we're recruiting we're looking at our job specifications we're making sure are they valid are they up to dat is what's listed in that job is that what we still need um as we're continuing to to grow as a city and postco um in some cases we're having to work smarter and so we make sure whenever we are going out and we're recruiting for different positions that we have uh a subject matter expert that is looking at these job specs they're looking at the qualifications for example what time of Ed what type of education do they need how much of experience do they need we want to make sure that we're being relevant and so we're just not making up these things as we go we are making sure that we're competitive we're our local Partners in the community that we are matching and and we we have the experience of knowing what it takes to be successful in that position and in addition we're also looking at our comparator cities what are they requiring are we being competitive with what they have if they're requiring a bachelor's degree and six years of experience you know why do we have a bachelor's in 10 years or two years we want to make sure that the job is matching what it is that we're recruiting for so I can tell you postco we've had um to look at many of the different positions that we've opened and and try to find out how we can do better and how we need to make changes so we've actually reclassified about 900 different positions um in the city which is about 24% of the workforce postco meaning that we are just looking and making sure that what it is that we're being asked um is what is being needed for the position we're also very proud of our Learning and Development team uh we talked earlier that we need to upskill and we need to rescale our Workforce um we need to make sure that we're giving them the tools that we're giving them the training and development to be able to grow in their position at the city of El Paso that they aren't staying stagnant in one position that we are growing them and as we're we're doing that we are using many different resources but some of the resources is our access to LinkedIn learning and so we've had over 2100 participants in the last 12 months that have actually logged into LinkedIn learning which shows that our employees do want to grow they want to develop and they want to go on for the next um bullet promotional opportunities that's what we're preparing them for that's how we retain our Workforce is that we continue to invest in them we want to make sure we're giving them the tools to be able to grow and to prosper in the city the rest of the bullets I'm going to cover in just a minute so compensation that that's on the the tip of everyone's tongue so I'm sure as you all know um in 2021 our minimum wage was $10.36 cents and so prior to 2022 the way that we pretty much handled all of our salary increases for our employees was through um across the board uh percentage increases you know 1% one and a half 2% so it was pretty much across the board but you know we were struggling to be able to continue to recruit and retain employees um at those levels especially postco and with the living wage Rising so we had to get more aggressive um and so uh based upon you know thanks to leadership and Council uh we have been able to uh instead of just doing across the board increases we started raising the minimum wage um we we started you know placing a higher value on the compensation so as you can see in this bar graph we went from 1036 to 1111 1211 1311 and I'm very happy to say as of this past Sunday our new minimum wage is $15.75 an hour now thank you I agree and so you see the graphs but I mean the overall picture is 52% increase in in minimum wage since 2021 and that that's what council has done so we were able to and that accounts for 76% of our Workforce is in the general service category so that's huge not only um while we took the opportunity while we were raising to 1575 we also took the opportunity to you know address the GSP scale and we made some other modifications because again we want to be competitive in our environment and the local community compression uh in 2022 and 2024 we also addressed compression issues you know which just means that you know we need to make sure that as we're bringing employees in that we have enough um Gap in between or breath in between the different positions and that we are recognizing our employees who have been here so that's something that we've addressed and we will continue address that's never a one-time deal that is a constant thing that we have to do um service time pay increases uh we've had those uh for a while but um a few years ago we actually raised the service time pay increase so what happens is is every 5 years we have them in fiveyear um blocks the employee will get a a percentage added to their base pay so it could be two two and a half three three and a half so in each fiveyear increment that grows so does the percentage you increase so what does this do well it's encouraging and it's rewarding our long-term employees we want to reward them because they've stayed with the city of El Paso and they continue to invest in our community and then also um compensation also we've had no health care cost increases pass to the employees since 2019 um as you know cost of Health Care has exponentially grown and so we're proud to be able to say that up until now we have been able to absorb those cost increases for our employees So speaking of benefits kind of our what our that's what employees are looking at compensation and benefits when they're when they're looking for employers and so we have a well- grounded comprehensive um benefits program um I'm not going to sit here you know and go through all of our benefits and this does not in any way Encompass all of our benefits we have a way more strategic but we just want to hit some of the highlights on here of course we know about health care but also if you have a cdhp plan the city contributes $500 into the HSA account and if you have employee plus one we contribute $1,000 into the HSA plan um not many places have pension we still have pension we're very proud of that um that that is a major motivator for employees for those employees who have one of our um Health insurances we have our Wellness Clinic um on site and several out in the community that's no cost for and I always forget the word um Roman for our acute episodic care I can't ever say that um another is our 457 deferred comp plan so in 2016 we actually added a 1% automatic enrollment so what that means is when employees get hired we actually automatically start them at 1% coming out and going into the deferred comp program and so that program has exponentially grown since 2016 um we also have our employee assistance program which we're proud of um City gyms I want to make sure I highlight that because a new Council I'm not sure you know but we have two City gyms that we built with our Wellness funds we have one at City 2 and we have one out at the mun Municipal service center we're very proud of those gyms so if you haven't been you need to um definitely go check those out we have a comprehensive tuition assistance program and so the main thing that I want to highlight on employee benefits is I want to make sure that we highlight that we want to make sure that we have a three-prong approach for our employees we want to make sure that we are taking care of their physical their mental and their financial well-being all three of those things are important not just one all three of those are addressed and so is we were constantly having trainings to make sure that they are aware of all the things that they have available to them and lastly you know what are our next steps what do we do next um and and so that's always a constant conversation we're always trying to look at what we can do as we just mentioned we have that civilian compensation increase that just took place on Sunday so staff is busy um getting those increases in as we speak um review and recommendation of the PM and ex so the one the pay scale that we just updated was our GS general service pay scale um we realized that we need to do this in phases so our next review will be the PM and the ex pay scales to make sure that we're being competitive um in the local environment and with our comparator cities uh review and recommendation of salary compression we understand whenever we implement this GS pay scale and the minimum wage of 1575 we will create uh some compression issues we knew that going in and so we are already looking at that um we'll be making recommendations on how we remedy that and we'll be bringing that back to you um in the budget for next year healthc care um again as those continue to grow we'll be continuing to monitor that and deciding you know whether or not the the the city will continue to absorb those increases or whether we have to pass those increases back to the employees uh workers compensation review we are um looking at the the workers compensation rates that are out um in the community we will be updating our rates to make sure that they more appropriately align with those and so that will um be able to help us reduce some of the um general fund and then we I've done a lot of talking today um all of my talking has been about the uh the the general service the PM the ex our our non our civilian Personnel I should say but we're not complete without our uniform personnel and so I recognize today that that was not mentioned but our Focus today is just on the civilian Personnel um we will have uh updates coming to you in the future that's going to more um Talk specifically about the uniform but I recogn I just want to make sure that we recognize that that it's the entire Workforce that's able to continue to to complete what we do but they'll be coming back um the there are cbas that will be coming up and they'll be talking to you about those as as well and that's it any questions thank you Mary for the the presentation uh represent leemon thank you mayor thank you Mary I had um three little bullet points that I was going to do and one of them you covered exceptionally well um it was going to be um who's the lowest paid or what is the lowest paid salary for a full-time employee um in a little bit of history when I was first on Council we were so proud and we were so happy because we went over the $10 mark and um and that took a lot it did and so we went from 1017 approximately to um 10:36 up to to 2021 and now it's at 1575 so thank you for that information do we have um city employees is working remotely we do um it was a a lot more during um Co we did have we implemented a telecommuting policy we had to quickly react to be able to continue providing Services I do have to say from where we were to where we went like two weeks after covid um we it was remarkable um what we were able to accomplish um in that time period um I would say the majority of the workforce is probably back in house house um but we do still have some that are on a flexible schedule doing some telecommuting do we know how many or would you let us know how many at some point in time and what work is it that they're actually doing uh working remotely and those are generally administrative okay and then also do we have alternative work schedules we do okay yeah so um we we leave the alternative work schedules up to each department and their direct they're the ones that understand what it takes to run that department so I mean we have some employees depending upon you know what the the um the department is there could be some 7-Day a week operations and so they handle those appropriately but we have a different schedules we have four tens we have four nines and a four we have four nines you know or four NES nine n they they have different schedules that they're able to do and so we do try to one of the things we have recognize is that we're trying to be a flexible we try to meet the employee where they are as far as you know home life experience and and trying to balance so the department directors um again they have to balance the needs of our citizens and making sure that we're providing the services um appropriately but the Departments that are able to offer flexible schedules I believe are doing so I believe that we I believe we're doing a great job at offering flexible schedules St employees very good thank you very much thank you mayor thank you and Mary thank you for for the presentation and I would like to learn more when we have time about the veteran strategy the bridge fellowship program and some of the things you're doing and also you guys should be applauded on holding the cost on insurance and not passing that on to the employees that that's huge because we know that that's going up by double digits every year just the prescriptions yeah so congratulations on that thank you so much and I know we have public comment thank you Mary yes mayor we do have two members of the public that signed up to speak the first person is Adrien Martinez followed by Lisa Turner okay good afternoon you have three minutes good afternoon good morning good well good afternoon for those of you who don't know me my name is Adrian Martinez up until a few months ago I spent seven years employed with the city of w Paso the latter two of which were with the city clerk's office where I manag granicus and innovated processes and streamlined things from his Prim I'm here today to address an issue I've previously brought to the attention of my city leadership which is the limitations on Recruitment and Retention the city has based on its hiring practices specifically your human resources department is significantly restricting the pool of talent considered for jobs by adhering to excessively narrow qualification standards to explain I find it easier to share some of my experiences I have two bachelor's degrees one's in Psychology one's in criminal justice I'm 10 weeks away from completing a third bachelor's degree in cyber engineering but knowledge isn't just about degrees it's about the ability to apply what you've learned in Practical situations my most recent success as a member of the city clerk's office did not come from titles or degree plans rather it's how I use my diverse knowledge in Law data and software to solve problems I felt underpaid for my value in an attempt to find better opportunities within the city I applied to 17 postings from 20 17 postings from 2024 to now 10 rejected me outright because I didn't meet the minimum qualifications for time sake I'm only able to highlight one example but please know that I have plenty the role of business systems analyst replaced my role with the city clerk's office upon my exit the job was redefined to try and match my skill set and given a $10,000 paying increase to do exactly what I've been doing for 2 years I applied out of curiosity of and as a data point for this narrative and despite my years of success in the exact same job functions I still didn't meet hr's degree requirements why because my degrees are a little bit different I can do the job better than anyone can I've proved it time and time again those of you that know me from my time here are well aware of that but apparently that doesn't matter you speak about retention but you did nothing to keep my talent my talent inous you speak about recruitment but block individuals with a dynamic background from finding a foothold here in the city something has to change I'm not just here to talk about problems I'm here to provide you a solution UTP and the county of El Paso both use a key phrase to mitigate this issue in their job postings and that phrase is or the equivalent combination of education and experiences this allows them to consider a wide range of candidates during the hiring and promotional processes especially those with Dynamic backgrounds like myself I urge you as Leaders to adopt similar language into job specification so that you can tap into a larger pool of qualified and talented individuals I say this not to benefit myself I've already exited I hope to come back someday but at the way things are it's not likely but I speak for many of those employees that I know feel stifled by the city standards I ask you to do better this isn't an action item but this is a discussion item and I ask you to truly talk about some of the issues here this presentation I felt was very sugarcoated my experiences are much different especially as somebody who reach close to middle management in that capacity Chris uh rep Gales when you came in you did the $15 minimum wage great for the lower people not much for people like me thank you sir thank you thank you the next speaker is Lisa Turner good afternoon Miss Turner good afternoon please pack yourselves on the back you paying a suboptimal living wage you're not paying a living wage let's be honest how are you going to recruit you have last year you awarded a contract for janitorial services where the people were paid $20 an hour $20 an hour and you won't pay your employees but 15 75 you're not paying anybody let's talk about your benefits let's talk about the women who make up the majority of this community where would they like to go to work let's look at some of your competitors Wells Fargo the VA Schneider Eaton Amazon guess what they all have in common that you don't paid maternity leave paid maternity leave you want a woman to come and work here then you're going to have to offer paid maternity benefits Standalone paid maternity benefits none of this oh you you have to use all your vacation pay all your vacation time and all your sick time if you want if you find find yourself pregnant do you understand that in this city in in this County only 66.9% of the women have prenatal care during the first trimester only 66.9% this is your Public Health Department who said this there are 11 births per 1,000 population so when you look at the possible number of people who can be pregnant you're talking around eight maybe nine people during the year which is not what was presented last year from your HR department with a price tag of around $2 million to provide such care but they did that because they added everybody else in you need a stand Standalone maternity benefit everybody the companies I mentioned provide anywhere from 12 to 22 weeks paid maternity leave uh the secondary partner let's see Amazon gives six let me run down here the VA offers eight Schneider offers four Eden offers four so you're not doing anything you talk about competition you want to compete these are the people you compete against you don't have anything to draw anyone here thank you and it's because your HR department is thank you in the 1950 by the way I think you left your phone up here mayor that thank you Miss Turner that concludes public comment on this item may we go to call to the public next yes thank you the El Paso city council is a local government body charged with serving all of the citizens of the city and the meetings must be focused on the meeting at charge the City Council meetings are public meetings under the Texas open meetings ACT public comment is an accommodation and not a requirement of city council all persons in attendance are expected to display Civility and deorum that is respectful to other persons without the use of insulting profane threatening or abusive language public comment will not be used for personal attacks against a person or group's character for integrity which are not pertinent to City business nor May any member of the public use this for for political statements or campaigning please note that during call to the public the city council may not deliberate or decide any subject that is not on the agenda however Council May propose that a topic brought forth be posted on a future agenda this afternoon we have nine members of the public that sign up to speak the first person is Claudia contas her topic is animal cruelty against cats she will be followed by Douglas Thompson good afternoon you have three minutes hi thank you everybody for giving us the opportunity to come and talk here I want to thank the El Paso Police Department and also the animal cruelty unit and animal services uh because we do not know all the work they do I go to animal services and I see a lot of volunteers and they're doing their best however however we cannot be um like mean to them like saying they're not professional cuz there's people that are saying Animal Services is not professional but it takes a city to educate a lot of people not to be cruel to the animals and to know how to take care of them El Paso it's always full of loose dogs and we need to go back and teach everybody how to be a pet owner I'm an um animal Advocate I had my first cat eight years ago and I was learning but some people do not know how to take care of a dog they run loose and also it will be a nice idea for animal services to work during the night I've been feeding Strays for 8 years I'm under the Trap neuter return program and some people release the dogs during the night and I think Animal Services should work during the night to go after the animal cruelty that it's going on also cat feeders we do it out of our own pocket there is not not an organization that it's Citywide everything is volunteer based trap Neer return works with volunteers and some people just don't understand you would have to go to the streets feed the cats and encounter all the dangers we have encountered it will be a very nice idea for to get all the cat feeders uh for you all to just also listen to them not only to me and we need to educate the city on about cats you know like PE some people hate them yet we are calling ourselves Catholics and Christians and it's written that everything that God made it was good so I I I want to demolish like thoughts and the roots that are affiliated with animal cruelty uh I think by this point all the leaders need to start educating and preaching Against Animal Cruelty like even like the the diois and everything um we need to be very creative when it comes to the animals today I'm going to host a party with the animal cruelty unit I'm just a regular person some people want me to become a nonprofit but but why volunteers need to become a nonprofit $500 a year now and please people never be afraid to report animal cruelty use all the platforms you have and but at this point people need to be brave to report cruelty thank you so much everybody thank you thank you the next speaker is Douglas Thompson Mr Thompson's topic is propos amendments to city ordinances title 7 animals good afternoon you have three minutes thank you good afternoon afternoon uh I want to address a pressing issue affecting many families in El Paso uh the rising cost mic okay oh sorry thanks first time here I want to address a pressing issue affecting many families in El Pas the rising cost of eggs which has increased by 37% in the past year within with a 4 point or I'm sorry 8 88.4% Spike just this December alone additionally US Census Data shows that 18.4% of el pasin are living in poverty uh that's roughly uh one in every five people here in El Paso uh having access to nutrient-dense food not only contributes to the overall well-being of our city it is essential for maintaining human life itself eggs not only provide us with all the essential amino acids but also many of the essential vitamins minerals and fatty acids that our bodies require to function properly vitamins a B2 B12 d e folate iron phosphorus selenium choline and omega-3 these are called essential nutrients for a reason our bodies need them to function properly in light of these facts I propose the following subject to be placed on the agenda for a subsequent meeting uh Amendment to the code of ordinances regarding foul amendment to title 7 chapter 24 section 020 subsection B strike as household pets and replace in quantities fewer than six with in quantities fewer than seven as it stands the current ordinance only permits five chickens per household this limits families to an average egg production of roughly two eggs per day permitting one more chicken per household will increase the average egg production to about three eggs per day also retracting the pet limitation will serve to recognize the utility value of raising chickens thereby permitting families to raise them for sustenance and not just as as pets um I also propose that we amend title 7 chapter 24 section 060 subsection a we strike out baby chickens ducks or other fowl under 3 weeks old this ordinance makes it difficult for El pasoans to purchase chickens locally instead of being able to buy baby chicks at the local Tractor Supply we're forced to drive all the way to Los crusis or Alamagordo this ordinance only serves to act as an unnecessary hindrance upon the liberty of el pasin many ELP pasin living in poverty rely on The Daily consumption of eggs to provide them with the nutrition necessary for maintaining proper Health however with s such large increases in the price of eggs many struggling families are now being forced to purchase lowquality or inhumanely raised eggs the aformentioned Amendments will serve to remove barriers for struggling families attempting to provide adequate nutrition for themselves and their loved ones thank you thank you the next speaker is Barbara Valencia Barbara Valencia Miss Valencia's topic is animal services and Sanity she will be followed by Ron Kom Richard Ricky Elizabeth Crawford June borders good afternoon you have three minutes good afternoon good afternoon I'm Barbara Valencia with Huckleberry Hound Dog Rescue okay what is it going to take for you to do something when some is it going to be when someone is Maul to death will that be enough to do something Jade nearly lost her life two weeks ago when she was brutally attacked by two dogs running at large dogs with the history of being aggressive Ive if you think this is an isolated incident it isn't there are over 400 comments from community members people from all over the city people that have filed reports and complaints about aggressive dogs running loose and they all say the same thing Animal Services won't do anything except leave the dogs out on the streets or take the dogs back to their irresponsible owners who continue to let the dogs run loose on the streets the community is speaking but you are not listening the City put someone in the position of director of Animal Services that had absolutely no previous experience in animal Sheltering and had none of the qualifications required for the position his only on the job training is a best friend's imbed shelter consultant and he was trained in doing things the best friend way include intake diversion in the field the best friend's Playbook yes the Playbook our shelter director uses provides a general understanding of how to implement a robust intake diversion program which includes returning captured dogs including dogs involed involved in bites and aggressive dogs back to their owner while still out in the field rather than bringing them into the shelter which is a direct violation of state law and field return to owner protocols where Animal Control Officers are to actively avoid bringing these animals to the shelter including dangerous and aggressive dogs instead field return to owner or leave them in the area of found location as these actions will not involve shelter impoundment in other words leave these dogs out in the community and put the community in danger so it is acceptable to put our safety at risk because the director does not want to impound aggressive IND dangerous dogs returning these dogs back home multiple times only to be running at large again and again and again or leaving them on the streets is not shelter intake diversion it's insanity doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result our neighborhoods are not safe our children are elderly and we are not safe even our own pets are not safe it's time for city council to step up and stop the insanity our safety is in your hands and it is your responsibility to protect the citizens public health safety and Welfare as stated in our city ordinance thank you thank you the next speaker is Ron KOMO Mr komo's topic is exercising his constitutional rights to the rescue 1983 and animal services good afternoon you have three minutes good afternoon ma'am good afternoon good afternoon everyone really like you to kind of please pay attention according to El Pass Animal Services shelter reports in 2019 we live intake 20 26859 Strays in 2023 we live intake 14,5 gota gota think about that for a minute we keep hearing that the shelter is not big enough when in in all reality it's the fact that we have poor management so let's discuss this a little more I'd give you 24 uh uh Records standards numbers but like everything else our shelter director has not done his job and filed open records for shelter reports after September of 24 so I cannot give you complete for 24 which is not unusual for our shelter our shelter was told by Colonel Weston to go to open intake after he it was brought to his attention that it's illegal to do managed intake in the city of El Paso by the city shelter uh that was never done um we also had Oscar liser In This Very Room tell him three times to intake at the Westside location that was never done so I I'm I'm sitting here we break state laws we break city ordinances we don't listen to the city manager we don't listen to the city mayor we don't speak the truth 90% of the time and yet we're still employed by the city of El Paso why I'm standing here I will meet with any one of you and I will prove everything I am saying to you honesty and transparency is something we're lacking and it's time you all decide that it's time to get a qualified director in place and we need to start protecting our citizens now sorry hold on we actually had a a city council member told kvia that due to the high number of Strays cats and dogs in the public safety issues after a dog attack is a problem we've been told by the state of Texas it's a problem we've been told by a city council member it's a problem you've been told by 20 some odd people not you guys some of you that stood up here and talked about being attacked when does it stop when do we do our job we've got a facility let's open it let's stop dragging our feet it's not an adoption center Oscars said it was a shelter let's finish this let's get proper management thank you Mr Kom thank you the next speaker is Richard recky Richard recky we'll move on to Elizabeth Crawford Miss Crawford star six please to unmute your telephone and her topic is American Holocaust good afternoon ma'am you have three minutes good afternoon I would like to read a passage sing a little louder by prolif or Penny Leah I'd like to start with a passage from scripture first John 189 if we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness want to read the passage several years ago I was ministering at a church in Upstate New York as I started praying for the people I spotted an ELD elderly gentleman standing at the front of the church I caught his eye and my heart broke I had no idea what his story was but his face was etched with pain it must have been close to an hour before I was able to make my way to him his old hand took mine and he began to speak I was a young man living in Germany during the Holocaust I considered myself a Christian I attended a little church with my family from the time I was a little boy we all heard about the atrocities that were happening not far from us in outch witch but it was too difficult to comprehend what could we do anyway there was a train track behind the church and week after week we would hear the sound of the whistle and the clacking of the wheels as the train passed it never bothered us we grew accustomed to it one morning we heard noise coming from the train it was the sound of wailing and moaning we were shocked when we realized that there were people in those box cars they were being led away to death the dear old man began to weep I stood there in shock as tears roll down my face week after week that train whistle blow blew and we heard the sound of those poor Jews crying out it was so disturbing that we devised the plan we moved up our song service so that when the train passed we would be singing We sang as loud as we could to drown out the cries if per chance we still heard them we just sang a little louder years have passed and no one talks about it much anymore but I still hear the sound of that train whistle in my sleep I can still hear them crying out for help God forgive me God forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians yet did nothing to intervene tonight I came came here and heard your cry you wept over the millions of babies who have died right here in America it's happening all over again may God forgive America for drowning out the screams of dying children may God forgive the church for allowing this Holocaust to take place in beautiful America let's sing a little louder by prif or Penny Le thank you thank you the next speaker is June borders this Border's topic is drainage repairs at pomino Street in Army Circle good afternoon you have 3 minutes good afternoon city council my name is June borders and I live near the intersection of Palamino Street and the laramy circle Channel Crossing in northeast El Paso my home along with my neighbors homes have been severely flooded multiple times since 2021 by storm water this is being caused by the construction of a road that was built over our storm water drainage Channel we are here today because we are desperate for drainage to be repaired and we need the city's help on July 15th last summer Palamino homeowners were represented in immediate a meeting with the land developer the engineers and their insurance company to try and repair our drainage all parties have come to an agreement and the case was settled now the city will go to the mediation with the insurance company this meeting is scheduled for March 12th 2025 which is in 2 weeks and we are pleading to city council to prioritize and expedite a settlement we have been living under the threat of more flooding and more property damage for nearly 5 years and so we pray for Relief please encourage a speedy resolution to this continuing problem and help us prevent any future flooding to our homes we thank you for any assistance you can provide Miss borders thank you the next speaker is Michelle esper Martin and her topic is enhancing accountability in city inspector's process for El Paso homeowners good afternoon you have three minutes thank you good afternoon thank you mayor and Council um I appreciate the opportunity to speak today um honestly I'm overwhelmed so I hope I can make it through some of this um take your time Miss Prime can we reset the clock for her please yes sir I'm sorry take your time um my name is Michelle esperaron and I'm here today to address Ser serious issues with the city inspections processes that are leaving homeowners unprotected and vulnerable to contract or misconduct um I am a h grown local um I was born and raised in El Paso and after spending time away I return to the city I love to help care for my aging parents um that is including included repairing my my childhood home which my family has lived in for 50 years um after M major damages instead um my 87-year-old mom and I have been displaced um for nearly a year because of a broken system um that is allowing a contractor to walk away without fixing dangerous and substandard work um while I appreciate the efforts of some of the the um recent individuals in the department I have official documentation from city inspectors confirming multiple code violations by this repeat Roofing offender yet my home remains uninhabitable why um because of instead of enforcing these VI violations that were written up the inspections department chose to remove violations at the contractor's insistance the safety and integrity of my home are not bargaining chips if if my roof failed building and safety codes 8 months ago with no repairs it still is a violation today I paid the contractor for work that does not meet standards um and I'm expected to spend even more to replace mistakes that never should have happened in the first place um how how many other contractors are getting away with cutting Corners because there are no real consequences I talk to my neighbors I talk to my doctors I talk to business owners and they all have been impacted by the exact same situations this city is responsible for protecting homeowners but currently we're left fighting these battles alone I'm asking the council to please take action strengthen enforcement increase contractor accountability and put Protections in place to prevent this from happening to other El pasoans El Paso families deserve better my mother and I deserve better and I can't stop pushing for change until homeowners in this city are protected will you please support improving enforcement and transparency in City inspections I certainly hope and hope you will thank you for your time and I appreciate you're listening to me and I apologize that I'm so upset Miss Martin thank you for taking the time to to come talk with us and Having the courage to do this I know it wasn't easy and and I assure you that you know the city manager was listening to what you said and we'll look into this but thank you I appreciate and the final speaker is omo Silva Mr Silva's topic is teen Dating Violence awareness and prevention good afternoon sir you have three minutes hello good afternoon good afternoon my name is omo and I'm here with Jennifer ANS group Jennifer an was a young lady that grew up in this border Community yeah when she was around 18 years old her family moved to Austin you know she was in her last year in high school and somehow we don't notice teen Dating Violence situations Jennifer an was killed by her boyfriend and so this was about 20 years ago and ever since her family Dr crescente her father and Dr richardon her grandmother have been working diligently to educate our community we greatly appreciate your effort in supporting the national month for teen Dating Violence awareness and prevention Because of You Charities like Jennifer an's group will reach and help more teens families Educators and communities because of you Jennifer ANS group can reach more teens and Educators through its awardwinning gaming against violence programs Jennifer an's group is pleased to share that in June of this year 2025 and again in June of next year 2026 our team will be training public health professionals from across the United States about its free pro-social video games through the na NIH funded title project in conjunction with Emory University in an effort to prevent violence our work today your work today will help increase public awareness about the very dangers of teen Dating Violence working together we will present future we will prevent future violence in our schools and Community thank you for all that you do thank you mayor that concludes call to the public okay Miss bran is Lisa Turner still here yes she is okay let's move items number 39 and 45 to the top so she has an opportunity to speak and then we're going to recess item 39 is discussion and action on the award of solicitation 2024-25 R passenger boarding bridge and check baggage inspection system maintenance to diugo Services America Corporation for initial term of 5 years and an estimated amount of 7,7 1,165 24 Miss Turner signed up to speak no no good afternoon Miss Turner good afternoon question is how how are we going to grow it how are you going to grow this transportation business I mean what are we going to do are we going to get another airline in here provides non-stop service from somewhere just you know I'd like to know oh there was somebody behind me hello Crystal bus with purchasing and strategic sourcing um M Turner can you clarify the question Miss Turner needs to address the question to Transportation what are we going to do I'll good afternoon Shane bricks with the airport um it's Airport Enterprise funding we do collect a fee oh do we going to are we going through the presentation we answering the question sorry um so this is a maintenance contract for our check baggage inspection system and the passenger boarding Bridges uh we hire a third party manager to um maintain and operate the seus I don't know if you all are familiar when you walk into the airport and you check your luggage with the airline they put it on a belt behind them it goes back it gets processed that's the specifically the system that we're referring to so we have six commercial airlines 3.9 million passengers and about 7,300 outbound flights this is a third party manager I mentioned that um there so there's an increase I'm sure you noticed on your um paperwork and that's because we added our 15 passenger boarding Bridges to the contract the boarding bridges are the thing you walk down before you get on the airplane so this group will also maintain those um the initial term is $4.4 million this is a um schematic of the cus so when you check your bag and it goes on those blue lines from start to finish your bag takes about 3 minutes to go through the system system so it's very efficient and there is a clause in the contract the system has to be operational 90% of the time more than that because we've got to get the passengers out and then it's got to be 99% accuracy and then this is a screenshot of the 15 boarding Bridges as well as the three standby generators that they'll be responsible to maintain what the solicitation summary and then the request for Action is to award the contract to the highest ranked offer D fuku services okay representative Canalis thank you mayor I wanted to take a stab at answering Miss Turner's question uh I think what what you what you read or what you heard Miss Turner is at the beginning of the of of every purchasing item it it contains the linkage to the Strategic plan and in this case it's subsection 1.4 grow The Core Business of air transportation and so every time the City goes through uh this this purchasing process uh and then they present it to the council they present what part of the Strategic plan the particular purchase falls under and so in this case it was section 1.4 of the city strategic plan grow The Core Business of air transportation but the item is simply this uh this solicitation for the maintenance maintenance of the of the uh baggage inspection system I read this how to grow The Core Business of air transportation I'm thinking increased markets increased flights I'm not thinking maintenance and and that's something that's you know consistent constant Improvement that's happening at the airport um they've presented that to us before I'd be happy to find some of their past presentations and go through it with you but um again this this item is specifically just the award of solicitation for this particular maintenance item but like I say grow The Core Business it doesn't say anything about maintenance yes it may be the title to what you have on a strategic plan but when a citizen picks this up oh we're going to well maybe there's going to be a new air you know more aircraft coming in Non-Stop Service uh more markets opened up uh Freight being shipped out by air but not maintenance maintenance you have to have but I'm thinking markets and more planes when you say grow The Core Business thank you thank you Mr representative Chavez thank you mayor I uh was wondering if you could just uh touch on the fact that I think there was no local bids for this contract is that correct I think someone mentioned that yesterday correct yes Crystal bus with purchasing and strategic sourcing no we did received five proposals none of them being from a local supplier and is it because there's no one local that could Supply this type of service correct we have done research um and did not find any local companies otherwise we would have included them on a it's called a bidder's list and I've sent them out a notification to invite them to um bet on our solicitation but this uh contract is for 10 years is that right yes so the initial term is for 5 years and it includes uh four options okay so maybe within the next 10 years someone locally could possibly bid for something like this in the future yes they'll have the opportunity at that point okay that would be our goal thank you so much thank you thank you is there a motion to approve this approve there's a motion and second any further discussion Miss bran yes sir the motion was made by alternate mayor Pro F seconded by representative leemon to approve item 39 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously next item with public comment is item 45 and this is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the mayor to sign the interlocal agreement for good and valuable consideration between the city of Al Paso and the county of Al Paso for the purposes of efficiency and Effectiveness the city seeks to use the County's procurement process to also contract with Newark Global strategies economic incentives advisory to update the city's Economic Development incentive policies under chapter 380 of the Texas local government code with a goal of enhancing the El Paso regions appeal for prospective Economic Development expansion opportunities I'm going to ask Council to bear with us on this we got about 20 items left and we're going to get through the ones with public comment and then we're going to recess for lunch and then we'll come back and finish okay mayor yes one I'm sorry we have an item here good 47 yes it's coming we have someone that came in from out of town I've got yeah we're going to do 39 I mean 4547 thank you very much thank you good afternoon mayor and Council I'm Adana pesio with economic and International Development and I'm presenting today on behalf of Mr Bill Allen from our same Department it the requested action is for a discussion and action on a proposed interlocal agreement between the city and the county of El Paso allowing parties to enter into an agreement with Newar global strategies economic incentives advisory the purpose of this agreement is to facilitate a joint Consulting agreement to review and amend the 30 the city's chapter 380 and the County's chapter 381 incentive policies the hope is to update these policies to increase the competitiveness of incentive agreements to make us more appealing for economic development opportunities and business attraction retention and expansion the changes will will reflect what we're hearing from business community about the support that they need and this will line up with our findings from the sets process as well and make sure that we're answering those questions and addressing Community needs through our incentive process as well H by utilizing the County's procurement process we'll just be able to make the process a little bit more efficient as they're already working on this on their end the benefits to this to the agreement are in aligning both of our incentive policies as are going to be reviewed at the same time and this is just going to bring a benefit as well to companies that are going to have an easier time understanding what the offerings are and how they can work with all of us to make sure that they can get an investment in our community and that we can all grow together we'll be able to join the County's RFQ procurement process and take advantage of uh the traction that they've got working on this already H I believe that this was addressed in their meeting this week as well and it'll be coming back up soon the agreement that self is for $440,000 of services we propose to not exceed a figure of 25,000 covering potential costs for travel as at the end of the process they'll be here to expose their findings and just uh give us all of the suggestions that that they'll find uh to set the stage for this project uh the last major 380 policy change was in 2010 and we were next it was in 2015 just with some change into definitions and then some light changes in 2021 looking at a qualification criteria and the bonus incentives uh section so this will be the next big opportunity to make sure that we're capturing everything that you've all heard from constituents and that we're hearing from companies abroad that want to be able to participate in our local economy uh this slide gives us a little bit of details on the four stages right of this four-phase H project H during the process a consultant will do some stakeholder interviews and compare our current policy to competing jurisdictions and developing a plan for us to move forward um this will consider everything that that we've been noting within our department and that we've been hearing like like I mentioned before this is where it lines up with the sets and what we'll be hearing from our partners locally and abroad this effort will also look into compliance and how it fits into the process and finally they'll make recommendations for our consideration and possible adoption they'll be available to come in and present all of their ideas to council and uh as far as a consultant with Newark they have experience in incentives Consulting and site selection and all of the other services that have come up within the processes that we had in Economic Development thank you representative Fier I think this TR was oh I'm sorry yes yeah you sorry Mary thank you very much for this presentation and and thank you for doing this I I think it Partners up with the the county makes us more uh competitive when it comes to incentives and and doing businesses uh in our community attracting more business in our community my understanding is what this will do is this will bring the best practices recommendations from other communities and just make us a much better um safer more uh friendlier working um U area for business to to come to is that correct oh yes sir I I wholeheartedly agree we've had a great work experience with the county so far and this is another opportunity for us to work closer together and address different parts of our community we have a lot to offer and this is just a way for us to present that information a little bit more clearly and make sure that we're putting our our best foot forward when engaging with companies and attracting business opportunities mayor this goes right along with your we're open for business um H so thank you very much for doing this yeah thank you very good thank you sir public comment yes sir we have Miss Turner the whole purpose I see here is to become more efficient and together as to support the entire region of El Paso but here comes the details more development means more electrical power we're already paying a lot of money for electricity the demand for more power means electric compan is going to have to build another plant which means that falls back on the rate payers you've already got two data centers which are going to be drawing an immense load on you you got one that gener a contract with with meta for those of you who are new uh they're guaranteed 2 million gallons of water per day 2 million gallons of water per day from the PSP we are limited as we are bumping up against the limits of our electrical power we're bumping up against limits of our water resources and we I have far exceeded the limits of our educational base the overwhelming majority of those living in op Paso have a high school education or less you want to attract people then you put your money there and getting people educated getting people into those skills whether it be Community College fouryear college or trade but as it stands now High School diplomas don't cut it in this world uh we have to increase that level you want high-tech firms to come in here they need people with B's degrees they need electrical engineering people and they need them here but we don't have those we got two good schools New Mexico and utap but those people in engineering they pick up and they go elsewhere because they'll get paid more and I'll Point go back your your base pay is $575 nobody's going to work here with any kind of education they're going to pick up and go somewhere else these are areas that you have to address if you want to expand you want to be be in the 21st and 22nd century you got to plan now for then our planning has always been we're looking back to 1980 1950 we need to start looking forward lay that base thank you thank you Mr Turner is there a motion and a second to approve this second there's a motion and a second any further discussion hearing none call the vote Miss pran yes sir the motion was made by representative Leon seconded by alternate mayor protim fedro to approve item 45 on that motion call for the vote and the vote session and that motion passes unanimously all right M Prim we're going to go to item number 47 yes sir item 47 is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the mayor to execute the mayor's certificate and the general certificate of the city in connection with the El Paso Housing Finance Corporation single family mortgage revenue bonds hi good afternoon I had morning written down but good afternoon everyone and thank you for your exhaustive service my name is Elizabeth MOA with the El Pasa house in Finance Corporation the item before you today seeks approval of a resolution which authorizes the mayor to execute the city's General certificate and the mayor's certificate approving the El Paso Housing Finance corporation's issuance of single family mortgage revenue bonds series 2025a our program will provide approximately a million dollars on down payment and closing cost assistance and approximately 24 million in 30-year fixed rate government loans to First time home buyers purchasing homes within the city limits of El Paso the city will not any will not incur any costs to issue the bonds the El Paso Housing Finance Corporation is incurring those on her own and the city will not incur any liability for repayment of those bonds those bonds are repaid directly from the revenue of the oance itself are there any other questions approve all right there's a motion to approve in a second any discussion on this item hearing none call for the vote Miss briyan and who was a second I'm sorry I didn't catch it thank you repres if you can please turn on your microphones when making motions so I can hear you clearly I'd appreciate it motion was made by representative Leon and it by representative Nino to approve item 47 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously thank you for your support thank you than you I would entertain a motion to recess and go to lunch until uh 2:15 second motion motion to go to motion a second there's a motion in a second to recess the regular city council meeting all in favor I anyone opposed and the regular city council meeting is in recess at 1258 p.m. and we'll reconvene at 2:15 speak e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e Miss Brian I think we're ready yes sir is there a motion to reconvene there's a motion in a second to reconvene the regular city council meeting all in favor anyone opposed and the meeting is back in session at 2:17 p.m. and Miss I believe we're starting with item number 29 you're correct mayor we're on page nine items 29 to 38 are the first reading of ordinances yes [Music] ma'am representative roacha I'm I'm sorry was there a motion to approve 29 through 38 yes ma'am these are the first reading of ordinances it's the introduction of ordinances um I need to I need to make a motion to pull 33 please would you like go ahead Miss P just item 33 would you were you going to postpone or delete I'm going to post I I need to make a move to postpone item 33 to the March 18th agenda please and that's when the public hearing will be held these are just the introduction of ordinances and the public hearings for these items will be on March 18th so then I can postpone the first meeting or make an a move to to help me Joshua was it you can postpone the first reading I'm sorry you want to postpone the introduction and bring it back yes ma'am okay how many weeks would you like to postpone the introduction um three please three Josh over here is helping me thanks Josh all so there's a motion is there a second second there's a motion and a second uh representative U Chavez thank you mayor and I know it's in the backup but for item 32 uh just for clarity I did receive $3,000 $3,500 from Doug Schwarz also Cino investment properties thank you and let the record show that I did receive a a contribution as well with that yeah I think that disclosure has to happen at the time that we take a vote in a public hearing but this is just the uction okay okay thank you is that correct Miss nean we don't differentiate on we don't differentiate on public hearings or um public hearings or introductions it just says that that at the time that the item is at the council agenda so ient abundance of caution I just recommend that you do it now thank you missan okay I I ALS sorry I I also needed to disclose for item 32 that I received $500 from shorts okay representative Canal yeah thank you mayor I guess then I I will also disclose I received a campaign contribution from Doug Schwarz uh it was multiple years ago I can't recall the amount yeah and U representative lion yeah um so did I but I don't recall the amount at this time I will bring it up when we do the vote okay so items we're taking items number 29 through what represent one there's a motion to postpone item 33 okay there's a motion is there a second to postpone item 33 yes it motion of second any further discussion all those in favor okay we take the postponement first the motion was made by representative roas seconded by representative oo yes and this is to postpone item 3333 for 3 weeks correct thank thank you on that motion call for the vote [Music] oh the other way and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously now there is a motion to approve the introduction of ordinances items 29 30 31 32 34 35 36 3 37 and 38 the motion was made by representative Leon yep second it by representative Canales yep is there any discussion Miss Bryan call for the vote Yes sir on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously we now turn to p page 14 the next item is item 40 item 40 is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign an agreement for Professional Services between the city of Al Paso and Decker LLC a Texas limited liability company for a project known as architect and Engineering Services for the AL Paso Police Department Pebble Hills Regional Command Center for an amount not to exceed $531,500 this project was approved as part of the 2019 Public Safety Bond okay good afterno good afternoon I'll do a presentation right now okay Mrs P said this is the award for the design contract for the Pebble Hills U renovation Command Center okay so this is solicitation 202 24-680 and Mrs Prime said this is located within District 5 and the contract value of The Proposal is the amount is worth $531,500 the funding source again 2019 Public Safety Bond this is just shows the location of the Pebble Hills command center right which is on Pebble Hills and leino the project involves tenant improvements to the atasa police department PEB Hills Regional Command Center located at 1078 10780 Pebble Hills Boulevard the services of this contract will include but are not limited to the following design facility inspection surveys planning assessments cost estimating ada8 compliance technical specifications utility coordin bidding construction um construction schedule and construction Administration and the intent is for the renovation is both looking at the me the mechanical electrical Plumbing all the Ada improvements code improvements and Forest protection for this facility as part of procurement summary request for qualification advertised on September 6 2024 selection process was qualification based through the city's AE selection process nine for firm submitted statements of qualifications after thorough evaluation of the sq's Decker LLC was identified as the highest ranked firm so once again recommended action is for the city manager to be authorized to sign an agreement for Professional Services by Between the city but DEC for a project known as a Pebble Hills renovation project okay thank you representative roacha thank you just thank you thank you mayor just for clarification um the Pebble Hill Regional Command Center resides in District 3 correct and not District 5 so just want to make sure that that's noted on there yes I will okay thank you corre is there a motion to approve second who made the motion represented Chavez okay so we can make sure M pre can can hear you guys and then you I didk you okay all right there's a motion in a second yes sir the motion was made by mayor protim Chavez by representative Roa and this is to approve item number 40 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously that brings us to item 41 and this is discussion and action on the request that the director of purchasing and strategic sourcing be authorized to issue purchase orders for solicitation 20258 defat equipment maintenance to zal Medical Corporation the soul Source provider for the xerious cardiac Monitor defibrillators and services for a term of 3 years for an estimated amount of 1,815 22065 move to approve second there's a motion and a second any discussion on this item hearing none call for the vote Miss Bryan yes sir the motion was made by representative nto second it by representative Fierro to approve item 41 good on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously next item is 42 and this is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign an agreement for Professional Services between the city of Al Paso and countrymen and Company pllc a Texas limited liability company for a project known as architect Cal and Engineering Services for the Modesto Gomez Central flat Fields project and an amount not to exceed $89,500 so once again good afternoon mayor councel Daniel Garcia from CID as Mr Prime said item number 42 is fa solicitation of 2024 D68 7R for the Modesta Gomez design and this is located in District true with the contract value of 890,000 uh funding source 2012 quality of life and 2020 cosos this is the location of Modesto Gomez as you can see it's it's uh between Delta and the loop 375 location right adjacent to the elasa water processing plant now the contract scope of work is pretty lengthy but I'll go through the architectural and Engineering Services contract will be utilized for the commission of all customary architectural and Engineering Services specified to the Modesto Gomez flat Fields project these services will include schematic design design development and construction documents phases as well as any necessary supplementary Services the scope of service and deliverables may include but are not limited to the following improvements to the existing facility including other amenity improvements for example parking areas restrooms concession facilities and roadway multi-use artificial turf fields example combination of football and soccer fields and capital projects design development which gives you the outline of the design development for this project for procurement summary request for qualifications advertised on September 13th 2024 selection process was qualifications based through the city's A and E selection process three firm submitted statements of qualifications after thorough evaluation of the S soqs Countryman and Coop LLC was identified as the highest ranked firm so this Council action is for the city manager be allowed to or authorize or desn't need to sign an agreement for Professional Services in between the C Paso and Countryman PLC for the project for Messa Gomez left Fields thank you I I just want to thank Miss Mack and her team and evet and all the people that have really been at it um you know we've been working really really hard on this for months now having tons of community meetings we were going to see this item at the beginning of the month but my constituents were not ready so I said okay let's have another meeting and we pushed it to today and I think they have a really good understanding that the more we push it the harder it was going to get right and we weren't going to get to a finished product and so we had a lot of difficult conversations and it was really over the turf versus um real grass and we brought experts from East Leeta and really did a really great Community effort to get to this point and this is step one of many and and I'm just really excited we're we're heading with this and I just really really grateful to all the stuff that put in a lot of work and it was some tumultuous meetings sometimes and and and we we made it through and we had very honest conversations with everybody so I just very very thankful and hoping this passes today very good any any more discussion all there was a motion made in a second Miss Prime yes sir the motion was made by representative Leon second by representative to approve item 42 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously that brings us to item number 44 and this is discussion and action that the city manager be authorized to sign an agreement for Professional Services between the city of Al Paso and grv integrated engineering Solutions LLC a Texas limited liability company for a project known as civil engineering Professional Services for the roas drive resurfacing reconstruction project for an amount not to exceed $445,900 14 mayor excuse me mayor wish to approve um item number 44 on the agenda please okay there's a motion is there a second second there's a motion and a second any discussion on this item all right Miss bran call for the vote Yes sir the motion was made by representative leemon seconded by representative Thro to approve item 44 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously that brings us to item 46 and this is discussion and action to approve a resolution that the 2025 public art plan be adopted and that the senior manager or designate is authorized to enter into contracts and amendments to carry out the plan as described in the exhibit of the resolution move to approve second all there was a motion to approve in a second did you get those Miss BR I got uh representative ACO it was n no I'm kidding AO second it by representative Ro what I heard okay is there any dis uh represent Canales thank you uh public art team Mr F everybody uh I know a lot of work goes into this every year um and you've produced wonderful projects um I I was going to ask you to give the presentation I think maybe the council doesn't might prefer not um so I I I'll refrain uh change my mind but uh I I do appreciate the hard work that you all do uh that goes into these uh you know often very complicated uh art projects and uh they've attracted some criticism over the years but I think they uh they make our city more attractive more beautiful uh and ultimately uh I think a place that is conducive to better Economic Development this is a quality of life issue so thank you thank you sir and we appreciate all the support from the council when we do have those difficult decisions thank you represent n good afternoon I also want to thank you know B and the entire MCAT team I have a lot of love for the Arts I was part of the public art committee and also of MCAT board previous in my previous previous capacity and thank you guys for the entire work that you guys do and looking forward to you know continuing this effort of really enhancing and look and making our community even more beautiful thank you thank you Ben any further discussion hear no discussion call for the vote Miss Brian yes sir the motion was made by representative ASO second by representative Geor to approve item 46 on that motion call for the vote and the voting session and that motion passes unanimously and the final item is number 48 this is discussion and action that the city manager or design be authorized to effectuate the listed budget transfer to increase pla drain baa Sosa project to set up budget for revolving Loan Fund for bplex Community Capital agreement project and to increase Memorial Park project for the purchase of solar lights move to appr okay there was a motion is there a second second our representative uh oo thanks for including the the presentation um that I requested yesterday can you just go over it really quick it's it's like four slides it's not very long sure thank you if it can this is the one for fa and it can bring up the one for Memorial Park yes Memorial Park please so once again good afternoon afternoon um this is for the nip round five Memorial Park BT request just background in in 2024 two Sol lights were installed at Memorial Park as part of the nip round five program additional Sol lights will be provided based on requests from the neighborhood association in the details of the project install a total of three solar life fixtures to provide illumination along granch Avenue three American Electro light fixtures God bless you um and it's for pedestrian acord style round 25 steel a 25t high steel pole with solar panels the the lights will be black in color and the cost for the true lights will be 77,000 this is a project location along with the detail of the actual light picture the pole as you can see here the pole houses most of the infrastructure for the solar lighting and these are the locations on the site on the right you will see the locations that the lights will be installed on Grant and farther to the right you will see the light picture that meets historic requirements we just provided photometric layouts on how the lights will illuminate the areas where they're going to be installed along Grant Avenue any any questions thank you I had a few questions how many lumens will these be let me see if that I can get that information for you it's kind of crucial yes um I'm not comfortable moving forward with it I don't know how many lumens it is because this has been a point of contention for the last year yes I will get that information for and and then the other thing here is it's three American electric lighting fixtures and it says it's pedestrian and we already have the three pedestrian lights so I thought these were going to be street lights and we were going to go over 10,000 lumens at the very least yes sir um youed on this uh with the deputy city manager uh that sounded weird I'll get used to it used to just saying c um you're correct yes we did do uh the higher lumens and these if we could go back to the slide um we do have the light so sorry if you could see the the green we do have light along the street so we're covering both uh pedestrian and Auto for the safety of that turn because it's dark along Memorial Park yes sir okay and on slide number two it says that we have two solar lights installed at Memorial but it was three now that was previous sir and so this but it's not it's three right correct so more this uh budget transfer is for the three additional I I just need to know the lumens and I would propose that we move this to next week if possible just this part of it and bring it back so I'd like to make a motion to bring back this part of item 408 the nip round five Memorial Park BT request it is the 11,000 you said ,000 actually it's 11 okay so you know for sure yes sir okay okay so it'll be Street lighting and I'm just I'm just a little worried because if my constituents see that it's pedestrian they kind of already were upset that we only got pedestrian and so these are for sure 11,000 it's going to light up the whole street and make the whole area brighter right yes sir that's the main reason for showing you the layout that we received from the vendor so that you can see how the light will hit onto the street and then is it there a way that we get rid of that light pole that's been there dead for over 10 years I can coordinate with the parks department yeah just to remove it right cuz then we'll have the the solar lighting and then this has already passed the Historic Landmark commission right yes sir it was approved okay thank you then I'll resend my motion yes sir represent represent Canales thank you mayor Mr herandez you said you're here with the deputy city manager which Deputy city manager are you here with you got me Chris uh sorry Deputy City manageris congratulations thank you sir thank you any further discussion on this item all right there was a motion in a second Miss Prime call for the vote Yes sir there was a motion made by representative lemon seconded by representative ACO n noo representative noo I promise I will learn your your voices by representative lemon second it by representative noo to approve item 48 on that motion call for the vote in the voting session and that motion passes unanimously and and before we adjourn I just want to say thank you to the public that was here and being patient with us this was a long day and I also want to thank our city council for working uh tirelessly through today it's it was a long day and I appreciate all the work that's gone into this I want to thank the city staff because uh getting prepared for these meetings is not easy and and we've got another one coming up next week so I want to say thank you to everyone involved and with that Miss pre yes sir is there a motion to adjourn like to make a motion to adjourn our meeting okay there's a motion and a second to adjourn the regular city council meeting all in favor I anyone oppos and the regular city council meeting for Tuesday February 25th 2025 is adjourned at 2:41 p.m. thank you Council for your patience J for