 Thank you. Good morning everybody and welcome to the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission meeting just Thursday February 4th. It's February 4th and nine o'clock and it's the RTC meeting and welcome everybody. Can we have roll call? Commissioner Bertrand. Here. Commissioner Brown. Here. Commissioner Johnson. Here. Commissioner Montecino. Here. Here. Commissioner Caput. Here. Commissioner Alternate Schifrin. Here. Commissioner Alternate Mulhern. Here. Commissioner Koenig. Here. Commissioner McPherson. Commissioner McPherson. Left away. I know he's here. Commissioner Alternate Myers. Present. Commissioner Gonzalez. Present. Commissioner Rotkin. And Mr. Tim Govins. Rotkin here. Sorry I was muted. Okay. Welcome commissioners and welcome the public that's out there. We're going to start with oral communications but I'd like to start out first as the chair and just to make a little announcement. You know in our last public hearing for the item 19, there were some students that would want to speak and due to their schedule they had to leave so they didn't have the opportunity to speak and again due to their schedule they're not able to attend this meeting streaming and so the Parker Valley high students really want to be recognized and I think we need to recognize them but I also want to make sure and a recommendation to our commission that in the future that if any student within the county from the high school level on down would like to speak to us I think we need to accommodate them and allow them to schedule their time and for any item on the agenda to be heard and so with that I'll leave you guys and I'll bring it back to the commission and I thank you. Oral communication we'll start with the public. We do have some hands raised. Mr. Kerry Pico. Yes, can everybody hear me? Yes, we hear you. Okay, so Yesenia hopefully has put up the power point. Not yet. Give me one second here. I'd like to tell you that I take my time looking at the information that people tend to not pay attention to so here now that we have that I'll get started. This is about traffic or an origin destination and the focus is on Watsonville but it covers more. Next slide please. Just click one second. I'm sorry I'm having a little bit of issues here. Okay, technical difficulties. For those of you old enough to remember outer limits we are in control of your screen. Anybody old enough to remember outer limits? Yes. Can you see my screen commissioners? We see the screen that you're slowing your first slide. Okay, let me sorry about that. We're going to have to do this again. Is there any way to the speed the? No actually it's all about the slide and it's really about how we are. Can we stop you then and we come back to you once we get that going? No it's there. Okay, just go to the top one. Just do the click on it. We don't need a slide show. Just click on the top slide and that will change it. There we go. So we're talking about origin destination. Go to the next slide. Just click on it. I want you to know that 50% of all highway traffic that goes past Buena Vista Drive in Watsonville does not come from Watsonville but it comes from Monterey. I shouldn't say that. 50% comes from Monterey County. Okay and this comes from looking at the and these are the Highway 1 numbers that go past Buena Vista. There's 34,000 and if you the sources of the traffic are 22,000 come from Highway 1 north across the county line and I was surprised to learn this that there's 17,000 cars going north across the Papua Road Bridge. That means 34,000 across the bridge every day at least on average. And then when you account for the on ramp off ramps and all that stuff that I go through in paying attention to detail, you come to about 17,000 cars come from Monterey County. So when we talk about the need for transit for Watsonville and all the traffic on the Highway 1, you're missing the big banana. It's really about the traffic coming from out of county. Next slide. But let's talk about Watsonville. Where are Watsonville commuters going? This is from the census and the census does a three-year survey, a one-year survey and so this doesn't capture all the workers or anything but this is what they had that 30. If you look at where Watsonville people are heading north, by the way, most of them are heading south for work. And by the way, you'd be surprised that more people both in Santa Cruz and Watsonville work outside of their city of residence as opposed to that. So anyway, 30% head to Santa Cruz that are, you know, that are heading north. And I was surprised to see the 70% head to the Bay Area or Scotch Valley kind of stuff. So when you talk about we need to have transit that takes people from Watsonville to Santa Cruz for their work, you're missing the understanding of the picture. You're not addressing it. You're missing two thirds of the population. Yes. Thank you for your time. I'm aware of that, but do I not get three minutes? No, sir. I'm allowing two minutes for oral communications. Well, thank you. Are you really going to pull this off that you had me on hold and then you cut it off? But this is one of the problems of having slides. I got one more slide. We're done. Thank you, sir. Next. Mr. David date. Just a reminder, this is items that are not on the agenda. And there's a two minute or communication from the public. Mr. Chair, you might suggest to the last person and others that they can always email us with their slides and comments. And we'd be happy to receive them. Hello. Yeah, David. Yeah, I'm sorry. That was exceptionally rude because Kerry was waiting patiently for you to get these slides figured out. And then obviously you're counting the clock down as as he can't even get his can't even get his information to show up. But I'll try to I'll try to keep that within two minutes. This was a letter to the editor I wrote to Santa Cruz Sentinel. I just wanted to read that because I won't I won't have the luxury of taking today off and and monitoring today's proceedings. We are currently witnessing the biggest revolution in transportation since the advent of the internal combustion engine. Very few for saw five years ago. The possibilities that are available today today. Community bikes, electric scooters, lift, pedal cars to name a few. But this is only the cusp of what's ahead. Autonomous vehicles, companies like Zooks and Tesla are seeking regulatory approval this year. Santa Cruz's own aerospace company, Joby acquired Uber's flying car division and is looking to institute autonomous air taxi service by 2023. Nearly a dozen companies are engaged in developing hyperloop technologies, which may replace air travel as we know it. Things are accelerating so fast that no one can definitively state what the future of transportation might look like in five, let alone 30 years. Yet the Santa Cruz Regional Transportation Commission is engaged in a process which seeks to do exactly that. Staff's current recommendation is to promise to leave a bed of dilapidated rails as a placeholder and the off chance that the future generation happens to find their ideas about fixed line rail transit of value. This promise comes at the expense of creating a full width multimodal pedestrian and ebike highway which would enable Santa Cruz to fully harness this green wave and transportation. It is refreshing to now have RTC commissioners who are delegates of the community's desire to have a safe active transportation alternative now. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Thank you for waking up to the realities of this rail plan. It is very dangerous for all of you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, would you please rule people who are speaking on other items on the agenda out of order when they begin when it's clear that that's where they're going? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, just to remind again, please speak only on items that are not on the agenda. Also, as far as the first speaker, I did not start his time until his presentation started, just so everybody's clear on that. Next is LD Freitas and then we'll go to Barry Scott. Is LD Freitas rail supporter? Mr. Freitas, you're recognized by the Chair? Sounds like he's going to talk on item 19 to me. Yeah, unless I mean, can't speak on the item 19. But is he there? Is he? We can come back to him if he's having issues. How about Mr. Barry Scott and Mr. Silvergate? We're going to move on. We come back to Mr. Freitas. Mr. Barry Scott, you're recognized by the chair? Yeah, two minutes. There we go. You know, I'm calling just to thank the RTC for all their work years and years and years of work on public transit generally. And something I don't think most of you might realize is that today is Rosa Parks birthday. And it's been named Transit Equity Day. And I'd like to read a short two sentences from from organizations that I belong to. It begins, why fight for public transit? Because access to safe, affordable, reliable public transit is access to economic opportunity. Decades of transportation policies see in systemic racism have exposed communities of color to more pollution and deprived them of quality mobility options. Fighting for a better public transit system is central to fighting for climate and racial justice. People deserve to move freely, which is why public transit is a civil right. This is a very special day. And I thank you for all you do. Lee Silvergate. Thank you for coming. Mr. Lee Silvergate, you're recognized by the chair. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Hi, everyone. Thanks for recognizing me. My name is Lee Silvergate. I'm a Santa Cruz native of the West Side who recently moved back after graduating from college. And today I'm voicing support for the passenger rail along the corridor. Excuse me, sir. I'm on the agenda 19. Oh, okay. Have anything else that you'd like to speak upon that's not on the agenda? No, it's general comment later. Yeah, on item 19. Okay. My mistake. Sorry about that. You're welcome. Deb Molina. Is Mr. Molina or Mrs. Molina? Ms. Molina. Deb Molina. Yes, I also wanted to talk about trail and train. That's on item 19, ma'am. Okay. Thank you. No problem. We're in oral, just to remind you, we're in oral communication. It's the time for the public to be able to comment on anything that is not on the agenda for the RTC. You have two minutes. Is there anyone that would like to speak on an item that is not on the agenda? I don't see any other hands raised. Oh, there's one. Charlie Wilcox. Go ahead, Charlie Wilcox. The chair recognizes you. You're on mute. Mr. Wilcox. Can't hear me. Apologize for not unmuting. Sorry about that. No problem, sir. Your time is now. Yep, no worries. Good morning. Thank you. I appreciate the attention. I just want to say that I feel like the ideas around the different forms of communication that are coming in the next few years are really important to take into account regarding the entire mission of the RTC, regardless of various specific agenda items today. And I've often thought that there should be allowance in the Measure D funding to take into account what we could do to subsidize transportation for folks who are really challenged with this environment. I feel like there's enough money there that we could actually buy an e-bike for every single resident of Santa Cruz County. And if we had appropriate pathways for that, it could go a long way towards solving a lot of the problems that we're dealing with. So I appreciate your time and attention. Thank you, sir. I do not see any other hands raised, commissioner. Okay. Seeing none, we're going to go ahead and move on. Item three, which is additions and deletions to consent agenda and regular agenda items. We have a handout from the executive director on item 16. And we also have a replacement page for item 19. That's page 19-9. There's a strikeouts on that. I hope all the commissioners receive that. There's also a replacement page for the agenda itself. Chair Gonzalez just removed the word draft at the top. And there's also some additional handouts for item 19. Okay. Thank you for that. Okay. We're going to go ahead and move on to the consent agenda. The minutes, approved draft minutes for January 14, 2021, and accept the draft minutes for January 21, 2021. Or really, we're not going to take a single action on the entire consent unless people pull things off, right? Yeah. And then there's project planning and items. Budget and expenditure items, administrative items and important items. Is there anything they'd like to be pulled from the consent agenda? We'll approve all the consent agenda. This is Reitgen. Second. We have to ask the public. We can back up here. Yeah. Is there anybody from the public that would like to make a comment on any item that's on the consent agenda? Mr. Brian Peoples. Hi. This is Brian from Trail. Now, is that include item 10? Should I make a comment on that? Yes. Item 10. It's great news that this truly the recognition that rail banking is a process eliminates the single concern with using the coastal corridor today for a transit oriented trail. This is exciting news that the RTC has confirmed the ownership rights of the corridor will be sustained even with the removal of the tracks. We see this as a key legal measure that will allow our community to build a trail now and preserve the corridor for future transit. This is great news. How our issue is not so much about transit in the future, but it's using the corridor today. It's already been a decade that that corridor has set unused. We've spent millions of dollars maintaining it. And it's poor public policy to allow this vital transportation corridor to remain unused and continue to burden the Santa Cruz taxpayers to sustain that corridor. Just to sit there as an unused corridor or even to allow a private tourist operator to use that corridor while our community needs it. So it's not a matter of what is on there. It's a matter of when, when will we use that corridor? And now with this new finding that the RTC, new to the RTC, we've communicated well for a while for a decade, this shows that the ownership rights can be maintained through rail banking. And lastly, I just want to thank Kerry Pinko again for bringing new evidence about the transit transportation patterns of our community. That wasn't part of the, that is very important information. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Rivas. Chair Gonzales, I do not see any other hands raised. Oh, there's one more. Ms. Arnold? Ms. Arnold, would you like to speak on any item on the consent agenda only? Yes. Yes, I just wanted to say, which item would you like to speak upon? The rail banking issue. Friends of the rail and trail recognize that this is a very big issue, a very complex issue and that it will require a lot of careful examination and that it's appropriate for that to happen in the public eye because it is a publicly owned asset. And so we appreciate that this issue is beginning to see some daylight. And we think that exploring the possibilities of rail banking would be well done within the context of a business plan for transit on the corridor. So we look forward to seeing some more public discussion on this issue in the future. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Arnold. Mr. Carl Kaplan and then David Van Brink. Hello, my name is Lawrence Kaplan. I live in Watsonville. How are you doing, sir? What item would you like to speak from the consent agenda? I'd like to speak about the rail and trail process. That is not on the consent agenda item, sir. Aside of number 19. Number 19 I could speak then. Number 19 then? Yeah, yes. Thank you. You're welcome, sir. I have a long history in the county, including a politics class at UCSC. Sir, hey, sir, I interrupt you. What item are you going to be speaking on? We're on the consent agenda right now. I'm sorry, I don't have a visual to the consent agenda. You can find it on the website for RTC. Perhaps you could just tell me if this is the appropriate time to talk about the rail and trail issue. You should come back when it's item 19. Thank you, I will do that. Thank you, Carl, for your time. Mr. Van Brink. Good morning. Can you hear me? Mr. Brink, what item would you like to speak on? Rail banking, of course. Like to remark that I'm reassured that rail banking is being carefully explored and analyzed. It's worth mentioning that in our community there is a minority of quite vocal or even rabid transit opponents. Obviously, rail banking would be premature at this stage, and if executed in a vacuum, these rabid transit opponents will wildly mischaracterize the issue and attempt to exploit it. If executed without a specific plan going forward, they'll say that RTC has agreed to rule out transit on the corridor. So please continue planning forward and consider rail banking only within the context of an actual transit plan. Thanks. Thank you, sir, for your time. Is there anybody else from the public who'd like to speak on any item on the consent agenda? Mr. Bud Colligan. And then someone that has the apple as their name. Mr. Colligan, what item would you like to speak upon on the consent agenda? You're muted, I guess. Can you hear me now? Yes. Thank you, Chairman. What item would you like to speak upon on the consent agenda? I would speak on number 10. I would just like to point out to the commission in case there are several new members here that Friends of the Rail and Trail has consistently opposed rail banking for the last six years and said it was not possible. Now it appears that staff says it is appropriate and possible. So I know there's a lot of revisionist history with people that comment here, but it's important to note the facts of the situation. There are also many commissioners who have said it wasn't possible and not appropriate. And now it appears that it is. So rail banking has been implemented in hundreds of communities across the country. It is a tried and true method of saving and protecting public assets. And it should be viewed as it is appropriately as a legal means to save the corridor, preserve all the easements, and to put the liability of any taking lawsuits to the federal government and not have county liability. This has been true for the last six years. And it's good that both the commission and organizations that have said it was not true have now changed their tune. Thank you. Thanks for speaking. Okay, someone that is calling themselves Apple. Apologize for that. My name is Bill Cook. I live in Santa Cruz. Mr. Cook, what would you like to speak on on the consent agenda? Rail banking, please. Okay, go ahead, sir. Thank you. Rail banking has been established for a very long time. It is the norm for the entire nation. This is the way these things done. Every other community that has ever approached any of these sorts of issues has used rail banking in order to do exactly what is being proposed by both sides on this issue. It's normative. It's under the absolute control of the surface transportation board. They don't split hairs. It's abundantly clear. Their decisions are perfunctory and they do not reverse themselves. There's no risk. And it's the normal way these things get done. Thank you. Thank you, sir, for your comments. Air Gonzales, I do not see any other hands. Okay, one more last. Anybody from the public would like to speak on any item on the consent agenda? Seeing none, we're going to go ahead and move forward to the regular agenda. Commissioner, we need to have a motion by Rockins and a second by Jock. So roll call. Commissioner Bertrand. Hi, approved. Commissioner Brown. Hi. Commissioner Johnson. Hi. Commissioner Montesino. Hi. Commissioner Caput. Hi. Commissioner Alternate Schifrin. Hi. Commissioner Alternate Mulherr. Commissioner Koenig. Hi. Commissioner McPherson. Hi. Commissioner Alternate Myers. Hi. Commissioner Gonzales. Commissioner Rodkin. Hi. Unanimously. All right. Okay, now we're going to go ahead and move on. I apologize for that, being new at this experience as a self. We're going to move on to the regular agenda item. Item number 15, commissioner reports. Is there any oral commissioners reports? Mr. Chair. Chair recognizes Mr. Koenig. Did I say that right? Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to request that staff place an item on the March RTC agenda to quote consider direction to prepare a delivery plan for a wide multi-use trail in the middle of the corridor, including use of all existing trestles and bridges, end quote. We promised the public with measure D that we would do a true analysis of the highest and best use of the corridor and plan for this kind of trail has never been done. The rail trail is currently planned is largely unbuildable, particularly in the first district. And transit, we're seeing some of the issues with the TCAA. And so I think we owe it to ourselves and the public to consider a plan that we can build with the money we have. Thank you. Thank you, commissioner. Is there any other commissioner? Mr. Bertrand. I know this is yes. I know this is a request that has to be honored by staff, but I would like to second the effort by Manu. I think this is an important consideration that needs due diligence so that the community and the RTC commissioners understand what the issue is and its impact. Thank you very much. Thank you, commissioner. Mr. Chair. Yes, Mike. As a procedural motion on, there's a motion on the, it's not a motion on the floor, but a suggestion to staff. And my question is it's a procedural one to you or to the, our legal support, whatever. I'm not against the idea of having these kinds of discussions, but the timing of them at our next meeting when we're still engaged in a process that we've been involved in first for two years studying generally and then more specifically about transit options seems inappropriate. And I believe that's appropriate at some point before we just like leave that, you know, where any member can request something, but I'd in fact like to see a formal motion to deny that suggestion and that leave it to staff when alternatively as we go forward with this process, what other kinds of options are for, there may be questions that I'm not going to, you know, I'm not pushing that we do any of these necessarily, but issues of whether we should have asked for information that might be helpful to a business plan for either a trail or for the rail, other kinds of questions and to simply like stick in the, you know, a month from now. Let's just undo the entire process to the last two years with agenda item does not seem productive to me. So I'll let you rule or others that I'm going to make a motion that we in fact not formally requested on the March agenda. We discussed the question of throwing out the entire public hands at discussion and have instead of discussion about a wider trail seems inappropriate. My motion is leave it to staff to figure when to bring us back various options around the entire use of the quarter question. That's my motion. Thank you for that, Commissioner Recker. You know, procedure wise that I had a question on that because I mean, he's requesting to put something on the agenda to the future or staff during oral communications and oral reports. So it neither fell on neither one of those. It wasn't either a report. And so in our agenda packet, we don't have any item that we can add into future items to address those. So is this still an appropriate place? What I would say is just to clarify my question, Mr. Chair, I'm just suggesting that it's perfectly fine for a member of the commission to say I'd like to have an item on the agenda, but to specify when it will appear on the agenda is inappropriate at this point. And you can make it, you can make a request, but it can't be seen as like the commission has approved this and the staff must follow that suggestion. So that's all I'm trying to do. Leave open, you know, again, people can suggest we ought to talk about items in the future, but to try and agendize them at the meeting, again, without a formal discussion seems inappropriate. That's my point. Mr. Chair, what does our legal counsel say? And that's what I want to hear from Steve. So Mr. Chair, members of commission, the request is to agendize the consideration of a discussion on these issues. And so that is appropriate as part of commissioner reports and just in anticipation of potentially a second question. Commissioner Rockins motion, which has not yet been seconded as I, as I understand, is also appropriate because you're not discussing the substantive issue right now. The request is to add an item to the agenda so that you can consider providing that direction. So you're not having the substantive discussion today. You're really just trying to determine whether or not you're going to have an item on your agenda at the next meeting. Okay. So I guess I think we have somebody who wants to speak on this. Commissioner Mulher. Yeah. Yes, thank you. I just wanted to clarify what Commissioner Rockin was saying that we will have this discussion at staff's discretion according to their time and capabilities to put together a staff report and leave it to staff to agendize it in an expeditious manner according to their own capabilities. That's my, that's my suggestion, Patrick. So is there a second to Mr. Commissioner Rockins motion? Yeah, I'll second that. Please, I can make a second by Mulham. Seconded by who? Oh, yeah. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. So roll call. So clarification of the question is that instead of at the March agenda or RTC meeting, it's simply at staff's discretion. Yes, but you know, I'm not trying to block it coming to the agenda. I just don't think we can tell them, you know, you'd be ready in March to do this discussion. It might be a big one. Yeah, that's a lot of work to cover in less than a month. Commissioner Bertrand? I approve. Commissioner Brown? Aye. Commissioner Johnson? No. Commissioner Montesino? Aye. Commissioner Caput? Aye. Commission alternate Schifrin? Aye. Commission alternate Mulher? Aye. Commissioner Koenig? No. Commissioner McPherson? Virginia Johnson for McPherson. Aye. And Commission alternate Myers? Aye. Commissioner Gonzales? Aye. And Commissioner Rockin? Aye. And we have two, three no's. Commissioners Schifrin has his hand up. Is there any other commission that I have? Yes, I'd just like to add a request that when this comes back, we get a full report on the unified quarters investment study and the findings from that study, what that study entailed, and what the commission did with that study. That's added to it, right? That's just the request that, you know, as the request that this item be brought to the agenda, I think it is important to the commission to review what decisions were made about the unified quarters study and why it was done and what it found. Okay, thank you. Is there any other commissioners report? Hearing none or seeing none. Jock, do you have a report? Yeah, I just wanted to say that reaching out to the public, thank you for your participation in giving your views on the issues on this agenda and also in talking to my eligible round law members, excuse me, the ones that provided by law that I could talk with. Thank you for that discourse. I appreciate the sharing of your ideas. And I respect the sharing of the ideas with those individual people. Some disagree with me and some agree with me, but that I think is part of our discussion and it helps this commission work a lot better. So my caduce to fellow commissioners I talk with and my caduce to the public who obviously put a lot of work into their ideas and trying to present it to the commission. And I assure the public that many of the commissioners read the emails. A little suggestion response to Kerry Pico, I believe. If you have ideas that you want to get across in your two or three minutes, depending on the agenda, I think it would help the commissioners if we saw the work ahead of time so we could read it. And then, you know, when you do the presentation, we'd have a better idea of what's actually on your mind. I think that would help us tremendously. Thank you very much. Thank you, commissioner. Is there any other commissioners would like to speak during oral communications? None. Hearing none and seeing none. We're going to go ahead and move on to item 16, director's report. Thank you, chair Gonzalez and commissioners and welcome, commissioner Montecino. I have just a couple items on my director's report today. The first item is regarding revenue forecast for Measure D and the Transportation Development Act. Since the beginning of the pandemic, RTC staff has been closely monitoring Measure D and TDA funds. We were expecting that both of these revenue sources would be significantly impacted by a drop in tax receipts. Based on initial projections, RTC passed a modified fiscal year 2021 budget in June of 2020, which reduced projected revenue of both Measure D and TDA funding to values 20% below actual fiscal year 18-19 receipts. And we used fiscal year 18-19 because that was the last year where we didn't have an effect by the pandemic. Measure D revenue is currently trending about 4% above actual fiscal year 18-19 receipts. And therefore, it's now 22% above RTC's approved fiscal year 2021 budget. Similarly, TDA revenue is currently trending about 3% above actual fiscal year 18-19 receipts and 29% above RTC's approved fiscal year 2021 budget. In addition to the effects of the various economic stimulus legislation, we suspect that a good portion of this positive trend is due to online sales. And we're very fortunate to have had a court ruling known as the Wayfair Decision and that provided that states could mandate that businesses without a physical presence in a state with more than 200 transactions or $100,000 in state sales collect and remit sales taxes on transactions in the state. California enacted AB 147, which required marketplace facilitators to collect remit sales tax for use consumption and storage in California effective October 1, 2019, just before the pandemic. And that's a good reason why we were able to weather the storm, so to speak. So for Measure D, the actual Measure D revenue will pass directly to recipients for the neighborhood and comprehensive program categories. So there's nothing we need to do for regional Measure D categories. And those would be the highway corridor, MBSST, and rail. Staff is considering appropriate estimates for this year's five-year programming show, which is currently under development. And we'll come to that RTC for consideration later this year. We will also be considering whether to replenish the TDA reserve, which was impacted in fiscal year in 1920, and how best to ensure that the balance of TDA revenue, the amounts above budgeted amounts and reserve requirements, can be expeditiously distributed to eligible recipients. It is likely that TDA claims that were adjusted in June of 2020 can be, at least partially, if not completely restored to pre-pandemic levels. I have one other update, and that's on the short-line railroad improvement program. On January, I reported a little bit on this last month, based on the CTC staff's recommendation. Well, on October 28th, the CTC approved RTC's grant application request for $285,000 from the short-line railroad improvement program for the construction of the $670,000 Aharo River Railroad Bridge rehabilitation project. RTC expects to request a construction application from the CTC this fall with contract award estimated in March of 2022. So we'll see construction next year. RTC is matching the grant funding with $214,000 in Measure D and $171,000 in private fee and lease funding generated by RTC's ownership of the branch line. I provided a little bit more detail on what will be done in my report. Transportation planner Tommy Travers is managing this project for RTC, and he worked hard on the grant application as well as Ginger Dicar. That concludes my report today. Thank you, Mr. Guy. I'm Mr. President. Is there any questions for the Executive Director from the commissioners on his report? Thanks for the good news. I have one question in regards to the Pakaro Bridge and the work that we're going to do on that. I understand that the levy itself is going to be upgraded. Are we taking into consideration the work that's going to be done on the levy because they're going to be wanting to raise the elevation of the levy? If we're going to invest all this money on rehab in the bridge, I just thought we had that under consideration. Staff is coordinating with the county. We are aware that there is a levy project and we're making sure that whatever we do corresponds with the other project being implemented by the county. Thank you. Is there any other questions from the commissioners, the Executive Director? Seeing none, we're going to go ahead and move on to item- We have public comment, Commissioner Gonzalez. Okay. Is there any, sorry about that. Is there any public comments or questions on the report from the Executive Director? Mr. Peoples? Chair recognizes Mr. Peoples. Yes. Hi, this is Brian from Trail Now. Thank you. I'm just as a reminder, Trail Now, when Measure D was first proposed, they had 24% of that going towards the train and actually $14 million going towards a Monterey train station. We came out as attack and opposed Measure D. And fortunately, Don Lane and Zach Fran changed the language and actually shifted money from the train to Metro and actually eliminated the train station out of Monterey. And we came back and was a big supporter and actually the majority, our supporters provided most of the funds, the highest amount of funds to get Measure D. So we're really happy that Measure D is gaining that. One of the points I want to highlight in the additional literature that was sent was from Roaring Camp. They're a private train operator and there's no requirement from the Surface Transportation Board to accommodate a private train operator connected to a public transit railroad. So we want to make sure that the RTC communicates that there's no obligation for the public owned property to accommodate Roaring Camp. We want to make sure that we recognize that. And then finally, I want to ask the question, this Pajaro trestle, is that within our branch line? Does that fall within our branch line? I wasn't sure if that's within it. Okay, Guy, thank you for nodding your head and I appreciate that. It would be great if you could put a braille on that next to it on that while you're doing the upgrades. I hope that you're including that because the Watsonville would benefit a lot from allowing the public to have a passage there over. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Bevels. Is there anybody else from the public they'd like to ask a question on the Executive Director's Report? Here comes always. I do not see any other hands raised. Thank you. We're going to go ahead and move on to item. Commissioner Bertrand is trying to speak. Yes, Commissioner. Yeah, Mr. Chair, if you may, if I may. The last public comment raised a question to me and I was wondering if I could address it to our legal counsel. And the question is, does a private entity, rail or whatever, have any rights over us in terms of providing service? Do we have to provide that connection to them because they're a private entity rather than a public entity? I'm just trying to understand what was brought up by you. Yeah, there is, to the extent that the Burring camp has common carrier status for their line that they own, there is an obligation, maybe slightly too strong a word. It is part of the national rail system. And it is something that, as Burring camp has indicated in their letter, they would like to continue to be connected to that. There are procedures under the STB involving abandonment and rail banking where those issues are actually looked at determine whether or not you're still able to, for instance, in the case of Burring camp, be able to get locomotives to where they actually operate at right now. And so those are the issues that are looked at as part of the abandonment and rail banking process. Okay, thank you. The moving of locomotives seems to me you can move those on the highway too, but thank you for that question. Thank you, commissioner. Seeing no more hands, we're going to go ahead and move on to item 17, Caltrans report. Mr. Tiddon, you're on. All right. Thank you, Chair, commissioners. For the commissioners, I haven't met or the members of the public. My name is Tim Govins. I am the district director of Caltrans District 5, so here on the central post. We do have, as usual, our Caltrans report as part of your agenda packet. In the interest of time, I won't go over any of those or some of perhaps my usual reports, but I did want to just make this board aware that Caltrans, my staff has been working very closely with staff throughout your county. And in the county OES, the preparations for the evacuations that had to happen with the storms, as well as all the preparations we were doing before the storms. We are very fortunate that the storm kind of hit Santa Cruz, moved a little to the south. Highway 236, through Big Basin State Parks, remains closed, but we're fairly fortunate with just minor damage in most of the other places. The county to yourself, Monterey County, I believe everyone's probably aware, since it's been in the news everywhere nationally. In Big Sur, in the area of the Dolan fire, the Dolan fire went from August to December of last year. Caltrans similarly had been working with Monterey County on doing a lot of preventative work, cleanup of debris, redundant drainage systems. And the good news is that most of the drainage systems then passed the water and debris flow. We had minor to significant damage that we're now cleaning up, but the most significant damage happened post mile 30, which is just a couple miles south of the Esalon Institute. If you guys need to think at a place called Rat Creek, we actually lost both lanes of Route 1. So Route 1 is currently impassable in Monterey County. We have contractors out there right now cleaning up the debris, finding the drainage systems that were buried under the mud, working on solutions to figure it out. We are firmly entrenched in the assessment, and we are working very closely with Monterey County to move the closures from the north and the south to just as close as we can to where the roadway is missing. We do not yet know how long it will be closed or what the solution is, whether we need to go to a structural fix. But since you are a neighboring county, I just wanted to bring that to your attention and let you know, as we all know, the traffic coming up from Monterey affects this county in both tourism and other areas. So that's my report for the day. I would be happy to entertain any questions. Thank you, Jim. Is there any questions from the commission? Ram? Yes, I have a question. Go ahead, Andy. The chair recognizes that's Andy, right? Yes, thank you. I have a question regarding the encampment of homeless unhoused individuals at the intersection of Highway 1 and Highway 9 in the city of Santa Cruz. Commissioner Cooney has received numerous concerns about that encampment. The land is owned, as I understand it, by Caltrans. It's unclear to the extent to which Caltrans is working with the city of Santa Cruz to respond to some of the concerns there. And I wonder, one, if I know this might be a new issue for you, Mr. Govins, so I don't want to put you on the spot, but I would ask you at the next meeting to provide an update on what the, what Calcans. Okay. I stopped hearing you, Andy. And so if the chair would like, I can start addressing the concern I heard. Yeah, unless Andy, is that wrapped it up, Andy? Can you hear us? Yes. Okay. Yes. Yes. Thank you. We are, we are, this is not a new issue. We are well aware. I can, I can bring information back. People experiencing homelessness in this state is a very large issue that has grown tremendously, especially in the last year with the pandemic and the economic situation we have. But also with the pandemic, there are protocols out there as far as health and safety of the general public and all of our workers. And so when we work in and around encampments, there is additional care taken. And with the governor's administration, we're trying to make sure we're following all CDC and other public health guidelines when we are actually removing encampments from our right away, as well as making sure that there's an opportunity to help lift these people up into a better situation for themselves and for society. And so we'll, I can come back and provide exactly what we can do. We have been in communication with the city. There are plans there. I think, I think everyone on this call is probably aware of some of the situations that are happening in this city and county and in all my counties and throughout the state. But this is a very serious issue. We take it seriously. We understand both sides of issues and I'll bring something back. I appreciate hearing that and I'm sorry I got my internet connection got messed up. The county also is providing services as I understand it to the area. So as part of your report next month, maybe you could talk about the nature of the interaction with both the city and the county in your response. But thank you very much. Yes, as thank you for bringing that up because as you know, we are not a social service agency. However, we are servants of the state. So it all blends together and we do look for that partnership at the local level before we take major action. So thank you. Thank you, commissioner. Thank you, Mr. Goods. Is there any other fellow commissioner that has questions? Donna Myers, the chair recognizes Donna Myers. Commissioner Donna Myers. Donna, you need to unmute yourself. Yeah, thank you, Director Govins. I wear two hats this morning and I appreciate commissioner Schifrin's questions. He had asked the question I had. I'm also the mayor of the city of Santa Cruz and I'm also the Metro alternate representing the Metro transit. And I appreciate your comments about the Highway 1 and 9 and would very much like to encourage a report back to this commission next month. We also in the city are planning a major construction project at Highway 1 and 9, an improvement project there at that intersection, which is a very dangerous intersection in our community. So we would appreciate and know the difficult situation you're in as an agency. But also just speaking from the Court Highway 9 corridor, we do see people moving up towards the transit district office and facilities are also along Highway 1 or excuse me, along Highway 9. And so the whole area is heavily impacted and your assistance from the state with regards to the issue there, we would very much like to and actually need to get to resolution pretty soon because we do need to get in and start building a major intersection improvement there. So I appreciate your time being here with us today and I look forward to the report next month. Thank you, Commissioner. And again, with the permission of the chair, I may suggest that it would be more productive so we can have a more substantial conversation. Perhaps you and I and even Commissioner Coonerty can meet independently. The report to this commission could just be very, very quick then and we could get into more of the substantive issues if that fits with your thank you. Yeah, thank you. I think that would be very acceptable to Commissioner Coonerty and how should we follow up? How can we make that happen? I will instruct my assistant to reach out to both of the offices and if you would like, you may also email me and my assistant we'll start working on scheduling that with the Commissioner, Myron and Coonerty. Thank you. Okay. That is Andy. Yes, although I see Johnson's hand, it might be good to invite Supervisor McPherson as well to that meeting. That was going to be my request, Mr. Chair and Tim, if you would please invite the McPherson office. We'd appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner recognizes Commissioner Brown, Sandy Brown. Yeah, I just wanted to add, I appreciate the questions and the information you've given us. I would also be interested in participating in that conversation given that I am the regular city representative and Mayor Myers will be participating in this meeting but it would be nice to have somebody who's kind of consistently here at the RTC to participate as well. So if you could reach out to me as well or just include me in the email, that'd be great. Thank you, Commissioner. So did you get that, Mr. Gibbs? Do you have one more request? Yes, sir. Okay. Is there any fellow commissioners that like to have any questions on the CalTrans report? Mr. Gibbs? No. Seeing no hands or hearing no voices. Thank you for your report. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your dedication to the state and the community. Commissioner Gonzales, we have public comment. Go ahead and I'll open it up to the public for questions of the report. Only questions to the board. Hi, this is Brian from Trail Now. Thank you, Mr. Gobans. Question, you know, I'm in actually Florida right now and so I'm really pleased about being forced to the future and being able to join in on this Zoom call. But what's interesting is I rented a car and with it's a new car, new car technology, the cars, you know, stop themselves, right? The technology's just screaming ahead, vehicle technology. And actually I was driving through, you know, I kid you not, driving through a neighborhood and the car stopped, they almost hit an alligator. I kid you not. And so my question is to you is, are you, is CalTrans looking at vehicle technology on your investment, your capital investment? And I think the best example is the alligator almost getting hit. Now, the alligators don't get hit because the cars stop. And so with, for example, we're looking at spending millions of dollars for this animal tunnel under Laurel Curve. You know, we don't have a lot of money. So I suspect that's going to be delayed for a while. Would you envision that some projects that CalTrans sees today would fall to the wayside because of vehicle technology where cars are driving themselves, people are out of the equation, animals are safer, motorcyclists are safer because cars are virtual, you know, trains, they're virtual trains. That's essentially what cars are becoming. Thank you. Over. Thank you, Mr. Peoples. Do you want to answer that? Yeah, with the chair's discretion, I'll give just a quick answer. The quick answer is yes, CalTrans is very engaged in automated technology and, you know, vehicle to vehicle, vehicle to infrastructure type of things. We're looking at the future on that. We also weigh with, you know, with automation, we don't, you know, we don't want to see a bunch of cars driving themselves to and from and actually increasing the number of trips. And so we're trying to be, we're trying to be careful of that. But there are some test areas in the state. Contra Costa County and San Diego have some different test beds for those. So we are taking that into account. However, when the total, it's also a matter of timing of when the total fleet would flip over to some of these more modern cars and whether you have to accommodate all of those as well as everything else. And so there are quite a few things going on. So yes, we do take that into account in our own expenditures. We also have Tom and Susan Haidt. Yeah. Hi. Thank you all for your service here. Go ahead. You have a minute. Yes. Okay. Any questions? So I just wanted to make a comment on the homeless encampment on the corner of River Street and Highway 1. So it's interesting, a friend of mine who was visiting here with me who was going around looking at Santa Cruz here and there. And he said, well, this is interesting to have the homeless camp directly on the one of the main entrances right into Santa Cruz. It's good that you people are not trying to hide the situation that's going on and you're putting it right in our face. Well, I told him, you know, this is not what we're trying to do. He said, these people have gone to his position, which many ways they've gotten this position, but there is no where do they go? That's what we're talking about here. They wind up on the corner of that highway because the city has not found a place where these people can actually live. Thousands of people and this continues to go on and it grows, especially with this COVID-19. Many people have lost their homes, lost their jobs, families are on the streets, family can't afford food. They wind up on the corner of River Street and Highway 1. It is disgraceful that the city will somehow not find a place for these people to stay. I've been to the River Street encampment behind the county building. It's a complete disaster and mess. I work with these people all the time and when the city has to step up and do something, it is absolutely dangerous, horribly dangerous, these people to be camping on the side of a highway. So I would like something done about this. What happens if a car turns off that highway and runs into those tents and kills those people? What happens? Who is- Thank you, sir, for your time and your comments. All right. Well, thank you. Commissioner Gonzalez, I do not see any other hands raised. Seeing no more hands, we're going to go ahead and move on to the next agenda item, which is agenda item number 18, which is a committee of appointments to the budget administration personnel, California Association of Councils of Government, CalCOG, and Coast Rail Coordinating Council, CRCC. We're going to go ahead and start with a staff report. Yes. Good morning, commissioners. Yesenia, part of your staff. Historically, each February, commissioners are asked to inform the commission chair or the executive director of their interest to be reelected or elected to serve on an RTC committee. Currently, the budget and administration personnel committee is your only standing commission committee. So staff recommends that commissioners please notify the chair Gonzalez or executive director Preston of your interest in serving on the BNA by February 17th. Appointments to this committee will be made at our March meeting. The RTC also holds membership on two external committees, CalCOG and the Coast Rail Coordinating Council. Your 2020 RTC representative to CalCOG was Commissioner Zach Friend and Mr. John Leopold served on the CRCC. The commissioners should also inform the chair or executive director of their interest to continue to serve or to be appointed to one of these external committees by February 17th. And again, all these appointments will be made at our March RTC meeting. Thank you. Thank you, Yesenia. Is there any questions from the commissioners? I just wanted to point out that no action is needed on this item. Yeah, exactly. There is no action. And there's been given direction by staff, what needs to be done. Seeing none, we're going to go ahead and move on to item 19, the transit corridor alternative analysis and rail network integration study, final draft report and locally preferred alternative. I want to bring up something to the commission in regards to allowing the public to speak on this item. I'd like to get a consensus that we only allow those that have not spoken on this agenda item. Since we did have a public clearing, and there was quite a few people that had spoken on that item already. Commissioner Rodkin, you're muted. You're muted, Commissioner. Commissioner Rodkins, you're muted. I know. Sorry. I just wanted to say that's a rule and you can make it unless there's a vote to overrule you. You can make that decision. Okay. And I support what you're doing unless anybody opposes to just go ahead. Thank you very much. So we're going to go ahead and we're going to proceed with item 19. And we're only going to allow those that have not spoken on this item to speak. And I would be given in two minutes when it comes to the public portion. So we'll go ahead and put staff, I guess. Thank you. I have a slide presentation if you can put up, Yusenia. I'm having technical difficulties here with these slides. So I'm going to try and do my best to show it as a presentation. Otherwise, I think I'm going to have to just scroll through the slides. Well, if you open it first and then open share screen of a work, there you go. Yeah, it doesn't. Oh, there we go. Okay. Thank you, Yusenia. Good morning, Chair, commissioners and members of the public. I'm Ginger Dakar, Senior Transportation Planner and RTC staff. The item before you today is a Transit Carter Alternatives Analysis and Rail Network Integration Study. The objective of this study is to evaluate transit investment options that utilize the Santa Cruz Branch rail line. The staff report is a continuation of the staff report that was presented to the commission on the January 14th meeting. The oral report for this item was presented at this previous meeting. Today I'll provide just a brief overview of the project. And also, there are a number of members of the project team here today to answer any additional questions. RTC and Metro staff have been working together with HDR Engineering and Farron Pierce on this analysis. We have in the meeting today, we have Steve Decker, who is the program manager for this project at HDR. I believe Pam Yavkins from HDR, I know she had some other things scheduled, but she may be able to be on this meeting as well. Alan Wang from Farron Pierce, from Metro staff, we have John Ergo, Pete Rasmussen, Wanda Buu, Mingin Stu, and Matt Marquez. We also have Cal Trans Division of Rail staff, Kyle Bradinger and Shannon Simons, and many members of RTC staff to help answer any questions you may have today. Today, the next slide, please. Today the project team is recommending that the RTC adopt the resolution that accepts the Transit-Carder Alternatives Analysis and Rail Network Integration Study, which selects Electric Passenger Rail as the locally preferred alternative. Why Electric Passenger Rail for the Santa Cruz Branch Rail Line? The future vision for transportation in Santa Cruz County includes fully utilizing the Santa Cruz Branch Rail Line for both transit and a trail to develop an integrated transit network throughout the county. RTC purchased this rail right away for transportation solutions. Let's fully utilize this resource for both transit and trail, with rail being the superior transit solution. The Santa Cruz Branch line is the only readily available facility in the county that can be dedicated to transit and not shared with other vehicle uses that would delay travel times. Rail transit will provide a fast, safe, and accessible option for travel for both residents and visitors and will improve quality of life. By improving transit travel times, transit becomes a much more realistic option for people to travel through Santa Cruz County without wasting time and experiencing the stress of sitting in congested traffic. Rail transit provides equitable, independent accessibility for people of all ages and abilities to travel. People who can't afford to own a vehicle or prefer not to drive, people who are younger than the driving age, with seniors and people with disabilities. Rail transit advances greenhouse gas emission reduction goals. Our community has been feeling the drastic impacts of climate change, such as increased wildfires and potential for mudslides, and more extreme droughts. The time is now to transition to clean energy transportation solutions. Proactive planning and investment in reducing climate impacts is much less expensive than funding disaster recovery. The California State Rail Plan outlines a strategy for developing a state-of-the-art rail system. It is important that Santa Cruz County is not left behind. Let's decide that Santa Cruz County should be part of this vision. Rail service along the Santa Cruz branch line will connect the Santa Cruz region into the statewide rail network. Your decision today whether to select rail as a locally preferred transit alternative for the Santa Cruz branch line will be represented in the California State Rail Plan update for 2022, which will affect the ability to obtain funding for this project. Transit projects that provide greenhouse gas emission reductions and serve transportation disadvantaged communities are the types of projects that state and federal funding programs are looking to fund. Next slide please. The next steps of this project are to develop a business plan for the locally preferred alternative. This business plan will provide a 25-year plan for implementation and operations and maintenance of the locally preferred alternative. It will provide information on the governance options for how transit could be administered. It will provide the steps for implementation that are needed to deliver the project and a cash flow analysis for funding these implementation steps. The business plan is scheduled to be brought to the RTC at the RTC people meeting. And before before I close I want to thank the many people who have been engaged in this discussion about how best to use the Santa Cruz branch rail line. It has been quite a lively discussion with input from so many members of our community. With that I'm happy to take any questions or comments. Thank you. Thank you, Ginger. Thank you for that report. Is there any questions from the fellow commissioners? I just had a process question. Go ahead, commissioners. I understand the direction from the chair to try to limit public comment to folks we haven't heard from but I'm just curious in council's opinion of whether or not we can actually legally stop anyone from making a comment at this time if they would like to. The commission did conduct a public hearing last time so the public has had an opportunity to speak on the issue of the TCA and the recommendation to proceed with the business plan. So I think you can limit the comments to just those who have not spoken before or actually not even take any public comments but that's not what is being considered right now. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Meyers. Thank you, chair. I have a question just about the business plan. I'm wondering about you mentioned it would come back to the commission in April. I'm wondering about is there a public process around that or how is that business plan developed with regards to public input? I can start that and any of the other project team members can add to it. The business plan is going to be based on the information that has been provided in the report already, the cost estimates as well as the funding sources that did go through a public process and the additional steps in this plan I feel are more of a technical basis to bring to the commission. We can take input at the April meeting from commissioners and other stakeholders. Thank you. Is there any other commissioners as any other questions? Yes. I see one back there. Can I have my hand up? I'm shocked as well. Yeah, I recognize commissioner Johnson, alternate Johnson. Thank you, chair. I just also have a process question. I don't have any questions for staff. Thank you though very much for all your work and the consultants, but I want to make sure that the commissioners have an opportunity to make comments after public comment. If that's your intent, Mr. Chair, that'd be great. Thank you. Yeah, we can do that. Right now we're just in questions on the study. Is there any? Commissioner Rodkins. So my question is about the comment that we just had about bringing back the business plan in April. Am I correct in my assumption that in such a business plan, we would simply be bringing forward the numbers in terms of the cost of alternatives since that's the business plan that's being proposed, bringing forward the numbers from the unified corridor study and the TCAA rather than developing numbers in terms of what the actual cost of a rail system would be? And let me make that clear why I'm asking this question. My understanding, I could be wrong and please correct me, is that the cost of rail alternatives is a kind of a conglomerate number that comes out of looking at a wide range of different kinds of rail systems, not I mean light rail systems down to trolleys and so forth. If in fact there's a seems to me that a business plan needs to be based on what actual costs would be to create something. And we know, let's say for example, the commission decides that rails are preferred alternative. It's still not clear whether we're talking about a light rail system, which is relatively expensive versus a trolley or tram system, small in a smaller scale kind of thing. The whole issue of whether, you know, the notice that what I'm asking about is the basis for building a business plan. Do we have sufficient information? Or if we wanted to get a more specific business plan focused on a particular technology, and I'm not endorsing this, but the TIGM system or something like it or some other particular actual system that's available, we would probably end up with I assume we would end up with different numbers for the cost of rail. And therefore the business plan, it could be a dramatic difference. I mean, perhaps half the cost of the average cost of rail or something, I'd have no idea. So my question to staff is, is, are we actually in a position to do a business plan? If we do one, is it simply going to be based on rolling over the numbers from a generic rail system that we've been studying? Or would this actually put some new numbers into what rail options are before us in a real way? Is the question clear? I believe so. Let me try and answer and see if I hit on your question here. So the business plan will be based on the transit card, alternatives analysis, cost estimates for both a light rail system and a commuter rail system. If that's the decision made today that they are both a locally preferred alternative. Those numbers would be, again, for the, say, light rail system, I assume that's a much more expensive system, say, than a trolley system or a smaller tram system. But we'd be making our business plan based on the assumption that we're building this sort of generic rail plan. Am I correct? It would be based on the business plan would be based on a light rail system and a commuter rail system. Yes. Commissioner Rocket, there was a huge difference between those two cost estimates. I'm correct in that it would be somewhat generic in nature, but the concepts are going to be the same with respect to delivery of the project, you know, needing environmental clearance, needing to fund environmental clearance, needing to fund the capital improvements, and then needing to fund operations and maintenance. You know, when I worked for the High Speed Rail Authority, they were producing business plans every two years. You know, they didn't have environmental clearance project level for all other projects. Cost estimates were adjusted and the plan was updated each year as more information became available. You can produce a business plan now. A business plan later will have greater accuracy. You can certainly revise the business plan at a periodic time table. Thank you for that response. Both of you. And Chair, I have additional questions. And go ahead. Sorry. Got to plug in my computer. Yeah, I just have maybe I didn't know if we were going to get just new to your process a little bit here. I do have some specific questions regarding some of the costs in the report. Is it appropriate that I kind of go through those now? It does relate to my question around the business plan, but I do see some I like to express that there are some concerns around how those numbers will continue through the process of estimation for the passenger rail service. Is now an appropriate time to get some questions from back from the staff answered? Or should we wait till after public comment? You would like to do that now? No, now it's one of the questions for the study. Great. Thank you, Chair. So I think, Ginger, this would be to you and thank you again for the presentation this morning. In the TCAA study, it's noted that the annual operating cost for rail service is estimated to be 25 million per year. But in looking at that report and I'm a bit new to all of this, but I did try to do as much of my homework as possible. I couldn't find a sort of a detailed breakdown on what exactly is in that figure. And so I just wanted to understand the relationship between the numbers in the in the Uniform Quarter Study and how they were either changed or not changed going into the TCAA. So that's kind of a broader question. And then I also have a question around Table B10 in the passenger rail service in the, well actually that's in the Uniform Quarter Study. But when I add the 13 million for operation for rail and the 12 million operational cost for additional bus service, that comes to the 25 million. And I just want, I'm just trying to understand where those numbers are coming from. I guess is my main question on that. Trying to understand the UCS study and how those numbers moved into the TCAA study. I'll be happy to start with the answer to that question. Then I'll hand it off to Steve Decker, who is the project manager at HDR. But there is significant difference between the estimates for the operations and maintenance between the Uniform Quarter Study and the alternatives analysis. And it's based, the difference comes mainly because the HDR team feels like many more vehicles would be needed than what were previous estimates for the operations of the rail system, which is if you increase the number of vehicles, then that would affect the total revenue hours. But with that, I'll hand it off to Steve and he can provide more information. Thanks, Ginger. Hopefully you guys can hear me. I believe I'm off mute. So based on what Ginger said, certainly we did not help prepare the UCS cost estimates, but we certainly worked with them in this TCAA process. And in particular with the operations and maintenance costs, there are a few things that we added that were not included in the previous analysis that provide some of that difference we're talking about. And Ginger mentioned the number of vehicles. I think we were at the UCS was at three vehicle train sets, and we're at five with ours. So that increased the operating expenses a bit. And then we also looked at full weekend services, some bridge maintenance issues, this thing called positive train control in terms of improving and ensuring safety, etc., with safety mechanisms with the operations of the train. So some of those costs were not included in the UCS. And I would say the positive train control may not have been required at that time. They may have been, but they certainly are now. So there are a few things in there that we refined. And I think Ginger hit it on the head with the number of trains providing, covering the service frequencies that we identified in the plan make up a lot of that difference. Hopefully that makes sense. Yeah, that's helpful. Thank you. Well, the one thing I guess that just really popped out for me, and especially as a member of the Metro Board, was that, you know, this, the calculation of the increasing bus service combined with the rail just really looks, looks as a, as a tremendous public transit benefit. So I'm pleased to see some of these things sort of being a little bit more realized in terms of the actual overall public transit benefit that that we're looking to achieve here via the study. My other question had to do with, I'll ask another one of these questions a little bit later on. Let's see here. Let me just double check my notes here on my questions. The other thing was on countywide transit ridership. So in the TCAA report, transit ridership performance measure coming from table five dash 19, that the BRT bus alternative was predicted to result in countywide transit ridership of about 37,500 daily boardings, about 9% more than the 34,300 predicted daily boardings for the light rail option. And then I also noticed in the uniform unified quarter investment study that adding the BRT bus service to the rail quarter as part of scenario C was predicted predicted to increase the countywide public transit mode share to only 4.8%. Despite that while adding rail transit as part of scenario B was predicted to increase the countywide public transit mode share to 6%. So when I do the math, looking at all that using the uniform quarter study figures, it looks like the countywide transit use will increase 25% more if rail is implemented than if the that if the BRT bus is implemented. And not that the the the result would not decrease as the TCAA predicts. So could you explain the apparent difference differences? I'm hoping that I know I'm getting into a lot of details here. So happy to do my best to explain the numbers and figures in front of me. I did see this comment presented by a member of the public. But it really is a little challenging to compare the results of the unified quarter study when we were looking at scenarios of a number of different projects versus in the alternatives analysis, we're focusing on the Santa Cruz branch rail line. And so when you when you do the travel demand modeling work for the unified quarter study where we had scenarios, there were a number of different projects that were being implemented in a future year that we're combining together to create a different dynamic for number of people driving versus the number of people taking transit. And so it is challenging to compare directly because of you know just what I said the scenarios group projects, there's a number of them that are affecting those numbers. Obviously, there's typically a synergy between if you the more transit you provide and we've heard this from Metro staff and often the more ridership you can get because you have a better more integrated transit network developed for people to get where they need to go. That said, I do think the the bus rapid transit analysis and the alternatives analysis had more detailed effort done on it in comparison to the unified quarter study. It did show more ridership in this analysis than we were able to determine from the unified quarter study. I think that's thanks to fair peers and the work they did and really bringing a lot of different tools together to be able to evaluate transit for the BRT. And you know some of that is because of the BRT being on SoCal and having the ability to have those shorter trips, the BRT alignment that we evaluated in the alternatives analysis. So again challenging to you know compare the differences between the two studies. Okay, great. Thank you very much for that. I guess I've got two very quick again math questions here. So if I'm looking at the 34,300 county wide transit ridership estimate for the LRT figure by 365 days a year. I come up with an annual county wide transit ridership figure of just over 12 12 million trips. Knowing the current annual county wide transit ridership is about five million. Am I really seeing what I think is quite a significant increase in annual public transit ridership as a potential result of the project? It looks substantial somewhere around you know seven and a half million more. Is that, am I doing the math right on that? Maybe you can send your spreadsheet over and I can check your math. I am a numbers person. I love that. I haven't done that analysis myself. I'm sorry. There's lots of different ways to kind of reconfigure these numbers and I haven't done that one yet. We are forecasting for 2040. So there is a difference there from you know where we are with 2020. So we need to always be mindful of that. There are no not substantial changes to our roadway structure to develop any kind of increased capacity for growth, population growth. And so you know this when we're looking at the alternatives analysis the increased capacity is to transit. We're transit. Okay. Yes. Well that's significant and again just as we really look forward to the benefits to our community more over the generations that is those numbers are pretty compelling to try to peel apart and tease together in terms of benefits. I just have one last question and that's really you know the metro budget is about 50 million and we carry about 5 million a year right now and I just want to see if there's also sort of a benefit to Metro's budget by obviously seeing this this system come into place. I won't I won't name you know numbers but it would look like we would have significant increase in ridership. So therefore our budget would be would be going up as well. So I'm seeing you're nodding your head. Great. Well that's thank very helpful in terms of of you know just a perspective as a metro board member and I appreciate you answering my questions. Thank you. Thank you Commissioner. The chair recognizes Commissioner Caput and then Commissioner Biltran. Do you have any questions on the study? Yeah. Thank you. Thanks a lot, Araleo. And my first my early impression of all this I like it. I think we need to look into it and some of the questions you could just answer yes or no. But anyway and I may have missed something in the report. We're talking about Devon board all the way to what? The study area for the alternatives analysis for passenger rail is from the west side of Santa Cruz to Pajaro. So natural bridges drive right on the west side close to the city limits. Okay and when we're talking this is electric but it's without the wires above right? Is that correct? Correct. That's what we're looking towards. Yes. Is there a third rail like watch out for the hot electrical rail? That is not where what we're looking towards not having a third rail. Okay and the other would be where and maybe how many nationally is this being actually done? And where would be the closest one? I keep thinking apart but part is different. It has a third rail. It's electric and all that but this is different. So what we're ginger when you and Steve were talking about here nationally where are they doing it? In a lot of places they're just a few or is it brand new and we don't know what's going on yet? I can start that and then I'll pass it on to Steve. He's the he's the rail vehicle expert but it is we are counting on technology advances in the next decade that would help us be able to provide a system that would be clean energy solution for the battery hydrogen fuel cell that type of thing. I think there's some out there but it is really changing rapidly. With that I'd hand it off to Steve. Yeah down in San Bernardino County there's a system that extends from Metrolinx called the Redlands passenger rail and that study that passenger rail it's probably about nine or ten miles long commuter rail it just was constructed. They are now going through an assessment of implementing changing the equipment from DMU which is diesel multiple unit to hydrogen cells so they're going through that study now my firm's involved in that as well so that is certainly very encouraging and it and technology has improved significantly so that would be no catnaries nothing above or no third rail and that would be hydrogen cell powered. There are other studies going on nationally to get cleaner zero emission vehicles out there not just with cars like we talked about earlier with Mr. Govans from Caltrans but also with rail vehicles so it is happening and the technology is increasing rapidly. Okay but it's still new and we're when we're looking at this it would include freight would freight be able to go on the same line. I'm happy to take that so definitely freight would be able to that's what we've been looking towards in the alternative analysis we have not received any other direction from the commission at this point to not consider freight. Okay it's still early but I guess that my final one is basically do we have to chair up the old line in order to put in a new line or is that you know that's all part of the cost and so yeah is the old line you're going to be you know the conventional passenger train that's going to be gone and it'll be all or nothing. So the cost estimates for the rail options did include replacing the rail I believe it's 100% and I think 75% of the ties would need to be replaced that that was the estimate for that was included in the cost. Okay then I guess in April when we're going forward we'll be voting on actually making this alternative plan or primary plan or we're just going to be approving looking at both conventional passenger rail and freight and this plan also in other words we will still be looking at both. So the business plan decision will be looking at just the passenger rail as an extension of the transit card alternatives analysis. Okay okay and I'll be in the future I'll be talking to Aurelio and Eduardo because they're Watsonville and trying to get their ideas on which could for Watsonville and South Carolina. Okay thank you. Thank you Commissioner Caput. Commissioner Beltran Chair recognizes you do you have any questions? Yes I do thank you very much Chair. So Donna sort of spoke to the questions that I had and in general it's the analysis portion of the business plan that you're going to be presenting if we approve to go ahead on this and so my question to you Ms. Dicar is is the business plan going to make these financing questions on the level of actual improvements and the ongoing expense appearance so that the public could get a clear idea of what we're actually talking about. Up to now we have multiple studies and you know various tables you know in the studies and you know a person has to go through these studies and compare and you know do the math and stuff like that which I think is asking a lot of the general public and you know some people are good in numbers Donna apparently is and you definitely go with numbers and thank you for being on the staff but I want an analysis and I want to have something that the public could understand so they could actually be appreciative of the total cost to do the implementation and the total cost is community as we go forward so that we could afford it on a long going basis. So that's my question to you and then I have one other question after that. So again I'll give a start here and Steven Guy can chime in as needed. The business plan is really trying to detail out either a year by year or a short-term, mid-term, long-term for how the funding would come together for implementing the locally preferred alternative and so it's kind of stepping through where you know what kind of grant programs that we're going to be going after what are the various different steps we need to take in order to just go through the implementation and so I think it really will give kind of a roadmap for implementing the locally preferred alternative. But from the presentation of staff I want to make sure that this is something the public to understand is this going to be focused on the general public being able to use it when they make their decisions when it comes to the ballot because a lot of this is going to be getting public support on the ballot. Well Commissioner Bertrand I really appreciate your input on thinking about how we can provide some maybe fact sheets or dashboard type of materials that would go along with a more technical report and that's a great thing for us to consider. I think that's highly critical because the public needs to be supportive of this if it's even going to go forward. My second question is and you sort of alluded to grants etc that would be state maybe federal stuff like that and what kind of moving forward you know when you get this proposal approved if it is approved what kind of grants and such are you going to be talking about and what kind of amounts are those are they you know I'm just trying to get an idea of what that portion of the business plan is. So as far as the funding sources there is one of the appendices in the back of the report lays out the funding sources that we're looking towards to help implement this project and there is amounts in there that are assumed and it'll be that information that will be utilizing in the business plan. There are a number of different sources I don't really have it on the tip of my tongue of what those are both state and federal sources. I did look at that table. Yes for doing studies mostly but you know basically to get us an idea of how to move forward but you know okay thank you very much. Thank you Commissioner. The chair recognizes Commissioner Brown. Thank you Chair Gonzales. I just wanted to follow up on the question and the response of Commissioner Rockins question about the potential for and I think others have been getting at this the potential for getting you know accurate assessments cost assessments given all of the unknowns new technologies and you know other you know alternative possibilities for getting us to you know a clean rail light rail and or trolley or something else alternative and so I guess I'm and I've been I'm not being well versed in the content and purpose of business well I understand the purpose but you know kind of how business plans are developed. It seems to me that because we don't have a clear plan that like I'm just wondering is there another step that could be and you know maybe a pre-business plan or something like that that isn't really you know spending a lot of energy and time on something that we may not end up you know pursuing so I guess I'm just wondering what your thoughts are about that and I know this was in response to our quest from the CTC so I don't want to minimize the you know rationale for it but just wondering about that possibility. So you know we do realize that this is a planning study that our cost estimates are based on it being a planning study that the further you go and implementing a project getting through environmental and 30 percent design and increased percentage of design the more information you have about the cost of the project and so right now we have a 50 contingency on the cost which is you know a big chunk of money but as you go forward and you know develop more detailed information then you have better cost estimates. For the business plan as far as you know you know when do you provide a business plan you know executive director Preston mentioned that something it's a living document that can be updated every so many years in order to increase the information in there to better represent more recent information. Can I answer all of your questions? I'm not sure I got them all. Okay thank you. Thank you Commissioner Brown. Chair recognizes Commissioner Cohen. Thank you chair. I just wanted to clarify and we've heard this notion a couple of times that maybe a TIG AM trolley type alternative might be preferred if we were even going to contemplate that would not the ridership numbers need to be reevaluated I mean essentially there would be less a very substantially different level of service so you know the notion that we're just going to cut the cost in half because now we're doing a trolley I mean would we not also need to consider the impacts on ridership? I have not you know part of the alternatives analysis was not to look specifically at the TIG AM model um so I don't think I I don't really feel like I have an answer to you for that um as far as how it would impact ridership I don't know if you have any sense of impact ridership. The TIG AM vehicle is essentially the light rail vehicle that was contemplated in our study so we did look at a system similar to a TIG AM vehicle running on our line and the cost estimates we have are um significantly higher than the cost estimates that TIG AM provided us um TIG AM provided us a proposal to do a public-private partnership and their cost estimates were only based on um pretty much the rail up it didn't consider the infrastructure below the railing the culverts the bridges significant other costs that would would increase the overall cost of the project so it's you know that I wouldn't say that the TIG AM model was not considered I think it it was it's just their their governance model of doing a public-private public-private partnership was not um at this particular time we think that that's way too early it's something that could certainly be discussed if this project was to move forward towards the environmental phase and then you could develop a different business plan based on a public-private partnership that that's the direction the commission would like to go thank you just a couple additional questions um you know the notion of a hydrogen train was mentioned I mean is that technology in place anywhere in the country today um TIG AM is um I know that their vehicles are being used in Dubai which is obviously not in this country um but they've also entered into a contract with the city of Riverside to potentially provide their vehicles for use there even though it's hydrogen cell it's hydrogen electrics so that's why you know we didn't specify the exact vehicle type you know it could just be traditionally generated electric or it could be hydrogen cell electric those are the types of decisions that you don't need to make at this particular time um you could do you know your vehicle selection after the environmental phase and and choose one of many different types of vehicles thank you one last question uh I believe um Supervisor Caput you know asked about whether other systems like this were in place today uh and San Bernardino County was referenced I would like to point out that is a county of two million people um and I'm curious you know in our in our business analysis or uh business study if we're looking at you know the total serviceable area and comparable systems um I mean maybe I should say uh you know has has there been a successful passenger light rail implementation for a population of our size 275,000 people in this county Mr. Coving says his hands up yeah I thank thank you um as commissioner I just wanted to weigh in here and as I've mentioned before or as I believe we um Ginger mentioned I do have Kyle Gradinger from this from Caltrans uh rail statewide and he has um some knowledge that I think he could share with us on this exact point so Kyle could you maybe answer that yes uh thank you Tim and and through the chair uh in response to the question about hydrogen I just wanted to uh to add that um there there are actual examples in the state of California uh the hydrogen fuel cell um uh light rail or or multiple unit vehicle that is um in production at the moment the um Caltrans has funded a project with the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority to develop a hydrogen fuel cell light rail vehicle and we are also in the process right now on of looking at two other acquisitions uh and and this concept is based on um a product that has been operating uh in Europe on a demonstration basis for two years now and the demonstration has resulted in in at least three different agencies across Europe requiring uh more than 50 of these vehicles so um just to sum it up the the the concept of a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle which is a you know an electric quiet vehicle uh is very much a reality uh internationally but also specifically in California and and as a state we are supporting that that technology development thank you thank you just one other response to um Commissioner Koenig's question there is a table in the appendix B in the back that provides um examples of other transit and other communities throughout the U.S. as a um and it gives you a sense for how they compare to uh Santa Cruz County system thank you um thank you Commissioner uh Commissioner Sifio I think you had a hand up Kyle? Oh I apologize that was uh in response to the previous question I'll take my hand down okay that's fine thank you sir uh Commissioner um Myers I see you had your hand up for a question yeah just one last question I'm sorry I'm this is great conversation um I'm curious about I did notice that there was a list of the comments um in the in the packet today with regards to the various comments that have come in on the uh TCA report um I'm just curious if there's a way um I guess I'm just curious is there a response um kind of a response to comments planned as part of finalizing the report um just to to be able to again put as much information out there to the public as possible so I'm just curious about whether or not that will be finalized as the report is finalized as well thank you chair thank you Commissioner I can take that question um so part of the stakeholder the the primary stakeholder engagement was from November 6th to November 27th through the open house as well as soliciting comments through email and we took that information um and considered all of the survey information as well as email comments in order to revise the draft report to the final draft report and you'll see in um I believe it's chapter five that talks about milestone three that shows how the report gives a summary for how the report was revised based on the comments received and we also have um you know we work as a staff to provide frequently asked questions you know we really work hard with um trying to provide the information to our community as best we can um obviously this is um a project that's passionate to many of our community members and we can't always respond to every single question that we get but the our process has been to develop frequently asked questions and as we get comments in to go through those and pick out the ones that um we're really going to provide that uh answers to our community's questions and so we've been doing that um even past the deadline of November 27th so we can find some of that demo kind of point the public to some of those uh resources to be able to kind of tease out sounds like okay great thank you very much commissioner ruckins they have a question on the study I just want to put on the public record I was not advocating for the TIGM system I just used as an example of technology that might or might not be cheaper and I just want that really clear I mean I don't have a particular axe to grind on that particular system thank you thank you commissioner can we hear from the public there is there any other commissioners that have the questions do you not I have one question on my question in regards to the ER ER that has to be performed is this going to be formed before the the business plan or is it going to be in conjunction with the business plan there's been no direction from commission to staff to develop the environmental impact report for this um as part of the business plan we would lay out when that environmental impact report would have to um be completed in order to implement the project because from my understanding that's part of the strikeout right or did I miss read that or misinterpret that it was a um a revision in the resolution in order to clarify that um that as part of signing this resolution you were not giving agreement to start an environmental impact report that it was just stating that um environmental impact report would be would potentially be needed to follow federal and state guidelines prior to any implementation so it really was for clarification it wasn't for the business plan thanks that's all the questions I have I want to go ahead and take this and open this up to the public now for any public questions or comments I will grant you two minutes and Yusenia Parra will identify who's going to be speaking okay first is Doug and after Doug will be Deb Molina can chair recognizes Doug hi this is Doug shank I appreciate uh being allowed to speak I would ask the commission to stop with the impossible dream of installing light rail along the rail quarter in Santa Cruz have each of you commissioners seen how narrow the right of weight is and how impossible it'll be to have a multi-purpose trail and a light rail quarter in that area have you also looked at the studies to see how expensive it's going to be to re-engineer all the bridges all the right of way to do this have you seen how little Santa Clara County actually uses its light rail system and what a joke it is to the residents of Santa Clara County have you talked to the neighbors along the right of way to see if how crazy and impossible it's going to be to run light rail trains multiple times an hour past their backyards just go ask Palo Alto residents how they like Cal train are you guys crazy and if you think that this won't be a part of how you're evaluated next ballot time as to whether or not you're speaking with the public's interest in mind uh don't deceive yourselves the only reason rail works is because of uninterrupted right of ways heavy rail and constraints on parking think of San Francisco or New York don't think of Santa Cruz or Santa Clara County electric bikes are the commute future in sunny Santa Cruz plan for the future don't fantasize about the past I appreciate you listening to my comments thank you Doug for your time in your comments Deb Molina Debbie yes yes hi can you hear me yes yes yes um I wanted to just address the the comment that you've had numerous public input on all your surveys I've taken the surveys for years and I have never once seen a trail only as an option it was always I always had to write it in as an other so to pretend that it's anything that you're offering as a true option is is not true uh you've got on ongoing expensive consultants continue to cost us tax dollars money you're getting us no closer to a true community decision the two referendum referendums on this issue that we have voted on the measuring capitolah and electing Manu Koenig points to what this community really wants um Mr. Rodkin and others who voted yay an hour ago who voted down a discussion on having a trail only on the railroad quarter based on quote staff not having enough time to investigate unquote you have spent years as well as loads of our tax dollars not looking at the option of having a trail and ignoring the strong community support for a trail only it's really frustrating to watch the process of you not even discussing it miss dyker you just you titled to report locally preferred alternative I think it needs to be renamed your preferred plan when you actually ask the community by putting it to a vote then we'll see what the true preferred alternative is and I know the community wants a trail only um let's see miss mires you talked about the metro bus getting more money but other communities that have added rail transit have seen their bus budgets thank you miss melina thank you for your comments we appreciate it um nick adams and then kasey kirkhardt chair recognizes nick adams thank you for calling me go ahead nick yeah yes thank you I asked that the commission approve the tcaa and move forward with the business plan but be sure to include an affordable light option that we can implement soon the technology exists today like a battery electric street car or trolley built in california and scheduled to provide a demonstration later this year I hope the commissioner will suggest a friendly amendment to include a streetcar trolley system as an alternative I ask you please to show the video please show the video thank you thank you sir for your comments we have next kasey kirkhardt and then rebecca downing chair recognizes kasey or she may have dropped on her name so rebecca downing and then um benjamin levine chair recognizes rebecca yes good morning we all can you hear me yes we all want a robust transportation network that serves the maximum number of residents in a sustainable equitable way but rail transit doesn't accomplish this it will not run after 9 p.m it won't stop within walking distance of our major employers downtown santa cruz ucsc or cabrillo college or a potentially redeveloped capitol mall riders will need to drive if there's adequate parking at the station or ride the bus to a station before boarding a train and then take a bus for the last part of the trip it doesn't even remove enough drivers from the daily commute to ease traffic you know views from passenger rail which i love riding along the coast do sound lovely but the recent storm eroded the rail bed and undermined the tracks and and risa beach so coastal erosion is only going to increase with climate change so it just doesn't seem like a smart place to put this type of transit now the tcaa study that includes brt coordinating with metro santa cruz you know metro already reaches all the major employers and colleges the brt integrates future bus on shoulder highway one routes and uses current roads to get all the travelers to and from destinations more quickly than the train it also incorporates the values of sustainable santa cruz which i did not see mentioned in the study the city of santa cruz is active transportation plan and the ambag 2040 metropolitan transit plan currently metro stops in more places more often and better serves the needs of south county commuters because it goes where we need to go at a price we can afford so i think brt is the best option for santa cruz county my last request is to carry pico's slides be put in the meantime thank you in your comments benjamin uh la veen and then timothy randasso chair recognizes benjamin commissioners my name is benji levine and i am a santa cruz resident in the king street neighborhood i support the rail as a locally preferred transit option on the rail corridor because the train is an investment in our future an investment in sustainable transit and the sustainable development that relies on it coastal towns like santa cruz are not part of the solution but by the time i grow up much of this town that i love will be part of the past west clifton will road away our beaches will sink and many communities will flood regularly it is time now thank you benjamin for your comments timothy randasso and then debora colmer chair recognizes timothy mendoza give me to you there all right debora debora debora colmer and then um lee silvergate chair recognizes debora colmer colmer colmer you're on me miss colmer are you there miss palmer you need to unmute yourself um am i new okay now you go ahead you got two minutes um i just want to say that uh i um uh would support that the board accept the tcaa and do the business plan and that the scope be expanded to include light fast streetcar service that could be more appropriate and affordable for the public um i also would like to add that the trail only concept that i've that i've heard spoken of just reflects such a privileged um attitude toward the needs of the population of santa cruz county especially south county folks i is there some sort of plan to buy electric bikes for everybody to take that trip from the watsonville to santa cruz i doubt it very seriously um we need public transit options on the trail and um whether it's rail whether it's a streetcar service um whatever it is it's what we need and um i do support the rail and trail effort thank you thank you mrs colmer for your comments next lee silvergate and then daniel harper chair recognizes lee hi can you hear me yes you're on lee silvergate great thank you um my name is lee silvergate i am a santa cruz native of the west side and i recently moved back after graduating from from college and today i'm voicing support for passenger rail along corridor um one of the main reasons that i am supporting rail over the proposed bus service alternative is because um it's going to be able to carry far more bikes and be able to integrate more effectively with our growing bike lane system um electric passenger rail coupled with bikes for that last mile of ridership is the best way for us to be able to meet our sustainability and transit needs and also just make our community a safer place for pedestrians and riders and just a more enjoyable place to live and navigate um on a daily basis um growing up here i've really seen firsthand how quickly our community is growing i think we can all agree upon that and investing in public transit really is not optional and public transit boosts local economies so this is something we shall be really eager to do and all of our transportation experts after extensive review have agreed that passenger rail is the best option for us um this is a multi-generational project it's going to benefit our community not just for the next 10 or 20 years but for the next 100 it doesn't make any sense for us to be talking about replacing already existing usable infrastructure especially when doing so could disqualify us from state funding for the project and especially when doing so we'll surely delay both trail construction and any transit implementation the fastest way for us to get both the trail and transit is to approve rails the locally preferred alternative please vote in favor of the passenger rail today and thank you for your time thank you mr. gate for your comments daniel harper then susan salt commissioner recognizes daniel harper hi everybody i hope you're having a great day morning my name is daniel harper and i'm a santa cruz resident um i prefer the rail trail as the locally preferred transit option on the rail corridor um the rail provides a long-term solution to the county's transportation issues and will help create a more sustainable and equitable santa cruz county i think by including watsonville in the corridor it promotes environmental justice because they've been left out of infrastructure and with a new administration in washington there will be more federal grant money available to build the rail that's kind of my take on it thank you thank you mr harper for your comments it looks like it is no longer on the pulse of benjamin what do we have we have judy giddelson chair recognizes judy giddelson you have two minutes thank you hi i'm judy giddelson my watsonville resident yes passenger rail for santa cruz county a plea a wish a hope and a prayer the best we could do for the county and air is to build and install a new rail right here it's gorgeous it's open the reasons are clear create healthy people community friends the list is so long it never ends a route is all planned most are on board the talents of many we need not hard develop and implement execute do help pave the way cement a future improved our county our country our citizens yes the economy booms cars transport less the coast will thank you the whole world will too to core to tour our coast car free what a hollow balloon a seashore vacation will now be a breeze traveling style oh if you please there's much to be done some terribly hard politics towns earth and those cars the people their choices we're here on the coast our oceans amazing remarkable we both let's make this reality without a big fuss a quiet accomplishment the world watches us with a good hand from you what we can get done will add up the numbers greater than some let the sunshine and let the earth move let's better the planet yeah get in the groove a loud thanks for your ear now please lend your words and make sure they're solid and make sure they're heard get ladies and men across this great land picking up shovels and lending a hand type on computers text on their phones encourage us all now hurry and soon let's reach for the stars and look to the sea smell the sweet air while it's still fresh and it's free yes passenger rail hop on this train thank you for your comments and uh thank you welcome next rebecca rockman and then dan deon rockham rebecca rockham rebecca rockham rick chair recognizes you have two minutes good morning my name is rebecca rockham and i recently moved to santa cruise from portland oregon where i'm one remote class away from my master's degree in urban and regional planning while in portland where transit options are plentiful and efficient my husband and i regularly commuted by bike and public transit to our jobs downtown as a passionately dedicated bus and light rail like rider i strongly urge the commission to please vote to approve the staff report and adopt rail as the locally approved alternative for the santa cruz county transit corridor i feel this package could transform transportation in our county adding eco-friendly and equitable commuting options for those who cannot or choose not to drive in park as mayor meyers noted the tcaa report cites a 25 million dollar price tag for rail service and a closer look reveals that this cost includes increasing metro budget by 12 million almost half that budget is for bus service not for rail this increase could add 32 percent more metro bus service to our community so the proposal before you is not just for rail service but a complete transportation package that includes clean and electric rail service and a substantial increase in metro bus service which all works together for our beloved car free trail please don't miss this opportunity to update our transit infrastructure and prepare for a sustainable future please vote to approve the staff recommendation and adopt electric rail service as the locally preferred alternative for a quarter thank you for your time and careful consideration of this issue thank you rebecca for those comments dan dion and then dave rigs i want to make a comment here real quick before we start i'm gonna take just the last two comments from the public and i want to bring it back to the commission i think i've allowed enough uh comment from the public and uh we need to um move forward so these will be the last two comments uh that i will receive from the public um mr mr chair if i if i may um the that we we should get confirmation from usenia that they're not others who haven't spoken yet if if the commission is going to change the practice um your earlier determination was to take all public comments that have not been heard before and so i'd recommend we stay with that okay um how many more do we have usenia thank you for that correction we have quite a bit more i didn't have encountered them we but we do have quite a bit of hands up nice try it really oh but it won't work well okay as long as they haven't spoken i guess at this point what i'm gonna do now uh since we have so many i'm gonna reduce it to a one minute um public and just to allow everybody uh time frame because i know there's commissioners that most likely would have to go to attend other meetings especially county supervisors or uh or some folks that may have to go back to their employment and i do want to give everybody an opportunity so uh let's go ahead and we'll proceed and we're just going to reduce it down now to one minute okay dantheon and then davrigs good morning i will help you out with your one minute limit i vote that we go forward with the staff recommendation and i want to add that the trail we've already funded and have begun building is plenty wide we absolutely at this point in the foreseeable future do not need a wider trail it's underutilized as it is building it from point to point uh where people can actually use it to commute on their bikes it's a priority um secondarily i think we need rail on our rail corridor thank you thank you next davrigs then veronica lc chair recognizes dav mix yes my name's davrigs um i'm a santa cruz county resident um but i think we have a glaringly obvious problem and that is that highway wind from santa cruz to la selva beach is a parking lot every day and every morning and every afternoon and i think this is an economic problem an environmental problem and frankly a social justice problem the longer we delaying addressing this issue the more expensive it becomes and uh i think we need to not only approve the recommendation to build a efficient modern passenger rail service between santa cruz and watsonville but we should go forward with that with focus and a high level of urgency to get it done thank you for your comments uh veronica lc then emily trexel chair recognizes veronica lc in one minute okay hi good morning i'm veronica lc a santa cruz resident who happens to be blind i can assure you i will not be riding an electric bicycle to watsonville i want to point out that there will be a cost savings from paratransit because more people who use wheelchairs can hop on a rail go somewhere right now our medical clinics are expanding and frankly there are appointments that i do not keep because it can take me up to two hours each way to get out to capitol and back so i support the shortened transit times i support being able to hop on a train and walk in watsonville because there's a trail so please consider everyone in the population and how badly we need rail because this town is still growing thank you thank you i'll see for your comments emily trexel then nick misadi chair recognizes emily emily hi there um so the first thing i wanted to say is thank you the next i don't think anybody's mentioned the covid situation so i mean the reality is is our future is changing we're i think it's irresponsible to approve this now when you're talking about places like new york that were hit so hard because they're densely populated and they ride right and so they're close together so you're talking about a future this is not the end of something like covid so the future of people riding in densely impact trains is unlikely i think that we also haven't considered the cost of lawsuits that rail brings deaths injuries that requires that could be millions in lawsuits later you know the county will be sued for that situation uh at some point um to minimize that it requires fencing and blocking access along our gorgeous beaches which is why we live here i think that it doesn't really address the needs of commuters they're talking about someplace like even lesselva that won't even have except for seasonal access so this isn't really as much for our local people as it is for torus it doesn't go to scott's valley where people from south county go to pick up their transit buses over to let's say the tech industry um it just doesn't make sense all right nick mesadi then um carl kaplan nick nick chair recognizes nick hi everyone my name is nick um i live in the west side and i support the rail as a locally preferred alternative for transit on the rail corridor with the threat of climate change looming we're a we're a county we need to go big on transit to get more people out of the gas guzzling cars and into clean electric trains building passenger rail and trail will create a more walkable and sustainable city and will cement sand and cruise county as a leader in climate change and help usher in us into a better future and with the new administration in washington federal money will be available to build the rail um so that will be a great help and asset to us um thank you for your time thank you nick for those comments carl kaplan and then don um laurenson lauren sir chair recognizes carl kaplan for one minute my name is actually laurence kaplan my wife and i live in watsonville i have a long history in the county including a politics class with professor rock and at ucsc in 1973 for the last 20 years i've worked as as a lawyer and a finance executive at a multinational company supervising five-year plans every year here i've heard serious well-intentioned people discuss their obligation to plan 2030 or even a hundred years out this approach is ultimately a mistake we are in a world of rapid change and as such we should rely on shorter term more targeted more reliable to achieve goals in particular looking at the county in subparts as transportation obstacles differ significantly from north to south seriously consider reconstituting select bus service perhaps electric or hydrogen powered that could make a real difference faster and at a much lower price in addition and in some way any real likelihood that all the voters of this county will ultimately support the enormous cost of the rail project thank you thank you mr kaplan for your comments we have don laurence and then tom haid don laurence and you're recognized can you hear me yes go ahead thank you thank you for your time today i live in east san occurs i've been an accounting resident for 40 years i'm a member of fort and support both the rail and trail urge you to vote for a rail as a locally preferred alternative to avoid delays in construction of the adjacent trail for the following reasons the current trail design assumes that the tracks will remain in place changes to the plan will just delay the trail construction because new design would have to be made and approved all over again this happened with the rana gulch trail which is now being enjoyed in many with many wondering why it took so long in the first place any change to the plan will trigger new environmental review and thus more delays segments of the trail are currently under construction and design ready to build in changing the plan would seriously delay the progress the trail will be much more useful as it if it's adjacent to the rail service because people can ride much further thank you thank you for your comments i'm hate and david van brink you're recognized done okay so i wasn't unmuted when it starts you go ahead you have a minute you can start the clock over okay so i had two minutes ready to go here but now i'll do a minute so i live in a uh senior mobile home park here in live oak area we have 120 units approximately 220 residents and i'm on the board of directors i took a poll of uh what people want in our park whether a train or just a trail or both and there's for my results 100% said no we do not want to trail a train 20% said we would take a trail with the train and then the others would just we haven't everybody wanted really wanted the trail because none of them said they would use the train to go anywhere it's not to shock not to go we just wouldn't use it as a senior what we do want is a bus system small buses that run around town we can get around come to our park get around downtown etc we will never use a train thank you mr hate for your for your comment like you put to a public vote thank you your comment stop okay we have david van brink and then elaine ralphs chair recognizes david van brink van brink van brink uh uh good afternoon um just a quick note also uh nick adams had previously requested one minute of this time for the coast future of video um i want to speak in favor of approving the tcaa and the locally preferred alternative of electric rail transit uh the experts all support this the main cities and all environmental groups including the coastal commission and the science support this i know from my involvement with friends of the rail and trail that there is definitely wide community support for this opponents are of course rather more shouty but not necessarily more numerous uh last month rod durin senior who certainly has some insight on all this suggested if we have a project shovel ready the money will be there there's always fiscal uncertainty but i hope that we plan forward in such a way that when funding is available will be in line for our share thanks for all you do thank you for your comments mr van brink we have elaine ralphs and then gary jamison elaine elaine chair recognizes elaine one minute can you hear me yes thank you thank you for all your efforts and i'm in support of the passenger rail so thank you very much for continuing to pursue that thank you thank you for your comment elaine gary jamison and then jack brown hi commissioners great sorry about that yeah it's great jamison great thank you yeah i i hope that at least some of you would remember me i've spoken at many meetings before um i've been a passionate transit advocate since high school i am now in my second year at cabrio college i live in district two here in live oak and i urge you all to support and vote for approving btcaa today to approve rail transit for our county it is one of the most important decisions you will ever make as part of this board and i urge you to vote for it it is so important and like we've seen with so many things recently the wildfires and everything how much our climate is changing and we need to move quickly as quickly as possible to bring our greenhouse gas emissions down and this is the best way to do it thank you thank you mr james for your comments jack brown then lanai chair recognizes mr jack brown hi thank you for having me um i'm jack brown from aptos um i wish to show my that you please reject the tcaa a plan that takes 25 years for climate action is not going to help climate action um and the degree in which it can help only taking 3500 cars out of 117 000 that are currently going is not going to make a dent in what we need to do since i've got limited time i just really wanted to focus on the tig m solution here um there was a lot of circling of the drain and the answers on the experience this company has zero experience in commuter rail they have a mall ride at the grove in la where they have their 10 years of experience in millions of hours supposedly the dubai uh uh project that was noted has been shelved it's a static display that's been on for five years please let's not go down the theranos route and let's get back to a trail solution with bus thank you thank you mr brown for your comments uh lanai then lisa smith lanai when i'm sorry about that chair recognizes hi um sorry it's funky to unmute um my name's launay falkner and i support rail and trail i'm a local santa cruz resident for over 25 years when i'm a live oak resident i just want to say that i'm hoping that we can get on task with uh places like europe and china and japan um i'm also an avid cyclist and runner i definitely support trail a rail only consideration i think is very limited in thought and doesn't consider economically challenged members of our community including students who need to commute south county and those who are challenged economically uh i'm also in the medical professions um travel right now even during coveted is bumper to bumper on highway one north and south i know as a past commuter i would really value trail as well as rail both are have value for those of us who run and bike and want to get to south county for work and other uh needs let's see uh thank you for your comments mr lenny okay thank you okay we have lisa smith then gregory um becker great chair recognizes lisa smith lisa smith hi um i have been a uh actually district one uh local for over 30 years and um what i'm finding highly unusual is that you guys are trying to make a decision of this kind with a one meeting alternate from metro when the actual alternate will be seated in the next meeting it is also inequitable when this change leads to the under representation of mid county where i live in this decision where it has two representatives on the rtc today and the city of santa cruz has four despite mid county having a larger population i would request that this decision is delayed to the next meeting when the rightful representation of our county is in place i also find it quite ironic that the commissioner suggests that he wants to vote on the preferred alternative today suggests that the preferred alternative is not what he actually wants thank you lisa for your comments this is the case what are we voting on today thank you for your comments we have gregory becker then linda wilcherson chair recognizes gregory gregory becker's bill uh i'm just yeah i'm talking about the proposed high level business plan i was reading the the transcript from the may 13th 2019 meeting where mr preston appeared before the california transportation commission and promised that you would have a high level or at least a business plan by january 2000 i thought that would be great and the california transportation commission agreed to help develop this high level business plan and it still hasn't arrived and now you're being asked to support something that you have zero information on the actual cost or the actual business plan no business would even begin operating without at least having a purpose of a high level business plan thank you that's all i have to say thank you for your comments linda wilcherson then charlie wilcox chair recognizes linda wilcherson sorry about that good morning my name is linda wilcherson i was executive director of the rtc from 1985 to 2005 i support the staff recommendation today we need to have more and cleaner travel options now along our primary travel corridor between watsonville mid county and santa Cruz where we have population densities that are equivalent to the san francisco bay area our county purchased this rail line explicitly to use for public transportation and for a public trail this intent has been reaffirmed by the rtc time and time again and is enthusiastically supported by a wide range of state and local agencies and organizations including the california coastal commission and caltrans thank you for all your listening commissioners and for your careful deliberations on these kinds of complicated decisions because we rely on you our elected and appointed representatives to fully consider the highest public good into the future thank you for making these decisions on our behalf thank you for your comments charlie wilcox then timothy rand also chair recognizes carlie wilcox carlie one minute thank you um i'll keep it short and sweet i feel like uh the conversation is not included all of the appropriate alternatives the direction's going towards brt and understanding what can be done in a reasonable time frame uh and in frankly my lifetime would be uh you know welcome by me particularly uh i really feel like the economic viability has not been well considered and uh my earlier comments regarding buying electric bikes for everyone i've actually sat and done the math i encourage the staff and the commissioners to do the math uh that could be done a brt solution combined with the last mile uh solution for folks with disabilities and folks who have other kinds of disadvantages would actually be more feasible thank you for your time do the right thing thank you mr wilcox for your comments timothy rand also then trink praxel timothy rand also you're recognized by the chair you have one minute is he unmuted is he there can we go ahead you have one minute you commissioners for the acknowledgement my name is timothy patrick rand also and i come before you in support of the electric passenger train option along the rail trail this investment will serve as an equitable support resource for our communities and as a crutch for our planet as climate pollution rises it's important than ever to for state and local leaders to take action and address greenhouse gas emissions and to set a precedent for aspiring young leaders to follow developing a modern clean transportation system by expanding access to electric public transit will save lives human and non-human create new jobs stimulate long-run economic gain and improve operational efficiency in many sectors as our workers will be able to travel faster through transit and decrease traffic congestion that's why there's public support for this altruistic action and we look forward to working with you to sustain economic opportunities with equity in mind to safeguard the future for our families thank you thank you mr redondo for your comments uh trink praxel trink you're recognized by chair thank you i did have to find a mute button um i just want to point out that first of all i want to support the staff recommendation um in support of the rail option and i just want to point out a couple of um points that have not been touched on much by other speakers um one is that this rail corridor is our last cross country across county corridor trans possible transportation corridor in our county and i think it would be a shame not use it for a wider range of public transportation options um as your one of your staff members said just a while ago in this discussion in this meeting that there is um our county population is going to increase but our road structure is not going to increase over the years and we need to hang on to as many non-road based options as we in looking forward uh into the future so thank you very much thank you mrs praxel for your comments commissioner gonzalez i have no other hands up that have that did not speak last month i do see two people that have their hands up however they are on the list as having spoken last month okay well thank you so okay not seeing any more new public speakers i'm going to go ahead and move this on and bring it back to the commission um i am going to ask the commissioners to make comments only and to refrain for two minutes uh to your comments um so if you could raise your hands and then i could proceed just a point of order is there any reason we can't make motions at this time that's no i'm as a chair first i'm taking the the comments you know point of order typically comments are made after motion is on the floor that is actually uh in importance with robert's rules and parliamentary procedure the chair has the option of doing whichever way he wants to do it so really quickly any any well i'm prepared to make a motion you know i'm prepared to move staff recommendation it's seen no comments hang on see no comments from the commission the commissioner recognizes the door those want to see no yeah like i said i'm ready to start the conversation and move staff recommendation hopefully i can get a second with them so that's a motion on the table excuse me chair you just clarified that you would not be taking motions at this time i did and i went down and i asked anybody had any comments and i didn't see no commissioners doing any comments or raising their hands and so proceeded and commissioner johnson raising their hands commissioner mulhern and johnson uh jenny johnson you have two minutes for comments uh we're trying to go ahead uh thank you i guess um so i i guess what my what i've derived from all these various studies that we've been through is that transit on the corridor is incredibly expensive um i think that um that we've factored in some optional uh funding sources um that we may be able to tap over the next 25 years to reach the half a billion dollars that is going to take to build this i don't dispute that that money is available for building uh but but there isn't any money or there certainly isn't enough money for operations and maintenance so uh prior to approving uh this the staff recommendations i'm hoping that we could insert some language into the resolution that would um allow us to proceed but only after identifying uh some mechanism for making up this funding gap i believe is 46 percent uh funding gap for operations and maintenance um the the report itself says that it would most likely have to be a tax measure uh so i'm hoping that we could add a uh a whereas into the resolution uh that says uh following the environmental phase so we we addressed that you mentioned that um chair um the new draft of the resolution so following the environmental phase and prior to implementing the proverb alternative a tax measure supporting rail transit shall be passed um and by my calculations we're short by 12 to 15 million dollars a year to pay for this there's no way that that a transit system obviously can be implemented without um addressing this funding shortfall first i think that after an environmental phase we'll have a better idea of what the actual cost of whatever technology we're going to choose are going to be but i think before we proceed any further down after our environmental phase we need to to identify uh some source for this funding so i would like that language inserted into the resolution please thank you uh Patrick for those comments uh commissioner bell John in two minutes thank you very much chair um i just like to go back to some public comment that was made when Ed Bortoff was uh chair and that was by steve woodhouse and uh he he detailed that he was very instrumental and he's a county um council and he was living in sonoma at the time he was very instrumental in getting the smart proposal on the ballot worked very hard to make sure that that passed and his comments to this board was that we do not have the economic base in this county to support a rail system he was blunt absolutely blunt i cannot support improving the staff recommendation without a clear detailed analysis of what the costs are to our public we are stewards of the public dollar we cannot i believe at least for me personally in good conscience vote for something when that is not clearly understood from a financial standpoint because it's a financial standpoint if it's voted one way or the other has repercussions when we vote to do something we also vote not to do something the cost for this rail as i understand it right now and i would like more clarity because that's why i want the business plan but the cost for this rail at this time at this time as i understand it will mean a great load on this community that as steve woodhouse talked about can't afford extra projects so the opportunity costs to do all sorts of other things that we clearly know that we need to do will not be met thank you thank you i'm not finished i'm giving everybody two minutes okay well thank you you need to consider the opportunity costs not only for tax purposes but also for the rtc staff what they could be working on to solve transportation issues thank you thank you commission for your comments commissioner cap it you have two minutes for your comments okay um yeah thank you i i don't know do we have a motion and the second is you have two minutes for your comments commissioner we're still coming i i would go along with uh edwardo's motion and also include the language of patrick mulhern and if that's okay with edwardo if you were the one who wants to make well we'll get back to that i'm gonna that's my open comment uh think about it thank you commissioner commissioner brown chair recommends commissioner brown thank you yeah i i just wanted to make a comment i think my position has been clear as we move through this process and i do want to move forward with the recommendation from staff although i think there may be some changes that um or may come forward uh with respect to commissioner mulhern's uh amendment or addition i really don't feel comfortable including something like that right now it appears to me that that um would uh you know not necessarily tie us legally but it it would cause us to be making a decision contingent upon a sales tax measure and we don't even know what the a plan we don't even have a project so i think that that doing that while we know that that's um a likely potential funding source it seems very premature to me to include that as a contingency i'm sorry just to clarify i didn't say sales tax just a tax measure whatever tax measure that may be okay so i'm sorry a local tax measure a a local tax measure whatever that format takes thank you uh commissioner going you have two minutes to comment thank you i would move to amend the uh the staff we're only taking it's not emotional minutes excuse me uh i believe before when there was comments the chair moved directly to taking a motion why could i not move an amendment at this time there is no motion on the floor no it's not no we're open to comments you have a minute and a half left no god if i'm just just commenting now i would just point out you know uh miss daikar asked me to look at the table that shows comparable systems uh comparable rail systems when you do that and you look at smart uh you can see that there's about 2400 boardings per day that is for a population area that is three times the size of our county i think it's interesting that some of the speakers chose to say we need rail because if our our county's growing um our county would have to go through bro three times and we can see a real life project that's been implemented has merely one third of the projected ridership that we're projecting for our system so it seems to me that the projected ridership that's being proposed here is radically overestimated i believe that's consistently the case when we look at systems that have been implemented across the country that's my comment thank you commissioner gone for your comments is there any other commissioner that'd like to make a comment yes commissioner ruckens you have two minutes thank you the question before us today is what's our locally preferred alternative it's not a decision to begin pouring millions or billions of dollars into a particular system and basically it's what's become clear through the study the tcaa bus on this quarter does not add anything to the transportation mobility of the county nothing at all we've done a study that showed that and people said we didn't study the question of trail only we did study that in our first proposal there was and the idea the idea was you'd have to put the public transit back on highway one only the situation in front of us today is bus on this quarter makes no sense if you want to have public transit sometime now or in the future you need to choose this option and then of course not spend a lot of money on this until we know what exactly it is we want to build but you have to preserve this option for people into the public tearing up the rails deciding on trail only means they will never have decent public transit through this county so the option choice of that's before us does the bus system make sense no it adds nothing in terms of time to getting anywhere it wouldn't reduce the number of people riding on the highway we have no positive impact rail is the only logical thing to choose right now and i agree with the people that are saying don't spend a lot of money till you know what you're spending it on it's money you don't even know if you have that makes total sense you need to have a business plan some idea where the money would come from and what exactly you get in terms of like transit ridership when it made it happen so just let's make the decision today to keep rail as our option for the future but not spend a lot of money on it till we know what exactly it is we're spending it on thank you very much thank you commissioner ruckens is there any other commissioner philip mr chair it's virginia johnson i'm sorry maybe i'm not in your screen i've been raising my hand i recognize you you have two minutes thank you so much so commissioner mcpherson is supported doing the tca study consistently because he knew we needed to fulfill our promise to the voters under measure d to investigate and compare the transit options we need a better answers and now we have better answers and the study is very valuable and once again he asked me to thank the staff and the consultants for producing it but what we're looking at today is not a complete product we need the business plan i think i hear concurrence on that and although the business plan brings forward prior cost estimates it also lays out the steps that we're going to have to take in order to build passenger rail make it a reality and that's really an important uh transparency conversation with our community it's a conversation we need to have as commissioner mcpherson has said many times before it is good public policy to reserve the options along that trail quarter and i think that's also i hear a lot of agreement on that um we need to bolster our current transit system and he is a bolster of that he's a member of metro and that's a very very big priority but it would be irresponsible for us um to say this is our preferred alternative without understanding where we're going to pay for it and how what steps we have to take so i can't vote today to to approve this as a preferred alternative i would prefer to wait until april first and we have that business plan our consultants have all the information they need to pursue that business plan already it's our we've already paid for it let's get that and then we can actually understand better the financial impacts and the steps we're going to have to take thank you mr chair thank you an alternate resolution chair hang on is any other fellow commissioners there he has randy has his hand up randy chair recognizes randy johnson uh thank you chair i i did want to interject um and question why there's a two minute limit on uh which would really be a contemplative i think process where commissioners respond to the myriad i mean we had like 50 people bring up 100 different points and all of a sudden we're being rushed now we last meeting we spent six hours at a meeting and this is within it's not even 12 o'clock yet we haven't even spent three hours and we essentially have one subject here so i would ask you to rescind your i guess it's an order demand that you know commissioners um back away from that we have to you know do all of our thinking our thoughts our points within two minutes because it's just so arbitrary why would we do that that's a question to the chair oh sorry um you know my my feelings on this is that we've we've had enough time to comment throughout the whole studies uh that the staff is brought to us uh if there's any more new uh revealing comments uh i feel that you should be able to do them within the two minutes um how would you know how would you know that because you don't know it's new and what is it well the study hasn't changed so if you have any comments on the study uh you could have made them and had the opportunity to make them in the past really if you have any more new comments you have less than 30 seconds so you're you're telling my comments because you think i should have excuse me in some way have known about what's been said what hasn't not respond to the new comments that were made today and just kind of fall under a two-minute arbitrary sort of uh demand point of order point of order point of order randy you may be right but you what do you have is the right to make a motion to overturn the chair's ruling here that's otherwise we're going to spend money talking about procedure time talking about procedure but that's how you get past it if that's what you want to do okay point of order i would like to make a motion that that as traditional we are allowed to kind of not we're not we're not the public we are the people assigned with the responsibility of being contemplative bringing things in and making our points you didn't make a two-minute thing when people were asking questions i i really appreciate all the questions that donna meyers uh posed and she took six eight minutes to do so okay and you had the same right to do that also i didn't negate on anybody's right to ask any questions uh and the amount of questions that they had well i would have i do you have a motion on the table yeah i would have asked that uh you you you return to the traditional contemplative way of commissioners being allowed to speak uh without being fettered with a two-minute limit i'll suck in that motion there's a motion and a second i think we should have discussion on this motion thank you very much chair right comment on the motion go ahead and a little bit of a comment my understanding of why uh you as a chair a limited conversation to uh initial comments to two minutes is so that then there could be a motion put on the floor and then once some motion was put on the floor to take action then commissioners could comment on the action that was being proposed um i don't think that that on if i'm understanding that correctly i don't think that unfairly uh restricts the commissioners ability to comment on the issue is it just focuses that on the actions that the commission needs to take so you know it's my understanding correct uh yeah what i wanted to do was give you guys a lot of you guys two minutes to comment uh general comments on it and then once the motion was brought onto the uh the table uh then we could open it to discussion that's the procedure i wanted to take because in that way we can discuss the motion that's on the table uh can i make procedurally since there's a motion on the floor we should simply vote on it up or down if it fails then you know we'd see which way it goes and with the understanding of what will happen if it if it fails is that we'll get a chance to talk after the motion that's what's on the floor i think yeah so can i real talk to commissioner Bertrand um no wait brown he's called it randy i'm sorry no commissioner randy johnson right commissioner montecino um commissioner cap it let me uh i'm reading read back to the exact motion who made the motion who made the second what what are we voting randy moved that we uh overrule the chair and have just would be allowed to speak for as long as we like right now the chair clarified that if we don't if we don't follow that procedure they'll get a chance to make our comments after there's a motion on the floor so the choice is you want to have a right to have open comments from all members right now that's the motion on the floor all right then i rescind i rescind i did not understand that motion so i'm going to switch to i i rescind my vote to change to i and support the resolution i did not quite understand it should have been repeated to at least to help me understand thank you german i'm voting no no commission alternate mulher no commissioner conic no commission alternate virginia johnson no commission alternate mires no commissioner gonzalez no commissioner rockin no emotion failed so motion failed so i want to wrap up with uh commissioners and allow them the two minutes um so any commissioners they'd like to speak on this uh commissioner john olinkin olinik olinik did i say that correct all right hi thank thank you my name's john olinik artistic director tim govins had to step out so he asked me just to take a spot and i just wanted to mention from the cal trans perspective that we support the locally preferred alternative it has county-wide benefits and the multimodal strategy for both the county and beyond and uh also just as a point that this plan is consistent with the state rail plan which envisions this corridor as part of the state network and just as a side point that also helps when it comes to time in the future to talk about operating costs as in it has had the opportunity to help reduce the burden of that operating cost because it's part of the statewide network so that's just want to mention that we're for the plan we really appreciate the partnership you can hear from the very beginning with the this group and others and we still have our rail staff online too if there are any specific questions thank you thank you is any fellow commissioner that hasn't spoken for two minutes i'd like to speak seeing none i'm going to go ahead and bring this back i had an uh i had recognized uh eduardo montecino uh and i'd just like to move the staff recommendation is there a second a second commissioner captain we have a second i would i would like to include uh uh amendments to the uh patrick mulhurn's and also i forget somebody else may comment too you would you want to add patrick's uh amendments to the motion is that i would understand do you accept that please say what that please say what that was again what that yeah what was the amendment bedrick um so in the resolution you need it now patrick you weren't but you are again you're beautiful yeah i'm sorry i'm trying to switch between documents here um so in the resolution um we've already no you mean it again anyway we've already changed the language and um in the the resolution to acknowledge that uh we would be obligated to enter an environmental study so what i'm asking is that following so another the next whereas would be following the environmental phase prior to implementing the preferred alternative a tax measure a tax measure supporting rail transit shall be passed that's all just just because it's acknowledging that the report says that there's already a funding gap before we we we commit to whatever the product of the environmental uh studies is we have identified some way to pay for it before we continue to invest in it that's all do you accept that amendment uh commissioner no i don't second it's not um i believe an amendment point of order i believe an amendment seconded or not and it does not necessarily to be accepted as a friendly amendment by the maker of the motion correct obviously yeah well i understand it was a commissioner cap it was adding that to his second um requesting that but but the make but the maker of the motion doesn't see this friendly so we have to be voted on as a separate amendment and then it's correct it would vote on the amendment before you vote on the main motion okay uh so very prestigious learning process for me also so that's fine all right so i guess we we we have a motion to amend in the second i just want to clarify something uh uh patrick are you saying we have to have a countywide one vote on us some kind of tax before we go forward yeah before we build a rail transit project yes we've identified a tax measure to address the funding shortfall that we're already projecting for this project i i yeah i don't go along with that okay okay we have roll call please no wait a minute wait a minute you're not clear on the motion chair i think that the commission needs to be clear because i've heard a motion and then there was an attempt to second with an amendment that was not accepted and so so yeah and from what i understood procedurally that patrick was making the um requesting the amendment to the motion and that mr um uh commissioner manu but second that uh and i need to go through that process first before i can come back to you know if you have an amended motion on the floor and you have a second on the amended motion and then you can act on that yes not amended there's just an emotion to make an amendment which needs to be discussed and then just vote it on first before you come back to the main motion yes exactly and i think andy wants to talk on the on the amendment so we're going to go ahead and discuss on the post amendment for the motion andy go ahead yes um i don't really support the amendment because i feel it's premature to decide that what the financing is going to be before we have any information about potential financing um alternate johnson talked about the lack of information we have about financing um the the pcaa has gross cost it really doesn't talk about um how those costs could be met i feel there's so much uncertainty about the future um and what funding will be available what might be feasible what might not be feasible to assume that there's going to be the need for tax measure without the financial information just seems very premature to me so i i think we should put off i don't think i i'm just not willing to support that amendment because i don't think that there um it's really uh right but this time to make that uh make that commitment thank you and commissioner andy um commissioner belton so basically we've made a lot of assumptions that this proposal to build whatever it is that we agree with on the transit quarter is going to be funded by grants somehow the feds or the state is going to come in make up for what we cannot pay for ourselves so to me it's very reasonable and it's not an assumption on patrick's part that we're going to need some sort of community support for this particular whatever the proposal actually is and so actually to put that into the motion and i agree with gray he's trying to understand how we're going to pay for this so he's thinking about what patrick said as an amendment and it's very reasonable to have something in there so the public knows that when we put this word before them we actually need to know how much you are going to make this possible so in politics when we're trying to figure out how we move forward it's the possible and in something like this a major infrastructure project it has to be possible there has to be money to pay for it so i think it's disingenuous to the public they're looking to us to figure out a possible proposal which has to include how much money we are going to make available to make it possible thank you thank you commissioner commissioner rothkins this will allow some of us to make briefer comments on the main motion because we're getting out one of the points here i agree with andy's point it's not that at some point you can't build a railroad without some kind of decision about how you're going to pay for it and you don't spend a lot of money on either environmental studies or engineering studies to 30 or any others until you have some idea of where you're going and where the money might come from i don't disagree with that the question is the timing and i don't think this is the time for us to stick this in the middle of this the public has to understand we were not going to spend millions of dollars or billions of dollars on a train proposal without knowing where the money is coming from that'll have to happen somewhere further down the road but i don't want to tie down the the idea that we're choosing rail is our long-term study option this is our best proposal with this with this particular constraint i think it would be a mistake at this time not it's a mistake at some point later for sure commissioner recognize chair recognizes that thank you chair just just very very briefly the i'm i'm this is this is from the tcaa that i'm identifying this deficiency an additional state federal and or local source of funds will be needed to fund a shortfall from what is reasonably expected from existing fund sources the report says there's a funding shortfall all i'm asking is that after we've identified a project which would come after an eir before we begin building that project we identify a funding source to address what we'll then know will be a what the what the funding shortfall is that's all you call the question a point point of information head commission does the vote today if we pass the resolution with with any amendment or not does it require us to continue to spend money on next level of environmental review for a preferred alternative it's a technical question to staff yeah no it does not thank you thank you okay yeah is there any go ahead uh mr cap is commissioner cap it uh yeah i maybe down the line i would go i would agree with uh what uh patrick mulhern said but i i do agree with uh right now uh commissioner schiffman and rockin it's uh it's pretty mature so i i want to vote that we go forward and then later on we can always talk about putting that to the public thank you commissioner cap it commissioner uh alternate schiffner um i i wonder if commissioner mulhern would be willing to add the uh instead the language he originally proposed the language from the tcaa because i think that's more general language and it's in the report and it is true there's going to need to be um federal state and or local funding if the realized the preferred alternative is going to happen and i think just putting that in the resolution is you know is a reasonable approach okay thank you uh commission can i uh let's have the question bro call on the commissioner i just want to make sure because i made a mistake last time repeat the motion or we're we're talking about a substitute no no it's not a substitute it's an amendment to the main excuse me thank you mike you're right an amendment i just want to understand the amendment so that i'm clear on the vote uh is that me okay uh following the environmental phase uh prior to implementing the preferred alternative a tax measure supporting rail transit shall be passed i broke it up i couldn't hear the motion uh following the environmental phase prior to implementing the preferred alternative a tax measure supporting rail transit shall be passed okay i was asked to recall yesenia so i support that motion i mean excuse me i support that amendment okay uh commissioner brown no commissioner randy johnson hey commissioner montecino no commissioner cap it no commissioner uh alternate shifrin no commission alternate mulhern hi commissioner conic hi commission alternate mires no commission alternate jenny johnson hi commissioner gonzalez no and commissioner rothkin no okay amendment failed and so we're now back to the original motion uh that's on the table and i'm gonna go in and open it up to comments commissioner bertrand has his hand up uh chair recognizes commissioner bertrand i'd like to make a substitute motion if i make sure a substitute motion to the motion that's on the table right now that's correct so my substitute's motion is that before we move the um vote on the alternative uh proposal by staff that we wait until the general uh the plan the general plan is presented to us excuse me the business plan is presented to us at a time when staff uh determines that they can make it um a preference is also suggested but my proposal basically is that we suspend the vote on the preferred analysis right now that we wait until the business plan is made before us so we have the information before the public thank you commissioner bertrand i think i i i also need to be clarified on something i think my understanding is that once we vote on the preferred plan we're also uh uh moving with uh forward with a business plan so if we don't approve the preferred plan there cannot be a business plan established first on the preferred plan is that correct staff yeah mr chair i i understand your point i i think it's a good point but we're being asked to make a choice on what what the preferred alternative is and in terms of the relative cost between the four alternatives we don't have that in terms of the business plan now ginger did say that all this information is available and i've talked to other people on staff and i know it's available but i would like it to be presented to the public so that they have a chance to see that information and also to the point i want it made perfectly clear what we're voting on in terms of cost so to me i think we have the carp for the horse the horse should be clear you have a motion yes i made a motion second is there a second on that second we have a second uh discussion on the well i think i've made my points i think the rest of the commission should talk my hands up yeah commissioner hudkin how do you have a business plan if you don't know what the business is you've got to decide first that you have a preferred alternative then otherwise you'd be doing a business plan i suppose suppose on brt on a commuter rail which i you know other kinds of options that were probably not moving towards and to me or a trail only for that matter which i'm sure some of our members would think was a great idea a business plan on that on the trail the business plan is on something and that's the preferred alternative so first you make that motion again the people that are concerned that we're somehow going to once we make this decision about preferred alternative that we've decided to build it to spend the money to move ahead and already tax people on something we don't even know what it is or what the gap is that needs to be funded i want me to be blunt it's ridiculous first decide that you have a preferred alternative and then go through a difficult process involving the public on whether you can in fact build that preferred alternative you might decide it's not feasible that's possible i don't think it's the case but others obviously do but you got first decide you want to what is it you're trying to study a business plan on so i think the the substitute motion is i'll be blunt i don't mean it's a personal attack or something but it makes no sense in terms of a rational decision making process thank you commission ruckens is there any other fellow commission that wants to make a comment on that i have a procedural question i believe we have to vote on the substitute to accept the substitute motion but i just wanted clarification from council yeah we're going to do that i just wanted to take their comments on this got it from the table and then we're going to go ask the question so i'm just asking is there any other commission of information uh i'm just the commissioner rockin suggested that somehow the business plan that we're going to see in april uh is a business plan on the preferred alternative i just want clarification to my understanding is that the business plan will see in april is on uh passenger rail and light rail regardless of the decision today because that's what's owed to the ctc is that correct or is the language somehow tied to the preferred alternative i'm happy to speak to that chair if you prefer yes ginger so the staff is looking for direction from the commission to determine the locally preferred alternative in order to do a business plan on the locally preferred alternative thank you ginger for that clarification uh so i'm going to go ahead and ask the question uh can we have rokov please this is on the substitute motion this is a substitute motion yes thank you can i move an amendment to jock's motion just for clarification that the that the business plan presented would be on passenger rail and light rail i'll accept that amendment there's no been a second on his on that second the second that well we got Virginia johnson i seconded we have an original motion yeah we have an original motion first it was amended by the original motion maker amended by the second and agreed to by the original motion maker so you actually you have a motion on the floor that right now what we have is uh we have the original motion it still has the question still be asked we had we had an amendment that failed and then we have a secondary uh motion substitute substitute motion sorry um seconded we're holding on the amendment no a secondary substitute motion is what you're voting on yes yes the secondary motion greg okay could could the chair or secretary repeat the motion as is understood today for the clarification of all commissioners steve can you do that please so so as i understand the substitute motion right now from from Bertrand seconded by conic it would be that the um that the business plan would be prepared before action is taken on the tcaa to approve the preferred alternative the discussion of the board so far has appeared to be around the business plan being on uh the rail that is identified as the preferred alternative but the board should be clear about that because staff needs to respond to your direction as to what you're asking us to come back and earlier today you had discussion about a different business plan and so the the staff should get clear direction from the board as to what you want but as we understand it right now and guy i would ask you to weigh into if this is your understanding as well too that you're asking for the preparation of the business plan that is related to the preferred alternative before you take action on the tcaa to approve it guy is that your understanding of what the that's my that's my understanding that we move forward with a business plan on the staff's recommended preferred alternative before asking the commission to vote on the staff recommended alternative that's one who made a substitute motion that correction or whatever you want to call it to augment what i said you know my basic point is that i cannot choose a preferred alternative to the four proposals we need to have a a cost estimate even if it's rough and i've also understood from staff that all this information is available and i want to present it to this board so we could actually look at it first hand in that concrete form of a business plan so right now we have we have a commissioner moan that made an amendment to your secondary motion and steve did not relate and it was seconded by alternate commissioner johnson right and so i've i've comment on that if i can yes here commissioner ruckens so what was now before us in the substitute motion would be to ask that they do a business plan based on rail but not take advantage of all the data that we've gathered over the last year through the tcaa process which is exactly how you build a business plan it's based on data information so forth but the commission's kind of if we if we pass the substitute motion will not go behind on the issue of whether they should use the actual study that they did and the information they gathered and they concluded to move ahead isn't this really basically saying well yes based on the whole thing but we don't want to vote that we should base it on that stuff but that's what we want you to do it lacks courage on some level if you're not saying you approve of the rail that you're going to vote for you want to spend the money on or something all you're saying is among the options that we want studied further is the rail and that's the main motion that's now that and so voting for the substitute basically you direct staff to do something without giving them clear guidelines for what the data should be in a business plan commissioner alternate shiffer yes thank you very thank you we've heard from literally hundreds of people about whether the commission should approve rail as the staff recommendation with with uh except the study that approves rail as a preferred alternative or to not do it uh we've heard a lot on both sides I think you know this as far as I'm concerned the substitute motion is really a way to deny approval of rail as a preferred alternative I you know I think that um the to quibble over whether the uh the business plan should be done first or the business plan should be done last after is really you know we're never going to get the information we need to know for sure whether rail is going to be feasible uh in in the foreseeable future we can get more information but the question before the commission today is do we agree that rail should be the preferred alternative if we do we should vote no in this motion I think if we don't then we should vote yes because it's really tantamount to saying that we don't want to accept rail as a preferred alternative thank you commissioners shifter is there any other fellow commissioners that would like to comment on the amendment to the secondary no no it's the to the substitute motion to the substitute motion sorry substitute motion the amendment to the substitute motion you have both johnson's with our hands raised commissioner johnson your friend bandy thank you chair so to to to my uh my commission right many many many um I guess alternatives are rejected out of hand prior to uh presented say to a board or moving forward because it just doesn't make sense financially okay and as a as a as a board uh I made the point at earlier times we can always think like a business because if we did we wouldn't have affordable housing we probably wouldn't have transit or whatever but there are times when you have to insert the whole concept of feasibility before you start in jumping off and pursuing um um you know things that just won't work I think one of your favorite terms is a fool's errand I love it but to me in many ways it's a fool's errand to kind of spend lots and lots of time you keep saying we won't spend any money but we spend you know boat loads of money already pursuing this alternative and then another another studies to think about this and do this that are all conflicting it's very confusing it's not out of the realm and it's not illogical to kind of you know make make a decision based on can we actually afford this okay so I'm saying you know it's a chicken and the egg question but it's not crazy for somebody like Jacques to say we we want to know if this is feasible before we move forward and spend massive amounts of uh consultant times and expense and staff time and expense uh pursuing something that ultimately will just not make sense thank you chair thank you uh commissioner johnson for those comments commissioner alternate johnson thank you chair um I I disagree with commissioner rock and that this uh suggestion and this motion by um mr butron would not take advantage of the data and uh the tca in fact uh commissioner conig amendment to the commission with a second or to the amendment sorry um his amendment to the yeah thank you thank you it basically says and and and I think that the council and the executive director articulated it very well that we direct the staff to do a business plan on the proposed preferred alternative before we actually um say yes to the whole thing and that is not meant to say that we shouldn't leave our options open for real in the future or for now if we can afford it commissioner macpherson completely supports making sure that we have that option it's bad public policy to do otherwise so so it's simply saying let's have the business plan on the proposed preferred alternatives alternative before we say yes to the whole thing and that's a completely reasonable thing to say yes to vote for thank you thank you commissioner I want to go ahead and just bring it back and uh to the question for the substitute motion amendment right yeah I gotta do it it's not an amendment it's a substitute motion if it passes the other motion goes away um commissioner khan who made an amendment to his to the substitute motion we don't we don't have to vote on that because both the make both um and his second agreed to the add put that in their motion that's what we're voting on now all right is that correct is that correct that is correct as as as we have articulated and at the at the risk of doing this I just I think it's critically important that the record be clear as to what everybody is voting on here so again we understand the staff understands the motion to be that the commission would direct us to prepare the business plan on the proposed preferred alternative and that that would be reported back to the commission before the commission takes action on the tcaa which would mean you would not obviously take action on the tcaa today that's what we understand the motion thank you thank you okay can we have the question okay commissioner burtrane I agree commissioner brown no commissioner randy johnson commissioner montecino no commissioner cap it no commission alternate shifrin no commission alternate mulherne hi commission alternate uh johnson yes commissioner konig hi commission alternate mires hi i'm excuse me no commissioner gonzalez no and commissioner rothkin no what is the final telling seven nos seven nos seven five five yes for the motion else working failed right that's correct now go back now you're back on the main motion as amended okay and i do want to make sure that the attorney understood that it did fail right yeah the motion failed on a five to seven vote there were five a's and seven nos okay thank you okay we're going to come back to the the original motion on the table um you read it can we read it that motion so we can have the question was just to prove the staff recommendation is that correct yes yes that is correct i think with all the discussion that the commission had about substitute motions i was not clear whether there was a clear second with no amendments just proceeding the staff recommendation is there a second there was a second by commissioner cap it okay thank you chair uh i want to make i want to make a point of order and ask us the mattis can a question be uh can can you bring the question forward and um you know ask the question unilaterally or doesn't that have to go before a vote needs a second has to be voted upon needs two-thirds votes before you end discussion no absolutely not well rules are robert rules of order that way the chair rules and then you could vote to overturn the chair but the chair will in this case decide whether we can simply proceed to a vote on this motion we don't have to have a vote about whether to vote or not yeah that's what you know why but if for really oh wants to move ahead with the vote right now he can move to do that anybody that thinks that he's being premature or something could vote to overturn him without discussion have a vote on whether to overturn his decision that's how it should be done the roberts rules of order that's what i'm saying is that typically you you call the question wait a second mike typically have you ever in your city council meetings in scott's valley ever voted on whether you have a right to vote we don't do it that way you can do that but the chair's rule we're going to skip that step if you think we need to vote on whether we're going to be able to vote you can make a motion to return turn and once he makes his ruling well that's each i teach parliamentary law i am i am bringing the question well i think a question was asked of the commission attorney and the commission attorney should yeah thank you respond um i'm not clear what the question is but if i you know i've never heard of a situation where we had to vote before we voted on the main motion on the floor but i think that if i understood commissioner johnson that was the question he asked our attorney and the attorney should respond to it not to negate anything that commissioner rott can sit but he's not the attorney for the commission no if you have a motion and a second on the floor and the motion gets called the question gets called then the board should act on that if they wish to override the determination of the chair if there's a desire on the part of any of the commissioners to override the determination of the chair um to call the question then that should be a separate uh motion that should take place and the board should vote on that but calling the question after you had discussion is a is a motion that takes precedence over other motions and so so um i think if the if the commission is now back on the first motion which was a motion to approve the staff recommendation that was seconded with no modifications then the commission's at a point where you either call the question or have discussion on that motion you call the question and i call the question of course he did okay commissioner burton no commissioner brown hi commissioner randy johnson no commissioner montecino yes commissioner cap it commissioner alternate shifrin hi commission alternate mulher yes yes commissioner konig hello commission alternate jenny johnson yes commission alternate mires hi commissioner gonzalez hi and commissioner rockin hi well thank you commissioners uh thank you for that lively conversation and experience um you are now an expert on robert's rules of order i don't go into further thank you chair for surviving it really chair you did a great job patrick has a comment he's got his hand in the air i do it it's a it's a it's a point a point of order actually we we don't use robert's rules of order we use rozenberg's rozenberg's rules oh that's true so um it's very short i recommend everybody take a look at it's like 10 pages long it's not like a million pages like robert's rules very easy to understand mr chair may i make a comment please yes uh commissioner alternate thank you i appreciate that i voted for the staff recommendation um because we do need a business plan and it's important and um but that is a that is a vote that's not necessarily a vote to move forward with building this project unless we know what the money situation is going to look like so i just want to make sure that the money and the financial picture is a very important piece and i support um knowing that fully thank you thank you alternate commissioner johnson i can concur with you on that it's important to move forward so many many many of us do yeah we're gonna we're gonna go ahead and we're gonna move forward on this we're gonna go to item 20 review of items to be discussed in closed session um mr chair we have a quick question uh for mr meadows you said we're not robert's rules of order or what rozenberg rozenberg rules of order and we can work with staff to send you the copy that commission mr mulhern identified it is a short document much easier to follow than robert's rules typically thank you thank you we're not congress thank heavens yeah we don't have it we don't have a filibuster rule yeah really sorry mr chair that sometimes you know i may have talked over you i totally support you in your position to keep order here and i'm trying to give everybody an opportunity to talk about the subject and um it's an important topic for our community and so mr chair i'm sorry we started that with uh the you had asked me about the closed session report and i'm not yeah review we're on item number 20 now um review of items to be discussed in closed session right so mr chair we do have one item related to um real property negotiations in closed session we're not anticipating a reportable action out of closed session um so we can uh when the commission is ready we can convene to a closed session and uh the commissioners would have received an email this morning from ian berry of ctv with the zoom link for the closed session okay thank you i'm gonna open it up to the public that they have any comments on any on the items on the closed session i do not see any raised hands okay with that i'd like to uh not adjourn the meeting but uh we're gonna move on to closed session and like to thank the public for uh participating and um being involved in these efforts thank you we log on to another you should have an email so we have to log on to another site right yes you should receive it okay thank you can this can the staff resend that because i'm looking at my email and i don't see an invitation to