 All right, good afternoon everyone. Welcome to our city council governance committee meeting. The time is now, let's say 11.39. 11.48. Let's say 11.48. 11.48, or 11.39, okay, all right. We'll get off the city clerk. Yeah, sir. Mayor Merriard. Here. Council Member Cervino. Here. Council Member Villagra. She's here. Council Member Saldana. Here. Congratulations, by the way. Thank you. And Councilwoman Sunderville. Here. Mayor, would you have a floor? All right, well, welcome everyone. We have several items on our agenda and a longer time period to get through them. So we'll start in order. We'll start with the approval of the meeting minutes from our governance meeting of October 23rd. To move. There's a motion and a second for approval of the city council governance committee meeting minutes of October 23rd. Any questions, clarifications? All right, hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item number two. Item number two. Item number two is a briefing of possible action regarding the development of evaluations in compensation for a year of executives appointed by the mayor and city council. I'm here on representing on behalf of the mayor's office and your behalf with respect to the performance review for the council of appointed executives. About a year ago, in the mayor's office, we found ourselves in a situation where we're looking at the need to provide performance reviews for city manager, city clerk, and city auditor. The last year we had no special attention to the specified process or performance metrics for any of these positions last year. So we, through the mayor's office, coordinated the review and we were responsible for review process for 2018. You'll also recall that in the process last year of looking at performance metrics and performance evaluations for these executives that the council adopted, for finalize, I should say, performance review metrics and standards for the city manager, city auditor, and city clerk. This is, there's a packet at the city clerk is can hand out here that actually this may be a reminder of what that was discussed with respect to to those standards for this calendar year. You also recall that following that process, the council elected to hire consultants specifically through a process that hired Segal waters consultant to create a consultant managed performance review process and also look at the appropriate compensation levels for not only city manager, city clerk, and auditor but also added the presiding judge of the municipal court to that process. The purpose of our presentation today is to update you on what will ultimately be the conclusion of the 2018 performance review process and then also Linda Wishard this year with Segal waters to provide you an update on what regards our process. So with regards to performance review for this year, we will be asking that the staff, the clerk, the auditor, and the city manager provide the city council a self evaluation of their performance against their performance metrics by November the 21st. The mayor will ask the chairman of the audit committee that audit committee consult, have a special meeting by which the city auditor will be reviewed and they will make recommendations while asking that the municipal court advisory committee review that were residing the judge and that we're recommending that the governance committee review the city clerk's performance and that all of your respective committee recommendations be forwarded to the entire city council for consideration and review. The city manager would be reviewed by the entire city council. In terms of a timeline we're proposing that those committee meetings occur for the various positions between December the 3rd and December the 11th, that there are opportunities in executive session for review and discussion, as permitted, and that if there is formal action with respect to compensation or performance review that that would occur at meetings either in late December or January. So at this point I want to conclude my presentation and before I do I was wondering if you have any particular questions of where I handed over to our consultant. Councilman Sanival. Thank you Chair, your presentation for your work on this. Is this formal action on compensation as the last bullet? That means we will be taking a council action in a vote. That's what's contemplated there and that could be for any of the particular executives. Just let me introduce Linda Wisher from Siegel's Warrant. Don't miss this one. Good morning Mayor and Council. I appreciate your opportunity to just briefly update you on where we're at in the performance review and compensation survey process. And I'm going backwards. Trai already indicated the purpose of engaging Siegel waters was to take a look at performance evaluations for the four council appointed executives, city manager, city clerk, city auditor and the presiding judge in the municipal court. As part of that we began the process with extensive one-on-one interviews of the mayor and all the council members as well as the four incumbents and the positions that were researching. We provided a summary report and it was basically sort of an overview of the basics of performance management and the types of the circumstances that would be beneficial for the city to be looking at when it looks at metrics and performance of those four individuals. We will be preparing what, we're gonna go over some of the objectives or observations that were brought forward after those interviews that I spoke about initially. But part of that process indicated that there was a need for job summaries or job descriptions for those four positions. So we will be providing a draft of those by the 19th of November. Our compensation survey was developed. It was a customized survey with regards to the four positions and we identified what we call benchmark organizations for those peers that it was appropriate to compare the city of San Antonio to. And within that context, the survey went out to those peers on November the second with a request for their participation and response by November the 14th. Again, there are eight critical factors for ensuring effective performance evaluations. I'm not going to necessarily read through each one of these. I understand each of you have a copy on your laptop as well as perhaps a hard copy. But again, I think these are the four eight critical areas that should be addressed in a performance evaluation process. And these are the things that were highlighted in stakeholder reviews. So these are basically the top observation based on those stakeholder interviews. And I think it was fairly, it was very interesting to me in that it was fairly consistent with regards to kinds of questions and issues that were raised. So going through some of those observations, obviously there was a desire to have a more structured process, a more structured timeline with regards to the fiscal year performance rather than the calendar year. Again, I mentioned no job summaries for those positions existed. There was a lack of consistency and clarity of the expectations of various council members with regards to these positions and their performance. And they were looking for consensus on the behaviors and values that should be demonstrated by the executives. Again, there was a desire for a well-defined goals and metrics, if you will, regarding those main goals and expectations aligned with what we call behavioral indicators, which provides an opportunity for everyone who is performing the evaluation as an evaluator to have a more consistent identification of what those indicators look like when performance is successful. One of the things that was also brought forth is that perhaps we needed a greater emphasis on customer service, customer focus. And so certainly not only external measurements of customer service, but internal as well. And of course, in corporation and focus on the city's core values. In addition, there were questions regarding consistency with regards to the performance ratings themselves and the rating scale, as well as how various criteria should be weighted for the overall performance evaluation. Again, back to the structured formalized process. There's a desire for a greater process in the self-evaluation process, as well as the evaluation prepared by the council. And so one of the observations was there was a desire for more feedback from direct reports to those four positions, not only internally with regards to staff, but externally as well. There was a concern that it was not clear and needed to be identified what the link between compensation and performance should be. And requires clarification of the roles and responsibilities to the council and board committees regarding various performance feedback. One of the issues that arose is currently we're using, currently we're on a calendar year performance basis and certainly one of the things that was raised is whether or not it should be on a fiscal year basis. As I mentioned before, the compensation survey has been sent to the various peers. I'll give you a quick rundown of the peer comparators that have been identified. We are using 10, City of Austin, the City of Dallas, City of El Paso, City of Fort Worth, City of Houston, City of Phoenix, City of Charlotte, North Carolina, City of San Jose, California, City of Oklahoma City and City of Virginia Beach, Virginia. Those are the main city or municipality comparators. In addition, some of the data is being gathered from various private sector entities in the area such as SAWS, CPS, the University Health System, the Alamo Community College, Bear County, and so forth. A few others in the area. So all of those are part of the compensation survey. Our plan is to have the analysis prepared and provided by December the 7th for review and discussion with a final compensation report with recommendations by January the 7th. Just very briefly on transition, sort of as a transition year in that we want to utilize the goals and performance measures that were already developed during the goal setting process in the spring. And we want to incorporate a new rating scale with regards to four levels of rating. Needs improvement, fully successful and commendable, and outstanding. The recommendation is to include not only the four core values that are so important throughout the organization, but certainly to identify core and specific competencies required of incumbents in these four positions. You will note that the four core values I mentioned, some of the competencies that are recommended include leadership and developing others, service excellence, and strategic planning and organization. As I indicated earlier, waiting the various criteria within the performance evaluation, we have recommended 25 to 20% be weighted on the core competencies and core values with 25% on what we call specific competencies and those will be specific to the job. And finally, 55% overall to the objectives and goals for the year. That's a very quick run through. Does anyone have any questions? Right, thank you Linda for the presentation just to rewind here for a minute. You know, just as the city staff has devoted so is city council to process improvement, continuous improvement. It's been relayed over the last several years, couple years, certainly this past year that we wanted a more standardized and predictable flow for performance evaluations as it relates to the four appointed. City council appointed executives, the city manager, the city clerk, the city auditor and then a presiding municipal court judge. So that's where we are today. This is an update on the process. I just have one question going to your previous slide. The proposed waiting, and even the slide, two slides before that with regard to the proposed evaluation rating scale, where is that from? Is that just your recommendation? Is that based on peer review? It's based on industry practice and single-wattage recommendations. Okay. I'd like to dig a little bit deeper into the recommendation on those specific things and the rationale for that as we move through the rest of this process. But I'll move now to Councilman Deacon. Thank you very much. I do have a question because we kept saying over and over to establish the review for fiscal year and the calendar year. But the contracts run through the calendar year. Is that correct? Sorry, anybody? The contracts are running through the calendar year. We have only one employee who gets under contract and it is up on the calendar year. So one of the things that I want to make sure that we have one looking at this and reviewing it and when the self-evaluation happens that or the self-appraisal happens that it is going to be consistent with just the year, the work of the body of work with the year, correct? For the self-appraisals? That's correct. Okay. So all of that will be communicated to our, to the four appointees. Okay. And can you talk a little bit more about how it will work with a more feedback from direct reports inside and outside of the organization? What does that look like? We're still working on the finalization of that part of the information but it would be surveys to identify direct reports for each position that basically respond to the core competencies and the core values of the organization and how they interact with that position. Okay. All right. I think this is a very much needed step, so thank you very much. Okay. Any other questions? And for the benefit of my colleagues, you should also note that a very similar process is underway for CDS and for SAWS and various iterations of that. And the whole goal here is to make sure that as we set compensation, we're doing so in a defensible way from one year to the next. So I appreciate the work and we'll have an update on the next step as we get to it. What's that? As Linda mentioned, we're gonna start to see some of the survey information come back and then by December the 7th, there's gonna be, they'll have a preliminary report back by December the 7th, so that could permit you as a council to hear more recommendations in either executive session or in special meetings and so forth. Okay. And I'll be scheduling my meetings with council members shortly after the holidays as well for as it relates to the 2018 calendar year. So, all right. Thank you very much. We'll move on now to item number three. Item number three is a great thing on a council consideration request by council member of the federal intervening to bring forward amendments related to the MF-33 and MF-25 study, of recently adopted confidence in my views categories. Good afternoon, mayor and council. And a handout is being provided to each of you outlining the trust consideration request on the agenda along with the staff recommendation. This handout basically summarizes the memo that's in the system for this particular item. So, once you get the hand on the handout on page two, you'll notice on the right the land use categories adopted by city council on October 11th. The council consideration request submitted by council which we know is to remove the MF-33 district from the medium density residential category and add MF-25 to the neighborhood mixed use category. Circle those two land use categories in green on that particular page. After the CCR was submitted, the mayor's office convened districts one and seven as well as the planning staff to learn to better understand the issues related to the request. During the discussions, there were three issues raised and I highlighted those on page three of the handout. The potential height of new developments, compatibility and the future designation small lots. First, potential height of new developments. There are currently small clusters of parcels zoned MF-33 in a number of areas near and around downtown. New primarily of course to zoning co-convergence. There are concerns of these parcels currently zoned MF-33 can allow developments where the height and scale would be out of context with the surrounding area. Second compatibility. On very early draft land use maps, some areas of the downtown and west side sub area plans are shown with the medium density residential land use category. There has been some concern expressed that allowing up to MF-33 densities and height would be out of context with the surrounding areas. Also some of these neighborhoods include areas with blocks of what we call MF-4 zoning which have categorized as medium density residential may allow for increased density if they were to be resumed. If you recall, the RN for zoning district was removed from the urban low density residential category given concerns raised as to how it was being applied. And finally as it relates to the future designation of small lots, there are a number of parcels that would likely be resumed to the R1 and R2 zoning district if those are adopted by council. Those are also currently shown as medium density residential on some very early draft maps. And the concern here is that expressed in aggregate the densities of these smaller parcels would range from 21 units to about 35 units per acre thus indicating the need to rezone them to a higher density as allowed a medium density residential land use category. And regarding the separate request to add the MF-25 zoning district neighborhood mixed use land use category, it was noted that having the current maximum NF-18 limits the ability for greater density and transit supported land use along key neighborhood quarters. So page four of the handout shows a staff's recommendation is response to each request. Staff recommends not removing the MF-33 zoning district from the medium density residential land use category. However, we are proposing several alternative solutions that were facilitated in the discussion with the mayor's office to address the issues raised. In regards to the potential height of the developments, two possible approaches would be rezoning those parcels and then also reviewing the ordinance we currently have in place addressing the application of height allowances to ensure that their intended application is uniform. We will continue to work with our SA Tomorrow sub-area planning team members on the most appropriate patterns and locations for the various land use categories in each of the sub-area plans. The draft land use maps that we have today have not been taken out to the public community but will be after the work has been completed into areas. Staff recommends moving forward with a process to add MF-25 zoning to the neighborhood mixed use land use category. The process should allow for public review and comments including review by the Planning Commission's TAC, the Planning Commission, the Zoning Commission before consideration of the Levi City Council. This completes my briefing later and I'm happy to answer any questions you have. Thank you, Brigit. Councilman to read me. Thank you, Mayor. First, I want to thank you in your office for helping to continue the conversation on something that is affecting our entire city but specifically what we're seeing in the inner city. So I also want to thank you, Brigit, your staff for working with us to help address the concerns that have been brought up by these neighborhoods and I think first and foremost, we must acknowledge the fact that these neighborhoods have pointed out quite clearly that there's incompatible development happening and they also want to just simply feel like we're listening to some of these issues and there is, of course, never going to be a silver bullet but I think that there is a path forward here and so again, I want to thank staff and the Mayor's office, Councilman Sandoval that have been convened at my field office and I want to thank all the neighborhoods that have come together to offer their input, their support. I want to again, reaffirm that you are being heard. It's really truly a part of an issue where we find ourselves many times with the development and in design, sometimes we're caught up in this idea that there's only one option available, one solution and we've shown here that there is more available to us and that's the way we should be growing our city, to truly find and capitalize on good ideas, ideas that are done collaboratively to help move our inner city communities in a way that they feel they know that their issues are being addressed out, also looking at the overall concerns of the entire city. So I also want to acknowledge all the letters that have come in. We certainly appreciate the concerns being addressed and can agree that I think we've found a balanced approach to moving us forward. Again, these neighbors are really truly in need of this kind of attention. And by allowing the R1, R2 code to be created, it's really given us another option and I think that that is something that we should all build on, on top of the fact that again, Mayor, I want to again point out that we've talked about committing to pushing the larger rezonings much faster in this process. Because what we know is that what we call them rezonings is that they're really corrective zones. And as Bridget pointed out, there's been some translation errors in the past. You have parts of the city that have existed for a long, long time and have had to go through many iterations of zoning designations and translation errors. And I think that's why we have arrived to some of the issues or the points we've come to today. And I think that these are the steps that help us to address that, to work together on that. And I certainly support this. Are we needing a motion to move these recommendations forward to full council? Okay, well, so again, I just want to say thank you. Again, Bridget, with that, I motion to... I'm sorry, if I may, I hate to interrupt, but in terms of the motions, we'd be looking at moving forward to MF 25 and adding that. So we'd have to go through a process to get back to full council for that. So, but you need action to... Yes, I need action for that. To do the action process. Yes, sir. I would say a motion, I would entertain a motion to advance these recommendations to the next steps in the process. Okay, so we have a motion to move this through the next steps of the process. Thank you. Was there a second? Yes. Okay, the discussion. Councilman Sandoval. Councilman Saldani. Thanks, Mary. I just want to make sure that I, I'm filtering through the emails that I'm getting. I'm looking at the backup letters of, I don't know if there's support or maybe Councilor Gimigno, I'm looking at Montevista, Toby Hill, Beacon Hill, King William, without reading the whole thing, the Clifton Others images, they support this or they don't support this? They support this. And so, again, I, and maybe I was a little too brief in my thanks. I want to thank, I've been thanking everybody, but I specifically want to thank the neighbors that have come together on this. And Chrissy from my staff has done an outstanding job working with council staff to make sure that the voices are being heard. I want to thank specifically all the neighbors that we've been in touch with in and out of district one. I mean, this is just a district one issue. There was some concerns that we were having to, to carve something out because we didn't have an option. But now that we have the R1 or R2, that gives us more options. And that's what I was referring to, making sure that we have more options available to us. We don't simply have to be forced to, to carve out something because we don't have any other direction to go. So I, yes, it's my understanding that we have the full support. Okay, and then they see this, they understand the implications, the consequences, the benefits, and I'll make the first we move to the next. Well, I think we're all, we're all ready to move forward on this. The point that I would make is that there's more work to do. That this is simply one layer to a multilayer strategy to address a lot of these concerns. So this is one of those steps. And Bridget, to the staff, how are you all feeling about the next step coming forward on this? This is your recommendation as well. Yes, so we do support moving forward with adding MF-25. However, we don't support moving MF-33. But as we outlined in the, on page four, there are a number of other solutions that we can work towards achieving the goal is outlined in the CCR. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Sultana and anybody else. So I want to acknowledge that Councilman Vigran. So what is the, tell me about the next process. Are you going to go out into the neighborhoods and the communities again? So in terms of adding MF-25 to neighborhood mixed use, yes, we go through a process that allows for public input. So we have to go through back to the planning commission tap. The planning commission. So what about R1 and R2? The R1 and R2 is a process that's going through the council process now. I believe it's back to city council on Thursday. So if those districts were to be approved by council on Thursday, we would look at how they would fall into a particular land use category. So that step is more or less dependent upon council action on Thursday. We're just pointing out that there are options and solutions if that were to move forward. Those are actually two different processes already down the road. Thank you councilman Vigran. And I want to acknowledge our two or one associations, our neighborhoods that are here on season two here as well as close to McHulvin. And also the difficult work that the staff of our offices had. I feel badly for you councilor Jermaine. It seems like every single one of these issues has been challenging and difficult to achieve technical leadership on. So I appreciate that work. First rule in public policy making is do no harm. The intent of the original proposal would have addressed the neighborhood concerns. Unfortunately it wasn't going to leave other areas of town without impacts. And so we've been working very hard and councilman Trevino I think has found a great solution to ensure that not only are the neighborhoods they're experiencing the incompatible development taken care of moving forward. But we also have the ability to prevent those negative impacts from happening in other parts of the city. So it's going to require some cooperation because there are multiple moving parts to this solution. So Bridget you have to let us know when things are getting off track with the rest of this including large area rezones and the R1R2 process. So please keep us surprised at that but we want to move this forward. So everybody I think ultimately gets what they're looking for. So thank you again for all hard work and we'll now councilman, councilwoman Sandoval. Thank you very much for taking the lead on this councilman. And thank you Bridget, your team of rooting for working with the neighborhoods. I just wanted to know as we move forward on this what's the plan for keeping the neighborhood or council members surprised at the progress as it was? In terms of adding M of 25 there is a process that we have to go through. So we would go through getting public input on adding that particular zoning category or zoning district to that particular land use category. So that's one process. In terms of the other steps or solutions outlined as we're going through our sub area planning process we are engaging planning team members, the community. We have a number of meetings left that we still have to have for the sub area plans that we're currently working on. So that involves some level of engagement and based upon the CCR and the public participation process that you've outlined really ramping up what we do in terms of that particular process. If R1, R2 is adopted by council on Thursday we would look at which land use category the category would fall into. So of course that would mean notified neighborhoods, associations, getting out to the community and let them know that this particular zoning district has been adopted and where it would go and which land use category it would go. And of course we work with development services so that as cases come in everyone would be aware of where it is and where it falls. So my question is more about how you would work with the council offices if you've done the prior steps as well. We actually have monthly meetings with the council offices throughout the SA Tomorrow process. So we update all the council staff where we are with the process, what decisions are being made and briefing them also on individual plans and the process of the plan. So for example, with the land use process that we just went through we met with the council offices to let them know this is what's going on. And so we have monthly meetings with your staff. And I'd be happy to brief council members too. No, no, as long as the staff has access to you and is able to get an update on what's going on. We do have monthly meetings and I believe the third Friday, I don't know. Okay, thank you. All right, thank you councilman Sandoval. There is a motion and a second for approval of the staff recommendations on item number three. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item number four. Item number fourth consideration of that large appointments to the planning commission. And mayor and council, there are six slots to fill. We received over 50 applications total. You may have the committee that went through all of those and the committee came up with 12 recommendations for interviews. Of those 12, we have approximately 10 here today that will be interviewed. Six of the slots that are going to be filled is what the total is. One of those will only have a term that expires October 2019 because of KC-18's resignation. While all the other five, those terms will expire in 2020. These are two year terms. And as you know, the entire board is comprised of nine members for two year terms. Of course, they meet monthly at the development services office on the second and fourth Wednesdays at 2 p.m. So with your permission, mayor, we can go ahead and begin the interviews. Great, thank you. I'm burnt. All right, so the way we'll do this is we'll have an alphabet board. Each of our candidates come forward. I think if we can have folks wait in the outside as they're called in to give everybody a fair chance. So would all the applicants at this time follow Brandon Smith? And as you're called in, you'll get your opportunity to be interviewed by the mayor and council. Thank you. Who's gonna be first? The first person is Christopher F.C.M. Mr. Garcia here. Where is F.C.M.? I just walked out. He just walked out. F.C.M. is behind you. F.C.M. is behind you. Christopher, you're gonna be first. You can check them. The podium, please. The mayor, we have a timer. All right. Chris, if you can give us a two-minute statement and then we'll open it up for questions. Okay. Well, good afternoon. Is everybody saying more? Yes. And have we started the... Yeah, please. I guess, okay. Currently serving on the planning commission as the vice chair and I'm asking for your consideration and support to continue serving on the planning commission because I'm a deep passion for Santa's home year. As planning commissioners, we are charged with balancing the needs of a development or redevelopment and requirements for our master plan on this essay tomorrow. Accomplishing this balance requires understanding of the intent of the master plan, where our city has been and where it is going along with the associated micro and macro effects of our commission's decisions. The growth of our city needs to be managed in a way that encourages responsible development that is in concert with essay tomorrow, master plan. We citizens help create. We can have the perks of the big city while maintaining our small, family-oriented style of life here in San Antonio. As a former HRA president and current board member, I always look to how development will affect the neighborhoods. It's why I always ask if there's any questions or concerns from communities at our meetings. We can have the exciting developments we need and maintain our quality of life. Our board's commissions have been formed to handle variations to our codes, plans and guidelines. I'm completing, currently completing service on the building-related and fire-coded Pilsner-Byland Report and also serve in the past of the zoning board of adjustments making those kinds of decisions. I have served when it came to update their associated codes and standards and I have that valuable experience. That's one of my personal background on product of the edge of the school district with parents in the laws that still live in the area. So I get a feeling of what some of the older neighborhoods' concerns are. I graduated from Trinity University with an engineering degree. It's been about 10 years in the product sector. Doing work here in San Antonio in South Texas and a few other city projects. If work didn't take me to different parts of the city, volunteering with different campaigns and concepts did. Thank you very much, Chris. I have questions for Mr. Garcia. How's it going, San Diego? Why don't we just go around for each candidate? Hey, Chris. Thank you for your application. One of the processes that the city is working on is a comprehensive climate action and adaptation plan right now and it will eventually come to the planning commission for review. I just want to know if you know anything about climate change or climate adaptation and what you think your role as a planning commissioner might be in helping the city meet its climate goals. So I was an engineer, a best participant of the science on climate change is what it is. Also on the other board that I'm on, the building related code, which is a motion to adopt with the 2018 International Energy Conservation Code, which as you know is about energy conservation and buildings and stuff of that nature. It's interesting because the state actually only adopts the energy, its codes and standards, I think it's every six years, but we decided to go ahead and move ahead and adopt the 2018 code for energy conservation, even though kind of, we could have left it alone, but we decided to keep it up to date. So our responsibility on the planning commission to look at what the proposal is and see how this is going to affect our city and how we, how it's going to affect the development, how it's going to affect how our city changes and how does that, the other things that are under curfew of the planning commission, you know, like you have, I say, four more, so that's transportation, so that leads to reduction in emissions and that nature. You've got some on the side of the wall, you've got some on the side of the wall. Thank you for that. You've got some on the side of the wall. You're CQB appointed for the planning commission and as you saw that we, going through the SAMR plans, one of the concerns many of our neighborhoods is about the, their, they were the plan that they worked on for years and years, will go away. What has been your thoughts and positions on this project? Yeah, so that's definitely something that I've heard and I understand that. Honestly, some of those plans have been there for decades and so I don't think there's anything wrong with re-evaluating it. I mean, has the neighborhood changed? Do they still want to implement those? If they do, that's fine. We'll just have a, I think we should implement them and kind of refresh them if you will and if they don't want to change how the measure plan is, that's fine. We'll just put a current date on it, but if the neighborhood has changed, because like I said, some of this from 10 years ago, 20 years ago, from the 90s or 80s or beyond that, if that's the case, then it would be a good opportunity to bring it up to date. Maybe the goals have changed throughout the years. Maybe there's new residents that have come in there, maybe the, some of the things they thought they wanted, they started to happen and they decided we don't really want to do those things anymore. So I see it as a good opportunity to update the plans with what's going on today in the city and those neighborhoods. Thank you, Councilman Bigground. So Chris, my question is, we're kind of in a transition period right now before SAMR was truly fully implemented with all the community plans and regional plans and so forth. I'd like to get your perspective on that as you make decisions parcel by parcel under the old way of doing things. Where are the pressure points and how do you see us best able to move forward on SAMR? Basically the SAMR process itself, because it's going through and like you said, evaluating parcel by parcel to make recommendations to bring those land usage categories up to date. We see a lot of cases where the zoning is matches what's going on, but the land usage doesn't because sometime back in the day, somebody just put a big paintbrush and there's stuff that doesn't match. So I think that really comes into it. Yeah, I can understand the concern because parcel by parcel we can start changing things, but that's why I always kind of like to see what's around this. Obviously it doesn't make sense to put like an industrial usage in front of a single family home, right? But that's why I love to see what's going on around this neighborhood. Where is it located? What is the community, when they show up and they vocalize their support or if they're not in favor of something, what are they saying, what are their concerns? Sometimes we will make motions for continuance because you can tell that they're almost to a point where they can reach an agreement with the developer or the property owner. So let's do a continuance, let them work it out and they'll come back to us. There have been a couple cases where I think staff recommended a change, but the community I can tell was not in favor. So I voted in favor of the community, but I think the rest of the commissioners voted a different way, but that's okay. That's why you got nine of us. So that's the trick. And then if you wanted to make changes, the only thing you would do is you could start looking like at the Board of Adjustments because the Board of Adjustments you have to meet. After as tomorrow's done and we have how we want development to happen, you could take the key from the Board of Adjustments because there you have to, if you want to make a change, you have a criteria that you have to meet and you have to prove how you're meeting each criteria, but that's something that can be looked at later in this. Great, thank you, Chris. Anybody else? Thanks very much for your application and your service, Mr. Garcia. Okay, Mayor, the next council, the next person is, that's that is June Cacetic, and she also has reapplied for review. I think June will give you two minutes for a statement and then we'll go into questions from the council. Thank you. I would like to start by saying that both my work and my voluntary activities reflect my great interest in the future and the well-being of the city of San Antonio. In my work, I went back to a graduate degree in 1980 from UTSA, it was a master's degree in urban planning and environmental management. My thesis was on how counties can deal with development and it was published by the state and made available to all counties. I was working for San Antonio Research, preparing monthly articles on development in San Antonio and I participated in environmental assessments in Bear County and Blanco County. After that, I worked for a planning and engineering firm and I prepared subdivision and zoning applications and then I ended my working life as the executive director of a local non-profit housing organization that provided counseling loans and construction management services to low income families. I also oversaw the construction of new homes. In my volunteer activities, I was a member of some city boards and commissions the zoning commission in the 1970s. I served on committees dealing with water, neighborhoods, flood planning and drainage, sign regulation, and then when the open space advisory board was formed in 1990, I was the first board chairman for his first six years. We developed an open space plan. That's two minutes' worth. Well, then you can just ask him questions. Thank you, too. We'll go around and counsel him and send him off. Hi, June, thank you very much for serving and for reapplying to this position. One of the things that the planning commission will be asked to do is to look at the climate action and adaptation plan that the city's developing. Just like to know how familiar you are with, well, A, the climate change and its impact on cities, our process on developing a plan and what role you feel the city's in play in addressing climate action and adaptation? Well, I think there is climate change effects and I do think it affects the city of San Antonio. I'm currently serving on the waste and consumption technical working group and I hope I'm having some impact on that and the recommendations that will be made. And I think the plan is extremely critical to the future of San Antonio. Thank you, Councilman Senval. Councilman Spaniel. Thank you, Ms. Katschick, for your work. I guess I'm just kind of curious as we're laying out a lot of the growth of our city, we see a lot of pressure on the inner city and a lot of neighborhoods in the inner city feel like their voices are not necessarily heard. How do you help those neighborhoods feel like they have a voice in the next question? Well, one of the things that I'm involved with at this time is as a member of the Board of the Conservation Society, we are working with the Office of Historic Preservation and also the local chapter of the AIA to produce four workshops for inner city neighborhoods inside Loop 410. And our topic is dealing with the change that occurs because of all the growth that is happening. So we are hoping to develop a way for neighborhoods to look at growth and to deal with it. A lot of this is a physical change that they automatically say no to. But there are ways, I think they would accept it if we could get to a common way of looking at things and talking about it rather than automatically saying no. So this is one of the efforts I've been involved in. Thank you, Ms. Kessler. Thank you very much, Ms. Kessler. Thank you. Again, it's Andrew Uzuna and he also is seeking a rare appointment. Thank you. I know we have one, two minutes. Good afternoon, Andrew. Yeah, so we're going to give everyone two minutes for a brief statement and then we'll get into council questions. Are we ready? Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of the Government Affairs Committee. I've had the privilege of serving on the Board of Adjustments for over three years plus, four years now. A little background of myself from the lifelong resident of San Antonio. I graduated from Thomas Jefferson High School, attended UTSA, Management Finance Degree and then Texas A&M University where I received a master's degree in real estate. My professional career of 20 year plus career in commercial real estate banking brought me back now and I manage the commercial real estate lending group and with that group we focus on investment, real estate lending, projects all throughout San Antonio. We've been really fortunate to have really nice projects both in the downtown area and Southside, Westside, all sectors of the city we're lending in commercial projects. With that, my planning experience started by volunteer work with the city as a member of the Mayor's Tax Visa Advisory Board where then I moved to the Board of Adjustments where I served, I think five or six years and chaired the Board of Adjustments in that capacity. When that kind of turned out then I moved to the Planning Commission where I obviously served first term and seeking an appointment in my second term. In that capacity, the fellow board members pointed me as a pro tem to the Planning Commission but also the PTAC, so I'm a member of the Technical Advisory Committee for the Planning Commission and we attended those meetings as well. So challenges that I see face in the city, first of all, we know that I'm familiar with the essay tomorrow, transit oriented development, military development concerns with that. Challenges that the city I see face like population growth, how are we going to handle a million plus the residents are coming in to San Antonio, that needs to be balanced with the densities. Well, I'll answer your questions as you bring them up, but. I'll start with that question. Yes. How are you balancing growth with the Planning Commission activities? Right, exactly. So what we see with the city, million plus in the next 20 years coming in, we need to implement how those planning tools that are available to the Planning Commission that help create that, both how we stock and employment stock, some of the challenges is that most of the neighborhoods where you're trying to put in these higher densities to accommodate them, the neighborhoods on some points don't want the densities aren't, they're not knowledgeable about what that density leads to them. So what I think we need to do is kind of work, to kind of educate the neighborhoods and work with the neighborhoods. They have a very valuable place within the stakeholder table on working with the challenges that we have in creating those places for these people to live and create those densities. Some of the things that the city's kind of developed is a transit-oriented development, the TOD, which will create that density around the transit locations, which kind of creates that density and also minimizes the traffic movement within the city, which is very important also, is if you all kind of go to the quality of life, if you're able to minimize that time you spend in a car, able to have the higher densities, you live, you work, you play that same area that it just creates for a more vibrant San Antonio. So a lot of it is really just kind of understanding, giving the dignity and respect of the neighborhoods, letting them know that, hey, you're a stakeholder in this and we're not just gonna push densities on you. There's what we're trying to create that, there's a place for the neighborhoods to be heard with that. Thank you, that's your councilman's animal. Hi, Mr. Osuna, thank you for being here. Apologize, this is the beginning of the year. Oh, that's the question. I wanted to ask you about climate action and adaptation. The city's got a process called around developing a plan and one of the functions of the planning commission will be to review that plan. So I wanted to know how familiar are you with climate change, the concept of it, and what role do you, how familiar are you with the process of the cities? Well, that's part of the essay tomorrow. Is that within the essay tomorrow overall plan or is this a new initiative then? Well, there was a sustainability plan. Yeah, exactly, there is a component within the essay tomorrow. And it's sort of an expansion of that. And then what role do you think cities can play? Yeah, well, that speaks, I just mentioned, like the transit order to development is one piece of that where if you're able to create those densities where you don't have to rely on cars, fossil fuels, burning, idling in the cars, waiting to get from your home, from part of the city to the other part of the city, I think that's important. I think cities do play an important part in trying to kind of bend the arc, if you will, and carve in emissions and such. And I think cities play an important part of that. And creating those densities is an important part of stemming that. I mean, at some point it's not sustainable that you can be sitting in a car to drive out, you know, further and further into suburbia. It's not a sustainable practice, I believe. But I am familiar with climate change, and I do, it's real, and the effects are real when you see what's happening in California, you see the impacts of the flooding, the message flooding that's occurred. That's all attributed to climate change. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, Councilor Zafiol. Councilor Dominion. Thank you very much. So thank you for reapplying. Yes. Yeah, and your service. What role do you think the Planning Commission has in helping to support affordable housing in San Antonio? Right, I think that's a very good question. Affordable housing is the backbone, I think, of the service that the city can provide to its citizens. When you look at, you know, the number of people waiting for affordable housing certificates with housing authority, it's a big problem. I think the Planning Commission can serve that function in trying to make it an easier pathway for developers to come in and provide housing that meets the needs of those citizens that are affordable, which is the new center below the median household income. That needs to be balanced out also with the neighborhoods and what the neighborhoods once and needs are as well. There's always, you always see a pushback, and I've been on the Planning Commission for dozens for years and years, and it's always been me being not in my backyard, and I've been fortunate that we've listened to the neighborhoods and sometimes we've voted against the neighborhoods in support of those projects. So it is a balancing act. I think the city has a important role in providing that venue to help facilitate that affordable housing. Just in private practice, we're involved in some number of affordable housing projects, including like the mold within our team, which is one of the three key other private partnership projects on the New York East side. So it's an important factor of what would work to continue providing that affordable housing environment for the city. That's one of the things. Thank you, Mayor. We've been discussing, as I say, tomorrow when part of the real concerns about our neighborhoods have had is their community plans just disappearing away. And what has been your position on it? Well, yeah, so a lot of the times what you see is kind of a spot zone request within our spot land use change within it, and most of the time I'm not in favor of that. I mean, that's where the neighborhoods really come out in opposition. When you have this established land plan that's been in place and then you have somebody coming in just trying to drop in a specialty use which is completely against the land plan. So in that particular, I mean, you'll have to listen to all sides, but I mean, I would, and I did support the neighborhoods issue, the neighborhoods concerns voted against that particular case. The neighborhoods, there's a plan process that's in place. Neighbors have a stake in it. They invested a lot of time and energy and they have a vision for what their neighborhoods want to look like. And for the most part we'll support that vision the neighborhoods have unless there's some compelling overriding reason that would not move forward. Thank you, Councilman Bairdon. Thank you very much, Andrew. Thank you. I appreciate your time here today. Thank you for your service as well. Thank you. The next applicant is George Peck. Also seeking re-appointments. George, we're getting everybody two minutes for a statement and then we'll get into council questions. Okay, thank you. Well, good afternoon, Mayor Nuremberg, members of the council. I appreciate you taking the time to interview me for re-domination of the planning commission. Planning commission plays a vital role in the orderly growth and development of our community based on my personal professional experience, interest in community service, understanding of the development process and participation with industry organizations in prior six years experience on the planning commission. I can fulfill all the duties of the planning commissioner and I value it to the commission's deliberations. I'm the current chair of the planning commission. Also the current chair of the technical advisory committee. I take these very seriously from the past two years I have not missed a single meeting and over the past six years I think it's only been three or four meetings that I have missed. So I take it very seriously. I have served on several committees as a planning commission representative so I'm very active outside of the normal planning commission meetings. My regular job, I'm a civil engineer by trade. I use and implement the UDC every day in the real world environment. 25 years experience using it and my vast knowledge of the code will come in handy and will be extremely important to the commission and the technical advisory commission committee as we move into the 2020 UDC and then we'll start before this term expires. Additionally, there's a little thing called Atlas 14 coming down the road which is the review and implementation of new rainfall intensities for our area based on historical weather data. I'm on a committee with TCI to vet these, this data and come up with a new intensities. So that will come to the tack and to the planning commission probably in March of next year. So my professional experience will be very helpful in reviewing those and we have something that works for our city. Additionally, that technical experience is a value to the other commissioners, the ones that may not have the technical experience. Are you telling me the stuff? Okay, I'll stop. Thank you George. All right, we're gonna go around the room now. We'll start with Councilman inside of all. Thank you for being here, Mr. Patrick, for your service and reapplying. You mentioned a couple of questions for you. You mentioned your vast familiarity with the UDC code which I think is extremely helpful but you mentioned that you were also a user of it so you would use it regularly. How will you be able to balance what's convenient for you as a user and then the ultimate goal of the UDC which is also to, what's best for the city as well? That's a great question and it's a question, as a commissioner, you have to ask yourself that when you're in the commission meetings and I've been able to make fair and impartial decisions on planning commission items and it's the same with the code. As a professional engineer, we're sworn to an oath. We have to do what's best for the community, not what's best for whoever you're working for or whoever your employer is. You know, I look at it from, yeah, there's been several instances where it's like, okay, this would make things a whole lot easier for me as an engineer, my day-to-day job, but for the health and safety of our city, there's a different way you might have to go. It may not be the best thing, but it may be the best thing for the bottom line, but it may be the best thing for the city. So you just have to use the judgment as the bottom line. And you have to have me personally. I'm not out for self-serving reasons. I have the interest of our city in mind because if our city is protected and healthy, then we're all going to bet for the phone. Thank you. Follow-up question on that. You talked about Atlas 14. You talked about what's best for the city, the health and safety of our city. So one thing that we're working on is a climate action adaptation plan for the city. So I'd like to know how familiar you may be with that process in the city and also what role do you think cities and specifically the planning commission can play in climate action and adaptation? So I am not on the climate committee. I've heard about it. I've heard some brief updates about it. I'm not intimately familiar with what they're doing right now. I'm sure as it progresses, we will learn more and more. I think it's very important. It's obvious that we're experiencing climate change and we have to be prepared for whatever we do, whether it's better buildings, lower emissions, which there's ways to decrease vehicle trips. Those are the things that we have to explore. And the planning commission's role in that is to, as these committees are created and processed, what has to be done, our role is to make sure and to make sure what's coming out of those committees is what's best for the city through the tap and then onto the planning commission. Like I said in my presentation, the planning commission's role is to ensure rational growth in the city. And that's what we have to do. We have to weigh our growth versus what the planning committees are presented to us. Thank you, Councilman Sendeval, Councilman Trevino. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Beck. Really appreciate your service, especially as chair. So I got two questions and they're related to your role as chair of this commission. And one of the most important things I think a chair has or role a chair has is to maintain the purview or control of what the planning commission is talking about. Give us some examples of how you do that as chair. Well, so, you know, let's, some of our more volatile meetings, you know, had, you know, the role is to kind of control the flow of the meeting, you know. So you have citizens to be heard in your opening, closed, public hearing formally. And it never fails when it's an issue that is contentious. Somebody stands up and starts talking out of turn and you just have to be forceful. You just have to say, look, please take a seat. Your time to speak is over. You know, you weren't signed up to speak or the public hearing is closed. There's been a couple of instances over the past two years that I've actually had to kind of say, look, if you don't sit down, you're gonna be removed. You just have to be forceful. Thank you, Mr. Beck. I think it is critical for the sake of the procedure and process that we maintain some level of control with these meetings. And so I appreciate your work on that. The second piece is, tell us about, does our planning department brief you? Do you feel connected to our planning department and what role do you see as the chair and the planning, and communications with the planning department sort of happening? So there is communication and we do have briefings in our work session which is held prior to our planning commission meetings. In some cases, I felt, and I think the case that comes to mind version foremost to me is the comprehensive plan. I know it's happening and I get information from a lot of different sources so I'm kind of up to date on what's happening but a lot of the commission, if I wasn't in the industry and connected with folks at the city and whatnot, I wouldn't hear about it. I think that there could be a better job done of maybe more information shared between staff and the commission members on big ticket items like that. Most of our stuff, there doesn't need to be any more communication but on those big items, kind of plan, some of these other big things like climate plan, things like that, I think we should be brought along a little more gently versus payers of the agenda five days at the end. Thank you, Mr. Pack, for your honesty. Thanks, Mayor. Thank you, Councilor Menor, Councilman Sallman. Thank you, Mayor. George, you've got a lot of experience now on the planning commission. You've heard overlapping discussions about the work and the agendas that come before you and the work and the discussion that comes before the City Council. One of those big ticket items is I'm going to borrow a question from Councilman Menor that you asked another board member which is what is your role as a chair or a member of the commission as it relates to affordable housing and what levels of tools or decisions do you have for your commission that might play into the order of goals of increasing affordable housing the same? So I probably don't have any more power than any other commission when it comes to, excuse me, to pushing something forward like that in regards to affordable housing. Again, like I said, I hear about these things because I'm very actively in the city and basically because of what I do for a living it's connected to that. As a chair, I don't think I have any more power. I think that I do probably hear a little bit more information than some because I'll do conversations with staff and conversations with whoever is on those committees. I'll hear about it. But I don't think I have any more information anybody else. Is that what you're asking or? Let me dig a little deeper. If I imagine that there's cases that come before you all that are contentious that have to do with either multifamily that have options for tax credit opportunities that could see resistance from community members. If you're several years of having served did you feel you were in a position to decide this is something that might be an overall public policy good that may not be of any intention with what the community is voicing and concerning at the dice as my guess is to be heard. So there's this conflict. Have you in any examples that you've taken of said, you know what, this is an important decision and important component to the House of Inventory that you've cited with a project that may have gone against what communities want. That's the kind of example. I got you. There have been instances and it's related to kind of the land use portion of what we do. There's been instances where there's been citizens there that have wanted or not wanted something. She looked at the facts, she looked at, you know, kind of like, well, this really does benefit the area, it does kind of fit in even though they don't want it and sometimes you do vote against what the people are there to speak against. And that decision is based on what's good for, what we feel as a commission is good for the communities. Thank you. Thank you Councilman Salahann and Councilwoman Begaran. Thank you. The Essay-Namaru plan and looking at the large re-zones in the sub-areas and the land use plans. Sorry, I keep forgetting that, I really can't do this. Many of our residents, many of the neighborhood associations are concerned that their neighborhood plans will go away, something that they've worked on for years and years that they will go away and there will no longer be, let's say that should be the Eastern Triad little neighborhood play. So what has been your position on that since you've been on the commission? So I do understand what their concern is and it makes a lot of sense, I would be thinking the same thing. It's like, why are you changing what we have? You know, what are you gonna do to me? It's kind of a question. And I think that as long as what is in the existing plans is used in the creation of the revised plan for that area and the components of it are taken into account and the plan that is implemented has community by it that I think there shouldn't be any problems. That's the way it has to be done. You know, if you have a plan that the community created and then also we erase it, implement a plan that is not at all similar, that's where the community will have an issue. I find that I'm gonna stick with you on this one because this is being chaired. I wanted to ask you a little bit deeper, but a lot of the residents come forward and they have a sense of attachment to that plan. So how do you all reconcile that sense of attachment that they have out of all of that, which maybe the new plan that's going to be, how do you all address that issue? Well, I think you just have to make sure they understand and explain to them that the new plan is similar, if not the same. They're not losing any of the community feel that they have existing or that they created their original plan to create. You know, we're not trying to change that. We're creating new plans that are more comprehensive, are larger in scale. Their individual neighborhoods are going to remain the way they are. In other words, if you have an historical district that you're moving to, and no one would have any attention to doing it. So you just have to assure them that their concerns, their existing community plan is being taken into account. Thank you, Councilman Vickron. Thank you very much, George. Thank you for your services. Thank you. The next applicant, Mayor, is Smeeda Bhakta. Smeeda, we're giving everyone two minutes for a statement and then we'll go around in the questions. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council members for taking the time today to meet with all of us. My name is Smeeda Bhakta and I'd like to share with you some of the reasons why I'd like to serve on the Planning Commission and also give you a little bit of information about my background. I was born and raised in London, in the UK and I attended law school there before I immigrated. I then went to University of Texas in Austin and majoring in government and went back to law school, because I guess I'm alone. I moved to San Antonio in 2004 and I'm practicing law in San Antonio ever since, primarily in the area of the state transactions. San Antonio is now my home and I really couldn't imagine living anywhere else at this point. I'm pretty involved in the local community. I vote professionally in the real estate industry and also personally in the Indian community and also in my children's school communities. I'm inspired to serve our city more and get more involved for a variety of reasons. I recently completed leadership in San Antonio and it's given me an even deeper appreciation for the role that each of us needs to play in our city. Not by accident, I was part of the team civic engagement and so Planning Commission for me is really the best for me to get civically engaged just because of my background. As a real estate attorney, I have subject matter knowledge in the area and I would be the only lawyer on the Planning Commission. I appreciate the importance of the orderly planning of our city. I understand that the bulk of the commission's work is approving plaques, which the commission doesn't have discretion on and in that regard I understand the local government code requirements. I've worked extensively with plaques. I understand the legal nuances and development issues that need to be considered in the planning process. I also understand that plan amendments which can be discretionary would require careful deliberation in order to allow the city to grow in a thoughtful way while protecting the character of our individual neighborhoods. So, with more than a million people moving to the city in the next 20 years, it's important, is that my timer? Go ahead and finish. It's important to think about how our decisions affect not just the city at large but more importantly the individual neighborhoods. Thank you very much. We're going to go around now with questions. We'll start with Councilwoman Sandel. Thank you very much for your application. I have a... Well, actually, I'm so glad you made sense. I know you have the whole world to choose from but you chose to make sense. Thank you. I wanted to ask you about climate action and adaptation. The city's currently developing a plan for climate action and adaptation. So, why don't you know if you're familiar with that process of the city's developing and what role you think the city can play in climate action? I'm glad I chose San Antonio as my home because San Antonio is such an awesome progressive city that comes up with plans like this. I'm actually not familiar with that particular plan and I guess I would probably approach it the same way I'd approach anything kind of like a lawyer, I'd probably collect all the available data and information available to me and make a decision on that basis. Okay, thank you. Councilwoman Sandel. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you for the application. While the plan commission doesn't have direct curvy over zoning, a lot of the cases will need to zoning. And so my question to you is you mentioned that you're familiar with some of the codes. How familiar are you with chapter 35 when you see it? Somewhat familiar, but if you're gonna ask me a specific code question, I may not be able to answer it. Okay, I mean, I think that he is to understand that there's, as you pointed out, that there's connection to a much bigger picture. And I just wanna ask, what do you think about the role the plan commission has in terms of how it relates very much to a lot of zoning cases? How do you think that's gonna impact some of the zoning cases? I'm sorry, I don't have a lot of questions. Well, so for example, you talked about neighborhoods, right, and protection of neighborhoods. So a lot of the decisions you make will have an impact in terms of what is moved forward in terms of the zoning case and how it would impact a neighborhood. So I think I just wanna hear your thoughts on the plan commission's role in being a part of that. While you don't have direct purview, you do have some kind of influence in connection to that. Well, I think it's, as I said, bifurcated. I think if it's a plat review issue, then the plan commission's role is limited to that plat review. I don't think that they have a broader role in that. But if we're talking about a larger discretionary matter, like a plan, like a kind of monster plan for a neighborhood, then I think they're kind of part of the equation working kind of hand in hand with the zoning to come up with a solution. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, Mr. Regno, anybody else? That's one figure out. Your familiarity with the SA Tomorrow plan and the different sub-area land use plans that will go eventually in front of the planning commission to have a review, what is your knowledge on the SA Tomorrow plan and what is your take on it, I guess, from your position right now? I mean, I'm somewhat familiar with the SA Tomorrow plan. And I think overall, it is a good plan for our city. I know a lot of work went into it and I think our role in this plan. Thank you very much, Megan. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Thank you all. So the next applicant is with us often. And Adam, as you're coming up, we're giving everyone two minutes for a statement and then we'll go around with questions. Okay. Mr. Mayor. Yes. Councilman, thank you very much for coming. Talk to me today, sorry, my throat is a little bit scratchy. I've done this before, so not quite as nervous as last time. But when I was trying to think of what to say, it occurred to me that plan, by the way, as I planned out when I was in New York, it was my life. I'm supposed to be sitting where the staffers are, but I'm sort of supposed to be. But things don't work out as planned. So when it came along, when I still had sort of this energy and this, this coquilles that sounds just dry for a public service, it's a noble thing. And I think it's easy to forget that, especially lately. So I'm very excited to be here again and to have this opportunity to talk to you today. Great. Thank you, Adam. We're going to go around now. We'll start with Councilman Stamford. Thanks for being here, Mr. Buffett. One of the things that the Planning Commission will do in the coming months is review the planning and actually adaptation plan is currently being developed by the City of San Antonio. Can you tell me if you're familiar with that, with what's going on with that, and also what role you take the City can play in climate action and adaptation? I've been familiar with it in so far as the SA-2020 and the SA-Tomorrow plan. So understanding that that kind of sustainability is part of the core of the three standards in the SA-2020 plan. So I don't have to clean up the air myself, but I'm sorry, but that's how things are going to change. But that's how things are going to change. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you as well. I appreciate your application and just want to ask you what role do you feel the Planning Commission has in affordable housing and the needs that we're currently seeing in our city? Well, I think it's affordable housing is one of those things that falls inside that that SA-Tomorrow plan more in terms of sustainability again for the city. I mean, if you are constantly pushing people out of the downtown core, which you know we're focused on, and it brings so much good to the community, I think, make you sure that there are places all around the city, not just in certain parts, that there's affordable housing, it's everything that's available for the City Commission. Thank you as well. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor. All right, thank you very much, Adam. Thank you. Mayor and Council, the next applicant is Julia Barrio. We're in two minutes, and then we'll go around with questions. Sounds good, thank you. Thank you, Mayor and Council members, Mayor and Staff, thank you for taking the time to add on to the opportunity to address you this afternoon. And my name is Julia Carrillo, I am the, I'm sorry, I've been a resident of Texas and specifically San Antonio for the past eight years. As a professional, I manage the Public Policy Division for the Ever's Opera for Authority. I oversee the development of regulation, policy, legislation, and all other governmental efforts. I have worked in policy and planning my entire career. Primarily focused on strategic and long-term planning for water resources and the natural resources sector, my career has taken me from a wholesale water provider in San Diego, California to the San Antonio River Authority and eventually the Ever's Opera Authority. As a resident, I am personally interested in planning and development occurring around San Antonio. As we all know, the city is growing and with an anticipated increase of over a million residents in the next 20 years, I believe that it's imperative that it's responsible in sustainable development in the forefront. I feel my professional background and education in public policy and public leadership give me a unique perspective and will help me on this commission. Ultimately, I want to be an engaged citizen and take an active role in my community, that I've chosen to establish roots and with many children. So that's my comments, I'll probably be brief in respect of everyone's time, that I won't take any questions. Thank you, Julia, Councilwoman Sanborn. Thank you very much for your application, Ms. Kechenko. So I have a couple of questions for you. You mentioned that part of your work is in regulatory development for the Ever's Opera Authority. How do you think that will be an interact with your role on the planning commission? I believe that it will actually help my position on the planning commission in that I've seen the regulatory side, been on the regulatory side as well as a resident. I am aware of the need for, as I mentioned, responsible and sustainable development. I think there's a unique balance that has to be stricken between land use and development and ensuring that that's all done responsibly. So as mentioned, as being a part of the Ever's Opera for the Authority and overseeing development and regulation of development over the region specifically, it would allow me to have a more concerning eye as plans come through. Thank you, I have another question for you. The city is currently developing a climate action adaptation plan. One of the roles or one of the functions of the planning commission will be to review that plan. Can you tell me are you at all familiar with climate change or with the process that we're doing and what role do you think cities can play and the commission can play in climate action? I'm not familiar with what the city is doing, I'll be honest. However, I think that the planning commission, that would involve the opportunity to be at the forefront of that. I think that it's a fairly good idea that cities and municipalities take an active role in that because whatever side of the aisle you're on, on that issue, there is a climate change that's occurring and it's incumbent upon the city leaders to address it as soon as possible. Thank you, Councilman Sandwell. Councilman Domino. Thank you, Mayor. While the planning commission does not have curvy over zoning, we will be making a recommendation to City Council on UDC amendments. How comfortable are you with Chapter 35 of UDC? I'll be honest, I'm not entirely familiar with the different chapters of UDC. My level of familiarity with UDC is when I was working at the San Antonio River Authority and I worked closely with staff there as well as in TCI to implement changes to stormwater codes and development codes and trying to implement change to the UDC. But specifically, Chapter 35. You feel you get yourself familiarized pretty quickly? Yes, I think I could absolutely familiarize myself. In the role that I have with the Edwards, I've had to get up to speed with understanding rules and regulations, known to Edwards, but state-level regulations at a very quick speed and I'm very confident that I'd be able to do that. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Councilman Domino. That's all I have to say. Thank you, Mayor. I'm really interested in the work and career path that you've taken. I'm really glad that you've provided yourself as an applicant for the planning for Michigan. Can you just tell me as feedback for the future, how you found out about the position and what role UDC can apply? I was actually in the conversation within another city manager, one of the suburban cities here in San Antonio, to become a colleague and professional mentor for even my graduate program at UT that was introduced to her. And just speaking to her and ways to become more involved without actually being at the city or being on council as an opportunity to become engaged citizen, she recommended looking into different planning commissions, or sort of different commissions. So in looking at the list of available commissions, the planning commission is what actually got my attention most and I'm not an engineer, but policy and planning, I think, go hand in hand with development. So I feel that my background really runs well to this commission. Thank you so much. Thank you, Councilman Salmanian. Thank you very much, Ms. Krayer. Thank you all for your time. Mayor, Council, Tiffany Chilpati was tentatively going to submit a statement and we have a check that called her and still have not received a statement. So she will not be here today. Nicholas Krayer will not be here today. And Ronnie Gess could not be here today, but he did submit a statement and it is included in your packet. So the next applicant is Jennifer Ramos. Good afternoon. That won't be too long because I know between y'all that I'm at lunch or maybe your afternoon. So thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to come and present myself for the appointment of planning commission. I'm a lifelong resident in San Antonio. I graduated from UIW with my bachelor's and my master's in 2004 of my master's. In 2004 I was elected to Alamo College's board of trustees. And I served there until 2008 when I got the appointment to city council. And so I served in city council from 2008 to 2012. During my tenure, we did some really great things. I have to say city manager, correct? That was the decade of downtown. That was the reinvestment of the east side zone, which led to the submission, excuse me, the submission to HUD for the approval of the Promise Zone. So it was a really great time to see the east side kind of redevelop. Sorry, I'm kind of got nervous. Also on top of that, during my tenure, we went through some tough times too. We had the nuclear project as well through CPS. And so that was a difficult time. So we've seen some good and some bad. And that happens in every city council. And every year, you have a lot of different projects that come to fruition. And you make the best decisions that you have with the amount of material and the amount of information you have at hand. So also I was able to be a part of some great things in district three, the opening of the Texas A&M, opening to go to plant. I know we can count on the sell down. I went to battle on who's going to keep Texas A&M in our district, because we went through three district D while I was there. Thank you so much. At the same time, I was also part of this mission for the city when we started the application process for the World Heritage of the missions. So I've seen a lot of great things happen for the city. More recently, I've worked with Merced Housing, Texas, where it's an affordable housing developer. OK, is that it? That's awesome. Councilman Sandoval. Thank you, Councilwoman. There is certainly a lot on your application. And I appreciate the opportunity to meet with you in advance and run through your outstanding qualifications. I do have a couple of questions for you. One of them has to do with your work for half and associates and your business development. How do you think that might affect your work as a planning commissioner? I have to tell you a great thing about half. We are 750 employees statewide. Our main corporate office is in Richardson. And in our local office, we do really concentrating disciplines. We really do public works, highway projects with textile. We do a lot of public work in municipal work. Land development, I have to tell you, we have probably a 1% clientele for land developers. So I don't see a huge conflict at all. I've already also spoken with the city attorney's office as well to make sure that there was no conflict, especially, you know, I love to work. So I want to make sure that there was no boundaries to be passed for any perceived conflicts. But I don't see that there would be an issue, if anything, it's an advantage, because I'm able to understand also that planning process, surveying how actually properties and parcels are developed and how an engineering firm can do their due diligence and make sure that there's proper runoff or there's proper retention on the property as these developments are coming online. How to build, you know, apartment communities where it's not as so impactful to neighborhoods as far as parking and these additional issues that the citizens face, when big developments come into the neighborhoods and they're an existing neighborhood, and you have what we do so-called gentrification at times. So I think my background now will help me in those kind of tough decisions and tough discussions and help bring a different balance view, because I also see the aspect of the neighborhood as well. So it's not just the engineering side that I represent, but my passion is for the city of San Antonio to grow. I love my city and I want to continue to be a part of that planning process. Thank you, Ms. Ramos. My other question you talked about runoff and drainage. So one thing with this piece of building right now is a climate action and adaptation plan. I don't really be familiar with that process. You are, I'd like to know, and then also what role you think the city can play in climate action and adaptation. I'm not very familiar with the process or what point you're at the process. I do have some experience when we're bringing in new concepts and how important it is to really bring every stakeholder to the table. You need to get everybody involved from neighborhoods to elected officials to the business community and make sure there's an open dialogue and open transparent process. If not, it always gets to late. You always have 30 questions right at E-session or A-session and you're trying to solve these problems. So I would just want to be a part of the conversation, making sure that everybody's voice is recognized. Everyone from district five to district 10 to district three to district nine. There needs to be a balanced voice and you're not going to satisfy everybody. I mean, there's going to be issues that you're not able to satisfy everybody, but you have to try your hardest and make sure that you have that communication back and forth to make sure that everybody understands we have to deal with climate change and we have to deal with the betterment of our community and make sure that we have a lasting impact for our next generation and generations to come. Thank you, Kazimou. I'm excited about Kazimou for being here. So thank you for your point. I want to just ask you, what role do you see the planning commission playing in addressing the four lands and so on? Well, I think everybody that's involved in city council, whether in the city, should be involved in those conversations. So planning commission definitely has a huge stake in it. I also, my background, I think it's going to it, but work for Merced Housing Texas, which is a nonprofit affordable housing developer for here, San Antonio and the state of Texas. And so I saw the need for affordable housing when I was on council, but I don't think there was such a concentrated push at the time. And now you see the impact because you see that we are in desperate need of affordable housing. And while working there at Merced Housing Texas, whether it was affordable housing in the aspect of multifamily, or whether it was people keeping people in their current homes and making sure that they had the tools to reinvest in their home. So they're not left out in cold and not able to keep ahead, I mean, keep a roof over there. I saw it firsthand. So the planning commission definitely has a huge role in this conversation as well. Thank you, Miss Amos. I appreciate you mentioning the moves. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman, for the video. Councilman, sell that to you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Housewoman, for willing to set up and serve again and bring this here out. Thank you very much for applying, Mr. Cate. Thank you very much, Miss Amos. Good day. Councilman, the last applicant who's here is Cherace Brown of Raving. Cherace, we're giving everyone two minutes and then we'll go to Councilors. Okay, well thank you very much for the invitation to come here today. I'm Cherace Brown of Greening. I'm not a native of San Antonio. I came here in 2001, living on the Northwest side for a very short time and then moved into the Lavaca neighborhood in 2002 where I've been a renter at first and now a homeowner for a number of years. So I've been around for a while to see some of the changes and how we proceed with development in the urban core as well as throughout the city. A little bit about me. I'm a pretty active member of my community. I've worked a lot with our neighborhood and in various communities on some of the housing and land use issues. And I'm currently the Lavaca neighborhood president. I've been there for a year now. I was on the board before that and through that role have worked with the task force on some of the zoning change discussions, some of them that you heard earlier today. And have spent a great deal of time with the SA Tomorrow planners on discussions, mostly on how it impacts neighborhoods like mine and the urban core. For the past year, I was invited to participate in the mayor's housing task force, representing the Equitable and Resilient Neighborhoods technical work group, which was a valuable experience. And one of the things I appreciated was that there were such a diverse array of people that were involved in those discussions. My day job is as a public health professional. I have worked for the city and the state before. Currently I work for a nonprofit that does public health education and legislative advocacy. And typically you don't think of a public health professional as somebody that would be interested in planning. I think from my experience, representing my neighborhood and my community, that's pretty obvious, but there actually is a big move nationwide to integrate public health with urban planners. And it's been a long process and a lot of people don't see how obvious that is. But when you start to think about it, it does become more obvious. Because public health people think about every decision we make, how does it impact the health of our individuals and how of our community. That could be how roads are developed, how they're used, et cetera. So, so there. Thank you very much. Councilwoman Sandhaw. Thank you very much, Dr. Laura, for applying. My first question was, would it be how you work might impact your role on the planning commissions that I think you've addressed that? Sort of, yes. I wanted to quickly explain. So my regular job is actually in immunizations education. So my paid job is not very limited, but because I'm a public health professional, I spend a lot of time in public health meetings and discussions and the annual meeting of a public health association, et cetera, which really does influence my thinking on public health and urban planning. Thank you. And my next question has to do with climate change. So the city's currently developing a climate action and adaptation plan. We know you're familiar with that process and what role you think cities can play in the climate action and adaptation. I'm somewhat familiar with the process, mostly by following in and talking to some of the folks that are involved and trying to get them to come to speak for us. It is an absolutely critical issue. And San Antonio is at the forefront of it. We really are. We can do so much here. And even though whatever decisions are made nationwide as a city, we can address some of the issues that do affect climate, but locally and more broadly across the state. So that could be how are we developing roads? How are we developing transportation? That could impact the overall climate, which when we think about climate change, it's a broad thing. And most of us like to see success quickly. And in public health, we know that success doesn't happen really quickly. It's a very long process. So making decisions that will positively impact the issue of climate change may not be that obvious and something we can celebrate right away, but we know we'll be better for the community overall. That's been free. Thank you very much. See you later. Yeah. Tell us what you would role do you think the Pliny Commission will play addressing the four miles in San Antonio? Well, in determining how land is used and different parts of the city. And we talk a lot, I talk a lot about the urban core because that's what I'm most familiar with. But affordable housing needs to happen across the entire city. And so how we impact development? What kind of development? Are we making sure that jobs are in the place where the affordable housing is located? We talked about it in terms of areas of opportunity. And if we're going to make a decision to allow use in a certain way, does it include all aspects? And so sometimes we think about the positives, we don't think about the negatives. And I want us as a Pliny Commission to think about what are the negative impacts and how can we address those before? So I'm gonna go back to public health and public health, we talk about prevention. And I think that applies in planning as well. Can we prevent the negative impacts from happening if we take a step back and think about that? So there does affect affordable housing. I spent a lot of time talking about affordable housing last year at the housing task force. That's gonna be a long conversation to get into. But I think that we can make an impact by how we determine where it's gonna go. What accessibility there is, is you can put an affordable housing. And we talk about affordable housing, that means a lot of things. Most people think of it as low income. It's not just low income, it's the 80 to 100% AMI as well. And that's what we're lacking in this city. Are we gonna be able to put that there as well as accessible roads that go there, bus transportation, other means of transport, so that we're not adding to the climate change problems by requiring people to use their vehicles more often. Are we providing public transport, et cetera, to that affordable housing? There's also the affordable housing for the lower income, which is a whole different topic. Thank you. Thank you, thank you, Mary. Councilman Salvedani. Thank you. Thank you, Mary. Thank you for your application. I'm thrilled to get to read through your academic experience and your work experience. Really well-qualified candidates. I just wanna ask about what drove you to find the application and motivation to apply. I see that you've got, you know, president of the law committee of the association to hear the things that the mayor's having a task force that we need to meet and to give a passion point and get involved. Why why the kind of condition that you're in? So as you, with you saw my resume, you see that I've done a lot of different things in my life. And so it all kind of comes full circle. I participated in the Latina Leadership Institute this past spring, which was an amazing experience and a lot of that was geared towards getting us ready to participate in boards and commissions. I had already decided I wanted to do that. And honestly, it was a matter of looking through the different commissions, seeing which one really worked for me. And I think having been involved with my neighborhood association for a number of years and then more recently as president, I've been involved in a lot of discussions about planning, both formally, as well as we have another informal group that is mostly urban core residents who've been involved in more formal capacities in informal capacities. We have sort of a monthly lunch to discuss housing and land use. That's given me a lot of ideas about where we can go with it. So those were probably the motivating factors. I felt like I wanted to do something and this would be a good role for me to step in to give in my experience with my neighborhood, but I'm gonna come back to public health. That is what drives me. And a public health professional thinks about the whole community. We're different from physicians whose focus is on an individual. So as a public health professional, we're looking at how does our decision affect everybody in the community, not just getting that one person well. And I think that relates a lot to what we can do in planning is how do the decisions we make, how are they gonna impact the broader community? Councilman Simon. Thank you very much, Rhys. For your application. 1.30 p.m. on this 13th day of November, 2018, pursuant to the authority granted by Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code DTCS, the Texas Supervenues Act and Governance Council Committee will now recess new executive session to discuss and deliberate the appointment and planning commission members for the Texas Government Code Section 5512074 for Snowmackers. Unfortunately, not every home we want to be on the commission is gonna get selected because they have a limited number of spots, but I would tell you that we wanna find places that are all keen to serve our community because it's a very impressive group of people and we wanna thank you for your stepping forward and applying to serve our community. So at this time, I'll entertain a motion for appointments to the planning commission. Councilman Trevino. Mayor, I'd like to make the motion for the term expiring 2019 in October. Christopher Garcia. And the following would expire October 2020. That would be as follows. June Kaczek. George Peck. Judith Garriam. Jennifer Ramos. Sharice Ror-Alegrin. Okay, there's a motion and a second for the slight planning commission members. Effective immediately, any comments from my colleagues? Okay, hearing none. I just wanted to add that this will go on the full council item for November 2019. November 2019, end of the month, okay. Thank you again, everyone. Hearing no further comments or questions, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. That is the remainder of our governance committee agenda. We are now adjourned. Thank you.