 Good afternoon. I am really happy to be here. Thank you Hudson and thank you councilman Nirenburg for inviting me to participate It's good to be back out here in district 8 other than had a budget meeting So I'm rather impressed that so many of you are here. We're competing with some pretty nice weather this afternoon But it's so great to be here at Hardburger Park Betty, Sutherland and I before this started We're just reminiscing about working on the acquisition of this property 10 years ago and then working on the 2007 bond program to have some funds available to be able to build this ecology center with the help of the community and What a wonderful wonderful asset this this great park is so we're really pleased to be here this afternoon So I do want to thank councilman Nirenburg for inviting me I'm going to use some notes because he told me I had five minutes and nothing more than that So I want to be quick so we can get on to your work session But personally for me it is always an opportunity and a pleasure to be here with you So what I thought I'd do is just quickly three things this afternoon in my comments first To talk with you a little bit in an overview about what we will embark on with our comprehensive plan For the city secondly a little bit about some major capital improvement projects That are happening here in district 8 and then thirdly introduce our chief of police our interim chief of police Tony Trevino who's here and tell you a little bit about our search process. So let me begin By talking just for a few minutes about our comprehensive plan as you know, we're embarking on a rather ambitious urban planning endeavor and This is an update of our comprehensive plan and that hasn't happened for over 20 years So we're excited to be able to have this opportunity to Update that plan and as you know councilman Nirenburg chairs the comprehensive planning committee of the city council so This district will have a big role in that process and according to our Texas state demographer Bear County will grow by at least 1.1 million new residents by the year 2040 with more than half of that growth Expected within the city limits one million more people means five hundred thousand more homes five hundred thousand more Jobs and lots more cars So we have a lot of work to do and the pressures projected population growth Necessitates a thorough review and update of our city policies not only the planning of how we want the city to grow But also the policies related to our comprehensive plan how what how and where we want to see that growth Updating our transportation plan as well as our sustainability What can we do to protect the environment as part of the growth? so the city looks forward to collaborating with all sectors of the community to make this incredible endeavor happen and a sustainable public engagement campaign is currently being developed and This is to ensure that the entire community is engaged in the conversation about how we grow in an authentic manner and Also one that is Appropriate for San Antonio So some of the things that the public engagement will include are youth town hall meetings Because we want those people who will be living working earning Educating in the community in the year 2040 when we have one million more people here in Bear County to be at the table With us helping us plan the community There's also a go where they are Engagement with residents and it is a program to make sure we get out into the community and talk with not those of Us who attend all of these kinds of meetings regularly But to reach everyone in the community and get their input also neighborhood association workshops and aggressive use of today's social media So we'll be using all of these avenues and I encourage you to participate in some of the many opportunities that will shape San Antonio in the year 2040 and a community-wide kickoff event will take place on Saturday April 11th at the Alamo Convocation Center beginning at 10 a.m. And I hope we'll see you there Now just a comment about annexation as our community addresses these substantial growth We also have to review our annexation policies and John Dugan our planning director is here And he's going to talk with you in just a few minutes But annexation projects for future development by existing zoning and public health safety codes facilitates long-range planning and promotes economic growth good annexation planning ensures that our city grows in an orderly fashion and we've spent quite a bit of time Over the past year and a half studying Different areas of the city and whether or not it's appropriate and whether or not the community Desires to annex these areas to become a part of the city San Antonio's annexation program identifies areas where the city may choose to initiate further annexations estimate phasing of the annexations and provide projections For the next ten years and on December 4th, 2014 the city council asked staff to initiate planning studies for five priority areas and The first three areas that will be completed this December of 2015 are out I 10 to the west So Northwest of us up up to 81 to the north and then I 10 to the east There are three areas identified John will talk about this a little bit later Then in 2016, we'll take a look at two further annexation areas one out around Highway 151 on the far west side and then us 90 and 1604 so there are areas that are being studied and this was at the policy direction of the city council to take a look at Those areas adjacent to the city limits and whether or not they should be considered for annexation to the city These areas total over 66 square miles the five areas that I identified that the council has given us direction to proceed and to study those areas for annexation and they have a current those areas have a current population of a 117,000 people and we expect those areas to grow as well so Much work in that area and we'll look for your input as well Initial annexation will extend building and safety codes for a period of three years and then council may annex the areas for Full purposes by the end of the third year the annexation process Take several years, but that is what we're working on right now It's important to retain annexation is important to retain the city's economic competitiveness in the region Facilitate long-range planning and will ensure a higher quality of development so You'll hear much more about that work in the upcoming months secondly some construction activity and I think we all have seen what's going on in this district as you know the 2012 bond program was approved by the voters almost three years ago and this program encompasses 140 different projects throughout all of San Antonio It's it's total cost is about 600 million and it was of course all voter approved Most of those projects are focused on street improvements drainage improvements and park development for the city There are some buildings that are funded, but it's mostly about streets drainage in park So let me take a moment just to highlight three construction projects Hausman Road interstate 10 that happens to be a state project, but I want to give you an update on the schedule for that and Days of follow from the railroad tracks north to lock Hill Selma Project that Councilman Nuremberg asked us to embark on so Hausman Road And as you know, that's from loop 1604 to I-10 Three miles a little over three miles and we partnered with the county. They have some bridge work some creek work Where they were going to do some drainage So we're all working together on that project in total with the city and the county seventy two million dollar project It's the single largest roadway project that we have ever undertaken It's the first roadway roadway project for utilizing what we call design build where the designers and the contractors are working under one contract to streamline and make sure that there's not a gap between The design and the construction of the road because sometimes what happens the road is designed Someone else comes in to construct the road and then they point fingers over well You didn't tell me this was here or we need to redo this when they're working under one contract There is one supervisor that's ensuring the project gets done. Well, so You know, it's under construction and the section of the loop from 1604 to road Road runner way is scheduled to be complete and open to the public August of 15 and it will that's right before school So Peter's an only deputy manager who's here who's over our transportation and capital improvements project Peter Wave your hand so they know who to go to if this project is not completed before school starts We're working with the contractor and we do want to make sure that we get this done in Peter's a really tough taskmaster, so I'm I'm confident. He's going to be able to Ensure that we're done on time and he'll keep track of it along the way And then the remaining section to I-10 will be completed by December of 2015 right before Christmas, so we're excited this project's been long in the making you may recall we had the engineering and design in the last bond program and then the actual Dollars for construction in the 2012 program, so thank you for voting the approval of that lots of pain during construction But once it's done, it will be a great addition for the community with turning lanes at the intersections and widened and Sidewalks on the north side of the roadway, so it'll be great and then I-10 from 1904 to Hebner a couple of facts regarding this project tech stocks $44 million expansion project is to relieve Congestion along I-10 between loop 1604 and Hebner and the project scope is huge Including the addition of one main lane in each direction on I-10 a turnaround at UTSA for Eastbound traffic in the elimination of a non-ramp at Hebner Oaks in an off-ramp at Dezavala So the project is estimated to be completed by June this summer June of 15 and To help with the traffic congestion tech stock anticipates To reopen the closed lanes and the turnaround at Dezavala by mid-March, so we're gonna stay on top of them To try to see that that happens the city has also made some signal timing adjustments along key intersections at Dezavala, Hebner and Worsbach throughout the construction and Peter can Affirm that I'm one of the biggest critics when it comes to our street construction and tech stock When we drive through all of us are on alert to make sure and to manage and take a look at it And then to give feedback to text dot in our own engineers so that we can facilitate and do the best job possible during construction So we're open to more suggestions today if you have some other ideas on that or want to give us some feedback We welcome that so that we can continue to make improvements And then thirdly Dezavala from the railroad as I said to Lockhill Selma. Here's a couple of facts about that project 17.7 million three million currently funded for the design And so the city is funding that design Councilman Nirenberg has asked us to Do our best to see if we can get some construction dollars We expect that we'll be requesting that at a minimum in the 2017 bond program But if other dollars become available for street construction before that will be taking a recommendation to counsel for that And as you know, it includes widening the road and adding sidewalks as well So that design is anticipated to be completed by the end of this calendar year So we'll be positioned to go forward with that and then the third thing I wanted to just talk with you a little bit about today as you know, police chief McManus Recently retired from his law enforcement career. He worked in law enforcement for over 40 years and Very distinguished career and we're very pleased that Unfortunate that he was our chief for the past nine years He was one of the first department heads that I recruited and appointed as the new city manager back in 2005 he was appointed in early 2006 and today the San Antonio Police Department is better managed more Professional and has better trained officer than ever in its history and we thank chief McManus for that Leadership in his great work and to continue and maintain this positive momentum I've appointed deputy chief Anthony Trevino to serve as interim interim chief and I know you know chief Trevino He was here and I saw him talking with many of you before the meeting began He's a San Antonio native has over 20 years of law enforcement Experience in the San Antonio Police Department and has held various leadership positions In addition to his recent role most recent role before being appointed interim chief He served as head of our internal affairs division and served in the community services unit providing leadership and guidance For the San Antonio fear-free environment our safe program which furthers the police department's relationship With neighborhood and community stakeholders, which is so important not just Responding to calls for service, but working in a proactive way with all of you He was also instrumental in the implementation of the patrol resource allocation model We call that pram for short But that was about reallocating our resources where the needs are the greatest and where we have growing populations So he led that effort I look forward to working with him in our entire police department to continue providing high quality public safety services to the community The appointment of the next police chief is one of my most important responsibilities that is one of the most important positions in our city government and You may recall that back in 2000 late 2005 when I began working with the city of San Antonio in early 2006 not only did we look at our applications those Internal to the department and those external to the department applying for chief, but we engaged the community And I invited about 30 Individuals from all walks of life throughout the community to serve on three community panels and to meet Those candidates for the position and to provide input not to select the chief But to tell me from their vantage point the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates and what they thought we needed in Our police chief so we're going to engage a similar process And I know that chief Trevino is going to be one of the applicants as well And he's doing a great job, so I encourage you to get to know him and To work with him and we'll look for representatives from district 8 to be on those community panels as well So I'm excited for that process and as I said, it's one of the most important positions with the city So as you can see in conclusion, there's significant activity going on throughout the city You know that through Councilman Nirenberg of the many many projects and policy issues That he is leading as a member of the city council and also that we're contemplating For our community. We're trying to position ourselves as a front-runner among our US cities in terms of our managed growth and development and Also in job creation for the community to help businesses here Grow and prosper and also to attract jobs to the community that are 21st century jobs That all can benefit from so thank you again and to Councilman Nirenberg Thank you for your outstanding leadership and support. We enjoy working with you Have a great afternoon, and we look forward to talking with you during the table discussions at this time I'd like to introduce Chief Trevino to come up and to share a few words with you this afternoon chief Hey, good afternoon. It's good to see everybody out here. I might be dating myself a little bit But I remember when I was a kid I was a deer hunting at one point in time where de Zavala a distance side 1604 is so like it or not growth is coming to San Antonio And I think as a community as a city we have to manage it And I think the manager is doing a great job of looking out for that future growth and like I said like it or not It's gonna be coming and one of the things that I've always truly loved about San Antonio it's a big city that doesn't know it's a big city yet and that's one of the things that really makes San Antonio a truly unique place to live and work and One of the things that we're doing in recognition of that is we are becoming a big city We are big city. We're seventh and I think there's some projections that we're gonna move up Within the next few years on that scale But one of the things that we did early on as I took office in January is We went city-wide with a program called next door who here is on is already logged into next door Who's part of that? If you're not you need to get involved in it It's really a good program and what it it's a it's an outreach But really it's utilizing social media to tie communities together because that's what what it's all about because strong communities Create a strong city and so what the what the next door platform allows you to do You can you can log in and you get to know everything that's going on within your community You can put things such as you know lost dog bake sale garage sales going on in the neighborhood But then also community type events that maybe aren't so positive But you need to be aware of such as crime prevention tips that our safe officers are putting out So it's a great platform. And so if you're not on next door yet, I encourage you to to utilize it It's something that again It's about trying to create stronger communities because again those stronger communities are going to create a better environment for us and then one of the things that prior to becoming a Chief is I was the chief of staff for the department and so one of the big pushes that I'm that I made is Rec the recognizing the fact that society in the way that we're communicating is changing and so one of the things that that I've made a hard push for us to do is to make sure that we're more active in the social media because We put stuff out through the news we can put stuff out through newspapers But it's not it's not the most effective way in some instances to put the word out And so a lot of what we're doing Organizationally we put that information out through our SAPD Facebook and then when I took office in January we also put out that information in Spanish also and but our Our followers on our SAPD Facebook. We have over almost 85,000 followers and so that puts us number one in the state of Texas I mean we're bigger than Houston Dallas Fort Worth Austin and think about it I mean and I think that puts us probably about fourth over on the nation So I think that's a big success But part of that is people engaged in that and actually following what we're doing within the community And so that's that's a great resource that I encourage you all to to to tie into if you have that opportunity and one other thing another thing that we did most recently is we had our first coffee with the cops event over off of Houston and IH 10 and that's a great opportunity for members of the community to get to meet not only the The officers are safe officers that a lot of y'all already know that are working within your communities But to know the line-level officers that are answering the calls for service within your community And so we're gonna be bringing that out to different areas of town and it's important because when I introduced everybody From the officer all the way up to command-level positions. I I Introduced them as your officer and so because that's truly what they are. They're your officer serving your community and so It's not like in the old days where There was an officer that was walking a footbeat that everybody knew who your officer was it was working in the area You know things are changed. We have officers that go And work larger service areas and patrol cars that the only time you're gonna see them Unfortunately is when bad things happened a lot of times But so we wanted to create a positive environment where members of the community get to meet their officers that are patrolling their streets a day and night and All the way up to the station commander and the division commanders within the department So it's a good opportunity and so we'll be putting that out and I encourage Some some great participation from the program We had our first event and we didn't know if we're gonna have five people show up or 50 people show up And I think we had about 65 people showed up and it was a really good positive event And it was very well received and then one of the final things that I want to talk about this afternoon is One of the things that I tell the officers all the time when I go out to it to roll calls is that People's perception of us as an organization Maybe the chief of police formerly chief McManus or myself doing a Sambide or coming out and doing an event such as like Like this that may be people's perception of who we are as an organization But what I'm stressing to the officers is you are that level where our reality is formed with that with the community And so the bottom line what we're talking about in justice-based policing is about treating people with dignity Because that's what people will fight you for and that's what what is most important to people what people covet And so we need to teach officers to make sure that we're communicating with the the citizens that we serve and protect every day And in the right way and nine out of ten officers do it in the absolutely perfect way And we're very proud of all that but there's always room for improvement And so we're seeking this opportunity to go through the justice-based policing curriculum to make sure that we're ten out of ten because again The those relationships are formed at what the line level officers and those day-to-day engagements with the members of the community And because if we have a strong relationship with the community That makes all the difference in the world because our relationship with the community needs to be based upon a foundation of trust And so we form that foundation of trust and those one-on-one individual engagements with members of the community so again, I am humbled and honored by the opportunity to at least be your interim chief for now and appreciate the opportunity manager and I Think your councilman is going to be coming up next But he's a great councilman to work with and has always been very supportive of public safety. So councilman. Thank you Thank you chief. I am not the councilman, but This event is billed as Ron's state of the district address But it's first and foremost and he's reminded me of this several times a community planning session And with the conference of plan we've just undertaken that meetings like this are all that more important Truly the success of this plan hinges on the quality of the public input we receive so I'm gonna Pass things off to someone who can speak far more intelligently than I can about all things planning the director of our cities planning department John Dugan We need a little aid here Hello, everybody as we get the slideshow going I'm John Dugan. I'm director of planning for the city and We have a real exciting planning program There's underway that you all get to be involved in and the whole city does doesn't happen once every 10 or 20 years But we're going to be talking about what is comprehensive planning here and Talk about how we're going to do our conference you plan for San Antonio As the city manager said comprehensive planning is about accommodating and distributing growth We're going to this huge amount of growth and it's going to help the council and all of us guide our strategic decision making about Transportation and where we put new roads and where future growth is going to take place and help us guide our infrastructure in terms of investments Now when we talk about a comprehensive plan for a city We're talking about really some policies for the city council is what it really boils down to about what we're going to do What the city council thinks the community could do what we're going to do with billions of dollars worth of city funds over the next generation And we're going to look at these different areas here to Focus in on in terms of what we call plan elements their focus areas of policy and these call are covering the areas of growth and urban form Transportation and connectivity about all of our roads and transit Housing is a huge affordable housing issue here, but you know both in the inner city and developing on the edge of the city The green and healthy neighborhoods how we can build new sustainable neighborhoods that are healthy and people can get food Walk to work perhaps new public facilities and safety as chief just talked about how those all interrelate our Natural resources in our environment. We've got an air quality issues and water quality and quality issues Historic preservation that makes San Antonio unique as a city our huge military presence and all the retirees Our jobs and our emphasis on economic competitiveness and growing the city The sustainability overall so that we don't make any big mistakes here that would really destroy the future for our Kids and grandkids and then how do we put this into law? How do we codify all these ideas these policies to be sure they are implemented and we're not just wasting our time So this is what the plan is going to be really focused on these different groups are going to start working in March And we're going to work for about two or three months and come back with some drafts as to what the future should be in terms of all These areas and then we're going to start having a dialogue with the public with you With all the different publics across the city as the manager laid out with all those different kinds of media Now we're not doing this just on our own and this isn't just a new thing a lot of cities across the country have been doing comprehensive planning for a long time and particularly recently in Texas with the huge growth in Texas our Major cities have also been doing comprehensive plans to guide the way to have a blueprint to be able to choose and prioritize resources Austin in 2012 as well as El Paso Houston's in process their very first comprehensive plan They actually decided they actually needed to have a guide to where to go. They're getting lost there Philadelphia a few years ago Denver Cincinnati all the major major cities in the country are laying out new comprehensive plans and guides for their future So why are we doing this now? Well, we've got some big challenges here for growth. Look at that line projection there That's what we perceive to be the population growth just based upon experience in the last 10 or 15 or 20 years Not really assuming we grow faster than we did in the past just the same rate 1.8 percent per year That's about half of that Natural demographic increase births over deaths and the other half people coming here for jobs before job initiatives are successful That line is going to happen that shows three million people in Bear County I don't know how much of Bear County is going to be in San Antonio by then but a good portion of it So if that happens we're talking about a city larger than Chicago And almost as big as Los Angeles and population. So it's a big challenge and we have to be ready to anticipate that So how is this city going to grow? That's the big $64,000 question If we keep going the way we've been growing we're going to have a suburban sprawl like Stone Oak all the way San Marcos and that could happen There's not really any big barriers there after a few little towns There's a better way to grow and it's called smarter growth And it's what it's in our vision for the city the 2020 vision that the community adopted several years ago when Mayor Castro Was really focusing on what should we do to become a great world-class city and how should we grow? One of the key themes of that was to focus as much growth as we could within the existing footprint of the city using existing utilities existing infrastructure existing roads and Parks etc and not have to duplicate it and replicate it more expensively on the edge of the city That's what we term and planning parlance smart growth. I'm not saying the other kind of growth is dumb But this this is smarter and if we do that We've got a big study of all the vacant land in Bear County including San Antonio and found 70,000 vacant and underutilized parcels That's a lot and that's enough to hold as this map shows here 22% of new units maybe a hundred thousand could go within 410 if we do it right and Planet carefully another 23% or another hundred thousand units between 410 and 1604 in the neighborhoods Not too far from here and then to the south and to the north beyond 1604 That would be where about half the growth would have to take place and we'll have to consider annexing property So that that property is within the city and it can be managed in zone correctly So let's look a little bit on the inner city here Nationally there's a growing preference, you know for home buyers to live in walkable mixed-use communities Surveys have shown that about half the US population in fact would like to be in one they didn't have to take a car everywhere to do everything and Unfortunately, though only 50 of San Antonio's over 380 communities are walkable according to national walk score assessments And that map shows that they're almost all within 410 and they're almost all just around The old part of the city downtown around the river walk and just north of the river rock And around the pearl district so we got a lot of ways to go there in terms of creating new walkable communities But when you think about Incorporating four or five hundred thousand more people within the existing footprint of the city You might want to know where would these people go? Well another study we've done shows that Frankly almost all of over half the growth in the last two decades and the city have been only in eight areas and We call these activity centers or employment centers and they're about areas You know about like around UTSA around the Medical Center and Stone Oak around the airport Sam Houston around Fort Sam Houston around downtown Fort San Antonio Hundreds of thousands of new jobs have focused in on these areas and there's a few areas that are emerging and shown in blue They're like around rolling oaks mall upon 6804 near 35 and out toward the west Round Fort to you know 151 and 1604 near Alamo Ranch and down south by the New Texas A&M campus Also brick space these are areas that also could accommodate a whole lot of growth So what we're trying to do is find places within the city where we can accommodate growth plan for growth But not impact the existing neighborhoods which need to be preserved protected and fostered So this is one way to do it and this is the best practice way to do it So let's just focus in a little more on district 8 Here we've got two of those growth centers and these are just generalized boundaries These aren't aren't specific yet. We plan need to do and we will do more detailed planning for all of these growth centers But the Medical Center really covers about 4,000 acres and there's 63,000 people working there I know some of the Medical Center Management would like that to expand quite a bit maybe 10 20 30,000 more jobs. There's 300 vacant acres there There's a lot of vacant land adjacent nearby UTSA covers twice that size and has over 18,000 people working there plus all the students So there's a huge concentration of people and as you know, you live around here, you know the traffic's like every day I drive through here every day and It's could be better and it's going to get worse with all this growth Particularly with the improvements to interstate 10 winding the road with managed lanes So that's why as the manager said we've looked really carefully at our recommending that we annex all the land on about a mile on each side of it and all the way up to Bernie and That we incorporate that into the city limits in the next three years and do more zone the property because it's not even zoned yet and Manage the growth around the new interchanges and expanded frontage roads that are going to be constructed there along our 10 And then look carefully at all the vacant parcels in here particularly around UTSA and the Medical Center For a careful infill development to accommodate some of the growth We really have three growth plans That we're a minute there we go that we're working on right now this comprehensive plan I'm talking about it's also a big sustainability plan to look at air quality resiliency issues And we're looking at a transportation plan that we'll see how could we link up all these growth centers and provide? Alternative moves of transportation more choices for people to get around the city than the car I used to be planning director in Los Angeles, and I'll tell you when you only have a car That's not a very good choice. You got to have some more you have to have many different options to be able to get around in a really big city So in conclusion we're not want to do this alone. This isn't an ivory tower exercise. This is a real engagement process, you know, we really need to talk to You all and so we are going to have a process here Public engagement so it says across the top there over the next year and We're going to be right now working on these studies that I mentioned to and any of you can access those studies It was a post them online when they get finished April May June we're going to be talking about writing up. Where are we now? What's the existing conditions? What are the issues? How are we going to model the transportation for all this growth? What's the air quality options that we have to improve our air quality? During the summer and into the fall We're going to be doing some real outreach to all you and the communities and the engagement tell you some things listening Back and forth back and forth over all these different social media And begin coming up with our draft plans and our draft needs assessment for where growth could take place and how to do it sustainably by the fall and early winter we'll have some draft planning work done and Talk about priorities and talk about an overall sustainability plan where we can then Get your feedback on that as well and we hope about a year from now In the spring of 2016 the final documents will go for public hearings We'll have reviews in each district and then go to the Planning Commission and City Council and Hopefully next spring we'll have a brand new city plan Guide and a blueprint for the next generation or so So those are our contact numbers and Addresses if you want to address us with San Antonio dot gov planning We're going to be posting all these ideas up on a new web page for planning next month And look forward to your engagement Now I could take a couple questions, but I also after have any questions you might have us your place There's a page a white page there With some questions for them about what you might think about the future because we want to start hearing from you This is a plan for your city, and we want to know what you want to do So if you would like to just take a few minutes and jot down some ideas there Afterward we'll have staff come and pick those up, and I'll read a few of the answers that That you all want to give back to us So you can start answering those questions, or you could ask and or ask me some questions now While you're working on those Any questions about our plans? your plans Okay, all right, then I want to hear from you see if you can fill those out, and then we'll talk about those for a few minutes Thank you Yes, sir. Yeah question Sure Yeah, there's three other big modes that other cities have bigger cities ones a better transportation system in terms of transit in terms of Bus rapid transit and light rail Houston's got an extensive light rail system in Dallas. This has as a very sophisticated one the biggest one in the country right now We can look at his models also pedestrian access along our stream valleys and connecting up our parks even to a much more Sophisticated level than we have now and then bicycle options connecting up things with good bicycle pathway systems and Hopefully more class one bikes which are off-road That's expensive, but that's safer and that gives another option for people. So looking at all the mode so though and then this rail Creative rail as well in terms of linking up Austin and San Antonio on high-speed rail Linking up Houston and Dallas, you know in Monterey, Mexico in terms of alternatives to flying Yes, it is doable and practical if we plan for it Right now the densities on most of our arterial streets aren't really high enough to support a real heavy transit system like in Dallas Dallas had the same densities we did and what they did is concentrate growth along Stations in their first corridor going north out of downtown Dallas and in the last ten years They've had five billion dollars a private sector investment around those stations They didn't have to impact the neighborhoods at all, but took a lot of traffic off the streets So they've got a really pretty good model on that Houston's taken another tack basically taking what's a little enhanced street car but it's not really as light rail as in Dallas and Moving that through their inner city neighborhoods and block by block as it extends They were rehabbing little stores strip malls and really changing the character of their inner city neighborhood that way So the two real different approaches to transit in addition to cars. They're both successful And at least if you gauge success in terms of improvements to neighborhoods and investment from the private sector And renovation and higher quality of life for people okay, take a look at your questions there they're pretty straightforward and When you're done in a few minutes, we'll start collecting them. Thank you First of all, I'd like to recognize dr. Finch who's in the audience here Calvin Finch He's one of our our key planning advisors who's working on our water issues for the city and He's going to be a big participant in our planning program Now that all of you and you've got about a dozen tables here I've had a chance to think about your individual answers to these questions, and I'll share some of these with you in a few minutes I'd like to hear from you if you There are different tables there. I think if you could sort of characterize What it is or there's any kind of theme that's emerged from you're thinking about this Can you talk about you could talk about that among yourselves for a few minutes? And then maybe one of you would have the courage to stand up and say here's what we think It's happening here or is it or is it happening in San Antonio? We're trying to anticipate the future and try to do it in a way That doesn't ruin all the good things we have here in the face of all this grill And your district particularly is going to be impacted on my 10 or 16 or 4 with all this growth So what information ideas or themes that you could give us? This is this is really useful So why don't we just Think about why don't you just talk about that amongst yourselves for a little bit? What do you think is that the big challenge that's really affecting district 8 because that's where you're all living What is it that you would really like us to see happen and not happen in district 8 and to see you've got you've got your Individual opinions. Why don't you share those amongst yourself after a little bit and five minutes or so? We'll come back and just just talk about Share about what do you think is going to happen here and what you don't want to happen Exciting I I Think I Anybody has any that you feel about that you want picked up I I Know I I Know I I Hope we can't Anybody at a table want to volunteer some ideas that your group was talking about Here to stand up What service the service the communities are more easily so that you don't have to use your car everywhere They stop so more like a more like See in the big city where the buses stop every couple of blocks and you get on and off and And do your shopping and get back on and get home without having to use your car That kind of thing Was the consolidation of the school districts That's a big with the growth. We have 18 school districts now. What are we going to have in another few years if we're going to Commodate try to accommodate another million people or so So something needs to be done about the school district system That we have now another Right and big point of discussion was the protection of the Edwards aquifer If we're going to have all that growth that they're projecting Well, uh, something Now there were a couple of other topics that I can't talk to you about because I'm not the original But we have some other things that I would like to talk about Um, I would like to see I just like I really think the city needs to develop expertise at neighborhood-based economic development And that includes looking at Our I guess more economic and vulnerable neighborhoods I think we need to actually bring in someone who is knowledgeable about studying the city's capacity for economic development like this and um This kind of economic development also looks at The multiplier effect because all of this money stays Not only in the city, but in those neighborhoods and it becomes a market-based way of developing some of our four You know more vulnerable neighborhoods and bring them Into vibrancy. Very good. Thank you. All right. Well, that was a productive table. Wow. We talked about improving transit service redoing the school districts protecting the Edwards aquifer in water And promoting neighborhood at level economic development. That's great And those are good ideas and by the way on that last topic We just finished a new study which I just presented to council last week On market analysis of all the neighborhoods in san Antonio. So we're posting that on our website Take a look. It's fascinating. The city's a real tapestry of neighborhoods that are And all different every district has a whole range of neighborhoods ready to be redeveloped or developed with the private sector All right, let's talk one of the easier way to do this. Let's just say anything at this table over here You Also, I think talked about the Costly mass transit system Talked about as a kind of michael's scale issue looking at a lot of pretty right turns of intersections There's a lot of opportunity and a lot of our intersections have pretty right turns Okay, again transportation looking at BRT bus rapid transit expansion and turning right more often That sounds good better than turning left more often And yeah, I saw that in some of the written responses. I'll get I'll get to those in a minute Okay a table here in front any comments This happened Can y'all hear it the concern about it that police brigade becoming an inner city district as growth moves out Chief said that neighborhood More citizen engagement to your hands full citizen police and community policing What do you mean by King William is a question Jefferson inner city is All right, this invested neighborhoods Stay in the district. Okay. So concerned to to really keep the district strong. You gotta people stay here and involve Well, you certainly are so that's great. Come here on Saturday afternoon Okay Let's see this table over here any comments are these two tables on the right side my right side So you'll be on the main east west the only east west route between 1604 and 410 and what's the traffic going to be like over there? Yeah That's a good question All right, any comments here at the center table Managed going out Very good point Yeah, and in fact, uh, we've just you know camp bullets just finished a big study And we have city has been beginning to implement those different Aspects of that city to protect the base I have engaged the the military here all the bases in terms of doing an overall plan for all the bases in greater san Antonio And they've agreed to do that They have a big portion a big play in our conferencing plan in terms of the policies to protect the the bases and all the economic activity At the bases and gender and almost a hundred thousand retirees here too So the military is going to be a big part of the future of 20 years 30 years out And and certainly we're going to try to make them feel much more at home even if they have in the past Yes, that's a very good point and we're that's one of the reasons for doing this plan Is to be a better coordination between saw cps and the city's investment in the past that necessarily Been quite in sync and now we're going to have them in sync All right any comments from the table started the back back there It's there I'm actually here from the army and I remember the association defense communities for communities winter forum in 2008 and here And that's the ass the equivalent general officer said the timbolus just needs to close before saying here's the militant So we approached your owner out So hold on a minute. Hold on a minute. We're going to do a joint land use study You did in 2009 and we have addressed most of the problems. We're starting to see problems We surface again in some areas, but it's it's manageable if you keep ahead of it I think our table our biggest dialogue is we see out in the itinerary or embolus We see lots and lots of very large developments the crest of elements of the world who come in and Just basically level whole kill sites clear cut And really change the nature of the hill country and really do strong impacts on camboas and came standard And we wonder how the rough proportionality system works, you know, I can I've been Working out of camboas can't stand waiting for saying for 10 years now. My skin is so much worse for track And it's everyone knows is because of all those large developments out that way Are they paying anything towards like 10s upgrade the textile? I guarantee you they're not And rough proportionality needs to be looked at more in terms of fair share What they're causing in terms of roads blood control And other impacts That's one of the reasons we've initiated an annexation the council has up that corridor because We believe those probably those developments should be in the city and paying their fair share toward improvements in the future Yes, yes, we have there's no plans to develop a square inch of camboas and to protect it as much as we can And not have any kind of a development too close to it. So that's Right Right, yeah, we'll be looking at that carefully Okay, um We have a little time left not much to answer a couple questions. Maybe five minutes. Let me just see I'm just going to take these at random what people said for the four questions And I thank you for your discussion and comments from your table. It's not easy to you know, stand up and Speak in public without any kind of preparation. So but it's really useful for us because we just don't know Okay, here's a here's an answer Resident of eight district eight. What would the future be like look like in your district? The i-10 corridor should be beautiful Wherever possible since it's the primary entry into san Antonio first impressions matter Very good perspective. Wow. That is one of them. That is the main entrance, you know from the west to the city northwest I love the accessibility in in district eight to great chopping and medical facilities good parks and recreational areas She wants to see they want to see manage growth in the future through good zoning practices and good enforcement of the development code provisions And transportation roads are congested expansion of the airport, especially non-stop flights as desired to major cities So very good perspective from that person Um, here's another one continue to operate and grow prudently great public schools and streets and neighborhoods that look excellent In our good cross sections of our wonderful city's population And they like neighborhoods like elm creek Public schools excellent schools we can grow but we must assure that we provide for additional people Um What about district eight? Do you love the suburban atmosphere of the parks and the connectivity? They want more walking distance Communities better traffic flows safe and friendly neighborhoods Replace businesses and homes that are unoccupied and reduce Northside growth. That's going to be hard but try Study major employers and employees working in this area Preserve the feel of the neighborhoods Annexation will be critical and without it. We will grow like Houston want that Want wider streets synchronized traffic lights? Okay Mixed use communities and more parks and green space Bond projects to support the infrastructure and growth. Okay. That's What about those these all all these are good and everybody has an understanding? I think of how the city works or it doesn't work at this point Growth of parks and linear parks more walkable less crime Water power and transportation is assured infrastructure along with adequate fire and police coverage Improved infrastructure more and bigger parks Linear parks commuter rail between utsa and utsa downtown That would be interesting No construction though We have the opportunity to increase the density of our community we can focus the growth inward um We like to see the district 8 developed in a more orderly fashion maintaining more green space avoiding traffic congestion Over development and lack of planning. Well, that will reduce the quality of life unless it is development is well regulated Planned growth mixed use great areas for residential commercial and retail Planned infill growth and light rail and high speed rail Mixed use with good transportation High tech solar power parks and recreation light rail more parks and ride locations And good secondary schools So there's a sampling of what people thought You're all anticipating the future. You're all thinking about All the great things that we need here and we're going to help you all pull this together in terms of this planning policy As we move forward we'll get to the point We'll be actually giving you all chances to comment on the actual policy statements Which we'll be asking council to approve next year And then I'll be packaged up in a snapshot and we'll call that the plan But the plan is just the start It's not the end the plan is the beginning of a process Which we are really trying to foster here in san Antonio of thinking about the future Anticipating the future preparing for the future Before it gets here too soon and then everybody is surprised like oh We can't move on the road or there's water is terrible or the air quality. We can't breathe I've been in cities that have had that situation and they wish they hadn't So this is our chance to try to head that off at the past so to speak So thank you very much and enjoyed talking to you this afternoon Thank you, john and to the whole planning department for coming out and Making this piece of our presentation possible. I know they're going to make good use of your feedback as it as they start to Take the first steps in formulating this comprehensive plan Any long-range conversation about district 8 Eventually winds up at utsa as john said it's a huge focal point It has to be near the center of our planning and no one is more qualified to talk about utsa where it is now and where it's headed than its current student body president Zach done To the constituents residents and community leaders of district 8 in the greater san Antonio communities And to all of you who are joining us here today It is my sincere honor to introduce one of the greatest vision visionary leaders I have ever had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know our fearless leader city councilman ron nuremberg But before I delve into what makes city councilman ron nuremberg such an inspiring leader I'd like to first highlight his involvement with the university of texas at san Antonio Now if you're from the university or you're involved there as a student, can you please raise your hand? Great representation. Thank you to you all for being here Now back when I first became student body president It was the absolute priority of the student government association to expand our community outreach and modify our external presence This was two months before ron nuremberg came into office that this vision was really starting to take hold But sga, which is the student government association Sga and her members already had an established a relationship with the councilman months before the celebratorious watch party And many months before the district extended its tradition of resounding leadership to newly capable hands chris stewart. Are you in the room, sir? chris stewart was instrument. Let's give a hand to chris stewart, please chris stewart is a outstanding student leader at utsa and he was instrumental in forming that relationship You see something councilman nuremberg took the time to do in his campaign was employ students to engage other students And he sees the vastly invaluable opportunity to really engage young people in this movement Now it's no secret that the youth of today are not as engaged in civic affairs as many would like them to be But we are still the leaders the innovators and the change agents of the future Councilman nuremberg recognizes this fact and on every single encounter i've ever had with him He has made it a point to discuss ways we can collectively engage young people and show them the powerfully rewarding experience Of getting involved with service to their community But a service to the youth doesn't stop there. It doesn't stop after a few conversations of shakes with the hand What I respect most about councilman nuremberg is his insatiable appetite to empower those around him to make change Allow me to paint a small picture That really highlights this example When my family and I visited the dallas fort worth area two summers ago We visited a small town and I don't exactly remember the name of the small town But I do remember the street signs there Street signs their way Their ways that people can can find out where they're going and where they've been they provide a clarity of purpose But these street signs were different. They were painted purple and they had a horned frog on them It was tcu country and no resident or visitor could be mistaken about that So I came back to student government and we ran with the idea We wanted to implement street signs in san antonio that highlighted this city's leading institution We wanted people resident or visitor to know that when they saw the street signs They were in roadrunner country Now it's easier when everybody on your team my team was smarter than me And has equally great ideas that furthered the agenda that we set out the very beginning The exec board at the time what it includes conna harvey and iliana gonzalez Who now works for the councilman as an intern and is a current miss utsa Uh, they gave life to the idea and they informed the councilman of our intentions Within a few months time the greater utsa community had street signs highlighting the university And one piece of our objective to really reach out the community had been accomplished None of that Absolutely none of that could have been accomplished without councilman nuremberg and is notoriously helpful staff Now it was a small change. It was a small ripple But the possibility for change in the community was thus sent out and with that ripple in mind It's easy to see how the councilman has been able to serve as an inspiring leader to this city's residents He's initiated the first coordinated water supply plan He continues to try to find more jobs for our residents. He's working on transportation infrastructure He's tackling in my opinion one of the city's most pressing issues our water supply He's founded the district date community academy All of these accomplishments and services barely begin to the work scratch the surface of the work He does for our community each and every single day But you know, it's better than all of that. You know what makes ron nuremberg city councilman for district date in san antonio special His connection to the people Never in my life that I think I'd actually meet a city councilman Never did I think I'd be able to call one my friend And never did I think that this community would be luckier to have them as their representative Then we all know now him to be And that is the effect that city councilman ron nuremberg has on every single person that he meets He believes that everybody should have access to the very best opportunities in life And he believes that on a daily basis So without further ado ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming our leader and city councilman. Mr ron nuremberg I need to bottle that up and use it for my next introduction. Zach. I appreciate that. Um I'm ron nuremberg uh and raise your hand. Uh, I know the utsa students here, but raise your hand if you wish you were 22 again Well, it's it's a great pleasure to be introduced by somebody like zach done because in many ways He exemplifies why we should feel good about the future of san antonio And I know that's what we've been talking about here today is is all the things that we're going to be doing in the future of san antonio Why it requires a great deal of work from all of us Um zach mentioned how we are making concerted effort to put students in san antonio into leadership positions within my office Um, and that's because number one. They're energetic. You just saw that Number two, they have great ideas But number three all of us are going to be depending on their leadership one way or the other in the future So we may be as removed as possible from the utsa campus We may be removed as possible from being 22 again But one way or the other we are going to depend on them being active and engaged in the leadership in the future of san antonio So it's a great honor to be doing things like the community academy Which is just by the way received a congressional award for some of the innovative techniques that we're using to reach out in the community and inspire new civic participation many of you are engaged in the in the community academy and that's basically proactive constituent services about us bringing the district gate office to you rather than you having to come to us when there are issues a community academy does things like Block walks to let people know what what's going on in the community Let us know let them know how to get a hold of us how to call us and email us Let's us know and find out where the problems in the streets are where their car holes need to be fixed We're doing town halls every month where many of you have come and talked about issues They're concerning you we do kids town halls with eight nine and ten and on up young people to let them know that their government is also listening to you to see because It's not just someone's right to vote that makes what we do in council and the rest of government That's important in fact Many times what we do with the people who can't get vote the young people Determines how successful the city will be in the future The kids town halls by the way are resulting in some real action. It's a benefit to all of you in fact Two weeks ago or three weeks ago now. We went over to hector garcia middle school And I think some of you live in that area, but we we heard During that town hall some really important concerns about infrastructure from the school dangerous intersections things like that missing Missing stop signs or places where signalization could be improved And we've asked those students now to make their presentation at tci So I know there's some tci folks we're having a meeting on on friday at city hall About 12 young people are going to come down and make their presentations to our city staff About why it's important to improve certain intersections and things like that and we can make those those presentations all day long But when you hear about it from a nine-year-old it makes it much more important It makes it much more salient while we're doing these things for the future So our future and the things that these students are doing is about human capital We want to tap into those ideas and those important The energy that they bring but it's also about our economic future. In fact the reason One of the reasons why I think you should care about our work With utsa is there in hot pursuit of this ephemeral thing called tier one status It's not a box that you can check off immediately But it has to do with building a great campus building a great campus community Making sure that we have the intellectual Capacity that is building within the university among the students as well as the faculty that we can begin to create A great future no matter where we are in the city and it has real dollars and cents impact On cities around the country that have two or one institutions attached to them They're able to lower more businesses because they have research capabilities that wouldn't otherwise have They also attract the best and the brightest from around the world. In fact, we are on our way there Through some concerted effort for utsa. They already make the 1.5 billion dollar impact on the city of san Antonio annually That's the impact from having utsa be a strong university And so that will only increase as we continue to build the profile of utsa In addition, they employ 15,000 san antonians That's 15,000 san antonio families that are able to get to and from work In a reasonable way and contribute to our economy and they also graduate more students utsa graduates more students today Than any other south texas university Uh around and that says a lot to a former commuter campus That was built among all the cow pass years in northwest san antonio It's an extraordinary story and it's one that i'm happy to tell and we're doing things already on the campus and outside of campus In fact, zack and i Celebrated the opening of the b-cycle program a bike share program that helps take cars That you're stuck in traffic with Off the road so students can get around campus without using a car Also a little safer and helps them stay healthy avoid the freshman 15 And it's also a great story for san antonio to be able to tell other students that hey This is what our great campus is doing In addition to that we've also asked my office initiated something called the university overlay zone so Many of you live around the campus and over the last 15 20 years that campus has sprawled You've seen frat parties in your neighborhoods probably You've seen the negative effects of having a sprawling place around your neighborhood We're trying to help encourage the growth of utsa and see to help you see the positive So we've asked for university overlay zones to help organize the growth around the university make it a friendly university for The students on campus and the faculty and the staff But also help focus that growth so it doesn't bleed over into other areas There's a there's an important reason to have great university campuses pursuits And then by doing that we can also make sure that we maintain and protect the integrity of the neighborhoods around there So that's all about planning land use better and we can do that in microcosm through the utsa campus But what you've done here today, which I thank you for being here and participating What's you're doing today is far bigger than that. This is about the future of san antonio It's about the comprehensive plan and we know what happens if we don't plan We see that all around us It's one of the reasons why in a city that sprawls as much as we have That we're finding difficulty paying for roads We have challenges maintaining services at times And that's because the farther we get away from infilling poor development the harder it is to maintain those things So the comprehensive plan for me Is one of the biggest challenges that we will face as a community and I have to tell you I was at I was at a candidate forum this morning And one of the questions was what are your top three priorities? as a city councilman And I can name them water transportation and jobs rolls off the tongue as it should But the reality is the priorities are much greater than that You know through our office and they're great folks that work for our office In fact, the best folks in my opinion in the city How dense the work is there is not a topic that we don't interact with that isn't a priority for the city But it does all revolve around one thing for me and that's growth You've heard the statistics from Cheryl and john over the next 25 years This city will have another 1.1 million people living and that's conservative estimates from the state demarcator's office We should have another 500,000 cars on the road We'll also be doubling in population next 35 years And you know what san Antonio looks like or excuse me where district 8 looks like today Our city over 2000 2010 the census grew by 33 percent. That's twice as fast as the rest of city of san Antonio So everything that you're feeling in san Antonio about the growth the growth factor has spelt almost twofold here in the city in district 8 Now the purpose of this plan And we've seen plans before we have the master master transportation plan. We have the north sector plan. We've got the Parks plan. We've got you name it. We have a plan for it But what is undeniably true about most of those plans is they sit on the shelf and they collect dust And I've seen many I've seen many uh Sorry I've seen many plans on my own shelf that the pages aren't even cracked yet What we don't want to have happen with this comprehensive plan is make it about the product and not about the process The real strength of this plan is that we're going to start engaging Community and raising our citizens so that they're directing it just like the sa 2020 process created a vision for the city near term What we're trying to do is create a roadmap of how to get there and by 2019 when when uh, who knows uh secretary casker comes down and he's cutting the ribbon on something that That we started because of the sa 2020 process That plan hopefully will be outdated What we don't want to happen with this comprehensive plan is that we we look at it and we think that it's it's done So we're engaging in a public process that allows us to direct the plan That allows us to update the plan when necessary and it's going to require all of your input In that way, it's publicly owned and it outlasts any of us elected officials. That's the important part This planning process and i'm proud to chair the comprehensive planning committee if we do it right We'll have nothing to do with mayor taylor Myself or any of the other council members. It's really going to be about what the public wants the city to look like In 30 40 50 years and when 30 40 50 years comes we still have a process in place to continue to plan for the future um I do want to make mention of two people who had to leave and one of the reasons why i'm so focused on the future And that was my son jonah who's six and my wife erica The work is pretty tough But when we have some people that inspire us to look beyond our own our own little circle of the day Um, it helps us quite a bit. So I wanted to make mention of them I also wanted to to mention to you our whole political process And you notice this from the federal government to the local government is built around incident gratification The reason why it's important for me to have students here and to have Us talk about planning and actually do planning at the state of the district events is to tell you that everything We're doing right here today if we do it right you won't get any credit for it You won't get any credit for it because what we're planning for is the future down the road And I promise after my son jonah when he comes up when I come home Late at night and i'm talking him in as the first thing I do when I get home He asked me did I make the world better? And I tell him I think so, but you have to tell me when when you're my age So I think that's the stuff that we're working on and jon mentioned the components of the plan. They're very important Uh, but they're all integrated the cop plan itself the sustainability plan The transportation plan we need to be working on all those things But I do want to touch on one which is the comprehensive water plan The federal reserve bank at set of dais recently cited in december 2013 water scarcity is a number one concern For economic security in san Antonio and for the rest of texas So we've been working very hard to sort that out You know in the city of san Antonio that has been a very big challenge for us over the last 40 50 years In fact 400 years ago this city was settled over the edwards aquifer and you all know the edwards aquifer A clean abundant plentiful water source that comes up out of the ground without any pumping So reason why san Antonio water system prices are so among the some of the lowest in the nation But this area is growing fast And the climate is getting more arid and so we have to plan for the future And cities around the country in fact around texas are having to plan for that future as well And that's where we come up with the saying whiskies for drinking and waters for fighting in texas But i'm happy to say that my office has been working very closely on this We've been working hard to with san antonio water system which has done a great job We recently passed the uh the pipeline project which is a very controversial project But that is the single largest most ambitious water supply diversification effort in the history of san antonio It took a lot of courage to cast a vote and it's going to take a lot of work to get it right It's not a done deal But we have to continue to work to make sure it's a done deal because In 20 years from now in 30 years from now our long-term water management plan shows gaps in the supply When we're trying to lower jobs for those 1.1 million people that we're live here We need to make sure that companies when they move here companies when they expand here don't have a want for water But it's not just about expanding supplies. It's not just about diversification. It's also about conservation it's about uh reuse and recycled water which Those are things that sauce is doing very very well And it's also about protecting the edwards aquifer and that's the one Area of this plan that i'm most concerned with and i've been working the most Hardest on Which is the edwards aquifer protection program over the last 15 years of san antonio Citizens of san antonio have protected 130 000 acres of the recharge zone That has protected the equivalent of 36 billion gallons of water annually That's half the water we will need to draw from the edwards aquifer in the year 2060 So when we're working on water supply, we're working on water security What we need to do is make sure we get our basics In 2060 if we continue to diversify and continue to bring those regional water sources on you continue to get better at recycling half of Two-thirds of our water, excuse me two-thirds of our water will still come from the edwards aquifer So if we hope to have clean water, we hope to have abundant water We need to make sure we we protect the edwards aquifer and and that's why Councilman Lopez and i worked very hard to get back on the ballot for you and on may 9th I'm not gonna this is not a political event But I can ask you this because it's not about me on may 9 Please vote to support the edwards aquifer protection program It is the most important initiative and by the way one of the most popular initiatives the city has ever undertaken And and for those of you who have followed some of the More fun episodes in council in my opinion one of them was about back so the last year Anyone heard of the bracken bat day? Yeah Well, this was a major political challenge for us. In fact, uh, that particular piece of property sits over one of the most sensitive regions of the edwards aquifer It happened also be in comal county Uh in political no man's land because also in comal county. It was part of the san antoniox territorial jurisdiction This for all practical purposes had no leadership whatsoever in that area of the community, but it had every Bit of importance to the city of san antoniox was through that edwards aquifer protection program That we were able to ante up to the table to get a regional partnership created That allowed san antoniox to protect probably the largest piece of land Over the edwards aquifer that we needed to protect so Just keep that in mind things like that leverage opportunities with the edwards aquifer program Are possible and they're very important for us to do So let me talk about The other part of the may 9th vote that I think is also important. This is the linear creepway park system You all know it. It's connected actually very close to here the hardburger park The linear creepway system was envisioned by Howard peak Back in the early 2000 actually before that the late 90s as an emerald ring Of parks linear parks around the city of san antonio Since then just like the edwards aquifer protection program We've been taking an eighth of our senate sales tax over the last 15 years and protecting Pieces of land to create an emerald ring of parks around the community Since then we've protected and created 46 miles linear miles of parkways We have another 40 under development and the vision the vision itself had 130 miles Creating that ring around the city. So we're well on our way But we also need to continue the program. So councillor Lopez and I and the rest of city council voted to put it back on the ballot So we have the opportunity to protect it again This quickly is becoming one of those additional reasons why people want to move to san antonio while people want to bring their business to san antonio So it's a critical thing for us not just for protecting open space and green space But it's a critical thing for us to help With economic development and quality of life in san antonio So i'm happy to champion it and i'm happy to ask you to support it in may One other part of that though is as we continue to build this international brand For the linear creekway system and we want people to know that we have one and we want people to use it We want people to increasingly use it for mobility purposes to move around places rather than using the cars or Or uh, you know something else We need them to know that it's safe So i've asked this last week and i have uh talked with our san antonio police department and parks department and with city staff As well as an advisory board members We've asked now for a comprehensive strategy to protect safety infrastructure in the linear creekway system develop Safety infrastructure along the linear creekway so that as we build This park system. We're also building and integrating a safety infrastructure. I'm not sure what that looks like That's why we've asked to have our our board members participate in the plan to have citizen input But what we want to do is make sure that no one has any doubt and when they enter the world's class power wp Greenway trail system. They're also going to be safe and they're going to be able to use it and allow their family And children to use it as well So that's a that's a very important initiative that's coming online for our park system The other part of our park system the jewel of our park system on the north side You're sitting in right now and i'm very proud to have championed an effort in the last budget cycle to find additional room to continue the park the The trailways or the trails inside our burger park To the tune of two million dollars over the next two years We're going to continue to improve this area of land which has become a world-class park In fact chuck is here. He can show you a map that he has hint Different locations of where people are coming from to come to our park It's an amazing thing this this park here in san antonio I know there's probably a number of you who have moved into this area just because of this park And you know it's disconnected too, right? This is actually two pieces of distinct property or actually there's one homestead But it's two pieces of property now that's cut right down the middle by horseback pathway We have a design and chuck will be happy to talk to you about it to create a land bridge over this park sounds Sounds interesting But I can tell you that if you look at this design and the innovation that it would bring to san antonio it would be a Bridge over a horseback parkway. That's about a football field wide It would be for Pedestrians to walk over it'd be for wildlife to walk over If be for us to connect the two sides of the park It would quickly become one of the two or three or four Top icons of our city It would be a land bridge the first of its kind in the united states and among a very very few in the world And I do hope you come to learn about it and you Ask about it, and I hope to earn your support to make that project happen You guys are a little warm in here I am too so apologize if i'm sweating The other part of this plan the transportation piece I know is the one that's got most people hot speaking of pot The reality is nothing we do in transportation gets done alone anymore We're working hard with the city management to identify dollars to Make our imp plan our infrastructure maintenance plan dynamics So what neighbors at these tables here identify different issues that what they're having in the neighborhood We can move things around every one of our city on the streets Is on a five-year rolling plan and our sidewalks as well And whenever there's issues we can go in on that five-year plan and make sure that the streets are getting resurfaced or repaired as necessary When we hear from you we help move things around as necessary But remember every bit of problem that you're having in your neighborhood We're experiencing all around the city and that's why I bring up the challenge of transportation with 1.1 million people moving here With buying power from our highway dollars Declining to about 50 percent what they were in the mid 90s at the state and the federal level With every project that we do we do becoming much more stressed because of the growth of san Antonio It has become a challenge and if you look at every model Of transportation growth and transportation need in the city of san Antonio and throughout the state of texas It is a dire situation And i'm here to tell you that it's not going to get any better It's not going to get any better until we start changing our thinking We need to start planning our transportation system better and a more multi-modal strategic capacity And that's what this comprehensive plan is meant to do but We do know we need to have some immediate relief here in town And i want to tell you through the leadership of councilman brie Williams who preceded me We took our leadership and 20 we took our our community we brought them together Through the bond program and we prioritized a triage list Roadways in district a and i can tell you if you've experienced it as well east and west travel Along any road in district a has become a challenge getting to it from my tent We have a triage that includes roads like de zavala crew heater Houseman road which is getting done utsa boulevard which is getting done All these roadways have become a challenge, but we're working on them And we're working on them very quickly on de zavala crew. We know the saga that was behind that We are identifying pre-construction dollars, and it's my hope and i'm going to be champion by the time we get together again next year, hopefully God willing That i will be able to tell you and ask for your support for prioritizing crew road Because that roadway Next to de zavala and hughesman road are absolutely Uh locked up experiencing major drainage problems And uh experiencing heavy growth along those corridors So it's my hope that with identifying pre-construction dollars, which we have in de zavala and improve road We will be able to get both of those roads done final Everybody do you want to stand up or anything? Please please do that. Um So on on the note of focusing transportation dollars, that's all very important But it also brings up one of the more serious discussions we're having here at the city of san antonio That is our bond rating As we talked about last year san antonio is one of the last big cities with a AAA bond rating. What does that mean? Well, I mean For some it may be winter addressing, but i'm here to tell you that it's not We got uh our ratings back from this from the rating agencies all three have them Have us at the highest level, which is great, uh because if you look at financial Ratings a notch or two decline in our rating Impacts our buying power to an extent that we would actually lose the buying power of the entire housing road So it's very important that we maintain our financial strength our financial ratings. And so we're budgeting around that priority We are the last remaining big city in the country with the AAA bond rating from all agencies And we're very proud to continue that And in this last cycle though The rating agency moodies actually gave us a warning and that is not not for anybody's fault This is things that are happening around us. These are things that are happening around the country Including the governmental accounting standards for re reshuffling their priorities Making sure that the cities are taking care of their infrastructure as well as budgeting properly This all brings up the other serious discussion that we're talking about in the city of san antonio Which is collective bargaining and i'm not here to offer a proposal Not off here to offer a characterize What's happening with negotiations other than to say My role as a city councilman is to establish the policy parameters of a discussion And what we did in zune of 2014, which is when we had our goal setting session is that we as a council decided That at maximum we need to have one third or at minimum We need to have one third of our city budget go towards all the other services that That are required by our citizens which include libraries parks Infrastructure maintenance things like that So my job as a city councilman is to make sure that we have those parameters that we stick to them and we have our Our negotiators go out and get us a deal I can tell you what we aren't talking about in our collective bargaining situation We are not talking about line of duty benefits We're not talking about pension benefits. We are simply talking about the costs day to day of public safety And I am very encouraged about what I've heard happened At the negotiating table yesterday We still have a lot of progress to be made But in my estimation if we all work and we stand our lanes and we make sure that we're sticking to our Our goals, we will be able to get a deal done and that's that's my hope and at no time Uh, have I ever felt that We need to do anything other than Be getting a deal so I'm very pleased with the progress I've heard about. I do think it's a pretty dire situation But I do believe we can get a deal done and and really I guess the last point I'll make about that is that The reality of this situation is that long term we need to make sure we contain costs in any single department And when we find Trends that are out of line, we need to make sure we contain them whether they're in public safety or any other place So let me talk about A couple other things one of them is innovation You're here about the uber and lift debate You know where I stand on the uber and lift debate What I would say is that the riot shared debate is about a lot of things But first and foremost it's about whether or not san Antonio is ready for our future So I've been I've been encouraged also that we are Working on a good agreement to keep those companies in town I'm also encouraged by the fact that We are working on innovation in other areas instead of san Antonio. You've all heard about google fiver Google fiverr is a broadband service that hopefully is coming to san Antonio We saw some of the action that's happening around the rest of the city or around the rest of the country But I can tell you that san Antonio is making real progress in getting google fiverr or getting AT&T High-speed service and getting time water and so forth. We're making good progress on creating a comprehensive plan for digital infrastructure in san Antonio um, what that means is in the next 20 30 40 years just as Electrical and water utility infrastructure was 100 years ago We are going to see digital infrastructure digital information infrastructure Be as important to our economy as as those things were to separate Communities that had and communities that had not back then So we've been working to get a comprehensive digital infrastructure plan Integrating within our comprehensive plan I'll be happy to talk with you more about that as we move along But it's about making sure that every home and businesses add access to the information infrastructure and making sure that we have Infrastructure in place that can meet our capacity demands while also Ensuring that the city has a voice in how that infrastructure is created And finally, let me talk a little bit about economic development 30 or 40 years ago in san Antonio. We were known as a Solid economy that was based on mainly a couple of industries military and tourism Over the last several decades. We've been diversifying into areas such as information technology financial services medical and so forth and I'm very happy with what's going on here in the district day in fact About a month ago. We secured an agreement with the largest financial services institution in texas security service federal credit union to retain 700 jobs and also the To create new 200 new jobs here in san antonio. They're going to contribute another 10 million dollars to infrastructure In a very key part of the itin corridor That's important because it's it's bringing again important employment for the future of san antonio It's also important because it's showing that we're ready to work with these folks In addition to that over in the medical center, we've seen a lot of work done in jim. Thank you for being here One of our growth centers in the city of san antonio one of the places that we will rely on To continue to fuel the economy is the medical center We employ over 50,000 people in the medical center from all industries and we believe that with the next 25 years of growth in san antonio. We expect that that Employment base can nearly double So we've been working with the medical center alliance and with the san antonio medical foundation To integrate the san antonio san antonio's capital improvement plan with The master plan from the medical center so we can let we can work together to build better infrastructure in fact major research institutions and a new jobs to To the medical center We're also doing that to ensure that the desk rooms and vehicles patients employees Have safe access into and out of the medical center And then finally with the biomedical industry that's in the medical center We are working to ensure that we are capturing All the growth and innovation potential that's in the medical center and in the biomedical area in particular We've had several new jobs Excuse me several new companies created in the biomedical space in the last Two years We are working hard to invest In those companies that will grow and build jobs in the city of san antonio And we're also seeing that realizing in the profile of san antonio being raised Just this last december we had the world stem cell summit here in san antonio Which brought innovators and scientists and researchers from around the country here to our city to examine how They can collaborate how they can work with our medical professionals in in san antonio So it was a great win for us all And the biomedical space in particular Is a strategic investment that we we plan to grow and we have a tremendous amount of opportunities to be built from So in in closing, I just want to make mention first Thank you again for being here to plan with us the comprehensive plan will continue to be rolled out and we'll continue to work with you To make sure that it's a good plan and then we have it to have a good process to continue to build from But I also want to thank you and my team for being here It is I say often and I think many of you experience that we have a just one of the best group of people working for district day That one could ask for so I do want to make mention of Conor Harvey who is one of our interns as well as hunting pile is our director of communication TJ mays in the back there who is our chief of staff Eloy Eloy is here is our district chief Please get to know them coden rail Garza handles all of our our land use and planning And of course jackie bold sewers our office director and alice gary handles everything that our office does Please get to know them. We are working hard for you. We are working hard for the future of san Antonio We thank you dearly for being part of it