 It is 901 and this is the June 2nd meeting of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission, and we will begin with a roll call. Commissioner Bertrand. Listen. Commissioner Lenick. Present. Commissioner Brown. Here. Commissioner Johnson. Here. Commissioner Caput. Here. Commissioner Alternate Schifrin. Here. Commissioner Alternate Quinn. Here. Commissioner Koenig. Here. Commissioner McPherson. Here. Commissioner Alternate Collin Tari Johnson. Here. Commissioner Parker. Commissioner Rockin. Here. And you have a quorum. Okay. We'll now review the items to be discussed in closed session. And that would be Steve, if you're here. That's correct. Thank you, Madam Chair. We have one closed session. Well, two closed sessions today. They are both related to labor negotiations with core and Ram. We will take those up at the appropriate time on the agenda. All right. Thank you. So we will now move in. You should ask if the public have any comments. Oh, thank you. I'm sorry. Are there members of the public who have questions or comments about the closed session items? Yes. I see, I don't see any hands up. We'll move into closed session now and when we return, we'll have our public portion of our meeting, which includes findings on SB. 361 and report out from closed session and oral communications. So if you're here for all communications. Hang on, we will be back. Thank you. So the question was, okay, I got the closed session zoom. Like, So if anyone does not have the closed session link, it looks like Commissioner Calendary Johnson, I see your hand is up. I think I still have not. Let's see. Yeah, I think I have to be headed CTV webinars. Yeah, I'll have to look to myself. I'll forward the link to both commissioners, Calendary Johnson and McPherson, and you'll just have to change your name. You'll show up as me. Thank you. Okay. Okay, so we are headed to closed session. Commissioner McPherson. Did you know it's good. Okay, great. We'll see you. See you soon. We have a quorum back for open session. So I'll go ahead and reopen our meeting with item for that is a report on closed session. Madam chair, there was no reportable action in closed session. The commission gave direction to your label negotiators. All right, thank you. Our next item is additions or deletions to the agenda. Any changes? The agenda. No, there are no changes to the agenda. Thank you. Thank you. And so we will now move on to our consent agenda that consists of one administrative item adoption of findings for virtual and hybrid meetings under assembly bill 361. First comments from the board public. I'll move approval of the consent agenda. I do not see anyone. It looks like we do have an attendee who's raised their hand. I'll call back to motion then. Okay, so we'll, we'll take public comments and then call for the motion. We have Brian from trail now you're up. Hi, it's Brian. I just want to clarify this is on the closed session, not the oral communications before I make a comment. We're, we're right. The item that we're considering right now is just extending the findings for virtual and hybrid meetings under AB 361 public comment on closed session occurred before we went into closed sessions this morning. All right, okay, so all up, but you haven't done oral sessions. We sure have not. That's next step. So, so, yeah, let me make a comment about the virtual hybrid. I think it's a phenomenon like, you know, one of the things I always talk about when I talk about the pandemic kids. It did bring us some really good things, especially for the charter of this organization, which is transportation, what the term I like to use is it's forced us to the future. Right, it's really forced us to, to start using those virtual tools that we have our community has that and, you know, I really want to just recognize the RTC staff on on how they were able to implement. So, so I just want to just take a moment and recognize staff for the great work they did and and support the continuation of hybrid meetings. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. peoples. Any other comments. I seeing no additional hands raised we will move approval with consent agenda. Okay. We have a motion and a second and we'll call for a vote roll call. Commissioner. Commissioner Bertrand. I agree. Commissioner Brown. I, Commissioner Johnson. Commissioner alternate hers. I, I think he might have left us. Okay. Commission alternate shift friend. I commission alternate Quinn. Yes. Commissioner cognate. I, Commissioner McPherson. Here. Commissioner alternate call Johnson. Big person's eye. Thank you. Commissioner McPherson. Commissioner Rotkin. All right. And that passes unanimously. Thank you. Okay, we will now move on to oral communications. Oral communications is a time for members of the public to address the commission on any item within the jurisdiction of the commission that is not already on the agenda. The commission will listen to all communications, but in compliance with state law may not take action on items that are not on the agenda. Speakers are requested to state their name clearly so that it can be accurately recorded in the minutes of the meeting. To comment, if you're on your phone, you want to press star nine to raise your hand. And I see two hands up. Brian from trail now. You're next. Yeah, hi. Thank you this brain people to trail now. I don't know if you can display what I sent. Which was the, the half mile of track from our UP rail yard to the Pajaro River trestle. We should have received an email from us on that section in our continued recommendation on looking at using it as a access road trail. We all know that the volume of freight along that is continuing to decline and, and at the end of the day your organization isn't, you know, the charter is transportation and improving transportation for all Santa Cruz community county residents including Watsonville. And the other part of your role, because you own the rail corridor the poster corridor is property management. And right now you have tenants on there that is not the most effective use of that property. We feel it's very important to start looking at that role and improving the utilization and the return on investment of that property for the community. Not just both financially, as well as mobility, increasing the mobility. And you know a lot of people might say oh we can't think of, we could never have a trucking operation from the UP yard to the local customers, but I would say you can't because look at the elaborate schemes you've had for second scenario to for second nine and 10 you had these very expensive elevated platforms. So if you're able to create such complicated platform trail. I would think that you will come up with a solution better utilize that half mile section. So thanks again for your time and have a good weekend. Thank you to the people's we did receive the email so we are able to review that flying or online. Okay, our next speaker is Barry Scott. Thank you. Thank you chair and thank you commission commissioners, I am. Attending every meeting I can possibly imagine never having been held and especially during the last couple of months with regards to the study of trail alternatives, and there were two. There were two zoom meetings and a public open house and a bicycle advisory committee meeting and presentations used slides to compare the cost of the ultimate trail against the cost of the ultimate trail with phases. And the from what I see on public and social media posted the public is completely confused and opponents to rail are using that confusion to their advantage and pretending that that an interim trail with no further work is a possible solution and I, I just want to remind all commissioners that that the director has stated time and time again that there is no such thing as a trail only plan. And this interim business is just a terrible distraction and and I firmly believe it's impossible, you're not going to have rail banking successful and I wish we would do two things. Always show the public the full cost over time for the interim approach and and indicate how much how expensive it is and how threatening it is to they were having a rail transit future. The other thing I brought up at the last to the last RTC meeting that it didn't seem that the work over the first seven miles had actually been done and I'm in possession of a letter from progressive rail that that seems to confirm that that they are waiting for confirmation and inspections to show that the first several miles have been repaired so I ask that the RTC I ask again the RTC produce documents that show that that work has been done. Thank you. Thank you Mr Scott. We're in oral communications and so if you are here and would like to speak this is to the last call please raise your hand. And this will be our final item for today so get your hands up and I'll call on David loves rail and trail next. Hello can you hear me. Yes. Good morning. Interesting times as usual. I saw the interview this morning with executive director Preston which was on lookout, which was very good very appreciated. And the last comment about buses a guy mentioned that something like some people say that they prefer train to bus. And I just want to mention I think there's a huge and necessary opportunity in our county to normalize bus use I live on the west side and I've been using the new route 18 quite a lot it's super convenient it runs every half hour. And I think there's a lot of opportunity to really promote bus use among people who maybe aren't even really that aware that we have a bus system. Thanks. That's all. Thank you. Hey, our next speaker is Ryan Ryan Sarnataro. Yes, I think I would like to make the comment that it is important to always show the full cost as as Barry Scott mentioned. And I think the important analysis in terms of removing the tracks or not removing the tracks is the total budget over time for giving Santa Cruz a rail network. And if the current estimate is $1.3 million for the, excuse me $1.3 billion for the for operating the system over 30 years and installing it. And we have a situation where you're either going to spend $70 million or $140 million on $70 million on removing the tracks $140 million on rail and rails in place and trail. What you're really saying there is that you're you're spending an extra $70 million now to retain the rails. If you were to look at the entire budget for putting in the putting in the system, you could see that. That $1.3 billion might have to go up another $200 million, but you'd be saving $70 million now. So you're really talking about a 10% difference in the cost of the total system over 30 years. And the question then is, will that extra 10% of budget be the reason why Santa Cruz is unable to afford a rail system. And I think that's an important way to look at what measure D is actually about. Thank you. Other hand, move on to our, our next, which is just an announcement of our next meetings. The next RTC meeting is scheduled for Thursday, August 4 2002 at or 22 at 9am. And are we will hold a transportation policy workshop on the sorry my screen just froze. I believe that's the 17th of June Thursday at 9am via zoom. So until then, stay safe and healthy and take good care. Likewise, everybody. Did you have a question. I was wondering if we were going to have all communication from the commissioners. We did not have that on today's agenda but if you'd like to make a comment now before we close. Thank you very much for that opportunity. You know it is close to election season. And we see all kinds of all kinds of deception going on out there. But we did see something concrete as well and that was the recent letter from progressive rail, saying they had no intent of giving up the, the, the use of the rail no abandonment. They were in fact waiting on the RTC to complete its obligation to repair the rails. And so I hope that that letter was received and the commissioners did see it. You know it's they're just waiting on the repair and that it is our obligation to provide rail service and is our obligation to repair that rail so that service can take place. And we're also kind of hearing a mixed message that, and it's a mixed message about money that we do have a lot of money in the RTC, but not enough to support the rail usage and so I think, you know, there needs to be some additional information and know that with the art with the progressive rail, the St. Paul and Pacific Rail incorporated their letter. I think that that should clear up some misunderstandings throughout the public and hopefully with the commissioners as well. Thank you very much. I think we're going to hear first Commissioner Rockin, could we have kind of we're straight I just want to say we're straying from the agenda now so I understand I recognize you know we do world. So, really quick, I just want to ask I pressed and respond to the last comment we responded to it last month but I this issue about whether we have or have not repaired the rail in the first seven miles to the as we're required to do. We have required progress around that we completed those repairs back in August of last year and we recently sent a letter to progress a rail indicating that they have not been maintaining that section of the rail line and the response from progress around with was with respect to that letter. So, we're going to meet our contractual requirements for phase one of the ACL agreement and we continue to work towards trying to meet our requirements for phase two. Thank you. Well, we certainly like to see some evidence for that. All right. We are going to adjourn the meeting and this is a conversation that will carry on. Moving forward for meetings. Thank you all we're adjourned. Thanks, Sammy. Thanks for your chairing. Thank you. Take care. Bye bye.